This excerpt is transcribed from a sermon by Matt Chandler that he gave at the Together For the Gospel conference in 2018. Watch the full sermon here.

Are You Playing with Sin?

It is the holiness of heaven that drives out the filthiness of the world. It is the beauty of Christ that compels us to say no to what is broken and grotesque in the world. Paul says, if it’s beautiful, if it’s lovely if it’s right, if it’s good, if it’s pure, hang out there, stay there, dwell there (Philippians 4:8).

I want to flood my life—fill my life—with joy-bringing, Jesus-exalting beauty.

Being entertained by what God finds deplorable is probably a bad usage of 30 minutes to two to three hours. If I find myself entertained by rape and incest and horrific violence and sexual perversion, what does that say about where my mind and heart are? And is Jesus sitting there with me enjoying that?

Again, don’t read me wrong brothers and sisters, I’m not telling you to throw out your TV, although some of you should throw out your TV…

Don’t play with sin.

Don’t Play With Sin

I used the illustration before, I’ll use it again.

There’s something broken in our minds, broken in our spirits, broken in our souls that leads us to believe that we are in control of sin in a way that is not biblically true. The way I’ll illustrate that is:

…So I’m watching this show and near the end of the show there’s this scene—they’re trying to shoot this commercial, and this commercial was going to be for shampoo or something and it’s this woman, you know this model, and they want her to lay on this male lion. And the lion attacks her and just rips her to shreds.

And then they’re interviewing the trainer and the guy is like, “Couldn’t see this coming!”

And I’m like, “It’s a LION; it has one purpose in all of creation—to kill stuff! It is an apex predator!”

But to hear this brother talk, he talked about raising it from when it was a baby, getting it when he could just hold it, taking it for walks, combing its mane.

And I just have to believe that many of us are playing with sin like this brother was playing with a lion: Oh I’ve got control of this. Oh man this is never going to turn on me. Man, for 15-20 years I have trained this sin to sit when I tell it to sit, to get in its bed when it’s time to get in bed… I would urge you brothers to not play with lions.

Eventually, in season at the right time, it will turn and it will devour. Therefore put on Christ and make no provision for the flesh (Romans 13:14).