Temptation and the Providence of God

Have you every wondered why God allows us to be tempted? According to the Scripture , God has good purposes for allowing His children to struggle with temptation and sin. Let's look at five purposes that God has in allowing us to face temptation.

1. God allows us to face temptation and sin so that He can demonstrate His fatherly love for us, His children.

And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?

“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
nor be weary when reproved by him.
For the Lord disciplines the one he loves,
and chastises every son whom he receives.”

It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. (Hebrews 12:5-7, ESV)

2. God allows us to see the lingering corruption and deceitfulness of sin in our hearts so that we will be humbled before Him.

For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. (Romans 7:22-25, ESV)

3. God allows temptation and sin to teach us to depend on Him and the provisions that He has made for us through Christ.

So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:7-10, ESV)

4. God allows temptation and sin to make us more watchful and aware of future occasions of sin. In other words, God helps us to grow in His grace (i.e. sanctification), so that we are better prepared to walk in holiness.

Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. (James 1:2-4, ESV)

5. God uses temptation and sin to accomplish purposes that He has not revealed to us.

The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.(Deuteronomy 29:29, ESV)

Fig Leaves and Garments of Skin

In Genesis 3, directly after Adam and Eve eat of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, we read that "the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths" (v.7). No longer did Adam and Eve stand before one another naked and unashamed as they had earlier (Genesis 2:25). Now, they are ashamed and, they cover themselves with a few fig leaves and hide from the LORD God. But both of their attempts (i.e. covering themselves and hiding) ultimately fail. First, their attempt to hide failed, because He is the all-present, all-knowing LORD. He knew exactly where they were and He confronted them (and the serpent) with the consequences of their sin. Second, their covering was not adequate. Instead of fig leaves, the LORD God gives them a new covering of His own making: "And the LORD God made for Adam and and for his wife garments of skin and clothed them" (Genesis 3:21). It is in regard to this second point, that I want to make a few observations.

First, just as Adam and Eve's fig leaves were not a proper covering, sinful men and women cannot cover their nakedness and shame (i.e. sins) by means of good works (Romans 4:4).

Second, just as God provided a proper covering for Adam and Eve, it is God alone who can provide the proper covering for man. In the garden, an animal had to be slain--blood had to be spilt-- in order for Adam and Eve to have garments of skin. And God has done the same for us. He has spilt blood and covered us. But this time, it was not the blood of an animal that was spilt, but it was His own blood--his own life--that was given for us (John 3:16). And it was not with a garment of animal skin that He used to cover us, but it was with Himself--with His own rightousness--that He clothed us with.

Of course, what we have been discussing is the doctrine of imputation (foreshadowed in the book of Genesis) in which Christ was counted as having our sin (though He Himself was sinless) and we are counted as having God's righteousness (though we ourselves are not righteous.) "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Corinthians 5:21). Let us praise God for taking our sin upon Himself and counting us righteous in Christ. What a gracious and awesome God!