Afternoon, we come to our fourth sermon in our sermon series on topics that you have suggested as a congregation. And we're looking, as you will recall, at those topics that fall into the category of living for the Lord in a fallen world. The question we're looking at this week has to do with addictions. Such as addiction to drugs or addiction to pornography or even something that maybe is not in itself sinful, like video games or or work or something like that. Addiction is definitely something that people struggle with in the fallen world. And, you know, many, many other people, I mean, many believers struggle with it, too. But what about what about once we have come to Jesus? Can a believer be an addict and still be a true believer? The one who submitted the question asked especially about 1 Corinthians 6, 9 through 11, where it plainly says that fornicators and drunkards and covetous persons and a whole list of other things will not inherit the kingdom of God. And yet, you know, believers yourself as a believer perhaps have struggled with addictions. And some of you struggle maybe now. At what point does this indicate that you're not in Christ? So this is a challenging question for us to look at today, and we're going to look at first Corinthians six, the passage that was quoted by the questioner, and we'll read the first eleven verses and consider what it says to us about this whole matter. I want to look at the text honestly and fairly, and not to try to put a spin on it of any kind. We want to know what the Word of God says. 1 Corinthians 6, beginning in verse 1. Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unrighteous and not before the saints? Do you not know that the saints will judge the world, and that the world will be judged by you? Are you unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Do you not know that we shall judge angels? How much more things that pertain to this life, if then you have judgments concerning things pertaining to this life? Do you appoint those who are least esteemed by the church to judge? I say this to your shame. Is it so that there is not a wise man among you, not even one who will be able to judge between his brethren, but brother goes to law against brother? And that before unbelievers. Now, therefore, it is already an utter failure for you that you go to law against one another. Why do you not rather accept wrong? Why do you not rather let yourselves be cheated? No, you yourselves do wrong and cheat and you do these things to your brethren. Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you, but you are washed, but you are sanctified, but you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the spirit of our God. And there will end the reading of God's word. May the Lord bless it to our hearing. You can see in verse 9 and 10, we have a very emphatic statement about the exclusion of the unrighteous from the kingdom of God. In those two verses, what would probably be described popularly in our day as going to heaven is referred to as inheriting the kingdom. It's a very excellent thing to inherit God's kingdom. It means that we're adopted into God's family. A child is one that has an inheritance. and the family of God possesses a kingdom that we will inherit. It's a kingdom of glory where perfect righteousness dwells. One of the reasons it will be such a glorious kingdom is because there will be no sin there. Just think of it. It will be a place where everyone loves God extensively and intensively, and where we love one another perfectly. Every one of us. will be done with our selfishness. We will all be out for the good of others and for the glory of God. We will finally be what we're meant to be. That is a wonderful thing to think about. And so if there is no sin in heaven, I guess you could say that it goes without saying that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of heaven. Perhaps that's why the apostle prophecies is saying with the words, do you not know? What it says again in verse nine, do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of heaven? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators nor idolaters and so on. Now, if we stop with this, we might be able to say, yeah, you know, that's just great when the time comes. for us to enter heaven and we'll no longer have any sin. God will take away all of our sin. We'll be perfected when we see Jesus, as it says. That's a wonderful thing. And so this verse makes sense. Unrighteous, they won't inherit the kingdom of heaven. But you need to look at verse 11 as well. Because it makes it clear that Paul is not just talking about what we will be when we are making our entry into heaven. He's talking about what we are now. if we are those who eventually, one day in the future, will make our entry into Heaven, will inherit the Kingdom of God. He's actually describing what we who have been saved are like now, in this life, at this present time, or actually what we're not like, I guess, if we have truly been converted, and if we are truly headed for Heaven. Look at verse 11. He says, after giving that great list of things that those will not be that inherit the kingdom of heaven, he says, And such were some of you, but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. So he's saying people who are going to heaven, you used to be the things on the list, but not anymore. We may have been fornicators, or idolaters, or adulterers, or homosexuals, or sodomites, or thieves, or covetous persons, or drunkards, or revilers, or extortioners before, but not anymore if we have been redeemed. Paul says emphatically that if we are any of these, we will not inherit the Kingdom of Heaven. So, how do we sort this out? Well, in looking at this, I want to proceed as follows. First, I want to look at the behaviors that are described here, verse 9 and 10. Then I want to look at God's deliverance from those behaviors, what we just saw in verse 11. And finally, I want to look at in what sense a true believer may struggle with these behaviors described in verses 9 and 10 and still be a believer. So let's get started. First, what are the behaviors that are described here? What we have here is a sample of life dominating sense. What I mean by that is that these are sins that characterize a person that you may say of him. That man is a drunkard or that man is a homosexual or that man is covetous. You can say that in the same way that you can say that man is a carpenter. That man is a lawyer. That man is a teacher. It's not the only thing that he is, but it is something that is a part of who he is. He may be a drunkard and a carpenter and a husband all at the same time. He's not only one to the exclusion of the others, of course, one or more of these behaviors or identities go into the definition of who he is and make up an appropriate description of him. That's the idea. Now, understand as well that the list in verse nine and 10 is not an exhaustive list. For example, liars and blasphemers and those who curse their parents are not mentioned here, but they would certainly be included and mentioned elsewhere. There are other things that are not included. The sins that are especially prominent in this particular list seem to be sexual sins. And that's probably because of who this letter is written to. The Corinthians. I've told you before that in the world at this time, when they said that somebody was Corinthianizing, it was a way of describing sexual morality, fornication, because it was so rampant at Corinth. I've told you about that before. Such sins were so common that they hardly even thought of them as sins, like sexual immorality. It was just what everybody did, you know, men with young boys. That was one of the favorite relationships. Very common. Nobody thought anything about it. It's just that's what you did because, you know, that's just the way it is. You have your wife that you'd have your legitimate children with and then you'd go and hang out with them. You know, boys that were under 12, they were one of the favorite victims. Our society seems to be falling more and more into this degradation today. We say, oh, we're not that bad. Well, yeah, but we're headed there. It won't be long. I should mention as well that persons who are dominated by these sins. All of the sins on the list often feel powerless to change. You consider some examples, take drunkenness. There are many people who are in bondage to the bottle. They come to realize, perhaps they admit it, that it's affecting their work. It's consuming their wealth. It's destroying their relationships with others. And while they would give it up if they could. They feel powerless, helpless, how often do they say just one more and then I'll stop. and then they can't. The same can be said about many of the other behaviors on the list. Thieves often get started. This is really talking about more petty thievery, just pulfering and things. They often get started, you know, you're working at a store and you take a little bit out of the cash register when nobody's looking, maybe because, you know, I just need a little bit of loan, there's a sale on, I want to buy something, I'm just going to borrow it and then I'll pay it back. And then you get into something else comes up and it was easy and you borrow a little bit more and nobody noticed. And then the next thing you know, you're addicted to that and you're living off of what you're constantly stealing and you can't even stop. And you keep thinking, well, I've got to get a handle on this. I've got to. But you keep on going back, back, back, back. Same thing. Then fornicators, men and women who are addicted and just can't give up, say, Internet porn or visiting of prostitutes. Again, if they would admit it, they recognize that it's having a very detrimental effect, destroying their relationships with the people around them, consuming their wealth sometimes. But the draw is so strong that they can't break free. And then look at homosexuality today. It's become very common for people to have so felt their inability to change that they blame God for it, in a sense, and openly profess that God made me this way. He made me attracted to the same gender. But here is what may be a shocking statement to you. In many ways, they are right. They are powerless to change. And God has delivered them over to those behaviors. The Scripture teaches that consistently. Is this not what we read in Hosea 4? There Hosea speaks of what we might call the natural consequences of sin in a certain way. That when you give yourself to it, it leads to bondage, enslavement to those sins. In Hosea 4.11 it says, Harlotry, wine, and new wine do what? Enslave the heart. They dominate. They take you over as a master. This is what people call addiction in our day. A heart that is enslaved so that a person is powerless to change. One of the saddest statements in Scripture is found in verse 16 and 17 of Hosea 4, where the Lord says, For Israel is stubborn like a stubborn calf. Now the Lord will let them forage like a lamb in open country." What do you do with your sheep? You go and you bring them in. You gather them. I'm just going to let them go. I'm just going to let them go in open country. Lions around. I don't care. I'm not going to take care of them anymore. He says, Ephraim is joined to idols. Let him alone. Terrible words. God lets you alone. That's the worst thing that could happen. God is not going to deal with them anymore, he's saying. He is not going to restrain them. He's not going to correct them. He's going to leave them. Go your own way. I don't care. This is really what happens in hell, people. People who did not want God in their lives are finally left, OK? Go your own way. Do it your way. Do your own thing. We have no idea the horrors that we would be capable of if we were turned over without God's restraint to our own ways. We need to be mindful of that horror. Romans 1 explains that the Lord actually turns people over to their own ways, to such behavior, wicked ways. He brings them into bondage to those ways. It explains that he brings them into bondage to things. And for one simple reason. For rejecting him. For breaking relationship with God, Romans 121. I want to turn to Romans. I want to look at a few verses there. Romans 121 says that although people knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful. They became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. The passage goes on to explain how they turned to idols, all because they didn't want to think about the real God. They didn't want the true God. So they said, we're going to make God the way we want Him to be. We're going to make idols. The God of our own construction. And so what did the Lord do in response to this? He turned them over to degrading behavior, to bondage, to sin, to corrupt these. See, we think when we're going off into our sinful behavior that, you know, I'm just taking my liberty here. I'm going to be free of all those restraints. I'm going to go and do my own thing. And we're actually going off into bondage. And we don't realize it. Romans 1.26, look what it says. It's very plain. For this reason, God gave them up to vile passions. They were not getting something on God. God was saying, enough. I'm turning you over to your behavior. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise, also the men leaving the natural use of the women burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing committing what is shameful and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error, which was due. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind to do those things which are not fitting. being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness. They are whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful, Who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same, but also approve of those who practice them. They're so given up to these things that they actually start to approve of the things in that list that I just read. These things become attractive and beautiful and something desirable to them. This is something that is often not understood, but it needs to be. You're not asserting your freedom when you rebel. There is pride in a person that says that they are entitled to something better than God has given them. They feel that they deserve more, and so they take what God has not given them. They break God's law to get more of God's good gifts. And the result is that they become enslaved to the things that they have taken unlawfully. They become enslaved to good things, like to sex or to worship. Even worship. Idolatrous worship. You can become a slave to that. To material possessions. To wine. Whatever they take these things without thankfulness to God, not from the hand of God, but in defiance of God. And then those very things become their masters who rule them. The outcome is that they become enslaved. What is, in fact, the gifts of God? Swallow them up. As persons consume them so that they become like a shell of a personal hollow. You see people when they're there are just all. heavily addicted to drugs and the hollowness. And all they want is just to get the drug. And that's all. They're just totally... Everything is all about that. They become a pitiful excuse for a human being. Persons who worship the creature rather than the Creator. Dehumanized. The more they are given over, the more they cease to truly care about other people. To love other people. The further they grow from God. Instead of God being their master, their own desires become their master. What a terrible thing to have that as your master instead of the living God. All this sin, all this bondage to sin takes hold of them for, again, one simple reason. They did not. How did it start? They did not like to retain God in their lives, the knowledge of God, nor were they thankful to Him. And I should add that every unbeliever is on that path until they are reconciled to God. Some are further down the path than others. We looked last week at the beautiful hospitality of the people at Malta that were unbelievers. But a severed relationship with God is where the degradation begins. And God turns people over different amounts, different times. They don't want the true God in their lives. They're not thankful to Him. And it all leads eventually to degradation and to bondage, to life-dominating sins like those in 1 Corinthians 6, 9 and 10. But there is a way of deliverance from this bondage to sin. The Bible frequently speaks about salvation in terms of deliverance from slavery or bondage. There's the whole picture or type that's used of redemption in the Old Testament. What is it? They were in Egypt. How were they in Egypt? As slaves under bondage. God redeemed them out of bondage to Egypt. In Galatians 5, Paul speaks of how we don't want to be entangled again with the yoke of bondage from which Christ has liberated or set us free. He has set us free and empowered us to serve God rather than to be enslaved to these things. Romans 6 picks up on this picture and speaks of our salvation as being freed from slavery to sin. Having been delivered from bondage to sin, Romans 6.12 says, Therefore, do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lust. And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin. See, I'm coming as a slave presenting myself to my master. But rather, present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. Here's the important part. For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law, but under grace. Now, look at how this deliverance is spoken of in our text. 1 Corinthians 6.11 Having just presented that big list of sins that characterize the unrighteous, Paul then says wonderfully to those who believe in Christ, And such were some of you, but you are washed, but you are sanctified, but you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. The first part there needs to be taken seriously. And such were some of you. If you are in Christ, there has been a radical change. You are no longer what you were. You are no longer what is characterized by this list. Such were some of you means that you used to be characterized by these things, but you are no longer characterized by them. There's been a fundamental change. You are delivered from death to life. from bondage to liberty, from slavery to sin to slavery to Christ. We must acknowledge this radical change that is part of conversion. Sometimes in an effort to be humble, believers do not acknowledge that in Christ they are not what they used to be. They say, oh, I'm just the same as I always was. But you're not in Christ if you're the same as you always were. Don't get me wrong. Of course, we need to confess our sin. And there are sins that plague us. There's enough sin in our lives every day. We need forgiveness every day. We go to hell just for the things we've done today. But there is a change that has occurred. Of course, we're still not what we shall be when Christ finishes his work in us. But if we are in Christ, we are, according to this text, no longer fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexual, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners. If we are these, Paul says plainly that we will not inherit the kingdom of God. He explains three things that God has done to change us. First, he says you are washed. This surely speaks of the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit. which Jesus gives to all who come to him. If you don't have the spirit, then you don't belong to Jesus. In his covenant, the Lord promises that he will write his law on our heart so that we will want to keep it. Our corruption is washed away. Secondly, he says you are sanctified. Now, the washing that we just saw is very personal. And so is sanctification. Sanctified means that we're set apart personally. to God, set apart to Him who is holy so that we're also set apart to holiness, is those who now want God in our lives. Remember how we saw that the whole process starts with going into the degradation and bondage? It's when we're no longer thankful to God, when we no longer want to retain the knowledge of God. We break away from God and then We're on our way down. He changes us from those who want to live outside of God's will, who want to take what he has not given us instead of rejoicing in what he has given us to those who want to please him and to do his will. Wonderful change from those who do not want to retain the knowledge of God to those who yearn to know God better and plead with him to show us his glory. We are set apart to our Holy God in a personal relationship. Sanctified. You are sanctified. Thirdly, he says, you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. This speaks to the full acceptance that we have on account of Jesus. To be justified is to be accounted as righteous in God's eyes, despite the sins that we were once in bondage to before corruption and despite the sins that we continue to commit now. Jesus fulfilled all that is required of the whole church, all of the elect as our representative. Jesus stands in our place. He lived the life that God accepted and he suffered to make atonement for all the sins that we have committed by trusting in him. We are assured that despite all that we have done and despite our present shortcoming, we are fully accepted by our heavenly father. He has officially declared in His covenant that those who believe are righteous in His eyes. So even as we are no longer in bondage to sin, so neither are we in bondage to death and hell on account of sin. But what is Paul's main point in saying this in this passage? Paul's main point here, he's saying that a person who is still in bondage to sin will not inherit the Kingdom of God. He got started with this by talking about professing believers taking each other to court before unbelievers. He's essentially saying that not only is the act of going to court wrong, but the very fact that there are unresolved problems like that that make you even want to go to court with your brothers is an utter failure. Verse seven. Now, therefore, it is already an utter failure for you that you go to law against another. Why do you not rather accept wrong? Why do you not rather let yourselves be cheated? No, you yourselves do wrong and cheat and you do these things to your brethren. How can such conduct possibly be thought consistent with someone who has the Lord Jesus as your Savior? He gave himself for you, and you're taking your own brother to court. It's not consistent. That's what Paul's saying. It's not consistent with the Christian profession. And then you see Paul goes on to speak of other behaviors that are not consistent with the Christian profession. The list in verse nine and 10, which, as I have pointed out, is not an exhaustive list. But the point could not be more clear. Those who are characterized by these sins are simply not among those who have been washed, sanctified and justified by Jesus Christ. Such persons, therefore, will not inherit the kingdom of God. And anyone who thinks otherwise, Paul says, is deceived. So you don't question, though. Don't we, as believers, sometimes struggle with the things on this list, with these sins in verse 9 and 10? Does this indicate then that we are not, in fact, true believers? Well, it depends on what you mean by struggle with these sins. If by struggle with these sins you mean that you are in bondage to them, that you are dominated by them, Well, then the answer is yes, it means that you're outside of Jesus Christ. The answer is yes, because that is clearly and plainly what the passage says. It says what it means and it means what it says and it says it strongly and unambiguously and emphatically. Do you not know? that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God. Do not be deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. The truth is, there are a lot of people who have made some kind of half-baked profession, asking Jesus into their hearts as they sometimes say, or whatever it is, who will not inherit the kingdom of heaven. They are characterized by the things that the Apostle says here, those who inherit the Kingdom of Heaven are not characterized by. But, if by struggle with these sins in 1 Corinthians 6, you mean that you have to constantly fight against these sins, and that you sometimes fall into them, Then the answer is that if you are truly trusting in Christ and you may be in such a case, then you will inherit the kingdom of heaven. The Westminster Confession has this to say in chapter 17 on the perseverance of the saints in section three. Nevertheless, they, the saints, may, through the temptation of Satan in the world, the prevalency of corruption remaining in them and the neglect of the means of their preservation, fall into grievous sins and for a time continue therein." Notice that, for a time continue therein. whereby they incur God's displeasure and grieve His Holy Spirit, come to be deprived of some measure of their graces and comforts, have their consciences wounded, hurt and scandalize others and bring temporal judgments upon themselves. So you see that the confession clearly teaches that true believers may continue in grievous sin for a time that it is possible for believers to do so. But the question is, is this in accord with the teaching of Scripture? And the answer is, yes, it is. We have some clear divinely attested examples. For example, we have the clear example of David that we often use to illustrate this. The Bible tells us plainly that when God chose David to be king, that he was a man after God's own heart. So we know that David was a believer, but we also are given an account of how he not only fell into grievous, the grievous sin of adultery, but how that afterward, rather than repenting, he tried to cover it up and so continue in that sin. If you don't repent of it, you continue in it. For months, even arranging the death of the woman's husband in order to cover up his sin. Then in the New Testament, we have the famous example of Peter, who denied Christ three times. But afterward, Jesus restored Peter. In fact, even before Peter fell, and this is important for us to look at, Jesus says something that helps us understand the condition of a rebellious believer. In Luke 22-32, he tells Peter that he will fall, but he says, I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. Now this is key. Through the whole affair, Peter was at the roots a man of faith rather than a man of sin when he denied Christ. Through the whole affair, his faith did not utterly fail. The seed of faith remained in Him. Jesus intercedes for all who truly belong to Him in that manner. Consider this a little more in the light of 1 John 3.9. 1 John 3.9 says, whoever has been born of God does not sin. Now, what that's talking about is a kind of sin whereby a person would show that they were not going to inherit the kingdom of God. It's talking about apostasy. It says, whoever has been born of God does not sin, for his seed remains in him, and he cannot sin because he has been born of God. This gives us some insight into how it is that Peter or David can escape Paul's declaration in first Corinthians six, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. The truth is that because of the seed that John speaks about, a believer who falls into adultery is not an adulterer and a believer who has a bout with drunkard drunkenness is not a drunkard. He is rather at the core, still a disciple of Jesus Christ, a disciple who is committing adultery or getting drunk, but he is still a disciple. He's a disciple who's not acting like a disciple, but still sin does not have dominion over him because Christ has dominion. The rebellious believer is not in bondage, but he is fighting sin. His fighting is very weak at that point, but he will recover because the seed is in him. But there is more that must be said about a disciple who is living in rebellion. There are two things in particular that we should say about him. First of all, it must be said that he has no basis for assurance until he repents. Even though he may have the true seed of new life in him, there's no way for him to know that he has the true seed of life. If you are living in rebellion right now, you have no basis for assurance. As John says, there is no way for you to know that you know him. The only way you can recover your assurance is by confessing your sin and repenting of it. And I might add that a believer who is recovering from bondage to sin may go through many cycles of falling and repenting. When that is the case, he can recover his assurance each time in contrast with the one who has not repented and is going on in his transgression, who cannot have assurance until he repents. If you have unrepentant sin in your life, you cannot have assurance. Sin that you know is sin, rebellion that you know is there, and you do not repent, you have no grounds for assurance. You see? If his problem, for example, this one who repents and then falls and then repents, if his problem is with excessive drinking, He's not a drunkard because he repents whenever he falls into the sin again. And if he is sincere, he will also not make provision for the flesh by keeping a stash of booze somewhere that he can resort to. If he does, he has no basis for assurance because he's not repenting. He's preparing to sin. He said, oh, I repent. And he's got his stuff stored up ready for the next time he wants to use it. That's not repentance. Besides that, he will take other measures like establishing accountability with other people or maybe blocking his ability to get hands on money that he's going to use in the wrong way, getting rid of his credit cards and making having his wife have access to the accounts or whatever he needs to do. So that's the first thing, though, that their repentance, like there's as long as he is not repentant. Then he has no grounds for assurance, but he may be in a situation where he's repenting and falling and repenting and falling. Secondly, it needs to be said that it is right for the church to discipline a man who does not repent. Having just said that the rebellious individual has no way to know if he knows the Lord, how much less ability does the elders have to know that a man who is living and rebelling against God has is in the Lord. We have no way to know if the seed of life is in a person's heart. We do not remove a person from the church because we have prophetic insight into a person's heart, but because that person is living in sin and refusing to repent. And First Corinthians five, Paul urges the church at Corinth to remove the wicked man. That's the chapter just before the one we're looking at to remove the wicked man from among themselves. In this case, it was a man living in incest. If he is a true believer, God will use the church discipline to leave him to lead him to repentance because he has the seed. It still remains in him even after he's put out of the church. When Paul wrote his letter to the Corinthians, he seems to speak of this man when he says that his second letter to the Corinthians, when he says, forgive and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one be swallowed up with too much sorrow. So it seems that this fellow that was disciplined had repented. And so now Paul says, OK, restore him, bring him back into the church, restore him into the fellowship. So the overall point is that a believer can go through a period of rebellion. But as long as he is living in rebellion, neither he nor others have any grounds for counting him as a believer. It is impossible to tell at that point whether he is fighting or whether he is in bondage. Because his behavior is that he is continuing in that sin. And this leads us to an important exhortation. And here it is. If you fall into sin, do not stay there. If you fall into sin, do not stay there. What I mean is repent immediately. Confess. that you have done wrong to God and to others, and ask all of those who you have sinned against to forgive you. If you continue living in the sin, it calls into question the genuineness of your faith. I tell my children, if you've lied to me and your consciousness is bothering you and you don't come and tell me, the whole time you're still living in that lie. Until you come and repent and break with that sin, you have no grounds for assurance. How can you know that you're a believer if you're not following Jesus? Why should you or anyone else think that you're a believer if you're not following Him, if you're living in rebellion? And when you repent, when you do repent, show that you're sincere by making no provision for the flesh. Take steps to keep yourself from falling back into sin. Don't deceive yourself when you're still planning to do it again. Get some kind of accountability. People to help you, people to check up on you, whatever is needed. That's the initial restraint that you need. An external restraint. I have to keep myself away from things. I have to put up barriers and walls. But above all, and this is the biggest part, replace the sinful conduct with godly behavior. Listen, brothers and sisters, there's always something to replace what you're doing with whatever sin you're committing with. If it is sexual immorality, If you're not married, start preparing yourself for marriage. Make your whole life about getting yourself ready for marriage. Or if you are married, then start giving yourself more fully to your spouse. Stop doing the things, even the little things that put barriers in your relationship. Start doing the things that enhance and build that relationship. You see, you put off the sexual immorality, but don't go into neutral. Come in and pour yourself into your spouse. If it is pilfering that I was talking about before, taking out of the till, then start working harder. Maybe even take a second job. Do something radical. Set aside not only for a tithe, but also money to give to those who have need. See, you have to replace and do the opposite. Or you haven't really changed. If it's drunkenness, then start devoting yourself to the praise and worship of God. Be not drunk with wine, but be filled with the Spirit. Pour your energies into living a godly, Spirit-filled life, as the Apostle says. Remember how I told you before that the principal thing is your relationship with God? That's what the problem is at the root. If you have addictions or whatever, bondage, the root problem is the relationship with God. God turns people over to sin, to things, to bondage to sin, because they're not thankful to Him and because they don't want Him in their lives. That is the root of the problem. That's why you need to replace the sin with godliness. Don't just try to give it up. Replace it with turning to God and engaging in life for Him more fully, or you'll just keep going back. You won't ever be able to change. Maybe you are a believer, but you're in that cycle where you go back, fall, get up, fall, back, back, going back and forth. You need to replace it. The Apostle Peter has a great name for what you do when you pursue godliness instead of sin. He calls it making your calling and election sure. Remember what I said before? That if you are living in rebellion, even though you may be actually fighting and you have that seed, If you're still in the rebellion, you can't have any assurance. So Peter says, look, you need to instead of doing these things, you need to pursue godliness and then you will make your calling election. Sure. I'll close with his words. Second, Peter one five. But also for this very reason, giving all diligence. Notice that all diligence add to your faith virtue. to virtue knowledge. Don't don't let that little seed of faith be alone. You see the faith that did not fail in Peter. He needed to have virtue and to virtue knowledge, to knowledge, self-control, to self-control, perseverance, perseverance, godliness, to godliness, brotherly kindness and to brotherly kindness, love. See, it comes all the way back to relationship, to love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these things is short-sighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never stumble. For so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So if you want to inherit the kingdom of God and you want to be sure that you'll inherit the kingdom of God, Peter says, make your calling election sure. This is how. Please stand and let's call on the Lord. Heavenly Father, thank you for the opportunity that we've had to look at what your word says about this matter. We pray, O Lord, that you would give us a clarity of understanding That father, we would realize what your word says about those who will not inherit the kingdom of heaven and about those who will. And I pray, Lord, that we would not live in the manner that Peter or David lived when they were in rebellion, but that we would live as those who are whom Peter describes in the passage in Peter that we read. Father, that we would make our call and election sure in this way. Father, please give us grace. Do not turn us over to our own way. But Lord, cause us to come into your way. We pray in Jesus name. Amen. Our song select. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.