Stubborn sin – the sort that just keeps coming back again and again, no matter how hard we try – is a fact of life for so many. And we have a choice – we can just accept it and its devastating consequences, or we can believe God’s Word that where there’s a will, there’s a way.

THE BIG CON

Today we are kicking off a new series of programmes for the next four weeks. It’s called “Overcoming Stubborn Sin – Once and For All.” And God triggered in my heart, just the other day, when I was sitting talking to a man – but more about him later.

Now let me ask you, have you ever had a pen in your pocket and it’s leaked? More common for men, I guess – we’ll put a pen in our shirt pocket or maybe on the inside pocket of our jacket and then, for one reason or another, the pen leaks and you end up with an ink stain all over your shirt or your jacket.

Now that stain, it’s called a stubborn stain, isn’t it? At least that’s how we refer to it where I come from. And the reason we call it a stubborn stain is that, no matter what you wash it with or scrub it with – it doesn’t matter what you do to it – it just won’t come out.

I remember when that happened to one of my favourite jackets, years ago now. I mean, I really liked this jacket; it was soft and comfortable and it looked great. I spent a fortune at the dry cleaners, but it doesn’t matter what they tried, the stain didn’t come out. And so I simply couldn’t wear it out any more. I mean, it would have looked ridiculous.

But isn’t it funny, these days, when we have a stain like that on our characters, it seems we almost wear it out with pride, or at the very least, we just put up with it. After all, it’s a stubborn stain – nothing we can do about it. And that’s the attitude of that man that I was telling you about at the beginning of the programme.

Here’s the thing: he rang the other day and wanted to catch up for a coffee. I agreed and as we sat down in the cafe, we had a bit of small chit-chat and then the crunch issue – the thing he wanted to talk to me about. Well, it was his sin. It was a sin he’d been struggling with all his life. It turned out that his particular Achilles heel was his temper. A lovely man but he has a hot temper and just flies of the handle at the drop of a hat.

He was sharing with me what had happened just a few days before. A situation where he’d hurt some people that really mattered to him and the more I listened, the more I got this impression that as far as he was concerned, this was something he was stuck with and the best he could do was to manage the symptoms. There wasn’t a single thought in his head of treating the disease.

And the reason this shocked me was this man is a Christian with a powerful heart after God and a commitment to God’s Word. So I listened without saying too much but the more I turned this conversation over and over in my head, the more disturbing it became. It was like he had a stubborn ink stain on his jacket but he was intent on wearing that same jacket out, day after day, with that stain on it. There was no thought of changing the jacket. Do you see the point?

We wouldn’t think of wearing an ink stained jacket out to work and yet we’ll take who we are – with this great big stubborn stain, smack bang in the middle of our character and our personality, so prominent; so obvious that nobody could ever miss it – and wear it out day after day after day, for a whole life time, resigned to what we think is the fact that there’s just nothing we can do about it. Changing the jacket never crosses our mind.

Have a listen to this. In the context of what we have just been talking about – stubborn sin – Galatians chapter 3, verse 27:

“As many of you as were baptised into Christ, have clothed yourselves with Christ.”

And again this: Ephesians chapter 4, verses 22 to 27:
“You were taught to put away your former way of life; your old self, corrupt and deluded by its lusts, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds and to clothe yourselves with a new self, created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.

So then, putting away falsehood, let all of us speak the truth to our neighbours, for we are members of one another. Be angry but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not make room for the devil.”

Both of these Scriptures from the Word of God are very, very clear. They’re about putting on a new jacket; they’re about clothing ourselves in Christ; clothing ourselves in the new creation that we become when we put our trust and our faith in Him. There’s nothing … nothing, so far as I can find in God’s Word which says that sin is normal. Sure, it’s common; all too common but normal it ain’t!

Have you put your trust in Jesus Christ? Have you? Then you are a new creation. The old things have passed away and all things … ALL THINGS are new. That comes from Second Corinthians chapter 5, verse 17.

We all have one or two stubborn sins in our lives. For some people it’s temper and anger, for others it lust, for others it’s always seeking glory and recognition, for others again it’s low self esteem or un-forgiveness or gossiping or slander. Other people are addicted to gambling or perhaps it’s worshipping other gods. Some people don’t seem to be able to help themselves – some are involved in the occult. My friend, the list goes on and we sometimes behave as if the only person who has this stubborn sin stain on us is us!

Listen to me – it’s everyone! I’ve never met a person who hasn’t had to grapple with at least one stubborn, persistent, ongoing form of sin in their lives. So many men are addicted to pornography, which now with the internet, has over half … over half of all men addicted to this – something we are going to talk about in the coming weeks – and they live in secret shame, imagining that there’s nothing they can do about it. And over half of all women, in Western society as least, suffer clinically from low self esteem.

And each one of these stubborn sins is the devil’s way of robbing us of life. Sure, so many of them are dressed up to look respectable – so seductive; so normal. Now the person who puts their faith in Jesus, kind of knows they’re not right, but like that man that I was talking about at the beginning of the programme, they’ve kind of resigned themselves into believing that there’s nothing they can do about their particular brand of stubborn sin. Whether it’s a red stain or a blue stain or a black stain, “Well, that’s just my coloured stain and there’s just nothing I can do about it.”

Let me give you this very direct and very blunt response to that kind of thinking: rubbish; its absolute rubbish! That’s a deception of the devil and you won’t find it in the Bible. Jesus said, quoting Isaiah chapter 61, verse 1. He said:

“God had sent him to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners.”

Now, there’s no fine print in there that provides you or me with a personal exclusion for our particular colour of stubborn sin. Now, I’m a man who has had more than his share of stubborn sins to work through – anger, temper – all sorts of stuff and because I am one of those strong willed people, those things have had even a stronger hold on me than most.

And here’s what I’ve discovered along the way and I’m still discovering it – Jesus came to set me free from every sin that robs me of life. He came to set you free from every sin that robs you of life – to clothe us in Christ, to make us a new creation that shines His glory and His image into this lost and hurting world. That is the truth!

WAKE UP

One of the worst feelings that we can have in life is that sense of being trapped … trapped in a place, trapped in our circumstances, trapped in our own destructive patterns of behaviour. And try as we might, we just can’t get out. Now, God has a name for those destructive behaviours; a much shorter name – He calls them ‘sin’ and that’s exactly what sin is – behaviour that’s destructive; behaviour that misses the whole point of life.

And it seems to be the case that pretty much each one of us has one particular pattern of destructive behaviour; one sin that seems to be stubborn in our lives. Like a stubborn stain that just won’t wash out – as much as we wish we could get rid of it. We’ve tried and tried and tried and tried over the years – we just can’t. For many people it feels like they’re trapped; like there’s no way out. It’s a pattern of behaviour that we seem to be locked into – repeating over and over and over again.

And so many people have just resigned themselves to the fact that that’s the way it is and that nothing’s ever going to change – they’re trapped; hopelessly trapped in sin and there’s no way out and so they just have to live life with the painful consequences of that sin.

Well, if that kind of resonates a bit with you, I have some good news for you – in fact, it’s some great news. Stubborn sin comes in so many different forms. Have a quick listen to this list written by Paul the Apostle, a couple of thousand years ago. It comes from Galatians chapter 5, verses 19 to 21:

“Now the works of the flesh are obvious: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. I am warning you, as I warned you before: those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”

Some people are just naturally prone to being critical or argumentative. Some are locked into patterns of jealousy or sexually immorality. And in this world of ‘anything goes’, where cheating on your wife or your husband has been reduced to a lifestyle choice, it’s easy for us to rationalise our particular form of stubborn sin away, as being just that.

“Well, the world’s moved on, you know – we think differently these days. Sleeping around – hey, what’s wrong with that? Arguing, criticising, pulling other people down, flying off the handle, ranting, raving, getting drunk until all hours – aw, they’re just the way we do things these days.”

But no matter how much we rationalise our sin away, if we are going to be brutally honest with ourselves, most of us – with just a few minutes thinking about it – will be able to point to the one sin that seems to recur over and over and over again in our lives. And come on, let’s be honest – there are consequences; serious consequences to our sin.

And those consequences hurt – they hurt us and they hurt other people. And I don’t know, maybe we have tried to break out of that pattern of behaviour from time to time, but it’s so easy to fall back into it again and that’s when we feel trapped. That’s when we feel like there’s no way out … no escape. And the worse thing is, it feels like, well, like we’re the only ones with this problem.

Well, have a listen to what God has to say. Come on, because, I for one, am prepared to take Him at His Word. Let’s have a listen – it comes from First Corinthians chapter 10, verse 13. It says that:

“No testing has overtaken you that is not common to everyone. God is faithful and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.”

Now, that’s powerful stuff, so let’s take just a few minutes to unpack this because my hunch is the power here in God’s Word is going to set some people down a path of actually believing that God can make a difference … that God wants to set them free.

“No testing has overtaken you that is not common to everyone.” Testing is about a trial and a temptation – it’s testing our fidelity to God. Let’s take a man walking down the street: a young, scantily clad woman comes walking towards him. Now there’s a test of his fidelity to his wife. What’s he going to do with his eyes; what’s he going to do with his imagination?

I heard an interesting statistic from research conducted by an American Jewellers Association on employee theft. Have a listen to this: Ten percent of people will always steal, no matter what. Ten percent will never, ever steal, but eighty percent will steal if given the opportunity and if they think they won’t get caught. So, for eighty percent of us, our honesty and integrity is tested on a daily basis. Testing happens all the time and nothing that you and I are tested with is unique to us – indeed it’s common to everyone.

We all go through this. Sometimes we feel condemned because we think that it’s just us that are being tempted with this or with that. No! Everyone is tempted … but and here’s the great BUT, “but God is faithful and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength.” I love that – that’s a promise from God.

When we feel trapped and weak and impossibly vulnerable, the promise of God is that He will never allow us to be tempted by our own desires or by the devil or, as is so often the case, by both, to an extent that is one hair’s breadth further than our capacity to withstand or resist the temptation.

So many of us head into temptation just expecting defeat – just planning on failure – so, well, we fail the test; we yield to the temptation. The great news is this: that God is faithful, and He will not let us be tested beyond our strength. Instead, with the testing He will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.

And over the coming weeks on the programme, what we are going to be doing is investigating that way out – a practical; rubber hits the road, expose of how to stop this stubborn sin dead in its tracks, because God’s Word is so incredibly practical. For the man who for years has been caught in a cycle of shame and addiction to pornography; for the woman who for years, has had a miserable life because of her low self esteem; for anyone and everyone who has ever felt trapped and completely powerless in their destructive patterns of behaviour that lash at their soul like a whip that never stops tearing into their flesh.

For you, I have this good news – First Corinthians chapter 10, verse 13:

“No testing has overtaken you that is not common to everyone. God is faithful and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.”

You’re not alone! You’re not unique and God is faithful. He has already prepared the way out for you; a way out of the shame and the pain of persistent, stubborn sin. And I want you to remember this – these aren’t my words. This is God’s Word and God’s Word is sharper that any two edged sword. God’s Word has the power to change us; a power that we simply can’t begin to understand, until we experience it for ourselves. That’s what we are going to be talking about next.

BACK TO PLAN “A”

Have you ever noticed that we can be chugging alone okay, living in victory for a week or two or maybe even a month or two and then all of a sudden – WHAM – that sin comes back and pounds us like a battering ram. It pounds the living daylights out of us. Have you ever wondered why that is? Why these ebbs and flows? Why is it sometimes I can live in victory over this thing and other times, I feel completely and utterly powerless to do anything at all to overcome this destructive behaviour called “sin”.

Well, here’s my take on it. Well, actually, no, no, it’s not my take at all, it’s God’s take – it’s God’s truth from God’s Word. We live on a spiritual battlefield and our enemy, the devil, is always prowling around, waiting for a good time to strike. He did that even with Jesus. After Jesus resisted the devil’s temptations when He had been in the wilderness for forty days and forty nights, Luke tells us in chapter 4 of his Gospel, verse 13 that:

“When the devil had finished testing Jesus, he (the devil) departed to wait for a more opportune time.”

So here we have this picture of the devil prowling around looking for someone to devour. He has the element of surprise and that’s why we feel powerless when he strikes. Well, today and over the next few weeks, we are going to take an intensely practical look at how to be ready for him. As I said before, we all have this Achilles heel; a part of our makeup or our personality or who we are, that’s more vulnerable to attack than others.

I was telling you before on the programme about this man whom I met who struggled with his temper and for other people it’s their sexuality and for others again it’s pride or they are addicted to money or recognition – we all have some area in our lives where we are vulnerable. And we all have times when we are more vulnerable than others in our lives.

Now sometimes we have learned to exercise self control over our tempers but then, you know, the pressure is on and we’re tired and the circumstances just seem to conspire to make us snap. So it doesn’t matter what our particular weak point is, there are times when we feel stronger and times when we feel weaker. And there are times when we feel completely tossed around and completely vulnerable, like we have no strength at all to resist the prowling devil who is just sitting back waiting, like a lion in the grass, to pounce and attack while we are feeling weak.

Now, what I’m about to say may sound completely perverse. In fact, if we judge it by the world’s wisdom, actually it is. God’s wisdom often seems perverse by the world’s standards, but have a listen to God’s wisdom about our weakness. It’s written by the Apostle Paul in the New Testament – Second Corinthians chapter 12, verses 7 to 9. Paul says:

… to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.

Now, we never discover what the thorn in the flesh was – was it a physical ailment? Was it a particular temptation to which Paul was prone? We’re not told, what we do know is that it was a messenger from Satan to torment him. And God doesn’t take this torment away because, God, it appears, is quite content with Paul’s weakness. He doesn’t actually want Paul to be strong, in and of himself but instead, He wants to give Paul the real thing – God’s perfect power amidst Paul’s weaknesses. And so that completely changes everything for Paul. Instead of being ashamed of his weakness, he boasts all the more gladly of it so that the power of Christ may dwell in him.

And here’s the crunch: anyone who has tried and tried and tried to be strong to overcome stubborn sin and overcome the devil will know that working hard at it doesn’t work, but it’s in our weakness that we have the opportunity to discover the good and perfect awesome power of God to achieve what we can’t; to achieve victory over stubborn sin.

My friend, this is fantastic news – it’s liberating news! The opportunity to give up trying and to tap into the power that works – it’s divine power. Have a listen again to Paul – Second Corinthians chapter 10, verses 4 to 5:

For the weapons of our warfare are not merely human but they have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every proud obstacle raised up against the knowledge of God, and we take every thought captive to obey Christ.

Paul’s saying that we are living on a battlefield and instead of just using human weapons, we actually have God’s divine power to destroy strongholds; the fortresses. And the strongholds that Paul is specifically talking about here are the thoughts, ideas beliefs, behaviours in people who believe in Jesus. Not something way out there – the strongholds in us that we can’t seem to defeat. God has given us weapons with divine power to overcome our sin.

You know what a stronghold is? It’s something we hang onto so strong that we can’t seem to let go. And if we are holding onto sin that strong we can’t take the hold of the good plans that God has for us. We can’t let go of stubborn sin in our own strength. We can’t break down those strongholds with weapons that are merely human – we need divine power and right here, right in the middle of our weaknesses is where God wants to give us His divine power.

And over the next couple of weeks on the programme we are going to look at just that – how to use that divine power to eliminate stubborn sin, once and for all.

Most of us have heard sermon after sermon, message after message telling us that we shouldn’t sin. That instead we should repent and live a godly, holy life. That’s great – but the real question is HOW?

STIFF-NECKED GENERATION

I was never much of an accountant but I do remember learning about double-entry book keeping systems. They were really important back in manual accounting systems because they provided a double check to make sure that the accounts balanced.

Basically, here’s how it worked. Every financial transaction in the accounts had two entries – hence the name double entry. A credit entry and a debit entry. And the whole point of that was the double entry provided a double check.

And it’s not just in accounting that you find this approach. You find it in physics too. Newton’s third law says that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. In other words – whenever a body exerts a force on a second body, that second body exerts an equal and opposite force on the first body. Maybe that’s something we should have learned at school.

And it’s not just in accounting and physics that we see this two sided approach to life, we also find it in the spiritual dimension. Absolutely we do. Every spiritual transaction has two sides to it. Every spiritual action in one direction creates an equal and opposite action in the other direction.

So what’s the point? Well in this double-sided mystery lies our rubber-hits-the-road solution to overcoming stubborn sin – which is the thing that we’re talking about in this series, “Eliminating Stubborn Sin Once and For All”. And it’s a powerful solution indeed.

Last week on the program we saw that each one of us finds ourselves with at least one stubborn sin in life that we can’t seem to overcome. Now it’s different for each one of us – anger, temper, sexuality, greed, self esteem, pride … the list goes on. And somehow that one particular sine comes back again and again to defeat us.

But whilst sin is all too common, it’s not normal – and God’s intention is to set us free from that sin. Not only His intention – it’s His plan, it’s His will and it’s something that He has the power, the divine power to do. Last week on the program we looked at this particular passage, 2 Corinthians 10:4-5:

For the weapons of our warfare are not merely human, but they have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every proud obstacle raised up against the knowledge of God, and we take every thought captive to obey Christ.

Every proud obstacle in our hearts that sets itself up against the knowledge of God – and that’s what the strongholds are that the Apostle Paul’s talking about here – can be destroyed by the weapons of warfare which are not human, they’re divine. God’s divine power.

And it’s a power that God delights in exerting right in the moment our of our weakness – so that it’s His power and not our strength that overcomes sin. Here’s Paul again. We looked at this last week too, 2 Corinthians 12:7-9:

To keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.

Don’t you just love this. Instead of just taking the messenger of Satan that was tormenting Paul away – God instead gives Paul the opportunity to discover God’s perfect power – the power of Jesus Himself – in His own experience in overcoming Satan.

But it’s one thing to know that whilst we all have a stubborn sin and even though it’s God’s plan to wield His divine power to overcome that sin in our lives – well, all that’s one thing. But what you and I really need to know, beyond that wonderful liberating truth – is how! HOW to lay hold of God’s power and how to overcome the stubborn sin that’s been wracking our bodies for a lifetime.

Well today, right now, I want to take you deep into God’s Word and show you God’s how. Not my how. Not the world’s how. But God’s HOW! Now I’ve heard this Scripture we’re about to go to have a look at quoted often – but only half of it, only one side of the transaction, and not the other side. And a half truth is as good as an untruth because a half truth can easily be made into a lie. It’s something the devil does all the time. The half truth – the part of this Scripture that’s most often quoted – goes like this, James Chapter 4 verse 7:

Resist the devil and he will flee from you.

And so a whole bunch of people set about resisting the devil. Problem is that the old enemy’s been around much longer than you and I have, and he’s seen it all. He’s wily, crafty and deceptive and he’ll go to any length to catch us in his snare. He’ll wait to till the most opportune moment, until we’re tired or weak or distracted or frustrated or all of the above – and then he’ll pounce. 1 Peter Chapter 5:8:

Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour.

Lions wait in the long grass until they see a weak animal or a young animal or a slow animal separated from the pack – and then they pounce on their prey. The devil’s the exactly the same.

And what we discover when we set about resisting the devil – is that working hard just doesn’t work. We don’t need human weapons in this spiritual battle, we need weapons full of divine power. And it turns out that the way to access and wield those weapons involves a double-sided transaction.

The half truth from the Scriptures that I gave you before – let me give the whole thing to you now – and you’ll see what I mean. James Chapter 4:7-8

Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.

Do you see the two sides of the transaction involved in defeating the devil – in overcoming stubborn sin? The first is, submit yourself to God and then resist the devil – two sides – and the result of that is that he will flee from you.

When we submit ourselves to God, we rebel against the devil. When we submit to the devil – we rebel against God. It’s a double sided entry, it’s a double sided transaction. But some people have a foot in both camps – they want to honour God but they want to go with the devil and they’re the ones who are double-minded, the ones who have to cleanse their hands and purify their hearts.

We’re going to look at some intensely practical examples of this after the break – but just for now think back to Adam and Eve in the garden. When they were living that perfect life prior to the fall – they were submitting to God (and getting all the benefits) – but on the other side of the ledger, they were resisting the devil.

The tree in the middle of the garden, the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, it was there all the time, they just didn’t eat of it – and so they lived in the benefit of God’s blessing. BUT – the moment they submitted to the devil – on the other side of the ledger, they were resisting God, they were rebelling against God – in that very first, terrible, double-sided act of rebellion.

Submission to God = rejecting the devil.
Submission to the devil = rejection God.

And in this double-sided transaction lies the practical truth of overcoming stubborn sin. If we try to do it by resisting the devil, as we’ve already seen – that’s a half truth and it doesn’t work. The answer is first to submit to God, to draw near to Him, because in so doing, He will draw near to us. And since He’s the one with the power – He’s the one with the weapons of warfare that have the divine power, the first thing that we need to do, is to submit our selves to Him. Resisting the devil is what flows out of that.

RULES DON’T WORK

Stubborn sin – that sin that we just can’t shift, sin that keeps on keeping on long after we’d hoped that we would have defeated it – is a fact in many, many people’s lives. And over the last couple of weeks on the program, we’ve seen that not only does God understand that, but He wants to give us His weapons full of His divine power, right in the middle of our weaknesses defeat the sin.

Jesus died and rose again to give us victory, to give us a new life – and so whilst stubborn sin is commonplace, it’s not normal and it’s not what God means for our lives.

In fact, this is something that God takes so seriously – that He sends not only His Son just to die to pay for all our sin on the cross, but to rise again to give us a new life. 2 Corinthians 5:17:

that if anyone believes in this Jesus, then that person is a new creation – old things have passed away and look all things are new.

So, whilst many a Christ-follower is convinced that their particular brand of stubborn sin is just a fact of life, just something that they have to live with for the rest of their lives here on Earth, that’s a luxury that the Gospel of Jesus Christ doesn’t afford us. Jesus came to set us free from every sin. And right now we’re going to continue our look at this practical “how to” – how do we lay hold of God’s divine power to allow ourselves to be set free, by God – of this sin and, and it’s painful consequences.

Now this is something that frankly puzzled me for a long time. First, I thought I had to do it all. And so I fought against the devil and I tried and I tried and I tried to resits him and overcome these temptations … but as strong willed an individual as I am, that just didn’t work. I ended up lying bloodied and beaten and discouraged and dejected and defeated on the battlefield. OK … OK … OK that didn’t work. So, what I’ll do is I’ll leave it all up to God. I’ll sit back and let God do it all. But let me tell you – the old “spiritual couch potato” model didn’t work either.

And it wouldn’t amaze me at all to know that you’ve been there too – right? So the question is, how do we make it work? What’s God’s part, what’s our part? Come on – how do we break free from the power of stubborn sin??

Well, before the break we discovered that not only do accountants have double entry book keeping, not only did Isaac Newton discover that in physics and in nature, every action has an equal and opposite reaction – but when it comes to defeating sin, this spiritual transaction too is double-sided. And, it’s in the double-sidedness of the transaction that we discover our role and God’s role. If you were with us before the break you’ll have heard this Scripture, James 4:7-8:

Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

Do you see its double sidedness? This is really important – that’s why we’re covering this ground again briefly. It’s not just about racing on and resisting the devil – that’s something we can’t win on our own. First, first submit yourselves to God – that’s the God side of the ledger, and then, on the devil’s side – resist him and he will flee.

That’s because when we submit to God, we lay hold of His power, and we have the power to resist the devil – and once he sees that power at work – he’s on his bike and out of there because he and all his demons have to submit to the name that is above all names – the name of Jesus Christ.

Now the danger is that we leave it there and we don’t get down and practical enough to give us something to take away to implement. So I want to go deeper into the “how to” so that each one of us knows how to live out this submission to God AND resist the devil, so that the devil will flee from us. That’s how you overcome stubborn sin.

This first example is one that jumped out at me in a Bible study group. Have a careful listen, it’s the Apostle Paul on death row, writing to his friends in Philippi – telling them how not to worry: now listen and see if you can pick up the double-sidedness of God’s solution to worrying, Philippians chapter 4:6-7:

Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

I remember sitting in this Bible study group and we talked about worry and people hedged around this and they were prepared to move on from it without taking God at His Word.

Worry is a sin – people with their trust in God needn’t worry. Worry falls a long way short of living the life of abundant peace that God purchased for us on that cross. What this passage says is – look, here’s the solution to overcoming this sin of worry. Instead of worrying – instead of spending your time doing that, replace that with praying and giving thanks to God and telling Him your needs.

First submit to God – see that’s what’s going on here. This is God’s way of dealing with the problem, the sin of worry. First submit to Him, do it his way. Pray and give thanks. Let your needs be known to God. If we take the time that we would have spent worrying … and instead we used it to do it God’s way – to pray. The devil loves throwing doubt in our minds. He loves it when we’re discouraged.

How to deal with him?? We submit to God, we do it God’s way – and the promise is that when we do that, “the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus”. What’s just happened here?

God’s weapons of divine power have been brought into play – we have a confidence that comes from God, because we did it His way in faith – and so the devil ceases to have any power over us to make us worry. Now, now stand in this newfound power from God … and watch the devil flee.

The secret is in proactively replacing the bad with the Good, proactively stepping into this space and saying – No, no – no, no! This worry is from the devil. My only answer is to submit to God. Now I discover His divine power in my weakness. Now I can resist, now the devil must flee.

Let’s have another quick look at another practical example. It has to do with the things that we say that hurt other people. So many of us have a problem with that don’t we – always grumbling, always pulling other people down. Have a listen again to the double-sided solution, Ephesians chapter 4:29:

Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up, as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear.

How do I stop this addiction of evil talk coming out of my mouth. Do I just sit there and try to hold my tongue. No! – God’s saying – instead of doing that, proactively replace it with my way – instead of speaking the things that are only going to hurt people, speak only what is useful for building other people up as there is need. Replace the bad with the Good.

Deliberately step out with God and do it God’s way and not our way. So when we feel like cursing people with our words instead we go “No! God’s way is to bless them”. The devil’s got nowhere to go. He’s lost his power. Then, having submitted to God, then we simply stand and resist the devil in the power of God because we’ve done it God’s way.

And let me tell you – they way I’ve learned this is simple. I sat down and thought about my weaknesses. I identified them. And I had more than my fair share. And I looked through the Bible and found a simple verse to tell me – when I’m in a situation where I’m prone to live out this particular stubborn sin – what is it that I CAN DO, to submit to God in my actions and my thoughts and my words, right there and then how can I submit to God.

And so when I found myself in that place, I knew God’s word, I knew how to submit to God. And you know what happened, little by little – God changed me. And the devil, well, he had no choice. He just had to flee. And when you think about it – this isn’t rocket science.

This is something that we can apply to any sin in any situation. It’d be just like God to make it that simple, wouldn’t it? In fact next week on the program, we’re going to look at some more specific details – common stubborn sins that people have in their lives, – to help each one of us stop sin dead in its tracks.

THE POWER TO CHANGE

Over the next couple of weeks on the program, we’re going to be looking at some very common stubborn sins that people deal with – anger, sexual immorality, selfishness, low self esteem – and how to overcome each of those.

But as we come towards the end of our time together, I want to share with you perhaps the most important thing that I know about overcoming stubborn sin in my life. In fact – there’s no maybe about it. It is the most important thing that I know. And it’s this – that prayer works. 1 Thessalonians 5:17 says very simply that we should:

Pray without ceasing.

Can I tell you something – that verse has stuck with me over and over and over again as God’s done His work in me to overcome the stubborn sin in my life – and let me tell you, I had more than my fair share – and this is what I’ve found.

When I was in that time of overcoming anger or overcoming selfishness – God dealt with them one at a time in me – I discovered that on those days when I specifically and deliberately prayed about that sin in my life first up in the morning – and got focussed on those handful of scriptures that God gave me – perhaps only a five minute investment each day – but when I made that investment I didn’t sin.

But somehow when I didn’t quite get around to it, didn’t have time, you know what it’s like– those sins just got the better of me – time and time and time again.

And still today, if I don’t spend that time with the Lord each morning in prayer and reading His Word and letting Him have sway in my heart – I tell you – those stubborn sins will find their way back into my life.

To put it very succinctly – PRAYER IS THE ONLY THING THAT WORKS. I can’t make it any simpler than that. And even through the day, when I was in a situation where that sin was prone to come out of me – just a quick prayer under my breath – LORD HELP ME – that’s all It takes.

Pray without ceasing – because prayer works. I’m always taken by the time that the disciples were trying to cast a demon out of a boy while Jesus was up on the mount of the transfiguration – they couldn’t do it. And Jesus came down – cast the demon out no problem and later the disciples went to Him and said, “So Lord, how come you could do it but we couldn’t?” And Jesus said the most surprising thing to them, Mark 9:29:

He replied to them, This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer and fasting.

Now just stop and think a minute – He’s been up on the mountain, He’s walked down into this farce where there’s a crowd and the disciples are trying to cast out a demon and the demon’s not going and instantly Jesus casts out the demon. Let me ask you – did Jesus have time for prayer and fasting right at that moment? Not at all – He was talking about his normal, every day prayer life, He was talking about the fasting He’d been doing before that.

And when I scratch around looking at the original text of what Jesus said – recorded in Greek not English – the deep sense of what He’s saying here is this – nothing but prayer and fasting has the power to cast out the stubborn demons such as these. – The stubborn demons. The sort that wont go – like our stubborn sins.

The power is in the prayer – Jesus was incredulous when He saw what was going on – He said “How long must I bear with you, you faithless and perverse generation?” Pretty strong language. He was expressing His frustration – why is it that you people still don’t get it?

My friend if you would defeat the stubborn sin in your life – it will only happen by prayer. And the odd bit of fasting isn’t going to hurt either I have to tell you. Pray without ceasing. Pray every day. And little by little that stubborn sin will be gone – so out there in the heat of the battle, with the crowds looking on – that hidden prayer life will bring its rewards.

That hidden prayer life will bear the fruit that others see in your life. That hidden prayer life will bring the power of God to bear in overcoming the most stubborn sin in our lives that we could ever imagine.

Anger, Sexual Immorality and Low Self Esteem are three of the most stubborn sins known to mankind. We know we should eliminate them from our lives, but the question is: HOW?

LIVING IN THE GOOD THINGS OF GOD

Well, welcome to this third week in this series called “Eliminating Stubborn Sin – Once and For All”. Over the last few weeks on the programme we have seen that God truly does want us to overcome stubborn sin in our lives – that God gives us the power to deal with every sin and whatever temptation comes our way. He gives us the way out – a way of dealing with it. Actually there are very few things that God says “Don’t do!” and the only things to which He says “Don’t do!” are the things, if we are honest with ourselves, the things that are going to hurt us.

And today we are going to look at anger, sexual immorality and low self esteem because they are way out there. But when it comes to dealing with these stubborn sins, the issue is not so much that we should get rid of them – we kind of know that – the question is how?

So let’s kick off today with anger because anger is actually a big issue in this world today – it seems we’re all so busy doing all the things we have to do – racing around, taking the kids to school, getting off to work and at work these days the pressure is really on. Make more, achieve more, deliver more – it used to be in the ‘good old days’ the pace was much slower.

You had to wait for the mail to arrive and when you sent a letter out, it took a couple of days to get it all correct through the typing pool. But these days, even when people are on holidays with their families, they’re answering emails on their mobile phones.

We’re so connected, so in demand, so busy – it’s almost like we’re like battery hens – the slightest thing makes us snap. Some people have more of a problem with anger than others. The more achievement oriented and outcome focused a personality we have, the more we are going to be prone to anger.

And that was my ‘biggie’ when I became a Christian – anger. Nothing was ever good enough or fast enough for me and as I look at that, the whole “anger” thing was based on a self-centeredness and a sense of self importance. The world was there to serve ME and to fit in with MY plans and if you didn’t play the game by MY rules and deliver what I wanted – well, watch out!

It’s a way of living and thinking and behaving that robs us of relationships and tenderness and joy. It’s actually awful! But how can we change that? Well, here’s how! Psalm 145, verse 8, says this:

The Lord is gracious and merciful and show to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

What that’s saying is that God’s grace and His mercy and His steadfast love make Him slow to get angry. God does get angry sometimes and that’s a fearsome thing but not at the drop of a hat. He doesn’t have a temper that’s on a hair trigger. Why? “Because He’s abounding in steadfast love.”

In other words, He’s more focused on loving us for who we are than what we do or don’t do. Imagine if this awesome and mighty God became angry with you and I every time we didn’t fit in with His plans – we wouldn’t last very long, would we?

For me, learning to break the pattern of angry behaviour began with loving the people I was dealing with; valuing them for who they were; understanding their hurts and their inadequacies. The things that had happened to them in their lives that made them behave the way they did. And the more I did that, the less angry I started to feel. In fact, what I began to do was prepare myself for people.

As I said, I am one of these outcome focused people who moves quickly, sets goals, achieves them. And it’s easy when you’re like that just to roll over the top of people. And then … then I have to work with someone who just wants to have fun! You know the sort of people? They just want to enjoy the moment and I just want to get things done. But without them to help me enjoy the moment, well, I’d miss out.

So I started to prepare myself – “I have to work with him today! Right! Okay! I understand him. He’s not going to be like me today and that’s okay”, almost forgiving them, if you like, before they walked into the room. It took me a while to figure it out but that’s what God is like. That’s what that verse from that Psalm is all about. Psalm 145, verse 8:

The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

And actually that “slow to anger” thing has a lot to be said for it. Here are a couple of verses from Proverbs that really helped me. Proverbs chapter 12, verse 16:

Fools show their anger at once but the prudent ignore an insult.

In other words, the moment that someone says something that triggers anger in me, well, I’ve learned to let it pass me by, more often than not, these days. No, I don’t have to win every time anymore. I don’t have to have the last say; I don’t have to be right all the time. “Only fools show their anger at once, the prudent ignore an insult.” And this verse – Proverbs chapter 15, verse 1:

A soft answer turns away wrath but a harsh word stirs up anger.

This was like being a shock absorber. When someone does something to stir up anger and dissent, how wonderful it is to respond with gentleness and wisdom, calming the situation instead of throwing fuel on the fire with a harsh word. Ignore the insult and respond with a gentle, soft answer.

Can I tell you, once I decided to start loving the people around me, these two things took a bit of practice but after a while they became a habit, because they’re a much, much better way of living? These days I have much more peace in my heart; much more joy in my life. Instead of always having MY day ruined by other people’s failure to fit in with my plans, I’ve discovered the joy of fitting in with their plans sometimes too.

And the biggest thing … the biggest thing with letting the anger go is that it set me free to enjoy the beauty and the creativity and the incredible specialness of each person I come in contact with. It’s like a whole new world has opened up.

Do I still get angry sometimes? Course I do, so do you! It’s what I do with that anger when it happens that makes all the difference. This anger thing was a stubborn sin in my life. It was one that looked like it would never go away but when I took those few simple Scriptures we just talked about and started applying them to my life, God did the rest. He set me free from a sin that would have ruined the rest of my life.

Next we are going to look at another one of those stubborn sins – sexual immorality.

STARTING EVERY DAY WITH JESUS

Earlier we looked at overcoming anger and right now we are going to move on to sexual immorality because it’s one of the most stubborn sins of all. It seems these days that it doesn’t matter how hard we try, sexuality is constantly thrust before our eyes and under our noses. Now, don’t get me wrong, I have a very simple view about sex. God invented it: it’s good, it’s great.

But the role of our sexuality – apart from the obvious thing of keeping the human race going by bringing babies into the world – is to bring a husband and a wife into a level of intimacy so wonderful that there aren’t enough words to describe how good that is. But because sex sells, it’s used in the media to such an extent, you can’t walk down the street without the image of a scantily clad woman advertising some product on a billboard shoved in your face.

Now, God’s Word is pretty clear on sex and here it is in a nut shell. Human sexuality is a part of His design for humanity and as such, physical intimacy is a beautiful gift from Him but the only proper expression of that gift is exclusively between one man and one woman who have been joined together as husband and wife in the life-long bond of marriage. And people who continue in sexual immorality outside that – whatever form that takes – will NOT inherit the Kingdom of God. They are not my ideas. That is clearly, clearly what God says through what I believe to be His Word – the Bible.

Now, I think that one of the biggest issues today is pornography. So many men are caught up in sexual immorality – they’re married, they want to be faithful to their wives but with the internet being available 24/7, the temptation is simply too great. And so they are caught up in the cycle of addiction and shame that spirals ever downward.

It actually robs them of the intimacy that God had planned for them. It substitutes a poor impostor for the real thing. And because they are carrying the burden of hidden shame around in their hearts, it robs them of the power that God has for their lives – the power to make a difference for God in this world. That’s why this particular stubborn sin is so insidious.

Here are some sobering statistics: over 50% of all men are addicted to pornography; over 82% percent of males between fifteen and twenty-eight have intentionally or deliberately sought out pornography in the last three months. A man whose campaign to help men addicted to pornography, Pastor Steve Davies, puts it this way – he says: “We’re at war and pornography is Satan’s number one weapon against men to destroy their walk with Christ.”

So how do we overcome this most stubborn of sins? If you are a man addicted to this cycle of pornography, how can you overcome it? If you are a woman who’s living through the pain of her husband’s addiction to pornography, how can you be part of overcoming it? They’re tough issues and perhaps the odd person is squirming right now and maybe you’re tempted to turn the radio off but God’s Word speaks into every situation … every situation and this sin is no different.

For the man who is caught up in this most stubborn of sins, the first thing he needs to know and understand is this: that Jesus came to set you free from every sin … every sin, and this sin is no different. Colossians chapter 1, verses 13 to 14, says this:

He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

So, anyone who has put their faith in Jesus has been rescued from the power of darkness and transferred into the Kingdom of Jesus Christ. And this Scripture too – Romans chapter 6, verse 14:

For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under the law but under grace.

So, here’s the very first thing – this man caught up in pornography is entitled to believe that something has happened – sin no longer has dominion over him and whilst it might take a little while to overcome this addiction, the power of sin is broken because God applied His grace to you in that situation. This has already been dealt with on the cross of Christ; once and for all, the power of sin has been broken.

So instead of approaching this addiction with faith in failure, you can approach it knowing that the deal is already done. Success is guaranteed and every time the devil whispers doubt into your heart, you can stand on God’s Word.

The second thing is getting really practical about what you look at and where your mind wanders. Proverbs chapter 5 is a powerful part of God’s Word for anyone caught in the cycle of pornography. In particular, verse 8 says this about seduction:

Keep you way far from her and do not go near the door of her house.

It’s so easy in a world saturated with sexuality, to let one image; one unintended and unfortunate encounter, act as a trigger for this addiction. Keep away; in other words, don’t put yourself in places where you are going to be trapped and when the temptation does come your way, “don’t go near to the door of her house”.

In other words, guard your eyes, guard your mind, guard your heart – stay away and don’t go there. Any man knows that there is a line he can step over, allowing his mind to wander into places where it should never go. And that wandering ultimately conceives sin.

Thirdly, you men who are married flee … flee into the arms of your wife. She is the real thing; she is God’s perfect provision for you. And as I said earlier on the programme, God’s plan for exclusive intimacy between one man and one woman who are yoked together for life, through thick and thin, is so utterly wonderful. It can never be replaced by this impostor called pornography.

This may surprise you – if you have never read it before, but the Bible – First Corinthians chapter 7, verses 1 to 5 – tells husbands and wives to be intimate with one another. Go on, read it for yourself – it’s all there – it’s God’s plan.

Finally, you men who are addicted to pornography, let me say this – and this is going to be perhaps the hardest thing of all – you need to be accountable; to your wife if you are married and to other men. It’s time for us to go beyond the shame and look for solutions. God’s plan is to set men free from this addiction. It is the most stubborn of sins because it’s hidden. Bring it out into the open and as much pain as it may cause in a marriage, that’s the place where healing can begin.

And if you are a wife, hurt you may be by this infidelity and adultery – because that’s what it is – here’s my counsel to you: forgive your husband and be part of the solution. Love him, hold him, and the Lord your God will use you as His instrument to heal this man whom He has entrusted to you. Love does hurt sometimes and this is one of those times, but the prize … the prize is worth it, isn’t it?

BE ON YOUR GUARD

Now, finally on the programme today we will look at low self esteem. Low self esteem is a rampant disease in our society, particularly let me say, amongst women. And while the Bible has lots to say about pride, it appears to be almost silent on this thing that nowadays we refer to as ‘low self esteem’. So what it is? Well, put simply, it’s an unhelpfully low sense of self worth. “Aw, I’m no good, I can’t do anything, I’m useless, I’m stupid, I’m worthless … ” all those statements are thoughts that constantly … constantly plague people with low self esteem.

And the impact of them is that the people who suffer from this unhelpfully low sense of self worth, struggle to have any meaningful relationships. They don’t have any joy; they don’t have any peace in their lives; they are touchy; their feelings are easily hurt – and it’s like a prison, this low self esteem thing – for many it seems like a life-long sentence.

Now, we would all agree that anyone who suffers from low self esteem is missing out on a full and healthy life. They are in a sense, missing the point of life, at least the point that God meant for them, which is a full and abundant and rich life. And if that’s the case, then there is only one name for low self esteem: it’s “sin”.

Now I don’t mean to make things worse but “sin” as it is defined in the New Testament, literally means, “to miss the mark”, or as we might say today, “to miss the whole point of life”, and wandering around with this incredibly low sense of self worth, misses the whole point, doesn’t it?

We all know people with low self esteem – we know how debilitating it is – we can see how it robs them of rich and meaningful relationships. But how many of us would have thought of it as “sin”? Well, let’s call it for what it is and there’s a good reason for that, because whilst “sin” is all too common, it is not normal. Jesus came to set us free from sin and its effects. Not just that we might have forgiveness for sins past but that we would be free from them today and for all eternity.

The problem with people who have low self esteem is that they don’t, for one minute, imagine that their lives could be any different. They don’t for a single minute believe that Jesus came to set them free from the pain and the anguish of their low self esteem. But what if … what if He came to do exactly that? Would you want to be part of it? Maybe that’s for you; maybe that’s for someone who’s close to you, well, I come to you today with some good news. It’s great news! Jesus came to set us free from sin; every sin, including this sin – stubborn though it may be; persistent though it may be.

As much as someone who suffers from low self esteem imagines they will never be free of it, Jesus came to set them free!! Here’s how I know: without a shadow of a doubt, this is true. At the beginning of His public ministry, Jesus stood up in the synagogue to tell people about Himself and He chose to quote from the Old Testament prophet, Isaiah, using chapter 61. Let me read to you the opening few verses of Isaiah 61:

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me;
he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the broken hearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners;
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour, and the day of vengeance of our God;
to comfort all who mourn; to give them a garland instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit.
They shall build up the ancient ruins, they shall raise up the former devastations;
they shall repair the ruined cities, the devastations of many generations.

Tell me … tell me that those who are suffering from this debilitating sin of low self esteem, tell me they are not included in that – gladness instead of mourning, God’s favour, comfort for all who mourn, binding up the broken hearted, liberty for the captives, release for the prisoners. The key … the key to being free from low self esteem is simply to know this: that you and I, we are fearfully and wonderfully made – Psalm 139, verse 14 – handcrafted by God in His own image.

See, most of us have spent so long, so very long staring at our reflections in this distorted mirror of the world that we’ve developed a distorted image of ourselves. We look at people who are more successful, more beautiful, more intelligent, more anything else you would care to name, more than us. We watch the ads on TV full of beautiful people, telling us we could be like them and no wonder people have low self esteem!

But what if we are indeed fearfully and wonderfully handcrafted by God Himself, made in His image? What if when He looks at us His great and mighty heart aches for us? And here’s a question … this is THE question: what are we going to believe, the world’s distortion or God’s truth? Well, what are you going to believe? The problem is that someone with low self esteem may well be able to get a glimpse of that but the feelings of complete inadequacy crash over them day by day by day, minute by minute, swamping any budding confidence that they might have developed in God’s truth.

That’s why, if you are someone who is struggling with low self esteem; if this is a stubborn sin that you just can’t overcome in your life, I want to give you something today that I believe … in fact, that I KNOW God will use it to heal you from the sin and its devastating effects. It’s a short, simple passage of Scripture that even I can memorise. Here it is: Ephesians chapter 2, verse 10:

For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus, to do good works that God prepared beforehand for us to do.

If you’re someone who’s struggled all your life with low self esteem, I believe God is going to use His Word to help you overcome it, once and for all because every time your distorted image is reflected back at you, through the lives and the deceptions of this world, you can take this Scripture; this verse – say it to yourself, choose to believe God over the world – every time your feelings are hurt, every time you feel that gut wrenching pain of rejection and fear and anguish, take this verse, listen to God and believe Him instead of the world.

Listen to God, memorise this Scripture! It’s something you can do in just about ten minutes or so – own it, let God’s Word do its work in you and I know that you will be set free from stubborn sin … this stubborn sin of low self esteem. I know that anyone caught up in low self esteem believes that it’s a life sentence – my friend, it is not! Jesus came, He died for you, He rose again for you. Our value is in what God says and not in what the world says.

For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus, to do the good works that God prepared beforehand for us to do.

My friend, that is the truth!!

Our self-life – self-indulgence, self-preservation, self-gratification – our self-life, as it turns out is a tyrant that robs us of real life. The life that Jesus has for us. And I believe that this selfishness, this craving of the flesh is something that Jesus came to set us free from.

OVERCOMING SELFISHNESS

Selfishness is a word that we are all too familiar with but I wonder how often we stop to think about what it actually means!
Self–ish-ness … it’s about our tendency to put ourselves, our needs, our plans, our reputations before other people.

Problem is, we notice when other people are being selfish to us – we notice when they put themselves and their own interests before ours but we rarely notice when the shoe is on the other foot. We rarely notice when it’s us who are being selfish. In fact, for most of my life, I never once thought of myself as being selfish when the reality was that ‘self’ was all I was interested in.

How about you? How often do you think of yourself being selfish as opposed to other people being selfish towards you? That’s why selfishness is such an insidious sin. It rears its ugly head all too often without us ever really noticing that we are the ones being selfish. And this putting of self above and before other people – it takes so many different forms. Whenever my interests are more important to me than your interests, the easiest thing in the world is to put mine before yours and that … that’s what we call selfishness.

Over the last three weeks on the programme we have been chatting about overcoming stubborn sin and I know that there are a few people who might squirm at that little word “sin”. I used to too. I thought of it as an outdated, irrelevant, judgemental, religious term that, frankly, belonged in the lexicon of those doddering old folk I saw wandering in and out of those places they call “church”, and that … that is a deception that the devil was happy for me to live under for many years.

But “sin” – it’s a very simple concept: it’s falling short of all the good and wonderful things that God has planned for our lives. It’s missing the whole point and the point is that God wants us to enjoy Him and worship Him and glorify Him with our lives and that brings such a great source of delight and wonder and peace and joy to us. It’s the way things are meant to be, now and for all eternity – through every up and every down – every mountain top experience and every trial and temptation and hurt this world has to offer.

And so those “sins” that are particularly stubborn, that one sin that keeps coming back again and again and again, is Satan’s messenger to torments us; to try and rob us of the abundant life that God has planned for us. And this one, selfishness, is one that so many people suffer from. It’s one that used to be right up there right on top of my list too. I couldn’t see what was wrong with it either.

I worked hard, I applied myself and I’m this outcome focused person who drives hard at life to achieve what I set out to achieve – my agenda, my success, my way or the highway. So what’s wrong with getting my way? If other people want to get their way, well, they should be like me, otherwise tough, right?

That’s the world’s template for success – climb over whoever you have to; roll over the top of whoever you have to; crash through whoever you have to, to get to wherever you are going.

And here’s how it changed for me. There were two parts – one to do with my heart, the other to do with my hands. In other words one part to do with my motivation and the other part to do with my practical “doing” – how I lived that out. I was always after greatness – I wanted people to recognise who I was; to recognise my achievements. And I, like most of the rest of the world, thought that that was about getting ‘my’ way and other people going “WOW!” isn’t he fantastic? Ha, well, that a deception; that’s a lie, because it doesn’t work that way.

Jesus, in what the theologians called the ‘Great Denunciation’ in Matthew chapter 23, where He rips into the religious leaders of the day; people who were selfish and were ripping off those in their charge. Right in the middle of His vehement argument against their hypocrisy and selfishness, Jesus has this to say – He says:

The greatest among you will be your servant. All who exalt themselves will be humbled and all who humble themselves, will be exalted.

That’s Matthew chapter 23, verses 11 and 12.

Now, I thought about that a lot and the truth of that first sentence really … really started to do its work in me. “The greatest among you will be your servant.” The greatest people in my life; the ones whom I truly value and honour and respect are the ones who have served me more than all the others.

There’s a man called Graham. He was a Colonel in the Army when I was a young Captain. Together Graham and I and another man, Mark, left the Army and formed an Information Technology consulting firm. Now Graham is not only intellectually one of the smartest people I know, but he has a deep wisdom about life; about dealing with other people – about all sorts of things. Now he’s twenty years my senior and over a period of seventeen years when we worked together in this consulting firm, he was my mentor; my teacher.

He taught me how to listen, how not to roll over the top of people, how to influence instead of control. He taught me any number of things – many of those come out through these radio programmes, day after day, week after week, all these years later. He served me, even when I was young and precocious; even when I didn’t deserve it. Ask me who are amongst the greatest people in my life and he is right up there.

Once I figured out the deep truth of what Jesus said: “The greatest among you will be your servant,” my motivations changed. And then … then it was time to live that out, minute by minute, relationship by relationship, interaction by interaction. And here’s what I discovered when I took my selfishness out of the equation; when I no longer had to win every time and get my way every time, all of a sudden life became much easier. James chapter 3, verse 16:

For when there is envy and selfish ambition there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind.

And that is absolutely right! Take away the selfishness and instead of disorder and wickedness, what you get, nine times out of ten, is peace. Once I learned to collaborate instead of obliterate, WOW, what a great way to live your life!

You know why ultimately, selfishness has become one of the easiest of my stubborn sins to give up? You know why? Because the rewards are so great and they are pretty much instant. Stop the selfishness and conflict reduces, peace increases, relationships improve and it happens quickly. And after a while it’s really easy to get addicted to those rewards.

You know, I’m wondering if that isn’t what God planned all along. Have a listen to a bit more of what James chapter 3 says – verses 16 to 18:

For where there is envy or selfish ambition there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for those who make peace.

When we give up our selfishness, we are sowing peace and whatever we sow we will reap – we’ll reap a harvest which is peace. This really works.

OVERCOMING THE FLESH

Well, I don’t know about you, but for me this last few weeks on the programme, where we’ve been looking at overcoming stubborn sin, once and for all – it’s been a real challenge and for me too, a breath of fresh air. See, as we have travelled through God’s Word, you know what’s really leapt out for me? The truth that Jesus truly does want to set us free from the terrible effects of those stubborn sins that linger on in our lives.

How many people I know – I was just sitting the other day having coffee with a man; a really successful businessman who was telling me about something in his life – a stubborn sin. And as successful as he was in business, he completely resigned himself to the fact – as least he thought it was a fact – that this stubborn sin would never go away. He was utterly convinced of it.

Man, that is such a tragedy! Does that mean, he believes that when it comes to that one particular stubborn sin, that Jesus died and rose again in vain? Does he believe that the cross of Christ is mighty and powerful and able to save everyone and everything except him from that one sin? Evidently so!

Well, let me be perfectly blunt – too many people for too long have been living with stubborn sin; destructive patterns of behaviour that they could be completely free of through a simple, yet tenacious faith in Jesus Christ.

Today, right now, I want to show you that this truth is for you too. But here’s the problem: so many people want a foot in each camp. They want to be free of the destructive effects of stubborn sin, but they don’t want to pay the price of letting it go.

Let me paint a picture for you. The man who works in a company; he’s incredibly competent at what he does – he knows his job backwards and as it turns out, his skills and knowledge and abilities are invaluable to his employer – BUT he’s incredibly critical. No one else can ever do the job to his standards and so he complains about people – he almost always has a bad attitude, he grumbles and because no one else can do things to his standard, he becomes a control freak.

So, valuable as he may well be to his employer, he just doesn’t have any friends at work. When people organise to go out to lunch together, they somehow … forget to invite him. The others seem to laugh together and enjoy each other’s company but he’s is always on the outer.

He knows deep inside, that his attitudes are robbing him of those relationships. But the truth is, he’s not prepared to let go of the bad attitudes and the destructive behaviour that is robbing him of life.

And that’s what happens! See, we justify our own sin to ourselves and we want to be rid of its effects – we just don’t want to have to pay the price of letting the sin go out of our lives. Huh, does this sound familiar? We’re double minded about our sin. We want a foot in both camps – we want to be free but we just don’t want to let go.

Now, here’s the question – how to we take this decisive step to let go of the sin? How? Well, I believe that what’s required is a decisive step; a firm decision; a firm resolve in Christ to make a change. And if you know you have been double minded; if you know that you have been struggling, trying to have one foot in each camp and it hasn’t been working, I want to share this powerful few verses from the Word of God with you. Because I believe that through them the Spirit of God is going to help you to decide, once and for all, to let go of whatever stubborn sin has been tearing your life apart. I’m reading from Romans chapter 13, beginning at verse 9:

The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet”; and any other commandment, are summed up by this word, “Love your neighbour as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbour; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.

Besides this, you know what time it is, how it is now the moment for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near. Let us then lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armour of light; let us live honourably as in the day, not in revelling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarrelling and jealousy. Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

Here’s what God is saying to us through the Apostle Paul and this chapter from Romans: you know all the obvious rules; the ones we just can’t seem to keep because of the stubborn sin in our lives. You want to know what they boil down to? Love the people around you; just love them the way God loves you and then He allowed His Son Jesus to be brutally nailed to that cross for you.

Let me ask you: can you do that? Are you prepared to love others the way Jesus loved you? That’s the question God’s asking each one of us right now. “Take a good hard look at My Son, nailed hands and feet to the cross,” God’s saying, “gasping for breath, dying, bearing the price of your sin in His flesh that you might be forgiven. Take a good, hard look. Now, tell Me, now that you have seen My great love for you, will you love others with that same love with which I loved you? The day’s coming; the time of your salvation is much, much closer than you might imagine. It is time … it’s time My child, for you to live in that light, to lay aside the works of your darkness and put on the armour of light. Replace whatever sin it is that’s tearing you apart, replace it with a love that you have in My Son, Jesus Christ.”

Here’s the problem: God’s saying through this passage: you have been making provision for your flesh to gratify your worldly desires. It is time … it is time for you, for each one of us to decide instead to clothe ourselves in Christ – to put on the Lord Jesus Christ and stop making provisions for your flesh – stop pandering to your desires.

And this, my friend, is the crunch point: we start off with all these great intentions … ”No, no, I won’t be selfish anymore; no, no, I won’t get involved in sexual immorality anymore; no, no, I won’t let anger ruin my life” … but then … then the flesh cries out.

See, the flesh never wants to let go; it never wants to die to self and when it hurts; when it screams out; when we can’t get the gratification that we have become addicted to … a gratification no less destructive than heroin or ice, mind you, when we can’t get it anymore, what we do is pander to the flesh. And just continue on that downward spiral of self destruction that sin is all about.

Today … today, God is calling you and me to a decisive point in our lives. Listen again to the very call of God to you and to me – listen, allow it to rest on your heart. Romans chapter 13, verse 14:

Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

Now I have a question – as the Holy Spirit takes that Scripture and begins to do His work in your heart by it, are you prepared to make the decision to die to self – to stop making provision for the flesh each time it cries out and once and for all, clothe yourselves in Jesus Christ? Because that’s what God is calling each one of us to do. I can’t answer that call for you, only you can.

As you stand and behold the Lamb of God, suffering on that cross for you, let me ask you this: do you hear His call? “Die to self and come … come and enjoy the new life that My Son died to give to you.” Do you see how much God loves you? “Come! Do you hear the call? How do you answer?

THAT WE MAY STAND

As we come to the end of this four week series “Overcoming Stubborn Sin Once and For All”, I know that there is still some among us, whilst they hunger in their hearts after God, find that something … an elusive something is holding them back. Something is not quite right. If that’s what going on inside you right now, then you should not be surprised – you’re not alone.

There is indeed an elusive something holding back many a man and many a woman – holding them back from giving their lives; all of who they are over to God – holding them back from letting go of this stubborn sin that has been ruling their lives all too long.

I’m going to read something to you that was written by the well known author A.W. Tozer in the mid-twentieth century, in his book “The Pursuit of God”. The language and the turn of phrase may have dated a little but it makes the truth of what he says no less true and no less powerful. Have a listen to what he writes:

There is something more serious than coldness of heart; something that may be back of that coldness and be the cause of its existence. What is it? What but the presence of a veil in our hearts. A veil not taken away as the first veil was but which remains there still shutting out the light and hiding the face of God from us.

It is the veil of our fleshly fallen nature living on, unjudged within us; un-crucified and un-repudiated. It is the close woven veil of the self life which we have never truly acknowledged, of which we have been secretly ashamed and which, for these reasons we have never brought to the judgement of the cross.

It is not too mysterious, this opaque veil, nor is it hard to identify – we have but to look in our own hearts and we shall see it there – sewn and patched and repaired it may be, but there, never the less, an enemy to our lives and an effective block to our spiritual progress.

This veil is not a beautiful thing, it is not a thing about which we commonly care to talk but I am addressing the thirsting souls who are determined to follow God and I know they will not turn back because the way leads temporarily through the blackened hills.

The urge of God within them will assure their continuing pursuit. They will face the facts, however unpleasant, and endure the cross for the joy set before them. So I am bold to name the threads out of which this inner veil is woven. It is woven of fine threads of the self life – the hyphenated sins of the human spirit. They are not something we do, they are something we are and therein lies both their subtlety and their power. To be specific, the self sins are these: self-righteousness, self-pity, self-confidence, self-sufficiency, self-admiration, self-love and a host of others like them.

They dwell too deep within us and are too much a part of our natures to come to our attention until the light of God is focused on them. The grosser manifestation of these sins: egotism, exhibitionism, self-promotion are strangely tolerated in Christian leaders, even in circles of impeccable orthodoxy. Promoting the self under the guise of promoting Christ is currently so common as to excite little notice. The self is a hard and brutal taskmaster and letting go is painful.

Tozer goes on to say this:

Let us remember when we talk about the rending of the veil we are speaking in a figure and the thought of it is poetical, almost pleasant but in actuality, there is nothing pleasant about it at all.

In human experience, that veil is made of living spiritual tissue. It is composed of the sentient, quivering stuff of which our whole being consists and to touch it is to touch us where we feel pain – to tear it away, this veil of self, is to injure us, to hurt us and to make us bleed.

To say otherwise is to make the cross, no cross and death, no death at all. It is never fun to die – to rip through that dear and tender stuff of which life is made, can never be anything but deeply, deeply painful. Yet that is what the cross did to Jesus and it is what the cross would do to every man to set him free.

Let us beware of tinkering with our inner life in the hope, ourselves, to rend the veil. God must do everything for us – our part is to yield and trust. We must confess, forsake and repudiate the self-life and then reckon it to be crucified. But we must be careful to distinguish lazy acceptance from the real work of God. We must insist upon this work being done. We dare not rest with a neat doctrine of self-crucifixion – that is to imitate Saul and to spare the best of the sheep and the oxen.

I have got to tell you, that really strikes hard with me. There is a veil of self that hangs over many a heart because we have not taken it to God; because we have not allowed it to be crucified and we have not travelled that way. I just feel right now as we finish this series, this four part series of “Eliminating Stubborn Sin – Once and For All”, I feel that you and I should pray this very thing through.

Father God. We come before You today, knowing the depth of our sin and the consequences of our rebellion. We come before You today not knowing how to let go of this stubborn sin that dogs our lives and we know that it is only through the cross that this veil of self can be torn from our hearts. So we come to You by the power of Your cross and the grace available to us through the price that Jesus paid for us there.

Forgive us, Lord God, and set us free from this sin, once and for all. This day, this moment, we will take up Your cross and follow You, no matter what it may cost us, no matter how much it may hurt to give up the self life. Even if it should cost us our lives, we choose to follow You. Father God, honour the desires of our hearts and empower us to live our lives for You. Father, we give our lives over to You. In Jesus mighty name, we pray. Amen.