Romans #10

Romans #10

Northside Church

Nov 17, 2024

Jamey Mills

Good Morning, my name is Jamey Mills and I am the lead pastor here at Northside… It’s always so good to be with you guys.

We are in the tenth week of our sermon series on the book of Romans…

We’ve talked about how Roman’s has played a powerful role in the lives of many people… one of the themes I’d give it… The Gospel made plain and applied…

Paul spends the majority of the first 4 chapters driving home in multiple ways this essential truth that is true of every single person who has ever lived… a truth so important that its impossible to understand God, His truth, Jesus, forgiveness, grace, and even even life… without it.

I believe the more we choose to embrace it… the more we choose to understand the depth of it… the greater the impact it has on our everyday lives and the more we cling to the truth Gospel… which is this…

While we were still sinners… enemies to the cause and cross of Christ… He died for us… taking our place of guilt and shame… and putting us in His place so that when God sees us… He sees the righteousness of Christ.

And knowing and embracing the truth that we have all sinned… and that the wages of sin is death… and then stepping truth that we are saved by Grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone…

And we even see that in the OT… in Abraham and David…

They weren’t saved by being good enough… but by God’s grace, through faith in Jesus.

The Gospel is not about your goodness, but His.

This week as I was studying… I started to think about those things in life that are dependable… those things that happen… day in and day out…

A lot of us have relationships…

Like… every day of my life without fail… the sun rises and sets.

Gravity… has never failed… the older I get the more I feel and fear it.

Every time I turn my faucet on… water comes out

You can sit and watch the ocean… and literally… wave after wave… comes and hits the shore and then crashes and dies… there is power in it… it has the power to reshape the environment.

Without fail… every time I got up to bed, Brandi has invited one of the dogs to sleep in my spot…

It’s actually one of the things the Bible claims about God Himself… He does not change… He’s not a moving target… you don’t have to wonder what He is about… He is consistent… and dependable.

I appreciate and enjoy consistency… but there is a danger in it too…

What is a potential danger with things/people we can depend on? We begin to take them for granted.

We can begin to lose sight of it… its importance… how it works…

We can begin to abuse it and take it for granted…

I’d assume that we’ve all been there…

With friends, or spouse, or our kids…

This month my kids turn 24 and 19…

And that seems to be an argument that Paul is trying to warn us about when it comes to God’s grace…

Paul begins to talk about our relationship with sin in view of our relationship with Christ…

Romans 6:1–2 NLT

Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace? Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it?

(NLT)

Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace? 2 Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it?

Grace is a central theme in the Bible

…

It’s so big, so extravagant, so dependable that it lends itself to abuse…

We can lose track of its meaning and importance… and what life would be like without it…

And we’ve seen it throughout history… the way we choose to see and handle grace has caused some division… and played a role in some of the denominational lines that exist to this day…

And before we dive in… it's important to remember the context of this church… it was made up of…

Jews who were entrusted with and highly valued the laws of Moses.

And the Gentiles who were not and did not.

And we get this feeling that they probably held on a little bit too tightly to those things… and it impacted their view of God and His grace… in a couple of ways that we struggle with even to this day…

Antinomianism means anti-nomos or… No law.

If God’s grace is abounding… If God loves me and I am forgiven anyway… why does it matter what I do?

It’s not just the idea that it's okay to just keep on sinning… but it carries that idea that I should sin even more… so that I might experience God and His grace even more… and so that others around me can see it even more…

Paul's response to that is strong.. and I think we're supposed to see it. Paul says by no means, that's unthinkable, absolutely not, don't be dumb!

It leads to what we call carnal Christianity…

What is Carnal Christianity? It’s where we claim to know God, but the truth is nothing has changed.

There is no sign of new life or a heart toward obedience, or the presence of His Spirit, and little to no spiritual fruit and spiritual growth.

There are examples in scripture of those who came wanting to know about Jesus… who met Jesus and walked away unchanged…

In Matthew 19… there was a rich young ruler who had heard about Jesus… he was Jewish and wanted to know about Jesus… and how to be saved…

Jesus basically responded… you know the commandments, keep them…

And we see his heart… when he responds with… I have kept them since I was a child… (not true… no one can).

Then Jesus said… if you really want to know me and what I am about… then go and sell all that you have and give it to the poor… then come back and follow me…

And it says the rich young ruler went away sad…

He was more interested in living his life… than he was in knowing the reality of who Jesus is and what He’s about… and the result was… he walked away unchanged.

He was interested in knowing Jesus as Savior… but not as Lord…

God, Jesus, His truth… are not a buffet where we take want we want and leave the rest.

Jesus… or God’s truth is not a buffet where you take what you like an leave the rest..

There is a significant difference between knowing about Jesus and knowing Him…

One author said it this way…

Be wary of any belief or doctrine that appeals to and feeds your sinful nature.

It’s a popular mindset even within the church today… that the only thing Jesus has is love, mercy, and grace… and while that is a HUGE part of who He is and what He is about… It’s what He longs for… it is an incomplete view… There is an edge to the Gospel… to the truth… and to grace… that cannot be ignored.

It can lead to this idea of… God follows me, not I follow Him.

We also abuse grace through legalism, which is fear based and rule/performance driven.

On the other side of the coin is legalism…

Which is rule-driven and often fear-based….

It leads to a low view of grace. I’m afraid it’s not enough… and so I am going to perform…

Legalism often driven by our desire to control or even be self sufficient.

It can come from this idea of trying to have some control over our own outcome… the desire to be self-sufficient… or the answer to our own problem… which… is problematic how… we lose sight of our need for Jesus and the forgiveness and grace that is ours through Him.

The religious leaders of the OT were notorious for this mindset… and it was a major issue that Jesus confronted… some of his harshest statements were directed there… calling them snakes and even white-washed tombs… graves… that looked good on the outside but contained and wreaked of death on the inside.

Legalism leads to self-righteousness and a graceless culture full of judgment and division. In ourselves, in homes, and in churches.

… that even they themselves cannot uphold.

And it's interesting…

Both of those mindsets are equally broken and equally damaging. They both attempt to rob the Gospel of its true power…

Rules without relationship lead to rebellion

And that is so true… in life, in parenting, and especially in our relationship with God.

A third way…

The Biblical and right way to view and apply God’s grace comes through relationship. Grace is relational!

the Biblical and right way to view and apply God’s grace comes through relationships… (relationship… community is not just a huge part of who God is, but also in how you are designed).

Where we understand God loves us and meets us where we are, but loves us enough to not leave us there.

Your relationship with God… coming to know the reality of who God is… changes you. It’s not just a better version of your old self… but a transformation that runs so deep that the Bible refers to it as a whole new life… transformed… empowered by the HS… and growing as we learn what it means to walk with God… in every area of our life.

It leads to thinking differently than I used to… having different priorities, purposes, and passions… it impacts our view of people, relationships marriage… it informs our very identity…

And we see the difference it makes in the sermon on the mount… where Jesus Himself is preaching and helping us to understand.. It’s not about abusing grace… or simply following rules… its about real change that comes from knowing him…

And he talks about how it impacts our idea of things like adultery… its more than just not sleeping with someone your not married to… but its a heart thing… even allowing lust to make its home there… it's not just about not killing people, but harboring anger.

Knowing God… experiencing grace… changes us from the inside out… and there is something to be said about learning to let go of those things we hold in our hands and hearts that keep us from embracing God and experiencing that reality.

Romans 6:3–4 NLT

Or have you forgotten that when we were joined with Christ Jesus in baptism, we joined him in his death? For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives.

3 Or have you forgotten that when we were joined with Christ Jesus in baptism, we joined him in his death? 4 For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives. 5 Since we have been united with him in his death, we will also be raised to life as he was. 6 We know that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. 7 For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin. 8 And since we died with Christ, we know we will also live with him. 9 We are sure of this because Christ was raised from the dead, and he will never die again. Death no longer has any power over him. 10 When he died, he died once to break the power of sin. But now that he lives, he lives for the glory of God. 11 So you also should consider yourselves to be dead to the power of sin and alive to God through Christ Jesus.

Paul uses the powerful imagery of baptism to help us understand this relationship that we have with sin in view of Christ and our connection to him.

Baptism is an external sign of an inward commitment… that we chose Jesus.

To follow Him.

Almost exclusively when we see baptism in the bible, it happens at the very beginning of someone's relationship with Jesus… We don’t wait until we have our stuff together… What Paul is saying is that the choice to follow Jesus, to invite him into our life is not only the basis for but it is also the the empowerment of this transformation, this change that takes place and Paul uses baptism to symbolize it…

Paul introduces this image of baptism to explain the believer's relationship with Christ, His death, and ressurection… It symbolizes our indetification with Christ…

For some of us, this is going to shed some light… the very Act of

Baptism symbolizes both death and life.

When we come to this place of choosing Jesus and to follow Jesus there is an aspect of our life that has to die… and it's not popular… in fact… a lot of people try to skip it…

If you look into the way the ESV actually says it, the ESV is a more literal… word for word translation, this is what it says…

Romans 6:4 (ESV)

4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

Baptized into death… something in us dies… IN ORDER that… we can experience this new life in Christ.

Lots of theologians put it this way… His death becomes our death and His life becomes our life. The old you is buried… and the new you is born in Christ.

It’s not popular, and its not optional… it supported all over in scripture…

In Matthew 16:24–26 (NLT) Jesus himself said…

Matthew 16:24–26 NLT

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross, and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? Is anything worth more than your soul?

24 “If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross (instrument of death, they all knew what he meant), and follow me. 25 If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. 26 And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? Is anything worth more than your soul?

There is life that's found in Christ that involves dying to yourself… to your sinful nature.

John 12 talks about how unless a kernel of wheat dies… it remains alone… But if it dies to itself… and hits the ground… there is this new, more full, and more fruitful life that comes… This idea of a seed that is sown… it died, was buried, brings new and greater life.

Col 3 talks about putting to death the sinful passions that lurk within you.

There is no doubt in my mind that for some of us… that is what God wants you to hear today… you are still clinging to things that need to die in you so that this new life in Jesus can flourish.

There is a change… of our heart and mind… or our purpose and or direction…

James the ½ brother of Jesus said it like this… Salt water and fresh water can’t come from the same spring…

And his point is… Jesus changes things. If we are truly in Christ there is fruit that is developing in our lives… it doesn’t mean we are perfect, but that we are growing… changing…

At one point we were alive to sin and dead to Christ, but now we are dead to sin and alive in Christ

To be clear, death is painful and hard. dying to our old self can be painful and difficult. I remember in 1993 as I was leaving for college I began to tear up. I had to make a tough choice… I knew there were some things I had to let go of… some things and some relationships that had become important that I had to let go of if I was going to take hold of all that Christ had for me.

Saying that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ… Paul says that it happened for two reasons…

1. So that sin might lose its power in us. 2. So that we will no longer be slaves to sin.

And that has past, present and future… conitations…

I don’t have to live with the guilt and shame of the past… that stuff has been crucified with Christ… I am not that person anymore.

In the present, I realize there is another way. I don’t have to be a slave to sin… Christ in me… is changing and transforming me and I’m leaning into that reality. It;s not behavior modification.

Because of Jesus… the hope of heaven is secure.

Powerful symbolism… The old self dying and the hope of new life is linked to the power of the resurrection.

the idea of the old self dying is powerful and complete… and the hope of new life… in us… is linked to the power of the resurrection…

And Paul goes on to talk in more practical detail on how this is lived out…

Romans 6:12–14 NLT

Do not let sin control the way you live; do not give in to sinful desires. Do not let any part of your body become an instrument of evil to serve sin. Instead, give yourselves completely to God, for you were dead, but now you have new life. So use your whole body as an instrument to do what is right for the glory of God. Sin is no longer your master, for you no longer live under the requirements of the law. Instead, you live under the freedom of God’s grace.

12 Do not let sin control the way you live; do not give in to sinful desires. 13 Do not let any part of your body become an instrument of evil to serve sin. Instead, give yourselves completely to God, for you were dead, but now you have new life. So use your whole body as an instrument to do what is right for the glory of God. 14 Sin is no longer your master, for you no longer live under the requirements of the law. Instead, you live under the freedom of God’s grace.

Paul reminds us that spiritual warfare is real… he is talking in war terms here…

In Gal 5 Paul talks about this spiritual battle that is going on in us and around us… between our sinful nature and the Holy Spirit…

One… brings death, captivity, isolation, captivity, and brokenness

The other Brings… life, fullness, freedom, meaning, purpose

Paul says that these two forces are constantly at work… and that no thought, or act, or choice… is free from that battle…

In vs. 12 it actually says… don’t surrender to sin. Don’t give in. Fight and I’d say.. Don’t fight alone.

And Paul says… not to let any part of our body be used as an instrument of evil… the word instrument can be used a couple ways…

Instrument = Don’t let any part of your body be… 1. A tool for evil 2. A Weapon for evil

Don’t let any part of your body be a tool for evil… in you or around you.

And… Don't let any part of your body become a weapon for evil… in you are around you.

One author put it this way:

War with God = We and our bodies surrender to sin we live at war with God.

Worship of God = We surrender to God and war with sin. We worship God with our heart, soul, mind, strength, body (whole being)

Worship God: We surrender to God and war against sin, worship God with our heart, soul, mind, strength… body… our whole being.

Paul in a sense shows us the difference…

Saying don’t use any part of your body to wage war of God… but use them as instruments of righteousness…

Mind Futile and dark Transformed

Eyes Full of self and lust Look to God and His truth

Hands Violent, sexually impure Raised in worship/serving

Ears Flooded with gossip and sin Hear what the HS is saying

Mouth Glutenous, alcoholism, gossip Singing out to God… praying

Feet Going where you shouldn't Going to God /from sin, sent

Heart harboring evil/hate

Paul over and over… presents this picture…

You are dead to sin… past, present, and future… To it’s power over you.

And you have new life in Christ…

And he goes on to say… to give yourself completely to God.

Have you…

There are a few things I’d have you consider today…

How are you handling the grace of God?

Rules… no rules… or relationship

Are there areas in your life where you are at war with God…

Things you refuse to give Him or trust Him with…

Things that you refuse to allow him to be Lord of…

What are the things in your life that need to be put to death…

Porn, addiction, anger, alcoholism, hate, fear, abusing grace,

Have you given yourself over completely to God?

It's a powerful picture of repentance…

This image of us standing with our back to God… fixed on things that are far from Him… but now turning to face God and move toward Him…

That prayer… God test me and see if there is any wicked way in me… teach me… show me… lead me..