Our passage this morning is found in 1 John chapter 5 verses 13 through 21, 1 John 5, 13 through 21. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him. If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask and God will give him life to those who commit sins that do not lead to death. There is sin that leads to death, I do not say that one should pray for that. All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin that does not lead to death. We know that everyone who has been born of God does not keep on sinning, but he who was born of God protects him and the evil one does not touch him. We know that we are from God and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. And we know that the Son of God is common as given us understanding so that we may know him who is true, and we are in him who is true in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. Little children, keep yourselves for miles. This is the word of the Lord. Father, we rejoice over what you have done first in calling us to yourself and calling us the gifts you have given us to bring you glory and whatever way you desire. We thank you for this body and the many gifts that are present here throughout the body, men and women and children using their gifts to bring you glory. In Jesus, we thank you for the great gift of the Holy Spirit who is the one indeed who has the spark in our hearts and our minds and our eyes and our ears that we could see and know that we need the truth. We know that you, Christ, continue to fan the flame and we ask that you would do that even now, transforming us this very day so that as we leave we would know for certain who we are, where we are with you, what it is that you seek to do in our life this very day, all for your glory and for our good. We pray this in Jesus' name, Amen. This morning we are going to conclude our study of this little letter that John has written to his dear children. The final words of all people are important. The final words of important people are extremely important. But the final words and a letter like this by an apostle, one carried along by the Holy Spirit, are of supreme importance. And this morning this sermon is not just for the men who were standing before us, it's for all of us, just as it would be every week because it's the same message. And it's simply this, to all the men who are here and to all the people of this congregation and those visiting this day, my first encouragement is this, remember who you are. Throughout this little letter in 1 John, he has sought to remind the true believers of who they are in Christ. You've now, many of you become deacons and elders, but your primary identity is still the same. You are a beloved child of God. Nothing else is supreme. You are God's child. And his John seeks to finish his letter, he makes that known. First look at verses 20 and 21. And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding. I don't know if you've noticed or not, but from the very beginning of the service and it will be all the way through the end, we've been indicating what is true, that it is God who gives us enlightenment. It is God who enlightens our eyes and our minds and our hearts and our ears to feel, hear, see and think correctly about God. That's it. Without that illumination, none of us would choose God. But in every true believer, that spark is lit. Some of you know the exact day and time. Others of you can refer to his season when that happened or a stage of life. For me, I know it and I share it often because it's important. June 23rd, 1982, 31 years ago, today, that divine spark went off inside me. And the question that was in my heart was this, what is wrong with me? I never thought anything was wrong with me. But suddenly at 15 and a half, I said, what is wrong with me? And the man, Tom Miller was there to say, I'll tell you what it is. And it's not what you think. You are a sinner separated from God and God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit is seeking to save you. And when he told me those words and walked me through the book of Romans, it made sense. And I prayed that sinner's prayer. And at that moment, even though it's his from all eternity, at that moment, he made himself real, he made himself known, he grabbed hold of me. And my primary identity was set and sealed for all eternity. So brothers and all in this body who are in Christ, remember who you are. John has sought to diligently make known to these dear little children that they know who he is. He continues in verse 20 saying, so that we may know him who is true and we are in him who is true. In his son, Jesus Christ, he said it in the first chapter, if you are a Christian, you are in Christ. You are in fellowship with God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. That means he's inside you. This transcendent God who is all glorious is also imminently present in you. When you reached out your hand and said, welcome in the name of Jesus today, if you shook the hand of a true believer, you shook the hand of a person and whom are God dwells. Awesome. Well, brothers, specifically elders, remember who you are, operate out of the identity always. Secondly, here at the end of his letter, John focuses for a moment on prayer, on intercession. Look with me at what he says in verse 14, and this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us, in whatever we ask, we know that we have the request that we have asked. There is power in prayer. Many people who have never attended the session meeting or elders meeting, they may have some idea of what takes place, but I want to tell you body that our session, our elders take prayer very seriously. Every Friday morning, the elders gather to pray, and often in the burgers home, I'm not at that meeting. It's just our elders coming together praying for you, praying for one another, praying for this world. It's a powerful thing, and here's why. Ian Bounds said it this way in a book called Power Through Prayer. Men are interested in methods. God is interested in men. Men mighty in prayer. As elders and deacons, we face many challenges. The broken world we live in, that we're part of, the broken church that we hope lead, we're not perfect. We are tempted by the devil to turn our eyes onto self, and figure out how we can solve the problem, instead of quickly running to the Lord and praying, God, give us wisdom. I promise you, our elders often employ these three simple words. Stop, listen to who, God in his holy word, and follow whatever it is that the Lord is calling us to. Prayer is powerful. And John here particularly talks about the kind of prayer which we should be praying. He says, pray, God's will. And then he goes on to talk about praying for people. Look with me at verse 16. If anyone sees his brother which implies that you're looking, you're a shepherd, you're looking to care for. If anyone sees his brother committing a sin, not leading to death, he shall ask, and God will give him life, to those who commit sins that do not lead to death. This is an interesting language. What does John mean? When he's speaking of a sin that leads to death, he really is, I believe, recording the sin of blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. It's what many in this letter were doing is they were denying the work of Christ by whom the Holy Spirit said Jesus was. They were denying the work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is his point that Christ really is fully God and fully man. And so blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is the one unforgivable sin where we deny what it is that the Spirit is saying about who Christ Jesus is, the one who is the way, the truth, and the life. And if an individual continues to deny the testimony of the Holy Spirit, that is an eternal death. But then he speaks of sins that do not lead to death. I want to be careful that you don't think, therefore sins are not that bad because it doesn't ultimately lead to death. It does lead to destruction. It does lead to a lack of life. That is why John says here, pray for them and God will give him life. You see the sins that do not lead to death are the sins that we confess every day and every week in our church. There are the sins that I'm about to spend the rest of this service talking about that we all commit and we need to pray for one another that God would give us life. And so what are those sins? Well, I'm putting it under the category of idols. And here's why. Isn't it interesting that the very last words of John's small letter to these dear children is simply this. Little children, keep yourself from idols. That's extremely clear, isn't it? But what are the idols? I want to warn us before I give you a list that it's a long list. It's not going to be exhausted today, but I want you to do something. I really want you. If you are in Christ, I really want you to do the very thing I'm asking you to do this day or this week. And it's going to be simply this. I ask the Lord to reveal to you the idols that are in your heart. I did it. And I should do it before I preach. And he's faithful to reveal those things which are meant to show me areas of my life, which are not really having life. And he desires for me as a saved man to wage war on those by his grace. But some of the idols are so common to people that we don't think they're serious as they really are. And so I want to warn you as I go through this list these categories that it's meant simply to help you begin to think about the idols that might be in your life. Good morning, though, is this that there is a temptation as you see and hear these things to deny that they're really an idol because they're good things. Well, I want to warn you that many idols are good things. But as John Piper says, the greatest enemy of a hunger for God is not poison. It's apple pie. It's not the x-rated video. It's the prime time dribble of triviality we drink in every night. A third warning before I make the list is this that is you hear some of these idols, you are going to be thankful that you don't have that idol. And you might even make an idol out of not having that idol. Each of the categories I'm going to mention begins with a P. It's pretty easy to remember. There are seven of them. I thought of coming up with a clever title like the seven habits or seven idols of highly addicted sinners or something like that. I wasn't sure how to do that. I didn't. But I'm going to give you the seven categories. As I do what I want you to know that I didn't read to discover these anywhere but scripture. And these are the idols of my life and probably most of yours as well. I don't remember one and they're not in any specific order position. We often make an idol out of the positions that we hold. First, think of position this way, the position that we have because of a title, because of a name, because of a place, because of a school, because of a country, because of a state. Again, I am so proud to be an American. I'm proud that I have five children, two of them are Texans. Some of you wish I would make an idol out of that. Others of you are glad I don't. None of those things are bad things, but we can make idols out of where we live, where we come from. When you have to tell a clerk at a store your zip code, do you have pride in knowing that it's a zip code that exudes wealth predominantly your position at work, your title on a board. Do you take pride in those things? Are they idols? But our position can also be positions that we take politically, philosophically, culturally, theologically. These are things that we can hold that may very well be true, but they become an idol in our life when we're so consumed by them, that we often begin to act in ways that are against Christ as we treat others who do not hold to the same position. Position can be a big idol. For some men this day who were ordained, you may have the temptation to think that God somehow this day is more in love with you than he was just about 20 minutes ago. It's not true. He does elevate this office. It's a significant office in his church. There are rewards because of those who serve in his church, but his love for you didn't just change. Your position in Christ is exactly the same. There are others of you out there who are looking at these men wondering what's so special about them. See position can be an idol or the lack of position. I'll move on to a second one. Our profession, that which we do for a living, how many of us make an idol out of that calling. It's good to be employed. It's good to be a great worker. It's good to be a godly example in the workplace, but does your work consume you? Does it occupy every waking hour and often the very thing that wakes you in the middle of the night? Are you pursuing your work as if it was an idol, perhaps the supreme importance in your life and the highest identity? Again, I can't tell you if it's true and you're not, but certainly for many people it has been and it would be worthy of you to take time this day this week to simply ask the Lord, Lord, am I in any way pursuing my employment as an idol? The third one, possessions, materials, things that we in this country possess so many of. Do they consume your heart, your mind, your attention? Be honest. How much time do you spend thinking about things that you might one day own? Things that you want to own. It could be big things like a house, a newer house, a bigger house, a better house, another house, or another house. It could be so many things that fill you. And once you have the house, it's filling each room. What does that look like? Does it give you energy and excitement that consumes you? It's not wrong to save and purchase and buy new things, but it is wrong when those things become the primary part of joy in your life. Possessions, do you find great satisfaction when you get to go shopping and there seems to be no limit on the amount you could spend? Does it give you some elation that is on par or greater than what you experience in worship? It's possible that it's an idol. How do you want to know if it's an idol? Perhaps you simply don't buy anything or go shopping for a season of time. See what happens. That's what we must do with idols. But our idols of possession aren't simply material things like homes and clothes and closets and cars. It's also things that we possess such as time. Do you make time an idol? Is it your time? Do you seek to protect it at all costs for the sake of doing things that you and you alone want to do? What about your gifts that God has given you? Do you see them as your gifts? Therefore you will use them when and how you want. I know I do. I'll move on to a fourth idol. Pleasures. What are the pleasures that you seek? The things you seek to make you happy? There are many good things. We're in the midst of summer and many of you are traveling on vacation or we'll travel on vacation and vacations are a good thing. But can they become an idol? Certainly they can. When we take no thought to how much money we're spending, how often we're going, how long we're going, we give no thought to anything else other than I just want to have fun for me and me always. Pleasure can become idolatrous very quickly. Sometimes the pleasures are simply unhealthy, unhealthy food, unhealthy drink, unhealthy things like drugs, and suddenly the pleasure that it brings us becomes all encompassing and we pursue it at all cost. It's an idol. It's taken a place in your life where it's not supposed to be. It's not just pleasures that can become an idol. Pain can also be an idol. How so? You could have experienced in your life such extreme brokenness. I've been sinned against in a horrific way by someone or some group and you can't let that go. You've never really given it over to the Lord. You've never been able to forgive and it's possible in that pain that you've created an idol. How do you know? What's possible that pain is your idol if you think about it constantly? If you aren't willing to really go through appropriate stages and steps and doors of healing, I know the pain can be extremely great. Pain is never meant to be our idol either. Pain might be specific to as an individual but we can also make the pain of living in a broken world an idol as well where you simply are overwhelmed by the needs that are around you in the condition of our world. Remember this. I feel this often. The Lord knows everything. He understands everything. There's nothing he can learn. Even as Jesus walked on the earth, he did not meet every need. I don't understand that but I know that I'm not supposed to carry the burden as if it was an idol in my life to the point where I can't even get up. I'm not meant to carry that and I could make that an idol. Another idol I doubt anyone struggles with this is perfection. I love it when people tell me that when they attend our church and they look around they say things like it just looks like everybody's got it together. They're perfect. Are we perfect? Thank you. Thank you. We're not perfect if you're visiting this day but our sin is this. We try to look at. We don't really want people to know that deep inside we're really broken. We're so addicted to that that we don't even know we're doing it so I apologize on behalf of it. We do it all the time. We want the perfect home. We want the perfect children. We want the perfect church. We want the perfect fill in the blank. And many of us work so hard at controlling everything so that it looks perfect. And if that's you answer this question is it exhausting? Yes. I'm glad the two perfectionists affirm that with me today. We will never be perfect but we have a perfect savior and we're in him so we do not need to make an idol out of perfectionism. Now again some of you might be saying I'm not a perfectionist and you made an idol out of that. And your house looks really sloppy. Maybe you should do something about that. Another one and this one is by far the greatest in my life. It's people. I make an idol out of people. First my family. My wife is a very good thing. My children are great gifts from the Lord. But when I put them ahead of the Lord and I do and their happiness and supreme in my life. I am not acting as the Lord would call me to act. It's very easy for us to make our spouses and our children and our grandchildren idols. If that's true of you and it probably is at some level for all parents begin to ask the question why. What other idols might be revealed when you do that? It's not just people like my wife and children. I know that it's tempting to have idols and they reveal themselves in such ways as name dropping. You ever do it? You ever say you know somebody and you drop a name just because somehow it excites you that you are somewhat connected to them. It happens. I hear it a lot. And when I do it, I'm beginning to giggle up myself because why is that important to say I know don't you wish I would say who you thought I was going to say. I know the living God who owns the cattle on a thousand hills whose portfolio cannot be measured whose mansions are beyond number, who set the sun on its course and didn't build a house that would simply have a nice view of the sun. He's the God who sends out lightning and it reports back to him. This is where I've been. He's not just a great photographer who happened to snap a great shot of a lightning strike going across a New Mexico sky. I know him and guess where he is in me and all of his creation. That's incredible. That's my God. But again, people are my main idol and primarily for this reason I want to be seen as great in your eyes. I want to be seen as perfect in your eyes and that idol will do exactly what the devil desires. It will kill me and it will kill you slowly, dulling you to not living towards the one who is supreme. So my friends, I want you to do this. Take these seven categories, add to them the things that the Lord reveals to you and then keep yourself from those idols. Now this would be a major mistake. If I said right now, let's see. Because this is what most people hear and most people do Sunday after Sunday. Okay, I need to identify my idols and I need to make a list of those idols and then I need to begin to wage war against those idols. I want to tell you something different. How is it that you keep yourself from idols? It is not by staring at the idols and hoping the desire for that idol will go away. It's not by meditating on the idol and wondering how you can make the last after whatever it is go away. No, it's this way. It's this Christian secret. I want you to turn your eyes away from the idols and towards the gracious, glorious God who is revealed to you what they are and what will you see? You will see who Jesus is and your position in him. You will see what all our God possesses and what the Holy Spirit is keeping in store for you. You will understand the pleasures that the Lord seeks for you to have and you'll find them in him. You will see pain but it's the pain of our Savior being on the cross, spread out, state, dying that we might live. You will see perfection in a man named Jesus who never sinned that was tempted towards idols beyond any temptation you and I have ever known. You will see that you are not alone, but you are in the fellowship of the church, of people like you called by God, the Divine Sparklet, struggling and waging war against all these things that say, I will give you life. That is why it's so profound at the end of his letter. John says, Jesus Christ, he is true God and eternal life and then he says, keep yourself from idols which are not gods and are not life. Maybe the best application is this, turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face, picture and the things of earth, the idols will grow strangely dim. And the light of his glory transcendent beyond measure and the light of his glory and grace, grace and measurable love so wide, so deep, so long, so high. You see, when we turn our eyes upon Jesus and see him, the idols that we've been pursuing don't change, their lust or doesn't suddenly change, their existence doesn't change. The way this car looked before you turned your eyes on Jesus and the way it looks to other people who have not turned our eyes on Jesus is exactly the same, the car hasn't changed. But what has changed is the light of our transcendent God is becoming so bright in your heart and mind that that thing, that power, that perfection, that idol that you've been seeking your work, your family, your church, whatever it is begins to dim because he becomes brighter. That is how you and me must keep ourselves from idols. Lord Jesus, the fact that we can even call out in your name should blow our minds. The Lord, we just don't see often as we ought, so would you open eyes this day and this week. For every man, woman or child here today, if it's the first time this divine spark has been lit, or whether it's a fanning of a flame that was lit 31 years ago, would you lift every eye towards your son Jesus and make us unable to stop speaking about that which we've seen or heard? O Lord, lead us in obedience to thinking of these things which have captivated our hearts and minds and help us to gaze at you as we wage war on the idols that will not bring us life. We pray in Jesus name. Amen.