Temptation: fright, flight or fight?

230 ladies of all ages, ranging from a toddler in a pushchair to great grandmothers, and from many different parts of the UK, met at Guildford for the GBWA day conference to hear Lizzy Smallwood teach all about temptation!

We gathered from 10.00 am for coffee and began the first session singing 'Jesus is King'.

Session one: 'Our Enemies - the World, the Flesh and the Devil'

We can become so comfortable with our sinful nature that we don’t recognise it is sinful. We have a constant battle - not to please self but to please God. We need to recognise Satan’s game plan, always remembering he is a defeated foe. Hell is the place he is destined for - it is not his home now. He is blinding the minds of believers (2 Corinthians 4.4) and is actively working against us (Revelation 2.9-11).

Satan's four-point strategy is :
1. Identifying a desire (e.g telling Eve how good the forbidden fruit was)
2. Planting doubt into our minds (e.g. when the serpent questioned Eve, did God really say that?)
3. By deceiving (Genesis 3.1). He is the father of lies and a sinner from the start (1 John 3.8)
4. By encouraging us to disobey (James 1.14)

We can be tempted to misuse God’s Word (1 Timothy 6. 3-5) with 21st-century phrases. We can be tempted to disuse God’s Word and take on the advice of the world which actively encourages us to sin.

Temptation - is it a good thing? In itself it is not sin, we only sin when we give in. We always have a choice, and God will use our temptation to draw us closer to him.

After a short break we resumed our study.

Session Two: our response

How do we defeat temptation? - by remembering that there is always a way out (1 Corinthians 10.13). God gives us an escape - our job is to take it. - so resist the devil using God’s Word and prayer.

We must fill our minds with and absorb the Scriptures. God’s Word is pure power ( 2 Timothy 3.14-17, Hebrews 4.12-13).

We then considered the 'desert prototype' (Matthew 4.1-11). Satan knows the Bible, but he misapplied it. Jesus’s temptation is a complete reversal of what happened in the Garden of Eden.

We need to:
1. Accept the authority of God's Word and decide to make the Bible our first and final authority on every aspect of our life.
2. Assimilate the truth.
Read the Bible and just do it (James 1.21-22)!
Receive it - don’t nit pick. Research it. Remember it. Reflect upon it. What we read and watch affects our attitudes. We must recognise our weak spots - Satan knows them!
3. Apply the principles of God's Word (John 13.15-17).

After a delicious lunch, we did some singing and heard news from Sally Jones, now working in Kisumu, Kenya.

Our next projects were then introduced: 'Wheels For the World' - an organisation which restores wheelchairs and ships them out to Africa and Eastern Europe (see Projects). 'Lovewise', a recently founded charity which provides presentations from a Christian perspective for young people on the subjects of marriage and sex relationships.

Tea and cakes followed before our final session which involved us breaking up into small groups to discuss Ephesians 6.10-18 - Preparing for Battle.

We then prepared for the battle home having spent a truly good day together enjoying fellowship with old friends and new. Now we pray that we will all be better equipped to recognise our enemy Satan and to resist him and defeat him with God’s Word.

Some photos