Where are your feet planted ? (2)

Rooted in the Eternal: Where Are Your Feet Planted?

Bible Passage: 1 Jn 2:15–17

Summary: In these verses, John warns believers against loving the world and the things in it, emphasizing the transient nature of worldly desires and the eternal significance of loving God.

Application: This passage calls Christians to examine their priorities and affections, encouraging them to cultivate a love for God that surpasses worldly attachments. It can help believers discern where they are investing their time, energy, and hearts, addressing struggles with materialism and fleeting pleasures.

Teaching: The sermon teaches the importance of prioritizing our relationship with God over worldly temptations and affections. It encourages self-reflection on what truly matters and challenges us to choose the eternal over the temporary.

How this passage could point to Christ: This passage ultimately points to Christ as the one who offers true and lasting fulfillment. In contrast to the world's fleeting promises, Jesus provides eternal love and life, highlighting the need to remain steadfast in Him.

Big Idea: Where we place our affections shapes our lives; true fulfillment is found in loving God fully rather than the transient world around us.

Recommended Study: As you prepare this sermon, consider exploring the cultural context of 1 John to understand the specific challenges the early believers faced regarding worldly love. Utilizing Logos, you can examine commentaries that discuss the nuances of 'the world' in John's writings, as well as relevant theological implications regarding affection for God versus the world. This might also include investigating how this theme resonates with other New Testament teachings on love and commitment to Christ.

1. Rejecting Worldly Attachments

1 John 2:15

You could begin by discussing how John explicitly instructs believers not to love the world or anything in it. Consider highlighting the nature of worldly love as fleeting and deceptive compared to the eternal and consistent love of God. Emphasize that prioritizing worldly desires can distort our affections and lead us away from the truth. This approach will guide the audience to self-reflect on their affections and encourage a reorientation towards godly love, which promises fulfillment beyond the world’s temporary attractions.

2. Resisting Temptations Triumphantly

1 John 2:16

Perhaps focus on the three main avenues of temptation: the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Stress that these represent the core of worldly desires which ultimately undermine our spiritual journey. By understanding these temptations, believers can identify and guard against them, aligning their lives with God's purposes. This point highlights Christ's triumph over temptation and His example as our source of strength in overcoming worldly lures.

3. Rooting in Eternal Will

1 John 2:17

Maybe conclude with the contrast between the passing world and the enduring will of God. Emphasize that doing God's will leads to eternal life, reflecting the transformative power of Christ’s love and sacrifice. Encourage the congregation to center their lives on eternal truths, drawing motivation from Christ’s victory over death and His promise of eternal life. This will inspire self-examination and a commitment to live in alignment with God’s eternal kingdom.

So God created the earth right. We are living in this big blue earth we are the world living inside of it. And there are two side of the world, we have OF world Some countries on this earth such as the Iran, North Korea, China, they all don’t allow Christianity. People of the world takes God out of everything. Like verse 15 says be not of the world and then we have THE world which is us Christians. We just sit back and watch everything happen and pray everything and everybody gets their stuff together, we don’t want to any parts of what ya’ll have going on. So when we look at the world in a whole we see there is one main we all need to survive. Money. We all need money to live, we need money to pay for food, we need money to pay for bills, we need money to pay for clothes, we all need money for something. And sometimes we put that before God or just that at the forefront and not the long run. I catch myself sometimes looking at the salaries and be like nah that doesn’t pay enough, wooo way much less, but instead we don’t look at maybe God wants us there for a reason. One of the main reasons i stopped acting was because around people were coming out saying in order to become a big star you have to sell your soul or you have to do this or do that and I wanted to be a big time actor, I still do. I want to be able to travel the world and people know who I am, but not at the cost of that. So I took a step back back because I did not want to be apart of that, I didn’t even want people thinking I thought of even doing anything. So If i get back into the acting game it’ll be the right way, God’s way. In 1 Timothy is says how the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. Focusing on money or worldly things will distract us from what God really has planned for us. If I would have kept trying to act and if I would have gotten a big role I would have never gotten into depression and answered my calling to become a minister. God has a plan for all of us and its on us to take the leap of faith, its on us to be able to know when to take that other foot out of the world. We can’t keep having one foot of the world and one foot in world. We need to plant both feet in the world with God. In order to lift up that other foot to bring it into the world with God and see what He has for us we need to resist the temptations of the world. And verse 16 tells us the three main ones the lust of flesh, the lust of eyes, and the pride of life. We need to be able to control ourselves when it comes to the flesh because the devil will come in different forms of food and snacks, men and women, drugs and alcohol. The eyes, you can see someone elses lives and how great they are living and put you down into a mood and now you missing out on what God has for you because you are focused on the wrong thing. God is the one who gets all the Glory and all of the Praise, I was talking to my grandma the other day about trump and she said he had the yearly presidential prayer and he didn’t do anything but talk about hisself and talk down on other presidents. Not supposed to have that mentality. To resist them just simply talk to God and pray. Thats a whole different sermon. But once we resist them life will be better, things will be easier. We will then be able to see and live out what God has truly planned for us. We will have eternal life. We will grow and life in the world but not of the world. And when its all said and done, when Jesus comes back, we wont be left down here we will be going up with The Lord. When we fully plant our feet with God we will have a brand new life. We can’t keep our old one and have a new one, we need to fully grab a hold of our new one and keep it, it’ll be better. If you want an example of someone who walked with God, and lived in the world but not of the world just look at Jesus. He is a perfect example. Jesus walked this earth teaching, breathing, living as a regular human being. He had flesh, He had a human body, Jesus had to deal with all the temptations, all the desires, He had the opportunity to do everything we all d or could do today but didn’t. Most people didn’t believe He was the Son of God, and He was beat, whipped, and nailed to the cross for us to be here today. So why not walk with FULLY with Him today ? With both feet.