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Turning Over a New Leaf

For the last three weeks we have been studying together the pattern and cycle of sin that Israel engaged in time and time again. We have asked you as a church to take steps of response that included symbolically placing a rock of remembrance in front of God as a sign of your commitment. We asked you to respond by coming forward and cutting the black out from around a little card with a white heart in the middle. Many of you responded. Last week we gave you a little O-ring to symbolically break in your private time of devotion and prayer with God as yet another symbol of your hunger to be completely surrendered to God.

I want you to look one more time at the cycle of sin we looked at last week. This slide is an outline of the cycle that Israel engaged in time after time in the Old Testament. It seems that no matter how hard the pain was they just couldn’t seem to understand the cause and effect.

One of the most significant verses of scripture so far was found in last week’s sermon:

“8 Joshua son of Nun, the servant of the LORD, died at the age of a hundred and ten. 9 And they buried him in the land of his inheritance, at Timnath Heres [b] in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash.

10 After that whole generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation grew up, who knew neither the LORD nor what he had done for Israel. 11 Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD and served the Baals.


In one generation this entire nation forgot about God and turned to false gods for worship and self-gratification. God kept answering their prayer for relief from the pain of sin but they would soon go back into the same old cycle.

The leadership in this church is very much aware of the painful similarities to Israel’s past and many of your own life cycles. We are doing everything we know to encourage you to turn from your sin and wickedness and follow Christ with all your hearts and minds and strength. We are painfully aware that the next generation of kids in this church could easily grow up without connecting to Christ unless we all begin to take this message of holiness and righteousness seriously.

Many people have a head knowledge of what is right and wrong but for some reason they are more than willing to fix it tomorrow. Many of you have refused to deal with it today. Maybe it is your circumstances at home or at work. Maybe it is a relationship that you are pursuing that you know is not godly or you are engaged in things at school that you aren’t willing to give up right now. I would refer to this as the : “Maybe Tomorrow Syndrome.”

Maybe tomorrow I will get right with God. Maybe tomorrow I will have more strength to face my stuff. Maybe tomorrow I will have better circumstances in my life. Let me let you in on a little secret. Tomorrow never comes! Today is the day when you are hearing the truth of God’s word. Today you are hearing the call to holy living. Today you are being shown the light of God’s standard of basic Christian living. Today is the day you need to decide to turn over a new leaf. Do you know what that phrase really means and where it came from? The pages of a book were referred to as turning over a leaf or new page. The phrase today means that we are starting over or starting anew.

Today I am giving you seven things to think about regarding breaking the cycle of sin.

Seven ways to break the cycle of sin:

1. We must have a deep commitment to pass on the torch of faith to the next generation.

I wish we could really see the importance of this statement. We live in a society that is largely focused on the satisfaction of the individual. “It’s all about me,” is a common thread of truth that we have come to embrace. Don’t inconvenience me. Don’t ask me to do anything that will cut into what I want to do.

There is nothing more important than passing on your faith to others. There is nothing more important than passing your faith on to your family. Let me ask you a question:

a. What are you passing on?

What are you handing down to others that will help break the cycle of sin? What are you doing with your life that is affecting others in a spiritual way? I wish I could say this the way it weighs on my heart. Every one of us should pause and take an inventory of our lives and our priorities in light of our profession to know and follow Christ.

b. Make spiritual growth a priority.

To pass the torch of faith you must have a commitment to spiritual growth in your own life. What are you doing on a daily basis to connect to God and to make sure He is on the throne of your life?

How differently would you live if you truly were growing spiritually? What would you do differently in regards to your family, your neighbors, the people you work around, the poor and marginalized of society if you were really authentic in your faith?

2. We must become aware that only God has the power to win the victory in the battles we face.

This is simply a statement of faith in the Sovereign power of God. You either believe this or you don’t. Do you believe? Do you really believe that God has the power to deliver you or would you rather not think about it because it would mean that you have to change.

So if God has this power, how are you and I supposed to tap into it? It is simple really; you have to connect to God on a daily basis. You have to express the desire of your heart and hold on in prayer until the answer comes. I don’t know how to say this but we have too often become spiritual wimps. We pray for something for a couple of days and nothing changes so we give up. We tune out or get bored or think that God should answer immediately.

This may be strange language for you but there is such a thing as staying on your knees until you have “prayed through” about something. You stay focused on God for as long as it takes because HE is the only hope you have.

I have a suspicion that it is a whole lot easer to learn to live with sin than it is to expend the energy to fight it.

3. All of the church body must participate according to their gifts.

Our church has experienced an amazing growth numerically over the last few years which can only be attributed to God. The more people He trusts us with the more it takes who will be involved in ministry. I am still amazed at the people who stay on the outer fringes of the church and never commit to being a part of this ministry. I am just going to be gut level honest with you today. We have the potential of becoming just like every other church in America. If we do that we will become a congregation of inwardly focused, self-centered, self-righteous, self-absorbed people who don’t give a care about lost people. Our nation is over run with churches just like that. It is so bad that missionaries are coming here from around the world by the thousands each year. Why are they doing this? Because so much of the American church has disengaged from the culture and retreated within the walls of their buildings in hopes that Jesus will return soon.

If you are a Christ follower you have one main goal in life and here it is: To serve God and glorify Him with your life. How are you doing with that? What are you doing with that? Let me ask you a question:

a. Are you on the team?

Every member of this church should be able to answer that question with a yes. We need you to find out what your gift are and to put them to work in this church. Every new member that joins our church has to stand in front of the congregation and tell where they are or will be serving. If we were to take the mike and interview random people from this audience would you hope that I wouldn’t talk to you? That’s a pretty good sign that you aren’t being a team player. You are consuming but are you giving back to others?

How hard is it to attend a service and then work a service? “Attend one, work one.” This idea of being on the team will translate outside the walls of this church. Yes we need people here in every department I can think of but we need you to be the body of Christ outside these walls as well.

“Everybody can be great because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace; a soul generated by love." -- Martin Luther King, Jr

b. Sidelines, bleachers and the uninvolved

Are you in the game or on the bleachers? Are you injured? Are you spiritually sick? What rationalization are you using to stay out of the game?

4. God’s word must remain the standard that is the first and final authority for life and faith.

If you are really serious about turning over a new leaf it must be done by once again pledging your allegiance to the Bible. Maybe you never have taken it seriously but you need to start now. Maybe you once read it and believed it but even though you’ve been in church for years it no longer holds much sway in your life.

Again for some of you this message is a serious call to renewal. You need to take a long hard look at where you are in your relationship with the Lord and get honest about it. You see if you don’t take the word of God seriously you will begin to drift away from what it really means to be a Christ follower. You won’t even realize that you have drifted. I mean you still show up at church. You look pretty good to anyone looking on. Is that what Christ following has come down to?

Have you joined the millions of consumerist Christians who have turned the church into a place to serve them? I am not sure some of you truly have heard the clear vision of this church. We are totally, 100%, committed to service not “serve us.” If you don’t get that you are on the outside looking in.

It will take every authentic Christ follower to truly break the cycle of sin in our church.

If you read the Bible you will see that there is no place for spiritual laziness.

5. We must remember our commitments and find joy and fullness of life in keeping them.

What are the commitments Christ followers make? We commit to following Christ. That means we embrace the way He taught us to live. It means that we hold to God’s way even if it means that we don’t fit in the culture so well.

It means that we are sold out completely to God every second of every day of every week of every month of every year! There is no other way to find true joy than to know that you are walking in the will of God. Going to church won’t provide you with lasting joy. Joining the church won’t fulfill your inner need for fulfillment.

6. We must look to the Holy Spirit of God to grant us the strength we need to overcome sinful desires and impulses.

The fact remains that before Jesus went away He promised His followers that He would send them His Holy Spirit. In fact in John we read why and what the Spirit would do for us.

“15 “If you love me, obey[d] my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate,[e] who will never leave you. 17 He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth.” John 14:15-17

“21 Those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them. And I will love them and reveal myself to each of them.” John 14:21

“23 Jesus replied, “All who love me will do what I say. My Father will love them, and we will come and make our home with each of them. 24 Anyone who doesn’t love me will not obey me. And remember, my words are not my own. What I am telling you is from the Father who sent me. 25 I am telling you these things now while I am still with you. 26 But when the Father sends the Advocate as my representative—that is, the Holy Spirit—he will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you.” John 14:23-26

Two things about what I have just read: Obeying God is critical and if you obey Him you will have the aid of His Spirit.

The fact remains that you and I can grieve the Holy Spirit of God away from us by consistently disobeying His word. There are some of you in this room today that will easily be touched by this teaching. You are ready to surrender. You know this word has touched your life. I thank God for you and your tenderness.

My fear is that there are others who have lived so long with their free ticket to heaven mentality that it is nearly impossible to penetrate the walls of self righteousness they have built around them.

7. Our cry for deliverance must come from:

This is no easy formula so I don’t want you to take it like that but there are three elements that must be in your cry for deliverance.

a. A true awareness of our sin

Before you take any other step this one is critical. If you are not going to be honest about where you are living then you might as well just stop now. If you are not going to be serious then you need to quit play acting like a Christ follower because you are doing more damage than you are good.

Are you willing to be serious and admit your need today? There is another thing that you need to have to be successful in your cry for deliverance:

b. A genuine sorrow for how we have broken God’s heart and hurt others.

To be honest about it if you are continually sinning and ignoring God’s call for holiness you are breaking His heart. That is all He has ever wanted from the beginning of the nation of Israel till now.

If you are not participating in the work of God on a daily basis by living a genuine Christ following life you are hurting others and you and I need to repent for that.

The final thing you must have is a commitment to change.

c. A commitment to change.

This is no easy thing but it is doable if you and I will proceed with a determination and a commitment to this new approach to our spiritual life.

There is a prayer of repentance and confession found in the Book of Common Prayer. Some of you will be uncomfortable with these words and maybe not every line is one that you need to pray but you will find yourself here. Listen to these words:

Let us confess our sins against God and our neighbor.

Most holy and merciful Father:
We confess to you and to one another,
and to the whole communion of saints
in heaven and on earth,
that we have sinned by our own fault
in thought, word, and deed;
by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved you with our whole heart, and mind, and strength. We have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We have not forgiven others, as we have been forgiven.
Have mercy on us, Lord.
We have been deaf to your call to serve, as Christ served us. We have not been true to the mind of Christ. We have grieved your Holy Spirit.
Have mercy on us, Lord.
We confess to you, Lord, all our past unfaithfulness: the pride, hypocrisy, and impatience of our lives,
We confess to you, Lord.
Our self-indulgent appetites and ways, and our exploitation of other people,
We confess to you, Lord.
Our anger at our own frustration, and our envy of those more fortunate than ourselves,
We confess to you, Lord.
Our intemperate love of worldly goods and comforts, and our dishonesty in daily life and work,
We confess to you, Lord.
Our negligence in prayer and worship, and our failure to commend the faith that is in us,
We confess to you, Lord.
Accept our repentance, Lord, for the wrongs we have done: for our blindness to human need and suffering, and our indifference to injustice and cruelty,
Accept our repentance, Lord.
For all false judgments, for uncharitable thoughts toward our neighbors, and for our prejudice and contempt toward those who differ from us,
Accept our repentance, Lord.
For our waste and pollution of your creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us, Accept our repentance, Lord.
Restore us, good Lord, and let your anger depart from us;
Favorably hear us, for your mercy is great.



2007/10/14