Category: Purity

Proverbs 30:12

“There is a kind who is pure in his own eyes,
Yet is not washed from his filthiness.”

Q: How can we seem clean in our own eyes, while we are actually filthy?

Psalm 51:2, 51:7

“Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity

And cleanse me from my sin.”

“Purify me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;

Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.”

Q: Do you feel like God has washed you and made you clean from your sin? Why or why not?

 

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John 13:8

“Peter said to Him, ‘Never shall You wash my feet!’ Jesus answered him, ‘If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.’”

Q: Why, like Peter, is it that we need to allow Jesus to wash us clean? Why do we fight Jesus from washing us clean from our sin?

Luke 11:38-41

“When the Pharisee saw it, he was surprised that He [Jesus] had not first ceremonially washed before the meal. But the Lord [Jesus] said to him, ‘Now you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and of the platter; but inside of you, you are full of robbery and wickedness. You foolish ones, did not He who made the outside make the inside also? But give that which is within as charity, and then all things are clean for you.”

Q: What is Jesus teaching this Pharisee? How does this apply in your life?

 

Paul

Acts 22:16

“Now why do you delay? Get up and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.’”

Q: Is there an area in your life that you believe is too dirty for God to clean? Why are you delaying taking this sin to God?

 

Peter

1 Peter 1:22

“Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart,”

Q: How does obedience to the truth purify our souls? How does obedience to the truth give us sincere love for one another?

 

APPLICATION:

How do these passages relate to me today? What changes do they bring to my life?

LOCKER ROOM:

Is there anything this week that you have been enslaved to, and how we can help you?

Proverbs 23:29-35

“Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has contentions? Who has complaining? Who has wounds without cause? Who has redness of eyes? Those who linger long over wine, those who go to taste mixed wine. Do not look on the wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup, when it goes down smoothly; at the last it bites like a serpent and stings like a viper. Your eyes will see strange things and your mind will utter perverse things. And you will be like one who lies down in the middle of the sea, or like one who lies down on the top of a mast. ‘They struck me, but I did not become ill; they beat me, but I did not know it. When shall I awake? I will seek another drink.’”

Q: What does the last line of this proverb say about alcohol and pot addiction?

Proverbs 20:1

“Wine is a mocker, strong drink a brawler, and whoever is intoxicated by it is not wise.”

Q: How does a “strong drink” inhibit your freedom? How does this relate to marijuana use?

In biblical times, “strong drink” (sikera in the original Greek of the New Testament) referred to any unmixed or undiluted wine. When Jesus turned water into wine in John 2, He didn’t make sikera; He made oinos, weak wine diluted with water. When Paul told Timothy in 1 Timothy 5:23 that he should drink wine, he told him to do it for medicinal purposes (for a stomach problem). Again, it was oinos, not sikera.

Psalms 15:1 & 2

“O Lord, who may abide in Your tent? Who may dwell on Your holy hill? He who walks with integrity, and works righteousness, and speaks truth in his heart.”

Q: Regarding the law, obedience to parents and being a witness to your friends, what does “walking in integrity” say about using alcohol and drugs or porn?

 

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Matthew 5:16

“Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”

Q: Describe the encouragement and exhortation this verse brings to you about addictive substances.

Matthew 18:6

“…but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck, and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.”

Q: What light does this verse shed on the practice of casual drinking or smoking pot? Describe a scenario that you might be faced with where this verse becomes a practical reality. Paul

John 8:34 – “Jesus answered them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin.’”

Q: Why is alcohol and pot so addictive, and what harm have you observed from it?

 

Peter

1 Peter 2:12

“Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation.”

Q: How does an alcohol and drug-free life become a witness to your friends?

 

APPLICATION:

How do these passages relate to me today? What changes do they bring to my life?

LOCKER ROOM:

Is there anything this week that you have been enslaved to, and how we can help you?

 

Proverbs 5:20-23

“For why should you, my son, be exhilarated with an adulteress and embrace the bosom of a foreigner? For the ways of a man are before the eyes of the Lord, and He watches all his paths. His own iniquities will capture the wicked, and he will be held with the cords of his sin. He will die for lack of instruction, and in the greatness of his folly he will go astray.”

Q: What is the issue being addressed by Solomon? What is the result of sexual immorality?

Proverbs 16:25

Q: Why is it that our sin seems “right” to us? How have you experienced sin leading to death?

 

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Matthew 5:27-28

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’; but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

Q: How honest have your eyes been this week? When do your lustful eyes cause you to sin?

Matthew 19:4-6

“And He answered and said, ‘Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together let no man separate.”

Q: What is God’s design for marriage? Why do we experience internal death when we do not follow God’s design for marriage?

 

Paul

Romans 6:23

“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord.”

Q: What is the result of your sin? How do you receive the free gift of eternal life from God?

 

Peter

1 Peter 2:11

“Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul.”

Q: What is one area of your life that you need to abstain from “fleshly lusts”?

 

APPLICATION:

How do these passages relate to me today? What changes do they bring to my life?

LOCKER ROOM:

Is there anything this week that you have been enslaved to, and how we can help you?

 

Proverbs 21:8

“The way of a guilty man is crooked, but as for the pure, his conduct is upright.”

Q: What is “upright conduct?”

Proverbs 21:12

“The righteous one considers the house of the wicked, turning the wicked to ruin.”

Q: What do righteousness and purity have in common?

Q: How do you pursue righteousness?

Proverbs 21:23

“He who guards his mouth and his tongue, guards his soul from troubles.”

Q: How do you guard your tongue?

Proverbs 19:1 & 18:7

“Better is a poor man who walks in his integrity than he who is perverse in speech and is a fool.”

“A fool’s mouth is his ruin, and his lips are the snare of his soul.”

Q: Why are your words an accurate measurement of the degree of purity in your life?

Psalms 119:7-9

“I shall give thanks to You with uprightness of heart, when I learn Your righteous judgments. I shall keep Your statutes; do not forsake me utterly!”

Q: How does God’s Word develop uncompromising moral purity in your life?

Psalm 119:37

“Turn away my eyes from looking at vanity, and revive me in Your ways.”

Q: How can you turn this Psalm into a personal prayer?

 

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Matthew 6:22-23

“The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!”

Q: What role does the “eye” play in maintaining purity?

Q: Why does an “eye of darkness” fill the entire body with darkness?

 

Paul

2 Timothy 2:20-22

“Now in a large house there are not only gold and silver vessels, but also vessels of wood and of earthenware, and some to honor and some to dishonor. Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from these things, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified, useful to the Master, prepared for every good work. Now flee from youthful lusts and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.” (NASB)

2 Timothy 2:22

“Run away from infantile indulgence. Run after mature righteousness – faith, love, peace – joining those who are in honest and serious prayer before God.” (The Message)

Q: Why is purity so vitally important in order to be “useful to the Master?”

 

Peter

1 Peter 1:14-16

“As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy.’”

Q: What would it take for you to completely abandon your “former-ness” and elect a standard of holiness in your life?

 

APPLICATION:

How do these passages relate to me today? What changes do they bring to my life?

LOCKER ROOM:

Is there anything this week that you have been enslaved to, and how we can help you?