Drifting – A Candid Look at Spiritual Entropy
July 17, 2005 Hebrews 2:1
INTRO: Entropy = the tendency for things to come to a stop. “All kinds of energy spontaneously spread out from where they are concentrated to where they are more dispersed, if they’re not hindered from doing so.”
• 2nd Law of Thermodynamics – applies to sun, to your car, everything moving from order to disorder. Unless hindered
• True of spiritual life as well. Especially in these last days.
Jesus said, in the last days…
MT 24:10 …many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11 and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. 12 Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold (spiritual entropy), 13 but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.
• Why the strong influences to drift away? What is going on?
• How is it that the fire that once burned hot begins to cool?
A few observations about - Drifting is…
SUBTLE – no big changes – little by little – Frog in the kettle
UNINTENTIONAL – never planned or purposed
“I’m just going to start drifting away now…”
GRADUAL – you never seem that far away – “…guess who moved?”
CARELESS – must handle spiritual life carefully – prayer…
I wanted to spend some time teaching on this subject because we all have a tendency to drift – Unless hindered from doing so
TEXT: HEB 2:1 We must pay more careful attention, therefore,
to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away.
We’ve heard the truth – embraced it – it hasn’t changed – we have!
• Maybe we’re no longer paying attention!
• “…must pay more careful attention,…”
o Drifting speaks of diverted attention
o Drawn away from the truth – distracted by things of this world.
ILLUS: Slipping away – “evaporated” – if don’t give heed – vanish thin air
• drifting = bucket with hole in it – gospel truth in faulty vessels
• The picture is of a boat that has slipped its moorings – drifted away. – carelessness.
Jesus said in Luke 21:34
"Be careful, or your hearts will be weighed down with dissipation, drunkenness and the anxieties of life, and that day will close on you unexpectedly like a trap.
TEXT - …therefore, to what we have heard,…
You and I have heard the truth!
• But does it have same importance as once did?
• The truth in chapter one shows the supremacy of Christ in all things!
• Once we were captivated by that message
• We must return our focus to the important things in this life!
I want to challenge us all to renewed spiritual vigor – over next several weeks as we explore This whole dynamic of Spiritual Entropy – drifting
There are some very basic things we must understand first…
1. We live in a world that resists the Christian life in it’s very nature.
When sin entered the human condition – resistance entered – 1st physical!
GE 3:16 To the woman he said, "I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you."
GE 3:17 To Adam he said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, `You must not eat of it,’ "Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.
GE 3:18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field.
GE 3:19 By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return."
• Thorns, animals, pain - in child bearing, sweat of brow.
Before born again – in step with the fallen nature of the world
• When born again – new nature was in conflict with the world.
RO 7:18 I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature.n For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do--this I keep on doing.
• Conflict is in you now – notice because of new nature
• Now you go against the flow – salmon upstream – dead downstream.
RO 8:5 Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6 The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; 7 the sinful mindn is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God.
RO 8:9 You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. 10 But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.
• Constantly amazed at the – Christians who don’t understand this!
• Understand – two natures… sinful all born with
• When born again – now Spirit of God in you
• The two are in conflict – vs. 7-8
• This conflict is normal for the Christian – cannot be otherwise!
• Old/Sinful nature pulling us down (entropy)
• Spirit of Christ is empowering to withstand
GAL 5:16 So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. 17 For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law.
• It’s possible to live according to either nature
• But God doesn’t want you to do that.
• That’s life in this world – its very nature resists the Christian
2. We have an enemy.
Not only is the sinful world system resisting us – but we have an entire population of malevolent beings, whose sworn duty and purpose is to take you down.
Why Peter says…
1PE 5:8 Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.
• Last I looked – never seen a half eaten Christian with teeth marks
• So how does He devour us - With cunning subtlety
• Thoughts implanted – false - that if believed – become truth for us.
• How Satan can get sway over us. – how devours us
The enemies sworn purpose at every turn is to get you to believe a lie – because when you do – He owns you at that point in your life!
Jesus said to the Pharisees…
JN 8:43 Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. 44 You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 45 Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! 46 Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me? 47 He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God."
Lies are his native language – lying comes so natural to some people – Brat Camp – compulsive liar – even when didn’t have to she did.
Way Satan is - he only lies – but he’s very convincing – subtle – won’t startle you with a blatant lie – no it’s disguised as truth – appeals to sin nature.
Paul says… Make no room for him
EPH 4:25 Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body. 26 "In your anger do not sin"n : Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, 27 and do not give the devil a foothold.
• Sole purpose is to move in on you and get a foothold…
We have the flow of this world/sin nature, and malevolent beings.
These two things work together to wear us down and bring us back into a state of captivity. A state of drifting.
3. We must be vigilant.
1PE 5:8 Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. 9 Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.
• How do we resist?
Paul says…
2CO 10:4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
• That pretty much summarizes the Christian life right there.
• One crisis, one trial to the next – replacing worldly/sinful thought with the truth of the Word of God.
• Must take them captive – struggle – warfare – doesn’t come easy!
• Sometimes they get away. – always conspiring – prison break.
• It is a clash of ideologies – waged in your head – who will win?
• 2 dogs fighting…
This isn’t something we do well here in America – we all too often allow ourselves the luxury of unchallenged thinking – because compared to most of the world – we have no needs
The tendency of a needless people is to indulge themselves in needless pursuits.
That’s exactly the kind of thing that the Word of God says we must filter out. And it is in the climate of a complacent people that satan plies his wares most effectively.
That’s what brought down Israel on several occasions…
DT 6:10 When the LORD your God brings you into the land he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to give you--a land with large, flourishing cities you did not build, 11 houses filled with all kinds of good things you did not provide, wells you did not dig, and vineyards and olive groves you did not plant--then when you eat and are satisfied, 12 be careful that you do not forget the LORD, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
And it is in such a climate that we find ourselves in right now.
And it is just such a climate as we find ourselves in America that makes us prime targets for drifting.
In a climate of relative rest and ease it’s hard to get into a mindset of resisting – and yet that is what we are called to do.
DT 7:1 When the LORD your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations--the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger than you-- 2 and when the LORD your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. 3 Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, 4 for they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods, and the LORD’s anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you. 5 This is what you are to do to them: Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones, cut down their Asherah polesn and burn their idols in the fire. 6 For you are a people holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession.
• Too often we have made treaties with the world
• Entanglements have turned our hearts away from the Lord and His Word.
The heart that used to burn hot for Him is now only a flicker
You find yourself there – not even sure how you got there
Now the Spirit pleads with you to … pay more careful attention, therefore,
to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away.
Pray
Drifting -
A Candid Look at Spiritual Entropy
July 17, 2005 Hebrews 2:1
We must pay more careful attention, therefore,
to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away.
1. We live in a world that ___________ the
Christian life in its very ______________.
2. We have an ____________________.
3. We must be ____________________.
