AIM TO WIN
Victory In Jesus – Part 5
Galatians 5
October 24, 2004
Introduction:
In the old days of the Wild West when two people got into a heated fight about something they sometimes had duels. Picture in your mind’s eye two dusty cowboys walking towards each other down main street. It is high noon. They face each other from about a distance of ten paces. The streets are lined by curious onlookers waiting to see which of the men will be quicker on the draw while those with more sense are taking cover and shutting up there businesses.
Then without out warning one man quickly draws his gun from its holster. He has the other man dead to rights as he fires off a round. But he misses. After the shock of having a bullet narrowly blow by his head the other man carefully takes aim and send the first cowboy to meet his maker.
The man who won the duel wasn’t the man who was quickest, but the one who knew how to aim. You see it doesn’t matter how fast you fire off your shot, if you don’t know how to aim you are going to lose.
Today I want to talk to you about another kind of duel. I want to talk to you about a showdown for your soul. This is a duel that I am sure every one of you has experienced in your life. Paul talked about it in Romans chapter seven when he wrote these words:
“I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do…For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do – this I keep on doing.” (Romans 7:15,18-19)
He also talks about this inner spiritual duel in the passage we will be focusing on today: Galatians 5.
17For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.
He is talking about the inner spiritual duel that takes place in the soul of the believer between your old sinful nature and the Holy Spirit. When you become a Christian God forgives you for all the sins that you have committed and he puts his Holy Spirit in you to give you new desires. The problem is that your old sinful nature isn’t too happy about the fact that there is a new sheriff in town and so rather than going away peacefully it puts up a fight. The result is that you have dueling natures within you.
I thing that everyone here knows what it is like to have a holy ambition. You have the desire to accomplish something good with your life. You want to change your world for the glory of God. Or you want to reach the lost in your family or community for Jesus. You want to be a spiritual leader in your church. You want to be a godly husband or wife. You want to raise your kids to grow up and serve the Lord. I am sure that you all have desires along these lines.
On the other hand you find that there are equally strong desires that battle against all of these good things. The desire to serve others is tempered by the desire to serve yourself. The desire to give sacrificially to missions is countered by the desire for the big screen TV or whatever extravagant toy you are interested in at the moment. The desire to accomplish something for the glory of God is offset by the desire to build a monument to yourself.
That is the inner spiritual duel. We find that we have a variety of differing desires. And all too often those desire are diametrically opposed to each other. Like wanting to be thin and wanting to eat pizza and ice cream all day. It just doesn’t work that way.
The real problem is that this duel goes far beyond what you choose to eat. It affects every single area of your life. It affects your marriage, your career, your kids, your church life – it affects it all.
We have been talking for the last several weeks about how we are saved by faith in Jesus Christ. We have been learning that we are saved by grace and not by our good works. But what does that mean? Does being saved by grace mean that I can sin with total abandon? No! It means that I can totally abandon sin! It doesn’t mean that we can be free to sin, but free from sin.
The book of Galatians is a book about victory. That is why this series is titled “Victory in Jesus.” You can experience real victory in your showdown with sin. But just like the cowboy in the open illustration, if you want to win this duel, you must “Aim to Win.” And that is what we are going to be talking about this morning. Let me share with you three principles from Galatians 5 about how to “Aim to Win.”
A – Avoid Negative Influences.
"According to the Associated Press, on December 14, 1996, a 763-foot grain freighter, the Bright Field, was heading down the Mississippi at New Orleans, Louisiana, when it lost control, veered toward the shore, and crashed into a riverside shopping mall. At the time the Riverwalk Mall was crowded with some 1,000 shoppers, and 116 people were injured. The impact of the freighter demolished parts of the wharf, which is the site of two hundred shops and restaurants as well as the adjoining Hilton Hotel.
The ship had lost control at the stretch in the Mississippi that is considered the most dangerous to navigate. After investigating the accident for a year, the Coast Guard reported that the freighter had lost control because the engine had shut down. The engine had shut down because of low oil pressure. The oil pressure was low because of a clogged oil filter. And the oil filter was clogged because the ship’s crew had failed to maintain the engine properly.
Furthermore, this failure was not out of character. According to the lead Coast Guard investigator, the ship’s owner and crew had failed to test the ship’s equipment and to repair longstanding engine problems. Sudden disasters frequently have a long history behind them." (SOURCE: Craig Brian Larson. Choice Contemporary Stories & Illustrations For Preachers, Teachers, & Writers. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1998, p. 65.)
Sudden spiritual disasters often times have a long history as well – a long history of failing to filter your influences. If you fail to avoid negative influences, you are heading for a spiritual shipwreck. If you are going to have any chance at all to win this spiritual showdown with sin, you are going to have to avoid negative influences.
Look at what Paul has to say about this:
7You were running a good race. Who cut in on you and kept you from obeying the truth? 8That kind of persuasion does not come from the one who calls you. 9”A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough.”
Paul is saying, “You’re listening to the wrong crowd. You’re allowing the wrong kind of people to influence your spiritual lives.
For the Galatians the negative influences that they were failing to filter or avoid were coming from a group a Jewish Christians. The Jews were called Judaizers and they were legalists. They said that you had to add obedience to the Old Testament rules and regulations to faith in Jesus Christ in order to be saved. The key issue for them was circumcision because circumcision represented all the Jewish laws. For them it was faith + works = salvation.
Paul was furious about this perversion of the true Gospel and he warned them:
10The one who is throwing you into confusion will pay the penalty, whoever he may be … 12As for those agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate themselves!
The word rendered “emasculate” by the NIV literally means “to cut off, to amputate.” Paul was saying that he wished that these false teachers would not stop with mere circumcision, but would go all the way and castrate themselves.
Cleary Paul is really upset about this and he isn’t pulling and punches with these false teachers. Paul isn’t arguing about some minor doctrinal difference, but about the central doctrine of Christianity – how is one saved?
Paul says don’t listen to them, listen to me:
10aI am trusting the Lord to bring you back to believing as I do about these things. (NLT)
He is saying, “Don’t believe as they do. Listen to me and believe as I do.” Paul could say that because as we learned earlier in this series he was preaching a gospel that had been received by revelation directly from the Lord, that was consistent with the Old Testament Scriptures, and had been endorsed by the leaders of the Christian church.
You need to get into the habit of avoiding negative influences. You need to get into the habit of practicing selective hearing. Guys, some of your wives think that you have already got that mastered. I know my wife thinks I have.
Who do you listen to? I think we all probably have at least one person in our lives who is the voice of the law. This person is someone who tends to be very legalistic about secondary issues. They hold up an impossibly high standard and then bring your every shortcoming to your attention every chance they get. They are quick to remind you that if you don’t do this or if you don’t do that then you are not a good Christian. Maybe this voice is the voice of a parent, or of a spouse, or of a friend, but we often times make the mistake of projecting that voice onto God. And so we think we here God telling us, “Prove it. Show me. Earn it. Work for it. Then I’ll accept you. Then I’ll love you.” Let me tell you unequivocally that is not the voice of God.
Instead get into the habit of listening to the voices of grace in your life. Now please understand that the voice of grace doesn’t pooh, pooh sin. While on the one hand the voice of grace isn’t shy about calling sin sin, on the other hand it is quick to remind you that God loved the world – sinners – so much that he sent his Son Jesus to die on the cross to pay for their sins. The voice of grace is the voice of encouragement, comfort, and support. The voice of grace will remind you of the goodness of God and ignite within you a passion for holy living. So learn to listen to the voice of grace and learn to let the voice of the self-righteous, legalistic hypocrites fall on deaf hears.
If you are going to win this showdown with sin, then like the cowboy in the opening illustration, you have go to aim to win. And aiming to win starts with avoiding negative influences.
Then there is a second habit that you need to form.
I – Initiate Service To Others.
A number of years ago, rock legend Bob Dylan wrote a song called, “You Gotta Serve Somebody.” The song runs through just about every possible “kind” of person you might want to mention, and then, after every verse, pounds home the message that, regardless of who you are, “You gotta serve somebody; It may be the devil and it may be the Lord, but you gotta serve somebody.”
While I wouldn’t want to get a ton of theology from Bob Dylan, I think he is onto something here. Like the apostle Paul, Dylan recognized that people aren’t defined so much by their behavior, their profession, their family, their status, but in the end, they are defined by whom they serve. (Mary Lewis – Sermon Central)
Look at the apostles’ words:
13You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love. 14The entire law is summed up on a single command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Have you every noticed how often the Bible connects true spirituality to how we treat other people? One of the reasons why legalists prefer legalism is that is allows them to remain focused on themselves. They prefer this for two reasons. First it is much easier. It is much easier to keep a few rules than it is to genuinely care about other people and sacrifice personally to meet their needs. Also legalism allows them to remain focused on themselves. It is as if they can say, “Look at me. Look at how wonderful I am. Look at how well I am doing at keeping these rules. Look at how spiritual I am.” While the focus of the grace centered person is on others. Instead of look at me it is look at you and how I can help you.
Back in verse six Paul tells us that this is central characteristic of a grace-based life.
6The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.
What a powerful statement. “The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.”
Skipping ahead for a moment to chapter six we find Paul saying, “Whenever we have the opportunity, we should do good to everyone” (Galatians 6:10, NLT).
For years the focus of the Vineyard Christian Fellowship in Cincinnati, Ohio has been developing believers who are committed to servanthood. They have reached thousands of people and touched thousands of lives through their commitment to serve others. They have made it a habit to look for opportunities to serve others. They go to sporting events and give away fee sunglasses. They go to marathons and give away bottled water. They go into businesses and offer to clean toilets. They go to biking trails and set up free Gatorade stands. Each Christmas they open a booth at the mall and offer free gift wrapping. (SermonNotes.com)
That is the way Christians should live their lives. We shouldn’t b waiting for an opportunity to do good to come along. We should be out looking for opportunities to do good for others.
You’ve heard it said, “God helps those who help themselves.” Some of you probably think that saying is from the Bible, but its not. What Paul is saying to us here is that God helps those who help others.
A young boy by the name of James had a desire to be the most famous manufacturer and salesman of cheese in the world. He planned on becoming rich and famous by making and selling cheese and began with a little buggy pulled by a pony named Paddy. After making his cheese, he would load his wagon and he and Paddy would drive down the streets of Chicago to sell the cheese. As the months passed, the young boy began to despair because he was not making any money, in spite of his long hours and hard work.
One day he pulled his pony to a stop and began to talk to him. He said, "Paddy, there is something wrong. We are not doing it right. I am afraid we have things turned around and our priorities are not where they ought to be. Maybe we ought to serve God and place him first in our lives." The boy drove home and made a covenant that for the rest of his life he would first serve God and then would work as God directed.
Many years after this, the young boy, now a man, stood as Sunday School Superintendent at North Shore Baptist Church in Chicago and said, "I would rather be a layman in the North Shore Baptist Church than to head the greatest corporation in America. My first job is serving Jesus."
So, every time you take a take a bite of Philadelphia Cream cheese, sip a cup of Maxwell House, mix a quart of Kool-Aid, slice up a DiGiorno Pizza, cook a pot of Macaroni & Cheese, spread some Grey Poupon, stir a bowl of Cream of Wheat, slurp down some Jell-O, eat the cream out of the middle of an Oreo cookie, or serve some Stove Top, remember a boy, his pony named Paddy, and the promise little James L. Kraft made to serve God and work as He directed. (SermonCentral Pro - Adapted by Brett Blair from Michael Green, Illustrations for Biblical Preaching, Baker, p. 331.)
It is amazing what God can do in and through your life when you make up your mind to put God and others first.
But there is a third thing that you have to do when you aim to win.
M – Make Up Your Mind To Be Holy.
Frank Outlaw said, “Watch your thoughts; they become words. Watch your words; they become actions. Watch your actions; they become habits. Watch your habits; they become character. What your character; it becomes your destiny.”
He is saying that everything you are today is a result of what you were thinking yesterday. And all that you will one day become will be a result of what and how you are thinking today. So if you want to change your life you need to start by changing the way you think. If you want to win this showdown with sin, you have to make up your mind to win. You have to make up your mind to be holy.
Paul told the Romans, “Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires” (Romans 8:5).
Walking in the Spirit begins with thinking in the Spirit. Living a holy life begins with thinking holy thoughts. And the same is true with sin. First, you think it and then you do it. That’s the problem with thinking bad thoughts. They don’t just stay up there in your brain, but they find a way to work themselves out in your behavior.
In today’s passage Paul spells out exactly what kind of lifestyle sinful thinking will lead to.
19 People’s desires make them give in to immoral ways, filthy thoughts, and shameful deeds. 20They worship idols, practice witchcraft, hate others, and are hard to get along with. People become jealous, angry, and selfish. They not only argue and cause trouble, but they are 21envious. They get drunk, carry on at wild parties, and do other evil things as well. I told you before, and I am telling you again: No one who does these things will share in the blessings of God’s kingdom.
Let me tell you another habit that we need to get into. We need to get into the habit of thinking about the consequences of our behavior. Let us just for a moment set aside some of the more outlandish sins in that list and look at some of the others. Paul lists things like jealousy, anger, selfishness, envy, and being hard to get along with as sins that will disqualify you for entrance into the kingdom of God. That is some pretty serious stuff here.
Now let me also say that just because you get angry once in a while doesn’t mean that you can’t go to heaven. Paul is talking about what happens when you live a life where these things are the rule rather than the exception.
However, you can be sure that if your life is characterized by the things in that list, you are in some real spiritual danger. But the good news is that you don’t have to stay that way. Just because your sinful nature has won some battles doesn’t mean that it has to win the war. You can have victory in Jesus. You can win this showdown with sin if you make up your mind to be holy. Because when you focus your thoughts on holy things those thoughts will also translate into holy actions and behavior.
Paul says that the following things are the fruit of setting your mind on the things of the Holy Spirit.
22The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness and selfcontrol.
Listen to this list as it is in the Message paraphrase:
22But what happens when we live God’s way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard--things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, 23not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely.
Paul says that when we set our minds on the Holy Spirit – when we make up our minds to be holy – and allow him to control our lives, these are the kinds of results that we get. Then look at the next verse.
24Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires.
You have to say to God, “Every desire, every thought that I have that isn’t pleasing to you, I want to put to death. As you go through each day of your life you will be making decisions and choices. Think about the negative consequences of following your own sinful desires. And then think about the positive results of following the leading of the Holy Spirit. And then choose to nail your sinful desires to the cross.
Conclusion:
I hope that I have not oversimplified this message because this battle is not easy. But as believers we do have an unfair advantage. We have the power of the Holy Spirit working in our lives. We can only win this showdown with sin, when we choose to die to our own selfish desire and to live for God alone.
If you are going to do that, you must aim to win. You need to avoid the negative influences in life that will seek to drag you down and lead you in the wrong direction. You need to initiate serving others, because God helps those who help others. And you need to make up your mind to be holy, because only then can the Holy Spirits power be unleashed in your life.
Because of these things you can now live your life with the confidence that you will win over sin. And have that confidence will change your life.
Lyle Arakaki of Honolulu, Hawaii tells the following story about himself. "In Hawaii, because of the time difference with the continental U.S., the National Football League Monday night football game is played in mid-afternoon; so the local TV station delays its telecast till 6:30 in the evening. When my favorite team plays, I’m too excited to wait for television, so I’ll listen to the game on the radio, which broadcasts it live. Then, because they are my favorite team, I’ll watch the game on television too. If I know my team has won the game, it influences how I watch it on television. If my team fumbles the ball or throws an interception, it’s not a problem. I just think, That’s bad, but it’s okay. In the end, we’ll win." (Randy Aly – SermonCentral)
That is the kind of confidence I am talking about. Having the knowledge that you are going to win in the end makes a huge difference. If you briefly slip into sin, it doesn’t get you down into despair because you know that sin is fighting a losing battle – it is a lost cause. You can repent and get back on feet and continue to live a life of victory in Jesus.
Please email me if you use this sermon or a revision of it. Thank you!!!
steveamanda8297@hotmail.com
