Welcome to the Potter's House Salmon Arm podcast. We are a Bible-Believing Church located
in beautiful British Columbia, Canada. We are proudly part of the Christian Fellowship
Ministries with 3,000 churches around the world. We are a church focused on world evangelism,
discipleship and church planting. Here we will share recent sermons from P.H.S.A. Church
and other sermons from throughout our fellowship. I am Pastor David Bickford and I will be your
host for this podcast. I thank you for listening today and we hope these messages are a blessing
to you and bring you closer to God.
Hello and welcome back to the podcast. First off, I'd like to apologize for having this
podcast not uploaded on the normal time on Sunday afternoon. I was able to get out and
preach for the morning but I ended up getting a little sick and so I'd actually been sleeping
most of the time in between I normally post and now. So I apologize for the delay. But
with that, I've put together a message. It was the one that I did preach on Sunday and
it's a little bit of a New Year's message in the sense that I just wanted to take some
time to reflect. You know, it was on Sunday, it was New Year's Eve and as the year is coming
to an end, I wanted to take a little bit of time just to reflect back on the year that
many of us would have had. Looking at our successes or our failures is a very common
thing that we tend to do. And so as the world stops and recounts all the events of last
year, we should also set some time aside to remember our own testimony and what God has
done in our own lives to reflect on the blessings and even yes lament on the trials that we
may have faced and to remember to praise God in the midst of both trials and blessings.
Let's keep in mind all the blessings that we have living here in Canada or in the United
States or in the Western world. It's just a tremendous blessing that we do have even
though there are a lot of things waging war against us, it's important for us to remember
our blessings. And with that in mind, I wanted to share a little bit from the satirical article
from the Babylon Bee that should just help us to remember how we are blessed and what
we're fighting for in the rest of the world. So here's the article. And just before I jump
into the article, the message I've entitled today is actually called Do Not Love and the
subheading is compassion, clarity and conviction. And the text we'll be working off of this
morning or evening or whenever you're listening is first John two verses 15 through 17. So
if you have your Bibles and you're following along, you can go ahead and turn there. But
let's jump into this, this funny fun article from the Babylon Bee. Times are tough in here
in the United States, especially for Christians from subpar coffee quality and stale breakfast
pastries to the worship teams fog machine breaking down and congregates having to park
up to a hundred feet away from the church building. American churches are facing unprecedented
hardships but how are our Christian brothers and sisters around the world faring? The Babylon
Bee has conducted an investigation and come up with the following list of differences
between the challenges faced by the underground church and the American church. So every time
I say American church, you could think, you know, Canadian church, you could think Western
world church, you could, you know, put any of those, those kinds of things on there just
so that we can remember to contrast the blessing that we have in the Western world versus our
brothers who are fighting for the same gospel in the rest of the world. So first up is the
American church complex growth and marketing strategies versus the underground church growth
strategy is to preach the gospel and try not to die. The American church will have pastors
jump dirt bikes over the stage to attract a crowd. Whereas the underground church pastor
will have to ride his dirt bike to escape the secret police. The American church pastor
has thousands of followers on Instagram. Whereas the underground pastor is forced to hide his
identity to avoid the Gulag. And the American eight trained musicians play over a $12 million
sound system. Whereas the underground church have has acapella hymns whispered to avoid
detection. In America, you could see here the people say bummer, your favorite preacher
from the pastoral staff isn't speaking today versus the underground will say bummer. The
only pastor your church has was imprisoned last night. And America, it'll say greeter
stand near the doors, you know, to usher people into the church. Whereas the underground church
will have lookouts posted on the roof. American pastors hide money in the walls, underground
pastors hide in the walls. American pastors will or churches will search for new churches
because the music isn't your style. Whereas the underground church, you'll search for
a new church because yours was burnt down by warlords last week. America, the authorities
have issued a mandate to stop the church from gathering together to worship. And the underground
church, the authorities have to kill them to stop them from gathering together to worship.
So I bring this the article up and it is tongue in cheek. It's satire from the Babylon B.
But it's critical that we keep ourselves in check. Remembering the difficulties others
face to help us remember that our mission is not over. And sometimes we might get knocked
down or hurt, but we need to get up, rub a little dirt on it and carry on with the mission.
So as we turn to our text at first, John two verses 15 at 16 or 15 to 17, just remember
that we do have a calling and we do have a purpose and we should remember to always as
we look back on the last year, you know, to count our blessings on where we are and to
remember that God is with us even in the trials and to give him praise both in the good times
and in the bad, because he is there for us in the midst of it all. So let's jump into
our text at verse 15. Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves
the world, the love of the father is not in him for all that is in the world. The desires
of the flesh and the desires, the eyes and pride of life is not from the father, but
is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does
the will of God abides forever. And as an illustration, I wanted to pull this, this
excerpt that I found from the, the, the U S constitutional convention in Philadelphia
from September 15th, 1787. And these, these, these words come from James Madison. So just
keep in mind that it's, that it's a different kind of English that they're speaking at the
time, but I think the point will still come across. Will's the last members were signing
the constitution, Dr. Benjamin Franklin, looking towards the president's chair at the back
of which a rising sun happened to be painted, observed a few members near him. The painters
had found it difficult to distinguish in their art, a rising from a setting sun. I've said
he often and often in the course of the session, the viscitudes of my hope and fears as it
to its issue, look at the behind the president without being able to tell whether it was
rising or setting, but now at length, I have happiness to know that it is rising and not
setting. The founding father had accomplished what they had set out to do with full pains
of labor. They have given birth and we're seeing the rise of a new nation.
So this, this little piece of a, you know, this excerpt from James Madison brings to,
you know, pretty clear thought the difference between a rising or setting sun. You know,
we have in our text, this call to not love the world. We have in this call that to recognize
that, you know, what is in of the, in the world, the desires of the eyes and the pride
of life, the desires of the flesh, these things are passing away, but whoever does the will
of God abides forever. So the world at the time of Christ's crucifixion, they thought
that they were creating the, the end of the believers belief that this, this, you know,
idea of Jesus Christ by taking and smiting Jesus, that they were putting an end to his
teachings. They thought it was the setting of the sun, but in reality, as we know, Jesus
Christ rose on that third day and it was just the rising of the sun. And it was just that
new beginning in Jesus Christ that was just taking its, its start at the, at, at, after
the third day of his crucifixion. So this brings me my first point, which is compassion.
And the main part of compassion is that I don't want you to perish. And as Christians,
we should want no one to perish. We should want everybody to turn to Jesus Christ for
their salvation so that all men can turn to him and be saved and set free from the bondage
of their sin. And they, this brings me the first thought of what, what we're commanded
not to love. We're commanded by, by Jesus Christ not to love the things of this world,
things that are sort of to sum this up, we're directed not to love things that are directed
towards the wrong things. In Matthew 28, 19 through 20, it says, go therefore and make
disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father, the son of the Holy
Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you and behold, I am with
you always to the end of the age. We're told in this scripture right away, teaching them
to observe all that I've commanded you. So clearly Jesus gave commands in ways to live
that we are supposed to observe or live by. There are three times when we're called not
to love. We hear a lot in today's society that love is love. This statement is meant
to shut down discourse and render us unable to defend against the cultural changes that
we see in the world today. The reality of this argument is the root as at its root,
Oriental mysticism or Gnosticism that is present in our own age, but it's not a new
idea. This has been around for a very long time. And when we look at our texts in verse
15, we see John tell us to be wary of the world too. Do not love the world or the things
in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the father is not in him. John is
not talking about loving our neighbor or for the created world, but rather the powers and
principalities that make up the spiritual realm that are in opposition to God and in
rebellion to his kingdom. In Ephesians 6 12, it says, for we do not wrestle against flesh
and blood, but against the rulers and against the authorities and against the cosmic powers
over this present darkness and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
And James 4 4, it says, you adulterous people, do you know that friendship with the world
is enmity with God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself
an enemy of God. It is that we are commanded not to love. Jesus tells us the hierarchy
when dealing with the Sadducees in Matthew 22. So there's clearly an understanding of
things that have a hierarchy and how love is supposed to to actually be dealt with according
to the will of God. And Matthew 22 36 through 39, it says, teacher, which is the greatest
commandment in the law. And he said to him, you shall love the Lord your God with all
your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first
commandment and the second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. So when
where then does compassion come in? When the gospel is taken together as a whole and in
context, we see our love has to first be focused on the right things to focus on things of
on the things of God and his call in our life is right and proper. This is what leads others
to repentance and salvation in Christ. This is godly love and compassion. We do not hate
the sinner, but rather we desperately want to see them come into right relationship with
the father. And this brings me to my next thought, which is the importance of clarity.
And as we think of clarity, think of the woman at the well and how Jesus dealt with the woman
at the well and she he brought to light her sin. Brought it out into the daylight so she
could see it so she had to deal with it. And then in the end, he said, go and sin no more.
Repentance sin no more. There is a declaration of this is your sin. Now go in and live clean
and away from it. Part of clarity is understanding that this is God's design. And part of the
failure of man is that the world is looking at the wrong source. So when you are loving
something that doesn't come from God, when you are loving something that is not within
the framework or the pattern of God's design, you're pulling from the wrong source and that
love is wrong. God has given us the word of God and it is a powerful resource that shows
us time and time again the pattern that he has built into the world. And as a quick aside,
if you think of Noah, in the time of Noah, this is before the Bible, God has put into
nature was put into mankind an understanding of right and wrong. And so when the judgment
of the time of Noah came about, they didn't have the word, but they had an understanding
of right and wrong and they were judged for their for their sin that they lived because
it said that every thought and all imagination was wicked at the time of Noah. And that's
why the judgment of God had to come in at that period of time and only Noah and his
family were saved. But we have this tremendous resource, which is the word of God. And when
we read the word of God and hold to the truth of the gospel, we are able with a plain reading
to see God's plan and his purpose. But we live in a fallen world and we are oftentimes
bombarded with a diff with different or new ideas, new translations or interpretations.
This is the same thing that the apostles were dealing with in the first century church.
There was a creeping plague that was infiltrating many of the early churches. And that is why
we have many of the epistles that are directly dealing with this so that we can have clarity
on the subject. One example is the book of Hebrews and how it was directed at the Jews
specifically to thwart wrong teaching and to clarify the new covenant in contrast to
the old covenant. In our text with John, we see the battle that is beginning to be fought
in verses 15 through 17. This call to resisting the world. John warned the readers of the
worldly dangers that are that the that faced Christians as he seeks to get to know God
better. He did so to enable them to prepare them for to overcome these obstacles with
God's help. As often in first John, we have reminders of what the readers already knew
and were doing or of what they knew they should avoid. The New Testament uses the term world
in at least three ways. Sometimes the world refers to the planet earth, the physical world.
Sometimes it refers to humankind, the human world. And sometimes it refers to the human
culture as influenced by Satan, the world system, which is what's being used here. John
presents these three pairs or these contrasting ideas in the earlier part of first John and
two chapter two, 12 through 14. In verse 15, he's using the love of the world to contrast
the true love, the love of the father. In verse 16, he's using the come comes from the
world, the idea of what is coming out of the world versus what comes from the father to
contrast what is good to love, which is what comes from the father and which we shouldn't
love, which comes from the world. And then to contrast the end of the times, the world
that's passing away versus the one who obeys God remains forever. So those who abide in
the father live forever and those who abide in the world will pass away with it. So these
thoughts, these ideas, they're, they're critical to our understanding of what godly love is
and the kind of love that we're supposed to respect and honor and the kind of love that
we're called not to not to foster. In Romans 12 two, it says, do not be conformed to this
world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind by the testing that you may discern
what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. And second Timothy
four 10, we get a picture of how, how, you know, of this battle was clearly evident in
their time for in four tenants as for Demas in his love with this present world has deserted
me and gone to Thessalonica. Christians has gone to Galatia and Titus to Dalmatia. In
verses 15 through 27 of our text, we only read a snippet of this, but we can see that
there's a recognizing of the spiritual adversary. If you read the continuation of that chapter,
having encouraged the readers with affirmations that their spiritual condition was very good.
John turned next to the enemies that they must face the world and the Antichrist. John
summarized the appeal of the world system as threefold. Here's a picture of the infernal
Trinity, the three faces of the world, the three sources of worldly temptation, lusts
or cravings of desires. And in context, they are evil because they are not in harmony with
God's will. The lust of the flesh is the desire to do something apart from the will
of God. It includes every sinful activity that appeals to the sinful hearts of people.
The lusts of the eyes is a desire to have something apart from the will of God. Whatever
is appealing to our senses, but is not properly ours to desire or obtain falls under this
category. And the pride of life is the desire to be something apart from the will of God.
It refers to the boastful pretensions in earthly matters. The first desire appeals mainly to
the body. The second appeals to the soul or the intellect and the third to the spirit.
The most common manifestation of lust of the flesh in modern Western civilization is illicit
sex, hedonism, idolizing pleasure. The most common manifestation of lust of the eyes is
the excessive buying materialism, idolizing possessions. And the most common manifestation
of the pride of life is trying to control egotism and idolizing power. In Romans 13,
14, it says, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to gratifying
its desires. This is far different than what our society calls us to do today, isn't it?
But we're called to make no room for the flesh or gratifying its desires. In 1 Peter
4, 2, it says, so as to live for the rest of time in the flesh, no longer for human
passions, but for the will of God. In 2 Peter 2, 18 through 19, for speaking loud boasts
of folly, they entice by sensual passions of flesh those who are barely escaping from those
who live in error. They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves, are slaves
of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person to that he is enslaved. This is the folly
we deal with, is that the world is calling us to be caught into the same web of folly
that they are, the same sensual passions of the flesh that they are. Even though they
think they're calling for freedom, they're slaves to their own corruption. For whatever
overcomes a person to that he is enslaved by. Part of the battle is knowing who and
what we are fighting. And during the first century church, much like now, we are fighting
Gnostic philosophies that seek to dilute the scripture and in some cases hide the true
meaning for the select few. So some possible options as to which group of Gnostics John
was addressing. You know, one main one is incipient Gnosticism. The basic teaching teachings
of incipient Gnosticism of the first century seemed to have been an emphasis on eternal
dualism between the spirit and matter. The spirit being the high God was considered good
while matter was inherently evil. This dichotomy resembles Plato isms, ideal versus physical,
heavenly versus earthly, invisible versus visible. There was also an over emphasis on the importance
of secret knowledge, passwords or secret codes, which allow us soul to pass through the angelic
spheres up to the high God necessary for salvation. There are two primary forms of incipient Gnosticism,
which apparently could have been in the background of first John. You have docetic Gnosticism,
which denies the true humanity of Jesus Christ because matter is evil. And you have syrnthian
Gnosticism, which identifies Christ with one of many angelic levels between the good high
God and evil matter. This Christ spirit indwelt the man Jesus at his baptism and left him
before his crucifixion. These two groups practiced either asceticism, which is if the body wants
it, it is evil, or antimonism, which is if the body wants it, give in. So these are the
two ideas that we battle with today. And you can probably see a couple of them in different
groups of society today. You have some groups that say give in to pleasure because God wouldn't
have given you these desires if he didn't want you to act on them fully. And this is
something John was dealing with. And we've already got the epistles. We have Paul, I've
read from Peter, I've read from Paul's writings and I've read from John's writings and they
all come against this idea. So we've already had this dealt with since the first century,
since the beginnings of the church. So there's no excuse for it. This giving into your pleasures
and your flesh and giving into your desires has already been dealt with by the word of
God long ago. And then we have this other group that says if the body wants it, it's
evil. This is shooing of everything that the body needs, like eating food for that matter.
That is more of an idea that you see commonly in Buddhism, where they're trying to eliminate
self altogether. And this idea is also dealt with. We're supposed to love God with everything
and we're supposed to live according to his pattern. Enjoy. That's why clarity of our
beliefs is so critical. To understand the plain reading of the words of Christ in the
many epistles gives us this basis to grow in our knowledge of the Lord. It gives us
a measuring stick to judge this world. If something in our culture is antithetical to
the gospel, then we need to offer clarity to the world and be the salt and light that
is needed. This brings me to my final point, which is conviction. To know what God's truth
is. Part of the way that we know what God's truth is, is by the fruit that someone bears.
So when someone is providing godly fruit, we know that it's from God. But when the wrong
fruit is being created, then we know that it's coming from the wrong source. God allows
us to live in our sin in the hope that we will turn from our sin and to him will turn
for redemption. We live in a fallen world and there's a lot that is wrong with the world
due to the corruption of sin. This does not mean that we have free reign to keep sinning,
but rather that we aspire to a higher principle. We should be growing in our convictions as
we draw closer to the Lord, not moving farther and farther away from the light. In verse
17, we learn that another reason we should not pursue the desires of this world is that
this system, along with its desires, is in the process of passing out of existence. We
are living in what John called the last hour of the world's existence. The world is only
temporary and ephemeral. Those who do God's will will abide, will remain alive forever.
Since all Christians will live forever, John was not saying we attain eternal life by our
obedience. However, we abide, we enjoy this relationship, this intimate relationship with
God and we experience our eternal life abundantly now as well as after death when we obey God.
Just as Abraham through obedience to God obtained the title friend of God, by which he is known
today in three world religions, it will be known forever, so too the obedient Christian
can obtain the same identity by obedience. Likewise, it would be reasonable to conclude
that Christian identity and eternity will be determined by obedience to God in time.
Resisting the appeal of the world is difficult for every believer. John urged his readers
in view of its attractiveness to understand the avenues of its temptations and to remember
four things. Love for the world indicates a lack of love for God. It results in consequences
that are not what our loving Heavenly Father desires for our welfare. It lasts for only
a short time and it precludes intimate fellowship with God. In 1 Corinthians 7, 31, and those
who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it, for the present form
of this world is passing away. So as we close, we need to remember that we are to deal with
those in the world with compassion just as Christ did. The goal is not to become more
like the world but to rescue others from the grip of the world. When dealing with the world,
our place in it must stand with clarity. The world will try to confuse you and lead you
astray. One of the best ways to combat this is to pray. Read your Bible regularly and
to commune with fellow believers. We are also shown we should avoid the fleshly and carnal
things of this world. And that finally brings me to conviction. As we grow in Christ, we
should also grow in our convictions. The closer we move to Christ, the further we move away
from this world. So do not be afraid to tell others that even though God is the God of
love, that does not mean that we are called to love all things. We are called to love
the Lord. Matthew 22, 37. And he said to them, You shall love the Lord your God with all
your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. That means you love him more
than you love yourself. And that means that you do what he says out of love for him before
you just do what you want, especially when what you want is in contradiction or is contrary
to his word. That means we love him above all else, that because we love him, we will
not love the things that are in rebellion to God and his nature. And with that, if I
could have every head bowed, every eye closed, unless of course you're driving. I always
like to throw that in just in case. I want to thank you for listening to this message
and I pray that it has impacted your life. But as if every message I want to give an
opportunity that if this message is spoken to you, if it's convicted your heart and you
recognize that you're not right with God and you want to get right with God, that you can
do that right now. You could signify that you want that by lifting your hand, raise
a hand. I can't see it, but clear you know, but God can. And if you did raise your hand
and you mean it, that you want, you want to repent, you want to get right with God, that
you can do that. You just simply repeat this prayer after me. Dear Lord God, I know that
I'm a sinner, but I know that you sent your son, Jesus Christ to die for me and that he
rose from the dead and I accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and my savior and I repent of my
sin. I turn from him and I thank you for salvation in Jesus name. Amen. Simple prayer. We typically
call that a sinner's prayer and that is all it takes to, you know, to go from being dead
in the world to alive in Christ. And of course there's always next steps just to grow in
Christ like I always said and part of that is finding a Bible believing church. If you're
in Salmon Arm, you know, reach out. We have service at 1030 on Sundays. If you're somewhere
else in the world and you want help finding a church, reach out. I'd be more than happy
to point you in the direction of one of our 3500 fellowship churches that we have worldwide.
God's moving in this end times and we want to get as many people in right relationship
with God as we possibly can. I want to thank you for listening. I apologize for the sound
of my voice this morning. I'm getting over being sick, but I thank you again and I can't
wait for you to come back next time. God bless.