1 Timothy chapter 6. We're almost finished with 1 Timothy. We probably will finish next
week. We might not, but we probably will finish up 1 Timothy. 1 Timothy chapter 6. We'll start
in verse 1. Last week we ended off with some instruction for God's people to honor the
elders, but also some good instruction in there for those who are elders. Tonight we
are picking up with kind of the same idea of honor in these first couple of verses kind
of thrown in here, not much context, but obviously Paul was writing to address something that
was going on in regards to slaves and masters. And so he talks about that here for a couple
of verses before he moves on to his next topic. So let's pray and then we'll get started.
Father God, we come to you tonight and I thank you that we can be in your house. I thank
you for your word and I pray that you would hide me behind the cross, that you would help
me to preach and teach this word and the way that you want us to hear it. I pray that your
Holy Spirit would speak to us tonight. I pray that we would understand your word and that
we would grow in it, dear Lord, that you would help me as a pastor to grow in these words
tonight, that you would just help us as Christians, dear Lord, to grow in these words tonight.
And I pray that you'd be good to us in these next few minutes, free us from distractions
and worries and bless the time we have. And I ask it in Jesus' name, amen.
1 Timothy chapter 6 verse 1, all who are under the yoke as slaves must regard their own
masters to be worthy of all respect so that God's name and his teaching will not be blasphemed.
Those who have believing masters should not be disrespectful to them because they are
their brothers, but should serve them better, since those who benefit from their service
are believers and dearly loved. Teach and encourage these things.
Now this passage and passages like these come with some difficulty. We commonly see in the
Old Testament and even in the New Testament, we see mentions of slavery. We don't really
see condemnation so much of slavery. We see instructions on slavery and for masters of
slaves and for slaves themselves. And this is somewhat of a difficulty for us, especially
in modern times. It's either just as bad as it has always been or maybe even worse in
modern times when it comes to slavery. Now part of that has to do with culture. Part
of that has to do with the way things may have been in biblical times and the way things
were in slavery that we most commonly think of. Now when we think of slavery, we typically
think of slavery as it was here in the United States. And on some occasions here on the
United States, it was very bad. Some occasions perhaps it wasn't as bad as other occasions,
but nonetheless based on kind of what our culture knows as slavery, what little bit
I guess we could say we've experienced for lack of a better term because it's somewhat
recent to us, slavery is often held as negative in every possible way that it could be. However,
when we see slavery in the Bible, it's good for us to recognize that there's a big cultural
difference there. Now that's not to say that it's ever okay to steal another person or
to own another person or to take somebody's rights or to mistreat them. That type of slavery
or treating someone in that way, whether they're your slave or not, is certainly not biblical
and that's never what God intended. So some would look at passages like these and they
would say, man, well the Bible's not very good and God's not very good because we see
slavery throughout all the scripture. So what are we to make of passages like these that
address slavery and deal with slavery? Well, I think what we are to make of passages like
these is what I said. We have to realize that there's a cultural difference and as hard
as it is for our minds to fathom that maybe some forms of slavery are acceptable and certainly
that's not a popular view in our culture. Perhaps that is the case. Now, again, as we
see this idea perhaps of one group of people stealing another group of people to enslave
them, this is nothing new. It's not like when we saw American slavery that this was the
first time this happened. There has been slavery since early on in the Bible. There is slavery
all over the world amongst all races. Slavery has been prominent for centuries. You can
search and find plenty of examples where lots of people have enslaved other people. However,
perhaps there are some instances where slavery is a benefit to the slave. Now, again, that
sounds crazy to us if we have our preconceived notion that all slavery is bad, but we have
to remember that perhaps not everyone who is a master of a slave mistreated their slave
and in many cases they probably did not. There are some instances where it is likely that
what we consider a slave or see a slavery here in the Bible, it may benefit us to think
about that in terms of a bond servant. That is to say that someone owes a debt to someone
which they are unable to pay and the only payment that they can make for that debt is
their service, is what they can do. And so we see this type of example, at least I believe
this is the type of example that we see in scripture, and it may be for the benefit of
someone. If you have got no money, if you have got nowhere to live, if you have got
no food and you go to someone and you say, I will be your slave, well with that is going
to come some benefit. Yeah, you are going to lose some freedom in a sense, but there
is going to be some benefit in that you are going to have a place to stay, you are going
to have food to eat, and as we see in the Old Testament, you are not enslaved forever.
It is not like that person owned you. It is not that that person was better than you.
It is not to say that those who are enslaved are inferior to those who are masters. Now
that is part of the problem where slavery becomes evil. And some would hold that view.
Some would say, well, we should enslave certain people because we are better than them. Well,
that is certainly not acceptable. That is certainly not ever accepted in scripture and
it is not celebrated. We should never hold that type of view. But in the sense that perhaps
someone's livelihood could be sustained by them saying, I will offer myself in service
to you to work for you so that my needs will be met and I can pay off whatever debt I may
owe. Well, then in that sense, slavery may not necessarily be such a bad thing. And what
we see in the Old Testament is the command that if someone is your slave, that they are
a slave for six years, but in the seventh year, you let them go. Now the Bible is pretty
clear that masters are to be good to their slaves. Now that's not to say that there have
not been many masters throughout the centuries who have mistreated their slaves. There have
certainly been people from many countries in the world, regardless of race, who have
enslaved other people and who has mistreated them, who have treated them as not equals,
as not human beings and not treated them like human beings and abused them. And that is
certainly wrong. In the Bible, nowhere promotes that as being this is the way God wants things.
Now there are certainly Christians throughout the years who have perhaps used passages like
this or other passages that talk about slavery to kind of back up their argument. Slavery
is okay and we should own slaves, but oftentimes those who would make those arguments are the
very ones who would mistreat their slaves. And so certainly some would call themselves
Christians and use scriptures like this to support their view, but then their actions
would go against everything that scripture would say. And so when we see scriptures about
slavery in the Bible, then it probably brings questions to our mind. Well, wait a minute,
I thought slavery was wrong. Well, in many cases, slavery is wrong, but perhaps there
are instances in which slavery, that is someone working for someone else saying, I'll give
you my labor and return for a debt that'll be paid. I'll work it off. We joke about that
sometimes. You go eat at a nice restaurant, you get the bill and it's a lot. And you say,
well, I'm going to have to go back there and wash dishes. We kind of understand that concept
and say it kind of jokingly. Now, thank the Lord, we can pay for our dinner most of the
time, hopefully, but what in the instance, what if it came that you couldn't pay? Then
perhaps this idea of being a bond servant of offering your service to pay off your debt.
Well, that may be the same kind of idea that we see in scripture. Now, nonetheless, there
were masters and slaves. And while that certainly isn't the ideal, and I don't know that God
desires for things to be in that way, the scripture gives us commands on how masters
are to treat slaves and how slaves are to treat masters. And that's what this passage
is talking about here in these first two verses. It kind of seems out of place, but nonetheless,
he brings it up. So it must have been something that was going on there. Now, we see this
idea that's brought up here of the master and the slave both being Christians. He's
talking about Christian slaves here and Christian masters. And as we see in the scripture, there's
no Jew or Gentile, there's no male or female, there's no slave or free. We see that in scripture.
That is, those who are in Christ, there is no distinction. And Paul says that, hey, if
you can get out of being a slave, then by all means do that. I don't remember that verse.
Maybe 1 Corinthians chapter 7 or somewhere in that area. But even Paul encourages people.
The book of Philemon, if you've never read it, you can read it tonight in about five
minutes. It's really, really short. It's in the New Testament. And there was this slave
by the name of Onesimus. And he had been helping Paul out, but he was a slave of Philemon.
Onesimus was a Christian, and so was Philemon. And so Paul writes him a letter and he says,
hey, look, I know that Onesimus is your slave, but he has been beneficial to my work and
the work of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so I'm going to send him back to you, but
I'm asking you as a brother in Christ to let him go, to freedom of his obligations, to
freedom of his debt. Whatever time he has left to serve, I ask that you would free him
of that so that he can serve and do the Lord's work. Now here Paul says, look, if you're
a slave and your master is a Christian, then don't take that for granted. Don't say, well,
wait a minute, we're both Christians. We're equal, so I shouldn't be a slave anymore.
Paul says just the opposite. Be a good example and show what it means to be a servant and
what it means to be a slave. Work that much harder. You should work even better for your
master. Now this language is harsh as it may seem and is politically incorrect as it may
seem in our culture today, is the same language that is used for Jesus Christ and for us.
We are servants of God. We are slaves of Jesus Christ. And so we see this idea of God being
our master, of Jesus being our master, and we are called to be servants and slaves for
God. Now that's certainly a beautiful relationship. There's nothing evil about that. There's nothing
evil about God's relationship with us and our relationship with God. It's quite beautiful.
As our master, God provides for us and takes care of us and sends Jesus Christ and Jesus
gives his life for us. Jesus came and served the Father faithfully while he was on earth.
And so when we put our faith in Jesus Christ, we are called to be servants of God. That
is to say, God, what we have is yours. What energy we have, what gifts we have, God, it
is yours. We live to serve you. Now, not in the sense that we are indebted to God. Okay,
God, you've forgiven my sins and I'm indebted, so I'm going to work to pay that off. That's
totally not what the gospel says. The gospel says Jesus has paid everything for us, so
we're not working to pay off a debt. Jesus has covered our sin, but we work to serve
God because God has been good to us and he has blessed us and he has taken care of us.
So this idea of being a servant or being a slave, when it's carried out in love, can
be both a beautiful thing for the master and the slave. So we need to remember that when
we see this language that certainly there are some people who have not been good masters
and those people are not living by the word of God. But there are other occasions perhaps
where maybe slavery, as we often may think of it in our culture, may not be the best
way to think of it. There may be a brighter side to slavery than sometimes what we may
recognize. All right, verse three. If anyone teaches other doctrines and does not agree
with the sound teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ and with the teaching that promotes
godliness, he is conceited, understanding nothing, but he has a sick interest in disputes
and arguments over words. Okay, so he appears to switch gears here to talk about false teachers
and we've kind of seen some talk about that already in First Timothy. But there appear
to be those who are false teachers. They're teaching doctrines that are not right. They
don't go along with what scripture says. They're not sound teachings. And what does he say
about those who would do this? It says they are conceited or they are proud. They understand
nothing. Okay, so maybe they think they have some understanding of scripture, but really
they don't have much understanding of scripture or the truth of scripture. Instead, it says
they have a sick interest in disputes and arguments over words. So they're not interested
really in learning the word of God or in teaching the word of God, but getting into disputes
about things in the word of God. Now, we have to be careful about this. This is, I think,
an easy trap to fall into because as we begin to study God's word and we begin to talk with
other Christians, there are sometimes differences of interpretation. And those differences over
interpretation, even amongst other Christians, can really turn into arguments and debates
and we can really become consumed with these things. We can become consumed with certain
views. And I was reading this today and I was thinking, man, I need to be more careful
because when I study and probably when you guys study or when you encounter other people,
you study those views and you want to give a good defense. And so in trying to give a
good defense and be true to scripture, it's easy to cross over that line where we become
consumed with a few different things. And we begin to want to dispute and argue about
those things and those differences of interpretation. And those things are not healthy. They're
not healthy for us and certainly for anybody who's going to be teaching scripture. And
so he gives, I believe, a good warning here for any who teach or preach in particularly
to not have this interest in disputes and arguments. That is, don't get pulled away
from what matters. Don't get pulled away from the word of God and the grace of God and the
love of God. Don't miss the forest for the trees. Don't get so caught up on something
that maybe is not significant that you miss the meaning of God's word and the love of
God's word. Continuing on in verse four, from these, that is the sick interest in disputes
and arguments, from these come envy, quarreling, slander, evil suspicions. Okay. Well, these
are, none of these things are good things that you become envious of other people or
you resent other people who may be smarter than you or know more than you. And you don't
like it when there's arguments that arise or different views that arise. And so you
want to dispute, you want to argue, and you always want to kind of prove you're the best.
And that's where that pride comes in. And that's something that, again, if you're going
to teach or you're going to preach, this passage may be especially helpful. But I think for
all of us, it's helpful in some way. So he talks about envy, quarreling, slandering the
other person, talking about the other person in such a way that you're trying to make them
look bad. Maybe not even necessarily lie about them, but bringing up things they say or trying
to poke holes in their argument in such a way that you want them to look bad so that
you will look better. And that's a bad motivation for teaching and that's a bad way to preach.
And so we have to be careful about those things. Evil suspicion. You become suspicious of the
person. Oh, they got a different view than me. I don't know if they can be trusted or
not. Maybe not very godly. I'm really surprised at that. I'm disappointed at that. And we
begin to have these suspicions that are evil that really are unfounded because they may
be good Christian people that just have a difference of opinion. But too many times
it's easy for us to make things that don't matter too important to us. And so some of
you may say, I don't have a clue what you're talking about. Others of you may say, yeah,
I know what you're talking about. I've seen that. I've experienced that. And so we need
to be on guard that we don't fall into that trap to become these people he's talking about.
Constant disagreement in verse five. Constant disagreement among people whose minds are
depraved and deprived of the truth. Well, that's a pretty bad place to be. So if we
get to this shape where we become proud and we begin to slander others and we just want
to argue and dispute all the time, that's a very scary place to be. So we need to check
ourselves. We need to test ourselves from time to time in the scripture and see if we're
kind of falling into those traps. And maybe this is one of them that we need to make sure
that we don't fall into that trap and pray that we, we don't, because we don't want to
be those who are depraved and those who are deprived of the truth. We want to know the
truth of God's word. We want to understand it. We want to be able to, to love one another
as brothers and sisters in Christ and not get caught up in the weeds. And sometimes
maybe we do get caught up in the weeds. And I will admit that I am guilty of that sometimes.
And so we have to be careful that we don't fall into those traps. What does it say here?
Those whose minds are depraved and deprived of the truth who imagine that godliness is
a way to material gain. So it appears that these false teachers that he is speaking of
here, they're not promoting the truth of the gospel. They are, they are just interested
in causing trouble essentially and causing disputes and arguing. And it appears that
this group that he's talking about, their, their real concern is not about doing the
work of God, but it is about material gain. I'm going to do this because it's going to
get me money. Well, that's a bad start. That's a bad place for someone who is going to teach
or preach the word of God to start. That should not be a, that should not be a question in
my opinion, very high on the list of a teacher or a preacher or someone who's serving. Well,
before we start, how much are you going to pay? Now I've heard stories of preachers and
people in the ministry who have said that before, I'll come, but only for X amount of
dollars. That's not a good place to start. And perhaps those are the type of people that
Paul is talking about here. Those who are, who are looking at ministry as a way for material
gain. And it's sad to say that perhaps there are many in our world today that preach and
teach and make a big to do about a lot of stuff. And sometimes you wonder when you hear
the things they say and you see the things they do and you see that they taken up the
offering plate. And sometimes even some of these big names, you see the offering plate
will come back up and they'll look over in it and they'll say, that ain't enough for
God to work tonight. God wants you to give more. And they'll pass the plate back around
again. Now this is crazy stuff, right? But yet these are the types of things that, that
you hear about. You hear these stories or maybe you see some of these things on TV.
Now I would say that those who do such things might be in danger of falling into this category
of those who are using the ministry as a way of material gain. That is they're not doing
it for the God, for the Lord. They're not doing it for the kingdom of God. They're doing
it to say, this is how I'm going to stuff my pockets full of money. But listen at this
next verse. This is one of my favorite verses and man, I fail at this so bad. And I wish
I, I wish I was, I lived this out and maybe you guys do too, but this is such a good verse.
Maybe you don't struggle with it. I hope you don't, but godliness with contentment is great
game. Now I think that is a good verse because the problem is, and maybe not for you guys,
but for me sometimes is I'm not content. Man, I wish I was content. You know, sometimes
you see people on the street and they ain't got anything and you say, poor them. But then
on the flip side, maybe poor us. Maybe they don't have anything. They may be more content
than we are. They may be happier than we are because when we're discontent and we begin
to get desires for the world and we begin to want some things in the world, which may
not necessarily be bad, those things in some way kind of become a burden to us. They become
a, they become a vice to us because we have to work to get those things. And then we're
miserable at work sometimes and then we're tired and then all these things come up and
then really isn't worth it. All the things that we have and we're not content with what
we have. So we want a little more. We want a little nicer car. We want a little bigger
TV. I'm just talking about myself. I ain't talking about y'all. And we want nicer clothes
or we want these things. And, and on some level it's not bad to, to want some things,
but the problem is sometimes we're not content because we always want just a little more
than what we got. But what a beautiful verse here that it says, but godliness with contentment
is great gain. Now I believe it's probably, and I hope I get there one day, Lord willing
more so now than I am in this life to come to a, to a spot where I'm content, where I'm
content. And what a, what a beautiful place that may be. And some of you may be there
tonight. Maybe all of you are there tonight. I hope you are those listening online that
godliness with contentment is great gain. That is to say, it's not about how much money
is in your pocket. That's, that's, that's not godliness. That's not going to make you
happy. That's not going to make you content. Godliness is going to make you content. And
when you are content with the things of God, you'll find that you are richer than you have
ever been. That when you are content with God and you say, you know what, there's good
things in this world and maybe I'll get some of them or maybe I won't, but if I don't,
it's okay. But too many times we're not content. We want that other thing. We get angry when
we don't get that other thing. We say, it's not fair that I don't get that other thing.
And that discontentment breeds trouble in our hearts. It does. It breeds trouble in
our heart. And that's why I think this verse is such a powerful verse for Christians to
look at and to consider, but godliness with contentment is great gain. Next verse, verse
seven, for we brought nothing into the world and we can take nothing out, but if we have
food and clothing, we will be content with these. What a beautiful thing. Paul recognizes
the truth here. You're not taking anything when you leave this world. You didn't bring
anything into this world. So some people might want to work and save up and have all this
money and for what purpose? For what purpose? You're not taking anything with you. So what's
the point of working and working and building all these things up that are in the end probably
going to make you unhappy because you're going to be discontent and because you're going
to want more and you're going to have to work harder. And it's the cycle that we get ourselves
in and part of that is our culture. The American way is you deserve to have this and you deserve
to have that and you can have whatever you want. And that's part of our culture. And
I was reading these verses today. I was, I don't know if our culture has got it right
on that. Maybe we don't have it right on that. And Paul says here, but if we have food and
clothing, we will be content with these. Well, that's good. I believe Paul probably was in
the right spot there, but many times perhaps we have food and clothing, but we're not happy
with the food and clothing we have. We have ham sandwich. We want a pizza. We have a pizza.
We want a steak. We have a steak. We want lobster, whatever it is. We want the next
thing, but we should be content with whatever we have. Maybe it's a turkey sandwich. If
you're not content with your turkey sandwich, let me tell you how you can be more content
with it. You take your bread, you put it on a pan, you put it in the oven, you get it
nice and toasty. You take it out, you put your little mayo on there. You put your turkey
on there. You put your cheese on there. You put it back in the oven and you get that thing
nice and toasty and it'll change your life. If you're not content with your turkey sandwich,
it might just be that you're not making it right. So we need to learn how to be content
even with the little things and to be grateful that we have a turkey sandwich, even a cold
one. If we had to have a cold one, even a cold one, we should be content with these
things and the clothes that we have. We should learn to be content in these areas and many
more. Verse nine, but those who want to be rich
fall into temptation, a trap and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge people into
ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil and by craving
it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains. Now
this passage we're probably familiar with. Now in the context here, it's talking about
those teachers who are wanting that material gain and they're not content and so they want
more and more and more, but they need to seek godliness and learn contentment with what
we have, whether a little or whether a lot. And then he goes on to give this strong warning.
Now even out of the context here, I think this is true, not just of teachers, but of
all of us, but those who want to be rich fall into temptation. Now I suspect that if we
were to poll many people that we were seeing, especially Christians and say, do you want
to be rich? We might would say no, but now you'd have some that say, I want to be rich,
but we'd probably say, Oh no, I don't want to be rich. And maybe partly because of this
passage. So I don't want to be rich because Hey, the love of money is the root of all
kinds of evil. That's a passage that many people are familiar with. And so we may say
we don't want to be rich and that we don't have a love of money, but in some way we may
be deceiving ourselves because it says here that those who want to be rich and fall into
temptation, a trap and many foolish and harmful desires, which plund people into ruin and
destruction. And so we may say, we, we may not say that we desire to be rich, but we
may have a list of desires. We may have the list of a lot of desires of homes, of cars,
of toys, of, of, of whatever it may be, all of those things, which take a lot of money.
And so we desire those things. Then the money has to come to, to, to get those things. And
so we find ourselves falling into this trap. We want more and more and more because we're
not content and it ensnares us. It traps us into this. We've got to get more money because
we've got to get more stuff. And so we fall into that trap of maybe, maybe desiring to
be rich and want money more than we realize. We say, well, I want some things, but that's
not the same as wanting to be rich. But then oftentimes it takes some wealth to be able
to obtain the things that we want. And so that's a trap. It's a trap that maybe sometimes
we fall into. And then he gives that warning for the root of, excuse me, for the love of
money is a root of all kinds of evil. And so when we begin desire things, it takes money.
And so we have to get money. And so what do we do to get that money? Well, some people
will do a lot of things to get money. People will kill to get money. People take out a
big life insurance on their spouse and then they'll have them killed. People do it all
the time. You can watch Dateline or any of these shows. You see it. It's crazy. People
will do a lot of stuff for money. Why? It's not that they just want to get that money
so they can just go bathe in it like Scrooge McDuck. He jumps into his vault and swims
around in his gold coins. No, people don't want to just sit there and look at a stack
of money. They want the money because they want the thing. They want the house. They
want the party life. They want whatever it is. And so our desires call for us to get
more money. How are we going to get more money? We're going to work ourself to death and feel
stressed and then not be happy because we work all the time. And so, so it's a trap
in that way. And maybe we don't realize that it's a trap and maybe that's not what this
scripture means, but then again, maybe it is. And so we have to be careful that we don't
get caught in the trap. It says by craving it, some have wandered away from the faith
and pierced themselves with many pains. Well, it does bring a lot of pain. Wealth brings
a lot of pain. You take that wealth and you buy a new car and it brings a lot of pain.
Now I used to have this little Jeep that was cheap and it was a piece of junk. And if it
got scratched up or denting, I didn't care. Now some of y'all probably got a car like
this. You don't care if it's dented up or rusted or whatever. You just beat and bang
and go against bushes and limbs. Ah, it don't matter. But then when you get your Sunday,
go to meet and car, well it's clean and it's shiny and you got to be careful. You park
it at the end of the lot at Walmart. You park your junky car up front. It don't matter if
it gets hit, hits by a buggy, but you get your good car. You park it at the end of the
thing. You don't want it to get hit by a buggy because that's your nice car. And so what
that nice car does is it puts a burden on you. Now your old junker that you're content
with, it don't matter. You don't pay no attention to, but when we begin to have these nicer
things, they come with a little bit of pain in a sense. They come with a little bit of
a burden in a sense, almost that it's not a joy to own them. It's more of a burden and
a joy. There's some days that I think, well, I wish I still had that Jeep because I didn't
care if it was dirty. I didn't care nothing. Somebody keyed it one day. I come out there
and they had a big old X they keyed on the side. I don't know why they did it. Didn't
matter. I didn't care. There's no pain in that. There's no pain in the contentment of
even the simple things, but sometimes there is pain in the better things and the more
expensive things. And more importantly, it says those who turn to these desires for money
and wealth and things, they wander from the faith. That is sometimes the money and the
things become God. And that's scary. That's a scary, scary thing. And maybe sometimes
we get closer to that, that we won't admit. Maybe we're closer to it now that our things
and our desires and our money have kind of caused us to wander from the faith. One more
verse here, verse 11, but you, man of God, run from these things and pursue righteousness,
godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness. Okay. So if we look at this last passage and
it's scary to us and we begin to test ourselves and we begin to say, I'm not doing good in
this area. Maybe I'm kind of falling into some of these traps for those who are preachers
and teachers. You look at this and you say, all right, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm some of these
things that it says these false teachers are doing. I'm doing these things are some of
these things about money and about the love of money and desire for things. Maybe I fall
into that trap. So what do we do? Well, praise the Lord. He gives us instruction here in
this verse, but you man or woman of God run from these things. So if we see these things
in our life, we must run from them, uh, resist the devil and he will flee from you. So repent
means to turn. So if we see we're turned and we're walking toward these things and giving
into these things, then the solution to our problem tonight is to repent and say, God,
I have, I'm guilty in this way. God, I repent of this sin and I'm going to turn away from
that. And when we do that, we are doing what the scripture says here, that we are running
from these things. Okay. So when we see that there's sin in our life, we, we want to run
from that sin, but it's not just a running from something, but it's a running to something.
So what are we going to run to? What are we going to replace that with those all sinful
desires? What are we going to replace that with? And well, if we just turn from them
and we don't replace that with something wholesome, then pretty soon, guess what? We're going
to begin to replace sin back in that spot again, back in that void. But we want to turn
from that sin and we're starting with a fresh slate. Okay, God, I've turned from that. What
are we turning to? Well, we want to run to something better. And what does he say? Run
from those things and pursue. And then he gives a list of things here, pursue righteousness.
Okay. So we want to seek to be righteous. We want to seek to do what is right. Now we're
not righteous based on our acts. Jesus is righteous and we're made righteous through
Jesus, but that's what we should desire. We should desire to live like Jesus and be made
right and to do the right thing. It says to pursue godliness. Okay. We want to pursue
those things that are godly. We want to live a godly way and do the things that God commands
us to in scripture. Pursue our faith that we seek God to be strengthened in our faith.
And when we begin to waver and we begin to question and we begin to kind of doubt, we
want to say, no, God, I'm going to come back to your word and I'm going to trust you that
you're going to provide for me. And that if I'm content, dear Lord, that there's going
to be great gain in that. So help me not to give into these, excuse me, sinful desires
again of the world. He tells us to pursue love. We should love God. We should love one
another. Maybe that's lacking in our life. Maybe our relationship with God hadn't been
too good. Maybe we just need to pray and say, God, I love you. God, I thank you. God, I
praise you. I come to you and I seek you. And God helped me to love others. If you have
loved me and we need to pursue love in our life, maybe we're not doing too good in that
area. We need to pursue endurance. Okay. So life is hard. Life is tough. This battle against
sin is unbelievably hard. Sin is hard. You beat sin the next day it's coming back and
it's a battle and we endure life and what it throws at us. So we want to pursue that
endurance that we'd be able to stand strong in the Lord and finally pursue gentleness.
That we want to be those who are gentle. That we want to be those who are harsh. Now, excuse
me, not be those who are harsh. That we want to be those who are compassionate. And so
what better example do we see of these things that it calls us to than what we see in Jesus
Christ? If we want to be those who are righteous and who are godly and who have a strong faith
and who have endurance and love and gentleness, then Jesus embodies those things in a perfect
way. And so that's where our help comes from. When we look at these verses before and say,
man, these are some serious things that sometimes we may fall into and sins that we may fall
into. What do we do? Will we pursue these things that we see in Christ so that these
things in Christ will be part of our life? That we come to the one who is atoned for
us, who is interceding for us, as we talked about Sunday in Hebrews, to Jesus Christ,
who is the one who will make us righteous, the one who can show us what love is, what
greater love is there that a man shows for his brothers than to lay down his life for
them. That's what Jesus shows us. He shows us what it means to be gentle, to be compassionate.
And so we come tonight to seek Jesus. We come to seek Jesus so that he can make us into
the men or women he wants us to be, because he's the only one that can do it. He's the
one who gave his life on the cross so that we could be forgiven and that the Holy Spirit
could live in us and work in us. So we need to check these things on this list and make
sure that we're not guilty of these things, whether we're a teacher or preacher or whether
we're just a follower of Christ. And maybe we don't have a title, so to speak, but we
need to check and make sure we're living right and make sure we're living like Jesus. Let's
pray.
Father God, we come to you. We thank you for your good word, and I pray that you bless
it. I pray that you would work on our hearts, dear Lord, help us to see the areas tonight,
maybe where we are discontent, where we have failed, where we have sinned in those ways,
that you would help us to be content with you, dear Lord, that you would help us to
seek you, that you would help us not to be involved with disputes about words and different
views and opinions, dear Lord, that those things would not consume us, but that we would
be consumed with the gospel of Jesus Christ and His teachings and His example and who
He is, dear Lord. I pray that if there are any that do not know Jesus Christ tonight
that they would repent, put their faith in Him. God, maybe there are some here tonight
and maybe there are some things in this passage that kind of pricked us a little bit. Let
us repent, dear Lord, and turn to you to seek to do what's right and to grow in you and
to run from the sinful things and to run to you, dear Lord. And I ask these things in
Jesus' name, amen.