Welcome to Reign of Grace. This
program is brought to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries,
an outreach ministry of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany,
Georgia. It is our pleasure and privilege
to present to you the gospel message of the sovereign grace
and glory of God in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that today's program
will be a blessing to you. Thank you for listening and now
for today's program. I'd like to welcome you to our
program today. If you'd like to follow along
in your Bibles, I'll be preaching from the book of Ephesians chapter
2. Ephesians chapter 2 beginning
at verse 1. My subject today is entitled
Spiritual Death and Spiritual Life. Spiritual Death and Spiritual
Life. Ephesians chapter 2 and verse
1 reads, and you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and
sins. Now that quickening there is
life. That's what the word quick means. It doesn't mean fast in this
context. The quickening. It means that
God gives life. Well, we know that God gives
physical life, but God also gives spiritual life. There's a difference
between physical life and spiritual life. And that's what I want
to talk about. And what he's saying here is
this, is that those who are saved by the grace of God, those who
are Christians, they have experienced this quickening a quickening
that you do not naturally experience a giving of life now most people
do not understand what it means to have spiritual life and they
don't know what it means to be spiritually dead as he uh... describes here in trespasses
and sins so i want to deal with that and i want to show you what
this quickening is there there's a What really the life-giving
is in each context, the quickening, has to do with the experience
of Christ on the cross. You know, we speak of His death,
His burial, and His resurrection. His resurrection is a quickening.
But now we understand in the Bible that the quickening that
Christ experienced in His resurrection, He did not do that as a private
person. He did it as the representative,
the surety, and the substitute of His people. And I'll show
you that in just a moment too. And then there is the quickening
that God's people, God's elect, God's chosen people, for whom
God chose before the foundation of the world, even though they
fell in Adam, we fell in Adam, into spiritual death, all right,
but have been redeemed by the blood of Christ, justified by
His righteousness imputed. Well, they experience in themselves
a quickening, which the Bible calls the new birth. When you're
born again by the Spirit, that is a quickening. And so he says,
and you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins. So what is this spiritual death?
Well, if you go back to the book of Romans chapter 5, I want to
show you something here. The Bible teaches that we all,
the whole human race, the whole human family, fell in Adam. Now do you understand that? We
talk about original sin and people go all over the map with that.
There's a lot of mythology and false religion. The original
sin was simply Adam's disobedience against God. And you can talk
about eating an apple, and there's been people who've done volumes
of work trying to figure what's not an apple. It was probably
some other kind of tree. Doesn't matter what kind of fruit
he ate, or Eve ate, or anything like that. Eating that fruit,
whatever it was, was Adam's disobedience. That's the key. He disobeyed
God. In Genesis chapter two, the Lord
told Adam and Eve, He said, of all the trees of the garden,
you can eat, but of this one tree, and that's the tree of
the knowledge of good and evil. And I believe there was a literal
tree there with literal fruit. I don't know what kind of tree
and I don't know what kind of fruit. The Bible doesn't tell
us, it doesn't matter. That tree was a real physical
symbol of God's sovereignty. God's sovereignty over man, the
creature. The knowledge of good and evil
had to do with God's right as the creator and as the sovereign,
the king, to set the standard by which good and evil was to
be measured. Man doesn't have that right.
You don't have that right. You know, that's why the Bible
throughout, you know, talks about the sinfulness of man in this
way. It says, every man does that which is right in his own
eyes. You know, people today, you know,
they'll talk about certain acts like homosexuality or multiple
marriages or something. They say, well, if it's love,
it's got to be right. No, God's the one who sets the
standard of right and wrong, not you, not me. If nothing is
right or wrong because I say it's right or wrong, it's right
or wrong because God says it. God is the standard of right
and wrong. And that's why when we speak
of the gospel and salvation, we must understand what the Bible
calls the righteousness of God, not the righteousness of man.
It's not what you think it is or what I think it is, it's what
God says it is. And His righteousness, His righteous
standard is set in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's why He says in Acts
17 31 that He is appointed a day in which He will judge the world
in righteousness. by that man whom he hath ordained,
Christ, in that he hath given assurance unto all men, in that
he hath raised him from the dead. So when you consider the question,
how good must I be to live forever, to go to heaven as people say,
to be saved, how righteous must I be? And the answer is this,
you must be as righteous as Christ. None of us measure up to that
standard. Now, you say, well, where's their
salvation? It's not by our works. It's not
by our wills. It's by Christ. His righteousness
imputed. So you see, the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil is God's standard. Well, Adam wanted to be as God's. In essence, he would say, I want
to set my own standard. You know, every man does that
which is right in his own eyes. And that's the key. And so Adam
disobeyed God and he fell. He took sides with Satan and
his wife Eve against God. Now Adam was put in that garden
and appointed by God to be a representative. Some of the old theologians called
the federal headship of Adam. You see, we're under the federal
government. People represent us, or are supposed to. Adam
was the federal head. He was the representative of
the whole human race. Because God put him in that position. You say, well, I don't like that.
Well, you're not God. And it doesn't matter whether
you like it or not. God is God. He's the creator.
You're the creature. You see, that's the problem today.
You know, people don't like a sovereign God who works all things after
the counsel of his own will. They want God to be at their beck and call, like
a genie in a bottle. Or they think of God as some
kind of cosmic chess player that he makes his move and we make
our counter moves and it's all that big game. No, that's not
the God of the Bible. God does what he wills in the
armies of heaven and the inhabitants of the earth. And who can stay
his hand? Who can even question him? That's
the God of the Bible. And that puts us in a very small
place. You see, that's why modern religion
doesn't like the God of the Bible. It's all about man. It's humanism. Everything revolves around man,
what you need and what you want and what you feel, but that's
not it. Adam fell when he disobeyed God. and in his fall he brought
the whole human family into sin and death. Now look at Romans
chapter 5 and verse 12. It says, Wherefore, as by one
man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death
passed upon all men, For that all have sinned, and literally
what that is, that all have sinned is all sinned when Adam sinned. And the Bible says, look over
at Romans chapter five and verse 18, or verse 17. It says, for if by one man's
offense, that's Adam's disobedience, death reigned by one, death reigned
over the whole human family by one, by Adam, much more they
which receive abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness
shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ. Now, spiritual death
came by the one man, Adam, representing the whole human family. Spiritual
life comes by one person, the God-man, the Lord Jesus Christ,
through his righteousness to all for whom he died, all whom
God gave him, all who have life, spiritual life. You see, for
whom did Christ die? All those who eventually have
spiritual life. They're born again by the Spirit.
He goes on in verse 18 of Romans 5. Therefore, as by the offensive
one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation. Now, the all
men there are all whom Adam represented. Even so, verse 18, by the righteousness
one, the free gift came upon all men unto justification of
life. Now, who are the all men there?
That's all whom Christ represented. How do you know who they are?
They are all men unto justification of life. They're justified and
they have life. Well, what is it to be justified?
It's to be not guilty. It's to be not condemned. It's
to be counted righteous in God's sight, based on Christ's righteousness
imputed. And if that's your case, if that's
my case, you will come to believe the gospel. You will be born
again by the Spirit and come to believe the gospel. You'll
cling to Christ. You'll believe in Him and trust
in Him for all salvation. The forgiveness of sins by His
blood. that I stand before God, righteous in Christ. And so verse
19 says, for as by one man's disobedience, many were made
sinners. How many? All whom Adam represented. So by the obedience of one shall
many be made righteous. How many? As many as Christ represented. I don't know how many there are.
I preach to anybody who'll listen. I tell all who listen to me,
whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
Seek him. And then in verse 20, he says,
moreover, the law entered that the offense might abound, but
where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. Now look at
verse 21. That as sin hath reigned unto death, that sin of Adam
reigned unto death upon the whole human family, He said, even so
might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ
our Lord. Now that right there shows us
that those for whom Christ died are not condemned and they will
live forever. That's what it means. And that's
what it says. Now, that's what we call ruined
by the fall. All people whom Adam represented
were ruined by the fall and brought into spiritual death. And what
happens now is as we are born naturally in the flesh, we are
born spiritually dead in trespasses and sins. And that's why in salvation,
as Christ told Nicodemus in John chapter 3, you must be born again
from above. by the Spirit of God. Now, sin
demands death. And life cannot come from a sinful
person. You see, we're born spiritually
dead as a result of our fall in Adam. Now, what does this
spiritual death consist of? Well, look at Romans chapter
three. This is one passage, and I'm coming back to Ephesians
two there. And we've said verse one, you hath he quickened who
were dead in trespasses and sins. And in Romans chapter three,
we have a description that I would show you concerning spiritual
death. This actually, this passage,
Romans three and verse 10, defines the total, what we call the total
depravity of man. You see, by nature, we are all
totally depraved. We're spiritually dead and totally
depraved. Now you need to understand something
about that. The depravity of man, the total
depravity of man does not mean that we are all as bad as we
could be. My goodness, think about that.
If we were all as bad as we could be, this world, we wouldn't,
it'd be anarchy, wouldn't it? We wouldn't be able to step outside
our doors. And you say, well, it's getting
that bad now anyway. Well, it is, I mean, to a lot,
to a point in some areas. But total depravity also describes
man at his best, okay? Man at his most religious, man
naturally as his most moral. So understand now, what I'm gonna
talk about here is the total depravity and spiritual death.
of the natural man. The Bible says in Romans, in
1 Corinthians chapter 2 and verse 14, the natural man receiveth
not the things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know them,
for they are spiritually discerned. Now why is it the natural man
cannot, will not receive them, cannot receive? Because he's
spiritually dead. Well what is that? Well look
at Romans chapter 3 and verse 10. It says, as it is written,
there is none righteous, no, not one. None righteous. Now, that doesn't say there are
none religious. It doesn't say there are none
moral and dedicated and sincere. It says there are none righteous.
Now remember, it is God who sets the standard of what is righteous
and what is sinful. And in God's standard, there's
not one human being who fell in Adam, which is all of us by
nature, who can say by his best efforts to be good, by his best
efforts to be sincere, that that's what makes me righteous. I always
fall short. of the perfection of righteousness
that God requires. There's none righteous, no, not
one. Now, if you ever quote Romans 3 23, it says, for all have sinned
and come short of the glory of God. That's what that means.
It doesn't mean that we've all made some mistakes. We all have.
It doesn't mean that we're just all imperfect. We are. We're
all imperfect. It means that we always fall
under the measure of God's perfection of righteousness that can only
be found in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the key. But now here's
spiritual death. Look at verse 11. of Romans 3. He says, there is none that understandeth. Spiritual death means spiritual
ignorance. Do you know the way of God? The way of salvation? Now by
nature you don't. And some of you probably think
you know the way. But do you really? I hope you
do. What is the way? The way of salvation is by God's
sovereign grace in Christ Jesus, the God-man, and based upon His
blood, His righteousness imputed, accounted. That's the way of
salvation. So there's none that understandeth
that. The natural man, remember what
I quoted in 1 Corinthians 2.14, the natural man receiveth not
the things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know them. And
what that means is he cannot receive and love that truth because
they're spiritually discerned. And so it goes on in verse 11,
there's none that seeketh after God. Now, it doesn't say there's
none that seeketh after a God, there's none that seeketh after
the true and living God as he identifies himself in this book. You know, you hear me preaching
all the time in this book about God's sovereignty, God's electing
grace. And people say, well, I don't
like that. I've even preached to you about a God not only who
loves sinners, but who hates sinners. And people won't receive
that. Well, that's the God of the Bible.
You say, well, I don't believe that. Well, you're seeking after
a God, but not the God, because he says he does love and he does
hate. Now his hatred is not sinful
like ours. His hatred is justice. But that's
the God of the Bible. He chose a people before the
foundation of the world and gave them to Christ, conditioned all
of their salvation on Christ, sent Christ into the world to
do for them what they could not do for themselves, and that is
by His obedience unto death establish righteousness for them which
is imputed to them. You like that? Do you know that
way? That's the way of the cross. That's the way of grace. That's
the way of mercy. It's the way of, Christ said,
I'm the way, the truth and the life. Well, he says, there's
none that seeketh after God. Verse 12, this is spiritual death. They are all gone out of the
way, the way of God. They've gone their own way. It
may be a way of immorality. It may be a way of crime, but
it can also be a way of religion. a way of works salvation. Verse 12, they are all together
become unprofitable. Any other way but Christ and
His blood and righteousness, the way of grace, is unprofitable. Are you seeking salvation like
Cain sought salvation by your works? Are you seeking salvation
by your goodwill, whatever it is? Well, that you're going to
be unprofitable. That's the broad way that leads
to destruction and will not bring you to eternal life. He says,
there's none that do with good. No, not one in verse 12. Now
that's good according to God's standard of goodness. The standard
of goodness that God sets forth can only be found in Christ.
Now we talk about good people and bad people. When we're talking
about on this plane of this earth and as they compare people to
people, okay. But when it comes to a right
relationship with God, there are none good, no not one. How
good must I be? As good as Christ. He's the only
one that's good. And I must be found in him. Now,
he says, he goes on in verse 13, their throat is an open sepulcher,
their tongues they've used to see, the poison of asp is under
their lips. who's, verse 14, whose mouth
is full of cursing and bitterness. Do you know that can include
the religious, the false preachers who preach a false gospel? 15,
their feet are swift to shed blood. Think about Israel bringing
the sacrifice of animals, the blood of animals. Now God commanded
that, but not for them to attain salvation by the blood of animals.
It was a picture of Christ, but they perverted it. He says in
verse 16, destruction and misery are in their ways, and the way
of peace have they not known. There's no fear of God before
their eyes. Now that's spiritual death. Now look back at Ephesians
chapter two. Now I'm gonna explain more of
this, but let me just read verses two and three to you on this. He says, verse one, you hath
he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins. Verse two,
wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this
world, according to the prince of the power of the air. Now
that's according to the workings of Satan. Now understand, you
say, well, that refers to the dregs of society, the criminals. No, it can refer also to the
religious. And I'm gonna show you that next
week. He says, verse two, the spirit that now worketh in the
children of disobedience. The children of disobedience
are unbelievers in the Bible. Those who do not believe in Christ,
God says they're children of disobedience, just like Adam.
And then verse three, among whom also we all had our conversation,
that's our walk, our lifestyle, in times past, in the lust of
our flesh, In other words, what we naturally desire, fulfilling
the desires or the wills of the flesh and of the mind, and were
by nature, naturally born, the children of wrath, even as others. In other words, a sinner saved
by grace, who has been quickened, given life through Christ, and
then been born again, quickened by the Holy Spirit, by nature,
He was no different, he, she was no different than those who
go through this life, all their life in disobedience, in unbelief
and die in condemned under the wrath of God. By nature, there's
no difference between me and them. In other words, what the
point that he's going to make here is this. If you are quickened,
if you are saved by the grace of God, It had nothing to do
with who you are or what you did or did not do. You didn't
earn it. You don't deserve it. No more
than the children of wrath who perish. In other words, the only
difference between me as a child of God, sinner saved by grace
and a child of wrath is the sovereign mercy and grace of God in the
Lord Jesus Christ. Later on in Ephesians 2, by grace
are you saved or have you been saved? Through faith, but that's
not of yourself. If I have faith, my faith didn't
make the difference between me and a child of wrath. It was
God's grace who gave me faith, who brought me to faith. And
He quickened me. And we're gonna talk more. He
gave me life. He gave me eyes to see and ears
to hear. Remember Christ said, except
you be born again, born from above, you cannot see the kingdom
of heaven, the kingdom of God. You can't see the glory of it,
the value of it. But when God shows you your sins
and your depravity, and the fact that you don't deserve anything
but God's wrath, just like a child of wrath, then you'll know it's
all of grace, based on the righteousness of another, the death, the burial,
and the resurrection of Christ, that quickening that he experienced
in himself as my representative, as my surety, and as my substitute. And that's what this spiritual
death and spiritual life is all about. I was born spiritually
dead. I've been born, I've been saved by Christ and his death,
burial and resurrection, his righteousness imputed. And I've
been born again by the Holy Spirit, evidenced by the fact that I
look to Christ and to Christ alone for all salvation, for
all forgiveness, for all righteousness, life and glory. Hope you'll join
us next week for another message from God's Word. We are glad you could join us
for another edition of Reign of Grace. This program is brought
to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries, an outreach ministry
of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany, Georgia. To receive
a copy of today's program or to learn more about Reign of
Grace Media Ministries or Eager Avenue Grace Church, write us
at 1-1-0-2 Eager Drive, Albany, Georgia 3-1-7-0-7. contact us by phone at 229-432-6969
or email us through our website at www.theletterofgrace.com. Thank you again for listening
today and may the Lord be with you.