The Weight of Resistance

A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means. This is an obvious lie. Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is. After all, you find out the strength of the German army by fighting against it, not by giving in. You find out the strength of a wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down. A man who gives into temptation after five minutes simply does not know what it would have been like an hour later. That is why bad people, in one sense, know very little about their badness. They have lived a sheltered life by always giving in. We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it: and Christ, because He was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows the full what temptation means - the only complete realist.

- C. S. Lewis

I have found out the strength of the evil impulse within me. I have resisted, but only long enough to know that it's there. My ability to resist is paltry. My urge to give in is strong. The impulse wins 9 out of 10 times. It is because of my awareness of its strength and my weakness in the face of it that I make, and pray for, efforts to stay away from situations that inflame my evil impulse. Someone told me not long ago that I am the strongest person they've ever known. I told them it is because I know how weak I really am that I make efforts to avoid temptation rather than resist it. I do this because I've learned that resistance is futile (at least 90% of the time).