Person of Balance in Culture of Compulsions 011

Becoming a Person of Balance in a Culture of Compulsions

Restoring the Savor of Our Salt Series       Message # 11

In 1 Timothy 4, beginning in verse 6, Paul, speaking to Timothy, says, “If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ, nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine, whereunto thou hast attained. 7  But refuse profane and old wives’ fables, and exercise thyself rather unto godliness. 8  For bodily exercise profiteth little: but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come. 9  This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation. 10  For therefore we both labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe. 11  These things command and teach. 12  Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity.”

I once visited a lady who was the most meticulous housekeeper I have ever encountered. You go into her home and open the cupboards and the cans in there are all facing forward, the labels can be read. There are little tiered steps going up. Everything in the kitchen is inventoried. If she used something, she wrote down on a list what she used so that it could be replaced. The kitchen floor you could eat off of. It was the kind of home that was meticulously taken care of that everyone going in there feels anxious about being there. She had a catalog system for everything you could imagine—books, recordings. Everything was in its place. No one wears shoes in the house. You took them off at the door, and she was not oriental.

On the surface, you might think to yourself, boy, that would be a great way to live—to be organized for a change. To have life in some sort of sense. But the fact is, I am convinced, this woman is just experiencing a very severe outbreak of one of the American diseases called compulsions.

There is a whole family of diseases in America that surround this idea of compulsion. They are found in abundance in America, because Americans at the core are hungry people.

I’d like for you to think with me about this issue of some of the compulsive diseases in America. I’m not going to belabor any of them.

Number one, I think Americans tend to be very impulsive people. They are who act on what they feel like at the moment. If they feel like buying a shirt, they buy a shirt. If they feel like eating a bagel, they eat a bagel. If they feel like moving somewhere, they move. They do what they feel like doing at the moment. They don’t reflect on what it means. They don’t question what they are doing. They don’t look at the consequences down the road. Americans tend to be people of impulse.

Secondly, Americans tend to be people of addictions. They tend to get hooked on things that they cannot stop. They tend to have these choices in their lives that they cannot turn away from. One of the most interesting verses in the New Testament is 1 Corinthians 6:12. Paul said, “All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.” Paraphrase—“I can do anything I want to if Christ has not said no, but I won’t do anything that I cannot easily stop when I want to.”

The idea is, I will not be mastered by anything. We tend to be people who let stuff master us.

Number three, America is also characterized by a disease called drivenness. People decide that something is good and valuable, and they say to themselves, I will have it. I don’t care what it costs. Whatever I have to pay, I will get it. So men and women are investing their health and their families and their reputations and their finances and their relationships—they are sacrificing everything because they said, I need this thing.

Issue number four. Americans tend to be people of compulsion. They are people who are not controlled by personal goals and by choice. Rather, they are controlled by some sort of a habit that has gotten into their lives that they cannot turn away from.

I’ve read about people who wash their hands forty, fifty times a day. Wash their hands so often that their hands become red and raw and the skin is injured and they start to bleed, but they cannot stop washing their hands.

I’ve heard of people missing their loved one’s funeral because it was on a Saturday and Saturday was the day to do the lawn. There are people who weigh themselves three times a day. Compulsive behaviors that they just can’t seem to turn away from.

Number five. Americans tend to be people of extremes. We tend to be out of balance in our lives. Rather than being content with one nice antique, we try to turn our home into a museum. Rather than being content with forty or forty-five hours a week, we say to ourselves, I’ve got to give them eighty if I am going to get anywhere. We tend to be people of extremes.

Number six. Americans tend to be people with little or no self-discipline. People who, even if they know what they ought to do, can’t seem to find the power to do what they should do. They have all these things in their lives they want to do, things they know they should do, and feel absolutely powerless like captives and slaves, unable to do what they should do.

Finally, number seven, Americans tend to be people of imbalance. People who are diligent masters of some area of their life, and who are letting other areas of their lives absolutely rot.

I’ve known of people who have incredible commitment to body-building. Their physique is in wonderful shape. They give huge energy to that pursuit. But other aspects of their lives are in absolute shambles. Their finances, their family, their relationships with their children—an absolute mess. Because they are people of imbalance.

I want to ask you to think today about this whole issue of escaping the compulsive diseases of America, and to think today about your BQ—your balance quotient. To say to yourself, Am I a person who is living a balanced life? Or have I somehow gotten involved with some extremes, turned my life in a direction that is really not honoring to the Lord, nor encouraging to my friends around me.

Specifically today, I want to do two things. Number one, I want to look at 1 Timothy 4:12, talk about this issue of living a balanced spiritual life. And number two, I want to look very briefly at the end at this question, How do I escape compulsions in my life? What is the beginning step to escape addiction? How do I become a person who turns away from imbalance and extremes in my life?

Let’s look first of all at 1 Timothy chapter 4, verse 12. Paul says to Timothy, “Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity.”

Let’s talk about those six balance points that Paul was urging Timothy to follow.

Balance point # 1 is the question, what is the character of my speech? A balanced Christian life means I am a person who has to say to myself, what is the character of my speech? Does my speech matter to me as much as my portfolio, and my home, and my career?

God has some very basic guidelines for our speech. First of all, to ask myself the question, is it truthful? Ephesians 4:15—did I say what is true? God is deeply committed to truth, and God is calling us for us to be people who say what is true.

Secondly, is the question, does my speech embody love for others? Ephesians 4:15 again. If I said something to someone, did they get the feeling that I loved them, or did they get the feeling I was out to batter them? Am I speaking in loving ways?

And number three, do I speak in ways that build people up or that knock people down? When I get done speaking to someone, do they feel built up and encouraged, or do they feel knocked down and discouraged?

A man who was in a very successful line of work felt God’s call on his life to ministry. A friend of his, upon hearing that he was leaving his current profession to go into the ministry, said to him, You are a fool. I cannot believe you are going to do that. And just went on and on about that. And that man experienced a tremendous discouragement come over his life as a result of those words spoken to him.

Years later, after being in the ministry for some time, a friend who had known him in his previous career was in a service where he was preaching. This man came up to him and said, I am so thankful to God that you left that career and went into the ministry. And he experienced tremendous encouragement as a result of those words. He still remembers both sets of words spoken to him. He will never forget either one.

Is my speech building up my friends, or is it knocking them down?

A balanced person is a person who is giving energy to the question, how am I speaking?

Balance point # 2, 1 Timothy 4:12, what is the nature of my lifestyle or my conduct? The Greek word is a word that means the way that I act, the way I behave, the way I conduct myself, the way I live in the sense of practicing certain principles.

It means an intentional lifestyle, a lifestyle that is built around intentional principles and beliefs, and a lifestyle that is not blown along by the current and the wind of the culture.

You see, there are two different ways to live. One of them is accidentally. Just to go whichever way the current is flowing. To go whichever way the culture is going. And there are a lot of people in America living that way. They are wearing what the culture wears, drinking what the culture drinks, thinking the way the culture thinks, saying things the culture says. They are people who are drifting with the current of their subculture.

But Paul said to Timothy in this passage, you need to live intentionally, according to a set of principles that you have personally embraced. You need to be a person who is concerned about your lifestyle and your conduct.

Balance point # 3. What is the level and the quality of my love for the people around me? 1 John 4:20, “If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also.”

God is a God who is calling me to have a terrific concern for loving the people around me. Number one, because He commanded it, and number two because it demonstrates that I belong to Him. And number three because people need it desperately. People need desperately to know that they are loved.

I heard a story about a man named Frank Reed who was held hostage in Lebanon from 1986 to 1990. Frank Reed was beaten. He was kept most of the time in a dark cell. He was blindfolded for a great part of five years. He was chained to a wall. At one point this man was moved from one cell to another cell. He was blindfolded. He was sitting in this darkened cell blindfolded, chained to a wall. He couldn’t hear anything because he was told by his captors to be strictly silent. But he got the feeling that someone was in the room with him. For three weeks he lived with the feeling that someone was in there, and he didn’t have the courage to lift his blindfold and see. After three weeks he got up the courage. He lifted his blindfold and he found two other Americans were chained next to him. They had all been there in silence for three weeks together. After he got home, after he was released, he gave an interview to Time Magazine. Here is a man who has been beaten, he had been made sick by not being fed. He had been tormented. He had been in the dark most of the time. He had not been allowed to speak. He was chained to a wall. But here is the thing that discouraged him. He said to Time Magazine, “Nothing I did mattered to anyone. I began to realize how withering it is to exist with not a single expression of caring around me. I learned one overriding fact—caring is a powerful force. If no one cares, you are truly alone.” When he got home, he said, it wasn’t the beating that took me down. It wasn’t the darkness. It wasn’t the silence. It was the fact that no one cared about me in that setting.

God is calling us to be people who live a balanced life by demonstrating our love for those around us.

Balance point # 4. The question, what is the size of my faith? It is a core issue with God—the issue that we trust Him. For some reason, it is a huge issue with God that we trust Him. Hebrews 11, verse1 and 6. “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen….But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.”

It is a huge issue with God that I trust Him for the things that I need, and that I trust Him to work through me. God is extremely concerned that I be a person who trusts Him.

I want to ask you a question: do you have anything going in your life, do you have anything you are trusting God for that is so big that you can’t do it yourself? Are you working on anything in life that God needs to work in? Or is everything in your life something you can manage by yourself?

I am convinced that God wants us to be working on issues and spiritual outreaches in our lives that are so big that if God doesn’t intercede it will be a miserable failure. What are you trusting God for?

I think we need to trust God in our personal lives, in our family lives, in our church life ministry. We need to be people who say, Lord, we are willing to trust You to do what we can never do. We must not be afraid to believe God.

Balance point # 5. What is the shape of my purity? God is a pure and holy Being. He is deeply committed to purity in us as well. For most Americans purity is a joke. Purity is an archaic, out-of-date ridiculous idea that they want nothing to do with. But God is saying to us, He wants us to be people who are very committed to purity in our thought lives, in our speech, in our media experiences, committed to purity in our jokes, committed to purity in our eyes, in the things we are looking at. God is calling us to be people who are much more concerned about our purity than our portfolios. It’s a big deal with God.

Final balance point. What is the character of my example? Paul said to Timothy, I want you to live in this way so that when other people look at your life they will say, there is a person who is different. There is a life, there is an example that is drastically different from the folks around us.

The question to ask is, what is the nature and the character of my example before other people? Or perhaps we could ask it in another way: does my life draw others to Jesus Christ, or does it push them away? Or in yet another way: is my life a clear representation of God in the area of purity? Or probably the most brutal way to ask it: would I want my children to live the way I’m living? Would I want my children to follow my example in terms of studying the Word of God, in terms of prayer, in terms of sharing my faith with those around me, in terms of making sacrifices for people who are struggling? Would I want my children to grow up and live like I’m living? Is this the kind of example I want to give to them of a lifestyle?

I could count very quickly a few people who have had a profound impact on my life. In every case, they are people whose lifestyles are motivating me to seek God. God is calling for us to have that kind of a lifestyle, that we are motivating our friends to seek the Lord because of the way we are living.

When you think about living in a compulsive culture, living in a place where people are impulsive and addicted and extreme and imbalanced, I believe this is the kind of balanced life that God is calling for us to pursue. Pursuing that kind of a lifestyle doesn’t always make you look good in front of other people. A lot of people around you are going to consider you an idiot. They are going to think you are a fool to pursue these kinds of things in your life, at the expense of the other things that you have been pursuing or that they are pursuing. In their opinion, you are foolish. In God’s opinion, you are brilliant! And God’s opinion is a brilliant way to live.

The last thing I want to do today is look very briefly at this question of escaping compulsive and addictive behaviors.

You and I both know that it would take ten days to do a basic coverage of this issue. We’re not going to take ten days. There are thousands of books written on this very question.

I want to talk about three foundational issues, I want to talk about them briefly. But I think these are foundational issues in terms of the question, how do I get victory over addictive and compulsive behaviors?

I want to begin by saying, compulsive and addictive behaviors are almost always used for three things. If a person has an addiction, or a compulsion, they are almost always doing one of three things with them. Number one, they are attempting to medicate pain. There are people who have been battered by life and by relationships, and they are saying to themselves, this activity and this choice will help me to medicate the pain that I am feeling in my life. Number two, they are attempting to cope with anxiety. There is something in their lives they are not sure about. They are not sure if life is going to work. They are not sure if anyone is going to take care of them or love them. There is an uncertainty, an anxiety, and they are using that behavior to attempt to deal with that anxiety. Or, number three, they are attempting to fill personal hunger. They understand that they are hungry people, they understand it at some level. They are saying to themselves, how can I deal with this? How can I get some satisfaction, some fulfillment? And their answer is the bad answer, but their answer is, I will follow this addictive behavior.

People are using it to medicate pain, to try to cope with anxiety, and to try to fill personal hunger. And therefore, the key to overcoming addictive behaviors and compulsive behaviors is to say to myself, How does God help me deal with pain? How does God help me deal with anxiety? And how does God help me fulfill personal hungers?

Three things. Number one, the Biblical way to respond to pain starts with 1 Samuel 30:6. “And David was greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters: but David encouraged himself in the LORD his God.” I wish we could go into that, but we cannot.

Number two, the Biblical way to deal with anxiety begins with 1 Peter 5:7. “Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.” If you and I follow 1 Peter 5:7 it will help us with anxiety in incredible ways.

Number three. How do I deal with personal hunger? Key verse: Psalm 34:8. “O taste and see that the LORD is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in him.” If I am a person who is pursuing Psalm 34:8, I will be able to deal with personal hunger. And I will be able to escape the addictive behaviors, the compulsions I am following, to work on personal hungers.

Three foundational, Biblical issues for dealing with compulsion in my own individual life.

I want to encourage you to take those verses home, look them up yourself, meditate on them, and say Lord, what do I need to do in my own life to make some progress, to move toward the victory that you have already supplied me in Christ Jesus?

I am convinced that God wants us to be people who are very committed to a balanced life. Not people drifting along with the culture’s extremes, not people going where the culture is going in addictions and imbalance, but people who are working hard to have an example of a balanced life. The kind of life that draws other people toward God.

A pastor tells of being on an airline flight some years back. It was a large plane loaded with mostly Christian men going to a particular place for a large meeting. The stewardesses were very anxious about the group. They were disgusted that they didn’t sell any alcohol. And in the process of serving a light meal (this was back when they served meals on planes), the stewardess got right down to this pastor, and she spilled a large container of tomato juice down the back of the man right across the aisle from this pastor. The guy was sitting there in a white shirt, and she spilled a half a can of tomato juice right down his back. She tensed up in terror, expecting a barrage of wrath for this. But it never came. The man said, “It’s not a problem. Don’t worry about it.” The woman apologized repeatedly. She was in disbelief. She was in absolute shock. This man pulled his arms inside of his shirt, turned his polo shirt around, took a handkerchief and a bottle of ginger ale and began cleaning his shirt. It took him twenty minutes. He would dump a little ginger ale on the handkerchief, clean a while, and do it again. It took him twenty minutes to clean his shirt. The stewardess was in absolute disbelief. He turned his shirt around, stuck his arms back out, ate his meal.

Here was a man whose lifestyle was shining the life of Jesus Christ on that airplane. That’s the kind of example that God is calling us to.

—PRAYER—