"We Have Jesus" (Luke 10:1-20)

Sunday, September 8, 2019

            An author recently made the point that people leave church “because too many churches are about things beyond or instead of the work of Jesus Christ.”[i]  I disagree.  Beyond the work of Jesus or instead of the work of Jesus; I agree many churches serve their own agendas instead of God’s, I just don’t know if that’s why people leave church and stay away from church.

            As Luke chapter 9 ends, Jesus is frustrated with people who are moving away from him because they don’t want any part of his agenda.  “I’ll follow you Jesus, but first let me go and bury my father” (9:59).  Jesus responds, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.”  Jesus’ reaction doesn’t sound very sympathetic.   Hey Jesus, how about, ‘Oh, I’m so sorry your father is dead.’  Let the dead bury their own dead?  What kind of response is that?  Maybe the Lord of creation and the Savior of the universe needed to spend a semester in a basic pastoral class? 

            Or, maybe Jesus knew something about the guy who wanted to hang out at the graveside when it was time to hit the mission field.  To the guy who wanted to say goodbye to mom and pop first, Jesus says, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

            Reading the Gospels in their totality, we know that Jesus cries at funerals and says his goodbyes.  The point here is not that he was cold to people who were in grief or who had to make big decisions.  The point Jesus wanted his followers to see and wants us to see is the decision to follow Him is the biggest decision a person will ever make.  Once you say, “Jesus is my Lord,” then He truly is; Lord of your marriage and your wedding day; Lord of whether you decide to marry and whom; Lord of your kids and your job.  We say “Jesus is Lord,” but do we understand what we are saying?

            There may be some people who stay away from church because people in the church have agenda’s that are different than God’s and the church misrepresents Jesus.  I think just as many people stay away from church because they sense what Jesus wants from us – our very lives; and they don’t want to give Him that much control.

            Turning the page from Luke 9 to Luke 10, Jesus has moved on from the hesitant disciples.  He’s got 70 who are ready to go wherever he says to go.  This is all before the resurrection, before his followers realize that He is God in the flesh, Messiah and Savior, and Savior for not just Israel but the entire world.  The 70 were Jewish disciples traveling in Jewish territory to announce that in the coming of Jesus, the Kingdom of God has come near.  What we see in Luke 10 is a prelude to the Great Commission Jesus will give his followers after resurrection; after he rose from the grave he sent them to Jerusalem, all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.  As Luke 10 shows us, even before the crucifixion and resurrection, to follow Jesus and to be one of His own is to be sent to tell the world about Him.

            There’s no such thing as a Christian who is not sent.  If we want the title ‘Christ-follower’, then we embrace the commission to go and tell about Jesus.  Maybe you are sent to the neighborhood where you live, Carrboro, Chapel Hill, or Durham.  Maybe you are sent to your workplace.  You do your work with great effort and integrity.  In that setting, God will open the door to spiritual conversations with co-workers; in that moment you share your faith.  Maybe you are sent to UNC’s campus or to a particular group on campus, a fraternity or gathering of students with a particular major or a dormitory.  That becomes your mission field.  The moment we say “Yes” to God, “Yes, I want to receive forgiveness of sins and give my life to Jesus;” in that moment, we are called to go and tell.  We are all sent.

            In upcoming weeks, we will look at the ways God equips us as we set out on the mission he lays before us.  God doesn’t just say to you or me “Go get ‘em, Tiger!”  God gives Spiritual gifts; this is mentioned in Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12, Ephesians 4, and briefly in 1 Peter 4.  God works in the opportunities we have in life; we see this in the stories of Peter, Philip, and Paul, all told in the book of acts.  God uses skills and talents we develop in life as He did with the artisan Bezalel in the book of Exodus, and the song writer Asaph whom we meet in Kings and Chronicles.  God speaks through our individual personalities.  Think of  the shy, timid Timothy or Barnabas, the encourager.  Spiritual gifts, personality, skills, experiences, and heart’s passion – God looks into your life, takes what you bring to the table, enhances it, and speaks through you to the world. 

            Our mission at HillSong is to follow Jesus, love others, and share hope.  We do that through ministries here at our church, ministries our church does out in the community, and through God at work in our members as we go about our lives.  You have a part to play based on the unique combination of traits that make you who you are.  Whether you have been in our church for 20 years or today is you first day with us, you have a part to play in the way God brings good news of salvation to Chapel Hill through us. 

            In talking about this – being on mission, being called, being equipped – why do we start with Luke 10, the story of Jesus sending 70 out?  Why not begin with standard spiritual gift lists in 1 Corinthian 12 and Romans 12?  Why start here?

            The gifts are important but we don’t start there because we don’t people to become “gift-obsessed.”  Is my gift serving?  Oh my gosh!  I thought I had the gift of prophecy!  Now what do I do?  I can’t speak truth to power.  I can’t prophecy.  I have to stay in my spiritual gift lane but I don’t like the lane God assigned me.  We don’t want that.  We believe great joy comes when we serve God in the church in our areas of gifting and strength.  But prophets can serve; just read the stories of Elisha in 2^nd Kings.  And servants can prophesy.  Ask Amos.  We want to know our gifts but not be gift-obsessed.

            A bigger reason to start our conversation about being equipped to do God’s work with the story of the sending of the 70 in Luke 10 is what Jesus does there for the disciples.  It’s more important than Spiritual gifting.  The Spirit of Jesus goes with them.

            He sends them with no provisions.  They are workers sent to harvest the souls of people who respond positively to God’s invitation.  Do you want your sins forgiven?  Do you want to follow Jesus?  The workers are sent to tell everyone how important this invitation is.  We workers are to guide people to Jesus so they can be born again and see His glory in their lives. 

            Sent without provisions or supplies, Jesus tells them they will face opposition.  “I am sending you out like lambs in the midst of wolves.”  When we step out on mission, two types of wolves await us.  There are evil forces, demons, and temptations from Satan.  This is supernatural opposition.  It is real and will confront us when we step out in Jesus’ name. 

The second type of wolf is the spirit of fallen humanity.  People and institutions give in to temptation to sin.  They declare that they don’t need God and you don’t either.  These are the builders of the tower of Babel.  This is humanity’s willful rejection of God.  Both types of wolves will draw us away from God and down the path that leads to our destruction.

            How can we possibly succeed?  What chance does a sheep have in conflict with a pack of hungry, snarling wolves?  Just one; we survive if we stay connected to the shepherd.  Before we take stock of our spiritual gifts we have to establish that link with Jesus. 

            This means we are so committed that we’d be willing to follow Jesus even in the midst of mourning a lost loved one.  We’d answer his call even if we missed the chance to say good bye.  Jesus would not lead us to hurt our families or be hurt by them.   But our commitment to Him puts him absolutely first in our lives, so we would do whatever he asked no matter what it is.  We move forward trusting that he is with us and that he will only ask us to do life-producing things and to go places where we can share love.  And we trust that’s he with us every step of the way.  Before we have spiritual gifts, talents, or other attributes, we have Jesus because he has us.

            The seventy Jesus commissions in Luke 10 go unnamed.  We could speculate that some of these are the heroes of the faith we later meet by name in the book of Acts.  In Luke they are anonymous believers that trust Jesus.  So, he sends them.  How does it go? 

            Luke 10:17, “The seventy returned with joy.”  It sounded ominous, “I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves.”  But they trusted him.  The put their hand to the plow and did not look back.  To Jesus, they proclaimed with wonder, “Lord, in your name even the demons submit to us!”  In Jesus name.  Jesus joined them in their triumph.  He tells them, “I watched Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning.  See, I have given you authority to tread on snakes and scorpions, and over the power of the enemy; and nothing will hurt you” (10:18b-19). 

            When they headed out, they didn’t need supplies.  They had the one thing they needed: Jesus.  Snakes and scorpions and demonic enemies and human temptations all await us when we head out to do the work of Jesus, whether it be in our church, on campus, in our town, or on the job.  Multiple manifestations of evil oppose the advance of the Gospel.  Starting now, we have what we need to step out boldly.

            No, not “what” we need; we have who we need.  When we turn to Him in faith, we have the Holy Spirit of the Resurrected Christ in us, before us, and holding us so that no threat is as powerful as the one who sends us and walks with us.  What do sheep need to face ravenous wolves?  The shepherd!  We have the shepherd, the one who is the way, the truth, and the life.

            I don’t know why people stay away from church.  I do know the Spirit that draws each one of us to God’s embrace also sends us into the world in Jesus’ name, stays with us as we go, and rejoices with us when we return.

AMEN 

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[i] https://matthewtennant.org/2019/09/04/decline-of-christianity-growing-churches/

Outfitted and Ready

^19 “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Jesus, in Matthew 28:19-20).

^11 “When they bring you to trial and hand you over, do not worry beforehand about what you are to say; but say whatever is given you at that time, for it is not you who speak, but the Holy Spirit” (Jesus, in Mark 13:11).

^17 ‘The seventy returned with joy, saying, “Lord, in your name even the demons submit to us”’ (seventy missionaries returning to Jesus, in Luke 10:17). 

            The first of the passages listed above is the final word in Matthew’s Gospel, the “Great Commission.”  “Go!” Jesus tells his 11 followers that life as his disciples, by its nature, is a life lived on the move.  Hit the road, there’s a mission to accomplish.  There’s a message that needs to be spread.

            Notice that before Jesus ascends bodily, he sends his disciples beyond the edges of their imagination.  Yes, they will tell their fellow Jews in their home, Galilee, all that they have learned from him, but here, he’s sending them to the ends of the earth, to all nations.  That commission continues with each new generation of disciples.  To be sent by Jesus – this connects us, disciples in 2019, with Andrew and Peter, Matthew and Philip and the rest of the 12. 

            Also notice that while they are sent, it does not mean they are separated from Jesus.  Remember I am with you always, to the end of the age.  Jesus promised to always be at the side of his disciples as they ventured to places they never even considered.  In the second quote above, from Mark 14, he tells them that when they are challenged, they will be able to respond.  It is not you who speaks, but the Holy Spirit.  Jesus doesn’t just send us.  He sends us outfitted for the journey and ready for whatever we encounter.

            For the next month at HillSong Church, we will resume our focus on Growing Young.  As we emphasized when we introduced this ministry approach back in the spring, Growing Young is not emphasizing teens and 20-somethings to the neglect of the rest of the church family.  Growing Young is the belief that the entire church will flourish when everyone in the church family of every age contributes to the spiritual growth of our members 10-25 years old. 

            One of our Growing Young points of emphasis will be the way God equips every one of us for the spiritual challenges ahead.  We’ll look at spiritual gifts, our personality styles, our experiences and natural aptitudes, and our hearts’ passions.  We’ll discover how to bring it all together so that each member is serving in areas of ministry that highlight his or her strengths.

            On the front end of this emphasis we consider that Jesus sends us, the commission; goes with us, I am with you always; and, with Jesus our journey ends in victory.  When the seventy returned, they triumphantly proclaimed, even the demons submit to us.  Yes, we have spiritual gifts, natural talents, and heart desires that all help us accomplish much in Jesus’ name.  But before all the gifting and talent, we have Jesus.  We have the Lord of creation at our side, paving the path for us, and walking with us.  That is the equipping we need.

            As you participate in worship and small group ministries at HillSong Church throughout September and October, be aware of God’s calling.  Like Peter, Matthew, Andrew, and the rest, you too are sent in Jesus.  And you have talents.  Jesus will work through you.  But as you grow in awareness of your calling, even more, grow in relationship with Jesus.  Through prayer, through re-ordering your priorities, and through learning to listen to the Spirit, go deeper with Jesus.  He speaks and works through us.  And better than that, he walks with us and works in us.  With Him, we can answer the call.

"Those who Love God" (1 Corinthians 2:6-16)

            Facebook has been a joy for me the past three weeks because 2 years ago at this time, our family was on our big Sabbatical trip to Russia, Ethiopia, and Egypt.  On the anniversary of Candy and I posting the pictures from that trip, those pictures pop-up.  So, every day, Facebook’s daily memories feature has taken me back to a very happy and meaningful time.  I know not everyone uses Facebook, and what I have to share will probably reinforce your decision to stay off it, but I thank God for the way this technology has been a blessing.  However …

            Another use of Facebook is the comment thread, where arguments rage.  Person 1 posts a meme or a snarky quote.  Or, Person 1 posts an opinion.  Every one of his 400 friends sees his post, including those “friends,” he doesn’t really know.  He met this guy, Person 2, at a convention last year and they discussed business so when Person 2 sent Person 1 a friend request, Person 1 accepted. 

But he doesn’t really know Person 2 and has not seen him since that convention.  Of his 400 Facebook friends, 50 are people he doesn’t really know.  So now, he posts his silly meme that pokes fun at some political figure.  Business convention guy, Person 2, doesn’t like the joke, so, in the comments section he writes a message railing against this anti-American, racist, anti-Christian meme that Person 1 posted for a laugh. 

Person 1 is not online when Person 2 posts his angry comments.  Person 1 has gone to bed.  But, one of his other Facebook “friends,” someone from his high school days, someone he hasn’t seen in 15 years, snipes back. We’ll call this one Person 3.  With vitriol, he snaps back at what Person 2 wrote in the comments section of Person 1’s quote.  Persons 2 and 3 don’t know each other; they’ve never met.  Yet here they are fighting under Person 1’s post which was just meant to be silly. 

In fact before Person 1 gets back to his computer, 5 different people from his friends group – all five completely unknown to each other – have become embroiled in a no-holds-barred Facebook comments section donnybrook.  Under his silly meme, there are 20 comments that include profanity bad enough to make a sailor blush, accusations of treason, and prophecies of the end of days. 

This kind of conflict – I know we don’t use this word in church often, but I’m going to – is stupid.  Massively stupid.  And the even stupider thing is I get sucked into these things.  This is not hypothetical or something I’ve heard about.  I get sucked in even when I have vowed not to.

This week, I saw one of my friend post a meme and I spent about 10 good minutes typing up my fiery response.  Thank you Jesus, I deleted what I wrote without sending it.  Facebook, I have learned things through conversations I’ve had on your platform.  Because you remind me, I remember greats times in my life.  But Facebook, I am not going to allow you to make me develop enemies or lead me into pointless conflicts that accomplish nothing and go nowhere. 

Some of you who know me and know my Facebook activity are looking at me and thinking, “O Rob, you already do that.”  All I can say is I’m not going to … anymore.  At least I’ll try not to.  Non-Facebook users, don’t judget those of us who do use it.  There’s a lot of good to be done in that platform and even if you don’t use that form of social media, there are chances you too have been in disputes that are pointless and avoidable, just not there. The conflicts that develop in Facebook threads are not worth it. Many conflicts in which we find ourselves can minimized or altogether avoided. 

However, in 1 Corinthians 2, Paul, the author of this letter, sets up an “us versus them” conflict that he feels is very important.

Speaking of himself and the Christians with him he writes, “We do speak wisdom, though it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age” (2:6).  On one side, in the conflict Paul identifies, stands the believers, those who, along with Paul, follow, serve, and worship God as God is revealed in Jesus.  Opposed to the Christ-followers are the rulers of this age.  In 1:18, Paul calls them “those who are perishing.”  They are lost, and without Christ, lost to God eternally.  In 1:19 he calls them “the wise,” in 1:20, “the debaters of this age,” and in 1:22-23 he implies that these are Jews and Gentiles who do not believe in Jesus.  Paul believes without Jesus, people are lost.  We can choose to reject God’s self-revelation in Jesus Christ, and many do. 

In 1:25, Paul refers to “human wisdom” and “human strength,” which is weaker and less wise than God’s foolishness and weakness.  Paul calls them “rulers of this age” in 2:6 and again in 2:8.  That phrase is key for our understanding because it transports this teaching from Paul’s first century Roman-Corinthian context to our 20^th century American context.  We have rulers and trendsetters and influencers in our age who are as enamored with their own smarts, accomplishments, power, wealth, and position as were the rulers of the age in Paul’s day.  Like in Paul’s day, rulers of our age do not humble themselves before God.  They constantly seek glory for themselves.

Yelling with exclamation points, all-caps, and angry emojis on Facebook accomplishes little.  But seeing it and understanding that people are far from God, and often their lust for status is why they are far from God is important.  We don’t want to emulate this worldly pursuit of Earthly glory – the American dream or the good life or whatever you want to call it.  We don’t chase that.  In fact, for Paul, chasing after earthly things is destructive for our faith. 

Chapter 2 verse 7 indicates that “us versus them” mindset Paul has.  While “they” are doomed to perish, he writes in verse 7, “we speak God’s wisdom” and “none of the rulers of this age [understand]) (v.8).  Are Christians smarter than non-Christians?  Not by a long shot.  That we can see God in Jesus does not come about from our supreme intelligence.  In chapter 1 Paul wrote, “Consider your own call, brothers and sisters, not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many of noble birth” (1:26).   So how do we who are in Christ understand who Jesus is and give Him the worship and allegiance he is due?

Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 2:9 that the wisdom of God is prepared “for those who love Him.”  I want the wisdom of God.  How do I get to be counted among “those who love him?”  Is it as simple as saying, I really love God, and meaning it?  Maybe.  But I don’t trust myself.  I know I can love something one minute, and then get caught up in something, like an inane Facebook argument or a minor annoyance or something bigger, and that love I professed for God recedes to the back of my mind.  As I tried to understand 1 Corinthians 2:9 and tried to grasp who it is that loves God and receives this knowledge, I looked to the Gospels.

In Mark 5, Jesus freed a man who was enslaved by 1000 demons.  They drove the man crazy.  When he was freed and made right by Jesus, he began to truly love God.  In Matthew 9, a woman who suffered non-stop bleeding for 12 years, possibly an obstetric fistula, was healed by Jesus.  She was regarded as “unclean;” Jesus called her “daughter” as he healed her.  She understood what it is to love God.  So did the wealthy, despised tax collectors, Levi in Mark 2 and Zacchaeus in Luke 19. Others hated these me.  Jesus welcomed them. 

This sent me on a journey into the gospels.  I went 11 different stories – rich and poor people, healthy and sick, Jewish and Gentile, powerful and peasant, innocent and guilty – all were marginalized by society and loved by Jesus.  Each one was aware of the need to humble himself or herself before God, revealed in Jesus.  When they lowered themselves and saw their own need, they were ready to receive the healing or forgiveness, to hear the call, and respond to God in faith.  These and so many others in the Gospels are those who love God.  I want to be part of that group. 

It is to this group that God has revealed all things through the Spirit.  Paul writes that the Spirit “searches everything, even the depths of God.  … No one comprehends what is truly God’s except the Spirit of God” (1 Cor 2:10-11).  The Holy Spirit is in all places and possesses all knowledge.  The Holy Spirit sees into the deepest parts of each one of us.  Nothing is hidden from God the Spirit. 

Of course our way of experiencing the world is going to be different than people who have no relationship with Jesus.  Verses 12-13 say “we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit that is from God.”  Without the Holy Spirit, we cannot understand God’s wisdom.  Once we have humbled ourselves before God and expressed faith in Christ, we are filled with the Spirit.  Then, we must not go back to seeing and acting in the flesh, from a worldly perspective, as if God had not acted in us. 

This is one more way Paul points out the conflict between Christians and the rulers of the age.  “Those who are unspiritual,” as it is worded in verse 15, “do not receive gifts of God’s Spirit.”  They cannot understand God’s ways and are cut off from God as their gaze is fixed on human ideas of power and wisdom and success.

So, if we want divine perspective, holy joy, and eternal life, we need to be among those who love God in Christ and receive the Holy Spirit.  As we have already said, the first step is to humble ourselves as sinners in need of forgiveness.  Humbled before God, we confess, repent, and receive Jesus.

But then what?  We are among those who are in Christ, the recipients of God’s wisdom through the Holy Spirit.  What about the world around us, the people still stuck in the world, still cut off from God?  Are they lost forever?

Of course not.  Jesus’ death on the cross is effective for the salvation of all sinners.  How do we help unbelievers turn to God?  Hint: we don’t do it through red-faced angry Facebook arguments.  We don’t get there through in-person arguments either.  We follow Jesus and our friends see Him in us.  The Holy Spirit has to reveal their sin to them and need for God.  We stand by as friends, invite them to church, love as Jesus has loved, and help them when they decide to turn to Him. 

God has given us his wisdom through His Spirit not to be hidden away or hoarded, but to be shared.  So that’s what we do.  We follow Jesus, we love our unchurched friends and co-workers and neighbors, and we help them turn from the vapid promises of our present age to eternal life as children of God, a life lived by all who have turned to Jesus.  We start by putting needless conflicts behind us and humbling ourselves before God.

AMEN

The Recipe for Faith (Galatians 5:16-26)

            As I read the ingredients label, you tell me the product.  Let’s see who can guess it first.  [Read the ingredients of several products, see who can guess what it is.]

            Now try this one: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.  That’s a follower of Jesus, a disciple.

            In Galatians 5:22-23, we read that these attributes are the fruit produced when the Holy Spirit of God goes to work in each of us.  When we say the things Jesus would say if he were in our place, and when we, in interactions with other people, do the things he did, then our lives are Spirit-filled and spirit-guided. 

            Put sugar, flour, eggs, and milk together in the right quantities and out comes a cake.  Put the Holy Spirit into a repentant, receptive heart, and out comes love, joy, peace, patience, and the rest.  We become kinder, more generous.  We exercise self-control when the world around us is falling apart.  It is not so much that we work at developing these qualities.  We can put in that effort.  But what actually happens when these qualities are produced in our lives is God is in the process of effecting constant change in us.  We become different people than we were without Christ in us.  We become new creation.  We become people who reflect God’s glory.

            How does it happen?  It begins with God’s love for us.  God wants to be in relationship with each one of us, and collectively with us as His Church.  What gets in the way?  Sin.

Sin is shorthand for all the ways we ignore God, hurt each other, hurt ourselves, destroy the good world God created, and disobey His word.  God takes sin seriously because it is damaging to human life.  God created us in His image and wants us to thrive in relationships with each other, with creation, and with Him. Whether we believe it or not, whether we see it or not, sin disrupts and ultimately destroys all those relationships.  When we live in unconfessed sin, we are cut off from Him.  When we die in unforgiven sin, we are cut off eternally. 

            God doesn’t want that but also doesn’t prevent it.  If He did we would be robots, automatons that don’t sin, but also don’t choose to love God and follow Jesus.  God gives us free will.  We can choose faith or rejection of faith.

If we choose to reject God, God honors our choice.  No one condemned to eternal separation is unloved by God.  God is perfect love.  God came as a human being, Jesus.  He taught us how to live as brothers and sisters to each other, as God’s beloved children.  And then, because God knew we could not overcome sin by our own will power, Jesus died on the cross.  No matter how hard we work at it, we cannot stop sinning.  So Jesus paid the price for our sins.  That’s grace – us receiving salvation from sin and death, salvation we did not earn.  Jesus on the cross is God empathizing with us and saving us from an eternity apart from his love.

            Why is this salvation so important?  Plenty of times I have heard people outside the church, outside of Christianity insist they don’t need saving.  What if our hearts are not receptive when God prompts us?  What if we see our sin, see God’s holiness, but decide we don’t want to repent?

            How will my life be if I spend my hours watching TV, drinking beer and eating chips, Oreos, and ice cream?  I like all those things.  But if those are the ingredients of my life, the result will be a fat, lonely, unhealthy existence.

            On the other hand, if I get plenty sleep and exercise, and eat a lot of salads and healthy proteins, and spend more time with friends and less time with eyes fixed to a screen, I’ll have a healthier, happier existence. This is not complicated.

            And it is not complicated if we think about it spiritually.  Galatians calls the life apart from God the life of the flesh.  Galatians 5:16-17 states it flatly.  “Live by the Spirit, I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh.”  We have those desires in us, even as the Spirit is in us when we turn to Jesus.  Temptation also resides in us, but we cannot be ruled by it.  We cannot organize our lives around our desires and what we think we need to satisfy those desires.  That too is a recipe – a recipe for frustration and disappointment.

            Verse 17 continues.  “What the flesh desires is opposed to the Spirit, and what the Spirit desires is opposed to the flesh.”  This is because the Spirit gives glory to God and leads us to give ourselves to loving others.  Think of the flesh as your deepest cravings; these are urges that if acted upon will feel good in the moment, but won’t help anyone else and in the big picture won’t help you either.  The flesh is hedonism; do whatever feels good even if in doing it you hurt yourself in the long run.  Are others injured by your cravings?  It doesn’t matter.  Satisfy those cravings anyway. 

            The works of the flesh are, says Galatians, “fornication;” that’s sexual activity outside of marriage.  The next two works of the flesh listed, impurity and licentiousness also involve sexual sins.  Paul identified marriage as the specific context for healthy sexuality and any sexual activity outside that context was flagrant defiance before God. 

Idolatry and sorcery, the next works of the flesh cited both involve human attempts to control the spiritual realm.  Idolatry is the attempt to contain and control God.  We worship things and give them the loyalty we owe to God.  In sorcery people revert to ridiculous incantations in the mistaken notion that God or the devil could be controlled by human wisdom.

After sexual sins, sorcery and idolatry, the next set of ingredients listed in the work of the flesh all relate to the breakdown of relationships: enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, and carousing.  Two weeks ago, we examined Jesus’ second great commandment – to love our neighbors as we love ourselves.  All these works of the flesh noted in Galatians 5 put us in conflict with the very neighbors God has commanded us to love.  Forgiveness is a must.  Often, when the sin of the flesh involves you or me harming someone, the person we hurt is someone we know well, maybe some we feel has hurt us.  Our own church family has experienced division like this.  Perhaps in many of us anger lingers.  The perfect love of God that has saved us from our own sins also empowers us to forgive.  By relying on the Spirit, our anger is rooted out and love and forgiveness take its place.

The final word in this list of works of the flesh is “and things like these.”  The list is not exhaustive.  You may have experienced bitter disappointment or unsavory temptation.  Maybe you have your own words to add to the works of the flesh listed in Galatians 5:19-21.  We don’t want these to be what describes us and it need not be. 

The Holy Spirit effects change in us.  We can’t provoke salvation.  Salvation is God’s initiative.  Jesus had to come and die for us.  We couldn’t make that happen.  God could and did.  Because it has happened we can position ourselves to receive what God has prepared.  We can be the mixing bowl in which God stirs up love, grace, and forgiveness in preparation for making us newly alive in Him. 

The words I used at the outset in talking about the fruit of the spirit were repentant and receptive. 

The one with a repentant heart looks into his own life and sees all these works of the flesh for what they are: agents of his own destruction.  We have to be painfully honest with ourselves.  The warning at the end of verse 21 is the person committed to continuing in the works of the flesh will not inherit the kingdom of God.  He can’t.  The flesh is in direct contrast with the Spirit.   However, when that person sees the evil in the flesh, is truly sorry, and turns away and turns to God, he is met with forgiveness and help.  Those temptations lurk and some insidious force is always there to lure us back to the sexual sin or the violence or the petty bickering with neighbors or some other misfortune.  But when we turn to Christ, he helps.

The turning – that’s repentance.  Once we are facing the Lord, we do so with receptive, responsive hearts.  It does no good to reject sin and then turn around and reject the Lord.  When He says to us, “My children, you are forgiven,” we need to believe it.  He’s removed our sins.  We don’t need to stay in them.

Instead, we open ourselves to God and fully receive His Spirit.  We don’t wrestle with God over who gets to control our lives.  Following Jesus means we say to God, “You’re in charge God.  I am here and I am yours.  You’re the boss.”  Galatians 5:24-25 puts it this way.  “Those who belong to Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.  If we live by the Spirit let us be guided by the Spirit.”  We can’t serve two masters.  Once we see the destructive nature of human lust and once we turn away from that, we must then hand ourselves over to the care and leadership of God, revealed in Jesus, and present in the same Holy Spirit that dwells in each of us. 

This recipe begins in salvation – the moment we are born again - and like so many good foods, it grows more flavorful the longer it cooks. 

Our part is to come to the table.  Turn away from sin and all that comes with it.  We then turn to God in full confession, full honesty about our fallen condition.  We come with arms and heart wide open, ready to receive the grace God has prepared for us. 

Forgiven and born again, we live our lives “guided by the Spirit” as verse 25 says.  The persistent tension of temptation never leaves, but we stay focused on Christ so that the Spirit will be unencumbered, free to be about the work of our transformation.  Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control become what defines our relationships. 

Pause as you ponder each example of the fruit of the Spirit.  When you or I react to life situations in ways that embody this fruit, we are choosing to yield to Jesus in the way we live.  When we act out in angry, relationship-destroying ways, we are choosing the works of the flesh.  Choose the Holy Spirit.  Become God’s good work so that not only will you feel the glorious transformation of becoming, new, others also will meet God as God works through you.  Then they too will be the container in which God’s work is accomplished. 

AMEN