Hi, I'm Matt Henry, and I'm the pastor at Missio Dei Fellowship in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Very thankful that you found our sermons, and I hope that they are a way of encouragement to you in your Christian walk. However, it's important for you to understand that this sermon was given in my church's context and for the people that God has entrusted for me to shepherd. So if you're in the Kenosha area, I would encourage you to come on a Sunday and worship with the body of Christ here. And if you're not in this area, these sermons are a great tool for supplementing your walk, but they are by no means a substitute for the local church. So you need to submit yourself to a faithful Bible teaching church and shepherd in your area. Thank you. Well, we are in Acts chapter 10. We're right now focused on one verse, verse 35. And this is where Peter, when he entered into the house of Cornelius, a Roman centurion, therefore somebody who would be naturally an enemy of the Jew, part of the occupying force, if you will, and Cornelius had bid him to come and to teach, and he had gathered all of his friends and family there to hear. that Peter is now himself, though an apostle, discovering things, learning things that he did not expect he would learn. This is one of those strange things I had learned myself just as a pastor, that even though I'd been doing this for quite a while, that you oftentimes will find yourself coming into a situation thinking that it is gonna be you who will be teaching somebody else, and then you discover, in fact, the Lord is teaching you. And that's exactly what's happening here with Peter, is he is about ready to speak to this gathered group, but he himself needs to learn some things. And so he's discovering that God, one, truly is impartial, and we've dealt with the whole idea of God's impartiality, that there is none who are his favorites, he doesn't play favorites, he is an impartial judge, and therefore we have to fear. But also, in verse 35, he says, but in every nation, the one who fears him, key phrase, fears him, him being God, and does righteousness, is welcome to him. And so last week we began to break that down. The nature of what is called faith and works. Fear and doing righteousness. Remember the idea that the fear of the Lord is simply the idea in the Old Testament, in the New Testament, for believing. They're one and the same and there's many other words that get used. But what we saw was that the one who fears God and, and that's important, and does righteousness is welcome to Him. Your translation may say accepted or acceptable to Him. You might have a translation that says pleasing to Him. They all mean the same thing out of the Greek term. It is a truly amazing statement. It is full of hope if you are one without hope that God might welcome you, embrace you, be pleased with you. But how is that accomplished? How does one find himself welcomed by God? And so I asked you these questions last week. Has God welcomed you? Does God claim you as his own? Do you want to be acceptable to God? These are questions that must be asked. And so we're gonna unpack today the relationship of faith and works, and my prayer is that I can finish this sermon. Just in going through it, there's so many other things I want to say, and so my prayer is that I will finish it. If not, we'll approach it again next week, of course. Remember that the idea of fearing God, as I said, is an Old Testament term. And so you'll see it in like the book of Proverbs, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. You can't enter into wisdom until you are in a right relationship with God. You need to fear God. Well, what does it mean to fear God? Well, it gets developed in the New Testament as one who believes in God, or trusts in God, or loves God, or comes to God, or follows the Lord. All of those are just synonyms for the idea of fearing God. These are not different things. They all press the same idea with a slightly different emphasis. So picture it being maybe faith, and it's a diamond, and it has different facets and shapes, and so as you turn the diamond, you're seeing different aspects of faith, love, coming, following, things like that. Now, I want to remind you, and this is very important, so I need you to hear this, because a lot of the sermon will harken back to this short explanation. When talking about saving faith, many people will say, I believe. Or if you're listening to a sermon, you might say, well, I fear God. And that's fine, that's good. I'm always happy to hear a person claim they believe or have faith in Christ. They know that they need to believe in Jesus Christ, and the promise is if you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you shall be what? Saved. And so you're like, well, I believe, and therefore I must be saved. But when we talk about saving faith, there are three aspects to that that you need to understand, because this is often missed, and many people wander around wondering why nothing changes in their life, while so much struggle is going on, and it's because they have not yet come to what's called saving faith. Everyone believes something, everyone. You even may believe in no belief, but that's your faith. Your faith rests somewhere. But what kind of faith saves? That's very important. There are three things to that. The first is, and we won't, we'll dispense with the fancy Latin. The first thing is you have to have the facts, right? You have to know the facts. The facts of the good news, the gospel. You have to know that Jesus, God in human flesh, came, sent by his father, to take on our sin, and then as the perfect sacrifice, die on the cross in our place, suffering our punishment, our death, receiving the fullness of God's wrath upon Him as our substitute, that God was pleased to put him to death, but he was also pleased to raise him from the dead on the third day, bodily, not spiritually, conquering even the power of sin, which is death, that he rose from the grave, he ascended to the right hand of the Father in heaven, and he is coming back to judge the living and the dead. In a nutshell, that's the gospel. Now, there's so much in there that we could spend hours and hours unpacking, but that's the essence. You need to know those facts. You can't just vaguely say, well, I believe that he died for my sins. Okay, what does that mean? Well, he died for my sins, but what does that mean? I don't know. That's not the facts. Does that make sense? You have to understand these things. Second. you have to agree or assent to them. You can't be saying, well, I know that's what the Bible says. I'm not sure I'd buy into it. Okay, that's fine. I meet people all the time who are that way. And they're like, I don't know if I agree with that. Fine. But you're not saved. You're not a Christian. You have not yet assented or agreed to what the Bible declares are the facts that one must know to be saved. So we have those two. Most people, let me, please hear me, most people stop right there and never go further. And this is because of the terrible way that churches preach the gospel so often within churches. And so if you're like me, maybe you're not, but I was raised up in a world where it became very, very simple to just say, look, you want to go to heaven? Yes, say this prayer. Perhaps you've done that. called the sinner's prayer, it's all generally the same. Sometimes it's in a church service, and remember, those of you who grew up in a church service like this, at the end of the sermon, the pastor starts turning the whole message toward the altar call, and then they get you to stand, and they're gonna sing a song. and there's some nice emotional music. And then he'll say, you know, look, anyone who desires to give their life to Jesus, why don't you come on forward and we can pray with you. Raise your hand. I grew up in one church, it was always every eye bowed, or every eye closed, every head bowed. And then if you want to be saved, just raise your hand in ascent. Just raise your hand. And then, of course, you always hear that, oh, I see that, I see that, bless you, bless you. And you're always like, who's doing that? And you want to peek, but you're not allowed to peek. And then you start to wonder as you get a little older, did anyone actually raise their hand? And now I grew up also in a church where you can lose salvation. And so we also would have the few that would every week come forward just to make sure. just to make sure, gotta cement that. And yet, that's not saving faith. Now maybe, and I'm not here to say that many have not come to faith during those times, but many times the reason that one says I am a Christian is I walked an aisle, I signed a card, I raised my hand, I said a prayer. When did you do it? When I was three, when I was five, when I was 10, whatever. And yet, you listen to them talk about their life and nothing, nothing indicates that they're a believer, which is where the works come in. Remember, all who fear God and do righteousness are welcome. The third aspect is something you cannot manufacture on your own. The Latin word is fiducia. It is a trust, or it's really hard to translate into English, you need many words, a trust, a resting hope, a settled faith. There's something that goes much farther than just simply a mental agreement. Look, I'm not arguing that there was Jesus. I even see historical evidence for that, and that he died and rose again. Fine, I don't debate that. I agree with that even, and I'll even say that I agree with that. But do you hope in that? Is that your rest? Is that your joy? Is that your delight? That is that third aspect. It is a settled trust, where you finally find rest for your soul. This is a type of faith that theologians will call a living or vital faith, as opposed to what James, the book of James, calls a dead faith. A vital, saving faith, where my only hope is resting fully and totally and only upon Jesus Christ. And it's here that we come then to the idea of faith that works, or as Peter says, a fear of God and who does what is right. So the gospel call is to trust, but it also is then to obey. Now, you need to hear that because there are two really bad ditches that are deadly for us as we work through this idea. On one side is faith, and that's it. And that will put you into all sorts of trouble. On the other side, you can say works, and that's it. And that will put you into all kinds of problems as well. But the Bible talks very casually and very calmly about the idea of a vital living faith that works, that obeys, that lives out the faith. And that's what we want to unpack today. And as I said, this is so important. I'm going to try to deal with it in one sermon, but I am not willing to let it slide and jump over things because so many people struggle in this area. I want to make certain that when you walk away, you walk away with a firm grasp. So with that in mind, we'll proceed. Now listen first, salvation, forgiveness, only comes by grace through faith. Period. Salvation from one's sin only comes by grace, that's the means, the basis, God's grace, through the instrument of faith. to discuss the differences, if you were a starving individual, let's say you were in the POW camps during World War II, and these people were walking skeletons, and when they went in and rescued them, they were on the brink of death, starvation, they couldn't eat average, normal food. And so they had to bring them bowls of simple soup, And these people would carefully, with trembling fingers, take the spoon, dip it into it, and bring it up to their mouth, and they were so desperate to not lose a drop of that soup, and they would slowly begin to nourish their bodies until they could take on full food. What saved them? The spoon? No. It was the soup, right? The grace of God is what saves you. It's the soup, if you will. The faith is the instrument by which you receive the grace. So keep those two in mind. It is God's grace and only God's grace that saves you, and the means by which you get that and receive that is faith in God alone. There is no salvation if having claimed to believe, however, now listen, there is no salvation if having claimed to believe there is ultimately no obedience or doing of what is right. To say, I believe, and it's by faith alone and grace alone, not by works, to say, I believe, and yet I now do not have any compulsion, need, or responsibility, or desire to obey, is not salvation. And this balance is so key and very easy to confuse today, and so we're gonna work at this. Go back now to James, all the way in the back part of the Bible, James, and we'll just briefly look at the passage we looked at last week, James 2. And if you're not real strong in knowing how to get around your Bible, you might want to also start turning to Romans 4, and that will save you some time, and you don't have to lose hope if I start going and you're not to that text. James chapter 2, in 14 to 26 again, he is dealing with faith and works. And so he starts out again with the question, what use is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith, but he has no works? And the rhetorical question that is presumed to have the answer no is can that faith save him? And yet today, in the pulpits today and the pews today in the churches of America, you would hear a resounding yes. Yes. I just need to believe and I'm in. And he is asking that question at the very beginning of the church. Earliest book of the Bible for the New Testament, around 45 AD, so only about 15 years, 12 years since Christ died, rose again, and ascended, he's writing this to the church. So you already know that that tendency to think, oh, I just say a prayer, I just claim faith, and therefore I'm in, and he's already addressing that problem. Can that faith save? And then he goes on to say, look, if a brother or sister has no clothes, they need food, and you say, be warmed and be filled, have you done anything? Is there of any value in that? Then he says, look, you want to say you have faith? Show it by your works. And if you say, well, do you believe? James says this, he's like, if you want to say, well, James, Do you believe? Do you have faith? Do you know how he would do it? He wouldn't say yes, he'd show you by his works. So my question to you is, can you? Can you show your faith by your works? Are you confident in that? Can you say, my life reflects a settled faith in Christ? And if you say, well, I believe, pastor, I believe, that's fine. But if I say, show it, can you show it? He goes on about, well, but we believe the right things, you believe that God is one, verse 19, that there is but one God. He's like, well, that's fine, but demons even believe that, and they're not happy, they shudder. But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is what? It's useless. It's useless. And then he gets into this little story about Abraham. And this is important to note, because we'll see it again in Romans. Was not Abraham, our father, justified by works when he offered up Isaac, his son, on the altar? You know the story, some of you don't. Abraham had been promised to become a great nation. The only way he could do that is if he had a son. He had no children. And many, many years after that, he had his son, Isaac. Miraculous and everything, and it's all written out for you in Genesis chapter 12, up to about 22. You can read all about that. And then there came a day where God said, I want you to take your son, your only son, the son whom you love. So he's really drilling this down on Abraham. And he says, I want you to take him and sacrifice him to me. And Abraham, in obedience, did. And he goes up onto the mountain, he puts his son upon the altar, and he's ready to bring the knife down, and God stops him. and he brings a ram in to be the substitute for the sacrifice of Isaac. And that's the story he's referring to. He says, he was justified by works when he offered up Isaac his son on the altar. You see, that faith was working with his works. And as a result of the faith, or works, faith was, here's the key word, perfected, made mature, full, complete. And the scripture was fulfilled, which says, and Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness. What's interesting is that quote is not about in the same story. That is a lot earlier in chapter 15, where he is taken out, he has no children yet, and he's struggling to believe, and God makes him go outside, look up at the stars, and say, as the stars are in the heavens, so shall be your offspring. And it says, Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him to be righteousness. It was there that he was saved. But now years later, he is given the chance to show that, and he operates out of faith and obeys. So keep that in mind. James is tying those two events together. And it says he was called the friend of God. Isn't that the same thing as being welcomed by God? Embraced by God, pleasing to God? And so he says, so you see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone. And then he brings up another one, in the same way was not Rahab the harlot. also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way." Everyone wants to say, so we're allowed to lie, because in that story, the spies of Israel went and spied out the land, and they had to find shelter to be hidden from those who were searching for them. And Rahab, who was a harlot, welcomed them into her house, hid them, deceived the people looking for them, and then was able to send them to safety. And what's so funny is we always wanna say, so lying's okay, or, well, she lied. And you missed the whole point. Why did she lie? Why did she hide the soldiers, I mean, the spies? She did so because she believed that Yahweh was the true God. She had faith. She knew that he was the true God, and these were his people, and therefore, it was right for her to protect them rather than to turn them over. and it was just an expression of her faith. And so he then says this, and this is key, for just as a body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead. So here we have the idea that a body, if you've ever seen a dead person, you know they're gone, right? Not all of you, but some of you perhaps have had the opportunity, I guess that's the word I'll use, to watch a person literally die right before you, right? Sometimes in violence, sometimes in a hospital. And what's going on? You're looking at them and there's this moment that they're alive. That's the best I can describe it for you. They're alive. It might be ugly, but they're alive. And then, they're not. And it's the same body. Nothing's changed. From one second to another, it's the same body, but it's not. They're gone. You know what I'm talking about? And you look, and I'm weird that way, so I think those things. And I remember many a time looking at a dead person as a police officer, and yeah, you just get, one thing you never know about becoming a cop is how many dead people you look at. And you just start looking, and you realize they're gone. They're just gone. The body is just there, and that's his point. The body without the spirit has the form, but not the reality. In the same way, you have faith, you claim faith, that's the form, the body, but you have no works, there's no reality. It's dead. It's dead. And it cannot save. So faith alone brings us to salvation, or does it? Is it really faith alone? Are we really saved by faith alone? That's the very first question that we have to ask and we have to answer. I'm on page three and we're halfway through my sermon time. All right, faith alone. So with that in mind, go to Romans 4. Romans 4. Faith alone. I said we are saved by faith alone. So by grace, through faith. So is that true? Am I doing a wink and nod? Am I saying, yes, we're saved by faith alone, but not really, wink and nod. So chapter four of Romans, we have to deal with this idea of a term, so get used to it. It's a term called justification. Many of you know it. Some of you may not be real sharp on that and say, I don't know quite what you're talking about, and that's okay. Justification simply means that you are declared righteous, not made righteous, declared righteous. Justification is the key benefit of salvation. If you were to say, what is salvation? Salvation is this big umbrella, and then underneath it are all sorts of key doctrines that fall under it. Doctrines like redemption, redeemed out of the enslavement to sin meaning, or adoption into the family of God. That's a wonderful one. or forgiveness of sin, that's another good one. All of these are just sub-doctrines of the bigger doctrine of salvation. But justification is the vital one, because it's out of that that all of these other blessings that we receive from being saved flow. No other blessing then can occur if you have not been justified. In other words, I am an ungodly, unholy enemy of God, dead in my sins, as these are all just statements the Bible says about me, how then can I stand before God who's holy? That's the question, simple question. How will you? How are you? Do you stand before God holy? He says, be holy as I am holy. Elsewhere, he says, you must be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect. How you doing? Very poorly. How can I be just? If I'm unjust, how can I be just? We sang it in our song. How can I be just? God's mercy and grace brings us through Christ and he justifies us. How? Through faith. So justification is a doctrine that means God declares a sinner to be righteous in his sight, not through us, but through the righteousness of Christ. Of what Jesus is and did, we are then declared righteous. And so it's through Jesus' righteousness and only Jesus. And so justification is gained through faith, and only through faith in the personal work of Jesus. So look at chapter four, verses one through five, and we can't go into the depths of this, but we can draw some points from it. What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather, according to the flesh, is found? So he's talking primarily to Jews in this one, and he's gonna pull them all the way back to Abraham. Abraham was not a Jew. Abraham was before Israel was even in existence. It was his grandson that became Israel. And so he's doing that on purpose, and he's taking them all the way back to Abraham, because the Jew loved to claim Abraham as their father, and that's fine. So he's gonna use Abraham to prove his point. He says, what shall we say that Abraham, our forefather, according to the flesh, has found? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. So he's dealing with justification. How was Abraham justified? If he was justified by works, then he can brag, but not before God. For what does the scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him, or reckoned to him, as righteousness. Now to the one who works, his wage is not counted according to grace, but according to what is due. But to the one who does not work, but believes upon him who justifies, who? The ungodly. Well, that's me. So that's a good word. Oh, I want to be justified, but I'm ungodly. He says, but the one who believes upon him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness. Do you see what he's saying? This is the same issue that James is picking up, but he's doing it from a whole different, James is looking at the backside of Abraham, Paul is looking at Abraham from the front side. Here is a man who did not have faith, heard the promise of God, came out, believed, without doing anything, believed God, and it was called or counted to him as righteousness. And this is how he is justified. His justification, the fact that he as an ungodly man was justified before God had nothing to do with his work. He says, if you work and you're trying to earn or work your way into God's good graces, you will fail. Salvation is a gift. Salvation comes through faith, not by works. Now, we can see this done again in Philippians, so go back a few books to Philippians. Chapter four, I'm sorry, chapter three, seven through nine. I should have told you to keep your finger in Romans, Oh well, you're gonna go right back to Romans. Paul is writing here to the church in Philippi, and he says these things, many things he's already said, but he's talking about, look, if we were to brag about our religiousness, our gifts, our abilities, our works, our efforts, our offerings to God, everything that we could count as something God would be pleased with, He's like, let's all sit down with a piece of paper and start writing down, well, what's, what do you got on the plus side? Well, I think I'm pretty honest. I'm a giving person. I'm kind. I try to not be hateful. That's it. Paul would just smile and he'd say, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. I've got all these things. He had the right pedigree. He had the right upbringing. He was a Pharisee. He was a man who kept, religiously kept the law. He was so many things amazing. In fact, he was described as a Hebrew of Hebrews. So what does he think about all of his pedigree? He has so much on that plus column from a human perspective. He says in verse seven, but whatever things were gained to me, whatever was on that plus column, those things I have counted as loss. In other words, he rips them and throws them away. I count them as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss because of the surpassing value of what? Of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and I count them but rubbish." Literally, feces. That's what he's really saying. Something you would flush. Everything. Not most things, not some things, not the bad things or just the good things. He says, I count everything in my life, all that would be Paul, I count it all as rubbish so that I may gain Christ. and be found in Him, in Christ. But notice, not having a righteousness, which is what justification is, a righteousness of my own, which is from the law, that is, doing good things, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God upon faith. This is a simple, glorious truth that you, as a wicked, helpless, hopeless sinner, you can find full salvation and justification, stand before God, declared to be righteous, simply through faith in Christ alone. In fact, that's the only thing you can. If you bring with him, bring with you, My other things, I try to be good, I try to this, I try to that, and you try to enter into a presence, the presence of God, you will be rejected. You cannot, it must be counted as loss. It must be. There is no option. He will not tolerate it. You will not come to him with your filthy works that you call good and say, all right, I'm claiming Christ and my works. He will say no. No man, no woman can be justified with works. And so here, what you need to see is that faith is the instrument, as I said, the instrument, a spoon that brings salvation or justification. And this is where great error creeps in. Now understand that faith and only faith in God's promises in the gospel is what makes you fully justified. From the moment a person rests and trusts and hopes and delights and comes to God through Christ, they are fully justified. Any one of you in this room who is a Christian, you will never be more justified than the moment when you believed. Because it is not your righteousness that justifies you, it is God's righteousness, his son. So you have the fullness of the righteousness upon you, a wretched sinner. Isn't that crazy? In a good way. Now here's where all kinds of error can come in. So here's one. The Roman Catholic Church teaches something very much different. This occurred over the course of the history of the church. The Roman Catholic Church teaches this. Now this is, I'm using technical language, but that's because salvation is technical. Faith is necessary. They would say, you need faith. You cannot be saved without faith, which we'd say, yeah, that sounds good. Faith is necessary, but it's not sufficient. So the Catholic Church will say, yes, you must believe, but it's not all. You also must do. And as you do, you add to that justification. And as you do that, given time, eventually you will enter into eternity, but only if you continue to add to the justification through your works. So faith is necessary, but not sufficient. That's not true. The gospel says that faith alone is sufficient and necessary, I believe. and it is in that faith in Christ, in Christ alone, through faith alone, by grace alone, that I am saved. That is a gospel that the Catholic Church teaches that damns you. And many a person is thinking, yeah, I believe, I believe, and they'll declare Christ, and they'll say many good things, and yet, ultimately, when you start talking to them, they're also resting in what they have done in the hopes of being accepted and justified by God. There's other traditions, many, many forms of Pentecostalism, where you must exercise faith. They say, again, faith is necessary but not sufficient. You also must be baptized, and until you're baptized, you're not saved. And so, again, what you have is this idea that you must do something, and then you're in. and it's deadly, it's a grave error. It is ultimately a mixing of faith and works. Now go back to Romans 5, as I said, going back to Romans. We're gonna talk all about Romans chapter 5, but we're only gonna do it in a couple of minutes. In Romans 5, verse 1, You find it? Good. All right, Romans 5.1. Therefore, now remember, chapter four, we learned about how you were justified, right? Abraham was justified by what? Please say the right word. Faith. Works, yeah. That's what I heard, pastor. Faith, right? Faith. And now he develops that all the way through chapter four, and then he says, therefore, in light of what I just said in chapter four, he then says, having been justified, how? By faith, we have something. What do we have? Peace with God. How? Through, not our works, but through our Lord Jesus Christ. I have placed my faith in Christ, I am now justified and therefore a benefit. A benefit, I have peace. I have peace with God. That's a good thing. Note that it starts with justification and then it brings a benefit. True peace with God through Jesus. Now, here, some of you are comfortable with this, some of you are not. So let me remind you, for those of you who, this is somewhat new. In all language, but in the Greek language that the New Testament's written in, there are these things called indicatives. Indicative, it's a mood. So the indicative mood or the imperative mood. Those are two very common things in the Bible. And in the indicative, it means fact or reality. That's all it means. When it's written in the indicative mood, it doesn't care what you think about it. It doesn't care if you like it. It doesn't care if you agree with it. It's just simply a fact. All right? The seats are gray. That's it. It's a fact. An imperative is a command. We tend to mix those things up in our thinking sometimes. We try to make an indicative something we're supposed to do. We don't do anything with the indicative. It doesn't change whether we do it or don't do it. It always remains the same. He says the indicative is this, we have been justified by faith. And therefore, we have peace. It doesn't matter. You say, well, I don't know if I have peace with God. Have you rested, placed your rest and hope and faith in Christ alone? Yes. You have peace. You have peace with God. But I don't feel it. It doesn't matter what you feel. I don't even care if you feel it. because no matter how you feel, changes the fact. In fact, one of the things you learn in the pastoral world is people want you to make them feel something, and it's not my job to make you feel anything. My job is to declare to you what is true, and it is your responsibility by faith to receive it and accept it, and then move forward in light of it. I don't care if you feel peace, because I can't make you feel peace, but I can declare to you that you have been justified by faith, you do have peace with God. That's a good word. The rest of chapter five, now hear me, the rest of chapter five, I remember when I preached through this, and I was translating to Greek, in preparation for my preaching, I kept looking for the imperatives. Because when you're preaching, oftentimes you're looking for the imperative, which is the command that you're gonna teach to the church. And so, as I'm translating the Greek, I'm seeing indicative, indicative, indicative. I'm all the way into chapter six and I haven't found a single imperative. All of chapter five and half of chapter six is nothing but indicatives. What are indicatives? Fact. or realities. Nothing in there is to do. Not one thing in it is to do. All God is doing through Paul is declaring what is fact. So all of chapter five is the fact, and it starts with having been justified by faith. Fact, fact, fact, fact, fact. And so all the way down to chapter six, verse 10, he says things are simply true. Now, whether you believe them or not, that's up to you, but if you're a genuine Christian, you should read these things and understand he is not asking you how you feel about it, he is telling you these things are true. You must receive them because they're true. Finally, only after he spends a chapter and a half telling you what is true, does he tell you to do something. He says in chapter six, verse 11, the very first command is, even so, command, consider yourselves to be dead to sin. Why? Because you are dead to sin. The first part of chapter six is that you have died with Christ. And you're like, I don't recall that. Well, read chapter six and figure it out. But you have died with Christ. You have died with Christ. So what are you commanded to do? Consider yourself dead to sin. And so I remember telling the church, so many of you, you struggle with sin and you wanna deal with sin and get rid of sin, and that's the right and good thing for you to want, but you're paralyzed, you don't know what to do, the very first thing Paul would tell you is start thinking. Start thinking right. Get your faith resting in the truth of what God has declared to be true. And he has said, you are dead to sin. And you're like, I feel very much alive to sin. No, you're dead to sin. you're dead to sin. Why? Because of the indicatives of chapters five and six. This is where lazy Bible, don't take that as a mean thing, it's just true. This is where lazy Bible reading does you so much harm. Your eyes are just kind of going across the page and you're letting the words go through your brain, but you're not thinking. and you're not considering and working through and wrestling with and say, what does this mean? A man or woman who struggles in life with sin, their problem, okay, let me back that. A man or woman who struggles in sin, consistent sin, but who is a genuine Christian. There's always a very real reality they're not a Christian. But if they are a genuine Christian, what is their problem? Their problem, first, is they're not thinking right. That simple. That simple. You're not thinking right. You have not yet considered yourself dead to sin. If I'm dead to sin, then that means something. There's consequences to that. But before you can think yourself to be dead to sin, you have to believe that Christ died And see, that's where the rub is, right? Because you would say, well, yeah, Christ died, but do you really believe he died? Do you believe that he died to sin? That he took your sin? That he died? And are you in Christ? in Christ, hidden in Christ, so that all that is Christ is yours. And if you say, yeah, I do believe that, do you really? Because if you're in Christ, all that is Christ is yours. That's why you have eternal life. You don't have eternal life in some weird way because there's a repository of life over here somewhere that God dips into and he gives to you. God is life. In fact, literally, Colossians 3 says Christ, who is our life, a fancy grammatical term about that is life and Christ are an apple, not oppo, apposition to one another, meaning they're the same thing. Christ is life and life is Christ. If you have life, it means you have Christ, and if you have Christ, it means you have life. You can't separate them. There's not Christ who has life. Do you see the difference? Christ who has life makes life something else. Christ is life. Do you have Christ? I do. Then you have life. Why? Because you're in Christ. Is Christ righteous? He is. Perfectly righteous? He is. Are you in Christ? Yes. What are you? What are you? Righteous. If Christ died, for sin, and you're in Christ, what have you done? You died. And Christ rose to life, and you're in Christ, what have you done? You've risen. The Bible even treats you as already raised. We're not gonna finish the sermon. If you can get that, though, it changes everything. It's not you. He's my life. He died my death. He did it all, and he says, come to me and believe in me, and you have it. You are declared righteous. And you're like, but I'm not righteous. But he is. He is righteous. And you have it. All of it. And then he says in verse, where are we at? 11, verse 12. So we start with thinking. that we're dead to sin but alive to God, we're in Christ, now he's gonna tell you to do stuff. Therefore, do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts. So he says, first think, consider, then do. I'll guarantee you, Most of you flip that around and you try to do without first thinking. And you end up in the same old cul-de-sac time after time because you stop thinking and you try to do something. And this is just a human condition. We gotta do something. Actually, the best thing to do most of the time is shut up and stop talking and think. Think. What's true? Oh, that's right, chapters five and six, nothing but truth. Do I believe that? I do, kind of. Lord, help my unbelief. I do though, I do. If that's true, then I'm already alive in Christ, I'm free. John Piper says it so well, he says, whenever we fight sin, the Christian must always remember the sin they're fighting is forgiven. You're never fighting a sin that's not yet forgiven, it's forgiven, you're free. So go fight it, you can't lose. And so you go, and you battle, and you do not let sin reign in your mortal body, but instead, he says, do not go on presenting your members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness, but instead, you present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. Why? For sin shall not be a master over you. Why? Why can it not be a master? For you are not under law, but under grace. Since I totally blew my sermon out of the water, let me just talk about that a little bit. Those little words, under and under, under law and under grace, they speak of dominion. Dominion. All of us are under sin and under law. We are born under law and under sin. We have no... Freedom. Everyone who tells you you are a free agent, you have your free will, fine, whatever you want to call it. The Bible looks at you and says, sure, under law or under sin. So yeah, you're as free as you can be as one who's a slave to sin. You are as free as you want to be under law, which you can't keep. But in Christ, you're released from that. and you're now under grace, God's grace. And you say, oh, but I condemn myself. Yeah, well, you can condemn yourself all day long. I have literally said that in pastoral counseling, because I am a kind man, that you're beating yourself up, pastor, I don't know, I just keep beating myself up. I said, well, beat yourself up all you want. God's not. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. So I mean, I can't make you stop feeling certain ways, but I can tell you, you're not impressing God with it. You're under grace. You're under grace, you're free. Live like it. Live like it. So, so many things to say. No time. When you learn what is true and you begin to ask yourself what that means, then you approach life in a very different way. Always look for what is stated as true in the Bible. Start there. Now you can say, well, it's up to me to decide if it's true. Fine, you'll go to hell with that, but fine. The Bible is not interested in how you feel about it. The Bible is simply there to declare, because it's God's word, what is true, and in light of that, what you are to be. So read your Bible with what does it say, and then quit fighting with it so much and embrace it. And then, in light of what is true, ask yourself, what does it say I'm to do or to be? That's your commands. And it's very simple. but is actually life-altering. So you look for biblical commands, and then second, and always second, biblical principles. Principles are not commands, so don't try to make them a command. The command is not an option. A principle is optional. It's something that you're deriving from what you're reading. And you do those, and you begin to put them into your life. No substantive change will ever take place until you understand sound theology. This is why we preach the way we preach here. This is why we do what we do here. Everything from the beginning of the service to the end of the service, we try to pack it with sound theology. All the songs we sing, we don't sing light, airy, happy songs. We sing heavy songs, weighty songs. Our prayers are carefully written out so that they reflect sound theology. Why? Because you have to know. You must know. And listen, all of us are buying into a theology, all of you, Christian, non-Christian, in between, whatever that means. You all have a theology. We all have what we believe. And if you buy into a theology that's born out of this fallen age, it will take you somewhere. You will never be able to change in accordance to God because you don't think right. Here, I'll just give you one simple example that I jotted down in my sermon notes. You buy into the theology of the day which says self-care is important. We need to have self-care. We have all different ways of doing it. Back when I was younger, it was self-esteem. Now we just repackage and it's called self-care. We need to do self-care. It's good for health. Okay, fine. The Bible, though, says if any man is to be Christ's disciple, he is to deny himself, take up his cross and follow him. Not a lot of self-care in that. You deny yourself, take up the cross and follow Christ. And if you're not willing, you have no part in him. See, this is the gospel. The gospel saves you, but it also splits you apart because he doesn't let you come halfway. He goes on, he says, that we are commanded in Philippians, commanded, imperative, that we are to consider others as more important than ourselves. You know what? We just need to stay away from toxic people. Oh, shut up. I'm serious. Why? You mean sinners. Praise God Christ did not stay away from toxic people. You. They're toxic. No, you pray for your enemy. You do good and bless your enemy. I don't know if I can do that. Then you need to rethink whether you truly believe. The Christian walk is not a joke. The Christian walk is not a place where we can find happiness and fulfillment in our life here. The Bible says if you desire to live godly in Christ Jesus, you will be persecuted. Not, that's the indicative, by the way. You will be, not maybe, possibly, could, no. You want to live godly in Christ Jesus? This is 1 Timothy. I'm sorry, 2 Timothy. You want to live godly in Christ Jesus? You'll be persecuted. It's just part of the package. We're out of time. We haven't gotten to the works. But it doesn't matter, I guess, because if you can understand that, if you, some of you, you're like, I think I was, I'm a Christian, I think, but do you have that faith, that third aspect of that faith? I find my hope and my rest, my joy, my peace in Christ alone. He is what brings me the forgiveness. He brings me the life and I'm in Him. That is what matters. Now in light of that, the Bible says it manifests itself in works, but they're separate. We have to make a distinction. Actually, I wanna change that. You need to make a distinction between the faith and the works. You can't separate them, but you have to keep that distinction. You are saved by faith alone, in Christ alone, by grace alone. Lord willing, look at that next week. Let's pray. So Father, I do ask that you honor the efforts I give thanks that your word is always sufficient. I do pray that you, by the work of the Spirit, would work in such a way that we, as a people, would truly examine our hearts, as Paul says to the Corinthians, to see if we are truly in the faith. Where is our hope? Do we believe the facts? Do we agree with those facts? And do we find our rest in those facts? Do we find hope in Christ alone? Oh, Father, open up the spirit of each person here. Make it all the more firm in their mind so that they might walk away with great hope and joy inexpressible because they have peace with God. Help us to that fact in your son's holy name, amen.