Beware: Sexual Immorality | Ephesians 5:1-5 | 2/15/16

All right. Well, it is great to be with

you all again, as we are every Sunday.

Uh, just a quick update on Eric. He's

doing great. He, uh, just went and saw a

play, a Shakespeare play in the Globe in

England, which if you don't know what

the Globe is, that's apparently where

Shakespeare did his plays 500 years ago.

Is that right?

>> Reconstructed.

>> The Reconstruct. Okay. So, Phil clearly

has more information about this than I

do. Uh, things are going well. Praise

God. Keep keep praying for him. Uh,

there's a lot of people out sick today.

a lot of people traveling. Please pray

for them. Uh they need our prayer.

So

sometimes I get to a point in scripture

where I'm getting ready to preach my

sermon

and every introduction I come up with

just feels sort of contrived.

And I really wrestle with this thing of

like, am I up here to

entertain you [laughter]

or am I up here to just help you

understand what the word says? [snorts]

And so this is completely off the cuff.

So hopefully nothing horrible happens.

Let's see how this goes.

I've been thinking a lot about

something I've started to say more as my

kids get older,

and it's this.

This is what our family does.

Did your father ever say that to you?

Do you ever say that to your kids? This

is just what our family does.

The first time I said that was just a

couple it was just a couple years ago.

And you know, one of our kids was like,

"Dad, I'm really tired. I don't want to

go to Bible study tonight."

And I I thought about that. It kind of

caught me off guard. I didn't really

know how to even process that. that's

not how I think. And so I said, well,

you know, we don't in our family, like

we don't do stuff because we feel like

it. We do it because it's the right

thing to do.

And that launched its whole other

conversation about this is what our

family does. Um,

obviously there's like that's a godly

example that makes me look good. We also

push ourselves way harder than we

probably should. Uh, one time I took all

my kids hiking and Jason Alfaro came

with us and he was like, I'd like to go

for a hike. And it turned out that hike

was like four miles straight uphill.

And like a trooper, he did that

amazingly. But, you know, of course,

halfway up, it's like, this is so steep.

Why are we doing this, Dad? It's like,

this is what our family does. We don't

quit.

And

it's just it's sort of hitting me with a

fresh clarity that there's going to be

implications for reinforcing this idea

in my kids. And I sure hope they're good

implications.

Um I really hope that these have the

intended effects on their hearts and

mind. But when you're born into a

family, you're going to absorb elements

of that family's culture because that's

who your parents are. That's what they

value. And hopefully their values are

aligned to scripture. And if they are,

usually it leaves you with something

good that you as a child grew up with

and then have to decide if you're going

to act on them, walk in them or not. But

that's what you're given.

And that's, you know, it's kind of

exactly how the book of Ephesians has

been talking to us

about obedience to Christ and God.

It's almost exactly how it's going to

talk to us today about valuing unity,

valuing the things that lead to unity,

and obeying the Lord because of what

he's done for us. It's these are just

the things God does. And if you're in

his family, you will do them, too.

My main point today from Ephesians

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

chapter 5 is going to be this. Joining

God's family is meant to transform your

present and your future. Just like

growing up in the Kamacho household,

growing up in God's household is meant

to transform your present and your

future. So, strive to be like him.

Please open your Bibles to Ephesians

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

chapter 5.

We're going to pick up where we left off

in verse one, verses 1 and two, um,

which serves as a very fitting

conclusion to chapter 4. and then we're

going to jump into verses 3-6

and transition to Paul's general

concerns for the church. Let's humble

our hearts. Let's humble our minds,

prepare our hearts for the reading of

God's word in Ephesians 5:es 1-6.

Therefore,

be imitators of God as beloved children

and walk in love as Christ loved us and

gave himself up for us a fragrant

offering and sacrifice to God. But

sexual immorality and all impurity or

covetousness must not even be named

among you as is proper among saints.

Let there be no filthiness nor foolish

talk nor crude joking which are out of

place.

But instead let there be thanksgiving.

For you may be sure of this, that

everyone who is sexually immoral or

impure or who is covetous, that is an

idoltor, idoltor, has no inheritance in

the kingdom of Christ and God. This is

the word of the Lord.

So, we're going to look at four things

from that today. We're going to look

first at our family identity. Who are we

in the Lord? Second, we're going to look

at the family pattern.

Third, we're going to talk about the

family boundaries. And fourth, we're

going to talk about the family warning.

The identity, the pattern, the

boundaries, the warning of this family,

God's family in Christ.

So, let's start by thinking hard about

verse one.

Verse one says something about what you

should do because of who you are. And

both elements of that are very crucial

to understand in order to properly apply

this. So let's take it one at a time.

Verse one says, "Therefore, be imitators

of God."

Therefore, therefore, we should act

like, we should do our best to emulate,

we should strive to image the God of all

creation.

And a super important first question to

ask about that sentence is, what does

that mean?

Clearly, there are things about God that

are unique to God. Should I be trying to

glorify myself in all things? That's

what God does. Probably not, right?

I don't think that's what Paul has in

mind. We should be we should not be

attempting to exercise total sovereignty

over creation the way God does.

There are aspects of God's being and

nature and character which are

communicable and some which are

incommunicable. There are things that

God shares with us, communicates to us

and there are things that he does not

share with us that we do not have in

common with him. So what does Paul have

in mind here? And I think the answer is

found in considering that word

therefore.

That word points us back to the verse

directly before where we find God doing

something.

Chapter 4:32, "Be kind to one another,

tenderhearted, forgiving one another as

God in Christ forgives you." We talked

about that last week when Paul writes,

"Therefore, be imitators of him," he

probably has that whole verse in view,

but he especially and super has the part

about forgiveness in view. Forgive one

another.

Forgive one another the same way that

God forgave.

God in Christ forgave.

Therefore, act like God. Imitate God.

Paul probably has all of those words in

mind. Be tender-hearted, kind,

forgiving. Those those words all relate

to each other. It's a an attitude and a

posture of your heart towards your

brother.

But acting like God in this context is

orienting yourself towards others in the

body of Christ in the church with a

posture of willingness and eager desire

to forgive them when they wrong you.

Be like God in that way and that God is

eager and willing to forgive even at

great cost to himself. Be a forgiving

person who desires reconciliation with

people who have wronged you.

That's how you're meant to imitate God

in this verse, first and foremost.

But the second part of the verse is just

as crucial to understanding how it

applies. Imitate God as an eager

forgiver because

you are loved children.

I know it says beloved

and and I I wrestle with that that that

is what it says but we don't use that

word really in conversation. Maybe you

you do. I don't use that word ever in

normal conversation but the word means

loved. You are children loved by God.

There's nothing sentimental or or

sappy or or old-fashioned about it. It's

you are the object as children of God's

eternal, steadfast, immovable,

unbreakable love in Christ.

Because you are God's children and

because you are loved by him, imitate

him because you have become the heir of

God's tender-hearted forgiveness and

kindness. Show that same sort of

tender-hearted willingness to forgive

each other. And by the way, the focus of

Paul's exhortation is the way that you

treat other Christians. That's who he's

talking about here. There are other

texts in other parts of the New

Testament that talk about how we relate

to outsiders, and it's not fundamentally

different. We're still always supposed

to have a posture of forgiveness, but

this is talking about in the church,

the camera here is focused on how you

treat other Christians in God's family.

And one of the reasons I think that

that's so important is that I think it's

way easier

to be nice to an abstract person,

mankind out there, than it is to be kind

towards that person or that Well,

actually, it's really easy to be nice

to. I don't know why I pointed at you,

Matt. Sorry. I love you.

Any um mankind

man, so Jesus says, "Love your

neighbor." Paul says, "Love the body.

Vest the body."

That we're never told to think of it in

abstract terms. Love mankind. The Bible

doesn't talk like that. And the reason I

think it doesn't really talk like that

is because mankind never asks to borrow

a tool out of your tool bag and then

forgives to give it back. Forgets to

give it back to you. Mankind doesn't

need your patience and grace the way

your neighbor does. Your neighbor

actually needs your love and your

forgiveness and your compassion, your

grace. That person that you can think of

whose face you recognize and whose name

you know, that actual human being is

someone who requires godlike love as

opposed to the abstract person that

never does anything wrong or never asks

you for anything.

Love each other because you are God's

beloved children

or you are the children he loves. That's

who you are. And who you are is meant to

transform and reshape what you do.

It's very important that you do not

forget what these words mean in context.

Beloved children, in Ephesians 1, Paul

told us the whole story of redemption

from the perspective of heaven. And just

let me quickly remind us this because

it's so important.

You know, people ask me my testimony and

a lot of you have heard my testimony a

million times. I was lost. I was stuck

in a cycle of addiction and abuse and

God came into that and saved me. And

that's true.

But then Paul says actually

your actual story is that from the

foundation of the world God chose you.

He predestined you to adoption as the

son and you came into contact with that

larger story when you converted.

There was always something greater and

more powerful and more loving and

gracious than ever would have occurred

to me going on behind the scenes.

As a consequence, I'm not that guy that

was that made all those mistakes and was

stuck in that room. I'm God's beloved

child from eternity past and to eternity

forever. And so are you if you're in

Christ.

My story, your story, our story does not

start in a dark place where sin and

rebellion run rampant. It starts in the

loving heart of God who chose us before

the foundation of the world to be holy

and blameless before him.

We're his very children.

We came into this identity when God made

us alive together with Christ.

This was always God's plan. We just

didn't know it. We were out wandering

the streets on a rainy night and God

summoned us into the cathedral of his

love. That was the illustration we used

as we were going through that. and said,

"All of this is yours. All of this is

yours. Now go live like that's true.

Who you are is not the terrible person

who ruined everything.

That's not who you are in Christ. Maybe

that's something you've done.

Maybe you have done horrible things that

you feel like have ruined everything.

But in Christ, that's not who you are.

You are forgiven, redeemed, adopted, and

loved as a child.

As a child of God,

maybe your view of yourself is that you

have really high expectations for

yourself and you're constantly trying to

do them and no matter how hard you try,

you can't ever quite seem to do it.

That also does not define you.

That is also not who you are in Christ

Jesus. You are not defined by what you

do or don't do. You are defined by what

he has done for us through his life,

death, and resurrection in the gospel.

That's who you are. That's what defines

you is his love for us at the cross.

Grace changes us. We're allowed to stop

trying to be enough. Christ is enough.

And that means that we don't have to be

enough.

Being in God's family as God's child not

only reshapes our identity, it reshapes

how we think about the people around us.

If you put your faith in Jesus, if you

are God's loved child, you can look at

what he has done and then go and do

likewise.

Let's now transition. So that's the

family

identity. Let's transition to the family

pattern.

Since God has forgiven us, verse one,

moving on to verse two, we ought to be

tender-hearted, for kind, and forgiving.

But not only that, we ought to do this

because we're beloved children. Um, so

love like God. But God has exemplified

this love by more ways than just

forgiving us. He's also exemplified it

by demonstrating sacrificial love toward

us in Christ.

The second verse is very deep and very

rich and I'm about to totally not do

justice to it. I would encourage you to

think about it more when we're done.

Paul says, "Walk in love.

Let love characterize your whole way of

life." Love above all else

is the family pattern.

Love above all else is the way of God.

I was reminded

watching a certain movie last night,

um,

which I love and I'm happy I did it and

I love my wife and don't take this as

any sort of a negative. She's so kind

and she totally stuck up for me when I

threw myself under the bus. Wasn't that

nice of her?

Part of why it's hard as a theologian

to watch movies about romantic love is

because the way it gets conceptualized

in contemporary movies is

like kind of dark.

Okay.

This is not a sermon about what's wrong

with that movie. This is a sermon about

Paul. Ephesians 5.

Okay.

It's worth restating what Christian love

is because I think we we get

taught and caught. You you absorb these

things that you hear on TV, you hear in

movies, and you think that they're

right, but they're wrong.

When Saul's when Paul says walk in love,

he's referring to a holy spirit

empowered resolution of your will to do

good to the beloved.

He's not talking about how someone makes

you feel.

He's not talking about whether or not

they're going to fulfill you or be

enough for you. It's fundamentally not a

give me, give me, give me enterprise.

Christian love is about giving. It's

about laying one's life down for others.

The entire way of construing it in

it's called Ticket to Paradise. I didn't

like it at all.

I can do this. I can move on from this

point without going on and on about it.

I swear

Christian love is fundamentally or

othersoriented. The gospel is

fundamentally othersoriented. any

vision. Listen to me. Especially if

you're younger, listen to me. This is so

so important. If you go through life

looking for people to fill your needs

and fill your hole and be what you need

out of the you're going to completely

misunderstand marital love, you're going

to distort it and turn it into something

inherently selfish. And you're not going

to do it on purpose. You're not going to

do it to be mean and terrible. You're

going to do it because this was never

clearly articulated to you.

Jesus came not to be served, but to

serve. Jesus says in Acts 20:35 that

Acts 20:35

it's more blessed to give than to

receive. I know that's counterintuitive

and I know I should also get back to my

sermon here in a second, but love is

fundamentally outward. That's how God

patterned it for us. That is how God

demonstrated it for us in the life,

death, and resurrection of Jesus.

Amen. So, I wonder where I'm supposed to

be in my notes now. Uh [laughter]

um

love is not about how we feel.

Love is not about what we get from each

other. Love is seeking to do good to

other good to others in God for God's

sake. In the holy for God's sake.

Um, Christ offered himself as a fragrant

offering. That means he did it with the

express view of wanting to please God.

That's what a fragrant offering is,

something that pleases the Lord. Um, he

didn't make up what loving was going to

look like. He did it in a way he knew

would glorify and honor his father in

heaven. And that's what we're supposed

to do. He gave himself as a sacrificial

offering, which means he willingly gave

up of himself.

It's a It's not just an othersoriented

love. It's like literally a self-giving

love. It's not giving something that you

have excess of like money or whatever

and just acting like that's generosity.

It's giving of your actual self.

That's Christian love.

Now, obviously, you and I are not Jesus,

and we don't always know exactly what

the good is that we should be seeking

for other people.

We often have an idea. We have a

direction. But sometimes, honestly, it's

hard to know. You do your best. You try

to love like Jesus and then it doesn't

go how you expect.

Does that ever happen to you?

I used to think

that think that seeking good for other

people was trying to help them no matter

what. even trying to help people who

really didn't want my help or who

weren't ready for my help.

Back the the classic example of this is

back when I first started doing

counseling with people who were trying

to stop make a break from substance

abuse is people would I would ask people

when we first meet, are you ready to be

done with this? And they'd say, no, I'm

not ready to be done with this. But I'd

keep trying to meet with them even

though they weren't ready to stop. I

would keep trying to coers them to do

what I thought was right even though

they themselves really didn't want to do

it. And behind that pattern of action is

broken relationships and time that

didn't amount to anything useful or

productive or good.

It turns out on the other side of trying

that for a few years that that wasn't

really seeking their good. that was

trying to coersse people into doing what

they didn't want to do, but into what I

wanted to do. That was moving before the

spirit did. It was trying to be the Holy

Spirit in their lives.

The grand aha moment for me, and you

know, we all need to pray about this and

think about this and not just

immediately use it as an excuse, but to

seriously consider this. The aha moment

for me was when I started to see myself

as just one part of what God is doing in

someone's life. I think that's where I

was confused. I thought, if I don't do

it, what's going to happen?

Well, it turns out God's pretty big.

News flash. Um, but what I mean

specifically is it it it turns out that

other people came along in other

people's in some of these people's lives

when they were ready to hear. They

weren't ready to hear when I talked to

them. They weren't ready to receive it

when I tried. And I could go, that's my

failure. Or I could go, you know what,

Lord, you have something you're doing

with this person, and I'm not the one to

do it with them right now. Maybe later,

but not at this moment.

Self-giving, sacrificial, God-pleasing

love is aimed at doing good. But it's

also aimed at acknowledging our own

limitations in Christ.

Seeing yourself as part of what's God

God is doing and not the totality of

what God is doing.

It's a resolution of the will.

And I recognize it could be complicated,

but this is Paul's general description

of our family's values. This is the

pattern that was left for us by God. An

eagerness to forgive when we're wronged.

A willingness to do our best to try to

do good to each other even at great

costs to ourselves. And not doing it

because we feel like doing it. Not doing

it because it's fun or because we derive

some pleasure from it. But we do it

because we want to imitate Christ. We

want to willingly give ourselves as a

fragrant offering to God. We want to

please him more than please ourselves.

We should stop here for a second.

Paul has just laid out some pretty heavy

duty stuff there

for all of us. He's laid out your family

identity and your family pattern.

He has just reminded you of who you are

and how you're called to live. [snorts]

And I think it's worth just pausing and

thinking for a second, how am I doing

with that?

How am I doing on reminding myself that

I'm God's loved child?

And how am I doing on letting the

reality of that settle into my heart and

then inform

how I treat the people around me?

We're meant to let God's love reshape

how we think about and treat others.

We're let meant to let it shape our

present and our future.

It's a commitment of the will.

It's a thing you have to resolve to do

because it's right.

And he empowers it by his spirit. We got

two more points to get through. So let's

keep going. We now need to talk about

family boundaries.

So family identity, family patterns,

family boundaries.

Verse three starts with the word but.

If there's going to be any positive

exhortations, if there's going to be any

positive commands of things that we

ought to do, then it's going to

logically require that there's things

that we ought not to do. If we ought to

love, we ought not to hate.

Right?

If we're going to treasure and treat as

precious some things that are holy, we

can't at the same time profane them and

belittle them. It's either one or the

other. That's how life works.

You can't h Okay, just I'm going to talk

about this in a minute, but you can't

have a Christianity that doesn't require

things of you.

You can't have any version of following

Jesus that doesn't require you to say

yes to certain things. And by

implication, no to other things.

And it doesn't matter how mad you get at

people like me for saying stuff like

that. It doesn't change what it says. It

just says what it says. And you either

submit yourself to it and you submit

yourself to him as your king or you say,

"I'm not going to submit yourself to him

as your king." And there's ramifications

for that choice, too.

For the people in Asia Minor that Paul

is writing to, for the churches in and

around Ephesus at this time,

one of the most common, straightforward,

simple, and direct departures from the

way of life called love is the way of

life called lust.

And I don't think you really understand

lust, the sin, until you understand the

way it corrupts love.

People think it's just about how you

feel. It's actually about what your

heart is doing, how it's causing you to

think about people. Here at the

beginning of Ephesians 5,

Paul seems to transition from mainly

being focused on unity to now being,

you know, attending to broader areas of

concern about the place, the time, the

culture in which these people live. And

he's going to highlight three things:

sexual immorality, impurity, or

covetousness.

And as I've said before, this letter is

meant to be circular. It's meant to be

circulated around Ephesus and the

surrounding region. But for the people

in Ephesus and for the people in the

surrounding regions, uh, sexual

immorality was a regular way of life.

I I went back and forth this week on how

much information to include. I don't

know how much of it's going to be

edifying,

but a lot of pagan worship involved

temple prostitution, cult prostitution.

It was a part of pagan worship practices

in Ephesus. We know for sure and

probably in the areas around Ephesus,

brothel,

places where you go to specifically to

have sex with a prostitute were public,

legal, and popular.

Everyone did it.

It wasn't even really considered

adultery

by a lot of people in society.

If you read the early Roman sources like

Horus and Ovid and others, you find that

visiting prostitutes

had almost no social stigma. They talked

about it the way I talk about playing

softball.

And Paul comes into this Roman world

with Jesus's sexual ethic, which was

even stricter than the average Jewish

person at this time. He took the

stricter view of the views you could

take. And Jesus taught us all that all

participation in extrammarital sexual

encounters are immoral.

To give your body to anyone other than

your wife or your husband is to

participate in something that Paul calls

impurity.

You're taking something pure and you're

making it impure.

There is pure sex between a husband and

a wife that are bound by covenant. And

then there's everything else. Sex with

someone else's husband or wife or with

someone who is not your husband or your

wife. And Paul says to participate in

these things is sexual immorality.

It's sexual immorality even if you and

everyone you know says it's not.

Even if everyone in your culture says

this sort of thing is fine like they

were in Paul's culture in in Ephesus.

Paul says these kinds of things must not

even be named among you as is proper

among the saints among God's holy ones.

This is one of the clearest ways I think

right now that God is calling you and me

to be faithful to scripture is in the

area of sexual ethics.

There is one right use of sex that God

says is moral and that is monogous sex

within the covenant of marriage between

a man and a woman.

That is God's will for people.

And there's a lot of really compelling

arguments that I'm not going to make

about why that's probably just the right

way to think about it, no matter what

scripture says, but that is definitely

what scripture says.

These kinds of things, these kinds of

sexual immorality practices must not be

ma named among you as is proper among

God's holy ones.

We are called to be radically different

than our culture.

God's people are not to participate in

sexual immorality or impurity. And we're

also not to participate in coveting.

He's going to talk more about what that

word coveting means in a couple ver at

at the end of verse 5. So I'll revisit

it more there. But he probably think is

thinking of coveting your neighbor's

wife. And the thing is sexual immorality

is the context here.

Sexual covetousness.

So he says, "You may not participate in

these kinds of things, these kinds of

immoral acts." But then he takes it even

a step further.

And I think this is worth thinking

about. He doesn't just want us to treat

the sexual act as holy. He wants to talk

he wants us to talk about the sexual act

as holy,

as something sacred.

If you're going to treat something as

holy and sacred, then you're not going

to make filthy comments about it or

foolish, vain conversation or even crude

jokes. Paul says all these things and

it's

people debate whether what those three

words only occur here in the New

Testament. So there's some debate about

what they mean exactly, but it almost

definitely you can draw a pretty tight

line around it has to do with just

talking about sex in a vulgar way.

making jokes about sex in a vulgar,

inappropriate, belittling, dehumanizing

way.

And I think it's worth noting that

there's an important point being made

here. Paul doesn't just want us to

reform the way we use sex. He wants to

us to reform the way we talk and joke

about sex.

In the same way that lust starts in the

heart, Jesus says that lust isn't

primarily expressed when you commit

adultery. It's when you start lusting in

your heart. I actually think treating

sex as something unholy starts inside.

And in the same way that the mouth is a

place where the heart overflows, I

actually think the things we say can

influence the way our heart thinks, I

think it can flow both ways.

How do you become the kind of person

that treats sex in an unholy way? How do

you come to believe that it's for you

and not for the other person? How do you

come to think of it as a way for you to

be served as opposed to serve

as something you get instead of

something you give? I think it starts

with how you talk about it and how you

think about it. Honestly,

if you're making lewd jokes about it and

treating it in conversation as an object

to be used for your own pleasure, how

long before you start treating people

that way? I think there's a

I don't even like know what to call it.

I called it in my notes a mysterious

connection. That's probably too

abstract.

There is a connection with how we choose

to talk about things and how we begin to

feel about them.

And I don't have a biblical theological

category for that, but I'm pretty sure

that's true. At least I see that in my

own life and I see that in some of your

lives. The mouth overflows from the

heart, but the mouth can affect how the

heart thinks.

I

I'm super debating whether to say this

next part.

All right.

>> [laughter]

>> I don't know who said do it, but I think

it's this person with a giant smile on

her face looking at me.

I don't think

Paul is here forbidding

any joking about any aspect of sex, no

matter how innocent. I don't think

that's what he's doing. I would hate to

think that you leave here and you think

if you're married, you think to

yourself, well, I guess we can't have

that silly, sweet, inside joke about

intimacy that we used to. I don't think

Paul's trying to forbid that.

I think that there are appropriate

contexts. And I realize I could spend

the rest of my time up here caveing what

would constitute appropriate context,

but I think there's a big difference

between trying to make a silly, giggly,

innocent joke and speaking vulgarly

about they're just like,

you know what I mean? [laughter]

Is that self-evident enough?

We are not kromagins.

The the antidote to this filthy lewd

talk is Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving for what?

[laughter]

We're supposed to be happy about sex,

not prudish about sex.

Have I used the word sex enough this

morning? Jeez Louise.

He's saying, don't take what God has set

apart as holy and treat it as this lewd,

vulgar,

ugly thing.

Instead, give thanks. Give thanks for

the goodness of sex.

That is one significant family boundary

in God's family that he's going to set

up this morning. We're not the bigger

principles. We don't treat as vulgar

things that he treats as holy. And

because you are God's loved child, you

should treat sex as a good, holy,

beautiful thing, not something to

belittle or use to dehumanize.

Now, let's close with the family

warning.

Paul says, "No one,

no one who is sexually immoral or impure

or who is covetous, that is an idoltor,

has an inheritance in the kingdom of

Christ and God."

So I think in order to under to

understand properly what this is saying,

it's important to see what it doesn't

say.

This doesn't say the sexually immoral

person will not future tense have an

inheritance.

This verse isn't looking ahead to the

future. It's talking about something

true right now.

It also doesn't say the sexually immoral

person cannot have inheritance in the

kingdom of Christ. It's actually not

talking it's not making claims over

anyone's future salvation. It's saying

something is true of you right now based

on how you're living today.

It's about whether or not we presently

hold a claim to the kingdom's

inheritance.

This claim about having no inheritance

in the present tense indicates to me

that what Paul has in mind is a present

way of life. It is a way of life that a

person today is committed to.

The person who is ruled by their sexual

desires today, this says, does not have

an inheritance in the rule or kingdom of

Christ and God.

It's not saying if you sin sexually,

you're excluded from the kingdom of God.

It's not saying if you stumble in your

weakness into sexual sin, you're

excluded from the kingdom of God. But if

this way of life characterizes your

behavior and that behavior is behavior

is persistent and without repentance or

contrition, then you do not in fact have

an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ.

Part of why I think that is is because

of how Paul qualifies what it means to

be sexually covetous.

He reiterates those same three

characteristics in verse 5 that I talked

about in verse three. sexually immoral,

impure, or covetous. Except this time

when he mentions covetousness, he

relates it to idolatry.

If you covet sexual sin to the point

that it is causing you to reject the

reign of God over your life in favor of

the reign of sin, if you value sex more

than you value God,

you have no inheritance in God's

kingdom.

If your desire for pleasure is so great

that you harden and stiffen your neck

and stuff back your guilt and refuse to

repent of your sins, you have no reason

to think you will be with God in heaven.

And the reason for that is really

simple. Heaven is the place where Christ

reigns.

It's the kingdom where God's will is

done. It's where we learn to love God's

will by trying to do it on earth and

hating the ways that we fail at it and

struggling against our sin and getting

back up and continuing to fight.

This is super important.

If you are fighting your lust

and you are discouraged by the fact that

you are constantly lo losing and you

don't understand why God doesn't just

take this struggle away you ask yourself

why do I get stuck in this tryh hard do

good fail repent try hard do good fail

repent why why

am I stuck in this

every young man I think wrestles with

that question about lust for a

And here's what I think the honest

answer is.

I don't know how else you learn to

genuinely hate your sin and genuinely

yearn for heaven

than to actually do war with a thing

that's killing you.

Otherwise, it's just a thing that you do

that you don't, you know, your heart

learns wisdom in the war.

You're instructed in the glory that

awaits us, the rest that awaits us by

fighting today.

It's how you learn to love and yearn for

and desire Christ's reign over your life

more than your flesh's reign over your

life.

And of course, this is a man and a woman

problem. I didn't mean to say it's only

guys.

If you don't strive against your sin,

you never learn to strive for heaven. If

you don't know the crushing defeat of

failure, that horrible feeling of I did

it again. What is wrong with me? That

caused you to lift up your eyes and go,

"Save me.

Redeem me from my brokenness and redeem

me from my weakness."

It's there in that weakness that you

actually learn strength.

You learn that the power doesn't come

from my own will, but is his will by his

spirit at work in me.

By cherishing Christ more than your

lust, you actually begin to learn to

exercise self-control.

The Puritan Thomas Watson once famously

said, "Till sin is bitter, Christ isn't

sweet."

is such a it's such like a raw and true

way to put it. You learn to hate your

sin by losing to it.

If you are someone who is stuck in your

sexual sin, or maybe you are stuck in a

different sin

and you're wearied by it and you're

wondering whether you should keep

fighting

or maybe you are on the verge of giving

up,

it's really crucial to hear this

warning.

If you give in to your sin, if you allow

it to have dominion over you, that is to

turn your back on the kingdom and reign

of Christ. If you do that, you have no

inheritance in the kingdom of God.

I am not going to qualify that or soften

that in any way.

If you surrender to your sin,

if you defect to the side of sin, the

sin that wants to destroy you, it will

destroy you. It will carry you into

darkness until you're lost.

That's what Paul is saying. Don't let it

take you away.

If there is even a spark of grace in

your soul, if there's even the smallest

part of you that wants to keep fighting

despite failure after failure, that

spark is not your own. It comes from the

spirit. It comes from grace.

If you are Christ's beloved child, you

are not defined by however many failures

you walked into this room with. You are

defined by the very love of God that

promises that he who begins a good work

in you will bring it to completion in

the day of Christ Jesus.

And if God is for you, who can be

against you?

God promises in Romans 8:13 that if by

Romans 8:13

the spirit you put to death the deeds of

the flesh, you will live. That's a

promise.

You will live with him forever.

This warning is real, but so are God's

promises.

Keep fighting. A day is coming soon. I

used to think about this all the time.

There is a day coming where this fight

is going to be over.

Where victory will finally be here

that'll never think another impure

thought again. There is a day coming,

brothers and sisters, where the only

thing left in your heart will be pure,

perfected love.

Don't give up. [snorts]

Don't give up.

In Christ, you are God's loved children.

You are God's own family. And joining

God's family is meant to transform your

present and your future. So, strive to

be like him. Let's pray.