I'm sanctified
I don't know what I believe • Sermon • Submitted
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What part of the body always loses? Da feet
If you’ve never tried archery blindfolded… you don’t know what you’re missing
Last week….This morning I want to start just talking about some what we would call basics of the church, we will talk about basics in the church and we will dive into some words and stuff that we throw
So let me talk to you about whats going on with us… picture
over the next few weeks we will be going over some scripture from 2 timothy that will illuminate our basics…
How many of you are saved… bad question...
How many of you live a Holy life… the number of hands would go down… because you are sitting next to people that actually know you...
9 He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time,
He has saved us AND called us… and
Its as if those two are together and inseparable… he has saved us AND called us to a holy life… so lets say verse 9 said saved us… and later in the chapter he said he called us… but that’s not how it goes… they are directly beside one another… he has called us to a holy life...
but we just agreed that if I asked those questions that hands would go down.. but here we find God calling us to a holy life and saving us… there is no separation of the two...
Here’s what I want to look at today… if what we are believing isn’t affecting who we are becoming do we really believe… because the true test of faith is whether or not it affects who i become… real faith affects who I am and changes me… yet so often it doesn’t...
But listen.. I’m right with you… I probably wouldn’t have raised my hand either...
Listen I had a whole class on this at Asbury,, and today we are going to talk about this word that you have probably heard if you have been in church for any amount of time, and if you haven’t I’m about to teach you a new word and I just want you to know that you don’t have anything to be ashamed of if you have no clue what I am talking about because most of the people in this room who would say they believe this word is being done in them...
But today we are going to look at the word Sanctification….
This word, is really quite simple.. it means a setting apart… so God has set you apart from the things that harm you from the things that can get you… his way of life is setting apart… Holy… sanctified… it just means set apart… being available to God for his use…
High School..Parkers… No instruments… well the piano is an acceptable one… and they thought I was a sinner… and listen I grew up that way… baptist church.. we had an organ…as I grew I started to realize that some of the music we are playing isn’t about trying to keep things out, but its more about trying to make the presences of the church known in the world... its a way to push the church into culture… because these guys I went to HS with they loved rock music… but something happened and they wanted this difference experience at church from their life… and all too often that is most of us we want this totally different Sunday morning experience that doesn’t line up with our life…
We got church… then we got life… when we go to church we want it to be different and its so weird there that we think if we can endure that hour and a half that maybe God will be good with whatever I have to do that week… but thats not holiness...
Holiness isn’t the church just separating itself out… in fact if the most holy person that ever lived is Jesus and he came into the world to save sinners… how can we possibly be holy like him if we try to stand outside the world screaming at them with a closed down mentality….
So here is what we are going to do this morning… we are going to talk about 3 things that keep us from living a Holy life...
Because listen… the question is why is it so easy to believe that God has saved me but so hard to believe that he wants to set me apart as Holy...
So since we are talking about Holiness I want to use a passage of the most Holy person that ever lived remained Holy even though he was tempted… so I’ll show you this in Matthew 4
So here we go, I have a question… anyone who doesn’t like attention? What about if you are sitting next to someone who doesn’t like attention?
Facebook live.... how many likes do you think I can get by the time we are done today?
I want to suggest to you that all too often we are living our life for the wrong likes… we miss the calling of God because we are going after the wrong likes...
the first thing we should address is that all too often we go for more likes FOR me… and when I am so consumed with I like and want and what I think I need I miss the life that God wants to give…. let me show you in matthew chapter 4… Jesus is hungry because he has been fasting for 40 days so the enemy comes at him when he is most weak…
Listen, Ive done it… I can show you some pictures… it wasn’t pretty at all… trust that…
but the Matthew tells us
2 After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.
3 The tempter came to him and said, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.”
2After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. 3The tempter came to him and said, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.”
So Satan tries to get Jesus, the son of God, to fulfill a god given hunger in an ungodly way… to break the fast and fulfill his hunger the wrong way… but jesus answered...
4 Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”
4Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”
In other words, no way Jose, Ive got something more important than what I want right now… maybe the reason the Bible tells us that Jesus is hungry, even though we would say that should be pretty obvious, is that if he hadn’t put that part in the Bible we would have missed what this temptation was really about… he was all man…. and all god… and he could have done something about his hunger and he was probably lonely and there will come a point when you get so lonely that you will compromise your calling so you don’t have to feel lonely anymore...
Sexually… just so i can get to a thing i like….
Here is what is true, we like being happy, and most of us have places in our lives where we are hypocrites… most of us know what is right and wrong, and we know what we are doing can harm us but we know that it feels good… so we go to the world to attempt to turn stones into bread… and when we wake up hungry again we will attempt it again, and then wonder what could have went wrong…and we love ourselves and our pleasures more tha the purpose of God…and sometimes it is our own desire that will get us into trouble… not that the devil made me do it… but our own evil desires….
Sometimes, there is all this justification and validation, but the truth of the matter is I just wanted it…because people that say that sin isn’t fun have just never done it right… because sometimes we just gotta take what we think we want and nail it to the cross and see if its what we really need… but its impossible to be fulfilled with the desires of god while pursuing my selfish desires...
So sometimes the desires of our heart don’t line up with what we believe and sometimes we just really don’t even care...
2. The second thing that keeps us from living a holy life is Sometimes we don;t live according to the calling because we are living for more likes of others...
Thats what w are doing with these pictures we take on the gram and the book.....
Don;t you like the dinner I made for my kids? Check out this workout I did this morning… was;t that awesome… Look at how I just posted this awesome Bible quote to throw in the face of all those people I see posting stuff that is against the will of God… you know you gonna like it… wait… I can’t believe that person like that quote… they so dumb… it was ABOUT them...
Like me… want me… if I wear it this short will you like me then… like me want me need me...
The quickest way to disrupt gods perfecting process in your life is to put out an image of perfection to others...
And thats the world we live in… we compare our behind the scenes with everyone else highlight reel...
So Jesus won’t turn the stones into bread so the devil tries another angle...
5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple.
5Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple.
Now you need to know that there were most likely lots of people standing at the temple that day, so the enemy is wanting him to prove something to people that are there...
6 “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written: “ ‘He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’”
6“If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written:
“ ‘He will command his angels concerning you,
and they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
So he is saying show them you’re the messiah… you can really prove your point right now… but Jesus didn’t live for that… he didn’t live to please others he lived to please the Father, the one who sent him… the one he came from… so Jesus responds...
7 Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
7Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
I really think it is impossible to please God and live a Holy life if you are worried about constructing an image...
How can you be conformed to the image of christ if you are more concerned with portraying an image to the world..if you are spending this mental energy on how to project this version of you that people think you are...
A lot of us live our whole day refreshing… seeing what we’ve got going on… and I hear some of you pushing back… I’m not on that contraption… I told you 20 years ago that those computers were of the devil… its about time some young person sees what I have been trying to say… no… there are other ways to live for the approval of others...
I find myself in a conversation with someone.. and the bible says I need to love someone and we shouldn’t slander or gossip… and when we are trying to impress someone…. and we know something about someone else, and we really shouldn’t say it, but we know it would impress them so we say it.. and its like hey… look at me…look at what I know… you should be impressed… I am so interesting…. how can I have a holy conversation seasoned with salt if I am doing that… and scripture tells us to speak only what is helpful in building up and not tearing down… and I know what some of you spouses are saying… it is helpful because if he doesn’t get it right Im going to kill him… and I’m just trying to help get him to see the right point of view… no… just what builds up… but pastor if I don’t tell him all the stuff he has done wrong, he won’t ever get it right… first there is a difference in correction and tearing down… and second if you speak to the good things he has done… let me make a note… speak to the good things without and a BUT… thats the man he will become… truth… if you constantly speak of the bad things… thats who he will become too because he can’t win…
start trying to build people up, and you will then start to live a holy life...
Heard the story of the dad…daughter… hibachi house… finds jeans… to look like his daughter had been wearing…
he was making a powerful statement… my daughter is throwing herself at the world.. and she doesn’t know what she looks like so I am going to show her… because I care more about her than I care about myself...
Love will make you do crazy things….it will make you walk away from a conversation and say Im sorry i can’t do this I can’t be a part of this and people will push back and say, oh I guess she thinks she’s too good for us… no its not that its just that I am in love with somebody that supersedes this superficial stuff that you are obsessed with…. he saved me and called me and you can’t do better… so here is my life lord its all for you...
When we are so focused on impressing people you have no more focus left for pleasing God… no wonder its hard to please God…
We gotta keep up the image… we gotta make sure we fit the bill.. but at the expense of what…it could be in the way we discipline kids… and sometimes its not because we are trying to build them up but its because the way they are acting and I am embarrassed and want to make sure people know I discipline my kids… come on I am preaching to me this morning… and thats good stuff...
IF you liking me makes me compromised my love For god you aren’t worth it…
Paul is writing this from prison so it looks like he is on the losing end… but he’s not ashamed… Im not ashamed to suffer for the one who was willing to die for me… you think I am ashamed of him… Im so thankful that I have a savior that stood with me… so no amount of loneliness is going to allow me to compromise my love for him for you...
Jesus said I didn’t need to do that I didn’t need to prove anything… and here is the third point…. this one is what you probably don’t expect...
First two we kind of get.. others… myself.. live for god...
3. Religion can be just as destructive to a holy life as sinfulness can… so i cannot live a holy life if I am living for likes from god
if in my mentality I have the thought that if I am better God will like me more… I will never get better…. if in my mentality the idea is when I can quit this God will like me more… I will never quit it… and since I can’t quit it and I don’t think god likes me I am hesitant to bring him into my situation because who wants to be around someone that doesn’t like you...
The final temptation of Jesus...
this one is interesting.. it teaches us how satan wants us to see God...
8 Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor.
9 “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.”
8Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. 9“All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.”
religion says, all this i will give you if you bow down and worship… our god says all this i HAVE given you…. now bow down and worship….
you ARE holy… so be holy… you are loved… so walk in love…. totally different idea...
HE has saved us and called us to a holy life - not because of anything we have done, but because of his own purpose and grace...
remember how saved and sanctified are totally one in the same in this passage...
it doesn’t say he has saved us…. and now he has called us to live a holy life…. because of our own virtue and strength...
He has saved us not because of anything we have done… and he has called us not because of anything we have done….
neither one of them are anything we have done… its something we have to receive
legalism says i’ll give you my love if you bow down and worship
jesus says I’ve given you my love now bow down and worship
now live for me… now live in your calling… because i saved you… because I called you… because I died for you… its a whole different deal!!!
Jesus said verse ten….
10Jesus said to him, “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.’”
11Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him.
Please him only...
What could give jesus that kind of perspective to say I don’t have to prove myself to God, I’m approved BY him… i think its because of what happened right before he went out to the wilderness… and want to know what happened...
Jesus went to the jordan… john…. no you baptize me… not because of sin i need to be washed away…but to set a pattern… and look at what happens Matthew 3:16...
16 As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him.
16As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him.
You know what the secret to becoming more like Christ is? Its not trying to get more likes from god for your behavior… its by becoming more aware of how much love God already has for you… we think if i could be more like jesus Id be more pleasing… father says no… it doesn’t work that way… he says this is my son.. whom I am well pleased… Paul said 2 Tim 1… this grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time… so If I am in Christ… and God is pleased with his son… it stands to reason that he is pleased with me too… now who do you have to please?
The number one way to assure you won’t live a life pleasing to god is to live a life where you are constantly trying to please god… yeah we should life a life that we are an offering… but not because we want more likes from him… but because we are getting deeper and deeper in his love from him… and each morning when we wake up we are refreshing a screen to see how many likes we get… and we aren’t trying to be more like Christ so God will like me more… were are trying to be more like Christ because I am becoming more and more aware of how much God already loves me… this is a new way to be holy… be what God called you… he called you holy… be holy… im not trying to get him to like me more.. I can’t make him love me more than he already does… but i can be more like him the more i stand in his love the more like him i become….
lets take a dip in the jordan before we leave church today… so when we go to work and are tempted to turn stones to bread…. hey look at me… or try to manufactor some sort of performance to please god… may we realize we are drenched in the jordan… and we don’t have to get more likes… we just have to be more like jesus… am I doing this for more likes… or am i doing this to be more like...