Standing In Purity

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Good morning, CCW.

Amen.

Glad to see your faces this morning.

And uh, Dave, I know that what you said we uh we feel, and um just want to thank the church uh for the outpouring of love.

Thank you for your prayers and texts and meals and gifts and uh it was a tremendously painful week.

Um but we want to share.

I know that everybody has uh a lot of thoughts and words, we want to uh get back to regular life, whatever that looks like.

Um and right now there's a big hole in that, but uh I will say one of the things I've felt most excited about was getting back to my church, preaching the word of God, and uh but thank you.

Uh it meant a lot and still means a lot, and um appreciate your prayers for autumn and the girls and Heather and her brothers and sister and mom and dad.

And uh it was um a week, but I want to say this we had a funeral service that celebrated a life that was wonderfully lived, and five people came to know Jesus as their Savior.

So, amen.

Amen.

About five weeks ago, I came before this church and preached a sermon on contending for right government.

That was by plan.

I wanted the church to understand that November 5th had no bearing on how this church was gonna move forward.

Uh, we were gonna support who was elected as president.

We were gonna pray for the president and vice president and the house and the Senate, and uh and so that's what we're going to do.

We're gonna support and pray and stand for this country and kneel before the throne of the King of Kings.

And so thank God that we know who's in control and uh we are excited about what God's going to do.

I want to ask you to continue to pray for revival.

That's what America needs.

When we think of America, I'm so thankful for the heroes that are in this church.

There are men and women who we're celebrating tomorrow that we call veterans.

If you've served in any form or branch of service, could you stand this morning?

We want to recognize you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

We have a right to stand today because of men and women who have fought for that.

So thank you so much.

Would you pray with me?

Father, we love you.

We are thankful that we can come together and worship freely in the house of God.

We're thankful for a place where we can have burdens and lay burdens and uh bear burdens and love one another, and we're thankful for your presence.

And the thing that can soothe more than anything is Jesus.

We're thankful for that hope and uh we're prayerful to give that hope.

Lord, I pray for somebody today who came in who is just feeling so down, so discouraged that they would be reminded that Jesus Christ is a light that pushes through any darkness.

God, I pray for somebody here today who just needs the word of God.

Lord, I pray that you would get me out of the way, that you would speak this message.

Lord, we love you in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Turn your Bible to Revelation chapter 2, continuing the seven letters.

Revelation 2 · chapter mention

Thank you again, Pastor Dave, for preaching last week, a hard topic and less time than maybe normal, but thank you, Dave.

Thank you, Amanda.

I listened to her.

She jumps right in and uh shares that ministry moment.

And thank you, worship team.

That worship was beautiful this morning.

And um let's open up Revelation chapter 2.

Revelation 2 · chapter mention

Look at verse 18 through 20.

The first point this morning is the danger of click formations.

It says, My heading in my Bible to the corrupt church.

That's real exciting.

And to the angel of the church in Thyatira, write these things, says the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and his feet like fine brass.

I know your works, love, service, faith, and your patience.

And as for your works, the last are more than the first.

Nevertheless, I have a few things against you, because you allow that woman, Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, to teach and seduce my servants to commit sexual immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols.

When Arne, a church consultant, surveyed members of nearly a thousand churches asking, why does the church exist?

And 89% of the members said the church exists so that my family and other families and the church can be cared for.

Then the pastors of the same churches were asked the same question, why does the church exist?

And they said the church exists to reach the world for Jesus Christ.

The results were exactly opposite, 89% and 90%.

But I want to tell you today, church, the purpose of the church, I believe, is a meld of both, that we need to win the world for Jesus Christ, and we need to shepherd the church.

I want you to see the mission of CCW.

Ever since you've been here, if you went through a next steps class, we should have a picture of it coming up.

It says, love God.

There it is.

Love people.

You can go right to our website, and this pops right up if you wonder what the mission is.

Serve at home and abroad.

So that's the mission.

That's who we are, what we do, with the vision that we share the good news.

The point of loving God and loving people is so that we can share the gospel with all generations.

For the spread of the gospel, we are God's hands and feet and united together in this one pursuit.

When we take our eyes off this pursuit, any church, by the way, if they take their eyes off this pursuit, can fill up full of clicks.

That's what you get.

This is not something new.

It happens everywhere in society.

It's not just the church.

People tend to categorize or affiliate with social groups or different groups based on perceived needs.

And I'm not telling you today, don't get close to people that are like you.

That's like kind of life.

We tend to bond over things that we've been through or life stages, or I've got kids and you got kids, and I played this sport and you played this sport.

That's all good and well, and you need close friendships.

But this church at Thyatira had a clique problem.

Some would say a cult problem.

In verse 20, what it says about that, I have a few things against you, because you allow that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, prophetess, to teach and seduce my servants.

And so they had a circle, a group formulating within the church.

They allowed this, what it's called, a seductress, prophetess seductress, inside the church.

The church should act like the church.

But the church was acting like the world.

The Bible says, come out to the church from among them and be ye separate.

It's like the church flyer I was told about for a men's activity.

On the flyer, it said, join us.

And within the flyer, it said, we're gonna have cigars, B-Y-O-L, bring your own liquor, and we're gonna blow things up.

Now, for some of you, you're like, where's that church, Pastor Rick?

And I get it.

I would like to blow things up.

But in the church, the Bible says that the church should look different, that we are separate from the world, that we live in the world, but we don't draw people in by the means of the world.

The church should look different.

Thyatire was a church that was suffering corruption because it was allowing impurities in the church.

Letter A, I want you to see Jesus' teaching.

Jesus teaches about a church on mission.

He even began to share with them the things that he saw that were right.

He said, I know your works, your working, you're serving.

I know that your love, your service, your faith, and your patience.

And he commends them for that part of their mission.

He commends their motive, their ministry, even mentality.

But there was something that was happening.

The Bible says that the gates of hell will not prevail against the church.

Do you think that that scripture meant that the gates of hell will not prevail against a church full of cliques?

Or a church that was on mission.

A church that had an understanding of what it meant to move forward as a movement.

You know, when the church is a conglomerate of cliques, the problem is people have identified with Christ but are trusting in the work of their hands.

Wrestler said the effect of clickish behavior in churches brings a cancerous effect because it brings a holy stiff arm based on outward judgments.

Here's what we need to know.

We collectively are the body.

We collectively have a mission.

By the way, we are the local New Testament church here with that mission, but that includes every Christian.

We are the body of Christ.

I want you to see 2 Corinthians chapter 10.

2 Corinthians 10 · chapter mention

I want you to see a verse.

2 Corinthians 10.

Verse 12.

How does this happen?

Well, because we make judgments.

But they, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves are not wise.

I know that's a mouthful, but what it's saying is when we have ungodly comparisons and make group click assumptions that it's ungodly.

He says it's dumb, it's not wise for the church to be formulated like that.

It's divisive from church unity.

In Acts 2, when the church was built, let me tell you about this scripture.

It says that they were together in a relationship, that they had fellowship, that they broke bread and went from house to house, that there was a partnership.

They sold things that they had and gave to people who had less, and people who had more would sacrifice so that the mission would continue through everyone's hand.

It wasn't a hierarchy, or these are the most spiritual, and these were the least spiritual, and that group can do this, and that group and it was the church.

The body moved forward.

What would it be like if 50 of our churches went together in support of a cause in Shelby County?

This was the church mission.

Unity is not created, it's protected through purpose.

I'm gonna say that again.

Unity is not created.

We're not gonna get together and have a think tank on how to create unity.

It's there within the bond of Jesus Christ, but it is protected by every member in the mission.

That's unity.

When we get on that same page, all of a sudden we don't have to have anything in common.

We go, man, we are brothers.

I got brothers in Christ that are nothing like me.

Some of my best good Christian friends, I'm telling you, we don't have nothing in common except for Jesus Christ.

And I like them and they like me.

I can't hunt with them, I can't fish with them, I can play cards.

But I got good friends, and we just bonded on the mission because the mission of Jesus Christ is beautiful.

I want you to think about a question.

What is your purpose for being a member at CCW?

The Great Commission is our mission.

The reason that we exist is to go into all the world, bringing the gospel so that we can then disciple all people, teaching them.

Your spiritual gift is for the purpose of the Great Commission.

God gifted you with something special that's unique to you, and it's for the Great Commission.

The platform that He's put you in with your spiritual gift is for the Great Commission.

That is your work, your job, the way that you're impacting people with your kids' schools or your environment, your neighborhood, your family.

That's your platform to use your gift for the mission.

And if you're doing it for any other reason, then you're not feeling the purpose.

It's a beautiful mission that God gave us.

Well, let's continue on.

Verse 20 and 21.

Let's find out more about this Jezebel that was slipping in.

I have a few things against you because you allow that woman.

Jezebel calls herself a prophetess, teach and seduce my servants, committing sexual immorality, eating things, sacrificed to idols.

And I gave her time to repent of her immorality, and she did not repent.

Letter B as this.

Jezebel twists the church with manipulation.

Pastor Danny called me one day for a visit, and he said, Pack your swimsuit.

We're going on a visit.

What?

Did he say?

Pack it.

It's 10 o'clock in the morning.

We gotta go see a man for a visit.

Okay, so next thing I know, I'm on a boat, and we're going and going.

They're like, Have you ever water skied?

And I'm like, nope.

They're like, you should water ski.

And I'm like, I'm the youngest on the boat.

All right, I'll give it a try.

Now, mind you, I'm not really a good swimmer.

So I get down in the water, and those of you that have done it know the impossibility of getting these things on your feet as it is.

Once I got the skis on my feet, I thought, I've done the hardest thing.

Like, I can't hardly swim, trying to put, they're hitting everything.

I get them on, and they're like, I can't hear them.

They're shouting instructions over a boat motor, and I'm like, yeah, I got it.

And the last thing that I thought about this whole situation was if things go bad, let go.

All I thought to myself is if I can hold on to this rope, I'm gonna be water skiing, I'm gonna be doing backflips, I'm everything.

They're gonna be amazed at how good I am at this, because I'm a natural athlete, right?

And so they fire up the thing and we get going, and I got one leg that gets going this way, and this other leg was somewhere over here, two miles back.

And when that happened, I thought my body split in half.

And I found out real quick that your body has regular directions that it wants to go.

There is a certain direction that your body will go, and there is a way that it twists, and there's a way that it don't want to twist.

And he broke me in half that day.

And I had to come home and tell my wife that I got injured on church visitation.

I couldn't walk for about a week.

But that twisting, my body wasn't allowed.

Let me tell you something.

The church has a bend and we have a mission and we have a right direction.

But this Jezebel comes in and she's trying to manipulate.

It says, because you allow that Jezebel to teach and seduce.

Now, commentators believe this is a descriptive title like the Old Testament Jezebel, but most also say that the Lord is talking about an actual person, a powerful person that came into this church at Thyatira that was manipulating people at this church who built a following using God's house with corrupt morals.

She was using God's house, and the commentator said a man or woman can be a Jezebel, but it says she, not God calls her, but herself as a prophetess.

Philip said, Jezebel's spiritual heir, her successor, was in the church at Thyatira.

We're not talking about outside the church.

Some of these towns, when you look at uh the reasoning for some of the judgment, the town itself, the area itself, had corruption, but this was the church allowing the world within the church.

And it's not a surprise.

2 Corinthians 11 14 says, Do not marvel.

Satan himself masquerades as a father of light.

He wants us to think that what we're hearing sounds really good, that it's close to the truth.

Meanwhile, twisting and manipulating and looking for someone to devour.

It was an old tactic.

It was an old tactic, but he was manipulating.

He was using spiritual influence within the church to teach false, using spiritual influence, Jezebel saying to incite sexual immorality.

And you probably go, Pastor Rick, really?

Somebody was in the church teaching sexual immorality?

I want you to study a little bit on all of the major cult leaders.

What is a marker of many of their cult following?

And what happens?

You see a lot of crass sexual behavior, these leaders looking for an opportunity to gain power and influence so that they can have sexual pleasures amongst their cult following.

It's debaucherous, it's sickening.

Church, I've been told of churches within the last decade who created groups, cliques within their church for swinging.

I'm not talking about out on the playground.

Flesh-driven people.

Can you imagine using power within the church?

By the way, Jezebel was known for immorality and idolatry.

So while we've been peering into the seductress side, I want you to know about idolatry.

Idolatry is worshiping anything before God as if it's God.

Hear this again.

Anything that is worshiped before God as if it were God.

Anything that precedes God in your schedule, your checkbook, your time, your talents, and your treasure.

Because immorality and idolatry with Jezebel go hand in hand.

In fact, scripture shows it that way.

I want you to see the scriptures that talk about harlotry.

In Judges 2.17, we see a passage that talks about that the nation of Israel had gone a harloting.

You see that?

Yet they would not listen to their judge, but they played the harlot with other gods and they bowed down.

Hosea 4.12, in the same way, they're speaking of idolatry, for the spirit of harlotry has caused them to stray, and they've played the harlot against their God.

This is because they were accepting other gods.

In Isaiah 1, you see the same.

Spiritually speaking, you may say, I'm not listening to a class and feeling, I'm not been invited to a swinging club within church.

But what about your heart and your life says there's a worship of anything before God?

God, as if it's God.

The second point I want you to see is the danger of consenting to filth and confession forsaken.

We're going to read the end there of verse 21 through 23.

And I give her time to repent of her sexual immorality, and she did not repent.

Indeed, I will cast her into a sick bed, and those who commit adultery with her into great tribulation, unless they repent of their deeds.

I will kill her children with death, and all the churches shall know that I am he who searches the minds and hearts, and I will give to each one of you according to your works.

Letter A is this from toleration to tribulation.

So back to the idea of Jezebel, from King David, we've seen the hand of God, and King David, what did he fall into?

Right?

We'll start there.

King David fell into adultery with Bathsheba.

He made a mistake, he got his heart right, he did repent.

But from King David to his son Solomon, we see from toleration to tribulation, Israel goes from blessing of God to the toleration of other gods.

And so with Solomon, Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines.

Can you imagine?

Now listen, I understand culturally that it was a way for a lot of people to be taken care of and tended to.

But this man was sleeping with a thousand people and caring for a thousand people's needs.

Do you think sexual problems were brewing?

And that goes on down to Ahab.

And when Ahab came into power, we saw that Israel and many around it largely began to bow the knee to the false God Baal, the sex fertility god.

Therefore, a desecration of God's temple was allowed.

They made God's temple, the worship of Almighty God became a house for prostitution.

It became a brothel.

Can you imagine?

Do you remember the fire that fell down on Mount Carmel?

Do you remember the battle between Elijah and the prophets of who?

Jezebel.

It was Jezebel's prophets.

They came from her home city of Phoenicia, 450 prophets, and she brought into the land where her husband Ahab was the king.

And then they had this worship competition.

We're going to put a bull on an altar, and we're going to see whose God can bring down fire from heaven.

I want you to turn to 1 Kings chapter 18 just for a second.

1 Kings 18 · chapter mention

This passage where I found out I really like Elijah.

So they have this competition, and Elijah throws down, he says, We're going to find out whose God is God.

Either Baal is God or God is God.

And so they put the bull on the altar.

And in verse, the second half of verse 26 in 1 Kings 18, you see the prophets, Jezebel's prophets are the prophets of Baal, and they say, Oh Baal, hear us.

But there was no voice, no one answered.

Then they leaped about the altar which they had made.

And so it was at noon.

This is what I love, Elijah right here.

That Elijah mocked them and said, Cry aloud, for he is a God.

Either is meditating, he is busy, he's on a journey, or perhaps he's sleeping and must be awakened.

So Elijah's over here in the corner, watching them, jumping and screaming.

At Hear Me Church, nothing.

A false God.

And they're just up and down and screaming.

And Elijah, this when I see the pastor in the scriptures mocking the people that are making those sense, I go, This is a good pastor.

He says, Maybe your God is off sleeping.

Yell louder.

He must be too busy.

And he goes on and on and he's mocking.

But what do we see about what happened?

When Elijah comes to that altar and prays to his God, fire came down.

The fire came from heaven and licked up the bull that was on the altar and licked up the altar and everything that was around it.

Here's what we find out about this scenario.

What do we see about the gods of Jezebel?

They promise everything and they leave nothing.

There's no power, there's no purpose, there's no fulfillment, and there's no fire because there's no thing.

They're false.

Where do we see that right now in culture?

Oh, people are jumping up and down.

Pastor, I need this, and if I can have this, and if I get this power and this success, and there and the Bible says that the prophets Baal went on to cutting themselves and slashing themselves and every other form of worship, trying to call this down.

And we see it right now in society.

Oh, if I can just get this fulfillment and power and prestige and money.

And here it's nothing.

It is not real.

It is not a God, it cannot fulfill.

They're jumping up and down for sex and fulfillment.

These people were consenting to filth.

It made me think of David had a brother Amnon who had a half-sister Tamar.

And in scripture, it's a terrible passage, but Amnon became obsessed and sickened with the idea of having his sister Tamar, his half-sister, his Absalom's sister.

And he wanted her so badly, whenever he seen her, he just could taste it.

And so he devised a plan to act sick, and his sister Tamar came into him and he forced her to sleep with him.

And it says, when he was done, I want you to hear what it says.

When he was done, then he hated her with greater hatred than the love which he had loved her.

Let me say it one more time.

He hated her with greater hatred than the love with which he loved her.

When you worship at the altar of immorality and idolatry, you are left emptier with more grief and guilt.

And that was Amnon.

Amnon was left empty, full of grief, because he allowed sin.

He allowed that immorality to take him over.

What they tolerated turned into how they tribulated.

I don't know if tribulated is a word, but it's been a tribulated kind of week, and I'm going to use it.

It says after this in Revelation, I gave her time to repent of this immorality.

She did not repent.

Indeed, I will cast her into a sick bed.

And those, look at what it says, and those who commit adultery with her.

Why would he say, and those who commit adultery with her?

Because it's pointing out that specific sin.

Sin has a natural consequence, right?

Natural physical consequence.

If you begin to drink a lot of liquor, there is a chance that you can get cirrhosis of the liver.

Okay?

That's a natural physical consequence.

The leading cause of lung cancer is smoking.

Okay?

This is natural physical consequences.

And here we see, interestingly, that it's written that I will cause you to be in a sick bed.

I want you to think on that.

1 Corinthians 6.18 says about immorality.

Every sin that a man does is outside of his own body, but sexual immorality is sin against his own body.

Sexual immorality is against you.

It is self-harm.

Immorality.

God created man, male, and female for the pleasurable, intimate sex within the bond of marriage, but any sex outside of that, any perversion of it, is immorality.

It is that pornea.

I want you to know something.

Sexual sin created STDs.

You can treat an STD with an antibiotic, but you cannot cure an STD.

It is a possibility that the sickbed of Thyatira was a result of her immorality.

A sick bed.

He says, I'm going to bring judgment on them.

Their own physical sexuality bringing judgment.

Them and those who committed adultery.

Now, it could be any type of judgment.

It doesn't tell us this.

But I have to wonder.

You know, no one had ever heard of AIDS before the 1980s.

Let me tell you a few of the first articles that came out.

June 5th, 1981, CDC reports rare pneumonia is found in five homosexual men.

July of 1981, a rare cancer observed in 41 homosexuals.

Immorality is a sin against your own body that creates disease.

A sick bed, he says.

Now I said we're not in here, there isn't a class for you to sign up to, I promise, that says Jezebel 101.

Okay, we're not doing that at CCW.

But if the local New Testament church is a picture of the big sea church, and we say we don't have any of that, let me ask you a question.

What do we have in private?

Because we as a whole are the body of Jesus Christ.

1 Corinthians 6 says that our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit.

What we do in private now, therefore, what I do at home, who I am not in the church, therefore impacts what I am in the corporate body of Christ.

So maybe we're not having Jezebel 101, but what's happening in private?

Because it does impact who we are in worship.

What we are as a congregant whole.

Are there any impurities?

We have to be on guard because in America we live it, church.

In America, we live it.

I mentioned earlier that Greek word for immorality, pornea.

There's 42 million pornographic websites.

We live in a time right now where sexual orientation boasts over 15 plus terms.

It's no longer just man and woman.

In 2021, there was over 57,000 sexual abuse cases.

Help us.

The World Population Review surveyed infidelity in the United States.

Approximately one half of married individuals cheated at least one time during the course of their marriage.

Three-fourths of men surveyed, and two-thirds over two-thirds of women admitted that they would sleep with someone else if they could be guaranteed they wouldn't get caught.

Sexual temptations are some of the most burdensome and toilsome, devastating darts that Satan slings.

Don't naively think today, I'm good here, Pastor.

I'm okay.

It doesn't really affect me.

Here's what we need to do.

Either we ask ourselves today, in what way do I need to be pure?

In what ways do conversations need to be had?

What way do I need to get rid of things in my life?

In what way do I need to spend more time with my spouse?

Or we can continue to be the frog in the kettle as we sit there and comfortably allow the water to boil until we're done.

Nobody came to a pastor's desk and said, I saw this coming.

It was week after week.

Everybody's always shocked at their marriages and shambles all of a sudden.

I can't believe they were looking.

I can't believe this happened.

I can't believe they were looking at pornography.

I'm telling you, this is where America's statistics lie, and the church is not on the outside of those statistics.

So some things that are practical helps.

Number one, seek God early.

Number two, speak of with spouses or if you have teenagers, speak of boundaries.

Number three, have accountability.

Have someone, man, have a man in your life that you can talk to.

We're getting ready to have a men's prayer breakfast.

You need a man in your life that you can be honest.

Ladies, you need someone in your life that you can be honest.

This isn't just men.

You need to be able to be honest with somebody.

Accountability.

Spouses, number four, you have to have regular communication on this topic.

It's awkward, I understand, but you need to sit across the table at a dinner once a month, once every couple of months, and say, Are you feeling okay with our marriage?

And allow that freedom of space.

Number five, the Bible says it over and over.

This is when it gets too close, but it says flee.

Flee.

Run.

We see it in scripture.

It's real, church.

Well, letter B, we see this from toleration to a testimony.

Toleration to a testimony.

You see, Jesus, let me look at verse 23.

It says, Again, I'll kill her children with death, and here's the testimony part part, and all the churches shall know that I am he who searches the minds and hearts, and I will give to each one of you according to your works.

He's saying, I've given you time to repent, but if you don't repent, I'm gonna cast judgment in a way that all the churches are going to know.

I want to tell you, if this type of thing slips in to a church, any church, what Jesus is saying here, I will let everyone know of this problem.

You're gonna be a testimony and not in a good way.

You see, Jesus preached heavily against immorality.

But I want you to see how individuals in the Bible who fell, what their circumstances looked like.

Samson had eyes on foreign women and he lost his power.

I already talked to you about Solomon, David's son.

We see in Scripture Rahab.

We see Gomer and the woman at the well.

These were women that were selling themselves or at least selling themselves short.

But let me show you God's response because he said, I want you to repent.

God's response to David's confession, it says simply, he put away his sin.

David is later called a man after God's own heart.

The woman at the well, you know what Jesus said?

John 3.17 says this to us, church, he came not to condemn the world, but to save it from sin.

So I want to say to you candidly today, if you're cheating, stop.

Go and sin no more.

If you're looking at things on a phone or a laptop or on a television, stop.

God wants you to repent.

Stop and sin no more.

If you're doing something secretly, if you're taking your eyes, if you're enjoying the attention of someone from the opposite sex because the attention at home isn't feeling like it used to.

Stop and go and have the hard conversation and communicate.

Don't start with an emotional affair because it's going to turn into a physical one.

He says, go and sin no more.

Stop doing that thing.

He doesn't say, I won't forgive you.

That's not what he said to David.

God is full of mercy.

But I want to tell you, and I know that there is one interpretation of passages with many applications, so I'm using that here.

2 Chronicles 7, 14 says, if my people should humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then and only then will I hear from heaven.

Then and only then will I forgive their sin, and then and only then will I heal their land.

Did you hear that?

It takes humbling, right?

To look in the mirror and see my fault.

And listen, this is one of the most awkward areas of faults.

I understand that.

It takes a humbling of self, man, woman, child, teenager, whatever you are.

To admit to myself first that there's a problem here.

He says, if you will humble myself, seek my face, turn, then I will hear and I will heal.

God can do that.

Nine times the phrase in the Old Testament, God is slow to anger and full of mercy is found.

God is slow.

But it says, unless they repent, I will change her bed into a place of pain.

That word repent refers to an event in which an individual attains a divinely provided new understanding of my behavior and seeks to change.

Repentance is going this way, and I'm walking towards it, and I stop.

Okay.

Confession can still go this way.

I'm sorry can still go this way.

But repentance has no other option but to turn.

Says, I changed my way.

If they will repent and change.

Acts 3.8 says, repent is good.

Repent and turn.

To repent is to turn.

But the issue, church, for many people is a pride issue.

And for so many, they don't want to admit their part.

The reason we have not had revival in churches in our land for a long time, because people are not rushing to these altars coming before their God and admitting their part.

What starts revivals?

Yes, there's masses of people who come to Christ, but if you study them, it's confession of sin.

I'm so good, and I don't want nobody to know how bad I am, so I can't get up and confess.

You don't know what I'll do to my reputation, Pastor.

Well, I'll tell you what it will do.

It will thwart revival.

God wants to change us, but we so want to keep everything looking just right.

I'm gonna tell you, we're all a mess.

He says you gotta humble yourself.

Humble yourself.

I've learned, especially this week, life is a vapor.

And if God through the Holy Spirit is speaking to your heart, 1 John 1 9 says, if we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to cleanse us and forgive us.

I wouldn't leave one tiny little thing left undone in pursuit of being pure before my God.

Church, don't tolerate one impurity, sexual or otherwise.

I want you to turn to Ephesians chapter 5.

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

We know this as the marriage text, the husband and wife text.

But I want you to see a greater picture.

Ephesians 5 25.

It says, Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for her, that he might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of the water by word, that he might present her to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.

So husbands ought to love their own wives as their bodies, for he who loves his wife loves himself.

For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church.

For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.

Did you catch that there?

It says, Husbands, it is our duty within that marriage to present our wives without wrinkle, without spot, that she should be a glorious bride, not one blemish.

But the greater picture there for the church, the bride of Christ, for you and me within this body, God's body, is that we do our part not to have one bit of impurity.

We present ourselves a pure bride.

That one day when Jesus comes again, he receives as the bridegroom his bride, and we are just as pure and holy before him as we can be.

But it says this of that testimony, and all the churches will know the Jezebel call at Thyatira.

There will be a testimony to all of God's judgment.

God is full of mercy, but his judgment is sure.

He's full of mercy.

I want you to see what it says there.

Those in the sick bed tribulation, lest they repent, I will kill children, and all the churches shall know that I am he who searches the minds.

Now to you I say to the rest in Thyatire, as many as do not have this doctrine, who have not known the depths of Satan, as they say, I will put on you no other burden.

He says, This will be a testimony.

And earlier he described himself, Jesus Christ's description, eyes of a flaming fire, meaning looking with penetrating judgment into what's going on, feet of brass.

Brass is a metal that is pure, refined through fire, strong and immovable.

He's saying, This judgment is going to be sure.

This is going to be a testimony.

Now, church, today can be a brand new day of testimony for you.

But we will be judged based on our failure or lack of to repent.

And I don't know what God's spoken to you.

But is there something that you have to repent about today?

There's an animal.

I'm finishing with this called the air mine.

Some of you probably maybe have it at home.

I'm just kidding.

You probably don't.

Airmine is very rare, hard to catch.

We've got a picture of one that should come up.

But the airmine, look at it, isn't it cute?

They're considered to have one of the most beautiful furs of all creatures.

I hope nobody came in today with their fur coat because hunters catch the ermine, and the pelts are used for the neck pieces on some of the finest and most beautiful fur coats, expensivest coats.

We're talking about coats that go for upward$40,000.

Insignia from the ermine go on royal robes, but I want to tell you to catch an ermine, this is what hunters have to do.

They get out running from their den, and the ermine is so specifically unique and created that it lives in a way to protect that fur coat at all costs.

That coat is special, and they're born just with a way of knowing that.

And so to catch an air mine, hunters go and they smear filth all around the den of an ermine.

Trash and garbage, things that smell, and just put it all over, all kinds of filth and nastiness.

And an ermine will, the hunters will send dogs chasing air mine, and it'll chase itself all the way back to a den.

And when an air mine gets to that den that's full of that trash and that mud and that nastiness, it gets to it and it will not allow itself to be full of that filth.

And so when an airmine gets back to that den, it would rather lose its life than for its coat to be marred with any impurity.

And so hunters catch an air mine right at the base of its den, unwilling to dirty its wonderful coat.

Oh church.

That today before our God we would be so full of passion that this heart would not allow or desire one smudge of impurity from this world.

We could be like the airmind.

If you accepted Jesus today, we want to hear about it.

Take a moment and text CCW Connect to 94,000.

Thank you again for joining us on the CCW podcast.

We hope you'll make plans to join us in person on Sundays.