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NO GOD-SUBSTITUTES!
Substitutes! If you've attended school at
all, and you have, you probably enjoyed having a substitute teacher from time
to time. After all, having a substitute teacher was almost like having
the day off. Oh sure, you were in class but suddenly, in the blink of an
eye, things were looking up! The things you weren't able to get away with
normally we're now a real possibility.
If you have ever been in such a situation, you
know what can happen when a substitute with little experience walks into a classroom. The
old nature kicks in and students who normally behave themselves try every trick
in the book. They suddenly need to use the restroom. Or, they need
to go get something in their car. Or, they remember that their counselor
wants to see them. Or, what may be the worst scenario, they stay in class
and revert to being junior high students; i. e. pre-people.
I bring this to your attention because as Peter
begins a new section, a section that deals with practical matters for those of
us within the household of God, he lays down some rules for our conduct within
the world in which we live. The first rule, the rule that is seldom mentioned
by anyone is as follows:
RULE # 1: OBEY ALL RULES!
I saw this in a clip where Barney Fife, Deputy
Sheriff of Mayberry, as played by Don Knotts, was lecturing a prisoner who was
behind bars. He told the guy, "There are only two rules. The
first rule is to obey all rules."
You might say that that goes without saying. True,
and you're right, it normally does goes without saying. But in the first
chapter and a half of I Peter we're given more than sufficient reasons to obey
all rules. We're told how God has given us new birth into a living hope. We're
told of an inheritance that is being kept in heaven for us. We're told
how our faith shields us until that day when our salvation is fully revealed
to us. We're told that we too are living stones built into a spiritual
house, the household of God. We're told that we are a precious people,
a chosen people, a people called out of darkness into a wonderful light that
guides us toward home.
So, in essence, Peter urged us in the first part
of his letter to obey all rules. We're to obey not because we have to
but because of our love for the Father who has given us a new life in Christ
Jesus.
Then in I Peter 2:11 - 12 we are given the second
rule. We read:
Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and
strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your
soul. 12 Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse
you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he
visits us.
Here is rule # 2 in a nutshell.
RULE # 2: THERE ARE TO BE NO SUBSTITUTES.
Peter is commanding those who are dear to him,
those who are no longer citizens of this world, to have no God-substitutes in
this world. For it is the God-substitutes of this world that wage war against
our souls.
Of course, as if we were in high school, we may
think we want a substitute. We may think we want to substitute something
for God in our lives but Peter tells us that a substitute will not be good for
our inner spirit. Hence, he commands us to "abstain from sinful desires."
The word "abstain," as you can guess,
means to consciously refrain from doing something. We can't say to someone
that we sort of "abstain" from this or that and be taken seriously. We
can't say that we abstain Monday through Friday but indulge ourselves on the
weekends and live with ourselves. We either abstain or don't abstain. So
the command is a good one in the sense that there is nothing ambiguous about
it.
Granted, as to sinful desires, Peter doesn't spell
these out for us and in that sense you might say the command is unclear. But
we know when we are doing something that is not right. Though we may not
admit it, we know it. Plus, the acts of our sinful nature are spelled out
for us in such passages as Galatians 5:19 - 21. We read,
The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual
immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred,
discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 and
envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those
who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.
Note! Paul tells us that the acts of the
sinful nature are obvious. Nevertheless, he spells many of them out for
us. He begins the list the way many of us would begin the list - with sexual
immorality. The list, however, does not stop with sexual immorality, it
includes all sorts of things that war against our soul.
For our purposes today we will look at two items
on the list - items that tend to be God-substitutes - sexual immorality
and hatred. In regards to the former let me share a short story with you
concerning a young man named Eric. It is taken from Randy Alcorn's book
entitled The Purity Principle. It reads:
Eric stormed into my office and flopped into a
chair. "I'm really mad at God."
Having grown up in a strong church family, he'd
met and married a Christian girl. Now he was the picture of misery.
"Okay . . . so why are you mad at God?"
"Because," he said, "last week
I committed adultery."
Long pause. Finally I said, "I can
see why God would be mad at you. But why are you mad at God?"
Eric explained that for several months he'd felt
a strong, mutual attraction with a woman at his office. He'd prayed earnestly
that God would keep him from immorality.
"Did you ask your wife to pray for you?" I
said. "Did you stay away from the woman?"
"Well . . . no. We went out to lunch
almost every day."1
What went wrong? What mistakes did Eric
make that resulted in him going to bed with this coworker? He said, "he
prayed." In fact, he said, "he prayed earnestly." Does
he have a right to be mad at God?
He prayed and he may have even prayed earnestly. However,
he made the mistake of not wanting to be the answer to his own prayers. He
made the mistake of going near to this coworker on almost a daily basis. His
mistake? He failed to keep his distance! He failed to keep it physically
and mentally.2
It is interesting to note that the verb "abstain" as
used by Peter literally means "to distance" yourself from fleshly
desires. Eric's failure to distance himself from his coworker, his failure
to take radical action, such as Joseph took in regards to Potiphar's wife, resulted
in him thinking about her far more than the time spent in prayer.
In regards to the latter, hatred, let me read
you a few paragraphs from Dr. Clouds' book entitled 9 Things You Simply MUST
DO. It concerns a young woman by the name of Jodi who married a nice guy
who wasn't the most organized guy in the world. We read,
When I asked what brought them in, Tony began. "I
have let her down a lot," he said. "I sometimes don't do all
the things around the house that I should be doing, and I disappoint her in other
ways too. I realize that. So, I guess I need to understand how I
can do better."
"Is that the way you would describe the problem?" I
asked Jodi.
"Sort of. But I think to call it 'disappoint" is
kind of a lame copout," she said.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"It's worse than 'disappoint," she
explained. "He totally drops the ball, and our life is a joke. I can't
depend on him for anything."
I felt my spirit sink. I had no idea as
to the extent of Tony's lack of performance. But I did know contempt when
I saw it, and no matter what he was doing, I knew her disdain was going to be
a big issue before they could get better. It was not so much in the actual
words she said; it was in the expressions and tone in which the disdain came
across. It was poisonous and ugly. I felt that she was the last person
in the world anyone would want to do something nice for, and I had to fight myself
to keep from immediately siding with Tony.
"Sounds like you have some strong views about
him," I said. I could not muster saying the word feelings because
she was not sharing her feelings. She was way past them. Hers was
a view, a stance, an attitude: of contempt. I had to see what that was
about.3
What Dr. Cloud saw on that day was a picture of
hatred. For you see, as he noted, hatred goes beyond mere feelings. It's
a view, a settled stance, an attitude of sheer contempt that plays itself out
in words and actions.
All of us in the days since 9/11 have seen the
destruction hatred can cause in the lives of others. We may have seen the
devastating affects of hatred within our own family. So we naturally think
that hatred is something to avoid at all cost.
In reality, even as Christians, we are called
upon to have a hatred for some things. For in Proverbs 6:16 - 19 we read,
There are six things the LORD hates, seven that
are detestable to him: 17 haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed
innocent blood, 18 a heart that devises wicked schemes, feet that are quick
to rush into evil, 19 a false witness who pours out lies and a man who
stirs up dissension among brothers.
Obviously, what we hate says a lot about who we
are, what we value, and what we care about in life. So hatred is
not necessarily a bad thing. And in Dr. Cloud's story, Jodi was right to
have a hatred for what was going on within the marriage.
But the way she hated suggested little hope for
her marriage. She was beyond solving the problem. She wanted to hurt
Tony as much as she had been hurt by him and by others in her past. Her
hatred had a life of its own. A life that resulted in over-reaction, hostile
words and/or actions, and an emotional inability to resolve conflict within the
relationship.
It's the hatred we catch a glimpse of on our freeways. We
inadvertently cut someone off on our way into Phoenix. The next thing
we know someone is reacting toward us as if we deserved to be destroyed right
then and there. But in reality, thankfully, no harm was done to anyone. Nevertheless,
the person reacted as if their entire life had been messed up by a poor decision
on our part.
This is the hatred we need to distance ourselves
from each and every day. We can do this by learning to hate well. We
can hate well by using our "hatred" to address issues within the family
that need to be solved. We can hate well by using our "hatred" to
protect what is important to us. We can hate well by using our "hatred" to
take a stand on social issues.
Now why would we want to distance ourselves from
sinful desires? Don't they hold out the promise of pleasure? Sure! But
it's an empty promise. Those who turn away from God in favor of a substitute
may have joy for a period but discover they can't face their teacher the next
day. For in reality they have disappointed their teacher. What's
more, they know they have squandered a day that could have brought blessings
to them.
Of course, we have all done it. I've done
it, you have done it. As sinners we tend to trade what we have, and could
have, for a lie. We swap God's present and future blessings for something
that makes us feel good for the moment. But it is not simply a bad swap. Spiritually
speaking, it is a self-inflicted wound. As such it damages our relationship
with the Father for we're too embarrassed and/or too proud to run to him for
help. Hence, we distance ourselves from him, which in turn hurts us even
more.
1 Randy
Alcorn, The Purity Principle, Multnomah Publishers, Inc. P.O. Box 1720, Sisters,
OR 97759, 2003, pp. 9 - 10.
2 Later on in his little book, Randy Alcorn uses an illustration
about someone who has a weakness for donuts. He promises his family that
he is not going to eat any more donuts. He even puts it on the class
prayer chain. But, he goes right on reading about donuts, he watches
programs that show him how to make donuts, and he buys a calendar entitled "Donut
Desires." Furthermore, he thinks he can go into a donut shop and
buy a cup of coffee and simply look at the donuts. Is he nuts or what?
3 Dr. Henry Cloud, 9 Things You Simply MUST DO, Integrity
Publishers, 5250 Virginia Way, Suite 110, Brentwood, TN 37027, 2004, pp. 148
- 149.PETER: THE MAN AND HIS
LETTERS 1/27/08 1
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