Killing the Sin in Your Life, by Dr. John MacArthur, from a sermon of 6-22-19 [all square brackets, emboldening and underscoring are mine].
MacArthur’s sermon is 52 minutes in length; the following points are more than just outline highlights, but these are not as beneficial as hearing his sermon.
However, in reading these points, you can get a sense for whether it is worth the investment of your time to hear the sermon.
I personally listened to it 3 times (noting it on the 3rd time through) because it had much for me today. But as I noted the points and wrote them out, I could not believe how much I missed by merely listening.
- In 1 Thessalonians 4:3, Paul stated that our sanctification is the will of God
- Sanctification is to be our chief concern in our earthly life; it is the stage between our justification and our glorification
- To be sanctified is to be separated from sin unto God; from sin unto holiness; to Christlikeness; to heavenly-mindedness
- MacArthur read Colossians 3:1-9
- Review of former sermon in this series, therein: called to the risen life wherein we are to reach those in the world by leaving the world; called to live a life seeking that which is above
- In chapters 1 and 2 of Col., Paul demonstrated the supremacy and sufficiency of the Lord Jesus Christ regarding His person, His atoning work; that believers are complete in Him: they do not need human philosophy, religious rituals, legalism, visions, a word from angels, or any of the ascetic disciplines many practiced
- Why? Because true converts have died and risen in Christ, to newness of life
- Chapter 3 begins with “Therefore” as Paul descends from the mountainous realms of doctrine to the lower regions of practice / conduct
- Because we already have everything we need, we need to live that way: everything we do in word and deed should be consistent with our identity in Christ, and should be an offering of thanks to God the Father, via the enablement of the Holy Spirit
- If we will live a heavenly life, then we must deal with that remaining earthliness in ourselves, our sin
- Practical actions are required of us: we must consider the members of our earthly bodies as dead
- Matthew 5:29-30, Christ calls us to cut off the right hand if it offends…this means that we need to take drastic actions against whatever causes us to sin
- Romans, 8:13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. [A call to mortify sin]
- Sin must be killed if you are to live the risen life because sin pulls us away from God
- As the apostle Paul stated in Romans 7, we are new creatures on the inside
- All of our human capacities are tainted with sin until we are glorified; again, in Romans 7 Paul called himself a wretched man, having a mind that loved God while his fleshly self, opposed Him
- The fallen aspects of ourselves show themselves by way of our mind, speech and conduct
- That is, these instruments of our fallen flesh will express themselves sinfully unless they are mortified [starved, killed]; John Owen produced a body of work dedicated to helping the Christian kill his sin so he might live the heavenly life
- Many professed Christians today believe that God loves us whether we sin or not BUT, God the Father, the Holy Spirit and the Son / the Lord Jesus Christ, have a differing perspective – we are not to ignore sin but kill it
- This chapter contains two catalogues of sin: verse 5 and verses 8-9. The first list deals with perverted love and the second with perverted hate
- The first, what we do; the second, what we say
- The first, the personal self; the second, our social self
- The first, our feelings; the second, our speech
- These lists are not exhaustive, but are samples of characteristic sins; however, therein is a pathology of sin that will help us
- In the first list, we are to consider the members of our earthly bodies as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (covetousness / idolatry)
- This list flows from specific actions back to their motive: beginning with immorality and flowing back to its motive, idolatry
- Immorality is any unlawful sexual act – to simplify, God has stated that there is only one type of sin that is lawful, the sex acts of a married man and woman; all other types are immoral
- Our culture ignores God’s commands, including about this matter (he explains briefly)
- Impurity is that which proceeds out of the man, as in Mark 7:21, wherein Jesus stated – out of the heart of man proceed evil thoughts, fornications, thefts…
- This defilement is within us: immorality is the effect of evil thoughts
- In Colossians, Paul was addressing converts who were formerly Pagan, or came from Pagan cultures, wherein all kinds of immorality were acceptable: having concubines, pedophilia, homosexuality; sexual relations before and outside marriage; religious sexuality with temple prostitutes…
- Paul’s words were stunning [likely, similar to Dr. MacArthur’s words presently, as the western world is returning to Paganism; that is, it is very similar to Paul’s world]
- Our problem, is that to avoid immorality, we have to avoid impure thinking; to avoid impure thinking, we must avoid things that stimulate such thinking
- The next word of Paul’s to consider is Passion. It is latent within us, like a spark that can be fanned into a flame
- Evil desire: this is part of our fallen state: the apostle John described it as the lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh and pride; James’ words implied that it began in the deep caverns of lust; that is, it is who we are, not necessarily the effect of what we see
- People do immoral behaviors because they have immoral thoughts; they have immoral thoughts because they have a built in propensity to be inflamed in the direction of their lusts. They have passions because there is an evil desire component built into every human [because of the fall]
- Greed: it activates evil desire, inflaming passion, causing impure thoughts and immoral behaviors (greed=covetousness=idolatry)
- This is the last sin of the Decalogue, but it is the sin behind all others (examples given)
- It is the desire for what is forbidden; for what is not yours; for what is against the will of God; for something one has no right to, is not entitled to
- To have “more,” the opposite of godly contentment; Jesus viewed the covetous heart as the source of all evil. In Greek, it indicates an insatiable desire
- This is a self-seeking pride: concerning money, it moves one to steal; regarding fame, leads to boasting; regarding success, leads to selfish ambition; regarding power, leads to exploitation, intimidation and tyranny; regarding physical relationships, leads to sexual sin
- Every kind of sin flows from this pride
- Idolatry: worshipping someone other than God, the root of all sin
- When one stops worshipping God, he begins worshipping self; he, himself becomes sovereign ruler of his life, determining what he can or cannot have, do, etc.
- Covetousness is the 10th commandment, but it is also a violation of command one
- It is self-worship
- It is not so much sex worship, money worship, power worship, fame worship, as it is self-worship; the opposite of “seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all else will be added”
- Instead of seeking God’s kingdom and righteousness, we seek what we want
- The Pathology of Sin: I worship myself; become greedy to satisfy myself; begin to covet that which I have no right to have, which rises out of my evil desire, inflames my passions, ruminates in my mind and manifests itself in my conduct
- Paul gave parallel instructions in Ephesians 5: 3 But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. 4 Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.
- 1 Corinthians 6:9 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
- The aforementioned text contains the same message as Colossians; the link is from sexual behavior to impure thoughts to inflamed passions, to deep-seated inherent lusts, to greed connected with what one wants but to which he has no right, to self-worship, rather than worship of God
- Do not be so ridiculous as to say that the Lord Jesus Christ does not care about what I do because He loves me
- It isn’t just about what I do, it is what I think, who I am, and my blasphemous rebellion against the sovereign God
- This pathology begins in idolatry [root] and ends in sexual behaviors [fruit]; that is, sexual sin is the product of idol worship; and the self is the idol
- The ROOT of this sin is SELF worship
- This process is most easily dealt with at its point of origin, the root
- ANYTHING THAT I HAVE NO RIGHT TO THAT I WANT IS A TEST OF WHO I WORSHIP
- One who worships God, says no at that point [which is like a fork in the road in each choice of daily life; if I choose self, I go down a ungodly road, the road of idolatry and disobedience]
- As James says in chapter one of his epistle: lust wants, conceives and brings forth sin which leads to death
- It is essential to realize that the ability to live the Christian life is not related to someone giving me a pep talk; but it is directly related to what I think about God and about self [therefore, studying scripture, meditating upon it, etc. will enable one to know God and self better and lead one towards a more godly life]
- Man-centered preaching focuses on making congregants feel good, it errs
- Strength against sin does not come from feeling good about oneself, but derives from the opposite, feeling terrible – Psalm 51 and Isaiah 66 indicate that God listens to those who approach Him with broken and contrite hearts [if you attend carefully to what you experience in Bible reading and while listening to preaching, you will find that the Holy Spirit is humbling you by showing you your sinfulness]
- [If one is observing himself in daily life, then such tests as that above will show the truth of the matter. That is, you might think you love Christ, but if you consistently choose self at every fork of the road in decision making, then you are mistaken]
- Modern attitudes that minimize sin in the Christian life, do not faithfully represent the word of God
- The second catalogue of sin in Col. 3, verses 8 and 9 are about perverted hate. There are things the Christian should hate such as sin and idolatry; but the hate Paul was explaining was about hating people
- Put aside anger, wrath, malice, slander and abusive speech, do not lie
- In the first catalogue, Paul began at the act [fruit] and worked towards the motive [root]; here, he began at the motive and worked towards the act / conduct
- Motive: anger turns into wrath which releases malice which turns into slander and abusive speech and lying
- Here, he is talking about what we say, the vicious capacity we have to use our tongue for violent sin
- He looks at these various types of ungodly speech and traces them back to their root, in anger; a smoldering hostility, deriving from self-worship that shows itself in fruit of anger
- This pattern of behavior comes from self-worship (he makes an ironic remark to explain; and another example to clarify)
- Ephesians 4:29 Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. 32 Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.
- Worshippers of self, protect self via wrath, slander, lies… [defensiveness]
- We must be mortifying these things, beginning with self-worship / idolatry, the root of anger and its fruit
- Even when a Christian is genuinely offended, his interactions should be marked by forgiveness
- The more one knows Christ, the more he will love Him, and greater love for Him facilitates submission to Him (making self-worship less of a problem)
The following link is to Dr. MacArthur’s sermon on YouTube: If you choose to listen to the sermon, then you might also be interested in hearing a sermon series at his site on “Winning the battle against sin”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUSHEKnqp5A&list=LL&index=2
For posts in this blog about John Owen’s mortification of sin, see, Categories: John Owen
In those posts, there are many very brief videos by Dr. Jeff Mayfield that help one understand the complex writings of John Owen. Owen is worthy of understanding because he wrote the most foundational works on the mortification of sin.