May 16, 2010 Pastor Tim Pusey

THE ULTIMATE CHARACTER BUILDER
Galatians 5:13-26
Sixth in series: “Are You Filled?”
May 16, 2010

Many of you are aware that some of us were involved in what is called our District Assembly this week in Nampa. It’s an annual gathering of the 50+ churches that comprise the Intermountain District of the Church of the Nazarene. And if it were just meetings, there wouldn’t be much inspiration to it, but what I find most encouraging are what some people call “the God stories” that we get to hear—of how Christ has transformed people’s lives across our district this year.

Wednesday evening we heard and saw some of the testimonies of people in the Nampa area who have found Christ and found new hope and new freedom through a ministry called Celebrate Recovery. Like the cardboard testimonies we had at Valley Shepherd on the Sunday before Thanksgiving, there was quite a parade of cardboard testimonies shared—where people would walk to the front and center of the sanctuary and display for all to see a cardboard sign that proclaimed how things once were, and then turn the simple piece of cardboard around to show how Christ had changed them. And their broad smiles as they proudly displayed the simple truth of how Jesus Christ had changed their lives was a wonderful thing to witness! We saw simple testimonies like:
• Hopelessly addicted to drugs—Now I’m free!
• Lonely and depressed—I am loved!
• Unfaithful—Restored
All the while we were hearing a Celebrate Recovery worship band playing and singing the song “I Am Free!” I turned to Marge Carman, who was sitting next to me, and mused, “This is the revised version of the old song ‘Hallelujah! I Am Free!’”

And if there were an overall theme in that part of the service it was the wonderful theme of “freedom”—freedom from the chains of our past, freedom from the demons within that seem to torture so many, and most important, freedom from sin that destroys! And if you had missed the messages on the cardboard signs, what you couldn’t miss was the glowing countenance of the people who came to share their silent testimony in simple words that evening—and what you could see in their faces is that Christ had set them free!

This morning we’re continuing in our series of sermons called, “Are You Filled?” on the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Look with me at Galatians 5, beginning at verse 13—
[Read Galatians 5:13-26, TNIV]
And may I simply go back to the beginning of this passage again and remind you of Paul’s words—“You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free.”

There are those who think that freedom is the right to do whatever you want to do—with no judgment and no condemnation for the choices you make. But I’d dare to say that those who had found life-changing help through Celebrate Recovery programs would dare to differ with you on that. Their license to do whatever they wanted to do, complicated by the license others also took to do whatever they wanted to do, had only brought bondage into the lives of the people sharing their testimonies! There’s no freedom in addictions! There’s no freedom in life when the wounds and hurts of our pasts are still eating us up on the inside! There’s no freedom in life when sin has control of us! And part of the problem is that the ramifications of sin are always destructive. And if you think that you can dabble with just a little bit of sin and not have it impact you, understand that sin will always take you further than you want to go!

But the Good News of the Gospel is that God has something better for every one of us! He wants to set us free! He wants to set us free from the sins of our past! He wants to set us free from guilt and shame and despair and hopelessness! He wants to set us free to live each day with confidence and hope and joy!

But as this passage makes clear, there is an enemy to this freedom—and it’s an enemy we need to face. There’s a conflict here—a major conflict! Paul is presenting a problem that has to be dealt with. It’s like the line from the movie “Apollo 13”—“Houston, we have a problem.” And the problem is that there is a battle going on within each of us for domination of our lives. We’re being pulled in two different directions at the same time—two opposing directions! And the question which we each have to face is this: Will we allow our sinful nature to dominate our lives or will we allow the Holy Spirit to dominate our lives? And what this passage from Galatians makes clear is that we can’t go both directions at the same time—any more than you can drive up Meridian highway and get to Highway 84 and head to Nampa and to Boise at the same time. You’ve got to decide which way you’re going to point your car, and whichever way you point your car, that will determine where you end up!

Now, please understand that this verse is not a description of equal forces combating each other, with no assurance of which can overpower the other. While our temptation to sin will continue to peck away at us, the Apostle Paul has no doubts at all about the fact that the Spirit of God has the upper hand! Paul is certain who will emerge triumphant—and we too can be certain if we “walk in the Spirit”! We don’t have to let our sinful nature control us—but we can only go a different direction if we live our lives under the authority and under the power of the Holy Spirit. And when we are in fellowship with God’s Holy Spirit, He continues to shape us into the kind of persons who overcome and rise above the sinful desires which—without God in our lives—will lead us down a path of destruction.

But the struggle is an ongoing one. Contrary to how we’ve sometimes painted the Spirit-filled life, the battle is not won overnight. Though we may win the victory in an initial, genuine and complete commitment of our lives to Christ, the war continues because we are still living our lives in human bodies and are exposed to the kingdom of darkness and sin every day. We’re tempted—and the Enemy is trying to defeat us!

Paul says that we are called to be free—every person is called to live a life of freedom in Jesus Christ. But he also says that we need to make sure that we don’t use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever we want to do—that would destroy our freedom! Kids, you may at times wish you could get free from your parents’ control over your lives and from people telling you what to do! It’s part of our human nature to want to do our own thing—but the lie of the Enemy of our souls is that that’s the way to be free. But I’m guessing that if the people who shared their brief testimonies on Wednesday were here to sit down and talk with us, we’d learn that the freedom to do whatever we want to do at the moment is what led them into terrible bondage! And it’s the untold truth about sin—it never produces what it promises! And it never produces what it promises because Satan is a liar! He’s not out to bring meaning and significance and purpose and joy into our lives; he’s out to destroy us—and that’s exactly what sins does. It destroys our lives.

So Paul begins a little catalog of the sinful desires that destroy us. It’s not meant to be an exhaustive list, but it paints the broad picture of the battle going on. He wrote,
The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies and the like. (Galatians 5:19-21, TNIV)
If we allow our lives to be dominated by our own sinful desires, this is what will be produced in our lives!

Let’s talk about these. To give you another glimpse at the overall picture, let me read this passage as it is paraphrased in The Message:
It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or to be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lop-sided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on. (Galatians 5:19-21, The Message)

The picture certainly isn’t pretty, is it? Paul pretty well described what is wrong in our world, didn’t he?—
• the perversion of sex and the way such perversion destroys lives,
• the undisciplined lifestyle of serving self and all of our selfish desires,
• allowing things to take the place of God in our lives,
• the human effort to control God, to try to make God fit into our plan and to do what we want Him to do,
• relationships gone ugly because people are consumed with self-centeredness and don’t know how to love
• lives wrecked and homes destroyed by the effects of alcohol and carousing.
And Paul minces no words in concluding that “those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”

Clearly, if we choose to allow our lives to be dominated by our sinful desires—by our temptations, by what are sometimes called the desires of our human nature—we will reap the results of messed-up lives. And, unfortunately, because of the way sin works, we’ll mess up other people’s lives along the way, too. If we use the freedom God gives to us to pursue our sinful desires, the messed-up lives described for us in these verses is exactly what our lives will look like! And the picture is never pretty—and it does not lead to heaven—on earth or beyond this world. Living a life of sin takes us a totally different direction.

But thanks to the working of the Holy Spirit in our lives, it doesn’t have to be that way! That’s where our freedom comes in! The people whose testimonies we heard this past week had discovered new freedom from all the bondage of sin. Through the power of the Holy Spirit at work in the life of the follower of Jesus, we can be set free from the train-wrecks of sin. If you’re a follower of Jesus Christ, God’s Holy Spirit has already come to you—and now He wants to teach you how to live “in the Spirit”! The Holy Spirit is at work in our lives to help us not only talk the talk, but to walk the walk! And what the Spirit of God produces in our lives is so much better than what our sinful nature will produce if we allow it to dominate us.

Paul described it as “the fruit of the Spirit”—and then he goes on to give a listing of what that looks like and what kind of character traits are produced in our lives if we walk in fellowship with God’s Holy Spirit. Make no mistake about it: it’s not the fruit of our own goodness, nor what we produce if we simply try hard enough. These virtues can only be produced in our lives if we are allowing the Holy Spirit to have full control of our lives—to have full reign in shaping us to be who God designed for us to be and desires for us to become!

I like the concept of it being “fruit” of the Spirit. I can understand that—even though I don’t understand a lot about the science of how fruit is produced. Last week I had some fun in talking about my older brothers—who loved to tease me when we were all younger by trying to convince me that I was adopted, and went on to say that it was surely because my brothers could tell from my stellar good looks that we weren’t genetically related! But if you were here, you heard someone speak out, saying “No! You and Larry look too much alike!” I hadn’t met Fred Slonaker before, but he knows my brother Larry well—they’ve been prayer partners for several years in Wenatchee, Washington. I met Fred after the service and laughed with him, telling him that the middle brother Steve and I have mused that our oldest brother Larry has always been the best looking of us all and that, disgustingly enough, he looks younger than either Steve or me. Steve and I contend that it’s because Larry, who is a plant pathologist by profession, has spent his life dealing with first peaches and now apples—while Steve and I have spent our lives dealing with people!

My brother Larry could explain more to us than most of us could comprehend about the whole fruit industry. It’s really amazing! He’s a brilliant guy! But my knowledge of fruit is good enough for this conversation, because in all my academic pursuits, I have learned the great truth that apple trees produce apples and peach trees produce peaches. Aren’t you impressed with my knowledge?!

And Paul is saying that letting our sinful nature control our lives produces messed up, sinful, self-serving, people-destroying, God-dishonoring lives. But…the life controlled by the Holy Spirit produces something altogether different and, oh so wonderful! The product of the Presence and control of the Holy Spirit in our lives cultivates some beautiful and fascinating character traits called the The Fruit of the Spirit: Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, and Self-control. Just as fruit appear in an orchard, the Holy Spirit brings gifts into our lives—things like a Christlike compassion for others, an exuberance about life that supercedes our circumstances, and a peace and serenity despite the sometimes harsh realities of life. The Spirit also cultivates within us a willingness to stick with things, a graciousness in responding to people’s needs and an integrity of heart which offers comfort to those afflicted by the pain and heartaches of life. The fruit of the Spirit fosters loyalty in commitments, a gentleness in not needing to force our way in life, and the ability to direct and channel our energies and resources wisely. The Fruit of the Spirit are the outward expressions of Christ dwelling within us.
Powerfully and surely the Spirit works—sometimes dramatically; sometimes slowly, almost imperceptibly—in our lives to repeat the miracle of a new creation in Christ Jesus. (Maxie D. Dunnam)

And it is a miracle, isn’t it? Because left to our devises and resources, we’re pretty much helpless not to go the way of our sinful nature—messing up our lives and the lives of others, and, most significantly, turning our backs on the very One who is equipped to help us and wants us to experience a better way! But with the power of the Holy Spirit at work in our lives, He creates in us that which we could never produce on our own! And it’s awesome!

This week we heard a video testimony of Sherri—a lady in Nampa whose life had been radically transformed and redeemed. And then Sherri was introduced to the crowd, and as she came to the front, I was struck with the reality that Sherri looked so much younger now! I remember my friend John who was saved quite a few years ago now. He was my age, but looked so much older back then because of the wear and tear of sin in his life. But as the years unfolded, he started looking younger and younger, as the Holy Spirit produced His fruit in John’s life!

The Apostle Paul said about the Fruit of the Spirit—“Against such things there is no law.” In other words, legalism is helpless in bringing about the Fruit of the Spirit. Legalism just gets in the way! We can’t just legislate to ourselves or to others the character of Christ reflected in the Fruit of the Spirit—but neither are we to use our freedom as an excuse to do whatever we want to do! We can’t just force ourselves to become like Christ in character. Someone is needed to help us—and that Someone is the Holy Spirit! And the best news of the day is that the Holy Spirit is as anxious to work in our lives as we are desperate for Him to do so!

Which catalog of character traits in this Galatians passage describes the person you want to become? Which listing—the acts of the sinful nature or the Fruit of the Spirit—describe the journey of life which you want to be on? I hope it’s the Fruit of the Spirit. And how are you going to get there? Not on your own, that’s for sure! You’re going to need the Holy Spirit to be in control of your life—or you’ll go the way of the sinful nature! You’re going to need to allow the Spirit of God to be front and center in your life. You’re going to need what He alone can do in you and for you. The Fruit of the Spirit is not the fruit of human potential—it’s the fruit of God’s Spirit in the driver’s seat in our hearts and lives.

Are you filled? Are you allowing the Holy Spirit control of your life? Have you let go of the steering wheel of your life and are you letting Him work in you? If not, why not? And if not, why not turn that over to Him this morning? We need what only He can offer—and He’s anxious to give it to us!