Speaker 1: Today on Daily Hope with Pastor Rick Warren, we continue
Speaker 1: in our riveting journey through the series The Invisible War.
Speaker 1: In it will explore the unseen world of good and
Speaker 1: evil and see how it impacts our day to day existence.
Speaker 1: Join us for eye opening biblical insights into the spiritual
Speaker 1: dimensions that influence our lives in ways we never imagined.
Speaker 1: Right now, here's Pastor Rick Warren with part two of
Speaker 1: a message called winning the Battle inside Me.
Speaker 2: The fourth thing that happens when I don't know how
Speaker 2: to fight the battle, then I keep losing. And long
Speaker 2: comes number four, self condemnation. And oh, some of you
Speaker 2: have gotten really good at this. You're a pro at
Speaker 2: putting yourself down. You're a pro at condemning yourself. And
Speaker 2: because you keep stumbling in the same area over and
Speaker 2: over and over, I still lose my temper. I still
Speaker 2: say them being things, I still have those thoughts. I
Speaker 2: still and you start going, I'm no good, I'm worthless,
Speaker 2: I'm junk. Why should I call myself a Christian? God
Speaker 2: must hate me, God's mad at me, blah blah blah
Speaker 2: blah and all those other things. And you start condemning yourself.
Speaker 2: That's an inevitable sign that you're in this spiritual battle.
Speaker 2: Verse eighteen, Paul says, I know I'm rotten inside as
Speaker 2: far as my old sinful nature is concerned. Now, who
Speaker 2: told him that? He's telling himself that he said, he's
Speaker 2: putting himself down. He's condemning himself. And that is a
Speaker 2: mark of when you have habitual areas that you keep
Speaker 2: falling in over and over. I want to keep how
Speaker 2: many resolutions have you made that you didn't keep? A lot?
Speaker 2: And then you start putting yourself down and do the
Speaker 2: self condemnation. That leads to number five frustration. And this
Speaker 2: is a mark of a Christian trying to live on
Speaker 2: their own powers at a God's power, you get frustrated.
Speaker 2: Says this. In the next verse, verse eighteen, he says,
Speaker 2: no matter which way I turn, I can't make myself
Speaker 2: do right. I want to, but I can't. When I
Speaker 2: want to do good, I don't. And when I try
Speaker 2: not to do wrong, I do it anyway. Now, if
Speaker 2: I'm doing what I don't want to do, it's plain
Speaker 2: where the trouble is. Sin has me in its evil grasp.
Speaker 2: Now the Bible calls this the law of sin, and
Speaker 2: the law of sin is the spiritual counterpart to the
Speaker 2: physical law of gravity. They both pull you down. Gravity
Speaker 2: pulls you down, Gravity loads you down. Gravity actually ages
Speaker 2: you because it's wearing on your body. And as I
Speaker 2: said last week, if you're down there and I'm up here,
Speaker 2: it's always easier for you to pull me down than
Speaker 2: for me to pull you up. This is the law
Speaker 2: of gravity in the physical realm, and in the spiritual
Speaker 2: realm it is the law of sin, which means it's
Speaker 2: always easier to be pulled down and do the wrong
Speaker 2: thing then it is to be pulled up and do
Speaker 2: the right thing. Happens all the time, and that law
Speaker 2: is trying to keep you down. Now, let's say I
Speaker 2: want to ignore the law of gravity, and I say
Speaker 2: I'm going to fly. I'm going to be the first
Speaker 2: human being to fly. So I go out and I
Speaker 2: start flapping my wings, you know, my hands up and down.
Speaker 2: I can flap as hard as I want, as long
Speaker 2: as I want. I'm never getting off the ground. Why,
Speaker 2: because the law of gravity is stronger than my human
Speaker 2: ability to fly. The same is true in a spiritual realm.
Speaker 2: When I try to do the right thing simply by
Speaker 2: willpower I'm just flapping my wings. I'm not going to
Speaker 2: get off the ground. I may get off the ground
Speaker 2: for a week or two weeks or three weeks or
Speaker 2: a month, and then after a while, I'm going off
Speaker 2: the Daniel plan, or I'm going back to my smoking,
Speaker 2: or I'm going back to my pornography, or I'm going
Speaker 2: back to yelling at the kids. And when I try
Speaker 2: to change by willpower, I pretty soon get tired and
Speaker 2: I give up and I stop flapping. You're not going
Speaker 2: to beat the law gravity physically, and you're not going
Speaker 2: to beat the law of sin spiritually. It's going to
Speaker 2: cause frustration in your life. And Paul says, I am
Speaker 2: so frustrated. Let me read you a great theological piece
Speaker 2: by Arnold LaBelle. Now, actually he's not a theologian. He's
Speaker 2: a children's book writer. And when my kids were little,
Speaker 2: if you've ever had preschoolers, you probably know the series
Speaker 2: of books called Frog and Toad Together. And I used
Speaker 2: to read into my kids, and one of my favorite
Speaker 2: stories to my kids was this story called cookies. Frog
Speaker 2: and Toad. Toad bake some cookies. These cookies smell really good,
Speaker 2: said Toad, and he ate one and they tasted even better,
Speaker 2: he said, So Toad ran over to Frog's house. Frog
Speaker 2: Frog cried, Toad, taste these cookies that I've made. Frog
Speaker 2: ate one of the cookies. These are the best cookies
Speaker 2: I have ever eaten, said Frog. So Frog and Toad
Speaker 2: ate many many cookies, one after another. You know, toad,
Speaker 2: said Frog, with his mouthful. I think we should stop eating.
Speaker 2: We will soon be sick. You are right, said toad.
Speaker 2: Let us eat one last cookie and then we will stop.
Speaker 2: So Frog and Toad ate one last cookie. But there
Speaker 2: were very many cookies still left in the bowl. Frog
Speaker 2: said toad. Let us eat one very last cookie and
Speaker 2: then we will stop eating cookies. Frog and Toad ate
Speaker 2: one very last cookie. We must stop eating, cried Toad
Speaker 2: as he ate another. Yes, said Frog, reaching for a cookie.
Speaker 2: We need willpower. What is willpower, asked toad. Frog said
Speaker 2: willpower is trying hard not to do something that you
Speaker 2: really want to do. You mean, like trying not to
Speaker 2: eat all these cookies, asked toad. Right, said Frog. So
Speaker 2: Frog put the cookies in a box there, said Frog.
Speaker 2: Now we will not eat any more cookies, but we
Speaker 2: can open the box, said toad. This is true, So
Speaker 2: Frog tied some string around the box. There. He said,
Speaker 2: now we will not eat anymore cookies. Toad said, but
Speaker 2: we can cut the string and open the box. That
Speaker 2: is true, said frog.
Speaker 1: So Frog got a ladder.
Speaker 2: They put the box up high on a shelf there,
Speaker 2: said Frog, Now we will not eat any more cookies.
Speaker 2: But Toad said, we can climb the ladder and take
Speaker 2: the box down from the shelf and cut the string
Speaker 2: and opened the box. That is true, said frog. So
Speaker 2: Frog climbed up the ladder and he took the box
Speaker 2: down from the shelf, and he cut the string, and
Speaker 2: he opened the box. And Frog took the box outside
Speaker 2: and threw all of the cookies out, and he shouted
Speaker 2: in a loud voice, Hey birds, Hey birds, here are
Speaker 2: free cookies. Birds came from everywhere. They picked up all
Speaker 2: the cookies in their beaks, and they flew away. Now
Speaker 2: we have no more cookies, said Frog. But we have
Speaker 2: lots and lots of willpower. You may keep it all.
Speaker 2: Frog said toad. I'm going home now to bake a cake.
Speaker 2: The great theology of Frog and Toad. Now, how many
Speaker 2: times have you played Frog and toad with something you thought,
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna do it? Anymore. I'm not gonna do
Speaker 2: it anymore. I'm not gonna do anymore, and then you
Speaker 2: do it. This is the frustration, and it always leads
Speaker 2: to number six, which is discouragement and despair. Paul gets
Speaker 2: so discouraged from this war going on inside him, and
Speaker 2: he says, it seems to be a fact of life.
Speaker 2: In other words, I'm giving up on This seems to
Speaker 2: be a fact of life that when I want to
Speaker 2: do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong.
Speaker 2: And in my mind, notice this is a mental battle.
Speaker 2: The battle's going on in your mind. In my mind,
Speaker 2: I want to be God's willing servant, but instead I
Speaker 2: find myself still enslaved to sin. He staid, I feel
Speaker 2: like giving up. I'm in a battle and I'm losing,
Speaker 2: and I'm feeling hopeless, and it causes these six things
Speaker 2: in my life. Now. Next, Paul discusses not the cost
Speaker 2: of the battle, but the cause. And what is the
Speaker 2: cause of this battle that's going on in you? You
Speaker 2: write this down? The reason is I have two natures.
Speaker 2: You actually have two natures inside of you. You have
Speaker 2: your old nature which you were born with, and you
Speaker 2: have the new nature that was given to you when
Speaker 2: you trusted in Christ, when you were born again, when
Speaker 2: you became a believer. And this new nature wants to
Speaker 2: do the right thing. But you still have the old
Speaker 2: nature inside of you. And these two natures are in
Speaker 2: constant conflict with each other. And that's the cause of
Speaker 2: the battle. You have two natures, not one, two natures
Speaker 2: inside of you. In verse twenty one, Paul says this,
Speaker 2: I love to do God's will so far as my
Speaker 2: new nature is concerned. But there's something else deep within me,
Speaker 2: my lower nature. That's my old nature. The Bible often
Speaker 2: calls it my flesh, or it calls it my carnal self,
Speaker 2: or calls it the old man. These are synonyms for
Speaker 2: the old nature. There's something else deep within me, my
Speaker 2: lower nature, that is at war with my mind and
Speaker 2: wins the fight and makes me a slave to the sin.
Speaker 2: That is still within me now, even though I'm a Christian,
Speaker 2: my old nature is still alive. And I hate to
Speaker 2: tell you this, but you're going to live with it
Speaker 2: the rest of your life. You don't get rid of
Speaker 2: your old nature until you go to heaven. When you
Speaker 2: became a foller of Christ, he gave you a new
Speaker 2: nature and a new ability to do the right thing.
Speaker 2: But that's at war with the old you. And sometimes
Speaker 2: you feel like I feel like there's two means inside
Speaker 2: of me. I heard about an old Indian chief who
Speaker 2: was a Christian, and he was trying to explain this
Speaker 2: war between the new natures to his son, and he said,
Speaker 2: it's like two dogs in my mind in battle together.
Speaker 2: There's a good dog and there's a bad dog, and
Speaker 2: they're fighting it out. And the young son said, well, Dad,
Speaker 2: which one wins? He said, whichever dog I feed the most.
Speaker 2: And that's going to be true in your life, whether
Speaker 2: you feed your old nature or feed your new nature.
Speaker 2: But even though I'm a believer and I've walked with
Speaker 2: the Lord for in a long time, I still have
Speaker 2: my old nature in me, which wants to be prideful,
Speaker 2: which wants to be self centered, which wants to gossip,
Speaker 2: to lie or steal or make myself better or you know,
Speaker 2: exaggerate or whatever. That old nature is still there, and
Speaker 2: the lust and the gossip and the lie and all
Speaker 2: that stuff there. Now, let me tell you why the
Speaker 2: problem is your problem. Because willpower is not enough to
Speaker 2: defeat your old nature. And if you think that you
Speaker 2: can change simply by wanting to change or by learning
Speaker 2: about change. It ain't gonna happen. It'll happen for a
Speaker 2: little while, but then you're gonna get tired and you're
Speaker 2: gonna stop flapping. Knowing what to do is not enough
Speaker 2: to change you. If it was, I would never have
Speaker 2: to repeat a sermon topic. You'd get it, you'd change
Speaker 2: in that area, and then we just go on to
Speaker 2: something else. But just because you know the right thing
Speaker 2: to do does not mean you do it. The next
Speaker 2: verse says this, so you see how it is. Paul says,
Speaker 2: my new life tells me to do right, but my
Speaker 2: old nature that still inside me loves to sin. Oh,
Speaker 2: what a terrible predicament. I'm in circle. That phrase terrible
Speaker 2: predicament in the original Greek, it literally means the exhaustion
Speaker 2: of hard work. It means being worn out after an
Speaker 2: intense battle. It means you're out of energy, you're wiped out,
Speaker 2: you're fatigued, you're frustrated, you feel like a failure. Paul's
Speaker 2: cry of agony says, I need relief, I need help now.
Speaker 2: This is not a pretty picture. Roman is the picture
Speaker 2: of a defeated struggling Christian. And finally he falls on
Speaker 2: his face and out of exhaustion, and Paul goes, what's
Speaker 2: the cure? And then he tells us, and he says
Speaker 2: God's battle plan for victory, and he tells us what
Speaker 2: the plan is. Now, this plan is all in chapter eight,
Speaker 2: and we're going to cover all of that next week.
Speaker 2: And I can't share it all one week because it's
Speaker 2: too much material. But let me get you started on
Speaker 2: a couple of advanced steps on how you start to
Speaker 2: win the battle going on inside you. You do three
Speaker 2: things initially, and then we'll cover all of the material
Speaker 2: next week. The first thing I need to do God's
Speaker 2: battle plan for winning the battle inside me is I
Speaker 2: must deepen my understanding of Christ. Now you already know Christ.
Speaker 2: It's you've got to deepen your understanding of Christ and
Speaker 2: what He did for you on the Cross. Now we're
Speaker 2: not talking about being an unbeliever here, you're a believer.
Speaker 2: Paul is a believer here. Jesus is already in you.
Speaker 2: In fact, that's why you have this battle. If you
Speaker 2: aren't a Christian, you wouldn't have this battle. Why because
Speaker 2: you'd only have one nature. And if you only got
Speaker 2: one nature, your old nature. You just go ahead and
Speaker 2: do whatever you please and do the wrong thing, and
Speaker 2: you don't even care about it. So a non believer
Speaker 2: does not have this battle going on in them because
Speaker 2: there you don't have the good nature battling with the
Speaker 2: old nature. They just got the old nature says, do
Speaker 2: whatever you want to do. So the fact that you've
Speaker 2: got Jesus in you is what's causing the battle. But
Speaker 2: having Christ in you is not enough. He doesn't just
Speaker 2: want to be resident in your life. He wants to
Speaker 2: be president in your life. He doesn't want to just
Speaker 2: take up space. He wants to be in charge. He
Speaker 2: wants to be the Lord of your life. What does
Speaker 2: that mean? The lord? It means he's the CEO, he's
Speaker 2: the boss. He's calling the shots, he's the chairman of
Speaker 2: the board. He wants you to put a sign over
Speaker 2: you that says under new management. That's what it means
Speaker 2: to have Jesus as the president of your life and
Speaker 2: under new management. But the first step is I have
Speaker 2: to deepen my understanding of Jesus Christ. He's in my life,
Speaker 2: but I got to know more about him. Roman seven,
Speaker 2: verse twenty four and twenty five who will free me
Speaker 2: from this life? Who will free me from this life
Speaker 2: that is dominated by sin? Thank God? The answer is
Speaker 2: through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Now I want you to
Speaker 2: circle the phrase dominated by sin. This is an amazing
Speaker 2: phrase here in the original Greek, it is literally, who
Speaker 2: will free me from this body of death? This body
Speaker 2: of death? And Paul is giving a striking illustration here
Speaker 2: that you wouldn't understand unless you knew what was going
Speaker 2: on in the Roman Empire, because in those days, one
Speaker 2: of the punishments for murdering somebody was sometimes they would
Speaker 2: chain the body of the person you murdered to you,
Speaker 2: and you had to walk around with that person until
Speaker 2: they decayed and fell off. And instead of putting you
Speaker 2: in jail, they would chain the person you murdered and
Speaker 2: took their life, and that body of death would be
Speaker 2: chained to you, which means everywhere you go, you're carrying
Speaker 2: around the memory of your sin, and you wake up
Speaker 2: each morning and the stench is unbearable, and wherever you
Speaker 2: go you have to drag that body with you. That's
Speaker 2: the phrase Paul is using here in the Greek when
Speaker 2: he says, Who's gonna free me from this body? Of
Speaker 2: death that's keeping its stinking. Now I want you to
Speaker 2: notice on that phrase circle the word who. He says,
Speaker 2: who will free me? He doesn't say what, because the
Speaker 2: answer to the battle in you is not a principle.
Speaker 2: It's not a program, it's not a pill, it's a person.
Speaker 2: It's Jesus Christ. He doesn't say, what will free me
Speaker 2: from all these hang ups I've got in my life?
Speaker 2: He says, who will free me? The answer is that
Speaker 2: only God can free you. Jesus Christ, who will free
Speaker 2: me from this decaying life I've got. Paul says, I'm
Speaker 2: at the end of my rope. He's been talking now
Speaker 2: for verse ACTI verse I'm at the end of my rope.
Speaker 2: And at the end of his rope he gets a
Speaker 2: flash of hope and he says, oh, I got it.
Speaker 2: Thank God. He just blurts it out, thank God. The
Speaker 2: answer is in what Jesus did. He says. The answer
Speaker 2: is through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Now it's not enough
Speaker 2: just to say Jesus is the answer to all your problems.
Speaker 2: I want to know how How is he the answer
Speaker 2: to all my problems? So you're going to have to
Speaker 2: come back next week for that because I can't go
Speaker 2: through the eight reasons, the things that Jesus did for
Speaker 2: you that are in Romans chapter eight. We're going to
Speaker 2: go on that, but the first thing you've got to
Speaker 2: do is you've got to learn to deepen my understanding
Speaker 2: of Christ.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Pastor Rick's Daily Home. We're so happy
Speaker 1: you've chosen to study along with us today. Why is
Speaker 1: everything in life so hard? Why does the right thing
Speaker 1: often feel like a battle. It's because every day there's
Speaker 1: a spiritual war raging all around you. Here's Pastor Rick
Speaker 1: to tell you more. You know, we all face temptations
Speaker 1: every day. It's a spiritual battle that takes place inside us,
Speaker 1: and it makes us vulnerable, particularly if we don't know
Speaker 1: how to fight it. To overcome temptation is absolutely essential
Speaker 1: that you know the tactics that Satan uses.
Speaker 2: To trip us up. And it's vital to learn the
Speaker 2: biblical defenses that God gives us. He has told us
Speaker 2: in his Word how to handle and how to manage
Speaker 2: the attacks of Satan. Now, in order to help you
Speaker 2: learn how to respond to the predictable patterns that Satan
Speaker 2: uses to tempt you, I've created a study kit called
Speaker 2: the Invisible War Winning the Battle of Temptation. This kit,
Speaker 2: The Invisible War Winning the Battle of Temptation includes a
Speaker 2: DVD with seven different sessions and a simple booklet that
Speaker 2: will help you learn how to overcome and defeat temptation
Speaker 2: in your life. You really need this. In the series,
Speaker 2: I will teach you the three kinds of temptation, God's
Speaker 2: antidote to temptation, and even how to avoid temptation in
Speaker 2: the first place. It is a steady guide that you
Speaker 2: can use by yourself, but you'll actually get more out
Speaker 2: of it if you'll gather a small group of friends
Speaker 2: together and study it together as a small group. Now,
Speaker 2: I want to send you the Invisible War Winning the
Speaker 2: Battle for Temptation study Kit as my gift to say
Speaker 2: thanks for your support of Daily Hope with your financial gift.
Speaker 2: You know we can't do this without you, and your
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Speaker 2: no Bible, no believer, and no body of Christ.
Speaker 1: Go to Pastorick dot com right now to get your copy.
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Speaker 1: Be sure to join us next time as we look
Speaker 1: into God's Word for our daily hope. This program is
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