The Ten Commandments Part 11
Scriptures: First Peter 1:13-16; Matthew 7:3-5; Jude 20-23
This message is the conclusion of my series on the Ten Commandments. I believe God led me to do this series because being a Christian today has been so watered down that it does not carry the meaning that it once did. It is hard to differentiate a Christian from a non-Christian because our lifestyles are so similar. Christianity in some instances has become the means to prosperity and blessings, regardless of how the Christian lives; as long as they give to the church and proclaim their blessings they are golden. We talk about the blessings. We sing about the blessings. We pray for the favor, all the while continuing to live our lives the way we want. Through this series I wanted us to recognize that it’s time to return to holiness. We cannot continue in sin in our thoughts and actions while claiming to be holy. Now I know that some of you may not have realized that you were made holy when you accepted Jesus as your Savior, but you were. Let me give you the definition of holiness (being holy). It is defined as “dedicated or set apart for religious purposes; devoted to the service of God; having a character that evokes reverence; something sanctified.” We are holy because Jesus made us holy. So let me give you an example of what I am talking about when I say we cannot continue in sin in our thoughts and action while still claiming to be holy.
How many of you have heard the term lip syncing? Lip syncing is when an actor or singer move their lips silently in synchronization with a recorded soundtrack. By all appearances from a distance they appear to be actually saying or singing the words, but in reality when you get close to them, it’s only their lips moving with no sound coming from their mouth. In the late eighties there was a lip syncing controversy involving the German, international, Grammy winning, dance-pop duo Rob and Fab otherwise known as Milli Vanilli. There were performing at a live concert (in which they were supposed to be singing live) when a skipping occurred on the recorded soundtrack. The mishap kept playing the same sentence over and over. For a few moments the duo kept singing and ultimately ran off the stage when the skipping did not stop. It wasn’t until later that the news broke that they had been lip syncing not only during their concerts but also on their recordings (the pair had done an interview on MTV and it was noted that they had poor English skills which further caused doubt on whether they were fluent enough to have sung the vocals on their recordings.) It all came crashing down when singer Charles Shaw told the press that it was his voice on the recordings. The duo was stripped of their Grammy award and was forced to refund album and ticket purchasers for their deception. They never had another hit. Why was their behavior an issue? The issue was they were expected to be doing exactly what they were being paid to do. In their lip syncing they were actually deceiving their audience. I share this with you because there are Christians who are lip syncing their Christianity. They are moving their lips to all the right words and songs but there is no voice behind them – there is no substance to the movements of their lips (their Christianity.) From a distance they look every bit of what a Christian is supposed to look like, but when you get up close to them you see that there is no substance. They are moving their lips but nothing is coming out. There are no words coming from their heart – where our beliefs are generated and stored. I did the series on the Ten Commandments so that we call all stop lip syncing our Christianity! We must be genuine and live who we are, not “act out” who we are supposed to be. Turn with me to First Peter 1:13-16.
It says “Therefore, prepare your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, ‘YOU SHALL BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY.”’ Now let’s see where this is written and the context in which it is written. Turn to Leviticus 11:43-45. “Do not render yourselves detestable through any of the swarming things that swarm; and you shall not make yourselves unclean with them so that you become unclean. For I am the LORD your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy. And you shall not make yourselves unclean with any of the swarming things that swarm on the earth. For I am the LORD who brought you up from the land of Egypt to be your God; thus you shall be holy, for I am holy.” Let’s stop here for a moment. Who is God holding responsible for making themselves unclean? The people. How did the people make themselves unclean? By coming in contact with unclean things. The people were deciding to make themselves unclean.
In Leviticus 11 God gives the children of Israel examples of what it means to be unclean before Him and what it means to be clean before Him. Most of these examples were related to food. And this is what many miss. There are Christians today who believe that we shouldn’t eat certain foods because of God’s instructions to Israel. How many of you remember reading somewhere in the Gospels that Jesus came to fulfill the Law? If Jesus fulfilled the Law, and what we read here in Leviticus is a part of it, then it no longer applies, right? The message that Leviticus communicates is unclean behavior makes you unholy and clean behavior makes you holy. If we were to give examples from today, they would include TV program and movies that we know are in the unclean category but we’re choosing to watch them anyway; participating in unclean behavior (clubbing, drinking, sexual immorality, etc). Now here is the point and I don’t want you to miss what Leviticus is showing us: when the children of Israel made themselves unholy they separated themselves from God. What they didn’t know was that they were also putting a sign on their doors that said “Satan, come on in.” Acting holy, now listen to me, gave them divine protection but things are different for us – we do not have to “act” holy because when we accepted Christ and were born again, we were made holy. And just to be clear, acting is pretending to be something through how you act. God does not want us pretending!!! Now our jobs are to live as we are – we live holy because we are holy! Now, what does it mean to be holy before God?
There are some key phrases in the verses that we read from First Peter that I want you to see. When we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we are made holy. Holy is not what we do. Holy is who we are. So then why do we sometimes act unholy? Although our spirits are new, our minds remain the same and that’s why the Bible says we have to renew them. Our bodies remain the same and that is why it craves things of the flesh. When we are saved, our spirits are changed and it is through this spiritual change that we begin working on the mental and physical changes. We see this in the phrases “prepare yourself for action”, “keep sober in spirit”, and “fix your hope on grace.” These phrases say we have to decide to prepare ourselves, to be sober spiritually and to never take our eyes off of our hope – Jesus Christ. We “prepare our minds” by filling it with God’s Word. And I mean more than just reading your daily devotional. We need to dedicate ourselves to reading the Bible because Satan knows what it says and if we don’t, he can teach us a lie. We also need to keep our spirits sober. How do we do that Pastor? We do that by, again, reading the Bible, spending time with God. We do all of these things so that we will not make our spirits drunks on the wrong doctrine. And we know that when a person is a drunk, he will continue to go back to what it was that made him drunk because he enjoys the process of getting drunk. And then the verse says “fix your hope on grace”. What hope is he talking about? The rest of verse 13 tells us: “the revelation of Jesus Christ.” This is not saying we have to wait until Jesus returns. Jesus has already been revealed to us – in His Word. When we fix our sights on Jesus, we are fixing our hope on the grace He provided. And the grace He provided will strengthen us to live holy.
Now there is a word that I want to draw your attention to from First Peter and it’s the word “obedient”. In the Hebrew the phrase “As obedient children” reads “As children of obedience”. This is what distinguishes God’s children from those who “say they are God’s children.” We do what our Father asks us to do. And this was never made clearer than when Jesus said in John 14:15 “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” The word “obedience” says “I hear what you are saying and I will do what you are saying.” Remember I said earlier that as Christians we are reborn holy? When we willingly do what God asks us to do based on what we see in the Bible, we are demonstrating that holiness. Holiness, as I said before, is not what you do it is who you are. God asks us to live holy because He gave us the ability to do so! When we choose not to live holy, when what we do and/or say goes against the Bible, Jesus says we don’t love Him. I want us to get this because I am taking us somewhere. Why is our holiness so important? Why is it important that we recognize who we are and then begin to live as such? It’s not simply so that we can be rewarded in heaven, it’s so that we can help others get there. Turn with me to the book of Jude so I can help you see this. We will start reading at verse 20.
Jude 20 says, “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit.” It is said here that they were to "build up themselves;" that is, they were to act as moral and responsible agents and were to put forth their own proper exertions to do it. They were not to be dependent upon other to build their faith! It was there responsibility. The phrase "most holy faith" here refers to the system of religion which was founded on faith; and the meaning is, that they should seek to establish themselves most firmly in the belief of the doctrines, and in the practice of the duties of that faith. Remember what I said earlier that holiness is not what you do, it’s who you are? If you know who you are and you believe it, you will begin to live who you are and not who others says you are.
Jude 21 says “Keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life.” The phrase “in the love of God” here means our love to Him because we cannot control God’s love for us. We control the love we show towards Him which once again comes through our obedience. God expects us to live who we are. We are holy so we are to live in holiness.
Jude 22-23 says, “And have mercy on some, who are doubting; save others, snatching them out of the fire; and on some have mercy with fear, hating even the garment polluted by the flesh.” Everything that I have shared with you for the last three months leads up top these two verses. These verses speaks to our responsibility to those who do not know Christ. Remember what Jesus said about judging, correcting someone else? He said, “Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ and behold, the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.” (Matthew 7:3-5) Jesus was talking about our seeing the sin in someone else’s life and trying to help them while ignoring our own sins. He said we could get ourselves together so that we can clearly be in a position to help someone else. If we are holy and we are living unholy, it will be hard to help someone else become holy through Jesus Christ. Remember, we are holy because we have accepted Christ. We just have to choose top walk in it so that others can be saved. Jude says in these two verses that our approach must be different depending on whom we are talking to.
Jude says we are to have special compassion for a certain class of persons and we must approach them with feelings appropriate for their condition. For some that approach could be with tenderness and kindness with all gentleness appealing to them with words that love would prompt because while they had a desire to believe, they were still doubting. Patience is required when witnessing to this individual. For others much force is required. Like the force that would be required if you were to grab someone and pull them back to keep them from falling off a ledge. You literally snatch them out of the fire through the plan of salvation. Then you would not use the mild and gentle language of persuasion, but by word and gesture show that he was deeply in earnest to be saved. But it is that last group that I want you to remember. The writer said having mercy with fear – even hating the garment that has been polluted. This last group speaks directly to why we need to walk as who we are – holy!
I want to explain what the writer said about “hating the garment polluted by the flesh.” By "the garment polluted by the flesh" there is the allusion to a garment worn by one who had the plague, or some offensive disease which might be communicated to others by touching even the clothing which they had worn (i.e. touching the garments of someone with leprosy(Lev. 15:4, 10, 17)). Or there may be an allusion to the ceremonial law of Moses, by which all those who came in contact with dead bodies were regarded as unclean, (Lev. 21:11; Num. 6:6; 9:6; 19:11.) In each of these examples, the idea being referred to is the garment had been polluted and therefore was contagious, or loathsome, and that it was proper not even to touch such a garment, or to come in contact with it in any way. The apostle is referring to the sins of the individual and this is very important to understand. While they were to do their best to save them, they were in no way to partake of their sins. The conduct of the sinner was to be regarded as loathsome and contagious; and those who attempted to save them were to take every precaution to preserve their own purity. In other words, even though they were going into the very presence of sin, because they were holy, they could not participate in the sin. They could not approve or support the sinful lifestyle of the person (Romans chapter one.) They had to view the sin as something contagious and if touched, could infect them. There is much wisdom in this counsel. While we endeavor to save the sinner, we cannot dislike their sins so much that we are unwilling to witness to them. But, in approaching some sinners, there is need to be very careful to avoid being defiled by them, as there would be to escape the plague if we had any transaction with one who had it. You cannot witness to someone about the dangers of alcohol while you’re drinking a beer with them. You cannot witness to your partner about adultery while you are in an adulterous relationship with them. Do you understand what I am telling you?
God called us to live who we are, a holy person. It’s how we think, how we walk, how we interact with others. God made us holy through Jesus Christ but it is our responsibility to walk in that holiness. I understand that most people need something concrete in order to help them live the Christian life. I know many people think that the Bible is full of grey areas and open to interpretation. What I can tell you in that Bible is pretty specific on this topic. We are holy. We are to live like we are holy. To do that we must not give in to the sins of the world. We have to be separate.
As I close this morning I want to remind you of something Paul told the Church at Colosse. He said, says “And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach, if indeed you continue in the faith firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the gospel that you have heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, was made a minister.” (Colossians 1:21-23)
All of us were at one time hostile in our minds towards Christ as we engaged in our sin. However, that was our past. When Christ saved us in His flesh, He made us holy. Everything that you have heard through this series was focused on giving you clear examples of what God expects of us because of our spirits being changed through Christ. We are holy. Now we have to choose to live out who we are. We need to stop pretending that how we live does not matter. How you live opens the door for you to witness to others. Do not hinder your witness or your personal testimony by living a lifestyle contrary to the One who saved you. Do not lip sync your faith!
Until next time, “The Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face shine on you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up His countenance on you and give you peace.” (Numbers 6:24-26)
(If you are ever in the Kansas City, KS area, please come and worship with us at New Light Christian Fellowship, 15 N. 14th Street, Kansas City, KS 66102. Our service Sunday worship starts at 9 a.m. and Thursday night Bible study at 7 p.m. We look forward to you worshipping with us. May God bless and keep you.)
