Not every desire is good. Whether a desire is good or bad depends on where that desire comes from. There are the desires of our sinful nature, which Paul says are obvious because of their fruit:
When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunken- ness, wild parties, and other sins like these. (Gal. 5:19–21 NLT)
These desires are aligned with the desires of the world. These worldly desires have wreaked havoc on individual lives, marriages, churches, communities, companies, cultures, etc., and because of this, the church has distanced itself from desire altogether.
Scripture says that “each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed” (James 1:14). Another source of desire is the demonic realm. Have you ever had an all-of-the-sudden, out-of-context strong desire? Sure you have. Urges like pornography, leaving your marriage, getting drunk, quitting, committing suicide, or hitting someone. At that moment the desire feels so real, but many times, when you stop to really think about it, it is completely irrational. There is a story in the New Testament of a couple who had sold some land, intending to give the proceeds to the apostles for the church (Acts 5:1–11). Scripture says that Satan influenced their hearts so that they secretly kept part of the proceeds, declaring to have given it all. In other words, Satan introduced a desire in their hearts that they followed, and the results weren’t good. Years ago, while traveling to speak to a group in another state, I had an overwhelming desire to look at pornography. I had not seen anything to trigger this idea. The desire was out of the blue and relentless. After a long period of battling with this unholy desire, trying to silence it without success, I realized that this was not from me. When I turned from resisting my heart to resisting the Adversary, the desire left. It was a diversionary tactic from the Enemy to dull my heart, both to God and to my calling.
