Is Temptation a Sin? The Difference Between Temptation and Sin

Welcome to Level 6: I am transformed in my thinking so I see people as God sees them.

I want to start by telling you something honest. I'm not standing here as a guy who has this figured out, handing you the finished map. I consider myself still working on this, right alongside you. Level 5, Level 6: this is where I live too. So think of this less like a lecture and more like two guys walking the same road, and I've just found a few landmarks worth pointing out.

Level 6 is about how you see. Specifically, how you see women, not as temptations to dodge, not as objects to use, but as persons. Eternal souls. Image-bearers of God. That's where we're headed.

A lie that derails a lot of guys

You see a beautiful woman, or one immodestly dressed, and something in you responds to that beauty. Here's the lie the enemy tells you: you've already sinned. You're just the same guy you were before. Jesus hasn't done a thing for you.

Hogwash.

"But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart."

Read that carefully. It's not "whoever looks." It's not "whoever notices." It's with lustful intent. There's an intention in there: a direction, a choice. Noticing isn't the sin. Choosing is.

Three steps: Attention, Attraction, Acceptance

A pastor who made a great impact on me, Albert Barr, used to preach a sermon I've never forgotten: that there are three steps between temptation and sin:

• Attention is simply noticing. You saw her. Your eyes work. That's not sin.
• Attraction is your body and mind registering something as beautiful or appealing. That's not sin either. That's being human, wired by God to notice beauty in the world He made, and being male, wired to notice female beauty.
• Acceptance is different. That's the moment your will says yes. The moment you take that image and choose to dwell there, to feed it, to go back for more. That's where sin enters the picture.

The enemy doesn't want you to know the difference

He wants to catch you at step one and shout, "See? You noticed her. You're a pervert. You haven't changed a bit." Or he catches you at step two: "That was attractive, wasn't it? Some progress you've made." If you don't know the difference between Attention, Attraction, and Acceptance, you'll believe him. You'll feel the shame of a sin you never actually committed, and that shame will wear you down until you give up somewhere you didn't have to.

The enemy's job is to make the guilty feel guiltless, and the guiltless feel guilty. That's why the Bible calls him "the accuser." So call it what it is. It's an accusation, not a conviction. It's the enemy trying to talk you back into a cage Jesus already opened.

Martin Luther put it this way: you can't stop birds from flying over your head, but you don't have to let them build a nest in your hair.

The birds are going to fly. Thoughts are going to come. Temptation is going to show up whether you invited it or not. That's not the battle. The battle is what you do in the next ten seconds: whether you let it land, or let it pass.

"We take every thought captive to obey Christ."

A weapon, not just a concept

Here's a short phrase to say the instant that bird flies over:

"That thought is not mine. I take that captive, and I hand it to Jesus."

Say it out loud right now if you need to. Make it yours. Change the words if you need to, but keep the truth in it: a passing thought is not your identity, and it is not your defeat. Only your will decides that.

You are not the sum of everything that crosses your mind. You are what you choose to hold onto. And today, we're choosing to let it fly right on by.

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This is Day 43 of Victory Over Pornography, the start of Level 6. Continue to Day 44 →