Welcome To The War Part 2

Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. Satan tries to derail our walk with God.

He appeals to natural desires and gets us to fulfill them in destructive ways. Today, more about a war from which there's no escape and how a Christian can best deflect temptation. From the Moody Church in Chicago, this is Running to Win with Dr. Erwin Lutzer, whose clear teaching helps us make it across the finish line. Pastor Lutzer, some may feel they lack the strength to fight a battle they feel they cannot win. And you know, Dave, I think the truth is all of us at times have felt that way. That's why it is so important to recognize that when we fight these battles, we have to fight them together. The Church of Jesus Christ plays a critical role in our victory and in our triumph over evil. These messages are so critical because they deal with issues that many people face, and certainly in our hearts, we are constantly being tempted.

You know, let me ask you this question. As a result of the COVID crisis, what we've discovered is the increasing role of technology in surveillance. What does this mean? Is this a picture of what might happen in the future? We're learning a lot about ourselves. We're learning a lot about our country. I've given a lecture entitled COVID-19, The Economy and Our Future.

For a gift of any amount, it can be yours. I deal with ongoing effects, actually, of the economy as a result of what we've experienced, effects that I think are going to be going on for a long while. Here's what you can do. Go to rtwoffer.com.

That's rtwoffer.com, or you can call us at 1-888-218-9337. Ask for COVID-19, The Economy and Our Future. And now we go to the pulpit of Moody Church where once again we talk about those temptations and the war within. Let's listen carefully. Now you think about the power of the world in our lives and you think of so-called worldly Christians who love the world, who are absolutely determined that they are going to take in all of the pleasures of the world.

We're talking about the wrong kind of pleasures now, and they're going to pursue these pleasures and entertain them in their lives, and then they're going to learn how to manage their sin so that they can get through a worship service and manage somehow and go back and do the same thing again. James says, you hate God and you're his enemy. Oh, this is so strong. This is so strong but so needed.

It's strong for me and it's strong for all of us. He says then, you adulteresses, you adulteresses, my oh my. Now in the Old Testament, you know, Israel was spoken of as having gone after other gods, having committed adultery. As a woman treacherously departs from her lover, so you have done to me, oh Israel says the Lord, says in the book of Jeremiah.

Second Corinthians chapter 11, the Apostle Paul says, I have betrothed you to one husband, namely Christ, that I might present you as a pure virgin to him. Now, all that you need to do is to talk to a woman whose husband has committed adultery. Do you understand something of the pain? And some of you who are listening can say, yeah, I understand the pain because you've been through it. The sense of betrayal, the sense of lack of trust, the sense of hurt, that all of the relationship that has been so carefully built shattered in those moments.

And the rebuilding might take months, if not years. But that's what we do to Christ who married us when we were redeemed. We were as a wife to her husband and said, Lord Jesus, now you are our husband. You are the husband. We are the bride. You have responsibility for us. Husbands have certain responsibilities and they're supposed to take care of the bride. But Jesus, you are not meeting our deepest needs.

The only way that we can meet those needs is to find the root of pleasure and find someone else who can be a better lover than you. Do you realize how that hurts God? That hurts God. You adulteresses, James says, and he's talking to us. And then James, of course, as he's talking about this, he says, or do you think the scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely? By the way, that is one of the most difficult verses in all the New Testament to interpret because there are two problems with it. The first is the question of what spirit is he talking about? Is James saying that the Holy Spirit of God within us is so jealous for God that he grieves when we sin? That's one way to interpret it. And if that's the interpretation, that certainly is theological and scriptural and could be found in many other passages, imagine what the Holy Spirit has to go through when the Holy Spirit is in contact with all of the sin that we so easily bring into our life.

Can you feel his pain and his grief? There's another way to interpret it, and that's the way the NIV has it here, namely that the spirit of man, and we could almost say an evil spirit within him, it is there and it causes us to envy, it causes the restlessness, it causes us to look into the world and think that we have been gypped and therefore we go to the world to meet the deepest needs of our hearts. Either way, what James is saying is look, we are adulteresses if we love the world. What a statement.

Oh, the second problem by the way, which I didn't deal with is this. There is no verse of scripture that says that the spirit that is within us causes us to envy intensely, where James says, or do you not think that the scripture says? There's no scripture that says this. I think that what James was doing is he was actually thinking ahead to the next thought that he was going to bring to people, namely the words, God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. That's a passage of scripture that comes to us from the book of Proverbs chapter 3, so I think that that's the explanation for what James is trying to say.

But what I'd like to do now is to make two life-changing concluding observations of the text. The first is that notice this, even though James acknowledges the desires that are within us, and there's no person alive who doesn't know what we're talking about, even though James acknowledges that he is still holding us accountable for our actions. He's saying, you know, you have all of these quarrels, you have all of these desires that are at war with your members and these desires are at war with you and they're at war with God, James says. But he doesn't say, well, you know, after all, you have to follow your desire because it is all in your genes anyway, so just act it out.

James doesn't go that route. You know that a couple of years ago, time goes so quickly, it might be years ago, Time magazine had a cover story on adultery. What it basically said was that the reason that men commit adultery is that it is because of their genetic makeup. It's these genes that are causing the problems and as a result of that, what you have is men who are promiscuous because they are born to be promiscuous.

That was the bottom line. There have been people who have been saying, well, you know, there's an adultery gene and it gives you a disposition to adultery. There's an alcohol gene because it runs in the family and we know that it runs in the family. We'll discuss this when we talk about alcoholism. Identical twins can be adopted in different families and yet they have a propensity to alcohol even if they are raised in families where there is no alcohol. So, you know, that's exactly what the scripture says, the sins of the father being visited upon the third and fourth generation. So there are those social consequences and connections.

But what people want to do is they want to isolate that alcohol gene so that they know why some people are alcoholics and others aren't. When I was in high school, we had a student who would steal. He would quote the verse of in Ephesians this way, let him who stole steal. Now, I think that that maybe went over some of your heads, but the rest of the verse says, let him that stole steal no more. That's actually the way it says it.

But anyway. But he said, that's the way I'm born. He said, ever since I was young, I could not stop taking things that I saw. If he could have put it in contemporary language, he has a stealing gene. And then you have people who say, we're going to make sure that we uncover that homosexual gene. Because if we can uncover that gene, why then indeed homosexuality has to be accepted as normal.

And on and on it goes. Listen to me carefully. James does not buy that.

Find as many genes as you want. We are responsible for our desires and for our actions. Please keep that in mind. You know what the problem is? Some of us, maybe we don't have these sins that I've listed for you on this sheet of paper that we're going to be speaking about. But you know what our problem is? You know what my problem is? You know what the problem is with the pastoral staff over here?

Yeah. We're all born with a sin gene. That's our problem. There's a sin gene that they still need to uncover. That's the seat of all of our difficulties.

Of course, we may have dispositions because of genes, because of desires. James does not let us off the hook and you cannot be let off the hook and you cannot be helped as long as you blame it on your genes. Now that's the first observation.

Let's go to a second. James now says, look, I'm going to tell you what to do. By the way, when I preach this series of messages, and I do want you to pray for me a great deal because obviously we're invading Satan's territory once we get into the things that are listed, but I want to preach very redemptively. You know, the easy thing is for a pastor to stand up and to just flail against some of these sins and rail against them and send everybody home feeling guilty, either if you're involved in the problem or the sin, you go home feeling guilty. If you're not, you go home feeling very, very self-righteous. My dear friend, the only reason we tackle these subjects, the only one, is to make sure that there's a helping hand extended to the needy, because we're all fallen creatures, as I mentioned.

We've all got the sin gene. And so what we want to do is to be redemptive, and we as a staff have talked about that in future messages how we can give people counsel and how we can show them the way. There was a young artist who painted a very, very dark picture, and it was just almost horrid in its, what shall we say, in the depth and the intensity of its darkness. And there was a man who was an artist who said, you know, never just paint a picture like that without painting a way leading out.

It's got to be a way out of the darkness, and what we're interested in is to find that way. So James says, I've got something for you to do. You've got a problem with the quarrels and the desires that are driving you, and you swear them off and they're back the next day. Here are the words of God. Verse 7, submit yourself to God.

Good place to start. You say, well, does that mean that my spouse is going to treat me much nicer now that I've submitted to God? Does that mean that that boss with whom I have to work and who is such an incredible irritation, who does everything that he or she can possibly do to make my life miserable? Does that mean that on Monday morning everything is going to be fine because at last that office is going to be turned around according to my liking so that they do it right?

No. But let me tell you that when you submit to God, now listen, that submission is a very thorough submission. That is a submission that simply says, God, I'm here and whatever you ask me to do so that I will not be desire driven, I'll do it.

That's not a submission that comes easily. But James says, submit yourself to God. Resist the devil, that's number two. You say, well, what does he have to do with all these things? Oh, my friend, the sins that we're talking about, they are his playground. This is where he spends his time making havoc, doing whatever he can to get us down and to fall into a snare and he has two lies that he loves to pass off onto people.

Let me give them to you. The first lie is, number one, just do it once and that's all. After you've done it once, he says, now that you've done it, you're defiled, you might just as well keep doing it and you're hooked.

Both are lies. Resist the devil. See, there are all kinds of people who are trying to resist the devil and they've not submitted to God and it's not working because the devil comes back. When Jesus even quoted verses of scripture at him, he memorized his own verses.

I don't know whether or not he carries cards around with him or not, but he memorized his own verses and he gave Jesus a verse back in his face. The thing that works is, dearly beloved, submit yourself to God. Secondly, resist the devil, James says, and then he says, come near to God and he'll come near to you. And I say that to those of you who feel on the fringes. I say that to those of you who feel that you've tried it a thousand times. I'm saying try it a thousand and one times. I say it to those of you who may feel as if God is so angry with you. He's turned his back on you.

He hasn't. Draw near to him and he will draw near to you. That's the promise that you can claim. Wash your hands, you sinners. Purify your hearts, you double-minded. Get clean as you confess your sins so that your conscience isn't constantly agitating you and telling you, well, you know, now that you've done it, you have to travel down the same path again. Humble yourself in the sight of the Lord. And by the way, it says, grieve and mourn for your sins, but verse 10, humble yourselves before the Lord and he'll lift you up.

Well, why does he say that? Because, listen carefully, all sin begins with pride because all sin says, I know better than God as to what's going to give me pleasure. And we will never overcome the tremendous desires within unless we go for pleasure, but they have to be God's pleasures that are on the right hand of God, that have no backwash of guilt, learning to enjoy God so much that we do not want to grieve him because of our sin.

That's really what happens. James says, folks, number one, there's a war within. And we say, James, we agree.

We've all been there, done that. Secondly, he's saying, you're at war with God and if you continue to be a lover of the world, you actually become his enemy. And that frightens us. I, for one, do not want to be an enemy of God. I hope that you agree with that. Don't be an enemy of God.

And then James is saying, look, there is a way out. Submit yourself to God, resist the devil, be cleansed and humble yourself under his mighty hand. And sometimes that humility means that we go to other people for help and we disclose the secrets that we have so carefully crafted and covered because it is in the process of disclosure that there is help and there is healing. Moody Church is a place where it's okay. It's okay to have problems. If it wasn't, we'd have nobody here.

It's okay to be needy, but we encourage you to come to God. There is that old story, that Indian legend that talks about the Indian who said, you know, I have two dogs within me. There's that ugly dog that's in the shadows and then there's the dog that is in the light. And the old question is, which one controls you? And the Indian wisely answered, the one that I feed the most.

Who are you feeding today? The desires which are going to drive you? Or are you feeding the desire for God? That's the question James says, you can change.

You can be different. And Jesus said, if the son therefore shall make you free, you shall be free indeed. Join me as we pray. And now Father we come to you and we ask that with sensitivity but firmness, your blessed Holy Spirit would work in our hearts. Father, we cannot even grasp the words that we have said this morning. That to love the world is to be an enemy of God. Oh Father, may it be said of the members and friends of Moody Church and our listening audience, that we never want to be your enemy.

Because you are opposed to the proud. You are at war with the proud, the Bible says, but you do give grace to the humble. We desire that we shall have that humility. And now before I close this prayer, what do you today have to tell God?

Whatever it is, would you tell him right now? Father, you know our weakness. You know that we are but dust. You know the struggles of the flesh.

You know how often we have failed. You know Father that all of our willpower has not been strong enough to subdue desires who want to control us. Grant us at this moment that we might submit to you Father. And may we love you so much that we would never want to be your enemy. Do that in my heart, in the heart of all the leadership of the church and every person who is listening. In Jesus name, Amen. You know my friend, it is so important that we feed ourselves on God's holy word.

It's the only way in which we can really overcome temptation. You know, God has taken us to a very unique place, hasn't he, in this country. We are experiencing things that we never thought of before, specifically because of the COVID crisis. It's a health crisis, but it's also an economic crisis. And I've given a lecture entitled COVID-19, The Economy and Our Future.

You can have it either on DVD or CD for a gift of any amount. And I'll tell you why I did it. I want us as Christians to think through what this says about what money really is, about the increasing effects on government dependency, technology, and all of the things that surround us. So ask for COVID-19, The Economy and Our Future.

Here's what you can do. Go to RTWOffer.com, that's RTWOffer.com, or call us at 1-888-218-9337. One of the things that is very important is for us to realize that we should respond to this crisis differently than the people around us. It is important for us to understand that trust in God does not mean that things will necessarily get better, but it means that God is faithful to us no matter what.

Go to RTWOffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337. Ask for COVID-19, The Economy and Our Future. It's time again for another opportunity for you to ask Pastor Lutzer a question you may have about the Bible or the Christian life. Dr. Lutzer, today's question comes from Calvin who lives in Michigan. He writes, I have heard you speak on the dangers of false prophets. I may be incorrect, but it seems you are equating preachers to prophets. It sounded like you were saying that if the preacher did not speak biblical truth, then he was a false prophet. Are you equating preachers with prophets? And if preachers are preaching and teaching ideas as doctrine which are not biblically supported, then would they be considered a false prophet? Yes, Calvin, I believe that preachers can also be spoken of as false prophets. Now, the reason why you have an emphasis on false prophets in the Bible is because it is the prophets who claim to speak directly in behalf of God. So, you know, they say that the word of the Lord came to me and said this and that, just like many do on TV, and many of these are false prophets as we well know. But if a preacher is preaching false doctrine, he can also be thought of in the same category as being a false prophet. If I were to teach something that would be unbiblical, something that would be different than the historic Christian teaching regarding salvation, for example, I could be considered also a false prophet, or at least I could be false in my teaching.

So I'm not sure exactly why you asked the question you did, but the answer is yes, we need to make sure that we judge the work and the ministry of preachers as well as so-called prophets. Thank you, Dr. Lutzer. If you'd like to hear your question answered, go to our website at rtwoffer.com and click on Ask Pastor Lutzer. Or call us at 1-888-218-9337.

That's 1-888-218-9337. You can write to us at Running to Win, 1635 N. LaSalle Blvd., Chicago, IL 60614. Running to Win is all about helping you understand God's roadmap for your race of life. One of the tough parts of that race is wanting what others have.

Your neighbor's car looks great, so does their house. Yes, greed says, I want more. But more is never enough. Greed, it's the first of the seven snares of the enemy that Erwin Lutzer is exposing. It's the sin that no one can see, but it lurks deep in every one of us. Next time, don't miss Greed, The Heart Revealed. Thanks for listening. For Dr. Erwin Lutzer, this is Dave McAllister. Running to Win is sponsored by the Moody Church.