Paul begins verse five with a “therefore.” Paul never fails to apply doctrine to our duty, our position to our practice. In verses 1-4 he emphasized our position or union with Christ. We died with Christ and have been raised with Christ. We are in Him. He is our life. Living for Christ means seeking to please Him and learning to think in a Christ-like way.
PUT OFF – PUT ON
Now Paul applies who you are in Christ to how you are to live in Christ. In verses 5-9 you put off the old ungodly habits and practices that you developed before you came to Christ. These include self-gratifying sexual sins and then self-centered reactions to other people. In verses 10-25 you put on godly attitudes and actions, including in your marriage, family, and in the work place. Your practical sanctification or spiritual growth is a matter of putting off everything that offends Christ, and putting on everything that honors Christ.
OUR MORAL CORRUPTION
This morning we’re going to talk about immoral practices God says you must put off. I want to be discreet but clear and biblical. Unlike our postmodern world of no absolute standards for morality – you do what pleases you – God has clearly revealed the boundaries of physical intimacy in the marriage relationship. No one has to argue that we live in a morally corrupt culture. Stimulated by entertainment, encouraged by academia, protected by government, driven by greed and unrestrained lust, we live in a generation of corrupt morals that no longer bring any shame, conviction, or embarrassment. I recall a young lady wanting a church wedding. I met with her and her live-in boyfriend and my first bit of premarital counsel was that they would have to live separately until their wedding. They decided I would not be the one to conduct their wedding.
Here are a few reminders of our moral bankruptcy. Pornography is a multi-billion dollar industry in America. Forty percent of children are born out of wed-lock, with no resident fathers. Planned Parenthood gladly provides its “services” for those who don’t want to be bothered by the consequences of physical intimacy. Barack O’Bama said back in 2008 if one of his daughters got pregnant he wouldn’t want to punish her by insisting she have the baby. More abortions are performed every year than the total of all combat deaths in America’s wars since 1775.
In 2015 the Supreme Court in the Obergefell case judged that same sex couples have the right to marry. This judgment revealed their flagrant disregard of God’s standard of marriage being only between a man and a woman.
In his book The American Crisis Jefrey Breshears says, “The LGBTQ agenda marks the ultimate triumph of secular humanism in general and the sexual revolution in particular” (p. 325). The Bible is clear that homosexuality, lesbianism, and transgenderism are all sinful rebellion against God. Romans 1 is one of a number of Old and New Testament references describing these practices as “degrading passions.”
Romans 1:25-27, For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. 26 For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, 27 and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.
It’s one thing for the culture to go down this slippery slide. The Greek-Roman culture was very morally corrupt. But of far greater concern is when churches begin to accept and approve of same-sex relationships and transgender decisions without calling them to repentance. Churches faithful to Scripture are regarded as oppressive and unloving.
Matthew Vines is a so-called “Christian gay man.” He left Harvard to devote himself to study what the Bible really says about homosexuality. With his “sling-shot hermeneutics” (stretching the meaning), he discovered the Bible says nothing about devoted, loving homosexual relationships, only “lustful” behaviors. He reinterpreted the Bible to fit his same sex attraction. In his book God and the Gay Christian, published in 2014, Vines predicted, “One hundred years from now, I think it is quite likely that every Protestant denomination and every evangelical church will be LGBT-affirming.”
Before moving on, for those caught up in the sins of immorality and other life-dominating sins, there is hope in Christ. Christ told us repentant prostitutes would get into heaven before self-righteous Pharisees. Paul put it like this:
1 Corinthians 6:9-11, Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, 10 nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 Such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.
People involved in immorality are not our enemies. They are our mission field. Never forget, Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. He bore the wrath of God in the place of sinners so we could be washed, sanctified, and justified. God is a God of grace and mercy, as well as righteousness and judgment.
YOU NEED THE HEART OF A WARRIOR
Colossians 3:5, Put to death therefore what is earthly in you (ESV).
1 Peter 2:11 says the passions of your flesh are waging war against your soul. Like comic-strip Pogo said, “We have met the enemy, and he is us.” God calls you to be a warrior and He gives you one command to resist these internal enemies: kill them. Put them to death. The verb is nekroo, from which we get the word necrosis, something dead.
Based on Romans 8:13 which says, “By the Spirit put to death the deeds of the body,” the Puritan John Owen named his famous message “Mortification of Sin in Believers.” King James translates “put to death” with the word “mortify.” To be mortified is to be totally embarrassed at something you did; but to mortify something is to kill it. Owen wrote, “Be killing sin or it will be killing you.” (Kris Lundgaart summarized Owen in his excellent little book, The Enemy Within.)
So you need the heart of a warrior to mortify or kill these lusts of your flesh whenever they show their faces. Have no mercy on them. Don’t coddle them or excuse or rationalize them. They are your enemy and want to destroy your soul. When God brought His enemy Agag before Samuel because Saul failed to kill him, Samuel hacked him to pieces. In the same way, don’t pussyfoot with immorality. The moment you are tempted sexually in any way, go after it with the sword of the Spirit and hack it to pieces.
When Potiphar’s wife tempted Joseph in Genesis 39, he put sin to death. He refused to betray his boss and he knew adultery was a great evil against the Lord. He did what every young man or woman in that situation should do. 2 Timothy 2:22 says “Flee immorality, and follow after godliness with godly friends.” When David looked out and saw Bathsheba dipping her toes into her balcony Jacuzzi (Steve Farrar’s description), he failed to kill his lust. Instead he unleashed his lust and brought on himself untold consequences. You need the heart of a warrior to put to death these enemies.
Jesus told us in Matthew 5:28 the look of lust after a woman is committing adultery in your heart. He urges us to be radical about members of your body that become avenues for moral sin. Speaking metaphorically, he says pluck out an eye, cut off a hand, chop off a foot – do whatever it takes to destroy the power and practice of those lusts.
Now, let’s identify these enemies waging war against your soul.
FIVE ENEMIES OF YOUR SOUL
Colossians 3:5, Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry.
Kill sexual immorality or fornication. The Greek word is porneia, from which we get our word pornography. Porneia refers to any and every form of illicit sexual activity outside of God’s boundary of marriage. Your fireplace is the boundary for fires in your family room. A fire in the middle of the room is a real problem. God designed the male and female for loving intimacy within the sacred covenant of marriage. Satan didn’t invent romance and sex, but he sure knows how to pervert it and he has done an excellent job through the ages. No wonder Paul heads his lists of sins of the flesh with this word porneia three times – Galatians 5:19, Ephesians 5:3, and here. Kill all temptation to sexual immorality.
Kill impurity. Immoral thoughts lead to the behavior of fornication. Romans 1:24 says “Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, that their bodies might be dishonored among them.” It includes suggestive and sensual flirting and talking, and certainly sending inappropriate pictures over social media. If you are toying with impure thoughts and aren’t killing them as soon as possible, you may easily justify some form of immorality. People don’t suddenly, out of the blue, meet up with someone and commit adultery. They drift into it.
You may start with a desire to maintain purity until the wedding day, or determine as a married person to be faithful to your spouse. Then you can slowly drift, making little compromises, allowing your thoughts to roam, you fantasize, you cross lines you never thought you would, but the anticipated pleasure is stronger than the uncomfortable nagging guilt. You harden your conscience and before you know it you are in an immoral relationship. Sin is a deceiver and in your mind you can justify about anything. Many years ago I met with a husband who committed adultery. He had even convinced himself that God was in it. He had stopped at a red light, looked over, and sure enough there was the lady. He thought that surely God arranged that moment. His mind was deceived. His wife suffered grievously when she found out. Kill impurity.
Kill passion. This gets behind the unclean thoughts to the ungodly lusts driving them. Passion speaks of being dominated by illicit sexual desires. Whether hetero or homo or pedophilia or pornography, never feed these self-pleasing lusts! Kill them! Drag them before the cross of Christ, realize these sinful thoughts deserved the wrath of God, and kill them.
1Thessalonians 4:3-5, For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; 4 that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, 5 not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God;
The last fruit of the Spirit is self-control and that is certainly key in this war against passion. Nip it in the bud before it advances. Here’s a word to young ladies. Many a young lady has surrendered her virtue to get what she felt was love, only to find out later it was lust from a selfish man. Many such girls end up in abusive and grievous relationships later on. That’s why the wise counsel of dads is so important to daughters, and sons as well. You need boundaries in the dating relationship. Pastor Bill Goode of Faith Church in Lafayette had a great saying, “When the physical gets involved, the passions are aroused, and reason flies out the window!” Kill passion.
Kill evil desire. Driving the immoral behavior, impure thoughts, and uncontrolled passion are evil, sinful desires. They are desires unchecked by God’s Word. They are inner cravings for selfish fulfillment. This evil desire may be cloaked as a caring love for others. Just because we have deep-seated desires doesn’t mean these are legitimate. God sets the standards and boundaries, and here He sets the boundaries of our sexuality.
Same sex attraction (SSA) is a controversy within Christianity. Some are claiming that having the attraction for someone of the same sex is okay as long as you don’t act on it. Let’s look at it this way. Say you are married and you have a desire to be with another lady. You tell your wife, “It’s only an attraction. I’m not going to act on it.” What would your wife say? If there’s a good-sized frying pan nearby, you might find it clanging on your head. The reasoning for SSA is if you find yourself desiring another person of the same sex, you must be made this way and therefore you are being dishonest to yourself and others by denying your feelings. Or you might think, “Well, maybe that is the way God made him or her, and who am I to say the attraction or desire is wrong?” No, that kind of reasoning reveals you’ve just listened to the culture too long and have become brainwashed. You need a strong biblical moral realignment. That unbiblical, ungodly desire and thinking must be attacked and killed. For some it may be a long battle.
Kill greed. The Greek word “greed” literally means you want more and more and are never satisfied. You want what is not yours to have. It could refer to sex or material stuff. It is idolatry because you live for what you want more than you want to please God. This is the curse of pornography. It’s greed that is never satisfied. Just one more clip. Remember that farmer who had so much he didn’t know what to do with all his stuff so he built bigger barns, bigger piggy banks, or today, more X-rated videos or pictures. God wrote an epitaph over his grave: Thou Fool! Greed killed him. Christians need to kill greed.
MOTIVES FOR OBEDIENCE
The wrath of God
Colossians 3:6, For it is because of these things that the wrath of God will come upon the sons of disobedience,
First, the wrath of God is real. It will come. No question. And God wants us to remember that these are the kinds of sins that deserve God’s judgment. These are the kinds of sins that will take people into God’s eternal wrath. These are the things that put Christ on that cross. Every time you indulge in a sexual sin of thought or deed, remember that’s why Jesus had to die and bear the wrath of God on the cross. Why would you want to engage in the very things that killed our Savior?
Ephesians 5:6 says the same thing.
Ephesians 5:6, Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.
This is sobering, folks. In a morally corrupt culture where you are exposed to immorality every day, don’t let your conscience harden. The church’s message isn’t about social justice. It is about fleeing from the wrath to come into the arms of Jesus and then killing anything in your heart that offends Him as soon as you can. Be killing sin or sin will be killing you.
Your new life in Christ
Colossians 3:7, and in them you also once walked, when you were living in them.
This is the strongest motive of all. You may have been sexually impure in your past life. You lived to please yourself. But you died, you are alive in Christ and He is your life. Now you are seeking the things above. You are setting your mind on godly thoughts. Do believers sin like this? Yes, but you can’t look for excuses. Here is what you do. You confess your sins, you remember Christ died for that lustful thought or act, you repent of it, you remember that the Spirit of God is in you to conquer these sins, and you remember God saves sinners by grace. Apart from God’s grace we’d all be swept away in those rapids of judgment ending in the eternal lake of fire.
Thank God, He saves sinners. Remember that immoral woman in Luke 7 who came in and wept over Jesus feet and wiped them with her hair? Jesus looked at her and said, “Your faith has saved you. Go in peace.” You may be heavy with guilt for sexual sins. Be assured Jesus is ready to forgive the worse of sins and the most twisted and perverted of sins, if you repent, turn from those sins, and trust in Him as your Lord and Savior.