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At the end of our last session this afternoon, we had begun the second great movement of the Epistle to the Romans. As justification is aimed at saving us from the wrath of God, sanctification is aimed at saving us from the wreckage of sin. As was reasonable, the second great movement we found began with a great diagnosis of sin. Just as, of course, did the first movement in the epistle. But now we move on this evening to consider the rest of movement six, which comprises chapters, uh, of movement two, which comprises chapters six, seven, and eight.
This part of Romans contains chapters that are perhaps the best known in all the epistles of the Hebrews. Being well known, I shall not need to say much about them. There is a sense in which, of course, one could talk now till the millennium comes, or otherwise one could say very little. And I propose the latter. Oh, it's a comparative term, of course, when I say it. Because I can see that my job is to sketch in still the major thought flow, and then leave to your discussion the details.
One thing we shall notice at once, because the paragraph that begins the movement has introduced us to the idea, that now we come to contemplate the death of Jesus Christ. Our Lord. We find that not only did he die for us, but there is a very real sense in which we died with him. That is not an idea that you meet in the first movement, but you do meet it now in the second. And you will see the import of it if you reflect once again on the comparison that is made between Adam and Christ.
In one sense, we stand with Adam because originally and physically we were in him anyway. The marvel of our salvation is then that Christ not merely died for us, but his becoming human, not ceasing to be the Son of God, has made possible this amazing thing that we can be united with him. You just think for a moment, so it should strike you forcibly enough.
If you read somewhere that so and so died with Socrates, you'd think the writer had gone berserk. You die with Socrates, or be buried with Socrates, or rise with Socrates, or any other figure you like. You die with the Buddha. Rise with the Buddha. The thing just wouldn't make sense. That it makes sense to talk of us being dead with Christ, buried with him, raised with him, and joined with him. Shows us something of the wonder of the person of Christ.
But now, as we proceed in chapter six onwards to see the program for delivering us from the wreckage of sin, let us remind ourselves that the entrance of sin into our world brought mankind into bondage, nor one bondage alone, but several bondages. A bondage to sin itself, to the reign of sin, a bondage to the reign and dominion of death. It brought creation, says chapter eight, into a bondage to corruption, under which we, it, uh, nature still groans, and we with her.
And moreover, far from God's holy law being something that would deliver us from any of those bondages or all of them, that law itself became a bondage and a dominion from which we needed to be delivered. Now that, of course, is a thing to get hold of, because here scripture goes against popular belief, flies directly in the face of it. It is instinctive in the human heart to think that our trouble could be cured if only we could be prevailed upon, uh, to do our best to keep God's law, and that God has given his law for this purpose, to save us from our bondages.
Whereas the opposite is true. Given what we are, the law has turned to be one more bondage from which we need to be. And indeed now, if we look at the actual text of Romans chapter six, we shall see that the, uh, force of its first paragraph down to verse fourteen is to show us this, that if we would be set free from the domination of sin, it is this way done. Let me quote verse fourteen of chapter six: Sin shall not have dominion over you.
How is that, and why shall it not? Well, the answer given is because you are not under law, but under grace. And I take the trouble to emphasize that to you, though you know it full well, because I find in talking to fellow Christians, and particularly younger Christians, that somehow these words do not always register. They start the verse, as good Christians should, uh, following the text very closely. Sin shall not have dominion over you, praise the Lord, they say. Get them to lift their noses from the text and say, why is that so?
Oh, because you see, the Holy Spirit within us lifts us above sinning. And of course, they're right, aren't they? But that isn't what this verse says. That is what, in fact, chapter eight says. The breaking of our bondages and the setting of us free, according to these chapter six, seven, and eight. uh, is done in, uh, not just one way, but in two ways at least, if not three. We readily want to turn Romans six, I find, into Romans eight, if I may put it in that peculiar fashion.
Sin shall not have dominion over you because the Holy Spirit, by his empowering, sets you free from the drag of sin. But we mustn't be impatient. This is Romans six, not Romans eight. And as you see, if we turn back to the text once more, the actual statement is, sin shall not have dominion over you. Why not? For you are not under law, but under grace. And we have to ask ourselves, don't we, and point out to our congregations, well, how is that a reason why sin shall not have dominion over you, that you are not under law?
What's that got to do with breaking the dominion of sin? Whatever it means, it is evident surely from its language that here we are still talking in legal terms. And saying that, be careful to whom you say it, because they're liable to get even more patient. They struggle through chapters one, two, three, four, and five, and by the time they come to six, they've had enough of legalisms. They say, be practical, my brother. Don't want to have any more, uh, lectures on the law and legal points of law. We want to get down to practical Christian living, see.
So abandon all this stuff about the law and legal arrangements. Come practical. But of course, in setting people free from bondages, knowing the legal facts is very important, isn't it? When I was a youth, my father used to regale me with all sorts of stories, and among them was his vivid descriptions of what happened to some of the less intelligent members of the Ipswich public, the unsoaked Ipswich, as Dickens had it. You'll see, in those far off days, the Queen's recruiters for the army would come to Ipswich, and they would go to the public houses, and they are, they would pay for all sorts of drinks all round until they got some poor codhopper from Suffolk, pretty well soused, and then they would offer him a shilling, which was a, a, a, a fortune in those days, and he took the Queen's shilling, and before he knew what, he was in the army and obliged to report to barracks, you'll see.
And once in the barracks, he would be taken out onto the old drill, uh, yard, you'll see, and some fiend, uh, of a drill sergeant would proceed to drill him and all the other thugs that he had collected, you'll see. Aha! Woe betide if he lagged behind. They had whips of tremendous potency, and the way they were bullied and thrashed within an inch of their life sometimes, got them in such conditions, state like Pavlov's dogs, you'll see, that the old army sergeant major only had to shout and they jumped to attention. If he said, go and jump down the barrel of that gun that the Germans hold towards you, they'd jump down the barrel of it, they'd face that rather than him.
You'll see. He got them so conditioned by his tactics. Well, imagine such a gentleman. And some long lost relative aunt comes from America and hears that poor Tommy has entered the Queen's Army and has been thus drilled, and she goes to the army, as you could in those days, and she buys him out. And to his great relief, she carts him off downtown and takes him for a coffee and tells him he's free, you see. Well, next Monday morning, he's walking through the streets of I- Ipswich, rejoicing in his freedom, when turning a corner, he comes across the the drill sergeant. What are you doing here? Get back to open up the road. He goes like one oh, because he was conditioned to go.
And I'll have the law after you, and I'll have you put in jail and have you thrashed. So he goes back to the thing, you see, the old yard. And presently, Aunt Matilda comes by and spies Tommy back in the barracks. What, my man, are you doing? Oh, the sergeant major said I had to. No, no, no, she says, I've bought you out. You don't have to. You're legally free, man. Of course, he, likewise, coming from Suffolk, wouldn't have a ready extra understanding of the law. But we can see now the tremendous practical importance of grasping the fact of the law that the man has been set free from his bondage.
And if I might use that somewhat crude analogy, the first step of breaking the dominion of sin is the legal step. Sin shall not hold you down. Catecho is the word. Why will it not? Because you are not under law, but under grace. And what does that mean in practical terms? Well, pray consider for a moment what law is as a principle. God's holy law in Old Testament wasn't simply advice, was it? Though, as you will know, the Hebrew word for, uh, for law, Torah, means basically instruction.
But God's law was far more than instruction. God didn't come to the Israelites or anybody else and say, I shouldn't murder if I were you. It's not a nice thing to do. If you were to take my advice, you wouldn't murder, but I mean, you know. No, certainly not. It was definitely instruction, but it was law. That is, it was command plus penalty. It was prohibition plus penalty. That's law. It isn't just kindly advice or guidance. Now consider, good friend, what would happen if we as believers started our course of sanctification, but we were under law still. I put it to myself like this, you'll see.
Here I am, I, uh, in bed, and I wake up Monday morning. There stands the law. Law as a principle. It says to me, now, Gooding, you will arise, and today you will love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. And if you don't, I shall curse you. Slip up once. Fail to love the Lord your God with all. Then that one slip, and I shall consign you to the penalty that you deserve.
You know what I should do? I shouldn't even get out of bed and try. Just stay in bed. I would say, well, what is the use? I get up with all the very good intentions. I might survive till after breakfast. Not likely to survive till after lunch. With past experience to guide me, no, I might as well be realist and give up before I start. And the law, then it would curse me for staying in bed. Oh, but it's serious, friend. You're proposing to be holy. Just tell me it's a matter of, now we will be practical.
You're proposing to be one hundred percent holy tomorrow morning by seven o'clock. You see, they're all sluggish. You see, and uh, you see? But if you're not proposing to be perfect, does it matter if you come short? Is God now taking a very easy notion of sin and saying, well, now because they're my people, I shan't set the standards too high, so they can, it doesn't matter if they, they don't get very far. So God has still the same standards as he always has. But you see now, if those standards were to be enforced by the principle of law, then here's me starting in all earnest to live a holy Christian life, and the first time I make a mistake, that's finished.
I make the mistake... and the law curses me. And good I saying, well, I'll do better the next time. For under the law, the one mistake was enough to ruin me. As I have tried to observe myself and others, it happens sometimes with men, doesn't it, and Christian women. They make some big ghastly mistake, and then they feel it's all up, it's no good my trying again. I can't keep it up, and if I try to go through with the open facade of, of Christian living, I shall feel a hypocrite.
I've already blotted my copy book. I can't be a hypocrite. I know my own heart. I might as well give up trying. Oh, but you see, sin shall not keep you down. Why? Because you are not under law. How did that happen then? How is it I'm not under law? Has God abolished his law? No, certainly not. Well, how then? Because, well, let the, um, earlier verses tell us.
With Christ we have died. With Christ we have been buried. As, of course, we symbolize in our baptism. Our old man, we are to know this, says verse six, was crucified with Christ. As the first step towards that the body of sin might be done away, that we should be no longer in bondage to sin. Our old man was crucified with Christ. Here, as you will know, if you dare say this in some, uh, congregations, you will be, uh, met by a chorus of protests.
What is the good of saying my old man is crucified when, especially Mondays, but sometimes also on Wednesdays, and very often on Saturdays, if not on Thursdays. Even Sundays can be a bad day. The old man in me is very much alive. What is the good of asking me to believe the impossible? Even if I tried hard, how could I do it? To say my old man has been crucified. A nonsense. Very much alive and kicking. Which would lead me to ask who your old man is. Who is your old man? I find again there's popular notion that, uh, as people in our unregenerate state, we were made up of two parts.
There was the nice part, and then there was the nasty part. The nice part was me, the nasty part was the old man. And this verse is asking me to believe, when I trusted Christ, the nasty bit of me was crucified, and that left the nice bit. Isn't true, is it? Because if you want an illustration of the whole thing, says Paul, well, take baptism do. Tell me, when you were baptized, which bit of you did they baptize, do you happen to remember? They baptized the nasty bit, and the nasty bit was buried, and that left the nice bit, I suppose, standing beside.
Well, of course not. Is it so that they baptized the whole of you? And buried the whole of you? So it is. The old man is not the nasty bit of us. The old man is the whole person who came under the judgment of God. God's law demanded not that the nasty bit so called, but that the whole person be executed. No good is it coming before a magistrate in the court and saying, it wasn't me that murdered the chap, it was my nasty temper.
The magistrate will simply reply, you oughtn't to have let your nasty temper do it. And he won't have your nasty temper executed, he'll have you executed. And God's law isn't concerned with which bit of you made you do the bad thing. It's concerned with the fact that before the Lord, we as persons are guilty, and we as persons, lock, stock, and barrel, must be executed. We are to know it. That when we repented towards God, we agreed with that judgment of God, and to agreed to our execution.
When we agreed to it, then there was presented to us a savior, and upon our receiving him and becoming one with him, God's law can regard what happened to him as happening to all those that have been made one with him. And to show that Paul is still thinking in terms of such legal situations, Paul adds, you'll see, that once you're dead, you know, you've been justified from sin, haven't you? So be it that you've done, uh, twenty five murders.
If they hang you for the first one, they can't hang you very well for the second. Once you're dead, you're acquit of the law. He that is dead has died, has been justified, the word is, and Paul means what he says, he's thinking in legal terms, has been justified from sin. You'll see, ladies and gentlemen, God's diagnosis is far more radical than we allow. So many people like to think of themselves as nice rosy red apples, with a tiny little bit of speck round the side. They think, therefore, the process of sanctification is by God's help, so to speak, to bore out the old little bit of speck of badness.
And if only they could do that, the rest of the apple would be left a nice red rosy apple. That is a forlorn hope. The more you dig into that little bit of corruption on the surface, you'll find it goes right down to the core. The only way to do is to get rid of the whole apple. That's what God's law demanded. That's what we consented to when we repented and received the Savior. And having died, have passed out of and beyond that principle of law.
Suppose you could go up to that part of heaven where they keep the ledgers. Be interesting, wouldn't it? I suspect when nobody's looking, you'll turn them up to your name. And then, you say that gooding chap comes around here preaching. I wonder what his ledger looks like. Bonjour. I don't know about some of these preachers. They preach the theory, but how does the practice get on? If you turned up my name in those ledgers, ladies and gentlemen, all the red ink you'd see. But after many, many pages, you would read as follows, account closed, the accused died.
Marvelous, isn't it? And because I am thus dead as far as the law is concerned, and have moved out from its arm, now there is real hope that I can learn and be trained to be holy. Know this, therefore, and learn to think of yourself this way round, says Paul. That, uh, just as Christ, you know, the death he died, didn't die every day of the week. He died to sin once, never going to die again.
Reckon yourselves to be dead to sin in that same way. Because when he died, paying the penalty of your sin, reckon yourself that you died with him once and for all. Yes, of course, there's a second side to it. Likewise illustrated in baptism, as Paul points out. Our baptisms are not only us saying that we agree with God's sentence that we should be executed because we are so helpless, hopeless. Not only that we died with Christ and were buried with him, baptism enacts a resurrection forthwith, so that a baptism is the most cheerful funeral you could ever attend because it is followed by an immediate resurrection.
And when we rise, it is not giving a promise, Lord, from now on I'll try to walk in newness of life. It's illustrating a fact. Executed with Christ under the law, dead and buried. When Christ rose, you rose, and God, having raised him from the dead, has raised you from the dead and given you a new life, and there's a newness of life in which you can now walk because God has created it. That too is a gift. Here is the beginnings, therefore, of our freedom. It will take us a long while, won't it, to learn to walk and use that newness of life consistently and ever more fully in every department of life.
And seeing we're not machines into which God puts a different program and it instantly obeys, but personalities. This new life will make progress, but amid many a mistake and a falling back. But oh, thank God if we fall. We're not chained. We can tell the Lord and confess it and get up and go again. The school I went to, I did one whole year of chemistry, which I suspect was enough. When boys in my school started chemistry, their parents had to pay a cautionary deposit.
That paid in advance for all the breakages and blowing up of chemistry laboratories that we were likely to engage in, either deliberately or accidentally. Ha, the dear parents had to pay in advance. My dear Christian friend, the cost of your spiritual whole, uh, uh, sanctification, your developing holiness. Don't you imagine it is without expense and cost? I am happy to tell you that Christ has paid in advance. God isn't lowering his standards, but to make the thing even possible, God has paid in advance.
You say that's outrageous, that will lead people to sin. That's just what they said to Paul. For not only does he say in chapter six, what shall we say then, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? But you notice he utters that same sentiment in verse fifteen. If the secret of not, uh, of a secret of being delivered from the dominion of sin is that we are not under law, well then, look at verse fifteen. What then, shall we sin then, if we are not under law, but under grace? You see the flow of the logic. And Paul doesn't reply, oh no, you mustn't sin because really we are still under law.
You mustn't take my earlier remarks too literally. No, no. We are not under law, we're under grace. Shall we sin then? I shouldn't if I were you, said Paul. Why not? Well, as I read the next verses, sixteen to twenty three, they tell us this, that we are not under law, and therefore there is no penalty, since Christ has paid the penalty. But there are consequences. And that's a different thing, isn't it? If God were to tell you, you being a farmer, and I don't know why on earth he should, but suppose he did.
Sam, I want you to grow wheat in your field this year. But Sam, having regard to all sorts of conditions of the market and possible profits and things like that, decides not to grow wheat, but to grow barley. He chose the barley. Three months later, the barley comes up, and he begins to see what he's done. And he goes to the Lord in true con- contrition and repentance, and says, Lord, what a fool I have been, disobeying you like that. What an ungrateful wretch. Forgive me, Lord.
The Lord forgives him, doesn't he? And there is no penalty to them that are in Christ Jesus. But what happens about the old barley? Does God change the barley into wheat? Oh no, you say it remains barley, and what the man sowed, that he will reap. No penalty. There are consequences. And if that exposition is true, it is a very important thing to get across to people, isn't it? I think sometimes we evangelicals will so emphasize the fact that there's no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, no penalty, that we've forgotten to remind ourselves and others that there are consequences.
As Paul remarks in Galatians, if you sow to the flesh, you will of the flesh reap corruption. God isn't mocked. What you sow, you reap. So here, he says, you'll see, uh, I speak after the manner of men, and there's a certain, uh, limit to be put upon, uh, uh, the extent to which you take hi- take his na- his, uh, the analogy he's about to use. Speak after the manner of men, he says. But don't you realize that to whomsoever you constantly yield your members to obey, you become his slave, to whom you constantly yield your members to obey? Yes? So then, you constantly, even as a believer, present your members to sin, and what will happen?
You'll become the slave of sin, because you say, I'm redeemed, I can't help that. You will become the slave of sin, even if as a b- if you are a believer, if constantly you yield your members to sin to obey sin. Isn't it true? And straightforward observation of habit forming is an example of the pointed issue. Legally free, you can be like my raw recruit, you know, back on bashing the square and being a slave to the old drill sergeant. Thanks be to God that you were the slaves of sin, but have now yielded yourself to that type, that mold of teaching to which you were delivered.
And you see, he says, you see, take note of this. In those old days when you were slaves of sin, what fruit did you have? What consequences, what harvest did you reap? Pretty poor one, really, wasn't it? Yes, because the opsonia that sin pays is death at its various levels. If as a believer you will drink methylated spirits every day before breakfast, before lunch and dinner again. You'll find it will lead to death in very startling effects. It'll kill your brain to start with, and then you afterwards.
Pointless to say there's no, well, it's not pointless, but what relevance now to say there's no penalty, because I'm in Christ. There will be consequences. The gift of God, however, is eternal life. To be exploited, all its potentials to be developed. How to do them? To yield our members constantly to God. And so we follow into chapter seven where Paul uses, to my mind, a delightful metaphor. To some people, they think it's a bit coarse and prefer it not to be pushed too far.
But he seems to be saying this to me, that the principle of holiness, therefore, is yielding our members to Christ, to God, to Christ, if you will. Not now, uh, so much the principle of obeying a law plus a prohibition plus penalty, but yielding ourselves as those alive from the dead to the Savior, that through union with us, he with us and we with him, we might bring forth fruit to God. Even so, you will see that Paul is still concerned with this matter of the law.
For he points out that once upon a time they were under the law and speaks of the law as though the law were their husband. And those who were under the law cannot say, oh, well, I got tired of that husband, let's walk out, like, like people do nowadays, Two months after they get married, uh, we're tired of him, let's walk out. Because a woman is bound to her husband under the law as long as he lives, she, uh, he lives. The only way to get free is either for him to die or her to die. In other words, the only thing that will break that bond, the dominion of the law, as Paul calls it, is death. Once upon a time, there was this principle then of law.
How did we get free? How did Israel get free? So as to be joined to another husband and a completely different principle. It's not that God said, oh, I gave the law, you know, but that was unsatisfactory for so, well, let's forget that and let's introduce a new principle. Folks had to be redeemed from that dominion of the law and delivered from it. How? By death. This time, not by the law's death, but by the believer's death, dying with Christ, so they can be legally set free to be married to another.
At eight o'clock of a Friday evening, elderly men have the sympathy and generally the permission of a younger, more vigorous brain to be a little fanciful. When I read these words, I cannot help remembering that ancient story of that good woman Abigail, who was married to an absolute fool. Must I should think? I've never been in this situation, and nor have any of you, I might add. Ladies, it must be a shocking thing to wake up one morning and find you're married to a fool, mustn't it?
Abigail did. And the more she thought about it, the more extensive the man's folly appeared. He refused to give David the demands that David could legitimately ask for, and she saw that very soon David and his army would be there to slaughter the fool of her husband, who was navel. While he was drunk, like some Texan at his ranch, uh, he, uh, with all his sheep around him, uh, she slipped out of the house with a few servants and took a donkey's load, camel loads of goodies to take them to David.
And when she arrived and he met her as he came around the mountain, she got off her camel, of course, and, uh, spread out her goodies, the cakes and the figs and this, that, and the other, before David, she said, and entered her plea and managed, in fact, to dissuade him from executing vengeance upon Nabal. You know, as she knelt there with all these goodies around and the even more charming face that she presented to David and her wincey natter, somehow the chemistry started working. I don't know whether it was her first or David first, you don't know which one it was first, but anyway, David got ideas into his head that she did as well.
That she kicked herself and said, you know, I wish I weren't married to that fool, because I do believe he was interested in me, was David. But David just couldn't take her as she was, couldn't she? She wasn't free to just up and leave Nabal. Death had to intervene. It was this time the death of the husband Nabal. When David heard of it, he sent and took Abigail to be his wife. With us, it was the law held us under its dominion. With us, it was death that s- broke that dominion, not the law's death, but our death.
You are made free from the law by the body, and thus the death of the Lord Jesus, that you might be joined to another. Oh, what a lovely love story it is. Why shouldn't we preach God's great plan of holiness as a love story? Joined to Christ, the living Lord, may bring forth through us fruit to God. How should it be anything other than joy and gladness to yield ourselves to such an husband?
Well, we do sometimes, don't we? Why don't we always? And to our answering of that question amongst others, Paul now turns himself, doesn't he, in chapter seven and the first part of chapter eight. And as he does so, he answers that question by answering a number of other big questions. He's been talking about our being free from the law so that we might become holy. It sounds very odd, doesn't it, when you first hear it? What's wrong with the law then?
And what is the law? You would understand how Jews would be outraged when they heard Paul talking like this, that to be holy you have to be set free from, from law and joined to Christ. What's wrong with law then? The answer to that is nothing, of course. Law is a perfectly good thing, and we know that, says Paul in chapter seven, The law as such is a very good thing. Joel says. But then, good as it was in itself, it had very unfortunate effects. For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were through the law wrought in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.
So God's holy law, there was a sense in which, holy though it was, it provoked our sinning, so corrupt was our sinful nature. Like naughty schoolboys coming down the road and seeing your garden gate with a notice on it, don't touch wet paint, and the boy was never thinking of touching it anyway, but when he saw your notice, he said, yes, I will. And ruined the painting. All because you put the notice on. So God's holy law provoked our foolish enmity and disobedience and rebellion. And then you'll see, the law, instead of making us more holy, says Paul, in the end, slew me.
Because when the law brought home to my conscience its commandment, thou shalt not covet, it exposed me for what I am in my own basic human sinful nature and showed me the game is up. You'll see it is possible for us to get a certain way along the line of Christian holiness, isn't it? Working under the principle of law. We think we're doing quite well. We haven't said an un- unkind word to mother-in-law or our maiden aunts these last six months. We must be improving. Well, if we think that, there'll come a time when that law will suddenly begin to speed, and we shall find eruptions within our personality that strive how we will.
We cannot master. If we were under law, that would be the end of it. What's wrong then? The law is good, but says Paul, arguing another possibility, was that which was good made sin to me? You know, hmm, the law was quite reasonable in asking for this and this to be done, except it wasn't reasonable asking me to do it, if only you knew me. It's nice that mum should ask eight-year-old to entertain the guests by playing the latest bit he's learned on the piano.
Well, mum being mum has a right to keep the boy up till eleven o'clock at night, so there comes a point after dinner when he can play the piano, and he shouldn't disobey his parents, but come, come, come. But when the child is more than tired, dead tired, and now been raised to a peak of excitement by all that's been going on, and you ask him to play the piano, well, you deserve what you get. Asking the child at that point in the evening. If it pays up, you mustn't be surprised. Says Paul, now the law is good, but was it rather unrealistic to ask me to keep it? I mean, knowing me. No, no. I can show you that, says Paul, because I'd like to keep it, as a matter of fact.
I agree with the law. With my mind, I can see it's the only sane way of living, and with my mind, I serve the law of God, actually. I agree with it, it's marvelous. And what do you more, not only do I agree with it intellectually, I agree with it emotionally. I delight in the law of God. And then I call my, bring my will to bear upon it, and I will to do the good, or to will is present with me. I expect you've noticed that yourself. Get intellect, get emotion, get will, all aligned behind the intention to keep the law.
Then why don't I? As a believer. I can see the only same way to le- live is to yield myself to Christ. Why don't I then always? And why is it today I say, no, I'm not going to do that certain thing again, I'm going to obey the Lord. And then this time, uh, uh, next month I... go and do the same old thing again. Well, uh, one discovers, and it's a good thing to discover, isn't it? That our troubles are deeper than we think they are.
Not only in our wilder days, but in the midst of our determinations to be holy and keep God's will, we discover the exceeding sinfulness of sin that's in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. Who shall deliver me, therefore? And now it's not a question any longer merely of, uh, a legal situation, is it? But now there begins to enter the great practical deliverance. And what the law could not do when it was weak through the flesh, God has made provision, condemning sin in the flesh.
Now he has given us new life through Christ. That the law, the life of the Spirit in Christ Jesus might set us free from the law of sin and death. And now we have what we've been waiting for, the positive practical side of freedom, in the power of the Holy Spirit within. Very good. I need then say very little more, because now we arrive at territory not only well known, but well loved, and in need of very little exposition, from me at least.
But do notice how a great part of chapter eight is still concerned with the difference of these two methods. The one method of producing holiness by the principle of law, the other method of producing holiness by the principle of the life in Christ, the power of the Spirit within. It is at this juncture, perhaps, that we are allowed to ask a question. Is there another sense in which we not only die to the law, but die to sin? I have talked about the legal side to it. Is there another side?
I am tempted from my reading of Paul, not only in Romans, but what he says in Colossians, to think that that is true. In Colossians, Paul talks in this fashion. He says that when it comes to the putting off of the body of the flesh, that has been done, says he. Notice the tense he uses. You have been circumcised by the circumcision of Christ, buried with him in baptism, which you were raised through faith of the working of God. Leads us to ask, what is this circumcision of Christ?
Circumcision performed by Christ, but how? When were you circumcised by Christ? Circumcision in Israel was a comparatively easy thing, getting rid of a scrap of the flesh. It's a different thing you've got to get rid of the body of the flesh, isn't it? The whole bang shoot. How would it be done? It seems to me that what we symbolize in our baptism is not only a legal thing, but goes more deep in that. There once was a time when, according to Paul's terminology in the Romans, you were in the flesh.
What other ground did you have of existence anyway? The real you, Joe, Sam, Billy, Margaret, Pamela, and Sycophant. What other ground of existence did you have? But a fallen human nature, and you were in it. And apart from Christ's intervention, you would have carried that fallen human nature out into eternity. And you would, what Christ calls, perish.
You would have perished, not ceased to exist. You would have become something that once was human, but... What made the difference then? How, when you consented to die with Christ, under God's judgment, it seems to me that that great operation took place, which now Paul refers to. You're not in the flesh now, are you? You are you, the real you. Whatever it is they call David or George or Mary. You are in the spirit.
It's an imperfect analogy, but just as I could take a twig off this tree, cut it, and transfer the twig across to a different plant. So the root of your being has been cut, and you are not in the flesh. Though some say the flesh is in you a good deal, but you are not in the flesh. You are in the spirit, if so be the spirit is in you. You may care to ask yourself a practical question. Suppose you die and they put you in the grave, and when the Lord comes for you, you'll rise, won't you?
Plus all that horrible old flesh you have now? You say, no, of course not. Oh. You're going to rise without it. Ah. And the unregenerate man, when he is summoned from the tomb to the final judgment, shall he arrive minus his fallen nature? You say, oh no. Well, what made the difference between him and you? It wasn't that the worms set the flesh away, was it, with you, but failed to with him or something. Something far more profound than that. We are on the border of a great mystery, aren't we?
But when you consented to die under God's law, and you were joined with Christ. You have been transplanted, if I may use the term, into Christ. Yeah. So that now we're led by his spirit and show ourselves to be sons of God in that particular, as he trains us to fight against the flesh, and he lusts against the flesh, though the flesh kicks back against the spirit. We can still sow to the flesh, we will be foolish if we do, we shall reap death.
If we sow to the spirit, we shall reap life and peace. And with that, Paul goes on to talk about the delightful ministries of the Holy Spirit in the believer, doesn't he? You'll see, uh, we are being led by the Spirit. We already begin to show that we are sons of God, carrying the character of God. Children we have long since been, who have trusted the Savior. And because we're children, thank God for that, it's simply by heredity that we become heirs. But the Holy Spirit is leading us forward to adult sonship, and creation subjected to vanity, emptiness is waiting and groaning as it waits for the manifestation of the really grown up sons of God.
And when their education is complete, all of them, then creation herself can be delivered from her bondage of corruption and handed over to the glorious administration of Christ and his perfected saints. We ourselves, we've grown within ourselves, waiting for our adoption, the redemption of our bodies. Notice what we do get out of redemption and the cross, won't you? We don't get healing of the body out of the atonement, do we? What we get is not healing of the body, we get the redemption of the body.
That's a very different thing. Yes, in the atonement there is redemption of the body, but you're not going to get it yet. You won't get it. The program is quite precise. Until the Lord come. Thank God you'll get it then. So once more, we're back to a major climax. Paul raises the matter of hope. What a delightful expectation we have. Hope, we don't have it yet, else we wouldn't need to hope for it, would we? We shall have it one day. Meanwhile, as we think of the goals that God has set himself in his wisdom, and they run like this, that whom he foreknew, them he called, and whom he called, them he justified.
I'm sorry, those whom he foreknew, he also foreordained to be conformed to the image of his son, and whom he foreordained, them he called, and whom he called, them he justified, and whom he justified, them he glorified. In spite of it being the determined counsel of God, this is the program. Doesn't happen automatically, does it? In this context, do you know, sir, what to pray for next, you madam? If you were me, having in regard to the program God has set for my ultimate glorification, what would you pray for next? A good deal of persecution, you say, I think would do him good, wake him up a bit, strip off some of the excess fat, hmm?
Oh, wouldn't you think I could do with a bit of encouragement, a bit of success, perhaps, some sunshine, plants have to have both sunshine as well as rain, don't they? What would you pray for next? To help forward the program. I don't think you know altogether, do you? Oh, thank God. Not just left to us. That God has put his Holy Spirit in us. Oh, what a delightful thing that is. Do you know there's an ancient story, and once again I indulge my endless capacity for fancifulness, but there's a delightful story known to you all in the Old Testament about the time when Abraham thought it was, uh, now at long last it was time for his son Isaac to get a wife.
He was about seventy or something. And, uh, uh, so he sent his servants, you may remember, back to the Gentiles from which Abraham came, who there, by God's grace, saw a good lady, and he put the proposition to her about becoming the wife of his master's son. His master's son was tolerably rich, and all this and that and other, and the question was put, will you go with me, the servant, you'll see, and I'll take you to, uh, uh, to the master? She said, yes, uh, yes, I agree to this marriage proposal. Well, what does he do then? I suppose he got out his visiting card, plus a map, and said, well, now this is a map of the country where my master lives, and if you'd like to turn up, you know, you'll find us at such and such a street or around such and such a palm tree.
Make yourself known, and someone be around, and you will introduce you to my master son. Not. And she said yes, the servant took her and took over responsibility for her. Step by step, by step, by step, he walked with her and traveled with her all the long wilderness road until he conveyed her to his master's son. You're destined, friend, to be conformed to the image of God's son. God hasn't left you a visiting card and a map of heaven and said, if you happen to turn up, ask for my Son. You think not?
Given his Holy Spirit to come and live in our hearts. Nor as an idle guest either, but knowing the will of God and know God knowing him and being able to read that Holy Spirit that dwells in our hearts, for he makes intercession for us according to the will of God. Step by step does that Holy Spirit prompt us in our prays and beyond them, and interceding for us according to the will of God, steadily brings us over the wilderness pilgrim path, ever nearer the goal of conformity to God's Son. Then who shall be against us?
If God be for us in that fashion, he that spared not his own Son, how shall he not with him freely give us all things? Shall Christ accuse us when he died, rose again, and intercedes for us. What an inconsistency it would be. It shall never happen. Therefore, said Paul, I am persuaded that neither life nor death, nor anything else in this whole disordered creation shall ever separate me from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Not saying, as you observe, that God will never allow anything to be difficult. He will not allow that anything, however difficult, separate me from his love. So that now we've reached another climax, climax of the second movement. It ends up with a tremendous emphasis on the love of God, interpreted to us by God's Holy Spirit, and pictures our hope and stakes it to the coming glory. Tomorrow, God willing, when we consider the third and the fourth movements, we shall find that they end not with the love of God, but both of them with the wisdom of God.
What a lovely thing that will be to. Though we hear less talked about the wisdom of God, perhaps, than the love of God, but what a tremendous boon it is to have both. Divine love, there's nothing it wouldn't do for the sake of Christ, and if you be Christ's, oh, what is there to tell me what God would not do for you? Our God is not only loving, he's all wise, and he knows how to fit means to ends. That's what wisdom is, isn't it? He has all the wisdom to achieve his ends, however exalted they may be. We've thought about the love in our justification and our sanctification.
Tomorrow, God willing, we shall think about God's wisdom. In what, in what sense are we going? Well, I think, sir, it is what the learners would call a prophetic purpose, meaning that some things are so certain i- in the mind of God that he can speak of them as past. Yeah, talking of his purpose. And this is the scheme, and the God is so certain of fulfillment that he regard- he he he he puts it in the perfect. Just as you'll read in various parts, for instance, Babylon is fall.
That is Old English for Babylon has fall. When, when you look at the context, it is a prophecy, not the reporting on actual happening. That's so certain is the fall of Babylon under God's judgment that he has, uh, foretold now that's going to happen, that you can, uh, uh, express it in the past tense. That's how I agree. And I am moved there too by the earlier observation a little earlier in that paragraph that we're saved by hope, and hope that is, uh, seen is not hope. This is something we wait for. You almost invited a question at the session before this one, when we were speaking through the final paragraph of the first movement, and you referred to children as being a special case.
Death passed at the law, children obviously don't transgress the law and so forth, nevertheless they still die. And, um, in what sense are they a special case? And how would they fit into the scheme? Well, the, the pointed issue, Peter, is to say some have felt that the statement death passed ap- uh, on all men because for that all sin, uh, must refer, as they say, to a sin in Adam. That all who subsequently came out of Adam were somehow involved in his sin, in some sense are guilty of it.
And they, in course of arguing for that position, for which they, of course, have many big arguments and strong, but in arguing for that position, they point to children and say that children die, they haven't transgressed any commandment, they die nonetheless, and according to this verse, they understand, therefore, that these children have nonetheless sinned. So when could they have sinned? They say he's talking about their sin in Adam. They were involved in Adam as the head of the race, and when Adam sinned, they sinned, and they are in some sense guilty of Adam's sin. Now that seems to me, uh, uh, not right as I see it for a number of reasons, some of which stand in the context there.
And I want to say the verse means sin enters into the world and death by sin and death passed on all men on this con- on this, for this reason, because of this, for that, all have personally sinned. You'll see. And if they raise the question of children to me, children that haven't, um, uh, uh, come to the age of responsibility, little infants that die, they say, well, they haven't personally sinned, have they? You see, well, I, I say to myself that the children are a special case. Uh, Paul is arguing, as our Lord will talk to Nicodemus, except you be born again, you cannot enter the kingdom of God, does that consign all children and imbeciles?
To be outside the kingdom of God eternally? Children that die in infancy, they come under this law that if they're not born from above, as some do teach, they're confined to limbo then. For my part, I never did find limbo in scripture. So I would be inclined to say there again, in the context of John three, children will be a special case and have to be dealt with, uh, as a special case. I would incline to say, if you press me a bit further, you'll see, that, uh, my belief is others don't share that either, you know, the verse is much disputed. You'll see.
My belief is that we're not guilty of Adam's sin. That Adam's sin did bring ruin on the human race. And that, uh, to use the old expressions, the difference between, uh, uh, uh, uh, having a sinful nature and actual acts of sin, that every child has inherited the fallen nature, and for that reason also knows death. Just like you can quote creation. Creation hasn't sinned, but as a result of what Adam did, creation has been subjected to vanity.
Tigers and lions die. They haven't personally sinned either, if you can use sin of them, have they? Now, creation herself has had known consequences of Adam's sin as a result of his fall, his creation's overlord. Creation has been made subject to it. In that sense, like creation, so I would regard myself with God children, and think that the verse is talking about, uh, responsible people that have sinned, though not in the way that Adam sinned. The verse explicitly says. So, I mean, the death of things like children and so forth could be construed, um, as coming under the consequences of Adam's sin rather than Yes, yes, yes.
like the six Yes, yes, yes. like a bit like a child being born with AIDS or something like that. I mean, it may be Oh, surely, surely, surely. Um, yet it would die just as a natural consequence. Sure. So where did that leave? Pardon? So where does that leave, um, children? Well, first, I not being certain, uh, explicitly says. So, I mean, the death of things like children and so forth could be construed, um, as coming under the consequences of sin rather than Yes, yes. like the distinction we made earlier. Uh, like a child being born with AIDS or something like that.
I mean, it may be Oh, surely, surely, surely, surely. Um, yet it would die just as a natural consequence. Surely. So where does that leave them? Pardon? So where does that leave, uh, children? Well, first, I not being flippant, uh, wouldn't you know, uh, but I think it leaves them with the Lord. And my hope is this, that the argument of that very paragraph is that whereas Adam's disobedience brought a fearful end tale, then on the side of Christ there is a tremendous surplusage and advantage.
If a child of irresponsible years dies as a consequence of Adam's fall, dies in irresponsible years. Then if the work of Christ doesn't cover it, in that particular, the balance would be on the side of Adam, wouldn't it? I'm not of those, uh, Juno, uh, that think that the term all in those two groups means every man living. I think, uh, how you get into Adam is by physical descent. How you get into Christ is not by any physical descent, of course, but through repentance and faith.
The all in each group is to be interpreted as all in Adam and then all in Christ, you see. But that said, it seems to me that the general thrust of those verses is to say the advantage is on the side of Christ. Therefore, if they were constituted sinners without their choice, by being descended from Adam, and die without the possibility of making a choice, then I would say they surely must be covered by the work of Christ. I couldn't prove that to you with any mathematician's logic, sir. Merely expressing here my hope based on the general thrust of that passage.
What do you think, sir? The, um, there- there- there is a view, I'm wondering if this is along the same line, that when Jesus died on the cross, he- he basically didn't die so much for men as to satisfy God's righteous anger against. In other words, it was obviously for the satisfaction of the holiness of God, the justice of God, as you said earlier on. So that, in a sense, one might say that, um, God was in a position then to deal with men on the basis of grace, that salvation was now available to all men, so that they would, uh, be able to come to him. In the case of babies, um, the barrier having been dealt with of sin and they not in a position to respond, God was still free to deal with them on the basis.
Oh, surely. Oh, yeah, I myself would hold that. Yes, certainly I would, Fergus. Certainly I would. The great, you'll say, I think what some of the older theologians used to point out, uh, in chapter five, we have received the reconciliation. When we talk only i- i- i- i- reconcil- about reconciliation, for instance, there's a long argument as to what reconciliation does. Is the work of Christ in reconciling me concerned simply to turn me from an enemy to a friend of God? Is Christ's work of reconciliation concerned, therefore, just simply with changing me? Or would it be appropriate to talk of reconciling God?
And some people say there, oh no, you mustn't talk of reconciling God, uh, Jules Lee. But even within the confines of the Greek language, if you talk about reconciling A to B, you don't mean simply changing A. You mean removing the cause of offense that B has been, uh, felt as a result of something A has done. B has been offended, and therefore, uh, B has to be satisfied if A is ever to be reconciled to him.
And that what Christ has done, as you say, sir, has to remove that cause of offense. The reconciliation has been made, if you see. It's a question now whether we will receive it or not. Therefore, I hold that men will be judged if they refuse to receive it. Where, as with the case of infants, they're not in any position or imbeciles, uh, to understand or to re- or to refuse, then I take it is available. Yes, uh, Robbie. Next question is, would it not be better not to tell people about the gospel so that what they didn't know would keep them in a safer position?
Well, uh, I have heard that's it. Do see. When it comes to adults, Robbie, I would have understood, uh, scripture to say that while all do not have the same light, all are given some light. I am disposed to take John chapter one verse nine not as a statement of potential, but as a statement of fact. The true light lights every man, more or less. I take it that the argument of the first three chapters, to and a half of Romans, is precisely that, that all men have light.
Why they are not only sinners, but guilty sinners and without excuse, is because they had light and rejected it. So, do you take it that until a person rejects Christ, you assume that they are covered by the benefits of Christ's death? I assume, uh, when it as it comes to a responsible adult, Robbie, I think I would prefer to put it that the benefits of the death of Christ are available to them. Let me, uh, uh, let me say, and this, the theologians will probably pick me up and say I'm, I'm far too imprecise for words, but, um, among the various terms that are used of the death of Christ is, of course, this very big term propitiation.
Yes? Eh, if you look to Old Testament, to its usages of it, the great day of atonement in Israel, propitiation, kaphar and all that, and the sprinkling of the, the mercy seat, the kaporeth with the blood of the victim. It is explicitly said that the point and purpose of that great propitiation on the Day of Atonement was, uh, to cleanse the tabernacle because of the uncleanness which, which stays among, let me read the actual terms, it's Leviticus sixteen. Uh, this great, the ceremonies of propitiation were done, do say, uh, God shall make atonement for the holy place because of the uncleannesses of the children of Israel and because of their transgressions, even all their sins.
And so shall he do for the tent of meeting that dwells with them in the midst of their uncleannesses. What that side of the sacrifice did, among other things, a propitiation, is allow God still to remain and be accessible to the Israelite and stay in that tabernacle, even though the very presence of those Israelites defiled his tabernacle. I take it that something like that is being said in one John two myself. These things I write unto you that you do not sin, but if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the propitiation.
Now extending this idea, you'll see even as a, if I sin as a believer, the Lord knows there are times when I sin without even knowing it, multitudinous times. And if it was merely a fact of God's holiness, God would have to sever himself from me immediately. How can he stay with me as someone who has sinned, even though I haven't realized I have, but I have sinned nonetheless. My presence in that sense would defile his tabernacle. How can God go on remaining with me? Well, because one I have an advocate, and all. he is the propitiation that allows God righteously to stay and bear with people that are still unclean.
With Christ, of course, it is that by his intercessions, amongst other things, he, he brings us at last to, uh, uh, uh, acknowledgement of our sin and confession of them. But then John adds, he's not only the propiti- that. My presence in that sense would defile his tabernacle. How can God go on remaining with me? Well, because one, I have an advocate, and two, he is the propitiation that allows God righteously to stay and bear with people that are still unclean. With Christ, of course, it is that by his intercessions, amongst other things, he, he brings us at last to, uh, uh, uh, acknowledgement of our sin and confession of them.
But then John adds, he's not only the propitiation for our sins. He is the propitiation, note the term, for the sins of the world. How can the world go on? How can God put up with it for five minutes and still be the holy God he is? I take it he does so because of that aspect of the great work of Christ, what is called propitiation. That doesn't do away with the necessity for the sinner to be made conscious of his sin eventually, to repent of it, and to come to terms with God.
At least that's how I would read it. As for the other side to the argument, yes, I, I take the point. I somehow find it difficult to feel the weight of it. You'll say, and perhaps I'm perverse. Why not leave the people with less light because their condemnation will be less? Well, that is a principle, isn't it? Our Lord said that, uh, it shall be more tolerable for the men of Sodom and Gomorrah than for the people of Capernaum. So why bother to go to the Sodoms and Gomorrah? Because what is more calculated to bring them to repentance anyway than the great death of Christ?
At what age does a child become responsible? You have to ask me. And, uh, David said in the Psalms that, uh, from birth I have relied on you, and, uh, Elizabeth's baby jumped inside the womb, uh, when, uh, uh, when Elizabeth met Mary, Jesus was inside the womb, and, uh, Jacob and Esau fought inside the womb. Mm. And, uh, if there is an age at which a child becomes responsible, should you not kill the child before that age? There's some very difficult questions. There's a little time taker there.
Isn't the general question there, is our concept of the age of responsibility demonstrable from scripture? Ooh, I would think God has mercy on those that know not the right hand from the left. Jonah four. And can we make that the last question because we aren't Might not.
