Book of Romans - Ch. 1, Vs. 1-6 (06/13/2004)

Park Meadows Church

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I had promised Greg that I would look at Revelation, and that I am doing.

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But in the meantime, we're going to look at the book of Romans. Joy, do angels have whiskers?

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Dennis, what do you think? Greg, but angels do not have whiskers, as an angel.

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Discernment is for you only. You cannot discern to or for others.

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Now, some opening remarks concerning the book of Romans. Romans 1 .1

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Dennis, tell me, what is prophecy? Alright.

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Greg, what is a prophet? It's a declaration of that which cannot be known by natural means.

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Is what you said. The purpose of prophecy is to edify, comfort, and encourage the believers.

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Found in 1 Corinthians 14 .3 But he that prophesieth speaketh unto men to edification, and exhortation, and comfort.

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Now, the teacher of today has replaced the prophet of yesterday.

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There's no prophets today. Found in 2

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Peter 2 .1 The Lord God did not use the

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Greek language or the Arabic language. Why, Joy?

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Well, he did not use the Greek language or the Arabic language, which is what he spoke in, just because it was here.

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It was here. He didn't use it just because it was here.

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Now, Greg, tell me, why did he use it? Well, he brought the

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Greek language and the Arabic language into existence so that the most expressive type of speech could be used for his holy word.

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Years ago, I used to think that God used the lamb because it was a perfect picture of his son.

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That's not true. He put the lamb here for that reason.

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He uses nothing because it is here. He put it here for a specific reason.

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Is this on? Yes. In writing this letter,

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Paul carries on a complicated method by design. While he is teaching on one thing, he gives us the opportunity of learning yet one or two other necessary things.

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You must always remember, God is the center of all things, not man.

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We're in the book of Romans 1 .1, John. Learn to look at every event from the viewpoint of God.

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The more you can do that, the more you will understand of the scripture.

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Paul had never been in Rome when he wrote this letter. It was sent to the metropolis of the world.

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And if the gospel presented be the gospel of God, then there are some things that we must do.

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We must entertain it in our judgments. We must retain it in our memories.

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We must embrace it in our affections. We must hide it in our hearts, confess it in our mouths, and most of all, practice it in our lives.

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Do you practice the word of God? I certainly hope so. Chapter 1, verse 1, was written

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A .D. 58. Paul is not ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God unto salvation for everyone that believes.

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The word gospel, what does it mean, John? All right, the good news of who,

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Dennis? The gospel has inherent power.

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What do we mean by that, Joy? Inherent, all right.

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What does it mean, Greg, the inherent power? All right.

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Dennis, we do not give it the inherent power. It is in the gospel.

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There are two seeds in the world. First of all, we have to learn that, know that, remember that, because it will color everything in your life.

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Two seeds in the gospel. Now, you do not have to go broadcasting it, but you must remember the fact.

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Romans 1 .1, Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God.

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Dennis, I know I have gone over it many times, but what does the word servant mean?

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All right. It is doulos in this particular place.

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But first of all, I want you to notice who this gospel, who the gospel belongs to.

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Now, whose gospel is it, Dennis? It is

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God the Father. It is His gospel. He is speaking the last word in anything.

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The word servant is doulos, and it means bond slave.

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A bond slave, let me go over it again, is one who has been marked or branded in some way.

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Back in Exodus 21, verses 5 and 6. If you will turn to that as we read.

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Exodus 21, verses 5 and 6.

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And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children,

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I will not go out free. Then his master shall bring him unto the judges.

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He shall also bring him to the door or unto the doorpost. And his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall serve him forever.

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So if a servant says, I want to be your slave forever, they go to court.

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Then after it passes the court, the master, not someone else, but the master takes him to the doorpost.

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And what is an awl, Dennis? Short ice pick.

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Now with that instrument, he bores a hole through his earlobe. I don't know if you watched the service the other day of Brother Reagan, but one of his sons says that he had a thing for earlobes.

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Did any of you see that? The only way this relationship can be broken is how,

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John? One of those two people, the slave or the master, has to die.

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If the master dies, the slave is free. If the free slave dies, then he is free.

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Now you tell me, Greg, why is it that we started our salvation walk in the death of Jesus Christ on the cross?

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Very good. It took a death to break this doulos bond.

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We were placed into Jesus the Christ. We were placed into him.

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It makes no difference whether you are alive in this world or dead in this world. You were placed into him.

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All of the saved people that will be in heaven were placed into Christ at his death on the cross.

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Can you comprehend that? And as Greg says,

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Paul is telling us here, before he was a doulos of Jesus Christ, he was a doulos of Satan.

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Now, he was never the seed of Satan. What's the difference, Dennis?

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That's right. Very well put. Before we were notified of belonging to God, we also were bond slaves of Satan.

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We were never the seed of Satan. Know the difference. Remember now, the only way this relationship can be severed is the death of one or the other.

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John, is Jesus Christ ever going to die?

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He will never die again. By the time we took up residence in him, we suffered his death with him and we will never be rid of him.

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So, we have his life. He's never going to die. So, we will never die.

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We find this death explained in Romans 6 and 3. Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death.

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John, what does baptism mean? Beg your pardon?

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What? Alright, it's the change.

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This is the death that broke that connection. You had nothing to do with it.

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The word called to be should read a called apostle.

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If you'll notice in that first verse, Paul was called by our Lord. Therefore, he was a called apostle, divinely selected and appointed.

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Now, you may ask, who are the called? In 1 John 3 .10,

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In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil are manifest.

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Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.

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That is, they which are the children of flesh, these are not the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted for the seed.

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In Matthew 13 .38, the field is the world, the good seed are the children of the kingdom, but the tares are the children of the wicked one.

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The Bible spells it out very, very plain when we know that there are two seeds.

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And you know that fact, no question about it. As you study the scripture, you will see the two seeds.

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If you do not know that fact, you will miss a lot of scripture.

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Yes. Alright. That's right, that's good.

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In John 10 .26, But ye believe not, because ye are not my sheep, as I have said unto you.

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10 .27, My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.

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I speak not of you all, I know whom I have chosen.

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Now the last part of that word, that verse, I know whom I have chosen.

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John 13 .18, In Genesis 3 .16,

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we see the beginning of all of this. Unto the woman he said,

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I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. Thy sorrow and thy conception.

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Not sorrow in conception, but sorrow and conception. Two different things.

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In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

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In that verse we have the beginning and the prophecy of beginning and end of the two seeds.

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Now, Greg, quickly tell me why, why was the multiplying of conception needed to bring, you're exactly right, to bring the seed of Satan into the world?

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The separation of the seed started right here as we read. Separated.

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Aphrodisio. In the good sense. It means to appoint, to set for some purpose.

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This word is passive. The significance of this is that it was done to Paul by someone else.

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You were separated unto, you can be separated unto or from, you were separated unto

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God. Now, Joy, did you have a choice in that separation?

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No. No choice in that at all. It also is imperative, denoting that it was done once for all, never to be done again, it's permanent, you cannot undo it.

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The word gospel, the glad tidings of salvation through Christ.

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Verse 2, which he had promised afore by his prophets in the

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Holy Scripture. Now, it was the gospel that was promised, and it was not spelled out as gospel.

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It had been prophesied by the writers of the Old Testament. They knew that there was something besides the

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Messiah coming. They didn't know what it was. And they searched for it, but they could not understand it.

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And the reason they could not understand was what, John? The reason that the writers of the

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Old Testament could not understand this something that was coming, why was that?

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Debbie, tell him. Who's on the back row?

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Who's this sitting on that? Okay. Are you waving your hand?

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Who is waving? All right, let's start over.

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Debbie first. Well, I want to know about that word couldn't.

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Greg, tell her.

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That's true, they did not have the Holy Spirit indwelling, but God simply restricted their understanding.

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Does he restrict our understanding today, or can we know anything that we might know,

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Dennis? But it will never come up to everything that God knows.

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So we're still restricted today. It may be hard to understand, but we are.

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John? That's right.

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Fred? Yes? All right.

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He guides that on several counts. One is providence, and the other is word.

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But you will never learn anything that will take you away completely, lose your salvation from God.

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We had no choice in the matter. Verse 3.

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Concerning his son Jesus the Christ, our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh.

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Now let me ask you, did Jesus have a divine or human nature? All right,

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I've got divine, I've got human. Well, the answer is both.

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But the divine nature was not mentioned until after his resurrection.

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Jesus had a human nature. Now, was that human nature sinful?

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Dennis? He what?

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All right. He had...

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How can I say this? He had the sin nature as Adam had the sin nature.

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Before Adam sinned, could he have sinned?

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Before Adam sinned, could he have sinned, John? All right, from man's view, yes.

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From God's view, no. But man's view, he could have sinned at any time.

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But he didn't have the active sin nature. Now, when he sinned, it activated the sin nature in everybody.

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We find in Genesis, we read that he beget...

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I want to say Seth, where it mentions that he beget a man after his own image.

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And Adam was made after the image of God. And by image, we think physical.

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That's not true. The divine nature was not mentioned in Jesus until after his resurrection.

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But he had them both. Was made, the little words was made.

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Debbie, what does that refer to? He was made.

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All right. God prepared for him a body. Why did he need a body,

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Dennis? John, why did he need a body?

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Debbie, why did he need a body?

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Greg, tell him. So he could die. It's that simple.

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He could not die with the body that he had, quote, unquote. He had to have a body.

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Now, the body was of the King of David, which was of the lineage of Adam.

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And the word was made refers to the flesh. He was not flesh, as he always existed.

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Greg? All right, he's always existed as Christ, not as Jesus.

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Jesus was the earthly body. They had to give a name to this body.

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The most revered name of all, the highest name of all. It was above every name,

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Jesus. Now, Jesus occupied the office of Christ.

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Was made to become, to come to pass, happen to rise, appear in history, come upon the stage, to be made, finished, seed of David.

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In John 7, 42, Hath not the scripture said that Christ cometh of the seed of David and out of the town of Bethlehem where David was?

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Second Timothy, 2A, Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel.

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According to an earthly body, he was a descendant of the King of David.

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This came through his mother only because he had no earthly father.

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Now, I'm going to say something that perhaps some people will disagree.

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Why was the virgin birth necessary? Why was it necessary,

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John? All right.

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The substitute for our sins could not be a man with the activated sin nature.

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He would have been no different than we. Jesus was innocent.

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He was made without an earthly father. So was

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Adam. The sin nature is passed on through the man.

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Therefore, Jesus did not have the sin nature. And there's where the question arises.

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You may say, prove it. All right, I will. If you will produce a child without an earthly father, that's the only way.

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If you will produce a child using the woman only, no earthly father, then it would be innocent.

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Do you believe that? Let me see your hands if you believe.

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Do you understand that? The only way we can prove it is to produce a child without an earthly father.

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Four. And declared to be the Son of God with power.

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Now, he was declared. What's the word declare mean, Greg? All right.

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Say it again. Yes, it was determined beforehand.

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It was determined way back at the council. And I suppose before that, we don't know when the council occurred.

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He was declared to be the Son, capital

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S -O -N. And he had power. Power according to the spirit of holiness.

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By the resurrection from the dead. This is when he was declared the

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Son of God. That which is declared, that which has been determined according to appointment, decree, or ordained determinants.

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A point, Jesus was ordained to be the slain lamb for the purchase of the elect.

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Now, there was something he had to redeem.

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And that was the Son of Man. The Sons of God. In Revelation 13, 8, we read,

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So we find at that verse in Revelation that everybody is going to worship him.

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Every single person that has ever been born.

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How many would that be, Dennis? Then he uses the word with power.

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Dunamis. It has inherent power.

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Power residing in the thing by virtue of its nature. And we get our word dynamite from the same source.

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Resurrected from the dead. This should read resurrection from among the dead.

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Resurrection means a standing up. Which causes us to understand that it will be a bodily resurrection.

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There are those that say it will just be a spirit. Why do we know it will be more than a spirit?

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Why do we know it will be a body, Dennis? Alright, and we will be like him.

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It will not be just a spiritual resurrection. Because the word resurrection gives us the word standing up.

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Jesus was called the Son of God by the fact that he was resurrected. It was the power of the

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Father that raised Jesus. And he was on this earth with all of the power of the

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Holy Spirit. In fact, his entire ministry was conducted under the power of the full or all of the

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Holy Spirit. In John 3 .34 He did not measure.

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For this man to have the Holy Spirit, he gave it all. Well, how is that different from us?

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Romans 12 .3 The measure of faith.

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So, Greg, can you have more faith than you are supposed to have? No. None of us can.

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Now, the amount of faith is different than the faith.

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Greg may have the amount to enable him to do that that is ordained.

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Fred may have a different amount because it does not require the same.

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Maybe more, maybe less. But he has exactly what he needs to operate in this life.

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Verse 5 Now we are obedient.

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Have we received this obedience so that we can now be obedient?

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Debbie? The word received is passive imperative.

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We have received this grace of our Lord not because of our obedience.

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Heaven forbid. He didn't. You were not obedient up until a level that he says, all right, you now qualify.

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But we have received the obedience so that we can be obedient.

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Does that make sense? We have received the obedience so that we can be obedient.

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It is impossible for anyone to be an obedient servant without knowing what his master demands.

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You cannot be a servant of Jesus without the study of his holy word.

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Timothy 2 .15 Study to show thyself approved unto God. A workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

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Study to show thyself. John, who is it you're showing?

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That's right. Study to show yourself. I studied to show myself.

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And this for the last. This obedience is that obedience which his obedience demands that he demand.

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Let me say it again. This obedience is that obedience which his obedience demands that he demand.

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Now remember that. Yes. Yes.

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Yes. Yes. That's right.

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But the obedience itself was given to you.

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It comes through the Holy Spirit. It comes from God the Father. Are there any words?