How To K.O. Temptation!
I Corinthians 10:13
I. Introduction
a. Rocky video
i. There Rocky stood… toe-to-toe with this huge mammoth of a man… the Russian, Ivan Koloff (or something like that).
ii. And the threat comes towering down… “I must break you!”
iii. I don’t know about you… but that would be pretty dang intimidating… it would seem like a hopeless task!
b. Today I want to talk to you guys about another pretty intimidating thing… and that is temptation.
c. Our pastor has been doing a series on the invisible world and recently he has talked about Satan.
d. So I thought it would be appropriate for me to piggy back that message by talking about Satan’s greatest weapon… the weapon of temptation!
e. No one in this room today is a stranger to what I am talking about. Temptation has been around since the garden of Eden and it is abundant in the world we live in today.
f. Temptation starts from the very beginning of our lives.
i. That is why we child proof our houses.
ii. If I have glass full of drink on our coffee table… I can tell you this… that is a temptation for Wyatt.
iii. I could tell him no a million times (and he knows what NO means), but if it is there… it is a temptation he cannot resist!
g. But as believers in Christ, our desire is to worship God through our lives… and a part of that worship is overcoming temptation, and not falling into sin. You see, it is not a sin to be tempted.
i. The Scriptures say, Jesus was tempted in every way but did not sin.
h. None of us are perfect… but we can improve… and that’s what I want to talk to you guys about today… How can we K.O. (that’s Knock Out) temptation?!!!
i. But before I get into the passage today, just let me say this… you are not looking at a world champ when it comes to this.
i. This message is birthed from the soils of failure… this message comes from one who has been on his face many times b/c temptation has tripped me up!
ii. So, just know this, this morning… we are in this fight together.
j. We are going to look at a very well known verse today and it is in this verse that we will camp for the most part.
k. Read I Corinthians 10:13
l. We know that temptation is big, ugly, and intimidating for the disciple who is truly trying to worship God in obedience… so how do we K.O. temptation? How do we win this constant battle in our lives?
II. We Must Connect with Others! (I Corinthians 10:13a)
a. Connect with lessons from the past!
i. “No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man…”
ii. I don’t care what you are struggling with… it doesn’t matter what face your temptation wears… someone has struggled with it too!
iii. In the beginning of this chapter Paul talks about the failures of the fathers of Israel, but then he says in verse 6, “now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things as they also craved.”
iv. We need to look in the past and learn from the failure of others.
v. The Bible doesn’t sugar coat it… it is blatantly truthful when the forefathers of Israel messed up. Why? So we could learn from their mistakes.
1. Here’s an example… if you read about the conquest of the promised land, you will see one huge mistake they made was they intermarried with the people of that land.
2. The result was that they eventually were enticed by their now wives to worship the idols of that culture.
3. How can we learn from that mistake today?
4. I am constantly telling the youth… and I will in the next few weeks… that dating a non-believer is NOT a good idea, for the same reason God didn’t want the Israelites to intermarry with the Canaanites.
vi. Hey, saw some of the mistakes that my older brothers made and the beatings that ensued… I didn’t make those mistakes.
vii. Not only should we learn from the failures of others in the past… we should also learn from the successes of those who went toe-to-toe with temptation and won.
viii. Joseph was tempted by Potiphar’s wife in Genesis to have an affair with her… but he didn’t… we knocked out temptation.
ix. Jesus… went toe-to-toe with temptation and the weaver of temptation himself (Satan) in the wilderness, and yet He won (I’ll talk a bit more about how He did that in a moment).
x. Let’s connect with and learn from the past.
b. Connect with others now!
i. Not only should we remember those in the past… but we need to connect with those now who, like us, are in the midst of this battle.
ii. One of Satan’s biggest tricks is to get us to think that we are alone in this battle… that there is no one out there who understands or can relate.
iii. Guys… hear this loud and clear this morning… we are NOT alone and God has given us the gift of each other to help us fight this battle!
iv. Last weekend, I took my AWESOME youth leaders away for a weekend to evaluate and plan our ministry.
1. One clear thing that came from our weekend was that our ministry is heavily dependant on our small group ministry.
2. Why? Because in those groups, there is life on life… there is transparency… and there is loving accountability.
v. I meet with two guys every week (Zack and Jeff) and from the beginning of our time together, we found the first part of I Corinthians 10:13 to be very true… we had struggles in common.
vi. And now we are doing all we can to help each other K.O. those temptations in our lives.
vii. In fact, we are using technology to do it… I asked them to text message me when they were struggling with temptation, so that I can pray for them and call them up and help them through it.
viii. That is true, biblical connection… and that is one way we can K.O. temptation in our lives.
III. We Must Claim God’s Promises! (10:13b)
a. Beware of the lie!
i. John 8:44 tells us that Satan is the “Father of lies!”
ii. And lies are the very foundation of temptation.
1. In the Garden of Eden, Satan, the Father of lies, tempted Eve with a bunch of ½ truths…
a. “You won’t die!” They didn’t die immediately (at least physically)
b. “Your eyes will be open and you’ll be like God!” Their eyes were certainly opened… but they were not like God at all… all they received was shame.
2. These were ½ truths…. But you know what a ½ truth is? It’s a LIE!!!
3. Example: My ½ truths when I got caught skipping school.
a. I fell and missed the bus… I did fall that day… but it was playing long after I had waved the big cheese good bye!
b. I didn’t want to come up b/c I thought you would be mad at me… that was mostly true, except the part where I made out like I really did want to go to school.
c. I did my homework so I wouldn’t fall behind… I did do the next lesson in my spelling book, but only because it was a part of my grand scheme to skip school w/o the consequences.
4. IT WAS A LIE!!!!
iii. And here in I Cor. 10:13, we see probably the biggest lie that Satan throws out at us when we struggle with a specific temptation in your life… “YOU CAN’T RESIST IT!”
iv. I don’t know about you guys… but I have heard and believed that lie many times.
v. But listen, God is clear in this verse that there is no truth in this verse for the believer in Christ… God WILL NOT ALLOW us to be tempted beyond what we can bear!
vi. And when we recognize that lie creeping into our thinking we must battle it with truth!!!
b. Battle with Truth!
i. I wouldn’t walk into battle w/o a weapon!
1. Show pic of squirrel with Bozoka!
ii. we should not walk into the battle of temptation without the weapon of Scripture!
iii. Remember that we are supposed to learn from the successes of others… Let’s learn from Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness.
1. Satan says, “You’re hungry… just turn these stones to bread.”
a. Jesus replies in Matthew 4:4, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.’”
2. Satan says, “Prove to me you’re the Son of God, jump off this building and let’s see if the Angels save you.”
a. Jesus replies, “On the other hand, it is written, ‘you shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
3. Satan says, “worship me, and I’ll give you all the kingdoms of the world.
a. Jesus replies, “Go Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord you God and serve Him only.’”
iv. My small group has memorized Psalm 119:9 – “How can a young man keep his way pure? By keeping it according to Your word.”
IV. We Must Climb Out the Escape Hatch! (10:13c)
a. Recognize the escape routes!
i. God gives us a promise… there will always be an escape!
ii. The thing is… we have listen for the alarms and find the escape.
iii. Are you looking for the warning signs?
1. Show pic of sign… “Eat Here and Get Gas!”
iv. Are we listening for the warning alarms… for the warning signs that we need to get out.
v. Story at WCU where fire alarm went off and I didn’t leave!
vi. Here’s the thing… there had been so many false alarms, or alarms that I didn’t need to respond to, that I didn’t get up.
1. Sometimes temptation works that way as well… we’ve been in situations and survived before… so we are not careful… we don’t take the escape route, and thus we get caught!
vii. There is always an avenue for us to escape temptation.
viii. Sometimes it is as simple as doing what you’re supposed to be doing anyway and keeping yourself busy with your work or your chores at home.
1. It could be a random phone call from a friend, that if you will just take the call you can survive.
ix. It may be preventative in nature by doing what I call radical amputation.
1. Explain
x. The thing is we have to be looking for those escape routes and have the sense of mind to take them and just…
b. Run!
i. Look at the very next verse in 1 Corinthians 10:14, “Therefore, my beloved, FLEE from idolatry!”
ii. Flee compromising situations!
1. Ex. My father-in-law is a huge Duke fan and when they are in a close game, he can get so worked up that it is sinful… so, Thursday night Duke was in a close game… a situation where he could get worked up…
2. How did he get out of that tempting situation? He went to bed.
iii. Run to God’s word… Run to an accountability partner… physically run from the situation!
iv. I remember a friend of mine in college was telling me the story of being in the elevator with a very attractive girl and he was engaged at the time… he was tempted, so as soon as the elevator door opened he ran… really… he ran for like ½ a mile!
1. I’m not saying that you have to be that extreme… but for him, that was what he needed to do to flee temptation and he did it… even if he did look a little silly.
V. Invitation
a. Where are you guys with this message today?!
b. I know I struggle sometimes to defeat the giant in front of me that is temptation.
c. But God wants us to have victory… he gave us freedom… not the freedom to sin without consequences, but the freedom to NOT sin… the freedom to look temptation in the eye and resist it!
d. What is the application today?
i. Maybe you need to connect with others on a very practical level. Pray this morning about an accountability partner… maybe you need to approach someone about being your accountability partner… someone who will pray for and with you… someone you can call in those moments of temptation and someone who will ask you tough questions.
ii. Maybe you have just been believing the lie that you can’t resist and today you need to just pray and rebuke that lie with truth. YOU CAN RESIST!!!
iii. Maybe you need to ask God today to help you to find and take the escape routes and K.O. temptation today.
