Teach Me to War | Part 3
< Part 2 | My Sin Was Hurting More Than My Marriage
We Want Deliverance, but We Don’t Always Want to Surrender
One of the difficulties we have when it comes to deliverance is that we want God to set us free, but we don’t always want to go through what is necessary for that deliverance to take place. We want a better way. We want something miraculous to happen, something filled with fireworks and a great display of God’s power. We want the heavens to open, brilliant lights to shine down upon us, and for God to set us free immediately. Sometimes deliverance can happen that way, but for the most part, deliverance is something we have to work through, not in our own strength, but by allowing the Holy Spirit to work in us and begin breaking down those things that have kept us in bondage.
The difficulty is that we sometimes refuse the very Saviour who wants to deliver us. We want freedom, but we’re not always willing to surrender those things that have taken hold of our hearts. And why do we refuse Him? The answer is really quite simple, although it is something that we may not want to admit. We love our sin. We can say that we want freedom, we can pray for deliverance, and we can ask God to change our lives, but if we continue loving the very things that have kept us in bondage, we’re resisting the One who has come to set us free.
Men Loved Darkness Rather Than Light
Jesus tells us something very important in John 3:19–21:
“And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.”
— John 3:19–21 (KJV)
I want you to understand what Jesus is saying here. As sinners, we love our sin. We take pleasure in it, we embrace it, and we become enthralled by it. We love those who participate in sin with us, and we’re drawn to those places where sin abounds because there is something in our sinful nature that desires those things. Yet as Christians, we’re supposed to be those who have stepped out of darkness and into light and truth. That’s what makes the difference between the sinner and the Christian. The sinner loves his sin, but the Christian is supposed to hate sin and run from it.
This is what Jesus is telling us in John 3. Everyone who does evil hates the light because they don’t want their deeds exposed. They don’t want those things brought out into the open, and they would rather remain in darkness than have to face what is in their hearts. But the one who does truth comes to the light, and that’s something we need to understand in our own walk with the Lord. We have to be willing to come into the light of Jesus Christ and allow Him to expose those things that we’ve been holding onto, rather than continuing to hide them because we don’t want to let them go.
Delivered From the Power of Darkness
I want to take you to another passage of Scripture, found in Colossians 1:12–14. The Apostle Paul writes:
“Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins.”
— Colossians 1:12–14 (KJV)
I want you to see something here. According to Colossians, we’ve been delivered from the power of darkness and brought into the kingdom of God’s dear Son. That kingdom is the kingdom of Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ is the ruler of light. The Father is the Father of lights, and the Holy Spirit leads us into the light. Now, the Bible tells us in Colossians 1:14 that through Jesus Christ, through His blood, we have redemption and the forgiveness of sins. So in this kingdom of light, there is forgiveness of sins, but in order for us to receive the benefits of that forgiveness, we have to be willing to step out of darkness and into the light.
When we refuse to acknowledge our sin, when we refuse to confess it, and when we refuse to admit that we’re walking in sin, we’re refusing to come into that light. We’re refusing to acknowledge the very things that have separated us from fellowship with the Lord, and we’re holding onto those things rather than surrendering them to Him. We cannot continue hiding our sin while expecting to experience the freedom that Jesus Christ has provided for us.
What Does Bringing Our Sin Into the Light Look Like?
We have to acknowledge the fact that we’re sinners by nature. We were born with a sinful nature, and we have sinned. We cannot refuse to admit that we’ve sinned and expect to walk in the freedom that Jesus Christ has provided for us. Whether it’s pornography, whether it’s lust, whether it’s alcohol, whether it’s malicious thoughts or hatred, whatever it may be, if it’s sin, it has to be brought into the light.
What does that look like? For me, it looks like falling on my knees before the Lord and saying, “God, I am a sinner. I’ve been involved in pornography. I have a lustful heart. I am a proud and arrogant man. I am religious. I am cold. I am hard. And these are things, God, that I do not want in my heart. I see these things in my life, Lord, and I’m asking You, please deliver me.”
That’s what bringing our sin into the light looks like. We have to be willing to acknowledge those things that are in our hearts and come before the Lord honestly, rather than continuing to hide them. We cannot continue holding onto our sin while asking God to deliver us from it. We have to be willing to surrender those things to Him and allow the Holy Spirit to begin working in our lives. Sometimes that’s difficult because there are things in our hearts that we don’t want to admit are there, things we’ve become comfortable with, and things we’ve allowed to remain in our lives for so long that we’ve almost accepted them as part of who we are. But if it’s sin, it needs to be brought into the light.
When We Refuse to Acknowledge Our Sin
When we refuse to acknowledge and confess our sin, we’re walking back into darkness. We’re stepping out of the light and returning to those things that God has called us out of, and as a result, we’re walking in direct opposition and rebellion toward God. We know that the Bible tells us God’s wrath will be poured out upon sin at the end of the age, and that there is an eternal judgment awaiting those who continue in their sin, loving their sin and refusing to turn away from it.
But what about the Christian who sins? What about the Christian who decides that he’s going to continue holding onto that besetting sin, who says, “I’m going to continue walking in this sin. I’m not going to bring it to the Lord. I’m going to hang onto it”? What is God’s response to that? This is something that began speaking to my heart in a very personal way, and it’s what I shared in the previous article, My Sin Was Hurting More Than My Marriage.
For a long time, I understood that my lust was hurting my wife. I understood that there were consequences to my actions and that my sin was affecting our marriage. But I hadn’t fully understood something far greater, and that was the fact that my sin was grieving the heart of God. When the Lord began showing me this through Ezekiel 6:9, I started to understand something about His heart that I hadn’t understood before. Here was God Almighty, the One who created the heavens and the earth, the One who spoke everything into existence, and yet my sin was grieving Him.
When I began to understand that I had hurt Him with my sin, and that my sins had nailed Jesus Christ to the cross, I started seeing the seriousness of what I had done in an entirely different way. My sin wasn’t simply affecting my marriage or hurting the people around me. I was grieving the heart of a holy, loving, compassionate, and merciful God who loved me so much that He gave His Son for me. When I began to understand this, it changed the way I looked at the things I had allowed into my life and helped me understand why repentance is so important.
We Have to Come to Repentance
If we’re going to go any further in our walk with the Lord, we have to come to repentance, and that’s one of the first things we need to understand. Your sin, my sin, our sin, has grieved the heart of God. We have sinned against a holy and loving God who is compassionate and merciful toward us, and although He loves us so much, He is grieved by our rejection of Him and by our unbelief. We need to understand that our sin is not something that affects only ourselves or the people around us, but that it grieves the heart of the One who loves us and gave Himself for us.
We need to come out of darkness and into His light. We cannot continue hiding those things that God is calling us to surrender, and we cannot continue refusing to acknowledge our sin while expecting to walk in the freedom that Jesus Christ has made available to us. We need to come before Him honestly, acknowledge our sin, confess it, and ask Him to deliver us. As we do that, we need to allow the Holy Spirit to work in our hearts, breaking down those things that have kept us in bondage, because this isn’t something we accomplish in our own strength. It’s the work of the Holy Spirit in us as we yield ourselves to Him.
I want to encourage you, wherever you are in your walk with the Lord, to keep going to Him and giving Him all of your heart. Continue bringing everything into the light, and don’t hold onto those things that have kept you in bondage. Bring them before the Lord, allow Him to work in your life, and continue seeking Him with all your heart.
About the Teach Me to War Series
This article concludes the three-part written series adapted from Module 1 of Teach Me to War, my video teaching series about sin, repentance, deliverance, and walking in the light of Jesus Christ. Throughout these three articles, I’ve shared some of the things the Lord has taught me through my own struggles, particularly how our love for sin can keep us in bondage and how our sin grieves the heart of God.
Module 2 of Teach Me to War will be coming soon. In that session, I want to share more about the darkness that keeps us bound, including a vision the Lord gave me. In the meantime, I encourage you to watch Module 1 in its entirety and continue seeking the Lord with all your heart.
Watch Teach Me to War — Module 1 on YouTube
Read the Previous Articles in This Series
Part 1 — What We Hide Keeps Us Bound
In the first article, I shared about our desire for deliverance, the struggle of surrendering our sin, and the importance of coming into the light of Jesus Christ.
Part 2 — My Sin Was Hurting More Than My Marriage
In the second article, I shared how I came to understand that my lust wasn’t only hurting my marriage but was grieving the heart of God Himself.