Phil Beach Jr. emphasizes the necessity of denying oneself to truly follow Christ, drawing from Ephesians 4 and Colossians 3. He highlights the importance of putting off the old self and embracing a new life in Christ, which involves rejecting earthly desires and excesses that lead to spiritual discontentment. The preacher calls for a deep introspection and repentance for covetousness and indulgence, urging believers to allow the Holy Spirit to govern their lives. He stresses that true love and forgiveness require self-denial and a willingness to be vulnerable, just as Christ demonstrated through His own suffering. Ultimately, the message is a call to live a life that reflects the love of God, free from the chains of self-centeredness and excess.

We adore you Lord, we adore you. We bow down before you Lord. We bow down, we bow down before you Lord. We adore you, we adore you. We bow down before you. Hallelujah, Lord. Hallelujah, Lord. We bow down, we bow down, we bow down, we bow down before you Lord. You are worthy, worthy, worthy, worthy. Hallelujah, Lord. Hallelujah, worthy. Pure and holy, so pure and holy. All together lovely, Jesus, Jesus. Hallelujah, hallelujah. You are present, Lord. You are present, Lord. Hallelujah, hallelujah. Glory to God. Oh, hallelujah. Hallelujah. Yes, Lord. Yes, Lord. We bow before you. We bow before you, Lord. You are the Master. You are the Master. You are the Sovereign Lord. You are the one that walks on the water, walks on the water and says, Fear not, for I am even Lord over the waves and Lord over the storm. Yea, I call the storm by name and say, Be still. Oh, Lord, Sovereign Lord, be still. Hallelujah. He maketh wars to cease. Glory to the Lamb. Hallelujah, hallelujah. Go ahead, Collette. Is that so? As we are in the presence of the Lord, let's let God's Word minister to us. These are some scriptures the Lord has put on my heart. We're just going to follow His leading now and let Him minister to us through His Word. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank You, Lord, that Thy Word is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path. We thank You, Lord, that Thy Word is forever settled in heaven and that by Thy Word, O God, the heavens and earth were created. And by Thy Word, O God, we are cleansed and washed and made clean. Lord, I pray that Your Word would minister to us now and that it would be planted deep into our spirits and that it would bring forth the likeness of Jesus Christ more and more into our hearts and into our minds. Now, Father, we commit Thy Word into the hands of the Holy Spirit and pray, God, that You would give us hearts that are meek and mild and tender and broken that we might receive the Word, the implanted Word, into our very spirits where it might grow. In the name of Jesus, Amen. Ephesians 4, beginning in verse 17, Ephesians 4, beginning in verse 17, This I say therefore and testify in the Lord, that you henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind, having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart, who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness. But ye have not so learned Christ. If so be that you have heard Him and have been taught by Him as the truth is in Jesus. That ye put off concerning the former conversation, the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind. And that ye put on the new man which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Wherefore, putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. Be ye angry and sin not. Let not the sun go down upon your wrath. Neither give place to the devil. Let him that stole steal no more, but rather let him labor, working with his hands the things which is good, that he may have to give to him that is in need. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice, and be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you. Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children, and walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us and hath given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling sable. But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not be once named among you as becometh saints. Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient, but rather giving of thanks. For this you know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, which is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words, for because of these things comes the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience. Be not ye therefore partakers with them, for ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord. Walk as children of light, for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth, proving what is acceptable to the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove. For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret. But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the light, for whatever doth make manifest is light. Wherefore He saith, Awake thou that sleepest and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light. See that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is. And be not drunk with wine wherein is excess, but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God. Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, and He is the Savior of the body. Therefore, as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for it, that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish. So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself. For no man ever yet hated his own flesh, but nourishes it and cherishes it, even as the Lord the church. For we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother and shall be joined unto his wife, and they too shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church. Nevertheless, let every one of you in particular so love his wife, even as himself, and the wife see that she reverence her husband." Colossians 3 Colossians 3 If you then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sits on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on the things on the earth. For you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall you also appear with Him in glory. Mortify. That means put to death. Another translation. Starvation. Death by starvation. Mortify. Death by starvation. Deny any fuel that will feed these things. Mortify. Put to death by starvation your members which are upon the earth. Fornication. Every single form of pornography available today. Every single form of pornography. Internet pornography. Magazine pornography. Sears pornography. Yes. Swimsuit pornography. Magazine pornography. Mortify. Put to death by starvation. Have nothing to do with any form of uncleanness God is telling us. Any form of immorality. Imagination pornography. Have nothing to do with it. It is a cancer that will destroy, a rust that will eat you alive. Mortify. Therefore, your members which are upon the earth. Fornication. Uncleanness. Inordinate affection. Any desire that rises up within us, whether it's the desire of the mind, the desire of the soul, the desire of the body. Any desire that is inordinate, that is not according to godliness, not according to what is lawful, not according to what is acceptable in the eyes of God. Every desire. Have nothing to do with it. Nothing. Declare war on everything and anything that is not like Jesus Christ in your life. Declare war on it in the name of Jesus by the power of the Word of God. Declare war. It's time to be a soldier. It's time to rise up in the name of Jesus. Not in our own strength, but as those who have been defeated at Calvary. It's time to rise up and say, Devil, in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, the Son of Mary, the Son of God, get behind Me! You remember that we had spent several weeks on 1 Corinthians 9, verses 24-27. Paul stands there as a man who recognizes he's entered a race. And that as a race runner, he had to be temperate in all things. He had to practice continually the spiritual discipline of self-denial. We've just read commentary on what self-denial is. Ephesians 4, verses 17 through Ephesians 5, all the way through actually Ephesians 6. Now we're reading more commentary on what it means to deny self. And we learned that the consequence of failure to deny self is placing ourselves in a category where we may forfeit the prize. We might forfeit the prize. We might be calling others into the race, like Paul said. Though I am preaching to others. Though I am calling others into this great spiritual race. Though I am commanding others, as Paul said, to exercise self-control and be temperate in all things. Though I am bringing to the mind of others the thought of the Olympic Games and those who participate are very, very careful that they don't allow their own natural desires to rule them, lest they become sloppy and easy in their life. And then they'll disqualify themselves from winning the prize. Paul said, if I do not beat my body into subjection, if I do not beat my body black and blue and make it my servant, he said, I will become disqualified from the prize. And the prize there is referring to Christ as His inheritance. Christ, the fullness of Christ. That's his own language. Paul had the mindset of one who recognized he was in a war. He didn't live as a Christian civilian. Christian civilians please themselves. Christian civilians do what they want, when they want, and how they want it. But Paul was among the ranks of those who were called as soldiers. And his ministry to the body of Christ then and now is one that is offering the mindset of becoming a soldier, which we'll read shortly. But what does it mean to deny self? It means to take these Scriptures that we're reading and verse by verse, word by word, read over them, and weep over them, and pray the power of the Holy Spirit will enable you to live in the good of the truth of these wonderful words from God's Bible. In Ephesians, we saw several statements that strongly suggest the need for the believer to what? Say no to, deny, put off. There's your self-denial. The power of the Holy Ghost enabling us to say no to everything and anything that is contrary in our life to the likeness and movement of Jesus Christ. Going back to the Scripture reading. Colossians 3 Put to death your members which are upon the earth. Put to death that which is working in you that is earthly. That which is working in you that is of earth. That is not like heaven. That is not heavenly. And even the lawful desires, the lawful earthly desires that we have, such as sleep, such as the need to eat, that's a lawful desire. It is a desire within us. Relaxation. A lawful desire. Within the confines of marriage. Physical pleasure. It's lawful. But brothers and sisters, don't ever think for a minute that you can govern by your own wisdom lawful pleasures. Because if you try and govern them, they'll turn into unlawful excesses. And that's why we have gluttony and all manner of sicknesses occurring because of overeating. Because the lawful pleasure of eating has turned into an unlawful desire to surf it and to indulge. That's excess. And you could take that principle with every single lawful desire we have. When it is under our government, when we're not listening to the Holy Spirit say, that's enough. That's enough. Every couple, according to the Word of God, should be practicing and engaging in times of prayer and fasting where there's a mutual agreement that they will give themselves holy spirit, soul, and body to the Lord. There is much problems. Now I'm saying this with discretion. There's not many kids here, but listen, this is the Lord. There's much problems today with physical relationships within marriage. And a lot of it has stemmed from excess. Excess. No limit. No ability to together deny even lawful pleasures for a season in order to give yourself to prayer and fasting. God's lawful pleasures in us are only good if they're under the control of the Word of God and the Holy Spirit. And when they are no longer under the control of the Word of God and the Holy Spirit, but we take them and we begin to govern them and we begin to enjoy them at our whim. At our desire. When we want, then the thing that is lawful is perverted. Every single lawful pleasure that is within our earthly frame that is not in and of itself sinful has to be surrendered to Christ daily and has to be governed by Him daily lest that which is lawful become unlawful. Are we hearing? You know why we're so finicky with our food? Because we're gluttons. We don't know what it is not to eat for several days. When you don't eat for several days, you're not picky. You eat what is set before you when you have a thankful heart. The smallest little bit of food turns into a lovely, delicious pleasure and enjoyment. You don't need to go into excess to enjoy what God has given you as a lawful pleasure, taste. All you have to do is stop surfeiting. Stop stuffing yourself for three days. Drink nothing but water. And then have a little teeny grape set before you. And take that grape and eat it. And oh my God, you suddenly realize you don't know what pleasure is. That's true lawful pleasure. When you abuse lawful pleasure, then you fall into the trap. You're never satisfied. You need more, more, more, more. But when you abstain from lawful pleasure and let God govern it, then you find in seasons when you are enjoying that pleasure, it is the way God intended. I hope we have ears to hear. I hope we have ears to hear. Oh God, I hope. Discontentment. Discontentment. Things. You know why you don't enjoy things? Because you want more, more, more, more. More, more, more, more. Say, Lord, I repent of a covetous, greedy heart. Lord, help me to be content. So what's the Lord saying to us about our lawful pleasures? Food, clothing, enjoyment, sleep, entertainment, all of these things have a lawful place in the church's life under the government of the Word of God and the Holy Spirit. And when these things get out from the government of the Word of God and the Holy Spirit, and we take hold of them, and we start deciding and choosing food and clothing and pleasure and entertainment, we're going to do the inevitable and that is excess, and it's going to turn into a curse. That's why there's so much trouble in the church today. And so little understanding of spiritual things because we've taken hold of the reins of our life and we're going to govern it. And Jesus is telling us, listen, listen, you've got to give it to Him. Every area of your life, you've got to give it to Him. And let Him and His Word be the governor. Time check. Colossians. This is a troubling issue that the Lord has in His heart and He wants to deal with us about it. Excess. It's everywhere. Excess. Excess. Indulgence. I want to move on, but I can't. I will though, but I can't because I sense in my spirit this is something God wants to deal with us about. Repenting over excesses in our life. Excesses. When you indulge in an excess, it might be a lawful thing, but it becomes excessive. You are going to fall into a snare because you're not going to be satisfied. You're going to want more, more, more, more, more, no matter what it is. And it's a vicious cycle and it will destroy you. Denying self means, Lord, Lord, I admit that I have tried to be the king of my life. I have tried to sit and be the governor of my life and my desires. I've used my own wisdom. I've used my own inclinations. I've used what others are doing. I've used what I think people expect me to do. I've used all of these things as the basis to make decisions. But Lord, I realize that all of this is faulty and I've got to be brought to the place by Your help and grace where I am being governed by Your Word and Your Holy Spirit in relation to my life. Lord, I repent of trying to be the king of my life. It's been a disaster. Colossians 3 Inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, that means evil desires, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Covetousness, which is idolatry. So therefore, a covetous person is what? An idolater. Does anybody know the meaning of the word covetous? Covet. The meaning of the word, just the way it is in the Word of God, is to desire more than what one has. Desire more than what one has. Now, brother Phil, that sounds to me like it's a little extreme. Alright, let's get a pair of scissors and cut this out here. I agree, it's extreme, isn't it? I mean, that touches the very fabric of our society, brother. Alright, so what do we do? What should we do with the meaning of covet? Should we cut it out? Or should we pray, Lord, forgive me for being inclined to be covetous. Deliver me from the desires in my life. Listen carefully. Deliver me from the desires in my life that are springing out of covetousness. Put to death, therefore. Put to death, therefore. You say, well, how do I know that? Well, you don't. But the shepherd does and the Word of God does. Pray. Oh God, show me. Show me, Lord. Let's let God's Word search us. Let's not be afraid of God's Word. Thank you. Let's not be afraid of God's Word. Covetousness, which is idolatry, for which things sake the wrath of God comes on the children of disobedience, in the which ye also walk sometime when you lived in them. But now, but now, if you then therefore be risen with Christ, but now, ye also put off all these anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth, do not lie one to another, seeing that you have put off the old man with his deeds, and have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him, where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free, but Christ is all and all. Put on, therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, vows of mercy." That means tenderness. Be tender one toward another. Forgiving. Kindness. Humbleness of mind. Humbleness of mind. You know what humbleness of mind is? Humbleness of mind is a condition where you're not always defending yourself. Humbleness of mind. Be humble in your mind. Let your mind submit to the Word. Let your mind submit to correction. What do you do when someone corrects you? Do you immediately rise up and try and justify your deeds and justify what you're doing and basically annul what the person is trying to tell you? That's not humbleness of mind. That's being proud in mind. And God resists the proud. God turns His face against the proud. Be humble in mind. Consider Jesus Christ who was accused and who was reviled against, but He answered not. He humbled Himself. He committed it to God. Most of the time when someone has something to say about you that's critical, there's truth to it. Listen to it. Why do you want to defend yourself? He that justifieth himself is not justified in the Lord. But he that claims to be guilty is just in the Lord. Christ justifies guilty people, not righteous, innocent people. Oh God, help us. Help us. Humbleness of mind. Meekness. Long-suffering. Forbearing one another. Putting up with one another. Forbear one another. Put up with one another. See why we have to deny ourselves? Because in ourselves, what do we want to do when it gets a little bumpy with one another? Later, buddy. Later. You're out of my life. You're out of my life. I can't put up with this. If we don't separate physically, what do we do? We separate emotionally from people. Emotionally. That means we no longer bear them in our heart. We're physically there, but emotionally, we've departed. We've closed the door. That's not forbearing love. Forbearing love is a love that's willing to get wounded. You remember a year ago or so, the Lord gave us three messages in three weeks on the many wounds of love. Some of you weren't here then. The many wounds of love. If you open up your life to the love of God and let your life be controlled by the love of God, you're going to be wounded over and over and over and over and over again. And if you allow the wounds that are inflicted on you because of the love of God working through you to offend you, then you're going to close up your heart and close up your emotions and close up your mind and you're going to end up becoming bitter. The many wounds of love. How many have found that when you deny yourself and open up your life to the love of God, you're going to be compelled to do things for people and with people that are going to result in being hurt in your humanity? What do you do with it? Deny yourself. Come on, there's some love here. I can feel it. Love here that's been wounded. There's some hearts that have been closed. Emotions have been hurt. And your heart's not wide open like it used to be to that person. Might be your husband. Might be your wife. Might be your children. Might be the neighbor. Someone has hurt you. And it's had a paralyzing effect. You don't have that openness you used to have toward that person. You know it's true. You say, well, what do I do? What do I do? What do I do? Cry out to God for mercy. Confess. Say, Jesus, I confess. I've been hurt and wounded. But I want the power to deny myself. Lord, forgive me. I want You to open up my heart back again for that love that used to flow in my life for that person. Come on. Is anybody hearing this? Anybody? You've closed up. You know it. It's been a few years. And you feel the lack. Confess it. Say, Lord, it's just my pride. It's my humanity. But I want to deny it, Lord. I don't want You to take Your love out of my life because I got hurt and I got wounded and I got offended. Oh, it's so easy, isn't it, to protect yourself? Protect yourself from being hurt. How do you protect yourself from being hurt? You believe the devil's lie and take back your life and claim it's yours. That's how you do it. It's a lie, isn't it? How do you protect yourself? Bless God. I'm not going to get hurt anymore. My life. My feelings. The Lord knows you've been hurt. But what about Him? He's been hurt. What is it one day? He's going to walk among His people and they're going to say, where did these wounds come from? And what does He say? They came from My house among My friends. Can you imagine if Jesus withdrew every time we hurt Him? Could you imagine if Jesus got offended every time we wound Him? Come on, who's guilty now? Who's guilty? That's good. Almost every hand going up. Come on, we're guilty. We're guilty. We're guilty because we didn't realize what it was going to cost us to say, Jesus, fill me with Your Holy Spirit. You know what that means? That means death. Thank you, brother. Death. You get full of the Holy Ghost. That means you're going to be led by the Holy Ghost. If you're led by the Holy Ghost, you're not going to be living a life where you're thinking of you. You're going to be living a life like Paul. You're compelled, driven, controlled by the love of God. You're going to be bearing the burden of God's heart and you're going to be serving God's people. That means you serve when they don't appreciate it and they don't say thank you. That means you serve when you know you're not even wanted. That's where we need to get close to Jesus and repent and say, Lord, forgive me. I've got to deny myself. Can you imagine if Paul didn't deny himself? The trouble that he went through? The misunderstandings? The difficulties? The beatings? He poured his heart out to a church in Corinth. He goes away for a little while. And these so-called super apostles rise up within. They steal the hearts of the flock from Paul. They start talking to the Corinthians about Paul being really not a true apostle. He's a charlatan. He's false. You imagine the temptation of Paul to say, away with you. Forget it. I'm out of here. Have what you want. No. He comes back in brokenness and tenderness and once again opens up his heart and his life and pours out to them. Forgives them. Loves them. Keeps visiting them. Keeps reaching out to them. That's forgiveness. Come on, who aren't you reaching out to anymore because you've been hurt? Somebody. God's given space of repentance this morning. This is something God does. When God's in it, you can repent. When He's not, you can't. God gives it. It's the grace of repentance. All He's asking is that you acknowledge. We acknowledge together, Lord. Yes. I knew what it was at one time to live much fooler in the love of God. But my Lord, I didn't realize that it meant death to myself. And I got concerned and I got afraid and I just selfish. And I closed my heart up. And Lord, I feel the barrenness. And I feel You want to heal me and I ask You to heal me. Come on. I ask You to heal me of that. I don't want to be alienated from Your love. I realize it's just nothing but a lie, Lord, that really what it is, is I'm grabbing hold of a life, my own life, that really I have no right to grab hold to. I really have to simply say, no, it's not my life. It's the Lord's life. We have a little plaque at home, a little saying on the wall. It says, there's no pain on earth that heaven can't heal. There's nothing you've gone through on earth that heaven can't heal. Do you believe that? There's healing here. Let's reach out for it, Lord. In the mighty name of Jesus, we pray for healing. Lord, we pray for the healing of Jesus Christ to come. We acknowledge, Lord, that there's wounds that come to us with love. There's wounds that come when we open our life up to Your love. We actually begin to share in the very wounds that You experience. The very pain that You experience. But oh, what greater joy can we know than to fellowship in Your suffering. I pray for healing now. I pray for healing. In the name of Jesus, pray, Lord, open up this hard heart of mine that's closed up. Say, Lord, open it up. I want Your love. I know it means I'm going to have to say no to myself. I know it means I'm going to have to say no to my own insecurities and my own fear. I know it means I'm going to have to say no to that instinct that's in me that wants to save my life and protect it. I know I'm going to have to say no, but Lord, You're with me. You said I'll never leave You nor forsake You. You said that You're my Helper. And so I lay hold of that by faith now, Lord. Fill me with Your love. Oh, Lord, in the name of Jesus, Lord, give us a baptism of love this morning. The love of God. Calvary's love! Calvary's love that doesn't consider self. Calvary's love that doesn't consider the cost personally, but considers the glory of God. Lord, we need You to do this. We beg You for a baptism of love in the name of Jesus. Heal our poor, trembling hearts by the power of Your nail-pierced hand in the name of Jesus. Let's sing this song together. Come on. Come on. Open up. It's here. He's here. And He's bringing healing. Everyone together. I receive Your love. Oh, Lord. I receive... That's it. Your love. Come on. I repent of bitterness, unforgiveness, Lord. Thank You for the cleansing. Now I receive Your love. Let's sing it one more time. One more time before we have to go. We have it up here on the screen.