How To Experience Real Freedom Series

LIFE IS AN ATTITUDE – PICK A GOOD ONE

How To Experience Real Freedom

Sunday March 25, 2007

Scripture Reference: Romans 12:2, 1 Peter 2:13-25

Intro.

A. Today I am sharing with you the last attitude in this series on developing attitudes that lead us into the life God desires for all of us. I said last week that I wasn’t looking forward to this day and I’m not. I am grateful that these sermons are available for us to listen to on our sermon player and I will tell you that one of the hits our sermon player gets each week is from yours truly. I have been listening to these messages while I am in the office during the week. I do that for two reasons, one is that I want to hear how the message actually came out of my mouth and consider ways I can improve my presentation of my message. The second reason is more important though and that reason is that I want to hear God’s word again for myself so that I can be challenged and encouraged to grow in these important areas of my life. I want to encourage you again to take advantage of our sermon player. There are so many different ways you can use it and ways that you can give it away to others. I think it is a fantastic ministry tool.

Trans. Well enough of this lamenting let’s move along to explore this last positive attitude that we need to develop in our lives to replace the negative attitude we explored last week of rebellion.

B. The attitude we are going to be learning about today is the attitude of submission. I wonder what is the attitude you have towards submission? What are the feelings you have when I bring up the word submission? If you are like me and I know you won’t admit it if you are but if you are anything like me you quickly discover that you have within you a built in resistance to submission. The very word itself makes you feel just a little bit uncomfortable. You probably find yourself saying something like this, “OK, but…” In other words you believe that submission is OK but only up to a certain point. You might be willing to submit but with certain qualifications.

1. Why is it that we have this built in resistance to submission? Well I think there are two definite reasons we are not friendly towards submission. From the spiritual side it is because we are all sinners. We have all been born into sin and therefore we all have a bent towards the attitude of rebellion instead of submission. The second reason we have this resistance towards submission is because submission is something that has been both misunderstood and abused in our society and for those reasons we don’t care for it a whole lot. What we need to understand at this point is that just because something is misunderstood or has been abused that doesn’t mean it is now a bad thing or something that needs to be gotten rid of. It just means that we need to get a proper understanding of the attitude and we need to ignore those who have abused it. There are many things in our society that have been either misunderstood or abused but we don’t abandon them. The institution of marriage comes to mind. There have been many abuses when it comes to marriage but we still get married. Why? Because we believe that marriage is a good and honorable thing and it is something we feel will enrich our lives. So let’s not abandon submission because it has been misunderstood or abused.

B. Here is something else I think we need to know as we begin to look into this attitude of submission. Submission is a universal principle. What I mean by that is that submission is not something for select group of people. Submission is not something that only concerns a certain portion of the population. Submission is something that all of us need to do whatever station in life God has placed us.

1. Submission is not just for Christians it is for everyone.

2. Submission is not just for wives it is for husbands as well.

3. Submission is not just for children it is for parents also.

4. Submission is not just for employees it is for employers also.

5. Submission is not just for students it is for teachers as well.

6. Submission is not just for the congregation it is for pastors also.

7. The fact is life runs much more smoothly and is more enjoyable when we all learn how to willing submit ourselves to those God has placed in authority over us.