Summary:
If there’s one thing that Christians can take away from Lindsey Jacobellis, it is to not be overconfident. We have one shot at living the Christian life and we can’t ruin it by being reckless with our freedom. Lindsey at least took home the silver medal. Second place for us is eternal condemnation.

Transcript:
This media has been made available by Mosaic Boston Church. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston and her neighborhood churches or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com.

Well, good morning Mosaic. My name is Andy Hoot. I am the pastoral resident here at Mosaic. Pastor Jan is on a much-deserved vacation and Pastor Shane is here, but they're giving me a swing today at preaching. If you didn't hear that there's a little sports reference there. Last week, we had a heavy emphasis on sports in the sermon. I got to just ask for forgiveness, I was just pumped up from Pastor Jan’s sermon and just had heard that in my mind all week. Get ready for a few more sports references. If you're new to Mosaic, welcome. We know there's a lot of health professionals coming in, lot of medical residents, grad students, people from all over the country and world coming in. We are glad that you're here at mosaic. I'd forgot to bring up the connection card. If you want to learn more about us, fill out that connection card in the bulletin. If you fill it out and bring it to our Welcome Center in the middle of the lobby, we have a gift for you. Go there and ask any questions that you'd like about the church.

Today, we're continuing in our series called Prodigal Church. We're walking through the book of 1 Corinthians this summer. We're going to cover verses 1 Corinthians 10:1-14. Take your Bibles or your phone apps out if you want to join me. We're going to read 1 Corinthians 10:1-14. Please hear the Word of God, “For I do not want you to be unaware brothers that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea and all they the same spiritual food and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them and that Rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them, God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.

Now, these things took place as examples for us that we might not desire evil as they did.” Do not be idolaters as some of them were as it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.” We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did and 23,000 fell in a single day. We must not put Christ to the test as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, nor grumble as some of them did and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now, these things happened to them as an example, but they're written down for our instruction on whom the end of the ages has come. Therefore, let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to men. God is faithful and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation, He will also provide the way of escape that you may be able to endure it. Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.

Join me in prayer. Heavenly Father, many of us here are people that know Your love, Your mercy, Your grace. Lord, we've been baptized. We partake in the Lord's Supper. Yet, so quickly we forget, we forget the extent that You went to engage in relationship with us. We forget the extent that You went to love us. We forget that You are constantly patient with us. Lord, when we're struggling, we tend to think that You are not there, we question Your goodness, Your justice, Your holiness. Lord, forgive us for that sin. Lord, we ask that Your Spirit would be among us now as we delve into Your word, may it sharpen our hearts, sharpen our affections for You and convert the hearts of those who don't know You. I pray this in Jesus name, amen.

Winter 2006, the Winter Olympics were debuting a new sport, snowboard cross. It's a sport, where four heats of four snowboarders race down a steep hill. They have to navigate sharp curves. They have to navigate the other competitors, cutting them off. They have to go over massive jumps and it's not about style. You get there, you scrap to get there the best you can and you just want to get there in first place. To launch the sport, NBC introduced us to Lindsey Jacobellis. Going into the Olympics, she was the favorite by a longshot. She was a 20-year-old blonde, curly hair with beautiful locks flowing out and just that rad snowboarder spirit. Lindsey cruised through the qualification round. She cruised through the semifinals and in the final round, she was dominating. Nine-tenths of the way through, she had at least a 40 meter lead in front of her closest competitor. She had two jumps left. On the second-to-last jump, it looked like she had the win, the gold in the bag. She decided in a moment of overconfidence and over-excitement, she did a trick in midair. The trick looked great, but she didn't land it and she lost her speed. She trickled down the slope just in time to get the silver medal.

I remember watching it live with a group of friends, just thinking, “How could you do that?” I wanted to feel bad for her, but I couldn't. She had that coming and that's kind of the tone that the Apostle Paul is bringing to the Corinthians this week. Last week, we went through 1 Corinthians 9:24-27. Again, it was a pump up speech that was Pastor Jan and the Apostle Paul reminding us to approach our faith, to approach the walk, the Christian walk with discipline, with intentionality, with purpose. That was the team huddle, where everybody's standing around before the game. You have your hands in the circle. You have the craziest guy on your team just hyping everybody that's what that felt last week. Now, in 1 Corinthians 10:1-14, it's a couple weeks into the season. The season isn't going as planned. You didn't start off undefeated as you hoped and the Apostle Pauls, they're having a chalk talk session. They're in the classroom. He is saying … Being a little more realistic and he's talking about specific challenges that his group of Christians have faced already and that they're going to face. Really, he's talking about that overconfidence that they're functioning with and how they're placing their confidence in the wrong things.

This topic really hits home to me. I came to Mosaic in 2011, fresh out of college. I grew up in the church, but it was at that moment in my life, where I saw my need for a savior. I was convicted of sin, saw my need for a Savior, placed Jesus as Lord of my life. I experienced bliss for two years. I just had freedom from a lot of sin, a lot of things that held me down. The Holy Spirit helped me to break the chains and I've read about seasons and trials and time in the wilderness, but I just didn't buy it. When it came to interacting with the world, I was a little overconfident, probably still inserted myself in communities that were not good for me, probably wanted to show my friends that I didn't change that much. When the trials and challenges appointed by God inevitably came, I was shocked and really just kind of had a little disillusionment.

This is a situation of the church in Corinth, they're a group of young believers living in a large Roman metropolis. They're surrounded by non-Christians, pagan temples. They're excited about Christ, but they're not being careful enough in their relationships, their social lives. They're grumbling amongst each other and they're still choosing to watch like all the wrong series on Netflix, like they're still consuming and spending like the rest of the world. Primarily they don't want their friends to think that their non-Christian friends to think that Christians don't have fun. They don't want them to think that they're closed-minded.

It's much like the feeling that some of us can have in Boston and this text is kind of funny, the Apostle Paul in the Chapter 10, he's taking a brief detour back to Chapter 8. In that chapter, he was talking to the strong. These were Christians in the Corinthian church that thought that it was okay to attend meals in temples that were dedicated to idols. They thought it was okay to eat meat dedicated to these idols. In that chapter, Paul was very delicate and gentle. He said, “It's probably not a good idea because it could make your weaker brother stumble, your younger Christians, your less mature Christians, the Christians with a background in paganism.”

Here, he goes around the topic in Chapter 9 and he's direct. He comes back in a way that only Paul can. He's basically trying to scare the pants off of his crowd. He's just saying, “Don't do it, don't toy with idolatry and it could literally be the death of you.” The passage today has a bit of a grim message to it, but we like to preach the whole word here at Mosaic. Our society doesn't necessarily like teaching in negatives, do not, do not, do not that's how the Apostle Paul delivers them to us. We're going to follow him.

Today, we're going to break down the passage and Paul's warning against overconfidence around idolatry into three points, know who you are, know the opposition and know your coach. Know who you are, first one, “For I do not want you to be unaware brothers that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea and all were baptized into Moses and in the sea and all ate the same spiritual food and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from spiritual Rock that followed them and the Rock was Christ.” What Paul is doing here, we don't normally talk about baptism and the Lord's Supper as directly with regards to the Old Testament. He's talking about a form of baptism that the Old Testament believers experienced. This spiritual food, the spiritual drink, it's referring to the Lord's Supper. He's talking about that indirectly reminding the Corinthians of their baptism. They're partaking in the Lord's Supper. They're followers of Jesus. He's beginning to remind them who are you? They're followers of Jesus, baptized into His death, risen to new life in His resurrection. They partake in communion to re-announce that to renew their fellowship with the Lord and they're standing and they're sustained by the Rock of Christ. This is an intentional strategy. I think we all have experienced this in some area of life.

My college soccer coach at the beginning of every season, after he made cuts, the first thing he did every year was he gathered us around in the classroom. He gave us our jerseys, gave us our training gear, gave us a shirt with the team crest on it. He emphasized that whole session, what an honor it was to wear that crest. He talked about the history of the program. He reminded us that we're now part of something bigger than ourselves. He told us that we represented not just ourselves in all that we did, we represented the team on campus, when we traveled with the team, in the classroom when we're socializing on campus. It was a lot like a soldier receiving his uniform, a medical professional at the white coat ceremony, receiving the white coat. It's just a piece of cloth physically, but it represents so much more in reality. A coach or an organization, they want you to have dignity in wearing the crest and wearing your gear. They want this to become a part of your identity. If they successfully hype you, like you want to parade this the fact that you're on the team everywhere.

I remember I coached high school soccer and it wasn't a great team. We had JV Varsity. We had 20 freshmen come in every year and I remember this kid was 5 foot 2, probably 150 pounds. He’s kind of like a circle. He was struggling all preseason, like a three week preseason and just running a mile, he's just literally crying. He at least kept going, just literally crying, complaining the whole preseason, but at the end of that preseason, we gave them the uniforms and the team warm-ups. That drastically changed that kid. He came in, he started showing up just in his full gear, wore it to school multiple days a week, every day that we had a game. He started gelling his hair. He was a freshman, but the kid started yelling at all of the seniors. The next year, it just drastically changed him. The next year, he came in 30 pounds lighter. He came in as one of the best players, like that transformation was incredible.

What Paul's saying, “When you reflect on who you are as a Christian, when you reflect on the uniform that you wear that's the transformation that you should have in your life.” How do we put on a uniform in the Christian life? Some people think it's a WWJD Bracelet. Some people think it's that gold chain with the cross. Others like the tattoo on their arm or on their back, but we put on the uniform of Christ when we get baptized. That is our white coat ceremony. That is that moment of receiving our uniform officially. It's an outward sign of something that has inwardly taken place. We are renewed, we're brought to life in Christ. When we take communion, we're going to take it later today, we're reminding ourselves of that initial baptism and we're renewing the commitment to wear that shirt with pride every day. We're not just fellowshipping here with Christ on Sunday morning, the rest of the week, we're wearing that jersey. Paul wants us to know that knowing who we are in Christ, it helps us in many ways, a lot like in the similar ways that my coach wanted. Knowing who we are in Christ should change the way we carry ourselves in day to day life.

When we take time to think that we are sinners, Jesus had no reason to go to the cross for us. He's been gracious for us. He is merciful. God could strike us with His wrath at any moment, but He didn't and He still doesn't. That should lead us to live lives of thankfulness and to do good works with excitement. Romans 6:1-4 says, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound, by no means. How can we who died to sin still live in it?” Do you not know that all of us, who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? We're buried therefore with Him by baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

Our conversion, our baptism, the partaking of the Lord's Supper, these things should remind us too that our whole lives should be transformed through our relationship with Christ. Knowing who you are in Christ, it takes the pressure off of ourselves to build an identity. Instead of exhausting ourselves, just trying to build something with our own strength, we are given one. God did everything for our salvation as He did for the Israelites. He led the people out of Egypt. He parted the waters. He gave them the food in the desert. All they had to do was follow, drink and eat.

Part of this is in addressing overconfidence, this is humbling. We are not who we are by anything that we did. When we walk, there's a humility. We're not reckless. We're not presuming upon the grace that has been extended to us. Knowing who we are in Christ is empowering. It gives us an identity because it was bought by God that the world cannot take away from us. If we embarrass ourselves for the sake of the Kingdom of God, like what does the opinion of man matter? Knowing that we're sustained by Christ, sustained by the Holy Spirit, we're emboldened to strive for the glory of His Kingdom with a greater zeal. Just the imagery of what this looks like, an empowered Christian, who knows his identity in Christ, I like to go to Pastor Jan illustrated this a lot for us last week.

I like to go to Nehemiah 4. 4 Nehemiah as a man, he receives a call from God to go rebuild the wall in Jerusalem, the city’s exposed, could be attacked at any point by enemies. He leads this charge to rebuild the wall. All of the local enemies start trying to slow the work. It says, “The people were building the wall with a shovel in one hand and a shield in the other.” That's the way that we're to approach our Christian lives. If you're not bringing that zeal, challenge yourself a lot. Just another way that knowing who we are in Christ is that it helps us take the attention of ourselves away from ourselves and our focus changes from ourselves to loving God and loving others. We don't get caught up in foolish pursuits and quarrels. We don't mind eating, drinking, socializing differently if it helps prevent a brother from falling or if it helps attract someone to the faith.

At Mosaic, just one way in particular that this applies is that community group. Those of you who are more mature, who are, “Strong,” you can pause to discuss the basics of the gospel to that guest to that new person to that seeker, instead of having deep theological discussion that you crave. When we know who we are in Christ, the focus is not for our betterment, it's for God, for our brothers and sisters around us. Lastly, when you know who you are in Christ, you have an identity that you can hold onto in the wilderness. You're going through difficulties, you have to have something to hold onto. Maybe you haven't seen a large body of water split, you haven't had a giant cloud guide you in the desert like the Israelites, you haven't seen manna raining from the sky, but the fact that you are a Christian is miraculous.

The fact that you and your sin would publicly declare that you're Christian in Boston in 2019 is miraculous. When you think of the miracles, everybody, every Christian knows the slavery that they were living in, the darkness that they were living in, the blindness that they're living in and you know that you didn't come out, you were drowning and you didn't even know that you needed to try to pull yourself up out of the water. When you reflect on that God pulled you out of that like this gives you hope in the future, in the wilderness when the storms and trials come, God will deliver you and get you through your despair again.

Just in this section of verses 1 through 4, he reminds the Israelites who they are, but he also tells them, “If you don't remember who you are, you can fall.” Just going through the motions of baptism, going through the motions when we partake in the Lord's Supper that doesn't save you. There are millions of Christians around the world, there's a large church, centered in Europe that a lot of people think this, it doesn't give you a free pass. Your baptism, your communion, it doesn't give you a free pass to the trials to the effects of idolatry. He's saying to the Israelites, “If you don't know who you are in Christ, you could fall like them.” Verse 5 says, “Nevertheless, with most of them, God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.”

Now, these things took place as examples for us that we might not desire evil as they did. God worked these mighty miracles to save them and they questioned Him and they turned away from Him really quickly. I just read these verses. You read your Bible app and it takes you through Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, January through April and May and like, you're reading about just the stupidity of these people. They're brought out of Egypt with mighty miracles and we tend to think that if we were there, if we saw what they saw, if we ate what they ate, we never would have fallen like them. Paul's telling us in this passage, “Be careful, we're just as likely to turn aside from God as them.” To prevent us from falling like the Israelites, the next step, he wants us to know our opposition.

In VERSES 7 to 11, he highlights four sins that led to the demise of thousands of Israelites. In fact, more than thousands of the original people, who left Egypt at the Exodus, only Joshua and Caleb were the only ones that made it to the Promised Land. I want to take you through very quickly these four sins and these four Old Testament stories to highlight the sins and also, the potential demise that could come to us if we're not careful.

In verse 7, Paul writes, “Do not be idolaters as some of them were as it is written. The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.” This is referring to a story in Exodus 32, a meeting between Moses and God on Mount Sinai. It took longer than expected. The text doesn't say why. The people got bored and restless and they thought that Moses wasn't going to come back. They told Aaron, Moses's right-hand man to fashion a God for them and they worshipped him how they wanted. That resulted in the worship throughout into eating and drinking and playing. The original word for that is playing sexually. When Moses came back down to the mountain, what happened? This is Exodus 32:26, Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said, “Who is on the Lord's side? Come to me. All the sons of Levi gathered around him and he said to them, “Thus says the Lord of God, put your sword on side each of you and go to and fro from the gate to gate throughout the camp and each of you kill his brother and his companion and his neighbor.” The sons of Levi did according to the word of Moses and that day about 3,000 men of the people fell.

Verse 8, he says, “We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did and 23,000 fell and a single day.” This comes from Numbers 25. While Israel lived in Shittim, the people began to whore with the daughters of Moab. These invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods and the people ate and bowed down to their gods. Israel yoked himself to bow of Baal of Peor and the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel. The Lord said to Moses, “Take all the chiefs of the people and hang them in the Sun before the Lord that the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel.” Moses said to the judges of Israel, “Each of you killed those of his men who have yoked themselves to Baal of Peor.” Shortly after that God sent a plague that killed another 20-some thousand people.

Verse 9, “We must not put Christ of a test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents.” This comes from numbers 21:4, “From Mount Hor, they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom. The people became impatient on the way. All the people spoke against God and against Moses, ‘Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness for there is no food and no water and we loathe this worthless food.’” Then, the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people, so that many of Israel died. In verse 10, “Nor do not grumble as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer.” There are a lot of places, where the Israelites grumbled against God, but this is likely referring to the story of Numbers 14, God leads the people to the Promised Land. They're right there. He sends spies in to explore the land. They come back and they say, “Yes, the land is awesome, but the people are huge and the cities are fortified.”

Numbers 14 continues, “Then all the congregation raised a loud cry and the people wept that night. All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron and the whole Assembly said to them, ‘If only we had died in Egypt, we're in the wilderness. Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as plunder, wouldn't it be better for us to go back to Egypt?’” They said to each other, “We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt.” The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, verse 26, saying, “How long shall this wicked congregation grumble against Me? I've heard the grumblings of the people of Israel, which they grumble against Me. Say to them, “As I live, declares the Lord, what you have said in my hearing, I will do to you. Your dead bodies shall fall in this wilderness and all of your number, listed in the census from 20 years old and upward, who have grumbled against Me. Not one shall come into the land, where I swore that I would make you dwell except Caleb, the son of Jephunneh and Joshua, the son of Nun.”

Verse 36, “And the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land, who returned and made all the congregation grumble against Him by bringing up a bad report about the land, the men who brought up a bad report of the land died by plague before the Lord.” “Of those men who went to spy out the land, only Joshua, the son of Nun and Caleb, the son of Jephunneh remained alive.”

These stories are pretty terrifying. If you’ve drifted, come back. After this gruesome story time, Grandpa Paul says to the Corinthians, “Now, these things happened to them as an example, but they're written down for our instruction on whom the end of the ages has come. Therefore, let anyone who thinks that he stands, take heed lest he fall.” Verse 14, “Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.” He's saying the same thing to us as he did to Corinthians, idolatry, sexual immorality, putting Christ to the test that's testing the limits, you know God's law. You know he's in charge, but you're just going to keep pushing and pushing until He strikes you. Idolatry, sexual immorality, putting Christ to the test and grumbling, they're serious sins and we must still in 2019 guard against them diligently. If you think these are just gruesome stories about the past, you're wrong. If we look at the common theme in these stories, the people stopped trusting and worshipping God. They began to trust and worship in something else. They're grumbling with what God gave them. They're believing something else is going to deliver us, something else is going to give us lasting peace and satisfaction. They're putting Christ to the test. They're thinking whatever they're choosing in that moment that's going to deliver them.

The Israelites saw all the miracles of God. He brought them out of Egypt, but Moses didn't come down the mountain in what they felt a reasonable amount of time. Therefore, they rebelled. Are you in the wilderness, are you waiting? Is God taking too long to answer prayer? Are you seeking a quicker fix, choosing temporary satisfaction, be careful. In Boston, some of you, some of us just live our lives so fast that we have no patience at all. You move fast, you work fast, you run 5Ks fast and the pace that you live that's probably what brought you to Boston that's probably what makes you successful at your job, but stop pressuring God, stop pressuring your spouse, who's a little different, stop pressuring your children to function at your pace. We think of Old Testament examples, Abraham and Sarah, they got the promise. They had to wait several decades until they were in their 90s until God gave them their promised child. Joseph at the end of Genesis, his brothers sell him into slavery. When he's in slavery, he's accused of sexually assaulting a woman. He goes through couple decades of trials before God uses him, used those tests, used those lessons to bring him to a point, where he could save his family from famine, serving as a right-hand man of Pharaoh.

The Israelites knew that God was one true God. Remember before they left Egypt, he dominated all the other gods, but the religious and sexual practices or religious/sexual practices of their neighbors just looked so enticing that they couldn't resist. We're talking sexual prostitution, temple prostitution. Do you look around at your non-Christian friends and think, “I wish I could do what they do.” Do you want to eat like them, dress like them, spend like them go to Sunday brunch like them, attend all the same parties? Are you compromising your beliefs just to fit in with a certain crowd, to start a relationship, if so, who or what is your God? God was feeding the Israelites with manna, this bread like grainy substance that literally fell from heaven six days a week and on the sixth day, twice as much came down, so they didn't have to gather it on the Sabbath. He fed them water from a rock twice. It wasn't good enough for them. Are you overlooking all of God's gifts to you? Do you want something that you think is better?

Do you value travel, food, wine, a romantic relationship more than you value your relationship with God? This is hard, like there is a barrage from the media and social media, trying to convince us that we're not content with our day-to-day lives, like you think the travel shows, the international cooking shows, home makeover shows, home makeover shows in the Caribbean, home makeover shows in beautiful rural mountainous regions, they're giving us this message that if you just escape from where you are that's going to satisfy you.

I keep getting an advertisement on my Facebook and it's a guy canoeing in a beautiful, bright blue pond on top of a glacier that's on top of a mountain. It's playing a song about escape. I question you how are you fighting this message that if you escape, you're going to be satisfied? That escape will be more satisfying than going forward in the day to day life that God's called you to? You know what I do on Facebook, top right corner, there's three dots and you can click hide post. You can choose not relevant or sometimes, you can choose to write a message, “Say other,” and say, “Thank you, I'm satisfied in Jesus.” Like what are you doing to fight this? It's prevalent. I mean for me, it can be as simple as on a busy day, I think a cup of coffee is going to deliver me, just if I don't give that 15 minutes, where I'm sitting and drinking coffee and doing nothing, like I turn into a monster. Like what is it for you, it's not just big trips, but in our day to day lives?

God led the people to the Promised Land, but they got scared and wanted to turn away. Is God asking you to face a giant that seems too big, are you saying to God, “I can't do it. I'd rather go back to Egypt.” Have you been asking God to use you, but when He does, He puts someone in your life, who's so hard to love, so hard to care for that you just slowly shy away from the relationship, so that you don't have to deal with it. Are you all about Jesus, but when it comes to the nitty-gritty, you just complain about the church, about the people in your community group, about your family? The Israelites grumbled. They grumbled about the manna, again that fell from heaven. They grumbled about their leadership. They grumbled about the Promised Land when they got there.

A lot of us know Jesus, we've never lacked for any resources. We've never had sleepless nights in the wilderness. We've never had any major health issues. A lot of us here get to go on multiple vacations a year and we still find ways to grumble all the time. I'm guilty. My whole life, everybody told me how good I was. I was in a small town, where if you follow the rules, did your homework, trained a little bit extra for sports that put you at the top performance-wise. When I got married, I learned how much of a pain I was, how much I complained non-stop. A verse that changed my life, Matthew 12:36, this is just clear, I tell you on the Day of Judgment, people will give account for every careless word they speak. I tell you on the Day of Judgment, people will give an account for every careless word they speak. That's every as in there.

Are you struggling with grumbling about your spouse? I take on a lot of the counseling for the church in my role. That's the area that I really love to serve in. Every time a couple, married, not married comes to me, it begins with one verse, Matthew 7:3, “Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?” Like are you really when you're grumbling about your family, your partner, the church like are you actually looking at the log in your own eye? Remember this is the gospel, it humbles us. When we know we're saved by grace, like we know and we know that darkness that we were in before Jesus pulled us up out of it, like we're constantly checking ourselves to see am I sinning, is the flesh guiding me? This is real talk, these are hard topics and questions. Paul is saying, “All of these things have serious consequences.” He's saying, “Don't toy around, don't mess with idolatry, sexual immorality, putting God to the test and grumbling, just don't do it.”

I've been a little hard, this does hit close to me. I'm really soft sometimes. I feel like things are often too hard. I constantly … When I sit down with people, I encourage them to push themselves, ask themselves, “What is God calling them to do?” Stay faithful to it, I struggle to it. Just the other day, on the 4th of July, I grew up in a household that had a 4th of July party every year. In my apartment, there's a pool, there's a deck. Everybody's celebrating around me while I'm studying, preparing for this sermon and I'm just asking myself, “How did I get here, how am I in Boston, several hundred miles away from this party?” Of course, everyone in my family is posting pictures on social media and this stuff, this thinking can come up just at any moment, but I know some of you are dealing with just much more difficult things, illness, divorce, breakup, abuse, infertility, recent death of a loved one, financial difficulties, loneliness, demanding jobs, unique callings and supporting people, dealing with any of those things, sometimes just caring, walking beside someone through those times can really wear on us.

At this point, you might be experiencing doubt and it's easy to question God. It's easy in these moments to turn to idols, turn to sex, turn to grumbling, turn to testing God. I often think of the Shire. My home town, it's like a small town. Everybody's happy, not many people leave and it's just this jolly place. When I have to face a challenge, I just want to go back to the Shire. I'm like Samwise in Lord of the Rings. What is it for you, what do you turn to in these moments? Is it God? Is it turning to Him and trusting, You've put me here for a purpose, You want my growth, you want my sanctification, You want to use me in this period to further Your Kingdom or is it an idol? Really ask yourselves that.

Really, I think a lot of you, I hope at this point, I've done a good job that I'm making you feel the weight of it all, like the Christian walk really does sound too difficult and it sounds terrifying. You're asking like, “Is God really good?” To me that brings up my final point, know your coach. In sports, there's nothing more disappointing for an athlete than when a coach puts a player in the wrong position. In college soccer, I played left bench and really butted heads with my coach. When a coach forces you to play in the wrong position, like you just lose your trust for him, you don't want to listen to his commands, you don't want to run those laps for him. You just want to quit playing altogether. In Christianity, we do not have a coach like that. Verse 13 says, “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation, He will also provide the way of escape that you may be able to endure it.”

Paul assures us that God is faithful, He will hold up His end of the bargain. He will not desert us. He will not tempt us beyond our ability. He's not setting us up to fail. He will always provide the means of escape that we can endure. I mean in a lot of counseling, a lot of discipleship is telling people, “Do you believe this,” and then just walking people through that when it's tough. Isaiah 43 says, “But now thus says the lord he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel, fear not for I have redeemed you. I've called you by My name, you are Mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with You and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you. When you walk through fire, you shall not be burned and the flame shall not consume you for I'm the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, Your savior.” Just really quickly, these verses can be abused. There's that idea of let go and let God, like I'm just going to keep living in sin, I'm not going to repent, I'm not going to turn in faith to the Lord and I'm just going to let God miraculously rescue me that is putting the Lord to the test.

My favorite artist Josh Garrels, he has a song on this theme called the Resistance. He says, “How do good men become a part of the regime? They don't believe in resistance,” like we have to put up a resistance, holding on is an active process. Seeking God's help as an active process. We need to fight. We just can't think we're immune to the dangers of these sins and idolatry.

Really quickly, I want to touch on is God good? Scripture tells us all over, He's good. Taste and see that the Lord is good, blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change the shifting shadows. Give thanks to the Lord for He is good, His love endures forever. The problem is on this topic of is God good, our modern idea of goodness, it's twisted. I think C.S. Lewis captures us really well, “By the goodness of God, we mean nowadays almost exclusively His lovingness. By love in this context, most of us mean kindness, the desire to see others than the self happy, not happy in this way or in that but just happy. What would really satisfy us would be a God who said of anything we happened to like doing, what does it matter so long as they are contented? We want, in fact, not so much a Father in Heaven as a grandfather in heaven, a senile, benevolent, who as they say like to see young people enjoying themselves and whose plan for the universe was simply that it might be truly sad at the end of each day, a good time was had by all.”

Now, I grew up about 200 yards from my grandmother. My mum had cable TV and a huge stock of fudgesicles. It was my routine for a couple of years in elementary school to go to her house after school, watch some TV, have a minimum of four fudgesicles and this is how my mum loved me. It was love, but it was somewhat of an indifferent love. It was focused on my temporary happiness in the moment. Now, my mom on the other hand, who got angry when I went home from my mum's and didn't eat dinner, she cared about my teeth, she cared about my health, she cared about what I was watching on TV.

She loved me with a fierce love. It was a more true love. If an acquaintance is struggling with a heroin addiction, we might in the moment be rattled. We might say a prayer for them. We might support their family with a message of encouragement, but we would go to sleep that night. If our parents or a spouse or a sibling or a child were in the same situation, we would lose sleep, we would fight. We'd fight hard to break the addiction, to get them into detox, to keep them clean. God's wrath against sin and idolatry, His desire for us to flee from sin, it's born out of His love for us. He knows it's bad for us. He doesn't want it to harm us. He knows that it can break our communion, break our bond with Him. He does what he can to remove it from the lives of His people.

A.W. Pink says, “Now, the wrath of God is as much a divine perfection as is His faithfulness, power or mercy.” It must be so for there is no blemish, not even a defect from the character of God. Yet, there would be if wrath were absent from Him. Indifference to sin is a moral blemish and he who hates it not is a moral leper. How could He who is the Sum of all excellency look with equal satisfaction upon virtue and vice, wisdom and folly? How could He who delights only in that which is pure and lovely, loathe and hate not that which is impure and vile?” Just like my mom, God's love for us, it's fierce and it's true. It's not apathetic. It's not distant. It's not set on our temporary needs, though oftentimes He does give us good and perfect gifts. It's so close. It's so real that He sent His son Jesus to come and die for us. That is the ultimate proof that He is good. He didn't let our sin go un-forgiven. Instead, He released the wrath upon His own son, like how could that be a cruel God?

In the moments when we want to give up, in the moments when we're tempted to partake in something that we know is sinful and idolatrous, we have to remind ourselves of who we are, we're children of God, slaves freed by Him. We have to remind ourselves that He has done the work. Jesus is a treasure greater than any family, greater than any friends, adrenaline-filled experience, reputation, comfort. Trials and temptations are going to come in this life, but we don't face them needlessly and we do not face them alone. With the help of o good and faithful coach, God, we can stand firm. Please join me in prayer.

Heavenly Father, we ask for forgiveness for turning from You. We ask for forgiveness for thinking that momentary pleasures, momentary joys, momentary feelings can replace You. Forgive us for not appreciating the fierce love with which You pursue us and with which you sustain us. Lord, help us to appreciate the burn of sanctification, help us to walk forward with the shovel in one hand and the shield in the other. Lord, help us bring glory to Your name alone, amen.