The Tragedy of an Unclean Christian

As we continue our Bible Survivor series this morning through the pages and the history of the Old Testament, I want us first to look at a parallel passage found in the New Testament. Open your bibles to 1 Corinthians 10. I am reading from the New Living Translation, 1 Corinthians chapter ten, beginning in verse 1.

I don’t want you to forget, dear brothers and sisters, what happened to our ancestors in the wilderness long ago. God guided all of them by sending a cloud that moved along ahead of them, and he brought them all safely through the waters of the sea on dry ground. 2 As followers of Moses, they were all baptized in the cloud and the sea. 3 And all of them ate the same miraculous food, 4 and all of them drank the same miraculous water. For they all drank from the miraculous rock that traveled with them, and that rock was Christ. 5 Yet after all this, God was not pleased with most of them, and he destroyed them in the wilderness. 6 These events happened as a warning to us, so that we would not crave evil things as they did 7 or worship idols as some of them did. For the Scriptures say, “The people celebrated with feasting and drinking, and they indulged themselves in pagan revelry.” 8 And we must not engage in sexual immorality as some of them did, causing 23,000 of them to die in one day. 9 Nor should we put Christ to the test, as some of them did and then died from snakebites. 10 And don’t grumble as some of them did, for that is why God sent his angel of death to destroy them. 11 All these events happened to them as examples for us. They were written down to warn us, who live at the time when this age is drawing to a close. 1 Corinthians 10:1-11, NLT

Now turn to the next book in the bible called appropriately 2 Corinthians and look at chapter six. What we are going to be talking about this morning is The Tragedy of an Unclean Christian.

In the past several months our nation has been riveted by terrorism and acts of insanity. The most recent scares have been the anthrax threats. People everywhere are afraid of being contaminated with the anthrax virus.

What I want to tell us today is that many of us are contaminated and we may not know it. But I am not talking about anthrax, but a far more serious and a far more dangerous contamination called sin. And because we are contaminated, we contaminate everything that we touch. Many of us are polluted and we pollute other things in a spiritual sense.

Now keep that in mind as I begin reading here in verse 14. God says, "Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers:" That can mean many things, but it primarily means that a saved person should never marry an unsaved person. "For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, hath said, I will dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their God and they shall be my people. Wherefore, come out from among them and be ye separate saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing and I will receive you and will be a Father unto you and ye shall be my sons and daughters saith the Lord Almighty."

Verse 17 gives us this injunction, "Touch not the unclean thing." Now what is He talking about. Turn back in your Bible please to Numbers chapter nineteen. Look in Numbers chapter 19.

I want you to notice as we read portions of Numbers 19 that the word unclean is used fifteen times.

1 Now the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, 2“This is the ordinance of the law which the Lord has commanded, saying: ‘Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring you a red heifer without blemish, in which there is no defect and on which a yoke has never come. 3‘You shall give it to Eleazar the priest, that he may take it outside the camp, and it shall be slaughtered before him; 4‘and Eleazar the priest shall take some of its blood with his finger, and sprinkle some of its blood seven times directly in front of the tabernacle of meeting. 5‘Then the heifer shall be burned in his sight: its hide, its flesh, its blood, and its offal shall be burned. 6‘And the priest shall take cedar wood and hyssop and scarlet, and cast them into the midst of the fire burning the heifer. 7‘Then the priest shall wash his clothes, he shall bathe in water, and afterward he shall come into the camp; the priest shall be unclean until evening. 8‘And the one who burns it shall wash his clothes in water, bathe in water, and shall be unclean until evening. 9‘Then a man who is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and store them outside the camp in a clean place; and they shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for the water of purification; it is for purifying from sin. 10‘And the one who gathers the ashes of the heifer shall wash his clothes, and be unclean until evening. It shall be a statute forever to the children of Israel and to the stranger who dwells among them.

11‘He who touches the dead body of anyone shall be unclean seven days. 12‘He shall purify himself with the water on the third day and on the seventh day; then he will be clean. But if he does not purify himself on the third day and on the seventh day, he will not be clean. 13‘Whoever touches the body of anyone who has died, and does not purify himself, defiles the tabernacle of the Lord. That person shall be cut off from Israel. He shall be unclean, because the water of purification was not sprinkled on him; his uncleanness is still on him.

14‘This is the law when a man dies in a tent: All who come into the tent and all who are in the tent shall be unclean seven days; 15‘and every open vessel, which has no cover fastened on it, is unclean. 16‘Whoever in the open field touches one who is slain by a sword or who has died, or a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be unclean seven days. 17‘And for an unclean person they shall take some of the ashes of the heifer burnt for purification from sin, and running water shall be put on them in a vessel. 18‘A clean person shall take hyssop and dip it in the water, sprinkle it on the tent, on all the vessels, on the persons who were there, or on the one who touched a bone, the slain, the dead, or a grave. 19‘The clean person shall sprinkle the unclean on the third day and on the seventh day; and on the seventh day he shall purify himself, wash his clothes, and bathe in water; and at evening he shall be clean.

20‘But the man who is unclean and does not purify himself, that person shall be cut off from among the assembly, because he has defiled the sanctuary of the Lord. The water of purification has not been sprinkled on him; he is unclean. 21‘It shall be a perpetual statute for them. He who sprinkles the water of purification shall wash his clothes; and he who touches the water of purification shall be unclean until evening. 22‘Whatever the unclean person touches shall be unclean; and the person who touches it shall be unclean until evening.’ ” Numbers 19:1-22, NKJV

Now you can understand why Paul said in the New Testament, "Touch not the unclean thing and I will receive you."

You say pastor, I really don't understand very much, as a matter of fact, I'm quite confused after that. Well I want you to turn to one other verse found in Hebrews chapter 9. And I want you to see how these verses all will come together in a moment. Hebrews chapter nine and I want you to read with me beginning in verse 13. For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, 14 how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? Hebrews 9:13-14, NKJV

Now go back with me to Numbers chapter nineteen and let's explain what this red heifer is all about. Let's explain what we are talking about when we are talking about the tragedy of an unclean Christian.

I. THE CONTAMINATION THAT SIN BRINGS

In the Old Testament, God had a law that you were not to touch a dead person. Now obviously if you touched the dead person, you'd need to be cleaned. Or you'd need to wait until any infection, or defilement, any microbes would die and you would no longer be a danger to others. This was all about sanitation here, and quarantine for one’s and others on safety and health. But it goes far beyond sanitation.

God is teaching an object lesson, and the object lesson is that death and sin are inseparably linked together. Sin causes death and therefore death is the visible sign of sin. The bible teaches that the wages of sin is death.

So when God said, don't touch a dead body, He was giving more than a lesson on hygiene. He was giving an object lesson saying do not pollute yourself with sin. And when Paul, in the New Testament, said "Touch not the unclean thing," he was not talking about dead bodies, he was talking about sin.

Now what kind of sin is it? Well, let's look in chapter 19 and I want to mention four kinds of sin.

1. CALCULATED SIN, 19:11

First of all is what I want to call presumptuous sin or calculated sin. Numbers 19:11 ‘He who touches the dead body of anyone shall be unclean seven days.

When a man, presumptuously walks up and lays his hand upon a corpse, upon a dead body, God says he is unclean. He did it willingly. He did it knowingly. He touched an unclean thing, and that's what I call calculated sin, or presumptuous sin.

Now my dear friend, the most dangerous sin in the world is that sin that you sin with your eyes wide open, saying I know that it is a deadly thing that I am doing, but I will do it anyway.

David prayed in Psalm nineteen and verse thirteen, "keep back thy servant from presumptuous sins, and let them not have dominion over me."

Now when we sin willingly, deliberately, definitely, knowing that it is sin, we are placing ourselves in the worst kind of satanic bondage. Now many of us have been touching an unclean thing, we know that it is a deadly thing. We’re playing with fire and the bible says, “how can a man take fire into his bosom and not be burned.” If that is true of you, I warn you, I beg you, I adjure you, I admonish you, to be cleansed today.

2. CASUAL SIN, 19:13-14

But not only is there calculated sin, there's another kind of sin that most of us here need to be cleansed from, I know I do, daily. Look if you will in verses fourteen and fifteen. ‘Whoever touches the body of anyone who has died, and does not purify himself, defiles the tabernacle of the Lord. That person shall be cut off from Israel. He shall be unclean, because the water of purification was not sprinkled on him; his uncleanness is still on him. 14‘This is the law when a man dies in a tent: All who come into the tent and all who are in the tent shall be unclean seven days; Numbers 19:13-14, NKJV.

That is if you do not deliberately and presumptuously defile yourself. If you're just around defilement. If you're just in a place where there is death and defilement, you can have casual contact with sin and you are casually corrupted.

Let me illustrate what the bible is saying here. If you work in an office, or a job where there's unclean conversation going on all the time, dirty stories, and jokes and filthy words and language used, then you can become corrupted casually. Maybe there's a book that you're reading and some defilement is in that book, maybe some television programming, maybe just the people that you travel with or just this old world that you live in, it’s just filled with casual sin.

Have you ever gone some place where the room was filled with cigarette smoke and you weren't smoking but you came home with the smell of smoke in your clothes and in your hair and you just felt unclean and you needed to go take a bath, well, my dear friend, that happens in a spiritual way too. Many of us need to come to the Lord daily and say, Lord, I've just been in the world and it's just kind of rubbed off on me. It wasn't presumptuous sin, but Lord, none the less, I've been defiled.

3. CARELESS SIN, 19:16

Not only is there casual sin, but there is also careless sin. Many of us sin and it's not that we intend to do it, but we just weren't thinking. We didn't plan to do it, but none the less we sinned. It wasn't calculated, it was careless.

Look if you will in verse 16. ‘Whoever in the open field touches one who is slain by a sword or who has died, or a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be unclean seven days.” Numbers 19:16, NKJV

Maybe this is a person, he's fighting a battle, and he looks and his buddy is over there, and he just reaches down and he touches his buddy who is dead. Now he didn't intend to do it. He didn't just walk up and say I'm going to touch an unclean thing. But He did it. It's what I want to call just careless sin.

He's out there, wandering through the desert, and he comes across a bone. He picks it up and looks at it and he says I ought not to be handling that bone like that and he puts it back down. Now this is what we call careless sin. Unguarded moments. We seem to trip over certain things, we stumble over certain things, and many times, they are things that we might deem too small to notice. Only a bone, not a full body, but only a bone. Nevertheless, the Bible says we need to be cleansed from those kind of careless of sins.

4. CONSEALED SIN, 19:16

Finally, there's one I suppose that is the most insidious of all is what I call Concealed sins. Notice in the last part of verse 16, he mentions a grave. You see, if you touch a grave. Now that means this sin is underground. You can't see it.

Here's a man who is just walking along and he accidently walks over an unmarked grave. And yet the Bible says, he is unclean. Maybe he was not even aware for a moment that he was doing it.

This is what the Bible calls secret faults. Psalm 19:12, "Who can understand his errors? Cleanse thou me from secret faults."

There's not a one of us that doesn't need to be cleansed from calculated sin, not a one of us that doesn't need to be cleansed from casual sin, not a one of us that doesn't need to be cleansed from careless sin, not a one of us that doesn't need to be cleansed from concealed sin daily.

Now, let me show you what happens if you don't get cleansed. Suppose you are an unclean Christian, and God is talking to you about sin in your life, and you don't deal with that defilement. Now let me show you what is going to happen to you.

II. THE CURSE THAT SIN BRINGS

We’ve already seen how God desires to bless His people and we also seen how the choice is ours, blessing or cursing. But I want to tell you the word of God is sure, God is not mocked, whatsoever a man sows, he shall reap. If you sow obedience, you will reap blessing. If you sow in sin, you will reap a curse.

What kind of curse does sin bring? Well this passage mentions three, three curses that unconfessed, unrepentant sin brings into our lives.

1. THE LOSS OF FELLOWSHIP WITH FELLOW BELIEVERS, 19:20

First of all, you're going to have a loss of fellowship with your brothers and sisters in Christ. Look in verse 20, "But the man that shall be unclean and shall not purify himself, that soul shall be cut off from among the congregation.

There is my dear friend, a loss of fellowship in God. Did you know that only sin separates the people of God. Is there anybody, I want everybody to listen to this question, is there anybody that you cannot get along with who is a member of this church? If that is true, either you or he or both of you have sinned. It is sin that separates the congregation.

It's sin that cuts a person off from the congregation. That defilement means there's loss of fellowship in God. And it means secondly that there's a loss of freedom with the Father’s House.

2. THE LOSS OF FREEDOM WITH THE FATHER’S HOUSE, 19:20

Look also in verse 20, "he hath defiled the sanctuary of the Lord." Now as you sit here in church this morning, and we call this place the sanctuary, God’s House. But not only are you out of fellowship with that person perhaps whose sitting near you, or some other person in this building, and there's no fellowship in God, but there's also no freedom with the Father’s House. You actually defile the sanctuary of the Lord when there is unconfessed, unrepentant sin in your life. And that’s the reason you do not have the freedom to worship as you should.

When you sing, you defile the praise music. When you pray, you defile the prayer. When you take the Lord's supper, you defile the Lord's supper. Everything that you touch you contaminate, because my dear friend, you have in you, a loathsome defilement, because you have touched that unclean thing called sin and you have not been cleansed.

Now, I can think of many things that it would be wrong to defile, but how horrible to defile the sanctuary of God. Not only do you rob yourself of the freedom to truly worship in God’s House, but you may actually be a stumbling block to the freedom of others to worship. There's the loss of fellowship in God, you're cut off from the congregation. There's a loss of freedom with God, you defile the sanctuary. There's also the loss of fruitfulness for God.

3. THE LOSS OF FRUITFULNESS FOR GOD, 19:22

Look in verse 22, "And whatever the unclean person touches, shall be unclean."

It's not dear friend, only that you bring judgement upon yourself, you spread your defilement everywhere you go. A person who is a member of this church, who has unconfessed, unrepentant sin in his life, defiles everything he touches.

That's what the writer of Hebrews was talking about in Hebrews chapter 9, verses 13-14, For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, 14 how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

Do you know what dead works are? Those are works that rather than ministering life, minister death. You may teach, but your teaching ministers death. You may preach, but your preaching ministers death. You may sing, but your singing is lifeless and cold. And the breath of death and defilement of sin is upon all that you do. You are spreading spiritual contamination.

Now the Bible says be clean that bare the vessels of the Lord. You spiritual leaders of this church, you need to listen. Every choir member, I want you to listen. If you are not willing to live a clean life, get out of the choir. You ushers, if you're not willing to live a clean life, don’t handle the gifts of God’s people. You deacons, if you're not willing to live a clean life, resign, do not dare, do not have the audacity to claim to be a deacon in this church.

You Sunday school teachers, you small group leaders, if your life is not pure, I said pure, do not, don't dare to stand to teach in a Sunday school class. You say, well I'm going to do something for the Lord. The only thing you're going to do my dear friend, is bring judgement upon yourself and defile whatever you touch.

The Bible says "you're to come out from among them and be ye separate saith the Lord and touch not the unclean thing and I will receive you."

Now what have I said. I’ve told you that the Bible says that if you have a life that is defiled, there is a loss of fellowship in God and fellow believers, and there's that loss of freedom with God, and there's a loss of fruitfulness for God. Be clean that bare the vessels of the Lord.

All right now let me talk to you not only about that contamination, and that curse, but let me talk to you about that cleansing that this chapter gives us here.

III. THE CLEANSING FROM SIN, 19:2

Now let me show you how that you can be clean. The cleansing agent is described here in Numbers chapter 19, and the ashes of this red heifer, picture the Lord Jesus Christ.

Let me say, first of all that this heifer, that was slain, pictures Jesus, and let me show you how. First of all she was without spot or blemish. Look if you will in verse two, “This is the ordinance of the law which the Lord has commanded, saying: ‘Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring you a red heifer without blemish, in which there is no defect and on which a yoke has never come.

Notice that this animal had to be “without blemish.” That is, it had to be sinless, without spot, without blemish. That pictures the Lord Jesus Christ.

The yoke could never have been upon the shoulders of an ox. That means this animal to be slaughtered has not been scared by the yoke of sin.

Notice in verse 3, the sacrifice is to be killed outside the gate, without the camp. And that pictures the Lord Jesus who died outside the gate on Calvary's cross, so long ago.

In verse 4, the Bible says, that the blood is sprinkled seven times. Seven is the perfect number and that speaks of the perfect blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Then in verse 5, Then the heifer shall be burned in his sight: its hide, its flesh, its blood, and its offal shall be burned. This again speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ, who baptized his soul in hell for us. This speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ who endured the fires of the wrath of all mighty God for us.

Now listen carefully to me. Whatever it is that cleanses you therefore must number one, be acceptable to God, but number two, it has to be accessible to man.

Look if you will now beginning in verse 6, ‘And the priest shall take cedar wood and hyssop and scarlet, and cast them into the midst of the fire burning the heifer. Then the priest shall wash his clothes, he shall bathe in water, and afterward he shall come into the camp; the priest shall be unclean until evening.

Oh thank God for this, "outside the camp in a clean place and it shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for a water of separation. It is a purification of sin."

Now why did they keep these ashes? Well these ashes were evidence of a finished sacrifice, and they were perpetually preserved, kept in a clean place for the removal of daily sin and its pollution.

Now my dear friend, that blood of the Lord Jesus Christ presented in that tabernacle in heaven, its still there. It's not just that the blood cleansed so long ago.

The Bible says in First John 1:7 the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin.

That is it just keeps on cleansing.

Now only dear friend, must it be acceptable to God, accessible to man, but it must be available by faith.

Look if you will now in verse 17 and 18, the Bible says, And for an unclean person they shall take of the ashes of the burnt heifer of purification for sin, and running water shall be put thereto in a vessel: 18 And a clean person shall take hyssop, and dip it in the water, and sprinkle it upon the tent, and upon all the vessels, and upon the persons that were there, and upon him that touched a bone, or one slain, or one dead, or a grave:

Running water is an emblem of the Word of God and the Spirit of God.

Hyssop was what? It was little shrub. A little shrub that just grows out of the wall, very very common. And what they would do is just reach up on a wall somewhere, get a hand full of that shrub, dip it down into that solution of water and ashes and blood and sprinkle it on. Hyssop therefore is an emblem of faith, faith. It just simply speaks of faith, a symbol of faith that applies the water and the blood. That's all it is. Faith that applies the water and the blood.

All of that was Old Testament and the way God worked to cleanse His people from sin, from contamination, from the curse. But our day is different. Because of the Lord Jesus Christ, we no longer need the red heifer, or the priest, or the sacrifice, or the fire, or the hyssop or the water. All we need is faith.

Listen one more time to Hebrews 9. For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, 14 how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

If today, this very moment, you find yourself living the tragic life of an unclean Christian, then this is what you need to do and you need to do it right now. Accept the blood of Jesus applied with the hyssop of faith. Know that the blood of Jesus will purge you and make you clean.

Heads are bowed, eyes are closed. I want you right now to take spiritual inventory. If you've been touching the unclean thing, then what you have done is defiled yourself and you've made yourself a defilement to others. You must ask yourself, “Have I been guilty of calculated sin, presumptuous sin? Oh dear God have I been guilty of casual sin, contagious sin? Oh God have I been guilty of careless sin? Just carelessly handling things I ought not to handle.

Oh God am I guilty of concealed sin, secret thoughts, walking on the graves of this world. Oh God if I am, cleanse me right now.

Now as you ask God to cleanse you, what I want you to do is let the Holy Spirit of God reveal to you what bone you've touched, what grave you walked on, what tent you entered. Let the holy Spirit of God reveal that to you, and when He does, if He says you were rude to your wife, or if He says that you were selfish, or if He says that you have lust or if He says that you were dishonest or if He says that you are bitter. What ever it is, you call that sin before the Lord right now and realize that the Lord Jesus Christ, pictured by that red heifer so long ago shed His blood that you might be clean right now, you just take the hyssop of faith right now and apply the water and the blood.

And remember this, the Bible says that "if we confess our sin, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

Grateful acknowledgement is given to Dr. Adrian Rogers for the bulk of the text of this message.

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