Temptation Journal

To fight sinful passions we need to grow in our awareness of temptation. The purpose of keeping this journal is to grow in such awareness. Think about this exercise as gathering intelligence regarding an enemy. The more we know about the strategies being used against us, the more effectively we will be able to counter them.

The instructions are as follows:

• Buy a cheap notebook or use a notepad on a digital device.

• Log any specific temptation that you feel to indulge a sinful passion e.g. lust, pride, envy, greed, gluttony, sloth, anger, sloth, malice, etc.

• Write a brief description of the temptation e.g. At 1:15pm I felt a desire to objectify a woman at work. Be sure to log what you did with the temptation: (1) gave into it; (2) prayed for help; etc.

• At the end of the day use your temptation journal to spend a few minutes in prayer. Confess any sins that were committed using Psalm 51 as a template for confession. Also, thank God for any strength that you experienced to fight sin.

• Extra coaching tip: look for repeated patterns of sin and temptation. Talk about these patterns with your band of brothers at small group meetings.