Have you ever tried to stop sinning or overcome an addiction? When trying harder does not seem to work, you might be tempted to give up, even on the faith. But before you do that, consider whether the problem is in your understanding of temptation and how it works rather than your inability to resist it. Change your understanding of temptation to a biblical model rather than a humanistic one, and then you will find that deliverance from temptation is through God’s power rather than your own.

Behaviorism

A common faulty understanding of temptation comes from behaviorism, the dominant school of thought in psychology until about the 1950’s. Behaviorists believe in a stimulus-response model that de-emphasizes personal choice. You neither have a choice of whether to be tempted, nor do you have a choice in your response to temptation.

Therefore, temptation always leads to sin—a form of slavery. Unfortunately, this is the lived reality of those who have been abusively programmed to respond to a triggered stimulus against their choice.

If this describes your condition, then take heart that behaviorism is neither biblical, nor even the final word in psychology. Jesus can deliver you from temptation and sin, breaking the link between the two so that you do not have to continue to sin in response to a trigger, even if you had an abusive past. God is stronger than your triggers.

Cognitivism

A more popular model of temptation these days, including among Christians, is cognitivism. Cognitivists believe that thinking precedes behavior, and therefore you have a choice whether to sin or not. If your therapist is using cognitive behavioral therapy, or your pastor is preaching that “the battleground is in the mind”, then they have adopted a cognitive model of temptation.

On the face of it, a cognitive model of temptation seems to align with Scripture and experience. Temptation is unavoidable (Matt 18:7),

⁷“Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes!

but you can resist giving into it like Jesus did (Luke 4:1–13

¹And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness ²for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing during those days. And when they were ended, he was hungry. ³The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.” ⁴And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone.’” ⁵And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, ⁶and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. ⁷If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” ⁸And Jesus answered him, “It is written, “‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.’” ⁹And he took him to Jerusalem and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, ¹⁰for it is written, “‘He will command his angels concerning you, to guard you,’ ¹¹and “‘On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’” ¹²And Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’” ¹³And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time.

; Heb 2:18

¹⁸For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

; Heb 4:15)

¹⁵For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

by “taking every thought captive” (2 Cor 10:5)

⁵We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ

through the “renewal of your mind” (Rom 12:2).

²Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

To cognitivists, resisting temptation is a matter of changing your thinking. This brings up a theological and practical problem: the responsibility of resisting temptation falls on you.

Cognitivism then, is a form of salvation by works.

For those who come from an abusive background, they cannot control their triggered responses, and thus a cognitive model of treatment leads to condemnation when they cannot change their thinking or the triggers fire anyway. Furthermore, the Bible surprisingly does not command us to resist temptation! We are to resist the devil (Jas 4:7)

⁷Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

and flee from temptation (1 Cor 10:13),

¹³No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.

but nowhere in the Bible does it say, “resist temptation”, and therein lies the clue as to why cognitivism is the wrong model of temptation.

Statements like, “temptation is not a sin” sound right and are frequently preached upon, but they are theological statements rather than biblical ones. You can make a theological case that temptation is not a sin because Jesus was tempted but was without sin (Heb 4:15),

¹⁵For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

but nowhere in the Bible does it say, “temptation is not sin”. You have to make a logical inference from Scripture to come to that conclusion, but that inference can be misleading or incomplete, as we will show later in this article.

Biblical Model of Temptation

To do that, let’s compare the biblical model of temptation to behaviorism and cognitivism based on Jas 1:14–15.

¹⁴But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. ¹⁵Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

The Bible says your evil desire leads you to temptation (vs 14), and then eventually to sin (vs 15). Sin inevitably brings forth death (vs 15).

Note that this pipeline model of temptation starts with desire, what the Bible calls the “sin nature” or “flesh” (Rom 8:5),

⁵For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.

and ends with death. The main problem of addiction is not temptation but the evil desire in you. This evil desire is something you are born with (Ps 51:5

⁵Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.

; Rom 5:12),

¹²Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned

so the biblical model of temptation is actually closer to behaviorism than cognitivism in that it is impossible for you to not sin, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23).

²³for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God

The Bible teaches extensively on sin and its consequences, whereas the humanistic behaviorist and cognitive models of temptation do not. They completely miss the root problem of the human condition and therefore only deal with the symptoms, not the root causes of temptation. Temptation is the result of the evil desire within you, not the other way around; therefore, the main battleground is not in your mind, but earlier than that, in your sinful nature, your flesh (Rom 7:5).

⁵For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.

The biblical solution is not to resist your sin nature and its resulting temptation through your own efforts, but rather, crucify them (Gal 2:20

²⁰I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

; Gal 5:24)

²⁴And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

so that they do not cause you to sin.

Theologians call this insight “salvation by grace” in that you are saved from your sins not through your own efforts, but through the finished work of Jesus Christ. The good news, called the “gospel”, is that Jesus saves you from your sins by killing the desire to sin within you and replacing it with His righteousness (2 Cor 5:21).

²¹For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

It’s not something you can do, but rather something that Christ has already done. All you have to do to enjoy salvation from addiction, desire, temptation, and sin is to receive the free gift of salvation in Jesus.

But What About the Human Responsibility for Holiness?

The Desire → Sin pipeline is correct but incomplete because the Bible has more to say about temptation than just Jas 1:14–15.

¹⁴But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. ¹⁵Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

We will flesh out our model of temptation by raising three shortcomings with the simplified Desire → Sin pipeline, and then present a fuller biblical model of temptation to account for its missing pieces. The first shortcoming with the simplified Desire → Sin pipeline is that it omits human responsibility for holiness, contrary to many Bible passages that place the responsibility of personal holiness on you rather than God (Rom 12:1

¹I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.

; 2 Cor 7:1

¹Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God.

; Heb 12:14).

¹⁴Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.

The second problem is that it implies that temptation is sinful because it is the fruit of evil desire, yet that cannot be right because Jesus was tempted and was without sin (Heb 4:15).

¹⁵For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

The third problem is a pastoral one in that the Jas 1:14–15

¹⁴But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. ¹⁵Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

pipeline does not account for the very common experience of Christians who sincerely believe in Jesus, yet still struggle with evil desires when the gospel promised full deliverance for them.

We answer these problems by noting that the Bible distinguishes between two sources of temptation: the internal temptation of the Desire → Sin pipeline versus the external temptation of evil sources outside of you (Jas 4:7

⁷Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

; 1 Cor 10:13).

¹³No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.

Jesus pronounces a woe on all those who tempt (Matt 18:7);

⁷“Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes!

therefore, all tempters are sinners. That means you are the sinner when you tempt yourself, while others are the sinners when they tempt you. If those tempters are demons, the Bible says you are to resist them (Jas 4:7),

⁷Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

and if they are other people, you are to escape them (1 Cor 10:13

¹³No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.

; Gen 39:12)

¹²she caught him by his garment, saying, “Lie with me.” But he left his garment in her hand and fled and got out of the house.

by the grace God gives to save you to do good works instead (Eph 2:8–10).

⁸For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, ⁹not a result of works, so that no one may boast. ¹⁰For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

However, if you fall to that external temptation, then it will incite desire in you, which produces internal temptation, then sin, and then death as per the Desire → Sin pipeline.

On the other hand, if you are the one tempting yourself, then it is already too late—you have already sinned. Jesus said that if you look at a woman with lust, you have already committed adultery even if you do not act on it (Matt 5:28).

²⁸But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

On the other hand, if that same woman tempts you to commit adultery, you are guilty only if you act on it (Gen 39:11–12).

¹¹But one day, when he went into the house to do his work and none of the men of the house was there in the house, ¹²she caught him by his garment, saying, “Lie with me.” But he left his garment in her hand and fled and got out of the house.

Therefore, temptation is always a sin, but the sinner is one who is doing the tempting, not the one who is being tempted.

Temptation is sin for you only if you are tempting yourself; however, that sin is unavoidable because you are born with it (Ps 51:5),

⁵Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.

regardless if you act upon it (Matt 5:22

²²But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire.

; Matt 5:28).

²⁸But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

But if you do, then not only have you been born into sin, but you also have committed sin. That sin produces all kinds of evil desires in you (Rom 7:8),

⁸But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead.

creating a vicious cycle which leads to more and more temptation and sin, and eventually death.

Answering the Three Problems

We can now answer the three problems raised by a model of temptation based solely on Jas 1:14–15

¹⁴But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. ¹⁵Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

which focuses on the internal life of the person. It denies that you can avoid sinning as a result of internal temptation because it’s already too late—your desire to sin is already sin.

Problem 1: Your Responsibility for Holiness

External temptation however can and should be resisted, but you are susceptible to falling for it because of the evil desire already within you. You are responsible for living a holy life (2 Tim 1:9)

⁹who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began

by resisting external temptation, but you cannot do that unless the evil desire is first killed in you (Rom 6:6–7).

⁶We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. ⁷For one who has died has been set free from sin.

Problem 2: Jesus’ Temptation Cannot Be Sin

Everyone is born with this sinful nature (Rom 5:12),

¹²Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned

and that’s why everyone sins (Rom 3:23).

²³for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God

The only exception is Jesus. Without a sin nature, He never had to face the internal temptation of Jas 1:14–15,

¹⁴But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. ¹⁵Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

nor did He ever sin by tempting Himself. However, He successfully resisted external temptation because there was no evil desire to incite in Him. The sin of temptation belonged to the tempters, not to Jesus. That’s how Jesus could be tempted, yet be without sin (Heb 4:15)

¹⁵For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

while we cannot, because temptation has no hold on a person without a sin nature.

Problem 3: Christians Still Struggle with Evil Desires

This insight gives us the hope and the answer of how you can stop sinning: kill the sin nature in you. Without desire, you will not want to tempt yourself to sin, and other people’s temptation will not work on you as there is no evil desire to incite.

Taking out the root of the Desire → Sin pipeline means the entire pipeline falls apart, and then you will no longer be a slave to sin or addiction. However, and this is key, killing desire is not something you can do, whether you practice a works-based religion such as Buddhism (Col 2:20),

²⁰If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations

asceticism (Col 2:23),

²³These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.

or even the spiritual disciplines such as Bible study and fasting. This is because desire is caused by sin (Rom 7:8),

⁸But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead.

and only the blood of Jesus can remove sin (Heb 9:12–14).

¹²he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption. ¹³For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, ¹⁴how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

Therefore, to kill desire, God must first clean you of sin, the producer of desire (Rom 7:8).

⁸But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead.

Then you will no longer be internally tempted, meaning that you would be free of your addictions and finally be free to stop sinning. This is not something you do through willpower, but rather through accepting the gift of salvation from God. “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Eph 2:8–9).

⁸For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, ⁹not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

How Does God Remove Sin?

To answer this question, we note that the Desire → Sin pipeline has more than a passing similarity to the vicious cycle of sin:

This is because the evil desire in you is a type of spiritual injury that happened in the past. It tempts you to sin, which is a type of spiritual attack in the present. So the Desire → Sin pipeline is really just an example of the vicious cycle of sin; what is true for sin in general is true for the specific case of temptation: all sin leads to slavery and death through the red and blue feedback loops.

The solution then for dismantling the Desire → Sin pipeline is the same as breaking the vicious cycle of sin: apply one of the healing methods based on the gospel of Jesus Christ to comprehensively heal you of everything and set you free.

Take-aways

Further Reading

While this article builds the case for comprehensive healing to overcome addiction, How Can I See God explains how sin separates you from God-the-healer, and the Healing Methods Overview explains the overall theory of how to find God and your healing. How I Cured Myself of Porn is a case study of those concepts in action—how to self-diagnose the root causes of addiction and heal them. More difficult cases of addiction such as Hurting Too Much to Hear God will require third-party help. Who Is Involved in Healing explains the roles and responsibilities of people involved in the healing process, and what to expect from them when asking for help.