Sins of the Spirit Series: Part 11 (Distraction)

Sins of the Spirit Series: Part 11 (Distraction)

All right, let's take our Bibles and turn if you will to Hebrews chapter 12. Please, Hebrews chapter 12. And we want to begin the reading there in verse number 1. Hebrews chapter 12 and just reading the first few verses, beginning in verse number 1. We're fore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which does so easily beset us. And let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith. Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him that endured such contradiction of sinners against Himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds. And we'll conclude the reading there with verse 3 this evening.

Father, in these moments together we pray for you to give us clear understanding of your word and how it does apply to our hearts and lives. We on Sunday nights have been looking at these sins of the Spirit and help us as we make application of this passage tonight to our spirits and our spiritual vision that you would just better us. May we be more like Christ as a result of the things we'll see tonight in Jesus' name we pray.

Hebrews 11 is the hall of faith. We've often called it that. I didn't originate that name but sometimes it's called the hall of faith because it lists and gives short summaries of men and women who lived and died in faith. And by faith overcame temptations and trials, tribulations in their lives and proved God true by their trust in Him. We see that this group of individuals here in verse 1 is referred back to we believe as a great cloud of witnesses. How great a cloud of witnesses it says in verse 1.

The Christian life is compared to a race. This race requires endurance. It requires patience. It sometimes gets long and there are times where we might be tempted to slow down or turn to the right hand or to the left hand or quit or any number of things. That a runner would be perhaps tempted to do. One of the things we see here is just getting distracted from the goal. Distracted from as we are running the race from why we are running and who is standing at the end of the way waiting for us as we run the race of this Christian life.

I think of one of those hymns that we sing that says he will carry you through. He will carry you through. Ask the Savior to help you comfort, strengthen and keep you. He is willing to aid you. He will carry you through. Ultimately he will carry us through it by faith. He will carry us through the test that he's appointed for our lives. We are not the same as Abraham's were or the same as Moses's or Moses's tests or Sarah or any of these different ones that we read of in Hebrews chapter 11. But they are all similar in many ways. They are all similar though. We need to run this race with faith.

We need to run the race. It says in verse 2, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. There are a lot of things that are said here. We need to lay aside every weight. We need to run with patience. Look at this phrase here, looking unto Jesus. This is what I want us to focus our attention on this evening. The sin of the Spirit that I want to talk about tonight, the sin of our spirits is not one that is plainly spelled out of this text. But as we look at the positive command given to us, which is that we should be looking unto Jesus. We are commanded to be looking unto Jesus. We find that if we are not looking unto Jesus, then that is sin to us, isn't it? If we're not looking unto Jesus, how are we going to run the race? Unless we're looking unto Jesus.

Now we need to take some time to talk about this word looking. And what does it mean? The word in the Greek literally means to turn the eyes away from other things and fix them on something. To turn the eyes away from other things and fix them on something or someone in particular. Sometimes when we want our children's attention, we say, hey, look at me. Look at me. Look at me. Your undivided attention. I want you to look at me right now. Sometimes we say something like that. Stop looking out the window. I think I've heard somebody in here, it's one of you say that when you were in school, maybe I remember in Pastor Peacock or somebody from the past that said they were looking out the window. And the teacher did something like bang on the desk and get everybody's attention. Hey, maybe it was you. Hey, threw a book at you. That's what it was. That was back in the days of non-OSHA approved. Well, pay attention. Pay attention. Look at me as the idea.

And this word, it comes from, there's two parts of this word, Oppo. And Horado, those are the two parts of that word. Oppo means away from. That's what I want you to see this. Look away from that and look here. So to look, Horado, to look, to see, beholds. And so in this context here, we're to look away. There are the sights and sounds we see in the allegory Pilgrim's Progress, right? The sights and sounds of Vanity Fair. There's things to the right, the things to the left that Christian would be tempted to turn aside to. But instead, he is to no matter whether he's going up the hill of difficulty or whether he's in a fruitful plane, he's to keep his eyes fixed ahead of him, not to turn to the right hand, not to turn to the left hand, along that pilgrim pathway.

But we're told here that while we are looking unto Jesus, we're also to consider this great cloud of witnesses. We're to remember them. That's not our ultimate gaze, but along the way, as we think upon him, we consider them, it will bring encouragement to our hearts and to think that the same temptations that are being accomplished in us have been accomplished in brothers and sisters in the past. And even now, we can look and know. We can know, even if we don't know the names of all the people around the world, know that the same temptations are being accomplished in our brethren that are in the world. And yet God has proven himself faithful time and again, not only in our lives, but in the lives of others, we draw great encouragement.

I think about people who have lost, you know, have miscarriages of children or they have lost a spouse or they have endured some kind of tribulation cancer. And they can look to someone else and really see the Lord in that person's life and how the Lord brought them through something. One of blessing, it becomes to that individual as they see how the Lord has helped them. And that's why even we need to go through our trials looking unto the Lord because, truly, he's going to bring us through whatever we may be facing at the present moment. And he's going to bring us through it with joy. And when we come out the other side and the more trials and tests of life that we come through, looking unto Jesus will be able along the way to give personal testimony to the faithfulness of God and tell others, look what the Lord did for me.

It was very encouraging even when we find people, you know, I thought about when I went to Bible college and I met other people that were my age, and I went through similar circumstances and how the Lord was helping them. It was a boost and what's the word I'm looking for. It was an encouragement to my own heart. But to disobey this command, looking unto Jesus and to have a wandering gaze, we might say, to have a divided attention to be distracted from the purpose God has for us is to sin. It is to sin, to the hymn that we are sometimes singing is since my eyes were fixed on Jesus, I've lost sight of all besides. So, enchained my spirit's vision, looking at the crucified.

Oh, yes, we transact in the business of this world. We involve ourselves in many things that are legitimate and that doesn't mean that, you know, attending to and looking unto Jesus is always being in your Bible, no. But seeking first his kingdom in all that we do. Seeking first his kingdom, in fact, we're told, and if you look with me in 2 Corinthians chapter 4, look at what the Apostle Paul says here. 2 Corinthians 4 verse number 18. Paul says, while we look not at the things which are seen, that's not our primary focus. But at the things which are not seen, for the things which are seen are temporal. But the things which are not seen are eternal. The things which are not seen are eternal.

We're told to let the word of Christ dwell in us richly in all wisdom, right? We're to let the word of Christ dwell in us richly. We are told the blessed man that will be like the tree planted by the rivers of water, bringing forth fruit. What is about him? He meditates in God's Law, day and night. You know, the watchful Christian does what? He sees everything. He's prayerful that God would help him to see every test and trial and, you know, maybe blessing things that are, you know, whether it be the mountaintop blessings or the valleys of tribulation. Help me to see it all through the lens of the Word. Help me to see it all. Help me to think scripturally, right? Help me to think biblically about what I'm going through right now. Give me wisdom to how to think about it. Help me to see you, Lord, in this. Help me to see Jesus Christ in what I'm facing in the moment.

So looking unto Jesus, looking unto Jesus, the only way we can see him is, as we said this morning, like we said, be still and know that I'm God. To know what he's revealed about himself in his Word and to view what he's placing in my life through that lens. There are things that can draw our attention away from the Lord, like getting our eyes on ourselves, as if we said this morning, getting our eyes on others, either in envy or in bitterness toward those individuals, any number of things lust. You can get your eyes on men. You can get your eyes on world events, help finances and all of those things and become preoccupied in your thinking. But the scripture says, take no thought for many of these things we just mentioned, right? Take no thought that is talking about a preoccupation of thought that brings an anxiety about those things.

That doesn't mean you have to balance your budget. You have to think wisely about you have to go to the grocery store. And you should enjoy doing those, I mean, as much as you can. You should enjoy the things of this life. But even as you're doing those things, don't forget the Lord. Keep in your thoughts. The thing about the wicked is that God is not in all their thoughts. He's not in their thinking about things. They think about it in an egocentric sort of way. It's all about me, right? Even in our enjoyment, we're thankful, right? Thankful to God. Thank you for giving me this blessing. We gathered with family today. Thank the Lord for the blessing of being together with family. Thank the Lord for this meal. We do a lot of thinking about food in our families by our gathering today. But we must always be conscious of the Lord.

Paul said in Colossians 3:2, to set your affection on things above. Not on things on the earth. Set your affection on things above. In fact, as we mentioned a moment ago in Matthew 6:31, I was alluding to this. Let's read these verses. Matthew 6:31 says, Wherefore, take no thought saying what shall we eat? Or what shall we drink? Or wherewithal shall we be clothed? Look at this parentheses. For after all these things do the Gentiles seek. This is where their attention is. This is what they're looking for. This is what they're looking at. They're thinking continually about what am I going to eat? What am I going to eat? All these temporal needs of life that consume their thinking. For your heavenly Father knoweth that you have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. And all these things shall be added unto you.

The principle here is seek God's will, His kingdom, His righteousness, put Him first in your life, and He'll provide your needs. He'll meet all those needs that you could spend your time worrying about and preoccupying yourself with. If you ever watched, let's say, we could say a hundred yard dash, I guess they call it. Or, you know, in the Olympics, I don't know if that's the exact term they use, but it's the hundred, you know, the one where they run from one end of that. Basically oval shaped track to the other. They won't run from one end to the other. It's a hundred yards, I think, or meters. And then there's the one where they have the, you know, they pass the baton. Is that relay four by one hundred or something like that. Then they have, you're thinking about all these races they do.

I have never, and I haven't watched them all, I've never seen any of them running down the track. I'm going like this and looking over at the crowds. I've never seen any of them, at least until they're done with the race. Maybe the exception of Usain Bolt, but, because he was so far ahead. Now, he was a show off, but I mean, generally speaking, they don't even know that people exist. They just block out the crowd from their thinking. And they're so focused when they run, their faces set like a flint toward the finish line. Their faces set toward a flint, because minor unnecessary movements of the head or body outside of the very economically mechanical. I don't know what the word I'm looking for. Very smooth movements towards that finish line. Anything that would distract from that is going to slow them down by hundreds of a second, and it could mean the difference between them winning or losing in that competition.

And in the same way, we need to have that same kind of focus that they have on the finish line, although Lord Jesus Christ, without distraction for us to not be looking unto Jesus, is the sin isn't it? If it's the opposite of what we're commanded to do, for us not to seek first the kingdom of God. For us not to set our affection on things above. For us not to, as we've read tonight, to put our attention on the things which are eternal rather than the things that are temporal is sin.

Paul used the analogy of a runner in Philippians 3. Look over there in Philippians chapter 3, verse number 14. Philippians 3:14. It's there where he says in Philippians 3:14 he says, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. This speaks of an earnest pursuit. I press toward the mark. This is not halfheartedly running the race. This is running with intense focus and earnest effort towards the finish line, toward the goal set before Him. They put blinders right on horses, keep them focused straight ahead, right? They put blinders on the horses so they won't become distracted with, maybe in the parade, the crowd that's to the side. But to keep straight ahead focused in the scripture does tell us that it is a straight narrow way that lies before us.

Well, as we look to Jesus, we must remember that he does stand at the end of the way and he beckons us homeward. And as our undivided attention is on him, inevitably we are also as we're looking unto him, what are we looking for? We're looking for his soon appearing. We're looking for his return. Now that's not an escape. That's an escape. It's a mentality. Well, we don't just want to be out of this earth, but if we're looking unto the Lord, we should be ready to go with him anytime. He would come back for us. Someday we may awaken his plans and erupt our own in the sense that he takes us to be with him. That may not happen in our lifetime. We don't know, but we should anticipate that it very well could happen even today, even tonight. It could. It could be today.

Look at Hebrews 9. Look at Hebrews 9:28 with me. It's here that our focus of our heart, our spirit's vision needs to be seen in this passage, that Hebrews 9:28 says, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin. And to salvation. You know, when the flood came, people weren't looking for that flood to come. They were not looking because they, why would people be looking for a flood to come? Well, they would be looking because of faith, right? Because Noah, being warned of God, moved with fear, prepared an ark. He was looking for the Lord to do what he said he was going to do. He was going to send a flood. So he was preparing and getting ready for that because he believed, right? That's in Hebrews chapter 11. But here we see that he was not so much anticipating being drowned in the flood as he was being in the ark, being in the ark of safety.

And so we noticed that we're to look for him because he's going to appear the second time in Philippians 3. Look there with me in Philippians chapter 3 verse 20. Philippians 3 and verse 20 says this. For our conversation is in the earth. Our conversation, literally our citizenship is in heaven from whence. Also, we look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, very clear. Where do we, what are we, to be looking for? What are we looking for the Savior? Looking for the Savior's return from heaven. And knowing that our very citizenship is in heaven, we're not, we're not part of this earth. We're not permanent citizens of this earth. We're passing through this earth. We're temporarily for the time being. We're citizens of the United States. And we have certain civic duties that we need to partake in. But ultimately our allegiance is heavenward, isn't it? It's with the Lord Jesus Christ.

And we should obey just as, I mean, if Daniel obeyed the laws of the land, of Babylon, a nation that certainly did not even resemble a Christian nation. How much more we should obey the laws of our land. We should be honorable, responsible, upstanding citizens in this United States of America. But unless the laws of the land contradict the laws of our heavenly citizenship. And that's why we must never be looking to the Lord. And Titus 2:13, we're told this. Titus 2 and verse number 13. This is a command. We're to be looking, Titus 2:13, looking for that blessed hope and glorious appearing of the great God in our Savior, Jesus Christ.

I was struck by an illustration this week. I saw and it was not anything to do with sermon preparation. It wasn't even spiritual. The source was not a Christian source, but it was interesting. It was more, I guess, kind of positive thinking kind of thing. But it talked about the illustration was be like a photographer. It said, what a photographer takes pictures of. There's a lot of things they could take pictures of, but they're looking for, and I'm just sort of paraphrasing here, the things that are beautiful, the things that are noteworthy, things that are momentous, things that are worth looking at basically. They take pictures of those things. There's a lot of things that they could occupy themselves with, which would just be a waste of time to take pictures of all these things. But they capture important moments and focus their cameras upon those things.

And it's true that as Christians, if we follow that to its conclusion here spiritually tonight, that's really what we're supposed to be doing. We're to be having our attention on the eternal import, even in the, it can be certainly in the temporal realm, but seeing the Lord in the temporal, the problem with Solomon, for instance, was not that he built things. And, you know, he invented things. That wasn't the problem. The problem was he never, he forgot God in all of that. It was just vanity. It was a lot of accomplishments without including God, without seeking God's will, without seeing God in the midst of what he was doing. And seeking God's direction in it.

So we need to make sure, I even heard the illustration recently. This is not vision related. This is taste related. It was a very interesting illustration. You know, a taste tester. A taste tester, they cleanse their palate before they try a new flavor, before they taste something. Why do they do that? Well, they cleanse that palate so that they can taste all the notes and flavors and spices and, you know, the sweetness and all the different flavors that are going on there, so that they can, they can benefit from that and make a proper judgment on it. And as Christians, it would, who of us, as Christians, to be sure that while we, we live in this world that we keep a spiritual taste, how can I put this? We can read our Bible and not get anything out of it, because our minds are so filled with the things of this world that we see the words, but that doesn't even, we don't really even taste and see that the Lord is good when we're reading, when we're taking our time for prayer, we can just go through the motions of it and not really be looking unto Jesus.

We can be looking like we're looking but we're not actually looking if you know what I mean. We can go, we can have the appearance of it, but not actually be doing it. I've been guilty of that, okay? We need to really be looking unto the Lord, Jesus Christ, in our thoughts, our waking thoughts, our middle of the day thoughts, going to bed, we need to be looking unto Him. And even as our text says tonight, what did it say? There's another word it gave us. It says in Hebrews 12 verse 3, for consider Him, for consider Him that endured such contradiction of sinners, lest ye be worried and faint in your mind. You see, if we're not looking to the Lord, what's gonna happen? We're gonna get weary. We're gonna faint. We're gonna flake out. We're gonna faint in our spiritual lives and not be able to go on in our own strength.

So look unto Him. What we're looking unto is the one who has finished this course, he's set down, even now he's seated at the right hand of the throne of God. He's at, he's where we're going at some point whenever God comes or calls for us, calls us home. But we're to consider Him. This word, consider, I know I've pointed out in the past, we get our word, I believe, analyze somewhat from this, but it's the word, and although it gets in my, it's to think over, to consider, to ponder, to reason through and come to a conclusion about something. You know, it's not just a passing thought, but this is dedicating meditation and thought to a particular person or thing that we give our full attention to. And we come to a conclusion by thinking upon this person, place or thing. And that's what we're to do. We look unto Jesus, we're to think on Him. Think about the implications of His gospel upon our lives that the things we're walking through.

Sometimes we may just, as we're reading the scripture and we read a phrase, maybe we need to read it again and just stop and what, where those little words that are put in sometimes in the Psalms, say, Selah, think on these things. Think on these things. Pause and think about, Lord, what would you have me to do about this? How does this apply to my life? Where I am right now. We haven't seen the Lord face to face, but we, the scripture says, whom having not seen, we love. How can we love Him more? How can we rejoice with this joy unspeakable and full of glory unless we're looking unto Him and considering Him? How can we love Him more tomorrow than we perhaps would, than perhaps we've loved Him today? Consider Him. Look unto Him. Don't get distracted.

If you get distracted, you're not going to be able to taste, you know, so to speak. If you've been eating all this other stuff of this world and it's filling your palate or if you're taking pictures of all these other things or you don't have your eyes fixed on Him, it's going to be hard to even think about Him. It's going to be hard to even think on the glories of His gospel and the wonders of what He's done for us, may we take the name of our Lord and Savior with us throughout the day, may it be even in the morning. We have a thought that comes to us. May we meditate on that, muse on that and say, Lord, how does this apply to me where I am right now? And the Lord will show us, he'll help us. So let's look unto Him. Let's not be distracted in our spirits from Him. While we do look at these things in the world around us, we certainly enjoy things in this world. May we not take thought, become preoccupied with these things so that we lose focus on the Lord.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for these moments we've had in your word. Thank you for these thoughts that we have gleaned from your word with your help. Help us when we look, Lord, in our mind's eye and in our spirits, may we, may our spirit's vision truly be fixed on the, and may our, may our spirit, may even our countenance reflect the joy of the Lord, more and more, our path grow brighter and brighter as we do gaze upon the, in a sense, similar to what we think of when we saw how Moses' countenance shone, and so help us to do that. May we behold the, with clarity through your word. We pray these things. We ask them in Jesus' name. Amen.