Session 4 - Damien Kyle

This conference just keeps on getting better and better. After sitting with Tom Stipe in the overflow room during Roger Wing's first workshop, getting to ask him some questions, then a great lunch of BBQ out under God's glorious (if somewhat hot - thank God He called me to Michigan) sky, I had my non-existent socks blown off by Damien "The 21^st Century's Chucky Spurgeon" Kyle.

Oh.

My.

• Paul was in Thessalonica only three Sabbaths
  
  
  
  • Despite that brevity, a healthy church was established
  
  
  • The believers were living & thinking as if Jesus could return any minute
    
    
    
    • There is a direct correlation between the one & the other
    
    
    
    
  
  
  
  


• Paul believed that the doctrine of the Rapture had/has a very powerful influence on the Church
  
  
  
  • Does this expectation dominate my thinking...?
  
  
  
  


• One of the most important influences of the doctrine: a concern for practical holiness


• Purity begins with knowing God's standard:
  
  
  
  • V.3 -> abstain from sexuality
    
    
    
    • Includes fornication
    
    
    • Adultery
    
    
    • Prostitution
    
    
    • Etc.
    
    
    
    
  
  
  • Paul purposefully uses a very broad term in porneia
  
  
  
  


• I must, as an act of my will, continually choose to make God's standard my standard
  
  
  
  • And I must cultivate a desire to live a holy life
  
  
  • Gotta bring the "want to" to the table
    
    
    
    • It's not enough to know what to do
    
    
    
    
  
  
  
  


• God is the source
  
  
  
  • He gives the desire and the power to live holy
  
  
  
  


• Do I hold the commitment to live after God?


• My desire to live pure must come from a realization that my life is not my own - Jesus bought
  me at terrible price
  
  
  
  • And so my life is set apart for Him - for His pleasure & use
  
  
  
  


• I need to remember - my God has the right to demand whatever He wants from me
  
  
  
  • A commitment to sustained holy living was the mark of the Apostles & great men of faith
  
  
  
  


• There is a price to pay


• Seemingly harmless things, that I think I can control
  
  
  
  • I may have a technical right to engage in things that are not expedient to holiness & purity
  
  
  
  


• When I no longer view my life as sanctified - I set myself up for a fall
  
  
  
  • I never come to the point I can say I've "paid my dues" and can "relax"
  
  
  
  


• Pastors aren't called because they're so holy
  
  
  
  • Instead, because our Lord knows if He doesn't keep us busy with spiritual things, we'd booger it
    
    
    
    • AMEN.
    
    
    
    
  
  
  
  


• I must become wholly a slave of righteousness
  
  
  
  • Otherwise I'll become a slave of sin
  
  
  
  


• I must maintain a commitment to this
  
  
  
  • I must willingly & purposefully sow to the spirit
  
  
  
  


• The fear of the Lord - especially in this - is good


• Do I really realize the cost of sexual sin?
  
  
  
  • To me? My witness?
  
  
  • My wife?
  
  
  • My son?
  
  
  • The church I get to pastor?
  
  
  
  


• Fear God's retribution to shepherds who fall in this!
  
  
  
  • The fear (terror, dread) of God is clean (and cleansing)
  
  
  
  


• My ultimate motive for pure living: to please my God.
  
  
  
  • He's been so good, so gracious, so longsuffering
  
  
  
  


• Maintaining of a love relationship with God that means more to me than the temptation
  
  
  
  • It takes a passion to conquer a passion
  
  
  • Do I love my God more than I hate my sin?
  
  
  
  


• Daily "quiet time"


• The "how":
  tho power of the Holy Spirit
  
  
  
  • The baptism, & then the continual re-filling