Holiness and Temptation — Earle Maxwell

Just before we commence, and you've got the notes there, and we look at them and draw from them, I was, just a moment ago, thinking of that which was to be ours tonight, and drawing in all that which we've had so far.

And then in my mind I wondered what would be one of the earlier incidents that you might remember about the devil. And into my mind, quite quickly, flashed an incident that happened in 1952. I was a teenage bandsman at Rockdale.

Those of you who were in tune with that era would remember that bandmaster George Dickens had the band. And it was Sunday morning, and I was a little tired, and when I woke and I was playing with my grandmother, I could hear the rain coming down, and I said, thank you, Lord.

And I didn't get to the corps until 11 o 'clock on Sunday morning, and the bandmaster was waiting for me, and he called me over into a little corner, and he said, tell me, Earl, why weren't you at the open air?

And I said, what open air? He said, we had an open air meeting this morning and you weren't there, and if you're going to be an officer, my boy, you want to take hold of yourself at this point, because I want to give you a little word.

I want to tell you this, that if you're going to be an officer, always remember that the devil always comes out when it's wet. I thought, well, I couldn't argue against the bandmaster, and I put it in my mind, and I thought it'll come in handy in some later moment.

At the end of the training session, I was appointed to Broken Hill, and Cadet Vines was too young to remember this incident, but I soon found that at Broken Hill, in those days, and I would like you to take that comment with inverted commas, in those days, people had a tendency to stay away from the meetings for either of two excuses.

We won't call them reasons, there's a difference between a reason and an excuse. If it was raining or if it was a dust storm. And about the third Sunday that I was there, a little shower of rain came at open air time, and instead of four in the circle, we only had three.

And I thought, I wonder where Sister So-and-so is, and suddenly the Lord brought back to my memory, Dear Bandmaster Dickens. So that when we retired and went back to the hall for the eleven o 'clock meeting, this here Cornish comrade, and you've got to go to Broken Hill to understand the significance of that phrase, Cornish comrade.

She came leaping up the front stairs of the hall and into the meeting with the joy of the Lord, and I said, excuse me, Sister, before we start, I'd like to have a little word with you. And I said, you know, we had an open air meeting this morning.

She said, I beg your pardon, Lieutenant, what open air meeting? Well, I said, we had an open air meeting this morning, you were conspicuous by your absence, it was conspicuous by your absence. But let me give you a little word of advice, Sister.

Remember, the devil always comes out when it's wet. And she took one look at me, she said, is that so, Lieutenant? I said, of course it's so. Then she said, that's all the more reason why I should have stayed at home.

Now, isn't it amazing that just sitting here, this incident comes back after 24 years, I think it is. And there we are. Well, now, tonight we are going to give our mind and heart to a very, very important aspect of our own Christian experience, holiness and temptation.

Now, I wouldn't want you to think that by any means we could cover the whole range of this important topic in the time that's available. There will be some of you who would like a little more emphasis in some area, some would have welcomed more comment in another.

But please accept this as something that, as I said, I find that God refreshed me in my own experience in preparing it. And I pray that God might reach you with renewal and encouragement as we share it together.

You'll see on your notes, and there will be different, I'll digress here and there, and you might just be able to add a thing or two thoughts that even come to you as we share. But you'll see that here we've got a little text which says, My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers' temptation.

Joy in Temptation and Spiritual Triumph

I recall that the Chief Secretary, when we were in college, Colonel William Cooper, in our final spiritual day, referred to a letter that he'd just received from an officer of 12 months. And the officer said, This year has been so testing, I've had such temptations.

And he used this phrase, I feel that I've been blistered by the hot breath of Satan. Long language. But we're understanding that here is someone who's gone through a difficult and trying experience. So as I said, on the surface it's hard to see the affiliation between these two words because of the experiences that are at variance in one sense.

But it is out of the hottest fire that the purest metal is born. And in meeting temptation in his name, we come to know the triumph of the soul. Now that's important, we come to know the triumph of the soul.

Paul could say, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loves us. And I believe that under the grace of God, this same conquering experience is ours when we are confronted with temptation.

I have a quote here by John Bunyan. Temptations, when we meet them at first, are as the lion that roared upon Samson. But if we overcome them, the next time we see them we shall find a nest of honey. Each help you to win.

Well now, before we get into further aspects of this topic, and I would like to give courtesy to those speakers who have preceded me, and I would apologise if in a sense I'm covering any ground that has already been covered.

But if that is so, please accept it as of the Lord and understand that repetition is said to bring conviction and it could be that we'll be stricken. Well now, let us look at temptation in relation to the sanctified life.

Temptation and the Sanctified Life

Temptation in relation to the sanctified life. Now, Cook gives us a little definition about holiness, and it's not down here in my notes, but it's this. Holiness is not the inability to see. Now, in Jesus, we see in human flesh the holiness of God.

And when we look at Jesus, who was sinless and divine, yet he was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin, it should come as no surprise to us to find that in this experience of holiness we are sometimes confronted with tremendous temptations.

In fact, it should not surprise us if temptations escalate once we experience the blessing of sanctification, because the devil marks us for destruction. He wants at all costs to separate us from God, and that's what temptation is all about.

So that in this experience of sanctification, we should not be surprised if temptation takes a new dimension in our spiritual horizon, and we find that we are buffeted and we are confronted as never before.

It is also true that the deeper our experience of Jesus Christ, the greater becomes our temptations. But that also includes more opportunities, and always keep that in mind. Well, now the second thought that I've asked that you might receive tonight that helps us just unwind in one or two areas, perhaps we're a little tight in our understanding of what holiness is about.

If it can help us to relax a little, then let's look at this second thought. Temptations meet us. Sometimes people get the idea that what they're going through is something that has never happened to anybody else except to them.

You might have felt that way. I've felt that way sometimes in a real trying and difficult moment. No one could have gone this way, and yet I've had to come back to the Word of God and find that as Jesus was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin.

I've also got a reference, and I don't think this is on the notes, of 1 Corinthians 10 .13 which says, There is no temptation taken you which is not common to me. Now, let me say this. The temptations may change with the passage of the years, but there is not an age as far as I can gather in which the power of temptation is not felt.

I have sometimes had fellowship with people who have experienced temptation in a more pronounced way in some peculiar aspect of their own life and service for God. Not many of you would remember my grandfather, Envoy Maxwell, who soldiered on at Rockdale Corps.

But I was always a little questioning in my own mind as to why sometimes when I'd go to the holiness meeting with my grandfather, and I would only be eleven or twelve perhaps, that it so often happened that when the altar call was given at the close of the meeting, he'd come in his eightieth year and kneel at the holiness table one Sunday a few weeks ago, and he'd come again.

And I dared to enquire, and he said, Earl, if you only knew the temptations that the devil is directing to me now. I've never experienced anything like it in my life, but God is bringing me through. Now, temptations meet us all.

But the glorious truth is, of course, as I've just mentioned, that God can bring us through. Now, there's a third thought here that I'd just ask for your attention. Temptation is not sin. And you say, well, that's fairly obvious.

Temptation Is Not Sin

My word in counselling Christian people, so often I've found that people, they stumble at this very point, and because something has come into their mind that is foreign to their own Christian experience and abhorrent, and they want to have nothing to do with it, suddenly they've felt convicted that they've sinned in that very thing coming into their mind.

You know, sometimes I've found myself, because of perhaps some incident or something I've seen or something I've heard, an incident of twenty-five or thirty years ago, something that a kid said at school that had a little bit of a twist about it, and it wasn't nice.

And yet, twenty-five or thirty years later, all of a sudden it can invade my mind at the instigation of the devil, and suddenly I find that it's torturing me in my mind with this evil thought. ...tempted in all points and yet was without sin.

Then the natural, or the truth to flow on from this is that we also can be tempted and yet not sin. You see, we need to learn to discern between tempted and sinning. Or we need to learn to discern between evil thoughts and thoughts about evil, if I can put it in that sort of phrase.

Because you see, when the evil one comes to you and he comes to me, and suddenly in our minds we find we are tortured with something that really we want nothing to do about, that, praise God, is the signal that it's a temptation that we want to defeat.

It's when that thought is retained in the mind and dwelt upon and considered as an alternative with other things, and it starts to assume bigger proportions, then the thought of the mind becomes a thought of the heart, and that's when the sin comes from the temptation.

Now, I just thought that if we might just spend those few moments on that, then it might just help us to unwind, if in any of those areas we've just been a little tense or tight and not so sure what to do.

Well, now, in my Bible here, and I know many of you in the college particularly have got your own way of writing things, but I'm indebted to Colonel Alistair Cairns when he was a divisional commander in Brisbane.

I got a look at his Bible one night, and I saw that he used this type of Bible, and he used a little marking pen, and he would write things in it, and I got the system going then, and it's a great system to write little seed thoughts in your word.

Satan as the Source of Temptation

But I notice in my Bible here, this is where I've taken this little verse. They may say the devil has never lived. They may say the devil has gone. But simple folk would like to know who carries the business on.

Now, the source of temptation, we're looking at this aspect of it. The source of temptation. The New Testament exposes the truth that although beaten at the cross, Satan still has power to influence men for evil.

And I like the way in which the Word of God spares nothing to expose for every person who turns to the Word of God a clear and vivid description of what the devil is. And sometimes it concerns me that so easily the devil and his work can be treated lightly, when in fact, as one writer says, he goes around like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.

But it says here the devil is the wicked one. Luke simply says that Jesus was tempted of the devil, a murderer in John's Gospel, an adversary, the prince of this world. John says a liar and a father of lies, that old serpent and a chooser of our brethren, the God of this world and the prince of the power of air.

Now, that's not all. Let's just give you a very quick little look at some of the descriptions that relate to Satan in the Bible. You see, when a man consents with Satan, this evil being enters a man and this is taken from the situation of Judas.

And then that man is in his power. And that reference, of course, is to Paul. And God gave to Paul the message that he might preach a message which would bring deliverance from those who were under the power of Satan.

The Subtlety and Timing of Satan's Attacks

Well, now let's just go to the next thought, which is the subtlety of Satan, the subtlety of Satan. He is a master at designing temptations to synchronise with personal aspects of our temperament, our location or our weaknesses.

You see, the devil traps us by seizing on what perhaps seems to be an isolated event. And he presents it in such a dominating way as eventually we can see and think of nothing else. I was only reading in Psalm 73 the other day, verse 3.

Psalm 73, verse 3. For I was envious at the foolish when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. You get a glimpse of how evil, the evil one had taken possession of the writer of the Psalms and had brought him to become a concentrated analyst of what was outside his domain.

And he became envious at the foolish when I saw the prosperity of the wicked, in verse 17. Until I went into the sanctuary of God, then I understood their end. You know, you've got to come right back to the truth.

And it's when you come back to the truth that the truth shall set you free. That's the beautiful experience. The truth shall set you free. Well now, I've just drawn from experience here one or two different situations which could help you.

Some of you tonight could look at this and say, well, I've been this way. If you haven't, may God help each of us to learn a little lesson that if we do go that way, we're better prepared for it in his name.

I do suggest sometimes that the devil chooses an isolated setting, an isolated setting. Years ago, when I read the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, the thought came to me, and possibly it came to me through someone else's writings, and I wouldn't want to claim anything else than that.

But in my thought, the question arose, where was Adam when the serpent came to Eve? Is it possible that he chose a moment when she was alone? Because he is a master at coming at us in isolated moments.

He is a master at it. You see, in verse 6, and he did it. Although in that verse it seems to suggest that there was a companionship which may in fact have been there all the time, but I just suggest the possibility.

But the interesting thing is that when you start to dialogue with the devil, you've got to be careful on what you say. And if you look at this incident in Genesis 3, that when the devil started to talk to her about what God had said would happen, Eve made some adjustments to what God had said.

And they're very, very small, but significant adjustments. For instance, in this verse here, God said to her in verse 3, she said, God has said you shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it. And yet in verse 17 of the previous chapter, God had only said to them, you shall not eat.

But she says to the devil, we don't eat, we don't touch. Alright? In the same verse 17 of the previous chapter, God had said if you eat, you shall surely die. There's a finality, there's a sentence in that.

Those few words. And yet when she talks to the devil, she says, you shall not eat it, God said, neither shall you touch it, lest you die. There's almost a hint of a modification of something of the strength of what God had said.

But you see, this is here, in this incident, we encounter the classic order of temptation. It was forbidden. And temptation is the experience of seeing a forbidden thing to be good. That's temptation.

To see a forbidden thing to be good. And she did take and eat. And there's a reference there in Joshua, and you know the incident of Aten, but you see the progression there, I saw, I coveted. Well now, if we go on to the second thought that I have here, it could follow a spiritual highlight, an uplift.

And how many of us in our Christian experience have had a high moment, and straight after it, bang, we're really being confronted by the devil as never before. We have this quote here, the seasons of highest exultation are often followed by those of greatest moral peril.

After the opening skies, the descending spirit and the heavenly voice comes the whisper of the demon and the serpent's hiss. After the blessing, the testing, and in Jesus' case into the wilderness, after the dove, the devil.

My third thought here is that the devil so frequently compounds the trauma of adversity. He is quick to move in on an area where something has met us, and we are a little sensitive. And do you remember John the Baptist?

The training principal in 1953 called him the Herald Exemplar. Do you remember that? 1953, the training principal. We were in college together, it's alright. But that's what Brigadier Harry Warren in those days used to call John the Baptist, the Herald Exemplar.

You remember how when John the Baptist was put into prison, and while he was in prison he started to have doubts? After a tremendous ministry where he'd been used of God to be the forerunner of the public ministry of Jesus, and then he's in prison and then the doubts come upon him.

What did he do? He sent his doubts to Jesus. And I think that's an important way to react if you've got doubts. Take them back to Jesus, that's what he did. And Jesus sent him encouragement and said to him, tell him the blind are seeing and those that are lame are walking and praising God.

Isn't it wonderful that we can take our doubts to Jesus? And there's a quote there from Brengel, you can read it. One further thought here, the devil can vary his attack. Don't forget this. Three times he confronted Jesus in the wilderness, sometimes he comes to you and to me directly, sometimes through an agent or even through circumstances, he can appear as an angel of light.

And so penetrating can be his attack that we can experience physical, mental and spiritual distress. You know, I've had some very wonderful lessons that God has taught me and allowed to come my way to make me a wiser Christian in my own experience of the sanctified life.

Discernment in Spiritual Warfare

You talk about varying his attack. I speak especially to those of you who have opportunity of a full time ministry, but not only you peculiarly in that sense, but to all of you tonight. I can remember an incident and I share it with you because it will just show you how subtle and how varied are the ways that the devil will attack you.

It's many years ago, my wife and I were at a call where we were enjoying our ministry but a local officer needed a little bit of correcting word because of a relationship that was emerging and he didn't take too kindly to this.

The person with whom the relationship was being developed was not a soldier, although there was a desire to be linked with the local fellowship and despite repeated requests that we should refrain even from the very appearance of evil, this person wouldn't just break that situation.

So of course it required a little further action which happened. Well I made it a matter of prayer as did the DC and others who were close to the scene and a few weeks later this person who had been had certain action taken in his interest I believe came and said, Mrs. So-and-so is very unwell Captain, would you go immediately she needs spiritual counsel.

I said thank you I'll try and go straight away if you say it's as urgent as it is. So I went to the place and it was a house that had steps going up and a veranda around and I something just hesitated told me to take caution.

I climbed the stairs and I could see that there was a bedroom and the window was open and I thought yes I'm not going into this house. She said I'm so glad you could come, won't you come in? I said no, look I won't come in I'm sorry but I won't come in but I'd like to pray with you and just commend you to God in this moment where you feel you've got such spiritual need.

So I prayed with her through the window never done it before or since. And I was in and out of the house in about three to four minutes which is usually a little quicker than my visits take. I wasn't home back at the quarters any more than ten minutes and the man concerned who'd asked me to visit was there and he said I'm terribly disappointed in you.

I said why? To think that there is a person in spiritual need and you wouldn't go and do the decent thing and go into the bedroom and give spiritual counsel. I said my dear man it was decency that kept me out that I recognised and he showed me in that very subtle way.

I've never had an experience like it but it was so cleverly engineered by the evil one that if I hadn't taken heed I could have fallen. Let's be careful because that further thought says the devil may retire from a direct confrontation for a season.

This was Luke in finalising his words about the three temptations he says that the devil left him for a season. It just gives us a chance to recover ourselves and learn a little bit more for the next battle because there'll be another one.

Jesus Came to Destroy the Devil's Works

Now let's look at temptation in relation to God. Jesus, the coming of Jesus is vitally linked with the victory over the evil one, vitally linked and the reason I just ask you to take these few brief comments is this, that John in writing his epistle says that Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil.

Now how would we summarise very quickly the works of the devil and I've just put three of them down here, the works of the devil because in John chapter 8 verse 44, John said that he was a murderer and a murderer of course is set on the destruction of life.

That's what the devil wants to do, he's a murderer. John also says that he's a liar and a liar is set to destroy truth and in a later chapter of that same gospel he said that Satan put it into the heart of Judas to betray Jesus.

Now a betrayer is one who's set on the violation of love. Doesn't it sound like the devil when you look at it? The destruction of life, the destruction of truth, the violation of love. That's what he wants to do and yet the antithesis of this is seen in Jesus.

Hallelujah. Because he came to give life and to give it more abundantly. To give the sanctified life. Hallelujah. But also he came as the embodiment of truth and not only was he truth but he said when he the spirit of truth is come he will guide you into all truth and the truth shall set you free.

Isn't that beautiful? And then of course in him we find the love of God which is broader than the measure of man's mind. Oh when I was just going over that I said thank you Jesus, this is beautiful. You came to destroy the works of the devil and we see it so clearly.

Let's take confidence from that. My next.

Thought here is in James 1 .13 confirms that temptation is not of God and yet it is possible that God and Satan might be active in the one human experience. God seeking to bless a man through temptation and Satan seeking to curse and destroy him.

And there's a little verse there. Don't you good for those of you who are looking forward to an appointment when you go to one. It's a great little verse. You just take it with you. But you see just digressing for a moment.

You know Romans 8 .28. You know how easy sometimes it flows out. All things work together for good. All things are not good. And sometimes you can go through an experience that is not good. The Bible doesn't of course say that they're not.

What the word of God says is that we know that all things work together for good to them that love God. So that even a temptation God can take it and use it not only for the triumph of our own soul but for strength for future victories.

God's Understanding and Protection in Temptation

Well now I've got one or two things written down here and time is racing away on us. God understands the temptations that confront us. He understands. Now let's remember this. There is no temptation that comes to you that he doesn't understand.

And you remember how when coming to that moment he exposed his deepest thoughts to Peter and he said Peter faith and have desired to have thee that he might sift you as wheat but I have prayed for you that thy faith fail not.

God understands the temptations that come to us in the sanctified life. And he says that he gives us his protection. He will not suffer us to be tempted above that which we are able to bear. Thank God for that.

Thank God for that. I'm sorry to have to go so far back just to training college days but let me just say one more thing. When we received word of our appointments as to where we could go in those days to do our self denial collecting I found that I was to go to Tarry and to Maitland or West Maitland as it was affectionately known in those days.

I was having a difficult time in my experience because in this very sanctuary the devil had put into my mind this challenge. There is no God. I tried to dismiss it. I tried to oppose it by giving it some antiseptic comment from the word of God which would clean it out and defeat it.

And it came again today. I went to self denial collecting and Tarry was wonderful. It just, the results were staggering. At Maitland I went in just after the flood and the enterprising corps officer had reserved an area for the cadet that had been most severely hit by flood waters.

I went to house after house and they gave me nothing.

And you, you, you just put.

Yourself into the situation where you're going from door to door and no one's coming good and you you've been tortured in your mind with this thought there is no God and it's of the devil and it starts to affect you emotionally and physically as well and you feel washed out.

Talk about blistered by the hot breath of Satan. I was feeling something like that and I went to another house and the man said to me, hold on a minute and I'll give you something. Yes, thank you Lord.

The drought's breaking. Even after the worst flood in history. The person came to the door and he handed me a card and said I hope this blesses you. I said thank you and I put it into my hand and I walked.

When I got to the gate of that house I looked at the card that was printed on one side only and do you know what it said? Be gone unbelief. My saviour is near and for my relief will surely appear by prayer let me wrestle and he will perform with Christ in the vessel.

How could you doubt the protection when that sort of thing comes your way is above that which we are able to believe. So you see it's not only the protection but it's because he makes provision. There's the way of escape and sometimes people say to me but why is it?

I seem to give in and I don't have the victory that I should have been having. What's happened? It could have been that we haven't taken the way of escape that God has offered. We can triumph in all things and this is a personal assurance.

The Three Temptations of Jesus

Well now let me very briefly in closing look at this situation of the temptations of Jesus to draw one or two thoughts. Because if we are going to find encouragement we get it from each other thank God because we're able to share victories to his glory and we share the difficulties and we find out how he's able to deliver the godly.

He is able to deliver the godly. That's ours. Now look at these temptations. There were three of them. So the devil doesn't stop at one failure. He comes up with a second and a third. So don't be surprised if you get a sequence of them will you?

It's interesting to notice that in the first temptation Satan concentrated on the physical weakness of Christ the point of hunger. Then his second temptation he switches it to the area in which Christ is strong.

He's confident in God. Jesus defeated him in the first encounter by quoting scripture. So in the second attack the devil takes the scripture and starts quoting it to him. You see a text taken out of context can so easily become a pretext.

And when the devil starts quoting scripture you need to watch both the devil and the scripture. Isn't it marvellous how he learns though? Jesus could defeat him with the word and then he turns round with the second temptation and says it is written.

And Jesus comes back and says it is written again. Hallelujah. It's lovely to see that in each of the temptations we find that Jesus simply succeeded by recognising his enemy and calling him Satan. I've got a little thought here, a simple digression.

When you marry into the devil's family you're bound to have trouble with your father-in-law. You try and counsel someone who started a friendship with someone who doesn't share the Christian faith. You try and counsel them.

My word, it can be a very delicate and a long. In each temptation the master gave only one reply. One reply it is written. I think one reply is enough too because when you start to dialogue as Eve did and go on to all sorts of tangents explaining things, my word you can get into problem country.

Remember the devil can only tempt. He cannot compel you to yield to temptation. Remember also that Satan has already been conquered by Christ. Quickly into these final thoughts. If I'm going to approach temptation as a sanctified person, how am I going to do it?

Practical Ways to Resist Temptation

I've got here a little thought. Pray in advance. Realise that temptation by Satan is his attempt to separate you and to separate me from God. So bathe yourself in a ministry of prayer and bathe the future in God in prayer and commit it to him and leave it to him.

For faithful is he who calleth you who will also do it. Pray in advance. Secondly, be alert as to the beginnings of temptation. Many of the most terrible temptations that have assailed humanity are at the beginning a silky cobweb seductive and fascinating and giving no indication of the terrible danger that lies behind them.

You know sometimes a show of bad temper is called righteous indignation. Lust cloaks itself as love can come to us in a subtle way. Thirdly, take the way of escape. I've got a reference if you wouldn't have on your notes, Proverbs 4, 14, 15.

Kill the serpent, don't stroke it. Flee also youthful lusts. Think of Joseph. Some question why do I yield to temptation and so sing when at times I have a real desire to overcome. Could it be that the only answer is that at the critical time we did not choose to take the way of escape so provided.

Finally, temptation overcome leads to greater strength and wider experience. And I'd like to close with my testimony about that. I went to Broken Hill still tortured in my mind with this experience that there is no God.

And although God had given me tokens of his presence in that encouragement which said be gone unbelief. And I took it and I said thank you Lord, it becomes an encouragement. I still went on for another four or five months absolutely torn within by this wretched temptation of the devil.

Submitting to God and Resisting the Devil

And I used to get down at the quarters of the night and I couldn't even say a prayer. I'd get the consortina out and I'd just say in a simple word all my days and all my hours shall be thine. And to say at that point where I knew it had been a certainty God had challenged me to give myself.