Sweet Temptations

Day 271 in my "Year In My Life Through Pictures" blog series

One thing you can count on during a diet is temptations. They come at you from every angle and are relentless. This temptation happens to be one of my favorites, coffee cake. Cinnamon, sugar, icing and all of the other yummy stuff that goes into making this are tops on my list. Only thing, all I can do is look at it right now. Who knows, I may never have anything like this again, or at least until I meet my goal weight. I know that cheating is not really an option for me, but if I happen to cave under the pressures of tempting morsels, it would be pizza, hands down.

Writing about the temptations of food when on a diet really reminded me of sin in a Christians life. We are bombarded with the temptations of sin every day of our lives. Our flesh still craves the "goodness" of sin, like I do the "goodness" of a sweet pastry. Why would we think ourselves not to go through temptations of this world? Our Savior was tempted, so we too will be tempted. Unlike Christ, though, we often times give in to the temptation and dive headfirst into sin and wallow around a bit.

I pray for the day when the temptations that plague me are gone and I walk with a new stride. I don't want to battle the temptations, I want them gone. Like God took away my desire to smoke cigarettes I want my desires to placate my flesh to be gone too. I realize that I need to move closer to God and as that happens my sinful urges and temptations will be better handled. Just like focusing on getting down to a healthier weight is motivation to not be tempted, since I know I can't eat sweets or pizza, the same goes for sin. As I see living without the option to sin it becomes the norm to resist the temptations of sin.

Temptations will never subside though. If anything they will increase as we get closer to God. What changes is our perception of those temptations. They can actually be used as a tool to draw us closer to God and to remind us that we need to go to Him as our Source to overcome these trials and temptations that arise. This side of Glory we will always have to fight and struggle, but one day soon we will finally have the sin purged from our bodies, once and for all. Then think of how awesome it will be to worship our Lord without the hindrance of this miserable flesh.