Pastor Herb, why don't you give us an update on the Dad the Family Shepherds Conference which you're coordinating for our church this next weekend. Alright, if you have additional questions regarding the conference, be sure to see him after the service tonight. There's still time for all of you men to register. You say, well it talks about Dad and I'm not a dad yet. Well that's fine.
Maybe you will be one day and you'll be learning some principles that will help you, not only as a father but as a husband in your home. It was about seven years ago that there was a meeting of a lot of people in the boardroom over Grace Church Edina which was then called Edina Baptist Church. And the purpose of the meeting was to decide a name for the new church which was going to be in Edina and in Roseville. What were we going to call it?
There was an opportunity given to the congregation to bring suggestions to the attention of the leadership and there were some 70 plus suggestions. Some of them good and some of them perhaps less than good. But there were a lot of suggestions and we went through them one by one, ruling out the ones that didn't seem appropriate. And we went through the whole list and there wasn't one that just quite struck us. It wasn't quite there.
And then someone suggested Grace, Grace Community Church perhaps. And there were some who said, well I don't like the idea of community in there. We want to be a regional church. Let's just call it Grace Church. And then we decided that we would attach the name of the city or the suburb in which the church was located to it. And that's how we came up with the name Grace Church Roseville. It was not some complicated procedure although it did take some time to accomplish that.
We chose the name Grace for a number of reasons. The fact that Grace is the message that we preach and Grace is a word that has a warm sound to it. It has an attractive sound. People are not turned off by the word Grace. Can you imagine being called Law Church of Roseville? Let's suppose churches were named after what they're like. Divided Baptist Church. Lukewarm Methodist. I saw one for sure that was almost as bad. It was Corinth Baptist Church.
Now if you know anything about the city of Corinth, in the New Testament times you know that that's not exactly the kind of a name you want, but it was in a city called Corinth. I guess that was the reason it was called Corinth Baptist Church. We called ourselves Grace Church because we preach the gospel of the grace of God. Because we want our name to be one that communicates not only a message but an invitation for people to feel free to come and to hear what God has to say.
The apostle Paul taught the grace of God. His teaching about grace was so sweeping in the book of Romans as he addressed those believers in the city of Rome. His teaching about grace was so sweeping in its content that he anticipated some objections to what he had to say. God's grace by the way is defined in various ways, but it is God's favor isn't it? God's favor which is toward those who deserve wrath. Or it is God's undeserved favor toward us. Paul had a lot to say about God's grace.
Because of what he said, he knew that there would be some, particularly those of a Jewish background who would not agree with what he said about grace. Because they had a commitment to the law of Moses. One of the things that Paul affirms in the first five chapters of the book is that the grace of God is greater than the sin of man. The grace of God is greater than the sin of man.
For example in chapter five and verse twenty it says in the last part of the verse, where sin increased, grace abounded all the more. Where sin abounds, it says, God's grace super abounds. It exceedingly abounds. God's grace is greater than man's sin. And so Paul knew that there would be some who would say in response to that, well if that's the case, if my sin makes God's grace super abound, perhaps then I should sin all the more. And then God's grace will abound all the more.
And God will even be more glorified because I sin more. You see how that reasoning goes? And so the apostle Paul approaches that by a question in chapter six and verse one where he says, what shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace might increase? You see the apostle here envisions an antagonist. Someone who's going to attack what he said about grace. And so he approaches it with this question. What shall we say? Shall we continue in sin? Make that our lifestyle?
Shall we continue on that way so that God's grace can even abound the more? And thus God be glorified. His response is, may it never be. God forbid that it should be so. And then the apostle Paul taught in these early chapters of the book of Romans that the law was not given to provide a means of salvation by works. Now particularly those of the Pharisees disagreed with that. For to them the means of salvation was in fact keeping the law.
And they had elaborate ways of keeping hundreds of minute regulations in the law. Or so they thought they kept them. It was an outward righteousness, a superficial self-righteousness. Not one of the heart, not one that God could accept. Paul affirms in this book that the law was not given to provide a means of salvation by works. For example, in chapter 3 and verse 20 he says, because by the works of the law no flesh will be justified in God's sight.
That is, no flesh, no person can be declared right with God through the works of the law. Indeed the apostle goes on to say that the purpose of the law was actually to expose sin. God gave the law to define sin and to show the sinner his just condemnation before a holy God. Paul says in this verse, for through the law or by means of the law comes the knowledge or the recognition of sin.
Sin is there all along but until God gave some standards, some commands, that sin was not defined, it was not clarified. And so God gave the law with its standards. And once that was done then sin could be recognized for what it was. And in verse 28 he says, for we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the law. There are many cults today that call themselves Christian which mingle law and grace.
And they say yes you believe in Jesus Christ but you must also keep certain aspects of the law. When that is done grace is made null and void. You cannot mix grace and law. The apostle says here that the works of the law have nothing to do with justification because that is by faith. Well he could hear his antagonist say something like this, if I'm no longer under the law, if I'm free from the law, then I am free to live the way I want to without any restraint on me whatsoever.
So the apostle Paul anticipating that kind of response poses another question in chapter 6 and verse 15. He says, what then? And notice a very similar kind of construction there as in verse 1. What shall we say then? Here he says, what then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? He says may it never be. And so the apostle taught that the grace of God is greater than the sin of man.
He taught that the law was not given to provide the means of salvation by works but rather its purpose of being given was to expose sin and to show the sinner his just condemnation. Then he taught that the law actually not only exposes sin but it stimulates sin in the sinner. The law increases sin in the sinner. For example in chapter 5 and verse 20 he says, and the law came in that the transgression might increase.
One of the results of the law is that it actually stimulates the heart of the sinner to disobey. You see that very simply in a child. You say to a child, now don't touch that. Mommy just bake that cake and we're going to have it for supper for dessert tonight so don't you touch it. And mommy walks out of the room and what does little Johnny think about? The only thing he can think about is what that cake must taste like.
And the very command not to do it was actually an agitation within his little sinful heart to go over there and try it. And what you see in that simple illustration of a child works the same way with the law of God in the adult. The apostle Paul in chapter 7 points out his own experience. He said, I really didn't know what coveting was until I read what the law said, you shall not covet. And then he said, boy I was overwhelmed with it. Because you see the law of God agitates sin.
Now because he taught that the apostle Paul knew that there would be an objection. He knew that someone might well say, if the law then increases sin, if it stimulates sin in me, then the law is made sinful. And so the apostle answers that again by a question in chapter 7 and verse 7. He says, what shall we say then? Is the law sin? Is it made sinful because it stimulates sin in the sinner? He says, may it never be.
And so you see the apostle Paul goes ahead of his readers anticipating the objections particularly of those who came from a background of Judaism. Answering those objections in advance. Declaring the sweeping, the exceeding abundant grace of God toward sinners. The grace of God saves me from the wrath of God. Now the apostle Paul is going to go on to say in chapters 6, 7, and 8 that the same grace of God that saves me from the wrath of God also saves me from the power of sin.
That's what he's going to say. The same grace of God that delivers me from the guilt of my sinfulness is the same grace that enables me to overcome the power of sin in my daily life. He is going to say that the same grace of God that declares us right with God makes us righteous in our living. Theologians use two big words for this. God declaring us righteous is what? Justification. Now he says that in chapter 5, he uses that very word for example in verse 18.
He talks about the one act of righteousness of Christ and his death on the cross which resulted in justification of life. But notice in verse 19 he talks about that same obedience of Christ by which the many will be made righteous. That my friend is sanctification. Justification in verse 18. But being made righteous or constituted as righteous in verse 19 is sanctification. The one is a legal term.
God declaring us to be right with himself in his eyes to be righteous because of the work of Jesus Christ, an act of grace. But now God's grace goes on to work in our lives so not only are we declared righteous in the sight of God, but we are made righteous in the way that we live. The one is a legal term. The other is shall we say a lifestyle term. It is God working in us to make us righteous in the way that we conduct ourselves. You cannot separate justification and sanctification.
Justification or salvation is the theme of chapters, begins in chapters 3, chapters 4 and 5 of Romans. Now he's going to talk about sanctification, holiness in the life of the one who is believed, chapters 6, 7 and 8. There is no division here. There is a flow from chapter 5 right into chapter 6. The theme of tonight's message, which we're not going to finish tonight but which we will continue the Lord willing next week, is the key to victory over sin.
The text we're going to look at is found in chapter 6 verses 1, 2 and 3. It says, What shall we say then, are we to continue in sin that grace might increase? May it never be. How shall we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into his death? The key to victory is found in the simple phrase found in verse 2 where it says, We died to sin. That is the key.
It is the truth that is contained in those words, We died to sin. That being so, how can we live in it anymore as a habit of life, as a way of life? Because something profound has happened to us because we have been saved by grace. God has done a deep work in our lives. It is that we died to sin, to sin as a power in us. I want to talk first about that personal pronoun, this plural here, We. The apostle says, We died to sin. Of whom does he speak? Who are we that he talks about?
Well, let's answer that several ways. In the first place, we are those who were under the condemnation of God. Make no mistake about it. The we he is talking about here are those who were under God's just condemnation. Turn back to chapter 1 in verse 18. He says, The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. And we're all unrighteous, we're all ungodly. Therefore the wrath of God was exposed from heaven against us.
We were under the condemnation of God. Well, someone says, I'm not that ungodly. I'm not that unrighteous. Paul says to the one who thinks himself to be pretty good, to be moral, he says this in chapter 2 and verse 3, Oh man, do you suppose this when you pass judgment upon those who practice such things as mentioned in chapter 1, ungodly things, and you do the same yourself that you will escape the judgment of God?
It goes on to say in chapter 3 and verse 9, both Jews and Greeks are all under sin. You say, well I'm not a Jew and I'm not Greek. Well the word Greek here refers to those who are non-Jews. I'm sorry if you thought it referred to somebody who was born in Greece.
The apostle is saying whether you are Jewish and therefore had the law of Moses, or you are non-Jewish, Greek or Gentile, and had no exposure to the law, he says all are under sin, that is under the bondage of sin, under the condemnation of sin. And then he says in verse 23, this familiar verse that many of us use in our gospel presentations to others, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, all have sinned. So when the apostle says we died to sin, remember this.
First of all, he is talking to we who were under the condemnation of God, all of us. But then he is talking to those who were not only under condemnation, but who by the goodness of God were led to repentance. Back in chapter 2 he speaks to this, the fourth verse. He puts it this way, do you think lightly of the riches of his, God's, kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?
It is the grace, it is the goodness, the kindness, the patience of God that leads any sinner to the point of repentance, that is changing his mind regarding his sin, regarding who God is, regarding who Christ is, changing his mind about these matters. So that no longer does he see himself as righteous before God, self-righteous, but he sees himself as what he is, a sinner.
And he knows his guilt and he changes his mind about himself and he comes to God humbly in order to receive by an act of faith God's free gift of righteousness through Jesus Christ. The we that Paul speaks about in Romans 6-2 are those who were led to repentance and who are therefore justified ones, those who have been justified by faith as he says in chapter 3 verse 22. He speaks here about the righteousness of God which is through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe.
And then skipping down to verse 24, being justified as a gift by his grace. So he is talking to those who have been declared right with God, those who were under condemnation because of sin, but who now have by the goodness of God have been led to repentance and who have believed on Jesus Christ and who are therefore now declared right with God, who have that legal position. The we also refers to those that he calls in Romans chapter 4, the descendants or the sons of Abraham.
Look how he puts it in chapter 4 in verse 16. For this reason it is by faith, that is salvation, that it might be in accordance with grace in order that the promise may be certain to all the descendants, not only to those who are of the law but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, he says. Adding the parenthesis in verse 17, who is the father of us all in the sight of him whom he believed even God. What is Paul saying here in Romans 4?
He is saying that the we in chapter 6 verse 2 are the true descendants of Abraham. There is a great battle going on in the Middle East in this generation between those who are the descendants of Abraham through Isaac and Jacob and those who are the descendants of Abraham through Ishmael, the Jews and the Arabs. Both of them look back to father Abraham.
I want you to know tonight that as far as God is concerned, the true descendants of Abraham are not those who are his descendants according to the flesh, but those who are his descendants according to the spirit. This corroborates with what he says in Galatians chapter 3 and verse 29 where he says that all of us who have believed the promise of God in Jesus Christ, we are the true sons of Abraham. We are Abraham's descendants. So when he says, we died to sin, who are we?
We are the descendants of Abraham, the spiritual descendants of Abraham by faith. Then we can answer that question this way. Who are we? Well, we are those who are the recipients of God's blessings, blessings which he enumerates in chapter 5 verses 1 through 11. We went over this last Wednesday night in a prayer meeting Bible study, but let me just move through it quickly. He says that those who have been justified by faith have these blessings along with justification.
Peace with God, verse 1, access to God, verse 2. We have the blessing of the glory of God, verse 2. We have the working of God in our lives, verses 3 through 5. We have the love of God shed abroad in our hearts, verses 5 through 8. We have the deliverance of God from future wrath, verses 9 and 10. And we have joy in God, verse 11. Who are we? We who have died to sin. We are those who are the recipients of the gracious blessings of God, enumerated there in those verses of Romans 5.
But then who are we? Well, let's answer it another way. We are those who are the many that Paul mentions in the last part of chapter 5. For example, in verse 15 he says, for if by the transgression of the one, Adam, the many died. Who are the many? Well, we said that those are they who are identified with Adam. That's everyone born into the world.
He says, if by the transgression of Adam, the many identified with him died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, abound to the many. Who is the many in the last part of the verse? All of those identified with Jesus Christ. The apostle is saying here in this last paragraph of Romans 5 that there are two families in the world. There's Adam's family and there's Christ's family.
There are those identified with Adam and who are still in sin and death under the condemnation of God. And then there are those who are in Christ's family, who by the grace of God have been saved. They have been taken from this family and placed into a new family, the family of Christ. We are the many who belong to him, who have been justified, declared righteous in the eyes of God. And we are the many who will be made righteous, sanctified, who will be made righteous by the same grace of God.
Martin Lloyd-Jones says, we are in Christ and because we are in Christ, all that belongs to him will become ours, even as all that belonged to Adam has already become ours. This matter of our identity, which is point number one in the outline that you have in your hands tonight, is a critical truth to grasp as we begin Romans 6 through 8. The key to victory is this truth, we died to sin. Who are we? Well we've answered it in the language of Romans.
But there's another word that Paul uses in chapter one, that's the word saint. Over in chapter eight he calls us the sons of God. The apostle Paul wants us to understand this, God wants us to know this, that the key to holy living, follow me, the key to holy living is discovering who you really are in Jesus Christ. It is understanding your new identity as a saint of God, as a child of God. Your real identity is your deepest self, it is your spirit. The new birth made you a brand new person.
David Needham in his book Birthright says, a Christian is a person who has become someone he was not before. Now you have to think about that. A Christian is someone who is what he was not before. In other words, you are not what you were, you are what you were not. There has been a radical change made in you.
Now this change does not mean that there has been a righteous nature that has been added to your sinful nature, but rather what he is saying is that there has been a profound fundamental change made in who you are, you who have died to sin. Needham says this in his book, contrary to much popular teaching, regeneration is more than having something taken away, your sins forgiven, or having something added to you, a new nature with the assistance of the Holy Spirit.
Rather it is becoming someone you had never been before. This new identity is not on the flesh level, but on the spirit level, one's deepest self. This miracle is more than a judicial act of God. It is an act so real that it is right to say that a Christian's essential nature is righteous rather than sinful. All lesser identities each of us have can only be understood and appreciated by our acceptance and response to this fact.
Here's the point that we're going to make on succeeding Sunday nights as well as tonight. Some of you here for the first time tonight as we approach this truth, others of you are reviewing it because we've covered it before, but the key to victory in our lives begins by understanding who we are. That we are not a people who have within us a sinful nature and a righteous nature. We have one nature.
It is the nature of Jesus Christ because you see nature, the word nature, refers to one's essential identity, who one truly is. Now because you and I have had a radical change in who we are, we are no longer sinners in the eyes of God. We are called His saints. Because we have had a radical change, we have been moved from this family of Adam to this family of Jesus Christ. Because of that transforming change, you and I have a new purpose and meaning in life.
How does this relate to what we're talking about tonight? That purpose and meaning in life means that we are not to continue on in sin. Now if I have a sinful nature, if I am essentially within the real part of me still sinful, if I am still a sinner, then it is very natural that I'm going to go on sinning. And I can excuse that sin because I have a sinful nature.
But if I have been radically transformed and changed, and if my essential identity, my true nature is one of a righteous person, a born one of God, then I no longer have an excuse for my sin. That's why the apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians with such horror and shock. He calls them brothers in Christ, but he slaps them across the face because he says you are living like mere men.
He says you have been radically changed to those Corinthians, and here you are living like there's been no change made in you. You are living like mere men. And that's why he says to them later, examine yourselves whether you truly be in the faith because you and I are fundamentally spirit beings and not physical beings. Our meaning is found in that sphere of reality, the sphere of the Spirit. And our meaning is found in reflecting God's holiness, God's glories to the world around us.
You and I have been saved that we might reflect and show the glories of him who has called us out of darkness into his marvelous light. In the meaning of our lives and the purpose of it, Needham says, true meaning in life for a Christian is in receiving and displaying the risen life of Christ. Rather than this being contrary to one's essential nature, as taught by some, it is in perfect harmony with the miracle of regeneration by which we became holy, God's workmanship, children of light.
To fulfill the will of God is to do what we most deeply desire to do, even though this may be contrary to the desires of our flesh. This fundamental awareness of identity brings a believer into the wholesome, positive atmosphere in which God's intention of manifesting his holiness in the world can be fulfilled. My friend, God has saved you and me that we might reflect his holiness to the world around us.
He has saved us that we might be the prisms through which the life of the risen Christ can be reflected in all of its glories to the world in which we live. A Christian is a multi-faceted prism, actually. As Jesus Christ shines into our lives with his light and his life, the surface of our lives becomes a reflection in the varied relationships that we have to other people.
Our lives become a prism that breaks down the life of Christ so that people can see it where we live, in the struggles we have, in the battles we fight, the disappointments that we have, the blessings that we enjoy. So that as they relate to us in various ways and on various levels, they can see in you and see in me the life of Jesus Christ. I have been witnessing to a businessman here in Roseville for about six months. Back in August, he knocked on my door one day, one of the appointments.
He told me his story. I had a chance then to share the gospel with him, but he immediately shrugged it off because of where he's coming from. He doesn't feel that he needs God. His life is happy, he says, with one breath. With the other breath, he pours out a tale of woe and heartache. It's almost unbelievable. But he says he's satisfied. This last week we had lunch together again. As we were chatting over these things of God, it was just so interesting to watch his eyes.
Because at the same time that he was telling me how much he doesn't really need God, he said to me, I can only believe in God if he comes through my front door and shakes my hand and introduces himself. He was telling me how complete his life is now, and then I was able to share with him what I have found in Jesus Christ. His eyes were filled with longing. I know that as I was speaking those words, the Spirit of God was sending them right down into his spirit.
Though he was not letting me know that, he thought it could be read in his very eyes that he was seeing something of the risen Christ and struggle against it though he may he is attracted by it. And that's just the way it is. And God wants your life and my life to be just that way, a prism. That's our purpose. He has radically changed us. He has made us new men and women through whom the glory of the risen Christ shows like a beautiful prism.
The colors expand and people as they relate to us from various angles, various levels, can marvel not at us, but at the risen Christ who is manifesting himself through us. So the Apostles point is this. We considering who we are and what our purpose is now in life, how can people like us continue on living in sin? It doesn't make sense. How can we who have died to sin continue to live in it?
Now what I've said tonight about our deepest self and our true identity as being one nature, righteous in Jesus Christ that does not preclude the possibility of sin as all of us know because we still do sin. But when we sin it's because we allow ourselves to sin. We choose to sin. And the Apostle Paul can relate to that because he had exactly the same experience. He's going to talk about that in chapter 7. We'll get to that. You've said enough for tonight. I commend to you the Word of God.
I encourage you to read Romans, well the whole book, but especially chapter 6, chapter 7, chapter 8 as we study it in upcoming weeks. Our Heavenly Father, how grateful we are for your Word which reveals truth to us that we could know no other way. And we see your exceeding grace, your abounding grace toward us. Thank you for justifying us. And thank you for the work of sanctifying us, making us righteous, and what you've done that we might experience that victory in our lives.
And Father, I pray that tonight's message will lay a foundation upon which we can build in weeks ahead. Undoubtedly there are some here who are struggling to understand this, who are trying to put it together in their minds. I pray that you will teach all of us by the Spirit and give us patience as we learn week by week the truth you've given to us in these precious chapters of your Word. In Jesus' name, amen.