SERMON: THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS: LUST

6 July 2014

I.  Introduction

            -- turn in Bibles to 2 Samuel 11:1-4a

2 Samuel 11:1-4 (NIV)

1 In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king's men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem.

2 One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful,

3 and David sent someone to find out about her. The man said, "Isn't this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite?"

4 Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he slept with her.

            -- a few years ago, I was promoted to a new position at work and became the environmental element chief -- and what that basically means is that, in addition to taking care of the natural and cultural resources at the base, I am now responsible for all aspects of the environmental program, including industrial environmental compliance

            -- and even though I like to say I was educated at a fine southern university, I quickly realized I did not possess a working knowledge of environmental compliance -- it was like these folks were talking in a foreign language and I spent a long time trying to catch up and just understand what they were saying when we were in meetings or when they sent projects through to me for approval

            -- when they first started sending stuff across my desk for my review, they were using words I had never heard of before -- let me give you a couple of real life examples here

            -- here's the first -- "I need money to pay the NAAQS permit fee" -- NAAQS -- what the heck is that? -- I had no idea if that was real or not, so I went to the guy and asked him what he was talking about -- NAAQS -- National Ambient Air Quality Standards -- how was I supposed to know that?

            -- the next one -- "We need to apply BACT on this project" -- I was thinking, okay, they've misspelled this word -- nope -- BACT -- Best Available Control Technology -- which is different from MACT -- Maximum Achievable Control -- don't ask me what the "T" is for -- I never figured it out

            -- some of them I guessed right on because they were close to what we used in natural resources -- DO -- Dissolved Oxygen -- BMP -- Best Management Practice -- but there were many of these acronyms and words I just didn't understand

            -- and I think they kind of enjoyed the fact their boss didn't understand what they were talking about -- it turned into a joke with them -- I was in a meeting with the element one day and one of them said, "We need to hurry -- the NPL is about to come out" -- and I said, "Excuse me?" -- "You know -- the NPL -- the National Priority List"

            -- and I understood what they were doing, so I didn't worry about it a lot, but when I started to catch on and found a list of common environmental acronyms and wasn't getting fooled all the time, they started making up acronyms just to confuse and test me -- so you can imagine what I thought when I got this last one across my desk -- they were putting in a project "to remove LUST"

            -- I'm like, "Okay, this is a joke -- we've been having all this training on sexual awareness and sexual harassment in the Air Force, so they're trying to make a point" -- so I went to the guy's desk to talk to him about it and about not putting through requests like this that would get me in trouble with my boss, but, you guessed it, it was real -- LUST -- Leaking Underground Storage Tanks -- LUST, they told me, is never a joke -- it's a big, big problem across the Air Force

            -- and they were right -- LUST is a big problem because leaks from underground storage tanks have the potential to contaminate soil and ground water

            -- as I was working on this message this week, I couldn't help but think about that environmental term, LUST -- and it occurred to me how this acronym unintentionally hit on the very problem we have with the sin of lust in our lives today

            -- as you know, we are in the midst of a sermon series on the Seven Deadly Sins -- and we call them "deadly" because these are sins that have the ability to open the door to other sins in our lives

            -- or, to put it in environmental compliance terminology, these sins are like leaks in our spirits that contaminate the environment around us -- in other words, the deadly sins like lust are not just sins that affect us, but their consequences contaminate other people and other relationships in our lives

           

II.  Defining Lust

            -- now before we begin our discussion on lust, I'd like to start off by defining what we mean when we use this term in a biblical sense -- I always like to default to Voltaire, who wrote, "If you would converse with me, define your terms" -- so let's do just that

            -- what is lust? -- when I use that term, I know immediately what is coming to your mind -- sexual sin -- impure thoughts -- looking at someone in a way that objectifies them as a sexual object -- and that is the common understanding of that word in our society today -- but that definition does not capture the entirety of the biblical meaning

            -- when the Bible uses the word lust, it does so in a more encompassing manner -- certainly, lust can involve sexual sin and impure thoughts towards another, but lust means more than just that

            -- as used in the Bible, lust is an intense craving after something God has chosen not to give you at this time -- lust is wanting something that you can't have

            -- Oswald Chambers put it this way -- "the essential definition of lust is the belief that it is my right to have what I want when I want it"

            -- so lust is not just related to sexual immorality, but it is also related to any want or desire for things or people or position or power -- you can lust for a new car -- you can lust for a new job -- you can lust for a person

            -- in 1 John 2:16 John said there were two types of lust that affected people -- lust of the eyes and lust of the flesh

            -- lust of the eyes -- the passion -- the desire that comes about when we see something we want -- lust of the eyes is the passion to possess

            -- lust of the flesh is the passion to feel -- to selfishly enjoy -- the desire that comes about when we want to experience something in our bodies, our emotions, or our souls

            -- in the Old Testament the word that most closely approximates the true meaning of lust is the word covet -- just like we see in the tenth commandment from Exodus 20:17 -- "You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor."

III.  Scripture Lesson -- The Story of David and Bathsheba

            -- okay, with that definition firmly placed in our mind, let's look at the story of David and Bathsheba and see what we can learn about resisting lust from his example

            -- look back with me at 2 Samuel 11:1

2 Samuel 11:1 (NIV)

1 In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king's men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem.

            -- as this chapter opens, David has been firmly established as Israel's king -- Saul has been defeated -- most of Israel's enemies surrounding them had either been destroyed or subjugated and were now paying tribute to Israel with money and manpower annually -- David had established his palace and throne in God's holy city of Jerusalem -- and, to borrow a phrase from the musical Porgie and Bess, it's summertime or spring, in this case, and the living is easy -- David has it made in the shade

            -- and so David apparently has decided it's time to enjoy the fruits of his labor -- instead of going out to war with his army as he had in the past, he sends them out with Joab and stays home alone

            -- here we see the first step in David's journey to sin -- he abdicates his responsibility and instead of doing what he should be doing as the leader of Israel, he stays behind to rest and relax and enjoy himself

            -- verse 2a

2 One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace.

            -- let's stop there and consider for a moment what is not being said in this verse -- why? -- why did David get up from his bed and walk around the roof of the palace -- most commentators say David did so to enjoy the cool evening air on the roof -- and maybe there's some truth to that, but I think this verse implies more

            -- I think David was bored -- bored and restless -- there's nothing wrong with taking a break from your labors -- for resting and just taking a moment and letting your mind and your spirit and your body be revived and restored -- science has shown we are much more productive if we will take a break from our labors periodically to do just that -- that's the purpose of vacations and of the Sabbath -- it's to give us time to recover from the stresses of our work

            -- but the text implies David was doing more than just taking a day off or even a week off -- it implies David was done -- he had retired -- and when a person who is used to being active and doing stuff on a routine basis takes too much time off, they get bored and restless and look for something to do -- and that's when trouble starts

            -- as the old proverb says, "Idle hands are a devil's workshop" -- and I think that's exactly what was going on with David when he got up from bed and went for a walk on his rooftop that night

            -- look at the second part of verse 2b-5

2b From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful,

3 and David sent someone to find out about her. The man said, "Isn't this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite?"

4 Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he slept with her. (She had purified herself from her uncleanness.) Then she went back home.

5 The woman conceived and sent word to David, saying, "I am pregnant."

            -- once again, there's a whole lot implied in these verses -- now get the picture -- David is walking around the roof and he looks down and he sees a woman bathing -- now if we saw that going on, most of us would turn away -- that's a natural reaction -- we'd see it -- we'd realize what was going on -- and we'd look away

            -- and knowing David as well as we do through his Psalms and through the biographies of his life in the Bible -- knowing that David is described by God as a man after God's own heart -- I feel that in normal circumstances David would have done the same -- he had already shown his honor by turning away his wrath from Nabal and not taking Abigail as his own wife when he clearly desired her in 1 Samuel 25 -- David respected God's law and the covenant of marriage, but not this time

            -- David didn't see a woman bathing and turn away -- he saw a woman bathing and his gaze lingered -- it lingered long enough that he saw she was very beautiful -- and he desired her -- he lusted after her

            -- he was bored -- he was lonely -- he saw something that attracted his attention -- and he decided he wanted it, regardless of the cost or the rightness of his actions

            -- even after finding out Bathsheba was married -- and married to one of his own mighty men of valor, Uriah the Hittite -- David said, "I don't care -- I want her -- go get her"

            -- so Bathsheba came to David -- they slept together and she became pregnant -- the penalty for this sin under the law of Moses was death for both of them

            -- David's story doesn't end here -- as we have pointed out, deadly sins like lust result in more and greater sin in our lives -- when David realized he was caught, he tried to cover his tracks -- he had Uriah brought back from the war to Jerusalem under the pretense of giving a report to David on the status of the battle -- you see, David hoped Uriah would go home and sleep with Bathsheba and they could claim the child was his -- but Uriah was more honorable than David and did not go home, despite all of David's attempts to get him to do so

            -- when that failed, David had Uriah killed through in a battle so he could marry Bathsheba and they could claim the child had been conceived lawfully

            -- skip down to verse 27 and let's end the story there

2 Samuel 11:27 (NIV)

27 After the time of mourning was over, David had her brought to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing David had done displeased the LORD.

            -- David got away with it -- only Joab knew the truth, and he wouldn't tell because of his relationship to David -- David's lust had destroyed a marriage, ended in murder, and displeased the Lord, but he had gotten what he wanted

IV.  Closing

            -- while this story of David and his spiral into sin revolves around lust expressed through sexual immorality, don't forget this could easily be a story about other types of possessions or power or position

            -- for instance when a later king of Israel, Ahab, lusted after a vineyard he didn't own but wanted, his lust also ended in the death of another through the hands of his wife Jezebel

            -- James gives us the pattern of sin in his epistle -- James 1:14-15 says, "each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed -- Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin -- and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death."

            -- so as I said in the beginning on this message, lust is a big, big problem

            -- which begs the question, "What do we do about it?"

            -- I think the key to overcoming lust is understanding it is a sin of covetousness -- it's a sin of wants -- it's a sin of desires

            -- the insidiousness of lust is that most of our desires are God-given -- the problem comes in when we try to satisfy our desires in ungodly ways

            -- lust begins in the heart when we see something that is not ours -- something that should not be ours -- and we decide in our heart that we want it regardless of the cost -- the cost to us or the cost to others

            -- I just read a story about Louis Zamperini, a World War II pilot who crashed in the Pacific Ocean with two other crew members and was forced to survive on a life raft for 47 days with very few supplies -- exposed to the sun and surrounded by nothing but water, these men grew very thirsty -- they had a desire to drink -- a God-given desire -- but they quickly ran out of water

            -- Zamperini warned the other two people in the raft to not drink the sea water -- as you know, sea water contains seven times the amount of salt our bodies our bodies need -- and it quickly causes dehydration as our bodies try to flush out the extra salt -- you can actually die of thirst from drinking sea water

            -- one of the crew members tried to satisfy his desire for water in an unhealthy way -- he looked around him and saw nothing but water -- and although Zamperini had warned him -- although it was not good for him -- while Zamperini and the other man slept, this crew member ate all the remaining food and drank sea water to quench his thirst -- he died that night

            -- his desire for water gave way to lusting for that which was not good for him and ultimately led to death

            -- in order to defeat lust in our lives, the first thing we need to do is ask ourselves, "Why? -- Why am I desiring this person, possession, position, whatever it is?"

            -- what is it we are missing in our lives? -- what need are we trying to fulfill in an ungodly way?

            -- a lot of times sexual lust stems from loneliness -- desiring a new car or a new home or other possessions stems from discontent -- wanting a new position or a new job stems from a lack of fulfillment

            -- what is the real desire? -- what is the real need?

            -- and once we have identified the desire or need that is leading to our lust, we need to ask God to help us fulfill that need in a way that pleases Him -- loneliness is a desire for relationship -- and it might be a call from God to reach out to a friend or a neighbor or someone else for companionship -- just a call might be all it takes to take away this feeling

            -- discontent can be satisfied by counting your blessings -- rather than looking at what you don't have, look at what you do have -- rather than longing for something other than what you have, consider how God has blessed you and spend time thanking Him for those blessings

            -- a lack of fulfillment or passion about your job or school or whatever it is might be God calling you to ministry in some form -- perhaps you're not satisfied because you aren't allowing yourself to be used by God where you are

            -- the point I'm trying to make is we need to identify the desire and look to God for fulfillment rather than the world -- as the old song goes, when we turn our eyes upon Jesus, the things of this world fade away

            -- so to answer the question of how to overcome lust in our lives, I'm afraid that's it -- I don't have any magic formula -- there's no seven-step program you can follow that will magically erase your problem with lust and make you a super saint

            -- the answer is simple and clearly lined out for us in Scripture -- identify the desire that is leading to lust and ask God to help you meet it in ways pleasing to Him -- be content with who you are and what you have -- and let God meet all your needs through Him

            -- that's it -- that's the answer -- simple, but not easy and rarely applied

            -- it's kind of like the question of how to lose weight -- there is a multi-million dollar industry designed to help people lose weight -- there are books and websites and blogs and all kinds of hawkers claiming if you just take this pill, you will lose weight -- if you just exercise four minutes a day, you will lose weight -- if you follow this ten-step plan, you will lose weight -- but if you get down to it, the key to losing weight comes down to just two words -- diet and exercise -- the problem is no one wants to do that -- it's too simple -- and so this multi-million dollar industry just rolls right along and people just keep gaining weight

            -- it's the same way with lust -- the answer is just as simple and is unchanged since the dawn of time -- identify the desire, flee from meeting this need in ungodly ways, and focus your eyes on Jesus

            -- that's it -- that's all it takes -- now we just have to go out and do it

            -- let's pray