I'm thankful that the Lord has
brought us together today and no matter what circumstances
brought you here, no matter what circumstances may be hindering
your heart, this morning God's Word is sufficiently able and
willing and certain to break it down and to destroy the strongholds
of your flesh because it has been put to death in Christ. The Word of God trumps our knowledge,
our abilities, our philosophies. The Word of God, by the power
of the Spirit, will take everything that we think we are and destroy
us and make us nothing, that we may become something in Christ. All is yours in Christ, beloved.
There is nothing in this world that is not under or subject
to the Lord Jesus. There is no pain. There is no
suffering. There is no anger. There is no
resentment. There is no bitterness. There
is no sin that is not subject to the Lord Jesus Christ. And
if we are in Him, then now, therefore, as Paul would say, there is no
condemnation. Now there is no condemnation
for those who are in Christ Jesus. But yet oftentimes we can hold
ourselves condemned. We hold each other condemned.
We condemn others because of their actions, their deeds, their
words, their hearts. I'm not talking about correcting
wrong and pointing out wrongdoing and pointing out wickedness.
We're commanded to do such things. But friends, we are not the judge
of the hearts of men. And as Jesus calls us and charges
us, as He does in His Word, as He did with the Pharisees, to
check our own hearts and our own eyes for the logs that so
easily blind us, in order that we might see the specks in each
other's eyes, so that we could help, as Paul would later say,
those who are spiritual. To what? To help each other. To give each other the graciousness
that's been afforded us through Jesus Christ, that we may present
each other blameless and spotless, not just in the church, but most
explicitly in the marriage. As we come this day, God has
you here this day to hear these truths. It is not by happenstance
that you're here. No matter what choice you make,
no matter what decision drove you to be in this seat this morning,
you are here by the divine appointment of God who created all things
with His power and with His Word. And you are here by divine appointment
that you may be able to hear the Word of God and repent and
believe and trust and have a transformation of heart. Or you are here by
the will of God as His child to be encouraged and equipped
and disciplined and pruned. Or you are here as an object
of destruction to see the wrath of God that's coming upon you.
And our prayer this day is that God in His mercy would allow
His Word to open the hearts of all. That you would hear the
Gospel and believe. That you would be saved from
the judgment of God which is just. It's His righteousness. And that we would understand
what kind of Savior we have. What kind of love has been given
to us that we should be called the children of God. And so we
are as the Word teaches. We're here in 1 Thessalonians
chapter 4 this morning. And last week we looked very
rapidly at verses 1 and 2. Today, in rapid succession, we
will look at verses 3 through 8. It will not be thorough because
I don't think we could thoroughly ever exposit this text. That
is why every day, beloved, we are to be in the Word of God.
If you subject yourself as a Christian and subject your ability to walk
in the faith and your interest and investment in the Word of
God, to me, you have failed miserably. What do I mean by that? If all
of your faith is bound up and all of your time in the Word
is bound up in what you come and get in 60 minutes, you are
missing everything. As we gather as the saints each
Lord's Day, we ought to be bringing with us an overflow of the urgency
of our hearts toward Christ Jesus, and that the Word that we've
been diving into, fighting for, the intimacy that we have with
Christ through the Gospel, through the written text, through the
Old and the New Testament, as many like to say, it ought to
be an overflow of these things. When we sing, it ought to be
an opportunity to just let out the joy, let out the fear, let
out the frustration, allow this week that has just burdened us
and broken us and pounded upon us. Now is the time when our
guard is no longer up, but we celebrate together that the victory
is ours in Christ. We don't come here for refueling,
for the hors d'oeuvre. We come here to be satisfied
together and to share with each other the grand meal of God's
Word that we've been digesting all week long. And friends, this text this morning
is one of the most misunderstood texts in a theological sense
when it comes to transmission of the New Testament and translation
into the English. Because as I read this, some
of you are going, that's not what my Bible says. Well, your Bible
is most likely incorrect. Now, I don't want to be frustrating. But the 600 years of Greek translation
from the 15th to the 17th century is not the most impressive. It's not. But we understand how
to read the Bible, we still understand the meaning of the text. And
I say that as a caveat. Do not throw the baby out with
the bathwater, for God's Word is true. And it would do us all good to
study and pound. Get off of Google and get out
the Word of God. Put our study Bibles in the fire
that we might study God's Word with an intense intimacy. Stop
looking at footnotes. Stop looking at narrations, commentaries,
sermons, and let the Word of God preach to your heart. Friends,
we have an epidemic in America. of so-called Christians and so-called
churches and so-called reformed circles. Friends, I predict -
I'm not being a prophet, I'm just being funny - but I will
promise you, if we look 15 years from now, there won't be the
young, the restless and the reformed anymore. For when their heads
are taken from their bodies, even in a metaphorical way, people
will not stand for the written Word of God. They will twist
it. They will abuse it. They will
teach that which they want to hear. And they will gather teachers
to tickle their itching ears. Paul told Timothy that 2,000
years ago, and it's not changed this very day. And when people
throw out thousands of years of debate Because it isn't exactly
the way their Bible prints it. They are no more filled with
the Spirit of God than a rock. But a rock will cry out. You
see? You see how that imagery looks?
So I want to warn you, church. Don't not hear what God's Word
says because you have a predisposition. Because you have an undercurrent
of conspiracy. that there's something amiss
with the Word of God, the Word of God is true. And your spirit
will testify to that fact if you indeed are in Christ today.
You will hear, and you will believe, and you will see, and you will
receive, and you will worship because of God, because of His
grace toward us. Let's look at chapter 4. Let's
just read the first eight verses together and we'll hone in on
verse 3. Finally then, brothers, we ask and urge you, beseech
you, in the Lord Jesus, that as you receive from us how you
ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you
do so more and more. For you know what instructions
we gave you through the Lord Jesus? For this is the will of
God, your sanctification. That you abstain from sexual
immorality. That each one of you know how
to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passions
of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God. That no one
transgress and wrong his brother in this manner because the Lord
is an avenger in all these things. as we told you beforehand and
solemnly warned you. For God has not called us for
impurity, but in holiness. Therefore, whoever disregards
this disregards not man, but God who gives His Holy Spirit
to you." And I cannot believe I'm going
to attempt to do this all today. Because I'm urged, I'm pressed
in my spirit Burdened, if I will, is a better word, to just talk
about sanctification for the next hour. Isn't that what Paul's
talking about? But because Paul then defines
partly some type of sanctification in some area, I would be wrong
to just ignore that or just wait. Next week we're going to talk
about sexual morality. This week we're going to talk... It's not
a word study. That's not what preaching is. Never is it a word
study. Though we study words, I want
to show you what Paul is dealing with here. And I want to stay
true to what the Word of God is teaching in the context of
these verses, of this sentence, of these sentences, of these
clauses, of these prepositions that move from one to the other.
For, for, for, for, therefore, because, if, then, this, It all
works together. God in His wisdom, for some strange
reason, has decided to display Himself through the written communicative
Word. I don't know why. And even as we see in Hebrews, as
He spoke to the prophets, the prophets then told the Word and
then they wrote it down and disseminated it, dispersed it. God didn't have this prophet.
And then when the prophet went to town, all of a sudden there
were like a thousand prophets. There was usually one. And when
there was no prophet, the word of the Lord was not to be found.
And even when they wrote it down, and we see the chronicles of
history. We see the kings of Israel. We
see the nations of antiquity that had the written word. It
became easily an icon. It became easily an artifact. And they stored it away and they
put it in a precious place. They locked it up in a vault,
never to read it, never to hear it. And it took God sending someone
prophetically to go and say, Thus saith the Lord. Do you not
know that the Lord has said, Of course you need to read the
Word of God. Look at what the Lord has said.
He says it still this day. Repent, lest you fall into the
judgment of His righteousness. He gave it to Babylon, He gave
it to Israel, over and over and over and over again, the Assyrians,
everybody. He was constantly teaching His
Word. Friends, we treat our Bible,
we treat the Bible like they did in that day. We have one,
we believe it, we say we believe it, but yet we never invest in
it at all. And yet we stand wishing and
hoping that we could have the power to overcome the things
in our lives. And we think that there's somebody
else that can give us the wisdom that we need. There's some other
place that we can go to. There's some other means. There's
some other book we could read. There's some other podcast I
could hear. There's some other writing. I can find some dead
guy that I can read and get a better understanding. That's not going
to happen. Faith in Jesus Christ alone means
that to the garbage, to the disposal of everything else, we stand
in Him as our sufficient everything. Christ is either all for us or
is nothing to us. We are either in Him fully or
we are not His. There is no such thing as being
more of a Christian. There's no such thing as having
more belief in Christ. We believe or we don't. Now,
can we have strong faith and weak faith? Yes, we understand
that. But it's not more faith. Even Jesus said the disciples
had little faith. It was enough. Weak. We are weak. But Christ
gives us all that we need. And friends, in verse 3, I will
argue with even this that I read this morning, for this is the
will of God, your sanctification. I've looked at every Greek text
that I can get my hands on, and I don't see the in front of will
of God anywhere. But how do we say it in our language?
This is will of God. Now that's Yoda talk. God of
will this is. I mean, you know, we don't understand
that, so we have to put something. But let me help you understand,
this isn't the single, solitary, individualistic, myopic will
of God. This isn't the only thing God
desires of us. You see what I'm saying there?
We don't need to say this is the will to be sanctified. It
is the will of God, but it's not the will of God. You see
the difference? So be careful. Little words are
important, but they're sometimes not that important, and sometimes
they're greatly important. Like in John, John 11. I won't
even go there. But other places where the word
for, instead of but, makes a big difference. One's a contradiction,
and one's a causation. Big difference. And when we translate
those wrong, we change the meaning of the text. So how do we know? We study. to show thyself an
approved worker. We don't just ditto-head what
we know, ditto-head what we read, ditto-head what we hear, and
say we know. We don't know anything. We're just a slave to another
man's ideals. Oftentimes, the Christian church, we're a slave
to other people's study. We're a slave to other people's
prayer. We're a slave to other people's academics. We're a slave
to other people's theology. It's not our own. And in doing
so, we become a slave to other people's faith. And then all
of a sudden, we have a crisis of faith. We go, I don't believe
this junk anyway. Now, what do I believe? You should believe
the Word of God as you study it, as you hear it, as it agrees
with you, as it agrees with the Spirit within you, as we discern
it and discriminate and rightly divide that Word. It's not sometimes
easy. Most of the time it's not difficult,
but never is it really easy. Because when we see that which
is simple, it attacks us to the core of our flesh. So we may
know what it says, then we have to deal with it. Such is the
text today. The will of God for you, beloved,
is your sanctification. And I often start here, and some
of you I've counseled about the will of God over the years. What is it God wants me to do
in this circumstance? Most importantly, you need to
understand that no matter what circumstance, it is always the
will of God for His church to be sanctified. No matter what
we're doing, no matter what details we might need to know and wisdom
from the Lord, even in those circumstances, it is the will
of God that we are sanctified through them. Friends, the Scripture
is replete with example after example and example. Doctrine
after doctrine means teachings after teachings after teaching.
That sanctification comes most and mostly through suffering. We can walk the walk of Christian
moralism when our lives are good. When we hit walls of opposition,
we hit walls of pain, we hit walls of relational problems,
we hit walls of financial issues, when our flesh falls apart and
we don't know where we're going or how we're going to get there,
then and then, mostly, are we truly being sanctified in Christ. That's why all the New Testament
letters are written. to answer the issue of the suffering church,
how they endure. False doctrine comes along, what
does it cause? Suffering. It causes the people
who stand for this to be hated because they're not the norm,
they're not the majority. And as we suffer, not lightly,
but it is light momentary affliction, as Paul would say in 2 Corinthians
4, It prepares us for an eternal weight of glory. We're becoming
more like Christ. For Christ suffered and therefore
we will suffer. It's a guarantee. It's a promise
of God. It's a gift of God. Suffering
is a gift of God. Because it doesn't allow idolatry
to take root in our hearts, church. When we're broken and bewildered
and sometimes just don't know where to turn, we are in a place
where God is mighty and His power is strong. And that none of us
can look in the mirror and say, man, you got it. You did it. You figured it out. We cannot
do that. People who teach that and say
that it is the will of God for us in our sanctification are
Satan's tongue. And I'm not talking about anybody
specific. But I've heard more people teach
those things to me from a pulpit than I've heard people teach
the alternative. It is not about us. We cannot
boast in ourselves. We cannot boast in each other.
We cannot boast in man. We cannot boast except in the
Gospel of Jesus Christ. We are His creation. We are His
fruit. We are the fruit of His work
and His righteousness. And if we are not, then we are
not worthy. The will of God. This is the
will of God. Your sanctification. See, I could preach on that.
What in the world? What is sanctification? In Hebrews
chapter 10 verse 4 it said, For by a single offering He has perfected
for all time those who are being sanctified. And so right there
in that text in Hebrews, we see two places that sanctification
sits. We see sanctification, which
is an eternal, true, present reality, that we are set apart
for God, by God, for the purposes of God, for the will of God,
as a people of God, to reflect God, and all of these things
are true. We are justified in Christ Jesus this very moment,
and there is no more holiness that we can muster in our lives. that would put us any closer
to being holy in the eyes of God through Jesus Christ. It
does not happen. We don't have any ability to
get more like Christ in our flesh. However, though we are standing
sanctified today, though we are justified before Christ, and
I know there are two different things, but friend, for the sake
of this text, just follow it. And if you want some questions,
come on Tuesday and we'll answer those questions. We'll dig in
there if you want to. But we also are being daily renewed,
daily made like Christ, growing, aching, moaning, fighting, striving,
believing. So we're set apart in these ways. Think about this, and this is
the machine gun version. We're set apart as is the will
of God for all those who are in Christ Jesus. We've been set
apart before the foundations of the world in the sense that
God has called us the beloved to Himself. We've been set apart. All who will believe have been
set apart in the knowledge of God. You see that? And that's deep. What's that
mean? You can grow in to understand
that. And as it comes in the text, we'll deal with it. It's
not there right now, so we have to understand that it's all broiled
into the reality of sanctification. We have been set apart. We've been set apart for Him
because He bought us in Christ Jesus. We are set apart to be
made in the image of Christ as Paul teaches the Ephesian church,
the church of Ephesus. And we are to be holy and blameless,
righteous. We've been called and set apart
to not be of the world, but to be of the Kingdom of Heaven.
We are the people of God, so therefore we are not like everyone
else. We are holy, pure, righteous. Not just in standing, but in
pressing, in action. We are not perfect in this life. So part of being set apart is
that we are being made righteous. Sanctification is a standing.
Sanctification is a process. I hate even saying those things.
It sounds so pragmatic. You can't always take the jungle
out of the monkey, folks. And there's a little bit of jungle
still in me. So I don't know how else to phrase that. We are being made in the image
of Christ, though we stand in His righteousness today. Though
we're sanctified. We are set apart. The righteousness
is not ours, but it is Christ Jesus. It is imputed to us. It
is not anything of us. But all of our righteousness,
all of our sanctification, all of that is a reflection of Christ. It's a product of His work. It's
a declaration of the Father's love. And it's certain. Jesus,
as I've said for years, this statement, there are about four
statements that really get me hung by people. And this is one
of them. is that Jesus is not a possible
Savior, but a certain Savior. And that's what the New Testament
teaches everywhere. The will of God for you, beloved,
is your sanctification because Jesus is your certain Savior.
For God's will will always be done. He will seek. He will find. He will save the lost. How? Through the preaching of the
gospel to the ears of the dead. And if it doesn't happen, we
don't believe, he will say. Some of my hypocalvinist brothers
and sisters who like to sit on their holy hands, in their holy
huddles, and never herald the gospel, where is that? That's
wickedness. How God saves is God's business. We do that which is what is revealed
to us. God says, herald the truth of
the good news of Jesus Christ that all men might hear, that
all men might repent, and that all men might believe. And those
who don't, that's in God's hands. And you know what we do for those
who don't? We pray and we preach that they might come to faith
in Jesus Christ. And as we grow, we understand that our set-apartness,
our sanctification, was something that God did to set us apart
from His wrath by putting Jesus in the middle of it. By Jesus,
who had no sin, becoming sin that we might be, not become,
but be the righteousness of God. We are God's righteousness in
Christ Jesus. We are His body. We are His bride. Same thing. We are His wife. We are set apart that we're being
continually made righteous in our flesh, never perfectly, but
always continually. Because friends, when our lives,
keep this in mind, when our lives in our absolute actions, and
even in our absolute thoughts, if we were to measure them and
say, okay, everything that I've thought and done today has been
honorable to Christ, we still have sin. And when we look at it, you notice
how when you grow in the Word, your sins aren't, man, I wish
I could get my anger under control. I wish I could stop being so
frustrated. I wish I could stop saying that
word that I like to say. I wish I could be more active
in my Bible reading and my prayer. You know, this sense of, quote,
omission that people like to talk about. I'm not making light
of it. I'm just, you know, we've titled everything so it can be
put in a book and sold. Nobody wants to read God's Word. I mean, we've got to redo it.
But it's amazing how we grow in those sins that no longer
are there, but then all of a sudden we see in our spirit we're more
of a sinner than we ever were. Because we understand the nature
of our heart, the core of our soul. We understand what happens
inside of us if it were not the grace of God restraining the
flesh and putting it to death in Jesus Christ. If there was
no hope for the glory of God to be given us through Christ,
we would fall into reprobation. We know. And look at the writings. You said not to look at the writings,
but I'm telling you, if you look at the writings of antiquity,
if you look at the early church fathers, if you look at the reformers,
if you look at these people, if you look at Paul's, you don't
even have to go to either of those, do you? We see Paul declaring,
I am the worst of sinners. Not just the worst, he gives
himself the title of chief. El Capitan. Not to be confused
with the update on the apple. He was the grand of all. But
Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, of which I am
the foremost, Paul said. And yet even before Paul was
saved by the grace of God, interrupted by Jesus Christ in a gracious
way, just as God saved Thomas, He just stood there before him
and just gave him faith. Paul said he was blameless before
the law. But then in his latter days,
I would love to see the memoirs of Paul during his last imprisonment. How he probably couldn't. Like
most martyrs, they probably cut off his hands or something. We
don't know. It's not important. But what are our memoirs? What
are we crying out? What are we writing on the tablets
of our hearts and minds this very moment as we reflect on
the nature of the gospel in our own lives? As we see Christ at
work, what are we writing? Friends, you know what it will
look like? You know what it looks like? To the praise of His glorious
grace. That's what it looks like. That's
what it looks like. We don't praise me. We don't
praise you. We don't praise mom and daddy.
We don't praise sister, brother, uncle. We don't praise that book.
We don't praise that ministry. We don't praise that preacher.
We don't praise anybody but God and His graciousness, which is
glorious. We're set apart and continually
being made righteous, though never perfectly, but continually.
How is that possible? Hebrews 9.11, listen to this
text. You don't have to turn there, but just listen to this.
I'm going to read it to you. But when Christ appeared, the contrast
there with, but He's talked about the precepts of Judaism and the
Old Covenant of sacrifices and how ineffectual they were. They
were a picture, a shadow of that which was to come. They never
did anything to atone for sins. Never was the blood of animal
or a sack of flour effective in atoning for sins. It's not
possible. But it was a practice holding
Israel to the picture of Christ. So that when Christ came it would
be, listen, obvious He was the final Lamb. And the true and
only Lamb. He actually is the first Lamb
of effect. He talks about all this. But
when Christ appeared as High Priest of the good things that
have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent not made
with hands, that is not of this creation, He entered once and
for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of
goats and calves, but by means of His own blood. thus securing
an eternal redemption. You see why I say He's a certain
Savior? Christ secured an eternal redemption. For if the blood
of goats and bulls and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes
of a heifer sanctify for the purification of the flesh, How
much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit
offered Himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience
from dead works to serve the living God? Therefore, He is
the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called
may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has
occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed
under the first covenant. For where a will is involved,
the death of the one who made it must be established, for a
will takes effect only at death, since it is not in force as long
as the one who made it is alive." What do we learn when there's
more egos? I'll end up reading the whole letter. I'm sorry. How long am I going to read?
Let's just stop. What's the point? The point is our sanctification
is secure in Christ. Christ satisfied justice. We are guilty. And Christ satisfied
that guilt. Satisfied that righteousness.
Satisfied that justice. Romans 3.21. Look at it. If you
don't believe me, look at it. For the righteousness of God
is manifested, what? Apart from the law. Though the
law and the prophets bore witness to it. What does he say? The
righteousness of God is seen, revealed, manifest, exposed,
effectually observed through what? Jesus Christ. Whom God put forth as propitiation. It's in every English translation
of the Bible that's true. And maybe some that aren't true. Propitiation! God's judgment
is paid, satisfied. There is no more justice that
God will pour on anyone for whom Christ died. Has Christ died
for you today? Do you believe in Jesus Christ
as your eternal treasure, as your eternal hope, as the satisfaction
of the wrath of God. God put forth Christ as propitiation
to be received by faith. This was to display God's righteousness,
for He, what? Forbore, forbared, whatever the
word might be there for you, Sins of old, all those before
Christ that He forgave, that He gave eternal life to, like
Abram, Adam, Moses, Noah, David, and all the other wicked sinners
in the world that we can list. This was to display His righteousness
then, in the days of old, as He forbade sins, and it's to
display His righteousness today. This day, His present righteousness,
His present justice. We walk around and say, we're
not guilty of our sins. We've been forgiven. We've been
forgiven. Hallelujah! Let's be forgiven. But at what cost? God is satisfied
in us because Christ satisfied for us. Don't forget that. God's justice is displayed in
the sanctification of His people through the blood of His Son
Jesus, the righteous, Christ, Christos, the holy, righteous,
sanctified, anointed One of God. For, here we are, this is the
will of God, your sanctification. And that's where it starts, beloved.
We start right there, we're good. Let's just go. But there's more
time, so we'll keep on going. We're sanctified because God
has saved us through Christ Jesus by faith we believe. And now Paul then, not in the
Greek, there's no colon in the Greek, but there's a colon in
the English. Paul begins to give a subject which is sex. That's
his subject. What? Sanctification? Now we're going to go to sex.
Why? Because it is at the core. Listen. It is at the core two
things. Here they are. Number one, it
is at the core one of the most innate realities of the human
body. When you get a certain age, it's
there. Okay? Number two, at the core
is one of the most Disgusting expressions of reprobation that
the human body acts upon. How do we fix those? There's three things. One more.
It was intended to display the gospel of Jesus. So that in our sanctification,
one of the things that Paul was certain that would be an issue
with these new believers is that they would have a problem understanding
what God's will is for their sanctification as it relates
to their sexuality. You see? Because during the Jesus movement
of the hippie generation, sexuality and Jesus Christ came hand in
hand. And they said, God made us to love. We just love. Love
is not sex. Can be. But sexual immorality
is the first thing Paul lists, not just here, everywhere. It's
all over the place. Go to every New Testament letter.
He writes it everywhere. Everywhere. He listed in the
midst of murder, gossip, sexual immorality, thievery, lying,
maliceness, envy, corruption, all that stuff. It's always there.
It was one of the major sins of the church in Corinth that
they not only had people who did not understand that they
should be pure sexually, but also who approved of absolute
immoral sexuality. And so now we've got a problem.
Because we have to be subject to this teaching. For we are
the body of Christ, and if we are to be like Christ, who is
not immoral in His body, we must also learn this. That you abstain from sexual
immorality. We could talk about this all
day. Sexuality is intended for God's glory. He made man and
woman, male and female. He made them. Their union was
not eternal. Their union was temporal. Husband
and wife is a temporary but amazing shadow of the reality of Christ
in the church. Genesis chapter 2 teaches us
that in creation, Ephesians chapters 5 and 6 teach us that in the
apostolic authority of the New Testament, that the gospel and
the church is what marriage is supposed to point to. It's not
about success in the world, three and a half kids, dog, two goldfish,
picket fence, life, will, future, trust fund, Harvard, do it again,
replicate. That's worldliness. That's the
second John 2.15. Don't love that. Because you
cannot love that and love Jesus. It is an impossible thing. You
cannot live for the flesh and for the world and for the culture
and for the glories of men as you live for the glory of Christ.
We cannot do that, beloved. It is impossible. No one can
serve two masters, Jesus said. And every one of us right now
are at war with that. Even in our greatest efforts,
we are at war with that. And we don't even understand
covetousness. We can't even recognize it most
days. We cannot even see it. I wish I could afford to buy
some new shoes for my children. Why? Because the other ones are
just dirty? A little tight? A little tattered? Buy them some
Toms. See how they like that? They're
coming in, putting those three dollar Band-Aids on the blisters. You see what I mean? Why is that
an indicator of success? We can give our children niceties.
Why isn't it an indicator of success that we can pay their
way? Where else in the world does
the body of Christ have such luxury? Nowhere! How about the Lord bring suffering
to our nation to such a degree that when we get up in the morning,
we've got those six pages of John's Gospel, because I've been
keeping them in a bag in my mouth, and that's all I own? Because
that's what I'm going to do. If it starts, I'm going to tear
John's Gospel out and I'm going to hide it. Got to have it. And instead
of worrying about what we're going to eat that day, we're
going to take it out under candlelight before the sun comes up, we're
going to read the Word of God. I wish we had that without suffering,
but ultimately, church, we're probably never going to have
that kind of heart until we suffer and have to have it. Maybe this Word today will strike
us to that. Abstain from sexual morality.
He made sex for a purpose. And we either submit by His power
to the purpose of sexuality, or we reject it and we're turned
over to reprobation. Where do you get that? Romans
chapter 1. There's a lot of Roman stuff
in here today. Romans 1, verse 18, for the wrath
of God, what does it say, is revealed from heaven against
all ungodliness and unrighteousness who by men, who by their unrighteousness
suppress the truth. Paul then says that everything
that we can know about God is plainly seen. Everything that
they know is plainly seen, can be clearly perceived. Even though
they knew Him, they did not honor Him or give Him worship or praise
or thanks or anything. Claiming to be fools, they exchanged
the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal
man and birds and animals and creeping things. Therefore, God
gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity. Listen, beloved. Because they
denied that which they knew was true and did not worship God,
God gave them up. and the loss of their hearts
to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves,
because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshipped and
served the creature rather than the Creator, who was blessed
forever. For this reason, Paul says, God
gave them up to dishonorable passions. Dishonorable passions. That they would do that which
was unnatural with their sexuality. That they would lay with each
other, have sex outside of wedlock. Men would lay with men and women
would lay with women. And that it would become condoned
and it would become something that would be natural among the
world, but unnatural amongst the rule and the authority of
God and His righteousness. God gave them up. The evidence of their distance
between God and them is their immoral sexuality. He gave them up to a debased
mind to do what ought not to be done. All manner of unrighteousness. Not just sexuality. Evil. covetousness, malice, envy, murder,
strife, deceit, maliciousness, gossips, slanderers, haters of
God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient
to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. It's like
a third grade name-calling session. It's awful. Though they know
God's righteous decrees, that those who practice such things
deserve to die. Listen to what happened. You
might say, well, I'm not one that partakes in this. They not
only do them, but they give approval to those who practice them. Our sanctification is seen in
these little lists here. Somewhat. Some small pictures.
A lot of things. My friends, this is a real problem, not just
in our own lives, but in our own culture. And you think bathrooms
are an issue? It's not an issue. It's not an
issue. You think marriage certificates
are an issue? That's not an issue. You know what's an issue? Reprobation
and salvation is an issue. And our lawmakers are reprobate.
Why do we expect anything different? And even the ones who don't act
it are. For the most part. We can't judge the heart. We
can only judge the fruit. You know, very few people who stand
for Christ will remain in public office. I doubt they ever would. In our client. In our current
culture. Climate, not client. The M's
left my mouth. The point is, our bodies are
supposed to be used for honor. and our holiness. And we see
that in verse 4. And this is where some of the
conflict comes in translation. It says that each one of you,
look at it, verse 3, for this is the will of God for you, or
this is the will of God, your sanctification, here's some,
that you abstain from sexual immorality, verse 4, that each
one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and
in honor. Go through that. How many of
you have something about taking a wife in there? Nobody? If we look at this text, the
context of Paul dealing with sanctification is sexuality.
Because it is the hallmark of marriage, the two become one
flesh. No man shall separate. You see
that? Leave your father and mother, cleave together, become one flesh.
No man separate. Here we are. This is what I say. I say this mystery is profound,
but it refers to Christ and the church. That's what Paul says
in Ephesians chapter 5. Therefore, this type of sin,
this type of ignorance, this type of behavior cannot be named,
as he would tell the Ephesian church, among you. You must be
pure. in these things. No sexual immorality. But each of you should know how
to control. What's that? Katsai. Katsai. That's the Greek word there means
to be a master over a slave. Control. Catch. Take hold of. As a master over a slave, take
hold of this thing. Get control of it. Do you think
Paul is saying get control of a wife? No. He's not. He says his own body, the skuos,
wife, is also under the word vessel, tool for the use of.
So let's put this in context here. This text is saying each
of you, in order to not be sexually immoral, so that you can show
you are being sanctified, should be in control. You should be
the master over your flesh, which is a slave to you in Christ Jesus. And your flesh is a body, a vessel,
a bride, a wife. All those words are interchangeable.
And in this context here, when we see it, we need to understand
that according to the other Scripture that I've already referred to,
Colossians 3, Ephesians 5, and Genesis 2, in regard to sexuality,
that this type of purity belongs in the marriage, which is why
some texts talk about a man should take a wife. Either way, just as it says,
in either instance of translation, no matter what the people decided
they wanted to say there, based on all the different inferences
of the words, It means that we, in the power of grace, because
we're sanctified and because we're being sanctified, must
control the lusts of our flesh, not just all the lusts, but explicitly
the lusts of sexuality. And I know some pastors when
he preaches text, because you have to use the word sex 16 times
a minute, We do our children a disjustice
by not letting them read these words. Because there were children in
the early church that heard it. And I'm sure a lot of questions,
what does that mean? Well, just teach them what the Bible teaches
and you'll be fine. But ultimately, the gospel, Paul
says in Romans 1, is the power of God. Peter says, His divine
power gives us all that we need for godliness and righteousness. The Word of God, Paul teaches
Timothy, is everything that the man of God needs to be equipped
to be effective in the work of the ministry. Nothing else. And the same thing is true here.
To be sanctified. Friends, is to abstain from sexual
immorality. Partly. Many things. But this
is dealing with that wholeheartedly. And some people might say, well,
I don't see that problem in my life. Friends, look! Sexuality is an idol in our culture,
even amongst Christians. It's everywhere. We want to look
good, we want to smell good, we want others to notice it. Vanity is closely related to
this innate problem. We're flattered. We're flattered by each other's
attention. And the outcome of what happens
is we need to understand is that the actions of humanity arise
out of the affections of the heart. And if we struggle with
these things, we need to put them to death by the power of
the cross so that we show that we are close to God. If we're close to God through
Jesus Christ, if we've been atoned, if we've been put at one with
God the Father through Jesus Christ the Son, our lives will
represent that placement. You see that? The Scripture says
God has snatched us and transferred us out of death into life, snatched
us out of the domain of darkness into the kingdom of life. Christ
has, what? Bridged the gap. He has closed
the chasm. We have fallen far from God's
glory, short of His glory. We're nowhere near it. Christ
has brought us to the Father and is preparing us for the Father's
presence, preparing us for righteousness. So that if our lives as Christians
do not show that place, then we're not standing in that place.
That's the problem. And we came to this frustrating
rub that's really active in our lives today with the onset of
social media. We really are hearing more and
more and more about this sinful licensure. It's okay. God's grace is amazing. It is
amazing. And it's so amazing. And God's grace is so powerful.
And God's grace is so wise. And God's grace is so loving
that we could all right now stand up and sin in the middle of our
worship service and still be forgiven. But we are compelled
not to do so because we are near Christ. We would dare not do
that easily. But don't say I never would or
you might just. You might say, where do you get
all this proximity stuff? Well, look at verse 5. Where do you get all
these weird things? Not, let me say, see that each
one of you know how to control your body in holiness and honor. Or take control of your vessel.
Which is, if we're going to literally translate it, that's what it
would say. Take control of your vessel. Not in the passion of lust like
the Gentiles who do not know God. So, would that work in the marriage?
Yes, it would work in the marriage. Men, if you take a wife, do so
in holiness and pureness. Not like men in the world who
just take a wife for pleasure and to be property. We know that
that would fit. But either way, we know the intention
of Paul here is to deal with sanctification and purity. And interestingly enough, he
did not write to just the men. He says in verse 4 that each
one of you, despite our misogynistic intentions
in our world today, women read and wrote the Scripture. As a matter of
fact, it was Chloe who told on the Corinthians. Not some holy
elder who was letting that junk go. Just be careful. Don't hear what I didn't say.
Just hear what I said. Not of the passion or the lust
of the Gentiles who do not know God or the lost. What is he saying
there? Don't be like these people. This
is passion. drives them, controls them, makes
them run into this. So the opposite of that is to
flee that, reject that reality, reject that desire, die to the
desires of the lust of the flesh, die. These are the passions of
those who do not know God. God knows His own. Jesus even
says that this is eternal life in John 17, that you know God
the Father and know the Son. And so if we are with God, we're
not distant from God. Those who do not know God are
distant from Him. Hear that. We, as the church, are not distant
from God. And the closer we are, we're
in that proximity, the Lord is near, as we've already learned. We are spiritual. We are spirit-led. And when the flesh comes, listen,
We know what John says, I write these things to you, beloved,
that you may not sin. If you sin, you have an advocate
with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. But he writes
these things that we may not sin. So the intention there is
that we would put to death sin before it comes full blown. When
it rises up, when we're tempted. Do you feel the contrast? Do
you feel the conflict? So where do I stand? In righteousness?
Do I stand in condemnation? No, I don't stand there. Do I
stand in grace? Is it my work? Is it God's work?
How does it work in hand in hand? We continue in the journey of
faith. But we don't take lightly sin
in our lives, church. Paul already said, I want you
to keep doing everything you're doing well. You're doing it well.
I want you to love. I want you to do all these things.
I want you to live for the glory of God. You're doing it well.
And then he brings this to light so that they may be warned that
it's happening, it's going to happen, and it probably might
come up again. Don't let it come in the church and take root and
destroy your witness. Don't let it prove that you are
not in Christ. These are hard things to manage.
We need to work them. We need to labor over these things.
Friends, when we get through here in preaching, it should
disrupt us. You think this doesn't disrupt
my day when I read this stuff? You've got to get weeks ahead
in your study and prayer, because you might hit something that
you're just not going to be able to preach that week, How am I going to deal with this?
Jesse, can you preach? No, I read it too. I mean, you
know. Let's put some distance between
it. And it says they don't know God,
so they live this way. Their sexual desire brings us
attraction that they call love. That's what the world says, but
it's not love. It's fleshly. And he says there in verse 6
that no one treads, gresses, and wrongs his brother in this
matter. And for the life of me, I have
battered that over for months. What exactly, with all the possibilities
of verse 4, how does that land? When I say all the possibilities,
I'm talking about 6 or 7 possibilities of how people like to translate
that one little word. But I tell you that the Word
of God is true and it rings true no matter what. If I sin against
my brother in the matter of wife, then I might be taking his wife.
That would be a transgression against my brother. If I sin
against my Lord and my flesh and impurities, I'm sinning against
my brother because I'm bearing false witness of the gospel on
him and bringing reproach upon the body. So either way it works,
doesn't it? It's not the imperative of the pragmatic. It's the gravity
of righteousness that's at stake here. That's the point. Because
I don't think Paul had any specifics in mind or he would have said,
this is wrong, he's wrong, here's his name, kick him out. I mean,
that's what he does everywhere else. Paul names names. Brother doesn't play. For us
to read them 2,000 years from now, what if some of them got
saved? And we get to heaven, and here's these knuckleheads.
Oh, yeah, you were in the Bible. I guess it worked out for you.
I mean, you know, we don't want to be... But I think Paul, in
a broad sense, wanted to warn these Christians. We sin against
our brother. Don't sin against your brother
this way. Don't sin against your sister this way. Imagine this. Imagine this first century church
with these people who were pagans at the core, who knew not Christ,
who knew not God. The gospel came in power and
with the Holy Spirit. They received it by faith with
much affliction and with great joy. These are the words of Paul.
Then all of a sudden, they're living together, they're intimate,
they're crying together, they're praying together, they're fighting
together, they're preaching together, and they're all together. Well,
friends, you know how we end up with the spouse that we have?
We spend time with each other. So all of a sudden we're spending
time with somebody else's wife, or some other lady in the church,
or some other man in the church that we may be single, all of
a sudden we've got this sin that rises out. It happens. Beware,
church. It happens. Don't sin against
your brother in this way. Do not live in the passions of
your flesh. Put them to death. As the church
became intimate, and as the church becomes intimate, We must guard
against adultery. We must guard against lust. We
must guard against sexual immorality. We must guard against these things
because of our intimacy in Christ. I tell young couples as they're
preparing for marriage, and they do marriage preparation for me,
and after a couple of weeks, if they still want to get married,
you know, there's probably hope for them. But I caution them
about praying together. and studying the Bible together
before their husband and wife, because that builds an intimacy
that could lead to sin, even though it's out of a pure heart.
It's not made for people who are not our spouse in that way.
Does that make sense? There's got to be a guarding
there. That's why the gathering is so safe. Because we'll notice
it. I saw you winking. Who you winking
at? Something in your eye? I mean,
you know. Not make a light of it, but we'll see it. We'll help
each other. You know what, brother? You need
to take that woman as your wife. Don't sit around like that. Don't
lust after someone else's spouse. What happens if we do? We confess
it. We repent. We forgive. There's no sin that
will not be present in the body at some time in history. None! What about murder? Some of us may lose our mind
one day and take a look. We may. I pray that we don't.
But don't say, oh, I never... How do we know? And it may be that it was a Christian
rebelling like David. It may be that it was an unbeliever
posing as a Christian. We don't... We'll figure it out.
But friends, the sins of our flesh are always right there,
ready to jump out when temptation arises. Don't make light of it. And in verse 6, he says, no one
transgresses in his brothers in this manner because the Lord
is an avenger in all these things as we told you beforehand and
solemnly warned you. What does he mean? Those who
live in this way, God will avenge His righteousness against them.
So this idea of being able to be a Christian and just sin how
you want to because you're in grace makes no sense. Because
Paul says here, Paul says in Romans, Paul says to the Galatians,
that God will avenge that which is unholy. He will avenge His
name. He will avenge His righteousness.
He will avenge the false testimony of those who claim to be in Christ,
but who continue to stand in idolatry and adultery and sin
and wickedness and malice. It isn't that it might not happen.
but it should be a rare occasion to which we respond quickly with
repentance, quickly with confession for those who are walking with
us that we might be encouraged to be in Christ, to stand, to
be like Christ, and to pray that God would deliver us from these
temptations and this evil. 4, verse 7, God has not called
us for impurity but in holiness. Paul prayed that this church
would walk in a manner worthy of their calling. And this is
one example he's given them. That they would not walk in impurity,
but holiness. Friends, we are called to walk
with Christ. And it means that we are at the
battle lines every day. Every day, right now, we're at
war with our flesh. We're at war with temptation
to believe, to act, to think, to admit to ourselves and to
our Lord, yes, this text applied to me today. And if it's not sexual immorality,
what immorality is it? There's something in all of us
at some time that we are identifying as sin. Paul says we're not called
to live in it, we're called to die to it. Can we die to it? And the argument usually goes
something like this. Yeah, but nobody's perfect. You
got that right except Jesus. And perfection is such an understated
word. Holy. God's holiness is an intrinsic
display of His worthiness. Why is God infinitely worthy?
Because He's holy. What sets God apart? How is God
able to be the Creator of all things and not be a monocle?
Because He's always right. He's just. He's righteous. He's
holy. And if we don't like it, Paul says, whoever disregards
this is not arguing with me. I'm not arguing with that sermon.
I'm not arguing with that text. I'm not arguing with Paul. We're
arguing with God. I love it when Paul does this. Because he just shuts up my philosophy. All my logic just flushes down
the toilet. Maybe he meant that. Maybe he was talking. Maybe.
Maybe not. I'm not arguing with you, Paul. No, I'm not arguing
with you God. We cannot disregard the reality
that we're called the holiness church. And it's a serious thing
when we brush it off. We disregard not man but God
who gives His Holy Spirit to you. Why would Paul end there?
Because he wants to remind the church that those who hear the
voice of their shepherd Follow it. Those who ignore it, they're
not the sheep. That's the warning He gives.
God will avenge against these things. For the wrath of God
is coming against all unrighteousness, Paul said to Romans. So what is it for you this moment,
this day? Where do you see in your own
life sin? I don't even have to ask that
question, do I? Most importantly, do you see the work of God through
Jesus Christ, the righteous, right now? Is your hope not in
your efforts, not in your righteousness, but in Christ? Is your hope in
the One who gave Himself for you, that you might be free from
the wrath of God? Do you understand the power of
the gospel and sanctification? For it is our only hope, church. And maybe some of us are struggling
to the point where we don't understand salvation. We don't grasp it. We don't embrace it. We just
do church and that's about the end of our faith. Friends, I
wish I could give you the magic words to say. I wish I could
give you the checklist to click. I wish I could give you the letter
to circle, but it doesn't work that way. This moment, as the
gospel of Jesus Christ is clear to you, is the moment that you
believe if you believe. Now you're confused. Believing is knowing, but believing is
trusting. Are you trusting? Are you resting? In your fight against sin, is
Christ already victorious for you? Believe in Jesus Christ as your
Savior, as your hope, as your treasure, as you've seen through
His Word today. We thank You so. We thank You so, Father, for
allowing us to worship today through Your Word. Father, the children and their
decibels, we praise You for them. May we take the Gospel to our
cars, to their little ears, May we pray for each other that
the power of the cross of Christ would be alive in us. We thank You, Lord, for providing
for us satisfaction against Your judgment through Jesus Christ
the righteous. And we thank You, Lord, that
You've given clarity for us to see even those things which are
confusing. Father, help us to be sanctified. Help us to walk in purity. Help
us to reflect the beauty of Your creation of the church. As our
nature is not ours, but Jesus the righteous. As our lives are not ours, but
are found in Him. As our hope is not in us, but
in Your love toward us through Christ. And Father, we thank You for
the grace to believe. We thank You for the Gospel as
it comes to our ears. Help us to be satisfied. Help
us to be content with Jesus. And help us to be content in
our hearts and minds, in our homes, with our spouses, with
our friends, with our family, with our world. Help us to be
patient and loving and selfless as we give of ourselves each
day because You gave Your Son and He gave Himself for our salvation. And it's in His name we pray.
Amen.