Untitled Sermon (3)

Main Proposition: Since there is no condemnation for those who have been set free in Christ Jesus, our lives will be characterized by living according to the Spirit and not according to the flesh.

By living according to the Spirit you must…

I. Contemplate your position in Christ.

a.) For those in Christ Jesus, there is NO condemnation!

This implies that this is true not only for the future, but throughout your entire life that you are in Christ.

b.) The reason those in Christ Jesus no longer have condemnation is because the “law of the Spirit of life” set us free from the “law of sin and death”!

This word that Paul uses for “law” can have multiple meanings. 1.) God’s law / standards, 2.) a general principle, or 3.) a force or power.

In this verse it seems to be #3, that the power of the Spirit of life, the power of the Holy Spirit has set us free from the power of sin and death! *In fact, the NLT uses this word to capture the intent of this word.

We were sitting on death row in our prison cell in which we could not free ourselves, the Holy Spirit came in and broke the chains of sin and death that held us captive!

c.) How has the Spirit set us free? God accomplished what the Law (the Law of Moses) could not! (3a)

The reason the Law could not save us had nothing to do with any problem within itself, the problem was with our flesh, it was weakened by our flesh!

The flesh refers to our sin nature. Our natural selves that are born into Adam’s fallen race.

Our culture says that we are born basically good or at least with a blank slate. Even amongst Christians the idea is starting to become popular that we are not born into the world without original sin!! This is called “semi-pelagianism”. This kind of thinking is not rooted in Scripture, but on human tradition. But the Bible is very clear that are born into this world enemies of God. We will see this a little bit later.

d.) God sent Jesus, his own Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh. (3b)

We see the qualifier for the flesh right there, it is sinful!

It is also important to recognize the word “likeness”. Jesus was no mere human being! He was the only person to not be born into sinful flesh. He did not possess a sin nature like ours. He was fully God and fully man.

e.) He had to be the perfect sacrificial lamb for the next truth: “He condemned sin in the flesh”! We have no condemnation because our sin has been condemned in His own body on the Cross! (3c)

This means that all of our sin - past, present, and future - was taken upon Jesus Christ and the wrath of God was poured out upon him on our behalf. We can do nothing to atone for our own sins, it was all Him!

f.) What was the purpose of Jesus paying the full penalty of all our sins? So that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us!

What does that mean? It means that even though we are “off the hook” in Christ, we are no means free to continue to indulge in our own sin! Sadly many do think that this is the case. Jesus satisfied the righteous requirement of the law, but then this fulfilled in us by us living according to the Spirit.

g.) This is shown in the next phrase: to us who live not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

II. Possess a mind that is preoccupied with the things of the Spirit.

III. Take heart at the Spirit’s resurrection power at work within you.