Join us now for the chapel hour, coming to you from the campus of Bob Jones University. Following the introduction by Mr. Al Carper, our speaker will be Dr. Ron Allen, pastor of Bible Baptist Church in Matthews, North Carolina. The title of his message is, The Devil's Formula for Sin. The text is from Joshua chapter 7, verse 21. It's my great privilege and honor to introduce our chapel speaker for today and tomorrow. Dr. Ron Allen. Now, Dr. Ron Allen is no stranger to Bob Jones University. He is currently the pastor of Bible Baptist Church in Matthews, North Carolina, where he's been since 1997. He served also on the pastoral staff of Marquette Manor Baptist Church in Downers Grove, Illinois, and he served for 10 years before that on the faculty and staff of Bob Jones University. He holds three graduate degrees from BJU. three graduate degrees from BJU, so I won't be getting into any contests with him on that. He is currently a member of our adjunct faculty here, and he's also a member of the board of Baptist World Missions. His wife, Janice, who's here also with us today, she has a Bachelor of Science in Nursing degree from BJU, and she taught in the School of Nursing for 10 years. She currently teaches piano lessons and also supports her husband in his ministry as pastor of Bible Baptist Church. They've been married for 22 years and they have four children, John, who is a sophomore, Jessica, Jordan and Jennifer, four children that the Lord has blessed them with. We're looking forward to hearing from him what the Lord has laid on his heart both today and tomorrow. Pastor Allen, if you would come, we're going to pray that the Lord will bless your messages. Thank you, Brother Carper. Good morning. And it's glad we're glad to be able to be here with you today. We're so thankful and want to express our appreciation to the administration for the opportunity to come and speak today in chapel. Bob Jones University means a great deal to me and to my family. We spent my wife and I many, many years here. God did some wonderful things in our own lives. And there are many places on the campus that I can go to now and can reflect back on things that the Lord did, lessons that the Lord taught me in different places right here on the campus. So we're so grateful to be here today. And we trust God will bless as we look into his word. I want you to turn in your Bibles to the book of Joshua. That's where we're going to begin today in the book of Joshua. As you're turning, I guess we should say a word of congratulations to all of you Pittsburgh Steeler fans that are out there. I, of course, being in Charlotte, am a Carolina Panthers fan, and we had a pretty good season through the course of the year, except for two weeks ago when we played the Seahawks. And we don't know what team showed up that day, but it wasn't the Panthers team with somebody else and got just miserably defeated there. But we do congratulate those of you who are Steelers fans in your Bibles. Joshua, chapter seven, we're going to be in Joshua, chapter seven. And let's pray and ask the Lord to help us as we consider a portion of his word. Oh, Lord, we thank you for your word that you've given to us. We know that it's truth. We know that we would not know truth that you had you not revealed it to us. And we're grateful for the privilege that we have of having it. We thank you for your Holy Spirit that you put in our hearts the moment we got saved. And we thank you for his ministry of opening up the truth and bringing it home to our hearts. Lord, would you do that today? Confirm this simple truth that we will consider today. in each of our lives, and we'll thank you in Jesus name. Amen. In 1886, John Pemberton, a chemist, developed a formula that has probably touched every life here today. Asa Griggs Candler, an Atlanta marketer, took that formula and made that formula a household name. In fact, it has become so popular that if you were to take the sales of this particular formula and you were to put them in six and a half ounce bottles and you would lay them end to end, they would reach to the moon and back well over a thousand times. This particular product is served up somewhere in the world nine thousand six hundred times per second. Everywhere you go in the world, people recognize the name Coca-Cola, even though that formula remains a secret, though the product has been being used for well over 100 years. The McDonald's Corporation has very definite safeguards that will keep people from duplicating that special taste that they have. You may have a family recipe that your family has kind of kept together and wanted to stay in your family. And you may serve that particular dish with someone, but you don't give that out. That's considered a secret. And you want something you want to keep in your family. There are a lot of different products today where you can go and those products have top secret formulas that produce them. The devil also has a formula. It doesn't produce a delicious chocolate chip cookie or a spicy chicken wing. It serves up sin, and most of the time when you and I fall into sin, it is the result of us looking into and coming along with and falling prey to the ingredients of this particular formula. I want us to see it this morning in the book of Joshua. We know that this book, chapter six, reveals to us. The story of Jericho, we're familiar with that story. The people were to silently circle the city of Jericho for six days. Then on the seventh day, they were to circle the city seven times and at the command of Joshua, the trumpeters would blow The people would shout. They did this. And the shout reverberated through the hills, startling every wild animal and terrorizing the dwellers in Jericho. And the walls, obeying the very summons of God, came collapsing to the ground. God gave them that day a tremendous, miraculous victory. Then there was the Battle of Ai. You're familiar with that battle, an army of 3000 went to battle that city and they suffered a miserable defeat. Joshua falls on his face before the Lord to plead for his people. And the Lord told him that there was sin in their camp. And so Joshua began to take the people and he took them by tribe by tribe. And then family by family and then household by household and then man by man. I wonder what that would have been like during that day. I would imagine that as this was taking place, there was a lot of introspection that was going on. I imagine that in each life they were kind of looking at things that were happening. I can think back in my own life of times, sometimes when my brother and I would be disobedient. I have a twin brother. Sometimes when we were growing up and we would be disobedient, sometimes we would be punished right on the spot. I remember one time when we were just little fellas and we were playing cowboys and Indians or something of that nature in the grocery store, the drugstore. And mom had told us not to be doing that. And we continue to do that. And she told us again, don't do that. And we continue to do that. And so she took us right outside on the sidewalk of the drugstore and she began to spank us. We're standing on the sidewalk. We're dancing around the sidewalk here with mom spanking both of us. This lady, God bless her, wherever she is today, she comes to my mom, she says, ma'am, you're going to kill your children if you spank them that way. My mother, not blinking, said they're my children, I'll kill them if I want to. And we believe that she would. Sometimes when we disobey right on the spot, we got spanked, we got taken care of. You couldn't do that today. That was 40 years ago and I wouldn't recommend that today. But that's what happened then. But sometimes Dad would say. Boys, we're going to talk about something when we get home. Your parents ever tell you that. Parents ever say we need to talk when we get home. And inside all the way home, you're thinking, OK, what does he know? Who has talked to him, how much information is he aware of and what is coming down the pike for me? It's like maybe here you get a note in your email saying that the dean of men or the dean of women or want to see you and and you're kind of rehearsing through your mind, OK, well, what did I do? What happened? What do they know? And on your way up there, you're confessing all kinds of things and you're thinking, OK, what's what's there? I can imagine in this kind of a setting here with Israel, they're kind of walking through and one by one, they're looking inside and they're saying, what is what's taking place here? And then the tribe of Judah is taken. And then the family of the Czar Heights was taken and then the household of Zabdi was taken. And then the man, Akin, was chosen. And when Akin is chosen there from Joshua, Joshua asked Akin, what have you done? And in Akin, when Akin begins to explain to Joshua, What has taken place in his life in that explanation? We see here this formula that I want us to consider. Joshua, chapter seven, just one verse we're looking at. Verse twenty one. Look in your Bibles there. Verse twenty one. Akin says to Joshua, when I saw among the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment. and 200 shekels of silver and a wedge of gold of 50 shekels weight. Then I coveted them and took them and behold, they are hid in the earth in the midst of my tent and the silver under it. What is this formula that the devil works in our lives that serves up sin for us when we fall prey to it? We see it here in this explanation. Akin said, I saw I coveted, I took. I don't know about you, but I know so many times in my life when I am tripped up by sin, this is what takes place. I see I covet. I take. Notice what Akin says here, the first thing he says is, I saw it. Sin is conceived in our mind. It's something that we see, you notice that Aiken said, I saw a goodly Babylonish garment. Now, was that a goodly Babylonish garment? If you're looking at it with the eye of flesh, it certainly was. If you're looking at it through the lusts of your flesh and you see that garment as you're looking over the spoils of the city, the walls have come miraculously crashing down. The spoils of the city lay in front of you. You're walking through that city. You're taking a look at things. And all your eye catches a garment there. And it was taken a goodly Babylonish garment. But God, it said. Everything, everything in there is accursed. Everything in there was to be devoted, Jericho was kind of the it was the first of the conquest of the land of Canaan for Israel. It was kind of a first fruit and everything in that city there was to be devoted. It was to be devoted either to the Lord for destruction or for the sanctuary. And Aiken, when he's looking over those things, he sees that. And he looks at it and says, that's a good thing. And he goes after it. And he looks at it with fleshly eyes. And the devil paints for him such a beautiful picture as the devil is such a master at doing in our lives. And my what kind of pictures he can paint, what kind of pictures he paints that are so difficult for us to resist. And there are times in every one of our lives when we don't resist those pictures. And we look at them. And we look at the picture that's there, the intricacies of what's there, and we begin to think through what all is involved in that particular picture. And it leads to some very difficult days in our lives. And we must get into habit, young people, that we don't look at things with fleshly eyes. We look at things with spiritual eyes. If they could have saw that garment with spiritual eyes, he would have said right away that garment, along with everything else here, does not belong to me. All of it is devoted to the Lord. It does not belong to me. But they can then look at it that way. He didn't look at it with spiritual eyes. He looked at it with fleshly eyes and it got him in trouble. And I know in my own life, when I look at things with fleshly eyes, it gets me in trouble. When the devil starts to paint a picture in my mind about something. And it's a pretty picture to him and it's a pretty picture to my flesh, and if I don't stop right dead in my tracks, right there in my mind, I am going to be in trouble. That's what happened with Aiken. Satan doesn't stop with our mind, though, that's just the starting point. Sin, if it's not dealt with immediately in the mind, is going to move to the second part of this formula. It's the second aspect, this second ingredient that really makes us fall into sin. Not only is it conceived in our mind, then it becomes confirmed in our heart. Is that not true? Doesn't that happen in your life? My how it happens in my life, if I don't deal with that stuff immediately in my mind, when the devil put something there, it begins to work itself down into my heart and it begins to get confirmed in my own heart. The devil paints the picture. He tells his lies to me. He's a master deceiver. He's a father of lies. John 844 tells us. And he knows what my buttons are. You know, the devil. He learns by trial and error. He's not omnipresent. He's not omnipotent, he's not omniscient, all of those qualities are supremely reserved for God. But he knows by trial and error what things I'm going to go after and he knows what things you're going to go after. He knows in my life if he pushes this particular button, I'm going to respond to it almost every time he knows if he pushes or pulls this chain, that's going to be something I'm going to really grapple with in my own heart. And he's learned those things by what he's seen take place in my life, just as he's learned them and he sees what's what takes place in your life. And he knows the things to pull. And as we let let the devil do those things and then that the sin that got conceived in our mind now begins to get confirmed in our hearts and those lusts that we have begin to go after that thing. And our fleshly lusts begin to get inflamed. And the things that we can't have, those are the things that we want. Our flesh is that way. We remember our first parents in the Garden of Eden. They could eat up whatever tree that they wanted to, but that one tree and that's the tree they wanted. And that's the tree that they went after, and that springs from this rebel nature that we have, every single one of us and the pride of life that we do not like to be denied. And so when we're told that we can't, it's like when we were children. Are you who have children and you say to them, listen, you can do this and do this and do this, but you can't do this. Well, that's the thing you want to do. There may be plenty of fun to be had in these other things, but it's not sufficient. I'm not going to really have fun until I get after that thing. That's our fleshly nature. And it works that way in all of us. And we began to go after those things. Remember. When we're tempted to sin, all of it comes from the devil. God never tempts us to sin, let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God, for God cannot be tempted with sin, neither tempted he any man, but every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed. Then when lust has conceived, it bringeth forth sin and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. Every single one of us, when we are tempted to sin, God may bring trial. God may bring suffering to refine us and grow us and mature us. But when we are tempted to sin, God never does that to us. God never says, I'm going to tempt this brother to sin and see if he can withstand it. God does not do that. Any temptation that we have, it comes from the devil. And as James one tells us, the devil is seeking to entice us. So word that means to catch by the use of bait. And that's the way the devil works. He seeks to entice us. Remember, as a junior high boy. But I think of this word I entice, I always go back to several different experiences in my life, but one of them as a junior high boy. My brother and I had made some rabbit boxes and we had gotten the idea that we were going to trap us some rabbits. We kind of lived in the woods. And so we made two rabbit boxes. One of them was kind of an uptown box. It was a box that we made from some scrap lumber that we had around the barn and we had sorted up and we had we had made this box just perfectly. The other box was a more authentic kind of look. We had taken a rotten log from the woods and we had hollowed out the inside of that thing. If you know anything about rabbit boxes, there's a there's it's enclosed on all the sides long. And then at the back, it's enclosed in on the front. It's an it's open. And you have this little door that sits on top and and on the backside, down through a hole of that rabbit box, there is a little A piece of wood is what we had. And there's a little wedge on that wood. And so the idea is when the animal goes in the front of that box and and you've enticed him in there with some kind of food and he goes in that box and he and he sees what's there. And as he's nibbling on that food that you've got in there, his head kind of hits the wedge and it flies up through the top hole there and the weight of the door makes it fall. And then you've got a rabbit inside. We're excited about trapping these rabbits. We're junior high, and I remember when we had got those rabbits, we set them out in the woods and we had gotten what we thought a rabbit would eat and we put it inside there and we went off to back home and then went back to school the next day. After school that day, we came home. We were excited. We were going to go see what had happened to our rabbit boxes. We went down to look in those boxes and we went down as we could see the doors were still open. We went back home discouraged. We went back the next day, the door was still open. We went back home discouraged. We went back the next day and as we got closer there, we could see the door on one of the boxes was shut. We were so excited as junior high fellows. And so we take off running down there. And as we got down to that box. We saw a long, slender tail coming out of that box. Now, we knew that rabbits don't have long, slender tails. So whatever it was in that box, it was not a rabbit. And the closer we got to that box, we realized that what we had in our box was a possum. Now, I don't know if this is true or not, but I have been told we were told that if a possum ever goes in your rabbit box, a rabbit will never go in there. Now, we had spent a lot of time on those rabbit boxes, and when we saw a possum in there, One of us grabbed that tail of that possum and pulled it out very carefully and the other one of us grabbed a big stick. And as we pulled that possum out, we beat that possum as hard as we could. I remember taking the thing and slinging it around the tree. You can imagine the fury of a junior high kid. And we were so upset that what had happened. Why? Because we could not get the animal trapped. We wanted a rabbit and we had set that thing up just right. And that's what the devil does with us young people. He sets it up just right and he puts in there just what is going to cause us to fall, and that's the kind of picture he puts in our minds. And he paints that picture so nice. And he puts on there just the things that are going to be our our hot buttons, just the things, just those chains that he knows we're going to pull and he paints that picture. And listen, if we don't stop right at the very beginning with that picture, it's being painted and say, listen, this is not something that God wants me to be seeing. We're going to fall. We're going to fall. That's in that formulas conceived in our mind, and then it begins to be confirmed in our heart. And those fleshly lusts began to just work themselves. And we go after that thing and we want it so badly. You're in a conversation and someone has said something in that conversation and it hurts your feelings. And immediately you are thinking what you are going to say to hurt them back at your flesh. That's the devil, and for some of you, that's a hot button. What comes out of your mouth? And immediately you begin to think about what you're going to say, and as a believer, the spirit of God inside of you says, hey, don't do that. But if you don't stop right there and say, OK, I'm not going to do that. If you don't stop right there, here comes that fleshly lust and that fleshly lust says to you, well, they should not have said that. Well, they're the ones who who began this whole thing in the first place. And that fleshly lust is going to keep working itself and keep working itself, and then what's going to come out of your mouth or words that you're going to regret later? You go into a situation. You go into and you're having a test today and you go into that test and for whatever reason, you just weren't able to get adequately prepared for that test and you go in for that test. And the devil says to you, there's some good answers on this paper over here. Or if you'll just take this in and just hide it around, then you'll be OK, and so you move that direction. And if you don't stop right there and say, wait a minute, that is the flesh. I am not looking at this situation with spiritual eyes. Those are fleshly eyes. That's the kind of thing that's going to get me in trouble if you don't stop right there in our mind, then that sin is going to develop there and it's going to be confirmed in our heart. And when that happens and it begins to be confirmed in our heart and our fleshly lusts get inflamed over that thing, whatever it is. Then we fall to the final aspect of this formula. And what was conceived in our mind and became confirmed in our hearts now becomes consummated in our will and we surrender over to the temptation. I saw, I coveted, I took, Aiken said. I saw it, I coveted, I took. He had reached that point of no return. And, you know, we have that in our lives. All of us do and our fleshly lust, they reach that point of inflammation where they work themselves in our lives and we know we're in trouble. Young man, you may be. On a computer somewhere. Now, pop up comes up and it's not a good thing, and immediately your mind says to you in the spirit of God says you this is not good. And then there's another spot for you to click and then there's another spot for you to click. And in those initial things, your your mind is saying to you, this is from the devil. What a nice picture. And the spirit of God is saying to you, that's your flesh. Here's the way of escape. Don't go that direction. And you keep clicking and as you keep clicking. Those last get inflamed and then you begin to fall and you reach a point where you're not going to stop clicking, you're going to keep on clicking. For you, it may be an issue. Of gossip, it may be something with your tongue. And the devil tempts you that direction and you the spirit of God says, hey, don't do that. And then you just keep on doing that and you keep on doing that and you keep on doing that. And eventually you reach a point where you're not going to stop yourself. You are going to say what the devil's put in your head to say. You are going to repeat what the devil's put in your head to repeat. You are going to end up taking some answers that don't belong to you because you did not stop right at the beginning there when the devil was putting that thing in your mind and the spirit of God said, hey, don't go there. Over and over and over, I can see that happening. In my own life. If I don't stop, I'm going to be in trouble and then. Akin hides it. Akin said, I saw it, I coveted it, I took it and they're hidden. And that what we do. Once we've taken it, once we fall and we got to make the plans to hide it, do you remember the man after God's own heart? Do you remember the story of David that we read of in Second Samuel, chapter 11? And in the first few verses there, the very same thing happens here. David. Is out. And he sees Bathsheba. And this is exactly what the scripture says, he sees her, she's bathing. And David begins to inquire, hey, who is that over there? And verse four says he sent messengers and took her. Am I reread of how David repented later? But he had fallen. And the challenge that I want to give to every one of us today is this challenge, folks, we must battle over sin in our minds. The moment the devil puts it there, we must immediately do battle right there. Because if we don't if we don't stop right at that moment, What happens then is going to go from being conceived in our mind to be reaching down inside of our heart. And it's going to get confirmed there, and then we're going to find ourselves falling into sin. That's why Peter writes in first Peter one in verse 13, wherefore, gird up the loins of your mind. Can we do that? Can we gird up the loins of our mind? So that when the devil comes along and he's ready to paint a picture for us, we can stop right there and say, I'm not going down that road. Those are fleshly eyes. These are not spiritual eyes that I'm looking at. I'm going to stop right there. I'm not going to go down that road. Once we start down, getting away from that is a very challenging thing. And how much easier it is for us if we just stop right at the beginning. Let's gird up the loins of our mind, let's fight that battle there, let's don't give the devil an opportunity. You've been listening to the Chapel Hour, coming to you from the campus of Bob Jones University. Our speaker was Dr. Ron Allen, pastor of Bible Baptist Church in Matthews, North Carolina. For a cassette or compact disc copy of today's message, send a check for $6 to Campus Store, Bob Jones University, Greenville, South Carolina 29614. Be sure to mention the name of the speaker and today's date. The Chapel Hour has been sponsored by Bob Jones University.