Introduction
Jesus has warned us in Luke 18:8 that when the end is near, He will not be able to find faith on the earth. And that could mean only one thing: Christian men and women's faith is going to come under attack and whatever that is that is attacking our faith may get the upper hand.
Last week, we looked at the first thing that is certainly going to attack our faith and it is the world. The values of this world will try to sell themselves as the same as the values of our God. But they are not. The values of this world are a moving target, constantly changing, and the value of God are unchanging, constant. The values of this world will try to sell themselves to you by enticements. The values of God are laid out plainly in His Word, no enticements, and you need to make a choice to accept or reject them.
Today, we are going to look at the second possible collision course with our faith and that is the toxic relationships that we are in, and everybody has those relationships that we maintain. For this sermon, you need to do an inventory of people you are in relationship with, and you need to honestly evaluate if they are helping you to get closer to God, or are they trying to pull you away from God. And if they are trying to pull you away from God and your faith then they are toxic. Today, we are going to look at some of the characteristics of toxic relationships, and then you got to decide if you are going to maintain those relationships or are you going to let your faith win?
So, just as our faith is on a collision course with the world; our faith is also on a collision course with those relationships that move us away from God and from our faith.
SCRIPTURE TEXT REFERENCE
(20) Walk with the wise and become wise, for a companion of fools suffers harm. Proverbs 13:20 - NIV
My Only Point
If God wants to bless you, God sends people into your life that will be a blessing. If the devil wants to harm you, the devil will send people in your life that will harm you. Our job is to determine who those people are that is going to be a blessing and who are those people that is going to be harmful.
To discern who is going to be a blessing and who is going to be harmful greatly matters. In I Corinthians 15:33 we are told "Do not be misled. Bad company corrupts good character." You hang with the wrong people, they are going to bring you down, you are not going to bring them up. And since that is straight from the Word of God, we know that is true, and so if we are in those toxic relationship (those that bring us down) our fellowship with God is going to suffer and inevitably our faith will suffer. Those toxic relationships collide head on against our faith.
The great King David knew this, so he tells us in Psalms 1:1- (1) Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers,
Paul, the author of the majority of the New Testament, knew this when he instructed the Ephesians church in Ephesians 5:7-9 (7) Therefore do not be partners with them. (8) For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (9) (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness, and truth)
So, I cannot stress enough how important to know the characteristics of harmful relationships. I want to share with you three of them today.
There are people in your life who knew you back when and they want to hold you in your past. Those relationships are toxic.
(17) So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. Ephesians 4:17 - NIV
I am not the same person I was before I knew Christ. Today, as I look back on my life before Christ, I don't even like the person I was before I knew Christ. I am so thankful that God saved me and made me a new creation and is changing me day by day.
But every one of us who are Christian have some family or friends that knew us back when we were not Christian, and they liked the way we acted back then prior to our salvation because we acted just like them. We might have gone out and partied with them; drank and smoked with them; used the same vulgar language as them; and had no regard for the things of God just like them.
And now they see the difference in you, and they don't like it. And so, they let you know their displeasure with comments such as "What happened to you, you use to be able to go out with us and have a fun time and now you are this holy roller?" "You changed and we don't like it." "We wish you would go back to the way you were."
We just read that Scripture from Ephesians 5 where Paul says I understand you were just like your unsaved family and friends before you knew Christ, but now you are different and so you got to live a separated life.
Even Jesus, Himself, while He was performing His earthly ministry, people wanted to hold Him in His past. In Matthew 13, Jesus returned to his hometown to minister to the people. But the people did not want the Jesus who was ministering in the town and villages instructing the people and performing miracles, but they wanted the Jesus of the past. Mary's son, the son of a carpenter, one of their town folks! They wanted Jesus the young boy not Jesus the minister and Savior of the world. They wanted to hold Him in the past.
And so, if people tried to hold Jesus in the past, we certainly will have people in our lives who want to hold us in our past. They want us to go back to the old ways rather than be glad that we are growing in our relationship with Christ. Those people are toxic.
There are people in your life who will always tell you what you want to hear, those people are toxic.
(3) For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 2 Timothy 4:3 - NIV
I come up with ideas all the time; some of them I will say are brilliant, but some of them are the dumbest ideas on the planet. I don't need someone in my life who will tell me that my brilliant ideas are brilliant; and my dumbest ideas are brilliant. I need someone to tell me that my dumb ideas are really dumb. I need to hear the truth. And the person who does not tell me the truth may cause me to fall into error. And what gets injured? My faith!
You don't need a preacher, if you came to him for advice, to tell you what you want to hear. He better tell you what the Word of God says. If he tells you what you want to hear, he could lead you astray. If he tells you the truth you may be as angry as heck at him, but he told you something that can set you free if you only listen to the Holy Spirit within you.
You may not want to hear this, but this is the truth. When I was growing up my parents had no problem telling me something I did not want to hear. No, you cannot use the car tonight. No, you cannot have $20.00 to buy that thing you don't need. No, I am not stopping everything I am doing and take you to your friend's house right this minute.
Do you know what parents do today? They tell children what they want to hear. You are not helping your children by doing everything they want, giving them everything they want, jumping when they say jump. Let me tell you children don't always do the right thing and sometimes what they want is not going to be good for them and they need to know you as the parent is in charge not them. It will teach for when they will have a boss over them later in life. If you are doing those things for your children (letting them do what they want, go where they want, and jump at their orders), you may think that you are being a good parent, but you are not. You are being a toxic parent.
There are people who you know in your life who say they are a Christian, but you have witnessed for yourself that their life does not line up with the Word of God. Those people are toxic.
(1) But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. (2) People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, (3) without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, (4) treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— (5) having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people. 2 Timothy 3:1-5 - NIV
Paul tells Timothy that there are people who will tell you; "Oh, yes I am a Christian and he or she know the right things to say and so they have a form of godliness or there may be people who are in the church house that have a form of godliness because of their church attendance. But their lifestyle, by the way that they live, shouts he or she is not a Christian. Paul tells Timothy to avoid them.
That means there might be some wolves in the sheep house. They may be in the pew. In fact, they may be in your pew. They may be in our deacon body. And worse yet they might be the Pastor or Associate Pastor.
Paul is telling us, each one of us, to keep our eyes open out in the world and even in the church house. Those who are saved ought to know how they should be living, and if you don't see that in the life of someone else you know who expresses that he or she is a Christian, bells and whistles ought to be going off in your head. Keep your distance.
Why is that so important? Remember 1 Corinthians 15:33 which tells us that bad company corrupts good morals.
Conclusion
In closing let me say this. Avoiding toxic relationships does not excuse our duty to witness. We are to witness to those who are lost, no question. We are not commanded to be their best friends.
Jesus witnessed to publicans and sinner and told them about Himself and the salvation that He was offering, but He did not hang around with Him. He was usually with His apostles and the disciples. Those who lives resembled His.
We have a duty to witness, but we also have a duty to keep our faith strong by avoiding toxic relationships.
