The Causes and Cure for Spiritual Inconsistency

Today on Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. Where are we saying I can't, but God says in actuality, you won't. You see, you need to start looking at your life like the unconquered territory of the Promised Land of Canaan. And you need to look at those areas of your life where you feel like I can't obey God here and realize that where you say can't, God says won't. Welcome to Summit Life with Pastor J.D.

Greer. As always, I'm your host, Molly Vidovitch. Today, we're launching into a new study in the book of Judges called Broken Saviors. Over the next few weeks, we'll discover that we're a lot like the Israelites who let fear and distraction get in the way of their nearness to God. We're kicking off this teaching series with a message meant to eliminate something that plagues us all, spiritual inconsistency.

Can anyone relate to that? Now to get better acquainted with Pastor J.D. and to see the wide variety of resources available to you, stop by jdgreer.com. But right now, let's get started with today's message called The Causes and Cure for Spiritual Inconsistency. You've got your Bibles this weekend. I invite you to take them out and open them to the book of Judges, the book of Judges, which is in what we call the Old Testament, the first of the testaments that God gave. I think it's like the seventh book, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges. Take out your Bible and open it there.

If you'll find it, you can keep your place there for the next several weeks because we're doing a beginning of a series through it called Broken Saviors. As you're opening your Bible there, I will tell you that my wife and I always say that we have been married for 12 wonderful years, even though we've actually been married for a total of 14 years. We've just had enough rough seasons that we can't honestly include them in the 12 wonderful years.

So we say we've been married for 12 wonderful years and two other ones for a total of 14. For a few of our first years, those rough seasons involved, ironically enough, are vacations. We could not be more opposite when it comes to a philosophy of vacations. My wife likes to have no real plan going into a vacation, which is what in her mind makes it a vacation. She points out that's what the word means is that you vacate. So her daily activities are get up and get a bagel.

That's it. That's one day of vacation. Me, I'm the opposite. I have our day planned out in five minute increments. I get up and I think, well, if we get out by sunrise, we can see the turtles do their morning routine and then head over to the planetarium at 10.05. We can see a movie there. Come home for 18 minutes of downtime.

Then there's a new hot dog place I heard about and just that's how the whole day goes. So it has caused a considerable amount of strife and annoyance, but we couldn't be more opposite. One redeeming thing that has helped though, is that we both have a love for museums on vacation. I know that puts us in total nerd life, but it's kind of the foundation of our relationship, a love for history and anything, but it annoys our kids.

They're not into it yet, but we both love going in and catching a snapshot of an entire epic of history, understanding of people, a movement, just all kind of in a glance. Well, the reason I share that is because the book of Judges is somewhat like a museum of Israel's spiritual history, particularly the first two chapters that we're going to look at today, because in them, you're going to see a snapshot of Israel's rather rocky history with God. You're going to see Israel go up and down in their faith. You're going to see how they're sometimes hot, sometimes cold.

Most often they're just lukewarm. There are certain temptations that no matter how hard they try, they just can't seem to shake them. I feel like it's something that most of us can relate to. Do you ever find yourself asking, why is it that you go up and down so much spiritually? A lot of us feel like we are spiritually bipolar. You're like, is that even a spiritual condition? If it is, that's what I am. One week, you're super Christian.

The next week, you're not even sure you believe. Or do you ever ask yourself, why are there some sins that no matter how many resolutions I make, I just can't seem to get rid of these things? Why is it that I have so little joy spiritually? Everybody else seems to have so much joy.

I see them at church and they got their little Bible and they got their smile on their face and they're saying, bless you, brother. And I just don't feel like that all the time. I struggle.

I feel like I drag myself along. Those people, by the way, are liars and fakes. Just so you know, one of my core principles as a pastor is everyone is screwed up once you get to know them. If you can't see that they're screwed up, you just don't know them that well.

That includes me. So that's where most of us are, which makes these first two chapters of Israel's spiritual struggles, I think, so helpful for me. You're going to see, I think, your struggle and their struggle and out of their struggles, we're going to draw three kind of guiding principles that the writer of Judges used to shape the rest of the book.

The book opens like this. Chapter one, verse one, after the death of Joshua. Joshua, you might recall, is the mighty warrior general who had led Israel into Canaan. But when he died, there were still large parts of the area of Canaan that had yet to be conquered.

It was a huge area, so they weren't done. So the people of Israel inquire of the Lord, verse one, who will go up first for us against the remaining Canaanites to fight against them now that Joshua is dead. The Lord said, Judah shall go up the tribe of Judah. Behold, I've given the land into his hand.

Well, things start out great. Judah went up and the Lord gave the Canaanites and the Parisites into their hand and defeated 10,000 of them at Bezak. Verse six, Adonai Bezak, which literally in Hebrew means the king of Bezak, Adonai Bezak.

He fled and they pursued him and caught him and cut off his thumbs and his big toes, because that's just what you do. Verse seven, Adonai Bezak said, 70 kings with their thumbs and their big toes cut off, used to pick up scraps under my table, as I have done, so God has repaid me. If you will allow me to digress for just a moment, one of the problems that people sometimes have with the book of Judges is they ask, how could God send an Israel to conquer a people?

This looks like a religious crusade and it looks unjust. That is a good question, but let me at least point out to you, King Adonai Bezak's perspective on this whole ordeal. He did not say, God, this is so unfair. He said, God, you have repaid me for my wickedness. Listen, in Deuteronomy 18 and Leviticus 18, God made clear to Israel that he was driving the Canaanites out because of their excessive wickedness. Israel was his instrument of judgment. These were not innocent people that Israel was stealing land from. They were cruel and wicked people that God was bringing judgment upon. And Israel was his instrument of justice. Now, you say that sounds like a very dangerous mentality. People taking on themselves the mantle of God to be his instruments of justice.

And that is true. People who adopt that mentality today commit horrific acts of injustice. The difference is that Israel had a very clear mandate and very clear instructions from God. God simply does not do that anymore. With the coming of Jesus, God began a new way of working in the world. Jesus came on a saving mission and those who follow him participate in that saving mission.

He did not come to bring justice. He came to extend mercy. He did not take life.

He laid his life down. So those of us who follow him today are not the instruments of judgment on the world. We are the instruments of mercy. It is true that one day King Jesus will bring judgment and justice to the world. But our role now is dispensing mercy, not judgment. And anyone who today claims they are on a mandate from God to bring judgment is either lying or they are pathologically deceived. You say, oh, but surely in these conquests there were innocent people affected. Like, I mean, if no one else, the kids were innocent.

And that is true. Innocent people sometimes get caught up in judgment. But realize that that's not just something that happens in judges.

It happens today. For example, if a man cheats on his wife or cheats in his business and he loses his marriage and his job, you might look at him and say, well, he brought that on himself and you would be right. But what about his kids? They suffer too. And the suffering they endure because of the sins of their father, they had no part in. Well, there are multiple ways that the Bible answers the question of why God allows the innocent to be caught up in someone else's judgment. But one thing that it assures you is that before the throne of God, everyone receives full, complete and impartial justice.

And that what we inherit in eternity is going to make anything we experience in our earthly lives seem rather trivial. Imagine that you discovered the post office had overcharged you 48 cents on a stamp. So you go down to the post office to complain. And in response to your complaint, they absolve you from any future responsibility to pay income taxes. You would say that on the whole, your interaction with the U.S. government was fairly positive.

Am I correct? It's not that you couldn't complain about the stamp. It's just that in light of what you received, it's hard to complain about 48 cents when they've forgiven you of thousands of dollars of income taxes. Well, see, what happens to us on earth compared to what we receive in eternity is like that 48 cents versus the huge gift of the freedom from income taxes.

When the all people die. And so when these kids died in this, they got caught in this. It's like God was collecting them early and what they received before the throne of God was full and complete and fair. And what they receive in eternity makes anything they experience on earth seem rather trivial.

I know that doesn't answer the question fully, but hopefully at least gives you a place to begin thinking or to do further research. But let's get back to the story. OK, verse 19. And the Lord was with Judah. He took possession of the hill country, but he could not. Word could is really key. He could not drive out the inhabitants of the plain because they had chariots of iron.

Well, that makes sense, of course. Chariots of iron. These were like the tanks of the ancient world. Just a couple dozen of them could mow down thousands of foot soldiers. And all Israel had were foot soldiers. So, of course, they could not conquer these people because these people had chariots of iron. That's why they couldn't drive them out. Verse 27. And Manasseh, the tribe of Manasseh, did not drive out the inhabitants of Beth Sheehan and its villages or Tanakh or Dor or the Klingons and the Ewoks and all the rest of the people that are mentioned there.

Here's why. For the Canaanites there were determined to dwell in that land. You see, these people were just really difficult. Israel asked them politely to leave. Then they raised their voice. Then they sent some angry letters. Then they mounted a few attacks. But these people were stubborn. They were just determined to stay.

So eventually Israel said, OK, well, let's put a line, a little piece of tape like in your room and you stay on your side. I'll stay on my side. You don't bother me.

I won't bother you. That makes sense. Ah, even better. Verse 28.

When Israel grew strong, they put those Canaanites to force labor. Well, that's a win win, right? That's even better.

Now we get some free labor out of it. You're listening to Summit Life with J.D. Greer.

You can always find more resources online free of charge by visiting jdgreer.com. We'll return to our teaching in just a moment, but I wanted to share some insight into who we are here at Summit Life. Deeper into the gospel, wider into the world, that is our heartbeat.

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Visit jdgreer.com to get started. Now let's return to our teaching. Once again, here's Pastor JD. Tim Keller, who wrote an excellent commentary on judges that I'll be using a lot during the series, says, taken on its own terms, Chapter 1 of the book of Judges reads like a collection of Israel's press releases about their campaign. It's their spin on why they weren't as successful as we and God might have expected. As you read Judges Chapter 1, we are lulled into sympathy with the Israelites. We are told they could not drive out the Canaanites and we are inclined to agree. They did their best and they found a more economical solution to boot.

They got some free labor out of the deal. All in all, pretty savvy if you ask me, but then comes God's assessment. Verse 2 of Chapter 2, you have not obeyed my voice, period. Look at that, verse 2. I brought you up from Egypt. I brought you into the land that I swore to give to your fathers, yet you have not obeyed my voice. What is this that you have done? So now I say, I will not drive them out before you, but they shall become thorns in your side, and their gods will become a snare to you.

Here is lesson number one. Small areas of disbelief produce large areas of disaster. These Canaanites that they left in the land became a thorn in the Israelite side, a source of constant warfare. Eventually, some of these people, like the Philistines, would rise up and subjugate them. Israel's response to God is, but God, we couldn't drive them out.

We tried. God says, actually, it's not that you can't. It's that you won't. It has nothing to do with you not being strong enough, because it's never been about your strength.

It has only to do with you not being confident enough in my grace. Don't you remember Jericho? Was there anything about your strength that had to do with the walls falling down? All you did was march around it seven times and holler.

I was the one who knocked the walls down. If I knocked the walls down at Jericho, don't you think I could continue to take care of these Canaanites? Here is a question that you and I should ask God.

Here is a question that you and I should ask ourselves. Where are we saying, I can't, but God says in actuality, you won't. You see, you need to start looking at your life like the unconquered territory of the promised land of Canaan. And you need to look at those areas of your life where you feel like, I can't obey God here, and realize that where you say can't, God says won't. Where are you saying that in your life?

Here are a few areas that I thought of by way of example. Maybe it has to do with your integrity. You say, well, God, if I were totally honest in my job, I would lose it.

You can't be expected to play fairly in this career field and survive. Maybe it has to do with extending forgiveness. God, I know that I'm supposed to forgive him or her, but I can't. I'm just not there yet, God.

Maybe it's avoiding some kind of sexual temptation. A lot of times people will begin to rationalize their behavior and they'll say, well, the Bible can't really mean that this is wrong because it just feels so natural to me. I love the person that makes me happy. Doesn't God want me to be happy? It's just who I am. I really can't say no. Maybe that compromise is being in a relationship you know you shouldn't be in.

I know all kinds of single people who get in or stay in relationships that they know they shouldn't be in because, well, God, I'm just afraid of being lonely. So I'm going to have to do this my way in this section. I'm not going to trust you to provide because I need this. One of the most common compromise areas I see is in the area of financial faithfulness, generosity. Well, God, I can barely afford things the way they are, much less be generous, give you the first fruits of what you give to me.

I can't afford that. I know wealthy people who say I'm just not sure the church is the best investment for the future. I know people who begin to cut out interaction with God's kingdom in their life with God's people because they say I got to work all the time. All these areas are areas that the enemy sets up a little camp where you say I can't and God says, nope, it's not that you can, it's that you won't. And these areas become the areas of defeat where the enemy brings cursing into your life. A great example of that is that forgiveness one. Paul said in Ephesians that when you refuse to forgive somebody, it becomes a foothold, a literal outpost in the promised land of your heart that Satan puts his soldiers in that he uses to tear apart the entire land.

Israel at this point, listen to this, had not ceased to be zealously religious. They just ceased to walk by faith and there's a huge difference in those two because the mark that you are walking by faith is full and absolute and unconditional and uncompromised obedience. You see, there are two ways to approach a relationship with God. One way is a way that you really do your own thing, but you do enough that you feel like you'll keep God happy so that you can use him as a safety net. This is the vast majority of people in church. The other way to approach God is you yield him complete and total control because you trust him completely. The only question you have in every area is what does God want? Over the years, I've used an illustration to kind of depict these two ways of approaching God and it has a story to go with it.

If you've been around here, you've heard me use it before, but I'll review it for you again. The illustration is repelling. When I was 16 years old, I was with a group of friends that we used to rock climb on the weekends. One of our friends read something in the book about going repelling and managed to convince the rest of us that he knew how to repel. So we all gullible 16-year-olds go up to the Hanging Rock State Park and we're going to repel.

Somehow I volunteered to go first, which I'm not sure still how that happened. But I remember standing there as he kind of ties it into the little belay system, whatever they call that, and he tells me, I've got a 75-foot drop behind me. He's like, now you're supposed to just lean back. I don't know if you've ever done this or you remember that moment, but you're like, what? Just lean back and the rope will catch you. There's nothing in you that is going to do that. If my manhood had not been on the line, there is no way that I would have done it.

But at 16 years old, your manhood is always on the line. So I stood there and I remember like everybody was kind of staring at me and I was like, and I remember, I kid you not, I asked Jesus to come into my heart again because I just wanted to make sure. And I remember holding on to that rope and I remember like leaning back and I kept rocking and eventually I felt kind of weight give and I'm falling backwards and it's just like, here it is, this is the end. And then you catch and there I am.

I'm like, you know, perpendicular with the rock and parallel with the ground. And I'm looking straight up into my friend's face and he's like, okay, now you got to jump and let go of the rope. So I worked up every ounce of courage that I could muster and I leaped with all of my might and I jumped probably an inch and a half.

I mean, you're barely perceptible. It's like, did you jump? I was like, yep. He's like, you got to do it again. So I did it again and I had five feet, 10 feet, 20 feet, because I'm a really fast learner and get down to the ground. Well, my best friend was next.

My best friend was even more afraid of heights than I was. I can see him from 75 feet below. I can see his whole body just like shaking and he stood there for no lie, like 10 minutes for 10 minutes.

He didn't move. He just stood there and eventually I saw him take his leg and kind of reach it down the rock face and find like, you know, one of the foothold and he reached his other leg down and he found another foothold and it begins to work his way down the rock face. Well, he gets to a point on the rock face. The rock face was kind of shaped like this, like a real sharp angle there and then it curves and then it was inverted. If you're a decent rock climber, you can climb on a, you know, this angle, but unless you're built like Chris Gaynor, you're not going to be able to climb on an inverted rock face. And so he gets to that vertex in the wall and he kind of hovers there and he looks for a foothold and eventually he just climbs back up. Now, if you had been watching us from a distance, it would look roughly like we were doing the same thing. We're both using a rope, we're both coming down the mountain, but there's a world of difference between rock climbing and using a rope as a safety net and actually repelling because when you're rock climbing and using the rope as a safety net, your confidence is really in your arms and your legs to move up and down the rock and you're just using the rope there if you fall.

Whereas when you're repelling, you have shifted the weight of your body off of your arms and legs and onto the rope entirely. There is a picture in that for you of what it means to walk by faith versus being religious. There are a number of people who are religious still using their arms and legs to get through life and they got God kind of tipped off so that he's there when they need him, but that is not the life of faith. The life of faith is a life that has yielded full and complete confidence and trust onto the rope that is God's promises and your only question is where and how. So if you are a religious person, what you find is that you're going to come to some points like that vertex where you can no longer go on in obedience and that's when you just go back the other way.

You stop obeying God financially, you stop obeying him in the area of waiting on him if you are single for the choice that God has. Any number of areas, you're going to just not be able to obey and you're going to feel like you can't, but God said it's a more fundamental problem and that is you won't because you've never actually learned to trust me. Israel's compromise started with a failure of belief. All sins start with a failure of belief. Again, you got to start seeing your life like the unconquered promised land of Canaan lurking in every crevice of your heart are your own little Canaanites of unbelief and sin and sin and you got to send out warriors of faith to subjugate them, which is why we say you got to preach the gospel to every part of your life to your worries, your ambitions, your goals, your temptations, your security, your needs.

You got to drive out the enemy from your heart because those areas of unconquered territory become the means by which the enemy enslaves you. Those small areas of disbelief can produce large areas of disaster. You're listening to Summit Life and Pastor JD Greer is just getting started in our new teaching series called Broken Saviors. Okay, so Pastor JD, we know the whole Bible is the inspired Word of God, but can you tell me why you chose to make a Bible study in a teaching series from the book of Judges? Yeah, you know, Judges is one of those really enigmatic books that, I'll be honest with you, a few times I would hit it in my Bible reading thing. I'm not sure what to do with a lot of this stuff, but when you really learn kind of the some of the interpretive keys, you kind of start to see that there's this kind of beautiful artwork being woven together by God and by the author that are just kind of saying, hey, all this stuff is set up. So anyway, when you get to a Bible book like this and you see some things that are daunting, a lot of times that's an invitation for you to see the real depth and beauty of it. So that's what we're trying to do is give you some tools that will help you go deeper. I mean, you can get a commentary and a study Bible, but we're just doing these that will go along with the thrust of the messages in a way that will help you apply it.

Some of that beauty to your life and then also share it with your kids or your neighbors or whoever. Anyway, that's why this study is so powerful because it's not just about learning history. It's about seeing how you have broken saviors. And Jesus is the fulfillment of all of these hopes and longings that we have. You know, as we do with a lot of things now, Molly, we want our audience to know, our listeners to know that the Bible study, we're making it digital so that you can share it like easily with your small group. That's how it's formatted, your Sunday school class, neighbor, family member, kid, you know, family devotions, whatever. So anyway, take a look now at jdgreer.com. We'll send you this new release as our way of saying thanks for your financial gift to support this ministry. Your gift to Summit Life opens the door for listeners all across the country and around the world, helping them dive deeper into the gospel message through this program and all of our free online resources. Join this mission today when you give by calling 866-335-5220. The number again is 866-335-5220 or go online to give at jdgreer.com. I'm Molly Vitovich. Tomorrow, Pastor JD will continue his message called The Causes and Cure for Spiritual Inconsistency. That's Wednesday on Summit Life. Today's program was produced and sponsored by JD Greer Ministries.