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"What Every Family Needs: Priceless Values In a Worthless
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So he slipped out of bed and made his way downstairs. The house was immaculate, something he had not seen in years. Then he walked into the kitchen where a plate with two eggs (over medium), bacon, homemade hash browns and steaming coffee were waiting. Beside the plate, two extra strength aspirin, tomato juice and another note: “Hope these aspirin make you feel better, Dear, your grateful wife.” The man was still puzzled when his son finally entered the room and sat down. “You don’t remember, do you?” “No”, replied the man. “You came home at three AM this morning, drunk out of your mind. You vomited all over the living room and passed out in the hallway. That’s when you woke up Mom. She finally managed to drag you into bed and was undressing you when you started fighting her and shouting, “I’ll have you know Madam, you can’t do that, I’m a married man!” Cost of too many drinks at the local tavern: $37.50 Cost of dry cleaning your favorite business suit: $13.50 Cost of full breakfast: $4.25 Saying just the right thing at just the right time: priceless! Priceless! This morning in the fourth message in our Extreme Makeover: Family Edition, we want to talk about priceless values. Last week we talked about discipline and one of the important aspects of discipline is learning to live out our values – especially the values God lays out for us in His Word. But I knew last week that just mentioning Godly values was not enough. This morning I want us to dig into some of those values and find the priceless treasures that living them out will bring into our families. We’re going to look at these values in three stages: (1) Eight specific values, (2) the Three Step Process to gaining those values, and (3) the results that living out those values bring to our families. So let’s jump right into our Bible passage this morning in Ephesians chapter four. You have the entire passage written in our Discovery Pack, so take it out and read along with me…or better yet, look in up in your Bible and read along in it! 17With the Lord’s authority let me say this: Live no longer as the ungodly do, for they are hopelessly confused. 18Their closed minds are full of darkness; they are far away from the life of God because they have shut their minds and hardened their hearts against him. 19They don’t care anymore about right and wrong, and they have given themselves over to immoral ways. Their lives are filled with all kinds of impurity and greed. 20But that isn’t what you were taught when you learned about Christ. 21Since you have heard all about him and have learned the truth that is in Jesus, 22throw off your old evil nature and your former way of life, which is rotten through and through, full of lust and deception. 23Instead, there must be a spiritual renewal of your thoughts and attitudes. 24You must display a new nature because you are a new person, created in God’s likeness—righteous, holy, and true. 25So put away all falsehood and “tell your neighbor the truth” because we belong to each other. 26And “don’t sin by letting anger gain control over you.” Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry, 27for anger gives a mighty foothold to the Devil. 28If you are a thief, stop stealing. Begin using your hands for honest work, and then give generously to others in need. 29Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them. 30And do not bring sorrow to God’s Holy Spirit by the way you live. Remember, he is the one who has identified you as his own, guaranteeing that you will be saved on the day of redemption. 31Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of malicious behavior. 32Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you. (Ephesians 4:17-31) That’s a pretty long passage to glean from in a few minutes, but I wanted us to read it all in context. The Apostle Paul is challenging his readers to live by God’s values and he gives some pretty good reasoning as to why the world’s perspective should not be ours. A life without God’s values “Live no longer as the ungodly do, for their minds are hopelessly confused…” (vs.17) The last thing we want to be considered is confused. The word there for confused is translated vanity in the Old English and means to move around, not really having any type of stability (transient). That’s what happens when you fail to live by God’s values – you just flip-flop around. You bounce from one opinion to another because there’s nothing to hold on to. Not only that, but living an ungodly life is also described as having a “closed, dark mind” “far away from the life of God”. Think about that for a moment. People without God, who are living ungodly lives (and that’s what ungodly is – anyone who lives apart from God.) are living far from the very purposes for which they were created. And when you continually live apart from your created purpose, you soon just stop caring about God’s purpose at all and set out to find your own. You harden your heart to God. You stop really caring about right and wrong and simply live out your own desires – which leads to all kinds of impurity and greed (selfish living). That’s a powerful description of life without God. The problem with that kind of life is that you are living the exact opposite of why you were created in the first place. Guys, imagine trying to use a fishing pole to catch a deer or a quad-cycle to go surfing. Ladies, imagine going to Neiman-Marcus to do your grocery shopping. Neiman-Marcus was not created to as a place to buy bacon and eggs. We just finished the Olympics a month ago. Wouldn’t it have been fun to watch the high divers compete in the heavy-weight lifting and those gargantuan power-lifters, wouldn’t it be fun to watch them high-dive. They weren’t designed for the other sports. When you live apart from God it just doesn’t work – not for long. Which is why the Apostle Paul continues in verse twenty: “But that isn’t what you were taught when you learned about Christ”. That’s not how you were taught or how you were created. Once you give your life to Jesus Christ you get a new live, the Bible calls it a new nature. You really do become a new person –“CREATED IN GOD’S LIKENESS-RIGHTEOUS, HOLY AND TRUE.” (vs.24) So once we are given new lives in Christ we are to live by a different set of values and Paul lists eight of those values for us in this passage. Priceless Values in a Worthless World What I mean by that phrase is that these values are worth more than anything this world offers. Here they are. The first value Paul mentions is HONESTY “So put away all falsehood and ‘tell your neighbor the truth’” (vs.25) Paul starts off the list with honestly. Tell the truth! Honestly is the perfect place to begin because we are all pretty good liars. Now don’t get offended, let’s be honest (grin) here, we’re all pretty good liars. We lie to ourselves all the time. We tell ourselves that the extra helping at dinner is necessary and won’t hurt anything. We tell ourselves that we right in an argument when we’re probably not that right. We call in sick. We hedge on our taxes. I could go on, but, honestly…I’m probably missing your specific dishonesty. It says “all falsehood” – that means we put away anything that isn’t really the truth. Man, what changes would we make in our families if we really determined to live by that value. What kind of things do we listen to every day that we KNOW are not true? What kind of things do we watch that we KNOW are not true? I think this value goes first because if we determine to live honestly with ourselves and our neighbors (that’s anyone living around us), we will discover quickly that a lot of what we have told ourselves is OK in our homes and lives will prove to be NOT OK. HONESTY The second value Paul mentions is SELF-CONTROL. If we just had more self-control… That’s a powerful value. It should be important to me that I practice self-control in every area of my life. I must be honest, self-control is not one of my greatest strengths. I work on this one constantly. I want to give in. I want to let go. But I have to practice self-control. It’s interesting here that Paul mentions ANGER as the big self-control issue. “don’t sin by letting anger gain control over you.” The Old English translations of this passages says, “Be angry and sin not.” You see, anger in and of itself is not a sin. God gets angry. Jesus showed anger. We call that “righteous indignation”. And before you assume you can get righteously indignant, make sure you are truly (honestly) righteous. “don’t sin by letting anger can control over you.” I wonder how many of us here this morning are angry at someone or something in our lives right now; so angry that we can’t get over it. We can’t move on? That’s when we know anger has control over us. And the really sad part is when you are angry at someone else – they control you whether you like it or not. They don’t have to do ANYTHING at all and they are controlling you. Your anger at them is allowing your thoughts of them to destroy your sleep, your meals, your peace. Self-control says I’m not going to let anything control me by Jesus Christ and His Spirit. The Apostle Paul writes it this way in 1 Corinthians 6:12, “And even though “I am allowed to do anything,” I must not become a slave to anything.” Even if you tell me that you have the RIGHT to do whatever you want, the Bible warns each of us Not to become controlled by anything. SELF-CONTROL The third value Paul tells us we need is INTEGRITY “If you are a thief, stop stealing.” That’s pretty straight forward, so we’ll let that one just sit there for a few minutes. The fourth value Paul mentions is DILIGENCE “…Begin using your hands for honest work,…” Get busy and do something! That’s a good value. WORK! Far too often we are good beginners, but we are poor finishers. We need to practice diligence. Last week at Oktoberfest Vu taught me diligence. Somehow I allowed him to talk me into the log sawing competition. I mean, how hard could that me for a short, bald, fat-guy like me. And besides, I had Vu – a muscular Navy Sailor on the other end of the saw. Well, we started pretty good, but about 20 seconds into the cut I realized that I had just made a huge mistake! I knew it because my chest was constricting, my arms were going numb, my head was spinning, and I thought I was the Angel Gabriel beckoning me heavenward…” I thought I was going to die. The only thing that kept me going, the only thing that kept me diligent through the process was looking over at Vu and seeking “NAVY” emblazoned across his t-shirt. I knew if I quit (or died) right then I would be letting down the entire U.S. NAVY. So I finished. I almost died, but I was diligent to the end! You know, we should work hard because when people see us they see “Jesus Christ” emblazoned across our heart! At least they should! Diligence is the only way to be truly successful. We’ve got to be willing to work hard! The next value Paul lists is GENEROSITY. I’ve never met a selfish happy person – ever. Selfish people by nature are not happy people. On the other hand, I’ve never met a genuinely generous person who wasn’t happy. There’s just something about living with the value that I always have enough to share that keeps my content and happy. “then give generously to others in need”. Is your family a generous family? I want FamilyFellowship to be a generous church. That’s why we hold events like our Oktoberfest outreach. We want to let our community know we care. We don’t have much – yet – but what we have we will share as God leads. And as I said, generosity is the antidote to greed and selfishness. OK, let’s look at our list so far… HONESTY – put away all falsehood SELF-CONTROL – don’t sin by letting anger (or anything else) control you INTEGRITY – stop stealing DILIGENCE – learn to work and stay at it, don’t give up – stay focused GENEROSITY – the antidote to selfishness The Apostle starts with our thoughts (and mouth) and now he comes back to both. The next value is DISCRETION “Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful.” I have the feeling that most of us could get past the first part of the verse fairly easily. Most of us don’t have potty mouths. And for those who do, you already know that it’s a problem and I’m assuming that as a believer, you’re working on that. It’s the next part of the verse that really gets ALL of us. It’s not enough to NOT be abusive in the way we talk to others – what we say must be “good and helpful”. This is huge, folks. It’s far to easy to use our words to defame other people. Even when we assume what we are saying is the “truth” – we can pretty abusive with the truth at times. Elsewhere in the Bible Paul told believers, “speak the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15) Psalm 15 even warns us that our worship is affected by how we speak of others. Listen to this passage: “Who may worship in your sanctuary, LORD? Who may enter your presence on your holy hill? Those who lead blameless lives and do what is right, speaking the truth from sincere hearts. Those who refuse to slander others or harm their neighbors or speak evil of their friends.” Psalm 15:1-3 Do you know what that’s saying? It’s telling us that the way we live, what we do and how we talk – all of that affects how we worship the LORD. I don’t care a bit if it’s true, if you’re saying it out of anger or vengefulness - it's wrong! Gossip is still gossip. And if you or the person you are talking to is not apart of either the problem or solution – then you shouldn’t be talking! Hey, did you hear the story about the local gossip up went to the church revival meeting and got under conviction about her tongue wagging. At the end of the service she came forward and told the preacher, “Pastor, I want to repent of my gossiping and I’ve come forward tonight to lay my gossiping tongue on the altar.” To which the Pastor replied, “Well, our prayer altar is about eight feet long, go ahead and put as much of it as you can on the altar and we’ll go from there…” We really do need to learn the value of discretion. We need to learn who to talk to, when to talk and what to talk about. And especially, stop talking about other people it it’s not encouragement! Which leads us to the next value in our list. The next value is CONCERN. “so that your words will be an encouragement”. If it’s not going to encourage someone then why are you saying it? Yes, there is a time to admonish. There are times when we have to get “in someone’s face” and deal with an issue – but even then our ultimate desire should be to encourage someone – not discourage. I like that work, encourage. It comes from an old French word that meant to put courage into someone. When you speak encouragement you are putting courage into them to go on – become better – overcome an obstacle. And it’s impossible to give works of encouragement if you are not concerned and willing to show compassion.
Honestly One final value and it’s as if Paul sums up everything with the final thought. Look at verse thirty. “And do not bring sorrow on God’s Holy Spirit by the way you live.” The old English says, “Grieve not the Holy Spirit”. I hope you understand that the moment you give your life to Jesus Christ, accept His forgiveness for your sins and submit to His leadership in your life – at that moment God’s Spirit, the Holy Spirit, comes to live inside your life. I Corinthians 3:16 says, “Don’t you know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you?” (New Century Version) God’s Spirit is living inside you. He’s there to guide you and prod you to live out His purpose in your life. However, when we live contrary to our purpose – when we live like we described at the beginning of the passage, when we fail to live by these values, it grieves God. It brings sorrow to God’s Holy Spirit. The final value Paul lists is SENSITIVITY TO GOD. This is the cap stone value. And it works both ways… If we are attempting to honor God’s in our life by living out these values we will find ourselves needing to rely more and more on His direction every moment of our lives. We can’t live these values on our own without God. Living out these values causes us to be more sensitive to our need for God. On the other hand, when we open ourselves to God’s Spirit and seek to truly hear Him in our daily walk – we’ll find it easier to live out these values and our created purpose. Living out the values allows me a greater sensitivity to God’s Spirit. A greater sensitivity to God’s Spirit allows me to live out these values. But the big question is still out there hanging and we purposefully skipped over it until right now. Those are the eight values – now discover with me the three step process to implementing these values in our lives. The Three Step Process Look back at verse twenty-two. “throw off your old evil nature and your former way of life which is rotten through and through, full of lust and deception.”…. Now verse twenty-four… “You must display a new nature because you are a new person, created in God’s likeness – righteous, holy and true. I read the verses just like I did because that’s the way most of us view the situation. God’s wants us to stop doing some things and He wants us to start living a different way. So we get up every morning telling ourselves the things we’re not going to do and at the same time commit to doing the things we are supposed to be doing. There’s only one HUGE PROBLEM – it typically doesn’t work. We keep doing the things we shouldn’t and fail to do the things we should – at least consistently. (We do it for a little while, then, fall back into the old habits and patterns.) We “throw off” and then try to “put on”. Let me give you a picture and see if this makes any sense. Suppose guys, you have been working really hard all day long (being diligent – that’s good!). You’re hot, sweaty, dirty, grimy, smelly…should I go on? You get it. You are all those things and then you arrive home. You walk in the door and there stands your wife dressed to the nines. Beautiful evening gown, perfume, quite the babe standing in front of you. She then reminds you that you have dinner reservations at your favorite upscale steak house with some of your favorite friends and you don’t want to miss it. But you also know that you don’t have much time. That’s when you run upstairs, throw off your work cloths and quickly jump into your best pants, nicest shirt – what the hey - maybe even a tie and jacket. And off you go to this nice restaurant for a nice meal – maybe even some dancing with your wife before the night’s over. Got that picture? What’s the problem? That’s right. You’ve put on new clothes, but you’re still stinky, grimy, dirty. The new, clean clothes will not hold back the "reekness" of your personhood at the moment. What you needed was to take a bath and some down stairs a new, clean man. Changing clothes didn’t help. Now look at verse twenty-three: “Instead, there must be a spiritual renewal of your thoughts and attitudes.” There’s the difference. You can’t just put off one nature and put on another until there is a genuine change of heart and mind. That’s what the Apostle Paul is actually telling his readers in the passage. If you want Godly values – your heart and thoughts have to change FIRST. Now, quickly look at his examples (values) again and see what I mean. Honestly: Paul tells us to stop lying. So let me ask you a question. When is a liar no longer a liar? When he stops lying? Nah, that doesn’t help, because there will always be other opportunities to lie. Look at the verse again… “So put away all falsehood and “tell your neighbor the truth” because we belong to each other.” Underline “we belong to each other”. When is a liar no longer a liar? When he lives by the principle – the attitude that we belong to each other. When I lie I’m trying to get one over on someone else. I’m saying by my actions that my needs and desires are more important that those I am lying to. But when I realize that “it’s not about me” (see last week’s message) then I don’t need to lie any more. Another question: When is a thief no longer a thief? When he stops stealing? Absolutely not. There will always be other opportunities to steal. A thief is a selfish person who assumes he doesn’t have to work for what he wants; he can simply take it from someone else who has it. But when our attitude changes and we realize that God gave us the ability to work diligently with our own hands – honestly – so that we can have what we need, and more importantly we can have enough to share – when our heart and mind changes from selfishness to generosity – then the temptation to steal goes away! The same is true with our potty mouths. The attitude change? We seek to encourage, not discourage. We see our purpose as one that spurs people on, not simply one that works to get people to focus on us. When is an angry man really practicing self-control? When he realizes and lives out the principle that, though anger is not a sin, it is a tool that Satan uses to get into our lives, our hearts, our minds. And how do you keep from grieving the Holy Spirit? Realize all that He has done for you and that you are not living for today – you are living for eternity. Three steps to developing these eight values. (1) Be willing to put off the old stuff, the old patterns in your life. (2) Ask God to help you renew your mind – change your thoughts and attitudes (3) Then begin practicing the right value, live out your new nature. So what’s the result. What happens when we follow these three steps and live out these values? The final two verses in the passage give us the benefits. The Results First, you find the power to overcome bitterness and self-destructive behaviors. “Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of malicious behavior.” And more importantly, you learn how to really live a purposeful life: “Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.” We titled this message “What Every Family Needs: Priceless Values in a Worthless World.” But what I want you to walk away with this morning is not just the values, but the means to implement and permeate these values into your family. As you look at these values and how they relate to you individually and as a family – which one stands out the most right now? Ask yourself, “What do I need to “throw off”. List it. Write it down. “Today, I need to throw off ______________.” Now skip to the third question. “What do I need to display since I have a new nature in Christ?” Write it now. “Instead of __________, I need to ___________.” Now look at question two: “What attitude, mindset do I need to change. Where in the Bible can I find a verse that helps me understand the attitude that I need?” Get help if you need it. Ask someone who’s been there what verses helped them. Then take it to God and seriously commit with Him to begin the spiritual work of getting a new attitude from God’s Word. Breakfast on the run…$5.25 Gas for the car and risking the speeding ticket…$25.00 Coming to FamilyFellowship and finding God’s cure for a rotten value…priceless. For the stuff that we need to get ready for church, there’s MasterCard For the really important commitment in life…there’s God’s Word. Let’s pray.
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(c) Paul Newell 2004 FamilyFellowship Church P.O. Box 465, Beaumont, CA 92223 |
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