Blessed is the Man Who Endures Temptation

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Ascension Presbyterian Church - Longwood, Florida Rev. Christopher Brenyo "Blessed is the Man Who Endures Temptation" James 1:12-15 September 10th, 2023 www.ascensionpresbyterian.com

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Please turn in your Bibles to the book of James and chapter 1
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James chapter 1 I'm again reading in verse 9
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This is God's holy and infallible word Let the lowly brother glory in his exaltation
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But the rich in his humiliation Because as a flower of the field he will pass away
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For no sooner has the Sun risen with a burning heat Then it withers the grass its flower falls and its beautiful appearance perishes
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So the rich man also will fade away in his pursuits
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Blessed is the man who endures temptation For when he has been approved he will receive the crown of life which the
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Lord has promised To those who love him Let no one say when he is tempted.
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I am tempted by God For God cannot be tempted by evil nor does he himself tempt anyone?
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But each one is tempted When he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed
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Then when desire has conceived it gives birth to sin and sin when it is full -grown
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Brings forth death May the Lord be pleased with our consideration of his most holy word
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Please pray with me now. Oh Lord we recognize that you are the truly blessed man and We want to walk in your ways and we want to be blessed men women and children
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Oh Oh Lord, I pray that we would be those who endure temptation that we would love righteousness and hate iniquity and That we would find comfort and solace
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That we have you as our Savior and I ask these things in Jesus name
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Amen Please be seated Today I'm going to start by giving you the outline points because it is the most
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Unnatural part of my message for me personally. I want to kind of get that out of the way and jump into it
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First we're going to consider holy ambition Pursuing the righteousness, excuse me the blessing of God holy ambition pursuing the blessing of God second we're going to consider the source of Temptation the source of temptation and We know this to be true, but it's always surprising when we read in James chapter 1 a surprising fact
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We already know the source of temptation Third we're going to consider the death cycle of desire the death cycle of Desire and fourth
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Lord willing we will end on the blessed man the blessed man holy ambition the source of temptation the death cycle of desire and the blessed man
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The title of the message today is blessed is the man who endures temptation blessed is the man who endures temptation and Sunday school.
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We had a perfect entree into the subject in Philippians and in the prayers of the people today.
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We had a perfect entree into our subject Today and I thank God for his providence and the ordering of things like Sunday school and the elements of liturgy and Preaching it's a very beautiful thing that the
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Lord does in this tapestry of the Christian life The Christian faith is often misperceived in the eyes of the worldly it is reduced to a list of prohibitions and this false conception of our
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God they believe that he is only interested in stealing their fun and His law his word his ways are an obstacle
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To their desires and I argued this a number of times.
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I believe this is at the root of atheism the God of Scripture the
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Christian God is a moral God and The atheists this is the
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God they don't want to believe in But in reality, we learned that he actually sets before the believer great joys
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Joys that far surpass anything the world has to offer
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He sets before us blessings that are both accessible and attainable
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We therefore ought to pursue God's blessings with great vigor
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Today you're going to be urged to have a greater holy Christian ambition more faith more obedience more patience more holiness and To attain and lay hold of that great blessing and reward
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You're also going to be forced to confront something very unpleasant today and That is the greatest impediment to the blessed life that is available to you in Christ.
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There is an impediment and You're going to have to painfully confront that impediment today
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It should be noted that we are dull -minded fools when we give in to our sinful desires
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He gives and sets before us as I've mentioned blessing and Life and yet we pine after that which conceals a hook a snare a poison a flaming arrow a serpent's bite
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May the Lord be pleased to show us the more excellent way
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Look again at verse 12 blessed is the man
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Who endures Temptation to be blessed is to be happy to be fortunate
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Not in the trivial senses of that word but in a very deep and profound way
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The Beatitudes is be blessed is really what we're considering there when we go through and pray through those things
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We should desire those things which tend to our blessing Ambition is viewed with suspicion and the church in our
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Deficient piety we view ambition as a bad thing. We need more ambition
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We need holy Ambition we need to be people who rabidly pursue the blessing of God the man of endurance is
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The blessed man The blessing comes to him who?
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endures Temptation now when we consider verse 12 the structure of the language for us in English makes us feel maybe that there is a a turn or a transition an abrupt change here in verse 12 the word temptation translated in English is
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The same word group. It's the same word essentially as trial up above So there's two types of trials and the language shift
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I think the interpreters rightly call it temptation because the temptation that is here presented is
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In relation to evil that helps us make the connection. The trial is a trial of righteousness as it concerns evil
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That's the temptation and the man who is blessed is the one who
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Goes through the trial of righteousness as it concerns evil.
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He's the one who's blessed And you and I need to have a greater ambition for holiness a
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Greater desire to be more and more like Christ You and I need to zealously
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Pursue the blessing of God There's something else that happens here
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And I'm not going to give this the full treatment because of your knowledge of this subject the one who endures when he has passed the test
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When he lives his life in faith when he is called to glory He's going to receive the crown of life
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There is a great reward Waiting for the believer who walks in righteousness
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You and I spend a lot of time and maybe thinking that we are on neutral or safe ground
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The outset of the preaching of the book of James I said that James deals in the black and white
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The world calls us to live in the gray There's blessing and cursing
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Deuteronomy 11 and Deuteronomy 30 the Lord sets before us life and death and we may be
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Being influenced by the world see ourselves in a comfortable middle place
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Not going too hard After sin and not going too hard after righteousness kind of content in this middle ground
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But for all us to receive the crown of life to receive the blessings that come from God's hand as a result of obedience
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We have to zealously with a holy ambition pursue
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Righteousness We have to endure the trial of righteousness as it concerns evil and we have to pass
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The test To have endurance means to stand your ground
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To bear up against it to persevere This idea of enduring temptation is not momentary it is not temporal it is ongoing and perpetual
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You and I every day are faced with a choice and in fact a myriad of choices
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Will we go the way of the world or will we follow after Christ?
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The blessed man endures the trial of righteousness the temptation
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Now when we think about temptations There was a famous moniker in the late 20th century
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Popularized by a comedian the devil made me do it You see the temptations we view them as external
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We live in a wicked culture and I just was caught up in the ways of the culture
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How do you think the Saints in Ephesus? Handled walking by the temple prostitution the temple of Diana They had to walk in righteousness
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Whatever happens in the culture is of no concern to us as it concerns our holiness, whatever they do we should be impervious to because we are rapidly seeking the blessing of The log the life that is found in faithfulness to Christ So we like to blame the culture
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We like to blame our upbringing When I would harshly discipline my children because of sin
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They would be moping around and we'd be talking about it later and I would jokingly say well someday
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You'll have something to tell your therapist The correction was not done in anger
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It wasn't done because I was mean it was done because I loved them and I wanted to correct their waywardness
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But we're looking for a scapegoat and and I would argue today Everyone here myself included when it comes to sin.
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We want to shift the blame somewhere We want to say it's it's some other reason some other cause it's not my fault
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But we have a scriptural perspective. That's Different, please. Look at verse 13
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It says let no one say when he is tempted. I Am tempted by God God is holy holy holy and Though we can say that that sin is is used by God in his providential care and his purposes
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We cannot say that God is holding sin before us and trying to entice us it would be a perversion of God's character
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I'm not tempted by God, but the temptation is a test the trial of Righteousness in relationship to evil there is a testing there and and God is observing how we will do under temptation
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But God himself cannot be tempted by evil Nor does he himself tempt?
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Anyone the hard news for us today is
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That you and I are the problem we can't shift the blame
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We can't attribute it to other causes and some of you have gone through horrible things in your upbringing
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You have experienced great pain and sorrow in your lives And and your upbringing may be harder than another person's upbringing
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But today I'm here to tell you that you and I are responsible for our sin
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No one else You and I are Responsible to walk in righteousness.
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No one's going to do it for us. We have to do it But no one say when he is tempted.
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I am tempted by God We're do a in -depth study of God's character we would learn that this is absolutely true
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He doesn't wave evil things in front of us. Hoping that will fall that he could
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Snuff us out or to punish us but in fact, he's laid before us blessing and life and Rewards like a crown of life and a future inheritance which can be undefiled as What's promised to us?
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Look at verse 14 the source of temptation Is found here each one is
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Tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires
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Sin doesn't happen Apart from our own
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Desires You and I fall into sin when we have inordinate affections when we have inappropriate desires you only sin as a consequence of acting upon the inclination of your desires this crazy old -fashioned words like Concupiscence concupiscence lust
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Desire that intense longing for something This is the source of our sin and it's not external the trials in the earlier part of the chapter
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We could say I am enduring this persecution because the culture hates
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Christians and I'm beaten or thrown into prison and that persecution is a
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Trial, but we could say it comes from without here
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James tells us that the temptation the propensity for sin comes entirely holy and exclusively from within you and I are only the products of our desires
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When it comes to sin I want to turn back if you would to Romans chapter 7 it's funny.
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I laugh when Mark mentioned Romans 7 today I want to show you and this is one angle of Romans 7 that's probably less talked about but it's there
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You're gonna see it very openly That The righteousness of the law which could never be questioned becomes an occasion for sin when the desire of the inner man
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Contemplates evil and looks upon it and desires it It's gonna make more sense in a second
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Romans 7 verse 7
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What shall we say then is The law sin certainly not on the contrary.
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I would not have known sin except through the law For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said you shall not covet the sinful inclination of man
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When given the holiness the holy command of God There's a part of him that says, huh,
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I'm interested in coveting It's a strange thing. I remember very distinctly my wife remembered me of the story and it's repeated in all of our households a young child member of our
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Family was given a popsicle and the first married house that we had was not our child was a child in our family
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And I want you to imagine the the luxury of this house We had a linoleum floor with a metal aluminum strip and some light blue carpet
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Between the living area and the kitchen And my wife says to the child.
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I'm giving you this popsicle I want you to stay in the kitchen on the linoleum and eat this popsicle
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I don't remember the color of the popsicle, but my guess is it contrasted with the color of that bright blue carpet
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The child had the popsicle in her hand and she walked over to the edge and she ate the popsicle and she put her foot on the carpet and Giving her the popsicle.
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She may have stayed in the kitchen and eaten it there But as soon as the command was given then this desire began
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There must be something good about eating popsicles on the blue carpet Our first parents in the garden things are good, but there's this command
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Don't eat of this tree And their desire has stirred and aroused within them
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What is God withholding from us? The serpent deceives the woman she eats and Adam in his abdication says that woman that you
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Put me with that you gave to me She gave me of the fruit and I ate you see
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Adam Wanted to blame his sin on Eve this desire these this inordinate longing
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Resides in every person. Let's continue with Paul here verse 7 of Romans is the law sin certainly not
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On the contrary. I would not have known sin except through the law For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said you shall not covet
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But sin taking opportunity by the commandment produced in me all manner of evil
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Desire for apart from the law sin was dead.
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I Was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came sin revived and I died
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The commandment which was to bring life I found to bring death
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For sin taking occasion by the commandment deceived me and by it killed me
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Therefore the law is holy and the commandment holy and just and good
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Is Paul critiquing the the goodness of God's law No He is saying that there is something else at work and that is the desire that is in a man and Even something holy like the law can be twisted and perverted
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Towards sin. There's of course other big elements that are in view in Romans chapter 7
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Let's go back to James 1 and while you're doing that I'm going to read one more short portion of 7 if we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal sold under sin
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For what I am doing I do not understand for what I will to do that I do not practice, but what
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I hate that I do If then I do what
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I will not to do I agree with the law that it is good But now it is no longer I who do it
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But sin that dwells in me For I know that in me that is in my flesh nothing good dwells
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For to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good. I do not find
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For the good that I will to do I do not do but the evil I will not to do that I practice
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Now if I do what I will not to do it is no longer I who do it but sin
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That dwells in me He goes on to say Oh wretched man that I am who will deliver me from this body of death
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I thank God through Jesus Christ Our Lord James 1
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Again the source of sin the source of temptation is
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Your desire and It feels though the
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Christian and in many respects as we look at sanctification We've been thinking about this in a number of different ways in recent years even
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We don't see the root cause of things We see the symptoms.
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It's like when you have strange things happening with your body we have to find the root cause in order to treat it and Today each one of us is confronted with the reality 100 % it's my fault when
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I said How many squabbles happen between siblings, why did you hit your sister?
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Well, she did this to me That's the reason I hit her Human nature removes responsibility from himself
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The man says it's not my fault It's my boss.
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It's my co -workers. It's the company. It's this it's that it's never my fault
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I'm here today to tell you It's entirely your fault That doesn't sell very well in the marketplace
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There's hope for us but first we have to see how bad it can get and the death cycle of desire and It's interesting
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James very masterfully and in terms of its rhetoric and its
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Argumentation, it's very amazing what he's done here and in James 1 he's implored us and he's admonished us to go through a conception and a gestational period and in a growing up to Maturity that that leads us to be mature and complete in Christ likeness
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But here he does it in reverse and We're gonna get some insight into how we can wage war with ourselves
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Concerning sin in the way that he explains this look at this again and in verse 14 each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed
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It wasn't the alcohol that did it it wasn't your bad parenting that happened to you that did it
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It wasn't your bad friends that did it. It was you verse 15
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When desire has conceived then it gives birth to sin
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Think about our pregnant and recently delivered moms Conception happens life begins the rapid expansion of cells and growth and Heartbeats and brain activity and lungs being formed and fingers and toes and eyelashes
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And suddenly you have a little baby And it wasn't that long ago that Eleanor looked like Antigone and Henry looked like George But but there's a progression there's there's a growing up that happens.
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It's natural It's life We see this for our growth and godliness.
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We need to grow up and mature and in faith But I'm arguing today that we do not want to grow up When it comes to sin when desire has conceived
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We have to put it to death And I would argue
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That in actuality to wage war against sin we have to have better desire
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We often think these things happen in vacuum or in isolation there's a hole and it's a desire hole in all of us and and it's either going to tend towards sin or It's going to go to righteousness.
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It's not there's no middle ground you and I need to have a
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Deep burning longing for Christ if we're
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Taking a more neutral approach We're going to be Giving in to our base desires and look at the progression desire is conceived
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The sins that we act on they first reside in our hearts and our minds and we entertain them and we cherish them
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And we cultivate them and then we act upon them So when the desire comes and it's inordinate, it's it's in the wrong direction.
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We have to put it to death but it's even better to have a more holistic approach to it to be a
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Person who desires and hungers and thirsts for the righteousness of Christ That's how you wage war on sin you have to really love
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Jesus and Really the deepest greatest desire of your heart to be communion with him to to walk with him to obey his
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Commands this has got to be your compulsion when a person is
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I think of the sad story and it's touched many families of someone who's got a severe
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Addiction to a something like heroin. I don't think I have anything like that in my family
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I've certainly been around counseling situations and things where people have been pursuing that How relentless is the heroin addict in his pursuit of his high?
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It's all consuming It touches everything he's going to rob from his mother and he's gonna sell her
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China and her jewelry in order to Get his drug you and I need to have
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Holy desires that are animated with fervor for Christ We hold a lot of back.
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We live our Christian lives in reserve and we have to be full -on for Jesus Look at the death cycle of desire
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Each one is tempted When he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed
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When desire has conceived it gives birth to sin and and sin when it is full -grown
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Brings forth death now in the severity of the language that I've used in James, it should be pointed out that the believer
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Is always secure The believer never loses their salvation, but this is a frightening thing
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If 1st Corinthians is to be believed that there have been Christians that God has killed
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Because of their sin they got to go to heaven They had rewards
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But they suffered consequences for their sin and our sin
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Chokes out our fruitfulness for Christ it it Mitigates our effectiveness for the kingdom.
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It steals our joy and our thanksgiving and yet we're drawn back to it again and again because of this desire
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One other reference really quickly and we'll Only be in James after this, please turn to Mark chapter 4.
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It's the parable of Sower, I like the title the parable of the soils a little better for this
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Description of this parable in Mark chapter 4. I'll be in reading in verse 2 of chapter 4
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And he taught them many things by parables and said to them in his teaching
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Listen Behold a sower went out to sow and it happened as he sowed that some seed fell by the wayside and The birds of the air came and devoured it
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Some fell on stony ground where it did not have much earth
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And immediately it sprang up because it had no depth of earth But when the
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Sun was up it was scorched and because of it it had no root it withered away
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Now verse 7 is a little perplexing to me Because I always have kind of taken it that the only
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Christians are the final one verse 8 But Bear with me just for the purpose of illustration.
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What if verse 7 included Christians? It's possible listen what it says and some seed fell among thorns and The thorns grew up and choked it and It yielded no crop
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Now the finality of that makes you lean toward may have a perspective that this is unbeliever
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But there are Christians who are brands that are plucked out of the fire
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Their rear ends are scorched, but they make it into heaven That's not the kind of believers that we want to be we could have a sincere
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Faith in Christ and have the cares of the world and our own desires choke out our effectiveness
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It's not the kind of believers we want to be Want to be the believers who?
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Have seed falling on good ground Good soil a soil that is ripe with desire for God and his holiness
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And that will yield a crop increase and produce thirty fold sixty fold and 100
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Let's be honest with ourselves today my desire
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Can say with me my desire in your heart say this with me my desires Are the cause of all of my sin?
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Let's go back to James conception of sin and this desire gives birth to greater and greater transgressions and all this and full maturity
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Contra that full maturity and Christ brings forth death. He sets before us life and death
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It's here in James Blessing and cursing right here in our section all of Scripture Supported here the same idea in our little section in James So what do we do about this
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How do I combat these? desires well,
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I have to Think of the Psalm one man The Blessed Man Jesus Christ How did
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Jesus endure every temptation of the devil in the wilderness? He was armed with the
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Word of God and what about every earthly temptation that that ought to evil that was
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Approach that came to him. Do you think some? Scandalous women were sent by the enemy to approach
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Jesus in a sensual way. I bet they were and The reason he didn't fall or falter was because his desire was for the will of God And you and I we have a lot of desires is is the primary one
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We know it from Gethsemane that the primary desire of Jesus's heart and the flesh is the will of God Will God is your is for your righteousness?
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Will of God is for you to be holy one of the things that I'm drawn to often
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Is Augustine and more popularized by Thomas Boston the fourfold state of man and if you read about Scottish history
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Having a library of books is a very modern thing rich people had books and And Poor ordinary people had a
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Bible and usually not much else. Maybe Pilgrim's Progress or Thomas Boston's fourfold state of man
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And here's something I want us to consider today in This conception that of man.
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There's four states of man And Augustine's is in some ways easier to follow for maybe the younger ones
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Surprisingly, so here are the fourfold state if you need to write this down it might be helpful to you to understand this number one the primitive integrity of man when blend them over that's
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Boston's language is expressed by Augustine as able to sin and able not to sin
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That's the garden Adam is able to sin and he's able to not sin and that primitive integrity
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He has that because he has the ability to choose right from wrong
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But the second stage after the fall of Adam Mankind is plunged into an entire depravity and the second state is not able not to sin
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You understand the second one We are in our sinful fallen estate in Adam we're unable to stop sinning in that state and for the
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Christian today we act as if we're in stage two a lot of the time
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Want you to work with me on this illustration? Because two -sided it's appropriate sometimes and not another
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Sometimes when I'm talking with someone about sin They give me a very pious answer they say
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I'm just a sinner and Usually that Sunday school answer wins the applause and the approval of the hearers
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Because it sounds like the publican Who beats his breast and say have mercy on me,
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I'm a sinner Oh God But I wonder if they're for us in our sanctification.
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I wonder if there is a little bit of an excuse Embedded in that sometimes.
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I'm not talking about our salvation our approach to Christ coming to him Exclusively having faith asking for his mercy.
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I'm talking about as the Christian we throw up I'm just a sinner
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My response is you're not Just a sinner You've been washed
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The blood of Christ has been used to purchase you You're redeemed in him
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You have been made alive in him though The Holy Spirit dwells within you and we're make excuses.
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Oh our good Calvinism I'm supposed to say I'm a sinner Well, you are a sinner, but you're more than a sinner
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You're one who's redeemed in Christ the third stage it's reserved only for believers
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Unbelievers aren't able to do this the third stage the third state is
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Able not to sin and we act as if we are still in stage two
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Good Calvinism sovereignty of God total depravity of man. I'm just a sinner responsibility alleviated
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It's good to remember that you're a sinner and to be humble That's a good thing But now in Christ you are able not to sin and in fact
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God holds forth to us a blessing and it says The man who endures the trial of righteousness.
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He's the blessed one It's accessible It's attainable
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You and I need to stop
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Making excuses for our sin Take full responsibility
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I'm never coerced You are never coerced to sin
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And finally the crown of life the future of heaven
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Of course, I think it has benefits now the glorified state Is one of consummate happiness and to use
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Augustine's language Someday we will be unable to sin and that will be a day of rejoicing for us because We love
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God and we love holiness and righteousness so much that that would be heaven for us you see heaven for us now as we get to play football and Whatever those things that we love to do when our desires are rightly ordered
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Christ is gonna be there I'm gonna be in face -to -face
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Fellowship and communion with the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit and the redeemed in Christ That's heaven.
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I don't need a cigar Guinness floating out of the clouds For that to be heaven well
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Let me give you some words of encouragement You and I have a
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Lot of problems, but we're urged to have a holy ambition we've been confronted with the reality of the source of our temptation, it's our own desires and If our desires are allowed to grow up They lead to death but you and I Know the blessed man you see the verse 12 man is
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Jesus Christ And you and I have been united to him the
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Psalm one man is Jesus Christ And we've been united to him
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Not only is he the blessed be giver of? Matthew chapter 5 which we prayed through in the prayers of the people.
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He's the one who exemplifies the ideals of those and you and I in Accordance with God's grace have been bound and united to the blessed man.
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So it follows That you and I are able to endure temptation to Pass the test of the trial of righteousness as it concerns good and evil
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Let's stop making excuses. Let's take responsibility Let's live and act and pray and worship and serve and strive as the redeemed in Christ Quick word of application additionally will close here
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First I have to love you have to love what
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God loves If you love sin and you love what the world loves
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You're not going to endure temptation Our deepest longing our greatest desire
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Must be Christ and obedience to him secondly
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You must see Sin as it is It's wretched and it leads to destruction third the desire to desire
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God and his ways is the actual Motivation the impetus the way
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To endure temptation. I have higher ideals. I have higher desires
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Those lower things can't approach that can intrude on that area
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I have the best wife in the world. Why would I want to harlot? Understand fourth you and I must attack through mortification the inordinate passions which form the seedbed of sin
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We have to become very expert at early repentance to squash it in the earliest stage in our lives and finally
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You and I need to take responsibility for our sin. We also have to take responsibility for our pursuit of righteousness in Christ and the power of the
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Holy Spirit Isn't Christ exalted and magnified when we see that that sin is all on us and Salvation is all in him you and I are
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Responsible for our sin, but now we're also responsible Not to sin to walk in righteousness
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It would seem to me that we have been united to the
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Blessed Man He's given us his Holy Spirit he's given us a new nature we are new creatures
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It would seem that the testimony of the Christian ought to be that he has greater victory over sin than he has defeat
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I Think you and I need to walk in that victory Please pray with me.
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Oh Lord, it's a crushing blow but needful for us to see that we have no one to blame but ourselves and I thank you
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Oh God that we come to the end of ourselves and find Christ and we have salvation and Sanctification Oh Lord forgive us for making excuses
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For theologically and argumentatively Saying that we are just totally depraved sinners
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When in fact, we are the redeemed in Christ Has won the victory over sin and death and has given us a share and its stake in that victory
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Oh Lord I pray that you would revive the hearts of every man woman and child here and they would
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Have the greatest desire fulfilled and their desire would be for you. Oh God and all of the other cotton candy false gems
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Shiny things of the world would be seen properly in that light and we ask these things in Jesus name.