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PRAISE & PRAYER PROMPT ••• I have a rain lamp hanging in my office. If you haven’t seen one, they were very popular in the late 60s/early 70s and you can find them on e-Bay. I have my grandmother’s, much to my mother’s delight (because she didn’t want it) and my husband’s dismay (because he doesn’t like it either). My grandmother was thrilled that I wanted it since I’m the only one in the family who appreciates it. As a little girl, I begged her to turn it on for me so I could watch it “rain.” Then I’d get my hand slapped for sticking my fingers in it. The rain is actually mineral oil so I get it—it can get messy if you don’t leave it alone.
The only problem with my rain lamp is some of the ducts are clogged. It doesn’t rain evenly anymore. I’ve disassembled it as much as I can and tried to clear them, but alas… the lamp is almost 50 years old. I’m just happy it works.
I had the lamp on for a bit yesterday and as I’ve thought about it, we all have some less-than-perfect aspects of ourselves… those places in our lives where our Christianity/faith doesn’t flow as well as we’d like it to. It would be nice if we rained out Christian love evenly and perfectly to everyone we meet… if we were perfect models of God’s grace and forgiveness in every situation…
But we have a few clogs of our own to deal with: Our sinful natures.
Just because we believe in Jesus doesn’t mean we won’t have sinful issues. Whether it’s a battle we face against our own personal brand of temptation… or selfish desires of the flesh… our pride… or someone we don’t like just rubs us the wrong way… our faith won’t rain down perfectly and evenly all the time.
James summed it up in his direct way when he wrote, “But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death” (James 1:14-15 ESV).
Gulp. But that’s what I love about the book of James. He just puts it out there and pulls no punches. We get a little (a lot) of consolation from the book of Hebrews though. “For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted” (Hebrews 2:18 ESV). The “He” here is Jesus. Jesus proved that it is possible to resist temptation.
We won’t do it perfectly, because we’re human. But Galatians 5:16 ESV says, “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.” When we make the commitment to invite the Holy Spirit into our lives—every aspect of our lives—He will help us battle the sinful areas that clog up areas of our faith.
And as we let Him lead, we’ll find that our faith rains down more readily and easily everywhere we go.
Today, as you pray, thank Jesus for understanding the temptations we face. Thank Him for modeling how to handle them. Ask the Holy Spirit to lead you and help you resist your sinful nature and any temptations that the enemy throws in your path.
