Gods at War - Gods of Love, Part 2

Someone has rightly said what ever has control of you is your God, is there anything or anyone that might have control of your life, your schedule decisions for that today welcome to this Edition of Living on the Edge with shipping as many of you know ships are regular Bible to daily discipleship program for the series is passed the mic to his friend Kyle is the senior pastor at Southeast Christian church talk to this program. Kyle wraps up his message of God's love from a series gods of war idols. The battle we hope you've enjoyed Kyle's teacher the last several programs really been challenged to look for the idols in your life. So if you learn something from the series would you take a minute after this message and shirt with a friend to do that through the trip and remap by downloading the free MP3 Living on the Edge.okay, let's join Kyle now for the second half of his talk from Genesis chapter 2, I was talking to young mom this week. She told me that her children have become for her. You mean is make them too high the priority, she said, is not so much that she said it's that I have given them control of my life. I've given the controls of my life over to my kids and and they have the power to determine whether I have a good day or a bad day, I've given the controls of my life over to my children and they can make and determine whether an angry person but I'm a depressed person requirement whether I'm a person who is in despair, she's recognizing that the joy of the Lord isn't her strength. The joy of her children have become her strength as he wasn't feeling very strong. She's right by definition whatever has control over you is your God is our relationship that determines whether or not you're a joyful person, whether or not your content person and then she went on to explain that for her.

She was living to please her kids met in her life. Everything revolved around making her children happy that by definition, is your God, what you live to please that your that is your God, so maybe that's true for you made. Maybe it's a child. Maybe it's a spouse that has replaced God as the controller of your life. When we begin to describe divine attributes to something or someone they become a false God for us.

So when we look to a relationship as our source of satisfaction are source of significance. Our source of security. When we look to relationship for salvation. We are making that relationship. A God and God is jealous because he wants to do those things for us.

He wants to be our source of significance and security and satisfaction, and he wants to be our salvation there some pretty graphic language in the Old Testament book of Ezekiel to help us understand how it feels to God when we are guilty of idolatry.

The picture that is painted for us is one of us having an affair on God. That's how he feels when we make something more important to him. In the Old Testament God sees it as spiritual adultery is jealous. He's hurt. He's angry some of you understand the pain of unfaithfulness because the person who vowed their life to you. You found was sleeping with someone else. Your husband or your wife sharing intimate moments with another giving their body to another person in the pain that you felt the anger that you felt the hurt that you felt.

It's hard to imagine anything worse.

And God says this is what you've done to me. This is how you've made me feel by your disordered blogs and illustration. I've used a few years ago I think helps paint a picture of how God feels. Imagine that you walk into a restaurant nice candlelit romantic type restaurant and you see me sitting at a table for two with a woman not married to just imagining it, just magic. So I'm sitting there was someone who's not my wife having this dates this candlelit dinner. You come over and and you your quick just to be you not to accuse me citizen your wife what what what are you doing where's your wife and I solicit my wife's at home. This is my date night with this lady. My wife and I have a date night on Tuesday night just just relax.

Everything's fine and you go away and you're angry and you're upset so you call my wife to tell her what's happened, but just imagine I go home. My wife meets me at the door, gives me a big hug and she says, honey, did you have a nice time on your date watch is ridiculous that she would never say that because the attention I was supposed to be hers. I was giving to someone else. The affection that belong to her.

I was giving to another. The money that should've been spent on her.

I was spending on someone else. My wife would not say to me honey did you have a nice time on your date she wouldn't say that my wife would not my wife would not say hey I don't mind if you date other people as well, as long as you you love me the most. I don't mind if you see others as long as I'm first place in your life.

She wouldn't say that this is how God loves us. He says I'm not going to share you not to share you and so is not enough just to have God in first place he wants there to be no 2nd Pl., Luke 14. Jesus has large crowds following him. I think large crowds always made him a little uncomfortable he what he was never that concerned about the size of the crowd.

He was much more concerned about the level of commitment in the crowd and so he would say things when the crowd would get big to make people you know go away. Here's what he says Luke 14 verse 26 we read Jesus as if anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brother and sisters is even his own life. You cannot be my disciple.

You don't hate your mom and your dad your husband your wife, your children, your brothers and if you don't hate them. You can follow me. Don't call yourself my follower. What you do with that hate really in the Bible consistently tells us that these are the people we should love if you think you need to understand one word that's translated hate here in Jewish culture was meant to communicate a lesser love the new living translation puts it a little more accurately, it says you must hate everyone else.

By comparison, the other thing for us is that we tend to equate words like love and hate with emotion with feeling. I love you I hate you is full of emotion, not true in the first century. These words were not meant to communicate in emotion or feeling they were meant to communicate a level of commitments and so what Jesus is saying is your commitment to meet your level of commitments to mesic beat should be such that there really is no other commitment and here's what we discover when we get this commitment rights than all these other relationships start to to be relationships that that honor God that they were meant to be. When God gave them to us and so here's here's what I want to see Morgan, turn a corner here. I want you to see that when we put someone else in place of God. When we make a relationship. Our false God is the most destructive thing you can do to that person and to that relationship going to be five things that happen when we make someone a false God in our life.

First, there is unrealistic pressure, unrealistic pressure when we per turn a spouse into a God substitute.

We are putting incredible pressure on them because were saying to them I want you to do for me what God wants to do for me and some of you feel this in your relationship right now, you're with someone who's made you feel incredible pressure because when they are unhappy they look to you to make them happy when they're stressed out. They look to you or something you offer to give them peace when their world is broken. They want you to fix it, and to make everything okay and and and you're just feeling a lot of pressure because you're not God, they're asking you to be God.

That's a lot of pressure to say to someone listen. If you are the key to my happiness.

You are the key to my satisfaction. And if you would just be more encouraging to me if you would just provide for me a little bit more if we could just be physically intimate, more often then I would be happy then I would be satisfied. You're looking to someone else to be your God. You're asking them to do for you what only God can do and that is a lot of pressure and given enough time pressure will cause things to crack it will cause things to break are you doing this to someone right now. Maybe it's a spouse, a child. Maybe it's someone you're dating you're saying to them I want you to do for me what only God can do a lot of pressure to put on a person. Another thing that happens when a person becomes the God of our life is theirs unreachable expectations.

We often do this to our children. We look to them as our source of significance we allow the home to rotate up around their activities and their success. And so the children grow, we push and push them and they grow up thinking I think this cannot please us as parents and so they convince themselves that no grades will be good enough. No trophy will be big enough and the problem is that what we do is we exchange our relationship with God, with a relationship with our children and instead of asking God to be the source of our significance as a person we go to that our children are children and we say to them.

We want you to be the reason for my life.

We want you to be the source of my significance. The source of of of of my identity as a person as was her expectations. They can't meet another thing that happens is theirs unreasonable disappointment.

Ultimately, any false God will disappoint you.

We talked about a number of them. It's true of all that, whether it's money whether it's physical pleasure, weathered success at work. Whether it's a relationship at any false God will leave you disappointed. And if you find that you're just kind of generally disappointed with life chances are it's because you've made something other than the Lord God, your God, and and is letting you down. Of course it's letting you down. Only God can satisfy little while ago was driving in my car, my gas light came on and I've heard some rumors that the gas prices were going to drop in on stumps on Omsk and wait till they drop.

I'm just gonna wait till you drop in so I I just keep driving been on for like two days like this is crazy. I don't care. I'm just gonna keep going on it. It's going to drop because as soon as I fill it up on the lookout and I like to get a change in skin be 20 since a gallon cheaper so I just keep drive and eventually I run out of gas.

Funny how that happens.

And so I'm not aghast and I get out of my car and I'm mad you know who I'm mad at. I'm not mad at myself not putting gas in the car I met at my car running out of gas. I'm mad at my car because it wouldn't keep running after it had run out of gas.

I was asking my car that was made to run on gas to keep running without gas that's pretty unreasonable.

I think right, but this is what we do in our relationships were asking people to do what they were never created to do were asking someone to meet a need that they were never meant to meet were asking someone to fulfill us in a way that they can't fulfill us.

Only God can. Here's another thing that that happens is that there's undeserved criticism in the relationship. See whenever someone isn't meeting your expectations and if you're in a relationship with someone and their discount letting you down.

That relationship starts to be marked by criticism and criticism is poison in a relationship. In any relationship.

Criticism is just poison and and so there's this this constant criticism because you want the person to fulfill you.

You want them to meet your needs and you show me a person who is constantly critical and always negative and always nagging, and I will show you someone whose delight is not in the Lord. They are looking to someone else or something else to fulfill them or satisfy them, and they complain and they whine and the negative in their critical because this won't do it, but it's not fair is that it wouldn't be fair for me to come over and start criticizing you because you can't make yourself invisible since it wouldn't be fair it's not fair to ask a human to be divine on only God can fulfill these things.

Lastly, here's what happens.

There's unfair comparisons and ultimately this is what will destroy a relationship. You look to a person to do these things for you.

They're not doing it.

And so you start to see these divine attributes and someone else and you think, well, if I was with this person, then I would be satisfied if I was with this person who's more encouraging of then I would have my needs met and so we compare we start to become vulnerable to an affair. Ultimately, even if you exchange this relationship for that would still he would still go unsatisfied. Why, because what you're doing unconsciously is your comparing a person to God, and that person is falling short may look to another person, but they're gonna fall short as well. I wish I had little more time to talk about this. I don't. But if I did I'd say I would say that part of rough but the problem isn't just that we look to our spouse to be God for us but that we some of us try to be God, to our spouse. That's just as dangerous.

What would you say I'm to be responsible for this person's happiness. I'm to be responsible for satisfying this person with good luck with that, or we see a problem in their life or an area that they need to change and we say to ourselves.

I think I can change that person out. I was really fun is when you have two spouse is trying to be God and with the husband looks of the wife and says I think I can change you and the wife looks at the husband and says I think I can change you. And you can almost hear little guy in the middle say let's get ready to rumble it just doesn't work. Or maybe you're trying to be God because you want that person to find their satisfaction you want to be there every thing and it just is not the way God designed it is not how he ordained it. I remember Bob Russell talking about what he would call a top button truth, the idea being that if you get if you get the top button wrong when you're buttoning a shirt that none of the other buttons will line up there.

All of them are off, but if you get that top button right in the rest of them just sort of fall into place and this is true with what were speaking of today in our relationship with God when he is the top button and we get that one right now relationship with our kids, our relationship with our spouse, our relationship with friends person were dating.

Whoever it is that just begins to fall into place, and until we get this right. The rest of it won't work and so hears from Sam.

If you have a relationship right now that's causing you disappointment and frustration instead of giving more and more attention to that relationship instead of tuning and Dr. Phil to see what you need to do differently. Instead of buying the latest self-help book even before you go see a counselor take your focus on that off that relationship. Put on your relationship with Christ you make him your greatest affection and just kind of see see the impact it has on all your other relationships. I was on the Internet the other day. Came across this website that the top 10 most romantic lines and in movies top 10 most romantic lines in a number one line came from a movie called Jerry McGuire and in the movie it ins with Tom Cruise getting this impassioned speech to Ren�e Zellweger and at the end of his speech is the number one according to this website most romantic line of all time and he says to her, just three words. He says to complete what he says.

You complete me.

I'm telling you if there was a Jerry McGuire to make never be. Here's what would happen, you would find that when they sell the Zellweger would crumble under such pressure, and she would get upset with him for making statements like you complete me ask a person to complete you and the relationship wouldn't work. I don't remedy, but that's what happens in the relationship they break up because you another person can complete you. But Jesus can. Jesus wants to when you wake up in the morning he's there when you want to talk to someone about your day at breakfast. He's listening when you feel frustrated and you're discouraged. He understands and knows how you feel about us as he keeps track of your tears in a bottle. He laughs with you Christ with you. He will never leave you will never forsake you. Only he completes you and so is he your primary affection. Is there a relationship in your life or you need to say to the person you're no longer going to be what's most important to me that I know that seems like a step back, but the truth is when Jesus is truly the Lord of my life. I am at my best. As a husband I met my best as a father I met my best as a friend.

When Jesus is truly the Lord of my life that I put all those other relationships in a position to be blessed by God while Abraham has a son bound on the altar. His knife is raised for stanzas and he reached out his hand and he took the knife to slay his son. But the angel of the Lord called out Abraham.

Abraham, here I am, he replied, do not lay a hand on the boy did not do anything to him.

Now I know that you fear that you honor God because you have not withheld from me, your son, your only son, Abraham looked up and there in the thicket. He saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and he took the ram and he sacrificed it as a burnt offering. Instead of his son.

So Abraham called the place. The Lord will provide it to the states that on the mountain of the Lord will be provided. God says listen now I know you had your son on one side, you had me on the other side and you chose me, God, you are the Lord most high, and we confess God that we have exchanged you are glorious God, for God's that do not respond in this moment we come to you as people we repent we repent of our sin of idolatry. Maybe it's a person and beats a possession. Maybe it's a passion of some kind that's become too important to us, God no longer will we ask you to share our affection, our attention with another, and so we confess to you, our idols we smash are false gods for you are our one true God.

We invite you and you alone to rain on the throne of our hearts as we wrap up this program. If you believe in Jesus, let me ask a trading question what relationship, aspiration or object or even a person you exchange for God and again ask you right now in your heart of hearts destroy that idol and rededicate your heart to the Lord Jesus just say no more. Not ever. Not today. God, I am throne you Jesus. You call the shots I surrender fully and completely to you. Let me encourage you do that as a follower of Christ right now and if you have yet to follow Jesus, I want to remind you that he loves you he wants a close relationship with you.

Just like Abraham had to make the ultimate decision between his son, and God a few thousand years later, the father, God was faced with a similar decision his son Jesus or you and me. The Bible says he loved you and me so much that God the father gave his one and only son, that whoever would believe in him would not perish but have everlasting life.

And so now the decision rests with you.

Today's the day of salvation. Put your faith in the Lord Jesus. It's simple is profound's life changing. It's altering but it's simple right now, this moment in your heart of hearts say Almighty God. I confess to you that I have sinned that I fall short of being the man or the woman that you want me to be. I believe that my sin has separated me from you forever and ever.

But in your great love. Jesus died upon the cross to pay for my sin. And he rose from the dead to prove it is true, and they give me new life right now I receive the free gift of salvation and the empty hands of faith.

Almighty God come into my life.

Forgive me and cleanse me.

Make me your son make me your daughter right now. And Lord, thank you because you promised all who call upon the name of the Lord will be saved that, as I've called on you right now you have delivered me you forgiven me. You taken up residence in my life and in my heart. Thank you so much Almighty God in Jesus name. If you just prayed with me. Let me encourage you to go to our website and find easy place where we have some information to give you to help you in your new life and then let me encourage you tell the greatest Christians you know that you prayed to receive Christ today, and you don't know exactly what to do or where to go or how to grow in finding good church this weekend that teaches the Bible and go there you won't understand everything at first, but don't sweat that just begin to build some relationships in this new life is going to take on all new dimensions. God bless you and keep pressing ahead if you just prayed with Chip, we'd love to put a free resource in your hands. It's called starting out right and it's absolutely free. This resource will help you gain a clear biblical understanding of what it means to put your faith in Jesus and that's our whole mission. Living on the Edge helping Christians really live like Christians. So let us help you get started in your faith journey. You can request this resource by calling AAA 333-6003 or visiting LivingontheEdge.org and clicking on the new believers button that's LivingontheEdge.org or call AAA 333-6003 will ship as we near the end of the series remind us how Kyle's book God's at war has influenced your walk with Jesus and why our listeners should get their hands on this resource. You know, every year I think about what does God want for me. So now it's 2022 and as I think about what I want God to do in my life. There is a book that has had a huge impact in my life.

In the past and as I've done a little review. I realize that I think it needs to have impact in 2022. The book is called God's at war by Kyle I Doman defeating the idols the battle for your heart and with all the junk that is happened in the last 18 to 24 months. I just kinda want to get right spiritually only go back to the baseline. I just want to say okay Lord if there's idols in my life and I know they just creep up. This is what I want to do and so I would encourage you if you're thinking about you know how I get on track for 2022.

How do I set a new baseline.

What's a book that I could read with my wife or with a friend or accountability partner or maybe just privately to sort of say Lord I want to be your man. I want to be your woman I really want to do a deep dive with you, God, Holy Spirit, let me recommend God's at war by Kyle I Doman I think it would be a great investment of your time and set your course for 2022 exactly where the Lord would have it will if you've been moved by what Kyle's been teaching in the series.

Let me encourage you to get this book it'll take you deeper into the subtle dangers of idolatry and pleasure to consider what needs to change in your life to order your copy of God's at war defeating the idols. The battle for your heart visit LivingontheEdge.org or call AAA 333-6003 that's AAA 333-6003 or go to LivingontheEdge.org app listeners tap special offers. As we wrap up I want to say thanks to those who make this program possible through your generous financial support. Your gifts help us create programs purchase airtime and develop additional resources to help Christians live like Christians you been blessed by the ministry of Living on the Edge. Would you consider sending a gift today. You can call us at AAA 333-6003.

Tap the donate button or donate online at http://livingontheedge.org. Your support is greatly appreciated will join us for our next program as Chip sits down with our guest teacher for the series Kyle idling to dive deeper into Kyle's book God's work and provide some meaningful advice on how to deal with the idolatry in our hearts.

Until then, this is Dave Murray saying thanks for listening this addition of living on the