If you would, go back to the
book of Romans. I want you to go to Romans chapter
five. And here's my subject in Romans
chapter five. Two kingdoms. Two kingdoms. One is grace and the other is
sin. Two kingdoms. Look at verses Romans 20 and
21. Romans 5. We read, moreover, the law entered,
and that would be the Ten Commandments. That's the law that was given
to Moses to give to the people from Mount Sinai. Moreover, the
law entered. God sent the law. He wrote the
law on two tablets of stone with his own finger, the scripture
says. He says, Paul says here, moreover
the law entered that the offense might abound. Why did the law
come? Well, the law came to reveal
sin. That's what Paul said in Romans
chapter seven. He said, I had known sin except
by the law. And there's something about the
law of God that, to a lost man, it just aggravates him and makes
him want to disobey God's law. And all of us, by nature, are
lawbreakers. All of us are criminals against
God. And as we become as we have some
understanding of the law of God, we're made to realize that it
is the law of God that exposes our guilt. You're not innocent.
I'm not innocent. We aren't free from sin. We aren't
free from trespasses. We aren't free from iniquities.
All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. It's what
Paul says in Romans chapter three in verse 23. And we know sin
by the law of God. However, Paul continues. He says, but where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. That as sin hath reigned unto
death, Even so might grace reign by
or through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ
our Lord. Now, just real quickly, let me
kind of give you a summary of these two verses here. Number
one, grace reigns. I still want to talk to you about
two kingdoms, but I don't want to begin by talking about the
kingdom of sin. A dismal subject, it's a necessary
subject, but I'd rather begin by talking about grace. Grace
is a happy word. Grace is a pleasant word. Grace
is that of God's divine favor, unmerited favor to sinners. Grace reigns. When we bow our
heads and our hearts to pray, we pray to the Lord who sits
upon His, what? Throne of grace. It's a throne
of grace. And then he says this, and I'm
just reading this second part of verse 21. Even so might grace
reign. Grace is a kingdom now. Grace
rules. Even so might grace reign, and
it reigns through righteousness. Grace always has regard to the
righteousness and the justice of God. Grace never discards
righteousness. Whenever grace reveals itself,
whenever grace does a work in the heart, it always works upon
the basis of justice being satisfied. There is no grace without righteousness. And then he continues, Even so might grace reign through
righteousness unto eternal life. Get this, wherever grace reigns, that is, wherever grace sets
up the throne in the heart of man, The necessary result will
always be eternal life. Grace doesn't wait for you to
make a decision. The entrance of grace isn't up
to you to let grace come in or reject grace. The grace of God,
whenever it is revealed, whenever it is shown to a sinner, whenever
grace is poured into the heart, it always results in eternal
life. It doesn't try to give eternal
life. Grace doesn't want to give eternal
life. Grace gives eternal life. And along with that giving of
eternal life, grace gives you faith to believe. One of the
reasons I began with that passage out of Ephesians the second chapter
is because it talks about not only grace being a gift of God,
but faith being a gift of God. For by grace are you saved through
faith. And that, that faith, that trust,
that confidence, That belief in the Lord Jesus Christ, that
is a gift of God. It's not of your works. So I'll
let God save me. I beg your pardon? You can't
let God do anything. God has to give these spiritual
gifts and repentance toward God is a spiritual gift. And faith
in the Lord Jesus Christ, that's a spiritual gift. Grace reigns. Grace doesn't want to reign.
Grace does reign. There's a kingdom of grace. And
I'll talk to you about it a little more fully later on. But know
this, when grace comes in, grace always brings with it its accompaniment. And that's eternal life. If grace
is like a seed is sown in your heart, if God by His grace makes
you to live spiritually and believe the Lord Jesus Christ, when grace
comes in, grace always has a companion. No exceptions to this. Grace
always brings with it eternal life. What is eternal life? Did not our Savior say what eternal
life is in John chapter 17? This is eternal life. That they
might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou
hast sent. That's eternal life. And it does
include the idea of everlasting life, but first, it's the idea
of knowing God. Knowing God. Do you know God? Do you have everlasting life?
Well, if grace has flooded your soul, you do. You have eternal
life. So he says there in the latter
part of verse 21, grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal
life, and then there's that little word by, and it's actually the
same word as in the previous line, through. Through or by Jesus Christ our
Lord. This grace of God that saves. This grace of God that lifts
the sinner out of the miry clay and puts him upon the rock, that's
the rock Christ Jesus. Grace is always, always associated
with the Lord Jesus Christ. You see, the grace of God, like
the love of God, like the salvation of God, like the righteousness
of God, It's found in Christ, our Savior. Grace reigns through
righteousness unto eternal life through or by our Lord Jesus
Christ, through and by his person, who he is, through and by his
work, what he did. He lived a life of righteousness. And that life he lived, and we'd
all agree on this, that perfect life he lived, that life of living
up to every requirement of God, that life that he lived, you
know he credits that to our account. That life he lived, that's my
life. That's my life story. My life
story is what the Savior did during His lifetime from birth
to His death. And then He who lived for me
died for me. He laid down His life for me
because the wages of sin is death. I deserve to die. But before
the world began, God put me in Christ Jesus so that when He
died, I died in Him. I died under the wrath of the
law of God. I died under divine justice. I was in Him. He was my representative. He stood for me. He lived for
me. He died for me. And He arose
for me. And He ascended back to heaven.
Where is the Savior now? Is He not seated in heaven? Guess
what? That's where I'm seated. In Him,
I'm seated there. In Christ Jesus, our Lord. He lived, He died, and He ever
lives for His people. Learn this. The religion of the
Bible is the religion of grace. Grace. Now, most every Most every religion talks about
grace, right? I mean, most all of them, television,
preachers, whoever, they all talk about grace. But the grace
that I'm talking about is the grace that the Bible sets forth,
grace that reigns, grace that has dominion, grace that is invincible,
grace that is always victorious. That's the grace that saves.
The grace that saves. Now, in Romans chapter five, the scripture speaks here of
two men, two representative men, Christ and Adam. In fact, if you look at verse
14, Nevertheless, Romans 5.14, nevertheless,
death reigned from Adam to Moses, even after them that had not
sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is
the figure, who is the type of him that was to come. Here are
the two men, here are the two representative men. We're all
in Adam by nature. All of God's chosen people are
in Christ by grace. Two men. In fact, in 1 Corinthians
15, Paul talks about the first Adam and the last Adam. The last Adam. In the first one
by nature and the last one by grace. Two kingdoms. Two men, two kingdoms. Two men, two acts. Look down in verse 19. So we
got two men, verse 19, for as by one man's
disobedience, that was his act. What did Adam do? He disobeyed
God. God said, in the day ye eat thereof,
of this forbidden, the fruit of this forbidden tree, you'll
surely die. Don't eat of it. The day ye eat
of it, you'll surely die. He ate, he disobeyed. And that
one act of disobedience had a devastating effect upon all of his posterity,
upon all of his seed. And we trace our life back to
Adam. He was our great, great, great,
great, great, great, great. I don't know how many greats
it'd be. It's a bunch of them, but we trace our lineage, our
nature, all the way back to Adam. And what he did when he put his
fist in the face of God, when he defied God Almighty, When
he said, I'm not gonna do what you've told me to do. I'm not
gonna refrain from taking of this fruit. I'll do what I wanna
do. I'll be my own God, thank you
very much. From that time forth, everybody
born as a result of a union of a man and a woman, we got that
same nature of rebellion. We just, we don't want to obey.
And we won't. We're rebels against God. His
disobedience, the disobedience of Adam, not only included the
disobedience of himself, but that's passed to us, his kids. You know, a lot of times you
can look at the pictures of kids and you see, oh yeah, Well, he
favors his daddy. Oh, yes, she favors her mama.
Well, let me tell you something. We all favor Adam. We all have
the likeness of Adam because we've sinned by his one act of
disobedience. It just devastated the whole
human race. But watch this. And so by the
obedience of one. Here's that other man. The representative
God man. His obedience. What specifically
do you believe that Adam is talking or Paul is talking about here?
Well, I believe Paul sets it forth in another one of his epistles
in Philippians chapter two. He was obedient. What does it
say next? Unto death, unto death, even
the death of the cross, even that horrible ignominious death
of crucifixion where man did all he could to inflict pain and agony to the
body of Christ. And when God the Father poured
out the fullness of His cup of wrath upon the Son of God, our
Lord was being obedient, obedient to God. For in the covenant of
grace, He purposed to lay down His life for His people. He pledged
Himself And that covenant of grace, which included the appointment
of a chosen people unto salvation, our Lord Jesus, He signed up,
as it were, to be the substitute, the sacrifice, the sin offering,
the Savior of His people. He signed the covenant of grace
with His own blood, with His own blood. By his act of obedience and laying
down his life for the sheep, he saved us. He saved us. By the disobedience of one, the
many, verse 19, the many people that Adam represented were legally
considered to be, legally constituted to be sinners. And so I, maybe
there's somebody here who's foolish and would say, well, hey, don't
lump me with everybody else. I'm not a sinner like everybody
else. Like it or not, you are. That's
just fact. God legally constituted you to
be, considered you to be a sinner because you were in Adam when
Adam fell. Like it or not, you're a sinner
and that's what God calls you. Well, Jim, you don't have to
preach it so hard. Well, no matter how hard we preach
that people are sinners, No matter how we describe the sinfulness
of everybody as the blackness, the awfulness of our guilt before
God, you know, our sin is kind of
like what the Queen of Sheba said about Solomon. The half
has not been told. When we paint the picture of
our sinfulness, we ain't even begun to hardly scratch the surface
of it. Well, I'll tell you who does
know and who has felt it, our Savior. When our sins were laid on Him
on the cross and the Father forsook His own Son, He knew the horribleness
of sin the Savior did. But He was obedient. He was obedient. and therefore we bathe the righteousness
of God in Him. Now let me get down to talking
about these two kingdoms real quick. Sin and grace. If you take your notes, it's
a pretty simple outline. Sin, Grace. Just single syllable
word, just two words, sin and grace. Sin deals with our ruin. Can you remember that? Sure you
can. Sin deals with our ruin. Grace speaks to our recovery. Sin is our ruin. Grace speaks
to our recovery. Sin is the disease and we're
all infected with it. Grace is the cure. We could say sin is the poison. Grace is the antidote. And the Holy Spirit, through
the preaching of the gospel, He shows us in our text both
the malady and its result. What's the malady? Sin. What's
the result? Death. You see, sin reigns under
death. If something's not done about
your sin, you're going to die, not only physically, but you're
going to die eternally. Sin, when it is finished, when
sin is done with you, when you've served the kingdom
of sin, and then you die, sin will be triumphant, because
then God steps in, for he said the soul that's sinning shall
die. And I'm telling you, when you
die, you're going out to meet a holy God who demands perfect
righteousness. And if you die in your sin, Christ
said, where I am, where you reckon Christ is? He's in glory. He's in heaven. He's seated at
the right hand of the Father. Christ said, if you die in your
sin, where I am, at the father's right hand. Where I am? In heaven's
sweet paradise. Where I am? You can't come. You can't come. Sin is the malady and its result
is always death. Isn't it amazing how we We hug
up to sin. We think very little of sin.
By nature, that's the way all of us are. We don't worry about
it. It's just a little white lie. Really? Well, I didn't steal
much. I only stole a quarter or whatever. I tell you, that's sin, anything. Anything that is not absolutely
perfect in the eyes of God, not in the eyes of men, but in the
eyes of God is sin. And like I just quoted, when
sin has finished with you, sin has used you, sin has fooled
you, sin showed you the pleasures
of sin, which are only for a season. The result is death. Here's the malady and its result. Sin and its result is death. But here also is the remedy for
sin. The remedy. Aren't you thankful
there's a remedy for our malady? There's a remedy for our disease. And the remedy is the almighty,
sovereign, free grace of God to sinners through the Lord Jesus
Christ. The hymn writer said, if you
from sin are longing to be free, look to the Lamb of God. And
I say that to all of you, I say it to myself, I say it to all
of you who are watching. If you from sin, the kingdom
of sin, if you want to be free, look to the Lamb of God, for
he's the king of the kingdom of grace. Well, let me talk to
you just a little bit about sin. Sin. Turn in your Bibles, I should
say, to 1 John. if you would, 1 John, the 3rd
chapter. 1 John, the 3rd chapter. 1 John, chapter 3 and verse 4. What exactly is sin? Well, this verse tells us. First
John chapter 3, first epistle of John chapter 3, verse 4. Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth
also the law. For sin, what is it? It's the
transgression of God's law. If you want a definition of the
word sin, here it is. It means missing the mark. That's
what sin is. Look up the word, that's the
definition in the original. It's missing the mark. What is
the mark? Perfection and the will of God. And we cannot render perfection,
nor can we fully and perfectly obey the will of God. You see,
sin is anything said, thought, done with any degree of imperfection. Now let me ask you a question,
and I don't want you to answer out loud because it'd just be
a massive mess if everybody talked at one time. Sin is the lack of perfection. any imperfection at all. How
many times do you think you've sinned today? That's kind of a redundant question,
isn't it? When you ate your breakfast,
I fixed a pretty good breakfast this morning, bacon and eggs,
sliced tomatoes. sliced some toast and put jelly
on my wife's bread. When you ate your breakfast,
oatmeal, cereal, you know, animal food like that or real ham and
eggs or bacon and eggs or sausage and eggs. When you had your breakfast, every time you chewed your food,
did you do so for the glory of God? Did you do so believing that
God had graciously provided that food for you? Let me tell you
something. That which is not of faith is sin. Oh, we're all guilty, aren't
we? I don't need to ask for a show of hands, because we're all guilty. All have sinned. Sin is missing
the mark. which means that everybody is
a sinner. What is a sinner? I was talking
about this to somebody just yesterday. What is a sinner? It's one who
sins. One who does not keep the law
of God perfectly. One who doesn't do all that they
do or all that they think, all that they say, one who does not
do those things perfectly in accordance with the will of God.
God doesn't demand the best you can do. Well, preacher, that's
the best I can do. Well, I can tell you right now,
that ain't good enough. Because Leviticus 22, 21 says,
it shall be perfect to be accepted. When you face God at the judgment,
He's not gonna put your good deeds on one side of the scales
and your sins on the other side. Because you've never done a good
deed. You ain't got none on that side. All we've done, we eat,
drink, smell, taste, think, do, motivated by sin. And it's in the kingdom of sin,
it's the kingdom of sin that holds us captive. And not only does sin hold us
captive, but we're captivated by sin. Isn't that right? We're
captivated by sin. It says here, sin is the transgression
of the law. A holy God can accept nothing
and no one apart from perfection. And this gives birth to the fifth
verse. And ye know that he was manifested. Who was manifested? The Son of
God. You know that he was manifested
to do what? Take away our sins. That's good
news. That's why he came. If we had
the time, we could look in Hebrews chapter 10. It says the blood
of bulls and goats can never do what? Take away sins. They couldn't take sins away.
Couldn't even take one sin away. So our Lord Jesus Christ, He
came. He died in the stead of His guilty
people who were chosen unto salvation, but nevertheless, we fell into
Adam's transgression. He came to do something that
nobody else could possibly do, and something that He alone could
do, and something He alone must do by laying down His life. He died for our sin. Isn't that
what Paul said, 1 Corinthians 15? He died for our sins, according
to the scriptures. His burial, he rose again the
third day, according to the scriptures. You see, the kingdom of sin,
it holds us captive. We're prisoners in the kingdom. And we can't get out. And furthermore,
we don't want to get out. We don't want to get out. We're
kind of comfortable. You see, sin as a kingdom, it's
not a passive thing. Sin is not content to just exist
in you. Sin insists on sitting upon the
throne of your heart. And sin insists on defying God. I know what the Bible says, but
I know Christ is the way, but I'm doing the best I can. That's
it. That shows you're still in the
kingdom of sin. It holds you captive. And be sure of this, sin is not
opposed to religion. It's opposed to grace. It's opposed
to salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ. It's opposed to eternal life. Because you see, sin, as a king
and as a kingdom, holding you captive, sin will be satisfied
in your death. In your death. And you can be
sure of this concerning sin, it always brings misery. You say, oh, boy, I don't feel
good this morning, Jim. I got aches and pains, or I got
a headache, or I got this disease or that disease. That's because
you're in the kingdom of sin. See, sin always results in misery. And the most miserable thing
about sin is it lands you in hell. Romans 6.23 says, for the wages
of sin is death. See, you're a sin slave. Me too,
by nature, we're servants of sin. Well, how do you think the
kingdom's gonna pay us? The kingdom of sin, how's it
gonna pay us? What wages am I earning? Death. But thank God there's another
kingdom, and it's the kingdom of grace.
Go back to my text. Let me show you this real quick.
Back in chapter 5. It says that as sin hath reigned
unto death, even so might grace. Instead of the kingdom of sin,
there's the kingdom of grace. And grace reigns. In fact, it says in the 20th
verse, moreover, the law entered that the offense might abound,
but where sin abounded, grace did much more about or grace
super abounded. You see, grace, the grace of
God is omnipotent. The grace of God is victorious. The grace of God is invincible.
Grace doesn't come to you and say, you want to be saved. Grace just saves. Grace saves. Grace doesn't say, would you
like a better life? I hear preachers. I watch some
of the preachers on television. I got up early up there in northern
Michigan. I'd watch some of these religious
guys. And one guy was talking about
the grace of God. He says, the grace of God offers
you a better way. Offers? Offers? Grace doesn't offer no more than
God offers. There's the gift of grace and
God gives you the willingness to receive the gift. Grace doesn't try to do anything.
The grace of God is omnipotent because of whose grace it is. It's God's grace. And it's sovereign
grace. Grace flows where God says for
it to flow. Grace reigns. Thank God for that
kingdom. Grace is, I read this week before
last, and I read this quote to the folks who are in Michigan
who are no doubt listening to me this morning. I read this quote to them. An
old Puritan wrote this. He said, grace is the divine
provision for people who are so fallen that they cannot lift
the axe of judgment, the A-X-E of judgment from off their necks. It's the divine provision for
people who are so corrupt they cannot change their nature. They're
so opposed to God that they can't turn to Him through Christ. Grace is the divine provision
for people who are so blinded that they can't see their need
for Christ. They can't see the beauties of
his person, the necessity of his work of redemption. Grace
is the divine provision for people who are so ignorant that they
don't see the necessity of a mediator between them and God. They're
so foolish that they cannot see the need of a perfect sacrifice
to satisfy the justice of God. They're so deaf that they can't
hear the voice of Christ in the gospel. They're so dead that
they can't open up the grave of their own sinfulness. And they're so deep in sin that
they can't lift themselves out of the pit and put their feet
on the solid rock of Christ. Only grace can do that. The almighty
grace of God which comes to us, watch it, in fulfillment of righteousness
through our Lord Jesus Christ. All the good, all the grace,
all the love, all the salvation, all the true mercy of God for
sinners is found in the kingdom of grace through our Lord Jesus
Christ. It's a glorious kingdom. No wonder. I'll give you several
things. I've jotted down several things. I was supposed to tell people
about how many points you got, but I got 10 more points. But I'm just gonna read them
to you. The only difference between a
saved center and a lost center, you know where it is? That's
the only difference. Number one, God's election is
of grace. So Paul calls it in Romans 11,
the election of grace. God's covenant with Christ on
behalf of chosen sinners is called the covenant of grace. Hebrews 13. Our adoption into
the family of God was by grace, Ephesians 1. The redemption of our souls was
by a marvelous work of grace, the work of Christ Jesus. We
see in Romans 3 that we're justified by grace. God declares us to
be righteous upon the basis of righteousness being established. by the faithfulness of our Lord
Jesus Christ. We're justified by grace, Romans
3. We're forgiven by grace, Ephesians
1, 7. In whom we have redemption through
his blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches
of his what? Grace, grace. Our regeneration
and calling, that's of grace. Paul says, when it pleased God,
who separated me from my mother's womb and called me by his grace. And I'll just quit. It's all of grace. Saved by grace. That's what the book says. Oh,
may the kingdom of grace invade your heart If grace comes to you, you'll
be found rejoicing in God's salvation by grace through the doing and
the dying of our Lord Jesus Christ. Well, let's sing the closing
song.