Fixing the Flesh
For the Love of God: How Jesus Transforms the Way we Live • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
0 ratings
· 7 viewsNotes
Transcript
Welcome
Welcome
New to LP
Easter (or other ANC)
Series Set-up
Introduction
Introduction
And because this is a heavy series, I thought I start today with a confession.
I’m a hypocrite.
It’s one of my fatal flaws. You can ask my family about it - my kids have a growing awareness of what Courtney, my wife has known for many years. You know I get up here with a lot of spiritual vibrato, week after week, talking about life the way it’s meant to be lived…talking about Good news of great joy…of following Jesus whatever the cost…of what the “church” really needs to be all about - with a vision for transforming a community in the name of Jesus.
And I think I’ve gotten pretty good at making it sound like I’ve got a lot of things figured out in my life. At least as it relates to spiritual things and the church.
But, honestly, what you don’t often see is the same pastor on Monday who’s desperately jealous of someone else’s success…who is hopelessly anxious about finances - rethinking careless word from the weekend before, who deep down wants to earn your approval, my bosses approval, and if I really think about it, God’s — because in my heart of hearts, I usually don’t think I have it.
Now, before you think I’m trying to brave in admitting these things to you, I should tell you that I also know your secret.
See, I’m not the only hypocrite in the room, am I?
And I think this is part of the great paradox of Following Jesus - that at the same time, we can have both a deep sincerity to love, honor and follow Jesus - and yet remain deeply flawed individuals.
We’re all hypocrites.
Now, I don’t say this in a way to let us off the hook.
Just because our hypocrisy is a reality does not mean it’s a good thing or they way it should be!
No!
It should gnaw at us. It’s should bother us. It should provoke us.
The question is what do we do about it. Again, this is really what’s at the heart of this series. What do we do with those areas of our lives that we feel we just can’t shake? That we know need to change, that we know need to stop…that need to be different, but we just can’t seem to make it happen.
Well, in the passage we’re looking at today, we get a second part of the answer Paul gives us to this great paradox of the Christian life in Romans 8.
And if there’s anything I want you to walk away thinking about, it’s this: God doesn’t want you to ‘fix’ your flesh, He wants to rescue you from it.
Let me read this passage, pray, and then we’ll get started.
12 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. 13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 14 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. 15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” 16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
PRAY
Fixing the Flesh
Fixing the Flesh
Alright, let’s go ahead and get started.
Context of Romans 8
Context of Romans 8
Just a quick reminder, the book of Romans is a letter written by one of the earliest Christian leaders, a guy called Paul.
Paul’s general pattern was to travel to major cities around the Roman empire - cities of influence were he could share the message of Jesus and see that message trickle out from the city to the rest of the world. Sometimes he would write letters back to the churches he started - and some of those letters are what makes up about 50% of the New Testament today - letters from Paul to real people with real problems in real churches in real cities.
Romans is a theologically dense letter.
And Romans chapter 8 is generally regarded as the climax of the letter; culminating in the unfailing, inescapable, redefining, and transforming love of God.
But what I think we fail to appreciate sometimes is context of Romans 8 in the letter. You see what Paul says right before chapter 8 really needs to shape how we understand this whole section. He spends much of chapter 7 talking about the very same problem I brought up earlier - hypocrisy…that ongoing brokenness is a reality in the life of every follower of Jesus!
He says it this way in Romans 7:24.
24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?
This should be a familiar frustration!
It’s the cry of: I thought I was done with this! I thought I had moved passed this! I promised I would never do it again!
The question is: what do you do with lingering sin in your life?
What do you do if you can’t seem to stop going back to pornography?
What do you do if you can’t seem to stop getting angry? If you can’t seem to stop being over taken by jealousy, anxiety, [fill in the blank].
What if you can’t step running to the thing you’re running from?
What is the Flesh?
What is the Flesh?
This is where Paul starts to offer a real solution. Remember, the big idea I want you walking away thinking about is this: “God doesn’t want you to fix your flesh, he wants to rescue you from it.”
What do I mean by that?
Let’s start with the first part - He doesn’t want you to fix your flesh.
Look with me again at v. 12 (Rom. 8:12)
12 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.
That word flesh is an interesting word. It’s a word that basically means the material body, but when Paul uses it, it often has a negative connotation. He talking what some call our “broken nature” or our “sin nature”.
It’s not a perfect analogy, but it makes me think of some of those cartoons where the character is trying to make a decision and a devil pops up on one shoulder and an angel on the other (use image). [EXPAND]
That’s what Paul means by “the flesh”. It’s the part of you that pulls you away from how God has created you to live. It’s the part of you that says: No one will know. No one can find out.
That’s the flesh, our broken nature, and everybody has it.
You know, I find it really interesting that one of the prevailing values we have today is that in order for you to discover the most authentic version of yourself, you have to look within…you have to look at your deepest and strongest desires and then believing that the good life is found when you’re lifestyle matches your strongest desires. But if that’s true, who’s to say that what you find when you look within is good, or better? I think Paul’s warning here is that we’re to search the caverns of our own soul, we will all find some sleeping dragon - the flesh. It’s part of what it means for us to be human.
And when Paul talks about living according to the flesh here in v. 12, he’s talking about rousing the dragon…listening to that devil on your shoulder…submitting to it’s voice.
And I think it’s important for us to sit here a moment, because we have to acknowledge that we often listen to that voice…we often live according to the flesh because in the moment we actually want to do it.
This is what happens every time you sit down to consume pornography - in that moment you are not doing what you don’t want to do - you’re doing exactly what you actually want to do! You’re chasing a “high” and however momentary it may be, that’s an afterthought because in the moment it actually feels good…in your heart of hearts, it’s what you want to do!
This is why you can easily get ensnared by anxiety in your life. Because in the moment, it strangely feels better to listen to the voice that says “you really should be more paniced about this.” Because that voice is louder - that voice seems more clear. And over and over again panic promises you the clarity and resolve to make a decision, forever dangling the right decision just a little farther ahead.
It’s why getting angry feels like the right response…
Friends, Paul wants us to see that the “Flesh”, the “devil on your shoulder” is not your buddy - it’s our demise.
He says it this way at the beginning of v. 13 (Romans 8:13)
Romans 8:13 (ESV)
13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die…
The flesh is our death.
So what do we do about it?
Rescue from the Flesh
Rescue from the Flesh
And I think this is the most natural question to ask from what Paul has said so far.
If the flesh is my demise, what do I do about it?
How do I fix the problem.
And I understand where that question comes from because, we all tend to have this tendency, to varying degrees, of finding solutions to problems. I know I keep jumping on this example, but I think it’s helpful for our conversation today —
Some of you are here today and you know you have a problem with pornography. You know full well what the issue is. You know how consuming it is on your mind. You know how it hurts or would hurt your wife (if she knew). You know all of what Jesus has to say about what it produces in your own heart and, if you stop to think about you, you’re even aware of the exploitive system the fuels the industry. And you want to stop. You want to stop wanting this in your life.
And so you come to the question: how? How do I stop.
And if you do a pull, there are all kinds of practical tips and tricks that you can find for this particular pattern in your life. Internet filter, blocking apps, accountability conversations…
And these are all good things.
But at the end of the day, you’re trying to engage in some kind of behavior modification.
And this is subtle, but we have to see that there is something that happens to Christianity when we actually turn this in to mere behavior modification.
That you can stop doing something you don’t want to do anymore is not the Good News! It’s not: I stopped and so can you. And what’s wild is that the church can become unintentionally obsessed with behavior modification because, at least for a moment, it looks like it’s doing something; behavior modification looks like it’s working.
At the same time, it has a tendency to produce this version of Christianity that is hyper focused on doing the right things…hyper focused on saying the right kinds of things…hyper focused on being involved in the right christian activities. At the end of the day, behavior modification Christianity is hyper focused on our external world and how we present ourselves to those around us.
You know, I was using that word hypocrite earlier. I think it’s a really interesting word. We only use it in a negative context - to talk about someone who’s a fraud or fake. But I think we actually end up neutering this word.
Seventeen times in the New Testament, Jesus calls the religious leaders around him hypocrites. Why?
It’s wasn’t because there was something wrong with their practice…there wasn’t something wrong with their behavior.
It’s because they were merely acting.
In fact, that is the actual definition of the word - hypocrite. An actor.
What Jesus wanted to get across to the actors is that God didn’t just want them to act. He didn’t just want behavior change. There is something far deeper, something far more profound that needs to take place in their hearts and minds — something that needs to take place in our hearts and minds!
You see, the Good News is not just that you can stop doing what you want, it’s that you can want something better!
This is where transformation takes place!
You know I had to get to the point in my life where someone had to sit me down in my own wrestle with lust and pornography and they had to help me see that it wasn’t really that I was giving myself over to something I didn’t want to do. That just wasn’t true. I may not have like the consequences of what I was doing…I didn’t want those…but he finally got me to see that problem wasn’t that I was doing something I didn’t want to do…the problem was that I was doing exactly what I wanted to do!
It’s the conversation you need to have. Your problem with getting angry is not that you’re doing what you don’t want to do…it’s that you’re responding exactly the way you want to!
And while behavior modification can be helpful, we have to see that alone can only produce actors. It can only produce hypocrites.
The real work of transformation you’re looking for takes place not with your actions, but at your heart. It’s not when you stop doing what you want to do, transformation happens when you want something else.
And I say all that to say: When we look at our our brokenness…when we are confronted with our flesh…and the most natural question in the world comes to mind — how do I fix the problem — we have to see that we’re asking the wrong question.
God doesn’t want you to fix your flesh - he wants to rescue you from it!
And Paul says as you keep reading v. 13 (Romans 8:13)
Romans 8:13 (ESV)
13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
We deal the flesh, or to borrow Paul’s language, put it death, by the Spirit.
It means it is not something we of our own accord do…it’s not something we muster up the will power to do. It is something God, in and through the Holy Spirit does on our behalf!
Now, if you’re anything like me, you’re wondering, okay, BUT HOW?
I think Paul gives us two ways the Holy Spirit puts the flesh to death in our lives - He Leads us…and He calls us.
Let me show you what I mean.
He Rescues by Leading
He Rescues by Leading
Look at v. 14 (Romans 8:14)
14 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.
We may not see it right away, but the language that Paul uses all over Romans 8 is borrowed heavily from the Old Testament story of the Exodus - of God delivering his people from slavery in Egypt. And it’s interesting that if you look throughout the pages of the bible, the one place you really find this same imagery of being led by God is in the Exodus story - it’s as the people of Israel are in the wilderness, they are being led by God on where to go.
And I think the image Paul is picking up here is saying we are Led is that idea we fix our attention on God himself.
You see, what so often happens when we try to fix our flesh is that we overly focus on the issue itself. That’s were our mind goes…that’s where our attention goes.
But what Paul is trying to get across is that we need a refocus. Because, again, the real question is not “how do I stop doing this thing that deep down I really want to do…but How do I, deep down, want something else?
It’s where we are giving our attention and focus.
VALUE: SPIRITUAL INTIMACY [EXPAND]
We are investing in that relationship! We are fixing our attentions on Him and experiencing our affections change.
He Rescues by Giving us a new identity.
He Rescues by Giving us a new identity.
Here’s the second way the spirit puts to death the flesh - he gives us a new identity.
Look with me at v. 15 (Rom. 8:15)
15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”
In other words, he takes us from what we were, and calls us into a new way of life…a new kind of life…a new family.
GOSPEL
And do you see how having this new calling fundamentally changes the way we start to engage in the world around us? It changes how we even think of our own brokenness.
Think of it this way.
My son Malachi doesn’t ever have to think about how to live like my son. He is my son. He cannot earn that, he cannot loose. He doesn’t have to fake that. He simply is my son. Imagine how he would go through life - and some of you don’t have to image because of you’ve lived this - imagine if he went through life always trying to earn or re-earn his sonship like was a status.
He would be obsessed with his behavior.
“Am I doing the right thing?”
“Am I doing the wrong thing?”
“Have I done enough of the right things?”
It’s exhausting. It never ends. And it is the product of acting. And it will never be enough, because it will never get to the heart.
And yet so many of us choose to engage our relationship with God like this—we keep it at this level of acting—of behavior modification.
When what we really need is a change, not in our actions, but in our heart. We don’t just need to stop doing the things we deep down want to do, we need to want something else! And the good news is that God doesn’t want you to fix you flesh - he wants to rescue you from it.
And this changes everything.
Finally, I love this phrase Paul uses in v. 15 (Romans 8:15
15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”
Story of David running down the isle, yelling my name.
That is the kind of relationship our father wants with us.
He doesn’t want us to fix our flesh, he wants to rescue us from it.
Let’s pray.