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then live like the devil but what they're saying is very subtle they're saying that that good works are motivated by the hope of rewards when we go to heaven and that if we are good and we behave
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ourselves and we obey then we're going to get rewards when we go to heaven but it's not necessary because we are not under law but under grace right one might even say
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that some of these exponents of the Grace Evangelical Society or the lordship debate lordship debate would go so far to say let us sin more that Grace might abound
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Paul's doctrine of Law and Grace is still misunderstood today as it was in his own time in fact it's perhaps one of the most misunderstood dichotomies in scripture law and Grace
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what is the relationship between the two I don't think Paul is unclear in what he says I think we are
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unclear in what we read and again I believe the cause of that lack of
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is because we are worried that if we adopt too much of Grace that we will enter into lawlessness or we're afraid that if we emphasize too
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much Behavior we're going to descend into a Works righteousness so we have the the rocks on the one side of the whirlpool on the other
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we're trying to sail in between but we're not doing a really good job I think fundamentally it's because we don't understand don't understand what Paul's talking about here even though his words are very clear
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are Christians independent of law may we now covet dishonor our parents commit murder is it okay to serve other gods or take
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the lord's name in vain well you know those are from the Ten Commandments we know they still stand right because we post them in our front yards but is it okay to glean into the corner
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of your fields to maximize your profit at the at the suffering of the poor and the deprivation of their needs is that still okay now see that's part of the
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law too law too is it okay to glean our fig trees and our grapes twice so that poor people like Ruth would have nothing
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to gather as they came along behind is that okay or let's say we're pulled over on the highway for speeding we rolled down our window and we tell the officers Officer I'm not under law
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I'm under grace and he responds well now you're under arrest is it okay are we independent of law well that would be really odd
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considering that the promise of the New Covenant is that God's law would be written on our hearts and that Paul will speak of the law in Romans 13 and elsewhere in his letters
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not in a disparaging way in Romans 7 he'll say it's it's holy and righteous and good and good so what is it which is it Grace or law
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see we seem to set up this dichotomy that if we're not under law then we are Lawless or that we can be and still be saved well if we read what he's saying
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we understand we understand that he's not talking about the content of the law he's talking about its power and his Dominion he's not talking about the content of
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Grace he's talking about its Rule and its sovereignty when he uses that preposition under he is saying you shall not be under the
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law because the law shall not be Master over you it is a position of relationship not of behavior and he says that we are
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no longer under the realm of the law he's already said we are no longer if we are in Christ we are no longer under the realm of Adam or the realm of sin in
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Adam but rather we are under the realm of Life In Christ so he's setting up a parallel opposition here again not about our Behavior but about
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our position our position are we in Adam if we are in Adam then we are under sin and under law
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because law is the instrument of sin are we in Christ than we are in life and under grace
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and therefore no longer in Adam and under sin or in sin and under law we are in Christ in life under grace I mean that that seems rather obvious to me at
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least that this is what he's been saying since chapter five when he begins to set up the division of humanity between those who are in Adam and those who are in Christ Jesus
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and he continues to say if you are in Christ this is where you are this is who you are therefore do not present your members as
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instruments of unrighteousness you see he's not ignoring Behavior he's not treating Behavior as it is of no account he's giving us the foundation
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for righteous Behavior rather than moralism he's giving us a transferred life a new life a resurrected life in Jesus
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Christ empowered by the Holy Spirit whereby we may now present our members as instruments of righteousness because we are not in Adam we are not in sin we
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are not under law so the law is not done away with in its content but it is deprived of its power
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it no longer has power over us this is our status our status we are either in Adam which means under law or we are in Christ which means
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under grace under grace one writer says thus the contrast is not between the content of the law and the content of Grace rather it is a question of identity
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we have this notion in the 21st century in the West that we are each independent autonomous beings we are under no one's Authority but our own and therefore all this talk about being
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in Christ or in Adam under sin or under law doesn't resonate even in the churches anymore just like creation we have abandoned for
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evolution so we have abandoned the truth of either being in Adam the unity of the human race in its fall and sin or being in Christ
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being united with him through baptism and death and raised with him to walk in newness of life
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but it's the only gospel Paul knew it's the only truth that he was aware of the only Revelation that had been given to him to him and it seems to me significant that in Galatians he tells us that if anyone brings any other gospel whether a man or
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an angel let him be accursed because this is the only hope for the condition of man
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there certainly is no hope for the condition of man from within man all the attempts at legislation all the attempts at World organizations all the attempts of throwing money at the
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problem all the attempts at increasing money in education have failed have failed and they will fail because a salt well cannot bring forth
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fresh water and a thornbush cannot produce figs produce figs the only thing that accurately describes the Human
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Condition is the gospel and the only thing that gives that condition hope of reclamation is the gospel and the gospel knows of only two
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divisions in the human race see this is also the the cure for racism as I mentioned a few weeks ago there are only two divisions in the human race those who are in Adam as we once were or
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maybe still are and those who are in Christ those who are walking a living death and those who are walking in the newness
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of life of life that is the only division when we see people who are outside of Christ we see people who as we once were are in Adam and we know and should know that their
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only hope only hope is that transfer of identity that transfer of Kingdom whereby the Holy Spirit regenerates our hearts and brings us into Christ and the man who was in
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Adam dies crucified with Christ buried in baptism in baptism and so that means a change of Dominion
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Paul said to the to the Corinthians in First Corinthians 12 . he says you remember though you Gentiles used to follow After idols he
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says but however you were LED that's that's the thing that we don't want to accept anymore we're all individuals and yet we all strive after something
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and Desiring others to follow after us what do you get on Instagram followers or you follow them right we seem to be so autonomous in our
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individual identities that we fail to realize how much we are LED and just as Paul divides the humanity between Adam and Christ he also divides
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our our motivation between either being led by the God of this age who has blinded the mind of those who are perishing or led by the Holy Spirit
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and he says then we are no longer under law if we are led by the holy spirit so we are LED what is leading us what is leading you
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are you being led by the holy spirit of God or still being led by the lusts of your own flesh but we're dealing with the law here and
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we are we are oh professedly a Reformed Church though other reformed churches would
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question that question that especially if they listen to this sermon because reformed Scholars have really struggled with Paul and the law John Murray who is about as reformed as
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anyone ever got denies that the Apostle is referring to the Mosaic law here because Old Testament Saints received Grace though they were under the Mosaic
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law he writes that it is not to be understood in the sense of the Mosaic law as an economy appears plainly from the fact that many who were under the
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Mosaic economy were the recipients of Grace yes they were under the old Covenant when the law was the greatest manifestation of divine holiness
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but what happens to the law when a greater manifestation comes along that manifestation being Jesus Christ who Paul says in Romans 10 is the end of
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the law the law for all who believe you see the reformed tradition can't let go of the law because if you let go of the law you're
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going to let go of control over the people and the next thing you know you're going to have a licentiousness in the churches and so the law has to be retained
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Paul you didn't know what you're talking about apparently we are still under the law but but the reformers don't want to admit that Paul was wrong and so we have to we have to deal with
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it by dividing up the law and many of you heard this many of you have read this the threefold division of the law the law we can divide the law between the
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ceremonial law ceremonial law the sacrifices of of Bullocks of pigeons the pouring out of of blood of wine in the in the burning of of grain the
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ceremonial law then there's the civil law the king and and all that he was supposed to do and how people were supposed to live in the society of Israel finally there's the moral law The
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Ten Commandments you know Christ has delivered us from the ceremony of law we do not have a mediator a priest we have one mediator between God and man Jesus Christ there
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the ceremonial law has been done away and we are not a theocracy and our government is not a Godly King so we're we're done with the civil law
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but the moral law still has authority over over us that's the point over us
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never mind the fact that the Bible nowhere makes this threefold division never mind the fact that all law is moral because all disobedience is sin
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God made no he didn't say oh that's ceremonial all that that's just you know that's just kind of dressing you can break that you can disobey and and do work on the
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Sabbath that's okay there's nothing moral involved even though the result is being cut off from your people because you have disobeyed which is a moral Act
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moral Act and so all law is moral never mind the fact that uh Mr Murray seems to ignore that when Paul speaks to the law he is almost always
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speaking of the Mosaic law not laws in general but the Mosaic law so there there is no biblical basis for this threefold
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division of the law it is an invasion and in my opinion it should be avoided so when you read it when you read it in commentaries when you read it in
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reformed authors ask yourself the question does Paul ever indicate a threefold division of the law freeing us from two of them and not the third one there was a song
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back in the 70s two out of three ain't okay there's a bad song but it's also a bad theology two out of three ain't that yes it is
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either the law or not the law but you see the reformed theologians can't understand that Paul is not talking about Behavior under the law or Guided by the law he's talking about
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Dominion of the law power of the law and he says in Christ who has died to the law you are no longer under that Dominion
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he's going to get into much more detail in chapter seven as Paul talks about what it means to be free from the law even though the law is holy and righteous and good but another way we
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can know that this threefold division of the law is probably not correct is that there has never been any agreement among the theologians who who ascribed to this threefold division as
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to which laws go into which categories even within the Ten Commandments keeping the Sabbath is that merely
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abstaining from murder and theft now that would seem to be moral but it has a certain social element to it doesn't it because if you're stealing you're stealing from your neighbor
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and if you're killing you're killing him so that means it's also civil law too well since that's we're freed from that let's go out and kill our neighbors
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I mean this is the way this logic is going how about not making graven images is that moral
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how is that moral well of course it's moral but it's also ceremonial and it's also civil because those graven images would lead the people astray into idolatry and bring down the wrath of God
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the threefold division is an invasion born of misunderstanding not understanding what Paul is
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saying in these passages in Romans and Galatians and Corinthians concerning the law and Grace and where this dead end Street of the threefold division leads
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is perhaps its greatest condemnation and that is because since scripture doesn't give us these three columns and doesn't give us a nice reference
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page whereby we can take this particular verse in Leviticus and we can go across and come down and say oh civil oh ceremonial then we have to make our own we make our
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own divisions and whenever man takes God's law and divides it up by himself that leads to tyranny and oppression it leads to idolatry and disobedience
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we are the final Arbiters of which laws of God still pertain to us that is not a good road to go down
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and so we're not going down that road because Paul's terminology I think makes it clear that we should never have begun down that road to begin with he says in verse 14 at the beginning and
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really we focus on the last part of this verse you are not under law but under grace but the focus in Paul is the first part the last part is just the reason
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he says you shall sin shall not be Master over you that's the new American Standard again somewhat unfortunate because the word for master is the same
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word for Lord and what Paul is saying literally is sin shall not Lord it over you and that puts us into Paul's paradigm
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again he's not talking about Behavior he's talking about power and he says it shall not Lord it over you because you have a different Lord
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when you were in Adam sin and the law lorded it over you and whether you realize it or not you had no choice in the matter
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you were conceived in iniquity you were born in sin and Every Act of your life is in Rebellion to God until you are redeemed in Jesus Christ
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you are under the wrath of God because you are under the just condemnation of his holy law and there's nothing you can do about it
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but God has done everything about it in Jesus Christ Romans 8 he says he condemned sin in the
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flesh the Flesh of Jesus Christ when Jesus when Jesus was on that cross he was condemning sin
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and he was delivering his people from the bondage of the law from the bondage of condemnation that is the power of the law
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and so when he says you are sin shall not Lord it over you why because you are no longer part of its domain
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anything can he make you do anything no he actually can't make the people over there do anything either but you know it's a metaphor um he has no Dominion here
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he has no power here Vladimir Putin cannot come over here and start writing laws because he has no Dominion here
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and we would simply say we are not under your laws you shall not Lord it over us because you are not our King that's the language Paul's using here
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we say to the law you shall not Lord it over me because I am not in your domain I am in the domain of the one who is himself the end of the law I am in the
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domain of the one who condemned sin in the flesh I am in the domain of Jesus Christ and therefore I am freed from the Dominion and power of the law
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to be under law one author says is to be subject to the constraining and sin strengthening regime of the old age to be under grace is to be subject to
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the new age in which freedom from the power of sin is available this is what Paul is going to elaborate in Romans 7. he's going to say how under the law
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I was powerless to not sin I was under the bondage of that in and of itself holy righteous and good
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but because of the sin Within Me it immediately led to my death I once was alive apart from the law but the law came sin revived and I died
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that is the condition of every child of Adam who shall who shall deliver me from this body of death praise be to God through Jesus Christ
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Our Lord Our Lord and so and so when we look at this passage as theologians but also as just
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believers we immediately go to the law to the legal side our mentality in Adam is legal we want to say what can we still do and what must we not do we gravitate to the
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do this and don't do that we gravitate to legalism because we want to be told okay you do these things you'll be okay you do these things you're not going to
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be okay be okay Paul doesn't go there he's not focusing on the law he's focusing on Grace remember this is all coming from that
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rhetorical question well let us sin that Grace might abound he's been talking about Grace all through this and will continue through
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the rest of the letter Grace is the focus Grace is the emphasis not the law
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and when we focus on Grace as Paul does we realize that what he is telling us is that there has been a transfer of our very being very being Jesus said to Nicodemus you must be born
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again you must be a new person Paul says it's going to be a new creation but that new birth that new person
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means a complete transfer from the old person born in Adam to a new man born in Christ so you the whole Paradigm of sin and law
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that governed us under Adam under Adam has been done away in Christ Paul says in Colossians he has he has taken all of that and he has nailed it
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to the cross and the powers and principalities and the rulers of the Heavenly places he has led them in Triumph through the cross
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having defeated them for us for us and so Paul is not saying oh you know you can do what you want he's falling Paul is saying this is who
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you are now and his answer to that earlier question when he's when the rhetorical question let us let us sin that Grace might be abound what's his answer may it never be
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how can we who died to sin still live in it the emphasis again is on Grace
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why do we do this well because there's one person in this whole scheme the scheme of redemption that we seem to want little to do with
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and that is the Holy Spirit it is so much easier to stand in the pulpit and spout out rules and regulations
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and tell you what to do and what not to do where to go and where not to go who to vote for who not to vote for and that is what most of evangelicalism has become but it's also what it has been
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throughout the history is moralism legalism and political activism with no mention of the Holy Spirit
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Paul says Paul says walk by the spirit and you will not fulfill the desires of the flesh Paul says if you are led by the spirit you are not under the law
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and where is Paul going with all of this well in Romans 8 he is going to the holy spirit this is where we're headed he's building us up like a crescendo where
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we're wondering how does all this work because I still see law at work in my members I still see the the desires that I wish to do I do not do and that which I do
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not wish I do how is this all going to work out well Paul tells us in Romans 8 there is now therefore now
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no condemnation no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus because we have been delivered in Christ from the law there is no law that stands
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against us against us and because there is no law that stands against us there can be no indictment and there can be no conviction in other words the acquittal has already
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been proclaimed been proclaimed and he says this is why for the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus you
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see we are not without law simply because we are not under the law we are in the law of Christ and under
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the law of Christ he says for the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and
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death we are not simply deprived of one master but not given another we're not simply deprived of one motivation as evil and as bad as it was
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and not given another we have been delivered from the Dominion of death in Adam we have been brought into the Dominion of Life In Christ
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but with that transferal we have been given the spirit of God himself and the law by him is written on our
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hearts let us pray father we do ask that we might truly understand what Paul is saying here
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that you would protect our minds and our hearts from descending into morality and moralism legalism and fear but rather we would walk by the spirit knowing ourselves to have been
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transferred in Jesus Christ into his kingdom of light and of life and father we do pray that if there be any here today any in our families any
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in whose life we have any influence at all that we might be given the words and the wisdom to show them
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that there is life in Jesus Christ and only death and eternal death in Adam that today might be the day of their
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salvation that they might be baptized in unity with Christ and death and in unity in newness of life with Christ in his resurrection we ask this
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for your glory and certainly for our good and we ask it in Jesus name
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from Titus Chapter 2 not actually a benediction but very very benedictary for the grace of God has appeared bringing salvation to all men instructing us to deny ungodliness and
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worldly desires and to live sensibly righteously and godly in the present age looking for the Blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God
