James 1:13–16 — where temptation really comes from

Through James, part 6 · James 1:13–16

"No one undergoing a trial should say, 'I am being tempted by God,' since God is not tempted by evil, and He Himself doesn't tempt anyone. But each person is tempted when he is drawn away and enticed by his own evil desire. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is fully grown, it gives birth to death. Don't be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters." (James 1:13–16)

Two kinds of trials

James uses the same word six times in this chapter, and it can mean either a trial that tests your faith or a temptation to sin. Up to now he's been talking about the first kind — the hard things that come from outside and grow you up. Now he draws a sharp line. God does test people, as far as their faith is concerned. But He never tempts anyone to do evil. When you're tempted to sin, that temptation is not from God.

How a test becomes a temptation

Here's the uncomfortable part: sometimes the trials God sends become the occasion for us to sin. We complain. We don't want to be under the thing God brought. We question His love and resist His will. Abraham went to Canaan at God's direction, found a famine there, and turned the test into a temptation — he ran to Egypt, and God had to bring him back. Israel in the wilderness did it over and over. When we stop trusting God to carry us through, we turn His testing of our faith into our temptation to sin.

Sin comes from inside

People have been shifting blame since the garden. James stops it cold: "each person is tempted when he is drawn away and enticed by his own evil desire." Sin doesn't come from your circumstances. It comes from within you.

Look at the words. Drawn away is hunting and fishing language — game lured out of its hiding place. Desire (older translations say lust) is craving, longing for what's forbidden; it sits right next to coveting. Enticed means to be caught by bait — to take the hook.

Then James switches pictures: desire conceives and gives birth to sin, and sin, when it's fully grown, gives birth to death. Compare that with verse 4. When you endure a trial, the finished product is maturity. When you stay in sin, the finished product is death. The "maturity" of sin is death.

Temptation is a good thing offered a bad way

Our desires themselves aren't the problem; the problem is desires out from under control. It's not wrong to want to pass a test, but it's wrong to cheat. It's not wrong to eat, but gluttony is sin. It's not wrong to sleep, but laziness is sin. Sex isn't bad; outside of marriage it's sin. The goal is to take these basic human desires and put them under the control of the Spirit instead of the flesh.

There's always bait on the hook

No fish bites an empty hook. The hunter sets a trap and the fisherman sets a hook, and both use bait — something attractive that hides the consequences. David didn't see the consequences when he looked at Bathsheba. Lot didn't see them when he chose the well-watered plains. Ananias and Sapphira didn't see them when they lied about the land. The bait blinds you to the hook.

Think about it from the deer's side. It's the rut. He smells a doe. He sees what look like other deer. He finds a spot with extra food that's always there. He hears bucks fighting and wants to go assert himself. He comes back to that spot every day — until the day he does exactly what he did every other day, and it costs him his life. The food wasn't natural, the does were plastic, the scent was manufactured.

Or the fish. He's hungry; the weather's turned and the bugs aren't out. Then a flash catches his eye and there's the juiciest crawdad he's ever seen. A little odd-looking, but he's starving, and like fish do, he hits it hard — and finds a hook set in his mouth and a line pulling him toward a boat. The bait was fake. The flash was there to get his attention. Your craving, your curiosity to do the thing you know you shouldn't, bites you back. That's how it works every time.

When we walk by faith — through the knowledge of the Bible and the power of the Spirit — we can see the hook under the bait.

"Death" for a believer

If you belong to Jesus, you're eternally saved. But James is writing to believers, and he still says sin brings death. Being out of fellowship with God is a Christian's form of living death. When we live in sin, death starts showing up: death to our relationship with God, to our marriage, to our parenting, to our holiness, our purity, our credibility, our trust. Sin never stays contained.

You are not a helpless victim

We're not powerless when we're drawn away and enticed. We can expel thoughts of sin and fill our minds with what's pure: "whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely... dwell on these things" (Philippians 4:8). Temptation becomes sin when, instead of expelling the thought, we encourage it, nourish it, and enjoy it. If you keep pondering a forbidden thing, you will eventually do it. Cut it off at the thought.

"Don't be deceived"

The word means to be led astray from the truth. James has just compared what it's like to stay under a trial (vv. 2–12) with what it's like to stay under sin (vv. 14–15), and his warning is: don't confuse the two. Don't accuse God of sending you the self-inflicted results of your own sin.

One more thing, because James ends on death and I don't want to leave it there. For a believer, sin fully grown means a dead-feeling marriage, a dead witness, a dead prayer life. For a person who has never trusted Jesus, it isn't a picture. It's the actual wage, and it's still on the books. But Jesus died the death your sin earned. He took the whole sentence, He was buried, and He is alive right now. Call on Him and that debt is not reduced. It's gone.

And for you who are saved: cut it off at the thought. Name the thing you keep pondering — you already know its name — and then go cut the access to it this week. Delete the app. Change the route home. Block the number. Tell one person. Do it today, before you talk yourself out of it, because you will talk yourself out of it by Thursday.

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Through James: ← Part 5 · Part 6 · Part 7 →