Two passages of scripture I'd like to use for our text this evening. The first is found in the book of Romans, the sixth chapter. We'll just read three verses, verses 11, 12, and 13, maybe 14. I've chosen this evening to speak on the theme of separateness. The reason why may be obvious in a moment or two. Maybe it'll be totally unobvious, which will mean that I've done a poor job. The premise of the scriptures, particularly the premise of the writings of the Apostle Paul, is that God's people, who are the elect of God, who are redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ, are not simply different persons, but new creations in Jesus Christ. Now, that's a biblical truth. And as he operates his writings upon that notion, he continually enjoins and encourages, enjoins from sin and encourages unto righteousness the people of God. And so here in the Roman writings, he says to them, regarding their lives, because bear in mind that the people at the church at Rome were under attack. Their faith was being attacked constantly by those who kept hearing that these peculiar people said that they were saved by grace and not by works, and that it was by God's grace that they were redeemed and not by the keeping of any particular set of laws. And they said such things as Paul did say, because he taught them this. He said, where I was a great sinner, therefore, where sin did abound, grace abounded even more than my sin, and therefore, I am redeemed. And then these gainsayers, these arguers would come along, and they would say, well, if grace abounds where sin abounds, then if you sin more, more grace will abound. And exactly the opposite, of course, is being taught by the apostle. He's teaching not only where grace abounds should sin not abound. He is saying sin should not even be named in your lives. And he makes a very strong argument on that particular point. And I think probably there is little doubt and should be little doubt in all of our minds that our attitude towards some sin, not all sin, but some sin is relatively casual. And then, of course, there are some other sins where our attitude is not casual, but very intense and very severe. And I would think that probably if you really took some time, some real time of introspection, you'd probably have to admit that that's the case, that we are casual about some kinds of sins and intense about other kinds. But the Bible doesn't give options to the people of God. The Bible simply says what it says, and it says here in the 11th verse, that you should obey it in its lusts. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but yield yourselves unto God as those that are alive from the dead and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. And then verse 14 says, for sin shall not have dominion over you. And the reason why is because you are not under the law, but you are under grace. Now let's look to the Lord in prayer. And now, our Father, we ask that you would capture our desires and draw them toward your Son, our lovely Lord and Redeemer. And may it please you, our God, to have us set our affections upon heavenly things, and reflect upon gracious and eternal things, cause us not only to recognize but to remember and to believe and to have faith in understanding that this world really isn't our home at all. And that the stuff that it gives cannot be compared to the things which we shall inherit. And so we pray that our minds will be drawn to thee, that our worship will be sweet and acceptable in thy sight. Lord our strength and our Redeemer for we pray it in Jesus name. Amen Now having read that I'd like you to turn to the book of Romans the 12th chapter just back a few pages and The same apostle, writing to the same group of believers, says in the very first few verses, I beseech you, that is, I implore you, I beg you, I persuade you, therefore, brethren, by God's mercy, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. and do not be conformed to this world but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove, that is, venture in faith and therefore prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. And this transformation has to do with new ideals and attitudes, and it's not optional, but it's obligatory. It simply says, Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed. All this is reasonable. A child of God is transformed, and his actions based upon that transformation is that he be not conformed to this world. That's reasonable. That's to be expected. That's natural, or I should say that's supernatural behavior for a supernatural person. Being conformed to this world is natural behavior for a natural person. And remember that we are supernatural persons. By that I mean that we have become new creations by the accomplishment, by the fiat of the Holy Spirit of God. And therefore, we do not belong to ourselves, but we belong to him. And therefore, we have become new creations. Therefore, when we speak of godly behavior, we are speaking of supernatural behavior. Not natural, but supernatural. So when we speak of being transformed by the renewing of our mind to prove what is good, we're talking about supernatural behavior, which is to be expected from a supernatural creation, which is what you are if you're in Christ Jesus. Now I want to tell you a story. It's an old story. Many of you know it already. A long, long time ago, When the nation of Israel was divided into the southern and northern kingdom by reason of the rebellion of Jeroboam against Rehoboam, Solomon's son, and so the northern kingdom became the nation of Israel, the kingdom of Israel, and the southern kingdom, the kingdom of Judah, there were a series of wicked kings who ruled in the nation of Israel. They weren't in the lineage of David. Some of them, would you believe, weren't even Jewish. And yet they were the kings of Israel. And they were, for the most part, very evil and very wicked. Well, there was one king, that famous old evil king called Ahab, who was married to a non-Jewish wicked woman named Jezebel, who promoted not the worship of the Jehovah God, the savior of the people of Israel, but promoted the worship of the god Baal. Who, by the way, Baal, is in direct lineage of the series of organizations and institutions and mysteries which are called Mystery Babylon in the New Testament, in the direct line, totally identified as being in that lineage, in the lineage of Mystery Babylon, Baal. There was a prophet in Israel in those days. You remember? His name was Elijah, a very godly man. not conformed to this world at all, elect of God and called out special for a special mission and for a very, very particular and peculiar reason. And so it was that as Elijah spoke about righteousness and kept telling King Ahab and Queen Jezebel and the people of Israel that they needed to repent and to reject Baal and to turn once again to the God of their fathers, he became more and more hated. hated so much that he was driven into exile and went into the hills. And while he was there, God brought upon the land a very serious and grievous drought. So grievous and dry was it that it didn't rain for a period of three and one half years. Three and one half continuous years of no rain. The drought was so severe and so intense that Israel became like, I suppose, what we see on our newscast today, Ethiopia looks like, a dust bowl and starving people. Well, you can imagine that when Elijah announced that this drought was going to come because of the wickedness of Israel, that the people didn't turn to God, but instead they turned their hatred against Elijah. And so did wicked Ahab and Jezebel. Finally, one day, God announced to Elijah that the drought was over. And he worked a set of circumstances and events whereby he would come back into Israel and he would meet with the messenger of Ahab. Finally, there was a contest called. Elijah said, if Baal be God, let him show to be God. And if God be God, let him show to be God. And there was this great contest. You remember that? And Elijah said to the people of Israel, there's a great gathering. And he said, we'll build this great mound, an altar of rocks and stones. And we will put flesh of animal sacrifices upon it. And we will call down fire from heaven. The prophets of Baal go first. And they did that. Perhaps you'll remember. And they prayed. And they danced. And they chanted. And they cut themselves, and they hurt themselves, and prostrated themselves, praying that God would bring fire down from heaven before that throng that was watching. This was before TV, you know, and radio. This was great entertainment. This was an event. And so there were thousands of people there. And nothing happened all day long, from morning until dusk. And then finally, Elijah said, build a moat around the altar, put the sacrifices on the altar, take barrels of water, pour them on the altar, soak the rocks, soak the sacrifice, build a moat of water around the altar. And they did, and he called God, Jehovah God. And he prayed to him, and fire came down, and it burned the sacrifice, and it burned the rocks, and it burned the water. It consumed everything. Elijah called for the slaying of the priests of Baal and the people turned against the priests of Baal and slew them and quickly recanted of slaying the priests of Baal and turned once again against Elijah. Elijah went away by himself and he wept and he thought he was all alone. Remember that? Okay, now turn back to the 11th chapter of Romans. Verse 2. God has not cast away his people whom he foreknew. Do you not remember that the scripture talks of Elijah and what it says, how he made intercession to God against Israel, saying, Lord, they've killed thy prophets, and they have dug down thine altars, and I am left alone, and they seek my life as well. But what saith the answer of God unto him? I have reserved to myself 7,000 men who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal. And so it is today. Even at this present time, there is a remnant according to the election of grace. And why I chose to tell you this story and to couple it with those two parcels of scripture that we used for our text is simply this. This world and everything in it has a design. And the design is to deceive, to fool people. to make it appear as though evil is good and good is evil. In fact, the scriptures say, don't be surprised when people will speak evil of you for doing good. Expect that as the course of your life. Because the more you become like Jesus Christ, the more you will incur the animosity of the world. The Bible says, remember him. The world crucified him. And the servant is not greater than his Lord. Baal was in the direct lineage of Mystery Babylon. The remnant, according to the election of grace, is in the direct lineage of Elijah. There have always been two streams in human history. Those who are God's elect redeemed by his grace, whose minds have been transformed, who have given their lives as reasonable service to Jesus Christ, and those who have not. The hallmark and the criterion in Elijah's day was simply this. Out of all of those people, the millions who lived in that land, there were at least 7,000 who hadn't bent their knee, who had not genuflected, who had not bowed down, who had not caved in, who had not been persuaded, who had not given in, who had resisted, even unto blood, bowing their knee to the deities of Babylon. And I only say that now because of the season of the year, but the principle holds true for every month of every year. We are really, we are actually, and we are completely the people of God and pilgrims just passing on through. It's a hymn that we sing, and I don't remember most of it, but I remember one sentence that says, oh, how this world to evil allures me. Oh, how my heart is prone to sin. That's why we need these kinds of writings and these kinds of remembrances. We're easy prey. We really are. We don't like to be called evil when we know we've done well. We resent it when people call us wicked for doing good. But they will, and you'll never change it. You will never change it.