Spiritual Chameleon
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7 Practices of Holiness
7 Practices of Holiness
Illustration Introduction
The Chameleon is a fasinating creature, their name is derived from the greek meaning ‘low to the ground lion’. They are unusal in look with their long toungue, bulging eyes, and reptile skin, one of many perculiar animals that God has created. But probable their most well known feature is that they can change colour, this is to show mood, regulate temperature and to blend into their surroundings to fit in. Christians can often live like a spiritual chameleon, minus the bulging eyes, long tongue and reptile skin. We can often blend into our secular surroundings especially when their is conflict towards Christian faith. We tend to believe that we are fitting in and being a part of the contemporary community, or it could be becasue we subconsciously have been influenced by our family, education, peers, and/or media. No matter how you politely put it, it is a form of comprimise. Christians are not and should not be spiritual chameleon’s even if it cost us.
God has given us a prime example with Andrew Thorburn’s case. The ex CEO of the NAB bank, who is a conservative Christian stepped down from his dream job after 15 hours of getting the gig of CEO for the Essedon footy club. There is so many reasons and issues that this raises, for example it exposes the supposed ‘tolerant’ and ‘diverse’ agenda by excluding those with morals and a christian worldview, which shows how intolerant and narrow-minded they are. It also shows us that we are in Isiaiah 63:10 days “Woe to those who call good evil and evil good.”
No, its that Andrew Thorburn had a choice, he could either be a spiritual chameleon or, shine his beliefs and walk away, he obviously chose the latter. Andrew Thorburn is not a spiritual chameleon and lost his job, how about you? It is only going to get worse and this incident will set a precedent and push Australia further down the slippery slope and further into the ‘good is evil and evil is good’ era. The time of Christian freedom in this country is growing closer to ceasing. What are we to do? How do we combat this?
7 Practices of Holiness
Pursue Truth
Bridal Anger
Be Content
Tame Tongue
Delight Spirit
Fighting Fight
Imitate Love
My Observations
Why does Paul use these do’s and don’ts as examples? It is New Humanity behaviour to be sure, and they are examples that can break relationships. They are destructive and de-humanizing.
The Negative Do nots (Old Life) are cancelled out by the Do’s (New Life). If we do the opposite of the sin, it leads to restored relationships and joy.
If we just look at surface level and turn these into a to do moral list, it becomes legalistic and arbituary. However, when we see that the motivation to do and do not is love, love for others but more importantly love for Jesus our Son.
If we have fallen madly in love with Jesus has Paul has we will want to sacrifice like he did to show and maintain love in him, and love with mone another and love of unity in the body. If we want to show love to Jesus, we must show love to one another.
These practices rooted on love and relationship leads to perfecting harmony and not allowing the World’s diversity to destroy our unity and peace.
Tremble and do not sin;
when you are on your beds,
search your hearts and be silent.
The beginning of sin is to forsake God. The end result of sin is to be God-forsaken.
Pursue Truth
Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body.
V25)We see that Paul is carrying over the clothers analogy, and we are taking off our former ways. We are now getting into the nitty-gritty of Christian behaviour kicking off with —telling the truth. Why is this so Important? Becasue this is not the characteristic nor the identiy of our Master, but of our old master Satan. He is the father of lies, deception and manipulation. We only need to look to the Garden where he showed his true character. The world is bathed and born out of lies, we can agree with the psalmist.
in my alarm I said,
“Everyone is a liar.”
So we are not to lie, however we live in a culture where we rate our lies from severe to ones we can wink at or better knows - little white lies. This includes things like ‘My fish was this big’ or in other words exaggeration. The other reason we tell the truth becasue the gospel is based in complete truth. ur world lives in lies and belives they are true. One of the greatest lies today is that all truths are true. Which has led to a dire need for the Church to stand up and declare that Jesus is the way the truth and the life.
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The other lie that the world is believing as truth, is that our happiness, worth and joy is found i our sexuality, to live out as whom we please, non binary this, trans that, people are being trapped in lies that are harming themselves and others. There has been a ground swell of people wanting to reverse surgeries, only the future will tell how much the toll on mental health has taken in all of this. Augustine long ago wrote a lengthy treatise on lying. We need something written like that again today. We are becoming far too accommodating towards “white lies” or “spin” or it being only a matter of “perspective” or telling “our truth” (rather than seeking to tell “the truth”).
These are the things you are to do: Speak the truth to each other, and render true and sound judgment in your courts;
2. Bridal Anger
“In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.
V26-27) This is talking about inappropiate and/or uncontrolled bouts of anger. Or when we should be angry at ourselves and our own sin, but take it out on those around us, it would seem the closer they are the more we take out our anger on them. So is all anger wrong? is that what Paul is saying to us today? That would be pretty hard to do.
Jesus said be angry and sin not, Jesus was angry at the money tables in the temple and chased them out without sinning. So what is righteous anger? It is what makes God angry. So, what makes God angry is the perversion of his goodness; the turning wrong of what he made right. God calls this perversion evil. Evil twists and disfigures God’s glory, vandalizing what is most valuable, and profaning what is most holy. Evil poisons and distorts reality, resulting in the destruction of joy for every creature that chooses the perversion over God’s good.
What are some righteous things to be angry at today in our day? Persecution of our brothers and sisters in Christ, the attack on Christianity today, the sexual sins that are trapping so many people (both Christian and Gentile), the new conversion laws that are being introduced, Gender reassignment being pushed on people and extra anger for it being pushed on kids, Religious freedoms being ripped away from Jews and Christians, anger at our sin, anger at sin and its consequences in general. What we are not to do is let any anger become self indulgent, self important, self righteoud indignation. Put another way, Paul tells us it is wise to adopt a time limit for grievances, but to end such a campaign of anger by days end, so that the devil cannot use it as a foot hold to destroy the unity and peace of the church or any of our relationships with each other.
3. Be Content
Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with their own hands, that they may have something to share with those in need.
V28) Stealing as the Gentiles do, or as you use to do is off the table now. Weather it be tools that are permantely borrowed, over estimation of your tax return, over-charging clients etc. must stop. Now, most of know this and might not be stealing physically. We know that Christ challenges oour thoughts and intentions as well, its the desire to steal the heart behind it. With that, what about stealing peoples dignity, character and/or good standing by gossiping or through false or trumped up allegations. How about stealing someones humanity by allowing yourself to desire them in your mind. In return our time, resources and care need to go into relationships through service acts and care to our church and community.
4. Tame Tongue
Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.
Unwholesome talk, - spiteful criticism, being overly harsh with your words, yes vulgar words and jokes, gossip (again). The term unwholesome renders as ‘speach that is rotten’, it rots away dignity, worth, hummanity rather than builds up. So therefore, we use wholesome words to repair those have been damaged to encourage people to grow and restore/grow the New hummanity in ourslves and be an example and antiseptic of love to the world who so desperatley trying to tear everyone down.
Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.
5. Delight Spirit
And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.
You’ve done it again. Your conscience begins to stain. Here it is: that sin you vowed — you prayed — never to repeat. You feel the desperate urge to flee from yourself. You wonder, Does God feel the same? Perhaps you wonder more specifically, Will he finally take his Spirit from me? You’ve already pled in David’s voice, “Cast me not away from your presence; and take not your Holy Spirit from me!” (Psalm 51:11). You wonder if you will end up being more Saul than David, for “the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul” (1 Samuel 16:14). What makes you any different from him? You know for certain that if the Lord’s Spirit leaves you, you will leave the Lord.
Instead of first considering that grieving the Spirit means poking at him with our own personal, more isolated sins of thought and deed, it is worthwhile, especially in our day, to realize that the context of this command is primarily corporate. How we frustrate the Spirit’s work to unite his people is in view more than how we sin in the chambers of our mind or alone in our room (though we may rightly imagine these also grieve the Spirit). V30) Paul here is referring to the rebellions of Israel, when they were on their way to the promise land and so grieved the Holy Spirit;
Isaiah 63:10 “Yet they rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit. So he turned and became their enemy and he himself fought against them.”
It is when the body as a whole pulls and fights against unity and harmony, when the church fights amongst itself - e.g. COVID 19 and the infighting regarding getting the vaccine or not getting the vacine, and/or when we wage a twitter war against each other. more holistically, it incorporates things like back biting, gossiping, slander, etc.
There is something very touching in this admonition, “Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God.” It does not say, “Do not make him angry.” A more delicate and tender term is used — “Grieve him not.” . . . For grief is a sweet combination of anger and of love. It is anger, but all the gall is taken from it. Love sweetens the anger, and turns the edge of it, not against the person, but against the offense - Spurgeon
If you have been indwelt, renewed, sealed by the Spirit, he will never leave you, nor us as a people. After so many provocations, you would leave you — but God the Holy Spirit will not. He is given as our down payment. But the Spirit has a personhood and we love him, and don’t want to greive him.
So, Individually what can we learn from the people of God who grieved the Spirit so? Don’t be a grumpy Christian, someone who complains all the time, tells people about the good old days of Church all the time and how bad it is now, or any other form of discontent grumbling. Also, we observe to maintain moral obedience for willingly disobeying God and his loving commands which protect us and others, and brings joy and freedom, greives the Spirit. We must cease rebellion that is seen in the Gentiles and the former way we lived. Delight in the Spirit who represents these freedoms and Joy.
6. Fighting Fight
Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.
V31-32) Paul has already addressed anger in verse 26, but here he is looking at the branches of anger. Brawling here is not likely physical altercation (although don’t do that either), but more shouting hostility in arguments. Again malice, bitterness, rage and brawling demean others, making them less human and in return it makes us less human. these 5 things leads to broken relationships and a weight to carry around. The opposite is true, goodness, kindness, compassion, reason, gentleness and of course forgiveness repairs and/or strengthens relastionships, it frees us up to have joyful life. Wec now, through the Spirit have the ability and capacity to repent of resentfulness towards others, even if they have not repented of hurting you. It’s ongoing at times, but you can do it.
Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
Through a tiny bit of the grace that was shown by Christ to us and his enemy and how we treated him, we can replace all the bitterness that is left in us from those who have hurt us. We then thorugh love and forgiveness not bring up their sin again to them, but instead show love and compassion towards them, even if they are our enemy.
Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.
7. Imitate Love
Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
5:1-2) shows us that if we imitate God/Jesus here is the antidote to our spiritual chameleoness. This kind of love that is shown to be imitated is a sacrifical love, a love that lays down our hurts, rights and serves our brother our sister, and even allows us to show love, compassion and salvation to the Gentiles who hate us, and as I said at the beginning Australia is becoming more hostile to Christians as it becomes more hostile towards God’s ways. This love is a fragrance amongst the stench of decay from the immoraltiy and so called liberating freedoms of our day.
So when we gaze at this text like a mirror, what is the reflection shown back. Is it one of dirty, dank and damaged clothing of gentile living, one of a spiritual chameleon so we can fit in and not be attacked. Or is it the bright, clean, smelling good new life that may be draged through the mud, but still come out smelling roses. What do you need to take off? Is it grumbling, is it spitefulness, is it stealing glances, cheating your taxes, bitterness, lying, gosspiping, bickering? And what do you need to put one? is it paitcence, kindness, forgiveness, gentelness, love, compassion, purity, biblical truth at all costs like Andrew Thorburn? What do you need to take off? and What do you need to put on?
Christian love is not a cold, antiseptic absence of immorality, but a willingness to make sacrifices for others - Richard Coekin
Application/Questions to Ask
Becasue it is easier to live like a Chameleon, to live like the Gentiles. What things will you put into place to live out the truth, how will you maintain holiness and the desire to be among the world as an evangelist?
Think about times that you have been a spiritual chameleon, and think in the gospel on how you would stop it and be Christ-like in a similar situation?
Help one another be bold, as iron sharpens iron. How will you be that coach to somone in church?
Since we have had a bunch of do’s and don’ts, how do we avoid legalism here?
How will you deepen your relationship, so the bible doesn’t become dry intellectualism?
Think upon the times where the Spirit helped you take off the old self (clothes) and helped you wear the new self, How has doing that changed your life for the better?
7 Practices of Holiness
Pursue Truth
Bridal Anger
Be Content
Tame Tongue
Delight Spirit
Fighting Fight
Imitate Love