Chapter Six

Here’s the ultimate answer to temptation—meditate on the Gospel. 

Do as Spurgeon suggested and “Abide hard by the cross and search out the mystery of his wounds.” 

We must live our lives in the shadow of the cross and remember that “we do not have a High Priest who is unable to sympathize and understand our weaknesses and temptations, but One who has been tempted [knowing exactly how it feels to be human] in every respect as we are, yet without [committing any] sin.” Hebrews 4:15

Jesus knows what temptation feels like; he knows what it’s like to feel the desire to do things that are not God’s will; he knows the suffering of temptation and so can authentically and compassionately help us when we are tempted. 

The crucifixion of our fleshly desires is intrinsically and theologically connected to the crucifixion of Christ—we cannot crucify ourselves apart from the empowerment and inspiration that only comes from the crucifixion of Christ. 

Paul says in Galatians 2:20, “I am crucified with Christ,” and this is a profound and essential truth for Christians. 

We are “crucified WITH Christ.” 

Ask for the Holy Spirit to captivate your heart so that your primary goal in life is “to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” 

Ask for the Spirit to make glorifying God the primary passion of your life so that we can say with Paul, “I have been crucified with Christ [that is, in Him I have shared His crucifixion]; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body I live by faith [by adhering to, relying on, and completely trusting] in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me” or put another way, “whatever life I have left in this failing body I live by the faithfulness of God’s Son, the One who loves me and gave His body on the cross for me.”

If we do these things, then transformation will happen…gradually. 

If we do these things, then we will develop a sacred sexuality; a sexuality that brings us pleasure and God's glory; a sexuality that offers the world around us an alternative to the rampant and pervasive sexual confusion and frustration. 

If we truly meditate on the cross of Christ and allow the supernatural, unconditional, and transformational love demonstrated there to saturate and motivate our lives, then we will be set apart from who we once were and from those around us who don’t yet know this kind of love.

We will embrace a sacred sexuality. 

Experiencing a sacred sexuality is a byproduct of intimacy with Christ.

Embracing and expressing a sacred sexuality is a fruit of the Gospel. 

We become more vulnerable to temptation the further we drift from the cross. 

Here’s the assignment that contains the solution.

It must be more than believing in God.

It must be more than attending church.

It must be more than praying. 

We must meditate on the cross and study the crucifixion. 

Meditate on these transformational truths:

“He (Jesus) was despised and rejected—a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief. We turned our backs on him and looked the other way. 

He was despised, and we did not care.

Yet it was our weaknesses he carried; it was our sorrows that weighed him down. And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins!

But he was pierced for our rebellion.

He was crushed for our sins.
The punishment that brought us peace was upon him 

and by His wounds we are healed. 

All of us, like sheep, have strayed away.

We have left God’s paths to follow our own.
Yet the Lord laid on him the sins of us all.”

Isaiah 53:3-6

Slowly read Matthew 27:27-54 

Treasure every word.

Ask the Holy Spirit to captivate your imagination and place you in the crowd around the cross. 

Think about what really happened on the cross.

Our salvation is not found in the physical torture and agony of Christ on the cross but in what he accomplished in the eyes of God.

He took on our sins—my sins, your sins. 

2 Corinthians 5:21 says, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

Jesus took on our sin and then absorbed the judgment on our behalf. 

The justice of God demands satisfaction. 

The love of God and the justice of God collided on the cross of Christ. 

He got our sinfulness and, by grace and through faith,  we get his righteousness. 

Mediate on Jesus experiencing the agony and desolation and abandonment and hopelessness of Hell so that we don’t have to. 

“This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.”
1 John 4:9-10

“For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only begotten (unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts in, clings to, relies on) Him shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal (everlasting) life.”
John 3:16

Now make it personal, put your name in this verse.

“For God so greatly loved and dearly prized____that He gave up His only begotten Son.”

As we meditate on these transformational truths, we will be transformed.

We will become what we behold. 

Take your eyes off your struggle and put them on God.

Take your eyes off the temptation and put them on the solution. 

Refuse to be distracted by the shiny things of this world and force yourself to gaze upon Jesus Christ. 

Find a quiet place and worship to this song:

Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus

Now worship to this song and make it a declaration of faith and rededicate your life to Christ:

I Surrender All - Version 1

I Surrender All - Version 2

When we meditate upon how God proved His love for us, how God demonstrated His love for us, how God communicated the value we have in His eyes; when our hearts attach to the love of God that flows from the cross of Christ it opens the floodgates of heaven and we will experience soul satisfaction and an inexpressible, eternal joy that eclipses temporary, worldly pleasures. 

“You see, no matter what, in spite of everything, God would love his children with a Never-Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love. And though they would forget him, and run from Him, deep in their hearts God’s children would miss Him always, and long for Him —lost children yearning for their home.”
Jesus Storybook Bible

The End

Love and prayers,

John