If you have your Bible, you might want to open it, as we study together to the Book of Romans, the sixth chapter. This is a part of a multi-month study, and we're up to the sixth chapter in the first fourteen verses. Before we turn to the text, let's go before the throne. Father, another week, another week to serve you and to glorify you. Father, remind us that's our business. Our business isn't to be happy or to everything go our way. Our business is that you should be glorified in us. Father, we fail that so often. There are so many sins in our lives. Sometimes we feel uncomfortable and coming into your presence. We can fool our friends. Sometimes even our family, but never you. And so, Father, we come with your light shining on our darkness. And the light of Christ has revealed the reality of who we are. We are sinners only brought before your throne because of grace. Father, we're not what we were, but we're better than we were. And we love more, and we're growing more, and we're more obedient than we were. We want to praise you for that growth. And then, Father, we want to come before you with our needs. You know them all. You know, everyone who's listening to this broadcast, those who stay awake at night, those who are afraid, and lonely, those who have financial problems and family problems, those who wonder sometimes if you're even there. And so, Father, we come as a child, would come to a Father. We trust you, help us to trust you more. We love you, help us to love you more. Father, we're not good, but we're yours, and we praise you because you're God, and you're worthy of all our praise. And then, Father, as we study the book this week, we pray, as always, for the one who teaches, that you would forgive him his sins for they are many. We would see Jesus and Him only, and we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Last week, as you know, we studied Romans 5, 6 through 21, and we saw two side roads, the actual existence in a space-time way of the persons of Adam and Eve. That's Romans 5, 12. Then we noted in sort of a frivolous way, the silly nature of gender-neutral, biblical language. We saw how those who advocate neutral language only want it to be applied to good things and never to bad. The feminist want the man of lawlessness to remain a man and not the man and woman of lawlessness. Then we looked at the concept of sin as it relates to the first Adam and the second Adam. Jesus Christ, we saw people our sinners, Romans 5, 12, that they're dying sinners, the statistic is 1 out of 1, Romans 5, 12. We are sinners, universally, Romans 5, 12, B through 13. We are constitutional sinners, Romans 5, 12, through 14, and then the 17th verse. Then we looked at the good news for believers. Goodness is His, 5, 18 through 19. Condemnation has been condemned, Romans 5, 16. Death is died, Romans 5, 17, and 21. Grace is without limit, it is without bounds. Romans 5, 20. One time, Spurgeon was worrying about whether God's grace was sufficient to meet all of his needs, and then he thought of a little mouse and the granaries of Egypt, with all of the acres of grain. And he said, either way, little mouse, there's plenty for you. And God said, this Virgin, rest on me. Grace is without limit. We are ready to turn to our debts for this week, and it's Romans 6, 1 through 14. Paul says, what shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not. How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we were baptized with him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father even though we also should walk in uneness of life. For if we've been united together in the likeness of his death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of his resurrection, knowing this that our old man was crucified with him. That the body of sin might be done away with, and we should no longer be slaves to sin. For he who has died has been freed from sin. Now, if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him, knowing that Christ having been raised from the dead dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over him, for the death that he died, he died to sin once for all, but the life that he lives, he lives to God, likewise you also consider, or reckon yourselves, to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God and Christ Jesus our Lord. Therefore, don't let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey at any its lusts. And don't present your member as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law, you are under grace. Now, as I said most this week, we're going to spend the time looking at the identification that we have with Jesus Christ, but before we do that, I want to go down a couple of side roads. Note if you will be external and personal nature of sin that is given by the Apostle Paul. It's quite interesting to note how Paul teaches in Romans the sin is not just a violation of a standard, and an attitude sin is a person personified as a king in Romans 5, 21, and 6, 12 as a slave owner in Romans 6, 6, as something dead or alive, Roman 7, 8, sin becomes an external power to which we react. You ever feel that way? Well, I do sometimes. It's always as if something or someone outside of me works on me in a way that is, well, almost personal. That's true. I don't want to make too much out of this, but sin is not only the result of the fall, it's not only the result of our own selfish desires, there's also a power that is external to us called Satan or the devil or metaphorical personification of evil. It's a power that is evil and in the world, but whatever you call him, he is real, and he's out to eat your lunch. People ask me if I believe in Satan. Yes, I do. I've seen him laughing at the lines of a pornographic movie and the dripping needle of a heroin addict and the red nose of a coke addict. I've seen him in the horror of an abortion mill, the snide laugh of a politician who's out to change culture. I've heard him in the harsh bark of con men and the cry of a child in the slums who goes to bed hungry. Oh, yeah. St. Andrew, he stands on the battlefields of the world and laughs his cynical laughter. He's in the broken heart of a pastor and the pain of a single mother. He's in this honesty and business, the lies of the irresponsible radical feminist and environmentalist. I see him sometimes in a church. When people are at each other's roads sometimes in a seminary where theological correctness is used to bash and make fun of other Christians. Oh, yes, he is real and he is dangerous. And the message of Romans, and indeed the message of the entire Bible, is that Satan has been defeated. You may not see it now, but he is. His end is sure, and the day will come when the fire will burn and will be destroyed, you can rest on that. One time Barbara Walter was interviewing Johnny Cash and she said to him, do you believe in hell? And he said, yes, ma'am. Is it a real hell? Yes, ma'am. Johnny Cash said, how do you know? She asked, because I have been there. Do I believe in the devil? Yes. Do I believe in a power external to us that is out to destroy God's people? Oh, yes, I've seen it. I've been in his presence, but I don't fear him because Jesus took care of him on the cross. He will still shout. He will still scream. He will still do his little thing. His body will still twitch, but he is finished. So I'd love Rutherford's kind of thing. You know, some of you guys think there's a demon under every bed, and you're so afraid of Satan that you're afraid to do anything. Listen, quit that. That's not Christian. That's dualism, and we're not dualists. You say, say what? A dualist is a person who believes there are two great powers in the world. One is evil and one is good. One is God and one is the devil. One does bad things to us, and one does good things to us. It's manifested in that statement that the devil casts a vote against you, and God casts a vote for you, and you cast the deciding vote. I used to say that a lot, but I don't anymore. You know why? Because God casts the only deciding vote. God loves you. And first, John 1.4 says, he was in you, is greater than he was in the world. Now that's a fact. Now back to what I started to say. Rutherford, one time, he heard a noise in his living room, and he got out of his bed, and he went out of the living room, and the devil was sitting in his favorite chair. Rutherford then smiled and said, oh, I thought it was somebody important. I thought it was somebody scary. I thought it was a thief. It's only you. And then he went back, went to bed, and went to sleep. The dragon has been slaying, dear friend, so don't spend all of the time in the world worrying about him. Of course his tail still switches, but his end is sure, and Jesus on the cross drove a stake into his heart. Now before we turn to the main thrust of this text, I want to go down one other important side road. While the teaching in this passage is a beautiful reflection on baptism, and its symbolism of dying, going under the water, and resurrection coming out of the water, that's one for the Baptist. However it is not the only imagery in the Bible, for instance Holy Spirit descending. To hear about the Methodist pastor arguing with the Baptist about baptism, the Methodist said to the Baptist, do you mean that you have to get all of the person under the water? Yes, that's exactly what I mean. If you are going to be baptized, Methodist said, well, what if I just get him up to his knees? No, said the Baptist. Got to be the whole person. What if said the Methodist? I get it up to his chin. Nope, got to be all the way, said the Baptist pastor. What about just up to his hairline? No way, a merchant means a merchant. You don't seem to understand. He must be immersed completely in water until his head is covered. So he said the Methodist? That's what I've been telling you. It's the top of the head that matters. Of course, you guys are a Baptist in your theology. You have problems that we Methodist Presbyterians, Anglicans, Lutherans, don't ask. I have a Baptist friend who went to a Baptist pastor's meeting, and he was early, and a man was sitting off in the corner looking terrible. My friend asked him what was wrong, and he said, Buckner, you ever tried to baptize a man with a cork leg? Every time we thought we got him under that leg, we thought, now I'm a Presbyterian, we don't have those problems. We don't have to build those big pools. We just have to have a cup of water. But I'll tell you something. I love the beauty of believer's baptism, and the wonderful symbolism of going under the water in his death and coming out in his resurrection. I remember the baptisms that were performed during the Jesus movement. They were often on mass, bunches together, and in the ocean are alike. And I don't think I've ever been moved more emotionally than I've lost to see those young people professing their faith in Christ, by proclaiming their death and resurrection through the wonderful sacrament of baptism. Now I still stand with what I believe about that, but I believe in aversion too. I don't think the mode is so important. I one time was asked by somebody what I believed about that, and I said, I really didn't care. You could hose them off as long as water was used. But it's a wonderful, wonderful sacrament of the church. And it's wonderful when it's administered as many Christians do to infants, and it's wonderful when it's administered to believers as a symbol of their death and resurrection. How magnificent the symbolism is. Well, I bring that up to the ironic and nice and kind, and I'll give one to the baptist there. Now let's turn to the main thrust. Sixth chapter of Romans begins a new section of Romans, where in Paul is teaching about Christian goodness or righteousness. How to be obedient to Christ. Now this section begins at the sixth chapter, and it goes through the eighth chapter of Romans. Now let me say something that's really, really, really important. And that is you've got to understand grace, you've got to understand atonement, you've got to understand God's unconditional love, His unconditional acceptance of the believer before you start studying Romans 6. Now we're going to talk about obedience, but you have to remember that if you're not obedient, God will still love you. And it's only when you recognize that, that you become more obedient. I told you what my friend, a Russian Anderson said, we were having dinner one night and he said, Steve, I don't believe I'm going to get any better than I am. And I said, man, that's not very American. It's not very Christian. He said, yeah, that's true. Probably not going to ever get any better than I am. And then he smiled. And he said, but God loves me anyway. Don't be of your principle. And tell you are sure that God will love you if you aren't any better than you are. You probably will never get any better than you are. In other words, freedom precedes and manifests and reflects obedience. If you get obedience before freedom, you never get free and you never get obedient. So it's no accident that there's Romans 1 through 5 before Romans 6 through 8. We're going to talk about obedience, but always the foundation of grace, so whatever we say from now on, don't forget about grace. Notice how Paul opens the entire section. He shows how people can very easily misunderstand the gospel of grace of Christ. Romans 6 and 1 through 2, what shall we say then? Shall we continue and send that grace may abound? Certainly not. How shall we who died and sin live any longer in it? That's my feeling. I never heard a Christian say, man, I'm going to go out and sin because I'm forgiving it and making it. I've never heard a single Christian say that. Never met a Christian who didn't want to be better than he or she was. I mean, the problem is that they don't feel guilty. The problem is that they don't know how to get better. And so Paul, in a very practical way, first deals with an attitude and that's a stupid attitude. And I believe, personally, that when you see that attitude, it comes from a heart that has never been converted. Man, if you know your sin, if you know Christ, if you look at the blood sacrifice of Christ on the cross and that doesn't do something to you in terms of making you want to please, somebody who loved you that much, then you probably haven't understood it. So Paul says, what shall we say then? Shall we continue and sin that grace may have bound certainly not? How shall we who died and sin live any longer? And in other words, Paul is expressing the sentiment of a friend of mine. God and I have a wonderful deal. I like to sin and he likes to forgive. Another friend who said, the best way to deal with temptation is to yield it on their friends, but they're not Christians. Listen, on the authority of God's word, that kind of attitude reflects an unregenerate mind and life. In other words, the person who says something like that has either grossly misunderstood the gospel or has never received the gospel in the first place. If after presenting the gospel to somebody, and somebody says to me, wow, that's great. Does that mean I can sin all I want? And God will love me no matter what. I respond by saying absolutely not. What do you abose, oh God, it's not your grandfather. If on the other hand, a person says to me, Steve, I'm not a good person. I know I'm not a good person. I can't believe Christ would die from me. I have no hope that I'll ever be any better. I've sinned and sinned. I can't stop. If I don't get any better, will Christ love me and save me? And I reply to that by saying, of course he will. You come on in. You come on home. You see it, it was the same question, but the attitude was different. A Christian can sin a lot and never change. And Christ will always accept and love him or her. But listen to me, if a man or woman isn't even bothered by his or her sin, and presumes on the grace of Christ, he or she doesn't even know Christ. I'm for a very strong teaching on holiness and sanctification. I believe Christians ought to be getting better and we ought to be moving, as John Wesley said, on to perfection. But not until the person I'm teaching has an understanding of grace and justification. Holiness doesn't produce grace and justification. Holiness is a product of grace and justification. And I'm going to repeat that and repeat it again and again and again. Holiness does not produce grace and justification. Holiness is a product of grace and justification. Goodness does not produce grace and freedom. Goodness is a product of grace and freedom. Luther, toward the end of his ministry, became quite depressed by the level of holiness in his congregation. I used to, when I was a pastor, get depressed about that too, until I looked at myself. He considered no longer preaching on grace and justification and just hitting people over the head with the lawn. Somebody asked him if that's what he was going to do. And he said, if no one followed obedience, he would still preach the gospel of justification. Because it's better that people hear the gospel and respond to it, though he would prefer both. And both are possible, but only when you start with justification, does sanctification become a reality. And you say, what does that mean? Well, when you're justified, that means that you are made just, even if you aren't. That Jesus died. Bicariously, for you on the cross, his blood was an atonement for your sin. So you're for a year, forgive him, past, present, and future. Sanctification comes from a word that means to be set apart. And then the Bible refers to be set apart under holiness, growth and grace, becoming what God wants you to be. Now, as we start this sixth chapter, Paul is very practical when he talks about, how do you go about getting better? How come it's taking me so long to get any better? Why can't I do better than I've done? How come I'm not any more obedient than I am? Well, Paul talks about some very important concepts here in the identification that we have with Jesus Christ. The rest of the week we're going to spend time on that particular wonderful concept. So without further chit-chat, let's dig in and see what we can find. First, I want you to note an incontrovertible, absolute, final, accomplished, achieved, consummated fact. To it, the death and resurrection of Christ. Never try to fix anything that's broken and don't try to add to something that's already finished. Roman 6.9A, through 10, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more for the death that he died, he died to sin once for all, but the life that he lives, he lives to God. You see, the death and resurrection of Christ was a one-time, actual, space-time event. On that day, on Calvary, something was settled eternally. It will never have to be done again. It has happened. It isn't a cliche. It isn't a symbol. It isn't a nice man biting the dust. There, there, for all the world to see, is the God-man, Jesus, dying on a cross-spread eagle. Therefore, all the world to see is an empty-dume filled with cobwebs. And if you'd had a little brownie camera, and it stood in that garden on that day and taken a picture, you would have seen a dead man walking. And you would have had a picture of it. It's hard to get away from him, isn't it? I have a friend who was a pastor and a teacher, and he's become an atheist. And everybody tried to talk to him and argue him out of it, and show him apologetics, and all the reasons for the faith. But he had heard all that. I mean, he had made a decision, and he was out there, and I pray for him every day. I love him more than I can tell you. It's with great sadness, when I think of him, not as a part of the family. But at any rate, his cousin called him. No, his brother-in-law called him one time, and said, but Jack, and that's not his name. He said, Jack, what about Jesus? And there was dead silence on the other end of the phone. Why is that? I'll tell you. Because there's something that's absolute that is absolutely there. It's not a cliche, it's a fact. A spacetime fact, a Nazarene carpenter, a Jewish rabbi hanging spreading along crossbeams on the town of Garbagey, all of a sudden the theology stops and the doctrines seem silly, and the stupid arguments come to an end when we stand on Calvary, and there he is, dying in our place. And that dead man got up and walked his heart to get away from him. The fact is that the fact that the crucifixion and the resurrection is an accomplished fact, and that means you don't have to do anything more for your salvation you just accepted. Some of you guys are trying to add to that. Quit it. You can, it's already settled. Some of you think, boy, if I can just be good, then God will rub me and save me, cut it out. That's not why you're good. That's already been accomplished. It is settled. The death and resurrection of Christ is an actual spacetime event. It is happened. Don't add to something that's already finished. No, I want to look at a new point. Secondly, I want you to note, not only an incomparable fact. I want you to note in a stounding reality, Romans 6, 4, 2, 5. Therefore, we were buried with him through baptism and to death. That just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so, we also should walk in unity of life. For if we've been united together in the likeness of his death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of his resurrection. Now, this is going to be sort of... You've got to sort of catch this more than understand it in a cerebral way. It's not just an intellectual fact. It's something that when it hits you, you'll do a toyota jump. His story is our story. There's a supernatural fact here, and I don't want you to miss it. Whatever happened to Jesus happened to us who belonged to Jesus. When Paul said in Galatians, I'm crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ's living with me. He wasn't just talking about a symbolic act. He was talking about an absolute fact. During Galilee times, a wealthy nobleman, if he didn't want to go to battle in the service of the king, would hire somebody, a knight, or somebody to go in his name out on the battlefield. Whenever that happened, and the knight fought in his stead, the wealthy nobleman, who had hired him, got to credit. You say, well, what happened if the knight died? Well, the nobleman could not be forced to replace him, or go himself, because according to ancient law, when the knight died, he died, too. Now, you need to know that I don't agree with a lot of what Watchmanney says. Well, that isn't true. I don't understand much of what he writes. I mean, I understand the words, the sentence structures, and the scripture, by sometimes feel like I'm drowning, when I read Watchmanney. But in his, one of his books, a book on Ephesians, he points to Christ and our identification with him. He says that when Christ died, we died. When he came back from the grave, we came back from the grave. When he sat down at the throne of the father, his right hand was in it. All that he is, is what we are, because we are in him. I said that again. All that he is, is what we are, because we are in him. It's not just a past event. You see, he was the first of the family, and he represented the entire family. It didn't just the cross. It's the resurrection. My friend John Debrine, will often say, in giving an invitation, you can be as sure of heaven as you would be if you were already there. Now that's a great statement. But I'll go further than that. You can be as sure of heaven as if you were already there, because you are already there. You are there in Christ, you are representative. When I was growing up, there was a congressman who lived high on the government, water bucket. He drove big cars and worked expensive jewelry, aided expensive restaurants. And then finally, he was caught for misusing public funds. And was sent to jail. The next election, he's phoked, put him right back in Washington. I asked the friend, why? And he said, Steve, you understand, we're very poor here. And none of us has ever been rich or successful. And he is one of those things, because he is one of us. It is almost as if it was us. I don't know if I agree with that. But there is kind of a whisk of an illustration about what Paul was talking about here. He's saying it's the same with Christ only more so. Kathy Norman, a church organist, overslept. I read this somewhere for an Easter sunrise service a number of years ago in a church. She was the organist and she showed up late for the sunrise service. And the next Easter, she was awakened very early in the morning by her pastor and boss who said, Kathy, Christ is risen, and you would better do. If she was a Christian, she was already risen, because why? His story is your story. Now let's look at this a little bit closer. Thirdly, I want you to note not only an incontrovertible fact and an astounding reality. I want you to note a wonderful liberty. Look at Romans 6, 6 through 9, knowing this that our old man was crucified with him. That the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin, for he who has died has been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him, knowing that Christ having been raised from the dead, dies no more, death no longer has dominion over him. Let me take something freedom. Liberty means choice. I have a friend who has recently come into a considerable amount of money, and I ask him, if it made him happy, and he replied, no, it doesn't, but it's better than being poor. And then he laughed and said, but it does give me a number of choices that I didn't have before. I'm still unhappy, but I have choices of how I'm going to be unhappy. Now that's what wealth does, you know, it gives you choices. Well, that's what the freedom in Christ brought with his blood, and what it did for us, it gave us a choice. There wasn't time in my life, and I didn't have any choice. I sin because I didn't have any option. Now I have a choice of pleasing him, or of not pleasing him. I have a choice of pleasing him, or pleasing myself. One of the things I've discovered in doing the grace for the moment, concerts with Betty Green, and the born-free seminars that we do in our number of cities around the country, is that most people don't think that Christian freedom is really that. We're no different than the pagans, to which freedom is just not another name for nothing left to lose. It's another name for nothing left to choose. And the point is that when we became Christians, we received the freedom that we didn't have before to do the right thing, as well as the freedom to do the wrong thing. Talk to the average Christian, and you'll ask him or her about freedom, and they will tell you if they're honest that they don't understand freedom. After they became a Christian, they became more bound than they were as a pagan. I told you about Annie, our newest addition to our dog family. We have a little rug rat who yaps. And I always said, I'm never going to have a dog like that. But let me tell you something about Annie. Annie is the only pet we have ever had that when I look at, I feel happy. I mean, that dog way sat in the morning and says, what kind of neat things are we going to do today? And you want to see Annie and Annie the orphan because we adopted her somebody to let her out in the forest near where we lived. And we got Quincy, the one or dog, the big German shepherd. And he's a big German shepherd. And Annie is a little tiny, kind of multi-breed orphan. And you ought to see him, man. It looks like Mutton Jeff and Annie says, looks up at Quincy and says, okay, boss, let's do it. And Quincy, sometimes Annie will jump on Quincy and when Annie wags her tail, she doesn't just wet her tail, she wags all of her. She's in a world of her own sometimes. You know, you have to what? Now Quincy is absolutely obedient. He's our Christian dog. If I say for him to stop, he stops. If I say, come, he comes. If I throw a stick and say bring it back, he brings it back. But Annie, Annie's sort of an orphan. And she's sort of in her own world. And she'll wander off, not to be disobedient. She just gets lost in chasing something or curious about something. And before I know it, she's out in the street. We've chased her and called her into one day. I decided to just let her do her own thing. And I went back into the house. I heard a novice at the door and opened it. And it was Annie. There she was. And she said, master, I've decided I'm going to stay with you. Jesus says to you, child, you're free. Does that mean I say that I can wander around all I want to? And you'll still love me? Yes, he says. That's what it means. Does it mean I can say and think whatever I want to say and think? And you'll still love me? Yes, that's what it means. Does it mean that I can go wherever I want to go? Yes, it means that. Then I say, thinking about it, I'm going to go with you. Here are those who say that Christian freedom means that I'm only free to obey. No, it doesn't mean that. It means that you're free to do whatever you want. But when you consider his love, your water gets changed and you want to be with him. I don't follow him because if I didn't follow him, he would get a lightning bolt and strike me down. I'm his child. He'll never do that. I mean, I would do that to my children. And he said, Jesus said, if you've been being evil, how much more your father now, he's not going to strike me down. I'll follow him because I've never found someone to love me that way, ever in my entire life. John 8 is a very, very sad passage of scripts you might want to read it for good a bit tonight. And John 8, Jesus has been saying some really good things and everybody's been following him around and saying, yeah, Jesus, and that sort of stuff. And then, he starts saying some pretty heavy things. And the disciples began to say, I'm out of here. I mean, I didn't know you meant that stuff. And so some of his followers start disappearing into the darkness again. And there's a sadness when Jesus turns to the disciples and he says, you guys are going to leave too, and Peter said, with great profundity. Where? Would we go, Jesus? You have the words of eternal life. Now, fourthly, and this is brand new, I want you to note not only an incontrovertible fact, an astounding reality, a wonderful liberty, I want you to note an unpleasant truth. Roman 6.11, likewise, you also reckon or consider yourselves to be dead, indeed descend, but alive to God, in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Now, the tenth of the Greek here doesn't mean reckon yourself dead, just once, and it's accomplished. It means reckon and keep on reckoning, or consider and keep on considering yourself dead in other words, because we're still in sin it means that the process of sanctification is just that, a process. The present, and not yet nature of the Christian faith, needs to be remembered by every believer listening to the sound of my voice. The present, and not yet nature, of the Christian faith, is an important fact. Paul is saying that considering yourself dead, identifying with Christ and all that he did, and all that he is, is an ongoing process it doesn't just happen once. I remember my brother Ron and how much he hated school. He was my kid brother four years younger than me, and we were both in Vance Elementary School in Nashville, North Carolina. First day of school, mother asked him how he liked, and he said, well, that was all right, but it didn't work. She said, well, he said, I have to go back tomorrow. Took a lot of explaining to him that he was not only have to go back tomorrow, but he's going to have to go for the next twenty years, and he went through the fourth grade, and he was in the first, and in the middle of the day he would decide that he had enough, and he was out of there. And the first great teacher would call me, and I would go running down the street after him, and I'd bring him back. A lot of Christians are like that. I was saved, but it didn't take. I still do bad things. Of course you do. But after the next time, simply ask forgiveness and affirm new life in you, say, Father, I'm dead. I consider that stuff all dead. It's irrelevant. I consider myself dead. I died with Christ, and now Christ lives in me. Now, I want to not only give you an incomparable fact, an astounding reality, a wonderful liberty, and an unpleasant truth. I want to give you some good news, a necessary application, and then finally, I'm going to do one other thing, and I'm going to, I want to give you a magnificent keen. But let's look at a necessary application. Romans 6 and 11 likewise, you also reckon, and keep on reckoning, consider, and keep on considering yourselves to be dead, indeed, just in, but alive to God in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Paul, you're talking about the regular, consistent, and faithful application of the truth of Christ of the life of the believer. I remember the first marriage counseling session I ever had. It was down in Cape God, and I was a young pastor, just performed my first marriage ceremony, and the loving couple went off on their honeymoon, and then they returned, and I decided to visit them. I knocked on the door, and she came to the door, and her eyes were red. Her hair was almost off, and I thought, oh, man, really picked a good time to visit. Then I went into the living room, and he was sitting over in the corner on the only chair they had, and he had his head in his hands, and he looked like he was going to die. And I thought to myself, myself, leave. But I decided that I would tread where angels feared to tread, and I asked them what was wrong, and they explained that they had their first fight, and they thought their marriage was over. The easiest problem I ever fixed, I said, oh, man, be in a bunch of fights. If you greed on everything we could do without one of you, so get used to it. But learn to do it fairly, and I thought them how to have a arguments fairly. Get used to getting up, and applying the truth to the one to whom you belong, over, and over, and over again, you fail. So what else is new? Say, I am dead to Christ. And he lives in me, and because he lives in me, I have the power to be obedient to him. You're tired? What else is new? That's the dead man. Say, Christ gives me, he is in me, and I live in him. You afraid? Welcome to the club. But that's dead. That doesn't matter. You are alive in Christ. You down? It doesn't matter. Keep on trucking. Keep applying the reality of your death in Christ's death, and his resurrection and your resurrection until it becomes a daily reality in your life. I'll give you one more point. Sixthly and finally, I want you to note not only an incontrovertible fact, and astounding reality of wonderful liberty and an unpleasant truth I want you to note not only an innocent king, Roman 612-14, therefore do not let sin rain in your mortal bodies that you should obey it in its lust. And don't present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourself to God as being alive from the dead. And your members as instruments of righteousness for sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law your undergrace. He is the king. Don't let sin rain in you. Let Jesus rain. I love the 17th chapter of John. You remember that among other things, Jesus prays that will be where he is to be hold his glory, which he had from the foundation of the world. It's a wonderful imagery. We'll stand around the throne. You'll stand there, and I'll stand there, and I'll elbow you. And we'll look at Jesus and I'll say, man, doesn't he shine? Doesn't our keen shine? Isn't he something else? Isn't he something else? Let's say some there are two kingdoms. One is ruled by a hard taskmaster. He requires your soul. He's hard and angry. He'll work you until you can't work anymore, and then you'll die, and you'll be lost forever on the basis of the law. His wages are very low. The kingdom is ruled. Another kingdom, by King Jesus, who operates from a base of love. He's patient and kind, and he leads me to love him more and more by loving me, more and more sometimes. I remember my old kingdom, and my old king, and I want to say, Christ, you're the best king, a man could ever have. You think about that? I'm in.