Evil attitudes, such as enmity, strife, jealousy, wrath, factions, divisions, sects, and envy, are identified as works of the flesh that hinder spiritual growth and grieve the Holy Spirit. The sermon emphasizes that these attitudes, often rooted in pride and insecurity, are not merely occasional slips but can become strongholds that prevent believers from living a life led by the Spirit. By exposing these sinful attitudes through God's Word and actively putting them to death, Christians can experience freedom from sin's power and become more effective instruments for God's service. The message concludes by highlighting that this process of mortification is unpopular but essential for a Christ-like life and witness.
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Good morning. I noticed as I looked out over the congregation this morning that there were considerably more sisters present than men. That didn't cause me any concern until our brother announced that the ladies would have a Bible study this afternoon and the men would go play golf. Well, I understand. Let's read a short passage in the Word of God and then we'll take a few minutes and do a summary of our work so far and then press forward. Galatians chapter five, reading from verse eighteen.
Galatians five and beginning at verse eighteen. But if ye be led by the Spirit, ye are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these. Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, strife, jealousy, wrath, factions, seditions, heresies, envying, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and the like. Of which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, or faithfulness, meekness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And they that are Christ have crucified the flesh with the affections and lust. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another. Shall we just look to the Lord? Heavenly Father, again, we turn to thee, and we ask this morning that in a special way, thou wilt help us.
The things that we are in need of considering together are very difficult, difficult for me to speak. Difficult for me to hear, and I'm sure difficult for all of my brothers and sisters to hear. And yet, Lord, we would be those who do not skip from one passage to another in Scripture, favoring only those ones that seem to give us a good feeling. But we would be those who are careful to confront all Scripture. And so this morning we ask for special help, and we pray that the Holy Spirit would be the true teacher. and not man. We ask it giving thanks in the worthy and precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Amen. After our decision to face whatever difficult matters we might need to face, which was our first step of the four that we're taking up on these mornings, we thought of a second step, which was to expose our life faithfully and systematically to the searching light of God's Word. And then yesterday we were thinking in some detail about a third step. We said that we must be willing to put to death or mortify the deeds of the body. And I spoke to you a little bit about the difference between confessing the sin into which we might slip and putting to death deeds that really were strongholds of the enemy in our life.
And I gave you two words that might sum up the matter of putting to death deeds of the body or deeds of the flesh. Identify and crucify. Identify being that we might know what God's word has to say about various sins that beset us so that we could identify them. We could speak clearly about them because God would like to speak clearly about them. We could identify them. And again, I remind you that we referred to them as things that might be strongholds in our lives. And then secondly, not only to identify but crucify. And at the end of the hour, I spoke to you a little bit about the significance and choice of that word crucify.
Up home, when I'm encouraging our young people to have a holy life and walk and we deal with this subject of crucify or put to death, I just say it like this to them. say no to sin and then suffer. You know, if you really say no to those things that your old nature enjoys and yet are wrong, it will cause you to suffer. And we need to be right up front about that and not pretend that it's going to be easy. And so that little statement, say no and suffer, is a good thing to remember. That there's nothing wrong if we have a little suffering because... We are saying no to the old nature and yes to God.
And then to help us identify sin, we looked at that list of the works of the flesh in verse nineteen through twenty one, and I broke it down into four major groups, sexual evil, spiritual evil, evil attitudes, and evil or wicked conduct. And I'm sure if you were insightful and paying good attention, you noticed that I skipped kind of quickly over that third group. the evil attitudes well I have to tell you that time has come for us to do the difficult we're going to look at that group of eight evil attitudes or sinful attitudes this morning and we're going to really zero in on them and then thank the Lord we can look at a very happy closing subject in our fourth step tomorrow Lord willing so this morning we just want to go right into that verse nineteen through twenty one and consider those eight attitudes.
Now, let me say this at the beginning. I'm sure there are always some who feel that, you know, let's not look on the gloomy side. We have enough trouble in the world without being confronted with gloomy things, especially gloomy things about ourselves. After all, doesn't the Scripture say forgetting those things that are past? And if we're supposed to forget them, let's forget them. And let's not get too introspective here and be poking around in our lives. Let's forget about ourselves and our problems. Well, let me tell you, I have no desire to go searching through the past and dredge up old things that are long gone. If it's under the blood of Christ, leave it there.
But you know, there are Christians for whom these things are not the past. They live with these things every day today. In other words, these are present strongholds of the enemy in their life. And so as we desire to be led by the Spirit, we have to deal with things that perhaps grieve and quench him and prevent him from effectively leading us. And so I stress again then that we want to look at these things and when we cover these eight, there will be a number of them, hopefully all of them, but many of them. which you could honestly say of your own life and walk, yes, perhaps once in a great while I might slip into that attitude, but it certainly could not be called a stronghold in my life.
Well, just thank God and sit quietly and take a little rest, because you may be sure that the Spirit of God may be putting his finger in the heart of someone who has not only an occasional problem there, but who must honestly say that is a stronghold in my life. of the old nature. I was thinking earlier this morning about the situation that we face from time to time, I'm sure every one of us, where we have to visit the doctor. And you folks here perhaps know a fair amount about that, yourselves and your loved ones. It seems like today everybody has to see their doctor. And I guess we all know that we want to have, above everything else, a doctor who is competent.
One thing we don't want to do is to go to a doctor when there is a very serious problem and have him just put a band-aid over the top and say, there, I've covered it up. Now you can't see it, so you go home and just relax. That doesn't give you a comfortable feeling, does it? If you go to see the doctor and he says, well, you know, I've just put a band-aid over it and we won't see it. No, you want a doctor who has to say, we're going to get to the bottom of this so we can treat it and so you can be well. Well, we need to have that same kind of attitude as we face God's Word. So without further ado then, let's go on and let me tell you what plan I hope to follow this morning.
I hope to just simply give you a definition of each of these words, one or two scriptures that you might write down and look up. I don't think we'll look up any of them this morning. Perhaps we'll look up just one that's very important. But a definition a couple of scriptures and maybe a couple of comments about it just for fun before we begin let me ask you a question how many of you have ever let's say in the past five years have remember hearing a careful explanation of the works of the flesh in Galatians five nineteen through twenty one let me see your hands okay no one how about as long as you can remember how many of you remember in hearing a message on that subject?
Can I see your hands? All right, a few. I think that probably underscores the importance of doing a study like this this morning. So let's begin in verse, actually verse twenty. You'll notice there the first two, idolatry and sorcery. We dealt with them yesterday and then the first one of our eight attitudes is hatred. Now I recognize that a number of new translations have different words here. And so what I'm going to give you is the word that I think most nearly describes the Greek word. In other words, whatever English word I think is the best word that you might find there.
And some of you will find that's the word in your translations. Other ones will be just a shade different. But certainly there's no error here or mistake. It's just shades of meaning. Now the word here, hatred, It's really the word enmity, E-N-M-I-T-Y, enmity. Let me give you a definition of that. A deep-seated unfriendliness accompanied by readiness to quarrel or fight. A deep-seated unfriendliness accompanied by the readiness to quarrel or fight. This is the word that was used or the thought that was used in Genesis when God said he would put enmity between the seed of the serpent and the woman.
I was interested just recently. I discovered in Ezekiel twenty-five that many, many years later, God goes to deal with the Philistines and he says, because of the old hatred or the old enmity that exists between the Philistines and the children of Israel. You get the picture of something that's kind of just simmering and bubbling away below the surface. Kind of a long-held grudge or hard feeling. Ready to flare up in a moment, but perhaps just held in check. Enmity. You remember the other morning we spoke about from Romans chapter eight, and we read there that the carnal mind is enmity against God.
That's the word. The carnal mind has a deep-seated unfriendliness toward God. and is ready to quarrel at the moment's notice. Now, you know, that's true. Some people, when you speak about certain doctrines or things that are commanded in Scripture, they rationalize and they reinterpret and they have problems and all the rest. They don't recognize that the old man just bristles when God speaks, and it makes them uncomfortable. And that deep-seated enmity comes to the surface. Do you know anyone? of whom it may be said that you have to walk on eggshells when you're around them.
That's the kind of a person we're talking about. They could be your friend and pretty good to get along with as long as you see it and do it their way and you're very careful. Every word has to be chosen and measured. You like walk on eggshells because if you don't, there could be trouble. Enmity. The second word is strife. It means, or it's defined as angry contention, any contest for advantage or superiority. In Proverbs twenty-eight and verse twenty-five, the wise man says, He that is of a proud heart stireth up strife.
Another way of translating that word is argue. Arguments. pride is the root or the source. Because there is pride in the heart, the person seeks to have a position, whatever that position might be. They seek to be recognized always and given the proper position. And if you don't recognize them or give them their position that they seek, very quickly you'll get an argument or a quarrel or a fight, strife. You know, if Any of us might identify that as being a stronghold of our old nature. We might go back and ponder over Second Peter chapter one and verse nine.
It says there that some have forgotten that they were purged from their old sins. As long as we remember, all I am is a sinner saved by grace. I don't deserve any position or special merit or anything. I am just a sinner saved by the grace of God. Why I can walk humbly when every one of my brothers and sisters, there'll be no strife. But as soon as I forget that and think that I'm somebody special, strife is going to come in because pride brings it. And so let me remind you of one other scripture, First Corinthians chapter three and verse three. I think that would be the one that we should turn to and look at because it contains three of our words this morning.
First Corinthians chapter three and verse three. I Corinthians chapter three and verse three. Paul here is describing the carnal Christian and he says, For ye are yet carnal, for whereas there is among you envying and strife and divisions, are ye not carnal and walk as men? Incidentally, that first word should be jealousy, not envy, but jealousy. And I'll explain that more in just a moment. Paul says, while there is jealousy, and here's our word, strife and divisions, are you not carnal?
Now, this is a very helpful progression for us to learn. If you work with people in any way, if you counsel or even listen to people in their troubles, remember First Corinthians three, three, because it helps us to understand what really happens. It begins in the heart with jealousy, and because it's in the heart, no one can see it. It goes on if it's not cared for and manifests itself in argumenting, strife, verbal fighting. If it's still not dealt with and cared for, it ends in division. Someone says, well, if that's the way you feel, I'll go my way and you go your way. And there's a division. Now, this is what happens in divorce.
When you see a division anywhere in the things of God, you can go to this passage and you can... Think backwards from the division that you see, and you know there must have been strife. And before the strife, there was jealousy. And Scripture puts its light on that. It's very helpful to us in counseling people. Well, let's go on to our third word. The third word is jealousy. Now, this is the Greek word zealos. Zealos. When it's used in a good sense, it's translated zeal. So, for example, when it says of the Lord Jesus, the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up, it's jealousy in a godly sense.
Zeal, good zealos. But when the word is used such as it is here in verse twenty, the definition is a fear or suspicion of being displaced by a rival in affections or favors. fear or suspicion of being displaced by a rival in affections or favors. Jealousy is very different from envy. Now, envy is the eighth word in our list, so I'll leave that one. But let's think about jealousy. We just looked at First Corinthians three and three, and that was the first word in the list, jealousy. You remember in Acts chapter seven, in verse nine, we read there that the patriarchs moved with envy, actually the word is zealos, jealousy, the patriarchs moved with jealousy, sold their brother Joseph into Egypt.
Now just take that definition and think back about what Joseph's brothers did to him, kind of fit it in there and see if it isn't just a good illustration of this word. His brothers had a fear or suspicion of being displaced by a rival in affection or favors. Is that exactly what happened? Remember the father made the coat of many colors and said, this is my favorite son. And they were very jealous. They were very jealous of him, and they hated him. James chapter three in verse sixteen says, where jealousy and strife are, there is confusion and every evil work.
What's the problem here with jealousy? This is a person who worries about being rejected. And usually when a person is worried about being rejected by their friends, they are insecure in their relationship with Christ. One of the things that we have tried to teach our children up home, I mean my own children, our family, my wife and I have tried to teach them is that if you know that you are loved and accepted by the Lord Jesus and your relationship is secure with him, it isn't going to bother you a lot if somebody doesn't like you. Isn't that true? And sometimes the kids will come home and they'll say, you know, Dad, everybody wears these, whatever it is.
And then I say, now, what do you think that should tell me? And they'll kind of, they know, they know. Kind of shuffle around and say, I know, I know. That doesn't make it right. That's what you're going to say, isn't it, Dad? That's true. But, I was pleased one time because my son did say more than that. He said, everybody does this, whatever it was, but he said, I don't need to do it. I don't need to do it. The Lord takes me the way I am. I was glad to hear that. And you see, a person who is secure in their relationship with Christ, now it doesn't mean they're odd or weird or they have to just be a social misfit, but it just means that when they face rejection over Christ, you know, little attitudes or behaviors or dress or whatever, it doesn't devastate them.
And so a person then who gets jealousy, jealous, is suspicious that someone else will come in and have affection where they should have it all. Number four, the word is wrath or literally anger. Rass is not found in this list. The Greek word orgase. This is the word sumos. Rass, excuse me, anger. And anger is a pretty common emotion. Let me give you the definition. A feeling of sudden strong displeasure and antagonism directed against the cause of an assumed wrong or injury.
Let me read that again. A feeling of sudden strong displeasure and antagonism directed against the cause of an assumed wrong or injury. So you remember when the Lord Jesus stood up in the synagogue in Luke chapter four and he read certain things and applied them to himself and the multitude was so angry, that's the word that's used, that they wanted to throw him over the cliff. Or in Acts chapter nineteen when Paul and Silvanus were being a threat to the silversmiths and the whole mob rushed into the amphitheater there and they were so angry. That's the word. A sudden, strong displeasure and antagonism against the source of the cause of an assumed wrong or injury.
What's the problem here with anger? We're not talking about a righteous anger that comes up because of sin and is held in a proper attitude in heart. We're talking about a sinful anger that loses control and proceeds from the flesh. What's the problem here? I like what Bill Gothard had to say about this word. I heard it many years ago. He said, the problem here is that the proud person has many unyielded rights in their life. You know, most of the time when we get angry, if you think about it, we have some rights that we think we have that somebody has transgressed. And that's my right.
And if you step on that, it makes me angry. We need to be careful to think just as, Again, sinners saved by grace. How many rights do we have? So a proud person showing unyielded rights. Rights that have not been yielded to Christ. Now in the next three, five, six, and seven, the next three words kind of go together. And we'll treat them together. Factions, divisions, and sects, or heresies. I want you to notice that these next three are not only attitudes, but they're also results that are brought on by these attitudes.
In other words, a factious spirit will result in a faction. A divisive spirit will result in a division and so on. But let's think about them together. What is a factious person? The person who operates within and in opposition to a larger group. for their own selfish ends. A person who operates within but in opposition to a larger group for their own selfish ends. I like the reference Philippians two and three here because Paul uses this word and he says, let nothing be done through, now in mine it says strife, but the Greek word erysia is this word.
Let nothing be done through a factious spirit. In other words, to translate it for our thinking, don't do anything that you do as a Christian. Let none of your service be done with an ulterior motive that self is going to benefit most. That shouldn't be the motive. That's an unacceptable motive for Christian service. What am I going to get out of it? You know, a good example of the person with a factious spirit who operated in a group but in opposition to the group because he was selfish. You know who that was. Judas. That was Judas. This person is self-serving, self-serving.
Number six, divisions. I think the word in the King James says seditions, very much the same, divisions. The word means separation through discord. Separation through discord. If the factious person was self-serving, this person is self-righteous. It literally means the word means to stand apart. I cannot stand with you. I must stand over here by myself because I am better than you and I don't want to contaminate myself with you. So I'll stand over here apart. And yes, that results in a division, but well, you know, that's all right. one who stands apart. Now, if the factious person is self-serving, the divisive person is self-righteous.
Self-righteous. You remember we looked up First Corinthians three, three. That's the third word. The Greek word is the third word. Jealousy leads to strife, leads to division. Number seven, sects, S-E-C-T-S, sects or heresies. Peter speaks about Second Peter two one Peter speaks about those who will bring in destructive heresies a heretical or a sectarian spirit definition of this word is that one who emphasizes differences now you have to be careful that definition it's not all that clear there are differences let's not pretend that we're some kind of ecumenical souls and we throw out the truth in order all get together into one happy conglomeration, not at all.
There are differences, and some differences should separate us. We as Christians stand for, for example, the absolute inspiration and authority of Scripture, every word, every letter of it. Now that's our stand, and we wouldn't compromise that just because somebody said, well, you know, if we're all going to get together, you're going to have to drop your belief there. We wouldn't compromise that for a minute. But the point is, the person with this spirit searches for and emphasizes and plays up small differences. In other words, they kind of enjoy finding what there is that we can say separates us. Instead of a desire that we might be unified, they enjoy just the opposite.
The first was self-serving. The second is self-righteous. This person is self-willed. It's often used in connection with false doctrine. emphasizing and bringing in and laboring only one side of the truth, a lopsided thinker. A person has a problem with submission to authority. Let's look at our last word. Number eight, envy. The definition of envy is a feeling of resentment over another's superior attainment endowments or possessions.
A feeling of resentment over another person's superior attainments, endowments or possessions. You remember in Matthew twenty seven and verse eighteen, Pilate knew that the reason why the chief priest delivered up our Lord, what it says there, he knew that they had delivered him for envy. That's the word that's used. This word, envy. Now think of that. A feeling of resentment. Those chief priests were very resentful against our Lord, weren't they? And why? Because of another's superior attainment, endowments, possessions. Our Lord, he had a character, a power in his words.
He did mighty miracles. He obviously knew God and knew what he spoke about. The people acclaimed him. The chief priests were very envious. So there's a difference then between jealousy and envy. Let me give you jealousy again, the fear or suspicion of being displaced by a rival. See, jealousy focuses on what I have that I might lose. Envy focuses on what the other person has that I wish I had. What's the problem here? This is a serious word. This word presents to us a serious problem because it means one who is bitter or resentful against God.
God made a mistake because he gave that person such and such and he didn't give it to me. And I resent that. God was wrong. Now that's an awful thing, isn't it? That any Christian might even be tempted to be envious or resent God because God didn't do what I think he should have done in my life? Well, I hope that as we've gone through that list, you've been listening carefully to any word that God the Holy Spirit might have said in your heart. I want to tell you that it has not been easy for me to go through that list with you. It has not been easy for me to go through that list in my own personal study.
But I want to conclude this morning by making four observations, and that will close our study of the third point, mortifying the deeds of the flesh and then tomorrow we can start with a clean slate and look at our last point and I'm not even going to tell you what it is but it's a very happy one and it's the one we've all been waiting for let me make four observations here just to conclude after we studied that list of the attitudes of the flesh as we did just a moment ago we can now see why carnality or self-centeredness remains in many people, or sad to say, many local churches, assemblies, for long years, can't we?
Because it does not take place in gross sin, but in attitudes. See? We now understand why carnality can exist and go on for years in certain people and even in groups. Because it's not something that we would quickly discipline and say, aha, you stole or you committed adultery or you killed someone. We have to really deal with that. It goes on in little underlying attitudes in our relationships and it poisons relationships, doesn't it? and yet God would have us deal with it.
Second observation, someone might say, you know, after listening to that, if the flesh, the old nature, is in an unsaved person, and it might also, or it does exist in Christians, and a Christian might even have a stronghold of one of these things in their life, like maybe I do, someone might say, how do I know I'm just not an unsaved person? How do I know I'm not just lost? Well, now, of course, we do not establish the fact that we are saved because of some attitude that may or may not exist. If you're putting your faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, if you're trusting his finished work and you have received him into your heart by faith, then you are saved.
And we're talking about something here that has to do with our daily walk, not our security in Christ. But I think nevertheless, it's worth pointing out that the attitude of a saved person and the attitude of a lost person toward what the scripture reveals or what the Holy Spirit reveals about their life is very different, isn't it? When a Christian is faced by the Spirit of God with something like this in their life, their attitude is or should be one of deep sorrow, grieved over sin. Yes, it is true and it grieves me.
And I pray God that He'll help me. What is the unsafe person? Hey, that's the way I am. Take it or leave it. See, no sorrow. That's the way I am. You don't like it. It's tough. Very different attitude. And so if we find it necessary then to go to a brother or sister and say, listen, I have to face you with something here that's really that's really hurting your testimony and has hurt me. We should expect to encounter an attitude very much like the Apostle Paul in Romans seven when he says, oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? And if we encounter an attitude that says, hey, don't pry in my business.
Who are you to come to me? Quit prying in my life. That's the way I am. That's a frightening response from one who would be called a child of God. So secondly, the way which a person responds to what the Word of God exposes in their life is very telling. Thirdly, let me say this as a practical application. If the Spirit of God is not free to lead us forward in putting to death, the deeds of the flesh and allowing the life of Christ to be manifested in us I don't think he could be too excited about using us in service one of the marks of a true servant is not only somebody who could do good works but somebody who can face sin in their own life and when they meet it anywhere else so let me say that one again then we'll move on to the last one if the Holy Spirit is not free in helping us put to death the deeds of the flesh and allowing the life of the Lord Jesus to be manifest.
If he's not free to do that, I really don't think he's too excited about using us as instruments of service. And I have told again and again in our leadership training classes up home, I have told our young couples who lead, you ought to have a red light that goes on. You ought to see warning sirens in your ministry. When you talk to somebody about something in their life that is hurting their testimony and hurting God's people, in other words, a stronghold, let's face what it is, a stronghold, you ought to see real danger signs when you speak to somebody about a stronghold of sin in their life and they immediately talk to you and change the subject about all they do, all the service and the works and the effort that they spend.
That ought to be a danger signal to us. Now, am I minimizing godly service? I am not. But service ought never be a smokescreen to cover the development of character. And you could see that all the way through the life and ministry of the Lord Jesus as he worked with his disciples. He never allowed service to cover character development. Let's do the last one. The mortification process, or that putting to death of the flesh process, is not popular. It's not comfortable. Look down at Galatians chapter five and verse eleven.
Paul says, And I, brethren, if I yet preach circumcision, why do I yet suffer persecution? Notice, then is the offense of the cross ceased. Notice the expression, the offense of the cross. Some people think that that verse applies to unsaved people when you preach the gospel to them. Well, it does. The cross has an offense. And people get offended by the preaching of the cross. That's true. But that verse also can apply to the Christian. There's an offense to the cross that God would have that deed of my old nature put away and crucify. There's an offense to that. And it is not popular, this whole matter of mortifying.
You know, no one will ever come up to you in the world and say, you know, I think it's so special that you're developing a holy life and walk. Nobody is ever going to do that. Nobody will ever commend you because you're developing a holy life and walk. So we have to do it because God wants us to. And then that removes those barriers, you see, that keep the Holy Spirit from really working in power. Let's pray. Our Father, we thank thee again that thou hast enabled us by thy grace to take a careful look at some difficult words. We thank thee, our Father, for...
the Spirit of God who would face us with these things, not to break us or discourage us, but indeed that we may be more effective in our work and in our witness. We long for the life of the Lord Jesus, our Savior, to be manifest in us and through us. We pray that thou will help us because we have studied together this morning thy word and that we may be willing to submit to thy help in this very matter. I commit, Lord, these people here who have been so gracious and patient to listen to these hard things and ask that thou bless them abundantly.
We thank thee for them, each one. Grant them a good day and go with them. Bring us back together again tonight, we pray, according to thy will. We ask it giving thanks in the Lord Jesus' name. Amen.