This morning, I want you to turn to the Book of Romans chapter 8. Romans chapter 8. We will focus our attention on two verses, but we are covering a slew of verses. Romans 8, verse 12 and 13. And what I am doing in this survey of the Book of Romans is hitting the high points, the important points I trust, but I'm relying on you. to do some study on your own, to do some reading, to familiarize yourself with this wonderful letter. Romans chapter 8, verse 12 and 13, Paul writes, Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die. But if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live." We've been taking a rather whirlwind tour through the Book of Romans. It's sort of like one of those vacations where you see six countries in five days. Bob Hope movie, if it's Tuesday, this must be Belgium. That's about all you see is hotel rooms. You try to see so much and you just can't do it. Well, that's sort of what we're doing. And I would sort of, as a way of review, point you back to the first part of Romans chapter 7. We ended about midway in Romans 7 at verse 6. And it's sort of like a, what shall we say, a soap opera. It's the continuing episode, and in our last episode, our heroine was married, you recall, a very unhappy marriage to a man I call Mr. Law. You see, Paul is telling us a little bit about our covenant relationships, and when it comes to covenants, the one that we're most familiar with is the marriage covenant, the marriage union, we call it. We know what it is to be married in a covenant relationship with someone. And so he's using that in the first six verses of Romans 7 to illustrate the principles of what's going on. That we once were married to this husband, Mr. Law. And the problem with that marriage was, is that Mr. Law was a perfectionist. Not anything we could do or ever would do was going to please Him. We were always falling short of what Mr. Law demanded. And it's not honey or sugar pie. It's Mr. Law. It's a very formal, unhappy arrangement. Plus the fruit that is being born from that arrangement. Oh yeah, there's children. Well, there's little adultery. There's fornication. He has his father's eyes. lasciviousness, uncleanness, inordinate affection, jealousy, witchcraft, sedition, you name it. All the children just keep on coming from this very unhappy relationship. And the problem is, as we well know, that you are bound, says Paul in chapter 7, verse 2, to your husband as long as you live. There's really no way out. But that raises a possibility, doesn't it? Death, after all, brings to an end the covenant relationship. We stand up here and we utter those little words, I do, to this proposition, as long as we both shall live. Death, we end it. And so you say, well, what are you suggesting here? Slipping a little poison in his coffee cup in the morning? Or are you talking about murder? Well, no. But Paul raises the interesting specter of the fact, what if you die? That it's not your husband that dies, but you die. Death, after all, ends the covenant relationship, does it not? And what he suggests to us is that through union with Christ, as I tried to explain the last time we were together, we inherit His history. We inherit His death, His burial, His resurrection. We have died. That's what we're doing when we come to be baptized. We're showing up for our funeral, folks. Our life is ended. There's a new life. I no longer live for me. I live for Him. And in union with Him, His death is my death. I am crucified with Christ. I live, yet not I. But I live by the faith of the Son of God. Christ lives in me. One time, Martin Luther was working in his study, and he was interrupted by a knock on the door. And he said, Who is it? He said, We're looking for Martin Luther. Martin Luther's dead. He just went right on studying. One time, Augustine, in his wonderful conversion story, his memoirs, his confession, we call it, talks about going back to the city of Hipporegius in North Africa after he had been converted up in Milan, Italy. And he sees one of his old buddies, one of the old friends that he used to go sinning with, And he sees this fellow far off and turns and begins to run from him. And the fellow begins to chase him and says, Augustine, Augustine, it is I, it is I. And Augustine hollers back over his shoulder, it is no longer I. You see, that's the point. It's not us anymore. We may look the same on the outside, but inside all has changed through my relationship with Christ. We have a new union with a new husband and new fruit is being born. Love, joy, peace. That's their names. Long-suffering, jealous, meekness, self-control. All of those things that could never be produced in our marriage to Mr. Law. Now, as we began our study today in Romans 7, verse 7, we have an interesting suggestion here. Well, is the problem, has the problem all along been Mr. Law? Paul puts it this way, is the law sin? In other words, here I am in this legal union, this legal covenant that is not producing righteousness. It's bringing out the sin in me. And is it the law that's the problem? And Paul will answer eventually down in verse 12, the law is holy, the commandment holy and just and good. The problem is not the law. The law is commanding us to do the right things, the just thing. The law is holding before us the standard of God's holiness that we are to aspire to. You know, let's play the blame game here. That always seems to be the indigenous to our society, let's figure out who to blame. And I'm going to blame my husband. I'm going to blame Mr. Law. That's the problem. All along was him. Paul will tell us in no uncertain terms, the problem was not the law. The problem was me. Look at verse 14. We know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal. sold under sin. In the NIV it's translated perhaps a little more correctly, sold as a slave to sin. That's the problem. It's not my husband, Mr. Law, it's me. It's sort of like taking the best NFL coach you could possibly find and giving him a bunch of misfits to coach and sending him into the NFL, you know, for a season. You can have the best coach in the world, but if the material that he's working with has no ability, no talent, he can improve a little bit on the talent that they have, but you can't win championships unless you've got championship material, can you? And that's the problem with the legal relationship between me and the law, is that the law is demanding of me what it cannot give me. It is bringing out what's in me, and unfortunately what is in me is sin. And so we put to death this notion that somehow the law is the problem. No, it's not the law. It's us. That then brings us to the second half of chapter 7, starting in verse 15, which is the most interesting section of Scripture. Let's read just a little of it to refresh your memory, starting in verse 5. I'm sorry, verse 15 of chapter 7. For that which I do, I allow not. For what I would, that do I not. But what I hate, that I do. If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that is good. You know, in other words, it is the experience of I want to do this, but I can't do it. I have this desire to do this and not to do that. And I wind up not doing this and doing the very thing that I don't want to do. That's what Paul is explaining. And this section, the second half of Romans 7, in history, has been most controversial. Because our immediate question is, who here is Paul talking about? There is a school of thought, and it is a minority opinion that has existed down through church history, but still found today, that Paul is talking here in the last half of Romans 7 of the lost man's experience. Now, the most notable proponent of that is the former Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones, who passed away a few years ago. And you know my high regard of Lloyd-Jones. If you can get your hands on a book he's written, it'll be worth your while. His exegesis is fantastic of the scripture. That notwithstanding, I believe he's wrong. on this chapter and the reason that there is a school of thought and why it can be supported to some degree that Paul here is discussing a lost man is because of what we just read in chapter 7 verse 14 that Paul says I'm carnal, sold under sin or sold like a slave to sin. And this school of thought says these are awfully strong terms to be talking about a Christian still being sold as a slave to sin and that's not the only one. Look down in verse 23. He says, I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, bringing me into the captivity, bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in my members. And again, they would say, is this the way you describe a Christian? captive to sin, or look at the last verse, verse 25, I'm sorry, verse 24, next to the last. Oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me or literally save me? Who will save me from the body of this death? You say, well, wait a minute, this is someone who is a slave to sin, crying out for deliverance, and that is not a saved person. That's a lost person. However, I side with what has been the majority view down through church history, that this second half of Romans 7 is in fact describing Christians. And it is describing the Christian's struggle with indwelling sin, with the sin that remains in his life. I believe that's the case for several reasons. Number one, it dovetails with the Christian experience down through the centuries. Now, that's not a conclusive argument, you understand. We should never judge doctrine by our experience. On the other hand, if we as Christians read these last verses in Romans 7 and say, man, I don't know what in the world he's talking about, this has never happened to me, I would never talk like this, we might have reason to worry. The fact is that almost every Christian who has ever lived can look at Romans 7 and say, yeah, I know exactly what he's talking about. Don't you? If you're a Christian, can't you say that I want to do better than I'm doing, and I've got this high aspiration, and I'm constantly falling short of it, and there's these things I don't want to do, I don't want to sin, I don't want to dishonor Christ, and I constantly find myself falling into that. Isn't that how language is? Am I just speaking for me? Is it only me that has that problem? Or is it every serious Christian and the most committed Christian? No matter how advanced he is in sanctification, And his walk of holiness will say the same thing. He's still not where he wants to be. He's still falling short of the goal. And so I say, number one, it at least dovetails with what Christians have confessed down through the centuries as being true of themselves. Number two, and far more important, is Paul's switch to the present tense, starting in verse 14. You'll notice that up until verse 14, he has been talking in the past tense. We won't take the time, but just let your eyes float back over what is preceded this. And suddenly in chapter 7, verse 14, he switches to the present tense and will use the present tense down through the end of that chapter. There must be some reason why Paul switched from the past tense to the present tense. And the easiest explanation is that Paul is speaking here of himself as a believer. This is his experience as a believer in Christ. Thirdly, even If we say the last half of Romans 7 does not speak of Christians but of lost persons, the problem is there's other scripture that says exactly the same thing that clearly uses this language to speak of Christians. Let me give you an example. Galatians. Galatians chapter 5. Galatians, you notice we have this discussion about walking in the flesh, walking in the spirit in Galatians 5.16. Clearly Paul writing to Christian people, Galatians 5.16, he says this, I say then, walk in the spirit and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. Here we have this dichotomy of flesh and spirit. Notice what he says in verse 17. For the flesh lusts against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh. Whatever those two things are, they're contrary, notice he says, one to the other, with what? Gramification. So that he cannot do the things that he would. The things that you would do, you can't do them. Isn't that exactly what Paul is saying in Romans 7? In that, just using different words to express exactly the same idea, that even if we didn't have Romans 7 in the picture, we would still have Galatians 5, 16, and 17 to tell us that Christians have a problem, and it's this thing Paul calls flesh. That's the problem. And then fourthly, and by the way, this is, I think, the strongest argument for all of this, is that when we look closely at what Paul is describing here in this last half of Romans 7, we see that it must be speaking of a saved person. Because what Paul is really describing here is only true of a saved person. Now, let me try to make clear what I'm saying. Not that what identifies this person being spoken of here as a saved person is the fact that he can't do what he wants to do. That's just not true. Christians, that's true of everybody that's ever lived. Even the bank robber is upset because his bank robbery didn't go off like he intended. Right? The sinner sinned. He's not happy with the way he sinned. He wanted to sin perfectly and he fell short of it. Right? In other words, all people will make that complaint, I intended to do better than I'm doing. It is not that that identifies the person being described here as a saved person. It is something else, and we find it here in Romans 7 and verse 22. In verse 22, Paul says, For I delight in the law of God. Remember Mr. Law? I delight in the law of God after the inward man. There is something within me, we would call it the heart, the soul, call it what you will, that delights in the law of God, but, verse 23, I see another law in my members, the flesh, warring against the law of my mind, that inward law. Notice we've got two laws. at work against one another. The law in my mind and the law in my members. Member being a part of your body. You get your head chopped off, they said you got dismembered. It's a rather gross definition of the term, but to be a member of something is to be part of a body. I have a law within me, in my mind, that is warring against another law in my members. in my body, if you will, or in my flesh, as Paul will use that language in Galatians, that there's two laws at work. What I am saying that it is only Christians that have that first law, the law of my mind, the law that within me delights in the law of God, that is only true of the regenerated believer. He's the only one that will make that statement and can possibly make it and mean it. Because you see, the lost man may want to be good, but the last thing a lost man wants to be is perfect. You say, how do you know that? Because he doesn't want to give up his sin, does he? What keeps him from repenting if he wants to be perfect? What keeps him from standing in judgment on his own activities and his own behavior? It's the fact that he's still in love with sin. He wants to be good, just good enough. I've said it's like going down to the used car lot and haggling with the salesman there. You know, what's your bottom dollar? And that's exactly how a lost man comes to God. God, what's your minimum standard? Tell me the bottom dollar price you'll take to be a Christian. And let me see if I can come up to it. The Christian does not speak in those terms. The Christian, and this is, by the way, a good test this morning, if you are truly saved. if you're truly a Christian. If that is true of you, then the law of God has been written on your heart. Ezekiel 36, Jeremiah 31, you're familiar with those terms? The law of God has been written on your heart. What does that mean? It means what Paul expresses here in verse 22. I delight in the law of God after the inward man. I will be the first to tell you that I am not perfect, I will be the first to tell you that in the very best things I've ever done, there is imperfection, there is sin. There's sin in the best sermon I've ever preached. There's sin in the best prayer I've ever prayed. Think for a moment about the best thing you've ever committed, the best act that you've ever done. It may take some of you a while. What's the best thing you've ever done? And I would ask you, was there not some pride in that? Especially the best thing you've ever done. One minute a little bit of this, boy, I sure hope somebody's looking. Were we totally concerned about that honor that comes from God and we didn't give a hoot about the honor that came from man? Hardly. In the best things we've ever done, we fall short. And yet there is the aspiration in every Christian heart that if I could possibly be sinless, I would. If I could come up here to the front and write my sins down on a piece of paper and burn them, and that means I never sin those sins again, I'd do it in a heartbeat, I'd do it in an instant. Wouldn't you? Every Christian would. Oh, that I could have victory over these things and never do them again. And if that is not your aspiration, my friend, I say this as lovingly and as kindly as I can possibly put it, you're not a Christian. That's the change that is wrought by the power of God on the human heart. When we come into a saving relationship with God, we are born again, born anew. What do you mean by that language? Our hearts are changed. The law written on our hearts. No longer is it being imposed by Mr. Law from the outside, you see. It is now my delight, as Paul uses that term here, my joy. I delight in the law of God after the inward man. So what's the problem? You want to be perfect? Go do it. I have this other law. I have this other principle that is at work in me. Notice that Paul speaks almost as if there's two of him. Did you catch that? And by the way, sometimes we speak of that as like the devil on one shoulder, the little angel on the other, you know? There's the two eyes that are battling. I think that's a terrible way of thinking of it, just between you and me. I don't think that's what Paul is expressing here. Rather, what Paul is meaning is that there's one I, one ego, the word for I in Greek, one I of me that stands in judgment, that desires, that wants and condemns when I fall short and applauds when I do what's right. There is the I, we call it the conscience. And then there's another I, the I of me that's performing. I don't mean performing, putting on an act, but there is the eye of me that's actually doing the action out here in the court of life. And then there's the eye of me that stands in judgment of what I do. The other eye. It's like a basketball. Let's suppose you're in a basketball game and you are both the player out on the court and you're also the fans seating up in the stands. And every time you do something down here on the court, the eye that's seated up there in the stands either applauds or boos. And if I'm down there, I think I told you about my high school championship basketball team. You can tell my contribution was to hold down the bench, make sure it didn't go anywhere. But we had a championship, regional championship basketball team. And the game was decided. We were ahead by one point at the end of the game. However, one of our guys fouled one of their guys. As time expired, it was a one-on-one free throw shot. They had their guy get out there. All the teams went and sat down on the bench. A whole crowd in the stands watching this poor guy go out there all by himself. To shoot a one-in-one free shot, you're one point behind, and he misses the front end of a one-in-one. He fell to the floor absolutely dejected. I've always felt sorry for that poor fellow. If want to made baskets, he would have made that basket. Nobody wanted to, more than that boy wanted to make that basket. It's his performance. They fell short. You understand? That's what Paul is describing, that there is the me that desires perfection, just like Mr. Law desired perfection. There's this now in me, this principle that desires to be perfect, but it is my performance that falls short. And so there's really two of me's. There's the me that's standing up here preaching to you this morning. And there's the me in here that's standing behind the scenes either saying, man, that was a dud, that was a lousy thing to say, or man, that was a great illustration. That hit the mark. You understand what I'm saying? There's the me that stands in judgment of the me that's doing the doing. Is that confusing enough? But I believe that's precisely what Paul is describing here. That a Christian doesn't necessarily act better than another person, but he's got a better conscience. He's got a cleansed conscience. He's got a conscience that desires perfection. And it is his greatest misery, as Paul will go on to say, O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me? How can I live like I want to live? as I desire to live. I'm carrying around this old baggage, this old man. In fact, some say that this, who shall deliver me from the body of this death, refers to the way they would execute people in those times. They would sometimes tie a living man to a dead corpse and he carried it around until the dead corpse killed him. I don't know if that's the case or not, but I do understand the cry, the desperation that is in Paul's cry here, who will save me from myself? I've been saved from sin. I've been saved from hell. Who will save me from me? And Paul will answer, I thank God, through Jesus Christ, my Lord. There is a Savior from sin, from Satan, and there's a Savior from me. But, the last verse, so then, with the mind, I myself serve the law of God, or within me I am a slave to God's law, but with the flesh, the law of sin, I still have what we call indwelling sin within me. Well, how in the world, then, am I to live as a Christian. That's what Romans 8 is about to explain. Now again, Romans 8 is controversial, mainly because the last half of Romans 7 is controversial. Depending on how you understand Romans 7, that's going to govern, to some degree, how you understand Romans 8. For instance, if you think, like Martyn Lloyd-Jones, that the last half of Romans 7 is describing a lost man, then clearly Romans 8 is describing a saved man. That's that interpretation. But even among those who believe that Romans 7 and 8 are describing, say, people, there is disagreement as to what Romans 8 is talking about. Some, starting with Wesley, the holiness movement in the 1800s that believed in a state of Christian perfectionism, that you could arrive at this state where you did not sin anymore. John Wesley perpetrated that. Wesley was an honest man on his deathbed. He said he never got there. But that was taught, especially in holiness churches, Nazarene churches, if you want to know what does that mean, if they've got holiness in their name, that's what that means, is that they taught that you, a Christian, could arrive at a state of sinless perfection in the early 1900s. It was very popular among the Keswick movement, the deeper life movement, that you can, through some sort of crisis experience, reach a higher plateau. Christian living, a spiritual walk as opposed to a carnal walk. And if you're familiar with the old carnal Christian, spiritual Christian dichotomy that was bandied about for the last 50 years, that's where that came from. Or, if you're in Charismatic or Pentecostal circles, it's the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Again, an experience that kicks me up to a higher level of Christianity, a victorious level as opposed to this defeat that Paul is describing in Romans 7. So the idea is that yes, these are Christians in the last half of Romans 7, but they're defeated Christians, carnal Christians, and through some sort of a crisis experience in Romans 8, this is telling us that there is a way for them to be kicked up to a higher, victorious level of living through some sort of experience that they experience. My particular view, I think again this is the majority view on this passage, is that Romans 7 and Romans 8 are both describing the same person. They're just looking at them from a different perspective, from a different context. One of the old Puritans one time, he'd been preaching in Romans 7 for eons, you know how those Puritans would do, they'd get on a verse and count for months sometimes. It's easy to do in Romans. And one of his church members said, well, when are we going to get out of Romans 7 into Romans 8? And he says, well, as long as I'm here, you're never going to get out of Romans 7 into Romans 8. In other words, you see, his point was, is that what's going on here in Romans is not a journey from Romans 7. That's a reality that's going to be with the Christian as long as he's in this life. Romans 7 is going to be true of us. But, but, Romans 7, it's not that it's not true. It's not that what it's teaching, namely that of myself and in myself and by myself, I cannot possibly live as I'm supposed to live as a Christian. It's not that that's not true. It's just not the whole story. As Paul Harvey would say, let me give you the rest of the story. And the rest of the story is what follows here in Romans 8. You'll notice in Romans 8, if you'll look at this carefully, It begins with this wonderful statement of our standing in grace and justification before God. There is, therefore, now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. Remember, that's what Paul cries out in the last part of Romans 7. Who will save me from this body of my death, this flesh? And what is he saying in Romans 8 verse 2 is that there is something new that has come into the Christian's experience. There's a new principle that has appeared on the horizon in the Christian. That yes, without him we can do nothing. That's what Romans 7 is saying. But Romans 8 is telling us you're not without him. And it is not correct for us to go around with our eyes downcast and beating ourselves up, saying, well, without Him, we can do nothing. That's just all we are. Paul says, with Him, I can do all things. The sky's the limit to what I can do in Christ Jesus. Take a fly, a little ordinary fly. How fast do you think a fly can fly? On a good day? If the wind's blowing? 20 miles an hour? 30 miles an hour? What if I told you I've seen a fly fly 500 miles an hour? You'd tell me that's absolutely impossible. Couldn't be. Couldn't happen. There's no fly. You'd have to be super fly. to fly 500 miles an hour. Well, one time we were flying down to Mexico. We got on the plane in Dallas and they closed the door and there was a fly flying around inside the cabin. And lo and behold, two hours later, they opened the door and we're in Mexico City. That fly has flown over 500 miles an hour. Well, you say he didn't do it on his own. Well, that's the point. Neither do we. Paul didn't say, I'm doing this on my own. He's saying, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. In Christ, anything's possible. You understand? It's a whole new ball game. And you see, that's what we're looking at in Romans 7. We're looking at the Christian by himself. He's got a new heart. He wants to do better. But we're looking at him as if he's separate and severed from Christ. But the truth is, the rest of the story is that he's not severed from Christ. He is in Christ. There is no condemnation to those who are where? In Christ Jesus. Now, let's look at the same helpless fella in Christ. Let's consider him not apart from his master and his Lord. Let's consider him in union with his master and his Lord. And the whole situation changes. We got a new law that has come into the picture. Some of you FedEx guys, you could probably tell me how much one of these airplanes weighs. Tens of thousands of pounds, at least. Hundreds of thousands of pounds, maybe fully loaded. Any of you guys know? They're heavy. And I ask you, what is it that will get one of those airplanes off the ground? Can we suspend the law of gravity? Is that why planes fly? That somehow we figured out a way to suspend the law of gravity so that gravity no longer works on an airplane. Well, of course, that's not how it happens, is it? The law of gravity is still very much in effect on an airplane. But what has happened is a new law. The law of aerodynamics comes into play. That if you have wind passing over the curved surface of a wing, low pressure, well, you don't want to know the details, but let's just say that lift is created as wind blows over that wing. And when the law that produces lift exceeds the law of gravity pulling down, the airplane flies. Now, it's very important that you grasp what I'm saying here. The law of gravity does not cease to pull. It has been superseded. It has been overcome by another law, by another principle. And that's what Paul is describing here, that victory over sin for a Christian. And you say, well, why can't we speak on something practical? There is nothing more practical for a Christian. than to ask, how can I live above sin? Nothing. That should be our number one aim as a Christian. You understand? If I understand nothing else, I need to understand this. Automate this my priority, number one, to get this. And what Paul is describing that the reason that it is possible for a Christian to live above sin is not that sin goes away. It's not that sin, it's like gravity, it's not that gravity quits. It's not that sin does not remain in you and given its opportunity will be glad to show itself. Just like gravity, if that plane's at 30,000 feet and wind quits blowing over those wings, guess what? Gravity takes over and down that thing comes like a rock. And so it is in the Christian life that remaining sin is always there. Always pulling downward, always pulling into sin. That the hope of living above sin is what Paul is expressing here in Romans 8 verse 2, a new law. The law of aerodynamics in the case of a plane, what he calls here the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus. There is another law that comes into the picture that is able to deliver me from that law of sin. Excuse me. Well, what is this thing? Well, notice he says it's the law in verse two of the spirit of life. There's an interesting thing to notice about the Book of Romans, and that is the noticeable absence of any stress at all upon the work of the Holy Spirit until Romans 8. There's one reference, maybe, to the Holy Spirit back in Romans 1, verse 4, where Paul talks about Christ being resurrected by the Spirit of holiness, although there's a lot of controversy over what exactly he means there, but that's a possible That's a possibility. But outside of that, we have the word spirit. Like, for instance, Paul says in my spirit, man has a spirit. We have spiritual versus carnal. We have the spirit of something as opposed to the letters of the spirit of the law as opposed to the letter of the law. But as far as any reference to the person of the Holy Spirit, it is noticeably absent all the way from Romans one four to this point. And then all of a sudden, everything changes. Paul will reference the Holy Spirit 19 times in the next 26 verses. Duh! You beginning to get the picture? Something new has come into the picture. And that new thing is the Holy Spirit. Now, I'm going to sound like a charismatic. But it is the Holy Spirit who enables us to live a holy, righteous, godly life as a Christian. And without the Holy Spirit, you ain't got a chance. And if you think that we are saying that because we don't believe in the baptism of the Holy Spirit in the sense that the Pentecostals do, speaking in tongues and so forth, that that means that we do not emphasize or speak of the necessity of the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives, you are misreading the whole situation. We are absolutely dependent on the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. That's our only hope. And we are woefully ignorant, most of us, of the work of the Holy Spirit, how the Holy Spirit works. We wouldn't know it if it came up and bit us. Is that the Holy Spirit or is it not? We don't have a ghost of an idea, most of us, let's be honest. And yet, that is our only hope. You say, well, how do you know that? I'll just point out, I don't know if I'm going to make Little Rock or not. Anyway, I've got to be in Little Rock at 3 o'clock today, so there is a limit to how far I can go. A few more minutes here. In verses 5 through 8, He makes it clear that when he speaks of being carnal, he means carnally minded. You remember the Christian in his mind, the law of his mind, the lights and the law of God? And Paul is saying here, you've got a carnal mind. You're not just immature. You're not a babe in Christ. You're lost. You're lost. If you mind carnal things instead of minding the things of God. These guys got back from England. I remember going down the subway down to the Tubes in London. They have a sign up there. Overhang it said, mind your head, mind your head. And what in the world are they talking about? Well, it means think about your head. What's your head? The man who does not think in the terms that Paul has described in Romans seven, that thinks carnally. He's not a Christian, folks. And if you think that the possession of the spirit of Christ, the spirit of God is for the super spiritual, read down here in verse 8, 9, 10, so then, Romans 8, 8, so then they that are in the flesh cannot please God, that's the lost man, but ye, you Christians are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he's none of his. And if Christ be in you, The body is dead, and so forth. Do you see the language? Three times he's given us three synonyms for thinking of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God in the first part of verse 9, the Spirit of Christ in the last half of verse 9, and in verse 10 when he says, If Christ be in you, he doesn't mean some little bitty Jesus sitting on a chair in your heart like the tract has. He means the Spirit of Christ indwelling us. Three ways of saying the same thing. But notice the sense that if This doesn't click with you if you have absolutely no concept of God's Spirit residing in you. Chances are you're lost. Because if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he's none of this. This is the definition of what it is to be a Christian. to be in union with Christ means not that I'm up there and he's down here, but that the Spirit of Christ indwells me. I am one with him, not just as a figment of my imagination, but that Christ actually dwells in my heart by faith through the presence of the Spirit of God. And so our duty in verse 12, and that's what we took as our text, is that we are to recognize this and seek then this new energy source. But we're all concerned about where is our energy going to come from, right? The main topic of conversation in our nation today. It ought to be the main topic of every Christian's conversation is where my energy is going to come from. He's going to do what? To light your house? To cook your food? No. To live as you ought to live. Where's that energy going to come from? He makes it clear here that it is going to come from the power of God's Spirit and God's Spirit alone. And without it, you don't have a prayer. But, oh, there is a way of living above sin. Let me say this as clearly as I can. If you're a Christian today, a real, genuine Christian, you don't have to sin. You say, but you just said you always do, and I didn't say you're not going to. I'm saying you don't have to. The means, the mechanism for you and me to live above sin is available to us. Our problem is not that God has not made it possible for us to do it, it's that we don't avail ourselves of it. There is a new energy source, if you will. It's sort of like The guys down there in Mexico digging those footings with a pick and shovel. Or somebody coming up with a backhoe. Now the fellow on the backhoe is working. He's doing stuff. Pushing levers. So forth. But what is he doing? He's utilizing another form of energy besides himself. Right? And so it is that Paul is stressing that to the Christian. Let me move on. I will come back to this as I close today. Usually when we preach through Romans 8, it is the last half of Romans 8 that catches our attention, and rightly so, because it is the triumph. It is God's assurance of final and complete victory over sin. It's the good stuff. And we're just going to be able to just brush over the good stuff. But trust me, if you would study it, if you will read it, it's worth your study. It's worth your attention, because not only are we taught to live by the spirit, live in the spirit, to be led by the spirit, all of those various phrases we found so far. We learn in verse 16, verse 15 and 16, that we're also to listen to the spirit. that the Spirit of God within us confesses, bears witness that we're God's children, that we're His. And if we're His, it means that we're heirs of God. It means that there is absolutely nothing that can thwart what God is doing in me and you. It is the absolute assurance and certainty of victory and final triumph over sin. Oh yes, right now, we sin, we struggle, or to use Paul's terminology in the next few verses, we groan, we groan to be delivered from this thing, but glory is coming and it is certain, it is sure to every believer. And you know why? Because as the last half of Romans 8 is going to tell us in no uncertain terms, this whole thing started with God, is carried on by God, and is going to end with God. It didn't start with you and me. Had God left us to ourselves, we'd have gone straight to hell. We'd have bust hell wide open. But God didn't leave us alone. He has purposed from the beginning of time, from the foundation of the world, to save a people for himself, for his own glory, for his own pleasure. Why he did it, I don't know. I'd have put all of you in hell if it had been me. And you'd have done the same to me. But God in grace and mercy has chosen to save a people. And he started this whole thing in motion when he didn't have to, when he wasn't supposed to, when the angels would have been saying, what in the world are you doing scratching their head? Why? Save them. Worms. Cockroaches. Why? And God's reply is, I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious. I will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. I do it because I do it. And I am the sovereign of the universe. I will do what I please. Thank you very much. And God has set his love on me. Set his love. I didn't draw his love. I was not so lovable and cuddly that heaven just wasn't going to be the same if I wasn't there. But me, the sinner, the cockroach, he set his love. He chose to love me. He foreknew me. That's really what those words meant. He foreloved me. And He predestined me to come to His Son, and in time He called me. That's a wonderful trilogy of these five terms down there in Romans 8, verse 28, 29. We know, we know that all things are working together for good. I don't know about your house. Things at my house don't work together, they fall apart. But God is working everything together for my good. There's nothing that can undo what's going on here. Because, note verse 29, whom he did foreknow, he predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom he predestined, whom he called, he also justified. Whom he justified, he also glorified. We haven't even got to glory yet, and he's already talking about it in the past tense. It's a done deal. It's guaranteed. God, the God of the universe, has declared it. It's His purpose. And He is the sovereign. Nothing can thwart Him. So, if God be for us, who can be against us? Who can undo what God has done? He will stop at nothing to save us, as he will go on to say, he that spared not his own son. I just got through preaching on Malachi up there in Thunder Bay, in that third chapter. Talking about God in that day of fire, the day of the Lord, the day that burns like an oven, that those that fear him now, he will spare them, he says, he'll spare them in that day as one who would spare his own son who pleases him. Did you get that? Just like you and I. If the house is on fire and our son, our beloved son, is sleeping in the next room, the first thing we're going to do is get him out. We would spare at all costs the son who pleases us. And yet God spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all. Do you get it? He'll stop at nothing. to fulfill its purpose. Therefore, it doesn't matter whether it's tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness. It doesn't matter whether it's life or death, or principalities or powers, or things present or things to come. Absolutely nothing can save us. for the love of God in Christ Jesus. And thus this section ends with that word of triumph. A little boy, one of the old evangelists, talking about, preached one night back in 1800, a little boy sitting on the front pew, his face aglow. The preacher got through preaching, came down, the little boy said, we're sitting pretty, aren't we? Yeah, we are. We're sitting pretty. I meant to go back to Romans 8, 12 and 13, speak on mortification. I think, number one, I'm not going to make a little rot. Number two, I'm seriously thinking about when this series is over for us to take as our next study. mortification of sin. It's that important. We learn how this works. Because Jesus said, the word says, if you live after the flesh, you will die. But if you, this is for Christians, if you, mortification, putting to death sin isn't for dead folks. It's for folks that are alive. They're the only ones that can do it. If you, Thrill the spirit. That's the means. Mortify the deeds of the body. That's the duty. You shall live. That's the promise. It's not an option. It must be done. You will either kill sin or sin will kill you. Is that clear? We'll come back and study how that works at the end of our study. But today, let me leave you with this thought. Oh, my. Oh, my. You say, but wait a minute. What if I do something? What if I foul up and Satan sees me and he's going to go tell God on me? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies us. He has declared us not guilty for the sake of faith in His Son. There's no higher court. There's not a higher judge that you can appeal to. The final, highest authority of the court in the universe has declared me not guilty. Hallelujah. What a Savior.