Sermon Transcript — April 7, 2007
A few years ago when I was living in Colorado, BD (before Debbie) I was living in Eagle, Colorado which is in the Eagle Valley not too far from Vail and was on my way into Glenwood Springs which is about thirty miles away and as I was traveling westbound on I 70, you come out of the Eagle Valley and you go through Glenwood Canyon and once you come through the Canyon you dump right into the town of Glenwood Springs and I can remember as I was driving toward Glenwood Springs, I looked in the distance and I could see this billowing mushrooming cloud and I remember thinking to myself, wow, that's quite a thunderstorm that's building up on the horizon, it must going to produce quite the gulley washer, as they would call it out west. As I got closer and closer, I noticed the cloud would continue to mushroom and get bigger and bigger and bigger. As I wound my way through the canyon and finally came into Glenwood Springs, I realized that it was not a cloud or a thundercloud at all but it was smoke from a forest fire that had been burning on the side of the mountain that Glenwood Springs is located in. Glenwood Springs is actually just located in between Storm King Mountain and also Glenwood Canyon itself. I remember coming in and being in awe of this smoke and you could see the fire off in the distance and I realized there was no way I was going any further on I70, that because the Colorado State Patrol had blocked the interstate and was funneling all the traffic off. I remember getting off and coming off the interstate and getting out of my car and I remember when I opened up my door, there was ash falling everywhere. I also remember the sensation of as soon as I opened up the door of my car there was a wave of heat that just came and hit me and yet the fire was fairly distant from me and yet that heat was felt even where I was. I went a certain way and realized this was not the place I wanted to be, I said I'm going to go back to Eagle, jumped in my car and started back on the access roads to get back on the interstate going eastbound and realized that my tank was on E, I had no gas. So I pulled up into a gas station to get some gas and as I'm putting the nozzle in my car and I'm looking up on the horizon, I can see flames that are licking over the mountain and as I'm standing there putting flammable liquid, holding a hose, putting flammable liquid into my car, standing on a tank with more flammable liquid, I realized that this was not the place I wanted to be and I got out of there as quick as I could.
I got back to work the next day and explained what had happened to some of my co-workers and some of the locals told me the story of Storm King Mountain. I looked it up on the internet several years later - Storm King Mountain is considered the worst fire fighting disaster in the United States history. It happened in July of 1994 when 49 firefighters were caught in a wildfire that stunned the nation with its swiftness and its fury. The 49 firefighters were not just firefighters, they were elite smokejumpers and hot shot specialist, they're considered the best of the best. A smokejumper or a hot shot specialist is someone that is trained specifically to go into remote areas and forest fires, to sometimes have to parachute in from low altitude and they're the first ones on the scene to fight the fire and deal with the fire to keep it from spreading. That day in July of 1994, twelve of those smokejumpers and hotshot specialists died on Storm King Mountain, seven miles west of Glenwood Springs.
What's interesting about the story of Storm King Mountain is that when they came into this fire, we're talking again about these specialists, elite firefighters, they died on a steep rocky slope in a fire that was initially was so small that the crews had not taken it seriously. They died while cars were passing on the interstate below, while people stood on their garage roofs with their camcorders aimed at the fire, taking pictures. There were coworkers on the slope at their backs where the fire was advancing, that had been overrun by flames, that one survivor guessed those flames that were rapidly approaching were as high as 300 feet. The fire raced ¼ mile up the mountain in about two minutes, hitting speeds of 18 miles an hour. The tools that these smokejumpers and hotshot specialists had were completely incinerated; the temperatures reached 2,000 degrees, hot enough to melt gold or fire clay. Of course after a tragedy like this, what happened? There was an investigation, the State of Colorado Federal authorities came in and investigated what had tragically gone wrong in the worst disaster in U.S. Firefighting history. What followed was a 226 page detailed report about all the factors, but what was most telling was the final conclusion of the report. It said the most horrifying conclusion of the report was that 12 of the victims could have easily escaped from the Valley if they had started running when evidence of extreme danger first emerged. Instead they began a slow walk, some of them dying with their tools in their hands, this meant two things - the order for an all out retreat was given far too late and the victims had an inherent reluctance to acknowledge the seriousness of their situation. One of the survivors put it as follows: "I know in my heart that the twelve persons who died in that part of the fire were unaware of what was happening."
It's a very tragic story, the story of Storm King Mountain, but it is story I believe with a principle that for us, during these days of Unleavened Bread, has a spiritual application. The first was that these specialists initially were dropped in on a fire that was so smallthey didn't take it seriously, but the second and the more important principle and the one that I'd like to discuss this afternoon is that in the final conclusion it was determined that they lost their lives because of they were not aware of the danger they were in. They were not aware of the danger that they were in.
When you and I wake up tomorrow morning, ¾ of the Days of Unleavened Bread will be over. My question for us is what have we learned so far, what will we take from these Days of Unleavened Bread? Certainly there are many principles that we could take from the Days of Unleavened Bread but there is one central lesson that I hope that we can take from the Days of Unleavened Bread. Let's turn over to I Corinthians 5. Now we read this scripture, it was read to us in the sermon on the first Day of Unleavened Bread, let's start in Verse 6.
I Cor. 5:6 - Your glorying in not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?
You read that scripture and apply it to the analogy that I just gave you about this tragic forest fire, remember what I said, that this fire started out so small that the crews did not take it seriously and yet they were the best of the best, the elite.
V. 7-8 - Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed, Christ our Passover, was sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
Now in the sermon on the first Day of Unleavened Bread, we heard about that word sincerity from the standpoint of being pure and unadulterated, but there's actually another rendering of that word and it is the word that you're going to hear throughout the rest of the sermon and that word is clarity. Clarity by definition is clearness, it is brightness. If you bought a diamond, if you remember some years back when you bought your wife a diamond, they talk about the clarity of the diamond, the cut, the color and the clarity. I remember going through this five years ago and of course the more clarity you have in that diamond, the higher the price of the diamond because it's more valuable, it has fewer impurities in it, that light shines through that diamond.
As we keep these days of Unleavened Bread, the unleavened bread of sincerity should be teaching us and giving us spiritual clarity, it should be giving us spiritual clarity. What do I mean by that? Well every year we focus these Days of Unleavened Bread, putting sin out. We scrub, we clean, we vacuum, we dust, we move cushions, move furniture, clean kids car seats, clean cars, homes, rooms, buildings, and yet what ends up happening? Inevitably in some way we find leavening! It happens every year, it might not happen to us but we know people that it happens to. I remember just last week being at the Home Office I walked by an office and somebody said, "I've sinned!" They said they had a granola bar in their purse that they'd forgotten about. I told them, go talk to your pastor; I don't want to deal with it, that's something for him! I'm joking of course but the point is, we do everything we possibly can to take that physical leavening out of our homes, out of our possessions. Everything we come in contact with and yet what ends up happening? There's always something that we see that we realize that perhaps we missed or that comes at us in some way. What's the point? The point is that sin surrounds us. God shows us through this physical exercise, the spiritual lesson of bringing us to the awareness of sin. We come to the awareness of sin and we come to the awareness of sin for this reason - awareness of sin brings us spiritual clarity. It is a clarity that should carry us even after these Days of Unleavened Bread are over, we should have a more clear, a more bright rendering of where we are spiritually after these Days of Unleavened Bread. It should humble us and make us realize that much more how much we need the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. We should come to that point.
The story of Storm King Mountain shows us that even the best were caught unaware. As I said before, these were the elite, the best of the best. Surely we're in a situation where we are the first fruits, where we have spent years upon years upon years in the Church and yet hopefully we have come to the point where we realize that every year we become a little more aware of sin and as we become a little more aware of sin, we gain just a little more clarity, spiritually speaking. Again, as I said, we're specialists in that particular way, we're the first fruits, surely we wouldn't be caught unaware!
But let me bring this analogy to you. Monday evening, it's about ½ hour before sundown, you haven't had dinner yet. You look at your spouse and say, Well, shall we get something to eat? Well, you know if we wait ½ hour we could call Domino's and get a deep dish pizza. Or perhaps you've already had dinner but you tell your wife, Honey, could you go to the store and get some toast because I really can't handle matzo with my eggs tomorrow morning, I've had it for seven days, I really want some toast. My point is that physically, very quickly, in a period of only hours, leavening will come back physically into our lives. So my question for you then is, how easily will spiritual sin come back in our lives? If it can happen that quickly physically, how quickly will it happen spiritually? Again, the awareness of sin must bring us to spiritual clarity. Let's turn over to Hebrews 12:1. We talk about this point of falling back into a condition where the awareness of sin goes away from us, where we lose that clarity, the spiritual clarity that we have gained during these days of Unleavened Bread.
Heb. 12:1 - Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us and let us run the race that is set before us.
You know it's rather interesting, you take a look at where that particular letter that's written because in the prior chapter we hear about the men and women of great faith, we hear about Abraham, we hear about Isaac, we hear about Jacob, Moses, Rahab, we hear about all of these women and men of faith that set the example for us. Over time they made their share of mistakes, but what happened? They came to spiritual clarity, that faith had been built over time and we in that same way, should be building our faith now. We should be looking to their examples and be encouraged if we stay aware and have that awareness of sin and how it affects our spiritual clarity, how it can affect our spiritual clarity and cloud it, if we're not careful.
The words of God in the bible give us excellent examples of how we can follow and we can see the example of people that have gone before us. We see that from the standpoint of people that have made mistakes and we see people from the standpoint of people that have done it the right way, it's very very encouraging. Let's take a look at a couple of examples, let's turn over to Exodus 12, I know that you may end up going here on the last day of Unleavened Bread but I always find it rather interesting to look at this particular passage of scripture when it deals with the children of Israel because in a certain sense it talks about clarity, it talks about a physical example, but for us it's an example of spiritual clarity and how spiritual clarity can be lost if one is not careful, if one takes their eyes off what is truly important. Ex. 12:21 - we see that:
Ex. 12:21 - Then Moses called for all the elders of Israel and said to them, "Pick out and take lambs for yourselves according to your families, and kill the Passover lamb." Of course we're talking about all the procedures and everything that is going to be done so that the death angel will pass over.
V. 22 - "And you shall take a bunch of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin and strike the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. And none of you shall go out of the door of this house until morning."
V. 23 - "For the Lord will pass through to strike the Egyptians and when He sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the Lord will pass over the door and not allow the destroyer to come into your houses to strike you."
I mean it's very clear and it's very evident in terms of what is being given to them, there's a definite physical awareness from the standpoint of all this instruction about what is being done. Notice in V. 27:
V. 27 - "That you shall say, 'It is the Passover sacrifice of the Lord who passed over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt when He struck the Egyptians and delivered our households.'" So the people bowed their heads and they worshipped.
See physically speaking they had come to a clarity of what they were doing, of the purpose that they had. They had seen the power of God witnessed in the plagues that He had brought on Egypt and now they were in a situation where they were being told, this is the situation that's going to happen, this is what's going to occur, this is what God wants us to do and He will deliver the firstborn. And notice what they did - verse 27 where it says, "The people bowed their heads and they worshipped." They had clarity, they knew what they were doing, they had a purpose. Surely as I said before, that clarity would have been reinforced by seeing the power of God when He'd been working with Moses, but of course He was dealing with Pharaoh and the hardness of Pharaoh's heart and there was no way that that was going to happen. Let's read forward now in Exodus 13, we see it finally gets to the point where Pharaoh says, get your people, get your kids, get your cattle, get your goats, get everything and get out of here, we're done.
Ex. 13:18 - So God led the people around by the way of the wilderness of the Red Sea and the children of Israel went out in orderly ranks out of the land of Egypt.
Again, trying to bring up this whole thing of orderly ranks, there was no confusion, there was no running around in circles, there was no, "what are we going to do now, what's in store for us?" There was clarity in what they were doing, they still had the clarity of purpose. Reading on:
V. 21-22 - And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead the way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so as to go by day and night. He did not take away the pillar of cloud by day nor the pillar of fire by night from before the people.
We see the miracle and yet there is no recorded word here, did they simply go, oh that's nice, a pillar of cloud to keep us cool in the day and a pillar of fire at night to keep us warm and give us light - or where they saying, wow, that is absolutely fantastic, look what God has done for us! We don't really know but we still know there was a clarity there; they were still working through the process of leaving.
Now we read on in Exodus 14, we see that as quickly as they had had that clarity and that purpose about what they were doing, it was going to be snatched from them - and I talk about it being snatched from them, they were the ones that were going to allow it to be snatched from themselves.
Ex. 14:10-12 - And when Pharaoh drew near, the children of Israel lifted their eyes and behold the Egyptians marched after them. So they were very afraid and the children of Israel cried out to the Lord. Then they said to Moses, "Because there were no graves in Egypt, have you taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why have you so dealt with us, to bring us up out of Egypt? Is this not the word that we were told in Egypt, saying, 'Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians.' For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than we should die in the wilderness."
They had been in oppression for how long? They had been delivered and yet they took their eyes off the clarity that they had and what did they see? They did not have the unleavened bread of clarity but they looked to the leavening of malice and wickedness. They took their eyes off what truly was important. They lost the spiritual clarity that they need. The awareness of sin was around them and they gave in to that, they started to panic, they started to fear. It's interesting that you can go from a situation where they were bowing their heads worshipping God over what God had commanded and what God had said that He would do for them, by saving their firstborn and now you go to a situation where they're saying, why couldn't we have just gone back to Egypt?
It's absolutely amazing when you think of it in terms of the spiritual clarity because it happened so quickly and that's the point that I'd like to drive home this afternoon. How quickly those things can happen if they're allowed to. If it's just the Days of Unleavened Bread that we keep, how quickly we can enter back into allowing sin in, the physical sin comes back in and sooner or later that spiritual sin comes back in as well. Let's go finally to Exodus 14:19-22.
Ex. 14:19-20 - And the angel of God went before the camp of Israel, moved and went behind them and the cloud of fire went from before them and stood behind them. So it came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel. Thus it was a cloud and darkness to the one and it gave light by night to the other so that the one did not come near the other all that night.
I mean the spiritual analogies you can draw from this, of light and dark, and yet another miracle, that God was trying to give them back that clarity and awareness.
V. 21-22 -Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night and made the sea into dry land and the waters were divided. So the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea on the dry ground and the waters were a wall to them on their right hand and on their left.
I mean we read that and we sit there and we look at that particular situation, I sometimes don't think we realize the magnitude of what happened and what occurred here. I mean when you think about that for just a moment, upwards of what, 2 million people fleeing, a pillar of cloud, a pillar of fire, these supernatural miracles that God had created for them, the pillar of cloud that hid them from the Egyptian army. This was no small crossing across the Red Sea. To put it in 21 st century terminology, how wide was that crossing? Ten, fifteen, twenty miles across? Two million people going across on dry land? You cross the Big Mac bridge from the city of Cincinnati into northern Kentucky, what is it, ¼ of a mile, half a mile? That's a pretty wide stretch of the Ohio River right there and yet when you consider the magnitude of what they went through, the wall of water that was parted, the parting of the Red Sea that took place right there was 30, 40, 50 times wider than that stretch of the Ohio River. I mean the magnitude of what was going on here! God trying to give them an awareness of what was going on and yet they lacked the clarity to understand. Exodus 15:22-23.
Ex. 15:22-23 - So Moses brought Israel from the Red Sea; they went out to the wilderness of Shur. And they went three days into the wilderness, found no water and when they came to Mara, they could not drink the waters of Marah, for they were bitter. Therefore the name of is called Marah. And the people complained against Moses saying, "What shall we drink?"
Seventy-two hours after they had witnessed the miracle of crossing the Red Sea they lost their clarity. The awareness of what they had been in and what they had been ensconced in and God working with them, trying to give them clarity and show them what was in store for them and they lost it completely within seventy-two hours. The spiritual analogy for us is something that we have to be aware of, that when we exit these Days of Unleavened Bread, if we take our eye off the major picture, the big goal, then we will lose our clarity. How will we treat these Days of Unleavened Bread? Will it be a time when the spiritual clarity and the awareness of sin has brought us that deepening, that brightness and that clarity of where we are at? Or will we lose it as we continue through this holy day cycle? Taking the eye off the goal was the problem that caused Israel to lose clarity, was a problem that plagued them as we see and we read throughout the Old Testament. Let's take a look at another example of an individual in the Old Testament. Let's look at the example of Abraham. Genesis 17:1.
Gen 17:1-6 - When Abram was ninety-nine years old the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, "I am Almighty God, walk before Me and be blameless and I will make My covenant between Me and you and will multiply you exceedingly." Then Abram fell on his face and talked with Him saying, "As for you, behold My covenant is with you and you shall be a father of many nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful and I will make nations of you and kings shall come from you."
Notice back in verse 3, that he fell on his face as God was talking to him. There was an awareness of God and what He was doing for him; there was a clarity there that Abraham had when God was going through the promise with him. Now let's take a look at chapter 17:15.
Gen 17:15 - Then God said to Abraham, "As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name and I will bless her and also give you a son by her, then I will bless her and she shall be a mother of nations, kings of people shall be from her.
V. 17 - Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed and said in his heart, "Shall a child be born to a man who is one hundred years old? And shall Sarah who is ninety years old bear a child?"
God had made a promise to Abraham, He'd given Abraham an awareness - now Abraham from the standpoint of looking at this, was he really laughing at God, was he doubting God or was he just marveling at God and saying, that's absolutely incredible that You are going to give me a son at a hundred years of age, with my wife being ninety! Abraham had clarity here, he had clarity. Genesis 20, you don't need to turn there, you can go to Genesis 22. Back in Genesis 20 you can read for yourself the account that Abraham used when he used the "she's my sister" trick, when he tried to get away from the situation with Abimelech, he was concerned, he feared, he lied, it was a situation he had done before. But what is most interesting here in chapter 22 is we see where Abraham was and now in chapter 22 we're going to see where he goes to.
Gen. 22:1-2 - Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am." Then He said, "Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you."
Here is the son that he had been promised, a son in which his seed would carry through and be the father of many nations and now God was telling him, I want you to take him and sacrifice him. Abraham had come to a point in his awareness, where we will read in verse 10, where he comes to the point where he realizes, he understands what God is doing in his life, he has faith and he obeys God.
V. 10 - And Abraham stretched out...we see that he had gathered everything up, everything had been done to carry out the sacrifice...and Abraham stretched out his hand, took the knife to slay his son, but the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, "Abraham, Abraham!" And so he said, "Here I am." And he said, "Do not lay your hand on the lad nor do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God since you have not withheld your son, your only son from Me."
What happened? What happened that Abraham would go from a situation in the past where he had lied, not once but twice, what had happened that he would go all the way to the point where he was willing to sacrifice his son? I would submit to you that he had come to a spiritual awareness; he had come to spiritual clarity through an awareness of himself. He had come to an awareness over a period of time that faith had grown and he came to spiritual clarity. The spiritual clarity of an awesome situation when you begin to see and realize and understand.
The willingness to obey God shows that clarity that he had. The stories of Israel and Abraham show us two things. They show us how spiritual clarity can be lost, they also show us how it can be built and reinforced over time. But the question really is, what is the purpose of gaining that clarity? If the awareness of sin shows us the spiritual clarity, what then is the purpose of gaining that clarity? Well it really is a four step process, it really is a four step process of an awareness of sinthat then moves us to spiritual clarity and the clarity then moves us to the understanding of where we are in our life and then at that point we can come to the point of true repentance. Not a human repentance, not just a "sorry for the situation" but a true repentance and then moving to the point where we truly can overcome. It's about spiritual growth; it's about coming to an awareness of who we are based upon the sin that exists, it really is a four step process, it is the process of an awareness of sin that then moves us to spiritual clarity and the clarity then moves us to the understanding that we're nothing more than a piece of coal that has been turned into something beautiful over time, with pressure and heat. But the clarity of a diamond can never change, you can take that diamond and you can polish it, you can clean it, you can do all you want to it, but it will never change its clarity. Well that's where the analogy breaks down with us, because we do have the ability to change, every day of Unleavened Bread that we go through, the Days of Unleavened Bread that we keep, should bring us to the point where we understand we can change, we come to a greater awareness of what sin is. We come to a greater awareness of what sin is and when we come to that awareness of sin, then we come to a deeper understanding and a deeper clarity, a brighter clarity of where we are in our lives and what we need to do.
As I said, we are different, over time we become brighter and brighter, the clarity is a process that continues over that period of time, that's where the spiritual growth comes from, but it has to come from starting at that awareness of sin. I remember back, one of the things that's most interesting, we talk about, is the standpoint of having an awareness. We come to an awareness at the pre-Passover time and we examine ourselves. We come to an awareness of where we are in our lives; we come to that clarity when we realize what it is that we need to be doing in our lives, the changes that we need to make. Perhaps we've made a list and looked at those things before the Passover; we take a look and see how are we doing in terms of our clarity over last year and this year. There's clarity isn't there, when you come to that point, when you examine yourself, both good and bad. We come to the Passover, we come to the realization, there is a tremendous amount of clarity, the Night to be Much Observed gives us a tremendous amount of clarity and the understanding and the joy that we face when we realize coming out of this world, coming out of sin. And these Days of Unleavened Bread should give us that clarity as well, but if it doesn't take us to true repentance and the understanding that we need the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and how badly we need that, then we miss the point and we don't understand that the awareness of sin brings us that clarity that we need to have in order to bring us to true repentance, understanding why we need that atoning sacrifice and helping us to overcome.
Ephesians 4, let's take a look at that book of Ephesians, if you'd turn over there with me. As we begin to talk about the spiritual growth. You know in the spring time a farmer will lay out a plan before he plants a particular crop. He doesn't just look at his field and decide, I'm just going to throw some seed and we'll see what happens. He has to take a look at the field, he has to prepare the field, he has to get the field ready to be planted and once that field is planted, he still continues to cultivate it, through the spring, through the summer, into the early fall before it's time for harvest. There's a time when he has to take a look and see the growth of that particular land, what he wants to have for it, it's not just something done willy-nilly, just throwing seed out and hoping that something happens.
There's a clarity of purpose with the farmer in terms of what he does in planting that crop. I can remember years ago when I was living in Indiana, I used to sell insurance for a company and I worked with farmers all the time and I can remember these guys telling me stories about planting, they would talk about planting $20, 25,000 in the ground, that was the dollar amount of the seed that they had put in the ground as well as the fertilizer and everything that goes with it. You better believe, when you put that much money in the ground, they had clarity, they know what they're doing. Well in that physical standpoint, much more so for us when we're talking about spiritual growth, is to have that understanding, that clarity of where we're going and that's what these Days of Unleavened Bread should launch us into, a clarity for the rest of the year of where we're going.
Eph. 4:17 - This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind...
We were there once, weren't we? A futility of the mind, of not having that understanding, of having a mind that was dark and yet all of a sudden God called us. One of the most fantastic things to do that always marvels me as a third generation Christian is to listen to the stories of the first generation Christians that have come into the Church. It's very unique because for me, they're the ones that paved the way for people like the second and the third to come along, it's very very interesting.
V. 18 - ...having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart;
Again, blindness of the heart, where is the awareness, if there is no awareness of sin, there can be no clarity. It is only through the magnification and the understanding of that sin that you can really being to see the sin. Once that sin is then drawn out, then the spiritual clarity begins to grow and then it launches in, as I said before, into the true repentance, which is what we all seek so that we truly can overcome.
V. 19-22 - ...who being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness. But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have taught Him and been taught by Him as the truth is in Jesus; that you put off concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts...
There is no spiritual clarity with that old man. It is the unleavened bread of malice and wickedness that is part of the old man, there is no brightness and there is no clarity and that is what we have to avoid because that old man will begin to pop up from time to time and rear its ugly head.
V. 23-24 - ...and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.
The righteousness of God and the holiness of God is 100% unadulterated bright clear spiritual clarity. That is what we are shooting for, that's the very clarity that Jesus Christ had when He walked this earth. So we see a contrast here, a contrast between an understanding that's been alienated and now coming to an understanding that has an awareness of sin that realizes what sin is, that seeks it out, that looks for it, that takes it away and builds that spiritual clarity. Let's turn over to Colossians1:19.
Col. 1:19 - For it pleased the Father that in Him all fullness should dwell,
Who are we talking about? You're talking about Jesus Christ, the person that we emulate ourselves after; He has total and complete spiritual clarity - perfect spiritual clarity. The very spiritual clarity that we are trying to gather. When He goes to the situation where He talks about in Matthew 16, where He says to "beware the leaven of the Sadducees and Pharisees" what is He talking from? He's talking from a standpoint of understanding and having the spiritual clarity, that's the same point that we need to find ourselves at, having that same spiritual clarity as Jesus Christ.
V. 20-21 - and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross and you who were once alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled.
The wall of partition has been broken down, the awareness that that partition was up there, through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, through our baptism, the acknowledgement of it, it is wiped away and we begin to have that spiritual clarity.
V. 22-23 - in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless and above reproach in His sight - if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I Paul, became a minister.
The biggest little two letter word in the bible is "if." If indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast...it is only in that faith that is grounded and steadfast, that we'll continue to reveal the awareness of sin after we exit these days of Unleavened Bread. It is only through that steadfastness of desiring and wanting to change that we truly can gain the clarity we need, the true spiritual clarity and then come to that true repentance that we need to have as we build the character, as we overcome and we have a product that God can work with, because that's what He's really looking for, that's what He's looking for in this physical training that we go through, that the spiritual standpoint of understanding and knowing that we have a job in the future, but we're dealing with these physical things now, moving to the point of clarity and moving to the point of true repentance.
Let's take a look at I Peter 1 - again, as we talk about this process of clarity that moves us to true repentance and understanding where we are and where we need to be and how we need to continue to live our lives each and every day throughout the next 365 days, up to Passover again next year when we begin to examine ourselves.
I Pet. 1:13-14 - Therefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober and rest your hope fully in the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts as in your ignorance.
See ignorance has no understanding and no awareness of sin and if you have no awareness or understanding of sin therefore with that ignorance, you can have no spiritual clarity, it's alienated from God, it's not part of God.
V. 15 - ...but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all of your conduct.
I like the rendering here in the New King James, the Old King James uses the word "conversation" but in the NKJ it talks about conduct. That everything that we do be holy. Why? Because it all takes us back to that spiritual clarity that we are building. We came to the Passover with the understanding that we were renewing the agreement that we had made at baptism, that we're renewing that contract that we had entered into but we also renewed something else and it was the determination that we were going to walk just as Jesus Christ walked. That we were going to take on those characteristics and we were going to do everything within our power to have that spiritual growth with the help of the holy spirit. You see it moves us to the point then where we start talking about Pentecost, the next step in the cycle. But what's most interesting is that the awareness of where we are and where we need to be in that spiritual clarity must start with an understanding of where we are now at this Passover time and into the Days of Unleavened Bread, as we take that sin out of our lives and spiritually speaking, we continue to examine ourselves during this time and realize that it is everywhere. We agreed to walk in that same clarity that Jesus Christ walked in. You know the Good News Bible translation renders those three verses the following way, let me read them to you, I think it's very telling in terms of the terminology that is used.
I Pet. 1:13-15(GNV) -So then have your minds ready for action, keep alert and set your hope completely on the blessing which will be given to you when Jesus Christ is revealed, be obedient to God and do not allow your lives to be shaped by those desires you had when you were still ignorant...again, when we did not have the awareness of sin...instead, be holy in all that you do, just as God who called you, is holy.
So again, we move from that attitude of awareness, we move from the situation of the awareness of sin to an attitude of understanding the spiritual clarity, understanding what we need to do and then moving to true repentance.
As I said before, the true repentance tells us what we need to do and why we need to do it and why we need to understand that we need that sacrifice. Not a superficial, but really searching down and getting to the deep things, the true repentance and once we do that we get that clarity, we begin to overcome and we're a product that God can work with. Let's look at an example of awareness of sin and clarity that led to true repentance, let's look at the parable of the two men who prayed in Luke 18. Luke 18:9 - what's rather interesting about this particular parable is it starts out in verse 9, notice who He was speaking to:
Luke 18:9 - Also He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that were righteous and despised others...
He was dealing with the problem of self-righteousness, He was dealing with the situation of those who were unaware of the sin, they had no spiritual clarity and so He was giving the parable to help them understand.
V. 10 - "Two men went up to the temple, to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers and even as this tax collector.'" Do you think he had spiritual clarity? No, he had a physical type of clarity because you read:
V. 12 - "'I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all I possess." He had this surface level thing that he thought he was doing that was so spiritual and yet it didn't even come close.
V. 13 - "And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven but beat his breast, saying, God, be merciful to me a sinner!' I tell you this man went down to his house justified rather than the other for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled and he who humbles himself will be exalted."
The man came from the situation of where he said in verse 13, "God be merciful to me a sinner." How did he get to that point? Because I submit to you that he had an awareness of sin, he had an awareness of sin and it brought him spiritual clarity and that clarity brought him to the understanding of true repentance which brought him to that humble attitude. That's what God's looking for, that's what God wants from us during these Days of Unleavened Bread, to bring us from spiritual clarity to the true repentance that we need. It's a most interesting story but it's a story that contrasts those two attitudes, an attitude of an unawareness of sin but an individual who had that awareness of sin and moved to the proper and correct clarity that he needed. Let's take a look at a final passage of scripture here this afternoon in the sermon. I John 2, as we begin to wrap this sermon up. The awareness of sin and everything we do during these Days of Unleavened Bread cannot escape us when sundown happens Monday evening, we have to continue on because the true repentance is something that does not just happen during the Days of Unleavened Bread, it is something that happens 365 days of the year. But what these days serve to do for us is to give us clarity from the standpoint of making us aware of sin - by putting that physical sin out of our lives and realizing that it's still everywhere, regardless of how hard we clean, we still realize that sin is everywhere and in order to get that spiritual clarity, we have to come to the point where we realize that sin, we root it out of our lives and once we have that clarity, it leads us then to the true repentance which we need.
I John 2:5 - But whoever keeps His word, truly the love of God is perfected in Him. By this we know that we are in Him. He who says he abides in Me, ought himself also to walk just as He walked. Remember what I said, when we talked about the fact that when we renewed that covenant, we agreed to walk just as Jesus Christ walked, in that same spiritual clarity.
V. 7- Brethren, I write no new commandment to you, but an old commandment which you have had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you heard from the beginning. Again, a new commandment I write to him, which thing is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining.
We see a situation here where the darkness that we were once in, the awareness of sin is pulled out and as that darkness comes away, the spiritual clarity begins to come in and every year and every day and every week that goes by, as we keep these Days of Unleavened Bread and as we take those lessons from it, that brightness becomes clearer and clearer and clearer, it becomes brighter and brighter and brighter and as we have that clarity, we become more in tune with what God wants as a son or daughter in His family.
V. 9 - He who says he is in the light and hates his brother is in darkness until now. He who loves his brother abides in the light and there is no cause for stumbling in him.
We see a situation here again, where we're talking about not only the clarity of what we're doing individually, but the clarity of everybody altogether as the body of Jesus Christ. The awareness of sin and the understanding of spiritual clarity, it's part of the lesson of what these days are all about.
As we conclude, the story I told you about Storm King Mountain showed that these specialists died because they didn't take that initial fire very seriously. We realize it grew to the point where when they died; the conclusion showed that they were unaware. It is an analogy that has a spiritual implication for us, that these Days of Unleavened Bread present us with a time in which we are reminded of sin, from the smallest bit of leavening to the greatest; we are reminded that it is everywhere. We are reminded that by putting leavening out we gain a greater awareness of sin by replacing it with the unleavened bread of sincerity, the unleavened bread of true spiritual clarity. We are reminded that we can no longer say, it's just the way I am. We are reminded that the spiritual clarity of these Days of Unleavened Bread should carry us forward with deep humility. We come to repentance and we overcome that sin that so easily besets us, as we read in Hebrews 12:1. Let's keep our spiritual clarity shining bright as we continue these days of Unleavened Bread and this holy day cycle and as we prepare now and in the years to come for the return of Jesus Christ.