Purity, 1

Articles

David Maxson
02/16/16 - Purity

Purity and the Child of God (1)

“Finally then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God; for you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified. For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness. Therefore he who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who has also given us His Holy Spirit.”  I Thess. 4:1-8

Wherever we turn sexual immorality is being pushed in our face. It’s used to sell everything from beer to shaving cream. Rarely will you find a program on television that doesn’t have some sexually immoral scene or theme in it. The Internet is full of immorality. Music is littered with sexual references. The news constantly reports public figures caught in some scandal. Illicit office romances are on the rise, and the number of teenagers keeping their purity is decreasing. There is no safe place. Even schools are involved in the depravity handing out condoms.

Maintaining purity in this world is a struggle, a daily struggle. You can’t let down your guard even for a moment. It matters not if you are young or old, male or female. The battle is fierce and we don’t see it getting easier any time soon.

Our struggle is not unique. The first century world was as depraved as our own (and perhaps worse). Though our access to such perversity today may be easier, the culture back then was as wicked as ours. The debauchery in idolatrous temples was as shocking as anything that goes on in houses of ill repute today. The theater had immorality that would rival anything shown in modern movies. And there were Christians who kept themselves pure. This should offer us some measure of hope.

Paul offers a strong appeal for purity in 1 Thessalonians 4. We’re going to examine this passage the next few weeks. We begin with what lies at the heart of everything in this passage: God wants us to be pure. The fact that this is what God wants couldn’t be clearer. Paul stresses this is God’s will no less than nine times in this text. 

What do we learn from this? We learn that for the saints God is central to their purity. Purity comes from an earnest desire to obey and please God. It comes when we seek the will of God for our lives. It flows out of a true knowledge of God. It follows a reverent fear of God. It is part of the call of God. Purity is provoked by the awareness that God’s Spirit dwells in us.

What this means is that impurity is not really the problem for the saint. It is only a symptom. The problem is not that we lack proper self-control or that we need to learn better habits (though both are certainly helpful). The real problem is that our relationship with God is suffering. The Devil has deceived us and we’ve chosen the forbidden fruit over our relationship with God.

If you are seeking a solution to your problem of impurity, you need look no further than God. He will supply you with both the motive to purity as well as the means to achieve it. You will not find purity anywhere else, not in better self-help books or in better self-discipline. The answer is God. Are you prepared to take the journey toward purity? The journey begins and ends with God. - David Maxson, via Embry Hills Church of Christ, Atlanta, www.embryhills.com