Embracing Honesty and Diligence in Spiritual Growth
Devotional
Sermon Summary
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We began by celebrating the life of Bill Branaugh, a long-standing member of our community, who recently went home to be with the Lord. His legacy reminds us of the importance of investing in our spiritual family and the impact of a life well-lived in faith. [00:17:04]
The first step to freedom from sin in general is to get honest. The first step to freedom from saying Christian or non-Christian is to get honest, is to stop hiding. In James 5:16 it says, therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed. [00:23:57]
Sin kind of has this pattern that it goes down, right? In chapter 5, we learned it talked about an adulterous woman and specifically telling us to stay away far from the adulterous woman, and that goes for really any sin you can think about. Actually, it's not just women or men and or adultery for that matter. [00:27:22]
The way habits are formed or broken follow a pattern. There's always a cue, a craving, a behavior, and a reward. It's just the way our brains work, and if God says get honest, if God says be transformed by the renewing of your minds, it's probably help to know how our minds actually work. [00:27:22]
Proverbs 6:1-5: Don't be foolish with your money. What does he say? I've highlighted some kind of key words here to give you a sense of what he's talking about. He says, my son, if you have put security for your neighbor and have given your pledge for a stranger. [00:34:32]
Go to the ant, oh sluggard, and consider her ways and be wise. Without having any chief officer or ruler, she prepares her bread in summer, gathers her food in the Harvest. And then again, another warning: how long you going to lie there, oh sluggard, when will you arise from your sleep? [00:36:43]
The warning then is be careful with your time. Be careful how you use your time. Don't be a lazy bone. Don't be lazy bones. There's other translations that have translated this verse in a number of different ways. Sluggard is not a word that we typically use. [00:36:43]
The father is saying to the son, you need to be really careful about your character, about what's coming out of your heart, about your words. Are you a trustworthy person? Now, another thing that's really helpful in the Bible is if it tells you specifically what God doesn't like. [00:38:12]
Much of my spiritual warfare is actually in my mind. For me, a lot of my spiritual warfare is the lie that I believe. It's the lie that I think, you're not enough, you're not good enough, you need this, you need that, wouldn't life be better if. These are lies that are planted in our minds. [00:52:09]
The question is how do we combat that, and that's really the focus. And I think to make it unattractive, how do we make sin unattractive? Once again, the secret to self-control is probably avoiding tempting situations the best you can, but sometimes you're going to be led to temptation. [00:52:09]
The truth makes sin unattractive. So go back to that verse. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God. You know what that is? Those are lies. Those are lies. Every temptation that you have and I have are based in a lie. [00:52:09]
We have the ability by the Conquering work of Jesus Christ to say no to the distraction, to say no to the temptation, to say you have no place here. I'm not going to let my flesh rule the day. I'm not going to let the enemy rule through my flesh. [00:59:43]
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The first step to freedom from sin in general is to get honest. The first step to freedom from saying Christian or non-Christian is to get honest, is to stop hiding. In James 5:16 it says, therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed. [00:23:57]
Sin kind of has this pattern that it goes down, right? In chapter 5, we learned it talked about an adulterous woman and specifically telling us to stay away far from the adulterous woman, and that goes for really any sin you can think about. Actually, it's not just women or men and or adultery for that matter. [00:27:22]
The way habits are formed or broken follow a pattern. There's always a cue, a craving, a behavior, and a reward. It's just the way our brains work, and if God says get honest, if God says be transformed by the renewing of your minds, it's probably help to know how our minds actually work. [00:27:22]
Proverbs 6:1-5: Don't be foolish with your money. What does he say? I've highlighted some kind of key words here to give you a sense of what he's talking about. He says, my son, if you have put security for your neighbor and have given your pledge for a stranger. [00:34:32]
Go to the ant, oh sluggard, and consider her ways and be wise. Without having any chief officer or ruler, she prepares her bread in summer, gathers her food in the Harvest. And then again, another warning: how long you going to lie there, oh sluggard, when will you arise from your sleep? [00:36:43]
The warning then is be careful with your time. Be careful how you use your time. Don't be a lazy bone. Don't be lazy bones. There's other translations that have translated this verse in a number of different ways. Sluggard is not a word that we typically use. [00:36:43]
The father is saying to the son, you need to be really careful about your character, about what's coming out of your heart, about your words. Are you a trustworthy person? Now, another thing that's really helpful in the Bible is if it tells you specifically what God doesn't like. [00:38:12]
Much of my spiritual warfare is actually in my mind. For me, a lot of my spiritual warfare is the lie that I believe. It's the lie that I think, you're not enough, you're not good enough, you need this, you need that, wouldn't life be better if. These are lies that are planted in our minds. [00:52:09]
The question is how do we combat that, and that's really the focus. And I think to make it unattractive, how do we make sin unattractive? Once again, the secret to self-control is probably avoiding tempting situations the best you can, but sometimes you're going to be led to temptation. [00:52:09]
The truth makes sin unattractive. So go back to that verse. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God. You know what that is? Those are lies. Those are lies. Every temptation that you have and I have are based in a lie. [00:52:09]
We have the ability by the Conquering work of Jesus Christ to say no to the distraction, to say no to the temptation, to say you have no place here. I'm not going to let my flesh rule the day. I'm not going to let the enemy rule through my flesh. [00:59:43]
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