93-25 – Do You Know Your Spiritual Birth Line? – Do You Know Your Birthright? Part 2

In this scripture-packed series, Dr. Betters discusses regeneration, effectual calling, conversion, justification, adoption, sanctification, perseverance and glorification. Come along on this journey and find great joy in discovering many treasures in your journey along your spiritual birthline. Peter’s spiritual journey is a clear picture of a man intrigued by the Messiah, but not converted. In this message we watch as God removes Peter’s spiritual blindness. Peter’s journey helps us see our own spiritual birthlines unfold.

Transcript

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Welcome to In His Growth with Dr. Chuck F. Fetters, produced by Mark Hill Ministries. Each In His Growth message is designed to help turn your hearts toward Jesus and equip you to walk by faith. Let's join Dr. Fetters as he preaches the series, Do You Know Your Spiritual Birth Line?

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As we continue our study along the birth line, we have been attempting to now move over into the area of sanctification. How do we then live as Christians? How do we stand against temptation? How does it happen that Christians fall into sin? And last time we were together, we worked out a definition of sin. And if you remember, what I told you was that sin for a lost man, now I am not talking about sin for a Christian, because I'm going to change that definition just a little bit. But sin for a lost man is the expression of man's struggle with the meaning of his existence. While he misses life apart from God. And sin is all of the varieties of ways man deals with and expresses his alienation, if you will, from God. As he encounters the inescapable issues of life. Man was created. Initially, when Adam and Eve were created, they were created to have a dependent relationship upon God. Satan, with his half-truths, convinced them that if they took of the forbidden fruit, they would become like God. And that is partially true. Because the moment they took of the forbidden fruit and committed that first sin, they became like God in this respect. They became independent creatures. You see, God is an independent being, He does not look for meaning and purpose in other things or other people or parts of his creation. God is independent of creation and independent of a need to have anything else fulfill his purpose for his intended existence. And so man becomes just like God in that regard, in that he becomes independent. And so what happens when he becomes independent of God? He begins to look for ways in which to fill the vacuum that is created as the result of his independence from God. Galatians 5, verses 19 and following talk about the various ways in which man fills that vacuum. These are the expressions of sin. These are the deeds of the flesh. These are the things that man does in order to find meaning and purpose for his life. And Paul calls them very simply the acts of the sinful nature, verse 19, are obvious. And they really are. Sexual immorality, impurity, and debauchery. These are man's attempts to find meaning through his body, through his glands, through his senses, through his sexuality, through his fantasies. You see, rather than be dependent upon God, he becomes independent from God and thus a vacuum is created. So where does he look? Where does he try to find meaning? In his body, in his glands, in his hormones. Paul says that's obvious. It doesn't take much radical Christian thinking to figure out that that's true. It is obvious. How many of you continue to struggle, even as you sit here this morning, with the very deeds of the sinful nature that Paul is talking about here? How many of you are in life-dominating patterns right now? Still following after the deeds of the flesh, trying to discover meaning and purpose in life that is apart from God. Paul says it can't happen. Verse 20 idolatry, kind of a broad term, if you will, whatever you decide, short of dependence upon God, that will give you meaning. You'll work for it, you'll work feverishly to achieve it, and then once you get it, you'll guard it, you'll even sacrifice to it, you'll even worship it. And to lose whatever it is, is to lose life itself. I asked you a question last week to think about. You kind of fill in the blank as you see fit. If I lost blank, and you fill in the blank, if I lost blank, I would lose life itself. My life would no longer have any meaning if this were taken out of my life. Now, if you can put something in that blank, you are fallen to the sin of idolatry, no matter what it is. Your children, your job, your marriage, your home, your possessions, whatever you put in that blank that says, I would lose meaning and purpose if I lost blank, then you're an idolater. Then he says, and witchcraft. Man searches for meaning in the occult. Specifically, the word witchcraft is the word we get drugs from. It's the word pharmaca, where we get the word pharmacology or drugs from. So man begins to look for substances outside of him, external stimuli to make him feel good about himself. He dabbles into the occult. New ageism, if you will. By the way, New Ageism is nothing more than old spiritism. It's the same thing. Spiritism back in the 1800s was battled feverishly by the church. Back in the 1600s, battled feverishly by the church. Man seeking some sort of contact supernaturally with the other world. Astrology, occultism, spiritism. New ageism is just modern spiritism. That's all it is. Same old garb, same old dress, same old MO, same old Satan involved in it. But man seeks some sort of external stimuli, some sort of experience, if you will. And dabbles into the forbidden areas, forbidden clearly in Scripture. That's witchcraft. Deeds of the flesh. Deeds of the sinful nature. Why? Man's attempting to fill the vacuum. I don't feel good, so I'll take a drug to make me feel good. I don't feel good, so I'll have sex to make me feel good. I don't feel good, so I'll get involved in booze and alcohol and drugs and whatever else it takes to make me feel good about myself. That's the old nature. Hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, he continues. I group these four together. Because they're all terms that reflect the standard reactions of one who is frustrated with this given set of circumstances. Some supposed meaning in life has been taken from me or threatened or kept beyond my reach. And so I've developed a hatred and a discord and a jealousy and a fit of rage, if you will, kind of like a little child having a temper tantrum because he can't get what he wants. Selfish ambition, dissensions, and factions. These deeds of the flesh point to the conflicting ideologies as to where life really is, where my values really are. All of this is caused by people who are determined to gain control over the lives of other people. I can exercise power over you. I have my goals, I have my objectives, I have my ambitions, and if I have to walk over you in the process to achieve them, then so be it. Deeds of the flesh. If you stand in the way, I'll rally other people around me who support my right to achieve my dreams. And that's where factions and dissensions, and by the way, that's where a lot of church splits are caused. People rally factions around them because they have a certain agenda, and unless they reach their agenda, unless somebody gets out of the way, they'll walk all over them in the process and gather forces. Factions, if you will. I can tell you this parenthetically. This pastor and this session will fight that with every ounce of energy that we have in this church. We are guarding the unity of this church with our very lives. It's one of the greatest blessings we have is that this church is a unified church. We don't know of any factions or dissensions or potential splits or conflicts or serious divisions. We don't know of any. But I can assure you of this. You can have a conflict, but you better handle it the right way. You can have a disagreement, but you better handle it the right way. Because you're going to be called to task if you don't. That's a little parentheses. Galatians 5 21. Envy. The standard reaction of the flesh in response to the fact that you have what I want. And I want it. And I ain't going to take no for an answer. That's envy. Drunkenness, orgies, and the like. He concludes this list, if you will. Man becomes hopelessly lost in his quest for meaning. He's hopelessly lost in his quest for purpose, and he gives up. He just plain gives up. The only way in which he can cope with reality is to escape reality, to get into another world somewhere. But the point we're trying to make to you is that your hopeless struggle for meaning and purpose, your hopeless struggle for meaning and purpose will never be fulfilled in the deeds of the flesh. No matter how hard you try, no matter how many of the fleshly desires you feed, you will never, never, never find fulfillment in the deeds of the flesh. Well, now the question becomes, how do we discover our identity? Who are we? Because you see, personhood, and this is a principle you can write down, personhood, who I am, precedes power. I cannot have any power until I know who I am. I cannot have any victory over temptation until I know who I am. And so personhood precedes power. Now let me define for you what a Christian is. By the way, I talked to somebody just yesterday on the telephone, and they use the word liberating in talking about some of the doctrines we've been outlining for you. It is so liberating when you begin to re-examine the process of salvation. It takes all of the burden off of you and places all of the burden on who it rightfully belongs on, and that's God. He is the one who will build his church. He said, You go and be fishers of men, I will build my church, and even hell cannot stand against it. So the burden of building the church is on God. He is the one who converts sinners. We don't convert anybody, we just share the message. It's up to him to do the converting. But here's another liberating concept. So many of you sitting here today are continuing to struggle with what you call, as Christians, the old nature. Now, here's how the picture goes. Here I am as a Christian. On this side is my spiritual nature. On this side is my old nature. And here I am in the middle between this old nature and this new nature, and I am standing in this tense position, and at any given moment when I am tempted to sin, the old nature and the new nature war against me. That is just not a biblical doctrine, yet it is the doctrine most Christians believe is biblical. And so, what determines whether or not I have victory? Which of those two natures wins that particular contest? And because of that, so many of us have been bound up tight as a drum, living non-victorious Christian lives. Our theme verse becomes 1 John 1:9, if we confess our sins, because that's all we do. He is faithful and just to forgive. Now that's a great promise, but a lot of us live our lives in that promise because every day we're in this war. And who's going to win? Who's going to win the war? The old nature or the new nature? Now, see, friends, a Christian is a person who has become someone that he was not before in the sense of his deepest identity. Follow this logic. Listen carefully to what I'm saying. A saint, a born-again child of God, a divine masterpiece, a child of light, a citizen of heaven, an ambassador of God. These are all terms that are used to describe a Christian. Not simply in the mind of God or positionally, as some theologians would argue. That is, from God's perspective, that's what we are. Or judicially, that means that God measures us against the backdrop of law and acquits us. Although those things are true, that's not what the Bible is talking about here. He's not talking about positional or judicial identity, he's talking about who we actually are, who I actually am, the real me, the essence of being, the real chuck, the real person. And what's he say about that person? You are a saint. You are a citizen of heaven. You are an ambassador of God. You are a divine masterpiece. You are a son, a daughter of the living God. That's who you are. You know, at conception, we do not simply get something more than we had before. Nothing was there before. There's nothing there at conception, is there? Nothing existed before, but something exists now because God created something out of nothing. The miracle of conception is that God creates life out of nothing. And so is our spiritual regeneration or our new birth. God takes what is nothing and creates something out of nothing. You see, when we sinned, we died. And if something's died, it's dead. So he doesn't take that which is dead and remake it, he brings something totally brand new. Creates a new spiritual being, a new personhood. When I come to grips with that, when I come to understand that he does not remake the old, but creates the new. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the fundamental nature of man dies when he sins. And the fundamental nature of man in Christ is the real you. That's what Jeremiah was talking about in chapter 13, verse 23. It's a verse you ought to mark down and read. He poses this hypothetical question. He says, Can an Ethiopian change his skin? Now you answer the question. An Ethiopian is a black man. Can an Ethiopian change his skin? Yes or no? No. Can a leopard change his spots? Why can't a leopard change his spots? Because he's what? He's a leopard. How can a leopard become a tiger? He can't. How can an Ethiopian become a white man? He can't. Why? Because the fundamental nature of the Ethiopian and the fundamental nature of the leopard remain intact and nothing, nothing, nothing can ever change that. So what's the point? The fundamental nature of every one of us when we were born, those of you who have those little babies, you hold that little baby up. We've had five little girls born this past week. You hold those little girls up, and you hold that beautiful little innocent child, and you hold that beautiful little innocent baby in your hands, and you can say that there's one absolute truth about this child. This child, this baby, is a part of the human race and therefore is under the Adamic curse. And nothing, nothing, nothing can ever change that baby's nature. Nothing. The nature is death. The nature is sin. And so from the very day that child is born, which is true of all of us, you are dying every day because you are what? A sinner by nature. So then why do we sin? If I am a new creation and the old man is dead, if God has brought me into contact with his Holy Spirit, the old nature is dead, and the old nature is gone, and the old nature no longer exists, and I have this brand new nature, where God has indeed worked the miracle of changing the Ethiopian skin and changing the spots of the leopard, where God has worked this marvelous miracle of giving me a brand new nature, then the question is, why do I sin? Turn to Romans chapter 7. A passage you've read a thousand times, probably never understood. Romans chapter 7. Follow my thinking here. Listen, here's what I'm saying to you. I am saying to you that you do not have, listen, you do not have two natures warring against you whenever you're tempted to sin. You do not have this spiritual nature and this carnal nature or worldly nature or old nature or old man vying for position in your life. The old man is gone, the old man is dead, and the essential identity of this new man is that he is a spiritual man in absolute conformity to the perfect will of God. Every time, every moment of his life, this new man is in perfect obedience to God. I see how you're looking at me. I see what you're saying, I hear it. You're saying that just doesn't click, that doesn't register. Because you see, I still sin. I'm not perfect. How can you tell me that this new man is in absolute, complete conformity to the will of God? And how can you tell me that this old man is dead? Well, let's take a look at it. Romans chapter 7, verse 17. Paul's answering the question of then why do I continue to sin? How come if this is true, I continue to sin? Verse 17. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it. That is my essential identity in Christ. Who the I is the real Paul, the real Chuck, the real Joe, the real Mary, the real you in Christ, whoever you are, put your name in. It is no longer you who does it. But it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me. And by the way, stop right there. Nothing good lives in me. Now, if Paul stopped there, I'd be very confused right now. Because I want you to note he qualifies what he means by nothing good lives in me. That is in my sinful nature. Now the Greek word there is the Greek word sarks, which means in my flesh. In my flesh. Nothing good lives in my flesh. He qualifies it. For I, the real Paul, I, the real me, have a desire to do what is good. But I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do. No, the evil I do not want to do, this I keep on doing. Now, if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. I can't tell you how many times I have read scholars and books interpreting these verses. The traditional explanation of Romans 7 goes like this. We are new creatures. As Christians, we are new creatures. But you see, we've got this problem. The problem is the old nature remains. And we'll never be stripped of the old nature until we get to heaven someday. So every day of my life, I have to battle this old nature. It's going to remain in me, it will continue to rear its ugly head. We still have this old nature struggling against my new nature. We call him the old man, the old nature, the sin nature. We use all those terms interchangeably. And so we conclude: I must learn to say yes to God by saying no to myself. It's like the old bumper sticker. Christians are not perfect, they are just forgiven. That's what we reason. Or the Christian is just one beggar telling another beggar where to find food. But is this really what the Bible teaches? Does the Bible really teach that we have this old nature rearing its ugly head and struggling with my new nature, this one sinister evil force warring against this brand new creature in Christ? And whichever one I decide has the power at the moment, that's where the victory lies. Is that really what the Bible teaches? Well, let's take a look. Turn over to Romans chapter 6. You're in Romans 7, go back one chapter. I want to know if we should tamper with these verses. We're gonna look at a series of verses. I want to read them to you, and you tell me whether or not we should tamper with them. Romans 6, verse 4. We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death, in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him, so that the body of sin might be done away with. That we should no longer be slaves to sin because anyone who has what's that next word? Died has been freed from sin. Chapter 8, verse 16. The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. Now, if we are children, then we are heirs, heirs of God, co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings, that we may also share in his glory. Now, what have we been told so far? The old man was crucified, the old man was buried, and we are now heirs, children of the living God. Go over to 2 Corinthians chapter 5. Read this verse in a new light. 2 Corinthians chapter 5. You've heard this verse a thousand times, but now read it in this context. 2 Corinthians 5, verse 17. Therefore, anytime Paul says therefore, he's concluding a massive section. This is the summary point. This is the principle he wants you to remember. If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has what's the word? Gone. The new has come. Now what have we been told? The old man is buried, the old man is crucified, the old man is gone, we are heirs, children of the living God, and the new has come. Go over to Ephesians chapter 2. I don't think we should tamper with these verses. Ephesians 2 and verse 10. For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. No struggling Christian there. No Christian caught between two extremes there. We are God's workmanship. He worked the miracle of life in me. I am a new creation. God worked the miracle. God is the workman. And I am the masterpiece. 1 Peter chapter 2, verse 9. But you, I don't see defeated Christians in 1 Peter 2.9. I don't see people sucking their thumbs spiritually in 1 Peter 2.9. I don't see people with their theme verse of 1 John 1.9 in 1 Peter 2.9. But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness and into his wonderful light. Do you see the transition? Do you see the dramatic changing of the Ethiopian skin? Do you see the fundamental nature of the beast has been changed into that which can sit down with the Lamb of God? You don't have to turn to this, but listen to 1 John 3. We sang about it a little bit here this morning. How great is the love the Father has lavished on us that we should be called children of God, and that is what we are. Not we'll be, that is what we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now, now you are the children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known, but we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. No one who is born of God continues to sin. Because God's seeds remain in him, he cannot go on sinning because he has been born of God. Now I've read a myriad of scholars and nobody satisfactorily answers that question. How is it that if I am a child of God, I do not go on sinning? How is it that if I am a child of God, I cannot go on sinning? And then the question becomes if all that's true, then how come I sin? Are you following me? Is this confusing to you? Probably a little bit. But now stop and think. I hear what you're saying. My life just does not jive with those verses. Therefore, here's what we do: we readjust the meaning of Romans 6, Romans 8, 2 Corinthians. We readjust the meaning. And here's how we readjust it. We say that the old man is not really dead, but he's dying. We say that the old man is not really crucified, that he's in the process of being crucified. We say that the old nature hasn't really gone, it's going. The old man has died really means that he's still very much alive and kicking. Crucified does not really mean that my old man is dead, but simply dying a slow death. I have been buried with Christ does not mean I've been buried, it means I've been buried alive, you see. How can we tamper with those verses? How can we tamper with verses that so clearly and distinctly tell us that the old man has died, that the new man has come, that the old man is buried, that the old man is crucified? How can we then say that that old man is still there raising its ugly head and trying to drag us into sin? Because that's the best way we can explain why we sin. But it's simply not biblical. Is sin conquered after you're converted by sheer human discipline? Of course not. Even a non-Christian can learn to conquer certain sin habits. You don't have to be a believer to conquer certain sin habits. We reasoned before I was converted, I could not say no. But now I can say no. Well, that's just not true. Non-Christians say no all the time. We have all heard the teaching that the old man being put off is a process. But that's not what these verbs and the tense of these verbs indicate. When it says we were buried, it's eris tense, past action, done once and for all, completed. There's no process in the Greek. None whatsoever. The old man is not being put off, the old man is not being crucified, he's dead, he's buried, he's gone. He doesn't exist anymore. And God hasn't taken that old man and reworked it into something new. He didn't take what is old and refashion it into something new. He took what was old, he killed it, he buried it, he put it away, and gave us something totally brand new. And you know what that brand new thing is? The real me. The real I. What Paul says in Romans 7, it is I that desires to do that which is good. But in me, that is in my flesh, dwells no good thing. You see what Paul is doing here? He's adding a brand new ingredient that we need to examine. Some scholars reason this is positional truth, I don't buy that. Some say it's experiential truth, that is, it's true only if I act on it, only if I name it and claim it, and I don't buy that either. The actual truth, the actual truth is this. I can lay claim to a spiritual birthright. And I, the real I, the real spiritual I, the one who at regeneration was united to Christ, the one whom he effectually called, the one whom he gave faith and repentance so that I could be converted, the one whom he justified and adopted and sealed with his Holy Spirit and baptized me into the body of Christ, that real I, that real person that I am, can lay claim to my spiritual birthright. I'm not the old man anymore, I'm a new person. A brand new creature. And this, listen to me, this alone is the basis upon which we must confront sin. You cannot confront sin any other way. That's why I told you earlier the principle is personhood precedes power. You can't confront sin until you claim the birthright. You can't deal with sin until you claim the birthright. And it's alone the foundation upon which holiness is built. We've been talking about meaning and identity and purpose. What does the old man do before he's saved? The old man seeks identity in what? The deeds of the flesh. But what does the new man do? If you kept reading in Galatians 5, after he talks about the deeds of the flesh, he says what? The deeds of the spirit are this. The fruit of the spirit is this: love, joy, peace, gentleness, etc. The new man follows after the things of the spirit. The old man follows after the things of the flesh. And I cannot confront sin. I cannot confront sin unless I claim the birthright. You know, I gotta ask you a question. What can be more frustrating than being a Christian who views himself primarily as a self-centered sinner, yet whose purpose in life is to produce God-centered holiness? What can be more frustrating than to live in that kind of emptiness? For that man, his identity in Christ and his meaning in life are miles apart. You know, when Jesus was tempted when he went into the wilderness, the Bible says in Matthew 4, Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. After fasting 40 days and 40 nights, he was hungry. The tempter came to him and said, If you are the son of God, notice where Satan tempts. Notice the point at which Satan begins to tempt Christ, where? His own identity. If you are the Son of God, and then to what does he appeal? The flesh. If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread. Jesus answered, it is written, man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God. If meaning for Jesus were wrapped up in the flesh, then he could say, I would eat that hot baked cinnamon-flavored buttered bread. Give it to me. Let me ask you a question. Is that all you are? Are you simply a skin-wrapped package of taste buds and salivary glands and hormones and fleshly drives? Is that your identity? Is that who you are in Christ? Is that the sum total of your makeup? Is that the real you? If you're sitting here this morning and you don't know Christ, then that is the real you. But for the vast majority of you sitting here who have come to understand what faith in Christ is all about, you are more than a skin wrapped package of taste buds and salivary glands and hormones and sex drives. If that's all you are, there's little doubt that you will live a futile, empty, powerless life as a Christian. God for you becomes almost your adversary. He becomes almost your enemy. Seems like the things you want most in life, he says you should want least. No to your dreams, no to your desires. All the while you're saying yes to God and his burdensome demands. And we love to sing, I surrender all. I surrender all. But in contrast to that, what does Paul say? For me to live is Christ. For me to live is Christ and to die is gain. When the Corinthian Christians were thinking about suing each other and taking each other to court, what did he say? What did he say to them? Don't you know who you are? Don't you know that the Christians will judge the angels? Don't you know that we will rule the world? How is it that you're taking your brother to court? Don't you know your identity? Read it in 1 Corinthians 6 if you don't believe me. Don't you know who you are? And he says to them in his second letter, be not yoked together with unbelievers, for what fellowship does light have with darkness? Or what agreement is there between God and Satan? And yet, what do we do as Christians? We act like after we come to Christ, that there's still this concord, there's still this agreement between Satan and me. That I'm still struggling with Satan and the flesh and my old nature and my old desires. Yet that harmony we say continues. Ephesians 5 8 says, For you were once darkness. Listen, for you were once darkness, but now you are light. Doesn't sound like there's a rheostat on that spirit, does there? Doesn't sound like the light's slowly coming on and the darkness is slowly disappearing. He says, You once were dark, now you're light. But how do we live? We live in the candlelight, don't we? We're not quite dark, we're not quite light. We're kind of in between, struggling with the old nature. Colossians 3 says, Since then you have been raised with Christ, set your heart on things above, not on things on the earth, for you are dead. And your life is hidden with Christ in God, and when Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall you also appear with him in glory. Notice he says, You're dead, not dying, dead. Well, chuck all those verses, because they're not really true. You see, they're only positionally true. I'm indebted to David Needham, who describes two portraits. I want to read these to you. Listen carefully. Portrait number one. Listen. I would like to try right now to paint two totally different portraits of a believer. The first portrait is familiar in many conservative evangelical circles. It looks something like this. I am a person with two natures. One of these natures is called the old man, otherwise called the natural man, sin nature, old nature, body of sin, etc. The other is the new man, otherwise called the new nature or spiritual nature. Got it? One man, two natures. I, the person, am in some sense between these two capacities. I, the person, am mind, will, personality, body, and emotions. This is my personhood. What my personhood manifests in behavior depends upon which capacity is energizing me. A victorious Christian, according to this viewpoint, is the one whose new nature is so energized by God that his behavior is Christ-like. Let's project this first perspective into a familiar life situation. Put yourself at home alone one evening, sitting in front of the TV set. Perhaps quite unexpectedly, a new program begins. It takes only a moment for you to realize that this is not a show for Christians to be watching. You are immediately aware that the program's sole purpose is to stir you to lust, whatever kind of lust you happen to be tantalized by. You know you shouldn't be watching it, but in a few moments you're hooked. Then the thought comes flashing into your mind: what if somebody caught me watching this? I better turn it off. I don't want to, but I don't dare take a chance. So reluctantly you turn the switch, taking one last longing look. Is that spiritual victory? Hardly. But let's go a step further. Same program, same circumstance. You're sitting there absorbed in the program when the thought hits you. Goodness, God is watching me. I sure don't want his heavy hand on me. He can be pretty tough. So once again, with equal reluctance, you turn the switch, savoring that last delicious look. Victory? Obviously not. Let's try again. Same thing, same place. Watching the show, you're hit by the thought. You know, if Jesus were here, it would certainly disappoint him to see me watching this thing. And I love him anyway. I don't have to yield to this sinful temptation. By the Holy Spirit, I have power to reject what I am doing. I will. Marching to the set, you grasp the switch, hesitate long enough to see just a little bit more, and flip it off. You hesitate because you've just said no to yourself, using strength from your new nature. And it hurts to do that. Why? Because you, the person, really wanted to keep on watching. Your curious mind, your churning emotions, your glandular body. But Jesus died for you. You want to please him. So who are you? You are the person who wants on one hand to please the Savior and on the other hand to sin. In other words, you are a split personality, a house divided. Is this then what Christian victory is all about? Now, how many fit that portrait? Huh? That's kind of where we are. That's kind of where we are. We stand there and we believe that this old demonic, old nature is still there when God says it's dead, crucified, buried, no more, gone. And the real me, the real person that I am, my real identity is wrapped up in the Spirit of God who is desiring to please the Father more than anything else, and does please the Father more than anything else. Portrait number two. Now listen to this. Instead of doing what this first guy does, we go a little further. Portrait number two. I am a person who, in terms of my most essential nature, deepest self, inner man, new man, is a creation of God who does not sin. I am righteous by nature, delighting in the law of God. This new man is not simply a capacity, it is the real me. The person I once was, the old man, I am no more. I am not by nature a child of wrath anymore. I am a child of light. If I died right now, I would be fit for heaven. And heaven is not a place for people who go against their natural tendencies to do what is right. It is a place for those who by nature do what is right. You know that's an amazing thing to say, but it's true. If you have received the Savior and five seconds from now you fell over dead, you would be at home in heaven. And according to both Peter and Paul, the only thing you would leave behind is your body. There is not a single word anywhere implying that at death the believer is finally separated from his old man or his old self. Not a single word. Why? Because when you were saved, that's when you were detached. Alright, now let's take a look at the TV. Same scenario, different identity. There you are. The program intended to stir you to lust is doing just that. It is of the flesh. For the flesh and your flesh, this remains unredeemed. From the time I was born, my old nature was teaching the flesh how to feed itself with the deeds of the flesh. That is why this body is going to die. That is why when it's put into the grave, God is going to raise it corruptible? No. Incorruptible. Why? Because when it goes to the grave, it's been corrupted. But you see, my new man, the new me, the new identity, still has to live in that flesh. Still has to struggle with mind, will, intellect, emotions, salivary glands, sexual glands, the whole nine yards. Living in an unredeemed body, that's why Paul says, in me, that is in my flesh, no good thing dwells. There you are. And we'll close with this. Your flesh, your unredeemed flesh, likes what it's seeing on TV and wants to watch. For a moment you find yourself saying, I want to watch this even though I know I shouldn't. Then with a sudden jolt, the gracious Holy Spirit reminds you of something so very important. Hey, wait a minute, you say, Who am I anyway? Is watching this stuff truly compatible with who I really am? Essentially, I am not flesh, eyes, ears, nose, and throat. Life for me is not sleek cars, fantasy vacations, quadriphonic sound, a perfect figure, an envious reputation. Who I am, I know who I am. I am fundamentally a spiritual being created by God to display Jesus. Life, real life, is right there. So I walk to the TV set, I turn it off. No last longing look this time, I flip it off. Not just because I should, not just because I love Jesus, but because I want to. Oh, thank God. Flesh, that's just your tough luck. Go ahead and cry. Go ahead and suffer. Go ahead and bombard my brain with angry signals. I have put to death the deeds of the flesh. This time you lose, and I am free to live. This and this alone is victory. Isn't that beautiful? Isn't that liberating? That the real me, united to Jesus Christ, wants to do the right thing, but still has to live in this body of flesh. So go ahead and flesh protest. Go ahead and raise your ugly head. Go ahead and scream. Go ahead and stir up my hormones. Go ahead and salivate glands. Go ahead and sweat. Go ahead and tease. Go ahead and get angry. The real me, the real person, the real child of God is alive in Jesus Christ. And the old me, the Ethiopian, the leopard, he's dead. He's gone. Because I am claiming my birthright. So which is your theme verse? 1 John 1:9? Or Colossians 3, verse 1. If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above. Where Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father. Set your affection on things above, not on the earth, for you are dead, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. And when Christ, who is my life, shall appear, then I shall also appear with him in glory. There's much more we're going to say about this next time we're together. I'm going to ask you to stand with me. Would you stand with me, please? Would you join hands with the person around you? And let's pray together. Father, I pray right now for the person whose hand we now hold. I pray that they would understand what their birthright is. That their essential nature is spiritual now, if they have come to Christ. And Lord, if that person's hand we are now holding does not know you, if they still live to find meaning and purpose in the deeds of the flesh, oh Father, bring them to Christ. Give them the new man, the new nature, the new life. Father, help us to live victorious Christian lives, not to live in empty defeat and vain efforts. Help us to please you, Lord. Energize our wills, energize our spirits, so that we may indeed day by day conform to the image of Christ.

SPEAKER_02 53:24

Now may the grace of God, the love of our Lord and our Savior, Jesus the Christ, the very presence, person, and power of his Holy Spirit abide with each of you now until Christ comes again and forevermore.

SPEAKER_01 53:46

You have been listening.