| The Golden Gate of Prayer |
Chapter 15 |
Page 5 |
Terrible is the power of temptation. What countless lives have been ruined by it! Yet it is possible to be so safely kept in the very midst of the world’s worst temptations that not a taint or trace of evil shall be left on the life. St. Paul has a wonderful verse about the Christian’s relation to temptation. “There hath no temptation taken you but such as man can bear: But God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation make also the way of escape, that ye may be able to endure it.” Every word here is full of meaning. We cannot escape temptation. But no temptation comes to any one but such as man can bear. It is not necessary, therefore, that any one should fall before the tempter. God is faithful and his eye is never off his child. He will not permit the strain to be greater than we can bear. When it is not possible for us longer to endure, he brings relief and makes the way to escape.
The whole gospel for temptation is in these words. We need never yield to any power of evil. Yet, as in all spiritual life, we have our part in our own keeping. It is ours to resist the evil. We are so made that no power in the universe can force the door of the castle in which we live. The door has no knob or latch outside. It can be opened only from within. Nor can all the power of the world’s evil force its way into the sanctuary in which we dwell. Thus we have only to refuse to yield, and temptation has no power to harm us. It can only assault us from without, while we remain secure and unharmed within. It is no sin to be tempted — Jesus was tempted; sin begins only when we open the door and let the tempter in, when we yield to the sinful solicitation and do the evil thing.
The only absolute safety in this world of evil is to have Christ in us. We cannot keep the door of our own life. There are traitors within, who, at some moment of peril, will admit the enemy. We cannot keep ourself. Thousands of times men have thought themselves safe and have boasted of their security. But in their very confidence lay their danger, because it was self-confidence. But if Christ be in us, he will keep the door and no enemy can deceive him or triumph over him.
“When the world seems full of evil,
Lurking near on every hand;
When I find my strength too feeble
Its temptations to withstand,
Then thy strength becomes sufficient,
As to thee my weak faith clings,
And I’m kept in perfect safety
“Neath the shadow of thy wings.”
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