So we were grateful to get some rain last night. We got a lot of rain. It was raining cats and dogs this morning. I stepped in the poodle. So you guys, some of y'all are still half asleep. All right, let me sit you in here and start my timer. Well, good morning. So today, following up from our sermon from, I don't know, a month and a half ago on union with Christ, since this is going to be a series, I figured we would take a step back and consider who we are united to from conception, from birth. And then we will see our union with Christ as something altogether glorious and majestic. But we need to know where we came from, who we were. before we can truly glory in what we have been made and what we have become. So as we start this series on union with Christ, I think it's important that we understand our union and see what we're saved out of, what we're saved from. Today we will see who we are without Christ and who we were saved from. I really want us to grasp the essence of our radical union with Christ, Christ's solidarity with us. His union with us, the word solidarity, I wanted to spend time getting into that. But solidarity. It's unanimous, it's joined. The beauty of our union with Christ is beyond our ability to comprehend, as Rich said just a few moments ago about who God is. It's so hard for our minds to wrap around, to even get just little glimpses of who he is, much less hold on, hold on to these thoughts. But the ultimate goal of proper theology, and today the topic of federal headship is a deep topic. This is something that you don't hear preached very often or taught very often. These are deep truths, right, that theologians love to sit and write many, many pages about. But these are truths that I believe will impact the way we do evangelism, the way we view those around us who are lost, the way we think of ourselves, and the way that we reflect upon what we've been saved from. So the goal of proper theology is not just head knowledge, it's doxology, it's worship. So proper orthodoxy, right thinking, leads to orthopraxis, which is right living. So if we understand the truths of the Bible rightly, we will live in a certain way. And that leads to doxology, which is worship. Just like a diamond, as you look at it, every time you turn it, the facets, and you just marvel, you'll never comprehend every single facet on that. But every time you look at a different angle with a little different light, that diamond is just much more precious. In the same way, when we study theology, when we study doctrines like this, what we're doing is we're lifting God and his character and the way he's organized and orchestrated this world and our union in Adam or in Christ. And what we're doing is we're taking this diamond and we're just twisting it and looking and being wowed by the different colors and the beauty that we will never, this side of eternity and probably for all of eternity, we will be trying to comprehend God's vine. and why he did what he did, and how he did what he did, and yet we will be saying, you know, why me? Ultimately, that's what this message today should lead you to do, is to look up and say, God, why me? So by way of a brief review from last time, my thesis statement last time, if you will, thesis statement as a sermon, but when we truly grasp our union with Christ, it will change how we think about how we view our salvation. It'll change how we view sanctification. It'll change how we view fellowship with one another. And ultimately, it changes the way we view our glorification. I quoted a dear brother of mine, Jay Wechter, and this is a worthy quote that summarizes union with Christ quite well. Here's the quote. God's eternal plan to save his people is that they should have salvation by union with the only begotten son. By radical identification with Christ, our sins became His. And His righteousness became ours. Christ's righteousness belongs to the believer, belongs to us, by virtue of union with Christ. So fully is the believer identified with Christ that what Christ earned for us is rightfully ours. We're going to spend some time on imputation today. It's a glorious doctrine. And this is the essence of it right here. So what Christ earned is rightfully ours as if we had earned it ourselves. His dying and raising is applied to us personally. It's the basis for newness of life in him. All the believers blessings are in Christ as its source. So we learn that we're united through Christ. by the Holy Spirit. Regeneration. That we are united to Christ through the Holy Spirit. He is our seal. He is our guarantor. He is the one who does the work of regeneration, giving us new life, breathing life into a dead body. And we are united to Christ through the Holy Spirit. Because of our union with Christ, we are heirs. Not hairs. Heirs. H-E-I-R-S. According to the hope of eternal life, We have been fully adopted. We have a new identity. We are now heirs in Christ and with Christ. What he inherits, we inherit. To me, that's just mind boggling. I could see getting crumbs off of his table or getting a, you know, he gets a 40,000 acre ranch and he'll give me, you know, here's a half acre with a, with a mobile home, you know, great. But we inherit what He inherits. We are so united to Him that what He accomplished, it's as if we accomplished what He inherits, we inherit. From Scripture last time we saw that we are chosen by the Father in Christ before the foundations of the world. We saw the triune God in action in salvation. We have been made alive with Christ and we have been seated in the heavenly places. Christ Jesus. You see in God's mind we are seated with Christ Jesus in the heavenly places. So we also study how our sin was placed upon Christ in such a way that he was treated as if he was actually us. As if he had committed those sins. He was our substitute. His perfect righteousness. His perfect obedience. is counted or credited to our account. When God looks at us, he sees us and treats us as if we had lived the perfect life that Christ lived. We saw that we've been saved to a holy calling for his purpose and his grace, which was given to us in Christ Jesus before the ages began. We have been known and loved with a specific intentional love for all of eternity. Does God love the world? Yes. And so much that the sun comes up, there's rain, there's seasons, there's food. He gives life and breath to his creatures. But he has had a specific intentional love for you, Christian, since before the foundations of the world. There's never been a time in all of history where God has not considered you to be in Christ Jesus. And to me, that's mind-boggling. Because I know, I know how often I blow it. Ask my wife. I know how many times I grumble. How many times I complain. How many times I'm not productive with my time. I flitter away time. How many times I get angry on the road or I respond sharply when I shouldn't. and to think, and to not even just think, but to consider, to reckon, to count that God sees me as perfect in the beloved. Just blows my mind. So we also learned that we are God's workmanship, the work of his hands created in Christ Jesus for good works. We also learned about the local church and the universal church. We saw how that we are each united to one another. Not just because we're here on Sunday together and we're in the same room and we're all from Texas, but because we are united to Christ. He's the head of the church. We are in Christ and we are joined to one another through Christ. That's why we're to love one another as Christ loves us. This means supporting, encouraging, admonishing, exhorting, praying for one another, forgiving one another. putting up with one another, not keeping accounts. This is because of our union with Christ that we are so inextricably joined together. We are joined to one another because of Christ. Well, that brings us up to today. So now we've had a fresh look at some of the glories and the glorious results of our union with Christ. I want to draw some contrast today. between who we were before and who we are now. Are we in the first Adam or in the second Adam? Two kinds of people in this world. Those who are in Adam, those who are in Christ. That's it. So just as the diamond sparkles more brilliantly against the black cloth, just like the gospel is more glorious when you hear the bad news, that we're lawbreakers and we deserve God's wrath. Now salvation in Christ is something altogether lovely. You've got to see the bad news with the good news. I think Greg Comfort uses this example. He used it hundreds and hundreds of times in Latin America. But if I go into the doctor and I say, he goes, James, take these pills. I'll be like, you're crazy. I'm not sick. Tom, you wouldn't prescribe and just say, hey, take these pills, right? But now I come in and I see Tom and he says, James, sit down. We've done x-rays, blood work, MRI. You have an aggressive cancer, you're gonna die in two weeks. Now I say, okay, what do I do? Doc, what do we do? He goes, don't worry. Here are these pills that can cure you. You see, in one example, those pills are foolishness, because I don't have the diagnosis. I don't see myself. There's not that black backdrop. I don't see myself as sick. But in that second example, the doctor gives me the diagnosis, and I'm cut. Cut to the quick and I say, what do we do? What can be done? He says, don't worry. In the same way, the law, our transgressions, our failures, the bad news, God's justice and judgment and righteous wrath and indignation towards sinners is that black backdrop. And then we will run to Christ. Not for his gifts, not for prosperity or healing or or for the emotion we're gonna run to christ because we need a savior we need a way out from the bad news in a sense that the law and in this case what we're gonna hear today about being in adam is that is like a machete that you use to cut people to hurt them and then you apply the sweet balm of gilead to that wound to heal it So when we understand what we're saved from, I believe we'll marvel at and appreciate what we've been saved into. So today I have bad news for those who are not in Christ. We're going to talk about Adam. We will see from scripture that each of us is viewed and considered and treated by God according to which Adam is our representative. That doesn't sound fair sometimes. It's like, what, what, he's not treating me according to how I act or who I, you know, Me, myself, and I? No. God treats us according to who he has placed us, over us, as our head. As our representative. We do not decide or vote on who our representative. In fact, we have no say in the matter at all. Again, the free willies would say, that's not fair! That's not fair! But I believe we will see from scripture and we know from the teaching and the theology that's taught here in this pulpit that God is sovereign and he's the one who decides. He's the potter. We're the clay. And he has the right to make out of the same lump of clay a vessel for honor and a vessel for dishonor, a vessel for salvation and a vessel for destruction. So let's define some key terms. To understand federal headship, also known as federalism, you have to understand imputation. Imputation is the act of assigning a condition, standing, or value. When it relates to a person, the new condition is fully given to them, considered to be completely theirs, just like Adam's sin and guilt was imputed to us long ago. And you're like, that's not fair, but yet we would say amen and yes, when we say our sins are imputed to Christ. You see, you can't have them both ways, right? Go gladly, oh yeah, give him my sin debt. But us incurring that guilt because of the actions of another just doesn't, it goes contrary to what we see as fair and equitable. An easier way to explain imputation would be the word credited or counted. The righteousness of Christ, His perfect obedience is imputed or credited to all those whom He purchased by His substitutionary atonement, His substitutionary death on the cross. There's a Greek word that's used throughout the New Testament It's legitsimai. Did I pronounce that right? I got on and every time I'd listen to somebody say it, they'd pronounce it different. So legitsimai. So this is the word that means to credit to another's account. One of the verses where it's found is Romans 4, 3, and we're not going to spend a lot of time getting into the Greek and all that, because number one, I'm not a Greek scholar. Romans 4.3, for what does the scripture say? Abraham believed God and it was legitimized. It was counted to him as righteousness. The word translated counted, imputed or credited is that Greek word legitimized. The righteousness of Abraham didn't come from his own pure motives or efforts or striving or running. It was credited to him by God through his faith. He believed that God would provide what he didn't have and he couldn't obtain that. that belief, that faith. God credited him based upon his faith. He counted him as righteous. In the Doctrine of Imputation we clearly see that we're judged by the actions of others, of another, either fallen in Adam or justified in Christ. Can we start to see how every human is represented by one of two men and is treated according to the actions and accomplishments of their representative, not based on their own merits or effort? We vote for a state representative or a congressman and they go to Austin or D.C. and they speak and act on our behalf. Theoretically, they're supposed to vote how we believe according to their constituents. It's not always how it works out as we know. But when we have a clear understanding of imputation, we can now talk about federalism. Here's a quote from Lincoln Air Ministries. Federalism has to do with representation, with one person acting on behalf of another, very much like a congressman or senator. Okay, this is key. God has appointed two representatives in history. Only two. This was not a bunch of guys in the boardroom making a decision. This was God. This is God. A covenantal God. A God who has appointed two men as representatives for all of mankind. Adam did not represent the race well. He disobeyed God. As a result, all his descendants are born with an inclination to sin, and they all share in his guilt. And they receive the same penalty he received, death. Dr. Boyce says, federalism is a proof of God's grace, for while the failure of our first federal head, Adam, brought terrible results, Federalism was the only way it would later be possible for God to save us once we had sinned. You see, we have an original federal head, Adam. And in Adam, all died. And in Adam, we're all guilty. Born with a sin nature. Guilty. The choo-choo train left the station for a second there. Then there has to be a new federal head, Christ, the second Adam. Federalism says that Adam was our just and accurate representative. Barry Cooper from Ligonier says this, in biblical federalism, not only do we bear the consequences of the representative God chose for us, again, that God chose for us, but we are also regarded as having done what our representative did. Again, this flies in the face of everything that most people would say is fair. He committed the crime, you can't hold me guilty. Well, you were driving the car. That's why if you go in to rob a store with a handgun, and maybe you're not even the shooter, but somebody dies in that process, you're gonna be brought up on murder charges. Because had you not been there, in other words, you were brought up on it because you were part of this action in the same way we are considered to have done what Adam did. Adam was a representative, just as later on in history, Jesus was a representative, succeeding where our first representative failed. Adam failed miserably, but Christ came and obtained victory and succeeded where Adam failed. Jesus lived a perfect life on our behalf, and he took the punishment for sin on our behalf. So if we are united to Christ by faith, God counts us as perfectly righteous because our representative, Jesus Christ, is perfectly righteous. Again, I tell people, when I'm explaining justification, that is a legal forensic declaration. God declares me just before him. Am I just? No. That Jesus was just and righteous and perfect on my behalf. In each of these quotes that I just read, the emphasis is on who God chose or who God appointed. God chooses who your federal representative will be. It doesn't matter who it is who runs or strives, but upon him who gives mercy, has mercy. That's Romans 9. It's not what man does or doesn't do or strives or tries. It's upon him who has mercy. Now, let's look at an alternate view briefly. It's called Seminal Headship or Seminalism. I believe this is an incomplete and deficient view. Both these views are considered to be within orthodoxy, but I think as we go through the rest of this message, you'll start to see that one view exalts God. and exalts God's purposes and His sovereign election. And the other view seems to try to soften things a little bit. So, symbolism states that through Adam we inherited our sin nature. Yes and Amen. Great. But we did not inherit his guilt. The key word being guilt. Adam's guilt is not passed on to his children. But his sinful tendencies are. Then as soon as we're born and have volition, then we sin because we're sinners, then we're guilty before God. You see how it's kind of in Spanish, quitando el tiro. It's trying to circumvent, get around the point. Because they don't think it's fair that because Adam sinned and Adam fell, that we should have guilt placed upon us. But if you look at Romans, Jacob I loved, Esau I hated. When they were in the room, before they could do anything right or wrong, God said, so that his purpose of election might stand, Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated. Okay. So it basically says that his sinful tendencies, that in other words, we're born with a sin nature because of Adam, but the guilt is not transferred to us. This school of thought comes from one passage in Hebrews where Abraham gives tithes to Melchizedek. So let's understand the word seminal or seminalism, seminal headship, okay? So it's a way of thinking and it's found in scripture. It's used as examples. So my grandson Isaiah, it could be said that he was in me even before he was born because my son was in me and my loins and then my son, Isaiah, so this is how they talked about it so because Adam we were all figuratively in Adam's loins he was the first male before any children were born so this is where we get this thing of that is through this bloodline okay through the male that we inherit this guilt or that we inherit this sin nature So it comes from a passage in Hebrews 7 4 through 10. Let's go there if you will Hebrews 7 4 through 10 and again, this is a the key passage that people who hold to the seminal view of headship That they hold to this is what they use Hebrews 7 4 through 10 Now observe how great this man was to whom Abraham, the patriarch, gave a tenth of the spoils. And those indeed of the sons of Levi, who received the priest's office, have a commandment in the law to collect a tenth from the people, that is, from their brothers, although these are descendants from Abraham. But the one whose genealogy is not traced from them had collected a tenth from Abraham, this is Melchizedek, and blessed the one who had the promise. But without any dispute, the lefter is blessed by the greater. And in this case, mortal men receive tithes. But in that case, one receives them, of whom it is witnessed that he lives on. And so to speak, through Abraham, even Levi, who received tithes, paid tithes. For he was still in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him." So here, we see that even before Levi and the Levitical priests were established and the tithing process was established, Abraham paid tithes to Melchizedek. And the author is trying to say that even Levi, because he was still in the loins of Abraham, paid a tithe to Melchizedek. So we know that God is continually laying out and defining covenants throughout history. And when we view headship or representation through the lens of a covenant God, in our text today, it'll be evident that federal headship is a more full, robust, and biblical view of the two unions that exist. So union in Adam or union in Christ, we must see, consider, count, and reckon our God-ordained union with Adam. In all of its ugliness, depravity, guilt, and condemnation in order to have a heightened and majestic, God-glorifying, sin-mortifying view of our blessed union with Christ. Now let's let the Word of God speak for itself. Let's go to 1 Corinthians 15, 20 through 22. Now we've shifted back over and I'm presenting the verses that I believe show federal headship, federalism, that there is actual imputation, that through Adam, we were actually made guilty. We were considered to be in Adam, just like we are considered to be righteous now because of Christ, our union with Christ, that we are considered from conception to be guilty because of our union with Adam. First Corinthians 15, 20 through 22. But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by a man came death. Who is that man? Adam. By a man came death. By a man also, Jesus, came the resurrection from the dead. For as in Adam, some die. No, no, doesn't say that. All die. So also in Christ all will be made alive. The Westminster Catechism states this regarding this verse. They, Adam and Eve, being the root of all mankind, the guilt of this sin was imputed and the same death in sin and corrupted nature conveyed to all their posterity descending from them by ordinary generation. The guilt of this sin was imputed. This is the Westminster Confession. Spurgeon comments on these two verses. And to clarify, so a lot of people will see, for as in Adam all die, also in Christ all will be made alive. Great, there it is. Everybody's gonna be made alive, everybody's gonna be saved. Universalism. So let's read what Spurgeon says about these verses. Not that all shall be saved, but all will be raised from the dead, or else the passage means that. As all who were in the second Adam died as the result of Adam's sin, so all who are in the second Adam, that is Christ, shall live as the result of his righteousness. The question is, are we in the second Adam? Faith is that which unites us to Christ. If we are trusting in him by living faith, then his rising from the dead ensures our rising from the dead. And that was from Sunday school this morning, right? And if not, it be true that we shall rise, but it will be to shame and everlasting contempt." So here we see Spurgeon clearly outlining that there are two Adams. All will be raised from death, but those united in Adam will be raised to eternal damnation. And those who are united to Christ will be raised with him to eternal glory. Notice it says, in Adam all died, past tense. Because of his sin, we are conceived in sin, guilty enemies of God before we even draw our first breath. David in the Psalms said, in sin, I was conceived, I was conceived in sin. That doesn't mean his parents were out of wedlock, but he's making a statement there. David understood total depravity. David understood imputation. This flies in the face of our flawed human concept of fairness and equity. So because Adam is my federal representative, I'm guilty before God, before I even draw my first breath? Before I can make any choices, good or bad? That's not fair, right? The answer is yes. Such is the depth of our radical nature, the radical nature of our union with Adam, that from conception, we are enemies of God. The following is a quote from Burke Parsons. When it comes to biblical anthropology, the doctrine of man, the Bible's doctrine of man, the most fundamental division between people is between those who are in Adam and those who are in Christ. When Adam sinned, we sinned and fell. All people were made liable, responsible for, guilty of, to sin and the miseries of this life because Adam represented all people. Would you hand me a tissue? Would you mind? Okay, Adam represented all people. That's the end of the quote from Burt Parsons. So dear Christian, when we understand our complete union with Adam and our utter helplessness, utter inability, we will have a deeper and a more glorious view of the graces, the benefits and the blessings that are given to us, that are bestowed upon us, that are credited to us, that are imputed to us, that are counted as ours when we consider our union with Christ. Let's go to another passage, Romans 5. I'm going to read this text with only a few minor commentaries just so we can get the flow, get a feel for the text as it reads. Romans 5, verses 12 through 19. Therefore, just as through one man, Adam, sin entered into the world and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned. Verse 13, for until the law, sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the trespass of Adam, who is a type of him who was to come. So here, let me just take a, so here Paul's, here is, argues that death reigned even before the giving of the Mosaic law. Rejection of sin towards God was in the world because God's law is written on man's heart, yes. But they could not sin like Adam because there was no law. Did Adam have a law? One law. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat. So he had a law, right? And then Moses, Sinai and the Ten Commandments. There we have a law, right? So here Paul is trying to say, look, so they sinned, but not in the sense they weren't law breakers, because there was no law. Adam had already broken the first, the one and only law. I think it's hard to keep 10 commandments, he had one. So with no law, they couldn't have been law breakers. Like those that had the 10 commandments, or like Adam who had his one law. But here we see that death reigned because of their union. with their God-appointed representative, Adam. So Paul says here, they didn't have a law, so the question would be, well then how could God be mad at them for sinning if they didn't have a law? True, the law of God is written on man's heart. But here Paul's making the argument that they were condemned and they were judged already because of their union with Adam. their union with the original lawbreaker. Let's go on to verse 15. But the gracious gift is not like the transgression. For if by the transgression of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the man Jesus Christ abound to the many. And here I want you to notice as we go through, the one, the one man, the one, the one, there's six times in these few verses here. So let's go back here. Let me read 15 again. But the gracious gift is not like the transgression. For if by the transgression of the one, Adam, the many died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, abound to the many. And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned. For on the one hand, the judgment arose from one transgression resulting in condemnation. One transgression, here he's saying that judgment and resulting condemnation came from one transgression. But on the other hand, the gracious gift arose for many transgressions resulting in justification. Verse 17, for if by the transgression of the one, Adam, death reigned through the one, much more those who received the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the one, Jesus Christ. So in these three verses, Paul takes kind of a parenthetical break and magnifies the contrast between union with Adam and union with Christ. Death reigns through Adam because of Adam. That's why death reigns. That's why we have unborn children, babies in the mother's womb that die, right? If they hadn't inherited Adam's guilt, what was the penalty of Adam's sin? Death. So why do infants die? Because we are all united to Adam. Now I'm not talking here whether infants go to heaven or not. That's a whole different ball of whack. But the fact that death reigns, right? That there's miscarriages and the baby's two, 15, you know, I preached an 18 day old, funeral for an 18 day old baby. You know, ah, talking about ripping your heart out. But death reigns because of the one. And I challenge you to go back and look at these groups of verses here and look and just highly underline the one, through the one, through the one, the one man, okay? So infants and children, they don't die because of their guilt, but because of the guilt of their federal representative. You see how that proceeds? Individual guilt. Okay. Verse 18, so then as through one transgression, there resulted condemnation to all men. Even so, through one act of righteousness, there resulted justification of life to all men. Again, this is not universalism when you consider the perspicuity of scripture, the clarity of scripture, and then you look at all the numerous verses that explain that not all men are saved, okay? For as through the one man's disobedience, Adam, the many were appointed, counted, considered, imputed, sinners. Even so, through the obedience of the one, the many will be appointed, remember, think, considered, counted, imputed, righteousness. Here again, Paul clarifies and preaches the gospel. This is because of the one man's sin and death entered guilt, condemnation. But then he points us to the second Adam, the better Adam, right? He points us to Christ. So to summarize these truths and these doctrines and to apply them to our way of thinking, how we pray, how we encourage one another, how we share the gospel, let's look at some key points. Every human ever conceived from fertilization is united to one of two men. Adam or Christ. From conception, every human is guilty before God. Not only for their outward rebellion against God, but even before birth, God views them and treats them as if they were Adam. Adam's sin is imputed by God to all mankind, and more specifically, every single individual. So when you're sharing the gospel with the sweet little lady up the street that makes cookies for the Boy Scouts and, you know, helps the elderly, and is just a sweet, sweet Aunt Thelma or whatever up the street, just the nicest lady ever, right? But she doesn't know the Lord. She's an Adam. By nature, a child of wrath. And that, again, to really comprehend that, when you comprehend the total lostness and total just condemnation of every single human being, and you're sharing the gospel, you're approaching them all on an even ground, on a level ground. And it removes from even the tiniest thought any kind of merit or earnings or good behavior that would ingratiate someone to God. So we're talking to dead men. We're talking to condemned men. We're talking to cadavers. These are men who are united to Adam. And when we truly understand this, we certainly aren't going to change the message to try to soften it up or try to smooth talk. And we're going to speak to them as what the Bible says they are, dead in their trespasses, blinded by the God of this age, following after the prince of the power of the air in Adam, condemned This is radical God-assigned union with the original Adam. Ergo, every man, woman, and child is an enemy of God, and they lay open to his wrath and fury. I don't care how good they are, how much they've done for society or for their neighbors, they're in Adam. If they don't know Christ, if Christ doesn't know them, they're in Adam, and they lay open to his fury and his wrath. There are no exceptions, no excuses, and no way out of this union with Adam except one, union with Christ. So I've heard this story and I'm going to try not to mess it up, but let's say I have a family, a wife and three little kids. And a teenager breaks into my house and he kills my three kids and my wife. He goes before the judge, got him on camera. He's caught dead to rights. And I go in there and I say, your honor, I don't want to press charges. I want you to let this young man go. That would be wonderful. And then what if I said, your honor, because he's underage, I'm going to adopt him. I'm going to bring him into my house and he's going to inherit what my children would have inherited. I'm going to feed him. I'm going to pay for his schooling. He's going to be my boy. And I'm going to love him like I love my kids. That's the gospel. That's the gospel. That God has appointed two federal heads and we're all born represented by Adam. Enemies of God. open to his wrath, and rightly so. And yet his grace and his mercy goes, no, uh-uh. I see what you've done and who you are. But I'm going to pluck you out of this federal head. I'm going to place you under my son. And you're going to inherit what my son inherits. And I'm going to see you and treat you like I treat my son. from a blasphemer and an enemy of the sovereign creator of this universe to an adopted son with all the rights and blessings of a true child. That's the gospel. God gives mercy to some of his enemies, not whimsically, but specifically and intentionally. by uniting Him to His Son. For those who are still in Adam today, this is a message of condemnation. This is a wake-up call. This is a reality check. This is me flicking the light bulb on at four in the morning, bright lights. If you're still in Adam, don't kid yourself or fool yourself by thinking you can be good enough, that you can do enough good to earn favor with God, that you can somehow placate or buy God off by going to church, by trying to be good, by tithing, by fasting. You can't. You can't buy off God. And all you're doing is buying off your own conscience. That's what we see here in America. The far majority of people that are lost on their way to hell are buying off their own conscience by adding some religion to their life. They get dressed up and they go to church. And yet they live the rest of the week and talk the rest of the week like anybody else. And some of them even modify their behavior and they don't. talk like they used to talk and things like that. But here we're just talking about self-improvement. They don't understand who they are in Adam. There's no gray, there's no middle ground. There's nothing in the middle. There's in Adam and there's in Christ. And for those of you today who are in Christ, my brothers and sisters, glory in these truths. Dwell on these truths. Study these truths. and know that you were plucked out of the family of Adam and placed in the family of Christ. You were purchased at an incredible price. You were purchased by the blood of God's eternal, precious, blameless Son. So consider these things throughout the week. As we move forward in this series, we will be concentrating specifically now on union in Christ. I felt this would be a good time to kind of lay the groundwork for who we were and who we are. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for the time this morning. Thank you for your word. Thank you for the incredible gift Your mercy, not giving us what we deserve. And then your grace giving us what we don't deserve. Not only to have our debts canceled, but to have our account credited with the perfect righteousness of your son. That goes beyond love. that you would take in your enemy, me, and adopt me, and conform me to your Son, and join me to your Son, and give me the blessings that your Son earned. Father, help us to grasp this, and to meditate, and to reckon this to be true about ourselves, because Scripture makes it so plain that this is who we are in Christ Jesus. And maybe more than just head knowledge, may these be truths that you use to give us a heart of gratitude, an unexplainable joy and peace, even in the darkest times and the most difficult times. Help us to be quick. to turn from self-reliance and to look at who we are in Christ and to rest, Father, and not stress and struggle and worry and fret because you see us as you see your son. Thank you for these glorious truths, Father. Apply them to our lives that we might live more holy life. and a life wholly acceptable unto you. In Jesus' name.