The Art of Seeking, Part 2
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Colossians 3:5 .
5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.
Jesus, through his death and resurrection, has given us a new identity that seeks the kingdom of God.
We are to seek the heavenly by the power of the resurrection of Jesus.
We do this by putting to death the earthly, i.e. the old self and its desires. This is done through identifying with Christ’s death on the cross (Romans 6:6).
Jesus died for sin once for all. We, too, die to our old self, i.e. sin, by choosing our new self given to us through the death and resurrection of Jesus.
Jesus died to since once for all. We, however, in the day-to-day grind must choose to live in the realty of his death and die to all sinful desires.
This is done in the power of the Holy Spirit, which Galatians 5:16 states.
16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
We make a daily, sometimes minute-by-minute, choice to die to sin and to walk with the Spirit in our new identity that Christ has made possible.
Paul forms two lists of vices that identify the earthly, and one list of virtues that identify the heavenly (our new identity).
The first list of six vices is centered around sexual sin. These were real struggles for the church in the first century, just as they are real for us today in the age of the internet.
We are to put them to death, to cease to practice them, and replace them with our new identity.
1 John 1:9 gives clear direction to this process.
9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
πορνεία (porneia) is the first vice Paul lists. It refers to sexual immorality. It is where we get the word pornography from.
ἀκαθαρσία (akatharsia) is the second vice Paul lists. It is the result of practicing sexual immorality, translated in our text as impurity. This impurity will not cease until we put to death sexual sin in our lives. When we do put it to death and live in the identity Jesus’ has given us we agree with the work of purity that Christ has wrought.
πάθος (pathos) and ἐπιθυμία (epithumia) are the third and fourth vices Paul lists. These words refer to sexual appetites, which addresses the addictive and consuming nature of sexual sin, forming ingrained habits that are only broken by the Holy Spirit’s work in your body through the body of Christ. Sexual addiction is not broken alone. You need the Holy Spirit working through the body of Christ.
πλεονεξία (pleonexia) is the fifth vice Paul lists. It refers to greed or covetousness. When we consider it with the other four words it carries with it sexual desire for what is not yours and the insatiable appetite it takes on. This reminds us that to die to this we need the Holy Spirit to work so we can live for God.
εἰδωλολατρία (eidōlolatria) is the sixth vice Paul lists. It refers to the worship of anything other than God. Each of these five sexual sins is an active choice to live in death, to put on the foreskin which Christ cut away, to worship the old self rather than your Creator, who has given you life and that life is abundant.
Brothers and Sisters, may we never forget the old Sunday School song, “I’ve Got a River of Life.”
I've got a river of life flowing out of me!
Makes the lame to walk, and the blind to see.
Opens prison doors, sets the captives free!
I've got a river of life flowing out of me!
Singing this in the midst of temptation would be a good start on dying to sin and living for God.
Josh McDowell gives us “a few startling statistics on sexual sin in our churches:
79 percent of men and 76 percent of women, ages 18-30, view pornography at least once a month.
64 percent of young people, ages 13-24, actively seek out pornography.
57 percent of pastors admit they struggle with pornography.
60-72 percent of men and 24-30 percent of women in the Church are sex addicts.
Sadly, according to this, we are not doing a good job of dying to sin and living to God. This, I believe, is partly due to only emphasizing death to the old self and not emphasizing living in our new identity.
Both are important and needed to grow into the fulness of Christ. If either are neglected then we falter in our struggle against sin.
When we die to fornication we are to replace that twisted desire with proper desire in the family of God. We do not only work from a place of death in Jesus’ crucifixion. We work from a place of life in his resurrection.
Remember, you have a river of live flowing out of you. The very power that raised Jesus from the dead is at work in you.
Colossians 3:6 .
6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming.
The justice and holiness of God requires his wrath.
Sin is not something we should take lightly.
Sin is not something we should dismiss.
Sin is not something we should justify.
Sin is serous and carries grave consequences in our lives.
We live in a culture that works to normalize sin of all forms through our entertainment, our social media, and our advertisement. Often we do not even realize that we have drifted into complacency and normalization concerning sin.
It is important that we remember two things to stem this tide.
First. it is for this very sin that Jesus died - he took the wrath of God.
Second, God’s wrath is coming upon all who do not receive Jesus’s death and resurrection.
May we never forget these two truths as we die to sin and live for God.
Colossians 3:7 .
7 In these you too once walked, when you were living in them.
Colossians 3:7 is such a beautiful verse, reminding us that our identity and actions grow out of Christ’s death and resurrection. Our identity is sons and daughters of God, and it is from this place that we die to sin and live for God. We choose to live in the place of life.
Colossians 3:8-10 .
8 But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth.
9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices
10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.
Here we have Paul’s second list of six vices that we are to put away. The command “put away” has the same idea as the command “put to death”. Paul has chosen to switch analogies from death to life, to garments of the old self and the new self. He is trying to get us to live in our God-given identity.
Paul commands us to put away six practices of the old self, six practices of death.
Anger (ὀργή orgē) is the first in the list to be “put away”. Anger is an emotional response to a perceived injustice. This Greek word speaks to normal human anger. We should take to heart the advice of Paul in Ephesians 4:26-27
26 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger,
27 and give no opportunity to the devil.
Wrath or rage (θυμός thumos) is the second in the list to “put away”. This is referring to an uncontrolled response to a perceived injustice. The common expression might be “hot head”. If you struggle with this, a passage to meditate on is Psalm 37:7-8
7 Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way, over the man who carries out evil devices!
8 Refrain from anger, and forsake wrath! Fret not yourself; it tends only to evil.
Malice (κακία kakia)is the third in the list to “put away”. In anger we are tempted to do evil to the objects of our anger. We want vengeance. May we meditate on Romans 12:19
19 Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”
Slander (βλάσφημος blasphēmosis) is the fourth in the list to “put away”. In anger we are tempted to speak half-truths or present partial information about individuals that puts them in a bad light. When we struggle with slander, let’s remember Psalm 101:5
5 Whoever slanders his neighbor secretly I will destroy. Whoever has a haughty look and an arrogant heart I will not endure.
Obscene talk (αἰσχρολογία aischrologia) is the fifth in the list to “put away”. When we are angry, we say things that are damaging. We call people names. We say things that we do not mean later, though we mean them in the moment. These words do damage that takes years and the grace of God to repair. Paul gives us good advice in Colossians 4:6
6 Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.
Lying (ψεύδομαι pseudomai) is the sixth in the list to “put away”. Paul singles this one out, stating clearly, “Do not lie to one another.” We all know lying erodes trust in a relationship faster than zinc on a ship’s hull. God has a stern warning for liers in Proverbs 6:16-19
16 There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him:
17 haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood,
18 a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil,
19 a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers.
Having put all these away, we put on the new self. We do not just deny. We put on Jesus, which fills our hearts with his love for us and our love for him. He does the work of renewing us through knowing him, thus conforming us to his image.
Colossians 3:11.
11 Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.
This identity that he has wrought for us, that he calls us to live in, cuts across all ethnicities, religions, social or economic status. All find their value and worth in their identity in Jesus, for Christ is the All in All.
Go, live in the identity that Christ, the All in All, has given you.