You become like whatever you worship. The heathen become like their gods. How much more? Will Christians become like Christ when we make Him the focus of our life? Because we are not just becoming like Him on our own, but by the work of the Holy Spirit, who is transforming us from one level of glory to the next into the image of Jesus Christ?
Welcome to Grace to You with John MacArthur. I'm your host, Phil Johnson. Today we're continuing a series that is an interesting one. For us here at Grace TU, and we hope it's interesting for you as well.
Some months ago, we asked each of our staff members to name the one sermon of John MacArthur's. that they considered their favorite, And of the messages they chose, we pulled together ten of them, and that's the series we're in the middle of. It's titled John MacArthur's Most Memorable Sermon. And now joining me in the studio is Eric G. Welcome, Eric.
Thank you, Phil. I'm excited to be here. John's teaching materials continue to be translated into major world languages, and that's Eric's job. He oversees the global distribution of those print and digital resources in other languages. And Eric, the message you chose as your favorite of John's It certainly has one of the more memorable titles of any of John MacArthur's sermons.
I think it's a favorite of a lot of people. It's called Hacking A Gag to Pieces. Why did you pick that sermon? Yeah, it's a great sermon from Pastor John on how to respond to sin that's still in the believer. Uh I remember hearing it first hearing it when I was at my old church.
I kind of remember the date. It was around December 2008. And I can be that specific because My old church didn't like John and I was like a secret Fan of John MacArthur, and I was listening to his sermons, you had to buy them. And I'd burn them on CDs and I'd listen to them in my car. And I remember visiting the site one day to download some more.
And then this picture of a vault door that was slightly ajar and it said like the vault's open or something like that. Yeah, that's right. And I just started downloading everything. I remember spending weeks because I wasn't sure if you guys would just change that. That was the year we opened the vault.
I think we opened it the day after Election Day in 2008. Yeah.
So by the time you were looking for sermons, all of them were for free. Yeah, and I don't know why I thought you guys would just change your mind on that or change the. A lot of people thought that. It was too good to be true. It was too good to be true.
And so I downloaded as much as I could. I spent days doing it. And I remember downloading it and uploading it to my iPod. And none of the files had names. It was all these numbers.
And so I didn't know how to pick one. And so I remember setting it to shuffle. And I thought, I'm just going to listen to a good sermon. I know it. And the sermon I heard was Hacking A Gag to Pieces.
Wow. Good one. Yeah, really good one. And coming from my old church, this, you know, this emotional, charismatic, very gospel-like church, you know, where you leave on Sunday and just feel really good. I remember hearing at one of the Bible studies, the leader at this old church said, you know, one day you'll be a believer and You'll have days where you go on without sinning.
And my conscience was just racked by that. I just. I couldn't imagine it. I started to feel like, Lord, like there is no soundness in my bones, right? Because of my sin, like the psalmist says.
And so I just started wondering, Am I really saved? There's still ongoing sin in me. And to hear this sermon, I was so encouraged, if that's the right word for it. It had this profound impact on my Christian life because John answers the very basic question: Lord, why do I still sin? What do I do?
about the remaining sin in my life. And so I was going from this burdened conscience of, you know, I can't see myself going a day without sinning because the more I read and study and pray, I see more sin in my life. to hearing this sermon and feeling like I have battle plans now. Like, I have orders from the Lord. I know exactly what I need to do.
To deal with sin. And so it encouraged me not to be passive with my sin, to be in the word, to be devoted to prayer, to remove the things in my life that brought casual interaction with sin.
So in the sermon, John uses that scene of Samuel hacking King Agag to pieces. As that illustration of what we need to do toward our sin. And so you have this picture of this man. I just imagine he's a priest, so he's probably just wearing priestly garb. He's unfamiliar with warfare.
He's untrained. He's more familiar with slaughtering animals than people. And you have this picture of him violently and aggressively killing the king of the Amalekites. A command that God had given against all the people. And so to have this order from the Lord: hey, this is how you need to treat your sin.
This is how aggressive you need to be with the sin in your life. It was so emboldening. And It's become more and more of a favorite of mine because I see how. It's not typical John Sermon. You know, you have John MacArthur, one of the greatest expositors of our time, preach this semi-can I say topical sermon?
Yeah.
And so he goes on saying, you know, you need to hack the agags in your life, you know, find the Amalekites in your heart. This is one of my favorite sermons as well. And it's actually. It is an unusual sermon because it was given in the form of a chapter in one of John's books before it became a sermon. It is a chapter by this same title.
In The Vanishing Conscience, where John was talking about the mortification of sin, putting our sin to death. And he used agag as a an illustration. And we gave that chapter that title. And John liked it so well, he did this sermon on the topic, an extended sermon on the mortification of sin. And so here is the message that Grace TU staff member Eric G chose as John MacArthur's most memorable sermon.
It's titled Hacking A Gag to Pieces. And now here is John MacArthur. No Christian can give testimony, honest testimony, to the fact that. When he became a Christian, sin was erased. It's not so.
The tendency to sin is still in our lives. Even though we're saved, we still sin. And worse, we still derive pleasure from our sin. We still struggle with Sinful habits, not just sinful, isolated acts. And sometimes we fall into shameful, scandalous sins.
Our thoughts, And our words are not always what they ought to be. Our time is often wasted on frivolous and worldly pursuits. Our minds and our affections are often set on things That will pass away. Our hearts often grow cold to things holy and evangelistic. And we might ask the question, why is this so?
If we go back to Romans chapter 6. We might conclude that Everything should be different. Verse 14 of Romans 6 says, For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law, but under grace. In verse 17, it says, But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. If indeed Sin does not have dominion over us.
If indeed we are no longer the slaves of sin, why can't we live a pure life and enjoy a clear conscience? Why? Does this battle go on?
Well, the answer is. There is yet remaining sin within us. We have been saved from the penalty of sin, in that Christ took the penalty in himself in dying on the cross. We have been saved from the dominating power of sin in that sin's powerful mastery over us is broken and we do not have to obey it. And we Have even been saved to some degree in the present from the presence of sin, for it no longer is with us at all times in all ways, and someday.
We will be saved from its presence altogether. But though we have been saved and redeemed and forgiven, there is still remaining sin within us. Therein lies the problem. The problem is, if you want to have a pure life and therefore a clear conscience, you have to deal with remaining sin. The question is, how do you deal with it?
I want to borrow an illustration from the Old Testament. I think it may help to give us a vivid picture of how to deal. with remaining sin in our lives so that we can have a clear conscience. Turn to 1 Samuel chapter 15. First Samuel chapter 15.
This great. Old Testament story. Is meant to teach us the seriousness of sin and the righteousness of God's holy wrath against it. I don't want to overlook those truths nor the historic value of this, but I would like to borrow it as a rather graphic illustration of or analogy of how believers have to deal with sin. Let's pick it up in 1 Samuel 15, verse 7.
So Saul defeated the Amalekites. And the rest of the verse from Havilah as you go to Shur, which is east of Egypt, indicates that it was a crushing, widespread, far-reaching, and devastating victory. He slaughtered them. from pillar to post. From front to back, east to west, north to south.
A crushing defeat. But verse 8, he captured agag. The king of the Amalekites alive. And utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword. But Saul and the people spared Agag.
And the best of the sheep, the oxen, the fatlings, the lambs, and all that was good, and were not willing to destroy them utterly. But everything despised and worthless. That they utterly destroyed. Motivated by covetousness, motivated by the love of money, they kept all the best animals, they kept all the best possessions, collected the spoils of victory. They didn't even do a thorough job, by the way, of executing the Amalekites.
A lot of them escaped. And then worst of all, They spared egg egg. They spared the king. Why? Why would Saul be so blatantly disobedient?
Well, it wasn't just materialism in this case, it was pride. Here was a marauding, vicious, terrorizing monarch of this tribe who was known to everybody as. Uh the greatest fighter and warrior and Victor Before whom others Crumbled. Saul was going to show his great mighty power, his great force by holding up the trophy agag. And saying, look what I have, look who I defeated.
It was pride and materialism. It was just an evil heart on Saul's part to flatly and blatantly disobey God. But the sin was so serious. that God immediately deposed Saul. and all of his descendants forever from the throne.
Look at verse 23. Actually, we could start in verse 22. Samuel said, Has the Lord as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? You remember that Saul had claimed that he kept some of the animals to offer as sacrifices, and God speaking to him through Samuel says, Do you think I'm interested in burnt offerings? What I want is obedience.
Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of divination. And insubordination is as iniquity and idolatry. And then the deposition of the king, because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has also rejected you from being king. And so he was dethroned.
Serious issue.
Now go down to verse 32. Then Samuel said, Bring me. A gag. The king. of the Amalekites.
Now you gotta know that of the people of Amalek who had survived, they were probably somehow in contact with their king, and as long as their king was alive, they felt their people still had a reason to exist, their king was still alive, they were still intact. And what was happening behind the scenes was the surviving members were beginning to reinvigorate and revive around the reality of their king. Samuel said, bring me Agag the king of the Amalekites. And Agag, thinking now all is going to be well, Saul is off the throne, everything is forgiven, comes in cheerfully. And Agag said, Surely the bitterness of death is past.
Well, that's all over. And Samuel said, As your sword has made women childless.
so shall your mother be childless among women. Which is another way of saying. I'm going to kill you. And Samuel. hewed or hacked egg egg.
to pieces before the Lord. at Gilgal. It's a rather sickening Scene, isn't it? It was God who commanded it to be done. And Samuel did it before the Lord.
And Samuel was no soldier. Samuel was a priest, but here was God sending out divine judgment from holy wrath against sin. Unlike Saul and the rest of the Israelites, Samuel carried out the Lord's commands. This is a tremendous picture. of God's attitude towards sin.
It is an excellent illustration, analogically, of the sin that remains in the believer's life. When you were saved and I was saved, there was at that moment a crushing defeat of sin, a crushing defeat. from one end to the other, east to west, north to south. Our sin was crushed. But We still have remaining sins.
There are some amalekites running around loose in everybody's life. We all have our egg eggs. And the problem in our Christian lives is not that sin has not been defeated. With a crushing defeat. It has, but there is still remaining sin.
There are some loose. iniquitous amalekites in all of us. And though there was a great and glorious and triumphant defeat, At the time of our salvation, there is the necessity that the remaining sins be hacked to pieces, or they will revive. They will plunder our hearts and sap our spiritual strength. We cannot be merciful with the agags of our life.
We cannot be merciful with the remaining sins in our life or They will turn. and create a insurrection and a rebellion. attempt to destroy us. Look for a moment now at Colossians chapter 3. In Colossians chapter 3.
Verse five. You will notice a marginal reading. For if you have any note in your margin in the New American Standard. The text actually reads Verse 5, therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead. But the marginal reading says Put to death.
the members which are upon the earth. Things like immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry. Kill them. Put them to death. You can't do it partially.
You can't do it half-heartedly. You can't just have a remaining egg egg and just sort of leave him in your life somewhere. He'll lead an insurrection. You've got to keep going until the task is complete. Sins like Amalekites have a way of escaping the slaughter, breeding, reviving, and launching new and unexpected assaults on our most vulnerable areas.
Go back to Romans chapter 8. And verse 12 and 13. Verse 12, Paul says, So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. Then in verse 13, For if you are living according to the flesh, you must die. But if By the Spirit, you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
putting to death The deeds of the body is characteristic of somebody who is living. In other words, it is characteristic of a believer to be killing the deeds of the body, to be executing the Amalekites. in his or her life and doing it by the power of the Spirit. That's what he's saying there. The distinctive behavior of those who are saved and those who are victorious over sin is they are continually putting their evil deeds to death.
killing them. The King James says. mortifying sin. Paul is saying that that is a characteristic of a true believer. They put to death the deeds of the flesh, they kill sin.
True believer. will not act like Saul. who wanted to pamper and preserve ag. But he will act like Samuel who hacked him without mercy. into pieces.
Beloved, you can't tame the flesh. You can't make it a house pet. You can't coexist with it. You can't say, well, there's only a few of them out there. Let them run around.
They're not going to harm anybody. Paul says, you better get after all of them and kill them, just as God instructed his people to do. with these marauding Amalekites. Dramatic action. Our Lord spoke of such dramatic action.
On several occasions, one of them is in Matthew 5, 29 and 30. When he said, If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you. For it is better for you that one of the parts of your body perish than For your whole body to be thrown into hell, and if your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you. It is better for you that one of the parts of your body perish than for your whole body to go into hell. He's not calling for self-mutilation.
He's calling for mortification. It's a very similar thing. You've got some things in your life. Do you need to kill? And Paul is saying essentially the same thing back in Romans when he's talking about killing sin.
Paul never promises a believer Immediate freedom from sin's harassment. He doesn't say that in the great triumph all the Amalekites will die. He says, you're going to have to keep putting him to death all through your life. And Paul doesn't say you can solve this problem with a With a crisis moment, second blessing, second work of grace, instant sanctification experience. Doesn't say that.
He doesn't say you can solve it with a passive approach by saying, let go and let God. I can't do anything. I won't do anything. I'll just flop. I'll just sit back.
I'm not going to get involved in this. I'm going to let God do it all. Paul doesn't say that. And he doesn't suggest some turning point decision of rededication or reconsecration at the end of an invitation after a sermon. He says, What you've got to do is continually, unendingly, through all your life, as noted by the.
the tense of the verb, be putting to death the deeds of the body. You're moving around killing sins all the time. It's a continuous struggle. persistently putting to death the deeds of the flesh. He's not calling for some kind of life of physical pain.
That's not the idea. I remember meeting a man who wore a belt next to his flesh that was filled with little needles because he wanted to rip and tear his flesh all the time so that he could somehow deal with his sin. He's not talking about that. I know of people in the history of the Catholic Church who put things like tacks and nails and rocks in their shoes in order to inflict pain on themselves, thinking somehow they could mortify sin. Paul is not calling for a life of self-inflicted pain.
He is not asking for monastic deprivation. He is not asking for self-mutilation. He wants nothing to do with external self-punishment. He is describing rather a way of life that seeks to kill sin, crush it, sap it of its strength, deprive it of its influence, and thus yield a clear and a good conscience that brings peace and joy. and rest, security.
assurance and hope. Basically. Mortification of sin or the killing of sin involves the cultivation of new habits of godliness combined with the elimination of old habits of sin. On the positive side, you begin to do godly things. On the negative side, you stop doing sinful things.
And that is a constant warfare to which we must remain. perpetually Committed.
Now scripture offers us some practical means by which we can hack up ag. Practical means by which we can kill the remaining Amalekites in our life. None of them is fleshly. None of them is external. None of them is mechanical.
None of them is ceremonial. None of them is ritual. Let me highlight some of them. All right, we'll run through a little flow and sequence. If you want to kill sin in your life, and that's the only way to a clear conscience, if you want to deal with sin in your life, here's how.
Step one. Abstain from fleshly lusts. Abstain from fleshly lusts. James says, each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. When lust is conceived, it gives birth to sin.
If you're going to kill sin, you've got to stop lust. You got to deal with it with a peremptory strike. 1 Peter 2.11. And Peter says, And I think it's as simple and direct as you could possibly say it. I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul.
Now, what is he saying? I'll tell you what he's saying. Stop. Blusting. It's not too mystical.
Stop lusting. It's like First Corinthians 6:18. Flee immorality. Do you want to put to death the lusts in your heart? Then stop entertaining them.
Peter doesn't describe some complex program of therapy. He says, quit lusting. Stop it. Put her out of your life. There's no point sitting around waiting for some heavenly power to erase lust.
There's no point spending Hours and hours or years and years looking for the right formula to chase away the demon of lust. Here's the most simple, straightforward means of killing sin. Stop lusting. Stop it. It's kind of like James 4, which says, resist the devil.
And he'll flee from you. Stop lusting. And you'll stop sinning. You say what How do you How do you stop lusting?
Well, let's go to Romans 13, 14. And here's another very simple command. The end of the verse: make no provision. for the flesh in regard to its lusts. If you want to stop lusting, then don't provide anything for lust to feed on.
You understand that? Don't accommodate your lust. Lust has to be halted before it gets started. I mean if you struggle with gluttony Don't go to the market. With a lot of money.
Hungry. Alone. Go with a little money. Full and with a spiritual friend. You know what I'm saying?
Don't put yourself in that position. If you struggle with gluttony, you don't load up on junk food. If you're tempted with sexual desire, don't fill your mind with the images that build that temptation. Don't go to a movie that demonstrates that kind of stuff or read a novel that's all about that or watch television along those lines. And then wonder why you're always battling lust and why you always have an accusing conscience.
Make no provision. for the flesh in regard. to its lust. It's kind of like starving it out. There's a third step in the flow here.
We're backing up. Fix your heart on Christ. This same verse, verse 14, put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Pursue Christ's likeness.
Don't be satisfied. Don't be content until you awake in his likeness, as the psalmist said, or to borrow the words of Paul, he said, I am. I am. In travail or bearing birth pains until Christ is fully formed in you. Pursue being like Christ.
1 John 3:3. He that has this hope in him purifies himself even as he is pure. Fix your heart on Christ and Christ's likeness, and ask yourself what. Christ would do. I mean, it is an inexorable spiritual law that you become like whatever you worship.
The heathen become like their gods, be they idols or be they athletes. How much more Will Christians become like Christ when we make Him the focus of our life? Because we are not just becoming like Him on our own, but by the work. Of the Holy Spirit, who is transforming us from one level of glory to the next into the image of Jesus Christ. As you fix your heart on Christ, you will become like Christ.
As you become like Christ, you will not choose those things which make provision for your lust, and therefore you will abstain from fleshly lust. You're listening to Grace to You, featuring the Bible teaching of John MacArthur. John's message today showed you how to fight the sin in your life. The title of the message, Hacking a Gag to Pieces, and it was chosen by a Grace TU staff member as John MacArthur's most memorable sermon.
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Now for the entire Grace to U staff, I'm Phil Johnson. Watch Grace to U television this Sunday on DirecTV Channel 378. And be back tomorrow for more practical principles for rooting out sin in your life. It's another 30 minutes of unleashing God's Truth one verse at a time. on Grace to You.
