Trusting God or Trust Our Emotions - 3

                                                 Trusting God or Trust Our Emotions - 3

Subject: Battling Our Emotions When a Test Comes

By Rick Welborne

Psalm 51:1-14 (NKJV)
¹  Have mercy upon me, O God, According to Your lovingkindness; According to the multitude of Your tender mercies, Blot out my transgressions.
²  Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, And cleanse me from my sin.
³  For I acknowledge my transgressions, And my sin is always before me.
⁴  Against You, You only, have I sinned, And done this evil in Your sight-- That You may be found just when You speak, And blameless when You judge.
⁵  Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, And in sin my mother conceived me.
⁶  Behold, You desire truth in the inward parts, And in the hidden part You will make me to know wisdom.
⁷  Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
⁸  Make me hear joy and gladness, That the bones You have broken may rejoice.
⁹  Hide Your face from my sins, And blot out all my iniquities.
¹⁰  Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me.
¹¹  Do not cast me away from Your presence, And do not take Your Holy Spirit from me.
¹²  Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, And uphold me by Your generous Spirit.
¹³  Then I will teach transgressors Your ways, And sinners shall be converted to You.
¹⁴  Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, The God of my salvation, And my tongue shall sing aloud of Your righteousness. 

1. Miriam-Webster – Guilt - the fact of having committed a breach of conduct especially violating law and involving a penalty. A feeling of deserving blame for offenses.

2. Guilt - the state of one who has committed an offense especially consciously. Feelings of deserving blame especially for imagined offenses or from a sense of inadequacy. 

--Whenever God leads me to preach something (Trust God or Trust Our Emotions), He always deals with me personally or leads me to someone who is fighting guilt.

--Today we are looking at this emotion of guilt. David had to deal with his guilt after being confronted by the prophet Nathan and was told…You are the man…the guilty person. 

--I was speaking to someone just having a normal conversation and I thought we were done…this person asked…can I please talk to you about something? Of course!

--Before I knew it, this person was confessing guilt and condemnation about things that had happened in their life thirty years ago. Their pain and guilt were very real to them.

--We expressed from the first sermon of this series that there is an “Accuser of the brethren” who attacks God’s children night and day…he had not let up on this person for thirty years.

--Now, we could take a survey tonight and probably find out that there are a great number of God’s children who are living in guilt and condemnation. Satan harassing you.

--Unfortunately, Satan is good at what he does because the person I was talking to, as I shared several scriptures, said, I know what the Bible says but I still feel guilty and ashamed.

Romans 8:1-2 (NKJV) ¹  There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. 

²  For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. 

--The Word of God says there is no condemnation and that the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made us free. Sadly, we live in condemnation and we are not free. 

--King David evidently was not bothered by his conscience after committing adultery and having a man killed to cover his sin…it took Nathan showing up. What’s your point, Pastor Rick? 

--We cannot always trust our consciences to lead us into all truth because our consciences can be affected by how will live and what we think.

Titus 1:15 (NLT2) ¹⁵  Everything is pure to those whose hearts are pure. But nothing is pure to those who are corrupt and unbelieving, because their minds and consciences are corrupted.

1 Timothy 4:1-2 (NKJV) ¹  Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons,
²  speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron, 

--Our consciences can be weak, our consciences can be violated, and our consciences can be corrupted and seared…in other words our consciences can even die. I think we all have met people like this.

James Dobson –I tend to believe that a sense of guilt occurs when we violate our inner code of conduct. Guilt is a message of disapproval from the conscience which says, in effect, “You should be ashamed of yourself!”

--In over forty years of ministry I have found that there is no lack of believers who struggle with guilt, shame, and sorrow. Satan makes sure you never forget what you did way back then.

1. There is an answer for this kind of guilt.

Romans 7:21-24 (NIV)
²¹  So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me.
²²  For in my inner being I delight in God's law; 

²³  but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. 

²⁴  What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 

--J. Vernon McGee says this is not an unbeliever struggling with sin and guilt but a believer who is in a major battle between his old nature and his new nature…let’s face it, we have all been there. 

--Many say and I have probably said…this body of death was a practice of barbarians who were extremely brutal in their punishment: I agree with Barnes’s Notes on the NT.  

Barnes’s Notes: Some have supposed that he refers to a custom practiced by ancient tyrants, of binding a dead body to a captive as a punishment, and compelling him to drag the cumbersome and offensive burden with him wherever he went. I do not see any evidence that the apostle had this in view.

--The truth is we cannot speculate exactly what Paul was thinking but Barnes goes on to say that this is probably the best illustration that could be given about what Paul was going through.

--The friend I mentioned earlier was crying out to me basically, who is going to deliver me from this body of death…this thing that has attached itself to me for over thirty years. 

--What a wretched man I am! I can’t believe I did that to that person or those people. I can’t believe I sinned against God by doing this! I feel so much guilt, shame, and sorrow for my sin. This person is in torment.

--The sad thing is this…this person and probably every other person in this situation have asked God at least a thousand times for forgiveness and have truly repented. Satan is unrelenting. I am wretched!

Thru The Bible with J. Vernon McGee - This is not an unsaved man who is crying, "O wretched man that I am"; this is a saved man. The word wretched carries with it the note of exhaustion because of the struggle. "Who is going to deliver me?" He is helpless. His shoulders are pinned to the floor -- he has been wrestled down. Like old Jacob, he has been crippled. He is calling for help from the outside.

--So Who can deliver us from this guilt and condemnation of the enemy who accuses us night and day?

Romans 7:25 (NIV) ²⁵  Thanks be to God--through Jesus Christ our Lord! 

Romans 8:1 (NKJV) ¹  There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

2. Help in the Word of God for those who feel guilty about children who are not serving God.

--One of the tools the enemy likes to use against us is condemnation and guilt about kids who have chosen a different path. You got angry in front of them…you sinned in front of them!

--If the only children who grew up to serve God were the ones who had parents who did everything right, or who never sinned, there wouldn’t be any kids living right!

Romans 3:23 (NKJV) ²³  for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

--The Book of Romans tells us later that each one of us will bow our knees and confess with our tongues Jesus is Lord and we will give account of ourselves before God. 

Ezekiel 18:19-22&30-32 (NLT2)
¹⁹  “‘What?’ you ask. ‘Doesn’t the child pay for the parent’s sins?’ No! For if the child does what is just and right and keeps my decrees, that child will surely live.
²⁰  The person who sins is the one who will die. The child will not be punished for the parent’s sins, and the parent will not be punished for the child’s sins. Righteous people will be rewarded for their own righteous behavior, and wicked people will be punished for their own wickedness.
²¹  But if wicked people turn away from all their sins and begin to obey my decrees and do what is just and right, they will surely live and not die.
²²  All their past sins will be forgotten, and they will live because of the righteous things they have done.
³⁰  “Therefore, I will judge each of you, O people of Israel, according to your actions, says the Sovereign LORD. Repent, and turn from your sins. Don’t let them destroy you!
³¹  Put all your rebellion behind you, and find yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. For why should you die, O people of Israel?
³²  I don’t want you to die, says the Sovereign LORD. Turn back and live! 

3. Guilt or sorrow that is good.

--I believe we have the opportunity to turn these feelings and emotions of guilt around for good. Listen to what Paul said to the people about a tough letter he had written to them:

2 Corinthians 7:9-11 (NKJV)
⁹  Now I rejoice, not that you were made sorry, but that your sorrow led to repentance. For you were made sorry in a godly manner, that you might suffer loss from us in nothing.
¹⁰  For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death.
¹¹  For observe this very thing, that you sorrowed in a godly manner: What diligence it produced in you, what clearing of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what vehement desire, what zeal, what vindication! In all things you proved yourselves to be clear in this matter.

--Godly sorrow or guilt that drives us to our knees and to repentance is good. It can lead us into a right relationship with God and with each other (our families and our church).