Romans 6-7

Well, good afternoon, everyone, on this very beautiful day of 11 bread. You can see why God says, do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together, because it does give us an opportunity to encourage one another in different ways, not only through just fellowship and learning things about the Word of God, but also to rejoice in music and to have the kind of music that we've had today, which is absolutely wonderful.

From what I understand, having the little Lafayette kids, that was kind of decided here this afternoon to put them together. I don't have the whole story, but I just, you know, just a little bit that Cherie told me that that was kind of added in there, and boy, they really performed very, very well. It is very wonderful to praise God and to make us all feel very, very excited about this day. Again, we are very grateful to all be together. This is not the case in different places in the world, and one of them is the areas in which we serve in Eastern Europe and Scandinavia. In Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, there's no place, except for a little group of Latvians, where people are together.

They're all just ones and twos, husband and wife, individuals scattered throughout Scandinavia that have to keep this day alone. I was talking to one of the ladies that kept the Passover. She said, you know, I even can't even do the foot washing. She's just all by herself and just has to go through the symbols and just her and God and not be together. And I thought how wonderful it is for all of us through these three days with the Passover night, as we all took and made our commitment to Jesus Christ individually, but also as a congregation, as a church, and it was very, very special to kind of witness that with one another and to bolster one another and know that we're on the same trip, going to the same place, and share in that joy.

And then last night, we had a wonderful night to be much observed with a Terre Haute congregation. We all got together in one place, had a catered meal, and that was just very, very enjoyable. One of the best night to be remembers that we've had, because we started off with a prayer that explained the meaning of the evening, and then we had a wonderful dinner, and we just had a hard time leaving last night.

We didn't get home until after 1130 last night. It was just wonderful to talk and visit, and now here today, we from Lafayette and Terre Haute, don't take for granted this wonderful opportunity to visit with and to meet with the Indianapolis Church, and the next, last day 11 bread, also with the Fort Wayne Church that will come down here. It's just wonderful to be together, to talk, and to fellowship in this way. Well, today the subject that I have is one that comes through a series of sermons that we've already been going through in the Lafayette and Terre Haute congregations.

We've been going through the Book of Romans, which is a most interesting and majestic book in the New Testament. I thought that where we were at, where we came to, and I'll just tell you exactly where we're going here today, we came to chapter six. And as I was reading chapter six and chapter seven, I thought, wow, these chapters explain the meaning of the days of 11 bread.

Chapter five in the Book of Romans is about the sacrifice of Christ and what it meant. That covers the Feast of the Passover, covers the meaning of the Passover. And chapters six and seven, which talk about baptism, which talk about the walking and newness of life. Chapter seven, which speaks about the battle that we have with our flesh, and trying to reconcile what we are with what God is doing for us and seeking the help of Jesus Christ.

That is just perfect for what these days mean. So that's my whole sermon. I could actually just kind of sit down here and say I gave you the Reader's Digest version of my sermon, and much less. But let's go through more detail. First of all, I marvel at the beauty of God's Word.

There's no question that there was intelligent design there. And just how that Word, which was put together by many different kinds of people through various periods in history, starting with the story of the creation, the tree of life, and man's access, and then lack of access to it, and being outside the Garden of Eden, and then having the Bible end in Revelation 21 and 22, talking about a reconnect to the tree of life, and talking about the new heavens and the new earth.

It begins with a very, very specific point about man's relationship with God, his losing that relationship, his being redeemed, and then having access in the new heavens and the new earth forever. And everything that's in between, which includes history, which includes instructions, which includes hard lessons, which includes a whole philosophy of what mankind is, and an explanation of what we are to God. It is a marvelous story that was designed by a great mind, by God, who placed all this instruction together.

The New Testament church, when it got started, at first really had no scriptures of their own. To them, it was unthinkable, at first, to have anything recorded as their own, because many felt, in fact, many felt it was imminent that Christ would return soon, that he would return in their lifetime. And the New Testament church held on to the Old Testament, what we consider the Old Testament now as these scriptures. And that's what they look to. That's what they use to preach Christ from. They preached Christ from Isaiah, from the book of Psalms, from the book of Zechariah. I mean, there's just so many things in the Old Testament that spoke of and spoke to the Messiah. Jesus Christ referred to himself from many places in the Old Testament about his first coming, about his second coming, about what he came for, and about the events leading to his death and resurrection.

In fact, the New Testament church, as it got started, really had no trouble getting organized right under the nose of the Roman government. Now, the Romans had a rule that no new religions could start up. The areas they conquered, the areas that they occupied, whatever religions were already in place, they were okay with that. The Romans developed a relationship with the Jewish leaders and Judaism, and they had a relationship.

There was a high priest and Pilate at the very end, you know, they had a discussion, they passed Jesus Christ back and forth. There was an acceptance of those bodies, but they didn't want anybody new to arise. And when the New Testament church was established on the day of Pentecost, and when they went to synagogues and held their first services, and when the Apostle Paul traveled throughout the Roman Empire, he went to the synagogues first.

There was no problem. This was not a new religion. It was looked upon as a sect, as a break-off from the Jews. They observed the same day of the week, they observed the same holy days, they had the same scriptures. So what's the difference? There was no problem at all. The very first gentile convert, the story about Cornelius, is a story about a Roman centurion.

He was responsible for 100 soldiers. Now, perhaps his captain didn't like that, but nonetheless, becoming a Christian as he did was no problem at all. Christianity was not an irritant to the Roman Empire until the time of Nero, but until that time, Christians basically functioned independently. They had more trouble from other Jews than they did from the Roman authorities. And so, they could use, and did use, the Old Testament as their authority. For the Passover service this year, for the first time, I read almost the entirety of Psalm 22.

Psalm 22 has 11 references in it to the suffering and to the death of Jesus Christ, which predicted accurately the kind of death that Christ would suffer, that it would be crucifixion, that he would have, you know, have be pierced with nails, a prophecy a thousand years before Christ, that spoke of a type of capital punishment that hadn't been even thought of or invented or known at the time that it was written, but it was accurately portrayed the death of Jesus Christ.

So, when the New Testament Church and Christianity spread through the Roman Empire, they had a lot of authority from the Old Testament scriptures. It was amazing as you read the Old Testament. I mean, references accurately depict the coming of Jesus Christ. Psalm Isaiah 52 and 53 are some of the most powerful references to the sufferings of Jesus Christ before his death, and that was 700 years before his coming.

These are the prophecies that we need to get hooked on. These are the prophecies that we need to look to. The first coming of Jesus Christ, but also, even more so, the prophecies of the second coming of Jesus Christ. And the New Testament Church thrived, survived, and grew under the Roman Empire. But it was becoming apparent that Jesus Christ was not going to be returning in a lifetime of many of the eyewitnesses of Christ.

The 30s came and went. 40s came and went. And some churches, such as the one in Thessalonica, even were beginning to predict the coming of the Messiah. People quit jobs and Paul had to say, whoa, whoa, whoa, you know, don't do that. In fact, if you don't work, you shouldn't eat. We know those passages. Then the 50s came and went. And people are just getting a little bit jittery here, wondering, well, is he coming or is he not?

Maybe it's going to be next year. But then it was becoming very, very evident in the mid-60s that Jesus Christ was not going to return. That it's possible that that generation would die out. And it was important for the New Testament Church to establish its own writings.

And in two different periods, close to the end of the 60s, and later on, close to the year 100 AD, the New Testament was forged. The New Testament was put together. The New Testament was forged is a bad word. No. The New Testament was assembled. And individuals such as James was approached, who was the brother of Jesus Christ, wrote his general epistle. Then Peter, who was the chief leader of the apostles, wrote his two books.

And then there were 14 letters that were assembled. They were like newsletters, and they were personal letters that were taken from the great communicator of the New Testament, the Apostle Paul. And these were put together into a section as the writings of Paul. There were 14 of them. They are mostly in chronological order, except for the very first book, which is the Book of Romans. The Book of Romans has a very, very special place. And it has a very, very special meaning, and it has a very, very special purpose. The Book of Romans is a book that was written to the largest, most influential city in the world at that time. It was like writing a gospel to New York or London, but having that city represent the world.

The Book of Romans has a very definite chronology of specifics that begins with talking about mankind, about the depravity of mankind, the Gentiles, first. And since the church always began with Jews and Gentiles in a congregation, then the Jews are taken to task. And the Apostle Paul makes very clear in the very early chapters in Romans chapter 3 in two places that there is no one righteous, no, not one. He talks about how the Romans, the Gentiles, were corrupt and lived a lifestyle that was extremely displeasing to God, that didn't know the law, had come to some things by their own natures, but didn't even live up to that. And as the Jews were saying, yeah, sure, give it to them, Paul, the Apostle Paul turns to them and says, and you knew all this, and you don't practice it. You're hypocrites. And there's no one righteous, no, not one. And he points out from the very beginning that mankind is in trouble. Mankind is doomed. Mankind is doomed to die. We're the only species of life that really has an understanding or a knowledge of the fact that we're going to die. Now, I don't know about fish and other animals, if they have, you know, they don't start retirement plans, you know, they don't plan for the future, they don't, you know, choose a place to die. They don't think about it. I don't know what they really think. What we do as human beings, we're very aware of our mortality. We know exactly how old we are, we know what we've lived, we kind of know about what we have, we pray that we don't get sick, that we live out our time, but we know that that day is coming.

The gospel message, and what is good news about the gospel message, that it addresses the most poignant of our fears, the core of our fears, and that is the fact that we will not exist. It will come in time and we will die. And so that's the bad news. What the good news is, is that there is a way to eternity. There's a way out of this, and that is explained as the gospel of Jesus Christ. That's the good news of Jesus Christ. Short and sweet. It's giving eternal life to us. Can't be put any more simply. We can talk about the gospel of the kingdom, you know, about the wonderful things that will be there, gospel of certain doctrines, the gospel of grace, etc., etc. But, you know, when it comes down to what the good news really is, is that we have a future. That you have a future, that God is establishing a family that is in His image, that's after His kind, and that we have an eternity to look forward to. We won't just cease on this earth as a blip that came and went, and that what we will feel 100 years from now was what we felt in 1850 when we didn't exist, which was nothingness. And that's what a lot of people have to look forward to, or they can't explain it. But the good news, the gospel, does explain all that. There is no book in the Bible that starts from talking about the state of man and what he is, to going through a process of explaining how Jesus Christ is going to fix that, how He's going to redeem us, how He's going to ransom us. And these are words that are used biblically. Ransom, redeem, to buy us, to get us out of the mess that we're in. And then have an entire plan of how this is done. As I mentioned in the first three chapters, the Apostle Paul establishes what man is. That man, first of all, that God respects no person, doesn't respect Jew over Gentile or Gentile over Jew, and that we're all going to the same place, we're going to all die, unless there is some kind of redemption process. Chapter 4 speaks about the fact that Jesus Christ came to justify us, and that there's a process of being made right before Him, that what was wrong can be made right. That's chapter 4, talking about justification, and that justification is by faith. Chapter 5, and that's where we actually will begin here, talks about the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

Now, let me kind of jump ahead here, too, because I said chapter 5 talks about the sacrifice of Christ, chapter 6 and 7 talk about the battle, the human battle, the human experience of what we do, the responsibilities that we have as human beings once we are redeemed.

The book of Romans continues in chapter 8, and talking about the Holy Spirit, and that takes us to the Feast of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit was given. Chapters 9, 10, 11 of the book of Romans speak about how God is going to graft in the Gentiles, how there'll be a lot more people that will be brought into and invited into this relationship. This takes us to the Fall Holy Days, takes us to the Feast of Tabernacles, takes us to the Last Great Day, where God is not just exclusively working with a few called people in a particular age, or working with the Jews only, or working with Americans, or working with large clusters of people in different places, and yet ignoring entire areas of the world. But that salvation will be available to all. And the book of Romans touches on that. God does not want anyone to perish, and everyone will have their opportunity. And then the last parts of the book of Romans talk about Christian living and responsibility to everything, from government to one another, to the church, etc. Christian living chapters, the last part of the book of Romans. So the book of Romans is kind of like a mini plan of God, starting with how God works with us individually, and then how He will work with the entire world. The book of Romans tracks with a meaning of the Holy Days, starting with the Passover, going through the Days of Love and Bread, the Day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit, and then the latter Holy Days, the days of the year which are broader and wide open to the world. It's really a wonderful story, and I feel very honored to go through this. Very honored to go and study this year after year.

Now one thing is we go through the Holy Days. The messages tend to be the same. They're about putting sin out. Leavening is a type of sin, hypocrisy, deceitfulness, malice, etc.

Unleavened bread is a type of sincerity and the type of Christ's body which was sinless, a very, very pure attitude towards life, representation of the nature of God.

And it's a challenge from year to year to say something a little bit different, or put a shed of different light or a different meaning to this. Not to be brought a different meaning, but just something to make it more interesting and something to make it live. And yet, the Bible is such an amazing book, such an amazing textbook, that you can go through it over and over again and pick out new things. The Bible is a book that's amazingly written, not for somebody who's got a college degree or a postgraduate degree. The Bible was intended to be a book that could be a understood by everyone. With any reasonable intelligence, a person can grasp what's in the Bible. That's the amazing thing about the Bible. It's a living book that you can go through and read the same passages year in and year out on a year's cycle, or on whatever kind of cycle you have, but we're forced to read it on an annual cycle when we talk about the Holy Days. And you say, well, I didn't really grasp that particular point, or I didn't really see that being emphasized before. And it's just wonderful to be able to have that when it becomes real to you and becomes exciting to you and it's something new that you have learned, instead of having the same things said to you year in and year out. So if there's anything that's kind of different about what I'm talking about today, is look at the book of Romans as a book that unfolds the plan of God and tracks with the Holy Days with chapters 5, 6, and 7, speaking about the Passover and the days of 11 bread. Okay, chapter 5 and verse 6. But when we were still without strength, in due time, Christ died for the ungodly. That is the overall purpose for the death of Jesus Christ. He came to fulfill that mission. He came to die for people that had spit on him. He was crucified by people that mocked him, that humiliated him, who people who didn't even care about him, because he died for us and his sacrifice was made available when we were still in our sins. He made a great sacrifice to mankind and to make it available for human beings for all time. Verse 8. But God demonstrates his own love towards us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. You know, in the verse previous it says, For scarcely for a righteous man will one man die.

Perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. No, we wouldn't die for... who here would die for Saddam Hussein? Who here would die for the leader of North Korea? Is there anybody here who would want to give his life for Adolf Hitler or for Stalin? Absolutely not. Not for these rotten, terrible people. But Jesus Christ's sacrifice was for all mankind, including rogues that committed great crimes against humanity. Christ died for them godly. Much more than having been justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. Now, there's a process in achieving immortality in life. You have to be made right before God. You have to be okay with God.

And, as Paul explains through his writings, that being made okay only comes from the grace that Christ imputes upon us, the gift that he gives us, that comes as a gift through his blood.

Now, he talks also in chapter 6 and 7 about our responsibility, but that has nothing to do with the gift itself that's made available. A gift is a gift. A gift is not a wage. A gift is something that is granted and given with no payment or nothing that's expected in return, at least by God. That once he grants us eternal life, that he's not expecting us to be doing all kinds of things yet, there's a certain responsibility on our part, once we're in this condition of being granted the gift. And, believe me, I've read through these chapters over and over again in considering the sermon. I've read through these chapters over the years. Some things are not fully exactly clear, and a lot of theologians stumble and disagree among themselves. So, who am I to give you the inside scoop of this is it? There's one thing about the Bible is that there are literally thousands of interpretations of it. Someone did a study of how many different interpretations and explanations there are for the book of Galatians, and it runs on the subject of 450 different explanations for the book of Galatians. So, who are we? And I'm not a theologian. I know the Bible pretty good.

I've been doing it for 40 years, but I haven't gone to extra studies, and I've not written fancy papers about this. And yet, I am going to Jesus Christ and saying, give me understanding, as what we read, you know, this Holy Spirit will give us an understanding that will refresh our minds about what Christ is actually saying. And I'm fairly certain that I basically have a reasonable understanding, although my understanding next year may deepen, but we're on the right track, and you are as well. Now, where we do grow in knowledge, growing knowledge does not mean to throw away everything you've learned, but to build upon that and to understand it more deeply.

And I would say that, you know, every year I ask myself, what do I know that I didn't know a year ago? It's a good question that we should ask ourselves. What do I understand and know? And it could be not only just technical knowledge about how the word was used back at that time, but it could be knowledge that applies to the way you think and the way you react and the way you use that knowledge and the way that you glory in that knowledge, as to how that knowledge motivates you to change the way you think and learn and treat one another and relate to God and pray to Him. You know, that's where that depth arises. So again, what am I trying to say here as far as understanding the word of God more deeply? I tried to understand it as literally as Paul wrote it. I tried to understand it as honestly as Paul wrote it. I tried to understand it as God wants me to understand it. I tried to understand it. The word hermeneutics means, you know, the process and the study of the Bible itself, interpretation of the Bible.

As humbly as I possibly can, realizing that this word has been given to me like it's been given to billions of people to understand, and how can I truly understand it in the best possible way, especially for these days of 11 bread, where I'm asking my God to give me understanding, what is it that's required of me? How can I accept forgiveness from the blood of Jesus Christ?

What is my responsibility in going on from here? What is my responsibility as one that has failed as a human being in many areas? That's why we ask for forgiveness of sins to go on again for another year. I ask these questions because they are very important questions. These are questions you need to be asking yourself, because you all have your own spiritual journey, your own spiritual trip to take to the same place where we're going.

And it's one that requires you to use your mind. It's one that requires you to understand what Christ is telling you. Okay, well, one thing we see from chapter 5 is that Christ died for them godly, that He demonstrates His love towards us while we were yet sinners, that Christ died for us. And that will be that we are justified that we are made right by His blood. Now, this is one area that I really want to get right in my life. What is it that makes me right before God? Now, when I pray and I ask to be justified, not justified by my own words, but be justified by the blood of Jesus Christ. And I know that God does not hear the prayers of sinners, so how does He make me fit into this scheme, into this plan? And, you know, I feel okay about that. I say that I have sinned, I have failed. I failed in many ways. I take a look at what my intentions were last year about certain things that I do think, plan, endure, prioritize, appreciate, shown, negligence, practice, do whatever, and I've failed.

I have not kept all of God's law as perfectly as I should have. I know what it is. As a same story with all of us, when we took the symbols of the Passover, we asked God for forgiveness. But we also asked Him to justify us by His blood. That means that we're presented to God the Father as a person without sin, a person who, when we face our God in the future, will not have to explain it to Him all over again. And we talk about how we have to explain things to God that when we are going to face God in a judgment that explains things to Him, well, if it's been forgotten and forgiven and God has made us just, we're not going to be explaining anything because God is going to be looking upon us as one who's never sinned, who's been cleansed by Jesus Christ. He's not going to dredge things up out of the past.

He's going to forgive us. That's the beauty of being made just. Not just forgiven, not just, okay, we'll let it go. And with the thought that it's going to come up sometime. No, it's not going to come up at all because you've been made just. You've been made clear.

The reason that Jesus Christ could actually do the kind of sacrifice He did is because He was just and perfect as a human being. You understand that? He could, honestly, literally before God, say that He earned it. And God took that perfect life that did nothing to pay for all of us who are failures. But once we are made just before God, we're okay. We're clean. We're looked upon as never having sinned. Now, who's going to have to answer to God for their sins? Well, it's a person who's still in their sins. A person who justifies their own sins.

A person who has excuses. A person who doesn't live up to what He should and lowers the standard.

Is a person, perhaps, who has led others off the track and knows it.

Is a person who's not asked for forgiveness. That's the person that's going to have to answer. There is going to be a whole line of people who are going to be doing just that.

There's going to be an entire resurrection, so to speak, and condemnation for those who have not been justified.

But do you think that those of us who have been justified and cleared by the blood of Jesus Christ are going to have to actually answer to God in a special interview room at the time of the resurrection? No! That's been forgiven and forgotten. And believe me, I am glad for that. I'm thankful. I can say, God, forgive me my sins. Forgive me my shortcomings. That gives me a lot of encouragement in going forward. That's a very important thing to understand about justification.

You are made right. God is not going to interview you any more about that particular issue.

And you are made right. And as you continue on, we are forgiven, we're reconciled, we are justified. That justification is a very, very important process. And justification is by faith in believing that.

If you haven't believed that yet or don't understand it yet, this is a good year to learn it.

And a year, good year to establish that relationship with God. Too many people live with guilt about a lot of baggage that they're carrying on their shoulders from the past. That they feel they're going to have to somehow unload, undo, and work out. When you're justified, that baggage is gone. You're made clear before our Savior. And you know, that makes it easy then to start.

You know, trying to get out of debt when you're really deep in debt is very discouraging, but to develop good habits and good spending habits when somebody just says, okay, you're paid up, you owe nothing. That makes a new start. Really a new start. A new start with a lot of baggage that you still have to undo before God is not a good start.

Romans 5, verse 16, And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned, but the judgment which came from one offense resulted in condemnation. And that was through Adam. Through his big mistake, through the mistake of Adam and Eve, condemnation spread to the entirety of the human race. But the free gift which came from many offenses, as it was of Christ paying for all the offenses, resulted in justification, in all of us being made right. In verse 19 of Romans 5, For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one man's obedience many will be made righteous. And that's what is the job of Christ working in us, is making us righteous.

That righteousness comes from Him imputing that righteousness, but as we see, we walk in the newness of life and we maintain it and we keep it going. That is our Christian responsibility.

Now, chapter 6.

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?

And this is answering some of the last verses of the chapter before, where God forgives us our sins, we could have our baggage undone, and it seems like a pretty good deal, because you can do it again, and again and again. And the Apostle Paul makes it very, very clear, not only here, but in another place as well, that treasure this relationship and treasure this gift. Don't abuse it. Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? He knew that human beings would jump to this or slip back into this. And he says, with no uncertain terms in verse 2, certainly not. How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? He's a mature Christian who understands that sin leads to death. Sin leads to failure. That sin, ultimately unrepentant of, doesn't make life work.

Like a Ponzi scheme. A Ponzi scheme, you know, made off, you know, with all the history of that, people get into Ponzi schemes all the time. But they don't realize that it's always going to collapse on them. You never can get out of that. They can't see the vision that is going to fail.

The same is true about any other sin that, unrepentant of, it's leading to literally a dead end. And so a person who's been forgiven, the mistake that he's done, is not going to go back and do the same things again, because it's only a dead end that results. So a person, a mature Christian, is one that is made right before God and just understands that sin leads to failure.

Sin leads to misery. Sin leads to depression. Sin leads to everything you don't want. How shall be who died to sin live any longer in it? Why would you want to go back into the slop?

Or do you know, verse 3, that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? That would you buried yourself? No, there are several different meanings to baptism, several different meanings ascribed to it. Commitment, asking God for forgiveness of sins.

But one that's a very obvious one is that God is burying you. Why is he burying you? Because you're dead. What person that is there symbolically shows that they want their past to be forgotten, to be dead. Therefore we are buried with him through baptism, symbolic of a burial, that just as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. The death of Christ, our justification, our forgiveness of sin, our burial through baptism, and a lot of people, you know, when they start thinking of baptism, it seems to come around Passover time because they know that that's a time that this commitment is made to Jesus Christ, but it pictures the death of the old self. But we also are brought up out of the water, and just as Christ was resurrected from the dead, this symbolizes walking in a new way of life. It's a commitment not only to being a Christian, but it's a commitment to walking in a new way of life, a new way of thinking, a new way of doing things, newness of life.

And when we talk about what these days of unleavened bread are about, we talk about the putting away of malice, wickedness, deceit, three words that are used to describe leavening, and we eat unleavened bread for seven days. That represents the body of Jesus Christ who was unleavened, who gave these symbols at the Passover two nights ago. It symbolizes walking in newness of life. So we have a beautiful marriage between grace and works responsibility.

The Passover and what Christ did for us, Passover night, is something that you can't buy for any price. It was the most expensive gift that was ever given. As I've talked to our church about this, why did Christ have to go through such a gory process of having God be transformed to a man and then have to be killed in bloodshed? It's a gory, violent story.

Because nothing else could pay for what God was requiring this gift to accomplish, to take away the sins of the world. God who owns all the silver and gold and everything else in the universe, he owns everything. Still, he couldn't pay with anything but in the manner that he did to produce redemption. That in itself ought to give us encouragement that God is very, very concerned and interested in us. And as I said, at the Passover night, there were two commitments made. One is our commitment, on our part, to live a sinless life as best we can and to walk a newness of life for the next year. But do you know that the Passover night also is a commitment on God's part, on Jesus' part, to stick with us for another year? It's a two-way commitment.

When we were there, we didn't just come in by ourselves with all this unloading.

When we came there, Jesus Christ was in our midst and also committed himself to us again.

Why? Well, he paid a big price. He paid a big price. He's got a lot in it.

God the Father and Jesus Christ have a lot in this.

At one point in history, on a galaxy far away, long before the creation of the earth, God the Father and Jesus Christ decided that Christ would be slain.

They discussed a process of bringing and expanding their family to make it so foolproof, bulletproof.

Something that would never happen as it did with the angelic world.

Philosophically, I don't know if God foresaw that or if it happened. Or if he... I don't know. I honestly don't. That's one thing I'd like to someday understand more.

What I do know is that God had to create mankind the way he did, to almost inject us with evil, to have us want to eradicate that evil, to make us just, and to make us appear sinless before him.

What a story! What a wonderful tale! That's what it's about.

And so, at the Passover in Days 11 Bread, we have this marriage, we have this understanding of the concept of the gift that is given that we can't pay for with anything.

If Christ and God couldn't pay for it with anything less than the death of Jesus Christ, what do we have? What can we chip in? Whatever we chip in is worthless.

There's no way we can, in any way, buy that what Christ did.

On the other hand, we do have a responsibility, which is pictured by the Days of 11 Bread.

There's seven of them. It's a journey. It's something that happens and continues one day to the next.

The Seven Days of 11 Bread are the days of your life as a Christian on earth.

For some it may be two, five, ten years. For some, 40 years or more of having been in the church. Those are your days of 11 Bread. That's the walk that you walk.

And that's the responsibility that we have.

Verse 5, For if we had been united together in the likeness of his death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of his resurrection.

Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him.

Christ died. Also, in this process, with the burial of the old self through baptism, our old man, our old self, was also crucified, was killed, died.

That the body of sin might be done away with, and that we should no longer be slaves of sin. He goes to an analogy here about us being enslaved to sin, of being bonded to sin.

But then he says this, For he who has died has been freed from sin, from the sin that brings about death.

We weren't freed from the law of God. We're freed from sin, which is a transgression of that law.

Now, verse 8, if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him.

That's the good news. There's the bad news that we died. The bad news is the fact that we were going nowhere. The good news is that we will live with him in the process that he shows.

Verse 9, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more.

There's a permanence after that happens, the crystallization that will never be undone.

Death no longer has dominion over him. For the death that he died, he died to sin once for all, but the life that he lives, he lives to God. Likewise, you also reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus, our Lord. These are words that require some thinking through and some personal reflection. They are very important words because this is the heart and core of the Gospel. This is the heart and core of our relationship with God. This is, you know, when we take our intelligence into all eternity, it's all right there, you know, in these words. Very, very important words. Therefore, as far as practicality, verse 12, do not let sin rain in your mortal body.

Don't allow it to come in. Be smart. Understand that any sin that you entertain, allow, play with, fool around with, allow to be tempted to get into, is only going to result in death. And you're going to have to ask God for forgiveness of it and go back to start. That you should obey it in its lusts.

Verse 12, probably the core verse in chapters 6 and 7 about what these days of 11 bread are about. Do not let sin rain in your mortal body. That you should obey it in its lusts. Do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being a lie from the dead, and that your members as instruments of righteousness to God. What are these members that he talks about? It's our eyes, our ears, our hands, our attitude, our focus. It's you.

Don't present yourself to be the one that allows and the one who facilitates sin. As Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, if you find yourself wanting to sin, cut off the right hand to take draconian measures not to get involved in sin.

This doesn't mean we earn anything. This just speaks about what our responsibility is.

That as a person who has spiritual wisdom and knowledge, they know that sin only leads to death.

And don't allow any part of you to facilitate sin. Dig it out. Get it out of your life.

Ask God to forgive you. Ask God to help you. Now, as we go through, and we won't be going through Chapter 8 today because that's reserved for the day of Pentecost. When the Holy Spirit comes, the Spirit of power, the Spirit of more enlightenment, etc., but on these days of beloved bread, the focus is on putting out sin. The focus is on walking in newness of life.

The focus is on, let's get our fundamentals straight. Let's learn how to pass the ball. Let's learn how to dribble. Let's learn how to do the layup. Some of the very basics here of what's required of a Christian. If it's sinful, if it's something that leads to immorality, if it's something that leads to theft, if it's something that leads to dishonor, if it's something that leads to hatred and murder, you know, cut it off. Head it off at the past. That's no good. We've been forgiven by Christ for those kinds of things already. So why don't we want to bring them back into our lives? We want to get rid of them. Cast them out.

And that's the important message, an important lesson of these days of Unleavened Bread.

Verse 14, for sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law. Okay, now, here's where the theologians just, you know, blow fuses and, you know, there's just a lot of discussion here about the law, etc. That's not talking about that. It's talking about the consequences. The Apostle Paul has to make that very, very clear in the next chapter that the law is holy, just, and good. It points these things out. He talks about that we are no longer under the consequences of breaking that law, of getting caught in a ponzi scheme, or allowing ourselves to be involved with pornography or immorality or theft or whatever else.

Under the consequences of what that action will lead to, if allowed to continue out. For you are not under the law, but under grace, which is the forgiveness and the goodness of God.

Again, in verse 15 of chapter 6, he says, What then? Shall we sin? Because we are not under the law. He says, I know you people are going to misunderstand me. And people have misunderstood Paul to this very day. And they have misunderstood him on this very point that he brings out quite stridently. Shall we sin because we are not under law, but under grace? Certainly not! Do you not know that to whom you present yourself slaves to obey?

You are that one's slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death or of obedience leading to righteousness. Interesting that when you no longer are yoked, bonded to sin, you become a servant, and you are bonded to righteousness. That's what God wants us to be. He wants us to be slaves of sin. He wants us to serve righteousness. And to do those things is something that's a responsibility and something which is our duty, which is a requirement of a Christian.

Remember that old song by Bob Dylan? You've got to serve somebody. You're either going to serve sin or you're going to serve God. Human beings are made to be servants of something. You see people right now serve mammon, serve music, are bonded and enslaved to habits, addictions, drugs, alcohol, whatever. Just get out from underneath that addiction. Get out from underneath that bondage and bond yourself to that which is good. Those things that are right yield your members to those righteous things. You become slaves of righteousness. The last part of verse 18. Paul says that actually this analogy I'm giving you maybe is kind of childlike or just very human.

Actually, I think that for many of us, I'm still trying to understand the fullness and the impact of this just from the way he says that. I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented yourselves as slaves of uncleanness and lawlessness, leading to moral lawlessness, now present your members to present yourself as slaves of righteousness for holiness. That's what this is all about. And then in verse 20, for when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.

You weren't a servant of righteousness at that point. You can't be a servant of evil and good at the same time. He says, what fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed?

Ultimately, we have to come and bring good fruit. And as we read Passover night, that beautiful chapter, John 15, I'm the vine, you are the branches. And you're working and you're relating to Christ will lead to trimming back, will lead to things that Christ does to make us grow so that we can bear more fruit. That's what this is about. The fruit of love, the fruit of joy, the happiness, the fruit of patience, faith, the fruits of the Holy Spirit in the book of Galatians.

Fruits of good habits, that people, when they know you, they know that you are reliable, that you will react and respond with the Holy Spirit rather than with the way of man.

Verse 22.

Oh, pardon me here. What fruit? For the end of those things is death. And believe me, death is where sin, when it's played out to its max, to its full, ends in death. You can go through every single commandment of God. And every single commandment, if you expand it out without any change and have it grow, it will result in death. Not just by the fact that it's the punishment from God for sin, it's just what sin leads to. The mature Christian will get that. He will get that through his mind, through his head. But, verse 22, but now, having been set free from sin and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness and the end everlasting life.

That's what it's all about, everlasting life. Verse 23, the one that's quoted more than any other verse in this chapter, but the context is what we just discussed. For the wages of sin is death. But the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Chapter 7. I'll begin with verse 4. My brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another, to him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God.

We become dead to the law from the standpoint of when we disobeyed that law, that we brought upon ourselves the consequences of that law. But now we have married ourselves to Jesus Christ so that we could bring forth good fruit. For when we were, verse 5, in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law, and you'll be a sinner. Now if you're a sinner and don't have the law, if you take a look at what's on television right now and the morality of people around the country, they're the one shocking thing to me more than anything else. It's not so much the terrible things that people say or the terrible conditions in which they live or the immoral conditions that they live in as they talk about abortion, as they live together, as people have no scruples.

But the fact that they don't even know what they're doing is sinful. That the way they live, their lifestyle, they brag about it, they talk about it, because they don't know the law of God. But you know, when the law of God comes in and when the law of God is understood, it exposes all these actions and all of a sudden at that point a person is horrified of what they are doing. But when you're outside the law, these things are just commonplace. That's the way people talk. People can have movies in their homes and hear all the language. They kind of forget that these things are wrong. Their morality has been so moved off-center in the wrong direction because they have no respect for the law. But when the law of God comes, it arouses a sense of this is wrong. Just like in the ancient temple of Israel, the nation just kept on doing things wrong and wrong and they forgot the holy days, he forgot everything until Josiah, in one case, found the Word of God. And it explained when certain days were to be kept and what the nation's heritage was, and he was cut to the heart because it was explained to him where they stood and how far they had veered off. That's what the law does.

And certainly the law of God arouses a sense of responsibility, a sense of guilt, all these things that should lead to stop doing those things because they go nowhere. For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were to work on our members to bear fruit to death.

But now, having been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that they should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not the oldness of the letter.

So I'll try to explain here about what it means aroused by the law. The law will bring forth about what is right and what is wrong. For if you have no law, you really don't know where you stand.

Verse 7, What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! Third time that Paul and this two-second two-chapter section talks about, don't get me wrong, he says.

Now shall we sin? Certainly not! Is the law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except for the law. So when somebody who lives and not being lives together with somebody and not being married, or somebody who commits fornication thinks that that's just something that's okay, everybody else does it. A lot of people at one time, when I was in high school, at least people knew that was wrong. They did those things, but they knew that it was wrong.

Now, it's not even wrong. And the only way that it's come to be understood that it's wrong is if the law of God is reintroduced again to explain that. I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known the covetousness unless the law said, you shall not covet.

Otherwise, this feeling that he had all the time with coveting, he didn't know where it came from, and he didn't even think it was wrong. It was just natural. But now, the law defines it as something which is sin, and something which has to be overcome, and something that you do, that you manage in a different way than you had before. But sin, verse 8, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For a part of the law, sin was dead.

And then he upholds the law in the very last...

See, verse 9 first, I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. Yes, the law really has a wonderful purpose of showing just exactly where you have veered off course. And it kind of puts you back to understanding what's right.

The disadvantage of being off course is that it leads to death.

And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death.

For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me and it killed me.

And therefore, he says the bottom line here, is the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good. So, as part of this process of walking in newness of life, we take a greater respect for the law of God. We go through every single one of the commandments and see, hey, have we so far drifted that we have even forgotten a sense of what's right and what's wrong? Because, frankly, if you have gone off and commit immorality, and if you commit sins, you know, the violation of the Ten Commandments. When those commandments are brought to the fore, they will light up and they will show where you are wrong. And they will bring tension. And they will bring crisis.

A crisis that needs to be addressed. These days of love and bread are a period of turning to the way that God thinks, the way that He asks us to live our lives, after He has done the greatest and given us the greatest gift of all, the forgiveness of our sins.

So, it's not just coming to the Passover, where, you know, one thing I find that in the church, people can be gone all year from church. People can be, you know, having attitudes that are less than desirable. People can drift, but they want to be there for Passover. They'll crawl to Passover services, because they need the Passover. But, you know, you also need with the Days of Love and Bread picture, walking in newness of life, a new attitude, a new spirit, a new respect for the values that God has given us. Respect for what Paul writes about in chapters 6 and 7.

Now, putting away the things that we had done before, and walking in newness of life, and bringing forth fruit, bringing forth results from your life. I know the Passover is very important.

And, you know, we always have people who just make it there, you know, for the Passover, because it is so important. It's important because the heart and core of the Gospel message is found in the Passover. Unless you eat my body and drink my blood, you have no life in you. And those words ring loud and clear and powerfully in our minds. But also, what rings powerfully is, go and sin no more. What also should ring powerfully is that we bear fruit. What should ring powerfully is that we have died to sin, and we walk and rise out of the water into a life of righteousness.

That we show respect to God for the gift that He's given us. You know, when you give a gift to somebody, you expect somebody to show at least some respect for your values and for who you are and what you stand for. You don't want to be giving a gift to somebody who then just, they receive the gift, or curses you, and walks away with, you know, this, you know, with no sense of gratitude.

The greatest gratitude that we can show towards God is to understand why He gave the gift, and why it's important to Him. That's what a mature Christian does. Recognizing and fully understanding that we cannot do things perfectly, that we will have to, next year, once again, ask God for forgiveness. In fact, not next year, but the next day. As part of the master and model prayer that Christ has for us, is to be asking for forgiveness of us and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven others their transgressions. I'll conclude here with the latter part of the chapter. The Apostle Paul talks about the battle, though, that we all endure.

You know, interestingly, too, it's a battle that you endure the more converted you become.

There's more tension on your life, spiritually, when you are trying to do the right thing.

If you're not trying to do the right thing, you know, you can deny, you can put yourself out, you can kind of live for weeks on end in a world of fantasy. But the Apostle Paul said that once he understood what it was to do good, and to obey the law of God, and to walk in the newness of life, he said the following. Verse 13, has then what is good become death to me?

Certainly not, once again. The fourth time. I mean, the Apostle Paul just knows that people are going to take him wrong. And, sure enough, they do. But sin that it may appear sin was producing death in me through what is good. So that sin through the commandment might become exceedingly sinful. So, I mean, the city is even worse as a Christian than it is if you live out in the world. Because they don't care. But to a Christian community, it is exceedingly sinful.

Verse 14, for we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin.

And then he talks about this battle. For what I am doing, I do not understand.

For what I will to do, that I do not practice. Hey, anybody done that? Things that you want to do, you don't practice. You just don't get around to it. But what I hate, that I do. Old habits come roaring back. If then, verse 16, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good.

But it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. Paul understood his nature, he understood the fact that he did have the unleavened body of Jesus Christ. He had a very leavened body, which all of us do. And Paul is making a tremendous admission as an apostle in the 60s or the late 50s AD. He's already done this job for 20 plus years, 23, 24 years.

So he's not a newbie. He's a person that's been around. He talks about this battle that he continually does. For I know that in me, that is in my flesh, nothing good dwells.

Our focus, too, on these days, love and bread, is that we have very, very leavened natures.

For to will is present with me, hey, I'll do it, I'll do it, okay, I'll do it this time.

But how to perform what is good, I do not find.

That's why you have everybody joining health clubs, January 1st.

Parking lot's full. February, parking lot's empty again. For the good that I will to do, I do not.

But the evil I will not to do, that I practice.

Whoa! What an admission!

Now, if I do what I will not to do, it is the longer I to do it, but the sin that dwells in me.

Paul talks about the reality of the nature that we have.

But he ends it in a very encouraging way, and one that focuses us back to our Lord and Master, Jesus Christ. I find then, a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man.

I think that down deep we all know the law of God is good. The inward man, you know, we delight in the law.

Now, honor your father and mother.

Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal. Hey, those are good principles. I'm all for it, I believe it.

But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in my members.

Isn't that true?

That we know what's right?

We can't really do it, or we won't do it, or we neglect to do it, or we, you know, live in a fantasy world of some sort, of our own making, of not doing it.

He says this, O wretched man that I am, and how many of us have said this on our knees before God, O wretched man or woman that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death?

I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord, and what's unsaid here, that I will be delivered through Jesus Christ.

And it's interesting that the one who justified us and made us right is also the one that we need to turn to as the one to help us in this battle against the flesh. It's him again who helps us.

And of course, he does it in different means.

Supernaturally, I truly feel a God at times, who supernaturally helped me to think and do things differently, to forgive against something that I find very difficult to forgive, or to let go of something I had found very difficult to let go.

I know that also, beyond supernatural, you know, as far as just asking as a result of prayer through the Holy Spirit, he gives us the might, the power to be able to overcome, which is going to be explained by the Holy Spirit.

So truly, in these days of Unleavened Bread, and this festival season, which is actually two different festivals, Passover is a feast in its own right.

The Feast of the Passover, it is a festival day.

And then, the Days of Unleavened Bread is another festival where there are two days that speak about this process of understanding what unleavened bread is, what unleavened bread is, what it's all about, what the process is, as we take our journey in life and accepting the full benefit of the gospel of Jesus Christ.