Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth, fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness which is idolatry. Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience in which you yourselves once walked when you lived in them. But now you yourselves are to put off all these anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language out of your mouth. Do not lie to one another. since you have put off the old man with his deeds and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of him who created him. Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcised nor uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave nor free, but Christ is all and in all. Amen. One of the reasons why soldiers pull the trigger, as it were, on the enemy. One of the reasons for that is because there is a real sense in which if they do not kill, then they will be killed. Whether it be a situation in World War II where Americans fought the Japanese and the Germans, or whether it be Vietnam or even Recently in Afghanistan, a platoon of infantrymen in some outpost surrounded by Islamic extremist Taliban fighters with rocket-propelled grenades and AK-47s. There's no surrender. You either kill or be killed. One of the spiritual truths that all of you need to come to terms with and to realize is not just those truths about the gospel that are so important that we love, the forgiveness of sins in Christ, faith, but also the idea that sin, even for a Christian, is destructive and it kills. You have a great need to understand that in your own life, if you are not going after sin, if you're not actively killing sin, then sin will be killing you. It will destroy your life. It will create havoc in your life and possibly if sin is never dealt with through faith in Christ and you never put to death sin, you show yourself to actually not be in Christ and the death that comes is far worse than just temporal pains and consequences. Paul says in Romans 8.13, if you live according to the flesh, you will die. If you live according to the sinful flesh, you will die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. And this killing of sin is called mortification. It's a theological word. Mortification is that spiritual activity where Christians, by the power of the Holy Spirit who's in them, they go through their life not perfect, but they slowly but surely kill. their sin. Paul is in this letter He's been talking a lot about gospel truth. He's been dealing with gospel truth in the first two chapters. He's speaking to a church that's both Jewish and Greek. They have, like any congregation, different trials and difficulties and problems. And he's been telling them about the sufficiency of Christ and the preeminence of Christ. You don't need Jewish ceremonies. philosophy, this Greek Gnostic knowledge, you know, apart from Christ. You don't need angels as mediators apart from Christ, all these different things. And he transitions from the gospel truth to gospel living. We looked last time at verses one through four and how Paul first addresses the heart. He addresses the mind, if you will, the heart, the thinking thing, those affections, and how important that is. And he wanted us to look to heaven and see the importance of living in light of eternity. And now he transitions to another aspect of gospel living, this idea of mortification. What I want you to see this morning is a simple truth, but it's very important. And that is this, that it is very appropriate for Christians to be killing sin. It was very appropriate for Christians to be killing their many different sins. I want to bring this lesson to you into three points. I want you to first see the object of mortification. What are we talking about? Secondly, the appropriateness of mortification. And then thirdly, the meaning of mortification. What does it actually mean practically? Look with me at verses 5 and verses 8. The object of mortification is our sin, our various different sins. Paul in verse 5 and verse 8 gives us particular sins to think about. He names them. Of course, these two lists aren't meant to be exhaustive. He gives lists in his epistles and they're not meant to be exhaustive. Sins is almost so numerous to even count all of them. But he wants us to think about these particular sins. And I want you to think about sin for a moment. What is the object of mortification? Verse 5, we have sins that are more or less related to one's own self. Verse 8, we have sins more or less related to one's neighbor. Fornication. So he says in verse five, therefore put to death your members which are on the earth. Your members which are on the earth. Paul's using a metaphor. He's using metaphors throughout this passage. Your members, your limbs, your arms, your legs. He's referring to sin as if it's the body. And that's common for him to do that. He's already done that in Colossians 2. He does it in Romans. I believe it's verse 11. Putting off the body of the sins of the flesh. Sin is very much close to us. As Christians, we're victorious over sin's dominion and its slavery, but it remains. And so in that sense, he refers to the body, your members, which are on the earth, things that are not spiritual and heavenly, but those things which are earthly and sinful. He lists fornication. Fornication is any sexual activity outside of the covenant of marriage between one man and one woman. includes cohabitation, which is very common. People who are faithful to one another, even in some cases, they can be professing Christians, and they have it actually covenanted to one another. It includes all types of things. It doesn't have to be actual intercourse. All types of fornication, uncleanness. Uncleanness is all the other types of fornication that would not even be appropriate to mention from the pulpit that are out there. Uncleanness, passion, This is that person who tends to not even have a restraint upon them. I think of Samson, if you recall the story of Samson and his particular sins, he didn't even seem to have a restraint. He just went about doing his sin. Evil desire. It's important for us to realize that things like anger and hatred even are not always sinful. Desire, having a desire, having a zeal for something is not sinful. Galatians 5, I believe it's verse 16, the spirit lusts against the flesh. Same word, but it's the evil desire. So he's getting at our heart. He's getting at what we want. Covetousness, which is idolatry. I want you to think about Sin for a moment. Paul, Paul wants you to think about sin. Covetousness is interesting. It's a, of course it's the 10th commandment. You shall not covet. Wanting something that God has not given you. It can be a good thing. It could be a good thing. But growing to the point where you're discontent and longing for it and God has not given it to you. And it's very interesting for us to notice that he says that covetousness is idolatry. It's idolatry. And that's because oftentimes when a Christian is coveting something and desiring something that God has not given, discontent about their state, they see that thing, it can be even a good thing, like money, money's not inherently sinful, a job, it could be a marriage, it could be anything, children. And looking at that and longing for that, Because a belief, that thing gives them satisfaction. They're trusting that thing to fulfill them. Only God can fulfill us. Only God can fulfill us. He calls it idolatry. One commentator writes, to whatever the affections of the heart cling as the chief good that is taken into the place of God. These are some of the sins that Paul would have us look at. He has in verse eight, Other sins, sins that are related more or less to our neighbor, anger. Someone has done you wrong and you want to harm them. You're angry with them. Of course, the chief on the scale, you know, murder would be like the highest manifestation of anger. But children, kids, have you ever been angry with your brother or your sister? Have you ever maybe pushed them? Maybe they did something wrong to you. But it's unjust to inflict pain upon them. Wrath, anger boiling over. Ever lost your temper? Ever lost your temper? And again, it's not always sinful to be angry. Jesus was angry, righteous anger. And one of the key things in noticing the difference is to ask yourself, what's my motive here? Am I enthralled and excited about the glory of God and the good of my neighbor? And is this why I'm upset? Or is it for other reasons? Anger, wrath, malice, the intent, the planning evil. One of the Proverbs says that there are six things that the Lord hates. Seven are an abomination. One of those is one who devises wicked plans. Think of Haman. Haman hated Mordecai and he planned to have Mordecai hanged on the gallows. Of course, God turned the table on him. Malice, blasphemy, speaking evil. Usually blasphemy refers to speaking evil of God, talking about things, slandering God, and typically that's called blasphemy. But in this context, I believe Paul has us to think about how we can speak evil of one another. Sharing other people's sins. And in that sense, blasphemy. Filthy language as well. Filthy language. All of our life, every aspect of our life, certainly our mouth, is to be a fountain of truth, is to be pure. The Bible doesn't give us a list of words that we can't say. Like four-letter words, for example. But God requires us to have pure words and edifying words, Ephesians 4. Verse 29, let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification. So if your words that you speak are not edifying, then they are not to be spoken. They're not to be spoken, whether they're a four-letter word or a joke. Ever made a joke that was not appropriate? Do not lie to one another. fibbing, not giving information to someone who needs it. You don't always have to say everything that's true. Sometimes you can hold back truth from certain people in certain circumstances. But lying has many different forms. Children, if you say to your parents that you've forgotten what they said, but you actually haven't forgotten, you're lying. And this is the type of things that God would have us to think about. Paul mentioned them. And it's important in our, as we deal with the idea of mortification, to understand that this passage of scripture applies to me, and it applies to you. It applies to everyone. Now some sermons and some passages of scripture are not as equally applicable to everyone. We're gonna get to some of that. Wives, husbands, okay, et cetera, and so forth. But this topic is applicable. It's applicable to everyone. Because if you have any sense, spiritual sense, if the Holy Spirit's working in your heart at all, you will recognize that there is in some way I'm speaking to you. John says, do not be deceived. Let no one say, I have no sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. I remember speaking to a friend of mine and Dorsey's in South Carolina. We told him we were going to come out to Fresno and I received a call to a church out here and they had spent a lot of time in California in the recent past and they really liked California. to the point where they kind of had dreams, and, oh, to return to California, and it's so great, and there's no bugs there. There's no bugs. You can go outside in the summer, in the middle of the night, and you can just enjoy the weather, and, oh, and to be back, and you barely even have to call the bug man, you know, just, there's no bugs. I get to Fresno, and Saturday night, at our old house especially, I would go out in the backyard and pray and think through my sermon, and I'm just constantly slapping my legs. This person was dreaming. There's bugs here. And oftentimes Christians can be dreaming. I don't have any bugs. We have bugs. We have bugs. We have the bugs of sin in our heart, and we have a need to look at this topic. Mortification. But one of the things that's useful, and secondly, I want to speak to this, it's one thing to be like, okay, you know, I have sin in my life. Thank you, Pastor Sam, once again for reminding me. But is mortification, is it, how important is it in the Christian life? You know, how appropriate is it to be marked as someone who's not perfect? but who is going about this process. Is it appropriate? It's very appropriate. I want you to see, secondly, the appropriateness of this duty, of mortification. There's three reasons, if you will, that Paul gives us. In fact, a lot of this passage of Scripture is taken up, Paul giving reasons, and he wants you to think about this duty. Well, the first the first reason why it's appropriate to go about this duty of mortification is because of who you are. Because of who you are, you're a Christian, you're in Christ, you're not only forgiven, but you have the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit's really powerful. He's strong spiritually. He says in verse five, therefore, therefore, he's he's connecting the past with the duty. Christians, the people in Colossae, they are those who have been raised up with Christ. They are those who who have been given spiritual life. Chapter two, verses 11 through 12. They've been regenerated by the power of the Holy Spirit. Christ is in them. He says in verse nine, he lists the sins and he says, do not lie to one another since you have put off the old man with his deeds. And I've put on the new man who was renewed in knowledge according to the image of him who created him. This is the gospel. This is part of the gospel. God comes to you and he gives you a new life. He the old man who was chained to sin, who obeyed that tyrant in the castle, who ruled the land. He's been removed. Christ has come. He's removed that tyrant. You're no longer a man. He's no longer your master. You sin. OK, you still commit sin. You're like me, but it's no longer your master. You face no ethical dilemma in your life because the Holy Spirit. is with you. You're being renewed. It's a process. This is a process. You don't overcome sin completely in this life. That's actually a an error that is so more or less around perfectionism. I've reached the high life. That's that does not exist in this life. We're being renewed in knowledge according to the image of Christ who created us. We're being renewed. And this is an important reason for us to seek mortification. You perhaps have been in a situation where perhaps you've gone to a gym with a friend who's stronger than you, or you've gone on a treadmill with a friend who's faster than you, you've gone on a walk with a friend who's been doing this for a while, and they're pushing you, and you're thinking to yourself, I can't do this. Well, because of who you are in Christ. God never puts something into your path. He never puts too much weight on your bar. Never makes you run too fast. The situations you find yourself, because of Christ, you can say no to sin. And you can uproot the sin in your life. That's very encouraging. Because if you're like me, you have sin in your life that you don't think, perhaps you've thought, I can't get rid of. I can't get rid of. You gotta remember who you are. The old man's gone and the new man is in. It's very appropriate for us to be about this because we can in Christ. Secondly, verses six through seven, it's very appropriate for us to go about mortification because of what happens to those who do not ever mortify their sin, who are not marked as those who are killers. Christians are killers. We kill sin. Verse six through seven, because of these things, the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience in which you yourselves once walked when you lived in them. Now, I want to be clear here for a moment. The wrath of God does not come upon Christians. What a glorious truth. He made him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in him. He bore our sins on the tree in our place. The wrath of God came upon the tree, upon Christ, and the wrath of God was poured out upon him. And that's true. I want you to think about this for a moment, because it's also possible to be deceived, to be someone who's marked as not having this grace, not having Christ. You're still walking. Verse seven, in which yourselves once walked when you lived in. You may be here and you may not know Christ, and one of the reasons why you ought to think that is because of your life. You never kill sin. And this is this is not a trivial thing. The wrath of God is coming upon Those who do not have this grace in Christ, who do not kill sin. The wrath of God is coming. You know, I go to my car, my mechanic, and he'll say things like, your back light is off and it's broken, you need to fix that. Back of my mind, I realize that that's not really a big deal. If I get pulled over for speeding, that's a big deal. If a cop pulls me over because I have a light that's off, he's just gonna give me a fix-it ticket. Just go fix it. Not a big deal. It's a big deal to have Christ and to have this grace in your life. Because the wrath of God is coming. The wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience. Children, children, have you Have you trusted in Christ Jesus? Do you have Christ? Are you living your life in the power of the Holy Spirit? I'm not asking you if you're perfect. Adults, I'm not asking you if you're perfect. What do you think about the appropriateness of backing up and saying to myself, do I kill any sin in my life? The wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience. The third reason. why it's appropriate to be killing sin. It's found in verse 11. It's found in verse 11. He's talking about, in verse 9 and 10, the new man. He's talking about a certain person. He's talking about the true church member. He's talking about the true church and that place where There is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcised nor uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave nor free, but Christ is all in all. Why is it appropriate to mortify your sin? Because this grace, having this grace of mortification in Christ is everything. Because it means you have Christ, and Christ is all in all. Okay, if you like, Christ is everything for everybody. This is the main thing. This is the pearl of great price. Go and sell everything you have so you can have Christ, so you can have this grace. See, Paul is dealing with an objection. Keep in mind the context. Who's Colossi? What have we already looked at? Paul's not doing away with social distinctions. He's certainly not doing away with racial distinctions. What he's saying is, it doesn't matter if, don't say I'm a Jew and I'm really in. No, don't say that. It doesn't matter if you're a Greek or a Jew. Circumcised, uncircumcised. Don't say, oh, I'm really sophisticated because I'm a Greek. I'm not a barbarian. Especially one of those Scythians. The Scythians were the barbarians of barbarians. Don't say that. Don't say, oh, I'm not a slave. I got property. I'm dignified. I got money. It doesn't matter. When it comes to salvation, all that matters is to have Christ. Christ is all in all. This is the theme of the whole letter. The preeminence. of Christ. And I want you to think about what you value, what you desire, what you really prize. Is it Christ? Is it the Christ of mortification? Is this important to you? To have this? Have you thought about whether or not you are someone who kills sin? Because if you have mortification, that means you have Christ. And Christ is everything. It's important. It's very appropriate. to to be killing sin. Not only do you have sin, but it's appropriate. Now, I want to speak to you thirdly about what mortification actually is. And we're kind of building this. I mean, mortification is the focus of this text, verses 5 through 11. He's going to transition to the opposite of mortification in verse 12. But in this section, he wants us to think about the killing of sin. What is that? I mean, it's a metaphor itself. Are we supposed to get a gun? Are we supposed to shoot something physically? No. What is the meaning of mortification? I've hinted at it. We need to see that certainly this was important to Christ. He taught this too. If your right eye, or if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. Okay, Paul says this in Romans. What is this? Well, there's a couple of things that I want you to think about in defining mortification. And I want you to think about it first what it's not, okay? In the history of the church, especially in the Roman Catholic Church, Mortification has been understood to be self-denial and self-affliction. Afflicting pain upon yourself as if you're trying to kill your actual body or something. That's not it. Mortification is not altering sins, trading out sins. When I was young, I used to go to my neighbor's house and take the oranges off their tree. I stole them. I don't do that anymore. At the same time, that older man is coveting a woman who is not his. And he's stealing money. He's just altered the form of it. That's what unbelievers specially do. They reform themselves by just trading sins. They don't have Christ, so they can't mortify their sin. Mortification is certainly not a truce. Perhaps you've been tempted to do that. After all, you can't teach an old dog new tricks. And you've always had this. You're not gonna feed, okay, you're not gonna feed the beast, as it were, but you're just gonna build a wall and just kinda ignore it. I've always done this, just kinda make a truce with the sin. That's not mortification. What is mortification? Well, I've had to define it. Mortification is removing from your life any temptation, any provocation to sin at the first moment you become conscious of it. Using the language of the text here, verses five and verse eight, put to death your members, but put off. It's really the same thing. Have you ever found a rattlesnake in your backyard? What do you do? And of course, this I'm speaking from personal experience, not at our current house, but you kill the snake, but you don't leave it there. You know, as a lawn decoration, you throw it out. I mean, think about what Jesus said. If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It's not meant to be taken literally. He's saying remove sin, remove the source, that thing that provokes you, that thing that is especially good at yielding you and pushing you over the cliff of sin. Get rid of it. It's a positive action. It's not a defensive thing. That's what I like about mortification because it's offensive. I like going on the offensive. We need to go out on the offensive as Christians. Romans 13, 14, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to fulfill its lust. It's something that you do. It's something that you make as it were. So what does it look like? Well, let's say, you know, let's say that you have a friend and this friend of yours, you know, not every time you hang out with this friend, but you know, lots of times you hang out with this friend, you end up doing things that you don't want to do and you wish you didn't do. And you pray for this friend and you make sure you read the Bible before you go out on the weekends with this friend or whatever. But it happens that you just keep getting involved with sin and doing things that you don't want to do. And at least for a time, what God wants you to do is He wants you to get new friends. You see? He wants you to get new friends. It's better to not have that friend and to not sin than to have that friend and sin. Now, you have an iPhone and your iPhone causes you to sin. Get a flip phone. Men, you don't know what I'm talking about. Pornography is everywhere. If you struggle with something, if there's a source, laptop, iPhone, then just get rid of it. Get rid of it. You know, you're in a relationship with someone and after 10 o'clock when you're alone with them, bad things happen. Then don't be alone after 10 o'clock. Don't pray about it and pretend like it's going to be okay and half the time it's okay. Don't go there. That's a mortification. You see, this is the things that we are to be doing. This is what God's commanding you to do. This is very important. It's very important because what's implied here when you put something to death is the fact that it's coming after you. It's coming after you. Soldiers don't have an option. Many cases. They either pull the trigger or they're gonna die. Sin, dear Christian, sin can't take away your salvation, but it can really frustrate you and really make you fruitless. Less fruitful, certainly. It's very appropriate for Christians to be killing their sin. I want you to imagine for a moment a garden and a gardener. And this gardener knows how to plant seeds. He knows how to water, but he never picks weeds. never picks weeds. What's going to happen to that garden? At the most, it's going to be a frustrating garden. Probably not going to be very successful. What I want you to see, dear congregation, is that Christ He's got all the tools in the shed, he's got the shovel, he's got the spray, and he's there, he knows what a seed is and what a weed is, and he's with you, and he's enabling you, and he's directing you, and he's calling upon you to pick the weeds of your heart, to pull them out and throw them away. This is very important. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the Lord Jesus, our shepherd, who feeds us, who guides us, who enables us to walk in the gospel truth and to live out the gospel and to live holy lives more and more. Father, we thank you that you are patient with your people. We're thankful that you are gracious, that you forgive us, not because we're good, not because we mortify our sin, but because we're in Christ, and Christ is perfect. Father, we ask that you would help us to glorify you, that you would help us to live holy lives, that you would give us new hope, especially if we have sins in our life that we seem to just can't shake off. And we even wonder if these things that have been spoken are even true. Give us a fresh sense of the glory and the power of Christ and the mortification of our sins. And give us faith to take the shovel and to get busy in the garden of our heart. For we ask in Jesus's name, amen.