Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to them that love him.  Wow, nonanonacontanonactapentalia, a word which has simplistic meaning yet in immediate review appears odd, lengthy, verbose and foreign.  Consistently we hear the opposite reaction when considering the word of God.  You might hear it is so complicated, so complex, hard to read or difficult to interpret, when in review the Word is rather straight forward and clear.  What then confounds?  What then stands in the hallways of knowledge delaying, obscuring, convoluting each passage?  Let’s take a moment and look at the simplicity of the previous  passage.

If you withstand temptation for the duration or a long time you will find personal increase in a Godly fashion: as when a man has passed through the crucible, he will receive a physical crown of life for having made it successfully through the test, and this is guaranteed and based on a promise from God to those who love him and endured that test.  Pretty simple, straight forward, no complexity, clouds, mysteries in Greek or otherwise.  Why then should I feel the desire to remain separated from such easy deciphered wisdom?  I don’t know why do you think you don’t want to spend time in the word?  Do you find yourself using the same excuses or is your most effective Time or the lack thereof.

Making time, marking time, maximizing time, managing time, some of the time, none of the time or only half of the time I ought to be watching the time.  Time itself is part of that test referred to in this passage of scripture, for endurance dictates that time is the measure of that effective completion.  Just as with money. time is a variable in the equation of life, you cannot escape it, buy it, reduce it, exchange it, justify it or ignore it.  Money is the same way.  Can you explain away the fact that you have no money yet you wish to purchase a home with nothing?  Try that one and you will find out what laughter and disdain look like.

Money is a necessary function of life again, part of the equation, yet these two factors are used more frequently to explain away lack of commitment to ministry than any two other concepts.  Why? Because we have to deal with them, no I believe it is much more simple.  These are the measures of a man’s life, the time and the  money you spent, because where your time and your money reside there your attention lay.  So, if you spend all your time and your money on things other than God, guess what the above passage will naturally indicate with regard to your endurance or temptation avoidance?

Great man you have hit me in my wallet and my watch, but what does this have to do with temptation?  Fair analysis, you’re right, but let us remember you were the one that said the above passage was too difficult to understand until we reviewed it together, right?  So, please don’t blame me for thinking I need to break things down to their basic components.  What are temptations?  I mean to you.  Do they involve drugs, sex, gluttony, entertainment, magic, theft, adultery or maybe following false gods?  Whichever one, tell me which one you could do with no money in your pocket or no time off work in order to do them?  Oh, you see, factors of the equation.  Where you spend your time and your money will indicate your resistance to temptation.  If you spend all your time in the Word and all your money is saved or put to issues as a good shepherd or steward of your household, then the temptations you face will the type that you may more readily resist.  Equations.  It is mathematics this Christianity, because I am willing to bet that the time you spend in the Word and the Money You Give to God are indirectly proportionate to the temptations you face and directly proportionate to the outcomes achieved for God.

So if you wish to have the crown of life “at time of judgment” for enduring temptation because or if you love God then concentrate on the factors of the equation and put your money and your time far away from the sirens of this world.  Act with your wallet and your watch, two tangible controls of the temptations you face.  But remember we can do none of this without God, this is not a doctrine of works trying to be good enough to get to heaven, because heaven may only be achieved through belief, belief in the gift of salvation and sanctification through Christ’s payment of our sin debt on the Cross.  Why endure, because he did for you.  In Jesus’ Name.