Hold on to What's Good - Bible Baptist Church

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Text: 1 Thessalonians 5:21

Hold on to what’s good. We’re very good at abandoning what’s good. And we know when we’re drifting away from what’s good. This is truly the history of humanity. God created all things good when this adversarial spirit appears and seduces mankind away from what’s good. This is what brings the wrath of God because his good gifts get perverted into wicked things. If you’re a parent you’ve watched children walk away from what’s good into something deadly.

Companionship is good

Whether it’s family, friendship, or fellowship, two are better than one.
Friendship turns to betrayal and people lose their desire for a good thing like friendship. Sin has a way of really destroying our desire for good things.
Marriage is a good thing. Lust outside of marriage turns a good thing into a source of disappointment and anger.

Gathering as church is good

God’s plan for his people to fellowship and learn the Bible in a congregation is a good thing. Then it gets poisoned with men’s carnality and arrogance and the good thing becomes a hated thing.
Or desires creeping in that draw you away from the good gathering. Desires for your kids. Desires for your job.

The truth is good

Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.
Cease my son to hear the instruction that causeth thee to err from the words of knowledge, Proverbs 19:27.
And that which fell among thorns are they, which, when they have heard, go forth, and are choked with cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection.
- Your concern and desire for the things in this world suffocate the work of the word of God in your life.
Maybe the truth has cost too much.
- And there’s regret over incorporating truth into your life.
- Elijah.
- I’ve said this before in private and meant it. When things were too painful I’ve said I wish I never learned certain things and I’d like to go back to a time when life was hard, just in a different way. The hard I’m talking about is where I’m brought to the point of despising the truth because of what I feel like it’s done to my life and relationships.
- Jeremiah said that. Job said that. He wished he’d never been born because his good life with his children was destroyed. His good marriage with his wife was near destruction.

A sound mind is good

A sound mind is part of the divine nature in God’s children.
Willing abandonment of a sound mind to run after new fears that we’re entertained by. Yes, entertained.
Our unbridled anger, which we talked about last week, causes mental instability. When anger clouds your mind, that’s the anger you’ve chosen. Things happen in life that make you mad, sure. But when anger controls your mind it’s because you gave it that opportunity.

Now, these are just a few examples. God gives good gifts. We ourselves as well as other people poison those good things. And we run from what’s good into something that is bad. When you start to notice the drift away from what’s good. Or you notice you start despising something that’s good. Remind yourself of this: hold fast to what’s good. This thought has anchored my heart in those contrary times. Hold fast to what’s good.