The Bible passage we just read is the verse that our older youth uses to identify themselves. They call themselves the 412 Youth Group (because of I Timothy 4:12) and essentially, they use that verse to declare that they want to be used by God, and they don’t want their AGE to get in the way of that. Notice what the verse said: In order to be used by God (in spite of your age). You need to set an example for others in your speech, in your conduct, in how you love people, in your faith, … and IN YOUR PURITY.
Now PURITY is a really important concept to God. In the book of Habakkuk 1:13 (an Old Testament prophet) we’re told that “(God’s) eyes are TOO PURE even to look on evil.” Thus, if you want to be used by God. you need to focus on purity just like He does!!! Otherwise, HE can’t even LOOK at you! In fact, Jesus said YOU can’t even look at God unless you are pure of heart. Jesus said: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Matthew 5:8
(PAUSE) Now, the focus of our sermon series, are the beads used on a “witness bracelet”. The BLACK bead stands for the deep darkness of SIN; the RED bead stands for the BLOOD of Christ; the BLUE for the waters of baptism; And now, the WHITE bead for PURITY.
But now Purity…, what does that mean?
ILLUS: Years ago, at the first church I served we took our youth group to Arizona to do a VBS at an Indian Reservation. While we were there we took the opportunity to cross over into Mexico to do some shopping and sightseeing. But one of the things we warned the youth about was: “Don’t Drink The Water!” WHY NOT? Because the water south of the border is contaminated. It was filled with unfriendly bacteria that causes things like nausea, vomiting, fever, and diarrhea. In short: The water was NOT PURE. One of the girls apparently wasn’t paying attention. She drank the water, and allowed that IMPURE liquid to get inside of her, and so we had to spend a few days Phoenix before she was ready to travel again.
Here’s the deal: God is telling us - Don’t drink the water; Don’t allow the contamination of this world to get INSIDE of you - because it will make you sick. IT’LL HURT YA!
In fact, God was SO SERIOUS about this, that after He freed Israel from slavery in Egypt He gave them explicit instructions on what they were to do to PURIFY the Promised Land when they got there.
“When the LORD your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations… and when the LORD your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, for they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods, and the Lord’s anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you. This is what you are to do to them: Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones, cut down their Asherah poles and burn their idols in the fire.” Deuteronomy 7:1-5
In other words – don’t drink the water. Purify the land you’re about to enter. Purge the land of everything that would make you sick. And those same kind of instructions… still holds for us. Purge your life of the impurities of this world. Get rid of the influences that will make you sick… spiritually.
Now, there are people who have a problem with that. They say – “I can’t live a pure life and I never have. I’ve always been impure… I always will. So I just accept that. I’ve always gotten drunk; I’ve always done drugs; I’ve always slept around; I’ve always cursed like a sailor. That’s just WHO I am!”
In fact… they might think that they might have been born that way. The adulterer will say “I can’t help myself. I’ve always slept around. That’s just WHO I am”. The man with child pornography on his computer will say “I can’t help myself. That’s just the way I’m wired.” And the homosexual says “I can’t help myself, I was just born that way.”
I CAN’T HELP MYSELF. I CAN’T BE PURE. THAT’S JUST WHO I AM. I WAS BORN THAT WAY. And Jesus says “I understand. You tell me you that’s just who you are. You tell me you were BORN THAT WAY. Fine… let me help you be BORN AGAIN.”
You see, the Bible consistently tells us… that none of us pure. From the Old Testament where we’re told that “there is NOT A JUST MAN on earth who does good and does not sin.” (Ecclesiastes 7:20) To the New Testament which says “ALL HAVE SINNED and fall short of the glory of God.” Romans 3:23
The Bible repeatedly tells us ALL of us have lived lives that’ve been darkened by sin. And God knows that! But God says “I can fix that. I can cleanse you of your sins. I can purify you so your soul will be white as snow.” In Isaiah 1:18 God said: Come now, let us reason together… though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.”
And that’s what God promised in I Peter 3:20-21 “when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”
In baptism, we’re appealing to God for pure life… a pure conscience. In that simple act we get to start over again with a clean slate. So now - having been purified by God - God now expects you and I to FOCUS on being pure in our lives.
What does purity look like? Well… everybody has a working knowledge of what purity is. For example – if you wouldn’t want SOMETHING you’ve said or done to be broadcast for everyone to hear and see - then don’t do it!!!
Ephesians 5:11-12 tells us “Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful to even speak of the things that they do in secret.”
Now, why do people do “deeds of darkness” and why do they these things “in secret?” Well, they do that because they don’t want people to see what they’re doing. Even pagans know that certain things are wrong. Even pagans don’t want folks to know what they’re doing!
By contrast, James 1:27 “Religion that is PURE and undefiled before God the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”
You see, if you want your religion (your relationship with God) - to be PURE and undefiled - then one of the things you need to do is keep yourself unstained by the world. If you know that going certain places, or being involved in certain activities, is going to stain your life - THEN DON’T GO THERE; DON’T DO THAT!!!
ILLUS: Back when I was a teenager, there was a corner bookstore I’d visit to buy comics. But when I’d go to that store… they had the comics HERE (up high) - but right next to those was a section that held the porn magazines. And I caught myself doing this (stealthily look down). WHY? Because for men… that is a temptation. I eventually decided I couldn’t go back to that book store. I couldn’t handle it.
The pursuit of purity is often a matter of building walls between yourself and your temptations. The walls help you to not go there and not to do that. Does that mean we’re NEVER going to fail? No, of course not! But making that decision to pursue purity sets our course and changes our destination. It declares we’re determined to be pure. We’re determined to be different.
ILLUS: I’ve talked to lots of folks in jail, and occasionally they’ll tell me that they want to become a Christian, but they’re afraid they’ll mess it up and sin all over again. So then I’ll ask them if they’ve ever roller-skated (YES). When they first started skating… did they ever fall down? (YES… A LOT). But if they could go skating today would they fall down as much as when they first started skating (NO… BUT THEY STILL FALL DOWN).
Then I ask if they’ve ever watched professional skaters skate. (YES). Had they ever seen those professionals fall down? (YES… BUT THEY FALL DOWN DOING STUFF THAT WOULD KILL YOU AND ME). Professionals fall down less than us because they’ve spent so much time on their skates that was it was like walking for them. For the professional, it’s normal NOT to fall down.
That’s what it’s like being a Christian when we first start following Jesus, we fall down – A LOT! But the longer we walk with Jesus, the less often we fall down. Even the most Godly Christian fails… they fall down. But they fall down less often than when they first baptized. That’s because they’ve spent so much time with Jesus that it’s normal not to fall down because they want to please Him. So they set their goal to be pure for Him.
Now, we do need to be careful about this. There’s a trap here … a trap that even the Scribes the Pharisees fell into. They believed that all they had to do was NOT do certain things, and that would make them pure before God. But Jesus condemned them saying: "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate (i.e. they kept the RULES – being stained on the outside), but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence.” (on the INSIDE, their religion it was all about them) Matthew 23:25
That’s why James 1:27 says “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father, is this: 1) to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and 2) to keep oneself unstained from the world.” Purity of heart is not just about deciding NOT to do BAD things - it’s about deciding to DO good things for others. If you want to be PURE OF HEART before God you have to find ways of helping the helpless. Purity isn't all about you. It's all about what you can do for the downtrodden and helpless of this world.
Now, one last thing - pursuing purity (no matter how pure you get) won’t get you into heaven. You CAN’T do this purity thing in order to gain salvation. That’s the kind of thinking of people (who believe that they can get into heaven without Jesus) because (to their mind) they’ve lived a pure life. They’ve done enough good things to outweigh the bad in their past. BUT THOSE PURE DEEDS WON’T GET THEM INTO HEAVEN. And, if good deeds (purity) won’t get them into heaven… it won’t get us in either.
Ephesians 2:8-9 tells Christians “(it’s) by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” In other words, our DOING good things doesn’t buy our salvation. Because salvation is a GIFT from God (and you can’t purchase His gift with your good deeds). Salvation is a gift that was given to us when Jesus died on the cross.
But now wait a minute - if pursuing purity doesn’t assure my salvation - why do it? Well, Romans 6 asks that very question. In Romans 5 Paul tells us that God loves us so much HE WANTS to forgive our sins. But then Paul writes: “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? (Romans 6:1) In other words: If it makes God happy to forgive our sins, why don’t we just SIN A LOT… and make Him REALLY happy!
But then Paul writes: “GOD FORBID! How can we who died to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.” Romans 6:2-4
In other words - you came to Christ because you wanted your sins forgiven. You felt the shame of your past, and there were times when guilt overwhelmed you. You wanted to be purified but didn’t know how. But then you learned that Jesus DIED FOR YOU - that He gave His life on the cross - that He was buried and rose from the dead just to make you pure before God. And so you wanted to become a Christian. And part of what God asked was that YOU die to your past. And, having died, YOU would then allow yourself to be buried in a watery grave. And then you would rise from YOUR DEAD PAST to walk in a new life. You Identified With The Death, Burial Resurrection of Christ to be saved from your sins.
But NOW if you decide to turn your back on that - if NOW you decide NOT to pursue purity in your life - THEN you become a slave to sin all over again. You would be just giving up and surrendering to your sins. DON’T DO THAT… DON’T GO THERE! DON’T SURRENDER TO SIN!
As a Christian you will FALL DOWN once in a while. You will struggle with sin. But for those of us who pursue purity, it’s not how many times we fall down. It’s how many times we get back up again. If you love God - do all that you can do to present yourself to your God as someone who wants to please Him by pursuing purity in your life.
INVITATION
