The Michael Vick saga reminds all of us of the human problem of sin. Gambling, which is at the base of dog-fighting might be defined as greed. Vick originally lied to Atlanta Falcons owner, Arthur Blank about his involvement, because one may suggest that in his pride, at that time he wanted to protect himself. Vick’s friends who lived at his Surry County property in Virginia didn’t have jobs but they lived off of Vick’s coattails and their gambling proceeds. That is the sin of sloth or laziness. In ancient times, early church leaders used to talk about the sins of pride and greed and sloth as well as 4 other primary sins that where called the seven deadly sins. They are still very real in our age and culture.
Sin is real. Several years ago, Bill Bennett, former Education Secretary and author of the book of Virtues and Catholic by faith was discovered to be a heavy gambler in Las Vegas. Bennett in an interview following the disclosure in the media, apologized for gambling and said he would quit gambling all together. Bennett quipped to a Fox News reporter in an interview at that time, ‘Apparently what happens in Vegas, doesn’t stay in Vegas.’
We may be uncomfortable talking about it, but sin is a hard truth. We try to ignore sin or pretend it’s not there. But sin it not a vacation spot, that we visit then come home to be normal again. We don’t go to Vegas and then leave it all behind. Now don’t misunderstand. I am not talking about physically being in Las Vegas, Nevada. But rather we carry with us our sins wherever we go and we have trouble laying them down, because sin stays in us.
We sometimes even try to convince ourselves that that evil in our world is caused by sick people who aren’t anything like us. But the truth remains; sin is real and it has a part in each of us.
I want us to go deep into the Bible for the next several weeks. For in the scripture is the answer to our struggle with the world and sin.
Do you remember when Jesus went into the garden of Gethsemane to pray the night of his capture? The disciples who were with him fell asleep and Jesus said to them. (Matthew 26) “Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour?”… 41 “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.”
Notice he said one hour, not all night, not for 3 and a half-hours. It was one hour, the disciples couldn’t do it. Every once in a while someone will fall asleep in worship. Has that ever happened to you? We think, what do I do? Do I nudge them? Maybe if I cough loudly they will awaken. I don’t know this person, I’m not going to touch them.
Jesus when he woke up his sleeping disciples said, The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. Now we use that phrase a lot in our modern vocabulary as we dismiss our shortcomings and failures. And there are so many ways we can stumble.
Pope John the 23rd who died in 1963 said, “There are three ways a man can be ruined; women, gambling and farming. My father chose the most boring.” I say that with apologies to those of you who grew up on a farm.
As we start this study really on how to conquer the weaknesses of the flesh so we can live more fully for the Lord. We need to be real about what goes on in our heads. Let’s be up front about what truly tempts us. And we want to be plain spoken about how God can help us live a better life.
Proverbs 26:11 says “As a dog returns to its vomit”, (and if you have lived on a farm, you have seen that happen) so a fool repeats his folly.” For many of us sin has a repetitive nature to us. It is a habit and we hate ourselves that we cannot break it.
Years ago at the very beginning of the church, early church fathers compiled a list of what they called capitol sins. By the forth century the early monastic movement had identified 8 sins that were of the most serious nature which had to be defeated in the life of a believer or inner spirituality they said could be lost. In the 6th century Pope Gregory the Great reduced the number from 8 to 7 and listed them in a catechism. They even listed the sins by color and gave an animal likeness to each. For example envy was green and gluttony was a pig. They even told of the punishment to come in hell for each sin. For example the person of sloth would be put in a pit of snakes. But since the middle ages the church universal has held this list which we call “The Seven Deadly Sins.” The seven are in order, Pride, Greed, Envy, Anger, Lust, Gluttony and Sloth.
Even the world recognizes this list. MTV several years ago ran a special entitled. “Seven Deadly Sins: An MTV News Special Report” in which well know pop and rock stars pretty much agreed that the list of sins or vices was dumb. That should be no surprise to us. (MTV – August 11,1993. PBS – 8/20/93)
What we want to do is to not just be aware of the sins that tempt us but also the early church fathers saw these sins as enemies of corresponding virtues that Christians needed. Instead of pride - humility, instead of Greed - generosity, instead of envy - love, instead of anger - kindness, instead of lust -self-control, instead of gluttony - temperance and instead of sloth - zeal.
Some of you who know your Bible well, always thought the seven deadly sins came from Proverbs chapter 6 where it says, “There are six things the LORD hates, seven that are detestable to him.” Though you find some of the sins there, this ancient list of deadly sins and corresponding virtues was the construction of great Christians long ago who helped define where the spiritual battle front was being fought and how it must be won by us.
So as we study together the next several weeks our intention is to forsake sin and cultivate virtue. Why? There must always be that question and answer. Because we want to please God and life isn’t good when lived in sin. We will never be what God desires for us, until we live out His purpose in our lives. Sin never makes us happy in the long run.
Worldly sin never can make us happy. Actually we are a people who long to live out God’s will but oh we struggle so to accomplish that. Because the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. Some times I can feel so weak, don’t you? We can agree with the Rita Mae Brown, the playwright who said, “Lead me not into temptation, I can find the way myself.”
Albert Einstein once said, “It is easier to denature plutonium than to denature the evil spirit of man.” Jeremiah in the O.T. (17:9) said, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?
We are a people who have hearts that need to
be changed. Paul Gallico, and American novelist
who died in 1976 said, “If there is any larceny
in a man- (playing)golf will bring it out.”
There is larceny, sin within us and situations in life simply bring is out in us..
You know well how under frustration or
pressure there are things that come up in your
heart that you would be embarrassed for others
to know. Jesus said, (Matt. 15:19) “19For out of the heart
come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality,
theft, false testimony, slander.”
Sin can reach all of us, the most refined and educated and the least educated. Smart people sin frequently. So do all of us.
We hear a lot about scandals in Washington, as if our leaders ought to be above such temptations. But they have the same temptations as us. And some of them fall publicly and embarrass their families and selves. I am reminded of what Barry Goldwater once said of his knowledge of Washington DC. “If everybody is this town connected with politics had to leave town because of chasing women and drinking, you’d have no government.”
So our goal is to be honest with our lives and we want to be
smart towards God so He can help us.
start chopping away at the root of sin in our lives and replacing it with godly virtues that help us live happily and successfully.
There is an old story in Genesis chapter 3 about the first sin ever committed. It’s a primitive story, though true and still today teaches us everything we need to know about what sin is.
1Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”
2The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’”
4“You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5“For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
6When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.”
Whatever else we get from this story, this much is clear. We are not only creatures of God’s making, we’re creatures in rebellion against our God.
At first Satan asked Eve to doubt God’s word, Did God really say, he suggested. Then Satan caused Eve to be skeptical of God motives, “For God knows if you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God.” Suggesting that God is sinister and wants to withhold from us some pleasure. Johnny Carson quipped once, “I know a man who gave up smoking, drinking, sex and rich food. He was healthy right up until the time he killed himself.” We think that unless we are also at the party, enjoying the sins that a Las Vegas or the world offers then life isn’t any fun. But we are confused. A bible teacher named Larry Moody once said, “we’re not in the land of the living going to the land of the dying. We’re in the land of the dying trying to get to the land of the living.”
The party isn’t here, it’s over there. What we do know is that living a life in sin actually ends up destroying us.
And so Eve with those suggestions by Satan disregards God’s word and rebels by eating the fruit of the tree we know as the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Ever since then people are prone to sin.
In Psalms 51 David apologized for a terrible mistake of his and in that text he used three words to describe his fallen nature.
a. First he said, blot out my transgressions.
The word literally means rebellion. Give an example of transgress, rebel..
b. Secondly he said, Wash away all my iniquity. That ancient Hebrew word means twisted or bent.
c. Thirdly he said, and cleanse me from my sin. This was the first meaning I ever learned, literally, “missing the mark or aim.” We rebel against God’s authority, we are twisted we have missed the mark. Romans 3:23 “There is no difference, 23for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
I heard an old preacher once say, “It is not fatal to be a sinner, denying that you are a sinner is fatal.” That perhaps is why our early church fathers who constructed this list called them, The seven Deadly sins.
It has an effect on us. There are three things that our rebellion, our twisted nature, our sin does to us.
1. Sin desensitizes us to others. Sin makes us uncaring and selfish and we cannot see in others what God wants us to do.
2. Sin distracts us from God’s purpose in our lives. The poet wrote the saddest words of tongue and pen and those that say, it might have been.
3. Sin destroys relationships. A man who sins actually tears down his life and the lives of his neighbors. Sin is both personal and social. AFTER BEING MARRIED FOR 44 YEARS, I TOOK A CAREFUL LOOK AT MY WIFE ONE DAY AND SAID, "HONEY, 44 YEARS AGO WE HAD A CHEAP APARTMENT, A CHEAP CAR, SLEPT
ON A SOFA BED AND WATCHED A 10-INCH BLACK AND WHITE TV, BUT I GOT TO SLEEP
EVERY NIGHT WITH A HOT 25-YEAR-OLD YOUNG WOMAN. NOW I HAVE A $500,000.00 HOME, A $45,000.00 CAR, NICE BIG BED AND A 50 INCH PLASMA SCREEN TV, BUT I’M SLEEPING WITH A 65-YEAR-OLD WOMAN. IT SEEMS TO ME THAT
YOU’RE NOT HOLDING UP YOUR SIDE OF THINGS."
MY WIFE IS A VERY REASONABLE WOMAN. SHE TOLD ME TO GO OUT AND FIND A HOT
25-YEAR-OLD GAL, AND SHE WOULD MAKE SURE THAT I WOULD ONCE AGAIN BE LIVING
IN A CHEAP APARTMENT, DRIVING A CHEAP CAR, SLEEPING ON A SOFA BED AND WATCHING A 10-INCH BLACK AND WHITE TV.
AREN’T OLDER WOMEN GREAT? THEY REALLY KNOW HOW TO SOLVE YOUR MID-LIFE CRISES!
The nature of sin blinds us to these effects. Some of you right now can be so caught in sin that you think I am overstating the case. You think can handle certain sins and you have convinced yourself that a moderate amount of foul language, or of some vice can be handled. Teens actually try to convince parents that experimentation can cure the curiosity factor. Some weird authors suggest things like an innocent affair can actually stimulate your marriage. Of having an outlet for your anger is healthy. Martin Luther said that the human nature is so corrupt and blind that it does not see or sense the gravity of sin.
Charles Schultz, who is was also a great Christian in a Peanuts cartoon has Lucy confronting Charlie Brown and she screams at him, “The whole trouble with you is you won’t listen to what the whole trouble with you is!”
1 John chapter 1 says, “7But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. 8If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.”
Certain sins leads us into others problems. The early church fathers taught that to commit one sin on the list would inevitably bring the commission of another sin on the list.
What are we to do? This series is to help us be real about sin in our lives and eliminate it so we can build virtues that last and heal us.
Here is our homework to get started in this series. Don’t take these lessons for granted and don’t approach them half-heartily. I want to cheer you on to victory and we are going to cheer each other on to victory and support one another. The Bible says, James 5:16 “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.” So we want to make our church a safe place to come and find help and support. We aren’t going to gossip about each other’s struggles, nor shall we look away, we are brothers and sisters in Christ who are here to build one another up. So here are three things to remember as we start.
1. Don’t judge other people. Instead spend time refining yourself. We can spend so much time talking about what others do or don’t do, we never look at our own lives. As a defense mechanism, we often justify our weaknesses and failures by pointing out how others may have failed. Preacher Henry Fairlie said, “We can recognize evil in others, but if we wish to look on the face of sin, we will see it most clearly in ourselves.” This is about you. Let’s improve by start thinking about how I can live more fully for Christ. Remember some things about this concept. First, Don’t speculate on someone’s motives. We say things like, they just want to be seen, or they only like being noticed. Don’t speculate. Only one person can know the heart and that is God. Also allow people time to grow up into Christ. You have in any church people at various levels of faith. You didn’t get to where you are in a day, others will grow too. And thirdly remember our highest calling is love. We are called by God to be a witness, it is not our job to sit on the Judges’ bench.
2. Let’s be a safe place for authentic living, which includes repentance and healing. Proverbs 28:13,14 “He who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy. Blessed is the man who always fears the LORD, but he who hardens his heart falls into trouble.”
3. Develop ways to passionately pursue Jesus. Ultimately you must give up any pursuit of sin and give our life to Jesus Christ, so that He can change your life. How? You say. Develop ways to reinforce the life of Jesus in your own experience. Read, pray, memorize scripture, talk openly about your faith with Christian friends. Listen to media that inspires instead of sources that drag you down. Take a step this week to do something that invites Jesus into your daily routine so that you can see His ways and follow them more easily.
When you understand who Jesus is, you will begin to think differently and you will understand how there is no pleasure in sin, pleasure will be found when you discover that sin is no longer your master, but God’s great purpose in your life now guides you.
But you must be willing to take a new step, today.
Where do you want your life to be today. Controlled by sins that demoralize and damage, or are you ready to do something greater, better and more lasting. Give your life to Christ, It will take courage to step out and say, He is my Lord. But you will never regret it.
Marguerite Higgins several years ago won the Pulitzer prize for Journalism for just one line. She went to the Korean Battlefield and interviewed a marine Sergeant. There were 15,000 American marine on one side of a hill and 100,000 Chinese communist on the other side of the hill. It was 42 degrees below zero. She interviewed a Sergeant who had been there for two weeks. He had endured the cold, he had eaten out of cans, he had not bathed in all that time, and she asked him a question and for his answer she won a journalistic prize. She asked, “If I were God and I could give you any one thing that you asked for, what would you ask for?” The marine sergeant thought for a moment and said, “I’d asked for tomorrow.”
Some sin may look treacherous and things may seem bleak, but God gives a new day in which we can change for good, experience His new life and leave behind all the sin of the past.
