Volume 23: Competing Desires

COMPETING DESIRES

One of the greatest battles you will ever fight is not between you and the world. It is between two desires within your own heart.

The apostle Paul described this struggle with remarkable honesty: “Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me… when I would do good, evil is present with me.” (Romans 7:20–21)

Every believer knows this tension—I’ll be the first to confess, I certainly do.

You desire to pray, yet priorities urge you to procrastinate.
You desire to forgive, yet your ego, flesh, and self-righteousness want to hold on to the offense.
You desire purity, yet temptation whispers that temporary pleasures wrapped in secret compromise are harmless.
You desire to trust God, yet fear and your double-minded nature argue louder than faith.

These competing desires do not prove that God has abandoned you. They reveal that a war is taking place.

Modern culture tells us to follow our hearts. Scripture tells us our wicked hearts must be surrendered to Christ.

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jeremiah 17:9).

Our worldly desires do not deserve to be obeyed. The flesh constantly craves what is immediate, gratifying, comfortable, and self-centered. The Spirit continually leads us toward what is eternal, holy, and pleasing to God. As Paul wrote, “For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh” (Galatians 5:17).

If the man who wrote 13 of the 27 books of the New Testament in the Bible struggled, why then do we have a complex with admitting that we do?

Victory is not found by pretending the battle doesn’t exist. It is found by deciding which voice you will feed.

Every time you open God’s Word instead of meditating on distractions, you strengthen the Spirit’s influence in your life.

Every time you choose prayer over panic, forgiveness over bitterness, generosity over selfishness, or obedience over compromise, you are declaring that Christ—not your cravings—is Lord.

The Christian life is not the absence of competing desires. It is the daily surrender of those desires to Jesus Christ. That is why the gospel is such good news.

Jesus not only forgives us when we fail, but He also gives us the Holy Spirit to transform us from within. He does not merely command us to live differently; He empowers us to do so.

The battle is real. But so is the Savior. And because Christ has overcome the world, those who abide in Him do not have to be ruled by their competing desires. We can walk in the victory He has already secured.