By S. Michael Durham
(Third installment on faith)
We have seen thus far that I have a faith problem stemming from my fallen nature. I was born with a heart that says, “I do not want to trust God in the least. I want to trust me.” The temptation in the Garden of Eden came down to whom Adam and Eve were going to trust—God or themselves. Of course, we know how they opted. And as a result we have opted right along with our first parents. We inherited their rebellious nature, and all a man can do is act out of his nature. We were born with a sinful nature that does not have faith in God.
The new birth counteracts our first birth. The new birth is a birth of a new nature. To be born of the Spirit is to be given a spiritual nature that is from above, given to us from our Spiritual Father. In no way does that make us divine, but as the Apostle Peter says in his second epistle, we partake or share or participate in the divine nature. This new nature or new man, as the Apostle Paul called it, has holy affections and desires. It, by grace, can exercise faith in God. To trust in God is standard equipment for the new heart.
In conjunction with the giving of spiritual life is the fact that our old man, that is who we were before conversion, is gone. The Bible says he has been crucified with Christ (Romans 6:6). To put it another way, the old man was my fallen human nature ruled and dominated by sin. When God regenerates the sinner and the sinner puts his trust in Christ, there is a literal conversion or change. A transformation occurs. The principle of sin enslaving and controlling the sinner is broken. The new believer is free to break with sin and no longer do sin’s bidding. He can now obey God from a heart of faith because sin’s power to enslave is gone.
But as wonderful as the gift of salvation is, it is not perfection. That is not yet. The new believer confidently hopes in a day when he or she will be absolutely and completely rid of the corruption of sin. Even the ability to sin will be vanquished. However, until that day we still have a mind and a body polluted. The mind and the body are not sinful, but within them are appetites and desires contrary to the Spirit that still remain. This is the remnant of the fallen human nature, with which we were born. The Bible calls it the flesh.
The Bible describes in Galatians 5:17 that a contention, to put it mildly, resides between the flesh and the Spirit within the Christian. The flesh promotes self and the Spirit promotes Christ. Flesh trusts only one person, self, whereas the Spirit trusts only Christ. So how are we to put our faith in God if we feel this tension between ourselves and God?
Thankfully, the answer is to walk in the Spirit and we will not fulfill the lust of the flesh (Galatians 5:16). We consciously reject faith in ourselves and look to the Savior. This is all Jesus meant when He described the conditions of being a Christian, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me” (Matthew 16:24). Self-denial means I deny myself the right to trust in myself. I refuse to live my life by my own wisdom or strength. This is the key to faith.
One of the most difficult things for the Christian to learn is that he cannot trust God without God’s help. If I trust me to trust God, then it is no more than my flesh trying to meet God’s requirement of faith. The sad fact is that even though I have a new nature and the Spirit of God resides with me, I still am insufficient to trust and obey the Lord. I must look away from myself totally and look to the One who gives faith. Only He can maintain my faith, increase my faith and preserve my faith. Only He can strengthen the faith that He has already given. Faith is still a gift from God. It is a spiritual gift, having spiritual substance. Otherwise faith becomes me straining with my brain to believe God. Sadly, this is what so many Christians think faith is—mere mental assent. If they can hurdle their own minds’ objections and feel like they believe, then they consider themselves to have faith in God.
If you are to have a strong faith, you must have a weak faith in you. Faith that is strong in God is based upon a strong belief in human helplessness. You must be absolutely convinced that without Jesus you cannot even hope to have faith in God. You believe with intention that Jesus meant what He said, “for without Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). Your will must be exercised to renounce any self-sufficiency so that you may receive God’s sufficiency.
Is not this the lesson of nine frustrated disciples who could not cast out a demon from an afflicted child? Did they not pray to the Lord, “Why could we not cast it out?” Note the “we.” They tried to cast out the demon. Contrast that to the prayer that got results. The father of the demonized prayed, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!” He somehow knew Christ could help him to believe. You and I are not faith factories. We do not nor cannot produce faith in God. All we can do is exercise the faith that He gives. Maybe that is why the disciples eventually, after this event, prayed more accurately, “Increase our faith.”
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
The Origin of Our Faith
By S. Michael Durham
(Second installment on faith)
The basic problem we have in the realm of faith in God is our human nature. Our fallenness works against trusting someone else completely. We don’t mind trusting someone as long as we maintain some control, but our Heavenly Father requires absolute trust, which translates as no control on our part. You and I must relinquish command of the situation in order to exercise faith in God. The Lord requires a dependency that relies completely on Him. This way, trust means trust. You really do trust God so that you are able to take your hands off and rest in Him.
But this is not natural to our humanity. And although we are redeemed with new natures we still have fallen human nature, i.e., flesh, which is opposed to the spirit of faith in God. Therefore, our problem is part of us wants to trust God and part of us wants to trust ourselves. How then can we have faith in God?
The answer to this all-important question is found in how we were able to exercise faith in Christ when we were converted. How could a sinner, dead in trespasses and sin, diametrically opposed to God to the degree that he hated God, ever wind up putting his confidence in Him? The answer is grace. God grants to the sinner faith. It is a gift given to all who will believe, otherwise none would believe. In Philippians 1:29 the Apostle Paul says, “For to you it has been granted on behalf of Christ, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake.” What does he mean, “it has been granted on behalf of Christ . . . to believe in Him”? Would it help to know that the word granted is translated from a Greek word that means to give graciously? In other words, it is a gift of grace. To believe in Christ is a gift of grace given to us by God.
Does not the Bible say that to every Christian God has given a “measure of faith”? Are we not told “for by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8)? There is no other explanation for how a God-hating, sin-loving, self-centered, Christ-rejecting sinner can suddenly trust the One he has never trusted. It is a gift of God’s amazing grace. It is part and parcel of what it means to be born again. The new birth is the beginning of a new life. Whereas the old life was full of self-trust and empty of God-trust, the new life created by God is the opposite. It is full of faith in Christ and empty of faith in self.
We can say that faith is a gift given to a person as much as we can say forgiveness is a gift. You did not manufacture your faith in God. You did not just, all by yourself, decide one day to cease your unbelief in God’s promises. Nor did you, apart from God’s grace, decide you could now trust the Lord. It is a part of the miracle we call the new birth.
Someone may ask, “Why then do I still find it, at times, hard to have faith in the Lord if God has given me faith?” Well, the answer may ring a bit with simplicity, but it is, nonetheless, true. The answer is that although God grants faith, you and I must exercise it. God will not do our trusting for us. We are involved in the very act of faith. That’s why Jesus often scolded the disciples for their lack of faith. If He didn’t expect them to exercise their faith but God to do it for them, then Jesus would not have rebuked them. And if that was the way faith worked and Jesus would have censured them, the disciples could have replied that the fault was not theirs but the Father’s since He had not moved them to believe.
God gives us faith but it is ours to use it or not. The measure of faith in Romans 12:3 that Paul says every believer has received, is an ability to trust God and not the very act of faith. It must not be confused with the “gift of faith” listed in 1 Corinthians 12. I must will to act on this ability to trust. It is exactly here that the battle to believe is waged. The flesh will be opposed until we learn how to bring the flesh into submission to the Spirit. How this battle is to be engaged and won will be the subject of our next entry. Until then may the Lord help you to trust in you less and Him more.
(Second installment on faith)
The basic problem we have in the realm of faith in God is our human nature. Our fallenness works against trusting someone else completely. We don’t mind trusting someone as long as we maintain some control, but our Heavenly Father requires absolute trust, which translates as no control on our part. You and I must relinquish command of the situation in order to exercise faith in God. The Lord requires a dependency that relies completely on Him. This way, trust means trust. You really do trust God so that you are able to take your hands off and rest in Him.
But this is not natural to our humanity. And although we are redeemed with new natures we still have fallen human nature, i.e., flesh, which is opposed to the spirit of faith in God. Therefore, our problem is part of us wants to trust God and part of us wants to trust ourselves. How then can we have faith in God?
The answer to this all-important question is found in how we were able to exercise faith in Christ when we were converted. How could a sinner, dead in trespasses and sin, diametrically opposed to God to the degree that he hated God, ever wind up putting his confidence in Him? The answer is grace. God grants to the sinner faith. It is a gift given to all who will believe, otherwise none would believe. In Philippians 1:29 the Apostle Paul says, “For to you it has been granted on behalf of Christ, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake.” What does he mean, “it has been granted on behalf of Christ . . . to believe in Him”? Would it help to know that the word granted is translated from a Greek word that means to give graciously? In other words, it is a gift of grace. To believe in Christ is a gift of grace given to us by God.
Does not the Bible say that to every Christian God has given a “measure of faith”? Are we not told “for by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8)? There is no other explanation for how a God-hating, sin-loving, self-centered, Christ-rejecting sinner can suddenly trust the One he has never trusted. It is a gift of God’s amazing grace. It is part and parcel of what it means to be born again. The new birth is the beginning of a new life. Whereas the old life was full of self-trust and empty of God-trust, the new life created by God is the opposite. It is full of faith in Christ and empty of faith in self.
We can say that faith is a gift given to a person as much as we can say forgiveness is a gift. You did not manufacture your faith in God. You did not just, all by yourself, decide one day to cease your unbelief in God’s promises. Nor did you, apart from God’s grace, decide you could now trust the Lord. It is a part of the miracle we call the new birth.
Someone may ask, “Why then do I still find it, at times, hard to have faith in the Lord if God has given me faith?” Well, the answer may ring a bit with simplicity, but it is, nonetheless, true. The answer is that although God grants faith, you and I must exercise it. God will not do our trusting for us. We are involved in the very act of faith. That’s why Jesus often scolded the disciples for their lack of faith. If He didn’t expect them to exercise their faith but God to do it for them, then Jesus would not have rebuked them. And if that was the way faith worked and Jesus would have censured them, the disciples could have replied that the fault was not theirs but the Father’s since He had not moved them to believe.
God gives us faith but it is ours to use it or not. The measure of faith in Romans 12:3 that Paul says every believer has received, is an ability to trust God and not the very act of faith. It must not be confused with the “gift of faith” listed in 1 Corinthians 12. I must will to act on this ability to trust. It is exactly here that the battle to believe is waged. The flesh will be opposed until we learn how to bring the flesh into submission to the Spirit. How this battle is to be engaged and won will be the subject of our next entry. Until then may the Lord help you to trust in you less and Him more.
Friday, August 7, 2009
I Have a Faith Problem
By S. Michael Durham
(This is the first of a series of blogs on the subject of faith.)
I feel like I am taking a refresher course. Or maybe it’s more like I have multiple times failed the class and must take it again. The lesson is faith, how to trust God in everything. You would think to believe God should be a relatively easy lesson to learn since God has a track record of never playing someone false. He does not lie, He cannot lie. He is completely trustworthy. So what’s the problem? Obviously it isn’t God; it’s me. I’m the problem. There is something wrong with me that I can’t trust the most honest Person in the universe.
Maybe my problem is that I’m an untrustworthy person and I’m judging the Lord based upon my performance. We do that; we often judge other people’s motives by our own motives. I know I can’t always be trusted. I sometimes have ulterior motives and so why couldn’t God have a few? May be He is up to something other than my good because often “my good” hurts. I can’t handle too much of that kind of good. Yet, that seems to be the kind of good the Lord is often dishing out.
Maybe my faith problem is an intellectual problem, meaning I just can’t figure God out. I mean He sometimes asks me to believe Him for things that don’t make sense to me. He requires strange things that appear unreasonable. He tells a 100 year old man he’s going to have a son with his 90 year old wife whose womb never worked when she was younger. And then once the miracle boy arrives a few years later God tells the same dad to take his son and offer him as a human sacrifice on an altar. I’m sorry but it doesn’t compute.
Perhaps my faith issues have stemmed from a problem I have with control. I do like to have my hands on the helm of my ship, if you know what I mean. I’m not so kosher with the idea of someone else doing the driving, especially if I don’t know where we are going. I want to sit down and plan my course. I want to Google map my trip and think of possible contingencies before I head off in any direction. But it seems the Lord has this thing about taking me to places I’ve never been without consulting me or at least letting me see the map.
Or could my faith problem be an odd mixture of all the above? And if so, wouldn’t that be indicative that my real problem is a nature problem? I mean it could very well be that my human nature is fallen and doesn’t like to trust anyone more than me. But don’t take my word for it. Remember, I’ve already confessed I’m not so honest. How about you? Why do you struggle with trusting God?
(This is the first of a series of blogs on the subject of faith.)
I feel like I am taking a refresher course. Or maybe it’s more like I have multiple times failed the class and must take it again. The lesson is faith, how to trust God in everything. You would think to believe God should be a relatively easy lesson to learn since God has a track record of never playing someone false. He does not lie, He cannot lie. He is completely trustworthy. So what’s the problem? Obviously it isn’t God; it’s me. I’m the problem. There is something wrong with me that I can’t trust the most honest Person in the universe.
Maybe my problem is that I’m an untrustworthy person and I’m judging the Lord based upon my performance. We do that; we often judge other people’s motives by our own motives. I know I can’t always be trusted. I sometimes have ulterior motives and so why couldn’t God have a few? May be He is up to something other than my good because often “my good” hurts. I can’t handle too much of that kind of good. Yet, that seems to be the kind of good the Lord is often dishing out.
Maybe my faith problem is an intellectual problem, meaning I just can’t figure God out. I mean He sometimes asks me to believe Him for things that don’t make sense to me. He requires strange things that appear unreasonable. He tells a 100 year old man he’s going to have a son with his 90 year old wife whose womb never worked when she was younger. And then once the miracle boy arrives a few years later God tells the same dad to take his son and offer him as a human sacrifice on an altar. I’m sorry but it doesn’t compute.
Perhaps my faith issues have stemmed from a problem I have with control. I do like to have my hands on the helm of my ship, if you know what I mean. I’m not so kosher with the idea of someone else doing the driving, especially if I don’t know where we are going. I want to sit down and plan my course. I want to Google map my trip and think of possible contingencies before I head off in any direction. But it seems the Lord has this thing about taking me to places I’ve never been without consulting me or at least letting me see the map.
Or could my faith problem be an odd mixture of all the above? And if so, wouldn’t that be indicative that my real problem is a nature problem? I mean it could very well be that my human nature is fallen and doesn’t like to trust anyone more than me. But don’t take my word for it. Remember, I’ve already confessed I’m not so honest. How about you? Why do you struggle with trusting God?
Thursday, August 6, 2009
This Present Evil Age: Worldliness Part Four
by Michael Durham (listen to all four parts of this blog entry by downloading it in MP3 format)
It motivates you to please yourself.
This is the one area, I fear, that has the strongest grip on us. To some degree, all of us are trying to be free from the power of the world. This desire for pleasure is not evil – it is not wrong to want to be happy or experience pleasure. Pleasure is a gift from heaven. But the present evil age perverts the true pleasure with lesser pleasures: Internet, computer, TV, cars, wealth, good friends and families, good homes, good health, hobbies – on and on the list goes; the lesser pleasures are offered to you.
If you are not careful, when you taste the pleasures the world offers, like a drug addict you will want more. You wish to regain the euphoria you felt when you first experienced the pleasures of the world. But the problem is, the pleasures of the world are not long lasting! You must drag an intravenous bottle with you! You must have a constant stream, because the heart becomes addicted to the entertainment of the surrounding culture. So we do what everyone else does: we go into debt for things that will cause us to experience pleasure. That’s the strategy of worldly pleasure: to get you seeking it rather than Jesus Christ.
Our Deliverance
Our text offers our help, “Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil age.” Would you note with me the measure to which Jesus went to offer you help? Not only did He die for your sins, but He also gave Himself up for our sins that He might deliver us from this present evil age.
Some of the things I talked about this morning may have seemed harmless or natural to you. But they must be of great offense to God and so dangerous to your soul that Jesus Christ would go to the cross to die so that He might deliver you from them. His life has been given that He might set you free from these things. Your self-providing spirit cannot handle these things. You sit there thinking, “I believe, now that you have warned me, I can handle these things.” And once again, the present evil age has deceived you. That is simply more self-provision and self-protection.
The only way you can be delivered is to call upon Jesus Christ for His saving mercy to rescue you from the spirit of this present evil age that has your body and soul. Only He can save you! I am talking to the saved as well as the unsaved. He is the only one who has overcome the world. Why would I listen to the spirit of this world in order to find out how to overcome it? That is like listening to the thief tell you how he will not steal you blind!
I want to go to the One who has overcome the world. He was in this world, confronted with things far more difficult than you have been confronted with. Pain? Think about the pain Jesus had to endure as He walked in this world of nothing but woe and problems. How did He withstand? It is an amazing thing. Look at how the world treated Him—with every argument lined up against Him and every weapon they could form aimed at Him. And yet He says, “I have overcome the world.” Finally, the world gets its final wish with Him: they take Him to a place called Golgotha, and there they stretch Him out on splintery, rough-hewn timbers, and there they nail Him and kill Him. And even as the world kills Him, the world does not overcome Him or defeat Him. He alone survives in victory. He defeats it!
If you are a believer today, “greater is He that is in you that He that is in the world!” The very One who has said, “I have overcome,” said to you, “Be of good cheer!” Be hopeful, Christian! You don’t have to continually be deceived by the spirit of this present evil age! There is victory in Christ Jesus!
Dear friend who has yet to know Christ (I would like to believe that you will be saved; please forgive me if I presume upon you that you will one day be a Christian, but I have great hope in God), if the Spirit of God has spoken to you so forcefully you could not help but know it was God, you must say, “I am bound by the spirit of this present evil age. I am preoccupied with myself. I care only for me – even my own family members, I love them, but I love them only in proportion to what they do for me! I promote me or I hide from the world so I can protect me! You have described me – what is my hope?”
Your hope is my hope. Your deliverance is my Deliverer. So I extend to you now the hope of Christ Jesus. Believe in Him, trust in Him, and be saved from this present evil age. Amen.
It motivates you to please yourself.
This is the one area, I fear, that has the strongest grip on us. To some degree, all of us are trying to be free from the power of the world. This desire for pleasure is not evil – it is not wrong to want to be happy or experience pleasure. Pleasure is a gift from heaven. But the present evil age perverts the true pleasure with lesser pleasures: Internet, computer, TV, cars, wealth, good friends and families, good homes, good health, hobbies – on and on the list goes; the lesser pleasures are offered to you.
If you are not careful, when you taste the pleasures the world offers, like a drug addict you will want more. You wish to regain the euphoria you felt when you first experienced the pleasures of the world. But the problem is, the pleasures of the world are not long lasting! You must drag an intravenous bottle with you! You must have a constant stream, because the heart becomes addicted to the entertainment of the surrounding culture. So we do what everyone else does: we go into debt for things that will cause us to experience pleasure. That’s the strategy of worldly pleasure: to get you seeking it rather than Jesus Christ.
Our Deliverance
Our text offers our help, “Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil age.” Would you note with me the measure to which Jesus went to offer you help? Not only did He die for your sins, but He also gave Himself up for our sins that He might deliver us from this present evil age.
Some of the things I talked about this morning may have seemed harmless or natural to you. But they must be of great offense to God and so dangerous to your soul that Jesus Christ would go to the cross to die so that He might deliver you from them. His life has been given that He might set you free from these things. Your self-providing spirit cannot handle these things. You sit there thinking, “I believe, now that you have warned me, I can handle these things.” And once again, the present evil age has deceived you. That is simply more self-provision and self-protection.
The only way you can be delivered is to call upon Jesus Christ for His saving mercy to rescue you from the spirit of this present evil age that has your body and soul. Only He can save you! I am talking to the saved as well as the unsaved. He is the only one who has overcome the world. Why would I listen to the spirit of this world in order to find out how to overcome it? That is like listening to the thief tell you how he will not steal you blind!
I want to go to the One who has overcome the world. He was in this world, confronted with things far more difficult than you have been confronted with. Pain? Think about the pain Jesus had to endure as He walked in this world of nothing but woe and problems. How did He withstand? It is an amazing thing. Look at how the world treated Him—with every argument lined up against Him and every weapon they could form aimed at Him. And yet He says, “I have overcome the world.” Finally, the world gets its final wish with Him: they take Him to a place called Golgotha, and there they stretch Him out on splintery, rough-hewn timbers, and there they nail Him and kill Him. And even as the world kills Him, the world does not overcome Him or defeat Him. He alone survives in victory. He defeats it!
If you are a believer today, “greater is He that is in you that He that is in the world!” The very One who has said, “I have overcome,” said to you, “Be of good cheer!” Be hopeful, Christian! You don’t have to continually be deceived by the spirit of this present evil age! There is victory in Christ Jesus!
Dear friend who has yet to know Christ (I would like to believe that you will be saved; please forgive me if I presume upon you that you will one day be a Christian, but I have great hope in God), if the Spirit of God has spoken to you so forcefully you could not help but know it was God, you must say, “I am bound by the spirit of this present evil age. I am preoccupied with myself. I care only for me – even my own family members, I love them, but I love them only in proportion to what they do for me! I promote me or I hide from the world so I can protect me! You have described me – what is my hope?”
Your hope is my hope. Your deliverance is my Deliverer. So I extend to you now the hope of Christ Jesus. Believe in Him, trust in Him, and be saved from this present evil age. Amen.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
This Present Evil Age: Worldliness Part Three
by Michael Durham (listen to all four parts of this blog entry by downloading it in MP3 format)
It motivates you to protect yourself.
Its motto is, “You must guard your heart, your reputation, your possessions, and your life. You can’t trust that to anyone; it is up to you.” I cannot expose this enough! It is so pervasive because it is so natural to us!
Much of what we call common sense is nothing more than worldly wisdom, the spirit of this present evil age. Therefore, you can be motivated by this spirit and not even know it. Here is the power of the mask: as we learn to take off our masks, you will find something resisting. It is the voice of worldliness saying, “You cannot let people know the real you! You must protect yourself against pain, hurt and rejection!” But, brothers and sisters, that is not the Spirit of Christ. The Lord bids you to trust Him with your life. He will bring pain into your life, and when He brings pain by the rejection of someone you hold dear, trust Him that it is for your good! Why? “What good can there be in that kind of pain, in someone hurting me like that?” you ask.
I can understand the anger of the question, and have only one answer. By submitting to your pain, you understand that your life is not to be something clung to as precious. It is rejection, pain, hurt and difficulty that keeps teaching you your life is not precious.
I don’t know what Tolkein intended to represent when he wrote of the ring of power; I’m sure it meant many things. But to me this morning it means one thing: your life. What will you do? What lengths will you go to, to hold your life as precious to you? That is the spirit of this present evil age. It is worldliness, and it is choking Christ in you. It is so unlike Jesus, who made Himself of no reputation and took upon Himself the form of a slave. God is not against you by introducing you to pain; He is actually trying to protect you against the person you are trying to protect: you!
This same spirit that keeps men from coming to Christ keeps Christians fearful. It can work just the opposite of self-promotion, causing you to hide in order to protect yourself. You don’t let anyone get close to you, and the few people you do allow near you, you manipulate by giving or withholding your love and affection.
Some are kept from Christ, this morning, because the spirit of this present evil age has manipulated you to believe there is some other way besides Calvary. There’s no better place to see this than in John Bunyan’s dream called, Pilgrim’s Progress, which I love. The pilgrim is loaded down with the burden of his sin. Evangelist has sent him to a place called the Wicket-gate, a narrow little gate that leads on a narrow pathway up a hill to a cross. Do you see the imagery? Burdened with sin, the only way to be free is Calvary. But Worldly Wiseman crosses Christian’s path and diverts him from Wicket-gate.
“I would advise thee, then, that thou with all speed get thyself rid of thy burden; for thou wilt never be settled in thy mind till then: nor canst thou enjoy the benefits of the blessings which God hath bestowed upon thee till then,” says Worldly Wiseman to the pilgrim, Christian. Sounds good, doesn’t it?
Christian: “That is that which I seek for, even to be rid of this heavy burden: but get it off myself I cannot, nor is there any man in our country that can take it off my shoulders; therefore am I going this way, as I told you, that I may be rid of my burden.” Does that sound familiar? Is there a load on you, like a concrete block on your chest, which no one has been able to lift?
Wiseman: “Who bid thee go this way to be rid of thy burden?”
Christian: “A man that appeared to me to be a very great and honorable person: his name, as I remember, is Evangelist.”
Wiseman: “I beshrew (condemn) him for his counsel! there is not a more dangerous and troublesome way in the world than is that into which he hath directed thee; and that thou shalt find, if thou wilt be ruled by his counsel. Thou hast met with something, as I perceive, already; for I see the dirt of the Slough of Despond is upon thee: but that slough is the beginning of the sorrows that do attend those that go on in that way. Hear me; I am older than thou: thou art like to meet with, in the way which thou goest, wearisomeness, painfulness, hunger, perils, nakedness, sword, lions, dragons, darkness, and, in a word, death, and what not. These things are certainly true, having been confirmed by many testimonies. And should a man so carelessly cast away himself, by giving heed to a stranger?”
Interesting question, since Worldly Wiseman is himself a stranger to Christian.
What I want you to notice is that Worldly Wiseman didn’t argue that Christian needed to get rid of his sin; he agreed Christian needed to get rid of his sin! But his argument was “You cannot trust the Gospel or the Gospel preacher who gave it to you!”
How many times have you heard that same message? How many times have I proclaimed the Gospel to you? But you heard another voice, an attitude of the heart that said, “Surely, if I can do the same things you all do, then why do I need to go to Calvary and die? Surely if I can learn your doctrine, I shall be rewarded as you! If I can perform and talk as you all do, surely God will accept me in the end!” My friend, that is the spirit of this present evil age! It will damn your soul as it almost did Christian, for when he diverted from the path and took Worldly Wiseman’s advice, his burden got heavier. It increased to the point he was almost to death, until the Gospel preacher came and put him back on the right path.
There is only one thing you need today, and it is not to protect yourself from pain, but to embrace it and let God deliver you. That doesn’t make sense to you, I know. Ask God to illuminate your mind and give you an understanding beyond just intellect. Ask Him to show you what I’m talking about, and He will. Say, “Tell, me, what does this mean, that I must embrace the pain in order that I may live?” He will show you Jesus, dying on a cross for your sins. He will show you a Savior bleeding on your behalf, One who suffered not because He had sinned, but because He was sinless, and thereby could be the only sacrifice for your sin. He will show you three days later, in the empty tomb where they had lay His body—the grave could not hold Him. “Up from the grave He arose, with a mighty triumph o’er His foes!” And you begin to see that when a man accepts God’s way, God will exalt him in due season.
The apostle Peter says in his epistle, “humble yourself, and in due season God will exalt you.” The way up is down! No, it doesn’t make sense, but who asked you to approve of God’s wisdom? Who gave you the intellect that you can discern God’s ways as being right or wrong? Do you have the intellect of God? No, nor do I. But I can testify that I once was lost, but now am found; was blind, but now I see. I was dead; now I’m alive. Can you testify to that? If you can’t, don’t listen to the spirit of this present evil age. It will lie to you all the way to your grave. For that is where it means to send you!
It motivates you to protect yourself.
Its motto is, “You must guard your heart, your reputation, your possessions, and your life. You can’t trust that to anyone; it is up to you.” I cannot expose this enough! It is so pervasive because it is so natural to us!
Much of what we call common sense is nothing more than worldly wisdom, the spirit of this present evil age. Therefore, you can be motivated by this spirit and not even know it. Here is the power of the mask: as we learn to take off our masks, you will find something resisting. It is the voice of worldliness saying, “You cannot let people know the real you! You must protect yourself against pain, hurt and rejection!” But, brothers and sisters, that is not the Spirit of Christ. The Lord bids you to trust Him with your life. He will bring pain into your life, and when He brings pain by the rejection of someone you hold dear, trust Him that it is for your good! Why? “What good can there be in that kind of pain, in someone hurting me like that?” you ask.
I can understand the anger of the question, and have only one answer. By submitting to your pain, you understand that your life is not to be something clung to as precious. It is rejection, pain, hurt and difficulty that keeps teaching you your life is not precious.
I don’t know what Tolkein intended to represent when he wrote of the ring of power; I’m sure it meant many things. But to me this morning it means one thing: your life. What will you do? What lengths will you go to, to hold your life as precious to you? That is the spirit of this present evil age. It is worldliness, and it is choking Christ in you. It is so unlike Jesus, who made Himself of no reputation and took upon Himself the form of a slave. God is not against you by introducing you to pain; He is actually trying to protect you against the person you are trying to protect: you!
This same spirit that keeps men from coming to Christ keeps Christians fearful. It can work just the opposite of self-promotion, causing you to hide in order to protect yourself. You don’t let anyone get close to you, and the few people you do allow near you, you manipulate by giving or withholding your love and affection.
Some are kept from Christ, this morning, because the spirit of this present evil age has manipulated you to believe there is some other way besides Calvary. There’s no better place to see this than in John Bunyan’s dream called, Pilgrim’s Progress, which I love. The pilgrim is loaded down with the burden of his sin. Evangelist has sent him to a place called the Wicket-gate, a narrow little gate that leads on a narrow pathway up a hill to a cross. Do you see the imagery? Burdened with sin, the only way to be free is Calvary. But Worldly Wiseman crosses Christian’s path and diverts him from Wicket-gate.
“I would advise thee, then, that thou with all speed get thyself rid of thy burden; for thou wilt never be settled in thy mind till then: nor canst thou enjoy the benefits of the blessings which God hath bestowed upon thee till then,” says Worldly Wiseman to the pilgrim, Christian. Sounds good, doesn’t it?
Christian: “That is that which I seek for, even to be rid of this heavy burden: but get it off myself I cannot, nor is there any man in our country that can take it off my shoulders; therefore am I going this way, as I told you, that I may be rid of my burden.” Does that sound familiar? Is there a load on you, like a concrete block on your chest, which no one has been able to lift?
Wiseman: “Who bid thee go this way to be rid of thy burden?”
Christian: “A man that appeared to me to be a very great and honorable person: his name, as I remember, is Evangelist.”
Wiseman: “I beshrew (condemn) him for his counsel! there is not a more dangerous and troublesome way in the world than is that into which he hath directed thee; and that thou shalt find, if thou wilt be ruled by his counsel. Thou hast met with something, as I perceive, already; for I see the dirt of the Slough of Despond is upon thee: but that slough is the beginning of the sorrows that do attend those that go on in that way. Hear me; I am older than thou: thou art like to meet with, in the way which thou goest, wearisomeness, painfulness, hunger, perils, nakedness, sword, lions, dragons, darkness, and, in a word, death, and what not. These things are certainly true, having been confirmed by many testimonies. And should a man so carelessly cast away himself, by giving heed to a stranger?”
Interesting question, since Worldly Wiseman is himself a stranger to Christian.
What I want you to notice is that Worldly Wiseman didn’t argue that Christian needed to get rid of his sin; he agreed Christian needed to get rid of his sin! But his argument was “You cannot trust the Gospel or the Gospel preacher who gave it to you!”
How many times have you heard that same message? How many times have I proclaimed the Gospel to you? But you heard another voice, an attitude of the heart that said, “Surely, if I can do the same things you all do, then why do I need to go to Calvary and die? Surely if I can learn your doctrine, I shall be rewarded as you! If I can perform and talk as you all do, surely God will accept me in the end!” My friend, that is the spirit of this present evil age! It will damn your soul as it almost did Christian, for when he diverted from the path and took Worldly Wiseman’s advice, his burden got heavier. It increased to the point he was almost to death, until the Gospel preacher came and put him back on the right path.
There is only one thing you need today, and it is not to protect yourself from pain, but to embrace it and let God deliver you. That doesn’t make sense to you, I know. Ask God to illuminate your mind and give you an understanding beyond just intellect. Ask Him to show you what I’m talking about, and He will. Say, “Tell, me, what does this mean, that I must embrace the pain in order that I may live?” He will show you Jesus, dying on a cross for your sins. He will show you a Savior bleeding on your behalf, One who suffered not because He had sinned, but because He was sinless, and thereby could be the only sacrifice for your sin. He will show you three days later, in the empty tomb where they had lay His body—the grave could not hold Him. “Up from the grave He arose, with a mighty triumph o’er His foes!” And you begin to see that when a man accepts God’s way, God will exalt him in due season.
The apostle Peter says in his epistle, “humble yourself, and in due season God will exalt you.” The way up is down! No, it doesn’t make sense, but who asked you to approve of God’s wisdom? Who gave you the intellect that you can discern God’s ways as being right or wrong? Do you have the intellect of God? No, nor do I. But I can testify that I once was lost, but now am found; was blind, but now I see. I was dead; now I’m alive. Can you testify to that? If you can’t, don’t listen to the spirit of this present evil age. It will lie to you all the way to your grave. For that is where it means to send you!
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
This Present Evil Age: Worldliness Part Two
by Michael Durham (listen to all four parts of this blog entry by downloading it in MP3 format)
How Does Worldliness Work?
The spirit of this present evil age permeates everything our human hands touch. It shouldn’t have sway over us, but it can. It works in accordance with our natural human natures, our personalities and dispositions. That is why it’s so believable! Its deception is so plausible, and we believe the lie!
I hope I’m not shocking you; I’m attempting to reveal and expose this. I believe every one of us have mindsets or belief systems that are, frankly, worldly. I might not even see them as worldly; I might even defend them thinking they are biblical! How can that be? Because worldliness always appeals to your fallen human nature in these four different ways:
1. It presents itself as being concerned for your welfare and provision.
It sounds so sensible – you must provide for you and your family, so good Christians work, burning both ends of the candle having no time for their families or the work of the church. Prayer meetings are missed because you must provide and the Sunday evening service must be missed because you must get up early and go to work. Mothers with young children forsake them and enslave themselves to a company and a boss in order to provide for themselves. And worldly wisdom will even quote the Bible defending it all, “But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever” (1 Timothy 5:8). Very good, spirit of the age! It is true that I am to provide for my family, but I do not trust that I am my family’s provider. It is also written, “Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out the mouth of God.” It is also written, “Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?” (Matthew 6:26).
It is the same spirit that whispers you must control your life, fix all of your problems, fix all the people in your little world, that says something to the effect of, “If it’s going to get done, it’s up to you.” That is the spirit of this present evil age.
It’s true that we are not to be lazy and not always looking to someone else to do our work for us. The Bible does say we are to bear our own burdens. But oh, the spirit of the present evil age, it will accentuate and emphasize the bearing of your own burdens. “You must rely on no one.” “Be your own person.” All of these things are of this present evil age.
1. It motivates you to promote yourself.
We assert ourselves so people will notice and appreciate us. We all do it to some degree. It manifests in many ways: the man who will not be involved in a project unless he leads the project; the woman who must have all the right clothes in all the latest fashions; the teenager who must be popular and in all the right cliques. It even works in the church with Christians who get involved in the work of the church so others can pay attention to their endeavors. They pray not to God but to the people who hear them. They love and care for others not because they really care, but because they want to bolster their reputations among the saints.
Are you offended when no one notices your endeavors or labors? Even slightly offended? Then you should know that the master you serve is not Christ, but the spirit of this present evil age.
Are you preoccupied with what others think of you? It’s the spirit of this present evil age.
Are you ever envious of the promotion of others? That’s the spirit of this present evil age.
It’s all worldliness. It is from these kinds of things we need our deliverance right here in this church! Don’t ever boast in this place – boast in the God who is working in us! Don’t ever forget, we need more deliverance ourselves.
What could you be if you, like Jesus, were concerned to promote only one Person, His Father! Why are you so preoccupied with yourself? Shouldn’t you be obsessed with others knowing Jesus? But how can you, with worldliness in your heart?
How Does Worldliness Work?
The spirit of this present evil age permeates everything our human hands touch. It shouldn’t have sway over us, but it can. It works in accordance with our natural human natures, our personalities and dispositions. That is why it’s so believable! Its deception is so plausible, and we believe the lie!
I hope I’m not shocking you; I’m attempting to reveal and expose this. I believe every one of us have mindsets or belief systems that are, frankly, worldly. I might not even see them as worldly; I might even defend them thinking they are biblical! How can that be? Because worldliness always appeals to your fallen human nature in these four different ways:
1. It presents itself as being concerned for your welfare and provision.
It sounds so sensible – you must provide for you and your family, so good Christians work, burning both ends of the candle having no time for their families or the work of the church. Prayer meetings are missed because you must provide and the Sunday evening service must be missed because you must get up early and go to work. Mothers with young children forsake them and enslave themselves to a company and a boss in order to provide for themselves. And worldly wisdom will even quote the Bible defending it all, “But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever” (1 Timothy 5:8). Very good, spirit of the age! It is true that I am to provide for my family, but I do not trust that I am my family’s provider. It is also written, “Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out the mouth of God.” It is also written, “Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?” (Matthew 6:26).
It is the same spirit that whispers you must control your life, fix all of your problems, fix all the people in your little world, that says something to the effect of, “If it’s going to get done, it’s up to you.” That is the spirit of this present evil age.
It’s true that we are not to be lazy and not always looking to someone else to do our work for us. The Bible does say we are to bear our own burdens. But oh, the spirit of the present evil age, it will accentuate and emphasize the bearing of your own burdens. “You must rely on no one.” “Be your own person.” All of these things are of this present evil age.
1. It motivates you to promote yourself.
We assert ourselves so people will notice and appreciate us. We all do it to some degree. It manifests in many ways: the man who will not be involved in a project unless he leads the project; the woman who must have all the right clothes in all the latest fashions; the teenager who must be popular and in all the right cliques. It even works in the church with Christians who get involved in the work of the church so others can pay attention to their endeavors. They pray not to God but to the people who hear them. They love and care for others not because they really care, but because they want to bolster their reputations among the saints.
Are you offended when no one notices your endeavors or labors? Even slightly offended? Then you should know that the master you serve is not Christ, but the spirit of this present evil age.
Are you preoccupied with what others think of you? It’s the spirit of this present evil age.
Are you ever envious of the promotion of others? That’s the spirit of this present evil age.
It’s all worldliness. It is from these kinds of things we need our deliverance right here in this church! Don’t ever boast in this place – boast in the God who is working in us! Don’t ever forget, we need more deliverance ourselves.
What could you be if you, like Jesus, were concerned to promote only one Person, His Father! Why are you so preoccupied with yourself? Shouldn’t you be obsessed with others knowing Jesus? But how can you, with worldliness in your heart?
Monday, August 3, 2009
This Present Evil Age: Worldliness Part One
by Michael Durham (listen to all four parts of this blog entry by downloading it in MP3 format)
Galatians 1:4
Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father...
We all know worldliness is wrong, but if we know it’s wrong, why are we often so worldly? If you would allow us to examine your personal preferences by looking at your checkbook, your Internet surfing, your TV viewing, your MP3 player, your DVD collection, or your calendar, how would it compare to a nonbeliever’s preferences? Would there be a huge difference, a moderate difference, or little to no difference? It is a fact, brothers and sisters, that if it is anywhere from moderate to no difference, you have fallen into the snare of worldliness.
But there are other ways to fall into worldliness than the snares that I mentioned above. For years, churches have defined worldliness in basically three ways: immorality, entertainment and immodesty. Use of alcohol and tobacco are considered immoral. Entertainment like dancing, attending the theater, music or sporting events have been considered worldly. Growing up, I was taught by my grandmother that playing cards were evil and worldly, no matter the game. The way you were dressed could also be worldly: women not wearing dresses or skirts, or men not wearing long sleeves; yet even within this definition there is a great deal of variance – one church may teach it is alright for a hemline to come to the knee on a lady, while another teaches any hemline above the ankle is sinful and worldly.
My point is not that we get hung up on these things like outward behavior and appearance; on the contrary, if you judge worldliness strictly on behavior, you will overlook many other kinds of worldliness and fail to see the problem of your own heart. Worldliness is more than just behavior. It is possible to avoid all of these questionable things and still be worldly.
What is Worldliness?
How does worldliness affect you, and how can you be free from it? These questions are more serious than trying to recalibrate a list of dos and don’ts.
In our text, the Apostle Paul uses a different word than worldliness; he uses the phrase “present evil age.” In Titus 2:12 he does use worldly when he says, “…teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age.” The Apostle John says to us in 1 John 2:15, “Do not love the world or the things in the world.” These three texts together tell us what worldliness is; there is a harmony of the three even though they give us a slightly different perspective.
In John’s text above, he says clearly, “Don’t love the world.” The question I would like to ask John is, “What do you mean by the word world? Do you mean this globe we call home?” It could almost sound that way when he adds, “or the things in the world.” What could capture our love but things that are in this planet we call home? So, is this a warning about becoming a tree-hugger or an environmental wacko? No, this is not necessarily his meaning. We are to respect God’s creation and we have been given stewardship of this planet, therefore we should not abuse but care for it.
But John is dealing with something much more dynamic than the planet we inhabit. You know that because in verse 16, he goes on: “For all that is in the world – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life – is not of the Father but is of the world.” He doesn’t mention trees, forests, flowers, or any of those things. The focus here is not on the earth, but on a spiritual dimension that inhabits this earth. He calls it “lust” or “desire.”
Your desires are a part of the spiritual dimension that exists. Desires come from the heart or soul and therefore are not physical but spiritual. There are bodily appetites or physical desires, but even these are controlled by the heart or they control the heart. Either way the spiritual dimension cannot be ignored.
Also, the word world in the Greek New Testament is the word kosmos. The word means, the arrangement and order of things. We get our English word cosmology from it, which deals with the study of the universe and its order. We also have the English words cosmetics and cosmetology, which deal with the order and arrangement of a person’s looks. So John is dealing with a system of order that is diametrically opposed to the order of God. In other words, “Don’t love the world’s system of order and arrangement or the things that comprise that system!”
In Titus 2:12, which I cited earlier, Paul says we are to deny worldly lusts. The two words, “worldly” and “lust,” are here linked. Therefore, we can continue on this train of thought that worldliness is something more akin to the spiritual than to our behavior or dress. Evidently there are desires that are in conjunction with this world and its order that we are to deny.
Back to the words present evil age in our text. And even though the word world is not used, clearly Paul is referring to it. If you have the Authorized Version, that is the King James, the word world is used. But the word here is not the word kosmos but aion from which we get our word eons or ages. The Apostle is saying that Jesus has died to deliver us from the present work of evil in our times. What is the present work of evil in our times? And the answer is the same as 1 John 2:15; it is the present system or arrangement of evil that exists. To call it culture is not enough because this thing is larger than culture. Culture is a part of it, but not all of it. You can’t call it society for the word society simply means, a collection of people living as members of a community. There is nothing necessarily evil in that. So what is it? Again, we are back to the word spiritual or spirit.
This present world is manipulated by a spirit that the Apostle Paul calls the “spirit of the world.” He says in 1 Corinthians 2:12, “Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.” Here we see that this thing called the world is a supernatural and spiritual dynamic. Again the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 2:2, “you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience.”
It is interesting that the word course, “the course of this world,” is the same word in our text for the word age, aion. But it is also interesting that this age or course that the world is going in is also the same thing as “according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience.” That is why John says, “the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one” (1 John 5:19).
Worldliness has to do with a spiritual dimension, and it penetrates us at the level of spirit. Therefore, I think we can come to this definition that will help us to understand worldliness over this series of messages:
Worldliness: a spiritual principle that works contrary to God; an evil spirit; the power of Satan working in human order and arrangements. It is the pursuit of anything in this world, good or bad, by one’s own hand for one’s own satisfaction, rather than Christ.
Any institution, order, arrangement, such as philosophy, arts, government, religion – all can be infiltrated and manipulated by this spirit of this present age, a spirit that loves anything but God.
You see, worldliness is not just immorality. It can also be a morality that does good things. It can be very religious or very spiritual. Some do what they do to make God happy with them; that is worldliness. You could have entered into this service today having your own agenda or motives that didn’t include the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, and if you did, you are right now being worldly. There is a spirit that loves things other than Christ. That is worldliness. It is a spirit that is part of the present course this world is on, and it motivates everything in this world, standing in contrast to the Spirit of Christ which we are to submit to.
Worldliness is a love for your own self, looking to the world and the things that it offers to satisfy you. We can be gripped by it and not even know it.
Galatians 1:4
Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father...
We all know worldliness is wrong, but if we know it’s wrong, why are we often so worldly? If you would allow us to examine your personal preferences by looking at your checkbook, your Internet surfing, your TV viewing, your MP3 player, your DVD collection, or your calendar, how would it compare to a nonbeliever’s preferences? Would there be a huge difference, a moderate difference, or little to no difference? It is a fact, brothers and sisters, that if it is anywhere from moderate to no difference, you have fallen into the snare of worldliness.
But there are other ways to fall into worldliness than the snares that I mentioned above. For years, churches have defined worldliness in basically three ways: immorality, entertainment and immodesty. Use of alcohol and tobacco are considered immoral. Entertainment like dancing, attending the theater, music or sporting events have been considered worldly. Growing up, I was taught by my grandmother that playing cards were evil and worldly, no matter the game. The way you were dressed could also be worldly: women not wearing dresses or skirts, or men not wearing long sleeves; yet even within this definition there is a great deal of variance – one church may teach it is alright for a hemline to come to the knee on a lady, while another teaches any hemline above the ankle is sinful and worldly.
My point is not that we get hung up on these things like outward behavior and appearance; on the contrary, if you judge worldliness strictly on behavior, you will overlook many other kinds of worldliness and fail to see the problem of your own heart. Worldliness is more than just behavior. It is possible to avoid all of these questionable things and still be worldly.
What is Worldliness?
How does worldliness affect you, and how can you be free from it? These questions are more serious than trying to recalibrate a list of dos and don’ts.
In our text, the Apostle Paul uses a different word than worldliness; he uses the phrase “present evil age.” In Titus 2:12 he does use worldly when he says, “…teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age.” The Apostle John says to us in 1 John 2:15, “Do not love the world or the things in the world.” These three texts together tell us what worldliness is; there is a harmony of the three even though they give us a slightly different perspective.
In John’s text above, he says clearly, “Don’t love the world.” The question I would like to ask John is, “What do you mean by the word world? Do you mean this globe we call home?” It could almost sound that way when he adds, “or the things in the world.” What could capture our love but things that are in this planet we call home? So, is this a warning about becoming a tree-hugger or an environmental wacko? No, this is not necessarily his meaning. We are to respect God’s creation and we have been given stewardship of this planet, therefore we should not abuse but care for it.
But John is dealing with something much more dynamic than the planet we inhabit. You know that because in verse 16, he goes on: “For all that is in the world – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life – is not of the Father but is of the world.” He doesn’t mention trees, forests, flowers, or any of those things. The focus here is not on the earth, but on a spiritual dimension that inhabits this earth. He calls it “lust” or “desire.”
Your desires are a part of the spiritual dimension that exists. Desires come from the heart or soul and therefore are not physical but spiritual. There are bodily appetites or physical desires, but even these are controlled by the heart or they control the heart. Either way the spiritual dimension cannot be ignored.
Also, the word world in the Greek New Testament is the word kosmos. The word means, the arrangement and order of things. We get our English word cosmology from it, which deals with the study of the universe and its order. We also have the English words cosmetics and cosmetology, which deal with the order and arrangement of a person’s looks. So John is dealing with a system of order that is diametrically opposed to the order of God. In other words, “Don’t love the world’s system of order and arrangement or the things that comprise that system!”
In Titus 2:12, which I cited earlier, Paul says we are to deny worldly lusts. The two words, “worldly” and “lust,” are here linked. Therefore, we can continue on this train of thought that worldliness is something more akin to the spiritual than to our behavior or dress. Evidently there are desires that are in conjunction with this world and its order that we are to deny.
Back to the words present evil age in our text. And even though the word world is not used, clearly Paul is referring to it. If you have the Authorized Version, that is the King James, the word world is used. But the word here is not the word kosmos but aion from which we get our word eons or ages. The Apostle is saying that Jesus has died to deliver us from the present work of evil in our times. What is the present work of evil in our times? And the answer is the same as 1 John 2:15; it is the present system or arrangement of evil that exists. To call it culture is not enough because this thing is larger than culture. Culture is a part of it, but not all of it. You can’t call it society for the word society simply means, a collection of people living as members of a community. There is nothing necessarily evil in that. So what is it? Again, we are back to the word spiritual or spirit.
This present world is manipulated by a spirit that the Apostle Paul calls the “spirit of the world.” He says in 1 Corinthians 2:12, “Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.” Here we see that this thing called the world is a supernatural and spiritual dynamic. Again the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 2:2, “you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience.”
It is interesting that the word course, “the course of this world,” is the same word in our text for the word age, aion. But it is also interesting that this age or course that the world is going in is also the same thing as “according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience.” That is why John says, “the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one” (1 John 5:19).
Worldliness has to do with a spiritual dimension, and it penetrates us at the level of spirit. Therefore, I think we can come to this definition that will help us to understand worldliness over this series of messages:
Worldliness: a spiritual principle that works contrary to God; an evil spirit; the power of Satan working in human order and arrangements. It is the pursuit of anything in this world, good or bad, by one’s own hand for one’s own satisfaction, rather than Christ.
Any institution, order, arrangement, such as philosophy, arts, government, religion – all can be infiltrated and manipulated by this spirit of this present age, a spirit that loves anything but God.
You see, worldliness is not just immorality. It can also be a morality that does good things. It can be very religious or very spiritual. Some do what they do to make God happy with them; that is worldliness. You could have entered into this service today having your own agenda or motives that didn’t include the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, and if you did, you are right now being worldly. There is a spirit that loves things other than Christ. That is worldliness. It is a spirit that is part of the present course this world is on, and it motivates everything in this world, standing in contrast to the Spirit of Christ which we are to submit to.
Worldliness is a love for your own self, looking to the world and the things that it offers to satisfy you. We can be gripped by it and not even know it.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
God's Design in Grace - Spurgeon
"Who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will."—Ephesians 1:11.
OUR belief in God's wisdom supposes and necessitates that He has a settled purpose and plan in the work of salvation. What would creation have been without His design? Is there a fish in the sea, or a fowl in the air, which was left to chance for its formation? Nay, in every bone, joint, and muscle, sinew, gland, and blood-vessel, you mark the presence of a God working everything according to the design of infinite wisdom. And shall God be present in creation, ruling over all, and not in grace? Shall the new creation have the fickle genius of free will to preside over it when divine counsel rules the old creation? Look at Providence! Who knoweth not that not a sparrow falleth to the ground without your Father? Even the hairs of your head are all numbered. God weighs the mountains of our grief in scales, and the hills of our tribulation in balances. And shall there be a God in providence and not in grace? Shall the shell be ordained by wisdom and the kernel be left to blind chance. No; He knows the end from the beginning. He sees in its appointed place, not merely the corner-stone which He has laid in fair colours, in the blood of His dear Son, but He beholds in their ordained position each of the chosen stones taken out of the quarry of nature, and polished by His grace; He sees the whole from corner to cornice, from base to roof, from foundation to pinnacle. He hath in His mind a clear knowledge of every stone which shall be laid in its prepared space, and how vast the edifice shall be, and when the top-stone shall be brought forth with shoutings of "Grace! Grace! unto it." At the last it shall be clearly seen that in every chosen vessel of mercy, Jehovah did as He willed with His own; and that in every part of the work of grace He accomplished His purpose, and glorified His own name.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
You'd think we'd have it down by now...
Christ came nearly 2000 years ago. He is the express image of God (Hebrews 1:3), and revealed to us fully who God is and how God is to relate to man. Within the first one-hundred years of Christ's death and resurrection, the knowledge of Him had spread far from Israel through his Apostles and the early church. Through Paul and the dispersion of Christians from Israel, Christianity was shared and told to people from Africa to Asia to Europe.
The works of the New Testament were completed within the first century and copied and passed from church to church. The early church continued the work of the Apostles. Writings emerged from the disciples of the Apostles and beyond. Centuries later, the innovations in papers and ink allowed information to be passed from one person to another, and with the printing press, the Bible, early church writings, and the writings of great church leaders could be distributed to the masses.
In our day, we are flooded with information. The average family may own several copies of the Bible, books explaining Biblical themes, access to commentaries, devotional materials, and study guides like no other time on this earth. Through our current technology, we can read the Word of God, instantly see the original languages and explanations of what the words mean, see what anyone and everyone has had to say about a passage from the early church until now, and then get interpretations on how it should be applied.
The question then comes: don't we, in the year 2009, have an advantage the early church does not? It has been nearly two thousand years since Christ came, so should we not be further along in our Christian walk than those in the first century? They did not have the vast resources and two millennia of learning that we enjoy. So why does it seem that we are further behind than they? Why does it seem like every Christian starts from scratch, and, while all our accumulated knowledge and study aids are of great help, in the end we have not progressed any further than those who did not have these things?
The answer is that many times we are pursing the wrong thing. For most of us, Christianity is about realizing that we are sinners and at odds with the standards of God, getting right with God, and now living the life that God has called us to live. We are now new people, and thus we must live like it. We have to strive to do good and please our God and Father. Sound familiar? But what is often lacking is the true thrust of Christianity and that is a relationship with God that is cultivated over the course of our lives. Upon conversion, we are introduced to Him by the Holy Spirit through the person of Christ. After conversion, we set out on a path to please Him by trying to live up to what He has done for us. The problem is we can't. I repeat, WE CAN'T. And it becomes and endless cycle of trying hard, and failing, trying hard, and failing, trying hard and failing.
But a relationship with God provides us with all we need as we spend time with Him and He begins to work the life of Christ through us. It's kind of funny how when two people spend a great deal of time with one another, they often pick up each others' characteristics. We need to spend time developing a relationship with our Heavenly Father so that we too pick up the characteristics of the divine. In Philippians 3, Paul said, "I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death..." Paul's aim was to know Christ. It wasn't to do better or try hard to live up to a new standard. His goal was to continue to grow in his active relationship with His Lord and Savior. And he prayed that for those he preached to as well.
So if it seems that every Christian starts from square one in the Christian life in spite of all that has been learned and compiled over the past two-thousand years, it's because developing a relationship with God takes a lifetime, and during our time on this earth pursuing Him with a dependency that builds as we continue our pilgrimage. A young man our young woman, in anticipation of getting married, may surround themselves by teachings, wise council, and hundreds of books about the marriage relationship. And while those things may be of great value and help, they must start at square one the day they get married and begin a lifelong relationship with their husband or wife that will grow and develop over the years, just like married couples have been doing for quite a long time. The same is true with our Christian life. We may have an advantage in an information rich culture, but the relationship building process remains the same. We must all start by pursuing Him, desiring Him, and treasuring Him above all. Then we continue on our pilgrimage, getting to know Him, the person who is the one true living God. That relationship is true Christianity.
The works of the New Testament were completed within the first century and copied and passed from church to church. The early church continued the work of the Apostles. Writings emerged from the disciples of the Apostles and beyond. Centuries later, the innovations in papers and ink allowed information to be passed from one person to another, and with the printing press, the Bible, early church writings, and the writings of great church leaders could be distributed to the masses.
In our day, we are flooded with information. The average family may own several copies of the Bible, books explaining Biblical themes, access to commentaries, devotional materials, and study guides like no other time on this earth. Through our current technology, we can read the Word of God, instantly see the original languages and explanations of what the words mean, see what anyone and everyone has had to say about a passage from the early church until now, and then get interpretations on how it should be applied.
The question then comes: don't we, in the year 2009, have an advantage the early church does not? It has been nearly two thousand years since Christ came, so should we not be further along in our Christian walk than those in the first century? They did not have the vast resources and two millennia of learning that we enjoy. So why does it seem that we are further behind than they? Why does it seem like every Christian starts from scratch, and, while all our accumulated knowledge and study aids are of great help, in the end we have not progressed any further than those who did not have these things?
The answer is that many times we are pursing the wrong thing. For most of us, Christianity is about realizing that we are sinners and at odds with the standards of God, getting right with God, and now living the life that God has called us to live. We are now new people, and thus we must live like it. We have to strive to do good and please our God and Father. Sound familiar? But what is often lacking is the true thrust of Christianity and that is a relationship with God that is cultivated over the course of our lives. Upon conversion, we are introduced to Him by the Holy Spirit through the person of Christ. After conversion, we set out on a path to please Him by trying to live up to what He has done for us. The problem is we can't. I repeat, WE CAN'T. And it becomes and endless cycle of trying hard, and failing, trying hard, and failing, trying hard and failing.
But a relationship with God provides us with all we need as we spend time with Him and He begins to work the life of Christ through us. It's kind of funny how when two people spend a great deal of time with one another, they often pick up each others' characteristics. We need to spend time developing a relationship with our Heavenly Father so that we too pick up the characteristics of the divine. In Philippians 3, Paul said, "I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death..." Paul's aim was to know Christ. It wasn't to do better or try hard to live up to a new standard. His goal was to continue to grow in his active relationship with His Lord and Savior. And he prayed that for those he preached to as well.
So if it seems that every Christian starts from square one in the Christian life in spite of all that has been learned and compiled over the past two-thousand years, it's because developing a relationship with God takes a lifetime, and during our time on this earth pursuing Him with a dependency that builds as we continue our pilgrimage. A young man our young woman, in anticipation of getting married, may surround themselves by teachings, wise council, and hundreds of books about the marriage relationship. And while those things may be of great value and help, they must start at square one the day they get married and begin a lifelong relationship with their husband or wife that will grow and develop over the years, just like married couples have been doing for quite a long time. The same is true with our Christian life. We may have an advantage in an information rich culture, but the relationship building process remains the same. We must all start by pursuing Him, desiring Him, and treasuring Him above all. Then we continue on our pilgrimage, getting to know Him, the person who is the one true living God. That relationship is true Christianity.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
2009 Conference Promo Video
On September 12, 2009, one of the most unique conferences to come to Paducah will be held at the Luther F. Carson Center. It will be a time to sharpen your mind, humble your heart, strengthen your backbone, and be blown away by the power of Christ's gospel.
The essential theme is the Gospel of Jesus Christ as it is presented Biblically. Over 200 years of man's tinkering with the gospel in America has left it crippled, at best. The deception has been so subtle and so gradual, that many can hardly distinguish modern Chrisitianty from that as preached by Paul, Peter, and the rest of the Apostles. Where did it go wrong? What is the gospel in our modern world? What does a Christian really look like?
We look forward to seeing you at the Carson Center on September 12 at 10am as we put forth answers to the most important questions facing the American church.
Please register at realtruthmatters.com - seating is limited.
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