WWUTT 1271 The Spirit of Christ in You (Romans 8:9-11)

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Think about this, the same powerful Spirit of God that raised Jesus from the dead is the

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Spirit that lives in you if you are a follower of Christ. When we understand the text.

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This is When We Understand The Text, a daily study in the Word of Christ, for the sake of the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness.

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Find all our videos and other ministry resources at www .utt .com.

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Here once again is Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. We come back to our study of Romans chapter 8.

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If you want to open up your Bible and join with me there, I'm going to start reading here in verse 9. We'll go through verse 17.

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The apostle Paul wrote to the church that was in Rome. You however are not in the flesh, but in the

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Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you, anyone who does not have the

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Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the

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Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised

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Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his

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Spirit who dwells in you. So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.

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For if you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

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For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. But you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry,

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Abba, Father. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God, and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

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So we come back to verse 9 here with the Apostle Paul saying, you, however, are not in the flesh but in the

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Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. So we are not walking according to the flesh.

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We are not entertaining the passions of our flesh. We desire not the things of the body and the mind which had previously enslaved us, which were the cause of our death.

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We were dead even while we were alive. It's Ephesians chapter 2, verses 1 through 3, where it says that you were once dead in the sins and trespasses in which you once walked.

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Following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived, following and carrying out the passions, the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind.

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That's who we were before we came to Christ. When Ezekiel was looking over the valley of dry bones, before you came to Christ, you were skeletons.

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You were among the skeletons there on that valley floor that Ezekiel was looking at. But then God told

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Ezekiel to prophesy to these bones that they may stand up. And this is a picture of the preaching of the gospel.

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Because we're all dead in sin, so dead a corpse that there's nothing to us at all.

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Nothing to us at all. Dry bones means that there's no life in these bones whatsoever.

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But then the gospel of Christ is proclaimed as Ezekiel testified to these dry bones and they stood up and sinews came upon them and skin and flesh and they stood there, but there was no life in them.

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And then God said, commanded the four winds to come that they may fill these bodies and there would be life.

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And so that's what Ezekiel did next. And they were filled with life and became an exceedingly great army.

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And so this is what it's like for us when we hear the gospel of Christ. We were once dead in our sins and our transgressions.

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So in the flesh, we were as living dead men. But then when the gospel is proclaimed, those bones that were sitting there on the valley floor get up and there are sinews and muscle and skin that comes upon them.

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No life yet, but we've heard the gospel. We're hearing the gospel and the Holy Spirit comes into our hearts and gives us life that we may hear this message proclaimed and we would be convicted of our sin, realizing that we've broken the law of God and we turn from that sin to Jesus Christ who forgives sin and gives eternal life.

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He grants life to you when you hear the gospel and that life that he gives is eternal.

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It's not a temporary or emotional hearing of the word that lasts for a moment.

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Then you breathe it out and it's gone. But the life that is given by Christ is now and forevermore.

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So the one who hears the gospel and turns from sin no longer lives according to the flesh, but in the spirit has been brought from death to life.

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And we who are in Christ who have the spirit of God dwelling within us, we are not in the flesh, not in the flesh in the sense that we're enslaved to the flesh.

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Yeah, you're still a fleshly being. It's not like you became a spirit, ethereal form or something like that when you heard the gospel.

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But you're not in the flesh in the sense that you are no longer enslaved to the flesh. You have taken those sinful passions and desires and crucified them.

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You have put them to death. I have been crucified with Christ, Paul said in Galatians 2 20, it is no longer

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I who live, but Christ who lives within me and the life that I now live in the flesh, talking about how we're still in these bodies, we're still physical matter with living spirits, spirits that have been brought to life now by the powerful working of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

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The life that I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.

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So we still live in these bodies. But as we live, we live by faith in the spirit.

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We do not live according to the passions and the desires of the flesh. Consider this from Titus three, three for we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient.

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We were led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.

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But when the goodness and loving kindness of God, our savior appeared, he saved us not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the

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Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our savior, so that being justified by his grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

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That's exactly what Paul is talking about here in Romans chapter eight as well. So now being filled with the spirit of God, we walk not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit.

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Now we still live a life in the flesh in the sense that we're still physical matter. Again, Galatians two, 20 and our bodies are subject to corruption.

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Your body is wasting away right now. I mean, you're getting older. The body is falling apart.

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So as the body is subject to corruption, so it is also subject to sin or it is.

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There's still the temptation of sin that exists. That's what I mean. Not subject to it as though enslaved to it, but there's still temptation and your body can be enticed by that temptation because it's corrupt.

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It is corrupted matter, but God has given you his spirit that you may have the power of God to resist those temptations when they come.

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As Paul said to the Corinthians, God has never tempted you beyond your ability to resist, but he has provided for you the way of escape and the power to resist that sin, to turn to God and cling to him, to do the righteous thing rather than give in and do the unrighteous thing.

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That power is by the spirit that dwells within you. So you are not in the flesh.

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You are in the spirit. If in fact the spirit of God dwells in you, this, uh, statement right here at the end of verse nine, very important.

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Anyone who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

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You will hear it said by secularists and even many liberal Christians that we are all children of God.

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Every single human being that exists has ever existed, is alive on the planet.

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Now we'll ever be born. Every single human being is a child of God. Is that true? Well, Jesus said to some of the

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Jews in John chapter eight, you are children of Satan and your will is to do your father's desires.

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Who are those who are children of Satan? The ones who do not listen to the word of Christ.

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If they do not listen to Jesus word, if they do not follow him, they do so because they are not of the father

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God in heaven, but they are of their father, the devil, which is why they do not know

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Christ and they resist Christ and they go their own way. So it is not true that every single human being is a child of God, unless you're saying that in the context of, of, uh, of the

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Imago Dei, that we all are image bearers of God. Every single human being has been made in the image of God.

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That is certainly true. In which case we are his offspring. As the apostle

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Paul talks about in the, uh, the sermon that he delivered at the Areopagus in Acts chapter 17, we are his offspring and him.

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We live and move and have our being. So we're his offspring in the sense that we have been created by God, but we are not all children of God as though we can call upon him as our father.

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And he loves us and bestows upon us his favor and blessing, including forgiveness of sin and everlasting life, because that is something

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God only grants to those who are followers of Jesus Christ. Adoption that we have received in Christ is only by faith in Christ.

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And Paul makes that distinction even here in Romans chapter eight, for it is the spirit of adoption that we have by whom we cry in the spirit of God, Abba father.

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We may call upon God in heaven as our father because of the adoption we have received in Christ and the spirit of God who dwells in you.

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Anyone who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him. So Paul is even stating here that there are some who do not have

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God's spirit. Those who are followers of Jesus have the spirit poured into our hearts.

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As we read again in, in Titus chapter three, uh, verse six, the spirit

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God poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our savior. So that being justified by his grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

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So those who are followers of Jesus have the spirit of God and we belong to him. We have the spirit of Christ.

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Those who are not followers of Jesus do not have the spirit of Christ and do not belong to God.

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So back in Romans chapter three, we had read that there is none righteous, not even one

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Romans three, 10, none is righteous. No, not one. No one understands.

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No one seeks for God. Verse 12, all have turned aside together. They have become worthless.

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No one does good, not even one person. Wouldn't you agree that repenting of sin and following Jesus is a good thing, but if you're not capable of good, then how can you do that?

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How can you do what God requires of those who would be saved to turn from sin and turn to Jesus Christ?

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That's a good thing. If no one does righteous, then how can you do that good thing that God requires of all those who would be saved?

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The answer is the Holy Spirit. And again, that picture of the spirit coming into those who hear the gospel that, uh, that God gives him in the valley of dry bones,

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Jesus speaks about the same thing with Nicodemus in John chapter three. And then you have in Titus three, that God has saved us not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the

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Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our savior. This is such an important doctrine that we very often neglect and don't often speak about.

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It's, it's very seldom taught in many churches. And this is the doctrine of regeneration for you to be able to hear the gospel of Christ and respond to it.

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It requires regeneration. You could be standing and listening to an evangelist and you've got an atheist friend standing next to you listening to the same evangelist.

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You're both unbelievers, but you hear the gospel, you're convicted of it, and you are cut to the heart and you want to repent of your sin.

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You want to follow Jesus. But your atheist friend who's with you is going, man, this stuff is ridiculous. Hocus pocus, religious mumbo jumbo belief in a sky fairy who would believe in such nonsense as this.

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Why were you changed by the hearing of that message? But he was not because the Holy Spirit regenerated your heart to hear it and understand it and be convicted of your sin and believe it.

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But the Holy Spirit did not do the same for the person next to you. Now, why? Why is that, that God has predestined some for salvation and others for destruction?

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We don't know. And that is only up to God. He is the one who has chosen for his own out of his mercy and grace, those who would come to salvation.

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And it's always by the hearing of the gospel. Never let anybody think that just because God has foreordained from the foundation of the world, those who would be saved, that we shouldn't be going out and preaching the gospel.

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This is the way that a person comes to salvation. The apostle Paul said in Titus one, one, that he did what he did for the sake of the faith of God's elect.

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So he knows that God has elected some for salvation, but we don't know who that is. Our job, what

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God has required of us is to go out and preach the gospel so that those who have been elected for this faith would receive this faith by the hearing of the gospel proclaimed and come to salvation because the

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Holy Spirit has regenerated their hearts to come to salvation. All of this is the gracious working of God.

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It is not by the work of any man so that no one may boast of Ephesians two, nine.

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It is by grace. You are saved through faith. And this is God's work.

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We also have it in John one, 12 and 13, and this goes right along with the spirit of adoption that we're talking about here in Romans eight to all who did receive

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Christ, who believed in his name. He gave the right to become children of God who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

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We are born again, not by our own will, but by the will of God and those who are followers of Jesus have the spirit of Christ and belong to him.

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Whoever does not follow Jesus does not have his spirit and does not belong to God.

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And you will know those who belong to God by their fruit, the fruit that they are producing, the fruit of this regeneration of this righteousness that has been imputed to us by faith in Jesus Christ.

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Paul goes on here in Romans eight, 10, but in Christ Jesus, if Christ Jesus is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness.

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You are still going to die. You are still going to come of an age where you will perish whether, and that's, that's only speaking of,

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I mean, if you die of old age, you might die of the Wuhan virus. You could die of some sickness or illness or disease.

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You could die of cancer. You could die of a horrible accident. You never know when your hour is going to be up.

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I had just shared with some friends of mine recently about a story that I had read of a pastor who was preaching that very thing on a

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Sunday morning. He was telling his congregation, you never know when the Lord is going to take you.

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When he has set your limits, because as it says in Job chapter 14, God has set our limits that we cannot pass and he holds our days in his hand.

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So this preacher was preaching on that. You never know when your hour is going to be up.

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And after he finished his sermon, he was walking off the platform and he had a heart attack and fell down and died.

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I mean, just right there, uh, after preaching this message to his church to turn from sin and turn to Jesus Christ now and my friends and joke, boy,

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I bet revival just swept across that church right away. They were like, oh Lord, please forgive me and bring me into your kingdom that I may not perish without Christ.

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The body is going to die still, even though you have Christ who raises the dead, his spirit dwelling within you, your body is still going to die.

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Though the body is dead because of sin and that's the effects of sin on creation.

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God having subjected all things to futility because of the sin of mankind, an argument that Paul is going to make coming up a little bit later on here in, uh, in Romans eight.

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So although your body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness.

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If you live according to your flesh, then you are going to be susceptible to all those desires of your corrupt flesh.

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But the spirit of God has given life in you because of righteousness, the righteousness of Christ that has been imputed to you.

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And so you desire to do the righteous thing rather than the fleshly thing, the unrighteous thing according to your flesh, that which leads to corruption and ultimately death.

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And as I said to you last week, does the spirit of God that dwells within you not have more power than the desires of your flesh?

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So don't ever fool yourself into thinking, well, I'm always going to have these temptations. There's nothing I'm ever going to be able to do about it.

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I guess I just need to accept it's who I am. And then you even start identifying yourself according to your sin.

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You would be claiming that your flesh has more power than the spirit of God. And that's blasphemy against God to say such a thing.

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Don't ever give in to thinking that you cannot conquer these temptations.

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Paul is going to say here in Romans 8, we are more than conquerors through him who loves us, although your body is dead and and susceptible to corruption because of sin.

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The spirit is life because of righteousness is not life more than death. Verse 11, then, if the spirit of him who raised

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Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you.

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The same power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead is the power that dwells in you now that has raised you from death to life, that you may walk not in dead, dirty sins, but in life to Jesus Christ.

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This is the spirit of God in you by the wonderful blessing of God that has been given to you.

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He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies, which which are dead, which are susceptible to decay and corruption and the temptations of this world.

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But you have the spirit of Christ dwelling within you, that you may live unto

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Christ and not unto yourself. And when you die, your body will be buried in the ground.

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It may even become dust. Your spirit will live forever with God in glory.

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And then a day is coming in which Christ is going to return. And even that body that had been put in the grave is going to be raised again to life.

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It is going to be made glorious like Christ's glorious body. And then we will be forever with the

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Lord. How mind boggling it is to consider that the same spirit who raised

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Jesus from the dead is the spirit that brought you from death to life and now dwells in you.

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Do not underestimate the power of God in your heart to forgive you of sin and give you new life.

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Trust in Christ and you shall live a life that is pleasing to God.

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Again, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. Back to verse eight. You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit.

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If the spirit of God dwells in you. Heavenly Father, thank you for your spirit.

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And I pray that today we are taking all those thoughts captive. We're resisting temptation.

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We're turning ourselves to Christ and living in righteousness unto him.

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Lead us in your truth to the praise and glory of your great name. Amen.

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Thank you for listening to When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. If you'd like to support this ministry, visit our website, www .wutt

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.com, and click on the Give tab in the top right corner of the page. Join us again tomorrow as we continue our