God Makes Us Spiritual Through Trials

We were reading in Jeremiah chapter 48 about the way the Lord spoke about this nation of Moab and all these things are written for our instruction. So just read this verse carefully. If you look in your Bible, Jeremiah 48 and verse 11.

Moab has had an easy time right from the time he was young and he's never been disturbed in his life. And it's like wine on his dregs. He's never been emptied from one vessel to another to another to another to another.

You know, it's sort of like a person getting transferred every six months to some other job or continuously into confusion. And he's never gone into exile. He's always lived comfortably in his own home.

What is the result? The result is his flavor and his aroma has not changed. The same selfish, good for nothing fellow he was at the beginning. 25 years later, he's the same good for nothing, useless, selfish person because he never went through difficult times.

He avoided the difficult times. He always chose the easy path. When he found a difficult path and an easy path, he chose the easy one.

And he came to another place, there was a difficult path and easy path, he chose the easy one. And he kept on making those choices and ends up with a useless life. So these things are written for our instruction.

We must remember we have only one life and it's a wonderful thing if we can teach our children and young people to take that life seriously from day one. So many people waste so much of their life and they realize the loss that they've suffered only when they get into eternity. It's too late.

They get into eternity and look back over their life and say so much of my life was wasted. God brought me to situations and I chose the easy path always. And so my character never developed.

God is ordained in this world because there's sin in the world. There's only one way for us to be spiritual and that is to deny ourself, die to the choices our self wants and choose Christ. See, when God created man, he was perfect and the garden was, everything was perfect.

There wasn't a single thorn or thistle or anything to hurt anybody. But the moment man sinned, God told him, from now on, this is in Genesis 3 and verse 18, God told Adam, because you listen to the voice of your wife and what the devil tempted him to disobey God, therefore thorns and thistles, verse Genesis 3, 18, will grow for you and in the sweat of your face, you'll eat bread. God is ordained that if we want to become spiritual, we have to choose a life of self-denial.

I was reading when the Apostles went to a particular place to preach. I want you to read this verse in Acts chapter 14 and verse 22. It looks like a contradiction, but you need to understand the truth here.

Acts 14, 22, the Apostles strengthened the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith. And how did they encourage them? How do you encourage somebody? Say some nice words to him. These are the words he said.

Through a lot of difficulties and tribulations, you will enter God's kingdom. Is that how you encourage people? When you go to encourage somebody, you go and tell him, well, you're going to face a lot of tribulation, brother, and you've got to face it and go through that to enter God's kingdom. That is the type of encouragement the Apostles gave to the disciples.

In other words, if you choose the easy path, you're not going to enter into God's kingdom. You're going to have a useless life. And it's very important that we teach our young people and children to choose that difficult path always because Jesus, you know, to encourage them by saying through many tribulations, through many trials, through self-discipline and denying your own desires, you will possess God's kingdom.

Why is it we find so many Christians who never laid hold of God's kingdom, whose life seems to be not counting for God, who don't understand what it means to take up the cross every day and deny yourself? The word self-denial in different situations is so unknown, especially among young people. It's very important that we teach our children from a very early age to deny themselves, not to give them everything they ask for, not to give them everything they want. It'll spoil them.

See what Jesus said in Matthew chapter 7 about the two ways. He said there is a way that leads to life and there's a way that leads to destruction. And the way that leads to life is narrow and constricted.

And the way that leads to destruction is broad. It's an easy path to go. And that's the way most people choose.

That's the way a lot of young people are choosing. This is the easy path. Let me choose this.

It goes to destruction. And there's another way where there's a lot of denial. I can't enjoy myself so much and I have to discipline myself and say no to so many situations.

But that leads to life. Matthew 7 verse 13. Enter through the narrow gate because the way to destruction is broad.

It's very easy to walk along that path. You don't have to be careful where you're walking. You can walk so wide away that you can, you know, deviate and go here and there and you won't miss the path.

It goes straight to destruction. But the road to life, the gate is very small and the way is very constricted and very few find it. Verse 14.

So that is why the apostles encouraged people by saying you can enter God's kingdom by facing tribulation and accepting it. Now, if we were to be given a choice of a path that is easy and a path that's full of trials, most people would choose the easy path. But that's the reason they do not develop in their life.

I often think of the, I've often quoted also the example you see in these, outside these gyms, the gymnasiums, picture of a muscular man with muscles all over the place. I mean, I didn't even realize there are so many muscles in a body. And how did he get that? It is not by choosing the easy path.

That guy went into that gymnasium, subjected every part of his body, with all types of instruments and muscles to develop his muscles and went through strain day after day after day after day for maybe 10 years. And then you see this muscular body. It's exactly the same spiritually.

You see a person whose life has become extremely useful to God. And he started out just like you. But you chose the easy path.

And so you had a wasted life at the end of it. And that person chose the path that was narrow and constricted of denying self, where he had an option to enjoy himself or deny himself. He chose to deny himself because Jesus said, you cannot follow me unless you deny yourself.

And the end result is a wasted life. The sad thing is, he'll realize it only when he gets into eternity. I've often felt this, that when I get into eternity and I look back over my life, yeah, we've all made mistakes.

But if to the best of our knowledge, we have said, Lord, I want to choose the path that you walked of self-denial. I believe if you make that choice every time you have a choice, and think of the final result, how it's going to be, said at the end of his life, I fought a good fight, and I finished my course. Henceforth, there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness.

Let's come back to the first verse that we read in Jeremiah and 48. Moab, verse 11. Moab has taken an easy path all through his life from the time he was young.

Joab 48, 11. He never wanted to be disturbed. I'm paraphrasing the words.

He always wanted to choose the easy path from the time he was young. He never wanted his life to be disturbed. He wanted to have an undisturbed life, comfortable life without any strain or trial.

And he never wanted, whenever the situation came into a little trial of being poured out from one to another, he avoided it. Every trial he'd avoided. The result is the aroma, the stink, of selfishness that we've all inherited from Adam.

That's the aroma. The stink of selfishness that we've all inherited from Adam. A life that is useless to God and useless to man has not changed.

Come to the end of a life like that. On the other hand, if he had chosen the path of self-denial that Jesus told us to take, he just said, if any man wants to come after me, let first of all say no to himself. To deny myself means to say no to myself.

To say again and again when I face a choice to say yes to my flesh or to say no to my flesh. Even a simple thing like eating. Most Christians are so thoroughly indisciplined in eating.

So there are many areas like this. I'll conclude with 1 Corinthians in chapter 9. Don't you know, verse 24, that so many people run in a race but only one person wins. And the person who wins is the one who disciplines himself, exercises self-control in every area.

1 Corinthians 9.28. And he does that because he wants. That's how all the people who take part in the Olympics, they win because they've disciplined themselves in the marathon race or the 100 meters race. And I believe Christians can learn a great lesson from that.

And Paul says, we can learn from these people who compete in the games in verse 25, Olympic games. They exercise self-control in every area. I believe most Christians that I've met have very little self-control, very self-control.

Even anger, for example, is a result of lack of self-control. If a person disciplines himself continuously in every area, he'll be able to restrain himself. But he never gets angry because he's got a control over himself.

A man who gets angry, he's got no control over himself. He doesn't have control over his tongue. He just says something suddenly because his whole life is one of choosing the broad path, easy path.

It's a way of a wasted life, brother. And so Paul says, I don't run like that. 1 Corinthians 9.26. I run in such a way, but an aim in life.

My aim in life is to finish my course with joy and please the Lord and glorify God. And so I discipline myself. Verse 27.

Otherwise, I can be the greatest preacher preaching to other people. And when I come to the end of my life, the Lord will disqualify me. That's a real danger.

Otherwise, Paul wouldn't be warning us about it. You know, this easy believism. I've accepted Christ.

I'm born again. I'm on my way to heaven. I'll tell you, it's a lot of garbage.

Because the way to life is narrow. It's not just a gate. It's a gate.

There's a gate and a way. And a lot of Christendom has just spoken about the gate. You enter in and you're okay.

You're not. You're set for eternity. You're not.

You've entered through the gate. There's a way that leads to life. It's a way of self-denial and self-discipline.

And for that, we need the power of the Holy Spirit. And that is why we need to seek God every day to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Otherwise, we'll never fulfill this plan God has for our life.

Amen.