The Sanctifying Power of Sexual Morality

This podcast is a ministry of Grand Parkway Baptist Church, helping people know, enjoy, and glorify God.

For more information about Grand Parkway, visit Grandparkway.org.

If you've got a Bible, I invite you to take it and open it up to 1 Thessalonians chapter 4.

1 Thessalonians 4 · chapter mention

First Thessalonians is kind of towards the back of the New Testament.

If you see maps, you've gone too far, turn back.

If you're a guest, let me say welcome this morning.

Thanks for uh looking into a new church.

You're always welcome here.

If you're just in town on business or you're visiting the grandkids or whatever, or if you're kind of thinking, hey, I might want to get myself into a church, uh, you're always welcome at this one.

You're sitting around some of the most beautiful, authentic, generous, broken, and healed people you'll ever meet, okay?

My name is Neil, I'm the lead pastor, and we're going through the Gospel of John.

Now you may be thinking, if we're going through the Gospel of John, what are we doing in First Thessalonians?

Uh I was reading in the Bible.

I try to read the Bible for more than just sermon preparation.

Amen?

Uh it's helpful because before I'm a pastor, I'm a son.

I'm a beloved son of the Father.

And so I just try to read and just enjoy God in my personal relationship.

This past week I was reading First Thessalonians, and I was struck.

I'm 54 years old.

I've been a Christian since July of 1982, and I never saw this in the Bible.

This is why you should pay attention.

Even, and I've read this passage, I don't know how many times.

I used to speak to students.

I mean, you'd preach on this passage.

Uh, and this past week it was kind of like my eyes were open, and I was like, oh, that's what that means.

And so I just thought this is my personal enjoyment, edification, sanctification, whatever right Asian word you want to use.

And about Tuesday, the Holy Spirit said, I want you to teach your people about this.

And like, okay, because one of my friends stopped me this morning and said, Hey, what brought on the change?

You know, why are we taking a break from John?

Uh and I said, Here's why.

And so I want to talk to you this morning about the sanctifying power of sexual morality.

The sanctifying power of sexual morality.

And I really only have two points, but it's going to take me some time to get to my two points.

That means there's a lot before we get to those two points.

And so you can write it down, you can take a picture of the screen, it doesn't matter.

Uh, if you don't have a Bible, and there's one on your row, I'm on page 987, and I just want to read from 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, the first eight verses.

1 Thessalonians 4 · chapter mention

This is what God's word says.

He says, Finally, then, brothers, we ask and we urge you in the Lord Jesus that as you receive from us how you ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you do so more and more.

For you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus, for this is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality, that each of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God, that no one turned no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things.

As we told you before, and we solemnly warned you, for God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness.

Therefore, whoever disregards this, disregards not man, but God, who gives you his who gives his Holy Spirit to you.

And we'll just stop right there.

Let me just voice a prayer before we get going into this.

God, we need to, our prayer this morning is you would just walk us home in the dead of night.

Because when it comes to this topic, God, we're in the dark.

And so we need the blazing illumination of the Holy Spirit to shine on the scripture this morning and let it reflect upon our minds and manifest itself in our lives.

We pray this now.

We submit to this now in Jesus' name.

And everyone said, Amen.

Amen.

I want to make uh uh four major, four or five, I lost count, uh, major points.

And I wouldn't want to get to the two, but I want you to hear as we kind of get there, we'll walk through the text.

And the first point I want to make is just to explain the text, what is going on, and what is going on is Paul is writing to these people in a city called Thessalonica.

It was very pagan, it was very immoral.

Matter of fact, for people that didn't know Jesus, one of the things that that characterized Christianity, you could tell who were Christians because they went from being immoral to being moral and they stayed moral.

It's not like, hey, I got my fire insurance, I prayed in prayer, and now I'm gonna go back, or I got the capacity to be forgiven now.

And so it really empowers me to be this way, any way I want to be.

No, the thing that stood out was the uh among the Christian community, it was their morality.

Morality is a sense of oughtness when it came to legal matters, financial matters, uh, sexual matters, and this is what Paul's talking about here.

And so the predominant thing was that the Christians in in the church were very moral people when it came uh uh to sexuality.

But there's a few knuckleheads among them.

There's a few people among them that are acting like the world.

And Paul gets after them, and you say, Well, how do you know that that was the majority?

Because he writes in verse 1, he says, you know, we we we we uh you know what we receive.

We urge you in the Lord Jesus that as you receive from us how you ought to walk and to please God, hear this phrase, just as you are doing, that you would do so more and more.

And so he's not he's not condemning everybody.

He's got I just want to say, there was a time when what distinguished Christians was their morality, and the immorality was the exception, and it was not the rule.

Beloved, I'm not so sure we can say that nowadays.

Because we've preached the therapeutic gospel and we've kind of broadened the my concern is I put all my cards on the table.

My concern is that by doing that, we've broadened the path that leads to destruction.

And with every subsequent generation, the path gets broader and broader and broader, and the sense of impending destruction that awaits these people is unfathomable.

So, on that happy note, let's go to point number two, amen.

Uh and it's simply this there's commands with there's the explanation of the text, the context of the text, what's going on, why he's writing this, and then there's there's three commands within the text, and they all start with the same adverb that, that, that.

Paul says this that you abstain from sexual immorality, that each of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, and that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter.

Let me say that again.

It's self-explanatory, not gonna talk much about that.

That you abstain from sexual immorality.

This is this is the command.

Uh, that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor.

Two words.

Just ask yourself when's the last time you heard somebody talk about holiness?

It's kind of like, oh, that's we're just being legalistic.

What's the deal?

Holiness and honor.

And that no one transgress or wrong his brother in this matter.

When you engage in immorality with somebody that's not as you and by the way, all sexual behavior outside the confines of a monogamous marriage is sin.

It's sin.

All behavior.

I don't care if it involves you by yourself, you as somebody else, it's sin.

And when you involve somebody else's spouse that's not yours, you are transgressing or wronging your brother in this matter.

That's what Paul's talking about.

Because what's happening in the church here is that we think that someone's gotten with somebody else's wife.

Uh, and Paul's kind of like, hey, no, no, not hating on you.

We're not gonna kick you out.

We're just gonna tell you that you're setting up a scenario which you do not want to.

And we'll get to in just a minute, because he says that the Lord is the avenger in these matters.

The Avengers is not a movie with a little thing at the end that tells you what's coming next.

It's God.

And so, thirdly, I want to just kind of slow down and get the plow in the ground here.

The consequences for not holding to these commands, these commands being that you that we abstain from sexual immorality, that each one of us know how to control our own body and holiness and honor, and that no one transgress or wrongless brother in this matter.

And so, the consequences for not holding to these commands, this is where we get begin, the Bible begins to get down in our business.

The first one is this that immorality shrinks our pleasures.

Immorality shrinks our pleasures.

In other words, it limits the size and the scope of things that we can enjoy.

It's verse one.

Finally, then, brothers, we ask you and we urge you in the Lord Jesus that he's received from us how you ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you do so more and more.

See, the goal of this walk is to please God.

It's not just to please ourselves.

And that's where most people just kind of settle.

Uh, the great theologian and preacher from the first great awakening, Jonathan Edwards, said this.

He said that sin acts as a powerful astringent upon the soul, to shrink it down to the size of the individual.

Let me say that again.

Sin acts as a powerful astringent to shrink it down to the size of the individual.

And when that happens, all the individual thinks about, wants, desires, schemes, plans to get is whatever pleases themselves, the individual.

We've lost the bigness and the scope and the capacity of thinking like a man or a woman or a student who says, you know what, I'm breathing to please God, not just myself.

It is immoral for me to think that life is all about me, not in a sexual way, but in a God glory-robbing way.

It is immoral for me to think like that.

But that's what's happened.

You you get in that situation, and I've been around people, and I have friends, and I've counseled people, and they just are so blinded.

And what I realize is their soul has just been shrunk down to the size of themselves.

And so for them, it's the most natural way to live.

It's just like understandable.

Matter of fact, they look at me and they're offended that I tell them that it's sin.

Now, when Edward says that sin acts as a powerful astringent, there's some of you in this room that know what that is, and there's some of you that don't.

Most women know what an astringent is.

Men have no idea.

Allow me to demonstrate when I first got married, I moved in with my wife because uh and and and I was surprised, not by the fact that she was crazy, but that but by the fact that she had so much stuff.

Not clothes, but like cosmetic stuff, like shampoo and conditioner and this and that and basically.

And so we had a little seminary housing bed.

Um I mean, uh, it's the whole thing was like 620 square feet.

And the bathroom was just like you couldn't get two people in there, but my wife had stuff everywhere.

Shells and hanging on the wall.

And one day she was gone with friends, and I was bored, and I went in the bathroom, I was watching a golf tournament, and there was on the shelf this little thing called seabreeze.

And I was like, and my wife said, Oh, I use that and it makes my face tingly.

So I just thought, I want to feel tingly.

So I just thought, my wife's not here, so I got a cotton ball and I soaked it and I rubbed it on my face because I see my wife do it.

I thought, that does feel tingly.

So I just took my shirt off.

And I just thought I just want to feel tingly all over.

And so I'm just doused in it on there.

And the more you put on, the more tingly it feels, man.

My stomach was tingly, my arms were tingly, and then I was like, I'm just gonna sit and air drama while I watch golf.

I'm sitting on my couch, and all of a sudden I just start to shrivel up.

I was like, I can't get it to the phone.

Because sea breeze is an astringent.

It drives you, it's like someone had a knot in my back and was just tightening my skin.

I was like, ooh, whoda, woo-daw.

That's what happens.

That's what sin does to your soul.

It shrinks it down to the size of the individual.

And so immorality shrinks our pleasures.

This is what happens.

Our goal, when this happens, our goal is pleasing ourselves, it's not pleasing God.

It's not that you don't want to please God, it's that you can't even think about pleasing God because you deserve it.

And beloved, I'm not mad at you.

I'm just gonna say this God is not content with one act that pleases him, he wants more and more pleasing him.

That's why Paul says, hey, just as you are doing, that you may do so more and more.

You should be growing in your capacity to please God.

And it's not, well, I'm not pleased.

Here's how you know that you have a relationship with God, not just with religion, not with just the fear of hell, not just with the need for forgiveness.

Here's how you know you really have a relationship with God because what pleases God, pleases you.

It's it's it's Ephesians 5, about verse 10, I think.

He says, and find out what pleases the Lord.

That's not that's not a ripoff.

You're not like, oh, God's getting pleased.

What about me?

If you're his child, why does it not please you when he's pleased?

Why do you think you exist?

Here's the second thing uh immorality misrepresents Christianity.

Look at verse 4 and 5.

I want you to listen very carefully to what I'm saying here.

We'll pick up in verse 3, for this is the will of God, your sanctification, the abstain from sexual immorality.

That each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor.

Here, verse 5.

Not in the passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God.

When I say immorality misrepresents Christianity, I'm not saying that Christians can't act immorally sometimes.

Not at all.

So if you're here, uh don't hear me say, oh, he's just saying, no, no, no.

But I want you to hear this immorality is not a lifestyle for the believer.

It's just not.

It's not, well, you know what?

It's just what I do.

No, no.

It's it you just write down 1 John 3, about verses 8 to 10, where he says that anyone who's born of God cannot keep on sinning.

It doesn't say you can't sin, but you can't keep on sinning.

Why?

Because God's seed, the Holy Spirit, the capacity to reproduce God's life lives inside of you.

It's the spirit which Paul appeals to in the end of this passage we're looking at today.

God's seed remains in you, and and and light will not fellowship with darkness on a consistent basis.

It's like you trying to hold the sun down every morning.

Good luck.

Because light comes to expose darkness, not live at the mercy of darkness.

And so immorality misrepresents Christianity.

What do I mean?

I mean people who cannot control themselves is not what it's not an accurate representation of Christianity.

Again, those two words.

Hey, you possess your vessel, your body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust, like the Gentiles.

One translation says, like the heathen who do not know God.

At least have the decency, if you're currently engaged in immorality with some other person, at least have the decency to say to them, hey, I profess to be a Christian, but this is not how Christians act.

I am bad advertising.

I'm the fat guy trying to sell you slim fast.

You don't need to take me seriously.

Now, that sounds crazy, but here's the reality: you don't take yourself seriously.

Otherwise, you wouldn't engage in that behavior in the first place.

Why not invite other people to look at you the way you look at you?

It really motivates repentance when you do that.

We've eroded in our thinking in the church where Christianity is really dominated by a God who forgives instead of directed by a God who empowers in such a way that sin doesn't appeal to you anymore.

Here's the third consequence that immorality requires God to be the avenger.

It's verse six.

Verse six that he says that see to it.

After he says, in the passion of lust, like a Gentile who do not know God, verse six, and that no one transgressed and wrong his brother in this matter.

Why?

Because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you before, and we solemnly warned you.

Preaching is telling you, but it's also solemnly warning you.

Solemnity is something that we've lost in the American church.

Just go to a seeker-friendly church.

It's like a circus.

It reminds me of Charles Spurgeon.

He says, the day is coming when we will not have shepherds feeding the sheep, but we'll have clowns entertaining the goats.

We are in that day and age, beloved.

And it's just kind of like there's I'm not saying be hyper serious for the sake of dread.

I'm just saying, hey, we told you and we warned you.

For this is not, we solemnly warn you because this is not what God has called us to.

What I mean when I say it requires God to be an Avenger.

Uh, an Avenger is I looked it up because I was like, hey, I I go see all the Avenger movies.

My kid's like, hey, we're going to see that one.

I'm like, oh, let me guess.

It's going to be bad.

There's a bad guy.

Then superperson's going to save the world.

At the end, they're going to introduce the next superperson, and I'm out 50 bucks.

Awesome.

Awesome.

So I looked it up.

And Avenger is this.

It's a person who exacts punishment or inflicts harm in return for an injury or a wrong.

Hear that again.

It's a person who exacts punishment or inflicts harm in return for an injury or a wrong.

And in this case, the Bible says the Lord Jesus Himself will take the side of the wronged person and will avenge that person.

Now people say, I hear it all the time, uh, we're considering adults, we're not hurting anyone.

Well, I have this question for you.

The text clearly teaches that when you engage in immorality, you're harming someone else.

Even if it involves no, doesn't involve another person, you are harming yourself.

And so if you're not doing any harm, then I have this question for you.

Then who is God avenging and on what basis is he going to avenge?

If no harm's happening, if there's no injustice being predicated upon somebody, then where does God get off coming and saying, I'm going to be the avenger in this?

Why is God punishing or inflicting harm if nobody's getting hurt?

Because you see, what you've set up with your really lame, verbal, cultural, I got off the internet, this guy said this was okay.

What you've set up is a scenario where either you're right and God's wrong, or God's right and you're wrong.

And I'll let you exercise some discernment to see which one of those is the case.

Obviously, God's right.

Now, people look around, and here's a second expression of just secular, humanist, moralistic, therapeutic deism thinking.

It sounds like this.

People look around and they go, Ain't nothing happening to me.

I'm good.

I've been immoral since I since puberty.

I've been immoral in every relationship I've ever had.

I'm cheating on my wife right now.

I'm good.

I mean, this God avenge.

Are you kidding me?

Here's the way God avenges himself in some people's life.

It's Matthew 7 talks about it.

When these people stand before him on judgment day and he says, Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity.

I never knew you.

And they say all the things they sang at youth camp, and they say all the phrases, oh Lord, Lord, do we not cast out demons in your name and perform many miracles?

The Bible is very clear.

There are people that will do the miraculous in this life.

Now, there's some churches nowadays that are very popular for their music and their passion for the miraculous.

They don't know God.

Just because you do miracles and you talk about miracles, that doesn't mean we all gotta listen to you.

Wise up, church.

Did we perform miracles and cast out demons in your name in Jesus?

Depart from me.

You people who could not stop sinning, who worked hard at sin.

I never knew you.

That's when God avenges Himself in the life of everybody.

And so you should ask yourself, hey man, can I still feel what's happening to me?

Can I still does it still move me?

Because if it doesn't, then you're you're your your need is not repentance, your need is relationship.

Here's the fourth consequence immorality violates the environment of your calling.

Look at verse 7.

For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness.

When you read the Bible, read the little words, not just the big ones.

Here are the prepositions again.

For God has not called us for impurity, but He's about in holiness.

One is about your purpose, the other is about your environment.

And so he says, hey, he's not called us for the purpose of impurity.

He's called us in the context of holiness.

And let me just say this to get into immorality, you have to walk out of holiness.

To get into immorality, ask yourself, what environment am I willing to leave to experience what I was never created to experience?

To experience that which is not my purpose.

Because that's what the Bible says right here in verse 7.

Fifth consequence.

And then I'll get to my two points I want to preach today.

Is immorality disregards God.

Look at verse 8.

I hear this all the time.

I see this in my office.

I see this through the teenagers that just fold their arms and be kind of like, I'm gonna do what I want.

And I don't go, oh, please don't do what you want.

I go, okay.

Put your big boy pants on, put your big girl pants on, because you're gonna be flippantly disregarding God.

That's great.

I can't talk you out of that.

To disregard God is to view God as null and void, is no big deal, or someone you can who can be neglected with no consequence.

Hear this again.

To disregard God is to just be flippant and just be like, hey, hey, you're you're you're null and void.

You're nothing to me.

Okay?

I I don't I don't even just just just leave me alone.

If you think you can neglect God with no consequence, and let me just say this, beloved.

God takes God very seriously.

And it ain't about, oh my mom and dad are just down my back.

You can just leave me alone.

Hey, you cannot punish your kids into a right view of God, mom and dad.

Stop trying to.

Just say to your kids, hey man, you you don't you don't regard God.

That's not good.

I said to my oldest, over up to Baylor, Jerusalem on the Brazos.

I said, hey, this isn't this isn't four years of youth camp here.

There's real sinners here.

There's real sinners up here.

And here's the deal you've been raised in the fear and admonition of the Lord.

You get up here and put it in the ditch and act stupid, or you meet some guy and you're gonna move in with him, I will cut you off and not give you a dime.

I am not going to fund your stupidity.

And she looked at me and she said, Who do you think I am?

I cried.

Because what she said was, Hey, I I know who I am.

I know who I am.

And what has it been?

Oh, it's been lonely.

It's been hard.

Because you just got to say, you know what?

No.

No.

No.

But immorality, disregard.

See, if you regard yourself and your appetites all the time and you're disregarding God, you're setting up a situation not very good for you.

Now I said all of that to say this.

Here's the two points that I want to preach today.

So do you have any attention left?

Hello.

Here's the thing that I was just like, oh my gosh, how did I not see that?

See, I don't know if you know it.

I'm preaching the text in reverse.

Look back at verse one.

Finally, then, brothers, we ask you and we urge in the Lord Jesus that as you receive from us how you ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you do so more and more.

More pleasing God, because God loves glory.

He loves people that glorify Him, and He reveals and entrusts more and more to those who do.

And so He says, just as you're doing, that you do so more and more.

For you know what instructions we gave you to the Lord Jesus.

Here's verse 3.

Here's what God wants us to hear today.

Not that He didn't want us to hear all this other stuff, but hear this.

Sink your teeth, sink your brain into this this morning, beloved.

He says, For this is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality.

Hear those two things.

For this is the will of God and your sanctification.

See, here's the context of morality.

If you want to be a more moral person, believe it or not, the sermon today is not about immorality.

It's about morality.

It's about the sanctifying power of sexual morality.

If you want to be a more moral person when it comes to your fleshly appetites, there's two things you have to embrace today.

Number one, the will of God.

He says it in verse 3, for this is the will of God.

He repeats it again in verse 8 because he knows that our country is full of naysayers.

It's full of a bunch of mealy-mouthed, irreligious scribblers who say anything to excuse them, who build a worldview around their sexual perversion, and then try to cram it down our throat at the ballot box.

And he comes in verse eight and says, Therefore, whoever disregards this, disregards not man but God.

Now I wouldn't disagree.

Here's what it sounds like.

Well, that's just your opinion.

You got your truth, I got my truth.

No, no, there's not your truth and my truth.

There's one truth, and it's God's truth.

And everyone that disagrees with God is a liar.

That's just the end of it.

He's like, well, I don't like that.

I'll be right here when we're done in a few minutes.

And I'm not like I'm gonna fight you.

I'm just saying, let's talk about it.

Because I need to love you enough to tell you it's not gonna go well for you.

It's just not.

This is the will of God.

Here's the one thing I want to say about this: the way we submit.

What if this is true, beloved?

Because I think it is.

The way we submit to and revere God's will in this area of our lives informs and affects the way we experience God's will in other areas of our life.

When God says, This is the will of God, if you're like, no, thank you, then who are you to think you can come back when you're 20 and you want to declare a major and you don't have a fat clue what you're supposed to do to insist that somehow God now pour out his will on someone who's lived in immorality since you were 14?

Who do you really regard?

You regard yourself.

You ever wonder why we got adults that are at work that are just like, I hate my job.

If I could get a better one, I'd quit.

I just think that we didn't steward the will of God when we were younger.

And here's the second context.

This is the only context within which morality happens.

The will of God and your sanctification.

Your sanctification.

That's what he says in verse 3 for this is the will of God, comma, your sanctification.

Sanctification, by the way, I'm gonna just use that word.

Let me give you a definition from a guy named Wayne Grutham.

He says this sanctification is a progressive work of God and man.

You have to participate through your obedience.

Sanctification, so stop asking God to work in you and work on you.

You have to participate in the process through obedience.

Sanctification is a progressive work of God and man that makes us more and more free from sin and more like Christ in our actual lives.

And let me just say it like this, beloved.

When you're involved in immorality, your sanctification pauses and your spiritual life becomes about maintenance instead of maturity.

Let me say that again.

When you're involved in immorality, your sanctification pauses.

Why?

Because you're not participating, you're just creating self-hatred for yourself.

It sounds like this.

I know better.

Sometimes you even pray to God.

God, I know this is wrong.

Please forgive me.

Your sanctification, God, yes, there's a forgiveness.

Absolutely, but there is no sanctification.

Because you cannot be living in willful, deliberate sin and be conformed to the image of Jesus at the same time.

Because he is the God who came to take away our sin, not to just overlook our sin.

And so what happens is you begin to burn up the majority of your relational energy, trying to keep things a secret, hide things from your parents, sleep your hide things from your spouse, get a burder phone, sleep with your phone under your pillow, whatever.

The tragedy is that immorality may begin when you're 12 or 16 or 19, that you wake up when you're 50 or you're 60 or you're 71, and you're the same person spiritually that you were when you were 14 or 16 or 19.

And you say, Oh, it's just the church's fault, man.

I don't know.

No, no, no.

It's your fault.

Because you've consistently engaged in immorality, and by doing so, you've had your finger on the pause button of sanctification, and you've said to God by default, this is as big as I want to be spiritually, because I'm gonna leave the context of holiness and pursue immorality.

Because God is not an immoral God, He's a very moral being.

When you and I pursue immorality, we cease to become like a moral God.

You're smart people.

Do the math.

And so here's the eventually you can't stand yourself.

So what happens is we just kind of give up being the person we once aspired to be.

And I want to say to you, from the Bible, I want to plead with you.

Don't give up on yourself.

You say, Oh, you don't know, man.

I just, I just all I think about these days, Pastor.

It's all I think about.

Somebody asked me this week, a man asked me this week for now.

We're chatting, and he goes, I mean, I hear you talk all the time.

Do you and your wife have a perfect marriage?

I said, No.

I mean, she's working on some things, but she's doing her best.

No, we don't have a perfect marriage.

Have a great marriage, have an enjoyable marriage.

I just, the first time I kissed my wife, I just thought, I think I want to do that some more.

I think I want to be around this person.

I want to be shaped by this person.

And so when you remove sin from the equation, you say, I'm not going to engage in immorality, it's a very transformative thing.

And so, don't give up today.

Don't give up.

And let me just say this will be done.

Sometimes the power to change is found in saying the right thing.

And so, the right thing this morning, hear me closely so you don't misquote me, okay?

The right thing this morning is not, God, I want to stop immorality.

Is that a good thing?

Yes.

How many times have you thought that or said that before and it doesn't happen?

See, Mary, the context we're talking about.

It is the will of God, one context.

I got to see this.

This is God's will.

This is what God has ordained and accomplished on my behalf for me, for me to walk in this.

And my your my sanctification.

So the right thing to say today is not, oh, I want to stop immorality.

I want to stop looking at things on the internet I shouldn't look at.

The right thing to say is, God, I want to restart the sanctification process.

It's not what I want to say no to.

It's who and what I want to say yes to.

God, I don't want to be 47 and think like a 13-year-old girl.

I just don't want to do that.

I don't want to be a mom that's got kids, and I'm trying to parent them out of my moral guilt and my lack of sanctification.

I want to be a woman of authority.

I want to get my hand off the pause button and say, please, Holy Spirit, and the Bible says that he who began a good work in you will continue it to the day of Christ Jesus.

Let's continue, let's engage.

I submit to the person and the process that makes sanctification possible and enjoyable.

And so what I came to say to you today, people that I love, people that I'm not mad at at all.

I don't get mad at you.

When you come to me and I realize you're in sin, I'm mad that you're missing out, that you've been deceived, but I'm not mad at you.

Just know that.

So don't don't send me an email.

Hey man, were you talking to me?

Yes, I'm talking to all of us today.

Absolutely, I'm talking to you.

Talking to me, I'm talking to everyone in this room.

And I was mad at myself when I just realized, how long have I read the Bible and not seen that it's the will of God, my sanctification?

Those are the two contexts where you experience the purifying power of sexual morality.

Let's pray together.

Let's just take a moment.

Just kind of let the Holy Spirit just be on us and brood over us for a minute.

And remember, it's Philippians 1 6, it says, He who began a good work in you will continue it to the day of Christ Jesus.

Let me just say a couple things.

If there's a period in your life where you lived it immoral life and you've gotten that right with God and you've received forgiveness, you've confessed that and broke that off of you.

Don't let the devil beat you up today.

He's a liar.

And so he has no, he ain't got no place in you.

You just kind of, you don't get, it's not like God kind of said, Hey, let's come back here.

Look at the stain on the carpet.

No, feel bad.

No, don't feel bad.

Feel forgiven.

Just, oh, thank you, Jesus.

That sanctification is taking place.

I don't have power over me anymore.

The issue is not what I want to stop.

I want to stop Emorough.

No, I want to start the sanctification process, God.

Holy Spirit, just kind of be among us.

Because God, when it comes to this, we're kind of looking for a black cat in a dark room.

We're not even sure it's in here anymore.

But it is.

It is.

It's possible for us to be men and women that please God.

It's possible for us to please you more and more.

It's possible for us to abstain.

It's possible for us to control our body and holiness and honor.

It's possible that we stop transgressing.

We stop wronging people.

And so, Lord, we ask you to act humbly.

And we appeal to your mercy.

And just to say, make everything that's a possibility a reality this morning for us.

And I pray for people in this room that are engaged in immoral behavior, in whatever form.

If they're cheating at work, if it's finances, if it's morality, what wherever it is, if it's relationships, I pray God they would just take their hand off the pause button of sanctification.

The Bible says of you that you'll restore that which the locusts have eaten.

The Bible says that though our sins be as scarlet, you'll wash us white as snow.

That's the merciful God of the Bible who avenges, not because he's mad and vindictive, but because he's not going to stand by.

No father stands by and watches children be harmed.

He comes to both their aid and their defense.

And so, Lord, we just want to sit and think about this for just a minute.

And so engage our minds and our bodies, we pray.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

Some we like to, if you're a guest, we like to teach the Bible.

And then we like to say, let's just let our soul breathe for a minute and think digestively about what we heard.

So there's some questions that come up on the screen.

You don't try to write them down.

You can take a picture, but more than anything, just think about.

You'll discuss them in your community groups tonight.

Let's just think to the glory of God for just a moment before we're dismissed.

Look at me for a minute.

When I heard Lindsay play in that great old hymn of the faith.

So I walked across the stage and just said, You know that?

And she just shook her head.

Sing that.

And here's why.

I don't want you to walk out of here and feel like you got beat up today.

You didn't get beat up today.

It's my job to teach you and to warn you.

And so some days you'll walk out of here and you'll love me.

And some days you'll walk out of here and you'll get in your car and you'll slam the door and you'll look at your wife and go, What do you want?

Some days your kids go get in your car and go, I hate Pastor Neil.

Don't correct that.

Let them.

Let them.

You hand him your cell phone, so you should call him and tell him.

Yes.

Yes.

Because you shouldn't always be comforted by the gospel.

Sometimes it should tear you.

Sometimes it should just be like, man, I want to be mad, but I really should be mad at myself.

But here's why I wanted you to have that just that great hymn just kind of wash over you.

It's because the grace of God is greater than your sin.

Okay?

And because the grace of God is greater than your sin and my sin, it's greater than the sin of everybody else in this world.

Which is one of the reasons that we partner with an organization called the Landing.

Uh, because there's women out there who are involved in the sex industry and they just don't believe that the grace of God is greater than what they've done.

And so we want to uh uh close our service this morning by showing you uh a short video about this missional partnership uh that we would love for some of you to come with us and get involved in.

So let's observe this together this morning.

My name is Irene Lauder, a member of Grand Parkway.

Human trafficking has been in my heart for many years.

I retired last February and prayed that God would show me where He wants me to be in this next season of my life.

Within a few weeks of retiring, I attended a presentation given by Natasha Paradeshi, the CEO of the landing, also a Grand Parkway member, and was very impressed.

I went on a tour of the facility with Natasha and I was sold.

After my training, I volunteered in the donation centre, organising donations and doing inventory.

As I became more familiar with the landing, I now I fill in wherever they need me, whatever the daily need is when I'm volunteering.

I'm also a member of the prayer team and the transportation team.

It is incredibly humbling to be a part of the landing team and to see the changes, the transformations that are taking place in the life of the survivors.

I urge you to attend a meeting that's taking place here at Grand Parkway on Sunday, April 14th, to dig in and learn more about the way that God is changing the survivors' lives.

Working with survivors of human trafficking at the landing is much more about building trust and meeting physical, emotional, and spiritual needs.

It isn't always a rescue mission.

Some of the main needs in working with victims of trafficking are building relationships, showing genuine love, and providing trauma-informed services as best we can.

It's hard to convince someone that they are worthy when they have heard that they are worthless most of their lives.

At the landing, we open our doors to anyone who is a potential victim of human trafficking, no matter age, gender, ethnicity, or background.

We build trust and help fill in the gaps so that survivors don't fall through the cracks.

And that can look different every day.

Sometimes it's working to get a client to a shelter or helping them apply for benefits or writing job resumes.

Sometimes it's helping them navigate the criminal justice system, and sometimes it's responding to emergency calls in the middle of the night.

But other days it's teaching a painting class or sitting down for a meal just to listen to their story.

All these things empower survivors to seek freedom for themselves.

Thank you so much.

I'm excited every day, I'm not coming up.

And to find the fellowship hall, you can just go down either hallway and you'll see doors that lead right into there.

1245 is a great place to gather information.

Also know this we the landing is one of our missional partners.

So when you give, when you support the ministry of this church, when you put money in that offering box, some of it goes to facilitate and make possible what you just saw in the video.

Okay?

If you have any questions about anything you heard this morning, myself and some of our pastors will be available down front.

Uh, we'd love to pray with you, to answer any questions you may have.

Uh, if this is your first, second, or third time to visit our church, we would love to just meet you and put a name with a face, okay?

Stand to your feet, let me speak a blessing over you.

Hold your hands out.

So easy to feel like you've gone so far you can never get back.

He wants you to be reminded today that it is his will.

And your sanctification.

Because it's his will that you be sanctified.

You'd be more like Jesus.

You can get there.