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. Welcome to our program. The message
today will be taken from the book of Romans, chapter 8. Romans,
chapter 8, if you'd like to follow along in your Bibles. The title
of the message is No Condemnation, No Separation. No Condemnation,
No Separation. And this message is part of a
series of messages that I've been preaching on this program
concerning the eternal security of the saved. And I've been stressing
that and showing from different passages in the scripture concerning
how if you truly believe the Bible and salvation by the grace
of God in the Lord Jesus Christ, then you must know that salvation,
true salvation now, there's a lot of what I call false professions
of salvation, false reformations, but true salvation is an eternally
secure salvation because it's by the grace of God completely
in its beginning, in its continuation, in its culmination. And it's
all conditioned on and based upon the glorious person and
the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Who is Jesus Christ? He is God in human flesh. And
He is the one who accomplished, fulfilled all the conditions,
requirements, stipulations of the salvation of His people when
He suffered unto death. on the cross of Calvary putting
away the sins of his people he stood as their surety and as
their substitute to suffer the untold agony the unimaginable
agony of the cross unto death to bring forth the very righteousness
of God that's what the gospel reveals and that righteousness
of God is the only ground of salvation, it's the only ground
of preservation, and it's the only ground of heavenly glory
in eternity. You see, the ground, the cause,
the condition is not us, but it's Christ. Who is the surety
of your salvation? I ask that in another message.
Most people believe that they're the surety. They believe they
make the difference between heaven, but Christ makes the difference
between heaven and hell. And that doesn't negate the necessity
of believing in Him, calling upon Him, and following Him.
Those are all the fruits and the evidences and the means by
which God saves and preserves His people. Well, in the book
of Romans, chapter 8, we have what I think is one of the strongest,
strongest truths revealed that shows us the security of the
saved, the eternal security of the saved. And it's in these
two points, as I said in the title, no condemnation and no
separation. Now I don't have time in this
program to go through the whole chapter, but I just hit some
of the highlights, especially at the beginning and the end.
But look at Romans chapter 8 and verse 1. It says here, there
is therefore now no condemnation. to them which are in Christ Jesus,
who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. No condemnation. Now, what is condemnation? Well,
that's the sentence of death. A person who is accused of a
crime goes before a judge and a jury, and they have a trial. The evidence is presented either
to show that they are guilty or not guilty. And when the verdict
comes in, and if it's guilty, and the punishment requires death,
then they are a condemned criminal. And what the Bible teaches is
that describes all of the whole human race as fallen in Adam,
condemned under the law. You see, that's what the scripture
tells us. I quote this all the time. There's none righteous, no not
one. In other words, what does the law require? It requires
righteousness. Anything less is sin. And the scripture tells us that
by deeds of law shall no flesh be justified. There's no person
who can be declared not guilty and righteous in God's sight
by deeds of the law, by their works. For by the law is the
knowledge of sin. So how is it possible that there
can be any people at all who have fallen in Adam, ruined by
the fall, and who are born dead in trespasses and sins? You see,
The human race is not only condemned for their fallen Adam, but for
our own sins. So how is it possible that there
can be anybody of whom it says no condemnation? Well, the key
is here. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus. Now what is it to be in Christ
Jesus? Well, it means a lot of things.
If you go throughout the scripture, the apostle Paul, as he's inspired
by the Holy Spirit to write here, he's speaking of some specific
things. But let's consider the whole realm of what it means
to be in Christ. And I won't turn to these scriptures,
but I'll just reference them for you, just refer you to them.
But one of the scriptures that you might read and study is Ephesians
chapter one. And like I said, I'm not gonna
read it, but it speaks of those who are in Christ before the
foundation of the world. And so to be in Christ is to
be chosen, elected by God before the world began. It's what Ephesians
1 teaches. Somebody says, well, that's just
for the Jews. No, there were believing Jews and believing
Gentiles in Ephesus. It's for God's people, all who
believe in Christ. What does believing in Christ
show about you? Does it show that you were a
better person than the one who didn't believe? No. Does it show
that you're less rebellious, less obstinate? No. First of
all, it shows that you were chosen of God before the world began.
That's what the Bible teaches. I know people don't like that,
but that's too bad. That's what this book teaches.
There was a time when I didn't like it either. But when I found
out that the Bible taught it, my first reaction to it said,
well, I just don't believe the Bible. But you see, God in his
power and mercy and grace came and changed my heart. He gave
me a new heart. Like Saul of Tarsus on the road
to Damascus. So when you come to believe the
gospel, the true gospel now, not a false gospel, there's a
lot of false gospels. When you come to believe the
true gospel of God's free and sovereign grace in Christ Jesus,
based on His blood and His righteousness alone, what does that say about
it? It says that you were chosen, first you were chosen by God
before the foundation of the world, and it had nothing to
do with anything you do or would do or could do or might do. It's
the election of grace. The second thing that it means
to be in Christ is to be in Christ by redemption. Christ died for
a people. His sheep, He calls them in John
chapter 10. His church, His brethren, God's
elect. That's who He died for. So when
you come to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, what does that
say about you? First, you were chosen before the foundation
of the world by God. Secondly, you were redeemed on
the cross by the blood of Jesus Christ. He put away your sins
by His death on the cross. That's the ground of salvation.
And then, when you come to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, what
else does that say about you? It says that you have been born
again by the Holy Spirit in the new birth. In Christ by electing
grace, in Christ by redeeming grace, in Christ by regenerating
grace. You see, those who were ruined
by the fall and were redeemed by the blood and are also regenerated
by the Spirit. You see things that some people
don't, other people don't see. It's what Christ told His disciples
in Matthew 13. Blessed are your eyes for they
see. Blessed are your ears for they hear. And it had nothing
to do with your goodness or your will or anything. God changed
your will. He made you willing in the day of His power. So,
let's look at it from this viewpoint. He says there in Romans 8.1,
there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.
Now, how do you know if you're in Christ Jesus? Well, he says,
who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. Now, what
is it to walk after the flesh? Well, back over in Romans chapter
seven, and I dealt with this a few messages ago. He talks
about in verse five of Romans seven. He says, for when we were
in the flesh, the motions or the passions of sins, which were
by the law did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.
To walk after the flesh is to walk in unbelief. All right? To walk after the spirit is to
walk in faith. believing in the Lord Jesus Christ,
resting in Him for all salvation, for all forgiveness, for all
righteousness, eternal life, for all glory in heaven. To walk
after the Spirit is to walk in the security of salvation by
the grace of God through Christ. To walk after the flesh, as I
said, is to walk in unbelief. Now, walking in unbelief can
manifest itself in a lot of different ways. You can look at the person
who is totally immoral. We've all read and known people
like that. They're just totally immoral.
They have no respect for the law of the land or the law of
God, certainly not the law of God. They have no interest in
what we call the good things of man, according to man's standard
of goodness. They're not even trying to be
good people. Criminals, drug addicts, we could go on and on.
The prisons are full. That's walking in unbelief. But
walking in unbelief also includes the religionist, the moralist,
who does not know and believe in and rest in Jesus Christ for
all salvation. Think about Saul of Tarsus before
he was saved. He was a moral Pharisee, dedicated,
sincere, trying to establish a righteousness of his own. That's
walking after the flesh too. And that's what people need to
understand when they read the Bible. Listen to it again, Romans
8.1. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh,
but after the Spirit. Now there are people who say,
well, if you walk after the Spirit, you're in Christ Jesus, but what
if you stop walking after the Spirit and you begin to walk
after the flesh? Now you're not in Christ Jesus
anymore. Now listen to me. First of all, that's not what
the Bible teaches. If you're in Christ Jesus, you were in
Him by electing grace before the foundation of the world.
You were in Him by redemptive grace in Christ on the cross. He is the substitute for His
people. And you're in Him by regenerating
grace, and I'm going to talk a little bit more about that.
If you claim to be in Christ and claim to walk after the Spirit,
but stop What does the Bible teach? You never were in Christ. You were just professing something
that wasn't real and sincere and true. And that's what the
Bible teaches. But let's go on. Look at Romans
8 in verse 2. He says, For the law of the Spirit
of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free, liberated from
the law of sin and death. What that means is I'm no longer
striving to save myself. I'm no longer striving to establish
my own righteousness. I've been liberated from that.
I'm now free from the law of sin and death. You see, the law
of sin and death is like this. If you strive to keep the law
for your salvation, and you fall short of its requirement, then
it's nothing but sin that deserves death. 1 Corinthians 15 says
the strength of sin is the law. That is, the power of sin to
condemn a person is the law of God. The law pronounces condemnation
where sin exists and is imputed, where sin is charged. So my only
hope of no condemnation is that that law is fulfilled completely,
it's perfected, And sin is not charged to me. Now where am I
going to find that? Only in the Lord Jesus Christ. By His blood
and righteousness. Christ the God-man. The righteousness
of God. As my surety and my substitute.
Verse 3 of Romans 8. For what the law could not do,
in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own son
in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, or by sacrifice
for sin, condemned sin in the flesh. What the law could not
do. Well, what is it the law cannot
do? Well, the law cannot justify a sinner based on his best efforts
to keep the law. Now why? Because our best efforts
to keep the law fall short. The law cannot save us. The law
cannot make a person holy and righteous. The law cannot give
life. It's the law of sin and death.
So what happened? God sending his, and the problem
with the law, the problem there is not with the law, it's with
us, the flesh. It was weak through the flesh,
me. I'm the problem. You're the problem. So God sending
forth His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh. You see Christ
is God the Son, the second person of the Trinity. But He came to
this earth and took upon Him the likeness of sinful flesh.
He became a man. The Word was made flesh and dwelt
among us. His name shall be called Immanuel,
God with us. But now He was not a sinful man.
He was not born in sin. I was, or you were. He was born
of the Virgin Mary, conceived in the womb by the Holy Spirit,
that holy thing. His humanity is sinless humanity. But for sin, that is, as a substitute
for sin, having the sins of His people charged or imputed in,
He condemned sin in the flesh. When He died on the cross, He
made an end of sin. And verse five, he says in verse
four, he says, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled
in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit.
The righteousness of the law fulfilled in us means that we
see by the power of the Holy Spirit, believers, true believers,
see that they are saved, secure, and certain for glory by the
righteousness of God in Christ. And so we walk not after the
flesh. We don't walk in unbelief. We're still sinners and we still
sin. We still have to ask for forgiveness
because God wants us to acknowledge our sinfulness and our dependence
upon Him and to acknowledge the power and glory of the blood
of Christ that continually cleanses us. We walk after the Spirit,
we look to Christ. In verse five, he says, for they
that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh, but
they that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. Those
who are after the flesh, they mind, they pay attention. They involve themselves in the
things of the flesh. And as I said, it may be abject
immorality, or it may be the height of man's religion and
his efforts, trying to establish a righteousness of his own. But
that's what they pay attention to. That's what they're involved
with. That's what they're consumed with. But they that are after
the Spirit, they mind the things of the Spirit. What does the
Spirit do? He shows us our sinfulness and drives us continually to
Jesus Christ for salvation, for forgiveness, for mercy, for grace,
for love, for righteousness. That's what he does. Verse 6
of Romans 8. For to be carnally minded, that's
fleshly minded, that's death. Whatever form it takes, whether
it's an immoral form or a religious form, By deeds of the law shall
no flesh be justified. Here's a person trying to be
the best they can be to try to work their way into heaven. That's
the carnal mind. That's the fleshly mind. That's
death. You see, there's no life in our
works. There's only life in Jesus Christ. But he says, but to be spiritually
minded, Romans 8, 6, to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Christ
is my life. Christ is my peace with God.
Verse seven, because the carnal mind is enmity. It's an enemy,
it's hatred against God. Do you realize that? Why? For it is not subject to the
law of God, neither indeed can be. Do you realize that a person,
now you can easily see an immoral, rebellious criminal is not subject
to the law of God. he's not subject to anybody's
law he goes out to break the law that's in his mind but do
you realize that that person who's doing their best to keep
the law in order to attain or maintain salvation they're not
subject to the law of God either you see As long as you depend
upon or look to anything or anyone for righteousness that does not
equal the requirement of the law, you're gonna fall short. And that means you're not subject
to the law of God. The only way that a sinner is subject to the
law of God is by looking to Jesus Christ alone as the fulfiller
of that law. Again, Romans 10, 4, for Christ
is the end of the law, the fulfillment, perfection, the whole completion,
finishing of the law for righteousness to everyone that believes. You've
never been subject to the law of God until you bow to Jesus
Christ as the Lord your righteousness. And that's what it says. Verse
8, so then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. Verse
nine, but you're not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be the
Spirit of God dwell in you. Now, if any man have not the
Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And read verse 10, and
if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the
Spirit is life because of righteousness. You see, the Spirit of God indwells
the people of God, and that's part of their security. There's
no condemnation. Now, what does that mean? Well,
one of the main reasons that a sinner who is saved by grace
can never lose that salvation is he cannot be charged with
sin. He's a sinner, but he cannot be charged with sin. God cannot
charge that sinner or impute sin to that sinner so as to condemn
him. Why? Because he charged it to
Christ. Look across the page there to
Romans chapter 8. And look at verse 31, what shall
we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be
against us? He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also
freely give us all things? That's his elect. How do you
know? Verse 33, who shall lay anything to the charge of God's
elect? It is God that justifies. Who
is he that condemneth? It is Christ that die. Yea, rather,
that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us. Now, no condemnation means
this, no separation. Look at verse 35. Who shall separate
us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, distress,
persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril soar, as it is written,
for thy sake we are killed all the day long, we're accounted
as sheep for the slaughter. Verse 37, nay, in all these things
we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. Not through
ourselves, you see. Verse 38, I'm persuaded that
neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor
powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, verse
39, nor height, nor death, nor any other creature shall be able
to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus
our Lord. No condemnation, no separation. What does that equal? It equals
the eternal security of the saved. Now, don't judge salvation simply
by what you see with the physical eye. You say, well, here's a
person who I know they were saved, and now they're out here living
like the devil. They've had to have lost that
salvation. Well, what does the Bible say? First of all, how
do you know they were saved? You say, well, they went through
this, they stopped this, they reformed this, they really got
dead. Let me tell you something. Those things are not the sure
signs of salvation. They can accompany salvation.
But you've got to look to the scripture. And if a person who
seems saved to you, you've got to judge salvation by what the
scripture says. What is salvation? I wrote a
book on that. What is salvation? I make it
available to you. You can look at our website or
call the church and you can order it and we'll give it to you free.
What is salvation? Study that. Study what salvation
really is from the Bible. And that's what that book's about.
But if a person's truly saved, they'll never be lost. There's
no condemnation. There's no separation. They're
eternally secure in Christ. And those who claim to be saved,
but then who leave the gospel, who leave Christ, they never
were saved. Now I'm gonna deal with scriptures
that'll show you that in this series. The sinner who is saved
by the grace of God through the Lord Jesus Christ, the God-man,
and based on his righteousness imputed alone, that sinner is
eternally secure. There's no condemnation. Who
shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? That's why David
wrote, blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord imputes righteousness without works. You see, I stand before
God in Christ. And all the troubles and problems
that I go through in this life cannot condemn me and cannot
separate me from Him. Why? Because it's all by His
grace, it's all by His power, it's all by His goodness, and
it's all conditioned on and made sure by the Lord Jesus Christ
who is the surety of His people. He's my surety. I'm not my own
surety. If you're saved, you're not your
own surety. You didn't make the difference,
Christ did. God's grace did. And it's all
according to His glory. We quote Romans 8, 28 all the
time, that all things work together for good to them that love God
who are the called according to His purpose. You see, His
purpose is His glory. His purpose is His grace. His
purpose has to do only, only with what Jesus Christ did for
us His people, and what Jesus Christ does in us by the power
of the Holy Spirit as He saves us, as He keeps us, and as He
brings us to glory forever and ever. And that's what the Scripture
says, and amen. 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
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today and may the Lord be with you.