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[0:00] The prophet Jeremiah, and we're in chapter 5 this morning, and I'll begin reading at verse 20 and read to the end of the chapter. Jeremiah 5 and verse 20.

[0:38] They may roll, but they cannot prevail. They may roar, but they cannot cross it. But these people have stubborn and rebellious hearts. They have turned aside and gone away.

[0:52] They do not say to themselves, let us fear the Lord our God, who gives autumn and spring rains in season, who assures us of the regular weeks of harvest.

[1:03] Your wrongdoings have kept these away. Your sins have deprived you of good. Among my people are wicked men who lie in wait like men who snare birds and like those who set traps to catch men.

[1:20] Like cages full of birds, their houses are full of deceit. They have become rich and powerful and have grown fat and sleek. Their evil deeds have no limit. They do not plead the case of the fatherless to win it.

[1:37] They do not defend the rights of the poor. Should I not punish them for this, declares the Lord? Should I not avenge myself on such a nation as this?

[1:49] A horrible and shocking thing has happened in the land. The prophets prophesy lies. The priests rule by their own authority.

[2:01] And my people love it this way. But what will you do in the end? Maybe some of you remember Karen Carpenter.

[2:17] Maybe some of you have no idea who I'm talking about. She was a very popular singer back in the 70s and the early 80s. She died in February of 1983 at the age of 32.

[2:31] She died of a heart failure brought on by complications from anorexia and bulimia. She starved herself to death.

[2:43] Why? Why does a husband with a loving wife go to pornography? Why does a child run to his parents' bedroom in the middle of the night because she's afraid?

[3:00] Why does one man eat a whole pizza in one sitting and another man work out for an hour? Why are you here?

[3:11] And why is someone else at home? Well, those are lots of questions, but the same exact answer. We all want to be happy.

[3:24] We all want good to come to our lives. Blaise Pascal, an old French theologian, wrote this.

[3:35] All men seek happiness. This is without exception. You're not the exception. Whatever different means they use, they all tend to this end.

[3:47] They're all for this purpose. The cause of some going to war and of others avoiding it is the same desire in both. Looked at from different directions.

[3:58] This is the motive of every man, of every action, even of those who hang themselves. We want good.

[4:10] We want to be happy. We don't want to be sad and miserable. So you should ask yourself, what is going on?

[4:25] Why did prescription depression medication use go up 400% in the last 10 years? If everyone wants to be happy, why are we so sad?

[4:40] There's a simple yet profound answer, and it's found in Jeremiah 5, verse 25. I direct your attention there, 525. Look at what it says in the second half of that verse.

[4:55] Your sins have deprived you of good. Your sins have deprived you of good. We read the passage. You have the gist of the context.

[5:06] Israel is suffering under God's judgment. They have stubborn, rebellious hearts. And so God has put their land under a curse. And so misery, sadness, hunger, poverty, injustice, everything is on the rise.

[5:24] If they had prescription depression medication back then, you better believe a lot of people would be on it. And God puts his finger on the problem.

[5:36] The problem back then and the problem today. Your sins have deprived you of good. That's man's problem.

[5:46] And that's man's delusion. We sin because we think it will do us good. We sin because we think it will make us happy. And all we get for our trouble is more misery.

[6:00] Our sin deprives us of good. And so we're going to just look at this short little sentence, this verse, under three headings. And the first is, how is God arguing? How is he confronting Israel?

[6:13] And then the second is, what does your unbelief cost you? What does your unbelief cost you? And three, how then, how can I use this? So one, how is God arguing?

[6:24] How is God confronting Israel? Israel, well, and this is so important to both understand God and to understand ourselves. He's using their own best interest to say, turn to me.

[6:41] He's using that inborn desire that we just talked about to have good, to be happy, to say, turn to me, fear me, because it's for your good.

[6:53] It's for your good. Now, we're used to Satan arguing that way. He argues that way, doesn't he? When he comes tempting us, he always puts bait on the hook.

[7:07] He always puts some sort of bait on it. There's always some good that he promises. He never hangs a naked hook of sin and misery in front of us. There's always something that he is promising that he will give to us.

[7:21] Or by sinning, we will have this. This will do us good. This will make us happy. If he could get away with it, he probably wouldn't put bait on the hook.

[7:32] He probably wouldn't put any joy or comfort or even a temporary bit of pleasure. But he can't. So he hides the hook and the bait. So he comes to Adam and Eve.

[7:44] Most of you are well aware of this story. He comes to Adam and Eve and he says, now look at that tree. Doesn't that tree look good?

[7:54] And then he slips in a lie. You won't die. And in fact, it will make you like God. Isn't that what you want?

[8:06] Isn't that what God wants for you? You want to be like God, don't you? You want to be wise, don't you? Then go for it. That tree is the way forward. That tree is the way upward.

[8:19] That is where your good is. So why don't you just take a bite? Well, next time you're tempted, look for the bait because it's there.

[8:32] And if you are sensitive to the bait, you're going to be sensitive to the hook as well. What is Satan offering you? Is it pleasure? Is it comfort?

[8:43] Is it acceptance? Is it security? Is it power? Then ask yourself, after you've sensed and seen the bait, ask yourself, can I trust him? Can he really deliver what he's offering?

[8:58] See, Satan is the biggest con man out there. And like every con man, his favorite words are, trust me. Trust me. No one ever is a con man without having those two words in their vocabulary.

[9:12] He never gets an audience. He never gets what he wants out of them until they trust him. And so he offers and he asks, you trust me, I can deliver. And so he's no better than one of those old Western snake oil salesmen that you've seen in the movies or you've heard about.

[9:30] And he loves to ride into town with his cure-all. He loves to ride into town with the answer to all of your problems. And he has his shills.

[9:40] He has his accomplices. Actually, the whole world is his accomplice saying, he's telling the truth. Clark Stanley, back at the turn of the 19th century, was called the Rattlesnake King.

[9:55] And he came into the West with quite a story. Every con man has a story, has a good background story so that people will believe him. And he said, I lived for years with a Hopi medicine man.

[10:07] And he taught me all the ancient secrets. And when I was sitting under this man and learning from him, he taught me the cure to your ills.

[10:19] It's this here rattlesnake oil. And he would go on and on about how it would cure all of your problems. And before long, someone in the audience would say, I've taken that.

[10:34] That's worked for me. I used to have these terrible headaches, and now they've gone away. I used to have the gout, and now it's I'm all better. I'm as good as can be. And Clark Stanley would sell you his fine rattlesnake oil.

[10:47] And then he would ride off with your money, and he would be gone before you realized that you bought a bottle of junk.

[10:59] Eventually, someone took him to court. Eventually, someone got wise with Clark Stanley's plan. And they ran some tests on the snake oil, and they found it consisted of mineral oil and beef fat and a few other things thrown in for good measure.

[11:16] Now, that's Satan's game. He pumps us up like a balloon, and then when sin pops us and ruins us, he smiles. That's what he is after.

[11:26] He offers good but ends up taking. He offers you security, but then he ends up making you feel so insecure. He offers Adam life and gives him death.

[11:36] He offers you joy, and in turn, he gives you pain. And that's how he argues. He argues for your own best, your own self-interest. And so the question is, will you trust him?

[11:49] This is always going on in our lives, this temptation. And so the question is, will you trust Satan? Now, here in Jeremiah, God takes up the same argument.

[12:01] And he says, your sins have deprived you of good. Now, he says, let's reason together. You notice what he calls them, you senseless, you foolish people.

[12:14] You know what a foolish, senseless person is? They don't know what's for their own good. He says, let's think together. Has all your sins turned out to really benefit you?

[12:26] In Sunday school, we looked at a passage from Jeremiah, and he talked about all the idols. And then there was one question.

[12:37] And he says, were they of any profit? Did they do you any good? So God says, think about what your sins are costing you.

[12:48] Now, what does that tell you about God? It tells you that God is no killjoy. God is not in heaven with a stern look on his face, saying, you better do this or else.

[13:02] And I don't care what good it does you, you miserable wretches. No, he comes down to our level, and he pleads with us in ways that we can understand, and in ways that make sense to us.

[13:14] And he says, this is for your own good. Won't you do what's for your own good? He loves us more than we love ourselves. Parents, do you ever feel that way?

[13:27] I know sometimes I do. Your children disobey, and they disobey, and you have to discipline them. And children, it's, I know you can't imagine this, but your parents actually don't want to do it.

[13:41] We do it because God says so. And so what do you say, parents? What do you think in your head? Don't you say, what is wrong with you? Do you like this?

[13:53] Why do you keep on doing this? Do you want to be in pain? If only you would obey. It would be so much better for you.

[14:05] Well, that's God's heart in heaven. He's not some hard-hearted dictator. He pleads with sinful man. Your ways are making you miserable.

[14:17] The way of the wicked is hard. And so come to your senses. You're in the pig pen. And there's more than enough food in my house. Well, get up and come.

[14:30] Why won't you leave your sins? Do they really make you happy? Do they really do you such good? Why do you keep on believing their promises? They're so empty.

[14:41] But that's the insanity of sin, isn't it? We are mice that have had the trap slam down on us. Again and again and again.

[14:54] And yet we want the cheese. And so we go after it. And we say, oh, I'll get away with it this time. And we never do. And yes, it will hurt. Yes, it will ruin me.

[15:05] Yes, it will send me to hell itself. But I have to have it. Yes, sin will ruin my relationships. Yes, it will make me feel guilty. Yes, it will put distance between me and God.

[15:16] God, the power of sin. Sin is such a powerful master. And if you, my unbelieving friend, don't think that you are a slave to sin, then just stop.

[15:32] Just stop sinning. And soon you will find that it is such a master. Well, why would we do it if we weren't enslaved? And that's where we all were until Jesus rescued us.

[15:48] Hopelessly enslaved, hopelessly blind, but thanks be to God through Jesus Christ. Through his death and resurrection, we have been freed from our sin.

[16:00] And so now, actually, we don't have to have our foot tied to the accelerator as the car of our life zooms off the cliff. But that's what it's like for every sinner. Everyone who is outside of Christ, your foot is tied to the accelerator.

[16:13] You are going off the cliff, and you can't stop yourself. You need a deliverer. You need someone to come in and set you free, to unshackle you, untie you.

[16:26] But in Christ, you become a slave to righteousness, Paul says. And that slavery leads to life. Now you're bound for life.

[16:39] Well, God loves sinners more than they love themselves. And so he says, stop. Your sins are depriving you of good. Now I just want to think of one sin and see what that one sin cost you.

[16:54] And it's the sin of unbelief. And what do I mean by unbelief? Well, I just mean this, that you don't believe in the goodness, the grace, the sufficiency, the merit of God in Christ Jesus.

[17:16] In your heart, you don't believe. You find no rest in Jesus Christ. You find no hope in his unfailing love. You don't rely on God's love in Christ Jesus for you.

[17:29] Now, why talk about unbelief? Because unbelief is right there down at the bottom of every other sin. We never sin unless we turn back, turn away from God.

[17:45] Until we see, you know, or until we think, wait a second, I don't think God can meet my needs here. I don't think God can help me here. It's up to me here. There's better pleasure over here.

[17:56] God isn't enough. Jesus isn't enough. It's over here. At the bottom of every sin is the sin of unbelief. And so we don't trust him. And so we don't worship him. We don't believe in his goodness.

[18:07] And so we don't like him. We don't like his laws because we don't think they're good for us. We don't think they'll make us happy. And we don't agree with them because they can't possibly be good for us. And so I see God's law and I don't agree with it.

[18:21] Yeah, it might be right in theory, but in this case, for me, it doesn't do me any good. So we don't trust him. So we trust other things. We worship other gods because if God can't save us, we need a savior somewhere.

[18:34] So we're going to trust in those gods and those idols. Now, what does your unbelief cost you? And we're going to look at what it costs a Christian and what it costs an unbeliever first or second.

[18:47] Well, Christian, what does your unbelief cost you? There is a price. There is a price. It costs you hope in trials.

[19:02] It costs you hope in your trials. Without faith, there can be no hope. Without a conviction that God is able to save me, that God loves me, that God is committed to me because of Jesus Christ, then you lose all your hope and your trials because wherever you look, like Jacob, we say, everything's against me.

[19:26] Even God is against me. And so when the gospel is a dying light, your hope dies with it. And so you come to a hard place and things grow dark.

[19:41] And as you run out of resources, as you run out of personal resources, and you don't believe in the resources in Christ for you, Christian, your hope dries up.

[19:54] And if he can't and if he won't help you, then how can you have hope? And his promises become stale things. How do you know if you have this active principle, Christian, of unbelief in your heart?

[20:10] Look at it. Are God's promises precious to you? Do you live on them? Or are they stale? They're nice in theory, but not so much now that we're in the situation.

[20:24] They're nice to talk about when you're in Sunday school, but nothing that I can count on now. See, your unbelief doesn't make God untrue.

[20:35] It doesn't make one of those promises go away. All it does is rob you of hope. Your unbelief doesn't change God's faithfulness.

[20:47] Your unbelief just robs you of hope. Then it robs you of peace and sorrow. How can you have peace if God is not someone that you can trust?

[20:58] So now your heart is this restless ocean. Read the psalmist, and it's wave after wave. Your breakers have broken over me. I'm so sad, the psalmist says.

[21:11] And without God, there's no place to stand. There's no place of security. There's no place of calm in the deepest trials if you do not trust God.

[21:22] And so if there's no harbor to steer into, and if God is suspicious, if God is unreliable, then I lose my peace.

[21:32] Now, like I said, God is still a rock. He's still faithful. He's still a fortress. But my unbelief robs me of the peace that could be mine.

[21:44] It robs you of the peace that could be yours. Then it robs you of day-to-day joy. So Christian, look at your life.

[21:56] When you're living under the conscious smile of God, in fellowship and communion with God your Father, isn't life a totally different thing?

[22:09] Isn't it a totally different kind of life when you have God smiling on you? When you know that you're His child, and He is your tender, loving Father.

[22:21] And yes, I sin, but He's so faithful. I come to Him and I confess my sin. He's faithful and just to forgive me. And His smile is still upon me. And then there's, it's that joy that nothing can replace.

[22:36] Have you experienced that, Christian? Where you go out and you go away from God and you try to find your joy, you try to find your peace in other things, and it just leaves you sick and weary and tired, and then you come back to God in repentance.

[22:51] And there's such joy. Well, unbelief robs you of that joy that is meant to be your strength. Unbelief robs me of the sense of affection and closeness to God.

[23:07] Sin in general, unbelief in particular, robs me of a sense of affection and closeness to God. Christian, do you know that in your life?

[23:18] That spirit of adoption? Well, if I'm not believing God's promises, if I'm not understanding and relying on all that Jesus Christ is for me, then I soon lose that sense of affection.

[23:38] So does the spirit actually leave me? Does that spirit of sonship actually leave me? No, but I don't feel him at work anymore. I don't feel his ministry. I don't experience his ministry in my heart.

[23:50] But when I'm walking in the spirit, and when I'm following him, and my ears are open to him, when I'm living in the goodness of the spirit's ministry, and what is the spirit's ministry?

[24:02] It's to take what is in Jesus Christ and show it to us and give it to us and make us feel it and understand it and experience it. When I'm walking in the spirit, and so he's giving and I'm receiving, he's speaking and I'm listening, he's directing and I'm following, then it's that and that place that I feel God loves me, my Father in Heaven loves me, and I can come right into his presence and I can sit right down on his lap because I know who he is.

[24:32] He's the rewarder of those who earnestly seek him. I know his heart. He loves me. He's gracious. He's giving. He's a generous Father.

[24:43] He's not a stranger. He's not suspicious. He's not some sort of suspicious, squint-eyed man that you can't trust. I can come right into his throne room and tell him all my troubles.

[24:55] Tell him all my wishes. That's the good of believing. But careless living, careless sinning, unbelief, it robs me of all of that.

[25:09] That sense of closeness, that sense of peace, that hope, that joy that comes from believing. My sin deprives me of good. And so Christian, are you wrestling with distance between you and God?

[25:25] Repent of your sin. Repent of your sin. Repent of your careless living. Turn back to God with your whole life, with all that you are, all that you have, all that you've done, and see if that doesn't close the gap.

[25:44] Turn back to God. Give him your heart completely again and see if he doesn't give you that spirit of sonship instead of the spirit of fear that you're living in. your sins have deprived you of good, so the thing to do is to get rid of them.

[25:58] Repent. Now, what about you? You're outside of Christ. You're unbelieving. You're still living in the flesh. You're still living like it's all up to you.

[26:12] What about you? What does your unbelief cost you? So here you are. You're saying, it's all up to me.

[26:25] That's what it means to live in the flesh. I don't need you, Jesus. I have enough on my own. I can do it on my own. I have my own works.

[26:36] I have my own goodness. I have my own church going. I have my own niceness. I have my own set of rules. I have my own fun. I have my own way of getting joy.

[26:47] I have people. I have friends. I have video games. I have a comfortable life. I have all I need. Thank you very much. I don't need you. That's what it means to live in the flesh.

[26:58] It's to live out of your resources instead of Jesus Christ's resources by the Spirit. It's living out of your own what you can do. Now, sometimes, if you looked at that list, sometimes it's legalistically fleshly living, and sometimes it's licensed fleshly living.

[27:15] Sometimes it's very moral fleshly living, and sometimes it's immoral fleshly living. But either way, I'm going to do it on my own. I'm going to do it my way. I don't need you, Jesus Christ.

[27:26] So to you who are outside of Christ, that is the state of your heart. That is what's going on. That's what's motivating you all the time. No wonder you can't, you don't love God.

[27:37] You don't love his commands. Because you don't need him. So what does your unbelief cost you? Cost you forgiveness. There's only forgiveness in Jesus Christ, and as long as you are trusting yourself, you cannot be forgiven.

[27:57] As long as you're living on your own resources, you rob yourself of mercy, of forgiveness, of pardon. See, a pardon has been announced. Amnesty has been announced.

[28:09] It is available. It's in Jesus Christ. It's for all those who will lay down that way of living, lay down, quit living that way like it's all up to me, like I don't need you, and who will come and say, I will trust in you.

[28:25] I will trust in you, God. I will trust in you, Jesus Christ. For all those who will hope in Jesus who was crucified, they will be forgiven.

[28:36] That is the promise. But if you don't believe the promise, if you refuse the promise, then you rob yourself of the mercy that could be yours.

[28:50] You're in debt, and your unbelief keeps you there. Your unbelief robs you of eternal life. robs you of eternal life.

[29:06] You will die, and you will go to hell. Not because you had to, but because you chose to. Because you chose carelessness, and you chose deafness, and you chose blindness.

[29:22] We speak plainly. We display Christ plainly. The gospel is not complicated.

[29:35] And yet, the excuse is always, what did you say? I don't understand. I don't understand. I don't see that. What did you say? It's so complicated.

[29:46] Christ died in the place of sinners. sinners. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was the perfect sacrifice for sinners. And now, all who believe in their heart that God would love sinners enough to send His Son, that Jesus Christ is enough for them, that He can make up for all of their sins, that's what it means to believe.

[30:12] That's what is asked. It's not hard. It's substitution. And a five-year-old can understand Him for me. A five-year-old can understand I go out and He comes in.

[30:30] And all that is asked is faith. Faith. Trust. Belief in the grace of God. That's all He asks to throw away your fleshly living and start living to Christ, believing on Christ.

[30:51] So put away your suspicion. Sinners are so suspicious of God. Like, they're so used to dealing with the devil, I suppose, that they think there's some sort of hook under that bait.

[31:04] There's no hook under the bait. There's just eternal life. So put away your excuses and come. He's better than what you think. And I'll just, my personal testimony, I've been a Christian for 17 or 18 years.

[31:21] He's better than I thought. 17 years ago, I thought God was good, but now I'm starting to realize just how good He is. He's better than what you think. And if you come, then you will live.

[31:33] Eternal life is in Christ. You get Christ, you get eternal life. He's the gate, He's the ticket, you get Him, you get everlasting life, but your unbelief, it's only your unbelief that robs you of good.

[31:47] So that you would believe. And that is my prayer, that you would believe that you could be saved today. Now, how can we use this truth?

[31:59] This is our third point. What can I do with it? What can you do with it? Well, Christians, I've thought of several things, but we're just going to limit it to one.

[32:09] And it's this, use this to fight sin. Use it to fight sin. Now, this verse in Jeremiah, your sin deprives you of good, is a mighty sword in your armory, in your battle against sin.

[32:27] Do you want to fight sin more fiercely, with more success, with more obedience, with more reliance on Jesus Christ? Well, God gives you all sorts of weapons and armor.

[32:39] This is not the only one, but this is a strong one. This is a mighty one. Don't forget this one. Every sin deprives you of good. Every sin deprives you of good.

[32:51] Because it's the opposite of God. It is the opposite of God. If God is the source of all good, if He is the fountain of everlasting joy, to have Him is to have life, to have joy, then to sin is to turn away from your own joy.

[33:10] It's to turn away from your own happiness. So here is a well in the middle of the desert. There's water only in this one well in all of the desert.

[33:24] If you walk away from the well, all you find is sun and dirt and distress and agony. God is that well. To walk away from the well is what sin is.

[33:37] And if you walk away from Him, you will be thirsty. Christian, it's inevitable. You walk away from God into sin, you will be thirsty.

[33:47] It will cost you. Every time you sin, you get less of God and more of the sand, less refreshment and more of the heat. So in all your battles with your sin, realize that your sin is not going to be worth it.

[34:09] Sin asks you to pay a price that is just too steep. It's asking you to give up the source of all joy. And that's just too much.

[34:21] So obedience is the path to enjoying God. That's what the psalmist, Psalm 119, Psalm 19, all the psalmists talking about how he loves the law of God.

[34:33] Why does he love God's law so much? Because God's commandments are invitations to joy. They're invitations to good. Because there are ways to stay close to God, the source of all joy.

[34:48] If I obey, I am blessed. If I obey, I'm staying near God. So we pray, teach me, God, your commands. Father, I want to be close to you.

[34:59] I don't want to go astray in any way. I don't want to go off. So show me what's going on in my heart. Show me my secret sins. Because I want to get rid of them because I want you. So ask yourself, is sin worth losing God?

[35:14] Even for a moment. Is sin worth losing hope? Is it worth losing peace? Is it worth losing joy? Is it worth losing a sense of fellowship with God? Christian, is sin worth it?

[35:28] I was reading an article in World Magazine this week about long-term single people. So they've been single for a long time. And it was just talking about the loneliness and how they deal with temptation and the problems that come from being single for so long.

[35:47] And it just seems like the ship of marriage is gone. And so just a real honest look at what it's like for them. How do they keep the course?

[35:59] How do they stay on in that hard situation? Gina Fenwick is 42. She lives in LA. She's been a Christian for 12 years.

[36:10] So how does she deal with temptation? How does she deal with the temptation to just marry anyone? To just settle because I got it. I got to be married so just marry whoever comes along.

[36:23] How does she deal with the temptation to be sexually immoral? Well listen to what it says. As her relationship with God grows, she's been seeing what really is at stake.

[36:43] So this is the context of this statement that she's going to say. Her relationship is growing. She's living with God. She's enjoying God's fellowship and communion with him. And she's seeing now more than ever what's at stake if she goes that route.

[36:58] She says this, if I entertain these thoughts, I'm going to lose so much more than just giving my body away. I'm going to impact my relationship with God, the church, and my community.

[37:12] So what is helping Gina stay pure? what is helping her stay faithful and stay the course in a hard path that she's walking in?

[37:24] Well, it's just this. As my relationship with God grows, I'm realizing that that would cost me too much. It would just cost me too much to sin that way.

[37:36] So is sin worth it? Gina says, no. Fellowship with God is too precious. When God comes walking in the cool of the evening, I want to be able to come out to him.

[37:50] I don't want to have to hide in the trees. I want fellowship with him. I don't want to have to hide. So what do I get when I sin?

[38:02] I get guilt. I get shame. I get separation. I get loss of closeness to God. Sin promises me good. God and then stabs me in the stomach.

[38:15] And I feel terrible. And so Christian, are you getting to the point where you're saying, I'm tired of feeling terrible? I'm tired of that. I'm tired of losing God. It's not worth it.

[38:26] He's the fountain. At his right hand are pleasures forevermore. So let me have him. I'm going to cut off right hands. I'm going to gouge out right eyes, not just because I like that kind of pain, but because he's worth it.

[38:38] If I can get rid of my sin to get more of him, then I am a winner. No man sacrifices for God without God fully giving himself in return.

[38:49] Sin deprives me of good. Then I'm not sinning. I'm not going to do it. But maybe someone says, well, isn't all this selfish? Isn't this self-centered?

[39:00] isn't this just being a mercenary? Isn't this just thinking about yourself and what you want? Well, my answer is God does not see it that way.

[39:12] My answer is that maybe that is a little more religious than right. God doesn't look on that as being a mercenary. He's the one who's coming down to Israel and saying, look at your own good.

[39:25] Your sin is costing you. He doesn't say, you wicked, selfish, people, all you care about is your pleasure. No, God made us for this. And when we walk into it and when we embrace God and when we're cutting off right hands and gouging out right eyes, we're saying, God, you're worth it.

[39:44] And that glorifies God. That's how I worship. That's how I love him. So God isn't looking at this like you selfish people. He's saying, run, run hard after me.

[39:56] Do what you have to do to get me. Because I'm worth it. So Jeremiah says, your sins are costing you. C.S. Lewis said in those famous words, God doesn't find our desires too great.

[40:10] He finds them too small. He doesn't look at us and say, you guys are too self-interested. you don't even know what's good for you. When I find my greatest joy in God, when I find my greatest joy in God instead of sin, that honors God.

[40:33] And that belittles whatever that idol is. It belittles that sin. So finding joy in God is how you worship God. God. It's how you love God.

[40:44] And that is the greatest commandment of all. And so let's love God. Let's get rid of all that sin that distances us, that puts distance between us and Him.

[41:01] When we first believed, with joy we sold all that we had to have that pearl of greatest price, didn't we? For the joy, joy, for the joy of it, we did it.

[41:14] And so I'm just asking you, isn't the joy worth getting rid of the sin? Your sin is depriving you of good. Let's pray.

[41:28] Our Heavenly Father, we thank you that you stoop to our level and you speak to words that we can understand, that you are so merciful, so forgiving.

[41:42] I pray for those who are outside of Jesus Christ, who are still living in the flesh, living on their bankrupt resources.

[41:56] Open their eyes like that sun. Make them come to their senses and see there's more than enough food in the Father's house. In Jesus Christ, there's more than enough for them and he is willing.

[42:11] Show them your heart. And I pray for my brothers and sisters that you would show us more of your heart and Jesus Christ for us, that we would learn to love you more, to delight in you more, that out of that delight, we would turn away from everything, everything that is not you, that we would learn to love you and enjoy you more and more.

[42:40] Thank you that you've called us to this, thank you that you're so patient with us, I pray that you would give us power, you would give us strength in every stride as we walk through this life.

[42:55] Thank you that at the end is a celestial city, as a heaven, as you, our great reward. We look forward to the day when we will see you and be like you, and we pray in Jesus' name, amen.