(audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) - My head's ringing. (audience chattering) I feel like half, like the entire time, it was just sound check. (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) - Yeah, only our streaming quality was good.
- Yeah, streaming's everything. (audience chattering) - No, I mean like, I'm just trying to get megatrends, you know, like professional. (audience chattering) Yeah, they're like, their Sunday streaming sounds like a CD track. - Yeah, yeah. (audience chattering) - They're all like, wearing like, a couple hundred not so high-end.
(audience chattering) (audience chattering) - I just, I'm just trying not to cough and like, not think about my head anymore. - Yeah. (audience chattering) - I just had some. (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (phone chimes) (phone chimes) (phone chimes) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (phone chimes) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (phone chimes) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) Honestly, at any session, any song, any time, like, I don't know, I did it today.
(audience chattering) Wait, when? You filled in or something? Or you play on Sundays? (audience chattering) Oh, try it. (audience chattering) (audience chattering) It's hard to go all out, like. (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) (audience chattering) What up, my brother? (audience chattering) Okay, hello, hello, good evening, everybody.
Let's gather at our tables, get situated to start our Bible study tonight. (audience chattering) Give a moment just for people to take their seats. Glad to see all of y'all. Please join with me in a word of prayer as we begin. Lord God, we truly do want to thank you and praise you.
Lord, we are grateful for your kind intention that you continue just to lavish on us, that you would lead us and guide us every single day of our lives. And what's more, Lord, we place an incredible amount of trust and hope that this journey that we are on, God, you're going to perfect it.
So in everything, God, we wanna thank you. And this opportunity we have tonight to join together as brothers and sisters to study your word, to encourage each other and to share, we know, God, it's an incredible privilege for us, so we praise you for that as well. And now, God, as we join our voices, as we lift you up, God, we do pray that through our faith you'd be honored, and God, that what we do would be pleasing in your sight.
It's in Christ, let me pray, amen. (gentle music) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) ♪ Jesus, the name above every other name ♪ ♪ Jesus, the only one who could ever save ♪ ♪ Worthy of every breath we could ever breathe ♪ ♪ We live for you ♪ ♪ Oh, we live for you ♪ ♪ Holy, holy ♪ ♪ There is no one like you ♪ ♪ There is none besides you ♪ ♪ Open up my eyes in wonder ♪ ♪ Show me who you are and fill me with your heart ♪ ♪ And lead me in your love to those around me ♪ Sing worthy.
(gentle music continues) ♪ Worthy of every song we could ever sing ♪ ♪ Worthy of all the praise we could ever bring ♪ ♪ Worthy of every breath we could ever breathe ♪ ♪ We live for you ♪ ♪ Jesus ♪ (gentle music continues) ♪ Jesus, the name above every other name ♪ ♪ Jesus, the only one who could ever save ♪ ♪ Worthy of every breath we could ever breathe ♪ ♪ We live for you ♪ ♪ Oh, we live for you ♪ ♪ Holy, holy ♪ ♪ There is no one like you ♪ ♪ There is none besides you ♪ ♪ Open up my eyes in wonder ♪ ♪ Show me who you are and fill me with your heart ♪ ♪ And lead me in your love to those around me ♪ ♪ Holy, there is no one like you ♪ ♪ There is none besides you ♪ ♪ Open up my eyes in wonder ♪ ♪ Show me who you are and fill me with your heart ♪ ♪ And lead me in your love to those around me ♪ (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) ♪ And I will build my life upon your love ♪ ♪ It is a firm foundation ♪ ♪ And I will put my trust in you alone ♪ ♪ And I will not be shaken ♪ ♪ And I will build my life upon your love ♪ ♪ It is a firm foundation ♪ ♪ And I will put my trust in you alone ♪ ♪ And I will not be shaken ♪ ♪ Holy, there is no one like you ♪ ♪ There is none besides you ♪ ♪ Open up my eyes in wonder ♪ ♪ Show me who you are and fill me with your heart ♪ ♪ And lead me in your love to those around me ♪ ♪ And I will build my life upon your love ♪ ♪ It is a firm foundation ♪ ♪ And I will put my trust in you alone ♪ (gentle music continues) ♪ And I will not be shaken ♪ ♪ And I will build my life upon your love ♪ ♪ It is a firm foundation ♪ ♪ And I will put my trust in you alone ♪ ♪ And I will not be shaken ♪ (gentle music continues) ♪ May the words of my mouth ♪ ♪ And the meditations of my heart ♪ ♪ Be pleasing to you ♪ ♪ Be pleasing to you ♪ Sing with me, please.
♪ May the words of my mouth ♪ ♪ And the meditations of my heart ♪ ♪ Be pleasing to you ♪ ♪ My heart ♪ ♪ You're my water, my tea ♪ ♪ The reason that I sing ♪ Sing every hour. ♪ And every hour and every moment ♪ ♪ Lord, I want to be your servant ♪ ♪ I desire to be a blessing ♪ ♪ In your eyes ♪ ♪ In your eyes ♪ ♪ In your eyes ♪ All right, let's pray after I cough.
(coughs) Okay, sorry. Father God, we just want to thank you for this time, Lord. You alone are worthy of our praise, our song, our breath, Lord. And just like as we sing, Lord, we just want to pray that you would fill us with your heart, Lord, and lead us through your spirit and your love to those around us, Lord.
And we want to be led by the spirit, we want to walk by the spirit, but God, often we just, it's impossible with our flesh. So we ask for your spirit to guide us, and Lord, every word, every thought, every intention of our heart, Lord, it is our prayer that it would be pleasing to you, that it would be a blessing to you and those around us, Lord.
So as we just continue our worship into our Bible study, would you just be with us? And all the glory to you, God. In Christ's name we pray, amen. Let's all meet back at eight. 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All right, for those of you guys who are in the rooms, now that it's about eight o'clock, let's go ahead and come on out, and we'll do a review in the next minute. (congregation chattering) (congregation chattering) (congregation chattering) (congregation chattering) (congregation chattering) (congregation chattering) (congregation chattering) (congregation chattering) A little bit closer to the mouth, okay.
(congregation chattering) Testing, testing, one, two, three. Testing, testing, one, two, three. Can you guys hear it okay? (congregation chattering) Yes? Not so much? Hello, hello, hello, hello. Testing, testing, one, two, three. This passage has a lot of stuff, huh? My guess is your discussions went pretty fast. We kind of ran out of time at our table.
Wait till you guys get to next week's passage, and it's gonna be even longer. Oh, okay. All right, good. All right, you guys, let's take a moment to pray and then jump right into the review. Heavenly Father, we do thank you. God, we thank you so much for the blessings and the freedom that we have in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Help us, Lord God, to hold on to the gospel so dearly that we would cherish Christ in our lives. It's in Christ's name, amen. Okay, I'm gonna take a moment to read our Bible passage for us. And it says here, "For you were called to freedom, brethren. "Only do not turn your freedom "into an opportunity for the flesh.
"But through love serve one another, "for the whole law is fulfilled in one word. "In the statement, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. "But if you bite and devour one another, "take care that you are not consumed by one another. "But I say, walk by the Spirit, "and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.
"For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, "and the Spirit against the flesh. "For these are in opposition to one another, "so that you may not do the things that you please. "But if you are led by the Spirit, "you are not under the law." So as you take a look at the diagram here, and I'm guessing you guys have seen, this passage has a lot of explanation, right?
Telling you reasons for this, for that, and it has a lot of contrast. If you're gonna be in the freedom, then you don't do this. But if you don't do this, then you need to be in love. And if you, in contrast to love, then you're gonna be biting and devouring each other, and it keeps going like that, okay?
It's like a flow of thought contrasting what is the will of God versus your flesh. As a way of overview, I highlight for you guys just two segments. Again, this is just me making observation of where there could be a division in thought. Verse 13 through 15, showing us that we need to embrace God's will for us.
In his freedom that he's given to us, we're free to love, and we ought to say no to the flesh. Likewise, we're free to walk in the Spirit and say no to the flesh. That's how I get divided into two segments. Jumping into today's passage, we need to take a moment to recall that the last segment was pretty intense, yes?
Talking about those who are your opposition, and the challenge to you and me was you should know who they are, not just their doctrines, but who they are, as the people who would desire to make influence in our lives. And Apostle Paul said that his desire is that those who are troubling you would even go to mutilate themselves.
And that is a really intense thing to say. It almost feels ungodly because shouldn't we love our enemies? Well, his thought is pretty clear. It's like no, these individuals who are in the church trying to disturb you, seek out your liberty, and put you back into bondage, it's appropriate for Apostle Paul to feel that way.
And so we jump into today's segment when he says for, and he gives an explanation. Why do I say what I say about these individuals? They should mutilate themselves and go all the ways because remember, that idea meant they should be outside the camp. They should freely expose themselves and leave because they're disturbing you.
And what's more, another way to put it is not only are they disturbing you, but God himself has called you to freedom. Meaning it is in the will of God to bless you so lavishly, he would give to you the freedoms of Christ and the blessings of Christ, yes?
And these people would try to undo that. These people would try to trouble you from that. It has been God's desire and it has been his will to cause you to have great, great abundance of life in Christ. And so I want you guys to think about freedom not in just a sense of like, oh, we have rights and liberties, but think of it as immense blessing in Christ.
Another way to summarize our freedom is an incredible blessing of the vibrancy of life, the power of the resurrection, and more. And so this passage begins off by explaining to us, this is what you have, okay? Now, we should take a moment to just quickly review. I know that we discussed it at length almost in the previous passages and even as an application discussion of how would you define freedom.
But because there is an interesting play on words here. There is this freedom that you have that you've been called to. And then you take this freedom and you're not supposed to make it into an opportunity for your flesh, but you're supposed to put yourself under and serve. And if you did a study, that idea to serve is doulos, meaning slave, okay?
So then we have to ask, what is the idea of freedom? And it's just, I wouldn't say there's one thing, but I want us to understand and just kind of show you that our freedom obviously is a freedom from the tyranny of Satan. Freedom from the domain of darkness.
Freedom from darkness, like blindness and ignorance. Freedom from, you know, the curse of the law. Freedom from bondage. And then there are some other immense personal blessings. Freedom from your personal guilt. Freedom from the shame you experience because of your sins. A freedom from a guilty conscience by which you cannot enter into the presence of God, right?
So as you look at the other side, freedom too, you're free to approach the throne of God, which is mind-blowing if you think about it. Free to learn and hear the revelation, the will of the Lord as it unfolds in history. Free to live in the household of the Lord, to love the spiritual family.
Free to experience the blessedness of His promise and more. And so I want to reiterate that what you have in freedom is essentially a massive, massive blessings in Christ, okay? So the command is, therefore, don't do it. Don't be that spoiled child where you get blessed and you immediately turn it into something nasty.
That's the way I summarize, or I guess see, that transition, okay? Don't take the freedom that you have, meaning the blessings that you have, and make it into an opportunity for your flesh. Your freedom clearly does not mean, right, that somehow there are no expectations on your life. Of course you do.
The book of James talks about how you will actually be judged by the law of liberty. God has designed and created you for various purposes to His glory. Of course you have expectations on your life. Obviously, none of us, right, would ever have the gall to say, "You know what?
I'm going to live my life and say what I want to say, do what I want to do, and don't you dare tell me otherwise," okay? But as we get into such an applicational portion of the text, I do want to ask a quick applicational question to you, okay?
We would never say that because I'm a free Christian, I can just do what I want. But another way to see if we actually feel that way is to ask the question, "How are your reactions?" How are your reactions when your fellow brother or sister tells you, "Hey, you shouldn't be doing that," or, "Man, you really should be doing better in your commitments, in your devotion, in your consistency, even in your participation," right?
Do you have knee-jerk reactions where it's like, "You can't tell me what to do," right? "I didn't do anything wrong." If you do, you're kind of saying it without saying it. You know what I mean? So we are in an applicational section, and I wanted to ask that question as a check to ourselves, "How are our reactions?" But I want to make a more pointed applicational question to you right there in the middle of verse 13.
When it tells you not to turn your freedom into opportunity for the flesh, how have you in any way, in any moment where I see the pattern, turned your blessings into opportunity just to gratify yourself? Okay? Definitely you should ask that applicational question. In what ways have you turned the blessings of God into moments for your flesh?
You know, as I was meditating on that just personally, I don't know why, like, it took me back to my childhood, you know? As soon as you have an opportunity where you're not in school and you get on spring break, what do you normally do? As a kid, it's like binge on movies and video games, right?
When you get older, there are other blessings and opportunities. When you get your first job and you first taste money, what do we normally do? Most people buy a car, right? What do we normally do when we are afforded certain things and blessings? Do we take them into opportunities?
And I just realized, you know what, just in humility, that kind of pattern exists. If some of us are, you know, in a kind of busyness of life and you feel like, "Man, I just had a season, though. I worked so hard." When you are first afforded your rest, what do you do?
Four movies in one day? Finish an entire season? What do we do, okay? It's just something to ask. Now, when I think about this, I want to take a moment where we can all gather our hearts and thank and praise the Lord. Why? Because God has said, knowing that people tend to do this, that his desire is to give us freedom.
Has it been God's desire to keep us underneath the strict tutor all our lives? No. He wants you and me to mature. And one of the maturities that we will see is when we have liberty, when we have blessing, what are we going to do with it, right? That's a very, very tangible application that we have here.
But praise be to God. I asked an interesting question like, "Whoa, that's really interesting. Did God take a fat risk giving freedom to a bunch of people who have a nature prone to laziness, selfishness, greed, and pleasure?" As you guys would know, praise be to God, God doesn't take just like risks.
In his perfect fatherly love, he's sanctifying us. Praise be to God, he's going to perfect us. Amen? Now, as we continue on, I want us to come to this next portion of verse 13 where it says, "But in contrast to you taking opportunities just to satisfy yourself, through love you ought to serve one another." So the command is there, right?
And any time there's a command, I hope you get in a pattern of highlighting it, circling it, and ask certain questions like, "Do I understand what he's telling me? Do I understand the motivation? And do I know how I'm practically going to do it?" Right? Okay. As we think about that, you guys, if you've done a word study on the word love, it is the word agape, right?
I thought it was interesting. It would have sufficed for him to say, "I want you to love people." But he adds another term that he wants you to, through love, serve one another. And that's the one I want to take a little bit of time on. You guys have probably heard that agape is a strong form of love where it's unconditional, sacrificial, not contingent upon superficial things like what you can do, how you look, and what status you are.
But here the challenge goes deeper for us, right? Because it says, "Rather than taking the blessings as a cue for you to now go live it up, he wants you to voluntarily become a servant of other people." Look at this, the idea of the verb to--the verb comes from the noun doulos, which means servant or slave, and it's to be in a position of servitude, to act accordingly, and to subject yourself.
What a challenge. What a challenge to all of us. And I want to say, again, by way of application, one of the more poignant signs of biblical maturity is not that you know theology and can teach. As a matter of fact, you can teach all you want and be incredibly what?
Selfish. You get annoyed that people aren't meeting up to certain standards because it annoys you. You want people to be better because in the end that serves you. You're challenging other people to be submissive, servant-like, etc. Why? Because somehow that serves your end. Who do you love most in that kind of scenario?
Yourself. But rather maturity is often reflected in an ability to subject yourself no matter who it is you're serving, to fulfill Christ's love for an individual. Moving forward to verse 14 and 15, it's all a part of that first segment where you're free to love. We say yes to love that God has designed us to do and say no to the flesh.
What's really interesting is in verse 14 it says the whole law is fulfilled in one word in the statement, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." He explains to us that these individuals who claim to be like, "We need to obey the law for righteousness," and these people who are trying to get everybody to do a simple act of both ritual and tradition for the sake of entering into the kingdom, he's essentially rebuking them like, "If you really understood the law, you would know that God's intent was for love because the law reminded us of the great kindness and the love of God." So by way of just level of conviction, you know that the great command for you and me in this side of the cross, Christ said this in John 13, "A new commandment I give to you that you love one another even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
By this all men will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another." So as we are entering into a very applicational portion, I'm just going to talk to different pockets of our church people. Some of you are anti-social. May the love of Christ compel you.
Some of you, you like nature, cars, tech, animals more than people. More than people. May the love of Christ compel you. Christ said that it's not just simply your ability to love anything, it's your ability to love people. Yes, even fallen ones. Yes, even people who fall from your standards, whatever it may be.
But God has told us that our love for the people around us, especially when it's at our own sacrifice, causes Him to be happy. Amen? The Father delights to see us love the brethren. What's more, I want to talk to another portion of the people. I would classify myself not as an anti-social person, but more of a people pleaser.
What we as people pleasers do, I'm just assuming there's a bunch of you out there, the same boat as I am, is not love. Let me repeat that. This generation is so self-centered, they constantly just cater to people all the time. You want to be happy? Sure, I'll do it.
You want to ask this of me? Okay. Just giving people what they want is not love. Because if I am pleasing you so that you would accept me, who do I love? Me. That's the logic, yes? True Christianity, true love of Christ, does good according to the will of God, amen?
Everything is in context from God's perspective. So the Scripture is challenging us. Fulfill the love of Christ. Love as I love. Love as Christ loves. That's the challenge to us. Now, I don't think this needs to be said, but in verse 14, it is interesting that, again, he quotes Old Testament, I think, to rebuke the people.
Do you guys really, like, know the Old Testament? Are you guys reading it? Because you would know it's not about your self-righteousness, it's about love, right? But notice how this passage does mention this idea of you shall love your neighbor as yourself, and I'm going to ask a silly question.
Do we need to love self first before we love other people? To this group, I know it doesn't need to be said, but sometimes people talk like that. But as a reminder to you, the reason why this passage, both from Leviticus, when quoted in Matthew 5, when quoted here, is because the idea is we already love ourselves way too much.
It's already a given that we have as our first priority our own well-being, our first preservation, et cetera, et cetera. But God, he desires to see love for others in that vein. Okay, now in thinking through this, verse 15, in verse 15, there's a warning, okay? There is a warning that rather than loving yourself, you have to be loving others.
Why? Because in so doing, you're going to ruin the whole thing. What is the warning here? In verse 15, it says, "If you bite and devour one another, "take care that you are not consumed by one another." Now, I think that little portion where it says, "Take care," right?
It may kind of throw you off. It's like, what is this passage actually saying, you know? But in contrast, if you guys remember just a couple passages ago, it talked about how a little leaven ruins the whole dough, yes? This is the same admonishment, essentially. If you give in to the ideology that you get to do whatever you want because you're blessed, if you think that Christianity means you're kind of free because you can sin and you're going to be forgiven, and there is an element of cheap grace, what that eventually turns into is a kind of licentious living where it's all about you.
And what kind of fruit do you think is born? In legalism, the kind of fruit that's born is self-righteousness. In licentious living, the kind of fruit that's born is self-preservation. I secure my own, I secure myself, I secure my rights, I secure my well-being, and what ends up happening is people devour each other.
That's what it's saying. Don't you understand where this is going to lead to? So, I'm not going to go into all the details of what does it mean to bite and what does it mean to devour. Essentially, it's like a strange play on words that means you're just going to eat each other up.
You're going to be like wild beasts out there in the wilderness, just working off of instinct. You just do whatever you want and watch what the animals do. They kill each other. They end up eating each other. Dog-eat-dog world, right? And so, I wanted to just highlight a quick passage that when the Scripture warns us about the false teachers who are going to essentially teach us the spirit of the age, it says in 2 Peter 2, "And especially those who indulge in the flesh, in corrupt desires and despise authority, daring, self-willed, they do not tremble when they revile against angelic majesties, whereas angels who are greater in might and power do not bring a reviling judgment against them before the Lord.
But these like unreasoning animals born as creatures of instinct to be captured and killed, reviling where they have no knowledge." So, this is the spirit. If we kind of think about our modern generation, and you think about like what is the mantra, what is the kind of ideology of the day, it literally is do whatever makes you happy, right?
And anything that doesn't make you happy, remove far from your midst. You would think an ideology of people, like a generation of people who are living by that ideology, that maybe they would be happier. Okay, then do what you want. Whatever floats your boat, I guess you'd be happy, right?
Do you see happiness in our generation? It's like hard not to comment on our current generation and the tenor and tide of our generation because we live in such an angry, almost paranoid generation where people are constantly feeling attacked. They're like paranoid that someone's going to violate their rights and violate who they are.
And people are essentially fighting each other nonstop. Where do you think that came from? It came from this do whatever you feel like kind of mentality. Moving forward then, in contrast to the spirit of the age, in contrast to living by the flesh, the scripture says to us, "But I say, walk by the spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.
For the flesh sets its desire against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. For these are in opposition to each other, so that you may not do the things that you please." Take a moment to talk through this and say, "You know this command, 'Walk by the spirit,' right?
It's such a big bucket. And I definitely hope that you guys, when you were talking through your observation, asked the question, 'Do I really understand what that means?'" What are some synonymous concepts through just a systematic study of the Bible or other passages that will help me understand what it means to walk in the spirit?
Clearly the scripture tells you, "I want the word of God to richly dwell in you, right? I want you to grow in wisdom, understanding, discernment." Why? Because blessed is the man who doesn't walk in the counsel of the wicked, but rather he's going to be meditating on the word of God and let it nourish his soul.
Amen? Scripture talks so much about what it means to walk daily as children of light, mimicking Christ, and I hope that we have an ability, I hope that you guys have an ability, to describe that in a succinct way. I think every Christian should be able to articulate, "This is what it means for me to walk near and consistently with my God, to be in tune and receive the benefits of the spirit." Amen?
Now, in thinking about this and how do we do it, I want to make brief mention of the fact that there is an active nature to this, but also a passive nature to this. Or, better yet, another way to think about it is there's an active walking where you are fighting, but there's also a surrendering and following.
We know we ought to pray unceasingly, as the scripture says, in all seasons, in every way, different types of prayers. And there are so many things you could be doing. But also, you guys know, that there's an element to which a big part of you walking is you surrendering and patiently waiting.
And those of you who are constantly trying to secure your blessings, and you're constantly trying to manipulate what's going on in your life, there is like a cease and desist order for you to trust God. That is a big part of you walking in the spirit. And then just for reference, this whole idea of walking in the spirit is referenced in Romans 8, 5-13.
Let's take a moment there and read it together very briefly. So turn your Bibles over to Romans 8, 5-13. And this passage kind of expands for us this idea of the flesh versus the spirit. And this is what the Word of God says. It says, "For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the spirit, the things of the spirit.
For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the spirit is life and peace. Because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God, for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so.
And those who are in the flesh cannot please God. However, you are not in the flesh but in the spirit, if indeed the spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him. If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
But if the spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His spirit who dwells in you. So then, brethren, we are under obligation not to the flesh to live according to the flesh.
For if you are living according to the flesh, you must die. But if by the spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. Okay, so let's take a moment to talk about this real briefly. This portion that we just read in Romans 5 highlighted for us the conflict between our flesh and the spirit, right?
And the way it said it was, "I want you guys to understand how desperately you need the spirit." Because if you think now that you're a Christian that things are supposed to happen naturally for you, you're mistaken. Your flesh has set itself against your spirit and the things of God.
It will fight you. And essentially, that's what he's saying here. Verse 17 is telling you the reality is your flesh as a decaying piece of the body in which it is now encasing you, and God is going to shed that so that you'll be glorified in the flesh, you will have a glorified body in heaven, right?
But in this time, it is completely against you. So we know that our enemy, Satan, is attacking us. His demons can attack us. This fallen world can attack us. The fallen world and its ideologies can attack us, but so can our flesh, okay? So in thinking about that, first just kind of way of application.
When we think about how we're doing, I want to just give you guys a challenge. Sometimes I hear a lot of times where people will say, "Hey, you know, these days I'm doing pretty good." When they're asked, "How are you doing spiritually?" they'll say, "I'm doing pretty good." And then they'll admit, like, "Ah, but there are compromises here.
Maybe me and my, you know, significant other, we're crossing boundaries. I'm sometimes, like, watching explicit stuff on the Internet, but overall I'm doing pretty good." Don't talk like that, right? If you're compromising in the flesh and feeding it, you're not doing good just because it's few. Why? That flesh is not going to be satisfied.
It's going to be fed, right? So we should be thinking red alarm, yellow alert, I am susceptible. Does that make sense? What we should be saying is, "Man, the fight is real, and it's getting really intense." What's more, I want to talk to, again, by way of application, those of you who are maybe, like, newer to the faith, right, younger Christians.
I know that a lot of us sometimes feel so frustrated, right? "Oh my goodness, how can I ascend so soon? Just the other week I went to, you know, a praise night," or, "Oh my goodness, like, Sunday was just the other day. How can I fall so easily, so soon, and so severely?" And you may be so discouraged.
It doesn't even have to be somebody who's young in the faith. You may have been a Christian a long time. You probably feel that way at certain moments in your life, right? May we be encouraged by this passage. We know and we believe the Holy Spirit is in you.
Amen? When you focus way too much on your failure, we almost hesitate to say, "I have the Holy Spirit that was at creation, that guided the writing of the Scriptures, the inerrant, infallible Scriptures, the Holy Spirit who is our comforter, who is our convictor and our helper in times of need.
He is in us." Amen? And what this passage in Romans chapter 8 and what this passage is telling us is when He comes first, then indirectly we will not follow the desires of our flesh. We have to believe that. We have to be convinced of that. There is an indirect solution.
We know that when we are building a deep, healthy, intimate, consistent and nourished relationship with Christ, walking with the Spirit, clinging to His every word, indirectly the sin will fade. Indirectly the temptation will subside. And so, if you are a young Christian, don't be so discouraged and bewildered like, "Oh my gosh, what's happening?
I just thought that if I confessed it once, then boom, it's supposed to happen." You know that it's going to happen in this way where we invest heavily into walking with the Lord. So, by way of conclusion, in verse 18, it says, "So if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law." And I want to wrap up with this.
That portion is kind of interesting because we could bypass it as like, "Hey, we've been talking so much about how you're not under the law. I get it." And then you just pass on, right? But is that what he's talking about? "Hey, you don't have to obey the law for righteousness anymore." I think this is a little bit different, right?
He's comparing and contrasting how daily you're supposed to be led, and therefore you're not underneath the law, right? One is seen as kind of like a general way of righteousness, etc. But here I want to talk about this and just give you an example. My guess is a bunch of you guys play sports, and sometimes when you are a newbie in playing sports, when you're young, what do you most often feel?
You often feel kind of awkward. You don't know what you're doing, right? A lot of times for a newbie player, what becomes the greatest hindrance to them actually playing is fear. Fear of what? I'm going to mess up, right? I'm going to mess up. I'm not going to do a good job.
People are going to laugh, and it's going to be miserable, okay? And then when somebody from the outside watching, it's kind of frustrating. It's like, "Just go for it. Just hit it. It doesn't matter, right? Just try." And in that way, you guys understand, if you're led in the spirit, you're already in the game.
The game is won. Just try. If you're focused on your failure and you're focused on the fear, what are you doing but completely just stop blocking whatever is progress for you already? And so likewise, I want to give you just a challenge and encouragement. For us, the game is already won.
For us, we have victory. For us, we have the Spirit of God. And in that way, perhaps maybe a lot of us may just sympathize with the disciples when Jesus said to them, "I know your spirit is willing, but your flesh is so weak. But nevertheless, we believe that the Spirit who is in us is greater, is greater than all our failures, and is greater than anything that's in the world." Amen?
Let's take a moment to pray. Lord God, we thank you for the challenge and the encouragement today. We know, Lord, that it has been your design for us to be filled with your love to such a degree that, God, we would freely just give it. I pray, Father God, that you would help us live as ones who are not looking for more satisfaction because we already are blessed.
We already have everything in Christ. And so I ask, God, that we can give, and then we would feel what the Scripture says, that it is more blessed to give than to receive. And, Lord, we would mimic you in that kind of lavish self-sacrifice. I also pray, Lord, you would teach us what it means, day by day, to walk in the Spirit, to be renewed in the Spirit, and, God, not to live with our head down, constantly afraid of failure.
I pray, Father God, that you would cause us to live in victory. It's in Christ's name. Amen. All right. So we're going to just do a quick announcement here. And then you guys can get into your questions or discussions. All right. Just by way of a reminder, I want to thank you guys, the brothers who have been parking farther away, so that we can give the sisters the closer parking lots.
But please continue to do that. The shuttle service is going to run. And so please let the sisters park closer. The only announcement that I really want to highlight, the Women's Conference has been announced, you guys, that's this Saturday. The membership class, if you're not a member, but you want to be a member at the church, it starts this next Sunday, the 21st, at 9.30 in the youth group room over there.
The thing that I want to highlight is we have a members' meeting at 2 p.m., which is mandatory. So if you can't make it, you already know, and it's a legitimate reason. We do keep track of this. So if you've steadily missed a bunch, someone will probably give you an e-mail.
But it is mandatory where we actually do share with you the different things that are happening in the church. For this one, in order to kind of help you with a lunch, our Korea missions team for the summer is going to have a meal ready for you for $10 as a fundraiser.
And in addition to that, our cafe is serving for that day strawberry matcha. No, strawberry lattes and matcha, something, something special. But that is – so typically we ask for your coffee drink. We do suggest a donation, so we're not losing money serving you coffee. But that day it's going to be specifically for a fundraiser.
So the drinks on that day are going to be for that. So a lunch and coffee service will be right before the members' meeting, so just please do keep that in mind. We have about 400 people signed up for the abortion birth control IVF seminar, but we do need a good headcount for the child care and for refreshments.
So if you haven't done so already but you're planning on coming to that, please do sign up. There are two sessions that are different, and it's going to be a part one and part two with refreshments in the middle. So those are the things that are coming up. All the other stuff you can look online.
But again, the emphasis is if you're not a member but you want to be one, the eight-week membership, of course, starts next week. Okay? All right. Thank you.