A Christmas Without Christ

Have you noticed that every year people seem more intent on secularizing Christmas?   They wish you a “Happy Holiday” or “Seasons Greetings” they have presentations at school that make no mention of the manger or the Wise Men let alone the Christ Child. 

Now I may be a little overly sensitive but somehow I think that if the school tried to secularize Muslim or Jewish Holidays in the same fashion that just wouldn’t be right.

Anyways maybe they are right, maybe, just maybe Christmas has itself has become more of a cultural holiday and should have the various religious elements removed so as not to offend those who might not practice the Christian faith.

This morning we are going to take a look at what happens when we take Christ out of Christmas.

Well the obvious thing is that we won’t be able to say Merry Christmas anymore.  If we are going to do this right the first thing we need to do is take his name out of the holiday.  That’s why we celebrate Christmas in the first place. 

Now a little background, some of you probably know that the date of Christmas was originally used in pagan celebrations in Rome to celebrate the passing of the winter solstice.  The ancients knew that by this time in December that the shortest day and longest night had passed, and with that came the promise of longer days, shorter nights and eventually spring. 

Around 270 AD Emperor Aurelian capitalized upon the heathen worship of the sun and co-opted it as a Roman holiday when he declared December 25th as the birthday of the Unconquered Sun.  

The date of December 25th as the celebration of Christ’s birth was first seen in a Roman calendar dating from approximately AD 336.  But it would be almost another twenty years in AD 354, at the beginning of the reign of Liberius as the bishop of Rome, that the 25th of December had become the official date for the celebration of the birth of Christ in the church.

But really.  You know as well as I do that it is very unlikely that Christ was born during the winter months of Israel.  Those cold and wet winter’s nights, Why not?  Good question in Luke 2:8 That night there were shepherds staying in the fields nearby, guarding their flocks of sheep.

The usual time for the sheep to be keep in the fields surrounding Bethlehem is after the last of the winter rains in April and before they start up again in November. 

But December wasn’t always the choice for celebrating Christ’s birthday, in the two hundred years after the death of Christ Christians celebrated his birth on January 6, April 19, May 20 and several other dates.

Forty years ago a British physicist and astronomer, David Hughes, calculated that the date of Christ’s birth was September 17th 7 BC.  He based this on various scientific evidence, including that of a conjunction of two planets, Jupiter and Saturn, in the constellation of Pisces on that date.  He concludes that this extraordinary celestial display was the “star” seen by the distant wise men. 

But the truth is that we really don’t know when Christ was born.  Historically it would have had to have been before 4 BC which was the death of Herod the great, and because of the weather patterns it is doubtful if it would have happened outside of that seven month spread between April and November.  But it really doesn’t matter does it? 

The fact is that if we are going to take all of the religious symbolism out of Christmas we have to get rid of the Christ.  And that leaves us wishing people a Merry ----mas.  And that really doesn’t work either.  You understand that the word Christmas is a combination of the words Christ and Mass and while the word Mass comes the Latin Missa which simply means “The Meeting” historical it has referred to the public celebration of the Eucharist in the Catholic Church. 

Or very simply mass means church service, which of course is rife with religious symbolism.  So I guess we’ll just have to wish people a Merry ------.   You’ll want to make sure people understand that you are saying Merry and not Mary, otherwise you’ll be into the entire debate of Mary being the mother of Christ. I guess we can leave them with the Merry because of the different spelling.

 So where does that leave us, we won’t call it Christmas we’ll have to simply refer to it as the Holidays and even that’s wrong because holiday is simply the diminutive of Holy Day, so maybe we can just call it “Winterfest”. 

And instead of having a Christmas tree we’ll just have a festive tree or a holiday tree.   

When we were meeting in the Lion’s Den in Bedford, each year around this time decorations would magically appear.  There would be an artificial tree, some fake holly and a few plastic bulbs.  That was the extent of their Christmas decorations.  The funny thing about the tree is that even though the city and the Lions club were very careful to avoid any suggestion of religion in their decorations, they definitely wouldn’t consider having a Nativity Scene, but each year there was always an angel on their tree.  And angels are an important part of the season for most people. 

We see them on trees and rooftops, they have become lawn ornaments and gift tags, Christmas cards that don’t say anything about Christ will have angels with trumpets on the cover. Go figure.  But you can’t just have angels without realizing where the angels come from.

The Christmas story is full of angels. It was an Angel who told Mary she would have a child even though she was a virgin.  It was an angel who reassured Joseph that his fiancé hadn’t been unfaithful and that the child she was carrying had been conceived by the Holy Spirit.  It was Angels who appeared to the shepherds with news of the Christ child being born in Bethlehem and it was an angel who warned Joseph and Mary that Herod wanted to kill their child.

Probably the part of the story that most of us associate with angels happened in the field with the shepherds, we read about it in Luke 2:13-14 Suddenly, the angel was joined by a vast host of others—the armies of heaven—praising God and saying, “Glory to God in highest heaven, and peace on earth to those with whom God is pleased.”

But have you noticed how in recent years angels have become harmless nonreligious icons?  I’ve had people tell me: “I’m really not religious but I believe in angels.”  Seriously, what they really believe in aren’t angels, they are just really big fairies. 

So realistically, if you are taking Christ out of Christmas then you have to get rid of the angel from the top of the tree.

So we get rid of that pesky angel off the top of the tree what should we replace it with?  I know a star.  What could be any more non-religious then a star? Stars appear on the flags of half the countries in the world, they cover the sidewalk in front of a Chinese Theatre in Hollywood and fill the sky at night.  So there shouldn’t be any problem with having a star on top of the tree, right? 

Well why do you think people put stars on top of their trees?  Why not moons or a little Jupiter, I think having a Saturn with its rings would be pretty cool. But no, traditionally people have insisted on placing stars on their trees, how come?

It probably goes back to the Christmas story; you know how the wise men followed a star

That was shining in the east and it led them to Bethlehem where they found the Christ child. It’s found in Matthew 2:2 “Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star as it rose, and we have come to worship him.”

There have been different legends told about the wise men and the star in the east through the years.  One of those legends tells us that the star, with its mission complete, fell into the well at Bethlehem, and that it is still there and can be seen sometimes by those whose hearts are pure. 

Well the real star might be in a well in Bethlehem but if we are taking religion out of the holiday season you are going to have to get rid of the star on top of your tree.

Well I guess that leaves us with a tree without a top. 

Except . . . You ever wonder where the Christmas tree came from?  While the early pagan cultures from the Romans to the Egyptians to the Celts used evergreens in their celebrations to signify eternal life, the Christmas tree didn’t actually come into usage until approximately the 16th century, and the home of the Christmas tree is Germany. 

Why was it used?  History tells us that it became popular because of a medieval play about Adam and Eve that was put on each year in December.  Part of the production was the paradise tree, a fir tree hung with apples signifying the forbidden fruit in the garden.  So having a “paradise tree” in your house was in the beginning a fad.  At the same time though there was another tradition in Germany and that was the Christmas pyramid, which was a triangular shelving unit that Christmas figurines, and fruit and gifts were put on.  The pyramid was decorated with a star, signifying the star of the east.  Eventually the paradise tree and Christmas pyramid merged and we have the Christmas tree.

Now a number of years ago I had heard that it was Martin Luther, a former catholic priest who became the father of the reformation and the Lutheran Church, who started this tradition.  So I hunted and hunted, I read a pile of books, church history, Christmas traditions, encyclopaedias, and finally I found it, and I quote, “One legend says that Martin Luther started the practice, according to the story, he noticed the starlit sky as he walked home one Christmas eve about the year 1513.  He thought the stars looked as if they were shining on the branches.  When he arrived home, Martin Luther placed a small fir tree inside his house.  He decorated it with lighted candles.”

I would like to tell you that that exciting discovery came from Encyclopaedia Britannica, or World Book, Church History Through the Ages but the truth is that I came upon it in a definitive yet obscure reference volume that many of you probably aren’t familiar with but that shouldn’t negate the value of the material.  You see I found my facts about Martin Luther in Charlie Brown’s Fourth Super Book of Questions and Answers.

The problem is that any way you slice it the Christmas tree has a religious background, so it’s gotta go. 

I guess if there’s no tree then Santa will just have to leave his gifts in the corner, won’t he?  Well that would be well and good if we could leave Santa in your non-religious Christmas. You’re probably sitting there thinking “Surely you can’t make Santa out to be religious symbolism?” 

Sorry. You see Santa Claus wasn’t always Santa Claus, that’s a relatively new innovation, in the last couple of hundred years. The Santa we know today had his beginnings in 1823 with Clement C. Moore’s “A Visit from St. Nicholas” in which he described Santa as “chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf”.  But the story of Saint Nicholas didn’t begin with Moore’s book, his roots actually go back 1700 years when a man by the name of Nicholas was Bishop of the city or Myra. 

If we were to pull up our trusty map here, we would discover that Myra is situated here, on the coast of Turkey.  Tradition tells us that Nicholas was born into a wealthy family and was orphaned as a child because of the plague.  He became a priest in his late teens and was known for his generosity. During the Roman persecutions of the Christians he was imprisoned and wasn’t released until the Emperor Constantine became a believer.

Legend tells us that he took gifts to the children of poor families and would deliver them by dropping them down their chimneys.  One story tells of how Nicholas heard of a family with three daughters who couldn’t marry because they had no dowry. Nicholas snuck into their home and left gold coins in the socks the girls had left hanging on the mantle to dry.   

Guess back then it wasn’t a matter of marrying for looks or love it all boiled down the money, and it also means that Christmas Stockings have to go as well.

After his death the Church pronounced him a Saint and when Christmas started being celebrated, St. Nicholas became a part of the celebration.  So, if we have to ditch Santa and the tree we’ll have to replace them with something.  Maybe a Festivus Pole, you know, from Sienfield, A Festivus for the Rest of Us.

It really doesn’t matter if we have a Santa or not I guess, as long as we have gifts right? All the presents wrapped up with pretty paper and bows and placed by someone who has no religious connections at all in the corner of the living room under an aluminum pole where the tree used to be. 

But what would prompt people to give other people gifts in the middle of the winter?  In Nova Scotia we now have a new holiday in February but you probably won’t buy a Tim’s card for your letter carrier to celebrate “Nova Scotia Heritage Day”.

Let me read you a scripture, Matthew 2:10-11 When they saw the star, they were filled with joy! They entered the house and saw the child with his mother, Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasure chests and gave him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Gifts have been around since as long as Christmas has been around.  And even though those first gifts may not have been practical they were all significant.  Gold was the traditionally the gift given to a King.  We are told that in Persia it was customary that no one could approach the King without first presenting him with a gift of Gold, good work if you can find it.  And so we need to remember that the child in cradle was also the King of Kings.
The second gift was frankincense, which was a type of incense that was used in temple worship, as a matter of fact it’s mentioned in the book of Leviticus in the Old Testament as a type of sacrifice.  And so this was a gift for a priest, one who would open the way to God for the people.  It’s interesting that in Latin the word for priest is Pontifex, which literally means “bridge builder”, and Jesus did what none of us could do, he built a bridge for us to God.
The third gift was Myrrh and it was mixed with aloes by the Jews to embalm their dead.  I wonder if Mary remembered the gifts when her son was crucified?  I wonder if she still had the myrrh?  It must have been one of the very first prepaid funerals.
A couple of years ago on a Christmas Eve a gentleman gave me a little frankincense and a little myrrh, which I know keep in my office. 
And so the gifts were brought to a child who would be King, Priest and who would die for the world.  No one of these gifts would have been sufficient to fully describe who Christ was, instead it took all three.
So each year when we open our presents we are remembering the gifts that were given to Christ 2000 years ago, and you know what that means don’t you?  Sorry, if you are secularizing Christmas it means no gifts.
So what do we have left, we’ve taken away the Christ and the mass, the angels the stars, the tree, we’ve had to get rid of Santa, stockings and all the gifts.  Guess it’s going to be a pretty boring Winterfest morning.  
But I suppose that we could always sing. Of course we can’t sing “Away in a Manger”, or “The First Noel”, or “Hark the Herald Angels Sing”, or “Joy to the World”, or any of the other traditional music. 
I marvelled that when I worked in retail they told us not wish people a Merry Christmas because it might offend someone who wasn’t from the Christian background and then they’d play Christmas hymns for two months.  I guess you take what you can get.
However if you are serious about secularizing Christmas all the songs you will have left will be about reindeer and snowmen.  And if you sing about snow men you won’t be able to pretend that he is Parson Brown, and if you sing about reindeer you won’t be able to sing about Santa.  But we can give you the reindeer and the sled, so maybe a snowman could drive the sled.

Ok, here’s the truth.  This year and for many years to come the world will not celebrate Winterfest they will celebrate Christmas, with both Christ and Mas, Churches will be packed on Christmas Eve as people who haven’t darkened the door for 12 months gather to celebrate the birth of Jesus.  Trees will have angels and stars, and in memory of a bishop named Nicholas Santa will deliver gifts to children all over the world just as the Magi gave gifts to the Christ child. We’ll sing our carols and the most pagan amongst us will celebrate the birth of Jesus in Song.    And that’s good because as Jesus said Luke 19:40 He replied, “If they kept quiet, the stones along the road would burst into cheers!”

Let Go of Stupid

(Start with clip from frozen: Elsa song “Let it Go”)

That clip really didn’t have anything to do with today’s message, there just wasn’t anything suitable for today’s message and figured that was the title of the series we should tie it in.

Last week it was announced that a colleague of mine had confessed to having an affair.  Now for most of you that might spell the end of your marriage but in this man’s case he found himself unemployed as well. 

He sold his marriage, his relationship with his children, the respect of his peers and his career for what?

A friend of mine told me the other day that his sister in law had recently cheated on his brother and it wasn’t looking good for their marriage. 

I don’t think any of us would doubt that Jesus had a strong view on marriage.  We often think that divorce is a recent innovation but rules and decrees guiding how couples should split up are more common in the bible than how they should hitch up.  You would be hard pressed to find guidelines for what a wedding should look like in the bible but you only have to go four books in to find the guidelines on how a marriage should be ended.

And two thousand years ago there were some of the same concerns about the sanctity of marriage, whether or not divorce and marriage split ups were becoming way too prevalent as there are today.  And so in the scripture that was read earlier Jesus is teaching that in order to be a light to a corrupt society that those who would follow Christ would have to live above the law. 

Jesus took a strong stand on divorce, much stronger than the church takes today and that is a sermon for a different day.  Jesus tells us in Matthew 5:31 “You have heard the law that says, ‘A man can divorce his wife by merely giving her a written notice of divorce.’  That was put in for the protection of the family and society.  A marriage couldn’t just be dissolved by one partner or the other simply walking out, there was a process that had to be followed. 

But for those who would follow Christ it was to go to an even higher standard, because the Christian believed that marriage was not a union of two but instead was a union of three. 

That God put them together and nobody should split them up, nobody.  But as strong as the bond of marriage was for Jesus he saw one exception and that was given in Matthew 5:32 But I say that a man who divorces his wife, unless she has been unfaithful, causes her to commit adultery. And anyone who marries a divorced woman also commits adultery.

Now some people see this as a loophole and others see this as an exception but I think Jesus saw very clearly that nothing could break the covenant like a physical betrayal, that a couple’s commitment to one another was declared null and void with the act of adultery.  

It takes two very special people to work through the damage left behind after an affair.

The Bible, the word of God takes a very dim view of adultery, as a matter of fact adultery didn’t have to be specified as a reason for divorce in the Old Testament.  Because in the Old Testament the punishment for cheating was death by stoning and there was nothing to prevent a widow or widower from remarrying.  I’ve said before that while it may not have been a deterrent, it sure cut down on repeat offenders. A view obviously shared by Loretta Lynn who said “My attitude toward men who mess around is simple: If you find 'em, kill 'em.”

Some recent studies indicate that 50% of married men and women will have at least one extramarital affair during their marriage.  Think about it, that’s 50 out of 100, 10 out of 20, 1 out of 2 married men and women will cheat on their respective spouses.  Hilda Houlding co-ordinator of the Calgary Family Service Bureau, made this comment “An affair is often an attempt to find a little bit of paradise on the side, pursuing the belief that if one just finds the right sexual partner there will be instant happiness and everything will fall into place.  An affair is often able to fulfil this myth, until itself becomes a relationship that has to be worked at and looked at in a long term light.  Seen in this way “paradise” soon becomes a prison”

I’m old enough to remember when Gary Hart had to withdraw as a US presidential candidate because there was speculation about an extramarital affair, and I remember the late 90’s when it seemed that America was quite willing to accept the fact that not only was their President an adulterer but was a serial adulterer.  

Today adultery has become almost common place, not only has it reached almost crisis proportion out there, but the crisis has spread into the church as well.  That which was almost unthinkable in the church thirty years ago has become all too common.

Keith Drury is an author and scholar in the Wesleyan Church , listen to what he wrote, “The devil is a liar.  No one falls in this area without believing some of the Devil’s lies.  God tells the truth.  His word is light, not darkness.  The Devil may be multiplying his attack on Christians because he has access to modern weapons like, TV, movies, videos, sexual advertising, cable and satellite TV.  He serves these stimulants daily in the living rooms of the average Christian, especially those who ‘watch TV to unwind.””  That was written over twenty years ago, I wonder what Dr. Drury would say about the Internet?

Too often when talking to people whose marriage is in trouble they want to tell me what the other person is or isn’t doing.  If I speak to someone who becomes involved with someone else, by the way having an affair is just a gussied up way of saying committing adultery, they tell me if their partner had of done more of this and less of that then they wouldn’t have had to look for love in all the wrong places.  And as much as I wish I could give you a list of ways to keep your spouse from cheating on you I can’t. 

And there isn’t anything you can do, legally anyway, that would absolutely guarantee that your spouse will always be faithful.  How often have you heard of a marriage that seemed perfect and yet one or the other partner broke their marriage vows? I’ve spoken to people whose partner cheated on them and they’ve said “I thought everything was going great, I thought we were happy.”  And I’ve even spoken to some people who have cheated on their spouse who said “I don’t know why I did it, everything was going great and we were happy and I just wasn’t thinking straight.”

And so the title of today’s message is “Let Go of Stupid”

Here is the bottom line: if we are going to be faithful in our marriage it’s going to be up to us.  If you hope that today you will discover how to keep your spouse from cheating on you, surprise.  You will never be able to control your partner’s faithfulness, but you will always be responsible for your side of the relationship.  How do you do that?  Good question.  The answer of course is that we work at it.  Grab your pen, because here are eight suggestions for affair proofing your marriage.  And I want to be upfront these aren’t’ original with Denn But come from Keith Drury.

1) Don’t Start Anything.  Sounds simple doesn’t it.  That fact of the matter is that adultery is one of those things that starts innocently enough.  A mutual attraction to a neighbour, co-worker, or even someone you go to church with.  You both understand each other so well.  You have so much in common with one another and you enjoy those quiet moments you have together.

They seem more eager to listen to you then your spouse does.  Soon there are those special little words that are spoken softly between you.  The little pats, a gentle squeeze of your arm, a meaningful glance, a lingering gaze, a quick hug, a short embrace, and eventually you have been led down a path you never intended to walk.  Someone said “Every affair begins with a smile”.

Don’t start up the ladder of affection with anyone other than your spouse.  Did you hear that? Don’t start up the ladder of affection with anyone other than your spouse.  Listen to what Solomon reminded us of three thousand years ago, Proverbs 6:27-29 Can a man scoop a flame into his lap and not have his clothes catch on fire? Can he walk on hot coals and not blister his feet? So it is with the man who sleeps with another man’s wife. He who embraces her will not go unpunished.

Words from a man who knew what he was talking about considering that he was the result of the adulterous affair between his father, King David and Bathsheba.  If you are involved at any stage of affectionate expression with anyone other than your mate than you are playing with fire.  Stop.  Turn around and turn back.  I’m not saying that you can’t be friends with members of the opposite sex, but you know what I’m saying. 

Sue Johanson who hosted a show on WTN says: “You can't say, 'I didn't know what would happen.' That's a crock. You knew with the sweaty palms and sweaty pits. You knew with the long gazes. You made the decision not to decide and you let it just happen.”  If you are climbing the ladder of affection, then get down, right now, don’t fool yourself into thinking that you are in control.  The best time to stop disobedience is today

2) Listen To Your Spouse This one is especially for you guys.  God seems to have given women the special ability to identify a strange woman on their turf. 

Don’t write off spousal comments as jealousy, and even if at this point it is innocent, it may not appear that way to them, and you can stand the warning.

If your spouse questions your relationship with someone of the opposite sex pay attention, they may notice a come on before you do. 

3) Tell On The Other Person.  If someone begins to quietly come on to you, then fink on them.  Tell your partner that very day, don’t wait until tomorrow to see if it happens again, tell your spouse before you go to bed.  Your spouse is supposed to be the most important person in your life, let them help you deal with the problem.  Sometimes it’s an ego problem.  It’s been so long since anyone flirted with you, you had forgotten how good it felt, and besides it’s not like it’s hurting anyone, and you wouldn’t think of taking it any further.  Stop it. 

You are in this marriage together and both of you need to learn to protect your relationship with each other and with God.  Do it and do it fast.  Tell your spouse if you suspect anyone; don’t play his or her game.  The quicker you realize that you are in this together trying to protect your marriage the better.

4) Don’t Spend Time Alone With The Opposite Sex.  Keith Drury has this to say to Pastors “He who meets another woman alone in private hath no brains!”  Don’t place yourself into a situation where there is temptation or where temptation can be acted on.  It’s surprising  how many martial indiscretions and outright adultery have sprung out of relationships established on the premise of “giving spiritual help” or “sharing our problems together” Hah!

Do you remember what Jesus taught us to pray in Matthew 6:13 ^NIV And lead us not into temptation,  but deliver us from the evil one.'     Only sometimes we don’t need a whole lot of leading, do we?  We can do a pretty good job of finding temptation all by ourselves. 

When I talk to teens and young adults about their dating habits I often warn them to stay out of situations where they are placing themselves into areas of greater temptation.  Parking on lonely country roads, being home together when there is no one else around.  There are some areas that are danger zones not only for teens but also for adults, and we need to recognize them and stay away from them.  “The person who meets with someone of the opposite sex who is not their spouse alone in private, hath no brains.”

5) Drink From Your Own Spring.  Proverbs 5:15 Drink water from your own well— share your love only with your wife.  It has been said that the best defence is a good offence.  Though it’s not a guarantee, “Keeping the fires hot at home,” is a good defence against temptation.  That has always been the case check out what Paul wrote almost two thousand years ago, in a letter to the church in Corinth, 1 Corinthians 7:2-5 But because there is so much sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband. The husband should fulfill his wife’s sexual needs, and the wife should fulfill her husband’s needs. The wife gives authority over her body to her husband, and the husband gives authority over his body to his wife. Do not deprive each other of sexual relations, unless you both agree to refrain from sexual intimacy for a limited time so you can give yourselves more completely to prayer. Afterward, you should come together again so that Satan won’t be able to tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

The CEV says don’t refuse, the NIV translates it don’t deprive each other and the Authorized Version tells us not to defraud each other.  And that’s what happens when you provide a dry or boring spring at home.  Hey guys and girls, sex wasn’t the devil’s idea it was God’s and sexual fulfilment in marriage is God’s plan.

But listen up; don’t allow Satan to suggest that any lack of fulfilment in your marriage justifies a little sin to make up for it. 

It don’t, never has, never will.

On the other hand if’n you’re not providing a spring to be drunk from at home and your spouse goes looking for a drink elsewhere, while they aren’t justified you are not entirely without blame. 

And the spring isn’t’ just a sexual one, make sure that your spouse wants to spend time with you. . .  If you are negative and miserable to be around your spouse might very well find someplace else to go.  One Colorado psychologist’s summary of more than a decades work counselling “The other woman” argues that the common trait that the “other woman” all share is being a good listener.

6) Be Aware of Emotional Adultery This is one of the first steps up the ladder of affection.  Beware of getting emotionally attached to someone of the opposite sex who is not your spouse.  I know that I’m sounding a bit extreme but affairs start in mostly innocent situations.  Emotional attachments can lead to explosive situations where temptations come crashing in with unexpected force.

Emotional relationships often develop into something more and end up in disaster.  And even if they don’t lead to sin, they can hinder your own marriage relationship.  If you are getting your emotional needs met somewhere other than home than you are leaving a gap in your relationship with your spouse.   And that includes relationships that develop online.

Emotional attachments are explosive, they can cause someone to fall in love with someone or they can cause you to fall for someone else “who seems to understands me so well” or they can cause such deep emotional bonding that you find it impossible to walk away.  If you are bonding emotionally with someone other than your mate then walk away from it before it ruins you.

7) Get Control Of Your Thought Life.   Long before an affair happens physically it happens mentally.  Listen to the words of a Minister who ended up with a ruined marriage and a ruined ministry after a one night stand "adultery isn't something that happens with the act -- it happens months beforehand. It's an attitude. You disconnect yourself from the person you've said you're spending the rest of your life with."  Those thoughts may differ whether you’re a man or a woman.  With men they are more apt to be sexual fantasies with a woman romantic fantasies but if they involve someone other than your spouse they are wrong, wrong, wrong.

 

You say “But they are only thoughts” sure they are, that’s why Conway Twitty wrote in one song, “We’re not exactly strangers you and I, because I’ve already loved you in my mind.”  And why Jesus told us in Matthew 5:28 But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.  And I don’t think it would be unfair to the scriptures to say Matthew 5:28 But I say, anyone who even looks at a man with lust has already committed adultery with him in her heart.

If you are keeping pure actions toward someone, and have not uttered even the slightest words of attachment, yet you are guilty of impure thoughts, then you are perching on a precarious cliff which leads nowhere but over the brink into deeper and deeper violations of God’s law.

Who do you think you are?  Do you believe that you will be the first to escape God’s law?  Do you think that you can play with fantasy fire without burning your soul?  Do you truly believe that you can keep God’s anointing on your life even as you dwell on thoughts of disobedience? 

I’m not talking about temptation here, you will probably never escape that in this life.  I’m talking about wilfully dwelling on impure thoughts, about thinking about them on purpose, playing and replaying them over and over again in your mind like a video.  That my friends is sin.

There is incredible power in the mind, power that can be focused on good or on evil.  Bring your thought life into captivity, before it brings you into captivity.  Find out what triggers those thoughts and starve the source, it might be certain people, times, memories, places, television shows, movies or websites.  Jesus said in Matthew 5:29 So if your eye—even your good eye—causes you to lust, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.  Now we’re not into self-mutilation, but there may be some areas of your life that need to be poked out, for your own protection and the protection of your marriage.

8) Recognize That You Will Get Caught.  This is the bottom line people, you will get caught.  Are you involved in a suspicious relationship right now?  Maybe nobody knows about it.  It’s a secret.  You may think you are getting away with it.  Satan is telling you that you will never get caught.  You believe that you are the exception and you are wrong.  You will get caught.  Satan is a liar, and the word of God is the ultimate truth and it says in the Bible, the word of God in the book of Numbers 32:23. . . and you may be sure that your sin will find you out. 

Sinners have always believed that they could get away with sin.  From day one they believe that.  Adam and Eve believed it and they got caught.  Cain thought he got away with murder and he got caught.  Rebecca and Jacob thought they had deceived everyone but they got caught.  Joseph’s brothers thought they had committed the perfect crime, but they got caught.  Moses thought he’d buried his sin in the sand, but he got caught.  Achan got caught, Saul got caught, David got caught, Jonah got caught, Anianas and Sapphira got caught, Jimmy Swaggart got caught, Gary Hart got caught and so did Bill Clinton, a couple of times.  Well you know what Billy Sunday said, “Sin can be forgiven, but stupid is forever.”  It’s simple, sinners get caught.

Do you really think that you can get away with a little sin?  What makes you think that you will do what others haven’t?  Do you think you can break God’s universal laws of life and get away with it? Do you think that you will be the first person who gets away with sin?  Friend you will be like every other sinner throughout history, you will get caught.

How?  I don’t know, maybe the other person will get a case of the guilts and confess, it’s happened before.  Or maybe someone else will tell.  You think that nobody knows?  When you are sinning Satan tricks you into believing that you are invisible, you’re not.  Someone will see you.  Or maybe the burden of guilt will get so great that you will confess.  You may even get away with it for a while.  If you do, than you will get more and more bold in your sin, and that in itself will make the sin so obvious that you will eventually cause yourself to get caught.

The devil promises you all the kingdoms of the world, if you will simply bow down and worship at his altar of impure desires.  But you can’t have it all.  God says that your sin will find you out and you will have to pay the price, and God is the truth.

You cannot make your spouse be faithful, but you and only you are responsible for how faithful you are going to be in your marriage.

As serious as physical adultery is, and it is serious, there is a game that is even more dangerous than that.  There may not be anyone here today who is cheating on their spouse, but I’m sure there are those here today who are cheating on God.  Yep, the bible talks about us being unfaithful to God.  As a matter of fact there is an entire book of the Bible which compares those who aren’t in step with God to a cheating spouse.  Maybe you know that you have wandered away from God, you maybe you’ve never made the commitment in the first place.  But there is only one who can make it and only one who can keep it and that is you.  God has already made it clear that he is going to be faithful in the book of Hebrews 13:5 it says: God has said, “I will never fail you. I will never abandon you.”