Oh my, it is again great to be back with you. I will be providing you with much more information about all the good that was done in Korea.
In addition to the classes Jason and I taught for two weeks, the first week we were there, Landon led a group that was working with the Korean young people.
Now, this all began some years ago in 2019 when Peggy and I coordinated a Christian Youth Camp in Korea. We had wanted to go back every year, and then 2020 happened, and traveling to Korea, or for that matter anywhere, became very difficult.
But as we have been able to get back, starting this spring, we had a Lads to Leaders convention in Korea. What the group did this past couple of weeks has been to build on that and to provide more training. We're looking forward to next year, once again having a series of classes for Korean youth and to bring the Lads to Leaders program there.
You know, young people are very much the same the world over, and they ultimately need the same thing, which is to say they need the good news of Jesus Christ.
On Sunday mornings this summer, we've been going through a series looking at the fruits of the Spirit and how we can apply the Spirit's work in our lives. This has been a great opportunity for us to remember that even though the signs and wonders of the first century passed away with the passing of the Apostles and those on whom the Apostles laid their hands, the Holy Spirit is still at work in His church, still bearing His fruit in the lives of God's people.
This morning, we'll be considering the freedom that comes through self-control. The theme for the entirety of these lessons comes from what the Apostle Paul wrote to the Galatians, where he encouraged his readers to keep in step with the Spirit.
In case they wondered how to do that, he enumerated aspects of the fruit of the Spirit. Galatians 5, beginning in verse 22:
"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law."
As we consider the fruit of the Spirit, we have to remember that these are not individual things, but rather they describe a mindset, a way of looking, a way of having one's heart open to the power of God to bring about the changes that God wants to bring.
We should dwell on all of these, but I'm especially fond of the topic of self-control. Because in 2019, when I was in Korea, I had just recently undergone a tumble and ended up with cellulitis in my leg. It was swollen, and I almost wasn't able to make the trip, but I made it there.
While I was there, there was an acupuncturist who stuck needles in and did other procedures on my leg. It was amazing. Then he told me that I really needed to work on my balance and to lose weight. I said, "Well, I know I need to lose weight, but you know that's always hard."
One of my Korean friends just looked at me, and in all seriousness, he said, "Remember, self-control is a fruit of the Spirit."
Oh my, the Bible is filled with examples of ways in which we can find self-control, and it's always better to see how someone else has done it rather than simply hearing the platitudes.
We think back in the Book of Genesis of a young man, Joseph, who was sold into slavery in Egypt. But God was with him. Joseph, having secured a position after being purchased by an army officer of renown, was brought to be the head of Potiphar's house. Potiphar, the army officer, trusted him with everything, and it looked like things were going very well for Joseph.
But Joseph was a very attractive young man, and perhaps because he was indeed a foreigner, he may have had a mystique about him that made him very alluring. Potiphar's wife was continually trying to seduce him. Repeatedly, she asked him to have relations with her that would be inappropriate.
One time in particular, she was trying to seduce him, and he was saying, "No, I'm not going to sin against my master, against Potiphar, and against God." She grabbed his clothes, and he had to wriggle out of them while she was holding his clothes as he ran out.
We know the rest of the story. Whenever Potiphar was shown the clothes and his wife denounced Joseph, Joseph would be thrown into jail. But God used that situation to make Joseph the prime minister of all of Egypt.
When we think in terms of Joseph and Potiphar's wife, we see a wonderful example of self-control. First of all, he resisted the temptation. We read of this in Genesis 39, beginning in verse 7:
"When she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or to be with her. But one day, when he went into the house to do his work, she caught him by his garment, saying, 'Lie with me.' But he left his garment in her hand and fled and got out of the house."
You notice what the text says: it was day by day she was enticing him, and he resisted that temptation.
Now, the text does not tell us much about Potiphar's wife, but we would imagine that she would have been a very desirable woman. Potiphar was a premier officer in the Egyptian military, and his wife would have been a kept woman, a woman in the house with beautiful clothes and the ability to present herself in a very attractive way.
But in spite of all of that, we find that Joseph resists the temptation. The Bible tells us repeatedly of the need to resist temptation. It is part of the human condition to be tempted, and temptation, as the Bible tells us, will almost always filter down to three things: the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.
And so it was that Joseph, being presented over and again with this temptation, resisted. Secondly, we see that he understood the bigger picture. He was not going to sin against his master or, more importantly, to sin against God.
The Bible teaches us that the eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the good and the evil. You can fool other people, but you can't fool God. The Book of Ecclesiastes closes with the simple statement that it is the end of the matter: fear God and keep His commandments, for God will bring everything into judgment.
Joseph knew that; he saw the big picture. And because of that, thirdly, he took immediate action. He fled. Sometimes people fool themselves into thinking, "Well, you know, I can keep one foot in the world and another foot in the Lord's work," and that never ends well.
When confronted with a choice between good and evil, do not deliberate, do not hesitate; take immediate action. Joseph fled, and because of his self-control, even though at that point in time he suffered for his integrity, in the end, God blessed him abundantly and through him blessed all of God's people, including us.
Many, many years, centuries after the time of Joseph, we come to David, a young man who was initially a shepherd. As a young man, he had entered into military service, remarkably killing the giant Goliath. For a brief time, he was a court favorite of King Saul, but that didn't last.
Saul heard the word that was coming: the people were chanting, "Saul has slain thousands, but David has slain ten thousands," and jealousy overtook Saul. Furthermore, Saul had been rejected by God. Saul had been told by the prophet Samuel, "God is going to remove you from being king."
David, on the other hand, was a man after God's own heart, and Saul determined to kill David. He hunted David like an animal. But there was one occasion where David and his men, having been pursued by Saul and eluding them, found out that Saul was held up in a cave in En Gedi.
In this cave, there was Saul sleeping, and David had every ability to kill Saul. Just a few years ago, when I led the Holy Land trip, we were able to go to En Gedi and see the cave that is still there. It's a remarkable thing.
But David would not kill Saul. He exercised self-control; he had restraint. We read of this:
"Oh my goodness, my slide has jolted."
He told his men, "I will not lay my hand against the Lord's anointed." So David persuaded his men with these words and did not permit them to attack Saul.
Saul, for all of his faults, for all of his sin, was still the Lord's anointed, and David would not attack him. David honored God's authority. He was not restraining himself because of who Saul was; he was restraining himself because of who God is, and he did not take Saul's life.
We see further that David delayed his gratification. The prophet Samuel had already said that David was going to become king, but David was willing for God to let that happen in God's own time. David did not hasten the matter by committing sin.
We can find many examples where people did not wait for God. You remember what happened with Abraham and Sarah, where a promise had been made that they were going to have a child. Rather than waiting for God—and let me just, you know, fairly say they were waiting a long time—rather than waiting for God, they attempted to push the matter and have a child through Hagar, the servant.
From that union between Abraham and Hagar, the Arab race arose, and the conflict between the Israelites and the Arabs has continued through the centuries. It all goes back to Abraham and Sarah not waiting for God.
David waited. He did not strike Saul down, although he could. Rather, he knew that God would bring about the blessings that God had promised. David provided an example for his men. Not only did David restrain his hand from killing Saul, but the men who were with him didn't do it either, and it was because of David's example.
Remember, when you do what you ought to do, you influence others to be the men and women of faith that God has called them to be as well.
A third example from the Old Testament: David in the early years of the Israelite kingdom. We come then to a time where the kingdom had fallen, first the Northern Kingdom of Israel and then the Southern Kingdom, the kingdom of Judah. Captives were taken into Babylon, into the far country.
There are so many lessons that we can learn about living in a pagan world because the world in which we live is a world that has forgotten God. The world of Babylon was one that didn't know God, and among those who were brought into captivity were members of the royal house, the extended family of the monarchy—those who were very well educated, those who were very competent to accomplish many, many tasks.
One of these was a young man named Daniel, who was going to be provided a seat at the king's table. But if you'll remember, in the law of Moses, one of the primary signs of the holiness that God's people were to follow was their dietary restriction. They could not eat unclean animals, and to eat the food that was provided by the king would have defiled Daniel.
Daniel said, "Please, no, no, I don't want to do that. Give me the opportunity to eat my own food for a period of time and then see how I'm doing." They permitted him, and they found that Daniel and those with him had an appearance that was superior to those who had eaten the king's food.
We see in Daniel's dietary choice not something that is primarily about the food, but about the obedience of faith, of having integrity. We see that Daniel had resolved (Daniel 1:8):
"But Daniel resolved that he would not defile himself with the king's food or with the wine that he drank."
He would not do that. Daniel had conviction over convenience. You know, it would have been so much easier for Daniel at that point in time to just go along and get along, to follow the crowd, to say, "Well, you know, when in Babylon, do as Babylonians do." But he didn't do it; he had conviction.
When you follow your convictions, you are going to find many times that it makes you the odd one out. It's difficult, and for Daniel, it was difficult. He had to make arrangements with the keeper of the king's table. He had to make sure that things could be arranged. It was not just simply an option like going to the cafeteria and saying, "Well, I'll choose this and not that." He had to make special arrangements, and it was inconvenient.
But he did it because he was a man of conviction. We see secondly that he was concerned about his spiritual health. The text in Daniel does talk about how his physical health was maintained with the faithful diet, but that's not the point. It's not a point for us to try to follow the diet that Daniel followed. The point is to be men and women of faith, to put conviction over convenience, because it's not a matter of our physical health; it's a matter of our spiritual health, and Daniel realized that.
Then thirdly, he trusted in God's provision. The king was offering to give him the best that the Babylonians had to offer in the way of food, but rather, Daniel trusted in God.
If we are going to exercise self-control, from the Old Testament, we've seen Joseph, David, and Daniel—all men of faith who exercised self-control, and they were blessed.
But the greatest example in this, as with all matters, is our Savior Himself. There are too many examples in the life of Christ of self-control that time would not permit us.
But in the opening of His ministry, when He was baptized by John the Baptist, His cousin, He was driven out into the wilderness by the Spirit, and He fasted for 40 days and 40 nights. I've always enjoyed the simple understatement of what the Bible says: it says, "And He was hungry."
Don't you think the devil always knows where we are weak? In the weakness of hunger, the devil came to Jesus and said, "Command these stones to become bread."
Don't you think that would have been attractive? In Korea, in the facility where we stayed, the BCC, the Bible Correspondence Center, our host, Thong, has a bread machine. Every night, he puts the ingredients in this machine and sets it in the hallway outside of the dining area so that the aroma of that bread will waft down to the bedrooms on the floor before and to ring his guests out.
I'll tell you, when you wake up in the morning to the smell of fresh-baked bread, it is motivating. Well, can you imagine with Jesus knowing He had the power? If He had said to the stones, "Become bread," it would have been bread.
But He exercised self-control. He is our perfect example. He answered the devil, as recorded in Matthew 4, verse 4:
"Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God."
Man shall not live by bread alone. We look at this and we see in the example of Jesus our perfect example, relying on God for all of us who are members of the Lord's Church, looking to the example of the great men and women recorded in Scripture, but ultimately looking to Jesus.
We know that in our lives, there are situations where the easy thing, where the alluring thing, would be to compromise. Don't do it. Exercise self-control, keep your eye on the big picture, and recognize that it is God who will bless you.
As members of God's family, we know this. And for those who are not yet Christians, we want to encourage you as well. There are choices to be made, but the greatest choice is whether you will accept Jesus as your Savior.
If you believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, with a statement of that faith, you can be baptized into Christ, placed underwater, receiving forgiveness of your sins, and being raised to walk in a new life—a life that is empowered by the Holy Spirit, who will bear His fruit in your life.
If that is your desire this morning, please come as together we stand and sing.
on Nov 05, 2023
