This text provides incredible insight for how to remain alert and fight against any temptation. In addition to realizing that we cannot stand against temptation on our own from v.12, we need to trust in several critical truths from v.13. This passage is unrivaled in terms of its practical benefit to our daily walk before God:
1) We will never experience a unique, one-of-a-kind temptation in either type or severity. Rather, we experience temptations which are common to our fellow brothers and sisters. There’s no doubt that circumstances and areas of weakness may vary from person to person, but temptations do not vary. This means that we don’t get nuclear bombs dropped on us by Satan, while everyone gets little nerf darts shot at them. If we believe otherwise, we will try to convince ourselves we cannot defeat the temptation, since who are we to defeat it if no one else in the history of the world has ever had to face this kind of onslaught? Also, if it constantly feels like we’re getting bombs dropped on us, that’s a possible indication that our faith is weak, but as we respond humbly in renewed confession and dependence upon the Lord, our faith can be strengthened;
2) The presence of temptations in our lives does not call into question the faithfulness or goodness of God. God is faithful. The only reason defeating temptation is hard for us is because of our desire to sin. That difficulty has nothing to do with God. God has never promised us an earthly existence void of temptation, rather he has promised us new life in Christ with power over the temptation. This corresponds exactly with the third and final truth…
3) God will not allow a temptation to come into your life that is more powerful than the resources you have been given in Christ. This means when we sin, we allowed the temptation to overpower us and we didn’t believe in the power of the resurrection already given to us. Notice that the temptations aren’t eliminated, but rather Paul says that we can endure the temptation, not be exempted from it. Regardless of our sinful tendencies and weaknesses, we know this verse is true. The more renewed our mind is in the truth of Scripture, the more calibrated our conscience is to the mind of Christ and therefore the more easily our alarm system is tripped, informing us that we are close to sinning against the Lord.
It’s at that point we either grab a hold of God’s promises or we believe the lie that we are trapped with no way out; we’re too far down the road of temptation to turn back now; there is no doorway of escape provided by God, therefore we have no choice, but to give in. We must recognize the blatant unbelief in those thoughts in order to fight temptation as we should.