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Category: Sin (Page 2 of 4)

Divorce & Remarriage: Part Four

July 5, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Before I post the next section of our “Divorce: It’s Going to be OK” sermon from last Sunday at Central, let me direct you to this story in USA Today detailing the successful efforts of Blue Bell Ice Cream to identify the woman who licked the top of a container of Tin Roof last week and placed it back inside a store freezer. It happened in Lufkin, Texas. Behind the Pine Curtain. What’s wrong with those people? It’s sickening to me that somebody would do this in the first place but, more than that, it’s ludicrous that she and her friend would record it and post the video to the internet. More proof, as if we needed any, that the internet in general and our iPhones in particular are making us worse people, not better.

Also, please be aware that you can buy Little Debbie Christmas Tree cakes now in the middle of the summer. It’s a special promotion they’re calling “Christmas in July.” And please do not be surprised that I am participating.

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God forgives all sin through the cross of Christ –

“You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly… God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!” ~Romans 5:6-10

Divorces cause many burdens: physical, emotional, sexual, and social burdens. And, of course, spiritual burdens. Well, yeah. Divorce is sin. There are consequences for disobeying God. With divorce, there’s a guilt because we’ve failed at this most important relationship. But God forgives us and restores us by offering his perfect Son to cover our imperfections. At the cross, we’re made perfect in God’s eyes despite our many failures, including our failures in marriage. We look to the love of God and the cross of Christ.

We’ve tried legislating divorce and remarriage by laws and rules. So if a person destroys a God-ordained marriage and can’t fix it, we impose some type of punishment or restitution. If you’re going to be forgiven by God and live in a righteous relationship with God — if you’re going to be OK — then you have to do this and you cannot do that. We try to deal with divorce through laws. Praise God, he deals with divorce at the cross!

The cross of Christ is an eternal symbol of God’s limitless love and amazing grace. When we are forgiven at the cross, we become perfect by God’s love and grace and we are completely released from the burdens of guilt and shame and fear and we’re also released from any requirement to make some kind of restitution. The Church has forced divorced people to stay celibate, we’ve forbidden them to remarry, we’ve demanded they dissolve their second marriages, and we’ve disfellowshipped people who wouldn’t or couldn’t pay those prices.

Know this: Jesus Christ is the only one who pays the price. Jesus Christ makes restitution for all the sins of humanity at the cross and that includes restitution for divorce. Jesus paid it all!

“I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more!” ~Hebrews 8:12

We do not offer judgment or condemnation to the world or to each other. We gladly offer the cross of Christ. We don’t fix past sins by adding new ones. Sometimes you truly cannot go back and change what’s done. But you can commit to, in our Lord’s words, go and sin no more. All of us can claim complete forgiveness and perfect pardon through the atoning death and resurrection of Christ and work hard to remain from now on faithful to whatever vows we’ve made.

A church that is anchored in the love of God and the cross of Christ is a church that can say to a couple in crisis, “Don’t divorce; stay married.” We can say to the divorcing couple, “Repent of this sin against your family and against God.” And we can say to the divorced, “God loves you; he’s not angry with you; you are forgiven by God in Christ.”

There will be some who accuse us of preaching cheap grace. My response to that is God’s grace is better than cheap; it’s free!

“The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” ~Romans 6:23

“It is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God!” ~Ephesians 2:8

There are some who say you can’t be forgiven for divorce and remarriage if you’re already a baptized Christian when it happens. There’s forgiveness if your divorce was before you became a Christian, but if you were already a Christian you knew better. You can’t be forgiven of that. You’re living in sin.

Really? Go back and read Romans 5:6-10.If baptism into Christ forgives a pre-Christian divorce and remarriage, how much more! If God’s grace is freely given to his enemies, how much more for his children! The idea that Christians receive less grace and forgiveness than non-Christians cannot be our guide. The idea that Christians receive less grace because we understand God’s will better distorts grace. All God’s children have grace. Grace has no value if it doesn’t forgive sin. Romans 8 tells us there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus!

Peace,

Allan

I Trust You Now

June 25, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Lord Jesus, I believe that you are able and willing to deliver me from all the care and unrest and bondage of my Christian life. I believe you did die to set me free, not only in the future, but now and here. I believe you are stronger than sin, and that you can keep me, even me, in my extreme of weakness, from falling in its snares or yielding obedience to its commands. And Lord, I am going to trust you to keep me. I have tried keeping myself, and have failed, and failed, most grievously. I am absolutely helpless. So now I will trust you. I give myself to you. I keep back no reserves. Body, soul, and spirit, I present myself to you as a piece of clay, to be fashioned into anything your love and your wisdom shall choose. And now I am yours. I believe you do accept that which I present to you; I believe that this poor, weak, foolish heart has been taken possession of by you, and that you have even at this very moment begun to work in me to will and to do of your good pleasure. I trust you utterly, and I trust you now.

~Hannah Whitall Smith

The Only One Who Frees

August 21, 2018 / / 0 Comments

We are a free people. Our freedom is a done deal, it is our reality. And that freedom we enjoyed is delivered by Christ Jesus. Christ has set us free. Christ has set you free. We are free. You are free. Because of Christ and Christ alone. Jesus is the only one who frees.

And we do enjoy our freedoms, don’t we?

Freedom means a lot of different things depending on who you talk to and where and when you talk to them. Freedom means being able to vote in a democratic election. It means being able to read a newspaper the government’s not controlling. It’s being able to choose your own profession or your spouse or your religion. Freedom can also be the absence of oppression — social or economic or political. When a tyrannical dictator is overthrown or an unjust law is overturned, that’s freedom. A driver license and a set of car keys is freedom. We can be freed in a psychological sense by being healed of past wounds or by breaking through emotional barriers. Freedom is what all people aspire to and value. It’s something all humans have in common whether we’re talking about freedom from a cruel government or freedom from shopper stalkers in the furniture store.

When the Bible talks about being set free or freedom as a state of reality, it’s about freedom from our slavery to sin and our slavery to self and our slavery to the world.

“Jesus Christ gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age.” ~Galatians 1:3-4

Our sins – this is about us. Present evil age – this is about the structures and values and ways of this fallen world. We are in bondage to these things and Jesus is the only one who sets us free.

“We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin — because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.” ~Romans 6:6-7

“Thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. You have been set free from sin!” ~Romans 6:17-18

“Now that you have been set free from sin… the benefit you reap leads to holiness and the result is eternal life.” ~Romans 6:22

“There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free!” ~Romans 8:1-2

In Christ. By Christ. Through Christ. Because of Christ. Jesus Christ is the only one who frees. So for all who are in Christ, we are free indeed! We are free from sin, free from guilt, free from condemnation, free from punishment. We’re also set free from the grip this world has on us and we’re freed from the clutches of the devil himself.

The Bible talks about the worldly powers and the rulers of hell being stripped of their clothes and weapons — they’re humiliated by Christ’s work on the cross. We are freed from the kingdom of darkness to walk eternally in newness of life. We were lost, but now we’re found. We were dead and gone, but now we’re alive forever. We were in chains to sin and to self and to the world, but now we are free!

In Christ Jesus it is already accomplished. In Christ Jesus it is already done. No matter what things look like or feel like around you, this is your reality. It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.

Peace,

Allan

More Than Enough Power

May 22, 2018 / / 0 Comments

98.6 is your normal sitting body temperature. It is also our youngest daughter Carley’s four-year cumulative GPA at Canyon High School. Carley was recognized last week for the fourth straight year as a Superintendent’s Scholar, awarded to all students who finish a school year with at least a 95 grade point average. They gave her another cord to wear at this Friday’s graduation. That makes almost a dozen. Her posture will be out of whack and her neck will be super sore after Friday night.

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We’re in the beginning stages of a sermon series from Galatians in which we are stressing that the Good News of salvation from God is “Christ Alone” — nothing more, nothing less. And we made the argument last week that Christ Alone is about his power.

Our salvation from God in Christ is about the power and the authority to create and restore, his power to save, his power to move us from one state of being to another, to move us from this present evil age to the eternal age of salvation and life, from the control of the world and its structures to the merciful control of our good and faithful God.

Galatians shows us that we are moved by Christ out from under the control of the enemy into the loving control of God’s Spirit. We are rescued from slavery and moved by Christ into a state of freedom. It’s not about when one age ends and the other begins — they both exist at the same time. It’s about control. It’s about the power. Who’s running things for you and your world?

“Through the Law I died to the Law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” (2:19-20)

“Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the Law, locked up until faith should be revealed… Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the Law.” (3:23-25)

“We were in slavery under the basic principles of the world. But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under Law, to redeem those under Law, that we might receive the full rights of sons… So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir… Now that you know God — or, rather, are known by God — how is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable principles? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again? (4:3-5, 7, 9)

“It is for freedom that Christ has set us free! Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” (5:1)

“May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything; what counts is a new creation!” (6:14-15)

Maybe you feel trapped. Maybe you feel like a powerless pawn in a cosmic game of chess or chance that you don’t have any control over. It feels like something’s got you. Maybe it’s an external force, maybe it’s an internal compulsion — something’s got you. And you’re in a cycle. A bad cycle that just keeps repeating over and over, around and around. These patterns can only be broken when the ultimate authority and power steps in to pull you off that awful treadmill. Christ alone has that power. His death and resurrection pulls off the ultimate rescue and sets us free. So not only does Jesus deal with your past, but we’re all under a gracious control that empowers us for the present and the future.

“Christ Jesus gave himself for our sins” (1:4). Can you begin to comprehend the extraordinary radical thing that is?

Jesus has stepped in and taken our place. He has assumed our responsibility. He’s taken on our failures. We don’t have to languish in our guilt, we don’t have to suffer with remorse. Christ died for your sins and you don’t need to hang onto them anymore. Christ alone gives us the grace and the power to live in freedom and eternal life today!

Christ Alone — nothing more, nothing less. Nothing subtracted from that and nothing added to it. Christ Alone — to the glory of God the Father for ever and ever. Amen.

Peace,

Allan

Holy Sex

May 31, 2017 / / 6 Comments

“It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him. The Lord will punish men for all such sins, as we have already told you and warned you. For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life.” ~1 Thessalonians 4:3-7

Of the many ways that holiness or sanctification impacts us, Paul focuses on sex. Why? In this particular context, with this specific group of Christians, as far as the apostle is concerned, this is the definition of holiness: Avoid sexual immorality. Why?

Think with me about this first century Hellenistic society in Thessalonica. There’s no real connection between religion and morality. The culture was such that as long as you provided for your wife and you didn’t abuse her physically, it didn’t really matter who you had sex with. No big deal. In this culture, as long as nobody got hurt, anything goes — wherever, whenever, whoever. Culturally, socially, mistresses, concubines, even religiously. Consider what was happening down the street at First Aphrodite Church: Naked priestesses and temple prostitutes — pagan worship rituals were based on and drenched in sex.

Now these brand new Christians are meeting in Jason’s house in Thessalonica for songs and prayers, words of encouragement and a meal. And these new converts to Christ have no understanding of a right or wrong way to behave sexually. This was the main issue for Christians back then.

And it’s the main issue for Christians in the United States today.

We live in a completely sexualized culture. I don’t have to tell you, I don’t have to point it out. It’s everywhere. And don’t think for a minute it’s not a problem in your church. In this country, three out of every four 4-year-olds has his or her own iPad or some kind of device with a search engine. We’re throwing our youngest into the line of fire and calling it good. In middle school, what they’re nonchalantly sharing with each other on Instagram and Snapchat is disturbing. The clothes we let our daughters wear — it’s a problem.

If the statistics are even close — recent surveys of church-going Christians in the U.S. — 77% of the men in your church are looking at pornography at least once a month. Thirty-five percent of the married men in your church have had an extra-marital sexual affair. Christians! Us! I’m not telling you this to point fingers, I’m telling you this so maybe we can get a better grip on the scope of the problem. We live in a hook-up culture where cohabitation before marriage and casual sex outside marriage are normal and we’re carrying easy and ready access to pornography in our pockets. That’s a problem.

How we behave sexually has everything to do with our Christianity. The two are very much connected. Paul shows us that “holy and honorable” are the opposite of “passionate lust.” He points out that “passionate lust” is self-centered and concerned only with my needs and my desires. “Holy and honorable” is concerned with what’s best for others.

Look at the contrast. The heathen don’t know God and they’re sexually immoral. They don’t control their bodies. If you do know God, you don’t act that way.

We know God. And that obligates us to honor him. With all of ourselves. With our bodies.

God’s will for us — to be holy, to be sanctified — is to enjoy sex only within the confines of holy marriage. Anything else — anyone else, anywhere else, anywhen else — is driven by passionate lust and self-seeking desires and it’s not holy.

But, look, my girlfriend and I are having sex. We’re going to get married in a couple of years but, yeah, we’re having sex right now. I have to have sex. We can’t wait that long. I’m a 21-year-old red-blooded American male. What am I supposed to do? If we don’t have sex, I’ll be forced to use pornography to relieve the situation. We either have sex before marriage or I have to go to porn. I’ve got to do one of the two. I don’t have a choice.

Yes, you do have a choice! In the name of Jesus and by the power of his Holy Spirit, you have lots of choices! How about abstaining? How about bringing your personal urges and personal desires into subjection to the lordship of Jesus? How about you and your girlfriend declaring together that Jesus is Lord over your sexuality, over every square inch of your bodies that he created and saved for his holy purposes?

We don’t talk about sex anymore in church because our culture tells us it’s nobody’s business. Sex is personal and private. No! Wrong answer! Sex is not personal or private! Every single sexual thing you do impacts our families, impacts our community, impacts our relationships with God, and impacts his Church. Holy sexual conduct honors and glorifies God and our relationships with each other and our community and our families and the Church. Unholy sexual conduct dishonors all that. It wrongs our brothers and sisters and takes advantage of other people.

God did not call you and save you and come to live inside you so you could live an impure life. We are redeemed and called by our loving Creator to be holy.

Peace,

Allan

What Jesus Did

April 13, 2017 / / 0 Comments

For the past two thousand years we’ve developed dozens of intricate theories as to why Jesus HAD to suffer and die on the cross to forgive our sins. The ransom theory says Jesus had to die to pay our debt of sin. The substitution theory says I belonged on the cross but Jesus took my place. Propitiation says God’s wrath had to be satisfied so Jesus took the punishment instead of us. The apostle Paul uses legal language and sacrificial imagery and military terms and financial lingo to explain WHY Jesus HAD to die on the cross.

But in the Gospels, in the story itself, it’s not about what Jesus HAD to do; it’s about what Jesus DID.

He died for us.

He died a terrible death.

For us.

What kind of love does our Lord have for us — knowing our sin, knowing our failure, knowing our past and future betrayals — to still willingly die for us?

Remember, Jesus the Christ is God. This is God, the Creator of Heaven and Earth. So, God doesn’t inflict pain on someone else to appease his wrath. God is on the cross, absorbing all the pain and violence and evil of the world into himself. He becoming our sin for us. Our God is nothing like the pagan deities who demand the blood of humans for their anger to be satisfied. No, our God becomes human and offers his own blood.

This is how he saves you. This is how he loves you, to the point of absurdity. He loves you all the way to the cross — purposefully, willfully, stubbornly, dying on the cross.

Peace,

Allan

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