Matthew 5:28 says “But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Does this apply to other things? If I had a desire to smoke and drink, but I actually don’t do it, does it means that I had already smoked and drank? Do I call myself a smoker and a drinker?<\/p>\n\t
“Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren<\/em>” (James 1:13-16).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I’ve noticed that people have a hard time distinguishing between a desire, a temptation, and lust.<\/p>\n
A desire is what you want at the moment. It doesn’t necessarily have to be bad. I might be hungry, tired, or want a chance to relax.<\/p>\n
“Temptation” is when Satan offers us what we want, but to get it we have to do something wrong. It ought to be clear that in order to be tempted, we must consider what is being offered. Being tempted is not a sin. Jesus was tempted, yet he did not sin. “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin<\/em>” (Hebrews 4:15).<\/p>\n
Lust is when we decide we want what Satan offers, but at the moment we don’t have an opportunity to act on it. Using your example, if at the time someone handed you a cigarette or a beer, would you have smoked or drank?<\/p>\n
Lust isn’t the same as committing the actual sin. A man guilty of lusting after a woman hasn’t committed adultery yet. Jesus charged that he has committed adultery in his heart. The point is that sin doesn’t start with the actual action, it starts with the lusts of the heart. “And He said, ‘What comes out of a man, that defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within and defile a man’<\/em>” (Mark 7:20-23).<\/p>\n
The problem is that some people excuse lust as harmless because it hasn’t been acted upon. What we see is that lust is corrosive. It eats away at a person’s spirit making him more likely to give in to the actual sin. Even when the sin isn’t committed, the defilement of the person’s spirit is itself a sin. The battle cannot come in resisting the chance to do sin but must come earlier in rejecting the thoughts about doing a sin.<\/p>\n
So, you might be thirsty and tempted to quench that thirst with a beer. You can reject it, or dwell on it wishing you really had a can available. The lust for a beer isn’t drunkenness, but it will make you susceptible to indulging in drinking if the opportunity arises. The lust for alcohol isn’t drunkenness, but the drunkard begins his sin when he starts lusting for alcohol.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Question: Matthew 5:28 says “But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Does this apply to other things? If I had a desire to smoke and drink, but I actually don’t do it, does it means that I had…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[66,371,156,708,420,185],"class_list":["post-23019","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-adultery","tag-alcohol","tag-lust","tag-matthew","tag-smoking","tag-temptation"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":12782,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/doesnt-matthew-527-28-only-apply-to-married-people\/","url_meta":{"origin":23019,"position":0},"title":"Doesn’t Matthew 5:27-28 only apply to married people?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 21, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: With the Scripture:\u00a0\"You shall not commit adultery.' But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart\" (Matthew 5:27-28). Only married people can commit adultery, so as I see it, this Scripture is not meant\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1334,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-does-adultery-start\/","url_meta":{"origin":23019,"position":1},"title":"How does adultery start?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"April 10, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: How does adultery start? In what way then is it looked upon as adultery Answer: James describes the steps leading to death from sin as thus: \"Let no one say when he is tempted, \"I am tempted by God\"; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2509,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-do-we-distinguish-between-attraction-and-lust\/","url_meta":{"origin":23019,"position":2},"title":"How do we distinguish between attraction and lust?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 9, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Having\u00a0read your article, \"Is masturbation unacceptable?\"\u00a0I wish to commend you for tackling a subject many avoid. Sunday night I finished a series of lessons on human sexuality, so I feel we have this in common. I have a question that might help shed some light on this subject. Matthew\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9823,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/my-boyfriend-and-i-have-been-falling-into-lewd-behavior-and-we-trying-to-stop-it\/","url_meta":{"origin":23019,"position":3},"title":"My boyfriend and I have been falling into lewd behavior and we trying to stop it","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 17, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hello. Good day to you. Thank you for taking the time out of your busy schedule to read my email. My boyfriend and I have been dating for a few months. He is sure of me, saying I am what he wants in a woman and in a wife.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":16502,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/which-book-can-i-commit-to-memory-to-overcome-sexual-lusts\/","url_meta":{"origin":23019,"position":4},"title":"Which book can I commit to memory to overcome sexual lusts?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 6, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: My Christian life hasn't been very fruitful, to say the least. I still engage in the same sexual lusts that I once did and I am searching for the right book in the New Testament to commit to memory so that I can combat these temptations. I can't win\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":49091,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/does-every-man-do-it\/","url_meta":{"origin":23019,"position":5},"title":"Does Every Man Do It?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 1, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"by Bobby K. Thompson Jesus said: \"Ye have heard that it was said by them of old, Thou shalt not commit adultery: but I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart\" (Matthew 5:27-28). This passage\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23019","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23019"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23019\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}