March 17

“We can choose to be kept from yielding to any temptation which plagues us.  But, if we choose to yield to the temptation, one thing inevitably results--we become rebellious!.....I see now I have no more alibis left.  He has already led my ‘captivity captive.’  I need not yield to the temptation.”  Eugenia Price, S.P.S., 3/17

Eugenia said she would yield to temptation because she feared she’d be smothered if she did not give in to it.  I’ve never given much thought to why I give into temptations when they come.  Sometimes it happens so quickly I’m not at all aware of my thought process.  But there must be some thoughts going on that I’m not aware of that allows me to say yes when I know I should say no.  I’ve never been happy with my decision to say yes to temptation afterwards, which would in turn lead me further into temptations to rebel as I tried to dig myself out of my pit.  Now that I understand I’m a new creature and that it’s Christ’s life in me that I am now living, I’m getting better at understanding the power of sin.  The only way I can now sin is to obey my flesh.  Recently I was on the phone with someone I love.  I was confronting this person with something they did not want to hear and they retaliated.  Tears came to my eyes, but I noticed my voice did not change.  It remained steady and sure of what it was saying to this person that they needed to hear.  I realized at that point their remark had punctured my flesh, but not my heart.  It was God’s voice speaking through me, and God cannot be injured.  My flesh wound did not deter me from continuing to speak the Truth in Love. 

“So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.”  John 8:36