Five Hindrances to Self-Control

"A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls," Proverbs tells us. Walls around ancient cities were necessary for the survival of its inhabitants. Without such walls, a city was left vulnerable to attack from outside forces. When we fail to exert self-control over ourselves, we are no better off than Jericho after its walls came tumbling down. We all struggle to master and maintain control over one or more aspects of ourselves--thoughts, desires, emotions, physical appetites. Why is self-control so hard? Here are five reasons that we struggle so much with it, five hindrances to self-control:

Hindrance 1: Competing Desires
We are often in the midst of an internal war. We have a love-hate relationship with a thing or a desire or a substance. We don't want to be ruled by this thing, but at some level we don't want to give it up. We don't like the negative effect this thing is having on us--our bodies, our relationships, our spiritual walk--but at some level we are getting a pay-off from indulging in it. A woman who stress eats hates the outcome--she gains weight, her clothes are tight. At the same time, she doesn't want to give up the escape from stress that food provides her. She is unable to get control over her eating because her desires compete. "Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and no city or house divided against itself will stand" (Matt. 12:25).

Hindrance 2: Wrong Motives
We pray for self-control but can't master it because we aren't asking for it for the right reasons. Why do we desire self-control? It's often so we can feel better about ourselves. But God isn't interested in helping us with our self-improvement program. We will find self-control much easier to come by if we desire it in order to make God look good. James wrote, "You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions" (James 4:2-3).

Hindrance 3: Failure to Understand the Destructive Power of Overindulgence
Something beneficial in the beginning will destroy us in the end if we do not exercise self-control over it. But all too often we don't look down the road that far. What we want is immediate satisfaction. Many things provide an immediate fix--an escape from stress, boredom, loneliness--but using God's good creation gifts as anesthesia for life's difficulties won't work for very long. "There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death" (Prov. 14:12).

Hindrance 4: Failure to Know Ourselves
Do you know the things that trip you up, the particular temptations that suck you into the pit of sin again and again? Resisting temptation takes humility. Only the humble can recognize and admit to their weaknesses, and it takes humility to repent of self-sufficiency and to lean on Christ for the exercise of self-control. Paul said, "Let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall" (1 Cor. 10:12).

Hindrance 5: We think self-control should be easy because we are Christians.
"Let go and let God," right? Nope. Anyone who has tried it knows it doesn't work. "But wait a minute. Aren't we supposed to depend on God for everything?" We are indeed. And one of the things we depend on him for is the strength to exercise self-control. All too often we are looking for effortlessness, not strength. The strength God gives is the enabling to overcome, but the enabling will likely require vigorous work all the same. Paul wrote, "I also labor, striving according to his working, which works in me mightily" (Col. 1:29). Paul tells us we are to crucify the flesh--not exactly the picture of a quick and painless death.

If we are struggling to master control over something in our life, perhaps one of these five hindrances is in the way.