Each of us face a continual problem – we sin.  We disobey God.  As an archer misses the bulls-eye, we miss what God intends for us.  There is a real Satan, who tempts, deceives, lies and devours.  He wants you and I to disobey and dishonor our Heavenly Father, and waste our lives.

James 1:14 says, “Each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire.” It is not temptation itself, but our heart’s desire for something that leads us to sin.  (James 4:1-2). You can’t be tempted to do something you don’t desire.  I can’t tempt you to eat a bowl of gravel. Why? Because you have no desire to eat gravel.  We can only be tempted by what we desire.

Temptation, then, is not something that happens TO us, it happens WITHIN us.  As James says, our own desires lure and entice us into sin.  The way to fight sin is not mainly by trying to resist temptation.  The most effective way to fight sin is by changing our desires.

Desire can only exist where something is lacking – a need, either perceived or real, seeking to be met (Genesis 3:6).  We desire food when our stomachs are empty. We desire warmth when our bodies are cold. Sinful desires, then must come from a sense that we lack something.  Temptation is the offer that sin makes to your desires to fill in the places that are empty.

But why do we choose sin? Unbelief is the root of every sin. (Romans 14:23).  We choose sin to fill the places in our lives that lack because we don’t believe God can really fill it himself.  On the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells us that since God cares for the sparrows and flowers, he will care for us all the more (Matthew 6:25-34). When we don’t rely on this truth about God’s provision, we sin through anxiety.  Sin says, “Please me, and do it NOW!”  If we want to fight a sin, we have to change a belief. At any moment.  Every moment.

We don’t fight anxiety by trying to stop being anxious. We fight anxiety by “seek[ing] first the kingdom of God and his righteousness,” knowing that everything else we need “will be added” to us (Matthew 6:33).

The more we put our faith in the truth of who God is for us in Christ, the more he fills in the places within us that are lacking. As he does this, the Holy Spirit creates new desires within our hearts. These new desires cut temptation’s legs out from under it and lead us away from sin and toward holiness.

~ Taken from an article by David Bowden, desiringgod.org