I don’t know about you but if there’s one thing I hate, it’s when someone comes along and upsets my apple cart. I have this plan to do this to achieve this and someone comes along and forces a change in my plans, ooh how I hate that.

So what do you have planned for today, for tomorrow, the next day, the next week, the next month? We all have hopes and dreams and plans, how we see the future, what we have to look forward to plays a really important part in how much we enjoy our lives today doesn’t it?

This morning I got up and I looked at my diary, for a change things were pretty clear, normally I have a lot of things in my diary, the reason is that I had planned ahead. So preparing radio programs I normally have several solid blocks of time blocked out in my diary during the week to do that. Time in the studio, meetings, admin stuff at the office, perhaps the odd catch up with a friend, men’s group Friday mornings but this morning it was pretty clear.

So after a time with the Lord I sat down to start putting some thoughts together for another radio program but yesterday, yesterday I had a list of twenty-seven items to get through. Got through about half of them which is not bad but in the middle of some really important stuff off goes Skype on my desktop. It was one of our team calling from Africa.

Now I hadn’t spoken with Joseph for a couple of weeks and I really wanted to talk to him but part of me was well, not now, I got annoyed or agitated because I had all these things planned for today and yet now I was being interrupted and it was going to cost me a half an hour to an hour of my time.

Of course I chatted with him and it was great but it’s that reaction of having your plans interrupted that’s the really interesting bit. I’m sure you’ve experienced it too, really good plans and then someone comes along and interrupts them. It happens in the small day-to-day things and it happens too in the bigger things of life.

The plan to get married, to have children, to find somewhere to live, perhaps to buy a house. The plan we have in our minds for our finances and for our careers and for our retirement and for our children, for our families. Time and time and time again those plans get turned on their head as other things, other people demand that they be changed. How do you react to that when that happens, huh?

We’ve been chatting over the last week about the idea of following Jesus with confidence. There are plenty of things that come along and shake our confidence in Him day-to-day and one of those things is when our good and Godly and well-meaning plans are turned upside down on their heads.

We kind of react with shock, hang on, what’s going on? I had things all planned out and now this, really? That can’t be right. Maybe I was heading in the wrong direction in the first place. And then that sense of ‘Maybe I had it wrong’ shakes your confidence a bit. Would it surprise you to know that you’re not the only one who’s been in that place, have a listen to this, it comes out of the Book of Acts in the New Testament, chapter 16, verse 6, the Book of Acts, it’s about the Apostle Paul’s ministry journey:

They went through the region of Phrygia and Galatia having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia. When they had come opposite Mysia they attempted to go into Bithynia but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them. So passing by Mysia they went down to Troas.

During the night Paul had a vision, there stood a man of Macedonia pleading with him, ‘Come over to Macedonia and help us.’ When he had seen the vision we immediately tried to cross over to Macedonia being convinced that God had called us to proclaim the good news to them.

Now did you notice in there twice, not once but twice we’re told that God Himself stopped Paul and his team from following their plans? Now listen, I’m sure they sat down, they’d thought about it, they’d prayed about it, they planned, they were strategic, they were convinced to go and proclaim the Good News of Jesus in Asia and yet they couldn’t because they’d been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the Word in Asia.

We don’t find out how that happened, perhaps Paul had another really sharp dream in the night or perhaps one of their team with the spiritual gift of prophecy stood up and said so. Perhaps they had been praying together and all of a sudden a few of them just got that really sharp check in the spirit about going to Asia or maybe there was some physical blockage stopping them from going. Whatever it was the Holy Spirit forbade them to go there contrary to their initial plans.

And the second time they tried to go to Bithynia but the Spirit of Jesus this time did not allow them to go. Was there some physical obstacle? Was it a sense of spiritual discernment? Again we’re not told but again the Holy Spirit blocked their way.

I was reading a great blog post Finding My Keys by a guy called Luke Collings where he writes this:

The role of the Holy Spirit in the life of a Christian is often portrayed as overwhelmingly positive, that is the Spirit enables the Christian to live in a manner of which they are incapable while they were still under sin. They can be obedient by the Spirit, Romans 8:4, they can understand the things of God, 1 Corinthians 2:12, they can overcome the desires of the body, Galatians 5:16, I could go on and on. The contemporary word to describe the Spirits effect on the Christian life is ’empowerment’.

Well put. In our contemporary social context of individualism and self it’s easy to get only half of the view of the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Almost as though the Spirit is there to serve us rather than the other way around. Of course God is our helper but He’s also our King. Of course Jesus is our Saviour but He’s also our Lord and it’s that second part of the equation that we miss at our peril.

Luke Collings goes on to say this:

What we see instead is the Holy Spirit is more than just ministry rocket fuel, the Spirit is the one who opens and closes doors for the Gospel to spread. The Spirit just doesn’t empower but He directs and He enables mission. Those engaged in preaching of Jesus learn from Acts chapter 16 that they are not the captain and the navigator of their own course. Those jobs are firmly in God’s hands.

So the next time God slams a door shut in your face this wouldn’t be a bad thing to remember. At the end of the day it’s not my plan or your plan that’s important, it’s God’s plan because He sees the whole picture.

Notice with Paul both times God slammed the door shut, God lead them to a different direction. The direction that He would have them go was to speak the Gospel to the people that He would have them speak to. As well as the no’s there was a strong positive yes as during the night Paul had that vision:

There stood a man from Macedonia pleading with him saying, ‘Come over to Macedonia and help us.’

When he’d seen that vision they immediately crossed over to Macedonia being convinced that God had called them to proclaim the Good News over there. See God leads us in all sorts of different ways, sometimes by closing this door and then a little while later flinging open some other door that you and I would never have even dreamed of knocking on.

That change of plan, sure our natural reaction sometimes is to wonder why, our natural reaction is to have our confidence shaken but the whole point of what we’re talking about today on the program is learning to follow Jesus with confidence. The next time a door slams unexpectedly shut in your face may the Holy Spirit dust this little chat of ours off and bring it back into your recollection.

A change of plans doesn’t mean something has gone wrong. A change of plans doesn’t mean you’ve done something wrong because God is still on the throne and He really does know what He’s doing.

None of us likes a sudden change of plan, we don’t like it much when our plan is to go this way but then something or someone forces us to go that way. We don’t even like it when it’s a good change at first but how about a bad change, how about when the change of plans is caused by satan himself?

Now you may have heard me talk recently about the fact that sometimes God changes our plans. We’re chugging along, we have plans for today and the rest of the week and in fact for the rest of our lives if the truth be known and sometimes God comes along and completely turns things upside down.

Now you’d think wouldn’t you that if it was God, hey we’d be all for it, go for it God. Yeah, well sometimes we come to that conclusion eventually and yet other times it’s like God has to drag us kicking and screaming in the direction that He’s planned for us. Have a listen to this from the missionary journey of the Apostle Paul in case you missed it last time. It’s out of the Book of Acts in the New Testament chapter 16:

They went through the region of Phrygia and Galatia having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia. When they had come opposite Mysia they attempted to go into Bithynia but the spirit of Jesus didn’t allow them to. So passing by Mysia they went down to Troas.

During the night Paul had a vision, there stood a man from Macedonia pleading with him saying ‘Come over to Macedonia, help us.’ When he had seen the vision we immediately tried to cross over to Macedonia being convinced that God had called us to proclaim the good news to them.

So there you have it. Twice Paul was prevented from going where he planned, once to Asia, a second time to Bithynia and yet God had a positive alternative plan for him and his team.

The initial shock and horror that we experience when someone changes our plans, in this case when God changes our plans, which clearly He does sometimes, shouldn’t rock our confidence. Think about it, sometimes a two-year old might have a really, really good plan to cross over that busy freeway but dad, fortunately, has an alternate plan. It’s the same with God.

But what about when it’s not God who changes our plans but satan himself, then what? Well for most of us that really rocks us to the core. There have been times when I’ve had some really good and Godly plans, I mean really good stuff to bless other people and something terrible happens.

An argument breaks out in the ministry team, someone undermines you, perhaps someone makes false accusations against you and this good and Godly plan that you just had goes up in a puff of smoke. If you’ve ever had that happen to you you’ll know that it’s just really the most painful thing, it knocks the stuffing out of us because, well doesn’t the Bible tell us to put our confidence in God, doesn’t it speak of God’s power and compassion and victory over the devil?

How is it that evil can win the day when the Bible says this, Deuteronomy chapter 20, verses 1 to 4:

When you go out to war against your enemies and see horses and chariots and an army larger than your own you shall not be afraid of them for the Lord your God is with you, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt and when you draw near to the battle the priest shall come forward and speak to the people and he shall say to them, ‘Hear O Israel, today you are drawing near for a battle against your enemies, let not your heart grow faint. Do not fear of panic or be in dread of them for the Lord your God is he who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to give you the victory.’

See that’s not an isolated quote, the Bible talks about victory over and over again, about God giving us victory over our enemies and over satan. James chapter 4, verse 7:

Submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil and he will flee from you.

So okay, but what happens when the devil doesn’t flee? What happens when he seems to have the upper hand? What happens when the wicked people around us seem to win against the good and Godly plans and intentions of our hearts? Then what? Well if that’s ever happened to you then you’re not alone. Have a listen to this, again it’s from the experience of the Apostle Paul in ministry, 1 Thessalonians chapter 2, verse 17 to 20: 

As for us brothers and sisters when for a short time we were made orphans by being separated from you, in person not in heart, we longed with great eagerness to see you face to face. For we wanted to come to you, certainly I, Paul wanted to come again and again but satan blocked our way. For what is our hope or our joy or our crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus is coming? Isn’t it you, yes you are our glory and our joy.

Who prevented Paul from going to see his friends in Thessalonica? Satan did, he blocked Paul’s way. Does Paul seem to be at all fazed by that? Not at all. He goes right on and talks about the glory of God. It’s almost as though he sees this as a normal part of doing business in the Kingdom of God.

And what about Jesus? When He was nailed there on the cross didn’t it look as though the enemy had won? Didn’t Jesus look like the vanquished and satan like the victor? And yet the Bible says this of this brutal love transaction on the cross, Colossians chapter 2, verses 13 to 15:

And when you were dead in trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh God made you alive together with him when he forgave us all our trespasses erasing the record that stood against us with its legal demands. He set it aside nailing it to the cross, he disarmed the rulers and the authorities and he made a public example of them, triumphing over them in it.

In other words what appeared to be a great loss was in fact a great victory, a victory so great that Jesus disarmed the rulers and the authorities, satan and his armies, and made a public spectacle of them and triumphed over them.

Do you recall the thorn that Paul had in his flesh, the one that he asked God to remove three times but God wouldn’t? Do you remember what he called that thorn? 2 Corinthians chapter 12, verses 7 to 10:

Therefore to keep me from being too elated a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ So I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses so the power of Christ may dwell in me.

Therefore I am content with weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and calamities for the sake of Christ for whenever I’m weak then I am strong.

You’re going to see this over and over again in Scripture, we see the situations and the circumstances where the devil seems to have gotten the upper hand, he thinks he has the upper hand and yet God’s always in control, God’s grace is always sufficient for the situation for you. It was true back then, my friend it’s true today.

Just because satan appears to have the upper hand in a particular situation or skirmish it doesn’t mean that God has lost the plot, it doesn’t mean that satan is winning, it doesn’t mean that God’s grace isn’t sufficient for you in that place. Look at Paul’s reaction to the fact that he’s going to have to live with this messenger of satan in his flesh:

So I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions and calamities for the sake of Christ for whenever I’m weak then I’m strong.

Hallelujah! Satan is purely a tool in God’s hand, nothing more nothing less. He is a subject of the sovereign power of God as you or I or any other creature in creation and as the wise old King Solomon wrote in Proverbs chapter 24, verses 19 to 20:

Don’t fret because of evil doers, do not envy the wicked for the evil have no future, the lamp of the wicked will go out.

My friend your God’s in control, your King reigns, your future is bright and nothing, no deception that satan can conjure up will ever change that, nothing. It’s why this is called the Good News.

Have you ever lost your way in life? Not in some major way, just sort of chugging along through life and then somehow you get this feeling that maybe, just maybe you’re not quite where you’re meant to be, things just don’t make sense the way they used to.

If you’ve ever had that nagging suspicion that things aren’t quite right in your life then you’re not alone, it’s something we all experience from time to time. We don’t think about it but in a very real sense for most of us life follows a pretty familiar well-worn trail. We’re born, we go to school, we become adults, we marry, we have children, they go to school, they grow up and eventually we die.

I know it’s a bit of an over simplification and I know a good many people don’t quite follow every step of that path and I know there are many twists and turns and variations on that theme but for most of us that pretty much sums it up. Along the way we go through times of great joy, times of great sadness and long periods of the mundane same old same old.

Our emotions go up, our emotions go down, our fortunes go up, our fortunes go down but we’re born, we bring children into the world, we die. That’s the basic template on which the survival of the human race depends. So you’re following along this path through life and at some stage perhaps you encounter Jesus and you decide to walk the rest of your journey with Him, where He leads, according to His plans, according to His purposes for your life.

Some people find that notion a bit depressing, I used to tell you the truth but these days it is singly the most liberating thing about my life. To be able to live out the plans and purposes for my life that God Himself dreamed up before time began. I have to tell you that is just unreal.

But I, like the next person, sometimes get into those patches in life where I wonder ‘Am I in the right place? Am I doing what I was made to do and is all this stuff that’s going on around me making sense?’ I wonder, where are you at right now? In an up, in a down, in one of those long periods of the boring mundaneness of life, the same day after day? Are you in place of contentment knowing that you’re on the right path or are you kind of wondering where it’s all headed?

In the army I spent ten years as a military officer. When we were training for war they taught us about the concept, the idea of what’s called The Fog Of War. It’s this idea that when you’re fighting a battle you’re enveloped in a kind of fog. Part of that fog is that you don’t have all the information you needed about your enemy, how strong he is, how many troops and tanks he has, how well-trained he is, what his morale is like, what his plans are, what his tactics are.

Part of it is that your enemy deliberately tries to feed you misinformation to deceive you, part of it is that you’re tired, exhausted often, afraid, your morale might be down. Your troops their morale is up and down and then when the bullets start flying and the artillery shells start exploding around you it’s like you’re in this fog, a stupor and making really good, well-informed decisions can be very, very difficult. That’s what this idea The Fog Of War is all about.

In a very real sense we sometimes operate in a bit of a fog too in our lives. Our emotions play havoc with us. People are having a go and we don’t understand their motives, their intentions and we don’t know if we can trust them and God, well what about Him? What exactly are His plans? Am I in the right place, am I doing the things I’m meant to be doing? Maybe I’ve taken a wrong turn and it’s in this fog that we can start questioning God’s faithfulness, it’s in this fog that we start second guessing God and ourselves.

We like to think we have it all together, we’d like to think we know where life is headed but all too often we either haven’t got a clue or we thought we did but well, we’re not really sure we do anymore.

I was having a coffee with a man who works for a large corporation who thought he knew what his life was about. But his health was failing him and deep down he had a sneaking suspicion that God had a different plan, he just didn’t quite know what that plan was. Do you relate to some of that? There seems to be a gap between our present circumstances and what we think the future might be about.

Right now we’re in the middle of a series called Following Jesus With Confidence and the reason we’re talking about this stuff today is that when we’re enveloped in this fog it’s hard to be confident. The thing about this fog is that it limits our field of vision so it’s easy, really easy to take a wrong step.

But I believe that God wants you and me to have confidence in Him even when we’re in the middle of this fog of war as I’ve called it, in fact especially then. When you think about it it’s when things run clear that we really need God because His field of vision is never ever limited by a single thing.

The first thing we need to know when we’re wandering through a bit of a fog in life is that God is faithful. He’s not angry, He’s not disappointed with us, He’s like a loving Father keen to see His child learn, keen to help His child through the fog. His love in that fog, His faithfulness in that fog is rock solid.

King David had more enemies than most of us. He went through many trials in his life and so many of the Psalms that he wrote he’s pouring his heart out to God in the midst of the fog of war. Listen to this, Psalm 86, verses 1 to 7:

Incline your ear O Lord and answer me for I am poor and needy. Preserve my life for I am devoted to you so save your servant who trusts in you. You’re my God, be gracious to me O Lord for to you I cry all day long. Gladden the soul of your servant for to you O Lord I lift up my soul.

For you O Lord are good and forgiving and abounding in steadfast love to all who call on you. Give ear O Lord to my prayer, listen to my cry of supplication. In the day of my trouble I call on you for you will answer me.

And towards the end of that Psalm, based on his past experiences David concludes this, Psalm 86, verses 14 to 17:

O God the insolent rise up against me, a band of ruffians seeks my life and they do not set you before them. But you O Lord are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. Turn to me and be gracious to me, give your strength to your servant, show me a sign of your favour so that those who hate me may see it and be put to shame because you O Lord have helped me and comforted me.

I know that there are people today who are going through one of these times in their life, when it’s hard to follow Jesus with any confidence. Are you one of them? And I know there are people today for whom such a time is just around the corner, maybe you’re one of them.

Friend your God is merciful and gracious, He’s slow to anger, He’s abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, that’s just who God is. So if you know you’ve turned your back on Him turn back to Him now, tell Him you’re sorry, ask Him to forgive you in Jesus name and it’s a done deal, you’re forgiven. You stand before Him as clean and as pure as Jesus Himself because that’s why Jesus died for you, that’s why Jesus did what He did for you, to give you a fresh start with the slate wiped clean.

And now as you draw close to Him you can take each step with Him being completely sure that when you need to turn to the left or right He’s going to let you know. When you need to slow down He’ll let you know. When you need to speed up He’ll let you know. When you need to stop and wait for a while or move a bit more quickly God will let you know that’s the deal, that’s the promise.

Jesus said:

I don’t call you servants anymore because a servant doesn’t know what the master is doing but I’ve called you friends because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father.

John chapter 15, verse 15.

My friend wherever you find yourself on your life’s journey right now the answer, the answer is Jesus.

The Bible talks a lot about slavery and freedom. None of us want to be in slavery yet so many people these days are slaves to so many things. So what about you, are you a slave or are you free?

The greatest tragedy I see in people’s lives is that they’ve become slaves to their circumstances, to their passions, to the ways of this world. Slaves to a whole bunch of things that promise so much and yet have left their lives empty and hollow and bereft of any meaning and purpose and things that ultimately lead to destruction.

You and I go through a lot of trials in life, things that tear at our flesh and tear at our emotions but when you stop and think about it we were made to be at peace, we were made to experience perfect peace and satisfaction and contentment. How do I know that? Because when I look back to see how God created us from the beginning it’s exactly what I see.

Adam and Eve were in that beautiful garden living the perfect life until they turned their backs on God, Genesis chapter 2 gives us the most beautiful picture of the perfect life that God has planned for us. But of course humanity, you and me included, turned our backs on God and so sickness and trial and temptation and the consequences of rebellion against God all entered this world.

It’s why we have to suffer, Shakespeare called it ‘the slings and arrows of outrageous fortunes’. That’s why things happen to us that we would never choose for ourselves, that’s why we end up doing things to other people that really we wish we hadn’t done. And that’s why we’re so powerless to save ourselves from continuing in a life that falls so far short of that beautiful perfect ideal that God has planned for us.

So people, you and me included, carry all this baggage around in life, baggage that gets heavier and heavier as the years pass and whether we realise it or not we can become slaves to that sin. We may not call it that but all that weight on our shoulders becomes the norm, it drains the life out of us and so we live as if it is the norm, we live as though slavery to sin and all its consequences is a normal state.

Well I’m here to tell you, wake up today because it’s just not normal. It’s anything but normal, it maybe common, it’s just not normal yet all too many are slaves without realising it. Have a listen to this discussion Jesus had with some Jews, God’s chosen people. John chapter 8, verses 31 to 36:

Jesus then said to the Jews who had believed in him, ‘If you continue in my word you are truly my disciples and you will know the truth and the truth will make you free’. They answered him, ‘We’re descendants of Abraham, we’ve never been slaves to anyone, what do you mean by saying ‘It will make us free’?

And Jesus answered them, ‘Very truly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin, the slave does not have a permanent place in the household. The Son has a place there forever so if the Son sets you free you’ll be free indeed.’

You see they didn’t realise they were slaves. They saw themselves as God’s chosen people not as slaves to their sin. Slaves were those people that had a home, Gentiles for the most part who served them but they themselves as God’s chosen people in their eyes were free.

But Jesus, as He has a habit of doing, goes straight to the heart of the reality, He says ‘Look guys whoever commits sin is a slave to sin’. And here’s the thing, if we’re living in some sin that we’re holding out on in our relationship with God, that slavery has terrible consequences.

See you can never have a deep wonderful intimate relationship with God, you can’t live your life in confidence in Jesus because every moment of every day the guilt that your conscience is so sensitive to robs you of that ability. Think about it. A man who is cheating on his wife, can he truly have a wonderful intimate perfect relationship with his wife while he’s cheating on her behind her back? He can pretend, he can deceive his wife although eventually she’ll realise but deep in his heart he can’t know the bliss of an intimate exclusive relationship with his wife because his conscience condemns him.

God gave you and me a conscience for a very good reason, He gave us a sense of touch so that when we touch something hot it will hurt and we’ll pull away before we really injure ourselves badly. Our conscience serves exactly the same purpose. When we stubbornly refuse to yield one particular area of our lives to God our conscience robs us of the peace and the joy we’re meant to have. And the purpose of that is to get us to turn away from that thing before it seriously hurts us.

I’ve met people who’ve been seeking the sort of relationship with Jesus we’ve been talking about in this series, the sort where no matter what comes their way gives them that quiet confidence in Him, confidence in Jesus. And yet they continue on as slaves to their sin, living with a slave mentality that will always in 100% of cases rob them of the very thing that they’re looking for.

Let me ask you kindly but plainly today, are you one of those people? Because if you are, if you’re yearning for that confidence and peace and joy in Christ Jesus but your sin is robbing you of it I’ve got an answer for you today, it comes directly from God’s Word, Romans chapter 6, verses 1 to 14 and this Word from Him is the power to set you free, utterly transform your life, have a listen:

What then are we to say? Should we continue in sin in order that grace might abound? By no means. How can we who die to sin go on living in it? Don’t you know that all of us who have been baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into his death? Therefore we’ve been buried with him by baptism into death so that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in the newness of life.

For if we’ve been united with him in a death like his we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed and we might no longer be a slave to sin. For whoever has died is free from sin but if we’ve died with Christ we believe that we will also live with him.

We know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again, death no longer has dominion over him. The death he died he died to sin once and for all but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ.

Therefore don’t let sin exercise dominion in your mortal bodies to make you obey their passions. No longer present your members to sin as instruments of wickedness but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death into life and present your members to God as instruments of righteousness for sin will have no dominion over you since you are no longer under the law but under grace.

My friend Jesus came to set you free. If you’ve put your trust in Him then two things have happened, firstly you have died to your sin. It no longer has power over you because Jesus squashed it at the cross. That’s a historical, judicial, forensic fact. And secondly because He rose again from the dead He has brought you the power to be set free from sin.

Do you believe in Jesus? Then you already have the power to overcome your sin, a power that none of us has in and of ourselves. It’s a gift from God this power, it’s His power, it’s the only power that there is that will set you free from the dominion and the consequences of sin. It’s the only thing that will give you the confidence that you need to have in Jesus Christ. You’re free.

So now, now you can choose not to let sin have dominion over your body. Hey it will be a battle, it will be a struggle but it’s a war that you’ve already won. And my friend as you yield yourself completely to Jesus you will, I guarantee this, you will be filled with peace, with joy, with confidence in Him. How do I know? Because that’s just how it works. If you don’t believe me give it a spin, it actually works.

Well today is the last message in this series called Following Jesus With Confidence and lest I should leave you with the wrong impression about how to do that there’s one more thing you need to know. In fact it’s the most important thing of all.

There’s many a time in the last twenty or so years since I gave my life to Jesus that I’ve come up short on my end of the bargain, many a time. I wish that wasn’t the case but it is and at those times our conscience condemns us because that’s exactly what it’s meant to do.

Yesterday I made the point that your conscience is a lot like your sense of touch. God gave us a conscience for a good reason, He gave us a sense of touch so that when we touch something hot it will hurt and we’ll pull away before we really injure ourselves badly. Your conscience and mine serve exactly the same purpose.

When we stubbornly refuse to yield one particular area of our lives to Jesus our conscience robs us of that peace and that joy that we’re meant to live in. And the purpose of that is to get us to turn away from that thing before it seriously hurts us. I have met so many people who have been seeking the sort of relationship with Jesus that we’ve been talking about in this series, the sort where no matter what comes their way He gives them that quiet sense of confidence and yet they turn their backs on Him and wonder where that confidence goes.

See there are two attitudes that we can have towards our sin. On the one hand we can stubbornly refuse to let it go. We can convince ourselves that this little sin of ours, well you know, it’s not really that bad. I met a Pastor of a Church once who refused to smile and say hello to the members of his congregation. Only a little thing you might think and yet it was tearing the congregation apart. People spoke to him about it but he stubbornly refused to do anything about it,’ Oh well that’s just how I am’, that was his answer.

Stubbornly holding out on God by continuing in sin has serious and devastating consequences both in the here and now and for all eternity. This is what Jesus said about it, Matthew chapter 7, verses 21 to 23. He said:

Not everyone who says to me ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the kingdom of heaven but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophecy in your name and cast demons out in your name and do many mighty works in your name’ and then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you, depart from me you workers of lawlessness.’

See faith translates into works, the works don’t save us but they’re evidence of genuine faith. They’re the fulfilment and out-working of our faith, without them our faith is dead (James chapter 2, verse 20). People who stubbornly continue in sin are going to get a rude shock when it comes to their day of judgement:

Now the works of the flesh are obvious, fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing and all the things like that. I’m warning you (writes Paul) as I warned you before, those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Galatians chapter 5, verses 19 to 21.

So that’s the first thing. If you want to follow Jesus with confidence don’t expect to be able to do that if you stubbornly refuse to turn away from your sin and turn back to God. The bottom line, the executive summary of the outcome of stubborn sin is this, Hebrews chapter 10, verses 26 and 27. This is a really worthwhile passage to remember:

For if we wilfully persist in sin after having received the knowledge of the truth there no longer remains a sacrifice for our sins but a fearful prospect of judgement and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries.

So what’s the alternative? Well we all know that we all fall short of the glory of God on a daily basis, we know that. We all know that our anger flares up, we carry around some insecurity, we all have some natural weaknesses and limitations that we’re working our way through, I just admitted to you that I’m in that boat.

The alternative here is to keep a short account with God. So instead of stubbornly refusing to hand it over to God and ask for His forgiveness we hang on to it and that robs us 100% of the time of our peace and our confidence in Christ. But the alternative is to go to God quickly and ask for His forgiveness. The alternative is to admit our sin to Him openly and honestly, I mean why do we hide? Why do we imagine He can’t see? He’s God after all:

If we say we have no sin we’re kidding ourselves and the truth isn’t in us but if we confess our sins He who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we haven’t sinned we make God a liar and His Word is not in us.

1 John chapter 1, verses 8 to 10.

You see the alternative is being honest and admitting our sin to ourselves and to God and when we do He’s faithful, He’s just, He’ll forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness because Jesus already died to pay for those sins.

What’s justice got to do with it? Well quite simply this: if you believe in Jesus He has already paid for your sins when He died on that cross for you and for me two thousand something years ago, justice has been served and so this faithful and just God forgives us in grace and in mercy even though we ourselves don’t deserve it because Jesus, Jesus paid the price for us.

That, if you don’t mind me saying, is sensational news. What I’ve noticed is this, the longer I take to go to God and ask Him for His forgiveness the worse my life is. Let me say it again, the longer I take to go to God and ask Him for His forgiveness the worse my life is. The less confidence I have in Him, the less peace I have, the less joy I have but the quicker I am to go to Him and be honest and admit my mistake or my rebellion or whatever the case may be, the more confidence I have in Him, the more peace I have, the more joy I have.

We learn by our mistakes and hanging on to my sin I’ve learned is never, ever, ever worth it in the end because the longer I hang on to it the more stubborn I become over it and then I put my life at peril. Jesus paints a sharp contrast between the humble sinner and the proud sinner. Sin is a fact, it’s a reality in my life, it’s a reality in your life from time to time. Here’s the picture of two different ways that we can handle sin, Luke chapter 18, verses 9 to 14:

Jesus told this parable to some who trusted in themselves and they were righteous and regarded others with contempt. He said, ‘Two men went up to the temple to pray. One was a Pharisee the other was a tax collector. The Pharisee standing by himself was praying thus. He said, ‘God I thank you that I am not like these other people, these thieves and rogues and adulterers, even like that tax collector over there. I fast twice a week, I give a tenth of all my income.’

But the tax collector was standing far off, wouldn’t even look up to heaven but was beating his chest and saying, ‘God be merciful to me, a sinner’. I tell you this man went down to his home justified rather than the other for all who exalt themselves will be humbled but all who humble themselves will be exalted.

Why does God want you and me to be honest with ourselves and with Him about our sin? Because our sin, our rebellion against God robs us of life itself, it robs us of peace, it robs us of confidence in order that we will come to our senses.

Let me come back to what I said yesterday, you and I were made to live a life of perfect peace, perfect joy, perfect contentment. Even though we go through many trials that’s how we’re made to live, that’s why God takes your sin and mine so seriously because it robs us of that perfect peace and joy and contentment and confidence that God has for us.

You truly want to follow this Jesus with confidence? Then keep short accounts with God, ask for His forgiveness, turn away from your sins, it’s a game changer.