Ignite 2023 Recap
Battle of the Gods • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Transcript
Intro
Intro
Main
Main
The Battle is Over (There is One God deserving of worship)
Is this you:
“Who is God that I should obey Him?” (Ex 5:2)
Because judgment is delayed, you live your life thinking you can get away with it (Ecc 8:11)
Delayed response/obedience
Bargains with God
Offers half-hearted apology
GOD WANTS HUMBLE SURRENDER
The Battle for Your Love
Need for a new heart
Go ALL-OUT pursuing the Savior who rescued you
It’s not wrong to desire what’s best for yourself, but that desire must find its answer in God. So, if you’re finding it in other things, your desire is too weak, not too strong. A strong desire of what’s best for yourself must drive you to God.
Don’t limp between two masters
The Battle for Your Trust
Joyfully accept God’s absolute sovereignty
See the futility of the alternatives
Guard against trusting what “makes sense” — You need faith
The gospel doesn’t “make sense”
Find refuge in the great I AM
God wants what is best for you
God knows what is best for you
God can do what is best for you
What is that? To make you like Jesus. Do you want this?
Join the Battle
Who are we fighting for?
What are we fighting against?
Thoughts of “God’s holding out on me”
loving or trusting something more than God
Fight that thought with faith
How do we fight the battle?
With God’s Word
Prayer
Our adversary has an inside man with each of us
our flesh
Not only do we fight for ourselves but for others
pray for others
exhort others
see the gospel reach new people
You’ve heard the truth
You’ve responded in one of four ways:
You looked at your life, saw worship of the one true God, and continued
You looked at your life, saw worship of false gods, and repented
You looked at your life, saw worship of false gods, and did nothing about it
You haven’t looked at your life to consider what you are worshiping
Tonight I’d like to look at the example of a man who was warned, ignored the warning, and suffered the consequences of ignoring the warning...
1 As soon as Solomon had finished building the house of the Lord and the king’s house and all that Solomon desired to build, 2 the Lord appeared to Solomon a second time, as he had appeared to him at Gibeon. 3 And the Lord said to him, “I have heard your prayer and your plea, which you have made before me. I have consecrated this house that you have built, by putting my name there forever. My eyes and my heart will be there for all time. 4 And as for you, if you will walk before me, as David your father walked, with integrity of heart and uprightness, doing according to all that I have commanded you, and keeping my statutes and my rules, 5 then I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever, as I promised David your father, saying, ‘You shall not lack a man on the throne of Israel.’ 6 But if you turn aside from following me, you or your children, and do not keep my commandments and my statutes that I have set before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them, 7 then I will cut off Israel from the land that I have given them, and the house that I have consecrated for my name I will cast out of my sight, and Israel will become a proverb and a byword among all peoples. 8 And this house will become a heap of ruins. Everyone passing by it will be astonished and will hiss, and they will say, ‘Why has the Lord done thus to this land and to this house?’ 9 Then they will say, ‘Because they abandoned the Lord their God who brought their fathers out of the land of Egypt and laid hold on other gods and worshiped them and served them. Therefore the Lord has brought all this disaster on them.’ ”
So. That was the truth, the command, the warning. Choose who you will worship and know the outcome…
Let’s see what happens...
1 Now King Solomon loved many foreign women, along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women, 2 from the nations concerning which the Lord had said to the people of Israel, “You shall not enter into marriage with them, neither shall they with you, for surely they will turn away your heart after their gods.” Solomon clung to these in love. 3 He had 700 wives, who were princesses, and 300 concubines. And his wives turned away his heart. 4 For when Solomon was old his wives turned away his heart after other gods, and his heart was not wholly true to the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father. 5 For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and after Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites. 6 So Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and did not wholly follow the Lord, as David his father had done. 7 Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the abomination of Moab, and for Molech the abomination of the Ammonites, on the mountain east of Jerusalem. 8 And so he did for all his foreign wives, who made offerings and sacrificed to their gods. 9 And the Lord was angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice 10 and had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not go after other gods. But he did not keep what the Lord commanded.
What we’ll see later is that there were severe consequences for this
Enemies of Israel during Solomon’s time
10 of the tribes being ripped away/split from the kingdom — now it’s a divided kingdom
eventual judgment and exile
So why? Why would he love these women and why would he stumble into this?
1 I said in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure; enjoy yourself.” But behold, this also was vanity. 2 I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?” 3 I searched with my heart how to cheer my body with wine—my heart still guiding me with wisdom—and how to lay hold on folly, till I might see what was good for the children of man to do under heaven during the few days of their life. 4 I made great works. I built houses and planted vineyards for myself. 5 I made myself gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. 6 I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees. 7 I bought male and female slaves, and had slaves who were born in my house. I had also great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem. 8 I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces. I got singers, both men and women, and many concubines, the delight of the sons of man. 9 So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem. Also my wisdom remained with me. 10 And whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I kept my heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure in all my toil, and this was my reward for all my toil. 11 Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had expended in doing it, and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.
SOLOMON
Heard the truth, the command of God, and the warning ( 1 Kgs 9:4, 6-9)
Disregarded the truth, the command of God, and the warning (1 Kgs 11:1-2)
Angered God and suffered consequences (a type for all of Israel)
God departed from the temple
Israel was judged, carried off into exile
YOU AND ME
We heard the truth, the command, the warning UP AT CAMP
How will you respond?
What will be the outcome?
APPLICATION
Guard your heart against a multitude of loves by devoting your heart to fully love God alone.
Surround yourself with people who will turn your heart to God.
I want you to think about the negative times in your life...
The times you are fearful
The times you are sad
The times you are hurting
The times you are angry
The times you are lonely
The times you are needy
WHERE DO YOU TURN?
You may have different answers for different things
This is what it should look like for someone who is fully devoted to God...
The times you are fearful
The times you are sad
The times you are hurting
The times you are angry
The times you are lonely
The times you are needy
12 training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age,
15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
4 You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
10 For Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia.
Closing
Closing