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Fred Evans

They Have Crucified the Flesh

Galatians 5:24
Fred Evans May, 12 2024 Video & Audio
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In the sermon titled "They Have Crucified the Flesh," Fred Evans addresses the theological topic of the believer's union with Christ as it pertains to mortification of the flesh and living by the Spirit, drawn primarily from Galatians 5:24. He argues that Christians must recognize both the internal conflict between the Spirit and the flesh and the necessity of actively crucifying their sinful desires. Evans supports his points through various scriptures, including Galatians 5:24 and John 6:37, illustrating that true believers, through divine election, redemption, and conquest by Christ, have crucified their sinful nature, abandoning all hope in personal merit for salvation. The practical significance of this doctrine lies in the encouragement it provides believers to rely solely on Christ for growth in holiness, fostering a process of sanctification that is contingent upon looking to Jesus rather than self-effort.

Key Quotes

“They that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.”

“When we come to Christ, we crucify all hopes of being saved by the flesh.”

“To crucify the flesh and the affections of the lust is not ever done by law or determination.”

“If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.”

Sermon Transcript

Auto-generated transcript • May contain errors

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Now, if you take your Bibles
and turn back with me to Galatians 5. Audrey, would you give me
a water, please, babe? Thank you. Galatians chapter 5. I'll let her get that before
I get started. Our text is going to be found
in verse 24. 24. Thank you, sweetheart. Our text says, and they that
are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and
lusts. If we live in the spirit, let
us also walk in the spirit. Now again, for reference, the
apostle is speaking to those brethren who have stood fast
in liberty, as well as those that have fallen. He says that
there are marks of those who have been born again to the Spirit,
and we went over these, that the first one is the inward conflict. The flesh lusting against the
Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh. These two are contrary
one to another, so that what? You cannot do what you would.
The flesh could not do what it would, and the Spirit could not
do what it would. It's a constant struggle within
the heart of every believer. And he mentions these works of
the flesh. And again, to emphasize this,
he is causing the church to internalize these. Not externalize them,
but internalize them. These lusts of the flesh are
our lusts of the flesh, not somebody else's. They're ours. And they're
manifest, aren't they? They're manifest in us, these
things. And these are the things that
the believer despises and loathes about himself. In this part of the covenant
in Jeremiah, I believe it's Jeremiah 31, he says this, and they shall
loathe themselves. Either Ezekiel or Jeremiah, he
said, they shall loathe themselves. You loathe yourself? I do. I loathe this old man. I loathe
his sin, despise him. We despise him because he's still
in us. He's still there. But there's also conversely something
else that takes place because we have a new nature which is
the fruit of the Spirit. Every believer not only has the
old nature of sin that can do nothing but sin, he is given
a new nature that is holy, created after God in true holiness that
cannot sin. And out of this produces these
fruit of the Spirit. What? Love. Love for Christ. Love for one another. Joy. The
joy of the Lord is my strength. That His joy is to save me. That's
my joy. That gives me joy is that His
joy is to save me. Peace. A peace that passes understanding. He gives every one of us because
Christ obtained it. Faith. Gentleness, which is kindness. Goodness. Faith. Faith is the
fruit of the Spirit. We know this. We didn't believe
because of ourselves. We believe because of His grace.
For by grace you are saved through faith, and that, what's the antecedent
of that? Faith is not of yourself. Faith is a gift of God, not of
works. Why? Lest any man should boast. That's why. So we have faith, and this faith
is given to us. is continual. It fluctuates,
doesn't it, just like our love, just like our joy, just like
our peace. They're fluctuating. But I'll tell you this, every
believer has it. Every believer has it. Mekness. I didn't get
to go over this very well, but mekness is humility with backbone.
That's what it means. Humility. It's a constant evenness. Though the world around you is
falling apart, A meek man is constant, steady, trusting God. Moses is an example of that.
Moses was not weak standing before Pharaoh, but he was steady. Why? He trusted God. He trusted God. That's what a meek man is. And
temperance is moderation. Against such there is no law.
And this is the last thing we went over last week, is that
we who are born again, we belong to Christ. We are belonging to
Christ. They that are Christ. Now, I wrote this out. I'm going
to go back just a second now and talk about the fruits of
the Spirit, because I read something this morning that I thought was
really helpful in this, as to how we're to view these fruits
of the Spirit. Robert Hawker says this, The
child of God, though distinguished through distinguishing grace,
is made a partaker of an unspeakable gift. Yet there is nothing of his which he can own. It is all received,
all free, unmerited, and on his part wholly undeserved. And hence
the child of God who looks at those fruits more than as fruits and overlooks the cause in the
effect. Taking comfort from evidences
instead of Christ alone has moved off a firm ground. It's looking at Christ second
hand when we look at him through our evidences. You see if you
evidence of his love, joy, peace, these are evidences, aren't they?
Are we to look at the evidences or the one that produced them?
A lot of people want to see their evidence. Man, do I love Him
or no? And they start looking at their love. They start looking
at their joy. They start looking at their peace.
For what? Evidence. No, that's just the result. Look
to the cause. And you'll find joy and peace
and love. Keep looking to Christ. Don't
look at Him secondhand. So that's how we're to view these
fruits of the Spirit. Now, last week again we say that those
that are Christ, There are three ways that we are Christ. First
of all, remember we were His by election. We were His by election. God chose us. God gave us to
Christ. God, the Father, purposed that
we should be saved by Him, made holy by Him. Therefore, you belong
to Him by the election of the Father. You belong to Him in
this, that Christ purchased you. Christ purchased you. He bought
you. He bought you with His own blood. When Christ came into the world,
listen to this. This is the difference between a false Christ and the
true Christ every time. The true Christ is successful. False Christ is not successful.
Any Christ that tried to do something and didn't do it, that's not
Christ. What Christ did is He actually redeemed us. He actually
purchased us. He actually satisfied the justice
of God for all that the Father gave Him. And so confident, he
said that, all that the Father giveth me shall come to me. And
him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. For I came
down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him
that sent me. And this is the Father's will which has sent
me, that of all he hath given me, all he hath given me, I should
lose nothing. And he did not lose anything.
He finished it. He bought us lock, stock, and
barrel, where he is. We came into the world we weren't
like. We didn't know that. Matter of fact, we rebelled against
it, didn't we? We came into this world, we were dead in trespasses
and sins. But by the grace and power of
God who chose us, by the grace and power of God who redeemed
us, the Holy Spirit came and conquered us. Conquered us. By the grace and power of the
Spirit, He showed us our sin. He showed us our need of Christ.
Let me ask you, have you ever seen your need of Christ? Do
you need Christ? Or is it a take it or leave it
kind of situation? I need Him. I'm a sinner. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation that Jesus Christ came to save one
group of people, sinners, of whom I am chief. And so when he conquers us, we
believe on him, we trust in him. And then the apostle gives a
mark of all those who belong to Christ. Now that's a good
question. Do I belong to Christ? Do I belong to Christ? "'Tis
the point I long to know," John Newton said, "'often causes anxious
thought. Am I His or am I not?' A lot of believers often feel
doubts and fears. Well, there is a mark by which
we know that all who belong to Christ, because they all have
done this. Listen to this, what Paul says,
"'They that are Christ by election by redemption and by conquest. What have they done? They have
crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. Those that have belonged to Christ
have crucified the affections and lusts. And secondly, look
what he says, if we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the
Spirit. So they that live by the Spirit
will also, what, walk in the Spirit. So only these belong to Christ. This shows this truth that all
who really belong to Christ, been conquered by Christ, have
submitted themselves to Christ. Submitted themselves. surrendered
themselves. I remember Don, he was a history
buff, and he had this painting of Appomattox, The Surrender
of the South. And they all had stacked their
arms, they put their arms and weapons, and they stacked them.
You see General Lee submitting his sword. Why, he was surrendering. Surrendering. When a man comes
to Christ, he surrenders all to Christ. He surrenders all
to Christ. He becomes his master. His master. This means that we had the means
of our former master has been put off. He's been crucified.
Jesus said no man can serve two masters. Those who live after
the flesh will perish. What does that mean, live after
the flesh? Yes, we know those that live in adultery, fornication,
uncleanness, lasciviousness, those who live in those things.
Paul said, I told you before, I tell you now that they're not
going to inherit the kingdom of God. Remember that he said
in the Corinthians, and it says, where are some of you? And the
only difference is, you were washed, you were sanctified,
you were cleansed. The only reason is because Christ
saved you. There's no difference between you and them. And it also means we have put
off the flesh of religion. Not just put off the flesh of
those lusts, we have put off the flesh of our former religion.
Work salvation. Those who live by the Spirit
will never perish. We live by the Spirit, we will
never perish. And such submission, such dominion
of Christ in the heart of His people will yield the same result
in our text. All who belong to Christ will
without doubt bear the mark, bear the fruit of the Spirit, both in our hearts and in our
conduct. Both in our hearts and in our conduct. Now, what does this mean in our
text? They have crucified the flesh
and the infections and lusts. What does this mean, crucified
the flesh? Well, first of all, I'm going to tell you what it
doesn't mean. It doesn't mean that we're free from sin. Well, I've
crucified Him and now I don't have to worry about that sin
thing anymore. He's crucified. That's not what it means. It
doesn't mean we're free from the presence of sin or the desire
of sin. I know that false religion has
this idea that if you can crucify some sin, And you can just put
it away as though it'll never come up again now. You've done
it. That's not true. John says this, if we say we
have no sin, what? Receive ourselves, truth not
in us. If you say, don't tell me that. I don't want to hear
that garbage. You're just being dishonest with
yourself and with me. And believe me, there are people
that actually believe that. They actually believe they don't sin.
I say, put a camera in their car during rush hour. And tell
me. Yeah. And this does not mean
that we literally beat or mortify our body. That's not what it
means. To crucify. And this was another thing that
the church had taught for many years. You could whip yourself
into submission. If you had an evil thought, you
would take a literal whip and you would just beat yourself
and then that sin would go out. Doesn't work. Doesn't work. I like what David did. David
in Psalm 39, you read it later, I've not got time for it. David
said, I'm not going to sin with my mouth. And the scripture says that it
boiled inside of me until it exploded. Isn't that what happens
to you when you try to suppress sin by your determination? I'm
just not going to. And the next thing you know,
you keep thinking about it, thinking about it. What are you going
to do? You'll do it. Why? It explodes on you. There is no carnal means to stop
the old man of sin. There's no carnal means to stop
him. You can chain him, you can put him in an isolation booth,
you can put him in solitary confinement, and you still can't stop him
from sinning. That's because sin is not just
outward, it's inward. and it affects the whole head. Do you believe it's about your
nature that it's completely sick? That there's no healing
the old nature? You know that, right? There's
no way to heal it. It's not, again, that which is born of
flesh, Jesus said, is what? Flesh. That's just all it is. It'll live flesh and it'll die
flesh. The whole head is sick. The whole heart is faint. The
heart is deceitful and desperately wicked above all things. Who
can know it? Now to have been crucified with
the flesh, I'm going to tell you what it means now. It means
three things. Three things. First of all this, they that
have crucified the flesh, it means that we have had our old
man crucified when Jesus died at Calvary. We by faith see and
know that our old man was crucified with Christ when he was crucified. We know that our union with Christ
was so vital, so close, that as our representative man, he
accomplished both our righteousness by his obedience and our justification
by his death. You see, when Christ lived in
righteousness, I was so in union with Him that I was living a
righteous life. His righteousness is mine. And the same thing is true about
His death. When Jesus Christ bore our sin, listen to this,
in His own body on the tree, The Apostle Paul said that Christ,
that God hath made Him to be sin for us. Who knew no sin? Why? That we might be made the
righteousness of God in Him. When Christ died on the cross,
listen, my old man was crucified with all his lust, with all his
affections toward the things of this world. The sins that
I have not yet committed have already been crucified with Christ. What a joy it is for us to belong
to Christ, to know this. that the old man in all our guilt
has been crucified. Therefore, God will never charge
us who are in union with Him. Back in chapter 2, this is exactly
what Paul said, I am crucified with Christ. This was his hope. is that this
old man that still resides in me has already been crucified. Nevertheless, I live. Now here
I am, I'm breathing, I'm living! I have spiritual life in me,
and yet what? It's not of me. He says, I live,
yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life that I now
live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God. How do I live? How am I living
now? By faith of the Son of God, because
of His faithfulness, because of His obedience, because of
His crucifixion, I live! Who loved me and gave Himself
for me. This thought should bring peace
to the heart of every believer. I'll tell you this, my sin troubles
me. My guilt troubles me. The thoughts and affections of
this natural man that just pour out of nowhere, just comes out
of left field, you're not even thinking about it, and all of
a sudden, there it is. What a peace to know that he's
already been dealt with. His sin has already been punished
in Christ. That song we sing, when peace
like a river attendeth my way, When sorrows like sea billows
roll, whatever my lot, you've taught
me to say, it is well, it is well with my soul. My sin, oh
the bliss of this glorious thought. My sin not in part, but the whole
was nailed to the cross. I bear it no more. Praise the
Lord, O my soul. Behold you who belong to Christ,
you have crucified the flesh. How? By our union with Him. When He was crucified, so was
I crucified with Him. Secondly, we have crucified the
flesh, it also means that we have crucified all hopes of being
saved by the flesh. When we come to Christ, we have
crucified all other hopes, and all our hope of salvation
is resting on Him. It is the affection and lust
of the flesh of everyone to be saved by the flesh. That's our
natural tendency. It is our natural tendency to
be saved by something we do. You can see it. It's amazing.
It doesn't matter if you look back at some of the old religions. You can look back to the Greek
religions, the Roman religions. You can look back even further
than that, the Egyptian religions. You know what they all had in
common? All their gods were different. But listen, their salvation was
dependent upon something they had to do to please those people.
I don't care which God it was. And so it is true today, in so-called
Christianity, is that, you know, yeah, you have still some part
to play in this. That God is doing everything
He can to save you, and that you have to exercise some volition
of will, some exercise of your works, in order to make His salvation
effectual. There's no difference between
that and worshiping Zeus. No difference. They're all trying
to earn. Why? Because this is natural
to us. And when we come to Christ, we
crucify all hopes of ever being saved by this flesh. I crucify everything that I might be saved only by
Christ. So when we're conquered by Christ,
He sets up His throne and we bow at once to His perfect person.
His perfect work. There's my hope. Is that your
hope? My hope is His perfect person.
That He is both God and man. He has to be God and He has to
be man. In order to represent me, He
has to touch both. He has to touch God and man.
He did that. He is the God-man. What a perfect
person. And not only that, what good
would a perfect person be if he didn't have a perfect work?
His work was perfect in every way. Is there anything missing? When Christ provided righteousness,
is there any righteousness missing? Anything you got to make up?
Anything you need to add? Nothing. It's perfect. What about
His death? Anything you need to sacrifice?
Anything you need to offer that's going to add to His? Nothing. It's perfect. Why? God said it
was perfect. God said, I accept this offering. It's only offering
God is except, is Christ. Perfect person. He's all our
salvation. And therefore, we immediately, what? Abandon all
other hopes. I'm going to give you an illustration
of this. This was so beautiful in my mind. I hope it solidifies
what I'm trying to say about this. You remember when the Apostle
Paul was a prisoner and he was headed to Rome? A storm was coming. And the Lord
Jesus himself appeared to the Apostle Paul and he said, listen,
except everyone remain in the ship, you will all perish. Storm's coming. And here's the result. Everyone
had to stay in the ship. If one person took a lifeboat,
and tried to escape, not only would the person in the lifeboat
perish, everybody in the ship would perish. And so Paul said this. And you
know, those Roman soldiers who guarded him, they saw some things. They believed some things. When
he said that, they immediately cut all the lifeboats. So no one had the opportunity
to try to find some way else off that ship. When we come to Christ, the Spirit
of God cuts all other lifeboats off. Listen, all my eggs in one basket.
Jesus Christ is all my salvation. I'm not looking for anything
else. He's everything. Sink or swim,
Christ is all. Christ is all. There is no other
lifeboat. Why? I have cut lifeboats. There's no other hope. He's all
my hope. He's all my stay. He's all my
acceptance. He is all my salvation. He's
all my wisdom. He's all my righteousness. He's
all my sanctification, and He's all my redemption. He is all
to me. This is what it means to crucify
the flesh, is that we crucify all other means of acceptance
with God, but Christ. Christ is all. Is that true of
you? Listen, if you had another way,
the flesh would take it. You know, when the Lord preached
to those people in John chapter 6, He preached that message I
just told you, All that the Father hath given me shall come to me,
Him that cometh to me I shall... Preached that message, right? Message
of sovereign mercy. He said, no man can come to me
except the Father which sent me draw him. Except you eat the
flesh and drink the blood of the Son of Man, you shall have
no life. And what did they do? They all
left. Why? They had some lifeboats. And he turned to his disciples
and said, will you go away also? Notice this. They said, Lord,
to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal
life. Isn't that true of us? So that's
what it means to crucify the afflictions and lusts. It is
to cut off all other hopes but Him. Is that true of you? He's all my hope. The Apostle
Paul, go to Philippians chapter 3, the Apostle Paul exemplifies
this in his own experience here. Philippians chapter 3, look at verse 7. Paul says this, but what things
were gained to me. What is he talking about? He's
talking about his religion. He's talking about his zeal,
his righteousness. Now listen, if you were to look
at the Apostle Paul before he became an apostle, before he
was saved, I'll tell you what, he lived an exemplary life. Could you match his zeal? You talk about zealous for what
he thought the glory of God was, he was zealous. Righteous, you
couldn't outwardly pick anything that he had done wrong. And yet
what does he say about those things? He said, those things
that appear to be gain, I count them as loss, nothing. They were no value to me whatsoever. And so it is true of us, isn't
it? All things, if we have love, joy, peace, meekness, temperance,
long-suffering, faith, gentleness, goodness, if we have all those
things, are any of those things added
to Christ? Do we add any to say, okay, well
now I'm closer to Christ because I've done this, or I'm closer
to God because I've done this. No, we count those as loss. Nothing. Why? I count those as loss for
who? For Christ. I want Him. I want
Him. I've got to have Him. Yea, doubtless
I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge
of Jesus my Lord. for whom I have suffered the
loss of all things, and do count them but..." He said, I did count
it as loss, but I'm counting them as loss
right now. I do, right now, count them but
dumb for this purpose, that I might
win Christ and be found in Him, not having mine own righteousness,
which suffered loss. This is a man who has crucified
all other hopes and pinned all his hopes on Christ. You belong
to Christ. I know that's true of you. You've
cut every lifeboat of law, cut it off. Self-righteousness, cut
it off. Religious works, cut it off.
My hope is Christ. He is my continual hope, constant
hope. And thirdly, to have crucified
The flesh and the affections and lust is this, it is to daily,
constantly mortify the deeds, thoughts and lusts of the old
man of sin. That's what it is. It is to daily
mortify the deeds of this body. I've said this many times because
I identify with it. J.C. Philpott wrote to remember
Self is the greatest enemy. I'll read you what he wrote,
because it's just brilliant. The Lord gave it to him, and
it affected my heart. He said, this serpent, self, can so creep
and crawl, can so twist and turn, and disguise himself under such
false appearances that it is often hidden from ourselves. Self creeps in, and you don't
even know he's doing it. You think it's humility when
it's really pride. Isn't that true what he just
said? You cannot do the things that you would. What you think
is humility, what it is is just really pride. You don't even
know it. That's how deceptive self is, who is the greatest
enemy we have to fear. who is the enemy we fear, he
who we carry in our own bosom, your daily, hourly, ever-present
companion that entwines himself in nearly every thought of your
heart, and sometimes puffs up with pride, inflames with lust,
inflates with presumption, and sometimes works under the feigned
humility and fleshly holiness. God is determined to stain the
pride of man's glory. He's determined to do it. He
will never let self wear the crown of victory. It must be
crucified. It must be denied. It must be mortified. Now this self must be overcome. And the way to overcome self
is by looking outside of oneself to Christ. It's the only way. Again, mortifying the deeds of
the body is not chaining yourself to a chair so you won't do something. Mortifying the deeds of the body
is not afflicting yourself with pain. It is simply this. It is to look outside yourself
for strength to overcome yourself. It is to look to Christ and behold
the love and the joy and the peace that He has accomplished
for us. It is the love of Christ that
constraineth us. This is how it's mortified. It
is simply by looking and beholding Christ. Believer, do you not long to
be free from this vile self? Then we must, by the power and
grace of God, daily overcome him by keeping our eye of faith
on Christ. That's it. It's a simplistic
thing. People want more. They say, well,
there's got to be something more than just looking to Christ.
No. No, this is how you mortify him.
This is how you put him down. This is how you kill him, by
looking to Christ. Why? Because he wants to do everything
but look to Christ. You know why faith is in the
middle of the fruit of the Spirit? You know why it's there? Because
it's the hinge of all of it. You can't love without faith,
you can't have joy without faith, you can't have meekness or long-suffering
without faith, you can't have temperance without faith, gentleness
without faith, goodness without faith. Faith is the hinge on
which all of this rests. So to crucify the flesh and the
affections of the lust is not ever done by law or determination. Now listen, I'm not saying that
it's passive. It's not passive. It's very active. Our faith is
not passive. It's active, isn't it? What good
is passive faith? It's simply, James said it's
not real faith. Remember when I talked to you
about kindness, I said this about kindness. Kindness, if you feel
kindness in your heart towards somebody, but don't do anything,
is that kindness? No. So it is like that with faith. If it's real faith, it will be,
it'll get out on you. If it's real faith, it'll get
out on you. Now when it gets out on you,
do you look at what you've done? No. Faith never looks at what it
does. Faith is always looking to Christ. And so faith in Christ
alone means to constantly crucify and mortify the deeds of the
body, to believe on Christ. Listen, he says it is to walk
in the Spirit. If you walk in the Spirit, what's
the conversing of that? You shall not fulfill the lust
of the flesh. What is it to walk in the Spirit?
It is to walk by faith. Isn't that the fruit of the Spirit?
Faith. It is to walk in those things
that God produces in us. No matter how much faith we have,
we must not be fooled to believe They will ever be free from this
monster. Not till he's gone. When I thought of the two natures
of man, this occurred to me, the two thieves on the cross.
What a picture of the believer here. You've got Christ in the center.
Christ dwells in every believer. And yet in every believer, you
have both thieves. You have the one who is crucified
with Christ and trusts Christ, believes Christ, and looks to
Christ. And yet you still have that other
man who is crucified, but yes, he still spits and kicks constantly
at the things of God. Isn't that true of you? Though the old man is crucified,
yet he from the cross still, like the thief, curses God and
rails against Christ. May God then the Holy Spirit
keep us. Go back to your text, look at
this. Paul then puts it back on the one who's
going to be able to do this. He says, If we live in the Spirit,
the word in, I think better translated by, if we live by the Spirit. Isn't that how we live? By the
Spirit. You that are believers, you're alive now, aren't you?
You're alive, you're still alive. Well, how are you still alive?
By the Spirit. The Spirit of God quickens you,
the Spirit of God keeps you. If we live by the grace and the
power of the Spirit, he says this, let us also walk by the
Spirit. Let us also walk by the Spirit. To walk by the Spirit is simply
this, it is to continually look to Christ, not look to the flesh. Not look for any power or strength
from yourself. It is to be totally dependent
upon the power and strength of Christ to overcome the flesh. So then we have crucified the
flesh, we have cut off all the vile hopes and affections And we constantly live by faith. We who mortify the flesh, we
live by the Spirit and walk by the Spirit. Paul says this, we
are his workmanship, aren't we? You're the believer, you're his
workmanship. Created in Christ Jesus. Unto good works, listen,
which God before ordains you to walk in them. The works that
you do, listen, they were already ordained that you should do.
Isn't that great? Yet it is the believer's responsibility
to continually mortify the deeds of the body, to put off the old
man. Put him off. Put him off. Put on the new man,
which is created after God in true holiness, continually, constantly
putting him off. Are you ever done with this?
Not till he's dead. Not until he's dead. And so it is, and I want you
to see this, to mortify the flesh, isn't it just reasonable? I'll close with this, go to Romans,
Romans 12. Paul spent 11 chapters talking
about the grace of God, mercy of God. 11 chapters, till he
got to the crescendo of it all, that all salvation is according
to the election and sovereign decree of God. And he gets down now to where
the rubber meets the road, where the believer concerning his conduct
in this life. And he says, I beseech you, I
beg you, brethren, by the mercies of God, because
of the 11 chapters I just wrote to you, because of all that I
just said to you, because of the grace of God. Listen, present
your bodies a living sacrifice, holy. Well, who made it holy? God did. Your sacrificing it
doesn't make it holy. Well, I'm getting to a place
where I'm ready to sacrifice myself because I'm getting holier.
No, no, no. He made it holy. present your bodies a living
sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God. All right. Honest with yourself. How much of the Word of God did
you retain this morning? How much of your heart was set
on Jesus Christ? Yet it is acceptable. You mean this? Yeah, it's acceptable
through Him. It's acceptable because of Him.
But it is acceptable. Your sacrifice is acceptable. And listen, it's just your reasonable
service to do. If we gave all that we have to
the worship of Christ, it would never be enough, never be enough. A debtor to mercy alone, a covenant
mercy I sing, a fee with his righteousness on of his person
and offering to bring. You see, we are acceptable, and
our service is acceptable. Is it not reasonable then to
give it? A lot of times we don't want to do something because
we think, well, it ain't enough. Well, it's never enough. It's
never enough. But through Christ it is. Through
Christ it is. It's just your reasonable service
to do these things. Why? Because we belong to Him. Isn't it reasonable for a slave
to do the will of his master? Yea, rather, is it not reasonable
for a man who was a slave and now made a son to love and honor
the Father that made him one? It's just reasonable, isn't it? So they that are Christ's, by election, by redemption, by
conquest, what have they done? They have crucified the flesh
through faith. looking and seeing he's already
been crucified. Second, we've crucified all other
hopes but Christ. And thirdly, we continually,
constantly mortify the deeds of this body. How? By looking
to Christ. By walking in the Spirit. Which is what? It is to believe
that Christ is all. Daily. I do pray God bless us and teach
us this. Set this in our hearts. Let's stand and be dismissed
in prayer. Go ahead and dismiss, please,
brother.
Fred Evans
About Fred Evans
Fred Evans is Pastor of Redeemer's Grace Church. Redeemer's Grace Church meets for worship at 6:30PM ET on Wednesdays and 11 AM ET on Sundays at 4702 Greenleaf Road in Sellersburg, IN. USA. To learn more or to connect with us, please visit our website at https://RedeemersGrace.com, or our Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/redeemersgracechurch. Pastor Evans may be contacted through our website and also by mail at: Redeemer's Grace Church, PO Box 57, Sellersburg, IN 47172-0057

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