When the Bible Whispers

I want to remain standing as we go to the Word of God. Do you want to turn to Ephesians 5 with me? And I just looked at the bulletin, and it appears that between the time I put together the order of worship, and today I've changed what I'm preaching about. So if you were really excited about the Eighth Commandment, we are still on the Seventh. So glad it wasn't the Ninth.

That would have been awkward to not follow through. Ephesians 5, starting in verse 3. But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you as is proper among saints. Let there be no filthiness, nor foolish talk, nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure or who is covetous, that is an idolater, has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. let no one deceive you with empty words for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience therefore do not become partners with them for at one time you were darkness but now you are light in the Lord walk as children of light for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord.

May God bless the reading of his word and the preaching of it. You may be seated. For the most part, people sin in similar ways, both male and female. So we make distinctions of males and females here, of course. but we all steal, we all lie, and we all need forgiveness for these things. When it comes to the seventh commandment, there are some generalities whereby it seems like if you look at most populations, there are certain parts of that type of sin of sexual immorality that men tend to indulge in, and there are certain things that women are the party to.

So there will be times in today's sermon where I'm going to generalize. I'm going to say ladies or men. And so if that one didn't apply to you, but the other one did, just make the application yourself, all right? But there are certain things that we can say as a general population, men or women will do when it comes to the seventh commandment, more than likely.

We looked at Jesus' words about the seventh commandment. Lord willing, this is the last sermon on the seventh. we looked at Jesus' words about the seventh commandment, where he made it clear to us that it's not only the physical breaking of the commandment that is a sin in the eyes of God, but it is your heart that actually sins before God, even before you've ever committed any act of outward sin. When Jesus said you should not even lust after a woman, or you've committed adultery with her in his heart, that was evidence of that.

We talked about the importance of marriage. We talked about what marriage is and we talked about divorce being part and parcel with honoring the marriage bed, I think, and how divorce is such a horrible affront to God and the gospel itself, actually. the one thing that I discovered that I don't think that we put a lot of emphasis on with the seventh commandment was our words and the types of language that we can use that would be in violation of the seventh commandment if one of the kids could grab me a confession I forgot to bring one up here I'm going to need one I would love that. Or one of the big kids.

Oh, there's one. All right. Elijah's a kid at heart, isn't he, guys? Yeah. Thank you, Emery. In the Baptist Catechism, in the Seventh Commandment section, question 76 says, what is required in the seventh commandment all right so the the catechism is designed to give you a very concise sometimes one sentence answer to what can be a difficult theological question and if you memorize what it says you still may have to work out the meaning of some of it but at least it gives you a basis but listen to this what is required in the seventh commandment the seventh commandment requireth the preservation of our own and our neighbor's chastity in heart, speech, and behavior.

Mike just read Proverbs 15 to us, and you can reread it yourself. I've heard it a few times because we practiced it while he was here this weekend. It's amazing how many times our heart and our speech were all intertwined in there in Proverbs 15. How about this? What is forbidden in the seventh commandment, the seventh commandment forbid all unchaste thoughts words and actions I think that for most of us it's sort of easy to recognize that we have to be pure in our actions I won say it necessarily easy to do this but I think we know that and we read Jesus words and we all know that well if you think about something you shouldn that a problem But I think that we don't always understand, we don't always think through how the things we say, or even the things other people say that we allow them to say, are a violation of God's seventh commandment. so very quickly turn to Acts 15 I want to address two primary issues today one of them is the question of whether or not sexual purity, adultery, immorality these concepts are in fact important and I'd like to believe if I asked everyone in here they'd just say yeah well of course it is But there's large sections of the Christian population in the United States that wants us to think otherwise.

So that's the first goal. That's going to be a speed reading through a few verses in the New Testament. Secondly, I want to focus on our speech and the speech of others, which means what you are listening to and how that is to be affected. So we'll look at Ephesians 5. In Acts 15, the believers in the Jerusalem church are trying to help out some Gentile believers.

So I can't go into the whole context for you here. But the idea here is these Gentiles are getting saved. They don't have 30 years of reading the Old Testament where they can just start knowing what a lot of the things to do are. They didn't even need a letter to the Hebrews to tell them what to stop doing. these people were completely heathen pagans they believed on the Lord Jesus Christ they wanted to know how to live and the Jerusalem church had to give them something they didn't have the New Testament yet in fact they wouldn't have had any of it at this point it would have all been word of mouth at this point they didn't have lots of copies of the Bible to just hand out to people like we can when we go out evangelizing for 89 cents or so we can give out almost whole copies of it, right?

Great. Praise the Lord for that. So they had to tell them, okay, here's what's important for you to do so that you're actually trying to obey God. So that you're living a Christian life where you're not going to be damaging yourself and others. So they could have told them things like, don't smoke. They could have said, make sure that you watch how much wine you drink.

They could have said things like, honor the Sabbath and tried to explain what the Sabbath was to them. If you look at verse 20, we'll see verse 19, Therefore my judgment is that we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God. He says, but should write to them to abstain from the things polluted by idols and from sexual immorality and from what has been strangled and from blood.

I don't want to get into all the details of the strangling and blood and stuff. We can talk about that later. The point is that the very beginning of the Christian church existence, the things that people found to be the important elements to preserve them from completely doing everything wrong was, basically, don't worship idols. Don't act like pagans.

That's the blood and stuff, that part. And don't commit sexual immorality, which everybody inherently knows what that is. people don't wake up in the morning and understand things like a seven day sabbath and the seventh day sabbath and the sunday instead of saturday like that's not natural revelation the entire world is utterly aware of what sexual morality is even though they deny it well so that's their advice to them i would dare say that if you read through the book of revelation and you see some of the passages where god accuses the people in those mostly apostate churches of the problems they have, he accuses them of eating meat, sacrifice to idols, and committing sexual immorality. Idolatry and sexual immorality appear to be two of the biggest problems that people have.

It's two of the biggest things we tolerate. Most societies won't tolerate theft, because ultimately a lot of people don't want to be stolen from. but they'll tolerate you being sexually immoral as long as you're not doing it against they're not doing it against you and your family or your wife so quick survey of the new testament first corinthians 6 the reason i'm doing this is just to prove to you briefly the importance of it part of the reason though and i don't like to be contemporary but a very very poor teacher named Jen Wilkin, who nobody should listen to or follow. If you own her books, you should throw them away.

She said in a book, and then it was quoted by the famous plagiarist J.D. Greer, the Bible whispers about sexual sin. She said, we should whisper about what the Bible whispers about and shout about what the Bible shouts about. And she followed it up by saying, the Bible whispers about sexual sin. And to be fair, they said in comparison to greed and like religious pride.

I disagree. I think the Bible is utterly against greed. I think the Bible is utterly against religious pride and pride in general. And I think the Bible shouts about sexual sin as well. 1 Corinthians 6.18 Paul says, flee from sexual immorality. He makes a really interesting statement.

He says, every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. There's something there. There something unique about sexual immorality that hurts you in ways that are more damaging more devastating and more long than other sins And if you don't know what I mean by that, praise the Lord. Galatians 5, verse 19.

Now the works of the flesh are evident. sexual immorality impurity somewhat the same thing including your mouth sensuality we think of sensuality as a word meaning like provocative women being sensual in a picture at Victoria's Secret or something like that sensuality also just implies being so titillated by your senses that you'll follow anything but objective truth makes everything subjective to you. If it feels good, you do it. The preacher made you excited that day.

It was a good sermon. And if he didn't, it was a bad sermon. It had nothing to do with if God's truth was preached to you. Mike just read the Word of God. He barely commented on it. It should have affected you.

The problem isn't the Word of God or the messenger. The problem is you. If it's not affecting you. Galatians 5.19 One of the notes that I noticed when I was looking for these verses, you can turn to Colossians 3.5, just a quick survey, is that a lot of times when God lists sins in the Bible, like here's the sins that are going to send you to hell. Here's the sins where you'll inherit the lake of fire.

Here's the things you need to flee from. Sexual immorality is listed first. I'm not going to say that was necessarily some kind of priority. I'm not going to say it wasn't either. I think it's notable. in Colossians 3 verse 5 a chapter that is basically a parallel to Ephesians 5 so if you want to study Ephesians 5 after today look at Colossians 3 as well he says put to death therefore what is earthly in you sexual immorality impurity, passion evil desire and covetousness and again he says which is idolatry on account of these the wrath of God is coming we'll see that in Ephesians 5 again 1 Thessalonians 4 verse 3 everybody wants to know what's the will of God for my life right people are getting magic 8 balls opening fortune cookies they're buying little Joel Osteen things to tell them what the will of God is for them they're sitting there praying asking God for a vision and a word and all these different things so they can know God's will.

And God not only wrote His will, but He has sentences like, this is the will of God. You want to know the will of God, the special will of God for your life? Figure out all the ones He's already revealed generally and start doing those a little bit, and His will will become real clear to you, I promise. He says, for this is the will of God, your sanctification.

And in case anybody's been accosted by some of the recent teaching that sanctification is just this one-time thing where God called you holy in Christ. He's not saying the will of God is that you get saved. He's saying that His will is that you be sanctified. That you are progressively and consistently being made more like Jesus Christ. He says that you abstain from sexual immorality.

And He says that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God. The mark that you're different from the Gentiles is not that you've got a certificate of baptism. That's a mark. But you know what? A lot of Gentiles have that too. one of the ways that we can tell that you're different from non-believers is you control yourself you have the same passions as non-believers you have the same things that can excite you physically as non-believers and you control it by the power of God and the grace of the Holy Spirit enabling you to do so 2 Timothy excuse me I think it's 1 Timothy no sorry this one I lost this one Paul tells Timothy to flee youthful passions, flee youthful lusts.

I don't remember the reference. I remember the verse. What was it? Which book? 2 Timothy 2.22. Point being, that's the command to the young pastor.

Paul doesn't say, hey, you're a young guy, so it's okay that you indulge a little bit in the stuff that the Gentiles do. or you're a young guy. I don't care if you've got kind of a foul mouth as long as you're preaching pretty good. He doesn't say that to him. He tells Timothy, flee youthful passions and he's basically telling him, unless you do all the things I'm telling you to do, people will despise your youth.

When Paul tells Timothy, don't let them despise your youth, he's not telling Timothy to somehow control other people's minds. He's telling him to act in a way so that people don't associate him with just being a youthful idiot. A youthful animal that just follows his own passions. Turn to Jude, verse 7, just one last verse in this section. So in case for a moment you started to think well it not that bad Okay the pastor said that the Bible doesn whisper about it but I still believe Jen Wilkin and the whole lot of people that just copy sermons off each other and online.

God says in verse 7 of Jude, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities... So this is surrounding cities here that got destroyed too. I mean, you forget that. But he says, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire. God will judge fornicators, the effeminate, homosexuals, adulterers.

And we live in a culture where we kind of wink our eye at it. And I get it. It's become normal. All right? Listen to what Spurgeon said. Always shocks me when I read these old guys.

Their wisdom doesn't shock me anymore. I know they're all smarter than we were. It shocks me that they were dealing with some of the same exact issues sometimes that I feel like are somewhat contemporary. But Spurgeon says this, this sin is not uncommon in our day. He says, let our midnight streets and our divorce courts be the witness. Perhaps the saddest proof that society is far from pure is found in the fact that seducers and fornicators, if they be but gentlemen, may enter respectable society.

Brand the miscreants, I say. I'll agree with Spurgeon. He says, if the woman should be shut out as a harlot, what shall be done unto the lustful maker of her and the cherisher of harlots? Most of us go to work every day. We have neighbors, maybe even people you call friends, family members, who, if you implemented the type of ostracization that Spurgeon just outlined, you would lose 80% of the people you know.

If you refuse to employ fornicators, you may have to fire some people once in a while if you own a business. If you refuse to be friends with people that you know indulge in pornography or you know that they're in a relationship that is not a really perverted one, it's heterosexual, they think they love each other, they're going to get married someday and you know that they're doing the wrong thing. If we actually treated people as miscreants, It would change the way that you view things.

But we live in a society where this stuff is so normal that we don't even bat an eye to walk into the mall or the outside part of Easton and to just expect that you're going to see basically naked people almost. And naked in the Bible doesn't... The biblical definition of naked doesn't mean completely unclothed. It's revealing so much that people are saying things they ought not, which is certainly the case.

So back to Ephesians 5. Let's look at this text to try to get the idea now of how serious this is. Hopefully you already believe the Bible shouts about sexual sin. The Bible does not necessarily think it's the worst sin. I'm not saying that. I think it's hard to even argue for worst sin and stuff like that.

But there's a reason in Romans 1 that when you have a society that's filled with utter perversion, that is called God having turned people over to a futile and debased mind. It's not normal. Even pagan societies that flourish at all start with one man and one woman making families and raising kids and trying to be productive and things of that sort. the other thing is a quick side note all these people that want to scream for they'll call it sexual freedom is what they're they'll call it what it is a sexual enslavement but all these people that want to scream for those things what's really interesting is when for the most part except for real perverts like will smith when somebody at least commits the sexual immorality against them they're offended they just want it to be somehow open to everyone Once you stop drawing the biblical lines against these things, there's no line.

There will just be lines that keep moving. It's just how it works. Verse 3 of Ephesians 5. But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you as is proper among saints. If you go back to 1 Corinthians 5, you'll see that Paul rebukes the Corinthians for preaching grace. over a man who was continuously in an improper relationship.

One that was even one Gentiles would have disapproved of in Corinth. And Corinth was a really wicked place. And Paul's telling them, you need to purge the evil from among you. You need to kick that person out and let them know that they are not a part of the church unless they repent. It shouldn't even be named among you. this is why it's a serious thing when you start to hear even rumors about something most of the people in here i like to believe if you know if you found out that a teacher that you watched on tv was was sexually immoral i if you'd stop watching them.

There's no line that won't be crossed eventually. Verse 4, let there be no filthiness, nor foolish talk, nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. It also could be, but instead let there be grace. So if you look back, just one page in my Bible, Ephesians 4.29, let no corrupting talk come out of your mouth. But only such as is good for building up as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.

So he says, let there be no filthiness in verse 4 of Ephesians 5. It's corrupting talk. There's things that we can say. Now, I want to be careful here. There's words that are blasphemous. hopefully according to the third commandment we've all tried to fight that and get rid of it there's also words that are we'll say curse words where it's not quite blasphemy but you're calling a curse on someone it's something only God can do things of that sort where it's being used inappropriately but then there's also words that are just will say filthy.

And if you want a list of them, I can't give you one. Because you know what? The list of filthy words changes all the time from language to language. And if somebody walked in here right now and didn't know the English language and somebody had given them a list of dirty words to say and they said them thinking they were communicating, we wouldn't accuse the person of obscene talk.

Because in and of itself, the word is in itself filthy. It's the person's heart who uses the filthy word that is having the problem. But there are words that in any society people realize this word is a word that is the kind of word people use when they're real angry in a locker room with other men. Or when something really bad happens and then they get angry and they say it.

And most Christians actually have a regret afterwards where they understand it and they know they shouldn't have. that's filthiness it's corrupting communication there are words that maybe you say because you're an adult but if your kids said it you'd tell them it's impolite i don't know why you would say a word that you would tell your kids they can't say why would there be two standards so he says let there be no filthiness among you but then he says nor foolish talk and that one gets a little convicting because as guys sometimes we make a lot of jokes with each other. I know you ladies don't have senses of humor most of the time, but we like to joke with each other and we say a lot of things that sometimes I wonder, is that foolish talk? Is that edifying?

Is that encouraging the saints? And I was thankful for Matthew Henry who said, this is not limiting all joking around with each other and merriment and things of that sort. He said there's a specific kind involved where it's utterly foolish. One of the things I think of is sometimes people will use like an inappropriate voice and like a lisp to sound different.

It's like you're imitating something that is sin. So I don't know if I wanted to find foolish talk for you and I don't think that was the goal of my sermon today. I just wanted to mention it. But crude joking. Crude joking carries with it the connotation of what I will, I'll just say clearly, I think it's pornography. Pornography, the word pornography actually just means sexually immoral something graphic, or we'll say written.

So in our century, when we hear the word pornography, we immediately think of the fact that we have video and we have pictures. And so people are able to produce movies and images of sexual immorality for the perverted pleasure of others. But pornography will also include if you just write a dirty joke. Pornography includes if you open a romance novel and there's a scene in the romance novel that if they made the movie, it would be rated R. and often these books are even more explicit than you could do on a TV or in a movie.

I mention that because there's, as I said earlier, some stereotypes and generalizations. There ladies in the room that probably never go to a dirty website and just watch movies but it is a problem in Christian America that I heard of that there are books galore romance type novels that women read where there is inappropriate descriptions of things that are only appropriate between a husband and wife. These things also, I'll warn you, are in children's books and especially we'll say teenage books probably.

I don't I don't even understand how to do it yet you can't read every single possible book your kid might want to read so there are websites that where people actually review these things and I disagree with a lot of their reviews but there are websites where you can go find out what's in this book you might not like that they still recommend it afterwards I don't excuse me but you can at least find out what's in it so there should be no crude joking this includes making jokes that reference sexual things it also includes listening to those jokes and being entertained by them I just eliminated most TV shows that you can watch now. Some of the most famous TV shows and some of the funniest ones, most of the humor revolved around making jokes that caused you to think about something sexual. You have to be separate.

God says in verse 7 therefore do not become partners with them so if you are somewhere where somebody is telling jokes that are inappropriate you need to be ready not to be entertained by them and I'll tell you it can be difficult because sometimes the joke is actually a funny joke it's the content that was so inappropriate but God says these things are out of place he said instead let there be thanksgiving let there be grace we should be speaking words of grace that edify people that fit the occasion this is difficult you can walk out of most church services and you can feel pretty good about yourself because maybe you don't look at porn or you don't look at porn anymore. Maybe you've been faithful to your one spouse. You've never even entertained another idea or getting a divorce.

But the idea that you've lived in the United States of America for any amount of time and you haven't laughed at an inappropriate joke, that's, they're everywhere. And sometimes you don't even know what it is. You have to be careful when you listen to some of these things because people will make references to things that you don't even know what it is.

I mean, I mentioned Will Smith earlier. God bless you if you have no idea why I did. He's in the news this week. Go figure. The man that told generations of people 30 years ago, your parents just don't understand, and came up with songs including cussing and sexual immorality is now considered a bad example for people. Christians could have told us that in the 80s if we'd have listened. some of you are like the 80s yeah some of us are old enough to remember when Will Smith first came on the scene alright he wasn't even called Will Smith we didn't know his name for a while but anyway it doesn't matter verse 5 in case you were unsure about whether God's serious about sexual immorality or maybe you're thinking well God doesn't like it but it's something he doesn't care if I dabble in it's something I can play around with the grace of Christ covers me, right?

The blood of Christ. He says, for you may be sure of this, everyone who is sexually immoral or impure or who is covetous, that is an idolater, has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Now salvation is by grace through faith alone in Christ alone. Nobody's going to go to heaven because they remained a virgin for a long time. But I'll tell you what, sexually immoral people reveal that they don't know the grace that saves.

It's that simple. And if somebody comes to you and they're sexually immoral, and I'm talking about even the slightest little things they think they're doing, you have no obligation to give that person assurance just because they say, oh no, Jesus paid for my sins. If Jesus paid for their sins, then they would do what the new birth promises in Ezekiel and they would loathe their former selves and they would live a different way now. in case somebody comes along, like Jen Wilkin or J Greer and wants to tell you it no big deal Look at verse 6, let no one deceive you.

It's almost as if God has anticipated all the evil things that people are going to do, so he can warn his people. And we're too busy worrying about celebrity preachers and getting to go touch them or get their autographs on the inside of our Bible, than to actually listen to them with any discernment. Let no one deceive you with empty words. Saying the Bible whispers about sexual sin is textbook definition of empty word.

But he says, but because of these things, the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore, do not become partners with them. Your mouth will condemn you. Remember, I'm not only talking about chastity and purity in your thoughts or in your actions. I'm not accusing anyone in here of having cheated on their spouse. I'm not accusing any of the children of being fornicators today.

Or adults. The dirty mouths will condemn you. Your dirty mouth, as Proverbs 15 taught us, reveals to us your dirty heart. Your dirty heart tells me that you're not pure in heart. And blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. If you're not pure in heart, how are you going to see God?

But just like in 1 Corinthians 6, after Paul declares a number of people to be condemned for their sinfulness and their persistent sinning, sinning. He says in verse 8, for at one time you were darkness. Interesting. He doesn't say you were in darkness. He says for one time you were darkness. But now you are light in the Lord.

1 Corinthians 6, he says and such were some of you. The church is filled with ex-fornicators, homosexuals, adulterers crude talkers, foolish talkers this is why if you know a pastor guy that likes to use crude talk or write crudely even if he says a lot of good things we recommend let's not follow that guy one of the most popular guys right now is Jeff Durbin and Doug Wilson Jeff Durbin makes video after video fighting abortion in very good ways it seems Doug Wilson has written more about the pandemic stuff and he's written more good things about it than a lot of other people and both of them have filthy mouths I'm not calling them not Christian I'm saying they shouldn't be followed they should clean that up according to this verse but God says at one time you were darkness but now you are light in the Lord He says, walk as children of light. Earlier, he says in verse 2, and walk in love as Christ loved us.

Being imitators of God, verse 1. You're a child of God. So you imitate your father. You imitate your elder brother, Jesus Christ, who walked in love. Jesus Christ, too. Every time he opened his mouth, spoke pure words. every time somebody said something inappropriate around Jesus he didn't let it cause him pure thoughts in his own mind and I would guess on many occasions he rebuked the person Jesus Christ who in a society with a harlot scrubbing his feet saw her as a sister didn't think about sex in verse 9 we're told for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true the fruit the result when the light shines so your darkness before if light shined on you, you would just look dirty this is why most people most normal people don't go to church and listen to preaching when they're not a Christian because the light exposes the darkness.

It exposes the dirtiness. But now you come to church and the light of God's word exposes the things in your heart that you decide to repent of. That by the grace of Christ you ask him, take this away from me that I might not think these impure thoughts anymore. And if your problem is that the TV show you watch is really funny and there's good acting and you love the story and you can wait to find out if the guy and the girl get married and all the things that TV shows hook you in with And if you can watch it without becoming a person that in your heart has filthy talk and then maybe it comes out of your mouth once in a while, you need to quit.

Because your holiness is more important. I haven't watched TV in a long enough time to even get an example of whether somebody marries somebody in a show. Okay? you want to protect yourself. You want to protect your ministry. Everyone's a minister here. Don't think otherwise.

You want to protect your family. You want to protect your children. This is not 1922, people. It's not as safe to just go out there as it once was in our country. I cannot remember a song from my youth that wasn't dirty my wife and I will constantly recall a song and we'll realize wow that was dirty how old were we 13 12 our parents were letting us listen to that don't make the same mistake because it gets built into people Paul says try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord it's not a magic thing right I mean if you got a fortune cookie that said try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord that'd be like okay what do I do he literally just told us what's pleasing to him and after this he will tell us what's pleasing to him.

And in 1 Thessalonians 4, he told us what his will is. And he tells us that later in Ephesians 5. He says, this is the will of God. And all throughout the New Testament, there's command after command after command. And some of us are waiting for like a magic thought to pop in our mind so we can know what God would want us to do. And yet he's told us clearly. and Spurgeon said some of you have enough dust on your Bible to write damned with your fingerprint on it you know study it the answers are all here I want you to consider the perfection of Christ whereas you cannot help but hear a dirty joke sometimes and because of your impurity that you still carry in your flesh, you either still think it's funny, even for a moment, or you have to fight that battle.

Like, I don't want to think it's funny. I don't want to laugh. But then you have to fight the battle. Do I say something? Do I risk making this person mad by saying something? Do I risk being seen as the weirdo at work because I tell people to shut up when they say dirty things?

Do I risk being the weirdo in my neighborhood because I won't assent to certain things? Jesus didn't fight those battles. He simply did what was right every single time. And when you die, if you are a Christian, if you have placed your faith and trust that Jesus Christ lived the life that you should have lived, then God will actually reward you in heaven for what he did.

And every single time, let's, for a moment, let's take away all of the sins that you've committed in your body. And just imagine for a moment that Jesus paid for every single impure thought you had, even for a fraction of a second. Even the ones that if I asked you, you'd say, well, I didn't even mean to. It just popped in there. Jesus never had that. And so we can follow his example.

And because you can't do it like he did it, you pray that he would enable you by his grace, by the Holy Spirit's power, to live a life that is pleasing to the Lord. Father in heaven, your word is pure and true, and we are so grateful that you have given it to us. Please grant that we would be cleansed. We think of the prophet Isaiah when he said, I'm a people of unclean lips and I have unclean lips.

And you put the coals on his lips. May the words we speak be gracious and pure. May we find more often than not to speak your word to people. Help us to think your thoughts after you. So that the words from our mouth and the actions of our bodies will be pleasing to you. In Christ's name I pray.

Amen.