Searching and Fearless

July 21, 2024 · 12 Steps

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Series · 12 Steps · Week 2 of 4

Scripture referenced 14 passages

The passage this message was preached from, in full, with every other passage it reached for.

John 16:7-13 Jesus in the upper room telling disciples the Holy Spirit would convict of sin, convince of righteousness, and guide into truth

7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth: It is to your advantage that I go away, for if I don’t go away, the Counselor won’t come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.
8 When he has come, he will convict the world about sin, about righteousness, and about judgment;
9 about sin, because they don’t believe in me;
10 about righteousness, because I am going to my Father, and you won’t see me any more;
11 about judgment, because the prince of this world has been judged.
12 “I have yet many things to tell you, but you can’t bear them now.
13 However when he, the Spirit of truth, has come, he will guide you into all truth, for he will not speak from himself; but whatever he hears, he will speak. He will declare to you things that are coming.

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Galatians 5:19-23

vice list including sexual immorality, fits of anger, drunkenness contrasted with the fruit of the Spirit

19 Now the deeds of the flesh are obvious, which are: adultery, sexual immorality, uncleanness, lustfulness,

20 idolatry, sorcery, hatred, strife, jealousies, outbursts of anger, rivalries, divisions, heresies,

21 envy, murders, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these; of which I forewarn you, even as I also forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit God’s Kingdom.

22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith,

23 gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

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1 Thessalonians 5

what God's will looks like: being grateful, encouraging one another

1 But concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need that anything be written to you.

2 For you yourselves know well that the day of the Lord comes like a thief in the night.

3 For when they are saying, “Peace and safety,” then sudden destruction will come on them, like birth pains on a pregnant woman; and they will in no way escape.

4 But you, brothers, aren’t in darkness, that the day should overtake you like a thief.

5 You are all children of light, and children of the day. We don’t belong to the night, nor to darkness,

6 so then let’s not sleep, as the rest do, but let’s watch and be sober.

7 For those who sleep, sleep in the night; and those who are drunk are drunk in the night.

8 But let us, since we belong to the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and, for a helmet, the hope of salvation.

9 For God didn’t appoint us to wrath, but to the obtaining of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,

10 who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him.

11 Therefore exhort one another, and build each other up, even as you also do.

12 But we beg you, brothers, to know those who labor among you, and are over you in the Lord, and admonish you,

13 and to respect and honor them in love for their work’s sake. Be at peace among yourselves.

14 We exhort you, brothers, admonish the disorderly, encourage the faint-hearted, support the weak, be patient toward all.

15 See that no one returns evil for evil to anyone, but always follow after that which is good, for one another, and for all.

16 Rejoice always.

17 Pray without ceasing.

18 In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus toward you.

19 Don’t quench the Spirit.

20 Don’t despise prophesies.

21 Test all things, and hold firmly that which is good.

22 Abstain from every form of evil.

23 May the God of peace himself sanctify you completely. May your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

24 He who calls you is faithful, who will also do it.

25 Brothers, pray for us.

26 Greet all the brothers with a holy kiss.

27 I solemnly command you by the Lord that this letter be read to all the holy brothers.

28 The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen.

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1 Corinthians 6:9-10

vice list including sexual immorality, adultery, homosexual activity, thievery, greed, drunkenness, reviling, swindling

9 Or don’t you know that the unrighteous will not inherit God’s Kingdom? Don’t be deceived. Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor male prostitutes, nor homosexuals,

10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor slanderers, nor extortionists, will inherit God’s Kingdom.

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Colossians 3

take off certain vices and put on their opposites

1 If then you were raised together with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated on the right hand of God.

2 Set your mind on the things that are above, not on the things that are on the earth.

3 For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

4 When Christ, our life, is revealed, then you will also be revealed with him in glory.

5 Put to death therefore your members which are on the earth: sexual immorality, uncleanness, depraved passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry;

6 for which things’ sake the wrath of God comes on the children of disobedience.

7 You also once walked in those, when you lived in them;

8 but now you also put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and shameful speaking out of your mouth.

9 Don’t lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old man with his doings,

10 and have put on the new man, who is being renewed in knowledge after the image of his Creator,

11 where there can’t be Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bondservant, freeman; but Christ is all, and in all.

12 Put on therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, a heart of compassion, kindness, lowliness, humility, and perseverance;

13 bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, if any man has a complaint against any; even as Christ forgave you, so you also do.

14 Above all these things, walk in love, which is the bond of perfection.

15 And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful.

16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your heart to the Lord.

17 Whatever you do, in word or in deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father, through him.

18 Wives, be in subjection to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

19 Husbands, love your wives, and don’t be bitter against them.

20 Children, obey your parents in all things, for this pleases the Lord.

21 Fathers, don’t provoke your children, so that they won’t be discouraged.

22 Servants, obey in all things those who are your masters according to the flesh, not just when they are looking, as men pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing God.

23 And whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord, and not for men,

24 knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance; for you serve the Lord Christ.

25 But he who does wrong will receive again for the wrong that he has done, and there is no partiality.

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James 1:13-14

God is not the author of sin and does not tempt anyone

13 Let no man say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God,” for God can’t be tempted by evil, and he himself tempts no one.

14 But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust, and enticed.

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James 4:17

to know to do right and not do it is sin, used to illustrate disobedience

17 To him therefore who knows to do good, and doesn’t do it, to him it is sin.

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Psalm 139:23-24

David's prayer: search me oh God and know my heart, cleanse me from sin

23 Search me, God, and know my heart. Try me, and know my thoughts.

24 See if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the everlasting way.

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Psalm 51

David's prayer of repentance after Nathan confronted him

1 Have mercy on me, God, according to your loving kindness. According to the multitude of your tender mercies, blot out my transgressions.

2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity. Cleanse me from my sin.

3 For I know my transgressions. My sin is constantly before me.

4 Against you, and you only, I have sinned, and done that which is evil in your sight; that you may be proved right when you speak, and justified when you judge.

5 Behold, I was born in iniquity. In sin my mother conceived me.

6 Behold, you desire truth in the inward parts. You teach me wisdom in the inmost place.

7 Purify me with hyssop, and I will be clean. Wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.

8 Let me hear joy and gladness, That the bones which you have broken may rejoice.

9 Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all of my iniquities.

10 Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a right spirit within me.

11 Don’t throw me from your presence, and don’t take your holy Spirit from me.

12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation. Uphold me with a willing spirit.

13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways. Sinners shall be converted to you.

14 Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, the God of my salvation. My tongue shall sing aloud of your righteousness.

15 Lord, open my lips. My mouth shall declare your praise.

16 For you don’t delight in sacrifice, or else I would give it. You have no pleasure in burnt offering.

17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. A broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

18 Do well in your good pleasure to Zion. Build the walls of Jerusalem.

19 Then you will delight in the sacrifices of righteousness, in burnt offerings and in whole burnt offerings. Then they will offer bulls on your altar.

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2 Samuel 11-12

David and Bathsheba, Uriah the Hittite, Nathan's parable confronting David's sin

11:1 At the return of the year, at the time when kings go out, David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel; and they destroyed the children of Ammon, and besieged Rabbah. But David stayed at Jerusalem.

11:2 At evening, David arose from his bed and walked on the roof of the king’s house. From the roof, he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to look at.

11:3 David sent and inquired after the woman. One said, “Isn’t this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, Uriah the Hittite’s wife?”

11:4 David sent messengers, and took her; and she came in to him, and he lay with her (for she was purified from her uncleanness); and she returned to her house.

11:5 The woman conceived; and she sent and told David, and said, “I am with child.”

11:6 David sent to Joab, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” Joab sent Uriah to David.

11:7 When Uriah had come to him, David asked him how Joab did, and how the people fared, and how the war prospered.

11:8 David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” Uriah departed out of the king’s house, and a gift from the king was sent after him.

11:9 But Uriah slept at the door of the king’s house with all the servants of his lord, and didn’t go down to his house.

11:10 When they had told David, saying, “Uriah didn’t go down to his house,” David said to Uriah, “Haven’t you come from a journey? Why didn’t you go down to your house?”

11:11 Uriah said to David, “The ark, Israel, and Judah, are staying in tents; and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord, are encamped in the open field. Shall I then go into my house to eat and to drink, and to lie with my wife? As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not do this thing!”

11:12 David said to Uriah, “Stay here today also, and tomorrow I will let you depart.” So Uriah stayed in Jerusalem that day, and the next day.

11:13 When David had called him, he ate and drink before him; and he made him drunk. At evening, he went out to lie on his bed with the servants of his lord, but didn’t go down to his house.

11:14 In the morning, David wrote a letter to Joab, and sent it by the hand of Uriah.

11:15 He wrote in the letter, saying, “Send Uriah to the forefront of the hottest battle, and retreat from him, that he may be struck, and die.”

11:16 When Joab kept watch on the city, he assigned Uriah to the place where he knew that valiant men were.

11:17 The men of the city went out, and fought with Joab. Some of the people fell, even of David’s servants; and Uriah the Hittite died also.

11:18 Then Joab sent and told David all the things concerning the war;

11:19 and he commanded the messenger, saying, “When you have finished telling all the things concerning the war to the king,

11:20 it shall be that, if the king’s wrath arise, and he asks you, ‘Why did you go so near to the city to fight? Didn’t you know that they would shoot from the wall?

11:21 Who struck Abimelech the son of Jerubbesheth? Didn’t a woman cast an upper millstone on him from the wall, so that he died at Thebez? Why did you go so near the wall?’ then you shall say, ‘Your servant Uriah the Hittite is also dead.’”

11:22 So the messenger went, and came and showed David all that Joab had sent him for.

11:23 The messenger said to David, “The men prevailed against us, and came out to us into the field, and we were on them even to the entrance of the gate.

11:24 The shooters shot at your servants from off the wall; and some of the king’s servants are dead, and your servant Uriah the Hittite is also dead.”

11:25 Then David said to the messenger, “Tell Joab, ‘Don’t let this thing displease you, for the sword devours one as well as another. Make your battle stronger against the city, and overthrow it.’ Encourage him.”

11:26 When Uriah’s wife heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she mourned for her husband.

11:27 When the mourning was past, David sent and took her home to his house, and she became his wife, and bore him a son. But the thing that David had done displeased Yahweh.

12:1 Yahweh sent Nathan to David. He came to him, and said to him, “There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor.

12:2 The rich man had very many flocks and herds,

12:3 but the poor man had nothing, except one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and raised. It grew up together with him, and with his children. It ate of his own food, drank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was like a daughter to him.

12:4 A traveler came to the rich man, and he spared to take of his own flock and of his own herd, to prepare for the wayfaring man who had come to him, but took the poor man’s lamb, and prepared it for the man who had come to him.”

12:5 David’s anger burned hot against the man, and he said to Nathan, “As Yahweh lives, the man who has done this deserves to die!

12:6 He must restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity!”

12:7 Nathan said to David, “You are the man. This is what Yahweh, the God of Israel, says: ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you out of the hand of Saul.

12:8 I gave you your master’s house, and your master’s wives into your bosom, and gave you the house of Israel and of Judah; and if that would have been too little, I would have added to you many more such things.

12:9 Why have you despised Yahweh’s word, to do that which is evil in his sight? You have struck Uriah the Hittite with the sword, and have taken his wife to be your wife, and have slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon.

12:10 Now therefore the sword will never depart from your house, because you have despised me, and have taken Uriah the Hittite’s wife to be your wife.’

12:11 “This is what Yahweh says: ‘Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house; and I will take your wives before your eyes, and give them to your neighbor, and he will lie with your wives in the sight of this sun.

12:12 For you did this secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the sun.’”

12:13…

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Romans 1:29-31

vice list including wickedness, covetousness, malice, envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness, gossip, slander, God-haters, insolent, haughty

29 being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, malice; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil habits, secret slanderers,

30 backbiters, hateful to God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,

31 without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, unforgiving, unmerciful;

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2 Timothy 3:2-5

vice list including lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, arrogant, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy

2 For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy,

3 without natural affection, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, fierce, not lovers of good,

4 traitors, headstrong, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God;

5 holding a form of godliness, but having denied its power. Turn away from these, also.

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1 John 1:9

if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive and cleanse us

9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us the sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

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Ephesians 1:19-20

the incredible greatness of God's power for believers is the same power that raised Christ from the dead

19 and what is the exceeding greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to that working of the strength of his might

20 which he worked in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and made him to sit at his right hand in the heavenly places,

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Recap

The message in order, in a few minutes of reading.

This message was the fourth installment in Pastor Ray's series walking through the 12 steps of recovery as a framework for spiritual health. After briefly reviewing steps one through three from previous weeks, he turned to step four: making a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. He used the story of David and Bathsheba, a roadside breakdown on the way home from a funeral, and a long biblical vice list to show why that kind of honest self-examination matters and how God meets us in it.

What was said

Pastor Ray opened by catching the congregation up on a heavy stretch of days, including two services for the same woman who had died after two years of cancer, and a funeral in Casper for a young man. On the drive back from Casper he stopped to help a stranger whose Jeep had thrown a serpentine belt. They worked together, got the belt back on, the man started the engine, and the belt flew off again immediately. The water pump shaft was broken. Putting the belt back on had not solved anything because that was never the problem. That picture became the entry point into step four: you have to correctly identify what is actually wrong before anything else can happen.

Steps one through three set the ground under step four. Step one is admitting you are powerless over the problem. Step two is coming to believe that a power greater than yourself can restore you to sanity. Step three, which was the previous week's sermon, is making a decision to turn your will and your life over to the care of God. Pastor Ray noted that in his experience, steps one through three function as a continuous loop rather than a one-time achievement, because there are always areas of life not yet surrendered.

Step four is the one most people find hardest: "we made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves." The difficulty is that looking inward and seeing real defects of character is painful, and it is much easier to catalog other people's faults. Pastor Ray pointed to David as the central biblical example. After David's sin with Bathsheba and his arrangement to have Uriah killed, he did not come to honest self-examination on his own. He thought he was above the law. Sin had compounded sin, and persistent sin had dulled his conscience to the point that the Holy Spirit's voice was not getting through.

Nathan's approach to David illustrated what happens when we cannot see our own sin: someone who knows the same kind of struggle, and cares enough to say something, can show us what we have been unable to see. Nathan told a story that made David furious on behalf of the wronged party, and then told him plainly, "you are that man." That confrontation opened David to the searching prayer of Psalm 139: "Search me, O God, and know my heart today." Pastor Ray described that as the moment step four actually began for David.

For anyone who came in feeling they had nothing to inventory, Pastor Ray read slowly through the vice lists drawn from Galatians, First Corinthians, Colossians and other passages, covering sexual immorality, idolatry, sorcery, fits of anger, rivalries, envy, drunkenness, reviling, swindling, greed, slander, ingratitude, pride, craftiness, quarrelsomeness, and several more. He was careful to say he did not want to add emphasis where Scripture does not place it, but he did not want to skip any that Scripture does include. He noted how many of the items on the list have to do with words, and how pride shows up repeatedly underneath other sins.

Pastor Ray closed by singing Psalm 139 set to the hymn "Search Me, O God," and pointing to the structure of the song as a picture of the whole process. The first verse asks God to reveal sin and cleanse it. The second verse begins from the place of already having been cleansed, praising God for it and asking to be filled. The third verse asks for revival to begin in the one praying. He connected that arc to Ephesians 1:19-20, which was read as the benediction: the same power that raised Christ from the dead is available to those who believe, and Christ is at the right hand of God interceding for them. The point was that the higher power of step two is not abstract, and not indifferent. He wants to do this work.

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Pastor Ray described the Holy Spirit's role as convicting of sin, convincing of God's righteousness, and guiding us into truth. Where have you noticed any of those three at work in your own life recently?
Step four calls for a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. What makes it easier to spot flaws in others than in ourselves, and what gets in the way of honest self-examination?

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Speaker 2Amen.

Speaker 1Thank you, Jeff. We're constantly throwing curveballs to that booth. We added that one this morning. How about this? It is well with my soul.

Y'all can have a seat and thank you. Have a couple of announcements that I know of. First, BBQ is happening again August 18. So that's still a little ways off, but I wanted you to know about it. We're doing it another time, couple of times this summer.

We're gonna call September summer. We're gonna do it. August 18, September 15. How many of you feel like you just barely got summer started at all? Yeah.

Me too. August 15 and September August 18, September 15 between services right out here on the green space, tables will be set up, barbecue grills and everything. We'll have breakfast between services. That's fun. Last night and the night before, there was the First Baptist Church camp out down at Palisades.

They have found a fantastic spot. Wide open, nice, flat, easy camping, lots of where you can pull in an RV. You can pull in the camper, can pull in a little trailer or you can do tent camping. All of that was happening last night. They had a couple of boats, a little floating dock.

It was just glorious. We went down for two hours because I don't like sleeping outside. So that's just me. That's just me. If that's not your thing, then you don't have to do that.

But going down and having a few s'mores, singing a song or two around the fire is always fun. But the next time that'll happen is August twenty third through the twenty fifth down at Palisades, probably the same area. They even got porta potties to make it easy. Right? It's really really nice.

Brian McCooey, Mike Demetrius have done a good job and they're the guys to talk to about it. Sunday school, miss Crystal is teaching kindergarten through first grade, second grade, and she takes all comers. Anybody that wants to come down is welcome. Middle school and high school, Sunday school still meeting during the 9AM service down in the library, and this is a big the We're We're We're in going to to be

Speaker 2We're church.

Speaker 1So there'll be all kinds of distractions available over there. So it's one of the weirdest places to try to preach under the big top with a lion's club breakfast going on before and sort of still during, but it is glorious. We have a great time. The community responds very well to that, I think, and we love it. So it'll be under the big top, one service at 10AM.

Don't come to the nine, don't come to the eleven, come to the ten over there under the big top. Any other thing I need to say about that? We'll break away from the current series, the one that we're going on today. I'm going break away that from that for next week in moments like these. I think that's it.

Would you all stand? There is still connect hour that happens between services, and there are some still some of the normal stuff I just didn't mention. The Thursday lunch study for men is on, the sisters saved by grace is on. All those sort of things are on, but we just set them and set them and set them and set them. So they're still happening.

Do not be alarmed. God help us in moments like these. Help us. Let's sing it again. Now his eyes on the sparrow.

Y'all can have a seat. I'm gonna invite the ushers to come forward. Lord God Almighty, we come before you in prayer right now, recognizing like that song, the highs and the lows. The highs and the lows of this life, the funerals and the births and the weddings and the baptisms and all of the significant milestones in life and all of the stuff in between. Lord God, thank you for giving us a Bible that looks at it straight on, that recognizes your goodness, your righteousness, and our frailty, and our lack.

And Lord, your goodness that can be imputed to us so that we actually might be of use to the kingdom. Lord, we ask you that you would do the work, that you would use our body. You'd use us individually, but collectively, Lord, to do your kingdom's work. We want to do it your will, Lord. We want to do it in your way.

Would you direct us on how that would be? Would you, Lord, do that? We know that your will done in your way won't lack your supply. So would you show us, Lord, how you would have us move forward, the steps ordained for us. In Jesus name, we ask your blessing on this offering and on the giver too, Lord.

Would you allow for us to go about your work in a way that is helpful. In Jesus name, amen. Amen. That's a quite a moving piece of music from what I could consider the campfire song, you know. Sincerely, that's beautiful.

I got kinda lost in it there for a moment. Oh, gracious. Here we go. Here we are together and if you have visited before and you've come in and you said, oh, just like coming back because it just takes a paragraph of scripture and goes straight through it. That's what I've always done, always done since I've been here for twelve and a half years.

I finished the New Testament a few a couple months back, two or three months back. And prayerfully considering where to go next, I felt pretty clear that needed to go through the thing that practically speaking, in actual practice, I feel like this sequential method is one of the best things that we can do for our own spiritual health. And so the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous originally and every addiction recovery group has used them since then, virtually every, is what we have been on. Now, they are thoroughly biblical. I will get to some of the biblical underpinning as we go today, but we'll talk through them.

Two weeks ago, we went through step one and two. And step one is this. Actually, before I get to that, we started with Jesus in the upper room with his disciples, speaking to him in the upper room the night that he was betrayed, the same night he instituted the Lord's Supper, the same night that he washed their feet and served them before that. Right? That's the night we're talking about.

He told them that it was good for them if he went away because if he didn't go away, we wouldn't send the comforter and whereas he can only be in one place at one time, the comforter, the Holy Spirit can be with them throughout all of their time And it can be writing the word of God on their heart so that they can know him more closer more closely than they ever had with Jesus. And he gave three of the aspects or roles of the Holy Spirit. He gave them this. He said, he would convict of sin. That's what the Holy Spirit would do.

Convict of sin. Convict the world of sin. Even those who don't know him, he is at work through their conscience and through their circumstances to convict of sin. Also, to convince of God's righteousness, so showing the goodness of God and that he is willing to help, to convince of the righteousness of God. So convict of sin, convince of righteousness, and to illumine his word and guide us into the truth.

And it is the work of the Holy Spirit. That's the way Jesus described it. In the 12 steps, we have step one as admitting that we were powerless over our own problem. Now, in 1939 when this book came out originally, it was from a group of guys who all struggled with the same problem, and that same issue was drinking to drunkenness, and it had caused all of them to have the same kinds of problems in their lives. And so admitting that they were powerless over the problem and admitting that their lives had become manageable was the first step out of 12 when they finally examined what it was that helped them to get sober in their case.

So step one, step one, admitting that you have a problem is a real good part of solving a problem. If you don't admit that you have it, you're just going to keep repeating the same behavior, getting the same results, and not get out of it. So admitting you're powerless over your problem, that your life will become manageable. And then I put this slide up. Now, forgot my whole intro, Diane.

I want to back up to the black slide. On the way here this morning, I thought of something. Anyway, let me do that. I'm back up. So, on the way home, this somebody just asked me right before the service.

The past two Sundays when I've gotten up, it's it's been kinda obviously heavy and there's been a lot of death and there's been a lot of difficulty and a lot of things in the body of this church and in the just one degree beyond the body and our families and whatnot and so I'm going give you kind of a little report. There were two funerals for the same person this week. It was a funeral here on Wednesday and it was beautiful. Everybody that came saw life that was well lived and beautifully saved by God and lived with a fire and fervency for the last two years while she had cancer. We did a funeral on Wednesday.

We did an interment ceremony for the same lady up on Aspen Hill on Thursday. And so there were there was another funeral on Friday. I was not doing it, I went to Casper to go to this funeral. Serendipitously, I kept seeing the highs and lows in all of the songs this morning in the first service and in this one. And going to this funeral on the way there, they were just going through Riverton, there were hot air balloons all over the place.

I was thinking, man, that's just a glorious beautiful thing, hadn't expected that. I went on to a difficult funeral for a young man who had died. And then coming home, I'm a car guy. And I was riding along and I'd seen several kind of cool cars and that's fun for me just being out on the highway. I've driven junk my whole life.

And riding along, I saw a guy, he was pulled over on the side of the road. He's got a '2 thousand Jeep, four point o, six cylinder. I know the exact engine. I've had one of them that was stolen in Mexico. Carl's Carl son has one back here that he got for me, and we just put a head gasket on it.

I've worked on those things a lot. And so I know a lot about the particular car, and I had my tools with me because like I said, I drive junk. So I had tools with me, And he's pulled over. And so I pulled over with him, and I got out and it's Wyoming. So I put my hands up and I said, hey, you didn't need of any help.

He had a dog and I was certain he had a gun. He had tools behind. He had tools in front. Hey, I'm here to help. Is there anything I could do to help?

And he said, well, it threw a belt. And he just kind of yelled. He didn't even look around the corner of the hood. He said, it threw a belt without shredding it. So that's one mechanic talking to another.

Normally, if you throw a belt, there's something wrong, obviously. But we're riding down the road, no problem. I was riding down the road, just me and the dog, and then it threw the belt off. And he said, I looked under there, it doesn't seem like there's anything wrong, but of course, when you throw a belt on a modern car, serpentine belt, you lose your alternator, so you can't charge your battery. You lose your water pump, so you can't cool your engine.

You lose your power steering because the power steering pump is what helps the power. It's all things, all systems go kablooey when you throw a belt. And so he was trying to put the belt on and he had it not routed correctly. There are no pictures or stickers, but like I said, I just fixed the head gasket on this. That's one of the things you have to do at the end of that job.

So I had a picture on my phone. That's fortuitous. Looked at the picture, showed him the picture, he starts trying to get it on. And he's just about there and he's got small hands and he's an older guy. He's trying to put it in there.

He can reach places I can't reach, but I can push things into place that he can't push into place. So got it on there and as I put it on, I realized that the pulley that is on the front of the water pump did this. It moved about that much. And so as we tighten down the tensioner, it squishes itself up against the water pump. And so I said, hey, this is a no go.

It's going to be bad. I said, obviously, when something's thrown, something's wrong. Not seeing anything, check the power steering pump, nothing. Check the alternator, nothing. Checked all the tensioners, nothing.

All of the issues and nothing appeared to be wrong until you could feel that water pump doing that. The shaft on that water pump was broken. It needs to be replaced. It's not going to pump any water anyway. It's not going to act as a tensioner and let you get down the road.

He said, I'm just going to drive back to Casper. It's only 45 miles. I said, you're not going to make it two miles and you're probably going blow the head gasket if you try to go further than that. But he had somebody that he could call. And so he when he called and when he when he finally got to a place that he could call him, and the guy said he was coming back, I left him alone.

I forgot till the end of that story in the first service. They're still worried about that man. He's fine. He's fine. He had somebody coming to get him.

But putting that belt back on, it just threw the belt off. Right? It just did. So he put it back on and I said, can get in and try it if you want to. He got in, cranked it up.

First time he revved the engine, threw the belt again because it's broken. First step is admitting you have a problem. And where we were, it was a problem we couldn't do anything about. He didn't have a water pump in the car. He did have a brand new serpentine belt, but that didn't help because that wasn't the problem.

Admitting that you have a problem you can't do anything about, your life has become unmanageable, you can't drive that car. We are designed to live in a certain way. And this is the way that we were designed to live. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control. Can I get an amen?

Amen. That's the way we're designed to live. In the garden, when God created Adam, they walked together in the cool of the day before sin entered in. You know what? God said it wasn't good that a man live alone and then so he created Eve and now Adam and Eve are walking naked and unashamed, and they are living in love and joy and peace and patience and kindness.

We don't know how long they lasted like that. But at some point when sin entered in, the works of the flesh became the default setting for human beings. Though we were designed to live like this and we can get back to that, these other things started showing up. Things like sexual immorality and impurity and sensuality, and I'll go into a longer list at the end today. But this list over here with rivalries and dissensions and divisions and envy and drunkenness is on the list, fits of anger, those things are the things with which we struggle.

And in some cases, we quit struggling as human beings. Not as Christians, I hope, but as human beings, we quit struggling with certain ones of those. Step two, after we figure out, after we know what it is that is the problem that we can't fix, we reach down to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and we realize we have no bootstraps. Right? We just can't get there.

Step two is we came to believe that a higher power, a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. Whether we had believed it previously or not or just felt like, oh, I'm not going to bother Jesus with that. We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. That's good. We need to go through knowing that we can't do anything about it and believing that God can, and that'll get us up to step three.

And if you talk to anybody that's in the program, most people will say, step one, two, and three are on a constant. We're always realizing some places that we haven't given over our will and our lives to the care of God as we understood him. Step three was last week's sermon and it was we made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him. When we looked at first Thessalonians five for what God's will looks like, God's will looks like being grateful in all circumstances. God's will looks like encouraging one another and building each other up, a few of those things.

That as we understood him is often something that Christians will push back on and say, God is just who he is no matter what we think of him. That's true. That's true. But if you don't access him the way that you know him, the way that you understand him, if you're not willing to humble yourself and admit that you don't know him fully, you don't know him as intimately as you want to. You don't know him as well as you want to.

I want to know you more. I want to love you more. I want to serve you more. I realize my understanding is limited, but I believe that you're showing me my problem, convicting of sin. And showing me your righteousness, he can help me with it.

I'm gonna let you, Lord. I'm gonna go with what you say. As we understood him as a statement of humility about not thinking we've got it all figured out. And step four is today. And this one in many ways is the hardest of all the steps for a lot of people because we don't like to look at ourselves in a mirror and see flaws and defects of character and see painful things that are our fault.

We don't like that. It's much easier to look and see painful things about other people and their flaws and their faults and point out those things. But this step forward is we made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves instead of it being of someone else, it's of ourselves. Searching and fearless. I I think of David and Bathsheba.

Yeah. That's you gotta go there for this sermon, don't you? David and Bathsheba. Now David was up on a rooftop and he's looking down on a naked woman. There's a naked woman within view of somebody on top of a different rooftop.

That sin of David is he saw that and liked it and wanted to pursue it and did, and Uriah the Hittite's wife and David got together. And then in order to try to cover it up, David, instead of seeing that he had a problem that was against your rules, that's against your law, that's against you. Lord, forgive me. He didn't see that. He's the king.

He invites Uriah in to try to cover it up, and then when that doesn't work because Uriah is a man of integrity, he puts him on the front line to have him killed. So that's murder. He knew what he was doing. So sin compounds sin. If we don't deal with it, it gets other sins involved.

So to make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves, I'm going to point back to ourselves right here. I think it helps if I made a searching and fearless moral moral inventory immortal of myself. That helps tremendously, but sometimes we're blind to our own stuff. Do you agree? Sometimes we just can't see it.

Through persistent sin, we often get to a place where we've seared our conscience and it's hard to hear the still small voice of the Holy Spirit and we don't hear him when he's saying, hey, right now Ray, you're being a reviler. You're reviling. What you're saying is ugly. That's slander and malice. You understand?

If I keep on doing it, I quit listening to it. And David's case, he thought that he was above reproach. He thought that he was above the law. He's got so many other good qualities. He got so much other faith, but maybe he thought that pet sin was his own and he could just hold on to it and there'd be no repercussions.

Well, Nathan, his friend comes to him. This is when it goes from I and myself. Sometimes we can't see our sin and the reason one of the reasons why AA works so well is because the same people that are struggling with the same problem know how to spot a problem. And Nathan was able to go to David. David's a king.

Coulda had him killed. He says, I gotta figure out a way to do this. So David, if it pleased the king, I'm sure. Right? Can I tell a story?

Yes. There's a man who's got tons of sheep, just lots and lots and lots of sheep, very rich man. He's got all the sheep, all these sheep. And then there's this other guy, poor guy, he's one poor shepherd. He only has one sheep and then the big rich guy with all these sheep comes along and takes his and then kills him.

But what should happen to that rich guy that has all those sheep that did this? And David's like, that man should be killed. Absolutely. We're gonna right this wrong. And then Nathan, in all gentleness and humility and caring deeply for his friend David says, you're that guy.

You did that. That helped David to see this where whether he had been searching or not before that, we know for certain that it began a searching. Psalm one thirty nine, David says, search me, oh God, and know my heart. I want you to get down to the last little bit. Know my heart today.

I want you to cleanse me from sin. That's getting on up to steps five and six, you know. But step four, the searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. Now, if you're sitting here today and going, I mean, I don't know what that'd be. I don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't chew, I don't run with girls that do.

Come on. Where do I start? Well, the Bible's got a list. It's got a lot of list actually. Here are all of them in one place.

This is this is to be helpful. When I say that it's not a list of do's and don'ts. It's not a list of do's and don'ts. If you're looking to make a searching and fearless moral inventory of yourself, you got to have a grid to do that with. Right?

And it helps to go, God, I wanna please you in every way. I wanna turn my will over to your will. I know, James says, that you are not the author of sin, that you are not the one who tempts, that you are the one who helps overcome temptation. So God, I want for you to help me. Show me my own sin, please.

He will. I'm gonna turn over my will to you. Now, I'm gonna look. His job is to convict of sin, to convince of his righteousness, to illumine scripture. So I'm asking God for me and I'm hoping and praying that you will ask God for you, that as I read through this list slowly, we will look at it and we'll see if we are on there, if that's us.

Right? And I guarantee you, it's every single one of us at some point on this list. I also wanna be even handed about the presentation of it because I don't want to beat up anything that scripture doesn't beat up. Right? I want for it to just say, here is the list.

Let's hold ourselves up against the standard. Jesus was none of these things and we want to be like Christ. We want to be repentant like David. David's a great example. Christ had no sin.

Sometimes it's kinda hard to relate to Christ because he had no sin. Well, he didn't have to worry about sin. He had to worry about our sin. All of our sin. So we'll start with that first list from Galatians and I've got a list up here if I've got a list on my computer.

Somebody took my other list which is great. I'm glad. Galatians and first Corinthians and different places, they're usually the vice lists most often come with a list of vices and then say, but the spirit of the God is the the fruit of the spirit is this and take these things off in Colossians and put these things on. So usually near the vice list, there is the the opposite of those things nearby too. So here they are, sexual immorality.

Pourneia is the word there, and it covers everything outside of marital sexual relations. Sexual immorality, even some things within immorality, impurity, sensuality. Sensuality is an overwhelming occupation of things you can see, feel, taste, touch or smell, the senses. Idolatry, when anything takes the place of God. Anything that gets to be more important in our lives than God is idolatry.

I think we think about that as being a primitive thing, but then again, there are a lot of things in modern life that get in between us and God. And we we leave God behind and we make sure we have our phone. Sorcery. Sorcery is when you try to manipulate the spiritual or astronomical world to get a result for yourself in the here and now. Enmity, having enemies and feeling good about it.

Strife, yan yan is the way we would say it back home, when you're just always yan yan. Strife. Always mixed up in something. Contentious. Jealousy.

Fits of anger. Now, the Bible does say be angry but sin not. So there's a level of anger that is righteous indignation, but you're not supposed to sin. Two wrongs don't make a right. Fits of anger is on the list.

Rivalries. Rivalries. When we've got such an us and them mentality, especially when we get to the point of God is for us and he's against them. God wants to be for them by using us. He does not want for us to have rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these is the end of that list from Galatians, from Corinthians.

Sexual immorality tops the list again. It tops the list three times or four times in these lists that I've got. Sexual immorality, adultery, homosexual activity. I said I don't want to add any extra emphasis where the Bible does not place it, but I don't wanna skip any emphasis where the Bible does. And so this is on the list.

And it's in the two in the couple places that it mentions, it is there's no doubt about what it says. If we change it, we're changing it to accommodate our own understanding. That's true of many of the things on the list. Idolatry, again, anything taking the place of God. Thievery, to steal, greed, drunkenness makes the list.

There it is. Reviling. Reviling is kind of mocking, having contempt and speaking out that contempt on the day that Jesus was crucified while the soldiers are nailing him to the cross and the two thieves on either side of him before one of them had a change of heart. It says and both of them were reviling Jesus. They were insulting him, mocking him, and calling out ugly things to him.

Swindling. Swindling. Watch out. These days, swindling is on a on an upswing. People are constantly scamming and they're phishing scams and all that.

And then as I was standing up here in the first service, was like, y'all watch out for people, other people, those people scamming you. And then I thought, wait a second, God help me not ever to be guilty of swindling, of scamming, of getting it convinced in my own mind that it'd be alright if I just kinda parted them with their income, swindling, lying, evil talking, fornication, another form, sexual immorality, vulgar talk, empty words, disobedience. You know, James says to know to do right and to not do it, that's sin. And so if we are walking out of Christian life, certainly, and God says, want for you to witness to that person and we go, well, I don't wanna talk to that person. That's enough disobedience.

Right? Now, you might think, well, that's not gonna cause my life to become unmanageable. It gets harder and harder to hear the voice of God when you ignore him over and over. Empty words, disobedience, anger, again on the list, wrath, malice, slander, abusive language. You notice how many of these have to do with our words?

Quenching the spirit, despising the words of the prophets. He gave us his word for a reason. We should be listening to it. To be self indulgent, to be double tongue, speak out of both sides of our mouth. To be conceited, there's pride.

To be oh, this is a fun one. Filled with a morbid curiosity and craving for oh, filled with a morbid craving for controversy. Isn't that a sign of our times? Filled with a morbid, deadly craving for controversy and eagerness to be rich, greed. Being overtaken with stupid and senseless controversies.

Two different lists, but they sound almost just alike. To be quarrelsome. That's one of the things about elder of a church that says they're not to be quarrelsome. None of us are to be quarrelsome. It's on the list.

If being quarrelsome is your thing like drunkenness might be someone else's or pornography might be someone else's. The same recourse is available. Recognizing it is in front of handing it over to God and allowing for him to clean it up. Wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness. I had a buddy that I used to do handyman stuff with in seminary, And he had had a job as a salesman at a company that you could see riding down the highway, had a big old Christian fish on the side of the business.

And if people pull in there to buy something, and he was one of the salesman, and his boss called him in one day and he said, Chip, if you're going to work here, you're to have to get to be more crafty. He said, well, I try to do my best for the customer. He said, that's the problem. You work for me. And so Chip was like confused by that.

He's a very strong believer. He's a bivocational minute missionary ministry. And he said, he went home and instead of looking it up at Crafty, he said it over and over in his head all the way home. And instead of looking up in a in a dictionary, he knew what crafty meant, he looked it up in the Bible to see if there was anything in the Bible about it. And it's on a vice list and he just called the guy and says, I can't work there anymore.

I can't do it. I'm not I don't want to be crafty. I don't want to improve my craftiness. Gossip, slander, God haters, insolent, haughty, boastful, haughty. Pride comes up a lot on this list and it's the one behind a lot of the others.

Inventors of new ways to do evil, rebellious toward parents, foolish. Foolish is not just ignorance. Ignorance is not knowing. And I think that there's something to not knowing. We're supposed to be living our lives and showing the way.

Right? Jesus was showing all of us the way. And there were people that were ignorant of what was going on. But to know the truth and go against it is foolishness. Faithless, heartless, ruthless, lovers of themselves caring more about yourself than you do about anyone else.

Lovers of money, boasters, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to parents, ungrateful. I mentioned this last week and I'll probably keep on mentioning it for a while. God, it doesn't surprise God. He put it in the Old Testament. He put it in the New Testament.

Last week's message was that this is God's will concerning you in Christ Jesus that you be grateful. Gratitude replaces anxiety. Brain science these days has proven that you can't be both grateful and anxious at the same time. Count your blessings, count them one by one, turns out to be really good advice. Ungrateful is up here as a list of sinful things.

Unholy, inhuman, implacable. Slanderers, using our words to tear other people down. Profligates, knowing how and going against it anyway. Brutes, that gets back to sensuality, haters of the good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, again there's pride, lovers of pleasure and hypocrisy. That's the list.

That's the grid, I would say. If you came in the door today and you said, well, I'll be glad when he gets through these 12 steps because I don't struggle with anything. Do you still feel that way? It's a pretty good grid to look through. I felt okay because I've been going through this for some time.

And I got in here and thought, Lord, I've got plenty, plenty, plenty of searching left to do. God, would you make us fearless? I know that looking at a list like that and feeling like, I'll never be pure, I'll never be whole, is daunting. And we have an enemy that is just milking that and saying, you're right, you never will. That's just a bunch of who anyway.

What does that 2,000 year old book have to do with you? You can live however you want to. God, would you help us to recognize the voice of the enemy of our adversary? And would you overcome him by your spirit? May we be be turning these things over to you as we figure them out, Lord.

May we be like David asking for you to search our heart every day. May we when we recognize that we have sinned, whether somebody had to bring it to our attention or we come to it on our own, may we be ready and willing, Lord, to to call it what it is. In Jesus name, I pray. Amen. I've got one song that I'd like to sing and I went way long in the first service or we started late, one or the other.

Did I forget anything? Okay. Alright. I've got a song here and I love this song and every time we sing it, the order of it impresses me. The order of the verses impresses me.

And it searched me. We don't have the words for it on the screen. I'm just gonna sing it. We'll still sing what we're gonna sing at the end. I need the every hour at the end.

But I'm always impressed with David once he realizes he was wrong. Then, he goes into this beautiful prayer in Psalm one thirty nine. In Psalm 51, we have another one but it's search me, oh God, and know my heart today. Try me, oh savior. Know my thoughts.

I want you to get past just the outside stuff and know my thoughts. When I'm plotting against Uriah the Hittite, I want you to stop me right there before I ever go wrong. When I see that, I go, woah, I don't need to be looking at that. Instead of focusing on it. Know my thoughts, I pray.

See if there be some wicked way in me and cleanse me from every sin and set me free. So at the the last line of that one simple verse, he goes from step four, I've made a fearless and searching moral inventory because I've asked you to search me. And I've asked you to know my thoughts. And I've asked you and your gentleness, God, to help me see where I'm going astray. And then it goes to turning it over to God by the end, which is the fifth step, sixth step, seventh step.

It's right in there that we really learn to lay down these things before God and allow him to clean them up. Allow him to take the burden on him. I'm gonna sing search me, oh God. If you'll pay attention to the order of the I think it's just genius the way it was written.

Speaker 2Search me, oh God, and know my heart today. Try me, oh savior. Know my thoughts, I pray. See if there be some wicked way in me. Cleanse me from every sin and set me free.

I praise the Lord for cleansing me from sin. I'm gonna stop right there.

Speaker 1Did you hear how he recognized his own sin? I asked God to help him recognize even more and said, cleanse me from this and set me free. And then the next verse knows that he already has. The way that God promises that he'll do that is, if we will confess our sin, he is faithful and just to be forgiven our sins. He'll throw it as

Speaker 2far as the east is from the West. He'll remember it no more. We will have a clean slate. Second verse starts at that. I praise thee, Lord, for cleansing me from sin.

Fulfill thy word and make me pure within. Fill me with fire where once I burned with shame. Grant my desire to magnify thy name. Lord, take my life and make it holy, thine. Fill my poor heart with thy great love divine.

Take all my will, my passion, self and pride. I now surrender, Lord, in me. Abide. Last verse. Oh, ghost, revival comes from thee.

Send a Start the work in me. Thy word declares, thou wilt supply our need. Four blessings now, o Lord, I humbly plead. Amen. Judy, would

Speaker 1you come up? And we're gonna sing, I need thee every hour. In the first service after the cleanse me, oh God, we sang the same power that raised Jesus from the dead is alive and at work in us. Right? It's great to know that that that power that overcomes death is what we have available.

That is higher power and in this case, we're acknowledging our need for God. Every hour of the day, if we are to be surrendering to his spirit, we need to be in contact with him. Would you stand with us? I have a benediction slide coming up in a second, but I wanna pray for a second. Lord, like the fellow on the side of the road, first of all, help him fix that Jeep.

But Lord, like the fellow on the side of the road, you say in Jeremiah that there's coming a time where you'll take the heart of stone out. You remove that part and you'll place in us a heart of flesh that actually works. So Lord, may we have soft hearts that are input by our designer, our creator, the best mechanic anyone has ever known. Lord God, would you help us to be turning over our problem to you and allowing you to show us any others, keeping first things first, doing triage, recognizing what's the most important thing that you need to take right now. And then as we go, being more and more refined by the presence of the Holy Spirit, in the presence of our humility, and in the righteousness of a good and almighty God.

In Jesus name, we ask for your blessing to do just that. Amen. Ephesians one nineteen to 20 says this, I also pray that you'll understand the incredible greatness of God's power for those of us who believe in him. That this is the same mighty power that raised Christ from the dead and seated him at the place of honor at God's right hand in the heavenly realms. And if you go on to see what he's doing there, he is interceding for you.

Not only is there a higher power that can restore you to sanity, he wants to. As you turn your will over to him, the spirit is praying with utter groanings that you can't even understand, don't even know how you ought to pray. Jesus is sitting there praying for you too, and God Almighty is working it through your humility. He resists the proud, but he gives grace to the humble. Lord, would you help us this week to be completely set free and able to help others.

Amen.

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12 Steps Addiction Recovery Forgiveness Of Sin Gratitude Moral Inventory Self-Examination

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