Identification Truths

Okay, identification clues. We were working our way through Romans 5. Just basic information. Why is Romans 5 so critical to us when it comes to talking about identification? Especially from 12 through 21. What is that known as? You read it, right? What does it tell you? Something unique.

This is information that has never been talked about before in the Word of God, starting at Romans 5.12. There's a whole new revelation starting right here. What is it?

The doctrine of the two men. It's known as the doctrine of the two men. Who are the two men? Adam and Christ. most critical men for believers to know and recognize as a growing believer. If you do not recognize or understand or know the doctrine of the two men, then you can't grow. Can you tell me why? Sure.

You'll spend the rest of your life working on the old man. You won't ever see yourself as identified with the new man. You'll see yourself as identified with the old man and you'll spend all your time trying to get that old man to function and act like a Christian. See that? That's why it's so important. Well, are we at Holly Hills nuts because everybody else, that's all they do is work on the old man. people that are under any kind of a law system, that's what they're doing. It's trying to get the old man to look and act and perform like a Christian. When in fact God's remedy for that old man is the introduction to let you know that there are two men and understanding about these two men and faith in these facts is the pathway to freedom from Adam.

This is really, Romans 5.12 really starts the path to freedom and rest and growth. Now we had worked from 12 through 17 last time. This week we start in verse 18. You know, just maybe to set the tone, let me do this.

It probably would be good to If you're like me, there are verses in the Bible or sections of the Word of God that have really terrific meaning. And so you don't have to concentrate on memorizing them. They make so much sense to you that you kind of know them. You know what I mean? This is 512.

Therefore, as by one man sin entered the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for all men sinned. For until law, sin was in the world, but sin was not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similarity or similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. But not as the offense, so also is the free gift. For if through the offense of the one many are dead, much more the grace of God and the gift by grace which is by one, Jesus Christ, has abounded unto many. And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift. For the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offenses unto justification. For if by one man's offense death reigned by one, much more they who receive abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ."

So that's kind of as far as we got so far. Now, therefore, if you ever see the word therefore, what does it mean? It means everything we've learned up to this point, we're going to draw a conclusion now. Therefore, as by the offense of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation, even so, by the righteousness of one, The free gift came upon all men under justification of life. The first question I ask is, through one trespass it was unto all men to condemnation. What's the extent of the application of the principle of condemnation? Was the question clear or not? How far did it go? Condemnation just went to the guys on the left side of the room? Yeah, every man. Every man.

You see, if you look at this from a legal standpoint, and there was a trial held in Eden, and there was a defendant. Who was the defendant? Adam, right? He was accused of violating a law. Was he the only defendant? Who else was the defendant? The whole human race was there.

Who's the prosecutor? God. Who's the judge? God. Who's the defense attorney? The Lord Jesus. So the trial was held, the prosecution presented his case, the defense at this point had no case, and so the judgment came down from God and the judgment was guilty as charged.

Then the judge said, okay, if you're guilty then we will levy a sentence on you. What's the sentence? Death. Condemned to death. So now the trial's over. So you have to look at it as though the trial has been completed and all in Adam, Adam and all of his progeny have all been Tried, convicted, and condemned to death.

There are no hopers. All we're waiting for is for each one to have the death sentence carried out on them. Now, in that trial though, the judge promised a redeemer. And so, the condemnation was not withheld because of the redeemer being promised. Condemnation is there. So when Adam sins, he takes the whole human race, all of humanity, into the position of death. In Adam, all die.

1 Corinthians 15.22. That's a very important verse. In Adam, all die. Death means what? Separation. So separation from what? Adam died positionally. And every human being died positionally the day in which Adam sinned and you sinned in him. And then 900 years later he died physically. Unless the Lord comes, we're all going to die physically. The cemeteries are undeniable proof that condemnation has been adjudicated and that it's being carried out. What was the verse, 1 Corinthians? 15.22.

In Ephesians 2.3 it says, Every human being is a child of wrath. So the Adamic life now is the source of sin in everyone, whether saved or unsaved. If you're unsaved, the source of the unsaved person is the sin nature. The source of sin in the believer's life is the same thing, the Adamic nature. Wherefore, as by one man sin entered the world, the sin nature. So did God have a right to have a judgment day on the whole human race in Eden? Did He have a right to do that? Why didn't He just have a judgment day for Adam and Eve? It wasn't going to stop there. Why not?

It's the principle that we studied the first week, like begets like. Adam produces little Adams. The sinner produces little Adam sinners. So, there's no doubt in scripture of the totality of the fall. Not only every man, but the whole entire creation. And it was total and irrevocable, the fall. Because God made it really clear to Adam that if and when he should sin, what would happen to him? He would surely die. And that day, Adam disobeyed God's single stipulation. He died spiritually. He died unto God. And all the race of mankind died unto God in Adam that day.

So, if you ever think in your mind, if I'd have been Adam, I'd have done a better job. or Adam that dirty dog he sinned and now look what I've got to suffer. The word teaches that all mankind was guilty before God that day and so he had the right to hold the trial. So Newell says, now do not question either God's right or his wisdom here or his love. He had the right to have a judgment day of our whole race in Eden in our head, Adam. And he did so. He always does right. Furthermore, he knew the creatures would ever fail. There's no sufficiency in the creature, but only in the Creator.

Okay? So... Where do you find that? I've got a lot of... Is that in Romans, verse by verse? Yeah. Yeah. It's verse 18, I think. Romans, verse by verse. Oh, verse 18. 5.18, I think, yeah. Now what was the character of God in which he judged? What part of him? What attribute of God effectuated the judgment? His righteousness.

But now think about what he's doing here. Because what he could have done is just blipped all of Adamic creation out of existence. You know, well you screwed up so... Start over? Yeah, start over. we'll get another guy, or we'll get a whole different creature, you know, maybe we'll use Klingons this time, you know. But it happened again. That's exactly right. It would happen again. He wanted to take what he created and justify it. Yeah, he wanted to take what he created. The thing I'm after is that he did all this in love. Yeah.

He judged in love, he condemned us in love, and he condemned our federal head. And think about this. If it hadn't have been this way, how would we have ever gotten into Christ? Think about that, and we'll start talking more about that next week. Because Adam wasn't in Christ. No. Even when he walked with God. That's right. So we're in a better situation? Much better. Much better. What question did you just ask? What part? Well, it was a question that wasn't in your notes. I'm working on question two. What was that question you just asked? I'd forgotten. Play the tape back. And what attribute of God was judgment pronounced? Is that the one? In love he judged.

Now, notice in the verse it says, the second half of the verse says, Even so, by the righteousness of one, the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. What in the world does justification of life mean? When I say to you, well you've been justified, in your mind you're thinking, I've been pardoned of my sins, right? That's as far as it goes. So what could the justification of life mean?

Why won't your sins ever be reckoned against you? What's that? covered by the blood. Let's talk about that for a minute. In the Old Testament, in the Jewish system, the blood of bulls and goats covered over the sins, right? Does the blood of Christ cover over the sins, or what does it do? It takes it away.

Now, this is where identification is really important. The Adamic old man, is still tied to his sins, isn't he? My buddy who lives in a house here that's not saved, when he dies, he's going to go wherever his Adamic old man goes, which has sin nature attached and the guilt of all those sins, even though Christ has paid for them. Wherever that sin nature goes, because he's identified with it, that's where he goes.

How about the believer? What keeps him from That's right. So the believer, because of justification, that's why it says justification of life, the believer understands that his sins will never be reckoned against him because the one that he's in has paid the penalty and has dealt with the separation of those sins. In other words, in order for your sins to be accounted against you in the future, they would have to be re-accounted against Christ and he'd have to die again.

Do you see that? We are justified in His blood, we are justified from all things. If we were just rid of our sins, we would not have a positive standing. Do you understand what I mean by that? We could have the cancelling of our debt, and we'd be free from the penalty, but what kind of standing would you have before God?

I've asked this question a thousand times. I probably have already asked it in this class once. If the work of Christ on the cross accomplished only one thing, which is a justification, that's all it did, are no longer have to pay the penalty for your sins, and that's all that happened. Nothing else happened.

Can you be in the presence of a holy God as a forgiven sinner? Why not? Because you're still a sinner, even though you're forgiven. Do you see that? You're still a sinner. A thief, even though he's forgiven, he's still a thief. Oh, over here. Sinner's welcome here. It's something about sin put you in jail, Christ paid the bail.

Sure. See, that's exactly right. The whole idea of identification truths is to come to an understanding that you are no longer, from God's perspective, identified as a sinner. Even the Schofield Reference Bible has a phrase in one of the footnotes that says, we are saved sinners. There's no such animal as a saved sinner.

Do you see that? Does that make sense to you? Now you may commit sins, and as we expand on our class, you'll see where we're going with it, but positionally before God, you are not a saved sinner. It's important to know that. Those in Christ have been taken out of the position of death and Adam and have been given a place in Christ.

The reference is 1 Corinthians 1.30, 2 Corinthians 5.21. In general, believers focus upon the death of Christ, He died for me. But for the growing believer, his life must be the focal point of faith, Christ who is our life. You see that? So many of us focus on the fact that Christ died for my sins, that my whole focus is that he died for me. We don't think about the fact that our life is hidden with Christ and God. We are these creatures that have been recreated and the focus is to be on life, not death. See that? That's justification of life.

It's not the Catholic Church last week, the Christ on the cross. The crucifix, yeah. Dead Christ. And, you know, the Catholics are probably as striking example of that as anybody, but most other Christian denominations are the same way. They have Christ off the cross, but they don't have you resurrected.

Now, are you okay with that justification of life? In other words, you have been accounted in life by God, not just... When a believer believes in the person and work of Christ, his position changes, and so he's now accounted by God to be in Christ. which is where he is.

Now, verse 19, For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall the many be made righteous. Explain how one righteous act can affect all men. In other words, let's talk about what the righteous act is. What is the righteous act? It's a perfectly sinless righteous act. Say that again? There's a perfect person, Christ, making that righteous act. There's a perfect person, Christ, and he's doing something that is ascribed to be a righteous act. What is the act? He's dying. He's taking the sins of the world on Him and He's dying. Why is that a righteous act?

Okay, what's righteousness mean? It's a right standing. Now, when you talk about God's righteousness, does He have right standing before Himself? Well, you have to say that God's righteousness is an intrinsic attribute. It's the summation of his total character. He's not only righteous in himself, but he's totally righteous in everything that he does, which means he has right standing with himself in the sense because he's God. Now, here's the Son of God performing a single righteous act. Now, according to whose standard? according to God's standard. There was a requirement here, on God's side of the ledger, that the sins of the world had to be paid for.

Do you think that God could have just gone through all eternity and said, well, those guys really made me mad. They sinned against me, so I blipped them out of existence and we're going to go somewhere else. Could he have done it that way? Answer no, because he was offended. His righteousness was offended. And once it's offended, there has to be propitiation. There has to be satisfaction. You see that?

So, the satisfaction cannot be done... I've tried to get Norm to die for me many times, but he won't do it. And even if he could, it wouldn't satisfy God about my sins. Okay, I'm going to kill myself then. That'll satisfy God about my own sins. No, it won't. because I'm a creature. In order for God to be satisfied, it's got to be done by Him.

Do you see that? It's got to be done by someone, a person, who's Him, because it has to be on the level of godliness in order to satisfy the insult. So you and I as creatures can insult God, but to propitiate Him, to satisfy Him, it takes someone of the Godhead to do it. Do you see that?

If you come over to my house and my dog bites you in the leg, and I tell the dog, you need to atone for that. And the dog wags his tail and looks at you, or growls at you. And so for you to get satisfaction, you're going to come to me, because I own the dog. And I can satisfy you because we're the same level of creation. The dog can't.

Same thing with God. What do you mean, how about? How about the angels that fell? It's interesting with the angels. There's two aspects here. One is that all sin, including Lucifer and all the angels' sin, were satisfied by the work of Christ on the cross. The problem with angels is that it didn't accrue to them because Christ was not an angel. Do you understand that?

God is satisfied. He's propitiated about all sins. It talks about in... I can't remember where... Christ took his blood into the heavenlies to cleanse it. That's why. Because there was sin there. And so, because he is God, he can satisfy all sin everywhere, from God's perspective.

God doesn't go into eternity thinking, I've got to figure out something to do with those angels. They really made me mad. Why not an angel messiah? There's no angel messiah. I've thought about that a lot. If there was an angel messiah, then I wouldn't have been able to be identified with Christ. Do you see that? Because you're not an angel. Because I'm not an angel. No, angel and deity. 100% angel, 100% God.

Right? They weren't created in God's image. Plus there was this deal that Verne talks about, that they had this window of opportunity to exercise their will. The ones that exercised their will against God, once they did that, their wills were fixed. So they won't come back. Do you see that? It isn't will they or won't they, it's they can't, because their wills are now fixed. Is it that they have full evidence of God? Absolutely. To make such an extreme drastic decision the other way, that's it. That's all you get.

In Hebrews it talks about the Lord Jesus was made a little lower than the angels for the propitiation of sins. And when he did that, he was raised above the angels. So what's interesting is that, as a human being, Christ now enjoys a position in creation above angels. Where do you enjoy your position? Because who are you going to get to judge? You're going to get to judge angels, even though you're a creature from Adam's line that's lower than angels. You're not anymore.

The other interesting thing about this is, right today, at this very minute, in the heavenlies on the throne room of God sits a man. A man is sitting there. The Lord Jesus Christ. A human being just like you and me. He's king. He's ruler. He's totally satisfied his father. Totally. And he's a man and he will be a man for all eternity. And that man will be the one through whom God manifests his glory forever.

And you too. So the position that we have, our identification with Christ, places us above angels. Verne said one Sunday, it just was really cool, he said, the angels learn about the character of God from us, because we know Him better than they do. See that? We do, because we share the life.

So the righteousness that affects all men, the one righteous act affects all men. Now, it doesn't mean that all men are saved, does it? But it does have an effect on all men. What's the effect? If all men acted in Adam's sin, and obviously there's an effect there, because all men die. So what about the the righteous act, what happens to that now? How does that affect all men?

Life. What's that? Life. But all men don't have life. But they could have. That's it. The opportunities there. In other words, the one righteous act, the one for the many, and that's the similarity, one acts for the many, even though it doesn't manifest itself in all men, it's available. It comes to them. It's available to all men. Do you see that? So his act wasn't restricted.

Those who believe in limited atonement, meaning that Christ died only for the saved, he didn't die for the unsaved, this verse proves them wrong, because the work of Christ accrues, or the opportunity for justification goes to all men. So that one act applies to all men, but it's up to men to take advantage of it by faith. Could be, sure.

Put it this way, the free gift that was accomplished at the cross from the cross goes out to every man and he can take the gift if he wants or not. The problem with Adam was that because all men were in Adam when he sinned, all of the results of that Adam's sin accrued to all men. Now that they're in Adam, another man comes and accomplishes a righteous act, but all men are not in Him when He does this. You see that? So it doesn't automatically go to every man.

It goes out to Him, and He can by faith receive it, and when He receives it, He's placed in Christ. Now He's in, and so all that's true of Christ is now true of Him. You see the difference? In what sense are we then the righteousness of God in Christ?

1 Corinthians 1.30, But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who was made unto us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.

Galatians 2.20 and 21, you know those verses. And we've had this discussion on Tuesday several times in the last month. What's the difference between I'll read the verse and see if you're smarter than those guys on Tuesday. You probably are. There are some pretty dumb guys in there.

In Galatians chapter 3 verse 6, even as Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness, So here's the question. Is that exactly the same thing as we have been made the righteousness of God in Christ? Does Abraham have the same righteousness you and I have?

No. And if you say no, why? You ought to know this in my class. If you say yes or no, you're going to have to explain yourself. That's the right answer. Tell me why. It's kind of floating around up here. Okay. Abraham is... Our pal Abraham lived in Ur of the Chaldees. He was an idol worshipper, a big-time sinner. And God came to him and said, Hey, I'm going to do all...

Abraham, I'm going to do all this stuff through you. I'm going to do it. You don't have to do anything. I've just picked you, and so I'm going to bless all nations through you. I'm going to give you land, make you a great nation. and I'm going to do this." And Abraham said, OK, I believe you. God counted him righteous. Abraham, you're righteous before me. So what's the difference between that and you and me? He did it, we didn't. Say that again? Abraham did the righteousness, we didn't. Abraham doing the righteousness meant that he believed God. He just believed, that's all he did.

You and I, we believe in the person and work of Christ, right? So does God say to, okay Norm, I count you righteous? I'm going to impute righteousness. Because we are in Christ. It says we have the righteousness of God in Christ. It doesn't say, God accounted you righteous. The difference? God has a righteousness that's unique, not unique, but that's him. He is eternally righteous, and all of his acts are righteous. That's what you have. Do you see the difference?

Are you saying that it's an attribute rather than a standard? Oh, that's cool. Don't you think? An attribute rather than... Yeah, I would say so. Because you're in Christ, it's an attribute of who you are. rather than an accounting, although it is an accounting. And both Abraham and you acquired righteousness the same way. How did you get it? By faith. By faith, sure. That's how you do it.

So are we in a better situation than Abraham? Yeah, and I'll tell you why. If I say yes, I have to explain myself. Is it better for a creature, a human being, to be... I'll make it simple. Would you be better off being a godly Jew, a saintly Jew, or a member of the body of Christ?

And the reason is, is why? Because you share the very life of the resurrected Christ. Put it this way. You're now family. Jews aren't family. See that? So then why wouldn't Abraham be a saved sinner? He is. He is a safe sinner. But life has been communicated to him for all eternity, and he's a saint. He's been set apart.

And I think when the Millennial Kingdom starts and the promises of Ezekiel end up being part of what the Jewish nation is, I don't know what God's going to do with their sin natures. Hal thinks that they're included in the identification of the cross, the death part of it, but they're not resurrected in Christ, I don't think. They're not members of the body of Christ. Stanford talks about the Sermon on the Mount and Jesus' instructions to the Kingdom Jews.

So is that Abraham is going to be this kingdom through this millennium ruler? But we're going to be in the heavenlies? In the millennial kingdom, there's going to be a whole group of people on the earth. That'd be the nation of Israel and then all these other people called Gentiles. Where are you going to be? Heaven. Where's Christ going to be? Ruling. From where? Earth. Where? What town? Aurora? Jerusalem. So where are you going to be? If he's ruling and reigning... He's going to be in the temple. Wherever He is, is where we're going to be. Now, we will rule and reign for that thousand years with Him, which means we'll be here, right?

But you'll be a totally identifiable member of the Bride of Christ. Creatures who are here, Jews and Gentiles alike, will look at you and know who you are. You're a member of the Body of Christ. And because you will always be in union with Him, like the Father was in heaven and Christ was on the earth, but they never were not one.

You can be in Castle Rock, and Christ can be in Jerusalem, and you'll never not be united to Him, and fully absorbed and orbed in Him. You'll be able to behold His glory from Castle Rock. What a thought, you know? But maybe not from Mount Bel-Alam. Aurora we're still working on. So the point is that you will be here ruling and reigning with him even though we all aren't going to jam into Jerusalem. You're not going to need any of the things that human beings on the earth need now. You won't need a place to stay. You won't need to eat. You won't need to sleep. No chickens.

So he was identified with our sins so that we might be identified with his righteousness. So what does it mean to be set down as a sinner? Condemnation, it not only means that you are in possession of a sinful nature that has sinful tendencies, but it also means that you're regarded as one who's committed sins. So God has said, okay, you're a sinner, not only by nature, but because you have, I'll put you over here. I'm setting you down as a sinner, okay?

It comes from, look at verse 19, 519 of Romans. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, you can also say many were set down as sinners. Some translations say that. I think Maxine Newell says that too. In other words, the emphasis is upon the effect here, whether in the case of Adam or in the case of Christ, because we're a product of the federal head acting apart from the actions of those affected.

In other words, when Adam sinned, we sinned in him. His actions meant that God now puts us in the box that says sinners. You see? We weren't made sinners, we're set down recognized as being sinners, not only because we have the nature, but because we've acted sinfully. Now, question seven, contrast obedience with disobedience. Verse 19, for as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall the many be made righteous. So obedience, our Lord's death is an act of obedience, right? Adam's sinfulness, his one sin, is an act of disobedience. So what does disobedience mean? What did Adam do? Adam disobeyed God.

What did that mean? How was he acting? Independent. Disagree. Disbelief. It means it's the essence of the refusal to hearken. You see that? It's the thing in man, and notice that Adam did this before he had a sin nature. He disobeyed God. You see that? Before he had the tendency to sin. So he had a tendency to sin before he had a tendency to hearken. exercised his will in a manner that refused to hearken to God. Obedience, then, would be the opposite of that, which would mean to bow the ear to submissive listening, or as we talk about around here, to listen under. Legal beagles love the word obedience. They love it because it makes them sound like, here's something I need to do.

But in the New Testament, our obedience is exactly like Christ's obedience, and if it means to listen under, how does it fit for you and I? As believers in Christ, if we're to live by faith, how do we obey that? Maybe that's the right question. Do nothing, but how would you describe obedience of faith? We're to live by faith. We have one requirement as believers, and that's to do what? We are to function moment by moment by faith. In other words, we are to listen under, to whatever God tells us, here.

Now here's the thing. Once you and I get past, in our study, get past Romans 6, then what you're going to find is that from then on, all of Paul's epistles have this incredible information about who you are in Christ. What are you supposed to do about that information? You're supposed to believe them. That's all you're supposed to do. Do you see that?

You're supposed to bow your ear and listen, and adhere to what is told you. The Lord Jesus became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. The Father said, if you will die, okay. He said, I will, and he obeyed. He listened under. He did the obedient act.

If we're identified with Christ, then it doesn't become as legal. That's right. Well, and what's interesting, even in the Galatian verse that I referred to, the reason Paul used Abraham as an example to make his case was that the Judaizers had come to the Galatians and said, yeah, this belief in Christ is a good thing, but if you really want to be saved, you need to be circumcised. and you need to do the Jewish song and dance. So Paul's rebuttal to that was, wait a minute, the father of the Jewish nation was accounted righteous because he believed God, not because he did anything, and not only that, the law was 430 years after that. So you and I are accounted righteous the same way, by believing God. But if the sons of God are to live by faith, that means moment by moment we're to live listening under God, then that's what he means. And that's the way the Lord Jesus lived. He never did anything of his own. He only did what his Father showed him. Let me quickly go through this. Only the first bell, right?

Was the law given to either the first Adam or the last Adam? Was the law given to the first Adam? Was the law given to the last Adam? to neither one. Who was it given to? Moses and the Jewish nation. Yeah, that people were dying. Adam had one law, but he didn't have the law. You see that? Okay, let's see if we can quickly cover verse 20. Moreover, the law entered that the offense might abound, but where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. The law came in alongside what? Because that's what it means. The law comes in alongside. It's outside, but it comes in alongside.

What? The sin nature, right? Why did it come in alongside the sin nature? What was the purpose? To reveal sin. Before there's a law, there isn't any category of sins. It condemns. Why? Because what does the law do to the sin nature? Sets it on fire. Take any of those kids in the nursery. put this can in front of them and tell them not to touch it, what will they do? They may not touch it, but you can see in their faces, now there's a desire to do it because they've been told not to. That's what the law does. It's like pouring gasoline on a campfire trying to put it out.

The other thing that the law did is that it took each individual act and it categorized it and it made a violation. Each little act was now a violation of some statute in the law, which condemned you every time. So what did law accomplish regarding sins? It made all lawbreakers guilty.

Because if men were dying from Adam to Moses, even though they didn't break a law, They're dying because they have a sin nature. Well, now that the law comes, now they're dying because they're sinning like Adam sinned. In other words, they're lawbreakers. So, if the law comes along and it makes sin abound, then verse 21 says that as sin reigned unto death... I'm sorry, back to 20.

But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. And these words, abound, for sin means that it bubbled up. But grace was a super-abounding thing. The point here is that God's grace, even though God gave the law and it caused sin to abound, that His grace is greater than the abounding sin nature. How does it superabound? It abounds beyond measure. It overflows. It's way over the top.

Now the last part, and I wish I saved more time for this, and we'll talk about it next time, that as sin has reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ. How does sin reign? It controls. Absolutely, as a monarch. Got you under the thumb. Sin reigns. And because it reigns over you, what's the outcome? Death. Now, listen to this.

The second part of that verse, that even so might grace reign through righteousness, unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." Have you ever thought about grace as a reigning principle? You think of it as a commodity, don't you? I get four gallons of it, six pounds, whatever. Grace is not a commodity. Grace is a reigning principle just like sin is a reigning principle. You see that?

In other words, I used to run my computer on Macintosh and now I've got Windows. Macintosh is the driving principle, it's the operating system. Now Windows is the operating system. SIN used to be the operating principle of all humanity. Now Grace is. Now can you imagine a society in which the overriding principle, the operating principle, the way that society functioned was Grace? That everybody functions that way?

Because it's the principle. What is a principle? It's a law, but it's not a statute. It's a principle that can be defined as the way a thing functions or operates. If I drop my glasses, they go to the floor. Why? The principle of gravity. We call it the law of gravity. The principle of sin functions and operates, condemns every man to death, and all men die. That's the principle. Do you know anybody who has escaped it? Are you sure your Uncle Louie didn't sort of... Go to Florida and never die? No. It's the principle. We, in Adam, all die.

Now, God is going to put in place, and has put in place, the principle of grace. And if you live under the principle of grace, then its attributes are what is going to be true of you. Do you see that? God's desire is that grace would be the reigning principle in the life of believers.

It will be in the future for all eternity, but he wants it to start now, for all of us. We'll talk more about that, because I don't think we as believers spend a lot of time thinking about grace as a reigning principle, that it rules over me. Imagine that. Let's see, how does that work? I get everything, I don't do anything, that's a reigning principle? I can go for that. The other buzzer rang?

Let's close. Dear Father, how we thank you for your word and how we thank you for our identification and our position in your dear Son in which we will actually spend the rest of eternity learning of your grace. We thank you and we pray in his name. Amen.