Mousetrap – What Cheese Tempts You?
When I was a kid a game my younger brother liked playing was Mousetrap. It was an elaborate set up that you had to be careful not to touch the board or it would spring into action. If you are not familiar with the game, it is an adventure to play. You move your mouse around the board and just hope you do not get caught in the trap when it is sprung. It is amazing how some games we played as kids show us just what is going on in our lives.
I truly believe that there is a mousetrap built for each one of us. It seems crazy that what one person is totally repulsed by another person cannot get enough of it. It is just the way we are as people. There is a thing we cannot resist. It calls to us whenever we are awake and then we dream about it as we sleep. It is the cheese that is in the trap that tempts each of us to our own demise. We just cannot seem to resist the lure of the cheese, even when we know it is a trap.
Why are we this way?
In the Lord’s Prayer there is a line that Jesus teaches us to pray that is about temptation. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. He realizes that temptation will lead us to a place we do not want to go to. He seems to understand that we need help to keep from giving in and being trapped.
There can be several different reasons we are tempted. Life is just that way. Why, when I decide to give up peanut butter cups is that I think about. Temptation has a way of finding us on our best days and worst days. It is does not care who you are or what you decide. If we are breathing then we are being tempted.
So what do we do to avoid the mousetrap?
First, admit that there is a mousetrap.
We all need to admit that there is a mousetrap with our cheese and we are searching for it every day. In 1 John 2:16, John tells us about temptation.
For the world offers only the lust for physical pleasure, the lust for everything we see, and pride in our possessions. These are not from the Father. They are from this evil world. 1 John 2:16 (NLT)
This life is full of temptation. We are bombarded with images of what we should own, where we should live and who we should become. This world and all the power in it is geared towards making us want more of whatever they are selling that day. These temptations are not brought to us by God, but by the evil around us.
But, why is it evil to want more? It all depends on you at times. Have we ever decided what enough is? Most of us have never really thought about what is enough and when can we be content with what we have. That is the tricky part of this game called life. One more move closer and then the trap is sprung. Oh, to find the cheese we dream of having. That is how temptation gets us. It lures us in and calls us deep within our desires.
The first step to overcoming temptation is knowing that you can be tempted. So spend some time figuring out what your cheese is and how much of a hold it has on your desires. We will talk in the weeks ahead about how temptation works and how to not give into the temptations around us.