Desires

• You should not desire something that belongs to someone else (Exodus 20: 17)-"Do not covet your neighbor's house.  Do not covet your neighbor's wife, male or female servant, ox or donkey, or anything else your neighbor owns."-We should not want anything belonging to anyone else.  We should want what we have; what God has blessed us with, what we've worked for with our own hands.  Desiring other's things is greed-another form of idolatry.
• Desire to honor God (Psalm 86: 12)-With all my heart I will praise you, O Lord my God.  I will give glory to your name forever,-When we desire to honor God, we are showing true love to God for who he is; what he's done, and what he's given to us for our lives.  We give Him glory, for only He is worthy.  We know that since He is the creator, He is merciful, He is loving, and He is wonderful-He deserves the glory; because it is nothing we've done, but what He's done for us, and through us that gives us the victory we have.
• Do not desire self-promotion (Psalm 119: 36)-Give me an eagerness for your decrees; do not inflict me with love for money!-The reason the Christian family desires not to be self-promoting is because it's vanity.  We cannot promote ourselves in our walk of faith because we understand that it was not by our own efforts that we have been saved, but by God's mercy we have been saved through our Lord and Savior Jesus.  We cannot take credit for anything.  God created the world and everything in it, and after man fell, man needed to be saved.  He sent his only begotten Son to save us.  He chose to give us the truth.  He chose servants before his birth to prepare the way for His coming.  Everything was meticulously planned.  Since man is sinful in nature, we need to pray to God to ask Him for an eagerness for His decrees.  Otherwise, we would be inflicted with desiring material things.  If we do not desire an eagerness for God, we will be inflicted by God with the love for money.  If we only have love for money, we cannot have or express our true sincere love for God.  God should come first.
• Money doesn't satisfy desires (Ecclesiastes 5: 10)-Those who love money will never have enough.  How absurd to think that wealth brings true happiness!- Since man was created by God, for the purpose of serving Him, man's true joy is in just that!  In honoring, serving Him, in giving Him praise for all His wonders!  The true joy of man's heart is in being able to please God.  Once man has obtained that, only then can he really experience a truly satisfied life; one of fulfilled purpose.  The joy that comes to man's heart from living for Him, living by his decrees, knowing that they are truly saved, knowing that they are His heirs-it cannot be compared with anything else.  The joy that money offers man is only temporary.  The joy of living in fellowship and good standing with God is eternal.  It cannot be taken from you.  Nothing can separate you from the love of God.  Man can lose his money.  But, man cannot lose his inheritance from God.
• Christians should not give in to sinful desires (Ephesians 4: 22)-Throw off your old evil nature and your former way of life, which is rotten through and through, full of lust and deception.-When the bible tells us to throw off our old evil nature and former way, it's saying to repent.  It's saying that we should no longer act in an evil way, desire the wrong thing or everything, and we should no longer live in deception.  Doing whatever we please is living in deception.  We can do it if we choose, but, we will not be pleasing God if we do.  If we do not please God, we are not saved.  If we continue to sin, it is as if we never believed or accepted God anyway.  Since He loved us enough to come to earth and show us the way, we should love Him enough to live that way that He has shown, regardless of our fallen forefathers.  We should make every effort to live in a way that is pleasing before Him, even if we fail along the way.  We should get up, dust ourselves off, and keep walking the walk of faith, forgetting our evil past, and forsaking our sins.
• Sinful desires should not have a home with God's children (1 Peter 1: 14)-Obey God because you are His children.  Don't slip back into your old ways of doing evil; you didn't know any better then.-from the moment we accept the Lord as our Savior, we learn more and more each day about the kind of life that God wants us to live.  Therefore, it is expected of His children to forsake sinful desires.  If something is wrong, we should not desire it.  If we are struggling with sinful desires, we should be praying to God for strength to resist those temptations.  We should be doing everything possible to avoid it.  We should be fasting, and seeking counseling, prayer and advice from our Pastors, and Church Elders.
• Desire to do God's will (1 Peter 4: 2)-And you won't spend the rest of your life chasing after evil desires, but you will be anxious to do the will of God.-Since Christ suffered physical pain, we must arm ourselves with the same attitude He had, and be ready to suffer too.  If you are willing to suffer for Christ, you have decided to stop sinning.  You have had enough in the past of the evil things that godless people enjoy-their immorality and lust, their feasting and drunkenness and wild parties, and their terrible worship of idols.  Of course, your former friends are very surprised when you no longer join them in the wicked things they do, and they say evil things about you.  But just remember that they will have to face God, who will judge everyone both the living and the dead.
• God's children desire to obey God (1 John 2: 3-6)-And how can we be sure that we belong to him? By obeying his commandments.  If someone says, "I belong to God," but doesn't obey God's commandments, that person is a liar and does not live in the truth.  But those who obey God's word really do love him.  That is the way to know whether or not we live in him.  those who say they live in God should live their lives as Christ did.  We should love one another just as we love ourselves, just as Christ loves us.

I hope this study is helpful in understanding evil desires; and how to resist them.  Please consult your bible directly for clarity in any of the studies given in this blog, and refer to your Pastor, or Church Elders for additional advice or guidance.  May God be with you, protect and guide you-until the next study..