Overview

1. The reason we still face trials and temptations
2. Your solution is found in the gospel of grace, not the law
3. The gospel’s answer to winning over temptation
4. Reckon yourself dead to sin and alive in Christ!

The reason we still face trials and temptations

Though as believers we are saved, but the world we live in is a fallen one. As such, we still face trials and temptations in our lives every day. It is important to know that though we may face difficult circumstances, be triggered to do things that we’re not proud of (for example, losing our cool while driving on the road or in the office, or responding in a curt manner to our loved ones, or look too long at some unsavory content online or on the TV), the Lord still loves us and is not behind these challenges.

Even Joseph, the most favored of his father Jacob’s many sons, was not spared of his share of trying times—having been betrayed by his brothers, tempted and wrongly accused by Potiphar’s wife, then thrown in prison and almost forgotten—despite being marked with a great destiny by the Lord from the very beginning (Gen. 37). But while we know negative situations are never initiated by the Lord, we must also acknowledge that He allows us to go through such trials because He loves us and desires to shape and build our character (Rom. 5:3–4).

When Queen Victoria was younger, she was spoiled and willful. However, the moment she ascended the throne, she chose to behave differently and took her role very seriously, saying, “How proud I felt to be Queen of such a nation,” and “I shall do my utmost to fulfill my duty towards my country.”

As new covenant believers, we also have the ability to choose to be better, to grow and transform from being playful and ignorant to being mature and responsible in our behavior. We have the choice of rising above our flaws, mistakes, and the temptations that assail us, and allowing the Lord to refine us each time we go through or encounter them. We are the Lord’s beloveds and our destinies in Him are too precious and great for Him to let us go on as we are.

Proverbs 3:11–12 tells us, “My son, do not despise the chastening of the LORD, nor detest His correction; for whom the LORD loves He corrects, just as a father the son in whom he delights.” When we open our eyes and hearts to recognize the Father’s love for us, we will begin to see things beyond the realm of flesh and have a better understanding of the purpose of each season, of what is happening in our lives, and of what the Lord is refining in our lives and our character.

Your solution is found in the gospel of grace, not in the law

So what do you do when you find ourselves in a temptation or frustrating situation? Have you ever tried suppressing your anger or erasing any lustful imaginations when they come into your mind? Were you successful? The truth is that any such attempt to control your feelings or thoughts by willpower often yields little to no success. When you try to do so in your own strength and self-effort, you are essentially imposing a law upon yourself which the Bible calls “the strength of sin” (1 Cor. 15:56), that then causes you to go into this cycle of doing what you don’t want to do again and again (Rom. 7:15).

In fact, God gave the law to the Israelites through Moses to show them that mankind is completely unable to keep the law through their own fleshly efforts and to reveal to them their need for a Savior.

The truth of the matter is that we have something our Lord Jesus does not have—sin in the flesh. While Jesus came fully as a man in the flesh (John 1:14), unlike us, there were no traces of sin in Him. He was not born in sin, and neither did He have sinful blood. Instead, He was pure, holy, and blameless; qualities that allowed for the divine exchange, that of a sinless sacrifice to take the place of sinful man, to happen at the cross and to deliver us from sin and the propensity to sin that remains in our flesh still.

We see this truth further revealed to us on the night of the first Passover when God instructed the children of Israel to mark their doorposts with the blood of the Passover lamb as protection from the angel of death. They were not spared because of their good works, nor their generous acts, but simply because of the blood of the lamb. Today, we have a way out of temptations not because of how faithful or how good we are, but because of Jesus, our Passover Lamb whose blood has redeemed us from the bondage of sin we were once in and brought us close to the Father (Eph. 2:13).

The gospel’s answer to winning over temptation

The answer in its simplest form to the age-old question of how to overcome temptation and the tendency to sin is this: Stop trying; in Christ, we have already died to sin!

In the Exodus account of the crossing of the Red Sea, we see special truths about how the Lord has already made a way for us to deal with sin in the flesh even in our present day. When the children of Israel were being fiercely pursued by their enemies, caught between the towering mountains behind them and the Red Sea in front of them, God made a miraculous way of escape by opening up the Red Sea. He used what would have drowned them to save them.

And then, God instructed Moses to stretch forth his hand and “the sea returned to its full depth,” covering the army of Pharaoh, till “Not so much as one of them remained” (Exod. 14: 26–28). The Bible records that after the Israelites had walked across the Red Sea on dry land, they were convinced that their enemies had been dealt with when they witnessed their dead bodies on the seashore (Exod. 14:30). This scene of that victory over the enemy that threatened and harassed the Israelites applies to us today, where the dead enemies represent the entire body of sin that has been dealt with, with none remaining. My friend, today not a single one of our sins—past, present, or future—remains. Not only that, but every sinful inclination we experience today has also been conquered by Jesus on the cross!

What is especially encouraging for us is the fact that God not only delivered the Israelites from their enemies at the Red Sea, but He also made sure that they were healthy and well provided for throughout their journey from Egypt into the promised land. Psalm 105:37 tells us that God “brought them out with silver and gold, and there was none feeble among His tribes.” This is also true for us today as our Lord Jesus, through His finished work on the cross, has bought for us both healing and provision (Isa. 53:5, 2 Cor. 8:9).

Reckon yourself dead to sin and alive in Christ!

While it is true that Christ has dealt with all our sins at the cross, it is also true that we still feel tempted, still fail, and still make mistakes. Sometimes, these feelings are so strong and the experiences so real, but it is important to remember that they are not more real than God’s truths. Beloved, it is time to stop living our lives based on the realm of feelings, or even experience, but to anchor ourselves to a higher source of truth—the Word of God. Let His Word, the unshakable truth, be the foundation of your life.

Romans 6:11 urges us to “reckon (y)ourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” The Greek word for “reckon” is logizomai, which means “count it as so.” What this tells us is that even amidst strong feelings of temptation or anger, envy, and bitterness, we can rise above them and count ourselves dead to that sin, as our old man, whose nature was sinful beyond repair, has already been crucified with Christ. The new man that we put on today now bears the “likeness of His resurrection” and is no longer a slave of sin. We are also told that this death that we died to sin, we died “once for all,” and that we who have died have been “freed from sin!”

These feelings are something that we need not even pray against because they are a defeated foe. Instead, we can boldly declare that in Christ, we have been freed from the power of sin and made the righteousness of God.

Now please understand that Pastor Prince is not suggesting that we now have the license to sin, or can go and live a lifestyle of sin. Pastor Prince is vehemently against sin and wants us to know that every sin is destructive. Sin comes with consequences that will cost us dearly, some of which must be paid for in this lifetime, for example some sins will result in a person having to go to prison.

However, Pastor Prince believes that the only way out of sin is not to try our best not to fall into temptation or to fail, but to behold what our Lord Jesus has already done for us at the cross, and reckon ourselves dead to sin, including the temptation to sin. When you feel tempted, go higher! Start declaring that you are already dead to the flesh, tell yourself “My old man has been crucified with Christ, I am dead to anger, I am dead to the flesh!” and “I AM the righteousness of God in Christ!”

The more we establish ourselves on God’s Word and His truth, and not our experiences or feelings, and align our hearts and minds with His perspective, the more we can reign over sin and temptation!

Nevertheless, there is one sin where the Bible tells us to actively flee from, and that is sexual temptation! Take a leaf from Joseph’s experience: when Potiphar’s wife attempted to seduce him, he turned on his heels and fled, leaving behind his cloak that she had been holding on to.

Beloved, the Lord is no stranger to what we are going through, the Bible tells us that He is able to sympathize with our weaknesses and was tempted “in all points” as we are, “yet without sin” (Heb. 4:15). And in His love and grace toward us, He has supplied us with the answer to deal with the sins and temptations we face.

Remember, the key to overcoming sin is not in your efforts, but in embracing the truth of your identity in Christ—that you have been crucified with Him and are a new creation, dead to sin and alive in Him, and today, you are as righteous as He is, at the Father’s right hand. As you do, be expectant to walk in greater security, stability, and confidence, and to reign in every area of your life!

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These sermon notes were taken by volunteers during the service. They are not a verbatim representation of the sermon.