WWUTT 1268 The Mind Set On the Flesh (Romans 8:7-8)

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To set the mind on the flesh is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law, indeed it cannot.

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Those who are in the flesh cannot please God and find no satisfaction in God, 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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Yesterday we made it as far as verse 6, I'm going to start reading here in verse 5, we'll go through verse 11.

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The Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Rome. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the

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Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the

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Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law, indeed it cannot.

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Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. 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 Spirit who dwells in you.

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Now today we'd be picking up in verse 7, but let me hit verse 6 one more time. As Paul says, to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the

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Spirit is life and peace. It's really interesting to me that he doesn't simply say, to set the mind on the

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Spirit is life, because that would be the opposite of the mind that is set on the flesh is death.

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To set the mind on the flesh, that results in death. So to set the mind on the Spirit results in life, right?

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Just opposites, how they're opposite of one another. The things of the flesh are contrary to the things of the

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Spirit, as we had seen in Galatians chapter 5. But he doesn't just say to set the mind on the Spirit is life, he also says it is peace.

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To set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. It's not just being alive.

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It's not just living in Christ. It's also the peace of Christ in knowing that in Him our sins are forgiven.

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We have no hostility toward God. We are not at enmity with Him. We are not enemies of God.

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We have peace with God. And knowing that our sins are forgiven, it makes that life beautiful to live.

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How difficult would it be to live in life if you were just living through life with a constant sense of guilt for your sins?

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That's one of the reasons why so many people have turned themselves over to substance abuse, whether that's alcohol or drugs, even prescription meds that they abuse and get addicted to.

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A lot of times, I'm not saying this is every time, but a lot of times a person is doing that because they're wanting to numb their mind and not have to think about the reality of things that are the result of evil, whether it's their own sin or the hurts and pains that they have to deal with because of some past difficulty.

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A person who is guilty of sin, that doesn't know how to deal with that sin, that is constantly plagued with this stuff in their mind, often turns themselves over to substance abuse in order to dull that attack of conscience.

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They may not even know what the misery is in their brain. Why am I feeling such radical depression?

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Maybe they can't pin that down. They don't know. Why am I sleepless? Why am I constantly fidgety?

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Why am I wandering around? Why am I unusually restless? I can't seem to have a peace of mind.

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I can't still my thoughts. I can't rest or even enjoy life.

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There is just constant misery or depression or anxiety. And so in order to handle that, rather than turn themselves over to Christ, rather than just crumble before him and weep and say,

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God, help me. And I'm speaking from personal experience here. Instead of doing that, they try to numb their understanding with something that will dull the mind, something that will help them forget a little bit.

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And that's a lot of times where that substance abuse comes from. Right now, we're seeing as the

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COVID -19 pandemic is spreading and it's taking away a lot of people's jobs and they're in lockdown and they're in fear because that's what's on the news constantly, something to be afraid of.

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And because of this constant stream of fear, it's causing a lot of depression and people feel worthless.

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They don't even have jobs, so they're not applying themselves to anything to feel like they're contributing or that there's any worth or meaning to why we live.

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It's causing massive depression. And I just saw a report from a doctor yesterday who said that the rise of overdose cases, people who are dying from an overdose on drugs and the rise of suicides is higher than the death count from COVID -19.

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In the United States, it's something like 800000 people die of suicide every year.

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That's more than five times what the COVID -19 death count is in the

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US right now. And doctors are saying that by the end of 2020, that suicide rate is going to be even higher.

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That's astounding. We just don't think about the kinds of effects this stuff has.

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The mind that does not have Christ feels worthless. The mind that does not have

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Christ is never going to find peace. To set the mind on the flesh is death. If you're constantly giving into temptations in your flesh, you're trying to appease that fleshly hunger, but it's never satisfied.

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If you are trying to gain righteousness by your flesh, you're just focusing on the law, keeping the law.

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Hey, if I do enough right things, maybe I will be righteous. And you never get there. You're just constantly doing good stuff, but you never feel like you've done enough to be righteous.

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All of this is setting the mind on the flesh, and it leads to destruction. It leads to death.

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To set the mind on the flesh, to think that I have to dull my senses in my flesh so that I can enjoy living in my flesh, that leads to death.

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No matter what we do in our flesh, we're never going to find a satisfaction.

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We're never going to get there. So to set the mind on the spirit is life, leads to life, does not lead to our destruction.

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It leads to life. Jesus in John 10 .10, the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.

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I have come that they may have life and have it abundantly. So to set the mind on the spirit is life and it's peace.

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You can live this life in peace. You've got sins that you've committed.

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Maybe you're afraid of cancel culture. I mean, that's kind of a thing right now, right? People find out some sort of sin you've done or something you posted online or whatever, and it just blows up and suddenly your guilt is exposed to everybody.

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You thought that you would handle this thing and suddenly it comes back to the surface and boom, you're a part of cancel culture.

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And there are people getting canceled that aren't even in, they aren't even celebrities. Just somebody finds something, they expose it online.

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Suddenly you're the target of ridicule. You thought you had handled this thing and it comes right back to the surface.

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But I tell you, this is why we have to have this rest in the way we started here in Romans 8 .1.

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There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

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Who cares what people find, plaster it all over the media and make you the object of ridicule and scorn.

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There's no condemnation in Christ. The whole world can be against you. But if Christ is for us, who can be against us?

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That's coming up here in Romans 8, still on that thesis line that Paul has made coming out of chapter seven, going into chapter eight.

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There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ.

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And as I said, when we were looking at that verse, are you worthy of condemnation? Yes, you are.

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But as Charles Spurgeon said, if anybody is condemning you because of your sin, take heart. You are way worse than they know you are.

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You have a familiarity with your sins that is far deeper than what anybody else is going to see.

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They see a couple of things that you've done or posted or whatever, and they're going to make fun of you for that.

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But there are sins worse than that that you are guilty of. But Christ has paid for them with his death on the cross.

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So you can rest in that assurance and not live in fear of death, especially not live in fear of the judgment of God.

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For you have peace with God. So what can man do to you? To set the mind on the flesh is death.

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To set the mind on the spirit. To know in the spirit of God and according to his word, your sins are forgiven.

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You have peace with God. That is life and life that is meaningful.

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When you go through something, you know there's a reason for it. And it causes you to cling to Christ all the more.

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I would never tell you that you're not going to go through tough stuff. You may very well go through some very, very difficult circumstances.

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I was just reading some things from some friends on the Internet earlier this week on some stuff that they're going through and praying for them.

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You can go through some very difficult life trials. I have. I'm not going through anything at the present, but stuff can get really hard and sometimes it can be so hard.

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You just don't think that there's ever really an end to it. Am I always going to be feeling this way for the rest of my life?

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But you can know that even through these difficult trials, that there is a meaning to it.

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There's a purpose to it. Paul said when he faced death and persecution and ridicule and all of his friends turning his back on him, when the persecutions that they had suffered in Asia had come to the ears of the

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Corinthians, Paul said to them in 2nd Corinthians chapter one, you know the great sufferings that we had gone through when we are in Asia.

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We thought that we had received a sentence, a sentence of death. This is Paul saying, yes,

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God will give you more than you can handle. But then he says, but this was to make us rely not on ourselves, but to rely more on God who raises the dead.

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So the difficult trial that you're going through is to draw you closer to Christ. If anything, you can know that.

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This is so I would cling to Christ all the more. And I'm looking forward to getting out of this world and being delivered into his kingdom.

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Don't let the tough stuff that happens in this world make you give up on Christ. I mean, what good is that?

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It's like, ah, the world is just beating me up so bad. I guess God's not really there. I'm going to turn to the world.

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The world was the thing that was beating you up. Why do you think going to the world is going to make you feel better?

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And I hear that from so many different people, like atheists in particular, they'll have this testimony where they will say, oh,

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I was just torturing myself until I just settled in my mind that I'm an atheist and God's not there.

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And now finally, I'm happy with life. And no, they're not. Give me a break. They have no peace or meaningfulness to their existence whatsoever.

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They're clinging to an ideology that says they're nothing but stardust and brain gas.

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And when they die, they go back to the dirt and that's it. There is no meaning or purpose to anything.

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They're just chemicals reacting. That's according to their own worldview. So there's no way there's peace in that.

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There's no way that there's any comfort in that. People who who commit suicide, who feel hopelessness and die, have no hope in God, no hope in Christ.

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They tried to find peace in the world and could not find it and fell into despair.

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And their only out was to take their own life. That's that's what leads to suicide.

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But we find meaningfulness in Christ. We find peace, forgiveness of sins.

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We find it in Christ so that even the fiery trial that we go through has a meaning and a purpose to it.

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First Peter 412 Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you as though something strange were happening to you.

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But rejoice in so far as you share Christ's sufferings that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.

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When Peter says here to rejoice, it doesn't mean put a smile on your face and just go around pretending that everything's fine.

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That's not what he means. But you find meaningfulness and contentment in Christ and be able to say with Paul in Philippians 413,

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I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. I know what it's like to abound and I know what it's like to be in need.

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And yet in any either of these circumstances. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

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Rejoice in so far as you share Christ's sufferings. Christ suffered even before his crucifixion.

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The prophet Isaiah 400 years before Christ gave us a picture of the kinds of griefs that Christ would carry in him while he was in his earthly ministry.

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He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief and is one from whom men hide their faces.

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He was despised and we esteemed him not. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.

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Yet we esteem him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. Then his crucifixion, of course,

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Isaiah 53 5, but he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities.

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Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace. And with his wounds, we are healed.

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All we, like sheep, have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way.

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And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. You are not saved just because you're oppressed and you go through difficult things in your life.

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You are saved because you put your faith in Jesus Christ. Whether you're oppressed or you're the oppressor, everyone needs the gospel.

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Everyone needs to turn from sin and put faith in Christ. No one is inherently saved.

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We are saved by grace through faith in Jesus. He was oppressed and he was afflicted and he is the only one who has gone through this affliction that did not deserve it.

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Jesus Christ was a good man and he gave himself to the sufferings that he endured in life even up to his death for our sake that by faith in him we may wear his righteousness.

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And now in Christ we have no hostility toward God. We love God and we love his law.

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See the law was oppressive to us before we came to Christ. No one can live up to the law.

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Isaiah again, 64 .6, even our best deeds, our best attempts to do the law and keep it are as filthy rags before a holy

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God. We have no righteousness of our own. And even if you were to set yourself at this point and declare,

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I'm going to live in righteousness for the rest of my life. Even if right now you were able to set yourself to that and do it, you still would not be righteous for two reasons.

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First of all, you still have the stain of the sins that you did before and nothing good that you do will be able to absolve them.

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So that's number one. Number two, what you're attempting to do is self -righteousness and not to the glory of God, which is no righteousness at all.

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So in, in either of, uh, in, for these two reasons, your best attempts at being righteous cannot ever be righteous before God.

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The righteousness that we need comes from Christ. He was pierced for our transgressions and we receive his righteousness as a gift.

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To set the mind on the flesh is death. To set the mind on the spirit is life and peace. And the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God for it does not submit to God's law.

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Indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please

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God. You're not pleasing God when you're oppressed. You're not pleasing

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God when you think life is hunky -dory. We are a pleasure to God when we are in his son and when he, when he looks at us, he sees not the filthy stain of our sin, which we were in when we were in rebellion against God or when we were in a state of woe is me.

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And the focus was still all on us when we were saying to ourselves, I've done nothing to deserve this.

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And we think that we're all right. And God is my oppressor. In those instances, we were hostile to God.

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You know that when Jesus says that the ones who are condemned, the ones who are judged go away into eternal punishment, he says in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

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Those who are gnashing their teeth are shaking a fist at God. And those who are weeping are shaking the fist at themselves.

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It's a woe is me depression for all eternity. The gnashing teeth is just an anger and vitriol for all eternity.

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So you can have this, this depression in yourself that does not make you righteous. And in fact, is something that you could experience for all eternity if Christ does not save you out of that.

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If you don't turn yourself to Christ and be lifted up by the power of his love.

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Knowing that you have meaning and purpose and fulfillment in life through faith in Jesus Christ, the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, it does not submit to God's law, doesn't matter if it's hostile to God in self -absorption or it's hostile to God in in just outright anger and shaking the fist at God.

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If you're not set on the spirit, you're hostile to God. You cannot submit to God's law.

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You cannot keep it in a way that is worthy or righteous or makes you right before God.

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The mind cannot, the person in the flesh, those who are in the flesh cannot please

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God. If you do not have the spirit, if you are not focused on Christ, if you are not walking in him, if you do not have his word abiding in you, if you are not taking up your cross and following after him, then you can't please

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God. Nothing you do will be pleasing to God. You're still living unto yourself.

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You are not living to God and living unto yourself, a slave to Satan and his ways, which in which, by the way, you're always going to be beaten down by him.

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He will always make you feel worthless. When you're walking in that way, it will lead you to your destruction.

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And it's not going to be the sort of a thing where on Judgment Day, God is going to say, oh, poor you, you live such a difficult, hard life.

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Let me lift you up and here. Great is your reward. I have heaven for you since you had a difficult life.

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No, what you chose to do in that difficult life is try to do it yourself in opposition to God, hostile to God, and that will lead ultimately to your destruction.

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You must turn from self -reliance. You must turn from believing that you have strength in your flesh and you must fall apart before God and ask for his forgiveness and he will give it to you.

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And then verse nine, you who are not in the flesh, but in the spirit belong to him.

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Verse nine, you, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if in fact the spirit of God dwells in you, anyone who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

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But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness.

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I'm going to finish on this verse. We're going to come back to this section again next week. Verse 11, 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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You still live in this body that's going to die because of the futility that we've been subjected to as a result of our sin.

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But you have nothing to fear of judgment on the other side, for God has given life to your mortal bodies that you may live in righteousness unto him.

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And when the body dies, he will resurrect you unto eternal life, which is promised you in Christ Jesus.

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The same power of God that raised his son from the dead is the power of God that is in you now, raising you from deadness in your sins to life in Jesus Christ.

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Amen. You can find a complete list of videos, books, devotionals, and other resources online at WWW .WWW