This week · Week 25 of 52
Temptation and Endurance
Tested faith learns to stand, and standing is how faith grows strong.
Built on James 1. James opens his letter by placing trials, temptation and endurance side by side, tracing temptation to its own source and promising a crown to the one who stands the test.
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Day 1
God Does Not Tempt
Loading James 1:13-14…
James corrects a excuse as old as Eden, the instinct to push temptation's origin onto God. He says plainly that God cannot be tempted by evil and tempts no one. Whatever else is true about the trials of verse 2, the pull toward sin has a different source entirely.
That source is named: each one is drawn away by his own lust, and enticed. The verbs are fishing and hunting words. Desire does not simply appear; it draws a person out from safety and then baits the trap. Naming this rightly is the first step to resisting it, because you cannot fight an enemy you keep mislocating.
- God tests faith; He does not entice toward evil.
- Temptation begins with your own desire, not God's will.
- Naming the source rightly is the beginning of resistance.
Father, I have sometimes blamed You for the pull I feel toward sin. Forgive that excuse. Show me my own desire honestly, and keep me from being drawn away by it today. Amen.