Kerwin Baptist Church Daily Broadcast

Welcome to the Kerwin Baptist Church broadcast today. Our desire is for the Word of God to be spread throughout the world so that all may know Christ.

Join us now for a portion of one of our services here at Kerwin Baptist Church located in Kernersville, North Carolina. Come they not hence, even of your lust that war in your members, ye lust and have not. Ye kill and desire to have and cannot obtain.

Ye fight and war, yet ye have not because ye ask not. Ye ask and receive not because ye ask amiss that ye may consume it upon your lust. Ye adulterers and adulteresses know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God. Whosoever, therefore, will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. Do ye think that the Scripture saith in vain?

The Spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy. This has been a fantastically positive passage of Scripture so far, hasn't it? Is it not true what the Bible says here? Is it not true whatever the Bible says? It's God's Word. It doesn't make it true because we like it, and it doesn't make it not true because we don't like it.

If God said it, it's true. And yet this passage is something that we all have to face with honesty, that we're giving reasons here why there is conflict and war and fighting and all kinds of matter of things. I want to show you a couple things here in just a minute, but I want you notice in verse one it says war and fighting is among you.

And then it says this even of your lust that war and your members says ye lust, ye kill, ye fight, ye have not, ye adulterers and adulteresses. So really, what we have to understand before we even go further in the passage is that the problem normally is me. Can we all humble ourselves enough? And you better go ahead and humble yourself enough to say that right now, because that's what we're talking about. And so you know, it's better to do it now because you're going to have to do it at the end anyway of this message. So it's better just to go ahead right now and humble ourselves and say normally, when there's conflict in my life, normally, I'm not saying it's 100% of the time, obviously not, but I'm saying this that many times it's, it's me.

It's me. He says this from whence come war and fightings. And, um, this is something that you and I have to understand, look at in our life. I noticed this that we're not talking about wars and fighting that's going on in the world here. Now there is a lot of war and fighting going on in the world, but that's not what he's dealing with here. We're not even talking about war and fighting in our country. We're not talking about wars and fighting in our culture. We're not even talking about wars and fighting that go on internationally. Um, you know, and may I say this to be honest with you, though, all of those conflicts can be traced back to sin.

It's always the way it is. I mean, where there's sin, there's war, there's conflict, and there is a war that goes on in our life every day because of our flesh and our sin. But what he's dealing with here is the believer. He said from whence come wars and fightings among you, not them, you.

Interesting question. So we've got to set aside everyone else and we've got to just isolate us, me and God, you and God. And as God is speaking to us through his word, what is it that we're supposed to get here?

What is it we're supposed to learn? And I don't know about you all the way down to verse five, where he says that the spirit that dwelleth in us lust it to envy. Can I show you already what you and I cause notice in verse one, it hurts the body of Christ. It says, the wiser fightings and wars among you, the brethren, the believed, the believers, the saved.

That's who he's talking about here. It means this, that these wars and fightings and the things that happen because of our flesh. And if you think about it, literally, it comes down that it's really our pride and it's our arrogance and it's our selfishness. It comes from our pride. It comes from us being determined to get our own way, to get what we want. It comes from our insatiable desire to fulfill our flesh. That is the root of all of it. Can I have an amen right there on homecoming Sunday? Doesn't this feel like homecoming? No, it absolutely does not.

Normal. But I do want to talk to you about coming home today. I noticed in verse one, it hurts the body of Christ. Notice in verse two, literally, it causes discontentment. It says, you lust and have not, you kill, desire to have, can't obtain.

I mean, it's a constant cycle in your life. My flesh creates desires that I can't get filled up. I can't fulfill them. So I got to keep bowing to my flesh. I got to keep giving into my flesh to try to get that desire fulfilled.

That desire can't be fulfilled permanently, just temporarily. And now it literally, it's gotten to the point, it hurts the whole body of Christ. And now it brings discontentment to my own life.

And I just can't seem to find contentment anywhere. Notice next, it kills our prayer life. Look at verse three, you ask and receive not because now the giving into that flesh has created desires in you and you're asking God to fulfill desires, but those desires are based in the flesh. So God can't answer those prayers. So it hurts the body of Christ.

It brings discontentment to our life. It kills our prayer life and notice next verse it really it places us and God on opposing sides. The last time I checked in God's word, God has never lost a battle.

And last time I checked in my life, I lose a lot of them. So you and I, the last place we want to get to is where we are literally positioned against God to the point that he calls us his enemy. Notice last, it grieves the Holy Spirit of God in our life. It says, do you think that the scripture saith in vain the spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy it?

It grieves God living in us. I'm so glad that in verse six it begins with that little conjunction. But but you know, if there was no verse six because of verses one through five, we would not have much hope today. By the way, verses one through five is what you and I cause. Verses six through 10 is what God can do. That I'd excite you this morning because you and I would be stuck in verses one through five because that's what the flesh produces and we're flesh and we fight a battle every day. But thank God for verses six through 10. He says, but he giveth more grace.

Wherefore he sayeth God resisteth the proud but giveth grace to the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.

Draw nigh to God and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands ye sinners and purify your hearts ye double minded. Be afflicted and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to heaviness.

Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and he shall lift you up. Thank God for those verses. And we're gonna dig into this. Verses one through five is the mess we make. And verses six through 10 is the steps we can take.

And I think that you and I, if we can on kind of what traditionally has been homecoming Sunday for us, I think we ought to look at it a little bit different right now with the midst of everything in our life right now if we're not careful. Everything on the outside can begin to produce war and fighting on the inside. Here's the way Satan works. He'll produce things on the outside that will now change and cause problems with you on the inside. And once that happens on the inside, now what does that what's inside?

What does that do? It now comes back out. So if I let my circumstances and things in my life, if those outside things change me on the inside, that change on the inside before long starts to show up on the outside. And now we have a vicious cycle. Circumstances are controlling me. It's changing my heart, my spirit, my attitude. And once that change happens on the inside, now it begins to change my actions on the outside. And now my actions on the outside are producing things that hurt me on the inside.

And it's this constant vicious cycle in our life. Am I the only one that's ever been there? Somebody help me at eight whatever on a Sunday morning. I guess it's actually nine something now.

It's 904. That 30 minutes has gone fast. What in the world happened to that? Time for you to start preaching preacher. Quit talking.

Okay. Let's pray. So what do we do about all this?

Let's find out from God's word. Lord, we love you. Thank you for all that you've done. Help us this morning. Jesus name we pray.

Amen. As you look at verses five between verse six through 10 after what we've done in verses one through five, that's just what our flesh does. I want you to write some things down. These will be on the screens for you, but I think this will really help you. These are principles that are just there in verses six through 10.

Number one is this. When we respond to God with humility, God responds to us with grace. When we respond to God with humility, God responds to us with grace. Now don't be confused. In verse six, he says, but he giveth more grace.

But that's just not some general. Hey, God's got tons of it. I'm just gonna throw it out on everybody.

No, he explains it further. Don't think that you can just you and I can just continue in our sin and our selfishness and fulfilling our lust and our desires and our fighting and our wars. And God's just gonna keep letting you do it. Hey, here's just some grace.

Keep doing what you're doing. No, he says, but he giveth more grace. I mean, we have literally grieved him in our life, but he is willing to give more grace. He's got plenty of it, and he's willing. But notice what he says. Wherefore he giveth more grace.

Wherefore? In other words, this is why I just said that, because he resists the proud. He doesn't throw grace around to the proud because the proud think they don't need it. But he giveth grace to the humble. You know that you and I have access to God's grace because of the gospel. Because Jesus loved us enough to die for us and forgive us our sin that has now given us access to all the riches of Christ. I want to read you a verse.

This will be on the screen for you. Isaiah 57 beginning verse 15 for thus saith the high and lofty one that inhabiteth eternity just preaching this recently notices the high and lofty one. So we know he's above us. He's over us.

He's bigger than us. Notice this whose name is holy. This is what he says. I dwell with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit to revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the heart of the contract ones. When you and I respond to God with humility, he immediately responds to us with grace. Matthew Henry said this.

I thought this is interesting. If there be not close communion between God and us, it is our fault, not his. If there is not a closeness between us and the Lord, it is not his fault.

It is ours. Because when we respond with humility, God always responds with grace. You know, that's the key in our life.

You say, Well, how do we stop all this? We need grace. We need grace.

Do you all agree with me? We need grace. The only way to get it is with humility.

Imagine this huge vault that is full of blessings, a door and a lock. Humility is the key that unlocks the door. He gives grace to the humble. Can I ask each of us a question today? Could we use a dose of humility?

Number two. When we submit ourselves to God, Satan removes himself from us. Now, when we respond to God with humility, God responds to us with grace. And obviously, you know, look at verse six just so you understand all that so that you don't get confused and in all he giveth more grace. God resists the proud.

He gives grace to the humble. But notice if you would in verse seven, he says, Submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil and he will flee from you. When we submit ourselves to God, Satan removes himself from us.

You say, Preacher, what are you saying here? Listen to me. Submitting requires resistance and resistance requires submitting. You see, for me to submit to God, I have to resist Satan.

I can't do both. And also for me to resist Satan, I need to submit to God. So you have to understand these are not two separate actions.

They're all one transaction. It means we submit to God by resisting Satan. And you and I, the way we resist Satan is to submit to God. We don't resist Satan by getting our own strength and saying Satan. No, no, we resist Satan by submitting to God. Everybody got that? So you and I have gotten confused over time that we think that for me to resist what the temptation I've got to just drum up the energy somehow and the strength to say, No, I'm not going to do that today.

Guess what? You're probably not going to have that strength. I don't know about you, but the majority of the time I'm pretty weak when it comes to temptation. So the way we resist Satan is by submitting to God.

And look at me. Once an individual at a particular moment in a particular situation on a particular occasion when they totally submit to God, Satan flees. Because there is no sense in him wasting his time if he knows you in this situation have totally submitted to God. So it's literally submitting to God. Satan flees. See, when I submit to God, now I'm no longer listening to what he's saying. When I'm submitting to God, I'm not I'm not seeing what he's throwing in front of me. When I'm submitting to God, I'm not swallowing that Kool Aid. So if I respond by submitting to God, Satan responds by fleeing me. Now, don't make any mistake about it.

In about 30 seconds, he's on his way back. So that's why you and I, to be led of the Spirit, can be really dumbed down to this throughout the day, submitting to God. Submitting to God, submitting to God. See, that sounds like good biblical lingo, submit to God.

In everyday life, what are you talking about? It's submitting to his word. In the beginning was the word, the word was with God, the word was God. When you and I submit to God's word, we're submitting to God. Everybody got that?

This book is alive. And so that means this. The way I submit to God is I submit to his word. And if his word says it, I've got to do that.

I've got to follow that. And that means I'm submitting to God and Satan will flee. You see, the reason I think you and I get taken by temptation so often is because Satan never has to leave us. We just don't fully submit to God, so Satan has full freedom to just sit there and keep trying on us. I want to give you this verse, Romans 7, 17, and I'm just going to read this to you.

It's not on the screen for you this morning. But this is the apostle Paul, and he describes well the battle that goes on constantly with us. This, if I submit to God, Satan will flee. But if I don't fully submit to God, Satan's going to stay on me. Listen to what he says in verse 17. He says, Now then, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. For I know that in me that is in my flesh, Paul says, dwelleth no good thing for to will is present with me. But how to perform that which is good, I find not for the good that I would, I do not. But the evil which I would not that I do now, if I do that, I would not. It is no more either do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. What are we saying?

It's a constant battle. Paul says, I resist. Satan flees.

Satan comes right back. And if I don't submit to God, I'm going to give in to him. So, you know, my flesh wants to do this, but my spirit says no. But then my spirit wants to do this, but if my flesh is now in charge. Paul says, and this is Paul.

This is probably the greatest individual Christian that wasn't Christ that ever lived was the apostle Paul. I don't know that. Goodness. It's all one battle, folks. We don't submit to God over here and then over here in our life, we resist Satan. It's all one transaction.

One produces the other. If I submit to God, that automatically means I resist Satan. And if I do not resist Satan, that means I've already chosen not to submit to God.

Everybody got that? It's all one action. Number three principle from this passage. This is near my God to thee.

We're working up to a number three. When we draw nigh to God in repentance, God will draw nigh to us in mercy. Look at verse eight. Draw nigh to God and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners, and purify your hearts, ye double minded.

Now, what is going on here in this verse? He says you draw nigh to God, he'll draw nigh to you. So if you would like to do that, this is how you draw nigh to God. Cleanse your hands, purify your hearts. So he says this is what you need to do and if this is what you would like to do, then this is what you must do to do what you need to do.

Are you confused yet? Draw nigh to God, he'll draw nigh to you. That means first there is this desire to be nearer to God. And if there is that desire, then here's how you draw close to God.

You cleanse your hands and you purify your hearts. Now, if he was able to make it work, I don't think they're here in the service and they might not be here today because I know with all their kids and stuff and, you know, if there's some concern, we always want people to keep their families safe and all that. But were you able to get those pictures done?

I want you to see this picture and I think I'll explain it. Now, I was a youth pastor less than a year here and I took a junior senior trip and this was to Gatlinburg and we took our youth group. We're having devotions in our room and these are some kids that used to go to our youth group years and years ago. And so after doing the math, you know, OK, so this was probably, I don't know, 20, this would have been 1995.

I think either 94 or 95, so you can do the math how long ago this was. Now, laying up there against that headboard is Matt Grannis. Some of you in our church, you obviously know Matt and Kim and all their children.

If you're visiting, just let you know these are members of our church now. And that is his now wife just to the right of him with kind of the mean look on her face. He must have done something to upset her.

I can't imagine that, but he must have done something to upset her. And here's what was going on because I was here right for the birth of the fact of them just starting to like each other. Just starting to date each other and I actually had a little bit of a part in that. And so here we are and we're on this trip and I brought all the kids in for devotions and obviously guys stayed in totally different rooms and girls stayed in totally different rooms. Obviously we had, you know, chaperones and all that there.

But if you can show me the next picture, I want you to see this. This is Matt and Kim and this is the first banquet that they ever went together. And this was a banquet that we did with the youth group and all that. And so I had this picture found this yesterday as I've got a memorial service this coming Saturday for Pastor Clevenger that I've got to preach.

I'd appreciate your prayers down in Florida this coming Saturday. So show me this next picture. And this is what I want to get to. This is the motel room that the motel gave us. We, you know, we went, you know, down here and we went to a youth conference. And at this youth conference, Matt and the guys were in the next room and Kim and her group of girls and the chaperones were in this room. And somehow down there at the bottom of that wall between the two beds, there was a hole that had worn through. And I had rules that, you know what, certain time of night we're off the phones.

You go to bed, you don't talk, you know, and we had one or two, I think, maybe couples that were kind of dating at that time. And so my job as youth pastor is to keep them apart as much as I can. Can I have an amen right there? Until it's time God put them together and they get married, then hey, wonderful. But it's a constant thing as a youth pastor.

You give them an inch, they'll go a mile and all those things. And so I came in this room and I snapped this picture. Now this is years ago.

And look at this picture. And I believe that this was Jacksonville, Florida, I think at a youth conference. Or it could have been at Gatlinburg, the trips that we take, but I believe it was Jacksonville. They couldn't see anything through, but what happened is we had lights out, nobody could talk on the phones, they couldn't. We didn't have cell phones back in those days. It wasn't like they could lay in the bed under the covers and text back and forth to each other. And they couldn't use the room phone because that was my rule. So they would talk into the wee hours of the night through that little hole in that wall. They got around my rules.

Why? They had a desire to draw near. And any way they could find, they wanted to communicate. Are you with me? Draw nigh to God, he'll draw nigh to you. You see, we're not going to really draw nigh until we want to.

And when we want to draw nigh to God, we will overcome all obstacles to make time to communicate with him. We can't say, well, I just got so much. Well, I'm so busy. Well, I just don't have time to. We make time for what we want to make time for. Nobody wants to lay over a bed, have your head upside down, talking in some dirty carpet and motel, but they would do it.

Why? Just so they could talk to each other. May I ask you this? What efforts are you making to talk to the Lord? Are you drawing nigh to him?

He said, draw nigh to him, he'll draw nigh to you. And notice what he says. First, cleanse your hands. Now, this is the outside. Secondly, and he'll show you, purify your hearts.

So I want you to understand the difference. Cleanse your hands, this is the outside. Purify your hearts, that's the inside. Cleanse your hands, this is your actions. Purify your hearts, this is your attitude.

Cleanse your hands, that's the body. Purify your hearts, that's the spirit. That's the soul, that's the inside. If you and I want to draw nigh to God, it has to be with the inside and the outside. Sometimes the outside will tell people, I just love the Lord, I want to get close to the Lord. But in the inside, that's not really how we feel.

Or we would be making more effort to do so. But he said, if you draw nigh to me, I'll draw nigh to you. Now I want to give you another verse and then I want to say something about this. Psalm 10 17 says, Lord, thou hast heard the desire of the humble. Thou wilt prepare their heart, thou wilt cause thine ear to hear the desire of the humble. You see, when you and I humble ourselves, remember if we respond to God with humility, he responds to us with grace. And when our desire is to draw near, he hears the desire of the humble.

Now here's what I wanted to just share with you real quick. We see how teenagers make effort to draw nigh to each other. They had an obvious desire to draw near.

This passage tells us how we draw nigh to God. Now you might be sitting there thinking, so preacher, so I've got to initiate it. So I've got to make the first move. I've got to make the first effort. Absolutely not.

Now I've always told people this. Historically, Jesus made the first move. He came, he died for you. First move. So he did not respond to us. We are to respond to him. He made the first move.

I don't care how you track it back. He made the first move. But can I give you a little principle the Bible teaches? Jesus said, if I be lifted up, I will draw all men unto myself. That is not just in salvation.

And that is salvation. But it means this, that if you and I preach Jesus, he will draw you. So when you draw nigh to God, it's really not you making the first move. It's you responding to the fact that he is drawing you.

And the moment you draw nigh to him, he comes right to you. Wow. Thank you for listening today. We hope you received a blessing from our broadcast. The Kerwin Baptist Church is located at 4520 Old Hollow Road in Kernersville, North Carolina. You may also contact us by phone at 336-993-5192 or via the web at kerwinbaptistchurch.com. Enjoy our services live and all our media on our website and church app. Thank you for listening to the Kerwin broadcast today. God bless you.