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The "put off" is not passive.
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But you know what?
-
We can act like it is.
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And this can be one
of the greatest killers
-
to sanctification that we can encounter,
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when we deal with sanctification
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as though it is passive.
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I want to be clear about something.
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Putting off the old man
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is something that Paul is telling
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the Colossians and the
Ephesians that they do.
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Oh, I know it's past tense
with the Colossians,
-
but it's something they did.
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Putting off these old man-ish ways
-
are something they must do.
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It is something he is appealing to them.
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It's not something done to us.
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It's not something done for us.
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It is specifically: you are to put away.
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You are to put off.
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That's the language of Scripture.
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Put off the old man.
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Put away falsehood, put away bitterness,
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put away wrath, put away anger.
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And you know what Paul never says here?
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Well, what you really need to do
-
is pray about it.
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What you really need
to do is fast about it
-
or seek counsel over it.
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Now look, you need to hear me right.
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You say, he's telling us
not to pray about this,
-
not to fast about this.
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I always knew. I always knew he had error.
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There it is.
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I knew something was wrong.
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Listen, you know as well as I do
-
Scripture talks about
praying without ceasing.
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But you need to listen to me
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and you need to hear
not what I'm saying so much
-
as hear what Paul is saying.
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Far too often through the years
-
as I have been a pastor in this church,
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people use prayer as a crutch
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in a bad way and in a wrong way.
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I can tell you I have seen people
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make horrible decisions in their life.
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But they say, "Well, I prayed about it."
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As though that just certifies
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that what they're
doing has God's approval.
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"I prayed about it."
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As though you can't touch me now.
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No counsel that is against
this is going to stand
-
because I prayed about this.
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That's one way I've
seen prayer used wrongly.
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But there's another way.
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You've got some sin in your life.
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There's something wrong.
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And you say, well, I know
that I have this thing
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in my life that's wrong
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and it's dishonoring to God.
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And I'm asking God to take it away.
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And you see, that sounds very... what?
-
Christian, noble.
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And I'll tell you so often
it is nothing but false piety.
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"Well, I'm praying about
this sin in my life."
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And you know what Paul would say?
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You go ahead and pray about that,
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but if you're ever going
to live a sanctified life,
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you better come to the place
-
where you put that off yourself.
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(incomplete thought)
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You know what happens.
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Somebody prays - "I prayed about it."
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And now they sit there.
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"I prayed about that bitterness."
"I prayed about that lack of forgiveness."
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"I prayed about my laziness."
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I prayed about this,
that, and the other thing.
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And then you sit there.
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And I know what you're waiting for.
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You're waiting for this feeling of power.
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Ahhh...
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You know, you wake up and it's like
-
now you're this spiritual superman
-
and you feel it coursing
through your veins.
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And it's like power's just exuding,
-
like you're going to see some light
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emanating from your face
when you look in the mirror.
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But that's how we are.
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Oh, I'm going to feel this.
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Paul says you might
want to examine v. 17-32.
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You'll notice I'm not really
charging the people
-
that they need to pray more.
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Where do you see prayer at all there?
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Paul doesn't tell you to
pray about dishonesty
-
or bitterness or laziness.
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Does he?
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He doesn't!
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You know what? He
goes straight to the point.
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And he says, you, Christian,
-
need to get that out of your life.
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Period.
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Get on with it, man.
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That's what Paul is saying.
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Paul doesn't say to the Ephesians:
-
Well, you have certain
people in your church
-
with old man-ish tendencies.
-
Some of you aren't speaking
truth to one another.
-
Some of you are given to sinful anger.
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Some are letting the sun
go down on their anger.
-
Some are giving advantage to the devil.
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Some of you are not laboring
very diligently in giving.
-
Some of you are grieving the Holy Spirit.
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Some are bitter and slanderous.
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He doesn't tell them to go start
-
a special Thursday evening prayer meeting.
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You know what he tells them?
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You put that off.
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Stop it.
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Oh! That doesn't sound very spiritual.
-
Having Thursday night prayer
meeting sounds spiritual.
-
Yeah, but you come back a year later,
-
and who are the people
that are running well?
-
Who are the people that
are the godly examples?
-
They're the ones that stood up
and looked their sin face-to-face
-
and said, "You're coming off."
-
And you go to battle against it.
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Versus the guy that has the
prayer meeting every Thursday night.
-
And a year later, he's just as pathetic
-
and wrapped up in his sin as ever.
-
Why? (incomplete thought)
-
It's like here's God.
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God's saying to you: Take it off.
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And you say, "Help me take it off."
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And He says Paul's under inspiration here.
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Take it off.
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"Would You please help me to take it off?"
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Take it off!
-
Can you imagine if your
child was doing that?
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What would you do?
-
Most parents would eventually
become frustrated with that
-
and they'd take the child as
rebelling and spank them.
-
If you as a parent say to your child,
-
"Take that shirt off right now."
-
"Would you help me to take it off?"
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You have arms. You can take that off.
-
You're equipped to take that off.
-
"Oh, but I need power to take this off."
-
"I need help to take this off."
-
Take it off!
-
But you see, we feel so pious and so holy
-
and so, oh, you know, I'm a man of prayer.
-
I pray about that sin all the time.
-
Yeah, how long have you
been praying for it?
-
The last twenty years?
Why do you still have it?
-
Because you never took it off.
-
You see, that's the way Paul's talking.
-
We need to come face-to-face with this.
-
There's something that's
definitely active on your part -
-
almost aggressive.
-
There's a violence about this.
-
And there ought to be.
-
There's a lot of procrastination.
-
There's a lot of false piety.
-
We get people who struggle
with the same thing
-
over and over and over.
-
They pray. They ask others to pray.
-
But Paul comes along
and simply tells them:
-
Stop.
-
Are you a thief?
-
Stop. And work with your hands and give.
-
Are you grieving the Spirit?
-
Stop it.
-
Are you bitter? Are you unforgiving?
-
Put it off.
-
Quit doing that.
-
Stop acting like a baby.
-
Because the truth is you're not a baby.
-
You know what the truth is?
You're God's man.
-
You're God's woman.
-
And he's telling us to act like it.
-
And I know you're going to declare to me.
-
Oh, I'm so weak...
-
I'm so frail.
-
I'm too pathetic, too inexperienced,
-
too newly saved, too dark a season.
-
My righteousness's are filthy rags.
-
My heart's deceitful. No one's good.
-
What's the answer to this?
-
You're a new creation in Christ.
-
Old things are passed away.
-
If by the Spirit, you put to death
the deeds of the body,
-
you will live.
-
If you live according to the flesh,
-
you're going to die.
-
Let me ask you this:
-
Are you a Christian? You say yes.
-
Does Scripture teach that if you're
a Christian, you have the Holy Spirit?
-
You say yes.
-
Case closed.
-
You have the Holy Spirit.
-
By the Holy Spirit, you put to death
-
the deeds of the body.
-
This excerpt was taken
from the full sermon:
-
What is the "Old Man"?