If you will, turn back in your
Bibles to the book of Romans chapter 6. Romans chapter 6. And we will be commencing with
our series in the book of Romans. I'm sorry, Romans chapter 7.
Romans 7 is where we are today. And we will be commencing with
our series in the book of Romans. And we are at a pivotal point
in that series, in chapter 7, where the Apostle Paul is addressing
The same audience he drew attention to in chapter two, verse 17. And this is affirmed for us in
Romans chapter seven, verse one, where the apostle says, no, ye
not brethren for I speak to them that know the law. So the audience
to whom Paul is speaking right now, and you can turn that down
just a tad Scott, just a tad, bring it down a tad. Um, the
audience to whom Scott, uh, to whom Paul is speaking is not
you. It's not me. So in order for
you to benefit from this discourse, you have to see yourself as a
third party. He's not speaking directly to
you, but the application is. I want you to view the apostle
speaking to a group of people who are trying to get their hands
around a theology of which is foreign to them. a foreign theology
that they are trying to get their arms around. Now, they are ostensibly
Christian, but they are struggling through some issues that emerge
out of a clear proposition of what God has done for us in Christ. So you and I, for a moment, get
to stand as a third party, although shortly we will slide right on
into the pocket and be forced to contemplate how it applies
to you and to me and what the apostle has been doing ever since
the opening of chapter 5 where he has He has taken the opportunity
to address the question that they raised. Now, the question
that these Jewish brethren, whom Paul says are under the law,
they call themselves Jews and they rest in the law, that's
Romans 2.17, you call yourself a Jew and you find your rest
in the law. That's the idea of an individual
fundamentally who basically identifies himself as having a right standing
with God based upon their keeping the law, based upon their good
works, based upon their kind deeds. This is the person to
whom Paul is speaking. And they've lived their whole
life fundamentally believing this, that I hope that one day
my good works outweigh my bad works and that God would accept
me into heaven. Now, Paul knows these people
well because he was one of them. And whenever you have been redeemed
by God's grace and brought out of a particular kind of pit,
now we all have pits, but when you have been brought out of
a particular kind of pit, it is your responsibility to be
hypersensitive to that particular pit, so that the people that
are still struggling in that pit can benefit from one who
used to be there. This is why Paul is taking his
time and I am calling your attention so that you can be expository
listeners, not passive listeners, but expository listeners. Knowing
when you are being spoken to in the second person or in the
third person versus someone else. At this time we get to Take the
comfort of knowing that Paul is speaking to our Jewish brethren
who have really struggled with how Gentiles find themselves
in a place of favor and grace with God based upon nothing that
they have done and when Paul has explained this gargantuan
reality that God has saved those Gentiles and Freely by his grace
through the merits of Christ obedience alone Apart from any
work that those Gentiles could have done They are struggling
with this question that emerged out of chapter 6 verse 1 They
said then what shall we then say? Shall we sin that grace
may abound? because what the Jew really struggled
with was the motivating factor of behind a scandalous grace
that justifies sinners so freely that they stand before God with
all the perfections of Christ's righteousness, not only as if
they have never sinned, that's only half the equation. If they
have perfectly obeyed God's law for all eternity so that when
God looks upon them They see the very righteousness of Christ
in them and they are so fully and totally liberated from everything
from which the law of God could have even remotely condemned
them or Condemned them to a hell for all eternity you and I have
rejoiced have we not in the doctrine of justification and We have
rejoiced in the fact that Christ is our propitiation. And because
he's our propitiation, we stand before God justified, righteous,
and therefore free to go. Isn't that right? The gospel
is a gospel of liberation, isn't it? It's a gospel of freedom,
emancipation. The Spirit of God says to the
soul who comes to know Jesus Christ, you are free to go. and
being free to go, that is being in a state of liberty, all of
God's people are free men and women. The question now is, how
shall we live since we have been liberated from the bondage of
sin, from the curse of the law, from the tyranny of the devil,
from the slavish passions of our own carnal flesh? How then
shall we live? The legalists would say, or the
person that grows up in church and feels like they're better
than others because they don't smoke, curse, drink, and other
stuff, they don't ever tell you what they do do. But I'm just
saying, I'm just saying, religious folk have a way of tallying up
the good over against the bad. And I got a feeling they've got
whiteout too. You know, on some days when the
ledger is lopsided and it's a little bit more bad than good, you use
the whiteout, hope God is busy, so that your tally can always
work out in your favor. But for the believer who understands
what grace really is, He knows, she knows, they know that they
never have to get up in the morning and worry about the tally. It's
always the same. Perfect in Christ. Righteous
in Christ. Holy in Christ. Sanctified in
Christ. Justified in Christ. Washed in
Christ. Glorified in Christ. All the
promises of God are yes and amen in Christ all the time for every
believer. He doesn't have to look at the
ledger. He has already passed the test. He's already gotten
100% on his exam because he had a fella that traded places with
him, let him sleep in, and he took the test for him and gave
him the benefits. You guys are hearing me, right?
So the legalist or the self-righteous person who does not understand
grace cannot wrap their arms around what is it that motivates
a person? What is it that causes a person
to then live for God and love God and obey God and serve God
passionately out of the right motive if it's not for merit? That's a great question, isn't
it? This revolutionary concept and foundational gospel truth
of justification really does drive us all and compel us all
to ask the question, what's going to motivate you and motivate
me to love God and to serve God and to sacrifice ourselves for
God now that he has totally set you free? That's the question
we're going to massage. We're going to massage that because
that's what Paul is doing. He's developing that and therefore
strengthening his argument around there is a basis for which God's
people serve God passionately, consistently, sacrificially. And we need to know what it is.
Well, the first thing we may discount is that we don't serve
God for merit. We don't serve God on the grounds
of pursuing righteousness so that God can say to us, we are
approved. We don't serve God on legal grounds,
do we? We don't serve God to get his favor, do we? But neither
do we serve God on the basis of, and I want you to get this
now, some abstract, impersonal concept of grace that has nothing
to do with a relationship. We don't serve God for merit.
We don't serve God on the grounds of legalism. We don't serve God
climbing some hill of law-keeping by which accruing some good words
then God lets us into heaven. But neither do we serve God on
the grounds of an impersonal, abstract concept of grace that
has nothing to do with a relationship. I said that intentionally so
that you could get it. There are those who have an understanding
of grace that amounts to nothing but an abstract, impersonal concept. And that won't work either. The Apostle Paul did not establish
his argument for justification by faith alone, in Christ alone,
apart from words, so that we could conclude that you and I
are saved by merely an idea, or a concept, or a theory of
grace. Paul's argument is this you can
be sure that the people of God who are saved Purely by the justifying
work of Christ will also love God serve God Sacrifice themselves
for God for all of their life and then end up in the presence
of God Not because of a concept but because of a person Stay
with me now Stay with me now. This is very important. What
Paul is about to introduce to his Jewish brethren is the idea
that God saved us in order that we might have a real, vital union
with Him. The key to the security of the
saints is their union with Jesus. The key to the security of the
saints and the assurance of the saints is their union with Jesus. So whereas Paul has dealt with
justification on a legal forensic term in chapter five, and whereas
he is dealing in chapter six with arguing for the effect of
that justification, where he told us that we have already
died, remember that? We are dead to sin. We are dead
to the law. We are dead to the flesh. Therefore,
sin shall have no dominion over you that were under the law,
because you're not. You're under grace. He's told
us that we died. And the man that has died, Romans
chapter 6 verse 6, is free from sin, correct? But now how shall
we live? We live because of our union
with Jesus. Now I want you to understand
how he's going to develop that argument. He's going to develop
the argument of our union with Jesus within the framework of
one of the most ancient and Christ-centered analogies of all the scriptures. Do you know what that is, ladies
and gentlemen? It's marriage. marriage the analogy that he's
going to use now in Romans 7 to continue to develop this argument
of the Sufficiency of God's grace to keep the people of God is
the analogy of marriage You and I have already bought into the
assumption that if you're truly born again You're only born again
because you're in Christ, right? And if you're truly born again,
you live because you're in Christ, right? You live in Christ Christ
lives in you you and I live as a consequence of our union with
Christ. Is that true? I Now watch this, is not then
union equivalent to marriage? Is not marriage nothing but another
way of saying in a formal covenant form the two have become one
flesh? Am I making some sense? What
Paul is about to argue then is it's impossible for the believer
to live a life that is assumed and anticipated by the legalist
where he is free to just live like he wants to because he was
liberated to be brought into union with Christ. And see the
text now is about to unpack this Paul is about to spread this
doctrine out and make it make it absolutely Practical to all
of us. That's the title of our message
as we work it through is the gospel to the Romans Redeemed
and what married to Christ? When a person asks you what does
it mean to be saved? It means to be redeemed and it
means to be married to Christ It means not only to be redeemed
but to be redeemed and married to Jesus Christ For the child
of God, understanding this, watch this now, that the child of God
has been redeemed by Jesus Christ and then also married to Christ
by the very work of that person who redeemed you is designed
for you and I to live a life of gratefulness because he redeemed
us. And then it's designed for us
to live a life of absolute enthralled wonder because he turned around
and said to the same person he redeemed, will you marry me?
Now you know you didn't deserve redeeming, let alone being married
to the Redeemer. And yet this is exactly what
Christ did. He not only redeemed our hell-bound
soul from the pit of hell, from the darkness of sin, from the
control and tyranny of the devil, from the consequences of a fallen
world status so that you were on the slave block, He bought
your soul. And then he turned around and
said, will you marry me? That's good. That's good. You better get a hold of that.
And see, this is where the believer sins when he does not daily rejoice
in the Lord. And again, I say rejoice. When
he does not daily boast in the Lord. And again, I say boast
in the Lord. Because your status is permanently
one of having been purchased, paid for and then married to
the Lord Jesus Christ. That ought to excite you every
time you think about it. Therefore let's consider our
first point as we work it through point number one you were purchased
by Christ purchased by Christ What that means is that you were
a debtor? a debtor to the law, and because you were a debtor
to the law, you were sold under sin. This Paul will expand in
the latter part of Romans 7, will he not? He will deal in
Romans 7 with what the consequences of sin does to a person that
is enslaved to sin. But you and I know what slavery
to sin is about. You and I were born and conceived
in sin, were we not? We came out of the womb speaking
lies, did we not? We came out of the womb with
our fist in God's face, and we turned every man to his own way,
did we not? We didn't ask God when we came
here, so God, what would you have me to do? At best, we were
telling God what we wanted Him to do. All our life long, we
lived in rebellion to God. That's how we came out. And we
accrued debt after debt after debt of sin against God. You
and I are debtors to the grace of God. When God has redeemed
you from the curse of the law having been made a curse from
you now How did he do this now watch this romans chapter 6 verse
18? Declares to us how you and I
were made free look at verse 18 of chapter 6. Are you there?
Being then what made free from sin stop right there Being then
made free from sin That was a radical, radical transition on the part
of the sinner from a state where you were a slave to sin to a
state where you are now the property of the one who redeemed you.
And I want you to mark how this works. You were made free from
sin at one time and you became the servants of what? Righteousness. Go back to our point. I want
you to see our point. Here it is. Point number one. Here it is. You were purchased
by Christ and therefore you were a passive participant. Do you
see that? Let me help you now. You didn't
participate one iota in being redeemed from your state of sin. When you were redeemed from your
state of sin, it was a unilateral act on the part of God. He looked
at you, he said, you are a slave. And he determined to deliver
you from your slavery all by himself. He didn't come and collaborate
with you, y'all didn't negotiate, y'all didn't talk it through.
He didn't lay a contract out in front of you and said, would
you sign on the dotted line? No, he came, he saw you, he redeemed
you, he purchased you while you were a passive participant in
a radical process of redemption. This is what we call the grace
of God. Now, it's going to get worse, so hold on. It's going
to get worse. Point number B, you are also a passive participant
in the process of becoming a slave of righteousness. What I mean
by that is God didn't take you out of the slave market of sin
and then tell you somehow to make yourself a slave of righteousness.
The same work of passive power that overcame you and changed
your situation and brought you out of bondage to sin was the
same power that actually changed you and made you a slave of righteousness. You know what we call that? The
grace of God. It's an act of grace to take
a hell-bound sinner and now make them an object of mercy and grace
in Jesus Christ. And you know what? True believers
know that. Don't you know that? Don't you know that it was all
of God? That you had nothing to do with
it? You had nothing to do with it other than contribute the
sin that you laid before God all the days of your life. I'm
making some sense. So now this is very important
as we work through the text because what Paul is doing Paul is going
to remind his Jewish brethren of which some of them are also
Beneficiaries of this grace they have not simply let go of the
law yet He's about to teach them brother. You got to let this
law go for a number of practical reasons one of which if you continue
to hold to the law in a covenantal sense you will be found an adulterer
and You gotta let it go. You can't be married but to one
man. Isn't that right? You can't be married but to one
man. We'll work that through. But what he is saying is the
individual that redeems you is the individual that puts you
in a state of righteousness. That's Romans 6 18. A state whereby
now you are owned by righteousness. You are the possession of righteousness. You are the product of not only
an act of righteousness but a person of righteousness. Now is that
not our God? Is our God not called the God
of righteousness? Is he not Jehovah's-seeking you?
Is he not our righteousness? And so you and I are in a state
of righteousness having been redeemed, emancipated, liberated,
freed from the curse of the law. It was an act of grace. It's
like you woke up one day free and you knew you had nothing
to do with it. Now you are on a positive pattern for it. And
I want to show you how this works. Because what's taking place in
verse 18 is a principle of ownership.
The one who purchases you owns you. The one who purchases you
owns you. You guys got that logic? Watch
this. In other words, don't call yourself a Christian if you're
not willing to also call yourself a slave of Christ. Don't call
yourself a Christian if you're not willing to live like a slave
of Christ. Don't say he bought you and then
you're running around free to do whatever you want to do. Am
I making some sense? 2 Peter 2, verse 19, here's the
principle of purchase. What happens when an individual
is purchased? While they promise them liberty,
this is a description that Peter is yielding concerning false
prophets and false teachers who teach a false grace. They promise
liberty. Now, this is another axiom of
truth we might as well lay down as we make our journey to our
argument. Are you ready? God never saves
men and women through false prophets. Let me say that again. I just
want to lay this down. God never, ever saves men and
women through false prophets. He never uses the devil to do
the work of angels. He never uses Satan to do the
work of the Son of God. God is not so inept in his capacity
or his ability to function and accomplish his purpose where
he is just beholden to use anything that shows up. Well, you know,
I didn't have anybody else to do it, so I had to use him. God's
not like that. God would not send men and women
all around the world to hunt down eternity bound souls. in
the name of Jesus and hazard their lives for the cause of
the gospel when he could use the very same devils that live
with those folks. Am I making an argument? Now,
I want you to follow my point. Listen carefully to me. You don't
get saved under a false prophet. If you think you were saved under
a false prophet, you're wrong. The Spirit of God does not work
in a false prophet. He does not work through a false
prophet to teach you truth, saving truth. It does not happen. You
only are saved by the truth of the gospel as it's communicated
to you by faithful messengers. Now watch what he says. While
they promised them liberty, they themselves are servants of what?
That means they weren't redeemed. We just dealt with redemption,
did we not? So the false prophet is a slave of corruption, but
he will preach a false liberty, a false freedom, a false gospel,
and you have it everywhere in the world. you have it everywhere
in the world. Now mark this, for of whom a
man is what? Stop right there, purchased,
bought, controlled. For of whom a man is overcome,
the word Nikei there means to actually control, to dominate.
If I purchase you, I've overcome you. If I bought you off the
slave block, I own you. I have authority over you. I
have triumphed over you. Of whom a man is overcome, the
same he is brought in bondage to. Do you see that? That's our
principle. So if Christ overcame me by purchasing
my sin debt, he owns me, does he not? I'm his. That's just
a logical outcome of the exertion of the one who has chosen to
redeem us. I'm making the point about this. For those who are
truly redeemed, You are not totally free. You are only free in the
sense for which your redemption designed it. To liberate you
from sin, but not from God. To liberate you from hell, but
not from God. To liberate you from the curse
of the law, but not from righteousness. You are a slave of God, you are
a slave of Christ, and you are a slave of righteousness if God
saved you. Am I making some sense? God owns me. and God owns you
too if you've been redeemed. You know what that means? You
get your marching orders from God. What that means, God get
to tell you what he wants you to do. Now ladies and gentlemen,
I'm already excited. I don't have to preach to you
because I'm already excited. Here's what I'm excited about.
I'm excited that not only did God purchase my soul at an infinite
price, which is beyond my imagination to contemplate. It humbles me
and causes me to fall apart every time I think about the death
of the Son of God in a rate of exchange for my eternity-bound
soul. Am I that valuable to God that
He would send His Son to die for my sin? That's an enormous
contemplation. And yet, He turns around and
says, I want to marry you too. Crazy! The book of Ruth is where
we have been in our women's theology class. It's Ruth chapter 4 verse
10 part 8. I want you to see our great Boaz
declaring to the world what he did. Listen to it. This is the
gospel right here. Is it there? Moreover, Ruth the
Moabitess, guess who's talking? Boaz. He's speaking to all the
witnesses in the gate. The gate is where you adjudicate
matters and you bear record to what's about to take place. And
what that corresponds to is the public preaching of the gospel
and the public declaration of Jesus Christ that he loves his
people. In other words, Christ didn't do anything in a corner.
It wasn't hidden. He did it in the world. He did
it publicly. So the whole world knows the
Son of God came, the Son of God died, the Son of God rose again. And he did it to let the world
know that he loves the objects of his sacrifice. And he wants
everybody to know, I paid for her. Watch this now, and I'm
going to marry her. Listen to the language. Moreover,
Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of Malon, have I purchased. Do
you see it? Are you ready to be my wife? Just keep that line right there.
So the elder was talking about this morning, parsing scripture
in order to actually augment and teach doctrinal truth. parsing
scripture in order to augment and teach doctrinal truth. If
you run quickly through those clauses, you will miss the beauty
of that first statement. If you don't understand what's
taking place there, get our women's theology class, the last three
studies, and you will see the gospel infinitely in it, powerfully
in it. Boaz purchased everything that
had to do with Ruth simply because he wanted Ruth. Do you know what
the motivating factor of it is? It was the love in Boaz's heart
for Ruth, for which he was willing to publicly stand, or ridicule,
or ignominy, every scandalous notion that might come to him,
Boaz, for marrying a Moabite. This is what I'm saying. Whether
you know it or not, you're a Moabite. I'm a Moabite too. Why God would
love me, I don't know. Why he would marry me, I don't
know. Because according to his law, he couldn't. Are you hearing
me? But what we have learned is that
God is greater than his law. He does not transgress his law,
but he fulfills his law in order to make it possible for him to
marry a hell-bound guilty sinner like me. And do you know Ruth
is a happy lady this day? I have purchased you to be my
what? See, that's the outline, that's
the title of our message, is it not? Redeemed and married
to Christ. Redeemed and married to Christ. So not only has Christ purchased
me and owns me as his property to do with me as he wishes. You
know, a slave master could be very, very mean towards his slaves. A slave master could be indifferent,
he could be cold, he could be apathetic, he could be harsh.
He could even kill his slaves. And there was nothing wrong with
that. He could do with whatever he wanted to with his life. That
was a kind of relationship, wasn't it? But the relationship of the
believer to Christ is not one of merely a slave with his master. This is where the gospel becomes
rich. He's a redeemer. And he's a romantic
redeemer. Because as a romantic redeemer,
he purchased us to marry us. That changes the nature of the
relationship qualitatively. Are you following what I'm saying?
Okay, so this man whom I never knew, but he knew me, has purchased
me at a price that I could not comprehend, so I am owned by
him. What is he going to do with me now? Marry me? That's ridiculous. What's in me that he should marry
me? It's not about what's in me,
it's about what's in him. and because he loves me he now
secures the quality of my relationship with him based on this one truth.
I am his and he is mine and we are one because we are married. Are you hearing me? I know now
because he has publicly accepted the terms of marriage, he will
do me good all the days of my life. He will never harm me because
I am his wife. I can always trust that the one
who redeemed me will love me forever. And see what Paul is
helping our Jewish brethren understand is, this is the secret, this
is the mystery. This here is the parabole, if
you will, of how it is that the believer will never abandon God,
never depart from God, never live scandalously because of
an ongoing relationship that's based upon marriage. Am I making
some sense? Let's continue to work through
this. Point number two. Let's continue to work through this.
First and foremost, you were purchased, child of God, by Christ. And you were passive and it had
nothing to do with it. But secondly, this is going to get hard, but
it's important. you were purchased and rescued from a husband who
would kill you. Stay right there now. Stay right
there. See, so the plot thickens. as our Hebrew teacher was teaching
us last night, as we were working through Hebrew in the book of
Jonah and joined the centrality of Christ there, the plot thickens.
But that's the nature of God, isn't it? As he draws near to
you and shows you what he's doing for you and in you and through
you, he actually expands in his goodness to show you how great
a salvation he wrought for your soul. See, you weren't only on
the slave block of sin as a wretched, eternity-bound sinner, But you
were in a former marriage. A former marriage that was designed
ultimately to destroy you. Let me see if we can work through
this good. You were purchased and you were rescued from a husband
who would kill you. This is Romans 7 verses 5 and
6. Now remember, our first and primary
targeted audience are our Jewish brethren, right? So they would
understand this rule much better than Christians do today, and
certainly pagans. Because in our present generation,
the idea of marriage, which I'm about to get into even deeper
now, is so watered down. It's so watered down and stretched
out of shape that it does not even remotely represent biblical
marriage. We're getting ready to go there
now. See today for us marriage is kind of like let me see what
kind of analogy I can use it's kind of like buying a movie ticket
to the theater. I Know that's crass, but that's
how it is. You might go you might not You
might sell a ticket. You might give it away There
is no deep reflection and earnest recognition that marriage is
a one-way journey that the two become so united that they never
ever think once about backing out of the marriage. That's not
the thinking in our present generation. But when you and I finish today,
here's what you're going to know. When Christ said yes for you
and eternity passed, there was no exit strategy for him. There
was no exit strategy. He understood fully what it means
to marry a woman. And if you get a biblical concept
of marriage, young man, you better be sure what that woman is that
you want to marry. Because you're going to learn
today how knitted together you become when you say yes to that
woman and she says yes to you. Proposition number two, when
we were in the flesh, the motions of sin did work by the what? And they did work in our members
to bring forth fruit unto what? Yeah, see see see what Paul is
saying to his Jewish brethren left before you came to know
Christ The only place you were in was in the flesh That's going
to be fleshed out to in Romans chapter 7 Remember we are either
in Christ or we are in the flesh To be in the flesh is to be in
the first Adam to be in crisis to be in the last Adam have we
not established the principle of federal headship ladies and
gentlemen that in Christ you are under a new head and In Adam,
you are under the old head, and the only thing that operates
is the carnal principles of our fallen nature. In Adam, all what? Die. But in Christ, all shall
be made what? Alive. So what Paul was saying
to his Jewish brethren is, while you were in Adam 1, though you
were under the law, all you experienced under the law and in Adam 1 was
an abounding set of transgressions and sins. that made your relationship
to the law of God one that produced death and not life. Are you guys
hearing me? He said, while you were married
to the law, all it did was indict you for every sin you committed. This is the fascinating thing
that we're about to get into. Look at verse 6. Verse 6, it
says, but now we are delivered from the what? that being dead,
wherein we were what? Stop right there. See, that's
line number two. When you were married to the law, and our next
point is gonna clear this up, all it did was hold you in prison. I tell people this all the time.
I should not segue like this, but I think I will. I tell people
all the time, marriage should not be a prison sentence. That'll come in just a second.
But marriage should not be a prison sentence. Neither the husband
nor the wife should feel compelled to remind their spouse that they're
married. Neither the husband nor the wife
should feel compelled that you're in a contract. Because marriage
is not a mere contract. It's a covenant. And a covenant
is different than a contract. When it's a contract, it's impersonal.
When it's a contract, it's abstract. When it's a contract, it's legal.
It has no vital union, vital life, no love principles in it
whatsoever. It's cold, it's hard, it's to
the fact. Just the facts, ma'am, and the
facts are these. When you are under a system of
legal religion, married to the law by virtue of your sin, the
only thing you can produce are sinful practices that are held
against you 24-7 a day. Are you hearing me? By abstraction
then, by abstraction, you and I better be careful that we are
not occupying the office of a legalist and the law over against our
spouse. Because if we are, all we're
doing is stacking up sin. Sin upon sin upon sin upon sin. Are you guys hearing me? Are
you hearing me? All we're doing is stacking sin upon, sin upon,
sin upon, sin upon, sin upon. And all we're doing is acting
out the role of the law against our spouse. And what that's doing
is holding them captive like a slave waiting to be punished. And this is the thing about the
law. Going back to our PowerPoint, I want you to see the propositions
under it. Here it is. You were purchased and rescued
from a husband that would kill you. Point number one, or sub-point
number one A, we were married to law and sin through whom? We were married to law and sin
through Adam. We argue this on a larger covenantal
scheme for people who do not recognize that when God created
Adam, he created Adam in a covenant model. And that covenant model
included keeping God's law. Is that true? He created Adam
in a covenant paradigm. What was that covenant paradigm?
Let's make man in our own image and in our own likeness. Let
him have dominion over everything. Let him be a great type of Jesus
Christ, the father-son paradigm. That's the first paradigm. But
in that paradigm construct, guess what? He told his son Adam, in
the day you eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,
you're going to die. That's law. Are you hearing me? That's law.
And what Adam and his wife did was sin against God and the whole
human race tumbled into that process of sin. Am I making some
sense? So you might argue, well, we Gentiles were never under
the law. And I would argue to you, yes,
you were. God didn't make any creature that wasn't under some
kind of law. See, he's the law giver. You
and I are under some kind of law. Either we are under the
law in Adam or we are under the law in Moses. And you and I are
operating by the law of Christ now in grace. Are you hearing
me? Watch how this unfolds then.
Under the first proposition, you and I, being redeemed off
the slave block of sin, were rescued from a husband that will
kill you. The wages of sin is what? The
soul that sinned, it shall what? In the day that you eat of the
tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall certainly
what? That's exactly right. You know who keeps saying that
every day? The law, the law, the law, the law. Now watch this.
The law has to say that because the law is an aspect of God's
holiness and righteousness. And he necessarily must let you
and I know when we violate God's terms. This is the challenge
now as we work through the virtue of the law in a marriage to a
woman who cannot live up to the standards. I'll say that again. This is the challenge as we work
through the virtues of a law married to a woman who cannot
live up to the standards. Anybody know what I'm talking
about? Here we go. It says in point number one, we were married
to the law and sin through Adam. We've just quoted that. Romans
chapter five, verse 12 says, by one man sin entered into the
world and death came upon all for all have what? Sinned. That's
right. Proposition B. And we loved our
sin. I like where I'm going right
now. Let me help you with something that I have noticed among people
who are grace people. But what I would say is grace
people who are not clear on the purpose of the law. Grace people
talk like the real problem in the marriage is the law and not
us. Let me keep working. Grace people
talk like it's the law's fault. The law is the problem. It's
that law that keeps on telling me that I'm wrong. It's the problem. When the problem actually is
not the law, it's you. Are you hearing me? Stay with
me now. The law is good. The law is holy. The law is just.
This is what Paul is going to stretch out in the next 18 verses. He's going to show us how that
even though our former husband called the law kept tally every
day against us, Well, if you wouldn't have sinned, he wouldn't
have had nothing to keep tallies on. Stay with me. Don't go anywhere. Don't go anywhere. Because if you are grace people,
you are going to understand how necessary it is for you and I
to know our true condition so that we can appreciate our new
husband. Are you hearing me? So when he
says we were purchased and rescued from a husband that would kill
us, He rescued us, not only from a husband that would kill us,
he rescued us from a process wherein you and I were constantly
loving our sin. Oh yeah, so when the law says,
thou shalt not commit adultery, that didn't stop you and me from
committing adultery, just because it said stop, didn't mean we
stop. When the law says, don't lie, don't steal, don't cheat,
it didn't stop us from doing it. Watch this, we did it because
we wanted to. We love sin. What God is rescuing
us from is not the law for the law's sake, but the law because
of our sin. This is what he's rescuing us
from. And this is what our Jewish brethren have to learn. We loved
our sin. Did we not love our sin when
we were in slavery to sin? See, so don't come to me talking
like, you know, when I was a hell-bound sinner, it was miserable. I really
didn't like all that evil. You know, I knew something was
wrong with it in the first place. I just felt uncomfortable in
my sin. You're lying between your teeth
right now. The truth is you loved your sin. You loved it. I did too. We all
loved it. We drank iniquity like water.
It was something that was so congruent with our nature. It
was so congruent with our nature, watch this now, that we don't
mind being separated from our husband, but don't let us be
separated from our sin. In your outline, read it in your
own time, Numbers chapter 11, verses 1 through 11, where Israel
is brought out of the land of Egypt by an outstretched hand
and a mighty arm on the part of their Redeemer, Jehovah. Is
that true? He brings them into the wilderness because he wants
to prepare them for the marriage in Canaan. As they're walking
through the land, guess what they're saying? We remember how
it used to be back in the day when we were in Egypt. When we
used to party, drink, smoke, kick it, commit all the abominations
of the land, and we were really having a good time. We loved
the onions and the leeks and the garlic and the fish and everything. Now watch this. This is how delusional
we are when we think about sin. Israel was miserable in Egypt. But here they are traveling through
the wilderness talking as if they were having a good time
in Egypt. What they loved in Egypt was
the sin. This is what we call a false
liberty. And it's rampant in the church today. It's a false
liberty. It's a liberty that says, I want
the merits of Christ to get me to heaven, but I still want to
live like an Egyptian. I want to enjoy the leeks and
the onions and the garlic. I want to enjoy all of the past
bondages of sin that I was in when I was in Egypt. Are you
guys hearing me? Now watch this. One of the reasons why we have
an Old and New Testament is to have a parallel contrasting antithesis
between the superiority of the new and the inferiority of the
old. And what that means is the Old
Testament church largely was unregenerate and unsaved. And
so they acted like it. And even though God was leading
them in a direction that was leading to liberty, they constantly
fought back to go to Egypt. Did they not? Every time they
turned around, they were using Egypt as a source to protect
them, to provide for them. They would go back to Egypt again
and again and again and again. And that's what amounts to professing
to be a believer while still being a slave to sin. When you
say Jesus has purchased you, but in your being you just love
your iniquity, love your transgression, and don't know anything about
the holy fight that we're about to deal with next week. The holy
fight. You're not a believer in Christ. Follow me now. If you love your sin, you're
not a believer in Christ. If sin has much more of a wooing,
loving, romantic, Disposition for you like the children of
Israel did with numbers 11. You still haven't come to know
Christ in a saving way Am I making some sense? This is very important.
So it's important for you to understand that when we were
rescued We were married to the law and sin through Adam and
we loved our sin We loved our sin so much ladies and gentlemen
point number C. Are you there Christ rescued
you against your will? Hallelujah This is wild I have
to set this doctrine down because see he didn't come to you and
ask you pretty please can I redeem you and would you allow me to
marry you he purchased you while you were yet in your sins he
bought you while you were ungodly he reconciled you by his proprietary
work on the cross while you were his enemy Christ purchased you
while you had your fist in his face. Am I making some sense?
See, we clearly assert that the salvation of God's people is
a work of grace from beginning to end. And the work of justifying
us does not require the condition of your heart meeting those requirements. He purchased you while you're
in your hell bound state. That's part of the overture of
his love to draw you to love him back. You were on the slave
block spitting at Jesus, kicking at him, throwing stuff at him
while he was redeeming your soul. Am I telling the truth? You were
hating on him, blaspheming him, ridiculing him, wanting every
other person in the world to save you but Jesus. Didn't we
learn that last night? We're going to try to roll in.
We're going to row in. We're going to get in on our
own. We're not going to throw Jonah
overboard. We're going to row in. We're going to try to get
saved every other way. And did not Christ have to shut
you up to himself? Didn't he have to destroy all
of your refuges of lies? Didn't he have to let you run
to that dead end? Didn't he have to let you fall
into that pit? Didn't he have to get you to a place where you
said, you know what? I give up. I give up. I give up. That's exactly what he did to
the apostle Paul. on the road to Damascus. He told
Paul, brother, it's hard for you to kick against the pricks.
I had my eye on you from eternity. I've been watching you and your
foolishness all these years. And I know how to goad you to
the place where I get you to go, uncle. That's what we call
the power of the Holy Ghost and breaking a man or a woman down
and causing them to realize you can't stop omnipotence from loving
you if you wanted to. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
This is very important for you to understand. He rescued us
against our will. This is Romans chapter 7 verse
6 part 8. Are you there? But now we are
delivered from the law. That's what I mean by rescued.
But now we are delivered from the law. That's what I mean by
rescue. You guys got that? Watch this. Here it is. That
being what? Where in you are what? So he
delivered us from the law in a condition where we were dead
spiritually and held captive by the curse of the law. Here's
your condition when he redeemed you as a slave. You were a dead
slave. Crazy! You were a dead slave. Let these metaphors and analogies
sink deep down in. He came after the law had slew
you because of your rebellion and your sin, and your sin put
you to death. In the eyes of God, you and I
were dead in trespasses and sins. We were nothing but living corpses.
Am I making some sense? He came to a corpse that was
spiritually dead, that had no spiritual life in it, couldn't
communicate with God at all, and he bought the corpse We're gonna get that back in
the latter part of Romans 7. I have to drive this home because
this is biblical theology. I'm sorry. God doesn't save living
persons. He saves dead persons to give
them life. He doesn't save living persons.
He saves dead persons to give them life. He bought a bunch
of dead carcasses when he died on Calvary's tree. Didn't we
learn that several weeks ago in our baptism series? Isaiah
chapter 26 verse 19. Isaiah 26 19. This is the promise
that he gave. Isaiah chapter 26 verse 19. This
is Christ speaking. You're dead men. Do you see it?
You're dead men. Who is that? You and me. Shall
what? Stop right there. If you're born
again, that promise came true for you. If you're trusting Christ,
that promise came true for you. Watch this ladies and gentlemen.
Outside of Christ, we're dead. And the reason we live is because
together with his dead body, shall they what? Do you see the
doctrine of union there again? You see what Christ did? He died
for dead men. He died for dead sinners. These
analogies, yes, they appear to conflict, because on the one
hand, we rebel against Him, we spit in His face, we run from
Him, we hide from Him, we blaspheme Him. That's true. But on the
other hand, we're dead spiritually, are we not? These are not contradictions. The evidence that we're dead
spiritually is by how we act. And so he has purchased dead
men to give them life. And that's exactly what he did
when he raised us from the dead. Going back to our PowerPoint
so I can quickly move to my finish for today. Under that point,
as we consider it now, proposition number two, you were purchased
and rescued from a husband who would kill you. We were married
to the law and sin through Adam. Point number B, we loved our
sin. Do you guys agree with that? We loved our sin point number
c christ rescued you against your will. Do you agree with
that? John chapter 6 44 makes it very plain No one's coming
to the father but by me and no one can come unto me except my
father which sent me drag him Drag him Drag him now what kind
of love is that that somebody come and buy a complete funeral
parlor full of dead sinners And drag them home drag them home
to give them life. What kind of love is that? Is
that not an unfathomable love? Is that not an... But it also
speaks to the power of this God who loved us. Because only God
can buy dead sinners and give them life. Only God can raise
the dead. Only God can bring you out of
your spiritually dead state. But he had to first deliver you
from the law. You hear me? He had to first
deliver you from the law. Point number D sub point number
D. He changed your heart and made you love him. Do you believe
that? He changed your heart made you
love him. Let me see if I can work this through Because in the realm
of the Spirit The only way you can you and I can identify what
the Spirit does is by being earnest and clear on what the Word of
God teaches Otherwise we will misrepresent and communicate
and articulate in a wrong fashion the work of the Spirit of God.
So mark this, you might think that because this room is filled
with people that everybody in this room is alive. You would
be wrong. Some of us are dead. And therefore,
because you would only be seeing things from a physical, empirical
perspective, you might misinterpret the work of the Holy Ghost, as
do many churches. Are you with me? Stay with me
for a second. Like many churches would identify the work of the
Holy Ghost in a church, where they would get people to stand
up, turn to your neighbor and say this, shake and wave your
hand, run around in the building, the Holy Ghost is on. And especially
when you get the ham and argan working on the C chord. Now the
Holy Ghost really working. But I would assert that the notion
that the Spirit of God is perceived by that means is a fallacy. I
would assert that you're thinking that you can perceive the work
of the Spirit of God by how people shout and yell and scream and
dance is nothing but a figment of your imagination. A figment
of your imagination. The only way you can know how
the Spirit works is by what the Word of God plainly says about
the work of the Spirit. You hath he quickened who were
dead in trespasses and sins having forgiven you of all your trespasses
He raised you up and set you in heavenly places at the right
hand of God in Jesus Christ by grace Are you saved through faith
and that not of yourselves? It's a gift of God not of works
lest any man should bow. I Are you hearing me? That's
how the spirit of God works. So we like to shout and we like
to clap and we like to do all that because I'm a kinetic preacher
and you need to burn a few calories before you leave the church.
Anyway, we all could lose a little weight, but it does not move
you one inch towards heaven. You can go to hell skinny. The Word of God plainly tells
us in the Law of God, Ezekiel 36, 25, I will take out the stony
heart and I will put in a heart of flesh and I will write my
laws on their heart and on their mind. I will put my spirit inside
them. That's union, ladies and gentlemen.
And I will cause them to keep my commandments. And Psalm 110
plainly lays out, in the day of your power you will cause
your people to be willing to come to Jesus. By the time we
say yes to Jesus, He has already changed our hearts. Am I making
some sense? By the time we say yes Lord Jesus,
He had already brought us from the downhill of sin into the
palace of His glorious presence, did an operation of faith on
our heart, and made us new creatures in Christ. When we woke up, we
said, the Lord is lovely, isn't He? The Lord is lovely. My last point, my last, I mean,
third point. Third point, I want to move quickly. Our husband,
the law, is right in seeking to condemn and kill us. You guys
want to hurry up and agree with that proposition right now? Because
I don't want to be here long. I'll develop that as we continue
working through chapter 7. Our husband, the law, is right
in telling us that we're wrong and we're headed to hell. It's
just right. That's verse 6 says we had it.
But look at verse 12 and 13. Here's how Paul explains it.
I'm moving into our text simply to affirm the argument because
I want grace people to respect God's law. Don't want you misinterpreting
the purpose and design of the law of God because it is an aspect
of his character Romans chapter 6 7 verse 12 and 13 listen to
what it says in verse 12. Here's what it says Wherefore
the law is what holy and the commandment is what holy and
just and good What's the question? Here's the interrogative was
then that which is good. What is he talking about the
law made death unto me and See what I'm getting at? Now watch
this now. If you go around talking to people like the problem is
the law and not your sin, you would be saying yes to that statement.
Was then that which is good made death unto me? You would go yeah! If I never married him, I wouldn't
have had all these problems. Every day I come home, he got
sins on the refrigerator. He got sins on the microwave.
He got sins on the washer. He got sins on the bathroom mirror.
He got sins, stickers over the top of our headboard in the bedroom.
Sinner, sinner, sinner, sinner, sinner. If I could get rid of
him, I'm cool. You're wrong. What you need to
have gotten rid of is your sin. And if you understand the gospel,
Christ came to die, not for the law, but for our sin. I'm making some sense. Am I making
some sense? Was that which is good made death unto me? God
forbid. What was the problem? Y'all see
it. You guys are smart people. Do
you see it? See it? That it might appear to be sin.
See, now I'm going to treat that when we get there, because you
and I don't like, really, We don't like to face our sin. You just don't. You quickly push
people off, call them legalists and self-righteous and workmongers
and all that. But you and I need to be reminded
of the accuracy in nature and consequences of sin so we can
ask ourselves, where am I standing? What's my trust? Where's my hope? Is my hope built upon some type
of false refuge by which I'm working to get my sin debts down?
Or do I trust in Christ completely? Am I resting in the fact that
I'm married to a man who has already covered all my sins?
So that while I may struggle, that's Romans 7, I may struggle
with maintaining my identity in Christ, I never have to worry
about what he has done for me. See, this is the battle we're
getting ready to fight. See, because an honest Christian struggles
with his sin. Now, if you don't struggle with
your sin, you're not a Christian. An honest Christian struggles
with his sin. But I've been teaching this for 25 years. Are you ready?
Struggle with your sin, don't struggle with Christ. Struggle
with your sin, don't struggle with Jesus. Struggle with your
sin, but understand Jesus paid it all all to him I owe Struggle
with your sin, but understand that Christ does not view you
as being identified with your sins You are one with him and
everything that he is you are in him and everything that you
were he was for you Are you guys hearing what I'm saying? See
this is the believer learning how to walk by what and not by
what see that's what I'm talking about so faith is a radical concept
that fights a good fight and and lays hold of eternal life
by believing the promises of God. Faith is a radical concept
that fights a good fight and lays hold of the promises of
God in spite of what's going on circumstantially. Did y'all
get that? So it's very important to understand.
What's in that which is good may death unto me, God forbid,
but sin, that it might be sin, working what in me? Now what
was working death in us? Ah, you guys are smart. So I'm
trying to deliver us from a false notion of the law. Let's go back
to our PowerPoint. Because we'll work through all
these clauses later. Our husband, the law, is right in seeking
to condemn us and kill us because we are adulterers by nature.
Is that true? Point B, don't make the law bad. The fault lies where? That's
right. See, now, if you get this one,
this one here is the key into the kingdom. If you do not know
the Lord Jesus Christ today in this place, and you want access
to this grace that you have been hearing, this marvelous grace
that is able to give you a standing with God for all eternity, simply
agree with God right now. Right where you are, just agree
with God. It does not help us not to agree
with God. Are you ready? All have sinned
and come short of the glory of God. There's not a just man upon
the earth that doeth good and sinneth not. I have sought out
the matter that God made men upright, but he sought out every
way to depart from God. The whole bastion from the top
of their head to the soles of their feet are nothing but sinners
through and through. That's you, that's me, that's
everyone but the lovely Lord Jesus. Are you ready now? If
we confess our sin, He is just and faithful to have already
forgiven us of all our sins and to have already cleansed us from
all unrighteousness. That's the door into the kingdom. Hallelujah. That's the door into
the kingdom right there. If a man is on the outside of
the door, agree with God right now. Agree with God. I am a sinner. Agree with God. I cannot help
myself. Agree with God. Christ is the
only way, the only truth, the only life. Agree with God. I
need your mercy. I need your grace. I need your
fullness. I need your help. If you leave
me to myself, I'm going to hell for sure. I'm going to hell for
sure. Don't make the law bad. The fault
lies in us. And by the way, If you're not a Christian and you
become one and you start hanging out with the likes of us, let me help you with something.
There's a whole bunch of us that don't actually like to be honest. We pretend that we got the world
by the tail on a downhill slide. We pretend like we don't still
sin. We pretend like we're so sanctified
and holy that we don't even identify with you. Hurry up and get away
from those kind of Christians. Hurry up. Find some real Christians who
are serious about God, about His glory, about His truth, who
will hold your hand and help you understand how to walk in
the grace of God, how to say yes to Jesus, how to say no to
sin, how to fight the good fight of faith, how to lay hold of
eternal life, how to trust God rather than making you feel like
you're so far from holiness by their pretended self-righteousness,
like their doo-doo don't stink. Proposition C. So here's what
I want to say about the law so that you can get this. I'm almost
done. Y'all can go home in a minute. I'm hungry, too. His, that personal pronoun his,
is the law. The law's weakness is this, that
it's altogether righteous, but it has no mercy. It wasn't designed
to have mercy. Its nature is only to acknowledge
sin, Condemn sin Magnify sin and punish sin. That's all I
could do. We're gonna see that as we work our way through seven
and eight The weakness of the law is that through our flesh
our sinfulness? It couldn't do nothing like your
husband the law can always tell you what you're doing wrong,
but he can never give you the remedy Y'all know something about
that, don't you? The problem with the law by itself
is it doesn't operate on the principle of faith. This is Galatians
3. We're in Galatians 3, chapter
2 rather. The law is not a faith. Because
if the law was a faith, the law itself would be able to look
to Christ. and say that Christ is the grounds
and basis of that person's righteousness and not their own. But the law
does not have that component intrinsic in that law standard.
This is what we call the gospel. Are you hearing me? It's only
the gospel that's able to cause you to turn away from the condemnation
of the law and look to Christ as the sinner's substitute. And
what Paul is saying to his Jewish brethren is we've been delivered
from the law to the gospel. the person of Christ by which
by faith we can look to Christ and see that all that Christ
did for us merits us the comfort to live in his presence while
he works on us this is other good stuff see like when Christ
married you and drug your dead soul into his house and took
out that stony heart and put in a heart of flesh he jumped
on the inside of your heart so he could actually take control
of your life and steer your life and conform you to his image
by his Holy Ghost. Are you hearing me? Dealing with
your computer brain point by point by point, taking out old
data, putting in new data, giving you a complete makeover, girl,
so you look good at the end of your journey. That's because
he's on the inside, the inside. This is what the word married
means. Go back to our chapter 7. I'm going to just look at verse
3 and 4, and I'm done here. Show you something about verse
3 and 4. This is what I meant by marriage. I'm done here. Show
you just one thing about marriage. So marriage is not merely an
external, abstract, impersonal contract signed on the bottom
line, and then y'all do your best to hang in there. Marriage
is a union between two people. Are you guys following me? It
is a living document that is to be internalized by the two
parties who agreed to promises and oaths and vows to be one. Are you guys hearing me? It's
a living document. It's not a dead, impersonal,
abstract set of propositions. It's a living document where
the two say, okay, let's do this thing together. I'm yours, you
are mine. We're one. We're going to live
until we die together. We are going to work through
this process of sanctification called marriage to where we're
going to develop harmony and unity. Harmony and unity. You
guys got that? Harmony and unity. It's called
a unit. So that we can accomplish the goals that God has called
us to do. That's what marriage is called. That's exactly what
Jesus did when he saved you. So then, if while her husband
lives, she'd be married to another, she'll be called what? But if
her husband be dead, she is what? from that law so that she is
no adulteress though she be married to another man, right? Verse
four, here it is. Here it is. Paul is helping us
understand, Romans 7, verse four, Paul is helping us understand
that the solution to the question that his Jewish brethren is raising.
Okay, so now you let them out of prison. How are they gonna
live right? Because the moment that they
step out of the prison doors, Jesus is gonna take them by the
hand and say, you're mine. and you're going to live with
me. And I'm going to make things such that you're going to be
glad to be free, but you're also going to be glad to be married
to me. Because marriage is union. It's union. Wherefore, my brethren,
you are also become dead to the law. Do you see that? By the
body of Christ. Didn't we learn that in Romans
6? We were dead through Christ. You're not dead in yourself.
You were dead in Christ. In order that, you see that little
clause, that? That's our hinder clause. In
order that, you should be what? Stop right there. See that little
word, married? Powerful verb. Powerful verb. It means more
than just signing a piece of paper. You know what it means?
It means two people coming together in such an ontological relationship
that one person, the person that was dead, is now becoming something
that they never were. I'm going to say that again.
I'm going to close. It means two people coming together
in such an ontological unity that the one person that was
dead is becoming something that they were not by virtue of their
union with that other person. What that means is when Christ
purchased you to marry you, the only way you could have life
is for him to give his life to you so that you two being planted
together now live together. Marriage means the two become
one. It's such a powerful concept
that the believer must never ever think of himself as being
by himself ever again. I am the vine. You are the branches. Every branch in me that bears
fruit, my father purges it that it might bring forth more fruit.
Without me, you can do nothing. And when we talk about being
married to Jesus, it means that he has committed himself to you. to make you everything that he
has purposed you to be. Your job is to fully and totally
and completely depend upon him. That's what grace people do.
They depend upon Jesus. They rely fully upon Jesus. You
guys got that? Amen. Amen.