Well, happy New Year.
Maybe you have a New Year's resolution.
Maybe you want to walk more, you want to stretch more, you want to open your hips up, you want to hydrate more, save more, give more.
Maybe you want to drink less and hydrate more.
That would be good.
Maybe your resolution is to have no more resolutions.
That could be resolution.
Well, I'll have an idea for you for the next four weeks.
We're going to study the book of Romans 8, that chapter in Romans, just Romans 8, about life in the Spirit.
Wants you to consider, consider for a new year's resolution, to begin to have a resolution to walk in the Spirit more.
What does it mean to walk in the Holy Spirit?
What does it mean to walk in truth and grace, not fear and falsehood?
Theologian Sinclair Ferguson for us to have an idea of who is this Holy Spirit.
What is this Holy Spirit?
Ferguson said this: The Holy Spirit is the person who brings us into living union with Christ and makes the realities of Christ's work effective in us.
So that Christ's work was done historically on the cross.
Well, how does it get applied to us?
How does it get in us?
Well, the Holy Spirit is applying that.
So we can say this about the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is fully God, third person of the Trinity, Heavenly Father, Jesus, Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit's personal, not an impersonal force.
The Holy Spirit's the applier of redemption.
So uniting us to Jesus.
The Holy Spirit's the indwelling presence of God.
So when we think about God in us, God's activity in our hearts, that's the Holy Spirit producing faith, repentance, holiness, and assurance.
All right, one more quote.
John Calvin, 500 years ago, said the Holy Spirit is the bond by which Christ effectually unites us to Himself.
So I love that word bond.
The Holy Spirit bonds us to Jesus, not your own goodness or religious resume.
But the Holy Spirit does that work.
Well, I hope you had a great Christmas.
Hope you had lots of presents filled with presents.
My favorite present that I got, I'm old.
I'm old.
My favorite present was a heating pad.
I mean, that's that's bad.
But it's so my wife got me this heating pad that drapes over the shoulders and it's weighted.
And so I have it in my chair in the living room.
It's like a it's like a three-hour hug at night while I watch TV.
If I could wear it right now and it'd be appropriate, I probably'd have it on right now.
Just like a warm, long hug.
Anyways, my wife gave it to me and I ripped over the paper, ripped open that tape to get this gift, right?
That's how you open a present.
You rip open the paper, rip open the tape, right?
Because that tape matters, right?
Like the kind of tape you use, because you want the tape to wrap a present to hold the paper, but you you want the person who can open it to be able to break that bond, right?
You don't want it to be super strong tape.
That's very frustrating when you open the present.
Right?
So you get tape strong enough to hold it, but not a bond strong enough to actually hold forever.
You want it easily broken.
So we could say this Christmas tape is like minimal bond, right?
You want it to break.
So Christmas tape's the opposite of the bond that we talk about when we think about the Holy Spirit.
Holy Spirit's bond is much more like the tape.
Do you remember the tape?
Flex tape, flex seal tape.
So this was Phil Swift, perfect salesman.
We're gonna watch a minute.
He'll sell you on the tape.
You'll go buy some later today.
Here's Phil Swift.
Hi, Phil Swift here for flex tape.
All right, so Phil, Phil will tape up anything, right?
And his tape, that's that's gospel tape, like the bond that holds, right?
In one commercial he tapes up with clear flex tape that fits over sharks.
I mean, not masking tape, not scotch tape, like like this is maximum bond you can trust.
All right, Calvin is saying when he talks about the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit bonds us to Jesus like that.
Like that amount of security, that amount of assurance.
And the Holy Spirit is doing that bonding, not us.
Not our commitment, not our amount of passion, not our religious resume.
That is the gift the Holy Spirit gives to us.
Now, our text this morning, Romans 8, verses 1 through 4, here's what we're gonna see.
We're gonna see our natural posture, which is guilty, defensive, and self-atoning.
So this is a way to say self-justifying.
I want to justify myself with my religious resume, with my goodness, but not necessarily help from God.
Number two, God's decisive declaration, no condemnation.
Number three, the Holy Spirit's ministry, applying Christ's finished work to us, to our hearts.
And then number four, we begin to see this week and in the coming three weeks a new way of life in the Spirit versus an old way of life of self-effort.
Romans 8, 1.
There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
Point number one is this life in the Spirit is life without condemnation.
This chapter begins with that word, therefore, which means Paul is giving us a conclusion about Romans 7 and everything that came before, about Jesus being enough for our relationship with God.
That Jesus actually is sufficient and enough for all the forgiveness we need and all the righteousness we need.
And that the law, all we should be as Christians, which is good, but all those guidelines and rules and the goodness that we should be, is not enough.
The problem is not the law, the problem is us before the law.
So Jesus fulfills the law.
He lives the perfect life that we don't live.
That's how we get verse one.
No condemnation.
Theologian John Stott said this: Our justification, together with its corresponding truth of no condemnation, is securely grounded in what God has done for us and through Jesus Christ.
So we can say it this way: the gospel tells us there's no condemnation before God and Jesus.
Our guilt has been fully paid for by Jesus, and our shame is met not with rejection, but with welcome from Jesus.
So this means that the Holy Spirit may convict us.
We'll have conviction by the Holy Spirit.
Now we know the difference between conviction and condemnation because condemnation leads to guilt trips and shame cycles.
Conviction leads to repentance, which is God's kindness to us and future growth.
Do you see the difference there?
That's how we know whether we're in the spirit or whether we're walking under the law or in our flesh.
If we're feeling condemnation, that sends us into guilt trips and shame cycles, we're not in the spirit.
If we're feeling conviction, that will lead us toward repentance in God's kindness, freedom, and growth.
Verse 2, for the law of the spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.
Point number two is this life in the spirit is freedom for ongoing relationship with God.
This freedom in verse two is joined together with the no condemnation in verse one.
So these are the two great blessings we can think about as we walk in the spirit.
No condemnation, an ongoing relationship with God.
And it's bonded to you, given to you by the Holy Spirit.
Maybe you remember about a year or so ago, I was hiking out at Kennesaw at the trails, and this beautiful couple kind of hiked up behind me, and I thought I was moving pretty good, and they came up behind me and they passed me.
Well, it happened again.
I was hiking up the back of Kennesaw Mountain, and I'm moving pretty good.
I'm thinking I'm an in-shape 46-year-old man.
I'm not too bad.
I'm not feeling too bad about myself.
I'm past a couple people feeling pretty good, just like I was a year ago.
And then I hear this young couple talking and they're gaining on me.
And I'm like, who's, you know, is this happening again?
Somebody's gaining?
I mean, this nobody runs up this trail, it's pretty steep.
I'm like, are they gaining?
And they're talking like they're sitting down, like they're not even winded.
And sure enough, I look back, same couple, same couple from a year ago.
Beautiful people, unbelievably beautiful.
If they ever show up to church here, you'll know they're here because you'll be like, unbelievably gorgeous man and woman.
Tall, perfect skin.
It'd been a year.
I looked at them.
I'm a year older.
Somehow they're younger.
I don't know how.
I mean, they're unbelievable.
I'm sure their marriage is even better now than before.
No childhood wounds.
He can still sleep through the night.
Uh I mean, they're unbelievable.
They're my ideal, right?
This is what I said a year ago.
Still true.
Somehow they're better, uh, more pristine than before.
They are my ideal.
They pass me, blow by me.
I can't keep up.
I try to keep up.
I try to let them not pass me.
Even once they pass me, I'm like, I'll keep up with them.
I can't keep.
And they're talking the whole time.
Like, I can't do it.
I don't have it in me.
That's the law.
The law is the standard that we should be and we want to be.
We just don't have the goods, the power to pull it off.
We need help.
Matthew 5, verse 17, Jesus teaches, do not think that I've come to abolish the law or the prophets.
I've not 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 the least in the kingdom of heaven.
But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
What is Jesus teaching in verse 20?
Well, he's teaching us to go back to verse 17 and realize he hasn't come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it.
So the law is good and holy.
We need the law to guide us, but the law, while it guides us, it has no power to actually fulfill the thing it calls us to.
So that's why there's so much exhaustion in the Christian life.
Because we're living under the law and flesh rather than living in the spirit.
The law is unable to produce the righteousness it calls for.
Meaning, all the shoulds in life can't deliver your heart from guilt.
It can't deliver your heart into righteousness.
We need outside help.
We need Jesus, we need the Holy Spirit to be applying the finished, sufficient work of Christ to us.
Here's how Paul explains it Galatians 3, verse 23 through 26.
Now, before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed.
So then the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith.
But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian.
For in Christ Jesus you are all sons, and we say daughters of God through faith.
So let's summarize it this way: just three quick points.
Our problem is our shortcoming before the law.
The problem is not the law, our shortcoming before the law, and our ongoing fascination with it.
That we want to keep returning back to being good enough as to be forgiven, being good enough as to be worthy, whole, righteous enough.
So we don't relax the law, we let it guide us, but it also shows us our need of Jesus.
That's point number two.
Our rescue is God's perfect completion of the law.
That's what we have in Jesus.
He is our justification and he is our holiness, even while we're still becoming holy.
Number three, you're no longer under law, but under grace, which is what the Holy Spirit is applying to your hearts even right now.
You're defined and secured outside of your production, good or bad, and this is the gift we have in the Spirit.
Romans 8, verse 3.
For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do.
By sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, he condemns sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fulfilled in us.
Okay.
So how do we walk?
Well, we walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
Because the Spirit is applying that Jesus work to our hearts.
Point number three, the Spirit empowers us to live holy and live in grace.
Both those things.
They go together.
We don't relax the law and say, oh, it means nothing to us.
We live however we want.
No, we say Jesus fulfilled the law, so we're free.
Now that I'm free, what does it mean for me to grow in grace?
What does it mean to grow toward godliness, even while I'm going to be repenting along the way?
So the Holy Spirit is our bond, and the Holy Spirit is our empowerment.
Now, imagine on Christmas morning, I'm sure this happened to you.
You wake up and you're your sweet someone, and they offer you that cup of coffee, and they say, Good morning, Merry Christmas.
I love you so much.
And they say, Oh, I'm so excited.
I, you know, I got you such a great gift this year.
You know, if you just come outside with me, I want to give it to you.
And you walk outside, and you know, here is your brand new Christmas Lexus, you know, just like in the commercial, somehow they magically paid for it outside of a joint account, so you don't even feel I've always wondered this about these commercials.
But like, if my wife gave me a Christmas Lexus, that'd be like, did you just pay$70,000 for this car and we didn't discuss this?
Like, shouldn't this be a discussion, not a gift?
Anyway, so in this scenario, sermon, uh, in this scenario, uh, magically the car is getting paid for outside of a joint account.
It's you know, they say, sweet someone says, Merry Christmas, I got this for you.
It's magically paid for, don't worry about it.
And they say, you know, this is in this beautiful, this is beautiful car.
This is actually the car you've been talking about.
This is your ideal dream car.
You cannot believe it.
Your sweet someone says, you know, there's only one thing, I got a deal on it because it doesn't have an engine.
You know, it's just a little thing.
So you gotta figure that out, you know.
And but here are the keys.
That's life by the law.
You have your ideal, but you don't have any power to run it.
Life by the law is the Lexus without the engine.
Life by our power alone will not be enough.
But God gifts himself to us in the Holy Spirit, bonds us, gives us the gift that we're already the status of fully righteous, even while he's empowering us to become more godly.
So we're free in Jesus by the Holy Spirit's application to us.
We're bonded to Jesus by the Holy Spirit, we're empowered to walk with Jesus by the Holy Spirit.
In our back lobby, we have a copy of Rembrandt's The Prodigal, the Return of the Prodigal.
Uh, in this picture is just outside those doors.
Uh, the child so exhausted.
We look at this painting a couple of times a year.
We've all been this child.
We've felt like this.
We have felt like this in the world because the world beat you down, or your rebellion beat you down, or you felt like this in the church, or your spiritual life because you kept trying to do enough and be enough, and man, you're just Christianity, your own religion exhausted you.
You'll come to the end of yourself.
We will all come to the end of ourselves.
We will all end up like this child and return to the Heavenly Father.
And the painting gives the gospel truth for us that the Father is greater than the child's condition, the father's love is greater than the child's rebellion or exhaustion.
And last week I learned this.
I'd never heard this before.
Many theologians, when they see the father's hands, they see the father's hand symbolic of the Holy Spirit's work.
And then look at look at the painting, look at the hands.
So when they see the hands of the Father, the application, they see that as the Holy Spirit, drawing the sinner home, holding him before he can stand, giving him strength to walk anew.
And so as we move into the new year, I want those hands to be an image for us to ponder the Holy Spirit.
How the Holy Spirit is working in you, holding you, bonding you, empowering you.
Let's pray together.
Heavenly Fathers, we come before you.
We enter a new year, God, we have resolutions.
God, help us to hydrate more and work out more and save more and give more.
Help us with the resolutions to study more and have better relationships.
Help us to do these things.
And God help us to learn what it means to walk in your spirit, not in the flesh and not under law.
Help us learn to receive this application of Christ's finished work, to live in the application that Jesus is enough for all my forgiveness and all my righteousness.
Help us to receive even more that you have found us, rescued us, bonded us, and you empower us to walk with you.
In Jesus' name we pray.
Amen.