Defilement

Turn with me, please, to 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians 8. What's been on my heart for this weekend has been touched on a couple of times already. I'd like to look at the idea and the truth of being defiled.

And maybe for an emphasis for the younger people and also for those of you that are older, I'd like to look at four things about it, about defilement. 1 Corinthians 8. And this was touched on, verse 7, for the sake of time. "'Howbeit, there is not in every man that knowledge, for some with conscience of the idol unto this hour eat as a thing offered to an idol, and their conscience, being weak, is defiled.'" To Hebrews, please.

Hebrews 12. Verse 14. "'Follow peace with all men and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.

Look indiligently, lest any man fail of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled.'" Now back to the book of Mark, please. And I'll go fast and maybe there will be time for two more. Mark 7. Verse 15.

"'There is nothing from without a man that entering into him can defile him, but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man. If any man have ears to hear, let him hear.'" Drop down to verse 18, please. "'And he saith unto them, Are ye so without understanding also? Do ye not perceive that whatsoever thing from without entereth into the man, it cannot defile him? Because it entereth not into his heart, but into the belly, and goeth out into the drought, purging all meats.

And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornication, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within and defile the man.'" And we've heard much already about our wicked heart.

Finally, 1 Timothy. 1 Timothy 1. Verse 9. 1 Timothy 1. Verse 9, "'Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, for harmongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for men-stealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine.'" And Lord, bless to us the reading of His Word. And we could look at other places, but for the sake of time, we'll just limit it to these.

I'd like to look at four parts of ourselves that can be defiled. We run of a conscience being defiled. In 1 Corinthians 8. In Hebrews 12, we looked at our spirit.

The root of bitterness coming into our spirit, defiling us. Mark 7 is the defilement of the heart. Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.

And in 1 Timothy 1, the defilement of the body. I've been impressed in my own life how little I understand of defilement. How serious it really is.

I'd like to look at this in four different ways. I'd like to look at Christians as being careless to defilement. Careless.

The second way I want to look at it is clueless about it. We really don't understand it. Even as we were listening this morning to the basin and the little bit of dirt that was on their feet, we don't understand the reality of what defilement does to us.

It really doesn't impress us. And so we've got the cluelessness of it, the contamination by it. And we're going to read one more verse in a few minutes about the cleansing from defilement.

A conscience. The word defiled means this. It means polluted.

It means unclean. And if we're going to present ourselves delivering sacrifice unto God, think back in the Old Testament of how many sacrifices were accepted if they were polluted or if they were unclean. Not any.

God couldn't accept them. God couldn't use them. And it's kind of like we're a vessel.

And a polluted and a dirty vessel, you wouldn't use it, would you? If you put your bowl of cereal there on the counter and the next day you come back and there was that bowl of cereal with that little bit of milk in it from yesterday, would you pour your cereal right in there and start munching away? It's polluted. It's defiled. I saw a guy do that one time.

Grossed me out. I went to visit him and there was milk in there and the cereals, you know, they swell up like this big. He just started munching on it.

It was defiled. It was polluted. It wasn't fit to be used.

It needed to be clean. It needed to be clean. And we've been already reminded and exhorted that in our salvation, we are absolutely forgiven.

We are absolutely clean. We've been bathed. But things come into our life every single day.

We are defiled every day. Every day. Unless we hide in our bedroom with our head under our pillow, we are defiled every day.

So this is something that we're really careless to. We go about our day and we don't take thought that this is what I'm going to partake in. This is going to defile me.

This is going to pollute me. And God won't be able to use me. Do you think that way in life? I can't go there because that's defiling.

I can't listen to that country music because that's defiling. It defiles me. And in Corinthians it talks about the conscience of another person.

But how could you function for God with a polluted and unclean conscience? It's impossible, isn't it? To try to do something spiritual, to try to do something for God, to try to offer yourself a sacrifice, a reasonable service, being polluted. And we're very careless to it. And the reason we're careless to it is because we've been raised with it, especially the younger people.

You see it all the time. You're exposed to sin at school. You're exposed to sin all over.

And we are so used to seeing it, we're so desensitized to it, we don't realize what it's done to us. It's rendered us, I don't want to say useless, but a lot useless for God. It affects us.

And it's real. And so we're careless to it. We're clueless of the effect it has on us.

Thinking of the conscience, and a polluted conscience. Thinking of the bitter spirit and the effect that it has on us. As we learned in Romans 12 about manifesting the love of God and the love of Christ to other people.

If I have a bitter spirit, a polluted spirit, how can I do that? I can't do that. That's just hypocrisy. That's dissimulation.

That's fake. There's nothing in that for God. Do we really understand this? Defiled conscience, defiled spirit, defiled heart, defiled body.

You know, the conscience, it convicts us. How well is our conscience going to work if it's polluted and if it's unclean? It says in Romans 2 that the work of the law was written in their hearts and in their conscience. How is that going to affect us if it's been polluted? If it's been defiled? The polluted conscience.

It torments us, doesn't it? It haunts us. It's always popping up. It's defiled.

It's hindering us. It's always there. That bitter spirit.

I'm just young and dumb, but I'm going to say this. We're awful thin-skinned as Christians. We get offended way too easy.

And we hang on to it for way too long. And we get bitter. And that bitterness comes in.

And you know what? We go to a meeting and we shake hands with someone, but we're out the door as soon as we can, and there's bitterness in there. And not only has it defiled me, but it's defiling other people. And assemblies split over it.

And I'm just wondering today, could we get a little tougher? Could we take a little more? Do we have to be so wimpy? Can I put it that way? A bitter spirit that comes in and ruins things of God. See, it tears it down. It's not only that we can't be used, but it tears down what is there.

It defiles others. The bitter spirit. I want to spend most of my time for the young people.

And Timothy, a defiled body. It was just a few years ago that I heard the phrase from some school kids that they were friends with benefits. Maybe you've never heard that term.

But you understand what that means. And if you're in school, you've heard that term. And we're so bombarded with the idea of fornication, and the idea of sins that defile the body.

And this is what I'm seeing as just a young person. And our older brother no doubt have confronted it. Here's a boy, and maybe he sent 50 emails to 50 different ladies, and finally one responds.

And so they correspond for a little while. And pretty soon they're seeing each other. And there's that desire there to hold hands.

To hold hands. Oh, and then their face turns all red, and you're all fuzzy and jiggly. And you're holding hands.

Oh, but then she looks squeezable. I just want to hug her. And I just want to give her a peck on the cheek.

And it keeps going. And it keeps going. Maybe you, brethren, have been asked this.

Has a young person ever asked you how far can you go before it's sin? How far can I go before it's defiled? And I want to say this, if you're thinking that way, you're thinking the wrong way. It's just backwards. It's not how far can I go before I'm in trouble.

It's how far I can stay away from it. That's the idea of fleeing it. It's not going to the very edge of it and say, okay, I'm going to stop there.

But it's staying away from that thing. It's preserving your body. So we're not defiled.

If you haven't faced that, you will. The devil will see to it. The flesh will see to it.

So instead of thinking this, how far can I go? Try to find that imaginary line. What is sin and what is not? Could I encourage you this afternoon to remain pure? Don't think that way. If you're thinking that way, you're in trouble.

Don't think that way. Think the opposite way. We're careless to it.

We're clueless to it in its subtlety. We're contaminated by it. But I want to sit down.

I want to look at Hebrews 9. And I want to look at being cleansed by it. Hebrews 9, verse 13. And I realize I rushed through this, but there will be time for two more.

Hebrews 9, verse 13, For if the blood of bulls and of goats and the ashes of a heifer... Now, that was the method for defilement in the Old Testament. It was the red heifer. The sprinkling and the unclean sanctifyeth to the purifying of the flesh.

How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? We've been exhorted to renew our minds daily through the Word of God. And I'd like to exhort us to consider the person of Christ and that precious blood that was shed for the cleansing of our sin. And it is the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, that cleanses us from all sin.

Beware of defilement. Maybe you've never thought about it before. Most of us young people haven't.

Don't be careless to it. God wants to use you. Don't be clueless to it.

It is affecting you even though maybe you don't notice it. It's real. Contamination by it in the cleansing of defilement.