Learning to Flee Sexual Sin ... According to the Gospel, Part 2

Hi, this is the Hymn We Proclaim podcast, season seven. Today we wrap up the series Do You Not Know? Judd has been taking us on a journey that goes for the heart of the matter, which is genuine gospel heart change, rather than hitting us with more tips, tricks, and suggestions. Have you looked into John's new book that goes along with this series? It's available now, and it's entitled Hope and Holiness How the Gospel Enables and Empowers Sexual Purity.

I put all the information in the show notes, so please check it out soon. Again, it's called Hope and Holiness: How the Gospel Enables and Empowers Sexual Purity. It's a great new resource for your personal spiritual growth library. And here's message number nine now, called Learning to Flee Sexual Sin According to the Gospel, Part two. This is gonna be long today.

I apologize up front, but We need to hear it. We're looking at verse 20, so look at verse 20. We're looking at the last part, chapter 6, verse 20b. And this is what the Apostle Paul, under the authority and inspiration of the Holy Spirit, has written to his church. He says to us, so.

That's in light of everything I've just taught you, particularly verses 18 and 19, but I would argue that he has the whole context in mind here.

So glorify God in your body. It's an imperative, it's a command. You must do this. What is the goal of sexual purity? What is the goal of sexual purity?

Paul gives us the answer right here in 1 Corinthians: to glorify God in our body. The great end and purpose of every believer's daily living your Christian life, when the rubber hits the road, so to speak, is to glorify God. The Westminster Shorter Catechism reminds us correctly in question one, what is the chief end of man? Answer, man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. Thomas Boston's exposition of that says this, the glory of God.

is a silver thread which must run through all our actions. In 1 Corinthians chapter 10, just a couple chapters later, Paul says to the Corinthians, he says, So, whether you eat, Or whether you drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. What is God's glory? The answer is twofold. God's glory, first, is the glory that He has in Himself.

God, the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, the Trinity, the Godhead, God. Is intrinsically glorious. He's intrinsically perfect and beautiful and all-glorious and other than anything that his creation is. As light is to the Son, so glory is intrinsic and essential to the Trinity. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit.

The glory of God is also a second thing. The glory of God is not only the glory that He has in Himself, which, by the way, The author of Hebrews opens up his letter and says that the very glory. of God emanates from within Jesus himself. Just mind-boggling. John chapter 1, we beheld his glory.

We'll come back to those. But the glory of God is also the glory which is ascribed to God. It's not giving God more than glory, it's ascribing to Him the honor and excellence due to His name. And this is what Paul has in mind here in 1 Corinthians chapter 6. To glorify God, glorify God in your body.

What does it mean? To glorify God is to influence others' opinions so as to enhance the latter's reputation. You are to live, Paul says, your life. in such a way when it comes to sexual issues That you influence other people in the church, in your family, in your friends, in your work relationships, in all of life. Your life enhances the opinion about Jesus Christ Himself.

You glorify God. Your life is to lead to the praise and honor and extolling. The holiness and purity and perfection of God. You must glorify God. This is why you were created, and this is why Paul says in this context, you have been redeemed.

So we hear a lot about the glory of God in the evangelical church, particularly the conservative branch. gospel-centered evangelical Christianity. And I've never ever heard an explicit message tell me, how do I do it? And so, what I want to teach you this morning is how you do it. I want to teach you this morning how do you flee sexual immorality?

How do you glorify God in your body? Point number one, you do not glorify God by legal holiness. What is legal holiness? Legal holiness is the path of inauthentic Christian living. What is it?

Listen carefully. This comes from J.I. Packer. It's very helpful. He says that legal holiness consists merely of forms.

Routines, outward appearances that are maintained from self-regarding motives. There's no glory of God in view in this picture. It's self-indulgence, self-help, good advice. Christianity. Yeah.

I recently received two articles responding to the problem of sexual sin and how to deal with it, and both of these articles illustrate. The problem of legal holiness.

So let me just don't take any notes. Just put your pins down and just listen. You'll get the notes in detail tomorrow by 10.30. I just want you to listen and we're going to go through this very quickly. The first article that I received is he is dealing with church leaders in the church who fall into sexual temptation and ruin the church.

So, pray for your leaders in the church. We are vulnerable to it. And so, I make myself accountable. You're welcome to ask me or Ron anytime, anywhere, at any point: how are you doing with your smartphones, your computers, and your iPads and your television and your eyes when you go to the beach and all of that stuff? Just ask us.

So, I'm not saying it's not important, but just listen because what I'm going to share with you, I doubt you've ever heard. The first article deals with church leaders falling in sin. And he gives, here's the title of the letter, seven steps to avoid sexual sin, how to obey Paul's commandment in 1 Corinthians 6 to flee sexual immorality.

So here, let me just give it to you very quickly and just listen. Step number one, don't say it can happen to you. We're all vulnerable to temptation. Yes. Step number two, repent of your pride and self-righteousness in this area.

Pride goes before a fall. Yes. Step number three, put all the needed safeguards in place and keep them there. Yes. Step number four: Don't just have a plurality in place of leadership in the church.

Have one in practice. Make yourself accountable if you're a church leader to other church leaders and to the church. Yes. Make your wife your partner in purity. Yes, I do that with my wife.

She has all of our televisions password protected so that I can't go past PG. I have no idea how to undo that, and I'm glad.

So I'll put safeguards in place. I don't counsel women in the church unless my wife is with me.

So if you're a woman in our church, don't call me. Call my wife. I'll come with my wife. I'll never come to you alone, ever, never. I won't pick you up in the car.

I won't take you anywhere. I won't do anything with anybody except my daughters, and my wife, and my mom, and my. Um in mother-in-law. That's it. Yeah.

You'll never see me in Jacksonville, at a restaurant, in a car, alone with anybody. I believe this. This is good advice. Make your wife your partner in purity. Number six, when in doubt, err on the side of caution.

And I just talked about that.

So we do that in our church. That's what we do. Never forget, number seven, here's the big one: never forget we're in a spiritual battle with real winners and real losers, and sexual sin is very damaging and deadly and affects everybody involved, so stay away from it. That's the article. That's the whole article.

The second article is entitled Avoiding Slip-Ups. And the article, the purpose of the article is The article offers 10 I'm reading word for word 10 tips. That may help you avoid and break pornography habits and avoid relapses.

So, here they go. Plan your week. Look ahead and anticipate times where you're more vulnerable to temptation and plan ahead and stay away from those times. Number two. Avoid becoming overconfident, thinking, well, I'm over this problem, because if you forget to listen, Practice spiritual disciplines, pray, scripture study, journaling, acts of service, and so on, you're going to become prey to it because you're falling with pride.

Third, remember that you're not able to do it by yourself and you don't have to.

So call upon the Lord. Call upon trained professionals. Ask trusted family members and friends. Go to your pastors. Go to spiritual leadership.

Help is not a weakness, it's a strength to ask for help. Number four, don't think, avoid thinking if only she would do this or only if he would do that. Don't blame others. Because addictive behavior is your problem. Don't blame others.

Concentrate on yourself. You can't fix other people. Concentrate on yourself. Number five, avoid thinking, I have changed, why doesn't anybody else? And you start looking around, the article says, nobody else wants to change, so why should I start changing?

Number six, don't think you can change overnight. Change is a very slow process. It's not an event. Be patient. Takes time.

Number seven, realize that repentance is a process, not a single event. Repentance is a course of a lifetime.

So, continue to study and follow the counsels of the prophets and apostles and give yourself to that and just take time with it. Number eight, set goals of abstinence. Begin one day at a time. Take baby steps until you have it free and every day pray to resist temptation. Number nine, seek out and cultivate good friends.

Good trusted friendships are vital to an atmosphere of recovery.

So surround yourself, good company corrupts bad character. Number 10. Recognize certain times and conditions that cause your temptations to come most strongly and avoid them. An evangelical pastor and church planter wrote the first article of the seven steps to avoid sexual sin. The National Mormon Leadership wrote the second article.

There's no difference between the two. None. None. Both articles approach sexual sin and sin in general The exact Same way. What is that?

They both offer helpful advice to overcome sin. We just substitute the word advice for law. Here is the problem. Helpful advice is nothing more than law, and law only imposes more expectations and demands as conditions for your success. Sanctification.

The Bible teaches does not consist merely in being practically told what to do. Regardless of how practical and how much the rubber hits the road, advice you are given. There is nothing distinctly Christian about this church planter's seven steps to avoid sexual sin from the National Mormon Leadership's 10 tips. There is nothing distinctive about it. The article never mentions the gospel one time, does not even imply it or assume it.

Graham Goldsworthy says this. He says that articles like this refer to what is naked law. Naked law is offering imperatives, good advice, tips, keys to victorious Christian living, whatever you want to call it. offering all of that stuff without grounding them in the indicatives of the gospel.

So that they are the logical outflow of the gospel and not merely just good advice from a life coach.

Now, we would not expect a Mormon to ground any imperatives in the gospel because they're not even Christian. But regrettably, this evangelical pastor's article that I received could easily be given as an address for moral purity to students at Brigham Young University and applauded and accepted. You could take this evangelical pastor's article and give it to Brigham Young University students and give it to them in their classroom and they would buy it hook line and sinker. Because the evangelical pastor's article implies that all we really need is good advice. What we really need is good instruction, a life coach who takes God's little life book of instruction manual to give me tips and principles on how to live the Christian life.

Now, this is not to say that both articles, both articles touch on wise counsel. They do give wise counsel. In fact, Almost every one of the principles from the Mormon Church I follow. Does it make me a Mormon? Does it mean that I believe in Mormon doctrine now?

It's good advice. It's smart. God's law in the Bible provides us much-needed wisdom for pursuing a moral and ethical life, but here is the point. Ethical exhortations without the gospel are legalistic and ultimately useless. That's the point.

Listen to Graham Goldsworthy. He says, if we constantly tell people what they should do in order to get their lives in order, we place a terrible legalistic burden on them. Of course, we should obey God. Of course, we should love Him with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. And here I paraphrase it.

Of course, we should flee sexual immorality and glorify God in our body. Of course. The Bible tells us to do these things. That's not the debate here. It's not the issue.

He says, but if we ever give the impression that these things are possible to do on our own, not only do we make the gospel irrelevant, But we suggest that the law is a lot, in fact, is a lot weaker in its demands. Then it really is. Legalism demeans the law by reducing it to standards to the level of our competence.

So, let me just paraphrase the rest of Graham Goldsworthy's paragraph in the context of 1 Corinthians 6. In practical terms, if pastors and Christian leaders set forth practical steps - seven steps to avoid sexual sin, ten tips to overcome pornography and avoid it. If they set forth practical steps for avoiding sexual sin in a way that implies conformity is simply a matter of understanding and being obedient, then we're being legalists and we risk undoing the very thing that we want to build up. We may achieve.

Now, here's legal holiness. We may achieve the outward semblance of conformity to the biblical pattern of sexual purity. But we do so at the expense of the gospel of grace that alone can produce a sexually pure life. To say that we should follow seven steps for sexual purity and not ground these imperatives clearly and self-consciously in what God in Christ has done about our failure to be or do perfectly as He wills in the area of sexual purity is to reject the grace of God and to lead people to seek after self-help and self-improvement in a way that to call a spade is a spade godless. It's legal holiness.

Pursuit maintained by self-regard. The glory of God nowhere in sight.

Nowhere. And so Goldsworthy proposes this question, is it possible to preach a Christian sermon? And I say, is it possible to write a Christian article on pursuing sexual purity without mentioning Jesus? The answer is resounding no. It's not.

We ought to ask, could my teaching, could my article, Could my discipleship Could it listen? Could it be used and taught in a Mormon Sunday gathering? Could it be used in a Jewish synagogue? Could it be used in a Muslim? Get together.

The problem with the evangelical article is that I could be a Mormon, a Jew, a Muslim, a New Ager, or even an atheist and follow those seven arc tips. And be a self-righteous, self-regarding motive. There's nothing distinctively Christian about it. Nothing. Do you know why this?

Church planter has in common articles with the Mormon because everybody has the law of God written on their conscience. Romans chapter 2 all humans are born under the covenant of works. You can't escape it. You know the law and you know what you're supposed to do. And so these tips and these principles and these steps and these secret keys, if I hear one more key to Victoria's Christian life, I'm just going to get sick.

I don't want keys. I want Jesus. Because it leaves the struggling believer without any power to actually fulfill what the law forbids and requires in relation to sexual purity.

So, coming back to 1 Corinthians, Paul says, and this is the question that begs to be asked and answered: do you not know that, listen, the law can do no more in sanctification than it could do in justification? The law can only do what the law can do, command. The law cannot do anything other than command and forbid and then punish when it's broken. It can never do anything else but that. The basic function of the law never changes.

It doesn't change for justification. Galatians 3:21, there's no law that could ever give life. That's justification in that context. Galatians chapter 3, verses 2 and 3, the law cannot sanctify. It cannot save.

That's the point. Sanctification is salvation. It cannot save. And so, whether the law comes to us in the form of Ten Commandments, the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians chapter 5, or a less threatening, unassuming, beautiful, smiling face giving me seven steps to avoid sexual sin. That type of moral instruction can only guide me and reveal to me when I go off course, but it can never compel my heart to do anything.

Never. The law is like A boat satellite navigation system. and you're out on the open ocean. And the satellite navigation system is pointing you in the direction to go. And it quickly alerts you with an alarm when you veer off course.

But it doesn't move your boat forward. The engine does. The engine moves your boat forward, and you have to have a spark plug to create a fire to ignite that fuel so that the engine will actually turn on so you can go. The power source for the boat is not the navigation system, but the engine. And I don't care how long you've been sailing on the open ocean.

If you don't have an engine and if you don't have fuel that creates a spark plug to ignite that fuel, you're going to sit out in the open ocean and you're going to be looking at that satellite navigation system saying, make the boat go, make the boat go, make it go, and you're not going. Seven steps to avoid sexual sin. Make the boat go, make the boat go, and you're not going. The law is like a boat satellite navigation system. It directs you and it warns you when you veer off course, but the power source for the believer's life of sanctification is the gospel in all of its unsearchable riches.

And the Holy Spirit is the fire that ignites that gospel fuel and propels your life in obedience to the law. And so to grow in our sanctification, we are to move forever, ever on, deeper and deeper into the gospel, which is the power of God unto salvation, because it alone is the ministry of the Holy Spirit. 2 Corinthians 3.8. The gospel leads me to obey. The gospel leads me, this is Paul's whole point, to glorify God in my body.

This is why we've got to come to church and have this external word outside of us preached into our hearts every week because faith comes from hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. And if you hear seven steps, seven steps, you are being told how to build a glorious satellite navigation system that does nothing but direct and warn and punish but never gives you power to obey. I'm sorry, I'm so excited about this. I want you to be like Paul. Do you not know?

Do you not know the gospel? Do you not know the ministry of the Holy Spirit? Do you not know the power of God unto salvation for your life? Listen, the Holy Spirit works through the gospel. He subdues our hearts in submission to the law.

He strengthens our faith against temptation. He builds us up in grace. As we come to the book of Titus, you're going to see in Titus chapter 2, verses 12 to 13, that the grace of God. given to us freely in the gospel. By the power of the Holy Spirit, renounce causes us to renounce ungodliness.

causes us to renounce worldly passions and trains us to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present age, eagerly waiting for the blessed hope of Jesus to come again and consummate the work of the gospel. That is what the gospel produces. This is what Paul is teaching us in 1 Corinthians 6 about the gospel and its fruit in relation to the pursuit of sexual purity. Paul is teaching us that whenever, in 1 Corinthians 6, whenever we swerve from the centrality of the gospel, our life will lapse into antinomianism. And listen to me carefully, license and antinomianism is an equally dangerous, destructive heresy as much as legalism.

If you don't believe it, 1 Corinthians 6 is all about it. Because the Corinthians were claiming their right and using theology and the slogans to justify their unrestrained, licentious, antinomian lifestyle. To engage in sexually unrestrained sexual behavior is because Paul says you don't know the gospel, you have never seriously considered its implications for your life, you don't know about the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit who takes that good news and sanctifies you. You don't know. Because the gospel does not lead a believer to theologically justify immorality.

The gospel does not lead a believer to engage in unrestrained sexual behavior outside of the marriage covenantal bond of a husband and a wife forever. Only continual immersion in the meat of the gospel ensures that our lives will be conformed to the sound doctrines that flow from the gospel. This is what Paul is teaching us.

So, in contrast, to legal holiness, seven steps, ten tips, whatever it is. Which most evangelicals are fed every Sunday morning in church. We come to 1 Corinthians chapter 6 and Paul presents the most radically different Copernican revolution, turn it your whole world upside down approach to this issue than you've ever thought or dreamed before. And I want to show it to you right now. Listen.

Paul's approach Listen carefully. His approach would get me kicked out of BYU chapel. Paul's approach would get my head cut off. At the local mosque. Paul's approach would get me stoned.

By a Jewish synagogue. It would not be accepted. Because it's radically different.

So, second, how do you glorify God? How do you obey this imperative? I'm going to teach you right now. Here's how you do it. You do it, you glorify God by gospel holiness.

Gospel holiness. What is gospel holiness? Listen to Packer again, he's very helpful. Gospel holiness, that that buzzword. Which we're going to start talking about in the culture of our church: gospel holiness.

Is Puritan shorthand for authentic Christian living? Gospel holiness springs from love and gratitude to God. It's not slavish duty. It's not outward conformity to a bunch of rules and regulations that has self-regarding motives. Listen to me.

Gospel holiness leads to obedience from gratitude straight to the glory of God. Paul shows us Throughout this argument, listen that a truly Christian ethic Sexual purity. is based on this understanding that the indicative always generates and is not generated by the imperative. Michael Horton, Christian Systematic Theology, page 717. What is Michael Horton saying there?

What is Paul saying here? Here's what they're saying. It's very simple. Paul does not say in 1 Corinthians 6: flee sexual immorality and glorify God in your body, so that Christ might dwell in your heart and the Holy Spirit might make you a sacred temple. He does not say that.

What he says is this: because Christ has redeemed you and bought you to belong to himself, and because the fruit of the gospel of the Holy Spirit has come to indwell you and make you into a temple of the Holy Spirit. Flee sexual immorality and glorify God. And that's the difference between being a pagan and a Christian. Gospel holiness springs from this gratitude to God. It flows from the gospel.

Legal holiness is simply religion. What is religion that we said at the beginning of this lesson? The average person on the street thinks that the purpose of religion is to make people better by offering them down-to-earth practical steps to become a better you. to be a better person. That approach is sustained by self-regarding motives rather than the God-glorifying affections that Paul is talking about here.

Paul is saying, be who you are. That's been his whole argument from 1 Corinthians 6, 9 through 20. Be who you are. Religion calls us to be something we're not. The gospel working, listen, the law working through the gospel calls us to be who we now are in Christ.

When I am giving you imperatives in this church, Flee sexual immorality and glorify God in your body. I'm speaking to that new man brought to life because you've been washed, believing that you have the Holy Spirit, and it's going to result in the fruit of obedience. And if you don't, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6 verses 9 and 10, do you not know that the unrighteous, the seriously unrepentant people who continue in this type of sin and never submit to the sexual ethic taught in Christ's kingdom, they're not going to be there one day?

So don't be deceived. But notice with me, really quickly, and we're going to wrap this up quickly, but I want you to notice with me, look what Paul does in 1 Corinthians 6. There are actually, well, I'll help Russ's poem. There are actually three imperatives, not two. Yeah.

That's okay. But in 1 Corinthians chapter 6, verses 9 to 20, there are three imperatives.

Now compare that to the seven-step approach that is seven imperatives. The Apostle Paul, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, gives us three. And the three imperatives. Contrast starkly with that which dominates the Christian living section of bookstores. And evangelical pulpits and teaching today in regard to helping believers struggling with sexual sin.

His three imperatives are this: Verse 9: Do not be deceived. Verse 18, flee sexual immorality. In verse 20, glorify God in your body. Three imperatives. These three imperatives are set in the context of a sea of indicatives.

They are immersed in indicatives, the gospel, good news, and the fruit of the gospel.

So here's the gospel and its fruit that Paul has been pointing us to. Listen, verses 9 and 10. He uses the word inheritance, inherit. That implies the doctrine of adoption. The doctrine of adoption, verses 9 and 10.

Verse 11, he says, You have been washed. That is the doctrine of regeneration. Yeah. Verse 11, he goes to the doctrine of definitive sanctification. You have been sanctified.

Verse 11, you have been justified, the doctrine of justification. Verse 14. You have been raised. The doctrine of resurrection applied to sexual purity in your daily life. Look at verses 15 to 17.

Your body is now a member of Christ and joined to the Lord the doctrine of union with Christ, verses 15 and 17. The fruit of the gospel is Christ's work in us is verses 18.

Well, verses 18 and 20. You are, listen, the temple of the Holy Spirit. You are a walking, sacred dwelling place for the holy presence of the living God. And then verse 20, you have been bought. Redeemed by Christ, who paid the price for your life to belong to Him, because He paid the price of God's just requirements in the law and bought you out of the slave market of your sin to belong to Him.

You have been redeemed, you have been bought.

So take careful note, Paul appeals to eight: gospel truths and the fruit of the gospel. And he issues three imperatives. My dad is an accountant. And I'm terribly in mass, so I called him so I wouldn't do something stupid this morning. I said, Dad, if Paul gives three imperatives and eight gospel truths and its fruit, what does that kind of percentage stuff look like?

Help me with that really quick. Listen. To sinning. Airing Unrestrained, licentious, immoral believers in the church who are sleeping with temple prostitutes paying money for it. The Apostle Paul, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, Gives three times as much gospel in this text as he does imperatives.

Three times as much. And he uses the law lawfully. Do not be deceived. You cannot engage in unrestrained sexual license serially and think you're going to be in the consummation of God's kingdom. You're deceived.

You're not going to be there. You need to repent. And then he uses the law lawfully in the third use of the law. Just guiding and directing believers to be who they already are in Christ. This is who we want to be.

Does any believer, and here's how it works. Every single gospel truth and fruit of the gospel that I just read to you that Paul gives us here. Everyone takes its aim straight to the glory of God. You have been adopted, washed, that's regeneration, sanctified, justifying, destined for resurrection, united to Christ, filled with the indwelling presence and made a temple by the Holy Spirit, bought with Jesus, all so that you can glorify God. The gospel takes dead aim at the glory of God.

The first reason it does, why? Because the gospel always, listen, first and foremost, God's glory shines into our hearts to let us see Jesus, who is the expression of God. fullest representation of the glory of God you will ever see. How do I know that? 2 Corinthians chapter 4 verse 6.

For God who said, Let light shine out of darkness, has shone in our hearts to give the light. Of the knowledge of the glory of God and the face of Jesus Christ. John says it in John 1, Hebrews says it in Hebrews 1. It's all over the New Testament. When you look at Jesus given to you in the gospel, you are seeing more perfection of glory than what you see in a beautiful sunrise at Jack's Beach.

And then the gospel not only through the power of the Holy Spirit shines in your heart to make you understand and make you capable of receiving this perfection of Jesus. The Holy Spirit makes you a temple, a sacred dwelling place where the Holy Spirit dwells in you and he then begins to cause you to live in conformity to what God requires in his law so that your life begins to issue in good deeds. People look at that and they say, oh, what a glorious God those people have. This is Matthew chapter 5, verse 16. In the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in the heaven.

The essence of regeneration, being washed, 1 Corinthians 6, verse 11, is the creation of a new heart that begins to delight in the law of God. You don't dismiss it. You do not make theological justifications. Oh, you know. No.

The heart desire of a gospel-driven, spirit-indwelled believer is to learn what it truly means to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. And if that's not your life, Paul says, Do you not know? You don't know. The gospel. In the context, this call to glorify God in your body, Paul is just saying: don't give your body to sexual immorality.

Don't give yourself to that which dishonors and desecrates God's holy temple. Live your life to the glory of God because this is what the Holy Spirit's leading you to. The contrast between the Corinthians and Paul's theology could not be further. In verses 12, 13, and 18, the Corinthians are making these theological, erroneous arguments justifying sexual immorality. And Paul says, your theology leads you to live a life.

Of selfish, self-centered rights and freedoms of the individual. To do whatever my desires in my flesh lead me to do. And he counters and he says, if you understand that you have been adopted, washed, sanctified, justified, destined for resurrection, united to Christ, made a dwelling temple place of the Holy Spirit, and bought with Christ with a price, your, listen, your life and the implications of that gospel would not be, listen, seeking to justify individual selfish indulgence of your flesh, but rather, rather, Paul says, your whole life will be focused in living devoted service to God for his glory. You don't know the gospel if you are not saturated. Listen, to live a life that makes God look good in the eyes of other people.

You've never tasted the gospel. And so, Paul is just teaching us how to fulfill the very purpose. for which we were created and redeemed. His imperatives, the three imperatives, are just a satellite navigation system. Telling believers this is the course you are to sail your boat.

And we're saying, well, I want to sell there. Holy Spirit, blow in me. Teach me the gospel so I can... Go your course. and not selfishly indulge my flesh.

Let me just ask you some questions as we finish. Do you want to flee from rather than engage in unrestrained sexual immorality? Do you want to? Do you want to live a life that glorifies God? If you do.

Don't seek to order your life by a satellite navigation system. Seek to immerse your life. Not in outward forms and routines and outward appearances, it is maintained by self-regarding motives. As a recipe for disaster, you will become shipwrecked. Instead, go way beyond all of this tip-oriented legal holiness Christianity that you are fed ad nauseum.

And like Paul, Live with a self consciously Soaked, immersed, gospel, drenched. Reality of the gospel and all of its unsearchable riches and implications and fruits, and then your life will be driven by the Holy Spirit to listen, go in paths that glorify God. And then you'll obey the law. and its third use, which doesn't condemn just guides.

So let me ask you as we conclude: how often do you dwell on your adoption? Paul says in Ephesians chapter 1, verses 4 and 5, We have been adopted to be holy and blameless. The purpose of your adoption is to live a holy and blameless life to the glory of God.

So how often do you dwell on your adoption?

Son of the living God. the highest privilege of the gospel. J.I. Packer says this. He says, gospel holiness is just a matter of the child of God being true to type, true to his Father.

That's all it is. It is being true to a Savior and to himself. It's not a matter of being a good person. It is a matter of being a good son or daughter, as distinct from a prodigal or black sheep in the royal family. You are in the royal family of God.

And I want to please my Father. How often do you dwell in your adoption? How many of you know what the doctrine of adoption is? The highest privilege of the gospel. Do you know that you've been washed?

Washed by the Holy Spirit, brought to life through the doctrine of regeneration. That is the basis and power for your obedience. Listen. It's not regeneration, it's not a moral makeover. It's a whole new identity.

It's a resurrection from the dead. It's ex nihilo creation. It's a whole new status. And listen, the doctrine of regeneration being washed. is an eternal cleansing.

You know why that's important? Because if you don't know what regeneration is, you have no source by which to go find cleansing from the guilt of your conscience for the regret and shame of your sexual failure. How many of you know that you've been sanctified, set apart by God for God and His holy purposes, that you are now a saint, a holy one? How many of you know that you've been justified? Justification is the only ground that you have for assurance before God.

There is no other ground. Because you and I sin every day. But the ground of justification never shifts. Because it's the perfect imputed righteousness of the Son of God Himself who has faithfully kept the law in our place. And all of that perfection is granted to me as if I've never sinned and as if I've always obeyed perfectly everything God has ever required of me my whole life.

There is no other ground for hope. If you have failed sexually, if you're struggling with sexual temptation, there's no other ground to flee to, how do you mean if you know you've been justified? How many of you know that your body is destined for resurrection to be just like the glorious, holy, perfect, reigning Son of the living God? Oh, what a great thought. Paul says in Philippians 3 that the Holy Spirit, Jesus Himself, will take your little lowly body and transform it by his power to bring it in conformity to the listen, the exalted glory of Jesus Himself.

Whoa! Come, Lord Jesus, do it today. Boy, that'll change how you live your life. How many of you know that your body is united to Christ, that you're a member of Christ, joined to Christ? That everything you do, like Russ shared, every Every time you look, guys, at the wrong thing, girls, every time you entertain something that you think is going to bring you in your little fantasy world, happiness.

You join Jesus to that and you make him do that. You don't desecrate the Son of God. How many of you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, a sacred dwelling place, this physical body? How many of you know that it has been purchased by Christ on the cross to belong to Him? Cultivating that kind of self-conscious awareness of the gospel and the meat of the gospel over and over every single day in your life is what will propel you to a pure, holy life.

That's how you glorify God. We don't believe in discounting wisdom. But if you discount the gospel It's over. You're going to be shipwrecked. Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?

Do you not know that you're adopted? Do you not know that you're a new creation in Christ? Do you not know that you've been set apart by God for God? Do you not know that you are not only declared not guilty, but also reckoned as if you have never had nor committed any sin and are a perfect lawkeeper? Do you not know that your body is destined for resurrection?

Do you not know that you are in union with Jesus? Do you not know that your body is a sacred dwelling place, a temple of the Holy Spirit? Do you not know that your body is Christ's purchased possession and that you belong to him as his treasured possession because you are his inheritance? When you live, Paul says, with that self-conscious, gospel-driven reality in your life, you will display, as one author says, positively in the use of your body, the glory, and especially the holiness of your heavenly Master, who has taken possession of you. Thanks again for listening to the Hymn We Proclaim podcast.

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