Throw Off the Natural Man

You'll stay standing. I'm going to look back a little bit before we look forward.

We just have three verses this morning first Corinthians 2 Verses 12 through 16 say now we have received not the

Spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God So that we may know the depths graciously given to us by God of which depths

We also speak not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit combining spiritual depths with spiritual words

But a natural man does not accept the depths of the Spirit of God For they are foolishness to him and he cannot understand them because they are spiritually examined

But he who is spiritual examines all things yet. He himself is examined by no one

For who has known the mind of the Lord? That he will direct him But we have the mind of Christ Let's pray

What a stunning statement Lord that you have given us the very mind of your

Son in Whom all the wisdom and all the treasures of God are hid

Lord we take it for granted we are fickle and We forget what you have called us to Lord I pray that you would strengthen us today

That we would not Be as a as a deaf dumb blind man who exist in this rotten natural flesh

But instead Lord that we would throw off those old garments and that we would see what the Spirit has for us is we would

Be led by him Disciplined as beloved children and that we would grow more and more day by day into the image of your

Son Who is holy above all and who is exalted by everyone and everything for all eternity?

It's in his illustrious majestic name we pray. Amen if you will be seated

We know from Corinthians and just from experience that there are three types of people who are in the church at any given time

We have type number one those who are lost They are completely enslaved to the natural desires

That if they stay in those natural desires will eventually give way to unnatural desires in sin.

That is the story of Romans 1 Those who are enslaved in natural desires will not go from bad to better.

They will go from bad to worse as the song saying we just saying If you tarry until you get better, you will never come at all

It doesn't say you may never come at all. You will never come at all There is no way to get better outside of the regenerating power of the

Holy Spirit The second type to see the first type what we have to do is we have to make them profoundly

Uncomfortable with the preaching of the word because hellfire awaits them and it is doing no love to our fellow man

If we make people feel comfortable in their sin, and so we preach at the sin and we preach to the need for repentance

The second type is the type that bothers me and that is a huge part of being a Christian though and that is the

Christian who inhabits the church who has failed to live by the Spirit and Has not thrown off the weight of sin in order to run the race and here's what we know

Discipline is coming for that Christian But we don't know how much discipline and we don't know the timing and there is mystery in God that righteous lot

Grieved at the sin and Sodom and yet he was living right amongst it Embarrassed by it, but not embarrassed enough to run away from it

We don't want to be that kind of Christian Although in the eternal economy of God you are righteous if you have a regenerate heart you are righteous

But these types of Christians they slow down the mission They take in ordered amount of resources and they are stagnant

Uninterested in doctrine unable to discern the depths of the Spirit that God has opened up for them

We'll spend some time on those today The third type is the spiritual man who is running the race and is mining the depths of God's wisdom

This is the place we obviously want to be and last week I mentioned that at Covenant Baptist by God's grace

What we want to do is to not be a mediocre church to not be a church That's surviving and comfortable but to be a great church and in order to be a great church by God's grace

We have to be highly populated with this third type of Christian The Christian who has thrown off all the things that make you weary and is running the race with everything that they have

Understanding that the spiritual treasures of heaven far outstrip any temporal comforts that we get here

In order to put us on this road though I think that it is wise for us and important for us to look at what is this natural man?

Who is he because Paul writes about him and says that he does not accept the depths of the Spirit of God They are foolishness to him.

He cannot understand them because they are spiritually examined The natural man has no spiritual sight.

He is the blind Pharisee of Mark. He is the blind prognosticator of Corinthians The sophist the philosopher who seems very smart very wise to men that knows nothing of God And so we see and we look at the natural man.

I'm going to give you five attributes of him Test yourself See if you're acting like this man

Number one. He is unspiritual He is unspiritual. The natural man is enslaved to his desires and his passions

Everything is about the here and now everything is about what makes him feel good What makes him happy what pacifies his needs in the moment?

see this is the opposite of the list of the fruits of the Spirit because when you look at the fruits of the Spirit the fruits of The Spirit are all about large -scale character attributes and they're never about short -term actions

But when we look at the laundry list of the opposite of the fruits of the Spirit They are all about being enslaved to the passions of your belly or of your eyes

Are you dominated by a lust for worldly things? Do you place your stock and value in the things that make you comfortable and the things that make you happy?

How much time is spent thinking about talking about dwelling on the things that appeal to your comfort?

See this road to being unspiritual it begins innocent enough It begins with the simple seductive draw of living for short -term pleasures

Living for the next meal like a dog Living for the next sexual encounter like an animal

Living for the next time you get to go out and have recreation like a fool That is the natural man

He is constantly at war with us Christian because Ephesians would tell us that he's still with us

We do have the desires of the flesh and we do still have the natural man in the flesh warring inside of us he's not put away until glory completely and he will constantly seduce you and he will constantly play on the natural corrupt man that we

Are to desire things that make us feel good in the more in the moment to the exclusion of storing up our treasures in heaven

See the same man the one with spiritual eyes will always choose the treasures of heaven over the fleeting passions of the day

But it's difficult, isn't it? It's very difficult. I take stock and My wife helps me tremendously about how much

I talk about golf. I Know you laugh and there and the reason why you laugh is because they're acceptable sins to chase your pleasures and to chase your recreation

And I'm profoundly convicted that it's not funny It's not funny at all. How much time is spent and what is the end of this road?

See the end of this road is always destruction and the natural man doesn't see that the natural man is enticed

By the pride of life and by the lust of the flesh and by what his eyes see is being good for food

It's a dangerous place So he's unspiritual the number two thing and this is why it's so difficult is he is first.

He's first. It's who you are You were born that way First Corinthians 15 42 through 44 says this so also is the resurrection of the dead

It is sown a corruptible body. It is raised an incorruptible body

It is sown to dishonor. It is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness

It is raised in power. It is sown a natural body It is raised a spiritual body if there is a natural body.

There is also a spiritual body See we all fight this battle because it's who we are.

We were born that way. We were born as David said born in iniquity Born in transgression born with sin ground into us born with the finitude of not being an eternal being in this body

But being an eternal being in our spiritual body and our spiritual body has one of two destinations

Glory with our Creator or eternal torment and isolation from our

Creator. There is no in -between And so we must Destroy the natural man so that the seed would sprout of the spiritual man and that is the

Christian life See we have this moment in time in ordo salutis where we are saved from judgment

Into grace and then we have this middle section that seems so long and so difficult which is sanctification

Which is done through the Spirit not through our own works But it's very difficult and it's very frustrating because we war with who we are and See God has changed who we are with the regeneration of spirit

We now love his law who were enemies of God We are his friends and we love his commands and yet the natural man that corruptible seed down in there still wars with what?

We know to be true in our spiritual sight and church if you're dominated by the natural man, if we become enticed by what we naturally are then we will die and God will take the lamp away as he does many churches

It's worldliness that kills the church It's not getting old. It's not losing people.

What kills the church is worldliness It's being blind and that's what Paul is warning the Corinthians about they are in a dangerous position

Number three thing that we know about the natural man is that his wisdom man James put this so bluntly, right?

it's earthly natural and Demonic James 3 15 says this wisdom speaking of worldly wisdom is not coming down from above But it is earthly natural demonic

Satan and his minions would love nothing better than for you to become a slave of your most simple desires and they will pick the ones that you are most drawn to to entice you if it is your belly then it will be food if It is taking leave of your senses then it will be intoxicants if it is the love of comfort and money then it will be

Working too much and working for yourself If it is the lust of your eyes, then it will be pornography

It's coming for you. Be careful. He's after you and that kind of wisdom that says I've earned this it's been weeks

I'm just gonna scratch this itch just a little bit. That's demonic. That is earthly wisdom That is him getting you right where he wants you

And beware because the consequences of sin or death the wages of sin or death

So he is unspiritual. He is first. He is natural. His wisdom is demonic and number four

He causes unrest in the church Jude 19. These are the ones who cause divisions worldly minded not having the spirit

If you have a church full of people being the natural man or doing their best impersonation of it

You will have sinful divisions in the church because the natural man is about himself

It'll be his pleasures and his Preferences above anyone else's and in the reformed circle it might even be our doctrine see in the reformed circles

What we've got is we've got a self -defeating premise We believe that our doctrine is so important that the doctrine itself saves you

Which is in contradiction to our doctrine Do you see we believe that we are saved by faith alone through grace alone?

not through understanding of doctrine alone and We look at our other brothers and sisters out there who have different doctrine than us and we think how can they possibly be saved?

And the answer is because we are idiots That's why Do you understand how how worthless is your doctrine when you can't even hold it consistently?

It's very important and these this kind of stuff This kind of moving the goalpost.

It causes unrest in the church We have to stop you're being the natural man and number five

He does not understand the depths of the Spirit of God who explains Spiritual depths to the spiritual man.

See the man who is a natural man. He can say some spiritual things But his life bears zero fruit in keeping with repentance

Jesus said that a tree is known by the fruit it bears. Look at the fruit Always look at the fruit and look at the fruit over time not over this last three months.

Look at the fruit in season Because fruit trees produce fruit every year. It is a long -term project a

Man or a woman is known by the fruit that they bear and that fruit bears out over time See the natural man will speak in slogans about God But he has no application or no regard no matter what he says for God's Word and commands

No regard their bumper stickers to him that go no deeper than that and the church is infested with this

All right, so now that we know what the natural man is let's talk about what happens when Christians embrace the natural man

Let's talk about Corinth first before we move it to here. I Matriarchal feminist hellhole you want me to prove it?

I will They accept sin even the most egregious kind of sin to show their love and acceptance outside of formal church discipline

They have a man who is in such gross public sexual immorality that they are in the

Corinthian Church They think that they are doing God a favor by showing their love and acceptance for this man

By letting him stay among them and leaven the whole loaf Is that a feminine or a masculine tendency, let me ask

Women are running the show as we'll see later in the book by displaying their abundant gifts of prophecy outside of their covering

They have stepped outside there'll be no man ruling me and I'm gonna speak my prophecy because they're so important and I'm gonna cause disorder in the church and no one's gonna say boo about it until the

Apostle Paul comes and says something They have appealed to outside forces as we're gonna see in chapter 6 they've appealed to outside forces to settle disputes out of the fear of having face -to -face fights and Trusting the church to sort it out

They trust the civil magistrate The Roman pagans to sort out their differences inside Because they're too afraid to look each other in the eye and have church discipline and have their fights in public with the people

They love the most Sound familiar Chapter 7 tells us about the sexless marriages that are going on in Corinthians Let me just ask you

Is that a male problem or a female problem? My body my choice leads the day in Corinth and Then we see in chapter 8 that there is a legalism that's pervading over conscience because what's important in Corinth is outward piety not

Spiritual sight How do you look on the outside? Ooh, I went over to their house.

They had some of that meat from the Aphrodite place Not very holy

That defines Christians who have embraced the natural man because like the old way they want to go back to the vomit of Legalism that was always outside of the will of God what they want to do is they want to look on the outside always instead of waiting to examine what's on the inside and At Corinth you have a church that's typified by sexual lawlessness

By fighting and infighting but all of the passive -aggressive kind right because we're not having church trials

We're all just whispering about each other. Did you see did you see I went over there? They had that idle meat

Did you hear about their marriage? That's what's going on in Corinth and it's destroying the church

And so when Paul says the biting things that he does he is talking about the natural man dominating a church and it can happen not because they're not redeemed but because they've let the little nose of the camel get under the

Tent and they have started to imbibe and drink the lies of the enemy

We've been doing this in the church for a long time And it's very easy for us to point the fingers and to point the guns outside and too often we do that It all sounds familiar doesn't it we have denominations that have female pastors

Essentially what Corinth was doing we have men that are stealing money out of the offering box extorting their flock fleecing the sheep by bringing them to their charismatic flag and it's easy for us to point fingers all day at the

Bad guys and you all know who they are Right. I can name them. It's fine. It takes no courage whatsoever

But friends, I think we need to look inside It always is easy to have the common enemy on the outside, but it's always hard to look inside at what's going on here

So let me ask some questions when Christians start to embrace the natural man I'm gonna deal with men and women separately and I'm gonna deal with women first Let me ask this do our women do you hear sisters

Do you fear what others think or say about you and then project this suspicion on to others without any evidence whatsoever?

Are you afraid of what they're saying about you behind your back? Are you afraid of what they're thinking about how you looked what you said what you brought in and then do you?

Propose or put that suspicion of they're talking about you Do you put it on them and then judge them that way with no evidence whatsoever?

See suspicious thoughts make us directly think the worst not the best of our fellow

Christians and is a sin That's besetting in women. It would be naive To think that that's not happening

Let's call it out if this is you if You if it brings it to mind if it brings the woman to mind that you thought

I wonder if they're talking bad about me You have one of two options Go ask them or Put it to death

Pray that God will take this sickness this disgusting sin away from you repent

We are not authorized To think the worst and hope for the best

See Christians what we do this means something right we say that we have to fear God we say as Calvinist that God has us in his hand and that he controls our destiny and Yet at the same time

We're afraid of the unfair fight and we try to gain every advantage by carnal means that we can

Christians understand that we don't have to be lambs to the slaughter. We don't have to be stupid But at the same time we are gonna lose some battles because we have to think the best of other

Christians and Sometimes they're gonna hurt us and you know what we should do when they hurt us We should turn in our

Bibles to Matthew chapter 18 and we should go to our brother when they sin against us and we should

Confront them with it and ask for repentance And if they do not repent we should bring another witness to them and we should confront them in their sin

And if they do not repent we should repeat those steps as much as is wise and necessary And if that doesn't work, we should bring them in front of the church

Call a meeting any member can do that you can call a special meeting and you can say this is going to be a church discipline meeting and it would moderate it and you will bring your case in front of that brother or sister and it will be heard by the congregation and if the congregation deems them to be an unrepentant sin, they will pass that judgment and that person has a

Decision to make do I repent or do I leave the table? Serious thing.

Have you ever seen it happen? Have you ever raise your hand if you've seen it happen? We are in willful disobedience to God because it hasn't happened and he's not happy with us

It starts here. Are we to believe that no one sinned against one another? No, but what we do is we go off like little cowards and we talk behind people's backs

Never dealing with the issue head -on and how can you trust someone when you don't have the conversation?

You can't You can't and we mirror Corinth What does the scripture tell us women it tells us that we have to think well of others

It tells us that we have to invest in relationships knowing that they can go wrong It tells us to cast off gossip and tailbearing

These little morsels, they're so tasty to the gossip The Proverbs say that they go down deep into the innermost parts

We love to hear just a little bit of salacious stuff because we know that it tickles our ears and it makes us feel a little bit better of ourselves because we're not doing that thing and You are crawling around in the grime and the muck along with the person that you're talking about and don't be fooled

We know this any person that would gossip to you is Gossiping about you at the same time with somebody else

It is an infectious contagious disease that has destroyed more churches than probably any other sin

I can think of Make holy war against it refuse the suspicions of other people and believe your assumptions

Do not believe bad assumptions about people but assume the best and you always have to have evidence

And if you don't have evidence you let it go If you have evidence, we have to go to Matthew 18

Let me ask a second question. Do our women run homes? By taking over leadership in the vacuum of male passivity.

This is the besetting sin of our age from men and women first Peter 3 1 says and we don't like this verse in the same way you wives be subject to your own husband so that Even if any of them are disobedient to the word

There may be they may be one without a word by the conduct of their wives Understand this women your husband's disobedience in failing to lead is not an invitation for you to step up to headship

You are gonna have a difficult time of it You have no authority to lead your home ever.

I Don't care how sinful he is You don't have to join him in his sin, but you lead nothing and if you lead it

You're leading it straight to hellfire where the natural man dwells. I know it's your desire It was our mother's desire from the very beginning

Her desire will be for him Just like sins desire was for Cain to rule over him to dominate him

So you have to do what's in your spear by making a home by encouraging pro providing counsel for sure

Raising kids and then get this pray for submission Submission never happens in agreement.

You understand that The word itself is about following the orders of the captain and sometimes your captain is a moron

So what I don't say that to deprecate men I say it as a fact men our

Responsibility is we're gonna lead them wrong sometimes and they are going to follow us and we bear the weight of all of that Just like the military captain who leads his men to a slaughter.

He hopes he dies, too That's the way it is You Have to learn to trust your husband knowing that your obedience is righteous in God's sight

Even if your husband is wrong, and I would say especially if your husband is wrong see

Sarah looked at Abraham and she called him Lord and In many ways he was a lordly man

But Sarah hatched a plan because she wanted to know better than God and God had promised an heir to Abraham And so she brought in her maidservant her slave

Hagar and said hey have a child with Hagar Abraham And this will provide our line

It will make God promise God's promises come true and Abraham like a big bozo said, okay, but what is the fundamental problem?

He wasn't leading What he should have said is get out of here woman You want to entrap me with fornication adultery?

No, but he didn't say that and a whole ancestry of people

Became the enemies of God because of the disobedience and the inversion of the headship submission relationship

Women are you running your homes? Do we really know let me just tell you you're fooling.

No one we know We know and I know it could be because he's not doing anything

Guess what you do. This is the hardship Peter says it Even if any of them are disobedient to the word

That is a hard calling wives. Very hard very difficult because in the absence of leadership things are going to start breaking and falling apart and it is not your job to fix them and You're gonna pray to the

Lord for strength and for perseverance as things fall apart hoping that God will bring him to the very end of his sin and his foolishness and That he will repent and everything will be made new and it will be better than it was before Because you will have known the depths and you will see the heights

That is the calling wives. Are you the natural man? Or are you throwing it off? I think these are the two vehicles that we see at the most in the church

Functional headship of the woman in the house We're okay with it here We've got this on lockdown, but in the house not so much

Wives run the show and it's obvious to everyone. It may not be obvious to you I urge you today to take inventory.

I urge you. I Urge you and if you love gossip, I It's easy to beat up on men and I'm about to do it

But we say this and no one's gonna disagree with me. Do men need to make holy war no holds barred against pornography

The answer is absolutely. Yes We all agree to this right women, where's the fire on Making holy war to the things that destroy you

It is the sins of the mouth. It's gossip. It's tailbearing It is taking over leadership in a way that's much more unnatural than pornography is

I'm not minimizing the greatest scourge that's taken men off the battlefield that I could ever imagine

It's unbelievable how bad it is and yet it is natural men desire women natural

Women desiring leadership of the home is unnatural. That is against God's order Beware Beware, it is your besetting sin men.

Let's talk about this and I want to start with a positive vision for you This is what you have to be men. You have to act boldly and you have to tell the truth to everyone

We have for too long set truth against love There is only one way to love people and that's to tell the truth and there is only one way to tell the truth

Riley And that's to love people if you don't love your brother Then you will coat and you will nuance the truth to protect yourself.

Don't be fooled. You're not trying to protect them You're trying to protect yourself because the besetting fear of men is the fear of man

Our sin men is that we are afraid of men and it's always been the besetting sin

We've always wanted to take the back seat and we've always wanted to be David while being much more like Barak Always Men don't fear man

And I know that we live in a culture that beats us on the head about toxic masculinity and friends

We are all feminists. It's so obvious to me. We are going to be tempered.

We are going to be afraid of our wives We are gonna say things that would probably get us publicly hanged if we truly are not feminists.

It's the truth I've seen it over and over again men I'm begging you do not be led from the shadows by your wife and thus be ruled by sin

This is what happens if your wife is running the home, then you are being ruled by sin

It's the sin of Adam you step aside and let it happen and you pacify yourself with your fleeting passions

See men we have to protect our wives from outside danger But we also have to protect her from the dangers of sin that are besetting to her

Her desire is to lead you You must shoot her down in blunt direct terms

There is a difference between encouragement and brow beating men

Do not lose your authority by stooping down to argue about foolish things and quarrels

We say it all the time there, you know the guys at Ogden that do bright hearth and all that kind of stuff

They talk all the time. They call each other Kings. Hey King. Good job King. Here's the thing When you get involved in petty quarrelings with anyone

You're not acting like a king that stuff's well below the level of that person

You're not dealing with petty little squabbles between three -year -olds if you want to lead you have to lead and leading oftentimes means standing above it and Declaring what needs to be and then letting your people do that.

It's very important Do you put your wife in her place with her besetting sins as she no doubt will do with you?

See, we don't have trouble With wives correcting their husbands That is ubiquitous We have a huge amount of trouble with husbands correcting their wives and that's because we're all feminists

Man, you have to purge the sin from your midst If you haven't done that it's going to infect your house

Get pastoral help today. If you are enslaved to sin, and I know some of you are

I Know you are Pornography is the biggest sin of the day

Don't fight alone for one more day with that one It is a lethal mortal danger.

It is sapping your strength is Making you a little coward and it makes you act more effeminate by the day

It's taking away all of your masculinity if you're passive if you're afraid of men talk

Get pastoral help We will call you out See the natural man acts like Abraham in that episode where he just does what his wife says because let's not be real

Why because he was being a pervert He wanted the maidservant he didn't control himself

Men you cannot lead at times without overruling. Here's how you know if your wife is leading the home

You've never overruled her You're not leading anything Do you think

I have to overrule my students at school Yeah, all the time now

Look, hopefully your wife is not as idiotic as my high school students at the public school If it is then brother you have a cross to bear and you're gonna have to be prayerful and steadfast in this

But probably not but listen in your marriage. There's going to be friction That's why we're told over and over again the way this works.

There's going to be friction You have to be resolved as a man that you're gonna do this thing and in order to do this thing

You're gonna have to cast off the sins that take your courage away because this task is mission -critical

If we want to put things in order in the church if we want to be men who cast off the natural man

This is what it takes. It takes throwing off the sin in our midst making war with it with no tools off the table

Why do we lack elders and statesmen in this culture have you ever asked yourself that why are our politicians so horrible?

Are they not? they're awful and It makes you hopeless does it not there is no great man.

I Can't think of a single one. We got there is not a great man in American politics today.

I don't know of one not of one that's even close. Do we lack elders in church? Yeah We do it's difficult.

Why it's because here's the deal men We cannot find the stomach to rule our own home and in the midst of this

We've tried to throw Christ out of the church by obeying women in our ritual in our reform types We don't do it by making them pastors.

We do it by making them the functional elders in the elder board You're doing what your wife says at the elder board and you are being ruled by women

You might as well stop the pretense and just let her come up here and preach What are we doing?

You cannot submit to Jesus by disobeying him. Isn't that obvious?

you can't love God by disobeying him and Wives, you can't love

Jesus without obeying your husband It's as simple as that and the limitation is very narrow if he calls you to sin don't do it

But you have to obey him everything else and this has been very easy women because we don't we don't lead you

There's nothing to obey That's the absence that I'm talking about and it's time to step up So let's end on a positive note and let's talk about the spiritual man.

This is what we are guys This is what we are. I want to read this again because I think it's critical

He who is spiritual examines all things yet He himself is examined by no one for who has known the mind of the

Lord that he will direct him But we have the mind of Christ Paul is an apostle of God who spoke the words of God God speaks to the spiritual man

And what Paul is doing is he is lifting off and working through Deuteronomy 4 I'm gonna give you a sampling of it has any people heard the voice of God speaking from the midst of the fire as you

Have heard it and lived Talking to Moses or has a God tried to go take for himself a nation from within another nation with trials with signs and wonders and with war and with a mighty hand and with an outstretched arm and with great terrors as the

Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes To you it was shown that you might know that the

Lord he is God that there is no other beside him out of the heavens He caused you to hear his voice to discipline you and on earth

He caused you to see his great fire and you heard his words from the midst of the fire Was it a dangerous thing to question

Moses? Yeah It was a very dangerous thing Because God has instilled hierarchy and it's unavoidable

Moses was a man who was saved by grace just like every other man who has ever been saved but Moses Moses spoke to God and You were not supposed to question what he had done and the

Lord reassures him See like Moses and the his father's before him Deuteronomy 31 says that God will not forget his covenant with his people and he has not forgotten it to this day

His covenant was to redeem you By his grace and to restore you to the works of the law that our father

Adam failed in Deuteronomy 429 comforts us that Paul is all over.

It says that the people of God will seek him and will find him The people of God will seek him and will find him and if you are one who is seeking him and you will surely find

Him then there is this curious thing that's going to define you that is that you will be examined by no one

There is a confidence in the Christian life And I will tell you that you can experience When you make war on sin when you throw it off and you take over your duties that God has commanded you to What you will have is a confidence not a swagger because you know

Your confidence comes from being declared righteous by God and if God is for you who can be against you You will be examined by no one because you are not judged by man

You are judged by God and we know what he's going to see. He sees the righteousness of his son

That is you We have a defense mechanism in place that we have neglected for a generation

To mold us in this way So that we'd be would be Christians who are examined by no one and that defense

Mechanism is the counselors and the guidance of the church The church is

God's means of accomplishing his mission and the reason why is because the church properly

Instituted directs people to holiness. I make no apologies about saying that the church is vital to the

Christian life Because the church is the means that God has provided to make you walk in his spirit

It's not a fairy floating around in a cloud He uses a multitude of counselors and he uses the authority of church officers to mold you into his image.

That's what he's doing See a clean conscience before God wiped clean of your sin will lead to the spiritual deaths of God that he desires for you to dive into God wants you to know him

That's why he's giving you the mind of Christ See, it's simple but not simplistic to say

That when we walk in a way that we're examined by no one that means that we will not fear men but we will do right and What is the appeal that Paul makes he quotes

Isaiah 40 13 who has encompassed the spirit of the Lord or as his counselor?

Has informed him. No one has informed God of anything No one has influenced

God of anything No one has ever contained or encompassed the spirit of God without him

Directing that spirit the spirit of God is God and he goes where he wills John 3 tells us that He goes where he wills

The man of God is directed of God and does not try to direct God the natural man hates

What God says and tries to direct God to make him more palatable to himself and to other people

We're all just doing our best no one's doing their best There is only one way to please

God and that is to be as adopted child The spiritual man don't miss this.

It's the powerhouse of this whole section Can you imagine he writes this to this church at Corinth and he says these words

We have the mind of Christ Hebrews tells us to consider

Christ Philippians asked us. Is there anything good? Is there anything excellent?

Is there anything virtuous? Is there anything true? And the answer is rhetorical isn't it?

Yes, there is. So what are we to think on? We have the mind of Christ See the

Queen of Sheba came to see the righteousness the wisdom of Solomon and she was amazed She was speechless dumbfounded by the wisdom of Solomon and yet Jesus said that a greater one than him is before you and do you understand that all the wisdom that Solomon asked for and was cheerfully granted by God is

Granted to you today in the depths of the wisdom of his spirit who resides in you even as we speak

You have the full treasury of the wisdom of God open to you

How can you follow his commands by listening to the spirit? We have all the tools to righteousness

So why aren't we working? Christ has defeated sin So, why are we not making war knowing that the victory is sure

Christ has defeated death. So why do we fear anyone if they can't kill us?

Then what can they do to us? If they kill us we live forever

See this stuff and the context of 1st Corinthians is not about personal piety Primarily, but it's about conduct in the church and within families and that is the emphasis of Corinthians It's not about what they're doing in their quiet time

It's about what they're doing with each other and we're about to get into that We're about to see it starting in chapter 5 that there is unrest in the church

There's trouble in the church with God's beloved people Friends, it's a warning to us from the ages 2 ,000 years ago.

We look back and we see today nothing changed Except we have less excuse than them

Because they didn't have many fathers and we have fathers I have less excuse than many of you because I have a great father

And I have a great heavenly father and he's taught me and how awful and rebellious is it for us to look at our fathers?

To dishonor them and to go our own way and that's what we've done in the church Men, you have to lead your home and the world will hate you for it women you have to follow your husband and it's gonna be fearful because Sometimes he's gonna have to learn to lead because no one ever taught him and every force in the world is telling him not to Men you have to throw off the sexual immorality that's enslaving you.

It's disapping the heart of you It's corrupting you you are King Theodon dying on the chair while you should be leading the battle

Stop it. Make holy war on it except nothing less men

We have to do this and the good news friends The good news man is God has promised that we will he who began a good work in us will complete it

Why because it's his glory not ours Let's pray that it would be so church Lord, we we stand amazed in your presence that you have saved a people

As Corey said other earlier and it pierced my heart Lord that that we have been insolent against you

Or we have honored you with our lips while our hearts were far from you or we have done religious activity

Thinking that that would pacify a holy God who is a consuming fire Lord we have tried to destroy others when you have told us that the summary of the law is to love you and to love our neighbors and Lord we have taken that and we have snubbed our nose at it and We have gossiped and had malicious words that we tried to kill each other

Lord we look at your scripture and it tells us very clearly how the home is supposed to be laid out and we think we know better Lord help us to repent of it.

Lord. Help us to see our sin For the deceptive evil that it is and Lord at the same time help us to see your righteousness is the light and The goodness of men given to us by God that we would follow your commands

Lord how your law Excites us how your statutes are a balm on our soul how your commands are guideposts that lead us to green pastures

Lord how we love your law Lord how good you were to give it to us

And Lord how much better you were to give us the ability to follow that which we in our natural man hated and rebelled against And in your mercy

You have drawn us to love it Lord make us that people Take away our blindness.

Take away our hard hearts and We will glorify you It's in your name.