Damned if you do, Damned if you don’t To HELL with that! Purity 910

To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.org or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of a robust tropical plant in a quaint wooden walking bridge leading to the shores of the Atlantic Ocean comes to us from a friend, a cousin-in-law, who shared this scene from South Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida yesterday on social media. Commenting that they needed this more than words can express. Well, it's Friday, and in light of recent developments in my life concerning matters of the past that live on in my present, I think I need, need the weekend to be here more than words can express. Thank you, Lord. I don't, uh, I don't know, I don't know if my I don't know if my matchmaking friend and cousin-in-law used a filter on this photo, but while I can't discuss the specific matters that are affecting my life because of legal agreements, I will be unfiltered in giving my advice of what to do with untenable situations in a general sense. First of all, common sense with some support from the Word of God to validate its wisdom. You shouldn't trust people who are not walking with the Lord, and especially if they have proven to be untrustworthy in the past, and even more so if they abuse alcohol or drugs. In terms of our faith, those without a covenant relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ and who are walking in the flesh could rightly be described as, quote unquote, wicked. And not wicked good, no matter how nice, friendly, or dynamic they are. Proverbs 25:26 says, "If the godly give in to the wicked, it's like polluting a fountain or muddying a spring." As much as we try to be peacemakers, or peacemakers and witnesses for Jesus Christ, and play nice, When we compromise our better judgment by giving in to the wicked, we can't be surprised when things turn into a big mess. Christ said in Matthew 7:17-20, a good tree produces good fruit, and a bad tree produces bad fruit. A good tree can't produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can't produce good fruit. So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire. Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, You— so you can identify people by their actions. And if someone is not walking with the Lord, it is foolish for us to think, to think that they will do what's right. Eventually we could pay for our decisions to give in to the wicked. You know, we could pay for our decisions to give in to the wicked. Uh, to paraphrase a line from National Lampoon's Animal House, You messed up. You trusted us. Yep, you messed up. You trusted the untrustworthy. Um, surprise, things went bad. And from my experience, I've learned that before the disaster comes, there are signs of the impending storm. Just like an earthquake will be precipitated by tremors, generally we get signs that we have chosen a poor path in trusting the wicked. Of course, if we respond to these early signs and change our course, we can avoid disaster. But when we can't— when you call someone out at the first sign of trouble, you usually get accused of overreacting or being unloving, or my favorites, being a bad Christian or a quote-unquote hypocrite. So if you've gotten those accusations thrown in your direction, rather than shying away from shying away from withdrawing your trust and making others accountable, I suggest you agree with the accusations that are intended to shame you into inaction and show the accuser that while you have given trust, mercy, and grace, you are free to withdraw them and, and do what you have to do to correct the situation. Easier said than done, I know, Of course, because dealing with people is always unpredictable, and the truth of the matter is that we simply cannot control what others do. And often there can be negative consequences for taking corrective action. Doing the right thing may cost you money, time, your reputation, or your relationships. And when we consider the cost, we may shy away from doing the right thing and just quote-unquote, hope and pray things will get better on their own. Or out of fear, we will agree that we, we have to do what is right, but we can't do that now. Our fear will tell us that the circumstances aren't right, that we simply can't do it. It's too painful, it costs too much, I don't like confrontations, I don't want to be a jerk. While I can understand all of these sentiments, when we look at them, we can see that the voice of fear is speaking through us, not the voice of faith that has confidence in God. Not long ago, I counseled a brother in Christ that was in a real pickle, a situation where he couldn't see a good outcome no matter what he did. He saw things dualistically and didn't think either of the paths he considered would fix his problem. He lamented, "I'm damned if I do and I'm damned if I don't." While I could totally understand where he was coming from, because we can really feel trapped when we don't see an easy way out, um, but that sitting on the fence in fear, um, does nothing to alleviate our troubles, uh, and just prolongs it. Um, his situation reminds me, um, of the common experience of removing a bandage from a wound that has been healed but is still tender. There are those who will peel it away slowly, feeling every bit of pain in every little bit of it being removed, and there are those who will just rip it off to feel a sudden sharp pain and then have it be over with in an instant. But there is a third option, of course, which is to do nothing. While in this scenario it is completely plausible that our wound will eventually heal and the bandage will let go and fall away on its own with absolutely no pain. It just requires patience. However, I can also imagine, uh, this inaction could lead to more pain as the bandage becomes dirty and the wound is prevented from drying out. Doing nothing could possibly lead to a bigger problem as the wound doesn't heal properly and becomes infected. Of these three hypothetical situations, only one of them is pain-free, but unfortunately we I guess it's 4 hypothetical situations. Um, we don't live in hypothetical— but unfortunately, we don't live in hypothetical situations. We live in a fallen world of sin. There are many things that can complicate matters, including the spiritual forces of darkness. And generally, prolonged inaction on our part results in the situations becoming worse. Most cancers caught early can be successfully treated. The ones that show signs but are ignored An allowed defester can kill us. So although in the moment I gave my friend who proclaimed, "I'm damned if I do and I'm damned if I don't," sound, measured, proactive advice at the time, when I— even though at the time I gave that advice, when I most recently related that story to the Freedom in Christ men's group that I led, I said So you think you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't? To hell with that. That is a lie of the enemy who would love to keep you frozen in fear. That's a lie. You may suffer, but we are not to sit idly by while things fall apart around us. We may not be able to fix anything, but God would direct us to do everything we could to make things better. Even if it costs us everything, and he would expect us to trust in him to see us through. So because of thing— because of the things I've walked through, I've discovered that it is best to meet our responsibilities head-on and to quote-unquote get 'er done as soon as possible to solve problems. However, I am not perfect. I genuinely want to be loved by everyone. I am a people pleaser, and because I desperately want to love my neighbor and quote unquote, be kind. I have failed in some instances to, quote unquote, push the issue to make things right, and, and I have left them on the back burner. Uh, in vaguely detailing this current situation in a recent blog post, my wife Tammy Lynn was quite surprised to hear me say that I would deal with it, quote unquote, eventually. These words coming out of my, my mouth didn't sit right with her spirit, and she lovingly shared her concern, saying, 'This doesn't sound like my hubby. Eventually? That isn't you. Let's just get it done.' So yesterday, against my fears and fully knowing that action would cost me, I reached out to retain the service of professionals that could take action on my behalf to right an injustice, to finish some bad business, to compel the quote-unquote wicked to do what was right. So never believe the lie that you are damned if you do or damned if you don't. God has put us here on earth to be holy and righteous, simply to do what is right and to undo the works of the devil, to confound and resist the wicked, to compel the sinful to repent, and, and the irresponsible to be responsible. Of course, that is a hard road, but it is the road that God has put us on, as Christ commanded us to go into the world and make disciples—people who would learn and apply the wisdom of the Lord to their lives. So we are to be vocal in telling others what is right and to encourage them to do so. If someone is living outside of God's will, they are suffering. If we refuse to do what God would have us do, to be righteous, to be bold and courageous, we will suffer. While we can't control what others do, we can take action to stop the suffering and put an end to an untenable situation. As peacemakers, we want the greater peace of being right with God. And sometimes we have to go to war and resist the enemy on the pathway that will lead us there. God wants us to fully surrender to him and fully trust in him. We are not to put trust in men, and we are not to surrender to God in half measures, to compromise his perfect will for a life of a limited or conditional peace that would have us make treaties with the wicked that will eventually cause us to suffer or compromise who who we are in Christ. So to hell with the devil, and to hell with doing nothing because we are afraid of the consequences of the actions that we don't know the outcomes to, and to hell with being less than the people that God calls us to be. Yeah, like Jonah, I walked away from the Lord's call to complete freedom from my past because I was afraid or simply didn't want to. But as I continued to walk in the Spirit, he would, he wouldn't let it, let his desire for me, my well-being, go. And he sent an angel in the person of my wife to encourage me to be bold and courageous and to do the hard things, to be the person he created me to be. So keep walking and talking with God. In Christ, we are never damned, and it is only in trusting him and following him that we can discover that he will be with us every step of the way through the fire of adversity, and that he will see us through no matter what the outcomes are. Trust in God only. As always— well, not as always— today's Bible verse comes to us from the New Living Translation Bible Promise Book for Men. This morning's meditation verse is Romans 6:23, and it says, for the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. Today's verse speaks of the reality that sin is death and that God gives us the free gift of eternal life through Christ alone. Ever, ever feel less than fresh? If we are suffering from bad moods or attitudes, we have most likely stepped off the path of Christian discipleship by either not remembering who we are in Christ or from doing things or thinking things that are contrary to who we are in Christ. And even though it wasn't etched in stones from the finger of God, that's sin. To sin is to miss the mark, basically to go astray from the way the Lord would have us walk. So this includes doing things that go against what God has said is right in his word, as well as not doing the good that God would have us to do. But these, but these things, our behaviors and our inaction, are driven by what we believe about life and us individually. To agree that something is bad but to still do it reveals that a part of us actually believes it is good or desirable in some way that causes us to do it. When we say one thing and do another, uh, it shows we believe the second thing. Um, the wages of sin is death. Ultimately, we are lost if we don't, uh, repent and have our sins covered by the blood of Jesus. That's eternal death and torment in hell. But sin also causes death in our lives as we are filled with shame or guilt or just cold-hearted, spiritually dead when we live independent of and in opposition to the Lord. So as today's verse tells us, we can experience the free gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ alone. And when we follow him and turn from our sin, we can experience a life filled with peace, love, joy, and the other fruit of the Spirit here on earth. So stop collecting those death wages to your mind, body, soul, and spirit by turning away from sin and agreeing with what God says about you, and by avoiding what is wrong and doing what is good. As always, I invite all to go to mtforchrist.org, uh, where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue sharing from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Discipleship, also known as The Cost of Discipleship, and we continue in these— the chapter called Chapter 10 in Bonhoeffer's work, Volume 4, Discipleship, uh, The Body of Christ. And so we're sharing a few paragraphs from Bonhoeffer's chapter on the body of Christ, and if you want to check those out, go to m.tforchrist.org and you'll see them on at the end of today's blog post. Well, yeah, time to get her done and, you know, spite your nose, you know, whatever. I don't know, I don't know, I don't know what the outcomes are gonna be. All I know is I had to get some representation and, you know, do something, do something. And of course it costs you greatly, so we're gonna trust the Lord and and pray and hope that things work out and there's— he'll make a way where there seems to be no way. That's all we can do. As I've counseled people in the past, you know, when we're faced with untenable situations, bad things, all we can do is everything we can do. We can— we start working the problem. We start working to fix things. We do everything in our power to correct correct the situation. And every step of the way, we trust in the Lord to help us. And when we're in communion with him daily through our daily spiritual practices of prayer and Bible study and just walking and talking with God, we know he's with us. And amazing things happen. My testimony, the reason I do these messages and the podcast and the blog or whatever, is because of the experiential reality of the Lord in my life. Um, he's led me into great things, and he's led me to a wonderful bride in my wife, uh, Tammy Lynn, who's calling me to be the man, um, that God created me to be, the man that I want to be, and the man that I am, uh, for the most part, you know, and progressively becoming. And that's all we can do, is we want to become the people that God wants us to become. And when we do that, you know, we might go through adversity, we might run into opposition, we might be rejected, we might lose things, but we gain the greater peace that comes from knowing the Lord and doing his will. And, uh, that's, that's what matters. So we encourage that. If you, if you want some more instruction on your freedom in Christ. We have discipleship teachings on our podcast and our YouTube channel to encourage you and to teach you and to, you know, inspire you to walk out a life of Christian discipleship. The classes are all based on the word of God and the work of Dr. Neil Anderson. The classes are called Victory Over the Darkness, The Bondage Breaker, and Freedom in Christ, and they're all available for your on the podcast. We also have an informal Bible study that we do with Arthur and Susanna Sincotti on a regularly weekly basis, and our latest one was called The Lampstand. So if you want to check that, that's on the, uh, the podcast as well. Also, I'm doing a study on discipleship and Bonhoeffer's discipleship, and we did lesson 17, 16, 17. Yeah, 17 last night on Bonhoeffer's chapter, The Saints, from The Cost of Discipleship. So if you want to see part 1 of that chapter, go to M.t. Clark for Christ, the podcast, or our YouTube channel to view that PowerPoint presentation and teaching. Basically, that's drawn right from Bonhoeffer's work. So we try to, you know, provide encouragement and resources to encourage people in their walk because I know how contrary the world is to this walk of faith. Um, you know, and, and, you know, when you know it's possible, uh, when you know that what the word of God says is true about you, you can, you can experience your freedom in Christ. And it's a whole different level than the church game that some people play. Um, you know, this is more than the form You know, more than sitting down and standing up in a pew. This is more than a weekly service. This is a life of following the Spirit in everything you do and surrendering yourself to his will and rejecting the world and its lies and believing his truth. And when you do that, brother, sister, your life is glorious. So even, even in your suffering, um, so, but there's hardly any suffering, but there will be. Anyway, um, I don't know what the Lord has in store for you, but I know it's good, and I encourage you to keep walking and talking with God. Anyway, let's pray. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, we thank you for all that you do for us. Lord, we thank you for giving us courage and strength when we need it, and wisdom in the way you talk to us through other people and experiences, the way you guide our path. We thank you so much for what you do for us, Lord. We pray again for the people listening or reading this message. We pray for you to bless them and guide them in their, in their walk of faith. And Lord, as always, we pray for you to go before us, set things up for our day today, and, uh, and to open our eyes to the things you want us to see and to lead us in the way we should go. It's all we want to do is represent you as, as on the, on the earth. And, uh, help us to do the good things you would have us do today, Lord. Lord, we thank you, we praise you, and we love you. And we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.