Hello everyone, we're back in Galatians chapter 5. We're going to look at three words today, hopefully we'll get through. That is jealousy, outbursts of anger, and disputes. And so let's have a little quick review here. Paul is talking in verse 16 about walking in the Spirit. This is a style of life. Previously in Galatians, he was talking about how one's justified through faith alone in Jesus. It is that faith that you place, that trust, that belief that you have in Jesus in which God can declare you to be righteous in his sight judicially. When you stand before him as judge, he can legally say that you are innocent of the charges against you. because of Jesus. How do you know that this belief that you have is real, since the scriptures say that even the demons believe, and that many people profess faith in Jesus? Well, there's fruit in your life. That's the demonstration. Simply put, you will know a tree by its fruit, as Jesus said in Matthew. All right, so he gives the same idea here. The deeds of the flesh are evident or obvious in verse 19. Those that are led by the Spirit are true children of God. Those that are possessing the deeds of the flesh as a lifestyle, of course, everyone struggles with these sins. And if you struggle, that's a good sign, if there's a battle there. But if you're just indulging in these sins without any conviction over them or repentance concerning them, that's where it would cause worry. Remember the warning in verse 21. I'll probably read this a couple times here because we're getting down there to the next section, which is the fruit of the Spirit. The warning in verse 21 is that those who practice You see you have that word walk, you have the word led, and you have the word practice in this section. And that's what we're talking about, a style of life. So those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. So this is a self-examining section. This is why it's important to go through and really think about the meanings of these words. You can do a way deeper study on your own than what we're doing here, and then examine yourself by that. Okay, so our first word is found in verse 20. You have idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, and now our word jealousy. Jealousy, this is the Greek word zealos, which means, you can hear the word there, zeal. You have a zeal. Obviously, this is going to be in a negative sense. We'll look at it from a positive sense here in a little bit. But in this deed of the flesh, that's obviously bad to have. You have a zeal, a zealous, which literally means a boiling from heat. So, you know, you can picture a man that's just turning red in the face here. A boiling over zeal that you have in your spirit. burning emotion okay a boiling anger and just hot enough to boil that's really the idea I think you can you can get this translated sometimes zeal indignation sometimes envy and fury so that's that's a little bit of a difficult one here because you have jealousy and envy and we kind of confuse The two sometimes, and it's sometimes hard to distinguish which one. And like I just said, sometimes this word's even translated envy. So we'll try to decipher there the differences as we go throughout this. The English dictionary defines this as resentment against a rival, a person enjoying success or advantage, a feeling of unhappiness and anger Because someone has something or someone that you want. You know, so maybe this could be an example. If there was a good-looking guy talking to my wife, I might be jealous of him. I don't really worry about that too much. But I might be jealous of him that he might be stealing my wife. But if I was envious of him, I would wish him to lose his good looks and get hit by a train or something. So there might be a different, that might help you understand the difference between envy and jealousy. So jealousy is this boiling over point, you kind of get angry, you're jealous that somebody has something that you want, and then envy's gonna crave Not that you necessarily get it, but that they don't have it either. Okay, so this is used in a good way in this way. Exodus 34 14 says this, For you shall not worship any other God for the Lord, that's Yahweh, whose name is Jealous. He's a jealous God. It's also found in the second commandment, if you go back to Exodus 20. He is a jealous God. Is this a sinful jealousy? Is this a sinful zeal? Of course not. What's he jealous for? He has zeal, just like our Lord did when He made the whip of cords and drove out the money changers. He has zeal for righteousness. There may be times in our lives as Christians that we possess this righteous zeal, but I would say very rarely are we doing this out of pure selfless love. I'm sure there was times in my life, I can think of one for the gospel. that I was, I just felt like I had pure zeal for truth and hated the false teaching that was going on. So this is the same idea with God. He is zealous or jealous for His name, for His glory, because He's pure, righteous, holy, and deserves all praise. And everything He says is perfect and good, and everything He makes, everything He created is perfect and good. In that sense, being jealous is a good thing. In Exodus 20, this is also in the commandments, you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, goods, or anything that belongs to your neighbor. This is a matter of the heart, right? You're observing, you're looking at stuff that you want or think would be better in your life, we are not to do that. Boy, so two times really in the Ten Commandments you're told not to have this. Zeal is a general strong feeling to see something come about. Envy is a desire to gain possession of something that does not belong to you and it is always sinful. Sinful jealousy is always selfish and thinks that the object that he's observing belongs in the possession of the one being jealous. It is the beginning of envy and it is the seed of bitterness. That's right. You see something you want, it just leads further and further into other sins that we don't want to have in our life. 1 Corinthians 13, the love chapter, Love is patient, love is kind, and it is not jealous. Love does not brag and it is not arrogant. The opposite of jealous is just being content. Just being satisfied with what God has given you and blessed you with. Godly jealousy is like God's jealous love. It demands the best for us and our relationships. The end road here in Cain and Abel. Cain sees that Abel's offering is pleasing. He's jealous. He's envious. And then, wow, he then commits murder and lies and all sorts of other stuff. Joseph's brothers, they see the coat of many colors, right? They don't like it. They're brother Joseph and they end up Selling him off. Some wanted to kill him. Saul with David, you have this same exact thing. Saul observes David's blessing on his life. Leads him to becoming a madman. In Acts 5.17, it says that those that are in opposition to the gospel, they were filled with jealousy. And it says it again in Acts 13, 45, this is where the Gentiles are becoming, well, this is a little after that. This is in Antioch, where they were first called Christians, but the Jews were filled with jealousy. Okay, this is how this word's used. Romans 10, 2, they have a zeal, talking about those of the nation Israel, they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge, that word zeal there. Listen to this in James 3. It's a little longer, but 13 through 16. Who among you is wise and understanding? Let him show by his good behavior, his deeds in the gentleness of wisdom. But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition, we're going to see that word come up. Selfish ambition again here in the next, not the next word, but the word after. In your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth. This wisdom is, is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly. So what are we talking about? The bitter jealousy. The bad wisdom that leads to bitter jealousy. It's earthly, natural, and what? What's it say? James 3, 16, or the end of 15. Demonic. It's demonic. For where jealousy and selfish ambition exists, there's disorder in every evil thing. God does not tolerate jealousy in us. He does not tolerate earthly, natural, selfish zeal, promoting yourself. as good. He calls it every evil thing and demonic. Later on here in Galatians, if you're there, you can look in verse 26. You have them envying one another. So the Galatian church is being warned to not be like this. They're having a problem with false teachers that are jealous and envying And the Christian church is not to be this way. Again, in that section, in James that I just read, do not harbor this bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts. Do not boast in it or deny the truth. Okay? This is something that, a sin that leads to other sins and is very dangerous to have this personality. Be content with what you have. Philippians 2, 3. Do nothing from selfish or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves. So what should you do if you are caught in this sin of jealousy, selfish zeal? I think the answer to this problem is a strong meditation on the sovereignty of God. Is God really in control? Does God really mean that we are not to worry about what we shall eat or drink or any other thing, what we shall wear? Yes, he does. Is he truly in control of every single aspect of this world and life? Yes. Does he truly love you? Yes. Does he care about you and your life? Yes, He does. He cares about your life. He cares about who you are. He cares about what you have. He has a concern for your life. Remember, He is a God of jealousy. His name is Jealous, in the righteous sense. He's jealous for you, because He loves you. Does the Bible say that we are to be content? Yes. Does the Bible teach that God will provide our basic needs of living? Yes. What grounds, you ask yourself this, what grounds do we have to be, do we have as creatures to be violent, bitter, self-serving, willing to fight, angry, jealous, and critical? We don't have any. We don't have any grounds for any of that. All right. So let's go to our next word, I believe, It is Outburst of Anger. I think it's the NIV that has Fits of Rage. If you've ever seen the Dude Perfect guy, you know, the rage monster where he just bashes everything. There you have your word picture. You know, he starts shaking. I had a kid on the baseball team. He played third base and he didn't like getting yelled at or told what to do. If you talk to him wrong, he would start shaking and turn into this, what I would call, rage monster and just lose it. Just have a temper tantrum. This is a quality that we can have. Obviously, we sophisticated, right? As adults, we don't just go around smashing everything. Usually, well, most people grow out of that. But we can harbor it in our heart, and we can still be this way. When things don't go our way, well, how about a mechanic that throws his wrench against the wall because a bolt didn't come out? Or I had an episode I told on Thursday nights here. The kids were playing so bad and being so lazy, and it was hot. And I'm yelling at them, and they weren't performing. They just were being lazy. And I threw my bat. I said, that was an example of the fit of rage, OK? We're prone to it. My personality, personally, is more prone to it than some of these other ones. But it's not something that we should be proud of or be consistent in. We need to repent and confess this to God or to another brother. All right, so the word literally means to rush along, getting heated up, and breathing violently. You can get the word meaning right from that as well. Passion-driven behavior. If you have these strong impulses, this personality of intensity, intense emotion, which, by the way, our society pushes, right? This is what we think is to be a man or a competitor, a personality like this. Really, you're just an arrogant jerk in the truth of it all. A true man can hold it back, can walk away, can take a deep breath and let it go. All right, so this is also used of God's attribute against sin. Okay, so God has an out, you might, can we say this without being blasphemous, has fits of rage. or outbursts of anger against sin. Yeah, he hates sin to the point of just makes him enraged in a godly, righteous sense that can be. All right, so. Sorry, my phone just went off. Okay, so this only God Maybe there's times in your life. I I doubt it. I don't think for me that I've demonstrated a righteous fit of rage Not that I can remember anyway, I I don't think so so God can he does against sin and that's what hell is it's God's anger against sin Here's some Here's some words from Proverbs for us. Proverbs 14, 17. A quick-tempered man acts foolishly. 29, 11. A fool always loses his temper, but a wise man holds it back. What is a quick-tempered, fly-off-the-handle, rage monster called according to the Bible? A fool. A fool. 1429, a patient man has great understanding, but a quick-tempered man promotes folly. He's foolish and he has a life of folly. A wise man holds it back. A patient man has great understanding. Listen to this one. 2528, like a city whose walls are broken down is a man who does not control his temper. Well, what's it like for a city? whose walls are broken down. I mean, just think of the analogy. Think of the proverb here. Like a city whose walls are broken down, that would be a bad thing. I think everybody in the city is going to die by the invading army. Well, that picture right there is the same thing as a man who does not control his temper. If you are constantly losing your temper, you are You're fit for destruction. The invading army, the sin of the world, the flesh, and the devil are coming to destroy you like a plague, like a flood. Proverbs 15, 18, a wrathful man stirs up discord, but one slow to anger calms strife. Couple more, 2922, an angry man stirs up strife and a hot-tempered man abounds in transgression. That's right, when you get angry, you say some things you wish you didn't. Everybody knows that. Our lifestyle is not to be marked by this, losing our temper thing. Okay, you gotta control it, you gotta prey on it, you gotta turn away from it. 2928, a wise man turns away from anger. 1632 he was slow to anger is better than than the mighty and he rules his spirit than he who captures a city Obviously, we're gonna get into that and self-control and the fruit of the spirit Here's one more Proverbs 22 24 do not associate with a man given to anger or go with a hot-tempered man Or you will learn his ways and find a snare for yourself. What are we told to not do here? We are not to associate or go with somebody given to anger or a hot tepid man. Our friends should not be this. If they're given over to this, you can warn them. You can say these things to them and hopefully they would repent. But if they don't and they just continue on in their way, we're warned not to be associated with them or we're going to learn their ways. Be careful who your friends are. you'll learn from your friends. Now we have a couple examples in scripture. Here's one. Remember King David. He was anointed king. He was with his men and Nabal, the rich guy, I forget where they were. He came to, David sent somebody to Nabal to see if they could get some food. Nabal said, no, I'm not. Who's David, da, da, da, all this stuff. And well, David got all the stuff on, grabbed his sword, and was coming to kill him. David fell prey to this fit of anger over Nabal not being hospitable. And then, of course, we know the story. Abigail saved the day. Nabal ends up dying, I think, that night or the night not shortly after. But you see how how somebody can quickly go from asking for food to a rage monster, if you will, an outburst of anger, with willingness to go kill all these people, right? And we do the same thing. You can throw a wrench. You can throw a baseball bat. You can punch a wall. That's all sinful, by the way. The world says, go do it. Let it out, right? Go scream. No, that's not the Christian way. We are to be peaceful and gentle. When somebody tempts you into your anger problem, You need to pray that you don't fall into this. I'm gonna attempt to move on to our next word here, disputes. I think I can finish. Disputes, okay, so you have, let me find it here real fast. Outbursts of anger and disputes, okay? This is, we're gonna really, see the selfishness of this word disputes. This is a word that you could see, I think, pretty clearly in the politic world, the politician's world. Seeking followers has the idea behind this. So your speech and your way of life is to get people to follow you. So you can say things to people to get them on your side. And by doing so, you're causing this dispute with the other side. So you're basically associating with people that you want to be around, and you could care less about everybody else. So this has rivalry involved in it, self-seeking, feuding, and factions. You're just doing the work as a hired man. You're carnal ambition. You're selfish rivalry. It doesn't matter the other side. You're doing what you want to do, and you're self-selfish in this. You're acting for one's own gain. That's how this word is used. We've already seen disputes, discord, Selfish ambition Those types of word all have their ramifications in this if you're self-serving as a Let's just say you're a leader Pastors can do this and I've seen them do it They'll say things so that they don't offend the one side so that they can gain a popular following in this and and this other side that can gain the majority. And I think, to pick on Donald Trump, his view on abortion, he doesn't go all the way as to calling it murder and he's okay with the pill and all sorts of stuff like that. If he were to say that, well, then he would lose his following. So he just speaks in a way that he can regain his following. He's not the only politician. They all do it, of course. But that would be an example. You should be declaring what's right. You should be bold in declaring what is righteous and good despite people's applause or following. We shouldn't use trickery. We shouldn't use things to try to draw men to yourself. We should be doing things to draw men to God, right? Romans 2 8 It says this to those who by perseverance in doing good seek glory honor and immortality He will give eternal life listen to this, but those who are Self-seeking that's the same word and who reject the truth and follow wickedness there will be wrath and anger Okay, there will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil so there's a warning in Romans and Romans chapter 2, the self-seeking person, it's not going to end well for them. There'll be wrath and anger. In Philippians 1.17, you have preachers of Jesus doing it for selfish ambition, right? Look at how many people I saved. Look at my ministry. Look at how great I am. Whatever it is, we see it all the time. Self-promotion to gain a following. I mean, our culture's geared in that right now. And I think I already read this with the jealousy one. Yeah, I did. James 3, 13 through 16, must be a really good passage. But if you harbor bitter envy or jealousy, that's what we looked at. and selfish ambition. That's this word, dispute, in your hearts. So not only do you have the last word we looked at, not the last word, but the word before jealousy here listed in James 3. Remember, he calls it earthly, unspiritual, and demonic. And every evil practice. So this thing that This word that we're looking at right now, disputes, is also the same used in James 3 as jealousy. Not the same word, but in the same group. Jealousy and disputes, selfish ambition, James calls it demonic. It's not wisdom from above, and it's every evil practice. It's every evil thing. Those two things, jealousy and selfish ambition. Like I said before, all these sins are completely selfish sins. Why do you want a following? Because you think you have something to say. Hopefully you are preaching the gospel. Hopefully that's what you want a following for. You know, like and subscribe. Whatever it is. So let us be careful that we are not selfish seekers, but we are God seekers and following the ways of the Bible so that God gives glory. If you have a problem with these sins, you should fear, but there is still hope as there's still breath in your lungs. Alright, aloha all. We will talk to you next time. Bye.