Get Out Of The Rut

Instead of considering their fellow Christians as spiritually alive Saints whose outward flesh has died with Christ… they are looking, with credibility, to outward qualifications.

Paul recognizes that they are beginning to treat him according to these standards… under the influence of new teachers (Paul sarcastically calls them, ‘super apostles’) who have come into their midst, - they are beginning to question Paul’s qualifications and are asking Paul to send to them letters of commendation.

It’s true, that if an unknown teacher comes to a church… they might be required to prove a good reputation.

But Paul reminds them, that they know him… and that their own Christian experience is his letter of commendation.

So Paul reminds them… that this is not how we are to regard our fellow Christian. We regard no one according to the flesh. Why? Because we are now, new creations. the old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

So last week, I approached this in the context of how we treat each other. Instead of looking at others as they are in the flesh… and regarding them according to the things they do in the flesh… - the things that offend us, or disappoint us, or wrongly impress us even…

We are now able to be more forgiving… we are able to extend more grace… we are able to be more understanding… we are able to be at peace with one another, because we recognize that the person before us… is a new creation… and that flesh which normally offends us.. is just a dead thing.

So we extend grace, knowing that this new creation before us, is still working out their salvation… they are still working to discover the mystery of walking in the Spirit… they are still wrestling with the enigma that is: crucifying the flesh and the desires within.

So… we’ve already covered this. You might be wondering. Why are we here, one week later… talking about the same thing?

We’re not.

Last week, we considered how to treat others as new creations in Christ. - this week: we think more intently, about what it means… that WE… ARE NEW CREATIONS IN CHRIST.

Sure, it’s going to affect how we treat each other, and that should be revolutionary in and of itself. But what does it mean for each of us, individually?

We all have heard that acronym: JOY: Jesus, Others, Yourself.

TODAY: We are going to the end of the line- Today, I want you to think about yourself. I want you to consider the implications… of what it means to be: A New Creation:

In … we have a very familiar Bible verse: It says: ‘And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but

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BE “BEING FILLED” WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT -

I realized our Bibles actually say: ‘be filled with’… but the original intent of the grammar here literally says: ‘BE BEING FILLED’.

Something that is constantly being filled… always has something new and fresh coming into it.

Something that is constantly being filled… -does not grow stagnant… does not stand still… they do not become an old thing. They themselves are new, and continually experience newness.

But… this doesn’t happen against our will -

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Ephesians 2:10 ESV

10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Eph

“we should walk in them” - That’s a challenge… an edification…

- We are given our identity: (We are His workmanship)…

We are given our purpose: (created for good works)

The source of our purpose is defined: (God prepared beforehand)...

A lot has gone into this… now, we are given our response: WE SHOULD WALK IN THEM.

If you think the Christian faith is lived out on auto pilot, then your Christian life will be a reoccurring experience of failure, disappointment, and ineffectiveness.

We need to

To let the fresh water flow into us… to ‘be being filled’ with the Holy Spirit… to Walk in the good works of our new identity..

It requires our will. It requires a choice. It requires the “o” word. - obedience

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O-BEDIENCE

We’re about ten minutes into this, so let me make mention of today’s sermon title. Today’s message is called:

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GET OUT OF THE RUT

I had a motorcycle when I was a teenager, I drove it constantly in the fields around my house. I started out riding in the ditches, but, at the age of 12, I had my first encounter with the law… and was told that I couldn’t ride my motorcycle in the ditches.

So, I moved into the fields… which was tricky… because, after the ground had been plowed, to ride in it, you had to pick a rut. In the ditch, I could swerve around, go up and down the hill, jump over the small driveways...

but out in a plowed field, I could only go straight… - Attempting to turn out of the rut, led… every time, to a painful spill.

Not long after the Iowa State Highway Patrol told me to leave the ditch… I sold my motorcycle.

It was boring. It was no longer fun. I was always going to the same place, the same way. I was stuck in a rut.

Years ago, Psychology Today did an article on ‘being stuck in a rut’.. They listed off 10 symptoms of being stuck..

The number one symptom was:

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“Even though you think you’d be happier if you made a change, it’s more comforting to stay the same and mope about it.”

Psychology calls this condition: ‘dysthymia’ (duhs-thai-mee-uh)

… a mild, chronic cousin of depression with symptoms like: low energy, low mood, loss of interest, and general loss of pleasure. - It’s generally caused by ‘chronic mild stress’.

Psychology tells us that chronic states are more harmful than intense, but scattered stressful events.

Extreme and desperate events… extreme pain… isolated events of great stress have a tendency to wake us up and push us to make a difference… But the ongoing mild and persistent discomfort… the chronic mild stress… leaves a person in a place where they have no motivation to change.

Live goes on. You still do your stuff. The day still happens. You get up. You do stuff. You go to bed. - It’s normal..

But… it’s not healthy.

Now, if you are a believer in Jesus… You are a new creation… you are a spiritual person… and whether you realize this or not, your emotional health and your spiritual health, now, are working hand in hand.

Your soul cannot be a wreck when your spirit is strong.

If you are in a rut emotionally… if you suffer the chronic effects of mild stress to the point where you have lost true motivation and pleasure… then it’s a certain thing, that you are also in a rut spiritually.

You can fall into the same psychological rut as an unbeliever… even though you are a new creation… but for you, Christian… it’s evidence of a bigger problem.

You are stuck.

Maybe you were once filled… but you are no longer being filled.

You have settled into a state… into a condition… into a normal… but it’s no longer a reflection of something that’s new.

The Bible reminds us… that we are new creations… but spiritually… we feel old, worn out, ineffective…

Sometimes we think that certain messages and experiences are for the young believer… but after we’ve been in church for a while, and after we’ve settled into our ways… we don’t consider them for us anymore…

Verses like:

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Romans 12:2 ESV

2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

…we’re like… I did that already… years ago. -I got my mind transformed when I was a new believer. I’m good now.

Oh really? Because… my experience is different. - I’m a pastor who spends a lot of time in the word and have over 25 years of ministry experience under my belt… and I REGULARLY FIND MYSELF… in a rut… in a place where I struggle to discern the will of God… in a place where I struggle to discern what is good, acceptable and perfect.

I regularly fall into a rut and face the difficulty of walking in the good works that God has prepared for me.

When I’m in a rut… I struggle to be ‘being filled’ with the HS… because I am not ‘being filled’ with the HS… no matter how many times I had experienced it in the past…

... I am unable to ride on the coat tails of past experiences for my present benefit. …

Listen… OLD BELIEVER!!!! You might be old in the flesh and bones… you ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE AN OLD BELIEVER!!!

God wants us to be mature believers… to be wise believers… but NOT OLD BELIEVERS.

BEING TRANSFORMED BY THE RENEWING OF YOUR MIND… is a call to every believer, no matter how many years have passed since you first raised your hand and walked down that isle.

When you were young… God began a new work in you.

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Philippians 1:6 ESV

6 And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

God intends to finish what He started.

You know… sometimes, when you pound a framing nail into a hard piece of oak… it tends to bend. When this happens, we try to correct the bend… but if it bends too much, we pull it out.. - or, if we are angry, we simply smash it down and pound in another one..

But if we are pounding that framing nail into a pine stud, it generally goes in straight…

The hard wood, provides more resistance… and brings out the bend...

God has a similar experience with people.

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Hosea 11:7 ESV

7 My people are bent on turning away from me, and though they call out to the Most High, he shall not raise them up at all.

THIS IS OUR NATURE… We are bent on doing the wrong thing… especially when the task before us is difficult.

But God intends to finish what He started… So God wants to pound in nails that won’t bend.

God wants you and I to follow the guidance and direction of the force that guides us… and willingly, and obediently push forward into the good works that He has prepared.

But once we bend… the process often times comes to a halt.

We pull ourselves out… we discard ourselves… we think of ourselves as bent nails…

And we don’t do anything, because we refuse to be made new… we refuse to be, ‘being filled’ with the spirit.

In Hosea, God recognized that His people were bent on turning away… but He tells these bent nails something different in Ezek 36.26

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Ezek.36.26

Ezekiel 36:26 ESV

26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.

Notice here what God says to His people in

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Isaiah 43:18–19 ESV

18 “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. 19 Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.

What did the Psalmist, Bono sing… as he quoted the Psalmist David, in :

verse 3

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Psalm 40:3 ESV

3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the Lord.

This is the nature of our God…

To those who are stuck in a rut… to those who are resistant to any kind of change… to those who have lost motivation… to those who have grown complacent..

To those who have become unteachable..

To those who life for their own agendas..

To those who are in the habit of submitting to their own fears..

To those who are ruled by conditional circumstances…

God says…

I am removing your heart of stone.

I am doing a new thing

YOu will sing a new song...

Because… - YOU ARE A NEW CREATION!!!

AND NEW THINGS DON’T GET STUCK IN RUTS…

New things… do new things. They move forward… they allow change and transition… they embrace things that are fresh… they are willing to go where God leads, even if he leads them into something that they might perceive as being difficult.

Please turn in your Bible to …

If you have the ESV, you’ll notice, that the editors put a fitting title over this section: PUT ON THE NEW SELF…

As we read verse one… we have to ask: “Have we been raised with Christ?” - Of course, the answer is yes. We reckon each other and ourselves according to the Spirit and not the flesh. We reckon the flesh dead… This is what Paul meant when he called us new creations…

So… we have been raised with Christ… so according to verse one.. we are to seek the things that are above, where Christ is.

Not seeking the things below where we are… not seeking our own ambition… not seeking according to our lack of ambition… not seeking a thing that can only be found in our rut… No, we look above and beyond that.

Verse 2 tells us where to set our minds: “on the things above, no on the things that are here on earth” - another way of saying this: Set your minds on spiritual things, not fleshly things… Which echoes Paul’s message back in …

Verse four says something profound… as we read it… “When Christ, who is your life appears,.... “ - we discover… that Christ is our life.

He is our life… He consumes our life… He gives purpose and direction to our life… Our life, our true, spiritual life, is hidden with Christ in God.

If you take just a moment and ponder that… it should blow your mind.

And in the context of this message… if Jesus if your life… is it fitting, that your life, or my life… be stuck in a rut???

Reminding us that our life is Jesus… we are told to avoid death… and the deeds of death are defined in vs. 5, verse 8 and part of verse 9.

I’ll bet, if you are in a rut… you are struggling with some of these things… - sexual immorality, impurity, passion… (that means: pornography… that means, sex outside of marriage… that means, unbridled lust)..

covetousness… (that means, the unhealthy drive and desire to have what you don’t have… and to get it with a passion and drive that is greater than the passion and drive that you have for God)… which is why it’s called, idolatry.

The list goes on… into verse 7 and into to verse nine where it wraps up with the command to not lie to one another.

You might say, “Christians don’t lie.” If you say that… I’m calling you a liar.

We struggle… with all of these things. Which is why we face the continual challenge to “put off the old self”. Which is why, when we don’t heed the challenge to put off the old self… we fall into a rut.

Look back at … this time, the second half of vs. 9 and vs. 10

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Colossians 3:9–10 ESV

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.

THERE IS ACTION REQUIRED OF US HERE… To put off… and to put on. - To put off the old self… and to put on the new self.

There’s a little more to the phrase ‘put off’… it can mean to ‘disrobe’… but it also can mean to ‘strip off’.... indicating an act that is quick… that is urgent. Like, if suddenly, your shirt was on fire… or… totally covered with fire ants.

This is one of the ideas behind this word…

But the word for ‘put on’.. simply means, to clothe yourself.. or dress yourself… ‘

With urgency, strip from yourself the old self… and be clothed in the new self…

And here we are given a characteristic of the ‘new self’… it is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator…

It is being renewed.

You… Christian… you… ‘New Creation’… are not a stagnant pool lacking a fresh water source… you are not stuck in your ways… you are not in a rut… IF… You have put on your new self.

And you might say… “I did that a long time ago… when I was a young believer… back when I was transformed by the renewing of my mind… back when the work began…

Yes… I hope that ‘s true…

But God completes what He begins… - And somewhere along the way.. maybe you were like the nail that bent and was set aside… and you accepted it… and you created a new ‘spiritual normal’… and you settled into a rut… and you became and Old Christian.

Listen up Old Christians and rut dwellers… Paul has more information for us here in

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Colossians 3:12–14 ESV

12 Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. 14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

Col 3.

These are the things that New Creations put on… this is what a person who is being filled with the HS will do… - These are not the garments of the complacent… of those who are in a rut…

CONCLUSION:

And yet… without a willingness on our part, to actively strip off the burning, fire-ant covered garments… and a willingness to put on the new self… to put on.. compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, patience and love…

All of this is just empty info…

You have shown up… because your rut led you here… you have endured the music and sermon, said hi to your friends… and are about to go to the restaurant that your rut generally leads you to…

And I have prepared this and preached it in vain...

Unless… some of us here… are willing… to once again, actively put on the new creation life that God gives us.

How do we do it?

We trust, first… that God’s spirit is able to empower us…

We faithfully pursue that power… and Beg of him to fill us again..

And we actively repent… in our actions… and in our thoughts… of those deeds of the flesh that have kept us in a rut.

We pray… and then, we gather around some support. We ask for ongoing prayer… we ask for encouragement… and we ask for accountability…