I was sitting there thinking
how it doesn't matter what your opinion is, nor does it matter
what my opinion is, it is always what thus saith the Lord. So many of the old confessions
of faith used to begin with something like this almost. The Scriptures
shall be our only rule of faith and practice. And when you state
that, if it's the truth, you ought to end your confession
right there. It's what God says in His Word,
and only what He says in His Word that is true. And in light of that, I want
you to open your Bibles this morning back to Romans chapter
6, where we read, where we'll read words that were given by
the Spirit of God through this man, the Apostle Paul. And what I've entitled this message
is, as is often the case, a question. And my question, and I ask it
in light of this text, is whose servant are you? Whose servant are you? In this
sixth chapter, The Apostle Paul does just exactly the opposite
of what false religionists and those who preach salvation by
works He does exactly the opposite of what they say that the preaching
of free grace will do. Just by virtue of what we read
in this chapter this morning, those who say that grace, free
sovereign grace, a salvation that depends on only Christ and
what He's done, Those who say that such preaching and such
a gospel and such doctrine will lead men and women to even greater
sinning, we'll know by that that they lie. There's no other way
to express it. They lie. And rather than excuse
unclean living or lackness in conduct, or any such notions
as that, He instructs these believers at Rome and us to conduct ourselves
and to live our lives to the glory of God. We are to live in obedience to
God in all He says. And rather than being a hindrance
to what some call holy living, what we find in the gospel of
grace is the only motive to it. True grace motivates God's people
in light of what He's done to obey Him, to live for His glory. And you can find this out in
the very first two verses of this chapter. Paul begins, what
shall we say then? Or is this what the gospel that
we preach is saying? Shall we continue in sin that
grace may abound? Is that what we're saying? Is
that what we're teaching? Look at the first two words in
verse 2. He says, God forbid. He says that using that term
a number of times in his epistles as an emphasis. on the fact that
this is not the way it is, not the way we're sated, not the
way we're to do. He says, are we saying that since
salvation is by grace, you can just go out and do anything you
want to? God forbid. How shall we that
are dead to sin live any longer therein? But what He does tell
us, Not only here, but in every place where God used him to write,
what he does tell us is that we do not do these things in
order to be saved. Our good works are not in order
to be saved. We don't do something for God
in order to gain His favor or to be some ground in any way
at any time or in any part, a part of the ground of our salvation. He says, what we do is never
ever any part has anything to do with the ground upon which
God makes us righteous, the ground upon which He justifies us. Never ever is that taught in
this book. Because clearly, these instructions
He gives to believers He gives them to those who are already
saved, already safe in Christ. What he's writing here, he writes
to those already justified, already righteous, already safe and secure
before the justice of God in Christ. This is a letter. And when you turn back to Romans
chapter 1, And you begin to read the beginning greeting of this
letter when you look down in verse 7. He's speaking of those,
it says, are the called of Jesus Christ. He says, "...to all that
be in Rome beloved of God, They don't have to do something to
become loved of God. They're already loved of God. As a matter of fact, God's love
for His people, He says, is in Christ and is an everlasting
love. They are beloved of God, called
saints. That is, separated ones, sanctified
ones, set apart unto God in that election of grace before the
world began, chosen of God in Christ, chosen to be His inheritance. He says, Grace be to you and
peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. He's writing to these that God
has saved altogether by His grace. And all that He saved, every
single one that is truly saved of God, that truly knows God,
He saves them by His grace, by His grace alone, and grace excludes
all human merit and works. All human merit. Turn over, hold your place here,
and turn over with me to the book of Ephesians. Here in Ephesians,
in this second chapter, Paul, writing to believers at a place
called Ephesus, states exactly the same thing, admonishes them
and instructs them from the very same ground, and this is what
he says. In verse 8 of Ephesians 2, for
by grace are ye saved. For by grace are you being saved. He says, through faith. Well, someone says, well, it's
your faith that does it. No, through faith and that not
of yourselves. You don't have that by nature.
The faith that believes God, the faith that rests in Jesus
Christ and Him alone, he says, that's the gift of God. Not of
yourselves, it is the gift of God. That means that faith is
of the grace of God. Not of works, lest any man should
boast. You're being saved by grace,
Paul says, and grace is not of works. If any works enter in,
then that renders it no longer grace. For we are His workmanship. created in Christ Jesus unto
good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk
in them." We are saved altogether by His grace. And if we fail
to understand this, He says it so many times, such as in the
epistle to Titus, in this way, He says, "...not by works of
righteousness, which we have done, but according to His mercy
He saved us." Isn't that plain? You would think that these verses
were not even in the Holy Scriptures by the way that men and women
talk and preach. How could anybody be deceived
into thinking that something that they did could gain the
favor of this God who is, as we've sung, infinitely and eternally
holy. How can a sinner do anything
that would gain the favor or move his state or stature before
this God who's a just God? There's no way. So, evidently,
what is said by the majority in this world, and that's exactly
what Christ expressed. He talks about all that many
that would go in that way of destruction. Evidently, they
speak, and when he says, those who are made known to be false
prophets and false apostles, he says, to the law and to the
testimony, that is, to the Word of God. And if they speak not
according to this Word, it's because there's no light in them.
not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according
to His mercy He saved us." Not good enough? Well, listen to
his words when he wrote to that young preacher by the name of
Timothy. He speaks of God saying, "...who
hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according
to our works, There it is again. Grace. Not according to our works,
but according to His own purpose and grace which was given us
in Christ Jesus before the world began. You see, salvation does
not begin with something that you decide to do. Salvation is as Jonah cried out
from the belly of that fish, being brought to look toward
God and confess this very thing, that salvation is of the Lord. Salvation in its origins is of
the Lord. Salvation in its accomplishments
is of the Lord. Salvation in its application
is of the Lord. Salvation in its perpetuation
is of the Lord. and only the Lord." We're not
saved by a decision that we make. We're not saved by a choice that
we make. It isn't that God has done this
and God has done that, now it's up to you. As a matter of fact,
when I was traveling back from Kentucky and I was turning on
some music to listen to, to try to keep me awake, And I'm listening
to some rather peppy, instrumental folk, bluegrass type music to
kind of keep me awake. And you know they always have
to put one religious song in there every half hour. And so
I'm riding along and I'm listening and the religious song, couldn't
call it a gospel song because there's no gospel in it. Couldn't
call it a hymn because it's not about hymn at all. But the title
of that song, the theme of that song is simply this, it's all
up to you. One line would be sung. Another
law would be sung, the chorus would ring in, the man would
sing, but it's all up to you. Let me tell you something. If
salvation, if the salvation of our soul, if the satisfaction
of God in the matter of our sins, if the raising of ourselves from
spiritual death to life, if it's all up to you and I, we're gone. We're going to perish. But you
see, this is the message of the Gospel. This is the good news
and the glad tidings of the Gospel. That salvation, the salvation
of your eternal soul is not up to you. It is and always has
been up to God. Now notice what he says. in these verses, of these people. And saying it of these people,
he's saying it of all who look to Christ alone. Verse 2, how
does he describe them? He describes them as dead to
sin. Now, what in the world does that
mean? How could it ever be said that
a sinner in fallen Adam A sinner by birth, by practice, by thought,
by deed. How could it ever be said that
we are dead to sin? That means that we are dead to
the penalty of sin. And dead not only to the penalty
of sin, but dead to the dominion of sin. That's what Paul is saying
here. That sin has no longer dominion
over us, which does not mean that we don't sin, but it has
no power over us because we are dead to sin. How are we dead
to sin? We died in Christ. God took His
people into union with Himself by taking them into union with
the Lord Jesus Christ. That man, Christ Jesus, is no
ordinary man in so many ways. He's a sinless man. He's God
manifest in the flesh. But He's a representative man. He's the one that's described
as the second or the last Adam. When our race fell in the first
Adam, He as a representative man, when He fell, we fell in
Him. It says, in Adam all die. But the Lord Jesus Christ, by
the grace of God, is the last Adam. And in union with Him,
all His people, When He took their sins upon Himself and went
to that cross, when He died, they died in Him. And when He
was buried, they were buried in Him. And when He rose from
the dead, they rose in Him. If the head is above water, as
somebody said, then the body's safe. We're described as already
being seated in the heavenlies in Jesus Christ. He says, you're
dead to sin. Verse 3, he describes them as
being buried. That's what this baptism is.
You know, when we baptize believers, We take them into that watery
pool, and we submerge them under that water, and then raise them
up out of that water. And when that is done, that is
simply a picture or a representation or a confession of the only way
that we could ever be free from our sins, and that is by our
identification with the death and the burial and the resurrection
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul loved to use a phrase. I don't know how many times he
uses it in his epistles. But he speaks of God's people
again and again and again as being in Christ Jesus. Where are they positionally?
Before God, by His grace. They are in Christ Jesus. Dead with Him, buried with Him,
raised with Him, seated together with Him in the heavenlies. And
then he describes it in this way. He says they're raised,
verses 4 and 5, raised to walk in newness of life. Just as Christ
was raised from the dead, so are His people raised spiritually,
not to sin, do everything that's ungodly, and it be excused by
grace. that we might walk in newness
of life. Newness of life. He speaks of
them as being crucified. Look there in verse 6. And there
probably isn't a passage in all the Bible that in the King James
Version, in the way that the tenses are translated into the
King James Version as they are here in Romans chapter 6, there
probably is not a place in the Bible where the translators actually
missed a little bit the tense of what is being said. Verse
6 says, knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him. And here's what some people do.
They say crucifixion was a slow death. Well, it might have been.
Crucifixion, that is, this old body, this old sinful nature,
this old us, this old man, it's slowly dying. That is not what
he's talking about here. Because actually, what it says
is, knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him. Was. In other words, whatever
he says, however he instructs, how much he rebukes or admonishes,
whatever he does, he's doing to God's people as they stand
as having been set apart, crucified, died, to all that we were in
Adam, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature, and all
things are made new, and all things are passed away." You
heard that verse in 2 Corinthians 5? Somebody said, that means
when you're born again, that's what happens. I'm so sorry. Number one, he's writing there
to the Lord's people again. Number two, his subject is not
regeneration, it is reconciliation. He speaks to them there as those
who have been reconciled to God. And they've been reconciled to
God by the doing and dying of Christ. God was in Christ reconciling
us unto Himself. And if any man be in Christ,
he's a new creation, because in Christ, All those old things
are passed away. Now, let me tell you something.
If he's talking about regeneration there, I'm afraid we missed it. Who could say? Oh, what bold
Pharisee could say that you're getting better? You getting any
better? What bold Pharisee could say even that, that everything,
that old nature, everything is passed away and everything is
new? No, that doesn't happen in regeneration. When he says you're not under
sin, when he says you're dead to sin, this is the same man,
if you go read Colossians 3, you'll find him telling the Lord's
people to put away malice, to put away lying, to put away a
whole bunch of other stuff. So the notion that a Christian,
a real Christian, or if he's a real Christian, he won't do
this. You name what you want to name, and I'll find where
a real Christian did it in this book. That's just the way it
is. Now, I could sugarcoat you up, and I could brag on you and
tell you something different. But Paul in Romans 7, as a believer
and as an apostle, is crying out, O wretched man that I am. That which I would do, I don't
do. And that which I wouldn't do,
that I do. There's a warring in my members. The flesh is always fighting
against the indwelling Spirit of God. Who shall deliver me
from the body of this death?" But he knew. He said immediately
on the heels of that, I thank God through Jesus Christ. He gives us the victory. He didn't simply lead us to victory. He gives us the victory. He saves
us by His grace. He brings us to this state. And
if you notice what he says true believers are in verse 14, he
says, "...for sin shall not have dominion over you, for you're
not under law." You're not under that Old Testament law. You're
not under this principle of legality. You're not under this principle
of doing in order to please God and be accepted by God. You're
not under law, but under grace. It's like here's two umbrellas. And one of them looks like my
umbrellas usually look. Tattered, torn, full of holes,
and really wouldn't keep you dry if I use them one or two
times. Here's this umbrella. It's full
of holes, riddled with holes, and it won't... And over here's
another umbrella. And it has no holes. It has no
flaws. It'll stand every storm. It'll
stand the scrutinizing eye of a holy God. It'll stand the examination
of inflexible perfect justice. And he says, now, you're not
under this umbrella anymore. You're under this umbrella. You're
safe. You're secure. You're kept by the power of God. But although he says you're not
under law, but under grace, This grace is not an excuse for sinning
and for disobeying God or for ungodliness, no. Look at verse
15. What then shall we sin because
we're not under the law but under grace? I can tell you many. who believe the truth of Romans
6 here. They've been charged as antinomians. That means men accuse them of
being against the law. But believers are not against
the law. They come before the law of God
trusting that that law has been kept and honored by our Savior. And that in Him, we are not under
the law, but we are under grace. And being under grace, we are
not to continue in sin. He says, again, God forbid, God
forbid. I've been living around the Lord's
people for a little over 30 years, been preaching this gospel. And
you know, I have never run up with one of the Lord's sheep. If you ask them, Do you want
to sin? Do you believe that the gospel
teaches you to go and sin all you want? I've never run up with
one of them that said yes. No, their confession is this,
I already sin more than I want. Like Paul, when I said I wouldn't,
that's what I did. It's not that I feel any excuse
to sin. We grieve over our sins. We grieve
that we are the way we are in this flesh. We grieve over our
weakness. And here we were under religion
for the most part, always trying to do something, to abstain from
something or accomplish something in order to please God and be
saved by God. God forbid. But what were they
before God saved them by His grace, before they believed the
truth? Look at verse 17. He says, "...but
God bethanked." that you were the servants of sin. That's how he described them.
You were the servants of sin. And I'm sure many of them, most
of them maybe, being Gentiles, that they were out and out, immoral,
irreligious, vile, God-hating sinners. But the reality is,
and the one who has the greatest problem with what Paul's dealing
here is. The reality is that many of them,
most of them like today, and like Paul himself, they were
moral, they were a part of somebody's religion, maybe even zealous
in that religion, raised up in that religion. How do I know? How did I find out that the religion
that I was raised up in, that I was taught all my life was
right, everything else was wrong. That I saw my mother and my father
and so many in my family a part of. How did I know? How did I
find out that that was not right? This Word. You don't find out
about it asking mom and dad or your friends or your brothers
or your Your fellow religionists, you don't. The only way you'll
ever find out, even if I'm telling you the truth, is to read the
Word. Read the Word. So that means
that even all... Nobody looks at, if they're a
drunkard or a harlot or a drug addict or anything like that,
They don't expect to be saved or they don't expect God to bless
them on that basis, do they? They don't. who's always gone
faithfully in their religion, that person who's already done
just exactly what the preacher or the priest or whatever tells
them to do, that person maybe that has ever even strived to
be morally upright, or that person who has sought to be generous
and all these things, do you think maybe they might think
that on that basis God might favor them? They've been told,
all these preachers, by all these religious representatives, that
if they do, that's what'll happen. And out there, there's just so
many people who are so defeated and so without hope, because
the very prescriptions and remedies for this guilt of sin that's
in them, that they've been given, they've done it and done it and
done it, they've tried and tried and tried, and they are without
any real hope. And I want to tell you this,
as long as you're trying to do something to be accepted by God,
you won't have any hope. You won't have any peace. You
won't have any assurance of eternity's blessings in the presence of
God. So it comes down to this, is
that person who does not know and believe the truth of God's
grace in Christ, that sincerely sincere person, that outwardly
kind person, that generous person, that person that today's religious
organizations recognize as their poster child, you might say?
Is Paul saying that they were the servants of sin? Absolutely. Absolutely. Why would we not? Now, I know I've dealt with a
lot of people. Why would we not? In light of the truth, if we
had some family member that had died, And they had died, and
all they ever believed was this self-righteous worksism religion. They knew nothing of the grace
of God. Their salvation depended on something
that they did, some emotional experience that they had, something
they did when the traveling evangelists raided the cradle row, you know,
and in Bible school or whatever it was, they got you to make
a decision or something, sign a card, whatever it is. Why?
be held in such bondage, thinking that they went to heaven. Because
the truth is, if they perished on that basis, and we're trusting
the same basis, then that means we'll perish. The Pharisees in
Christ's day, I mean they were the people that would Morally,
as far as most all were concerned, as we say, they were as clean
as a hound's tooth. They weighed out. They were so
religiously zealous that they'd weigh out and tithe the spices. Oop, I didn't give quite enough.
That tenth is not there. I'll put another flake or two
on this scale, weigh it out, you know, and that's what I'll
do." You know what Christ said to them? He said, He called them
a bunch of snakes, vipers. He called them whited sepulchres. They were like a sepulchre, a
grave, white on the outside, but inside, in their heart of
hearts, they were like a grave full of dead man's bones. The
prophet had already said, all of our righteousnesses are as
filthy rags. You say, preacher, why would
you knock down all these things so much in order to show you
the one salvation, the one Savior, the one way of God? Are they lost? Well, our Lord's
already given us a peak of the judgment. He said, many, many
would say unto Him, Lord, Lord. At that day, standing before
the judge of all the earth, they'd say this, they'd say, Lord, Lord. But He said, not everyone that
saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven,
Only those who do the will of my Father." What is that? To
believe on the Son. But he goes on, he says, they'll
say to me in that day, they'll say to me in that day, Lord,
while we preached in your name. This is Matthew 7, you can read
it for yourself. They'll say, Lord, we preached
in your name. We did many wonderful works of
charity. We gave to the poor. We helped
this one and that one. We sacrificed for the religious
body that we were a part of. We did many wonderful things. And you know what Christ says
to them? Depart from Me, ye that work iniquity. In other words,
what they thought, what they did, They thought it was great. They thought they were doing
God a favor. But He calls it Iniquity, that
is inequity, not equal to what God requires. He says, depart
from me, ye that work iniquity, I never knew you. And not only
does He give us an example of what the end is for these servants
of sin as they're described here, but He also tells us in another
example, which is the writer of this passage himself. Turn
over to Philippians 3. Philippians chapter 3, we find
the apostle Paul confessing the things that he now repented of. Repented of. And he describes
the true people of God, the true Israel, the true circumcision
in verse 3 in this way. He says, we are the circumcision. Now, Paul himself was a Jew,
so you know he has to be speaking of something other than that
Jewishness by the flesh. We are the circumcision who worship
God in the Spirit, who rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no
confidence in the flesh." You say, well, I don't have much
confidence in the flesh. No confidence in the flesh. You cannot be depending on, relying
on something you experienced or did or anything in this flesh,
and at the same time be trusting Christ. If righteousness come
by the law, then Christ is dead in vain. But now, if you notice
here, Paul is not repenting of, he's not confessing that he once
rode with the hell's angels, or that he used to do drugs,
or that he was a drunkard, or a womanizer, or a bank robber. He wasn't confessing any of these
things. Everybody knows you can't go
to heaven on that basis. But Paul, by nature and by his
religion, he thought that on the basis of his doing, he could. He says, though I might also
have confidence in the flesh, if any man thinks he hath whereof,
he might trust in the flesh, I more. All of a sudden, just
bring your record. Just bring what you've done for
God out. And if you think that you've
got a basis to trust in your flesh before God, I got you beat. You think he lied under inspiration
of the Spirit? I don't think so. Well, what
does he say? He says, "...I was circumcised
the eighth day of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin,
and Hebrew of the Hebrews, as touching the law of Pharisee
concerning zeal, persecuting the church, touching the righteousness
which is of the law, is in the law, blameless." That is, as
far as the world's approval, as far as his religion's approval,
as far as morality's approval, Paul would have stood like a
third world general with all his medals and his badges and
all that stuff. I mean, he looked more impressive
than Gaddafi did with all his medals. He's confessing his repentance
of and abandonment of all these things as any part of his hope
of eternal life." Listen, verse 7, "...but what things were gained
to me, those I counted loss for Christ." Yea, doubtless, and
I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge
of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I've suffered the loss of
all things, and do count them but done that I may win Christ."
I count all those things I once carried around like treasures
in a treasure chest. I count it now as garbage. What
I thought was worth so much, I count it now as worth nothing
and less than nothing. I count it all as if it's not
worth anything anymore. Never was, come to find out.
He says, but that I may win Christ. and be found in him, not having
mine own righteousness, which is of the law," that is, on a
principle of my doing, but that which is through the faith of
Christ, the righteousness of God, which is of God by faith. I was telling somebody in Kentucky
recently, when Paul says in his instruction to these very same
people, that which is not of faith is sin, That is a principle
that you can apply everywhere. That doesn't mean that if I don't
do it by faith, then it's sin to me. That means that everything
that I have, that I did not receive as a gift of God through God-given
faith, the things of Christ, everything but Christ, what? That makes us the servants of
sin. They were the servants of sin. Paul was a servant of sin. And he's now renouncing that
which religion in this world rests in, and preaches, and honors,
and holds fast to, and sets forth as the golden standard. He's
counted all loss for Christ. And you know this man who was
a rabbi? who sat at the feet of the leading
teacher of his day, a man by the name of Gamaliel, this man
who knew the Old Testament Scriptures in the letter of them, this man
who had sacrificed and who had conducted himself in a way that
he's able to say, as far as the law, outwardly, I was blameless. I want you to turn over. to 1
Timothy. Hold your place here. Turn over
to 1 Timothy and listen to what Paul says when the Lord has revealed
the truth to him. 1 Timothy chapter 1. 1 Timothy
chapter 1. Look down at verse 12. And I
thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that
he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry. Is he talking
about his faithfulness there? No. He's talking about believing
there. Now listen to how he describes
himself. Who was before a blasphemer. He was a blasphemer. You know
how he finds out, when he finds out that he was what he was before? After. We don't know what we
are. until God, by His Spirit, through
the truth, brings us to see God as He is, to see His truth as
He gives it, to see ourselves for what we are. We know what
we were before when He brings us to the after. What will you,
Paul? I was a blasphemer. You mean
as a Jew leading and preaching and teaching and guiding and
all that zeal you had so much though that you were headed down
to Damascus to hail men and women into prison because they were
preaching and believing something you thought contrary to God?
Blasphemy. I was a blasphemer. Does that
mean that those few years that I spent as a preacher People
patted me on the back. People called me as their pastor.
I read the Bible. I told people how to live. I
said so many good things, but I was void of the truth of the
Gospel. I thought things like, well,
you have to choose God before He'll choose you. Or you'll have
to do this before God will accept you. You have to accept Him before
He'll accept you. You've got to do something. to
make what Christ has already done effectual. In other words,
here's Christ and His work, and it's like a brand new car. I
mean, it's spotless from top to bottom and from front end
to back end. But it doesn't have any wheels
on it, and it won't roll and run until you put the wheel of
faith on it, or something like that. He said, I was before a
blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious, and I obtained
mercy. That's what happened to me. I
obtained mercy. because I did it ignorantly in
unbelief, and the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant with
faith and love which is in Christ Jesus." And this is a faithful
saying, worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the
world to save sinners of whom I am chief." The chief of sinners. Now, what reason does Paul give
as a basis upon which this great altering of his state was? And the same that was true to
these people here at Rome, these believers at Rome. Look down
in verse 17 again. Who does he attribute all this
to? Who is he thankful to? He says, but God be thanked. My friend, if you're ever brought
from being this one servant to being this other servant, then
you'll have to thank and give all the honor and praise to God
for His grace. All that has to happen for us
to die servants of sin is for God just to leave us to ourselves.
Saul of Tarsus, who became Paul, he was not seeking the Lord.
He thought he already knew God. I wasn't seeking the Lord. I
thought I was a preacher of God. No. But God interrupted him. And he's on that road to Damascus.
In such a mighty way, that he smote him to blindness, stopped
him, and he said, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? In other words, when he persecuted
the children of God, he persecuted God himself. Why persecutest
thou me? Paul of Tarsus cried out, Who
are you, Lord? In other words, I don't know
who you are, but whoever you are, you are the Lord. You are
the King. And the Lord said, I'm Jesus,
and you persecute. And unless God interrupts us,
intercepts us, these people are so ignorant and blind, saying,
He wants you to have your free will. He's done everything, but
He doesn't want to interfere with your precious little will.
All the time that will is in defiance of His holy throne and
authority. He doesn't exercise His sovereign
will over your imagined free will. You'll die in your sin. You'll be the servant of sin
for all eternity. He's already shown here. In Romans
chapter 3 and Romans chapter 5, the only basis upon which
God can accept a sinner, the only basis upon which God will
bless His people with these spiritual blessings, the only way our sins
can be put away, the only way the justice of God against us
can be satisfied, and that is through this man, Christ Jesus. And not only through Him in person,
but through what He did. He died for somebody's sins. He didn't die for the sins of
every person in the world. And the only thing that would
make His work effectual would be for them to do something,
recognize Him, or walk down an aisle, or something like that.
He said, I lay down my life for the sheep. I lay down my life
for the sheep. And when He shed His blood, God
having imputed the sins of His people to them. And He does shed
His blood on that cross. He's made sin for us on that
cross. He says that we might be made
the righteousness of God. Who did that? God did it. But
they were delivered. How were they delivered in their
experience? Look back at verse 17 again. He says, "...but God bethank
that you were the servants of sin, but you have obeyed from
the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you." Flesh
says, give me something to do, not teach me a doctrine to believe. But you know what? That's what
the gospel is. It's a report. It's the doctrine. It isn't just simply, though
we do believe this, we talk about the doctrines of grace, five
points of grace, all true, all essential to the gospel. But
the gospel as a whole has so many more points. It is the doctrine
of grace, which John calls in his epistle, the doctrine of
Christ. He said, if anybody comes to
your door, And they don't have the doctrine of Christ. Don't
receive them into your home. Don't bid them God's speed. Because
everything other than the doctrine of God's grace in Christ is sin. God delivered the true gospel
to them by Paul and others. And He does this to all His elect. and even enables them to receive
that which is contrary to their natural thinking and believe
it to the liberation of their soul. When he speaks in verse
7, saying, for he that is dead is freed from sin, it is literally
justified from sin. But when he talks and uses this
word in verse 18, being then made free from sin, it means
liberated. Because He justified you, He
liberates you. Whatever it takes, He liberates
us. He says in verse 18, "...and
you became the servants of righteousness." Did they become the servants
of righteousness? Let me say this, did they cease
to become the servants of sins by anything that they did? Did
they become the servants of righteousness because of anything they did?
But what was the means God used in their experience to deliver
them from this bondage and to set them free? He says, it was
this form or this gospel of His grace. Really? Most people nowadays
don't have time to hear a word. about what God says. They can
watch a two-hour movie, no problem. They can watch a sporting event
that lasts on and on and on and on, depending on how many overtimes.
They can do all these things, but they're dead and blind, and
they desire not to know that which God would use to deliver
them from this being servants of sin to servants of righteousness. And this wont of a desire to
know the truth is the very evidence of our spiritual deadness. Do
you remember what Christ said? He said, "...and ye shall know
the truth, and the truth shall make you free." If you have to
be made free, evidently you are in bondage. If you have to be
liberated, evidently you are held captive. Held captive by
Satan at his will, is what Paul says. So what makes you free?
He said the truth. But not the truth in some abstract
sense. He goes on in the same chapter.
He says, if the Son therefore make you free, you shall be free
indeed. You see, in our experience, we
are not liberated. until God brings to us and brings
us to the truth that He states concerning who He is and what
He has done for us as sinners in Jesus Christ and His sacrifice. He goes on in chapter 7. He gives
us an example. One example is concerning fruit. What kind of fruit do we as the
servants of sin, if you liken us to a tree, what kind of fruit
do we give forth? He says, the fruit that brings
forth death. What kind of fruit do we bring
forth as those who seek no longer to be saved by themselves but
in Christ alone? He says, fruit unto God. We don't
have any righteousness by our doing and can only be made the
righteousness of God in Jesus Christ. Now everybody always
stands this last verse of chapter 6 kind of on its end by itself. Going to give it as a part of
the Roman road. Where the wages of sin is death, but the gift
of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Now apply
that to this context. If you get what you merit and
deserve, if God Pays you according to what you deserve, what you're
going to get. Death. Eternal death. But if
the gift of God is given to you, the gift of righteousness, as
Paul calls it, the gift to His Himself, Jesus Christ, if He
gives that gift to you, what do you have? eternal life. Those who trust themselves, they
trust in what they do, what they haven't done. Paul said, or Christ
said, those Pharisees were those who trusted in themselves that
they were righteous and despised others. What are they? Servants
of sin. But those that God brings this
saving truth to, of Christ and Him crucified, enables them to
obey from the heart. That means to do what he says.
What is that? Cease from your doing and believe
on Christ. He said you were the servants
of sin, but God be thanked. He enabled you to obey that form
of doctrine which was delivered unto you, and being then made
free or liberated from sin, you became the servants of righteousness. You seek to serve God on an entirely
new basis and motive. You see, God's people, they want
to do right, live right, be generous, be kind, abstain from that sinful
nature that still racks them day by day. They want to do so,
but they don't want to do so in order to be saved. They want
to do so because God has saved them all together by His grace.
So it boils down to this. Whose servant are you? Whose
servant am I? Paul makes it very clear. Father,
we pray this morning that You would cause Your Word to go in
power into our minds and hearts and tear down those strongholds
of false gospels and religious pride and self-righteousness. Tear them down that You might
establish Your throne in our hearts. that we might look to
Jesus Christ and Him crucified alone. Look to Your free favor
and grace in Him. Do not leave us to ourselves. Help us, Father, we pray. Honor
Yourself. Bless those that have been named
and so many more. We pray You'd bless Wanda's sister
and so many more, Lord. We're all in need of Your help.
For I, like Peter, Lord, help us or we perish. Thank You in
Christ's name. Amen.