Love not the World
Sunday Evening – Lynn Haven COC – 06/25/06
FOCUS:
1. Exposing the seductive ideas the world presents us and envisioning reality as is revealed to us.
FUNCTION:
1. To correct or remind of faulty thinking that can creep into our lives and affect our habits.
INTRODUCTION
A. Good evening … pleasantries … encouraging.
B. It’s easy to go through life thinking something to be true, only to come to find that you were mistaken.
1. This idea was parodied in a commercial for Federal Express a couple years ago.
2. The commercial starts with someone walking into the office saying, “Smith was wrong; FedEx ground IS cheaper.”
3. Someone else in the room turns to Smith and says, “You are always wrong!”
4. Smith says, “No, I’m not.”
5. The person says, “Yes you are. We get FRINGE benefits, not FRENCH benefits. Steely Dan is not one person. It’s not the leaning Tower of Pizza. And James Dean was an actor – Jimmy Dean makes sausage.”
6. Smith pauses, then, exasperated, he throws up his hands and asks, “We don’t get French benefits!?”
C. Many of us have grown up thinking the names of songs were something other than what they are.
1. My sister has a friend that thought “Inagodadavida” was “In the Garden of Eden.”
2. I had a friend in school who grew up thinking the song “Just a Little Walk with Jesus” was “Just a Little Chocolate Jesus.”
D. But what’s not funny is the fact that folks grow up and live life thinking they know what reality is … but in reality, what they believe is totally false.
E. Even we in the church can slowly be tricked into believing falsehoods.
F. And so that’s why the apostle John wrote these words to a 1st century church.
G. 1st John 2:15-17
1. At first reading, this could sound a little confusing.
2. John writes here “do not love the world,” and then over in his gospel he writes “For Christ so loved the world …”
3. Well there’s three different ways we can conceive of the world.
a. The world – the third rock from the sun in the Milky Way solar system.
b. Or a 2nd meaning – the totality of individuals that make-up our planetary society
c. A 3rd meaning – the ideas taught and practiced by those who are outside of the will of God. THIS is what John is talking about in our passage.
What are some of the ways of the world that we are fooled with? And where do they come from?
A. Man can be sovereign, or be God. John calls it here “the pride of life.”
1. It’s as if we decide can be the arbiter of our own reality.
a. We can decide what’s right and wrong for ourselves.
b. We can decide what’s best for ourselves.
c. We can do our own thing, have our own way.
2. This is mankind saying to God, “We have no need of you.”
a. “What our mind can conceive, we can achieve.”
3. Isn’t this how Eve was tempted in Genesis 3.
a. “Eve, if you eat this fruit, you will be … like God.”
b. And ever since, every sin that has been committed has followed the same pattern. It’s as if when we sin, we say to God, “I know you say this is wrong, but I think I can decide what’s best for me better than you can.”
4. One of the reasons we sin is plain and simple arrogance. We think that we can be like God, or better than God in deciding how we live our lives.
B. If it feels good, do it. John calls this “the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes.”
1. We know this one.
2. And it isn’t new; it’s as ancient as the Bible. 1st Corinthians 6:12-20.
a. IMO, the NIV does a better job with this text than any other translation.
b. Look at verse 12. Why are there quotations around that phrase? (Explain letter transmission and Paul’s response.)
c. This isn’t Paul saying this; this is Paul responding to the Corinthian mantra that equated sexual activity with appetite. How does that work?
1. “Well, God made you hungry, what do you do?” Eat
2. “God made you thirsty, what do you do?” Drink
3. “Well God also made you with a sex appetite, which is meant to be fulfilled.”
3. “The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes.”
C. This is all there is.
1. The world tries to tell us that “what you see is what you get.”
a. “There is no pie in the sky by and by. That’s just an imagined fairy tale in an ancient book.”
b. There is no ethereal world beyond what we can touch, see, smell, taste, and hear.
2. And so, if this is all there is, what’s the point in living for anything else, right?
a. Even Paul says this. “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is in vain … eat, drink, and be merry.”
D. Well, where do all these ideas come from?
1. John tells us plainly here in chapter 2 … “they don’t come from the Father.”
2. Well, if they don’t come from the Father, where do they come from?
a. From Satan, the Father of all lies. And that’s just what these statements are … lies.
What does the Father have to say about the World?
A. There is only one God.
1. “The Lord is our God, the Lord is one.” Deuteronomy 6:1
2. And he is not like us … Jesus says that “God is Spirit.” John 4:24
a. He was God, He is God, He always will be God.
b. He had a whole master plan cooked up from the beginning.
c. I think he knows what he’s doing, don’t you?
3. When I think about our awareness and ability to plan for ourselves, I think of the passage in Is. 53 … “We all like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way.”
a. Compared to God, we’re just like sheep.
i. That’s what the point of Psalm 23 is, isn’t it?
a. We need protection
b. We need water
c. We need food
ii. And we can’t provide for ourselves.
iii. We cannot rely on ourselves
a. We can’t be self-reliant.
b. We need to be God-reliant.
c. We can’t be self-made men & women.
d. We need to be God-formed men & women.
b. If we’re still holding on to it, it’s time we lay the arrogance aside.
c. And the moment we try to think that we’re smarter than God or what he says in His revealed word, we might wanna check ourselves … and remember that we’re sheep.
B. If it feels good … be discerning.
1. Not all things that feel good are bad.
a. But many things that feel good can be misused.
b. It takes a discerning mind in obedience with the will of God to determine when something is good or not.
2. Paul goes on in 1st Corinthians 6 to describe how sexual immorality is different than mere appetite … it is an inherently spiritual activity.
3. You know, the Bible is honest. Sin is pleasurable for a season.
a. But the luster of the lust wears off.
b. And before long, like the prodigal son, sin will deposit us into the pig sty.
4. Even worse, it leads to death.
a. If we’re struggling with sin, we have to realize what is at stake here.
b. (Illustration) Imagine you’re in a garage on a Saturday afternoon.
i. Someone you know is working on a car, and you’re helping them out.
ii. And it is HOT. Blazing hot, with 90% humidity. And you are thirsty.
iii. You look over on the counter in your friend’s garage and you see a nice, inviting, tall glass of water. Crystal clear. Calling your name.
iv. You reach for it, and your friend says, “Wait, don’t drink that!”
v. What would you do? Well you’d begin to think that through. “Well, he just doesn’t want me to have a drink, he wants it all to himself. He never seems to let me have what I want when I’m around him.”
vi. But then he says, “You shouldn’t drink that because it’s not water … its hydrochloric acid! It will eat through your whole body if you drink it.”
vii. Well you wouldn’t touch that with a long stick, would you? Why? Because you know it will kill you!
c. Sin will kill us, folks.
i. Unless we realize that, we won’t walk away from it.
ii. But you’ve gotta know: sin will kill YOU. It will chew you up, spit you back out, and walk all over you.
5. Don’t do something just because it feels good … be discerning and obey your Father’s voice.
C. This is not all there is.
1. Despite what the world would have you believe, there is more to this life than what we can see, smell, hear, taste, and touch.
a. There is another dimension, a reality we cannot see.
b. One in which there is God and angels and demons. There is heaven and hell.
c. Someone has said that the most diabolical trick Satan has ever played is convincing the world that he doesn’t exist.
i. Convincing the world that spiritual realities don’t exist.
2. Paul said, “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is in vain.” But he was raised!
a. That’s what Paul was teaching. He appeared to more than 500 witnesses, many of whom were tortured and died. Do you think they would have undergone such if they were lying about having seen Jesus? Surely not!
b. Because Jesus rose again, because he ascended into Heaven with the Father, we can be assured that when we depart from life on this Earth, there will be another life awaiting us.
CONCLUSION
A. Such a reality behooves us to obey Him.
B. Love not the world. It is a path that only leads to ruin. It’s a sad, malevolent, torturous road that you don’t have to walk down anymore.
C. There’s another way: the way of life. Won’t you choose life?
