How Your Priorities are Enslaving You | Kingsmen

Reclaiming Biblical Manhood and the Kingdom

Welcome to the Kingsman podcast, where we are reclaiming biblical manhood. I know that's a trigger word. Stay with us.

Don't go anywhere.

And the other thing that we're focusing on here is the kingdom, which I think has been lost and how we are to be equipping ourselves and getting ready to do the work of the king. So that's what this episode is about.

Stay tuned. I'm your host, John Moffitt. I'm the pastor of Grace Reformed Church. And I am also a host of Theocast, where we talk about the sufficiency of Christ and resting.

In Christ.

The World Sets Our Priorities

And these two go together. Gentlemen, priorities. That's the issue. Priorities. We set them and we don't realize where they come from. You guys ever get frustrated? You keep making the same mistakes over and over again.

And then like, okay, I'm going to try this. And you're using your own wisdom or you'll listen to podcasts out there that talk about how to set your priorities or how to be disciplined. And it's interesting to watch.

I, you know, I often get, I often feel guilty. I'm like, wow, if I, I should probably prioritize my fitness more, prioritize this more. And I'm always feeling guilty. I should be a better dad. I should be a better husband.

I should be a better church man. I should be better with my money. Everybody's a guru and everybody's, if you just do this, this, and this, then your life's going to be better. And that's right there.

That's the problem. Your life will be better if you have the right priorities. And then everybody's setting the priorities for you. Let me put it this way. The world's setting the priorities for you. In the fitness industry, it's about living longer.

In the finance industry, it's about not letting your money outlast you, right? In the entertainment industry, it's about getting to that next level. There's always something, but it's all based upon individualism.

It's all based upon me and the outcome of me. And it's very narcissistic. It's very selfish. And so the priority is me. When I was thinking about this episode, and listen, there's a hole in every illustration.

So if you're going to pick this apart, I know you can. But I was thinking about this episode. You ever meet a Marine? And as the joke goes, well, how do you know someone's a Marine? Because in 30 seconds, the most likely they're going to tell you.

But in some ways, I'm flattered by that. They're excited about the mission and the method of that organization, right? It's probably tatted on them. They've got a hat. They've got a shirt. They proudly represent something that they feel they can get behind.

And these men tend to be disciplined. But there's a brotherhood that's a part of it, where they are connected to it, and they support it, and they want everybody else to know they support it. They represent the Marines.

In many ways, there is a correlation. They're behind the priority of what that organization stands for, and they want everybody to know.

It.

Spiritual Battle, Sober-Mindedness, and Captive Thoughts

Well, what's hard for us is that no one's really attacking. I mean, there's other military branches, and they like to make fun of each other. But we're actually in a real spiritual battle, where God is very clear on what his mission is, and what his method is, and what our priorities should be.

And we are getting attacked constantly to have other priorities and other missions and other methods, all of the time. This is why you have both Peter and Paul say things like, be sober-minded, right?

Don't let things get into your brain that would clutter it. So what's the opposite of sober? Intoxicated, right? Don't be intoxicated with the world, is what he's saying. And how is it... Let's just take that in a logical...

So let's just unfold his logic. Your brain and your affections, your desires, your hopes and dreams are being flooded by not Christ and his wonderful gospel and his word, but it's being flooded by the world and the world's ideologies and the world's desires.

He says, take captive every thought, meaning you've got to... To take captive means to hold on to it. Do not allow anyone else to have the thoughts of your brain.

Why?

Why?

Why is he doing that? Well, it's not based on our salvation. That's clear. Go and listen to Theocast or the first few episodes of this. I'm not saying you should be worrying about your salvation. It's definitely not for the sake of your sanctification.

That's also controlled by the Holy Spirit.

What is this for?

It's for our own enjoyment, our own rest, our own... And then I will say this, our own effectiveness, right? We're not just left here waiting for God to come back and just kind of eat, drink, and be merry.

We are left in a sinking ship. We're left in a world that's self-destructing.

It's falling apart.

And we can then go by our words, our actions, our times. Sometimes we can go and help rescue people or care for those who are rescuing you people. But instead, our priorities have us all over the place, right?

We're evaluating, we put value in our personal appearance, in our bank accounts, what people think about our house, our cars, how people think about our children, the way we parent our children, the pressures we put on our spouses, it's all over the place.

It's because we're allowing the priority of the world to set the tone of our life. And then, oh boy, I'm going to step on some toes here, but let's do it anyways. And then when the church comes in and lays out, hey, I think maybe you're spending more time pursuing the things of the world than you are the things of your king.

Oh, that's legalism. Well, no, no, no one ever said you're earning favor. No one ever said you're earning your salvation. We're just here holding up a flag saying, hey, dear brother, dear sister, you are trapped in sin, your attitude towards your spouse, your attitude towards your children, your attitude towards other people, you're constantly feeling anxious and angry.

You keep making the same mistakes, and you're over here wondering why. And instead of going to the fount of joy and hope and freedom, you keep going to the world's wisdom, thinking that another podcast, another book, another system, more discipline is going to get you through this.

Colossians, Hebrews, and the Failure of Worldly Wisdom

I think it's brilliant at the end of Colossians chapter two, when he says all of this sounds like wisdom, but it's of no value of stopping your flesh from continuing to pursue the wrong priorities. He doesn't say be more disciplined.

In chapters three, he says, look to Jesus, right? He completely says your priority has been looking to the world and the world's solutions to control your flesh, which listen, all of us hate sin. We hate the effects of sin.

We don't want to sin anymore. I'm on board with that. Sin is, it's horrible. Yet we keep allowing the world, and listen, I agree. I think the world hates sin. This is why there's a lot of people out there who aren't Christians, but they can talk to you about how to live dedicated lives and disciplined lives and morally right lives because the law is written on their hearts, according to Romans chapter one, right?

So even the world has an aversion to sin, but you cannot use the world's methods to deal with it. And this is what we keep doing. And here's what's even crazy. We even prioritize it. We prioritize the world.

Now, I know I've been talking a lot of generalities. Let's get down into the specifics. What has happened is the gospel and the grace of God has lost its luster in our life. And we don't believe that we are weak.

We are frail. We can't do this. And it's God's love for us that motivates us. If we truly believe that we would set aside the weight, we would set aside sin. We would keep our eyes focused on Christ. We know this is a problem because the writer of Hebrews says, do not forsake dissembling of yourselves as such as you were doing.

The whole book of Hebrews is about people abandoning Jesus, going back to the law, man-made efforts, going back to the priority of the law to find favor with God. And he was like, you cannot go back to the law because it failed.

Go read Hebrews 10. The law was but a shadow of the substance of Christ, right? But what do we do? We believe Satan and his lies. And then we wonder why our life is full of pain and sorrow and frustration.

So my encouragement to you in this is just hear me out. If you say you believe in Jesus and you say you believe God's word is powerful, then why are we continuing to not prioritize it? I'm not talking about daily memorizations or daily Bible reading.

I'm talking about actually obeying the word of God and hearing its power and prioritizing it. Uh, guys, you're not taking this body with you. You're not taking your bank account with you. You're not taking your fame with you.

When you get to heaven, we're not glorifying you. We're not praising, oh, look at how great you did with your company. No one cares when we get there.

Why?

We're there for the glory of the King, right? So you spend all this time prioritizing that which burns. And then there are people over here who are suffering, who don't know Christ, who have been lied to.

You know, you can be a Christian and trapped in sin. Do you know you can be a Christian and trapped in bad doctrine? There are people who believe that if they speak in tongues, then God's going to bless them.

Or there are people who think they give enough money. They see, there's so much. If they don't smoke, drink, and go with those who do, then God will finally be pleased with them. God's never going to be pleased with you on what you do and don't do.

That doesn't mean that doesn't matter.

It does matter.

It matters because our joy and our experience of watching others being liberated. So here's my final thought for you. If you do not believe that you are trapped, literally a slave to sin, and the only freedom that you have is the gospel, if you're not convinced of that, you're going to keep going to the world.

You're going to let the world's music, its movies, its philosophy, its advertisement continue to manipulate you. I'll quote it again, 2 Peter. What does he say to those who are not producing love and joy and peace and harmony to the body.

Of Christ, right?

Who are sacrificing their lives for the sake of the kingdom. He says, you forgot you've been cleansed from your former sins. He doesn't call them to discipline. He doesn't call them to some radicalness.

Go hear the good news of Jesus Christ. This is why multiple times to multiple churches, Paul says, I want to come to you and preach to you the message of Jesus Christ, the sufficiency of Jesus Christ.

As a matter of fact, in Titus, he says, insist on the preaching of the cross. It's amazing message. So what's the final application for us here, guys, if there's something getting in the way of you hearing the gospel from your brothers and sisters on a Sunday morning or in a group, if there's something that is getting in the way where you seem to be missing more Sundays than you're in attendance to, right?

Or you seem to be disconnected from the body of Christ, your elders aren't caring for you. The message of the gospel is not the priority, right? Then you have to step back and say, am I more concerned about the method and message of the world or of Christ?

If you're feeling a little guilty, that's probably the point. Listen, the only way our guilt and shame is removed is by Christ, not more effort, right? The world will lie to you. It will promise you everything and it never delivers.

So here's my encouragement to all of us, including myself. Every day we have to wake up and understand I'm in a new battle today. I'm going to battle the flesh. I'm going to battle my mind. The world's going to come at me and advertise.

I saw some of the world's advertisements today. If then, if then, it's the arrival fallacy, right? If I have this car, if I have this body, if I had that woman, if I had this, this, then I'll be happy.

No, you won't. No one's ever, no one has ever arrived at full satisfaction. It has never happened. Eve, who was not in sin, was promised the arrival of being like God. Did she ever experience it? The moment she ate of the fruit, what did she experience?

Shame. She went to hide herself and we keep pursuing sin. We even prioritize it and yet we constantly live in shame. And where is our shame removed? Our shame is removed by Christ in the gospel and that constant glorious opportunity for us to run to him.

Prioritizing Christ Over the World

So let's prioritize Christ and the message of Christ. And we'll talk more about what does this look like next week. But I just wanted to start the conversation. You can't make a change in your life until you finally acknowledge there's a problem.

So here's what I want you to evaluate. What do you spend more time? Is the world influencing you more and what your priorities are or does God and his word influence you more? If you're like, yeah, probably definitely in listening to more of the world, then we might need to prioritize that.

That's it. Hopefully it's encouraging. Tell me what your feedback is.

Tell me what you think.

You know, engage either in the comments of YouTube or send us a message in social media or on our website. Love to hear from you guys. Hope this was helpful and we'll continue the conversation next week.