The Doctrine of Sin..

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com. That's cornerstonerbc.com. Let's open them up to Romans chapter 6. Romans chapter 6.

What I'd like to do this evening is begin by reading the whole chapter with you together. So the context of the chapter is going to be in our minds, I hope. But the verses we'll be considering or meditating upon together will simply be from verses 11 through 14. That's where our brother left off last week. But I'd like to read the whole chapter before us and then by God's grace we will look at looking a bit deeper into verses 11 through 14.

Romans chapter 6 from verse 1. What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means. How can we who died to sin still live in it?

Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ, Jesus, were baptized into his death? We were buried, therefore, with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin."

Now, if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again. Death no longer has dominion over Him. For the death He died, He died to sin once for all, but the life He lives, He lives to God. 11.

So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law, but under grace. Amen.

This is the word of the Lord. The grass withers. And the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord, it remains forever. Well, brothers and sisters, as we are aware, we've been working our way through a series called the Doctrines of Sin, and we've worked our way through nine of the studies, and it was a 10-week study. This is the 10th.

So we're bringing that series to an end this evening by God's grace, and we were in particular looking at the sins that are found in Proverbs 6 from verses 16 through 19. The six sins that God hates, the seven sins that are an abomination to Him. Now, when we look at examining God's Word and when we meditate upon it, it is for more reason than just to attain knowledge. When we read about the sins that God hates that are abomination to him, it's not simply that we will grow in our intellectual understanding of who God is and what he hates and leave it at that. Beloved, that would be dishonoring of God.

Because we know knowledge what? It puffs up. Right? Corinthians 8. But love builds up in that passage.

So when we approach the Scripture, we ought to be approaching the Scripture because of our love for God, recognizing that He reveals Himself through His Word that is intended for the heart of His people. And as we read Scripture, as we meditate, as we consider what the Lord has given us in His Word, we're not only growing in our understanding of who God is, Our knowledge of who God is, hopefully that is a knowledge that resides in our soul, not just in our minds, but also we're learning what God hates and what God loves, so that we can learn to hate what God hates and love what God loves. That's the intention. That we grow in our love for God. That we grow in our understanding of truth, and truth is found in the Word of God.

So our study revealed that God hates sin. Why? It's contrary to His character. It's contrary to His nature. It's contrary in opposing the very thing that God created man for.

Because when God created man, He created him in His own image, in His own likeness He created him. He created man to reflect the character of God, the goodness of God, so that man would be obedient to God and produce works of righteousness. Right? But over and over again, as we've worked our way through the seven sins in the book of Proverbs chapter 6, probably every single week we were reminded of Adam. Because we were reminded that we were all born in Adam.

Every woman, man and child, we're all born in Adam. But not only are we born in a sinful nature, but beyond that, it's more devastating than that. Because we are slaves to sin. Not only is our nature sinful, but we are in bondage. We are in chains to sin.

In fact, the chapter that is before us here in chapter 6, in verse 20, the Apostle Paul tells us, For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regards to righteousness. You see, in Adam, we have a master. We have a king. Sin. And we're told here in verse 20 that as slaves to sin, we are free from righteousness, which means we are only free to do what?

Sin. Only free to do acts of righteousness in Adam, in our sinful nature. If Christ hasn't penetrated our hearts with His love and inserted us into Him by faith, then we are only able to sin and sin continuously. Being free from righteousness means we are unable to be free to produce works of righteousness which are works that are pleasing to God. Because apart from faith, you cannot please God.

That's the devastating story of the story of man. That we are born with a sinful nature, and we are slaves to sin. Only able to sin. And we learned in our study, at least in the first eight weeks, that God's heart disposition towards sin is one of hatred. It's one of abomination.

It's an abomination, detestable. It's loathsome to Him. Now that is a serious indictment that when we say that mankind is only able to sin in and of himself, that's to say that in the state that we are born in, The performance of our hands and the very best efforts of our souls can only produce an ugliness in God's eyes. That's it. That's it.

God can never smile upon a person who is yet an Adam. His heart's disposition can never be one of joy. His heart can never be pleased at the works of those who are in Adam. If you remember, when we looked, when I taught the very first lesson of the first sin, the sin of haughty eyes, I went back into verse 16 and I explained what that word abomination is, to a vowel, to a bar in the original. And beloved, it is a strong word.

It is the strongest word in fact. You see, it's the strongest word the Bible uses to describe the intensity of God's negative heart disposition towards anything. That's what abomination means, because it's such a great offence to God when we sin, that the strongest word in the Bible against a negative word that describes the intensity of God's hatred towards something is used in that word abomination. Beloved, that should bring us back a step to really think about the holiness of God. No, the holy, holy, holiness of God.

Thrice holy. He's so separated from who we are, so clean, so righteous, so pure, that even the smallest of sins, that what we would call the smallest of sins, are an abomination in His eyes. They're disgusting in His eyes. And the only thing in our nature that we are capable of producing in the heart of God is hatred or even a fervent hatred towards sin. And beloved, until we understand the reality of those words, until we understand the holiness of God and his displeasure of sin, we will never really contemplate and grasp the wonder of grace.

And also, if we don't understand those words, we will not grasp God's righteousness and His justice and His goodness in applying His fury and His wrath upon those who are yet in sin. Because unless we understand the wholeness of God, we will see that as unjust. We would see it as unfair. How could one lie warrant the infinite justice of God? We may ask those questions and to be honest, I haven't begun to scratch the surface of God's holiness.

So I certainly haven't plumbed the depth of it. No human being has. However, once we do, if that be the Lord's will that we grow in our understanding of how holy he actually is and how offensive sin actually is in his eyes, then we will begin to see wow. Every sin is worthy of his righteous fury forever. Sin is dark.

Sin is dark. And every man, every man has sinned. In fact, the book that is before us, the book of Romans, the Apostle Paul makes it his agenda in the first three chapters, or almost three chapters to bring that point up, to indict the whole world into sin, both Jew who have the law and Gentiles who don't have the law, to indict them into sin before God. That no one is innocent before God. Everyone is a sinner, no matter where you come from, what ethnicity, what background, what creed, or what color, you're born in sin.

And beloved, the wages of sin we know is what? Death. And so halfway through, or thereabouts, the third chapter of the book of Romans, we see this glorious transition that speaks about all who have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And then from there, we see these beautiful words come out, and it explains and describes for us who Christ is, that He is the propitiation set by God, that by His blood He will atone for the sins of those who will come to believe in Him. Yes, all humanity has sinned.

Yes, all humanity is indicted into Judgment and under the wrath of God, but there is hope. Hope in Jesus. Hope for those who place their trust and their faith in Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ alone. He is the just and He is the justifier. He's the one who accomplishes the work of God.

He's the one who fulfills all righteousness. He's the one that God is pleased in. He is the one that we are united in by faith, and thereby God looks upon those united in the Son, and He has a smile on His face. He's pleased. He's pleased by those who are united in His Son, because He is eternally pleased with His Son.

Beloved, it is by faith in Christ alone that we are forgiven of our sins. It is by faith in Christ alone that we are reconciled to God, of whom we were once enemies. It is by faith alone that we find peace with God. And it's by faith alone that the imputed righteousness of Christ covers us. And we are made right standing before the God of the universe who looks upon sin and unrighteousness with a fervent hatred.

By faith in Christ, he looks upon us and sees us as innocent. It's a glorious, a glorious reality. And so now in chapter six, the chapter that is before us, We see that the grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ, that not only are we justified, as glorious as that truth is, it's a one-off event, remember, so it's not a continual event to be justified. We are justified in Christ one-off. It happens once in history when we are vitally united in Jesus Christ by faith.

We are justified in God's eyes. Not only are we justified, but we also see that we are in us. He produces in us a fruit of that justification, one of which is sanctification. That we are being made sanctified. That is, that by the Spirit of God working in us, He's empowering us to put to death the deeds of the flesh, the passions of the flesh, to put to death sin.

He's making us holy. Basically, He is producing in us a transformation so that we become more and more like Christ. And that transforming power of God that practically brings death to the grip of sin upon our lives is found in Christ. In Jesus Christ. In Christ, through his accomplished work, through his life, through his death, and through his resurrection.

But unlike justification, sanctification, although empowered by the Spirit of God, requires an engagement on our behalf. You see, justification is a work only by God and God alone. It's a monogistic work. God is the one who accomplishes salvation in us. God is the one who justifies us by faith in Jesus Christ.

That is purely a work of God. We are rebels, sinners. He breaks through, brings life, opens our eyes, gives us faith to embrace Jesus Christ. But sanctification, on the other hand, sanctification requires the engagement of the person. Still, by faith in Christ, the power of God working in and through us, however, it requires that we be obedient to the Lord.

It's not by our own efforts. Don't get me wrong. It's not by the performance of our hands. It's not by the goodness of our hearts. It's none of that.

It is by faith in Jesus Christ. Because, beloved, the righteous live by faith. Romans 1.17. You can almost say that's the thesis statement of the whole book, I would say.

The righteous live by faith. But the faith is never alone. It's necessary, or it necessarily, I should say, produces fruit pleasing to God. And James is very clear on that. How can you have faith without works, right?

He says that's a dead faith and he doesn't save. By faith we're enabled to produce a righteousness approved by him. Now we have to make sure we don't mix up the righteousness, the language when we speak of that. Because although that the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit in us, for those who have been united by faith in Jesus Christ, are actually producing works of righteousness, pleasing to God, that is the Spirit's work in through us, we have to not mix that up with the righteousness of Christ that justifies us. Because we are saved through faith in Jesus Christ, and it's His righteousness that covers us.

A perfect, blemishless righteousness. The perfect obedience to the Father's will. The perfect obedience to the law. It's His righteousness that justifies us or covers us. So we are right standing before God, not based on the work of our hands, not based on the sanctifying work through the Spirit in our lives, but we are justified by God and we stand rightly before him because of the righteousness of Christ, because of the atoning death of Christ, because of his blood that covers us and atones for our sin.

We have to get that right because if we get that wrong we're in heresy. But in sanctification, and as I said, sanctification is a product or a fruit of the justified life, there is still a genuine righteousness. So it's not like a righteousness of God. No, it is a genuine righteousness that works in and through the believer. The Spirit of God is working through the believer to produce some fruit that are pleasing to God.

And that is because by virtue of our union in Christ. And so there is a real righteousness that is imparted by God, or infused, you can almost say, by God, by the Spirit of God, that is formed and is worked out in the life of a believer. Because remember, we weren't saved to sit around and do nothing. We were saved into good works, which God the Father had preordained for us to do. So faith is not dormant, it works, it produces.

But beloved, the main point I want to make this evening is that faith only works in union with Christ. In union with Christ. Just remember that. In Christ. In Christ.

A great exercise for you, if you have a bit of time through the week, would be to read a book. I mean, even a short book like the book of Ephesians or Colossians. And as you read through one of those books, just note how many times the Apostle writes in Christ, with Christ, through Christ, union with Christ. You'll be pleasantly pleased, believe me, because the Christian faith is summarised by being in Jesus Christ. Not apart from him, not only looking to him, but actually united in Jesus Christ.

Even the chapter that is before us here, in chapter 6 of Romans, we will find in Christ's language no less than seven times in one chapter. And this is a chapter on sanctification. So we know that in Christ we are justified. But beloved, it's also in Christ that we are sanctified. All the spiritual blessings in the heavenly realm are found in who?

In Christ. And sanctification is one. Because beloved, the Christian faith from beginning to end finds its substance wholly and fully in Jesus Christ, the author and the perfecter of our faith. So if you are in Christ, if you have come to trust in Jesus Christ and be united in Christ, then the ambition of your heart and the purpose of your life ought to be to be like Christ. Right?

To be like Him. That's the goal of our hearts. That's the work of the Spirit working in and through us. That's sanctification. To be like Christ.

And it's in this chapter that we are commanded to be busy in bringing about that Christ-likeness. Chapter 6. So it's needless to say that in chapter 6 we do find imperatives. Imperials are do's and don'ts. We do have instruction for the Christian to do certain things and to don't do other things.

Because we haven't been saved, as I said earlier, to sit back and just accept things happen to us. No, there's an engagement in sanctification. Justification is a work of God purely. Sanctification in Christ, the work of the Spirit in and through us, but it requires an engagement and obedience on our behalf. And that we know is a work of the Spirit of God that is working in and through us.

So there are imperatives in this chapter. There are do's and there are don'ts. But listen, listen very carefully to this. Those imperatives, those commands, those instructions are not given until the doctrine of Christ is taught to the heart by the Apostle Paul. That's incredibly important.

That is a very, very important thing to recognize what, under inspiration, the Apostle Paul is doing in this chapter and does elsewhere as well. Actually, it's a hallmark of the gospel authors or the biblical authors to do this. If we get this wrong, we'll end in very serious error. Legalism on one side, or antinomianism is the other. We have to be careful that we get this right, because the imperatives do come.

The do's and don'ts do come. I've heard people say, you know, there's no imperatives in the Bible. How can there be no imperatives? Of course there is. We're besieged to do many things.

And they do come in this chapter, but not before we understand or Paul makes us understand our standing in Christ. Not before we recognize who this Jesus is and what he has done for sinners like us on our behalf. You can see this so clearly even in the small letters, like the letter of Ephesians. You might know what Paul does there. Six chapters.

The first three. The first three of those six chapters, the Apostle Paul is telling us who this Jesus is. He's telling us that faith comes by, that salvation comes through grace and by grace and through faith in Christ alone. He tells us, as I said earlier, that all the spiritual blessings in the heavenly are found in Christ and He does all things for the praise of His glorious praise. He tells us that we are united in Christ, that the two, that is the Gentile and the Jew, they become one in Christ.

The dividing wall has been broken. That is the mystery of ages, of the Old Testament. It tells us so much about this Jesus, about your salvation, about what He's done for you. Doctrine, statements of truth, and then the last three chapters, four, five, and six, now He gives us exhortations. Now go do it.

Now live it out. First, He gives us the standing of who Christ is, and then He, once you know that, once you've got that in your mind and in your heart, once you understand it, Then He says, now you're in a position where I can tell you to do and to do and don't do. Because until then you're not going to understand. Until then you'll have the wrong motivation to do or don't do. You need to understand who Christ is.

It's almost like you're saying, this is your Savior. This is your salvation. This is what He's done for you. Understand what He's done. And now that you understand, now that you know, go live in the light of this truth.

It's a beautiful thing that he does. We have to get this point because, beloved, our faith is in a real person who has done remarkable things for us. And so now by faith in Christ, the Christ that we know, that we have knowledge not only in the mind but in the heart, the Spirit of God empowers us to holiness through a genuine spirit-wrought knowledge of what Christ has done for us. In other words, the power of God working in and through us works in and through us based on our knowledge of what Christ has done for us. If our minds and our hearts don't know what Christ has done for us, we're almost like crippled Christians.

We're almost like impotent Christians. We need to first and foremost know Christ, understand what he's accomplished in his life, death, and resurrection. And then once we understand what he's done for us, the Spirit of God empowers us to produce good spiritual fruit. And that comes by faith, because it's impossible to please God apart from faith. And faith, apart from the object of faith, is absolutely useless.

And the object of our faith is who? Christ. It's Jesus Christ. Get this wrong, get this whole thing wrong, and you're on a one-way street to destruction and despair. Beloved, get this wrong, and the alternative is you'll end up looking for yourself, at yourself, for fruit.

And guess what? When you look inside, you will not find anything satisfying. Nothing. Take your eyes off Christ and what He's done. Look to self.

You won't be satisfied with what you see. And then you'll end up wondering again and again, am I even saved? They're the questions that you'll ask if you continue to look to self and not look to Christ. Doubts will begin to creep in and you become a mess, believe me. Your ability to produce true, abiding fruit hinges upon not your own efforts, but on your genuine, genuine understanding of who your Saviour is and what He has done for you.

And that's exactly why the Apostle Paul begins a chapter on sanctification, not with do's and don'ts, I'll come, but rather he begins with taking your attention, my attention, of course the original audience, the Christians of Rome, he takes their attention to look to Jesus Christ. Beloved, I can just end there. That's the Christian faith. And I've said this before, and I've said it over and over again. You know, the Christian faith is very profound, but it can be simplified to that.

Look to Christ. In Christ. In a way, when I sit down with someone, my job is simple. It's simply to direct their gaze to Jesus. Every time.

Every single time. Just direct your gaze, your heart, to Christ. Because in Christ, all the spiritual blessings and the heavenlies are found. Our Christian journey begins with Christ. He is the essence.

He is the emphasis. So beloved brothers and sisters, if that's how here we begin in Christ, then what makes us think that the journey continues without him? I want you to think about those words. What makes you think the journey continues without him when he began in Christ? He justifies in the beginning what makes you and I think that we are sanctified apart from Him, that we can kill sin apart from Him, that we can produce works of righteousness apart from Him.

Beloved, Jesus Himself said in John 15 that apart from Me you can do zilch, nothing. And that was in the context of fruit bearing, that chapter, chapter 15. Now that sounds so obvious, right? It sounds very obvious to us, but I wish it was. He only knew how many Christians struggle unnecessarily because of this.

They'll confess with their mouth that Jesus is Lord. They understand that He is the righteous Lamb of God, the Son of God, eternally, who came into this world and took on a reasonable body and a reasonable soul, true human nature. They live the perfect life. He died a sacrificial death and His atoning blood covers their sin. He was buried and He resurrected from the dead, now sits at the right hand of the Father.

And they understand and they understand that it's by faith in this Jesus that they're justified. And they can articulate the gospel as good as the Reformers. But beyond that, their lives are powerless, joyless, and absolutely hopeless, spiritually speaking. Why is that? Because they don't walk by faith, but by sight.

For some reason, after coming to a saving knowledge of Christ, so many take their eyes off Him and place their eyes on self. This is the horrible thing about this sinful nature. It continues to drag self into the piece. They become fruit inspectors. searching their own fruit, their own performance for assurance.

Am I producing enough fruit? Is my life looking enough like Christ? Am I, am I, am I, am I? And before you know it, they sink deeper and deeper and deeper and deeper into despair. Because they're basing all things upon their own performance and not upon Christ.

Apart from Him, beloved, you are in the flesh. And apart from faith, you cannot. Please God, remember. Beloved, you know what you see when you look at self? 100% of the time if you look into yourself on your own flesh instead of Christ, do you know what you see?

Let the Apostle Paul answer that question in Romans 7.18. He says, For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. Nothing? The Apostle Paul says, nothing good, because apart from Christ, remember, you can do nothing.

He's speaking about works of righteousness. Nothing good. Brothers and sisters, you won't find the power to overcome sin. You won't find desires for righteousness. You won't find a heavenly hope.

You won't find any certainty that you are saved or that you are indeed a child of God by introspection. You won't get it. At least you shouldn't. That's the lie of our age, you know. Listen to your heart.

Look within. That's what you hear. Beloved, do we know what the Bible says about the human heart? It's wicked and deceitful. It's wicked.

It's deceitful. Who can understand it? The prophet says. Look to the heart. No.

No, no, no. Don't look to the heart because that is a road for certain despair. Look to Christ. Remember, in Christ. in Christ.

Read his word. Meditate upon what he has accomplished for you. Trust in his promises. Abide in his love. No truth and the truth will set you free.

Our brother last week, in explaining the first section of Romans chapter 6, he did so with the three Ps. I hope you remember what the three Ps were. Do you remember? Does anyone remember what the three Ps were? What was number one?

Yeah, one of them is the presence of sin. the power of sin and the... And the penalty of sin. And in summary, the dominating, enslaving power of sin has been shattered in Christ. So you have the power of sin and you have the penalty of sin.

Remember that. And the power, the dominating power which enslaves us by human nature. We're told that Christ has crushed. That dominating power is no more. You're no longer slaves to sin and unrighteousness.

Now you're slaves to God. And the penalty of sin, Christ has bore that on the cross, because the wages of sin is what? Death. Jesus allowed and He submitted to death, that He would partake in the human experience of death. But He's holy, He's perfectly righteous, He's God in flesh, death could not hold Him.

And so he rose from the dead. And now his new life is a life that death has no claim on and sin has no claim on. We're told this in the chapter here in verse 9 and verse 10. Life is not subject to death. not subject to sin, the life of Christ, the new resurrected victorious life of Jesus Christ.

And that life, beloved, is for those who come and believe in him because he died on behalf of his people. But the presence of sin Remember our brother said last week, the presence of sin is still around. We look around, it's still there. Now I can tell you, look around, turn the TV on, look at the advertisements, just walk in a shopping center, you'll see it. But I want to say, no, look in you.

This is a time where you can introspect, not for assurance, but to see that we still have ugliness in us. We still have sin abiding within. We know our thoughts. We know our thoughts. We know our actions.

We know the inclinations of our sinful nature. We know that the remnant of sin is still in us. That sinful nature, the flesh, still abides within. We know this for sure. We also know That although sin is real and it's serious and it must not be taken lightly, that our strength and our hope and our endurance and all that we look forward to is found because of what Christ has already done and accomplished upon that cross.

Some things we have already enjoyed. like the breaking power, the dominating power of sin, the penalty of sin, and some things we are yet to enjoy in glory when he comes back and redeems his church in glory and takes us to be in a place where the presence of sin is absolutely no more. Why? Because the Lamb of God takes away the sin of the world. Beloved, we are also in this life.

Although the sin is present, we are also called not to live as defeated, joyless Christians without hope. We are called to live in the newness of Christ's life. And if you remember last week, the newness of Christ's life is a victorious, resurrected life that has broken the shackles and the dominating power of sin. And it's a life that's dealt with death and the penalty of sin. And that is what we have to have in our hearts.

and in our minds as we live in this exile where sin is actually present. And that's why the Apostle Paul begins with statements of fact about who our Lord is before he utters a single word of command. Because he knows, unless we have come to know what Christ has done for us. Unless that reality is secure in our hearts, we will never be empowered to live holy lives. Our sanctification depends upon our eyes being fixed upon Christ and knowing and perceiving what Christ has done for us.

That's how the Spirit works in and through us and produces in us the power to overcome practically sin that has lost its binding or dominion effect upon us. It's by looking to Christ. He ought to be in the forefront of our hearts and the forefront of our minds. Remember, in Christ. In Christ.

Let me read for you in the passage that we have before us, Romans 6, from verse 3. Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too may walk in newness of life. See, baptism is brought up here. You might think it's a spiritual baptism, but I believe it's a spiritual baptism that is spoken of, but the physical baptism that we've all come to know and we've all witnessed is actually pointing to the spiritual baptism in Christ.

The physical baptism is a visual demonstration of the reality that has already taken place in our hearts, that we have died with Christ, we have been buried with Christ, we've died to sin, we've died to unrighteousness with Jesus Christ. And then we were resurrected with Christ. And that comes next. You think about the resurrected life from verse five. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.

We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Hear that? Seven. For one who has died has been set free from sin.

Now, if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again. Death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died, he died to sin once and for all. But the life he lives, he lives.

God. are what Gloria is empowering and transforming truths in a word, Christ has done it all. Christ has done it all. In Him, my salvation is completely secure. And my union with Him by faith means all that He's accomplished in His death and in His resurrection is now applied to me by faith.

So I'm the benefactor, if I've truly come, to be united with Christ. I'm the benefactor of His death and the benefactor of His life. It's applied to me. He's the source of my power. He's the source of my life.

And in him, I drink and drink and drink from the limitless well that never runs dry. That's the beauty of our union with Christ. And until, beloved, we understand these truths, until we understand the work that he's accomplished, that the father has been satisfied, that the dominating power of the enemy destroyed, your life is secure in him. Unless we understand these things by faith, then our lives will be impotent, absolutely impotent, devoid of the transforming power to bring death to sin that is yet present in your life. Whether the sin comes from the flesh or from the enemy or from the world, whatever it is, you'll be impotent to kill it unless, unless you know what Christ has done for you.

Beloved, if that is the continual state of someone's soul, that they're always defeated, that they never look to Christ, that they never understand what He's done for them, that they never meditate upon these things and just continually look to self, look to self, look to self, and never to Christ, then that may be evidence that they were never united in Him in the first place. And that would mean that the wrath of God remains on that person. And that's a scary thought. Because it is impossible to be united in Christ and continue to abide in unrepentant sin. I'll say that again.

It is impossible to abide in Christ and to continue to abide in unrepentant sin. That's to abide in death, not to abide in life. That point is clear in Romans chapter 8. For if you live according to the flesh you will. But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you will.

Beloved, having the power to wage war against the sin that is present in our life is contingent upon, is dependent upon a true heart knowledge of Christ and what He has done for us in our justification and what He's continuing to do for us in our sanctification. That settled assurance of the work is what the Spirit of God uses to transform lives and to break the grip of sin in our lives. It's all in Christ. In Christ. In Christ.

Look to Christ. That's why the inspired text before us goes from a declarative making statements of truth about this Jesus and his work and what he's done for sinners like us who trust in him by faith. Namely, through his death and his resurrection, to now instructive or imperatives, which are the things that Christians should do in union with Christ, but looking to Christ. In union with Him, looking to Him, now we are called to actually do things. And this begins in verse 11.

So, you also must consider, the Apostle says, You also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. You also must consider. You see, this is something that the Christian needs to do, isn't it? This is where it begins. You must consider.

It's something that you need to do. Consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus is what we're told. that the word consider can be translated resolve or conclude. So that is a mindset that we must have, which is rooted or predicated in truth. And that truth is that something massive has taken place in our lives.

that we are to consider or to be resolved in the very being of our soul that Christ has died to death, has died to sin, and has taken care of the problem. We are to consider these things. Beloved, if we've had an encounter with God, then that would be an encounter, you would remember, an encounter that permeates our whole being, our minds, our hearts, everything. You've heard the truth. You've claimed to believe in the truth.

Now your heart and your mind, Paul is saying, must be resolved in acting according to the truth. So what is that truth? That you are dead in your sin and alive. Dead to sin and alive in Christ. That's a positional statement.

Dead to sin and alive in Christ. Remember that, in Christ. In Christ. Dead to sin and alive in Christ. So in other words, sin is dead to you.

Christ died to sin. In Him, sin has no dominion over your life. That's a fact. Do you believe it? Do we believe?

Because that's the real question here. Do we believe? Have we come to the conclusion in our hearts and our souls? Are we resolved to believe that we are now dead to sin and alive in Christ? Because the Apostle Paul is saying, before I can move on and tell you what else you need to do, that needs to be a reality in your heart.

Have you come to the acknowledgement, to the realisation, that indeed, by virtue of your union with Christ, that you are now dead to sin? Remember that death to sin doesn't mean you are sinless. It means that the bondage and the power and the dominion and the rule and the reign of sin no longer is over you. You are no longer in shackles to sin. And the life you live now is the resurrected victorious life of Jesus Christ.

Is that the statement of your heart? Is that the statement of your mind? Do you believe it? Do you believe that sin's dominion is broken? Beloved, these are very important questions.

And as I say these things, you can meditate to think, do you believe that sin's dominion has been broken? That means are there any repetitive unrepentant sin in your life that you've just been defeated over and over and over and over again and you just cannot seem to overcome? Would that be consistent with the statement that you are dead to sin and alive in Christ? Do we believe that we are dead to sin and alive in Christ? Do we believe that the victorious life of Christ that we are now inserted into, that life, sin has no claim over?

Do we believe that the life that we've been inserted into through by virtue of union in Christ, that death has no power over that life? Do we believe that? Because, beloved, if we believed that with all our heart, soul, strength and mind, then we would live our lives consistent with that truth. Because sin is not dominating over us. We are not in bondage to sin.

Christ has done the work and if the life of Christ flows through us, then we must believe that his life is a life that has broken the dominating power of sin and now enables us to practically overcome the sins of our lives. We still have sin in our lives. I'm not saying we become perfect. We don't believe in sinless perfectionism, although I will say that is the goal. Because Christ's likeness is the goal, and Christ is sinlessly perfect.

And if his life is flowing through us, if his desire is flowing through us, then what is our attitude towards sin? Do we believe that that life is empowering us to slay, and to mortify, and to kill sin? Or are we submitting to sin that doesn't have rule in our life, if we are indeed in Christ? So the glorious truth that the Apostle Paul gives us in the beginning, before he begins to tell us of the imperatives, is a truth that we need to have reside in our hearts and place and trust Christ by faith, looking upon the author and the perfecter of our faith, believing that he has accomplished the work He's broken the power of sin, he's dealt with the penalty, and we deal with the presence of sin by looking to him and being reminded constantly of what he has done, trusting that he's working in and through us by his Spirit to modify the sins of our flesh, to destroy the passions of our flesh. So in other words, the Apostle Paul is saying, do you believe these great and glorious truths?

If so, live like it. That's what he's saying. Live like it. Oh beloved, these words are so convicting to me as they are to you, I hope. Because then we have in verse 12, he says, let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body to make you obey its passions.

Now, our brother explained for us last week the therefore. The therefore is always there because it's predicated or rooted in something that happened before. The therefore, right? So, let not sin reign in your mortal bodies is predicated upon the therefore. And the therefore is, if you've considered or if you've concluded in your mind that you're dead to sin and alive in Christ, now don't let sin reign in your mortal body.

It doesn't belong in you any longer is what the apostle is saying. And that word reign is like a majestic word, it's a kingly word in nature. It's as if to say, sin is seeking to reside in you as king. Sin seeks to rule over you. That was the case, wasn't it?

Wasn't that the case when we were yet in our transgression and our sin? That sin was dominating our life, it had a dominating power over us? But hasn't it been broken? Hasn't Christ broken that power of sin? Are we still in bondage to sin?

Or has the blood of Christ smashed that to pieces? You're no longer in chains to sin, to do according to the passions and the flesh, passions of the flesh, the desires of the body. Those days when sin sat on the throne of your life, they're now over. You now have a new king on the throne of your life. A new master, a new ruler, the righteous one, the name who is love, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Not sin. Listen to the language that is being used. And it's actually a fearful language. It says, let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body to make you obey its passions. You see, sin doesn't simply want to creep in and make residents unnoticed.

Creep in a little corner and just, don't mind me, I'm not even here. No, it wishes to rule you. It wishes to dominate you. It wishes to reign over you. And the Apostle Paul is saying, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, don't let that happen.

Don't let that happen. And the question you need to ask is, who is my king? Who rules in my life? Am I going to allow unrighteousness to rule? Or am I going to allow the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, the true King of my life to rule?

Who's my King? Who has the right to your heart? Who has the right to my heart? You used to belong to sin. Those chains were unbroken at one stage.

You could do nothing but sin. We said that early on in the study. But now you're being plucked by faith from the kingdom of darkness, inserted into the kingdom of the Son. Jesus being not only your Saviour, but your King. He's now enthroned over your soul.

Paul is saying, but sin wants you back. Sin is a sore loser. The prince of the power of the air or the god of this age, he's angry. He wants you back and he doesn't want to be your friend. He wants to destroy.

He wants to reign over your life. But now, beloved, there's a difference. You had no say before. But now, if you have truly, in faith, come to believe in Jesus Christ as Lord, as Saviour, if you've been united in Christ, now you do have a say. See, before you would submit to the cruel taskmaster of sin, but now you have a say.

This is why Paul's writing this. He's not writing this just to fill the parchment. He's writing this under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, because he's saying, now you have a say, because, hear this, it is a possibility that sin will come back in and rule over you. That's a possibility. But you say that the dominion of sin has been broken.

Yes it is. In Christ it has been. But if you allow sin to come back in and to rule, you will submit to it. Even though it's a lie. Even though it's deceiving.

It's deception. Sin doesn't have power over you, but it masquerades. The enemy will masquerade as though he does. He comes back in force. He says, I want to dominate you.

I want to dominate you. If your master has already shattered the power of sin, the dominating power of sin, your chains have been broken. So don't believe the lie of the enemy. Fix your eyes upon Christ. Acknowledge what He's done.

Live in light of that. And trust the Spirit of God is working in and through you. And then look to the enemy and tell him he's a liar. He's all bark and no bite. Because the dominating power of sin is broken if we are indeed in Christ Jesus.

And now live according to that truth. Live in that victory. Your marching orders have been given by Christ who is your new master, your king. And those marching orders are, defy the demands of your old defeated master and resist his advancements to take rule over your life. This is permission to disobedience.

Disobey. Disobey your old master. Defy his commands. Put to death the passions of sin and unrighteousness. You've been empowered to do so by the Spirit of Christ, by the work of Christ.

And certainty, certainly I should say, certainly don't present your members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness. Verse 13. You know, instruments here, the word instrument has been used six times in the New Testament. And apart from when it's used here twice in verse 13, it's always translated weapons. That's an interesting take.

Don't offer your members, your body parts, as weapons of unrighteousness. I was meditating upon that and I thought, wow, what's a weapon used for? A weapon is used to be offensive, right? And a weapon is used to attack. And if we look at this, don't use your members, the faculty that God has given you, the body members, your eyes, your ears, your nose, your mouth, your hands, your heart, your feet.

If we're using those weapons, those things, the members of our bodies, as weapons of unrighteousness, then we're using them as weapons against righteousness. And who is righteous? Beloved, this is actually a scary thing, because when we sin like this, we use our body members in direct opposition to God. And now we're using weapons. We're opposing God, the one we claim to love, the one we claim to have salvation in.

And Paul is saying, don't present your members to sin as instruments, as weapons of unrighteousness. But we went through Proverbs chapter 6, and we saw some of those members of our body and how they could be used for unrighteousness. We saw how that can all take place. And we looked at that and we thought, this is horrible. And every sin of those sins looked so bad.

And when we bring in the fact that there were abomination in God's eyes, Maybe in our minds we thought, no, those sins are reserved for the unregenerate. Those sins are reserved for the reprobate, for those who are so steeped in sin and unrighteousness. They're not sins that are of people who are Christian or people who know the Lord. Why is Paul writing this to us? Why under inspiration do we have these words before us?

Do not present your members to sin as instruments or weapons of unrighteousness, beloved, because it's an option. You see, I said before that even as Christians, We can still submit to the enemy, even though the enemy has no dominion over us. And when we do and we go into unrepentant sin, then we're actually opposing God. Think about how offensive that is to God. Think of how horrible that thought is.

That in our sin, we are directly opposing God. Beloved, I would say, let the Spirit of God speak to you and speak to me in this passage. Let's hear what is being said. Because if any of us realise that we are indeed in or slipping into sin, unrepentant, habitual sin, if there is sin in our lives that we know of that we are masking or pet sins that we're covering over, if there are sin in our life that we have not dealt with, we need to deal with that sin because that is direct opposition to God. That is a direct opposition against God.

And there is one who is faithful and just in Christ Jesus to forgive our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Praise be to God. But how do you deal with that sin? It's not by trying harder not to sin like that. You see, trying harder is what opened the door to sin in the first place.

Because when you try harder, you're not looking to Christ. You're looking to self. And when you look to self, you open the door to sin. You know why? Because you're basing everything on your own performance, on your own strength, on your own ability.

Look to Christ. Your strength is in Christ and what He has done and His power working in and through you. Press into the Lord. If you want victory over sin, press into the Lord. Remind yourself over and over again what He has done, what He has accomplished for you.

Embrace Him. Love Him. Commune with Him. Train your heart to be always in love with Jesus Christ. Be close to Him.

He will give you the power to overcome sin by His indestructible, resurrected, victorious, resurrected life. Press into Christ. Don't look to yourself. You have a choice. And either do that.

where you can continue in sin. And that's the scary thing, that we're able actually to choose to remain in sin. And if we are children of the living God, then we are going to sit under the judgment or the discipline of God. Beloved, the Apostle Paul reminds us of our position in Christ before he speaks of any imperatives simply because he knows. Under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, he knows how feeble we can be, how foolish we can be, because we are like sheep and we're easily, easily gone astray.

Remember the Pharaoh? The Israelites were not long gone from Egypt before he came. He became remorseful of letting Israel leave. He said in Exodus chapter 14, what is this we have done that we have let Israel go from serving us? Israel is gone.

God performed miraculous wonders, 10 of them. And then they departed from Egypt and Pharaoh became remorseful. And he said, what have we done? We've lost our slaves. Let's go get these guys.

Do you remember what happens? He pursues them. And he pursues them to get all his slaves back. And if he can't get them back, he'll destroy them. But the slaves are no longer, or I should say the Israelites, are no longer slaves to Pharaoh.

They are now belonging to a new master, and their master is Yahweh. He's the one who saved them. He's the one who broke the bondage, the chains. He's the one who brought them out of bondage and is bringing them into freedom, into a real vibrant relationship with the God of the universe. Yahweh is fulfilling his promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the promise that they all knew.

And they knew with the power of God that he who is with them is more powerful than the Pharaoh who is against them. But when Pharaoh came and pressed into them, there was a distance, they're back against the Red Sea and Pharaoh was before them. Do you remember? Do you remember what they experienced? This is Israel.

This is the people of God. They ought to have known that the dominion of Pharaoh is broken. They've been freed from bondage. But when their old master comes and presses into them, they were absolutely terrified and were told that they cried out, let us go back to Egypt and serve the Egyptians. After all you've been through, all that you've experienced.

the goodness and the power of God, the mighty hand of God that plucked you out of the darkness under slavery. You knew no rest. Seven days work in bondage to an oppressive leader, an oppressive king like Pharaoh, an unrighteous, unjust man. And you saw the power of God. You saw the mighty hand of God.

It was demonstrated before your very eye. And even now, as you stand, the cloud is before you. The manifest glory of the presence of God is before you. And yet you cry out at the first sign of difficulty. We wish we were back into slavery in Egypt.

Beloved, that's so scary. They capitulated. What do you want with Egypt? What has Egypt ever offered you? Now you've seen the other side, and it's so much more glorious than Egypt.

Why would you want to go back to Egypt? You know, we can look back at these ancient people, and sometimes in our minds, because we see of all the evil, we can think, this people was wicked and they were faithless, right? Faithless people. But you know, in Hebrews chapter 11, and this is an incredible thing, we're told that they crossed the Red Sea by faith. Now, I don't understand how all that works, to be honest.

Because many of them died in the wilderness. Many of them perished because of unbelief. And they were given to us as an example of what? Examples not to do. But we're taught in Hebrews chapter 11 that they crossed the Red Sea by faith.

Beloved, because their eyes were taken off God, because they no longer looked to Him by faith, but now they were walking by sight, they capitulated and broke. You know why? Because what they saw was scary. They saw an army coming towards them and that was scary. Now he who is with them is more powerful, more mighty, and he's one who keeps his promises.

But their eyes were taken off God. They looked at who was coming and they went, whoa, this is scary. And they end up wanting to even go back into Egypt to serve an evil Pharaoh than to continue with the Lord. Beloved, that's a very scary thing. And when we look back at these people, we ought to not think that we are any better than them.

But my counsel to you and I is 1 Corinthians 10, 12 that says, therefore let anyone who thinks he stands take heed, lest he fall. Because it doesn't tell, because I can tell you, it doesn't matter how many wonderful memories you've had with the Lord. It doesn't matter how faithfully you have served Him in the past. It doesn't matter how much power He's given you to overcome sin and unrighteousness in your life, if you allow yourself, even for a short season, to walk away. to not have Him as the focal point of your heart and your soul in all that you are.

If you allow yourself to be distracted by this life and the business of life, and His glory and His salvation no longer marvels and brings wonder to your soul, if you're no longer looking to Christ for all things, for power to overcome sin, if that is no longer the case, beloved, you won't be long before Egypt becomes very appealing in your eyes. and you'll slip back into the sin that placed Jesus Christ on the cross to shed his blood for. We have to be careful to look to Christ, to embrace Christ, to believe in Christ and to live our lives in faith of Christ. Be reminded of his promises. Listen.

Listen to what he has said in his word. Understand, meditate what he has spoken, what his apostles have written. Come to know Christ in a more deeper and more intimate way. Understand what he has done upon that cross and what his resurrected life now means for you. Understand truly what this breaking of the dominion of the power of sin actually is for your life.

And then next time you're confronted with temptation, next time you're confronted with sin, next time you're confronted with the enemy saying, bow to me, you'll know, hey, I'm not going to bow to you. I have a new king and I love my new king. He's righteous and he's glorious and I will bend my knee only to him. Paul says, don't let sin reign. Don't let sin rule in your life.

Beloved, the only remedy, the only remedy to not allow sin to rule in your life is to look to Jesus Christ and to know what He has done for you. The command turns into a positive and it goes from being don't allow and don't submit and don't allow your members to be given as instruments or weapons for God unto unrighteousness. to now he says that you ought to positively allow your instruments or your whole self be submitted. to God as instruments of righteousness. You're members to God as instruments of righteousness.

That is the whole of yourself, the whole of your being ought to be submitted to the Lord Jesus Christ. Acknowledging that your union with Him is absolutely everything. Beloved, how do we overcome sin? It's not by trying harder. It's not like by looking inside our hearts and seeing whether we've got any goodness in there.

It's not like, it's not by looking at the fruit and saying, we're okay. You know, I produced some fruit of righteousness a month, two months, six months ago. So I'm okay. I must be a Christian. No.

The only way we can destroy sin, bring sin practically in our life to destruction, is abiding in Jesus Christ. To love him, because it is a matter of affection and love. Because when you sin, you love something more than Christ. Because you know that He is your Savior and He is all for holiness and righteousness and goodness. But when you sin, you choose unrighteousness above righteousness.

It's a disposition of the heart. When our heart is disposed or predisposed to love Him, to press into Him, to commune with Him, to be constantly reminded of who He is and what He's done for us, then our hearts will be only concerned with pleasing Him. And then sin around us is now, we are now empowered to bring to death, to mortify the sins of the flesh one by one and do it over and over and over again. Its appeal weakens every single time. We have to believe that Christ has given us the power to overcome sin.

We have to believe even habitual sins, even sins that we've been struggling with maybe years. We have to believe the power of God is able, through our union with Christ, to give us overcoming power of that sin, because no sin has dominion over God's people. Because no sin has dominion over Christ. Death has been overcome and that's the life we live in. So beloved, I pray for you and for me that we would continually press into Christ and trust that only in Christ are we able to overcome sin and live lives that are indeed pleasing to God.

Let's pray.