Almost Persuaded or
Fully Persuaded (2/18/09)
·
The
prodigal son. Luke 15:11-16
o
Sin
looks good but it will take you farther than you want to go.
o
If
sin didn’t look good, then it wouldn’t be a temptation. The devil knows your weakness and he will
attack you when you are at your weakest.
But remember that God is greater.
·
Sin
is be fun for a short while. But you
can’t dabble in sin and serve God. The
Bible says that no man can serve two masters.
Willful sinning is serving the
devil!
o
The
prodigal son had a great time for a while
o
Commercials
make drinking look cool and movies make gambling look exciting.
o
College
kids have a great time each year partying and having a wild time.
o
But
you’re not promised tomorrow. You never
know when it’s your time to die.
o
I
personally have known 4 people that died between the ages of 16 and 25.
·
Sin
has a cost
o
Sin
can cost you your family, money, home, or your life.
o
That
homeless drunk on the street didn’t picture his life that way when he took that
first drink. Sin will take you farther
than you wanted to go.
o
The
drug addict on the corner that will sell his body to get that next high didn’t
picture his life that way either. But
sin cost him more than he ever wanted to pay.
o
You
know the difference between me and these men?
It could very well be that first drink that I didn’t take because I was
saved at a young age. God kept me from
some of the things that I could have gotten involved in had I not accepted
Christ at a young age.
o
Romans
6:23 - For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
o
This
death is not limited to the earthly death that I spoke of above. This death is the second death, eternal
torment in hell with the devil and his angels.
·
It
doesn’t have to be the big sins that I have just talked about either. Not putting
God first in your life will send you to hell.
Not accepting Jesus as your personal savior is the ultimate sin.
·
But
yet everybody is searching for something.
People simply aren’t happy anymore.
In this generation of me first, make me happy and not worry about
others, and people still aren’t happy. People
say “I’d be happy if I had more money” but that’s not true because rich people
aren’t happy either. Single people will
say that they would be happy if they could just find that perfect
guy/girl. But that’s not true because
married people are constantly getting divorced because they wan t to be single
again.
·
Remember
the rich young ruler that we looked at last time? By earthly standards he had everything, so he
should have been happy. But he realized
that there was still something missing.
Something that he couldn’t fill with his money.
·
Even
king Agrippa, a king that has great power and should have a sense of great
accomplishment realized that something was missing in his life that he couldn’t
fill with his power or money. When Paul
witnessed to him he said that he was “almost persuaded.”
·
Jesus
can fill this void. Jesus is the only
thing that can fill this void.
·
It’s
simple to be a Christian but people often try to overcomplicate it. We have to believe that Jesus lived a sinless
life, died on the cross, and rose again.
But remember that believing is not enough, even the devils do that. We need to accept Jesus as our personal
savior. Then we need to love God with
all of our hearts and all of our soul and all of our mind. If we do this, everything else will fall into
place. We shouldn’t have to worry about
doing things that we shouldn’t do because if we truly love God with all of our
heart then we will listen when the Holy Spirit tells us not to do something.
·
King
Agrippa and the rich young ruler were both holding on to something. They weren’t willing to give God total
control of their lives. Many of us are
holding onto something too. Maybe it’s
drugs or alcohol. Maybe it’s a filthy
mouth that you don’t want to give up.
Perhaps it’s your popularity. Or
could it be that you love your money more than you love God? Maybe you worship your car a little more than
you ought to. Can’t drive your car to
church when it rains because your car will get dirty? Something’s wrong there.
·
Or
maybe you are a Christian and you do love God most. But maybe other things are creeping up to a
very close second and third. We need to
be fully persuaded to serve Christ to be a good Christian. If we’re not careful, we’ll let these things
take over and we’ll let God temporarily slip to 2nd or 3rd
in our life. I think that most
Christians are guilty of this every now and then. We don’t mean for this to happen. We need to make sure that we quickly regain
our focus and put Christ back to 1st in our lives. We need to strive to keep God the center of
our lives.
·
The
devil can’t take away your salvation. He
simply doesn’t have the power! Remember,
Greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world. But so often the devil can start with one
little sin, and then you’re hooked.
Before you know it, he’s gotten you to give up your salvation. This is why we have to be careful not to let
earthly stuff creep up and become as important as God is in our lives. The devil is good at what he does, he knows
our weaknesses and he knows how to best use them against us. So remember, we need to be fully persuaded to
follow Christ. Being almost persuaded
will send you to hell. Sin will take you
farther than you want to go, cost you more than you want to pay, and keep you
longer than you want to stay. Remember
this the next time that you want to do something that the Holy Spirit is
telling you not to do.
