43 Bible Verses about desires

But you should exclude the younger widows from the list; for, when they grow restive under the yoke of the Christ, they want to marry,

I, however, say to you that any one who looks at a woman with an impure intention has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

That, I say, is why God abandoned them to degrading passions. Even the women among them perverted the natural use of their bodies to the unnatural;

For this is God's purpose--that you should be pure; abstaining from all immorality; Each of you recognizing the duty of taking one woman for his wife, purely and honorably,

Surely in the past you have spent time enough living as the Gentiles delight to live. For your path has lain among scenes of debauchery, licentiousness, drunkenness, revelry, hard-drinking, and profane idolatry.

Therefore God abandoned them to impurity, letting them follow the cravings of their hearts, till they dishonored their own bodies;

With boastful and foolish talk, they appeal to the passions of man's lower nature, and, by their profligacy, entice those who are just escaping from the men who live such misguided lives.

Pray for us, for we are sure that our consciences are clear, since our wish is to be occupied with what is good.

But sin took advantage of the Commandment to arouse in me every form of covetousness, for where there is no consciousness of Law sin shows no sign of life.

And had you learned the meaning of the words--'I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,' you would not have condemned those who are not guilty.

Those who want to be rich fall into the snares of temptation, and become the prey of many foolish and harmful ambitions, which plunge people into Destruction and Ruin. Love of money is a source of all kinds of evil; and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the Faith, and have been pierced to the heart by many a regret.

Let no one say, when he is tempted, "It is God who is tempting me!" For God, who cannot be tempted to do wrong, does not himself tempt any one. A man is in every case tempted by his own passions--allured and enticed by them. Then Passion conceives and gives birth to Sin, and Sin, on reaching maturity, brings forth Death.

Go and learn what this means--'I desire mercy, and not sacrifice'; for I did not come to call the religious, but the outcast."

First be assured of this, that, as the age draws to an end, scoffers, led by their own passions,

If one of you is deficient in wisdom, let him ask wisdom from the God who gives freely to every one without reproaches, and it will be given to him.

And it was among them that we all once lived our lives, indulging the cravings of our earthly nature, and carrying out the desires prompted by that earthly nature and by our own thoughts. Our very nature exposed us to the Divine Wrath, like the rest of mankind.

Seek this Love earnestly, and strive for spiritual gifts, above all for the gift of preaching. He who, when speaking, uses the gift of 'tongues' is speaking, not to men, but to God, for no one understands him; yet in spirit he is speaking of hidden truths. But he who preaches is speaking to his fellow men words that will build up faith, and give them comfort and encouragement.read more.
He who, when speaking, uses the gift of 'tongues' builds up his own faith, while he who preaches builds up the faith of the Church. Now I want you all to speak in 'tongues,' but much more I wish that you should preach. A Preacher is of more account than he who speaks in 'tongues,' unless he interprets his words, so that the faith of the Church may be built up.

especially those who, following the promptings of their lower nature, indulge their polluting passions and despise all control. Audacious and self-willed, they feel no awe of the Mighty, maligning them,

Together you are the Body of Christ, and individually its parts. In the Church God has appointed, first, Apostles, secondly Preachers, thirdly Teachers; then he has given supernatural powers, then power to cure diseases, aptness for helping others, capacity to govern, varieties of the gift of 'tongues.' Can every one be an Apostle? can every one be a Preacher? can every one be a Teacher? can every one have supernatural powers?read more.
Can every one have power to cure diseases? can every one speak in 'tongues'? can every one interpret them? Strive for the greater gifts. Yet I can still show you a way beyond all comparison the best.

"Believe me," replied Jesus, "a time is coming when it will be neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem that you will worship the Father. You Samaritans do not know what you worship; we know what we worship, for Salvation comes from the Jews. But a time is coming, indeed it is already here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father spiritually and truly; for such are the worshipers that the Father desires.read more.
God is Spirit; and those who worship him must worship spiritually and truly."

That is why, when he was coming into the world, the Christ declared-- 'Sacrifice and offering thou dost not desire, but thou dost provide for me a body; Thou dost take no pleasure in burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin. So I said, "See, I have come' (as is written of me in the pages of the Book), "To do thy will, O God."'read more.
First come the words-- 'Thou dost not desire, nor dost thou take pleasure in, sacrifices, offerings, burnt offerings, and sacrifices for sin' (offerings regularly made under the Law), and then there is added-- 'See, I have come to do thy will.' The former sacrifices are set aside to be replaced by the latter. And it is in the fulfillment of the will of God that we have been purified by the sacrifice, once and for all, of the body of Jesus Christ. Every other priest stands day after day at his ministrations, and offers the same sacrifices over and over again--sacrifices that can never take sins away. But, this priest, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, which should serve for all time, 'took his seat at the right hand of God,' and has since then been waiting 'for his enemies to be put as a stool for his feet.' By a single offering he has made perfect for all time those who are being purified.

How true is that saying! When a man aspires to be a Presiding-Officer in the Church, he is ambitious for a noble task.

And those who belong to Jesus, the Christ, have already crucified their earthly nature, with its passions and its cravings.

They who follow their earthly nature are earthly-minded, while they who follow the Spirit are spiritually minded. To be earthly-minded means Death, to be spiritually minded means Life and Peace; Because to be earthly-minded is to be an enemy to God, for such a mind does not submit to the Law of God, nor indeed can it do so.read more.
They who are earthly cannot please God. You, however, are not earthly but spiritual, since the Spirit of God lives within you. Unless a man has the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ; But, if Christ is within you, then, though the body is dead as a consequence of sin, the spirit is Life as a consequence of righteousness. And, if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead lives within you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will give Life even to your mortal bodies, through his Spirit living within you. So then, Brothers, we owe nothing to our earthly nature, that we should live in obedience to it. If you live in obedience to your earthly nature, you will inevitably die; but if, by the power of the Spirit, you put an end to the evil habits of the body, you will live. All who are guided by the Spirit of God are Sons of God.

This I say, because you know the crisis that we have reached, for the time has already come for you to rouse yourselves from sleep; our Salvation is nearer now than when we accepted the Faith. The night is almost gone; the day is near. Therefore let us have done with the deeds of Darkness, and arm ourselves with the weapons of Light. Being in the light of Day, let us live becomingly, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in lust and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy.read more.
No! Arm yourselves with the spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ, and spend no thought on your earthly nature, to satisfy its cravings.

Mark this, my dear Brothers--Let every one be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry; For the anger of man does not forward the righteous purpose of God.

For you learned with regard to your former way of living that you must cast off your old nature, which, yielding to deluding passions, grows corrupt; That the very spirit of your minds must be constantly renewed; And that you must clothe yourselves in that new nature which was created to resemble God, with the righteousness and holiness springing from the Truth.

Therefore destroy all that is earthly in you--immorality, uncleanness, passions, evil desires, and that greed which is idolatry.

Flee from the passions of youth, but pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, in the company of those who, with a pure heart, invoke the Lord.

Be like obedient children; do not let your lives be shaped by the passions which once swayed you in the days of your ignorance, but in your whole life show yourselves to be holy, after the pattern of the Holy One from whom you received your Call.

Dear friends, I urge you, as pilgrims and strangers upon earth, to refrain from indulging the cravings of your earthly nature, for they make war upon the soul.

Since, then, Christ suffered in body, arm yourselves with the same resolve as he; for he who has suffered in body has ceased to sin, and so will live the rest of his earthly life guided, not by human passions, but by the will of God. Surely in the past you have spent time enough living as the Gentiles delight to live. For your path has lain among scenes of debauchery, licentiousness, drunkenness, revelry, hard-drinking, and profane idolatry.read more.
And, because you do not run to the same extremes of profligacy as others, they are astonished, and malign you. But they will have to answer for their conduct to him who is ready to judge both the living and the dead.

This is what I have to say--Let your steps be guided by the Spirit, and then you will never gratify the cravings of your earthly nature. For these cravings of our earthly nature conflict with the Spirit, and the Spirit with our earthly nature--they are two contrary principles--so that you cannot do what you wish.

I know that there is nothing good in me-I mean in my earthly nature. For, although it is easy for me to want to do right, to act rightly is not easy.

What is the cause of the fighting and quarreling that goes on among you? Is not it to be found in the desires which are always at war within you?