A Test for True Spirituality - Pastor Daniel Batarseh

It was one cold, black night where a group of young soldiers were shuffling through the jungles of enemy territory with a strategy to get to the other side. But men that were traveling through made it clear that in order to be successful, they had to take every step carefully without making any noise in order for the enemy to find out of their presence. And as they spent their time traveling in that midnight hour, one of these soldiers had his laces loose on one of his boots. And all for a sudden as they are trying to move over to this thick jungle, there's this empty space there, and these four soldiers move on ahead while this other soldier with his loose shoe trips over on his own lace and causes these branches to break and the shuffling of leaves to come about. Now these other soldiers kept moving forward, but the enemy heard.

And all for a sudden in that silent night, there was this zipping noise of a sniper bullet that came and struck that fallen soldier in the leg. And with the little strength that he had, he began to crawl his way to the other soldiers that moved on ahead and found himself to be in a safer place. This caught the attention of the other soldiers, so they turn back and they see this friend of theirs gasping for help. As these other soldiers come on by him, they look at one another. This person is writhing in pain, asking them to look at the wound, asking them to do something about it.

And they once again look at one another, and one of these soldiers takes a step back. He looks at this fallen soldier and with all his strength, takes a step forward and kicks him in the stomach. And another soldier looks over, and he begins to look down at this fallen brother and begins to tell him how weak he is It begins to mock at the fact that he was unable to fulfill the mission. And they begin to do this for quite a time until another soldier pulls out his pistol and shoots him in the same leg. After a time, these soldiers pick themselves up and they move forward while their brother is laying there in his own blood trying to fix this wound of his by himself, not knowing what will happen to him.

You might be wondering, what war are you talking about? Well, it's a war that's been happening actually for the past few hundreds and even thousands of years. Your second question might be, what army do these soldiers represent? The US army? The UK?

I mean, what what army is this? It's the army that you and I are representing. The army of the Church of Jesus Christ. Because I personally cannot think of an army that knows how to so shoot their fellow brethren so quickly as the Church of Jesus Christ. In case you do not know, you and I are part of a war, and it's not a flesh and blood, but it's against another realm.

And we are fellow soldiers of Jesus Christ. We represent his kingdom. We have a purpose. And every single day, there are assaults coming our way, and there is a strategy that we have to hold to. There are disciplines that we must develop in order to prove successful and faithful.

But from time to time, Satan, not only Satan, but this flesh gets a hold of one of our brethren. And so what do you and I do when we realize that there is someone, or more than one person who has fallen? Turn with me to Galatians chapter six. Galatians six chapter chapter six verse one says, brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted.

Here's Paul the apostle, and he's speaking to the church. And he says, if anyone, and I mean anyone, is caught in what? Any. Any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. I find that fascinating.

How do you measure somebody who is truly spiritual? The amount of Bible verses they know? The way they can stir up a crowd by their preaching? The amount of time they boast of their prayer and their devotional time with the lord at home. Those are all wonderful things.

But Paul gives us another insight to know how somebody is really spiritual. Do you wanna know and do you wanna gauge somebody's true spirituality in the lord? See what they do when they find out that somebody's caught in sin. See how they respond when a fellow brother is caught in a transgression. And based on their response, you can gauge whether they are really spiritual or not.

There seems to be this trend of people who feel called to have ministries to simply accuse people. They just find it, their mission to find faults, not to defend the faith, not to be apologetic and show why our faith is the true faith, not to warn other believers of false teachers. No. They find it their ambition to look at other believers and to find faults and to show how weak they are. And in doing so, they they wanna show as though they are really spiritual.

They wanna come off as somebody who is very righteous. One who is very pious. And in their self deception, they think they're actually doing the service of the Lord by doing these things. But I wanna tell you very boldly that people that find it in their hearts to go out and find accusations, and find faults for the purpose of exposing in order to make themselves look self righteous, they are not doing the ministry of Jesus Christ. What they are doing is fulfilling the mission of Satan himself.

That is Satan's ministry. Satan's ministry is to accuse the brethren day and night. Be very careful of those who in the name of Christ love to find faults in others. If you do not believe me, turn with me to Zechariah chapter three. It's a famous chapter that gives us a vivid image of what Galatians talks about.

Look what this chapter says. Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord. Here he is. And Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. So here's Joshua the high priest, and he's before the Lord, and right there is the enemy, and what is he doing?

What he does best. Accuse and accuse and accuse. And he's trying to show the Lord while Joshua is not worthy, while he is standing there in his filthiness. Verse two, and the Lord said to Satan, the Lord rebuke you, oh Satan. The Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you.

Is not this a brand plucked from the fire? Now look at this picture. Now Joshua was standing before the angel, clothed with filthy garments. And the angel, who said it? The angel said to those who were standing before him, remove the filthy garments from him.

So we see the heart of God. That He doesn't want us to stay in our filthiness, nor does He condemn us in our filthiness. What does He do? He seeks to restore us in our filthiness. And so clothe Him.

Behold, I have taken your iniquity from you and I will clothe you with pure vestments. That's beautiful. Now look at verse five. And I said, not the angel, who? Zechariah.

I said, let them put a clean turban on his head. So Zechariah is joining the Lord in seeing Joshua restored. Zechariah is the one who comes alongside of the Lord and says, yes. And add more. Make him even cleaner.

Put a clean turban on his head. But there are many believers that are not standing by the Lord like Zechariah. They're standing by Satan and are accusing. Brothers and sisters, where do you and I stand when we see somebody who is not as spiritual or who is stumbling in their walk with the Lord? Are we by the Lord and say put a clean turban on Him Lord?

I pray that You make Him holy. I pray that You show them their sin. I pray that You restore them from the inside out. Or do we find ourselves leaning towards the the enemy's side and judge and condemn and elevate our own righteousness so that we can feel better about our own piety? When we go back to Galatians, it says, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual, what's the aim?

Restore him. Restore Him. That is the heart of every believer who is truly spiritual in the Lord. Restoration for fellow brothers who have fallen. Now let me tell you what restoration is not.

Restoration is not turning an eye away from somebody who's living in habitual sin, and in the name of grace letting them continue because we're all in the flesh and this is how we live. That's not restoration. That's like saying, there's a bullet in your leg, but I'm too scared to touch it because it's gonna hurt, so just stay there and risking that person to getting infected and eventually amputated. That is not love, to let somebody continue in their sin or to turn an eye away from somebody who's fallen in sin and letting them stay there. Neither is restoration scolding somebody to the point where they have no hope of even wanting to walk with the Lord again because of shame.

That's like finding somebody who has a bullet in their leg, and instead of treating that wound, you take a big knife and cut the leg off completely. It's the balance of coming in with the desire to seeing that person being able to get up and walk again, and you knowing that it's gonna hurt. So you are so gentle in coming in to deal with that wound. And continually reminding the person that you are treating, I'm here so you can walk again. You are a spiritual restorer.

That's always the goal. How can I find You probably know somebody that's walking the You know, you probably know somebody that's probably in sequence or whatever it may be? Our heart must be, how can I, Lord? Give me the wisdom to know how to restore them. Give me the words to say that I can come to them in love, and they know that I am there for them.

Intercede for them. Cry out for them. Fast for them. That is a spiritual person. And we must do it in a certain attitude, in the spirit of gentleness.

It reinforces that that a a spiritual person is a gentle person. Can you think of somebody more gentle than Jesus? The master who went Peter, who made such great boast of devotion fell. And there he is fishing with his friends. And Jesus appears on the scene, which shows me something.

Jesus initiated the restoration process. He came to find Peter. Peter didn't go and find Jesus. And there he is standing on the shore. And before Jesus even talks about His love for Him, before He even asked Peter, do you love me?

Do you love me? You know what He says first? Come and have breakfast. Let's eat. Let's talk.

And he knew how to bring Peter in, and at the right moment, confront him about this issue. Why should we do it in a spirit of gentleness? Because of the second part of the verse. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Because you and I are susceptible to fall as well.

You and I have this thing called the flesh, and at times it can be very powerful. And if we're not careful to make sure that our shoes are tied up just right day by day, we can fall. And we have to keep that in mind daily as we walk with other brothers, and sometimes you might see somebody fall. You have to realize too, that could happen to me. That can happen to me.

And so, we have to have the frame of mind, whenever we wanna confront somebody, whenever we wanna seek to restore somebody, how would I want to be approached by somebody if I felt? What would I want their tone of voice to be? What would I want their choice of words to be? And Jesus, so gentle, gave the church the instructions of how to bring restoration to somebody. Just gonna go over this very quickly in Matthew 18 verse 15.

If your brother sins against you, what do you do? Go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. It's as simple as that. Somebody sins against you, you go with what?

That spirit of gentleness. You go what? Seeking that person to be restored. What happens if they don't? If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you.

What happens if he doesn't? If he refuses in verse 17, listen to them. If he doesn't listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses, what does Jesus say? Treat him like a gentile or a tax collector.

In other words, treat him and excommunicate him, like how you would a gentile or a tax collector. But we have to remember, even in all of those things, in that process, the heart is always restoration. The heart is always, we have to win this brother back. We have to win this sister back. And there's a real life scenario of this in the Book of Corinthians, where Paul is telling the church, you have somebody that committed a gross sin, get rid of the person because they're not repented.

Well you can't stop there in first Corinthians five. When you come to second Corinthians chapter two, that person eventually now senses the weight of his sin and he comes back, and what does Paul say? Lavish your love on him. Forgive Him. Restore Him.

Confirm Him. Don't let Him stay in that state. So even the extreme of stage four church discipline, the heart is always restore. We wanna bring them up again. We wanna see them walking again.

We didn't We wanna see them represent Christ well again. Now if you're thinking, oh this is wonderful for me because I can live how I want, and I can just seek restoration, this is not the verse for you. There are many different verses for you, sir or ma'am, if you wanna abuse this understanding of gentleness and grace. But for those who are overtaken, this verse confirm confirms something for you and I, that confession should not be a difficult thing. Now it is if you're in a body in which they love to shoot you when you're down.

But when you're in a place in which we all have the same attitude of Jesus seeking restoration, we should be able to find comfort in confession. Because we know that our fellow brethren seek our restoration. I wanna challenge you if you really wanna strive to be like Jesus Christ, if you really wanna be like Him, if you wanna be spiritual in this life, know how to adopt this kind of an attitude. And ask the Lord to give you this kind of a heart. Lord, when I know somebody's fallen, may my heart respond the way you would.

Give me the ability to see them and be broken for them. Give me the ability to seek how I can restore them. God, give me your heart so I can intercede for them. Do you remember the prophet Samuel? When Saul, that stubborn mind of his, completely rebelled against God more than once, and you find him in this one scene after the kingdom was ripped away from him.

He's weeping and praying for Saul to the point where God says, stop it. Move on and find another king. What a heart this prophet prophet, the one who would call out the transgressions of people. The one who stepped onto the scene and called people to a holy standard. That person was also the person in his room weeping and calling out to God for that person who has fallen.

That's true spirituality. Pray with me. Father, give us the heart that desires restoration for others, and give us the ability to know how to confront, to know how to rebuke, to know how to reach out with a spirit of gentleness. And Lord, may we be reminded that we are susceptible to the falling as well. So keep us, Lord.

Give us the ability to discern any blind spots in our own lives, lest we fall. And, Lord, may you fill our hearts with love for one another in this place, knowing that we are an army, knowing that we have a goal, and we need one another to fulfill it. Humble us in this place, we pray. In Jesus' name. Amen.