Lovely hymn. Okay, Ephesians chapter two. If you have your Bible up on there, please. Before we consider this portion, let's just pray. I always value your prayer for me as a minister. Pray also for yourself, that God will speak. And we'll learn something today. Vein is the help of man, the Psalms say. So never trust in a man to teach you, but you look to the Lord to teach you through what we consider this morning. Our heavenly Father, vein is the help of man. That's why, Lord, we pray to Thee, for Thou art God. And Lord, we pray to Thee that You would be our help. We pray, Lord, that You would be our teacher. We ask of thee as we open the scriptures that the Holy Ghost would open our eyes to understand, that the saved would be encouraged to go on, and that the lost would, Lord, this day, get on board and join with us on our way to heaven and home. Now, Lord, help us, help us, help us to prioritize holiness. Lord, it is your will, you have commanded that we ought to be holy, for thy art holy. Help us, Lord, to take seriously the responsibility and the calling to reflect thee on this earth, to be like thee. O God, conform us to the image of thy Son, the Son who is wise, the Son who is loving, the Son who always knew what was right to do, Help us, Lord, to be like the Son. Help us to be holy. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. God, amen. Being holy. is a beautiful characteristic. A holy person is a godly person, and they will be a beautiful person. But being holy is hard. That's the reality. And that's what I want to look at this morning, the hardships of holiness. As we have progressed through this study, I trust you have a high view of holiness. I trust you do. But as we come to look at it this morning, I want you to work with me as we think about the hardships and the battles, because perhaps for the past few weeks, you have been making this a priority. You have been thinking about how to be more holy, as God will have you be holy. But you found last week, and the week before it, and the week before that, boy, it is tough. And it is. There are many things to pull us down. There are many things to hinder holiness. The hardships you will find are inevitable. I would start this morning by focusing upon temptation. And temptation is the big enemy here. It is temptation that draws us into sin. And sin's the ugly thing. That's the thing that God hates. That's the thing that we hate. And we're all subject to temptation. Everyone is. But there must be a battle, like I said on previous weeks, if you're not holy, you have no one to blame but yourself. Because holy is something that we have a duty to pursue with God. We choose to do right or we choose to do wrong, and we pray that God will help us, but holiness is your responsibility by God's help. Temptation then. Temptation wants to drag you down from being holy and get you dirtied by the sin of this world. That's the reality. Temptation is what causes your desire to do what's wrong. Sin, temptation rather, is encouraging you to long for what is wrong. It encourages you to long for what is wrong, and it is a daily battle which you are either going to win or lose every day. There may be things, men and women, you don't think about. You just do them instinctively. You think, well, you know, I'm only human. You don't find that verse in the Bible. When there's little sins, all the little foxes, all the little foxes spoil the vine. You know what your sins are, and you will know that day and day, whether it is the lust of your eye, maybe it's the greed of your heart, Maybe it's some other sin that's an addiction to you, and how the taste is there, the smell is there, the sight is there, and those senses every day are confronted by the things that are tempting you to sin. You must deal with them at the very root cause. Look away. Turn your ear away. Keep your mouth closed. Whatever the sin is, have no part. Don't entertain even the smallest manifestation of it. but fight it and crucify it, don't nurse it. Don't nurse it. Turn with me, keep your finger there in Ephesians, we'll be back there soon, but turn with me to Galatians, just the previous book actually. Galatians chapter five. And here's how we deal with temptation. Galatians five, and the verse 16. This I say then, walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. Walk in the Spirit." Now, what does that mean? That's the answer. That is the answer right before you. How you deal with temptation, sin, and all that, you walk in the Spirit. Well, the word walk in the Bible, It's usually a metaphor. A metaphor for how you live in a daily way. It means your daily lifestyle. You could read it like that. This I say then, live daily in the spirit. Okay? Walk daily, live daily in the Spirit. So how do you walk with the Spirit? How do you live daily with the Spirit? What that means is you're following the Spirit of God. There's an alignment there. What the Spirit of God says you do, you're in agreement when two, okay, walk together. They must be in agreement, all right? And so if you're walking with the Spirit and the Spirit says something, you do it. You do it. You don't make excuses. You don't go online and search all these topics and gurus and great minds and several subjects and the Spirit of God says don't do something. Don't do it. Don't entertain it. Just walk away. You don't need the research anymore. Do not do it. Verse 16. This I say then, walk in the spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. Rather, you're starving the flesh. You're starving those appetites that are ungodly. Verse 17, for the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. There's the hardship. There's the battle. And these are contrary the one to the other, so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law. And what that means is if you are someone who's listening to the Spirit of God, you read the Word, and when the Word of God highlights your particular sin, straight away you respond and you act quickly. That's an evidence that you're saved because you're walking with the Spirit of God. Now, if the Word of God tells you to do something and you go ahead and do that thing that's forbidden, you need to question your salvation. If you can do that sin and in no way really be troubled about it, you have to question whether or not you're saved at all. Temptation, men and women, exists to cause you to desire to do what's wrong. Look with me for a moment, please, at Luke chapter four, Luke's gospel. I take you to this because here Christ was being tempted. Luke four. And then verse 13. So, you know, don't be surprised when temptation comes. Christ was tempted. Rather be ready for it. Luke 4, 13, and when the devil had ended all the temptation, so there's a real bombardment here upon Christ, and when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from him for a season. Now, you know what happened here. The Lord was led by the Spirit out into the wilderness. And when he was there, the devil was there. There's 40 days of the devil tempting Christ. Remember how the Lord hungered, the devil said, you know, take these stones, make them into bread. And the Lord responded by quoting from the book of Deuteronomy. I assume you know that. When the Lord was tempted, he took the word of God and he responded to temptation by the word of God. Okay, man shall not live by bread alone. That was the response there. But what I want you to see is the devil was tempting Christ to do what was wrong and sinful. And the devil does that with everyone. So it is important that you and I, we don't underestimate the enemy, but be prepared. This coming week, temptation will come to you. If you don't know what it feels like to be tempted, there's something wrong with your soul. You're either not saved or badly backslidden because temptation will come. and you must know how to contend against it and pursue holiness. Don't live the kind of life where all you want to do is just get into heaven and keep your head down and just get through this life. That's not what Christ has called you to do. The Lord Jesus Christ didn't die on the cross just for you to sneak through life and end up in heaven. No, he saved you to reflect him. to represent Him, to show to the world who God is and what He does and how He will save. You are called to be a witness and if you are not holy, you can't be a witness. This must be your priority. So we must fight temptation, fight sin, not live as close to the world as we can. No, no, no. We live as close to Christ as humanly possible by God's help. You don't have to turn to it, but Luke 22, something states there, verse 40. And when he was in the place as Christ, he said unto them, his disciples, pray that ye enter not. End the temptation. The Lord says, pray about this. Make this something you pray about every day. Lord, deliver me from temptation. Temptation's gonna come, deliver me. Help me, save me, because I'm weak. Like the psalmist as we read in Psalm 18. Pray for that synergy. Lord, you're my strength. You're my helper. You're my fortress. I'm looking to you when temptation comes. Lord, help me. I can't cut it myself. I can't cut it myself. You know, sin, temptation, I sometimes see it like a staircase. Let's take a particular sin. Let's say drug abuse, okay? So I don't know of anyone here who is living a drug-induced lifestyle, okay? But let's take that. The person who is consumed by drugs looks at the bottom of the staircase and they think, well, I'm never going to be down there lying in a heap done by drugs. Lost my family, my friends, my wife, my children. I'm not going to be the one who's lost my license. I'm not going to be the one who's lost all my money, my home, everything. That's never going to be me. But they take the first step. And when you take the first step, well, a step, usually, what depth's a step? I should know, I'm always a joiner. Nine inches, isn't that right? Couldn't be. Whatever step it is, I'm forgetting now, I'm so long out in the trade. But anyway, every step on your staircase is a few inches big. If you're able to take the first step, that means you have the capability to take every single step until you're at the bottom as well. And that's how it begins with drugs. Just take something softer. It's all you have to do. Just a wee night out, whatever. Just take the first step. And then you'll be able to take the next step and get on to harder stuff. And before you know it, you are the one lying at the bottom of the staircase. And that's how temptation works. It's just a small thing. Just a small sniff. Just a small tablet. Just a small sticker. Just a small whatever. But all sin is the same. Sins of the tongue, sins of the ear, sins of the eye, whatever you care to mention. What does the Bible say? The Bible says if your eye offends you, pluck it out. Pluck it out. Get rid of it. I remember one time reading of a dear woman. She was recently saved. And I believe that's to be true. And she had a particular sin, lust of the eye. She read that verse and took it very literally. And she damaged one of her eyes to the point she couldn't see out of it anymore. She was so frustrated by her inability to deal with that sin. But even when the eye was damaged, she realized the problem's still there. Because the problem isn't her eye. The problem is her heart. And that's the case. If you have a sin of your eye, your ear, your tongue, the body's not literally saying, you know, remove that organ, remove that part of your body. That won't cure it. Because it's the roots in your heart. And what the Bible's saying, you deal with that. Deal with that. Rip it out. Discipline the eye, the ear, the tongue. Don't let them take you to hell. That's what the Lord was saying in that sermon. Okay, we're focusing here on temptation. And the Lord said, pray that ye enter not into temptation. Do that, that's the Lord's prayer. That's something to pray every day. Lord, deliver me from temptation. All right, help me out here. Give me strength. Now, look at our text then this morning, Ephesians. Let's go back there. And I trust everything we said is now preparatory to look at this portion. Ephesians chapter two and the verse number one. And you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins. Look for three things here, three influences that tempt you. Verse two, wherein in time past ye walked, there's your daily lifestyle, not according to the spirit, but according to the world, okay? Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this, number one, world, according to the prince of the power of the air, there's number two, the devil. Because he's described as a spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience. I hope you're following me here now. There's the world, there's the devil. Look at verse three. Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past. Envy, number three, lusts of our flesh. We've a battle to fight, men and women. And those couple of verses there define for us who the enemy is. The Bible over and over again describes the Christian life as a warfare. You're called to be soldiers. Soldiers. The soldiers have to fight. Can I say something? When we think about a Christian and someone who has to fight, I want you to understand here that if you're a nominal Christian, Christian name only, you're not of a fight. All you're doing is, you come to church, and that's good. I wanna encourage you to do that, don't get me wrong. You might leave church and have some moral standards that you live by, that's good as well. But when you're a real Christian, I mean actually born again, if you are really following Christ and pursuing holiness, it's a fight, it is. Because the world, the flesh, and the devil will bombard you every single day of every week of every year until you get the glory. That's the fight. That's the fight. They're all tempting and leading you into sin. Remember what 1 Timothy, go to 1 Timothy actually for a moment here. I know we're jumping to a lot of texts here. I'm trying to get to Ephesians, but 1 Timothy. So you have Thessalonians, then you have Timothy. 1 Timothy chapter 6. Verse 12. Fight. There you are. Fight the good fight of faith. So Christianity is not about you jumping into God's limousine and being chauffeured the whole way to heaven. while you enjoy the luxuries of the limousine. No, no, no. When you get saved, you're entering into a battle. Understand that. Understand that. Look at chapter, the next book, 2 Timothy 2, verse 3. Thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. Endure hardness. You see, well actually with any soldiers in the battle, you don't enjoy the battle. You don't have your luxury items at home. You don't get a full night's sleep. You don't get your breakfast or food of choice. You don't get to relax through the day. No, no, no. You have to endure hardship. We're enduring hardship until we get to glory. That is the battle of the Christian that must be done. Look at verse 4. Don't let the things of this world distract you from the battle. There's many duties and things we have to take care of for sure, but there is a battle that you and I must fight. Here's the thing. Who is the enemy? We're fighting, we're in a battle, who is it we're fighting against? The answer to that I've already told you. Your enemy number one is yourself. You. Look no further than your own flesh, your own inclinations to love what God hates. There's your battle. You're also fighting with the devil, far, far, far superior to you. And then you're fighting against the world system. Now, let's try and get into Ephesians two now. Ephesians chapter two, go with me to the verse number two, please. Let's look first of all, well we'll do it in order here perhaps, might be the best way. Verse two, just quickly let me outline these three. Verse two, wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world. Now what does that mean? See, before we were saved, we just did what the world does. Whatever the world system is, whatever the culture does, even if it's opposing the word and the will of God, you just did it. You're going with the flow. And this world has a momentum, and this world is living without God. And when you're unsaved, you're like a dead man walking like that zombie, just doing what all the other zombies are doing. Just doing what every other dead, walking person's doing. We just go with the flow. You're running the rat race and that's what sin is. Remember I said that to you, sin. Listen, being holy means that you're separate. You have an excellency about you and you don't do what the world does. Sin is just running the rat race, just going with the flow. Other people work, they get lots of stuff. materialism, as worldliness, just living for stuff and items and the pride of life and the pleasures that man can give you, that's the world. The Bible tells us a complete different lifestyle, not to be worried about what the world thinks about you. You ought not to offend people, obviously. I need common sense here this morning. I don't mean you, from this day forth, you're ignorant to everyone else in the world. I don't mean that. You speak the truth in love. But what I mean is, we don't go with the flow. We're called into a battle with Christ to do God's will and to walk with the Spirit, not walk with the world. All right? not just do what culture does, not just do what society does, but it's opposing God. I've mentioned materialism just as an example. That's what worldliness is. It's materialism, living for the things that are supposed to give you pleasure, and when will we learn? Stuff never makes us happy. How many times have you made the illustration? Remember as a child, you were just bursting with enthusiasm that on your birthday, it's your birthday, you're going to get that thing you wanted for weeks or months or whatever, and the minute you get it, you get it out, you play with it, and you need batteries. and, okay, I've got to get Bart raised, and you get the Barties in, and you put it on, and it's nowhere near your expectation, and by the end of the day, you're not that bothered, and by the end of the week, it's lying in the garage somewhere, and by next year, when it's your birthday, you can't even remember what you got on your birthday last year. That happens every year to children. And then when we become adults, we still think, it's stuff that'll make us happy. Materialism, this world, God never designed it to make you happy. You're designed to be happy with God, and that's what holiness does. Holiness is the pursuit of living with God, walking with God, pleasing Him, enjoying Him. It's a beautiful lifestyle, but sin is always empty. It doesn't satisfy, it never will. Don't follow worldliness. In fact, ye adulterers and adulteresses, Know ye not that friendship of the world is enmity with God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. Let's not be a friend of the world. Let's be an enemy of the world, a friend of God. Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not on him. That's your daily battle. And here's the thing. Your eye is bombarded with worldly stuff. Your ears are bombarded with worldly stuff. Constantly. Our senses, our touch, our smell, our taste, our sight, our hearing. We're just drinking in the world all the day and we need to fight that. But you need to realise there's a battle to be fought there. The next one here is the devil, isn't that right? Verse two, wherein time passed, you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air. So you have a genuine devil who is out to tempt you and to bring you down. Now can I say something this morning? The devil is a real person. I don't have to defend that, I'm sure. I certainly hope not this morning. The devil's not a force. He is a real person who has desires, who has plans, who has ambitions. He's a real person. Now, the devil, can I say, men and women, well, rather than me state it, let me ask you a question. That might be better. What has angels, And humans, and demons, and the devil, and flowers, and insects all have in common. What do they all have in common? They're all created. They're all created. They all had a beginning. God, on the other hand, is eternal. He's the creator. And the devil, let me remind you, is not God. God is a spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable. In his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. That's a beautiful description of who God is and what God is. God is omnipotent, all-powerful, omniscient, all-knowing, omnipresent, all-present. That's God, that's not the devil. He's in one place at one time. He's like you and me in the sense that he can only be in one location. He is limited like me in power. So, men and women, be conscious, yes, you have a devil who is a roaring lion. It is his desire to cause you to sin, but greater is he that is in us than he that is in the world. Yes, there's a battle, and the devil's out to tempt you, but greater is he that lives in you. And I want not to encourage you this week, but the devil will tempt you to sin. Look at Genesis. What did he do with Adam and Eve? He didn't say to Eve, let's fight with God. He got Eve over the first step of the staircase. Just look. And listen, window shopping is always wrong, alright? When you just look, they've got you. That's why companies put so much money into advertising, alright? If they can get you looking at the product, you're halfway there. If they can get some famous personality to wear your stuff or use their stuff, you're more likely to buy it. Because window shopping works, and the devil knows that, and if he gets you looking over that first step on the staircase, you're going to head down the bottom. The devil's busy, and he will distract and tempt and fight against you. but greater is he that is in us than he that is in the world. We ought to fight against that men and women. The time's flying on here, I'm conscious of that. Let me come to the last one here, verse three. I know this week these are your enemies. Verse three, among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh. There's the flesh. That's you, that's yourself. That's your own desires. Listen, even if you're saved, understand this, even when you're saved, you carry with you a nature which is sinful. You're still fallen. That's the way to put this. You're still a fallen individual. That's why you die. That's why you get old. We're still fallen, and we will carry that fallen sinful nature until we enter into glory and we're glorified. So be conscious that that's there, and at once, And it's a hunger and an appetite, a fallen appetite for things that are wrong. And you fight that every week. How do we deal with that? Well, let me read to you Matthew 26 where it says, God says your flesh is weak. The old man's still there, drawing you in. And that's why holiness is such a battle. It's a hardship. There's a fight. There's a wrestle. We starve the flesh. We walk by the Spirit. I don't care what the flesh says. I'm going to do what the Spirit of God says. I may have an appetite, and we try to excuse our appetites. We try to make excuses for them. If they're wrong, we're wrong. And that's why last week was so important. Not only to understand what we're running to. We're running towards God and holiness. But understand what you're running from. You're running from sin. And when temptation comes, it's leading you into sin. And that sin is rotten. It's ugly. It's bad. It will do you no good. And sin never, ever, ever does you good. No matter how good it might appear in your imagination. Or how good it may taste. Never, ever do you good and know you're running from that because when you partake of that, you're grieving the Holy Ghost and what you're saying is, Lord, I need a break for a minute from you. Do I taste sin? Give me some space. And that's what the Bible means. When you grieve the Holy Ghost, the Lord departs from you. That's a reality for the believer. Don't say to sin, I'm taking a new, I'm taking a break from Christianity. It doesn't work that way. We live for God, no matter the price. Turn with me please, as we finish up here, to the verse that we read a minute ago. 1 Timothy. 1 Timothy chapter six. And you know the verse. 1 Timothy six and the verse 12. Have you ever thought about that phrase? Fight. Okay, so there's a fight. We know we're fighting. Ourselves. The world. The devil. All right? Verse 12. Fight. We got that bit, but it says fight the what fight? The good fight. A good fight. When is fighting ever good? When countries fight, there's bloodshed. There's lives lost. That's happening in our world right now, isn't it? There are parents whose children are gone. There are children whose parents are gone, whose homes ripped apart. Fighting is never good. Or is there one occasion when it is? Well, yes, this verse makes it very clear. There is something that's called a good fight, and it's referring, men and women, to the fight of holiness. This is a good fight because what you're fighting for is good. You're fighting against sin. You're fighting against that which is wrong and ungodly and devilish. That makes it a good fight. And if it's a good fight, it's worthwhile. It's worthwhile dying for. So even when temptation comes, you're better fighting that temptation should it kill you. you're better to fight it. Don't be subdued by it. Sometimes we feel. We don't fight, we feel. But even when you mess up, the reality is you have to get up and go back to the Lord and say, Lord, I messed up, forgive me. And give me wisdom and victory and help to fight again. There must be a pressing on, and I want to encourage you here then, there is a good fight, alright? It's a good fight, it is. Don't hesitate. Unsaved. Don't hesitate to join the fight. The fight against the world, the flesh, and the devil. Don't allow the world, the flesh, and the devil to do what they want to do, and that's take you to hell. Don't do that. Join the fight. Don't be cowardly, or don't be lazy, but join us in the fight! Fight sin! Don't go with it. Don't let it damn you forevermore. Get rid of it. Contempt. Pray for the Lord to help you. You might say, well, I'm too weak to fight. Well, let the Lord deal with that. The Lord enlists everyone who comes. Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, the Lord enlists. He brings you into the battle and he will bring you home. If you are saved, don't stop the fight. Can be wearisome, appreciate that. Can be uncomfortable, I appreciate that. There are times you do feel, I know that. There are times you'll feel like just giving up. You fight for holiness. Pursue holiness until the Lord takes you home and encourage others to do the same. Let's fight together. Remember then, we're not fighting For holiness, that we might be saved. We're fighting to be holy because we are saved. It's an outworking of who we are. We're saved, therefore we ought to be holy. It's a natural outgrowth of being saved. Let's not give up when we mess up. Let's not feel, let's fight. Can I say this? Revelation 21, verse seven. He that overcometh, shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. That's the prize. The Lord says you fight for holiness, you overcome sin, there's hardships, yes, but you pursue holiness and your reward is this, that you'll receive me. I'm the prize. And that's good enough. So we know what we're fighting against, it's sin. We know what we're fighting for, it's holiness. Let's live then, men and women, to pursue holiness above everything else. Take your hymn books, please, this morning.