Your Commitment To Purity - God Will Make A Way

Your Commitment to Purity - God Will Make a Way

1 Corinthians 10:13

Sermon by: Rick Crandall

McClendon Baptist Church - Nov. 26, 2006

“No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.” (1 Corin 10:13)

*It’s a whole lot harder to grow up today than it used to be. There’s no doubt about it. I’ve heard a hundred people say it, “It’s a whole lot harder to grow up today than it used to be.”

*Last Tuesday, USA Today online had an article with this headline: “Almost 4 in 10 U.S. children born out of wedlock in 2005” (1)

*Yesterday My Way online news had a long article with the headline, “10 Is the New 15 As Kids Grow Up Faster”

*Here is a little of that in-depth article: “Diane Levin, a professor of human development and early childhood at Wheelock College in Boston, is among those who’ve taken aim at toys deemed too violent or sexual. ‘We’ve crossed a line. We can no longer avoid it _ it’s just so in our face,’ says Levin, author of the upcoming book ‘So Sexy So Soon: The Sexualization of Childhood.’” (2)

*Staying pure may have never been harder, but God will make a way for you. This is His promise for you in 1 Cor 10:13, “No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.”

*God will make a way for you. Let’s look into His Word tonight and see how.

1. First of all, realize the seriousness of sexual sin.

*This is one of the most important things we need to do, and this can be hard to do with our media telling you just the opposite 24/7. They give us shows like “Sex in the City” five nights a week, and then we can switch over to “E” and watch 80-year-old Hugh Hefner living like a king with his three 20-something girlfriends. You can’t go through the channels on your TV without seeing something designed to be sexually appealing.

*As far as our media is concerned, there are basically only 2 sexual sins. One is unprotected sex, but the greatest sex sin in their eyes is judging other people’s lifestyles. That’s the media’s view, but God’s Word is clear: Sex outside of marriage is a sin. God wants it to be one man and one woman for a lifetime.

*There are many places to see this. Let’s look for a few minutes at Matt 5:27-32.

27. "You have heard that it was said to those of old, `You shall not commit adultery.’ 28. "But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

*Reading these verses, we can see that there is no question that pornography is a sin...

29. "And if your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell. 30. "And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell.”

*Of course, Jesus is not telling us to literally gouge out our eye. It wouldn’t do any good anyway, because the problem is not in our eyes or our hands. The problem is in our hearts. What the Lord is doing in these verses is showing us the seriousness of sexual sin.

*Then in vs. 31-32, Jesus said: "Furthermore it has been said, `Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that whoever divorces his wife for any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a woman who is divorced commits adultery.”

*Now, we are not here to beat-up on divorced people. There is probably not a family here in this church that has not been touched by divorce. And God loves divorced people, but God hates divorce.

*Why? One reason why is because it hurts so many people. Divorce hurts husbands and wives. It also hurts children.

-And nobody knows that better than divorced people. Nobody ever went through a divorce and said, “Boy that was fun. Let’s do it again.”