Gtcotr/ss030418
3 John 1 NKJV
9 I wrote to the church, but
Diotrephes, who loves to have the preeminence among them, does not receive us.
10 Therefore, if I come, I
will call to mind his deeds which he does, prating against us with malicious
words. And not content with that, he himself does not receive the brethren, and
forbids those who wish to, putting them out of the church.
11 Beloved, do not imitate
what is evil, but what is good. He who does good is of God, but he who does
evil has not seen God.
This
morning we are continuing in the series:
Defeating the Enemies of the Soul
This
is the fourth lesson in our series. Three weeks ago, we learned that the Old
Testament accounts of the Children of Israel were not written as merely a
historical record of their journey. Rather we found that the accounts of the
Bible were intended by God to be a spiritual roadmap for our lives. We drew
parallels between the natural Egypt and this world. We found that the enemies
faced by the Children of Israel in their conquest of the Promised Land equal
the spiritual enemies we face in our walk with Christ today.
Two
weeks ago, we discovered how the first enemy, called the Canaanite, hopes to render the Christian powerless by
enticing them to compromise. We cannot hope to live a victorious Christian life with one
foot in the Kingdom of God and one foot in the world. We heard how to
identify the voices of compromise and what to do to defeat that Canaanite in
our lives.
Last
week we studied the Hittite and found that the
goal of this enemy is to dismay us in hopes we will lose it and go to pieces
under pressure. Fear is the Hittite’s weapon of choice. The Hittite hopes to
terrorize and paralyze the Christian by acting bigger and stronger than he
really is. He is a liar!
What would happen if you stopped paying attention to your fears? Most, if not all, of
them might simply go away. We tend to keep our fears alive and give them so
much more credit than they deserve. According to Joshua 1:9, this needs to
stop! Be strong, take courage, do not fear nor be dismayed. Why? Because the
LORD your God is with you …
Exodus 3:8 “So I have come
down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up
from that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey,
to the place of the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites and the
Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites."
This
week we continue with our series by learning how to identify and defeat the
third enemy: The
Amorite
There is a difference between being strongly principled and being
stubbornly opinionated.
These two are not the same … One is a godly characteristic and the other is
born of the flesh at best and can, at times, be purely demonic. This enemy of
the soul is best represented by the Amorite.
Allow
me to list some human characteristics associated the Amorite:
·
Outspoken; Boastful; Direct; Contentious and Argumentative
·
Arrogant; Aggressive; Unbending; Non-Negotiable; Quick Tempered and
Insecure
·
Territorial; Possessive; Jealous and Controlling
·
Prideful; Independent and Opinionated
·
A Self-Appointment protector of non-granted lands.
·
Always right in their own eyes; Justifying their actions by their
own emotions. Self-righteous …
·
A Superiority Complex; Looking down on others to maintain a sense of
security.
·
Prominence; Preeminence and filled with Pride.
·
Stubborn; Intimidating; Mountaineer; Haughty; High-minded and always
Willing to go to War over anything at the drop of a hat.
No
wonder God wants this enemy to be defeated in our lives. And, you all know
someone who fits in this category … hopefully it’s not the person you see in
the mirror! But perhaps we have all been tempted at some point to be that
opinionated, outspoken person who’s sure they’re right.
The
Amorites set themselves up in the high places of Canaan to be master and the dictate
of all they surveyed. Seeing every approach as a challenge and unwilling to
change they often attacked people before they even knew if they were true
enemies. They weren’t prejudice … they just attacked everyone equally, even
members of their own group.
Such
was the case with Diotrephes who, as the elder
Apostle John revealed, “loves to have the preeminence”.
Diotrephes wanted to be the unchallenged, self-appointed protector of
non-granted land. Diotrephes was willing to go to war with the Apostle John.
Why? Because Diotrephes valued his personal opinions greater than the principles
of God’s Word.
Every
one of us has been tempted to exalt our opinion, our emotion or our passion and
let it rule our lives. When we allow our own personal thoughts or feelings to
become master and occupy the throne of our heart, we fall prey to that enemy
spirit of the Amorite. Pride comes before a fall; but with the lowly there is
wisdom. (Proverbs 11:12; 13:10; 16:18; 1 Timothy 3:6;)
Romans 12:3 For I say,
through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of
himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God
has dealt to each one a measure of faith.
James 4 NKJV
1
¶ Where do wars and fights come
from among you? Do they not come from your desires for
pleasure that war in your members?
2 You lust and do not have. You murder and
covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do
not ask.
3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask
amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.
4 Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know
that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to
be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
5 Or do you think that the Scripture says in
vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”?
6 But He gives more grace.
Therefore He says: “God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.”
7 Therefore submit to God.
Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to
you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your
hearts, you double-minded.
9 Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter
be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.
10 Humble yourselves in the
sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.
11
¶ Do not speak evil of one another,
brethren. He who speaks evil of a brother and judges his brother, speaks evil
of the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of
the law but a judge.
12 There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save
and to destroy. Who are you to judge another?
13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we
will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a
profit”;
14 whereas you do not know what will happen
tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a
little time and then vanishes away.
15 Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord
wills, we shall live and do this or that.”
16 But now you boast in your arrogance. All such
boasting is evil.
17 Therefore, to him who knows to do good and
does not do it, to him it is sin.
We
must fight this enemy who wants to isolate us, ignite our fleshly passions and
send us to war filled with pride … even war with God.
3 John 1:11 Beloved, do not
imitate what is evil, but what is good. He who does good is of God, but he who
does evil has not seen God.
How Can We Defeat
The Amorite Within?
1.
Be slow to
speak. James 1:19
So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to
speak, slow to wrath.
a. Humble yourself
before God and He will exalt you in due time. (1 Peter 5:6)
b. Be Kind. (Amorite:
“Sayer” – This will defeat that enemy …)
2.
Challenge
your own opinion with the Word of God.
a. Refuse to justify
your actions by your emotions.
b. If you find yourself
wrong before God, repent.
c. We cannot go outside
the Word to accomplish the Will of God.
3.
Be
unwilling to go to war with family and friends.
a. Stop it and Drop it
b. Not every difference
of opinion is a challenge.
c. Learn to suffer
humility to save a soul … it may be your soul!
