The Size of Seeds

Have you ever heard this verse?

" ... If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you."

It's from Matthew 17:20. If we have faith the size of a mustard seed (which is really, really tiny), our life can be transformed by God. God will use that bit of faith to make us holy. That bit of faith can bring us eternal life. That's the good news.

Here's the bad news: Temptation works the same way. It doesn't take much to take root in us.

This is how temptation works, according to me:

1. We get an idea, attraction, or desire that is contrary to what the Lord wants for our lives.

2. The idea might be fun and enticing, so we pay attention to the idea, thereby feeding it. Ideas flourish when we give them attention, just like flowers flourish when we give them water and sun.

3. The idea roots itself in our brain. It becomes part of our conscious and subconscious thoughts.

4. We act on the idea, thereby giving into temptation.

A sin is not committed when we act on the temptation ... the sin was already committed when we paid any attention to the idea to begin with! Acting on it just got ourselves into a big mess.

This goes for anything. Getting angry with someone and wishing for something bad to happen to that person. Developing a crush on a man or woman who is married. Desiring money/food/alcohol/sex/ as a solution to one's problems.

Each of these temptations starts out as an idea, small as a mustard seed. Our thoughts nourish it. Before long it controls us. It grows about as fast as the morning glories that take over my garden; maybe faster. It becomes way too big for us to fix by ourselves.

So what do we do? The solution is not 100% in books, on TV, in alcoholics anonymous, in conversations with friends, in Weight Watchers, or in anything else. These tactics are helpful but are not the whole solution.

The only thing I've ever found to kill off temptation is to ask God to remove it. Ironically, it's the easiest, cheapest, and most painless solution of all. But it requires us to give up not just that particular temptation but give our whole lives to God so he can fix us up and make us clean. God is like the ultimate weed killer but God needs our whole lawn to be effective, not just the one part of our garden that has weeds.

I guess this is why people say things like, "In God, you'll find freedom." That was always very paradoxical to me. In God, we're somewhat confined, right? We don't get to do everything we want to do (see paragraph that lists possible temptations, above). We're supposed to do what God wants us to do.

However, I've found that what God wants me to do is absolutely the best thing for me, and is usually pretty fun. On the contrary, the temptation that controls me ends up being really not fun and only God can pry us free from it.

This verse sums it up pretty well:

" ... the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God." Romans 8:21