Knowing and Growing – Who were we - Who are we - Who are we becoming - Part III

We're in part of our series here, Knowing and Growing, beginning this preface to what God is doing in the life of the believer, so the processes and progress of the believer. And so we're in part three, next week is part four, of who we were, who are we, and who we are becoming. So, who we were, meaning who were we before we were saved, who we are now that we are saved, and who we are becoming. This focuses on who we are or who we were in today's lesson.

So, and we talk about the identification truths often at Holly Hills, and that's a good thing. A lot of churches, they have no idea what it even is. You say identification truths, they go, huh? And so anyway, some of the key points, just to summarize it for the unbeliever is in Adam. All human beings are conceived and born in Adam. That is, they are positionally in Adam and identified with him. so that all unbelievers have Adam as the spiritual head of the race of fallen mankind. This is the fit position of each unbeliever. Can an unbeliever do anything to get out of being an Adam? Believe.

That's it. That's really the only choice, right? There isn't a plan B, or you've got three different options. It's not like that. We live in a generally capitalist society where we a lot of times get our options and choices. I've talked to people from behind what was the Iron Curtain and they said they were overwhelmed by the options and choices that we have at the stores and the supermarkets and things like that because they just don't get those, right? You get your brand of soap that you buy for your laundry, and that's the soap you get. Whereas here, we've got all kinds of different brands and advertisements trying to get you to choose this one over that one, right? Sometimes that would be easier. Right. But for those in Atom, do they have different choices, different options? No. And what happens is people present things to them, oh, this will fix it.

Oh, no, it won't. There isn't any way to get out of Adam except believing. The really good thing is the same goes for the believers. You can't do anything to get out. Ah, okay. The same goes for the believers once you believe there is no exit door. Not that you would walk.

Well, what's very interesting, our son Ed went through a rebellious period in his late teens And he said, do you mean to tell me that now that, you know, once I believed, I can't unbelieve? He said, yep, you can unbelieve if you want, but it won't make any difference.

You're still saved. And he got really ticked about it. And of course, he finally got this resolved. I think it was one of these teenage rebellion things that where they haven't got it all figured out. So it eventually changed and he wrote me a letter. He thanked me for raising him as a believer.

Which is a nice reversal. You're doing a comparison and contrast here in Adam and in Christ. In Christ, you didn't put down permanent position, whereas in Adam, you had spaced position. So if you look at this, that would be something that you would put in there. The unbelievers in Adam permanently accept for belief. The person who believes is permanently in Good point. All those who were conceived and born in Adam, once having believed the gospel of salvation, are placed into Christ permanently.

They are, from that time forward in Christ, by God's doing, as 1 Corinthians 1.30, here's the believers in Corinth, they've got all sorts of problems. He starts off the chapter by telling them you're sanctified in the perfect tense.

He tells them in 1 Corinthians 1.30, later in the same chapter, he says by God's doing you're in Christ Jesus. And I'm sure he's thinking, and that's a good thing, because if it was up to you, you guys would be all over the place, right?

All those in Christ share His spiritual history, and the consequences of that history, and are identified with Him. And when we say His spiritual history, is that universally His spiritual history? That is, are we identified with Christ and His birth in Bethlehem?

No, no, and so that's a clarification point. We make that further on, but just from the outset. When we talk about sharing a spiritual history with Christ, it is only in those five things, death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and seething. And let's think about that.

Can you drop one out? No, you can't drop one out. Can you scramble them? Can you mix the order? And so the thing about every single one of those five is essential. And the order is also essential. You can't drop one out and end up with the same thing. You cannot mix the order and end up with the same thing. But it is only those five, in that order, all five.

So that's key for us to understand when we talk about identification truths, this is not just something that Holly Hills came up with. This is something that Scripture spells out. It's just people fail to observe it quite often. People fail to observe it, but all five of those things are spiritual history. All five are essential, not optional. All five must be in that order. The order matters. All five matter. And you don't get the same thing if you drop one out or if you switch the order around on anything. We have a supplement here that we won't have enough time to go over, but I do want to draw to your attention because it's huge. The supplement here on the back, should be on most of you's there.

The Believer's Unfathomable Riches in Christ. Now that's to put it succinctly, in fact being in Christ is a part of those riches, right? So it's a simplification to put it that way. It's a four-page supplement, and we could spend a whole year on it. And so here I am giving it to you as a supplement one Sunday.

But it is key, all of these things, these are the position and possessions of the believer. By the way, that's another thing that gets frequently thrown into the same dumpers, is everything gets put into position, The reality is some of them are possessions related to our position. Yes? Is this similar to Schaeffer's 33? This is exactly where it comes from. And so what we have at the end, here's the story, okay? Schaeffer was around, and when he was around, he died August 22nd in 1952.

When he was around, he wrote his Systematic Theology. And it's not the Bible, it's not perfect, but one of the things he did was to summarize and give some description of these things that we have here as the believers' unfathomable riches in Christ. And so he put that together and detailed things in some degree.

Another fellow, whose name is Hampton Keithley III, Hampton Keithley III, who very curiously, both Mike and I had a relationship with him before I came to Holly Hills. Isn't that interesting? So Hampton Keithley, he's home with the Lord now, He put this together and took Schaefer's statements and boiled it down, shorter, and then Nancy and I wrote to him, that was one of the reasons for contacting him, wrote to him and got permission to boil it down further.

So what you have is the very boiled down version. instead of quoting every verse and explaining each one. Very boiled down, so you'd have to look each verse up and follow through. But at least you have it in some succinct form, so it doesn't look quite as overwhelming. But the thing is, as you look at this, this is really critical.

It's the believer's unfathomable riches in Christ. So does the unbeliever have any of these? No. The unbeliever doesn't have them. And so they're not true of the unbeliever, and can the unbeliever do anything to gain any of these? No. The unbeliever can't do anything to gain any of these except for what?

Belief. That's it. Just like what I said before, that's the only exit for the unbeliever from the condition of these. We'll look in more detail what that is next time. And it's the only entrance, believing is the only entrance into all these things that we have here, what the believer has in Christ. Yes? So these are the things that Paul is referring to in the epistle of Ephesians, right? Ephesians is one of the places, as you look through this, what the believer has in Christ, if you look through that document, which Nancy boiled it down to three and a half pages, I think, Ephesians is listed a number of times, but it's not the only thing that's listed.

And it was kind of a general statement that he made. He didn't list them. He just referred to the many blessings that you have in Christ. Well, and the way it was done initially, Schaeffer actually had lots more detail. He quoted the passages and had descriptions. Hampton Keighley boiled that down to something smaller than Nancy and I got permission to boil it down to something smaller still.

And so Schaeffer's book is a systematic theology? It's a systematic theology. It's available in print. It's printed at least in the past by Dallas Seminary. It was available in print and in some of your Bible study programs they have it available electronically if a person has wanted that. I've been trying to get a hold of it as a PDF file or Adobe Acrobat file and haven't been able to do so, so far.

Because I like to keep things in that format instead of tucked away in some specific program. Okay, so we have those, like I said, those are just fantastic things because it gives people a sense of these are all the things that were true of me from the time that I believed, right? From the moment I believed.

But how many people know about those things at the moment they believe? Just about zero, right? And the truth is we spend the rest of our lives catching up to all the things that are in that list. And in fact, many believers never even learn about them.

But when we talk about growing, when we talk about sanctification as a process, when we talk about are being conformed and transformed and all those things, it is much better for us to understand these things and to realize we're growing into them, we're being changed into these things over time.

Next week we'll take a look at what part of us is being changed into them and what part is not. Because we will make statements about, oh, this guy is growing spiritually, or that guy is growing, you know. And, well, what part of him is growing? Because there are actually parts that are changing and parts that are not. So we will take a look at that next time. So one of the things here, so we have deeper in and farther along, in the middle of page one.

Identification is a principle taught in scripture principally to believers in the body of Christ. Identification is explained most fully by the Apostle Paul, but evidenced in the writings of John and Peter, as well as other authors of scripture. Now, I make the statement, it's explained most fully by the Apostle Paul, evidenced in the writings of John and Peter, as well as other authors. And most of the identification truths are focused on us in the church, not exclusively.

And we find out that all unbelievers, Jew, Gentile, doesn't matter, all unbelievers are in Adam. They're positionally in Adam and everything about Adam's history, Adam's ownership, Adam's relationships to God and to man and to the physical world, everything about Adam is true of the unbeliever. Then, when a person believes, then we have all those things that are only really spelled out in the New Testament, and not all of it. In John it's chapter 15 and chapter 17 that talks about the identification truths. For the most part, most of the rest of the Gospels don't address that. What does the Bible say about the unbeliever who's an Adam? Yeah, it doesn't say, frankly, as much as it does for us who are believers.

Interesting. But here's an interesting, dead in his sins, we get that out of Ephesians 2, verses 1-3. In John 8, 24, Jesus tells the unbelieving Jewish leaders, if you do not believe, you will die in your sins, plural. So what does that mean? What is the unbeliever's relationship to sins? He's in them. Not just in sin, but in the sins that they execute. This is big. Because what does that say? He's giving them a warning. You're going to die in your sins and that's not a good situation to die in.

Because what happens is an unbeliever is judged based on those sins that they are in, spiritually in, for eternity. If I as a believer, who am in Christ, I'm not in my sins anymore am I? I am in Christ and in His righteousness. Why? Because a part of what that means is my sins have been taken care of by Him, because I'm in Him. Instead of those same sins, I've got to pay for them, since I didn't accept Christ's payment for them. I've got to pay for them. Why? Because I'm in them. Positionally in them.

You can't. Pardon? But you can't. The problem is you can't pay for it here, right? There's no way to do it, so what are you going to do? You're going to pay for it forever, for eternity. And that's a part of, in other words, the reason you're there is that your name is not in the Book of Life, but once having headed there, the other reason you're there is you've got to make payment instead because you didn't accept Christ's payment. Okay, so now what we have here, We have here blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, in Christ, just as he chose us in him.

There are brief examples of the identification truths applying to other believers and unbelievers, both. But most of the identification truths are focused on what is true of Christian believers. And that's kind of redundant, but the bottom line is there isn't anybody who's a Christian unbeliever, is there? But for example, the Jews from the time of the Exodus, who were they in?

Moses. That's 1 Corinthians chapter 10. There are several verses there. I'll tell you exactly that. Paul explains that when they went through the water and under the cloud, they were baptized into Moses. So they were baptized into Moses, are we baptized into Moses? No. Alright, and so does the law apply to us? No. No, because why? We weren't baptized into Moses. And it never did. No, and we never did.

And our baptism into Christ separates us from the law. So it's very clear when we understand identification and baptism. If you look at the bottom of page one, we've got the words that are used for identification. It becomes very clear, and by the way this is huge because a great deal of Christendom is still really confused and messed up about the law.

Oh, we've got to take parts and pieces of it, we've got to take this one and tweak that one, and we've got to take the ten and we've got to tweak one of them where you've got the Sabbath, because that's no good, except some of them think, well, you've still got to have the Sabbath, right? So you've got Seventh-day Adventists, and by the way, there's Seventh-day Baptists. their congregation, the closest ones in Boulder, Seventh-day Baptists. Why? Because they're still locked in on the Ten Commandments, and especially that one that tells them you get the seventh day, you've got to keep it holy.

Instead of recognizing, wait a minute, when did Christ die on the cross for us? Give me the whole list. So really huge difference, really huge difference. So we have, let's go over the words here, in, being placed entirely in, so as to share an identity.

Okay, I wasn't straddled into Christ. You know, how about 60% in Christ, right? You don't find that anywhere in the New Testament. I'm not working to get myself into Christ. I'm not, there's no grace scale. There's no Venn diagram. Here's the part where I'm in Christ, and here's the part... No. This is the whole thing. A Venn diagram only if you have one circle entirely inside another, right?

So, so, but there's no splitting, there's no grayscale, there's no my effort. By who's doing am I in Christ Jesus? It's by God's doing. 1st Corinthians 1.30. I'm in Christ Jesus, that's it. So by his doing, all I did was what? One thing. Believe. I believe. That's it. God takes it from there.

So then we have in, we also have with, and the Greek word, you'll find it separately or as a prefix in the New Testament, is sun. It looks like sun, but it's sun. So this is WITH or TOGETHER WITH is usually how it's translated. And that's the next one, TOGETHER WITH as above, but TOGETHER underscoring the same identity and action. So IN WITH, TOGETHER WITH, and then another one UNITED WITH.

The King James in Romans 6 has the word PLANTED. That's actually not a very good translation. As a matter of fact, it was based on an improper understanding of the Greek. Even the New King James Version corrects that in Romans chapter 6. The word planted is not there because it's united with. That's what it means, not planted.

And then finally, baptized into. Baptized means to be immersed or entirely placed into so as to be permanently changed by that immersion or entire placement. By the way, that's the primary definition. Once in a great while you can find the word baptized used differently. So if somebody makes an absolute statement, just remember, but it's only in context.

For example, what did the Jews used to do before meal? They do a ceremonial washing, right? And they were surprised Jesus didn't do that, and the word for that ceremonial washing is a baptism, right? And that didn't mean they immersed their hands in the water, because the Jews said that it had to be poured over your hands. So anyway, if somebody says that word means immersion, and they start arguing, you say, well, be careful. Context, context, context, right?

Okay. But those five words are key. Concerning united with, one way to translate abide is vitally united to. Is that similar or the same? Yeah, that would be an expression with more words. And that's where we use expanded and explained. I'm talking about John 15. Right, I know what you're talking about.

Instead of just the word abide Because what does that mean? I can say where do you abide and that means where do you live, right? It's even more than that. Nancy and I, in order to come here, we left our abode, our house, where we live, but we don't live there all the time. What Jesus meant You lived there all the time, right? Abiding was full-time, all-the-time living, not just a, that's our home base and we occasionally run other places.

So it's a state. Yes. Your state is abiding. It is given as a, you know, your condition must be, because it's an imperative, your condition must be in a state of intimacy and constant dependence, which is an act of will, which by the way, branches don't do that, right? Branches don't make a choice. You don't see them, yeah, they'll go up by today. Yeah, but not tomorrow. Tomorrow I'll take a break. They don't do that, do they?

Another way to translate that is remain. Yes, and so what will happen is translations are typically shortened and what the translators are told to do is to pick an equivalent word. But keep it short. Don't multiply words. And so they'll pick one, and so the difference between one translation and the next is often simply a matter of which word did I pick. If that word does not explain all the nuances, then you can have, like, people will go and compare three, four, five different translations, and that may not get the whole idea across even then, because the translators are picking one word, because that's what they're told. You can't go and put in ten words, whereas I'll go in and say, you know, abide in me, and okay, that means this and this and this and this and this, right?

And Jesus will use a perfect tense, and so I'll say that's a completed past action with ongoing results on in the future implying permanence. And the translator would get shot for doing that. But anyway, these five words, look for them as you're going through the New Testament. These are the key words that, taken together, are the way identification is expressed. Let's take a look at the top of page two. A key point there is death is separation. This, by the way, has also been a dividing point among those of the reformed camp.

Because instead of taking death as separation, and I can remember this even from seminary, because they taught Calvinism, the reform camp will see not death as separation, but death as lying out on a slab, cold, dead, unable to respond. So death is seen as inability to respond. which is where they then come up with the, you know, you have to be first regenerated and then you get given the gift of faith and all those things. So they start into a whole sequence based on defining death law. And so that death as separation is a key starting point and we give several scripture passages there to reinforce that death as separation not termination, annihilation, cessation, unable to respond. That's not the focal point of what scripture brings out as the definition of death, but rather death as separation. And the key point is right in the middle of page 2. The key biblical principles can be summarized, identification joins us Death separates us. Identification with a death joins us in that death so as to separate.

Romans 7 verses 1 through 6, it gives the example of a husband and wife and a death in there and it says at the end of that passage you've been joined to Christ. You've been joined to Christ and that starts off with a death. Because you've been identified with Christ in his death. So it starts off, but that death, is that the end of you?

No. The death is so you can then be identified with him in his burial, that certifies that the death was for real, and then his resurrection, right? And it's that resurrection, we said every single one is essential. What if I took the five identification clues and I said, well, the resurrection part isn't so important. That would be the end of it. Yeah. Bottom line, you wrecked the whole thing. You wrecked the whole thing. It's like telling somebody, well, you can do without one of your tires. Good luck on the freeway.

But you have then the identification truths and the key point there that comes out of starting in Romans 7.4, but also other passages in Romans and Galatians.

In Adam, before faith in Christ, you are separated from Christ. A death of separation, right? Joined to the sin nature. Because remember, in dying you will surely die. That's what God told Adam, right? So, key point. That death is a death of separation. You're separated from Christ in Adam. You're joined to the sin nature, principle of law in the world. Yes? Did that mean there was going to be two deaths? In other words, Adam was spiritually separated, but he was also physically going to die. So if he wouldn't have eaten of that tree, would he have lived physically forever? Or would he have died?

Well, let's think about this. Let's think about this. You asked a very good question. We could take the whole time on it, but we won't. So anyway, so here you have it. Here's Adam. God told him, literally speaking, where it's translated, you will surely die. It actually means, this is one of those things where they take a Hebrew expression. It literally means, you're going to die, die. A double death. Just like in Isaiah, it says, we translate it, perfect peace. You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind has stayed on you. It's peace, peace. So what you have is you're going to have death, death. You're going to die, die. Second death is a lake of fire. Yeah, you're going to die, die. What God was telling me, you are really going to die.

Just like peace, peace is perfect peace. You're going to die perfectly. It's emphatic. It's a Hebrew double emphatic. You're going to die, die. And so the translator said, OK, I'll carry that across. That's a little weird. But it's a Hebrew expression. You're going to die, die.

And so here in Adam, before faith in Christ, you were separated from Christ, joined to the sin nature. By the way, did Adam have a sin nature when he was in the garden before God said, don't eat of this? No, he didn't. The sin nature was generated and therefore passed along to others when he ate of the tree that he should not have. At that point, what did Adam know about physical death? Here's what's interesting. God could give him this, Adam, don't eat of that or you're going to die, die.

And while he had not experienced it, and think about this, Adam was created with the ability to have language, right? And that language both had basic definitions, as well as, here's the animals, what did God tell him to do with the animals? So language was given to him as a basic thing, as a part of his creation, He could add and build upon that language, but for God to have told him, you're going to die, die, he had to have had connections that God gave him for him to understand what that meant. Otherwise, you'd think, how does he know what death is?

Here God says, you're going to die, die. Whoa, that's heavy duty. And he would not have any idea except that God built that into him, just like the rest of the language that God used with him. Okay, so it says in Romans that the earth also came under sin.

So what Pat asked, was there any kind of death prior to the fall of Adam? I mean, did trees die? Did animals die? Did anything die? Did he have any kind of death? Here's what's interesting. As you examine that, we're not given everything we might want to know. But here's a for instance. What was Adam allowed to eat? Fruit. Seeds.

He could eat of the plants, right? So do the plant cells die when he eats them? No. They change, but they don't die. So what's interesting is that on the plant side, it would be something like death, But there was also a certain amount of life in the plants that we don't have now, right? So real interesting. So that's about the closest you can look at and say, well, there must be something like death there, even if it isn't quite equivalent to what we have. We don't have a lot of revelation.

Or as you look at it, could you produce an entire encyclopedia about life before the fall? Yeah, you could, I mean, because you're talking about, here's this tree, and that one, and this plant, and that animal, and here's the hydrology of everything. Well, I mean, you could produce an entire encyclopedia of things before the fall, and what do we get?

Two chapters, right? Two chapters, that's all we get. So anyway, there's a lot that we don't know, the implication being that there is a death, but it somehow is not like the deaths that we see and experience and understand now. And certainly not on the animal side, right?

Okay, so we have this now in Christ, after faith in Christ, we are now joined to Christ, and now everything that we were joined to before, we're separated from, and everything we were separated from before, Christ, we're now joined to, right? So now everything is reversed. In Adam, we have these separated from Christ, joined to the sin nature, principle of law. In Christ, that all gets reversed, and it all gets reversed And what did we do in order for that to happen?

We believed. That's it. We believed. And God says, that's it. I'll do the rest and include it in everything else. Because remember, we got a three and a half page summary here of everything that is true of you once you're in Christ. So what we have here in this little chart is the short list.

But it does clearly and cleanly say, here we were separated from Christ and joined to the sin nature, the principle of law in the world, and now being in Christ, and all I did was believe, and that's it. God just said, okay, by God's doing you're in Christ Jesus, and it means you're joined to Christ, and it means you're separated from the sin nature, the principle of law in the world. Does the sin nature go away? No. Does the law go away? Does the world go away?

No. So those are not deaths of, they are deaths unto. Very important distinction. Yes, separated from, and what is separated from mean, and death unto, very important point. And by the way, that is why a great many of the folks of the Reformed camp and a lot of other parts of Christendom don't understand this because they misdefine death. That's where they miss it. And so therefore misinterpret a great deal of the Bible as a result of that one thing.

So we have been through the second death because we died with Christ. We died with Adam when we were born. Remember though, the second death is going into the lake of fire. right, but we died a second time in Christ. Okay, was that the second time or the first time? First. It was really the first time. It was first for us. Yeah, and so the biblical term is that's our first death, and then the second death, and this is specifically out of the book of Revelation, The second death is then going into the lake of fire. Yes? So, I may have asked this before, but I'm getting old and I can't remember.

The sin nature, is that Satan's nature? Because Jesus said the Pharisees, that their father was Satan. And when Adam died, did he become identified then with Satan and his nature? Here's what's interesting. While we get some indication of the relationship of Satan, the Bible doesn't call it Satan's nature per se. The closest we get to that is your father the devil, is what Jesus puts it.

And we get a fuller explanation of the relationship between the sin nature, the unbeliever, and this world in Ephesians 2, 1-3. In Ephesians 2, 1-3, we are dead in our sins, and dead into our sins means what? It means we are annihilated, wiped out, No. Dead in our sins means we are separated from God, from Christ, right? Separated from Christ, but we're in the sins, and as Jesus told the Jewish leaders, unless you believe you'll die in your sins, right? So Paul wrote in Ephesians 2, 1 through 3, you're going to die in your sins, and he used two different expressions.

One's Jewish and the other's Greek. He talked about we walk, that's a Jewish term, and that is step-by-step living out one's individual life according to a spiritual principle. So Enoch walked with God. That doesn't mean just that he had fellowship with God, although that's true. But he walked, he ordered his life step-by-step according to the spiritual principle that is based on his relationship with God. Noah walked with God.

But these walk, Ephesians 2, 1-3, according to another spiritual principle. And it talks about the nature, the sin nature, in that passage. But then the other word that gets used is the Jewish term, walk, but then the Greek term, interactive living, is what that Greek word means there. We lived interactive living.

So then it's not just how I walk according to God, but the interactions between us as human beings are subject to that being dead in sin, subject to being separated from God, and then give us this other insight, and that is Satan is the god of this world. That's the one we're under. Right, and if he's God of this world, then we can extrapolate and say that since we're identified with the world, we are identified with Satan as well, if you're in Adam.

Yeah, what's interesting, the Bible does not describe an identification with Satan in the same way. And here's one of the things that's really interesting. Is Satan opposite to God? So he's opposite but not equal. And so what we'll find is that there are things that we can say about God that are not just the opposite and true of Satan. And just test that real quickly. Is God omniscient? Does God know everything? Is Satan omniscient? Nope. God is all-powerful. Is Satan all-powerful?

No. And as a matter of fact, when it's time to bind Satan, Revelation chapter 20, how many angels does it take to bind him? One. And with one angel, he is bound with a chain, he is thrown into the abyss, not the lake of fire, with one angel, that's all it takes, just one. He's bound, he's thrown into the abyss, and the abyss is locked up and sealed. One angel, that's all it takes. Yep, that's it.

My brother didn't say one man, I wonder who that man was. And so by the way, why hasn't he thrown into the lake of fire at that point? Because he's going to be released. He's going to be released for a brief time at the end of the Immortal Kingdom, and at that point in time thrown into the lake of fire. So that's his future.

Okay, let's look at page three. There are four points there just to kind of summarize things. It says there are at least two areas of application, and actually I should have changed that to four. The primary manner of dealing with the sin nature comes about because we are identified with Christ. We are dead to the sin nature, present as a deposed monarch, attached to our human physical bodies and alive to God.

I say a deposed monarch because we can think of examples of deposed monarchs, those that have been around for a while. Ferdinand Marcos was a deposed monarch. Imelda, famous for all her shoes and everything else, was the wife of a deposed monarch, essentially.

Idi Amin, who was a horrible, cruel man, ruled in Uganda. Awful, horrible guy. But he was deposed, he made the political, military mistake of attacking Tanzania, and the Tanzanians just kicked his keister. And so he spent the rest of his days, died in 2003, in Saudi Arabia. But imagine somebody trying to, you know, one of these guys trying to regain control. Here's a deposed monarch essentially, Saddam Hussein. Until they caught him, he could go there and try to gain control even though he'd been ousted.

And that's what the sin nature does. The sin nature has no claim to its authority, but it keeps trying to grab hold of what it has no claim to. Okay, so we have that. Then, The spiritual changes take place in the believer as the believer reckons and considers himself dead to the sin nature and alive to God.

These changes, and that's what these processes are we're talking about, express being made into the character and qualities of Christ. Conformed, transformed, growing, maturing, being sanctified, those are terms we'll be looking at in the months ahead. These are the processes, this is the character of the progress that the believer made. These changes take place as we are walking consistent.

Remember, walking is a Jewish term, right? Step-by-step ordering one's life according to a principle. Consistent with who we have been made to be as our eternal identity, which takes place because Christ does the living in through us by faith in Him. Let's ask this question. Noah walked with God, right? Is that correct? That's what the Bible says. Genesis. Real clear.

Enoch walked with God. Did they walk with God because they were able to do that because they were in Christ? No. And so here's the thing that's really special and unique. These things that we'll be looking at here are things that are special and unique to us who are in the church, the body of Christ.

Even great men of God in the past As you look at it, they couldn't do these things. Even here's one, Jesus is at the Last Supper talking to his disciples, or just leaving. At the Last Supper, talking to his disciples, he says, And so bear much fruit, right? And bearing much fruit, you'll so prove to be my disciples.

Let me ask this. When he told them that, could they abide in him? Did they know what it meant? No. Isn't that amazing? He said, abide in me. They couldn't do it yet. This is really astounding stuff to ponder. We had a very unique place. Here's twelve disciples who would spend years right alongside Christ, and they'd say, abide in me, and they couldn't do it yet. It was not possible to abide in Christ when Jesus gave them those words. I believe that's one reason why John didn't write it until decades later. Probably about half a century later. Okay, so here we have this one.

Number three, the unbeliever who never believes dies in their sins in Adam. But once a person believes that Christ died for his sins, was buried and rose again, then all the things that are summarized in the accompanying Believers' Unfathomable Riches in Christ are true of each and every single one.

Ever run into somebody who once believed and says, I don't believe anymore? I would say God is the only one who really knows for sure, but I would say based on what they've previously claimed, that these things are true of them as they walk in unbelief.

Isn't that something? that believers really struggling with something. Ever know a believer who just chronically struggles with something? I mean there's all sorts of different things. People have all sorts of things that they can get hung up on chronically struggling with.

It's true of them. So here's the believers at He tells them right off, right after saying, Hi, I'm Paul, he says, you're sanctified. Perfect text. He writes them later in the chapter, by God's doing, you're in Christ Jesus. And then he goes and talks about all the chapter after chapter after chapter of horrible problems they have. Does that mean that they weren't sanctified at the beginning? No. Does it mean that they aren't by God's doing in Christ Jesus?

No. So someone who even says, I'm walking away, someone who by whatever floundering struggles for years with something, that does not mean that all these things that we have in our appendix here are not true of them. I'll put it in the positive. If they believed, these are all still true of them. even to their last day.

There are a lot of believers that would not They have to know about the five things to believe in, but they don't actually believe that that's what they have to believe. There is all sorts of misunderstanding, there is all sorts of ignorance, even among pastors. Pastors sitting there laying the law on people. I heard one pastor give a whole sermon.

If you're a good Christian, you'll do this. That's legal. That's legal. He says, if you're a good Christian, here's the law for you, right? That's not telling you, by God's doing, you're in Christ Jesus, and in Christ Jesus, you died, and Christ lives in you, and it's his life that gets it done.

It's not, if I'm a good Christian, I'll do this and that. If I'm a good Christian, I'll recognize I'm dead. If I'm a good Christian, I'll realize that it is only his life that's going to pull it off. And nothing else. God didn't intend any halfway, and as we'll talk about in the Maiden Service, He didn't intend us to try really hard to be like Christ.

Good luck with that. I'm a believer, but I believe in the law, and I follow the law. So does that mean that you don't have? Here's what happens. One of the reasons we go through all these things is because there are a great many believers, and I think they're eternally sane. who go around not trying to live out the Christian life biblically. I mean, fairly regularly, you know, I get out on the internet and I interact with people who are discouraged Christians, I interact with atheists and agnostics a lot.

But the bottom line is, they'll say, well, I tried Christianity and it didn't work for me. Well, probably because you didn't try it. Probably because what? Probably because you didn't try it. Because what happens is people try other things, but it's not biblical Christianity. You know, Randy, he tells me, he says, it wasn't until later that, you know, not when he was young, it wasn't until later that I understood abiding. What would a difference that would have made? Just abiding. Abiding in Christ.

Well, people try the law and it just doesn't work for them. Yeah. And so people say, I tried Christianity and it didn't work for me. Well, you probably didn't try Christianity. Right. You tried Islam or you tried, you know, some New Age thing or you tried, you know, my best effort instead of, I am crucified with Christ. It's no longer I who do the living, but Christ does the living in me. That's huge. The verse right before that is I died to the law. So Christianity is something actually rarely tried. OK, we're way out of time. And people have their nose pressed up against the glass and all sorts of horrible things. So we don't have really dirty glass between this room and the next, let's stop and pray.

Lord, we do thank You for Your Word. We thank You for just the immense, amazing, astounding truths that You've revealed. And You've done that because You love us so very, very much. And You do indeed want us to walk in fellowship with You and in dependence upon You, to abide in You. And we just pray as we go through the rest of this elective, just that you would teach us these things, not just in our head, but in our heart, that we might indeed know you and walk with you. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.