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Conversion in Christ (Biblical Sexuality Sunday)

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INTRODUCTION

On December 8th, the Canadian government passed Bill C-4 by royal assent, which means that with a little bit of bureaucratic shenanigans, it passed with unanimous consent. Bill C-4 effectively criminalizes Christian preaching, teaching, and counseling that upholds Biblical morality for all sexuality. It specifically prohibits “conversion therapy” and defines that therapy as any practice, treatment, or service that seeks to call individuals to embrace the body God created them with and heterosexuality, with a penalty of up to five years in prison. It also condemned historic, biblical teaching as “myths.” Having gone into effect last week, a number of faithful men have called for the pastors of Canada to preach messages today in defiance of that law, and many American pastors are also joining them to stand in solidarity with them but also to exhort and warn our own American leaders from going down this same path.

THE TEXT

“Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor. 6:9-11).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Here Scripture clearly teaches that the unrighteous cannot inherit the kingdom of God (6:9). And the surprising warning is that Christians can be deceived into thinking that they can live in these patterns of sin and inherit the kingdom (6:9). In particular, fornication, idolatry, adultery, effeminacy, sodomy, theft, covetousness, drunkenness, rage, and extortion are singled out (6:10). These practices characterized some of the Corinthians (6:11). But they have been changed, and they are not the same anymore because they have been washed, sanctified, and justified in the name of Jesus, and by His Spirit (6:11).

THE SPIRIT OF DESPAIR

Our texts says: “do not be deceived” (1 Cor. 6:9). And the clear implication is that it is possible to be deceived. This is a real temptation, and it is a temptation for Christians in the church. The Devil is the Father of all lies and deception, and one of the central lies of the Devil is the lie of despair. This is the lie of the Canadian legislation, and it is the lie that has been growing in influence in our culture, even inside the Christian Church. In Revelation 12, we are told that the Accuser has been cast down out of heaven, where he used to accuse the brethren night and day (Rev. 12:9-10). While his power has been greatly diminished, his primary occupation is accusing sinners of their sin. And with those accusations comes condemnation: the wages of sin is death (Rom. 6:23).

So the central lie is that it is too late, your sins and mistakes are too great, there’s nothing that can be done, and you cannot change. The next lie that comes right on the heels of those lies is that the best you can hope for in this life is to limp and hobble along with your sins and demons clutching at you and weighing you down. Paul was writing Christians who were making peace with certain sins, concluding that they could not be completely free in this life. But Paul says that if they are not free of those sins then they cannot inherit the kingdom of heaven (1 Cor. 6:9-10). In a sense, the Satanic lie is actually so insidious because it settles for a mild despair: this is as good as it gets, limping along. But the Bible teaches that you must completely despair. You must come to the end of yourself.

IDENTITY POLITICS & SALVATION

Ever since Adam, there’s a sick rebellious streak in all the sons and daughters of Adam that wants to be a tragic hero. We want to make terrible choices and then flop and claim we are victims of the universe. “That’s just who I am” is a proud, defiant claim, and we have taken that claim to new institutional heights in our culture by making them fundamental identity markers: transgender, bisexual, queer, lesbian, same-sex attracted, “gay celibate Christian,” etc. But all of it is a false gospel. The offer of this “gospel” is that if you find your “identity,” you will be at peace with yourself and the world, but there is no peace in sin, and the early death and suicide rates of these communities is off the charts.

Many well-meaning and soft-hearted Christians are swept along with this, not wanting to heap up shame or hurt on folks who struggle with these sins and temptations. Or we go soft on those sins because we have our own guilt and shame for “more respectable” struggles. While we must always be kind and patient, it is not kind or gracious to go along with lies or delusions, especially the kind that we are told explicitly in Scripture cannot inherit the Kingdom. The truth is that all the descendants of Adam do need a new identity, and that identity is found in Christ, and Christ alone. In Christ, every sin and sinful identity is washed away, and we are set apart as holy to God by the Holy Spirit and fully vindicated by the name of Jesus (1 Cor. 6:11).

CONVERSION TO CHRIST

So we preach conversion to Christ and conversion in Christ. This is not a “therapy” at all, but it is the supernatural power to change, to repent, to turn from sin and walk in the light. We proclaim liberty to the captives. We proclaim forgiveness of all sins in the blood of Jesus. And we defy and condemn every teaching, every legislation, every executive order, or court decision that says otherwise.

Fundamentally, to deny the power of Christ to change sinners, to set them free from the bondage of their sin, is to deny the resurrection of Jesus from the dead: “… what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead…” (Eph. 1:19-20). What is this great power to change that we proclaim in Christ? It is the power of resurrection from the dead.

Elsewhere, it says that if Christ is not risen, then we are still in our sins (1 Cor. 15:17). We can make the inverse point as well: if we are still in our sins, and if our sins are impossible to remove, then Christ is not risen from the dead. This is what the Canadian government, Revoicers, and all the rainbow churches are fundamentally denying: the resurrection of Jesus. But Christ is risen, and we are free. Christ is risen, and all things are being made new.

And the particular newness that we are being made into is the newness of what we were made to be: new men and new women, new fathers and new mothers, new marriages, new families, new communities, new nations. If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17).

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Confession of Sin (Covenant Life Together #2)

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INTRODUCTION

Confession of sin is a basic activity that all Christians need to understand and practice. It is the most fundamental form of spiritual housekeeping. There is no way for us to maintain covenant life together without this sort of understanding being woven into the fabric of our community.

THE TEXT

“If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10)

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

If we decide to lie to ourselves, then obviously the truth is not in us (v. 8). One of the lies we like to tell ourselves is the lie that our current condition is “normal,” and that we have no sin. Or at least we have no sin to speak of. John tells us that this is self-deception, period. And if we lie in this way, we are making God into a liar (because He says we have sinned), and His word is obviously not in us—a lie is (v. 10). The meat of this sandwich is in verse 9, but these two pieces of bread make it a sandwich. Don’t kid yourself, John is saying—we all need to hear this. In the ninth verse, John gives us a conditional statement. If we confess our sins, God will do something. The word for confess is homologeo, and literally means “to speak the same thing.” If we say the same thing about our sin that God says about it (i.e. that it is sin), then God will do what He promises. What is that? God will be faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and He will cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

TWO HOUSES

Imagine two mothers with a robust family—six kids each, let’s say. One home is bombed all the time and the other is spotless. The difference between the two homes is not that in the second home nothing is ever spilled, or knocked over, or left on the coffee table. The difference between the home that is trashed and the home that isn’t is the difference between leaving things there “for the present,” and picking them up right away.

Given God’s promise above, we need to recognize what this means. The promise is good on Monday mornings, and Thursday afternoons. The promise is good in May, and good in October. That means there is never a legitimate reason for refusing to deal with it now. The vacuum cleaner is never broken, never at the shop, never too far away, never too hard to operate. The word is near you, in your heart and in your mouth. “God, what I just said . . . that was sin.” That is confession. And God’s promise is fulfilled at that moment.

TANGLEFOOT

The writer to the Hebrews describes what sin does when you leave it unattended. It starts to trip you up—it starts to really get in the way. “Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us . . .” (Heb. 12:1). Sin clutters, sin gets in the way, sin weighs you down, sin gets tangled around your feet. Set it aside we are told, and then run the race. You can’t run the race with a two-hundred-pound backpack on. You cannot run the race with snarls of rope tangled around your feet. Stop trying to be good with unconfessed sin in your life. It just makes you more irritable than you already are. John tells us how to get untangled. Don’t try to do that and run at the same time. Get completely untangled, take off the backpack, and then run.

CLUTTER AND BACKLOG

Let’s change the image. Suppose you haven’t cleaned the garage for twenty years, and you are overwhelmed at the very thought of trying to straighten it out. Every time you go open the door, you just stare helplessly for about five minutes, and then go back inside. All you can think of to do is pray for a fire. Now suppose that is what your pile of unconfessed sin looks like. You are tempted to think that you have to remember everything that is in there first, and then set about cleaning it up.

But you don’t have to remember the sins you don’t remember—just confess the ones you do remember. The ones you stuffed just inside the garage door just last week. Don’t try to remember what is at the bottom of the pile; just look at what is on the top of the pile. If you deal with the sin you know about honestly, then God will cleanse you from all unrighteousness. The confessing is your job; the cleansing is His.

HONESTY

The central virtue here that of honesty. No blowing smoke at God. No spin control. No attempts to make yourself the flawed hero in this tragic affair. We saw that homologeo means to speak the same. If God calls it adultery, don’t you call it an affair or indiscretion. If God calls it grumbling and complaining, don’t you call it realism. If God calls it theft, don’t you call it shrewd business practice. As the Puritans might have put it, had they only thought of it, bs and honest confession accord not well together.

A FEW PRACTICAL CONSIDERATIONS

This is not meant to sound flippant. Sin is a ravening wolf, and has destroyed many things. If you have held back from confessing your sins because you know that to do so could threaten your marriage, or cost you your job, or get you expelled from college, you really do have a significant practical problem. I am not saying you should charge off and start confessing your sin like a loose cannon on deck. But you should decide today to deal with it honestly, and depending on how tangled up it is, get counsel and help today in putting things right. Commit yourself now. Busting yourself is the best thing you can do to rebuild trust with those you may have wronged.

And last, allow me to consider your feelings. You may feel like a hesitant cliff-diver, toes curled over the edge, and here I am poking you in the back with a stick. There are any number of things you might want to do—anything but jump. You might rationalize. “What I did wasn’t really wrong.” You might excuse. “What I did was not started by me.” You might postpone. “In my honest opinion, the best day for jumping will be sometime tomorrow afternoon.” You might blame somebody else, anybody else. “I think they should be here jumping, not me.” You might use vague terms to try jumping sideways along the cliff edge. “I think that, generally speaking, I have certainly sinned in some ways.”

It is easy to dismiss this kind of emphasis as morbid introspectionism, but actually it is the opposite. If you confess your sins, and lay aside the weight of that backpack, you never have to think about it again. Now, with it unconfessed, you think about it frequently.

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The Fire and Fury of the Living God (Zephaniah 1)

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INTRODUCTION

The prophetic ministry is not an extra-curricular activity of some believers. Rather, preaching is a part of our corporate worship. We affirm that in the reading and explanation of God’s Word, we are hearing God speak to us. But man would rather reach for the volume knob of his distractions. But God will be heard, and if these are the echoes of His ways, what will you do when He thunders?

THE TEXT

“The word of the LORD which came unto Zephaniah the son of Cushi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hizkiah, in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah. 2 I will utterly consume all things from off the land, saith the LORD. 3 I will consume man and beast; I will consume the fowls of the heaven, and the fishes of the sea, and the stumblingblocks with the wicked; and I will cut off man from off the land, saith the LORD. 4 I will also stretch out mine hand upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and I will cut off the remnant of Baal from this place, and the name of the Chemarims with the priests…” (Zephaniah 1:1-18).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Zephaniah begins with a personal lineage, which appears to intimate that he’s related to the royal family; there’s also an important mention of polar opposite kings of Judah: godly Josiah and his wicked father Amon. This locates when this prophecy was given––~626BC (v1). Then commences the announcement of God’s coming wrath, which is described in all-encompassing terms; reminiscent of God’s global judgement in Noah’s day (cf. Gen. 6:7) (vv2-3). Judah and Jerusalem are brought into the crosshairs, and we begin to see why God is readying to unleash His holy wrath on the whole world: worship of Baal and the heavenly host persists, mixed in with a fair helping of swearing by both the Lord and Malcham, and plenty of apathetic apostasy (vv 4-6).

The Jews should lay their hand on their mouth if they think to object to this sweeping judgement, because the oft foretold “day of the Lord” was now imminent (v7). God Himself has prepared a sacrificial meal and invited His guests. The twist here is that Judah will be the sacrifice, and it would seem that the summoned guests are the nations (Cf. Jer. 10:25) which God has brought to “devour” Judah (v7b).

Certain groups are held up as epitomizing the offenses which God is coming to punish: the royal family who have arrayed themselves in “strange apparel” (v8), and those who “leap/rush over the threshold” in order to obtain plunder for their masters’ house (v9). Think Prince John and the Sheriff of Nottingham. Lest the commoners think they are somehow so insignificant as to escape the Lord’s notice, Zephaniah describes the cries and howls which will issue across Jerusalem when this ruination comes (vv10-11).

God will be thorough in His search for evildoers, and there won’t be a crevice in which to hide; those who had been dismissive of former prophetic warnings won’t be able to be dismissive anymore (v12). Judah will be wholly plundered, and all the deuteronomic blessings whisked away (v13).

Zephaniah echoes and summarizes earlier prophets’ warnings of “the day of the Lord.” It is near. It is terrible. It is an inescapable reality (vv14-16). This judgement will be devastating, and neither their silver nor gold will deliver them. The fierce fire of the Lord’s jealousy is upon them and He is thundering down upon them to expel them from the land, and wish them, “good riddance (vv17-18).”

THE EXCEEDING SINFULNESS OF SIN

One of the most damning effects of sin is that we call evil good, and good evil. Sin is so wicked because not only do we trespass in the commission of the sinful act, but we sin by telling ourselves that the sin is necessary, even right. Not only do we sin, we redefine our sin. We buttress ourselves against what our guilty consciences witness against us.

Zephaniah presents us a vivid picture in response to man’s temptation to paper over his sin. God is coming, candle in hand, searching every nook and cranny of Jerusalem to find those who had grown indifferent to the Lord’s claim over that Holy City. God is shown here as hunting down and searching out those who have said in their hearts, “God isn’t going to do good or evil.”

THE GOSPEL ARC

Zephaniah’s opening salvo leaves no wiggle room for the  warm fuzzies of our modern evangelical nannies, which all too often rush in and comfort us with “There, there…God is love.” Some scholars bemoan how derivative this book is, because it borrows imagery from more gifted prophets like Amos and Isaiah. But we should see in Zephaniah a lovely succinctness––a prophetic bluntness––made to startle the complacent. His main objective is to disturb the complacent with a simple but vibrant warning.

In some Christian circles it has become increasingly en vogue to avoid the bad news of the Gospel. They think presenting Jesus as merely an example of tolerance, love, and kindness is all the Church is called to. But, the Gospel, faithfully preached, must first make the unrepentant sinner miserable. That is the Gospel arc we see here in this short prophetic book: a shocking rebuke, a call to repentance, and then, and only then, the assurance of mercy to those who turn to the Lord.

In our age of self-esteem, this is avoided at all cost, even in many pulpits. Nevertheless, the prophetic denouncement of sins big and small, sins of the royalty and sins of the commoners, corporate sins and individual sins, and the just wrath that awaits such sins is meant to incite sinners to ask “What must I do to be saved?”

WHAT MUST I DO?

Trying to carve out God’s love as if it can stand apart from His justice is denying His immutability. It assumes that God’s love cannot be so fierce as to burn with the heat of a thousand suns when wickedness is allowed to flourish. God will not be pitted against Himself.

Instead of blushing at the severity of the prophet’s voice, or bubble-wrapping the bad news of the Good News we need to wince. The prophetic Word insists, “Don’t ignore the warnings. Don’t minimize them. Don’t scoff at them.” When God warns, the thing you must do is ask, “Is there anything else? Show it all to me!” Don’t look for refuge in comparison shopping your sin compared to other more grievous sins.

Some may want to balk at Zephaniah’s hyperbole. Isn’t he overdoing it? But often a pastor needs to wave his hands and say in simple terms, “Stop it.” Spurgeon once commented on the severe nature of Zephaniah’s prophetic book, “I bless the Bible for being severe with my unbelief.” Do you want God to “go easy” on evil? Do you really want a God who yawns at wickedness? Do you really want God to let the vilest men never be brought to justice?

THE LORD’S CITY

Remember that this city which is at the epicenter of God’s global judgement, was His city. Judah had broken God’s law, neglected it, mixed it with idolatry, spurned it, and were indifferent to the covenant of their King. Now the King warns, by his messenger, that He’s coming to bring justice down.

So the question is, have you hidden sin way down deep, thinking God won’t care, God won’t notice, nobody was hurt? God has a claim on you. He will search it out. He will bring it out. He will expose it, and that is a grace. But remember, the only place to flee from the wrath of the Living God is in the Living God.

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1 John: Liar

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Introduction

We should all know that it is a sin to lie. Perjury is, after all, prohibited by the ninth commandment (Ex. 20:16). The Colossians were told not to lie to one another, now that they had put off the old man with his deeds (Col. 3:9). And we are told that the lake of fire is reserved for liars, among a number of others (Rev. 21:8). So we know that lying is a sin. But it is less well known that lying is foundationally about sin.

The Text

“If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8–10).

Summary of the Text

It is a lie to say that you mailed the check when you know good and well that you did not mail the check. That is a lie simpliciter. But there is another kind of lie, a deeper lie, a more foundational lie. And that is the prior lie that you have to tell yourself, convincing yourself that you are not sinning, that you are not lying. The truth is not in the person who lies to himself, even though part of him knows what the truth is.

A person who says he has no sin deceives himself (v. 8). Now how is it possible for one part of us to lie to another part of us, and, on top of that, to have us buy it? How do we dothat? Scripture teaches us about self-deception elsewhere, and we are taught that one way it happens is by copping a religious pose while not bridling your tongue (Jas. 1:26). Another way is through listening to good teaching without actually doing any of it (Jas. 1:22).

Now of course if we confess our sins (the opposite of lying about them), then God forgives us and cleanses us because He is faithful and just (v. 9). But if He says that we have sinned, and we claim that we have not sinned, then in effect we are accusing Him of being a liar (v. 10). If that is the case, then the truth is not in us.

Lying About Our Own Performance

Because we were created as God’s image-bearers, we have a deep need to believe ourselves to be righteous. But because we have, with our first parents, tumbled into the chaos of sin, we are notin fact righteous. Put those two realities together—a deep need to be righteous, to be in the right, coupled with the fact that we are profoundly unrighteous. What is the result? Self-deception is the result.

“He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him” (1 John 2:4).

Bitterness Tells Lies as Well

If your internal dialog frequently starts out like this: “I am not bitter . . . I just want to . . .” then you almost certainly have a problem. The problem is called “going to Hell.”

“If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?” (1 John 4:20).

The Definition of Sin

Now if lying is fundamentally about our own sin, you can see why we would have an interest in tinkering with the definitions. Adjusting the definition of sin is a great way to tell yourself these pretty little lies.

Absolute righteousness is established by the way God is. “But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God” (John 3:21). “This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5). The holiness of God’s character is itself the ultimate law, and any deviation from this character is what all sin actually is. “Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness” (1 John 3:4, ESV).

Remember that we have already defined worldliness as the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life (1 John 2:15-17). Remember also that when Eve was dazzled by these things, she was deceivedabout them. “But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ” (2 Cor. 11:3, ESV).

The Unveiled Word

Sin is our problem, and Christ is our salvation from that problem. This means that it is not possible to be deceived about the nature of your sin without simultaneously being deceived about Christ.

“He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son” (1 John 5:10).

Sin is revealed whenever Christ is revealed. Sin lies hidden whenever Christ is veiled. And this is why so much of the Church lies in a mass of confusions, stupefied by the world’s lies. This is why so many Christians worship at Ichabod Memorial. The glory has departed from the Church, but it is in the interest of clerics and professional religionists to prevent awareness of this from getting around. So they take the correct-on-paper gospel and smother it with academic jargon, or with soothing therapeutic whispers. This is nothing but a veiling of the gospel, and it is done for the same reason Moses had to do it. But we are not called to this. “It is not for us to use veiled language, as Moses veiled his face” (2 Cor. 3:13, Knox).

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