Understanding Lust

The secular definition of lust goes as follows:

• An overwhelming desire or craving.

• Intense eagerness or enthusiasm.

• craving, desire, hunger, itch, longing, thirst, wish, yearning

The biblical definition is consistent, but comes with implications.

…we…all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind…(Ephesians 2.3 NAS)

The Bible says that lust is the indulgence of the desires of the heart and mind. This is the

What is Mortification?

• The secular definition of mortification is as follows:

• To practice ascetic discipline or self-denial of the body and its appetites.

• Comes from the middle English word ‘mortifien’ which means ‘to deaden or subdue’ and from the Latin word ‘mortificare’ which means ‘to kill’.

abolish, annihilate, blot out, clear, eradicate, erase, exterminate, extinguish, extirpate, liquidate, obliterate, remove, root out, rub out, snuff out, stamp out, uproot, wipe out.

Again, the biblical definition is consistent, but comes with implications.

Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts, (Romans 6.12 NAS)

To mortify is to get rid of sin, so that it is not the focus of your mind and heart so that you will not act in sin.

Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For you are dead, and your life is…with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, appears, then you shall also appear with him in glory. Mortify therefore your members…(Col 3.2-5 KJV ~ simplified)

To mortify is to remove all concentration on worldly things and to focus on heavenly things. To mortify is not simply to root out or eradicate sin, but to remove the focus of sin from things which are against God to things which are for God.

Why Should I Mortify Sin?

…God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie [literally: we are liars] and do not live by the truth. (1 John 1.5,6)

This passage makes it abundantly clear that the person, who walks according to Christ’s ways, is a brother of Christ and will receive his inheritance in God’s kingdom. The person who claims to be a brother to Christ, but instead of following His commands lives according to his own lusts is living a lie and does not live according to the truth. The implication is that this person whose sin is un-mortified is only claiming the name of Christ, but has no inheritance, has not made a true commitment to follow Christ and therefore is not saved from eternal condemnation.

How Do I Do It? *

Habitual weakening of lust. Every lust is a righteous habit, which has not been developed and is therefore pushing the heart toward evil. This person who does not form righteous habits is described in Genesis 6.5, “the LORD saw that…every intent of the thoughts of [man’s]…heart was only evil continually. A persistence for bodily and mental sin leads to an evil heart. By nature, man’s habit is to “gratify the desires of the sinful nature” (Rom 13.14 NIV). Sin is “waging war against the law of my mind [God’s law according to general revelation] and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members” (Romans 7.23 NIV).

If every desire of the heart is habitually bent on evil, then the logical conclusion is to form righteous habits to replace the negative ones. Even clinical psychologists agree on this principle and have used it to break smoking and other drug habits. Paul gives advice on the matter of discerning good and evil when he told the Corinthian church, “…whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor 10.31 NAS). The idea is that we should not be so concerned with formulating a legalistic set of rules to follow; rather in all we do, we should take time to discern what would glorify God and do that. As we perform actions for God’s glory, we replace actions which are for our own gratification, thereby mortifying our sin. In case of specific struggles that we have, the principle applies as well. Find an action which you know to glorify God and when the lust of your flesh tempts you to sin, do what glorifies God. Examples are prayer, singing of hymns and reading God’s word.

Fight against sin. We are at war with sin. The following are important in any battle and are pertinent even on the topic of overcoming lust.

• Know the enemy. It is critical that you understand what you are dealing with in order to overcome it. The enemy is our own sinful nature. Adam and Eve were only had one sin, which was to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen 2.17). There was only one lust. That lust was a desire to be like God. The temptation was to eat the fruit so that they could be like God, able to discern good and evil (Gen 3.5). Notice that where the serpent was the tool of for the temptation, the lust itself was rooted at the heart of man. If Adam and Eve did not have the wicked desire to be like God, they COULD NOT have been tempted by the serpent. Your battle against sin is rooted in your own wicked heart. “The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick;” (Jer 17.9).

• Be acquainted with the success of lust. I’m not suggesting that you intentionally fall to sin. That would be foolish indeed. Rather, you must be aware of situations, places, people and occasions which make it difficult for you to overcome your sin. Once you know your enemy, where they go, what they do, it is easier to defeat them. So it is with sin. We must be familiar with the situations which cause us to fall and succeed. Once we know how to defeat an enemy, we can do it repeatedly, which means we can form a habit so that the sin will be mortified.

• Intentional daily attack. Don’t wait for sin to attack you in order to attempt defense. Form a game plan. List your struggles and make conscious efforts to attack them daily. Do this by considering what you will be doing day by day so that you can prepare yourself for the temptations that are coming. You know your lusts so only you are qualified to determine this attack.

Conclusion

We can only mortify our sins in order to overcome lust by the power of the Holy Spirit and through forming of convictions. We do this so that we can bring glory to God and partake in Christ’s inheritance which is the kingdom of God.

* Much of this section on mortifying sin is sampled from John Owens, “The Mortification of Sin.”

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Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil. So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.
And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord; always giving thanks for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God, even the Father; and be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.
Eph. 5.15-21 (NAS)

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It starts out with a warning to “be careful how you walk” (v. 15). We should walk as wise men. This is not literally walking, it is how we live. We should live as wise men and wisdom comes from God. Not only that, but as the world is evil, we should “make the most of our days” (v. 16) so that we are taking advantage of every moment, to use it for God, otherwise its use is for evil; “the days are evil.” This statement is summed up with how we are to fill our days and that is by “understand[ing] what the will of the Lord it” (v. 17) that we should know through prayer and dedication to scripture what the Lord has planned for us to do.

“And do not get drunk with wine” (v. 18a) is not just a command against drunkenness. The context tells us that we are supposed to live every moment for God. To become drunk is to remove inhibition and discernment. So, anything we do, including excessive consumption of alcohol, which can leave us vulnerable to any sort of sin, is “dissipation;” that is profligacy or a recklessly wasting of your time which God has given you for His purpose.

Instead of this, we are to do one thing! “…be filled with the Spirit” (v. 18b). Sing out praises of the Lord to one another (v. 19) and “give thanks [to Christ] for all things” (v. 20). And lastly we are to serve one another “in the fear of Christ” (v. 21). We are to do these things that are the will of God, not because of whimsical faith, but out of a true fear and reverence for the Lord.

This passage has a massive amount of application as it speaks to the purpose of everything we do. Are we living life blindly or actively seeking the will of God?

On a theological level, we get a glimpse of why God requires this of us. It is not so much that he needs our praise, but that in his infinite power and might, we will stand condemned if we do not choose to follow his son. We are not to come before him with mere belief, rather we should come in faith, in fear and trembling, before the Almighty, but infinitely loving God.

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Believe it or not, the way that you speak says more about you than everything else you do combined. James 3:5 says “the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts” (NIV). For this reason we should adhere to Paul’s advice; “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen” (Ephesians 4:29 NIV). Our speech should build others up not tear them down. It should be a demonstration of everything we believe, everything that Christ taught. Here is a collection of scriptures intended to encourage us to speak in a way that would honor God.

I looked for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found none. So I will pour out my wrath on them and consume them with my fiery anger, bringing down on their own heads all they have done, declares the Sovereign LORD.
Ezekiel 22:30: 31

God says that he looked upon man to find someone who could bridge the gap. This gap is between the sinful ways of man and the perfection of God. His desire is to be with man, but only on His terms, which are perfection. God looked and found no one because, “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23 NIV).

This passage is actually a foreshadowing to the coming of Christ. Jesus Christ is the bridge between man and God because He provides atonement for sin so that we are “Holy and Blameless in his sight” as we have been commanded to be (Ephesians 1:4 NIV). Not without sin, rather forgiven of our sin. Atonement is the sufficient payment required from God for our sins. The acceptable payment was Christ’s death on the cross.

The important thing to note, as an application of this passage is that we, like the Israelites are deserving of destruction, however we do not experience destruction because God looks down and sees Christ who is able to bridge the gap so He does not have to destroy us. We should accept the gift of Christ with humility. How much blessing is in our lives as a result of Christ and we are deserving of destruction?

In order for everyone to glorify God, we would all have to choose Him. If we all choose Him, then that means that he has manifested himself in our lives in a way that we would all have perfect knowledge of Him so that none would falter. So what is choice? To choose is to prefer or decide to do something. If the choice is between God and sin, would anyone prefer sin with perfect understanding of God?

Similarly, would anyone choose God if they had no understanding of Him? It is a balance that is required. All men have a sinful nature and all men have an innate knowledge of God proven by the general sense of morality shared by the majority of the world cultures. We have a battle between good and evil so that God will be glorified.  As a product, all will not be saved as many will choose evil over good.

What God really wants is for us to choose Him based on faith. Once you take a step of faith he will make himself clear through the power of the Holy Spirit and at that time the choice to choose Jesus becomes confirmed. “Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit” (Ephesians 1:13).

The definition of grieve is “to cause to be sorrowful” (American Heritage Dictionary). To grieve the Holy Spirit then is to become sorrowful because of the Holy Spirit. It is because there is a longing for sinful pleasure and the Holy Spirit is convicting you of that sin which you must let go of. Because of this you become sorrowful. This was the case for the Israelites as well. They simply would not settle for the love of God and instead harbored bitterness, rage and anger and sought slander along with malice on those who persecuted them. Do not cherish sin in your heart (Psalms 66) for it causes grief of the Holy Spirit who strengthens you. Rather give your sin and your struggles to Jesus Christ and seek joy in place of bitterness and good works in place of malice.

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First let’s address sin payment. “For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Pure blood is the only acceptable payment for sin. Christ was the perfect sacrifice because he was completely pure, free from sin. Even before Christ came to earth, God made accommodation for sin as He knew that man could not overcome their sinful nature. Sin payment for the Israelites was by sacrificing unblemished animals. This is also why Christ is referred to in the bible as “the lamb of God” (John 1:29, 1:36).

Is atonement a license to sin? Due to man’s sinful nature, it is not possible to be free from sin. We were “predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son” (Romans 8:29). This is talking about long term conformity which is referred to as sanctification. Sanctification means we become more and more like Christ every day. The question is if God decided that we, as the body of Christ, should be more and more like Christ, who is free from all sin, then are we really followers of Christ if we do not see ourselves abandoning sin and conforming to the laws of God more and more every day?

The Disciple John put it this way, “If we claim to have fellowship with him”, (who is Christ in context, “yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth” (1 John 1:6). The word lie in Ancient Greek does not simply mean that the statement is a lie rather that your life is a lie. So, if we say we follow Christ, but continue to be involved in sin, we are living a lie and may not truly have salvation through Jesus Christ.

It was decided before the creation of the world that followers of Jesus would “holy and blameless in his sight” (Ephesians 1:4). We are to be presented as “holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation” (Colossians 1:22). On the subject of abortion (or any sin really), are we fulfilling this command to be holy and blameless if we sin intentionally? Certainly children are a gift from God and he will give all the necessary strength and provision if we only trust in Him and pray that he will provide these things.

The concern is that we would take the text out of context. First, let’s define the context. The section of scripture which contains a theme, the context is 1st Corinthians 14:26-40 which talks about the order of worship within the church. There is a larger context. The chapter itself talks about the spiritual gifts of prophesy and tongues and how they are to be utilized. To put this in perspective, this is no different than analyzing literature or a song or anything else. You need to understand the story to understand the intent of one small passage.

The primary focus of   26-40 is this, “God is not a God of disorder but of peace” (1 Corinthians 14:33). In the context of the chapter, you can see that the concern is that those who are speaking in tongues will cause confusion if there is no one with the gift of prophesy to interpret or if too many are speaking at the same time. Paul clarifies tongues further when he builds an argument that, “Tongues… are a sign, not for believers but for unbelievers” (1 Corinthians 14:22).

“As the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything” (Ephesians 5:24). This statement from the book of Ephesians is to back up the statement that wives are really intended to be in a place of submission to their husbands. It is the husband who is to lead the wife spiritually just as Christ leads the church spiritually. However, Christians are not so naïve as to believe that women cannot obtain spiritual wisdom and that is why it says, “If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home” (1 Corinthians 14:34). It almost seems that the husband is in complete authority over the wife, but the reality is that there is a balance in the relationship. “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church” (Ephesians 5:25).

Getting back on track, it is explained better in 1 Timothy. “A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man” (1 Timothy 2:11, 12). The understanding here is that a woman would have authority over a man if she were to speak out in church. She may have authority over children and other women because that is not forbidden. This section of scripture also has the same context which is orderly worship.

Love: First let’s preface this ‘How To’ with an understanding of Love. There is Love, the emotion, and there is Love, the action. “He who loves his wife loves himself” (Ephesians 5:28). This is in reference to the emotion. Most do not have to choose to love themselves, rather they have just grown quite attached to themselves and sincerely do not wish to do harm to themselves. In fact, they would do nearly anything to avoid it. When Paul writes to love your wife in this way, he means that in every situation you should desire that no harm befall your wife in any way.

Here is the action, the command. “Love your wives”; give yourself up for her (Ephesians 5:25). The command to love means to do love. What would make others see love in what you do, that would make your wife feel love, is how you do love. In the simplest form, bring her flowers and tell her, “I love you.” That’s just a start though. You are also commanded to give yourself up for her. The obvious implication is that you should be willing to die for her. What is more difficult than dying? Give your life for her. In all you do, do it with the interests of your wife in mind.

Forgiveness and Radiance: Have a heart for your wife. This again is the emotion of love. “Make her holy, cleansing her” (Ephesians 5:26). “Present her…without stain or wrinkle” (Ephesians 5:27). When your wife is in need of it, cleanse her; forgive her when she acts against you. For example, you ask your wife to get you steak at the store and you get mad because she says that you eat too much red meat. Forgive and forget. Don’t allow yourself to harbor any bitterness and you will feel the love for your wife.

The Head: Many people read this section first and stop. “Wives submit to your husbands” (Ephesians 5:22). And then they stop there. There is a whole other study for the wives. The implication in this passage is that if the man truly loves his wife (that’s the action and the emotion), the wife will gladly submit to the man.

Application:

1) Don’t harbor bitterness and you will be happier.
2) Consider your wife’s best interests throughout the day and your wife will be happier.
3) A happy wife really can mean a happy husband.

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Christians: Is believing that our religion is the only 100% correct religion being humble?

Jesus taught us to be humble.

Yes many Christians proclaim that they, and only they, are smart enough to KNOW they are in the right religion. It isn’t enough that all non-Christians are wrong, but also that every Christian denomination is wrong as well.

Let’s take Catholicism vs. Protestantism. Isn’t it extremely vain for us to proclaim that OUR side is 100% right, and the other side is wrong? Wouldn’t it be more humble of us to admit that we may be wrong on some things, and the other side may be right?.

For instance, I admit my side is not perfect. I do not believe the pope is 100% infallible. I believe we should have women priests, etc.

Shouldn’t we humble ourselves to admit that, just maybe, we might not be 100% correct?
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The first part of the question is to analyze the Catholicism versus Protestantism. For purposes of the argument, it is safe to argue any one religion versus another. For example: Hinduism versus Mormonism or any other. It’s important to remember that the analysis of this argument is from the Christian perspective, and to be fair, regardless of denomination.

“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8). As an assumption, all Christians agree that salvation is the most important aspect of the faith. Grace is the gift of God which is salvation through Jesus Christ and this is accomplished through faith. Salvation is not by works then, but simply by faith.

As a contrast, “faith without deeds is dead” (James 2:26). This is not a paradox, rather in context James suggests that you do not truly have faith unless your faith is demonstrated. This is merely a challenge against hypocrisy. It is one thing to say you believe in Jesus Christ; it is another thing to demonstrate your belief in Jesus Christ. In conclusion, all men and women who demonstrate faith in Jesus Christ have found salvation regardless of religious affiliation or denomination. Certainly this leaves out entire religions and even some denominations of Christianity. Certainly one of the biggest questions is that of Catholics versus Protestants. The bible says they are brothers in Jesus Christ.

The second concern is one of humility. Shall we boast? “Let him who boasts boast in the Lord” (2 Corinthians 10:17). If one person has knowledge of God, let him boast because of what God has taught him. He should not boast in the arguably unbiblical traditions which make up their denominations and extricate them from the true faith which is salvation through Jesus Christ. The challenge then is to not be religious, shan’t we boast, but to simply have faith and act upon it as we have been taught by Jesus Christ.