How does God provide the way of escape from temptation (1 Corinthians 10:13)?

Now the Spirit of God has recorded these things for our warning. The true believer is marked by confidence in God, and the more simple and absolute his confidence the better. But it is correspondingly true that he is marked by no confidence in himself, and the more deep his self-distrust the better. It is when we think that we stand that we are in danger of a fall. It is quite another thing when a saint has confidence that "God is able to make him stand" (Rom. 14:4).

And not only is God able to support us, but also He keeps a watchful eye upon us in His faithfulness, not permitting us to be tempted beyond a certain limit. The temptations that confront us are "common to man," or such as "belong to man." They are not of some superhuman sort. And again there is with them an issue, or way out. "Way of escape," might lead us to suppose that we may always expect some way by which we may escape the temptation altogether. It is not that, but that God always sees to it that there is a way through by which we may emerge unscathed at the other side. Temptation may be like a long dark tunnel, but there is always visible the light of day at the further end.

On the one hand the self-confidence of the Corinthians, as of every one else, is precisely the source of danger. In the world as it is, and in man as he is, there must be constant exposure; for evil exists, and an enemy is not wanting to avail himself of it; and the people of God are the especial aim of his malicious activity to dishonour the Lord by their means. If others slumber in unremoved death, those that are alive to God in Christ need to watch and pray. On the other hand they had been tried by no temptation beyond the lot of man: Christ was tried beyond it in the days of His flesh, not only at the end of His service but at the beginning; not only in all things in like manner, apart from sin, but beyond what belongs to man, tempted as He was for forty days in the wilderness. But we can only overcome in our little trials as He in His great ones by dependence on God and obedience of His word which the Spirit clothes with might against Satan. We may and ought to confide in God. If He is faithful who called us to the fellowship of His Son, equally so is He in not permitting us to be tempted beyond measure. It is His power by which the saints are kept through faith, not by their perseverance. Hence with the trial He makes also the issue or escape, and this not by removing the trial but by enabling His own to endure.

How blessed to realize again that in the midst of a world full of testing, such as this is, in which the history of the Church has repeated for us in so solemn a way the history of Israel, in which man has been tested under grace (although that was not the object of grace) as he has been so thoroughly, still with the same result! When we look at ourselves, and think of how little we are able to stand against all the trials of the way, how blessed to realize the limits which the apostle sets to the trial! There is no temptation but such as belongs to man; and then, God is faithful who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able. He is speaking, of course, of a soul in the true condition of conscious helplessness before Him. If we are self-confident, we shall find that the least temptation is something above what we are able; but if we are in a right condition, (which should be the normal one of the Christian,) God will not suffer temptation to he too strong for us, but will with the temptation make the outcome of it also a deliverance in due time, that we may be able to bear it. He adds, significantly, as one great lesson of it all: "Wherefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry." Idolatry was but one feature of that history of Israel, although a notorious one; but for us, is it not, in fact, in a heart that wanders from God which makes in this way, however little conscious it may be, a false god of its own, — is it not in this that all departure from Him, we may say, is found? Here is the root, the basis of it. If God Himself, the God that we know, the God that has been revealed to us, is the God of our hearts, the God whom we serve and follow, how safe and how blessed will be our condition! Christ is the manifestation of God for this, and thus we are indeed far better provided than was Israel in the knowledge of this God who claims our obedience and our affections. What is it for us to depart from One who has revealed Himself to us after this manner?

So that verse 12 presses the faithfulness of God, and that it is upon this only that we can safely depend. If temptation comes to a believer, it is not a completely new thing: others too have been similarly tried, no matter how unusual the thing may seem. But God will not allow one to be tempted above his ability to endure it. Let us therefore remember God's faithfulness, and depend thoroughly upon it. He will provide a way out in His own time, that the individual may have grace to bear it. The important thing here is the confidence of faith in the Living God that is the opposite of self-confidence. We cannot stand alone, but God is able to make us stand.

Verse 13. "There has no temptation taken you," etc. As a prelude to the special exhortation which occupies the remainder of this chapter, we have now a general declaration; first, of the limits of temptation; and, secondly, of the faithfulness of God, as the ready Deliverer of those who in their trials look to Him. The measure of temptation is the human conscience. What man ought not to do he is through his lusts solicited to do by Satan, who works, as the tempter, upon our natural dispositions. The end of temptation is apostasy from God; its means are almost infinite. God, who tempts no man,7 is yet the trier of His children's hearts, and turns the active malice of the adversary to their eventual gain. What the apostle is here plainly teaching is, that there exists in every saint a measure of ability to resist temptation, and that when that measure is exceeded an escape is made8 The fear of God, and that alone, is the certain preservative from temptation under all its forms. His presence is His children's hiding-place; nor will He suffer darkness to invade His light.9 With God, temptations may be borne and turned to joy.1 If not abiding under His shadow, our own strength is as a straw against the tempter's power.2

Verse 14. "Wherefore, my dearly beloved," etc. The special sin and danger to which these saints at Corinth were peculiarly exposed, is now taken up by the apostle as a subject of direct and explicit warning. Of idols, and their intrinsic vanity, he had already spoken in chap. 8. But an idol, though itself a nonentity, is a visible expression of the deadliest of evils. Idolatry, or the habit of false worship, is to be shunned as the chief snare of the tempter. Effectual refuge from its power is to be found only in the service of the living God. In order therefore to guard his brethren the more surely against this all-besetting danger, he turns at once to the chief distinctive act of Christian worship, that by duly meditating on their position and sanctity as partakers of Christ, they might shrink with a readier abhorrence from any fellowship with the way of darkness.

(Vv. 12-14). The Apostle, in searching words, proceeds to apply these warnings to professing Christians. He warns us against the natural self-confidence of the flesh; “Let him that thinks he stands take heed lest he fall”. Let us not think that, because we have partaken of the Supper, we are safe from falling into the grossest sins. But, we are reminded, God is our resource. The temptations that come upon us are common to man, and God never allows us to be tempted without making a way of escape, though, alas, we may neglect the way. “Wherefore”, says the Apostle, “flee from idolatry”. Avoid all that would stir up lust, come between the soul and God, and lead to an outward fall.

Two important statements follow. "Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." This is our responsibility. But how can a believer stand in this world, so dangerous and full of evil? Only by faith can we stand, and faith is confidence in God. As we have no self-confidence, but trust in Him alone and walk in fellowship with Him we shall stand and be upheld. Then there is the blessed comforting statement: "God is faithful." He does not allow that we are tempted above that we are able, but he provides a way to escape. "Wherefore, dearly beloved, flee from idolatry." It meant for the Corinthians the idolatry of heathendom. But there is also a more subtle idolatry. That believer is kept from all idolatry who is wholly devoted to the Lord and who gives to Him constantly the preeminence. Devotedness to God keeps from idols.

64 We can never give the least justification to sin and say, The flesh is in us, and we could not help it; for "there hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able, but will with the temptation also make a way of escape that ye may be able to bear it." The theory of the Christian is this - the flesh should never be discovered but in the presence of God, where it is always in the presence of grace and of holiness too. This is the true power of our walk. It is not any particular measure of attainment; it is simply a man walking according to his communion, who never gets into the weakness of the flesh, for the flesh is known only before God, and not before Satan. When I learn the flesh thus, I drink into the opposite of it, the grace of God, and so go forth in the strength of what is in God, and not in the shame and weakness of - what is in myself.

If you go to Christ about your sins, as if He were to go about them to God, that is not what He does as Priest. The Priest is to obtain grace for me, that I should not sin; He is always there to obtain every needed grace, to help in time of need. It is impossible that a temptation can be too strong for us, for He is faithful not to suffer us to be tempted above that we are able, and we have all the strength of God. We go to the throne of grace, and get what is needed to help in time of need.

Paint the picture as black as you like, yet the limit of endurance is not reached, and never will be, for our text goes on to say, “GOD IS FAITHFUL, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way of escape, that ye may be able to bear it” (1 Cor. 10:13).

Mark, God does not promise a way of escape from the trial, but a way of escape in the trial for the deeply tried mind and heart, so that in this ministration of grace the trial may be borne to the glory of God. What a stay then for poor suffering saints are the words: “GOD IS FAITHFUL.”