Aug. 6, 2017 The Law of the Spirit of Life by Pastor Josh Sheldon

Please be seated. Well, we've spent a good long time in Romans 8. We had a three-week hiatus as Conley brought to us the first few verses of the book of Hebrews. And so we've had this break in the preaching through Romans.

Why Romans 8 Sits Between the Earlier Chapters and Romans 9

Next week, with God's blessing, we will begin chapter 9. But I thought that after having gone through Romans 8 as slowly as we did, nine messages in all, and after the three-week break that we took for the other series in Romans, that it would be good for us to look back and remind ourselves of everything that we learned, or as much as we can in one message, in the nine messages on this great chapter, this Romans 8, where Paul suddenly brings to the fore the working of the Holy Spirit.

All right. And so what I want to do is really just summarize some of the truths that we had from before as we went through this, and to remind us how we got here. All of a sudden, the Holy Spirit appears in this book.

It is sort of a sudden thing, if you will. The Apostle Paul unravels for us the question that must have been fairly bursting out of his hearers as they heard the first seven chapters of this read for the first time.

And the question is, how? How do we do this? How are these things accomplished? How does all this work? How can we possibly, and then fill in the blank, fulfill all these things, satisfy God's righteous anger, His just anger, His wrath at our sin?

How do we live according to the righteousness of God that is revealed in the Gospel? How does this happen? And so Romans 8, the working of the Holy Spirit, the indwelling of the third person of the Trinity, God Himself, God the Spirit.

And so what have we found as we went through the first chapters leading up to Romans 8, and what do we have in Romans 8 that's going to lead us into Romans 9 so we maintain the continuity of Paul's thought?

What do we have here in this book of Romans, this book revealing the righteousness of God in the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ? Now all men are justly condemned for their willing sin. God has revealed His righteousness to all men.

We had that in Romans 1, did we not? That's chapter 1, that the heavens are declaring the glory of God, the firmament shows forth its hand. Romans 1 depends so much on Psalm 19. And what is the point there?

That the order of creation itself is enough to reveal to you that God made it. And if God made it and is ordered as it is, then He is a righteous and a just and a holy God before whom you are accountable and guilty.

That's chapter 1. Chapter 2 says that even the Jews, those who know the law of God, stand naked and without excuse before Him. No, says chapter 3, all have sinned, fallen short of the glory of God. Your advantages as the people of God, as the people who are called Israel, as the Jews, your advantages, all the things that you had, knowing the oracles of God, having the temple worship of God, having been the people through whom Jesus, the Son of God, would come according to the flesh.

No, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. The only hope is faith. Faith in God and the justification that He has provided for us in His Son, Jesus. And as we go through this, there are these questions that Paul has either heard during his time as a preacher, as a missionary, or he simply knows would be on the minds of people who are hearing this.

Faith calls out the Jew. Faith, we have Abraham, our father, the friend of God. We are His offspring, and our relationship to God because of Him, because our physical descendancy from Him is secure. We're secure because of Abraham.

What are you talking about, Paul? Well, chapter 4 answers back. It answers back, says, your relationship to God is indeed by being Abraham's offspring, but that is by faith, not by birth. Jesus said you must be born again.

The people from whom we descend, that is not what gains us anything. Parents can be Christians. You could have generations of Christians before you if you have not faith, if you have not been reborn by the Spirit of God, who is the subject of chapter 8, then you cannot be Abraham's child.

That's the answer of chapter 4 to the Jewish question that why do we need faith if we have Abraham? Abraham believed God. He believed God, and that, faith, not works, trust, not effort, Christ, not the law.

Faith is what was credited to him as righteousness, this righteousness that the whole book of Romans is about. Paul says, for I'm not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the righteousness of God. Not ashamed, meaning it fulfills what it says it will do.

It is a reliable gospel. Faith in Him, whose righteousness revealed in this gospel. By faith, God imputed to Abraham, he credits to all who believe the very righteousness of his beloved son, Jesus, who as a man obeyed him perfectly.

Chapter 5. Chapter 5 goes on to say that because Adam sinned, and because we all came from Adam, and because He represented us when He sinned, therefore we all sinned because we were in Him. In just the same way, when Jesus obeyed and then suffered on the cross for our sins, He represented us.

Thus we are assured that by faith we have peace with God. Peace because Christ's righteousness imputed to all who believe is a perfect righteousness. And as He obeyed, we were in Him, gaining the benefit of that obedience.

Chapter 5. When God looks on the one who believes, He sees Jesus' perfect obedience. He looks peacefully upon us because Christ's faithfulness to His Father has been reckoned to we who believe as Abraham believed.

So what does all this mean? Well, Chapter 6 says that because of what God the Father has done for us through God His Son, we are free from the law of sin and death. Our slavery to sin has been vanquished on the cross.

We have been liberated. We who have Abraham's faith, and by that faith are truly Abraham's children, liberated from the law of sin and death. Jesus Christ, on the cross, by His suffering for our sins, has liberated us, has made us free from that.

He has purchased us from subjugation to the whims of the flesh. We now belong to Him and are to live according to His righteousness. That's the law, the ruling principle by which we now live because of Him and what He has done.

That's Chapter 6. Chapter 7. In Chapter 7, whichever way we think of it, is it Saul who struggles and then finds freedom, representing the sinner before his conversion? Or is it Paul, the converted man, who's fighting this battle and so it pictures our continuing combat against sin?

Whichever way you interpret it, this much is clear. If the contest is engaged in terms of the flesh, if we enter the fray by our own efforts, we've lost the battle before we even begin because by the works of the flesh, no human being shall be justified.

This says we can't do it. You, of your own effort, no man of his effort, can satisfy this righteousness that the law reveals and that Christ fulfilled. We know what James says. If you would gain salvation, I'm paraphrasing a little bit, if you would try to gain the righteousness that is revealed in the gospel, if you would have salvation by the works of the law, by doing what God revealed as his righteous demands for us in his law, go for it, but fail at no point, the slightest jot or tittle.

You must not fail, not once. We understand the implications of that. Very, very quick thumbnail sketch of six chapters, and then we get to chapter eight and enter the Holy Spirit. He's our only hope. Whichever way you look at chapter seven, chapter eight says the Holy Spirit is your only hope.

And so my purpose this morning is to remind us of some of the great themes of this magnificent chapter. So look again in your Bibles at Romans chapter eight. Hear how it begins. After, as it were, piling and piling and piling on us our just condemnation for our willing sins against a God who's revealed his righteous demands.

And how are we to ever look back up? How can we survive? How can we come out from under this just condemnation of God for having of our own free will, if you will, ignored what he has said, what he's revealed.

Look at verse one again. There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, meaning weakened by our effort, meaning the law itself, in and of itself, the word of God not weak.

What is weak is us, human effort towards that law, the law weakened by the flesh could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemns sin in the flesh in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

The condemnation that the law demands for the sin it exposes has been satisfied. Do you see that, dear ones? The condemnation that the law demands for the sin that it exposes in us has been satisfied by another, by Christ Jesus, speaking of his suffering on the cross where God poured out his fury, his wrath against our sins upon him.

And because of that, there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, for those represented by him when he was on the cross, for those whose sins were poured out on him, on Christ Jesus.

All the demands of God which we violated, satisfied because of him, because of Christ Jesus. What does that tell you? It tells you you're free of it. You're free of that condemnation. The dread of God's displeasure has been removed.

There is therefore now no condemnation. Your fear of failure has given way to complete and total and satisfactory success. Success that we want? No. Jesus Christ, his success, what he accomplished, if you ask why, simply because Jesus Christ obeyed the law.

And then he suffered for those who did not obey. And that's everyone, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. He took upon himself that condemnation that we deserve. 1 Peter 2 .24, alluding back to Isaiah 53, says he himself bore our sins on the tree, the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.

I like to think of these verses as a river up in what we call the gold country where gold was discovered, not too far from this spot. And there in the middle of your gold pan you can think of a single shining nugget so pure, so untainted that all the effort to get there and all the work to find that one nugget makes the whole thing worthwhile.

And here's that pearl of great price. Here is that nugget that is worth all the work, all the effort, all the money that was spent on the equipment, whatever it took to get there and find that one thing.

Verse 3 is the gospel. God has done what the law weakened by the flesh could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned our sin in his flesh. That's a nugget worth all we have.

A treasure worth any and everything. No sacrifice too great. If only we can have the field where that nugget is buried. Verse 4 says that our sin being condemned in Jesus Christ's flesh has a purpose.

God had a purpose. This is not to surprise us. If the hero of the story, who of course is God, should offer up his Son, his only Son, his beloved Son, there's a purpose to it. In order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us.

The terror of what James says in his book, where he says, if you gain the righteousness of God by your own effort, go ahead. But if you fail in one point, you failed in the whole thing. That dread taken aside, replaced by the righteous requirement of the law fulfilled in us by Christ Jesus and what He did.

That's why we're not condemned. That's why you needn't fear the horrible wrath of God. Because Christ took your condemnation upon Himself. By His life He obeyed. By His death He satisfied. Because of Him, by faith, because of Him, by our faith in Him, His accomplishment is ours.

And that, brethren, is why you are not condemned. That is why self-condemning attitudes are totally out of place in the gospel life. Because this great chapter where the Holy Spirit suddenly implodes into this book, starts out with, there is therefore now no condemnation.

There's a condition here. There's a description given about those to whom this applies, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. To walk, what does he mean here? It's the ordering principle of one's life.

How do you walk? How do you live? What's your world view? What's the filter through which you decide what to do, what to say, what to think, how to respond to any and everything? That's what's meant by walk.

It doesn't mean strolling along. It's the entire way that you organize yourself around this gospel. Walking according to the, it's for those who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

There's many different walks of life to choose from, aren't there? It would seem that there are out there in the world. To walk by the Spirit means, in this particular treasure trove of Romans chapter eight, that we live in the confidence of knowing that all our sin and all our punishment and all of God's rightful anger, the wrath of God revealed from heaven, that's verse 118, against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the flesh, or excuse me, suppress the truth, all this removed.

All this wrath revealed from heaven removed for those who walk not by the flesh, but by the Spirit of God. We have indeed been justified by faith and therefore have peace with God. Here is our response.

We walk according to that Spirit. We walk according to the Spirit, the ordering principle that He gives us. Well, who could not? Who, having realized these truths, apprehended them by faith, living them out because of love for God and gratitude for what He has done for us in His Son, who could not order their life around this Gospel.

I mean, after having been set free from sin and all its rewards, Paul calls it the law of sin and death, how could we again fall back on those old and beggarly ways to those fleshly desires that bring only putrid corruption?

It's the law of sin and death versus the law of the Spirit of life. Who would go back to those ways of the flesh, the same which kept us trapped in iniquity and cloaked in misery, back to our own desires which can only restore our enmity with God?

No, this is for those who don't walk that way, but walk according to the Spirit, according to the life that He infuses in those to whom He has granted faith. This chapter really ends on the same note.

Look down at verse 33, if you would. Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Hear the emphasis there. Who would dare bring a charge against God's elect when God has pronounced justification upon them?

Who would disagree with God Almighty? That's the question here. God has declared us justified by the merits of His own Son who, verse 32 tells us, He did not spare but gave Him up for us all. Any charge against us even if true, can only condemn us if the accuser can prove that what Christ did was not enough.

You heard this a few weeks ago. I want to say it again. Any charge brought against the believer, the Christian, he or she whose faith is in Christ, that charge, even if it is true, can only bring condemnation if the accuser can prove before God that Christ's death, His suffering, did not cover that one.

Only then. And of course that, as we know, is impossible. That's impossible. Who is to condemn? The very next verse. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died. More than that, who was raised.

We're speaking of the Holy Spirit. We're speaking of the truths that the Holy Spirit has revealed to us and infused into us. Truths which give us confidence that we can walk in the ways of God and according to His gospel.

Not by our own strength, not by our own power, but by His might, by His Spirit indwelling in the believer and giving us the strength and the wherewithal which is only available by Him. Who is to condemn?

Christ Jesus is the one who died. More than that, who was raised. Chapter 4, verse 25 says He was raised for our justification. The very thing that verse 8, 33 says God has by His own authority conferred upon us who believe this gospel.

Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. How do we know we're justified? Because for our justification, God raised up Jesus Christ. Chapter 8 is a chapter full of assurances.

Assurances not in ourself. Assurances in God and what He has done for us in Christ. Assurances that the Holy Spirit, if He indeed is within you, if you've repented of your sins and fled to Jesus Christ and Him alone for forgiveness.

Because what He and He alone did. And by He alone I mean not you. For by grace you've been saved. Not of works. We know we're justified because in time and space, in history, God raised up His Son to prove that you are indeed justified because He is indeed satisfied with what Christ on the cross accomplished.

It's a book of assurances. I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

What glorious words these are. In Christ Jesus our Lord. The love God has for His Son is matched by only one thing. His love for those who are in His Son. This is the witness of the Holy Spirit in chapter 8 of Romans.

Open your Bibles. I want us to really focus on this for a few months. Open your Bibles to John's Gospel. Turn to chapter 14 in the Gospel of John please. Paul says nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

That's the Apostle Paul speaking by inspiration of the Holy Spirit about whom he writes in Romans 8. That's the Apostle Paul. Look in chapter 14 of John's Gospel and at verse 21 I want you to hear what the Lord Jesus Christ has to say about the love of God for those who are in Him when He suffered and died for our sins.

Chapter 14 verse 21. Whoever has my commandments and keeps them he it is who loves me and he who loves me will be loved by my Father and I will love him and manifest myself to him. If you love Jesus Christ you're loved by the Father.

If you love His Son the Father loves you. But look two verses down. Verse 23. Jesus answered him if anyone loves me he will keep my word and my Father will love him and we will come to him and make our home with him.

Do we see why the Apostle Paul can write that nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus? Go down to chapter 15 verse 9 in John's Gospel. Chapter 15 verse 9. As the Father has loved me so I have loved you abide in my love.

And just one more but you have to go the other way. Chapter 14 verse 16. Still the words of Jesus Christ. He says and I will ask the Father and He will give you another helper to be with you forever. Enter Romans 8.

Which is all about the helper that Jesus Christ promised. The helper. The Holy Spirit. We call Him our paraclete. The alongside helper encourager one. The paraclete. The Holy Spirit of God. The Holy Ghost.

Back to chapter 8 of Romans please. Says you if you are a child of Abraham by faith in Christ Jesus these promises are yours. This is what the Holy Spirit testifies in verses 12 to 14 of Romans 8. The helper did come.

The helper was given as Jesus Christ promised He would be. We see Him in Acts 2 when He came down at Pentecost in a way that people could see. So that the Gospel could be heard by people of all the languages that were there.

All the tribes. All the nations that were there. So testifies the Holy Spirit. Look at verse 12. If we are debtors not to the flesh then to whom are we debtors? The Holy Spirit. Verse 13. We owe all to the Spirit of God by leading by whose leading we put to death the sinful deeds of the body and so will live and not die.

Verse 14. All who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. So how does God treat His children? His sons? His daughters? We sort of covered that already haven't we? With a bond of love that nothing in creation could diminish at all.

Not height or depth. Not angels or rulers. Not our failures. For if a failure could separate us from His love then we'd all perish. Nothing can separate you from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

So testifies the Holy Spirit that Jesus said in John 14 and 15 He would give. And the Holy Spirit indwelling those who have faith in Him. These promises are witnessed to you by the Word of God and by the inner witness of the Spirit by whom we cry out Abba Father.

We do fail don't we? We do have to fall back so often on 1 John 1 and 9 and confess our sins and count on God who is righteous to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. We do fail.

We do need to repent. Often. And yet in our need to repent in your constant failures know this that your failure cannot separate you from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. If it could we're all ready to perish.

No. It is Christ's success His accomplishment that assures us these things. So how can this be? Because it is not our deficiencies that God sees but His Son's sufficiency. That's why. Not your deficiency but Christ's sufficiency.

Verse 15 says we did not receive from the Spirit of life and freedom a spirit of slavery. Because that would mean that God the Spirit is working against God the Son which is a ludicrous idea. No. We receive the Spirit of freedom.

Verse 16 and 17 the Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirits that we are children of God and if children then heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ provided we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him.

If you had any idea that God wants us to wonder whether these things be true like the Muslim who believes it blasphemous to have any confidence in salvation hear this again. He is bearing witness with your spirit that you are a child of God and if you're a child then with Christ you are an heir of God.

You will inherit all things with Christ. Be assured believer if your faith is in Christ if your hope is in Him then He has given you the Holy Spirit who within you is witnessing you these things. Putting all your confidence all your hope all your trust on Christ.

God Himself by the inner witness of His Holy Spirit denies the claim that we should have anything less than complete assurance not in ourselves that was debunked throughout this book of Romans assurance in God assurance in Christ confidence in Him and Him alone.

In the spirit of adoption that we have by which we cry out Abba Father allows us to look to Heaven. So look there tonight look there tonight count the stars if you are able. One of my hiking adventures I sat with a friend in the evening we were just talking we were talking about anything profound a little bit about the Lord a little bit about the hike some about Jesus and some about where we were going to go the next day on the hike.

And as we talked the stars in the Milky Way came out one by one. And before we went into the tent the sky was white with all the stars. It was one of the most incredible things I ever saw. So count the stars if you are able is quite a challenge.

You see the God who adopted you the God for whom you cry out Abba Father that God who gives you the spirit of adoption He can count them all. In fact He put each one in place. That one twinkles right now because God says twinkle and He numbers and names every one of those stars.

Look at the Leviathan whatever that creature was or is Job asks can you draw the Leviathan with a fish hook or press down His tongue with a cord? God can. The God who adopted you and is witness to you by the Spirit that God can.

This God by His Spirit says with the stamp of His irrevocable love for you because of His love for His Son in whom we are He says call me Abba Father. Abba means My Father. Chapter 8 of Romans is His wealth of blessed assurance.

So much is here that it's the proverbial teaspoon of water from a fire hydrant but it's no teaspoon. It's no teaspoon. It's a well. It's fathomless and deep. It's wide in circumference so much so that you can come and drink and drink and drink.

It's an ocean of promises that will never run dry. If you find yourself overwhelmed drowning in God's loving favor I have no rescue for you. There's deeper water ahead as we go through this book. There's no life raft that can remove you from this ocean of love.

I hope we all drown in it. Look at verse 11 please in Romans 8. If the Spirit of Him who raised Christ 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.

Is that tautology? Is that an unnecessary repetition? No. It's not unnecessary. It's very necessary. We hear this again and again and again and again. The Spirit of Him who raised Jesus if He dwells in you He who raised Jesus from the dead will give life to you through His Spirit who dwells in you.

How many times does Paul have to say it? We've said it several times. I think we need to read it over and over again. Right now I only want to repeat what I said a few weeks ago. The resurrection is not just an idea.

He who raised Jesus Christ from the dead is not just some concept that we put in there that's going to make us feel better. It's a historical fact better attested than any other significant ancient event.

Well recorded by multiple eyewitnesses and careful historians. Jesus died for our sins and He was raised on the third day and here we have the Word of God promising that our resurrection that your resurrection is just as certain.

Just as certain. Jesus commended His Spirit to His Father and He was raised up according to the Scriptures. And by the Word of those same Scriptures spoken by that same God we will follow in a resurrection just like His.

And doesn't this make sense? After all we are God's adopted children. He loves us with a love that never tires of our dumb mistakes but revels in Christ's intercession. He loves us as He loves His own Son and so He would have us around Him.

His adopted children as a good Father wants us by Him. If our earthly fathers loved us and wanted us near them how much more our perfect Heavenly Father. Well finally let us remember that the Spirit is an ever-present help in our time of need.

Verses 18 to 30 take us from the sufferings of this present age to the certainty of our final destiny. Look at verse 26 please. Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness for we do not know what to pray for as we ought but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words and He who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

He not only helps us along He intercedes for us. He translates our weak and our unknowing prayers into prayers that meet with the will of God. We answer with confidence that whatever He gives is for our good and in accord with His will.

That's what verses 28 to 30 are all about. We know that for those who love God all things work together for good. To those who are called according to His purpose. He goes on to speak of those whom He predestined He calls and those whom He calls He justifies and those whom He justified He glorified telling us what?

That our ultimate destiny is as certain as Jesus Christ's resurrection which has already happened. So God seals our faith by His Spirit with this promise with this assurance that everything that happens in this life is for our good because we are under the care of a good and loving Father who loves us who loves you if your faith is in Christ Jesus the same way He loves Christ Jesus Himself.

And Paul speaks of our future this ultimate destiny as if it already happened. He predestined us. When did He predestine us? Ephesians 1 verse 4 says it was before the creation of the world. In time past He predestined us that we should be holy and blameless before Him in love.

It says He called us. When did He call us? Different times for each of us but in time and space He called us because He had predestined us making effectual what He had predestined us to be. He justified us.

When? Again in the past we were justified by faith. Having been justified by faith He glorified us. When did He glorify us? Not yet. That's our future. That's our ultimate destiny. Just look at you and me you know that we're not in a state of glory yet the word is in the same form as the others in the form of a definite action taken and effected at a point in time.

So sure is Paul of God's promise that he states our future as though it's already happened. This whole chapter has the effect of removing from us any self-confidence to accomplish anything of any eternal value.

It transfers our pride to the scrap heap and replaces it with confidence instead in God who alone works wonders. Wonders like sparing not His own Son. Wonders like attributing to you or me Christ's righteousness.

Wonders like raising His Son from the dead and promising the same to us. We must look to God and His Spirit for everything. The way as the psalmist says that a maiden looks to the hand of her mistress for everything.

Do we fail? Certainly we do. Will God? May it never be. I will close this with a single verse. Our next outing in Romans will be to start chapter 9 if you want to read ahead. God willing, we'll be there next week.

The single verse summarizes what we've been saying throughout so wonderfully that it needs only to be read. As you walk along the way, as various trials seek to tear down your confidence in God, as your own stumbling and fumbling seems to undo you, let this be remembered.

I beg you, plant it deep in your soul, guard it as with a vault, but open this door often. What does Paul say? What shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? Amen? Heavenly Father, we thank you again for the day that you've given us.

We thank you, Father, for your word, for the assurances that he gives us, for your Holy Spirit and the witness that he makes constantly to our souls. Let us pray, Father, that we would grow in confidence in the Lord Jesus Christ, more and more assured according to your word and the indwelling Spirit who testifies these things to us, that you, Father, have accomplished what your scripture says you have accomplished and will do what the scripture promises is still ahead.

And for all this, Lord, Father, we give you thanks in Christ's name. Amen.