Hello again, friend, so glad to be studying with you today!
As you know, there are many programs that deal with what the world calls “addiction”, and the Bible calls “sin.” But there is literally only one way to true freedom. While programs might help us to stop the behavior temporarily, only God can change our hearts which gives us the desire to be finished with substance abuse. And only God has given us the gospel, which is the power of God both for salvation and to mature us.
So would you rather temporarily stop the bad behavior, all the while strongly craving in your heart and nursing the desire to return to it? Or would you rather be free indeed? Free from the heart? Free from the behavior and free from the desire to indulge your flesh?
If you answered that you want to be free, free inside, free from the heart, which leads to freedom in the actions, then this lesson is for you.
In this lesson, we will learn more about the necessity of washing at the cross as well as how to do it. The old hymn, Rock of Ages, says it well:
“Nothing in my hands I bring,
Simply to Thy cross I cling;
Naked, come to Thee for dress,
Helpless, look to Thee for grace:
Foul, I to the fountain fly,
Wash me, Savior, or I die.”
https://library.timelesstruths.org/music/Rock_of_Ages/
In Leviticus 15, God set forth the horrible condition of being impure. This chapter shows us that the definition for “impurity” is bigger than our modern definition, that of being sexually immoral. No, impurity is just sin in the heart and life, expressing itself in thousands of different ways.
The first half of Leviticus 15 deals with men’s impurity (uncleanness) and the second half with women’s:
"The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘When any man has an unusual bodily discharge, such a discharge is unclean. Whether it continues flowing from his body or is blocked, it will make him unclean. This is how his discharge will bring about uncleanness."
Leviticus 15:1-3 (NIV)
The next section in Leviticus 15 shows how literally everything the unclean person touched would be unclean: anything slept on, sat upon (verse 4), touched (verses 11 and 12), and even anyone who touched the unclean person would become unclean (verse 7). Impurity spreads and contaminates everything and everyone around us.
It is important to understand the ramifications of our involvement in impurity (sin) were widespread. Involvement with impurity such as drunkenness, drug dependency, smoking, etc. contaminated our jobs, our health, our relationships, our everything. If married, our spouse was affected, whether we knew it or not. We might have thought we hid our sin well, that we were what the world calls “functioning addicts” but it is impossible to hide any sin. Everything and everyone we interacted with was in some way affected by our involvement in abusing substances.
In my case, my years of bondage to sin made me into an angry, shallow, irritable, and depressed person. I was immature, defensive, accusatory, and demeaning to others. My wife and children were not only affected by my sinful actions, but they also adopted my sinful heart attitudes. Our home was not marked by love but rather by fear, anger, and discontent. Back then, I didn’t know that by involving myself with all this sin I had opened the door to the evil one and that when he comes in, he ransacks everything.
I have met many husbands who couldn’t understand their wife's coldness or lack of respect towards them, and wives who couldn’t understand their husband's anger or lack of attentiveness to them. And yet, they would be involved with impurity (some form of habitual sin) which was defiling and destroying their relationship.
Later in this course, one of the battle strategies will center on how to begin repairing and restoring gospel love into our relationships. Once we begin walking by the Spirit and experiencing freedom in Christ, God’s love begins to spread all through our hearts and spills over to everyone around us.
Question 1. What were some of the widespread effects of your own involvement with impurity (alcohol, drugs, smoking, etc.)?
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I also believed that my impurity was without effect on anyone else. I would smoke rarely and by myself. However, I now see that it was making me love the world, and since I cannot serve two masters, I was becoming a servant of the enemy. This could have effected all the people that I’m supposed to bring closer to God, as I, myself wasn’t close to God. It made me a hypocrite because I seemed to have given my all to God when in reality I hadn’t.