Temptation and escape

Years ago Billy Graham was interviewed by Sir David Frost. He was asked outright, ‘Are you ever tempted by the lusts of the flesh?’

In response he told the following story. 'One of my evangelist colleagues was in Paris some years ago and one night he phoned me. He said that he had been to a Christian meeting and as he walked back to his hotel past some of the seedy night clubs and sex shops of Pigale he felt these powerful temptations to give in . . . He said, "Billy I just want you to know that was the battle that was going on within me last night, but this is what I did. I took the key to my hotel room, locked the door from the inside and I threw the key out of the window so I couldn’t get myself out of the room for the rest of the night. It was the only way I figured I would be able to fight it."'

Then Billy Graham went on to say to David Frost: ‘If you are tempted God has promised to provide a way of escape. If it was Joseph who had to leave his garment behind and flee or this evangelist who locked himself in his room. I tell you the Holy Spirit provides a way for Christians to escape and the world does not know this.’

Ravi Zacharias comments on this topic, 'You see God changes not only what we do but what we want to do . . . The Holy Spirit didn’t miraculously throw the key out of that window, the evangelist had to do that, but it was the Holy Spirit who gave him the desire.'