When Really, Really Good Still Isn't Good Enough

In this episode of Black, White, & the Red Letters, Ed Grifenhagen and Cameron "Cami" Arnett launch into the hard sayings of Jesus with Matthew 5:20: “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

That one will smack you in the head.

Ed and Cami unpack why Jesus’ words would have shocked His original audience, what Pharisee righteousness looked like, and why external religion can never save anybody. They talk about grace, obedience, the law, the flesh, the Holy Spirit, and the righteousness that only comes through Christ.

This is a conversation about the difference between looking righteous and being made righteous — and why Jesus didn’t come to lower the bar, but to fulfill what we never could. 🎙️🔥

#BlackWhiteAndTheRedLetters #HardSayingsOfJesus #Matthew520

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:01

Two guys, friends, brothers, pastors, Jesus freaks.

SPEAKER_00 0:05

One's Lily White and formerly a Jewish guy. Yeah, and he's still recovering from that. And the other one's a Haitian-born actor who spent many years in Hollywood.

SPEAKER_03 0:14

So yeah, I'm thinking this ought to go well.

SPEAKER_00 0:16

Yeah. I'm Camille. And I'm Ed. And every week we sit down and talk about real life.

SPEAKER_03 0:21

And we do it without turning it into a Sunday morning sermon. We're talking culture, faith, purpose, scripture. And race and truth and the stuff that most people avoid.

SPEAKER_00 0:30

And we're running it all through the words of Jesus.

SPEAKER_03 0:32

Dude, those red letters, they just don't play. No filter. And no pretending. No churchy cliches. We're just having real conversations about a real savior. This is black, white, and the red letters.

SPEAKER_00 0:53

Well, hello there, everyone. We are back here and we are talking about the red letters. You know, Jesus speaks, and we have to be the ones who, man, take it in. And we're dealing with the hard sayings of Jesus. So they're not all easy? They're not all fluffy. You know, I know sometimes we want them to be fluffy, but you know, Jesus, man, he had a way of just getting around and and and hitting the jugular. You know, sometimes, you know, you know, people put a perspective of Jesus as being this, you know, polite. Everywhere he goes, he's, you know, this halo, whatever. But the reality is that truth, man, is daring. Truth is provoking. You know what I'm saying? And and Jesus says some hard things. And it's not just that they're hard from the perspective of, you know, fire and brimstone and that kind of stuff, because that's how people think of hard, but it is hard for the flesh because we can't do what the spirit does. And he put some stuff on us.

SPEAKER_03 1:53

It's funny, I did a series one time, a preaching series, probably three, four years ago. And the name of the series was Say What? You want me to do what?

SPEAKER_00 2:05

And then it was all this hard stuff because brother, I mean, man, you know, without him, we're flesh men. And the flesh can't do, can't be godly. The flesh, you know, is sinful and wants to do the wrong thing, and you tell it to uh I mean, say, I'm sorry, and it feels like it's been punched in the face. So even though we know that he's love, man, let's let's jump into this, man. Let's jump into this. Let's take a look at Matthew 5.20. Matthew 5.20 says, For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. And then the mic dropped. That's a mic drop, man. That's a mic drop. That's a, you know, you all of a sudden the air just, you know, comes out of everywhere. You know what I'm saying? You can't breathe. Because unless your righteousness exceeds exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will never. Not sometimes.

SPEAKER_03 3:12

Not maybe. Never. And it, and you know, that Matthew 5.20, it didn't just uh it didn't drop out of the sky disconnected from something. You know, he's in the middle of, or not really the middle, toward the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, this um this huge biggest block of instruction from Jesus in all of the gospels, Matthew 5, 6, and 7. So it doesn't just drop out of the sky. And if you imagine uh on the southwest shore of the Sea of Galilee, and they're on this little hillside, and Jesus is is talking, preaching this message about kingdom people and what kingdom people look like, and how kingdom people should look and sound and how they should treat each other. And that's all this Sermon on the Mount. And you know, he doesn't start uh the Sermon on the Mount by telling his followers how impressive they are, you know, and we want to be told, we want to be affirmed.

SPEAKER_00 4:16

Of course we do. You know what I'm saying? Give me some pats on the back, on the back, you know, and and if we don't get that, we feel like we're not getting a uh a scriptural, palatable word that we can actually live by and use. But the reality is that to encourage, you know, sometimes you need to hear what you need to hear.

SPEAKER_03 4:35

Yeah, and he starts in in chapter five. He doesn't start by saying, Um, Cameron, Ed, y'all are some good guys. No, he starts out telling his guys, his his all of his disciples, and the however many people are there, telling them how bankrupt they are, how hungry they are, how meek, merciful, and persecuted that kingdom people either are or or will be.

SPEAKER_00 5:02

That's right. Yeah, if you're gonna follow him, they're gonna go ahead and talk about you just as bad as they talk about him. That's right.

SPEAKER_03 5:09

They hated me. You think they're gonna like you? So you can kind of wear that as a badge of honor, I guess. But you know, by the time he gets to verse 20, when he says that, and you gotta know that in the in the history and the context of it, and he's on that little hillside and he's talking to all his guys, and and men and women, and who knows, several hundred people probably there. And amazingly enough, that it is a fact that the acoustics at that place were the best acoustics on the earth. So that uh where he most likely was standing, he could be talking at the same level that we are right now, and people could hear him uh two or three hundred yards away. It's an amazing place, right? And so where that while they're there and he's preaching to these and speaking and teaching, the Pharisees, a group of Jewish leadership, they're off to the side somewhere, who knows, could be a hundred yards away, sort of lurking, you know, in the background.

SPEAKER_00 6:09

Waiting to find something wrong.

SPEAKER_03 6:10

That's right. And so, what is he what's he doing in that verse that you just read? He's contrasting two kinds of righteousness. He's not saying righteousness doesn't matter. In fact, the opposite. He says your righteousness has got to exceed theirs. And probably he's pointing over there to those Pharisees.

SPEAKER_00 6:31

And and they're hearing him say this absolutely while they're standing there. So uh imagine again, you know, this is Jesus. You know how we talk about, you know, uh these days, it's it's people don't talk about being offended and don't offend and don't offend and everything else, but here's Jesus on this mountainside, and we know who he is looking backwards, but these people don't know who he is at all. And so they're hearing this guy talk about them badly in front of everybody.

SPEAKER_03 7:00

And the people, the the people that are there for the teaching, they did not, we have a view of of the Pharisees looking backwards in time that is so negative, but the general population of people, they didn't, they looked at those people, they are the holy guys. That's right. They're the guys that know the law, they know the script absolutely looked up to them. And so Jesus kind of threw the gauntlet down, and so contrasting these two kinds of righteousness, one being fair, I don't know what the word, Pharisee righteousness versus kingdom righteousness, and the Pharisee righteousness, if that's a good term to use, it's all external and measurable and reputation conscious and rule heavy and tradition heavy and ceremony heavy and all of that stuff.

SPEAKER_00 7:53

It's awful show.

SPEAKER_03 7:55

100%, 100% contrasted with righteousness in the kingdom, because remember, the whole Sermon on the Mount is all about the kingdom and kingdom people. And kingdom righteousness is the opposite of that. It's not external, it's internal, and it's humble, and it's and it's God focused and God-centered, and it's shaped like mercy and grace, and it's purity-driven, internal, real purity, right?

SPEAKER_00 8:25

Well, that's where the problem comes in with the flesh, because all of this that you're talking about, Ed, is, you know, kind of like a four-letter word to the flesh. You know, you're talking about being humble, you're talking about being merciful. I don't want to be humble. I don't want to what, you know, that's diametrically opposed to who we are in the flesh. And so here you have this guy that you're following, that you're listening to, and he's kind of ripping down these guys that you have been, you know, looking up to that you thought were the epitome of and the examples of, and who here he is telling you who you have to be, and that these guys are basically not fulfilling the righteousness of the kingdom. And so, what have I been following all this time? Because it's not just the fact that they're talking about the Pharisees and the Sadducees and all these guys, but I've been following these guys.

SPEAKER_03 9:16

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

This is who I've been patterning my life after. So you're telling me, you must be telling me too. I mean, that I'm nowhere.

SPEAKER_03 9:24

And think about if I'm standing there and I'm a just a regular dude, a first century Jew, I'm I'm a blacksmith or something, I don't know. But I've been trying to do good. I've been trying to be a good guy. I've been trying to be a good husband, a good father, a good Jew. I go to the temple, I kill a couple of oxes when they tell me to, you know. And you just said that I gotta be better than them? How could I ever? They're the best, they're the holy, and I gotta, and and you're saying that my righteousness has got to be better than theirs. And I think one of the things that Jesus is really saying is, yeah, the Pharisees had a righteousness that you could photograph, and Jesus is after a righteousness that you cannot fake.

SPEAKER_00 10:10

That's right.

SPEAKER_03 10:11

There ain't no AI in it.

SPEAKER_00 10:13

There's it's no fakes allowed, right? It's gotta be internal. It's gotta be something that has transformed you from the inside out. Because again, when we're dealing with righteousness, we're talking about in up that right positioning with God where God approves. It's not what man says, it's not what we think or how we feel, you know. This this uh this facsimile of, you know, we're talking about what the father, what the spirit of God is actually seeing from the inside out and knowing that you're just like him, that your your perspective is his, and that you've given yourself up to be a godly individual because of him. But the Pharisees, man, it's all that religious stuff. It's all, you know, showmanship, it's all, you know, making sure that the people over here and the people over there see me doing the right thing so that they can think that I'm somebody and something, and you know, they can go ahead and bring me their money and bring me whatever, and I can have all the accolades, you know, of the world, but it has nothing to do with a relationship with a God who created me.

SPEAKER_03 11:15

And so so he starts this thing off with the the beatitudes, with the blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are the meek, all of that, which is literally the opposite of what Pharisaic Judaism is. Don't tell me to be meek. I need to be strong and big and bad. Leadership. Yeah, don't tell me poor. That's right, that's right. Yeah, but but then a few verses later, he starts, a few verses later, after the Beatitudes, not up to um to verse 20 yet, but uh he starts talking about the law. And so is he's does he say that the law was bad? No, he doesn't say the law is bad. He's not throwing away the law. He you know, he's saying that the law was always pointing somewhere, pointing at ultimately at someone. It's pointing to him. Look what he says in verse 17, 18, and 19 that lead up to this verse that that uh Kami just read. He says, Don't think I've come to abolish the law and the prophets. I haven't come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. So does that mean that the law is tossed to the curb?

SPEAKER_00 12:49

Who now not only does it not mean that it's tossed, but then as you're reading this, man, as you're reading this, I'm thinking about the word of God that's being professed and declared and heralded on YouTube, on television, everywhere, and you're you're hearing sermons in your mind, right? Are you reading this something? There's so many people out there, pastors, whatever they want to call. There's so many people out there that have basically abolished the law in the minds of the people. That there's a price to pay. Oh my gosh. It is that's anti-gospel. That's anti-gospel.

SPEAKER_03 13:28

Yeah, Jesus does not lower the bar on the law, he raises the bar on the law.

SPEAKER_00 13:35

That's right. Because grace teaches us how to actually follow correctly. Because when we're talking about, again, righteousness, we're dealing with that right position before God, that right way of living and being uh uh accepted by God. And so understand that when we talk about not being under the law, we're the Bible's really talking about for righteousness' sake. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 13:58

That's a great point. Say that again.

SPEAKER_00 14:01

You know, and I I think that's what what is missing in the understanding when we talk about grace, grace is right. By grace are we saved through faith. Man, you can't throw grace away, but grace makes it possible for you to live out now this new creature that you've been created as correctly. And so we're not under the law for righteousness' sake, but we still have to fulfill and live out the law after we're righteous because of Jesus Christ.

SPEAKER_03 14:27

And the the law, big picture, the intent of the law from the 50,000 square uh foot kind of view, its intent was never to righteous you. Yeah, its intent was never to save you. Because we could never, ever, um, in a million years, we we could never keep all of the law. 613 commandments in the old testament.

SPEAKER_00 14:51

Oh goodness.

SPEAKER_03 14:52

How so what happens when I keep 612 of the 613? If you've broken any of them, you've broken them all.

SPEAKER_00 14:59

I'm toast. You're gone. And and and that's the thing. The I'm glad you brought that up. Man, the law was never for the perspective of making you perfect and flawless in God's sight. It was to show you that you couldn't be and that you needed something, and some something else had to happen for you to actually be. And so it was ascribed to us through Christ. But after we've been ascribed righteousness, which does exceed that of the Pharisees, because you can only have true righteousness with the Father God through Christ Jesus, now the law becomes something that we live out out of our newness. But we still have to, we still have to live it out. So I don't, I don't get an opportunity, I don't get the right now to covet somebody's wife. No, no, it doesn't work that way, guys.

SPEAKER_03 15:46

So when he says your righteousness has got to exceed their, those guys over there, it's gotta exceed their righteousness. And I'm the first century Jew hearing that, and I'm like, Well, there's no way that I could ever, ever be better, quote, better than them. Jesus looks at them and says, No, but I can. And so the only way for my big mic drop, man, my the only way for Ed's, commise, if you're listening, yours, those people in the first century hearing Jesus' words, the only way possible, and you use the word ascribed, the only way possible for my righteousness to exceed theirs is somehow for this first century carpenter's righteousness to be on me. And and using the theological churchy word, imputed.

SPEAKER_02 16:41

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 16:41

Think about the exchange that is made on the cross. Theologians for years have called it the great exchange. That's right. I get to trade my horrible junk for his righteousness. Life for life. What that's the best deal ever. I get to give him my sin and he gives me his righteousness. That's right. And then my righteousness exceeds everything.

SPEAKER_00 17:05

But see, man wants to earn something. But back to the flesh, right? We we we want to put our chest out and say, look what I did. And God doesn't give you that opportunity. And that's kind of what kind of hits us in the face. God is saying, you can't meet what I only I can meet. You can't meet me. Ever, ever, ever, ever. So I have to give you, I have to credit you this righteousness. I have to just decide to make you righteous in my own sight. And sometimes the flesh of man just, you know, we balk in that, man, and and and yet it's the best deal ever.

SPEAKER_03 17:40

Think about the best human being ever, on the very best day ever, I think about the number 612, because they're 613. On the the best man on his best day keeps 612, he going to hell. So you can never ever be good enough, no matter what. And you're not called to carry that burden.

SPEAKER_00 18:08

And the thought, the thought, the very thought of you thinking that you can hit 612. Prideful. Show shows you where you are because it's it's just impossible for sinful man to somehow muster up the righteousness, the holiness of God. And we I don't know what kind of of blindness we end up putting ourselves in and to even thinking that we can even get to that point. And that was the whole point of Jesus coming and giving us an understanding. Look, you're these guys, they have now come to a place where they think they have attained to something, even with something that thought that that the reason why it was given was to show you that you can't. So what went wrong in their in their whole mindset? They became out of what God gave for a purpose, they're not even fulfilling the purpose for which it was given. Yet they think that they are they're okay.

SPEAKER_03 19:09

And that didn't happen overnight either, because we're 1500 years, well, they were 1,500 years or so removed from Moses on the mountain. And when God made a covenant with Moses, he says, You keep my law, I will be your God, you be my people, keep my law. It's where the phrase keepers of the law came from. And so over that 1500 years, it's like it got bastardized into all about the law and not about the spirit of the law. It came became about the letter of the law. Now, even with that said, in no way, shape, or form is Jesus saying rules don't matter.

SPEAKER_00 19:54

That's exactly right.

SPEAKER_03 19:55

And obedience doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_00 19:57

But he says that in the scriptures that we've read. Okay. And so the thing about it, how do you take what the man what you know what the man is saying, what he has said, what's written for us, how do you take that and let that cause you to throw away the law? I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 20:16

I don't know. I mean, people do it every day.

SPEAKER_00 20:18

Every day.

SPEAKER_03 20:19

Every day. And a lot of that comes from sitting. This is gonna sound terrible, but sitting under bad teaching. Yes, sir. Um he's not saying that rules don't matter, but he is saying that rules without a transformed heart won't save you.

SPEAKER_00 20:35

That's right. The rules still matter, but it's not the rules that make you righteous, it's the the ruler himself, and receiving the death, burial, and resurrection of the ruler himself to take on your sin and have paid the price for you. And now because he's done that, you're righteous. And as a righteous man, now you can you you you've been given all the rights, all the privileges, all the credit of having fulfilled all the law. But now you can begin to allow him by the Holy Spirit to cause you on the outside of you to be someone who now, empowered by the Holy Spirit, can actually fulfill the law. But that's not what makes you righteous. So your why matters. Your why is extremely important. You know, and and I think people don't understand too, Ed, is that when you're dealing with the law, and the reason why the law is so important, and and you have to put it on that pedestal is because now that you are righteous, the Father God is treating you like Jesus. He's trying to, he's getting over to you. Because we have to remember the death, burial, and resurrection brought us into the kingdom. It's the door, he's the door to the kingdom. But inside the kingdom are all the benefits that he went and. and and and purchase for you but now God is giving to you he's he's he's he's getting all of heaven over to you but if you don't if you don't abide by the laws you end up being people with pockets with holes everything that God does for you seeps out because sin will mess you up and even though God is good to you you can't keep the goodness of God you it's almost like you know you we we we can understand it with finances look I can make 10 million dollars a day but I if I spend 10 million dollars in one dollar a day I'm broke okay so it doesn't matter give me 10 million i won't I won't spend 10 million in one you know you know it it but it but it's so easy to understand that what he's trying to tell us is look if I give you 10 million dollars a day I want you to have sutured pockets so that they don't you know the next day you'll have 20 the next day you'll have 30. But if not I'll give it to you day in day day in and day out but because you have not dealt with the sin issue within your own life and being able to follow me in a holy and righteous perspective then you're the one that brings upon yourself the retribution of that that it's not God doing it to you God is blessing you God is treating you like Jesus he he sees you by the blood of Jesus but hey man if you won't let yourself uh be under the sway of the word the written word of God that's on you that you can't keep what God gives.

SPEAKER_03 23:33

And we are you back all the way up and I think we talked about this a little bit a few weeks ago but you back all the way up to Abraham and it says Abraham believed the Lord and he was what? He was credited with righteousness. If he if you're thinking of a of a ledger card in business and you got credits on one side and debits on the other and all my sin is filling up the debit column one check mark from Jesus in the credit column balances the balance sheet and so did Abraham do anything to deserve that credit?

SPEAKER_00 24:12

Absolutely not me and you don't but we get it anyway that's why I said it's the best deal every by grace alone and and if you if you believe him then it takes hold if you will confess that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead that's a belief thing man that is a faith walk that is a trust that he is who he said he is and he did what he said he did and because of that God ascribes to you credits you just like Abraham we see there in the old testament God ascribes to you a righteousness that we can never muster up so let me ask you a question why do you why do you think um I'm gonna call them with quotes around this religious people why do they sometimes prefer external rules over internal surrender ooh well there you go again man flesh you know there's a fallacy that man is under and that is that if you give them the right rule then they can follow it and actually live up to it. See that's a fallacy that's that's Satan talking okay you actually think that you can follow something so perfectly that you can match God and his perfection and his holiness that you can actually one upmanship on God. Oh yeah you know and see that in itself is like Satan thinking that he can kill Jesus that's absurd. You know you're a created being and you think that you're going to kill the creator of the universe see you have to be a a certain kind of stupid so that's kind of what it's like man I think that that we we are under that fallacy and and it's called blindness.

SPEAKER_03 26:11

And I think that uh that the devil will somehow convince you that you can keep the external rules because he's playing the long game. That's right. Right? He's smart don't act like the devil's stupid he's not so he wants to convince Ed you can keep the rules so that in about 12 seconds when I break one he can say in my ear gently you just thought you were saved. Yeah you were not saved because if you were you wouldn't have broke the rule and and that's because he is I said a second go he's playing the long game because he's the the adversary he is the greatest deceiver that has ever been and he wants to eat you and your wife and your your children and your grandchildren and that's what he does. That's what he does. That's what he does.

SPEAKER_00 27:00

That's what he lives for that's what that's what he he wants to tear down the children of God because he can't tear down the God who created the children. And so there's whatever way he has to do whatever he's what whatever has to I and like you said the long game whatever long game he has to play in order to be able to dismantle the children of God and you have to understand that Christ Jesus by his very presence by his very spirit that is within us is the one that's able to keep us and cause us to flourish in his own presence and so we we have to to to throw away the fallacy.

SPEAKER_03 27:47

And I think that that you use the word fallacy which I love because I think we can buy the lie as well and this is all related to what we were just talking about that the word exceed in in verse 20 that you read exceed doesn't mean uh Ed you're supposed to out Pharisee the Pharisees like it it doesn't it doesn't mean that right it doesn't um it it if it did it would be like I gotta pray longer than them I gotta use churchier flowery language in my prayer than them I gotta fast harder or longer than them I gotta memorize more verses than them. How many they memorize 173 well I'm on 174.

SPEAKER_00 28:32

I mean but that's what they thought righteousness was that's what they're saying that's what they thought righteousness was.

SPEAKER_03 28:38

Let's just add some more rules let's just add some more rules that we'll never really gonna keep and and it's it's crazy and and and for another podcast we'll deal with the Sabbath but when the the in in this in Judaism today there are this is such it's so messed up when the Lord said in the Ten Commandments it was just simple Sabbath days holy keep it that's about all he said rest Sabbath days holy keep it there are 39 categories and I'm talking about in 2026 Judaism there's 39 categories of ways that you can break the Sabbath in each category there are hundreds of rules so we're talking about thousands like you better just put yourself in a straitjacket when the sun goes down on Friday night until the sun goes down on Saturday night because you're fixing to break the Sabbath that is so messed up that is in no way shape or form what God meant in the Ten Commandments so you you have and Jesus says this you have you this is Ed's translation you have so messed up the spirit of the law that you have completely lost it completely lost it for the letter of it.

SPEAKER_00 30:01

That's right that's right and and and I think what happens in in you know relating to it to that today we're dealing with still people that are preaching a word that miss the spirit of that law because again when we deal with it from the perspective of for righteousness's sake we have already turned it upside down so that people now don't understand even when we're dealing with right now you may be listening to us you say wait wait a minute I I have to keep the law I have to keep the law no but it no you have already kept the law in Christ Jesus that's the whole point it is his righteousness that he has given to you because he's the one who kept the law and through him we have all been ascribed by the Father that we have kept the law. However now in increasing measure as we grow on the outside from the inside that means that we are now more able every day to fulfill what is good for it's really for our benefit what is part of all these laws and whatever else and when we talk about the laws we're talking about especially the new especially the new testament all right and so we're dealing with that but it's not for the sake of of you getting God's notice got get God getting God's love that is already yours. So we have to be mindful of how that comes across and how you now are able to really hear and receive it because it's not about keeping the law in order to keep a relationship with God. It's keeping the law because God your heavenly father is in love with you and he doesn't want you to bang your head against the wall all right and so if he's telling you hey don't do that it's not because he's trying to give you that relationship that makes you uh his is because you are his and now he's protecting you and letting you know this is how my son lives.

SPEAKER_03 32:01

So when Paul writes Kami you are raised to walk in the newness of life that would not be said if you were unable to walk in the newness of life if the Holy Spirit is indwelling you you can walk in the newness of life are you going to be perfect of course you're not gonna be perfect but you can walk in the newness of life and you don't have to sin.

SPEAKER_00 32:27

You do you're gonna but you don't have to but here's the thing I don't even know and I've taught this I've I don't even know if I've ever even heard anyone else say what you just said. You don't have to say I've listened to you stop it you know I don't even know that I've ever heard anyone else say that you don't have to I've I've always heard men and women of God behind the pulpit say yes you yes you're gonna sin but I I I I I've always heard people say that everybody sins and everybody and you have and you're gonna sin and and it's a pre uh how what's the word I'm looking for presupposed presuppose that you're gonna sin but you don't have to the same Holy Spirit that that reigned Jesus because Jesus could have could have sinned this flesh wanted to sin it could have sinned but the Holy Spirit restrained him from sinning. Well that same Holy Spirit that's inside of us can restrain us from ever sinning again. He's the same Holy Spirit it's the same flesh the only difference is that ours has already experienced sin we obeyed the flesh and we we're we're now living on the other side of having flesh that has already sinned but the power of the Holy Spirit in his resurrection form cannot restrain you from ever sinning again. But you have to believe that you have to have that aim and how many people how many Christians really have a belief that they don't have to sin again that's not how we think now the flip side though of that is the odds are pretty high that I'm gonna sin. But you're living in that flesh that everything around you is is pulling you towards sin.

SPEAKER_03 34:18

And there's a battle is there's a battle there's a battle between the flesh and the spirit that generally did not exist when I was lost this the the flesh just was a did whatever perpetual winner I guess I guess but now there's a battle and I do have the Holy Spirit of God living inside of me and so now I'm armed for the battle. That's right and and I am if I'm raised to walk in the newness of life I want to pray every day Lord let me walk in the newness of life let me be Christlike let me be Christlike let me be a little Christ um and I and I think that we are empowered with that we are empowered by the Holy Spirit now the devil is going to be lurking and when you do sin he's gonna say that same thing I said a minute ago you see Ed you just thought you were saved you're not saved. That is an absolute lie from hell that's right and and but but again it doesn't mean that that um that obedience doesn't matter because I sin it doesn't but it also doesn't mean that I will ever or could ever be saved by being obedient.

SPEAKER_00 35:27

I'm empowered with the Holy Spirit to be obedient the law is not this um this taskmaster waiting to beat me up it just allows and I remember when I got saved I somehow the Lord made me realize in my mind that oh this whole old testament thing these all these laws they really just pointed out my need for Christ you know I I I think I think about it too I think about it too it's like we we have a tendency to you know make this you know I don't know like in the air kind of a deal you know we can like it's non-tangible and yet we understand it everywhere else man I've been an athlete all my life and when I had good coaches they would take me out to the beach to run the sand and and and just they they just want to one one millisecond off of your you know I'm saying and just to make you better but the whole thing was to make you better we're not they're not trying to make you run the sand because they hate you or because you have to keep this you know and that's how we think of the law the reality is that the law is just to be able to benefit you now that you have received that righteousness is only from Christ.

SPEAKER_03 36:44

Think about this verse that that comes started this off with Matthew 520 it is not Jesus handing us a ladder and saying climb higher it is Jesus exposing that our ladder doesn't reach and then becoming the way the entrance into the kingdom himself for us.

SPEAKER_00 37:08

Amen yeah amen amen well you know the thing about it too guys is like we're dealing with the heart of the hard uh sayings of Jesus but the reality what what we're finding out is that the words may be hard but the love the impact the reason the why behind it couldn't be anything better well hey man thank y'all uh for joining us today and we will see you in about a week