Purity, Maturity, Destiny
Your Mission Possible: Purity, Maturity, Destiny
How do we achieve our Mission Possible? We follow Jesus’s awesome example and live lives of Purity, Maturity, and Destiny, as we walk in ever increasing Intimacy with the Father. Jesus conquered His giants even as He passed through the Wilderness of testing. Staying pure and true, Jesus grew into the universe-changing call upon His life, making the most mature of decisions to lay down His life for the lost. He then fulfilled His personal destiny in the most amazing way possible, while walking in intimate relationship with His Father. Is it any wonder the Father is so proud of His Son?! We then—if we are truly Christ-ians—must fulfill the unique destiny set before each of us.
If Jesus can do it, anyone can!
Purity: The Death to Self
Mission completion for every Christian hinges on two particular accomplishments: You must (1) put to death your flesh (that is, your broken, sinful nature, as you deny your instinctual human drives); and (2) defeat the specific demonic schemes against you. Read that sentence again; it’s that important. Memorize it.
Two things, Agent Hunt: deny yourself and defeat the devil. Otherwise, no Mission Possible! And where better to start than sexual purity, where you have so often indulged your flesh and bowed down before demons?!
Purity is so extremely important I’ve written entire books on the subject, so I mention but a few thoughts here. The Spirit leads Jesus into the Wilderness (Matthew 4)—this isn’t the devil’s idea; Lucifer is just a pawn in God’s plan. The Spirit understands that Jesus in His humanity must be tested first. Like the Israelites, Jesus wasn’t ready yet for the Promised Land, not without first defeating the giants in the land. What’s the first giant Jesus must overcome? Hunger. That’s right, people, it’s Esau and the “stew test” all over again. The devil is trying to buy Jesus’s priceless destiny with that same old cheeseburger! A purified Christian must learn how to die to self, not just in saying no to sin, but also at times to even normal, healthy drives like the need for food and sex.
Get this, Agent Hunt: Choosing a cheeseburger outside of God’s will is just as sinful as choosing a prostitute! One mouthful of bread (during the 40-day fast), and Jesus’s sin would have changed the entire universe. And likewise, if Jesus had ever sinned sexually. Scripture has nothing to say about how Jesus lived sexually pure, but it does explicitly state that He was tempted in every way you and I are tested (Hebrews 4:15). So, yes, that means Jesus woke up sometimes with that early morning erection, all revved up and no place to go! Why do you suppose Jesus was such a great carpenter? Instead of masturbating, He took out His virgin frustrations building furniture! Jesus gets that few things suck like being hungry and horny, and yet He stayed pure because He understood that to fulfill self outside of God’s will is a sin that always produces bad fruit.
Hear me, especially those of you who are currently single, separated, or divorced. You need to totally reframe your thinking about sexual purity and abstinence and see it as a fasting in the Wilderness, a test of utterly vital importance. Single, separated, married, or divorced, God has you now exactly where He wants you! Only in the desert can you die to the instinctual part of you that always wants to put YOU first.
This is what Scripture means when it talks about the seed falling to the ground and dying. Every time you say no to a second look, to masturbation, to something erotic on TV, to something sexual outside of marriage—well, a little bit of the nasty old you crawls under a rock and dies. As it should! There’s no quick fix here, just a slow painful death that, ironically, starts slowly but surely, turning into new life. Like a butterfly crawling out of chrysalis, you will turn into something beautiful beyond your imagining!
Indeed, take a moment and imagine what it would be like to live consistently pure like Jesus. How would this change your relationship with God? Imagine taking communion with a clean conscience! Imagine being able to hear the Holy Spirit without interference! Imagine God’s power and hope and love flowing through you freely! Imagine your spouse trusting you again! Imagine a healed marriage! Imagine the relationship with your children! Imagine the satisfaction for living out your destiny! Imagine doing what you were born to do!
And if I can pass the tests and walk through Wilderness—you can too!
Maturity: Step-by-Step Submission to God’s Will
The next Wilderness test is all about immaturity versus maturity (Matthew 4:4-7). We don’t get to test God; God tests us! Immature decisions test the limits of God’s patience, not to mention hindering us from achieving His will for our lives. Jumping off the top of the temple on a dare is just a stupid teenager stunt. Esau would have been all over this one! Dude, great idea! Watch this!
Thankfully for us, Jesus was growing into wisdom and stature and saw through the devil’s scheming. Jesus understood the deeper and oh-so-critical truth that impulsive decisions, without the leading of the Spirit, are always disobedient decisions.
Pay attention, Agent Hunt! You don’t do something just because you can, even if it’s a good thing—you do only what the Spirit wants you to do. Jesus said He did only what His Father commanded Him to do. Jesus obeyed His Father knowing full well that every evil thing of all time was about to be placed upon His back. This is the essence of maturity!
Indeed, Jesus’s submission to the Father’s will in the Garden of Gethsemane is the single greatest act of maturity the universe will ever see. I submit to you that the Garden of Gethsemane was the defining moment of Jesus’s life, the crowning jewel of His personal destiny. Everyone focuses on the Cross, on His death and resurrection, but these things were out of His control once He made that staggeringly, incredibly mature decision in the Garden. Jesus could not crucify Himself, much less kill Himself, and the Father raised Him from the dead; so it’s in the Garden that Jesus’s obedience literally pays the price for Adam’s disobedience in yet another Garden so long ago. Greater love has no one than this, except when that Person is literally taking upon His spotless self each and every fallen moment since the Fall. This is the incredible example Jesus sets before us, even as He calls each of us to likewise: to lay down our lives for others.
Maturity is a higher level test than purity, but you don’t get to the maturity test without first passing the purity test. Impure people never become mature people—how can you learn to choose between the good and the best when you are always choosing the worst?! Sounds again like the story that used to be my life. And yet, screwup that I was, if I can slowly but surely learn to grow up and get my act together—you can too!
The next book in this series, Special Ops!, is all about maturity. I will teach you step-by-step how to overcome the most common obstacles to Christian maturity. Just imagine the new you consistently disciplined in everything you did. Devotions. Exercise. Finances. Career choices. Honesty. Purity. Integrity. Imagine how your life (and your family’s life) would change if you could fulfill all the good goals God has set before you. Imagine if you instinctually chose what is righteous and honorable just as easily as you once chose sin.
Sound far-fetched? Well, keep reading, O ye of little faith, because I’ve seen hundreds of people choose to grow up in God!
Destiny: Take Your Specific Promised Land
You don’t get to the destiny test unless you first pass the purity test and make serious progress in the maturity test. This is why the devil saves this oh-so-important test for last (Matthew 4:8-10). Remember, evil doesn’t necessarily mean dumb. Like any good con man, the devil was trying to soften up Jesus before he went for the jugular. You see, the worship test is where Jesus defines His destiny. As I stated before, everyone (even the Son of God!) gets a bona fide choice of mission, but there is no neutrality. Nobody gets to do a Switzerland. You either worship and serve Satan, or you worship and serve the Father. Your destiny will unfold depending on the choices you make throughout life. In other words, we become like who and what we worship!
Completing your Mission Possible makes all the pain and testing in the Wilderness worthwhile. (I’m speaking from lots of experience.) It’s only once you’ve stepped out of the desert and into your personal Promised Land that you can finally look back with context and understand: Oh, so that’s why that happened, and, That’s why I had to wrestle for so long with that particular demon. Not to mention the deep, deep satisfaction of watching your dreams come true.
You see, the devil offered what he did not own and could not give (the kingdoms of the world—and its kings—are appointed by God) for what was rightfully already part of Jesus’s inheritance, pending His passing through Wilderness of testing. Jesus is the King of Kings; there is no other name before His; all knees, even knobby Luciferian knees, bow before Him. So why on earth would you—having been made likewise a king and priest—keep groveling on your face before the devil, trying to gain what Satan does not own and can never give?!
And yes, you guessed it: the third book in my trilogy—Battle Stations!—is all about who you are, why you are here, and how you take what is rightfully yours. Imagine for a moment watching your dreams come to pass. Imagine the joy of seeing God use you to change people’s lives, even as He has changed yours.
Indeed, He will do more that we ask or imagine, if we are faithful. In my wildest dreams, I never imagined that I would someday set people free all over the world. I have counseled people from Siberia to South Africa and Tanzania to Taiwan. God took my mess and turned it into ministry. And yes, I know I sound like a once broken record, but if God can do this for me, He can certainly do it for you. Are you willing to pay the price and choose Purity, Maturity, and Destiny?
Your Brother in the Battle,
Timothy
Ready to start your Mission Possible? Contact Pureheart today for more information
Excerpt taken from Pureheart Ministry’s Basic Training! Stage 1: Operation Purity
Copyright ©2023 Timothy Davis