Let's open this morning's service
with a hymn from our hardbacked hymnal, number 69. Hymn number 69, Safely Through
Another Week. Let's all stand together, number
69. Safely through another week,
God has brought us on our way. Let us now a blessing seek, waiting
in his courts today. Day of all, the week the best,
emblem of eternal rest. Day of all, the week the best,
emblem of eternal rest. While we pray for pardoning grace,
through the dear Redeemer's name, show Thy reconciled face, take
away our sin and shame. From our worldly care set free,
may we rest this day in thee. From our worldly care set free,
may we rest this day in thee. Here we come, thy name to praise. Let us feel thy presence near. May thy glory meet our eyes while
we in thy house appear. ? Here afford us, Lord, a taste
of our everlasting feast ? Here afford us, Lord, a taste of our
everlasting feast ? May thy gospels joyful sound ? Conquer sinners,
comfort saints fruits of grace abound, bring relief for all
complaints. Thus may all our Sabbaths prove
till we join the church above. Thus may all our Sabbaths prove
till we join the church above. Please be seated. Good morning. This morning we're going to be
looking at several scriptures and I'd like to start with a
word of prayer that the Holy Spirit will be with us because
we need him in this special hour and in the next hour as well.
Father God, we come before you in the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ, giving you thanks and praise that you allow us to be
here, to listen to your word, to listen about Christ and his
work, his ministry in us. We pray now that you might send
the Holy Spirit. We require His needs, Father. We need the filling of the Holy
Spirit in order to understand your scriptures, to see Christ
more clearly in His work and His ministry, Father. We pray
this for all the other churches as well. They're meeting this
morning, preaching the gospel. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. We're going to be looking at
Romans Chapter 8. However, I'd like to go first
to 2 Timothy 3.16, a very familiar passage for us. Very familiar. You'll recognize this as soon
as you hear it. It says 2 Timothy 3.16. It talks about the scriptures. What
benefit do we get out of the scriptures, out of the word of
God? It says all scripture is given by inspiration of God,
all of it. It's profitable. It's profitable
for doctrine, for reproof. for correction, for the instructions
in righteousness that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly
furnished into all good works. So all the scripture is given
to us for all those things, for doctrine, for reproof, for correction,
and for instruction for us. So there's no part of scripture.
Many times you hear from this pulpit how much How much of Scripture
does the believer has to believe? All of it. By faith, of course,
we believe all of it. We saw that example in Acts 17. Let's go to Acts 17 quickly.
And it's going to say something about the reaction or the reception
that the Bereans had when Paul went over and preached. It says
in Acts 17 verse 10 and 11, it says, and the burden immediately
sent away Paul and Silas. This was right after the Thessalonians,
by the way. The previous portion talks about
only some believe in Thessalonica and the other ones stirred up
a group and they were rebellious, did not receive Paul's words
as the gospel. It says, and Burton immediately
sent away Paul and Silas by night into Berea, who, coming there
at dinner, went into the synagogue of the Jews. They were more noble
than those in Thessalonica. And why were they more noble?
Well, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind. They gladly received the word.
And at the same time, they searched the scriptures daily. whether
these things were so. So they respected the scriptures
and even though it was Pastor Paul there, they were listening,
they searched the scriptures to see if that was so because
the scriptures is the infallible word. The scriptures is authority,
not the speaker. Any of us, we found old men,
any of us here could preach error. It'll be mistaken, but not the
scriptures. And that's, that's how we should
always be looking at the scriptures. And so I sort you to do that
as well all the time. And, and, uh, so I'm going to
talk about the natures that, that the believer hats. We have
two natures, as you know, uh, we have first the flesh. We are
born in sin and we have the flesh. This flesh that we're born with
is sinful due to our failure in Adam. When I say our failure,
we cannot see Adam as an outsider and as that he failed and I know
we were in Adam. We were united with Adam just
as we were united in Christ and we failed. So our sinful, this
is how we are born, we are blind, we are sinful, we cannot see
the spiritual things. Number two, I want to say about
the flesh, we're totally depraved, totally depraved. Every area
of this flesh is sinful. And we're blind, we cannot see,
we cannot hear the gospel, we cannot understand spiritual things
without the Holy Spirit, without Jesus Christ pouring into ourselves
and having, showing grace and mercy upon us. We cannot understand,
we're totally depraved. And we were with this flesh since
birth until we die as well. Okay, so this is our natural
man and this is everyone has the flesh. Both believer and
unbeliever have the flesh and it's simple and it's one of our
natures. The believer also has a second
nature as this nature is given to us by grace. nature is given
us to us by the Lord Jesus Christ himself. We were united in him
and when we talk about the two natures we also have to talk
about the unity in Christ of course. This nature is called
in the scriptures the new man, right? It's called the new man. It's called the inner man as
well, Paul calls it in I think Romans 6. And so this new nature
God gives us by grace. And we as believers, it would
be inaccurate to say that we are only flesh, because we're
not. We are saved by grace. We were only flesh before we
came to Christ, before God had mercy upon us. But now we have
two natures. If you will, if I stand over
here, this is the old nature. We were born this way, and some
of you may still not be in Christ, may not believe, you are only
this, only the flesh. And God gives us the new nature,
which is over here, right? Because the new nature is by
grace, and it's the nature of Christ. And Christ gives you
that nature, it's united with Christ. It's one with Christ. And everything Christ has done
since he was born till he died was for this nature here. First,
the dying of sin, payment of sin was for that nature, but
all his obedience, all his righteousness was for this new nature that
we have in Christ. And we have it in Christ and
Christ alone. We don't have it within ourselves. You cannot earn it. You cannot
get it through study. It comes by grace and grace alone. but this new nature. But also
it's interesting also when you talk about the new nature, also
talks in the scriptures that we're the temple of the Holy
Spirit also. So we have the Holy Spirit in us in 1 Corinthians
3.16, I made a note of that, so let's go look at it quickly.
1 Corinthians 3.16. says, for you know that you are
the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you. So the Spirit of God also dwells
in us. This is a gift of God. So also
in Colossians, we're going to read that in a moment, it says
Christ is in you. Christ is in you. Colossians
1, let's go there quickly. Colossians 1, 25 through 29. Wherefore, I made a minister
according to the dispensation of God, which is given to me
for you to fulfill the word of God, even the mystery which have
been hid from all ages from generations, but now has been made manifest
to his saints. to whom God would make known
what riches of glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which
is Christ in you, the hope of glory. So this is the mystery
and this is a hope. This is a hope that Christ be
in us as well. So to say now, after we have
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ by grace, to say that we are
only the flesh and only sinful is not really accurate because
we have the new nature as well. So it's very important to differentiate,
to make that difference that we have two natures and the nature
that is redeemed the nature that's justified, the nature that's
sanctified, and will continue on your resurrection is that
new nature that the Lord has given you. Now, even though that
new nature is part of you and it's in you, it's not based on
anything you've done or it's not earned, it's by grace, it's
God-given. Now we're gonna go to our main
text, which is Romans chapter eight. We're gonna go to Romans
chapter eight. We're gonna go one through 17. And the first verse says, therefore
now, this is a wonderful, wonderful verse. There's no condemnation
to them that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh,
but after the spirit. So here it says this, as you
probably know, was the passage immediately following Paul's
struggle that he has with those two natures that we just mentioned.
He sees both natures in there. But the consolation and the hope
that we have here, it says now there's no condemnation. Don't
worry, there's no condemnation. for those who are in Christ Jesus,
that walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. So there's
no condemnation for those who are in the spirit. Verse two
teaches me that walking in the spirit makes you free of the
law. For the law of the spirit of
life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and
death. So we are free from the law.
So this passage is gonna talk about walking in the spirit.
It's not about religion. It's not about the law. It's
walking in the spirit. It's not the same thing as walking
in law. For the law kills. The law, we're never able to
fulfill the law in ourselves. Christ has done that for us.
So not to be confused with a work we do, but it's something that
we do because of the Spirit in us. And He's the one that gets
the glory. So verse three, we see, we learn
that due to our sinful nature, we could not follow the law.
God condemns sin in His Son. That's what we learn in verse
three. It says what? For what the law could not do, it could
not save us, could not give us life. The law could not do that.
in that it was weak through the flesh, not that the law itself
was weak because the law is perfect, the law is holy, but to our flesh
is not, our flesh is sinful, sinful, utterly, desperately
wicked, right? Well, God sent his own son in
the likeness of sinful flesh, in the likeness of sinful flesh,
meaning that he had a body just like us, okay, that he came in
the flesh, he became a man, and for sin come then sin in the
flesh. The sin in the flesh was come then at the cross and that
was done on our behalf and we were in him as well there. In
verse 4 it shows that it teaches me when I read that verse it
teaches me that the righteousness of the law is fulfilling those
who walk in the spirit. It says that the righteousness
of the law might be fulfilling us. who walk not after the flesh
but after the Spirit. Those, and the next verse teaches
me this. It teaches me that those who
walk after the Spirit mind the things of the Spirit. Verse five,
for they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh. That's what they worry about.
That's what they're concerned about. That's all they can do. because they do not have the
Spirit of God. But they that are after the Spirit, the things
of the Spirit. In verse six, it's very important,
it teaches me after looking at verse six, I gathered that being
calmly minded equals death. This is spiritual death, eternal
death. And spiritually minded equals
life and peace. Verse six, it says, For to be
carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life
and peace. The next verse is important. The first verse says that, teaching
me that the flesh, the flesh is this one here that I was born
with, this sinful flesh. I still have that flesh. Those
who do not trust in Christ That's all they have, the flesh. That
part of me cannot fulfill the law of God. It says, because
the carnal mind is in enmity against God. Okay, so we have
somebody inside of us, in nature, that hates God. It's in enmity
against God. For it's not subject to the law.
Neither indeed can be, it cannot be. It's not subject to the law. Verse eight. in the flesh it's
impossible to please God. Verse 8. And this is important. It says, so they that are in
the flesh. Now while we have talked about
these people that are in the flesh, they're not born again. They're
not saved. They're in the flesh. It says
that they that are in the flesh, so they that are in the flesh
cannot please God. They cannot please God whatsoever.
There's nothing they can do to please God, no matter how hard
they try, no matter why, because their intentions, everything
inside of them is sinful. And without Christ, without the
Spirit of the Lord, you cannot please God, because everything
is sinful. Without faith, there's nothing
that you can do to please God, those that are in the flesh.
Verse nine. Verse 9 teaches me, but you are
not in the flesh. Talking to believers now. So
those that are in the flesh, impossible to please God. They
cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh,
but in the spirit. If so, the spirit of God dwells
in you. Now if any man have not the spirit
of Christ, it's none of his. So it's identifying that all
believers have the Spirit. And if you do not have the Spirit,
you're not of God. And if you're not of God, you
are in the flesh, you cannot please God. I'll talk in the
previous verse. Now verse 10 teaches me that
if Christ is in you, you're both dead and alive at the same time,
meaning we have those two natures, right? If Christ be in you, the
body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is alive because
of righteousness. It's, again, the true natures
here, right? We're not only the flesh. That's
a dead body. It talks about we carry this
dead body around, right? But we're not that body that
we carry. We carry it. So we are carrying it, carrying
that dead body, but sometimes we forget that we are the one
carrying it and that the Lord has done something for us. He
has given us a new nature. and sometimes we take off our
eyes over that and that's taking off our eyes of Christ, what
he has done for us and his nature and his Holy Spirit. Sometimes
we tend to do that. We tend to take our eyes and
just kind of look at the sinful and stay here, right? And we
acknowledge that we have this sinful flesh, but we forget about
what Christ has done for us. He has given us a new nature.
So, and I wrote here that we tend to behave based on how we
identify ourselves, don't we? We tend to behave based on how
we identify ourselves. In 1 John 3, 1, let's go to 1
John. 1 John 3 says, Behold what many
of love the Father has bestowed upon us, that we should be called
sons of God. Behold, yes. Therefore the world
knoweth not, because it knew him not. Beloved, now we are
sons of God and does not appear what we shall be, but we know
that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall
see him as he is. And then verse three, which is
key here, and every man have this hope. in him and purifies
himself even he is pure. What is the hope? The hope is
Christ. The hope is looking at him, looking at this new nature,
looking at what Christ has done for us. That needs to be our
focus, not the sin that this flesh was crucified, was done
away with at the cross. It really was. It's still here
and we're still hanging and carrying it. But we need to look at Christ
and look what He has done, not so much what our condition was
before we knew Christ, what our condition was when we were born.
Let's go to Romans 1, I mean Romans 6, chapter 6. Spend a
little bit of time with that, Romans 6. I'm going to read through the
first 22 verses. What shall we say then? Shall
we continue in sin that grace may abound? This is a question,
right? The obvious answer is no, right? God forbid. How shall we that
are dead to sin, we talked about that, we are dead to sin, Christ
has crucified the flesh, shall live any longer therein? knowing
not that so many of us as we were baptized in Christ Jesus
were baptized into his death. Okay, this was in union. That's
when we were baptized. We baptized into his death. To
what? Therefore, we are buried with
him. That's what happens when we proclaim Christ and we are
baptized publicly, no? Therefore, we are buried with
him by baptism into death. that like as Christ was raised
from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we shall
walk in newness of life. This is how we should walk, in
newness of life. For we have been planted together
in the lightness of His death. We shall also in the lightness
of His resurrection. We are one with Him, and this
is what we need to look at. Knowing this, that our old man
This is the flesh, what we were born with. The man that we still
carrying around is crucified with him, was crucified in Christ. All that sin that the flesh does,
all that was taken care of at the cross, all of it. The body of sin might be destroyed. Henceforth, we should not serve
sin. We should not serve sin, okay? For he that is dead is freed
from sin. Now, if we be dead with Christ,
we believe that we also should live with him. We shall live
with Christ. Knowing that Christ being raised
from the dead died no more, death has no more dominion over him. And it does not have over us
either because we were in Christ. For in that he died, he died
unto sin one time. Only once, that was enough. But
in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. He lives towards God.
He lives for God. Likewise, very important here. Likewise, likewise means the
same way. All right, in the same way. Reckon
ye also yourselves. Reckon means, it's an old word
for consider. but consider in a way stronger
than sometimes we consider something, right? Sometimes we consider,
we're considering two options, and we consider which one is
best. No, reckon I think is a little bit better. Reckon means see
it that is so. Believe that this is a fact.
You also are dead indeed into sin, but alive into God. but not in ourselves, through
Christ our Lord, through what he has done, through him. Let
not sin, therefore, reign in your mortal bodies, that you
should obey its laws thereof. We do not have to obey its laws
any longer. We're not only this flesh here. We have Christ, who we look to. And we should not obey their
laws, and neither yield the members as instruments of righteousness
unto sin, but yield yourselves to God. Be submissive to God.
We are to yield ourselves to God. For those that are alive
from the dead are members as instruments of righteousness
to God. Now, immediately when you read this, natural to say,
well, so we are pleasing God, we ourselves are yielding unto
God. No, this new nature that God
has given us is perfect and holy, and it's by God's grace. And
it's God who's doing the work, not you. It is the Holy Spirit
that's doing the work, not you. It is in Christ. It is in Christ,
so it's perfect in his sight. For sin shall not have dominion
over you, for you're not under the law, but under grace. And if you continue, it says,
what then? Shall sin because we are under
the law or under grace? God forbid. You not know that
whom you yield yourselves servants to obey, the servants ye are
and whom ye obey, whether it be sin unto death. If you obey
sin, if you obey your flesh, if you live by the flesh, it
says that God's going to bring you death. Or obedience into
righteousness. Obedience is through the Holy
Spirit, through looking to Christ, it is Christ's obedience in you.
But be, but God be thankful. that ye were the servants of
sin, thus in the past, but ye have obeyed from the heart that
form of doctrine which is delivered unto you. Being made free from
sin, ye became servants of righteousness. And how do we become servants
of righteousness? In the Spirit, by the Lord. by looking to the Lord Jesus
Christ, that spirit that He gives us, that new man that He gives
us. I speak in the matter of man
because of your infirmity of the flesh. Let's talk about our
flesh. It's still present. For ye have yielded your members,
servants, unto uncleanness and to iniquity, unto iniquity. Even
so, now yield your members servants to righteousness into holiness.
So this is the new, the end of that verse is what we are to
look at, right? We have these two natures. We're
not to be here or we're not to be looking at this. This is how
we were born. This is all that unbeliever has.
We look to Christ. We look to that new nature and
it has effects in the way we walk. We will walk in newness
of life. And, uh, Let's go back to our
text of Romans 8. We look at verse 11. It says, the Lord Jesus Christ will raise
you from within. Verse 11, it says, and as Christ
be in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life
because of righteousness. This is the Lord Jesus Christ's
life, himself, is what we see. But if the Spirit of Him that
raised Him, Jesus, from the dead dwells in you, if the Spirit
dwells in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall
also quicken your mortal bodies by the Spirit that dwells in
you. That same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead is in you
and will raise your body in your resurrection. Verse 12, I learned
that we no longer have to walk in the flesh. Look at verse 12.
Therefore, because of all these truths that preceded this verse,
therefore, brethren, we are debtors not to the flesh, to live after
the flesh. So we're not in bondage, we're
not in debt, we don't owe that flesh anything. That flesh was
crucified in Christ. We are to live in the Spirit.
It says, verse 13, if you continue on living in the flesh, you will
die your sins. But if you modify the deeds of
the body through the spirit, you have eternal life. That's
what verse 13 says. Listen to what it says. For if
we live after the flesh, ye shall die. But if you, through the
spirit, do modify the spirits of the body, you shall live.
The key is two things. We modify the deeds of the body,
but we do not do it ourselves. It's through the Spirit, through
the Holy Spirit. This is God living in us. This
is Christ living in you. It is not a work of the flesh.
The flesh cannot do that. All the flesh can do is sin.
That's all it can do. In verse 14, only those that
are led by the Spirit are the sons of God. 14 says, for as
many are led are the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. This is a clarification there
that any unbeliever cannot do this. And verse 15, this is not
a works gospel. Why? Because it says, we have
not received the Spirit of bondage again. It's talking about the
law of bondage, again, to fear. But we have received the spirit
of adoption. We are adopted in Christ. Wherefore,
we cry, Abba, Father. At verse 16, it teaches me that
the Spirit of God gives our spirit assurance. The Spirit Himself
bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.
This is the peace and the assurance that only God can give you. No
man can give you this. Only Christ himself can give
you this. And verse 17, we are completely united to Christ.
It says, if we children, then we heirs, heirs of God, joint
heirs with Christ, he so be that we suffer with him, that ye may
also be glorified together. We're gonna go to Galatians and
read a very similar passage. Galatians 5. Galatians 5, of
course, is that letter that Paul wrote against legalism, against
using the law either to get saved or to become sanctified, which
Paul preaches against. And Galatians 5, 16 through 25,
says, this I say then, walk in the Spirit, and ye shall
not fulfill the loss of the flesh. Okay, so you, how do we not fulfill
the loss of this flesh? It tells you right there, walk
in the Spirit. That's the way. The flesh lusteth
against the Spirit, and the Spirit is against the flesh. For these
are contrary to one another, so that you cannot do the things
that you would. I believe the things that you
would is your sinfulness. constantly have that sinfulness
in you that you want to do to satisfy the flesh? That's constantly
with us. But if ye be led by the Spirit,
you're not under the law. The law has nothing to do with
this. Moses' law has been fulfilled in Christ. And Christ is the
one that gives you that new nature. That new nature has already fulfilled
the law. It has. In Christ it has. And Sometimes when we say in
Christ we have, in Christ, it seems like it's less important
or less forceful than if we had done it, right? because they
say, oh, in Christ we are this, in Christ we have this. And we
think, well, in Christ, I wish I would have done it myself.
I feel more secure. No, no, no. Christ, when we say
in Christ, it's done perfectly. It's done by the Son. And it's holy and it's pure. And what Christ does for us is
much better than if we would have done it ourselves. Because
we experience grace. and we could not do it ourselves. God did not create man immutable. He created us immutable and we
changed. We sinned immediately. The first chance we got, we sinned. So when it says in Christ, we
were here, let's say, we're not under law, basically, verse 18.
Now the works of the flesh are manifest. Which are these? These are a list, a partial list
of this works of the flesh. And it's in a lot of the scripture. It's all over the scriptures.
It was not hard finding a passage to talk about this. It was hard
to select which one. Because I have a list here of
so many. This is all over the place. It's all over the word
of God. So the works of the flesh are
evident. They are adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,
idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath,
strife, sedition, heresies, ambience, murders, drunkenness, revelings,
as such, of which I tell you before, and I have also told
you in the past, that they which do these things shall not inherit
the kingdom of God. very clear, the wrath of God
is coming against these things. But the fruit, now the fruit,
of course, is singular. This is one single fruit because
it's one spirit in us. It's love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
gentleness, goodness, and faith. So it says, but the fruit is
love, joy, long-suffering, meekness, temperance, against no such law,
verse 24, very important, and they that are Christ have crucified
the flesh with its affections and lust. This is something that
believer will do. Every believer will do it in
Christ. This will do with that new nature, because that new
nature is holy. That new nature pleases God,
that new nature, not the flesh. The flesh is only sinful, but
that new nature does. So if we live in the Spirit,
let us walk in the Spirit, verse 25. And I'm not gonna cover every
session, but if you wanna look on your own, Ephesians, talk
about the same subject, Ephesians 4, 17 through 24, Colossians
3, 1 through 17. And now we're gonna, in conclusion,
we're gonna go to Thessalonians. Now remember that I started saying
about Thessalonians and the Bereans, no? And we talked about how the
Thessalonians, at first kind of had some objections and they
had resistance to Paul's preaching. We're going to go to 1 Thessalonians.
And 1 Thessalonians, we're going to look at, first, we're going
to look at chapter 2, verses 11 and 12. He's writing to Thessalonians
and he says the following, as you know now, As you now know
how, we sorted and comforted and charge every one of you.
This is what Paul did with them. As thou fathers do with children,
like the fathers do with children, in a loving manner, that ye walk
worthy of God, who have called unto his kingdom and glory. and he's exhorting the Thessalonians
and in verse chapter three, verse 10 through 13, says, night and
day, this is him while he was away from Thessalonians, night
and day prayed exceedingly that we might see your face.
He wanted to see them again. For we might perfect that which
was lacking in your faith. There was something lacking in
their faith and he's praying that it might be fulfilled what's
lacking in their faith. Now, God himself and our Father
and our Lord Jesus Christ direct your way. He's praying that the
Lord Jesus direct their way. And the Lord may increase and
unbound you, okay, so he's praying for them to increase into abounding
love towards one another, that's always crucial, and that's always
a prayer of God to us, that we love each other, toward all men,
and even do towards you, to the end that he may establish your
hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father,
at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints. Furthermore,
that we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus
Christ. That means by the Lord Jesus
Christ authority. He's exhorting them. He's beseeching
them that ye have received us how we are to walk to please
God. Now, when it talks about pleasing
God, I want to say, how can I please God? I thought the Lord Jesus
Christ pleased him, him alone. But you must remember that any
pleasing to God is done by this new man that Christ has given
us. It's done by him, not by the flesh. The flesh cannot please
God, but this new man can. We are both, we have them both,
but it says how you are to walk and please God. that you will
abound more and more, for you know what commandments we gave
you by the Lord Jesus Christ. For this is the will of God,
even your sanctification, that you should abstain from fornication." sanctification by works or by
the law, because there's no such thing. The law is only good for
the lawless, and it may have been good to see our sin, but
the law does not sanctify you, the law does not save you. But
it's talking about here walking in the Spirit does. It says, the will of God is our sanctification,
it says, that you should abstain from fornication, that everyone
should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and
in honor. How can I do that? The new man. The new man can. The new man
looks to Christ. The new man is Christ in the
sense it's united. Paul says that is Christ in me,
the hope of glory. He says that is Christ who does,
not I, but Christ, is Christ himself doing this. So even though
you may experience this, this is not something you look at.
The believer never looks at anything that he does as his own righteousness. He knows that it's Christ. He knows that it's the Holy Spirit.
Yet it says that everyone should know how to possess his vessel
of sanctification and honor, not in lust of competence even
as the Gentiles which know not God, that no man shall go beyond
and defraud his brother in any matter because of the Lord will
be avenger of all such and have forewarned and testified. So
these commandments are not new to them, right? It tells them
to abstain from fornication. Fornication is sexual sin. It's any sin, any sex outside
of marriage. That's the clear word of God.
is the will of God. And then verse 4 teaches me that
every believer should follow this commandment. And Philippians
2.13 talks about what is going on. Meaning, is this me? Is this the flesh working out
some salvation? Is this the flesh working out
some sanctification? No. Philippians 2.13 says, Brethren,
I count myself Let me see this. No, that's not 213. 213 is this. For it is God which worketh in
you both to will and to do his good pleasure. It is God who
gets the glory because this is not of yourselves. The only thing that is really
of yourself that you deserve credit for is this. It's the
flesh. It's all the same. That's all. Nothing else. Now,
do you do these things? Yes, you do them. But it's God
working in you. He gets the glory. He always
gets the glory. And Philippians 4.13, in the
same book, if we go to Philippians 4.13, it says, I can do all things. Huh. He could? Yes. That means
that we can also. How? Through Christ which strengthened
me. It is Christ working in you. It is Christ. So verse 5, going
back to our text, and we were in Thessalonians, it says, modify
this, modify the loss. Do not behave like Gentiles.
That's what verse 5 says. in 1 Thessalonians 4, 5. And it talks about in verse 6,
to love the brethren, love our brothers. And verse 7 says, God
has not called us into uncleanness, but into holiness. Now holiness,
now we know that sometimes we feel holiness because we feel
that that's a characteristic of God. But think about this. We pray, and our pray is sinful. isn't it? I mean, it's wrought
with sin because we are praying it. But the spirit doesn't work
in that prayer and it reaches God as it should. He fixed it. We sing songs, we worship, but
we do so with our sin nature as well. So we walk in the spirit
the same way. We do not look at our walking
as anything that has to do with us or that we should get credit
for, yet we still walk and trust Christ. because we're not looking
at anything we do or anything we walk for the acceptance of
God because it is Christ. Our acceptance is Christ and
Christ alone. And that new nature is the one
that is accepted. That new nature is the one that's
saved. We've been already saved and we have this new nature in
us. And there's nothing we can do
that will lose this nature. This is the nature that's going
to go on. This body is going to go into the grave. It's dead
already. And our safe nature is in us. And we don't do anything to attain
that same nature. That nature just is there, is
there by grace, and it manifests itself, and we glorify God because
of it. Because we see Christ being exalted. So, I love the brothers. In 1 Peter and 2 Peter it talks
about God calling us into holiness. It's not saying that we are going
to be like God, sinless. It's saying that we ought to
be walking towards the Spirit, this one. Forgetting about this
all nature, sinful flesh, we ought to be walking towards this
one, to that new nature. But that new nature really is
Christ, isn't it? Because Christ is the one that's
given us life. We are united in Christ and we're
walking towards Christ. Now of course the last verse
in verse 8 is a solemn warning here. He says, He therefore that
despises, despises not God. God hath given us unto the Holy
Spirit. It says that he is not despising
man, meaning that this teaching here that we just talked about
is not of man, it's of God. If you reject this You're rejecting
the Holy Spirit, which is the one that gives the power to do
these things that we cannot do if we are just the flesh. But by God's grace, we have both
natures. And this nature here is already
saved, is holy in Christ. Christ gave it to us in the same
nature as Christ the man was, and this is the nature that pleases
the Lord Jesus Christ, pleases God. But thank be to God that
we have Christ, that we have that gift. May that be our blessing. th th