What then? Should we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that you, having once been slaves of sin, have become obedient from the heart to the form of teaching to which you were entrusted, and that you, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness. I am speaking in human terms because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to greater and greater iniquity, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness for sanctification.

When you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. So what advantage did you then get from the things of which you now are ashamed? The end of those things is death. But now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the advantage you get is sanctification. The end is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 6:15-23

We all have struggles with the good and bad inside us. Every follower of Jesus can identify with that struggle. We fight an ongoing battle with selfish and sinful desires. They rise up within us and put incredible pressure on us to satisfy them.

To resist we must believe what the Bible tells us about temptation's power. We must also believe that the Holy Spirit will help us resist or to break free from its power. But then comes the hard part. When an evil desire demands to be fed, we must say no - perhaps again and again and again.

It is easier to resist the first evil desire

than to satisfy all the ones that follow.

Our Daily Bread - September 18, 2004