Welcome to the Islands Christian Church podcast.
Subscribe to hear a new episode every week.
Thanks for joining us. So let's jump into our talk.
If you have your Bibles, go to Romans chapter 8.
We are kind of picking up the verses where we left off last
week and we are just going to keep marching through some
verses here in Romans. And I'm going to be completely
frank with you. I probably bit off more than I
can chew when it comes to preaching a sermon.
We're going to talk about Romans chapter 8, verses 5 through 16,
verses 5 through 16. If you don't know when you're
talking about Romans, that's a lot of verses.
That's a lot. OK.
And so we're going to, we're going to attempt to do this.
So you guys hang with me, pretend like it's good.
All right, just kind of out like it's going well.
That'll help me stay in place. You know what we Daydream about?
Kind of what we imagine often reveals what we desire most.
We can all imagine our lives differently.
Have you ever done this? We just kind of imagine your
life different than what it is currently.
Maybe we imagine a different future.
Maybe we imagine ourselves with a different version of
ourselves. Right.
Maybe if you ever, if you ever imagined yourself being more
patient than you currently are anybody ever done that right?
Yeah, me too. Maybe we imagine ourselves being
more joyful than we are. Maybe we imagine ourselves being
less reactive, less anxious, less pulled around by life.
Maybe we imagine ourselves. This is what I tend to imagine
myself about the future is we tend to imagine ourselves being
less busy. Anybody else?
Just I imagine myself being less busy.
Like there's just less things going on, the ability that you
have and that I have to imagine something better, to imagine a
different future, to imagine a different version of yourself.
That ability is a gift from God. You are wired on purpose to be
that way. And actually that ability is a
tool that he uses for your maturity and for your spiritual
growth. If you are a believer, he uses
that imagination to see yourself differently.
He uses that to grow your faith and to mature you in your faith.
Now, last week we started this series called Make Room,
creating space for the life Jesus offers you.
And now this series is about maturity.
It's about growing up in your faith.
It's, you know, we talk a lot around here about justification,
which is the doctrine of, you know, how we get saved, how God
justifies us. But this series is about a
theological term. Maybe you've heard of this term
before, sanctification. And we said it last week.
We made you all say it together. We're going to say it together
again. When I say 123, you say
sanctification. You ready 123 sanctification.
And So what is sanctification? You're like big words and come
to church, this guy. Sanctification is simply this.
It's the Holy Spirit's work of gradually shaping you into the
likeness of Jesus over your lifetime.
It's the Holy Spirit's work. Now that's a key part of the
definition. It's the Holy Spirit's work of
gradually, gradually shaping you into Christ's likeness over your
lifetime. Now, does anybody want to go?
I can feel that gradual thing. It's super gradual, brother,
right? We can all testify to that.
Super gradual. Yes, sanctification can
sometimes seem very slow. And last week what we talked
about, if you were here, you remember this.
If you weren't, that's OK. You could go back on YouTube and
catch up or you'll you'll be able to figure it out.
You're smart. Last week we learned that in all
of us there's a war, that we are in this battle.
And we said that we're that we have this old nature, we have
this this flesh, a war with our flesh.
And we're all constantly battling internally that we
said, hey, we want to do the good thing, but then we're
pulled to do the bad thing. And we said, yeah, we all relate
with Paul. Like we all we desire good
things, we want to be good, but at the same time we have
something pulling us to not do the good thing.
Remember, Paul said, I find that I don't do the good I want to do
and I do the bad I don't want to do.
And we all kind of went, yeah, I can relate with that.
And so we said there's this internal battle happening inside
of us. And now there was something
really important that I said last week in the second service.
And I don't think I said it in the first service.
And man, it was like a moment for me.
And I want to tell you, if you were here last week in the first
service, let me publicly apologize for not giving you the
best sermon I could have, because I just dropped the ball
on this. One of the key ideas of the tech
of the text from last week and the teaching last week is this.
Is that the sin in US, that the flesh that's waging war against
us, the sin in US that has been condemned?
God has condemned the sin in us, but he has not condemned us.
So the sin in me has been condemned, but God has not
condemned you, and he's separated.
He's separated the fact that that I fail from who I am.
Your failure has been separated from who you are.
In other words, your identity and your worth and your value is
not the fact that you fail. Sometimes that's does not.
That is not who you are. And so we learned that you are
not condemned by God. Remember Romans chapter 8, verse
one? For there is now therefore no
condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, that if you
know Jesus Christ, you are not condemned by God.
And here's the thing that means completely and totally you're
not on probation. Sometimes people approach their
Christian life like they're kind of on probation.
Like if I can keep being good and I check in with God at least
1.6 * a month, I should be OK, right?
And that's, that's not the story of the gospel.
You're not on probation with God.
You're not one mistake away from God rejecting you.
That is not the story of the gospel either.
Now, from this foundation, this foundation of no condemnation,
you are, you are not condemned. From that foundation we can talk
about how the Holy Spirit changes us.
But you must start. You must start with the
foundation that in Christ there is no condemnation.
You cannot talk about sanctification without a firm
grasp and an understanding of justification, that you have
been justified just as if you'd never sinned through the blood
of Jesus Christ. And so from that foundation that
you are not condemned, you are totally accepted by God.
From that foundation, we can begin to talk about how change
happens and how the Holy Spirit does it.
And here's the big idea, if you take notes, which you can write
down to kind of guide our conversation and maybe remind
you later when you look back at it, the Holy Spirit is changing
you. The Holy Spirit is changing you.
And he does so by reminding you
of your adoption, and he does so by reminding you of your
adoption. The Holy Spirit is changing you
and he does so by reminding you of your adoption.
All right, so maybe you've taken your Bibles and you've gone back
to Romans 8 already, or you've gone to your phone.
Romans 8. We're going to pick this up in
verses 5 and we're going to read verses 5 through 8.
We're not, we're going to go all the way through 16, but I'm
going to read it in chunk so we can walk through it together.
Romans 8, verses 5 through 8. Now remember, Romans is just a
letter. It's a it's like a guy wrote a
long e-mail to a church and in the to Christians in Rome.
And Please remember that Romans is a masterpiece of rhetoric.
It's a masterpiece of 1 long argument.
Paul's making an arc of an argument throughout the whole
letter. And so when you pick up just
like parts of the, the, the letter, you are stepping into
the middle of an argument. And so we're kind of stepping
into the middle of an argument. Chapter 7, the beginning of
chapter 8 was Chapter 7 was, hey, we have the body, We have
this body of sin that is under the rule of the law of sin and
death. It's held down.
We can't seem to break out of it.
But verse eight said, but you know what?
We are not condemned because God has separated the fact that I
am, that I'm a Sinner and I do wrong things.
He separated that from who I am. He condemns the sin in me, but
he does not condemn me. And now we're going into the
rest of the argument of how, how we change, like how to think.
How does the Christian life work out?
So Romans chapter 8, verses 5 through here we go.
You ready? Those who live according to the
flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires, but
those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds
set on what the Spirit desires. The mind governed by the flesh
is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace.
The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God.
It does not submit to God's law and nor can it do so.
Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.
Now, there is a word that Paul repeated over and over and over
in those verses. Maybe you picked up on it.
It was the word mind, MIND. Did you see that mind in these
verses? The the crux of his argument is
really there in verse 6, right? You have two options on where
you can set your mind and this is what Paul's arguing.
And here's the first idea this morning.
You ready? The first idea this morning, if
you take notes, is this what captures your mind shapes your
life, what you think about shapes your life.
That's what Paul's saying is simply this.
And Paul's not saying there are two types of Christians here.
He, he, he's actually saying there are only, there are two
types of preoccupations for the human mind.
And this is there are only two, there are only two of two types
of preoccupations for the human mind, things that we can set our
minds on. We can either set our our minds
on the flesh or the natural self.
You know, the values of the world, self protection, self
exaltation. Get as much as you can, store up
as much as you can, have as much fun as you can, eat, drink and
be merry for tomorrow we die. Like that's one thing we can set
our mind on self protection, self exaltation, the mind of the
flesh. That's one.
That's one thing you can set your mind on.
Then the other is the you can set your mind on the things of
the Spirit. Those are the only two options.
And what are the things of the Spirit, the image of God, the
realities of grace, the truth of the gospel?
These are these are the only two.
There aren't any other. You can either set your mind on
the things of the flesh, the things of the natural man, the
things of the natural world, or you can set your mind on the
things of the Spirit. And setting your mind is not
just casual thinking. Set the word for setting your
mind here that Paul's using mind.
It's a Greek word that means to strive and to seek.
So the word means something like this, to be preoccupied with
something, to have something that's on your mind so much that
it's governing you that you're captivated by it.
Let me ask you this question. Have you ever known anybody that
when they're going to purchase something, they have to become
experts about that product they're going to purchase
anybody, anybody know I'm talking about some of you are
willing to raise your hand like you like, man, you got to read
every article. You study price, you studied the
price, you track the prices for months or weeks or days.
You know, you're just you're watching YouTube videos.
You got a whole playlist on your YouTube of like the reviews
around this item. You know, I'm talking about.
And it's like all you can talk about your friends, your spouse,
they're so annoyed with you. They're like, for the love of
God, if I just buy it for you, will you shut up about it,
right? Like, but if you can't, but you
can't go buy it for him. You know why right 'cause you
buy the wrong one, you'll buy the wrong 1.
So like, and you can't give them the money to go buy.
You can't say you've been looking at ATVI know you're
trying to decide which one. Here's $5000.
Surely that'll get you the TV you want.
I don't know, a year later they've got around, but there's
this new model that's coming out any day now.
We're waiting on Sony to drop it.
You know, talking about like they're so in the weeds of the
products. It's because they become
preoccupied. Their mind is set on this thing.
And this is the, the analogy Paul's using here and Paul's
arguing this. He's saying that these are
verses. In these verses, what Paul's
saying is that what you set your mind on, whether it is the
sinful nature, the flesh, or the things of the Spirit, those are
the only two that will govern your life and the outcome.
This is important and the outcome is radically different
between if you set your mind on the flesh and if you set your
mind on the things of the Spirit, the outcome is radically
different. You see the text said seeking
and striving for the things of the flesh or the natural self
will lead to death. And that's more than just
physical death. That's death like in the garden
in Genesis chapter 1 and 2, three, That's death in a
spiritual sense. You know, dislocation of
yourself where you just aren't home in the world, a
restlessness to yourself, destructive behaviors.
Have you ever known anyone that just keeps destroying their
life? They just keep doing destructive
behaviors? Paul says that is the result of
someone setting their mind on the flesh or the natural self.
So that's, that's the outcome of that and the radical different
outcome of when you set your mind on the things of the
spirit. Paul says that that leads to
life and peace. So one leads to death.
And once one leads to life and peace, you can't have a more
contrasting difference, can you? To set your your mind on the
things of the flesh leads to death, spiritual dislocation,
restlessness, destructive behavior, or setting your mind
on the things of the Spirit leads to life and peace.
And again, just like it's more than physical death.
This is more than just living. It's what John, what Jesus
refers to in John chapter 10, verse 10, Jesus said, I have
come that they may have life and life to the fool.
And so when you set your mind on the things of the Spirit, this
is the outcome. So what you Daydream about, what
you set your mind on has a real impact on our lives.
Listen to me, friend, I love you.
What you set your mind on is not just random, it's formative,
it's formational. You don't drift into wholeness
and health. We naturally drift away from
wholeness and health. We will always drift towards
what's capturing our imagination.
And Paul says these are the two options.
You can set your mind on the things of the spirit, or you can
set your mind on the things of the flesh.
OK, Steven, if what governs our mind is so important, then
knowing what governs our mind is a question we ought to be
asking. And that's our second idea this
morning. The second idea this morning is
who governs me? Or you could ask it for
yourself. Maybe if you take notes, you can
write on your notes right now. Who governs me?
What governs me? Who governs me?
Let's keep reading verses 9 through 11 and see how Paul
continues this argument. Verses 9 through 11 says this.
You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh, but are in
the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives
in you. And if anyone does not have the
Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.
But if Christ is in you, then even though your body is subject
to death because of sin, the Spirit gives life because of
righteousness. And if the Spirit of him who
raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised
Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies
because of his Spirit who lives in you.
And this to me is a beautiful section of Scripture.
It's an absolutely beautiful section of Scripture.
It is Paul making a powerful claim.
It's a gospel centered claim. And what Paul is saying is this.
He's saying simply he's write this down.
He is saying, if you belong to Christ, the Spirit of God lives
in you, period. If you belong to Christ, the
Spirit of God lives in you. In other words, if you have
surrendered your life to Christ, if you have said, I place my
faith in Jesus Christ, he is my Savior, then the Spirit of God
lives in you, period. Notice he does not say if you
try hard enough to be good, then maybe God's Spirit will come and
be with you. It doesn't say if you really
trust and really believe that you are being the right kind of
person, then the Spirit will come.
Now he says if you've trusted Christ, then Christ is dwelling
in you period, full stop into the story.
This is this is radical. And he's saying that God's
Spirit himself and dwells and lives in you based on no merit
of your own, based on nothing you do yourself.
God himself lives in you. The Holy Spirit is a gift to
you. This is what Jesus said in the
Gospel. John said, if I leave and I will
send a helper. So the Holy Spirit is a gift to
you. He lives in you.
Now this is important. Just as faith in Christ, just as
by your faith in Christ you are not condemned.
In other words, Romans 8 chapter 1 for there is now therefore no
condemnation for those who are in Christ.
If by your faith in Christ you do not face condemnation, that's
beautiful. The same thing is also true by
your faith in Christ. We have the promise that the
Holy Spirit is governing us and shaping us by your faith in
Christ. Do you have days sometimes maybe
where you think I don't? I've placed my I've placed my
faith in Christ, but I don't know.
Is the Holy Spirit governing me? Is he leading my life?
There are days when you don't feel it.
There are days when you don't have some emotional attachment
to this idea, but the Scripture is clear, The text is clear.
You have the Holy Spirit because of your faith in Christ.
Now verse 10 says something beautiful about the Holy Spirit
governing us. And this is amazing to me.
I love this verse. Let me he'll put this back on
the screen. Listen to this.
But if Christ is in you comma, then even though your body is
subject to death because of sin and we that's what we talked
about last week. Our bodies are subject to death
because of the synonym. So listen, if Christ is in you,
then even though your body is in this war is in this battle, even
though your body is subject to death because of sin comma the
Spirit gives life because of righteousness.
This verse, it's like the the gospel because think about this,
what we said was in our bodies. There's a war and that sin is
plaguing us, right? Remember Romans 7 last week.
I want to do good, but I'm pulled to the bad.
That's a war that's inside of us.
But at the same time that there's a war happening inside
of me, inside of my body. At the exact same time Paul says
there is life, abundant life that is also inside of me during
that war alongside that war. How can I be plagued with sin,
plagued with wanting to do the wrong thing, and yet have God's
Spirit living in me, giving me life at the same time?
Have you ever felt like I can't get it right?
I don't ever do good enough? Surely God has abandoned me?
Paul says. That's not true.
And actually, yes, there was a war inside of you and it's
plaguing you, but the Holy Spirit is right there in you
giving you life. Well, how's that possible?
What does he say? He says, He says because he
says, but if Christ is in you, then even though your body is
subject to death, which we all are, all our bodies are subject
to death because of sin. And we all go, yeah, that's me,
me right here. He says, even though that's true
of you, the Spirit still gives life to you.
Well, how's that possible, Stephen?
Well, he tells you in the verse, what's he say?
Because of righteousness. Now you got to pause here
because you don't got to read the Bible carefully.
Whose righteousness is he referring to?
Is Paul saying if you're righteous enough then the Holy
Spirit will give you life? That can't be because Romans 3,
Romans chapter 3 says that for all of sin and fallen short of
the glory of God, there is none who are righteous know not one.
So that can't be what Paul is saying here.
If the Holy Spirit comes into my broken life, my messed up life,
your broken life, your messed up life, and he says, hey, I know
you're broken, I know you're pulled this way and that.
I know sin is plaguing us, but here's the God says, here's the
Holy Spirit and here's life for you.
How is that possible? Well, that's because of
righteousness. Well, whose righteousness?
Not mine. Romans 3 and 4, chapters 3 and
4. Then whose righteousness makes
it possible for me to have God's Spirit living in me?
An answer you could always say in church and almost always be
right is the word Jesus. So if I say whose righteousness,
if it's not my righteousness, whose righteousness makes it
possible for the Holy Spirit, for God's Spirit to live inside
of me and give me life, Who if not mine, whose?
And the Sunday school answer is right.
Look at there, look at there. You guys are ready for prime
time, man. You see, if you go chapter 8
verses 3 and 4, remember Paul said this.
He said that God, so just earlier in this chapter, he said
God sent his Son as a sin offering.
That means his Son was the payment for sin that through
Christ the righteous requirement of the law is met in US.
Remember I told you this last week, you are righteously
perfect before God. And This is why the Holy Spirit
can live inside of you. The reason you have the Holy
Spirit is because of the righteousness of Christ has been
given to you. And so now your body, your body,
listen to me carefully. Your body, this, this body is
now a perfect temple of God's Holy Spirit, of the Holy Spirit,
not because you're so holy and you keep yourself so clean and
you go to church so much and you never say those dirty words, not
because of any of that, but because God and his infinite
grace credited Jesus's righteousness to your account.
He gave you Jesus's righteousness as if it were your
own. This is the foundation of the
gospel. This is how the Holy Spirit can
live in you. Even though our bodies are at
war, even though they're plagued with being pulled this way and
that way, the Holy Spirit can live in me.
But this grace of sanctification gets even better for us.
It gets this is even better. There's there's something in
this passage that's even better. Paul says something astonishing
here, the end of verse 11. He says this, He who raised
Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies
because of his Spirit who lives in you.
Now that is not just poetic language.
He's not just saying, oh, he'll give life to your more.
It's not just poetic language. This is the power of the
resurrection language. He's bringing up the
resurrection on purpose. And if you go back and read
verse 11 on your own later today, you'll realize that he
mentions Jesus is the power of the resurrection twice.
You'll meant you'll see it twice.
He's not just bringing up the resurrection in a poetic way.
No, he's doing this on purpose. And I love this part.
Please don't miss this. The Spirit of God gives life to
your mortal bodies. Think about the oxymoron of that
sentence. What does mortal mean?
That's not a trick question. Means you're dying.
And everybody's like, yeah, that's true.
I'm dying. And the text says that the Holy
Spirit gives life. What is what is the opposite of
dying? Life living.
The text says that the Holy Spirit gives life to our mortal
bodies. And so we said our bodies are
subject to death. They're plagued with this war,
and we feel this battleground. But Paul says even your bodies,
even your hands and your mouth, your bodies, they are not beyond
redemption. God is not just resurrecting
your souls into a new life. No, that's, that's, that's
Greek, that's not Christianity. He's not just resurrecting your
souls into new life, but he's bringing new life to your bodies
as well as to your soul. And not just ultimately in the
end, when we get a new body, anybody else looking forward to
their new body? And not just in the end when we
get a new body, but today, right now, the Holy Spirit is actually
doing the work of bringing life to your current mortal body.
Right now. This is amazing thing about the
gospel. There is no dualism here, right?
There isn't. There's no idea in Christianity
that says, you know, the body is bad and the spirit is good.
No, that's not Christianity. Paul's not saying that the soul
is worth saying saving, but the body is not.
No, the Christianity teaches that both body and soul get new
life from the Holy Spirit. OK, how does the body that's
decaying and dying get new life from the Holy Spirit?
Well, in Galatians Paul talks about this thing called the
fruit of the Spirit. You should go read it later.
And now the fruit of the Spirit doesn't just show up in your
heart, does it? It doesn't just show up in your
mind. So think about this.
The Holy Spirit makes you more patient.
Are you just more patient in your heart or are you more
patient with your tongue? Are you just more patient in
your soul or are you more patient with your tongue?
You see, there is an internal thing that the Holy Spirit's
working in your soul and bringing new life, but He also
brings new life to your tongue. And so that we are more patient
with our tongue. Think about it this way.
One of the fruit of the Holy Spirit is kindness.
And so we're not just kind in our soul or kind in our
intentions, but we're kind in our actions.
Our mortal bodies, though diseased by the law of sin and
death, are capable of God like goodness because resurrection
life has been given to you by the Holy Spirit.
I want to say that again, your mortal body, which is in the
battle of sin and under the law of sin and death, and in this
battle your mortal body is capable of God like goodness
because of the resurrection life that has been given to you by
the Holy Spirit, your hands and your feet.
The Holy Spirit is not just making you feel alive, He's
making your life different. So who governs you?
Who governs you? The Holy Spirit governs you,
period. The Holy Spirit governs you if
you are in Christ, if you do not always feel it, it doesn't
matter. He's always working you.
He's always working in you. You do not govern yourself.
You are spirit dwelt. Your body and soul are
experiencing resurrection power even right this minute.
Now before we leave today, and I've got to rush through this, I
promise. Let me do this before we leave
today. There has to be something said
about your role and my role in what the Spirit is doing to
sanctify us because we do have a role.
And this is our third idea today.
You ready? This is our our obligation, our
obligation. Romans chapter 8 verses 12
through 16 says this. Therefore, brothers and sisters,
we have an obligation. But it is not to the flesh to
live according to it. For if you live according to the
flesh, you will die. But if by the Spirit you put to
death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.
For those who are led by the Spirit of God or the children of
God, the Spirit you receive does not make you slaves, so that you
live in fear again. Rather, the Spirit you received
brought about your adoption to sonship.
And by him we cry, ABBA, Father, the Spirit himself testifies
with our Spirit that we are God's children.
Now Paul says we have an obligation.
That's what he said at the very beginning.
Brothers and sisters, we have an obligation.
But then he quickly says it is not to our flesh.
It is not to our flesh. And So what that means is this.
Your old flesh sinful nature has no claim on you anymore.
You don't owe it anything. You don't owe your fear any
obedience. You don't owe your resentment
any loyalty. You don't owe.
You don't owe your old patterns any allegiance.
They have no rights over you because now instead of belonging
to your old self, you belong to God, not because you earned it,
but because Christ redeemed you from sin and death.
Now let's reread verse 13. This is the scary part.
This is the feels like religious part.
This is the part that people kind of use to hit other people
over their heads with, right? Verse 13 says if by the Spirit
you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.
And there's something we miss in verse 13, and you can miss it
very easily. You and I do not put to death
the misdeeds of the body by our effort or by our determination
or our willpower. How do we put to death the
misdeeds of the body? By the what?
By the Spirit. That's what the text said.
Just by the Spirit, by His presence, by His resurrection
power, by Him living inside of us.
Now this is not self salvation. Meaning if I try hard enough
then I will be good. No, this is surrender to the
Holy Spirit. This is cooperation to the Holy
Spirit. It means we listen to the Holy
Spirit. Well, Stephen, how do I kill the
deed, the misdeeds of the body? How do I've been trying to kill
the misdeeds of the body my whole life.
How do I kill the misdeeds of the body if it's not willpower
and determination? Well, we go back to where we
started at the very beginning of this talk.
We set our minds on things of the Spirit, verses 5 and 6, we
set our minds on the things of the spirit.
The things of the spirit are not religious things.
They're not religious activities.
No. Paul, in these verses that I
just read to you, verses 12 through 612 through 16, he makes
it clear what the things of the Spirit are.
He, he makes us super clear and the things of the things of the
Spirit are not religious activities or religious stuff.
The things of the Spirit are in this passage.
He, he tells us what they are and what they are is this.
You are a child of God. That's what Paul said.
You are not a slave to fear anymore.
And he says we have been adopted into sonship.
And I know that like some, like this is a translation of
sonship. That's necessary.
We need to have sonship there because it is not about gender.
It's about a title. It's about a new status, because
in Roman culture, to be adopted into sonship meant that you went
from being whatever you were. If you were a slave or if you
were underclass, if you didn't have money, you went
immediately. As soon as you were adopted, you
went immediately as a member of that household with all the
rights and privileges, completely and totally by
nothing more than the will of the father who adopted you.
So when Paul uses the term sonship, he's saying here's what
you have. You have a new status.
These are the things of the spirit that we set our mind on.
You are a child of God. You are not a slave.
You have a new status. He uses this term ABBA, which is
like a term for endearment, like saying dad or daddy.
He said he's saying, hey, the, the things of the spirit are the
fact that you are God's child, that you have been adopted, that
you belong to God. And so Stephen, how can I, how
can I mortify to use the old king King James version?
How can I kill the misdeeds of the body if it's not through
willpower and sheer determination?
Will you set your mind on the things of the Spirit, or what
are the things of the spirit? The things of the spirit are
your identity. The things of the Spirit are
what's true about you. And when you set your mind on
the things of the Spirit, the fact that you're adopted, the
fact that you're a child of God, the fact that you were chosen,
the fact that you've been given the status of sonship.
When you set your mind on those beautiful truths and they
dominate your thinking. If you begin to preach that
gospel to yourself daily, I belong, I'm accepted by God.
If you continue to do that and you do not preach law centered
sermons to yourself, you know, Stephen, get it together.
You can do better, try harder, stop better.
But if you preach gospel centered truth to yourself, I'm
adopted, I am loved, I belong, I owe sin nothing.
Then slowly over time, as you preach the the things of the
Spirit to you, what Paul lists, your status, your life begins to
reflect who you actually are. But if you preach sermons like
this, you can never get it together.
Why can't you stop doing this? You need to try harder.
Why can't you do that better? If you always preach sermons
like that to yourself, you will always be feeling like you're a
failure. But if you instead preach the
truth of the gospel to yourself, you are chosen.
You are a son, you are a child of God, you are a daughter of
God. You have been put into the
family of God by his sheer will and desire for you.
There's nothing you could do to deserve it.
If you preach sermons of the gospel to yourself, slowly over
time you will begin to live like the the Son and the daughter of
God that you are. You see, here's the thing,
friend, Children do not obey to become sons.
My children do not obey me in hopes that they will be my
children one day. They obey me because they are my
children. Our identity forms our actions,
not the other way around. Your actions will never form
your identity because our bodies are plagued with sin and death,
but the truth of the gospel can form our actions.
So friend, how do you make room for the life that Jesus is
offering you? It is not by trying harder.
Do not leave today and say you're going to try harder.
It is not by trying harder. It is by remembering better,
remembering better, remembering the truth of your adoption.
When you feel anxiety, preach adoption.
Say my Father is in control of this world, He owns it.
When you feel guilt creep in because you've done something
wrong, say preach no condemnation.
Say there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are
in Christ Jesus. When temptation comes whispering
to you, telling you to abandon your sonship and to follow your
flesh, preach the cross to yourself.
Look at what Christ has done for me.
The Spirit inside of you is not waiting for you to impress Him.
He knows you, He is reminding you daily that you already
belong. And these are the things of the
Spirit. And the more you set your mind
on that truth, the more you will put the deep to death, the
misdeeds of the body. So making room for the Spirit
means making room for the gospel to shape how you think over time
and slowly how you live. I'm going to say benediction
over us. Will you stand with me?
It was a bit like drinking out of a fire hose today, wasn't it?
May the Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead remind you this
week that you belong to the Father.
May your mind be governed not by fear, but by life and peace.
When anxiety rises, and it certainly will, may you remember
you are adopted. When guilt whispers, may you
remember there is now no condemnation.
And as you go from this place, may the gospel, the Good News
shape how you think, so that slowly and surely your life
reflects who you already are in Christ.
Go, my brothers and sisters in the life and the peace the
Spirit is bringing into you. Amen.
Love you guys.