Walking in the Spirit: The Key to True Christianity

0:00:40 - Speaker 2
How many of you have been enjoying this journey that we've been on going through Romans? It is so vital. It is so important Why? Because we live under the new covenant. We are no longer under the old, and we have to understand the difference. We have to understand the principles that govern the new covenant, since that's what we are living under, even though we still prize the words in the old, but we are no longer under that system. Those things were written on to us as an example, and we can still learn so much about the nature and the character of God, and especially learn by reading the old covenant what brought us to this place and why Jesus had to come and deliver us from a system that the Apostle Paul called the Ministry of Death. It was the Ministry of Death because it placed a requirement on you but didn't enable you to fulfill that requirement at all, and so, in that way, it pinned you, it cornered you and in that way, it brought death to you. You had to tap out, but Jesus brought the solution and the victory, and so we are going to be going on a journey through Romans 6, 7, and 8. It is supposed to be three Sundays. We are in part two of Romans 8, because I got one verse in last Sunday And then we will go through Galatians and in our summer life groups.

Our summer life groups are different than our regular life groups. Every group is doing a different book. In the summer we all do the same book and it will be more on the new covenant and what Jesus' blood has actually done for us and what the true meaning of grace is. And when you understand grace, your Christianity comes alive, your faith soars and you experience the transformation that is promised to us in the Scriptures. But it doesn't come through the self-effort of ourselves, but it's by His grace, amen.

So let's begin in Romans 8. Normally I do a recap. By normally or traditionally, that means the last few Sundays when I had to recap. I'm going to skip the recap because of the recap. I got one verse into Romans 8 last week, so we'll skip the recap and we'll just start at verse one.

There is therefore Again, whenever you see a, therefore, pause, ask yourself what it's there for. It's therefore because of what Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit, established in the previous two chapters, that you have died to sin, your old sin nature, that part of you that is in rebellion against God. That part of you that contained original sin, that was passed down to us like a deadly disease through the generations from Adam and Eve, that part of you has been nailed to the cross of Jesus. That's established in Romans 6, and that no longer has power over us. And then in Romans 7, he establishes not only have we died to sin, but that we've died to the law. And this is so important.

This is where Christians get nervous, especially religious Christians, because when I quote the scripture, this is not a pastor-boyanism, it's not something I'm coming up with. We just read over and over again the scripture says you're dead to the law. But people freak out at that Because what they're hearing is I'm dead to God's requirements. Are you inviting me into lawlessness? And when the scripture speaks first of all, let me answer that question No. And the apostle Paul answers that question because he knew we would have it. How did he know that? Because they had it back then. There's nothing new under the sun. They had it 2,000 years ago.

When he's talking about grace and going hard on grace and preaching grace, he knows what people are thinking in the back of their mind. So it says should we continue to sin, that grace may abound? Certainly not. Or more appropriately, god forbid. To be dead to the law means that you have died to that system, that old covenant system of the law. It was a wretched system.

Why Was there a problem with God's law? No, god's law is perfect, it's holy, it's beautiful. The problem is is that we're not empowered to fulfill any of the obligations of it, and so, in that way, it brought death. It's like an x-ray machine that exposes the broken and sinful parts of us but doesn't help us out in getting better in any way. And so we're dead to that system. What a relief We have a new system, not the old covenant of his law, but the new covenant of his grace, and the two are diametrically opposed And they can never, ever be combined.

They cannot be mixed. When we get into Galatians, it's something that Paul repeats a few dozen times, giving different examples and illustrations that they cannot be mixed. Yet when you look at the church world today, what do you see? Mixture, always trying to mix it because grace does not make sense to the natural mind. It is freaky, it is bizarre. There is no other earthly faith or religion that can compare to it. It's not what people naturally understand. What people naturally understand is do this or you'll be punished, across every culture, every time zone, every continent, country, remote, island.

That's the message, starting with our parents, that's handed down. That is not God's message under grace. God's message under grace is I will come into you, i will remove that old heart of stone, your old spirit, and because of the new creation, the new birth, i will put inside of you a heart of flesh, a new spirit, and then I will indwell you and I will cause you Isn't that beautiful? I will cause you. I will cause you by the power of the Holy Spirit From the inside out. I will cause you to walk in my ways And I will cause you to obey my statutes So that when we attain any amount of transformation in our lives and holiness, we can never take the credit for it.

That's what the Pharisees did, and all it bred was a stinking pride. And, by the way, when you get that Pharisee spirit and you get that stinking pride, you know what really sets you off Somebody who's living free and in the power of the Holy Spirit. That's why Jesus came with just a skip to his step, free as the wind, enjoying the love of the Father And they just, for all their religious law keeping, they couldn't open up one blind eye. And then comes Jesus with a smile, rise up and walk, be opened, and they're just. They gnashed their teeth at him. They've been triggered, literally shaking, gnashed their teeth at him. So there is therefore now no condemnation. Why is there now no condemnation? Because sin has already been condemned.

When 2000 years ago, where, in the body of Jesus, he took the sin problem out of the way and he was hammered there by the righteous wrath of God and sin was condemned So that we would never have to be, through faith in Jesus, hammered with the righteous wrath of God, he took that what's so beautiful, he took that punishment in our place. When describing the crucifixion, i've heard maybe I've done it in the past myself we as preachers, we want to really bring this point home. So we'll try to list every sin that comes to mind in a service. And when Jesus hung there, pornography was nailed there with him, whoremongering was nailed there with him, fever you know the most uncomfortable sins. Just to get everyone to squirm to realize And really it's unnecessary to do that You don't have to go down the list until you touch on what potentially could be a secret struggle of somebody in the congregation, because he just took sin out of the way, sin, the entire concept of sin. When John the Baptist saw Jesus coming still a ways off, he said behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin Not plural, you don't have to list them all The sin of the world. Behold the Lamb of God who takes away this entire mess that we're in the curse, this entire sin problem. He comes to take it away. He's going to take it and receive the punishment in his own body so that we could be free. Hallelujah. So therefore, there is no more condemnation, you might ask.

Well then, why do I sometimes feel condemned? Why do I feel ashamed? Why do I feel guilty? There's two reasons. One we have an unrenewed mind. Your spirit, the real you, the inner man, the part of you that's born again, the part of you that's been recreated according to Jesus. That's perfect. Do you know? that cannot get any better. You cannot get more perfect. Perfect, spotless, sinless. But you also have a soul. That's your mind. It's from the Greek suke, where we get psyche from. Your mind is in the process of getting saved. In James it says to receive the word of God, which is able to transform your mind or renew your mind, in Psalms 23,. The Lord is my shepherd. He restores or renews my soul. We're in the process of overcoming all that stinking thinking and the way that we've been taught for years. And then that's reason number one why we may feel condemned, and number two is because Satan will come right along and side with an unrenewed mind.

But the truth is there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. Are you in Christ Jesus? If you're not in Christ Jesus, i highly recommend that you get in Christ Jesus. How do I get in Christ Jesus? Ask him. Lord Jesus, i want to be in you. I trust in you for my salvation. I look to you for my righteousness. I'm nothing, you're everything. I can't do it, you did it.

Who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the spirit. I will show you over and over again, throughout the scriptures, what the definition of walking in the flesh is. We have to use the Bible to define the Bible. And walking in the flesh means walking under an old covenant system. Walking in the flesh means relying on yourself to keep God's law. Hey, guess what? We already tried that. We have the whole Old Testament as our example. You can't do it. You fall flat on your face every time.

It's no coincidence that the New Testament begins with the Gospel of Matthew And it's no coincidence that the Gospel of Matthew very quickly after we see him born and the temptation and the wilderness, the fasting, the baptism, then we see him sermon on the mount. And what happens at the sermon on the mount? He says some very hard things. He put some expectations on us that we're not supposed to read and go, oh cool, hey, love your enemies, do good to those who hurt you. I got that. No, you're supposed to shut the book and throw it across the room. And I said this is ridiculous. All the stuff he lays out, i can't do it. And then you realize, oh, i can't do it.

God actually comes and fills me and God from within, helps me to serve God. So my dependence and my focus isn't on myself, but it's on him. And then you walk over and you pick up the book again and now you continue reading it through a fresh new covenant lens of grace, amen. So we don't walk according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. What does it mean to walk according to the spirit. You're no longer trusting in yourself, you're trusting in Jesus. You're not an endeavoring to get God's approval based on your works and your self, effort and your behavior. You know you have God's approval based on what Jesus has already done and accomplished through the finished work of the cross. Hallelujah And again. He then puts his Holy Spirit within you And as you keep your eyes on him, there is a transformation, but it's not from the outside in, it's from the inside out, and the more you focus on this truth, the more transformation there is.

Why there's some Christians that seem to be no transformation. I can guarantee you they're not paying attention to this. They've become distracted. They have their eyes on other things. There's a listen. There's a lot of voices in the world. You hear mine on Friday nights and Sunday mornings and you have Life Group Midweek. There's a lot of other hours in the week and there's a lot of other voices pumping information into your ears And it's easy to forget and be distracted.

But the power is always in the gospel. Paul said the gospel is the power of God. It always brings us back to the crucifixion and what that affords us Verse 2. So verse one shows us that, because of Jesus and what he did on the cross, the shame and the guilt and the condemnation of sin has been taken away. Verse two shows us that, because of what Jesus did on the cross, the power of sin is taken away.

For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus. What's the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus? Living under the new covenant, relying on him, not yourself? Remember, under the Old Testament law, they just had themselves. They weren't filled with the Holy Spirit. They had to rely on their own self effort, their own willpower, their own strength, and they failed every time, just like we do every time we rely on ourselves. So the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.

Now, john G Lake various stories documented various times. This was in the last century in South Africa, where there was a plague It was actually a type of the bubonic plague And people were dying everywhere. When John G Lake was there ministering to the sick and asked him how come you're not affected? I don't recommend this, by the way. He was an apostle of faith and this is what he had. Faith for, this is what he had proven in his own life. And he called the scientist over and he took some of the foam from one of the corpse's mouths, put his hand under the microscope and the plague, the virus, died right in his hands. And he said how is this possible? And he quoted Romans A2 and said the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.

He took it, in his faith, even a step further. What the scripture here is specifically saying is that we've been delivered from sin and death. That's all we had under that system of the old covenant. You would have to sin. You realize that just by being alive for one day, and then you die. You go to a cemetery and you see the reality of that. Under the new covenant, the power of sin is broken in your life And the proclamation to us is death. Where is your sting Grave? where is your victory? Why? Because the sin problem has been taken away. He said I don't know. That's not a reality in my life, received by faith, hallelujah. And so he took it a step further, because sin was taken out of the way.

It's not just sin, it's all of the effects of sin Destruction, pain, sorrow, hurt, sickness, disease, all those things. Do you realize what sin has produced in the world? Do you think Adam and Eve would have eaten that forbidden fruit if they knew, if they really knew, if they could say oh look, what's gonna enter into the world famine and war and plague, disease, all the horrors that people will do to one another. They didn't know that, but when they sinned, that's what it opened the door to. But the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made you free from the law of sin and death. Amen.

Verse three, for what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh. The law couldn't do it. It places this colossal demand on you but doesn't help you at all to fulfill that demand. Again, like an X-ray machine, it exposes the sin but doesn't empower you with the solution against it. Every time I say that and I'm speaking about people living under the old covenant law don't think of a bunch of Hebrews living 3,000 years ago. Yes, that's true, but there's so many Christians living this way today. Don't you flash back in your mind Rava Machula, hey, hey. No, it's you today.

It's Paul in Romans seven, saying the things that I wanna do, i don't do. The things I don't wanna do, i end up doing. I'm like a walking civil war. I'm like a spiritual schizophrenic. I wanna go left, i go right. I wanna go right, i go. Who am I? where am I? why am I here? That doesn't sound like fun. Yet and I use that word fun. That's not like. Why? Because Christianity actually is supposed to be fun, amen. That's why every analogy about Christianity and all the parables, jesus paints the picture of a party. Amen. It's supposed to be a celebration and they hated him for it.

He actually talked about that to the Pharisees. He said John the Baptist came and it was like a funeral. You were all wailing and he was playing the flute and you were all. You didn't like that. You said no, too sad. The Son of Man comes, eating and drinking and being happy and throwing. Oh no, not that, that's too happy. You don't like it either way. You just don't like. Whatever way. I come to you.

You have beef with For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh.

God did by sending His own Son, and this is why we pray daily. God, you did for me what I could never do for myself. The law set the standard, but there was a weakness In my flesh. I couldn't fulfill that standard. But then God did by sending His own Son, and look how beautifully that's worded. Not in sinful flesh, but in the likeness of sinful flesh. Because Jesus didn't come in sinful flesh.

The Holy Spirit came, and that's what the angel Gabriel announced. The Holy Spirit would overshadow Mary. The Holy Spirit, just as much God as the Father is God, just as much God as Jesus is God, that same as Zuzia, that same essence would go into Mary. By passing the sin, by passing the sin nature, by passing that virus that would come in through Adam and Eve and all the generational sin, he came in to Mary. And so, while Jesus was 100% human and 100% God, he did not have original sin, he did not have sinful flesh, but He was human. So He came in the likeness of sinful flesh, and that's so awesome. He never, ever sinned. He condemned on account of sin. He condemned sin in the flesh. That is so beautiful. That's why this is the greatest love story ever told, in that Jesus lived the only perfect life there ever was but was punished as though He was the worst of sinners?

Why? Well, because God's righteous requirement is very high. You can't get an A-minus, you need an A-plus. You can't get into heaven with one sin, you need an A-plus. That's scary. So Jesus keeps the law perfectly, gets an A plus. Imagine that. Imagine you're in class with Jesus and you got the F on the paper, the final exam, and Jesus, leveling it, comes in and says come here, he takes your paper with the F, he puts his name there, he gets punished like he got the F, and he takes his A plus and gives it to all of humanity. You come home to mom and dad Hey mom, hey dad, you didn't even study. You were waking up at noon. I got an A plus. Thank you, jesus.

He condemns in the flesh verse 4, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us. So this A plus requirement was fulfilled in us. Jesus gave us that Who do not walk according to the flesh. Now again, he keeps repeating this. So, consequently, i keep repeating it And I asked in the first service, after repeating it a dozen times do I want me to repeat it one more time? People, you have one more time And I get that. You have to keep repeating it.

We've been taught a different way. When we get into Galatians, the apostle Paul actually calls the system the ABCs of the universe. He's alluding to the fact that whether you're Roman or Greek or Jew, or wherever you are in the world, we just intuitively, as universal man, we understand a particular system Do good, get good, do bad, get bad. That's the system of the law, and so if we don't hear this all the time and remind ourselves, we'll fall back. Martin Luther is famous for saying I repeat the gospel to myself every day because I forget the gospel myself every day.

There's a lot of other messages, even in Christianity. You go to a Christian bookstore, christian cooking books. What is a Christian cooking books Book? How to speak in tongues while you stuff with turkey, how to wave a banner While you bake a salmon. That the righteous. What I'm saying is there's a lot of info out there, a lot of books, a lot of seven ways to go on the five paths that'll take you to the 15 doors where you'll receive the 12 keys to greater life and success in Jesus, and then we forget the gospel and we don't get all that other stuff, because it's the gospel that's the door to all of the goodness of God.

So we do not walk according to the flesh, but we walk according to the spirit. So I'll repeat that again What is it to walk according to the spirit? It is not doing good things reading the Bible, praying, witnessing, giving, those are all good things, but that's not walking in the spirit. That is a result of walking in the spirit, that is the fruit of walking in the spirit. Walking in the spirit is you saying I'm not trusting in me, i can't do it. I'm looking at my Savior, i'm trusting my Savior, i'm yielding to Him. The flesh is I'm going to try in my own strength. The spirit is I yield and I consider myself dead, dead to sin, dead to this world, and that is the activation to the power of God. This is why humility is so prized in the Scriptures. This is also why the concept of humility is attacked and twisted in the church.

Humility is too often presented in you being quiet. Some of the proudest people I know are very quiet. Humility is presented in well, don't dress flashy. Tell that to Joseph and his coat of many colors. Humility is presented in you know you can't have too much money. Some of the proudest people I know are broke as a joke. Humility has nothing to do with those things. Humility, very simply, is your dependence on God.

And King Solomon, before he was blessed. God said what do you want from me? And Solomon said it's so beautiful. He said I don't know how to come in or go out unless you lead me. What is that Humility? He's essentially saying I don't even know how to walk through a doorway. I'm like a little kid stumbling and I need dad to take me by the hand, and I can't even know how to go through a doorway unless you lead me.

What is that? That's humility. That's dependence on God. You know what God said right in response to that? Because you've asked for this, you've asked for wisdom and you've shown your humility, and you haven't asked for fame or for money. Now I'm going to give you not just the wisdom, but fame and money. And, by the way, solomon, if you calculate his wealth because it actually lists it And how many talents of gold, a talent of 75 pounds And how many talents of silver, there's no one who has surpassed his wealth. No one, not Mensamosa, not whatever ancient king. You can talk about the world's first and only multi-trillionaire, but how did he get through humility and dependence, and that's what we're called to as Christians.

Do you realize that this isn't about doing? it's about yielding. And really this is the offense of the gospel, because notice who's not in the picture so much Us In the Old Testament. Under the law, under the flesh, the expectation and the impetus is placed on you And you can't take the pressure. I can't, none of us can We buckle underneath it, under the new, the pressure's all on Jesus. So what do you do? You die. And this, by the way, is what prevents people from coming to Jesus, because you die and you surrender to his lordship.

And I've been at this since I was 16 years old. So I've heard every reason and excuse why people don't bend the knee to Jesus. But what about evolution? What about the dinosaurs? Where did Cain's wife come from? But what about an appointed? The appointed things that are easily explainable.

But really, what's behind all the reasons and all the excuses is I don't want to bend the knee, i don't want to surrender my life to his lordship. I don't like him, i don't trust him, i want to be my own God And I want to do my own thing. And that is the truth. But no one wants to say that out loud. So they present all these other fronts, the reality. How do I know that? Because I know where I was. I know exactly. Come on, how many of you know what I'm talking about? How do you experience that Before you bent the knee, there was a war raging.

You didn't want it to be your own God. I did. I wanted to do whatever was right in my own eyes. That's why Satanism. Their mantra is do what thou wilt, do what you want. I want to do it my way.

Put on Frank Sinatra's song, volume 10. I want to stand there, tear my shirt open, stare at the mirror and bellow out. I did it my way And wink back at myself in my reflection Because I'm my own God. Well, why aren't you a Christian? Oh, you know there's so many hypocrites in the church. No, you want to do your own thing. Hey, happy Mother's Day. Everybody. Did I say that already We got a flower for every mother. This was laying here for me, just nothing else. And I thought, oh, there's a hit that's been placed upon my life And someone just left a rose as a warning coming for you.

Then I remembered All right, let's go to the next verse, for those who live according to the flesh, set their minds on the things of the flesh. Now, this is important here because the apostle Paul he's introducing this concept of what you set your mind on. What you set your mind on is what your reality is going to be. As a man thinks in his heart, so is he, and this is important And this is vital.

You say it kind of sounds new agey. I know The reason for that is is all the new ageers and all the motivational gurus and self-help types. It was a whole movement in the 1950s. They got a hold of these biblical truths and took Christ out of them And some of the principles can still work, hobble along without Jesus. And so now you say it's important when you think about, oh, new age teaching, your mind is your God, no one is saying that But what you set your mind on. So if you set your mind on yourself and on your own strength and on your own willpower, it's going to lead to death, it's going to lead to failure, it's going to not fulfill any of God's requirements. But if you set your mind according to the spirit, but those who live according to the spirit, the things they set their mind on the things of the spirit.

Verse six for to be carnally minded is death. What does it mean to be carnally minded? And someone will say, well, that means thinking about bad things. No, that's the fruit of being carnally minded. What does it mean to be carnally minded? It means that you're not thinking about Jesus and what he did for you and that a plus he gave you And now he's empowered you from within.

And this happens all the time. It happens to me all the time. It's so easy to slip into that, especially when a crisis comes, an emergency, and I respond right away. I'm still endeavoring to get to that place where my knee jerk response is Jesus. Sometimes it is. Other times my knee jerk response is I don't word it this way, what can I do? How am I gonna respond? It, never. It always ends in me being anxious and stressed out and falling flat on the floor, a drool coming out the side of my mouth, all defeated. And then I remember, oh yeah, i have a savior and an almighty God. And then I, out loud, yield to him. And then I see him do in a fraction of the time what I could never, ever do for myself hallelujah. So to be carnally minded. I'll put it very simply it's to trust in yourself.

And this is the offense of the gospel, because everything about our culture is about how great we are and who can be the greatest of the great. And that's why God said all of that righteousness, all of your proud accomplishments, it's like a filthy rag. That's what it stinks like to me. I would just well, we don't know, not that one. I'm not gonna do that. They've already turned enough. I was gonna talk about my own filthy.

You know, in the house we use the magic cloths because we don't wanna go through all the paper towels, because the planet's gonna die. So we use the magic cloths. But you know, you coffee, you spill some milk, whatever you do the man. Then you lay the magic cloth and you come back like six hours later And I'm like I think a rat died in the walls. I'm like where is? and no, you take the. It's the magic cloth smelling like a dead cat d'avre.

Well, god said that's what our self effort and our attempts at righteousness smell like to him. That's what it means to be carnal in mind. That is what I'm saying. Amen, next verse, please, because the carnal mind is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So, then, those who are in the flesh, and just keep that verse up there, so that those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

So, in church in East, depending on what background you come from, or many of you are new to Christianity, and there is a difference between Christianity, true, biblical, new covenant grace Christianity and what eventually morphs and becomes churchianity, and the truths of the Bible that become Christianese or churchinese. And in Christianese and churchinese there is this concept of that sometimes you're in the spirit and sometimes you're in the flesh. Have you heard that? And it paints this picture of a duality within us, like we're two people with two identities. When we're doing good, we're in the spirit. And then have you heard a Christian or you yourself, and I said oh, i got in the flesh, oh, i was in the flesh last week. What Jesus first of all said a house divided against itself cannot stand. You're not two people at war. That is the definition, really, of insanity. There's no peace in that. That is what Paul was talking about in Romans seven When he said the things I wanna do, i don't do. The things that I don't wanna do, i end up doing.

The reality is is that if you're a born again Christian, if you've received Jesus as your Lord and Savior, if you've submitted to his Lordship your new creation and you are in the spirit, you cannot be in the flesh. You cannot. It is impossible. You can sometimes, scripturally speaking, walk by the flesh. What does that mean? It means that you forgot these truths And you got distracted, maybe intentionally, maybe over time. You forgot that there's a greater one within you And his job is to live with the power and life of God through you. And now you're walking by the flesh, or according to the flesh, but you cannot be in the flesh, you say. That sounds really radical. I don't know if I trust you, pastor. I'd never ask you to trust me.

Let's go to the next verse. But you are not in the flesh but in the spirit. Who's he writing to Christians? You've come out from darkness into light. You've come out from death into life. You are in the spirit, but you are not in the flesh but in the spirit, if indeed the spirit of God dwells in you. Now, if anyone does not have the spirit of Christ, he is not his. Hey, let me. Just read this to you. Go back to that verse, please, right before then. If anyone now, if anybody, does not have the spirit of Christ, he is not his.

There are some folk, and I understand, listen. If you're new to the Lord and if you're not in the Word, there are times when you will question your own salvation even. But that's not how God designed you to live And all that means is that you're not getting enough of the truth of God's Word in you. If you're wondering and questioning about your salvation, you need to get out every scripture that promises you eternal life for free and memorize it and get it deep in your spirit. That'll shut that lying voice right down. We overcome these lies the same way Jesus did with the word, the sword of the spirit.

But here are some questions. If someone's saying well, how do I know I have the Holy Spirit within me, i answer these questions. Has the spirit led you to Jesus? Has the spirit put in you the desire to honor Jesus? Is the spirit leading you to be more like Jesus? Is the spirit at work in your heart? If you can answer yes to any of those questions, even if you've been struggling in these areas, but you know, oh, the Holy Spirit is. You have the Holy Spirit of God inside of you. Amen, verse 10,.

And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors not to the flesh to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, if you live in your own strength, if you trust in you, if you're not surrendered to the Lordship of Jesus but you're trying to do it in your own power, you will die. But if, by the spirit, you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. How do you, by the spirit, put to death the deeds of the body?

The apostle Paul. He mentioned this several times in Galatians. He said I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live. Yet not I, but Christ lives in me, And the life which I now live in the flesh. What he meant was just natural living. I live by the faith and the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I don't want you to confuse this verse with something that you have to do. But if, by the spirit, you put to death the deeds of the body, what does that mean? That you have to do something? No, you have to acknowledge what he already did for you and then yield and surrender and allow him, through you, to work out that. It's awesome, it's freeing, it's liberating, hallelujah, hallelujah.

Look, a lot of stuff that's presented today is presented in a do-do, to-do And people want, people are comfortable. Again, that's how we're trained. You want a lot of to-dos. Get your note ready. What are the 21 to-dos? And you end up covered in do-do with all the to-do, do-do, do-do, do's. This is not a do-do faith, this is a done-done faith. And you yield and you consider yourself dead to sin and you surrender and you plug in to what he has already done, done, done and be relieved of the do-do-do. Hallelujah, amen.

I'm convinced and there's scriptures that allude to this that we have there's a scent in the spirit. That's why you get around some Christians and you're like I, just like being with you. Oh yeah, in the spirit you smell nice. Paul even said an offering can have a smell, a fragrance unto the Lord. And that's why, when you get around miserable religious law-keeping not law-keeping, but putting confidence in themselves, living under the law of Christians there's a smell right. There's like a you need some grace deodorant sat because I can smell it on you. Oh God, i know that was a hit because my wife is laughing. Maybe it's a new product idea Grace deodorant. It'll do for you when no other deodorant can. Verse 14. For as many as are led by the spirit of God, these are the sons of God.

0:44:48 - Speaker 1
So, again.

0:44:48 - Speaker 2
He's just hammering the point home. If you're led by yourself, if you're looking to yourself, if you're full in and of yourself with all your genius, brilliant ideas and how you're gonna make it, you're alone and you're now walking in the flesh. How do you know you're a child of God? Because you're looking to him. Remember, david is a type of Christ. David is also a type of Christian. It's all under the old covenant of the law, but we can look to him, and the phrase most associated with David's life is and David inquired of the Lord, and so those that are led by the spirit of God, they're the sons of God. Now there's something else that we can draw from this, because we all wanna be led by God.

The old covenant way of being led by God was always external. Did you know that There's not one of them who had the inner voice of the Holy Spirit, the still small voice, the peace? Not one of them, because they weren't filled with the Holy Spirit, not like we are today. The Holy Spirit would come upon them from time to time for a particular purpose, a particular mission, and then he would who recede, because Jesus hadn't died yet, he hadn't been glorified, he hadn't shed his blood so that we could be made clean and have a new heart, a new human spirit that the Holy Spirit can then indwell. So even David, when he would inquire of the Lord. Did you guys know this? back when I was a Christian, people used to. There were much more sermons on it, but there was an orem and a thummim and the priests would come out with these stones and they would actually light up Red light, green light, one, two, three And David would ask a question of the Lord and these stones would light up with different colors. One color would mean yes, another color would mean no. It was always external.

Imagine that Gideon, when he wanted to discern the will of God, it was always something external. He took a sheep's fleece and put it on grass and said God, i'll know it's your will If the grass has the dew of the morning on it, but the fleece is dry. And then God did that for him, because that was the system external validations and signals. That wasn't enough for Gideon. The next morning he's like oh, let me really check God this time. I got you this time. Make the fleece all wet and then the grass where there should be dew, make it all dry And God did that. Cool, that's under old covenant system. Under the new covenant, though, you have Christians that still try to do that and they ask for external signals and signs. Christians fall into it all the time.

God, if it's not your will, close every door. Maybe the devil will close all the doors. God, there's a city-like trip to Guatemala coming up, february 7th to 14th 2024. If it's your will for me to go, cause my goldfish Abraham to leap out of the fishbowl and do a backwards triple somersault, and then I'll know that. I know that. I know that it's your will that I should go. What, god? I have a new job that I should take. If it's your will, cause the grub hub guy to come to my apartment instead of my neighbors and accidentally knock, like that.

If you put out a fleece under the new covenant, you're gonna get fleeced. There is a better way. You're now under the new covenant, the Holy Spirit is inside of you and you look at how people were led by the Lord under the new covenant, and He's within you. He'll give you something known as the inward witness. There's dozens of ways that the Lord speaks, but the greatest men of God that I've known and those books I've studied. They'll all say the same thing, although there's so many ways that God can speak through dreams, through angelic visitations, through an audible voice, all that But they'll always say over 90% of the time, the vast majority of the time, the way the Lord has led me and guided me has been by the inward witness. What's the inward witness? It's the orem and the thummon, but inside It's a red light and a green light. You ever go to do something and you feel the red light. Ooh, no, that's not right. God is mm-mm, i don't have peace there. Or you think of doing something and it's like a little bell on the inside ding, ding, ding, ding and it's a smooth, sweet, velvety feeling and it's a green light and the Lord is saying this is the way. That's the inward witness. So, as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. Also, let me just say this my wife and I are at a crossroads. If you've been following our story over the last few months and the magical Narnia spring that has manifested in our lower level that seems to keep coming back, a portal to another dimension, water continually flooding us, and so we're considering moving.

And I shared about how I don't want to live outside of the five boroughs. This was just like That was two Sundays ago And I made I wanted to get the, the condo above me, but it would obviously rely on this water being fixed. But I wanted to get the kind because the family is growing and right now our kids are sleeping in a glorified walking closet. And So I I phoned my neighbor who doesn't live there, he rents it out and and I Told him hey, are you, are you willing to sell your condo? It's a really hard way to enter a negotiation when he knows by default you're desperate for it. Why are you interested in? oh, you want to set up a triplex, nice. So his response basically was I don't want to give you a number, you give me a number. So I gave him a number, isn't? I don't want to respond with an, i don't want to get into a negotiating thing. But you and I'm listening I'm like what are you saying? Oh, i understand what you're saying. You're saying make me an offer, i can't refuse. Wow, me, dazzle me. Pay 300,000 above market rate. So I said okay, you know, this is not so. Never say you're not gonna do something.

I Started looking at Long Island And but this, this is how many Long Islanders we have. It Will be as as as close to Queens as you can be while still being literally long. I like I'd be 25 minutes away from here. Well, first of all, i'd be 25 minutes non rush hour from here. I'd be six to eight hours during rush hour from here. So I'm glad Emily's not here. Well, i'm sharing all this because I love she's so adorable, but you know, she can't play any church games, she can't hide anything, whatever she's feeling, it's just apparent to all. So this is still. We're still navigating all this stuff.

I start talking about this Because it's a huge. I mean, this is a huge change for us, for the kids, for everything that happened in a week's time. So of course, we're seeking that. By the way, i'm still preaching about being led by the Lord, so we're praying Lord, what is your will? We don't want it. And you know what I'm sensing the whole time. I'm sensing you can do this, not go and do this, but you can if you want, which kind of disturbed me, because something this big I would really like a mandate from heaven. I would really like. I understand Moses. He heard the trumpet blast and the heavenly host and all that. I won't get that now, but the inner go out And I'm just hearing like you can. And then I'm reminded how the apostles made decisions And it said it seemed good to us and the Holy Spirit. So there are major decisions you can make, because God will sometimes say as much about what he wants by not saying anything about what he doesn't want. Did that make sense? and Here's what I found sometimes The only time you get that mandate, like God, is when you don't want to Or when it makes no logical sense.

So you need the mandate, you need a strong word from the Lord go. But when it's kind of obvious, like he gives you also wisdom, he gives you a mind and intellect, gives you hopefully, rational thought, and ask you to come to him with all of that. So sometimes, when the decision is not going to get you in trouble and it just requires you using your mind, from heaven, what you'll hear is I'm with you. And if the, if the decision is obvious, there might be a type of silence. You feel peace. There's a type of silence To be interpreted as a heavenly duh. Go this way. Yeah, do all. And this is what the, when somebody is submitted to the Lord, the word when, and they're not going out of the Lord's will, the word from heaven was many times. Do all that is in your heart to do, for I am with you And he gives you choices. Amen.

Verse 15 worship team, won't you come on up? Obviously there's gonna be a Romans chapter 8, part 3, in case you were all bracing for impact for the next 15 verses, i Got Mother's Day reservations. You got to help me. We're closing, For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear. What is the spirit of bondage? It's associated with the law and living under the law, which means you're trying to serve God with your own strength, with your own discipline, with your own self effort.

Under the old covenant system where the whole burden was placed on you. Of course you were Afraid. Of course you were terrified. Of course Christians today have no boldness, no confidence. There is a righteous fear of the Lord. That's a reverence for him, but some Christians, they're just afraid.

That's why the way, why I used to work a prayer line back in my early like year one. You ever wonder who calls the prayer line? nine times out of ten. It's Christians who are afraid of praying themselves. So when they say pray for me, they don't mean hey, you pray for me. They mean you pray instead of me, you Pray for me, i'll be here not praying. And you pray for me and you dig a little oats because you're terrified of God.

But you haven't been given the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you have been given the spirit of a member, the spirit of adoption. Under the Roman system, when you were adopted, any debt you had was wiped out. Your old identity was wiped clean. You came into a new family and you had the same privileges as the natural born son, exactly identical. There wasn't a two-tier system. And this is what you have under the new covenant the same benefits, the same privileges as God, the Father's son, jesus Christ.

And he's put the spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, abba, father, how many of you have heard this read in this like Defeatist, bottom-dwelling, scavenger type posture, and we cry out. We cry Because it says cry. Cry doesn't mean I go, cry means a Shout, a holler. He's given us his holy spirit By which we can cry out with confidence, not with fear, with boldness. Abba, father, your father, hallelujah, he's your father, he loves you, he's on your side, he has your best, best, best in his heart and, believe it or not, he loves you more than you love you. And the more you yield, the more you surrender, the more you see that love work Itself out in your life.

Amen, amen, usher's, will you come? if you're a mom here, won't you stand right now? We want to honor you right now, if you're a mom, stand. We want to bless you with a rose. What are the? No, she said. Are you thinking of the bachelor? No, i was thinking of what The Catholic, you know. I was thinking mother, queen of heaven. I was gonna say that and give that to you. Amen, it's not blasphemous, i'm having fun. Since the title isn't biblical, i might as well use it for my wife.

But listen, moms, is It awesome being a mom? Yeah, moms, your, your job, your contribution, your blessing is beyond words. We're grateful for every mom. We're grateful for what you've given, what you've sacrificed, what you've sown. I want to bless you, father, in Jesus name, that your hand Would come extra heavy, your hand of goodness and your hand of blessing, and every mother here. Let every see that they've sown come back a hundred fold harvest. Father, thank you for the children of every mom represented here. Thank you that you, you, minister, and Turn the heart of every child to you and me. Your hand of provision, your hand of protection, your hand of goodness be on the mom and All of her children in Jesus name, amen. Let's put our hands together one more time. Thank you, moms.