Romans chapter 6, Romans chapter number 6, and we’re going to be in page 75 here in just a moment. Romans chapter 6, you’ll see that it is pretty much, the chapter is given to us, but we’re going to not read all of it at the moment. We will refer to the chapter in a progressive type way as we go through the passage here this afternoon.

Romans chapter number 6, and I’ve entitled the message, God’s Way of Escape. I could just say by way of introduction to the session this afternoon, There are always two sides of truth. You’ve heard them presented here already today.

We unfortunately like to emphasize one side over the other in this particular area. There’s the one side that pretty much teaches us. Well, the Bible says that we say we have no sin.

We deceive ourselves and the truth is not in it. There’s one side of theology that says to the day we die, we are going to deal with our propensity to sin. And we’re going to have to deal with sin. The last day on this planet, you will have as much propensity to sin

as you do now in the sense that our flesh does not get any better. And so that’s one side of theology. We all know that’s true.

There’s a certain group of people that believe you can live above sin. In other words, you could reach a point in your life where there’s this crisis, and the rest of your life, you never sin again. Now, that’s kind of, I don’t know if you’ve ever, I know it wouldn’t be good, because God obviously didn’t allow it, but you ever wonder, that kind of be nice, wouldn’t it?

You know, reach a point in your Christian life, you never sinned again. But God doesn’t teach that. Back when I was in Bible college, in fact, Frank was remembering this very same phrase. I remember a Bible conference speaker saying,

the only way to live above sin is to rent a room above a pool hall. And obviously teaching us that we’re not going to live above sin. I thought it was a unique way to put it.

Most of you are too dated to know what a pool hall is all about. But that’s all right. The people with no hair, they know what I’m talking about. But anyway, the thing I want us to see is there’s one side of theology teaches us,

obviously, the day we die, we recognize the propensity to sin. But unfortunately, many people, that’s where they live. And they, as was preached earlier today, they anticipate it.

They say, well, you know, they plan on it, plan on sinning. And that’s coming out the wrong window. Certainly, we recognize the day we die, we have the flesh, the lust against the spirit. Folks, there’s another side to theology, and you’ve already heard it emphasized, and it’s a wonderful emphasis because we often don’t hear it,

and that is that every single time you and I are tempted, there’s a way out. There’s a way of escape. And I want to deal with that way of escape here this morning, because what are you going to do when you get home and you’re tempted? Your parents, whatever it is that provokes you, it happens, and you’re ready to, all of a sudden, right there,

You’re tempted to have that disrespectful response. What are you going to do? Here you are, you’re out with your friends, and you’re kind of the kind that maybe yields to peer pressure.

They say, hey, come, let’s go do this. And you know, and if you do it, it’s going to be sin. What are you going to do at that moment of temptation? Hey, what are you going to do when you’re all alone, your parents aren’t there, and you have a temptation to do that sinful activity

that you know your parents don’t know anything about? Hopefully this week you’ll confess it, which will obviously help in this whole issue. See, I want us to deal with God’s way of escape.

There is a way out. So we’re going to just ask a couple of questions here to begin the message. It says, are you defeated by a certain sin?

You know what, folks, it’s like this. Ask yourselves the question, what sin is it that gets you all too often? You know, a few, I think it was two summers ago, Pastor Gilmore asked me to speak in Reformers Unanimous.

They were just getting kicked off. It’s our faith-based addictions program. And we have a chapter here.

It’s a local, it’s a national movement. And he asked me to preach there. And I knew that most of the people, because we were just getting started, were our own workers.

And I thought, what can I preach that would apply to the addicts, but would also be a help to our own people? And it hit me. All of us have addictions.

And a certain sense, can we say it this way? All of us have besetting sins. In other words, all of us have sins that get us all too often.

I don’t know what it is for you. It might be that you have a propensity toward getting frustrated. Now, some of it, I’m not blaming it.

This is not a blame thing, but some of us get some of those propensities genetically. I’m told, my uncle told me that my grandfather, who I never knew, he said one day, my grandfather, his father, was putting on a screen door. And he told me the next thing he remembers, he said the screen door was on the floor.

and he said his dad was jumping up and down on the screen door. Now, I got the guy’s genes, okay? I don’t know him, but I can relate with that, okay?

I don’t know if you’re the kind. I’m there certain times. I just want to take something and stomp on it, tear it to pieces.

You know, you just, I don’t know. I got it honestly, I guess. Now, I’m not blaming him.

I’m just telling you that we all have certain propensities. As an evangelist, I have the gift of impatience. I want you to get right with God yesterday, okay?

Now, that has a good side. It has a bad side. We won’t develop that.

But just ask Frank Bailey. He’s been with me for 10 years. But even Bill could tell you a few moments of that.

But anyway, the point I’m making, friends, is we know ourselves. And we know our propensities. We know in a certain sense our addictions.

Those failures that are all too predictable. Certain situations come up. Certain problems come up.

And absolutely we’re predictable. And by the way, if you don’t think you have any besetting sins, and if you don’t think you have any addictions, just go home and ask your brothers and sisters. They’d be glad to enlighten you.

Because there are certain things about you that are very predictable. You know, you ever notice about brothers and sisters? They know, you know, they just know how to get you.

You know, that little look, you know, or that little whatever, you know. You say, how do you know about that? Well, I had a younger brother.

I mean, we knew how to get each other, you know. I know some of you know Evangelist John. It’s hard to believe that.

But nonetheless, yeah, we had our moments. There’s things in our own experience that defeat us all too often. Now, have you ever felt like you could just never experience victory over it?

Some of that’s been developed. Well, Romans chapter 6, I trust, will in some fashion here this afternoon give you biblical hope. Now, this is a message, young people.

I’m going to be honest with you. We’re going to really run through the text. And we’re going to chew on some of this.

And I want you to leave with some substance here that can be a help to you here. So hang tight with me. We’ll try to make it as understandable as we can.

Let’s begin by reading in verse number three. It says, Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death. Therefore, we are buried with him by baptism into death.

That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. Now, I want you to notice that little phrase in verse number three. It says, know ye not.

Then look at verse number six. It says, knowing. Look at verse number nine.

It says, knowing. Do you get the idea that God’s trying to teach us something? Now, friends, don’t miss this.

Knowledge alone is not enough. But knowledge is important. For instance, you cannot trust a gospel you don’t know.

Now, head knowledge is not enough, but it is important. So the very first thing I want us to see here is I’m going to just put it this way. It’s not good English, but you’ll see in a moment why I’m going to do this.

You’ve got to know right. You’ve got to know the right facts. Now, it is important that we have the right paradigm.

It is important that we know the right facts. Reminds me of a cute little story. Some of you perhaps have heard it, but there was a policeman sitting on the side of the road.

He had his radar gun with him and he’s zapping people as they go by. I will be honest with you. There are some things in life I think I would enjoy.

One of them is zapping people as they go by in traffic. But anyway, they’re going by and he’s got his radar gun out. He’s, you know, zapping people and these cars are going by.

And all of a sudden this car is moving at a very slow speed, pulls his gun up, hits it 22 miles an hour on his screen. He thinks, well, they’re not breaking the speed limit, but man, they’re a hazard. So he gets in his police car, you know, turns the lights on.

Of course, it didn’t have to go very far. And he pulls the car over and he gets out. And he notices four grandmas, four older ladies in the car.

He walks up, the driver rolls down the window and says, officers, are there a problem? He said, no, man, there’s not a problem. He said, you’re just going way slower than the speed limit, and it’s a hazard.

She said, oh, no, officer. She said, I’m going exactly the speed limit, 22 miles an hour, she says a bit proudly. Well, the officer chuckles to himself and says, ma’am, not the speed limit.

That’s not the speed limit. That’s the route number. Well, the lady’s a little embarrassed.

She apologizes. And once she apologizes, the officer says, ma’am, before I leave, I’ve got one question for you. I’ve noticed that the other ladies here in the car, they look stunned.

They look like something’s wrong. They look like, you know, like I’ve seen a ghost. Is something wrong?

And the driver says, oh, no, nothing’s wrong. We just got off Route 119. Now, some of you would like the route number, I’m sure, to be the speed limit in some cases.

Interstate 94 would become extremely interesting. But now, friends, it’s simply you got to know the right facts. Now, I want us to see what the right facts are here in Romans chapter number six.

It says, know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death. Now, friend, all this is simply saying is that when you got saved, you were put into union with Jesus Christ. Okay, the idea of baptism, if you take a sponge and you baptize it, immerse it into that water, the sponge is in the water and the water is in the sponge.

Now, the only problem with that illustration, you take a sponge out and dry it. But you can’t do that with us. Once you are in union with Jesus Christ, it is an eternally inseparable union. So that when a man or woman gets saved, they are baptized, put into, immersed into Jesus Christ,

so that Christ is in you and you are in Christ. Now that union, don’t miss this, that union means that you have become a part of his history. That’s what it’s saying. If you’ve been baptized, immersed into Christ, don’t you know that you’re immersed, put into his death

so that his history has now become yours by union with him. Okay, now you’re not going to understand everything off the bat, but try to assimilate in as much as you can And hopefully the dots will connect. Now, as a result of that, a reality of our identification with Christ, death, burial and resurrection, as a reality of this union with Christ, which means we’re in union with his history, his death, his burial and his resurrection,

we’re united with that as a result of that truth. In the spiritual realm, there are two phenomenal possibilities. In the Greek language, there is a mood called subjunctive.

It is the mood of possibility. You find in the next two verses, two of the subjunctive mood, which means there are two possibilities that come as a result of our union with Christ’s death, burial and resurrection. Number one, we have the possibility of walking in Christ’s resurrection.

Look at verse number four. Therefore, we are buried with him by this immersion, this baptism into death that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the father. Here it is.

Even so, we also should walk in newness of life. Now, teenager, if you’re saved this morning, there is a new possibility. And the possibility is that you can walk on planet Earth energized, enabled, animated, strengthened by resurrection life.

Capital R, by the way, capital L. I think you’ve already got it. Life’s not an it.

It’s a he. OK, so this life, Christ, who is our life, lives within us. I’m the resurrection and the life, Jesus said. Okay, so you have this wonderful possibility that your union with this resurrected Christ

means that you have a wonderful possibility that you can walk on this vile planet energized by resurrection life. Now, that’s the first possibility. But there is, the basis, of course, is that we’re in union with his resurrection.

If we’re in union with his death, you see there be. But now we have a second possibility in the next couple of verses. We have the possibility of living free from sin’s authority.

Look at verse number six. Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him. There’s that union.

That the body of sin might be destroyed. That henceforth we should not serve sin. Now, let’s start with that phrase, the body of sin might be destroyed.

That’s the subjunctive mood. It’s the possibility that the body of sin might be destroyed. Now, what does that mean?

Well, let’s just take it apart. The word destroyed here does not mean destroyed in the sense of obliterated. It means destroyed in the sense of render powerless.

Now, let me illustrate it this way. Let’s imagine that you drove to the conference. How many of you, by the way, do have a DL?

You drive. Okay, roads are still pretty safe, it looks like. Okay, now, let’s just imagine you drove to the conference, and the usher comes to you after the evening service and said, Hey, listen, neighborhood kids got in the parking lot.

I’m sorry to tell you, your car is destroyed. now you’d probably have the idea that some kid took a stick of dynamite lit it threw it in your tailpipe and turned your car into spare parts that’s what you’d think wouldn’t you’d be looking for a black charred piece of the parking lot you know but let’s just imagine they came in under the hood took the battery cables off now they have destroyed the ability of your car to operate and

that’s what the word means doesn’t mean it’s obliterated it means destroyed in the sense that It has ability to operate has been rendered ineffective. OK, so so that’s what it means. OK, you say, well, preacher, what’s body of sin?

Now, scholars disagree on this, but I’m convinced the body of sin is not talking about this human body. It is talking about body like we use the word if we talk about the body of truth. It is talking about that body we call sin. In other words, what God is saying is this as a result of our union with Christ death,

Every sin on this planet has lost its authority in our lives. Now, if you don’t understand that, maybe this illustration will help. Let’s imagine you were a slave before the Civil War.

Let’s imagine you had a very cruel taskmaster. Let’s imagine he beats you on a regular basis. He demands you work 16 hours a day.

He gives you no day off. He says only cruel, unkind things to you. And one day you despair of life.

You say, I cannot go on in this master-slave relationship. Well, friends, you only got two options. Number one, for you to die.

You know what happens when a slave dies? The boss can’t boss him around anymore. See, if you died, you’d be freed from the master-slave relationship.

He couldn’t boss you around anymore. In case you have a problem with that, go down to the morgue and try to boss around the corpses and see how far you go. I mean, bring yourself a loaded pistol.

I mean, put it right to their head and say, buddy, you don’t move. I’m going to blow your brains out. Okay, you’ll find out you can’t boss them around.

They’re just not going to do it. Okay, so you could die. The slave could die.

And the master-slave relationship would be broken. His authority would be gone. Or the master could die.

And hopefully you get another one. Okay, now friends, don’t miss this. Before you got saved, you had a terrible taskmaster.

His name was Sin. And although he tried to paint a pretty picture to you, Sin had one goal in his, as far as you’re concerned, he wanted to destroy you and put you in hell. You had a terrible taskmaster.

Don’t miss this. When you got saved, the taskmaster didn’t die. You did.

In Christ. And the moment you got saved, don’t miss this. Sin’s authority was broken.

See, that’s what it’s saying. So there’s not a sin on this planet that you have to commit. Okay, they’ve been rendered inoperative, so you don’t have to serve sin anymore.

Why? Because the moment you got saved, you died and sin lost his authority. See, that’s the picture.

Now, let’s continue on here. In fact, you can look down there, and some of this is already laid out in the notes. looking down at the very end of the page there on page 76, means for he who has once died to sin now stands free from its claim.

That’s the idea that we’ve just tried to illustrate. Now, if you’ll see there, there’s the repetition there in Romans 6, 8-10. He repeats this. Now, there’s one other thing, if you’re on page 77, before we move to the second point,

there’s one other thing that I think we need to articulate. See, he’s basically coming here and saying, listen, folks, you need to know something. You’re in union with Jesus Christ.

It presents two wonderful possibilities. You’re in union with resurrection, which means you have a wonderful possibility that this life, this resurrection life can animate you, enable you. You have a second wonderful possibility, and that is as a result of your union with his death, you have died to sin’s claim, sin’s lost its authority, so you don’t have to be bossed around by sin any longer.

Okay, now let’s just imagine, let’s bring it up to date. Let’s just imagine here in 2007, you had a boss. The boss was ornery.

He was mean. He constantly was criticizing you. You could never do anything right.

He calls you up in the middle of the night, get in here. I need you in here on the double. He demands you work overtime without extra pay.

I mean, just a demanding boss, just all the time, making life miserable. One day you decide, I’m done. You get another job and you lit the light.

Tell the boss, two weeks and I’m out of here. Okay, now, the day you walk off that job two weeks later, you’re thinking to myself, he’s no longer my boss. He’s lost his authority.

Let’s imagine for two weeks or so, you’re just enjoying not having that boss any longer. But let’s just imagine your boss, your former boss, he’s really becoming despair. He found so much fulfillment and satisfaction in making your life miserable that one day he decides he cannot stand any longer.

He’s just got to boss you around. So one night in the middle of the night, you hear the phone ring, you groggily reach over, you grab it. He said, get in here on the double.

I want you in here on the double. You don’t realize how foolish you would be to get dressed and go in. You say, well, pretty sure.

Nobody do that. I mean, he’s not my boss anymore. Why would I let him boss him around?

And that is exactly what God is asking every one of you in this room. Now that you’re saved, sin’s lost is authority. Why in the world are you letting sin boss you around?

He’s not your boss anymore. that’s what Romans 6 is teaching us now you know the right facts you got to know those facts folks those are the facts now that brings us to a second truth a second action here look if you would please at verse number 11 it says likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed into sin but alive unto God here’s the key through Jesus Christ our Lord the idea there is in Jesus Christ

as a result of our union with Jesus Christ God says you need to reckon yourself dead to sin and alive unto God. So number one, you’ve got to know right, but number two, you’ve got to think right. You’ve got to think right. It’s one thing to know it,

but it’s another thing to accept it. That means you’re now agreeing with it. And it affects your thinking. So in order to reckon,

you can’t think right if you don’t know right. You’ve got to know the right facts. And then you’ve got to, of course, have got to accept those facts, which reckoning is.

Now, look at what reckoning is, B. Reckoning means to count, to compute, to take into account. It is an accounting term, and as Watchman Nee says, it’s a word that relates only to the past.

Words reckon has nothing to do with the future. Faith does. Hope does.

But reckon doesn’t. It has nothing to do with the future. It has only what to do with the past and the present.

Now, as I mentioned, it’s an accounting term. Now, let’s imagine one day, teenager, you decide to do an audit of your assets. Okay, that wouldn’t take very long, would it?

But you’re going to do an audit of your assets. So you get out in a little ledger. You put checking account. You put, you know, savings account, whatever, if you have one,

and IRA, which I doubt you have, and you’re off IRA. You don’t know. Anyway, whatever.

You put down there, you know, piggy bank. And so let’s just imagine you really want to be accurate, so you put down wallet. Okay, so you’re filling all this in, you know, you count the pennies in the piggy bank, you know, you check with the bank, and you’re putting all that down and getting ready to go to Baptist College of Ministry, of course, seeing how much you got. And so you open up your wallet, and I’ll be honest with you,

I have just got $6 and I’ve got three team scoopy prize tokens. So I need seven more to get a nice kid’s meal at Culver’s. Okay.

So if you want to get those to me afterwards, I’d be glad to take them. But anyway, so let’s imagine I sold six bucks in my wallet. That’s not a whole lot, is it?

But anyway, I got credit cards. See, some of you don’t have those. But anyway, so I take down the ledger line and I put $6.

That’s called accounting. Now, if I put $2,000, that’s called wishful thinking. and if I want to balance the check sheet I’m going to put down six dollars as difficult as that may be okay I’m going to put down six bucks now folks you see what that is accounting is not wishful thinking it’s not trying to make something up it’s just saying this is what is now folks this is what

I want us to see about reckoning reckoning in fact it’s in the present imperative which means this reckoning needs to be an attitude of the mind where you’re saying yes I’m dead to sin yes I’m alive to God in Jesus Christ, which brings us to some of the problems of reckoning. First is a simple misunderstanding. The first misunderstanding is simply this, that sin is dead to us. Now, folks,

I want you to understand when you get saved, sin does not die. You do. See, if you think sin’s died, you’re going to be in real shock when sin comes around trying to boss you around again.

Notice what Griffith Thomas says. We must also be particularly careful to note that dead to sin does not mean the death of sin is a power in the heart. The apostle does not say that sin is dead to us, but that we in Christ are dead to it.

And that we are to keep ourselves reckoning ourselves to be so. Simple truth, but number two. Second misunderstanding is we are dead to sin in and of ourselves.

Folks, I want you to tell you, I am dead to sin. But my deadness to sin this morning is not because of me. My deadness to sin is only because of my union with Him who is dead to sin.

I’m not dead to sin in and of myself. Watchman, he says the scriptures declare that we are dead indeed, but nowhere do they say that we are dead in ourselves We look in vain to find death within that is just the place where it is not to be found We are dead not in ourselves, but hallelujah in Christ Okay, now number three It says we are dead to sin The third misunderstanding is we are dead to sin through reckoning now folks don’t miss this

You are dead to sin if you’re a believer you are dead to sin whether or not you reckon it you say what do you mean you see when you reckon that doesn’t make you dead to sin reckoning simply acknowledges that you are now let me illustrate it this way so you say well preacher you know man my life yeah i’m saved but man i’m not

very dead to sin i mean i’ve sinned all the time i mean yeah okay it says i’m dead to sin but boy I don’t feel dead to sin. Now, let me explain this, folks. The fact in the spiritual realm that you are dead to sin, and if you are not experiencing in your experience, then here’s the problem.

Let’s use an analogy. Let’s imagine today that you went into the most beautiful garden this world has. And let’s imagine you went into this garden with your eyes closed. And imagine the tour guard is saying,

look, all these are the most beautiful rose bushes. And he’s describing the beauty of the moment. and you’re thinking, man, alive, this garden’s not beautiful.

I’m not experiencing any aesthetic beauty here. You know, you’d be a fool, wouldn’t you? We all know what the problem is.

Here you are walking around with your eyes closed. You say, well, preacher, why is it? It says I’m dead to sin, but oh, I just don’t experience it.

I just feel so alive to sin. What’s the problem? Because you got your eyes closed.

If you were in that garden, what would you do? You’d open your eyes. And don’t miss this.

The moment you open your eyes does not make the garden beautiful. It simply appropriates that it is. See, you are dead to sin.

And the fact that your experience seems to indicate that you’re not simply means you’re living with your spiritual eyes closed. Reckoning does not make you dead to sin. It simply acknowledges that you are.

It brings from positional truth into experiential truth. Okay, now brings it into your experience. Just like opening your eyes brings the beauty of a garden into your experience.

So reckoning brings the spiritual reality of your deadness to sin into your experience. Okay, so we see some of the misunderstandings. Now, let’s look at number two.

This is another one of the problems, and this is a key problem. And this is probably where we need to park for just a few moments. Doubt. As I’ve already mentioned, already alluded to, some of you out here, you hear these truths and you’re thinking you know preacher man a dirty thought comes across my mind i just think it i i can’t fight that or somebody say oh you’re a preacher i’m just so defeated i

i just can’t help myself i just i just end up disrespecting my parents and i know i shouldn’t but i do and so i just i can’t i just i know i shouldn’t yell at my brothers and sisters but i just can’t help it i just just come on i just i just do it well that’s why is the problem here Okay, well, let’s look at it. Doubting. Why do we doubt divine facts?

Why do we doubt that we are in Christ, dead to sin, alive unto God? Number one, we doubt it because of past failures. Watchman Nee says one of the devil’s main objects is always make us to doubt divine facts.

And he often gets us to doubt divine facts because we see so much failure in the past. And we’re going to deal with that in just a moment. But secondly, we doubt divine facts because of present temptation or experience.

Now, let me take a couple of steps back here to help us with both of these points. Do you know, young person, that every single day you live, you have experience? You’ve had experiences at this conference.

You may have all kinds of things that you remember, things that you have experienced. Okay, now don’t miss this. There are two kinds of experiences in the spiritual realm as we walk through life.

Number one, real experience. Number two, illusion. experience.

You say, what do you mean? Well, friends, Satan is a master illusionist. The Bible says he deceives us.

And one of the ways he deceives us is by crafting illusion. You know, friends, when the Bible says that Satan goes to hell, somebody, the Bible says in Isaiah 14 is going to say, is this the man that made the earth to tremble? That did shake kingdoms? In other

words, when Satan goes to hell, somebody is going to say, is that Satan? You got to be kidding me. Why?

Because much of his power is the power to deceive. He’s an illusionist and he paints this illusion around you. You say, I just feel like I just got a cost.

I just feel like I just got to be disrespectful. I just feel like I got a loss. I just feel like I got to watch it.

I just feel like I can’t help it. A gang, don’t miss this. He’s an illusionist and he paints around you those illusions.

For instance, do you know, how many of this room have ever been discouraged? Can I see your hands, please? I’m raising mine. Okay, I think everybody who’s cognitive at this moment,

some of you are doing, most of you are doing a great job. A few of you are drifting off. But it is after lunch.

Okay, now, so let’s continue on here. You ever been discouraged? You know what happens when you’re discouraged?

You’ve believed a lie. You know, you flunk a test, you know. This happens over here.

Got some friends talking about you. This happens over here. And, you know, friends, you know what reality is?

You know, when we get discouraged, I will tell you this. God is not in heaven thinking, oh, look at that Christian teenager. Oh, this is just terrible.

They flunked a test. Their friends are turning on them. Oh, yeah, they’re having trouble at home.

Oh, this is terrible. What am I going to do? Do you think God’s doing that?

But we act like he is. And when we do, don’t miss this. We’re not living in reality.

We are living in illusion. Because reality is God’s saying, wow, look at that problem over here. That problem over here.

this problem. Wow, I’m going to take this and I’m going to work it together for good if he’ll just trust me. That’s reality. So in every moment of our life, you’re either living in illusion or

you’re living in reality. By the way, let me just say this. You know, sometimes parents will say to Christian school administrators or whatever, and they’ll say, you know, I got to. And again,

your only option is a public school. I understand that. But but sometimes they’ll say, you know, I’m going to send my kid to a public school because I want him to live in the real world.

May I tell you, friends, the world outside the doors of this church is not the real world. That’s the fake world. Because out there, they don’t believe that Jesus saves.

Out there, they don’t believe there’s a heaven and a hell. Out there, they don’t believe that God loves us unconditionally. Out there, you tell me, friend, that’s not the real world.

That’s the fake world. The real world is in the walls of your church. They believe God loves you, believe there’s a heaven and hell, believes we’ve got a wonderful Savior, believes the wonderful truths of the Bible.

That’s the real world. So we’re constantly dividing our experience between reality and illusion. You say, well, preacher, what’s reckoning?

Reckoning is when that illusion, you’re thinking, I just got to cuss. Or I just got to think those thoughts. Or I just can’t help it.

I got to watch it. I just can’t help it. I got to get mad.

or I just can’t help it. I’ve got to be disrespectful. That moment you are buying into an illusion. And by the way, when you say, I just can’t help it, I can’t forgive,

do you know that you’ve reckoned? But you’ve reckoned a lie. And when you reckon a lie, you know what happens?

It becomes that in your experience. And guess what? You can’t help it, can you?

Because you’ve reckoned a lie. So when we reckon, biblical reckon, what we do is we say, now wait a second. I’m in Christ.

Christ is dead to sin. Is Christ dead to sin this morning? Is he?

Yeah, he is. And you’re in him. And I’m in Christ and he’s alive unto God.

Hallelujah. I believe that to be true. You know what that is, friend? It’s moving from the illusion and moving to reality and saying,

I reject the illusion of experience and I accept what the Bible says. I reckon it is true. Now, some of you here from Falls have heard me use this illustration before, but bear with me because it’s the best way I know how to illustrate reckoning and maybe help us. I guess it was three years ago, maybe four, I took my two girls down to the Milwaukee Museum with a homeschool group here

to watch a documentary at the IMAX. I’d never been before, and I thought, well, I’ll go see it. I thought it might be kind of interesting with the dome, kind of an eggshell.

Some of you are familiar with that. And so we went down there, my two oldest girls, and it was a documentary on flight and had some stuff with the Blue Angels. And I remember I’m sitting there, you know, and I got up there and you got this dome.

You just feel like, you know, they put a camera sometimes in the cockpit, sometimes underneath the Blue Angels jet. So you literally felt like you’re flying like this jet through the air. And they take, you know, how Blue Angels, they do all kinds of stuff.

At times they put those things in barrel rolls. And so, I mean, this, you know, the plane is going like this and the screen is going around and around and around. There were several moments of that throughout that documentary.

And, you know, when we finished, there were two teenagers at the garbage can losing lunch. Do you know why those guys were losing lunch? I’m going to tell you why.

They believed a lie. You say, well, preacher, what did you do? Well, I normally do not have conversations with myself, though I do believe everybody’s got some compartmental insanity.

That’s a theory of mine. But I didn’t have thought processes. And if I could, I’d like to change my thought processes into a conversation.

Okay, I’m sitting there. I’m looking at this guy and it’s spinning around. And my stomach says to me, we’re in trouble.

And if you don’t do something quickly, the guy in front of you is really going to be in trouble. And my brain says to my stomach, don’t you have a brain? And my stomach says, as a matter of fact, I don’t.

And my brain says, now listen, let’s be logical about this thing. That is a screen. You are seated completely still.

It’s an illusion. It’s just spinning around, but you’re seated completely still. There’s no reason to be worried about anything.

And my stomach says, I don’t care what you say. We’re going to be in trouble. And if you don’t get this thing solved soon, we’re going to really be in trouble.

The poor guy in front of you is really, really going to be in trouble. And so my brain says, OK, I’m not arguing with anymore. I’m going to I’m going to prove to you that we’re seated completely still.

So I took my eyes off of the screen and I brought them right over the seat sitting next to me. And my stomach says, you know, we’re seated completely still. Yeah, we’re not spinning around.

This is okay. And my brain says, you should have listened to me in the first place. And so I’m looking at the seats and my brain says, now listen, we’re missing this thing.

We paid money to come and see this thing. We’re going to look back at the screen. So I took my eyes.

He says, okay, I think we’re doing okay. So I take my eyes, put them back on the screen. Now the ground’s spinning, you know, and it didn’t go very long.

And my stomach says, we’re in trouble again. And my stomach said, I’m not arguing with you this time. I took my eyes off the screen, put them back on the chairs.

Now, young people, don’t miss this. Do you know when I took my eyes off the illusion, the screen, and I put them on the chairs, do you know what I was doing? I was reckoning. You see, friends, I want you to see all the reality was I was seated completely still,

but I bought into the illusion. And, friends, when you’re sitting in a temptation, I just got to watch that dirty movie, or I just got to get angry, or I just can’t witness to that person, or I just can’t forgive, whatever it might be, it is an illusion because the Bible says I can do all things through Christ which strengthened me. And it’s taking your eyes off the illusion and putting on the reality of what you have in Christ.

That’s reckoning. The reckoning doesn’t make you dead to sin. It simply acknowledges that you are.

It’s opening your eyes in the garden. Now, that brings us to a final point. First of all, you’ve got to know right.

Secondly, you’ve got to think right. Thirdly, don’t miss this, you’ve got to do right. Now, young people, let me just stop for a moment.

And I want you to see something here that hopefully will be a help. Often in Christian life, we think, if I do certain things, I’ll be. Now, there may be some truth to that.

Don’t get me wrong. But the emphasis of this passage is because you are due. In other words, being precedes doing.

What he’s saying is because you are dead to sin, because you are in Christ, due. Now, that brings us to verse number 12. And let’s see what it says.

It says, let not sin. Could everybody say that fourth word? What is it? See, basically everything we’ve just learned in Firemore,

if you could package it all up and stick it into therefore, you got it. And God says, let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that she should obey it in the lust thereof. Now, folks, don’t miss this.

This is what they call the present tense with the negative. And what he is saying here is it’s very confrontational. It’s extremely in your face.

And what he is saying is stop letting sin boss you around. Based on everything we’ve just learned, God is saying to every teenager and every adult in this room, he’s saying, stop it. He’s saying, stop.

Let dirty television images impurify your mind. Stop it. He’s saying, stop letting disrespect call the shots in your life.

Stop it. Stop letting spiritual apathy rule you. Stop it, young person.

Stop it. He’s saying, listen, stop letting fear and lack of courage in the area of witness run the show in your life. stop it young person stop it and God is coming right into your personal space and He is confronting you with every issue you’re struggling with and He’s saying cut it out He’s saying listen back row Baptist cut out the spiritual apathy stop it by the way it’s not wrong to be in the back row

but that’s just where you ended up every once in a while but if you’re the kind that’s always grabbing to the back row God is saying cut it out it’s the mentality not the location in a full auditorium somebody’s got to sit in the back but I will tell you when the same people always occupy the back I will tell you it’s not a location problem it’s a heart problem so some of you are thinking

well it’s the first time in the back room why I’m not preaching to you it’s not location it’s heart but I’ll tell you friends God’s saying, cut it out. Listen, young person, cut it out. Stop being apathetic, God’s saying.

Stop it. If you’re born again, cut it out, God is saying. He’s saying, I don’t care who you are in this room.

God is saying, cut it out. Stop letting anger in the home rule the show in your life. Cut it out. Stop letting compromise on what you look at defile your mind

and run the show and boss you around. Stop it. Why?

Because you’re in Christ. You’re dead to sin. You’re alive unto God.

Now, you know, every time I come to verse number 12, I always feel that I have not preached it strong enough. Young people, I don’t know how to explain it. This is extremely confrontational. In other words, whatever sin you excuse, whatever sin you constantly get involved in, whatever it is you’ve been pushing God off about in these days,

God is coming very close into your life and saying, cut it out. Cut. Stop letting that sin rule you.

Cut it out because you are in Christ, dead, the sin, alive, and the God. now you say okay yeah preacher yeah that’s right yeah yeah i gotta do yeah okay i gotta stop letting sin boss me around how do i do that what’s a good thing god anticipated your question because verse number 13 moves from a general command to stop letting sin boss you around to a specific of how

look at verse number 13 same grammatical phenomena the present tense with a negative he says neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin but yield yourselves on god um as those that are alive from the dead. Now, friends, don’t miss this. What he’s saying is, stop yielding body parts to sin.

Do you know that it takes body parts to sin? There are certain body parts, members, there are certain body parts you’ve got to have to commit certain sins. For instance, some of you say, well, you know, preacher, you know, what about worry?

We got you on that one. What about worry? Well, you ever try to worry without a brain?

I have seen a few blonde girls who I think have been… I don’t know, I’m just teasing. Okay, but anyway, that was a joke.

Okay. But my point is, folks, it takes body parts to sin. You know, there’s certain sins a blind man can’t commit.

There’s certain sins a deaf man cannot commit. You know, we all know there’s certain body parts that are a necessity for certain sins. And God is coming in and saying, stop. He’s saying, going from the general,

stop yielding yourselves to sin. Stop letting sin boss you around. And now he goes, stop yielding body parts to do it. And the word yield here

is not just passive. It is also active. It’s translated in Romans chapter 12 and verse one. I beseech you there, brethren,

by the mercies of God that ye. There it is. Active, same word.

So it’s not just yield. Okay, I give up. It’s also you go to work.

It’s like the idea of surrendering to the enemy, putting on that uniform and going to work. It’d be like if you’re working for the devil, you got his uniform armed, you surrender to God, you put on God’s uniform and you go to work for God. That’s the picture.

So it’s yield present. Now, let’s look at this yielding because it’s absolutely essential. There’s two prohibitions and there’s one action.

Yield yourselves to God. Now, I want you to see three things about this yielding to God and will be done. Number one, yield yourself to God as those that are alive from the dead. Verse number 13, neither yield you your members as instruments of unrighteousness of sin,

but yield yourselves, those body parts, unto God as those that are alive from the dead. It’s like this, friend. Whenever you and I are tempted, we’re going to yield.

You say, wait a second, preacher, I thought we were talking about victory here. Oh, don’t miss this. You’re either going to yield to sin or you’re going to yield to righteousness.

But you will yield. Every time you and I are confronted with temptation, there’s going to be a yielding. Somebody’s going to win.

Righteousness or unrighteousness, but somebody’s going to win. Are you with me? So what God is saying here is when you yield to God, and we’re going to deal with this in a moment.

And a little clearer what I just brought up. But when you yield to God, you yield, this is key, as those that are alive from the dead. We often overlook that to our great detriment.

This is not just the yielding to God. In fact, let me prove it. How many of you out here have ever made a decision for Christ that you meant?

You fully expected the decision to last. You fully wanted the decision to last. You fully intended for it to last.

And maybe it did for a couple of days, a couple of weeks, long haul though. You went back on the decision. Went back to living like you were before the decision.

If that has ever occurred in your life as it has in mind, would you with me raise your hand? Okay, put your hands down. You say, well, preacher, I yielded myself to God.

Okay, don’t miss this. The key is as those from the life of the dead. You say, preacher, what do you mean?

Okay, when we yield ourselves to God, this yielding is with the awareness that we are in him who is alive from the dead. We’re yielding ourselves, recognizing that we’re in resurrection life. Resurrection life is in us.

So it is what I’m going to call resurrection life dependent yielding. It’s yielding to God recognizing I’m in Jesus Christ. He’s alive from the dead.

I’m dead to sin in Christ. I’m alive on the righteousness in the Christ. And friends, it is a yielding to God recognizing that we are in Christ, the resurrected one, and his resurrection life can strengthen us, can enable us, can animate us.

So it’s a God-dependent yielding, friend. It is a resurrection life-dependent yielding. Recognizing we’re in union with Jesus Christ.

Now, I recognize that some of you that you’re going to miss. Now, I’ll get all of this. I trust in time it’ll sink in.

But some of you are ready to get this. I trust that you’ll really put your brain in action here in the final points. Here it is.

Number one, yield to God as those who are alive from the dead. Number two, yield to righteousness as one who listens as to obey. Look, if you would, please, there.

at verse number 15 and 16. What then shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? God forbid. Know ye not that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey, whether of sin unto death

or of obedience unto righteousness. Now, there’s a new word introduced to this whole concept of yielding. Anybody want to tell me what it is?

Three times. Different forms, but what is it? Obey.

Now, look what it means down here. Obey means to hear under as a subordinate. To listen attentively.

By implication, to heed or conform to a command or authority. Hearken, be obedient, to obey. Look, if you would please, at obedience.

Attentive, hearkening. Now, friends, it literally means to hear under. Now, hang on, friend.

This is going to be a little rough, but hang on. The very essence of obedience begins with your ears. When I was a kid, there was a well-known radio commercial.

In fact, some of the adults in here are going to recognize it. When E.F. Hutton speaks, somebody tell me.

People listen. Yeah, okay. When E.F.

Hutton speaks, people listen. Now, I’m going to tell you something. E.F.

Hutton had nothing on my dad. When my dad spoke, I listened. I listened to tentatively everything he said.

And then I immediately obeyed. You said, oh, preacher, you must have been a good kid. No, that’s what people did in our house.

just the way it was. And by the way, when I think of my dad, I do not think of somebody who could swing a belt, though he could. I think of someone who loves me unconditionally.

So don’t get the wrong picture here. But I will tell you, I’m not sure how my dad did it. But I will tell you, even when I was in my 30s, my dad’s elder years, we’d be sitting in church, he’d speak, man, I’d tune everything out right to him.

Everything he said, immediately obey. He said, Jim, get me a cup of coffee. I’d be getting me a cup of coffee.

It was just ingrained. Now, I’ll be honest with you. I thank the Lord that my dad taught me to listen to him because it makes it a whole lot easier to listen to God. The reason some of you have a hard time listening to God

is your parents have made you listen to them. And that’s the kind of culture we live in. But what we’re talking about, young person, when it comes to yielding, don’t miss this, yielding begins with your ears.

You say, preacher, what do you mean? Can I put it this way, friend? Where’s your satellite dish pointed?

I’m not talking about literally. For some of you, it may be. I’m talking about figuratively.

Where is your satellite dish pointed? Listen, for some of you kids out here, you may not have a TV, but your satellite dish is pointed right to Hollywood. I mean, you want everything the world has.

You want the world’s media. You’re bummed out that you can’t watch certain things. You’ll sneak them if you can.

And you’ve got your satellite dish pointed straight toward the world. Don’t be shocked when you’re a defeated, worldly, backslidden, carnal Christian. Don’t be shocked. Listen, if you watch compromised DVDs, and you watch movies a Christian has no business watching, and you listen to ungodly music, music that feeds your flesh, and has lyrical content that pollutes your mind,

don’t be shocked when you’re defeated. See, the whole issue of listening, of yielding, starts with your ears. Some people say, yeah, I come to church, I don’t get anything.

I want to tell you something, friend. Have you ever occurred that you’re not going to get anything if you’ve got spiritual earplugs in? I guarantee you, if you come to church and you say, oh, God, I need to hear from heaven.

Oh, God, I need to hear from heaven. This may shock you. You’re going to hear from heaven.

So the idea is where are your ears? If you, oh, yeah, I’ve got to have my devotions after all. Well, you know, my youth pastor is going to ask me.

So better do it. Yeah, read the chapter. Check it all. I don’t get very much from the Bible yeah, because you’ve got spiritual earplugs in I guarantee you you get up in the morning you say, God, I’ve got to hear from you Lord, I’ve got to learn something God, you’ve got to open my eyes Lord, I’m dependent on you you’re the author oh Lord, help me I guarantee you’re going to get something

I’ll tell you, this whole thing of yielding starts right here faith cometh by yeah so the whole idea of yielding starts with the ears. And young people, if you’re listening to junk and you’re compromising and you’re watching filth and you’ve got all kinds of stuff you’re looking at and listening to, don’t be shocked when you’re defeated. That’s what God’s saying here. You can take Romans chapter 6 and try to do all you can with it, but

it won’t work. So yielding starts with your ears. By the way, friend, if you want to start listening to God, start listening to your parents. Some of you out here, your parents didn’t make you

Listen to them. And if you’ve got a brain between your head, you’re going to say, I’m going to start listening to them. You know what that means? I don’t know what it is about teenage boys and their mothers,

but I think it’s tragic when teenage boys don’t listen to their mothers. And some of you big old boys out here, you can go bench 200 and you treat your mama like she’s absolutely trash. I want to tell you something, friend.

You need to go get right with mom. And the next time she speaks, you listen to everything she has to say and immediately obey. And you will find your relationship with God getting closer.

I am absolutely so burdened in the way teenagers treat their parents. It absolutely, it first burdens me that mom and dad let them get away with it. And the second burden is that the kid does it because friends, you can have the worst parents on this planet, but God’s grace is sufficient.

You have no business treating them like trash. And I beg some of you young people to clean out your ears and start listening to your mothers. And some of you big old boys out here, you have a heart for God.

You want God to use you. You have a heart for the ministry, but you don’t listen to your mom. And it’s a problem. I don’t know what it is When a boy becomes 12 He thinks he’s big stuff He doesn’t have to listen to mom anymore Some of you kids out here Have a huge spiritual problem Listen, you’ve got trouble with mom and dad You’ve got trouble with God And I will tell you friends

For some of you out here You have no idea some of the difficulties Some of you have single mothers And you treat them like trash And I want to tell you young man That’s big stuff You had better get right with God and your mother you have no idea the heartache she carries when she speaks you ought to listen and I will tell you friends if you’re not listening to your parents you’re not going to listen to God

I’m talking to some good kids in here but you’ve got a problem here because our culture is so inundated with this junk so you yield to righteousness as one who listens to obey that brings us to the final point Number three, you yield to righteousness as you once, hang on, yielded to unrighteousness. Now, God is going to make an analogy that no Christian would dare make if it was not inspired by God.

You run here and say, okay, you know, I preach, how do you do this? I mean, you know, how do you yield the righteousness? Okay, how do we get this body part stuff, these members to do right?

Okay, how do we do it? Help me out. Give me a picture. Okay, friends, God is going to give us a picture, an analogy, again,

that none of us would dare to make if it was not inspired of God. So notice what he says here in verse number 19. I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh.

May I say that is not a complimentary phrase. He is nicely telling us because you are so affirmed, because your flesh is so bad off, he said I’m going to have to make this analogy so you get it. For as you have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity, even so now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness.

And what he’s saying is this. The same way you yielded body parts to do wrong is the same way you yield body parts to do right. In other words, tragically, we all know how to sin far too well. And so what he’s saying is, if you know how to yield to uncleanness and to iniquity and to iniquity,

you yield to righteousness the same way. Now, uncleanness is a troubling word. In fact, if you look at Strong’s Concordance, it says impurity, the quality physically or morally uncleanness. The word, friends, is one that in almost every context I have ever seen it in, I think all but one,

it has nuances of moral uncleanness. it’s a troubling word what god is saying is just like you yielded to lust just like you yielded to moral uncleanness you yield to righteousness i mean the lord does make an analogy here that again goes right to the core issue and uh let’s go ahead and make let’s just appropriately make the analogy okay here it is you go to the grocery store you go there for one purpose and that’s to get groceries

you honestly went for no evil purpose while you’re standing in line all of a sudden a dirty magazine or some sensual cover of a magazine catches your eye now friends do not miss this at that moment young man you’re going to yield you will either yield to impurity or you will yield to purity but you’re going to yield now what happens when you yield to impurity now hang on You cannot yield to impurity without body parts. What happens?

You take your neck muscles and you move them to the magazine. You take your eyes. You focus on the magazine cover.

You focus them. And then you meditate on filth. We call that lust.

It took a brain. It took eyes. It took neck muscles.

It took body parts. Okay, let’s use the same analogy. Here you are in line.

You didn’t come there. Bang. There are temptations right there.

Okay, same neck muscles. But instead of looking at the magazine, you take those neck muscles and you look up. every guy in this room ought to know what the ceilings of your grocery stores look like oh yeah there’s a light out over there that ceiling tile’s missing they need to paint that girder up there I had one guy says an approach he said I do not know the ceilings of my grocery store he says but I do know the floors

yeah that tile’s broken you know all that kind of stuff same idea take those neck muscles you look you take those eyes you focus on something else and you take that same brain and instead of focusing on uncleanness you focus on purity You say, what’s that? Proverbs 30 and verse 5, every word of God is pure. And you begin to meditate on Proverbs chapter 5, Proverbs chapter 6, and Proverbs chapter 7, which show you the reality of the strange woman.

And every time you see a sensual picture, it is Proverbs 5, 6, and 7. It is a lie. And it is the purity of the word of God that begins to clean out the temptation that has just come.

Or do you see it, friends? Just like you yielded uncleanness, you yield to cleanness. Same body parts.

How about this? Here you are, and I hope this wouldn’t happen to you, but here you are in your Christian school or your youth group, for you homeschoolers or public schoolers, or even a public school, this could happen, probably. It would happen in Christian schools as well.

Somebody of the opposite gender begins that thing we call flirting. You say it’s flirting in the Bible? Yeah, Proverbs 5, 6, and 7 talks all about it. you know the flattery of the eyelids you know the body movements and that coying one with another you say Richard what’s the difference between friendliness and flirting don’t try that on me everybody out here you got a brain you know the difference you know when you’re friendly and you know when you’re flirting

so that opposite gender begins that you know that coying one with another and all of a sudden at that point you have in your heart what the old Puritan writers used to call unholy passion and you have a decision at that moment what happens if you yield to uncleanness you begin to return the flirtation the eyes the mouth the Bible talks about her mouth and there begins that co-ing one with another that ritual that has become all too familiar in our wicked world

of which Christian young people have become immune to you say well preacher I don’t think it’s wrong before you get married Well, I want to tell you something, friends. What do you think about a guy who’s married, who flirts with all these women who aren’t his wife? That’d bother you?

It bothers the fire out of me. What do you think about some lady who flirts with every guy, flirts with all the ushers, flirts with all the people out, all the men out in the lobby, and she’s married? That’d bother you?

What do you think she learned that? I’ll tell you, she didn’t learn it after she said, I do. And so there’s that uncleanness, that yielding to uncleanness.

And in order to yield to that uncleanness, there has to be a returning of the flirtation. You say, okay, preacher, how would you yield to purity? Okay, here you are.

That person begins to flirt at that very moment in your own heart. You think to yourself, wait a second. This is wrong.

And this is an unholy passion. And so you say, well, friend, what do you do? You know, the Bible says there’s only one way to get away from lust and sexual temptation.

It says, flee! Youthful lust. I’ll tell you this, one time you have an excuse not to give a gospel tract, that’s when it’s someone who is giving you immoral temptation.

You run. I want to tell you, friends, when Joseph was encountered with temptation, he took that, as old Lester Roloff said, he lost his coat, but hallelujah, it didn’t lose his character. He took his two good legs and ran. And you take those body parts and you yield them to purity

and you run from that situation and get away from it. You know, I’m thinking right now of a young man at a camp a few years ago. He comes to me, tears for me down his face.

He said, Preacher, I was with some guys I never should have been with. Well, I noted that, number one. He said, they put in a dirty movie.

He said, I didn’t watch it. He said, I went over and put it in a dirty movie. He said, I looked up.

He said, Preacher, it was only a couple minutes. Oh, I wish I hadn’t seen it. You know what his problem was?

Number one, he shouldn’t have been with them in the first place. But let’s just say he innocently was with them. They threw in the dirty movie.

His mistake was he didn’t take his two good legs and run. It’s the only way to handle that kind of temptation. It’s to run, to yield.

Take those good, let’s say, okay, take a step. Take another step. Take another step, okay?

You’re bossing your members around. You’re yielding to purity. That’s why some of you guys have looked at dirty magazines.

That’s why some of you guys have minds full of filth. Because one day you were some friends you never should have been with. They opened up that dirty magazine.

They started laughing. They said, hey, look at this. They threw in that dirty DVD.

They went to that dirty internet site. They got you to look at it. And foolishly, you yielded your members to impurity instead of obeying God and taking your two good legs that God gave you and running the other direction and yielding yourself to purity.

And you hear me, the most manly thing you can do is run. Wimp, spiritually stay and look at it. See, you yield the righteousness just like you yielded the unrighteousness. One other illustration, perhaps out of the moral realm,

and two, perhaps your issue is just anger. Maybe it’s a parent, maybe it’s a brother or sister. They do say what they always do and say. They hit the right knobs, pull the right lever,

and you’re as predictable as old faithful. You know, you blow. Let’s imagine that’s happening.

And at that very moment, young person, you’re in a decision. You can yield to grievous words, or you can yield to a soft answer. A soft answer, but grievous words, so you have a choice.

What do you normally do? You yield to grievous words. You say whatever you say, and World War III.

And some of you know exactly what I’m talking about because it happens all the time. Say, well, preach what I do. Okay, here you are.

The provoking situation comes up. You say, wait a second. I’m dead to sin.

I don’t have to listen to sin. In Christ, I’m dead to sin. I’m alive with the God.

The resurrection life lives in me. He can enable me. So instead of taking body parts and yielding them to, what did you have to do to do grievous words?

You had to take a tongue, lips, and you had to frame grievous words, didn’t you? You take that same tongue, same lips, and instead of framing grievous words, you frame a soft answer. And the moment you begin to frame those soft answers that’s already been referred to, you experience grace.

In other words, God begins to strengthen you. He meets with you. We’re not under the law, but under grace, it says a few verses earlier.

Then it explains what grace is. Grace is when we believe God, yield to Him, independence upon Him, and He graces us. He enables us.

He strengthens us. So we yield to unrighteousness. We yield to righteousness just like we once yielded to unrighteousness. I remember a few years ago, I think it was two summers ago, some of you in this room perhaps were there,

and you heard this message last time I preached it to the youth group here. I was up in the state of Minnesota, up in the boundary waters up there, and we were having a wonderful time. How many of you were in that trip?

I know there’s a few of you here. Okay, not many, but a few. I remember I had an opportunity to preach to the kids once or twice a day, and I remember it was getting toward the end of the week.

I sensed God wanted to do something, but I didn’t sense we were there yet. One night, God laid this passage on my heart. I felt like I had to preach it.

I was going over to it, and Matthew Ryan stopped me. He said, Brother Van Gelder, he said, I’ve been praying. He said, God is going to do something tonight. I was encouraged by the fact he’d been wrestling with the Lord in prayer,

And I took that as encouragement and sensed that he was right, that God was going to do something that night. Remember that night, having great liberty preaching on Romans chapter 6. And I remember as I came to the end of the message, I gave an invitation.

You have to understand we’re outside. We’re on this little island, you know, there’s water all around. I had to get there with canoes.

And I gave an invitation. I just said, listen, if God struck you tonight, I urge you to get on your knees and to reckon yourself dead to sin, alive unto God, and do business with God. And I’ll never forget. I remember some young people getting on their knees And there was one young lady in particular I don’t know how to explain it I knew she was meeting with God I mean everything’s going on But she was on her knees a long time

I noted it I never said a word to her I just noted that It seemed that she was meeting with God It was six months later She came up to me I’ll never forget this She said quite a bit to me But I’m only going to give you Basically an essence And these might not have been exact words She said to me Brother Van Gelman I just want you to know that Romans 6 has changed my life.

You know, friends, I want to tell you something. The truth will set you free. Can I ask every headbound, please, and every eye closed?