Focal Point

Announcer: Today on Focal Point with Pastor Mike Fabarez. The Bible says that we should all be looking out for each other. You are your brother's keeper. You should care about those around you. And it's time for us to say, I'm going to care enough when I see someone in sin to step out and say, hey, I know maybe my life isn't perfect, but I can tell you, I just know that's not what God wants you to be doing. Don't we care enough to do this?

When we're brave enough to honestly admit our mistakes, we often describe them as private sins or personal struggles. We tend to think that our battle with temptation is an individual fight, but today on Focal Point, Pastor Mike Fabarez shows that when we attack the sin in our own lives, we're really fighting for each other. We're in a series called Our Fight with Sin. And to go along with our study, we're offering any first-time listener a free copy of Pastor Mike's new booklet, Battling Sin. Just reach out online at focalpointradio.org.

Now here's Pastor Mike.

Pastor Mike Fabarez: The Bible teaches that if you're going to receive eternal life, you can't earn it. That's what grace is all about. That if you're going to go to heaven, you can't do enough good things to get there. If you're going to be a Christian, you're a Christian solely on the work of Christ and it has nothing to do with your good deeds.

Now, back to Hebrews chapter 12. Verse number 14 now becomes jarring against the backdrop of grace because in our minds, if our salvation has nothing to do with our good works, what's this statement all about that we got to make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy because without holiness, no one will see the Lord. I don't understand. I thought I get to see the Lord and it has nothing to do with my good deeds.

You're absolutely right. Real grace, here's the truth. Real grace fights sin. Okay? If you have embraced real biblical grace, okay? Then your life will, by necessity, it will fight sin. That's why our fight against sin is required and non-optional because you cannot be a Christian and it have real grace in your life without that grace moving us to fight sin.

The reality of the Bible is simply this, if you are saved by the grace of God, that grace of God is going to drive you to become holy. And if your life is not becoming more holy, then you are not justified. Therefore, the writer of Hebrews can say without holiness, no one will see the Lord.

And that's not imputed holiness, that's the practice of holiness. What I thought we didn't earn our salvation by our good deeds? We don't. See? But if we have been given the grace of God, it transforms our life and he produces in us people that are eager to do what is good. And that's not something that's an option for the Christian.

You can do all you want to talk around that or say, well, I want to judge people like that. Well, Jesus taught us to do this. Matthew 7:16. He says, here it is, you've heard this before, by their fruits you will recognize them. Right? You'll know them by their fruits. And the point is should be able to tell. Christians will have changed lives and changing lives.

There ought to be as the writer of Hebrews says, an an an an extreme effort, make every effort to be holy. Are you making every effort to be holy? If you say no because you're relying on the grace of God, jot this one down. Jude verse 4. There are people that have crept in among you that turn the grace of God into a license to sin.

In other words, they say, well, I I I'm not trying hard to be holy because whatever, I believe in the grace of God. The Bible calls that out as heresy. Really? Yeah. Really. Hebrews chapter 12. Let's go back there for a second. Now that's the ultimate motivation. Why are we going through the hassle of fighting sin? Well, because it's part and parcel of real Christianity.

I got no choice. I don't even have grace in my life if I'm not fighting sin. But he gives us more motivation. He says in verse 15, See to it that no one misses the grace of God. Make sure they all have the grace of God, which will be evidenced by making every effort to be holy. He says, and see to it that no bitter root grows up, and then he describes a problem with sin.

When sin is growing in our lives, as opposed to righteousness growing in our lives, here's what it does. It causes trouble and defiles many. Here's another motivation. One of the reasons we fight this thing is because sin unchecked in our lives creates trouble according to verse 15, and defiles many.

There are a lot of consequences to ongoing sin that we ought to fear. Number two, let's jot it down that way. We ought to fear the consequences of ongoing sin. And that means that if sin is growing in my life instead of sanctification or holiness, then what I ought to recognize is that I should be expecting an increase of trouble and defilement.

And this is not the discipline we already dealt with that. God is going to discipline his his wayward children, but this is the fact that sin itself, if it's unchecked and growing in our lives, causes trouble. It causes defilement. It hurts the church. The church is hurt. If you don't take care of sin in your life and fight it and you let it grow in your life, the church will be hurt.

Defilement for instance. That's a word that is sometimes translated or at least explained and described and defined as contamination. When one part of the body of Christ is filled with lives that have unchecked sin, whether it's, and let's look at the examples in the passage, bitterness verse 15, sexual immorality verse 16, or general godliness of the expedience of Esau, who just did whatever he wanted to do whenever he wanted to do it.

When there's bitterness, sexual immorality, and and and general godlessness in your life, here's the deal. That contaminates the many. It defiles many. You don't sin in a vacuum. You sin in a network of relationships. Not only that, let's think about the trouble it causes for us outside of the church. Okay? Not only does it defile many in the church, it causes defilement outside of the church.

In in in a passage where Nathan confronts David about his sin with Bathsheba, remember that passage? In 2 Samuel, here comes Nathan, and one of the things he says, which is tucked away unfortunately in some of the English translations, but some of them make it clear, where he comes and he says, here's one of the reasons God is not happy with what you've done. Here's what he says, is because you have given cause for the Gentiles to blaspheme us, right?

In other words, we trash our reputation as God's people. Divorce and sexual immorality, do you think that hurts the church? Do you think the outsider looks at us and and and and has a has a jaded view of us if we can't keep our marriages together? Are we perfect? No, we're not perfect, but boy, we're sure working to be more like the perfect one, the perfect son of God.

Let's keep our marriages together, right? Let's not be sexually immoral. Let's stop it with the bitter attitude. Let's stop it with the expedience of wanting what we want when we want it. Let's be self-controlled and godly in the present world, waiting for the blessed hope. That would be a good thing. And let's be distinctive as a community of believers.

Fear the consequences of ongoing sin, it hurts the church, it hurts us internally, it contaminates us internally, but contradictions also trash our reputations outside the church. Ah, I want to take you to another passage on this one. Can I do that? I got the microphone, so I'm going to do it. 1 Peter chapter 2. 1 Peter 2. This one drives it home. This is a great passage.

Because we're already up against it with non-Christians, aren't we? I mean, the world already is looking for a reason to not embrace us or our message, right? They're fighting us in their hearts. They suppress according to Romans. They suppress the truth in unrighteousness. So we've it's a high hurdle for us, a steep road.

1 Peter chapter 2, verse number 12. We got to give it a double effort here to keep our reputation intact. Live such good lives among the pagans that though they accuse you of doing wrong, and they're always looking for something, right? They may see your good deeds. They won't find wrong, they'll see good things, and they'll glorify God on the day he visits us. And I don't know if that's in vindication, in that they're lost anyway, but they're, well, they were I guess they were godly after all.

Or whether it's the fact that our good deeds lead them to repentance, but either way it's a good thing. And the Bible says redouble your efforts, live such good lives among these onlookers that even though they accuse you of doing wrong, they'll see your good deeds and one day they'll change their perspective about you. Look at verse 15 after some specific instructions about how to deal with the government, he says in verse 15, for it is God's will that by doing good, you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.

And here's the deal, they're all out there telling us we're a bunch of fools and and hypocrites and we're no different than the rest of the world. Can we do good? Keep our marriages together? Stop with the bitter attitudes? Stop with the backbiting and the general godlessness so that ultimately we can silence their talk? I'd like that to be silenced.

And we hide behind these these these false perceptions of grace and think we got license to do wrong, we don't. Let's make every effort to be holy. Fear the consequences of ongoing sin. Letter A, the church is hurt. But the worst thing, and we've already touched on this, but let's look at it from a more personal perspective, will be surrounded with people like Esau. Esau.

I mean, we'll have people in our lives that we sit next to in church and if there's unchecked sin in their lives or maybe us ourselves, we will really be churchgoers that aren't saved. Okay? Letter B, let's put it that way. Here's the real tragedy. Churchgoers that aren't saved. People that sit there listening to these sermons week after week and they they're not even Christians.

Does that not take us back to Matthew chapter 7? Dare I have to read that one more time? I mean, he says depart from me, I never knew you. Oh, but wait a minute, we sat through all that Kentucky Fried Chicken on Thursday nights and listened to endless sermons about. Come on, let us in. No, depart from me, I never knew you, you who practice lawlessness.

You never got sin, it wasn't even a battle in your life. You prove that your justification wasn't real because you never made serious efforts at sanctification. James chapter 1, verse 22 says, don't merely listen to the word and so deceive yourself. The problem is that we can sit through church as I once said in a sermon, the hazards of church are that we get more and more deceived because we know a lot.

You know, we figure out, well, I I know something about Daniel 9 prophecy and I can I you know, I can tell you about eschatology or I know something about the books of the Bible or or biblical history, but we're never in our hearts transformed. And the Bible says that's a deceiving place to be. And if this sounds like old hat, I just want to quote Philippians 3:1.

I know you've heard me preach on this many times, but as Paul said, it's no trouble for me to do it again and to say it again and to write it again, but it's a safeguard for you. Check yourself to see if you're of the faith. Examine your life. And by the way, look at the text again. It's not just your life you should be concerned with. Back to Hebrews 12.

Make every effort to live in peace. Now we don't see this as clearly in English, but here is a clear second person plural imperative. Y'all check yourself. Make sure you're working hard to be be godly people. Make every effort all of you. Okay? That seems very individualistic. I know it's to a group, but it hits us in the chest. That's not what happens in the next two verses.

Verse 15 starts with a different kind of verb. He doesn't say, you know, check yourself. He says in verse 15, see to it that no one misses the grace of God. It's repeated in our English text in verse 16. And see to it that no one is sexually immoral. Do you see how that takes the finger, changes the perspective, it's not just pointing at my chest, it's pointing at me and those around me.

And it's saying, hey, you got to look you got to look around you. See to it that no one is sexually immoral. You know, let's make it, let's make an uncomfortable sermon even more uncomfortable. You ready for this? Okay? Number three on your outline. We need to evaluate ourselves, evaluate yourself, and (capital A N D) care about other people. And that means that when you see someone who is bitter, when you see someone that is sexually immoral, when you see some professing believer who is generally godless in his decisions, you need to confront them.

The word here, and it's even more it's even stronger than our English text translated. Some of you are familiar with this word, episcopos. You've heard that one before? Episcopos, the noun, we get the words uh Episcopal church from that. Episcopos is one of three words in in the Greek New Testament for the pastor. Episcopos, right? It's translated in the old translations the bishop.

It's translated in in our modern translations the overseer. Episcopos. This is one of two times that word shows up as a verb, right? And it's not you you overseers. It's you should be overseeing. Okay? And guess what? It's not addressed to pastors. Because I know what a lot of you're thinking. Isn't that the pastor's job? He sees someone in sin in the church, he can take care of it.

Here's the deal. If someone is is engaged in sexual immorality in this church right now, you will learn about it before anybody on staff ever hears a a whiff of it. And the Bible says that we should all be looking out for each other. Episcopao, we should be looking out, we should be overseeing, we should be seeing to it that those around us, not only ourselves, aren't bitter, three examples in our text, aren't sexually immoral, and aren't godless.

I don't want to be the Holy Spirit in somebody's life, you know? I don't want to be the Holy Spirit. I don't want to be the salvation police. I'm not my brother's keeper. Remember what God thought of the last guy that said that, right? That's not a good answer. You are your brother's keeper. You should care about those around you. And when you get a whiff of sexual immorality or bitterness or general godlessness in someone's life, don't don't just pick up the phone and call the pastors, right? You need to be seeing to it that that's not happening in your circle of influence.

Oh, that's going to be tough. I might they might they might not like me after that. They might not. But it isn't about being liked. This isn't the passage, you know, how to be popular in in your social circles, right? This is a passage about being passionate about God's calling on our lives to be a holy community. And it's time for us to say, I'm going to care enough when I see someone in sin to step out and say, hey, I I I I you know, I know that I'm not perfect.

I know maybe my my my life isn't perfect, but I I can tell you, I just know that's not what God wants you to be doing. And and maybe we can sit down and talk about it. Maybe we can help each other and maybe I can help you. See to it that no one misses the grace of God. See to it that no one is sexually immoral. See to it that no one is godless.

Let me drive this home with one quick passage in Galatians chapter 6. Galatians chapter 6. And I know sometimes we see this word in in Galatians 6:1, caught, and we think, oh, that's a scandal, you know, that's that's a big scandal. When someone's caught in a scandal, that just it means the concept of it's been revealed. You learn about it. Galatians 6:1. Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin.

If you see bitterness, if you see a hint of sexual immorality, if you see godlessness, you who are spiritual, and that doesn't mean you have to be perfect to do this, this just means you're not entrapped in the same thing, right? You who are spiritual should restore him. Do it gently though. And again, there are some people that really like this point. Oh, great, I get to go and, you know, police other people's lives.

If you like this point, it's probably not for you. Okay? If you're reluctant about this point, okay, then it is for you. Then God is trying to remind you that when you see someone in a sin, you need to go and you need to restore the person gently, but watch yourselves, because you might be tempted too. So be careful how you engage in this. Carry one another's burdens. And in this way, you fulfill the law of Christ.

What's that all about? Here's the deal. We like to think about our Christian life in a very autonomous, individualistic way. I'm just going to worry about myself. I'm not I can't care about those people in my I mean, I don't know, it's just between them and God. When you hear yourself saying that to yourself, just recognize that in the law of Christ. Christ didn't come to please himself, he didn't come to serve himself.

The concept of the law of Christ is to care for other people. And when you see someone displaying symptoms of these kinds of sins, we ought to get involved. Carry their burdens. Watch out, do it gently, watch yourself, you could be tempted. And you know what, don't we care enough, and I use the word care advisedly. Care, don't we care enough to do this? What if the person you're sitting next to right now in church ends up in the lake of fire?

Let's think that one through for a second. Do you care about that or are you just worried about yourself? You don't want to be the Holy Spirit for anybody else. Just all about you, right? I'll let God it's between them and God. Don't you care? Seriously? Do you care if your spouse is really saved? Don't you care if your friend in your small group is really going to heaven? Don't you care about that?

Let's care enough to say I I've got to I've got to get involved. When I see contradictions, I want to get involved. And I know that's scary for some of us because we don't want anybody pointing out our contradictions. Get over that, right? You can I don't know what to do there. There's no Christianity that's just for individuals. This is a group deal, you realize that.

Paul said the same kind of thing, 2 Corinthians 5. He says, knowing then what it is to fear the Lord, we persuade men. And it started with this verse. We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. The person you're sitting next to right now will have to appear before God, the Almighty God and his judge, Jesus Christ, and have to give an account for his life of all the deeds done in their body, whether good or bad. That's what the Bible says.

Do you care enough to try and mitigate the problem of that day for your friend? Let's get involved. Let's help these folks. Evaluate yourself and care about others. See to it that no one misses the grace of God. See to it that no one is sexually immoral. One last passage. Hebrews chapter 4. Here's the problem. I know a lot of people look at this and go, wow.

It's that serious? It's that important? I don't think I can do it. Ah, it's too hard. Just remember this, you're not on your own. I've got a helper. It's no no mistake that in the scriptures, the Holy Spirit is called our paracletos, our helper. He has not left us to our own devices to try and become sanctified. He's got help for us.

Hebrews 4, and verse 11, he's got the same kind of verbage, make every effort to enter into that rest. The picture here was the promised land. See to it that no one falls by following the example of disobedience of those people in the desert. Don't do that. Then he talks about the word of God. It judges the thoughts and attitudes of our heart. He talks about accountability in verse 13, that we're going to stand before the judgment seat of God. That we'll give an account to him.

And then it says in verse 14, hold firmly to the faith that we profess, but verse 15, here's the deal. We got a high priest who sympathizes with us. He sympathizes with our weaknesses. He knows that we're weak. It's not an excuse to indulge in sin, but he's sympathetic. We've have one who's been tempted in every way just as we are, yet without sin. Let us then, here's the most important verse in this section, approach the throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

Not only we have each other to kind of help, you know, ourselves grow, we've got the Holy Spirit. If you're a real Christian, that's a relationship that the Bible says is so close, it is spatially defined as not being with you, he's being he's in you. That's a big deal. And the point is, when you say, wow, my life's kind of a mess and I got a long way to go to be Christ-like, that's fine.

Boxes everywhere, a disheveled house, fine. You got a helper, and he is great at rearranging your life. He just wants you to take it seriously and make every effort to be holy. If you do that, the Holy Spirit says, great, I'm I'm ready to not only sympathize with your weakness, but to give you mercy and grace in your time of need. God wants to help. He can pull your life together. Let's pray together. I'll let you go.

God help us, please, as we build the base here to understand your promises. I know like uh I mentioned at the outset, it is like standing at the terminal at LAX in that those old round terminals and, you know, what we decide about some of these interpretive decisions are going to make all the difference in the world as to where our eschatology ends up. But I pray that all of us would approach with humility.

I know we're all trying to be consistent with our understanding of how to interpret scripture, but I pray God that as we go down these corridors and and and try and get comfortable with a a particular brand of eschatology that we would be gracious and kind, knowing that the issues about uh pre-tribulationism and and and mid-trib and all mill and post-mill, a lot of these things are are um are fringe issues in the Christian life.

I know that many people claim them to be just catastrophic divergence from one post to another because of, you know, their their their decisions about hermeneutics and how they they interpret scripture, but I pray that we'd be kind, that we would be uh uh recognizing that uh just because we've studied this for a couple hundred hours, that maybe we uh we have some room to adjust our thinking and our ideas about this.

And I pray ultimately that we would trust you, that we'd major on the majors and that we would have some understanding of the particulars and that we would understand divergent views with a sense of grace and love for each other. So help us through these things, God, I pray as we continue to study and look at the implications for the future in Jesus' name. Amen.

Announcer: Christians will have changed lives and will be changing lives. An important takeaway from our message called, Recalling Why This Is So Important. You're listening to Focal Point with Pastor Mike Fabarez. And you can revisit or share today's lesson anytime by going to our website, focalpointradio.org, or download the free Focal Point app, which lets you access all of Pastor Mike's Bible teaching resources wherever you go.

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Claim your copy of Making a Difference when you give this month. Call 888-320-5885, or give online at focalpointradio.org. You can also mail your donation to us by writing to Focal Point, Post Office Box 2850, Laguna Hills, California, 92654. I'm Dave Drewey, tune in next time for the start of Pastor Mike's next message on being motivated by Heaven's perspective. That's Wednesday, on Focal Point.

Pastor Mike Fabarez: Hi, Pastor Mike here. God's word promises it'll never return void. So I wonder, how is God's word moving in your heart right now? Drop us a line, let us know. We'd love to hear from you. We'd love to be praying for you here. Just go to focalpointradio.org, and then be sure to join us again tomorrow right here as we continue to explore the depths of scripture. We'll see you then.

Announcer: Today's program was produced and sponsored by Focal Point Ministries.