Abstain

Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from

fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul. 1 Peter 2:11

Rather than giving in to the pull of our flesh, we need to fight it. We need to keep the desire of our minds and our lusts at a distance. Don’t embrace them and don’t flirt with them.

Peter uses the word abstain to describe what we should do with fleshly desires. The word literally means to keep something at arms length.

It’s how you might hold a dead rat that you had to remove from your attic. You wouldn’t cuddle it or hold it close. You’d keep it as far away from you as possible.

And so we should with lusts. Paul tells us that they wage war with our souls. Lust is not your friend. It’s an enemy and it will kill you. So treat it accordingly.

Why should we fight the gravitational pull of sin and lust? Why shouldn’t we just dive headlong into our lusts and let them carry us away?

Simple—we’re strangers and aliens. This world (and its lusts and cravings) is foreign to us. It no longer represents what we’re about, whom we love or what we need. And so we should fight the desire to be engulfed by its pleasures.

Today, as you go about your day, think about the fact that you are an alien here. This world is not your home. Don’t give in to its false promises.

Abstain.

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