Psalm 51:1–2“Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!”
Commentary from the sermon “The Cry of a Fallen Leader” by Alistair Begg:
“Sin cannot be sealed away in the past. Sin does not go away like the Delete button releasing a file on your laptop computer. Sin and guilt are not eradicated simply as a result of saying ‘Oh well, I don’t want to think about that anymore. Oh well, that’s in the past. Oh well, that’s okay.’ No it’s not! Even if the courts don’t punish it, even if public scandal doesn’t expose it, even if by hypocrisy we manage to conceal it—singing our hymns, attending our services, preaching our sermons, going about our business—even if by hypocrisy we manage to conceal it, eventually the rotting carcass will smell so bad that everyone will know. There is no way to avoid it. …
“The only safe thing that can be done with guilt is to have it washed away. And there is only one to whom we may go to have it washed away. There is only one in the whole world who has, if you like, the spiritual detergent necessary to remove the stains of sin and guilt. … To whom, then, can this fallen leader go? Well, to the one whom he addresses in the psalm. He says, ‘I’m coming to You, and my cry,’ he says, ‘is “Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your unfailing love, according to Your great compassion.”’ Who is this God? Well, He is the God who has revealed Himself as a God of unfailing love, and He is the God who has shown Himself to be great in His compassion. And it is to this one that we may go with the request ‘Blot out my transgressions.’”
1 Thessalonians 4:3–5“For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality.”
Commentary from the sermon “Purity (Southern)” by Alistair Begg:
“Paul is writing to Thessalonica from Corinth. Corinth was a hotbed of immoral excess. The Temple of Aphrodite dominated the skyline in Corinth, and the servants of Aphrodite plied their trade on the streets of Corinth under cover of darkness, in a similar fashion to what is happening in Cleveland and Louisville and New York City and Seattle and Portland and Glasgow and London right now. …
“In Thessalonica, the worship of the deities similarly involved rites of gross immorality. And in the immoral climate in which Paul was writing, the assumption in such communities, both Roman and Greek, was simply this: that men could not or would not limit themselves to their wives as their only sexual partner. That was par for the course. That was the framework in which the church was set. That was one of the distinguishing features of the radical transformation that was brought about by the Gospel in the lives of those who had once been marked by that kind of lifestyle. And what is striking about this is surely the fact that when Paul addresses it, he doesn’t waffle. There’s no embarrassment in what he is saying. The way in which he tackles it, both here and elsewhere in his letters, is plain, honest, practical, authoritative, and uninhibited.”
Genesis 39:9–10“‘He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?’ And as she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or to be with her.”
Commentary from the sermon “Joseph’s Temptation” by Alistair Begg:
“Temptation is an enticement to evil or to sin. Temptation in and of itself is something that is known to everyone, known even to the Lord Jesus Himself, and temptation in and of itself is not sin. It is our response to temptation which leads us either in the paths of righteousness or down into the meadows of our disobedience.”
“Isn’t it interesting, when we sin, that we think as long as, you know, our friends don’t see or our parents don’t see or our brother doesn’t see or whoever it is doesn’t see, that we’re okay? That’s not the issue. God sees. God sees. …
“There is no more powerful force in overcoming temptation than the fear of God. …
“No matter what contemporary culture says, sexual sin is not just between two consenting adults. Sexual sin is an act of disobedience against God. And that’s why you don’t engage in sexual sin. That’s why. No other reason. Not the pragmatism of it, not what it might do to the children, not that it might get round the office, not it might be an issue here or there. No. It is a wicked thing. It is against God. Therefore, we don’t do it. Even if we feel like it, we don’t do it. Even if every circumstance moves in that direction, we don’t do it.”
Exodus 20:14“You shall not commit adultery.”
Commentary from the sermon “Sex Is Sacred: The Seventh Commandment” by Alistair Begg:
“The Word of God speaks into our lives today in one simple, straightforward statement: ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ The problem, ladies and gentlemen, is with our worldview, you see. We are not prepared to allow God to be God, and so the immediate reaction to a talk like this is for us to say, ‘Who says?’ See? Since we have made God a cosmic genie who may or may not exist, we can remove Him from His throne, thereby taking His place and remaining the master and destiny of our lives and therefore choosing what we would like or not like to do. Most of us have been brought up believing that there is no absolute ethic which would determine the norms of human society and behavior but the situation determines the actions that should be taken. …
“Therefore, we say to ourselves, ‘There may be times when adultery is the right thing to do, because after all, I’m supposed to be happy here, am I not? After all, I’m supposed to love.’ Since we got love and lust so horribly mixed up, most of us have a dreadful time making those kind of situational decisions. And what we need, as children, is for somebody who is above us to tell us what’s in and what’s out.”
1 Corinthians 6:19–20“Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”
Commentary from the sermon “You Are Not Your Own” by Alistair Begg:
“The freedom that is ours in Christ through the Gospel only exists under Christ’s lordship. In other words, you can’t believe what you want, and you can’t behave as you like. Why? Because the freedom into which you’ve been brought by the purchase of Christ’s blood is not a freedom to sin at will but is the freedom to say no to sin by the power of Christ. Therefore, when I say that Jesus is Lord, it means I have no right to believe anything other than what my Lord teaches me. Therefore, I can’t redefine my view of marriage. I can’t redefine my view of sexuality. I can’t redefine the parameters of morality. Because Jesus is Lord. Therefore, all of my believing and all of my behaving underneath His lordship is the freedom into which we have been brought. …
“You were purchased at a great price. You are united with Christ. He has taken your past and He has buried it in the deepest sea; as far as the east is from the west, so far has He placed your transgressions from you, so that you may now live in the freedom that comes from the indwelling power of the Spirit under the lordship of Christ. Therefore, it is incongruous, it is ridiculous for those who are the dwelling place of God to fiddle and piddle around in a way that our unbelieving friends have chosen to do.”
2 Timothy 2:22“Flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.”
Commentary from the sermon “Useful to the Master” by Alistair Begg:
“What practical steps need to be taken if one is going to be useful to the master? That’s really what he’s answering: ‘What practical steps need to be taken if I’m going to be a vessel for honorable use?’ …
“‘Run away.’ Doesn’t sound very spiritual, does it? ‘What am I supposed to do?’ ‘Make a run for it.’ In other words, when we come up against sin, you’re not supposed to sit around and discuss it. It’s not an occasion for dialogue. It’s not even a time for prayer. Don’t misunderstand me. But if I had a dollar for every person that’s told me, ‘Well, I’m just praying about whether I should do this or not,’ and in the Bible it says you shouldn’t do it, I don’t know why you’re having a prayer time. God says, ‘There’s no need to pray about this. I already told you, it’s out! We don’t have to have a discussion on it.’” …
“What Paul is saying is you need to get as far away from it as possible and as quickly as possible. … Do you want to be useful to God? Then flee!”
2 Samuel 11:2“It happened, late one afternoon, when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king’s house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful.”
Commentary from the sermon “David and Bathsheba” by Alistair Begg:
“Is it possible—is it actually possible—to erase a life of usefulness in the space of an afternoon? For that’s what happens here. Here in this incident, a defining moment, a dark shadow is cast over David’s life. No matter what anybody said about him from that point on, they could never actually say it without mentioning this. …
“Now, it would appear that David knew nothing about a covenant with his eyes. You remember Job? Job 31:1: ‘I have made a covenant with my eyes so that I don’t get myself in a major problem.’ Apparently, he didn’t know anything about that. He couldn’t help seeing her, but he could prevent himself from staring at her. It wasn’t a problem that he caught a glimpse; the problem was when he started to gaze. I’m not gonna expand on this right now, but let’s just state facts as facts: Men are sexually attracted and stimulated by the female body. Fact. If you doubt that, then just pay attention to the multi-billion-dollar pornography industry, which bears testimony to that reality. God has made us as he’s made us. And so it is that in this case, the eye is the point of entry through which temptation comes, as it is so often for us—hence legitimate concerns in terms of our lives, our viewing, our reading, our gazing, our children, our children’s viewing, our cell phones, our iPads, our everything. Facts are facts.”
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