temptation Prayer to Remove Sinful and Tempting Thoughts Did Not Work...

[Vort]

22 hours ago, Awakened said:

Thank you everyone! Well... I'm not gonna lie, I'm quite discouraged. I thought as long as we were trying our best and we make an active choice to resist, as long as we pray, we can remove such sinful desires even if just temporarily. I know that I could never have temptation removed permanently but even not temporarily?

Crap... This changes a lot. I now have to rethink how I'm going to do this... I really thought faith in Christ would help me. After all, with great faith were many miracles and works done according to the will of God. I never thought this would be different.

Please don't be discouraged. If your mental model wasn't perfect, it may not have been that far off. You can have a temptation fully removed from your life, but that generally does not come merely for the asking. It requires a change in your heart, that you become the kind of person who isn't tempted by whatever it is. Sometimes we build up hedges to keep us from the temptation. If done right, this can be a useful strategy.

As an example, pornography saturates our society and presents itself in many of our daily tasks. It is very difficult to avoid pornography completely. Very difficult. But not impossible. We can use filters and whitelists and other tools to get rid of much of the garbage. We can restrict our own web surfing or TV viewing to avoid evil. That reduces our exposure to the point that we have a much smaller set of pornography to manage (meaning to close our eyes to or otherwise avoid). Once we master that, we can move on from there.

Sorry that this is not very eloquent. I read the discouragement in your online voice and wanted to encourage you. It may help to know that this is a fight we all carry on. It is the human condition. We all have checkered histories of success and failure, but winning can happen.

[omegaseamaster75]

On 6/5/2016 at 9:14 AM, Awakened said:

Thank you everyone! Well... I'm not gonna lie, I'm quite discouraged. I thought as long as we were trying our best and we make an active choice to resist, as long as we pray, we can remove such sinful desires even if just temporarily. I know that I could never have temptation removed permanently but even not temporarily?

 

That's not how it works.....kind of like saying a prayer to find your car keys.  It just does not work that way.

[The Folk Prophet]

7 hours ago, omegaseamaster75 said:

That's not how it works.....kind of like saying a prayer to find your car keys.  It just does not work that way.

I've found things after praying to do so. I guess you can call that coincidence...but I'm a believer.

I think it would be more accurate to say that's not always how it works. Sometimes it works that way (though I would guess significantly more often with lost keys that the removal of various temptations).

[Awakened]

Oof... Thank you guys for being so supportive and incredible. I do see it and appreciate it more than you know. I haven't stopped trying at all and I won't.

[Guest LiterateParakeet]

13 hours ago, omegaseamaster75 said:

That's not how it works.....kind of like saying a prayer to find your car keys.  It just does not work that way.

I partially agree with you, it doesn't always work that way, but sometimes it does.  It's like tithing.  I've had miraculous tithing blessings in my life, but I also went through bankruptcy and foreclosure.  Most of those people at the Bishop's Storehouse are full tithe payers.  

I've pondered this a lot and I think it's like "faith school".  When you are a new convert, or even a member with your first job, and it is a big leap of faith to pay your tithing, then miracles come if you need them to strengthen your faith.  Later as your faith in that principle and in Christ gets stronger, the "training wheels" come off so to speak and the tithing net is not as large.  When hubby and I went through our bad financial time, I prayed and asked, where is my tithing blessing?  (I was more tactful in my prayers, but same idea.)  The Lord said, "I am blessing you.  I gave you a very generous Bishop and the Bishop's Storehouse."  

I think it is the same thing with finding lost keys.  I remember when my sister was a new convert, and we were rushing out the door to got to her son's baptism (he had just turned eight) and we couldn't find her keys.  I used that opportunity (I was a recently returned missionary, after all, LOL!) to help her learn to recognize the Spirit.  I told her Heavenly Father knows where your keys are and since getting to the baptism is a righteous desire I believe He will help you find them.  We need to say a prayer and then after the prayer, the first thought that comes to your mind (no matter how silly you might think it is) look there.  So we did.  After the prayer, she felt impressed to look in her work vest. At first she thought, "No, I already looked there."  But she remembered what I had said and looked...sure enough there were her keys.  We made it to the baptism on time.  Not that they would have started without us, but it would have been really awkward to hold everything up.

I still get help finding things now and then.  But being farther along in "faith school", I've also had experiences where the desired blessing, even though it was a righteous desire did not come.  Sometimes it doesn't come right away, but it does come later.  Some of those hoped for blessings I'm still waiting for.   "Faith school" is the most rigorous education ever, but I trust that it is worth it. 

[estradling75]

It is possible that the Lord would take it away....  However it is much more likely that the Lord will help and magnify your efforts... so what are you doing to control your thoughts?

 

Faith is an active thing... we need to do things in faith or exercise faith to be said to truly have it.  Prayer can be an exercise of faith, but it usually needs to be coupled with us taking proactive steps to improve which the Lord can then bless, and strengthen our efforts.

[David13]

God expects us to do the footwork.

This means you must occupy your mind with other things, not just pray that it will magically happen with no effort on your part.

We have been discussing this much lately.

The Lord will provide, but we must do the footwork.

dc

[David13]

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Edited June 7, 2016 by David13

[omegaseamaster75]

13 hours ago, The Folk Prophet said:

I've found things after praying to do so. I guess you can call that coincidence...but I'm a believer.

 

Ridiculous did you pray and stop looking? Did that item magically appear?

No you kept looking until you found it.  Was that an answer to your prayer?  Maybe, but most likely you found what you were looking for through persistence.

[Awakened]

59 minutes ago, omegaseamaster75 said:

Ridiculous did you pray and stop looking? Did that item magically appear?

No you kept looking until you found it.  Was that an answer to your prayer?  Maybe, but most likely you found what you were looking for through persistence.

Why would it be hard to believe that the Lord helped him?

And BTW, I've prayed a fair few times to find something important and I kid you not. I usually find it after that within 5-10 minutes

Edited June 7, 2016 by Awakened

[omegaseamaster75]

11 minutes ago, Awakened said:

Why would it be hard to believe that the Lord helped him?

And BTW, I've prayed a fair few times to find something important and I kid you not. I usually find it after that within 5-10 minutes

Yeah because you kept looking.  Trust me nothing magical happened.

[zil]

More than one of us has had the location of the lost item revealed to us (as LP's post shows).  Maybe those who had to continue searching for a time (rather than having the location revealed to them) were given help to have the patience or persistence to keep looking.  Maybe in some cases it was "coincidence".  But there have been many who have had undeniable help in finding exactly what we were seeking.  If you don't believe that this can happen, it's to your detriment, not the believers'.

[omegaseamaster75]

59 minutes ago, zil said:

More than one of us has had the location of the lost item revealed to us (as LP's post shows).  Maybe those who had to continue searching for a time (rather than having the location revealed to them) were given help to have the patience or persistence to keep looking.  Maybe in some cases it was "coincidence".  But there have been many who have had undeniable help in finding exactly what we were seeking.  If you don't believe that this can happen, it's to your detriment, not the believers'.

So your serious, you think that God can help you find your car keys? As in: Think Booming voice "your keys are under the bed".  Or an actual vision?

What do you mean by revealed?

I'll then tell you why God does not help you find your keys

Edited June 7, 2016 by omegaseamaster75

[Guest LiterateParakeet]

1 hour ago, omegaseamaster75 said:

So your serious, you think that God can help you find your car keys? As in: Think Booming voice "your keys are under the bed".  Or an actual vision?

Is that how you get answers to prayer?(any topic)

[Vort]

2 hours ago, omegaseamaster75 said:

So your serious, you think that God can help you find your car keys? As in: Think Booming voice "your keys are under the bed".  Or an actual vision?

Mock the idea however you like -- take care not to fall out the window of that great and spacious building -- but yes, I do indeed believe that God reveals such things to us. President Monson believed that God helped him to find the $10 he earned as a child. Even with people being slaughtered and children being raped and sold into slavery and all sorts of unspeakable awfulness being perpetrated upon innocents, God still helped Tommy Monson to find his lost $10. The $10 may not be important, but Tommy Monson learning to hear and hearken to God's voice is.

[Vort]

3 hours ago, omegaseamaster75 said:

Trust me nothing magical happened.

Why would we trust you on a matter to which you were not a witness and know absolutely nothing except the brief account given? And who (besides you) said anything about magic?

[omegaseamaster75]

1 hour ago, LiterateParakeet said:

Is that how you get answers to prayer?(any topic)

No

[Guest LiterateParakeet]

25 minutes ago, omegaseamaster75 said:

No

Precisely. 

[The Folk Prophet]

11 hours ago, omegaseamaster75 said:

Ridiculous did you pray and stop looking? Did that item magically appear?

No you kept looking until you found it.  Was that an answer to your prayer?  Maybe, but most likely you found what you were looking for through persistence.

Oh ye of little faith.

[theSQUIDSTER]

On 6/7/2016 at 8:08 AM, omegaseamaster75 said:

Ridiculous did you pray and stop looking? Did that item magically appear?

No you kept looking until you found it.  Was that an answer to your prayer?  Maybe, but most likely you found what you were looking for through persistence.

Omega,

I think I get what you're saying... or at least in part.  I also get what others are saying.

I don't think this is an either/or thing.  We pray for help and then we persist in doing what we can.  We have to keep doing our part and persist.

I've also experienced answers to prayer on finding things more than once.  No, the Lord didn't drop the lost item out of the sky into my lap right after the prayer finished.  I had to continue looking for it and then found it fairly quickly after the prayer of faith..  5-10 minutes usually, same as Awakened describes.

I had another experience where I'd been trying to fix a lock for almost 2 hours and had not been getting a certain part to fit the way it was supposed to.  I was extremely tired after a long night's graveyard shift and in need of sleep and at my wits end.  My wife asked me, "Why don't you pray about it?"  I quipped to her that I wasn't feeling much faith at the moment and I shot back, "Why don't YOU pray about it?!"  So she did.  After her prayer I tried the lock, to fit the part in and it went right in... just like that.  It wasn't because of my faith or lack of persistence... to me it was humbling to see this and yet, despite my lack of faith, my wife's faith was apparently enough.  For me that was a pretty big answer coming from such a small thing.

 

Prayers DO matter.  Prayers DO work.  Sometimes they can be answered almost immediately.  Other times it seems like we have to wait and go through a refining process... but prayers DO work.

[Guest]

On 6/7/2016 at 0:31 PM, omegaseamaster75 said:

So your serious, you think that God can help you find your car keys? As in: Think Booming voice "your keys are under the bed".  Or an actual vision?

What do you mean by revealed?

I'll then tell you why God does not help you find your keys

I was trying to get to a place I'd never been.  I was given wrong directions, but I knew it was somewhere in this general area.  I kept driving around for a while until I got really frustrated.  My daughter finally suggested we pray about it.  Although I was frustrated to the point where I believed her request was utterly ridiculous, she's just such an angelic child that I had to at least humor her.

We stopped the car.  She said the prayer.  I opened my eyes and the Lord told me where to go.  I went there.  We found the place.  I want to emphasize that I had done a very engineering-level methodical grid-by-grid search in this area.  But I just wasn't seeing it.  But when I was told to go to this specific spot, I looked, and there it was.

Yes, something "magical" can happen through prayer even for very simple things.

Edited June 9, 2016 by Guest

[Guest]

@Awakened,

I've been thinking about your OP.  Your OP was about prayer.  I believe many answered that question.  But if you're looking for a method to control your thoughts...

Rules:

1. There is no such thing as having a mind with no thought.  Therefore, you cannot "remove" a thought.  You can only replace it.
2. When you have an undesirable thought, you have to get a more persistent, desired, thought to come into your mind.
3. You'll have to consistently work at this because once that replacement thought becomes common, it no longer has the same power of persistence.  So rotate some "go-to" thoughts every three weeks or so.  Your mileage may vary.
4. The idle mind is the Devil's playground.  So, if you find yourself thinking evil thoughts, get into some good work or service.  Being actively engaged in a good cause is a really good way to keep your mind focused on good things.

Mrs. Carb was looking up indexing (since the Church has made a big push for it).  She read a story about a man who had been struggling with pornography for many years.  But when he got into indexing, he found that the thoughts and desires simply went away.  Every time he had a sexual thought, he'd get on the computer and start indexing.  The joy of indexing was so powerful that even if he accidentally saw a pop-up ad for something inappropriate, he quickly turned on the indexing software and the thoughts were gone.

He's now at the point where he fears he's more addicted to indexing than he ever was to pornography.

[zil]

2 hours ago, theSQUIDSTER said:

I've also experienced answers to prayer on finding things more than once.  No, the Lord didn't drop the lost item out of the sky into my lap right after the prayer finished.  I had to continue looking for it and then found it fairly quickly after the prayer of faith..  5-10 minutes usually, same as Awakened describes.

Let me be perfectly clear: I did not have to keep looking - the answer to my prayer was the item's location.  In one case, the missing item was lost by my husband (and was his possession), so no, I did not coincidentally remember where I'd put it.

54 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

She read a story about a man who had been struggling with pornography for many years.  But when he got into indexing, he found that the thoughts and desires simply went away.  Every time he had a sexual thought, he'd get on the computer and start indexing.  The joy of indexing was so powerful that even if he accidentally saw a pop-up ad for something inappropriate, he quickly turned on the indexing software and the thoughts were gone.

I am confident that he had help from the other side of the veil when he was doing this work.  I think genealogy work is one of those things that brings such help into our lives.