Living a Godly Principled Life

In a pre-Pentecost sermon, I spoke on godly freedom. And the lesson is that we need to be free from lawlessness. But in being free from lawlessness, we are slaves of godliness, as Romans 6 tells us. I was listening to a song by Lee Greenwood recently, Proud to be an American. It's quite a stirring song if you're an American. It really gets you wound up. Basically, the content is, I'm proud to be an American where at least I know I'm free. And I won't forget the men who died and who gave that right to me. God bless the USA. Now that's touching. It's also devoid of any meaningful content. That song actually was contrived, the lyrics and the music, for record sales. And it's long on emotion and it pulls at certain things and it's very stirring.

Free of what? At least I know I'm free. Free of what? As we can see, this nation and its lawmakers are increasingly taking us free from responsibility, free from any laws that constrain human nature. In fact, this country has become a symbol of freedom for human nature to do basically anything it wants.

What does God want? God wants laws that restrict and constrain human nature.

How can God bless a lawless nation and one that promotes lawlessness? I get more inspired personally about the kingdom whose motto is, The truth shall set you free. Now that can really get us excited. Something of meaning and purpose and relevance and not just some lyrics stirred around and drummed up in order to make record sales. The Pentecost sermon that I gave was, Are you a godly principled person? We need to live the principles that set us free, and in doing so produce fruit that can be harvested by God. Examples given were David going against Goliath, very principled situation with a principled person. Shadrach and his friends going up against Nebuchadnezzar, principled people in a situation that required principle in order to get through it. Several have mentioned since then that the concept is important to them, but they would like to get a better grasp on how to apply it on a daily basis in our lives. What are some of the specifics that we can use to use godly principled decisions in our daily lives? Well, today I'd like to talk about how to make godly principled decisions in and on a daily basis, how we can go about the business of living a godly principled life. Actually put it into practice. I'd like to start with the goal in mind. Going back to 1 Peter chapter 3 verses 3 through 5. 1 Peter chapter 3 beginning in verse 3.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, you who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation, ready to be revealed at the last time. That is what we can rejoice about and that is the beauty of the plan that God has made and the calling that He has given to us. And so there is a treasure in heaven reserved for you that will not fade away. It's not out of your grasp. It's not something promised, but then it fades back, it shrinks back. It is sure and we have a living hope for that. That is the goal. But who will obtain that goal? Who will be in the kingdom of God? In Psalm chapter 15, we are told who will be in the kingdom of God. Psalm chapter 15 talks about people of principle, people of godly principle. There are various types of principles that people can stand on. We don't care about those. We only care about the ones God has established as the proper and right principles, the eternal principles, the true ones. And Psalm chapter 15 opens with the question, who may abide, who may live and dwell in your tabernacle? Who will dwell in your kingdom? Who may dwell in your holy hill?

New Jerusalem. Who's going to be there? And then He begins to follow it up with people who are godly principled. I'd like to go through this list, just as we did at the camp out last week. There were six individuals that chose half of these 12 points and gave a sermonette and a short discussion on each one. Found it to be invigorating and got our mind on these principles. But let's look at all of them today as we begin the sermon, just to get them in mind. I'm not going to go to them in any detail as we did last week. But it says in verse 2, He who walks uprightly, a person who is walking on the right path, he's moving, he's growing, he's overcoming, and he's doing so in a principled manner. He's upright, he's respectable in the eyes of God, and he's working righteousness. Righteousness is keeping the law of God, which is loving God with all your heart, loving your neighbor as yourself, and therefore fulfilling the whole law. So really, this individual has a lot going on of integrity. He's working righteousness. He's putting love of God into his life. In order to love God and put him first, this person is praying. This person is taking the time to walk, make sure that what he's doing and what he's saying and what he's thinking, or she, is upright and proper and is loving and respective, responsive of God. That person is putting God first in their life. That person is praying every day. That person is godly principled, and there's not a day that comes along that the person says, oh, I think I'll just be selfish today. I just think, oh, I forgot to pray for the last three days. No? That person is following a principle of, I put God first in my life. And I love my neighbor as myself. I don't go blowing through a few days, like, oh, hey, look at that. I haven't thought or done anything for anybody but me. No? The individual also is thinking of others and helping and serving others as much as his or herself. That's a principle that they are working and doing on a daily basis. And speaks the truth in his heart. This is the truth. Jesus Christ is the logos, and the logos is the truth. Speaking the truth in the heart means to have oneself involved in truth, knowing truth. The way of God to dwell on it as David did, to meditate on it, it involves some type of internalization and bringing to mind of truth, whether it's Bible study. You can't turn to the Bible and say, well, you have to study the Bible every day because people didn't study the Bible every day because people didn't have Bibles. Sort of a modern phenomena. But at the same time, people did dwell and in some way recall what they were taught on the Sabbath. Today we can use sermon tapes, literature. We have booklets. We have Bibles. We have various ways and means of having the word of truth on our mind during the day. And then we, like the logos, Jesus Christ, also speak the truth. We internalize it, and it also comes out of us. So speaking the truth, as it says here, in his heart means that truth is internalized and whatever comes out is according to God's word and it also is absolutely accurate.

Now, nobody will be in God's kingdom who is untruthful, Revelation 21.8 tells us. And so God is absolutely truth. He never would lie. We must be of the same character. I once asked you, when is it okay to tell a lie? When are those special circumstances that it's okay to lie? Did that in a Bible study. Remember some of the answers that came up, some of the hands that rose? I don't remember anybody or anything that was said. But I do remember some surprising hands, and people tried to figure out, well, let's see, would this be the case or would that be the case?

There is never a time to lie. Never, ever, never, ever. And as we go through life, we must absorb that as one of the godly principles on which we stand. No matter the cost to you or anyone else, there is never, ever a time to follow humanity's father, the devil, who was a liar and was so from the beginning and is the father of lies. There's never a time for that. Going on. Who does not backbite with his tongue, nor does evil to his neighbor, nor does he take up a reproach on his friend or against his friend. He's not a person who is about himself and therefore is critical to others doing other people harm. That is not loving your neighbor as yourself. That's not what we read that love does in 1 Corinthians 13. Oh, it's very typical of your carnality in mind to do that, but that's not what a person who's going to be in God's kingdom will do. And therefore, we must make it a principle to not hurt other people by what we say, how we speak, even how we think about them. It must become something that we internalize and say, I'm not going to do that. I am not going to do that. Rather, in verse 4, in whose eyes a vile person is despised. People who are trying their best. There's a difference between a vile person and somebody who's trying their best and makes mistakes. Anybody here know anybody who's trying their best and makes mistakes? Anybody here one of those people? Okay, there's nothing wrong with that. But where a person is a vile person, we despise the behavior or reject the behavior. Rejecting the behavior that is wrong can happen with anybody. If I have an attempt at doing right, but I have a behavior that is wrong, should you accept it? No, you should reject it. Sin is sin is sin no matter where it is, and therefore we say, I don't go there. It's like the Bible says, when your brother strays he doesn't do those things that the Bible is taught, then you don't have anything to do with him at that point. That he can be ashamed and come back, you see? It's not good people and vile people. There's good people who sometimes have vile behavior, and there are some people who are just, they're just vile behavior pretty much because they don't know any better. And whatever the situation is, we need to look at people who have vile behavior with disgust, despise or rejection of that behavior. We're not going to pick up on it. I don't care who it is. I don't care how good looking they are, how cute they are, how important they are, how big a position they have. If it's not proper behavior, that is rejected. Because we go for the principles of God, remember? We are not loyal to people. We are loyal to principle. There is a difference. Not loyal to people, we are loyal to principle. And where an individual has vileness, that is rejected. But he honors those who fear the Lord. Notice, he didn't honor those who are in a group, didn't honor those who are in a church, he didn't honor those in whatever. He honors those who deeply reverence God. And those people are people of godly principle. It's about principle. It's not about personalities.

He who swears to his own hurt and does not change. Now, there's a person of principle, a person who said, I gave my word. I thought at the time it was the right thing to do. I probably heard a matter before I answered it. I probably got in there and got all the details and thought I was well informed. I thought it was going to work out for both parties. And I ascribed to that, and I put my hand to it, and I agreed on it, and I said, I will do this. That swearing turned out to be hurtful. It didn't work out. It didn't work out. Something went wrong. It's going to cost me. I'm going to have to go through this. I'm going to have to labor in this. Like Jacob ended up doing for Rachel for another seven years after finding himself, after getting drunk and finding himself with Leah. He had to pay another seven years there. But he was good to his word, and he went back. He went on through that. You swear to your own hurt and do not change. Verse 5, He who does not put out his money at usury. There's nothing wrong with people who are in business. It takes money to make money, and sometimes you don't have money. It's not wrong at all for a person who needs to borrow to find some people who are venture capitalists who want to make some money while he's going to make money. Nothing wrong with that at all. But where you have a poor person who can't make ends meet and they need to borrow some money. They're already short, in other words. They can't make it until next payday. And then you open up one of these nice payroll and advance companies. It says, come in and in advance of getting your payroll checked, we'll just take a big chunk of it and give it to you, give you the rest up front. But what does that do to the person? They already can't make it to payday, and now you give them enough to survive to payday, but when payday comes you've already taken a chunk out. That means they're going to be back, aren't they, before next payday and next payday. And then you run that cute little ad on TV that says, oh, our company does not want you to make a habit out of coming to us, as one was running yesterday. Please don't make a habit of coming to payroll, you know, pre-payroll payment company or whatever, because it's not good. It's not good. Don't make a habit of it. But you see, how can you not make a habit of it? That is wrong. That is wrong, and whenever an individual charges usury to somebody who cannot afford to pay their bills, that's wrong. It says here, nor does he take a bribe against the innocent. This will work out well for me. It's not going to work out so well for the person, but I'm going to get a little bribe here. It's going to feather my bed. It's going to make my life happy, and unfortunately someone else is going to be in a losing situation. But that's not according to the law of love, is it? It's not about money in this life. It's not about feathering my bed or feathering my life. It's about loving God and loving our neighbor as ourself, and therefore, these things don't fit.

Now, in a sense, everything in the Bible is covered in these five verses or four verses. These are the attributes of a godly, principled person. How can we adapt these into our life? Well, David faced Goliath on principle, and God supported him. We all know that story. God supported him. You may look at your life, and I hope you can, and say, I am a person of principle. There's this thing or that thing that I never do. Some people may just be the speed limit keepers. I never, ever in my life will go one mile an hour over the speed limit. That's just what I do. Other people are time keepers. I never, ever get any place late, and that's one thing I do. I'm a very principled person. Another person may be a truth, you know, principled person. I always tell the truth, no matter. And so on and so forth. We can probably look at our life and find some areas of principles that we just are strong in. But does that mean that we are a godly principled person in all things? Or all the time? Remember how principled David was as a young man to walk up and look at an impossible situation and see no way through it when you have that kind of covering over Goliath, and then you put a shield bearer in front of him. What are you going to do? But David knew the strength of God, and David was God-reliant in that situation. And yet a few years later, David numbered his own troops because he didn't have confidence that God could help him win the battle. See, life is like that, and parts of our life can be like that. And so to be a godly principled person requires a lot more than just being godly principled in one or two areas or once in a while. It's an area that we really, really need to be serious about, and as we've already seen, must come from the heart. Let's look at some things that Jesus said about it coming from the heart. Matthew 15, verses 18 and 19. Matthew 15, beginning in verse 18, says, For out of the heart proceeds all kinds of thoughts. In this situation with the carnal mind, they're negative thoughts, but also there are positive thoughts. It depends on what's in the heart. And so the quality of our heart and our character and what we really believe is very crucial to what we do and what we say. Verse 18, Those things which come out of the mouth come from the heart.

The heart is really our mind. It's our character. It's what we really, truly are. It's what we really, truly feel, not sort of the nice dressing that we would put on it.

He said in Matthew chapter 5 and verse 8 that something special will happen to those who are pure in heart. Blessed, supremely blessed, are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. They're going to be in the resurrection. They're going to be in God's holy hill. So it comes down to, what am I and what are you really? Down on the core, down on the inside. And this is where it really becomes important for you and I to become godly, principled people. And start internalizing these things, all of these things, and saying, this is what I do in any situation. This is who I am in any circumstance. It's who I am now at church. It's who I am on Sunday. It's who I am when nobody's around. It's who I am when, ooh, really nice opportunities are coming up. It's who I am at work when there are opportunities to sort of bend things, you see, or any other place in life. David found himself principled at times, unprincipled at other times. And in Psalm 51, we find what we need to do a lot of the time, and that is to repent. To repent of when we let down, when we break, and we need to recommit as he did. And get a clean heart in us. Created me a clean heart, O God. Proverbs 23, 7 says, As a person thinks in his heart, so is he. So is he. I'm going to show you in a few minutes how important what you think in your heart is, how important your belief system is in every decision, in every act, in every emotion that you have. A question came to me this last week. Do you feel like we too often let cynicism or reservation override principled idealism? In other words, we say, yes, I'm principled, and we can be idealistic about it. I never, whatever it is, I always, I stand for this. But sometimes does cynicism or sometimes does reservation, caution, wisdom, moderation, sometimes we'll use some of these terms. Do these sort of shift us from being strong in principle? The answer is yes. The answer is very yes. These things are tempered because we don't always have the faith. When Nebuchadnezzar calls you and me up to the fiery furnace, we say, well, under these circumstances, let's see. And we start to feel the heat of that fire. We start looking around for God. We see a lot of pagans there, and we don't see anybody looking. And what do we do in the wisdom of me? If I just really blurted out, I might offend this king, and I might, but if I just sort of, hmm, to the God, oh, my stomach, I feel better now. You know, if you just do something, you know, and things might work out well, you know what I mean? In almost any situation in life. So what happens to this idealistic principle that we stand for at times?

Well, this caution or better judgment is actually a lack of faith. It's really an internalization that is weak, because at our core, what do we really believe in? Well, we believe in the saving of the soul. The soul is my life, my physical life, and that's pretty important to us. Yet, a godly-principled person would always be strong, always be idealistic, no matter what. David was idealistic. I mean, he walked right up there and says, what do you mean? This impossible, huge, massive blob of metal down there. Of course he's going to die. That's idealistic.

So were other people. But even if they died, they would have died for the right cause, the right reason, having faith in God. And they would have been listed in the faithful back in Hebrews 11.

Matthew 18, verses 6-9 tell us that there will be pulls to get us away from what this individual called idealistic principle, state. It'll try to draw us away into some kind of a convoluted thing where, you know, Judas was a disciple and he was the treasure and he had the money and he paid the bills, but he also kept a little for himself and it all seemed to work somehow, you see. Something's going to pull at us, Jesus Christ tells us, to test those principles that we say we stand on. In Matthew 18, verse 6, whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin. Now wait a minute, these little ones he's talking about aren't just sinning on their own. It's somebody's causing them to sin. They're on the right path. They're on the straight and narrow, but something's pulling them off. Something's snaring them.

Verse 7. Whoops, whoops, hang on. I lost my place here just a minute.

Yes, verse 7. Woe to the world because of offenses. Now it's not talking about you getting offended. This passage has nothing to do and never did with anybody getting offended. All right, because that word offended is not talking about you getting offended. Going back up, it's talking about sin. Those who believe in him to sin. The word offense, if you look in your margin, means enticements to sin. So when it says here, woe to the world because of enticements to sin. Another meaning of the Greek is snare. You're going along and something stops you from going, from walking down the right way. It snares you or it entices you and pulls you off the path. For offenses, no, snares and enticements must come, but woe to that man by whom the enticements and the snares come. The lesson here is enticements and snares towards your and my principle life will come. They will be there. They will pull at you. They will tug at you. It's wrong that they come. They're coming from the world that says woe to the world, but they will be there. Even Jesus Christ was tempted. He was tempted to be diverted from the path by Satan the devil. He was tempted to compromise. He was tempted, and Satan attempted, to pull him away and entice him. And to doing something, as you notice, that was similar. You know, you're going to rule the world. Why don't you do it now? Here, I'll give it to you. You can have it. Everything there was sort of based on the Bible, and it didn't take much. You won't even have to die. You won't have to be crucified. Just make this little step here.

Jesus Christ, in every case, answered on principle. He went to a biblical principle, and he said, This is what I do. This is what I stand for. This is who I am. And it was not himself talking about himself. It was talking about himself. It was talking about the word that God the Father had inspired him to be and to say.

He avoided the snares by being godly principled. There are some things that you can be idealistically principled about. Just pure black and white. You can just walk up to any situation and never lie. No matter what. Or never be inaccurate. No matter what. And two hoots for the consequences.

Stealing. Stealing. You can say, I will never steal. I will never steal. And in any situation, somebody says, you know, employee of the store says, Oh, you can just have that. No. It's not yours to give that. Unless it is theirs to give that. Maybe it's a company policy. But stealing, under any circumstance, is wrong. Just because somebody lost something doesn't mean it's yours. You know, it's still theirs. They just don't know where it is. They may not even know they don't have it.

Unless, obviously, it's somewhere where no one will ever find it or they will never find it. And, you know, pretty much garbage along the freeways up for grabs. You know, unless it's in a FedEx box, it's not open with an address on it.

Or if it says, you know, bank deposit, whatever. I remember my wife one time went in the ladies' room, closed the door, and there hanging was the, I think, the payroll or an expense packet from a company. And no paperwork at all. Just a bag full of cash. I think it was expenses or something. I forget what it was. So, obviously, it was hers, right?

The lady who left it there was pretty happy when she came back to the store and found that, or actually, I guess, called her house or something, stopped by and picked it up.

Kind of a relief and an awkward circumstance there with her own company. The thing that we still remember about her is that she showed no thanks whatsoever.

Just, you know, it's the way it is. But sexual misconduct. Sexual misconduct is always wrong. It's always robbing. It's always stealing from a spouse or a future spouse. And it's wrong. Killing people. When is it okay to kill people? You know, only when they're trying to kill you, or might kill you, or steal your stuff. When is it okay to kill people? You know, if you're a godly principled person, you will never kill another person, period. It just won't happen. And when you think, oh, how tragic, like I always run this scenario in my mind, what if the guy's out there and he's shooting people, you know, and I found a gun? Well, guess what? God can resurrect people. There's no reason for me to break his law in order to keep somebody else from breaking the law. Two wrongs don't make a right, do they?

What about coveting and lusting? Sabbath. Sabbath observance. Holy days. That's black and white. You never break the Sabbath, ever. Never, ever, never. Those who don't show God a sign of who his people are. Black and white. We don't take God's name in vain, or any part of it, or to any degree. That is God's precious name. And just because the world trashes it and doesn't care, that doesn't mean that there is ever a time to take God's name in vain. And that is our name in the future. And it's precious to us, and it's precious to God, and we identify with it. It's holy, and anytime there is any taking of it in vain, it bothers us. Now, if somebody else is taking God's name in vain, you don't control that. It's none of your business. We don't go out of our way to get immersed in entertainment or with people that do that because of the offensiveness of it.

Putting someone or something before God. We don't do that. That's the first great commandment. To honor your parents. When is it a good time to dishonor your parents or not honor your parents? Well, let's see. What kind of parents did I have? What did or didn't they do? Well, people of principle who follow the Bible honor their parents no matter what. Period. They honor their parents. There's no ifs, ands, or buts about it. The worst parents in the world still changed your diaper, still gave you life, still fed you.

God says to honor them. Things that we should not be idealistic about, black and white about, include anything that God has not promised. And sometimes people will, well, I'm standing on this promise. I know God will do this. God never said he would. Or things God hasn't commanded. Kind of make up your own rules.

Well, I believe that this is wrong. Well, where do you get that idea? Well, I just know it's wrong. God hates it. It's a sin. God put enough things in the Bible and defined them very well. We don't have to come up with more, unless something obviously is a spirit of the law of violation.

It doesn't love God and doesn't love your neighbor. The book that the Church publishes, called The Fundamental Beliefs of the United Church of God, has 20 truths restored by Mr. Armstrong to the Church. We can be pretty black and white, pretty idealistic about these biblical truths. That there's God the Father, there's Jesus Christ, and they have given to us the Holy Spirit, the Helper, that the Word of God is truth. It is truth. It is pure truth. It is nothing but the truth. That there is a Satan, the devil, that God has a law that's immutable, it's unbreakable.

And Jesus said, no part of it, not the smallest little part of writing will ever be removed from it, until all the heavens and the earth are gone away. That there is an atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ, and following repentance, we receive forgiveness every time. That there's a covenant we make with baptism. That the Sabbath day is a sign, the festivals of God are holy, and they're prophetic.

God's food laws are to be obeyed. Military service and war is wrong. It's wrong for any people anywhere at any time who are godly principled, without any doubt, without any reservation. God's purpose for mankind is to build the family of God. The church is the body of called-out ones. Ties are God's property. They are always God's property. They always will be God's property. There's no way not to make tithes not God's property.

The resurrections are coming, and they're certain. Jesus Christ will return and rule the world with the saints. These principles, when a person really internalizes them, and that is what they are in the heart, and therefore that is who they are, can take a person through life, through any situation. Let's look over in Acts 24 and verse 15 and see how these very principles that I just read to you are what drove Paul and guided Paul to do the work that God gave him to do through all the circumstances that he faced in life. Acts 24 and verse 15, I have hope in God, he said, going on, that there will be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust.

That's a profound statement. I have hope in God that there will be a resurrection from the dead of both the just and the unjust. Peter talked about that. What kind of people ought we to be seeing the resurrections that are coming, first, second, and third? You don't want to be in the third resurrection. With that in mind, he says, this being so, I myself always strive to have a conscience without offense towards God and man.

The laws, the teachings, the word of God, the truth of God, Paul internalized, and then he strove in whatever he did, whatever he said, not to be of offense. Remember, a snare, a sinner, one who enticed others or was enticed himself to sin against God. But you fast forward to the year 2007, and here you find us. Now, we're an interesting generation, aren't we? We've had a hundred years of psychology, Freudian psychology, Freudian psychology, and all the other concepts of man, rolled up into one, means I get my way. That's what it all amounts to.

Self and carnality gets its way. So, psychology has six basic assumptions. I won't bother with the first four, but I'd like to mention the last two. Point five, or assumption five, is that people tend to think, then act. People tend to think, then act. And you think, well, that's a no-brainer. Well, actually, it is a brainer, because what he's saying there is an event, when something impacts you, you think about it, and then you act.

In other words, an event triggers a reaction. Something happens to you, you do something. And number six, behavior can stem from unsubstantiated events and acts of others.

In other words, something happens to you, boom, and you act, and your reaction can stem from the actions of others. So, what others do to you and the events that you see and you act, are not your responsibility. It's really the fault of the event that caused you to react the way that you did, and therefore, don't feel guilty, don't feel responsibility.

The formula is that the event or act leads to behavior, or the emotion. And this is the underlying assumption that colors psychological counseling. We have to be careful with those various programs. But in godly principled people, there is another step in between those two things. We need to recognize this. You don't have an event that someone creates, and then you have a behavior that results. No, there's a step in between. You have an event that happens, and then you have your belief. Remember, we talked about this a while ago. You have what's in your core, and you analyze the event through your belief, and then you behave or have an emotion. That's what a godly principled person does every time. We see the event, we see the action, we see the opportunity, then we process it through the mind of God as to how should we behave and what emotion should we have, and then we react as a godly principled person. And it takes place every time something happens if we are godly principled people. A person's belief is in control. The event itself is not in control. We can't just say, well, it's not my fault. Therefore, it isn't the event. Rather, it's one belief and view of the event that produces the behavior or the emotion. Our belief then becomes the dominating factor of our behavior and our emotions. Who you are inside, what is in the heart is the person. With a godly principled person, sin is always sin. It's not a personality problem. It's not an addiction. It's not something we rationalize. It is something that we despise and we want to repent of. We want to get away from, put out of our life. It's the whole point of the whole spring festival season that we go through each year to remind us of that.

So the point is that when one's mind is guided by biblical principles, because we pray to God and we ask for his Holy Spirit and we study his word and we get our minds full of the principles, and when we are guided by the principles of God, then any event that comes, any opportunity, any thought that comes will be processed through a godly principled mind. And the outcome will produce a behavior and emotion that is godly. And that's good. That's the character that God wants us to have. That's the responsibility, in fact, of parents, is to encourage this in children. Parents, teachers, counselors, pastors, anybody with influence over others, need to get people to follow God's instructions, God's principles.

With God's Holy Spirit, this will grow in us. You know, the way that the Holy Spirit helps us is we see an event, we see a situation, and God's Spirit brings to mind this.

That's what God's Spirit does. It brings to mind this. Remember? It says, I will remind you of those things that I taught you. That's what Jesus Christ said the Helper would do. It'll bring to mind. So we see the event, the Holy Spirit brings it to mind and says, hmm, here's how you should view this. Here's how you should look at this. And your carnality also brings to mind, here's the opportunity of how you can do this in a self-centered way. Now, it's up to you as to how you will behave, react, and what emotion you'll have to that. A godly-principled person will choose what the Holy Spirit puts in their mind and reject what carnality finds as an opportunity. But that's not always the case, because we're all weak. Like Paul said, for me, he wrote it there so I didn't have to. That which I want to do is not always that what I do. Because you have that double choice, don't you? You have those two opportunities that present themselves every time. If you ever find yourself seeing an event or an event opens up to you and you see two choices, know that you're in the same boat as every other person with God's Holy Spirit. The only difference you have over the world is they only see one choice. You see two. How we choose is what God wants to know. That's the character that we can build, a fruit that we can grow.

In conclusion, godly principled people have a surprising benefit in their life. It's not just about, well, you do this and you'll get in the kingdom, or you do that and you won't. I've got to appease God. It's not about that. A godly principled person has a surprise benefit to this physical life that we live now. A little background on this. Isaiah 55 verse 8 talks about, or God talks about, his thoughts and his ways. He says, For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways. That's to the carnal man.

Humans follow what Paul called a tradition of men in Colossians 2.8. The elements of the world, not after Christ. That's a direction that humanity goes. And you and I tend to follow that as well. Therefore, because humanity is not after Christ, it's after the elements of the world, it's after the tradition of men, it's not after the thoughts of God, and it's not after the ways of God. It is self-centered. It's not God-centered. It is self-centered. Romans chapter 8 and verse 5, we can turn there. Romans chapter 8 and verse 5 says, Those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh. The carnal or the physical mind is focused not on godly things, but on self-centered things. Verse 6, For to be carnally minded is death. So here's a whole direction we see here of thought processes, of actions, of things that are important, of following the human logic and the human group, it goes towards death. This philosophy produces fear and guilt. It removes real purpose from life. Why is that? Mankind was created to reflect the ethical and moral qualities of its creator. And when man does not reflect the ethical and moral qualities of his creator, he's going in a way that he's not equipped. He's not designed for that path. It's not going to be fulfilling. It's not going to be happy. It's not going to work out.

It's just not going to work out. A good example of that is go back and read the life of Jacob.

And how he saw God and then he left God for a long time, 20 or 40 years or more, and he went through this way of thinking that was so clear to him, but it was godless. And he messed up with Leah, then he messed up with Rachel, and then they got into child wars and wife wars. And finally, he drove him nearly nuts and he wanted to get out of there. And he's got his father-in-law trying to kill him as they're leaving town. That's how it works out. It's not a happy life. And at the end of it all, he says, my life has been terrible. My short life has been awful. That's typical of the human way to live life. The only alternative, if one does not live a godly life, is self. And self is human. Self is mortal. Self has no future. Self can't help itself. Self winds down. Self is void of the resources to deal with the issues of human life. You know, we do not have it in ourselves to direct ourselves. We are void of the necessary tools in which to have relationships and to live life.

The end result is fear. Fear of the future. Fear of the unknown and a purposeless existence. You can read through Solomon's eyes who tried it all. And at the end, it was useless. Uselessness of uselessness. Thus say us the preacher. That's what vanity of vanities means. Uselessness of uselessness. Worthlessness of worthlessness.

It's a life without any fulfillment, without any real purpose.

What is the surprising benefit of godly, principled living? When God's thoughts are our thoughts, and God's thoughts are our ways, and they can be, through putting this into our heart by making ourselves follow God and being godly, principled people, then His thoughts are our thoughts through His Holy Spirit. And His ways are our ways. We enjoy the fullness of life that God wants us to enjoy now. We get something out of this life that other people just don't get. Romans 8, verse 5 again, the second part, but to those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. In the end of verse 6, to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Life and peace. That's life now. Life to the full now. Life with purpose now. And peace. Peaceful, harmonious relationships with God and man now. And in the future, life eternal and harmony with the family of God forever. That's the surprise that comes to a person who chooses to live a godly, principled life.

The godly, principled person has confidence and security in all situations. That is why David had confidence when he went up against this blob of metal that was 9 or 12 feet high. That's why Shadrach and boys and friends had confidence when they were feeling the heat and were walking around inside with Jesus Christ.

That's how Paul faced life-threatening danger. Let's conclude by reading Acts 21, 12 through 14. The Apostle Paul was up against the Roman Empire and going right up against the governors, the military rulers, and eventually the crazy Caesar himself, before whom he would die in some way. What do you do in a situation like that? Well, if you're a principled person, it's not a problem because you're always in the right place at the right time, no matter what happens. You're always building treasure in heaven. You're always exuding godliness. You're always qualifying for the kingdom. What mattered is it if you're fishing on a lake or you're getting shot at. Acts 21, verse 12. Now, when we heard these things, there were some people talking about what was coming and the risks and the dangers to the Apostle Paul that faced him in Jerusalem. When we heard these things, both we and those from that place pleaded with Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. Begged him, pleaded him, warned him. And then Paul answered verse 13, what do you mean by weeping and breaking my heart? For I am ready not only to be bound as a prisoner, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.

See, Paul could get beat up. He gets stoned. He could get ridiculed. He could be taken into prison. He could even die. But that's who he was. That's what he did. Being a Christian was what he was about.

So when he would not be persuaded, we tried to dry him off the course. We tried to snare him. We tried to bag him. We tried to entice him. But when he would not be persuaded, we ceased doing that and said instead, the will of the Lord be done. So, brethren, let's learn to apply godly principles to everything that we think and everything that we say each day. And in doing so, our lives today will be rich and our future will be secure.