I'd like you to open up to the
book of Acts, chapter five.
I'd like to speak to you tonight on
the issue.
Of a hindrance in the Christian life that
I think is rarely recognized and is often
neglected, and it's the hindrance of broken vows
before the Lord.
We'll illustrate this tonight, this principle, by taking
a look at Ananias and Sapphira in Acts,
chapter five, verse one.
We read there, but a certain man named
Ananias with Sapphira, his wife, sold a possession
and he kept back part of the proceeds,
his wife also being aware of it and
brought a certain part and laid it at
the apostles feet.
It was a time of great outpouring of
the Holy Spirit in the early church.
Remarkable things were happening.
Thousands of people were coming to Jesus at
a time.
You had the day of Pentecost with several
thousand.
You had the preaching in Acts, chapter three,
after the lame man at the gate, beautiful,
was healed and several more thousand came and
the work of God was deepening and multiplying
extremely rapidly.
It was it was a remarkable outpouring of
the Holy Spirit.
I wonder if the early apostles thought, I
mean, is it going to continue like this
forever?
You know, I mean, every few weeks are
we going to see a new group of
two or three thousand come to Christ at
one time?
And they thought, man, if this is how
it's going to be, then I mean, the
whole world is going to be converted in
a couple of years.
Well, I don't know if they necessarily thought
that it would continue at that same rate,
but surely there was something remarkable going on.
Now, there's a principle that we should know
about God's work is that whenever the Lord
begins to work in a mighty way and
the devil begins to work in a mighty
way as well.
As a matter of fact, sadly, there are
some people who have experienced this in their
Christian life where they have dedicated themselves to
a season of extra service, extra commitment unto
the Lord, and they have felt a great
deal of attack that has come into their
life.
And so now they say, well, I'm never
going to venture out for the Lord anymore
because I don't want to face that attack.
That's a very foolish thing, because if you
will trust in the Lord and weather through
that season of attack, Satan will back off.
Satan is a being who knows how to
manage his resources and he will not put
his resources into areas that will be ineffective.
And so many times when we stand strong
against the wiles of the devil and hang
in there against him, he will ratchet back
his attack because he'll go put it in
an area that has more opportunity for success.
Well, that's sort of getting off of our
theme here.
But what I want you to be aware
of is that when Satan began to focus
his attack against the church, first he started
doing it by stirring up opposition from without.
That's what we find in Acts chapter four.
Peter and John were arrested.
They were brought before the Sanhedrin.
They spoke with great boldness and Satan found
that bringing attack from the outside against the
church didn't work at all.
So he changed his perspective.
Now, he said, I'm going to work from
the inside of the church.
And what he did was he worked through
these two people, Ananias and Sapphira.
Now, when you have these seasons of great
outpouring of the Holy Spirit and great advancement
in the work of God, it's also a
time when you would expect God's people are
tremendously generous.
I mean, spiritual things become so important to
them that material things aren't so important.
And when they see somebody in need and
they see that they have the things that
they could help the other person, it's like
nothing to go sell it and do it.
It's just because spiritual things just have a
much greater priority in lives when these great
seasons of outpouring from the Holy Spirit happen.
Well, they noticed Ananias and Sapphira did that
one man named Barnabas gave a remarkable gift.
It was a large piece of land.
And he sold the land, verse 20, excuse
me, verse 37 of Acts chapter four tells
us this.
He sold the land and he brought the
money and he laid it at the apostles
feet here.
This is for you, apostles.
Use it as you will.
Well, Ananias and Sapphira saw this and what
did they do?
It says they sold the possession and he
kept back part of the proceeds, his wife
also being aware of it and brought a
certain part and laid it at the apostles
feet.
Well, I have no idea what this piece
of land was worth.
I have no idea what the possession had
a value of.
Let me just throw out a number and
I could be way off in relating it
to today's terms.
But let's just say that the possession or
the piece of land was worth fifty thousand
dollars and they sold it and they kept
back part of it and brought the rest
to the apostles.
Now, let me tell you, let's say you
had a piece of land or a possession
of some kind, maybe a fancy car or
something, and it was worth fifty thousand dollars
and you went out tonight and you sold
that thing for fifty thousand dollars and you
came and brought it here to the church
and wrote out a check for twenty five
thousand dollars and you kept twenty five thousand
dollars and put it in an account for
yourself.
Might I say, I don't think God would
be displeased with that.
I don't think I would be displeased with
it either.
I mean, we would thank you for your
gift very kindly.
The problem wasn't that they kept back a
portion and that they gave a portion, the
problem was that they gave others the clear
impression that they were giving it all.
They came and brought the gift and either
specifically said or gave every impression that this
was it all.
I surrender all is what they were saying,
but they weren't surrendering all.
Now, how do we know this?
We know this from the civic word that
Luke used in writing the book of Acts,
where it says there, look again in verse
two, it says, and he kept back part
of the proceeds.
The specific ancient Greek word there that's used
for kept back, it means to misappropriate.
It doesn't mean just to withhold something, it
means to withhold something in a deceptive, stealing
kind of way.
And so what Ananias and Sapphira did was
they sold the land, let's say for fifty
thousand.
And I don't know in some way or
another, they let everybody know that when they
brought that twenty five thousand dollar gift, we
sold the land for twenty five thousand.
And here it is where all along they
had the twenty five thousand that was left
over for themselves.
Now, I want you to notice something that
essentially what they did when they did this
was they broke a vow they made before
the Lord.
Maybe they saw Barnabas's example of giving and
maybe they were being touched by the Holy
Spirit.
You know, that piece of land that you
have, you should do the same.
You could see that happening in a meeting,
right?
I mean, you can just see, wow, this
this man has done this.
I needed the Holy Spirit speaking.
I need to do the same thing.
And so Ananias goes home to Sapphira, goes,
God is telling me that we need to
sell that piece of land and give the
money to the Lord.
And Sapphira goes white and she says, God
was speaking to my heart just the same
thing.
Well, let's do it.
And they call up the real estate agent.
And wouldn't you know, boom, there's somebody to
buy it right away and everybody's happy.
And let's say they get the check, you
know, or it gets deposited in their account
or whatever.
And they think fifty thousand dollars, that's a
lot of money.
Wow, you know, we know God told us
to give him the money and we told
the Lord that we would.
And we told the church that we would.
Man, let's not.
I mean, nobody knows exactly how much we
sold it for.
The church is going to be stoked to
get twenty five thousand dollars.
So so let's do it.
And essentially they made a vow to God
that they would sell the possession, give all
the money.
But they didn't.
They broke a vow before the Lord.
I want you to see as well.
That their vow was not only a private
vow before the Lord.
Yes, it was private, it was between them
and the Lord, but it was also public
because when they came and laid it down
at the apostles feet, their vow was made
public.
Well, we're giving this all to the Lord,
but they broke that vow.
It was a public vow.
It was a private vow.
And might I say as well that their
vow was a voluntary act of consecration.
I don't read any arm twisting here.
I don't read any manipulation.
I don't read Peter walking through the congregation
and saying, I need four people to sell
their land and to give their money to
the church.
Now, come on now, who's going to be
the four?
There's none of that kind of thing at
all.
No manipulation.
The only inducement that they had was the
power of a godly example.
Barnabas's example.
This was no sermon on giving.
This was no pledge card passed around to
the congregation.
Their vow was a voluntary act of consecration
and they broke it.
They made the vow privately and they broke
it privately.
They made the vow publicly and they broke
it publicly.
So what is God going to do with
Ananias and Sapphira in regard to this broken
vow?
Verse three.
But Peter said, Ananias, why has Satan filled
your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit
and keep back part of the price of
the land for yourself while it remained?
Was it not your own?
And after it was sold, was it not
in your own control?
Why have you conceived this thing in your
heart?
You've not lied to men, but to God.
Ananias, you told God you would do this
and now you didn't do it.
You lied to God.
You can just imagine how shocked Ananias was
because, you know, it's not like Peter heard
about this deal from the real estate agent.
This was divine communication.
Communication to Peter by the Holy Spirit.
If you're talking in terms of spiritual gifts,
you would call this a word of knowledge.
This was supernatural knowledge for Peter.
There's no way he would have known this
except that the spirit of God revealed it
to him.
Now, of course, God knew all about their
broken vow, didn't they?
Peter didn't know until God told him.
The other people in the church didn't know
until Peter told them, but God knew from
the very beginning.
Now, can I start bringing this home to
our life right now?
And I mean, we'll do this as we
continue to consider this.
There are probably broken vows in your life.
Promises that you have made to God either
privately or publicly, and you've broken those vows.
I suppose that when I first say that,
for some reason, the thing that kind of
pops into our minds immediately is wedding vows,
right?
I mean, because that's normally where we would
use the term vows.
Well, if a person breaks their wedding vows,
they've broken it before God, they've broken it
before man, and they've broken it publicly.
It's something that needs to be addressed, and
God knows about the broken vow.
Have you ever had somebody make a promise
to you and the promise was important to
you for whatever reason?
Maybe you're a little kid and your mom
or dad promised to give you something or
do something.
And looking back on it now, it was
an insignificant thing.
But back then it was an important promise
to you.
And when somebody breaks that promise to you,
it matters, doesn't it?
You care about it.
Might I say the Bible tells us that
the vows we make to God are important
to him.
Think of these common examples of broken vows.
Lord, I'll spend more time in prayer.
You broke that vow, didn't you?
Lord, I'm going to intercede more for the
Lord every day.
I'm going to give you 15 minutes, 20
minutes, half hour, whatever you said of intercession
for other people.
Lord, I'm going to do more devotional reading
every day.
I'm going to spend my time with you.
Lord, I vow.
I promise no more of this flaking around,
God.
Every day I'm going to spend that time
with you.
Lord, I'm going to get serious about studying
my Bible.
No longer just a quick verse here and
there.
I'm going to take some time out every
week and sit down and dig into the
Bible.
Lord, I I'm so ashamed that I'm not
a good witness of you.
People mock you at my workplace and I
don't say anything.
I have opportunities to speak up for you
at school and I don't say anything.
God, I'm so ashamed.
Lord, I vow that I'm going to be
a more faithful, personal witness.
Lord, I know that I don't give to
you the way that I should.
I know that I don't give to you
of all that you've blessed me.
I don't tithe.
I don't give.
Lord, I vow I'm going to start doing
that.
Lord, I'm going to be a better example.
Lord, I'm going to be more patient with
my children.
Lord, Lord, I'm going to start being pure
in sexual things.
Now, all of those are common examples of
vows.
That any believer might make and any believer
might break.
I think what's interesting about this.
Is that Ananias and Sapphira seemed completely unaware
that they had lied to the Holy Spirit.
How unaware?
Well, again, Peter said, again, look at verse
four, while it remained, was it not your
own?
And after it was sold, was it not
in your own control?
Why have you conceived this thing in your
heart?
You have not lied to men, but to
God.
Then Ananias, hearing these words, fell down and
breathed his last.
So great fear came upon all those who
heard these things.
I can imagine.
So.
He fell down dead in the church meeting.
Dead.
Ananias seemed to be overcome by such shock.
That it indicates he was totally unaware that
he had lied to the Holy Spirit.
Later on, Peter says to Sapphira, how is
it that you have agreed together to test
the spirit of the Lord?
Do you think if you were to ask
Ananias and Sapphira, are you guys testing the
spirit of the Lord?
Are you provoking him?
Oh, no, not us.
But they were, weren't they?
You see, their sin was serious and it
was dealt with seriously.
There's another indication of these times of great
outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
It is often characteristic of these times that
sin is dealt with more seriously under these
times.
You know why?
Because God is doing something remarkable and His
Spirit is jealous to see it preserved.
I wonder how many people have great sin
in their life of broken vows and they
are completely unaware of how serious it is.
It's just yawn, yeah, you know, nobody's perfect.
Come on now, we all make promises and
break them.
Blah, blah, blah.
They have no sense, they're like Ananias.
What do you mean I've lied to the
Holy Spirit?
You mean when I vowed to read my
Bible every day and I didn't.
You tell me I lied to the Holy,
well yeah.
You told the Holy Spirit you'd do something
and you're not doing it.
Now maybe you should have never made the
vow.
But the bottom line is you made it
and you haven't fulfilled it.
It's a broken vow before the Lord.
We can also say that their broken vow
was the result of a work of Satan.
You see that in verse 3?
Peter said, Ananias, why has Satan filled your
heart to lie to the Holy Spirit?
Satan worked through a broken vow.
He wanted to attack and derail the whole
church into the corruptions of pride and vanity
and a phony, egotistical image consciousness.
And he tried to use broken vows to
do it.
See, Satan wants you to break your vows
that you've made to the Lord.
I think Satan tries to provoke us in
two ways in these areas.
First of all, he wants to provoke us
to make foolish vows.
Secondly, Satan wants us to break the vows
that we've made before the Lord.
Another thing I want you to see is
that Ananias and Sapphira broke fellowship with their
fellow believers when they broke fellowship with God.
In other words, let me put it to
you this way.
Had Peter and the rest of the church
lied to the Holy Spirit?
No.
So here you have a group that has
lied to the Holy Spirit.
And here you have a group that has
not lied to the Holy Spirit.
Had Peter and the rest of the church
provoked the Holy Spirit and tested the Holy
Spirit?
No.
So here you have a group that has
provoked and tested the Holy Spirit.
And here you have a group that has
not.
Now, do you know what fellowship means?
It means you're walking in common.
It means you're walking in sync.
And now they're not walking in sync.
They're not walking in sync anymore.
We often fail to see it this way
because, honestly, we often see fellowship purely in
social terms.
We think of fellowship as just a social
thing.
Well, I'm hanging out with people.
I'm fellowshipping with them.
Not necessarily.
There's a lot of social fellowship in the
church that never comes into the place of
being spiritual fellowship.
Hanging around with the guys, talking about the
football games, that's not spiritual fellowship.
Now, I'm not saying it's bad.
You've just got to recognize it for what
it is.
It's not sharing of the spiritual life with
one another.
That's what fellowship is.
It means to share, to have things in
common.
And when Ananias and Sapphira went off this
way, they broke fellowship with the rest of
the body of Christ.
Couldn't we say that one of the great
reasons why the body of Christ seems in
many ways weak and fragmented and doesn't seem
to make the impact upon the community that
it seems that it should is because, in
reality, there's just a lot more social fellowship
than spiritual fellowship.
And the reason why there's not much spiritual
fellowship is because there's sin in the life
of believers that keeps them from coming together
and walking step by step.
And a lot of that sin probably has
to do with broken vows.
I imagine that Ananias and Sapphira could eat
together at the church potluck and have a
great time and laugh and talk about the
chariot races the other day in the city
and all the rest of it.
But they couldn't have spiritual fellowship with that
group.
No, because they weren't in spiritual agreement.
Next, I want you to see that Ananias
and Sapphira paid a price for their broken
vow.
Well, that's pretty obvious, isn't it?
Ananias paid a price.
If you want to go on, take a
look at the price Sapphira paid.
It says in verse 6, And the young
man arose and wrapped him up and carried
him out and buried him.
Now, it was about three hours later when
his wife came in, not knowing what had
happened, and Peter answered her, Tell me whether
you sold the land for so much?
And she said, Yes, for so much.
Boom!
Broken vow.
Verse 9, Then Peter said to her, How
is it that you've agreed together to test
the spirit of the Lord?
Look, the feet of those who buried your
husband are at the door, and they'll carry
you out.
Then immediately she fell down at his feet
and breathed her last.
And the young man came in and found
her dead, and carrying her out, buried her
by her husband.
So great fear came upon all the church
and upon all who heard these things.
Well, that certainly is paying a price for
breaking your vow, isn't it?
We plead with God for a great outpouring
of His spirit upon the church.
Knowing that these things can happen in times
of great outpouring, maybe we should say tonight,
Lord, we are thankful that you have not
sent such a mighty outpouring of your Holy
Spirit.
Oh Lord, we want to see the day
of Pentecost all over again.
Do you want to see the day of
Ananias and Sapphira all over again?
What would happen if the Lord would strike
down every person in this room who had
a broken vow?
I know they'd be carrying me out by
my feet.
Think about that.
Now, we pay a price, even if it's
not that dramatic.
We pay one in our spiritual life.
Let me read to you from Ecclesiastes, chapter
5, verses 4, 5 and 6.
When you make a vow to God, do
not delay to pay it, for He has
no pleasure in fools.
Pay what you have vowed.
Better not to vow than to vow and
not pay.
Do not let your mouth cause your flesh
to sin, nor say before the messenger of
God that it was an error.
Why should God be angry at your excuse
and destroy the work of your hands?
Let's say you want to go to the
bank and take out a loan.
You go to the bank and you fill
out the application.
And when they run your credit check, what's
one of the first things they look at?
When they look at your credit record, one
of the first things they take a gander
at is how you pay the loans that
you already have.
You already have some other loans out?
Maybe a car, maybe some other kind of
consumer loan.
They want to know, are you making the
payments on those loans?
Now, if you're not making the payments on
the loans that you already have out, the
bank isn't going to look too favorably at
your credit record.
Many of us are like delinquent debtors who
keep coming back to God again and again
for an extension of credit.
Maybe that's a reason why so many prayers
are unanswered.
We come to God and say, oh Lord,
hear my prayer.
And God says, you've never cleared up this
thing that you got wrong between you and
me a long time ago.
You want an extension of credit.
But you won't pay off the debts that
you've already had.
Listen to these words from Dr. J.
Edwin Orr.
He wrote in one book, until broken vows
are mended, it is difficult to make any
progress along the way of consecration.
Before seeking a blessing from God, one should
carefully consider in honest retrospect, one's previous dealings
with deity.
It is not enough that no offense was
intended.
It is not enough that no deceit was
planned in advance.
But do you think Ananias and Sapphira intended
to offend God?
Do you think that they attended to deceive
God?
That's not how their minds were thinking.
They just wanted a little for themselves.
See, it led to a broken vow and
it was an offense to God.
It was deceiving God.
Friends, there's a price to pay for our
broken vows.
And I would say that for many, many
people, they mainly pay the price in arrested
spiritual development.
In other words, they're just not growing in
the Lord the way that they used to
or the way that they could be.
Finally, looking at Ananias and Sapphira, let me
say that characteristic of them is that the
shock of being exposed was too much for
Ananias and Sapphira.
You know, for many Christians in compromise, their
greatest fear is not in sinning itself, but
in being found out.
It's interesting.
I mean, if you could just take one
sin and I'll just pick something out of
the hat, so to speak.
Many men deal and struggle with the sin
of pornography.
Well, there are many men who commit this
sin and they're not terrified to commit the
sin, but they would be absolutely terrified if
it was known that they commit this sin.
Do you see the difference?
The shock of being found out is far
more terrible to them than the shock of
committing the sin itself.
As much as anything else, I would say
that the lesson of Ananias and Sapphira teaches
us that we presume greatly on God when
we assume that there's always time to repent,
that there's always time to get right with
Him, to get honest with Him.
Let's turn back to Ecclesiastes chapter five.
Again, it's about in the middle of your
Bible.
You have Psalms, then Proverbs, then Ecclesiastes.
Ecclesiastes chapter five.
It speaks to us more.
We've already read one segment of this.
I want to take a little longer look
at this passage.
Again, Psalms, Proverbs and then Ecclesiastes.
Find your way to chapter five.
Take a look at verse one.
Walk prudently when you go to the house
of God and draw near to hear rather
than give the sacrifice of fools.
For they do not know that they do
evil.
Do not be rash with your mouth, nor
let your heart utter anything hastily before God.
For God is in heaven and you are
on earth.
Therefore, let your words be few.
I go down to verse four.
When you make a vow to God, do
not delay to pay it, for he has
no pleasure in fools.
Pay what you have vowed.
Better not to vow than to vow and
not pay.
Do not let your mouth cause your flesh
to sin, nor say before the messenger of
God that it was an error.
Why should God be angry at your excuse
and destroy the work of your hands?
We learn a few principles from this passage.
First of all, we learn that it's better
to not make vows at all than to
make a foolish vow.
Isn't that often the problem we make?
We make a solemn vow before God and
it's something that we really don't either intend
to do or it's beyond our capability to
do.
And it's a foolish vow.
Now, here's the thing is what the writer
of Ecclesiastes tells us is that God will
hold you even to your foolish vows.
I mean, a lot of times you just
think that God is handing out mulligans in
heaven.
You know, do you know what a mulligan
is?
A mulligan is a golf term where you
step up to the tee and there you
put the golf ball on the tee and
you go back and you take your swing
back and whack, you hit the ball.
And man, the thing's got a slice on
it that just horrifies you when you watch
it.
And the ball goes whoo and it just
curves right over, you know, out of bounds
or into the water or something like that.
And guys, a lot of times if they're
playing a casual game, they'll say, well, I'll
take a mulligan.
And what that means is you count it,
it's just you never even hit it.
You just tee it up again and hit
the ball again and you don't even count
a stroke.
You don't count the penalty stroke for the
ball you just hit.
A mulligan is like a freebie.
Yeah, do over.
A lot of people think that God in
heaven just does the same kind of thing.
Oh, do over.
Oh, I made a fool of that.
I need to repent.
Do over.
God understands.
Mulligan.
That's not how it is before the Lord.
There is forgiveness for your broken bow.
It's readily available in Jesus Christ.
But first of all, you need to come
to the Lord and confess and repent of
it.
I might say another thing about this.
I've seen some people respond to this passage
in Ecclesiastes and say this.
Well, then I'll just never make a vow
before the Lord.
No, that's not the attitude.
Vows can be good things to make before
God.
But it just means that you need to
take them seriously and you need to fulfill
them when you make them.
Let me put it to you this way.
If you've broken vows, either repent of them
and keep them or repent of your foolishness
and ever making the vow and seek God's
release from the vow.
Lord, this was a foolish vow.
Forgive me for making it.
Forgive me for breaking it.
And Lord, please excuse me from that vow.
I listen.
God in heaven is merciful.
He looks at the heart of that child
who's coming before them in sincere repentance and
he says, I forgive you.
God says, that was a foolish vow.
You come to me in this humility.
I will not hold you to that vow.
Let's sweep it out of the way.
I think you need to ask the question
tonight.
What are you going to do about your
broken vows before the Lord?
It's a good measurement for your spiritual temperature.
You know, you take your temperature to see
if you're sick or if you've got a
fever.
I would say that when you take your
spiritual temperature here and if you don't care
about your broken vows, that's a real coldness
of heart before God.
Your heart's cold before him.
Your heart's hard before him.
You made a promise to God.
You broke it and you don't even care.
Well, what would you say of a husband
who breaks his marriage vows before his wife?
You know, it doesn't bother him one bit.
Didn't care.
You'd say that is a cold hearted husband.
Well, if you don't care about the broken
vows that you've made before the Lord, then
it betrays a coldness of heart.
I mean, maybe for some of you tonight,
your prayer needs to be, God, I've got
a cold heart.
Won't you touch me?
Won't you change me?
If we don't care about our broken vows,
it betrays a real lack of the fear
of God.
Last night, we were together with some other
folks and having a very nice evening.
And for some reason, we started talking about
traffic tickets.
You know, how people get stopped for tickets
or parking tickets or this or that.
Now, let's say you get a traffic ticket.
You get it.
Policeman writes it.
And you just throw it in the glove
box and forget about it.
You get notices from the court.
You just forget about it.
You can get away with that for a
while.
But as your glove compartment gets filled up
with parking tickets, pretty soon you realize, I've
got to deal with these things.
I can't just ignore it.
I have to deal with these things.
And you go in and you deal with
them, painful as it is.
Honestly, wouldn't you say that many Christians have
more respect for the Department of Motor Vehicles
than they do for the Holy Spirit of
God?
Because God's bringing conviction into their life.
A parking ticket, if you will.
God says, here's conviction.
Now, you come and deal with this.
They throw it in the glove compartment.
Ah, forget about it.
And God sends them something in the mail.
You know, there they get convicted again when
they go to church.
And the pastor, you know, it's one of
those things.
The pastor was reading my mind, you know,
in that.
And what do they do with that?
They throw it in the glove compartment.
Forget about it.
And again, the way people respond to God,
you'd have to say, honestly, they respect the
Department of Motor Vehicles more than they respect
God.
Because of the way they respond to conviction.
So what do you do to restore broken
vows?
Let's say, man, that's me tonight.
I know I've broken vows.
What do you do?
Well, let's take a look, finally, at Numbers,
chapter six.
Turn your Bible to Numbers, chapter six.
Now, it's interesting because we have the exact
scenario here in the book of Numbers.
The law of Moses deals with this exact
issue of what to do when you've broken
the vow.
Now, the specific vow that they're dealing with
here in Numbers, chapter six, is the vow
of a Nazarite.
Have you ever heard of that term?
The vow of a Nazarite.
Well, the vow of a Nazarite was a
vow that you would take for 60 days
or 30 days or 90 days.
And during that time, you would do certain
things.
You would regard it as a special time
of separation unto the Lord.
You would say, first of all, I'm not
going to eat or drink anything that comes
from the grapevine.
No grape juice, no wine, no grapes, no
raisins, no nothing.
It comes from the grapevine.
I don't have it.
Secondly, you would avoid dead bodies and death.
Third, you would let your hair grow long
for the length of the vow.
So if you took a two-month vow
of a Nazarite, you wouldn't cut your hair
for two months.
And then at the end of the vow,
you would cut your hair and you'd come
and bring it before the Lord and offer
a special sacrifice to conclude your vow.
Now, let's say you took the vow of
a Nazarite and somebody fell down dead right
next to you.
Then what do you do?
You broke the vow.
Maybe you didn't intend to, but the vow's
broken.
That's the issue dealt with here in Numbers
chapter 6, beginning at verse 9.
Take a look here.
It says, And if anyone dies very suddenly
beside him, he means the person who's made
the vow of a Nazarite, and he defiles
his consecrated head, then he shall shave his
head on the day of his cleansing.
On the seventh day, he shall shave it.
Then on the eighth day, he shall bring
two turtle doves or two young pigeons to
the priest, to the door of the tabernacle
of meeting.
And the priest shall offer one as a
sin offering and the other as a burnt
offering and make atonement for him because he
sinned by reason of the dead body.
And he shall sanctify his head that same
day.
He shall consecrate to the Lord the days
of his separation and bring a male lamb
in its first year as a trespass offering,
but the former days shall be lost because
his separation was defiled.
So what do you do to restore a
broken vow?
I think we have a pattern here.
The first thing you do is you humble
yourself.
That's what you did by shaving your head.
I know today some people shave their head
as a fashion statement.
They think, well, that's the look and so
I want to have it.
It wasn't that way in ancient Israel.
In ancient Israel, when you saw somebody with
a shaved head, you said that man is
repenting of something.
There's something spiritual going on in his life.
So that's the first thing you did was
you humbled yourself by shaving your head.
And might I say you humbled yourself publicly.
I would say that if the vow you
made was public in any way, you should
repent of it publicly.
As a matter of fact, if you sense
in your heart that your broken vow has
affected the spiritual life of others, that it's
held back the work of the church of
Jesus Christ in some way, then you should
repent of it publicly.
You should be willing to stand before a
group just as this and say there's something
I'd like to tell you all.
I broke a vow before the Lord and
you know what?
I think it's really hindered my walk with
God and I think that it's affected my
fellow brothers and sisters in Christ because if
my walk with God isn't right, then that
affects the body of Christ.
I'd like to repent of my broken vow
and I'd like you all to know about
it.
So would you pray for me?
What would you think if somebody did that?
Right here tonight, would you think that filthy
sinner removed them from my midst?
You wouldn't think that for a moment, would
you?
You'd say, God bless that person.
God bless them for responding to the conviction
of the Holy Spirit.
And yes, I'll pray for them.
It's funny how differently we see ourselves and
how we see other people.
Secondly, you need to look to your atoning
sacrifice.
After you humble yourself, you have to look
to your atoning sacrifice.
And how did they do that?
Well, that was the whole turtle dove thing.
Bringing two young turtle doves or two young
pigeons.
You look to your atoning sacrifice.
What's your atoning sacrifice?
Well, it's what Jesus did on the cross.
Say, Lord, I know that I humbled myself
before you.
Jesus, you paid for this sin.
You paid for my sin of broken vows.
Thank you, Jesus.
Thank you that this removes my guilt, that
it removes my shame of this broken vow.
Thank you, Lord God.
You know, your broken vow is a sin
of omission and it must be confessed as
sin before you can have a totally restored
fellowship with God and with others.
You say, Lord, Jesus cleansed me of this.
And then fourthly, did you see what you
need to do?
Finally, I should say.
What do you do?
You start all over again.
You find that in verse 12.
Take a look.
It says, He shall consecrate to the Lord
the days of separation.
Bring a male lamb the first years of
trespass offering.
But the former days shall be lost because
the separation was defiled.
In other words, start all over again with
your vow.
Okay, you took the vow of Nazareth.
You said, Lord, I'm not going to do
these things for 30 days.
And after 10 days, somebody falls down dead
next to you.
You know, a dead body falls on you.
Crazy circumstance or whatever.
Your vow is broken.
You humble yourself.
You humble yourself publicly.
You look to your atoning sacrifice.
And then you start all over again.
And that's what you should do.
Now, accepting, of course, if your vow was
foolish.
If it was a foolish vow that you
should have never made, then don't start it
all over again.
Just humbly ask God to release you from
your foolish vow.
But maybe it was a good vow that
you made.
Maybe it wasn't foolish.
Maybe it wasn't beyond what you should expect
to consecrate yourself to, Lord.
Well, then come back and say, Lord, I'm
going to keep that.
Your Holy Spirit empowering me.
Me looking to Jesus.
I am going to keep that vow before
you.
Finally, and I think that's a pretty clear
pattern, right?
Humble yourself.
Humble yourself publicly.
Look to your atoning sacrifice.
And start all over again.
Now, let me touch on one last thing,
and then we'll conclude.
What if I think I've broken vows, but
I can't remember any of them?
Are you like that?
That's kind of like I am.
It's like, man, who knows what promises I've
made to God that I haven't broken.
I know they must be out there, but
I can't think of any specific one.
So what do you do?
Well, you humble yourself.
You confess and you repent in general terms.
Lord, I know that I must have broken
some vows.
I mean, I just know I sense it
within myself.
I can't think of any one specifically, but
I just sense, Lord, this is me.
And so, Lord, I confess, I repent, cleanse
me of these things, Lord.
I just cleanse me.
But then ask God to show you.
Lord, is there a specific vow that I've
broken that you want to call to my
attention?
You know, if you ask God to show
you, he'll show you, right?
I mean, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow.
Maybe he'll do it next week, but you
just be ready for it.
And when God.
Whoa.
I remember I did make that.
I did make that promise to God.
Oh, Lord, I'm so sorry that I didn't
keep that vow.
And then you think, was it a foolish
vow or was it a godly vow?
If it's a godly vow, you start all
over with it again.
If it was a foolish vow, you humbly
ask God to release you from it.
God will do that if you'll keep your
ears open to him.
Friends.
Why does Jesus want to talk to us
about these things?
Is it because he's angry with you?
And just likes beating up on you and
I?
No, no, a thousand times no.
Jesus, the humble, gentle servant, is here before
you tonight washing your feet.
And you know what the problem is?
Yeah, your feet are dirty.
But up under one of the toenails, there's
a real stubborn piece of crud.
And so he's kind of poking away at
it, you know, and cleaning it out.
And oh, oh, man, oh, don't worry.
I got to get this thing out.
It'll get infected if I leave it in
there.
Well, then cleanse my feet, Jesus.
Take it away.
The humble servant Jesus is before you tonight,
gently convicting you of sin.
And you say, well, it doesn't feel so
gentle inside of me right now.
Well, let me tell you something.
You want harsh conviction of sin from the
Lord?
Don't even be asking for that.
He's gently convicting you of sin because he
loves you.
Because he wants to take everything out of
the way that would hinder fellowship between you
and him.
And broken vows will hinder your fellowship.
You should confidently expect God to do great
things in your life when you set this
area right.
Let's pray.
Father, we do.
We expect you to do great things in
our life, Lord, when we set these things
right.
And, Lord, I stand before these people here
this evening, and I confess to them and
to you, Lord, that I've broken vows in
my life, Lord.
I've broken vows made to you and made
to men.
Lord, I pray.
I pray, Lord, that if there's any specific
vow that you want to put your finger
on in my life, then, Lord, that you
would show me.
But, God, in humility I come before you
and I say, Lord, wash me clean of
this sin and help me to walk in
faithfulness, Lord.
I don't want anything to come between my
fellowship with you.
Make me more sensitive to sin, God.
I want to be more sensitive.
I want to be more troubled when I'm
not walking in the sink of fellowship with
you.
Bless you, God, for your great love.
Move upon us now by your Spirit.