Discernment Radar Wk. 2

Colossians 2:8-23

Transcript

Well, all right, everybody doing well tonight? I hope we did have a good Fourth of July. It's been two weeks since we've gotten together like this on a Sunday to dig into and talk about Colossians. I just spent the past couple of days, I manage a fireworks store during the Fourth of July and New Year's. And so if you've ever thought, is he kind of a redneck? I hope that clears it up for you.

I am. I love fireworks. I get in there and I get like a little kid. But you can't tell people when you sell fireworks, you can't tell people all the cool things they can do with them. You have to be like, no, don't hold that in your hand. No, don't throw that at your brother, like those kind of things.

But it is fun and has been a busy past couple of weeks. And a week before we didn't gather, we had the opportunity to eat or to eat here with First Baptist West Columbia or to come hang out with Midtown Fellowship or to stay at your house and nap. So hopefully people made good choices there. I think eating here and then napping would have been a good combo, but whatever you want to do. But what we're talking about tonight, we're in Colossians chapter 2.

We've been going verse by verse through Colossians. What we're talking about tonight, we're finishing up. We started talking in Colossians chapter 2 about a discernment radar. And so we'll be in 8 through 23 tonight. And what we're kind of doing is we're finishing up this idea of having a discernment radar that Paul kind of starts off in the beginning of chapter 2. And so really what we said that was is as Christians, as really as humans in the United States, we're bombarded with ways to think and to feel about everything.

So we're told constantly by television how we ought to view romance, life, joy, hope, the purpose of why we're here. We're told through books that we read and through shows that we watch. I mean, constantly. I was watching the end of a show. My wife and I were watching the season finale of a show. And I found myself sitting there wanting one of the main characters to get rich.

There was a job he was trying to work out. And I was wanting him to have it work out really well at the end of the show so that I could just know that this character, who wasn't real, was going to be okay off in Fake World when I was no longer allowed to watch him. And I remember sitting there thinking, like, wanting that to work out. And then I was like, you know, the truth is I don't think that's where life and joy and hope and happiness come from. I don't think that wealth accomplishes that for us. But through this show, I was believing that for this guy.

And I was beginning to think that that would make his life better and he would have joy and hope and life if he had that. And this was like two nights ago, and it just reminded me of the fact that as we watch television, as we read books, we're constantly being sold a worldview. And so what happens is we get indoctrined by everything around us. And that's what Paul is. He's writing to the Colossians. He's saying, look, there's all of this coming in at you, and I want you to have a way to process it.

I want you to have a way to understand what's healthy and helpful and good for you. And so what we talked about in the first seven verses of chapter two is, and we kind of went through it backwards, but Paul says, I want you to be knit together in love. I want you to be one so that you can have the full assurance of Christ, so that you can know what is true in the gospel, so that you're not led astray by plausible arguments. And so what we basically said last time we got together was, we're constantly being attacked by plausible arguments, things that sound smart and good, but we need to be able to submit them to Jesus in the context of community.

And that's actually what our discernment radar is. Does this line up with Jesus? And we do that in the context of community. As we finish out this chapter, we're going to see that Paul, it feels kind of like a father talking with his children in this passage. It's almost like, look, I'm not going to be here with you, and I want you to have a way to process everything that's coming in. I'm not, Paul tells them, he says, you've never seen me face to face.

And so I'm just trying to equip you with a way to understand the world around you, a way for you to know what's good and helpful and true. And the truth is, as we go through, we're going to look today more at what comes into us from the church, what comes into us from what we see and read in Christian literature and books and pastors and teaching and all that. And so in some ways we get constantly attacked by society. And then we'll walk into a bookstore and we'll like run to the Christian living section and feel like we're at home base. It's like, can't get me here. I'm safe.

That sign says Christian. Or like you're flipping through television channels and you'll flip to some sort of a Christian channel. And it's like, no, can't, this, this is going to be good for me. And that may not necessarily be true. And so Paul's going to kind of unpack. And what he does in this passage, we've got a lot of ground to cover.

It's a lot of verses. And Paul's going to bring up a bunch of ideas. And so actually some of this will need to be unpacked in our community groups as we go throughout the rest of the week and weeks as we continue to walk through Colossians. But what basically Paul does is he brings everything into the room. So he's going to bring up all kinds of different teaching and philosophies and, and ways to understand the world.

And he's just going to gather them all together and say, the way you process this is by looking at Jesus. And so he's going to bring up all this stuff, but he's going to point to Jesus. And so that's what we're going to do tonight. We're going to pull it all into the room. We're not going to spend a whole lot of time unpacking what all of it is, but we're going to point to Jesus. So I'm going to pray and then we'll, we'll hop in.

God, I pray that you'd help us see you clearly in this. You would give us wisdom as we walk through it. Thank you for your word that you do in it, reveal yourself to us and that you lead us through it. And so we praise you. We thank you. Pray that you'd bless our time that we have together tonight in Jesus name.

Amen. Okay. So chapter two, he just, we just finished reading in verse six. Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus, the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him, established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving. So what we said last week was that we're to be one.

We're to be knit together. We're to know that everything submits to Jesus. And then that way we won't be led astray by plausible arguments. One of the things we said is that that means we have to be one. We have to have the Bible, not just books. We have to actually study God's word to know that, that Jesus, God revealed himself through Jesus coming to earth.

And that then we, we have him revealed to us through scripture. And so for us to know whether or not something lines up and submits to Jesus and lines up with what's true about the gospel, we have to know scripture. We can't just read books. We can't just, because it's a Christian author. We have to even weigh that against scripture. We also said it has to be community, not just crowd.

So we can't just be like, well, I read some online reviews. This is probably pretty good. Like we can't do that. We have to actually have people around us who know us. One of the best things about my community group is that they know me well enough that I can't trick them. I can't try to try to tell them half of a truth and convince them that what I'm pursuing is actually good for me.

They'll be like, no, man, we know you. And we know that you're actually pursuing this for wrong reasons, even though it's an okay thing. And they get to help guide me. They get to help me point me in the right direction. And so we actually have to have people around us who know us. And so then we get established in the faith and we abound in thanksgiving.

So verse eight, see to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world and not according to Christ. Okay. So we've said in Colossians that every time we see the word you, it is the plural you. It's the Greek version of y'all. And so every time we see you, it's actually y'all. He's talking to the church, the group of people.

And so when he says, see to it that y'all aren't taken captive. What he's saying is that it's actually a team effort. That the person responsible for you not being led astray is you and all the Christians around you. That we actually have to care enough about each other to point out where we're getting off, where we're chasing after dumb things, where we're believing something that isn't true. And we have to actually care about each other in order to do that. And so it's, it's our job to defend against everything together as a team.

So see to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit. So basically philosophy, ways of thinking, ways to process the world, empty deceit, people who are just outright lying, just making stuff up to try to trick us. Philosophy, empty deceit, according to human tradition. So just, this is what we've done forever, according to the elemental spirits of the world and not according to Christ. But he says, he starts gathering all this in the room and he says, everything has to point to Jesus.

We submit to what points to Jesus and nothing else. And so what we're going to see as we go through this is Paul is going to tell us where we actually have the power and the authority in having discernment, what we actually hold everything up against, what we actually hold everything up against so that we know whether or not it's true and helpful and good. Just keep going. For in him, that's Jesus, the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily. It means that God became a human, that fullness is in Jesus and Jesus alone, that wisdom and life and joy and fullness are in Jesus. And you have been filled in him who is the head of all rule and authority.

So fullness is in Jesus and we're filled up in Jesus. And he's the head of all rule and authority. You know, that's really good news. We have so many rules and authorities in the world right now. In Colossians, what that means is it both means spiritual rulers and authorities and earthly. So Paul in chapter one would say that Jesus is in charge of visible things, invisible things, things on earth, things in heaven.

I did my hands backwards, but you know what I'm talking about. And, and so what, what this actually means for us is that everything submits to Jesus. And so someone has a PhD that has a rule and authority. It's submitted to Jesus. You have a local church leader, rule and authority submitted to Jesus, local government submitted to Jesus. Which means if I stand up here and point you to something other than Jesus, you tell me to shut up and sit down.

Everything submits to Jesus. That's how that works. And so all rule and authority is submitted to him who is the head and he's head over all rule and authority. Verse 11, in him, you also were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands. This just got weird. Um, uh, so Paul's going to start talking about circumcision here.

If you're not familiar with what circumcision is, Matt would love to talk with you about it afterward. Uh, he'd love to walk you through that. Um, okay. So what Paul's going to start talking about circumcision and what, what he's referring to is Jewish religious Acts. So in the old Testament, the way that you knew you were initiated into being a God fear, a God follower, uh, was circumcision.

So all the males were circumcised and that was how they knew that they began to follow the law and how they followed God. And so what happened is after, um, after Jesus came, after he died, after he rose again, and after the church began, it began amongst Jewish people. Uh, contrary to the painting your grandmother has at her house, Jesus was Jewish, not some sort of blonde haired, blue eyed woman with a beard, uh, that you may have seen in a painting. Or if you Google it, there are some pictures of him with dreadlocks, but Jesus was Jewish. So dark hair, dark eyes, Jewish, uh, and Christianity began out of Judaism.

And so what happened was as Christian, Christianity began to grow to those who weren't Jewish, Jewish people would say, yes, you need Jesus. Yes, you need the gospel, but you also need to be Jewish. You need to be a good Jewish person. And your initiation into that is circumcision. And you need to also follow the law. And what Paul is saying is that he says, in him also, you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands by putting off the body of flesh by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.

Paul says that our initiation into following Jesus was done without hands. That is such good news. That means that nobody in this room accomplished salvation on their own. It was done without hands, that he accomplished it for us. What brings us into being Jesus followers, brings us into being rescued by Jesus is not our hard work, our good morals, our intellect, our effort. It's Jesus.

Jesus has already accomplished it for us. And so what it says is that you, verse 12, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. Christianity is us placing faith in God. And faith is not us doing work. It's us admitting that we can't, that we wouldn't accomplish this on our own. So we place our faith.

We say, I'm not going to work this out. I'm not going to accomplish this, but you can on my behalf. And that's what baptism is. It's us saying that Jesus died for our sins, that we died with him, that our sins died with him. And that when he rose again from the grave, we rose with him. And that's all it is, is us publicly proclaiming that the gospel is true for us.

And so some of you in this room may have become Christians, and you actually need to be baptized, which is just a public declaration of, this is true for me because of Jesus. We'll be doing some baptisms again in August. We throw parties when we baptize people, because we want to make much of Jesus, and we want to celebrate, and we love dunking people to point to Jesus. It's great. And so we eat food and celebrate and make a big deal out of it. And so that's what he's saying.

You were baptized with him. You were buried with him, and you've been raised again through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised Jesus from the dead. It's about to get good, y'all. It's one of my favorite sections in Scripture. And you who were dead in your trespasses, trespasses means sin. Every time we've overstepped the bounds, every time we've stepped out of line, every time we've rebelled against God, every time we've loved something more than we've loved him, every time that we've pursued something, that we've placed in higher importance in our life than he is.

Every time we've been greedy and selfish, every time. So we were dead in our trespasses, and those of us outside of Christ in this room are dead in our trespasses, and the uncircumcision of your flesh, meaning that Jesus hadn't brought you in yet, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. All right, we're Americans, so we're familiar with debt, correct? Y'all know what debt is? Okay, it has legal demands. So like China could show up and be like, give us everything now, and they have legal demands on us.

We'd tell them no, because we don't have anything to give them. But we'd say, come get it, we have guns. But we have debt, and Americans have debt, and we accrue debt constantly. I saw a thing after the Olympics that said, it was USA and China talking, and it said, USA, we got more gold medals than you did. And China was like, that's cute. You owe us infinite money.

And then USA said, USA, USA. Just change the subject. But anyway, what it's saying is that we, when we sin, have a record of debt with God. A record of debt when we sin. My wife and I own a house. We rent it from the bank.

It's the correct way to say that, I think. Because if we quit paying our mortgage, we'd find out really quickly who actually owned it when they took it from us. But we have a mortgage. We have an electricity bill. We have a Netflix bill that comes in. We have an internet bill.

And they show up every month. We live in West Columbia, but not in the city of West Columbia. So we have to pay water to the city of West Columbia and sewer to the city of Casey. Seems a bit fishy, but that's how that works. And so we pay two bills on that. And so they show up every month in my mailbox.

And that's debt that we owe, and it has legal demand. And so I got to thinking about this. What if God sent me a bill every month for the record of my debt? Sins of commission, which means when we do something we shouldn't do. Every time that I'm just absolutely just selfish with my wife or just pop off and say something really mean to her just because I'm a jerk and she lives with me. Every time that I should have done something and didn't, when I should have been generous, when I should have cared more about someone else than myself, but I convinced myself that I deserved my money more than they did, that I had earned it, that I had more value than they do, and so I don't need to be generous to them.

Every time I stepped over the bounds, every time I missed the Mark, God kept a record of my debt and sent it to me at the end of the month. My neighbors would wonder why I got a phone book once a month. They'd be like, man, we get a phone book once a year. This cat gets a phone book every month. I'd be like flipping through and be like, wow, Tuesday the 12th was a bad day for me. I must have had to have been around a lot of humans.

So what it says is that we have a record of debt, that we're dead in our trespasses, and that we owe a debt to the God of the universe. And here's what it says. We'll start back in 13. And you who were dead in your trespasses, and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. Jesus was nailed to the cross.

He became our debt. He became our substitute, that he died in our place for our debt, and in so doing, paid it for us. You see, Jesus is the fullness of deity. See, God became a man and lived a perfect, sinless life. He wouldn't have gotten a bill every month. He had no record of debt.

He had a clean slate. He had not only not committed sin, but he'd done everything he was supposed to do to be right with God. And then, he died to pay our debt. So our God is a judge. We stood before him in his high courtroom, and he looked at us and declared that we were guilty and that we owed an unpayable debt. And then he passed our sentence on to Jesus.

So that Jesus, who owed no debt, paid our guilty sentence. And that we, who owed all the debt, received Jesus' innocence. So that we were declared innocent, and Jesus was declared guilty because he swapped places with us. If you're a Christian in this room, you have no debt when you stand before God. Because Jesus was nailed to the cross, and he became our debt, and he canceled the record of our debt. And we've been set free.

Let me show you why this is such good news. Other than the fact we've been set free, it says this. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them in him. So that when he canceled the record of our debt, he disarmed the rulers and authorities. And so this is both spiritual heavenly rulers and authorities and earthly rulers and authorities. Let's talk about spiritual ones first.

Satan, who is real, he's a created being. He has fallen angels that follow him. They're called demons in scripture. They are spiritual beings that exist. He's called an accuser, which says that he accuses God's people before the throne of God day and night. When Jesus died for our sins, he has nothing left to accuse us of.

So when the enemy shows up and tries to tell you, how on earth can you call yourself a Christian when you did this and this? How on earth can you say that you love Jesus when you've just acted this way? They're disarmed. All that is is an opportunity to say, good point. You're right. Grace is unfathomable that Jesus would pay for that.

Thank you so much for helping me praise his holy name, that I am that messed up, that I did just do that, and that I get to claim the name of Christian because Christ has already paid my debt. The enemy has been disarmed. I used to watch a bunch of movies when I was growing up, like action movies and stuff, and in any pirate movie or Princess Bride has a scene like this, and I think Three Musketeers has a scene like this, but they're always fighting, and then the hero does this wrist thing that I'm not sure actually exists in real life, but they do this, and then the sword shoots up in the air out of their enemy's hand, and then they grab it. And then the bad guy is standing there with no weapon, and he's suddenly in a really bad position because he used to have a weapon, and now he doesn't, and the guy he's fighting has two weapons, which makes it harder because both ends are pointy now, and so it's just a bad day.

That's what Jesus has done for us. What the enemy held against us, what the enemy would hold against us to say that we had fallen short, that we weren't good enough, that we weren't going to make it, that we hadn't earned it, Jesus has disarmed him so that when he says that, we say absolutely. Isn't Jesus good? Absolutely. Didn't he rescue me to the utmost? He's disarmed.

Not only spiritual enemies, but earthly rules and authorities that say you have to do this to know that you have value. You have to do this to get God to love you. You have to accomplish these things to know that you're successful, to know that you have worth. Not at all. Not no heck no. Jesus has already accomplished all that for me.

I've already been given worth freely. I've already been made successful freely. There's nothing that's held against us anymore. And so that's what Paul says here. He says, therefore let no one pass judgment on you. Judgment is where God stands up and he Judges us based off of our merit.

Judgment is when you're in any kind of a competition, there's a certain level of standard or measure that you have to measure up against. And so if you were in a beauty contest, you'd be judged based off of beauty. So if I entered into a beauty contest, I would lose. I would have losing well in hand. Like I wouldn't even get like a participation award. They would just be like, no, stop it.

Go home. No ribbon for you. Because they're basing it off of beauty. If I was in a pie eating contest, that I could actually do. I'm just going to, let's just think about eating pie for a second. But you have to, you have to be based off of the rules that are there.

And so what Paul is saying is that there are no more rules that apply to us that base our acceptance, that our acceptance is based off of, that our merit is based off of. Because Jesus has already brought us in. He's already initiated everything that needs to happen. He's already accomplished it without hands. And so what we're going to look at is three areas that this shows up in the church, that this kind of plays out in how we walk through life as Paul unpacks this. So he says, Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food or drink, or with regard to a festival, or a new moon, or a Sabbath.

These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. Okay. If Jesus has already accomplished that for us, and if that's what we hold everything up against, then we aren't judged by legalism. We're set free from it. So what Paul says is, don't let anybody pass judgment on you when it comes to how you behave and how you participate in religious activities.

That they're a shadow of the things to come, and the substance belongs to Christ. And so what that means is, we gather together on Sunday nights. We gather with our community groups, and we walk through life, normal life together, but it's not to get God to love us. It's not to qualify ourselves. It's because of what He's already accomplished. So if you're here tonight to make God love you, that's not how this works.

He's already accomplished it for us. So we do these things because, He says, these are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. We do these things because we enjoy the shadow, because it points us to Jesus. We enjoy the shadow because it outlines Jesus, but the shadow is a means to point us to Jesus. It's not Jesus. It's not the goal.

Religion isn't the goal. Legalism isn't the goal. Adhering to a certain strict set of rules isn't the goal. It's to point us to Jesus. And we get off on this in our thinking. I know my grandparents were, a pastor and wife and my dad, whenever he was sick, they would come home from church, if he was sick and didn't go to church on a Sunday night or something, they would come home and touch the back of the television to see if it was hot.

Because if he was too sick to hang out with the church, he was too sick to watch television, which seems like odd logic. Because you know those people aren't real. Like I can't get them sick through the screen. They're not actually there. Like I think I can watch TV while I'm sick. But that's what they would do.

Because the point was, your adherence to following God in this religious way, but that's not the point. The point is growing closer to Jesus, finding Jesus and realizing that he's already accomplished everything for us. Another way this shows up in the church is Christian karma, which is when things are going well, I just assume I must be doing things right. God must like me because I'm behaving well. And when things aren't going well, I just assume that God must be mad at me. I've got to figure out what I've done wrong.

Jesus. Y'all know everybody likes Jesus, right? That's a thing. Like not many people are like, man, if I met Jesus, I bet we'd fight. Like most people think that Jesus is probably an okay guy. All right?

Jesus was God and he was perfect. Jesus died to cancel the record of our debt that we owed. That's not karma. That's grace. So our walk with God isn't based off of our actions and our effort and our merit.

It's based off of Jesus. So when things are going poorly, it just means things are going poorly. You get to talk to God about it, who's good and who in the cross has already shown you that he's good and that he's for your good. And when things are going great, you get to praise Jesus for it, who's good. But it's not based off of you.

So we're not judged based off of legalism. We enjoy the shadow. We enjoy the things that God's given us that point to him, but we don't base our worth and our value and our salvation off of it. Let no one disqualify you assisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind and not holding fast to the head from whom the whole body nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments grows with a growth that is from God. We aren't judged by spiritualism. So some of us think that Christianity is about having intense spiritual experiences, that we've got to have these experiences, these moments that we're just swept away or it's not real or we're not actually in.

But that's not how that works because it's not based off of you and your experiences. It's based off of what Jesus has already accomplished. And so what Paul's saying is that there are people that get swept up in worship of angels, which I didn't know this was a thing. I was talking to Jordan about it. He's from Liberty University, and he said that there's a whole section of Christians now that have gotten into very experiential worship, which there's nothing wrong with that. But then they've started talking about like glory clouds and finding angel feathers, and it's like, nope, that's gotten weird.

And biblically angels fly, but there's only one place that we're ever told anybody had feathers, so I'm not even sure that's a thing. Usually they just show up looking like really scary men. The wife of Samson's mama told her husband there's a really awesome man outside, which I'm sure made him feel great. He's like, awesome man, I'll show you an awesome man. Good gosh, you're gracious. So we get caught up in all of this thing, and we'll overly spiritualize things.

And this isn't the case in all churches, but in some areas in the holiness church and in Pentecostalism, they're taught that in order to show that you are truly a believer, you have to speak in tongues. That's not true. That's not in here. Speaking in tongues is, it's a gift given by God, but it's not to show, you don't have to have this experience to prove that you've been rescued. You don't have to have this spiritual moment to prove that Jesus has accomplished this on your behalf. So for us, we want to have spiritual experiences.

We want to speak in tongues. The Bible says not to forbid the speaking in tongues, and so that's what Baptists have done. They forbid it, and it's like, okay, explain to me Romans 14, where it clearly says, don't do that. Let me show you, let's get into Greek syntax. I'm pretty sure it means don't do that. And we want that to happen, but in a way that points to Jesus.

He says that they're not holding fast to the head. And so we have spiritual experiences, yes, and the Holy Spirit moves, yes, but he points to Jesus. Revelation says that the spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus. And so if you want to know if you're in a spirit-filled church, you're talking about Jesus, you're praying Jesus, you're praising Jesus, everybody's pointing to Jesus. That's what the Holy Spirit is about. It's pointing to Jesus, it's making much of Jesus, it's showing us that salvation is in Jesus, it's convicting us of sin, and drawing us close to Jesus.

A way that we do this, overly spiritualized things, is we throw around the phrase, God told me a lot, and we use it like a trump card. So you'll be talking to somebody, and be like, hey man, I really don't think that this relationship you're in is really healthy, there's some obvious signs of some sin areas, and some things y'all need to be working on, it's like, well, God told me we're supposed to be together. It's like, okay, I don't know if that's true, maybe, after you repent, and start lining up with the other things that he said clearly and wrote down. So, we'll say things like, I feel more spiritual when I'm not, I don't feel like I have to read the Bible much, I feel more spiritual when I'm not reading the Bible, I don't feel like I have to be around the church much, be around church family, I just, I get really spiritual in the woods, and it's like, okay, the Holy Spirit's gonna point you to the head, who's Jesus, who's revealed to us clearly in scripture, and the head, is going to grow the body.

It says the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God, as we hold fast to the head. So we don't overly spiritualize things, we won't have spiritual experiences, and so some of us in this room, you want to have that, that's great, but let me tell you something, let me just pastor you a little bit, if you've never had intense spiritual experiences, it doesn't mean you're not a Christian. It doesn't. It's faith in Jesus, and what he's accomplished, and not what your life looks like, and the experiences you've had. It's faith in Jesus, and what he's already done.

We're not judged by spiritualism. Last one he points out, knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with the growth that is from God. If with Christ you dived to the elemental spirits of the world, why as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations? Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch. Referring to things that all perish as they are used, according to human precepts and teachings. These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion, and asceticism, and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.

So what Paul's saying is, yeah, we're Christians, and we deny the flesh, which means that we deny ourselves, pick up the cross, and follow Jesus, which, whatever he calls us to, we follow him in. But that doesn't mean we're ascetics, is that how that's said? Asceticism, which is just, you don't indulge any area of the flesh, which means you don't, anything that seems enjoyable, you just don't do. So it's like, your clothes should be uncomfortable, and you should eat gross food. And it's like, well, what does that do? C.S.

Lewis, who's a theologian, he said, yes, deny yourself, but don't pour out the port, and get rid of the cigars. Like, he's like, no, we still get to enjoy things in life, but as they point us to Jesus, and so we don't make it about, what we're partaking in. Like, I can eat a really good steak, but the enjoyment doesn't end on the steak, it points me to the God who invented flavor, and cows, and flavorful cows. And so we're not judged by moralism. We're not judged by our adherence to a set of rules. Here's the thing, with all of these, we love rules.

We do. Everyone thinks they don't. There's a few people that probably know you do. Everybody loves rules. Because if I, like, if I invited you to my house and said, we're going to play a game, first question, okay, how you play, like, what are the rules? And I said, there are no rules, and then I pushed you and said, I win, like, you wouldn't play that game.

If I, like, kicked your shin and yelled Yahtzee, like, we wouldn't play the game, because you're like, no, there's no rules, this is stupid. And so, our whole life is based on rules. Like, the way you woke up this morning, you woke up at a set time, based on a general set of what's acceptable in our society. When you drove down the road, you followed road signs, you dressed appropriately for generally what's acceptable in our society, because our whole life is guided by rules. And when we approach Christianity, we want something that tells us whether we're in or out. We want something that we can measure ourselves by and say, no, I know I'm in, I know I'm here, because I've done this and this, and I don't do these things.

Because I act this way, or I participate in this, and not those things. It's not about that. It's made without hands. It's not your calloused hands that accomplish your salvation. It's Jesus' scarred hands that accomplish it. It's not your hard work, your effort, your religion, your morals, any of it.

Does God love morality? Yeah. Does He want us to repent of sin? Yes. Does He want us to gather as a church family? Yes.

Does He want us to enjoy the shadow that points to the substance? Yes. Does He want us to have spiritual experiences? Yes. Does the Holy Spirit lead us to prophesy, and to speak in tongues, and to move, and change people, and lead us to repentance, and joy in life, and grow us in the body? Yes.

But none of that gets us in. Jesus does. None of that pays our debt. Jesus does. No amount of adherence to rules, and regulations, and experiences brings us in. Jesus does.

And so when it comes to how do we know what's coming in? Is it helpful? Is it good? Is what I'm reading helpful and good? Is what I'm being taught helpful and good? We hold it up to, does it make much of Jesus?

Or is it telling me that I have to accomplish something to bring myself in? Is it pointing me to Jesus, or is it saying that my worth and value comes from my hard work, my effort, my experiences, my life? And so when it comes to our discernment radar, when it comes to how do we vet, how do we know, there's two really helpful questions. Who's the hero? And what's the goal? Who's the hero, and what's the goal?

Because in this story, Jesus is the hero. He's the one who pays the debt. That old school, I'll pay the rent thing, and then you put the bow on your head, and you say, oh, my hero, you know what I'm talking about? Anybody know what I'm talking about? No? Nobody knows what I'm talking about?

I think that's an old SNL from like the 60s. My mom loved it. But anyway, I should have known better than to bring that up. At the end, the guy pays the rent, or he pays the debt, and then the girl says, oh, my hero. And the question is, who's the hero? Who are you pointing me to?

Who's bringing salvation about? Me, or Jesus? Is it my hard work, my effort, my morality, or is it Jesus? And what's the goal? What am I getting out of this? A good marriage, or Jesus?

Is it I'm getting a good life out of it? Is my goal financial success, or is it Jesus? We love to take the American dream to Jesus, and have him rubber stamp it, and he's not into that. The enemy has been disarmed, and that's really good news for us. And so for those of us in this room who feel like Christianity, Christian or non-Christian, you feel like Christianity is about your morality, your effort, your work, your goodness, your value, I'm here to tell you that you have debt that's paid by Jesus, and you have value that's given to you by Jesus, not by you. It's not made by your hands, it's made by his.

And that's really good news, because none of us were actually going to get that accomplished. Jesus is the hero, and Jesus is the goal, and we walk in community pointing each other to Jesus, because he's where life and joy and hope and wisdom are found. Band's going to come back up, we're going to sing, and we're going to make much of Jesus. We're going to praise Jesus, that he has rescued and redeemed us, that he's paid a debt we couldn't pay. And if you're in this room, and you haven't placed your faith in Jesus, I'm here to tell you that you get to, that he pays our debt, not on your own merit, but on his.

You don't have to clean yourself up, he accomplishes that. You don't have to make yourself good, he accomplishes that. And we're not inviting you into religion. We're not inviting you into, come behave like us. We're inviting you to come follow Jesus as we repent, and learn what it looks like to be more like him, and continue to have the gospel change how we live, and how we think, and how we feel. I'm going to pray.

We're going to praise Jesus. God, we thank you. Thank you for your grace. We thank you for your love. We thank you that you did disarm the enemy on our behalf, and that we are made new and right because of you. We thank you that you are the hero, and that you are supreme, you are what we, you are our prize.

Help us to see that, help us to walk that out in community. Thank you that you paid our debt. Pray for those people in this room right now, God, that are still trying to pay their own debt. Pray that you, through your grace, show them they can stop. Show them the futility of paying off debt, and show them that you, when you died, you died for them. That in faith, you can pay their debt and give them life.

We love you, we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.