Remember Eric and Angela and
your prayers. Spoke with them today. You seem to have a few steps
forward and several steps backwards. The process of healing, if the
Lord be gracious, is going to be that way. So just pray for
them as they struggle with this. It was good to hear his voice
today, so pray for him. Ask your prayers for me tonight
as I desire to preach the gospel to you and again find the spirit indeed is willing
but the flesh is weak. I long to have a mind and pray
that God would fill it with the words that you need tonight and
I pray that this would be a comforting message, as it should be. It
should be a comforting message. I find that these messages, when
I'm preparing them, I know that Paul was dealing with a lot of
confrontation in this book. He's dealing with those who would
oppose him. And surely there are those that
will oppose the message. and we'll oppose the message
that Paul preached, and as I preach the same message to you, I don't
desire to preach a different one, but exactly what the Apostle
is conveying, there will be those that oppose us, but regardless
of them, this should not be something that we just see as a confrontation,
but rather a comfort. It should be a comfort to us. And I pray that it will be. I
pray that the Spirit would use this as it may be offensive to
the world, but to us it is not offensive. It is a beautiful
message of grace. And that's the message Paul is
saying that we are under. We are under grace. And what
a glorious state this is to be under the grace of God. And it
should be a comfort to us. And I pray that the message will
be that to you. And again, I don't have to try
to be confrontational. To just preach the gospel itself
is enough. And so I pray that the Spirit
of God would give me the liberty that I need tonight for you.
And I ask your prayers for me. Pray for Mom and Audrey. Audrey
will be traveling back with Mom this week, so pray for them as
they travel. Continue to pray for Chuck and Patty as they travel
home this week. Pray for them. Yes. Okay, pray for Mike and Connie.
She's just having issues with the... Okay. We pray for them. It is very tough. She handles that well. She handles
it well, and God's given her the grace to. And I imagine there'll
be a time where she don't handle it well. But that's OK, too,
because that's just who we are. We're not going to be perfect
in this. So pray for her as she deals
with that illness. Pray for Mike. Anybody else that we're missing?
Pray for those that are not able to be here. I would that the
Lord would open the way that they would be able to attend. I think that it feels like that
some people are getting only half. They're only getting half
of this. In other words, I'd be preaching
to them just half of the Book of Romans. I'm preaching to you
the whole book, But to them, they're only getting half. And
I would long for them. I hope they can at least use
the means that are available to keep up with the messages,
because they've been precious to me. I hope they've been precious
to you. I hope they've been a benefit
to you as we go through this book together. Any other requests? I want to
thank the Lord for trying to do really well Well, that's good. Reprieves are wonderful. Reprieves
are wonderful times, and we should be thankful for them. Any chance
we get to be thankful, we should. We should. So pray for our children. There's life, there's hope. There's
life, there's hope. my prayers that every one of
our children would believe. There would be none outside of
Christ. That would be my prayer. That's
always my prayer. And I pray that God would do
that and be gracious. And I know this, He don't need
us. He don't need us to help in the
salvation of our children. I know it'd be nice if you could
They'd listen to you, but most of the time, they just don't.
Peradventure, God sent another man, they'd listen to him. So,
we'll pray for that end. Let's go to him and pray. Gracious
Father in heaven, I'm thankful you're gracious. What would we do if you were
not gracious? I know this, we would perish
if you were not gracious. But you are gracious, and merciful,
slow to anger, and plenteous in redemption. The precious blood
of Christ is sufficient for ten million worlds, had you willed
it to be so. And I know it is sufficient for
all the elect that you have purpose to save. Father, this night,
send your Spirit. Pour out your Spirit upon the
hearts of your people. I beg you to shore up this message
in the hearts of your people as we struggle with the flesh
and we struggle against the sin of the old man constantly. Help us to be ever mindful of
the greatness of Christ's offering to free us from sin, its curse,
its penalty, its dominion. Tonight as we learn, Father,
I do pray that you would show us again that we are free or
we are dead to the law, but yet we are alive to you in Christ
our Savior. I beg you to open the text to
our hearts. Fill me with the words you need
your people to hear, and then open their hearts to give it
to them. These that we mentioned that are sick, we lift them up
and we lay them before you. We spread them out. We spread them out before you,
Father, our petitions, our cries, our struggles, our difficulties,
our afflictions, our sorrows, our sicknesses, you know them
all, and yet we bring them even now before your presence and
beg for grace, beg for healing and mercies, and pray that you'd
be tender and compassionate to your people. Give us strength
and faith to endure all of the trials and difficulties of this
life. Father, I beg you to save sinners.
Please be merciful and help us to ever be mindful to give thanks
at every opportunity for the things that you give us, the
prayers that you do answer, the things that you have heard and
answered and given to us. Help us to see these things and
not be blind to them so that we can be thankful. Forgive us
our sins when we're not in Christ's name Amen Take your bibles in turn with
me to Romans chapter 7 Romans chapter 7 And our text will be found in verse
4, but we're going to go through verse 1 and through verse 6 this
evening, but look at verse 4 just to begin with. The apostle says,
Wherefore, my brethren, you also are become
dead to the law by the body of Christ, that you should be married
to another even to him. who is raised from the dead,
that we should bring forth fruit unto God." Entitled this message,
Dead to the Law. Dead to the Law. As I was thinking about this,
this one word has caught my attention as I was reading this text, and
it is the word in this verse that connects and binds and builds
upon all that the Apostle said before, and that word is also. Also. He's saying this is true,
but look, even more, this is also true. He said you are also become dead
to the law by the body of Christ. Now Paul clearly expounded in
chapter 6 this fact that every believer is dead to sin. Every believer is dead to sin. He says in verse 6 of chapter
6, he says, Knowing that our old man is crucified with him,
that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth you
should not serve sin, for he that is dead is freed, or justified,
from sin. And then in verse 10 he tells
us how we are dead to sin. He says that for in that he died,
Christ, He died once unto sin, but in that he liveth, he liveth
unto God, listen to what he says, likewise. He said, however Christ died
to sin, and however He is alive unto God, he said, likewise,
impute this to be true of yourselves, that you are indeed dead to sin. but alive unto God through Jesus
Christ our Lord. As Christ died once for sin,
what did he do? He died in satisfaction of the
justice of God for our sins. He died for our sins once. forever removing the penalty
of our sins. Never again shall anyone for
whom Christ died suffer the penalty of sin. Never again. He died
once unto sin. Likewise, you too died once unto
sin. We don't die unto sin every day.
That's what religion would tell you. You need to mortify your
sins every day. No, they were mortified when
Christ died, once. They were put away. They were
free from the curse. And as He is risen from the dead
and alive unto God, even so, likewise, impute this to be true. You're alive unto God, even as
He is. And never again will you ever
stand under the rule of sin or the shadow of death ever again. That verse in Revelation just
codifies this. He says, Whosoever hath part
in the first resurrection, that's the new birth, over which the
second death hath no power. You got that? The second death
hath no power over anybody that has been born again. Everyone
that is born of God, the second death has no power. Why? Because we died in Christ. Sin
hath no more dominion over you. And what's the evidence that
it has no dominion over us? Look at verse 17, God be thanked
that you were servants of sin, but you have obeyed from the
heart that formal doctrine which was delivered. What's the evidence
that sin has no more dominion over you? Can you follow me around
and see that? Nope. You won't be able to follow
me around and see that. I won't be able to look in the
mirror and say, aha, look, that's somebody who's dead to sin. No. How do I know I'm dead to sin?
Because you have obeyed. Now, I want you to get this. If Paul wanted you back under
the law, that was a perfect opportunity for him to put it in there. You
were servants of sin, but you obeyed the law. That would have
been a perfect opportunity for him to put that back in there.
That's not what he's trying to do. He's trying to show you something,
that you are free from the guilt and penalty of sin, which is
death. Why? How do you know? Because
you've obeyed the gospel. You believe the gospel of Jesus
Christ. It's the whole point of the first
five chapters of justification by faith. And faith in Christ
is the evidence of being justified by the faith of Christ. We've
been over that multiple times. And who's to be thanked for all
this? God's to be thanked, isn't He? God's to be thanked for these
things. And this has come by the new
birth, isn't it? Our Lord told Nicodemus, you
must be born again. There's no way to see God. There's
no way you can enter into heaven except you be born from above. except the Spirit of God come
and give us a new nature, a new heart, a new mind, a new spirit. We should never enter the Kingdom
of God, but that's what He did for us, isn't it? And the evidence
I have that is faith. You believe? If you believe,
that is the evidence that you are now the servants of God.
You are now the servants of God. So, this answers the question
of the legalist. Obviously, all of this has been
answering the question of the legalist. Shall we sin that grace
may abound? Well, Paul says, how in the world
can we live in sin when we're dead to it? If we're dead to
it, we can't live in it. It has no influence on the anew
man, does it? No influence whatsoever. Now, in chapter 7, the Apostle
declares another benefit for believers in Christ, another
benefit of his death. And that is, you are not only
dead to sin's guilt and penalty, You're not only alive unto God,
free from eternal death. Listen, as we walk in this world,
listen, you are also dead to the law. That's a benefit. It's a benefit of the body of
Christ. He said you are also dead to
the law by the offering of Christ. In chapter 6 we learn that sin
shall not have dominion, over us and in chapter 7 we learn
that the law has no dominion over us. Now why would the apostle need
to make this statement? Have you figured this out yet
why? He's made this statement before,
hasn't he? Look in verse 14 of chapter 6. He says, For sin shall not have
dominion over you. Now why is that? For you are
not under the law. but under grace. But why does the apostle have
to keep saying this? Even because he knew the heart
and mind of the legalist would always seek to return back to
the law. That's always the mind of the
flesh. That he would return from grace
to the law in some measure to keep himself from the dominion
of sin. We as believers are free from
the penalty of sin. Why? Because God has created
in us a new nature that cannot sin. In Ephesians chapter 4 he
says, put on the new man which is created. Everybody understands
what that word means, don't you? When something's created, that
means something wasn't there before. And now it is. It was made by a divine miracle. It's created. And listen to the
image of this new man. It's created after God in true
holiness. And so we have a new nature that
cannot sin, nor can it be ruled, ever ruled by sin, ever. Yet
we in our experience still have what? The old man. You have the
old man of sin that still abides in us and thus what do we have?
We got a conflict, don't we? We have a struggle within our
own selves. The desire of the new man is
what? To serve God. So when Paul says things like,
yield not your members to unrighteousness, but to righteousness. Now that's
the desire of the new man, isn't it? These hands, this mind, this
heart, these eyes, it is our desire that we yield these things
into service of our God. And yet, have you been able to?
Can you fulfill that desire? No, because the old man of sin
is constantly warring against that. But, praise God, the old man
has things he desires to do that he won't be able to do either.
So Paul said that you cannot do what you would. We have this struggle within
ourselves. So the question remains, what is going to keep us from
sin? Isn't this the longing of the believer? If we are dead
to sin, isn't the longing of the believer to abstain from
it, to keep from it, to not do those things that are displeasing
to our Lord? Of course it is. Well, what means
or what source of power does the believer lean on? That's the question. Well, the
legalist will then promote the law. He says, well, the law will
help you. The legalist will promote the
law. These are the ones who say that we're saved by grace, but
the law keeps us saved. The law keeps us under grace. The legalist says, yes, grace
justifies me from the sins, curse, and penalty, but the law restrains
me, sanctifies me, makes me pure. But the apostle here seeks to
totally undermine such a thought. In this chapter, listen to me,
he will put another nail in the coffin of such false religion
who seeks to be saved by grace and kept by the law. Those who seek to be justified
by Christ and sanctified by their obedience. This text will put
a nail in that coffin forever. Because he says this, by Jesus
Christ you are freed from the penalty of sin, the curse of
sin, and listen, by the same body of Jesus Christ you are
dead to the law. In other words, the law has no
say or effect on you whatsoever. Also dead to the law. Now the
reason sin shall not have dominion over you, the reason death shall
not come upon you is because you're not under the law. Listen
to me, if you were under the law, you're under its what? Curse. You can't be under the law and
be under God's blessing. Paul says that in verse 14 of
chapter 6, sin shall not have dominion over you because you
are not under the law, but under grace, because you are dead to
the law. And so to return to the law in
any measure is to be removed from grace. And so in this text I want to
see four clear divisions. Four clear divisions here in
this text. First of all, a known fact. Paul
is going to give us a known fact. He said, those that are under
the law, those who know the law, you know something. And secondly, he's going to,
in verses 2 and 3, we're going to have an illustration of this.
He's going to use marriage as an illustration of the duration
of the rule of law. And then he's going to get to
the main point of what it is to be dead to sin in verse 4. And in verses 5 and 6, he's going
to show us the difference between those under the law and under
grace. There's a difference. So first
of all, a known fact. Let's read this together in verse
1. He says, Know you not, brethren, for I speak to them that know
the law, how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as
he liveth. And Paul is not only speaking
to the Jew, he's speaking to anybody that wants to be under
the law. Anybody that wants to be under the law, they're professing
they know the law. And so he's going to ask this
factual question, don't you know this? Isn't this just so, you
that want to be under the law, that the man is only under the
law so long as he lives? As long as a man lives, the law,
he is alive to the law, and the law is alive to that man. And
this is true of all law, isn't it? We have laws in this country,
and we're under those laws. But as soon as you die, that
law has no effect on you whatsoever. You know, you lay in there, Bodies
on the ground and somebody comes and says, you know what? We're
going to raise taxes on you. What does the corpse say? So
what? Your law don't affect me anymore. Don't have any charge over me
anymore. I'm dead. And so how much more true is
that concerning the law of God? I want you to know this as a
fact, everyone is born under the law. Everyone who is created
of God is under His government and subject to His law. Now there
are many people in this world that have never heard the law
of Moses. Regardless of that, did not Paul deal with this early
on in chapter 2 when he said that the law of God is written
on the heart of every man? Every man from the time of his
birth until the time of his death is under that law, subject to
that law. That law has dominion over him.
And listen what this law demands. It demands perfection. I don't
think anybody who wants to be under the law understands the
true nature of the law. The nature of the law is perfection. You view the law, at least the
Ten Commandments, as more like the Ten Suggestions. They are
not suggestions, friends. They are demands that must be
met every second of every day. The law's demands is holy perfection
and everyone who disobeys the law, death is the consequence. We just went over this last Sunday. The wages of sin is death. And what is sin but transgression
of the law. You remember when our father
was given the first law, the first law of God that was given
to man was given to Adam, wasn't it? Was it the 613 laws in the
law of Moses? It was one. He said, that's my
tree, don't eat it. In the day you eat it, you'll
die. That's a very simple command, isn't it? Adam was a highly intelligent,
the most intelligent man that ever lived other than Christ.
He had all the capacity of his mind and his faculties, and yet
God gave him the simplest of commands. You know what happened? He failed. He died. When he broke that law, he died. And the moment he died, the law
of God, the sin of his nature was written on his heart. The law was immediately written.
How do you know? Because then he looked down and
saw he was naked. He didn't know that before or didn't have any
inclination to that before. What happened? Immediately when
he died, the law of God was written on his heart and he knew he was
guilty. And men live. under that short,
under the conscience. From Adam to Moses, men lived
by conscience, by what was written on their hearts. Why did God give the Law of Sinai? Why was the Law of Moses given? It was given so that sin might
be magnified. You see, sin continued, didn't
it? From Adam to Moses? Before the
law, you suppose there was no sin? No, there was sin. Yet what the law of Moses came
in to do was only to magnify the offense. That's all it was
intended to do. I believe in Galatians he said,
Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of the transgression,
that's what Paul said. It was added to magnify it, that's
all the law can do, is magnify the transgression. And so Paul writes in Galatians
chapter 3, the result of this, now everybody's under this law,
and this is what the law says about itself, as it is written,
cursed, is everyone who continueth not in all things
written in the book of the law to do them. I don't know. I mean, when I'm trying to preach
this, I don't know how much more simple you can make it. I don't
know how much more plain you can say it. The law says, Cursed is everyone
that continueth not, listen to me, in all things written in
the book of the law, not to acknowledge them, but to do them. You're cursed if you don't do
them all. James says if you miss one, if
you are guilty of one, James chapter 2 and verse 10, if you
are guilty of one point of the law, you're guilty of the whole
law. And so then the wages of such
guilt is what? Death. That's what the law demands. And this law has dominion over
men so long as they're alive to it. So long as they're alive. But look now at the illustration
that Pohl gives. So we see the duration, don't
you? You see how long this law, as long as you're alive, you're
under law. Look what Paul says. He says,
For the woman which hath a husband, which is bound by the law to
her husband, so long as he liveth. But if the husband be dead, she
is loosed from her husband. So then, if while her husband
liveth she be married to another man, she is called an adulteress. But if her husband be dead, she
is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress Though she
be married to another man. It's a very simple illustration.
She's got a woman under the law. When she's married to her husband,
as long as her husband's alive, she's subject to him. If she goes off and marries another
man under the law, listen, she's an adulteress. Anybody misunderstand
that? It's very plain. I know the world
don't like that. That's just so. This is the law.
This is God's law. But listen, if he dies, she's free. She's free. I remember Don hitting on this
message one time, and he was several years back before he
got really sick. He was preaching this, and he
said, you know what? He's pointing to Shelby. He said,
listen to me very carefully. When I die, the minute I die,
the very second I stop breathing, that woman's free. And if she
has a man the very next day, don't you say a word to her.
She's free. She's free. It's a very simple
illustration. You can understand it. She's
under his dominion so long as he's alive. But as soon as he
dies, what? She's free to marry another. Now, I know that there are exceptions
in marriage, divorce, concerning fornication in the law. Paul
doesn't deal with it here. I'm not going to take the time
to deal with it. But our Lord said this about marriage. He said in Matthew 19, He said,
Moses, because of the hardness of your heart, suffered you to
put away your wives. But from the beginning it was
not so. Marriage under the law was intended to be forever. It was intended to be as long
as life lasted for the spouse. Why? Because it was to be a picture. Marriage was always intended
to be a picture of the Lord's devotion and love for his people. It was intended of God to preach
the gospel to us. The bond of love and devotion
between Jesus and his bride is pictured in marriage. But by
this illustration, we are made to see that before our marriage
to Christ, we were first married to the law. Every one of us were first married
to the law. The law was our first husband.
The law was our first husband. I thought of that illustration
of Ruth. You remember Ruth? She's a Moabitess.
And she goes to Boaz. And Boaz says, look, I would
marry you, but there is a nearer kinsman than me. And she had to actually go before
that nearer kinsman first. That nearer kinsman's a law,
friends. It's a picture of the law. And
you remember, he said, I'll redeem her until he found out she was
a Moabitess and realized that he could not redeem her without
destroying his own inheritance. You see, the law can't redeem
you unless it defiles itself. It would have to defile itself
to redeem you. And then Jesus Christ comes in and once he rejects
her, once he cannot marry her, then Boaz is able to come in
as the kinsman redeemer under the law. But our first husband
is the law, friends. And consider what we have done
to our first husband. We have broken the law. We have
broken the law. And the law, our first husband
demands this, our death. Isn't that what is true under
the law if a woman committed adultery? What's the sentence
of that? It was death, wasn't it? I thought of that woman who had
committed adultery when the Lord Jesus Christ was here on the
earth. You remember those Pharisees grabbed that woman and they said
they took her in the very act And they cast her at his feet
and said, this woman had committed adultery. The law said we should
stone her. What do you say? Under the law, the sentence of
the law, every one of us deserved, like that woman, death. Every one of us deserved death. And surely if we had died under
the sentence of the law, we would have only got what we deserved.
Isn't this true? Of you who believe, if you were
to die under the sentence of this law, you would have just
received what you deserved. That's what every believer confesses.
And so this illustration is this, the only hope then is what? that we die to the law, that
we die to the law. Now, how can I die to the law
without actually dying? How can I be dead to the law
without actually dying? Well, this is the third point,
the good news, the hope that is found in verse 4. Look at
this. He says, Wherefore, my brethren, you also are become
dead to the law by the body of Christ. He said in the same way we are
justified from sins, guilt, in the same way we are made alive
unto God, is the same way we are free to marry another. That we are free from the law.
Not by our death, but by the death of Jesus Christ, our Savior. Again, he says in verse 6 of
chapter 6, knowing this, that our old man is crucified with
him. Now, what did the law demand of you? You that were under the
law, what did the law demand? It demanded your death. Well, guess what? In Christ,
my old man was crucified. It died. When Christ died, I
died. being the old man crucified with
him, that the body of sin might be destroyed. Now listen, if
my body of sin is destroyed, then what dominion has the law
over me? It has no dominion over me if
it's already satisfied. And so likewise, reckon this
to be true. We're under the law so long as
a man liveth, but guess what? We've already died. So then what
does the law have to say to someone who's already died? It no longer
has dominion over us. The illustration of that woman
taken in adultery, you remember, she was under the law and she
was guilty. She was worthy of death. And
there she was, laying out naked before our Lord. You know, those men thought they
had Him, didn't they? He had been preaching love and
mercy and grace and forgiveness, and there it was, they got this
woman in the very act, she was guilty, and they said, well now
what do you want to do? The law says we should stone
her. Now if He said, Well, we need to have mercy. Then what
they're gonna say is, they're gonna say, well see, he doesn't
like, he doesn't obey the law of God. But, if he said stoner,
then he could say, where's all this love and mercy you were
talking about? They thought they had him. Do you remember what
our Lord did? He knelt down and wrote on the
ground. I don't know exactly, but I know this. The first time
God knelt down to write something, he wrote the law. And surely, if he did not write
specific names and specific sins, he wrote the law. Whatever he
wrote, it was concerning the law. And you remember what happened.
He said, he that is without sin, let him cast the first stone.
And you remember, they all looked down at what he wrote, and they
all had to turn away and leave. Every one of them were just as
guilty as she was. And there she is. He was exposed
them to be hypocrites. And the only one that can stone
her was him. The only one who had a right
to kill her was Christ. It was his law that she broke. But instead of stoning her, you
know what He did. He showed mercy to her. He said,
Who is it that condemneth thee? And she looked around and she
saw no one. She said, No man, Lord. And He
said, Neither do I condemn thee. How could He do that? How could
He be just and let that woman go? the same way He can be just
and let you go. Because He came to bear her sin
under the law. He came to bear her guilt in His own body on the tree. And as God made him to be sinned,
God's law was justly satisfied by his death. Now listen, if
we and that woman died under our sins, one thing about this
is that the law would never be satisfied. That's why a sinner's death is
eternal, because it could never pay sufficient price for our
sins. But the glory of Jesus Christ
is this, when He died under the law for our sins, He satisfied,
so when the law was coming down and justice was condemning the
Lord Jesus Christ, when He was dying in our stead, when He died,
the law says, that's enough. That's enough. I'm completely
satisfied with His death. All sin is paid in full. And so it is with us. He came
to be our savior. As our federal head, he provided
what we could not provide. What the law required, he provided. By his one offering in death,
the justice of the law was forever satisfied. The scripture says,
being made a curse for us. You see how you're dead to the
law? He was made a curse for you, that he might redeem us
from the curse of the law. Wherefore, my brethren, not only
are you free from the curse and penalty of sin, But you are free
from the law even because you are dead to the law. Dead to the law. You see, Christ came into this
world as a man and being found in fashion as a man. Listen,
the scripture says he humbled himself. And what? Became obedient. Isn't this what he was living
for when he came here? He was living under that law.
He was satisfying the demands of that law in perfect obedience
to God and by his perfect offering that law is completely and forever
established, satisfied, and honored for everyone he represented. He fulfilled that law. And you
know what the law bears witness of? The law bears witness that
Christ satisfied it. The law bears witness that Christ
satisfied it. What are the two principles of
the whole law? What are the two principles? To love the Lord your God with
all your heart, soul, and mind, and strength, and body, and love
thy neighbor as thyself. The law has 613 commandments
and if you are to obey the law you have to obey all 613 with
that perfect mindset. Everything you do in obedience
to the law has to be in love to God and in love to your neighbor. We don't even know of the law
much less able to do one of those things with complete perfect
love to God and complete perfect love to our neighbor the only
one who done that is Christ he's the only one that satisfied that
demands and the law testifies that he has satisfied it in this
he's alive when he died for our sins How
do you know that your sins were paid for? How do you know there's no more
sin to pay? Because God raised him from the
dead. God raised him from the dead.
His resurrection is proof that the law is satisfied. And this
is what Paul says in chapter 10. He gets to this point. Christ
is the end of the law. Now what does he mean by that?
He's the fulfillment of the law, isn't he? He is the satisfaction
of the law. He has established the law forever,
honored God completely, and in love for his people. He is the end of the law for
righteousness to everyone that believeth. So we know this, He being our faithful husband,
our faithful husband, he has forever established the law of
God. You know what illustrates this
idea of marriage? I think the best is Gomer and
Hosea, don't you? What a beautiful, beautiful picture
of how Christ saves his people. Hosea was a man of God, a prophet,
and God said, I want you to go down and marry a prostitute. And Hosea goes and finds Gomer,
and he marries her, and then it wasn't long until she runs
off, and she goes right back to the whorehouse, right back
to where she was. She abandons her husband, abandons
her children, And you know what? Every day,
in love for her, I don't understand this, in love for her, he brings
her provisions and puts them at her door and doesn't even
tell her it's him. He just puts the food there and
he leaves. And every day she gets up and
she says, look what my lover gave me. Didn't even know it
was him. One day he determines to get
her back. You know what he does? He withholds that food. He withholds that food. Withholds
those provisions. And then what? She ain't got
nothing. And then she says this, I'll
return to my first husband. That doesn't work out too well
for her. And then you know what he does
when she's all broken and she's got no one? He said, I will lure
her into the wilderness, and I'm not going to speak harshly.
I'll speak comfortably to her, and I'm going to give her back
her inheritance as my wife. What an astounding picture. That
is a picture of Christ and his church. Christ is betrothed,
has betrothed of God to his elect people. And what kind of people
are his elect people? They're Gomer. We all by nature
went a-whoring after our own gods, after our own flesh, and
yet what did He provide for us daily? Daily He made provisions
for us. Daily He gave us our food, our
substance, and our life, and we thought what? It was our lovers,
it was our flesh giving us these pleasures. But thank God by His grace He
was determined to bring us to Himself, wasn't He? He wasn't
going to leave us there. And what did he start doing?
He started withholding those things. Flesh, the sin had no
longer had its joys and its pleasures anymore. We began to grieve. We began to experience the pains
of our sins, the sorrow. And then what we say? What do
we say? I'm going to return to my first husband. Who was your
first husband? It was the law. Isn't that where you desire to
return? We desire to return. Religion! I know what I'll do. I'll clean up my life. I'll get
right with God. Then it'll all be well. You know
what it says in Hosea chapter 2? He said, I'm going to make
her new moons and her Sabbaths and all of her feasts, they're
going to be horrible. Religion to us was horrible,
wasn't it? It was no help. It was no benefit
to our souls. Everybody else seemed to be happy
in it, but we couldn't be. And then what'd he do? He took
us away from all that and put us in the wilderness. He set us alone with no help,
no hope. And He did something I never
thought would ever happen. He didn't condemn me. He spoke comfortably to me. How could He speak comfortably
to me? Knowing what I have done to disobey His law, He can speak comfortably to me
because He died so that I might be dead to the law. The law could
have no more say over me I like that when Joshua, that old high
priest, is standing there in all those filthy rags. And the
scripture says, Satan stood at his right hand ready to accuse
him. You know what Satan said? Nothing. He wasn't allowed to speak. He wasn't allowed to speak. Our
Lord says, isn't this mine? You have no right to condemn
this man. He's mine. He's a brand pluck
from the burning. Isn't that comfortable? Did I
speak comfortably to you? You see, we were married to the
law. But now then, by grace, through faith, what have we found?
That we are dead to the law and able then to what? Marry another. Isn't this wonderful that you're
married to the Son of the Living God. We are betrothed to Him
in righteousness and in love and mercy. He came and He delivered
us who could not deliver ourselves. He delivered us. He delivered us from sin's penalty,
sin's curse. And He delivered us from the
dominion of the law so that now we are married to another. Notice
this last thing, the difference between those who are under grace
and under law. Look at verse 5. He said, For when we were
in the flesh, the motions of sin which were by the law did
work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. What
is the result of everyone who is under the law? What fruit
do they have? Death. That's all you can produce.
When we were under the law, that's exactly what we found in it.
We lived according to the flesh. We lived according to how we
wanted to live. And what we found, we found that
to be the fruit of that is death. It's always death. And so anyone who desires to
only be under the law, if you profess to be saved by grace
and then return to the law, listen, the only thing I've got for you
is death. There's no hope for a person like that. But we who are free and under
grace, look what happens to us, but now we are delivered from
the law. That being dead, wherein we were
hailed, that we should serve in newness of spirit and not
in the oldness of the letter. What then is the motivation of
everyone who is married to Christ and dead to the law? We do not desire to live under
the oldness of the letter. That's like that woman, the illustration
there, if you had a woman and her husband, he was He was hard,
he was cold, he was mean, he didn't show any affection to
her, but yet she was bound to him. Until when? Until he died. And there he died. And then she
finds a husband and he's gracious and he loves her and he has mercy
on her. Do you think she'd go to that
grave and try to obey the husband that died? No. One fellow put it like this,
those who are under grace, said this man, he hired this woman
to be his housekeeper. And he put a list of things for
her to do every morning on the refrigerator. And she would come
in and look at the list, and she would go through that list.
and do everything on that list and he would pay her. Well, time
went on and these two fell in love. They fell in love and they got
married. Do you know what happened to
the list? The list went in the trash. Why? Because she now does those things
out of love. whereas before she was doing
it for merit. This is the motivation of everyone
under grace. We produce real spiritual fruit and we do it because of love. That's the difference between
those under the law and under grace. Those under the law seek
to earn. We do it Because he's our husband. Because he's the love of our
hearts. I pray that God would teach us
the truth that we are dead to the law. Because you are. You're
dead to the law. Law has no hold over you. It
was a husband that died and it's gone. It's never going to come
back to rule over us again. We are now under a new husband,
one that has delivered us, one who has justified us, he has
sanctified us, he has redeemed us, he has called us, and guess
what? He keeps us. He keeps us. Who's going to keep you to the
end? How are you going to make this? How are you going to finish
this race? With all the struggle within
yourself and all the struggle in your flesh and all of the
difficulties of life, how in the world are you ever sure you're
going to make it? Well, my husband keeps me. My Savior keeps me. That's my
hope, is that because I am married to Him, I am never going back
under that other husband. I'm free. Free from the law. Oh, happy condition. If you understand what the law
says, you know it's a happy condition to be free from it, if you understand
what it is. And you are so free that you're,
Paul says you're dead to it. What can a law do? You're under
the law so long as you're alive, but what happens when you're
dead? That law has no dominion over you, and you've already
died. Paul said, I am crucified with
Christ. Isn't that what he said? I'm crucified with Christ. I've
already died. I died to the law once in Christ. Crucified with
Christ. Nevertheless, what? I live. Yet,
not I. But Christ liveth in me. And the life I now live, I live
by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself
for me. Isn't this how you live? You
live by the faith in the Son of God. Not faith in the Son
of God, faith of the Son of God. I live by His faith, by His justifying
faith. And I pray this would give us
comfort in the struggle that we face. Let's stand and be dismissed
in prayer. Most gracious Father, dismiss
us with your own blessings and mercies. Testify the great love and mercy
that Christ has had on us by offering himself as our sacrifice
for sins, freeing us from the dominion of sin and causing us
to be dead to the law but alive unto Christ and to God. I pray,
Father, that you would cause the spiritual fruit inside of
every one of us who are under grace that it may grow. May use
of you, Father, in your service and for the glory of your name
and the good of your people. We pray this in Christ's name. Good. Love you. You're welcome. You're welcome, Joey. I love
you.