Expanding Self-Examination, Part 2

I love to preach the Word of God. I love to study the Word of God. I like to pray over the Word of God. And to be able to share with you each and every week, twice, Wednesdays and Sundays, the things that God's teaching me. And every once in a while, not often, but every once in a while, maybe two, three times a year, there's a nerve that's touched in the church. And people respond in a different way. You come to me and you say, wow, that really touched my heart. Wow, that really challenged me to live for Christ.

I needed that sermon. Doesn't happen every week. I don't know why it doesn't, but it doesn't. But every once in a while, I preach something and the Spirit of the Lord touches you in a unique and special way and you come back and say something to me. When that happens, I know that I need to finish it. So I'm gonna do that. Six weeks ago, we talked about self-examination and expanding self-examination. Because it's one of the disciplines of the Christian life. And what better time to do that than on Sunday morning, before you partake at the Lord's table, where 1 Corinthians 11, 28 says, let a man examine himself.

To see where he's at. So important. So that he doesn't eat and drink at the table in an unworthy manner. And self-examination is one of those disciplines that just falls right in line with the discipline of Scripture or the discipline of supplication or the discipline of self-denial or the discipline of surrender or the discipline of song. And the disciplines go on and on and on in Scripture. There are so many of them, but they characterize the person who wants to discipline himself unto godliness, as Paul would challenge Timothy.

It's a discipline. Paul says, I beat my body into subjection, lest I be disqualified from the ministry. He understood the rigors of discipline. And that's why it's so important for us to realize that the Scriptures spell out for us what it means to discipline yourself unto godliness. And one day, I'm gonna preach through all those disciplines. Just not today. But I want to preach and continue what we started six weeks ago on the discipline of self-examination. Because we need to look, first of all, at the reality of our faith.

We covered this last time. Because there are many people who believe they're in the faith, but they're not. So you examine the reality of your faith. That's what James 2 is about. You have Abraham, you have Rahab. Both, by the way, are in Hebrews 11. Both we will discuss in depth. Both Abraham's life and Rahab's life. The prostitute, as well as that great man of God, Abraham. They were a people of faith. And God used them. And yet their faith was always seen in the works of their lives. Faith is always evident in our lifestyle.

So you examine the reality of your faith as you come before the Lord's table. That's why Paul says in 2 Corinthians 13, verse number 5, see if Jesus is in you. Test yourself. Prove yourself. Does Jesus reign supreme in your life? Are you a man and a woman of supreme faith? So we looked at examining the reality of our faith. Then we move to look at the destiny of my soul.

That's self-examination. Where will I spend eternity? The Bible says, What should a prophet of man do if he gains the whole world, yet loses his own soul?

Do you understand the destiny of your soul? Do you know what's going to happen when you die? The Bible says that the rich young ruler came to our Lord and said, What must I do to inherit eternal life?

Good teacher, what can I do? Because he knew that even though he was rich and he had all the world's possessions, he was empty on the inside because man has been created by God with a longing for the eternal God. And the Lord told him, You've got to keep the commandments. He said, I've done all that. And the Lord said, Well, you know what? Sell all that you have. Give to the poor and come follow me. The man wouldn't do that. Because you see, he was an idolater. He had another God. He wanted to serve another God, the God of possession, the God of money.

That's the God he bowed before. He was not willing to surrender that to follow the great Savior of the world and cry out to him to have mercy upon him. And the man went away. We hear nothing about the man again. How about you? Have you examined your life to understand the destiny of your soul? Will you spend eternity with the living God? Oh, that's so important. I mean, I think about if COVID did anything, it did this. It helped man examine the destiny of his soul. Where's he going to go? What if he dies?

What happens next? We have the answer to that. God has spelled it out to us. That's why we live with no fear. We as Christians never feared COVID. We as Christians never feared death. That's what characterizes the believer. He lives with no fear. Except for the fear of the one who can kill body and soul in hell. That's certainly one we fear. And so we examine our lives in terms of the reality of our faith, the destiny of our soul, and the authenticity of my heart. God told those in Edom, the Edomites, who lived in the red rose city of the rocks, Petra, who felt that they could never be defeated.

He said, the arrogance of your heart, Obadiah 1 verse number 3, has deceived you. You think you can't be defeated, but you can. The authenticity, the sincerity of my heart. That's why Solomon said, son, give me your heart. Why? Because out of your heart flow all the issues of life. Your heart is the wellspring of all things in life. And so where is the sincerity of your heart? Where is your heart? Who has your heart? Does God have your heart? So we talked about the authenticity of your heart. This was all last time.

And the fourth one was the purity of your mind. The purity of your mind. Back in July when Cade and Rachel were married here in the church, I talked about building a lasting legacy of love. And it begins with purity of mind. A mind that's been cleansed. That's been washed. And that continuing on through marriage, a pure and holy life. So important. You know, when God gave the very first instruction to the church, it wasn't in the book of Acts.

It was in the Gospels. Before the church was ever born. Before any of the apostles knew anything about a church, in Matthew 18, he gave instruction on how to deal with a person who lives in sin. Why? Because you need to understand that the one who gave his life and died for the church wants the church to live his kind of life. A pure and holy life. That's why in the book of Acts, the church is born. Next thing that happens is persecution on the church because the church needs to be purified. And then there's a punishment of Ananias and Sapphira.

They die in the church because they lied about how much they sold their property for. And great fear came upon everybody in the church. And great fear came upon everybody in Jerusalem because God is serious about sin. He wants a pure and holy church more than anything else. So you look at your life and say, is my mind pure before the Lord?

The Bible says very clearly in Proverbs 23, verse number 7, as a man thinks within himself, so is he.

Therefore we are to think of the things that are true, Philippians 4, things that are pure, things that are holy. There needs to be a purity of mind. And that's all that we covered last time. But I can't get off of that. I got to stay right there. Why? Because we are to be as holy as Christ himself is holy. This becomes the benchmark of the church. We are a called-out people. We are a people chosen by God to live for God. If we're going to represent God, we must live pure and holy lives before him.

Years ago, back in 1983, 84, excuse me, I was a college pastor at a church in New York. It's there I met my wife Lori, and we're shortly married after that time. But I did a series. I was in charge of scheduling all the chapels. We had 150 chapels a year. So I scheduled all those chapels. I decided to spend a week of those chapels preaching on the purity of the believer, the purity of the believer. Now this is a Christian college. And so when I was all done, they had a student council meeting. And the meeting was to discuss why the college pastor would be so bold as to challenge us as Christians to live a pure and holy life.

And so they packed out the auditorium with students, and they had this big debate, and they invited me to come, which is always a good thing. And so the student body president said, Mr. Sparks, would you come down and tell us why you're doing this? I said, sure. I said, first of all, the Lord wants you to be holy as he is holy.

But when I look around the church, when I look around the campus, I realize that in this semester alone, and it wasn't even half over yet, it was only October, I said, we've had 11 abortions on our campus. 11 students have had abortions already that we know of. That's not talking about all the students that we don't know that had abortions. That's just in a half a semester. And you're asking me why I would be so bold as to preach on the purity of the believer and a pure and holy life that we are to maintain.

You're asking me that question when there's so much immorality on our campus anyway. And there was, sad to say. So what I preached on, I have preached on all these years, same thing. How can I live a life of purity? So if you're taking notes, hopefully you are, just take the word purity, P-U-R-I-T-Y. And I'm gonna challenge you to live a pure and holy life by looking at what the scripture says about purity.

Number one, pour yourself into the word of God. If you're not in the word of God and not under the word of God, you will not live a pure and holy life. You have to pour yourself into the word of God. I choose my words very carefully, not a cursory reading of the word of God, but if what you do and receive is what you have on Sunday and that's it, or Wednesday and Sunday and that's it, that's not good enough. You gotta pour yourself into the word of God. How can a young man keep his way pure, the psalmist says?

By taking heed to the word of God. Thy word I have treasured in my heart that I might not sin against thee. It's the word of God that cleanses you. Christ said in John 15 verse number three, you have been made clean through the word that I've spoken unto you.

You must be in and under the word of God constantly. It is your lifeline. It's everything to you. And if you choose not to pour yourself into the word of God, you will pour yourself into something else. You'll pour it into a hobby. You'll pour it into your education. You'll pour it into your job. But you must pour into the word of God. Remember what God told Joshua? He said you must meditate on the law day and night. Joshua was about to lead the children of Israel into the land of promise. There were two million Jews he had to lead into that land.

You can add up all the people that we oversee in this auditorium, it would not add up to two million Jews. He had a huge responsibility. Mammoth, much more than you have or I have. And God says you must meditate on my word day and night.

You must pour yourself, Joshua, to the word of God. If you're gonna lead my people, you gotta lead them my way. And the only way you're gonna lead them my way is if you know me. So pour yourself into the word of God. Meditate on it on a day and night. Psalm 1, verses 1 to 3, who's the blessed man? The one who delights in the law of God and meditates on it day and night. That's the blessed man, right? You gotta pour yourself into the word of the living God. I would like to say that there's some kind of magic formula that would allow you to live a pure life.

It's not tricky. It's not hard to find. God says pour yourself into the word of God. I would trust you'd do that. You, that's point number two, you.

Not you as in Y-O-U, but you as in you, okay? Understand the choice in temptation. Understand the choice in temptation. When you're tempted, you have a choice. Here they are. Are you ready? Okay. You're gonna choose the path of pleasure or you're gonna choose the path of pain. You have one or two choices. You don't have three choices or four or five or six. You have one of two choices. One path is pleasure and the other path is pain. If at the point of temptation you want to be pleased, sin. If at the point of temptation you don't want to be pleased but honor the Lord, you choose pain.

But the pathway of pleasure is called the pathway of temporary pleasure. And the pathway of pain is called the pathway of temporary pain. Why? Because there is a way, it would seem, with writing to a man, but the ends are over the ways of death, not life. So it might be pleasurable at first, but the end result is death.

And you might not physically die, but you'll have a death-like existence. How many people do you know that live a death-like existence? Because they've chosen the path of pleasure. But if you choose the path of pain, at thy right hand are pleasures forevermore. The temporary path of pain always leads to permanent pleasure and the path of temporary pleasure always leads to permanent pain. The path of pleasure is disobedience and the path of pain is obedience. It always costs to obey. Ask Joseph. When he was tempted, he chose the path of pain.

Oh, he could have slept with Potiphar's wife. That would have been the path of pleasure. But when temptation came, he chose the path of pain. He ran away. And he was cast into prison. And therefore, he was there for a number of years before he was ever able to rise to a place of prominence and experience the ultimate pleasure of being the ruler in Egypt, even more so than Pharaoh himself. Think about it this way. For those of you who want to move on to the book of Hebrews, Hebrews chapter 11. Remember Hebrews 11?

It's the story of Moses. And we'll study him in depth. By faith, Moses, when he was born, was hidden for three months by his parents because they saw he was a beautiful child and they were not afraid of the king's edict. Oh, I love Jacob, Ben, and Abraham. The king's edict meant nothing to them. They didn't care. They were not going to sacrifice their child because the king said, you got to die. Throw all the male babies into the Nile River. They weren't going to do that. By faith, Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.

Here you go. Choosing rather to endure ill treatment with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin. Okay? So you have two choices. Enjoy the passing pleasures of sin or endure ill treatment with the people of God. One of two choices. And you must understand that when you are tempted to engage in any kind of sinful behavior, no matter what it is, you have one of two choices. Pleasure or pain. The reason we choose pleasure or choose sin is because sin is pleasurable. That's Satan's great lie.

He deceives us into thinking, this will meet your needs. This will satisfy you. This will be good for you. The same thing he told Adam and Eve way back in the Garden of Eden. Or like Moses, or like Joseph, you choose the path of pain, the path of obedience, the path that endures ill treatment with the people of God. There is always a choice to make. You must understand that choice. If you pour yourself into the Word of God, you are equipped to make the right choice. But if you're constantly making the wrong choices, it's simply because you have not let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly as Colossians 3.16 says.

It's not at home in your heart. You haven't treasured God's Word in your heart that you might not sin against Him. You've treasured other things in your heart. Therefore, when the temptation comes, you choose pleasure instead of pain because temporary pleasure means more to you than temporary pain. Always a bad choice. You do what you do because you make a choice. The choices you make today will affect your tomorrow. Every single time. Make the right choice. To live a pure life, pour yourself into the Word of God.

Understand the choice in temptation. R, renew your mind. Ephesians 4.23 says we're to be renewed in the spirit of our minds. Paul says in Romans 12, and Tim quoted earlier, be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Our minds need to be renewed. That's where meditation comes in. That's where memorization comes in. We want to pour ourselves into the Word of God? Yes. That helps us understand the choice in temptation? Yes. But all the while, we are renewing our minds because we're memorizing and meditating upon the Word of God.

Boy, if you go through Psalm 119, what a beautiful, beautiful picture of all that the Lord is doing in the life of the psalmist as he recognizes the importance of meditation. In Psalm 119, the Bible says this in verse number 23.

Even though princes sit and talk against me, your servant meditates on your statutes. Verse 15 of Psalm 119. I will meditate on your precepts and regard your ways. I shall delight in your statutes. I shall not forget your word. Verse 48. And I shall lift up my hands to your commandments, which I love, and I will meditate on your statutes. Verse number 78. May the arrogant be ashamed, for they subvert me with a lie. But I shall meditate on your precepts. Verse 97. Oh, how I love your law. It is my meditation all the day.

Verse 148. My eyes anticipate the night watches that I may meditate on your word. The psalmist says, I just want to meditate upon your word. I want to get to know you as thoroughly as possible. I want to muse over the truth of God's word. That's how you renew your mind. Listen, we have become the disciples of our society, more so than the disciples of our Savior. We become better disciples of our culture than disciples of the Christ. We think like the culture thinks. You can't do that. And that was opened up to us more so at any other time than at COVID.

We fear like the world fears. We're concerned as the world's concerned. You're letting media, social media, movies, television control your mind. Instead of letting God's word control your mind, knowing what he says, what he expects, what he wants you to do. We need to be people of the word of God, constantly renewing our minds, being disciples of the Christ, always in the word, under the word, memorizing the word, medicating upon the word, renewing our minds. Our minds need to be purified, cleansed, directed in terms of the ways of God.

So important. And you as parents have got to pass that down to your children. They've got to see how mom and dad's minds are being renewed day by day. So pour yourself into the word of God. Understand the choice and temptation. Renew your mind. I involve yourself in accountability. Involve yourself in accountability. As iron sharpens iron, Proverbs 27, 17, so one man sharpens another. Gentlemen, if you're married, you want to live a pure life, hold yourself accountable to your wife. Speak freely with your wife.

Let her know who you talk to, who you text, who you email, who you meet with. Let her know your schedule so you're totally accountable to your wife. Accountability is about you, not about the person who holds you accountable. You have to want to be accountable. And your wife is your greatest accountability partner. Because you are one flesh with her. You're one with her. Only in marriage is one plus one, one. In the world, one plus one is two. But in marriage, one plus one is one. You're one flesh with your wife.

What better person to be accountable to? And if you're not married, you need to choose someone that's very close to you that you can say, I want to submit myself to you. I want to hold myself accountable to you for where I go, what's on my phone, what's on my computer, what I look at, what I say, where I go, the movies I watch.

I want you to know what I'm doing. You do that. You're on your way to living a pure life. Involve yourself in accountability so incredibly important. Listen, you need to hang around people that honor and glorify the Lord. The Bible says in the book of Proverbs, the 13th chapter, the 20th verse, he who walks with wise men will be wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm.

Tell me who you follow and I will show you your future. Tell it to your kids. Show me or tell me who you follow and I will show you your future. He who hangs around with wise men will be wise, the companion of fools will suffer harm. Involve yourself in accountability. If you are renewing your minds, you'll want to be accountable because you've understood the choice and temptation because you've poured yourself into the word of God. T, I wish I could spend more time on all these. Take drastic measures.

Take drastic measures. Now remember, since 1984, I've been preaching the same sermon to college students, to youth students, to adults, married, single, because the principles go across the board. You gotta take drastic measures. Why do I say that? That's what Jesus said. Matthew chapter 5. You have heard that it was said you should not commit adultery, but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her. In his heart, if your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it far from you.

For it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it far from you. For it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. Jesus said, listen, you think that if you commit adultery, you've sinned. I'm telling you, if you're looking lustfully upon a woman, you have already committed adultery with her in your heart. So therefore, take whatever measures are necessary to make sure that doesn't happen.

He's not literally saying, pluck out your eyes and cut off your arm. Listen, we'd all be blind and armless. We wouldn't find our way to church. We couldn't even drive to church. We couldn't even get an Uber to take us because that guy would be blind and armless as well. So he's not literally talking about that. He is saying this, take whatever measure is necessary so that you don't engage in sinful behavior. If you have to get rid of your computers, get rid of your computers. If you got to go back to a dumb phone instead of a smart phone, get a dumb phone.

There's nothing wrong with that. If you have to cut off a relationship, cut it off. If that relationship was with an unbeliever, cut it off. If that relationship is with a believer and yet you're still continuing in sin, cut it off. Be willing to risk the relationship for the sake of the truth of God's word and the purity of your own life and mind. That is so important. Take whatever measures are necessary so you don't engage in sin. Are you willing to do that? See, most people don't want to do that.

They say, well, I need this or I need that. But you know what? The only thing you need is a relationship with the living God. Are you willing to do what is ever necessary for you to live a pure and holy life? You will have to take some of the most drastic measures you can ever think of to do so. And that's where the rubber meets the road. But if you've poured yourself into the word of God, if you've immersed yourself into the text, you then understand the choice and temptation is either pleasure or pain.

Disobedience, obedience. But it's only temporary because the ends are over the ways of death. Here at thy right hand are pleasures forevermore. Moses would endure ill treatment with the people of God rather than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin because he knew at the end was the glory and honor of his God. Once you understand the choice and temptation, you renew your mind by meditating and memorizing scripture. You involve yourself in accountability with wise men, wise women, godly people. Why?

Because you want to make sure your life is true and pure and holy. You want that. See? And you are willing to take whatever measures are necessary to live that kind of life. And lastly, you yield yourself to the spirit's control. Walk in the spirit, Galatians 5, 16. So you do not fulfill the lust of the flesh. You must take every step that you take dependent upon the spirit of God. That's what it means to yield to a spirit. That's what it means to walk in the spirit. Be controlled, be filled with the spirit.

And this comes right back around to pouring yourself into the word of God because now you're making the word of God dwell in you richly. It's at home in your heart. So every time you take a step, every time you walk someplace, you're walking dependent upon the spirit. You are trusting the spirit to guide you, to lead you because you know what God's word says and you want to follow what God's word says. So you yield totally, moment by moment, to the spirit of God. Yielding to the spirit of God is not like scope.

Once in the morning does it. You yield to the spirit of God moment by moment. That's why you walk in the spirit with each step you take so your words are the words of God, your thoughts are the thoughts of God. The purity of your mind is so important because it leads to the purity of life, which leads to the purity of the church, which leads to a beautiful picture of the bride of Christ. And that's who we are. And that's why self-examination needs to be expanded way beyond the reality of my faith, way beyond the destiny of my soul, way beyond the authenticity of my heart to the purity of my mind that I might live a life that glorifies the King.

Let me pray with you. Father, thank you for today. Lord, you've brought us here to hear this today. Nobody came by accident today. Everybody's here by divine appointment. This sermon, this sermon, Lord, is one that you've put on my heart to share with your people because you want a pure and holy church. You died that we might live your life. And Father, with you in us, you can instruct us and teach us in the way that we should go. Help us, Lord, to depend upon you for everything that we might glorify your name in every decision that we make, that we'd be willing to take whatever measure is necessary to say, I want to be pure before my God.

In Jesus' name, amen.