The Gospel of Self-Effort - Love Worth Finding - October 18

Audio By Carbonatix

October 18, 2025 – The Gospel of Self-Effort

Genesis 11:3-4

Sermon: 1883 The Coming Kingdom of Christ, Part 2

Pray Over This

“Then they said to one another, ‘Come, let us make bricks and bake them thoroughly.’ They had brick for stone, and they had asphalt for mortar. And they said, ‘Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.’”

Genesis 11:3-4

Ponder This

I heard a lady speaking on a talk show in Memphis about the gospel of self-effort. It’s a contradiction in terms because there is no good news to save us in our own effort. This is what happened at Babel: Babylonian builders who were trying to make a name for themselves said, “Let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach up to Heaven; let us make us a name.” These people took mud and bricks they had fashioned with their own hands, and then they began to build this high rise to Hell, fashioned from their own wit, their own wisdom, and their own ingenuity. Verse three begins, “And they said one to another.” They never consulted God. Instead, they pooled their wickedness and their ignorance. They dethroned God and enthroned their own intellect.

This is our struggle today as much as it was theirs. We’re still trying to do it with brick and slime, only our slime and brick are computers. We are seeking to build our utopia. We’ve substituted our own wit and wisdom for God, and we’re trying to build a golden age with minds, machinery, and money, and it can’t be done.

• What are some ways you have valued your own ways over God’s?
• What are the things you are striving for right now? Are you depending on God or trying to achieve for yourself?

Practice This

Talk to a mentor or friend about the goals you have set for yourself and ask your friend to hold you accountable for enthroning God in your plans.  

For more from Love Worth Finding and Pastor Adrian Rogers, please visit www.lwf.org. 

You can also listen to Adrian Rogers at OnePlace.com.