I Don’t Have a Problem – Lies of the Enemy #25– Purity 1037

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 the sun sitting on top of a cloud formation as its light illuminates the green grass and decorative well in the side yard of my place down by the river comes to us from yours truly as I deliberately walked around the corner of my house to capture what I knew would be a worthwhile sight as the sun was riding high this past Friday afternoon upon my arrival home from work. My presence at River House was atypical for a Friday because when I don't have to work on Saturday, Saturday like I did this past weekend, I normally go north to my countryside home to be with my wife. But even though I was tired and had things to do indoors, when I realized that there was something good just around the corner, I made a point to take the time to appreciate it. Well, it's Monday again, and my one-day weekend flew by, but I was blessed by it all the same, as my wife and I had our humble countryside home to ourselves on Saturday evening, and we spent yesterday in each other's company at church and at a picnic with a short hike in the afternoon. What our time together lacked in quantity was made up for in quality. Of one another, the, the quality of one another's presence. But that was yesterday, and it is not only back to work and back to reality today. I have the added excitement of having to pull things together in terms of preparing to lead the recovery/discipleship growth group Celebrate Freedom at my, at my church in 2 days. This afternoon I plan on going to the church to check out the facilities of the classroom I'll be teaching in, to know experientially what I can do and what I can't do in the place. Our meetings will include a time of worship, and while the classrooms have television monitors, I need to know if I can utilize them to do worship via Lyric videos on YouTube, or if I will have to use my wife's karaoke machine and hand out lyric sheets. Assurances and the intellectual acknowledge that I could probably do that is not enough. I may not be from Missouri, but when it comes to running a recovery ministry, I need to— I— you need to just wait. Let's see, uh, I need— yeah, I, I miswrote all this, so I have to correct it here. Let's say, when I— when it comes to running a recovery ministry, uh You can't just tell me what I could do. You need to show me, uh, what I can and will do. I have to see and do it for myself so I can know experientially I can do this. I have also finally taken the time to review the first lesson that I will be teaching on Wednesday night on Denial. Although I taught from the Celebrate Recovery material regularly for 5 years at my previous church, I haven't reviewed these lessons since the fall of 2020. When I made the executive decision to make the recovery ministry a Community Freedom Ministry, which led to the M.t. for Christ 247 podcast, my marriage to Tammy Lynn, and to becoming an online discipleship course leader for Freedom in Christ Ministries. So even though I know I could lead a recovery ministry again, I took time last night and this morning to experience, uh, the read-through of the first lesson for from the Celebrate Recovery curriculum. I need to know more than the fact that I could do it. I need to know I can do it by reading through and teaching the material. Um, the Celebrate Recovery material is good, and after a few alterations to the verbiage here and there to satisfy my focus on trusting the Lord and pursuing freedom rather than just doing recovery, I feel confident that I will be ready to encourage the new group to trust the Lord to help them with their hurts, habits, and hangups. The first step to freedom from our problems, of course, is getting past our denial by admitting we have a problem and asking the Lord to help us to overcome it. And as I am still in the midst of our current series on the Lies of the Enemy, which is an examination of some of the common lies, sometimes sneakily whispered into our minds as first-person statements that the enemy tells us to cause us to doubt our faith, lose our peace, cause division, or influence us to not follow the Lord with the way we live our lives. I've decided to shine a light on our denial for what it really is: just another big lie of the enemy. So today's big lie is number— lie number 25: I don't have a problem. Whether this lie is in reference to the spiritual realm where the enemy would have you deny any need of a Savior, or it is told in reference to sinful or selfish choices that separate us from God or others, the lie of "I don't have a problem," which is also classic denial, seeks to keep us in the darkness of our current bondage or broken state. And prevents us from experiencing the new, abundant life of peace and joy that the Lord has made available to all who put their faith in Jesus. While this lie is an effective lie to keep people from pursuing spiritual matters or a relationship of faith with God at all, it also operates in the confines of church buildings and the hearts of some who would claim to be Christians. When we can see how "I don't have a problem" can lead non-believers to follow it up with an "I don't need God or Jesus" proclamation. "I don't have a problem" can also be used by those who claim to be followers of Jesus. I use that phrasing purposely because it is the term my pastor, Roscoe Lilly, uses to describe Christian disciples. We are not just believers, we are followers of Jesus, because its verbiage indicates that we don't just believe, that what Jesus said is true, we actually try to apply his teachings to our lives. We believe it, and so we try to live it— live out our faith. Or, there we go. However, some Christians believe in God's forgiveness, mercy, and grace to cover a multitude of sins so much that they have fallen into the error of cheap grace, which is belief without repentance. They proudly claim that they are sinners saved by grace and do nothing to reduce or change the sinful activities they do. They reason, "I don't have a problem," because Christ paid for their sin, and so they sin and confess and thank God over and over for his mercy and love, but refuse to follow his guidance to seek sanctification through repentance. This attitude of "I don't have a problem because of Jesus" is extremely common in our churches today and accounts for what should be surprising, surprising research findings that saved Christian lifestyles are not significantly different from their unsaved, non-believing neighbors or non-religious neighbors. Cheap grace makes the church as dirty as the rest of the world. With unrepentant Christians— another oxymoron— claiming their not-perfect-but-forgiven status. This attitude covers everything from secular worldliness, worldliness, to the sins of the flesh, as people use their faith to excuse their sin. As hypocritical as this attitude is, it seems to be on the rise as more and more churches are affirming or excusing blatant sinful lifestyles and practices, all in the name of love or for the purpose of sharing "the Gospel of Jesus." The problem is that Jesus said to do something more than just to believe the Gospel. In Mark 1:15, Jesus said, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the Gospel." We are to believe in the Gospel and we are to repent. So don't believe the lie that I don't have a problem if you don't have Jesus as your Lord and Savior. And don't believe the lie, that lie, that lie if because you have Jesus you think that you can continue in the practices, activities, or lifestyles that the Bible calls sins, works of the flesh, as in Galatians 5:19-21, or an abomination, as Leviticus 18:22 points out. Instead, look at your life honestly, and if there are attitudes or actions that contradict what the Word of God says, admit that you do have a problem to God and to a trusted brother or sister in Christ, and ask them to help you to change. God can help you with all of your problems, um, but, uh, the first step is to tell him I have a problem and I need your help. Um, and that moves us to the Bible verse of the day. Today's Bible verse comes to us from the New Living Translation Bible Promise Book for Men. This morning's meditation verses are Luke 12:8-9, and Jesus said I tell you the truth, everyone who acknowledges me publicly here on earth, the Son of Man, will also acknowledge in the presence of God's angels. But anyone who denies me here on earth will be denied before God's angels. Today's verses speak of the— to the fact that if we believe in God and make and have made Jesus our Lord and Savior, we will be outspoken about our faith. Here Jesus tells us that his followers will also be his witnesses by acknowledging our faith in him publicly, with the warning that those who deny him here on earth would be denied in eternity. The Apostle Peter springs to mind as a case study here. He, of course, out of fear, denied Christ 3 times. But after Jesus was resurrected and all doubts of him being the Messiah were gone, and after Jesus received the Holy Spirit, Peter's days of denial were gone as he became a vocal and outspoken evangelist and leader of the church to the point of martyrdom. So as Christians, we must speak about, about and live out our faith by being a witness of Jesus Christ. When we acknowledge Him on earth, we will be acknowledged by Him in eternity. We can have the full assurance of our salvation and place in God's kingdom when we witness for Christ. As always, we invite everyone to go to mtforchrist.org 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 sharing from June Hunt's Satan, Demons, and Satanism: A Sinister Reality, and today we're moving into section 3, which which is the causes of attraction to satanic worship, and subsection A, the pitfall of pride. And there's quite a few Bible verses there, um, you know, basically today to talk, talk to the issue of pride. And the question is asked: since Satan knows so much about scripture, even well enough to quote it, why doesn't he know that his fate is sealed? And so if you want to hear that, the answer to that question, go to mt4christ.org and you'll see it at the end of today's blog post. Also at the end of today's blog post, you'll see an encouragement to join our, our discipleship series of classes for Victor Over the Darkness, The Bondage Breaker, and Freedom in Christ. They teach all about who you are in Christ, the spiritual forces of darkness, and how you can experience your freedom in Christ. To know it experientially. So if you want to learn and try to experience that, if you haven't already, you can check out our teachings that are on the podcast and our YouTube channel under each of those class names. They're all based on the Word of God and the work of Dr. Neil Anderson. And if you contact me at mtforchrists247@gmail.com, I'd even provide you with the class materials that I handed out when I taught these classes originally in 2020. 21. So there's that. And obviously we revere the word of God, uh, the Bible, and we encourage people to study it every day. The way we do that here at the podcast is that we do a topical Bible study of sorts with Arthur and Susanna Sincotti. Yesterday we completed another study, and it was on the, uh, the simplicity of the gospel, which It was more of an explanation of, you know, Christian living and how it's simple. Our faith is simple, you know. So forgive us if we sort of, you know, led you astray to think we were going to be talking about how simple the gospel is. It's about living simply before our God in faith in Jesus. So, but if you want to check out that study, that's on the YouTube channel and our podcast, and we invite you to check out the archives of all our Bible studies, as that was our 101st episode of our Bible study that began back in 2021. So we enjoy— uh, if you don't have any Bible study to go to locally, you can join ours. Well, it is Monday after all, and I do have a long day of work and then running to a church and checking out facilities, hopefully if I get access. Um, maybe running to get a karaoke machine. So we've got a lot of— a lot to do, and so we should definitely pray. Um, also, I, I offer up prayers for Susanna Sincotti's mother, who had a medical crisis last evening. I don't know what the status is currently, but we offer prayers for her. We also have a prayer for a dear friend who lost her husband, um, who I encourage to pray, you know, to stay close to the Lord and pray and to thank him. And you know, it's difficult to tell someone who's suffering loss to thank God, but that's really, you know, God is with us through it all, and that's what we can thank him for, is his presence and the blessings he's given us in the past. So I'm not sure what these outcomes will be like in terms of dealing with grief and dealing with sicknesses, but even in the midst of all our struggles, we can thank the Lord just because he saved us and he loves us and he's going to guide us to a good place one way or the other. And so we can never forget to be thankful. And, um, I'm thankful for my friends that I care about enough to mention on the podcast, and I'm thankful for all the people who would be listening, um, you know, to this or reading the message. So let's pray. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, we thank you for anyone who's listening or, or, or, or reading this message, or, and all our friends, Lord, as we We brought them before you. We ask you to come alongside them and their, and their, and their issues, their problems. And we ask you to help them with their walk every day. And Lord, we just, uh, we just want to represent you here on the earth, but we need your help. Um, we need to see the truth and remember it and live by it. And we need you to guide us as we go, um, as the world, the flesh, and the devil all try to confuse us and tear us away from the faith that gives us peace. Um, so Lord, we just ask you to go before us, to open our eyes to things you want us to see, and lead our steps in the things you want us to do, and guide us in the way we should go. Lord, we thank you, we praise you, and we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.