Focal Point

Pastor Mike Fabarez: For those that think coming to Christ is the end of the battle, you need to recognize it's the beginning of the battle. And if you want to be passive and kick your feet up on the desk and say, "Well, I'm loved by God and the grace of God. I'm into all that. I don't really need to fight this stuff," you're a disaster waiting to happen. You've got to recognize it requires a fight. And you and I need to be ruthless about it.

Dave Drewie: Today on Focal Point with Pastor Mike Fabarez. Look around your church and you'll notice men and women who've been Christians for decades and others who are brand new in their faith. But you can count on this: old or young believer alike, no one ever outgrows the war against temptation.

Today on Focal Point, Pastor Mike Fabarez looks to God's word for ways to be victorious in our fight with sin and reminds us that we're not alone. Perhaps you're facing a few battles of your own today. Well, Pastor Mike explains where to turn for help.

Pastor Mike Fabarez: Let's open up God's word again with you in Hebrews chapter 12. But before we dig deeply into that, I want to remind you how Jesus loved to use the analogy of the shepherd as he described his relationship with his people. He describes himself in John 10 as the good shepherd, not just the shepherd, the good shepherd who has, of course and obviously, good intentions for his sheep.

But for the sheep to participate and realize the good intentions that are available to the sheep because of the shepherd, it is requisite upon them to actually follow the shepherd. That seems to be our part of the responsibility. He's the shepherd and we're the sheep. Our responsibility is to follow him.

As a matter of fact, simply put, it sounds easy, but it's not. Jesus made that clear when he said every sheep of mine is going to be surrounded by competing forces. There will be things and people and desires that are going to try to detract and draw people away from the leadership of the shepherd. He quantifies that in the analogy with the words "thieves and robbers," and he says there are all kinds of them.

As a matter of fact, he says in the most famous verse in John 10, verse number 10, "You need to recognize that the thieves, they only come to steal, kill, and destroy." He says, "But I have come as the good shepherd. I've come to give you life." And he doesn't end it there so we're not just left with some broad eschatological view of salvation from punishment. He gets really practical and he says, "and that you might have it to the full." I want you to have it the way it's supposed to be.

Do you realize how much of your life, the quality of it, the fulfillment of it, the gratitude of it, the joy that you experience, it really comes down to this one basic thing: how well are you following the shepherd? Or are you distracted and entangled and drawn off the path, and are you struggling as you have all these competing forces in your life?

With so much hanging on whether we faithfully follow the shepherd, and your life, really the daily quality of it, contingent on that, I think it would do us well as we take Hebrews 12 seriously to open ourselves up to God and his Spirit and say, "I need to get serious about this issue. It needs to be priority one, top priority. And I am willing to walk this path and run this race and get serious about fighting all the distractions and everything that wants to take me off the path of walking in step with our great shepherd."

That ought to be just a basic fundamental desire of our lives. And yet it's series like this that you don't find too much in the modern church. This is operation crowd reduction for most churches to talk about sin and temptation. This is putting our lives under the microscope of God's Spirit and saying in the heart of Psalm 139, "Search us and try us. See if there's any wicked way in us. Check our lives out, God, because we want to be holy. We want to live holy lives."

That seems to be unique, as the churches today seem to be very, very interested in doing nothing but pat ourselves on the back for what we already know and believe and reminding ourselves that we're loved by God. Oh, that's super important, but I hope you recognize that the love of God and the grace of God, as Paul wrote to Titus, instructs us to deny ungodliness. And if God is going to find a people that he is rejoicing in, it will be a people that are zealous for good works. It'll be a people that say, "God, we want to be holy like you're holy." And we're serious about taking every encumbrance and getting it out of the way because we want to be faithful to follow you.

It's a big deal. It's a big deal because sin is a big rip-off. It's a big deal because the big attributes of God are at stake. It's a big deal for a lot of reasons. In Hebrews chapter 11, we saw we called it ambitious faith, and we looked at all these examples of people that said, "I'm going to follow God and do the right thing and I'm going to trust him no matter what. I'm going to do that and God is good and it's worth it and I'm going to go after it."

We saw that verse after verse and paragraph after paragraph. And finally, we get to chapter 12 in Hebrews, and it's as though the inspired words of Hebrews turn a corner, and now it just points its attention right at us. The Holy Spirit just puts his finger right in our chest and says, "Okay, those were the great people who followed me then. But what about you and what about now?"

Take a look at these words. Hebrews chapter 12, some of the most needed and desperately needed verses for the church today, just for us to say, "We're going to take this battle seriously. We want to follow the shepherd faithfully." So I guess learning the great biographies of Christians gone by and godly people of the Old Testament, that's not enough.

Since we're surrounded, verse 1, "Therefore, since we're surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses," and there are people that have done it well and there's all kinds of examples we could continue to give. But since that's true of them, then how about us? Here's the main verb here: "Let us throw off everything that hinders, everything, and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race that is marked out for us."

The writer of Hebrews really is crafting together this homiletical bullet that's moving through all these reasons to live for God, and then he says to these people, "Listen, now you live godly lives. This is about you taking all the sin and all the temptation and all the lure and just getting it out of the way. Don't be entangled in sin. Let's move forward and live for God and follow the shepherd faithfully."

And that means some analysis. It means some introspection. Throw off everything that hinders. We've got to find out what hinders our lives and the sin that so easily entangles. And some of you already, boom, it's coming to mind. "Yeah, that trips me up. That's a temptation for me." And the Bible says it's time for us to declare war on that. It's time for us to get serious about our sanctification, growing up in Christ and becoming more like Jesus. That really needs to be our passion.

This is a great passage and there's so much here. Let's just try and analyze verse number 1 for a second. Let's look at the central verb, if you will, the main imperative in the text. And it's found right in the middle, to throw off everything that hinders. The command for us here in light of chapter 11 is to take everything that's hindering our pursuit of God and to get rid of it. And the sin, obviously, is going to do that. And the sin that entangles, get rid of it.

Now, to "get rid of it," and some older translations say "lay aside." That sounds pretty passive and it sounds pretty mild. "Hey, you know, just lay that stuff aside." But I think the translation here is helpful, "to throw off," because really it's reminiscent of some words that Jesus used when he talked about the same topic. And there's no confusion when Jesus talked about throwing things off.

Do you remember the verses I'm referring to? It's found in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapter 5. Jesus is talking to people who, a lot like us, are very uncomfortable thinking about our own sin. We're good at thinking about the sins of other people, right? "Yeah, those are bad sinners. Let's all huddle together, circle the wagons and say how bad those sinners in the world are."

The crowd reduction sermons are those where we're really saying, "Forget them. Let's talk about you. Let's really get into our own lives and let God do some convicting there." That's the hard work. And Jesus, he isn't going to let people off the hook on the Sermon on the Mount. And as they sit there in this beautiful pastoral setting with cascading hills into the Sea of Galilee and he's talking to them about things, he's not going to let them say, "Yeah, you know what? I know Henry down the street and that guy, he's a bad sinner." He's going to say, "Forget about him."

Take a look at how he does this just strategically in verse number 27, for instance. He does it throughout the whole first part of the Sermon on the Mount. But look what he does in verse 27. This is just indicative of the rest of the chapter. He says, "You've heard it said, 'Do not commit adultery.'" And you can hear a lot of people at that point, "Yeah, you're right. That's terrible. I know somebody who's done that. That's bad." He's not going to let them off the hook there. Yeah, that's big, that's bad. But he says, "I tell you," verse 28, "I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart."

And about the time you're thinking of that really bad sinner you know, and Jesus says that to you, all of a sudden now a lot of eyes go down to the top of the sandals and people start saying, "Oh wow. I mean, that's a big deal to you too?" And he says, "Yeah." And he goes on to talk about anger and murder. He says murderers, those are bad people, right? But if you harbor anger in your heart against your brother, you know what? You're guilty of sin too.

Well, how should I respond to that? Well, if you're an adulterer, I guess you should be really ruthless about your sin and just totally attack it. But lust, anger, those kind of things, I don't know, maybe if you get around to it you ought to do something about it. Jesus doesn't say that. Look at the next verse. He says this in verse 29, "Guys, if your eye is the problem, I mean, if your eyeball is just, I can't help it, you know, my eyes are just attracted, I just can't, he says, "Well then, I've got a solution for your eyeballs. Here's what he says. "Gouge out your right eye and throw it away."

See, that'll get your attention. Now, I'm thinking little sin right now. Big sin, adulterer, right? Big sin, murderer. Little sin, angry. Little sin, lustful heart. And Jesus is now going to say, "You need the most ruthless solution to that." With whatever avenue, whatever temptation, whatever it is that is causing you and you're saying, "Well, that's causing me to sin," deal with it. And Jesus is saying don't deal with it lightly, deal with it severely.

And the phrase that is reminiscent of Hebrews 12 is, what do I do with my eye? Here, this thing's causing me to sin. What does he say to do with it? Toss it. Get rid of it. There's the reminiscent phrase from Hebrews 12. Now he says, "Guys, if you've got sin in your life, if something's entangling you, hindering you, hey, I've got a solution for you. Cast it off. Throw it from you."

Number one on your outlines, jot this down. It's the best advice I can give you about sin. It's the title of our series. When it comes to sin, we can't sit around and go, "Well, what should we do about that?" You need to have a mindset of warfare. Let's put it down this way: number one, you need to fight. That's the best advice I can give you. It needs to be something you declare war on. It needs to be something you get militant about. It needs to be something you get intense about, this problem of temptation and sin.

That's what the scripture is asking us to do. Cast it off. And by the way, if you think, "Well, I don't know, I'm not sold on that, you're kind of overplaying this, it sounds like you're kind of worked up about it. I don't know, your vacation went poorly or something, but I don't know, you're upset." No, I'm not. As a matter of fact, to talk about fighting sin in your life, I mean, the scripture says that clearly. But you know what? It's almost the lighter end of how the Bible talks about sin for the Christian and how we should respond to it. It's almost a euphemism because in scripture it gets a lot worse than that.

Let me give you one example, I could give you many, but let me have you turn to Colossians chapter 3. Here is a text that is addressed to Christians who are now being led to think by the Apostle Paul about their sin. And he says, "You know what? If you still got patterns and habits and bad things that are going on in your life, I've got a biblical authoritative imperative for you." Here it comes, Colossians chapter 3, and it goes a little bit further than fighting. This is not fighting like just slap-fighting. This is like a cage match. This is death. This is gladiator stuff.

Colossians 3:5, let's take a look at it. Here it comes, one Greek word here it is: "Put to," what's the word? "Death." Put to death. Our grandparents called it "mortification." Remember that word? To mortify the flesh. Talk about crowd reduction, right? Mortify, that just sounds negative. I want butterflies on the banners and the series to be about love and grace. No, here's a series about mortifying. What, mortify what? It says, "Put to death whatever belongs to your earthly nature."

And by that, that's a translation of the concept of sinful impulses in your life. And then he gives some examples. Sexual immorality. And if you say, "Well, I'm not doing that," remember Matthew 5. You don't have to commit the acts. It's allowing your mind to entertain the impure thoughts. And the Bible says whether that's true about sexual sin or anger or impurity in just your thoughts, materialism, oh let's look at the list: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, and greed.

Greed. And, "Well, I'm not opulent. My house is modest." I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about what's going on in your heart. And Jesus says you need to declare war on sin in your heart. Whether it's sexual sin or flipping through magazines and coveting other people's stuff, we need to declare war on that. It is a big deal to God. And the words he uses aren't, "Well, you should deal with that when you can." He uses the most extreme words he can use. Put it to death. Kill it. There's a part of you that needs to die. That's what the scripture is teaching. And we need to put it actively to death.

What I'm asking for is what God's word is asking for, and that is that we get sin in perspective. And he tries to do that in verse 6 of Colossians 3. He says, "You need to recognize these are the things that the righteous attributes of God rebel against. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming." Well, I'm forgiven. I understand that. But this is the thing that invokes the anger, the righteous justice of God.

Oh, I know you used to walk in these ways. It used to be the pattern of your life in the life you once lived, but now you must, here's another way to put it, rid yourself of all such things. And then in case we didn't get the list last time, he gives us more things: anger, rage, malice, slander, filthy language from your lips. Don't lie to one another. It doesn't matter what your job calls for or what you think the market standards are for your industry. It doesn't matter. The Bible says you have a higher calling to be godly in all of these areas.

Since, by the way, you've made a commitment to make Jesus your shepherd. If you've said, "I repent of my sins," and you've said about your old self, "I'm turning from my old ways," you've put off the old self with its practices and you've put on the new self, and you say, "I am now a follower of Christ." Since you've done that, that's called justification, moment in time.

Now, there's a process. He says this new self, which is, present tense, now "being renewed in knowledge and in the image of its creator." Are you tracking with that? The point is, now we start this process. And for those that think coming to Christ is the end of the battle, you need to recognize it's the beginning of the battle. Because the day you stand up and say, "I want to follow Jesus Christ," not only does the satanic world system and the demonic spiritual forces of this world, but your flesh itself rebels against that resolve.

And even though God recreates our heart and makes us new, we are now according to Galatians 5 and 6, we are now at war in our hearts. As Peter put it, he says, "There are desires that wage war against our soul." And if you want to be passive and kick your feet up on the desk and say, "Well, I'm loved by God and the grace of God, I'm into all that, I don't really need to fight this stuff," you are a disaster waiting to happen. You've got to recognize it requires a fight. And you and I need to be ruthless about it.

So, you know, I could stop right there and say, "Okay, that's what we should do." But I want to go a couple layers deeper. Can we just have a little time of contemplation right now and say to God we are going to declare war on sin? Not what Pastor Mike reveals, but what your Spirit reveals in the conviction of my heart because of the preaching of the word. I am ready to say I'll cast it off. Whatever hinders and whatever sin entangles me, I'm ready to say I'm done with it.

I mean, you've got to agree up front. One thing I've learned about God and I know you have too, he's not much into dealing with people who say, "Show me first and then I'll decide." Is God a God that deals with people like that? No way. What is he looking for? Faith. What is faith? Saying to God, "God, I trust you. You're my leader. If you want me to get rid of it," like the psalmist says, "try me, know me, search my heart, see if there's any wicked way in me." Why? Because the precondition is I'm willing to cast it aside if it's not pleasing to you.

And it's not just about sin. It's about the avenue through which they come. Matthew 5 was clear on that, right? The eye, I need to get mad at the avenues through which they come. Which means that the practical implications of this series, if you give God the blank check and say, "God, whatever you decide in my life is not pleasing to you, I'm going to cast it off," you do recognize that some of them will seem unrelated.

And some of your Christian friends will tell you, "Well, you're overboard. Now you're just being crazy. What kind of fundamentalist group are you a part of because you're going to start to get mad at the avenues through which sin come," which by the way is a biblical concept if you've ever read Matthew chapter 18. Do you remember the whole millstone around the neck discussion? Remember that story? You know what a millstone is, right? And they used it to grind out their wheat. You remember all that. If you've been to Israel with us, you've seen examples of these giant millstones. They don't make great flotation devices, right?

I mean, you don't want to have one in a pool or a lake. And Jesus says, listen, here's how mad he is at the avenues through which sin come into your life. He says, "Listen, if someone in your life is bringing sin and temptation into your life, it would be better for that person to have a millstone hung around their neck and cast into the Sea of Galilee than for them to bring sin and temptation into your life." If God is mad at the avenues through which this comes into our life, how can we stay passive about those things?

In other words, if in eight weeks we're not mad at the things that bring temptation into our life, then God hasn't worked. And we've got to say ahead of time we're willing to have that attitude. I'm willing to adopt God's attitude about my form of recreation if I determine by your Spirit and God's word that that is an avenue through which sin comes.

I'm ready to stop the subscription to that magazine, as benign as my friends may think it is, if it's leading me to covet other people's stuff. I'm ready to say no to that television program. I'm willing to say no to that internet. I'm willing to say no to that job. I'm willing to move. I'm willing to stop that relationship with that person. I'm willing to change states because whatever it might be for you, God's going to say, "Hey, here's the problem for you." And it's not just the sin, it's the avenue through which sin comes.

The lure is temptation, the entanglement is sin. We need to deal with both. It's the hindrance and the sin that so easily entangles. And the command for us is to fight. So if this is just an intellectual exercise for you, this will do nothing according to James 1 but delude you. Because we'll talk theoretically about sin and all it'll be for some of you is, "Well, that's an interesting thing. Let me think that one through."

Unless we all start at the beginning of the series and say, "God, you've got free rein in my life. I'm signing the blank check. If you reveal sin or temptation avenues in my life, I'm agreeing up front I'm getting rid of them." And there's no manipulation, I've got no secret agenda here. We're not going to give up hamburgers or something. I've got no agenda here. I just want to preach this text and have you ahead of time say, "I'm willing to put out anything in my life that hinders or entangles my following of the shepherd." If you're willing to do that and I'm willing to do that, here's the thing: this series can change your life, radically transform it.

It could be one of those series you look back on five years from now and say, "That's where I got really serious about my sanctification. That turned my life around in terms of that habit and that sin that used to entangle me. God changed my life there." But we should be willing. So let's not make it theoretical. Are you ready for that? Let's just agree. I mean, I know we're not a vocal church and you're not interactive. I try to draw it out of you. But I get it. You're Orange Countians. I understand that. But at least in your head, at least you can nod with your eyeballs that you're ready. Yes, God is going to be the king and I'm going to do what he says. Okay?

You're saying to God, "Okay, God. You got it. You're the king. You see something in my life you don't like, I'm ditching it." That's the bottom line. Fight. We're going to fight it. "Well, what if it's hard?" You're going to fight it. You're going to put it to death. Whatever belongs to your earthly nature that is not pleasing to God, we're getting rid of it. Saying no to it. "Oh, but I don't know. That's just what we've always done as a family." It doesn't matter. We're giving God free rein here. As Jude 23 says, I love that little one-chapter book, "Hating even the clothing that is stained by the flesh." Just anything, we're ready to say no.

"Oh, sound like a bunch of fanatics at that church," see. Let the world say what they want. Let a lukewarm church say whatever they want. Let's just try and be people that are serious about holiness.

Dave Drewie: We're developing a passion for saying no to temptation today on Focal Point. You're listening to Pastor Mike Fabarez and the start of a message called Spurred On by Godly Examples. You can revisit today's lesson at focalpointradio.org. And don't forget the free Focal Point app is another great listening option, putting Pastor Mike's sermon series right in your pocket, ready whenever you are.

Perhaps you've attempted to live a godly life but have been caught in a cycle of failure. Well, we hope you'll stay with us over the next few weeks as our study continues to better understand our struggle with sin and the biblical path to victory.

And to go along with this study, we'd like to send you a book called Sinners in the Hands of a Good God by David Clotfelter. The title turns a familiar phrase on its head for good reason. We've all felt the weight of standing before a holy God, but Clotfelter's aim is to hold two realities together without softening either one: the seriousness of sin and the genuine goodness of the God who saves sinners.

If you've ever wrestled with how a God who is perfectly just can also be perfectly merciful, this book takes on that tension head-on. Request your copy of Sinners in the Hands of a Good God today when you make a donation to Focal Point or sign up as a monthly Focal Point partner.

However you choose to give, it's your generosity that keeps this Bible teaching on the air, bringing it to people who need it. Call us at 888-320-5885 or give online at focalpointradio.org. You can also reach us by mail by writing to us at Focal Point, P.O. Box 2850, Laguna Hills, California 92654.

And if you're new to Focal Point, Pastor Mike has a new booklet called Storing Up Treasures set aside for you at no charge. It's a focused look at living with eternity in view, and it's yours free when you reach out online at focalpointradio.org or when you call 888-320-5885. Well, I'm Dave Drewie. Join us tomorrow as we continue our message titled Spurred On by Godly Examples, Tuesday on Focal Point with Pastor Mike Fabarez.

Pastor Mike Fabarez: Hey there, Pastor Mike here. We're almost out of time, but before we go, I wanted to personally invite you to contact us here. Let us know how we can be praying for you. Head on over to focalpointradio.org and click the contact page, or send me a note on Facebook, facebook.com/pastormike, or x.com/pastormike. Can't wait to hear from you.