Winning the Battle

The Sunday morning message given in the United Methodist churches of the Wheatland Parish on September 10, 2023.  The Bible verses used are James 3:13-18.

            The Bible tells us that each of us is created in the image of God.  And yet, because sin entered the world, the Bible also tells us that each of us inherently has a sinful nature.

            And so, as we try to live our lives as Christians, these two things are constantly in tension.  There’s a constant battle going on in our hearts.  We want to live for God, dedicate our lives to God the way we’re supposed to.  And yet, our sinful nature keeps getting in our way, dragging us down, taking us away from God.  And one of the biggest ways in which our sinful nature does that is in the sin of selfishness.

            It is so easy for us to be selfish.  Society encourages it.  “Look out for number one” is the motto of the age.  The symbol of our times is the selfie.  We’re constantly told that we should be able to do whatever we want to do whenever we want to do it.  It seems like we get that message everywhere we look.

            But the thing is, outright, obvious selfishness is not the biggest problem.  It’s a problem, of course.  And we’re all subject to falling for it at times.  But selfishness reveals itself in a lot of more subtle ways.  Ways that we don’t think of as selfish.  Ways that not just society in general but most people around us would not think of as selfish.  

            Selfishness comes in when someone stops by or calls and we think, “I’m busy right now.  I don’t have time for this.”  Selfishness comes in when we’re asked to help with a project and we say, “I can’t do that.  I have too much to do.”  Selfishness comes in when we’re asked to donate to something and we say, “I don’t have the money for that.  I need to pay my bills.”  We could come up with all kinds of other examples, too.

            Now, I understand that there can be times when those things are quite literally true.  But that’s what makes this such a tricky thing.  While there are times when those things are literally true, there are a lot of times when they’re not.  There are a lot of times when, as the old saying goes, “I don’t have time” is another way of saying “I don’t want to”.  There are times when “I have to pay my bills” means “I’m saving up for something I want”

            And the thing is, it’s really easy for us to make excuses for ourselves.  I know because I’ve done it many, many times.  I still do it, far too often.  I tell myself, it’s not really being selfish.  I need to take some time to myself.  I deserve to have some nice things.  What’s wrong with that?  Deep down, I know what’s wrong with it.  I know what I’m doing, really.  But I drown out those thoughts with my excuses.  And if that does not work, then I just keep myself from thinking about it too much.

            Now, maybe you don’t do this kind of thing as much as I do.  Maybe you don’t do it all, I don’t know.  I don’t know what you do.  I don’t mean this to sound harsh or judgmental about anyone.  I don’t have the right to do that.  I just know it’s something I struggle with, and I think I’m probably not the only one.

            James tells us where this comes from.  It comes from our sinful nature.  Listen again to what he says.  “If you harbor...selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth.  Such wisdom does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic.  For where you have...selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.”

            It’s what we said at the start of this message.  There’s that part of us that’s made in the image of God.  But there’s this other part, our sinful nature, that gets in the way.  It’s not from heaven.  It’s earthy, unspiritual, and demonic.  But it’s still there.  And it does not seem to be going away by itself.  So what can we do about it?

            The first thing to do, as James says, is to acknowledge that it’s there.  James says that when we have these selfish feelings, we should not deny the truth.  It’s really easy to deny the truth.  It is for me, anyway.  Again, deep down, I know the truth.  But I make excuses for myself.  I tell myself it’s okay.  I lie to myself.  A lot of times, the biggest lies we tell are the lies we tell ourselves.  It’s so easy to do.  But if we’re going to get rid of our selfishness, we first need to acknowledge that it’s there.

            So if we’re willing to do that, what’s the next step?  Well, as we said last week, you cannot replace something with nothing.  We need to replace something with something.  If we want to give up something, we need to replace it with something else.  In this case, we can replace selfishness with selflessness and giving.

            Now, in talking about selflessness and giving, I’m not talking about giving more to the church.  I mean, I’m all for giving more to the church.  If you feel moved to do that, that’s great.  Thank you.  But that’s not really what I’m talking about.  When I talk about selflessness and giving, I’m talking about giving of everything we have.  Not just our money, but our time, our talents, our abilities, everything.  Everything that makes up our lives on earth.  And I’m not talking about giving them to the church.  That’s one way you can do it, but what I’m really talking about is giving them to God.

            Listen to what Jesus said to the disciples in the ninth chapter of Luke:  “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.  For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it.  What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit their very self?”

            When we talk about losing our lives for Christ, we often think of that in present, physical terms.  We think of someone, maybe in the Middle East or someplace, who’s actually killed because of their faith in Christ.  That certainly is one way that we can lose our lives for Christ.  But I don’t think it’s the only way.

            How do we measure our lives?  By units of time, right?  Years.  Months.  Days.  Hours.  Minutes.  Those are the things by which we measure our time on earth.  Those are the things by which we measure our lives.

            So, whenever we give something selflessly, with no thought of getting anything in return, we lose a little bit of our life for Christ.  Whenever we make time for someone who needs us, even though we think we’re too busy, we lose a little bit of our life for Christ.  Whenever we make time to get involved in a project that helps people, even though we can think of a lot of other things we’d rather be doing, we lose a little bit of our life for Christ.  Whenever we give to a worthy cause that will help people, even though we have lots of other things we want to do with our money, we lose a little bit of our life for Christ.  And we could think of lots of other examples.

            Those are not easy things to do.  Too often, we want to save our lives on earth.  After all, our lives on earth are pretty short.  With every year that goes by I realize just how short our time here is.  I’ve probably lived at least two-thirds of my life already, even if I live to a fine old age.  It’s really easy for us to get very protective of the time we have left.  And again, we can come up with all kinds of excuses and lies to tell ourselves about why it’s okay to do that.

            But here’s the thing.  Our lives on earth may be short, but eternity is long.  If we’re willing to lose the short time that we have on earth and give it to God, we can save our lives for eternity.

            But just as we’ve said before, I don’t think this is something we can do on our own.  I don’t think I can, anyway.  I’ve tried.  I have good intentions.  I say, “This time I’m going to win the battle.  This time I’m going to overcome my selfishness and live the way I’m supposed to.  This time I’m going to live like I really am created in God’s image.”  And maybe, this time, I do.  And maybe I even do next time.  But eventually, the sinful nature comes back.  And it works its way in.  And it convinces me to give in to my selfishness again.  It convinces me to use all those excuses and tell myself all those lies for why it’s okay.

            Maybe you’ve had that happen, too.  If so, then maybe you agree with me:  we cannot win this battle on our own.  Our sinful nature is too strong.  We can only overcome it with God’s help.  And the way we get God’s help is through prayer.

            So let’s pray.  Let’s pray for God to help us win the battle.  Let’s pray for God to help us overcome our sinful nature and live lives that show we’re created in the image of God.  Let’s pray for God to give us a spirit of selflessness and giving.  Let’s pray for God to help us lose our lives on earth, so we can save them for eternity.  Let’s give up selfishness, and give our lives to God.