HOW TO OVERCOME TEMPTATIONS- 1
The other day, a young lady met me and, in the course of her talk, said, "I can resist everything except temptation."
How true it is that no man had graduated to the art of life till he has been well tempted and overcome every temptation.
They meet me: young men and women in whose hearts is the aspiration to live the new life, the life of simplicity and service, of purity and prayer, of love and compassion, young men and women, who have not yet been tainted through contact with worldliness – pure, young, eagre-souls, - and they put to me the question: why is that we are tempted? What is the place of temptation in life? Why can we not have a world without temptation? What a wonderful world it would be, where everyone could live a pure, chaste, clean life! What is the purpose of temptations? Why do we have temptation at all? In answer to these questions, I say to them: "Temptations are the dumbbells of the soul."
In my boyhood days, I joined a gymnasium. Every evening I would go and practice my exercise with the dumbbells. One evening, I asked the instructor: "What is the use of doing this exercise, day after day?" He answered: "As you do this exercise, your muscles will be strengthened."
Just as dumbbells strengthen the physical muscles, of the soul develop our hidden spiritual strength, temptations unlock the hidden powers of the Spirit.
There was a holy man. His life was pure and chase as the waters of the Ganges. He lived in the fear and love of God. His life was a source of inspiration and joy to many around him. He lived to a ripe, old age. Soon after he passed away, one of his companions had a dream. In the dream, he saw the holy man occupying a place of honour in the heaven world. Around him were angels who said: "He is a great saint and occupies place in heaven, because he succeeded in overcoming many temptations."
A person becomes holy, in the measure in which he overcomes temptations. Instead of complaining, let us bless God for our temptations. They come to unfold our hidden spiritual strength. They come to make us spiritually strong. Truly, temptations are the dumbbells of the soul.
The word temptation, is derived from the Latin, tentare, which means to prove, to put to the test. Temptation is the touchstone of the soul. Even as gold is tested on the touchstone, so is the man’s character. The loftiness of his soul is tested by the temptations he is able to overcome.
When a temple bell is cast in a foundry, the Founder does not at once fix it in the temple, but first tries it with his strong hammer to see if there are any flaws in it. So is man tries with hammer blows of temptations before he becomes perfect.
- to be continued.
(J.P. Vaswani)
