Romans 8:9-17 (The Spiritual Life, Part 2, Pastor Jeff Kliewer)

Prayer for Salvation and Assurance

Gracious Heavenly Father, we pray that through the preaching of the Word that you would afflict those who are too comfortable, and that you would comfort those who are afflicted. Lord, we pray for those sensitive Christians who are secure, who are sealed with the Holy Spirit, yet they don't have an assurance of their salvation.

We pray that supernaturally you would do a work today to confirm to their own hearts that they are children of God. We pray especially for any false converts in the room or listening online who have not been born again, and they're comfortable, and yet destined for an eternity away from you unless they repent and believe the good news.

We pray for assurance only to those who are genuinely saved, but help us all now by your Word to come to saving faith if we don't have it, or to delight in that faith if you've already given it. In Jesus' name, amen.

Hurricane Helene and the Signs of Life

So there were two massive hurricanes that have come through the southern part of the country recently. Helene was particularly devastating because it went through the mountains, and the mountains acted like a valleys, and in some cases wiping out entire towns.

My brother and my whole family really live in the Tampa Bay area. My oldest brother actually lives on the bay, and he has a boat there, and by some miracle his house and his boat were without any damage at all as that hurricane came through Tampa Bay.

And all of my family is doing great, and heard good reports from many of you have family down there, so we thank God for that. But in North Carolina especially, there have been many lives lost to Hurricane Helene.

Very often a rescuer will go to a house and find a body there, and the first thing that the rescuer will do is to check for signs of life. Is there a pulse? They'll look to see if the test is moving up and down, or check to see if there's any airflow coming from the mouth or nose.

Signs of life. They might even do a test with a prick to prick the flesh to see if the person reacts at all to pain. They're testing for signs of life. It is horrible and sad tragedy when people lose their lives in a natural disaster in this way, but if this man who was found to be dead has trusted in Jesus Christ, there's coming a day when that body will be resurrected, and even in that moment while that person lay dead, their spirit is with Jesus Christ.

There is the resurrection of the dead through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who is the firstborn from the dead. But there is something, a tragedy of greater proportion, that we don't tend to notice because it doesn't make the news.

And that is, there is often a dead person walking in our midst with no signs of life, and sometimes even coming into church. This is a person who when they see a sunset, might notice that it's beautiful, but doesn't have any impulse to say, thank you God for the beauty of this display.

Doesn't pursue righteousness, doesn't pray, doesn't really desire to come to church. Might do it because of family or pressure, but doesn't pursue righteousness. A second bad sign that there is no life, is that this person gives in to all the indulgences of the flesh.

Committing fornication, also indulging every desire that comes to the body. But thirdly, another bad sign, is that this person cannot be led. He's unteachable. The Word of God doesn't hold sway over his will, and yet he's very much given to fear.

He would worry about taking a stand, what other people would think about him, if he were to make a stand about the Word of God. And so he's controlled by fear, and when bad things happen, he doesn't cry Abba Father, instead he begins to cry, God why do you always treat me like this?

He doesn't have an internal witness from the Holy Spirit, that he's a child of God. And here's the final litmus test, when suffering comes into his life, and there's an easy way out that would reduce the suffering, or a harder way that would bring glory to the name of Jesus.

He always takes the easy way out, unwilling to suffer. And when suffering does come, as I said, he tends to blame God. Why do so many bad things happen to me? I deserve better than this. And so suffering causes him at times even to curse God, and in his heart harbor anger and hatred.

And yet this man attends a Bible-believing church. His friends think he is a Christian, and scarier still, he himself is convinced that he's been born again. He is a false convert. He has none of the signs of life, but only signs of death.

And yet because he's gone to church for so long, his family is Christian. Maybe he walked an aisle when he was young at a Billy Graham crusade, or maybe he saw some great signs and wonders. He was part of something.

He tasted the goodness of the Word of God, the powers of the coming age. He knows something of the fellowship of the believer. And so he's convinced that the day he dies, whether it be by a hurricane or natural death at a ripe old age, he's convinced that he's going to heaven.

If I ever preach a sermon more important than this one, I can't imagine what it is. So if you're ever gonna listen to me, let it be today. Because the passage that we now turn to, Romans 8 verses 9 to 17, provides for us a test.

In fact, a seven-fold test. This is not hoops to jump through in order to be saved. This is a description of someone who is genuinely saved. It is a person who has the Spirit of the Living God. And think about this for a minute.

If someone has been indwelt by the Spirit of God, they will be different than someone who does not have the Spirit of the Living God. That contrast should be day and night. The difference between sheep and goat, wheat and tares, good and evil, right and wrong, up and down, sweet and bitter.

To use all the biblical analogies, the difference should be obvious. Because now you have the Holy Spirit living inside of you. Those of us who truly have the Holy Spirit indwelling us, will display certain signs.

Don't you want to know what those signs are? Paul tells the Corinthians, examine yourself to see whether you are in the faith. If in fact you pass the test. So it's a good thing to examine ourselves by the light of Scripture.

And here we have that. We were told last week about the Holy Spirit. Because the problem in chapter 7 is that what we want to do, we don't do. And what we don't want to do, is what we tend to do. That's the struggle with the flesh.

We all have that struggle. But last week we learned that the Holy Spirit is actually greater than the law of sin and death. Your indwelling sin nature is not stronger than the Holy Spirit. Chapter 8 verse 2 says, for the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.

Look at chapter 8 verse 1. Do you recall whether we should hold to the long ending or the short ending at this point? Romans 8 1, the short ending says, there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

That's a justification. There's no penalty for sin. If you are in Christ, your sin is atoned for, propitiated. God has no more wrath for you. You're declared righteous by the righteousness of Christ. But the long ending goes on to say this.

If you look in your footnote at the bottom of the Bible, on the page, you should see it say something like, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. The reason that the English Standard Version and the New American and the the NIV, these modern translations, they leave that off is because in the discovery of newer manuscripts, there's often a shorter ending.

But what I told you last week is that the newer discoveries of the book of Romans do not have this portion of Romans. Papyrus 27, 40, 46, and 131, all those early versions of Romans, none of them have this verse.

So there's no textual reason, in terms of textual criticism, to say that that shouldn't be there. So I agree with the King James Version and the New King James to keep that in there and not just throw it as a footnote.

But there's a genuine believer. And it's the thesis statement that the rest of chapter 8 flows out of. That phrase, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. That is not a condition to be saved.

That's a description of every truly converted person. False converts can come to church, but only those who have the Spirit, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit, are truly converted.

Seven Signs of Spiritual Life

So this is an important subject, isn't it? Let's look at what are the seven signs of a Christian, a truly converted soul. The first sign of spiritual life is a lively approach to righteousness, verses 9 to 11.

You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if, that's a big if, that conjunction there, that those two little letters, if, distinguishes between one reality and a false reality. One or the other.

Either you are or you aren't. If, in fact, the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to Him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

If the Spirit of Him who raised 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. So the first sign is a lively approach to righteousness.

You're alive to the pursuit of God and desiring to please Him, to be right in His eyes. Notice in verse 9 that the Spirit is described as the Spirit of God. Wherever God is left generically without indicating a member of the Trinity, just that word theos in the Greek, it refers to the Father.

Unless otherwise noted, God the Father. The Spirit of God refers to the Spirit of God the Father. But notice at the end of verse 9, anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ, Father, Son, and Spirit, who's the subject here of the passage, three members of one Trinity.

So which member of the Trinity lives in you? The Holy Spirit. That's the subject of this passage. This is the big idea, but I want you to notice something in verse 10. We're actually told, but if Christ is in you.

I thought Jesus Christ was in the flesh seated at the right hand of the Father. How could He be in us if He's seated there? The answer is that when we think about the Trinity, church this is very important, we are not to so separate the persons that we have three separate beings.

That's tritheism. That's what the Mormons do. That the Father is one God, the Son is another God, and the Spirit is a third God. By personhood, we're not referring to different beings or essences, but there is only one God.

Church remember this. It was the most important thing that Israel used to repeat. Hear, O Israel. The Shema, Deuteronomy 6, 4 I think it is. The Lord our God is one. God is only one being, one essence.

Now He exists in three persons, and here the Spirit is described as the Spirit of the Father, the Spirit of Christ. So the idea is to emphasize the unity of the persons in one being. In other words, when you think about the idea that the Spirit came to live inside of you, you're not to think of Him as some essence that emanates from God like a power from heaven, an anointing, a dripping, a filling of some substance that comes out from God and gives you power, and now you have the Spirit inside of you.

No, when we're talking about the Spirit, we are talking about God Himself. Now this makes all the difference. What this text is telling us is that the Spirit of Christ is Christ in you. The Spirit and the second member of the Trinity are so united that this is one God.

And what kind of difference does that make? The difference between a person who doesn't have God in them and the person who does. The person who does relates to God now, desires God. When you see a sunset, when you see the deer running on the field, does your heart turn to God or does it stop at the thing itself?

Are you connected to God? Do you desire to please Him, to walk in a way to pursue Him? Do you want to be at church or did somebody drag you here today? Is there some pursuit of righteousness? That's the idea.

It says in verse 10, but if Christ is in you although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. How many of you have a capital S on the Spirit in your Bible? Anybody have a lowercase s?

Many commentators, and I would agree with them, hold that this should be a lowercase s, indicating the Spirit of the person in contrast to the body of the person. There's a parallelism in the verse there.

Now how would we know from the Greek which is the right? We don't because the original manuscripts that we talk about in the Greek, they were all written in capital letters. There was no lowercase letters in the Greek, okay, and there was no punctuation.

So if you see an exclamation point in your Bible, that's the translator emphasizing the point. It's a translation decision. So here this is an editorial decision to capitalize the s, but I'll tell you, I think the idea here is that as the body is a lesser faculty, a part of you, in contrast to that which is dead, meaning, hey brother, you're gonna die.

Ten out of ten people in this room are gonna die. When Adam and Eve ate the fruit, they physically, their bodies were dying only a matter of time before being put in the earth. That's why I have lower back pain.

That's why the eyesight starts to go a little bit and eventually the body is dead. You see this in verse 10? Although the body is dead, this is referring to the body of even a Christian here, because of sin, sin is in the world and so death with it, the second part of the verse says, the spirit is life because of righteousness.

Now we know that both things are true. Our spirit, our spirit, the human spirit is only alive because the Holy Spirit has come inside and given us life, that's regeneration. But the idea here is your spirit, your spirit is alive when pursuing righteousness.

If you're pursuing righteousness, that's the sign that you're alive. Otherwise your spirit's just as dead as your body. When your body goes into the grave, the spirit will depart to be punished forever.

So the first sign is a desire for righteousness. How many of y 'all were at the library a couple weeks ago when we challenged the presentation of pornography to children in these horrific books that they used to indoctrinate kids into unrighteousness?

From the beginning we challenged that and said, protect children, and we were astonished to see one parent after another, moms, dads, stand up and say we want this in our library. It was mind-blowing, but as we left I think it was Antoinette that said, you know, just a couple of years ago I would have thought exactly as they did, but for the grace of God there go I.

The change that happens when you get saved is that you desire righteousness. You want to see children protected from these kind of things. You want your own heart to be pure before God. Now does that mean you're gonna be perfect?

Are you always going to overcome the desires of the flesh? No, but the desire is for righteousness. You're alive to God. You want to be at church because you want to be like Christ. The first sign is a lively approach to righteousness.

The second sign is the killing of the desires of the body. Look at verses 12 and 13. So then brothers we are debtors, not to the flesh to live according to the flesh, 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.

This almost sounds like you have to accept Christ as your Savior, be saved, and then there's something you have to do in order to make it to heaven. You got to overcome the desires of the body. That's not what it's saying.

The if here is descriptive. The difference between the person who by the Spirit is putting to death the deeds of the body and the person who is controlled by the body. This is the indication of what's happening.

Remember the Gnostic teachers? Some of you who have been in church for a while you know about Gnosticism. The Gnostic teachers of the first and second century taught that there was a duality between the body and the Spirit.

The Spirit was spiritual and this is where God dwelt with man. You can have secret knowledge and hear from angels and relate to the spiritual world, whereas the body just does what the body does. And so the Gnostics were perfectly fine with these so-called Christian Gnostics going to prostitutes because what's done in the body has no bearing on what happens in the Spirit.

There was a dualism there. But our text says exactly the opposite. The body indicates where the Spirit is. Where are you spiritually? Are you putting to death the deeds of the body or are you controlled by the desires of the flesh?

So the body is made in the image of God. Your body is the best indicator of where your heart is. It's a part of you. It is you. Made in the image of God. And think how God has cared for the body. He's given us food and drink, sex, rest, play, all in the body.

But God being Lord and Creator of these things draws His boundaries around those things. All of them. Now the flesh just wants to indulge and overindulge and serve itself. But imagine a fire that is meant to be kept in the fireplace if allowed to run wild and indulge itself however it desires to go.

How would that work out for your house if the fireplace had no boundaries? The house would be consumed. So it is with the deeds of the body. God has made good gifts but here what's happening is the indulging of the flesh.

A person who is serving the flesh is consumed by desires. It might be sexual where whatever the body desires is the person is given over to that thing. Or it could be some other desire of the body. Maybe for an adrenaline rush.

Somebody's entire life might be all about skydiving because they can't live without that sense of adrenaline coursing through the body. Other people are given over to alcohol, indulging the body, or some other substance, drugs.

For some people it's food. The idea that the body though is controlling the spirit is a bad indicator. Now realize this is a constant war but the good sign is if you're at war. The sensitive conscience, many people have come to me doubting their salvation and they're so concerned they might not be saved.

And one of the first things I like to tell them is the fact that you're so concerned about the flesh and overcoming the flesh, that's a good sign. It's a really good sign that you want to kill the flesh, you're struggling to do it.

The description here, the second sign, is that you are putting to death the deeds of the body. You need to be killing sin or sin will be killing you. John Owen, the third sign, verse 14, for all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.

Are you led by the Spirit of God? Now when we get to talk about spiritual gifts in chapter 12, we'll talk about how the Spirit can do remarkable things to lead us. I've shared from the pulpit before about times when the Spirit has led me or prompted me to go to a certain spot.

One time I was praying in Dallas at my friend's house where I rented a room from him and the Spirit prompted me to go to the corner of Globe and Shiloh to meet a particular person and it turned out he was there.

I was prompted to go. I got to share the gospel with him and bring him to see the passion of the Christ. I was led by the Spirit in that sense. Many of you have had that sense where the Spirit is telling you, knock on his door, go talk to her, and you don't know why but you obey.

That has more to do with spiritual gifts. What's in view here in verse 14 is submission to headship, being willing to be taught to trust and obey the Word of God. The man I described at the beginning was unteachable.

He didn't listen to the commands of Scripture. He wasn't controlled by them. He was the master of his own destiny. How many people in our culture think that whatever is right in their own eyes is good for them?

They have no head. They are their own God. Their God is their stomach, actually, according to Philippians chapter 3. Their mind is on earthly things. They're not led. They're not teachable. They're not submitted to the Spirit of God.

The Spirit of God is the author of Scripture and everything he commands us is not a suggestion but a command. And those who are under headship take it that way. All who are led by the Spirit are sons of God.

So the third test is if you are in submission to the Spirit of God, especially in the words of Scripture, everything that he commands. If the Bible says it, do you believe it? Sadly, it seems to me a majority of churches these days have rejected that simple idea.

The Bible has a certain sexual ethic but people feel something different. They're being led by their passions and desires and so they reject what the Word of God says in favor of what the culture has begun to say.

And that's a sign. That's the third sign that a person is not yet born again. If they will not submit to them themselves, to everything that God says, they're not under headship. They're their own God.

That's the idea. 15. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear. The fourth sign is that you're not controlled by fear. A few weeks ago I talked about how my grandpa in World War II was a runner from one line to another and he saw so much death that he almost gave up.

He actually threw his Bible down but when he picked it up he read Psalm 91 and from that day forward he never feared again. The war did not terrorize him anymore. But I was visiting, oh it's Gaylord, thank you for what you shared.

Gaylord came up to me after the service and reminded me that courage is not the absence of the feeling of fear because not everybody gets that special grace that my grandpa got, to not feel fear any longer.

But courage and faith is doing what God has called you to do despite what you're feeling. Such an important point. The idea is that you're not controlled by fear. Look at the text. It says, for you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear.

Many people are slaves to their fear. They don't do what God commands them to do because they're afraid of what other people will think, what a certain family member will think, what the culture at large will think and so they they're enslaved to fear.

I asked Gaylord to please write down some of his thoughts about that and he did and I thought what he wrote for us is beautiful and worth hearing. He described how soldiers have each other's back on the battlefield and the reason they're willing to die or put their lives at risk is because they've been through the battle with brothers in arms and they have one another.

They're trying to survive and they depend on each other for survival. And then Gaylord wrote this, in our walk with God we have duties and commands not unlike the military. Our God and eternal security are much bigger than our own desires and aspirations.

Do we respond to this bigger responsibility or do we keep our head down in our own little fighting hole and just let things happen? There are those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who wonder what happened.

Let me read that again because that's great. There are those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who wonder what happened. Are we letting our family and friends die on a spiritual battlefield or are we fighting for them?

We are commanded to make disciples in the world. Do we love the lost who share our hardships as in the training and battles of the military or do we leave it up to the quote-unquote brave Christians?

Without fear there is no courage, right? But God doesn't call it courage, He calls it faith. You see, the person who's enslaved to their fear, that's a sign that they don't have the Spirit of the Living God.

Because what kind of spirit is this? He has not given a spirit of fear to fall back into slavery, but He's given us a spirit of love and power and a sound mind. Every Christian having the Holy Spirit can overcome fear.

Now, of course, some are more susceptible to fear than others, right? You guys know more fearful Christians and that it's harder for them to step out in faith? It's not like we can judge that standard of where that line is, but you know your own disposition.

And the question is, are you a Christian who has faith in God to do what He tells you to do or do you live in your fear? Are you enslaved to it? Now, the second half of verse 15 is the fifth point. You have received the Spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry, Abba Father.

The fifth sign of a genuine Christian of having spiritual life is that you call Abba Father, which means Daddy. And when do you do this? Well, it's in connection with the first part of verse 15. When you have occasion for fear, when you're in distress, Gaylord was a helicopter pilot in Vietnam.

He's setting the the copter down so that the soldiers can get in. There's enemy fire and he's praying, Abba Father, save me. Have you been in distress? Is your inclination at that time to cry, Abba Father?

If it is, that's a good sign. God help me. Or do you go into that mode of cursing God? Why are you letting me be in this situation? The Christian cries, Abba Father, because you know him as Father. You might have been a prodigal son, but when you came back, he ran to you, he hugged you, and now you know him as your Father.

That's the sign that you cry to him in these times of distress. Number six of seven comes from verse 16. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. This is hard for me to describe, and I think that's the point.

It can't really be described. This is not a communication of ideas through word. This is a spirit-to-spirit communication. The Lord, by grace, has given me an assurance of salvation. That's different from eternal security.

Every genuine Christian is secure, even if they start doubting their salvation sometimes. Assurance is different from security. Every Christian is secure, but sometimes that assurance might wane. Maybe because you just messed up so bad, and you think, how could I be a Christian?

But the Spirit testifies with your spirit. It's ineffable. It's internal. It's spirit-to spirit. You just know, and I haven't doubted for 30-some years, that I'm a child of God. I just know because I know him.

How about you? Does the Spirit tell you that you're a child of God? And I don't always stress emotions. I tend to prioritize the mind over the heart, right? Because biblically, it's the mind that's over the heart, physically and also spiritually.

We go by the Word of God to control our feelings, but there's some emotion. Emotions are important. Feelings do matter. The Holy Spirit can give you that feeling that only you know that he's got you. That's what's in view here.

It's the sixth of seven signs. It's subjective, but the Lord tells you that you're his child. He testifies with your own spirit. Lastly, and this is really where the rubber meets the road, it's in a time of suffering, would you deny his name to make your life easier?

If children than heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided, that word provided indicates the if that we're talking about. This will indicate, provided that it's this way and not that way.

Provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. There will come times in your Christian life where there's an easy way and a hard way. The hard way is where you are identifying with Christ.

Maybe it's speaking up in a certain conversation and you know the people will mock you. You might even lose your job. In the first century, you'd be put out of the synagogue, which is a horrible thing to have happen to you if you're a Jew growing up in Jerusalem.

To be put out of the synagogue is devastating. You might lose your family business and in the first century they were even martyring Christians. Remember Stephen, the first Christian witness to be martyred.

In our culture, it's not likely to be that drastic, but it will still happen at some level. And the question is, the test is, will you deny the name of Jesus Christ for the sake of an easier road? It says here, provided we suffer with him, suffering will be a great indication.

And you just know how you react because all of us suffer, right? When you suffer, do you begin to blame God? Do you begin to curse him because you broke your leg? Happened to me three times in my college, my basketball career.

Before my high school basketball career, I broke my fifth metatarsal. Before my college basketball career, I broke it again. And then right before my senior year in college, I broke my third metatarsal.

Metatarsals are foot bones. But each time it made me cry to him and each time I grew closer to him through suffering. To say, you know what, let go of basketball. I can still play basketball, but let God be your everything.

It drew me closer. Suffering didn't turn me away. How about you? Do you pass that test? That's the indication. Suffering brings out the true character. Fire brings out the gold in the dross. When you suffer, do you turn to the Lord?

These are the tests. Now, good news. If you failed that test, that seven-fold test, you can cry out to God in your spirit right now and say, Lord have mercy on me the sinner. I don't think I have your Holy Spirit.

But if you pass that test, be assured by these things that you are a child of God. So either way, there's hope for you. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. I'll pray first for those who have not yet received this assurance of salvation, maybe haven't yet been saved.

And then secondly, for those of us who have. Father, I lift up those who have not yet been born again. Maybe they've been playing church. Maybe they've just been assuming that they have spiritual life, but they've never looked at these signs of life.

I pray that your Holy Spirit would convict them deeply by this word, even make them tremble in fear before the holy and living God. And Lord, I pray that they would confess their sin to you right now.

Repent of that sin. Call on the name of Jesus. Acts 2 .38 says that you will give the promised Holy Spirit to those who believe. So Father, send your Holy Spirit into the hearts of everyone who calls on the name of Jesus.

We pray God that you would save them. They can't save themselves. The wind blows where it will. No one knows where it's coming from or going. So it is with those born of the Spirit. God, only you can send your spirit into them and make them new.

I pray that you would do that. And now Lord, I pray for all of us to have the assurance of salvation. Those of us who do believe in Jesus, that you would grant us assurance that we would know that we are children of God.

That we could walk in confidence. Fill us with your Holy Spirit. Help us to do now the things that mark a true Christian. Pursue righteousness. Help us to kill the sins of the body. Help us to be led and to be teachable.

Break us out of the strongholds of fear. Help us to cry, Abba Father. Witness to our spirit that we are children of God. And Lord, help us to endure suffering well for the sake of the name. In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.