Stop Fighting Sin by Staring at It

A common way to fight a bad habit is to make a rule and then think about the rule constantly. Do not check the phone at the table. Do not have the second drink. Do not raise your voice. The rule is good. The constant thinking about it is where things go wrong, because attention fed to a temptation tends to grow it, and Romans 7 explains why.

Paul says that sin seized the opportunity afforded by the commandment and produced in him every kind of coveting. The command itself became the occasion for the desire. This is not a reason to abandon commands. It is a reason to stop expecting the command to do the whole job. A rule can mark the boundary. It cannot supply the wanting that makes the boundary easy to keep.

The practical lesson is to fight sin mostly by attending to something else. If you want to stop reaching for the phone at dinner, the best tool is not a stronger prohibition but a better conversation, a table that is worth being present at. If you want to stop the sharp word, the work is less in biting your tongue and more in filling your mind with what is true and lovely, so that the sharp word has less to draw on when it comes.

Paul's own remedy, in the next chapter, is to set the mind on what the Spirit desires. The rule tells you what to avoid. The Spirit gives you something better to want. In an ordinary week, that means spending less time staring at the thing you are not supposed to do and more time on the things you are made for.