Talk

Counterfeit Spirituality

Ben Stuart
February, 13, 2022

Spirituality is not conformity to morality for the sake of acceptance. It’s a pursuit of intimacy with the God who accepted us.

Ben Stuart brings a crucial message about what true spirituality looks like. Spirituality is not about doing a list of things to be good, it’s about belonging to God. And the more we pursue God, the more we become like Him.

Scripture References

6The
Lord
your God will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live.
1Further, my brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord! It is no trouble for me to write the same things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you.
2Watch out for those dogs, those evildoers, those mutilators of the flesh.
3For it is we who are the circumcision, we who serve God by his Spirit, who boast in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh—
4though I myself have reasons for such confidence.

If someone else thinks they have reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; 6as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.

5circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee;
6as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.
7But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ.
8What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ
9and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.
10I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,
11and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.
12Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.
13Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,
14I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
15All of us, then, who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you.
16Only let us live up to what we have already attained.

Ben Stuart
Ben Stuart
Ben Stuart is the pastor of Passion City Church D.C. Prior to joining Passion City Church, Ben served as the executive director of Breakaway Ministries on the campus of Texas A&M. He also earned a master’s degree in historical theology from Dallas Theological Seminary. He and his wife, Donna, live to inspire and equip people to walk with God for a lifetime.