All right, let's open our Bibles
to Romans chapter seven. I wanna speak to you this morning
on the subject of newness of spirit. Newness of spirit. You recall in verse five of Romans
chapter seven, Paul speaks by inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
And he says, for when we were in the flesh, that is, when we
were unregenerate, unbelieving, ignorant of Christ and his righteousness,
ignorant of the guilt of our sin, ignorant of the true and
living God, in the flesh, motivated, guided, energized by the flesh. And remember, the flesh is sin.
And one of the things that we're going to see as you get through
Romans 7 when you're looking at the subject of the warfare
of the flesh and the spirit is that Paul personifies flesh,
sin, spirit even. And of course we know when he's
talking about the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is a person.
He's the third person of the Trinity. God, the Spirit, the
Holy Spirit. But even when Paul speaks of
the spirit within us, the spirit of life, he calls it the inner
man later on in Romans 7. And what he's talking about there
is what I am in reality within my heart of hearts, within my
mind and my affections and my will, my desires, my motives,
all of that. So don't get confused about that
when he goes down through here. You know, just like for example,
You know, he makes a statement over here in verse 17 of Romans
7. He says, now, when I sin, basically
what he's saying, when I fail to meet up to my desired goal,
which is to be perfectly conformed to the image of Christ in every
way, he said, when I fail, when I sin, now then it is no more
I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. Now, Paul is not passing
the buck there. He's not saying I'm not responsible.
It's some person in me called sin and he's the ones doing all
that. I'm doing all the good. That would be crazy. That would
be shifting the blame. That's not what he's saying.
But he does personify sin and spirit here to try to give us
some grasp of what this thing about fighting the warfare of
the flesh and the spirit, the reality of our walk, The believers
walk in this world, what it's about. And so back here in verse
five, he says, when we were in the flesh, when I was an unbeliever,
not born again by the spirit, now I'm married to Christ, he
says. I've been redeemed by the blood of Christ. I'm justified
in his righteousness and I'm married to him. I'm united to
Christ. But when, before that, when I
was in the flesh, the motions or passions The desires of sin,
which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth
fruit unto death. Now remember that fruit unto
death. It brings itself forth in one of two ways. It can either
be total rebellion against any of God's law. Or it can be religious exercise,
such as in the case of Saul of Tarsus. And I tell people all
the time, when they read Romans 7, they read passages like that,
think about the man whom the Spirit is using here to write
this. Think about when, he says, when we were in the flesh. Now
what was Paul, the apostle, what was he when he was in the flesh?
He was a Pharisee. He was a religious person. He
was doing his dead-level best to try to keep the law. Why? In order to be saved, in order
to be righteous. He was a man of religious works
and efforts, and he was serious about it. He wasn't, as some
preachers say, playing church. I mean, he meant business. Saul
of Tarsus was a devout Pharisee. He went above and beyond the
call of duty. But that's fruit under debt, that's the passions
of sin, according to God's standard. If Paul had been a bank robber,
a drug pusher, a murderer, that's the passions of sins too. But
so is this religious world. You see what I'm saying? And
that's where our thinking has to be brought into subjection
to Christ, seeing this thing. Christ had the harshest words
in his earthly ministry for the religious people of his day.
And you know that so. He'd stood before those religious
Pharisees and he said, you're of your father the devil. Harsh
words to some people. But that's what they needed to
hear. They weren't harsh at all. But he said, Paul says, for when
we were in the flesh. Now he says in verse 6, but now
we're delivered from the law. How were we delivered from the
law, back up in verse 4, by the body of Christ? I'm delivered
from the curse of the law, it cannot condemn me. I'm no longer
guilty in God's sight under the law because Christ took my guilt. He was made a curse for me. He
was made sin for me. I didn't have anything to do
with that. I didn't work for it, didn't earn it, didn't deserve
it. It was totally the work of God through Christ. Salvation
by grace. I'm delivered from the law. I
owe no obedience to the law in order to gain or maintain salvation. That's right, Christ is my righteousness.
He was made sin that I might be made the righteousness of
God. He says that being dead when we were held, I was in bondage
now in my conscience, in my thoughts, You see, back when we're delivered
from that law that we were held in bondage to, and that's before
I was regenerated, before I became a believer, before I became free
in Christ, I was held in bondage in my conscience. That's why sinners without Christ
get religious. You see? That's why people turn
over new leaves in religion. You know, we say, and I agree
with this whole heart, we need to encourage people to be moral,
not immoral. We don't want to encourage immorality.
We don't want to encourage drunkenness, abuse of drugs. prostitution
or any of the heinous sins that society recognizes. But here's
the point, the point that Paul's making. When you reform from
all that, that is not salvation before God. You understand what
I'm saying? So he says, that's being held
in bondage if you think that's for salvation. If you think that'll
make you righteous, that's bondage. And so he says, in verse six,
we were held there, but we were delivered from that. We were
delivered from it in our conscience when the Holy Spirit brought
us to Christ. And now why? In order that we
should serve in newness of spirit. Now, if we're going to understand
what Paul says in the rest of Romans 7, and if we're going
to understand the warfare of the flesh and the spirit, you've
got to understand what he means by newness of spirit. He says,
in newness of spirit and not in oldness of the letter. newness
of spirit, not in oldness of the letter. So, what is this
newness of spirit? Serving in newness of spirit.
Well, it's the operation of God within his people by the Spirit
of God through Christ who gives life, spiritual life that was
not there before. It's called the new birth. Being
raised from the dead spiritually. Ephesians chapter 2 and verse
1 says, And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and
sins. You were dead spiritually, but
he quickened you. That means he gave you life.
Spiritual life. And that's new. We weren't born
with it. We didn't have it by nature.
It's not in us by nature. But it's given us. and worked
in us. We can even say imparted to us
by the Holy Spirit. What does it involve? Well, Ezekiel,
back in Ezekiel 36, he explained it this way in prophecy, talking
about a new heart in verse 26. He says it's a new heart. What
is the heart? It's the mind, it's the affections,
it's the will, it's the conscience, it's the inner man that Paul
speaks of. I'm made new, I have a new heart. And it says in Ezekiel
36, 26, he says, a new heart also will I give you. And a new
spirit will I put within you. New life. He says, and I will
take away the stony heart out of your flesh. What is the stony
heart? That's an unbelieving heart. That's a stubborn heart. That's an obstinate heart that
won't bend and won't bow, you say. He said, and I'll give you
a heart of flesh. Now flesh there doesn't mean
sin. God doesn't give hearts of sin. The heart of flesh there
is talking about one that's pliable, one that's bendable, one that
will submit. And then he says in verse 27,
he said, I will put my spirit within you. Commentators argue
over that. Is that the Holy Spirit or the
New Spirit? It could be both. The Holy Spirit indwells the
people of God. He said, I'll cause you to walk in my statutes,
and you shall keep my judgments and do them. That's what he's
talking about, newness of spirit. Paul spoke of it over here in
Romans chapter 6. Look there in verse 17. He says,
God, bethink that as you were the servants of sin, Now that
being a servant of sin means being unregenerate, in bondage. Remember he said over here, we
are delivered from the law, that being dead when we were held.
When we were held in that unregenerate state, unbelieving state, didn't
know Christ, didn't know ourselves. That's what we were, we were
servants of sin. Whether we were religious servants of sin or
immoral servants of sin, that's what we were, servants of sin.
Paul, Saul was a religious servant of sin. He was a pillar of the
community. He was one who everybody admired,
but he was still a servant of sin. Because as long as you don't
know Christ, you see, as long as you're not submitted to him
as the one and only way of salvation, of forgiveness, of righteousness,
that's what you are, no matter how you appear to me or how I
appear to me. And he says, we were servants
of sin, but we've obeyed from the heart. That's the new heart
that Ezekiel spoke of. That's the newness of spirit
that Paul's talking about. That form of doctrine, that teaching,
that's what that is. And who does the teaching there?
Well, God, the Holy Spirit, through the preaching of the gospel.
And he uses pitiful human instruments to do it, doesn't he? Clay pots,
they're called in 2 Corinthians chapter 4. And he says, which
was delivered you, preached unto you. And then he says in verse
18, being then made free from sin. Now, how am I made free
from sin? Does that mean I no longer sin? Well, if it does,
I'm not a Christian. How about you? Well, you know
it doesn't mean that. And Paul shows that it doesn't
mean that down here in Romans chapter seven. If we're free from sin in the
sense that we stop sinning, we don't have a warfare within. Did you know that? If you can
stop sinning, you don't have a war. Your warfare is over.
But that's not what it's talking about. We're free from sin in
the sense that sin can no longer condemn me. Sin can no longer
keep me from looking to Christ. Why? Because God has given me
a new heart, a new spirit. I'm born again by the spirit
of God. And then he says, you became the servants of righteousness.
That's a servant of Christ. That's what he's talking about.
To be a servant of Christ is a servant of righteousness. This
new heart, this newness of spirit, this new heart is a heart that's
broken and contrite over sin. It's the circumcised heart. Paul
wrote about that in Romans chapter two in verses 28 and 29. When
he talked about circumcision, it's not that which is of the
flesh, but that which is of the heart. What's that? The cutting
away the filth of the flesh. What does that mean? That's repentance.
When you talk about the cutting away of the filth of the flesh
in the spiritual manner of the heart, that's talking about repentance,
faith in Christ, repentance of dead works. To walk in newness
of spirit means to walk in an atmosphere, an environment, a
state that has never existed before for me. And it's because
of our standing in Christ. And it's because the Holy Spirit
has placed in us a new state of life, a new power of life,
the grace of life, a new knowledge of life. And it's not just head
knowledge, it's conviction. I mean, this is life for us.
Christ is our life. He's not just a good prophet. He's not just a fine example.
He's my life, you see. And that's given by God when
He gives us a new heart, a new mind, a new affection. We love
things that we didn't love before. We don't love them perfectly
yet. Don't get mixed up and confused
here now. A new will. We didn't have a
will to come to God. It's not of him that runneth,
nor of him that willeth, but of God that showeth mercy. If
I have any want to or will to come to God, to serve God, to
come to Christ, that's given to me of God. That's newness
of spirit. I didn't have that before. It's
a new way of looking at things. A new way of looking at things.
And I want to tell you something, folks. Now that doesn't, even
to a believer, that doesn't come naturally. You know how we cultivate
and nurture that new way of looking at things? Pick this up. Study it, read it, hear it preached. That's how you cultivate the
new way of looking at things. Because I'll tell you, I find
myself, Demi and I were talking this last night, I find myself
when somebody does me wrong or, you know, I don't have a new
way of looking at things naturally. The first thing that pops into
my head is to get back at them. How about you? But I go to the
word of God continually, and it tells me that's not the way
I should look at it. And that's where the struggle
begins, you see. That's where the warfare begins. And I feel
shamed. I do. Not even as ashamed as
I ought to feel, but I do. But it's a new way of looking
at it, a new way of judging things. Why, before God brought me to
a saving knowledge of myself and a saving knowledge of Christ,
there's no way I would have told you that any moral, dedicated,
religious person who walked the face of this earth would die
and go to eternal damnation. I don't care what doctrine they
have. I wouldn't have said that. But
we've got a new way of judging things because, see, that way
of judging things now has its origin in the glory of God. in
Christ. That's walking in newness of
spirit. It's a new calling. Look over at Ephesians chapter
4. Think about this. Now, it's not that, you know,
somebody says, well, this idea of grace, the way you preach
it, that means you can go out and live as you please. Well,
that doesn't hold water. See, for this issue of walk and
newness of spirit and the gospel. In Ephesians chapter 4 and verse
1, look at it. He says, I therefore the prisoner
of the Lord. The reason Paul called himself the prisoner of
the Lord here is because he was in prison. He was literally in
prison, he was in jail. There's a set of epistles that
Paul wrote, set of letters that are called the prison letters,
the prison epistles. Philippians is another one, Ephesians
is one. He was in jail because he preached
the gospel and he wrote these letters from jail. But notice
how he said, I'm a prisoner of the Lord. Now that's a new way
of looking at things, isn't it? Now what he could have said is
that dirty, rotten, scoundrel Sanhedrin Jews put me here. along
with those dirty, rotten, scoundrel Romans. But he said, no, I'm
here because the Lord put me here. It's like Joseph. If you've
been keeping up with our daily readings, I told my Sunday school
class, you just finished the, or recently finished the book
of Genesis. And I told him, I said, anytime
I read the story of Joseph, it just knocks me for a loop. Because
here he was, his brothers treated him awfully, evilly and would
have killed him if it hadn't been for his oldest brother,
Reuben. Sold him into slavery down in Egypt, and here he was
about 16, 17 years later, and he met them face to face. They
didn't even recognize him, and he had the power at that time
just to snap his fingers and lop their heads off. And he looked
at them, and they were afraid, and they should have been. They
should have been shaking in their boots, shouldn't they? And he
looked at him and he said, you didn't put me here, God did.
Now you chew on that for a while, then talk about the free will
of man. You didn't put me here, God did, he said. God put me. Now he says, you're responsible.
You meant it for evil. You didn't mean it for good.
You didn't do all that conniving and murder in your heart and
all that sinning, thinking the whole time, well, we're doing
the will of God, ultimately. No, sir. You meant it for evil,
God meant it for good. Think about that. And here Paul
says, I therefore the prisoner of the Lord. I'm here because
God's got a purpose for putting me here. Now I could just think,
if God put me in jail, you know the first thing I'd want to do?
I'm going to quit this mess and go do something else. That's
the first thought that would pop into my mind. I know it's
wrong, but here's a new way of looking at things. And he says,
I beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith you're
called. We're called of grace in Christ.
Now let's walk worthy. What is that? Newness of spirit.
Newness of spirit. You see, we're married to Christ.
And let me illustrate that this way. It's kind of like when you
think about the realm of relationships that we have on this earth, physical
relationships. Think about this. You have acquaintances. I have acquaintances. I have
a lot of acquaintances. There's a lot of people that
I know just by acquaintance. I know their name. I recognize
their faces. And I have a lot of them. But
that really, that being acquainted with them really doesn't require
much from me. You know? I'm not really, I'm
not really, I don't really know them. I know their name. I know
their face. They're an acquaintance. We all have those. And then secondly,
we have friendships, don't we? And we have fewer friends. We
have a lot more acquaintances than we do friends. And we have few friends because
friendship demands something of both of us. For example, it
demands us to help each other, to protect each other, to do
things for each other. It requires more. But then, thirdly,
there's a marriage. And then it gets a lot narrower,
doesn't it? Because see, a true marriage
is one man and one woman and nobody else. And if anybody else tries to
intrude in that marriage, what happens? There's problems. Isn't that right? One man, one
woman. Not two men, not two women, not
three or four. One man, one woman, dedicated,
devoted, loyal to each other. And you've heard, I remember
Brother Mahan used this illustration about a man and a woman who got
married. The next day, the man come up and he had a list of
rules. He tapped them up on the wall
and he looked at the wife and he said, now if you break any
of those rules, you're out the door. Well, that's man's works religion
right there. That's not a marriage, is it? Marriage is based on love. It's walking in a new state of
life now. It's based upon a mutual love
and devotion to one another. Well, Christ is the husband of
his church. We're married to Christ. And
if anybody else intrudes into that relationship, even a pastor. That's bad news, brother. Even
a preacher. I had a fellow tell me one time,
he said, he was chiding me because I left Albany to come up here.
And here's what he told me. He said, the way I look at it,
boy, when somebody says that, you can pretty much just cast
it to the wind. But he said, it used to go here.
He said, the way I look at it, he said, a pastor is married
to his church. And when you leave that church,
it's like a divorce. And I said, well, that sounds
good on paper, but where do you find that in scripture? I said,
what scripture do you use to base that? Here's what the scripture
says. The church, whether it's a local
body or the universal church, is married to Christ. And anybody
else that intrudes into that relationship, huh? That's bad news. That's bad business. That's trouble, friend. Even
a pastor. What is a pastor? He's an under-shepherd. He's a servant of the church.
He's not married to the church. He's married to Christ if he's
God's pastor. I'm not married to you and you're
not married to me. We're all, in Christ, married to him. And
nobody else. Paul said, I've espoused you
to one husband. That's one husband. Christ. Now
walking in newness of life and not in oldness of the letter,
oldness of legalism, oldness of bondage, is walking as the
bride of Christ, as the wife of the Lord Jesus Christ. What
does it involve? Let me give you several things.
Number one, it involves a true, continual conviction of sin. That's walking in newness of
the spirit, newness of life. A true, continual conviction
of sin. There's an initial conviction
of sin. Paul speaks of that in Philippians
chapter 3 when he says, all those things that I thought recommended
me unto God, now I count lost for Christ's sake. But that doesn't
stop. He called it in 2 Corinthians
chapter 7 a godly sorrow over sin. The psalmist expressed it. In Psalm 130 in verse three,
he says, if thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who
shall stand? Do you know that's just as true
of me today as it ever was? What are you saying, preacher?
I'm saying this. If God were to mark iniquities, I would not
be able to stand. If God were to charge me with
my sin, even now, after preaching the gospel for 30 years. If God
were even now, and listen, if the Lord lets me live 10 years
from now, 20 years from now, before I draw my last breath,
if God at that time were to charge me, mark me with my sins, I would
not be able to stand. I'm a sinner. From here on to eternity, I'll
never be able one second of my life to say, now I deserve salvation. Now I've finally made it, I've
earned it. Even in glory, what is the song of the redeemed?
Revelation chapter five. Worthy is the lamb, that was
slang. Let me tell you something. In these things that I'm telling
you about walking in newness of the spirit, there's a warfare. Because I'm going to tell you
something, there are times in my life where I get to thinking,
man, I don't deserve all this stuff, all this mess that I'm
getting, all this grief I'm getting. But you see, here's the thing,
if the Lord would mark iniquities, I wouldn't stand. I get to feeling good about myself.
Man, boy, I sure preached a good one that night. Lord, you ought
to give me something for that. Down south they'd say, boy, I
sure shucked some corn from the pulpit that night. But you see,
all the sermons that I preach, even good sermons, great sermons,
cannot make me righteous before God. They can't do it. I'm a sinner. That's why he said
in that psalm that Brother Joe read, it's a broken and a contrite
heart over sin. That's walking in newness of
spirit. When I look at Christ, I see continually that I just
don't measure up in my mind and in my heart. That I don't deserve
his love. I'm gonna tell you something,
when Christ married me, he married down. That's right. When he married
you, he married down. We talk about, some of us men,
we talk about we married up. We did. Not Christ though, he
married down. He condescended. Worthy is the
Lamb. I married up when I married him. Way up. I don't even realize
how high up. Because I don't see like I will
see. He loves me and saves me and keeps me in spite of myself
during my best moment. Not just during the worst ones.
That's walking in newness of spirit. Secondly, it's walking
with a true, continual conviction of Christ. Conviction of Christ. Paul over here, I'll just jump
a lot of verses here for today, and then we'll come back and
get what's in the middle. But look at verse 24 of Romans 7.
A true, continual conviction of Christ. You see, this walking
in newness of spirit is not walking in despair without hope. It's
not walking in, as old John Bunyan said in Pilgrim's Progress, the
slew of despond. You know, there are some religious
people who believe that, that you've got to be down in the
dumps, always doubting your salvation or you're not safe. That's not
walking in newness of the spirit. That's just as much bondage as
anything. That's oldness of the letter
too. That's being forced down when you don't want to go down.
But walking in newness of spirit is this. Look at verse 24. He
says, O wretched man that I am, talking about himself, who shall
deliver me from the body of this death? Now look at verse 25. I thank God through Jesus Christ
our Lord. That's conviction of Christ.
I can't deliver myself from the body of this death. I want to serve God. I want to
be an example of His saving grace, a trophy of His grace. I want
to lead people to Christ. But I fail in so many ways because
of sin. And what is sin? It's self. I
want to please self. more than I want to please God
sometimes. And my first reaction in so many cases is self-sin. Who's going to deliver me from
that mess? I thank God through Jesus Christ, my Lord. The psalmist
who wrote Psalm 130 in verse 3 when he said, If thou, Lord,
shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who would stand? The next verse
says this in verse 4. It says, But there is forgiveness
with thee. that thou mayest be feared. There's
forgiveness with Christ. There's forgiveness through His
blood. Don't seek for forgiveness anywhere else. If you do, you're
not walking in newness of spirit. You're walking in oldness of
the left. Now, the flesh will try to get you to seek forgiveness
in other places, other ways, other than Christ and Him crucified.
There's the warfare. The flesh will get you to thinking,
well, I was baptized when I was 12, and I wore a Sunday school
pin, I've done this and I've done that and that ought to count
for something. You see, that's the flesh. There's the war. No,
sir. No, sir. It's the blood of Christ alone. What can wash away my sins? Nothing
but the blood of Jesus. What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus. But the blood of Jesus can and
does make me whole. The blood of Jesus can and does.
Wash away my sins. Put them away. He paid for them.
He settled the debt in full. You see, this involves repentance
of dead works, faith in Christ, assurance in him, his blood alone,
his righteousness imputed alone. Makes me justified before a holy
God. It entitles me to eternal life
and glory. That's walking in newness of
the spirit. Christ is my all and in all. Christ is my hope. Christ is my assurance. You want
to fight sin? Stop looking at the sin. Look
to Christ. That it? He'll make you ashamed
in a godly way. What is it to be ashamed in a
godly way? It's an ashamedness that drives
you to Christ. For relief. For hope. The flesh will want to drive
you somewhere else. Fig leaf aprons. Works religion. Ceremony. But the spirit drives you to
Christ. Here's the third thing. Walking in newness of the spirit.
Conviction of sin, continue. Conviction of Christ, continue.
Here's the third thing. Walking in the liberty of his
grace. Now we've talked about that over
in Galatians chapter five. Liberty. Freedom. What is that? Look over at Romans six across
the page there in verse 11. Here's that freedom. It's being
justified before God through Christ and his righteousness
alone, imputed to me, charged to me. I'm justified before God
by what Christ accomplished on Calvary's cross. And he says
in verse 11, he talks about how Christ died unto sin and that
death has no more dominion over him. And it says in verse 11,
likewise, or in the same way, reckon, account, impute. That's
what the word is. You also yourselves to be dead
indeed unto sin. Now the reason he says reckon
it that way is because that's the only way I can reckon it. Because I'm not dead to sin's
influence in my life. The sin, the selfishness, self-righteousness,
self-love still influence you. Does it influence you at all?
Does it ever enter your thoughts in any given situation? What
I should do? What I shouldn't do? How I should
treat this one or that one? Does self-love ever enter into
it? At all? Well, if it does, you're not
dead to it, are you? Because I'm telling you, if you were
dead to it, it wouldn't even come up. It wouldn't even be a thought.
It wouldn't be a speck of an inkling of a thought in the smallest
neuron of your brain. I don't know if I said that right
physiologically, but you know what I'm talking about. That's
it. So how can I be dead to sin? I've got to reckon it that way
according to the Word of God. I've got to impute it. I've got
to account it that I'm dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God.
Now how do I know that? Because Christ is my only hope
of salvation, of righteousness, of forgiveness. I'm alive unto
God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Look at verse 12. Now,
therefore let not sin therefore reign, rule in your mortal body
that you should obey it in the lust thereof. What's he saying
there? Simply this. Fight it. Fight that self-love. Fight that
selfishness. Fight that self-righteousness.
Go to war against it. Don't give in to it. You say
it's a struggle. That's what warfare is, isn't
it? Isn't it called the warfare of the flesh and the spirit? You say, well, do I have any
days where I don't have to fight it? No! Not in this life. It's an everyday
battle, it's an everyday warfare. And he says in verse 13, neither
yield you your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin.
In other words, fight not to use my hands for sinful purposes. That's what he said, it's instruments.
Fight not to let my legs take me to where I would indulge my
selfishness and my sinfulness. Fight not to let my eyes see.
Now that's not going to make me righteous now. Now you understand,
that's what religion teaches. Religion says if you taste not
this and touch not that and handle not that, that's what will make
you righteous. That's what will make you worthy. Oh no, that's
not what this is saying at all. Christ is my righteousness. Christ
is my worthiness, you see. Why should we do that? Because
we have the liberty now to look to Him and rest in Him. And so he says, look at verse
13, neither yield you yourselves members as instruments of unrighteousness
unto sin, but yield yourselves unto God as those that are alive
from the dead. Not in order to be made alive
from the dead, but because you already are alive from the dead.
You're already justified before God. You've already been given
a new heart, a new spirit. You're a born-again person. You're
a person of faith. You look to Christ. You're his
servant. You're married to him. You husbands are married to your
wives. Don't do things that dishonor her and beat her down and kill
her spirit. You take care of her. You wives
who love your husbands, same thing. Well, we're married to
Christ, we wanna honor him, you see? And he says, and your members
as instruments of righteousness unto God, look at verse 14, for
sin shall not have dominion over you, that is rule over you, for
you are not under the law, you're not condemned, you're under grace,
you're free in Christ. You've got the liberty of grace. Paul in Galatians 5 verse 1 he
says, stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ
has made you three. Here's the fourth thing. Walking
in newness of spirit is walking in the motivation of love and
grace and gratitude. Now I mention that a lot in my
preaching because I'm gonna tell you something. What is the motive
of the oldness of the letter? It's one of two things. The motive
of those who don't know Christ. It's either fear of punishment
or loss of reward. Right? That's what inspires people
to do what they do. It's either fear of punishment
or loss of reward. That's not grace. That's not
newness. That's oldness of the letter.
That's like you getting your children to obey you because
you've put it in their minds and in their hearts that if they
don't obey you, you're going to kick them out of the family.
and renounce them and disown them. They may obey you, but
it won't be because they love you. It's because they're in
terror of you. Or if you say, well, if you don't
obey me, I'm just gonna beat you up. You know, that's what
a wife beater. He wants his way, and if he don't
get his way, he beats her up. And you know, it's common for
a wife who's like that to stay with him. Why? Because of fear
and terror. That's the oldness of the letter.
You might be able to keep people in church that way. Just open the Bible and bring
out the black whip of the law and just whip them up every time. But that's not walking in newness
of spirit. You see, walking in newness of
spirit is motivated by love. Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5
and verse 14, the love of Christ constrains me, motivates me,
moves me. Herein is love, not that we love
God, but that he loved us and gave his son to be the propitiation
of our sin. We do it because he loved us,
because he's given us everything in blessings that we don't deserve
and didn't earn, and we want to thank him. Thank you, Lord.
Thank you, Lord. Here's the fifth thing, walking
in newness of spirit. It's walking with desires to
follow Christ and his will born out of need. Now, I mentioned
this last time. The newness of spirit, the new
heart, the new life, the new knowledge, all of that within
is a desire to be like Christ. But that desire, and you have
to understand that, is not born out of feeling. What's born out
of feeling is the flesh, the fleshly desire, what I feel like
doing. The world says if it feels good,
what? Do it. That's flesh. This desire
is born out of need. It's born out of knowledge. Turn
over to John chapter 6 with me. Listen to this. In John chapter
6. Now what I'm saying is this. I may not feel like doing the
right thing. But I know it's the right thing
to do and I know that's what I need to do. I know which honors God and which
dishonors Him. I know that which He commands
me to do and that which He commands me not to do. For example, I
know my sin. And I'm going to tell you something,
my greatest need is the grace of God in Christ. That's my greatest
need of all. Now I can tell you about other
things I think I need. You can tell me about a lot of
things you think, but I want to tell you something. I know
from this word by the power of the spirit that I need Christ
more than anything else. Whether I live to be a, if I'm
like Methuselah and live to be a 969 or if I'm cut down like
Abel. In my youth, I need Christ more
than anything else. I know that. So I need to be
where he's preached, where his word is, where his people are.
I know, I know that Christ is the only way of salvation for
me. I know that his word is my life.
Look at John 6 and verse 63. Christ says here, in John 6 and
verse 63, He said, it's the spirit that quickeneth, that gives life
to flesh, profiteth nothing. The words that I speak unto you,
they are spirit and they are life. Now how, if the words that
he speaks are spirit and life, how can we walk in newness of
spirit without his word? You see what I'm saying? Look
here, he says, but there are some of you that believe not.
For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not
and who should betray him. And he said, therefore said I
unto you that no man can come unto me except it were given
unto him of my father. From that time, many of his disciples
went back and walked no more with him. Then said Jesus unto
the 12, will you also go away? And then Simon Peter answered
him, Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal
life. We've got no place else to go. I have a need. This is the only place here in
his word that I can meet that need. I may not feel like reading it
all the time. I may not even feel like hearing
it preached all the time, but I know that's what I need spiritually. This is the words of eternal
life. I know that the things of God and obedience to Him is
right and I need to thank Him for what He's given me. Here's
the sixth thing. Growing and walking in newness
of the Spirit is growing in grace and in knowledge of Christ. Turn
to 1 Peter chapter 2. Let me hurry. 1 Peter chapter
2. You have a baby. And I'm going
to tell you something. If you didn't know it now, listen
to what I'm telling you. That baby's got to eat. And if
that baby doesn't get food, what does that baby do? He cries. He or she cries. He doesn't sit
around and reason these things out now, does he? I mean, you
know, the thought processes just don't come, but there's a physical
need born in that baby. It's physical life, and that
physical life has to be fed. And if it doesn't get fed, what
happens? It dies. If you're born again
by the Spirit, if you have a new heart, a new spirit, if you have
the grace of God within, if you're walking in it, you've got to
be fed spiritually, and there's only one thing that'll do it.
And that's the word of God. Look at verse two of 1 Peter
chapter two. As newborn babes desire the sincere
milk of the word that you may grow thereby, if so be you've
tasted that the Lord is gracious. If you've tasted the Lord is
gracious, this comes with it. To whom coming as unto a living
stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious.
Who's he talking about? He's talking about Christ. Under
you, therefore, which belief is precious. Walking in newness
of spirit is growing in grace and knowledge of Christ, 2 Peter
3, 18. It doesn't mean you're getting
holier and more righteous, you don't. In fact, the more you
grow in grace and in knowledge of Christ, the more you'll see
your sinfulness. But the more you'll see your
need of Christ. And then the last one, seven,
is just exactly what I've been talking about all along. Walking
in newness of spirit is walking in the warfare. Fighting the
warfare of the flesh and the spirit. And I won't say much
more about that because we're going to get into that in Romans
7. But that's what it's all about. Walking in newness of spirit.
All right.