Toward a Christian Worldview: Romans 7:1-13

we are in Romans chapter 7 starting in verse 1 and what we're going to talk about tonight is it's a little bit to put difficult to put into a nutshell it's really worldview issues the things that that Paul's laying out for us these are things that the Christians every Christian should understand this stuff like we all should know these things but we don't all necessarily knows we know these things there's some Christians who might be believers in Jesus and they may love the Lord and they might love the Bible but yet they have perhaps some sort of filters they view the world through that aren't biblical and aren't godly and what if that's us like what if what if I'm one of those people you know what if I'm viewing things in an unbiblical sense my own issues or other people's issues and this is causing me to make bad decisions not even realizing that what I'm doing is not ultimately honoring to the Lord and helpful and so as we do this stuff it might seem like the kind of thing where you just kind of go oh that's interesting but not realize how foundational it is I mean when you drive by the foundation of a new construction you don't stop and just look at the foundation like wow look at that foundation man look at that cement how well late is that oh look at the corners how perfectly 90-degree angle they are you don't think of these things yet everything else matters I have a buddy who his job is to inspect the ground that they're building on to make sure that it can hold the building in the structure before they even lay the foundations before anything else that's kind of a worldview thing the worldview is sort of everything else it's on your worldview so let me make sense of this will start to Romans chapter 7 verse 1 it says or do you not know brethren for I speak to those who know the law a little little side note the the audience that Romans is intended for are people who are familiar with the law they're familiar with the Old Testament they doesn't necessarily mean it were Jewish but they knew the law although which means probably a lot of them were Jewish Jewish converts to Christianity so I speak to those who know the law that the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives don't you know this the law is only applicable to you as long as you live and the knee he explains for the who has a husband is bound by the law to her husband as long as he lives but if the husband dies she's released from the law of her husband so then if while her husband lives she marries another man she will be called an adulteress but if her husband dies she's freed from that law so that she is no adulteress though she has married another man now let me first say this people will miss the point on this passage this passage is not about divorce this passage doesn't mention divorce this passage doesn't even have divorce in mind it only has two situations a married woman who marries another man while she's still married to this guy or a married woman whose husband dies and in she marries another man these are these are the two situations it has in view it's an analogy about a married woman it's not a teaching on divorce I just say this because one day one of these days I'm going to do a full-on go through the Scriptures and collect all the passages about marriage divorce remarriage and all that kind of stuff and there's a lot of passages and it's a big topic and I want to cover that carefully and thoughtfully but that's not today because right now I'm going to Romans chapter 7 and it really is not what we're talking about so it's kind of a distraction for tonight so it although I'll say in large part the biblical teaching our marriage is extremely simple but life is very complicated and so when we try to approach it with the complexities of life we should be thoughtful so that that that can wait and if you can't wait then I say go do your own study you look at you wanna study marry go look up all the biblical passages about marriage do your own Bible study pull them all together and find out what's true so this I'll take this is kind of a teaching moment I remember when I was working at a preschool when I was in high school I worked at a preschool ROP preschool right a reasonable occupational program they teach teens how to like work and so I did a preschool and at one point we were traveling with the class and you're sort of watching over a few of the kids and making getting him from point A to point B and Miss Marlene the preschool teacher she sees a butterfly and she stops and she's like teachable moment and she tells the class class do you see this butter sly and then she starts telling them about the butterfly and how it used to be a different creature and how it metamorphosed metamorphosize old metamorphosized what is what's the word I'm looking for your metamorph Metamorpho lies into another creature and then and then she and then she told us then she turns to us the helpers and she goes this is what's called a teaching moment life is full of teaching moments it's good to stop when you when you reach them and to teach the kids something because it applies to what they're going through so they'll be more ready to receive it and so I thought that was interesting well here's a teaching moment sometimes we missed the point you could read Romans 7 and think it and think the first you know three verses here is all about marriage it's not about marriage it's an analogy right what we have to know is the author of Romans and really the Holy Spirit is trying to build a case trying to explain a big concept there are some things that just don't fit in Twitter posts that God is trying to communicate to us so as you have to think in more than 160 characters and this is what we're being called to do especially in the book of Romans in the book of Hebrews you don't understand Hebrews because you were looking for random verses to pick out instead of trying to get the whole concept that it was a flow of thought and the the major passage is not just a verse and so this is a good thing for us to learn it is a teaching moment right we should study passages not just verses so what is the point what is Paul's point in Romans 7 he's saying the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives that was from verse 1 the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives and here's my here's my proof my example my analogy the guy's married to the woman without the law of their marriage holds until he passes away and now she's free to marry another that's the law has dominion over the man as long as he lives he dies it no longer applies so he describes those two situations the woman she's she's a widow she gets remarried that's okay because she is quote released from the law of her husband then there's a woman who's still married and she gets married again that is not okay that's called adultery so this is drawing from biblical principles that death breaks the tie between spouses and then we're saying here that this means something about you and me and our relationship to God and the law so this is more than a Twitter post this is this is what might be kind of uninteresting to some people and fine but it's rather profound actually so the parallel issue relates how we get saved and how we relate to God verse 4 he starts to unpack how to apply this analogy therefore my brethren you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ that you may be married to another to him who was raised from the dead that we should bear fruit to God we talked last week and any week before about this idea that there's there's an atom we all die but in Christ we all live Adam represented us also in Adam we kind of all die in Christ represented through baptism we goes into the death and the resurrection of Christ we positionally change who we are and how we relate to God our new head is Jesus you know he's my new representative and so now here he's saying that through this death in Christ we have become dead to the law so Christianity here through the body of Christ it is based on the idea that Jesus is physical death accomplished everything for us it wasn't just an example it actually affects me that when I put I just put my faith and trust in him and then that thing that he did impacts my life for eternity forever this is why Christians are always thankful and grateful because of these things so it's real tangible benefits not just an example so we're like the woman our dead husband is the law our new husband is Jesus that's the application that's the analogy and how it parallels with with our with our worldview I am dead to the law I'm alive and married to Christ now in fact that this is carried not just through one author of the New Testament this is a constant theme where the Bride of Christ read revelation in a read these other passages we're the Bride of Christ Jesus himself told parables about how he's the bridegroom he's coming and we're the you know so the beautiful stuff so I have some questions as I read verse 4 if I'm dead to the law how how was I married to it before I mean this analogy about a husband right so how is it that I was married to the law well that would be I think through sin I think sin sort of married me to the law in the same sense that if I get pulled over for speeding and I'm given a traffic ticket I'm now married to this thing I have to pay this ticket I have to pay my debt and it was my sin that brought me into a irrevocable encounter with the law that brought it was gonna bring penalty upon my life this is a perfect parallel with my relationship with with God because of sin I sin I bring the consequence of death into my life so sin and death that's my marriage the law so in what sense next question and what sense is a lot dead to me or am i dead to the law what is meant by this well one analogy could be this that there's a there's a death penalty now after the person pays the death penalty they don't pay it again like you're dead it's over it's done it's done for and Jesus who paid the death penalty for my sin he stood in my place he paid the penalty now I cannot then have to suffer again for the things which he has already paid the fine has been paid so there's that Romans 6 talked about this it uses the phrase as we're trying to we're trying to tie together the things in the book of Romans we can understand not just verses but whole passages right we were baptized into his death Romans 6 says it says in Romans 6 verse 2 that we died to sin in Romans 6 8 it says that we died with Christ so my death is to sin to the law in other passages of Scripture to this world to myself and then I'm alive to Christ it's just this real change of life a position of everything so then it says that we should bear fruit to God in verse 4 the universe for that we should bear fruit to God this is then the purpose of my salvation so I'm saved by grace but I'm saved unto works that fruit to God I'm safe for something not just from the full so our work they're not those done out of fear like I'm trying to please God so if I please him and then he'll take me into heaven this is such a confused thing I I just want to like start over with the conversation of someone who says this like well Christians just obey got it because of fear of Hell and you just kind of look at him to be like man your foundations kind of messed up they're like you're not talking about Christianity that's not that's not the truth jesus said if you fear me obey my commands no he said if you love me if you love me obey my commands and the perfect love casts out fear and conspiratorial I'll be I'll be tormented in some future time for these things but God delivers us and then calls us to a fruit-based relationship of love and obedience to him so we would say this that if you're lacking fruit if you're lacking works godly works in your life then what you're really lacking is a relationship and the fruit is just a symptom of a problem that sin is often just a symptom of a deeper problem in the lacking in my relationship and even a Christian who's struggling with sin so often you can say you know what have you just gone to the prayer closet so to speak and just got on your knees to lord this sin is me breaking in my heart relationship with you I need to be restored to you and deal with it at the root of the problem that it really is relational between us and the Lord I remember having a when I was a younger believer having one particular guy I'd see him every like year or two and he loved the Lord real just a simple guy loved Jesus and he'd be like hey Mike how you doing I'm like oh hey Kevin how are you man you like hey how's your walk and I was always like a really personal question - okay but I always thought like oh and the funny thing was it and I'm not saying you should just walk up to strangers and ask them how their walk is I think sometimes you have a place in someone's life to ask this kind of question is sometimes you don't depend on your relationship you know but but it gets right to the heart of the issue it just gets right to the heart of the issue how's your relationship with the Lord truly not in your fantasy realm in reality how is your relationship with God and how's your walk because if the if the walk is there the fruit we'll come the fruit will come in so sometimes I didn't like hearing that question so what van based on Romans seven what's my relationship with the law now well I'm dead to it yeah but but this gets complicated because I look at the Old Testament law and I go am I am I really dead to this thing like what about the part this is like don't murder does that mean I can murder because I'm dead to the law well of course not there are certain moral laws there are certain things that carry through that would be true for all people of all times but there's certain things that are for Israel and we realize that this was to teach us a lesson a tutor to bring us to Christ and now we can say I'm dead to the law he'll get more into this in Romans 14 he'll actually address this topic but in summary here's how I treat the Old Testament law as you're reading through it on your own personal time in the word I learned from it but I'm not under it I think that's a great summary I learn from it I'm just not under it so I don't want to be the extreme of casting out the Old Testament as though it has somehow inferior no its foundational but I don't want to sit here and start acting as though Christ has not delivered me from sin and death and the law and forget that as well so I learned from it but I'm not under it then in verse 5 as we continue it says for when we were weak in the flesh the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death we were when we were in the flesh this is a past tense thing right I think he's talking here about in the flesh he's talking about before you're saved later on he'll talk about in my flesh as this thing that still abides with him but when you were in the flesh like you like this is the your position of who you are you're just carnal you're in the flesh this is when you are not yet born again you're not yet given a spirit of a right relationship with God like jesus said to John or in John 10 Ditka demas he says this I'll quote it Nicodemus first said to him in response to the whole idea of being born again how can a man be born when he's old remember this this is so funny because I've actually heard people say this in response to the idea of being born again can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and I was just like man you gotta read John three but he like is literally what he said so john jesus answered most assuredly i say to you unless one is born of water and the spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God that which is born of the flesh is flesh that which is born of the Spirit is spirit you're not marvel that I said to you you must be born again now Jesus is communicating about two births one that's natural in the flesh water you're surrounded by this water sac you know that's that's what you can have it for nine months and you're born the water breaks and all that and it's not literal water but neither were they worried about scientific like like an entirely accurate like nobody's worried about this at the time some people just read it according to genre of literature it is right but anyway um then there's the spirit birth right and so just sorry stop laughing of it the spirit birth is the new birth of the new the new born-again thing so there's really just two births but some people they think the water birth refers to baptism so yes we weren't of water and spirit so now I'm born three times I'm original birth in the flesh then I have a water birth baptism and have a spirit verse so I'm at three percent make sense to me so there's really just two bursts your initial physical flesh birth and that's what Romans is talking about when we were in the flesh and then the born-again you know you have a spirit so this is this is foundational stuff it's not super exciting but it's very powerful you know so when we were weak in the flesh the sinful passions were route which were aroused by the law and this is interesting wave aroused by the law did you read that what my sinful passions were aroused by the law okay in the Greek it's not nearly as strong as it is in the English they're trying to communicate it but in the Greek it's just a word dia where it says aroused which is means through the means through like diagonal like through you're going through something but but there is a sense in which it seems that it's saying somehow my sin met the law like my sinful desires met the rules of the law and I became even stronger in my desire to sin what's up with that what is up with that I think this is really interesting it's not that they were created the law didn't make me want to sin it simply sort of put a magnifying glass on those sinful things this is actually explained more when we get to verse 8 so wait until we get there to explain it more but let's keep this in mind the law somehow arouses my my sinful passions then it mentions that that these sinful passions they were at work in our members to bear fruit to death members just means body parts literal physical body parts arms and legs and teeth and eyes and stuff like that so members just means means that that's very typical in the New Testament for members just to mean body so it seems clumsy and English but that's the nature of translation sometimes it was originally written in a different language we're trying to understand to the best of our ability and the fruit it says it bore fruit to death or fruit to death now now as a Christian I'm born again I have the fruit of righteousness and that's to eternal treasures and eternal rewards but before I'm saved I'm in the flesh and I have my sins piling up and they're bearing fruit which is going to be more and more wrath quote storing up wrath as it says in Romans 1 the number 6 as we go on this is but now but now not in the flesh anymore but now we have been delivered from the law having died to what we were held by so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the old nosov the letter new concept new concept new worldview thing Christians can view things as the newness of the Spirit the old nosov the letter this is two different ways of living and serving the illness of the letter the newness of the Spirit I think this is like the old covenant versus the new covenant and we read about it in Jeremiah so if you flip back and go to Jeremiah chapter 31 if you like we're going to read one verse there but but we're going to go back hundreds and hundreds of years before Paul and this is I think what Paul had in mind he says it says but this is the Covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days says the Lord I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people Jeremiah is the one that speaks of New Covenant as so it was anticipated prophetically and the Jesus shows up and he fulfills it and he gives us this new covenant here's the new covenant in my blood and then we become born-again a new spiritual life so here we are taking what people people would do if they go to a friend and be like hey man Gino Jesus and they go oh yeah yeah I go to church now but do you know Jesus like no I rived I have a Bible but do you know Jesus is like dude I I'm a member of a church I even tie sometimes no man are you born again and what you're trying to communicate is this this concept of the old carnal life before Christ the new rebirth the new life in Christ not just new doctrines and new teachings but a life in Christ that we have that goes beyond just what words can explain so we serve in this not the oldest of the letter and I think serving and under the oldest of the letter is I'm trying to obey the Old Testament law and I'm constantly failing I have a life of constant failure constant disappointment constantly I'm not good enough and I don't measure up I'm watching these rules that come my way I'm realizing that internally I want to fight against them I don't even want to do this I'm carnal but serving in the newness of the Spirit is an entirely different kind of thing it's really is from the inside out the law comes at me and says you should do this and I go I don't feel like it I'll try because I know it's right but the work of the Holy Spirit in my life says you should do this and I go I know I want to Lord I want to I want to it's just a change it's a change in the whole quality of the goodness that comes so why would I need to be delivered from the law in the first place because that's what verse 6 said having now been delivered from the law because the laws for sinners as he's explained earlier the whole purpose of the laws for sinners and you kind of you kind of know this but first Timothy 1:9 says knowing this that the law was not made for a righteous person but for the lawless and insubordinate for the ungodly and for sinners now if you have the perfect kit perfect child who always does perfectly all the time and you're leaving the house and you're like I'll be back in two hours and you're thinking of all the things you could tell them to do but why bother I have the perfect chat I'll be back I leave confident that everything will be fine when I return home but the number of rules you give your kid is in direct relation to how much you trust them right so the more rules the law is for the sinner you know like the more messed up you are the more rules I got to give you as I'm stepping out and you know this is this is proof that Alison thinks I'm really messed up when it comes to certain things in life because she's like all but do it this way into it that way I do this way and she's right because I probably will I was want to be like I don't need you to but I'm thinking I do need her to tell me it's just truth I don't even think about stuff and then I make a Madison yeah so it's true the rules are for that are for the rule breakers and the more breaky you are the more rouille you need and so this is this is the laws for sinners but I need be delivered from it because I'd be delivered from even my need for the law something's wrong with me that I even need you to tell me not to do this God something's wrong inside me and the Lord's going to work on that and also I need it to be delivered from the law because the law condemns me when I see the law and I commit all these crimes I get moral crimes against God I'm now standing condemned and I'm like I need deliverance from this I'm like the guy who's caught red-handed who's going to court and they're going to convict me and I'm going to get the sentence and I need some deliverance I can't plea insanity I can't I can't say I wasn't me it's all proven it's all right there and so I need deliverance because it condemns me and I also need deliverance because the law can't save me it could condemn me but it can't deliver me because once I've broken it it's broken like James says you broken one you broke them all so I stand there I like the analogy of the laws like a ten link chain and I'm hanging over the precipice of Hell by this 10 link Jain how many links do you get to break none man you hold it perfectly or you break one and the whole chain falls apart and so so is the case with the law so I all have sinned as it says if righteousness comes through the law then Christ died in vain scripture tells us and so Romans 8:3 we'll get there later it says the law was weak through the flesh so though the law in a sense if I could obey it perfectly I could work my way to heaven but nobody does because the weakness of our flesh so I need to be delivered from this the whole system's based on my brokenness I wouldn't need the law if I could obey the law I wouldn't even need it I would just do good the whole system is based on our brokenness I got to get out from under this thing I'm condemned so how do I do that I die to it just like the death of the husband delivered this woman from that marriage so the death of myself to the law separates me from this whole thing and I'm reborn in Christ in Christ I have a total depth to the law to sin to myself to the world these are all different passages of scripture that unpack these ideas and in Christ I have a total life a new life to the Spirit of God a new life of fellowship with the Lord eternal glory I will never die in my spirit to a new nature and a new identity to love goodness righteousness to God working not from the outside in with laws but from the inside out by the work of his Holy Spirit a beautiful beautiful thing and if I just got to say if you need this you just need to ask Lord I've been laboring my Christian life under rules and rules and rules wanting to kick against them feeling burdened feeling like it's not coming from inside out it's all from the outside in well then you need to be born again and God will work it from the inside out it will work from the inside out so what then is the the newness of the Spirit versus the oldest of the letter the oldest is a letter we just talked about that and you can see why we need to get out from under that because because we're lame we can't make it so the newness of the Spirit this is not feelings based walking in the newness of the Spirit living your life in the spirit is not does not mean that at every moment you are led by urges from the Holy Spirit now I'm not discounting that the Holy Spirit can in fact give you leading and guiding at any moment that can happen but there's our frequent times where you're not aware that the Holy Spirit is giving you any kind of specific direction and you can still be walking in the spirit because you're walking in the goodness of God and walking out love in your life so we're not necessarily led by urges God can do this and we shouldn't discount it but I don't see that as normal I don't expect as I'm driving on my way home to have the Holy Spirit tell me to take a left instead of a right I don't expect as I wake up tomorrow morning to just know exactly what God wants me to do at that moment I think God wants us to make decisions if he didn't want us to make decisions he would not have written the book of Proverbs he's like forget wisdom just do what I say okay we need wisdom because we do make choices and God wants us to just like you would want your children to make actual choices in life so that's not that's not newness of the Spirit it's not necessarily a feelings based or urged based living it's not gift focused it's not necessarily like okay speaking in tongues or get the prophecy or these types of things that's there's an element of that but this is like on the side kind of compared to our normal daily life most of your life is not exercising clear clear gift things and your most of your daily life it's it's basically being led by the spirit in the sense of these new internal desires an internal awareness of relationship with God and desire to serve Him that's the difference this is the first thing you notice when you actually get saved if especially you'd say that our older age when you've really were able to flesh out the flesh so to speak if you're like I know exactly what the flesh life is about and you get saved you're like Lord I I love you I know you I want to walk in you with you that's the newness of the Spirit that's the newness of the Spirit so it's how we serve how we serve but some misuse these terms the oldest of the letter and the newness of the Spirit and I just want to guard us against this some think that the oldest of the letter means anything that the generation before me used to do as Christians right so like if they sang hymns and I don't like hymns well then hymns is the oldest of the letter man neither the next old wineskins right and they used and abused these biblical terms to just attack whatever some generation before them did and others it would be the newness of the Spirit would be like just a certain vibe you have like in Calvary chapel's we tend to dress down instead of up and if somebody shows up and they're wearing like a three-piece suit and they're going to preach in their three-piece suit you're like man it's the littleness as a letter no there's nothing to do with anything it's just a three-piece suit it doesn't mean anything wear what you want you know you dress down you just have a different uniform I'll tell it and so on the newness of the Spirit some people misuse that term to mean anything that they feel good about have you caught this and this can actually lead them to be a little confused just anything they feel good about if there's a ministry they like and then the spear is moving in that ministry because I like them so there must be the Holy Spirit and it can be or maybe you just like them because they look like you or they talk like you or you met the guy and he made you feel good so you must be a good and maybe not the newness of the Spirit it's it's not new stuff or old stuff boldness of the letter is the carnal pre Christ's life newness of the Spirit is the born-again walking with Jesus life that's the difference so it's positional one was from the outside in one from the inside out alright so verse seven having a beat death to death let's move on what shall we say then is the law sin certainly not on the contrary I would not have known sin except through the law for I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said you shall not covet but sin taking opportunity by the commandment produced in me all manner of evil desire for apart from the law sin was dead some people might misunderstand the law they think is the law sin what shall we say is it sin well of course it's not they might think the law is bad or the law is actually the problem and and here I think Paul's not just talking about the Old Testament law I think he's talking about whatever law has been revealed to you whether it's moral law like the Gentiles have proving within themselves they have it says in Romans chapter 1 and 2 or if it's talking about the more clearer and more exact laws that we have in the scriptures either way he uses the term seems both ways but something bad happens when the law meets my sin nature and you can see this in real life because what happens when people meet wet paint signs that's what happens in the law meet your sin nature you walk of it it says wet paint and you like it is what it that's that's our sin nature now do I blame the wet paint sign some people do some people do what you shouldn't put a wet paint sign up and I imagine the guy that keeps painting benches poor guy whoever you are we all feel that for you and so I guess he's not out of a job she just keeps crackin repaying I imagine he's like well what am I supposed to do I don't put the sign of you sit on it get the whole thing all over you I put the sign up you put little marks all over it is the sign dad is Allah bad know the law is not bad let's not blame the wet paint sign the issue is this I have sinned nature I have sinful desires and when someone tells me not to do something I find out how much I want to do it so the lot exposes my sin nature it draws it out it draws it out I know I had a kid one time with youth ministry over here he were sitting right over here and he comes up and he says he says uh all I have a joke to tell you guys that's really bad I probably shouldn't and I was like oh good then don't and he was like there's this guy and he he like can't hold it back he can't hold it because there's something in us that just knows I just want this I want what I want and the more I'm told not to the more I want it the problem isn't the law the problem is me but this is what this is how like we said earlier how the law arouses my sin nature it's just it accesses what was already there I know that I'm bad because when I'm told not to do something I wanted that much more so something must be wrong inside of me now without any moral law imagine if you had no awareness of morality of any kind no awareness in any way all you have is desires you have no way of identifying whether these desires are good or these desires are bad you just have desires and you just do what you want and then when the law comes or moral awareness comes now imagine you're suddenly flooded with moral knowledge all of a sudden you can split the things you want into two categories good stuff bad stuff that's what the law does for us and then it reveals to us I have a lot of these desires that fit in the wrong category and that's not good so the law reveals two may have bad desires and it reveals to me that these things when I do try to resist them they're very strong indeed and it's very unfortunate and it becomes where I cry out Lord deliver me as well get there at the end of chapter 7 next time verse 9 it says I was alive once without the law but when the commandment came sin revived and I died now this this I find to be a really interesting verse not only is it carrying through the same you know foundational teaching about who we are and our nature as humans and all that sort of thing but what does he mean that he was alive once without the law but the commandment came sin revived and he died to my knowledge the best thing he could mean were the most clear thing to me I think could be wrong here but my opinion is that this passage is talking about a sense of age of accountability there was a time in his life where he became a morally aware and he realized that he was not he's not a good person the commandment came his moral awareness came and then sin fought against that as it as it always does when you tell it not to it says I want to and he became aware of this so there's not much in the scripture when it comes to the idea of like our babies really truly innocent I mean obviously they've not committed any any actual sins of the kind that we can imagine because it's not like they're conceptualizing sin you know they're just born they're screaming because they're like cold or hungry or something like that but they're not like thinking lustful thoughts or mini thoughts at all like at this point in time so so I I've always tended to lean towards the idea that that children it's would seem to me on my own human understanding was that they would seem to be innocent not by virtue of not having sin nature but by virtue of simply having never had opportunity to play out these things in any way shape or form David King David talks a little bit about this because he has a son who dies and I won't get into the whole story you probably know it but but he says this he says but now he is dead why should I fast can I bring him back again I shall go to him but he shall not return to me now that can be kind of you might think that's a little bit vague I'll go to him but he won't come back to me did David just mean I'll go to the grave but David had hope about a life beyond the grave read the Psalms he knew he'd be eternally with the Lord he'd be in the presence of God forever and so he thinks he can go to his son so he thinks his son is in the presence of the Lord or is in somehow in some sort of comfort or some sort of you know good place so to speak um now you could you could find a way around that but I would say that that's sort of something very comforting I think and I think for a lot of parents who've lost a child as well I sure hope so I sure hope that this this verse helps support the idea of the innocence of infants by virtue not of having no sin nature but above having no opportunity to play it out in the first place and I think that ultimately though we know God is just and God is good and he'll just he'll do the perfect thing from eternity back I will look and say yes God amen to that that was perfect that was the perfect thing you did but I think that this verse helps support that idea somewhat I was alive once without the law but when the commandment came sin revived and I died interesting interesting verse 10 then the commandment which was to bring life I found to bring death how is it bring life well when he gave the law to Israel he says to them do this and you shall live the commitments to bring life I'm giving you ways of life is to bring light and it was to bring life but because he disobeyed it he found it to bring death so the commandment which was to bring life I found to bring death for sin taking occasion by the commandment deceived me and by it killed me I think that there can be an application here by analogy into into the issue of gluttony sin taking occasion by the commandment to see me and by it killed me sin use the commandment to kill you so there's a desire in my heart to just eat and eat and eat and eat guys want to eat the world you know and then so I keep consuming things that are inappropriate too much too much too much and then eventually it kills me the very the very laws about why I was eating food because it nurtures and it brings nutrition and a branded taste good ends up being the thing those same laws those same rules about nutrition are the same reasons why it ends up killing me when I later you know get diabetes or get some other whatever ailment comes from me eating too much and then I pass away and so this is the case though for all of humanity because there are moral laws we've broken and by by it in a sense the law is like this like this in this knife you know it can heal or it can kill and when I hand it to my sin nature my scenarios thank you stab me in the chest that's that's how it kills me therefore the law is holy in the commandment holy and just and good has been what is good become death to me certainly not but sin that it might appear sin was producing death in me through what is good so that sin through the commandment might be become exceedingly sinfulness is we're gonna we're gonna in tonight on this concept Paul is he's driving in and the Holy Spirit is driving in this concept sin is exceedingly sinful this is where our Christian worldview needs to be grounded we have to realize that sin is actually very bad there aren't white lies there's just lies and are some lies worse than others absolutely but we have to wage every lie as being a pretty seriously bad thing are some sins worse than others absolutely they are absolutely they are would you rather be stabbed you once or 53 times we'll all take once but that's still really bad they're all they're all bad but there are of course variations but we have to do is think of it like this like like all sin is utterly exceedingly sinful yet I recognize that some sins are still worse by measure of other sins what we do is we say because this sin is worse than that sin then that sin must not be so bad that is not a Christian worldview that is not a biblical concept at all I should view every sin as utterly sinful not now this actually protects me from pride doesn't it because I see sins and others but I see some in me too and now I can't wage my sins as B somehow lesser to the degree that makes me okay and you're not but I realize I'm humbled sin is utterly sinful it produces death in me like James says when it's full-grown it brings forth death so tonight's tonight's study probably not the most exciting but this is foundational stuff and these are things that a Christian would listen to and go oh yeah amen amen but others would listen to it maybe even some Christians and go I don't know about all that like really are you sure because you're encountering the fact that your worldview isn't a biblical worldview and you need to let the Bible change the way you think so that you can you can see the whole picture the way God does let's pray father we thank you for your word we thank you for this passage in Romans 7 we pray we pray this Lord help us help us to see the world the way you see it we need to see it biblically we got to think biblically in life because we might casually have really unbiblical views that impact us Internet and impact our lives massively and we just pray Lord God we appeal to you give us your word and guide us in your truth and let us understand things the way you do let us see the world the way you do see ourselves the way you do see sin the way you do see the spirit the way you do Lord we just want to see everything like you do we pray that you'd renew our minds you'd renew our minds and God we we pray for safety on the way home tonight in the rain and whatever weather we're going to meet and we ask Lord that you just you go with us this week bless us let us walk in your spirit let us let us be really fully aware of what it means to walk in the newness of the Spirit in Jesus name Amen elaborate on those verses as I love the law kill yourself yeah the law well sin uses a lot to kill you so if the consequence of us of committing a crime is the death penalty then your sin in a sense when you commit that crime that's the sin it's using the law to kill you though the sin doesn't kill you directly it uses the law to do it so to speak oh if you obey it you live yes but if you hadn't done that you wouldn't have a death penalty and you and if you obeyed all the laws to be walking in the paths of life and righteousness but all have sinned and so what was what what could have brought life instead brought death which is why I've got to be delivered from this whole system of the oldest of the letter of earning my salvation or walking a perfect obedience I've got to be delivered from this because I don't do it and there's in the ads the element of deception I didn't even talk about this but yeah the element of deception is in sin or sin to cease me we could look at even see this she was deceived meaning that she really thought she was going to get good stuff out evening this she knew God said not to but she thought it was somehow going to work out for her like but not for me and we think we're the exception of the rule like I don't know it's okay though because we really love each other I mean there's like when we think we're the exception to the rule we have to realize there's a reason for the rule and sin deceives me it tricks me into thinking I can get away with sin I can be okay with sin that's why he says do not be deceived brethren deceitful lusts ephesians calls it and i just interestingly I find that like people who go into sin they the thing they're going after it after is usually the thing that they lose you know someone who like you have this young person who they have broken relationships they desperately want relationship and so they get into quick and dangerous or even sinful relationships and they're the ones who in older age have the worst relationships and the broken relationships and the hurt relationships and so by doing it the wrong way sin deceived them the person who uses drugs because they just want to escape life well while they're escaping life is getting way worse because of drugs so they'd use drugs because they were trying to improve their life in and of destroying their life the person who steals because they want quick money I mean find an old rich thief good luck you know the thief in the long run ends up in poverty it's sin deceives us the guy who's who's hurting in his marriage and he feels a lack of love for his spouse and so he cheats on his spouse destroys his marriage how much love is he feeling now the the thing that he thought would heal his the whatever was what was wrong with them sin deceives it tricks us and what we go for I mean the lazy man makes a lot more work for himself through his laziness there's like if you just think of sin after sin after sin where the thing that you're trying to accomplish it fails you the guy who's like at work he's like I'm not appreciated enough so I'm not going to work as hard maybe like well that'll make you more appreciated if you're the guy that's gonna get passed over for promotions and all that because your discontent you don't you don't you don't do what the Bible says to be diligent and work hard but the guy who's like I'm just going to work hard no matter what what everybody notices me or not everybody notices that so it's interesting how it works you know a person who's who's wanting loves so much from others that they end up being judgmental and harsh and cold and they do propelling the thing that they're going for because they won't just do it the scripture system they put on love towards others when I'm not asking you to love me that I'm just loving you anyways all of a sudden people love me because that's a nice kind of be around you know so sin just backfires over and over again and then finally the final result is it brings forth death you know the consequences cool well next week we get to talk about or next week are two weeks from now Oh wretched man that I am so that'll be a good study Oh [Music] [Music] and you're [Music]

Channel: Mike Winger

Views: 27,062

Rating: 4.9099097 out of 5

Keywords: Worldview, Christian, Christian worldview, Mike Winger, BibleThinker, Bible Thinker, under the law, are we under the law?, died with Christ, in the flesh, sin nature, why do people sin?, is the law sin?

Id: rRva7MW5dfc

Length: 46min 18sec (2778 seconds)

Published: Thu May 11 2017