How to draw close to the Father

The Cross, Conscience, and Family Forgiveness

Lesson 4 Essential Truths

The gospel applied is always the answer—it brings integration to the soul in a way that the law has no hope of doing. The gospel conducts a kind of heart surgery. It brings back together the parts of our soul that sin has broken apart and fragmented. Christ brings completeness; wholeness; healing to sinners (Is 53:5).

When the gospel is on the throne of conscience, we consent to have Christ carry our eligibility and qualification for God’s acceptance of us. The gospel proclaims that Christ, by His propitiation, has cleared away every obstacle that stood in the way of us enjoying the unbroken reception of the Father’s love (1 Jn 4:9-11).

Now we all know that this unbroken enjoyment is contested. We have to fight for joy by means of the gospel. What remains of indwelling sin is always seeking to rob us of peace. Our new transgressions and our old ones are always calling for a courtroom ‘trial’ in our conscience. The conscience wants to schedule new legal trials. The conscience is a kind of courtroom, a place of law, prosecutions, evidence, and verdicts. Our problem is that we are better at listening to ourselves than talking to ourselves. We put the law back on the throne of conscience and then we listen to all its arguments and wind up taking sides against ourselves as if there has been no atonement made on our behalf. We slip into mental passivity and find that the old habits of listening to the accusations of conscience are allowed to hold greater sway over us than the gospel.

The mental ‘tapes’ of accusation play in an endless loop and we wind up giving more authority to the taped messages of condemnation than to the authority of the gospel. Years of self-loathing have cut deep grooves. Like water seeking its lowest level, we easily slip back into the familiar and we find that our thoughts are again flowing in the deep grooves of self-rejection.

Preaching the gospel to the self is how to erase the old tapes and record new ones. We ought to be about the business of composing gospel sermons to preach to ourselves—gospel sermons with very precise and specific application. These gospel sermons are designed to display to our conscience that real justice has been done against our sins in the crucifixion of Christ (1 Pet 2:24; 3:18).

These sermons must contain the practical value of justification—that Christ is my eligibility for God’s acceptance, love and favor. Christ carries my lovability! Christ is my completeness. He is my wholeness, my “Okay-ness” if you will. I am a broken wretch united to a perfect Savior. That is the arrangement of God’s grace. I am a broken sinner; but I wear the perfect robe of Christ’s imputed righteousness. To deny that by re-enthroning law is to put oneself into competition with Christ—it pits self against Christ for who will carry out the task of Savior and Source Person.

Only when I keep consenting by faith to rest in Christ as my status; favor; acceptance; sonship; righteousness; and lovability will His love be free to animate my heart affections. God wants my heart affections unhindered by agitations and inner disputes. He desires to be able to pass His hand over my heartstrings to make the spontaneous music of worship. Only when I am living by faith in Him will the lust for law and the demands of self-assertion lose their magnetic pull. The gospel enthroned in conscience keeps displaying the sufficiency of Christ to the eye of faith and to the demands of the justice. There is no other source of pervasive peace.

The Conscience, the Cross, and Family Forgiveness

By Jay Wegter

“Sin makes cowards of us all” (Paul Zahl, Who Will Deliver Us?).

The human condition is such that the law of God continually judges us and finds us wanting. Not one of us can say that we have loved God with all of our heart, soul, mind and strength for even an hour.

According to the book of Romans, the judgment of the law is internalized in the conscience (Rom 2). The law operates in the conscience as a principle of self-condemnation. The law judges us wanting if we are not found capable of perfect obedience.

According to Scripture, our response to this condemnation of conscience is fear of punishment – “fear has to do with punishment” (1 Jn 4:18). We will do almost anything to ward off threats of condemnation – we will go to great lengths to defend against judgment.

Because our consciences carry a deep sense of moral failure against God’s law, much energy is exerted in seeking to avoid any additional condemnation.

In his book on the present power of the cross, Paul Zahl explains to what degree our lives are involved in attempts to steer clear of judgment. (He asks his readers to recall some humiliating event from their childhood. The emotional pain from it has etched it into the memory -- we want to avoid further exposure to humiliation at all cost.)

Due to our depravity, human nature cannot adequately meet judgment. According to the Bible, it is impossible to work our way out of condemnation. The harder we try to live up to the law, the worse we feel about our failure (Paul Zahl, Who Will Deliver Us?, p. 38).

Our greatest need is personal atonement for guilt. Zahl notes that much of our working and striving involves an attempt to offset or “atone” for our failure. Like an accounting spread sheet, we try to pencil into our consciences more credits than debits!

The law makes its overtures to us as we attempt to minister to our fear of judgment. The law beckons us to return to the legal principle of justification by works – “I am what I do.” We become stuck in patterns of performance. Self-righteousness begins contaminating our works.

Our carnal efforts to carry our own worth and relieve our own consciences always fail. The verdict of conscience can only be brought into line with the verdict of heaven (justification) by fresh acts of faith in the Gospel of Jesus Christ (Jerry Bridges, The Discipline of Grace, p. 53).

The flesh has strategies to avoid judgment.

The biblical prototype of all subsequent attempts to escape judgment is Adam’s flight from God in Eden: “I heard your voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; so I hid myself” (Gen 3:10). The effort to ward off judgment is expressed in the form of strategies that fall under three heads:

The first strategy involves the effort to escape condemnation by ESCAPE (or splitting off from reality). Absenting our inner self does not completely quiet the voice of condemnation. Our attempts to “turn off” the conscience by a denial of judgment ultimately fail. (We can recall the attempts of a number of biblical characters who used this strategy: Pilate in Mt 27:24; Nabal in 1 Sam 25:36-38; or Felix in Acts 24:25.)

A second strategy that is used to ward off the threat of judgment is OPEN RESISTANCE. This involves an attempt to take on the judgment “head on” with a defense or even with defiance. (Biblical figures who employed open resistance or were defiant in the face of judgment were: Pharoah in Ex 5:2; Job in Jb 23:1-7; Zedekiah in Jer 36:23-25; the Jewish refugees under Jeremiah in Jer 44:15-18.)

A third strategy used to ward off judgment is APPEASEMENT. Of the three, this strategy is dealt with in the greatest detail in Scripture. Saul of Tarsus sought to win God’s favor by law-keeping. Saul sought to appease God and win His friendship by successfully adhering to the law (Phil 3:4-6; Gal 1:14).

The APPEASEMENT strategy recognizes the superior force of the judgment that is faced. It is aware of personal vulnerability. “This strategy attempts to negotiate for peace with the hostile powers of condemnation, hoping for the best” (Zahl, Who Will Deliver Us? p. 22).

Appeasement tragically fails to eliminate the threat of judgment.

The tragic flaw of the appeasement strategy is the resentment that accompanies it. One may use words to negotiate for peace, but the inner man resents the arrangement. In this case, the one using appeasement feels he has too much to lose by standing up to the opposing force and defending himself (Zahl, p. 22).

Each time the appeaser compromises, he becomes more furious on the inside (thus resentment is bred).

Appeasement is an attempt to take upon oneself the burden of another’s judgment and thereby disarm it. “It means accepting the judgment as correct and bowing to it in the hope of withstanding it. It is undertaken as a means of making friends with it. Unfortunately, this never happens. As soon as we bow to a human being or institution in judgment over us, we are in their power. We will never be good enough to satisfy them” (Zahl, p. 22).

Zahl observes that appeasement is degrading because we know that it is only a temporary measure – it forestalls, but does not eliminate the reckoning we fear. “Appeasement will always feel compulsory; it is always accompanied by anger. We can open negotiations, but it is never enough, the judge will not be satisfied by anything we do” (Zahl, p. 24).

Control of others by guilt, (or by their fear of judgment), involves an attempt to bind the conscience. The opponents of the Apostle Paul sought to bring the Galatians into bondage by means of the conscience. The Judaizers wanted to bind the consciences of the believers in Galatia. The Jewish false teachers were seeking control over others. They made a solicitation to the Galatians that involved accepting a certain criterion for “conscience management.” But Paul admonishes his readers to stay free! “Do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery” (Gal 5:1).

Stephen Olford notes that legalists are not interested in alleviating bondage. They want to keep guilt in place because it is the means by which they control others (Stephen Olford, Anointed Expository Preaching, p. 35).

Paul makes it clear in Galatians that the person who seeks to bind the consciences of others dishonors the work of the atonement. By contrast, the Holy Spirit “points to the blood of Christ.” The Spirit keeps bringing spiritual freedom and liberty because He ministers the blood of Christ to the conscience (Heb 9:14; 10:22).

Olford indicates that the Holy Spirit personalizes the redemptive work of Christ as we yield moment by moment (Olford, p. 37).

A person who uses guilt as a major means of manipulation is demonstrating that his or her conscience is not at peace. A lifestyle of blame/shame never vindicates us. We cannot raise ourselves up above condemnation by transferring our fear of judgment to the conscience of another.

Holding others “hostage” by attempting to keep their guilt in place cannot protect us from judgment. Instead it is a very telling symptom that one’s conscience is not managed by the blood of Christ. A prominent family counselor makes the following observation. When we lash the conscience of another person, it is a strategy learned in childhood; it is practiced in order to feel powerful. To abandon the behavior is to feel a loss of power.

God’s only method for bringing peace to the conscience of the believer is by renewed “views” of our suffering Substitute. The justice our conscience cries out for against ourselves and those who have offended us is found only in the atonement of Calvary. Our conscience only comes to a full rest when it sees (by faith) justice against sin carried out in the bloody death of the Son of God.

The powers of darkness have much to gain by keeping guilt in place in the conscience. As Puritan John Owen states, even one sin circulating within the conscience is enough to discourage us from drawing near to the throne of grace with confidence.

Concerning guilt in the conscience, Robert Haldane warns that “No sin can be crucified either in heart or life, unless it be first pardoned in conscience. . .” (Robert Haldane, An Exposition of the Book of Romans, pp. 253-254).

The atonement of Christ is God’s plan to free His people from fear.

Because we live our lives under judgment, our greatest need is personal atonement for guilt. In the counsels of eternity, God planned that our judgment and condemnation would be assumed by Another. Central to the Good News is that the Son of God did a voluntary guilt transfer.

The atonement is a “cosmic moral transfer” of infinite worth. The atonement disarms and frees us from the law. Because of my sin, the condemnation of the law was my chief adversary. But now, the empty tomb carries the atonement into the eternal present (Zahl, p. 41).

Now humanity’s designated meeting place with God is the same for every person – it is true fellowship with the Trinity based on true freedom from judgment.

Our problem as believers is that indwelling sin keeps disturbing the conscience with fear of judgment. We find it difficult to reckon that the full force of our judgment fell upon the Son of God.

We are still searching for atonement to answer our fear. We often act out of guilt; seeking to discharge a debt, win approval, appease. The old strategies of escape, open resistance, and appeasement still hold attraction for us. The heart is drawn to self-righteous merit systems – we want to have a part in carrying and proving our worth to ourselves and others.

The Gospel is the only antidote to our hiding, rage, defensiveness, and self pity. In order to daily experience its healing grace, we must consent to be represented and protected by the Son of God.

The Gospel’s message of justification teaches us that the righteousness of Christ is put on our account – it is imputed to us. Our worth as believers is upheld by Christ and His work. This is life-transforming, for infinite worth and credit have been assigned to us!

The atonement is freedom from judgment because God’s verdict about us in Christ has the power to evaporate all other verdicts (Rom 8:31-34). (Verdicts of condemnation come from people, demons, and God’s law – only the blood of Christ can silence these.)

Herein is the success of the atonement to heal our fear. By God’s plan we may become as we are regarded. Though we carry feelings of condemnation and worthlessness, God regards us as righteous in Christ and free from condemnation.

The Gospel is able to penetrate the most guarded prisons of the heart. All the carnal fortresses we have raised to protect ourselves against judgment harm our relationship with others. What is needed is courage and healing; the Gospel provides both.

The Gospel makes us heroes in our dealings with sin and conscience.

So much of our energy goes into the effort to resist the verdicts of others, we forget to run to the atonement. But, Christ’s work is where we find heroism and courage to face our own sinful imperfections.

The great reformer Martin Luther had a problem as a priest. He couldn’t understand how a perfectly holy God could accept him when he was so filled with sin and imperfection. At one point Luther protested, “Love God, I feel I hate Him!” (When Luther uttered these words, he felt it impossible to be good enough to gain divine acceptance.)

In His grace, God showed Luther the biblical doctrine of justification by faith. The world has not been the same since. Luther wrote volumes on the practical value of justification. Here is his formula for heroism and courage in dealing with sin and conscience: according to the Gospel, the believer is justified, yet a sinner. Therefore, he may be absolutely honest about his sin without jeopardizing his perfect status in Christ.

The Reformer’s point is vital. The imputation of Christ’s righteousness draws the blood of Christ into real situations. This is the basis for radical heroism; I can be a very imperfect person who is honest about his transgressions and offenses without losing my perfect standing in Christ. I don’t have to prove my worth (by using carnal strategies) because the Gospel proclaims the affirmation of my worth in a most dramatic way. The Gospel literally gives me permission, even urges me, to give up fleshly strategies for personal worth (Zahl, p. 73).

The sin of self-justification needlessly makes others into adversaries.

Paul Zahl practically X-rays the human heart when he makes the following observations: When I become depressed, it is usually through the gateway of someone else’s perception of me as I perceive it. I feel my own weakness so heavily, it seems to express the whole truth about my life.

Depression provides a clue to our need for value to be assigned to us. The absence of positive value can incarcerate us in a prison of depression. The only real and lasting cure must fulfill our need of value.

Union with Christ decisively answers this need, nothing else can.

Because we are sinners, we carry a sense of condemnation and fear of judgment. Just below the surface, we feel our impotence, fear, weakness and fragility. Because of this, the slightest thing can make us feel diminished.

Due to our desperate need of worth, we tend to suspect the worst about ourselves. This colors our interactions with others. Anger is the response to perceived hostile invasions of self. The angry person is likely to interpret exchanges with others as attacks on self. Behind the rage is a most painful insecurity. Because we feel small, weak and vulnerable, we believe we must protect ourselves with all our might, even if relationships are damaged in the process (Zahl, pp. 13, 14).

If the lion’s share of our emotional energy is devoted to fighting a sense of judgment, we won’t be able to handle negativity nor will we be able to risk intimacy. God’s answer is the healing power of the Gospel.

The atonement of Christ has healing power.

When we allow others to carry our value instead of depending upon the work of Christ, we are still wed to fleshly strategies for warding off judgment. These flesh strategies further damage our humanity and our relationships. When we use our pain to hurt others, we are living in sin (Zahl, p. 45).

God loves us too much to allow this situation to continue indefinitely in His child. Because of God’s fatherly care, He allows our defenses to fail. He does this because He wants our souls and our relationships healed (Eli Ashdown, The Saving Health of the Gospel, p. 101-108).

Our fear of judgment is so strong, we will not repent of our fleshly strategies until we believe that the atonement has the power to heal our fear and replace our need of self-protection. That daily consent to suffer Another to work for us is the key. Jerry Bridges refers to this as preaching the Gospel to oneself every day. Says Bridges, since we sin every day, we need to preach the Gospel to ourselves every day (Jerry Bridges, The Discipline of Grace, pp. 123, 124).

The Gospel’s healing power comes about through ongoing repentance.

Since fleshly strategies of managing condemnation further damage our humanity and our relationships, repentance is called for.

We are to repent of the destructive fortifications that we have habitually employed.

When we hear that our worth is established by God, we are enabled to move from carnal control to liberty, heroism, and realism. There is great power in God regarding us righteous in Christ. We can face negativity without being radically diminished. We can face the worst news about ourselves without our value being threatened.

By contrast, when we are always fighting against negativity and fear, our lives are characterized by a cowardly escape from judgment. The cross leads us out of escape, denial, and blame. The atonement enables us to “assimilate” negativity, processing it with courage and realism. (The Psalms provide an ideal model of this processing of negativity. John Calvin referred to the Psalms as a complete anatomy of the human heart.)

“God is glorified when we believe with all our hearts that those who trust in Christ can never be condemned. [When we] live in the good of total forgiveness, we are able to turn from old, sinful ways of living and walk in grace-motivated obedience” (C. J. Mahaney, The Cross Centered Life, pp. 39, 40).

The imputed righteousness granted in justification gives believers the legal right and responsibility to come out of hiding and deal with sin courageously in ongoing repentance. This always involves forsaking false refuges and strategies designed to defer judgment.

Jesus’ righteous regard of the Christian enables him to see himself in truth and to accept the truth about himself. He can admit his bondage, his failure, his suffering, and his compulsive sin. Justification gives us the courage to admit the suffering our sin has caused in our lives and the lives of others.

A mighty redemption has broken sin’s bondage, yet believers still carry the tendency to defend and fight against judgment. We are all too aware of our failures, inadequacy, and guilt. The temptation is to return to the old refuges and strategies for protection from judgment. What is needed is renewed appropriation of the Gospel, for that alone is the source of heroism. Justification in the Son of God establishes a secure status that produces courage.

The atonement gives us the courage to forgive others.

No where is more courage needed than in the area of relational hurt. Hiding, pretending, attacking, and defending keep short-circuiting any hope of restoration.

The courage born of justification enables the believer to deal with the alienation and ache of offenses committed both by him and against him. The truth of justification gives the power to forgive freely and to be freely forgiven (Eph 4:32).

Nothing short of heroism is necessary in order for the Body of Christ to build itself up in love. When believers are self-protective and defensive, they are unable to give and receive admonishment (Rom 15:14). It is the justified man who is wise enough to receive a genuine admonishment born of love. Because he knows he is justified, yet a sinner, he can admit when he is wrong without being diminished. Conclusion:

So much of our self-protection, pretending, and hiding our hearts from God and each other is because we do not understand the present value of the cross. The finished work of Christ is perfectly suited for dealing with every sin and the fruit of every sin. The present value of the cross allows the believer to process the most horrendous things about himself. This is because no fact or negative truth can harm the saint’s perfect standing in Christ before God.

The cross works across the grain of the flesh. It opposes the self-preservation strategies that turn upon self-sufficiency. God calls His people to childlike vulnerability before Him. We must be willing to be searched (Ps 139). The Scriptures join lowliness of mind with contrition (Is 57:15; 66:2).

Guarded dungeons of pain keep us from receiving God’s love in new areas of our being. Christ calls His people to make appointments with Him in these dungeons. He wants us to dismiss our guards and give Him the opportunity to apply His grace to these heart prisons. He is perfectly qualified for this. He is the Sympathetic High Priest who empathizes and identifies with all of our weakness and pain.

In His suffering for us, He identified Himself with the sorrows and exigencies of the human condition. His priesthood addresses both the guilt of sin and the effects of sin. He wants us to desist from our schemes of carnal management and call upon Him for new supplies of grace and mercy (Heb 4:15, 16).

His priestly mercy is available to us in areas that we are used to controlling. These areas include sin, weakness, failure, rejection, disillusionment, inadequacy, helplessness, pain, and suffering.

Realism before God is a hard won asset. Strategies to defend our pain and woundedness tend to be habitual and instinctive. The Psalmist is willing to meet God in some very painful places. There are prayers with themes of despair, despondency, depression, betrayal, disillusionment, resentment, guilt, and injustice. Agonizing memories and ache of soul are a common theme.

When a believer refuses to accept appointments with God in these areas of negativity, these same areas become “sealed off” from the full benefit of God’s grace. When appointments with Christ in our regions of pain are consistently refused, the heart builds prisons to house these unacceptable negatives.

The result of sealing off the pain is often a host of defenses that manifest themselves in our relationships. Our hearts are no longer tender before God because we have refused to “pour out our hearts to God” (Ps 62:5-8).

Sealing off pain is a symptom of flight from judgment. It causes us to split off from the very regions of our hearts that are needed for godly passion and Christian compassion. Unless our heart prisons of pain are allowed to come in contact with God, it is very unlikely that we will be able to weep with those who weep (Rom 12:15).

The Apostle Paul makes it clear, those who draw abundantly from God’s comfort amidst their suffering are best equipped to comfort others (2 Cor 1:3-6).

It is a mercy that God lets our defenses fail. Affliction is sent by God to break up the lime scale of our carnal strategies. A constant use of carnal defenses builds up layers of protection that inhibit our ability to enjoy intimate contact with God. Only the cross can put these self-life strategies out of business.

When we endure God’s chastening, it is unto a grace awakening. During affliction, God empties out our secret coffers of merit. He takes us back to the Publican who has nothing but sin. He causes our defenses to fail (this can be catastrophic to us, it may feel like God is against us). He orchestrates all of this that He might restore us to a place of child-like reliance and vulnerability before Him.

Only by fresh views of our depravity, including our defenses, will we be able to marvel again at the unfathomable riches of Christ our righteousness (Jer 23:6).

How to draw close to the Father 2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1

INTRODUCTION:

There is urgency in the message of salvation. For the Scriptures tell us of mankind’s RUIN by the Fall. When mankind was plunged into sin; it included the darkening of the intellect to the knowledge of God. In addition, the Scripture states that accompanying this darkness is an enmity, or hostility, which causes sinners to prefer distance and estrangement from God.

But God in His great mercy and love provided REDEMPTION. He sent the Lord Jesus Christ to be the Merciful Redeemer – to purchase sinners out of their rebellion, deadness, and enmity.

Jesus willingly laid down His life and shed His precious blood so that sinners could be forgiven and clothed with Christ’s righteousness as a royal robe. Now God calls out to the world through His word in the mouths of His servants, “Turn to Me, and be saved, all the ends of the earth, for I am God, and there is no other” (Is 45:22).

But sinful man is so dead to the true knowledge of God that he will not respond in faith and repentance to the Gospel offer and command of salvation. God literally commands people to come to Him and receive forgiveness and eternal life. But sinners will not come.

So dead in sin and unbelief are we that God must draw us, quicken us, and call us by the work of His Holy Spirit. For without REGENERATION, by which the gift of faith is bestowed, no one would enter the covenant of Grace. Even though the Father pleads -- make use of My only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, trust in His blood and I will forgive you and receive you, our Lord tells us, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him” (Jn 6:44).

It is the Holy Spirit who convicts of sin. He brings the sinner to the point where he feels his desperation, unbelief, helplessness, guilt, and ruin. Only then does He show that prepared man the beauty and suitability of the Savior.

Christ must be revealed by the Holy Spirit’s work. Then Christ shines into the sinner’s heart and reveals the knowledge of God in the face of Christ (2 Cor 4:4-6). Once Christ shines into the heart the sinner finds that God’s love and forgiveness to him in particular is too good to be true.

He now wants His children to draw near to God; he wants us to be close to God. That’s what our lesson is about tonight. How to cultivate closeness to your heavenly Father.

PROPOSITION: There are three guidelines God wants you to know and to practice in order to draw close to the Father: 1.) You must know the Father’s holy character. 2.) You must know the Father’s loving heart. 3.) You must know your own heart.

I. In order to draw near to God, we must know our Father’s holy character.

6:14-15 – (EX. Note the absurdities of attempting to mix things that don’t mix. Brocolli and ice cream don’t go well together. Steamed clams and chocolate syrup are not a hit. Rugby at a funeral; not a good mix.)

Literally, stop becoming unequally yoked with unbelievers. “Unequally yoked;” consider the absurdity of yoking together a little donkey with a huge ox – why the donkey’s hooves would be alternately lifted off the earth by the powerful gait of the massive and powerful ox (they could not pull together in unison).

To drive home his point about nearness to the Father, Paul is going to ask FIVE rhetorical questions – each of which is to be answered in the negative. These five questions form a summary of reasons why believers are not to form close relationships with non-believers.

What’s the chief reason to stay away from compromised relationships? – The answer is that the true believer belongs to exclusively to God. And we must live in such a way that all of our life demonstrates we belong to God.

Close, ‘bosom friendships’ with unbelievers produces an incompatible mixture – that means in order for a believer to maintain that “closeness” with an unbeliever, the Christian will have to compromise his testimony.

You see sometimes we argue – Well, I’ll keep this close relationship with this unbeliever because maybe this unsaved friend will get saved some day. The problem is as follows: as soon as God’s truth (loved and lived out) comes up, things get uncomfortable and disturbing -- there is discomfort. That’s why Christians who try to be close friends with non-Christians will find that they have to set the truth aside in order to keep things harmonious. It’s two kingdoms; two masters; two worldviews clashing.

“Light” (the Bible metaphor for truth and knowledge of God) has nothing in common with darkness (ignorance, evil, rebellion, spiritual blindness). As nice as an unbeliever may be, they still have the devil as their spiritual father (Eph 2:2). The unbeliever is not neutral toward the light; he or she is not just lacking information – Scripture says that unbelievers have a deep-seated hatred of the light (Jn 3:19-21). (We once hated the light as well – “but for the grace of God.”)

Christ and Satan are irreconcilable – they head up two opposing kingdoms locked in mortal combat – thus no concord; no agreement – only warfare.

(EX. I remember as a young Christian I was confronted by a man in front of a market asking for donations so that he could teach the Bible – I dropped in a dollar and then asked what he believed. I was shocked to hear him say that he thought everyone would be saved someday – even the devil!) No the battle of the ages comes to its close only when the devil and his followers are cast into the lake of fire forever.

“What harmony can there be?” asks Paul. The Greek word for harmony, sounds like the word symphony. (EX. Imagine the New York Philharmonic with a section of folks hitting trashcans with baseball bats – they wouldn’t sell tickets would they?)

There can be no blending of these “musical scores” for those who are of this world love this world – they play to a different conductor; they notes they play reflect their idolatrous orientation – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life.

(EX. Note the example of the canary yellow humvee and matching race boat. The world’s lie is that you have the power to use the world to make yourself secure and significant and important.)

(APPL. -- It must be obvious from our text that these two kingdoms cannot have agreement or closeness BECAUSE they have radically different interests. Now that does not mean that Christians and non-Christians do not share the enjoyment of the same legal pleasures that God has given the human race – rainbows, puppies, great food, beach and mountains, snowboarding, music, sports and recreation, nice clothes, smell of summer rain on the herbs of the field.

The irreconcilable differences between saint and sinner have to do with the changes that God has made in the Christian – as a “new creature,” the true believer has new affections, new hopes, new values, new love of God, His truth, His glory, His people, His holiness – the unbeliever does not share these “new creature” marks and distinctives with you – you have no commonality at these points. (Use Psalm one here regarding the company a believer keeps.)

So we’ve seen that God’s holiness means that He is altogether separate from sin. He dwells in light, righteousness, justice, and love – those who will live with Him forever must be characterized by these virtues. For God will not dwell with sinners in eternity anymore than you’d be willing to share your bedroom with the carcass of a decaying animal.

II. In order to draw near to God, we must know our Father’s loving heart.

6:16 – In this verse the Apostle begins his call to the separated life by explaining God’s demand for purity in your life. There must be separation from close contact with those who embrace the world’s values – a separation from all evil.

All that God is toward you in Christ is infinitely precious. It’s the Father’s loving heart that chose the believer before time and then united him to Christ in love. The Christian is a vessel of mercy.

The believer is a temple of God’s Spirit – corporately the Temple of the Living God; living stones in God’s temple. Collectively believers make up a royal priesthood. Our chief blessing is the nearness of God – He has come to dwell within His people. His people house His Spirit; they house the infinite treasure of the Gospel of God. Therefore there can be no agreement between the Temple of God and idols – for idols are

rivals of God. They seek to rob God of the honor He is due – idols corrupt and degrade

their worshippers (see Colossians 3:5 for what

amounts to idolatry ).

Consider the wealth of this promise that the Lord shall be our God and we shall be His people. This promise touches all the blessings of God’s covenant – that He will use His matchless perfections and immutable attributes to save us, sanctify us, protect us, provide for us, and bring us to glory.

He has
forged
the wondrous promises of the new covenant in the
foundry
of His attributes so that

when His promises are experienced in your life, He is glorified and you are blessed

in Christ, the Beloved

(2 Pet 1:3-4).

6:17 – All God’s truth comes with obligations that shape the way you will live. Every encounter with God by means of His truth is a “crossroad” in your life; a “turning point,” a “moment of faith and obedience.”

We believe His truth in order to obey His truth. The demand flowing from His covenant promise to be your God (wherein He literally gives Himself to you forever and reveals Himself to you and allows you to abide in His presence) requires that you live a separated life as God’s own possession (Titus 2:14).

Therefore the command is come out from among them and be separate says the Lord.

When you socialize closely with unbelievers you pick up their values (1 Cor 15:33). Their worldview works its way into you. You begin desiring their approval and acceptance. You find that you want them to like you and so start keeping score by their scorecards.

Jesus warned about this tendency to live for the approval of others (Jn 5:40-44). He said that it can keep you from receiving Him and that living for the approval of others cancels out your ability to live for the approval and glory of your heavenly Father (see James 4:4).

God has set apart believers for Himself. He has set them apart to be pure and to be enthusiastic about serving Him (Titus 2:14). We are set apart for the spiritual worship of God. We are to steer clear of that which would pollute the sanctuary of God.

(EX. A boy chewing gum in church was approached by the deacon, “No chewing gum in the sanctuary.” The boy’s father replied, “He is the sanctuary.”)

To be “holy” is to be set apart. It is to be separated from an unholy use to a holy use. (EX. Tell the peanut butter jar story. And the example of serving pasta in the same pan that you change the oil on your rusty old Volkswagen. To “consecrate” is to set apart for a particular purpose.)

God has saved the Christian from hell by means of rescuing him from the world’s defilements (2 Pet 1:4). Thus redemption has an end result; a goal – it is to make us like Christ. Believers are set apart for this. That’s God’s only formula for your eternal happiness. He conforms you to himself in holiness to make you eternally happy that’s His heart of love at work.

(EX. A family planned to live on a yacht in the South Pacific for a year. All the family members were to take scuba lessons so that they could enter the stunningly beautiful colorful world of the tropical coral reef. The 15 year old crossed his arms and refused to get wet or even take one dive lesson. He was opposing his own happiness was he not?)

How much does God’s acceptance, fellowship and approval mean to you? It will show up in your compliance with His will “come out, be separate!” (6:17). It will show up in your desire to be a clean vessel; avoiding defilement and idols in any aspect of your life.

Do you desire to draw close to the Father? Look again at what He promises us if we are willing to move in His direction by distancing ourselves from that which defiles. (We’re as close to God as we want to be – we must feed our desire in order to draw closer to Him.)

6:18 -- Corporately believers comprise the temple of God – but individually we are sons and daughters of God (1 Jn 3:1-3). “I Will be a Father.” There is no greater dignity than to have God as one’s Father. It is such a high privilege to be adopted by God; to have His Spirit seal us. This is why He tells us love not the world, nor the things in the world. There is no greater happiness than to be God’s possession – to have a clear conscience, to know you are loved by God and walking with Him in the light.

Sonship is the motive and meaning of Gospel holiness. For the Gospel not only tells us who our God is, it tells us what we were before salvation, who we are now, and what we will be in glory.

Dear people you must learn to live upon Christ as He is given to you in the Gospel. That alone will draw out your affections for your heavenly Father; it will let you reckon a life-transforming spiritual reality – namely that as His redeemed possession, the holy God of the universe holds you in His heart of love (1 Jn 4).

III. In order to draw near to God, we must know our own hearts.

7:1 – With his chain of O.T. quotes in 2 Corinthians 6:14-18, Paul has stressed the privilege of being the temple of God and the child of God; and he has highlighted the benefits of complying with God’s will of living a separated life – if we live “dead to sin and alive to God,” we will know the infinite blessing of Him dwelling with us. He will manifest His presence in your life – He will deepen your awareness of your sonship. He will make you know His covenant pledge to be your heavenly Father (Ps 25:14).

The preciousness of His promises must control us. His promises must take up residence in your heart and affections – you must identify whatever idols seek to crowd out God’s promises. (EX. The cuckoo chick tolerates no rivals; every one of them is pushed out of the nest. The invasive cuckoo chick, though living a parasitic existence, tolerates no other nest-mates but the naïve parents that feed it. So also, only a new affection can expel an old affection.)

For God, by His sovereign grace, has initiated the rescue of believers. He has rescued us from the corruption that is in the world by lust (2 Pet 1:4). He has granted believers to be partakers of His infinite grace. And now He requires our gratitude in return (Gen 17:1-2).

It is the nature of God’s gracious promises to urge us on to sanctification and holiness. In Christ we have a new identity. We long to promote the glory of our wonderful God who set His particular love upon us in Christ and made us vessels of mercy.

Redemption has a specific goal – it is to prepare us to live with God and enjoy Him forever. God is working

from
and
for
the perspective of eternity. Our high calling and privilege is seen in God’s

purpose in our lives to make us like Himself (the restored image of God – conformity to Christ – elected unto this purpose. God will complete this work in His own and will not desist from it. That’s why His faithful discipline is such a mark of His favor. Our part is to wholeheartedly cooperate with His purpose.)

(EX. Puritan pastors such as Baxter used to ask their parishioners, “Do you believe that all of life is preparation for the next life?” What a barometer of spiritual health! We take only one thing with us into the eternal state; our relationship with God.)

Paul has shown us that we are called to purity. And it must be a purity evident in body and soul; in both the outward and the inward life. There must be a clear conscience in regards to both the outward and the inward life. We must consecrate yourself to God – all the members of your being devoted to Him – that involves a commitment which we renew each day to not live with impurity in His sight.

(APPL. We live in the age of the moral disconnect. Professing Christians put confidence in their convictions and then live without dedicating the members of their body to God. What they say they believe is radically different from how they live – there is a huge disconnect; a huge gap. We could call it the hypocrisy gap. The wider the gap between what we say we believe and how we live, the more serious the hypocrisy.

Vs. 7:1 is about getting rid of the disconnect. It’s about applying the most deadly serious form of ongoing repentance to close that gap that has allowed hypocrisy to grow like spiritual cancer in our lives. And we are to do so by cleansing ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit. You see, that refers to the whole personality; the whole man; the inner and outer man.

God wants the whole person. He wants you to draw close enough to Him so that you can share your thought life with Him throughout the day – God told Abraham to walk before Him, that is with an awareness that He was always in God’s presence, under God’s eye (Gen 17:1).

“Cleanse yourselves,”—this involves ongoing repentance. That’s the only way to close the gap – to close the gap is to eliminate the disconnect between what you say you believe and how you live.

Live set apart, consecrated to God. Strive to walk before Him blameless – that is walking in the consciousness of His presence. It is walking in the light – that involves confession of sin as a daily reality (1 Jn 1:1-9). It is being conformed to the truth by loving the truth and by preaching to yourself systematic arguments for obeying the truth.

(EX. Peter needed his feet washed but he asked for an entire bath. Jesus told him that he who has bathed needs only to wash his feet. The “bath” in this analogy is the washing away of sin at initial salvation. The foot-washing is the cleansing from daily defilement through daily confession of sin – Jn 13:8-11.)

We must be conscious of forgiveness of sin in order to gain deliverance from sin. Guilt is a lousy motivator. As Puritan Haldane used to say, “Even one sin in the conscience is enough to damage our confidence before God.” We must know the sin is forgiven in order to gain power over it so as to conquer it.

“Flesh and spirit” designate regions of our being in which specific sins are committed. (APPL. Sins of the flesh and sins of the spirit each have a respective “vortex” that holds us in its pull. We must know how to escape through Christ and come back into the light of God’s fellowship.)

Sins of the flesh kick out shame. The guilt generated by sins of the flesh is degrading – we retreat into the grey castle of self; we lose our courage to believe that God desires fellowship with creatures as polluted as we are.

As the shame keeps us in the dankness of the castle, we keep judging ourselves to be ineligible for God’s love and favor. The desire for comfort pulls us back again to carnal objects of lust. We’re vulnerable to sexual idolatry. Sins of the flesh have their own inherent dangers. Sustained unbelief is hardened by indulging in sins of the flesh. If we doubt God’s goodness, then indulge in sins of the flesh, it fixes a certain kind of bondage upon us; we lose our tenderness toward God. As the unbelief deepens; ‘addiction’ to the passing pleasures of sin can re-enslave.

When caught in the vortex of sins of the flesh, walking with God in the sunlit meadow of His favor and presence seems only a memory. We need an exit strategy to get out of the sins of the flesh vortex. But we find the pull of that whirlpool to be too strong.

By the grace of God, the recoveries we experience are tokens of Christ’s sovereign love. He rescues us over and over again. He allows us by His Holy Spirit to believe the Gospel again – to believe that Christ is given for guilty sinners and that the provision of His cleansing blood cannot be exhausted.

We take hold of Christ again by faith as the Gospel gives us courage to go to God for more grace and love. We believe again that all of the qualifications necessary to be a child of light in the kingdom of light are provided by Christ and His finished work. We find that He who began a good work in us will keep us and continue to forgive us.

We repent and declare war on the sins of the flesh that we had tolerated (repentance is not merely a passing remorse – it involves a very proactive change in our thinking and in our willing. In involves a renewed hatred of the sin and a rekindling of our affections for things above. For further study examine each verb in this repentance passage -- 2 Cor 7:9-11).

We’ve found the exit door to the grey castle! It is faith in Christ as our qualifier; as our life and righteousness. We leave the castle and consent again to be loved for no good reason in us. We find again that fellowship with God issues forth in joy and peace and confidence.

As we reckon His love to us and feed upon all that God is toward us in Christ we find a new strength to resist the sins of the flesh. Hoping in our Father’s love and walking with Him has become a treasure too precious to forsake – we do not wish to stoop to the sins of the flesh – they are beneath our dignity as a child of the Father’s love and as a possessor of His promises.

Sins of the spirit are a different sort than sins of the flesh. Sins of the spirit, according to Charles Hodge’s commentary on 2 Corinthians, entail the following: pride, slander, hatred, resentment, malice, spiritual pride, anger, rage, unbelief.

Sins of the spirit hold us in their vortex in a different way than sins of the flesh. Sins of the spirit hold us through self-pity; through self-deception; through a false sense of superiority. When under the influence of sins of the spirit, the believer is commonly in a mode controlled by demanding-ness.

There is an accompanying lack of gratitude and contentment. The attitude, “I don’t deserve this; why is this being withheld from me!” churns inside the heart. There is an ensuing contest with God – as if God must give in to the believer’s demands or worship and devotion to Him will not be restored. While under the influence of sins of the spirit, the believer holds God’s goodness and glory hostage.

With every new thwarting of the believer’s will, a new expression of anger exudes from the heart. The believer certainly is not happy in this state – in fact his is tolerating a low level of misery.

Many believers ‘sentence’ themselves to an extended period of unhappiness because they refuse to repent of this condition in a timely manner. If it becomes habitual, they eventually become complainers and fault-finders (this author has found that complaining to others is a symptom of not praying our pain to God. Jude warns about this condition – if it is not corrected; it can be a sign of apostasy – Jude 16).

Sins of the spirit are subtle indeed – very often the pride associated with sins of the spirit is bound up in a desire to be perfect, whole, and complete in the self. It becomes an ontological issue; an issue of personhood. The “lukewarm” church of Laodicea sought completeness in self. The attitude is as follows: I will make myself complete; I will clothe my own soul by my own efforts at personal security and significance. Needless to say, God does not “cooperate” with the believers plans to lean upon an arm of flesh (Jer 17:5).

The exit strategy from sins of the flesh is not an easy one. Spiritual pride and self-pity comprise Satan’s sin – he knows all too well how to sustain its grip. The only way to be delivered is to bring one’s heart down; way down by contemplating one’s ill desert and depravity (see Ps 39; 51; Ps 90:7ff, and Ps 139).

When the believer is willing to think upon what he deserves and what he is in himself, it will help bring the heart back to a proper consideration of depraved creaturehood. But more is needed – the saint spinning in the vortex of sins of the spirit needs to come to a full stop at the base of the cross and meditate upon the depths of Christ’s humiliation.

It was my nakedness, reproach, defilement, separation, hellishness, and enmity that was being exposed to nails, jeering, wrath, and torture in the body of my Substitute. This must be allowed to sink into the spirit; into the inner man so that the believer can recover from the spiritual insanity of spiritual pride.

This is the only way to recover from the gross forgetfulness and neglect of what it means to be a trophy of God’s grace – having been dug from the same lump of clay as hell-bound vessels of wrath.

Demandingness, loss of contentment, and rage only give way when self is judged severely. There must be a renewed submission to the authority of Christ as Lord of all. There must be a resignation to His providence – a confidence that He sees hidden caverns of depravity in our nature that if left alone will cause soul-destroying trouble – thus He engages them in a series of preemptive strikes. He chooses our trials with perfect wisdom and love.

It is because of His discipline that we survive – without it we would be condemned along with the world (1 Cor 11:31-32; Heb 12). Our exit strategy must encompass these spiritual truths. These truths about the Lord’s dealings with us must enter the depths of our spirit. For we have been guilty of forgetting (forgetfulness is the sin the book of Deuteronomy is designed to prevent).

The exit strategy involves falling on our faces at the base of the cross before our Savior – it is consenting to be the object of His Gethsemene love; a love that consented to betrayal for our sakes. It is a willingness to be utterly obligated to Christ in trusting love that gives Him the vote of confidence; that He is infinitely qualified to run our lives (Gal 2:20). He is perfectly qualified to be our King – and we own Him to be such with eternal gratitude (Ps 2).

The exit strategy for sins of the spirit utilizes a willingness to be done with disputing in our spirits. Disputing is all about expectations from self. Are you willing to be weak; to tell the truth that you are inadequate; a hunk of hell; a wretch in union with a perfect Savior? That’s the only way to end disputing. Let Christ be all in all and you nothing. Consent to have your evil covered by His righteousness alone and not by anything that springs from your heart and life.

Can you say it and mean it – apart from God’s pity, I deserve to be perishing as an ulcerated incontinent blasphemer lying in an aids ward? Preach this to yourself. Spiritual pride has grown up in a long season of neglect in your life.

Beg God to allow tears to replace your anger. Plead with God to grant you repentance at the bottom of your rebellion. The noxious plants of spiritual pride are not removed with a little bit of weed spray; they will have to be pulled up by the roots. It will take sweat – Christ will assume His proper place in your thoughts and affections ONLY if this work is undertaken.

“Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God that He will exalt you at the proper time” (1 Pet 5:6).

As recipients of such magnificent promises of fellowship with God – the Christian should avoid any possible source of defilement in any aspect of his life, whether from flesh or spirit.

God’s precious promises are an inducement to put to death lust and corruptions of body and mind. We must endeavor to be partakers of His holiness. To strive for holiness is evidence that we truly fear God. He reserves His promises of nearness and the sense of His presence to those who take holiness seriously (Is 66:1-2; 57:15).

God takes pleasure in those who fear Him and who hope in His mercy. God is as good as His Word; He has annexed His glory to the fulfillment of His Word. His Word is unbreakable both when He promises and when He threatens – the man who fears God orders his life accordingly.

CONCLUSION:

Are you about the business of maintaining your relationship with God? As one pastor said, “You are as close to God as you want to be right now.”

In order for us to do what God expects of us, we will have to engage in the great privilege of feeding our faith upon His promises – meditating upon all He is toward us in Christ. Going back to the Gospel so that we have the courage (in spite of our sinfulness) to keep going to the Lord for His love and grace. Taking Christ as our “Source Person” each day will mean that we must loathe self as a rival “source.”

“Now those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires”(Gal 5:24).