James MacDonald - Lord, I'm Yours
I can’t give you any assurance of salvation if you’re reading this and thinking, «Nope, nope, nope, that’s not good, that’s not good.» Now, what I will say is, and I say this frequently, you don’t have to have these things down perfectly, just increasingly, right? I think I had some way of saying that. Do we have that quote? Yeah, «First, if your faith hasn’t changed you, it hasn’t saved you.» And then, «I am changing,» not perfectly, but say it, okay? There just needs to be a growing pattern in this. You might say, «Well, I’m not as quick to reconcile as I should be, but I’m not as stubborn as I used to be.» Well, great! Keep on moving down that line and growing in your faith.
Now, turn the page here, and here comes the rest of this: victory begins when I know that in Christ, I am dead to sin. Victory is underway when, at the point of temptation, I reckon myself dead to sin. Victory is accomplished when we present ourselves to God; this is the completion of the process of change. You can see this throughout the text; it’s hard to miss. But alive to God in Christ Jesus, then in verse 12, present your members, and then, a little further down, verse 16, present yourselves; and then later in that same verse, to present yourselves. Verse 19 says, «Present your members,» and again, «present your members as slaves of righteousness.» There’s this whole idea, not just of being dead to sin, but offering yourself—it’s the word I like—offering yourself alive to God.
Now, I’d like to say a lot of things about this, but I’m just going to say what the Scripture says. Look at verse 19; he says, «I’m speaking in human terms.» This is really an important point in the message. He says, «I’m using an analogy to help us, as humans with finite minds, comprehend a supernatural truth.» Okay, and here’s the key: don’t press the analogy too far. Look up here, in the truest sense, okay? In the truest sense, you’re not a slave to righteousness. You’re a slave to sin. When you come to Christ, you’re not a slave to righteousness. He says, «I’m just using an analogy here.»
Look at the text again in verse 19; he’s kind of backing off on it a bit, and he says, «I speak in human terms because you have limitations. You can’t really understand all this.» Paul wants to make sure that we don’t transfer the negative imagery of slavery to living for God. Get that? Paul wants to make sure that you don’t start thinking of yourself like this: «Well, I was a slave to sin; now I’m a slave to God.» All right?
Paul wants to ensure we don’t transfer the negative imagery of slavery to living for God. Why? Well, if Satan’s your master, he hates you. If Christ is your master, he loves you. If Satan is your master, he consumes you for his own ends alone. If Christ is your master, he changes you for your own good. If Satan is your master, he condemns you with generalities that produce despair. If Satan is your master, if he controls your thoughts and life, you hear, «You’re lame, you stink, you’re awful, you’ll never change; it’s hopeless for you—give it up.» But if Christ is your master, he says, «Get up, try again, I love you; come on, you can do this, let’s go forward. It’s not too late for you.»
Okay, so he wants to make sure that we don’t get the slavery image creates a wrong understanding. When you do what Satan says, you feel like garbage, and you live in despair. Someone here today, no question about it, that’s your testimony. If you do what Satan says, your life is like garbage, and you’re filled with despair. But there’s a better way. When you do what God says, you feel awesome and joyful. You’re telling me that when you say no to sin, «I’m dead to that,» and you offer yourself alive to God in that moment, isn’t that one of the greatest moments you have? Just that little breath of victory, just that little taste of doing what’s right, just that little smell of the future and how awesome it’s going to be—those are the greatest moments here in life on Earth. I don’t think it’s hopeless; I’m not going to be like this forever! It’s awesome. Victory is accomplished when we present ourselves to God, and it feels like victory, not slavery.
Secondly, notice these are just some sub-thoughts here: it requires a choice. You can’t study this passage carefully and miss the obvious repeated truth: it’s a choice! It’s a choice; present yourself, offer yourself, give yourself. We have a choice. We try to convince ourselves we don’t, but we do. Now, one of the things that I’m working on and doing quite well—it’s been a good week—one of the things that I’m working on is saying no to sugar. I am a terrible, terrible, terrible sinner when it comes to sugar, and I’m as serious as can be. I’m not talking weakness here; I’m talking sin. If I should depend upon the Lord in a moment of stress, and I depend upon sugar; if I should lean more upon the strength that God wants to give me, and I lean upon some substance instead to smooth the edge, to calm me down, to comfort me in a difficult time—I’m just speaking for myself here, just talking about myself—tried to pick something that everyone could relate to. And I’m not saying for a moment that this is the worst sin or struggle in my life; that would be hypocrisy; just tried to pick something we could all understand.
But if I walk into the back room here, or into the counter and rolling meadows, or out in the office in Elgin—I’m telling you, this is a food church; man, just trust me on that—and you wouldn’t believe how many times a month some incredible lady in our church says, «Pastor James, we love you so much, I just baked you some cookies.» That sort of feels like love or evil. I believe the heart is right, but I can’t tell you how many times I have to say, «Don’t have that near me; don’t have that near me.» Why? I can’t handle it! Now, some of you who are like little soldiers don’t understand people like me. Does anyone here at all relate to what I’m saying? All right, I got a couple of people with me in this. All right, but I told you what it is; it’s sin. And I can be like, «I’m dead to that, I’m dead to that, I am dead to that.» And I’m telling you, that is not going to go on for very long. There has to be—I have to be «alive for God.» Okay, you get it?
In the same way, I’m not going to give myself to one thing; I’m going to give myself to God. I’m not going to give myself to the sin, but I have to turn my back on that and offer myself alive to God. I have to do something different. Now, here’s the key: it requires a choice, and it happens moment by moment. Change is not yearly; it’s not monthly, or even daily. Change is truly a thousand little choices, moment by moment. And the great struggle is that I can say no to this analogy; I can say no to this 50 times, but if I say yes once, it’s usually followed by more yeses. Jot this down: it takes far more energy to recover from failure than it takes to prevent it. And the key, even in falling, is not how often you fall but how long you stay down.
Even though I’m using a safe analogy here, we can all make applications to the things that we specifically choose. When I fall back into a pattern of thinking that’s been destructive for me, it’s that much harder again to pull myself out. That’s why I say there’s a hole in that road, because I know if I go down there, I may dive in the hole sometimes. It’s better just to avoid it completely. Those choices are made moment by moment.
Now, this is where this key verse, verse 13, comes in: «Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness.» Isn’t it interesting that he’s talking about various body parts? I want to be careful here and respectful of the delicacy of what I’m speaking of, so I’ll just say that various parts of our body are inclined toward certain kinds of sin. Clear? Various parts of our body are inclined toward certain parts of sin, and sometimes we have to present our members, not just collectively but individually, as instruments for righteousness. That’s an awesome truth! Yield—King James says—New King James says present; NIV says offer yourselves to God. But none of these capture the idea. Here it is: that it’s a continuous action.
Now, I grew up in a church and went to a youth group where it was always a crisis. The pastor would give an invitation every week, and people would come forward and rededicate their lives to the Lord. I thought about it today; I went to five different summer camps. I went to a camp called Wujidan, Pioneer, Crystal Springs, Word of Life, and another one I can’t remember right now, but I wrote it down—oh, Camp Kaka Boy Brigade Camp. I went to five different camps, and I think I rededicated my life to the Lord at every camp. You know, throw a stick in the fire, raise your hand—how many people did that? All right, those crises are needed; they’re important. But what they can create is the illusion that if I’m struggling, I need another crisis. But what I really need is a better understanding of the process.
Now, as I’ve taught here many times, when you fail in the process, you have to go back to the crisis and recommit yourself. But the key to victory is not crisis living; the key to victory is that moment by moment, make five good decisions, then make 50, then make 500, then you won’t count anymore. Okay? Moment by moment, offer yourself to God. Somebody here right now is struggling with a major temptation in your life. «I’m dead to that; I don’t have to do that; I know where that road goes.» But you better get yourself turned on your heel and start offering yourself alive to God.
The biblical concept here is the idea of the Christian life as a walk, moment by moment. I love that analogy! Romans 8:1 says there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who walk—not later in the chapter, it says according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. Galatians 5:16 says, «This I say then, walk in the spirit, and you will not give in to the desires of the flesh.» Ephesians 4 says that we should walk worthy of the Lord. Also, in Ephesians, it says that we should walk in love, walk as children of the light, and walk carefully. Colossians 2:6 says, «As you received the Lord, so walk in Him.» I could go on and on with the «walk» language in the Scriptures, but when you’re walking, all that matters is, you know, it’s the next step. What am I thinking about now? Just the next step! When you’re walking, all you have to think about is the next step. Victory is not out there; it’s not for a thousand days, or a thousand hours, or for a thousand minutes. Victory is in the next moment and building on that moment by moment. When sin rears its ugly head, I say, «I am dead to that, but alive to God.»
Norman Grubb wrote in his insightful little booklet «Continuous Revival» that at this moment—this is awesome—right now, if your walk is being clouded with the rising of some motion of sin in you, listen; as God points to that and says, «That right there, get that under the blood, and walk with me in this moment—that right there; get that under my Son; yield that to me.» Right there, that rising up in me to lash out at someone in my family, that rising up in me—whatever your specific thing is—right there in that moment, I’m dead to that and offer yourself alive to God.
Now, in just a couple of moments that remain here, because I believe this is such a practical thing, I want to have you call out some sin because it matters not to me, and I keep brainstorming, but just call out a sin—not yours, but maybe someone in your family or something. Just kidding! Kidding! Settle down! It’s all good! All right, so I heard someone say here, «anger.» Okay, anger! So something—hang on—something is causing me to feel anger, and if it’s not righteous, if it’s not God’s heart, something is wrong to be angry.
So the Bible says, «Be angry and do not sin.» But assuming that the anger is unrighteous, we ought to be angry about the things that anger God. When God’s reputation is insulted, when God’s name is on the line, but instead, those are the things we’re passive about, and when we’re more angry is when someone steps on our toes, insults us. When I feel that rising up in me, I need to, in that moment, know that I don’t have to do that. That’s a big deal! I don’t have to do that anymore! Know that in Christ I’m dead to sin, reckon myself dead to sin, and speak those words out loud: «I’m dead to that! I’m dead to that!» And then offer myself alive to you.
You better do something else with your time, with your energy, with your thoughts in that moment. What I find in a situation, if the issue is anger, I find that it helps to speak a word of kindness—to speak a word of kindness to say something gentle, something healing, something helpful. My mouth wants to engage with my flesh and start tearing something down, so better to be dead to that and engage my mouth in something good.
Call out a different one! Right? Okay, I heard someone say «gossip.» Gossip? Um, okay, so is that your deal? Is that one of the ones you circled? So you are always running your mouth about other people, running your mouth all the time. What do you think about this? What do you think about that? What do you think about somebody? It’s nothing to you to speak negatively about someone else to someone else. That’s awful! Proverbs says that God hates seven things, and one of the things he hates is those who sow discord among brothers—those who separate people. So that’s got to get dealt with.
So you say, «Well, I’ve always just kind of been that way, and I like the drama; I like to kind of talk about what everybody’s doing and what I think about it.» Well, you got to know you don’t have to do that anymore! You got to reckon yourself dead to that. I encourage you to speak those words: «I’m dead to that!» But you better find something else to do with your mouth. Go to your small group leader this week and just say, «Give me the names or the phone numbers of the people in my group; I got to get on the phone and start encouraging people. I got to bless somebody!» And watch, as soon as you start doing that, you’ll have a chance to gossip, so you better be ready to say, «Now I’m going to use my mouth for something good.»
That’s two things—anger and gossip. Give me something really different than that! Okay, stubbornness is the one that I heard. I appreciate you all yelling stuff out—so, stubbornness! Okay, you just don’t yield to people; you just don’t give in. All your thoughts are internal. You think what you think; nobody can affect you. No one can change your mind—you’re stubborn! Okay, that’s a whole different kind of thing. There’s pride tied up in that. Again, you see the damage that that does and the way that severs relationships. You’re not intreatable, and you don’t listen. You don’t learn from others. This is a hard church to be in, by the way, if you’re like that. So I appreciate you just being willing to be here if stubbornness is your thing, because we kind of go at that, right? We’re pushing on people’s wills all the time.
So, it’s the same thing—reckon yourself dead to that. I don’t have to be that kind of person. All that’s ever done is cause hardship and create relational havoc in my life. I’m dead to that! But you need to actively submit your will. If your issue is stubbornness, I would encourage you to start seeking out counsel, something you would never do. I can remember, a few years ago in the church, when we were going through a particular series, I picked three people in the church and said, «I’m taking you out for breakfast; I want you to talk for 45 minutes. I’m bringing a pen; I won’t say a word except thank you at the end. I want you to tell me everything you think I need to know—everything that no one wants to tell me. I know you care for me. Shine the light on me; tell me the whole thing.» That was really something! And I got so much input, and it was so helpful and so pivotal in my life, so that would be a good exercise for a person who struggles with stubbornness: offer yourself, just get on top of that and really go after working on it.
Now, many, many other examples could be given. Let’s stand together for prayer. Let’s all pray. Father, thank you for the joy of being here; thank you for that which we celebrate today in this great outpouring of generosity. Thank you for what that says about the gospel at work in our church. We, who have been given so much, cannot withhold from your kingdom and the work of reaching others with the message that has so affected our lives. Thank you for everyone who has expressed their faith. Encourage them and strengthen them. And in this matter of personal change, God, I pray for every person here who is discouraged. I pray for every person listening on one of our campuses who is under the weight of failure. Would you remind them again, God, that they are not under law but under grace? Would you cause them to know how great your love for them is? That you’re not trying to keep anything from us; you’re not trying to hold anything from us that will help us. Sin has only ever made me restless and miserable; it has always taken and never ultimately given. What you forbid, you forbid for my good; what you allow, you allow for my blessing.
Help us as we would seek to walk in the path of life and obedience. Thank you that in Christ we are dead to sin. Thank you that in Christ we are alive to righteousness. Help us this week as we offer ourselves afresh to you moment by moment. This we pray in the precious name of Jesus. Lift up your voice and say, «Amen.»