(Romans) Prescription for Blessing

Romans chapter 8. Tonight, what we're going to do is highlight some of the key verses in this 8th chapter of Romans, and then next week we'll pick up in our actual verse by verse study through it. It'll take us another three weeks or so to get through the 8th chapter. But this 8th chapter is.

It's one of those great chapters of the Bible. So much packed into this 8th chapter that is so vitally important over the years, I've done a message from this 8th chapter, and it's essentially what I want to share with you tonight. But I've often referred to it as things that every Christian needs to know, and we've been looking at the necessity of knowledge as we've been studying through this epistle to the Romans.

And we've seen how there's a direct link between victory and knowledge, and we must know certain things if we're going to experience the victory and the blessing that God has for us. And here in this 8th chapter, this is a key chapter to really know. Oftentimes, you know, after a session, a counseling session with a person, I will recommend to them, go home and for the next seven days, read Romans 8 over and over and over again.

It has often been the prescription that has been given because it is just such a powerful chapter. So God has much to speak to us tonight from it. So let's have a quick word of prayer, then we'll jump into it.

Lord, we do pray that tonight you would minister to us through your word. And we thank you that your word is living and it's powerful. And Lord, just listening to the testimonies that were shared about how your word has impacted lives.

Lord, we're here tonight. We pray that you would send your word forth by the power of your spirit and that you would work mightily in us. We pray this in Jesus name.

Amen. The first thing that we need to know as believers here in this 8th chapter is found in the very first verse. There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.

There's no condemnation. Condemnation is a reference to God's judgment. There's no future judgment coming for those who are in Christ.

God is already taking care of that. That's what happened on the cross. And Jesus himself said, for those who hear my word and believe in him who sent me, they shall not come into condemnation or into judgment.

But they have passed from death into life. I don't know about you, but that is a great relief to know that there is no condemnation ahead. I don't have to live in fear or in dread of that judgment day.

That is something that is not in my future. It's not in your future. If you're in Christ tonight.

You know, I remember in my life before I was a Christian, I remember lying in bed at night and thinking about. The fact that I would die one day and thinking about the judgment. And I remember the fear and the dread that would come upon me as I would think about that, I would, of course, try my best to get it out of my mind as quick as I could.

But those kinds of moments would occur. But, you know, having come to the Lord, I never think of those things, those thoughts never crossed my mind again, because I know there is no condemnation now, as I said, condemnation is that judgment that will come upon sin. But there's another aspect of condemnation that we need to consider, and we need to understand that there is no condemnation for us in that realm either.

And that is condemnation in the sense of what the enemy will do in trying to discourage us when we failed. You see, here's a here's a scenario that I think all of us can identify with. At some point in our Christian lives, we fail, we sin, we make a mistake, we don't do something we should have done, we do something we shouldn't have done, whatever the case.

And upon our failure, Satan will rush to the scene and will come with a word of condemnation. He will come to seek to convince us that we've gone too far, we've blown it, it's over, there's no possibility of forgiveness, there's no possibility of restoration, there's no hope, God's finished with you. And he will taunt us with that, he will haunt us with those kinds of things, that is, that's condemnation in action.

Now, later on in this 8th chapter, Paul is going to ask a very important question. He says, who is he that condemns? And his point there in posing the question is to show us that it's not Christ who's doing that. Who is he that condemns? It's not Christ, for Christ is risen from the dead, he's seated at the right hand of the Father, he's making intercession for us.

So who is it that condemns? Well, of course, it's Satan. But the good news is, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Now, I have had that very experience that I just described to you, and I think many of you have had it as well.

I've had it many times over. There are many times that I failed, many times that I have done things that I shouldn't have done, said things I shouldn't have said. And there have been many occasions where the enemy has come in like a flood, as the language of Isaiah communicates with us.

He's come in like a flood and sought to overwhelm me with that feeling of condemnation. And it's a very powerful thing. It's a very real thing.

And it's something that Satan has been so effective with. He has virtually been able to at times paralyze people and stop them from progressing spiritually. He's even at times been able to drive people away from the Lord through feelings of condemnation.

He's driven people at times not only to the brink of suicide. I know for a fact there are people that have taken their own lives because they bought into this powerful lie of Satan and this condemning voice that was saying to them, God is finished with you. There's no hope.

But you see, the tragedy is that when that goes on and debilitates a person, the tragedy is that it shouldn't happen. Because God has forgiven our sins. He's cleansed us from our sin.

He's dealt with our sin. But it does happen to people because we either don't know what God's word is said or sometimes we just don't believe it. Sometimes we let the enemy convince us that it's not true for us.

But a lot of people are simply ignorant of it. They don't realize it. So that's why Romans 8 1 is so vitally important for you and for me, that we have this verse committed to memory, that we understand this is God's word.

There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. So when I have those feelings of condemnation, when I have those feelings that God is against me and he's no longer for me and he can't forgive me and he has given up on his love for me. I can know instantly this is not God.

This is the enemy. This is the evil one. I found that oftentimes when I'm going to move into some service to the Lord, the enemy will rush in and try to bring a state of condemnation to discourage me, to keep me from moving ahead.

Oh, I've had so many times where I sat down maybe on a Saturday night to prepare a message for Sunday morning, and all of a sudden every failure of the week is brought to my attention. And there's that little voice of the enemy saying, oh, right, you're going to prepare a message. You're going to go tell people how to love God.

You hypocrite, you might as well just forget it. You better call in sick tomorrow. And, you know, sometimes it's a reflection on the previous week, but I've had things where, you know, something I might have done 10, 15, 20, 25 years ago, all of a sudden, boom, it's just brought right back.

And it's just like it just happened. You think, my goodness, you know, I can't remember what I did yesterday. How can I so vividly remember this event from 25 years ago? That's the enemy at work.

I don't know how he does it, but he does it. And people buy into it. But we've got to stand on the word of God because there is no condemnation.

And this is what you can know for sure. When you are having that sort of experience, that kind of feeling, those kinds of thoughts or voices taunting you in your mind, this is what you can know immediately. This is not the Lord.

It's not the Lord saying this to me. Because there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Now, there is a legitimate dealing of the spirit with us that is conviction.

When we sin, the Holy Spirit comes to convict us of sin. But here's how to distinguish between the two things. The conviction of the spirit always leads us to Jesus for the remedy.

The condemnation of the devil always seeks to drive us away from the Lord. And insinuate to us that there is no remedy. Here's what the Bible tells us.

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. When you confess your sin, you stand on that fact, whether you feel it or not. You know, a lot of times we get caught up in allowing our feelings to control us.

And we've confessed our sin, but we don't really feel like anything's happened. And so then we succumb to condemnation. But this is where faith comes into the picture.

God said, if I would confess my sin, he's faithful and just forgive me. I've done that. And so I believe that he's forgiven me.

And there is no condemnation. And I resist this temptation to buy into this voice of condemnation. This is one of the great blessings that belong to us who are in Christ.

There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. So embrace that, lay hold of that, receive that. And maybe some of you tonight, you need to apply it immediately to your situation because perhaps you've been under that heavy burden, that heavy weight of condemnation.

Know that that's not the Lord. That's not his heart. That's not his attitude.

That's not the way he looks at you. His heart toward you is one of restoration. It's one of mercy.

It's one of wanting to bless you. Now, as we move on in this eighth chapter, and as I said, we're going to get to the eighth chapter in its entirety, and there's so many powerful truths that we'll be looking at. But I want to move on, just highlight some of these things in the 11th verse.

We read this, but if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. This is a real important statement here. And oftentimes I know that it's been misunderstood or not totally understood, and therefore people haven't received the ultimate benefit from it.

But what Paul is saying here, we've talked about this a little bit before, but what he's really telling us here in this 11th verse is how to really have victory over sin. And he says the key to victory is the fact that the spirit of Christ dwells in us. And this is what we've talked about in the past where we've talked about, you know, the way to victory is not to concentrate on trying to drive all the bad stuff out of my life.

The way to victory is to just more or less ignore that and just immerse myself in the things of the spirit. And that's really what Paul's saying here in this particular verse. If the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, and of course, that is the case if you're a believer.

He said that in the preceding passage. So the spirit dwells in us. And then it says he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal body, your mortal body, the body you possess right now.

The spirit of God, the spirit that raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, and it's through the indwelling spirit that we have power imparted to us to live above the level of the flesh. We have power literally imparted to us to have victory. The key is the spirit indwelling us.

But as we pointed out before, so often the case is people are walking in defeat. They're not experiencing the victory. Why? A lot of times because they're just simply not realizing that the key to victory is cultivating the spiritual life.

The key to victory is feeding the spirit. Sowing to the spirit as I feed the spirit, as I sow to the spirit, the spirit grows in my life, increases in my life, and then the spirit that raised Christ from the dead imparts life to my mortal body. So now here in my mortal body, I can have victory over sin.

The key is through the indwelling spirit and cultivating that life of the spirit. And so Paul reminds us of that here in verse 16. Another thing that all of us need to know, all of us need to realize verse 15, he says, for you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear.

But you received the spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, Abba, Father, the spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. Oh, I need to remember that I'm a child of God. And because I'm a child of God, there's all kinds of implications to that.

My children, your children, they bear a resemblance to you, don't they? Because they're part of you. And likewise, as the children of God, we are going to bear a resemblance to him. Why? Because we're part of God now.

He's part of us. He's placed his life in our lives. I just went up north for a couple of days to see my daughter for her 25th birthday and my little five-year-old grandson.

You know, it's amazing because everybody looks at him and thinks this guy's a spitting image of me. You know, he's my grandson, but he does. He just looks so much like me.

And you see that family resemblance, you see that connection. And there is a family resemblance also with us in God's family. He puts his likeness upon us.

We are his children. But another aspect to this is also that God's care for us is the care of a loving father. He cares about us as a father pities his children.

You remember the 103rd Psalm. So the Lord pities those who fear him. He remembers our frame.

He knows that we are dust. And to understand the relationship that we have with God is it's a it's a parental kind of a thing, a parent-child relationship, but in the best sense of that. Now, for some people, you talk about parent and child and you talk about father and son.

For some people, that's not a good picture. They didn't have a good experience with their father, perhaps. And if that was maybe your experience, just forget that because that's not what we're talking about.

We're talking about the ultimate, the ideal relationship between a father and his children. And that's what we have with the Lord. You know, my parents broke up early in my life.

I remember, I think I was about five years old when my dad moved out. I remember vividly the very day he came home, packed his stuff and left. And, of course, said he was going away for a couple of days and never came back.

And I remember the, you know, the devastation of that and the many years afterward of the visitations and all the pain that involved, you know, having to visit for a while, but then be brought back home. And, you know, all of that was very difficult. And growing up and getting married, and, of course, I became a Christian, which gave me a huge advantage.

But one of the things I've always determined is that I would never do anything like that to my kids. And just the love that God has, you know, put in my heart for my children. And I know you guys, you have that for your children as well.

There's something there. You just, you love your children. You know, think about your love for your children and then magnify that a billion times over.

Take any thing out of it that's not perfectly the way it ought to be in whatever realm. And then think of God in those terms. That's how God feels about you.

That's how He feels about me. You know, the scripture is full of reminders to us that His thoughts toward us are more in number than the sand. You know, isn't that incredible? I don't think that that's hyperbole.

I think that's reality. God just, He, being God and being omniscient, having all knowledge, being omnipotent, having all power, being omnipresent, being in all places at all times. You know, God actually has us on His mind 24-7.

And guess what He's thinking? He's thinking all good things, all good thoughts. I know the thoughts that I have toward you, says the Lord. Thoughts of good, thoughts of peace, not of harm or evil.

And that's the glorious truth. God has been misrepresented so often and seen as, you know, an angry judge or an unreasonable master or a harsh and vindictive figure. That's not the picture that we get in the scripture.

The picture in scripture is that of a father. And here we're reminded that the spirit of adoption has been imparted to us by whom we cry out, Abba. Abba is that Aramaic term that would be equivalent to Papa or Daddy in English.

We have that kind of relationship with God. We need to understand that. God loves us as a father, loves His children.

We are His children. But then in verse 18, Paul reminds us of another thing that's important to know and remember. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.

The sufferings of this present time, we suffer in life, don't we? Some people suffer more so than others. Everybody suffers to some degree or another. There's no escaping it.

But Paul reminds us that the sufferings of the present time, they can't even be compared with the glory that's going to come in the future. So even though I might suffer immensely here in this world, heaven is going to obliterate even the remembrance of it. Heaven is going to be so glorious that what happened to me here or the experiences I had here will not even come into my mind.

At that time. Paul says it in a similar fashion in his epistle to the Corinthians, the second epistle. He says, for our light affliction, which is but for a moment is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.

So, you know, the worst experiences here on earth will be completely overshadowed just by heaven itself. The glory that God has awaiting us. It's it's really unimaginable.

It's incomprehensible. Humanly speaking, that's why the scripture says, I is not seeing ears, not heard. It hasn't even entered into the heart of a man.

The things that God has prepared for those who love him. But God has shown them to us by his spirit. There are those moments occasionally where the spirit of God will just sort of illuminate us and we'll get a microsecond.

Of a sense of what's in the future. And it's so glorious. It's so powerful.

Paul spoke of his being caught up into heaven at a certain point. And he says that he heard and saw things that are indescribable. He said it would actually be unlawful for me to try to explain to you what I heard and saw.

Human language cannot do justice to the glory that he experienced and that we will experience. The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us. And then he goes on and in verse 28, he reminds us.

And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to his purpose. You know, this, of course, is a promise that only is applicable to the believer. The man of the world cannot claim this promise.

You hear people sometimes, you know, make statements. You're you're certain they have no idea where the statement came from. I've heard people say, hey, don't worry about it.

You know, man, all things work together for good. That's only true for those who are in Christ Jesus. But it's absolutely true for those who are in Christ Jesus.

God works all things together for good. Now, there's a lot under that category of all things. And there are certainly things that we will all be tempted at times to question whether or not this could really fit in the category.

I mean, come on, I can understand lots of things. I can understand most things. I can understand almost every single thing.

But this one thing, I just don't get this. I can't understand this. But this is where by faith we have to stand on what God has said.

All things. Paul says, and we know, do we know that? One of the great illustrations of this verse is found in the life of Joseph. You remember the story of Joseph.

Seventeen years old, envied by his brothers because of his father's preferential treatment toward him. And he's taken by his brothers and he's thrown into a pit. They want to kill him, but they realize it's probably not the best thing to do.

So instead, they sell him into slavery. And for 13 years, think about that 13 years, he's a prisoner. Now, at the end of 13 years, when he's 30 years of age, he's finally released from prison and he's elevated and he's made the prime minister of Egypt.

And then because there's a famine in the land, his brothers have to come to Egypt. And there they come to try to get some grain so the family will survive. And they find that there's this Egyptian who's very gruff and not very kind toward them.

It's Joseph. They don't know it, though. He knows them.

They don't recognize him. And he's testing them. He's dealing with them.

And you know the story. Finally, Joseph reveals himself to them. I'm your brother, Joseph.

And they're stricken with fear. They can't believe it. Oh, no, this guy who's ruling Egypt is our brother.

And we know what we did to him. And they were certain that Joseph was going to kill them, punish them. And this is what Joseph said to them.

He said, you meant what you did for evil, but God meant it for good. You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good to save your lives. He sent me ahead of you.

And you know, that's true. There are things that come our way that are intended for evil. The devil is behind the scenes.

He's manipulating the flesh and blood. Because remember, we don't wrestle against flesh and blood. We wrestle against the principalities and powers.

And he's back there. He's manipulating the situation. And he has an intent to harm us.

But God takes that which was meant for evil, and he turns it around for good. He works all things together for good. The greatest illustration of this verse is in the cross of Jesus Christ.

Because, of course, they meant it for evil. But God meant it for good to save the entire human family. So we know that all things work together for good.

And then in verse 31, what then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? God is for us. So who can be against us? Or who can succeed in their efforts against us is the idea. Certainly people can rise up against us.

But who can succeed if God is for us? It's like what Isaiah said. There is no weapon formed against you that shall prosper. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord.

This is our heritage as God's servants. There's no weapon formed against me that will prosper. God is for me.

And since God is for me, nobody can succeed against me. No one can succeed against us. And he goes on and he says, he who did not spare his own son but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies.

Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died and furthermore is also risen. Who is even at the right hand of God who also makes intercession for us? Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword? As it is written, for your sake, we are killed all day long. We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

Yet in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. You know, it is a common occurrence that whenever we experience tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword, we tend to think that, oh no, it must be because I've sinned or it must be because God is upset with me. It must be because God has forsaken me or something like that.

You know, the opposite is quite often the case. That's what Paul says here. He says, these are the things that happen to the people of God.

This isn't an indicator that God has forsaken you. This isn't an indicator that you've been separated from God. Quite often, it's an indicator that you are his possession.

And that's why these things happen to us because we're living in a fallen world. We're living in a world that's controlled by God's enemy. But it just seems that somehow in our minds, we always equate any bad thing with somehow God's displeasure, his lack of love or his lack of concern for us.

That was the whole dilemma that Job's friends found themselves in. We thought Job was righteous. He tells us he's righteous.

But how could a righteous man really suffer like this? There's got to be some secret thing in Job's life. There's got to be something that he hasn't exposed. There's got to be something that we weren't aware of because nobody who's really righteous could go through this kind of stuff.

We understand that kind of reasoning because that's the way we think as people. But what we learned from Job's case is that these guys were dead wrong. Job wasn't separated from God.

God was very much with Job. And God allowed things to happen in Job's life. But he had a greater purpose in the end.

So what we need to remember is verse 38, for I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present or things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Man, that's it. Now, remember, we'll come back and we'll tie it all together when we look at the chapter verse by verse.

But this is the culmination of all that Paul has been saying in Romans up until this very point. And what's he been doing? He's basically been expounding the grace of God. He's been explaining that we're justified by grace through faith.

And now he brings the whole thing to a climax by showing us that because of God's grace and because of what Jesus did, nothing can undo that, nothing can alter that. We belong to God and God himself will keep us and carry us through and see us through to the end. Remember, Jesus is both the author and the finisher of our faith.

Just as surely as he's the author of our faith, he's the finisher. Because Jesus Christ, unlike human beings, Jesus doesn't start something that he doesn't finish. I'm so thankful.

I am so grateful that the Lord is not a man. Remember, we're told that a few times in scripture. God is not a man that he should repent.

He's not a son of man. He doesn't lie. He doesn't change his mind.

He doesn't go back on things. He doesn't get bored with something. He doesn't decide after a while, this wasn't that good of an idea after all.

You know, I've had so many experiences and I have to confess, you know, even in the context of ministry, I've had so many times where I've looked at a person and I thought, man, there's such potential here. And then you're discipling them and you're working with them. And, you know, somewhere down the road, you're thinking, why in the world did I ever get myself into this? This is so much more work than I thought it was going to be.

And there's a temptation you want to give up. But thank God he's not like that. He knew, he knew how arduous the task would be from the very beginning, but he took it on anyway.

He's the author and the finisher of our faith. And there's nothing that can separate us from his love. But remember, this is our closing point.

These things are applicable, not to everyone, but only to those who are in Christ Jesus. You see, for those who are not in Christ Jesus, there is condemnation. That's exactly where they stand.

They stand in a place of condemnation. They have no way of dealing with their sin. Their sin has overwhelmed them and they have no solution for it.

They are condemned. Those who are not in Christ Jesus are not indwelt by the spirit of God. Therefore, they have no possibility of true victory over sin.

Those who are not in Christ are not the children of God. That relationship doesn't exist. You don't have the confidence that you have a loving heavenly father who's committed to your welfare and taking care of you and working out his purposes for your life.

If you're not in Christ, the sufferings of this present time are nothing compared to the sufferings in the future. They can't even be compared. You know, some people mistakenly say, oh, there's no such thing as hell.

This is hell. No, this is not hell. As bad as it gets here, this is not hell.

Hell is unimaginably worse. For those who are not in Christ, you could not say for them that all things are working together for good. All you'd have to say is it's just whatever.

It's just a random life and a random world and you might succeed. You might not succeed. You might live long.

You might not live long. There's no rhyme or reason to it if you're not in Christ. If you're not in Christ, well, who can be against you? The forces of darkness are against you and have you captive and are destroying you.

And if you're not in Christ, you are already separated from God. But it can all be remedied real quickly by simply making the transition from where you are right now into Christ. This term in Christ, Paul uses this term frequently and this is his way of describing the Christian life or the new birth, the regenerate person.

By nature, we are in Adam. We're in sin and we're in condemnation. God has offered all of the human race an opportunity to come out of Adam and to be placed in Christ.

God is starting. You know what God's doing? This is a fascinating way to look at it. You know, God is starting a new family.

That's actually what He's doing. The first family failed. God created Adam.

Adam sinned. His descendants are sinners. But God is determined to have a family, an eternal family that will live with Him in glory forever and experience all of His blessing.

So He decides to start a new family. And He, just as He created Adam and Adam is the father of the human race, so Jesus came and He's the head of the new family. And just as you were born into the Adam's family, and you remember how weird they were.

The TV show and the movie didn't tell the half of it. But just as you were born into Adam's family and inherited that sin nature and all the ramifications of it, you can be born again into Christ's family and become part of that eternal family. That's what it is to be in Christ.

And in Christ, all of these wonderful blessings, they belong to us because we're connected to Christ. And may God bless us with the knowledge of these things in our hearts. Lord, we thank you that you have made a way for us to come out of that family that is marred with sin and headed to destruction.

That we can be in Christ and all of those wonderful blessings that we read about tonight. And Lord, we pray if there's a single man here with us tonight that's not in Christ, hasn't made that transition from Adam to Jesus, we pray they'd open their hearts tonight and receive you, just simply confessing their sins and asking you to come into their life. Help them to do that.

And Lord, these blessings, may they resonate in our hearts. And may these truths ring loud in our minds so that we can walk in the victory that you've given us in Christ. In his name we pray.

Amen. Amen.