Getting Used To Your New Reality

Well, it's great to see all of you here today and what a blessing it is to be able to gather with God's people to worship God together, and we can take pleasure in the fact that God's heart is blessed by our worship, and we can also take pleasure in the fact that our hearts get rearranged as we, we worship God. We're stronger than we were half an hour ago, as a result of just being in his presence, worshiping Him, celebrating the gospel, and celebrating. the Lord's table. Hopefully, 45 minutes from now will be even stronger after partaking of His word.

so let me invite you to turn in your Bibles, this morning to Romans chapter 6. Romans chapter 6. By the way, Larry and Diane Fowler are in our service. Could you guys stand?

Let's welcome them. they minister, with Awanis, and, he preached at our church about a year ago, just a wonderful message on Joseph. You guys remember that? And I believe we still, have copies of his book Raising a Modern Day Joseph in our Information booth, and we would commend that resource to you.

But if you've not met them, please look for them after after the service. anyway, Romans chapter 6, we're doing a series through Romans 5 through 8, a journey to the heart of the gospel. These chapters are so dense with, with gospel truth that it's been proven to be such a rich blessing for us as we've made our way through Romans 5 and for a good chunk of Romans 6 and this morning what we come to Romans chapter 6 and verse 18. And we're going to try to actually finish studying Romans 6 this morning, and the first few verses 18 to 20, will be review, and there will be a lot of review this morning.

you'll have to pardon me. I just need to hear this again. So if you'll just indulge me and let me say some of these same things to myself again, I would appreciate that. I've, I noticed this past week that I've noticed over the last few weeks that Romans 5 and Romans 6, as wonderful as they are, there's something slippery about the truths and the concepts in these, in these verses to really lay hold of them.

Like he says in verse 19, I'm speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. Sometimes we're not strong enough to really capture and hold onto and grasp truth, and it's a struggle, and Paul understands that he gets that. But then even sometimes once having grasped something to then hold on to it, and I have to confess to you that this week I've lived woefully short of the very truths that I preached last last Sunday. So I need some of these reminders and if you don't need any of these reminders and you've got it down pat, talk to me afterwards because I really want to find out your secret.

but anyway, if you want to give a title to the message this morning, it would be getting used to your new reality. Getting used to your new, reality. It turns out that since coming to faith in Christ, we are now in a brand new reality on many levels, and Paul in the second half of chapter 6 is trying to help us to, to get acclimated to this new reality and we're going to receive some direction. From him this morning.

As I studied this passage and thought about the message for today, I could not help but think about something that happened a number of years ago. my wife and I and our kids, a number of years ago went to the wild animal park down towards San Diego, and while we were there, one of the memories that stands out is we were on this tram and, taking a ride through this large reserve area where there were various species of wild animals. And we came upon a group of white rhinos, OK, white rhinos.

In fact, I've got a picture here of one of them just in case you're wondering what I'm talking about.

Cute little feller here, but we came upon a group of of these white rhinos and the lady who was speaking into the microphone and explaining everything to us started telling us details about the white rhinos. And when they came to the wild animal park, And as she was doing that, she told us something interesting that had happened when these rhinos were dropped off at the wild animal park. She said, what, what happened was they, these guys, you don't put them on a leash and tell them where to go, right?

It is not a good idea.

And, but what they did is they had these rhinos individually in a very safe, secure container. an imprisoning container, but that was the safest way to go, and they then transported these containers to the park and then into this large reserve area and they were all lined up one beside another. I don't know how many there were, but there would have been a few. And she said the workers then all at the same time opened up the doors of these imprisoning containers and then got out of the way as fast as they could.

And they were not surprised by what happened next, and that is that as soon as the doors of the containers were opened, every one of these white rhinos came bursting forth from their imprisoning container out into the wide open acreage of this reserve that was waiting for them. That was not surprising to them, but what happened next did surprise them. Every one of the white rhinos came bursting out, and once they were free, they looked around, they sniffed around, and then every one of them turned around and walked back into their container and stayed there.

And I'm sure those rhinos hated those containers, but it was more secure because it was what they were used to, and I'm sure they loved the freedom at first that was theirs, but as they sniffed around and looked around, it probably freaked them out and shocked them, and they ended up going back to the comfort and the security of the container that I have no doubt they hated.

But by the time we were there riding on this tram, The rhinos seemed like they had made the adjustment. There were no containers anywhere, and if there were, they would have wanted nothing to do with being inside of those containers. They seem to be enjoying the expanse and the luxury of where they were at the wild animal park. Well, I want to be careful in how I say this, but we are a lot like those white rhinos, right?

we have been brought into a whole new reality in Christ. We've been brought into the expanse of God's freedom in Christ and in our Christian life at the moment of conversion, I think all of us came bursting out of that old imprisonment of sin into all of this lush terrain that is ours in Christ. But how many times have we looked around and And ended up turning around and going right back into that old container of sin. That we were accustomed to.

We hated it, but it was comfortable and we were used to it and we were not used to the freedom that was ours in Christ. Paul in Romans 6 is intending in these verses of Romans 6 to help us to get acclimated to This new reality that we have in Jesus. In fact, if you look at like some of the verses, it's there you see him toggling back and forth from the old life to the new life. In verse 17, you were, you were slaves of sin, but you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching.

which is the gospel to which you were committed. Verse 18, having been freed from sin, you became so you were no longer what you once were. Verse 19, just as, and he talks about the way we were before Christ, before our conversion, so now here's how you need to live. Now that you are a believer in Jesus, verse 20, you were verse 22, but now, and so we find him going back and forth between our life before Christ and after Christ, and his goal is to help us to get used to this new reality that is ours.

And as he does so, we're going to encounter a big theological word that's gonna show up twice, once in verse 19. And once in verse 22, and that is the word sanctification, and I'm going to give you a more technical definition of sanctification a little bit later in the message this morning, but for our purposes now, let me just give you this definition of sanctification. Sanctification is simply the process by which a justified believer gets used to his new reality. It is simply the process by which a justified believer gets used to his new reality that he has in Christ.

It's not like God justifies you, and now there's this second work of grace called sanctification. Lord, sanctify me now. Do something that you have not already done and sanctifying me. No, sanctification is merely the process by which we orient ourselves towards our justification.

And the salvation God has given to us on the day of our conversion, and it's just a process by which we get acclimated to that. We get used to that and learn how to live accordingly and to help us in that sanctification process, what we're going to infer from our passage this morning is 5 directions that we receive from this passage regarding what to think and what to do in order to get ourselves acclimated. To the new reality that we have now in Jesus. And the 1st 3 of these will be, or the 1st 2.5 of these will be reviews.

So let's just review this and then we'll get into some new territory for this morning. the first thing you need to do, guys, to get acclimated to the new reality that is yours in Christ is recognize the fact that sin is a master. Sin is a master. Sin is not interested in serving you.

It is only interested in ruling and dominating. It is a master, but it's a master from which you have been freed. You can take that to the bank. Verse 17, Paul says, But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, You became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed and verse 18, having been freed from sin.

So we have been delivered from bondage to sin. We no longer have to follow sin's direction. We're no longer under its mastery. Now it's easy for us to believe that when it comes to sins maybe that come to us from the outside and even certain categories of sin, it's easy for us to believe that.

I suspect, I don't know this for sure, but I suspect that no one in this room has even been tempted this week to rob a bank. OK, I think you've all walked in pretty nice freedom from that. If you haven't and you're struggling with that, talk to me afterwards, OK? we can help you.

But, and it's easy for us to believe that we're free from maybe a sin like that, but it's, it's often the sins that arise from within, is it not? that arise from within that serve to be a challenge to us in believing, the truth, sins, for example, that are woven into our personal history. And we still remember those sins and having committed them, and we still feel shame, regret, remorse as we think back upon our personal history. It's sins that are woven into our physicality.

We've talked about that indwelling sin is somehow profoundly affiliated with our physicality with these bodies that we have that are not yet redeemed, that are destined for the grave before they are glorified. Paul speaks of sin. And our dying body and its lust and desires and all of that gets woven into the fact that we have present tendencies that we feel sometimes very profound tendencies towards sin that we experience in our life as a believer and it's easy for us when those sins arise from within of this nature for us to think this must be who I am.

And Paul is saying this is not who you are in Jesus.

You are free from sin, and you can look at any and all sin coming from without and coming from within and say this is not who I am in Jesus, and these sins are no longer my master. So we need to recognize the fact that sin is a master from which we have been freed. The second thing you need to do to get acclimated to the new reality that is yours in Christ is you need to recognize that righteousness is the master to which you are now enslaved. He says in verse 18.

Having been freed from sin, you became slaves literally of the righteousness. And this means more than just you're now a slave to having to do the righteous thing for the rest of your life. No, we saw last week that to be a slave of the righteousness means at least being a slave to the righteous one. That is Jesus.

It also means being a slave to or under the governing influence of the righteousness that Jesus, the righteous one, displayed at the cross, where we see the ultimate act of righteousness of Jesus Christ obeying His Father to the point of death and laying down His life for His enemies in order to make them His friend. In that one act we see the fulfillment of the law beautifully love for God, love for one's fellow man. And now that we're saved, we're being ruled and governed by not only the righteous one, but the event of the cross and what we see there.

Also to be governed by The righteousness means to be governed by the righteous verdict.

On the day that we believed in Jesus, God rendered a verdict about us, and He said, I will from this day forward forever think of your sins as forgiven and will forever think of you as righteous with the righteousness of Jesus, and I will always treat you accordingly. God wants that reality to govern us, guys. God's allowing that reality to govern Himself. God is saying, I will forever be bound by this decree and this decision I've made about you to always think of you as forgiven and to always think of you as righteous with the righteousness of Jesus.

To be a slave to the righteousness is to be governed by the righteous one, the righteous act, the righteous verdict, and also the righteous call that God delivers upon us, calling us to live a righteous life, and that leads to a third direction. And that is in terms of what do we do with that now we have something really active here with direction number 3, and that is present your members as slaves to this righteousness the way you once did to sin. Present your members as slaves to this righteousness the way you once did sin.

Paul says, I'm speaking in human terms, because of the weakness of your flesh.

For just as you presented your members as slaves to impurity, And the lawlessness resulting in further lawlessness. Look what he says. So now present your members as slaves to the righteousness resulting in sanctification. For when you were slaves of sin, you were free.

In regard to righteousness, and last week we focused on the words just as and then so now there's a sense in which Paul literally is telling us to think back to the way we were before we were saved, to think about our devotion. To sin prior to us coming to faith in Christ, how we devoted our time to sin, how we pursued sin. We didn't wait for sin to come to us. We went looking for sin.

We were willing to sacrifice time, sacrifice money, sacrifice relationships in our pursuit and devotion to sin. We applied great energy into our sin. And we persevered in our sin. Many times when we were sinning, it turned out to be a really bad experience, right?

But that didn't make us stop. We persevered and tried to become even better at it. As the days wore by, we were persistent and persevere. We were passionate about sin.

We were bold and brazen in our sin. Think Charlie Sheen. A guy who is passionate. About himself, passionate about his sin, he's bold and brazen, doesn't care what anyone thinks about him.

He's going to do what he wants to do. That's a man who's committed to his sin. And living for himself, and that's the way all of us were outside of Christ. And Paul is saying literally, just as you used to be devoted to sin.

So now, I want you to go as gangbusters with righteousness as you used to with sin. I want you to go as crazy with righteousness, and in your pursuit of righteousness, and in your practice of righteousness as you used to be. In your pursuit and practice of sin, in fact, look what he says in verse 20. This is interesting.

He says, For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. Why does he throw that in? Well, I think what Paul's trying to say is he's trying to say, I want you to be as committed to righteousness now as you used to be to sin before you came to Christ. And he's also saying this, I want you now to walk and live as free from sin as you used to live free from righteousness before you were saved.

You didn't care anything about the cross. You didn't care anything about the influence of the righteous one and allowing yourself to be governed by Him and to be governed by the reality of the cross event and, and by the reality of justification. You are totally living free from the influence of righteousness from that standpoint, and Paul says, I want you now to live as free from your former sin as you used to live completely free from righteousness. The question we ended on last week, is this question, if somebody knew you before you were saved, and they know you now, and they knew the way you lived before you were saved, and they know the way you live now, would they say, That person is as passionate about righteousness as they used to be about sin.

Would they make that observation? As I was studying this passage, I could not help but remember. A sermon that CJ Mahaney preached that I listened to about a year ago and I found that sermon and I started listening to it and sure enough it was as I remembered. CJ's not even trying to make this point, but it serves our point this morning and so I want to share it with you.

He's talking about And the message His life before Christ, and there was a point where he experienced a conversion from alcohol to drugs, OK, and, and he's telling about that moment in his life and what followed. And let me read this to you. He says, I can still remember the evening that I first smoked marijuana, and that evening as I left the apartment of an older friend, I was passionate about what just took place. I resolved that a transition just took place in my life from the world of alcohol to the world of drugs, and I pursued the world of drugs, all to my shame as passionately as I could.

I wasn't passive about this. I was passionate about this. I found my way to every drug induced experience I could short of heroin. And the only reason I did not do heroin was because I was afraid of shots.

I took LSD like it was vitamin C. I took it on a daily basis. I took it repeatedly. I took it over a lengthy period of time and sadly, to my shame, I didn't just passionately pursue sin.

I recruited others to passionately participate in the pursuit of sin. I recruited others. I trained them in this passionate pursuit. I was immersed in the drug culture.

I was passionately pursuing sin and immorality in every possible form. Now what intrigues me as I, as I read those two slides to you is this If you take the exact wording that I just read, And remove the words marijuana, LSD, drugs, immorality, and sin. You just lifted those words out, threw them aside, and replaced those words with Jesus Christ and gospel. You've got a pretty decent description of the way that CJ Mahaney lives his life today, right?

In fact, let me just read it to you this way just for the fun of it, OK? Listen to this. I can still remember the evening that I first embraced the gospel, and that evening as I left the apartment of an older friend, I was passionate about what just took place. I resolved that a transition just took place in my life from the world of sin to the world of following Christ, and now I pursue the world of following Christ as passionately as I can.

I'm not passive about this. I'm passionate about this. I try to find my way to every experience of Christ I can. I partake of gospel truth like it is vitamin C.

I take it on a daily basis. I take it repeatedly. I take it over a lengthy period of time. And I don't just passionately pursue Christ.

I recruit others to passionately participate in the pursuit of Christ. I recruit others. I train them in this passionate pursuit. I am immersed in the culture of Jesus Christ.

I am passionately pursuing Christ and His righteousness in every possible form. Amen. anyone that would have known CJ Mahaney before he was saved and watches the way he lives now, they would notice one thing is consistent. And that is, as gangbusters as this man was towards sin, that's the way he is towards the gospel, and Jesus Christ, and his righteousness.

And so I just want to leave that question with all of us. I just, are, were you more passionate about sin before you were saved than you are about righteousness now? I think sometimes as believers we just expect holiness to come walking up to us and we're bummed out that we got saved and now this is going to be a lot of work, but what, it never bothered us that sin took a lot of work. Before we were saved.

And a person becomes a believer and before they were saved when they sang the songs of Satan. They pay big money to go to concerts where they can sing with other people the songs of Satan, and I guarantee you they're not standing at a concert just like like dead, like I can't wait till this is over, but then that same person maybe becomes a Christian and They don't sing songs of righteousness nearly with the abandon that they used to sing the songs of Satan. In fact, John Wesley is providing instructions for believers on how to sing gospel songs, how to sing in church, and one of his instructions is sing the way you used to sing the songs of Satan.

With the passion and abandon that you used to sing the songs of Satan.

How passionate were you about sin? How passionate are you now about righteousness? I have no doubt in a church of our size that there are people who habitually attend Cornerstone who've never truly experienced conversion. You think you're saved, but you're not really saved.

God's spirit has never regenerated you to where you belong to Jesus. I'm also convinced that there are many who attend our church that are truly, genuinely saved. But you're not making the adjustment. You're not getting used to your new reality in Christ, and you need to get with the program of becoming a student of the glory of what is yours in Christ, and, and actually even look at how you used to be with sin and pursue righteousness with the same abandon that you used to pursue sin with.

Look what he says in verse 19. We learned a very valuable lesson in verse 19 about sanctification. He says, present your members as slaves to the righteousness resulting in sanctification. What we observe here is that it's not so much, at least in this context, that sanctification is something we pursue.

Sanctification is simply something that happens as a byproduct of us doing something else, and that is allowing ourselves to be governed by the righteousness, the righteous one, the righteous act, and the righteous verdict that God has delivered upon. sanctification is a result. In fact, now let me give you a more technical definition of sanctification. Sanctification could be defined as the lifelong process by which justified believers become in their practice increasingly set apart from sin and increasingly set apart to God.

Sanctification is not just pulling away from sin. It's pulling away from sin and coming closer to God in your practice. And the closer you get to God, proportionately, the more you hate sin because sin ruins the party. Sin ruins the feast that you're having between you and God.

And progressively, as we become acclimated to the reality of all that is ours in Christ. The reality of our justification being governed by Jesus Christ and the cross event we find happening as a result of that sanctification. It's almost like we catch ourselves becoming sanctified as we orient our lives and feed upon these realities that happen to us instantly on the day of our conversion. In fact, one scholar who's done a lot of thinking and writing on the subject of justification and sanctification says it this way, and I would highly commend this to you.

If this is a simplification, it's or an oversimplification, it's barely an oversimplification, but I like the way he says this. He says sanctification is simply the art of getting used to justification. That's what it is. It's not like you get saved and now you're praying for some second work of grace that you've got to pray for and pray through on and wait on God for.

No, sanctification is simply the art of getting used to your justification and all that you have and that is true of you now by virtue of that justification that occurred on the day of your conversion. So let's embrace that and embrace this righteousness that belongs to us, orient our lives towards it, feed upon it, and we will catch sanctification happening in our hearts and lives as a result of that. There's 1/4 direction that we can infer from Paul's writing here in Romans 6.

As we come to verse 21, and that is this if you Want to really get acclimated to the new reality that is yours in Christ, and walk in the good of that.

Number 4, never let yourself forget the outcome of your past sins. Never let yourself forget your past sins and Never fail to remember your past sins for the disappointing, dismaying, death producing things that they really were. Paul's talking to genuine believers here, and he wants them to think. He's like, therefore, what benefit were you then deriving from the things of which you are now ashamed for the outcome of those things is death.

Think back to the way you lived before you were saved. You were devoted to, passionate about your sin. You were surrendered to the sin master doing whatever the sin master wanted you to do. And what did you get for all of that?

For all of your labor, for all of your sacrifice and the service of sin. What did you get from that? He says, what benefit or literally what fruit were you then deriving from the things of which you're now ashamed, the outcome of those things is death on every imaginable level. Separation from God, eternal separation from God, were it not for the intervention of Jesus Christ and His saving grace.

Also death in relationships, death in your heart, darkening that follows. It's death on so many levels, the death of opportunity, the death of everything you sacrifice in your pursuit of sin. Just from what he's saying there, we observed that what we, what did come from our past sins is shame, a shame that lingers with us to this day. I remember talking to someone in our church.

A couple of years ago who lived a pretty wicked past. was involved in a lot of sin, has known the Lord for over 2 decades now. Wonderful godly saint. And I asked this person, how often do you think about your past sins without even trying?

What factor do those sins play in your life from day to day? This person said, not a day goes by that I'm not haunted by the things that I did before I was saved. That's ongoing sense of shame, remorse, and regret. As a result of past sins, that's So the sin master, you surrender to the sin master, and that's what the sin master gives you, and also it gives you death.

See guys, here I think Paul is wanting us to go here and think about this because One of the dangers that we often can be subjected to if we're not careful is that we can remember our past sins, but we don't remember them for what they really are. We don't remember them as the ugly, disgusting, foul smelling, disappointing, death producing things that they really are. What happens is that, we hate those sins when we're in them. And we repent and we come to Jesus and we're walking in freedom and then as time goes by our memory of those sins starts getting airbrushed.

And sanitized and we began to forget what really made those sins so dark and repulsive and why we renounced those sins in the first place and that's why we often go back into those imprisoning containers of sin and then when we go back we're like, oh, I remember now what stunk so bad about this sin. You ever done that? Even in sins, seasons of sin that we've had since we've become believers and we're inside of it, it's like I've got to get out of this and we repent and we come back to the Lord and we're walking in freedom and then our memory of those sins gets sanitized and airbrushed and, and we can very easily find our way back to them.

And then in the middle of that sin again, we're freshly reminded of what really stunk so bad about those sins.

We're like the Israelites. They were in Egypt. Under bondage and given a double workload under Pharaoh, right, they get miraculously delivered and they're not long in the wilderness before they're like, oh, if we could just go back to Egypt. Where there was we could eat leeks and garlic and onions, and they remember the food that they ate, they're completely forgetting about the bad stuff they remember only the good stuff.

They're forgetting about the bondage, the slavery, the bad breath they had from the garlic, the leeks, and the onions, and They're just remembering the positive things, and I remember as a kid reading those stories in Sunday school and in church, and I'm like, how could they be so stupid. And yet I again and again in my life have been just as stupid. Going back into a sin and then in the middle of it, it's like, oh, I Now I, I'm being freshly reminded now why I don't want to be here.

In fact, a few years ago I got caught up in a vortex of sinful thoughts that just caused me enormous pain inside, and, and, and I woke up at like 2 in the morning just caught in this, this painful whirlwind of thoughts and anxieties, and I just pulled out a tablet and I've done this a number of times and I just started writing.

It's like I want, I want to write down exactly what I'm feeling so that this journal entry can serve as a signpost to remind me why I never want to come back here. Because it was something I had pulled away from and ended up the memory of it got airbrushed and I get back in the middle of it and it's like, oh, now I know what really stinks so bad about this. The psalmist does exactly this in Psalm 32. David, he commits adultery with Bathsheba and murders her husband and lives in self-denial, or denial and self-deception for a number of months, and he gets confronted by Nathan the prophet.

He repents. He writes Psalm 51, God forgive me, cleanse me of my sins, and restore the joy of my salvation. God answers that prayer. And then David in Psalm 32 is Writing a song of celebration, right?

How blessed is the man whose sins are forgiven, to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity, and he's just celebrating this grace and this forgiveness and restored relationship. And yet amazingly, early in Psalm 32 in the Psalm of celebration, David makes a journal entry. He's like, I've got to write this down. I don't want to forget this.

I don't want to forget what my season of sin was really like. I want to write this down so I can always refer to it and never forget, he says in Psalm 32 3 and 4. When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long, for day and night your hand was heavy upon me. My vitality was drained away as from the fever heat of summer.

I am sure that if David At any point in the future, found his thoughts going in the wrong direction back towards his sin. I'm sure he started singing these words to himself. He's like, I do not want to forget. I know what this was like.

I wrote these words down. Sin is disappointing. Sin is disgusting. It never, it never produces a fruit that you end up liking or that is beneficial in any way.

In fact, what we've learned from Romans 6 is you could probably make a list of at least 4 things that serve as outcomes of sin. Number 1, enslavement. We learned that in verse 16. We become a slave of whatever we surrender ourselves to.

So bondage and enslavement, you can use the word addiction there if it's rightly understood. Also, sin produces further lawlessness. That's why it's impossible to tell one lie. One lie breeds another and then another one sin breeds another sin.

So it just takes you deeper and further than you wanted to go initially. And also it brings shame, and it brings death on many levels. Paul says, I don't ever want you to forget your old master or your old slavery to the sin master. Don't ever forget the master that sin was to you.

And so when sin comes to you all dressed up and says, hey, now that you're under grace, we can actually continue our relationship now. Paul's like, no, remember, remember the sin master, remember the sin master for who he really is. And reject him outright. That leads to a 5th and a final direction that we can infer from.

This passage, and that is if you want to get acclimated to the new reality that is yours in Christ and walk in the good of that day by day, cherish the new economy of slavery to God under which you now live. Think about, become a student of, become an expert in Study and cherish your new reality, the new economy of slavery to God under which you now live. Look what he says in verse 22. He says, but now having been freed from sin, and enslaved to God, we're enslaved to God.

And you might read that and go, yep, there it is again, we're enslaved to God. We've got to do whatever God wants us to do. That's the new life in Christ. Yes, it involves that.

But that's not the first place that your mind ought to go. When you think about being enslaved to God. Back in this day when a master purchased a slave, the master was assuming full responsibility. For the care of that slave, and I will make sure the slave is clothed and fed and has shelter and accommodations.

And if anyone messes with this slave, they're messing with me. This slave is my property, and I assume full responsibility for this person that is now my property. And so when you think about it this way, there's beautiful aspects to being enslaved to God. He's now our master.

He's purchased us because he wanted us. How's that? He wanted us, he wanted to buy us for himself from the slave market of sin, and in buying us and being our master, God is saying, I will now assume full responsibility for your care, for your life, to make sure you're properly fed, properly clothed, down to the smallest detail. That you have sufficient accommodations and shelter.

In fact, I've got my son right now working on a dwelling place for you to live forever because that's my responsibility. That's not your responsibility. That's my responsibility because I'm your master and you belong to me. And if anyone messes with you, they're messing with me.

Because I'm your master and you belong to me, and yes, in addition to all that I've just said, being enslaved to God does involve God giving us directions and commands and us obeying what he says, but it's in this environment. of all of these other aspects that I have mentioned, now having been freed from that old sin master that only paid you death, and shame and regret and further lawlessness and deeper slavery, you're now Under a new master, and that is God, and he says, and under God you derive your benefits resulting in sanctification, which is growth in holiness, and the outcome, which is eternal life, which is not only Quantitatively like a life that lasts forever, but it's eternal life according to Jesus in John 17:3 I believe, is to know God, the only true God in Jesus Christ whom He has sent.

Eternal life is an intimate relationship with God the Father and God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. It's, it's eternal life and all that is found inside of that life.

That's the new economy under which we find ourselves, and he closes the chapter by saying this 4 the wages of sin. is death, but the free gift, or literally the charisma of God. The gracious gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Let me just give you a visual so you have this in your mind.

It's not that we do sin and we get wages from someone of death. No, it's when we sin we're surrendering to the slave master, and sin pays us the wages. Of death on every imaginable level. But now under the new economy, being in Christ, we are under God, and what we receive from Him is a charisma, is a gracious gift, and it is the gift of eternal life and all that is found inside of that life in terms of blessing, in terms of intimacy and relationship with God, freedom from sin, and on and on the list can go.

It turns out upon a closer look, That there's something a little deeper that's happening in verse 23. Look again at this verse in your Bibles, for the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. When you think about it, guys, Paul's not just saying that the wages of our sins that we commit from day to day is death or the wages of our sins that we consciously committed before we were saved is death. That's true.

But Paul told us in Romans 5 that something deeper and more profound that even preceded our first conscious sin is going on, and that is that Adam, thousands of years ago, committed an act of transgression or sin, and Paul tells us in Romans 5, as a result of Adam's sin, death spread to all men, right? That's why children, little children who've never made a conscious choice to sin, or even a child in the womb can experience death even though they've never ever themselves made a choice to sin, because any objective observer would notice that death has spread to all men.

How did death enter into the human race? It did.

So because Adam thousands of years ago, surrendered himself in one awful moment to the sin master and did what the sin master wanted him to do. And as a result of that, Adam and all of the human race ever since, all of us, we are essentially receiving royalties on that decision that Adam made in surrendering himself and ultimately the human race to the sin master. But Glory be to God. Jesus said, you guys are contracted out as a race and as individuals to receive the wages of death.

Here's what I'm going to do. I will, I will put myself in your position, and I will receive in my person. The wages that you deserve for the sins that you've committed, and I will receive in my person the royalties from the sin of Adam. I will bear that in my own person on the cross, so He moves us aside and He receives those wages that we should have received.

And in that act of pure, unadulterated, glorious righteousness, Jesus thereby purchased for us an eternal life that is now ours. And belongs to those who have put their trust in Jesus. God raised Jesus from the dead, and He's brought us into a whole new economy underneath the charisma of eternal life. God's not given us wages.

He's given us a gift of eternal life that was very costly, but Jesus purchased that, and we daily are the recipients of the royalties that Christ earned by virtue of His perfect act of righteousness on the cross. What is not to love? About a God like this. What is not to love about a righteousness like this?

What is not to love about being able to live in obedience to and in service to a God who has served us. In this profound way. I want to ask you to bow your heads this morning. We're going to take an offering in just a moment.

We would encourage you to give. As the Lord leads you to give. If you're here today, you've never put your trust in Jesus. You can do that right where you're seated just Just turn from the sins you're trusting in and turn to Jesus, not even turning just from your sin.

Turn from your righteousness. Come on, look at the cross. You're looking at a righteousness that far outshines yours. Embrace Christ's righteousness, and say, I want Jesus to be my Lord, my Savior, and my righteousness.

Just call out to God where you're seated and receive that gift that God would love to give you. For those of us that are believers, I just want to say to all of you, you're justified, you're free, get used to it. And enjoy a life day by day of being a student of these things and getting yourself acclimated to the glories of what is yours in Christ. Father, we just come to you at this time and thank you for what you've accomplished.

We probably the the most mature person in this room probably doesn't understand more than 20% of the magnitude of what you have accomplished and what belongs to every believer on the day of their conversion. But we want to know, Lord. We want to know, remove the scales from our eyes that we might see. And know and give us the grace to get used to these things and to live accordingly.

And thank you for using our brother, the apostle Paul, and using your word here in Romans 6 to help us in that journey. Lord, we give our offerings to you with gratitude in our hearts for all that you've done for us. Receive these funds, do much with them at the same time we give ourselves to you and ask you to do much with us for your glory. In Jesus' name we pray, and all God's people said,