“Follow Me”
The second paragraph of Untied States Declaration of Independence begins with these words; “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Whether you’re a citizen of the US or even just a visitor, I think we can all agree that we are blessed to live in a country that recognizes its citizens’ right to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness. And I think if we even casually observe our society today, we’ll see that people are indeed in hot pursuit of happiness. But if we look closely, we’ll notice, that for some reason, they tend to look for it in all the wrong places. For instance, many look for happiness in a career, in the heaping up of great wealth, personal accomplishments, or in another person. But most finally realize that true happiness cannot be found there. Still others seek happiness in alcohol, drugs and all forms of immorality only to sink into worse misery.
It appears that, despite our best efforts, true happiness continues to elude most of us. In fact, as people pursue happiness, many not only fail to find it but actually find depression instead.
Did you know that the use of antidepressants in the US is up by a whopping 65% over the last 15 years. (cbs news 2017) In fact, we currently have the second highest rate of depression in the entire world. Only France is more depressed than we are…
It doesn’t seem to make sense but studies have shown that wealthier countries tend to have much higher rates of depression. I know it sounds irrational, but could it be that our “relentless pursuit of happiness” is actually dragging us into depression?? And could it be that those who are not so obsessed with chasing after happiness are, ironically enough, among the happiest people in the world?
Reminds me of something Jesus tells us in the gospel of Mark chapter 8.
Mark 8:34-36 34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.35 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it. 36 What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul?
“whoever wants to save his life will lose it…” that is, whoever chooses not to live as a stranger and a pilgrim in this world but to make his or her home here—content with pursuing worldly allurements and happiness rather than using this life to grow spiritually closer to Christ and serve Him these few years we have on this earth.
Matthew 6:33 that great passage where Jesus commands us not to worry about our earthly lives, he finishes that powerful admonition with these words, “Seek ye first… (happiness??) the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”
Nowhere in Scripture are we told to “pursue happiness”—much less invest our entire lives in the vain attempt to find it. But we are told, quite often in fact, to diligently pursue something else—something much more enduring than happiness. Something that we may even perceive to be counterproductive to our happiness—we’re told to pursue holiness.
Hebrews 12:14 “14 Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.”
Without holiness, how many will see the Lord??
Friends, God has impressed me to ask you this morning, are YOU holy?? In your thoughts, in your words, in your actions, in public and in private; are you holy? Am I holy?
This is a question I think that most of us hardly ever really consider.. But again, the Word of God tells us here that if we are not, we will not be saved.
Many professing Christians today think they are holy but, in reality, are far from it. You see, a lot of us get justification and sanctification confused. And that could be a deadly mistake. Justification and sanctification are certainly related—in fact one never exists without the other. But they are quite different and we need to understand that.
Justification happens when, after we are convicted of our sinful state realizing that we are deserving of death, we come to Christ in true repentance asking forgiveness for our sins. 1 John 1:9 says that if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins….” That’s justification, because of the sacrifice of Christ in our behalf and His imputed righteousness, we are looked upon by the Father “just as if” we’ve never sinned. Sanctification comes immediately after justification. The last part of 1 John 1:9 speaks, I believe, to sanctification. “If we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins AND cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” That’s sanctification—that’s the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.
The Hebrew word from which holiness is translated in Hebrews 12:14 is “hagiasmos” which means, holy, consecrated or dedicated to God. And the context here strongly implies the moral transformation that results from that dedication to God. The dangerous view a lot of Christians today have of this passage is that when we accept Christ and His imputed righteousness, we are both justified and sanctified with no effort on our part. They believe they aren’t required to “work” at making a significant change to their moral behavior besides going to church and basically being a “good person”
But this understanding of the passage or this word cannot be accurate simply because Paul says right here in verse 14 to “make every effort”, or “strive” to be holy….
Leviticus 11:45 God says, “I am the Lord who brought you up out of Egypt to be your God; therefor BE holy, because I am holy.” God didn’t say “you ARE holy because I am holy,” he said, BE holy.
Romans 12:1,2 “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. 2 Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”
Ephesians 1:4 “For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.”
Romans 6:19-23 “19 I put this in human terms because you are weak in your natural selves. Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness. 20 When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. 21 What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! 22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (we are freed not only from the penalty of sin, but also from the mastery—we are no longer powerless against it!)
1 Peter 1:13-16 “13 Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed. 14 As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. 15 But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; 16 for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”
I’ll ask you again, are YOU holy?
Someone will say; yes! When I was saved the Lord helped me to get the victory over my foul mouth, I stopped drinking or smoking, I try to be nice to people and I go to church and I even return a faithful tithe and offering…… And I say to that, praise the Lord! But are you still growing? Are you daily pressing on—striving to be more and more holy?
The problem with most of us is that we get to a certain point in allowing God to sanctify us and then we plateau. We reach what we feel is an acceptable “level of holiness” and just spiritually coast the rest of our lives…
Exactly how holy we’re to be is not relative to our past, our environment, or our family history. The Bible is clear about God’s ideal level of holiness He desires for His Children.
Jesus says in Matthew 5:48, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
2 Corinthians 7:1 “Since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God.”
Now some of you are beginning to think that I’m preaching salvation by works. I assure you that I certainly am not. What I am preaching is salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ—keeping in mind what James says in chapter 2 of his letter about saving faith—it will never be alone but will always be accompanied by works; if it is not, it is a dead faith.
As we all know, David was far from perfect, but God saw him as perfect because of what was in his heart. David’s desire was well reflected in his earnest prayer to God. Psalm 51:10 “Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.”
That’s what sanctification and the pursuit of holiness is all about; we are a holy people, destined for a holy place where we’ll stand in the presence of a holy God. Sanctification is that journey along which we allow God to transform us back into His likeness.
1 John 2:5,6 “This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus walked.”
Illustration: The story is told of a little boy named Johnny. He was about six years old and attended a Christian school. One day as he and his classmates were finger painting beautiful scenes of what they imagined heaven would be like, the teacher looked around at all the pictures and then asked, “who’s ready to go to heaven?” All the children stopped what they were doing an threw their hands up into the air and screamed “I do! I do!” But Johnny didn’t get excited nor did he raise his hand or say that he wanted to go. He very quietly continued what he was doing. The teacher was concerned enough to mention it to his parents, so one night at dinner, Johnny’s dad asked him if he was afraid of God or if for some other reason he didn’t want to go to heaven. Johnny cracked a half smile and said, “oh, that—sure I want to go to heaven but I was afraid Miss Conner was trying to get up a group to go that day!”
It was St. Augustine whose honest prayer seems to well represent the sinner’s struggle against the carnal nature. He said, “Please God, make me pure—but not just yet!”
There was a hard rock band that had a big number one hit when I was a teenager that is still popular today. The name of the song is Highway to Hell. In fact that’s about all there is to the song is these guys screaming, “we’re on the highway to hell!” and all the fans enthusiastically playing air guitar and singing along with it as if hell is where they really wanted to go.
The sad reality is that there is indeed a highway to hell and it is bumper to bumper. But in Isaiah 35 the Bible talks about another highway that leads to heaven. It’s called the Way of Holiness. While it’s true that everyone is at a different mile marker on this highway, as long as we keep traveling it and heading toward our destination of Christlikeness, by the grace of God, we’ll all reach heaven together.
But once again, “without holiness, no one will see the Lord..” So how can we obtain the level of holiness God expects of us?
John 17:17 “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.”
Psalm 119:9 “How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to Your word.”
2 Timothy 3:16,17 “16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
I’d like to close our message today with the same passage I began with.
Mark 8:34-36 34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.(follow Him where? To the place where he will lay down his life and the place we are to lay down OUR lives—to crucify our sinful, selfish, worldly, carnal nature that He might raise us to a NEW life—one led not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit of God. Paul says in Galatians 2:20 “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” )
True holiness is Christ IN US. Justification is when we invite Him into our hearts, sanctification is the life long process in which we allow Him to transform every aspect of our lives so that His character is perfectly formed in us. And we don’t do this in order to be saved, we do it because we ARE saved.
35 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it.”
The last thing I want to do is to give the impression that being a good Christian means being a miserable Christian! The reality is that God does indeed want us to be truly happy and if we order our lives in accordance with His revealed will, we will be happy—although likely not what the world perceives as happy. [touch on how worldly happiness is quite fickle in that is tends to be conditional upon our current circumstances why joy and peace are gifts of God that are not conditional upon these things but can actually be permanent pillars of the Christian’s life. Also touch on Matthew 11:28-30 if time permits]
Jesus said in John 12:32 “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto myself.”
Now I realize that Jesus was here alluding to His coming crucifixion. But when I read this text I can’t help but to think about it this way: When we die to self and allow Christ to live in and through us, we are “lifting Him up” and He is drawing others to himself through our lives which we offer Him as “living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to the Lord.”
Appeal
Suggested hymns
I Would Be Like Jesus
Lord, I Want to Be a Christian
Give of Your Best to the Master
