Jesus was filled with the Holy Spirit and yet was tempted. The strongest force of temptation often comes upon a person when he is closest to God.

Someone once said, “The Devil aims high.” In fact, he caused one disciple to say he did not even know Christ.

Why is it that very few people have had as great a conflict with the Devil as Martin Luther had? It is because Martin Luther was shaking the very kingdom of hell itself. And remember the tremendous struggles John Bunyan had!

When a person has the fullness of the Spirit of God, he will experience great conflicts with the Tempter. God allows temptation because it does for us what storms do for oak trees, rooting us deeper, and it does for us what heat does for paint on porcelain, giving us long-lasting endurance.

You will never fully realize the level of strength of your grasp on Christ, or His grasp on you, until the Devil uses all his force to attract you to himself. It is then you will feel the tug of Christ’s right hand.

Extraordinary afflictions are not always the punishment of extraordinary sins but are sometimes the trials resulting from God’s extraordinary gifts.

God uses many sharp-cutting instruments, and polishes His jewels with files that are rough. And those saints He especially loves, and desires to make shine the most brilliantly, will often feel His tools upon them. R. LEIGHTON

I willingly bear witness to the fact that I owe more to my Lord’s fire, hammer, and file than to anything else in His workshop. Sometimes I wonder if I have ever learned anything except at the end of God’s rod.

When my classroom is darkest, I see best. CHARLES H. SPURGEON

Let no man say, when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: but every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin.

They lusted exceedingly in the wilderness, and tempted God in the desert.

Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, being forty days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did eat nothing: and when they were ended, he afterward hungered. And the devil said unto him, If thou be the Son of God, command this stone that it be made bread.

He himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted.—Simon, Simon, . . . Satan hath desired to have you, that he might sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not.