WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.759 Now, we're going back this morning to look at Romans chapter 6. 00:00:06.759 --> 00:00:13.160 We see that Romans is really a textbook that focuses on the gospel, that focuses on how 00:00:13.160 --> 00:00:17.400 important it is and how much we need Jesus Christ. 00:00:17.400 --> 00:00:19.820 And I really love this section. 00:00:19.820 --> 00:00:28.160 This is a brilliant section of Romans that really focuses on Jesus Christ and what it 00:00:28.160 --> 00:00:30.399 is to be a Christian. 00:00:30.399 --> 00:00:34.840 He keeps going back, Paul keeps going back to, and I'm using one of Thomas's really 00:00:34.840 --> 00:00:42.159 significant big new words that he used last week when he preached. 00:00:42.159 --> 00:00:46.240 This great technical term that he used, bigness. 00:00:46.240 --> 00:00:50.719 The bigness of the gospel, that's what he spoke of, and that's what is tremendously 00:00:50.719 --> 00:00:55.320 important here in this section, what it means to be a Christian. 00:00:55.320 --> 00:01:00.280 And the challenge when we come together, the challenge for us in our day-to-day, mundane, 00:01:00.280 --> 00:01:07.840 ordinary Christian lives is very much to recognize what it is that we have and what we possess 00:01:07.840 --> 00:01:15.200 so often for us, and I confess my guilt in this, that Jesus is a small part of my life 00:01:15.200 --> 00:01:22.480 and that Christ can be insignificant to us, a segment of our lives, kind of a relevant 00:01:22.480 --> 00:01:25.760 day-to-day in many ways, sometimes for us. 00:01:25.760 --> 00:01:29.560 And I want to challenge that today. 00:01:29.560 --> 00:01:34.800 I also want to challenge you if you're an unbeliever and maybe visiting with us today, 00:01:34.800 --> 00:01:37.640 and it's brilliant to have you here if that's the case. 00:01:37.640 --> 00:01:44.200 You may be wrestling with who you are as a person and why you're here, not here, or 00:01:44.200 --> 00:01:48.800 maybe why you're here, maybe you've been dragged along, but why you're here on this 00:01:48.799 --> 00:01:53.759 world, why you exist and what it means to be part of this world. 00:01:53.759 --> 00:01:58.479 And I hope that we will be able to grasp the wonderful truth that is here. 00:01:58.479 --> 00:02:04.079 It's a bit like driving, you know, if you've been driving a car for a long time and you 00:02:04.079 --> 00:02:09.479 forget what it's like to learn to drive and you forget what it's like to find the biting 00:02:09.479 --> 00:02:11.079 point on the clutch. 00:02:11.079 --> 00:02:15.960 Now, our American friends would know what I'm meaning here because they all drive automatics, 00:02:15.960 --> 00:02:19.400 but when in the old days when you used to drive stick shifts, when you used to have 00:02:19.400 --> 00:02:25.040 a gear stick like most normal drivers have in the UK, then you remember that one of the 00:02:25.040 --> 00:02:30.280 most difficult things is finding the biting point in the clutch so that you're not lurching 00:02:30.280 --> 00:02:33.159 forward or you're not stalling and stopping. 00:02:33.159 --> 00:02:37.760 So they actually smoothly move forward and are able to drive confidently. 00:02:37.760 --> 00:02:44.640 When you get the biting point, when you have confidence in that movement when you're driving, 00:02:44.639 --> 00:02:46.439 then it makes such a difference. 00:02:46.439 --> 00:02:50.319 These plates come together and the car moves forward smoothly. 00:02:50.319 --> 00:02:54.079 Well, in many ways, this is like a biting point. 00:02:54.079 --> 00:02:58.399 When we get this, when we get what Paul is saying here and what the gospel is really, 00:02:58.399 --> 00:03:04.359 the code of the gospel, it enables us to move forward much more smoothly in our Christian 00:03:04.359 --> 00:03:10.799 lives as we recognize who he is and what the gospel is. 00:03:10.800 --> 00:03:15.840 Because Paul is here wrestling with the danger of not understanding the gospel properly. 00:03:15.840 --> 00:03:18.480 He said, that's crazy. 00:03:18.480 --> 00:03:20.600 How can you not understand the gospel? 00:03:20.600 --> 00:03:22.840 The gospel is absolutely simple. 00:03:22.840 --> 00:03:23.840 It's basic. 00:03:23.840 --> 00:03:24.840 It's clear. 00:03:24.840 --> 00:03:26.520 The Bible makes clear what it is. 00:03:26.520 --> 00:03:27.520 I understand that. 00:03:27.520 --> 00:03:32.160 Please don't give me another simple, basic gospel message because I understand. 00:03:32.160 --> 00:03:33.840 I've moved beyond that. 00:03:33.840 --> 00:03:39.760 Well, Paul makes clear and God makes clear through Paul that it's easy for us long time 00:03:39.759 --> 00:03:45.239 Christians or short time Christians or not Christians to misunderstand what the gospel 00:03:45.239 --> 00:03:46.239 is. 00:03:46.239 --> 00:03:49.340 So I'm going to say two things from this chapter. 00:03:49.340 --> 00:03:53.840 The danger of believing what the gospel is not. 00:03:53.840 --> 00:03:59.199 And also the danger of not believing what the gospel is. 00:03:59.199 --> 00:04:00.199 Slight difference. 00:04:00.199 --> 00:04:04.780 I hope that we'll unpack that a little bit and it will not be too confusing. 00:04:04.780 --> 00:04:06.759 Believing what the gospel is not. 00:04:06.759 --> 00:04:11.919 You see, Paul in the previous section and Thomas was dealing with this superbly last 00:04:11.919 --> 00:04:20.360 week, he was explaining grace and Paul is explaining grace in the previous chapter, verse 18 of 00:04:20.360 --> 00:04:22.439 chapter 5. 00:04:22.439 --> 00:04:25.639 One man's trespass led to condemnation for all men. 00:04:25.639 --> 00:04:29.399 One act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. 00:04:29.399 --> 00:04:34.279 So there's this great sense in which Paul is pointing to Jesus Christ and what he has 00:04:34.279 --> 00:04:40.639 done and that God is saying through one person, through Jesus Christ alone, it's the only way 00:04:40.639 --> 00:04:43.599 that we can be made right with God. 00:04:43.599 --> 00:04:47.079 It's nothing to do with our own goodness. 00:04:47.079 --> 00:04:49.599 It's nothing to do with our own efforts. 00:04:49.599 --> 00:04:54.599 Paul is radically and powerfully saying it's all about what Jesus has done. 00:04:54.599 --> 00:04:56.759 We get His righteousness. 00:04:56.759 --> 00:04:58.559 He takes our sin. 00:04:58.560 --> 00:05:05.439 And it's that old truth of the gospel, isn't it, that we know? 00:05:05.439 --> 00:05:12.439 We trust and we believe, at least in our heads, that all our sins as Christians, our past 00:05:12.439 --> 00:05:17.720 sins, our sins today, our future sins that we haven't even committed yet, they've all 00:05:17.720 --> 00:05:18.720 been covered. 00:05:18.720 --> 00:05:20.519 They've all been dealt with. 00:05:20.519 --> 00:05:23.959 They are all forgiven in Christ. 00:05:23.959 --> 00:05:31.079 You can, as a believer, do anything to make yourself better or more righteous or more 00:05:31.079 --> 00:05:35.919 pleasing and right to God, because Jesus has done it. 00:05:35.919 --> 00:05:38.399 We are covered in what He has done. 00:05:38.399 --> 00:05:40.839 You can't be loved more by Him. 00:05:40.839 --> 00:05:43.079 He loves you today. 00:05:43.079 --> 00:05:45.120 He loves you when you've failed. 00:05:45.120 --> 00:05:47.359 He loves you when you've done great things. 00:05:47.359 --> 00:05:49.519 His love for us doesn't change. 00:05:49.519 --> 00:05:51.959 We can never be more accepted. 00:05:51.959 --> 00:05:53.560 It's a gift. 00:05:53.560 --> 00:05:54.720 Salvation is a gift. 00:05:54.720 --> 00:05:56.519 We recognize that, don't we? 00:05:56.519 --> 00:06:02.600 We see that there's nothing we can do, our church going, our Bible attendance, our morality. 00:06:02.600 --> 00:06:08.319 Nothing adds to what Jesus achieved when we trust in Him. 00:06:08.319 --> 00:06:11.720 But that is risky truth, isn't it? 00:06:11.720 --> 00:06:14.319 It is risky truth for us. 00:06:14.319 --> 00:06:25.199 And Paul and God, through Paul, anticipates that kind of risky teaching by bringing out 00:06:25.199 --> 00:06:31.039 a misunderstanding, either that he's heard in the church in Corinth or he's anticipating 00:06:31.039 --> 00:06:37.719 might be as a result of what he is teaching, because we recognize in verse 20 of chapter 00:06:37.719 --> 00:06:41.279 5 that he says, the law came in to increase the trespass. 00:06:41.279 --> 00:06:45.239 So were sin increased, grace abounded all the more. 00:06:45.239 --> 00:06:54.479 And because of that, he anticipates a misunderstanding about that truth that people might be asking, 00:06:54.479 --> 00:07:00.159 oh well, let's continue in sin so that grace may abound. 00:07:00.159 --> 00:07:04.199 And he sees that as a misunderstanding of the gospel. 00:07:04.199 --> 00:07:09.799 Let's sin more, because if we sin more, then we'll be more forgiven. 00:07:09.800 --> 00:07:16.639 And it'll be more glorifying to God, because more grace will be revealed. 00:07:16.639 --> 00:07:23.160 If we haven't faced that kind of thinking ourselves, or other people have challenged 00:07:23.160 --> 00:07:26.280 us with that thinking when we presented the gospel, it's probably because we've never 00:07:26.280 --> 00:07:29.240 presented the gospel. 00:07:29.240 --> 00:07:31.199 That is the risk of the gospel. 00:07:31.199 --> 00:07:37.199 People will come up with this misunderstanding that it doesn't matter then how we live, because 00:07:37.199 --> 00:07:39.160 God's forgiven it anyway. 00:07:39.160 --> 00:07:41.640 We can live anyway. 00:07:41.640 --> 00:07:43.960 Once saved, always saved. 00:07:43.960 --> 00:07:49.320 It doesn't matter if we sin, because all we need to do is live this way and go to God 00:07:49.320 --> 00:07:53.600 at the end of the week and ask Him for forgiveness, and Jesus has paid the price. 00:07:53.600 --> 00:07:56.360 That's the meaning of verse 20, isn't it? 00:07:56.360 --> 00:07:57.360 Right? 00:07:57.360 --> 00:07:59.440 Let's sin all the more so that grace can abound. 00:07:59.440 --> 00:08:00.440 Isn't that right? 00:08:00.440 --> 00:08:03.440 Can't we live like that in our lives? 00:08:03.440 --> 00:08:08.640 Well Paul speaks into that, and God through Paul speaks into it. 00:08:08.639 --> 00:08:09.639 And this is a challenge. 00:08:09.639 --> 00:08:11.319 It doesn't matter how you live. 00:08:11.319 --> 00:08:14.039 Sin is unimportant as Christians. 00:08:14.039 --> 00:08:19.599 It's okay, because Jesus is forgiving it all anyway, and I believe. 00:08:19.599 --> 00:08:21.560 What does God say through Paul? 00:08:21.560 --> 00:08:26.759 He says, by no means. 00:08:26.759 --> 00:08:29.879 He says, may it never be. 00:08:29.879 --> 00:08:31.479 It's really strong language. 00:08:31.479 --> 00:08:37.639 In fact, it's so strong that the authorized version, the old version of the Bible, gave 00:08:37.639 --> 00:08:41.720 us a paraphrase there and said, God forbid. 00:08:41.720 --> 00:08:44.439 God forbid, it was really strong. 00:08:44.439 --> 00:08:45.439 May it never be. 00:08:45.439 --> 00:08:48.480 That cannot be the case. 00:08:48.480 --> 00:08:53.159 It's not right that we ever think it doesn't matter how we live, and that we can sin and 00:08:53.159 --> 00:08:57.559 keep on doing wrong things so that grace and forgiveness may abound. 00:08:57.559 --> 00:08:59.159 May it never be. 00:08:59.159 --> 00:09:05.039 It's a misunderstanding of who we have become, and what was achieved for us on the cross, 00:09:05.039 --> 00:09:10.399 as well as not realizing the seriousness and the destructiveness of sin. 00:09:10.399 --> 00:09:18.480 So I want to spend just a moment here talking about sin, because it's very important in 00:09:18.480 --> 00:09:24.360 this section that we understand why Paul is making, why God through Paul is making such 00:09:24.360 --> 00:09:29.199 a big deal, why the Holy Spirit is making such a big deal, of this really significant 00:09:29.199 --> 00:09:32.279 gospel truth. 00:09:32.279 --> 00:09:35.519 And so we're going to look at sin for a minute, and the word that's used here is a word we've 00:09:35.519 --> 00:09:39.639 looked at before, or the meaning behind it is one we've looked at before. 00:09:39.639 --> 00:09:42.639 It's about not hitting the target. 00:09:42.639 --> 00:09:50.759 Sin is here described as falling short of the target, being separated from the target. 00:09:50.759 --> 00:09:58.639 So God asks us to live perfect lives, loving Him perfectly, loving one another perfectly. 00:09:58.639 --> 00:10:00.600 We fall short of that. 00:10:00.600 --> 00:10:07.040 It's like an arrow that is shot, but it doesn't hit the target, and it's lying on the ground, 00:10:07.040 --> 00:10:09.800 separated from what it's meant to be hitting. 00:10:09.800 --> 00:10:15.720 Like a bullet that's spent lying on the ground that hasn't met its target and isn't where 00:10:15.720 --> 00:10:18.120 it should be. 00:10:18.120 --> 00:10:22.279 And that's the picture, the word picture of sin here. 00:10:22.279 --> 00:10:23.360 We are lawbreakers. 00:10:23.360 --> 00:10:29.600 When we think of lawbreaking, we think of rules to disobey, of broken rules that I shouldn't 00:10:29.600 --> 00:10:31.440 have broken. 00:10:31.440 --> 00:10:35.519 But there's a layer deeper than that in the gospel because it's actually the breaking 00:10:35.519 --> 00:10:42.000 of the trust and the love that is behind the commandments, for example, God's commandments, 00:10:42.000 --> 00:10:44.080 which are commandments of love. 00:10:44.080 --> 00:10:50.560 Jesus summarizes them as loving God perfectly and loving your neighbor. 00:10:50.560 --> 00:10:57.399 Sin replaces that and distorts that love by taking God out of the equation, separating 00:10:57.399 --> 00:11:01.319 God out so he's not part of the life that they live. 00:11:01.319 --> 00:11:07.319 We love ourselves, we enthrone ourselves, and we only love other people as it suits 00:11:07.319 --> 00:11:08.759 us. 00:11:08.759 --> 00:11:17.079 So sin is ditching the idea that there's someone greater than us, someone holy, someone perfect, 00:11:17.079 --> 00:11:23.439 someone that we are accountable to, someone that we can't understand ordinarily, and that 00:11:23.440 --> 00:11:28.720 sin separates us from Him, the author of life and of all goodness. 00:11:28.720 --> 00:11:33.600 Now I think it's easy for us today to have sanitized and justified and caricatured and 00:11:33.600 --> 00:11:38.040 popularized and diminished and minimized sin. 00:11:38.040 --> 00:11:42.160 We don't like the word, we don't like the concept. 00:11:42.160 --> 00:11:44.720 But I think separation is a good picture today. 00:11:44.720 --> 00:11:45.720 It helps us. 00:11:45.720 --> 00:11:54.200 You know, if you're in a fire and the fire is burning at the escape route, you're separated 00:11:54.200 --> 00:11:58.440 from the way of escape, that's a terrible thing. 00:11:58.440 --> 00:12:04.200 Or if you're in a huge city late at night as a child and you're separated from your 00:12:04.200 --> 00:12:08.920 parents and you don't know how to find them, that's a terrible thing. 00:12:08.919 --> 00:12:17.439 It's a frightening thing to be lost and alone as darkness falls, or much more sadly when 00:12:17.439 --> 00:12:23.679 you stand at the graveside of your wife, or of your husband, or of your daughter, or of 00:12:23.679 --> 00:12:30.479 your sister, or of your best friend, and you're separated from them in the most final way. 00:12:30.479 --> 00:12:31.559 And you know that, don't you? 00:12:31.559 --> 00:12:35.719 You recognize that that's a desperate separation. 00:12:35.720 --> 00:12:42.720 That's what sin is, it's this lot breaking separating us ultimately from God because 00:12:42.720 --> 00:12:44.680 we don't love Him as we should. 00:12:44.680 --> 00:12:52.080 He is holy and we are disunited from Him and death separation from Him is the result of 00:12:52.080 --> 00:12:54.960 that. 00:12:54.960 --> 00:12:58.080 Christ alone bridges that gap, doesn't He? 00:12:58.080 --> 00:13:02.240 Christ alone bridges that gap between ourselves and God. 00:13:02.240 --> 00:13:07.440 Now there's a related misunderstanding here and I'm wondering a little bit, but it's 00:13:07.440 --> 00:13:12.960 still very, I think important in the whole idea of understanding sin. 00:13:12.960 --> 00:13:18.560 We might not say, well God will forgive me because He's already paid the price, but we 00:13:18.560 --> 00:13:23.919 might just say, well God will forgive me if I do my best and I'm as good as anyone else. 00:13:23.919 --> 00:13:28.320 Because we misunderstand the word, the concept, the reality of sin. 00:13:28.320 --> 00:13:31.039 I'll just do my best, I'll try my hardest. 00:13:31.039 --> 00:13:36.519 Now all I want to do is give a quick illustration of why this is a dangerous thinking. 00:13:36.519 --> 00:13:40.879 Mike Powell, I don't know if any of you have heard of Mike Powell, he's the world record 00:13:40.879 --> 00:13:43.439 holder long jump of long jump. 00:13:43.439 --> 00:13:47.319 He broke the world record a long time ago in 1991. 00:13:47.319 --> 00:13:52.240 He's held that record for a long time and his world record long jump is 29 feet, four 00:13:52.240 --> 00:13:54.360 inches and a quarter. 00:13:54.360 --> 00:13:57.919 That's a long way to jump, that's nearly nine meters. 00:13:57.919 --> 00:14:00.519 He's the very best long jumper in the world. 00:14:00.519 --> 00:14:02.879 He is the best at what he does. 00:14:02.879 --> 00:14:07.120 There's no one better than Mike Powell. 00:14:07.120 --> 00:14:15.299 But if I were to take Mike Powell to the shortest point, the narrowest point of between two 00:14:15.299 --> 00:14:22.679 sides of the Grand Canyon and ask him to jump, he would fall desperately short because at 00:14:22.679 --> 00:14:26.240 its shortest the Grand Canyon is 600 feet apart. 00:14:26.240 --> 00:14:32.919 At its widest it's 18 miles, but at its narrowest it's 600 feet. 00:14:32.919 --> 00:14:38.680 His 29 feet, four inches and a quarter kind of falls in significance, doesn't it? 00:14:38.680 --> 00:14:40.639 He's not going to make it to the other side. 00:14:40.639 --> 00:14:44.680 It doesn't matter that he comparatively is the best jumper in the whole world. 00:14:44.680 --> 00:14:48.600 He isn't anywhere near bridging the gap of the Grand Canyon. 00:14:48.600 --> 00:14:50.639 And the same is true of us comparatively. 00:14:50.639 --> 00:14:54.879 We might be the best person in the whole world compared with everyone else. 00:14:54.879 --> 00:14:57.519 It might be the most moral and the most upright. 00:14:57.519 --> 00:15:04.840 But compared with ourselves and God, the gap is just enormous. 00:15:04.840 --> 00:15:07.360 And we fall short. 00:15:07.360 --> 00:15:08.799 We fall short of His standard. 00:15:08.799 --> 00:15:11.279 That's what sin is being spoken of here. 00:15:11.279 --> 00:15:17.399 And it's vital to realize as Christians that we don't go on sinning. 00:15:17.399 --> 00:15:22.559 Because going on sinning, that is always having this attitude that it doesn't matter. 00:15:22.559 --> 00:15:28.239 It reminds us that we're being separated from the author of life and of love. 00:15:28.239 --> 00:15:32.559 So we mustn't believe what it is not. 00:15:32.559 --> 00:15:33.879 And Paul addresses that here. 00:15:33.879 --> 00:15:36.039 He says, you know, well, let's continue and sin. 00:15:36.039 --> 00:15:37.039 So that graces me about. 00:15:37.039 --> 00:15:38.039 It doesn't matter how you live. 00:15:38.039 --> 00:15:40.279 You can go from here and live any way you want. 00:15:40.279 --> 00:15:44.399 Just come back and have a prayer just before you come into church on a Sunday morning and 00:15:44.399 --> 00:15:45.679 God will forgive you everything. 00:15:45.679 --> 00:15:47.479 That's what he's saying. 00:15:47.480 --> 00:15:52.680 Don't believe that because it's a misrepresentation of the gospel. 00:15:52.680 --> 00:15:57.120 So the danger, secondly, the other thing I want to say is not believing what it is. 00:15:57.120 --> 00:15:58.720 What is the gospel? 00:15:58.720 --> 00:16:01.039 We must, it's so important for us. 00:16:01.039 --> 00:16:02.600 It's so precious and valuable. 00:16:02.600 --> 00:16:07.560 And I hope, encouraging for us to know what it is to believe in Jesus Christ. 00:16:07.560 --> 00:16:10.320 He says, do you not know? 00:16:10.320 --> 00:16:12.920 Well, verse two, by no means. 00:16:12.919 --> 00:16:17.679 And then he goes on to say, how can we who died to sin still live in it? 00:16:17.679 --> 00:16:22.279 And he goes on to speak about being baptized with Christ into His death and into His resurrection. 00:16:22.279 --> 00:16:23.959 So what he's saying? 00:16:23.959 --> 00:16:27.679 He's saying we've died to sin. 00:16:27.679 --> 00:16:32.919 So he's nailing this particular misunderstanding and saying, no, you have died to sin. 00:16:32.919 --> 00:16:33.919 Really? 00:16:33.919 --> 00:16:34.919 Is that what he's saying? 00:16:34.919 --> 00:16:35.919 Do you believe that? 00:16:35.919 --> 00:16:36.919 Do I believe that? 00:16:36.919 --> 00:16:37.919 What's he saying? 00:16:37.919 --> 00:16:40.519 Does that mean I'm now perfect? 00:16:40.519 --> 00:16:41.919 That I never sin? 00:16:41.919 --> 00:16:46.439 Well, if someone takes a cup of coffee at the end of the service and actually does, he 00:16:46.439 --> 00:16:50.559 spills it all over you, we'll find out how many of us are still sinners. 00:16:50.559 --> 00:16:54.759 But we recognize that that is not what he means. 00:16:54.759 --> 00:16:57.719 He doesn't mean that we're not going to sin anymore. 00:16:57.719 --> 00:17:02.599 He doesn't mean that we are now perfect because we are dead to sin. 00:17:02.599 --> 00:17:03.759 That's not your experience. 00:17:03.759 --> 00:17:05.259 That's not my experience. 00:17:05.259 --> 00:17:06.559 That's not the teaching of the Bible. 00:17:06.559 --> 00:17:10.119 We know we battle and wrestle with sin every day. 00:17:10.119 --> 00:17:15.399 But from God's perspective, he's saying, when you come to Jesus Christ and you're a 00:17:15.399 --> 00:17:21.719 believer and you follow Him, from God's perspective, there's been a seismic shift. 00:17:21.719 --> 00:17:26.279 There's been a huge change in the way God looks at you. 00:17:26.279 --> 00:17:31.959 And what he's saying is that something real, God the Father saying something real happened 00:17:31.959 --> 00:17:33.759 at Calvary. 00:17:33.759 --> 00:17:43.519 By faith, we believe that our old self was crucified with Jesus on the cross. 00:17:43.519 --> 00:17:49.680 That means our sin, as we said at the beginning, was dealt with 2,000 years ago. 00:17:49.680 --> 00:17:55.879 Our sin, past, present and future, has been punished on Jesus Christ, the innocent Son 00:17:55.879 --> 00:17:57.480 of God. 00:17:57.480 --> 00:18:05.079 And as we trust in Him, as we believe that, as we look to Jesus Christ for salvation, 00:18:05.079 --> 00:18:09.519 then the separation comes to an end. 00:18:09.519 --> 00:18:16.839 The gap has been bridged, not by Mike Powell, not by me or by anyone else, but by Jesus 00:18:16.839 --> 00:18:26.120 Christ who bridged the grand canyon of our sin by His perfect life and met God's standard 00:18:26.119 --> 00:18:30.439 and yet paid the price for our sin so that we are no longer separated. 00:18:30.439 --> 00:18:34.599 We have moved, therefore, what the passage is from death to life. 00:18:34.599 --> 00:18:39.239 We are in a different kingdom as Christians, with a different King. 00:18:39.239 --> 00:18:43.559 We're no longer, it says, under the reign of sin. 00:18:43.559 --> 00:18:53.199 That is, with darkness and Satan as the King of that kingdom and death as the outcome. 00:18:53.200 --> 00:19:01.400 He said, we've moved, we died on that day, we died to sin as believers. 00:19:01.400 --> 00:19:02.559 Therefore, what is He saying? 00:19:02.559 --> 00:19:03.559 What is He saying? 00:19:03.559 --> 00:19:10.600 He's saying, therefore, that it's impossible, therefore, as Christians, to live a lifestyle 00:19:10.600 --> 00:19:13.600 that's separated from God again. 00:19:13.600 --> 00:19:16.799 In other words, to live as if we are not Christians. 00:19:16.799 --> 00:19:22.120 To live as if we haven't moved from darkness to life, from death to life. 00:19:22.119 --> 00:19:24.239 We've changed. 00:19:24.239 --> 00:19:28.039 We've been united with Christ, as I'll go on to say. 00:19:28.039 --> 00:19:32.959 So we can't live as Christians and have no thoughts of God and have no relationship with 00:19:32.959 --> 00:19:38.959 God and where the love of God doesn't matter to us, where we just live any old way as if 00:19:38.959 --> 00:19:42.079 we're dead to Christ. 00:19:42.079 --> 00:19:51.919 So what He's saying is that something amazing happened at Calvary and it symbolized in what 00:19:51.920 --> 00:19:55.440 baptism symbolizes in verses 3 and 4. 00:19:55.440 --> 00:19:59.960 He talks about, you were baptized with Christ into His death, you were buried with Him by 00:19:59.960 --> 00:20:04.080 baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the 00:20:04.080 --> 00:20:07.000 Father, so we might walk in unison of life. 00:20:07.000 --> 00:20:12.800 So baptism is just as the Lord's Supper speaks to the death and resurrection of Christ. 00:20:12.800 --> 00:20:16.700 So does baptism speak of the death and resurrection of Christ? 00:20:16.700 --> 00:20:19.400 Something radical happens. 00:20:19.400 --> 00:20:26.880 When we are baptized into the Holy Spirit, when we become believers, we need to recognize 00:20:26.880 --> 00:20:32.480 if you're a covenant child and you were baptized as a child and you've become a Christian and 00:20:32.480 --> 00:20:37.200 you've accepted Christ as your Savior that was promised to you in baptism and example 00:20:37.200 --> 00:20:39.840 in the life of your parents and in the church community. 00:20:39.840 --> 00:20:45.240 You need to recognize that you've moved from darkness to light when you accepted Christ 00:20:45.240 --> 00:20:46.240 as your Savior. 00:20:46.240 --> 00:20:52.799 Or if you're baptized as an adult, it reminds us and symbolizes that it's a new beginning, 00:20:52.799 --> 00:20:58.160 that you've changed citizenship, that you're not in the same place. 00:20:58.160 --> 00:21:03.319 A death to death and a beginning of life. 00:21:03.319 --> 00:21:05.920 You are a different place as a Christian. 00:21:05.920 --> 00:21:07.960 We died to sin. 00:21:07.960 --> 00:21:13.839 And then in verses 5 to 7, it speaks about, going on to speak about, we have been united 00:21:13.839 --> 00:21:15.099 with Christ. 00:21:15.099 --> 00:21:24.679 This is a hugely significant biblical theological truth that we are as believers, united to Jesus 00:21:24.679 --> 00:21:25.679 Christ. 00:21:25.679 --> 00:21:32.319 We are fused and alive in Jesus Christ for if we have been united with Him in His death, 00:21:32.319 --> 00:21:37.319 we shall certainly be united with Him in the resurrection like His. 00:21:37.319 --> 00:21:41.919 That means we are united in His resurrection power. 00:21:41.919 --> 00:21:43.439 We are alive. 00:21:43.440 --> 00:21:45.920 We are not dead to sin. 00:21:45.920 --> 00:21:47.840 We are not, sorry, we are not dead to Christ. 00:21:47.840 --> 00:21:49.340 We are no longer separated. 00:21:49.340 --> 00:21:56.440 We are alive in relationship with Jesus in His resurrection power. 00:21:56.440 --> 00:22:01.480 Now I guarantee nearly every one of us here will be saying, I don't feel His resurrection 00:22:01.480 --> 00:22:02.480 power. 00:22:02.480 --> 00:22:05.960 I don't feel very powerful and important and significant. 00:22:05.960 --> 00:22:09.880 I don't feel like I'm doing anything that Jesus in His power could do. 00:22:09.880 --> 00:22:12.400 And His radical resurrection doesn't feel like anything. 00:22:12.400 --> 00:22:16.000 I experience from week to week in my Christian life. 00:22:16.000 --> 00:22:19.680 I don't feel the power. 00:22:19.680 --> 00:22:25.720 What can I just encourage you and say, every time you bow the knee as a Christian, every 00:22:25.720 --> 00:22:32.400 time you can say, I love the Lord Jesus Christ, every time you give a cup of cold water in 00:22:32.400 --> 00:22:38.240 the name of Christ, every time you forgive a fellow Christian, that is evidencing the 00:22:38.240 --> 00:22:39.880 power of a new life. 00:22:39.880 --> 00:22:45.520 You can't do that without resurrection power, without having moved from darkness to light. 00:22:45.520 --> 00:22:50.720 You can't love Him, you can't sing, worship to Him, you can't be under the authority of 00:22:50.720 --> 00:22:56.720 His Word and submit to it unless you have come to Jesus Christ and you know the power 00:22:56.720 --> 00:22:57.720 of a new life. 00:22:57.720 --> 00:22:59.160 It might not be dramatic. 00:22:59.160 --> 00:23:04.720 It might not be evidential in some kind of dramatic, miraculous, powerful way. 00:23:04.720 --> 00:23:06.920 But it is. 00:23:06.920 --> 00:23:11.960 And why does this matter, because I can say today to myself and need to remind myself that 00:23:11.960 --> 00:23:13.440 I'm not sin free. 00:23:13.440 --> 00:23:20.400 Okay, I'm not sin free and you're not sin free, but you are free not to sin. 00:23:20.400 --> 00:23:24.120 Now there's a great difference here, that's the power of the resurrection. 00:23:24.120 --> 00:23:27.519 You could never say that before you became a Christian. 00:23:27.519 --> 00:23:30.600 Now you can say, I am free not to sin. 00:23:30.600 --> 00:23:36.039 I can choose not to sin, because I'm no longer enslaved. 00:23:36.039 --> 00:23:37.359 I am free. 00:23:37.359 --> 00:23:42.200 For the one who has died, verse 7, has been set free from sin. 00:23:42.200 --> 00:23:45.839 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him. 00:23:45.839 --> 00:23:52.000 So there is a freedom that we maybe don't recognize and don't appreciate that we are 00:23:52.000 --> 00:23:55.119 no longer enslaved to do wrong things. 00:23:55.119 --> 00:23:57.960 We are no longer bound to sin. 00:23:57.960 --> 00:24:01.279 We are free not to sin rather than being sin free. 00:24:01.279 --> 00:24:05.519 Do you get that difference? 00:24:05.519 --> 00:24:11.519 We are able to please Him, because we've moved because of what Jesus has done from darkness 00:24:11.519 --> 00:24:13.279 to light. 00:24:13.279 --> 00:24:19.960 So one thing we can never say, we often do, but when we understand our position in Christ, 00:24:19.960 --> 00:24:26.240 we can never actually say, I had to sin there. 00:24:26.240 --> 00:24:28.799 I had to sin, I couldn't stop it. 00:24:28.799 --> 00:24:33.160 It was just more powerful than my ability to resist. 00:24:33.160 --> 00:24:36.160 Now that often happens to us in our lives. 00:24:36.160 --> 00:24:41.560 It seems like that, that we just, there's nothing we can do about it. 00:24:41.560 --> 00:24:46.440 We just give in to temptation. 00:24:46.440 --> 00:24:51.720 But the power of resurrection life says we are in a different place. 00:24:51.720 --> 00:24:59.080 We are dead to that reign of sin in our lives and the power of sin over us. 00:24:59.079 --> 00:25:05.039 Yes, I know we fail, I know we sin, I know we're forgiven, I know I'll lose my temper, 00:25:05.039 --> 00:25:12.000 I know I will not love, I know I will lust, and I will know wrong things, because there 00:25:12.000 --> 00:25:22.439 is an old nature dying within me that needs to be crucified and needs to be resisted. 00:25:22.439 --> 00:25:25.159 But that must not be my lifestyle. 00:25:25.160 --> 00:25:32.400 I must not live separate from God and from the Holy Spirit, as if it doesn't matter, 00:25:32.400 --> 00:25:34.360 as if it isn't important. 00:25:34.360 --> 00:25:39.400 We are to be maturing and growing and being sanctified and becoming holy, because one 00:25:39.400 --> 00:25:42.840 day our battle will be over. 00:25:42.840 --> 00:25:49.759 But we are free not to sin, and we can never say, I had to do that wrong thing. 00:25:49.759 --> 00:25:52.680 We will make, you will make choices tomorrow. 00:25:52.680 --> 00:25:54.759 You will make a choice either to obey or to disobey. 00:25:54.759 --> 00:25:57.359 You can always choose to obey the living God. 00:25:57.359 --> 00:26:01.160 And it's a great thing to, just in the back of our minds every day say, not my will but 00:26:01.160 --> 00:26:02.400 yours be done. 00:26:02.400 --> 00:26:03.920 Not my will but yours be done. 00:26:03.920 --> 00:26:06.839 In this decision, not my will but yours be done. 00:26:06.839 --> 00:26:08.879 Because it's the will of love. 00:26:08.879 --> 00:26:13.279 He loves us and he cares for us and he doesn't want us to go down a bad and dangerous and 00:26:13.279 --> 00:26:15.279 unhelpful route. 00:26:15.279 --> 00:26:20.039 We are citizens of a new kingdom and we belong to Jesus. 00:26:20.039 --> 00:26:24.079 Now I just want to finish with an illustration here as well, just about anyway. 00:26:24.079 --> 00:26:25.480 I've made this illustration before. 00:26:25.480 --> 00:26:29.839 One is about the old guy, Brooks, from Shawshank Redemption. 00:26:29.839 --> 00:26:33.799 And just as an illustration of sometimes how difficult it is for us to recognize that we 00:26:33.799 --> 00:26:34.799 are free. 00:26:34.799 --> 00:26:35.799 Remember him? 00:26:35.799 --> 00:26:38.000 If you've seen the film, obviously if you haven't, you wouldn't. 00:26:38.000 --> 00:26:41.679 He's an old guy who's been in prison all his life almost, 60 years. 00:26:41.679 --> 00:26:43.519 And then eventually he gets parole, he gets out. 00:26:43.519 --> 00:26:44.799 He's an old man. 00:26:44.799 --> 00:26:48.359 The world he goes into is very different and he can't live with it. 00:26:48.359 --> 00:26:50.439 He can't cope with the freedom. 00:26:50.439 --> 00:26:52.079 He prefers the old life. 00:26:52.079 --> 00:26:56.480 You know, and sometimes we're like that as Christians because we don't understand, we 00:26:56.480 --> 00:27:00.199 don't appreciate what we have in Jesus and the freedom that we have. 00:27:00.199 --> 00:27:05.319 Or many of the African-American slaves that were set free and got their freedom under 00:27:05.319 --> 00:27:06.319 charter. 00:27:06.319 --> 00:27:09.960 They weren't able to cope with the freedom. 00:27:09.960 --> 00:27:16.279 They didn't know how to deal with being free and they almost wanted back into sin or into 00:27:16.279 --> 00:27:17.279 captivity. 00:27:17.279 --> 00:27:24.639 But maybe a more relevant illustration, this is, it's only an illustration so it will fall 00:27:24.639 --> 00:27:25.639 short. 00:27:25.639 --> 00:27:26.639 Don't pick all the holes in it. 00:27:26.639 --> 00:27:29.759 But it's only an illustration to try and make us see. 00:27:29.759 --> 00:27:33.000 Maybe you're being the employee of a company. 00:27:33.000 --> 00:27:37.680 And it's a really bad company to work for and regularly as a matter of course, it cheats 00:27:37.680 --> 00:27:39.180 its customers. 00:27:39.180 --> 00:27:44.000 There's no trust between employee and employer and between customer. 00:27:44.000 --> 00:27:48.680 Within a zero hours contract, you're regularly underpaid and overworked. 00:27:48.680 --> 00:27:55.559 The company's always at odds with the inland revenue and it's a nightmare. 00:27:55.559 --> 00:27:59.160 But then you get a new job. 00:27:59.160 --> 00:28:03.559 You get a new job and the job is suited to your gifts. 00:28:03.559 --> 00:28:11.000 It's where the customers and the employees share benefits and profits together where 00:28:11.000 --> 00:28:12.839 you've got a permanent contract. 00:28:12.839 --> 00:28:14.319 You're paid for the hours you do. 00:28:14.319 --> 00:28:16.639 You're valued. 00:28:16.639 --> 00:28:19.759 Trust is built into everything. 00:28:19.759 --> 00:28:21.879 And it's a great place to work. 00:28:21.879 --> 00:28:26.519 But it's a tough change for you. 00:28:26.519 --> 00:28:30.599 It's really tough because you're conditioned to cheat and you're conditioned to do the 00:28:30.599 --> 00:28:33.439 least profitable in a day of work. 00:28:33.439 --> 00:28:37.799 And you're conditioned to see profit at the expense of everything. 00:28:37.799 --> 00:28:40.919 And it's hard to change your thinking. 00:28:40.920 --> 00:28:46.720 What you need to recognize and I need to recognize we're not under that regime anymore. 00:28:46.720 --> 00:28:51.680 You're dead to that company, to that philosophy, to that way of thinking. 00:28:51.680 --> 00:28:56.800 The boss of that company has no hold, no power, no strength over you. 00:28:56.800 --> 00:29:02.800 You're under a new management with a new boss and it's a brilliant place to be. 00:29:02.800 --> 00:29:05.800 And yet so many of us struggle to fit in. 00:29:05.800 --> 00:29:08.800 It takes time and readjustment. 00:29:08.800 --> 00:29:10.320 I think that's often the case for us. 00:29:10.319 --> 00:29:12.039 I know that I know it falls. 00:29:12.039 --> 00:29:13.679 Don't all start thinking about when it falls short. 00:29:13.679 --> 00:29:16.639 It falls short in lots of ways, that illustration. 00:29:16.639 --> 00:29:20.519 But just think that we're like that. 00:29:20.519 --> 00:29:26.200 We sometimes struggle to adapt to the freedom we have in Christ and to the power that is 00:29:26.200 --> 00:29:31.399 in us to say no to doing wrong things. 00:29:31.399 --> 00:29:33.439 We have that in our lives. 00:29:33.439 --> 00:29:38.720 So it's possible to not believe what the Bible, what the gospel is. 00:29:38.720 --> 00:29:42.319 And it's possible to believe what it is not. 00:29:42.319 --> 00:29:48.360 Very, very, in just one minute, we finish with these two practical outworkings. 00:29:48.360 --> 00:29:52.079 The first is we need to understand who we are. 00:29:52.079 --> 00:30:00.039 Verse 11, so you must consider yourself dead to sin and alive to God in Christ. 00:30:00.039 --> 00:30:02.720 And he points back to the cross and what Jesus has done. 00:30:02.720 --> 00:30:04.880 We're no longer under the dominion of sin. 00:30:04.880 --> 00:30:06.079 Death, he died. 00:30:06.079 --> 00:30:07.680 He died to sin once for all. 00:30:07.680 --> 00:30:09.640 But the life he lives, he lives to God. 00:30:09.640 --> 00:30:10.640 We need to understand. 00:30:10.640 --> 00:30:12.440 That's why it's so important. 00:30:12.440 --> 00:30:14.600 Such a great passage. 00:30:14.600 --> 00:30:20.080 The word consider here is, you must consider yourself dead to sin. 00:30:20.080 --> 00:30:24.880 It's the kind of word we get logical from, it's thinking through things. 00:30:24.880 --> 00:30:26.480 We need to understand. 00:30:26.480 --> 00:30:32.160 We need to think of ourselves as dead to Christ because something happened at Calvary where 00:30:32.160 --> 00:30:33.640 that is actually the case. 00:30:33.640 --> 00:30:36.240 We are citizens of a different country. 00:30:36.240 --> 00:30:41.200 We live out a different Christian life in the community of St. Columbus because we're 00:30:41.200 --> 00:30:46.200 citizens of Jesus Christ and we're to love one another and serve one another and be committed 00:30:46.200 --> 00:30:49.640 to one another because we're citizens of a new kingdom. 00:30:49.640 --> 00:30:55.599 We need to understand that we are dead to a life that is separated from God. 00:30:55.599 --> 00:31:00.720 You can't go from here as a Christian and live a week to week life that you have no 00:31:00.720 --> 00:31:05.559 contact with the living God through Christ, where you're separated from Him and you're 00:31:05.559 --> 00:31:11.519 quenching His Spirit by living in a life of rebellion and sin. 00:31:11.519 --> 00:31:12.519 That is not Christianity. 00:31:12.519 --> 00:31:15.399 It is false truth. 00:31:15.399 --> 00:31:21.919 You are not saved if that's your thinking in a long-term, ongoing philosophy of life 00:31:21.919 --> 00:31:24.079 way. 00:31:24.079 --> 00:31:25.240 Understand who we are. 00:31:25.240 --> 00:31:27.359 We have moved from darkness to light. 00:31:27.359 --> 00:31:31.279 And then secondly, live accordingly. 00:31:31.279 --> 00:31:36.359 You know, verse 12, some of the other translations put the therefore at the beginning, and so 00:31:36.359 --> 00:31:39.720 would I, you know, being a Greek expert. 00:31:39.720 --> 00:31:43.119 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies. 00:31:43.119 --> 00:31:45.240 I would rather it say therefore. 00:31:45.240 --> 00:31:48.319 Let not sin reign because it's a linking word, isn't it? 00:31:48.319 --> 00:31:50.680 Therefore is a linking word to what's gone before. 00:31:50.680 --> 00:31:54.039 So let's live in a certain way. 00:31:54.039 --> 00:31:58.559 Therefore, don't give over your mortal body to obey its passions. 00:31:58.559 --> 00:32:02.279 Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness. 00:32:02.279 --> 00:32:09.240 In other words, don't keep giving in to your sinful desires because that's unloving. 00:32:09.240 --> 00:32:12.559 It's unloving to God and it's unloving to your neighbor. 00:32:12.559 --> 00:32:14.440 Sin remember separates. 00:32:14.440 --> 00:32:16.200 It's not good. 00:32:16.200 --> 00:32:18.679 God hasn't been a killjoy here. 00:32:18.679 --> 00:32:23.599 He is saying it's not good for us to give in to these desires because they're damaging 00:32:23.599 --> 00:32:29.799 and they're separating us both from God and from one another and ultimately from life. 00:32:29.799 --> 00:32:30.799 Don't give in. 00:32:30.799 --> 00:32:34.559 Ask God to change our broken desires. 00:32:34.559 --> 00:32:35.839 They're damaging. 00:32:35.839 --> 00:32:40.079 So don't give in, but then He goes on to say, live righteously. 00:32:40.079 --> 00:32:44.039 But rather you moved from death to life and present them. 00:32:44.039 --> 00:32:48.559 Your life, your members, your body to God as instruments for righteousness for sin will 00:32:48.559 --> 00:32:52.559 not have dominion over you since you're not on their lob under grace. 00:32:52.559 --> 00:32:57.000 Live righteously. 00:32:57.000 --> 00:33:02.159 Live righteously because you love Him and because His laws are laws of love. 00:33:02.159 --> 00:33:08.480 And if you're not a Christian, the law seems like a law, doesn't it? 00:33:08.480 --> 00:33:12.879 And you live under that law and actually that law condemns you if you're not a Christian 00:33:12.879 --> 00:33:16.000 because it makes you see you fall short at every level. 00:33:16.000 --> 00:33:19.000 That's why it's so important to recognize the power of the law. 00:33:19.000 --> 00:33:20.000 It condemns us. 00:33:20.000 --> 00:33:21.359 You don't love God perfectly. 00:33:21.359 --> 00:33:23.679 You don't love one another perfectly. 00:33:23.679 --> 00:33:29.119 And we're not under that law because it condemns us. 00:33:29.119 --> 00:33:33.039 But Jesus loved God perfectly and loved one another perfectly. 00:33:33.039 --> 00:33:35.000 And we get His righteousness. 00:33:35.000 --> 00:33:36.759 That's why we are under grace. 00:33:36.759 --> 00:33:39.559 And that is a life of joy and peace. 00:33:39.559 --> 00:33:42.799 That should be a life of joy and peace. 00:33:42.799 --> 00:33:49.919 And it's not for us when we misunderstand this and keep living separated from God as 00:33:49.920 --> 00:33:53.519 if we are still in the kingdom of darkness. 00:33:53.519 --> 00:33:59.840 That's the encouragement to know joy and peace and freedom as Christians because we understand 00:33:59.840 --> 00:34:00.840 the gospel. 00:34:00.840 --> 00:34:03.160 May that be true for each of us today. 00:34:03.160 --> 00:34:05.920 Let's bow our heads briefly in prayer. 00:34:05.920 --> 00:34:08.720 Father God, help us. 00:34:08.720 --> 00:34:14.599 Help us all to understand who we are in Jesus and who we are not in Jesus. 00:34:14.599 --> 00:34:18.760 Remind us that we have a great new king and we are citizens of a different kingdom. 00:34:18.760 --> 00:34:22.360 Today we are part of a kingdom that will go on eternally. 00:34:22.360 --> 00:34:28.000 That death for us even in this life has had its sting removed and it is simply an entry 00:34:28.000 --> 00:34:33.040 way into the presence of Christ and the life eternal that He's promised. 00:34:33.040 --> 00:34:35.360 So may we live as citizens. 00:34:35.360 --> 00:34:39.840 May we be, live recognizing we are dead to sin and that we have moved from that place 00:34:39.840 --> 00:34:43.360 of separation to that place of union with Christ. 00:34:43.360 --> 00:34:46.200 May we not take the union of Christ lightly. 00:34:46.199 --> 00:34:52.960 May we not just fill our stomach with all kinds of rotten miserable sins that we spew 00:34:52.960 --> 00:34:57.119 out at the end of a week and then ask for somehow for forgiveness to go in and fill 00:34:57.119 --> 00:34:58.719 ourselves with it all again. 00:34:58.719 --> 00:35:02.960 But may we seek to follow you and serve you and love you knowing that sin is damaging 00:35:02.960 --> 00:35:09.759 and hurtful and separating us from our fellow men and women, from our church, from those 00:35:09.759 --> 00:35:13.039 that we love and also from God. 00:35:13.039 --> 00:35:15.599 So bless us and continue with us. 00:35:15.599 --> 00:35:16.000 Amen.