The Christian life has its seasons. One of those seasons is a winter of severe trial and temptation. Even the most devout Christian sometimes suffers a dark night of the soul from a diabolical cause. Among his 41 letters on religious subjects, John Newton addresses this problem in this letter number 14. In such times, God and Satan are battling over us, and the Lord always prevails for His children’s good. My abridged paraphrase is below with paragraphs corresponding to the original.
“On Temptation”
Though you have more experience than I, you requested my thoughts on temptation, so I will write this letter mostly for others to read. I want to address two questions. Why does the Lord permit some to be tempted so grievously, and what are Satan’s main tricks against us, that we may guard against them?
I pass by Satan’s deceptions for ruining professing Christians. I would focus rather on his schemes to make true Christians miserable. These sore trials God allows for good reasons that promote our sanctification (Rom 8.28). First, God permits these to prevent greater evils, like our growing proud, careless, or worldly. Therefore, we can rejoice in them.
Second, God permits temptations greater than we can handle on our own in order to put on display His powerful grace. Sometimes these are secret trials and secret victories. Other times, many good consequences follow outside ourselves, as with Job. Defeated repeatedly, Satan, with the foolhardiness of Goliath, still challenges saints whose strength is in the Lord, and God allows this. Suppose someone perfected glass that looked fragile but had the strength of iron. They may wish to let others beat on it to prove its wonderful resiliency. Though believers are like clay pots, brittle in ourselves, yet the Lord makes His strength perfect in our weakness. In this way He glorifies Himself in us, and we are honored.
Third, by these severe trials we enter into fellowship with Christ who suffered. Since the world hated Him, it hates us, too. This painful fellowship with Christ is a precious gift of God’s grace to us (Phil 1.29). Remember, it is only temporary. He will soon crush Satan under our feet and we will reign with Christ in eternity.
Fourth, suffering enables us to sympathize more deeply with other sufferers. This happened to Christ. In His incarnation, He experienced human suffering firsthand and became our sympathetic High Priest. The wounded Christian becomes much more sensitive and caring toward others who are suffering. The broken-hearted become the best comforters of the distressed. When God uses you to help others this way, you will not think the price was too high.
Fifth, severe temptations tend to break down all our natural self-confidence and to convince us how precious Christ really is and how desperately we need Him. God has more reasons besides these I have mentioned, but I hope this much is enough to convince all of His wisdom.
Now I would offer advice for the tempted and tried. I will expose a few of Satan’s tricks so that we may be on guard against them.
1. The devil hides the Lord’s wise and gracious purposes in letting him rage against us. During the storm, we tend to forget these and doubt that any good could come of it. We should rather become like experienced soldiers who have survived many battles, confident that even when things are at their worst, the Lord is sustaining us.
2. The devil, while he torments us, provokes us to say things which only make the experience worse than it need be. Job handled his misery best at first, when he merely justified God’s ways with him. Afterward, Job’s protracted, bitter speeches only intensified his inner turmoil. When we have dreadful thoughts, it is better not to vent. That is fueling the fire.
3. The devil tries to demoralize us by causing us to mistake his temptations for our corruptions. Admittedly, there is a fine line. As a rule, strong, sudden urges to do horrible things that shock us are from the devil. These urges happen to us, so we must not blame ourselves. A clear conscience after the hellish storm proves our innocence.
4. The devil discourages us from resorting to prayer. Especially when tempted, we need to pray and we must pray, even though this might be the hardest time to pray. Prayerlessness only encourages the enemy. Remember how Gethsemane was a place of intense suffering and intense prayer. The worse it got, the harder Jesus prayed. If only we could imitate Him better! We sometimes slacken prayer in our distresses. Satan will try to make us quit praying altogether, or he will try to wear us out by a legalistic attitude about protracted prayer, as if we will be heard because of our many words that take a long time to say. When we fail to meet that unreasonable standard, we feel false guilt. Short, frequent, fervent prayer is better during times of great temptation. This we can do, God helping us, and He will. We should always remember Satan is a defeated foe, and that we are already victors in Christ. Signed, JN.
—————-
Before distress comes, we should imbibe these truths very well to keep us in good stead later. The wise soldier loads his gun prior to enemy fire. If you find yourself in the thick of it now, do the best you can to take these things to heart. Pastor Newton shows himself a discerning biblical counselor. Satan is a formidable foe, but the Lord is our sure and Almighty Ally. God knows what He is doing in your life, and you can trust Him implicitly. Ω