This Sunday we begin an 11-week journey through the scriptures on what marriage is supposed to look like. If we can faithfully live out God’s intentions for this relationship, we can almost certainly do it in any other. Please don’t miss this opportunity to be challenged, affirmed, and encouraged by what God has to say about all human relationships, but especially about marriage.

That’s the difference I think between managing and killing sin. When we manage it, we wait until after what is done has been done. Then we pray, we cry, we repent…but it’s done. What I have rarely heard in a decade of ministry, from myself or anyone else for that matter, is that when I prayed to Jesus, in that very moment of sin or when I was about to sin, I still sinned. Because generally, if your heart and mind are turned to Him, the very urge for the false savior that this sin is posing as begins to fade away. I hope this is bringing clarity and not further confusion.

You see, if you have been raised with Christ (which I believe you have or you wouldn’t be concerned with killing your sin), then He is truly the power that dwells in you. And if He is that power, then you must call on Him in the very moment that you feel powerless against the sin that is crouching at your door, not after it has already won the fight. From what I see in scripture, and what I’ve learned about people over these years, that is the only way we can truly kill sin: to attack it, minute by minute, moment by moment, with the power of Jesus, by calling on Him in every moment to not only show us how to kill it, but in that very moment, to give us the strength to do so.

To answer this question, I’ll start with why I didn’t give a “how.” The danger in telling people what to do after they are confronted with the gospel and all of its implications on their lives is that we—all of us—have a tendency to take those things and make them into law. Then they turn into a means to modify our behavior, but never really deal with what is at the heart of why we are sinning. The reason we sin is because some part of us has ceased to trust Jesus, not only as Savior, but also as Lord. But, if I say at the end of a message, “Now here is how you kill sin,” it doesn’t build our trust in Him, it just gives us a way to not do something that displeases Him.

Courage Is Not Always Measured by the Ability to Win; It Is More Often Measured by the Ability to Sacrifice

The gospel writer John says, “They took Jesus and flogged him (19:1)…And the soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on his head (v.2)… They…struck him with their hands and plucked the hair from His beard]….Then Jesus went out, bearing his own cross (v.17)…[And] they crucified him (v.18)…When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his garments and divided them (v.23)…After this they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it to his mouth (vv.28-9). When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, ‘It is finished,’ and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit” (v.30). And after all of this “one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water” (v.34).

At any moment, during any part of this ordeal, Jesus could have destroyed all those who were attacking and oppressing Him. He’s God! He has ultimate power and authority! He is preeminent in all things, and in all things He is supreme! And yet, He did nothing to defend Himself, nothing to fight back, nothing to win. Was He afraid to fight back? No, He said, “No one takes My life, I give it away.” Was He unable? No, He could have at any moment combated their attack with all the power of heaven in His hands. But, He chose the path of sacrifice, and in this He showed what is truly courageous.

Do you always have to win? With your employees or employer? With your kids or your spouse? Do you always feel it necessary to win because you can, and if you don’t, then you wouldn’t be showing courage? Next time you encounter conflict, remind yourself of the most courageous man to ever walk the earth. He didn’t have to win, because in sacrificing Himself, He’d already won. True courage is, more often than not, measured by the ability to sacrifice.

Courage Is Not Always Measured by the Ability to Win; It Is More Often Measured by the Ability to Sacrifice

I was recently invited to participate in an event as the guest speaker, and I said these words to a group of young men there. The event was called Camp Grace, a camp specifically for under-resourced inner-city children. Many of the kids were from right around my neighborhood here in Atlanta, so it was a privilege to get to speak to them because who they become will not only affect their lives, but it may affect mine as well.

For them, these words have meaning because in their neighborhoods it is the strong or most violent that is counted as courageous. The one who “Don’t take not $#!@ off of nobody.” But, if I could just get them to see that true courage is not always being able to win the fight, the argument, or the conflict by force, then it could fundamentally change how they interact with each other, and the other kids in their neighborhoods.

Jesus is the perfect example of this type of courage and strength.

When is the last time you read the gospel account of Jesus’ death and crucifixion? When is the last time, if you are a Christian, that you have taken in and meditated on all that Jesus suffered, not only in the actual crucifixion, but also in everything leading up to it?

This isn’t just about watching porn or telling lies; it’s not that simple. Just because you don’t do certain things that are considered taboo or sinful, doesn’t mean that the world and the ruler of it is not fighting against you or influencing you. Your pride for not doing certain things is just as venomous and destructive to glorifying God as the one who can’t stop giving in to lust.

But the follower of Jesus has been given the power to overcome, to master the world by the power of the Holy Spirit. God doesn’t mean for us to just survive the onslaught, nor does He mean for us to take pride in our ability to religiously abstain from certain things while worshipping our ability to do so. No, we have been given victory, and that victory is our faith in the One who paid the price for the win.

As a follower of Jesus we have a promise in verse [4] of 1 John 5 that everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. Everyone who has God’s seed, God’s breath of life, has received the gospel, acknowledged their adoption and been filled with the Holy Ghost overcomes the world!

This means that we are not bound by lust! We are not bound by perversion! We are not bound by low self-worth! We are not bound by a need to achieve! We are not a slave to our past! We are not a slave to our sin! We are not a slave to pride! We are not weighed down by guilt! We are not weighed down by the lies of the enemy! We are not a slave to what they say about us or what somebody did to us! And we have nothing to fear from the powers of hell, death or the grave because we have the seed of God, the breath of life, the Holy Ghost and we are free! By faith we overcome the world and receive the victory that ends in the promise of eternal life.

This is the declaration of the Lord, that the victory that has overcome the world— [is] our faith. God has deposited something of Himself in you, and you have victory by faith! You are an overcomer by the power of God and your trust in Him! He that is in you is greater than he that rules over this world or the ones he uses!

“44 No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day. 45 it is written in the Prophets, ‘And they will all be  taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me….47Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. 48 I am the bread of life….and 51I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

Following Jesus’ saying

52 The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”

And Jesus responded

53 “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me.

And what follows Jesus final statement is at the heart of so much of post-modern faith that it is daily exchanging the truth for the lie about God, who He is, and how He has revealed Himself.

60 When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?”

It is a HARD saying…who can listen to it? Apparently not many. How do we know this, because they killed Jesus for this and many hard sayings, and it seems that many today are covertly and overtly killing Him over again by misinterpreting, misrepresenting, and misappropriating scripture to make it say what they wish, because the saying is hard, so they refuse to believe it…even though they purport to be Christians.
I recently read this article. You will have to go and read to understand the nature of the remainder of this post.

As I read it I was saddened and confused at this blatant abuse of the scriptures, and their twisting it to be interpreted the way the author wished because the author can’t or won’t reconcile God’s grace and benevolence with the hard sayings regarding how those outside of Jesus will spend eternity. Below is my response which I felt made a fitting blog post.

Though I see the point he is attempting to make, it is derived from a blatant isolation of this particular text apart from those that precede it as well as those that follow it. With that said, even looking at it in the isolated manner by which you present it, it still does not say what you are attempting to make it say. Sorry to be so direct, but the “truth,” which is absolute and not to be placed on the sliding scale of post-modernity, is that you have misappropriated scripture to make your point thus making it say what you wish.

To the point–this scripture is delineating between Jews and Gentiles, not “non-believers and believers” this is not only a biblical interpretation of the text, but a historical one as well.

This is, as was often the case in many of Paul’s arguments, an argument for the salvation of the Gentiles [Romans, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, Ethiopians etc.] over and against any adherence to the law, which the Jewish Christians were at the time trying to force on them. Issues such as but not limited to: dietary restrictions, circumcision, celebrating the Jewish feasts, etc.

Paul’s argument was clear…they have the law on their hearts, and a conscience given them by God, by which they will be judged. In that way, you were correct, but in that way only. You see the point Paul is making is that they don’t need to adhere to the law [of God given by Moses] to be saved in Jesus, why? Because their conscience, and the law God has “written on their hearts,” have compelled them to Jesus, so following [as explained above] the law is immaterial to their salvation.

The lynch pin in this text? “By Jesus Christ” that’s how God is going to judge. Don’t quote this verse for your purposes and forget to dissect that little phrase, for without it you lose everything, and without Jesus you lose everything. This leaves no room, no way, but One. And rationalizing around it brings us no closer to understanding the truth or who God is.

Regarding the closing, “Everyone must take this journey of faith for themselves, however they conceive God to be.” We must conceive God in the manner in which He has revealed Himself or we will as Romans 1:25, which precedes the verse you manipulated, “exchange the truth about God for a lie.” I write this in love, but with truth, as a brother, and I hope you receive it as such.

I end this post as I did the comment that has made up the bulk of it. I write this in love, and in hope that we will stop seeking wiggle room for the hard sayings of the bible, and reconcile them in the character, nature, and love of our good and gracious Father, and what He has done for us, His rebellious creation, in Jesus.

This is the lynch pin, because He chose us before the foundation of the world, and in love, He predestined us for adoption. So we are predestined, chosen, and adopted.

Before time itself existed, before the Evil one turned in pride from God to his own works, before this world was even created, before Adam and Eve were ever created, before the unveiling of creation itself…God chose His children.  Now, I want to slow down, and pause, so that you absorb the great, cosmic, joy laden words of Paul here…so that you can soak in what is being communicated here. As far back as imagination will allow, further, deeper into time, before the dawn of time, it was there that God chooses us.   Are you feeling the very tangible weight of such a statement? Do you understand all of the implications of this; that the Father chose us before He even created us? What a glorious realization!

What a wonderful, good, loving, merciful, gracious Father! We don’t have to earn, or merit, or work for His choosing, but He is simply pleased to choose us in Him. God’s choosing to save, choosing to die in the Person of Jesus, choosing His children from among humanity was not an arbitrary or whimsical decision. He planned for Jesus to die before Adam ever rejected Him. This is huge! This is the tension between His great transcendence and His accessibility, as He flexes His eternal authority and unstoppable love in the dimensions of time! This marks the security of our adoption, and though we are difficult children, He will never give us back.

During one of my pastorate before moving to Atlanta to plant Renovation I met a family in our church who had two adopted son’s, and two biological daughters. Their son’s were from New Orleans, and when they found out that I grew up in Baton Rouge, and had family in New Orleans, they were very excited to introduce me to their son’s. These two boy’s suffered horror’s as children that no person, let alone a child should ever have to experience. They suffered through sexual abuse, verbal abuse, physical abuse, and forced incestuous behavior with each other. Needless to say they were extremely broken…which made them extremely difficult children.

Growing up with their adopted parents the boy’s had done everything you could imagine, in fact when I met them the youngest had just finished a short stint in a juvenile detention center for drug and battery charges. At one point things got so bad that the father removed the family’s two daughters from their own home to a grandparents, because they feared what the boy’s might do to the two girls, but didn’t want to give up on the boy’s.

Rather than sending the boy’s away, or giving them back to the state, their father gave up his and his wifes biological children for a time, so that they, through the power of the gospel, could rescue these boy’s. They never gave up, they never gave them back, though these were difficult, no, more than difficult children to parent. They made extraordinary sacrifices to keep these children, to show them gospel love…and grace…and mercy. They pursued, and kept these boy’s despite the many complications it came with!

The truth is, that all of us who are in christ, are “difficult children”.  We are resistant often, “prone to wander…prone to leave the God we love”—-And yet, God will not give us back.  He will not give up on us.  His commitment to us is unbreakable.  An imperfect God…and imperfect Father would give us back.  A God with weak commitments would be done with us….but not “The God” of the bible…the God who exists (in reality),creates, and saves.

Some of you have experienced a father’s failed commitments to you, time and time again…and yet, our paternal God demonstrates his unshakeable commitment to us. That he would break into time, to keep his promises to us in Christ. God orphaned His Son Jesus on the cross, to make us orphans no longer. This is the power of His “other-worldly” love, and the wonder of His mercy and grace in securing our adoption.

So some of you are thinking, what do I do with this truth? I implore you to consider not what to do, but who to be. God wants His children to be all of these things described. Secure in Him. Secure in His promises. And consumed by His love. Once you figure out who you are in Jesus, what to do flows out of that identity…and in Jesus you are the child of the living God.