Grace Reformed Baptist Church, Bangalore

Philippians 3:17-19: Brethren, join in following my example, and note those who so walk, as you have us for a pattern. For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame—who set their mind on earthly things.

A man named Tony wrote a book called “New Religion.” The cover had pictures of a car, a house, a watch, sports, money, a dress, and good health. He says the goal of the Christian life in this new religion is to progressively meet these worldly needs: being fulfilled, being happy, and enjoying a good life in this world. Jesus, God, and the Church are used as a means to meet all their personal needs. It has a man-centered theology. Their good news is man’s prosperity, health, wealth, happiness, and security. If you have a problem, don’t worry, Jesus will solve your problem and meet all your needs. He says this new religion has now poisoned a whole generation.

This is completely the opposite of the true religion revealed in the Bible. The simple goal of a Christian is to regularly become like Christ. In that process, sometimes I have to crucify my flesh, deny my needs, and deny myself to become more like Christ. The goal of salvation is not meeting our worldly needs, but making us like Christ. The very meaning of faith is looking out to Christ, not looking at what I need. Sadly, this true biblical religion is slowly disappearing, and the new religion of self-satisfaction has filled the churches globally. We have a generation with a twisted, wrong idea of Christianity.

We see the apostle Paul probably seeing that trend early in the church, and he writes these verses with great burden and tears. Paul is very concerned here; he says, “I often told you, now I tell you even with tears.” In Acts 20:31, he says, “Be on the alert, remembering that night and day for a period of three years I didn’t cease to warn each one with tears.” Warning each person with tears for three years—an amazing statement. Then he says the only thing I can do to save you from these false teachers is to “commend you to His Word which will build you up.” You’re protected by the Word. If you don’t know the Word, you cannot be protected from this coming flood.

Paul never wept for any of his suffering. When he wrote a list of his sufferings, he rejoiced and gloried in them. Why does this great heart weep now? This verse is unique, because nowhere in the New Testament does Paul write anything with tears in his eyes. But this is the only time he says, “As I write, I cry, I weep.” Now this great heart is broken, which should tell us what a dangerous impact these enemies of Christ will have on the church. These are people who call themselves Christians, join the church, and abuse the great truth of the gospel, reasoning that if we are perfectly justified, whatever we do in this life doesn’t matter. It was those whose language is embodied in Romans 6: “If we sin, God gives super-abounding grace, so let us sin that grace may abound.”

As Paul thinks of these enemies who will attack churches from the inside and dishonor Christ’s cross, and how they will lead millions astray, he realizes that Philippi is a pioneer church in Europe. If they get infected, how generations will deviate from the true way. This broke the great heart of the apostle; his deep shepherd’s heart, like his Lord’s, was moved with compassion and wept. If he had so many tears at that time when the gospel was still spreading and the church was small, if he could see Christianity today, oh, how heartbroken he must be. If he speaks to us now, how much more would he have said with tears? So let us respect these words that are coming with great burden and love for the Philippians’ welfare and for us.

In this background, he gave a command in verse 17: “If you want to become like Christ and not be diverted, you need some examples, so follow me and those who walk according to the pattern that you have seen in us.” Notice he supports that command with these verses. You will notice in your Bibles that verse 18 begins with the word “for.” In other words, the exhortation to follow Paul in verse 17 was necessitated by the realities described in verse 18.

Because there are so many negative examples, be careful to follow a positive, correct example. So when we understand the danger of these enemies of Christ, we will feel the tremendous weight of the command to follow Paul’s example. The wrong examples we should not follow are called the “enemies of the cross.” He clearly describes them so we have discernment to identify them. See, they are very subtle; they don’t come as enemies with a direct attack on the gospel, saying “we are against the cross.” That is easy to find. But these people are very, very subtle. You cannot immediately or easily spot them. They are like hidden snakes in the grass; unless you are bitten, you will not know their poison.

They will come as friends. They will claim to believe in Christ and be truly saved. They will have church membership. They will be famous pastors having big churches. You have to be very careful and very discerning to know them. Our Lord himself warned, “Beware of those who come to you in sheep’s clothing and inwardly they are wolves.” All apostles warned the church to be discerning about these people. When a church lacks this discernment, it becomes naive, they follow such people, and the whole church and generation become enemies of the cross. The sad state of today’s Christianity is because Christians lack this discernment.

I am regularly astounded when I hear very educated, knowledgeable people say, “I go to this church or that church.” My inner voice says, “I wonder how you can go to such a wrong church and hear such a foolish, false pastor; do you have any brains?” The only reason is because they lack this biblical discernment, and discernment comes only when you spend time learning basic, foundational biblical teaching. Paul has been teaching verse by verse in this epistle, clear doctrines like we are teaching on Tuesdays from the 1689 confession, so without clear knowledge, you cannot have clear thinking. You cannot have discernment. And so, millions of people are blindly following pastors who are actually enemies of the cross of Christ.

So Paul, how do we identify them? The apostle says three things about these enemies of the cross: you will know them in three areas—their Character, Influence, and Destiny. Think of the phrase; is it not startling to read of “enemies of the cross of Christ”? For helpless mankind, the only mercy and hope is the cross of Christ, the height of God’s love to sinners revealed in the cross. What can be a greater crime than being an enemy of the cross? All crimes are atoned by the cross; if you are an enemy of that cross, you are the greatest criminal. If you have to identify those criminals, remember CID: Character, Influence, Destiny.

First, their character. “For many walk,” walk being the idea of daily conduct, manner of life. This is their pattern. He says three things about their character. First of all, uniting themselves with a Christian church, they were not walking as they should do, but their walk was marked by sensuality. They are known for living for fleshly lusts. Notice verse 19, “whose god is the belly.”

What does it mean? The belly or the stomach is that organ which identifies the most basic of all natural physical needs and desires. We don’t need a big education, or to grow in holiness, or to gain maturity to realize it is basic. We are born with this physical need: hunger. By a figure of speech, the belly stands as a symbol of all physical, natural, sensual appetites and desires.

So when Paul describes these people as those whose God is the belly, he is saying earthly, sensual, physical needs and desires have become their God. Now, what is a person’s God? Whatever you and I love supremely and serve devotedly is our God, be it a person or a thing. One’s God is that person or thing which receives the best of what we have and our highest thoughts, emotions, actions, and energies for that. So if their belly is their God, it means they regularly think, love supremely, move, and do everything to devotedly serve this God, which is their belly.

So the first characteristic of the enemies of the cross is that their whole being and lives are animated only when they have a relationship with their physical needs and desires. They live for bodily desires and needs; they don’t have a higher goal in life. They don’t know of any higher spiritual joys of the Holy Spirit, or of love, joy, or peace. The only joys they know are: food for the body, clothes for the body, and sexual needs of their body, which are more important than their soul or God. That is their supreme God. Whatever religious things they do—they do them, they come to church, say they believe in Christ, and hear messages—all these are means to serve their belly god. If you had a way to enter their heart and see their secret, you would see that they daily bow down and prostrate themselves to worship their belly god, burn incense to it, and do a puja.

Such people will regularly come to church. Why? They love to hear about the doctrines of grace, justification, and the imputation of the righteousness of Christ as the only ground of a sinner’s acceptance. Such teaching, instead of helping them grow in their relationship with God, they abuse to pacify their conscience, but their real God was their belly, to which they yielded supreme loyalty. When they have food, clothing, and other needs met, they are very happy. If anything is lacking, they will turn the world upside down and are very sad and upset.

For some, it will express itself in the basic, grosser forms of gluttony, drunkenness, an orgy, or a party. In 2 Peter 2, Peter says they have eyes full of adultery, and they entice in the lusts of the flesh. Others may know the ill effects on the body of such a lifestyle. They are refined and cultured; they exercise, take care of their body, and express it in luxury, addiction to fashion, or buying expensive personal gadgets. They have higher tastes, but the common thing for all is that their physical desires are their God. This is the first thing about their character: all for the stomach, no higher goals.

These are enemies of the cross, and this enmity is a very old enmity. It has roots from the Garden of Eden. After men fell, God said to the serpent, “I will put enmity between your seed and the woman’s seed.” The serpent will have a seed, and they will follow the serpent’s curse: “On your belly you shall go, and you shall eat dust all the days of your life.” You will move only when it is related to the belly; nothing else will move you, and finally, dust you shall eat. They are old enemies who will be in the church as enemies of the cross.

Then the second thing about their character is this: it was not only marked by sensuality, but the apostle tells us it was marked by shamelessness. Look at the language of verse 19, “and whose glory is in their shame.”

It is not that they are worldly but are ashamed of it and want to change. No, they are so blind they glory in this shame, meaning they boast in the very things in which they actually should be ashamed. They should be deeply ashamed of calling themselves disciples of Christ yet always living like this and dishonoring Him. But in their blindness, they not only have a shame, they boast about this. They justify their life as right. They don’t even know what is wrong, but think their wrong is good. How blind!

“As a believer in Christ, is it right for you to live so worldly, only for bodily desires?” They boast, saying, “See, this shows how confident I am that I am saved by the righteousness of Christ, not by my works. I can enjoy and indulge in sensuality and excesses because of Christ’s work and have no fear of judgment or damnation, so confident I am that the righteousness of Christ alone is adequate for all of my needs.” Today, prosperity preachers have no shame, taking money from people, with a coat, suit, gold, or a luxury car. They should be ashamed, but they have become so shameless they glory that Christ has blessed them and glorify Christ with that. They did it under the guise of glorying in the cross of Christ. They gloried in their shame.

So they were not only marked by sensuality and shamelessness, but notice in the third place, their character was marked by worldliness, at the end of verse 19: “who set their mind on earthly things.”

The third one is an overarching, culminating expression of their character. It means that they were continually setting their minds, their interests, and their devotions fixed upon the things of this earth. These are things perhaps innocent in themselves, not sinful things, maybe good things of life. All their focus is on thinking about family, job, health, and the future, that which Jesus calls the cares of this life.

All things which are representative of earthly life in its innocence and earthly life without any higher spiritual goal or glory of God. Their only concerns are all earthly things, how to enjoy things of this earth. They have no eagerness or a strong idea of heaven. Heaven is just a nice future, a vague belief to avoid hell. They don’t want to be sanctified and go to heaven to live as heavenly citizens; they want to draw heaven to earth and make their lives on earth heaven.

They use Christ’s cross just to salve and pacify their conscience, just to give them peace as they continue to live worldly lives. They want a church so their children don’t become bad monsters, their husband doesn’t run away with another woman, and their wife doesn’t scream and beat him, but quietly submits and listens to him. That is all they need with Christ. He should come as a genie whenever there are problems or they are sad and do a miracle. They have no idea about discipleship, knowing Christ, following Christ, or obeying Christ. They will not follow Christ’s path and the apostle’s, but use all Christian privileges to make their worldly life comfortable. They are fully swallowed and filled with their worldly life on this earth. When in reality the basic mindset, the basic perspective, and the preoccupation of the soul was the earth. They set their minds on things of the earth; the same thing is used in Romans: “those of the flesh set their minds on things of the flesh.” All their focus and lifestyle are continuously on earth.

When a whole country is filled with such Christians, false teachers like the famous churches of Bethel AG, Johnson, and Paul Thangiah gather these people and teach their false gospel, saying Christ will give them money, bring prosperity, and blessing. All their focus and teaching and their church’s theology and sermons are all focused on man: how to have a good family, be prosperous in a job, get a miracle for health, get healing, how to get rich, and get more money by giving to the pastor.

What about us? Are we like this? What an exposure! The first two traits, sensuality and shamelessness, we may say we are not like that, but who can escape the third description? Worldliness, at the end of verse 19: “who set their mind on earthly things.”

One preacher said, “They have their thoughts and their affections occupied exclusively or supremely with the interest of this world: to make money or to spend it, how to become famous or influential, enjoy life here. Self-gratification is their aim and nothing more than this. God, holiness, and heaven are ideas which have little power in their lives. They hear of them on the Lord’s day, it is there in their confession, they may hear the greatest, most moving sermons, but it doesn’t affect their lives. Why? Because their minds are set on earthly things; worldly cares, like thorns, choke the word and bear no fruit. Worldly things occupy 100% of their thoughts and are the objects of their real desires. It is for these they live. For these they run their risks. For these they make their sacrifices. It is after these they run day and night, so that one day they can say like the rich fool: ‘O soul, thou hast much goods laid up for you for many years, take thine ease.’ Then they die in a few days, not rich towards God, in utter poverty.”

So the third trait is worldliness. We studied in John Bunyan in the interpreter’s house, the man who cannot look right, left, or up, only always down, and with the rake who was raking the muck, the manure. Above him in the gospel, God gives an eternal heavenly crown, but this guy is so fully occupied with worldly dust, blind to heavenly things, his eyes are constantly on the ground where he’s raking up the manure. In the same way, people are obsessed with the mud of the world: houses and cars.

… and money, bank accounts, trips, clothes, and wardrobes, and accumulating stuff. They don’t look up.

There are three descriptions of their character: sensuality, shamelessness, and worldliness.

Secondly, notice what the apostle tells us about their influence. He is concerned not only to describe their character but also their influence. In verse 18, he says, “For many walk of whom I told you often and now tell you even weeping that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ.”

What a horrible description of them: “Enemies of the cross.” It talks about their influence. Notice, he doesn’t just say they are “an” enemy of the cross. The definite article “the” is used, saying they are “the” main enemies of the cross.

Now, why does he describe their influence as one that is at enmity with the cross of Christ?

Well, think for a moment, and I think the answer will be quite clear. The cross of Christ refers to the central, saving act of God. In New Testament language, it has become a synonym for the Christian faith in its doctrine and in its practice. The cross of Christ had some goals, and these people’s lives completely destroy those goals.

Scripture talks about the purpose of the cross, the power of the cross, and the spirit of the cross. When we believe in the cross, this will be seen in our lives. But these people say they believe and join the church, and they live completely opposite to these goals. With their wrong example, they spread their poison like snakes to others in the church. They are the enemies of the cross because by their life they deny the very purpose, power, and spirit of the cross.

What was the purpose of the cross? It is to deliver us completely from sin and make us turn from sin. The purpose of the cross is that we must turn from sin. In Titus 2, we are told that Christ gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify for Himself a people zealous of good works. In Ephesians chapter 5, “Christ loved the church and gave Himself for the church.” Why? “That He might sanctify and cleanse it and present it to Himself a glorious church.”

The purpose of the cross is to deliver us completely from sin and make us turn from sin. It is not merely deliverance from the penalty of sin, but deliverance from the power and finally even the presence of sin when Jesus comes back. Remember the 3 P’s: deliverance from the penalty, power, and presence of sin. The purpose of the cross is the complete deliverance from sin. And here are people who say, “Oh yes, I am saved by the work of Christ upon the cross; I am delivered from the penalty of sin.” But by their sensuality, shamelessness, and worldliness, they show that they have not been delivered from the power of sin.

In Romans 6, Paul explains that the cross will not just save us from the penalty but gives us power over sin. The power of the cross is nothing less than the destruction of the old man. “Our old man has been crucified with Him.” That’s the power of the cross: to put to death the old man, that there might emerge a new man in Christ under the power and influence of the new life, even the resurrection life of the Lord Jesus. But by their sensuality, shamelessness, and worldliness, they are showing by their life and teaching others, “Oh, I can continue living such lives and yet believe Christ will take me to Heaven.” They denied not only the purpose of the cross but the power of the cross.

Furthermore, by their practice, they utterly, utterly negate the very spirit of the cross. When a sinner sees Christ’s selfless love, the Holy Spirit creates a spirit of the cross as self-denying love. And the Scripture tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:15, “He gave Himself for all that they who live should no longer henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him.” We not only get forgiveness and deliverance from the power of sin, but we also learn the very spirit of that cross, which penetrates our hearts, so that we have taken up a cross in self-denial and are following Him. We no longer live for these base bodily needs, setting our minds only on worldly things, but we deny those needs and learn to follow Christ. Jesus said, “Take your cross and follow me.” That is the Christian life: selfless love for Christ.

These people, who say they believe in Christ, join a church, and claim to be saved by Christ, but by their life and language and disposition and attitudes, lifestyle, and dress, and the totality of their being, completely destroy the purpose, power, and spirit of the cross. They are enemies of the cross. By their example and teaching, they never allow the purpose, power, and spirit of the cross to work on people and create a completely distorted form of Christianity. Thus, they are enemies of the cross.

They are the greatest enemy of the cross, whom God sees with utter anger and who are a great stench in the nostrils of God. They hinder the growth of the Gospel; they make Christianity a source of ridicule and a great stumbling block for Gentiles to believe the Gospel and come to Christ. Paul says of the Jews who say they are Jews but live as Gentiles in Romans 2:24, “The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.” That is what these people do.

Not only are they a hindrance to Gentiles outside the church, but within the church, they are a hindrance to church growth. They are never faithful to their membership responsibilities. God’s blessing is hindered when a church tolerates such people as believers. They are enemies of the cross. They are Judases among the apostles who betray Christ with a kiss. The greatest, most unbearable pain is betrayal not from enemies but from those who pose as friends. They give the greatest pain to Christ’s heart. They pierce Him and crucify Christ afresh and put Him to an open shame. The apostle, moved by the Holy Spirit, is so brokenhearted that he had to write this with tears.

Because of their influence, the Gospel has not progressed and the church doesn’t grow. They were very subtle. The church can manage a thousand devils outside the church, but one devil inside posing as an angel is more dangerous. One Achan inside the camp caused so much destruction. Our greatest cause of fear is from the crafty “wolves in sheep’s clothing” that devour the flock. Their influence is deadly. It is against such people that Apostle Paul uses the worst title in holy wrath, shedding the bitterest tears of sorrow. They are “the enemies of the cross of Christ.”

After explaining their character and their terrible influence, he talks about their destiny.

Their Destiny

In verse 19, as if to shock them from the start, before talking about their character, he states their end. “Whose end is destruction.” Look, whoever they are, don’t follow them. If you follow the way they live, you will face their end. Their end is perdition. Whatever they may boast about going to Heaven and believing in Christ’s resurrection, people with such a sensual, shameless, and worldly character are enemies of the cross, and their end is fixed as hell. Scripture clearly says, “Do not be deceived, God cannot be mocked. If you sow to the flesh, you shall of the flesh reap corruption.” “The minding of the flesh is death.” “Without holiness, no man shall see the Lord.”

The word “perdition” is the awful, frightening, and unhinging place of hell. It is a place where the consummate wrath and fury of Almighty God are poured out upon sinners, pressing them into a state and place of conscious, everlasting torment and woe. If all those who do not believe the cross will suffer eternal hell, can you imagine the horror of hell for these enemies of the cross? When you imagine it, you feel like saying it is “better that they were not born.” It will start with a terrible shock. At least sinners will have some idea they will suffer, but these people blindly go on until judgment, thinking they will go to Heaven. After judging all to hell, they will be singled out and will hear a terrible sentence. They will come running, saying, “Lord, Lord, we came to church, we did all those things.” But He will say, “Depart from Me, I never knew you!” “Though you came to My church, though you were a member of My church, though you took baptism and the Lord’s Supper, by your character you lived as an enemy of the cross. I never knew you.”

If there were a hottest place in hell, a darkest place, a suffering that racks the whole body and soul with intense pain, if there were the hottest fire that shall more tremendously scorch the body, if there be pangs that shall more effectually twist the soul in agonies a million ways, these hypocrites will face that.

He whose god was his belly never learned to deny his bodily desires. What a desperate situation! Those desires will be at a maximum in hell with no object to satisfy them. Sometimes in police punishment, they show a drunkard wine but don’t give one drop. They show food but don’t give it. Oh, the horror! These who lived with their belly as their god will curse every food they ate, all the enjoyments of the flesh.

They would beat their breasts and cry for all eternity, “Oh, if I had died as the worst sinner, a drunkard, a murderer, a rapist, I would not have to suffer so much for eternity. But to wear the name of Christ, to be in the church, and to deny the cross in life and lead everyone astray, such wrath!”

They not only carry the guilt of their own sins, but all those who followed their example will be on them. Oh, what horror they will face! Who can explain what they are facing?

If one enemy of the cross could come back from hell and describe to us today the horrible end he is facing, we would shudder and sweat and not sleep for years. But God’s wisdom says that if you don’t hear His word preached now and repent, even if someone comes from hell, you will not change.

So Paul says, “Oh, my Philippians, listen to me, I am telling you with tears. Do not follow such people whose character is sensuality, shamelessness, and worldliness, and think you are going to Heaven. Their influence in your life will destroy the purpose of the cross, the power of the cross, and the spirit of the cross. They are enemies of the cross, and their end is terrible destruction. Follow my example as a church, and those who follow our pattern.”

Application

What is the application for us today? Well, if churches under the scrutinizing eye of the apostles were plagued by such influences, who are we to think that we will be exempt from them?

First application: Beware of the influence of the enemies of the cross in your life. Beware of any professing Christian whose influence by life or teaching weakens in you the purpose of the cross to turn from sin, the power of the cross to overcome sin, and the spirit of the cross to live for Christ, not for yourself.

For then, as now, there are professing Christians who can be in our church, who are not following the example of Paul’s pattern. They claim they believe Christ died; they rejoice in Christ’s resurrection. All their faith becomes an excuse or a license for serving the flesh. Whatever influence or teaching spoils your conscience, makes you less sensitive to sin, and makes you deviate from God’s law, that is not biblical doctrine. That’s the devil’s imitation. They turn the grace of God into a reason for a dissolute life.

I have to say it with tears: just as in that church, there are such people in our church who can be described like this. They become members, saying they have truly turned from sin and the world and have decided to follow Christ. But all their focus is on the world. Their influence and participation are no support to the church; they do not contribute to the growth of the Gospel.

I am not saying we will be perfect. On one side, we have to enjoy our fellowship with God through Christ’s work; we are God’s children, adopted. But that should always lead us to more holiness. Yes, we have remaining sin; we fail. But how long will we continue to live a downward life with excuses? We should carefully deal with sin through confession and repentance and plead with God’s grace to overcome that sin in the future. Anyone who says you don’t have to be so overly worried about remaining sin, “everyone sins,” “Oh, I need not be so scrupulous. I need not be so careful. I need not be so sensitive,” my friend, beware. Beware of any person or any teaching whose influence weakens in you the realization of the purpose of the cross.

One of the surest indexes of a person’s true state is the kind of people he voluntarily chooses to be with the most. Here are two groups of people for you: Paul and those who follow his model, or the enemies of the cross. Whom do you choose? Do you choose to be with the Pauls and those who share his spirit, who are aggressively pursuing to know and become like Christ, who take sin seriously? Or do you feel uncomfortable around people like that and choose the crowd that can laugh and snicker at the same sins you snicker at? Things that we should be ashamed of, we laugh at.

You’d better ask yourself that. There’s only one kind of people who are going to make it to Heaven: the people who follow the apostle’s model. Are you somewhere in that line? Oh, if you’re not among them, may I urge you to join them? You can only join them today by repenting of your ways. How carefully you and I should think about what our influence is creating in others’ lives. Is it fulfilling the purpose of the cross, the power of the cross, and the spirit of the cross? We have to learn to cultivate a tender conscience in all things.

Second exhortation: Don’t resist the repeated warnings of God’s word. Notice what Paul said in verse 18: “For many walk, of whom I told you often and now tell you even weeping.” He told the Philippians, “When I was among you, I told you often about these people, and now I tell you again, even with tears.” In Acts, he spent three years just warning them.

Paul says to the Philippian church and to our church today, “Beware, these people would be hovering around every Gospel church.” Not only would the legalist Judaizers come and try to spoil your appreciation of the infinite perfection of Christ and His righteousness received by faith alone, but the direct opposite, these libertines, these antinomians, would be there. In your Christian progress, these two lions—legalism and antinomianism—will always try to drag you from the path, like in Pilgrim’s Progress. Always check if you are being influenced by either. If so, you are not progressing on the heavenly path.

So you need this warning regularly. So he says, “I told you often. But now, I tell you again, weeping.” Dear people, don’t grow weary of being warned about those things that will bring death to your soul. Don’t say, “Pastor, come on, why so much warning? Tell us encouraging, nice things. Give us feel-good sermons. Why are you repeating the same warnings again and again? Yes, I know the warning. Don’t keep talking to us like children, again and again, with warnings, making us uncomfortable.” No, no, we all need these warnings. If you have a love for your soul, you will not resent biblically based, biblically balanced, and biblically urgent warnings. David says the glory of the word of God is that “by them is thy servant warned, and in the keeping of them there is great reward.”

Finally, let us all go home with this searching question, a personal question. I believe before it is too late, God wants us to ask this question. Don’t allow your deceptive heart to avoid this question. And the question is this: Do verses 18 and 19 describe you? You call yourself a believer. You believe Christ died for you. You are well instructed in the doctrine of justification by faith through the imputation of the righteousness of Christ. Do verses 18 and 19 describe you?

What is your god? What do you think about a lot, what do you pursue after, what do you love supremely? Your god is the person or thing to which you yield supreme allegiance, which draws forth the expenditure of your energies, which fills your mind, which is the subject of your emotions. Is your God the God and Father of the Lord Jesus and His blessed Son, who is in Heaven, or is it your belly on this Earth? Food, clothing, home, car, job, position, prestige—who is your god, man? Have you not tasted greater spiritual joys so that these become your greatest joys in life?

Have you set your mind on the things of the world or the things of Heaven? Is the pattern of your life earthiness or Heavenliness? You had better ask yourself because if you fit this description, God says you’re an enemy of the cross of Christ. Whatever you say about your love for Christ, you are an enemy of the very cross you claim to love. What a terrible description: “enemies of the cross.” By having your belly as your god and fixing your mind on Earth, all your influence is to destroy the purpose, power, and spirit of the cross. As a nominal Christian, if you continue to live like that, you are a hindrance to the Gospel and a hindrance to the church. You don’t rise above your daily needs for food, family, and clothes. You just have time for Sunday morning service. Mark this truth of God in your mind: the inevitable end of the enemies of the cross is perdition.

This calls for a complete self-examination and repentance. It is like the Lord saying, “One of you will betray me.” Each of us has to examine, “Is it I?” We are all so prone to this, to crossing the line. Who can stand before this and say, “My conscience is clear”? We all feel guilty. The Holy Spirit intends each of us to examine ourselves. And then, if you say it exactly describes you, that guilt and burden are what the Holy Spirit will use to transform us.

If we are serious about the Christian life, about going to Heaven, we need to repent. We need to change. And as a church, we must follow the apostle’s model.

If in any way this verse describes you, what a call to repentance and to turn from that idol and begin to serve the living and true God, or you will suffer the worst hell. Unless you repent and become a friend of Christ, and repent so that the purpose, power, and spirit of the cross become the regulative, formative influence upon your own spirit, self-denial, and the pursuit of the end for which He died becomes the real goal of your life, to be a holy man, a holy woman, you have no grounds to claim that you’re a Christian.

See the Holy Spirit, through the apostle, standing with tears. In Acts, he says, “For three years with tears, I warned.” Why? Because these are not scare tactics; these are true realities. He believed what he preached. Perdition was not just a word to Paul. By faith, he had seen the lake of fire. By faith, he had heard the groans of the damned. By faith, he had heard the agonizing, plaintive wail and the gnashing of teeth. He knows all enemies of the cross, whatever they may say, will go to hell.

May God wake you up before it is too late.