Verse 1, There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, and that it was weak through the flesh, God did, by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin, He condemned sin in the flesh. that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the spirit, the things of the spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 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 cannot please God. You're 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. And if Christ is in you, the body's 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, brothers, we are not debtors. to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, you'll die. But if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you'll live. The word of God for the people of God. That is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. Let me pray for you one more time. High King of Heaven, we come before you this morning realizing that everything that we've enjoyed up to this point has prepared us for this point. We trust your great sovereign hand, that the things that you've prepared for us to hear this morning are particularly placed in this congregation, in this moment. I pray that we will trust you in this moment to move as you should. Take away the fears that are alive in this room right now. The fear of what you have to take care of after a service, what people have to take care of after the service, the fear of people, the fear of being crippled by health issues, the fear of being misunderstood. I pray that you would condemn those those fears, crush those fears, live in us in supernatural faith. We look forward to seeing you in the body. For now, we will settle for seeing you in the scripture. Help us, oh Lord, so that we can be changed forever. In Jesus' name, amen. Our roadmap this morning is coming. I want to just kind of review what we talked about last week. We talked about the three phases. First of all, this line here is just your physical life. We talked a little bit about how this gold triangle here is your physical life in your current body after you were saved. And you'll notice, let me use my right hand, you'll notice, oh, it's much stiller, isn't it? Rest that on a fence post or something like that. I feel like I'm holding a rifle. This here is your spiritual life since being saved here. If you've trusted the gospel, you're saved as I am. You're as good as in heaven if you're saved. I mean, Paul is no more saved than you if you've trusted the gospel. How about them apples? And here is that space between your death right there and the coming of Jesus. We're going to call that the gray area. Oh boy, I wonder what's setting in on me there. All right, so we have the age that we're living in now and we have the age to come. And we talked about how your life that you have because of Jesus, your everlasting life. It's good to see you, Jay. Welcome this morning. Everlasting life. Jay Adams is with us. He serves us in the house in Raleigh. So thanks for being here this morning. We do think Jesus is the biggest guest, but we're glad you're here too. And appreciate you being here. And your wife. Thanks for being here, Mrs. Adams. Alrighty, so back to this. Once you get saved, here is this spiritual life that you have going through the thousand-year reign. And then the new heaven and new earth. And you might notice that that life we talked about two weeks ago gets more and more. So if you've got this idea, That heaven is just a place where you're gonna learn how to play the harp and get used to not fishing. And basically, the Lord is just a big problem for all the fun that you try to have here. And heaven is a great alternative to hell, but you're still trying to figure out if heaven is a good alternative to earth. This is supposed to remind you that you become more of what He designed you to be, the more that the ages roll. We do a great disservice to us, saying things to one another like, it'll all make sense once you see Jesus. I don't think so, but you'll have all of eternity for Him to unwrap His grace for you. And that's going to be super. And then we talked about these three kinds of salvation that we experience. The red here, to picture the blood of Jesus, the red here, we are justified at the point where we trust the atoning work of Jesus and his resurrection. That saves us from having to go to hell for our sins. The green here, which goes from the time that we're saved to the time when we die, is our sanctification. And I'm thinking about adjusting that maybe in the weeks to come. I'll tell you why some other time. But for now, We receive this salvation continually by faith every day by trusting the Holy Spirit. And little by little, he saves us from the power of sin. And in other words, I get infuriated on the road a little less. Right? Y'all know what I'm saying? Especially at McDonald Parkway. Have I got a witness there? Why is it 50? Why is the speed limit 50? All right? Stuff like that. You know what I'm saying? It ought to be like 90 or something like that. Something. Anyways, or open to your discretion. The speed limit should be, Springs Road, open to your discretion. All righty. And then here we have the gold, glorification. That is when we're saved from the presence of sin. And that happens at the return of Jesus. I'm so glad that we have this salvation is sort of three tenses. It's not like the Lord's going to leave this up to you, and we'll get more into that. And so here they are on our timeline, justification, sanctification, glorification. And here's our roadmap for this morning. The truth is, because we have the Lord's Supper, I'm pretty sure we're going to get through one. Thank you for that. Maybe two. Listen, let's talk about the Lord's Supper for a second. We do it the third Sunday of every month. Two out of those three of every quarter, we have it in here. This morning, we're having it in here. So I'll just say for guests, Barry and Rebecca are back with us. They were members until 2020 when they moved to Florida, and they're moving back here in March. We're super glad for that. Barry, at the beginning of our Lord's Supper, I'm going to ask you to bless that, OK? So be ready. Think up your best prayer. So Barry and Rebecca, we didn't do that when you were here. So everyone else is going to listen in. Because you're in the center section, you'll use that aisle to your right. You'll come by here. The Deacons will give you the bread and the juice. If we were Presbyterian, it'd be bread and wine, but bread and juice here, OK? And then you'll go back this way to your seat. We'll take it together, all right? So if you're listening in their balcony, you're going to rappel or hover down to the front and just kind of grab whatever table you want. We'll make it work. And that is how we're going to do it. You're welcome to take the Lord's Supper if you have been saved, if you have been justified, are being sanctified, and expect to be glorified. You're welcome to take the Lord's Supper. If you've been immersed in water, that is our church's belief. If you've been baptized, you are welcome to take the Lord's Supper. I don't want you leaving, though. You're not not welcomed if you can't take the Lord's Supper. What I'd ask you to do is come by like everyone else, and when you walk by, just don't take something if those criteria don't suit you. All right. Here we go. Number one. Who can make me pure again? This week we found out from the news that there's this idea that people are not wanting things in their bodies because they're afraid of how they connect to the internet. And soon, maybe, whether it's Apple Watches that you wear or digital devices within you, because of my heart issues, I have a supraventricular tachycardia. And so I think it was fixed. We'll find out. But I had an ablation about 16 or 18 months ago. And before that, they stuck this capsule underneath my skin. So I can still feel it. Here it is. And I think it's a passive device. It uploads to my phone. We'll find out one day. If I fall over and start doing the kickin' chicken, it was not a passive device. And the people that are responsible for 9-11 have come to get me, whoever they are. For you conspiracy people out there. Concerned about the Internet of Bodies. We might actually think that that is our biggest problem. Even though we have a politician with us this morning, that's not how he wants to be known. We sometimes think politicians are the biggest issue. Unless, of course, our party just won, and then we think our party is actually the savior of the world, and we have to be careful about that. I'm reminded, noticing verse number one, there's no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. I'm reminded of the 1st and 3rd Ranger Battalions of the famous World War II era Darby's Rangers. They were proving to be a pretty awesome fighting force until they got to Italy, particularly a little town called Cisterna, not to be confused with Cicera or Cicerna. 761 out of 767 from the two Ranger battalions that were there were either captured or killed. 761 out of 767 were captured or killed by a much heavier German and Italian force outside the Italian town of Cisterna. They were profoundly effective earlier in the war, Profoundly ineffective as light fighters against a tank division. Mark Moyer, in his book, Oppose Any Foe, The Rise of American Special Operations Forces, 2017, says, the demise of two and a half Ranger battalions at Cisterna swept away in one stroke the high confidence in the Rangers that had built up among the US military leadership during the preceding year and a half. The mystique of stealthy elite soldiers, the aura of invincibility attained through victories unending, had been shattered outside a small Italian town in the span of three hours. Concluding that, superior fitness of mind and body cannot compensate for the lack of heavy weapons. Last week we talked about how in Romans chapter number 7, Paul sees a major issue and he sees it in his body. He closes the chapter in verse 25, if you'll look there, I with my mind serve the law of God, but with my flesh the law of sin. A person might wonder, how in the world did Paul struggle like that? How did he not just muscle through and become victorious in that green area of his life after his salvation and while he waits to die? What is so hard, Paul? What is so hard, Paul, about just muscling through this and being very strong? What's so hard about this? I mean, what's so wrong about it is that Paul is mere flesh, even if he's the greatest Christian you know. And you might have found amazing ability to stop swearing, to stop drinking, to think more highly of your fellow church members, to think the best of people. You might have found victories in habitual reformation, meaning the reforming of your habits. You might become more moral in that you go to church now. And we rejoice in all of those changes. But if that is all you have, you're going to find an end to your capability to overcome sin in your life. How many of you have met that time in your life when you realized, if I'm going to have victory over this sin, it's going to take God? I certainly have. And that is Paul's point in verse number 24 of chapter 7 when he says, Oh wretched man that I am. Some have played fast and loose and even the footnotes of your study Bible probably aren't comfortable with saying this is Paul after he gets saved being bothered that he's just not performative as a Christian. But as we said last week, first person pronouns still mean something. He's not a Zin or a Zay or whatever it is. He's an I and a me. And he uses present tense verbs all the way through chapter seven. He says, I got major issues. And the victories of yesterday where I muscled through it and just became a better man, that's just not good enough. Well, Paul, then what is? Number two, what is the biggest issue in my life? The biggest issue in my life is that I am condemned if two things are not true about me. Number one, I am condemned if I'm not justified. Look at verse one of chapter eight. There's therefore no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. How does one get, what is the opposite of condemnation? Now I want you to know what the Bible says the opposite of condemnation is, so that you don't have to take my word for it. Look at chapter five, please. Look at verse number 17. Chapter five. Verse number 17. If you're wondering how long we've been in Romans, we've been in Romans 13 months, minus our little Christmas detour. So if you feel like you're a little behind, we're slowing it down a wee bit so that you, the visitors, or the returning guests, or the new person, because we have some other guests. Good to have you with us this morning. I hope you'll be back. We're not a perfect church, but the one you tried last week isn't either, and the one you'll try next week won't be. So you might fit in here. We need one more center. You might work. Chapter 5 verse 16, the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned. For the judgment which came from one offense resulted in condemnation. Look here, but the free gift which came from many offenses resulted in justification. So you see how those are opposites. Being condemned and being justified are opposites. Do you see that in verse 16? Look again at verse 18. Therefore, as through one man's offenses, judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one man's righteous act, the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life. Again, condemnation is juxtaposed to Condemnation. Justification and condemnation are opposites. So, if justification means to declare someone righteous, condemnation is to declare someone guilty. If justification is declaring someone righteous and the fruit of that is that they get to spend forever with you in heaven, says the Lord, or on the new heaven and new earth, then that means that condemnation is the declaring of you as an unbelonger, if that's a word, a trespasser, an imposter. You're not welcome and your very presence is hostility to God. Justification, come on in, this is mi casa tu casa. Condemnation, you don't belong here, get out. Our biggest concern is not whether we're considered religious, our biggest concern is whether we're considered righteous. And that is a free gift, says chapter 5 verse 1, that comes by faith in Jesus. So if chapter 5 verse 1 is true, and you have trusted the work of Jesus for your salvation, then chapter 8 verse 1, if 5 1 is true about you, 8 1 is true about you. There is no condemnation. Why? Because you have the opposite justification. You are not declared a hostile imposter who will soon be crushed because you broke into someone's home. You are a welcomed person at the table because of someone else's righteousness. So pull up a chair. You belong at the table with the Lord, if you've trusted what Christ has done. Your biggest need is justification. But I want you to notice, some of you have translations like mine, where at the end of verse one, there's a phrase that says, you do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. And I thought about, well, let me explain why some Bibles have that and some don't, but I don't need to. And the reason I don't need to, is because it shows up again at the end of verse four. What does the Lord do? What did God do in sending his son in the likeness of sinful flesh? What did God do by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh? What did he do? He condemned our sin in the flesh. We'll talk about that. Probably not this morning. Maybe tonight, probably not. What did he do? He did something that the law could not do. Look at verse 3. He did what the law couldn't do. The law already condemned our sin. That's why you and I feel like we're losers when we do it. Because we feel condemned and we ought to. When we sin against the Lord, we should feel condemnation. Unless we have been justified. And unless, secondly, this is so important. So important. Verse number four, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. All right, let's see if we can work this together here. I love technology. Let's see if we can work this together here. All right. We often think, and this is what we teach Christians, and this is why we're taking it so slow, and this is why we did it last week, and this is why we're gonna do it this week, this is why we're gonna do it next week, and if I live through it, we're gonna continue to do this every week, step upon step, line upon line, precept upon precept. We're gonna keep on explaining this. We often think that the troubles behind us, so long as I've been forgiven, because that's all the Lord cares about, and that's all I care about, and meanwhile, we live like beggarly people, in God's kingdom because we continue to serve our impulses like animals. And the Lord says, look, your biggest need. And Paul says, look at verse 17 of chapter 7. Look at 717. 717. But now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me." Now again, if it weren't Paul saying it, and if it weren't in scripture, I'd say, what a dumb excuse. I mean, that's second place that the devil made me do it. It's not me, it's my body. But I believe Paul. And in verse 18, you should too, by the way. Verse 18, for I know that in me, that's in my flesh, nothing good dwells. He did it again. He blames it on his flesh. Look at verse 20. Now, if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. It's not me. It's sin in me. I'm telling you, if my kid told me that, I'd whip him. Well, not now. The youngest is 21. We frown on that. But... Verse 23. I see another law in my members, in my body parts. I am warring against the law of my mind. My body is fighting my mind. All right, you see that? Now look at verse 24. O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? He's very clear here. He's saying, there's two of me. I've got the new me and the old me. Now in a sense, the old him died. But in another sense, and I hate to be graphic here, I don't actually hate to be graphic, but I don't actually want to be graphic right here. Look at verse number 13 of chapter 8. Chapter eight, verse 13, look there. For if you live according to the flesh, you'll die, but if you by the Spirit put to death, look at here, put to death the deeds of the body, you'll live. Now, we have seven laying hens at the Sturm home. Four of them are laying, and as soon as we figure out who the three are that are not, the rumor is that we're gonna have them processed. Direct exchanged, yeah. Now, the problem is we can't figure out which ones are not laying. But I am told that if you process one, that is, remove its head from off its body, there are some lingering effects that take place. Have you ever seen this? Evidently, it can be dead, but the members keep moving. I'm not trying to get you to think of the new you as, I just got some chicken parts. But Paul is saying, the old you, dead. 6-6. Romans 6-6. But you got some body parts that seem to be serving the old you. And they, 8-13, got to be suffocated. You got to put a wash tub on that thing. Right? Now, I know I'm a northerner. That's one strike. I know that. I know I'm a city boy. That's strike two. But y'all, I'm trying. You gave me a hunting rifle. I got a pickup truck. We're trying. I got some chickens. All right? Trying. Sometimes I even leave the last consonant off my words so that you'll believe me, that I'm trying. I'm trying. This passage says our biggest need is not just to be declared not guilty. This passage says that our biggest need is to walk according to the Spirit and be declared not guilty. For it says in chapter 8 verse 1, there's no condemnation to you if you're in Christ. Check. Justification. And if you do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit, sanctification. Our biggest need today, Christian, is not just to be a one-stop shop with Jesus, and then tell him to get in the back seat while I run my life. And every now and then for the big stuff, where I go to college, who I marry, I run it by him, and if I don't get an automatic veto from the red phone, I just do what I want. I buy the house I want, I say the words I want, I'm hurtful to the people that I want, and I say stupid things like, you'll have to forgive me, I just had to get that off my chest. No, you don't! No, you don't! We do not have to sin, because we can mortify the deeds of the body. And that is our biggest need. Now, let's see if I can put this into perspective, and then we're done. Because I'm out of time. Condemnation or being declared not guilty, rather condemnation or being declared guilty and ultimately destroyed is the ultimate hazard that is objectively salient. That means that even if you don't feel like it's true, it is still true. You can say you don't believe in gravity. We'll take you to the pinnacle of the temple and you can jump off and sudden deceleration trauma will find you. even if you don't believe in it. And the scripture says that our biggest need is not being condemned, which is accomplished. It's accomplished primarily by knowing we've been forgiven, yes, and the ongoing work of the Spirit arresting my heart and mind and taking over my body little by little. And if you don't experience that and it doesn't bother you, all you're telling the Lord is you were actually never forgiven. You were never really justified. Because you have no continuing interest from the Holy Ghost, from the third person of the Trinity. You have nothing inside of you that says, you are not your own. And so, I think about 1941, George Marshall. Franklin Delano Roosevelt's Army Chief of Staff had to build the United States Army from 175,000 to 1.4 million troops, and he couldn't get Congress to spend the money. Congress was scared to spend money and get involved with wars off of America's shores. You see how we got involved because they found us, trouble found us. And I don't mean to get political, but hey, you live in a political world, get over it. And this is what it says in Jack Aldrich's book, Soldier, Statesman, Peacemaker, Leadership Lessons from George C. Marshall. Marshall knew he had to lead, and in spite of receiving hundreds of hate letters and being called everything from Hitler-Marshall to Benedict Arnold, he pressed on in his belief that an extension of the draft was the right thing to do that summer. and more than a dozen and a half congressional hearings, Marshall stressed that the national interest was imperiled and an emergency existed, quote, whether or not Congress ever declares it so. In a world, friends, where we need to be reminded of how we ought to feel about our actions, where we need to constantly be told how to feel about who we are, and how we are constantly tempted to take more responsibility than belongs to us. Let me tell you what this sounds like. I know he beat me, but I did raise my voice. That is evidence of a codependent person who wants to feel everything, even things that are not objectively their responsibility. We're not talking about that. When you know someone, And maybe you hear someone say something like, I know she was unfaithful, but I wasn't there for her emotionally. We do need to be reminded that there are dangers that are not subjective like that, where people feel better when they take guilt that doesn't belong to them. Or that warm, nasty diaper is so familiar that you'd rather sit in it than be changed. We're not talking about those subjective things. We're talking about something that's true, whether you feel it or not. Judgment is coming and Jesus is making his people ready through chapter eight, verse two, the spirit of life. Will you stand with me? Father, I pray that you'd help us to be gripped by the reality that our greatest need as Christians is to look for and yield to the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Help us to be guided by the Spirit. Help us to be gripped by the truth. Help us to be gratified when we know that you're doing it. Barry Pierce, would you bless the Lord's Supper and we'll take part.