Lesson 6

Alright, we'll turn to the Book of Romans this morning, if you would please. Romans chapter 6. Romans chapter 6. Let's see who all has signed in this morning. Good morning Pete and Michelle. Good morning, Gail and Phil. Good morning Brother Igwem. Romans chapter 6. And if there have been any others on here this morning that have not commented, then good morning to you, whoever you are. Now remember, next week I'll be in Kentucky preaching up there to some of the people who are watching online with us this morning, getting to fellowship with our online members in person, which I'm very much looking forward to. So next week, instead of coming in here, then just go in Brother Shephard's class. You all go sit in there with him and listen to some good teaching there in the Old Testament. Alright, Romans chapter 6. Okay, that's fine, no problem. Right there, R-O-M, right next to Acts. You see it? Nope, still blind. Oh! There you go. Alright. Well, I see better up close without my button. That's the problem. Right, right. Alright, so Romans chapter 6. And we have been looking at different doctrines that the apostles had to address in the New Testament. And we'll continue looking at more until we get the fundamentals down and then we'll finish our building on Jesus and be done. And then maybe in the future, if God supplies us with new people to teach, then we'll have another Genesis of Jesus class. But during that interim, if there's no one in the waiting, then we'll just go over to Brother Shephard's. It's been a long time since I've sat down and listened to a Sunday school class, but this last time we had back-to-back. So if you'll look here now in verse 1, we're going to look at some very powerful doctrine that the apostle Paul was teaching the people in the New Testament. It's the other half of the Gospel. And I say it that way because that's the way I view it. And you'll understand what I mean here in just a moment. If you look here in chapter 6, verse 1, "What shall we say then? Shall we continue and sin that grace may abound?" Well, the question is this. We're saved by God's grace, not by what we've done, not by what we've accomplished, but by just the grace of God that he sent his Son to die for us, to live for us, to be raised again from the dead for us. Just God's wonderful grace. Well, if we're not saved by doing good and pleasing God through our own merit because no one can do that because we come short of his glory, should we just say, "Well, hey, we're saved by grace. Let's just go do whatever we want and just sin however we want to." And what does he say? Verse 2, "God forbid." God forbid we do that. That would be like going to a doctor, by the way, and the doctor's saying, "Well, here, let's say that Chris comes to me and I'm the doctor, and Chris says, 'Man, I've got this terrible pain in my gut, and it just won't go away.' So we do the CT scans. We do all this stuff we're supposed to do. And I come back and I break the news to Chris, and I say, "Well, I hate to tell you this, but you've got cancer." Chris is so sad to hear that. He's only got six months to live. But let's say that, you know, I say, "Well, I'll tell you what. I've got this new magic pill that you can take, and it'll keep you from dying. You won't die in six months. In fact, you can live as long as you want to if you'll take this pill." Now, let's say Chris took that pill, and Chris then developed the attitude, "This is wonderful. Thank you. Now I can take this pill and have all the cancer I want." You see? Now, what kind of thinking is that? That's ridiculous. Sin brings death. Sin brings sorrow. Sin breaks homes up. Sin brings anger and all the problems that you see in this world today. Sin is because of sin. Every single problem. Every sickness. Every person who dies. Every argument. Every war. Every social outcast. Every homeless person. Everything. Every disability. Everything is brought about on account of sin. For without sin, we wouldn't be experiencing any of these things. And so, when we understand that, I mean, let's say that Chris lived forever because he took that pill. But he still had the hair loss. He still had the pain in his gut. He still had all the symptoms. His body's still withering away, and he remains in that horrible condition, unable to escape it through death. Which, by the way, if you remember, God was merciful to Adam and Eve because after they ate from the tree of the knobs of good and evil, he wouldn't allow him to eat from the tree of life. That would have enabled them to live without ever being rescued from what was causing them to die. You're talking about zombies. They've been living dead. They've been horrible to be trapped in that sinful condition forever where the world would never, ever be rid of tears. Always be sorrow and pain. Just no death. So, he says, "Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?" So, he says, "Well, the more I sin, the more we can say what wonderful grace God had, saved such a sinner like me." Now, anyone that develops that attitude, they don't understand the nature of sin. They don't understand the concept of sin. Adrian Rogers once said, "I'm saved, and I go out and sin all I want to." He says, "Well, you need to get a new one, or you need to be born again, because even though our flesh does desire to do wrong, that will never stop. Who we really are on the inside, we shouldn't desire to do wrong. We shouldn't desire to do things that are harmful to us and others." So, he says, "God forbid." Now, watch what he says in verse 2. "How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?" Now, if you have a paper, Bible, and a pen in front of you, you might want to understand, we that are dead. See, Brother Richard, did Paul write this letter to a cemetery? No. Dead people can't live. Nevertheless, the people who were reading this were dead. And so, I remember the first time I read this, I had been, as a young believer, trying to figure out a way to overcome temptation, to overcome the snares the devil would put in my life, try to make sure my thought life was clean, my heart was right, everything I was doing was right. And the devil would constantly tempt me, like he does others, especially young people. And I kept praying, "God, give me strength. Give me strength to overcome temptation. Give me strength to think right. Give me strength to think right. That's not the way it works." And I remember memorizing the scripture because I was thinking to myself, "Well, it says, God forbid we shouldn't continue in sin. Maybe if I memorize this and meditate on it, it will help me, encourage me to live victoriously over sin." And when I got to this part here, "How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?" I immediately stopped. I was in my patrol car and I pushed on my brake. I stopped. And the Lord gave me this amazing truth. I was dead. "How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?" Verse 3, I opened the scripture up. I looked back at it. Did I read that right? I did. We're dead to sin. Verse 3, "No, you're not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into his death. Therefore we're buried with him by baptism into death." The most liberating truth in the world is the truth that the believer in Jesus Christ is dead. And this is where we get to what I call the other half of the gospel or the other side of the gospel. However you want to put it. You got the moon. You got the other side of the moon. No one sees. Well, a lot of people never see the other side of the gospel. And let me explain it to you. Anybody that has ever heard the gospel can tell you this. The gospel is based on the fact that Jesus died for me. Right? So when we're thinking about how do I overcome the condemnation of my sin, it's because Jesus died for me. In my place, Jesus was condemned. And because Jesus died for me, I don't have to be condemned. That's the first side of the gospel that people are introduced to. When we preach the gospel to someone, number one, you're a sinner or you've got cancer. However you want to put it. Number two, Jesus died for your sin. So even though you're condemned because of your sin, there's good news. And that is God sent his son or God became man. However you want to put it. Same thing. And he, your sin was charged to his account. And he was condemned in your place. That's the beautiful part of the gospel. The other side of the gospel is this. The Bible says, God forbid, how shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein? So here's the other side of the gospel. Number one, Jesus died for me. Number two, watch the reversal. We're going to take the me and put it over here and the Jesus, we're going to put it over here. Jesus died for me. I died with Jesus. That's the other half of the gospel. Now, if Jesus died in my place, then when Jesus was on the cross, legally speaking, when Jesus died, who died? I died. Jesus didn't have any sin of his own. Jesus didn't die for himself. Jesus wasn't condemned on his own behalf. He was condemned on my behalf. So legally speaking, Jesus stood in for me that day. Legally speaking, I'm sitting there or standing there about to have the hangman's noose put around my neck for crimes that I committed. And Jesus comes up there, pushes me out of the way, and he stands there on the trap door and the noose is put around his neck. But the only way that I can go free is if I'm cleared under the law. The law has to show the sentence being executed against the defendant. And so when Jesus died on the cross, he died for or in the stead of me. So legally when he died, I died so that in the court of law, guess what happened to Richard? That sentence has already been condemned. That sentence has already been executed. That's why the Bible says concerning Isaac in the Old Testament. Abraham is about to come down and slay his son Isaac and then God gives a lamb as a substitute for Isaac. And so Abraham kills the lamb in Isaac's place. But then you read later in the Bible and you'll see that Abraham offered up his only son. Well, but he didn't. He offered up a lamb. Yes, but it was a substitute lamb and the lamb stood in his place. And so Isaac died in the lamb legally, you see. And so when Jesus died, I died. Now, if you'll look here, it says, verse three, no, you not. There's so many of us as we're baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death. So the means by which we died is baptism. Now, baptism means to make fully wet. And what that means is this. When when John the Baptist would baptize someone in the water, they would go all the way down when the last person. By God's grace, I got to baptize with brother Chris here and we push him down in the water in that swimming pool. That means he is plunged into that water in the same way when we put our faith in Christ and what he's done for us on the cross. The Holy Spirit plunges us down into Jesus. We are immersed into him. Therefore, we are in him and we are overwhelmed with him. We are completely covered by him. We lose our identity and we gain that identity of the person we've been put into. And so when Jesus was on the cross that day, not only was he on the cross, but who else was on the cross? We were. That's right. We were on the cross. Let's go put Chris up here. What did you say? We'll put some we'll put some props up with the God wires up there to keep that cross falling. So, but when Jesus on the cross, Chris was on the cross. Now, if Chris is in Christ, and by the way, in Christ is a big phrase in the Bible, because there's really only two kinds of people in the world. Those who are in Adam. That's how we're born. We're born in Adam and those who are in Christ. Those who have been born again by accepting Christ as their savior. They have a new identity. They're no longer identified as Chris, but it's Christ. All right. And so if if Chris was on the cross that day, when Jesus died, Chris died. And Chris is in Christ. He's baptized into him. He's fully immersed into him. If he's fully immersed into Christ and now he's taken on Jesus identity. He is in Christ. The Bible says if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. You see, and you got a whole new identity. And so now that he's baptized or submerged into Jesus and taken on Jesus identity. When Jesus died, Chris died. What's the logic? Did Jesus stay on the cross? Where did Jesus go after he died? Huh? He went to the tomb. So here's a term. Now, when Jesus went to the tomb, who else went to the tomb? Chris. Did you say Chris? Very good. Very astute. So when Jesus died, Chris died when Jesus was buried. Chris was buried. Did Jesus stay in the tomb? No. Three days later. He comes out of the grave and he sits at the right hand of God. We're going to make a little throne here. Okay. Not a very good throne, but we're going to make a throne. Right. So he sits at the right hand of God. So when Chris when Jesus died, Chris died when Jesus was buried. Chris was buried. Can we do this when Jesus rose in the dead, Chris rose from the dead? Huh? Why? We believe in Jesus. That's right. But if Chris is in Christ, then where Christ goes, Chris goes. So when Jesus was buried, Chris was buried. When Jesus rose from the dead, Chris rose from the dead. You're born again. Now, does this mean that Chris is seated at the right hand of God right now in heaven? Yes, it does. It absolutely does. Positionally, positionally, that's where Chris is legally. That's where Chris is. Take your Bibles, please, and turn to Ephesians chapter two. Let me look this up here. I think it's chapter two. Yeah, Ephesians chapter two and. Look here if you would in verse four, Ephesians two verse four. The other side of the gospel this morning, Ephesians two verse four. You there? Yes, sir. Ephesians chapter two verse four. All right. Looks like everyone is there. Here we go. But God, who is rich in mercy for his great love, were with he loved us. Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us. The word quicken means made alive. Hath quickened us together with Christ. Verse six, and hath raised us up together. You see that? Did it stop there? No. And made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Isn't that amazing? When Jesus died, you died if you believe on Christ as your Savior. When Jesus was buried, you were buried. You were dead. But God quickened you together with Christ. That means he made you alive. And so he made you alive together with Jesus. He raised us up together to sit together in heavenly places. Now, I want you to notice something about this verse. Look in verse five. If you have a paper Bible, underscore the word together. Together with Christ. That is the key to victorious Christian living. That you, what God does with Jesus, God does with you. Together with Christ. So the moment that we trust in Christ as our Savior, the Holy Spirit baptizes us into him. He puts us in Christ. And from that point forward, from the cross forward, we are together with Christ. What God does with Jesus, he does to us. So he quickens us together with Christ. Look in verse six. He raises us up, what? Together. You see that again? He makes us sit how? Together in heavenly places. How? In Christ Jesus. That in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace and his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. For by grace are you saved through faith. And that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God. What a wonderful gift. And so now we're embarking upon this incredible, powerful truth. The other side of the gospel. That yes, Jesus died for me, but look here now. I died with Jesus. Jesus died for me that delivers me from condemnation. But you know what? I can be in this world. And I can say, "Praise God Jesus died for me. I don't have to go to hell." "Praise God Jesus died for me. I can go to heaven." But you know what? There's another part of that too because I don't want to just be victorious over being condemned. I want to be victorious in every aspect of my life. I want to be victorious over temptation. I want to be victorious over the grave. I want to be victorious in ruling over the enemies that tried to rule over me. Sin, Satan, and death. And so here's how that works. When I died with Jesus, that means I have the power to overcome temptation now through my death with him. How does that work? Here's how. And I explained this in my book, "Leaving Egypt." When I was a policeman, there was one particular—I worked a lot of accidents. I saw a lot of dead people. But there's one particular accident that it was on an Easter Sunday. And a drunk driver went wrong way on the highway and hit a pastor in his whole family in the van. And when I showed up, the drunk driver was dead. His dog was dead. His dog was in the back of the pickup, and it killed his dog too. And I can't remember if anyone died in the pastor's vehicle, but I remember his daughter laying in the ditch. She had been thrown out of the vehicle, and she was screaming for Daddy to come help her. Well, Daddy's trapped behind the steering wheel. The steering wheel was in his chest. And I was pretty angry at this drunk guy. These people just left church. And I go over there, and the drunk guy is still in the driver's seat. I go over there and I look at him. His eyes are wide open, because people don't close their eyes when they die. It's not like that in the movies. His eyes are wide open. He's staring into space. He's just as dead as he can be. His blood's over the legal limit of alcohol. He's in the driver's seat. He's in the vehicle on a public roadway. He just committed a felony. And I have all the power in the world to arrest him, but I can't. Why? He's dead. I have all the authority in the world. I've got pepper spray. I've got a stick I can hit him with. I've got a gun I can shoot him with. I'm stronger than him because I'm younger than him, and he's old and he's drunk. And I've got all the power in the world to say, "Get out of that vehicle. Turn around and put your hands behind your back." But no matter how much I command him, and how much I threaten him, and how much I stand over him, and all that stuff, I'm absolutely powerless. Powerless to make this man do anything. Why? He's dead. Death delivered him from the domain of my authority. This is why the Apostle Paul is capitalizing on our death with Jesus. Because is the devil stronger than us? Yes. Is the devil bigger than us? Yes. Can the devil come and threaten and all this stuff? Yes. Do we and the bondage of our flesh, because our flesh craves to do wrong? Anyone in here, does anyone in here that never craves to do anything bad anymore? You never have any...anyone like that in here? Nobody, because your flesh still craves it. And we're living inside that flesh, that inner man of us. But no matter about your flesh, no matter about the devil, no matter about any of these things, the devil and your flesh can't make you do anything. Why? You're dead. You're dead. The Apostle Paul in another place, victoriously cried, "I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live. Yet not I, but Christ lives in me in the life that I now live. I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. That is the key. Our death with Christ gives us the power. I am no longer trapped in my carnal body here, my sinful body on this earth. I am now seated together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, far above my enemy, far above sin, far above Satan, far above death. Where's my flesh at? Practically my flesh is on me or I'm in it. Legally, where's my flesh? It's right here. Positionally it's right here. We have this thing in life. We have our position in Christ and we have our walk with Christ. And there's a difference between your position and your walk. Your standing, your legal standing and your walk. Your walk is your daily activity. It's going to be filled full of error, sin, mistakes, wrongs that you do. That's your daily walk with Christ. But your position in Christ Jesus, your standing in Christ Jesus never changes. No matter what, no matter if you wake up one day and you're feeling real bad and you've got temptations in your head and you've got thoughts in your mind and you're not happy with them and they're sinful thoughts and you just don't feel so loving and worshipful toward God because we all have days like that. Why? Because our walk is, we're still living in this flesh, but our position is, no matter how we feel one day, here's the truth that never changes. We still die with Jesus. We're still buried with Jesus. We're still sitting at the right hand of God with Jesus. Bang. That's it right there. That's your position. Now, knowing that that's your position in Christ, the devil will come to you and the devil will say, "Ah, Chris, man. Wow. I can't believe you just said that. Chris, I can't believe you just thought that. Chris, I can't believe you just did that. You can't be a Christian. Ah, in my daily walk, I've got my flesh and I make mistakes." But positionally, I'm dead, buried and I'm sitting in heaven and already, I'm already there. He seated me together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus because what God did with Jesus, He does together with me. It's powerful. That liberates us because what the devil wants you to do, he wants you to always be afraid of doing something wrong so that maybe God will take your salvation away. It's not that way. Our salvation was never based on us to begin with. And the fact of the matter is, we will do something wrong every day. And while that is a fact, there's another fact that won't change and that is we're dead, buried and risen with Him. And we're seated together in heavenly places. So my standing in Christ is, I'm perfect. I'm sinless. I've been raised from the dead and I'm already in heaven, made a new man in Christ Jesus. Now, go back to Romans and we need to close this up. And we're going to see in Romans, let me go back here. Romans chapter 6, three words that change everything in a believer's life. Watch this now. Verse 5, "For if we have been planted together in the..." There's that word together again, "and the likenesses of His death, we shall be also the likenesses of His resurrection." Knowing this, if you have a paper Bible, underscore the word "knowing." Knowing. If not, if you have notes, you might want to write it down. Excuse me. "Knowing this, that our old man..." Ooh, look at there. There's an old man now. You see, if you died and you were buried with Christ, and now you're seated together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, who's in the tomb? The old man. Who's here? The new man. And all we're doing is waiting for Christ to come back to take the old body and make it new like the rest of us. You see? Meanwhile, we've got to live in this old sinful body. But positionally, it's dead. So our identity, when you put your faith in Christ, there was a heavenly obituary written for you. "Chris lived this long. He did this terrible thing." He didn't believe in me. He denied me all this stuff. But on this day, he died. And he was buried. That old man's gone. That identity has been put away. It's passed away. And now he's got a new identity in Christ, the new Chris in Jesus, not the old Chris in Adam. So our old man is crucified with him. Why? That the body of sin might be destroyed so it can be put away, so it could be raised up when Jesus comes back brand new without sin. And to be made like Jesus. And so the body of sin might be destroyed. Henceforth, we should not serve sin. Watch this in verse 7. "For he that is dead is freed from sin." You have a man who's a slave. And he doesn't want to work. His master comes out there with a whip. Whips him on the back. "Get to work, slave." "Yes, sir, master. Yes, sir, master." And he serves him. And then one day, the master comes out with his whip. And he finds his servant. And he tells him again, "Get up and work, servant." But the servant died that night. And now it's the same master, the same whip. He's still on the same plantation. But he's free from serving his old master. When we put our faith in Christ, we died with him. We were buried. And now we're free from serving our old master. Does the master still crack the whip? Yes. Do we still have temptations? Yes. But the way to overcome temptation is not to say, "Work up the strength. Oh, Lord, God help me." And I'm just going to try to overcome. No, the way to overcome temptation is to know that you died with Christ and you don't have to do that anymore. Knowing. What's the next word? "For he that is dead is freed from sin." Verse 6. "Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him." There's that word knowing again. "Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead doth no more. Death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once, but in that he lives, he lives unto God." Verse 11. Likewise, reckon. There's that next word, reckon. "Recon ye also yourselves to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord." Reckon means consider it done. Consider it done. We know the truth that we died with Christ when he died for us. In knowing that, that empowers us. And now what we have to do is reckon that to be so. Consider it done. I remember the first time I understood this, and the devil attempted me to look at a young woman that wasn't my wife. I was a young man in my twenties, and he'd tend to me, "There's a pretty girl. Look at her!" And where normally I'd say, "Oh, I don't want to do it right. I don't have to. I'm dead." You talk to that old man over there. I'm not interested. Now, was it always that easy? No. Because the reality is, I still live in my flesh, right? But the truth of the matter is this. When I remind myself, "I'm dead. I died with Jesus." And then I reckon it to be so. That's when I begin to walk in the power of the truth that I possess. Faith in our standing makes it real in our lives. Does that make sense? There was a--I got to hurry. I was at an apartment complex one day. I was an auto theft detective up in the Metroplex for the state. I pulled into this apartment complex. I thought, "Well, I'm going to look for some stolen vehicles, see if I want to abandon a stolen vehicle here overnight." I want to pull in. There's this canopy. I kid you not. You can't make this stuff up. There's this canopy set out like a shade that you would normally have a little function under. And this canopy set up, and there's two men out there, and there's a white panel van with the back doors open, cargo van. And there is a Chevrolet Camaro under this canopy, and two men are chopping that Camaro up. Well, they're parting it out. I'm watching them take fenders off, load it up in the back of the van, take this off, load it up in the--and I do like this, you know. I mean, I'm not really seeing this. This can't be so. And at first, I thought, "I got to do something." And at first, my stomach got nuts, because here are two criminals out there, and they look like they own the place. And they're under this canopy, and from the God and everybody, as people say. And I thought, "Well, you know, a little intimidating." And then I thought, "Wait a second. I'm the police. I got a gun. I can put them in jail. They need to be intimidated at me." What was that doing then? I was wrestling with my identity, wasn't I? There was that child that grew up in the grade school and all this stuff, and there was that boyish part of me that was trying to take over, and then there was that other part of me that said, "You know, I have to identify with what I am now and the authority I have now." And so what did I do? I knew. I then reckoned. I considered it to be so. And then here's the next word. If you'll look now in verse 12, "Let not sin, therefore, reign in your mortal body. Don't let it rule over you that you should obey it in the lustre of." Verse 13, "Neither yield," there's that third word, "neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness and descent, but yield yourselves unto God." So I knew. I then reckoned it to be so, and then what did I do? I then yielded to the information on you. I then walked in the information on you. I then walked right up to them, just as bold as they were out in front of God and everybody. And I said, "Hi, I'm Sergeant Fulton. I'm with the state police, and yeah, I'm going to look at this vehicle just a moment here." And of course, they got all nervous. And of course, the vehicle was stolen. And so, but all of that would have never taken place had I did not know, had I did not reckon my identity, and did not yield to what I knew to be the case. This is how you overcome everything in your Christian life. You know, you then reckon, and then you yield to the truth thereof. You then walk in the truth of it. How to overcome temptation? No, reckon, yield. How to overcome fear of falling, fear of dying, fear of God rejecting me? No, reckon and yield to what you know. Every single thing that you face, every challenge you face as a Christian, how do I handle a bad diagnosis that a doctor gives me, and I only have so many months to live? No, reckon and then yield. Yield to the fact that as God raised up Christ from the dead, and you're already there, it won't be long, and He'll raise that body up too, and He'll make it right. No, reckon, yield, three of the most powerful words in the Bible. That will stop. And see you all online next week over there. Don't forget, over there next week.