life in the spirit

Introduction

“And now these three remain, faith, hope and love, but the greatest of these is love.” So says the final verse of 1 Corinthians 13. And as I meditate on that, I think about what does it mean these three remain? Could it be at the end of your life, when there's nothing else left? You're conscious that you're dying, you're at the end of your life, you're not sure what else is left, these three will still be there: Faith, hope, and love, at the end of your life. But you know what's gonna happen if you believe in Christ? Soon faith and hope itself will drop off. Faith will become sight, and you'll no longer need to hope for what you do not have, you'll have it. And you know what we'd be left with then? Love.

And as Jonathan Edwards put it in an incredible sermon I read, “Heaven is a World of Love.” You will step across that divide that river of death, and you'll step into a world of love that can scarcely be described. A world rich with love, with the consummation of love, with love incarnate there on his throne, Jesus Christ, and your own heart will be transformed in an instant and all the things you labored for all your life to love God with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength, to love your neighbor as yourself, will be instantly given you as a gift. And you'll be transformed into a person of love, fit for a world of love. And you'll be welcomed in at that point. That's the consummation. Isn't it? That's what we're looking for.

Heaven is a world of love. But this world is not a world of love. It's not characterized by love. It ought to be, but it isn't. And so, we are surrounded by 6 billion people, and very few of them really know what love is, have experienced the love of Christ. Few there are that find it, Jesus said. And sometimes in the simplest acts of kindness and generosity, there can be an oasis of love in the middle of all that, that gives us a foretaste of that future world of love. And how sweet is that?

Sometimes, it can even happen while watching a movie. It doesn't always happen, but sometimes it can happen. And here I'm talking about a really sweet and pure love scene. Not that sordid type that we know about. But I was watching this movie called Driving Miss Daisy, sometime ago. Maybe you've seen it, about an elderly African American gentleman, Morgan Freeman, who is hired to drive around an even more elderly Southern lady. And the movie just traces the development of their relationship. As it goes first from kind of suspicion and not really sure where they are with each other, of an employer-employee relationship and that's all. She didn't really want him to drive. She doesn't use him. He drives along and she's walking and will not get in the car. And it's quite a scene.

So there's some mistrust but as the relationship develops, a really beautiful thing to see, just friendship is what it is. Friendship.

And the consummation of that is, at the end, the final scene, and by this time she's quite elderly and she is suffering from dementia, and she's in a nursing home. And she's sitting at a table, and it's Thanksgiving and Morgan Freeman goes to visit her. And she's got a piece of pie there. And it's on the table and there's a fork there, but she doesn't seem to be aware of it. And so he sits down and he's trying to talk to her. And he just decides to feed her the pie. And that's just one of the most spectacular scenes in all moviedom for me. Like, that's boring. No, it's not boring, it's awesome because as he feeds her the pie, he seems to be eating it through her. As though her joy is his joy. As though the taste of the pie in her mouth as though he is enjoying it. He doesn't have a bite of the pie. Your pleasure is my pleasure, your joy is my joy. Your pie is my pie, and I'm not taking it from you. You go ahead and eat it all, but I can enjoy it through you.

Friends, that is that horizontal love that God is commanding of us here in this passage today. That we would love our neighbor like that, that we would love our neighbor as ourselves. And you know, we can't do it. Our heart is so hardened and we're so corrupt in sin that we can't do that naturally. We need a supernatural work of God to fulfill this command. And that supernatural work of God is available to us through the grace that's given us in Christ Jesus.

He came, it says in Ephesians 2, talking about the hostility between Jews and Gentiles, that's the context, but I'm gonna extend it just to all human relationships. He came to destroy, to put to death all hostility between the two. And to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace. He's come to do that, friends, not just with Jew and Gentile, but with people. Person A and Person B, in Christ, becoming one together. And in this way, I think, Christ died to fulfill this second commandment. He died loving his neighbor as himself. He died in order that we might love our neighbors as ourselves.

So, let's set this in context. You know, it's the final week of Jesus' life. Jesus is having strife and conflict with his enemies, who are seeking to kill him. They hate him, and they try to lay one trap after another for him. In Matthew 22, the Pharisees and Herodians bring him this question on taxation. “Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not?” He deals with that. Then the Sadducees come with that ridiculous question on resurrection and whose wife will she be of the seven. He deals with that. And then this expert in the law tests him with this question, “‘Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?’ And Jesus replied: ‘“Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” All the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.’”

A Dark History

When the Vertical Goes, the Horizontal Goes With It

Now, for the last two sermons, we've looked at the first and greatest commandment, it had its proper place. It comes first. It should be first. Talk more about that in a moment, but that is that vertical relationship toward God, that we should love God with all of our hearts above everything else. But we cannot love God and hate our neighbors. And again, I'm gonna talk more about that. And so, it must move out. Jesus gives beyond what the lawyer asked, a second commandment which he said is like it, love your neighbor as yourself.

And so, we come to this issue of our horizontal relationship with one another, our love relationship with the other 6 billion people on the face of the earth. You are not alone. There are other people. That's a central pillar of our parenting. We're teaching our children, they're not alone, there are other people. Those other people are precious. They're created in the image of God, this kind of thing. And so we're not alone. And so we've got this horizontal, and dear friends, we come therefore into a dark history. In the Bible, there's a dark history of that horizontal relationship.

Adam and Eve: Marriage Damaged

I believe because our fellowship with God was broken, our fellowship with one another was broken. Because Adam and Eve disobeyed God, they were soon in hostility toward one another. And we see evidence of it right from the start, Genesis 3:7 “Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked; and so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.” This is just evidence of a distance that's come between the man and his wife, between Adam and Eve because of sin.

And then when God confronted Adam, Adam sought to blame his wife and God, too. You remember that, Genesis 3:12, “The man said, ‘This woman you put here with me, she gave me some fruit from the tree and I ate it.’” And so therefore, I think that broken vertical relationship with God inevitably results in broken horizontal relationships.

First and foremost, here in marriage, Adam and Eve covering themselves, and blaming each other for sin. That's just the beginning of marital difficulties. All manner of problems would then pollute the marriage relationship after that. Conflicts, arguments, dissensions, jealousy, adultery and divorce, even murder would sully marriage in the generations to come.

Then in the very next chapter, Cain and Abel, as the sin spreads more horizontally, we see the brotherly affections dissolved, destroyed as Cain is jealous of his brother, Abel, and murders him. By the end of the chapter, we have this man Lamech who murders a man just for insulting him. And you could just see the degeneration of that horizontal relationship.

By the time of Noah, the world was filled with violence, it says. That's why I believe that the death penalty was established for murder after the flood was over. If any man sheds a man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed, for the image of God has God made man. He re-establishes the dignity of humanity concerning murder. You can't murder a person, because they're created in the image of God. Terrible wickedness in Noah's day.

And so it continued beyond that. Abraham was called and then Ishmael was born, and then Isaac afterwards and Ishmael mocks Isaac. And they're in hostility with one another. That brotherly affection destroyed, if it ever existed, in that relationship. 

Then Jacob and Esau come, the twins who are struggling in the womb, and come out struggling and struggled all the way through. And how Jacob swindled his father and stole Esau's blessing and then Esau wanted to murder him. He comforted himself, he consoled himself with the thought of murdering his brother. And so Jacobs has to flee.

And so he runs and meets Laban. Oh, what a man Laban was. And so now we get the employer-employee relationship destroyed as Laban swindles him again and again. And then you have Rachel and Leah, and the hostility there is sister to sister, as they're in a clearly dysfunctional family. And the relationships are just very, very tough. Joseph and his four, I guess, wives give birth to the patriarchs and they hate Joseph. And they wanna murder him for his coat of many colors, they're jealous of him, instead, they sell him for money as a slave.

And so the Book of Genesis, you just see the degeneration of that horizontal relationship and you know the story doesn't end there. And it's continued right to this present time. All you have to do is click into a CNN site or whatever, and you're just gonna find the evidence of hostility, person-to-person, wars and rumors of wars, of crimes and murders, of divorce and hostility and broken relationships, of even church factions and divisions.

And so it's a dark history we face today. But dear friends, there is hope, isn't there? Isn't there hope in the gospel of Jesus Christ? Isn't there hope for that world of love? We have to trace out this dark history, we have to look at the darkness of our own hearts. But know this, the future is infinitely bright, and someday this hostility will be put to death, and it will be gone forever and ever, amen.

The Two Commandments Intertwined

So we have these two commandments. We have that vertical commandment, love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. We have that horizontal commandment, Love your neighbor as yourself. And as I already touched on but I'll say now more fully, those two commandments are completely intertwined. You can't pick and choose. That's why Jesus went beyond what the lawyer asked him, gave the second commandment. The lawyer didn't say which are the top two commandments, but Jesus knew that he could not give a summation of all the Law and the Prophets without the second command.

True Love for Neighbor Depends on First Loving God

And so I say this: true love for your neighbor depends on your love for God. If you don't love God, you cannot love your neighbor properly. I speak now to unbelievers who do charitable works. You're not really loving your neighbor, not as God intended. And why is that? Why do I say that? Well, because you cannot, you must not, love your neighbor more than you love God. Frankly, you must not love anything more than you love God. If you love anything more than you love God, you're an idolater.

So you cannot make an idol of your neighbor. But quite frankly, most people who are not Christians who do good works, works of benevolence and charity, they're really just loving themselves in a sinful and idolatrous way. There is a pride involved in some of those good works. So I say to you, you cannot really love your neighbor if you don't first love God through Jesus Christ.

True Love for God ALWAYS Results in Love for Neighbor

But secondly, we know this is true as well, true love for God always results in a horizontal commitment to love others. You cannot really be loving God if you don't love your neighbor. The two of them go together. So 1 John 4:20 says, “If anyone says ‘I love God’ and yet hates his brother, he's a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen." So the two are intertwined, we must have them both.

Humanity Judged Based on these Two Laws

The Standard of Judgment is the Law of God

Now, I've already said before, and I say again, it's very, very plain. This is the law of God, these two commandments, this is the law. This is Sinai, this is what God requires of you. This is what he's standing on you and with threatenings and with earthquake and with flashing lightning, and thunder with a loud voice. He says you must obey these two commands. You must love me with all of your heart, soul, mind and strength, and you must love your neighbor as yourself. This is the standard of judgment, this is the law of God, the Ten Commandments can be arranged in these two tables.

The first table, the vertical table, the first four commandments. You shall have no other gods besides me. You shall not make any idols or bow down to any idols or worship any idols. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain. And remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. These are the vertical commands in the Ten Commandments. It's that love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

And then the last six are all horizontal. Honor your father and mother. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor and you shall not covet your neighbor's belongings, anything that belongs to your neighbor. Those six commandments are summed up in this one commandment, “love your neighbor as yourself.” Romans 13, Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfillment of that second table of the law.

God Really Intends that the Human Race Obey

And as I've said before, God really does intend for the human race to obey this. You must be righteous in these two senses. You must have loved God, and you must have loved your neighbor as yourself. These are not idle words. These words are our life, Deuteronomy. And if we have not obeyed, we stand guilty and condemned before the law of God.

By this Law We are Condemned

Romans 3:10-20, says by this law, we are condemned, not saved. As it says, “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; There is no one who does good, not even one. Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit. The poison of vipers is on their lips. Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness, their feet are swift to shed blood. Ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know. There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

Do you not see the two commandments right there in that list that Paul gives? Their feet are swift to shed blood, that's horizontal. There's no fear of God before their eyes, that's vertical. They're not obeying the law. Paul continues. “Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. Therefore, no one will be justified, no one will be declared righteous in God's sight by obeying the law; rather, through the law, we become conscious of sin.”

It should not surprise you, then, if you listen to a sermon on the first and greatest commandment and you become conscious of sin. And it should not surprise you, again if you hear a sermon on the second greatest commandment, that you become conscious of sin in your life, expect it friends. Expect that you'll be convicted by the Spirit, that you'll find that you have not been loving as you should. You've not loved your neighbor as yourself.

Law and Gospel: Christ Fulfills the Law

And so we must have a savior. We must have a gospel, if it's only law, we are condemned, we're lost. But it's always law plus gospel. That's my pleasure. My delight is to proclaim both law and gospel to you. And so, I proclaim, not just to you, but to my own soul. There is hope in Jesus.

Christ Came to Fulfill the Law

But Jesus said in Matthew 5:17, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I've not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them.” And he came to fulfill them in many different ways. He came to fulfill them just by obeying them. He just obeyed them. He just loved God with all of his heart, soul, mind, and strength. He loved his neighbors as himself. He perfectly obeyed the laws of God.

This is the Only Hope

And he won a perfect righteousness, which he then offers to us as a free gift. And this “righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus,” Romans 3:21-24. There is our hope.

Having Been Justified We Are Called to Law Obedience

Jesus was obedient, and so in Him, you can be seen to be obedient too, simply by faith. But is that the end? Is that the end of our encounter with the two great commandments? Friends, you know, it's not. As I've said before, God isn't giving you a free pass. “Now that you're justified, forget about loving me, and don't worry about loving your neighbor,” he's not saying that. He's saying, “Okay now, now that you're justified, I have given you the gift of my indwelling Holy Spirit. You're an adopted son or daughter of the living God.” Now he turns you and he faces you to the law and says, “Now do this. Do it. Walk in these ways.”

Romans 8:4, “In order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.” He wants you to love God, and friends, horizontally, he wants you to love your neighbor as yourself. And he wants you to do it by the power of God.

What Is Love for Neighbor?

So, what does it mean then to love your neighbor as yourself? Now, I'm gonna talk more next week about “as yourself,” we're gonna talk more about that phrase, I'll save that till next week. 

Definition

But let me give you a definition similar to the one I gave you concerning that vertical love for God. Remember how I said it was cheerful sacrificial obedience to God's commands? I'm gonna do something similar horizontally, just shift the words a bit. Horizontally then, love, love for neighbor is cheerful sacrifice, resulting in beneficial action for the glory of God. That's what true love is.

We'll start with the end, it's got to be done for the glory of God. If it isn't, then there's something wrong with it, it's defective. So we've got to do it for the glory of God. But with that arranged, we've already talked about that in the previous two sermons, then what is it? Okay, well it's cheerful sacrifice resulting in beneficial actions in the world, helping them in some way.

I'm gonna take that and break it into two senses. This clarity I think came to me very much in prayer this morning. I see that there are two aspects in the New Testament, and we've got to understand them both. And I'm devoting this sermon to one and then next week's sermon to the second aspect. Okay. There is a heart affection aspect, and there's a physical action in the world aspect. And without both of those, you're not loving. You got to have them both.

So there's a heart affection for the neighbor, a delight from the heart, going out from the inside, resulting in sacrificial acts of service to them that are gonna help them in some way. And I believe there are two great scriptures that describe those two. The heart aspect of love is 1 Corinthians 13, you can turn your Bibles there, I'm gonna trace along with that, this morning. 1 Corinthians 13 describes the heart affection aspect, that internal sense that must be there, or it isn't love.

The external actions part, I could choose a lot of passages, but Luke 10 the parable of the Good Samaritan describes that. Sacrificial acts of service to benefit the person. We'll discuss that next week. Okay. The two have to be there, so love is an affection, it's a heart movement toward a person, it must come from the heart, that's included in the word cheerful, you're cheerful and you're glad to do it. And it's got to be a sacrifice that is a willingness to give something valuable: Time, energy, money, yourself, your attention, your gifts, your personality, your listening ear, something of value, something you sacrifice, without the sacrifice there's no love and it results in beneficial action in the world.

Something has to actually happen in space and time. They need to know you did something for 'em. So there's actually some kind of act of service. It could just be a word spoken of encouragement, but if something happens, so that there's an internal feeling aspect and in that external sacrificial service aspect.

Love is a Feeling, and Not Less than a Feeling

And so love is a feeling, friends. It's not less than a feeling. It just is more than a feeling, but it's not less than a feeling. Okay? And common expressions of love fill the world. “Oh, I love this song! It's my favorite!” says a teenage girl and leans forward and turns up the radio. It's happened before.

“I love this time of year,” says a woman at the spring when the warm winds begin to blow and the flowers are poking up from the soil, and the birds have returned and the days are getting warmer and longer. Do you sense I can't wait for it to come. Come spring. I've gotten soft since I moved down here. I couldn't ever live in Massachusetts again. I just don't think I could do it. I don't know how our brothers and sisters made it through. I don't want to. My relatives they’d probably call me soft. I can't handle any more blizzards, you know they're pretty until they get all salty and dirty and sandy and all that and then it's not so fun. But at any rate.

“I just love the mountains with all the spectacular scenery,” says a hiker to his partner as they just look at one of those scenic overlooks. Or, “Daddy loves you so much,” says the Father who has been away for a week on a business trip to his little daughter as she runs with her arms stretched out. “I love chocolate,” says the wife as she opens up the package later this afternoon or maybe already this morning. It's already happened. “I love March Madness,” says the guy as he settles back into the easy chair and watches the first of 16 consecutive basketball games. No more comments on that, you know who you are.

Now the question is how are all of these loves related? Are they related? Are they connected? A song on the radio, a season in the year, a mountain scenery, a four-year-old daughter running with her arm outstretched, chocolate, college basketball, and God. How do they all relate? They do relate. It's wrong for you to think they don't relate. There's a reason that we use the same word for all of them. They are clearly different, but they all just relate.

And as I said last week, Jonathan Edwards helped me organize this and see that they all do relate: The heart has the ability to assess and analyze things, and then be attracted or repulsed from them, it's what the heart does. It's what your heart was designed by God to do. And the essence of true religion according to Edwards is affection of the heart, primarily expressed vertically toward God. But it also moves horizontally toward the neighbor. The heart is moved in attraction toward the neighbor. That's what I'm gonna try to describe to you today, there's a heart movement toward the neighbor. And without that heart movement toward the neighbor, it isn't really love, whatever you do it for.

1 Corinthians 13 I think makes this plain. Look at verse 3, “If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.” Okay, what Paul's saying there is he's talking about sacrifice in the highest sense of the word, the highest level of sacrifice. You give all of your possessions, and then you give your body to death. You have nothing left to give, that's Christ, that's what Jesus did. His possessions were gambled over to fulfill prophecy, and then his body was just given out fully for us.

Even if you did that though, and you had not loved you would gain nothing. It would not be commendable before God. Isn't that terrifying? Think about it. It's like, I don't even do anything close to that. It's like, but even if you did, if you did that and you didn't have love, so therefore I assert to you love must be more than just sacrificial actions. There's got to be something else, something in the heart, there's gotta be a heart affection for the individual.

John Piper in his classic Desiring God makes it plain that what he calls disinterested benevolence is not truly loving, saying, I don't get anything out of the things I give, I don't get anything. I hope you husbands did your duty and bought your wives something, “Oh don't mention it, hun, it was just my duty.” That's not gonna get you anything dear friends, oh actually that it gets you a lot, it won't get you what you want. She doesn't want to think it was your duty.

One Christian writer was talking about this. Suppose a husband says to his wife, “Must I kiss you goodnight every night?” She says, “Yes you must, but not that kind of must.” In other words, if it doesn't come from your heart I don't want it. So there's got to be something inside you that says “I want to do this for you.” We should delight in doing good to others. We should enjoy benefiting them. And if you don't, it isn't love. So 2 Corinthians 9:7, “Each man should give what he has decided to give in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.”

Dear friends, how much of your service to Christ and others did that just weed out right there? “Reluctantly or under compulsion,” that is so convicting, isn't it? If you're doing it reluctantly you're doing it like 'cause you have to, it isn't really love. God wants you to do it cheerfully. And why should we be cheerful givers? Well, we should just think of the joy and delight that we bring God by obeying his commands. We are loving God by doing this, that should make us happy.

And then horizontally we should just be pondering the blessing and the benefit we're bringing to another person. We're alleviating their suffering, we're making them happy, in some way that should make you cheerful. And you should think thirdly about the rewards you get, your stored up treasure in heaven. And someday you're going to experience God's pleasure in what you did, when he says, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” you've got three good reasons for being cheerful and giving.

So it should make you very very happy to give. So therefore genuine love is a feeling that fills the heart. It's an internal motivator and attraction towards the person. “I want to bless you. It is my pleasure to help you to bring you joy. I want to ease your pain and suffering.” And without that feeling it isn't love, it's hypocrisy.

Jonathan Edwards put it this way, “In some sense, the most benevolent, generous person in the world seeks his own happiness in doing good to others because he places his happiness in their good. His mind is so enlarged to take them, as it were, into himself. Thus when they are happy he feels it. He partakes with them, and is happy in their happiness. This is so far from being inconsistent with the freeness of generosity, but on the contrary free generosity and kindness, consist in it.”

In other words, if your mind can't expand to then include this other person, so that you're happy because they're happy, you haven't really loved, that's what Edwards is saying. Powerful statements. Ponder it the rest of the day because it's so life transforming.

Love Results in Sacrificial Action to Benefit Someone

Now of course, as we've said and we'll talk more next week, the feeling isn't enough I must balance it. Say I had so many good intentions. I really really felt lots of good feelings toward the members of this church. But did you do anything for them?

I mean did anything ever happen because of it? Well, that's James' job. James comes in and does that, also I John, both of them teach about the same thing. But James 2:15-17 says, “Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes or daily food. If one of you says to him ‘Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way,” he makes the point, “faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.”

I don't think it's a stretch to say love is the same way, love without actions isn't love, it's dead. So there's got to be something physical done for the individual. So, 1 Corinthians 13:3 says you can't just have the actions, you've got to have the feeling. Got it? James 2 says you can't just have the feeling, you've got to have the actions, you've got to put them together in order to get biblical love. Does that make sense? All the rest is just exegesis of 1 Corinthians 13, should we skip it? No we're not gonna skip it, let's go ahead.

Jesus’ Example

Jesus gives us a display of this again and again in his ministry, do you not see it? How many times does his heart go out to somebody, and then he does something for them? Beautiful example, you should look at it in Luke chapter 7, don't turn there but just later on, read it.

Jesus comes into Nain. And there's a widow there and it's a funeral procession, she is burying her only son. I mean, you just have to understand how tough that is, she's a widow, no husband, and now she's burying her only son. She is bereft of provision and protection in the world in that society. And it says in Luke 7:13, “When the Lord saw her, his heart went out to her and he said, ‘Don't cry.’” Do you see that? His heart went out and he said something, “Don't cry.” And then he raised the son from the dead. Don't you wish you could do that? Wouldn't that be beautiful? But he acts and does something for her.

Again, with the leper in Mark chapter 1, “A leper came to him imploring him and kneeling to him and said, ‘If you will, you can make me clean,’” Now listen to verse, 41, Mark 1:41 this captures it, “Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand." That's it, friends. That's the combination. Do you see it? “Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and healed him, ‘I am willing be clean.’” There it is.

Jesus has shown the way for us. He's done this again and again. I could multiply examples. But his heart is moved, and then he acts. It started in heaven. His heart was moved toward us and he entered the world. And that's what he's done. And so he's still in heaven, he's up there in heaven and he's still doing it.

Hebrews 4:15 says, “We do not have a high priest who cannot be touched with our infirmities, the feeling of our infirmities,” KJV, it's beautiful. He is moved by what we're going through and prays for us, based on that.

Two Great Clarifying Texts: 1 Corinthians 13, Luke 10

What Kind of Heart Attitude is Truly Loving?: 1 Corinthians 13

Alright, so 1 Corinthians 13, what kind of heart attitude is truly loving? Well look at verses 4-6, “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast. It is not proud. It is not rude. It is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth.” Let's just look at those verses there, there's enough there.

Love is patient, that's long-suffering, you put up with things for a long time, that's a heart state, a state of patience. Conversely, love is not impatient. We are an impatient people. So a loving neighbor cannot be impatient with his neighbor. Don't impatiently wait for your neighbor to finish their sentence so you can finally say what you want to say. That's not loving. Give them all the time they need. Even if you don't get to say what you want to say. Don't be impatient as all the checkout lines at the supermarket are full and this person seems to not know how to do you scan. Don't let the emotions of impatience rise up in your heart, give them the time they need to figure it out.

Love is kind, there's a mildness in the heart that is loving, there's a gentleness toward an affection, a tenderness, love is kind. Conversely, anti-love is unkind, we are more and more characterized by unkindness, we are becoming an unkind harsh people. People who cut down people with a clever remark, or show somebody up at a meeting or grab a parking spot right out from under somebody just as they're sizing it up.

Love does not envy, envy is a feeling of jealousy. Do you know how good it's gonna feel to be free of that in heaven? I mean it's gonna be beautiful, to just enjoy the exaltation of the martyrs and the great men and women of the faith higher than you and me, and not feel even the slightest motion of jealousy or envy toward them but just delight in what God did in and through them. That's gonna be awesome to be that out of yourself and free of yourself to feel no envy or jealousy at all.

Love doesn't boast, there's no boasting in it. You're not saying, “I'm the greatest of all times,” Muhammad Ali said that, remember, “I'm the greatest of all times.” In doing that he's putting down all the other boxers; that's just not loving. It may be what our athletes do these days but it's not Christian.

Love isn't proud it says, pride is the root sin, it's celebrating yourself too much. We could go on and on about that one. Love is not rude, dear friends, do you not see the growth of rudeness in our culture?

I was reading one journalist who was talking about rudeness in America, I came across this story. See if you can relate: “The other day I went into a juice place, ordered a smoothie and watched the girl behind the counter fill to overflowing, cram the top on and slide it across the counter at me with such vehemence I wondered if she was training for some Olympic shuffleboard event. Luckily my reflexes are quick and I caught it just in time. But then came the challenge of inserting the straw, which of course resulted in the top popping off and the smoothie squishing out all over the counter. She watched me the whole time and did nothing to assist me as I went through the futile motions of trying to mop up the mess with the tiny squares of napkins they provide. Finally I asked her for another top. ‘You mean a lid? You want a lid?’ She snarled before shoving another one across the counter.”

Have you had any kind of encounter like that before? Even worse, have you ever been like that before? That's the hard part. Love isn't rude, like that. There is more and more rudeness. It bothers me when I put my directional on to change lanes, I'm one of the few people that uses their directional... That was a prideful statement, wasn't it? I actually have started to notice how many turns are made without them. I saw a bumper sticker once and it's “visualize using your directional,” I love that. All right, just picture it in your mind. But you put the directional on saying I would like to change lanes and the person speeds up to prevent you from getting over. I don't, I don't understand that.

And so what I do is I say those same tendencies are in my own heart, be sure I don't do it too. Be sure I don't do it too, because whenever you judge someone else you're judging yourself it's out there.

Love isn't selfish, you're not looking for your own things, it's not easily angered, flaming into anger at any moment. And it keeps no record of wrongs. Could it be that sometimes your marriage relationship or church relationships are poison because you're keeping a record of wrongs? You haven't really forgiven? Love doesn't do that.

Love does not delight in evil. I've mentioned before in sermons this “shadenfreude” this delight in somebody else's demise, or delight in their trouble. Watching YouTube videos of the world's worst drivers, with a secret delight knowing you're not one of them. Boy it's fun to watch that lady, take six minutes to size up a parking spot in Walmart until the guy finally does it for her, boy isn't that fun? And it's like yeah you laugh at it and all that but then you're like you're delighting in somebody's struggle trouble, they're having a hard time. Even worse, is delighting in somebody else's sin. And you see that too with, you know, with a Rick Pitino or a Tiger Woods or something like that and there just seems to be a fascination with it. And I think it's ultimately self-serving and prideful.

Love doesn't delight in evil, but what does it do, where do we end up here? We end up with delight, cheerfulness, it rejoices in the truth, it rejoices in the truth, and here at last, friends, the two of them come together, what is the truth? Jesus is the truth. And so horizontally I'm gonna delight in giving you Jesus. Christian or non-Christian, I want you to have Jesus, or thy word is true, sanctify them by the truth. Your word is truth. I want to give you the word.

And so the vertical then flows out into the horizontal, I wanna give you Jesus, I wanna give you the word, I wanna delight in the truth in your life. So we're gonna watch over one another in brotherly love, and we're gonna sanctify each other, and pray for each other and delight in the truth. I'll zero in on that word delight, love delights in truth coming up in that person's heart.

Friends, assess your heart, assess your heart. Can you listen to this and not be convicted? Can you listen to this and make it through unscathed? So say 1 Corinthians 13 is my favorite chapter in the Bible. It's the wedding chapter. It's so beautiful. It is the toughest chapter in the Bible friends. It's a chapter with teeth. And it digs in and says, “Are you doing this?” These aren't just pretty words. This is the heart state of affection, you should have for other human beings, for every other human being.

This is what God wants from you. Now next week we're gonna talk about okay so what, maybe we have those feelings, maybe God's worked them, what kind of life of action should we seek? How can we serve the poor and needy? How can we see that kind of love come alive in a marriage, and in a church? What kinds of acts of service and sacrifice does God expect from us? Close with me if you would in prayer.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches on Matthew 22:34-40, and how we are to examine our hearts in light of Jesus' Crucifixion and obey the Law of God.

- SERMON TRANSCRIPT  - 

Introduction

Truly, it is said that God's ways are not our ways, and his thoughts are not our thoughts. If it had been up to me, John's gospel would have ended at Chapter 20. What an incredible end there is there, and I know we're preaching on Matthew, I haven't forgotten. Your pastor hasn't lost his mind. But this is how I'm beginning the sermon today. You remember what happened in John 20, how Jesus, resurrected from the dead, appeared suddenly through locked doors and stood in the midst of his disciples and said, “Peace be with you,” and showed them the evidence of his resurrection, his hands and his side, and said again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent Me, I'm sending you.”

Thomas wasn't there. Doubting Thomas. Over that next week, he asserted that unless he saw the physical evidence of Jesus' resurrection, he would never believe. A week later, Jesus comes again, though the doors are locked, and stands in their midst, and says, “Peace be with you,” and then he shows the evidence of his resurrection to Thomas. Hands and his side. Stop doubting and believe. And Thomas makes that confession, which everyone on the face of the earth must make if they want to be saved.

That saving confession, which must come from the heart, saying, to Jesus, “My Lord, and my God.” That's the pinnacle. Maybe the pinnacle of the Bible right there. The evidence of Jesus' deity, his crucifixion, his resurrection, and then a sinner standing and saying, “My Lord and my God,” to Jesus. “Because you have seen me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed. And then Jesus did many other miraculous signs which are in the presence of his disciples which are not recorded in this book, but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and believing you may have life in his name.” That sounds like a good place to end to me. What do you think? But there is a whole chapter 21, after it. What is the purpose of that chapter 21?

You remember what happened, how the disciples seemingly having nothing to do, decided to go back to fishing. I mean like physical fishing, not fishing for men, I mean, fishing. And so they're there fishing, in the Sea of Galilee, and suddenly a stranger stands by the shore and says, “Have you caught any fish and they'd fished all night and hadn’t caught anything. And he said, “Why don't you try the right side of the boat.” Suddenly the nets are so filled that they are ripping and breaking and it suddenly dawns on them who the stranger is by the shore. It's the Lord. Peter dives in, swims in there, they barely are able to haul that filled net to shore. Jesus makes them a breakfast of fish and bread and serves them.

And then he turns to Simon Peter, and starts to work on him. You remember what happened, don't you? Simon Peter had denied Jesus three times. Three times he said that he didn't even know him. He was trying to save his own life. The very thing that Jesus told us we should never try to do, whoever tries to save his life, will lose it. And so, he denied him.

And that very night, you remember in the providence of God, and the sovereignty of Christ, Jesus, being moved from one side of his trial to the next, just as the cock crows and Peter has denied him for the third time, Jesus turned and looked right at him, without saying a word. What did he need to say? “You are guilty. You're guilty of not loving me, you're guilty of denying me.” Just the crushing blow of that look, and you know what it did to Peter.

Oh, he went outside and wept bitterly, he wept. To look in the face of Jesus and to see that disappointment. Is there a future for me? Is there a place for me? I mean, yes, Jesus, you're risen. But is there a place for me? I'm the one who denied you. I don't love you like I should, I know it now. I know who you are. I agree with Thomas. You're My Lord and my God, but what am I? And is there a future for me?

And so, Jesus says to Simon, he says, “Simon son of John. Do you truly love me more than these?” I don't know what “more than these” means. More than these fish? More than these friends? More than these people love me? Do you love me more than you love anything else? I don't really know. I don't have to know 'cause I'm not preaching on John 21 this morning, but at any rate, “Do you love me more than these?” “Yes, Lord", he said, “You know I love you.” And Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.” Sometime later, he turned to him and said again, “Simon, son of John. Do you love me, do you truly love me?” “Yes, Lord,” he said. “You know that I love you.” “Take care of my sheep,” he said. The third time he said to him, “Simon Son of John, do you love me?”

Peter was hurt because Jesus had asked him this question three times. Now let me ask you, do you think that Jesus knew this would hurt Peter? I think he knew it. Did he intend to hurt Peter? I think he did. But not the kind of hurt that Satan would intend or an enemy would intend. It's the heart of a friend. It's the wounds of a friend. And the issue is, “Do you love me?” Jesus is saying. And I just feel that this is vital. We don't just need to know who Jesus is, we don't just need to know that his death was for us, and all that, we need to have this problem dealt with in our hearts that we don't really love Jesus.

And we need Jesus to stand in front of us, and probe our hearts to reveal to us that we really don't love him like we should. And it hurts, friends. And so, I don't have any desire to hurt you today but Jesus may. And I just want to step out of the way and let him do his work on you, because we're coming, as I said two weeks ago, to the foot of Sinai here. This is the law, friends, with all of it's delightful language and loving God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength we know the truth, don't we? We don't love him with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength.

Some time ago, I came across these lyrics, “Give me one pure and holy passion. Give me one magnificent obsession, give me one glorious ambition for my life to know and follow, hard after you.” I couldn't sing it. I couldn't sing it. I actually kind of almost hated it. I was like turn the page. I don't wanna sing this one, 'cause it just isn't true of me. I don't have one pure and holy passion. I'm a man of many passions. And I yearn to be a man of one passion, I really want that.

And so John 21 actually ministers to me. Maybe it ministers to you to have Jesus stand in front of you and probe you on this very issue. Do you love him? Do you love Jesus? Do you love him with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength? Do you? And that's what this sermon is about today. It's really diagnosing your heart condition. None of us enjoys a trip to the doctor. You know that annual check-up. Some just go ahead and skip it. That's not a good idea, but that's what we do. And so this is just diagnosis. This is just God probing us, by the Scripture. He's probing our hearts. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.”

What God Wants More Than Anything Else

Jesus Texted by a Lawyer

Now, let's set the context. You remember Jesus was in the final week of his life, and his enemies are there trying to make trouble for him and Jesus deals with many, many different difficult questions. And then along comes this lawyer from the Pharisees, and he says “Which is the greatest commandment in the law?”

Jesus’ Very Orthodox Answer

Jesus gives a very orthodox-ed answer as you remember. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”

Love the Lord Your God with Everything You Have

We saw two weeks ago as we looked at this, “with all your heart” means that central part of you. Your heart is that part of you that thinks, it feels, it decides, it plans, it desires everything inside you, that heart of you, the core of you, love God. And love God “with all of your soul,” the “nephesh”, the life principle, with every fiber of your living being as you live and breathe, love God. And “with all your mind,” the part of you that thinks, and reasons and meditates, the part of you that imagines your thought life. All your mental powers, your science and philosophy, and logic, and all of that thinking, love God in all of it. And then with all your strength. With your body, present your body. All of its powers and its faculties to God, ready for service. God, I want you to use my body. I want you to use all of my strength, I wanna be poured out like a drink offering, I wanna drop exhausted on the pillow at the end of the day, having given everything for God.

With ALL Your Heart, and ALL Your Soul, and ALL Your Mind and ALL Your Strength

And it says with all of your heart, and all of your soul and all of your mind and all of your strength, and the full teaching of the Word of God is all the time. So you do all of that all the time and never fail. Now you see why I've said this is a trip to the foot of Mount Sinai. Who wants to stand up here and testify. I have kept this law. I have kept this law. This week has been the best week of my life. I have kept this law 100 percent. Who would dare to testify like that, I wouldn't.

In Pilgrim's Progress, Christian, the character that's moving from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City, before he comes to the cross, he comes to Mount Sinai and it's like a mountain leaning over ready to crush him. And I think we think, “Oh wow, boy. The first and greatest commandment, love God.” It's the very thing, friends that we don't do.

A Second Commandment Like It

And so we talked about that last time. And Jesus gives a second commandment which I'm going to speak fully on, more fully next week, but he said “The second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” The two of them are interconnected. I'll make that point next week. 

Everything Depends on these Two Commands

But everything, all the law and the prophets, everything God wants from you everything he commands from you hangs on these two things, summarized by these two things: Love God and love your neighbor.

"Everything, all the law and the prophets, everything God wants from you, everything he commands from you ... [is] summarized by these two things: Love God and love your neighbor."

Judgment Day: God Actually Requires This

And I said last week, God actually in fact requires this of us. It's not theoretical. It's not theoretical, it's not like he's gonna dismiss it and say, “Oh, well we all know nobody kept it. And so you're fine. I'm gonna grade on the curve.” God doesn't grade on the curve. Did you or did you not love me in this moment or at that moment, etcetera? And then you just start to see the times where you didn't piled up.

And I said at this point, you must understand the purpose of the law, is it not to crush self-confidence? Is it not just to crush it into a powder where you realize, I cannot do this? I can't be perfect, I can't. I must have a savior. The law brings wrath dear friends, not salvation, Romans 4, read about it. It doesn't bring salvation. The law brings wrath. By the works of the law, Romans 3:20, no one, no flesh will be justified in his sight. You can't do this, that's the testimony of the Word of God.

But thanks be to God, there's a gospel, amen? Thanks be to God, that's not the final word. Could have been, that could have been the final word on us. You didn't love me. And therefore go to hell. God could have said that, that could have been the final word. We are condemned by that law, 'cause God really did mean it.

But it says in Romans 8, “What the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son.” Praise be to God. For sending Jesus who went and actually did this for 30 plus years, he actually did it in space and time with his body, he loved God perfectly every moment of his life. And he won for us a perfect righteousness that he now just offers you as a free gift. Oh dear lost friend, that's your only hope, that's the righteousness God actually does require, he's just gonna give it to you as a gift. Just as a free gift.

He'd just say “Here, put this on. Give me all of your wickedness, and all of your sin.” And he puts it on Jesus, Jesus dies under the wrath of God. Remember I said the law brings wrath. There's the wrath at the cross. And he just gives you a gift. Perfect righteousness. Well, that was all last week.

What Does it Mean to Love God?

Now I wanna ask a deeper question, “What does this mean?” Thanks be to God that if you have trusted in God, this righteousness is credited to your account, it's imputed to you or reckoned to you. You're thought of as righteous as Jesus, is that the end of our salvation? You're free from the law, oh happy condition. You don't need to love God with any part of you.

Is that so? Is that what the Bible teaches? That cannot be. You know, what he says, “Okay now that you're forgiven now that I see you as perfectly righteous from this point forward, for the rest of your existence on into eternity, I see you as perfectly righteous, now I want you to get up and obey this law.” Romans 8:4, “For what the law was powerless to do, in that it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of the flesh, to be a sin offering. And so we condemn the flesh in the flesh in order that,” listen, “the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”

So he actually does want you to obey this, friends. He wants you to love him now and for the rest of your life, and more and more and more, as you live by the Spirit. It's what he wants you to do. He wants you to walk in this law with all of your heart.

So I've tried to understand what it means to love God. I've studied my own heart, I’ve studied the scriptures, I study other people as they study me. I look and I try to understand love. Love is a pretty common topic in our society. What are the odds that you'll turn on the radio and hear the word “love” within the first minute in some song or something. It's just all over the place.

Jonathan Edwards: Treatise on Religious Affections

So it's a very familiar topic. What does it mean here? Well, I thank God for the brothers and sisters in Christ that have gone before us, and one of my favorite men from church history is Jonathan Edwards. And Edwards kind of sorted it all out for me, in a book that he wrote called Treatise on Religious Affections.

Let me give you the context historically, of what Edwards wrote. It was the first great awakening, perhaps one of the greatest revivals in all of church history. It was in 1742, and the Holy Spirit was poured out. There were sweeping changes, there was religious excitement, there were major upheavals, all kinds of things were happening. Huge crowds were leaving their fields and their shops and going out to hear gospel preaching, especially George Whitfield. People were coming from miles around to hear Whitfield and others preaching the gospel. And many people swooned, sometimes even physically, under the influence of the gospel. And there were some changes, some changes happened.

However, you know in the parable of the seed and the soils, Jesus warned about what they call the stony ground hearers, the ones that hear the Word with joy and immediately respond, but when trouble comes they quickly fall away. And so now it's been a number of years later, five or six years later. And Jonathan Edwards is looking back on the experience of the Great Awakening and what's happened since then. And he's probably the most careful thinker and accurate spiritual assessor, maybe, in all of church history. And he put his skills to work in assessing the nature of true revival or more deeply the nature of true religion, a true right relationship with God, what is true Christianity, that's what he was looking at, what's the truth?

And he likened the initial enthusiasm of many of those hearers of the gospel to the cherry blossoms of spring, that come each of them promising some sweet cherry fruits later on, but many of them flutter to the ground without ever bearing any fruit at all. But some of them ripen into maturity and produce delicious sweet cherries. So he wanted to assess spiritual experience and try to get at what is the nature of true Christian experience, true Christian religion.

Now, there are opposite views of the Great Awakening two equal and opposite errors concerning all of the excitement and outward emotion. Error number one, is that religion is only a matter of the emotions, the feelings and especially extreme outward displays of emotion: raising of hands, melting, falling on the ground, screaming for joy, dancing in the aisles, whatever. Big displays of emotion. And if you don't get to that level, you're really not truly saved.

But then there is an opposite error, that religion is never in any of those displays. And if you see any of them you know there religion isn't. Religion is more in the reason and judgment, and in dutiful behavior. Dear friends, both of those are ditches. Edward sought to steer in the middle to try to find what it really was. Satan's scheme here, friends, was to push unstable souls into excesses, and that created a backlash effect.

Early in the awakening, Satan pushed people to extremes, to burning clothes and books and doing all kinds of things and just outward huge displays of emotion. And the tendency was, if you don't have all that you're not really saved. And a few people only a few people seemed interested in trying to probe what was really going on in the hearts of people. Edwards was one of them. What were the root causes? Eventually people just threw out the baby with the bathwater, went the opposite direction, you ended up with a cold formalism, in which no emotional displays were permitted at all.

So he's like, what is the truth, what is the nature of true religion? And as he thought through, prayed through, the Lord led him to this text, 1 Peter 1:8. Just listen, don't turn there, but just listen, “Though, you have not seen him,” Christ, “you believe in him; and even though you do not see him now, you love him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy.” You love him, the invisible one, you believe in him.

I think it's beautiful, isn't it? That it was Peter that wrote that, the one who was probed by Jesus. Do you love me, do you love me? He says, you've never seen him, but just like me, you love him, don't you? And so, Edward said, there it is. True religion then in great part consists in holy affections, emotions, holy emotions, holy affections.

Now this is what he does, he breaks open the human heart, he breaks open the human heart so we can understand what it does. And he said the human heart has two capabilities. There are two things it can do. Okay? First of all it can understand, and second, it can have affections toward what it understands. These are the two things the heart does, you do it all the time. You may not know you're doing it, but you are.

And so, first the analytical side, the heart has the ability to perceive things, everything it encounters, and to assess those things, to analyze them, to understand them for what they are, to judge them. That's what the heart does.

Secondly then, the heart has the ability to be inclined toward or repelled away from everything you're analyzing and assessing. And you do it without any matter of the will, it's not something you're choosing to do, it's just the way your heart is. In short, then you'll either love or hate to a greater or lesser degree everything you analyze in the universe. Everything. So then, I just started to think, I get it now, I get it. It's got to do with attraction and repulsion, my engineering mind started to kick in. Alright, bear with me, guys. That's what you have as a pastor. This is who I am. I'm a mechanical engineer.

Years ago, I worked at a company that made ion implanters and there were these awesome magnets, these rare earth magnets samarium-cobalt magnets, strongest magnets I've ever seen in my life. Boy, were they fun? We had lots of fun with those things. You could do lots of pranks, like putting important messages for your roommate. And most of the message is covered by a magnet that could not be moved with 10 men. Oh, that was fun, I enjoyed that.

“Whatever you do be sure you…” That kind of thing, and covered with the magnet. And I remember seeing my roommate leaning on it, pushing, trying to pull it in something and that was fun. That's sick, though, that you could even do that to someone that you love and a friend but I did that. The Lord has his ways though, that magnet erased all my credit cards too. So, you know, the Lord, he got me back for that one, it was right there in my pocket. And then I went to use the card and that was that.

But I remember these magnets and I would hold it and you could just throw a paper clip and any, just within feet, and you just see the thing go like that and just move to this magnet. And we did all sorts of stuff. We put it like on the other side of walls and we'd stick things there and wonder how it's sticking on the wall, and it was just a lot of fun. We did all kinds of things.

So alright, now you have this image of this powerful magnet in your heart. The object lesson is on the basic nature of the human heart. God has designed your heart with the capacity to be attracted to or repelled from everything that there is, to a greater or lesser degree, all the way down to no attraction or repulsion because you know nothing about it at all. That's where you start and the more you get to know things then you more love or hate. That's what happens. And again, the amazing thing is you actually have no control over your heart as it does this. This is something just the heart does. It has to do with the nature of the heart.

And so now in comes mathematical engineering analysis part two. Picture a number line, okay. And you've got the plus side and zero and the minus side. What your heart does is it puts everything on that number line, in an array. Positive and negative. I love it, I don't love it. I desire it, I don't desire it. I want it or I wanna stay away from it, to a greater or lesser degree. Everything in the universe, it's all there, your heart is just doing it.

And what is God saying? God has to be number one affection farthest as far right on your positive number line as possible, and nothing can be equal to it, or surpass it, or frankly even be close to it. You must love God more than anything else in the created universe. That's what it's saying. And Edwards is saying true religion is in the nature of the attraction to God. And that you love Him with holy affection. That's what it is.

And at the moment of conversion everything gets rearranged - Not everything, but many, many things, all things of spiritual import get rearranged. You heard a testimony earlier, 2 Corinthians 5:17, “If anyone is in Christ, he's a new creation.” Everything gets rearranged, and then, sanctification starts to move things, you start to love God more and more and more. And love the people of God more and more and the Word of God, more and more. And the kingdom of God more and more. And all of the things of God, that's sanctification.

Conversely, you start to hate sin more and you start to hate what it does to you and hate pride, and lust, and you want it out more and more. That's it. That's the nature of true religion, that's what's going on in your heart. And as I said, we don't have any control over our hearts directly, we just can't. All we can do is just know our hearts, and say, “God, God, there isn't an infinite gap between you and created things in my life. There are some times that it actually seems that I love some other things more than I love you. God, would you change me?” And that yearning to change is evidence of the Holy Spirit's work in your life.

Oh, I wanna convict you, but I wanna encourage you too this morning, I want you to know when the Spirit's at work in your life. And if you're discontent with how little you love God, then that's the Spirit's work in you. And if you yearn to love him more, then that's the Spirit's work in you. Ezekiel 36:27, “I will put my Spirit in you and I will move you to keep my laws and my decrees.” And so this is the first and greatest one. He's gonna put the Spirit in you and move you to love him. He's gonna move you to do that.

Loving Nothing More Than or Equal to God

And so compared to our love for God, any other affection should look even like hatred. So God should be on your number line, so far that when you stand at the God position and look down, there's such a gap between you and the next thing that it almost looks like hatred. And so, Jesus says in Luke 14:26, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife, and his children, his brothers and sisters - yes, even his own life - he cannot be my disciple.” That's what it means now. You understand what that means. It doesn't mean you actually hate those, but by comparison, standing there at the position of your love for God, everything else it's almost all the same at that point. That's how much you love God.

Cheerful Sacrifice of Obedience

Alright, so what then should love look like in my life? That's what it is. How should it play out in my life? So I've thought about that too. You know the Bible verse, it says, “We love because he first loved us.” Well, I think that that has more to teach us, I think we also love like he first loved us, He teaches us how to love. Right. So we should love like he has loved us.

How has he loved us? This is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. He's demonstrating love. God demonstrates his own love for us in this while we were still sinners, Christ died for you. And he demonstrates the heart of it, when he says, “Do not fear, little flock; it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” He just enjoys doing this, it's for the joy set before him that he did it. So I put all that together and this is what I think love for God is: Love for God, then, is measured by cheerful sacrifice in the obedience to his commands. You've gotta have all three, friends, if you don't have all three, you're not loving God. Cheerful sacrifice in obeying his commands.

Sacrificial Obedience

Let's start with the last one, obedience. You cannot love God without obeying him. John 14:15, Jesus said, “If you love me, you will obey what I command.” “This is love for God,” 1 John 5:3, “This is love for God: to obey his commands.” God is telling you, if you love me, you'll obey me, you must obey my commands.

Okay. So it has to be obedience, but is that enough? No, there has to be sacrificial obedience. It has to cost you something. I mean, you just know the way it is. Valentine's Day is coming up, friends. Husbands, let me say something, don't forget it. Love your wives but let me tell you something. They wanna be sure that there's some sacrifice involved. Don't dig something out of your glove compartment and give it to her. There's gotta be some sacrifice. It's gotta hurt you, it's gotta cost you something. If it doesn't cost you something, it isn't love. Did God's love for us cost him anything? Oh yes, it did. He sent his Son for us. It's got to be sacrificial obedience to the law. It's gotta cost you something to obey, and he's gonna make you prove it too. He's gonna make things hard for you sometimes to obey to see how much do you love him.

But that's not enough, either. Isn't that amazing how much God wants from us? It's not enough to just obey, it's not enough even just sacrificially obey, you have to cheerfully sacrificially obey. You have to do it with joy and delight in your heart. You have to want to do it. We've covered that before. Valentine's Day, don't tell your wife, “Hey, I didn't take this out of the glove department, I did just what the pastor said. I want you to know how much this cost me. Alright. I have obeyed and I have sacrificed.” That will not get you any further than giving the cheap gift dug out of your glove compartment. She needs to know how much you love giving it to her. Right? And so you have to have a delight in the giving. This is gonna work horizontally next week when the same definition is gonna work for people too. Cheerful sacrificial obedience, that's what it's gonna be for people, too. 

But here's the thing, it says in 1 Corinthians 13:3, “If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames,” that’s sacrifice, huge sacrifice, “but if I have not love, it profits me nothing.” What is it saying? There's a heart disposition that apparently is missing. Well, this guy is dying for people. And that's powerful, isn't it? God doesn't just want the sacrifice, he wants you to delight in doing it for God.

“The Kingdom of Heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, when a man found it, he hid it again and then in his joy, he went and sold everything he had and bought that field.” I think it's a privilege for us in the Christian life to buy that field, in some sense, again and again. Day after day, you get to sell everything for Jesus. Day after day for the joy set before you, you get to make sacrifices for Jesus. I'm not in any way denying the permanence of justification or anything, you've got to feel it's yours, I'm just saying we get to make that sacrifice again and again, and that's the nature, the essence of our love relationship with God.  “For God loves a cheerful giver,” dear friends.

Diagnosing Your Own Heart

How Love for God is Assessed: Cheerful Sacrifice of Obedience

So there it is.  So diagnose your own heart. What's going on? Is there a principle of sacrifice in your relationship with God? Does it cost you anything to be a Christian? Does your quiet time in the morning cost you something? Does your giving, your financial giving, cost you something? Does your service in your ministry to the church here, or in any other way, does your evangelism cost you anything?

And when it does, are you doing it cheerfully or under compulsion? Do you feel like you have to do it? You gotta do something to prove yourself to God? Well, you're back under the old work system then. Are you doing it cheerfully or under compulsion? And is the pattern of your giving to God set by his word, by his commands? He's told you what he wants. Are you following his laws, and his commands? Is that what's going on in your life? Diagnose your heart, Friends.

Evidence that the Love of God is Not in You

And you know what's gonna happen when you do? You're gonna come to the conclusion that I did earlier this morning, and I just said, “How can I preach this sermon? How can I preach? I feel like my heart is distant from you, I don't love you like I should. I don't. So who am I to stand up in front of a bunch of people and tell them they need to love God?” And I just kinda was like that for as much as 90 minutes this morning and I kept thinking, and then suddenly I felt the grace of God come into my heart. And I felt then like the Lord testified to me. Now you're ready to preach, because you're not preaching as a self-righteous man. I'm not standing in front of you telling you that I do this 100 percent. I'm just telling you, I wish I did. I yearn, I hunger and thirst to do this.

"What is love for God? It is cheerful sacrificial obedience to his commands."

Therapy for Distant Hearts: James 4

And so what do I do then if my heart's distant? I want to commend briefly, another passage of scripture. It's printed right in your outline. James 4:4-10. I just wanna read through it briefly, it's not another sermon within a sermon, but I just want to bring it to you to heal you.

Start with Christ: Imputed Righteousness is His Perfect Obedience to these Commandments

First and foremost I wanna bring you back again to the cross. If you feel like your heart's distant, remember this, Christ is your righteousness. Keep that in mind, never forget. It's not how much you love God, it's how much he loved you in Jesus. Never forget that. Go to that again and again. But is that enough? No, we need to have our wandering hearts brought back.

James: Steps to Recovering our love for God

James 4:4-10. “You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. Or do you think the scripture says without reason that the Spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely? But he gives us more grace. That is why scripture says: ‘God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.’ Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you, Come near to God, and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.”

There's the remedy. Just let me say some brief things. First of all, be honest and call the wandering of your heart what God calls it: spiritual adultery. Don't call it by any other name. The thing, the created thing you love more than God is an idol. Someone who loves idols is an idolater. Call it what it really is, spiritual adultery is idolatry.

So identify the idols. What is it? Is it worldly pleasure? Is it sexual sin? Is it materialism? Is it Power or workaholism? What is it? Is it worldly entertainment? Is it food? What is the idol that you love more than Jesus? Identify it, and call it spiritual adultery to love it more than you love Jesus. This is the essence of worldliness. Understand the jealousy of the indwelling Holy Spirit, the Spirit he caused to live in you, envies over you.

Imagine a husband and wife and they go to some party, and the wife is starting to be a little too familiar with another guy there. What is that husband going to feel toward that? What's he gonna feel? That's what the Holy Spirit feels when you wander into idolatry. He's jealous over your affections. And he goes and gets you. And he will not let you wonder, and so just understand that that spirit he caused to live in you is envious over your heart.

And then rejoice in the promise that God will give you more grace. Anybody here need more grace? I need more grace, I need fresh infusions of grace. Not just grace for justification, but I need grace to stay loving Jesus. I need grace right now. So give me more grace, God, I need more grace. Just humble yourself and say, “I need more grace.” And James points to the scriptures to the way to get it. You get more grace here, this is where it comes from. The Scripture says that he gives us more grace. Read the scripture, get the grace from the Bible. “Grace to you,” Paul promises it. So go get it, go get yourself some more grace to deal with that idolatry in your heart.

“God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” Then humble yourself. Identify pride in your heart. It's always pride that causes us to stray from loving God. First of all, we make too much of our own pleasure and happiness. I must be happy, I must be happy right now, I need to do this. That's just pride, friends. And it's pride for you to say, “I know best how to make myself happy.” God actually knows better than you do how to make you happy. So let God oppose the proud, but let him give grace to the humble.

Then submit yourself humbly to God. Resist the devil. It is the devil who is the pimp, who is dressing the world up, the prostitute world, painting her eyes and making her look attractive, that's his doing, that's what he does. Resist him in this, and he'll flee from you. O blessed thought! The Holy Spirit will make him run. The omnipotent spirit will turn him and put him to flight, if you'll just dig in and resist.

Come near to God then. Say, “Lord, I love you. I'm sorry, I strayed. I'm sorry I allowed my heart's precious affections, the ointment of my heart to be poured out at the foot of an idol. Please forgive me. Please forgive me and take me back.” Come near to God, and what is the promise? He will come near to you. Then “wash your hands, you sinners.” That means turn away from the things you were doing. Stop doing them. Don't just keep doing this again and again, wash your hands, change your life. “Purify your heart, you double-minded.” Start thinking differently about those idols. And be willing to be broken and hurt: “Grieve, mourn and wail.” Peter wept when Jesus looked at him. Maybe you need to weep and cry. This is one of those scriptures that the good-time people and good-time churches will never preach. Grieve, mourn, you all need to grieve, mourn, and wail. Hey, let's all have a time together of grieving, mourning and wailing. That's sometimes what needs to happen, dear friends. Cry. And then humble yourself before the Lord and let him lift you up. Spiritual physician telling you how to heal your straying heart.

We come now to the time of the Lord's supper. I can't think of a better time for you to look after your heart. It says in Corinthians that in order for you to come to the Lord's supper, you have to assess your spiritual condition. You have to look inwardly. Have you been convicted today? Then bring that to God, and say, “Lord, heal me. Draw me in and use the Lord's supper, use the Lord's Supper to draw a sinner like me back into a healthy relationship with you.” The Lord's supper is for people who have testified plainly to faith in Christ. We had baptism. They've testified by water baptism. If you have come to faith in Christ, and have testified to that by water baptism, you're welcome at this table. If not, I urge you to refrain lest you eat and drink judgment on yourself, but instead, I urge you to come to Christ and trust in him.

Close with me, if you would, in prayer. Father, I thank you for the message of the word and as we give our attention now to the Lord's supper, we pray for the sending forth of your Holy Spirit, so that we can enjoy you. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

I. The Supernatural Life

So we're looking at Romans chapter 12 and for the next three weeks, some of the practicalities of the Christian life, what God's word has to say about how to live our everyday lives to his glory. Now as I think about the life of the Apostle Peter, I think there can be no more amazing walk he ever took than the one recorded in Matthew 14. You don't have to turn there, but you know the story of Matthew 14, how Jesus fed the 5000 and then dismissed the crowd, dismissed the disciples, went up on the mountain by himself, alone to pray. The disciples are trying to make their way across the lake, the Sea of Galilee, and as frequently happens on the Sea of Galilee, a terrible storm came and whipped that Sea of Galilee up into a frenzy. And they were having very great difficulty making progress across the lake.

And so, there they were in the middle of the lake, in the middle of the night, in the middle of their terrors, thinking they were going to drown, and suddenly they saw Jesus walking on the water, coming toward the boat and they were afraid of him. "'It's a ghost,' they said, cried out in fear. But Jesus said, 'Take courage. It is I, don't be afraid.'" I'm no ghost, I'm here." And then Peter said an astonishing thing. Where did it come from? Do you really understand, Peter? What a man he was. But up out of Peter's heart, somewhere inside he said, "Lord, if it's you tell me to come to you on the water." "Come," Jesus said. And there's the command of God. Come and live a supernatural life, get up out of the boat and do something that you could only do if I support you by my supernatural power.

And so Peter got out and started to walk in the lake. And I would say there was no man on the face of the earth that understood how Jesus' supernatural power is not just for himself to display his own glory, but actually to transform us and make us glorious. He knew at that moment, he was new in this through his own power and strength. Oh, he'd taken many walks since his toddler years. And left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot, he could do that. But on the water? It may only be by the supernatural power of Jesus Christ.

Now, I don't want to end in a downer and tell you how it happened. You know what happened after that. But I want to fix that picture in your mind of a supernatural walk because I think that's what God is calling each and every Christian here today to do and to be; to walk in a supernatural way by the power of Christ. Now as you read Romans 12:9-21, you're not going to see the word supernatural in there. But understand, there is a context to Romans 12, it's not just a bunch of ethical teachings that come out of nowhere, but Paul has developed the foundation for a supernatural life already in 11 chapters. It's a life that begins with full and complete forgiveness of sins through the blood of Jesus Christ. Amen? All of your sins forgiven and without that, the rest is impossible. But Romans 1-3, talks about that, how all have sinned and how Jesus shed his blood on the cross, and that through simple faith in the death of Christ, the blood shed on the cross, all of your sins can be, absolutely will be, forgiven.

Amen. Isn't that exciting? That's fantastic. It's the foundation of this supernatural life, but that's not all. Romans 6 says that we're not slave to sin. The baptism we saw earlier gives a picture that we are liberated, we have died to sin, we have risen to a new life. What is the nature of that new life? It is a supernatural life. It's a life that can only be lived by the power of God, only be lived by the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit. Now, Romans 7 says, "It's a life of struggle. It's not easy." Just because you're struggling, doesn't mean you're not living a supernatural life. We're going to struggle with the flesh, we're going to have difficulty, we're going to yearn like Paul did, "O, wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?" That is true. But Romans 8 speaks very plainly, very clearly of a supernatural life, a life not lived by the power of the flesh, a life that has lived only by the power of the indwelling spirit, the spirit-filled life, Romans 8. A life in which we are more than conquerors no matter what the devil throws at us. More than conquers.

And so that, I think, is the foundation of this life. As I said, we're not going to see this word supernatural in Romans 12. But here in Romans 12, Paul is going to give us a specific list of duties and exhortations, and aspects of what that life is going to look like. And oh, is it sweet? And oh, is it practical? And it helps us in every way. I think we forget that Romans, people like me can come along and preach it in 88 or 196 messages or something like that, or Martyn Lloyd-Jones in 444. But you can read Romans in one hour, and I think you ought to do it sometimes. Read it right through and realize this is a synopsis of what Paul would have taught to the Romans if he had been there. And so, we forget that we have already had this teaching, it's right there and then within 20 minutes of reading or less, you go right from Romans 8 through 9, through 11, and then into 12, the spirit-filled life looks like this. It's the foundation of what he's telling us to do.

You Are Called to Live a Supernatural Life!

Now, I confess to you that when I was a boy, I used to like to read comic books. I don't do it anymore. But I used to like read them when I was a kid, the Marvel comics, with the Superman and the Fantastic Four. Now they're making all these movie, Spider-Man, and these folks, each one of them had extraordinary capabilities, the ability to fly or to have a bullet bounce off your chest or to have x-ray vision, all of that kind of thing, and the extraordinary, a sense of the supernatural and you know something, this is not new with us. It's been around for a long time. The Greek myths are filled with supernatural heroes like Hercules who could do amazing things. He was given 10 tasks to do, and did each one by his mighty supernatural power.

Why is this? Well, I think there's a cry inside the human heart to be lifted up out of the humdrum ordinary physical existence to something greater, something better. There's a cry for the extraordinary. I could say a cry for the supernatural. We were made for God. We were not just made for 9:00-5:00 humdrum existence, but we were made for more than that. Do you not feel it inside your heart that you were made for more than a humdrum experience? And Christ came to bring us that. He came to call on us to get up out of the boat and see what he could do supernaturally in and through us. And this is the whole thing, Christ's supernatural power is so great, so comprehensive, that he can actually work in the everyday ordinary ebb and flow of life and do supernatural things, things of eternal consequence in the way you think, in the way you speak, in the way you work, in the way you play, in the way you do family, in the way you treat other people, other Christians, non-Christians, even enemies, the way you deal with each one of these categories of people can be done supernaturally.

You are called, brothers and sisters in Christ, to a supernatural life. Isn't that marvelous? You were called to it, and I can show it to you from lots of Scriptures. You know, it says that Christ is in us, indwelling in us, in us the hope of glory. He calls us the temple of the Holy Spirit of God. He says, "Your bodies are the temple of the Spirit of God." These are the bodies we are presenting to him daily as living sacrifices. And we're called on to be more than normal, ordinary people. Look at Jesus' statement in the Sermon on the Mount. I've given you a section of Scripture in Matthew 5, at the middle of the Sermon on the Mount, at the end of chapter 5, Jesus says this, "If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others?" Think about that.

"What are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect therefore as your Heavenly Father is perfect." Do you not see in that the upward call of God in Christ Jesus? Be perfect, go upward. Don't just be like everyone else. Don't be like the ordinary pagans. Live a higher life, a better life. You should be doing more than others. You should be living a supernatural life. For Paul, we see this in Corinthians. He's struggling with this talented spiritually gifted church that just has so many problems and they're faction ridden, and they've got all kinds of difficulties. And he gets to this point in 1 Corinthians 3 when he tells them that they are still worldly. "For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere men?"

What is the implication that Paul has? From what point of view is he arguing? He's saying you shouldn't be. You should be better than that. You should be acting like spirit-filled men and women. Not acting in an ordinary way. "For when one says, 'I follow Paul,' and another, 'I follow Apollos,' are you not mere men?" What is the problem? Paul is expecting the Corinthian Christians to be living an openly supernatural life. They should be different than they are.

Now, this life is impossible to be lived apart from the Spirit of God. It is impossible to be lived apart from the foundation of forgiveness, through faith in the cross. Forgiveness through faith in the blood of Christ. But it is a life that we Christians are called to live and that we can live by his power. Isn't that wonderful?

II. Supernatural Character

And look at all the areas that we're going to be covering in the next three weeks, this week and two more weeks. We'll start with supernatural character. We'll start with the heart and love. And then we're going to talk about again this morning, zeal which is also a heart matter. Zeal and service. And then we're going to talk about next week, supernatural joy in trials and supernaturally loving the brothers, getting along with one another, living in harmony with Christians, which sometimes can be a challenge especially if it's me. I'll put it on me.

Sometimes living with other Christians can be difficult, a challenge. But supernatural love for the family of God, and a supernatural stance toward the outside world, dealing with other people, even humble lowly poor people, dealing with them well; a life of hospitality in which you're opening your homes, a life in which you just feel like you're encountering God, people are encountering God when they encounter you. When they come into your home, when they come into your life in some way, they just feel like God is around that person. Supernatural. And then the culmination in chapter 12, a supernatural love for enemies. Giving up on vengeance, giving up on revenge, living an open and forgiving life. Harder to do than you might think. I believe that everyone of us to some degree still is holding on to some bitterness, some unforgiveness, a desire for revenge at one level. And I just think Romans 12 frees us from that, and I'm looking forward to that in the third week.

It All Begins with the Heart

Well, let's start with the heart. Let's start with supernatural character. It all begins with the heart. And verse 9 says, "Love must be sincere." Paul starts with the character. What kind of person you are inside and he starts with love, that's where he begins. Now, Paul's been discussing spiritual gifts, and after discussing practical ministries that we can have, he goes back to this, the motive for your using your spiritual gift. Love. It must be love. But he says it's got to be a sincere love. And he goes to the root matter.

Now, the issue here is one of integrity. The word that's translated here, sincere, literally, literalistically could be brought over from the original language, unhypocritical. Unhypocritical, and unhypocritical love. Now, hypocritical in that original language is like an actor. Okay? An actor, somebody who presents a facade, who's got a mask and you don't see them as they really are.

I read a story about Sir Laurence Olivier, he's one of the greatest actors of the 20th century. And there was a young actor who became famous in his own right eventually, who was a very hard-working actor and who threw himself into the role by gaining a lot of weight and immersing himself in the lifestyle that he was going to be doing in the movie and studying and going all these sort of places. And Lawrence Olivier pulled him aside and said, "What are you doing?" He said, "Well, I want to experience this role so I can do it better." He said, "Why don't you just act?" He said, "Watch," and he just for 10 minutes acted in this sort of way and the guy was blown away.

The essence of acting is that it's not based on being, and he's saying, "You don't need to do all that, just act." Well, that's the exact opposite of what the Lord's commanding on us here. You can't just act like a Christian, you can't just act loving. It can't be a sham. It can't be a facade. It must be unhypocritical. How many times do you hear this, 'Church is full of hypocrites'? Well, I have found that church is full of hypocrites. I've also found, so is the world. Have you ever noticed?

I was talking once to somebody about this, "Oh, you know, you're a pastor, you're in the ministry," and, "I never go to church, full of hypocrites." I said, "What's a hypocrite?" "Well, somebody who doesn't live up to the standard that they have." I said, "Well, what standards do you have for life? Give me, for example, 10 ideas of standards we should live up to and write them down." Well, they didn't want to do all that work. I said, "Alright, then do three. And then just watch and see how well you live up to them." It isn't long before they recognize they're hypocrites, too. I think church is a good place to come and get healed of your hypocrisy. Amen? Get healed of it. But here's a command that says be healed of it. Love must be unhypocritical, it must be sincere, it must go to the core. Don't be two different people. Don't have a secret life.

Matthew 22, it says, "Love the Lord your God with all of your heart, and with all your soul and with all of your strength, this is the first and greatest commandment. The second is like it, Love your neighbor as yourself." Everything that God wants of you is summed up in this, love. But it's got to be a sincere love. You're not going to fool God. There's no facade in front of God. He will be able to see through it. This is such a clear indicator of true Christianity that Jesus said this in John 13:35, "By this will all men know that you are my disciples if you love one another." And so it starts with an unhypocritical love. But we also find in this verse that it's not just a positive matter of love. What you are attracted to, what your soul embraces, what you are yearning for, that's not it alone. It also says love must be sincere, hate what is evil. There is a hatred that's part of the mature healthy Christian life. And it is definitely the other side of the coin on love.

If we genuinely love something, you will hate anything that's opposed to that. For example, if you love a person, you'll hate anything that would destroy that person, right? If you love righteousness then you're going to hate wickedness. You can't just love righteousness and be ambivalent about wickedness, so we must hate what is evil.

Recently, my children were going through a unit study on World War II and one of them brought me a picture in a book. I can scarcely even mention the picture, but it was a group of Russian children about the age of my kids, black and white photo, standing for a photo, a group photo, and they're smiling, waving all this kind of thing, oblivious to the fact that they're about to be murdered by some SS guards and all of them were. They're all dead. That was their last moment on Earth, and I started to cry. And that was 60 years ago.

Now you look at that kind of thing and you say, "That is just evil. It's just evil." And you can't have a blah reaction to that. But I say we have a blah reaction to evil all the time. God calls more things evil than we do. And there has to be a passionate reaction to temptation like not just, "Ehh, not right now." But, "No way! May it never be!" We have to hate what is evil. There's a passion inside. Not just to, like it says, cling to what is good, the very next phrase, like glue, literally a good translation. Cling to what is good, but be repulsed by what is evil. Not just neutral. That's the way God is. And so it begins with the heart.

III. Supernatural Zeal in Service

Part of the heart though is zeal. Look at verse 11, it says, "Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor serving the Lord." What is zeal?

Zeal is the fire of God in your heart. I think about, for example, the burning bush of Moses, the one that he saw that was burning and burning and burning, but it wasn't burned up. It says also in the Book of Hebrews, our God is a consuming fire. Zeal is like the fire of God, a spiritual fire of God inside your heart. It cause you to burn for his glory. And here it says in verse 11, "Never be lacking in zeal. But keep your spiritual fervor serving the Lord."

JC Ryle wrote this, he said, "Zeal and Christianity is a burning desire to please God, to do his will, to advance his glory in the world in every possible way. It is a desire which is not natural to men or women, it is a desire which the Spirit puts in the heart of every believer when they are converted to Christ, a desire which some believers, however, feel so much more strongly than others, that they alone deserved to be called zealous men and women. This desire is so strong when it really reigns in a person, that it impels them to make any sacrifice to go through any trouble, to deny themselves anything, to suffer, to work, to labor, to toil, to spend themselves and to be spent, even to die. If only they can please Christ their Savior. A zealous person in Christianity then is preeminently a person of one thing. It is not enough to say that they're earnest, strong, uncompromising, meticulous, wholehearted, and fervent in spirit. No, zealous people see only one thing, they care for one thing, they live for one thing, they're swallowed up in one thing, and that one thing is to please Almighty God."

Well, that's what Ryle says, and I think he's right. There's an intense focus like a laser beam on the pleasure of God. I burn to please God, that's what a zealous person is saying. It's a single-minded focus. Now, Christ had it, didn't he? Did Christ not have zeal for the glory of God? Do you not see it in John chapter 2, when he comes in and finds that the place filled with the traffic of religion, all the concessions, the temple concessions, they're selling sacrifices, and what a scam the whole thing was, how filthy and wretched from top to bottom? And so, Jesus pulls off to the side and takes the time to make a whip. I don't know how long it took him to make that whip, but it's a picture of the wrath of God. It takes a while to get going, but boy, when it's unleashed. And he comes out there and he takes that whip and he moves those animals right out of the temple, and he overturns the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves, and he says, "Get these out of here! How dare you turn my Father's house into a marketplace!"

In John 2, it says his disciples remembered that it was written, "Zeal for your house will consume me." I think that's almost a literalistic prophecy of Jesus' life. Basically, zeal for the house of God ate him up. It killed him. What do you think motivated the high priest and all his henchmen to kill Jesus? Was it his doctrine? What do you think? I think these folks were somewhat more atheological than we might imagine. They were businessmen. It's not personal, only business, right? They're going after him like the mafioso.

But at any rate, it's very serious because Jesus interfered with their business. He didn't do it just once, he did it twice, and so zeal for the house of God led to his crucifixion. But let's go even more directly theological. It is for zeal for the glory of God and zeal for our souls that Jesus shed his blood on the cross. He was willing to die rather than that unforgiven, uncleansed sinner should defile his heavenly realm, and he would rather die than that people he love should burn forever in hell. Both sides are true. Do you see the zeal of Jesus, both for the glory and the holiness of God and for souls like yours and mine? The zeal of Jesus Christ.

The Apostle Paul had it too, didn't he? Do you see the zeal of the Apostle Paul? He said, "I count my life worth nothing to me. If only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me, the task of testifying to the gospel of God's grace." And at the end of his life, he gets to say, "I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race, I have kept the faith." Zeal. And so I say, away with bland, tasteless Christianity. Away with it! Away with it from my life. You should have a flavor as a Christian, don't you think? You should be salty. Jesus said if the salt lose its saltiness, it's worthless, it's no longer good for anything. You should have a distinct flavor. I would hope the flavor would be enticing.  It would be appealing, but you should away with bland Christianity. There should be a fire in your life, a fire in your heart, a fire in your ministry.

I used to go camping, as I've mentioned before, with my father, and he had this incredible little blue stove called an Optimus stove, it was made in Sweden. I'll never forget a little blue box like this. We went camping/hiking. Later in marriage, I just went camping, surrounded by RVs and TV sets and hot showers and stuff. I didn't do that when I was younger. We hiked up to just below the tree line, about 5000 feet up and everything you had, you needed, you carried on your back. And so we have this little Optimus stove, and I'll never forget the heat that that thing would put out, this fiery blue flame that could boil water in about 4 minutes. It's just a picture of that fire. Imagine trying to cook a meal using a candle. Alright? You can't do it, try it sometime. Try to boil water with a pot and a candle. It would take an awfully long time, wouldn't it? Couldn't do it.

But yet I feel like we present to God a candle and say, "Here, use me. Use me." He can't. He won't. Thomas Brooks, a Puritan, said, "Cold prayers freeze before they get to heaven." Well, so does cold service, it freezes before it ever gets to heaven, it can accomplish nothing. Where is your fire? These are big time issues going on. Heaven and earth, eternity in heaven, eternity in hell. That's what we're talking about. Giving Christ an account for every moment of your life, that is big. Giving him an account for every careless word you've spoken, that is big. Making the most of every dollar, every minute, that is big. It should call some fire from you, it should call some passion from you that the name of your Savior, Jesus, is dishonored in this world, it should bother you. It should like the psalmist in Psalm 119 said, "Tears flow from my eyes because your law is disobeyed or dishonored." Well, tears should flow from our eyes because Christ is dishonored. And so, we have to get rid of this idea of laziness. A literal translation here is, do not be slothful in zeal. The NIV gives us, never be lacking in zeal. Basically, don't be lazy in the matter of zeal.

I saw a humorous thing put out by a Christian company, they do different videos and stuff and some of them are pretty good, but it showed two teenage or maybe early 20s something young men, sitting in easy chairs, and behind one of them, a fire starts burning in the kitchen. And he looks over his shoulder and just... So he pulls out his cell phone and he dials a number and it's his friend who's sitting in the next chair over to him. He says, "Hey, there's a fire in the kitchen." And the other guy, just as sleepy as he is, he looks back and says, "Well, what should we do about it?" And then at that moment, it just burns down and burns out, and they shrug and they hang up and keep watching the program. I fear that that's how some of us deal with our lives here on earth. Do not be slothful in zeal. Do not be lazy. God is calling from us diligence in the matter of personal holiness, of growing in grace and the knowledge of Christ, we have to work at it.

God is calling from us diligence in the matter of taking the gospel to the ends of the earth, even to our neighbors and co-workers. Do not be slothful in zeal, it says. Especially, I want to focus on zeal for lost souls, passion for the lost around you. You're surrounded all the time by people who don't know Christ as their Savior. Do you care about that? Does that matter to you? Christ had that passion for souls. He said in John 4, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me and finish his work. Do you not say four months more and then comes the harvest? I tell you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, they are white for harvest." He's talking about people.

John 7, on the last and greatest day of the feast, it says Jesus stood and called out in a loud voice, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink." Do you see the passion in Jesus for lost souls? For people to be saved? And passion when they're not. In Luke 19:41, it says, "As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it." We saw the same passion in the Apostle Paul for his own Jewish people who were rejecting the gospel. In Romans 9, "I speak the truth in Christ, I'm not lying, my conscience confirms it, in the Holy Spirit I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart for I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my own people, those of the nation of Israel." Do you see the passion inside it? Do you have it? Do you have that kind of passion for the lost? Is it in you?

William Carey burned with it. Before he went on the mission field, he was a shoemaker and repairer. He used to carry on a leather globe that he had made, and he would turn it to the part of the world that God had laid on his heart, Asia and India and he'd point and with tears coming down his face, he say, "These are all heathen, they're lost." And that's what made him get on a boat and go.

Henry Martin, educated at Cambridge, he could have done anything he wanted in the world but turned his back on all of it, went to an early grave because of his passion for the lost. He said this, "I would be willing to be torn in pieces if only I could hear the sobs of repentance, if I could see the eyes of faith directed to the redeemer." This is zeal.

I'm going to close with a story I read from a biography of Hudson Taylor, and Hudson Taylor was asked to be a missionary motivation speaker in Toronto, and he went there, I think it was, it might have been actually in the UK, but he wasn't used to that kind of speaking and didn't know what to say, but he brought out of his own missionary experience a story that was moving. And this is what he said, "On a journey from Shanghai to Ningbo," he said, "Among the passengers on board the boat was one intelligent man who, in the course of his travels, had been a good deal abroad. On the previous evening, I had drawn him into earnest conversation about his soul salvation, the man listened with attention, and was even moved to tears but still no definite result was apparent. I was pleased therefore when he asked to be allowed to accompany me and to hear me preach." Then as the story continues, as Mr. Taylor was in the cabin a few moments later, he heard a splash and a cry and running out, found this man had fallen overboard and had sunk in the water.

Instantly lowering the sail of the boat, he sprang into the water and he called to a nearby fishing boat to come with their drag hooks. 'Come!' He cried, his hope revived in his heart. 'Come and drag over this spot directly, a man is drowning, just here.' 'It is not convenient,' was the unfeeling answer. 'Don't talk of convenience,' cried I in agony, 'A man is drowning I tell you.' 'But we are busy fishing,' they responded, 'and we cannot come.' 'Never mind your fishing. I will give you more money than many days fishing will bring. Only come, come at once!' 'How much money will you give us?' 'We cannot stay to discuss that now. Come or it will be too late. I'll give you $5.' 'We won't do it for that,' replied the man. 'Give us $20 and we will drag.' 'I do not possess so much. Do come quickly and I'll give you everything I have.' 'Well, how much is that?' 'I don't know exactly, about $14.' At last, but even then, slowly, the boat paddled over and the net was let down, and less than a minute sufficed to bring up the body of the missing man. All in vain, however, life was gone."

It's not convenient? How much will you give me? Christ is calling on us to have a passion for his service, a zeal for him, for his glory. What is he doing in the world? What work is he doing? Is he not calling people to himself, calling people to salvation? Brothers and sisters, we are rich. We have forgiveness of sins, we have the indwelling spirit, we have a glorious future in heaven, we have everything we need for life and godliness. We also have a high calling, to walk perfectly in this world and to be his witnesses to bring people to salvation. Neve be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor serving the Lord. Close with me in prayer.

Introduction

In Matthew, chapter 11, we  look at an invitation in which Christ is commanding, inviting us to come into his rest.  The world has a desperate need for the truth that Christ gives us here today, we have a desperate need for the peace of Jesus Christ. Is that not true? 

We watch in the streets of New York, in Barcelona and Sydney and all over the world, peace protesters with their angry faces and their burning flags and their fits of rage. We see, again, the need for the truth of this text, the peace that only Christ can give. This world is in the throes and the power of the evil one, the devil, and he is not a peaceful being. We're going to talk about that this morning, but because of our casting in our lot with him, because we as a race have joined in Satan's rebellion, we do not know the peace of God, we do not know the peace that only God can give. As we look out over the nations, we see turbulence, we see churning, we see a casting up of mire and muck. We see a great deal of unrest all over the world.

One of the most fascinating little phrases that I've noticed in the Book of Revelation happens at the end. In Revelation 21:1, it says, "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea". It's kind of strange. What does God have against the sea? I think the sea is a majestic and a beautiful thing.  The ocean's a powerful but it's not a very peaceful thing. There's a great deal of churning all the time, and in the Book of Revelation, Chapter 13:1, it says, "The Dragon stood on the shore of the sea and I saw a beast coming out of the sea, he had 10 horns and seven heads with 10 crowns on his horns and on each head a blasphemous name." So, up out of the sea comes this beast. Earlier in the book of Daniel, it'd been the same thing,. It'd been the winds blowing over the sea and out of it, come a succession of beasts, representing human government, wicked human government.

The sea represents the churning turbulence of world history of the nations, and out of it come all these filthy beasts, this government which is so anti-God. Revelation 21:1 says, there'll be no more sea because there will be a king and he will rule greatly over his kingdom, the kingdom of God at that time, and there'll be no more churning up of mire and muck and sin for the old order of things will have passed away. It says in Isaiah 17:12, "Oh, the raging of many nations, they rage like the raging sea. Oh, the uproar of the peoples, they roar like the roaring of great waters." So it is as we look over world history today, we see the raging of the nations and the lack of peace, and all of that comes from the fact that we are not at peace with God. It all starts with individual rebellion against our Creator. 

We need the truth of this text more than ever before. Jesus stands before a rebellious people. Realize the context of this invitation. Jesus had denounced the cities in which most of his miracles had been performed because they did not repent, they were not accepting Christ, they were rejecting him.  Capernaum and Chorazin and Bethsaida were representative of the cities of Israel that were listening to the gospel and rejecting it. Jesus stood before that rejection and  said, "Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light."  He's inviting weary burdened sinners. "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened," he says, "And I will give you rest." He's inviting people that are sick of sin, sick of the struggle with sin, because sin is a crushing tyrant everyday. Sin is the most vicious ruler there has ever been, and you get weary of it. You get weary of the effects of sin in your life. "Come to me," said Jesus, "All you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest." Even greater is the crushing burden of a guilty conscience of knowing that you have sinned and knowing that God is holy and that the law of God stands against you, and that you're accused and that someday, you will have to give an account to God, a meticulous and perfect account for every careless word you've ever spoken. If you don't know Christ, you have no savior, and you know that you're condemned and there's nothing for you except the fearful expectation of judgement and raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. What a terrifying way to live.

The Authority of the Yoke 

Jesus said, "If that's oppressive to you, a sense of the condemnation that hangs over you because of your sin then come to me and I will give you rest."  I want to show you what the king commands. He invites weary burdened sinners and what does he invite them to do? Simply to come to him. That's all, "Come to me," he says, "And receive a gift." Nothing you could ever earn. "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” It's a gift of grace. That's who he invites and invites them to come simply to Him through repentance, and faith, that's all. But then he commands something of them, and we're going to zero in on that. "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls." Then he says, “…for my yoke is easy and my burden is light." Now what does this mean, "Take my yoke upon you?" What is a yoke? It's a simple wooden structure that connects a beast of burden to a plow or some other piece of farm equipment. It enables them to stay, perhaps, two oxen to stay together and pull in the same direction.  There's a physical meaning of this yoke and that's the way the Bible uses it in some cases. But ordinarily, when the Bible speaks of a yoke, it uses it metaphorically. It refers to the authority of a king or a master, good or bad, over a subject or a slave. The yoke  represents authority. It's used for example, of the Egyptian's domination over the Israelites when they were slaves in Egypt. In Exodus 6:6,  "Therefore, say to the Israelites. I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm, and with mighty acts of judgment." So the yoke represents the authority badly used by the Egyptians but the authority of the Egyptians over the Israelites.

In another instance, Jeremiah had a wooden yoke that he went around with and a false prophet came and broke the yoke and said, "God will not give us over to Nebuchadnezzar."  God said, "Make an iron one, he can't break." "There's no way that you're going to escape the authority of Nebuchadnezzar."  That's how the Bible uses the term “yoke.” It's a matter of authority of a king or a master over a subject or slave. Good or bad, that's how the word is used. What then is Christ's yoke? Jesus says, "Take my yoke upon you." Some commentators think that it's Christ's way of religion. Learn to do religion the way I'm telling you to do religion. There's some backing for this because it speaks of the yoke that our forefathers put on the necks of the descendants of Israel. It mentions that in the circumcision struggle, but I don't think that's what's going on here. The overall context of Matthew's gospel is the kingdom of heaven.  Jesus is presenting himself as the King of the Kingdom of Heaven, so when He says, "Take My yoke upon you," is he not declaring himself to be a king? Is he not in effect saying, "Stop rebelling against me, throw down your weapons of revolt and come back under my authority"? Isn't that what he's saying? "Allow me to be your ruler, allow me to be your king." I think what he's saying is, "Let me be your Lord, your master, your ruler." He's going to describe his yoke as easy and his burden as light and we'll talk about that in a moment, but I think that's what he's commanding. "Let me rule your life, obey me, submit to my authority." Now bowing the neck under Christ's yoke is an extreme burden, actually impossible for the unregenerate. For somebody who has never been born again, they would never do this, they would not bow their neck to Christ, they would not yield to Him, no matter how much He assures them the yoke is easy and the burden is light. This is the one thing they will not do.

 Charles Spurgeon put it this way, "Observe dear friends that our Lord Jesus Christ does lay a yoke and a burden upon his followers. He uses these words that none may presume to enter his service without due consideration. Religion is not a matter for the trifling. The service of the meek and lowly Christ is no child's play. There is a yoke that is to be borne by all his disciples, and the neck of self will must be bent low to receive it. There is a burden to be carried for Christ and all the strength that God gives us must be used for his glory and honor."  So there is a yoke, but then Spurgeon goes on and says this, "If you are going to come into Christ's kingdom, you must repent, and believe the good news." What does “repent” mean? It means to turn away from self-rebellion. It's impossible to do this if you're unconverted. Spurgeon said, "Some of you would not find Christ's yoke easy or his burden light. That is the very last thing you would find them to be in your present condition, but you would find his yoke to be heavy and his burden impossible for you to bear. Some of you are mere worldlings, lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. It may be that some of you are self-righteous and proud of what should be your shame. In any case you are un-regenerate and our text would not be true of you, in your unconverted state." Basically you cannot obey this command if you don't come to Christ first.  Simply come to Christ, simply trust in Him, believe in Him as your savior and then you will be able by the power of the Spirit to bow your neck to his yoke. 

Now Jesus says, "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me." Literally, I think it means “be my disciple”. "Let me disciple you, let me teach you, let me instruct you." We must have a word of instruction, because we die from lack of the word of God, don't we? We perish from a famine of hearing the word of God. Jesus says, "I will be your instructor, I will be your teacher, I will give you everything you need. Learn from me." And he describes his yoke, as easy and his burden as light.  Now stop with me for a moment and consider how shocking this really is. Christ's yoke easy and his burden is light? Realize that already he has demanded of His disciples complete and total perfect obedience. You don't get any days off from this yoke.  Do we ever get a break from the yoke of Christ? Are not his standards perfection and nothing less? Does he not claim a loyalty higher than any other relationship we have on Earth?  It is higher than even your love for your life itself and you must demonstrate every day a willingness to take up your cross and follow, a willingness even to die.  How can Jesus call that yoke easy and that burden light? 

Seven Reasons Christ’s Yoke is Easy & the Burden Light

I think there are seven reasons why Christ's yoke is easy and why his burden is light. Let's look at them. First, because of Christ's perfect nature. How does He describe Himself in this text? He says, "I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls." If Christ were a raging tyrant who delighted to make us suffer, who took pleasure in our pain, would his yoke be easy and his burden light? No that's describing sin, and the devil, actually, but not Christ. The Kingdom of God is good news, because God is such a good king, because Christ is such a good king, and therefore because of his personal nature, his perfect nature, his yoke is easy and his burden is light. Christ is perfectly humble.  He submitted to the yoke of his father. He did everything that God commanded him to do. His will, his food, was to do the will of Him who sent Him and to finish His work, and so he was perfectly humble. We have a king who's willing to take off his garments of glory and get down on his hands and knees and wash our dirty yucky feet. He doesn't do it just once, he does it all the time. He's very humble in dealing with us, he's very lowly. He condescends and lowers Himself to take care of us. That's the nature of our king. Therefore, we can take His yoke upon us because He is gentle and humble in heart, because of His perfect nature. 

Secondly, we can take His yoke upon us and it is easy and his burden is light because of his perfected work. Christ has already borne the heaviest yoke. He's already carried the weight of our sins, and He did it right to the cross. Jesus was humble enough to die on the cross. "He who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness and being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death, even death on the cross." Because of Christ perfected work on the cross, His yoke is easy and his burden is light. We don't drink his cup of wrath, we drink from his cup that's persecution, but we don't drink it to the bottom the way He did. He drank the cup of God's wrath. Isaiah 53 says, "Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him and afflicted." But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities, the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His wounds, we are healed, we all like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way.” The Lord has laid on him might we say the crushing burden of our sin, our judgment. So his yoke is easy and his burden is light, because He's already carried the heaviest load for us when He died on the cross.

 Thirdly, His yoke is easy and his burden is light because of the simplicity of being a servant. What do you have to worry about when you're the servant of an all powerful and all providing master?  Just do what you're told, that's all. Don't fret anymore about finances. Don't be concerned anymore about the future, about your physical health. Don't fret yourself over the unfolding events, current events. You can pray for all of these things and you should, but don't be anxious over them as though you are somehow king over them. It's a simple life. The simple life of being the servant of a good and powerful providing master.Hs yoke is easy and his burden is light, because of the simplicity of being a servant.

 Fourthly, because of the perfection of Christ commands, Christ's yoke is the way that He rules your life, you bow your neck to him, you put your neck under His yoke and then he says, "This is the way, walk in it." If he wants you to go left and you go straight or right, you're going to have problems, aren't you? But might I suggest to you that straight or right is sin anyway, and God's commandments protect you from sin. 1 John 5:3, "His commands are not burdensome." No, do you know what is burdensome? Sin is burdensome, sin is the enemy. I want to fight sin with all of my heart when I see it and Christ's yoke, God’s commands,  actually protects me from the very thing that would seek to destroy me. That's why his yoke is easy and his burden is light, because it's much easier than sin. Is it not easier for a man, let's say, to resist lust than to pick up the pieces of a broken marriage after committing adultery? Is it not easier to bow your neck to Christ commands so that you don't have to face the grief of a broken world? Christ's yoke is infinitely easier and his burden infinitely lighter than the alternative, which is sin. 

Fifthly, Christ's yoke is easy and his burden is light because of the hopefulness of a life well invested under His yoke. Do it his way and you will store up treasure in Heaven. You will know that every moment the labor, the service, the sacrifice that you're giving matters.  It adds up for something worthwhile, you're not wasting your life, you're not sowing to the wind and reaping a whirlwind. You're not sowing seeds on the rocky soil or on the hardened path and nothing comes of it, instead as a result of following Christ's yoke, you are storing up treasure in heaven. You're building a kingdom that will never end, and everything you do therefore has value, it is worthwhile. As we submit to His yoke as our king and follow his ways, then our service to him lasts for eternity. It's valuable. But if you don't, your life will be blown away as dust in a storm. Your works will be torched with fire and they will burn like wood hay in stubble, and there will be nothing to show. It says in 1 Corinthians 3, "We will suffer loss." But as we follow Him, as we keep in step with the Spirit and do the good works that He's ordained in advance that we should walk in them, then we store up treasure. His yoke is easy and his burden is light, because we have a sense of hopefulness always that our life is counting and pointing toward the future.

Sixthly, his yoke is easy and his burden is light because of the powerful assistance that he gives you in bearing it. He doesn't just put a heavy burden on you and stand back and watch you as you lift it. No, that's the scribes and Pharisees. Matthew 23:4 says, "Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites, you tie up heavy loads and put them on men's shoulders, but you yourself won't lift a little finger to help them." Is that our Christ? Oh, not at all. He dwells within us, by the power of the Spirit and any burden that he's put on us, He's already fully borne himself, he's given us an example and he steps up inside us and enables us to obey every command, to follow every inclination of His will. Hebrews 13:21 says, "May God equip you with everything good for doing His will and may he work in us what is pleasing to him."  God puts a heavy yoke on me and then gets inside me and helps me to lift it. He gives me the strength to follow. Augustine put it this way, "Give what you command, and then command what you will." His yoke is easy and his burden is light, because He assists us from within by the power of the Spirit to bear it. 

Seventhly, his yoke is easy and his burden is light because of the sweetness of the love we bear to Christ. We're glad to carry his yoke because we love Him. We're glad because in a way he's yoked right next to us walking with us. He is God with us, we're not alone. Every burden that we bear we do in fellowship with Christ, we're not alone. We have come to him and he is giving us rest. You remember Jacob served an additional seven years to get Rachel? It said the seven years that he served were as a few days to him because of his love for Rachel  and so it is with us, seven reasons why His yoke is easy and His burden is light. 

God’s Promise of Rest

What does the king promise for us? He promises rest for your souls. Satan is an inherently restless being. Remember when God spoke to Satan in the Book of Job, he said, "Where have you come from, what are you doing? He said, "I'm roaming around on the earth.” That's what he does for a living. He roams around all the time and why? Because he's a restless being, what does he have to look forward to? The lake of fire, that's it, he knows his time is short and so he roams around restlessly, not only him but his demons too. In Matthew 12:43, Jesus speaking of demons says, "When a demon comes out of a man it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it." Satan and his kingdom are in a restless place.When you're in sin, do you not feel also the restlessness? Nothing satisfies, Christ comes to give peace and freedom from that. The Bible says, "There is no rest for the wicked," but they're like mire churned up all the time, like the waves as we said at the beginning.There are counterfeits.  Satan tries to counterfeit the peace that Christ alone can give. There's drugs, there's alcohol, there's sensual pleasures, there's careerism, there's all kinds of worldly things but none of them can take the place of the peace that Christ can give, Christ alone can give it.

What are we talking about when He says, "I will give you rest"? First of all, peace with God; a relationship of peace with God, a status of peace, that He's no longer at war with you. Romans 5:1, says, "Therefore since we have been justified through faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." God's not at war with you anymore if you're in Christ. You have a status of peace with God, that's the rest that He gives you. It's the end of your soul, it's the goal of your soul, it's what you've been searching for all this time. I think about the pioneers in our country’s early history, going across our nation to populate the west. Can you imagine being on one of those wagon trains going across the deserts of Colorado, Utah, Nevada and coming up over the last mountain ridge and seeing a fertile valley California, where you knew at last you've reached your desired haven. This is home at last. It's well watered land, free for the taking, you can settle there, you survive. You've come to the end of your journey. That's Christ after you've searched for everything. Augustine put it this way, "You have made us for yourself O God and the heart of man is restless until it finds its rest in you."  Christ gives you peace with God and you know your sins are forgiven. 

But there's another kind of peace isn't there?  Philippians 4:6-7 it says, "Do not be anxious about anything but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving present your requests to God and the peace of God which passes all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." What is that? It's an experience of peace right now in the middle of your circumstances. Oh, but you don't know my circumstances you might say. Well, I can guess there's really only so many circumstances that people tend to go into. Christ does know your circumstances and it is possible to know the rest for your souls that God intends even in the middle of very terrible and difficult circumstances. Do you think God is all stirred up and turbulent about the current events this week?  Is God on His throne saying, "What am I going to do? I don't know what to do, it's getting confusing, help me out, why don't an angel come give me some advice." Is this our God? Not at all. He knows what He's doing. Don't you want to experience His peace through anything you go through? The peace of God, this is the rest that Christ offers. Ultimately,  he offers you a Sabbath rest in perfect face-to-face fellowship with God having crossed the spiritual Jordan. Death into His presence you will find rest for your souls in Christ But he also offers you peace with God now, forgiveness of sins, justification, He offers you the peace of God, an experience of God's peace no matter what your circumstances and then He offers you in the future peace and His presence, a Sabbath rest, an eternal Sabbath rest in the very presence of God. That is the peace that he offers here in Matthew 11:28-30, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Application

What application can we take from this? First, come to Christ, the gentle king, come to Him for salvation. Can I urge you if you don't know for sure that your sins are forgiven through faith in Christ, that you don't know whether you've ever come to Christ and received the peace that he alone can give, that you not walk out of here without talking to me or one of the other ministers about your soul. Come to Christ through faith, through simple faith. If you have already come to Christ can I urge you, are you bowing your neck to Him, to His yoke every day? I you're not, if you can honestly say you're not, would you not say that all the trouble in your life is connected to the fact that you won't take His yoke upon you, that you want to run your life your way, you're not yielded to the king and following His instructions. Can I urge you gently and tenderly to repent and allow Christ to be your king. Bow your neck to him, take His yoke upon you and learn from Him, become like Him, gentle and humble in heart, peaceful and trusting under the hand of a master as Jesus was under the hand of His father, learn from Him. Thirdly, live your life free from anxiety, free from concern. Live in the peace of God through prayer and through obedience and through trusting, looking forward to your eternal Sabbath rest by trusting Him no matter what you're going through, whether financial difficulties, marriage difficulties, parenting difficulties, physical health difficulties, struggles that you're having. Trust Him and let Him give you the peace that only He can give.

I. The Highest Honor of the Gospel

If you would, take your Bibles and open to Romans chapter 8, a magnificent passage of Scripture. We're looking this morning at verses 14-17, but in a little bit of a different way. Last week, we went through the verses, verse by verse, and we tried to understand the privilege, and what it means to be called a child of God, and specifically, in one sense: How do we know if we are children of God? And we drew out five questions, and we applied those to ourselves, that we might understand and know, whether we, ourselves, are children of God. Nothing could be more important than that. There is no inquiry more significant than to determine, are we children of God? Am I a child of God?

"I believe the reason why so many poor souls," it says, William Gurnall said, "The reason why so many poor souls have so little joy in their hearts, is that they have so little light of Gospel knowledge in their minds. The further a soul stands from the light of truth, the further he must needs be from the heat of comfort." I guess, in a way, I'm inviting all of us to come into the cottage and sit right by the fire. Get right close to the Scripture truth, that we might be warmed by it, that we might understand the light and the heat that come from the promises of God. Because the fact of the matter is, we don't experience, in our physical world, in our physical lives, all the blessings of being a child of God. Most of them are deferred, aren't they? And we're not going to experience them all, until we die, and go to Heaven.

And so, we actually have to read, constantly, the Scriptures, and renew, again, our minds in them, that we might understand the privileges of the child of God. I'm hoping that joy will enter your heart this morning. I'm going to be going over a list of privileges of being a child of God. I'm hoping that, as you read each one, the promise, the lavish promise that comes to you, as a child of God, might bring joy into your hearts. Thomas Watson said this, "Here, in this world, joy enters into the saints, but in Heaven, the saints enter into joy." Here, we just get a little foretaste, don't we? We get a little drink, and hopefully, it'll be enough for you, as you face all of the trials, and the things that you're going to face this week. But think, someday, perhaps, even soon, for some of you that are listening to me, joy won't enter into you, you're going to dive into an ocean of joy.

As Jesus said, "Well done, good and faithful servant. You've been faithful in a few things. Now, I'll put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your Master." What kind of joy does God have? Well, it's an ocean of joy, and someday, as a child of God, you're going to dive in. But today, I'm praying that just joy will enter into you, as you consider the blessing of being a child of God. I believe that when we first come to faith in Christ, all of these things are given to us in totality. They're all ours. They're part of our inheritances, as a child of God. They're given to us in lump sum, and then time, the purpose of time, among other things, is to unfold each of those blessings, as we walk along, as children of God. We're going to unfold them a little bit this morning. Thomas Watson said this, "God is ever giving to His children, yet, has nonetheless forgiving. His riches are imparted, they are not impaired. And so, as God doles out these privileges, these riches of the Gospel, He doesn't have any less to give."

We're looking, this morning, in terms of adoption, and the fact that we are adopted children of God, at what I think is the highest, the most surprising honor and blessing of the Gospel. Now, Romans chapter 8, as a whole, is given to us, to give us assurance of salvation. The very first sentence in Romans 8, namely, verse 1, gives us a sense of that assurance. Look, again, at it. It says, "There is, therefore, now, no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." What an incredible promise that is. But realize that, even there, it's delimited. It's stated very clearly who gets that blessing, "Those who are in Christ Jesus." For them, there is no condemnation. And so, all the way through to the end, in Romans chapter 8, at the very end it says that, nothing, "neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God, that is in Christ Jesus." From the beginning to the end of Romans 8, from 'no condemnation' all the way through to 'no separation,' there are incredible blessings given to us, but all of them come to those that are in Christ Jesus. Or, to zero in the way we've been looking, last week, and this week, to those that are adopted children of God. All the blessings of the Gospel are given to those that are children of God.

II. Am I a Child of God?

Those Who Receive Christ by Faith

Now, last week, we zeroed in on that question, the central question of your existence. We could put it this way, "Am I or am I not a child of God?" We looked at five questions. A child of God are those who have received Christ by faith, so have you received Christ by faith? In John 1:12, it says, Those who are justified by faith are children of God. They're adopted by faith into the family. Simply by receiving Christ, by trusting in Him, that He is God in the flesh, that He died on the Cross for you, that He rose from the dead, that His death was your death, the death you deserve, that His resurrection from the grave is really your resurrection, spiritually now, physically later, that there is a union between you and Christ. Have you received Jesus as your Lord and Savior? If so, you're a child of God.

Those Who Are Led by His Spirit

Secondly, the text says that, "Those who are led by His Spirit are children of God." Look at verse 14, it says, "All who are being led by," is a good translation, "All who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God." Now, we saw last week, that that meant, specifically, if you look back, if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die, but if by the Spirit, you are putting to death the deeds of the flesh, you will live, because those who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. So you put it all together, basically, you are a child of God, if you are daily putting sin to death by the power of the Holy Spirit. That's the second test and the second way you can know, whether you're a child of God.

Those Who Cry “Abba, Father” by His Spirit

Thirdly, children of God are those who cry, "Abba Father," by the Spirit. As we began our prayer time today, as I stepped up here, I had the privilege of addressing God as Abba Father, daddy. A sense of intimacy, a sense of love. We're going to talk more about that this morning, but those who have the Spirit moving us to cry up to God, "Abba Father," those are the children of God. It says in verse 15, "You have not received a Spirit of slavery leading to fear, again, but you have received a Spirit of adoption, as sons, by which we cry out, 'Abba Father.'"

Those Who Receive the Internal Witness by His Spirit

And then fourthly, those who receive the internal testimony of the Spirit, that you're a child of God, those are the children of God. Look at verse 16, "The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit, that we are children of God." If you're a child of God, the Holy Spirit's going to be telling you so. Over and over, He's going to be speaking to you. He's going to be addressing your spirit. He's going to be talking to you and saying, "Child of God. You're a child of God." It's like a homing beacon. "A child of God." He's just speaking and communicating to you, "You're a child of God," the indwelling Holy Spirit.

Those Who Suffer With Christ by His Spirit

And then, fifthly, we said, those who suffer with Christ, by His Spirit, these are children of God. Look at verse 17, "And if we are children, then we are heirs also, heirs of God, and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, in order that we may also be glorified with Him." In other words, you boil that verse down, "No suffering, no Kingdom." If you don't suffer with Christ, by the Spirit, you will not go to Heaven and reign with Christ. It's a clear teaching from Scripture. Well, what kind of suffering? Again, we talked about that last week, but I think there are two specific kinds of suffering that are in mind here. Suffering from temptation, as we resist sin and say, "No," and suffering persecution from a world that cannot understand Christ. These are the types of suffering, I think, that are in view here.

Those are the questions that we have to ask, to determine, am I a child of God? We did that last week. But I think it's still good for us to review it.

III. What Are My Privileges As a Child of God?

Now, what I'd like to ask, secondly, this week is, what are, specifically, my privileges, if I am a child of God? Boy, isn't this joyful? What a joy to go through a list like this. I've written out 11 privileges. You might wonder, "Why didn't I squeeze it out and get 12?" I didn't count them, until this morning. I guess I might've worked at it and we could've found more. I'm not saying these are all the privileges there are for a child of God, but these are some that we can find most naturally in the New Testament. And here, we're going to digress a little bit from my ordinary method. Usually, I'm just going verse by verse, word by word, looking through, but I have to tell you, that the New Testament is so filled with rich teaching on the idea of us as children of God, that it's really quite a delight to go through the New Testament, to try to understand the privileges, and also the responsibilities, of being a child of God.

• Eternal Life

Well, the first privilege that I'd like to bring to your attention, as a child of God, is that of life, mainly eternal life. Look what it says, again, in verses 13-14, "If you live according to the sinful nature, you will die. But if by the Spirit, you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live." That's the life that we're talking about. Jesus said, "I have come that they may have life and have it abundantly." There's an abundant rich, spiritual life that Christ has come to give.

Now, the opposite of that life is spiritual death, and the confirmation of both of those, is either condemnation in hell, or a rich welcome into Heaven. The life that we're talking about is the life of a child of God, namely, an intimate love relationship with God. We're going to talk more about that in a minute, but a life that can never be snuffed out. Children of God cannot die. Therefore, we have eternal life. That's the first privilege of being a child of God.

• Title

The second is a title. Now, in America, we've kind of turned our back on titles and privileges, haven't we? We left all that behind in the Revolutionary War. We're a free and open society, and we don't think much of Dukes, and Duchesses, and Lords, and Ladies, and all of that. That's part of the old world. But I think there is still a sense of a title being significant, that we should be called by the title 'children of God.' Isn't that incredible? And what an honor and a privilege it is. It says in 1 John 3:1, "Behold, how great is the love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God." There's a sense of a delight, in just having the title 'child of God,' that we could be called 'children of God.' It's incredible. And it's an honor, isn't it? It's not something we deserve. We can't say, "This is my birthright as a created being." No, not at all. We've already said, in John 1:12, "As many has received Him, to them, He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name." It's a privilege to be called a child of God. It's not for anyone, but for those who have faith in Christ, and they received this privilege.

Hebrews 2:11, it says, "Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy, are of the same family, so Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers." What an incredible verse. He's not ashamed to own you as a brother or a sister. We've been meeting on Thursdays, and discussing Hebrews in a Bible study, and we've turned the whole thing around, saying, "Jesus is not ashamed to call you a brother. Are you ever ashamed of Jesus?" Isn't that a stinging question? We should never be ashamed of Christ, or of this Gospel that gives such blessings. Paul says, "I'm not ashamed of the Gospel," not at all, but sometimes, I think the world wants to make us feel ashamed of Christ. Well, let me tell you something, on Judgment Day, if you're a child of God, he is going to own you as a brother or a sister. He's going to say, "She's mine. He's mine. I've paid with my blood for them." 'Child of God,' it's a title that's bestowed and it's an honored title.

• Love Relationship with the Father

Thirdly, there is a precious and a special, an intimate love relationship with the Father. God could've sat as a Judge and with his robes on there, just merely justified us very coldly, "Based on the blood of Jesus Christ, I absolve you of all of your sins. You're free." But there's no relationship there, is there? That's why I think adoption's the most incredible thing in the Gospel. He hasn't just sat there with his black robes on and discharged justice, but rather, He has adopted us into His own family. And so, we have a love relationship with the Father. Verse 15, again, "You received the Spirit of adoption, and by Him, we cry out, 'Abba Father.'" Romans 5:5, "God has poured out His love into our hearts, by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us." There's a sense of God just taking a huge cistern, and a pitcher, and just pouring love into you, because of His love for you in Christ. He loves you in the same way that He loves His own Son. "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you." That's the way that Jesus loves you. There's a lavish love here, isn't there? A love relationship with the Father. "How great is the love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God!"

Can I ask, just for a moment, are you taking advantage of that? Do you have a sense of the richness of your relationship with the Father, that He has loved you? It says in Jeremiah 31:3, "With an everlasting love." He set on you a love which cannot be broken. We're going to talk more about that at the end of Romans 8, but there's no enemy that can come, that can separate you from the love of Christ, nothing. Oh, you should be filled with joy, filled with a sense of security, a sense that, "I belong to the family of God," a sense of protection in that love relationship.

• Free Access to the Throne

Well, along with that, fourthly, we have free access to the throne. Your Father runs the universe, isn't that incredible? You ever hear a little son or daughter boast about what his or her dad does? "Well, my dad's this. My dad's that." Well, your Heavenly Father runs the universe, runs the universe. I remember a story, Christy Wilson, one of my heroes, a missionary in Afghanistan, and he trained me and many others, in terms of missionary theory. But one of the best things about him, was he was a great storyteller, phenomenal storyteller, just from experiences. And he was there in Kabul, that very same place we've been thinking a lot about, and it's bombed out now, and we're praying. He was the one that enjoined on President Eisenhower, that a church building be built there, and it was. He was a great man of faith and a great man of prayer.

Anyway, they had a hospital for the blind, and it was very renowned in that whole area, and people would come from all over to come to this hospital for the blind. And it was very difficult to get in, because there were so many people. And one poor person, who was losing her sight, came to Christy Wilson, and said, "I need to get in there. I need to be able to get in." Now, Dr. Wilson had nothing to do with the hospital. He prayed for them and knew the people who ran it, but he had nothing to do with it. He said, "Well, I want you to know that I know the person who's in charge of this hospital. Why don't we ask him, if you can get in?" And then he stopped, and prayed. And he interceded with God, that this individual would be able to get in, and she did, that very same day.

Now, he had no power over the queue, and the line, and where people were, but an opening worked out, and so she was able to get in, and her eyesight was restored. You should have that same attitude toward anything, "I know the CEO of that company." "I know who's running that country." "Oh, I know who's in charge of that particular wing of the government." It is God, your Heavenly Father, and you have access, right to the very throne room of God in prayer. If you're a child of the King, you can just go right into His presence with a holy boldness and ask Him for anything. Listen to what it says in Ephesians 3:12, "In Him and through faith in Him, we may approach God with freedom and confidence." Do you approach God with freedom and confidence? Do you have a sense of the freedom of access, right into the very throne room of God? You should, if you're a child of God. It says in Hebrews 4:16, "Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy, and find grace to help us in time of need." You have free access to the one who runs all things.

• Discipline

Now, the fifth one, you may say, "What? What is that? Discipline is a privilege of the child of God? Well, first of all, let's understand discipline properly. Discipline, in this case, would be a holy spanking when you do wrong. And that's a privilege from a child of God? The Bible thinks so. The Bible speaks of it that way. If you're a royal prince or princess, you're trained from an early age, how you are to behave, and there is a training program, isn't there? And so, also, for the children of God. Deuteronomy 8:5 says this, "Know then, in your heart, that as a man disciplines his son, so the Lord, your God, disciplines you." "As a man disciplines his son, so…God disciplines you." And then, of course, Hebrews 12:7-8 says, "Endure hardship as discipline. God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his Father? If you are not disciplined, and everyone undergoes discipline, then you are illegitimate children, and not true sons." In other words, if you're walking along in your life and start to stray from God, start to sin, start to disobey, expect a response soon from your Heavenly Father. It is a privilege of the child of God, and why? Because He loves you. He's not going to let you stray. He's not going to let you roam or wander. He's going to discipline you. You're a child of God.

• Provision

Sixthly, He's also going to provide for you. If you're a child of God, it's His job to take care of you, isn't that right? If you're a slave, it's the master's job to care for the slave. If you're a servant, the master's job to provide for all the needs. It's a servant and slave's job to just do what the master wants. We are also servants of God or slaves of God, it says in Scripture. And so it's up to God to provide for all our needs. Why then do we be anxious about these things? Now, fess up, have you been anxious at all about material needs this week, about money, about taxes? I don't know. It's coming up. Sorry to remind you. I saw that pained look on some faces. It's true. Are you concerned about these things? Are you anxious over them? Your Father has promised to provide for you. He's promised to provide for you. Psalm 37:25, "I was young, and now I'm old, and I have never seen the righteous forsaken, or their children begging bread, never." Royal children get to eat from the royal table, don't they?

There's a story about David adopting Mephibosheth, Jonathan's son, into his own family, and he got to sit at the King's table every day. What does that mean? No more worries. You don't have to worry anymore about where your next meal's coming from. "I get to sit at the King's table." Isn't it that exact way of thinking, that Jesus uses in Matthew 6, to banish anxiety forever? Why do you worry about your life, what you'll eat, or your body, what you'll wear? Your Father's going to take care of you. He's going to meet all your needs. Seek first, the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you as well. He also said in Matthew Seven, "Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or, if you ask for fish, he'll give him a snake? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him?" He knows how to take care of His children, and so provision, rich provision is part of being a child of God.

• Protection

So also, protection. Royal children are the apple of the King's eye. "You better not touch him, because if you touch him, you're going to rue the day." And anyone who wants to get to you has to go through God first. Do you realize that? Is that not one of the many lessons of the Book of Job? Remember, Satan’s frustration in front of God? "I can't touch him. You've got this hedge around him all the time, and I just can't get at him. Would you just give me a chance, to just get a pop at him?" And he said, "Yeah, I'll give you a chance, but this far, and no farther may you go." Remember, how it worked? God controls all of these things. And so you have protection. Now, you might say, "How does that line up with the sufferings we have in this world?" We're going to talk about that, God willing, next time. There is suffering in this world, physical suffering. But what God is protecting you from, ultimately, is ultimate spiritual ruin, do you understand that? He's protecting your faith, that it may not fail. He's protecting your spirit, that you may not be attacked and go down, but rather, that you may stand firm in the midst of your temptation and your struggle.

Jesus, in praying the high priestly prayer in John 17 says to the Father, "I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world." Do you know what that means? They're in a place of danger. Everything of this world system hates your faith. You're in a dangerous place. Jesus said, "I'm sending you out like sheep among wolves, but don't worry about it, because I'm Sovereign and I will protect you. I will keep you safe." He says, "Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name… While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe, by that name you gave me. None has been lost." Do you understand how Jesus is thinking about protection? "Protect them by your name, Father, that none may be lost." And so also, God will protect you. If you're a child of God, you're not going to drop out of the family, He's going to keep you safe.

• Fellowship with the Royal Family

Well, along with that comes fellowship with the Royal Family. Now, again, you're going to say, just like the discipline, "That's not always such great shakes."

But to be honest with you, it really is one of the richest blessings in this world, isn't it? Fellowship with the children of God. As a matter of fact, the more that we go on in this world, and if our culture continues to go non-Christian, who do you think are going to be the most precious people in the world to you? True believers in Jesus Christ. Isn't that what David said in Psalm 16:3? "As for the saints who are in the land, they are the glorious ones and whom is all my delight." I love being with them. I love to be with true children of God, who love the Word and who love Christ, and who are growing in their faith, don't you? Isn't that precious? But not only that, we get fellowship with dead people too.

Now, don't misunderstand me. I'm not talking about seances or anything weird. Those things are cut out from Scripture. But what I'm saying to you, specifically, is that we are part of one family of God, and many of them have already died, and gone on to be with the Lord. You're in rich fellowship with the same God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Someday, you'll meet them too. They still are Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob. They haven't lost their identity. We're not Hindus, who believe that the water drops into the ocean and loses its identity. There's still Abraham, there's still Isaac, still Jacob. They're still the same ones. David's up there, also Nehemiah, also all the saints of old. Aren't you looking forward to meeting them? And then all the ones from church history, from when the Bible ended on to our present day, 2,000 years of godly women and men, and they're waiting, rich fellowship, fellowship in the Royal Family.

• Freedom

And ninth, freedom. You're free. If you're a royal son or daughter, you're free. There's a freedom that comes there. Freedom from what? Well, freedom from law. You don't have to obey the law anymore. Is that what I'm saying? Well, in one sense, yes. Think of what Jesus said in Matthew 17:25-26. You remember, there was the question about the taxes you had to pay to go into the temple? You remember that? And so they asked Peter, "Does your teacher, [Jesus] pay the temple tax?" "Yes, He does," Peter said. Then they go into the house, and Jesus sits Peter down, and said, "I want to teach you a lesson about what it means to be a child of God. From whom do the kings of the Earth collect duty and taxes, from their own sons or from others?" "From others," said Peter. "Then the sons are exempt," said Jesus. Did you hear that? Exempt from paying taxes.

Now, don't misunderstand me. It says in Romans 13 that you need to pay your taxes to the secular government, but the point is, you have freedom in this matter of spiritual access to God. Why should you have to pay to go into the house of your Father? In one sense, we are free from the law. Why is that? Because law is given to transgressors, not to sons. What do we get instead? We get the Spirit from within. We're not under the law anymore, but rather, under the Spirit.

We're free also, therefore, from sin. Romans 6:18, "You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness." You're free from fear of condemnation. Isn't that wonderful? Look, again, at Verse 15, "You did not receive a Spirit that makes you a slave, again, to fear." You don't need to be afraid anymore of condemnation. You don't have to be afraid of death. It says in Hebrews 2 that by faith you should be free forever from the fear of death. You're free from these things. You're free, also, from fear of earthly catastrophe. Now, understand what I said. You're free from fear of earthly catastrophe. I did not say you'd be free from earthly catastrophe. You're free from fear of earthly catastrophe.

Listen to this. This is from Robert Leighton. He was a Puritan. He said this, "How can you make a child of God afraid? Bring him word that his estate has been ruined and he'll say, 'Yet, my true inheritance is safe.' " Did you hear that? "Bring him word that his wife, or child, or dear friend has died, 'Yet, my Heavenly Father still lives.' " Do you hear the response? "Tell him you, yourself, will soon die. He will answer, 'Well, then, I go home to my Father and to my eternal inheritance.' " Do you see that? There's an attitude. You're free from fear of these things, because they have no ultimate harm for you.

• Immense Inheritance

Also, as a child of God, you have an immense inheritance. Look at verse 17, "Now, if we are children, then we are heirs, heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ. If indeed we share in His sufferings, in order that we may also share in His glory." And Revelation 21:7 says, "He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his Father, and he will be my son." And so we have this incredible inheritance. Well, what are you going to get? What do we get as children of God? Well, you get the Kingdom. You get the Kingdom itself, and you get to rule on the Kingdom. You will sit down and rule with Jesus.

Listen to this one, Revelation 3:21, "To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I overcame and sat down with my Father on His throne." John Piper gets this image of lap, and lap, and lap. Father on His throne, Jesus on the Father's throne. We're on Jesus' throne, ruling with Him. What is that going to mean? I don't know. But, boy, is that rich? And an inheritance of your own possessions. Jesus said, "If you're not faithful with worldly mammon, who's going to give you true riches? If you're not faithful with little things that belong to somebody else, who's going to give you," listen, "Possessions of your own?"

The Book of Hebrew says that, they were willing to not even worry about their houses being destroyed, because they had their own lasting possessions. You're going to get an inheritance in the Kingdom of God, if you're a child of God. Well, those are all the joys that come from being a child of God, and they culminate in the greatest, and that is in glory. Look at 17-18, "Now, if we are children, then we are heirs, heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ. If indeed, we share in His sufferings, in order that we may also share in His glory."

• Glory

And then, again, verse 18, "I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us." Someday, you're going to be glorious. You're going to, it says in Matthew 13, "Shine like the sun in the Kingdom of your Father." You're going to be like Jesus, and you're going to radiate with a brightness that can't even be measured.

Well, 11 privileges of the child of God. Maybe to make it a round 12, just like the number of the tribes of Israel or the apostles, you could find another one today, but this is a rich inheritance, isn't it? But along with that, comes some responsibilities.

IV. What Are My Responsibilities As a Child of God?

Look at verse 12, it says, "Therefore, my brothers, we have an obligation." We are debtors, aren't we? We have an obligation. There's a story that James Baldwin tells about King Alfred, King of England, and the Cakes. I read this, this morning. I found it interesting. He was King of the West Saxons in England during the ninth century. He was called King Alfred the Great, because he was able to defeat the Danes in battle, and drive them out of England. He also was a very enlightened ruler, and that he taught common people how to read, and so was an early advocate of public education.

Well, the Danes had invaded England and they were winning one battle after another. After one particularly fierce battle, his own army was defeated, and he had to flee for his life. He put on a shepherd's outfit, and managed to escape, and was fleeing through the woods and the bogs, and he went that way for a long time. He was hungry, and tired, and came to a little clearing in the woods, and there was a cottage there. Just being in need, he went up and knocked on the door of the cottage. It was a woodcutter's cottage. His wife opened the door, and she looked at him, and said, "What can I do for you?" And he said, "I'm very hungry. Is it possible for me to have a morsel of bread, and maybe warm myself by your fire?"

She was a kindly woman and said, "Well, I'm cooking some hearth cakes now. If you'll sit down, and tend the cakes, and watch them, care for them, I'm going to go out, and milk the cow, and we'll share what we have with you." Well, he agreed to do that. And he sat down, and started to tend the cakes. She went out to milk the cow, and he just, through fatigue, and through his concern and worry for England, didn't pay attention to his work, and let the cakes burn. Well, she comes back in, and smells the smoke, and looks down, and they're burned to a crisp. And she loses her temper, she said, "You lazy, good-for-nothing fellow, I left you with a simple task to do, taking care of cakes, and now, none of us has anything to eat, because of you. I couldn't entrust you with a simple task." And he just quietly hung his head in shame.

Well, at that moment, the woodcutter comes in, and immediately recognizes who he is. And he had caught the tail end of his wife's rebuke, and said, "Do you realize who this man is? This is the king." She was immediately afraid for her life. And he said, "Don't worry, you were right to scold me. I told you I would watch the cakes, and then I let them burn. I deserve what you said. Anyone who accepts a duty, no matter how small the duty or how great the person, should perform that duty faithfully. I have failed this time, but I shall not fail again. Now, I must leave. My duties as King await me."

Now, I've given you a list of 11 privileges. How could it be then, that you are called on to do something as humble as sweep a floor, or wash the feet of a brother or sister in Christ, or some humble task, if you're this exalted child of God? Well, God has given you many tasks to do, and just like King Alfred The Great, with this great task, and this great inheritance and responsibility, sometimes called on to do simple tasks. And Jesus said, "He who is faithful in little will be faithful in much." He wants us to be faithful, both in little and much, and He's given us some responsibilities, and we need to be faithful to them.

Imitating the Father’s Nature

The first responsibility of a child of God, is that we need to imitate the Father's nature. The basic principle in the New Testament, as in the Old is, "Like the Father, like the Son." Whatever the Father is, that's what we must be in this world. We must imitate our Father. It says in 1 Peter 1, "As obedient children, do not conform any longer to the desires you had while you lived in ignorance, but just as He who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do, for it is written, 'Be holy, because I am holy.'" Do you hear that? "Imitate me. Be like me." He's calling on us to imitate Him. That includes love. It says, "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in Heaven. He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. Be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect." Do you see that printed in your outline? "Be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect." Is that not a challenge? Well, that's the responsibility of a child of God.

Bearing the Father’s Name

Along with that, secondly, we bear the Father's name, don't we? We carry the Father's name. Do you know one of the Ten Commandments says, "You shall not take the name of the Lord, your God, in vain?" What do you think of when you think of that? Isn't it a sense of not letting a word slip out of your mouth? Don't say 'God' or 'Jesus,' unless you're praying or meaning to address God. But I think it means more than that. We are, in effect, carrying or taking the name of our God everywhere we go. Do you hear that? Everywhere we go, we're taking His reputation with us. Don't bear His name in vain. Do you hear that? Everywhere you go, His reputation goes with you. It says in Jeremiah 15:16, "When your words came, I ate them. They were my joy and my heart's delight. [Listen] For I bear your name, O God."

Obeying the Father’s Commands

Thirdly, along with that, we need to obey our Father's commands. First John 5:3-4 says, "This is love for God, to obey His commands, and His commands are not burdensome. For everyone born of God overcomes the world." If you're born of God, if you're a child of God, you're going to obey His commands. You're going to do the things that He's told you to do. You can't tell your Father, "I love you," and then you don't do what He says. Jesus said the Kingdom of God is like a father who had two sons. He went to the first son and said, 'Son, go and work in the vineyard.' And he said, 'I will,' but he didn't go. And then he goes to the other son, and says, 'Son, go and work in the vineyard.' He says, 'I won't,' but he later changes his mind and goes. And He says, "Which of the two did what his father wanted?" The point is, we need to obey our Father's command.

Doing the Father’s Work

Along with that, we need to do the Father's work. Jesus lived constantly to do the will of the Father. He said, "My food is to do the will of Him who sent me and finish His work." We also should be doing the Father's work. We should be about the Father's business. 1 Peter, it says we should live such good lives among the Pagans, that though they may accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and, do what? "Praise your Father in Heaven." As you're doing good deeds, serving God, obeying Him, doing His work, they're going to think about God, they're going to understand Him differently.

Well, what kind of work are we going to do? How many of you read Henry Blackaby's book, "Experiencing God?" He talks about being where the Father's at work, working where the Father's working. Jesus put it this way, "The Son can do nothing by Himself. He can only do what He sees His Father doing, because whatever the Father does, the Son also does."

Facing the Father’s Enemies

And the fifth responsibility, is we need to be willing to face our Father's enemies. We need to be willing to face our Father's enemies. A child of God has to bear the reproach and scorn of a world that hates Him. If you're going to carry His name, you are going to be reviled and persecuted. Everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus, who wants to carry the name of God into a world in rebellion against Him, will face that persecution. Jesus said in Romans 15:3, it says, "For even Christ did not please Himself, but as it is written, the insults of those who insult you have fallen on me." "The insults of those who insult you have fallen on me." And Jesus put it this way, "If the head of the house has been called Beelzebub, how do you think they're going to treat the members of the household?" If you're in His household and He's your Father, be willing to bear the reproach that Jesus bore.

V. Summary

Now, the last two weeks, we've asked three questions concerning being a child of God. The first is the most important of all. All of you have heard me talk about the privileges and the responsibilities this morning, of being a child of God, but none of it means anything to you, if you are not, in fact, a child of God today. The first and most important question I want to ask you is, are you a child of God? Have you come to personal faith in Christ? Are you, moment by moment, step by step, following the Holy Spirit, to put sin to death in your life? Do you have the internal welling up of the Holy Spirit, to cry out, "Abba Father," from your heart? Is He speaking to you and testifying to you, that you are a child of God? Or is He actually convicting you right now, that you are not a child of God, and that you need to become one?

These are the questions you have to ask. Are you, in fact, a child of God? If you are, do you understand your privileges? Do you know all the things that you get as a child of God? Eternal life, a title, love relationship with the Father, free access to the throne, discipline from a loving Father, provision and protection, fellowship within the Royal Family, freedom, immense inheritance and glory. Do you understand these things?

And finally, are you fulfilling your responsibilities as a child of God? Imitating the Father's nature in holiness and in love, bearing the Father's name, obeying the Father's command, doing the Father's work, and being willing to face the Father's enemies? As we close in prayer, I'd like to ask any, who you feel like the Lord is convicting you, that you are not a child of God, please come and speak to me. Don't let today go by, without knowing, for sure, that these things are yours. And if you are a child of God, look over this list of privileges, and thank God, and look over, again, the responsibilities, and ask to be faithful.

The Lavish Love of Adoption

Please, if you would, take your Bibles and look with me at Romans Chapter 8. We're going to be zeroing in this morning at verses 14-17, which testifies to us with joy that we are adopted children of God. Isn't that incredible, that we are adopted children of God. Now, it being Sanctity of Human Life Sunday, I think it's important for us to give thanks to God for His providence that this is exactly where we are in Romans, and the confluence of Biblical truth and the current events is just so beautiful. Our God is a sovereign God. There was a time earlier in my Christian life that I was involved actively in the pro-life movement up in Boston. There are many people up there who do not understand our position on this. They are not in favor of what we teach and I would go down every Saturday morning with other Christian men and women, and our purpose was only to engage them in discussion to try to change minds and hearts. We wanted to bring the truth of God there. We knew that if you didn't win the mind and the heart, you hadn't accomplished anything. And so, we desired to be there and to talk.

And one of the things that struck me more than anything was despite all of the pro-choice rhetoric of those that opposed us, so many of the women in that situation spoke of having no choice. Isn't that remarkable? With all the pro-choice rhetoric, they speak of having no choice. And when you're speaking of having no choice, you're really speaking the language of hopelessness. You feel like there is absolutely nowhere you can turn. You feel that there are no resources big enough to meet the life situation that you're in. It's a language of hopelessness. I was reading recently a book entitled Adoption Nation. It was in light of this truth that we're going to learn this morning about being adopted children of God. It's a secular book, but it talks a lot about adoption and it speaks about this woman, Donna. And many people are in the situation that Donna found herself in. She was lying on a surgical table at an abortion clinic in 1986 when she realized that adoption was the only alternative that she could live with. She could barely believe she'd walked into this place to begin with. Just a few years earlier, after all, she had been president of a Right to Life Chapter at her high school. "I was on my back there for what seemed to be the longest time talking to God out loud, asking Him, What am I doing here?" She recalls. When the doctor finally approached her, Donna bolted upright and raised her voice and said, "You will not touch me."

Donna had fallen in love with Mr. Wonderful while she was a 20-year-old junior at the University of Kentucky, two months later she was pregnant, he was gone, and her sister persuaded her to temporarily move in with her in Nashville, so that she would have some support while considering what to do. And after she left the abortion clinic that day, Donna began to learn about adoption. The thing about adoption is that it is a ray of hope into the midst of two hopeless situations, isn't it? The hopeless situation of the young woman who finds herself with no answers, and then of a possibly of an infertile couple that's been praying for a child forever and nothing is coming. And so, they turn to adoption. And so, in the midst of two hopeless situations, all of a sudden adoption speaks God's hope. And that's what Christians are meant to do in this world. We're meant to be hope bearers to hopeless people. And no greater word of hope could ever be spoken than the word of the Gospel that gives us an eternal hope that can never be shaken, no matter what we face in this world. We're supposed to be the messengers of that hope, that word of hope in this world. But I feel the church has retreated from that.

II. Adoption: The Highest Honor of the Gospel

I'm going to urge us today to step back up to it and do it. That we would be messengers of hope into hopeless situations. And I would like you to bring the truth of Romans Chapter 8 when you go. That you speak of a hope that is unseen, but it's true hope that is an anchor for the soul that can never be moved, no matter what the circumstances. And I believe the truth of adoption, to be the very child of God, may be the highest, most stunning blessing of the Gospel. Now, the Gospel has many blessings, doesn't it? There's a whole treasure trove of blessings in the Gospel. And in a way, I feel somewhat week after week, especially in Romans 8, that we're just taking out all of these diamonds and rubies and goblets, and just looking at them one after the other. But this one, I think, shines the most brightly. It's stunning to me that the holy God would adopt people like us into His own family. Isn't that incredible? And that's the truth we get to look at. The adoption, the highest honor of the Gospel. Now, the Gospel promises us every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms. Every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms is given to us in Christ Jesus. Now, we've been talking for a long time about one of those blessings, namely, justification.

That because of faith in Jesus Christ, we need fear no condemnation on Judgment Day. Look again at verse 1 of this chapter, Romans 8:1. It says in Romans 8:1, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, no fear any longer of Judgment Day if you're in Christ Jesus," but then it continues, of course, and describes who that person is. For those who are in Christ Jesus, who in Verses 2-4, "Walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." They don't live like they used to. They don't live like the world. There's been a transformation in their lives. And so, basically, I feel like the rest of the Chapter is describing the kind of life that is true of those for whom there is no condemnation, so that you might have assurance that it's true of you. It wouldn't be good to know that there was a banquet, a feast out there and know that you didn't have a place at the table. What good is that? You want to know, do I have a place? Am I invited, can I sit at that banquet?

Is there a place for me in Heaven? Well, Romans 8 testifies to how you can know, it's an assurance chapter. Verse after verse describes the kind of life lived by those who are not Christians, who are still under condemnation. Contrast it with the kind of life lived by those who are Christians, who are born again, and the center of it all, I believe, in Romans 8 is the ministry of the indwelling Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit has been given by God to bring assurance right to you as a child of God. And He does that in a variety of ways. But we're speaking of the blessings of the Gospel, and this may be the greatest of them all. I think John thought so. In 1 John 3:1 and following, he says, "Behold what manner of love the Father has given to us that we should be called Children of God. And that is what we are… Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known, but we know that when He appears, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as he is." Isn't that beautiful? He almost can't get over it, that we, we should be called children of God, can it really be? And I almost want to stress that. Who is the "we" that we're talking about? Have we not met ourselves in the Book of Romans, so we understand who we truly are? Haven't we had some law work done on us so that we can really understand who we are, apart from Christ? I know it's unpleasant, but it's true.

It says in Romans 3:10 and following, "There is no one righteous. No, not one. There is no one who understands, no one who seeks God, all have turned away. They've together become worthless. There is no one who does good. No, not one. Their throats are open graves, their tongues practice deceit, the poison of vipers is on their lips. Ruin and misery mark their ways. Their feet are swift to shed blood. There is no fear of God before their eyes."

Now, if you're a Christian, you look in that mirror and say, "That's me, apart from Christ. That's who I was, apart from Christ." It's true. That's who I was. And yet, and yet God has adopted me into His own family. How great is the love the Father has given to us that we, even we, should be called Children of God. Now, I believe God could've justified us, could've brought us to Heaven as His slaves, and we would've been honoring, amazing, we would still sing Amazing Grace, because we didn't deserve it. We are rescued from hell, from eternity and condemnation, and we would not have to suffer it. And just to be there, just to see it, just to hear the songs and not even to be allowed to participate would've been grace. Amen. Just to be there, but how much more that we should be adopted children of God. Incredible that God should do that for us.

Liberal Theology: A Misunderstanding on the Doctrine of the Fatherhood of God

Now, I think there has been a misunderstanding of this doctrine of the fatherhood of God, to be a child of God, what it means. Over 100 years ago, there was something in vogue called the Social Gospel. Liberal theology brought it to us, and the basic idea is the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man. You know what I'm talking about, that God is the father of everyone and that we're all brothers in God, brothers and sisters, all of us. And there were good things that came out of that movement. Good things. There was a lot of social work that was done, a lot of ministering to people's bodies. Soup kitchens were set up, agencies for the poor and the needy were set up. The widow and orphan were looked after greatly. There was an awful lot of ministry done to the body, but of course, there was no need for a ministry to the soul in particular, because if we're all children of God, then there's no danger of hell, is there? And so, we don't really need the Gospel message, we just need our physical needs met. That was the Social Gospel.

And I think that that is a false understanding of Christianity. It's part of it. Didn't Jesus minister to the body? Did He not feed the 5,000? Did He not cure diseases? Of course he did. He ministered to the body, but I think it's interesting, make a note of this. Mark 6:34, right before Jesus fed the 5,000 it says, "When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, He had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So He began teaching them many things." How did Jesus show His compassion for the needy? He taught them the Gospel, He taught them many things, and then He fed them. Of course, the next day they showed up for another meal, you know how it is. They were on the other side, and they bumped into Him, and they said, "Oh, when did you get here?" And He said, "I'll tell you the truth, you're not looking for me because you saw a miraculous sign, because you ate a meal and you've never had such a bread as that." There was never such fresh bread as those barley loaves that they ate that day. "Oh, it was delicious. Give us another meal." And Jesus said, "Don't work for the food that spoils, but for the food that lasts to eternal life, which I have come into the world to give you." They said, "What must we do to do the works of God?" He said, "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent."

And so, Jesus was always lifting them up off their concern for their stomach and their bodies, to their concern for their soul. And this is exactly where the Social Gospel fell apart. Now, the Gospel talks of the fact that we are children of God as an immense privilege, isn't it? And it is not true of every single human being on the face of the earth. Now, it is true that every single human being is created in the image of God, that is true. We are special creations of God. That is true, but not in this sense, in Romans 8 and in John 1, the sense of being an adopted child of God, that is not true of all. So therefore, with this immense privilege, the incredible promises, the great responsibilities of being a child of God with all of the whole status before God of eternity laying before you, does it not become obvious?

III. Am I a Child of God?

The most central, most important question of your existence is this, "Am I a child of God or not? Am I a child of God? Have I been adopted into God's family?  The Bible teaches that all of humanity is divided into two groups, children of the Devil and children of God. There's no third group, no third category. Jesus said to the Pharisees who sought to kill Him, John 8:44, He said, "You are of your father the Devil and you want to do the desires of your father, he was a murderer from the beginning." 1 John 3:10, "By this, the children of God and the children of the Devil are obvious. Anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God nor is the one who does not love his brother." So you see John and Jesus both divided the human race into these two categories, children of the Devil and children of God. The amazing thing is that all of us at one point belonged to the Devil's family. We were natural born sons of the devil.

That's what it says, we were born into that. Ephesians 2:1-3 and I think the NASB has it a little better here. Ephesians 2:1-3 it says, "And you were dead in your transgressions and sins in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working, listen, in the sons of disobedience." Verse 3, Ephesians 2:3, "Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind and we were, by nature, children of wrath just as the rest." So, we're children of disobedience, children of wrath. We are children of the Devil naturally. And God rescued us and transferred us into His own family. He adopted us into His own family by simple faith in Jesus Christ. John 1:12-13, "As many as received them. To them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born not of blood nor the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God."

Those Who Receive Christ by Faith

Note, the right, the privilege to become a child of God is given to you simply by faith. So, what are we going to do with Romans 8:14-17? We are going to take two weeks on it. Today, we're going to look simply at one question. How can you tell? How do you know whether you are a child of God? Romans 8 is given for that reason, 14-17. How can I tell? And we're going to look at five things. Five ways to know whether you're a child of God. Next week, God willing, we're going to look at the privileges and the responsibilities that come to you if you're a child of God, that's next week. But let's zero in on the first one, and that is the question, am I a child of God? And first, the answer to the question is, you are a child of God if and only if you have received Jesus Christ by faith.

I'm going to read John 1:12-13 again. It says, "As many has received Him to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born not of blood, nor the will of the flesh nor the will of man but of God." So simply by faith, you become a child of God. Now, there's no clearer statement of this in Romans, but the whole Book of Romans has been teaching the same thing, hasn't it? Romans has said that, "We are justified simply by faith." Paul says in Romans 3:28, "We maintain that a man is justified by faith, apart from observing the law." Romans 4:3, "What does the scripture say?" By the way, that's always a great question to ask. I know I'm taking it out of context, but you should always ask, Romans 4:3, "What does the scripture say?" Moving along, I know I want to keep to the point, but we've got to ask, what does the scripture say and what does it say concerning our justification?

"Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness." Romans 5:1, "Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." So it teaches that we are made right, we are justified with God by faith alone, but Paul says it more directly in Galatians 3:26, "You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus." Did you hear that? You are a son or a daughter, a child of God simply by faith in Jesus Christ. So, how do you know whether you're a child of God? Well, have you accepted Jesus Christ by faith, by simple faith? Do you believe that He's God in the flesh? That He lived a normal human life doing miracles and free from sin. That He was a physical human being on earth, did miracles, walked on this earth, never sinned, died in your place on the cross, suffering the death, the condemnation, the wrath that you deserve? He died a physical death. On the third day, He rose again, bodily raised from the dead, ascended to heaven. That one and that one only is your savior. Have you received Him by faith? And if so, you're a child of God.

Those Who Are Led by His Spirit

Secondly, the Bible says that those who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. And now we get right into Romans Chapter 8, those who are led... Look at Verse 13-14. It says, "If you live according to the sinful nature, you will die." That means go to hell. "But if, by the Spirit, you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live," that means go to heaven. It means far more than that, but it does mean that. Now, what is the first word of verse 14? "Because," or "for," that is an unbelievably important word, because here he's going to explain who the children of God are. What does it mean to be a child of God? It means that you are led by the Spirit. Well, what does it mean to be led by the spirit? Look backward. That's what the word "because" or "for" means, look backward to verse 13. What does it mean to be led by the spirit? It means to put sin to death. Do you see that? "Because those who are led by the spirit of God…" Go back to 13. To put to death the deeds of the body, those are the children of God. Do you see what I'm saying? And so therefore, if you are not led by the Spirit of God in the way that it means in verse 14, you're not a child of God. Those who are led by the Spirit of God, are children of God. You see that. And so, the word "because" or "for," tells us what the leadership's about, and it's about a holy life. It's about putting sin to death. It's about never waving the white flag before sin at all.

Where you say instead, "I will fight sin to the day I die. I'm going to battle, I'm going to struggle, I may stumble and fall." We all stumble in many ways. It says in the Book of James. It's not about sinless perfection, but it's about a war, isn't it? And we are never going to give in. And that's what it means to be led by the Spirit of God. And if you're not led by the Spirit of God in this way, you're not a child of God. You haven't been adopted. For or because all who are being led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. Now let's talk about this leadership, the leading of the indwelling Holy Spirit. We know the Holy Spirit comes in, He dwells within us, He lives within us if we're children of God. But what is this leading about?

Well, I want to put some scenarios in front of you to help explain it. Suppose that you were in the World Trade Center on the morning of September 11th. You were on the fifth floor, let's say. And let's say the aircraft hits it, the lights go out, there's screaming, there's darkness, the emergency lights are going on and off and you're trying to make your way to a stairwell to get down, and you don't know where you are and there's all kinds of frenzy. Then suddenly, in the middle of all the smell and the smoke and the darkness and all of that, you see a uniformed New York fireman standing there. And he grabs you by the arm and says, "Follow me, I'm going to lead you to safety." Would you follow him? Oh, you'd better believe you will. And when you get out and you're on the sidewalk when that building implodes, you will thank him for your life. He saved your life. And that is some aspect, I think at least, of the leadership of the Holy Spirit. He comes and leads you down the five flights of stairs and out of the dangerous place. What is the dangerous place? Is there a dangerous place for us as Christians? Yeah, it's called Vanity Fair, it's called the world. You're still there. You're living here now. Do you need leadership through the world? Oh, absolutely you do. And He has been sent by God to lead you through this world until you come home, like that fireman who will lead you to safety.

Or another analogy, a military one. General Washington, one of the heroes of American history, December 26, 1776, he crossed the icy Delaware River to attack the Hessians at Trenton to win a minor victory, but major in terms of the morale of that army. They were falling apart. And he prepared the battle plan, figured it all out, figured what they would do, when they would do it. He trained his men, he motivated them, he told them what they were going to accomplish and then he got in the boat and led them to do it. And so also the Holy Spirit leads us in holiness. And He leads us into battle. He's not leaving you to sit back at home, He's leading you into battle with sin. He's going to say, "We've got to fight sin. And so we've got to cross this icy river, and we've got to fight at night, and we've got to do what's necessary." And so, He is General Washington to us. He's leading us. And not only that, but we're going to go on to Princeton a week later and we're going to fight there too. And He keeps moving, He keeps saying, "I'm the commanding officer, I'm the General. We're moving out, we're not going to take this lying down. We're going to fight sin." And so He leads us. Those who are led by the Spirit of God to put sin to death, those are children of God.

How Does the Spirit Lead Us?

Now, how does He lead us? Well, there's a highway of holiness, isn't there? It says in Isaiah 35:8, "A highway will be there. It will be called the way of holiness. The unclean will not journey on it. It will be for those who walk in that way. Wicked fools will not go about on it." And then Isaiah 20:21-22, "You will hear a voice behind you. Whether you turn to the right or left, your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, this is the way, walk in it." That's the leadership of the Holy Spirit. There's a way of holiness, isn't there? Or there's a way to live through this world. It's a way of wisdom, a way of righteousness. He gets you on the path and He says, "This is the way, now walk in it." And so we're called to live by the Spirit. Galatians 5:16 and 25, "So I say live by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature." "Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit." Let us stick with Him as He marches. We're going to march too, we're going to stay with Him on the way of holiness.

Now, how does He lead? Well, the same Greek word is used in Matthew 21:2, in which it says, "Jesus said to His disciples, 'Go into the village ahead of you and at once you will find a donkey tied there with her colt by her. Untie them and lead them to me.'" Is that how He leads us? Absolutely not. It's the same Greek word, but there's a different sense of the leadership of the Holy Spirit. We know that because it says in Psalm 32:8-9, "I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go. I will counsel you and watch over you. Do not be like the horse or mule which have no understanding, but must be controlled by bit and bridle or they will not come to you." Don't be like that. It's a leadership of understanding of wisdom, so that we see that sin is evil and terrible and we need to get rid of it, and that wisdom is beautiful and delightful and we need to walk in it. It's a way of understanding. He leads by a way of understanding. He instructs you and teaches you in the way you should go.

Psalm 23 says, "He leads us by paths of righteousness," what? "For His name's sake." He's leading us to live a certain kind of life. He leads by wisdom, by truth, by teaching you step by step. He also leads you and entices you by love and by goodness. There's a personal aspect now, isn't there? It's not just the law written on these stone tablets external to us anymore. There's now very much a person there all the time. And that has a tremendous influence. It says in Hosea 11:4, "I led them with cords of human kindness, with ties of love. I lifted the yoke from their neck and bent down to feed them." Imagine, if you would, just by way of illustration, that you are in a room and you see somewhere a door and it looks interesting to you, and there's a big sign on the door, it says, "Do not Enter." That's called law. And immediately, you're wondering, what? I wonder what's behind the door? And so there's a struggle, back and forth. And gee, "Do not enter, you'll see all the things behind this door what you must not see." Oh, boy, this is getting worse, the more the law goes, the more you want it.

But suppose your best friend stood there and said, "Please don't enter that door." And kept standing there. Which of those two is harder to disobey? The personal one, isn't it? The person standing right there, it's not an affront against something printed on a page. It's an affront against a person. And the indwelling Spirit makes sin very personal, doesn't He? He makes it hurt. You get a sense of betrayal. Jesus is wounded by the sin, it hurts. And so, He's grieved by it and He includes you in His grief. You're going to feel what He feels when you sin. Conversely, speaking positively, you're going to feel a joy and satisfaction when you do right and put sin to death. It becomes very personal. And so He leads you that way.

Those Who Cry “Abba, Father” by His Spirit

Thirdly, those who cry, "Abba, Father" by His spirit are children of God. Look at verse 15, it says, "You have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you'll receive a spirit of adoption as sons, by which we cry out Abba, Father." So we have the indwelling Holy Spirit and He is crying out from within us, "Daddy, daddy, Abba, Father." There was a time a number of years ago, I don't remember exactly what church it was, but I went to pick up one of my children. And when you're at a strange church and they don't know you, procedures are important at that door. They're not going to just hand over a child to just anybody. Well, as I went to that door and started doing the procedure, the child looked at me and said, "Daddy," with her arms out. And it's hard to beat that as evidence. This came so naturally from within, but I still did the cards and we did all that, but there was no question in the heart of the workers there, who were doing their job, rightly so, that I was that child's father. And so that's what the Holy Spirit does within us. There's a testimony, a crying out that God is our daddy. He's our Father, it's the Aramaic word for daddy. It's not a spirit of slavery.

We're going to talk next week more about this, so I'm not going to leave it alone, we're going to go back to the freedom of fear that we have. But we've got this beacon within us that just keeps crying to God, "Daddy, Daddy, I want to be with you. I love you." And it just keeps beaconing again and again, the indwelling Spirit saying, "Heaven is my home. God is My Father, I want to be there." And He never stops that work in us. And so, if you've got that indwelling Holy Spirit crying out, "Abba, Father," then you're a child of God.

Those Who Receive the Internal Witness by His Spirit

Fourthly, those who receive the internal witness by His Spirit. Not only does the Spirit cry out through us, "Abba, Father," but He cries to us and testifies to us that we are children of God. Look in verse 16, it says, "The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God." This is a testimony from the indwelling Spirit. You are a child of God, and He speaks to your spirit. Now, what does it mean that He speaks to your spirit? Well, you have a new creation spirit. You have a new entity within you.

"If anyone is in Christ, he's a new creation. The old has gone, the new has come," 2 Corinthians 5:17. So you have a new creation entity within you, a spiritual entity. He speaks to that and says, "You are a child of God. You're a child of God." He testifies to your spirit and He testifies with your spirit because your conscience is bearing witness also that you're a child of God. A change has happened in your life. You are a child of God, but you know there's no limit to this testimony. Some of you may remember, a while ago when we were looking at Romans 5:5 that the love of God is poured out into our hearts by His Holy Spirit whom He has given us. He's just pouring out His love. And so I talked about that. Remember? I talked about the 'whoosh,' how the Holy Spirit can just take you somewhat into the Heavenly realms. There's no limit to what He can do.

And testifying that you're a child of God. 2 Corinthians 12, Paul talked about this, "I know a man in Christ who 14 years ago was caught up to the third Heaven, whether it was in the body or out of the body, I do not know. God knows. And I know that this man, whether in the body or apart from the body, I do not know, but God knows, was caught up to paradise. He heard inexpressible things, things that man is not permitted to talk about." Wow! Remember what we said at that time? Inexpressible things that people are not permitted to talk about. You can't put it in words and you're not allowed to try. Wow! And the Spirit can just bring that kind of a testimony directly to your heart, if He chooses. Remember I talked about the Puritan Thomas Goodwin who described this very thing. He described, remember? I'm going to tell the story again, because it's so effective, so powerful. A man and his child walking down through the woods in a path. And they're hand in hand and the little child knows that he's the son of the father. The father loves the child. There's a good relationship. There's no problems, they're enjoying the walk together, when all of a sudden, moved by some kind of hidden impulse, the father, swoops that child up into his arms, kisses him, hugs him, just gives him love, sets him back down. And they continue to walk hand in hand.

Is there a difference before and after in the experience of that child? You better believe there is. Have you had God do that to you? Just whoosh you, pick you up and just assure you that you are a child of God, maybe not like Paul. Caught up to third Heaven in paradise and all that, that's up to God if He wants to do something like that, He can do it. Blaise Pascal had an experience like that, Jonathan Edwards had one, DL Moody had one, many people from history have experienced this. If you haven't. Maybe you didn't ask for it. You don't have because you don't ask God. Ask Him for it. If you who are parents, you know how to give your children good things. How much more will your Heavenly Father give something like that to people who ask and ask and ask and ask and ask, He's going to give it to you. He's going to lavish blessing and love, and it will be different. Everybody's different, but He gives you an internal witness that you are a child of God.

Those Who Suffer With Christ by His Spirit

The fifth proof or evidence that you're a child of God is suffering. Not just suffering, but a special kind of suffering. Look at verse 17, it says, "If we are children then we are heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ. If indeed we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him." Suffering is required. There's no getting away from it, there's no escaping it. If you don't suffer with Christ you will not inherit with Christ, that's what the verse says. If indeed we share in His sufferings, in order that we may also share in His glory.

Now, what kind of suffering is this? Well, there are sufferings common to all people, aren't there? Wrestling with the cursed ground every day to get thorns and thistles out of it, that's called holding down a job. And that's common to all of us. Suffering from decaying bodies and from physical sickness is common to everyone. Suffering from death of loved ones and friends is common to all of us, we all suffer that. Suffering from financial trials and from relational difficulties and from the myriad trials of everyday life, power outages, car trouble, floods, fire, famine, all of those things that are insured. All of those things, they're part of this world, but I don't believe that that's the kind of suffering that's in view here. That's common to everybody and we'll talk about that later in 8:18-25. This is a special kind of suffering, a suffering that only Christians go through, and I think it's of two kinds. Christian suffer things the world does not suffer in the way that the Christian suffers it. We suffer when we are tempted, and we suffer persecution. These are two things that Christians suffer that the worldlings don't suffer.

They don't suffer temptation the way we do. Now, yeah, I know they fight sin, they try to give up smoking or give up drinking, or a certain habit, but they do not fight sin the way we do. They don't wake up every day with the burden of you must be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect. That's one of the responsibilities of being a child of God, imitating God's nature, and that leads you to suffering, doesn't it? You resist temptation all the time if you're a child of God. Hebrews 2:18 says, "That Jesus because He Himself suffered when He was tempted He is able to help those who are being tempted." There is a suffering in temptation, isn't there? Now, how do we avoid that suffering? Two ways. Number one, we persevere in it in holiness and eventually we resist the devil and he does what? He flees from us, but that may take a while. What's the other way to get out of that suffering in the middle of temptation? Sin, sin, and then, guess what? Temptation is over, but now you got other problems.

So we have to bear up under, we have to be willing to suffer temptation. We also suffer persecution from the world. John 15, 18 and 19, Jesus said, "If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belong to the world it will love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, that is why the world hates you." The world hates you. Don't expect a friendly, cozy, comfortable relationship with America. Don't expect it. 2 Timothy 3:12, "Everyone who wants to live a Godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted." "Dear friends," 1 Peter 4, "Do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering as though something strange were happening to you, but rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ so that you may be overjoyed when His glory is revealed. If you were insulted because of the name of Christ you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you." And so we've come full circle.

We started talking about the abortion question, and in my prayer I prayed that the church would wake up. I prayed that the church would wake up and be willing to bear the reproach of Jesus Christ outside the walls. Hebrews 13. And pay the price necessary to win the struggle. This is a Christian magazine entitled World. A little baby, isn't he cute, she cute? I can't tell. A little child, a little infant, obviously a new born in somebody's hand. Look at that, isn't that beautiful? It's incredible. The church is called to protect the weak, when the strong threaten the weak. Religion that our God and Father accepts as pure and faultless is this; to look after orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. Early Roman Christians used to go along the river and scoop up abandoned babies and raise them. They adopted them. They took them into their families. They literally adopted them, so that they might be adopted by their Heavenly Father.

And the tragedy here, it says, "Row v. Wade at 29," it's 29 years, and then the sub-title says, "The silent stalemate." That just pierced my heart. Is this really a stalemate or are we losing? Which is it? See, a stalemate is two equal forces, let's say, on a chessboard, and they can't get anywhere. They're equally strong and they can't get anywhere and there's no victory for anybody. Isn't that the case that we are losing this battle day after day, week after week, year after year because the laws haven't changed? And because we're not ministering to the needy the way we need to. I would urge you to be willing to bear the reproach of Jesus Christ, be willing to suffer the way He suffered. Not just the internal suffering of temptation, but the external rejection of the world, and you'll get it, believe me, if you're willing to speak up for Jesus Christ.

I just want to close by asking you a question. Are you a child of God? Are you a child of God? Have you by faith received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior? Was there a time that you accepted Him? Are you led by the Spirit daily to put sin to death, keeping in step with Him, moment by moment? Do you have that indwelling Spirit crying out from within you, Abba, Father? And is He testifying to you, that you're a child of God? And are you suffering with Jesus Christ, what He suffered? If you don't think that you're a child of God, please come and talk to me after the service. I'm going to be standing down here. Come and say to me, "You know, I don't think I'm a Christian. I'm afraid for my soul. I want to know eternal life. I want to know Jesus Christ." Come and talk to me. Don't leave this place without an absolute certainty that you are a child of God. It's free to anyone who asks for it. Ask and you will receive. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened, this is for you. But if you are a child of God, ask, "Are you willing to stand outside with Jesus and bear the reproach, the suffering that He bore by upholding righteousness in our land?"

I. The Mortification of Sin

Please, if you would open your Bibles and look with me at Romans chapter 8, we're going to be zeroing in this morning on Romans 8:9-13, the indwelling spirit's invisible war. Now, I'd like to ask you to imagine if you would, that you were living back in the Middle Ages and you were in a walled city in a castle, and you had received news. The city had received news that your bitterest enemy had invaded your borders. And scouts had come back and said that there was absolutely no doubt whatsoever that sometime before dawn, the attack would come on your city. And suppose the commander of your city told you to stand on the ramparts on the wall and watch. With what kind of attitude would you watch that night? What kind of passion would keep you awake all night long? In effect, that's what happened in the Garden of Gethsemane, when Jesus said to Peter and to the other disciples, watch and pray, so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is what? It is weak.

And so Peter was commanded that night to watch diligently, and to pray and to prepare for the onslaught of temptation. And you remember what happened to him, the same thing that happens to you, he fell asleep and he did not watch. He did not prepare himself for that battle and so he fell into sin. And so we have before us in the text here, described a war that God is calling us to. It is an internal war, a war with the flesh, a war with sin. And we are called to fight that war by the power of the Spirit. Look at verse 13, it says, "If you live according to the sinful nature, you will die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live." As some might say, "Them's fighting words." That is the language of warfare, that is... You're being called to enlist and to fight a battle. You're being called to stand on the wall and watch, because the enemy will most certainly come. One Puritan writer said, "When sin let's us alone, we'll let sin alone, but until then we're going to fight." And so we're called to a war, we're called to a fight.

Now what is the context of this? Well, the context is glorious good news, isn't it? Isn't Romans 8 one of the greatest chapters in the Bible? Romans 8:1 says, "There is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." No condemnation for you, if you are Christian. And that's wonderful good news. But along with it in this chapter, comes a serious warning that while we may be free from sin's condemning power, we are not free from sin's indwelling influence and presence. We have a bitter foe that seeks our very life and we are not free from the command of God, "Be perfect therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect." "You shall be holy, because I am holy." "Make every effort," it says in Hebrews 12:14 "to be holy. Without holiness, no one will see the Lord." That's an incredibly important passage. What it's saying is that there's a holiness that comes as a result of your spirit filled effort. And if you don't have that, what I call sanctification holiness, you're not a Christian. And if you're not Christian, you will not see the Lord. And so we're right in the business of sanctification here in Romans 8:9-13. I think these verses maybe the most important verses in the Bible on how you fight sin internally by the power of the Spirit. We are called to fight.

Living the Two Journeys

Now, I didn't want to give you a static impression like we are in a castle, as if we're not moving, or that we're kind of like stuck here. We're actually more called to journey out. A perilous quest, somewhat like the Lord of the Rings. Some of you have seen that movie or read the book. There's a sense that we're called to move out and to journey across a perilous quest. And we're given, I think, laid before, as I've said before, two journeys that seem to have no end. The journey of internal holiness, the way of holiness growing until you are perfect like Jesus morally. And how long a journey is that? And then laying out before us also is the journey of world evangelization. That we should take this Gospel message to the ends of the earth and proclaim it to those who haven't heard. And I have found that in the church life, the two intimately go together, don't they? Who is it that's going to be faithful to take the Gospel, who's going to be preaching, who's going to be proclaiming, but those who are putting sin to death in their own lives. Those that are growing in holiness, those that are truly Christians. So these two journeys are enmeshed together. The journey of discipleship, the journey of evangelism. And it's to that that we are called.

Now, the good news of the Gospel, we've already understood is that justification by faith clears us of the guilt of all sins. If you've heard the Gospel message of Jesus Christ our Savior, dead on the cross, buried on the third day, he was raised again to new life, and you realize that he died in the place of sinners just like you. And that if you trust in Him, you'll have eternal life. You've heard that message, you have believed you're justified just at that moment, instantaneously clear to the guilt of all sin. And so there is for you now, no condemnation if you're in Christ. Wonderful, good news. But just as soon as you are justified, the Holy Spirit, the indwelling Spirit comes into you and begins to say, "Let's Move. Let's start growing. Let's start walking like a Christian. Let's be holy. Let's put sin to death." And that's the journey that's before us. We have a daily duty to put indwelling sin to death. Jesus said, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." That's dynamic, isn't it? That's a journey. "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." There's a journey, a road to be traveled.

And so it's a perilous journey, and that journey in this text, is a journey of internal holiness, a journey to be like Christ. It says in verse 13, (I think the NASB has a little better,) "If you are living according to the flesh you must die, but if by the spirit you are putting to death continually the deeds of the body, you will live." Colossians 3:5 gives it in direct command form, "Put to death therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature. Sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry." So our question today, is what does it mean to put sin to death? What does that mean and how do we do it? What are the means that God has given us? What is the relationship with the indwelling spirit? How important is it? That's what's before us today, the mortification, the putting to death of sin.

The History of Mortification

Now, there is a long history in the church and in humanity of a struggle in this area. A long history of efforts that people have made to do this very thing. Perhaps you've heard about the early monks in the desert on the fourth century. After the Roman persecution had ended and it was really not possible at that point to become a martyr anymore. People who are serious about their faith began to look at monasticism, began to look at the life of John the Baptist, who lived out in the desert and who wore rough clothing and ate locusts and wild honey and had an odd kind of life. And so Antony for example, a Coptic, an Egyptian Christian, went out into the desert and began living the life of what some have called a spiritual athlete. Putting sin to death, freeing himself from all worldly temptations, so he thought. Going out into a cave apart from people and just living a holy life as far as he understood it. Problem was, he brought his enemy with him, the indwelling sin. He didn't leave it behind, and so, he had lusts and he had anxieties and he had fears and he had temptations and they just were there with him constantly.

Others followed as well. One man sat on a stile, on a pole, for decades and somebody brought him food. And he'd pull it up in a bucket and he just spent his whole time fighting sin up on top of a pole. He was trying to get away from all temptation. I think the real heroes in that story are the ones that brought him the food every day. I think that's remarkable. But this man also brought his enemy with him. It was an internal enemy, the enemy of the flesh. Sin within the heart could not escape it. Soon there came to be communities of monks, monasteries would grow up and people would try to help each other in the battle with the flesh. The problem with all that is that they may have been making progress in the one journey, weren't they? Journey of personal holiness, but where was world evangelization? It was all inward focus, it all came in. And so you may be growing in holiness but at the same time who's hearing the Gospel through you? It's supposed to be proclaimed to the ends of the earth.

Those Catholic monasteries grew up and they were a big part of Medieval Europe. Martin Luther entered one, you remember the story. And he sought to put sin to death by physical mortification. By fasting, by prayer, by sleeping on stone floors without blankets, by torturing his body. But it says in Colossians 2, that those things have little effect on fleshly or sensual desires. And then immediately goes into chapter 3 which tells you to put sin to death. And so how can it be? Romans 8 tells us that by the power of the spirit, and by the power of the spirit alone may we put sin to death." That is the message of Romans 8.

Now, I’m giving you an extended quote here from John Owen, and I think it's powerful. Look and read along with me. John Owen, a Puritan theologian from the 17th Century said this: "The vigor and power and comfort of our spiritual life depends on the mortification of the deeds of the flesh." Do you see that? The vigor, and the power, and the comfort of your spiritual life depends on your putting sin to death. If you do not put sin to death, your spiritual life will not be vigorous. It will not be powerful. It will be sick and weak and ineffective and fruitless, and so you must put sin to death. This is not an option if you're a Christian. And I think it's so important for us to realize, to whom is Paul speaking? He's speaking to those that he's already assured that there's no condemnation for those that are in Christ Jesus and he's calling them to war. He's calling them to put sin to death.

Owen goes on, he says, "The choicest believers, the best ones, who are assuredly freed from the condemning power of sin ought yet to make it their business all their days to mortify the indwelling power of sin. The principal efficient cause of the performance of this duty is the spirit. The holy spirit. All other ways of mortification are vain. All helps are helpless it must be done by the spirit." What do you think Owen had in mind when he said, "All other approaches are vain?" I think probably that history that I've already traced out for you, of worldly or fleshly physical efforts to put indwelling sin to death. It must be done by the Holy Spirit.

I want you as a Baptist, to see yourself on a pilgrimage. I want you to see yourself on a journey. I want you to see yourself traveling and moving through hill and vale. Traveling and making progress in your Christian life. You're a pilgrim on progress. You are not static. You didn't pray the prayer, walk the aisle, get the thing and then you're finished. You're on a journey and if you're not on the journey you're not justified. If you're not on the journey you're not a Christian. That's what it's saying here. There are two journeys in scripture, aren't there? Jesus described them in Matthew 7, "Enter through the narrow gate for wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction and many enter through it, but small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life and only a few find it." Is that not a dynamic passage? You're on a journey, you're traveling somewhere, either that road is heading toward heaven or it's heading toward hell.

And so you are on a journey and it's not unopposed, is it? You have enemies on the journey. It's difficult, it's hard. What did you think it meant at the end of Romans 8 when it says, "Know in all these things, we are" what? "More than conquerors?" Is it possible to conquer without a conflict? Is it possible to be an overcomer without a war? A victor without a battle? It's impossible. And so what's laid before us is a perilous journey, a difficult journey, hard. And through Christ and through Christ alone, in all these things we're more than conquerors. Through Him who loved us, through Christ and through Christ alone we can walk a life of holiness in His presence, and that is what this text calls us to.

II. Present Condition: Realm, Indwelling, Body, Spirit

Now, as we look at how the New Testament teaches holiness, it always teaches it the same way. It's so vital that we understand that. How does Paul tell us to be holy? Well first, as always, he's telling us who we are, what is true about us, what is our present condition. And in that we look at realm and indwelling, and then we're going to learn about the body and the spirit. What realm do you live in? Now, this is review for those who've heard me preach, but basically there are two realms, aren't there? There are two kingdoms, they're not of equal power. Do not think that the Devil's kingdom and God's Kingdom are of equal power like we're in some kind of a equal struggle here, not at all. God is the creator of heaven and earth. And any time He wanted to He could pull the plug on Satan. But there are these two realms. And if you are not a Christian you are in the realm of the devil, you're in the realm of the world of the flesh. You're under the power and the control of the flesh.

And so it says in verse 9, "However, you [as a Christian] are not in the flesh." You see that? "You are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit." What does that mean you're not in the flesh? I feel like I'm still in my flesh. I haven't died yet. There's my hand, I feel it. What does it mean I'm not in the flesh? Well, it's talking about a spiritual position, a spiritual realm that you're in, a kingdom really, and you're not there anymore. Somebody say, "Praise God." We're not there anymore, we got transferred from it. We got rescued "from the dominion of darkness and brought over into the Kingdom of the Son He Loves," Colossians 1:13. You were rescued and it's all that matter in terms of the domain, the dominions, whose are you? To whom do you belong? Who possesses you? You're either Satan's or you're God's. You're either child of the devil, or you're child of God. One or the other, there's no third option. Scripture gives us no third option. You're a possession of God if you're a child of God, possession. Isn’t that beautiful?

It is written in Exodus 19:5, "Now, if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all the nations," God said to Israel, "you will be my treasured possession." Isn’t that beautiful? The treasured possession of God out of all the nations, that was Israel. The apple of His eye. Psalm 135:4, "For the Lord has chosen Jacob to be his own and Israel to be again his treasured possession." That's the way God spoke in the Old Covenant. Well it's the same language in the New Covenant, exact same language. It says here in verse 9 "And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ," what? "He does not belong to Christ." He is not Christ's, of Christ. And so you belong to Christ if you are Christian. You belong to Christ. There is always a struggle for self-esteem. Find your esteem there that you are possessed, owned by Jesus Christ.

He says in John 10:14, "I am the good shepherd. I know my sheep and my sheep know me." Do you see the possessive? They're my sheep, I bought them with my blood. I paid the price for them and they are mine. Says later in John 10:27 and 28, "My sheep listen to my voice. I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life and they shall never perish. No one can snatch them out of my hand." Well, this ownership is the ground of our obligation to fight sin. That's the way Paul speaks, look at verse 12, "Therefore brothers, we have an obligation" or "we are debtors," we owe something." Going to talk more about that in a minute. But we are not debtors to the sinful nature to live according to it. We don't owe the sinful nature anything. It's a matter of possession, who owns us, what realm are we in.

First Corinthians 6:19-20, it says, "Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you whom you have received from God?" Now listen, "You are not your own. You've been bought at a price, therefore glorify God in your body." You see the logic of the obligation? You are owned, you are bought, someone paid something for you, and so you're not your own, therefore glorify God with your body. And then it says in Romans 14:8, "If we live we live to the Lord and if we die we die to the Lord. So whether we live or die," what? "We belong to the Lord." We are His treasured possession. Non-Christians are not his treasured possession. They're not owned by Him, not in this way. Jesus said to his enemies in John 10:26 "You do not believe because you are not my sheep." And He says in John 8:44, "You belong to [or you are owned by] your Father, the devil."

So there are two realms, two kingdoms. You either are owned by or belong to your father, the devil, or you are a child of God. Possessed by Him, a treasured possession, you are Christ's sheep, you're owned by Him, bought at a price. These are the realms. And we are told in this passage of Romans that we are no longer in the flesh, we are now in the spirit. Is that not glorious good news? There's been a rescue. We are told negatively what we are not, what is not true of us. We are not in the flesh. We are not in Adam anymore. We're not under the condemnation of Adam anymore. We're not under the law. We're not controlled any longer by the sin nature. We don't have any longer that carnal or fleshly mind in which we delight in sin and delight in the sinful world that surrounds us. We're not any longer bearing fruit for death. We're not any longer unable to please God. All of those things that he just said in Romans 8:5-8. But instead, we are in the spirit. We've been rescued. We've been transferred to a whole new realm. We are in a new kingdom now. We are in Christ. We are under grace. We are controlled by the Spirit. We have our mind on the things of the Spirit. We are bearing fruit for life, and we are pleasing to God moment by moment.

And so there has been in our case, in our condition, a great rescue. You hear about these SWAT teams that are trained, specially trained to go into hostage situations, right? And they're given special equipment and special training and they know how to move in there and rescue the captive and get them out of there. Or you hear about those two missionaries in Afghanistan that so many of us were praying for. They were delivered, they were rescued by a military action. Both of those things are nothing compared to what happened to you if you're Christian, you are rescued, you are delivered from the dominion of darkness and brought over into the kingdom, the new kingdom of Christ. Jesus put it this way, in Luke 11, "When a strong man, fully armed, guards his house, his possessions are safe but when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up the spoils."

He's talking about driving Satan out. And so you were the spoils, And He is the someone that is stronger, and the devil is the strong man, and he had this armor in which he trusted. And the strong man lost to the stronger man, Jesus Christ. And so you were delivered, you were rescued from the dominion of darkness by a stronger one, by Jesus Christ.

Now let me ask you a question, is this not tremendous grounds for assurance? If you're a Christian, you're in the new kingdom, aren't you? You're in walled city, you're protected. And who is guarding that is it not Jesus Christ is he not also a strong man? Is there anyone stronger than Jesus, who can overpower him, take you back and bring you back to the devil's kingdom. Can it be done? It cannot be done. "My Father, who is greater than all is given to me and no one can snatch them out of my Father's hand. I and the Father are one." We are kept by the power of God. We're in a new kingdom and we cannot be snatched back. So that's the foundation of holiness. Understanding who you are. What kingdom do you live in, you're citizenship of a... You're a citizen of a whole new realm now. It's a whole new way of living in this new kingdom. And so He tells you who and what you are, and then he tells you what? Live like it. Live up to it since you are a child of God. That's the way He teaches holiness. And so we can know now that we're in this kingdom, can't We? We can know as we see the activity of the Holy Spirit in our lives. We are not in the flesh but we are in the spirit and as possible to know based on the indwelling spirit, the one who lives in us now. "If indeed," it says, "the Spirit of God lives in you." If the Spirit of God lives in you... Don't let that "if" bother you. Sometimes the word if can really mean since.

"If you're my son, now act like it," you might say. It doesn't mean you may or may not be my son, it means since you're my child please live up to it, that's what it's saying. So if indeed we have the spirit, we should say as Christians, since we have the spirit there's no doubts here, He dwells within us, He lives within us.

Now let's again try to understand this properly. Talk about having the spirit of Christ. Here we hear the secular way of talking about Christmas we need to catch the spirit of Christmas. What is the spirit of Christmas? I've never been able to figure it out. Is it materialism? Is it parties? What is the spirit of Christmas? Is it good cheer? We just went through it. Think about it, our minds are cleared now, we can look back on it. What was the spirit of Christmas? And you're told to catch the spirit of Christmas. Or we're all looking ahead, we don't like looking back. The catching the spirit of spring, you want to see some warm weather... There's a spirit that you catch. Is that what it means here? It's like it's an attitude, a way of thinking, a way of an outlook. We're going to catch the spirit of Christ. Kind of, have Christ attitude about things.

Is that what it's talking about here? Not at all. Actually, you were invaded by the Holy Spirit, He came, the third person of the Trinity and lived within you, and you became his temple. He dwelt within you. If you could have seen in the spiritual realm, it'd be like the, Shekinah glory coming down and entering into you. There's a person in you now, that wasn't there before. He has an intellect. He has a will. He has power. He makes plans. He has feelings. And he communicates those feelings. He has passions. He loves things, and He hates things. And He's living within you if you're a child of God. The Spirit indwells every believer, verse 9 "If anyone does not have the spirit of Christ... " What? "He does not belong to Christ." If you do not have the indwelling Holy Spirit, you are not a Christian. You're not a Christian.

Well when did the spirit come? It came the moment you believed. "Having believed you are marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit," Ephesians 1:13-14, same thing that Peter preached in Acts chapter 2, when the people heard this is Pentecost sermon they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and other apostles, brothers what shall we do? Peter replied, "Repent to be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, the promises for you and your children and for all who are far off, for all of whom the Lord your God will call."

So all those who are the called, who are Christians, they receive the gift of the Holy Spirit and he lives within you. Not only the Holy Spirit though, actually the scripture teaches that the whole trinity that lives within you. We have here in the text that the spirit lives within us but we also have indications in John 14:20, "On that day," Jesus said, "You will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me and I am in you. I am in you," Jesus said. And then Jesus said that same time in John 14:23 said, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him and we will come to Him and make our dwelling with Him." Do you understand what that saying? That the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, the triune God lives within you, if you are Christian. Isn't that incredible? And not just some of the time, all the time. By the way how does it make you feel when you sin? Isn't that striking? And isn't that the ground over the call for holiness. You're indwelt now by the Holy Spirit, you're indwelt by the Father, Son and Spirit. And the spirit has come in.

Well, what should you expect from your body? Well this text covers that as well, verse 10, "And if Christ is in you, though the body on the one hand is dead because of sin. Yet the spirit on other hand is alive because of righteous." So it talks about the body here and what does it say about the body? Well, it's not very complementary, is it? Your body is dead. It's dead, not it's dying or it will die. It's dead. This is very striking and Paul meant it to be striking. Well, why is it dead? Well, it's dead according to this because of sin. Romans 6:23, "The wages of sin is death." And this is what I think it means. Your physical body is under a death sentence. And that death sentence, plays itself out everyday. Your physical body's under a death sentence. Your cells within you are dying constantly, aren't they? They're being replaced but not perfectly, that's called aging. Your cells are being replaced but little by little you change, you're decaying, you're dying. The principle of death is already in your body, you're under a death sentence. And as matter of fact if the Lord does not come back in our generation, if we are not the final generation, everyone of you who listens to me right now and I who speak, will sink into the grave. Will we not? Is that not promised? That is the outcome for our body. Our body is under a death sentence. Not the final word for the body, we'll talk more about that in a minute. But we're going to wrestle with the ground, according to the curse. And in the end, the ground is going to win. And we're going to sink into the dust because of sin. And God has not, in fact, removed the death sentence. Death is the final enemy that he will remove at the end of the worlds.

Meanwhile in this present age, we are under this physical death sentence. And we live it out everyday, this present corruption, the decay is part of our physical life. We have within, you talk about an invisible war. There's an internal war going on inside you right now. Isn't there? Viruses, bacteria, maybe even some cancer cells multiplying too fast, your immune system's keeping up, struggling right. But in the end, they will win and you will die. That is what it's saying here. The body is dead, though the body is dead because of sin, but we can go further than that. The body is also a seat of sin, isn't it? It's an avenue in which sin works or through which sin works. Your body uses or your sin uses your body to do its work. Lust entices you to evil thoughts through members of your body.

Greed entices you to want to accumulate more through members of your body. Pride entices you to want to be a king or a queen in your life through members of your body. Laziness entices you to procrastinate again through members of your body. The body is a seed or an enticing to sin. Take a minute, put your finger here in Romans 8 and look over to 1 Corinthians chapter 9, the very next book in the Bible. 1 Corinthians 9, And Paul tells us how this doctrine should make us feel about our bodies. If this is true Paul, that our body is dead because of sin, how should we think about the body? How should we think about it?" Look what he says in verse 24, "Do you not know that in a race, all the runners run but only one gets the prize. Run in such way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the game goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last but we do it to get a crown that will last forever." Verse 26, "Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly. I do not fight like a man beating the air." Now look at verse 27, so vital, look at with your eyes. "No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I preach to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize." Now, what does Paul mean there? I think he means that he keeps his body under constant vigilance. He's on it all the time. It's really a dangerous thing to him to get the sense that his body is dangerous to his Christian life.

Go back to Romans 8. He beats his body and makes it a slave because it is a dangerous thing to him in his spiritual endeavor. He doesn't trust it. He's got to fight its inclinations. He's got a fight it's whining and complaining, right? You know what I'm talking about. When you try to get up early and have a prayer time. It's whining and it's complaining, "What do I have to do this for?" Your body is fighting against the very thing that the spirit's doing in you.

Yet he paused to fight against the body's oppositions. It's rebellions and its desires every step of the way. It's like you're in charge of a rebellious prisoner and you need to take that prisoner 50 miles down the road to some other place. What's that journey going to be like? You've got to watch it every step of the way, and it's going to be difficult. That's what the body is like and ultimately there's future corruption in the grave. John Paton, I've told the story before, was a missionary determined to go to the Pacific Hebrides Islands as a missionary to preach the gospel to a tribe that had just finished eating as a cannibal, the last missionary that went there.

How would you like to be the next missionary that goes? But John Paton felt the call of God and he wanted to take the gospel that second journey we've talked about, to the ends of the earth and that was the middle of the South Pacific. Well, one of his aged friends godly man dear old Christian man tried to dissuade him and said, "The cannibals! You'll be eaten by cannibals!" and John Paton said so beautifully, "Mr. Dixon, you are I perceive advanced in years now and your own prospect is soon to be laid in the grave and there to be eaten by worms. I confess to you that if I can but live and die serving and honoring the Lord Jesus. It will make no difference to me whether I'm eaten by cannibals or by worms. And in the great day, my resurrection body will arise as fair as yours in the lightness of our Redeemer."

Is that not a great answer? Why preserve the body, why try to be young, why buy those special products they advertise late at night or whenever, why do that? You're going to sink into the grave. So that's the future of the body. Where is the present in the body? It's not all bleak is it because the body is also the vehicle of our service to God in this world isn't it? Is it not this mouth that's speaking these words now. Is it not your ears that are hearing the words. Your mind that's thinking about it. Are they not your hands and your feet that will do your service to God this week. Your body is not all evil. It's just weak it's a ground of sin. It's a difficult thing, but it needs to be brought under control and used for the glory of God. The body, that's what to expect with the body.

What about the spirit? It says in verse 10 "If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin yet the spirit is lie, life or alive because of righteousness." It's difficult to interpret this. I think it's either that the Holy Spirit is life because of righteousness, or your spirit is life because of righteousness. I don't think that the the word spirit should be capitalized here. I think it's referring to your spirit. I may be wrong on that it's possible but looked down on verse 16. It says, "The Spirit himself testifies with... " What? "Our spirit, that we are children of God." So at least somewhere in this passage, Paul is thinking about something called our spirit. So we've got our spirit and we've got the Holy Spirit. What I think happens is the moment you come to faith in Christ, you're a new creation. You have a new soul, a new spirit a new spiritual existence within you. And it will never die ever. It is alive. And why? Because of righteousness. Whose righteousness? Not yours. The righteousness of Jesus Christ given to you.

It had a beginning but it will have no end and it will survive death. It'll survive your last days in the hospital. It'll survive your funeral. It'll survive judgment day even. It'll go right on into glory. Amen! Hallelujah! The new spirit put in you will never die. It's life because of the righteousness, the gift of righteousness through Jesus Christ. And so it says in 2 Corinthians 4:16, "Therefore we do not lose heart." We don't get discouraged even though we age. Even though we lose capabilities. Even though we may even lose members of our body. Even though corruption is all around us and within us too. We are not getting discouraged. We do not lose heart. We knew it would happen. Though outwardly we are wasting away yet inwardly in the spirit we are being renewed day by day isn't that beautiful. We have this treasure in jars of clay. Don't beautify the jar of clay. I'm not saying, don't comb your hair. And put on nice clothes On Sunday do that, but I'm saying don't trouble yourself about the body too much. Keep it under control. Use it to serve God but realize that your future lies elsewhere. And there is a future. God has a future promise for your body.

Look at verse 11, "If the spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you. He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies." Those death filled bodies… He is going to give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who indwells you. God has not forgotten your body. He's not left it out of the picture. He created your body. He created the physical world and he has a future plan for it. It's called resurrection. And nobody but Jesus has this resurrection body right now. It's yet future but it's coming and it's promised to us we'll talk about it more later in this chapter not now. But it's here in this verse and without question as promised look at verse 23, "Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption of sons, to the redemption of our bodies." So you're going to be groaning inwardly, but you're going to be waiting eagerly with hope for your resurrection body and it's going to come.

III. Living Up to Your New Identity... Or Else!!  

Well so then what look at verse 12 we're going to live up to our new identity so then as a result of all this doctrine all that's teaching we are under obligation. We're debtors , we owe something. There's an ought or I should do to this Christian life, isn't there? We owe Christ everything. We must live up to our obligations. Now I want to make it caution here. This is not, you should never think that you're mortifying or putting sin to death is somehow paying Jesus back for the blood he shed for You. You can never pay that back and you should not think of yourself paying him back. Your good deeds none of them should be thought of as paying Jesus back for what he did. You can't. You never will, just accepted by grace, it's a gift. But the obligation is different, it's a sense of ought, a sense of ownership. He is your lord, you should obey him. There's a warning here isn't there?

It says, if you live according to the flesh you must die, but if by the spirit you are in the business of putting sin to death, you will live. You have no obligation to the flesh, none, you owe it nothing. Isn't that beautiful? You owe sin nothing. You owe the devil nothing. He has no authority over you so you can say to sin, no I'm dead to that sin. Sin shall not be your master because you're not under law but under grace, Romans 6. Now we have the power of the spirit to say no. It is the spirit that stands behind our saying no to temptation. We owe the flesh nothing, but we owe Christ everything. And so, therefore, he comes to us as a commander and he commands that we should put sin to death by the spirit. Now the command is just implicit here, it's explicit in Colossians 3:5; "Put to death therefore whatever belongs to your earthly nature." And how do we do it? We do it by the power of the spirit. Daily life in step with the Spirit. The Spirit leads, you follow. The Spirit prompts, you respond. The Spirit commands and you'll obey.

Moment by moment by moment you put sin to death. That's how it happens. We could and should spend hours on this. I actually believe that this is a fitting topic for Sunday evenings in depth, how to put sin to death. I'm being led now and probably that's what I'm going to do. We need to follow the Spirit's lead, we need to feel the Spirit's passions. When the Spirit is rejoicing in us, we need to rejoice too. When the Spirit is grieved with us, we need to grieve, mourn and wail and change our laughter to mourning and our joy to gloom and repent. We need to keep in step with the Spirit as he leads us to holiness. We need to go to war, brothers and sisters. When sin leaves you alone, then you can leave sin alone. Recently some friends gave us some betta fish. Have you ever heard of the betta fish? Beta fish are beautiful fish that have the proclivity of hating each other and fighting each other to the death until there's only one left. And so this was an unusual little tank that had these compartments and they're beautiful and they swim around but they can't get at each other so they survive and they go on. There's a barrier between the two. Well, that's a good paradigm of the flesh, the sin nature and the Holy Spirit.

They will never be friends. You can't sin and say "now Holy Spirit, let's sit down and see if you can work this out. Let's see if there can be some kind of reconciliation here between the two of you. You seem to have a difference, you seem to hate each other. Is there something that can be worked out?" No, there is nothing that can be worked out. They will be at war until it's over. Owen put it this way, in terms of walking down the street. You walk down the street or path and you see a viper and the viper sees you. Then you begin to engage the viper with a stick. You begin to see this is a strong viper and very quick, quicker than you thought, they can move. "Say listen, I'm actually sorry that I talked to you, I'm sorry I interacted with you, I would like to you leave you alone now. I would like to walk the other way and you go your way and we will just part." Is that going to happen? No. If you turn your back and start walking, you will die. You must kill that snake or it will kill you and so it is with sin. And the Holy Spirit convinces you that what I'm saying is true. You can have no separate peace with sin. There can be no white flag, no surrender. You have to go to war. The Holy Spirit has come to give you the power. Be strong then in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God and take your stand and fight, there's no other way. John Bunyan pointed out there's no armor for the back side by the way. No armor for the retreating coward, just for standing firm and fighting sin.

IV. Application

Now what is our application? Simply first, understand your position. We've talked about it, who are you? Are you in the Spirit or are you in the flesh? If you're in the flesh, you are lost, you're under condemnation. If you're in the Spirit, you can do the things that I've been talking about today. You have the power and the authority to put sin to death. You have the indwelling Spirit. Therefore, understand not so much your power, understand the power of the Holy Spirit within you. Understand your future, your promised inheritance. You know what's beautiful? Romans 8:1 tells you the outcome of the journey. In the end you will win. In the end there will be no condemnation. In the end you will triumph and be victorious. You will be glorious, you will win in the end. So therefore, fight now. Understand these things.

I want to finish by just taking you briefly through a day led by the Spirit. Tomorrow morning, it's Monday morning. The alarm wakes at 5:30, wakes you. 5:30, maybe even 5:00 because you need a quiet time. What happens when that alarm rings an hour and a half earlier than you're used to setting it? Your flesh groans and says, "No way." But the Holy Spirit said, "Yes way, get out of bed." And so you pray and ask for help. The next thing you know you're on your feet. You go and you shower and shake the cobwebs out and whatever it takes and you go to begin your Bible study. You open up the Bible and you begin to read. Your mind is drifting and wandering, you want to just get through it, get through it, the chapter, get it done. The Holy Spirit says, dig deep, meditate, take time. Your flesh is lazy. But the Holy Spirit says meditate, chew over each phrase and so you do. And you pray, "Lord open my eyes that I might see wonderful things in your law." And so you read, and when you get done you've learned some things.

And God has spoken to you, and given you so marching orders for the day. And at that moment, your flesh wants to take that information and throw it out the door. Right? Wants you to be a hearer of the word only, and not a doer of the word. So instead you're going to say, "By the power of the Spirit, I want to do these things today. I'm asking for your help. Move in me, work in me." And so the Spirit moves, that you obey what you read. Then you get dressed, and you sit down and eat breakfast. And you have your breakfast, and there's that second donut, or maybe some third donut. And you're saying, "Hmm... Flesh wants it," Spirit says, "You've eaten enough, maybe even too much," and so there's a war, a struggle. Put sin to death. You say, "No, this is over eating, it's sin, I won't do it." Get in the car and start driving and your flesh wants to listen to the talk radio station, or secular radio, or whatever it is that your flesh wants, and the Spirit says, "Why don't you begin praying for your work day? Why don't you go in ready for your work day, that you might be able to witness for me today. Pray for your co-workers, pray for your boss, pray for yourself to work." "Ahhh... Alright, I'll pray." And so you follow the lead of the Spirit.

You get into work, you start your work day, coffee break comes around and you see a coworker and the coworker says to you, "How are you doing?" "I'm doing well, how are you?" "Well, I'm not doing too well, I'm having some problems at home." Well you know that this is a tailor-made opportunity to listen, to show some love, maybe even begin a Christian witness with this person. And the Spirit prompts you to be bold, to say something about Christ, and your flesh says, "No way am I going to do that. They're going to think I'm a Bible thumper, they're going to think I'm a religious fanatic." And so you don't share. And the coffee break ends, you go back to your office or whatever, and then the Spirit gets busy on other side, and starts to convict you, and says, "You know, you missed an opportunity there, and I'm grieved about that, and so I want you to be grieved too." And so you say, "I'm grieved, I'm sorry, and I confess that to you sin." And the Spirit assures you that the blood of Christ is sufficient to cleanse you of all sin. And you resolve at that moment that you're going to be more open to witnessing opportunities.

Well guess what? At lunch time that same person's sitting alone. Sitting alone! And the Spirit prompts you and says, "Go over and sit there." Just like he did with Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch. "Go over and sit there, and talk to him." And this time you're ready, and you say, "Okay, I will." And you go sit, you listen for awhile, and then the moment comes to say something for Christ, and you do. By the Spirit. You put you own fleshly desires to death, and you say something about Jesus to that person. Invite them to church. They're interested, it's the best witnessing opportunity you've had in ages.

Well, lunch is over, you go back, about an hour later your lunch starts to hit you, the blood is all working on your food, and you get sluggish and sleepy. You know what I'm talking about? And you can't really work, and you're working on a report for your boss, it's due in two weeks, you're ahead of schedule anyway, and you're tempted to be lazy and to laze around, and the Spirit says, "Come on, whatever you do, do it as unto the Lord, not with eye service, like people are watching but do it as you're offering it up in worship to me."

And that's how your day ends. You go home, your spouse greets you and says, "Where's the orange juice, and milk, and other stuff I asked you to get?" "I'm sorry. I forgot." And there starts to be one of those communications that happens sometimes. Not with me of course, I want you to know that, that never happens with us. But it may happen in your marriage. And so, your pride starts to rise. It starts to rise, and as it rises the Spirits says, "Put sin to death, don't be prideful." And say, "I'm sorry, I forgot I'm going to go back out." And so the day ends with you setting your alarm clock, and what time do you set it for? Same time as yesterday. That's a day with the Spirit. I've skipped a lot of stuff, but that's what the Spirit's calling you to do. Keep in step with Spirit and put sin to death, and walk with him day by day.

An Eternal Promise, or a Temporary Meal?

Please, if you would take your scriptures and open to Romans 8. And we're going to be looking this morning, at verses 5-8. Romans 8:5-8.

Do you enjoy a good stew? Do you like stew? Think about it. Did you have something hot on Thursday? You know what I'm talking about, maybe some beef stew, or with some kind of chunks of potato, or something steaming, something thick. You need something thick and hot on a day like that. Do you like a good stew? I love a good stew, but I wouldn't trade Heaven for a good stew. And it's shocking to me, that the Bible records the story of a man who did, in effect, just that. I'm talking, of course, about Esau. Now, we're preaching in Romans 8, but you know the story about Esau. And there was a day, in which he came in from the open country. He was a hunter. I am not a hunter, but he was a hunter. And I guess, when you've been hunting all day long, and came up empty, you come home hungry, and you want something to eat. And Jacob was making a stew that day, and it smelled so good. It smelled delicious. And Esau said to Jacob, "Give me some of that stew. It smells good." And Jacob said in response, "First, sell me your birthright."

Now, what is the significance of that birthright? Well, you remember that we've been learning in Romans chapter 4, that the moment that Abraham was justified was the moment that God made a promise to him. You remember what I'm talking about? God took Abraham out and had him look up at the stars. He had promised him a child, a child of promise. He had already said earlier, "Through your offspring, through your seed, all peoples on Earth will be blessed." Well, Abraham continued to move on, year after year, his wife Sarah continued to get older. She was still barren, and it seemed like the promise was fruitless, just like her womb. And so, at one point, in Genesis 15, he said, "Lord, what can you give me, since I remain childless? You haven't given me a child." And so He took Abraham out, and had him look at the stars, and said, "Look up at the heavens and count the stars, if indeed you can count them... So shall your offspring be." That's a promise. He made him a promise, "So shall your offspring be." You'll have as many descendants as there are stars. And one of those descendants would be the blessing to every people, and tribe, and language, and nation on Earth." Abraham heard that promise. He believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.

Well, Abraham had a son, Isaac, and Isaac had twin sons, Jacob and Esau. And you know that Isaac explained all this to those boys, you know he did, from when they were early enough to understand the significance of why they were living in tents, wandering around in a country not their own. And there was a promise that they would inherit that land, but the Amorites still lived there, and Isaac continued to tell the twins, Jacob and Esau, it wouldn't be theirs, but it would belong to their descendants after them, after they had sojourned in a country not their own for a long time.

And so, one day, Esau came in, and he was hungry. His tummy was empty, he wanted something to eat. And Jacob said to the firstborn, Esau... He was the firstborn... "Sell me your birthright." And do you remember what Esau said? He said, "What good a birthright to me?" "I'm about to die from hunger. Give me some of that stew. You can have the birthright. It means nothing to me." That is about the opposite, as opposite as you can get from, "Abraham believed God and He credited it him as righteousness." This promise meant nothing to Esau, if only he could have a bowl of stew. And so, we have displayed before us, in living form, the doctrine that Paul is going to teach us today, concerning the mind of the flesh.

Look at it again in verse 5,  "Those who are, " literally, it says, "In the flesh, have their mind set on the flesh, but those who live in the Spirit, have their mind set on what the Spirit desires." So we have before us two different ways of looking at life, two different minds, as it were: The carnal mind, the fleshly mind, the mind controlled by the sinful nature. And then you have the spiritual mind, the mind controlled by the Spirit, by the promise of God. And so, therefore, we have a radical transformation that's been described, because all of us were born into Esau-ishness. Is that a word?

We were born like Esau, whose god was their stomach. I have a little five-month-old, whose god is his stomach right now, if he has a god. He lives for feeding that desire. We are born into that, aren't we? And at some point, a transformation occurs, where we would not sell our birthright, any longer, for a bowl of stew, a radical transformation.

I. A Radical Transformation

Now, in Romans chapter 8, Paul is laboring to prove his original premise, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." And so, all of chapter 8, he's going to be laying out proofs that that is true. That is unspeakably precious to people who are of Jacob's mind, who hear the Word of God and believe it. A promise from God means everything, and so he's trying to prove it. And now, in the verses we're looking at this morning, Paul is going to pick up on what he said at the end, in verse 4. He's describing who it is true for, that there is no condemnation. It's not true of everybody. As a matter of fact, Jesus said that most are on the road to destruction. It's true, of only a certain category of people, that there's no condemnation, and so he's describing it. He said in verse 4, "In order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature, but according to the Spirit, for those who live according to the flesh, [this sinful nature] have their mind set on what that nature desires."

He's describing the category of people, that it's true of them, that there is no condemnation. On Judgment Day, they will be acquitted, they will go to Heaven when they die, they are saved. Who is it true of? It’s true of those who do not have the carnal mind, the fleshly mind, but those who have the mind of the Spirit. And so he gives us Romans chapter 8, either that we may be assured of our salvation, because we look inward, and we see that that new mind has come to us. We have been transformed from the carnal mind to the spiritual mind, that we may be assured that we may have joy of our salvation. And from that joy, we may have power to serve Him, to put sin to death, to grow. From that fruit, comes eternal life, from all of that. That we may be assured or that we may be warned, that we are still under condemnation, because we are characterized by the fleshly minds. He's giving us either assurance or warning here.

Paul is Describing All Christians

Now, I want to make two key assertions, as we look at this text. First of all, I'm asserting that Paul is describing here all Christians, when he talks about those who are controlled by the Spirit. What do I mean by that? There's not, I don't believe, a special class or category of Christian, halfway between converted and unconverted, that we would call the carnal Christian, that you have the unconverted, the carnal Christian, and then the spiritual Christian. I am denying that. I believe that He's talking here about all Christians, and about all non-Christians, and he's making a big cleaving and a dividing of the human race into these two categories, as he's done all the way through, from Romans 5, into 6 and 7, and now 8. You're either in Adam or you're in Christ. You're either under the law or you're in the Spirit. You're either saved or you're not. And so that's what you do.

I don't believe he's talking about a special category or class called the spiritual Christians, the Holy Spirit-filled Christian. He's going to say, very plainly, "If you don't have the Spirit, you're not a Christian." We'll get to that, God-willing, next time. There's not a special category, nor is there a second blessing needed, so that you need to be baptized with the Holy Spirit, not having had the Spirit, but you're already justified. That's impossible. If you are justified, you have received the indwelling Holy Spirit. That's the first assertion that I want to make. The distinction here is between Christian and non-Christian, not between immature Christian and mature Christian, or between somebody living right at that moment, and somebody who's not living right at that moment.

Total Transformation is Absolutely Essential to Salvation

Secondly, I want to say that this total transformation, from the carnal mindset to the spiritual mindset, is absolutely essential to salvation. If it hasn't happened in you, you're not saved. You have not been justified. You are still in your sins, you're still under condemnation. Those are the two assertions that I want to make. Martyn Lloyd-Jones put it this way, "Christianity involves a complete radical change in the nature of the human being. A radical change in your mind, in your heart, from within. Something that is supernatural, something that can only be done by God, a radical change in your nature."

II. The Gift of the Holy Spirit

Now, as we come to this text, and as we continue on in Romans 8, we're coming to the issue of the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit has been mentioned four times in the first seven chapters of Romans. He is going to be mentioned over 20 times in this chapter. This is the chapter of the Spirit, the indwelling Holy Spirit. John MacArthur put it this way, "The Spirit is to a believer, what God, the Creator, is to the physical world. Without God, the physical world would not exist. Without the Spirit, a Christian would not be a Christian." And so we have the gift of the Holy Spirit.

The Gift Promised

Now, the gift was promised. It is the promised gift. You remember Joel chapter 2, "And afterward, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days." This is the promise of Joel. And so Paul, in Ephesians 1:13, says, "He is the Spirit of promise." He is the promised Holy Spirit. He's been promised to us. Just like God made a promise to Abraham, so this promise has been given to us.

The Promise Fulfilled: Peter’s Sermon

And so, on the Day of Pentecost, it came true. God poured out His Holy Spirit on all who believed, all who were assembled there. And so Peter, by the power of the Spirit, stood up, and preached a great Pentecostal message, and people who heard it in Jerusalem were cut to their heart, and they said to Peter and the other apostles, "Brothers, what shall we do?" And Peter answered, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children, and for all who are far off, for all whom the Lord, your God, will call." Who are the ones who are far off, is it not us? Durham is a long way from Jerusalem, isn't it? The year 2002 is a long way from the time that Peter preached that sermon. "For all who are far off, for all whom the Lord God will call." The promise is for you. The gift of the Holy Spirit is yours. We're talking about this promised Holy Spirit.

The Gift From Above

Well, what is this gift? How shall we describe the gift of the Holy Spirit? What is the power of the Spirit? Is it some impersonal force, like electricity that comes out of an outlet, and you take an extension cord, and plug it in, and you've got this power flowing through you? And if you unplug the cord, the machine stops, but if you plug it back in, it starts going, is that what it is? Is it kind of like, "Use the force, Luke"? Is that what it is?  Absolutely not. He is not electricity and he is not the force of Star Wars. He is the third person of the Trinity. He is a person. He has a will. He has an intellect. He has passions and desires. He has a plan. He has a personality. And if you're a believer, He lives inside of you today, the indwelling Holy Spirit. Look at verse 9 in our text. I know that we're not covering it today, but look at it. "You, however, are not controlled by the sinful nature, but by the Spirit," or controlled by the Spirit, "if the Spirit of God," look at this, "lives in you." If He dwells, if He has taken up residence within you. And he says, "If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ." Do you see that? It's very plain. If you're a Christian, the Spirit lives in you, He dwells in you. It's the very promise that Jesus had made in John 14 about the Comforter, "Another Comforter, whom the world cannot receive, but you can receive Him, for He lives with you," Jesus said, "And will be in you," the indwelling Holy Spirit.

And so Paul is going to talk about the activity of the gift of the Spirit, in Romans chapter 8. He's very active. He is not passive in your life. He basically comes in like a King, and takes over, and He controls, and He moves, and He works, and He does not take sin lightly. He is the Holy Spirit, and so He works in you. He works in you to put sin to death. We'll talk about that, God willing. He works in you to testify to your Spirit, that you're a child of God. He works in you, so that you go through Christ's sufferings with Him. He works in you, so that you can pray effectively and powerfully. He is active, He is working, He is assuring, He is comforting, He's convicting, He's moving, He's indwelling, the indwelling Spirit.

III. The Carnally-Minded Person

Now, in verse five, we talk about the carnally-minded person. Now, we've got two categories. The carnally or the sinfully-minded person does not have the indwelling Spirit, and so he's got a mind of the flesh. He's got the carnal mind. Look again at verse Five, "Those who live according to the sinful nature, have their minds set on what that nature desires. But those who live in accordance with the Spirit, have their mind set on what the Spirit desires." We have two different categories of people that we're comparing. We have the carnal, fleshly mindset, and we have the Spirit-controlled mindset. Two different categories.

And may I say that these two types of people that live in this world, just simply do not understand each other? They don't. The Spirit-filled person makes no sense at all to the carnally-minded person, "Why in the world would you live the way you do, suffering, making sacrifices, and for what? When you could have it all. When you could have it all." And meanwhile, the spiritually-minded person looks at the carnally-minded, and says, "What are you thinking? This is all temporary. In a flash, your life will be over, and then you're gonna stand before God, and give an account on Judgment Day. What will you do then?" And so we make no sense to each other, but we make up the whole population of the world: The carnally-minded and the spiritually-minded, the non-Christian and the Christian.

Under (Therefore After) the Flesh: Position, Desire, and Lifestyle

Well, let's try to understand this carnal mind. First, "Of this person, they are under the flesh." That's what the text literally says. The NIV does not do a great job here. Literally, "This person is under or in the flesh, and therefore, they are after the flesh." That's the point. It's a matter of position first, mindset or desire second, lifestyle third. Do you understand how that works? What kingdom are you a member of? What kingdom are you part of? How do you think in that kingdom, and out of that, how do you live your life? Position, desire or mindset lifestyle.

Well, what is the position of the carnally-minded person? They are enslaved to sin. They are in Adam. They are under the law. They are under condemnation. They have no power to refuse sin. Sin has authority over them. They are enslaved to sin. Alright, well, what of their mind? They desire, or yearn for, or think about the things of the flesh, the things of the world, and as a result, they live out a lifestyle accordingly.

Now, what is the carnal mind? If you were to say... Maybe you don't say it anymore... But when I was a child, I had an older sister. And from time to time, I would tell her to mind her own business. Now, when you say to somebody, "Mind your own business," what are we saying? "Be busy with, be active in, be engaged in your own affairs, and let me do that for myself." So when we use the word 'mind,' you're talking about being busy. Or if you leave somebody to "mind the store." We don't really talk that way anymore, but that's how it used to mean... Look after the store, tend the customers that come in, sweep the floors, make it look nice, mind the store. And so this carnally minded person is minding the things of the flesh, the things of the world. They're thinking about them. They're passionate over them.

Now, look back at Romans 1:28, and this mind has already been described to us, but it's been so long ago, since I preached on this, that I think it would be worth looking at again. Romans 1:28, this is describing those people apart from God, under the wrath of God, probably Gentiles in context. He's going to get to the Jews in chapter 2, but in verse 28, he says, "Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, He gave them over [look] "to a depraved mind." Do you see that? "To do what ought not to be done." That is the carnal mind I'm describing, the mind, the desire, the way of thinking. It's a worldview. And out of that, comes everything that follows, "To a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done," Verse 29, "They become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed, and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God haters, insolent, arrogant, and boastful. They invent ways of doing evil. They disobey their parents. They are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless." This is the carnal mind, and then the lifestyle that flows from it. Do you see it? "He gave them over to a depraved mind, to do," it says, "What ought not to be done." It's a yearning after those things.

Now, when you think about the sins of the flesh, you tend to think of, perhaps, sexual sins, or addictive-type sins, like alcohol, or drugs, that kind of thing, but it extends to a bigger area than that. In First John 2:15-17, John lists the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the boastful pride of life, as being those things in the world. These are the worldly things. This is what the devil has to offer. Imagine the devil, like a waiter, coming to your table and say, "Well, today, we have three things on the menu. We're going to offer the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the boastful pride of life." He's been offering the same menu for 2,000 years. It never changes. It's always the same stuff, and so he's offering that.

John Bunyan, in his brilliant "Pilgrim's Progress," talked about it in terms of Vanity Fair. You remember Vanity Fair? And Bunyan described the world this way, "At this fair, are all such merchandise sold, as houses, lands, trades, places, honors, preferments, titles, countries, kingdoms, lusts, pleasures, and delights of all sorts, as harlots, wives, husbands, children, masters, servants, lives, blood, bodies, souls, silver, gold, pearls, precious stones, and whatnot." You can put anything you want in 'whatnot.' Now, we have DVDs, and computers, and four-wheel drive automobiles, whatever. 'Whatnot' is what he called it. "And moreover, at this fair, there is at all times to be seen jugglings, cheats, games, plays, fools, apes, knaves, and rogues, and that of every kind. Here are to be seen too, and that for nothing, thefts, murders, adulteries, false swearers, and that of a blood red color. Now, as I said, the way to the celestial city lies just through this town, where this lusty fair is kept. And he that will go to the celestial city, and yet, not go through this town, must needs leave this world." You got to go through Vanity Fair. You've got to walk through this Vanity Fair. And the carnally-minded man looks at that, and says, "Wow, what an exciting place. What a great thing this is." A spiritually minded man says, "Lord, deliver me from this place. What a weird world we live in."

But it extends beyond, just what we call the sins of the flesh. Trench put it this way, "It's the floating mass of thought, opinions, maxims, speculations, hopes, impulses, aims, and aspirations, at any time current in the world." Do you know what I'm talking about, worldview? You just listen to a talk radio station, read an op-ed, an editorial page in a newspaper, listen to the news, and see if you can see any bias there at all. Just listen and take in. You know what I'm talking about. It's the mind of the flesh, and it extends even to the greatest accomplishments of the human race: Political interests apart from God, social causes apart from God, cultural achievements apart from God, human philosophies, human art, human culture, human music, human literature, all of them done apart from God.

An illustration of this is Ludwig von Beethoven, the composer. A young composer that he was teaching sent him one of his works, and at the bottom, he said, "With God's help, I will try to improve this piece." And he crossed out the words, "With God's help," and scrawled below it, "O man, help thyself." I think Beethoven drank a little too much of that Enlightenment philosophy, and as he lay on his deathbed... I'm talking about Beethoven now... I think it was in Vienna. There was a weird storm. The sky was odd looking. There was thunder, and there was lightning, and it rained. And Beethoven looked out, bitter, probably because of his deafness, and he shook his fist at the sky. And shortly thereafter, he died.

Even the highest and best that we achieve, apart from God, that's what I'm talking about when I talk about the carnal mind. Psalm 10:4 puts it this way, "In his pride, the wicked does not seek God. In all his thoughts, there is no room for God." There's no room for God. We talk at Christmas time about there being no room at the inn for Jesus Christ. In the carnal mind, there's no place for God. And so it is, therefore, a life bounded by the body. The five sense world is everything: What you can smell, what you can taste, what you can touch, what you can feel, what you can see. Paul talked about it in Philippians Three, "For as I've often told you before, and now, say again, even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things, but our citizenship is in Heaven." And there's the contrast between Esau and Jacob. There's the contrast between a carnal mind and a spiritual mind. And Esau is the poster child for that, living for the flesh, living for the stomach.

Now, in verse 6, it says of this carnally-minded person, "The carnal mindedness is spiritual death." Look at verse 6, it says, "The mind of the flesh [or the mind controlled by the flesh] is death." It's not nearly that it leads to death, it is death, dead already. Ephesians 2 says, "As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world." Dead already, dead to spiritual things, have no interest. John MacArthur talks about a tragic funeral that he went to, or actually, officiated at, a funeral for a baby girl killed in a traffic accident. And he remembers distinctly, the mother kept picking up the lifeless body of this little infant, and crying over it, and holding it, and talking to it, speaking to it, singing to it, but there was no response, and there never would be a response. The baby's dead. And so it is for the carnally-minded person with spiritual things. It doesn't matter how you say it. It doesn't matter how you preach it. It doesn't matter how it's presented. The person is dead. They will never understand it. They will never relate to it. They're dead in transgressions and sins.

William Wilberforce and William Pitt

In the early 1800s, in England, there was a man named William Wilberforce. He led England out of slavery, he and a group of other people. England was in the slave trade. And William Wilberforce said, "This is sin. It is wrong." This is way before the American Civil War. And so he was a godly man, a committed Christian. He had a best friend named William Pitt. William Pitt was Prime Minister of England. Pitt was a nominal Anglican, nominally went to church, but really wasn't all that interested in these things. And William Wilberforce was very concerned about the spiritual life of his friend. And so he invited him, again and again, to hear one particular preacher that he loved to hear, Richard Cecil, in London. He was a fiery, passionate Evangelical preacher. William Pitt really didn't have the time, wasn't interested, but finally, one day, he said, "You know, Wilberforce, I'd like to come with you and hear this guy."

And so, they went, and listened, and Cecil was at his best. He was preaching. He was empowered by the Spirit. He was speaking of things to come. He was speaking of the Heavenly realms, and he was speaking of the promises that we have laid before us in Romans. He was talking about these things, and Wilberforce, for a time, just forgot that his friend was there, and was just, himself, caught up in these things. They were delightful to him. But then, toward the end, he began to wonder what his friend Pitt was thinking about. Well, he didn't have to wait long, because as the two of them walked out, Pitt looked over to Wilberforce and said, "You know, Wilberforce, I have not the slightest idea what that man was talking about."

That is the carnal mind. That's somebody who's spiritually dead. And somebody's sitting right next to him, whose ear drums are vibrating the exact same way, heard in those words, life itself, the promise of eternal life. "You know, Wilberforce, I have not the slightest idea what that man is talking about." That's the carnal mind. That man was bored by it, couldn't be bothered, wasn't interested in it, couldn't figure it out.

The Hostility of the Sinful Mind Toward God

1 Corinthians 2:14 says, "The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned," and so they are spiritually dead, and as a result of this, they're at war with God. In verse seven, "The sinful mind," it says, "Is hostile to God," at enmity or hostility to God. This is either a settled rebellion against the Word of God, or is a sense of passive indifference, a sense in which we don't really care about the things of God. "Well, we're going to craft God in our own image." We're going to say, "I like to think of God as a good friend." "I like to think of God as a gentle breeze on a summer day." "I like to think of God as a buddy, who comes alongside when I need Him." "But I sure don't like to think about the God of the Bible, the God who is the Holy Judge of the world, a God who can do what He wants with what He's made, without asking us, a God who dwells in unapproachable light, a God who reveals His wrath and His justice everyday, a God who has the right to make laws and enforce them." This is the God they do not love.

And so Existentialist French philosopher, Jean-Paul Sartre said, "Even if such a God existed, we would have to pretend He did not exist, so that we could live our lives." That is that carnal mindset, a desire to be free from the God of the Bible. And as a result, it's rebellious against God's love. Verse 7, "It does not submit to God's law, nor can it do so." When I was up in New England, I frequently saw pro-abortion bumper stickers, one that would say, "Keep your laws off my body." Have you ever seen that? "Keep your laws off my body." Well, that itself, just even apart from the abortion issue, that is representative of this attitude here. "I don't want God's laws on me. I don't want His laws on me." But you know something? God's laws are all over your body. As a matter of fact, God's law has actually crawled into your brain and say, "You shall not covet your neighbor's goods." "Coveting? That's an attitude of the mind, that's wanting something." That's right and it's forbidden in the 10 Commandments. God's laws are all over you and the carnal mind says, "I don't want God's laws on me. Keep your laws off me." There's a hostility and rebellion against God's laws.

And so how will they live? Well, they'll live their way. Frank Sinatra sang it, didn't he? "I did it my way." And so they make their way through the world the way they see best. They construct their own morality, and live up to it, and they do it their way. That is the carnal mindset. And as a result, verse 8, "It is impossible for them to please God." Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God. It is impossible for them to please God. There is nothing in them at all that pleases God. And so people who think that they're going to stand before God, and give good works for their sin, they don't understand. They don't have any. It's not that they don't have enough, it's that they don't have any. There are no good works, because none of it was done to please God, none of it done to glorify Him. All of it, just a testimony to human arrogance and pride.

Summary of the Carnal Mindset

Position, they are under the flesh. They are in Adam. They are apart from the life of God. As a result, they have a mind, a desire after the flesh. They have a taste for the things of this world, and as a result of that, they live a certain kind of lifestyle. Well, that is the carnal mind.

IV. The Spiritually-Minded Person

Under (Therefore After) the Spirit: Position, Desire, and Lifestyle

What of the spiritual mind? Well, it's exactly the opposite. Look again at verse 5, "Those in the Spirit," it says, "set their minds on the things of the Spirit." This person is under, and therefore, after the Spirit. They're after the things of the Spirit. They used to be in Adam, and now they are in Christ. They have been transformed. There's a radical transformation that's occurred in their minds, in their whole way of thinking. What they used to hate, they now love, and what they used to love, they now hate. There's been a change in them by the power of the Spirit.

Now, the spiritual mind minds the things of the Spirit. It's like minding the store, you remember that? Being active or busy about the spiritual things. The gravitational center of your existence are the things of the Spirit, just like the sun is the gravitational center of the solar system. This is what you want, the things of the Spirit.

What ARE the “things of the Spirit?”

Now, what are the things of the Spirit? Well, first, I would say, I've given you this list at the bottom, in 'Applications,' that you are intensely concerned about the soul. You see yourself, not as a body, primarily, but as a soul, a soul that can never die, an eternal soul, a soul that will come before God on Judgment Day. After death, comes judgment, and you see yourself in that light. We must all appear before the Judgment Seat of God, that we may receive the things we did while in the body. You will say, "While my soul was in that home called the body... " A spiritually-minded person thinks about the soul, they think of themselves as a soul.

Secondly, they're intensely aware of personal sinfulness. There's a sense of sin before a Holy God. Not dodging it or avoiding it, but saying, "I am a sinner. I need a Savior, and I see it more clearly, the more I go on. I see myself that way, as a sinner."

Thirdly, they are totally consumed, therefore, with the person of Jesus Christ. They can't think about Him too much, they can't love Him too much, they can't say thank you enough to Jesus for what He did. There would be no hope, were it not for Jesus. And so they are consumed by the person of Jesus. They see Him to be the most delightful person that ever lived. They are thrilled with the stories of His control over the wind and the waves, ability to walk on water, His miracles. The words He spoke are precious. The fact that He eternally existed as God, the Son, these things are precious to a spiritually-minded person.

Fourthly, they are deeply absorbed in the way of salvation. Terms like justification, regeneration, sanctification, glorification, they're theological terms, but the ideas behind them are delightful to a spiritually-minded person. They love the idea that God has declared them not guilty of all their sins. They're delighted with the fact that God is working holiness within them. They're happy to learn about these things. They have a taste for them, they're interested in them, and so they can't wait to hear about the glory that's going to be revealed in us. That's what they live for, the way of salvation.

Fifthly, they have a yearning for a growth in prayer. They want to talk to God. They've got a hunger for it. They want to have communication with God. They talk to Him privately, not so everybody can see. There might be time for public prayer, but that's not the point. The point is, through the day, they want to talk to God. They speak to Him and they call Him 'Abba Father.'

And sixthly, there's a hunger for true Christian fellowship. When you are like this, you like being with other people who are like this. Isn't that true? You delight in Christian fellowship. And when we're talking about the things of the Spirit, there's a joy that comes. It's like everybody brings a log to the fire, and it just gets bigger and bigger. We have delightful fellowship and you have a taste for it.

Seventhly, passionately concerned about evangelism and missions. You want to hear about the advance of the Gospel. How is it going on those frontier missions? You already know that the Lord's not coming back, 'til the work's done. "Well, how's the work going? How can I advance it? Have I shared the Gospel? Am I concerned about these things?" Evangelism and missions.

More than anything, number eight, you're concerned about the things in this book. They're not dry, boring things to you. You want to know what's in there. This is the mind of the Spirit. This is what you are interested in. If anybody can explain it or make it clear to you, you are delighted in it. You love the things of the book.

Now, it says in verse 6 that the spiritual mind is life and peace. In other words, this is the essence of the life that God gives. Jesus says in John 10 that he, "came that you might have life and have it abundantly." The spiritual mind is the life He came to give, and if you don't have this mind, if you don't have this yearning, this desire, this hunger, you're not a Christian. You have not been converted, because this is the life that He came to give. This is the life He came to give and there's a fruit that flows from it.

Now, this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. This is the life that He came to give, and if you are justified, you have received that life. Look at Romans 5:18. "Consequently, just as the result of one trespass, was condemnation for all men," remember that word 'condemnation.' "There is, therefore," what? "No condemnation." We're talking about condemnation. The result of Adam's sin was condemnation. Look at, "So also, the result of one act of righteousness, was justification that brings life." Do you understand what I'm saying? If you are justified, you have life, spiritual life. You have this life that I'm describing today. This is what salvation is. It's not just that your sins are written off, and then you can live whatever way you want. It's that He transforms you from within, by the power of the Spirit. You are a spiritually-minded person. This mind of the Spirit is life. And, the mind of the Spirit is peace. You know the Hebrew word is 'shalom,' a sense of deep rich fellowship with the eternal God. Everything is right, things are put in their right place, God is at peace with you, and you are at peace with God. Oh, how precious is that.

Romans 5:1, "Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." Where you were at enmity with God, now you're at peace, and He with you. And there's a status of peace, He's at peace with you, though you may not always feel the peace in your feelings. There is peace with God, and then there is the peace of God. We've talked about this before. Sometimes you feel that peace. You experience it, even in the midst of difficult times. Philippians 4:6-7, "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, through prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God," and what happens? "The peace of God, which transcends all understanding," will do what? "Guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." The Christian mind, guarded and protected in Christ Jesus. That's what prayer does for you, among other things.

The spiritual mind is life and it is peace. And though it's not mentioned in the text, this minded person is very pleasing to God, very pleasing to God. This is what pleases Him, that you be this way, that you have this mind given you as a gift. At His baptism, Jesus Christ stood in the waters. After his baptism, and you remember a voice came down from the Father, saying, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am," what? "Well pleased." If you have this spiritual mind, you are well pleasing to God, well pleasing to God. And as a result, you live for that, don't you? You yearn to please God. You yearn for it. Every day, you want to search out and find out what is pleasing to God. Second Corinthians 5:9, "So we make it our goal," to what? "Please Him, whether at home in the body or away from it." We want to please God and that includes the law.

1 John 3:22-23, "We obey His commands, and we do what pleases Him, and this is His command: To believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another, as He has commanded us."

V. Application

Now, what is the application that we can take from this? As you look at these verses, do you see any commands in here? Something to obey? Is there something that you should do, as a result of it? Look at it. Or is there only spiritual description of what is true of you, if you're a Christian? Look at it. It's only description. You're not commanded to do anything. You're described or you are not described, do you understand what I'm saying? Either this is true of you, what I've been saying to you today, or it is not. Either you are controlled by the Spirit, you have the mind of the Spirit, or you don't. And if you do not have the mind of the Spirit, you have the carnal mind, and therefore, you're in Adam, under judgment still, and Romans 8:1 does not apply to you. There is condemnation for you.

Basically, the application here, is for you to diagnose yourself. And I would suggest you go backwards, start with your lifestyle, go back to your mind, your desires, and then what does it say about your position? As you look at your lifestyle, how do you live? How do you invest your resources? How do you act? What do you do in reference to the commands of God? How are you living? Trace that back to your mindset. How do you look at the world? What are your ambitions, your goals, your desires, your hungers? What do you want? What is of value to you? What do you think about? Look at those things that I've listed there. Are you intensely concerned about your soul? Do you see yourself as a soul? Are you aware of your personal sinfulness? Not dodging it or hiding it, but knowing that you need a Savior? Are you consumed with the person of Jesus Christ, who is that Savior? Are you absorbed in the way of salvation? Are you yearning for growth in prayer? Are you hungry for true Christian fellowship? Are you passionately concerned about evangelism and missions? And are you hungry for the Bible, the Word of God? And if so, what is your position? Diagnose yourself.

Lloyd-Jones, this is Martyn Lloyd-Jones, the Welsh preacher, after he got done with the sermon on this text, said, "May I be so bold as to say, how have you thought of this sermon?" Now, he had preached for 40 years before he said that. And I'm not going to do it, I'm going to quote him. I'm going to step aside and let him say it, "Were you interested in these things or was it boring? Was it dry? Was it dusty to you? Another sermon, more text, more doctrine. Or was it engaging, exciting? Did it entice you? Did it make you want to say, 'Do I have the spiritual mind? What has God done in me? Is it true of me, that there's no condemnation? Am I hungry and thirsty for righteousness?'" That's how Lloyd-Jones ended his sermon. I'm not going to end mine that way, but that's how he ended his. Investigate yourself. Diagnose yourself. Think about these things and apply it.

If you have not come to Christ, please come today. Come and talk to me. If you're concerned about your soul, if you don't know whether you're a Christian or not, you don't know whether you've given your life to Christ, don't let another day go by. Come and talk to me. Don't let your pride stand in the way. We're going to have a closing hymn in a minute. It'd be a good chance for you to come and talk to me. After the service, you can do the same.

Building a Chain of Death

This morning, we are looking at Romans 7, specifically, the end of the section we've looked at now for two weeks, and this is our third week in Romans 7:1-6. Our purpose here, in this section of Romans, is to try to understand the law and how it relates to a justified Christian. What is our relationship to the law? And I heard an illustration that Charles Spurgeon used at the end of one of his sermons, to press the message home, and it spoke to me so clearly, about what it means to serve in the old way of the written code.

And this is what he said, "A certain tyrant sent for one of his subjects and said to him, 'What is your employment?' He answered, 'I am a blacksmith.' 'Go home,' said he, 'And make me a chain of such and such a length.' He went home. The work occupied him several months, and he had no wages at all while he was making the chain, only the trouble and the pains of making it. Then he brought it the monarch and he said, 'Go back and make it twice as long as this.' He gave him nothing to do it with, but sent him away. Again, he worked on, made it twice as long. He brought it up again. The monarch said, 'Go and make it longer still.' Each time he brought it, there was nothing but the command to make it longer still. And when he brought it up at last, the monarch said, 'Take him, bind him hand and foot with it, and cast him into a furnace of fire.' There were his wages for making the chain.

"For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus." And Paul says in our text right here, in verse Five, "When we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in us, so that we bore fruit for death." Every day, somebody who's apart from the grace of Jesus Christ… Every day, somebody who is not living in the New Covenant, (that we're going to talk about this morning)… Every day, somebody who has not yet been saved, is making a chain through sin. Every day, they add another link to it. And in the end, justice will demand that that chain be bound around them, that we will be cast with our sins into eternal darkness. And so serving in the old way of the written code, produces only, as it says in our text, "Fruit for death." Is there any liberation from that which binds us? Yes, there is, and it is the New Covenant of faith in Jesus Christ.

Look again to what it says in verse Four, "So my brothers, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to Him who is raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death. But now, by dying to what once bound us, we've been released from the law, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code."

I. Our Covenant-Keeping God

This morning, our purpose is to understand that phrase, "Serving in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code." What does it mean, that we have been moved over into a New Covenant? The word 'covenant' doesn't appear in this text, but that's the foundation of what Paul is saying to us. 'Covenant' is a binding agreement between two or more parties. The clearest example that we have in our everyday life, is that of marriage. A man and a woman stand before God and make a promise to one another. They make a binding agreement and God ratifies that. He hears it and holds the couple to it. And so Paul takes that example here, in Romans 7:1-3, of a married couple, and that we're bound to each other by this covenant, as long as the spouse is alive. What he's saying is that, we also, in one sense, we're bound to the law, and the only way we could be released from the law, is either that the law would die or that we would die. And the beauty of it, the law can never die. Jesus said, "Heaven and Earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away." He said, "Until Heaven, and Earth, and not the smallest letter, or the least stroke of a pen will, by any means, disappear from the law, until everything is accomplished." The law cannot die. The law will still stand on Judgment Day, and it will testify against all those who have not been saved through faith in Jesus Christ. The law can stand and it will stand, but what about us?

Well, the beauty of the Gospel is, that we died with Jesus Christ. The moment that Jesus died, we died with Him by faith, and we have been united with Him. He says in Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me." And so our purpose today, is to understand what that means. Not only that I have died, that I was crucified with Christ, but now, I live by the power of the Spirit, that there's a new life. There's a power in me, which is utterly unlike anything I've experienced before. And that's what He's saying, the covenant, the New Covenant through the blood of Jesus Christ.

Now, God makes covenants. Our God is a covenant-making God. The word appears 275 times in the Bible and it is God's major manner of dealing with the human race. He made a covenant with Noah, for example. He said He would never again destroy the world with a flood, and He set the Sign of the Covenant, the rainbow, up in the clouds to testify to His faithfulness to that Covenant. He made a covenant with Abraham, that to his offspring, He would give the land, and He would be their God, and they would be His people. He made a covenant with Abraham.

He made a covenant with Moses and that's the focus of our study this morning, the Mosaic Covenant, the Promise that He gave to the descendants of Abraham, who are with Moses at the base of the Mount Sinai, that if they obeyed God's commandments, His ordinances, and His regulations, that they would be able to stay in the Promised Land, that they would live there. "If you obey me, you may stay in this land." He also made a covenant with David, that He would place one of his sons on his throne, that David would never lack a lampstand, he would never lack a lamp, and that ultimately, the Son of David would reign forever and ever over the people of God, and that is Jesus Christ. And He made a covenant with Jesus Christ. The Father made a covenant with the Son, "I will save any for whom you die. Any who call on your name, I will save them, and I will welcome them as my own children." And so on the basis of these covenants, we stand before God. Our God is a covenant-making God, but He is also a covenant-keeping God.

It says, in reference to the Mosaic Covenant, that he would keep His covenant to a thousand generations of those who love and obey His commands. A thousand generations. What is that? Between 25 and 40,000 years? Our God is a faithful covenant-keeping God. He never breaks His Word. And on the basis of the New Covenant, and its superior promises, we will stand before God holy and blameless one day. And there is complete protection, security. There is a guarantee for us in this New Covenant, if we only understand it. God keeps His covenants, and our salvation is, therefore, guaranteed by this New Covenant. Paul says in Second Corinthians 3:6, "He has made us competent as ministers of a New Covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit, for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life."

II. Context: “Not Under Law But Under Grace”

Let's see if we can understand that. The context in Romans here, he's already explained to us the need for justification, Romans 1-3, that both Jew and Gentile alike are all under sin. That expression 'under sin' means under sin's dominion. Sin is the tyrant that causes us to make that chain, with which we would be bound. Sin is a vicious and a cruel tyrant. We're going to talk more about that in Romans 7, as we understand the indwelling sin that we still wrestle with. But sin is a tyrant, and all of us, Jew and Gentile, people from every tribe, and language, and people, and nation, all of us understand what sin is. Sin is a vicious tyrant, and we need to be justified, and there's nothing we can do. We were under sin. We were under sin's dominion, and so we needed forgiveness of sins, and we needed liberation from sin.

Jesus said, "Anyone who sins is a slave to sin, but if the Son makes you free, you'll be truly free." And so He's trying to explain how justification came, and it came by the blood of Jesus Christ. Jesus stood up, and took our wrath, our condemnation, and through His blood shed on the cross, He took away forever the guilt and the punishment that we deserve under the Mosaic Covenant. He took away the curse. He died in our place, and He rose from the dead on the third day, and so He is our propitiation, He's our sacrifice of atonement. And that sacrifice is good for any of us who have trusted in Him, any of us who put our faith in Him. Romans chapter 4, we are justified simply by faith. Just as Abraham looked up at those stars and believed a promise that God gave him, so shall your offspring be. We hear of life through faith in Jesus Christ, and we believe, and we are justified. At that moment, we're declared forever not guilty of all of our sins. The guilt and the condemnation of the law has been removed from us. We died to the law and its condemning power, when we united with Christ through faith.

But then, in Romans Chapters 6-8, he's dealing with the issue of indwelling sin, the struggle we have with sin. Any of you who are honest and you know yourself, you say, "Well, I was justified by faith many years ago, but sin didn't just disappear from my life. I still have sin in my life. How can this be? And what is it?" And also, he deals with it theologically. If we're only justified by grace, apart from works, can't we live any way that we want? And he's dealing with that in Romans Chapter Six, he says, "No, you can't, because if you are a Christian, you are united with Jesus Christ. You died with Him when he died, and so, also, you've been raised in newness of life. You're living a whole new life." That was covered in Romans 6

But in the middle of that, in Romans 6:14, he says, "Sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace." And so that's a very important thing to say. What does it mean that we're not under law? Did God give a law, and then revoke it through Christ? What is our relationship to the law? And he's dealing with that in Romans chapter 7, and the issue of this Old Covenant and the New Covenant. He uses the illustration of marriage and says that you're bound as long as you're alive, but if one of the spouses dies, that covenant is ended. And so, also, we died to the law through the body of Christ, that we might belong to another, a new marriage. We talked about it last time, that Jesus Christ is our spouse. We died to the law, and we're freed forever from that old bondage, and now, we've come into a whole new way of serving God.

III. Old Covenant: The Old Way of the Written Code

But we need to understand what that Old Covenant was. What was the nature of the Old Covenant? First, the Old Covenant was promised to Abraham. In Genesis 12:7, it was promised to Abraham at the great Tree of Moreh at Shechem, "This land will belong to you and to all your offspring." And then, in Genesis 17, He gave him a Sign of the Covenant, as a precursor to the Mosaic Law. It was circumcision. And He said that, "All your male descendants must be circumcised, and anyone who's not circumcised will be cut off from the covenant." So that's the covenant promised, but it wasn't established, until Moses brought the people of God to the foot of Mount Sinai. And they received the covenant, they received the Mosaic Law coming down off the mountain.

And this is what they said in Exodus 24, "When Moses went and told the people all the Lord's words and laws, they responded with one voice, 'Everything the Lord has said, we will do.'" That sounds like a marriage to me. They made a promise, "Alright, I've heard all of the laws, the rules, and regulations. We'll do it." They made a covenant. They made a promise that they would obey everything that God said. Moses then wrote down everything the Lord had said. "Then he took the Book of the Covenant, and read it to the people, and they responded again, 'We will do everything the Lord has said. We will obey, '" they said to God. Moses took the blood of the covenant, the blood of the sacrifice, this covenant was ratified in blood, and he sprinkled it on the people, and said, "This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words." And so there it is, they made a covenant. They were in a bonded relationship with the law they promised that they would obey.

Now, what is the nature of that covenant? In Deuteronomy, he explains it very clearly. Deuteronomy 11:26 and following, it says, "See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse, a blessing if you obey… the curse if you disobey..." That is the nature of the Old Covenant, blessings and curses. Blessings on obedience, curses on disobedience.

Now, what was the essence of the Old Covenant in the life of Israel? How did it function? We're going to look at it in four ways. First, in terms of law, the relationship to God's Word. Second, in terms of salvation, relationship to God's Holiness. Thirdly, in terms of worship, relationship to God's throne. And fourthly, in terms of service, relationship to God's world.

Law: Relationship to God’s Word

Let's look at the first one, law, relationship to God's Word. It says in verse Six of the passage we're looking at, we served  "in the old way of the written code." What does this mean, 'written code?' It means that the law was written down on things physical. At first, it was written by the finger of God on the tablets of stone, do you remember that? The finger of God wrote down the Ten Commandments. God inscribed His Word down. He wanted it written. That was the first of the Bible. God was the first, literally, physically, the first author of Scripture, when He inscribed the Ten Commandments with His finger on those tablets of stone. He began the whole written Word. It was His Word written, and He wanted it obeyed, but it was physical, and it was also external.

Later, the Word was written on stone pillars and Joshua brought them in the Promised Land. They wrote it down, so that everyone could read it. It was there for future generations. They also copied it on parchments, on scrolls, and other things, and it was copied, but it was always physical. It was something you could read with your eyes, but it was not internal, it was external. It was something you would read. It would stand outside of you, and it would talk to you, and it would tell you which way to live, and which way not to live, but it was external. And ultimately, because of that, it was powerless. It made no change in the human heart. It ultimately was rendered powerless by our sin nature.

Look again at Verse Five, "From when we were controlled by the sinful nature or the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death." Paul is going to talk about that more in Romans 7. The law comes and actually arouses sin. You're kind of moving along just fine, until you hear what God will and will not permit, and then, suddenly, there's a desire to do that very thing. It's just a phenomenon. We see it around us. We see it in our own hearts. There it is, the law comes and says, "You must not do this," or, "You must do that," and then there's just, immediately, a desire to disobey. It's what the law does, and he's going to talk about that, he said, "Once I was alive, apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died." It's always been the same. It's the same today.

"When we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies." So that we made another link for that chain. Day, after day, after day, we bore fruit for death. It never produced righteousness. Look at Romans 8:3, "For what the law was powerless to do, in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did, by sending His own Son." Isn't that beautiful? The law could never get you saved, and so God did it, by sending His Son. The law was powerless. The Book of Hebrews calls it 'useless.' It could affect no genuine change in you.  It stands outside and cannot save you. And we prove it every day, don't we? By just readings, "I see it, but I just can't do it." That's the second half of Romans 7, we'll get there. But that's what the law does, it stands on the shore, and calls out to you, and tells you how to save yourself, but you can't.

Salvation: Relationship to God’s Holiness

The New Covenant is Jesus Christ gets in there. And you got the second half so beautifully right. Jesus literally gets in, and saves us, and therefore, our salvation is guaranteed, because He is never ineffective. He accomplishes what He came to do. Jesus never dives in, and swims out to save somebody, and they end up drowned. It's impossible. He saves us and that's the New Covenant. And so the law was powerless, it was useless, it could save us, not at all. And so in relation to salvation, in relation to God's Holiness, what the law did, is it told you, "Be holy, because I am holy." That's what the law said. Leviticus 19:2, "Speak to the entire Assembly of Israel and say to them, "Be holy, because, I, the Lord, your God, am holy." That's what the law told you, but could you do it? Could you be holy the way God is Holy?

In the message of the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5:48, Jesus said the same thing, "Be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect." I witness to people and I say, "Do you understand what the standards are for fellowship with God? Do you understand what it takes to go to Heaven? God will allow no darkness in His presence. He is perfectly holy and righteous. And therefore, you, also, must be perfect to be in the presence of God." And so in relation to God's Holiness, it speaks to us of holiness. The law screams to us of holiness, but it cannot make us holy. Hebrews 7:19 says, "For the law made nothing perfect." Do you hear that? The law makes nothing perfect and we must be perfect to be in God's presence. Actually, the law only brings curse on us. Galatians 3:10, "All who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written, 'Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law." Everything, you've got to obey the whole thing.

The illustration I've used before is of the aquarium tank. Imagine a huge big aquarium, where all these sharks, and manta rays, and all that is swimming around, and it's only got one little hole in it. That's all, just one hole down toward the bottom. Would you feel safe near that? As you watch the hole progressively get larger and larger? I'd run out of that building. One transgression is enough to condemn us forever, but we don't just have one transgression, do you? We have a whole lifetime of them. We have a very long chain. We've been fashioning it day after day. "All who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written, 'Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.'" Isn't it beautiful, that Jesus stood and took our curse for us? He came and took our curse. He was hung on a tree. "Cursed is everyone who's hung on a tree." Jesus took our curse. If you're in Christ, you're not under the law anymore. You're not under the law's curse. It's been taken away forever.

Praise God for that. Now, within the law, there were priestly sacrifices for sin, weren't there? There was provision, if you broke the law. You would bring a sacrifice, but could the sacrifice do anything for you? Was it not merely a symbol of the future sacrifice of Jesus Christ? How do we know that? beause they had to be repeated, day, after day, after day, week after week, and for the same sinners. Hebrews 9:9-10 says, "The gifts and sacrifices being offered were not able to clear the conscience of the worshipper." They're not able to do it. You could not have your conscience cleared by blood animal sacrifice. It couldn't be done. And so the law made no provision, genuinely, for sin.

Now, the righteousness that came by the law would be demonstrated by perfect obedience. Romans 10:5, "Moses describes in this way, 'The righteousness that is by law, the man who does these things will live by them.'" In context, he means live eternally. You will get your eternal life by perfect obedience to the commands of God. Perfect obedience. And eternal life comes as a result of this accomplished righteousness. "The man who does these things will live [eternally] by them." But all of this is impossible, isn't it true? Because Paul says in Romans 7, "As soon as you hear the law, the sinful nature kicks in and you rebel." And we've all done it. And once you rebel once, it's over. The law will never again be a path of righteousness for you. It's impossible. It only speaks a curse on you. And only in Jesus Christ, is that curse removed.

"Therefore," says Paul in Romans 3:20, "No one will be declared righteous by observing the law, rather, through the law, we become conscious of sin." You're never going to stand before God and say, "Well, I came that path. I came up the path of the law." No, you didn't. Nobody but one person has walked that path perfectly, and that's Jesus Christ.

Worship: Relationship to God’s Throne

What about in relation to worship, worship in relation to God's throne? God's holy throne is the center of all worship, is it not? "In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a…" what? "On a throne high and lifted up. And the train of His robe filled the temple."  And there were seraphs crying, 'Holy, holy, holy.'  It's the center of Heaven. It's the throne of God, the eternal God. It's the center of Heaven should be the center of your life too. And so, in the Book of Revelation Chapter Four, the apostle says, "At once, I was in the Spirit, and there before me was a throne in Heaven with someone sitting on it. And the one who sat there had the appearance of jasper and carnelian. A rainbow resembling an emerald encircled the throne. Surrounding the throne were twenty-four other thrones and seated on them were twenty-four elders. They were dressed in white and had crowns of gold on their heads. Before the throne came flashes of lightning, rumblings, and peals of thunder. Before the throne, seven lamps were blazing. These are the seven spirits of God." The throne is the center of it all. It's the center of worship, the throne of God.

And so, when Bill comes here, and we go to worship, what are we doing, but spiritually establishing the throne of God, right in the center of this room? That's what worship is. But the fact of the matter is, God's throne is unapproachable. 1 Timothy 6:15-16 says, "God the blessed and only ruler." What chair does a ruler sit on? A throne. "The King of Kings and Lord of Lords."  He's going to sit on the ultimate throne. "Who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light." You can't get to Him. He lives in unapproachable light. He is holy and pure. Therefore, Old Covenant worship is never going to get you to the throne of God. It's only a shadow, not the reality, as it says in the Book of Hebrews. It's just a shadow, it's an image. It's never going to get you right to the throne of God. Therefore, Old Covenant worship is all about what you can't do, and not what you can. It's all about barriers and oppositions, not coming very close to the throne of grace.

Exodus 24:1-2, "Then God said to Moses, 'Come up to the Lord, you, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and 70 of the elders of Israel. You are to worship at a distance." Underline that one. "Worship at a distance," is Old Covenant worship, isn't it? "Worship at a distance." What do I mean by, "Worship at a distance"? Separation between you and God. Why the separation? Because of your sin. And there was nothing in the Old Covenant that could take care of it. There was a fence around the base of Mount Sinai saying, "You can't come up this mountain." There was a thousand yard distance between the people of God and the ark, as they went into the Promised Land. There was a curtain in the temple, which separated the Holy of Holies from the priest, and then other curtains would separate the rest of it from the regular people, who couldn't come in. What is that telling you? Barrier. Obstruction. "Worship at a distance." You can't come close.

After striking Aaron's sons, Nadab and Abihu dead, because they offered unauthorized sacrifice, Leviticus 10:3, God said this, "Among those who approach me, I will show myself holy. In the sight of all people, I will be honored." That's the Old Covenant. "Among those who approach me, I'm going to demonstrate my holiness to you. I will show you how holy I am." And the Old Covenant did that, but you were not welcomed into the throne of God. You couldn't come. That's the essence of Old Covenant worship.

Service: Relationship to God’s World

And finally, service, relationship to God's world. How did you serve in the old way of the written code? What was the nature of old code service? Well, first of all, it was about duty, wasn't it? What you had to do. If it's external to you, it means you don't want to do it. It hasn't come inside your heart, and so that it's a matter of duty. The worst expression of that was in Malachi 1:12-13. They're talking about the sacrificial system. They're talking about the Lord's table. They're talking about the actual blood sacrifices that God had provided, and Malachi says this, "You profane it, by saying of the Lord's temple, 'It is defiled,' and of the food, 'It is contemptible.' And you say, 'What a burden,' and you sniff at it contemptuously,' says the Lord Almighty. "

There's some people that serve in the Christian way this way, what a burden they feel. It's a sense of duty and obligation. A sense of 'got to' and 'have to,' not a sense of 'want to.' That's a service in the old way of the written code. "What a burden." It's also based on fear. You're afraid. If you don't do it, what will happen to you? You'll be judged, you'll be condemned. There's a sense of fear. Fear has to do, in First John 4:18, with punishment. That's the essence of Old Covenant service. You serve out of duty, you serve out of fear. Ultimately, it could lead to hatred, hatred for God. You say, "How is that possible?" Romans 8:7-8 says, "The sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law, nor can it do so. Those committed by the sinful nature cannot please God."

Perfect illustration of this in Martin Luther's life. Before Luther came to understand justification by faith alone, he was serving in the old way of the written code, wasn't he? A bunch of rules and regulations. A bunch of laws, and duties, and obligations. A bunch of fasting, and prayer, and tithe offering, and a bunch of all these works. And nothing could take away his sense of guilt before God, nothing. And it got more and more frustrating to him. And he, as a Roman Catholic, would go to his father confessor, Father Johann Staupitz, and he would confess sin after sin, inclinations of the heart, slight temptations, anything he could to try to cleanse himself, and it never worked. Finally, just out of frustration, he came, and he started to confess something that he had forgotten from the last time, and Staupitz said, "You're making it too hard. All you need to do is love God." And Luther said, "Love God? I hate Him." And Staupitz was shocked. This was blasphemy. But that's what old written code service is all about. It's not about love for God. It's about duty, and fear, and obligation, not about being a son or a daughter of God.

And what is the end result of all that? Well, verse 5, "When we're controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our body, so that we bore fruit for death." We bore fruit for death by serving the law? Yes, because here it is. It's either one or the other. Either you will feel that you are being successful in serving by that way, or you will feel unsuccessful. If you feel successful by that way, you will be proud and boastful, because you did it on your own. Or you'll say, "I could never do that," and you openly rebel. Either way, the law condemns. There is no way that you can come to God that way. To the generally obedient, there's the white devil of pride. To the generally disobedient, the black devil of rebellion. Either way, it comes.

So that's the old way of the written code. Relationship to God's Word: It was written externally, not in your heart. Relationship to God's holiness: The law commanded you to be holy, but made no provision for it. Relationship to God's throne and worship: Law had made it very clear, that you were not welcome to the throne of God. And service relationship to God's Word: It came from duty, and pride, and obligation, and fear. Ultimately, it bore fruit for death. That's the Old Covenant. Aren't you glad we're free from all that?

IV. New Covenant: The New Way of the Spirit

Praise God. We're waiting for the good news. Well, the good news is in verse 6. Look at the first two words, "But now." What does that tell you? Something new, something fresh, something wonderful. And Jesus said, "It had to be this way. It had to be new." Why? Because of the Parable of the Wine-skins. Remember, He said, "You can't put new wine into old wine-skins. We've got to have a whole new thing. We've got to have a New Covenant." And the beauty is, the New Covenant was promised in the Old. Jeremiah came and promised it.

New Covenant Established

Look at Jeremiah 31, it's printed there, part of it anyway. Oh, you got to read the whole thing. You got to read the whole thing, but I'm just going to zero in on a couple things. "'The time is coming,' declares the Lord, 'When I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah.'" There it is in the Old Testament. There's going to be a New Covenant, something new. And we will not serve in that old way anymore, we'll serve in a new way. There's going to be a New Covenant. He said, "'It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers, when I took them by the hand and led them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, even though I was a husband to them,' declares the Lord. 'This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel, after that time,' declares the Lord. 'I will put my law in their minds and I'll write them on their hearts. They will be my people and I will be their God. No longer will a man teach his neighbor or a man his brothers, saying, 'Know the Lord,' because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. For I will forgive their wickedness and remember their sins no more." Oh, boy. That brings goosebumps. I'm just getting excited talking about it.

What are the two aspects of the New Covenant the Old Covenant could never give us? It could not give us forgiveness of sins, and it could not write the law of God on our hearts... But the New Covenant can. Isn't that beautiful? This is a replacement covenant. "By calling this covenant new," Hebrews 8:13, "By calling this covenant new, he's made the old one obsolete. And what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear." It's gone. We're not under it anymore. We've got a New Covenant now. It's an unbreakable covenant, not like the former one. It's not dependent on your obedience. He's going to work obedience in you. It's an internal covenant within your own heart. It's a universal covenant. "The will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest." Everyone included in the covenant will all know me personally. "I will be their God and they will be my people." And it's a cleansing covenant, "I will forgive their wickedness and remember their sins no more."

Well, that's the promise. Was it fulfilled? Is there now, in fact, a New Covenant? It was promised, did it come? Yes, it did, through Jesus Christ. Do you remember the night before Jesus died? He took that cup, the wine, and what did He say, remember? He took the cup, He gave thanks, and offered it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the New Covenant." There it is. Jesus said it. There's a New Covenant. Now, the wine only represents it. We know that the real blood was the blood Jesus shed on the cross, "Which is poured out for many," Jesus said, "For the forgiveness of sins." The New Covenant is in effect. It's here. It's been here for 2,000 years. We're not in the Old Covenant any longer. It's here.

Law: Relationship to God’s Word

Now, how does it work in relation to God's Word? Look at verse 6, "But now, by dying to what once bound us, we've been released from the law, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code." It is a spiritual thing. The indwelling Holy Spirit comes in and changes you from inside. It's written on the heart by the Spirit. And it is powerful. It actually transforms you. It makes you different than you were before. You love what you used to hate and you hate what you used to love. It has changed you. You're different now, as a result. It is effective. The law is no longer external, it's now written on your heart. He says in this verse, Jeremiah 31:33, "I'll put my law in their minds and I will write it on their hearts." Do you realize the whole Bible is written on your heart? Now, you're wondering why you can't recite the whole thing.

I didn't say it was written in your brain, so that you could recite it. I'm saying it's there, and what happens is, if you're a child of God, when it gets preached or taught accurately, you know it. You just can tell. "My sheep hear my voice. I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life." You just know, even if you're in Obadiah or some other place you'd never been, you say, "Yes, this is right." And why? Because He already wrote the law in your heart. It's already there. Now, I still think you should memorize it. I really do.

But it's already there. The truth of it is there and why? Because the Spirit wrote it there. Oh, look at blessed Ezekiel 36. It's printed in your bulletin. Look at it. I would urge you to take that home. I know you're thinking about, perhaps, you're thinking about what you're going to eat for lunch.

This is sweeter than anything you're going to eat for lunch. Ezekiel 36:26-27, take it home and chew on it, before you put any food in your mouth, or after. Maybe during, maybe during your lunchtime, talk about Ezekiel 36:26-27, "I will give you a new heart, and then put a new Spirit in you. I will remove from you your heart of stone, and give you a heart of flesh, and I will put my Spirit in you, and move you to follow my decrees, and be careful to keep my laws." That is New Covenant stuff, folks. Has that happened to you? Has your heart of stone been taken out and your heart of flesh put in? Are you receptive to the moving of the Spirit, and do you have the indwelling Spirit moving you to obey God's commandments? That's the relation of the law. It's written on your heart.

Salvation: Relationship to God’s Holiness

Secondly, relation to salvation, relation to God's holiness. Do you realize that we stand in Christ's perfect obedience? Remember, I told you there was one man who walked the law perfectly, and it was Jesus Christ? He is the end of the law, it says in Romans 10. He is the completion, the perfection of the law. He did it. He is our champion. He is our victor. And He walked that way perfectly for 33 years, some odd years. Perfectly walked, moment by moment, in obedience to His Father's commands. He said, "I always do what pleases Him."

And do you realize, if you're a Christian, His righteousness, that He won fairly in 33 years of obedience in this, it's cloaked on you by faith? Isn't that beautiful? And you're going to stand before Him on Judgment Day, not with any righteousness of your own. You have none. We've proven that. None of us. I don't have any. You all, we don't have any, but there is a robe available. Jesus Christ's righteousness. He earned it, He won it fair and squarely, it's His. And He's offering it to you by faith. Holiness, perfect righteousness that you can cloak yourself with, complete forgiveness of sins. Oh, my goodness. "I will forgive their wickedness and remember their sins no more." What is that worth to you? What is it worth to you, to have all your sins forgiven through the blood of Jesus Christ, and He will never remember them again? Wow... You get nothing else out of this, two aspects of the New Covenant: Total forgiveness of sins and indwelling Holy Spirit writing the law in your heart. That Old Covenant doesn't have anything like it, but if you're a Christian, you get them both.

Worship: Relationship to God’s Throne

What about worship, relationship to God's throne? We came in here to worship today. I hope you did. I hope you came in here to worship. Do you realize that, if you're a Christian, God has said, "Come right to my throne, right to the center." "Let us approach the throne of grace with confidence," it says. Isn't that beautiful? Right to the throne. There's no barrier anymore. The moment that Jesus died, that curtain in the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. From top to bottom, what does that tell you? Who tore it? God did. If it had been torn from bottom to top, they'd repair it, but it's torn from top to bottom. God did it. Maybe they did repair it. I don't think they should've. I think they should've come into the New Covenant that day. God is saying, "Come and welcome to the feast." He's saying, "Come and welcome to my very throne, through the blood of Jesus Christ, right to my throne."

You know Jesus talked to the Samaritan woman. Remember, they had a debate about what's the proper place for worship? Remember that? Is it on this mountain or on that mountain? He's like, Let me tell you something, "a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."

He's saying that it's not going to be about location. It's going to be about worshipping, and Spirit, and truth. The indwelling Spirit brings you right to the throne Of God, and therefore, you can worship Him. You have freedom of access. Ephesians 3:12 says, "In Christ and through faith in Christ, we may approach God with freedom and confidence." Is that how you approach God everyday? Freedom and confidence, like a forgiven sinner? Or do you feel like you need to earn your way back in? Freedom and confidence.

Service: Relationship to God’s World

And then, finally, service in relationship to God's Word. Not duty, but delight. Not what you have to do, but what you get to do. I love to read the laws now, and the prohibitions, "Thou shalt not," I'd say, "I don't need to do that anymore." And the commands, "Thou shalt," "I get to do that by the power of the Spirit." Isn't that wonderful? It's a whole different thing. It's not duty anymore, it's delight. The law has become my birthright. It's what I get to do. It's said of Jesus in Psalm 40:8, "Here am I. I delight to do your will, oh, God. Your law is hidden within my heart." "This is what I love to do," said Jesus." Now, that same Spirit's in us. That's what I want to do, what I love to do. Not duty, but delight. Not fear, but confidence in Him. And through faith in Him, we may approach God with freedom and confidence. You can be confident before God. Not hatred, but love. We serve as a son or a daughter of God. We cry out, "Abba Father," and we follow the Spirit, moment by moment, serving Him. That's not hatred, that's love. We do it, because we love. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. We're not under that anymore, are we? We're dead to that. We're free from what bound us, and now, we serve with love, and not fruit for death, but fruit for eternal life.

Romans 6:22. Yes, there is a Romans 6:22. I know you've heard of Romans 6:23, but 6:22 says this, "But now that you've been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the harvest or the fruits you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life." You live this kind of life, you'll end up in Heaven. But if what I'm talking to you about right now seems strange, unfamiliar, you don't know what I'm talking about, I don't know that you've come into the New Covenant. I don't know that you understand the life of the Spirit. I'm not talking about perfect people. I'm talking about people who understand what I'm talking about, about worship, and about forgiveness of sins, and about serving God, moment by moment, by the power of the Spirit.

V. Application

I want to speak to you Christians. First of all, rejoice that your sins are forgiven. Rejoice that your sins are forgiven. What is that worth to you? What would you trade for it? Your sins are forgiven through the blood of Jesus Christ. He will remember your sins no more.  And delight in a whole new way of serving God, not like a slave, but like a son or daughter of God, a child of God. Delight in serving God daily, using your spiritual gifts. Tonight, we're going to talk more about that. God has given you a ministry, each one of us a priestly duty of serving God. Use that gift, that service. Delight in God's service. Offer up, everyday, a service to God, an aroma pleasing to Him. And delight in God's Word. Realize, it's already written in your heart. Delight in it, chew on it, and delight in God's family.

Realize, look around here, this room and around the world, there are people all over the world that God is doing that thing to. And we're all going to be gathered into one place someday, and we're all goanna be made perfect, and isn't that going to be awesome, and wonderful? How beautiful is the family of God, when perfected, and cleansed, and finished.

But for the non-Christian, I guess I just want to make you jealous. I want you to wish you had all that. I want you to wish you knew your sins were forgiven. I want you to be hungry and thirsty for righteousness, and I want you to realize that that chain that you're making, day, after day, after day, it will condemn you, unless through Jesus Christ, and through His blood, you have complete forgiveness of sins. Come to Him today.

Why don't you close with me in prayer? Father, as we bow before you, we thank you for the truths of your Word. We thank you for the new wine put into new wine-skins, both are preserved that way. And we thank you for your goodness in giving it to us. Thank you for the New Covenant, and for its promises that you will forgive our wickedness, and remember our sins no more, and you will write the law in our hearts, by your Holy Spirit. Father, I pray for any who are here, who have never come to faith in Christ, that today would be, for them, the day of salvation. If today, you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts, but come. I pray that they would come in welcome to Jesus Christ. We pray in His name, Amen.

I. An Eternally Fruitful Marriage

Please, if you would, take your Bibles and open to Romans 7. We continue to make our way through this incredibly deep scripture. And as we come to Romans 7, we come to a very difficult and challenging chapter. And in Romans 7, Paul is dealing with the issue of the law and its relationship to the Christian. What is the purpose and what are the limits of the law? How is the law to function in our lives as Christians? This itself is a subset of a larger question in which the Apostle is dealing with the relationship of sin in the life of a justified person. We have learned from the gospel right from the very beginning, we have seen, Romans 1:16, that the gospel is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes. And so this powerful message has come to transform us from a dire, literally hopeless situation that we might have eternal hope, that we might have actually eternal life through faith in Jesus Christ. And so in Romans 1, 2 and 3, the Apostle Paul makes it clear that both Jew and Gentile alike are all under sin. They're under the dominion of sin and all of us were enslaved to sin. Jesus Himself said, "Everyone who sins is a slave to sin, but if the Son makes you free, you'll be free indeed."

Now, what a joyful thing is it to be free indeed from the bondage and the burden of sin. And this gospel message comes and makes that burden light. It takes it from us. It frees us. It frees us from the guilt of sin, and so in Romans 3, Jesus Christ, dead on the cross is the propitiation, the atoning sacrifice for our sin. And that all we must do (Romans 4 and Romans 5), is have faith in Christ. Have faith alone, not faith plus works, faith plus any accomplishment at all on our part, but simply faith. And so in Romans 5, Paul elevates this sovereign grace, this gift of God's grace. A simple free gift to be received by faith alone. Well, that raises up a question, doesn't it? If salvation, if justification is simply by faith alone, apart from works of the law, then it does it really matter how we live? And we've been wrestling with this question. What about sin in the life of a justified person? How can we explain it? And so, he deals with it in Romans 6 and talks about our spiritual union with Jesus Christ. We died with Christ through faith and we have been raised with Christ through faith. And so he's talking about union.

And all the way through Romans 6 he talks about that union that we have with Jesus Christ. And if we are alive with Christ, we are no longer dead in transgressions and sins. We have actually died to sin. Sin shall not be our master because we're not under law but under grace. Well, if we're not under law, then what is the relationship of the law to the Christian? And that's what he's dealing with right now. And the way he does it is by bringing up this analogy of marriage in Romans 7:1-6. Now, marriage was originally created as a blessed state from God. It is a gift from God. God created a beautiful world, did He not? Don't you see the beauty around you every day? Don't you see it even this morning? I love the fall. I don't know about you, but I'm not much for hazy, hot and humid weather. I really enjoy the cool crisp days, and I think about the changing leaves and all the beauty. And if you think about this whole world that God made, He put beauty in it. He wove His glory into the very fabric of creation, did He not? And so, He created this beautiful world and He filled it with all kinds of living creatures, with fish of the sea and birds of the air, and animals that walk across the earth. But on the sixth day He created man in His image.

And it says in Genesis 1:27 and 28, "God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him male and female. He created them and God blessed them and said, 'Be fruitful and increase in number. Fill the earth and subdue it.'" And so, He set before Adam and Eve, before the man and the woman, a challenge to fill the whole earth. And since man and woman are created in the image of God, so also their children would be in the image of God, and so the image of God would be spread over the whole surface of this globe. The earth was already filled with the glory of the Lord. But God intended that the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord. And that was our job. Created in His image, that we would see His beauty. And that we would give Him honor and glory and praise and thanksgiving for what He has done. And so, from the very beginning, marriage was intended to be a blessed and a fruitful state. He said, be fruitful and multiply. Now, what he is speaking about physically there, he then moves over into the spiritual realm here in Romans 7. He talks about bearing fruit for God. Now, we've talked in many places about the image of bearing fruit. God intends you that you should bear fruit in your life. After you have been justified, He begins this process of sanctification.

And in this process of growing up to be like Jesus, you will bear fruit day after day. Fruit for God. Fruit that will last. Eternal fruit. And so, Jesus says in John 15, "I am the vine, and you are the branches. If a man remains in me, and I in him, he will bear much fruit. Apart from me, you can do nothing." And so, there's this picture of fruit that will last through union with Jesus Christ. The picture of the branch and the vine is one of union, is it not? And so, also, we have this picture of marriage in Romans 7.

II. Context: Romans 7 is a Difficult Chapter

Now, Romans 7 is a challenging chapter. Wait 'til we get to the second half where we try to wrestle through the picture of Paul and is Paul speaking as a believer or as a unbeliever. And all of us feel the pull and the wrestling with sin. Well, we'll get to that in due time. But first, we have to understand Romans 7:1-6 and what it means to us that we should be dead to the law.

And so, he picks up this image of marriage. He says, "Do you not know, brothers," verse 1, "For I am speaking to those who know the law, that the law has authority over a man only as long as he lives. For example, by law a married woman is bound to her husband, as long as he is alive. But if her husband dies, she is released from the law of marriage. So then, if she marries another man while her husband is still alive she is called an adulteress. But if her husband dies she is released from that law and is not an adulteress, even though she marries another man." So in that section he's lifting up this issue of marriage as an analogy, he's speaking by way of picture that they might understand the change in their relationship to the law. Why does he pick marriage? Well, because it's a legally binding relationship, it's a covenant, a relationship between two parties, a covenant or a promise. You're bound together 'til death do us part, and that marriage, that covenant was intended to bear fruit.

The problem is that our being bound together to the law never bore fruit for life, but only for death. Our being bound together by the law does not bear fruit for eternal life, and does not glorify God and why? He's going to get to that in the second half of the chapter. In the middle section in Romans 7, he brings up the issue, is there something wrong with the law? Maybe we were married to a bad spouse, maybe if we had a better law, if God had written a better law, we could have born fruit for life by the law. He actually says not at all, the law is holy and righteous and good. There's nothing wrong with the law. Second half of the chapter, there's something wrong with me. I have sin inside me, therefore the law cannot be used to bear fruit.

Now, let me illustrate that for you in perhaps an analogy that you could understand. Suppose the state legislature of North Carolina legislated that on the first Monday of every month, every husband in the state must buy his wife a dozen red roses. Now, all of you women maybe are excited about that, but then think about it. What would those roses mean to you? They could be called in some cases the roses of obligation, right? You have to buy these roses. They don't mean anything to me. They're beautiful roses but they don't mean love to me. You're under compulsion. And so it is with the law. All of the fruit that we bore at that point was fruit of compulsion; at one point, the Jews themselves sniffed under the burden of the sacrificial system and said what a burden it is. And they did it, they cranked it out, but there was no love. How much better is it that we should die to the law and be brought into a whole new relationship with God, a relationship similar to marriage? And that's the very thing that he's seeking to do. He's getting at how we bear fruit for God.

He's talking about in Romans 7:6 that we serve in the new way of the spirit, and not in the old way of the written code, it's a whole new relationship, and that's what he's driving at. I think you could almost miss it. You're talking about this woman, right? In verse 2 and 3, a woman who is bound to her husband as long as her husband is alive, but when her husband dies, she is released from the law of marriage so she is free to remarry. But then in verse 4 he says, "So also, brothers, you…" You see the connection? He's continuing on with this marriage analogy, and he is saying, you died. Now, it's a little complicated, because first the woman is alive and her husband dies. So the woman is us in the first analogy and the law is the husband that only bore fruit for death. But we know the law is never going to die, the law is going to be with us to the end of the world. Who is the one that died in the marriage relationship? We died, didn't we? The moment we had faith in Christ, we died with Christ. And then we were raised again to a new life, so now we're free to remarry. The principle is clear, dead people are no longer under the jurisdiction of the law, and we died to the law. And so now we're free to remarry.

III. A New Life: Married to Christ (verse 4)

And who are we going to remarry? Look at verse 4, it says, "So, my brothers, you also died to the law through the body of Christ that you might belong to another." Do you see the word belong? It's a marriage analogy, that you might be married to another. It's very strong in the original language, doesn't come across as well in English. But you died to the law that you might be able to remarry, that you might belong to another. And who is that to? Him, who is raised from the dead, that we might be married to Christ. We died to the law that we might be married to Christ and so we have this picture of marriage to Christ. Now, as we look across the scripture we see that this is a major theme. And what I'd like us to do together as we think about being married to Christ is look at it in prophecy, the marriage in prophecy, also the marriage in proclamation, the privileges of this marriage, the preparation of the marriage, the purpose of the marriage, and ultimately the perfection of this marriage to Jesus Christ.

Prophecy of this Marriage

Let's start with the prophecy of the marriage, and I refer here to the Old Covenant, the relationship between Yahweh, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and the people of God, Israel. How many times in the prophets does He speak about His people as though they were His spouse? Many times, it's a consistent theme. Look at Jeremiah 2:2-3. It says there, "I remember the devotion of your youth how as a bride you loved me and followed me through the desert through a land not sewn. Israel was holy to the Lord, the first fruits of His harvest." He said, "You remember what it was like in the desert as we were moving through the desert, you were like a bride to me and you followed me as a bride follows her husband." So He's speaking through the prophet Jeremiah about the early days of their relationship and how she was like a bride, or again in Isaiah 54:5, you don't have to look there, but just listen. It says, "For your maker is your husband." Let's think about that. Your maker is your husband. He's speaking to Israel. "Your maker is your husband, the Lord Almighty is His name. The Holy One of Israel is your redeemer. He is called the God of all the earth."

And so that relationship, that covenantly binding relationship between Israel and Yahweh, was likened in the Old Covenant to a marriage. She was his bride and he was her groom, her husband. And so therefore when Israel sinned, it was like committing adultery. And so the prophets use this kind of analogy. In Jeremiah 3:14, he says, "'Return, faithless people,' declares the Lord, 'For I am your husband,'" He says. "I am your husband." The prophet Hosea was commanded to marry a prostitute to symbolize in his marriage and in his physical life the struggle spiritually between God and faithless Israel. And so he was commanded, Hosea, to marry Gomer, a woman of unfaithfulness, and he had to labor to keep her interested in him. And so it was with Israel and God.

And Israel's restitution in the latter days is likened to the reestablishment of marriage with God. Isaiah 62:5, "As a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you." And so it is, it's a beautiful picture in prophecy, a picture of marriage between the people of God and God Himself.

Proclamation of this Marriage

But then in the New Covenant, we have a proclamation of this marriage, and it begins with John the Baptist. John the Baptist was in many senses the final Old Covenant prophet. He came out of the wilderness with a powerful message for Israel. And he spoke to them, and people began to follow him, they began to listen to his preaching. And he had a large following, and he baptized them. And they were his disciples.

Well, in John 3, they hear that Jesus is attracting more disciples than John was, Jesus is more popular than John, everybody's going after Jesus. And John's disciples come to him and they're very troubled by this. And they say, "Everybody's going after that man that you pointed to in the desert. They're all going after Jesus." And John responds this way. "The bride belongs to the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who waits and listens for him, is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom's voice. That joy is mine, and it is now complete." What is he saying? The bridegroom's here, and the bride's going over to him. Who is the bride? It's the people of God, and they're going over to their bridegroom, Jesus Christ. It's just the way it should be. He must increase and I must decrease.

And so in prophecy and in proclamation, we have by John the Baptist this marriage. Jesus Himself proclaimed it, didn't He? He talked about it often. He made an open statement in Matthew 9:14 and 15, "John's disciples came to Him and asked Him, 'How is it that we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples don't fast?' Jesus answered, 'How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them. In those days, they will fast.'" So He speaks of Himself clearly as the bridegroom. And then in Parables, many times He talks about the wedding banquet. The Kingdom of Heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son. By the way, we're in that preparation time now, aren't we? For 2,000 years the King has been preparing a wedding banquet for his Son. And the invitation's going out to come to the wedding banquet, to come and sit at table, and to be part of that great wedding banquet of the Lamb of God.

But He's speaking in parable form, and He's saying, "The Kingdom of Heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son." And then in Matthew 25:1, "At that time the Kingdom of Heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom." And so both in open statement and in parable form, Jesus speaks of this marriage. And then the Apostle Paul proclaims it as well. Look, if you will, turn over to Ephesians 5, and there in Ephesians he talks about the relationship between a husband and wife, and likens it to the relationship between Christ and His church. We're going to talk a little bit more about that in a minute, so you can just keep it open there. It's such a significant passage. But in Ephesians 5:31-32, Paul writes, "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This is a profound mystery, but I am talking about Christ and His church." So what Paul is saying there is that every marriage, every union between a husband and wife, is a picture of Christ and His church. And so the Apostle Paul understood his ministry in this way.

2 Corinthians 11:2, he's speaking to the Corinthian church, a divided, a carnal, a sinful church. And speaking to them as they're mingling with the world, and tempted and drawn into sin. He's speaking of his own ministry. 2 Corinthians 11:2. He says, "I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. I promised you to one husband, to Christ, that I might present you as a pure virgin to Him." You see what he's saying? The church is Jesus's, and my role as an apostle, says Paul, is to present you pure as a virgin to Christ, your true bridegroom. So I believe also pastors and teachers have that same responsibility, that the church is Jesus's, and that the job of a pastor/teacher is to present the church to Christ as a pure virgin, undefiled by the world in which we live. And so Paul also likens the relationship between Christ and the church to marriage. And so we see the proclamation of this marriage.

Privileges of this Marriage

Thirdly, we see the privileges of this marriage. What a treasure chest is this, this is incredible. I stopped at six, we could have kept going. But with all marriages you see traditionally the bride taking the name of the bridegroom. And so also, we take the name of Jesus Christ.

The Apostle said in Acts 4, "Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men, by which we must be saved." We get saved by calling on the name of Jesus Christ. And so if we are in his name, we are saved. We take His name upon us through faith, don't we? And so the disciples in Acts 19:5, on hearing this gospel message it says, "They were baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus." And so we are baptized into His name. In Revelation 22:4 it says they, the people of God, "will see His face, and His name will be on their foreheads." There's a sense of ownership, a sense of authority, and a sense of possession that we are His. It says that in verse 4, the passage we're looking at, that we died to the law, that we might belong to another. We are His, and we're called by His name.

Secondly, we also share His standing and His position. First of all, in terms of perfect righteousness. How does God the Father see God the Son? Perfectly righteous. And so also we share the righteousness of Jesus Christ. The Father speaks to the Son and He says, "Your throne, oh God, will last forever and ever and righteousness will be the scepter of your kingdom. You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness. Therefore, God, your God, has set you above your companions by anointing you with the oil of joy." That's how the Father looks at the Son. How does He look at us who are united with the Son? The exact same way. We share His righteousness, we're in the righteousness of Jesus Christ and so that's our standing, we share His righteousness. We also share His position, He's a son, an honored son. Well, how would it be, let's say, for a king, and the son, what is the relationship between the bride of the son? Is she not a family member? Is she not taken in as a daughter-in-law, beloved? And so also we will be called and are called children of God. As many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God through union with Jesus Christ, and no other way. Through our union with Christ we are called children of God.

We also share His protection, don't we? In John 17:12 Jesus says in His priestly prayer, He's praying for His people, in John 17:12 He says, "While I was with them I protected them and kept them safe by that name you gave me. None of them has been lost." Think about that, "While I was with them I kept them safe by the name of God and none of them has been lost," and so, His protection has to do with His people not being lost. He protects them in this world from sin and from attack, He protects His bride out of His intense love for her, He protects her from outside threats, doesn't He? Outside threats or persecution, for example. Remember what He said to that persecutor, Saul of Tarsus, he said, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? You're persecuting my body, you're persecuting my bride," and so He takes it very personally when any government or any people attack His church. He protects them from attacks from without, but He also protects from attacks from within and that is sin, isn't it?

Aren't we prone to wander? Don't you feel it? Don't you feel in your heart how prone you are to sin? And we're going to get to that in the rest of Romans 7, but we've got this sin inside us, don't we? And it is dangerous, it is deadly. Sin is more deadly to us and more dangerous than the devil himself. And He protects us from our own sin, doesn't He? What does He say in James 4:4-6? He says, "You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God." Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. [Listen to this], Or do you think that scripture says without reason that the Spirit that He caused to live in us envies intensely?" The Holy Spirit is jealous over His people, is He not? And when we start to wander and stray into worldliness, there's a spirit of jealousy, like a husband over his bride. And so, He protects us from our own sin, He disciplines us, He chastens us and will not allow us to wander into sin, He shares His protection. He also shares His possessions. Jesus in that priestly prayer in John 17:10, He said to the Father, "All I have is yours and all you have is mine." Isn't that beautiful? Doesn't He say that to His bride too? All of Jesus' things, they're ours, isn't that incredible?

It says of Jesus in Hebrews 1:2, it says, "In his last days, He has spoken to us by His son whom He appointed to be heir of all things." Jesus is going to get it all, He's the inheritor of all things, all things are Jesus', He's the heir of all things. But then, remarkably, it says in Romans 4:13, "It was not through law that Abraham and his offspring received the promise that he would be heir of the world, but through the righteousness that comes by faith." What does that mean? Jesus is heir of all things, Abraham is heir of the world, how can that be? Well, Abraham is part of the bride of Jesus Christ. And so, all His possessions become ours. What does He say in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5:5? "Blessed are the meek for they will inherit... " What? "The earth." We get it all. 1 Corinthians 3:21-22, Paul says, "No more boasting about men, all things are yours." All things are yours, you get it all. Why struggle over material possessions and position in this world, and honor, and all of those things? You're going to get it all. Why struggle over it now? God is going to give it to you as an inheritance. You just fulfill your mission as God has commanded, you do the work that God's called you to do and don't worry about what you get in this life and in this world.

Whether reputation, or esteem from people, or material possessions, or any of those things and why? Because you're going to get it all, all things are yours. He says "whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or the present or the future, all things are yours…" And so we share His possessions. We also share His glory and His throne, we will see His glory, not just the reflected glory of this physical creation, we will see His glory directly. The very thing that Moses could never bear to see, the full glory of God we will see it. "Father, I want those whom you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory." Don't you want to see His glory? Aren't you hungry for it? I know I am, hungry to see His glory, and we will see it by His promise. We will also be transformed by it, we will actually share His glory, we will be glorified. John 17:22,"I have given them the glory you gave me." I've given them the glory you gave me and so, we have His glory, it's bestowed upon us through Christ. And we will also share His position, we will share His throne, we will reign with Him forever and ever, it says in in Revelation 3:21, "To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne just as I overcame and sat down with my Father on His throne." And so, we share His glory and His throne,

And sixthly, we will share His intimate love. Is there not an intense and an intimate love between a husband and a wife? There should be, it's an exclusive relationship and a passionate one. And so, Jesus says to us in Jeremiah 31, "I have loved you with an everlasting love." Heaven and earth cannot separate you from my love, nothing can separate you from the love of Christ. There's an intense and intimate love that we will share forever in heaven. So this is the privilege of this marriage.

Preparation for this marriage

What is the preparation for this marriage? Why do I speak of preparation? Because we're not fully married yet, I don't mean to shock you, but in the ancient Near East there was a betrothal, you remember, between Joseph and Mary? And then there was a period of time before the actual wedding day. We haven't come to the wedding day yet, have we? The invitations are still going out, the bride is not complete, she's not fully ready yet. And so, the wedding day hasn't come, we are betrothed to Christ and that's a binding relationship. In the ancient Near East that you had to get a divorce to break that.

Remember how Joseph contemplated divorcing Mary even though they weren't even married yet, but that's how binding the betrothal was, and so it is for us. We are betrothed to Jesus Christ, we are bound to Him, and we will be married, that's why that parable of five wise and five foolish virgins, you got to be ready when the bridegroom comes, when the wedding day comes you need to be ready, and so we have to be prepared for marriage. Well, how does Christ prepare us for the marriage? Look again, I told you to wait at Ephesians 5, look at it. Ephesians 5:25-27 shows how Christ prepared us for marriage.

Look what it says in Ephesians 5:25-27, "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church, and gave Himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to Himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless." That explains how Christ got His bride ready for the wedding. Look what it says, husbands love your wives just as Christ love the church and gave Himself up for her to make her holy. What is that referring to? Justification, do you see it? He died on the cross, taking our sins on Himself, and in His death we find our holiness, we are made holy through the death of Jesus Christ. Jesus gave himself up for His bride, He died for her that she might be holy. That's justification. Then what does it say?

"To make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word." What is that? Sanctification, the ongoing ministry of the word of God. As faithful preachers preach the word, the church grows up in holiness. It gets ready for its wedding day, it's being made holy, it's being transformed little by little by the washing with water through the word, little by little the church is being made ready for her wedding day. And then finally it says, "And to present her to Himself as a radiant church without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish but holy and blameless." That's the beautiful day of glorification in which the church is radiant and shining and ready for that day. This is how Jesus gets His bride ready for the day, He prepares her for it through justification, through sanctification and through glorification.

Purpose of this marriage

Well, what is the purpose of the marriage? Well, I already told you the purpose of all marriage is fruitfulness, He wants fruit, eternal fruit. Look at verse 4 in our passage again, in Romans 7:4, "In order that we might bear fruit for God," it says. So you also die to the law through the body of Christ, in order that you might belong to another, to Him who is raised from the dead, so that or in order of that we might bear fruit for God.

Can a Christian live in sin? Openly, forsaking all righteousness? Can we just sin as much as we want? You don't understand the marriage, you don't understand what new life is all about. We don't just receive forgiveness of sins, we receive a spouse, we receive a God who stands united with us, and will not permit us to live that way.  Rather that we bear fruit for Him, eternal fruit, fruit that will last. Now, every marriage is intended to bear fruit, we know that sadly in this sin-cursed world not every marriage can have physical offspring, children, but that's the usual intention of God in bringing a man and a woman together, that there should be children, that the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord.

It says in Malachi 2:15, "Has not the Lord made them one? In flesh and spirit they are His and why one, because He was seeking godly offspring." He wanted children. "So guard yourself and your spirit and do not break faith with the wife of your youth." "I hate divorce," says God. But His intention was that there should be godly offspring, godly homes training up children in righteousness. Alright, well, that's the physical side.

So also we have spiritual offspring here, fruit for God, that we bear fruit for God, that we bear fruit through our union with Jesus Christ. And what does that mean? What is fruit?  Well, anything that God leads you to do in service to Him, evangelism, people led to Christ, that's fruit for God, isn't it? Deeds done and the humility that comes from righteousness, isn't that fruit for God? Isn't it fruit for God for all of you to use your spiritual gifts? Is it not fruit for God for you to contribute to the needs of others generously and cheerfully? Is it not fruit for God to come to worship and offer up the sacrifice of praise the fruit of lips that bear His name? Is that not fruit for God? All of these things are fruit, and He wants fruit from us, and then finally we see the perfection of this marriage.

Turn, if you will, to Revelation 19:7-8 as we close. There is in all of our aspect with God now, in our experience in the gospel, an already and not yet aspect. In one sense we're already married to Christ, in one sense we're not yet married to Christ, already and not yet. We do not have the fullness yet, the perfection of the marriage waits, when the bridegroom comes the union happens, the wedding banquet of the Lamb will occur, and it's described in Revelation 19, look at verses 7-8, "Let us rejoice and be glad and give Him glory, for the wedding of the Lamb has come and His bride has made herself ready." What does a bride do to get ready for her wedding day that morning? Some of you remember all the work you put into your appearance. Getting your hair just right, your face, getting the most perfect dress, I hope you already had it picked out by then. It's no small thing to pick out a wedding dress, I've heard. I went on the Internet recently and tried to find and there are just infinite wedding dresses out there, aren't there?

I don't know anything about this kind of thing. But I looked up and I saw that the most expensive dress, wedding dress that there was, was available for $7.3 million. And it involved diamonds in platinum settings sewn into the hem and in different places in the dress. Now, if you can afford that, you will be well adorned for your wedding day. I don't know that there's a husband on earth that would be worthy of a wife like that. That's incredible. And the principle is that you're going to look your best on your wedding day. And here in Revelation 19, it says, "The bride's made herself ready." She is all ready. She looks beautiful. She's radiant. She's glorious. It's interesting that her actions and her activities are part of it.

She has made herself ready. And so, it is in Ephesians 4 that through spiritual gifts and through our involvement in witness and all that, that we lead others to Christ. We build others up in their walks with God. We are included in the work. We are making ourselves ready. The Church of Christ is built up as each part does its work, right? So the bride is making herself ready every day. But we're not finished yet.

And then it says, verse 8, "Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear." Well, here's another outside person giving something to the bride. Well, he's giving her dress and that's coming from God. The righteousness, it is a symbol of righteousness. Fine linen stands for the righteousness or the righteous acts of the saints. And we have a righteousness from God and then we have the gifts of righteous deeds done by the power of the Spirit. You see? And so, every day the bride gets herself ready by standing in the righteousness of Jesus Christ and doing righteous deeds by the power of the Holy Spirit. And so, we will be adorned in those righteous deeds on our great wedding day. That's the perfection of the marriage, not finished yet, because the bride is still dirty, unclean, sinful, unsaved.

Some of the people haven't come to Christ yet, the church is still divided. Individual congregations are divided through carnality. The body of Christ widely is divided through denominationalism. We're not finished yet. The bride's not ready, but He's going to get her ready. And she, through the working and through the following of the Spirit, walking in those good deeds, "for we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance that we should walk in them." Through those righteous acts we make ourselves ready for our wedding day. And what is the consummation? Look what it says in Revelation 21, "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away and there was no longer any sea. I saw the holy city, [That's the people of God, folks] the new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband." Isn't that great? The new Jerusalem coming down and she's ready. She's prepared as a bride, beautifully dressed for that eternal marriage union in heaven with Jesus Christ. Amen. Can't wait. Are you going to be there? Are you included? Are you included by faith in Jesus Christ? I hope so.

You don't want to miss it, because if you're not included, you're going to be cast outside in the darkness where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth. There's no other option. Either you're included in the bride of Christ, or you're condemned for eternity. Are you included?

IV. Application

Four applications. Number one, they all begin with H, the four H club. Happiness, holiness, harvest and hope. Number one, happiness. Rejoice at the security of this relationship. Is there any more secure relationship in this world than marriage? I'm so sorry for the burgeoning divorce statistics. It's a tragedy, it's a sin, but there is no more secure relationship than that husband and wife Covenant relationship. And this one will never end. Rejoice, be happy at the love that Jesus Christ has shown you, to call you His spouse.

Second H, holiness. Realize that Jesus Christ will never tolerate for a moment an unclean, faithless, wandering bride. And so, the moment we start to wander, He will come after us. When we go after worldly pleasures and sins, it arouses in Him a spirit of jealousy that you cannot imagine. The spirit that He caused to live in us envies intensely, it says. Akin to a husband coming around a corner at an office party and seeing his wife embracing another man. Completely unacceptable to God. When we get involved in worldliness, worldly ways of thinking, sinfulness, friendship of the world has hatred toward God. We must be holy. His bride will be holy and pure on that day.

Thirdly, harvest. Christ expects His bride to bear fruit daily. Following in the power of the Spirit, we serve in the new way of the spirit and not in the old way of the written code. We have a whole new way of serving God now, and everything we do bears fruit for him.

And then finally hope. Be filled with joy at what awaits you. I've said it before, I'll say it again. If you're a Christian, the best is yet to come. All of your best things are in the future. There's nothing you've experienced in this life that even compares to the wedding banquet of the lamb and being included in the bride of Jesus Christ. Nothing. I don't care how great a life you've had. Conversely, there's no misery or grief or suffering or trial that you're going through that is even worthy of comparing with what He's going to give you on that final day. It doesn't matter how much grief and suffering and trial we go through. None of it compares with what He will give us on that day.

Set your hope on things to come. Set your hope on Christ. One final thing, if you're still in Revelation, turn to Revelation 22:17. Look what it says. Revelation 22:17, "The Spirit and the bride say, 'Come.'" You see that? Isn't that powerful? "The Spirit and the bride say, 'Come.'" Who are they speaking to? The world. Unbelievers. Unregenerate people. And the Spirit and the bride together testify and say the same thing. And what do they say? "Come." "The Spirit and the bride say, 'Come.' And let him who hears say, 'Come.' And whoever is thirsty, let him come. And whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life." Come to Christ. Come and be part of His bride. Don't trust in your good works anymore. We only ever bore fruit for death by the law. Come and receive the free gift, not only of righteousness, but of an indwelling spirit that bears forth fruit for eternal life. Won't you pray with me?

I'd like to ask that you just quiet your hearts for a moment as we pray. Lord Jesus, you are the lover of our soul. You poured out your blood on the cross, that our souls might not suffer eternal loss. You loved us with an everlasting and an eternal love, a love unshakable even by death. And you rose again from the dead that we might have newness of life and walk in that newness of life. Oh, God, I pray that you would work out that newness of life in us as the people of God. Father, I pray that we would have done with sin, putting it to death by the power of the Spirit. I pray that we would walk in that newness of life, bearing forth eternal fruit for your glory. And Father, if there's anyone here in this room today who has never come to Christ, I pray that they would hear what the Spirit says and what the bride says. That they would come to Christ, and that they might have complete forgiveness through the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ for their sins. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

I. Precious in the Sight of the Lord

Take your Bibles please and open to Romans 5. This morning, we're going to focus on one verse, Romans 5:5. And what does it mean, when it says that, "Hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out His love into our hearts, by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us." This is the first mention of the Holy Spirit. As we've been unfolding the doctrine of salvation, this is the first time the Spirit has been mentioned. And what does it mean, that, "The love of God has been poured out into our hearts, by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us"? That is the purpose of my sermon today, but I want to go far beyond it. I want the love of God to be poured out into your hearts, by the Holy Spirit. And it's something that can't be put into words.

Well, how do I know it can't be put into words? Well, last week, I read Paul's experience. In 2 Corinthians Chapter 12, Paul says, "I know a man in Christ, who, fourteen years ago, was caught up to the Third Heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body, I do not know. God knows. And I know that this man, whether in the body or apart from the body, I do not know, but God knows, was caught up to Paradise. [Now, listen] He heard inexpressible things, things that man is not permitted to tell." Those are two different things, aren't they? "Inexpressible," means you can't put it into words. "Things that man is not permitted to tell," means you're not allowed to try.

Now, what was Paul talking about? What did he see? What happened to him? Has anything like that ever happened to you? Anything even remotely like that? Has the love of God been poured out into your heart, by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us? Well, Scripture says, "Yes." But to what degree? My perception is, that most of us walk along satisfied with a much lower level of experience in our Christian lives, than God intends for us. We're dryer, more fruitless, more patterned after legal requirements, satisfied with far less than God intends for us. And I want to just open up your heart today, and have the Holy Spirit pour out God's love into you. I want you to experience His love in a way you never had before.

Richard Robarts, Nineteenth-Century Minister

Now, Richard Robarts, a minister of God in the early 19th century, early 1800s, died of consumption, (tuberculosis), when he was 36 years old. That's a young man. And he writes about his experiences toward the end of his life in a journal. And this is what he says, "Frequently, all around me, thought me about to expire. My cough was so dreadful, and so were the pains I felt in my chest inside. And above all, the languor, which oppressed me for a while, seemed almost overwhelming. But while I was thus sinking, I felt more of the consolations and supports of religion, than I ever had experienced before. Oh, with what strong and assured confidence, was I enabled to look upon my Redeemer, and how gladly would I have resigned my soul into His hands." 

Assurance of salvation carried that man right to the end of his life. All of us are going to die. If the Lord doesn't return in our generation, we will face the day of our death. This man came into it, knowing he was soon to die, with an incredible assurance of his own salvation. "Oh, with what strong and assured confidence, was I enabled to look upon my Redeemer, and how gladly would I have resigned my soul into His hands." Gladly. Glad to go. Glad to go across the river and see Jesus face to face. Not sad, saying, "I've lived a good life." Glad to go. The best things are yet to come. I can't wait to see Him. For me, to live is Christ and to die is what? Gain. What could be more than Christ? Nothing's more than Christ. More Christ then. Face to face, not through a glass darkly. Seeing Him face to face. "Oh, I would be glad to go."

"What glorious manifestations of His love and mercy did He make to my soul? And how did I rejoice to believe that, in a few days more, I should be with Him in glory eternal. For the sake of my dear wife and friends, I was willing to live, and I saw it my duty to use all proper means to promote my recovery. I need to get better and I'm praying for it. I'm going to take my medicine, but let me tell you what's in my heart. For my own sake, I had a desire to be with Christ. And thus, I lay in sweet suspense, as it were, between Earth and Heaven, somewhere in between. And indeed, so I have remained, in general, ever since." This is a great journal entry, isn't it? Do you write journal entries like this?

Later on, a friend said to him, "I should be glad to enjoy your happiness." He was standing by his death bed, observing him. He's basically saying, "What is your secret? How do you do it?" At this point, Robarts couldn't speak, but he wrote this on a slate, "Believe constantly on the Lord Jesus Christ and you may be much happier than you are. Had I been more faithful in this respect, I should have enjoyed more consolation," and listen, "And done more for the glory of God."

The account continues: "In the course of this day, he experienced an ecstasy of Heavenly joy. His eyes were bathed in tears, and he uttered words of praise, consolation, and triumph. It appeared as if he were transported into Paradise. It was evident that he experienced a foretaste of Heaven. He said, 'Oh, I am happy in my God, in His love. I'm going to possess Him forever. I shall enter into that city whose streets are a fine gold. Yes, the New Jerusalem, from above the city of the living God.' "

And then the final journal entry, he wrote this, "Since my last attack, three weeks ago, the Lord has been near, and has manifested His love to my soul in an uncommon degree. I have been deeply humbled under a sense of my unworthiness and past unfaithfulness, but I have felt myself firmly fixed upon the rock of ages, and have been enabled to anticipate my departure from the body with unspeakable delight. One thing has much occupied my mind, mainly, the great proneness I have ever felt to rest short of all the fullness of God." What is he saying there? "I was too easily satisfied. I stopped short."

"Often, it seemed within my grasp. Often, has my soul seemed to take possession of it, but never did I enjoy a constant sense of it, of all the great salvation of God. However, I never gave up the hope of possessing it fully, and I trust that I shall now obtain my heart's desire." He's saying, "God had something for me, but I fell short of it. I didn't take it all in and I regret that. I would have done more for God, if I had. But now, I'm going to get it. I'll get the full amount now. I'm certain of it. No question about it." 

My question to you today is, what is Robarts talking about? What is this? What was Paul talking about in 2 Corinthians 12? And do you experience this? Is this part of your Christian experience? If not, I want to point the way. I want to point the way today. "God has poured out His love into our hearts, by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us." Now, by way of review, this fits in somewhere. It's not just out of nowhere. Paul has been talking to us about what we were, apart from Jesus Christ. We were, it says in Ephesians, "Dead in the transgressions and sins." In the language of Romans, it says, "There is no one righteous. No, not one. There is no one who understands, no one who seeks God." Let me say that again, "No one who seeks God." We don't naturally want God. We want anything else, but not God. "There is no one who does good. No, not one."

Alright, is there any salvation for people like us? Yes, there is. "For all have sinned, and lack the glory of God, and are justified freely by His grace, through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus." Free justification. A free declaration from the Judge of all the universe. You are forgiven, because Jesus died for you. His righteousness has become your righteousness. The gift of righteousness has been given to you and I have declared you not guilty on that basis. How do we receive it? Well, Romans 4 tells us, simply by faith, apart from works of the law. Abraham heard a promise from God. He believed God and it was justified. He was declared not guilty, because He believed a promise from God. And so, also, all of you who have been justified, if you have been justified... If you have been justified, it's because you heard a promise, you believed it, and God declared you not guilty, because of Christ's righteousness. That's what we've been getting to now.

In Romans 5, he unfolds the benefits that come to you. Look at it: Romans 5, beginning at verse 1, "Since we have now been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace, in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that our suffering produces perseverance, perseverance, character, and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out His love into our hearts, by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us. You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely, will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man, someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love for us in this, that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by His blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through Him? For if when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to Him through the death of His Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through His life? Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation."

Do you know what Paul's doing here in these 11 verses? He wants you certain of your justification. He wants you to know that you're saved, and that no power in Heaven, or on Earth, or under the Earth, can take that away from you. You're going to Heaven when you die, if you've been justified. That's was he's laboring for here. He's working that you may be assured. He's giving you an assurance.

Assurance of Salvation

Now, last week, I gave you the categories of assurance, and I've given you the same diagram again. It's on the cover of your worship bulletin. These are the three types of assurance that God measures out to us. And what are they? First, an assurance that's reasoned out in the mind. That's the lowest level. It basically works this way: God has made you a promise. You believe it, you trust that it's yours, and therefore, you know you're forgiven. Lowest level. "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tell me so." Period. That's the lowest level of assurance. Then the next level, worked out in the life, that talks about proven character. Remember, trials result in proven character, and proven character is the basis of hope. What's another word for hope? Assurance. Okay, so the basis of your assurance, in this case, is proven character. You are a Christian. Why? Because God is doing things in your life, things that only He could do. You don't take credit for them. Jesus Christ has changed you. He's working in you.

What's this third one? "Poured out into the heart." And what is this strange looking swoosh on top of it? Well, that's the purpose of the sermon today. God pours out His love into your hearts. It means He just tells you, "You're a child of God." He just assures you in truths that words can't express. And He can do this so much, that you will feel as if you've been swooshed up to Heaven. He can take you as high as He wants to take you here. Paul went up to Third Heaven, Paradise, whatever that is. Now, you can't work your way to this. It's not like, "Well, if I do this or do that, then I'll get higher... " This is something God does. It's something God does. But every Christian's somewhere along this swoosh at different times in their life. A certain elevation comes, a certain sense of God's presence, a certain sense of His love. That's what we're talking about today.

Now, I want to give you a few words about assurance, so you'll understand it. First of all, assurance is worked by the Holy Spirit. All three flavors of assurance, three types, the Holy Spirit does all three. We'll talk about that in a minute. All of them are a direct result of faith, interconnected with faith. Faith and hope go together. They're totally related. Without faith, there's no hope. These are all just really out-workings of justifying faith. Thirdly, this assurance is not required for salvation. It's true. It's possible to have salvation and not be fully assured. I think many of you, frankly, are in that category, and that's why I'm preaching on this today, that you may be assured, but it's not the same as salvation. And it's not equally strong for all Christians, nor is it equally strong within the life of one Christian all the time. It kind of comes and goes. And why is that? Because it's tied to how you're living. It's related to sin, isn't it? You can sin your assurance away. You can't sin your salvation away. You can't sin your justification away, but you can sin your assurance away. And some of you know what I'm talking about. Those are the things I want to say about assurance, in general.

II. The Gift of the Holy Spirit: Poured Out

But now, I want to zero in on the gift of the Holy Spirit, who has been poured out on us. The Holy Spirit is universally given to all justified people. I am not, today, talking about a "second work" of a Baptism in the Spirit or any of those things. I am talking about a filling of the Spirit. But I'm not saying that you do not have the Holy Spirit if you are justified. That, I believe, is doctrinally impossible. If you have been justified, you have the Holy Spirit already. Well, you know that from our verse, it says, "Through the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us." "Whom He has given us." So He's already given us the Holy Spirit.

Romans 8:9 says, "If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, He does not belong to Christ." "He does not belong to Christ." And Romans 8:16 says, "The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirits, that we are God's children." Isn't that sweet? As soon as you're justified, what happens? The Holy Spirit comes into your heart and He begins to tell you, "Child of God, you're a child of God. I love you. You're a child of God." And so, if you look at our verse, Romans 5:5, what is the verb tense? "The love of God has been poured out into our hearts, by the Holy Spirit." You've already experienced it. You're somewhere on the swoosh, maybe a low one. You haven't been swooshed up as high as Paul, but you're somewhere there. He's already poured out His love into your hearts, but He has more to give you. That's all I'm telling you today. He has more love to pour out into your heart.

From the moment you're born again, you have the Holy Spirit. Now, I want to stop just a minute. There's kind of a danger in preaching on assurance to a huge mixed group. Now, what is the danger? Some of you may not be regenerate. Some of you may not be born again. I don't want to give you any assurance of salvation. I want you to seek Christ, if you're not born again. If you have not yet been justified, the Scripture says that you're under condemnation, under the wrath of God, heading for hell. That's a clear teaching of Scripture. So I don't want to give you any assurance at all. None. Because I want you to seek justification through faith in Christ. I want you to know this, but you can't depart from entering through the narrow gate, Jesus Christ. Through faith in Jesus Christ, all your sins can be forgiven.

But those of you who have received this, I want to give you a full and healthy, full body, muscular assurance of your salvation. These are the people I'm talking to now. I want you to have assurance of your salvation, if you already trusted in Jesus Christ. Now, what happens at the moment of justification? The Holy Spirit comes in and Ephesians it says He is a deposit, guaranteeing a full inheritance. Well, how does this work? Well, suppose one of you were underage and you had wealthy parents, Mr. and Mrs. Bill Gates. He has a daughter, I think, isn't that true? She stands to inherit a lot of money, billions and billions of dollars, but she's underage. And so, if they should tragically die, and leave her all that money, they're not going to give it all to her at once. It's going to be put in trust, to be held against her maturity. When she comes into her maturity, she will come into her inheritance. But how will she live in the meantime? That's the question. There's going to be a certain amount coming out of that sum, a small amount coming toward that inheritor, toward that heir, to support her. A down payment, a deposit guaranteeing the full amount, and it'll come to her at the right time. You see? And so that is what the Holy Spirit is for us. We have a full inheritance coming and what is it? What is it?

Face to face fellowship with God for all eternity. Is there anything better than that? Is there something you would trade? "Well, I've got face to face... But I'd rather have... " No. There's nothing better than face to face fellowship with God for all eternity. Are you experiencing that now? No. You haven't come into your inheritance, but you're getting a down payment, a deposit, "I love you. You're my child. Stay with me. Walk with me." The down payment, the experience, it's coming. You feel it? You know what I'm saying? The Spirit testifies that you're a child of God, and you feed off that, and it keeps you going, but it's not the full amount. No. "We see through a glass darkly, then we shall see face to face."

Now, the indwelling Spirit is responsible for the other forms of assurance too. He does all of this. None of this is done, except by the Holy Spirit. For example, reason out in the mind, it says in 1 Corinthians 2:12-13, "We have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us." The Spirit tells us what God's given us, as we read the Scripture. We open up the Bible and the Spirit illuminates it, lights the Scripture to us. If you don't have the Spirit, the Scripture will make no sense to you.

But, if you do have the Spirit, you will understand, and these things come as a form of testimony to you. The Holy Spirit also works it out in your life. Those changes I was talking about last week, the proven character, the action fruit, and attitude fruit? It comes by the Holy Spirit, doesn't it? And no other place. It comes as we're grafted in the vine, Jesus Christ, and by His Spirit, He produces good fruit in us. The Holy Spirit works holiness in us. Highest form of assurance, in terms of your practical everyday working out, is that you're putting sin to death. We'll talk about that in Romans Eight. If you're not putting sin to death in your life, if you're not following, keeping step with the Spirit, you're not a child of God. This is what it means to be a child of God. I didn't say, "If you sin, you're not a child of God," we know that. 1 John 1 says, "If anyone says, 'I have not sinned,' he's a liar." All of us have sinned. But there's a relentless urge to put sin to death in the life of a child of God.

Now, where did the Holy Spirit come from? Well, He was poured out on us. Pentecost, right? It says that, "The love of God has been poured out." What is this pouring out? Well, it's similar language from Acts 2 The Day of Pentecost, Peter stood up and quoted Joel chapter 2, it says, "'In the last days,' God says, 'I will pour out my Spirit on all people.'" The Holy Spirit poured out on all people... And as He pours out the Holy Spirit onto you, and you receive the Holy Spirit, at the moment of justification, He opens a channel, a conduit, through which He pours out the love of God into your life, day by day. That's how it works.

Now, what is this experience? What are we talking about? Thomas Goodwin, a Puritan, put it in these words: Suppose a father and a son are walking along a road. Let's say they're walking through the woods. It's a beautiful day. It's fall, let's say. The leaves are beautiful, the breeze is blowing, and they're holding hands. Father and five-year-old son, let's say, walking along, and the son knows he's the son of his father. And he knows that his father loves him, and he knows that his father will provide for all of his needs. He's always done that. He knows those things, and he's happy they're having a walk together through the woods, when all of a sudden, from some sudden impulse within, the father picks up the son, and squeezes him, and speaks into his ear, 'I love you. You're my son.' And twirls him around a little, maybe throws him up in the air, catches him, and sets him back down, holds his hand, and they continue walking.

Is there a difference in the son after that, as before? Is there a cognitive difference? No. You try to write it down, there's no difference. It's the same stuff, right? The same truth. But they're on fire now, you see? There's a love. They've been filled in. They were black and white; now, they're color. There's a vividness to the love. Have you ever experienced that? Has God ever picked you up, and squeezed you, and said, "You're my child," in that way? And you went higher up on the swoosh, than you've ever been before? Has that ever happened to you?

The Experience of Blaise Pascal

There are testimonies about this from church history. Blaise Pascal, 17th century philosopher and mathematician, something happened to him one day. Something happened and he never forgot it. It changed the rest of his life. Up to that time, he'd been doing his mathematics, and his philosophy, and all. From this day on, he concentrated totally on theology. Something happened...

When he died, they found his coat, and they opened it up, and there was a piece of paper sewn inside the lining of his coat. What is this? And they took the paper off, and written on it were these words, "This day of grace, 1654, from about half past 10 at night, to about half past midnight. [Two hours] Fire. God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, not of the philosophers and the wise. Security. Security." What's another word for security? Assurance. "Security. Security. Feeling. Joy. Peace. God of Jesus Christ. Thy God shall be my God. Forgetfulness of the world in all except God. He can be found only in ways taught in the Gospel. Greatness of the human soul. Oh, righteous Father, the world hath not known thee, but I have known thee. Joy. Joy. Joy. Tears of joy. I have separated myself from Him. My God, why has thou forsaken me? That I be not separated from thee eternally. This is life eternal, that they may know thee, the only true God, and whom who now has sent Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ. I have separated myself from Him. I have fled, renounced, crucified Him. May I never be separated from Him. He maintains Himself in me, only in ways taught in the Gospel. Renunciation, total and sweet."

What was going on there? That's a hug, isn't it? He gets swooshed up and he hugs. And he's hugged, and he feels that love in a passionate way. And you know what? He wrote it out on a piece of paper and sewed it in his coat. And when the coat wore out, he sewed it in the next coat. And when that coat wore out, he sewed it in the next coat. He never forgot.

The Experience of Jonathan Edwards

Jonathan Edwards. Who's Jonathan Edwards? "Oh, he's one of those dry, dusty, theologian types." Don't you believe it. But I want to tell you about a quiet time he experienced one day:

"As I rode out into the woods for my health, in 1737, having alighted from my horse in a retired place, as my manner commonly has been, to walk for divine contemplation and prayer, I had a view that was, for me, extraordinary, of the glory of the Son of God, as mediator between God and man, and His wonderful, great, full, pure, and sweet love, and grace, and meek and gentle condescension. This grace that appeared so calm and sweet, appeared also great above the Heavens. The person of Christ appeared ineffably excellent, with an excellency great enough to swallow up all thoughts and conceptions, which continued, as near as I can judge, about an hour."

What is going on here? "About an hour, such as to keep me, the greater part of the time, in a flood of tears and weeping aloud. I felt such an ardency of soul, to be what I know not otherwise, how to express emptied and annihilated? To lie in the dust, and to be full of Christ alone, and to love Him with a wholly and pure love. To trust in Him, to live upon Him, to serve Him, and to be perfectly sanctified, and made pure with a Heavenly purity." And then he picks himself up, off the dust out of the ground, and dusts himself off, and keeps walking with his father, but it's never the same, is it, after that?

The Experience of D.L. Moody

D.L. Moody, heard of him? 19th century evangelist. He'd been a Christian, a minister in charge of a mission. He was seeing people converted, but he was unsatisfied. He wanted more. And this is what he says, "I began to cry, as never before, for a greater blessing from God. The hunger increased. I felt that I did not want to live any longer. I kept on crying all the time, that God would fill me with His Spirit. Well, one day, in the city of New York, oh, what a day. I cannot describe it. I seldom refer to it. It is almost too sacred an experience to name. Paul had an experience of which he never spoke for 14 years. I can only say God revealed Himself to me, and I had such an experience of His love, that I had to ask Him to stay His hand." Stop. I can't take anymore. It's too much.

Have you ever experienced anything like that? When God does it in one life, it's one thing. When He does it to a group of people, it's called a revival. Isn't that true? It's called a revival. Now, let's understand that word, Southern Baptists. A revival is not something you can schedule. It's not something you can advertise. You don't know when it's going to come and you know why? Because a revival is a miracle. Finney had it wrong. You can't manipulate and maneuver people. You can manipulate, maneuver them to do many things, walking aisles, singing songs, and to jumping up, but you cannot manipulate or maneuver, so that they're born again by the Spirit. That's something God does. Also, He gives a revival, and only He gives a revival, the only one.

John Wesley talked about it, 1734 journal entry, "Mr Hall, Ingham, Whitefield, Hutchins, and my brother, Charles, were present at a love-feast at Fetter Lane with about 60 of our brethren, about three in the morning, as we were continuing instant in prayer." What time was it? Three in the morning. What were they doing praying at three in the morning? Well, they wanted to be there. There was a group prayer time. Three in the morning, they were praying. Maybe revival doesn't come at convenient hours, I don't know. But at three in the morning, they were praying. "And as they were continuing, instant in prayer," it says, "The power of God came mightily upon us, insomuch that many cried out for exalting joy and many fell to the ground. As soon as we recovered a little, from the awe and amazement at the presence of His Majesty, we broke out with one voice, 'We praise thee, oh, God, we acknowledge thee to be the Lord.' "

Now, lest you think this is unbiblical, you ought to read Acts chapter 4, After Peter and John were released, they went back, and they prayed together, and they continued in prayer. "And after they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and spoke the Word of God boldly." I'm quoting Scripture. This happens in the Bible. It happens in church history. Has it happened at First Baptist? Will you pray with me that it will?

III. Seeking the Filling

Well, what are we to do? Can I urge you to seek this feeling, to hunger for it, to yearn for it, to not be satisfied with Christian mediocrity any longer, to want more? I'm going to give you some invitations, an invitation from Jesus Christ. John Chapter 7:37 and following, "On the last and greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood and called out in a loud voice, 'If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.'" Are you thirsty or are you satisfied? "It's enough. Enough, God. I have enough God." "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me," as the Scripture has said, "Streams of living water will flow from within him. By this, He meant the Holy Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were later to receive. Up to that point, the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified." I've just quoted John 7:37-39. By this, He meant the Spirit, "Streams of living water flowing from within," out to who? Well, we'll talk about that in a minute. To others? That's an invitation. Are you thirsty or are you satisfied? If you're thirsty, come to Jesus. Come and drink.

Or He invites us to pray. In Luke 11:9 and following. "So, I say to you, ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. Which of you fathers, if a son asked for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or, if he asks for an egg, will he give him a scorpion? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit, to those who ask Him!"

Now, wait a minute. I thought we already had the Holy Spirit? Well, if He's your Heavenly Father, you do have the Holy Spirit. What is Jesus talking about? He's talking about the love of God poured out into your hearts, by the Holy Spirit. He's talking about that hug. He's talking about a power, which cannot be explained humanly.

I'm going to skip the benedictions and I'm going to go right to Ephesians 3. It's printed out there. I believe that Ephesians 3 is Paul's prayer exposition of Romans 5:5. We don't have time to fully develop this. I would urge you to take Ephesians 3:14-21, and break it apart, and see. But let's see what Paul prays for his people. It's printed out in your bulletin, if you want to read it, or just look in your own Bible. "For this reason, I kneel before the Father, from whom His whole family in Heaven and on Earth derives its name. I pray that out of His glorious riches, He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit, in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power together with all the saints to grasp how wide, and long, and high, and deep is the love of Christ, and to know that love that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." Does that characterize your present Christian experience? "Filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." If not, can I urge you to begin asking for it?

Paul prays for it here for the Ephesians. He prays for them. He gets on his knees and asks that God, that they might know the dimensions of the love of Jesus Christ. I get the picture of the Grand Canyon, how wide, and long, and high, and deep is the love of God. And that you may know that love that surpasses knowledge. That doesn't make sense. Know something that can't be known? Speak of something that can't be put in words? It's an experience of God's love that can't be put into words.

Do you know this love? Do you know what I'm talking about? Are you somewhere in the swoosh? Would you like to be higher? Would you like to know more of God's love? You say, "Wait a minute, I don't want to experience now." Well, I'm not really talking about experience, I'm talking about God, that you may know God, that you may know Jesus, that He may be enough for you. All of the experiences that I've read are not empty-headed nirvana-type things. They're filled with truth. Look at what Blaise Pascal wrote. It's just saturated with biblical truth, and ideas, and quotes, and it's just flowing in some fire. It's not an empty-headed drifting thing. No. It's a fullness of the person of Jesus Christ, who is truth incarnate. Well, if you've never experienced anything like this, ask Him for it, and keep asking, keep seeking, keep knocking, until He gives it to you.

Thomas Goodwin said, "Sue Him for it. Sue Him for it. Ask Him for it. Don't give up." Now, the Puritans meant 'sue' differently. We're not going to take God to court. What we're going to do, is we're going to pursue Him, until He gives it. I'll get very practical: Begin setting aside specific time every day, simply to ask God for a deeper experience of His love. Instead of watching the ballgame today, do this instead. Say, "It's not enough. I've been drinking out of my own cisterns. I want the living water. I am thirsty, Jesus. I don't want the ballgame. I don't want nine holes on the links. I've done that so many times before. I don't want this. I want Jesus today." Ask Him to work His Holiness in you. He's not going to do it to... He's not going to assure a rebellious child. He'll convict you and try to fix those things, but He's not going to assure you. He's not going to pick you up that way. He's going to fix the sin problem first. If you've got sin problem, repent, turn to Him, allow Him to change you, and then start lifting those hands. And say, "God, please give me that hug."

Put aside earthly pursuits. Seek God diligently. Take Ephesians 3:14-21 and pray through it line by line, until it becomes yours. And look around you, and realize that there's other brothers and sisters. Want it for them too. That's what Paul's praying. He gets on his knees for his brothers and sisters. Pray for First Baptist Church, that we may be pipes or conduits of the love of God. Jesus said, "If anyone comes to me, as it is written, streams of living water will flow from... " The Greek is 'ek.' "From within and out to others." To who? To other Christians, other believers who need it, who are parched, and need love from Jesus Christ. To unbelievers, to a world that's not yet been justified, and a great outpouring for missions.

Remember Acts chapter 4? "After they prayed, the place they were meeting was shaken, and they are all filled with the Holy Spirit, and spoke the Word of God boldly." What do you think happened after they spoke the Word of God boldly? People got saved, as a result. I want to challenge you to begin asking for this. I want to challenge lay people to start praying for it. Don't wait for the staff to organize that prayer meeting on Friday or whatever. You be thirsty for it. You organize it. You get together, and pray, and ask that God would pour out His love into our hearts, by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us. Why don't you close with me in prayer?

Father, I thank you for the time that we've had to understand and experience your Word. Father, I pray that we would also experience your love, that we may know that love that surpasses knowledge, that we may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Father, I pray for any here who have not yet trusted in you, who are not born again. Father, I pray that you would bring them to personal faith in Jesus Christ, that they might also know this love that surpasses knowledge. I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.