Holy and Honorable

DEVOTION
1 THESSALONIANS
HOLY AND HONORABLE
1 Thess 4:3-8
3 It is God's will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; 4 that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, 5 not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; 6 and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him. The Lord will punish men for all such sins, as we have already told you and warned you. 7 For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life. 8 Therefore, he who rejects this instruction does not reject man but God, who gives you his Holy Spirit.
NIV
This is one of the strongest urges that exist in most men and I suspect in woman as well. But I am to be pure, to be sanctified, that is different than most men, most people in the world today. I have to live in a manner in which I control those impulses, those desires, and live in a manner that is holy and honorable. If I said I was void of any kind of desire I would be deceiving myself and lying to God. But I think it is different to have temptation knocking at your door than opening the door and inviting it in. I think a lot people fool themselves by believing they are not tempted by some kind of impurity. The devil is after all of us 24/7. But that is still different than actually getting involved in the sorted behavior the world is filled with. It is an awful thing to be a part of that. Sin in any form is not pure and honorable. It takes a great deal of strength that only God himself can provide to avoid any kind of sin much less this kind. He created man and woman in such a way we would desire each other in a physical sense so as to fill the earth. Maybe he could have done it another way but he did not. So with those God instilled desires, each of us most live with. I live with those and I must control them. I think the older I get the less I would have to struggle them but I know much older men who I have talked with and they still deal with those temptations. How can this be? How can God put something in me than tell me to keep it in check? Well that is exactly what he says and means at least as far as going about like all the unbelievers. He has given to each man a woman and expects us to be one another’s. Our bodies our not our own but belong to each other. This impurity is outside of that, beyond the bonds of marriage. Yet the tempter is still at large seeking whom he can devour. But is toothless and without the power of God. This I have access to, this power I have available to in order that I may live a life pleasing and acceptable to him, pure and honorable.