Know God, Fight Lust

1:18 What do you do in the first five seconds, women and men? This is my effort, and I'm not going to talk about it now. I'm going to go to the text and try to find one thing. Now, let me say as I move into this, that I do not mainly have in view a strategy. That's a quick fix for this afternoon's battle.

1:42 It will help this afternoon, I believe. I have in mind, rather, 10 years from now, and 30 and 60, do you know, young people, that some of you will be struggling with sexual temptation in 60 years, as strongly as you do today? And the question will be, have you learned any battle strategies that work in Christ? I'm much more interested in the long term than I am this afternoon.

2:13 I want to save marriages in 20 years. I want you to walk pure down the aisle with your daughter. I want you to look in the face of a wrinkled 75 year old wife and say, we made it. I care about that. I'll be gone when that happens. But I'll be watching. The Lord will let me see some of that. I do believe. I'm preaching for that. If you don't make it this afternoon, God can handle that. But oh, get on a path of purity that will work in the long term for your life. So here we go. Verse 4 and 5. that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in lustful passion, and here comes the key phrase, like the Gentiles who do not know God.

3:16 When you give way to sexual lust or sexual misconduct, you act like the Gentiles who don't know God. I infer from this, knowing God is the pathway to sexual purity. Now say it again. Knowing God is the pathway to sexual purity. to which I can hear some cynical person ready to nullify verse 5 say, yeah, right, as if there aren't a thousand world-class theologians who aren't in the bondage of sexual sin sleeping around at their academic meetings in New Orleans.

4:16 So what good is all this God knowledge for them? I've seen them. I've seen them. I've been there. I've been to New Orleans. And I could name the academic societies I have in mind. I've watched them go to the strip clubs. These teachers of religion. So you asked me, rightly.

4:42 So what good is all this knowledge of God? And here's my answer. And I say it with tremendous confidence. They don't know God. There is a universe of difference between knowing about God and knowing God. Listen, if you're struggling with internet pornography, labor to know God the way you know those images. I know about them, but I say with my hand on the Bible, as your pastor, I have never looked at internet pornography in my life.

5:39 But I know about it. I get enough of those little advertisements that pop up to make me know what would really be there if I followed them through. But some of you know it. What do I mean by that? You have a relationship with it. You're drawn into it. You embrace it. Things happen when it happens. And that's what it means to know God. Do you want to know God? Or do you just know about God the way some people know about internet pornography? They don't know God. They don't know God. This text says, by implication in verse 5, knowing God is the pathway to sexual purity. Now I ask this question, why would God ordain that purity be through the pathway of knowing Him?

6:35 Let's ask that question Why would God ordain That sexual purity Be obtained Along the path of knowing God There's a reason And it's found in 1 Corinthians 6 18-20 Let me read it for you Flee from sexual immorality Every other sin That a man commits is outside his body But the sexually immoral person Sins against his own body or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit whom you have from God? You're not your own.

7:17 You were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body. You know why you have a body? tall, short, pretty, plain, brony, feeble. Do you know why you have a body? That you may make God look precious by the way you use it.

7:49 That's why you have a body. By the way you eat. By the TV programs you watch. by what you use your body-earned money to buy, by what you do with your leisure, by the way you decorate your face and wear your clothes. It's not a sermon mainly about how you adorn your body. But I'll put in a parenthesis here. Frankly, I'm very pleased with Bethlehem. I like the way you dress. There's a lot of variety out here. I like variety. Some people do like I do. Almost nobody, but that's okay.

8:33 And it's all over the map. And that says something about God that's very precious to me. That's another sermon. And I'm not at all worked up about the makeup in this church. Seems like most of the women in this church have got that figured out. Pretty simple. And it doesn't look to me like women are spending 80 hours in front of the mirror. Or men. And I just think that speaks volumes about where our treasure is. It isn't here. It's there. And we want a heart. And so it says to women and men, work on your heart. Don't work on your face so much. Work on your heart. Don't fret about your wrinkles. Don't fret about the hair that's falling out on top. So that when you bend over, the light shines off your head. Don't worry about that. The fact that I'm even mentioning it shows I'm a sinner, right? Rather, work on this heart so that you use your face and your hands and your legs and your voice and your eyes and your sexual organs in order that you might make God look really good that is really valuable, really precious your treasure more than anything else that's why you have a body now, with that premise in front of us we can answer the question, why has God ordained that we be delivered from sexual misconduct along the pathway of knowing God?

10:07 You got it figured out yet? Say it like this. If we were able to get victory over our fantasy life, victory over our dealings with pornography, victory over fornication, victory over adultery, without it being through the knowledge of God, He would get no glory with it. In other words, God is concerned not only with what you do with your body and what you do with your emotions He's concerned about why you do it What's driving you? What's churning you in here? That makes a difference to God Because if you come to sexual purity through knowing God, God will get the glory If you come to sexual purity along some self-improvement program You will find yourself in bondage to another idol moralism, legalism, or some other ism, but not the Lord of glory.

11:10 That's why liberty must come through knowing God. Which is what verse 5 clearly implies. The pathway to purity is along the path of knowing God. So here's the way I close. Let's be a little more specific and a little more practical. what is it, you might ask me, what is it about God that I need to know? I mean, even asking the question like that is a little misleading, isn't it, after what I said about the difference between knowing about God and knowing God. Yet I have to ask the question, what is it about God? Or maybe I should ask it like this, knowing God in what aspects or what regards or what way? What is it specifically that I could get a handle on about God that would help me get free.

12:04 And there are three things in this text about God that are massively helpful, at least to me, I pray they are to you. Number one, know the patience of God. Hear me, strugglers and failers, all you failing saints, hear me on this patience of God. Look at verse one. Oh, this helped me so much. Over the years, these kinds of more and more texts in the Bible have helped me and encouraged me so much. Because I tend to be the kind of person that Paul is not in this verse. And I'll tell you what that is in a minute. Verse 1. Finally then, brethren. We request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus. That as you received from us instruction as to how you ought to walk and please God. and then he puts in this just as you actually do walk what a merciful thing to say that's hardly true that's not very true it's a little bit true just enough to justify it in the Holy Bible and I say exactly the same thing looking at you you know how you ought to walk and please God just as you are doing and some of you are sitting there saying If you knew what I did last night, you wouldn't say that to me.

13:25 I would. Believer, I would. Because of what follows these words. that you excel still more. That's a breath of fresh air to me. I am a kind of husband and a kind of pastor and leader who tends to be very all or nothing. You give me a pack of gum, I'll eat all five sticks in five minutes. If I ever touched alcohol, I'd be an alcoholic.

14:05 And that's not what this text is like. This text is not an all or nothing text, is it? He says to a people who have a long way to go, here you all know what you're supposed to do. Way to go, you're doing it a little bit. Now, let's go, Bethlehem, more, more sexual purity, more sexual purity. Because as soon as you say more sexual purity, you're admitting there's impurity in the church.

14:31 And I know it's out there. And you know it's out there. And what if I had to be an all-or-nothing preacher and we had an all-or-nothing God who said, every little improvement you make is worthless because of every failure you make. What if we had a God like that? And you know what? There are a lot of Christians who see God that way. We have quoted the text about our righteousness is as filthy rags so often we can't even believe this text. That is not what that text means, by the way. That text does not mean that a Christian cannot please God in his behavior. when you do something by faith in the Holy Spirit according to God's word it is not filthy rags it is pleasing to God of course it's got contamination in it I've said to you before that every good deed I've ever done I have to repent of which means I know it's contaminated my motives are never pure that's life in this fallen world and isn't it good to have an apostle and to have a God who says you're living this way now really live this way.

15:34 You're making some progress. Come on, let's do better. You got one victory this week on a Tuesday night. Come on, two victories next week. And He's willing to forgive you if you will fight and ask for forgiveness. That's the first thing. He's patient. He's not an all or nothing God. None of us in this room, not a single man or woman or child in this room is where you ought to be in the Christian life. So I could just hammer you to death in view of that, couldn't I? Well, what good would that do? Paul didn't do it that way. He just said, you're making some progress? Let's go Bethlehem. Come on, let's do better.

16:19 Second, know the power of God. First the patience, now the power. Now I'm drawing this from the previous chapter, and you can back your eyes up to it. if you would like. This is very precious and powerful to me. 1 Thessalonians 3, verse 12. Chapter 3, verse 12. May the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another. May the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another, as we do for you, so that he may establish your hearts blameless in holiness. There it is. before our God the Father at his coming. Now, do you hear what's implied here? Paul is praying for them in a kind of benedictory style.

17:14 May the Lord make you increase and abound in love for God. Make you downtown. Make you here. Isn't that amazing? Keep reading. may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all all, even those people on the internet those people on the videos those people in the movies may He make you love those women and love those men so that you can begin to participate in their destructive behavior that's sending them to destruction may you love them love everybody you see on the internet Everybody you see on the internet, love that person, love that woman, love that man, and pray for them. Can you pray and masturbate with them at the same time? You cannot.

18:09 Do we love them? This text says, God will do that. It says, may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for all, so that He may establish your hearts blameless in holiness. There it is. May He make you abound in love so that He may establish you in holiness. Holiness is what we're after here. Sexual purity. And where does it come from? It comes from God. May you make Bethlehem abound in love to all and be perfected in holiness, step by step, until the last day, so that when you come, in the twinkling of an eye, we will be in Christ and changed into the image of Jesus. perfectly. Oh, Bethlehem, know the power of God. Here you are alone at work. It's a break time. The internet's free. Everybody's gone out of the office. Think of God in two ways. He's not just there to zap you. He's there to help you. He's there to help you. Cry to Him. Cry to Him as your hand is moving on that mouse, say, oh God, lift my hand and then lift it. And when you lift it, say, praise God.

19:27 Fight, brothers and sisters Fight for your life Finally, number three, first the patience of God, then the power of God to help you, not destroy you. And finally, the preciousness of God. Patience, power, preciousness.

19:51 Where do I get this in the text? Simply from the word God. I mean, what's the definition of God? Isn't God the being who's most precious in the universe? Most valuable? isn't God the highest treasure there ever was? This is what it means to be God. Would you not agree? It means God. G-O-D means most precious being in the universe. Would anybody disagree with that? No. Most valuable, most precious, most to be desired of all beings in the universe. And therefore, I simply ask you, know Him. Know him as God. Know him as the most precious treasure in your life. Brothers and sisters, the back of pornography, the back of pornography will be broken.

20:53 The back of pornography downtown will be broken. The back of pornography here in this room will be broken by the preciousness of God in our lives. You sit at your desk, you walk through the airport, you sit in your living room in front of the television with a little clicker in your hand. The question is, is he precious to me? I tell you, I have sat in a hundred hotel rooms by myself when I've been out speaking. All the movies are there available. All the TV is there available. and I've got to speak in the name of Jesus Christ in the morning,

21:42 I tell you, the battles there are very great, and God... Powerful. You get on your knees beside a bed, and you say, oh God, I will not stand before those people as a duplicitous, cowardly, caving shepherd. Cut off my hand. Gild you out my eye. I will not yield.

22:07 Oh, come on. Let's be people who seek the lost and drop our nets. Let's be people who make light go up at Bethlehem downtown and here because we pour ourselves out for the poor, whether here or in Zimbabwe. And let's be people who refuse to be typed by any other group of liberal or conservatives who say, well, if you give yourself to that, you sure won't give yourself to massive efforts in sexual purity. Oh, yes, we will. Come on, Bethlehem, let's do it. Father in heaven, please come in power and work in this room right now as we close in song. Oh Lord, give us one pure and holy passion. Give us one magnificent obsession.

23:04 Give us one glorious ambition for our lives to know, to know, to know, to know So...