Heavenly Father, here we are in the battle
of the ages.
Here we are, Lord, to present ourselves again
to you this morning as soldiers of Christ,
soldiers of the cross.
We bless you, Lord, that you've ever called
us unto yourself, that you've called us to
stand by your side, you've called us to
be followers of you, you've called us, Lord,
to put on the armor of God, you've
called us to wield the sword of the
Spirit, that you've called us to be clothed
with the armor of righteousness on the right
hand and on the left and do battle
for you as men of God, women of
God, and that you've been pleased, Lord, to
put us into your service, that we might
have a part in advancing your kingdom, that
we might have a part in dealing blows
to the strongholds of the enemy, that we
might have a real part in furthering the
gospel.
Lord, here we are in the battle.
Here we are, Lord, in a world that
is perishing, a world that is dying, a
world with souls that are perishing in their
sins.
With nations falling and shaking, with cities being
uprooted, our communities are held by the power
of sin this morning.
And we long, Lord, that you'd clothe us
with your Holy Spirit, that you'd use these
days that we might go back to our
communities and to our churches and that we
might see our communities move for your holy
name.
We ask, Lord, then you'd be pleased to
continue to equip us for the battle, arm
us with jealous cares in thy sight to
live, thy servants, Lord, prepare a strict account
to give.
We bless your name, Lord, we admit thine
is the victory, the glory, the majesty, now
and forever.
Amen.
Open your Bibles with me, please, to Hebrews
chapter 12.
Hebrews chapter 12.
Shall we read the first four verses?
Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with
so great a cloud of witnesses, let us
lay aside every weight and the sin which
doth so easily beset us, and let us
run with patience the race that is set
before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and
finisher of our faith, who for the joy
that was set before him endured the cross,
despising the shame, and is set down at
the right hand of the throne of God.
For consider him that endured such contradiction of
sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and
faint in your minds.
Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving
against sin.
We know that Christ and him crucified is
central to the gospel, but there wouldn't be
any need for a Messiah and his work
if there weren't one thing that it presupposes,
namely, the need which is sin.
I'd like to speak to you this morning
on sin.
You walk, you talk to the man on
the streets, and his supreme problem that that
man is facing is sin.
You look at the baby in the cradle,
and the supreme problem that that child is
facing and will face is sin.
You go to the nursing home and talk
to that elderly person, and the supreme problem
that that soul is facing is sin.
You go to the insane asylum, and the
chief problem that that person is facing is
sin.
The supreme problem of the human race is
sin.
I'd like to speak on sin this morning.
However, not the sin of omission, as James
4.17 speaks of, not the sin of
commission, as 1 John 3.4 speaks of,
not the sin of doubt, as Romans 14
identifies, not the sin of presumption, as Psalm
19 speaks of, but rather the sin of
Hebrews 12, verse 1, namely, the besetting sin.
Sometimes the Bible takes us to the battlefield
that we might be reminded as soldiers of
the sacrifice and the hardship that is involved.
Sometimes the Bible takes us to the wheat
field that we might learn patience like farmers.
Sometimes the Bible takes us to the sports
field that we might learn discipline like the
athlete.
And here we are in this passage.
We've been taken to the arena, the sports
arena and the arena of faith.
Here we find then a great cloud of
witnesses, those witnesses of Hebrews 11.
And they're not watching us like spectators, but
they're speaking to us.
They're crying out to us like cheerleaders to
press on, to go along with God and
to believe God no matter what's facing you
and be a victor over sin.
Here we are in the race of life.
It speaks of this race, to run the
race with patience, the race that is set
before us and to lay aside every weight
that would hold us down.
You look at a runner and you don't
see a runner with a lot of extra
pounds on him.
He's skinny as a rail.
He doesn't even want to have any weight
on his feet.
He doesn't wear socks.
He doesn't want to have any weight on
his legs.
He wears gym trunks, naked trunks is the
Greek word.
Anything that would hinder our spiritual progress is
to be laid aside, as one man said.
The Christian self-denial should bear not only
on the guilty pleasures, but on every habit
or pleasure or enjoyment which, although it may
not be vicious, nevertheless robs us of spiritual
strength and time.
We go out for a recreation and we
come back a lot of times finding it
was just dissipation, right?
But not only to lay aside these weights,
but he specifically says, now lay aside this
sin which so easily besets us.
I'm not totally convinced in my own mind
whether this is talking about just sin in
general, but I have taken it before and
I take it now as referring to a
besetting a specific sin.
The besetting sin is what I want to
talk about this morning.
That is a sin that is persistent and
predominant and deep-rooted and continually in evidence
in my life.
A stronghold sin in my life as a
Christian.
So let's look at three things pertaining to
the besetting sin.
Number one, the problem of a besetting sin
for the Christian.
Number two, the nature of a besetting sin
for the Christian.
And number three, the cost of tolerating a
besetting sin as a professing Christian.
The problem, first, of a besetting sin.
Here you are, you're a Christian, you see?
And you've had victory, substantial victory over sin.
By definition, that's what a Christian is.
As Brother Leiter just preached to us, he
is born of God, overcomes.
You've got substantial victory over sin if you're
a Christian.
But here's this one sin that continues to
bug you and plague you and hang on
to you again and again and again and
day after day after day and week after
week.
A besetting sin.
And you hate it because you're regenerate.
You hate sin by nature, but yet you
pity it and you pamper it and you
play around with it and you put up
with it and you plead for it, like
Abraham did Ishmael, like Lot did for Zohar.
And you protect it like Jacob did for
Benjamin and make excuses for it.
You know it's there.
And yet you won't lay it aside like
the Bible says, lay aside every weight and
the sin which does so easily beset us.
You know it's there and you know others
know it's there and yet you won't lay
it aside.
And you know God knows it's there and
yet you won't lay it aside.
And it's defiling your conscience and yet you
won't lay it aside like the Bible commands
you.
And it's depleting your spiritual strength and yet
you won't lay it aside like the Bible
commands you.
You won't kick it out.
You won't pluck it out.
You won't put it off.
A besetting sin, the problem of a besetting
sin.
Second, consider the nature of a besetting sin.
It's the very same as any other sin.
All sin is sin.
I'll just point out two things about the
of a besetting sin and really of all
sin.
One thing, it deceives.
Hebrews chapter 3 speaks of the deceitfulness of
sin.
You think in this matter of a besetting
sin that initially you realize that it is
sin.
I mean, God has spoken to you and
it's come to you in the Bible and
it's come to you from the pulpit and
it's coming to you in your conscience that
yes, that's sin.
It is, it's wrong for me to have
and hold this thing.
But you don't deal with it right away.
And you dabble around with it and play
on with it.
And eventually you think there's nothing wrong with
that.
And you eventually you think that you've even
got a right to have just one sin.
Yeah, everybody's got a right to have a
besetting sin and a little problem of some
kind.
And so you go along with that and
you think eventually you start defending that thing.
And eventually, and I've heard it, eventually you
start even bragging on your besetting sin.
I've heard men brag on their sin.
What's going on in their mind to brag
about that thing?
I say it's deceptive.
You start out knowing it's wrong and don't
deal with it and you end up bragging
about it.
You see it coming to you and you
extend your hand to shake its hand like
a joab and it ends up in the
end jabbing you under the fifth rib.
You let that sin kiss you like Judas
and it eventually ends up betraying you and
destroying you.
It is possible, Revelation 3, 17, to think
that you're rich in the things of God
and yet you don't know that you're poor
and blind and wretched and miserable and naked.
You don't know.
The worst thing about a deceived person is
that he doesn't know it.
The worst thing about a man that can't
see is that he can't see.
And so James 1.22 says, let's be
not just hearers of the word but doers
of the word.
Let's be deluded ourselves.
And another thing about the nature of a
besetting sin and of all sin is that
it not only deceives.
Hebrews 3 says, lest any of you be
hardened due to the deceitfulness of sin.
Hardened.
You know what it is?
Maybe you do.
Take that body putty and fix a rough
spot in the car.
Here's a can of putty and you take
some out and you take this here tube
of chemical and squeeze a little of that
out into the putty and stir it around.
You stir it around, stir it around and
eventually, gradually, it starts getting harder and harder
and harder and it's hard, finally.
And that's the way it is with sin.
Soft choices lead to hard hearts.
You better not count on victory someday.
You don't know the end of sin.
You don't know the latter end of sin.
You don't know where it's going to stop.
The Bible speaks of a conscience being seared
or becoming calloused.
At the beginning, we realized that that was
sin and it was ugly and hateful.
And whenever we'd do it and commit it,
that needle on our conscience would register and
register and go way over.
But now you become used to it and
become hardened to it and calloused to it
and now it's just a little bit left.
Just the needle just moves a little bit
and it's scary.
You remember Balaam?
God gave him a clear word at the
beginning, what was right and what was wrong.
But he overrode that command of the Lord,
that revelation of the Lord, and bucked through
it.
And eventually, it was like God was saying
to him, go on then.
And he thought it was right and went
to hell because of it.
The only hope you've got, brethren, is to
be right now sensitive to every prompting of
the Holy Spirit that you've got upon you
and cherish every rebuke that comes to you,
whether by the Spirit of God or a
brother in Christ, and respond to it now,
not then, because you're liable to be hardened
a month down the road and think it's
all right to go on with your besetting
sin.
Third, the cost of tolerating a besetting sin.
Death is still the wages of sin, whether
it's a besetting sin or any sin.
A besetting sin, it's still the same thing.
You're going to experience death in some form
or another, whether it's disease or disappointment or
discouragement or despair, depression, it's death in some
form or another.
You go up to the paymaster and there
at the window you stand after a week's
wickedness, and what does he pay you?
He pays you in death.
In some way or another, you're going to
experience death to whatever degree of sin you
commit.
He who sows to the flesh reaps corruption.
But Samuel Rutherford put it well.
He said, don't think that you and your
idle sins can go to heaven together.
You either kill it or it'll kill you.
You don't have any reason to think if
you're going on in a known sin day
after day after day that you're a Christian.
I mean, it's going to zap you, rob
you of your assurance in some measure, if
not totally.
We're going to have to either bow to
the scepter of God's authority and deal with
that sin or else bow to his rod
and be judged by it.
It's either the scepter or the rod.
Remember Saul, King Saul?
He didn't destroy Amalek according to the will
of God, and so Amalek ended up destroying
him.
You play with a snake and you're going
to get bit by it.
You dance around the pit and you're going
to fall into it.
Think of what the Bible tells us by
way of testimony as to the effect of
tolerating one sin, committing one sin.
Lot's wife was judged because of one sin.
Ananias and Sapphira were judged because of one
sin.
The rich young ruler went to hell because
of one sin.
One thing you lack, Jesus said.
Adam and Eve, because of one sin, plunged
the whole human race into death and misery.
A besetting sin, brethren, is sin.
And the Bible says without holiness no man
will see the Lord.
The Bible declares that God is light and
in him is no darkness at all.
And the Christian is called to walk in
the light as he's in the light.
That means to entertain no darkness at all.
I mean, a Christian by definition is a
person who's walking with a clear, clean conscience.
That's my boast.
I don't know of any sin on my
conscience right now.
No known sin.
Yes, you've got a whole bunch of unknown
sin.
You're not perfectly sanctified yet and we won't
be until we get to heaven.
But our boast and our joy and our
confidence is that we can walk without any
known sin, with a clear, clean slate.
But here you are with a besetting sin
that's bothering you day after day after day.
And I say this, or rather you might
say, yes, but I'm trusting the blood of
Christ to cover all my sins.
I say unto you, if you're dabbling, if
you're having a problem with a besetting sin,
you don't have any reason.
Or I'll say it this way, you are
robbed of full assurance of saying you're a
Christian unless you are actively,
violently fighting, struggling, striving against that sin.
That's your only hope, that you've got any
assurance of thinking you're a Christian and the
blood of Christ is going to cover all
your sins.
Is that if you're fighting against that besetting
sin, according to Hebrews 12, verse 4, striving
against sin.
Lord, I know I'm doing this, I know
I've got a problem with it, I know
it's got a hold on me, there's a
stronghold in my life, but I hate it
and I'm fighting against it and would you
please deliver me from it.
That's the only way you've got any assurance
that you are a Christian and that the
blood of Christ is covering your sins.
At the very least, it is going to
mar your testimony.
It is marring your testimony and hindering your
usefulness, if in fact you are a Christian.
Here you are with this beautiful garment, it's
beautiful, but it's just got this one stain
on it and because of that one stain,
you can't use it.
Here you've got this precious ointment, valuable, but
because of one dead fly, you can't use
it.
I worked for a while with a seed
corn company and they had charts, all figured
out how much yield it would cost you
to just have one weed for every ten
foot of row.
I wonder how much fruitfulness, just one sin
in our life is going to hinder our
yield for God.
It robs us of our spiritual strength.
You just let the faucet drip one time
per second and at the end of the
day, you've lost nine gallons.
You let a faucet leak one thirty second
of an inch and for three months, in
three months time, you've lost 18,500 gallons
of water.
What is it?
What's this one sin costing you?
With regard to spiritual usefulness and spiritual strength,
plug up the leaks in your vessel, brother.
Remember the effects of one sin.
Because of one sin, Moses was kept out
of the promised land.
Because of one sin, the Abraham sin, we've
got all this mess in the Middle East,
so to speak, or indirectly.
Because of one sin, David lost peace in
his house and the sword didn't depart thereafter.
Because of one sin, Noah helped to bring
a curse on his children.
And so this one sin is affecting you.
It's affecting you.
You can't shine the way you ought.
You can't look people in the eye the
way you ought.
You can't regice the way you ought.
You're not free the way you ought to
be and could be as a Christian.
It's affecting you.
It's affecting your ministry.
It's affecting your family.
It's affecting your church.
Because of one sin, Achan's sin, all Israel
is defeated.
What are you doing dabbling around with that
sin?
Maybe that's what it means, the mystery of
iniquity.
It's a mystery why we fiddle around with
sin when it costs us so much.
In closing, I exhort you, brothers and sisters,
to be a perfectionist on yourself.
Be a perfectionist.
Give the others a whole bunch of slack.
Give them some slack, but be a perfectionist
on yourself.
You take a piano player, and here she's
got this beautiful piece of music, and she
can play it beautifully, all except for this
one hard spot.
Well, what does she do?
Go to the concert with it that way
and let that dead fly spoil the ointment?
No.
Ahead of time, she works on it and
works on it and works on that hard
spot until it shines like the rest of
it.
And then she can present it with brilliance.
You take the Olympic athlete, and the coach
comes up and says to him, you could
win that crown if you just work on
this one thing.
If you just deal with that and get
victory in that one area, you can win
that crown.
And he does.
He works on it.
He concentrates on it.
He deals with it.
He focuses in on it until he's got
it down.
And he does it for a corruptible crown.
And here we are talking about an incorruptible
crown, eternal weights of glory.
Surely we ought, like the athlete, to discipline
our lives for the purpose of godliness, which
holds a promise for the life that now
is, and for that which is to come.
Samuel Rutherford, to quote him again, he said
we ought to make growth in grace a
priority above everything else in our lives.
Isn't conformity to Christ, isn't dealing with sin,
isn't laying aside sin and falling in love
with him, isn't that sinful in your life
as a Christian?
Secondly, I exhort you to be courageous.
Take courage.
Rise up.
Be courageous in this striving against sin.
What is your besetting sin, if you have
one?
Maybe it's late to bed and late to
rise.
Maybe it's prayerlessness.
Maybe it's gluttony.
Maybe it's silly talk.
Maybe it's laziness.
Or some other form of lust.
I don't know what it is.
I don't need to know.
But by definition of the besetting sin, you
know what it is.
Whatever it is, there it stands before you
like a Goliath, defying the power of the
living Christ.
And are you going to let that thing,
blaspheme the name of the Lord?
Why not rise up and take courage and
like David, hit it in the head?
Or like David, do with it like he
did to the Jebusites.
Let's look at that testimony in 1 Chronicles
11.
He did not come hither.
Nevertheless, David took the castle of Zion, which
is the city of David.
Here's the devil.
Or here you are.
You have this victory and that victory and
the other victory in Canaan's fair and happy
land.
You've tasted of the milk and the honey.
You've seen them routed out.
But here's this stronghold, the stronghold of the
Jebusites.
And they're saying to you, you shall not
come here.
You're not going to take this one.
You're not going to conquer this one.
There's no victory over this one.
You're not coming in here.
And there's the devil saying that to you
like those Jebusites.
But look at the next word.
Nevertheless.
Nevertheless, David took it.
He came in.
It didn't faze him a bit.
We're going to take it like we took
the rest of them.
Courage.
Take heart.
Remember the example of David and the Jebusites.
Thirdly, be radical to find victory over your
besetting sin.
Be radical.
Again, I like David's words in Psalm 18.
He said, I pursued my enemies and I
overtook them.
I did not turn back until they were
shattered and they fell at my feet and
were unable to rise.
Remember what he did to Goliath.
He not only hit him in the head,
but he took the sword and cut his
head off.
And make sure he wasn't going to rise
up.
Radical.
I shattered them so they were unable to
rise.
Don't play around with it.
Don't go for a half victory.
Don't pamper it.
Here's a man with a problem with gluttony
and obesity.
And what does he do?
He goes off on some weight watchers or
partial diet instead of being radical and going
right to the root of it and plucking
the weed out by the root.
Why not declare a fast?
Why not run up the red with a
white flag and deal with it?
You take a doctor that prescribes the pills.
Isn't this right, Dr. Campbell?
He prescribes these pills and he says, make
sure you patient, make sure that you take
them all.
Don't just take half the bottle and then
quit.
You're liable to have a relapse.
Take all the pills and make sure that
all of them are killed.
Be radical.
Number four, be persistent to gain victory over
your besetting sin.
Be persistent.
You've got a sore on your arm or
whatever.
It's not enough to put the ointment on
just one day.
You've got to keep applying it and applying
it and applying it and be regular and
persistent every day until it's healed.
Keep at it.
Keep on it.
Deal with it.
Another thing, if you want victory over a
besetting sin is be vigilant.
Remember the example of the Syrians in 1
Kings chapter 20.
Here the Lord, unbelievably, had given King Ahab,
the wicked man that he was, victory over
the Syrians in Ben-Hadad.
And what happened?
The prophet came to Ahab and he said,
you go and strengthen yourself because they're coming
back at the turn of the year.
That's the way with the devil.
He left the Lord until an opportune time.
Make sure, watch out, be vigilant.
Because it's coming back to try and get
in again and get a foothold on you.
And if it does, it's liable to be
seven times worse than it was the first
time.
What we're saying, brethren, is to be all
out for God.
All out for Him.
And be violent in the things of the
kingdom.
Radical in the pursuit of the Lord and
in the matters of holiness.
You don't know how consecrated you really are
until you gain victory over that besetting sin.
Until you fight under the heat of the
battles on.
And you don't know the riches that the
Lord has for you until you deal with
that besetting sin.
The riches of peace and glory and goodness
and gladness.
You don't know the riches that the Lord
has for you until all on the altar
is laid.
I one time was told the story, I
guess, of Genghis Khan.
And here that man was going through the
land, sweeping through the land with his army,
taking one city after another.
And they came to this one city.
And there they'd taken it all except this
one temple, Buddhist temple or whatever it was.
And they got into that temple and there
they went into the inner sanctuary.
And there they found those priests all bobbed
down around this here mighty idol.
And the main, the head priest, he rose
up and he came to that great leader
and he pleaded with that leader, take everything,
take anything, but would you just spare this
one?
And the leader at first, he said, all
right.
But then he thought again and said, no,
cut her down.
And they knocked that idol and split it
wide open and there came up buckets of
jewels.
And that's the way with the Lord.
If he can just keep one stronghold sin
in our life, he knows that he's holding
back riches of the Lord from us.
Finally, to have victory over a besetting sin,
it just means believing God.
Have faith in God.
That's what all those witnesses were crying out
in Hebrews chapter 11.
By faith, by faith, by faith, have faith
in God.
And really, what sin is it that's too
big for the Lord?
Isn't that why the Lord came, was to
set his people free from their sins?
Doesn't it say in Titus 2.14, he
gave himself for us that he might redeem
us and deliver us from all iniquity, every
lawless deed, and to purify for himself a
people zealous of good works.
2 Timothy 4.18, the Lord will deliver
me from every lawless deed and preserve me
unto his heavenly kingdom.
I mean, it says every.
It says all.
Isn't there power in the blood to deal
with that thing that seems so impossible in
your life, that seems unconquerable in your life?
Isn't God sufficient?
Isn't the Lord sufficient?
Isn't the blood, isn't the cross sufficient for
that?
Really, what you're doing by putting up, by
tolerating a besetting sin in your life, in
a measure, you're blaspheming, you're insulting the cross
of Christ.
And Brother Leiter has been preaching the doctrine
of regeneration.
And what does it mean if it doesn't
mean this, that there's victory over sin no
matter what it is?
The Lord's given us a new heart, and
now it's only natural to be free from
sin, only natural to fight against sin, only
natural to see those sins drop off.
It's the natural thing.
That's the way God has wired us up.
And so you don't need it.
You don't need to put up with it.
You don't need to tolerate it.
You don't need to go on with it.
There is victory.
It's right at your fingertips.
It's real in you already.
Believe God.
Cash in on it.
Write out the check that God has laid
out there before you.
Fill it in.
Only natural.
If you've tasted that the Lord is gracious,
here, what is that grace teaching you?
Titus 2.11 says that the grace of
God has appeared teaching you, actively teaching you
to deny ungodliness and worldly loss, to live
soberly, righteously and godly in this present world.
That's what grace does.
Think of the promises of God.
Oh, exceeding great and precious promises that we
might be partakers of his divine nature, that
we might be conformed to the image of
Christ.
He said we're more than conquerors to him
who loved us.
He made us kings and priests unto him.
If we're kings, why don't we gain the
dominion and possess our possessions and inherit the
promises?
It's there for us as Christians.
Think of this text, how it says to
deal with sin.
It says in some places that we just
need to avoid sin.
In other places it says we need to
flee from sin.
But here in our text it says lay
aside sin.
Just like a book when you're done with
it, or like your shoes when you take
them off.
You just lay them aside.
The other day I was walking through the
woods and there a branch got tangled up
in my shoestrings and I couldn't walk with
that thing there, let alone run, and so
I had to stop and reach down and
take it out and lay it aside.
And that's what the Lord wants us to
do with our sins.
Lay them aside.
You set them aside.
I don't want it anymore.
I'm tired of it.
I'm sick of it.
I've had enough.
I want to be holy like him.
A.
W.
Tozer says, many run well, but few run
well to the end.
What a thing.
Could it be true?
Don't you want to run a good race?
Don't you want to finish the course with
joy?
Don't you want to fight a good fight?
Don't you want to end with making your
deathbed pillow soft with a holy life?
Oh, then we ought to rise up and
press the battle air.
The night shall veil the glowing skies.
Rise up and run the race.
Rise up and look to Jesus.
How did he deal with sin?
How did he face the problem of sin?
How was it?
Well, he had cost him his lifeblood in
dealing with sin.
He had to die for sin.
And so it says we ought to look
to him.
He's the pioneer.
He's the leader.
He's going on ahead, following his steps, and
do whatever it takes to deal with that
sin.
Here we are.
We're in the race of life.
We're talking about the dangers of being disqualified.
We're talking about rules, the rules of the
game.
We're talking about time element.
We want to run as far as we
can on the race of holiness before we
die and our stewardship is taken away.
We're talking about incorruptible crowns and goals and
glories beyond anything that we can imagine.
Well, let's get on with it.
Amen.
Break down every idol.
Cast out every foe.
Be whiter, much whiter than snow.
May the Lord help us.
Amen.