Pastor Tim Brown, Calvary Chapel Fremont, Sunday March 1, 2009

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SPIRITUAL DEPRESSION
James 4:6-10

e-mail last week: CANCER CELLS FEED ON: - protect thru nutrition
1. Sugar - by cutting off sugar you cut off one important food supply to the cancer cells.
2. Milk causes the body to produce mucus. Cancer feeds on mucus. By cutting off milk, cancer cells are being starved. Substitute milk w/ unsweetened soya milk.
3. Cancer cells thrive in an acid environment. A meat-based diet is acidic. Meat protein is difficult to digest.  Undigested meat remaining in the intestines become putrefied and leads to more toxic buildup.
4. Avoid coffee, tea, and chocolate, which have high caffeine.

When I read this my laughing turned to mourning/joy to gloom.  I love sugar/milk/meat/coffee.   All the things that cancer feeds on are loved/treasured by me.  I saw that I would need to cleanse my diet/purify my body.  I’m just glad it didn’t mention ice cream!
Note: after service we will not be serving coffee/donuts, but unsweetened soya milk/tofu/lettuce leaves.

J sees a spiritual cancer eating away at the church - tongue set on fire by hell/demonic wisdom from below/impure motives/ friendship w/ the world that manifests itself in violent outbursts – in speech/reasoning/desires/motives/actions – cancer eating away.

J tells us that we are providing the devil the very things he needs to feed on our lives/destroy us.  And when your eyes are really open to the spiritual cancer in your soul, when you see that, even as a Christian, your heart is a toxic swamp of sin, when you are aware that the cancer of sin is eating you alive – you will mourn and weep and fall on your face.  This is the mood of this passage. 

If in the lobby you were to tell us that the doctor had just diagnosed bone cancer in you, everything would stop.  All laughter would be turned into mourning, joy to gloom, there would be weeping.  The mood would become depressed.  But if in the lobby after service you confess to someone that the cancer of sin has eaten a big hole in your soul, you will hear, “Aren’t you glad that Jesus loves you?  If God be for you, who can be against you?  Let the joy of the Lord be your strength.”  The danger of the cancer of sin would be downplayed.  The need to mourn wouldn’t be seen.

It is difficult for many in the evangelical church to fully absorb the serious tone of J because of the consistent emphasis that has been placed on grace/mercy/forgiveness/living the abundant life/a life of praise and worship and happy, happy, joy, joy.  The mood of the evangelical church today makes this kind of mourning a strange experience, almost forbidden in some circles. 
If walk into a church service where there is mourning/weeping/gloom, you’d think, “What’s wrong?”  J would say, “Nothing, there’s something right going on.  Finally, a church that gets it.”

J, after seeing the condition of the church, counsels spiritual depression: mourn/weep/wail.  “You need to be depressed about the condition your life is in,” J would say.  There are some things that should sadden and dishearten us.  Your child brings home Ds and Fs and is unconcerned.  Losing football game in east L.A. as sophomore in high school.  On way home on bus we were all singing and cutting up.  Coach got up and yelled at us: “You guys are losers.  Why are you acting as if you didn’t lose?” 

J: “You have allowed sin and the devil to eat away at your spiritual life.  Why aren’t you depressed about your spiritual condition?”  Many go to the counselor to be helped out of their depression.  J wants to move us into depression!  He knows that the only way to spiritual exaltation/spiritual health is through spiritual depression.


    SPIRITUAL DEPRESSION PAVES WAY FOR GREATER GRACE
Grace greater than what?  The lusts and passions that make one a friend of the world/the hell that sets your tongue on fire/wisdom from below.  The grace that God would give you is greater than sin and hell and the devil.

Yet you can’t arrive at this greater grace until you humble yourself before the Lord.  And the reason you need to humble yourself before the Lord is because you have raised yourself up against Him.

The proud are the ones who have made friends w/ the world – they allow the lust of the eye/flesh, boastful pride of life to mold and shape who they are and what they do.  The proud are those who walk in the flesh and not in the Spirit/live by their passions and not their conscience/by reason and not by revelation.  Remember, J is writing to believers. 

Your conscience/Word/Spirit say not to look at pornography but your passions win out - waste that money/speak that hurtful word...



Resists – Gr. – to arrange yourself against.  Offensive tackle squared off against defensive tackle.  Here’s the reason you should be spiritually depressed – God is against you.  If God being against you doesn’t depress you, you are like Jonah – sleeping in boat in storm.  “God is against you.”  I can’t imagine worse news in the world.  “But if God be for me, who can be against me?”  Only God.  Sometimes the only way I can be for my son is to be against him.

Spiritual depression is a good thing because it gives birth to spiritual desperation.  Our football coach wanted us to be desperate to be a better team and rack up some wins.  V8 – draw near to God.  Implied: you are far from God.  If you think you are close – no desperation.  If you see that you are far – desperation.  A cry in the heart: how do I get back?  When did the prodigal son become desperate?  When you see how far your heart is from the Father’s heart, you will become desperate.  And like the prodigal son, humble yourself.

Humble – Th. – NOT RISING FROM THE GROUND.  Humus – ground/earth.
Gen. 2:7 Adam formed of dust from the ground and did not rise and move about until the breath of God came into him.  And even as Adam could not have life and rise and move about w/o the breath of God, so the church.

And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.  Lk. 24:49

The humble are those who wait for the Spirit of God.  Acts 13 – waiting on/ministering to the Lord – Spirit spoke.  Adam was made of the earth and on the ground until which time God did something.  The humble do nothing unless it is breathed of God. 

The humble are those who listen to the Word of God.  He doesn’t say, “…therefore be humble…”, but “…submit to God…” for submission is the essence of humility.  Humility/submission is nothing short of waiting on God to give shape/definition to your life.  We can see this in 4:13-15.

What is diagnosis of your heart?  Is cancer of sin eating away?
Is there a spiritual depression or complacency about this?
Is there a desperation in your heart to draw near to God?

Submit to God – sound counsel for Christian and non-Christian alike.