2 Timothy 2:3-4
Choosing Sides Part 2
IINTRODUCTION
Last week we saw how all of us are engaged in a war that is much bigger than we are. It’s been going on for ages, and whether we like it or not we’ve all become a part of it. At stake is our freedom and the freedom of all of mankind. Satan is the great enemy, a terrorist if you will, and he has been doing a wonderful job of keeping people in bondage, a trade off of sorts for peace and comfort. But is that freedom? Is that a life worth living? Jesus said, "I have come to give you life, and to give you an abundant life at that." He wants so much more for us than to just exist – to get up and eat and do our daily thing and go to bed and do that until we die. He has created us for a great purpose and in doing that purpose we find life – but not just any life – it is an abundant life!
We also said that you must choose whose side you want to be on – either Satan’s or God’s. It is my hope and prayer that you choose the Lord’s side – that you are enlisted in His army through a personal relationship with Him. If you refused to be saved, if you didn’t see the need to repent of your sin and confess it to God, then you are in Satan’s camp and you fight against the Lord, but there was a second way you can be one of his soldiers, and that is to do so as a child of God. You see, you can be in Satan’s army by refusing to be saved, but you can also be in his army by refusing to live for Christ.
The greatest battle you’ll ever fight is choosing whose side you want to be on.
One of my favorite Bible passages is Joshua 5:13. In this chapter, the Lord has been preparing Joshua to lead the people of Israel to destroy Jericho. They are only waiting on the Lord’s command to move now, and Joshua walks to some place in the Jordan valley from which he can view the city. He has just walked away from the people and is alone to think about this first battle in the Promised Land. Now the land of Canaan does not represent heaven as it is so often talked about. It does however represent the abundant life. The abundant life is the life Jesus wants to give to you. It is a life of blessing and great joy, but it is a life of constant growth and personal battles. In this Promised Land called the abundant life, there are many battles to fight. As Joshua advanced toward this lookout place, the Bible records the following scene:
"And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand: and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries? And he said, "Nay; but as captain or the host of the Lord am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, what saith my lord unto his servant? And the captain of the Lord’s host said unto Joshua, loose thy shoe from off thy foot, for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so."
Here it is – Joshua goes to survey the coming battle, and the Lord is already there with His sword drawn. Joshua walks up pretty close and asks Him, "Are you for us or against us?" The Lord replies, "No." What? What does He mean by no? It means this: It wasn’t Joshua’s battle. It wasn’t his side or Jericho’s side. It was the Lord’s battle, and Joshua needed to make up his mind whose side he would be on. It is the same for each of us today.
Every day there are countless battles being waged in our lives, and we survey them wondering how they will turn out. Some of you have been faced with battles of a sexual nature. Others have faced battles involving addictive substances. You may never see an illegal drug, but many a child of God has struggled with the addictive hold a cigarette or bottle has on him or her. There are the daily battles that involve hate and prejudice and bitterness and unforgiveness. Maybe you fight the battles of verbal abuse. You don’t want to talk that way to your wife or your children, but it comes out. Some of you wrestle with emotional abusive and maybe even physical abuse. Others fight the daily battles of neglect and divorce and fear and self-esteem. These are not the battles fought with fists or even wits, but instead they are the battles fought in front of the bathroom mirror or in the presence of peers.
You may feel like you don’t have a friend in the world and nobody understands who you are or how you feel. Your parents don’t understand you. Your husband doesn’t understand you. No one is interested in you. Christian people are looking in all the wrong places for significance and importance. Your heart is screaming from the inside out because you have been forced to be someone you never wanted to be and I don’t know what your particular battles are but you feel so alone and you wonder what the future holds in it all. Christ stands there between you and the battle you face and so often you find yourself asking the question, "God, whose side are you on anyway? Have you forgotten me?" You’re like Jacob wrestling with the Lord and in all your fighting you say to Him, "I’m not going to quit fighting until you bless me!" And all the while He is gently telling you, "No, the battle is mine. Whose side will you be on?"
It’s the same battle that the twelve spies fought 40 years before Joshua’s account in Israel’s history. They had come to Kadesh Barnea and had been surveying the land and sure enough, it was rich with God’s blessings, but there were giants in the land. "Oh, they’re too big! We could never stand against them. Let’s stay in the wilderness where at least we’ll be free!" But listen, they bought the lie of the devil! They weren’t free at all. They were in great bondage to their fears, their doubts, their worries and unbelief.
Many of God’s children today, some of you today look at the giants of life and declare that they are too big to go in and fight. We determine that the fight is not worth the effort, so we retreat, but we place ourselves in bondage and become prisoners of war. Get this image in your heads – Imagine that during the war on Iraq that our POWs were in these cages being held captive by the enemy. We come along and bust open the doors and tell them that America has won the war, they can come out now and be free. They look to one another and say, "You know, there’s no shooting in here. There are no Iraqis in here. It’s a little crowded, but at least we’re safe. Let’s just stay inside." But we’ve won the war!
How many people of God are sitting in their cages when Jesus says, "I’ve won the war!" You can come out now! Listen to me – your freedom is at stake every time you face a battle and you choose the easy way out. Every time you give in to sin or self, you drive your heart and your ability to fellowship with Christ farther away than it was before. Before long you’ll be in such bondage you wonder if you can ever come back to Him. It is not the manly man who can handle his sin – it is the one who can say no. It is not the manly man who can walk through the mires of filth and decay and do better than the rest – it is the man who realizes that he is too weak on his own.
All of us face the same battles. We all face the battles of unwillingness to forgive those who have wronged us, the battles of wanting to hate, or get revenge. We all face the battles of lust – it may not be for the opposite sex – maybe you lust after power or money or position. There are the battles of a loose tongue, self-pity, worry, and many, many more. These are the things Satan throws your way and those battles must be faced and fought in the power and might of the Lord if you are ever to experience the freedom that is found in Christ and if you are ever to enjoy the abundant life He promises you. That’s why Paul told Timothy in our text,
"Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ."
I don’t know anyone who likes or enjoys fighting the battles of the Christian life. That is why so many never accept Jesus, because they don’t want to have to fight those battles. That is why Israel never went into the Promised Land under Moses’ leadership; they were afraid to fight the battles. The easiest thing to do is not resist, to give in, to walk away, but listen, something in you dies every time you walk away from a battle that you should have fought. Listen to what Paul told the Romans,
"Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God."
In other words, you’ve been set free from bondage. Don’t let those things be the lords of your life any more, and don’t hand your weapons over to the enemy. Don’t give your members: your body, your mind, your heart and soul as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but give your weapons to God so He might use you for His sake.
Can you do that? Can you live and fight for Christ in the greatest army ever known to man? You’d better believe it! Turn to 2 Timothy 1:7, where Paul said,
"For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our lord, nor of me his prisoner: but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God; who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began…"
If the Spirit of God lives in you, there is something in you that longs to live for Christ. It is wild and dangerous and fierce. There is something in you that screams out to be released, to be set free from the bondage of existence. That something is the Spirit of God in you. There are three things you have to acknowledge about yourself if you are ever going to enjoy victory as a soldier in the Lord’s army.
YOU’VE GOT AN IDENTITY.
The Scriptures identify you as a believer in many ways. You are a child of God. You’re a child of the King! The Scriptures identify believers as prisoners, as soldiers, as slaves, as bondservants, as the friends of God. You are called saints, a peculiar people, a chosen people, a special people unto God. Listen, I don’t care what others call you – it doesn’t matter what your parents, your co-workers, your culture says about you – you are a very special person to God, "who has saved you and called you with a holy calling." You were special enough to die for, and you were special enough for God to provide salvation for you by killing His only begotten Son. God loves you, He has saved you and He has chosen you. You are a somebody from heaven’s perspective.
What does that mean? It means that your identity doesn’t come from others. It doesn’t come from the brands you wear or your car or from your job or what you play. Your identity doesn’t come from the people you associate with – you are a child of the King! If you want to know who you are and what you are to be like, then look to Jesus. When you know who Jesus was and how He lived, then you’ve found your identity. I said last week that for many people, Jesus is like Mr. Rogers – some kind of weak, cowardly wimp who just flops around – but my Jesus isn’t like that and I wouldn’t want to follow Him if He was. He was a man full of life, of great courage, tender when He needed to be, fierce and dangerous when He needed to be – and that’s who you are.
A soldier is just one part of who you are. You look at the life of Jesus, and you’ll find Him weeping at the unbelief of the Jews at times. Other times He tenderly spoke words of life to the widows and children. He was merciful to sinful people and was loving to the hurting and unlovable. But to think that He was only that way is lopsided. Follow Jesus into the temple and watch Him drive out the moneychangers, or go with Him as He challenged the Pharisees and scribes in Matthew 23. I love the account of the night when the mob came to arrest Jesus. The walked up with the swords and clubs and various other weapons, an angry mob ready to crucify Christ and they ask if He was Jesus. When He speaks the words, "I am He…" they all fall down backward – talk about power! The same Jesus that speaks with such authority is the Jesus that lives in you, and that power and fierceness longs to be set free in your life to fight the battles you face against Satan your enemy.
YOU’VE GOT A PURPOSE FOR LIVING.
Why are you here? Why do you exist? Paul said that God "hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace." When you were saved you were given a new purpose for living. It is not your life to spend any more. You don’t belong to yourself, you belong to the One who has bought and paid for you with His precious life-changing blood. What is your purpose? Say it with me from Revelation 4:11:
"Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power, for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created."
You were created to bring God pleasure – that’s it! How do you bring God pleasure? Through a personal relationship with Him. By being obedient to Him. By expressing your love to Him in service. How do you make God happy? By not being afraid to live for Him. Listen, why do I keep preaching this? Because believers all over the world and in our church are proudly claiming Jesus as their Savior but they are refusing to live for Him and give Him the honor that is due His holy name!
There are countless thousands of people around you every day who are dying and who will go to hell so long as your enemy the devil has his way with them. You’ve been called into active duty in the Lord’s army, this life is the battlefield, your body, mind, heart and soul are your instruments of warfare, you’re armed with the Word of God, and those souls are the prize. Either Satan will deceive them and lead them to hell, or you will reach them with the gospel and lead them to Christ. That’s your purpose – that’s your reason for living – that’s your mission in life. There is no other.
That doesn’t mean that God wants all of you to be preachers or missionaries, or that all you women have to be Sunday School teachers and so forth. What it does mean is that as you follow God’s will in your life, as you live as carpenters and nurses and truck drivers and teachers and husbands and wives and mothers and fathers that you will stand up for Christ right where He puts you. We need Christians in the workforce! We need soldiers for Christ affecting every area of society, and doing that means that you’ve got to learn to stand for Christ outside of the four walls built around your church.
It takes great faith to stand up for Jesus in the public arena – but to stand up for Jesus out there is where it counts – and that’s what brings Him pleasure.
YOU’VE GOT WHAT IT TAKES.
As a soldier for Christ, you’ve not been given the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love and of a sound mind. You’ve been fully equipped for battle. God has given you a spirit of courage, but its been driven somewhere far away through rejection and fear. You don’t need to be God for courage, you need to pray that God will allow you the opportunity to step forward in that courage, the courage He has already given you to do what you are supposed to be doing. God has already equipped you for the battles, now you must fight.
CONCLUSION
Have you made up your mind yet to fight for the Lord? It is your choice. You will fight for Him or against Him by the choice you make today and the choices you make every day of your life. If you still haven’t called upon Christ in salvation, you can still do that today and leave here on the Lord’s side, a part of the greatest family in the universe. The war is being waged right now as I speak, the enemy and the Lord’s Spirit are fighting for your heart – to whom will the victory go in the invitation we are about to have?
Are you tired of living in bondage? Are you ready to be set free so you can live for Christ the way He wants you to? Are you weary from getting beat around in the battles you face? Some of you today are involved in activities you hate, but you do them anyway because it is expected of you. You wish you could move or just run and hide, but you can’t do that. Some of you long to be loved and you’re looking for it in all the wrong places and ways.
Maybe you’re in a relationship that is hurting you, your family life isn’t what it ought to be, you’re tired of living a double life, a fake life, a half-life. Satan has you right where he wants you, defeated and tired and with no desire to fight, but God has given you a spirit of courage and power and sound mind – will you choose to rise up today and give your body, your heart, your mind to Christ and allow Him to begin a work in you that will catch the attention of all who know you? You may need to come to the altar during our invitation and apologize to God for how you’ve been living and commit yourselves unto Him.
You can do that today – you’re a child of the King, the Ruler of all, and He lives in you. You’ve got a wonderful purpose in life, maybe a purpose you haven’t given much thought to, to please the Lord in your life by knowing Him and serving Him. Soldier, you’ve got what it takes – are you ready to get on with it this morning?
