Let's pray. Father, I would pray this morning
in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that through his spirit,
you would cause us all to ask ourselves this question. Are
we too natured? Are we a new creation that drags
along this old dead body or Lord, are we just double-minded religionists
who can put on our religious hat on Sunday? and proceed, Lord,
to be the same sinner that we've always been the rest of the time.
I pray that you would bless us, Lord, that you would speak to
us all, that you would show us the glory of what the work of
grace really is, that you've worked in us, worked in our Lord's
name, the Lord Jesus Christ, that we pray. Amen. There have
always been only two kinds of people who make up the local
assemblies of God's church on this earth. Those who have two
natures and those who are double-minded. Outwardly now, it's very difficult
to tell the difference. You can't tell by looking. The
two-natured person is one who has a new nature. The Bible says
one created after God in righteousness and true holiness, and that through
union with the Lord Jesus Christ. Yet this person still possesses
at the same time. the old, depraved, God-hating,
sin-craving nature which we inherited from Adam. This two-natured person
is just as capable of sitting together in heavenly places in
Christ Jesus as he or she is capable of engaging in the same
shameless depths of fornication that Paul condemned the Corinthians
for. Now that sounds rather schizophrenic, doesn't it? This is who we are. But as schizophrenic as a two-natured
person may sound, and every one of us is that way, it's far worse
to be a double-minded person. Unlike the two-natured person,
the double-minded man or woman has but a single nature, and
that nature can do nothing but sin. He is a single, depraved
creature that craves nothing but sin. having nothing else
in their being to direct them or to pull them otherwise, except
maybe perhaps a fear of public embarrassment or some proud,
vain desire to appear to others to be something that they are
not, which is pretty much the essence of what people call morality,
just trying to appear to be a little better than somebody else. But
in the double-minded man, there's only one voice. He's a single
entity. She's a single entity. There
is no other voice to contest their sinful desires, to call
them away from that which they crave by nature. They are only
a single fallen nature and they can do nothing but sin. Let's
briefly, if you would, with me, I'd like for you to review what
the Bible teaches about the two natured man first. This person,
is everything he was born as or she was born as. That is the
way you started out, you still are. You still are. Son and daughter
of Adam. He's everything that he was born
as and at the same time everything he was born again to be. He's
made up of two diametrically opposed natures that couldn't
possibly be any more unlike or different. One that craves only
sin and cares absolutely nothing for righteousness, and one that
hungers and thirsts after righteousness, and would, if he could, never
sin again. How often do these beloved two-natured
souls cry out to God like Rebecca did? Look with me, if you would,
in Genesis 25. Such a good illustration in this
passage at this particular point we're trying to talk about. Genesis 25, and we'll begin with
verse 21. And Isaac entreated the Lord
for his wife because she was barren. She could not have children.
And the Lord was entreated of him and Rebecca, his wife conceived. Verse 22, the children struggled
together within her. And she said, If it be so, if
it be that the Lord has blessed me to have children, why am I
like this? Why am I thus? Why have I got all this turmoil
going on inside of me? And she went to inquire of the
Lord, and the Lord said unto her, two nations are in thy womb,
and two kinds of people shall be separated from your bowels.
The one people shall be stronger than the other people, and the
elder shall serve the younger. If it be so, why am I thus? And for us, that translates into
something like this. That is, if you have, God, if
you have graciously given me life, made me a new creation
in Christ Jesus, in union with Christ, why does this war continue
to rage within my breast? Why am I thus? And just as God
told Rebecca. Two kinds of people shall be
separated from inside of you. The elder shall serve the younger,
and so it is with us. We are promised that the old
man of sin will not dominate the new man, that one created
in righteousness and true holiness. Look with me, if you would, in
Galatians 5. Let's read three verses there. Here's who we are. Paul speaks
of this often throughout the New Testament, but this is a
good enough place to start. Look at verse 13, and then we'll
skip down to verses 16 and 17. Paul says, for you were called,
and by the way, I'm gonna read my literal translation if you
follow along with me in the King James. For you were called upon the
ground of freedom, only not the freedom that gives advantage
to the flesh. Now I say, walk in the spirit,
and the lust of the flesh you will by no means fulfill. For the flesh lusts, it craves,
endlessly desiring that which is against the spirit. And the
spirit lusts, craves, and yearns for everything that is against
the flesh. For these oppose each other so
that you don't do the things that you really want to do. Here's
the life of the two natured man. He never just embraces sin, but
neither is he ever free from his presence. He never just says,
whatever. He's always fighting that warfare.
but he never embraces sin and he never fully finds himself
complete either because he's always got that ball and chain
of a fallen nature attached to him. So what is the essence of
these two natures? The Bible uses this terminology
to describe the saint of God. He's one who is simultaneously
a new man at the same time an old man. What God created and
what we received from Adam, all at the same time. It makes me
stay, I can say this openly, I am in a constant state of turmoil.
I would do everything else that I don't do, and there's something
in me that says, no, just go ahead and do it anyway. I'm just
that kind of person. One of these men, is to be put
off, the Bible says. Put him off, put him off, get
rid of him. And the other is to be put on,
make me more like this, more like I should be. The action
of that verb, if you look that up, it's actually such that believers
are constantly doing both. And isn't that our lifestyle?
Isn't that the life we live out on this earth? Constantly putting
off the old man, shut up. Shut up, I don't want to do that.
Yes, you do. This would be good. This would
be fun. This would be nice. Wouldn't
you like that? Shut up. And then I have a new
man. A new man that constantly says,
oh Lord, make me more like yourself. Make me to think more like yourself.
Make those scriptures to stick in my mind and not keep falling
out. Make me remember the message that was preached and make me
to be that kind of person. We have that putting on and putting
off all the time. Thank God we are new creations
made so because of our union with the Lord Jesus Christ and
that new creation can never sin. can never sin. That true believer
in you, those of you who've been joined to the Lord Jesus Christ,
that true believer in you has never sinned one time. He's never
okayed his old man's agenda, not one minute. He has stayed
steadfast. You know why? Because it's Christ
in you, the hope of glory. Mark, I don't feel like that.
I don't either, so you're not alone. I don't feel like that.
I feel like a sinner every day of my life. The trash and garbage
that runs through my mind sometimes comes out my mouth and it comes
always out in my actions. And me a believer and me joined
with Christ on my, I wonder sometimes, I wonder sometimes. Don't be
deceived though at this point. We are new creations in Christ
Jesus, and it will ever be the same every minute of the day
that we are simultaneously the same old man that can do nothing
but sin. Now, this two-natured man, first
of all, then has an old man which cannot be improved. Look with
me in Romans 7, 21 through 25. And again, I'm going to read
my literal translation. You follow along with me there
in the King James. Romans 7. Wonderful passage, beginning
with verse 21. What's a person like us to do?
Paul describes it here. I find then the law, this is
a universal law, that whenever I will do good, evil is present
with me. For I delight, and I do, I delight
in the law of God according to the inner man. But I see a different
law in my members. Warring, making combat, daily
fighting against the law of my mind, taking me captive by the
law of sin, which is in my members. Oh, what a wretched man. What
a wretched man I am. This is the apostle Paul talking
about himself. Who will deliver me from this
dead body, this fleshly thing? Thanks to God. through Jesus
Christ our Lord. So then, here we are, this is
our life. So then I myself on the one hand
serve the law of God, that is in my new man, and on the other,
with the flesh, I serve the law of sin. The old man has, the
two-natured man has an old man which cannot be fixed. God has
determined to make it so. And would any of us be people
of faith if we could control it? This is what drives us to
Christ. Is it not? Is it not? Is it not
wise? Is it not wise? Is it, does it
not glorify God that he's left us in this state? Where are you
going to go? I went to one place to go. I'm
going to go to Christ. Oh Lord, keep me, hold me, keep
me from being who I am and doing what I do and thinking what I
think and saying what I say. Oh Lord, have mercy on me. No,
it's a wise thing. God's doing here. Are we miserable? Yes, we are. And yet on occasion
we have heights of ecstasy because we see our savior and we rest
in him. Not only is the two natured man,
one who has an old man, which cannot be improved, but thank
God the two natured man has a new man, which cannot be diminished. Paul told the Ephesians in chapter
4, verses 22 through 24, he says, be ye continually putting off,
as regards your former conduct, the old man, being corrupted
according to deceitful lusts, and be continually being renewed
in the spirit of your mind and putting on the new man, created
according to God in righteousness and true holiness. No creation
of God ever did anything that God did not create it to do. All of God's creation does exactly
what he created it to perform. He created in us, dear beloved
believer, he created in us a nature That's as godly, and this sounds
blasphemous, but I want to say it anyway because it's the truth.
He has created in us a nature like his own. Like his own. Loves holiness as much as God
does. Loves righteousness as much as
Christ does. Loves what's right above the
wrong all the time and never wavers. He has created in us
that kind of nature and it cannot be spoiled. It cannot be diminished. It cannot be altered. Aren't
you glad? Aren't you glad the Lord didn't
leave you to your sin? If you're anything like me, you
would not want to live that life. What a terrible thing. The two-natured man then is a
new creation. And just as we are sinners by
the choice of another, Adam made that choice for us. Likewise,
we are made holy by the choice of another. Let me read that
to you. Paul writes to the Corinthians in chapter 5 verse 17, if anyone
is in Christ, I don't know how close that is, but I know it's
close enough that it can't be separated. If anyone is in Christ,
he is a new creation. And in that new creation, the
old things have passed away. There's none of the old in it.
Behold, they've all become new. Only the new man. You know, we
say this. Quite often I hear this statement
and I'm quite okay with it. It's a statement I understand
that the purpose of it is to glorify our liberty. Our liberty. And we say it like this, trust
Christ and do what you want to. I only say this, make sure you
know which man you're talking to. Only the new man, only that newly
created man can properly interpret that statement. That person trusts
Christ and does what he wants to because the new man wants
to do nothing but good, nothing but right, nothing but holiness.
So if you're saying that, say, if you're saying that and hearing
trust Christ and do what you want to, and that's your new
man hearing that and says, amen, you go for that. You go for that.
But do beware that our old man is devious. Is he not? Is he
not? Catches in all your weak, your
weakest moments. And that person says, oh, I understand
that. Trust Christ and do what I want
to. As long as I believe the gospel and not false religion,
as long as I'm following the right doctrines and not false
doctrine, then I can do whatever I want to. That's an old man
talking. You better shut him up. You better
shut him up. But if you love Christ, And you're
one with Christ and you've been recreated with a new nature in
Christ Jesus. Do you trust Christ and do whatever
you want to cause you want to do nothing but good. And that's,
that, that is something I fear so much that some people are
going to hear us say that and greatly misinterpret that. It
does not mean that I'm free to do whatever I want to, not as
long as my old man's in the company with me. Now let's talk briefly
and we'll finish about the double minded man. You only find this twice in the
scriptures, by the way. It's in James 1.8 and James 4.8. Actually, in the original, it's
not a double-minded man. It's a two-souled man, and I
suppose the imagery is still pretty much the same. A double-minded
man almost reminds me of a two-headed person, someone who's going with
his bad side and going with his good side, and he's going back
and he's forth. And if you talk about him being a two-souled
man, this is like there's two people in there. There's two
people in there. There's the religious guy, and
then there's the irreligious guy. And so he's talking about
that kind of man. And he says a double-minded man,
in chapter 1, verse 8, is unstable, unstable in all his ways. That is, he tries to act like
a new man in Christ Jesus when he's in church, but he's just
a religious actor. He can't truly impersonate a
believer because he's not one. nor keep himself in character
trying to pretend that he's one. He can't do that for very long
because his old nature comes out again. No, this is a person
who's not got two natures. He's only got one nature, and
that nature can pretend to be religious. There is a world full
of people right now across this country who are sitting in church
houses, and they're double-minded people. They're sitting there,
and they're putting on their Christian suit, and they've got
their Christian hat, and their Christian language going on,
and they're just there. They look like they're just as
fine and upstanding as anybody you'd ever want to meet. And
in that person is nothing but a rank sinner. There is no new
nature with them. They're just double-minded. One
mind says, on Sunday I do this, and the other mind says, every
other day of the week I can do that, whatever else I want to. That's the double-minded man.
He tries to be. He knows there's something that
he ought to be doing. He knows he shouldn't lie. He
knows that he shouldn't cheat. He knows that he shouldn't steal.
He knows all the things that we know we shouldn't do, and
he tries to do something about that, especially on Sunday. I
mean, after all, he tries to do something about that, but
he knows that he, he thinks that he is. He thinks he's doing okay,
but he's not a two-natured man. He's just a double-minded sinner.
Religionist on Sunday and whatever else every other day of the week.
And he's okay with that. He's okay with that because he
can play both roles. No, just a pretender trying to
find peace. at least one day a week through
impersonation of a true believer. You can't impersonate Christianity,
you know that? You can't impersonate the new
man. That only comes from being combined as one with Christ Jesus.
We share his nature, by the way. It's not as though he breaks
a little piece of himself off and says, I'll give you some
and you some and you some. We're just all one with him. Everything
he has, we have. That's my only hope. My only
hope. So in conclusion, the two-natured
person is a creation. God Almighty alone can do this.
God takes a sinner with no spiritual life and creates a new holy nature
in him or her and that through union with Christ. This person
is as truly holy as the Lord Jesus Christ is with whom he
or she has been made one. God's determination, his decision,
to leave that person's sinful nature intact in no way diminishes,
thank God, the reality of our new nature. We may fall into
sin, and we do, but his new nature will not allow us to justify
our actions. Oh, thank God for condemnation. Wouldn't you hate to be a person
going through this life and never felt any remorse? no sorrow,
no grieving, no pain over your sin. What a terrible life to
live. Those are all blessings of God. Thank God we have a new
nature, that we're as holy as the Lord Jesus Christ and he's
given us that. We're so much one with him that
we know, we know when we're not right. We know when we shouldn't
be walking like we are. And he blesses us with that knowledge.
Oh, what a wonderful thing. Since the double-minded man has
received no work of God's grace, possesses no new righteous nature,
and has not been born again of the Spirit of God, he's just
a religious imposter. He has no one or nothing inside. The world is just various shades
of gray. It all depends on the circumstance. It all depends
on who I'm with and what I'm doing. It all depends on whether
anyone's watching or anyone will find out. Oh my, what a terrible
existence. May God deliver us from that.
The psalmist writes of them and says this, they speak vanity,
every one of them with his neighbor. They cannot tell the truth. And
with flattering lips and a double heart do they speak. Oh, may
God preserve us from that. Let's pray. Lord, we're so thankful. We wouldn't
even begin to know how to express our gratitude that you've actually
done more than just hug us up as a filthy sinner. You've actually
become one with us. Lord, you could not have died
on the cross under God's wrath if you had not been one with
us because you had no sin to be killed for. You were killed
bearing our sins in your body. Our spirits were united even
before our birth. Lord, I don't understand that.
I just know that's my only hope, that I am one with you. Make
us ever new creations in Christ Jesus. And Lord, for those among
us who are simply religionists today because it's Sunday, oh,
would you do them the great grace of making them anew in union
with Christ. For it's in his name we pray.
Amen.