When you are trying to resist temptations, food temptations to be specific it can be challenging. Inviting God into your struggles is key as a Christian. Ask God for help! Then make spending time with Him a habit, to increase your resilience and ability to fight temptation.

Spend time in God’s word daily. Make it a habit.

By knowing His Word and the weapons in His Word that He has given us, you can resist temptations.  We all know that in a fallen and sinful world that we will be confronted by temptation, find a verse or two that you can recite to help resist the temptation.  As you read your Bible, it can help you stay focused on God today and not the sweets, simple carbs, or Grande Foo-Foo Frappuccino.

Understand Your Personal Weaknesses

Not everyone is tempted in the same way. What is a struggle for one person may not be the least bit tempting to another person? For example, one person may be tempted with smoking. For the next guy, smoking has never had a foothold on the person and therefore is not at all tempting.

James 1:14 says that we are drawn away with our own lusts. This indicates that each person has their own weak areas to deal with. You need to understand your own weakness so that you will know how to combat and avoid it.

Flee Temptation

Once you enter temptation you are on your own.  The key is to see temptation, and not entertain it.  Flee it!  That is a strong word.  Basically, turn around, remove it from your site and run!  Physically remove yourself from the temptation.  Change your route to work if needed, stop going by Starbucks, or the bakery or the fast-food joint. 

Create an Accountability Network

As Christians we have direct access to God. There is no place in the Bible where we are taught that we must confess our sins to others to have forgiveness from God. However, the Bible does teach that creating accountability with someone else can help you in your struggle against temptation (James 5:16).

You do not need to go into detail with your accountability partner about your struggles, but they do need to know how to pray for you. Find someone who is a mature Christian. Tell them that you are struggling in a certain area. Look through the Bible together finding verses that will be a help to you. Have your friend ask you occasionally how you were doing in this area. Once a week is usually often enough. Make a promise to your friend that you will not lie to them when asked about how you are doing. You only hurt yourself when you lie to the other person. Ask your friend to pray for you—not stand in judgment.

Don’t be Discouraged

You should not become complacent about your sin. Yes, it is sin to keep doing what you know is wrong.  Let’s not candy coat it.  Don’t allow your sin to defeat you. Sin is much more serious than eating too much dessert but allow me to make an analogy. If you are on a diet and eat an extra cookie that you were not supposed to, does it make sense to quit your diet and eat the rest of the bag? The truth is that one extra cookie is a minor thing compared to how many good choices you made the previous week. It sounds silly to quit a diet because of 100 extra calories. Yet people do it all the time.  Think of it as a lifestyle, and not a diet.  Why are you removing the cookie from your food intake?  If you view your body as the temple of the Holy Spirit, it can make that choice easier.  I am not going to eat the cookie because it increased my BMI and that extra fat is harmful to my body, my temple. 

Realize that you probably will fall to temptation on occasion, but that is no reason to quit your Christian walk. Don’t accept your sin as if it doesn’t matter, but also realize that you have a choice in your future actions.  Enlist God and His unlimited resources of strength into your choices and He can help you fight a sugar or simple carb temptation out there!