Sermon Transcript Tone Analysis

So, what do you think of when you hear the word self-control?

What comes to mind when you hear that word?

Anybody.

What do you think?

Erica?

What don't be in a rush?

That's one way to be in self-control discipline.

For some on the bus.

It's sitting down.

They have a trouble trouble with that.

Any other examples of self-control that you can think of?

Control your temper.

We all have brushes with that one.

Don't lie.

You know, when it comes to talking about the fruit of the spirit is, we've been working through the fruit of the spirit, you know.

we all have that time where

we have self control issues where, you know, we

try to fight against our humanness, right?

We all have different passions, different strengths, different weaknesses.

And you know, when it talks about this, it's talking about restraining some of those different passions talking about restraining, those Desires that we have sometimes.

Cuz you know, we can have strong desires for really good things.

But we can also have bad things in our life that we have equal desire for.

You know, we're not talking about things like, you know, if you have a real passion for God's word or a hunger to learn more, those aren't the things were talking about restraining, when were talking about restraining things were talking about restraining, the things that get in the way of our relationship with God.

Those are what it's talking about here.

When it talks about self-control is recognizing those things that stand between us and our, holy God, and block that relationship from being what it needs to be.

And we all know that we have a fallen human nature.

So we know that the only way that we can really hope to stand strong against some of these things is by the power of the holy spirit in our lives.

That's what we're going to talk about today.

She knows I was studying this as I was looking at it, you know, in a lot of these fruit of the spirit leave talked about how Christ has been our perfect example of those things and it's no different here because in his Incarnation Christ, was the epitome of self-control.

I mean, think about it.

He is the same as God, right?

He has all the power, all the knowledge over everything in the universe.

But to not use it.

I mean, yeah, we saw glimpses of it when he would heal people and do things but think of how many other instances He could have used that.

But he didn't.

He allowed certain things to happen in certain things, do not happen because he knew it was a part of God's plan.

So he did that or another example that came to mind.

Was he not think about when he was tempted by Satan?

You know, you could have all this.

If you'll just be out of me.

I'll give you this.

If you just bow out of me.

He didn't do it.

It wasn't hard for him to resist that.

So he was never tempted and he never did anything.

That wasn't consistent with God's will.

For him and why he had come to Earth as Believers in Christ.

That is what we are striving for to be able to live our lives in perfect alignment with God's Will.

And that is something that's only possible when we're walking with the Holy Spirit.

The main scripture, I want to look at for today is in 1st Corinthians, chapter 9, verses 24 through 27 if you want to follow along with me on the screen up there.

Do you not know that those who run in a race all run?

But only one receives the prize.

Run in such a way that you may win.

Everyone who competes in the game's exercises, self-control in all things.

They then do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable.

Therefore I run in such a way as not without aim ibox, in such a way as not beating the air, but I discipline my body and make it my slave.

So that after I have preached to others.

I myself will not be disqualified.

You know, our sinfulness resents and resists any sort of restrictions, doesn't it?

you know, we've talked about, you know, used to be that the American dream was he know to get a job, buy a house, you know, have the 2.5 children and, you know, All those things.

Anymore, it seems that the American dream has become the I can do whatever I want to do regardless of how it impacts anybody else.

So regardless of anyone else is right, my rights, Trump your ride so I can do whatever.

You know why we even take it so far that we do some of those things in the name of spiritual Freedom, that we think we should have.

You know, it's one thing to acknowledge that principle of living in love, but it's another thing to really follow it and to live it out the way that God intended it.

You know, Paul talks about it here and says that he followed it because he wanted to make sure that he finished his race Victorious.

He wanted to not just finish his race.

Well, he wanted to make sure he finished it Victorious.

And you know, in this scripture, Paul's tying into something that people are very familiar with in society.

Their, you know, the Greeks were famous for their athletic contest.

You know, if you read it, it says there were two main ones that they had and one of them we still have the Olympic Games.

And we still see that happen.

But, you know, back in the day.

They had some pretty strict requirements for that for you to be able to compete in any of these games.

You had to have proof of 10 months of rigorous training, which I don't know what your proof was for that, but you had to have proof of that.

And then, when it was seen that, you met those criteria, then the athletes who were going to participate had to, basically kind of go into this camp for a month, prior to the games where they would have to participate in these strict daily workouts to show that they were in the physical shape that they needed to be to participate in these games.

And that's what they would do.

They would spend all their time training for these things.

And yes, they usually lived a life where some benefactor was supporting them, but it wasn't like the athletes of the day who are multi-millionaires and those things.

You usually they were doing this at Great personal cost to themself.

The one of the biggest events in one of the biggest attractions of the games was the race.

And you know, Paul uses this figure to illustrate the Christian Life.

It says those who run in a race all run, the only one receives the prize.

You know, no one would train that hard and devote, you know, practically all day everyday to training for a race.

If they weren't intending to Win It.

I don't think anyone usually starts out in that sort of thing, you know, wanting to get S planning to get S planning to lose.

Yeah, out of the large number of Runners who ran every time one person would win?

You're a great difference between those races in the Christian race.

Is that every Christian who will pay the price of careful training can win?

And we do not compete against each other, like we would in a sporting event like that, but we compete against the obstacles.

You'll be competing against the Practical, the physical, and the spiritual that would hinder us from reaching our goal from winning our race.

Those are what we're competing against.

Ian a sense, every Christian runs his own race so that enables each and everyone of us to be a winner.

Each and every one of us can win that prize of Salvation, if we run our race and give her life to Christ.

But an even bigger reward that can be there is that when we run that race the right way.

When we live our life, like God intended it, we can become a part of winning more.

Souls to Christ.

Which is really the intention God has for all of us.

That's why Paul is counseling Believers to run in such a way that not only might you win.

Set aside all those things that could hinder you from fully receiving the gospel and they could hinder others from fully hearing the gospel.

Cuz what he's trying to tell the Corinthian Church is that they were saying they were passionate for God.