Temperance: Your Secret Weapon Against Life's Temptations

Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast

where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.

In this podcast series, we're going to be looking into biblical

words that have great significance to our faith.

The name of this series is called the Word of the Week, where

once a week we will dive deeper into these words that we are

familiar with in scripture.

So come along with me, let's study the Word of the week.

Pastor Josh here the word of the week is temperance or self control.

In the King James we see the word temperance, but a way that we

could describe that word temperance is self control.

And we know that in the list there of attributes of the fruit

of the Spirit in Galatians chapter five, the very last character

trait that's listed is temperance or self control.

Galatians 5.

22.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering,

gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.

Against such there is no law.

And so we know that as a believer, the Holy Spirit indwells

us, which means he lives within us.

And when we yield to him, when we submit to him and obey his guidance

in our life, we will display these character traits.

And so we know that the character of God is that he is temperate

in all things.

And so we grow in our understanding of who God is, and

we grow in our understanding of God's guidance in our life.

And we're able to manifest that self control in our life.

So another way that we could describe it is God control.

Instead of saying that, you know, I myself am creating this control

in my life, it's allowing God to control my life.

And so the Bible uses this word temperance.

And the understanding is for us to be able to stop those fleshly

desires in our life by the power of God and yield to his work

in our life.

So one of the things that we can see in Scripture is that In Philippians

Philippians 2:13

chapter 2, verse 13, it says, for it is God which worketh in you

both to will and to do his good pleasure.

And so it's really allowing God to work in our lives, dying to

our flesh, yielding to the Spirit.

And so everything that we do in our lives, when it comes to following

God's word, anything we do in our lives that shows the fruit of

the Spirit is really just God working through us.

And so it's in definition self control or temperance is the ability

to control oneself.

It involves things like having moderation, being able to restrain

those fleshly sensual desires.

You could, you could put it even this way, the ability to say

no to a temptation and so we know that before we were saved, the

Bible says that we were in bondage to our sin.

Basically, we couldn't do anything else but to feed our flesh.

But the Bible says that when the Holy Spirit indwells us, we now

have the capabilities of doing something different than that.

So we are no longer under the bondage of sin, but we are now servants

to the Lord.

And so we are saved by what Jesus Christ has done for us.

And so he's given us that freedom, he's given us that ability,

he's given us that path for living that righteous life.

And so I think it's Romans chapter six that speaks of that idea

of being in bondage to sin.

And now we have been given liberty, we have given that liberation

of sin.

And now we are now in the freedom to live our lives for Christ.

And so a lot of times one might think that, well, you, now

that I'm saved, I'm not going to struggle with the flesh.

But we know that even in Romans chapter 7 that there are still

Romans 7 · chapter mention

the forces of evil that are manifesting themselves in our lives

through outside stimuli.

And our flesh, right, our flesh still battles with the Spirit.

And the Bible puts it this way, the old man and the new man.

The old man is the old ways, the old man is our flesh.

The new man is the Spirit.

The new man is the new path that we take as believers and we

go through that sanctification process.

And so if we are not exhibiting self control in our lives,

we are living in the flesh.

And it's very easy to fall into that trap.

That's our default.

And so the Bible speaks over and over again about dying to the

flesh, putting on the new man, mortifying your members, as the King

James says.

And so I would encourage you to think about how you can display

that self control in your life.

And it's not about necessarily just working harder or removing yourself

from certain situations, though those things can help.

It's completely relying on God to give you the power and the wisdom

and the ability to live this out in your life.

So it's the ability to say no.

It's the ability through the power of God as He empowers us to

restrain ourselves from just feeding what our body wants, feeding

what the lust of our eyes, the lust of our flesh and the pride of

life wants.

And so this manifests itself in many different ways.

I mean, manifests itself in our relationships, in our life.

It manifests ourselves in the way that we deal with conflict, manifests

itself in the way that we deal with just the day to day affairs

of our life, whether it be our workplace or our family or just even

within the church.

And so the Bible says, even in Philippians, let your moderation

be known unto all men.

And so I think that's an important verse to think about in

Philippians chapter 4.

Philippians 4 · chapter mention

Philippians chapter 4, verse 6 reminds us that there is this need.

Philippians 4:6

I think it's verse five actually.

Let your moderation be known unto all men.

The Lord is at hand.

So the way that we understand that verse is that we display that

moderation, we display that proper lifestyle, we display that,

that self control, that temperance.

And then doing so, that's a testimony that the Lord is at work.

That's a testimony that the Lord is coming, a testimony that

the gospel message is true.

And then we know of course, right after that verse, in verse

6, it talks about the way that we should be confident in the Lord

through our prayer lives.

Be careful for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication,

with thanksgiving, let your request be made known unto God.

And then of course we know that the next verse tells us then

the peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your

hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

So it's a wonderful thing.

When we live out these character traits that God has gifted

us with, we then are able to rely on him more and we are then

able to be better testimonies for him and we are able to walk in

the peace of God.

And so a lot of times we think that, you know, if I don't do something,

I'm missing out.

But actually what God is saying is that when we restrain ourselves

with the power of God to, to be yielded to the spirit and not

the flesh, then we then gain something and we gain the peace of

God.

We gain a testimony, we gain further blessings in our life.

And certainly we're doing it because God commands us to do it.

But we know that God doesn't leave us alone.

We know that God gives us blessings when we serve him and live

this lifestyle of temperance and self control.

So I think that that's one of those passages of scripture that

we could go to when it comes to this understanding of, of temperance,

of self control.

Another passage of scripture that I think would be appropriate

to look at would be Second Peter chapter one, verse six.

So what's the outcome of this self control?

Well, self control leads to something and the Bible calls it

here patience or endurance.

So self control naturally, or we could even say supernaturally,

leads to a place of patience in our life.

So two Peter chapter one, verse six.

And to knowledge, temperance.

And this is that passage of Scripture that's talking about adding

things to our faith.

So yes, salvation is an amazing thing that happens in our

life.

It's a miracle of the moment we're justified.

And when we are justified, we are immediately put into a place

of being, a child of God.

And so positionally we are changed from a path to destruction

to a path of everlasting life.

So that is the start, but not the end.

And so we know that as a Christian we are called in that sanctification,

spiritual growth process to add things to our faith and our spiritual

maturity.

And so in that passage in second Peter chapter one, it's talking

about adding things to our faith, it's talking about growing,

maturing in our faith.

And so we get to verse five, we let's go back a little bit for

context and you can follow along with me here if you're, if

you're listening and following along with scripture or your phone.

It says, and beside this, giving all diligence, add to your

faith virtue, and to virtue, knowledge.

And then verse six, and to knowledge, temperance, there's that

word.

And then to temperance, patience.

And to patience, godliness.

And to godliness, brotherly kindness.

And brotherly kindness, charity, that's love.

For these things being you and abound, they shall make you, make

you, that ye shall neither be barren nor fruitful in the knowledge

of our Lord Jesus Christ.

And so the Bible says that when we exemplify Christ attributes

in our life, we will be fruitful, right?

Instead of being ineffective, unfruitful Christians, we can have

the knowledge of God in our life.

Specifically here it says the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

So it says his attributes in our life.

And as we live those out, we're able to see effective fruit

for the cause of the gospel.

And then he says, but he that lacketh these things is blind.

So when we miss the opportunity to add these things to

our life, we're living as blind Christians.

We're near sighted to the fact that we cannot see the bigger picture.

And he says, even and have forgotten that he was purged from

his old sins.

And so essentially what we're seeing here is that, you know, we're

living like we're not saved.

We're living like we are still in bondage to sin if we're not adding

these things to our faith.

And so we ask the Lord to give us these things specifically, in

this case, self control, temperance.

And then when we ask him in faith, we then are Open to what God

does and works in our life, and we're submissive to his will.

And therefore we are able to add to our faith temperance.

And as we add to our faith temperance, as it says in verse six,

then we can then build upon that in patience.

And so, you know, a lot of times that word patience is not a

word that we want to talk about very often, but it is a necessity

in the Christian life.

Patience, endurance, pushing forward, not being short sighted.

And so part of having self control in our life, part of having

temperance in our life is seeing the bigger picture, playing

the long game, so to speak, the eternal perspective in our lives.

And so I would ask the Lord if that's something that you're struggling

with, ask the Lord to give you the power to live out that moderation,

that temperance, that self control in your life, that God control

in your life.

But then what I would say is this, after you ask him, be open

and willing to submit to him when he brings you those opportunities.

Because we can sit here all day and say, lord, give me the strength,

but then, yet we still choose the flesh when that choice comes.

And so it's over and over again, making these daily, sometimes

hourly decisions, even sometimes, in most cases, minute

to minute, Am I going to make a decision of the flesh and yield

to that, or am I going to make a decision according to the Spirit

and yield to that and therefore live that life of temperance

and self control?

That's how we should be known.

Our testimony should be, wow, that person is able to restrain his

or her desires because of the bigger picture in the cause of the

gospel.

Now we're not going to be perfect on this.

And that's why these attributes, yes, are communicable

from God to us, but we are never going to be perfect in that.

But the whole decision making process should be that we want to

be more and more characterized by our temperance and our life.

So I hope that this has been a help to you.

Obviously you could go through all of the character traits listed

there in the Fruit of the Spirit in the book of Galatians and

emphasize the need for the Lord's power in them.

But I thought it would be important to look into that character

trait of temperance or self control.

And so let's ask the Lord to give us strength.

Let's ask the Lord to give us the opportunity to exercise our self

control today and to model that before the world so that they

can see that the Lord is at work, so that they can see that the

Lord has a plan, so that they can see that the Lord can change

lives and influence his people and transform his people for the

cause of the kingdom of God.

And so let's pray and ask the Lord to give us strength to live

that life of temperance, to live that life of self control.

Well, again, we're going to continue on in our sermon series,

well, sermon series, podcast series, so to speak, when it comes

to the attributes of God.

Next week will be in the week of Thanksgiving.

And so we're going to talk about giving thanks.

But I would encourage you to continue on listening to these Word

of the Week episodes so that we can grow in our understanding

of what the Word of God has to say for us here in this, in this

time that we have for the cause of the gospel.

If you have any questions or suggestions about what we should

be studying or what we could be studying when it comes to different

words, I'd love for you to let us know.

You can email me @ Josh, that's Josh Massaromas, a R [email protected]

well, we look forward to hearing from you.

Love for you to leave a review on either whatever platform you're

listening to this on and that would help us out greatly.

And I would encourage you to, hey, maybe share it with a friend.

The more folks that are able to listen, the more folks are able

to share the truth of the Word of God.

And we would love that.

So we hope you have a wonderful rest of your week.

Looking forward to talking to you next week when it comes to the

Word of the Week.

Well, God bless you.

Take care.

We will talk to you soon.

Hey, I really appreciate that you listened to the Word of the Week

podcast.

If you have any questions about the podcast or about our church,

Middletown Baptist Church, you can find more information about us

on Facebook or YouTube or you can find the podcast on NBCPodcast.org

you can contact me directly at Josh Massaro at middletownbaptistchurch.org

stay tuned for future Word of the Week episodes where we dive deeper

into words that impact our life according to scripture.

Thank you so much.

God bless.

We'll talk to you soon.