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Bibleline Bibleline, here God’s word on Bibleline, here God’s truth on Bibleline. Welcome to Bibleline with Dr. Ralph Yankee Arnold, pastor of Calvary Community Church in Tampa, Florida. Clearly declaring the gospel of Jesus Christ through the radio and the internet. Your regular prayers and monthly support make it possible for Bibleline to continue on the air. You can reach us toll free at 1-800-576-3771. Online donations may be made by clicking on the donations link on the BibleLineMinistries.org homepage. We pray that you will enjoy our commitment to the clear gospel of Jesus Christ and that today’s first part of this two-part message will be a blessing to you and your family.

Well, anyway, I want to talk to you about a few things that I think might help as we go to this Christian life. So turn in your Bible to the book of Romans, the book of Romans, chapter 7. Romans chapter 7. We’ve talked about when did you die? Well, that’s when you trust the Christ as your Savior. So God considers you as a dead man and a dead man under the law because he’s dead. The law can’t touch him, can’t condemn him because you’ve already paid your debt in full.

Whenever you trust that Christ has saved you have paid your debt in full to the Lord. Now, let me ask you a question. Let’s say for example, here’s a man standing right here. Say he’s 70 years old. We’ve got a teenager back there that’s 13 years old. If a person could lose their salvation. Doesn’t it make sense to trust the Lord when you get old? Because you have less time to lose it. But if you can lose your salvation and trust the Lord when you’re 13 years old, and if you live to be 70, you’ve got a lot of time to lose it.

And if God saves you and now you have eternal life and now you can go to heaven when you die, why would God let you live knowing that you’re going to lose it in the future? Well, if he really loved you and you already saved, why don’t he take you home before you lost it? Doesn’t that make sense? Some people can’t think about these things. I think about these things. So I believe that it’s wise, maybe we ought to just all wait until you’re right before you die and then trust the Lord because then that way you don’t have any time left mess up.

But then there’s a problem with that. How do you know when you’re going to die? And how much time do you know that you’re going to have? So maybe the safest thing to do is to trust Christ as your Savior and take Him at His Word that He’ll never cast you out and He will never lose you and you can never lose your salvation. I like that better. Once you trust Christ to save you are his child or ever his child.

Now in chapter 7 we talked about how that you have this battle that goes on in your life. You want to do right and then you don’t want to do right. You want to witness and you don’t want to witness. But those things are mentioned and there’s this battle that goes on back and forth, back and forth. So we came to the conclusion this morning as we we were looking at the scriptures. You see there in verse 23, but I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, bringing me into captivity.

See the old nature wants to capture you again. It wants to get you to walk in the flesh so that it can cause you to, you know, to have this struggle and it defeats you. And you had this choice to make. So you have the choice. So in verse 25 it states the choice. I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mine I will do this and with the flesh I will live the other. So there’s a choice.

So in your Christian life you have to understand that you’re going to be making choices for the rest of your life. Every day, all the time. So you are the individual that decides which of these natures is you’re going to follow. Which one of you are going to follow the new birth or the old birth? But there’s only one of you. There’s not two of you. You have two births, but you’ve only got one of you. You’re only one person.

You’re making decisions of which nature you’re going to allow to control your life. But you can’t get the new nature to follow the old nature. The new nature cannot sin. Now look what he says in chapter 8 and verse 1, there is therefore, now in view of what we’ve already talked about and the battle that goes on and the decisions that you’ve got to make and realizing that the second birth is always holy, the second birth is always right, it cannot sin.

So the second birth can only walk in the spirit. The second birth cannot walk in the flesh. So when you read there in verse one, there is therefore now, now, no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. So you are not now, and if you read it today, or you read it 10 years from now, there’s never any condemnation to those that are in Christ. So when you trust that Christ is your Savior, see, all of your condemnation has been taken care of, you have been redeemed from the curse of the law.

You have been made free from the old sin nature and God separated you. So your new birth is totally separate. So a lot of people think that when you go to church, you’re trying to reform this old man. You can’t reform that old man. You’ve got to start working on this new man and getting him build him up strong in the Lord and he feeds upon the Word of God. And that’s why he says, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit.

The first birth walks only after the spirit. See, look up here. This birth right here, when you trust the Christ God gave to you a new birth, this one here, there’s no condemnation to those that are in Christ. The spiritual birth can only walk in the spirit. It can never walk in the flesh. You as an individual who have two births, You may choose to walk in this one or choose to walk in this one, but there’s only one of you.

So the battle is on and you’re trying to make decisions all your life. So he says, for me to make decisions, don’t walk after the flesh. But in verse two, then he tells you why, because for the law of the spirit of life, in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. I know some of these, it is very difficult and it’s a hard scripture to teach. You can read it a thousand times and times and say, what does it mean?

What does it mean? What does it mean? What does it mean? And I very seldom read commentaries on it because I get so messed up with commentaries because nobody really explains it clearly enough for me. So I just study and study and study and I think I got it now. I think you got it. And so after about 50 years to think, well, I think I got a little idea of what’s just talking about. But this old birth over here, when you trusted Christ, you gave you a new birth set you free from that law of sin and death.

So God sees you in the spirit. God does no longer see you in the flesh because he, that’s the way you were when you were a lost man, but you trusted Christ. This one died and God’s eyes is dead. This one is alive. We’re supposed to live our Christian life is though that’s true but you and I know this one is very much alive and he causes us a lot of struggle in our Christian life. So he says for the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death for what the law could not do.

Now remember this this is the one the first birth is under the law that’s why every person born into the world born of the flesh, the physical birth, you’re under the law. Because the law is to contain and constrain that old sinful nature. And that’s why there’s punishment. You break the law, this happens. You break this law, this happens. You break the law. That’s why we have laws in our nation because of people who do the wrong. So there’s a law.

You can’t do that. You can’t do that. You can’t do that. And then there’s penalties. And that’s why people go to jail, go to prison. Some are killed. But that’s because they have broken law. The first birth is under the law. The second birth is not under the law. Why? It has no sinful nature. It doesn’t do anything wrong. Your second birth is perfect. So therefore it doesn’t have to worry about that law. It’s under the spirit of life because God gave you life and therefore you don’t have to worry about that.

You’re free from this condemnation and you can never in the future ever be condemned again. because the law considers you as a dead man. Hold your place right here and look in the book of Galatians. In the book of Galatians chapter 2. In the book of Galatians, and look what it says here. And notice in verse 16. Verse 16 of chapter 2, and Galatians says, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ.

Even we have believed in Jesus Christ that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, not by the works of the law. For by the works of the law, no flesh would be justified. By the law, we’re all condemned. The law never saved anybody. The law just lets you know you cannot keep it. Therefore you need to save your soul. The law was our school master to bring us to Christ that we might be justified by faith. That’s in chapter three.

In verse 17, but if while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners. In other words, if you’re still seeking to be justified, then you have to declare, I am not yet justified. So you put yourself under the law seeking something that you don’t have to worry about because you can never be condemned. You’re not under the law. You don’t have to seek to be justified. I’m not seeking to be saved, but if you try to put yourself under the law, there is no justification.

You can’t be saved or justified by the law. So then he says this in verse 19, for I threw the law and was those next words. and dead to the law that I might live under God. And this is why we put it this away. I was in the flesh, I died, I paid for my sins. I came back from the dead and all I got is my new birth. So that’s how God sees it. That’s how you’re supposed to think it and see it and believe it and reckon it to be true.

Now in our own physical life, yeah, we still got this old man that we got to drag around with us because we haven’t got our new body yet. See, we were guaranteed we’re gonna get a new body, but until then I’ve gotta live in this one, and that’s where my old flesh nature lives. So you’re gonna battle this. So that’s why in Galatians, he says, that I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live. So I am crucified. That’s this one.

I was crucified. That means I’m dead. Now the law cannot touch me, cannot condemn me. So when you go to Romans, he’s telling you, look, a dead man can no longer be condemned. You can’t judge him, he’s dead. But understanding that we don’t always apply everything the way we should, we don’t all live the way we should because we have this whole sinful nature and it can flare up at any time. So you notice what he says here in verse 3, but what the law could not do, what could not the law though.

The law could not produce righteousness. The law demanded righteousness, but the law could not produce righteousness. Remember when Christ came He says, except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the Pharisees, you shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven. So they were the law keepers and theirs wasn’t good enough. So the law cannot save. The law was the knowledge of sin. That’s how we know that we’ve all sin and fails in the eyes of the Lord.

So what the law couldn’t do, produce righteousness, now that you have the Holy Spirit living within you and you have this new birth, now you can live the way God wants you to live. You can produce the fruits of righteousness. So look there very quickly in the book of Romans in chapter 6. Chapter 6. And you notice what he says here because of this righteousness that God wants. You’ll notice down in verse 16, know ye not that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants you are to whom you obey, whether sin and the death of obedience unto righteousness.

The lost man can’t produce the righteousness God’s looking for. And this is why Christ says that if he’s looking for the tree to produce the fruit, and if it doesn’t produce the fruit of righteousness He’s going to cut down the tree. Well, if no tree can produce this righteousness and he’s talking about people, then every person dies and all the trees are cut down. But he was that tender plant that grew up and he has the righteous seeds. And so those who eat from this tree, the fruit of that tree, Christ, well, then we have eternal life and we can bring forth the fruits of righteousness.

So he mentions this about yielding ourselves and so forth to him. But he wants us to bring forth this fruit of righteousness. That’s why I want you to see there in verse 21 of chapter 6. What fruit had you then in those things where of your now ashamed for the end of those things is death but now been made free from sin that owes in nature and become servants to God. You have your fruit unto holiness and the end everlasting life, your fruit that lasts forever.

Now also there in Chapter 7. He talks about a man and a woman who gets married. And she can’t marry another man as long as she’s married to this man. So she has to wait till he dies. And when he dies, she’s free to marry another. Well, see, our old sinful nature, we were like married, but I can’t marry Christ because I married my old man. But if this old man was dead, then I would be free to marry Christ.

So that’s why you have to accept Christ as your Savior. And his death was the death of this old man you were married to. Now you’re free from that old man so that you can marry Christ. Now that you’re married to Christ, you can bring forth fruits of righteousness that you could not when you were married to the old man. Because you see that old man is that old sinful, wicked nature that you had and you could not produce the fruits of righteousness and therefore you could not do what God wanted.

But she in chapter 7, notice what he says in verse 4, wherefore my brethren he also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ that ye should be married to another even to him who is raised from the dead. I ain’t making this stuff. Five minutes right there in the book. It says the same thing. But notice what he says, that we should bring forth what? Fruit unto God. Now you couldn’t do it in the old man, but you can do it in the new man.

So the new man can produce the fruits of righteousness and please God, but when you’re in the flesh you cannot please God. And so this is why the eighth chapter of the of the Romans explains this difference. And so that’s why he wants you to be spiritually minded instead of carnally minded. Now some people try to say, and especially those in the Calvinistic field, that there’s no such thing as a carnal Christian. They just say the carnal Christian is the lost man.

No. In the book of 1 Corinthians in chapter 3, is a natural man, there is a carnal man, and there is a spiritual man. And so we believe that the carnal Christian, the carnal mind is the mind of a Christian who is letting the mind of the flesh control his life. So there’s going to be results from that. Whatever seeds you sow, you’re going to produce. So notice what else he says here. Look in verse 5. He says in verse five of chapter seven, for when you were in the flesh, the motions of sin, or the desire, the passions of sins that motivate you to do what you do, which were by the law.

He said, did work in our members, our flesh, physical body to bring forth fruit unto death. That’s why the Christians life in the flesh, if you live in the flesh, you’re gonna bring forth fruit. But none of that fruit lives forever, because God does not reward you for that, is nothing but death and destruction. God does not give you credit for that. It’s a waste of time, like letting you live, and you absolutely accomplish zero. So the Christian now has this choice of flesh and spirit.

How are you gonna be? You gonna be carnally minded or spiritually minded? And if you’ve come spiritually minded, you’re going to have to develop a way of thinking. That’s why you have to study the Word of God so that you can think the way God wants you to think so you can produce that which God wants you to produce. If you use your natural mind, Launched Christians I believe do. They do what they want to do the way they want to do it and that’s good enough for them.

They’re serving the Lord is just whatever they want to do and call it I’m serving the Lord. Instead of what does God want. What does God want? Now, notice what else he says here. In verse 6, but now, now, we are delivered from the law that being what? That being what? Dead. So you are in God’s eyes dead. And because you are dead, a law cannot touch you. Now, why would you want to if you have this new birth go back to the cemetery and dig up that old man and drag him around with you and say, lead me and guide me and tell me what to do.

Well, he’s the one that got you in that trouble first place. Leave that old man alone. If he’s dead, leave him dead. Now, as you live your Christian life, you’ll find out he gets revived every once in a while and then slacks you upside the head and you can be surprised how he can control your life, how quickly it can happen. So you have here in verse six, but now we are delivered from the law that being dead, wherein we were held that we should serve in newness of spirit, not in the oldness of the letter, which is of the law.

So now God says, you have a choice. The flesh, look up here, the flesh is under the law. But you died. The law cannot condemn you. That’s why in chapter verse 1, there is no condemnation to those that are in Christ. These are the only ones a believer in Christ can walk after the Spirit. And the new bird cannot walk after the flesh. So you have choices that you have to make in your Christian life of what you want to do.

So you as an individual, I got two births. Now which one am I going to make control my life? I can’t make my new birth sin. They called my new birth cannot sin. So whenever I do that, which is wrong, it’s my flesh. This is why he says, there in chapter seven, look at this. In verse 17, now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelt in me. You have this old sinful nature still dwelling inside of you.

And in verse 18, for I know that in me that is in my what? In my flesh, dwelleth, no good thing. For to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good, I find now. How do I get victory when I have this all-centhal desire, the emotions of sin, the passions, and so forth, the still do wrong. And they can be just as big and real and mean and ugly as they’ve always been all your life and they will be until the day you die.

You’d be surprised the things you can think about, the things you can feel, all this is the flesh and you have it. And so that’s why he says there in verse 19, for the good that I would, I do not, but the evil which I would not that I do. Now if I do that I would not. It is no more I that do it but sin that dwelleth in me. See, look at me. It’s that old sinful nature that you have.

So you have choices that you make. Now back there to chapter 8, in verse 4, where he says, excuse me, verse 3, but what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, the law was strong, its spiritual, its good, as holy and all of that. That’s mentioned over there in Romans in chapter 7. And there’s nothing wrong with all, but the law was considered to be weak in this point. It could not make you do what it wants you to do.

It could command you to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, but it can’t make you do it. And thou shalt not covet, but you still covet. And sometimes when the law told you not to do something, it created the desire to want to do it. Did you know that of everything that was in the garden of everything that he could eat. It wasn’t until he told them, don’t eat the fruit of this tree that that became a problem.

You could have 15 jars in the cabinet, but tell a little Johnny. Johnny, that one right there, don’t look in that one. Now which one do you think he wants to look in? Because you made a law. There’s just something about your nature. When you’re told you can’t do this, I can’t. What? You can’t have this. Why? A law automatically creates the passion to want to break the law. You ever pull up to the stop sign? Totally stop? Look both ways?

Or you just slow down real slow? Don’t confess your sins to me. I I don’t want to know. Have you ever went one mile over the speed limit? Not me. Never one mile. Always a whole bunch more. But you could not make the law could not make a person righteous. Where’s it saying to Bible that the law made nothing perfect? Where is that found? All right, since we ain’t going to wait on you all day. Look in Hebrews chapter 7.

Hold your place here. Hebrews chapter 7. Hebrews chapter 7. Look in verse 19. This is why it’s so important to see and understand from what God has to say. For the law made nothing perfect. If it can’t make you perfect, why try to keep it to go to heaven If you have to be perfect to go to heaven. It’s a problem, right? But the bringing in of a better hope did, by the which we draw nigh unto God. There is a better way, and that was through Christ.

Now when you trust Christ as your Savior, He makes you perfect. That’s why in chapter 10 it states that in verse 10, 12, and 14. Now go back to the book of Romans. Back to Romans. So he says here in verse three, for what the law could not do that in that it was weak to the flesh because the man couldn’t obey it. God sending his son in the likeness of sinful flesh. Does that mean that he had sinful flesh?

It was in the likeness of sinful flesh. He was in a body just like ours. Now his body got tired, he got hungry, he got weary and worn, and all that. He was thirsty. But he did not have a sinful nature. He did not sin. He could not sin. He is God. Now notice, he says he was in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh. He did not yield to a sinful nature, though he was tempted, he did not yield.

He condemned the sin because he never obeyed the sin for desires or the passions or anything like that. He never failed. He was not guilty, no fault found in Him. And therefore He was able to do what no man could do. So He delivered us. That’s why He talked about the body of His death, Christ. And so He made that payment for us. And so we accept His death is our death. I died. As far as God is concerned, my old man, he died.

And all I have left is my new birth.” Now some people believe that you don’t have that that will send through nature anymore. It’s been totally eradicated. That is not true. Your old nature is just as real as it’s always been. But now you have a way to control in verse 4 that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, but not necessarily by us. See, this is why God is going to give to us the moment we trust in the Savior.

He gives us the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit in us never leads you to sin. The Holy Spirit is not in my flesh birth. He’s in my physical flesh body, but not in my flesh birth. That old He’s in my new birth. And therefore, his spirit bears witness with my spirit that I am a child of God. How do I know my child God because of his spirit bears with my spirit? How does he do that? With the Word of God.

The Holy Spirit gave us the Word and bears witness. And I know that I’m saved. How do I know? Because God’s Word says so. Are you a new listener to Bibleline? Do you enjoy the teachings of Dr. Arnold? Well, if you’ve never contacted us before, we want to give you Dr. Arnold’s book, the gospel-driven man. Every day we receive many emails from folks who have questions about repentance and salvation, about faith in works, and about how to share the gospel with friends and loved ones.

This book, The Gospel-Driven Man, covers all those topics and we want all new listeners of Bibleline to receive a free copy. There’s no obligation, no donation necessary, simply call us at 1-800-576-3771 or write to us and request your free copy of the Gospel-Driven Man. The mailing address is 4811 George Road, Tampa, Florida, 33634. Again, don’t forget to include your mailing address, and God bless you and thank you for listening to Bibleline. Thanks for joining us on Bibleline. If you are in the area, we welcome you to visit us.

The address for Calvary Community Church is 4811 George Road, Tampa, Florida, 33634. and now a closing thought from Pastor Arnold. Friend, one day it will happen. The trumpet will sound, and we will be changed. Caught up to meet the Lord in the air. So live today and every day. Believing that the Lord is coming soon, just keep looking up.