Fighting the Good Fight and Deciding to Serve - Purity 1548

Welcome to the MT for Christ 24/7 podcast. I am M.t. Clark, and this is today's photo. To see today's photo, go to mtforchrist.com or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter, or watch us on YouTube. Good morning. Today's photo of the sun rising over the hills in a rustic barn comes to us from Fred Dimmick, who shared this scene from near his former home, uh, near Liberty, Kentucky, if my memory serves me right, on social media back on May 8th, 2021. Well, it's Monday, and as the sun rises on the first full work week of 2025, I am rejoicing over the Lord's faithfulness in helping me to overcome the growing pains of repentance as I made giving up lies my recent New Year's resolution. I previously called it a New Year's revolution, and I stand by that because I have decided to overthrow the government of some persistent strongholds in my life. And instead, and instead of going after them one at a time, I've decided to declare a total war on the things that have kept me enslaved, the lies I believed, and the way those lies have made me— made things I know that are not healthy for me physically, emotionally, mentally, or spiritually to be somehow periodically and regularly acceptable. I decided to take on a few areas of my life that I continually went back to in 2024, even though I knew better, and ended up suffering for it physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. So it's time, um, it's, it's time to fight them and to get rid of them for good. Um, I'm pretty sure we are all familiar with that concept that we do things that we know aren't good for us, and yet we still do them. Uh, for those who have overcome big problems like alcohol, drug, and sex addiction, like I have, there is a tendency to take it easy on the smaller sins in our lives. But if you are trying to walk in the Spirit and you're attempting to make progress in your sanctification, you become more sensitive to the fact that you are in bondage to the flesh in different ways now. And are indulging in the flesh, uh, in fleshly ways to comfort yourself rather than making or standing on the decision to say no to the things that negatively affect your life and to be free from them for good. Um, I was suffering withdrawal from the things I decided to give up over the weekend, and on Saturday I was feeling the pain, and at one point I got frustrated, almost decided to stop this total war campaign. But after a few moments, I was able to calm myself and to see just how necessary this cam— campaign is. Uh, my flesh was rebelling against me, and this was a clear sign that I really needed the fight to be free of the things that had caused my body to cry out for relief. So I relaxed and prayed for the Lord to heal me of my pains and to give me the strength to endure. I also directed my thoughts away from those from any ideas of giving up. And praise the Lord, I began to feel better. And come Sunday morning, the headache I was suffering from was gone. And now I feel great as my body has been detoxed of the things that it was craving. And I feel confident to keep fighting the good fight of faith by trusting the Lord and rejecting those little things that were causing me to fall short of my goal to live a healthy and holy life. So game on! Uh, restoring our temples of the Holy Spirit, our bodies, and can be a lot of work, but it isn't the only work that the Lord has for us to do. I'm looking forward, uh, to beginning another online Freedom in Christ course tomorrow night, and I'm serving at my local church with the Celebrate Freedom support group on Wednesday. Speaking of serving, The In Touch with Dr. Charles Stanley devotion for today addresses the topic, and I'm sharing it on the blog today to encourage all of us to serve God's kingdom. Uh, Dr. Charles Stanley writes, Serving One Another. God designed you to serve a unique and needed role in his church. Believers have two main responsibilities: to love God and to love people. This often— this is often done by serving. Where and how we serve varies based on our talents, skills, and calling, but we're all expected to be involved with a local church. When someone trusts in Jesus as Savior, that person is baptized by the Holy Spirit into the church, the body of believers living all over the world and united by faith. The biblical plan is that the new Christian will then choose, in accordance with God's will, to join a local church, uh, well, a local group of believers where he or she is loved and needed. The church is more than a community. It's a body of individual members created by God to function in communion with one another. Christians, like the world at large, are a diverse group of people, so we have to strive for unity. But our differences are something to be celebrated, which— with each person uniquely contributing to God's purpose. A church truly operating as a unit, with all its varied gifts, talents, personalities, and intellects focused toward kingdom goals, is a thing of beauty in the Lord's eyes. The body of Christ functions most beautifully when all its members resolve to serve God and each other to the best of their ability. How can you serve today? That was from Dr. Charles Stanley, and I say amen. Um, although I encourage a personal walk of faith with daily spiritual practice, I also recognize the need for us to be a part of, a part of, and to serve at a local church. Yesterday, my pastor took part of his sermon, part of his sermon, to recognize the sudden death of one of his flock that had that had happened in the past week. This deceased brother had been a faithful servant to our church, and his loss had hit hard because he was loved by those he served with at our church. This man had faithfully served our church for years in various ways, and our pastor gave him honor for his faithfulness and to point to him as an example, uh, who got— uh, as someone who got it, um, someone who not only said they believed in Jesus but someone who demonstrated their faith with action. So let me encourage you to be a part of a local church and to serve it in some capacity. The local church is the place where your faith can grow exponentially, as you will discover opportunities to learn more about your faith and how to live as a Christian. We all need each other, and the body of Christ and your local church needs you to give more of yourself to God's kingdom, uh, kingdom God's kingdom cause by making the decision to serve. Today's Bible verses come from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling by John G. Cruis. This morning's meditation, uh, meditation verses come from the section on humility or pride, and it references Ephesians 1:11-14 but shares 1:11-12, which says, in him we are also chosen, having been predestined according to the the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we who were the first to put our hope in Christ might be for the praise of his glory. Today's verses are the first of four passages of scripture that fall under the sixth point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on humility or pride. And that sixth point is: Are you a Christian? Born again? If so, God alone gets the glory. Today's Bible verses remind us that although we can claim that we wised up and chose to follow God, God chose us first. Our faith is supernatural. God intervenes in our lives to call us into the kingdom. In John 6:44-45, Jesus said, no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up at the last day. It is written in the prophets. They will all be taught by God. Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me. God brought us into the kingdom. God caused us to come to Jesus. This truth should cause us to rejoice and to humble us, uh, because the God of the universe decided to reach through time and space to save us. We couldn't save ourselves, but God was gracious to save wretches like us. And when consider the world and how it rejects the Lord, rejects the Lord, we should really be humbled by how fortunate we are to know God and to be in his royal family. As always, we encourage everyone to go to mtforchrist.com, where we always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist our brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue to share from Day by Day Along the Way by J.E. Adams. It's a 365-day devotional, and we're on day 47, where Adam shares a portion of 1 John 2:10, which says, whoever loves his brother remains in the light, and there is nothing in him to stumble over. And J.E. Adams writes, Christians must put no stumbling blocks before their brothers and sisters in Christ. Love makes them aware of the possibility of doing so and puts a desire in their hearts to avoid all such possibilities. Remaining in the light is the way to place a good example before a brother. If one walks in darkness, his lifestyle becomes a temptation for others to sin by putting stumbling blocks in their way that, that may cause them to trip and fall and thus lead them away from the light into darkness. Love means considering how one's life influences others, either for good or for evil. The Christian who says, 'It's my business what I do, I'm not hurting anyone else,' fails to recognize this fact. Everyone influences others. Often we fail to recognize how great the influence is. The question is, are you influencing others for evil or for good? Answer it truthfully. Amen. And yeah, what we do matters. And, you know, we're called to serve the church. And if we selfishly say, I don't gotta, I don't gotta do that, I don't, you know, I, I do enough, uh, just by going to church on Sunday and, uh, you know, given, given an offering, you know, I pay, I pay some money. Yeah, sure, it's not a tithe, but I pay something. Um, you know, these, these are, you know, examples, um in your setting that lead people not into the light but into darkness, you know, where they could benefit from being a part of the community of the body of Christ at a local church. You're putting forth an example to not do that and to remain worldly. And quite frankly, if, you know, if you haven't actually put your faith in Jesus, it could lead, you know, to your own destruction, your false belief that you're a Christian when you're not, because you've hardened your heart against the idea of following the Lord into service. That's not good. And in other ways, you know, alcohol, drugs, you know, sexual relationships outside of marriage, all of these, you know, that's what I do, and don't tell me what to do, I'm forgiven, and you know, this is how I live, leave me alone. You know, that's leading people into darkness. That's setting a wrong example as someone, as a Christian. If you're trying to represent God's kingdom, you're not doing it right. And that's why we always ask the question: have you fully surrendered to God? Are you trying to walk the walk and talk the talk? Um, it's the only way to be. When I came into faith, because I was such a skeptic for most of my life, uh, you know, an agnostic, or, you know, I don't know what, you know, an atheist at times and following a false religion at other times, um, because I was such a mess before coming into the kingdom of God, when I finally did put my faith in Jesus, I make sure this thing was real. So I investigated, investigated the faith by going to Bible school and, you know, serving at my local church and then getting a master's degree in Christian counseling, going into recovery, living the life of a Christian. And when I did that, I discovered this faith is true. Our God is real and Jesus is his son and our God. And the Holy Spirit lives within us and he's guiding us and encouraging us to go along. And he answers prayers. As I learned this weekend, I really needed it. And I got it, and I'll take it. You know, God's the healer. He made us and he shapes our bodies, causes us to come into not only just the world, but he calls us to come out of the world too. So we have to thank the Lord for our lives and try to, you know, surrender to his purposes. As I stated earlier, part of my purpose is to lead the Celebrate Freedom support group at Starpoint Church, my local church on Clifton Park, New York. We meet on Wednesdays, which is in 2 days, January 8th. We begin again with the Celebrate recovery material. Um, and we invite anybody in the Upstate New York region who get— and can get to Clifton Park who wants to have a fellowship of, uh, you know, believers to help them overcome their hurts, habits, and hangups. We invite them to come out. So please do. You can check out the information at Starpoint Church's website and register for it by going to the events page and clicking on Celebrate Freedom. And register. Um, beyond that, tonight we're, we're jumping out in faith and we're doing an online teaching. Um, basically, um, it's going to be Celebrate Freedom Online, um, for those people who can't get to Clifton Park who want to go into recovery, and maybe they don't have a Christian ministry near them. So we're sharing, um, the Celebrate Recovery material along with, you know, whatever insights or encouragements I have, as I'll try to teaching and coaching you to follow the Lord and to, you know, believe that the Lord will help you. And that, that I'm going to record and upload tonight, and we'll be doing that until we're through all the material. So we hope it blesses somebody, and if it does, we, we would appreciate a donation basically to support our efforts, as it is our time and we do have expenses in terms of the the yearly cost of the website and everything. But we appreciate whatever donations you can give. Thank you. Anyway, we also offer other playlists online, basically, that'll be— that are already out there that you can jump into. We've done teachings for the Victory Over the Darkness, the Bondage Breaker, Freedom in Christ, and our very own Celebrate Freedom discipleship course. Plus we do the podcast every day, um, to encourage people that this is a real person who's not perfect but who's trying to follow the perfect one, Jesus, um, to, to the abundant life that he has for us. And so we, and, you know, we put these out there because we believe you can find or increase your freedom in Christ by, you know, plugging into what these teachings tell you and following them. You know, into a life that's new and awesome. Uh, anyway, we end every podcast by asking the question, are you empty for Christ too? And that just simply means, are you surrendered to God? Um, are you, are you making room for the Lord to come in and impact your life? And, uh, are you serving his kingdom? Are you walking in faith? If so, we say awesome. Keep on walking and talking with God. If not, we encourage you to do so. And, uh, to pray, um, pray to the Lord to reveal himself. Pray for, um, Jesus to become your Lord and Savior, and, uh, let the Holy Spirit come in and make a change in your life. Um, it happened to me, and I know it can happen to you. If you're hearing this message, this is the Lord calling you to, to come into the kingdom. Um, and we know prayer works, and so we pray every day, like right now. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. We thank you so much for all that you've done for us, Lord. We thank you most, uh, you know, a lot for the healing that you brought in the last, uh, 24 hours or 48 hours. Um, we appreciate it. We feel great because we are trying to follow you with the way we live our lives, Lord. When we still need your help, uh, so we're asking for help for us to maintain our strength and to walk in victory and freedom., going forward today. And plus, we need your help at work. We need you to open our eyes to the things you want us to see and the way we should go. And also, we pray for anyone reading and listening or watching this message today, Lord, that you come alongside them and their prayer request and bless them too. We all need your help, Lord, and we're praying for you to, to help us. And we know you're a good, good Father who gives good gifts to those who ask. So we're asking, Lord, we thank you, we praise you, we love you. And we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.