Joshua and Judges: The doctrine of leadership part 41 - Essential qualities of leadership: The filling of the Spirit; Rom 5:12- 6:13.

Title: Joshua and Judges: The doctrine of leadership part 41 - Essential qualities of leadership: The filling of the Spirit; ROM 5:12- 6:13.

 

Announcementsopening prayer:  

 

 

ROM 6:1 What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace might increase?

 

This question arises constantly, both in uninstructed believers, and in blind unbelievers. The message of simple grace, apart from all works, to the poor natural heart of man seems wholly inconsistent and impossible. "Why!" people say, "if where sin abounds grace overflows, then the more sin, the more grace." So the unbeliever rejects the grace of God. Moreover, the uninstructed Christian also is afraid; for he says, "If we are in a reign of pure grace, what will control our conscious evil tendencies? We fear such utter freedom. Put us under rules for holy living. and we can get along." [Newell from his commentary on Romans]

 

Of course, some see abounding grace as giving liberty to do the things that they know are wrong.

 

ROM 6:2 May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?

 

It is impossible to carry on the same relationship with the sinful nature that we did as unbelievers. Not the repeated declarations in this sixth chapter of our actual identification with the death of Christ:

 

6:2 We who died to sin

6:3 We were baptized into His death

6:4 We were buried with Him through baptism unto death

6:5 We became united with Him in the likeness of His death

6:6 Our old man was crucified with Him

 

6:7 He that has died is justified from sin

6:8 We died with Christ

6:11 Reckon yourselves dead unto sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus

6:13 Present yourselves unto God as alive from the dead

 

ROM 6:3 Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?

 

ROM 6:4 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

 

Walking presupposes the possession of life. It is life itself and not just a manner of living. We are not pretending and acting in the manner of life as a child might pretend to be an adult. We are this life. Resurrection life was never known until Christ was raised from the dead. Lazarus and Jairus' daughter were brought back into this present earth-life, but Christ's resurrection was not so. He was the first-born from the dead, the first-fruits of them that slept. He has a heavenly, human body.

 

ROM 6:5 For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection,

 

ROM 6:6 knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin;

 

"Perhaps no more difficult task, no task requiring such constant vigilant attention, is assigned by God to the believer. It is a stupendous thing, this matter of taking note of and keeping in mind what goes so completely against consciousness, - that our old man was crucified. These words are addressed to faith, and to faith only. Emotions, feelings, deny them. To reason, they are foolishness. But ah, what stormy seas has faith walked over! What mountains has faith cast into the sea! How many impossible things has faith done! [Newell]

 

The crucifixion is a historical reality. The worlds have been formed by God out of nothing. To reason these things are impossible to understand and yet we believe them fully. Your crucifixion with Christ must be believed just as fully. And by this faith we conclude that understand that we are so incredibly bad that we deserve crucifixion as a just sentence, yet Christ took our place. Our penalty is paid. We are fully justified.

 

The legalist sets you at crucifying yourself. They say you must "die out" to this and that. But God says that our old man has already been dealt with. There could be nothing left to do to it. The very words "with Him" means it was done back at Calvary and our task is to believe the good news, period.

 

Difficulty there will be, no doubt, in taking and maintaining constantly this attitude: but faith will remove the difficulty, and faith here will grow out of assiduous, constant attention to God's exact statements of fact. We may be impelled to cry to God to increase our faith, but He will only repeat the same thing to you and in the same factual way. Either this was done by Christ or it wasn't and the Spirit will bear witness with your Spirit that it is indeed the case. Upon this water God commands us to step out and walk. Satan's great device is to drive earnest souls back to beseeching God for what God says has already been done.

 

ROM 6:7 for he who has died is freed from sin.

 

We should have no more dejection and self-condemnation when we see our old selves; for we have been declared righteous from that old state of being, as well as from what we had done. Very excellent and godly men, not recognizing this blessed fact, have spent much time before God "bemoaning the sinfulness" of their now revealed old nature. But this was really not to recognize the word of God that we have been justified, declared righteous, from the old state of being, from sin itself. If Gabriel were to stand before you right now, you should stand tall in front of him as one who is in Christ, higher in position even than he. The presence of sin in the flesh has no more power to trouble your conscience, than have your sins: for both were dealt with at the cross. Your old man was crucified, sin in the flesh was condemned at the cross. We have become children of God and fellow heirs with Christ. This work and transformation has been done. It is for this reason that Paul could be caught up into the third heaven, into Paradise, and hear unspeakable words and not tarnish or blemish heaven one bit. This would be true of any believer.

 

ROM 6:8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him,

 

ROM 6:9 knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him.

 

ROM 6:10 For the death that He died, He died to sin, once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.

 

ROM 6:11 Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

 

In verse eleven we come to the real application of faith to everything that has been taught in this passage.

 

"Even so" is the Greek word houtos and it refers to what precedes it. It says in essence, "Now that these things have been settled, then or likewise or even so…"

 

Now that we have come to understand what Christ did to your old Adamic nature and the reign of sin and death have been destroyed and now the monarch of your life is forever abundant grace, righteousness, and eternal life by your position in Christ, and that you are now identified with Christ in His death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and session, and that you are alive with Him forever, likewise or even so, consider…

 

"consider" - logi,zomai [logizomai] = reckon, count, compute, calculate.

 

I am to count myself dead to the sin nature and alive to God in my position in Christ. Considering myself alive would make for a condition of life that is the justified life, and my position in Christ is the reality of the creature that I am that has only this as its purpose.

 

A good analogy is of a man who has been a beggar for all of his life. He born from beggars and he never was able to leave his position. Yet it turns out that he is the only surviving family member of an Texas oil tycoon who has recently died and had no children. No one knows, much less himself, that the beggar is the heir to many millions of dollars. The lawyer of the deceased tycoon finds this man through much research and then travels to go and find this man in person. The man is elected, but he just doesn't know it yet. The lawyer finally finds him and tells him of his fortune, and the man receives the news with abundant joy. The lawyer then tells the man that he will help him to store the money properly, use it properly, invest it wisely, and to use it responsibly and not wastefully. The beggar, now a millionaire, has the choice to learn how to handle his new assets from someone who knows how to do so expertly, or he can reject the instruction and take his own chances. A lot of people have been destroyed by wealth just as by poverty. The beggar decides to learn from the lawyer and so his new life begins, but first with a simple shower, shave, haircut and some decent new clothes. He then spends years learning how to expertly handle wealth. He doesn't run off in license and just buy up every shiny thing he sees. He buys a sensible but beautiful home and he invests not only in his own personal growth but in the lives of others. Over many years he changes to the point where his closest friends on the street would never recognize him. In fact it took him quite some time to stop looking at himself as a beggar and to see himself as an upstanding, clean, responsible, great financier. If one of these friends ran into him a week or so after his life change he would have recognized him easily, but through the years of growth and wisdom and understanding, he looks so different and acts so different that recognition is impossible. The believer begins his new life with the same amount of incredible assets from the Lord, but it is only with time that he learns how to understand them and invest them, and all the while he changes, or is transformed so that he may, with his very life, prove the will of God. It will take a certain amount of time for ROM 5:12-6:10 to sink in and through faith be understood and seen as a fore gone reality. How much time this takes, I believe, is different with each believer. And when he does understand he will reckon or consider himself absolutely dead to the sinful nature and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

 

The beggar could choose to remain a beggar though he is a millionaire. He may be so used to the lifestyle that he doesn't desire anything else. In other words, he fears anything else. He may choose to draw on the money and just go out and spend it all as fast as he can on anything he can. He may run to very sinful things or things that pump up his ego. That is only a different manifestation of the flesh. He may even by frightened by the money and choose to ignore it for that reason, not knowing that it can be used for immense good to others and to himself. There are all kinds of false ways that he can go just like the believer can from the plan of God. Yet the word of God has all the instruction and the believer has a pastor and more importantly the Holy Spirit to teach him. Every believer has been given all things in Christ, but they may choose to not joyfully avail themselves of the riches or live in the power and possession of their wealth.

 

1JO 2:15-16

Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.

 

ROM 6:10 For the death that He died, He died to sin, once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.

 

ROM 6:11 Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

 

Our relationship to the sinful nature is precisely the same as Christ's. He was crucified for it and it is crucified in us. To us the sinful nature is dead and God no longer looks upon our sins or iniquities. Why does the adult stop doing childish things? He is no longer a child. When we seize this passage by faith, the sin nature can no longer be king in our mortal bodies or make us yield to its passions.

 

ROM 6:12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey its lusts,

 

Lust is an inordinate desire for something and it exists in many categories.

 

It is obvious from the command that the sin nature can reign, and not because it actually occupies the throne, but that we can submit to it even though it is in exile. The carnal believer who lets the sin nature reign in his body rejects his true Sovereign and submits to the dead, exiled, old sovereign. It's a waste of time and just plain stupid.

 

We all are either struggling greatly with sin by submitting to the sinful nature or we have greatly struggled and found increased victory over it. Either way, the important matter that is brought to us by God is our relationship to the sinful nature. If it is getting the best of me, do I maintain an attitude that it will not reign, or do I say to myself in apathy, it doesn't matter whether it does or not?

 

I have known believers to have pet areas of sin that they maintain is justified. It means that these areas are allowed by them. They attempt to calm their conscience by claiming it is their weakness and it is not reasonable that such a thing could be overcome. They twist passages out of context and self-justify their committal to these areas while they claim that they are quite righteous in other areas of their lives. The spiritual life is not a tennis match between the two natures with the hope that the divine nature scores at least one more point than the sinful nature. One nature is dead and the other is alive. The life is a justified life or a justification of life. Would we presume to think that God has justified a pet area of sin? Or in other words, that God justly condones an area of sin in our lives? God makes clear that He does not call us to sinlessness, but He is also abundantly clear that He does not condone any sin. We will fail more often in our areas of weakness and we will struggle more in these areas, but are we to conclude that the spiritual life is sufficient for some areas of life and not for others?  

 

Considering or counting yourself as dead to the sin nature and alive to Christ, a deep seated conviction and reality, now leads to verse 13.

 

ROM 6:13 and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.

 

"present" - pari,sthmi [paristemi] = to present, to put at one's disposal. The first use is present tense = stop putting your members at the disposal of your sin nature (quenching the HS).

 

There obviously was in some a constant and abiding experience of sinfulness. It is no use asking how many sins comprise a constant experience, for that is only looking to ritualize the situation or to give yourself a sin limit per day as if this is like a low calorie diet. The issue is your will; your free will.

 

Quenching the Spirit may be simply defined as being unyielded to Him, or saying, "No." The issue is, therefore, the question of willingness to do His will.