The Gift of Grace: Finding Hope Beyond Sin

Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church Podcast, where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.

My name is Pastor Josh, and I want to thank you for listening to this podcast.

I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen you in the word of God.

Now, come along.

Let's look into the Bible and see what God has for us here today.

We're going to be in Romans chapter five here this morning, and we're going to start in verse number 12.

Where we left off last week was this idea of God's love and what that means, how deep the Father's love for us that.

That he would send his only begotten Son in that while we were yet sinners, he would give His Son and offer that sacrifice for us.

That's the greatest act of love.

We know that.

But what we're going to be talking about here this week is the understanding of sin and the understanding of grace.

Part of growing in our knowledge of God is knowing where we stand in his sight and knowing what he has gifted us in his grace.

And so we're going to talk about those two concepts here this morning, sin and grace.

What is sin?

Well, literally, sin means missing the mark.

What.

What mark are we talking about?

Well, we're talking about God's standard.

The Bible says, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.

So we might think that we are good people.

We might even be considered against somebody else, a good person, relatively speaking, meaning I don't do as much sin as that person, so I'm a good person.

But the Bible says outside of a relationship with God, there is none righteous.

No, not one.

There is none good.

No, not one.

And so the Bible teaches us throughout the book of Romans and throughout the Scriptures, that we, in and of our own strength, in and of our own flesh, fall short of the glory of God.

Therefore, in our sin, we find a punishment.

The Bible says for the wages or the payment of sin is death.

But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

And so we're going to look at our side of things, our sin, and what that brings us to and why we sin and how we sin and how God's grace is more abundant than our sin.

And we're going to see that through this passage that where sin is, where there is punishment, where there is death, where there is brokenness, the grace of God abounds.

And so often we forget about how powerful the grace of God is.

And so many times we can actually live our lives defined by our sin, defined by our failures.

But what the Christians real hope is found in is not becoming a better person.

The believer's true hope is found in a relationship with Jesus Christ and experiencing his grace and experiencing his forgiveness.

And so Romans chapter 5, verse 12 says this.

Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world.

Now we're going to stop there.

What is he talking about here?

He's talking about how this world, how what we would consider to be a marred world, a, a broken world, how did this world come to be?

How do we have sin in our life?

How do we have sin in this world?

There's a lot of people that will ask the question, why?

Why do you bad things happen to good people.

Now there's a lot of ways that we can answer that, theologically speaking.

Again, there's none good.

No, not one.

But we understand what we mean by when that question is asked.

Like why?

Why, why is there pain in this world?

Why is there death?

Why is there suffering?

Why is there brokenness?

Well, the Bible tells us right here it's because of sin.

Maybe some of you have wrestled with that concept.

Why would God allow me to get sick?

Or, or why would this person have to go through this pain?

The Bible says it's not because God hates us.

It's not because God necessarily ordains that to happen.

The Bible says that we live in a sin curse world.

And with sin comes death, with sin comes brokenness.

And so what we see here in this passage is that sin entered the world through one man.

Now does anyone know who that man is?

It's Adam.

Right, Adam.

And we're going to look here in this passage about the first Adam.

And then we're going to see later on what many people call as the second Adam.

That's Jesus.

We're going to see how through Adam, through one man, sin entered this world.

But just as one man and his sin caused great issue, within this world, within pain and suffering and death, came one man who conquered death through his death, burial and resurrection.

And that is Jesus Christ.

But if you were to read verse 12, outside of understanding the context of scripture, you might say, well, why does God judge me?

If it's Adam's fault for my sin, why does God judge me for my sin?

Well, it goes on to say a little bit more.

It says, wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin.

So, so he equates death to sin, sin to death.

The reason why death is here is because of sin and the Reason why we have to go through all of that, all that pain and suffering is because of sin.

And then he says, and so death passed upon all men.

For that all have sin.

And so, yes, Adam is guilty of that first sin and ushering in the sin that we have in this world.

And the Bible says that we all have a sin nature.

And then it goes on to say, for that all have sinned.

Now, how do we know that all have sinned?

Well, we.

One could say, well, the Bible says that.

But number two, we could say that all have sinned because all of us are in jeopardy of death.

None of us are immortal in the sense that we are right now.

And so I'm.

I'm going to die one day if the Lord tarries.

And all of us eventually, at some point in time, will succumb to physical death if God does not return.

So what we see here in this passage is this.

Yes, Adam ushered in sin and the sin nature was passed on to those that are born into this world.

Now, some of you might say, I don't believe in a sin nature.

I believe that we're all good until we learn bad.

Maybe you didn't have children then.

Because my children, when they were born, I didn't sit down with my children and say, okay, look, you know, Micah, Nora, Silas, there's an alternative to telling the truth.

You know, you can lie, you can get angry.

You don't know what we see that within our flesh comes sin.

It's in our nature.

The Bible speaks of that.

But some might say, well, if I'm cursed by Adam and his sin, you can read that in Genesis chapter three, God curses Adam and that curse comes onto to all.

And then if God allowed that to happen, and I'm just a sinner by nature, when.

Why does God judge me for my sin?

Why does God judge me for my wrongdoing?

Isn't that just what I'm going to do?

I'm a human, so therefore I just.

I sin.

Well, no, the Bible doesn't say that we can blame anybody else.

We can't blame God.

We can't blame another person.

We.

We can't blame our upbringing.

And I want to take you to a passage of scripture that speaks to this.

It's in the book of James.

The book of James tells us how sin is accomplished in our life.

Now, I know that many of you here this morning have heard that word sin.

I mean, it's.

It's something that people use very frequently that even aren't in church.

But when we're talking about sin here.

We're not just talking about something that makes us upset.

Like I heard people say, man, you didn't finish all that meal.

That's just a sin that you didn't finish that meal.

There's starving people all over the world.

Well, one could argue that that's not necessarily a biblical sin.

When we're talking about sin, we're talking about God's standard according to his word.

And so in the book of James, James chapter one, it says here very clearly what happens when we sin.

It says in verse number 13 of James chapter 1, Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God.

For God cannot be tempted with evil.

Neither tempted he any man.

So the Bible says that the temptation to sin does not come from God.

God is not the source of, of our sin.

God is not the source of our temptation.

Why?

Because he's perfect.

He's sinless.

And so therefore he does not tempt us with sin.

So it says here we can't blame God.

And sometimes when people read Romans chapter 5, verse 12, they say, well, I'm going to either blame God or blame Adam or blame somebody else, but I'm not going to blame me.

Well, that's what James chapter one tells us right here, is that you can't blame anybody else except yourself.

So it says when you were tempted, by the way, the temptation is not the sin.

We all understand that.

I think you understand that, that the temptation itself is not the sin.

We're all going to be tempted.

We even know that Jesus was tempted.

But the Bible says in Hebrews chapter four, yet without sin, so, so what happens?

When does it become just the temptation and when does it change to sin?

Well, it says it very clearly here in James, chapter 1, verse 14.

But every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust.

Meaning we follow our lust.

We follow our desire to something.

Now, the Bible says that sin is a very desirable thing, that that sin in its package looks good, or we would not go after it.

So it says when this happens, when we're drawn away of our own lust and enticed.

The idea here would be that we are tempted to go after something like, like a fish wants to go after a lure.

I don't know if any of you fish.

The whole idea of fishing if you're using an artificial bait is you want to throw something in the water that looks like what they eat so that they'll go after it.

Now, they don't know it's fake.

They think it's real and they go after it and then the hooks are set in.

And that's the picture that's being laid out here.

It's that, that when the temptation comes, it looks enticing.

But when we go after it, when we, when we go for it and we desire it.

And the Bible says that there's lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes and the pride of life.

When we go after it, it says, what then?

When lust hath conceived, so.

So it's our desires.

And when it comes to pass, when we act upon our lust, when we act upon this desire, it says, and when love has conceived that bringeth forth sin and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.

So what does it say here?

It says this.

It's.

It's kind of like a birth.

And it says there's this, this temptation and then there's our, our lustful desires.

Our lustful desires meet with the temptation and it's conceived into a sin.

But when it comes forth in birth, what does it bring forth?

It brings forth death.

It's actually a picture of like a still bird.

It's talking about this idea that, hey, this sin is going to bring me something satisfying.

But when it comes to pass, what does it bring to us?

It brings forth death.

And so James chapter one tells us that we cannot blame anybody else, but we cannot blame Adam, we cannot blame God, we cannot blame the person who we consider caused us to sin.

No.

So when we look at Romans 5:12, we do see that yes, sin comes in through one man, but we are all responsible as it ends that verse with for that all have sin.

And so when our sin comes, guilt in our sin comes, brokenness in our sin comes pain and suffering and ultimately death.

But then one would argue, well, you know what?

It's.

I didn't know.

I didn't.

I didn't know that it was wrong.

I didn't know that I was sinning.

Well, verse 13 says this.

For until the law, sin was in the world.

Meaning this sin was in the world before the law, before Moses.

We know that because Adam sinned.

We know that because Abraham sinned, all those individuals that came before Moses and the law sin and they're.

And how do we know that?

Because Adam died, because Abraham died.

And the response to that would be that if they died, they were in sin.

So for unto the lost, sin was in the world.

But sin is not imputed whether there is no law.

Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, sin reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them.

That had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression.

Which means this, if you don't catch that says this, you don't have to sin exactly like Adam to be guilty of sin.

Obviously, we know that there are people out there that say, well, I didn't do that sin, so I'm okay.

What the Bible is saying is that there's no excuse now.

Now, I'm not teaching here.

Make sure that you are clear and that I'm clear.

I'm not teaching here that all sins are equal in the punishment when it comes to the earthly side of things.

So, for example, there are certain sins that I commit here that I might pay some consequences here on this side of heaven, but there's some other sins that I might commit that might have greater condemnation on this side of heaven.

But what we do know is that as the Bible says, that if I've sinned once, whether it be a white lie, as some would call it, or murder in the eyes of God, I've fallen short.

Therefore I am going to face judgment.

So nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression.

Who is the figure of him that was to come?

So, so again, what is he.

What is he talking about here?

He's specifically talking about this idea of guilt.

Sin brings guilt.

But then he says, Adam was just a type or a representation of the one who is to come.

Now we know who the one that is to come, that is Jesus.

And so he's going to shift gears here.

In verse number 14, he's going to say, what did Adam bring?

What did man bring?

What did sin bring?

Sin.

Mankind.

Flesh brought death, it brought judgment, it brought condemnation.

But then he says, hey, Adam is just a picture of what is to come.

And what comes in Jesus is so much more.

And so he's going to go on and talk about the contrast to the sin and the guilt and the condemnation.

He's going to now bring this idea of gift and grace.

And so he says in verse number 15, but not as the offense, meaning, so the sin was different.

The action of Adam is different than the action of Jesus.

He says, yes, Adam's sin made all of all of mankind forever guilty.

But what Jesus does is he brings a free gift.

Verse 15, it says, but not as the offense.

So also is the free gift.

The idea here is this, the free gift is different.

And the idea that Jesus now offers an opportunity for all who believe in him to have Forgiveness, to not pay for their sins, to not live in condemnation, says, for if through the offense of one, many be dead.

And that's one of the biggest understatements of scripture, right?

Throughout all of history, there have been people who have been guilty of sin through Adam.

But then it goes much more the grace of God.

So he says, you think it's.

You think it's a big thing that Adam's sin showed everybody else sin and Adam's sin brought everyone else death.

He says, how much greater is it that through one man there can be grace?

And it says there that.

That there is this free gift of salvation.

Now, I want to be.

Be very cautious when I say free gift, because when I say free gift, it's free for us, but it was not free for him.

It was not free for Jesus Christ.

We, we know that we are bought with the price.

Jesus paid the price.

And when we undercut the grandeur and the majesty of what Jesus Christ did for us, we live in something called cheap grace, which means this.

We become so flippant about what God has done for us that we just live the life that we want to live.

And so what that means is this.

We abuse grace.

But when we truly understand what Jesus Christ did for us, it brings us to a place of soberness.

It brings us to a place of conviction.

It brings us to a place of understanding that we can do everything in our lives for him because of what he has done for us.

And so it says, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam, we're still guilty.

But Jesus gives us the opportunity to overcome that through faith in Him.

So he says much more.

Verse 15.

Much more.

The grace of God and the gift by grace, which is by one man.

Jesus Christ hath abounded unto many.

So he says, just as many people that have been guilty of sin because of Adam can find grace, can find salvation through one man, that is Jesus Christ.

Now, we could talk a lot about that, but what is he saying here?

He says, there's only one way to find salvation.

There's only one way to find true grace.

There's only one way to find true forgiveness, and that is through Jesus Christ.

Folks, if there's anybody who teaches that, it's Jesus plus anything else or anything that we can do.

What they're doing here is they're saying, hey, you know what?

I like the grace of God, but I think I can meet it.

I think I can match it, I think I can in some way compete with it.

But What Paul is saying here is this.

There is no way that we can bring anything to the table when it comes to the gift of grace because of our failures, because of our brokenness.

And so it shows us that we are in desperate need of Jesus, desperate need of Jesus.

It's by faith alone in Jesus Christ.

I want to warn you that in Second Corinthians, chapter 11, verse 4, it says that there will be people that preach a different Jesus.

Folks, just because someone says that they believe in Jesus, it doesn't mean that they believe the Jesus of the Bible.

Just because someone says that they believe a gospel, it doesn't mean it's the Gospel of, of the Bible.

What we need to be very cautious of is that people preach Jesus, but they're not preaching the Jesus of Scripture.

And the Jesus of Scripture says that we are all sinners, we all deserve judgment and only he can save us through complete faith and reliance in Him.

It's not by works of righteousness that we have done, but according to his mercy.

The Bible says it's his mercy, it's his grace.

The reason why we preach this is because the most important thing, thing that we do within the church is talk about the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

It's not just for those that are in the world that are unsaved.

The Gospel is for everybody.

And I can tell you by way of example, I grew up in a Christian church, Bible believing Baptist church.

I went to a Christian school.

But it wasn't until the day before my 16th birthday that I came to a place in my life where I believed and understood the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Because before that I thought I was a good person.

Even though I knew that I wasn't perfect.

I thought I was good enough.

But there was a point in my life where I realized that I could not match God's grace.

I could not meet his perfection.

And therefore I had to come to him and fall before him and say, you know, there's nothing else that I can do other than trust in you.

And folks, I don't want to take for granted that everybody here today knows Jesus Christ as their personal Savior.

But even if, even if every single person in this room has come to that place in their life where they say, you know what?

I have trusted in Jesus Christ as my Savior, we still need to go back to this because we're tempted sometimes to forget about this abundant grace and live our lives the way that we want to live it and blame other people for our sin.

Folks, we have to take the responsibility for the decisions that we make and when we fall short and when we can't meet that we have to go to God and say, lord, you have to give me the strength to overcome this.

You have to give me the strength to forgive.

You have to give me the strength to overcome.

You have to give me the strength to.

To pursue and to.

To perform what you have called me to perform in my life.

And so it says here that the gift of grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many.

And verse 16.

And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift, for the judgment was by one to condemnation.

So we go back to Adam's sin, we go back to humanity, we go back to our way, we go back to our wisdom, we go back to our path that we have gone, decided to follow.

And what does that bring?

It says here in verse number 16, that brings judgment and condemnation.

But what does the free gift bring?

Well, it says here that the free gift is given in abundance, much more.

They which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one Jesus Christ.

So the free gift is of many offenses unto justification.

That's what verse 16 says.

So sin and man's wisdom brings condemnation, it brings judgment, it brings death, it brings separation.

But faith in Jesus Christ.

What does it say here?

It says that it in many offenses, by the way, meaning you can, you can sin, you can, you.

You can be a.

A person who has lived your whole life sinning.

So a lot of people say, well, I'm just too.

I'm too far gone.

I'm too.

I'm too much of a sinner to be saved by Jesus Christ.

No, the Bible says that we can.

We can live a life of sin.

But what does it mean here?

Not after we're saved.

And it doesn't mean that we can live the way that we want to live.

But what it says here is that there's no sin there.

There's no person who has gone too far for the grace of God to save them.

And it says here that in verse 16.

But the free gift is of many offenses unto justification.

Now, we talked about that word justification a lot.

It just means a declaration of righteousness by God, meaning that God can look at me and no longer see my sin and no longer see my problems, and no longer see my shortcomings.

But he looks at me and he sees his Son's blood on my account.

He looks at me and says, that is my child.

Therefore there is righteousness and so it says in verse 17.

For by one man's offense, death reigned.

So through sin, death reigns by one much more.

They which received abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one Jesus Christ.

Meaning this.

The life of grace is a life characterized by righteousness.

It's a life characterized by forgiveness.

I don't know about you, but I want to live on the side of grace because I want to be characterized by righteousness.

I want to be characterized by forgiveness.

I don't want to be characterized by my works, by the way, if I'm.

None of us want to be judged by our works.

None of us.

Because again, all fall short of the glory of God.

So if you're tempted to think, well, you know what?

I'm just not a good person.

I'm just not a good Christian.

The reality is this.

The reality is this, okay?

And I know this isn't necessarily something that we all want to hear, but the reality is, is that there is no one that's a perfect Christian.

How.

Don't raise your hand, but how many of you have been tempted in your life to think, I've got to be a perfect Christian?

The truth is that we can be a perfect Christian.

All we can do is rest in the grace of God and we will become more like him.

We will live in righteousness.

And we see here it's a submission to Christ in every way.

Folks, I've been really, really convicted recently.

I've been doing a lot of research and doing a lot of study on the church history, going back and looking at different individuals who.

We might not agree with every aspect of their theology, but there were individuals throughout history that were willing to die for what they believed in.

Things today that we take for granted, things today that we just go, yeah, whatever, we're going to church.

There, there are people who were willing to be burned at the stake for matters that we just go, okay, yeah, of course.

That's what we believe.

And we don't understand the investment of people throughout the centuries and ultimately the investment of what we.

We see in scripture when it comes to the apostles and all of the sacrifice that they did.

Why did they do that?

Because of what Jesus Christ did.

They understood the beauty.

They understood the power of forgiveness in Jesus Christ, and they were willing to live for it, and they were willing to die for it.

And today we live a very casual Christianity, and I'm included.

We live very comfortably in this world today.

And because the reality is that persecution doesn't really find us because we live in a place that there's a lot of freedoms.

But I'm going to tell you here this morning that there has been times in my life that I'm not living boldly enough for Christ.

And therefore no one's even going to know I'm a Christian.

I'm never going to face persecution because I'm living too comfortably.

And what the Bible says here is that when we understand the beauty that we can live in Christ and live in his righteousness.

Folks, there will be an opportunity for us to see struggles and suffering.

But at the end of the day, we get the beauty of walking with him and knowing what it means to be a child of the king.

So verse 18, it says, Therefore, as by the offense of one, judgment came upon all men, to condemnation, even so by the righteousness of one, the free gift came upon all men unto the justification of life.

And there's this repetition.

And what Paul is trying to do here is he's trying to emphasize the importance of seeing our lives in Christ, in his grace, and walking in that and not going back to what we've been saved from, not going back to live in our flesh, not going back to what we've been rescued from, and that is that judgment and condemnation.

He's going to address this throughout the book of Romans.

Romans, chapter 6, verse 1.

He talks about what it means to abuse the grace of God.

Meaning this.

You.

You've.

You've probably heard someone say this before throughout their life.

Well, God's already forgiven me.

And God says that he loves me.

So why can't I just live my life the way that I want to live it?

Why can't I just live in sin throughout the week and fulfill all my lust and my desires and then come back on Sunday morning and say, well, Lord, forgive me.

Won't he forgive me?

Well, number one, his grace is abundant and he can forgive and he will forgive.

But at the, at the core of that, I will say that if we live our lives that way, we don't understand the grace of God.

He says, how can we continue in sin that gracious continues to abound?

He says, God forbid, how can we live in such a way that we've been saved from?

So it's not to say that that's that Christians can't sin anymore, but it goes back.

He.

He always is concerned with our heart.

If my heart is like, well, I just want to do whatever I want to do and God will just keep forgiving me, our heart's not in the right place.

Our Heart is not submitted to him.

We're not presenting our bodies, a living sacrifice wholly acceptable unto God, which is our reasonable service.

We're living our lives according to our fleshly desires.

He says, that's not what it's all about.

And so he says, yes, there is a free gift, and it was given upon all men to the justification of life when we.

And that doesn't mean that everybody's saved.

And a lot of people teach universalism, which means that God just loves everyone so much that he just brings everyone to heaven.

That's not what he's saying here.

He says it's those who come in faith that Jesus Christ receive this free gift.

Verse 19.

For as by one man's disobedience, many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteousness.

I love how that's mentioned there.

Through Jesus's obedience to the Father, we now have an opportunity to live in righteousness.

We often don't think about that, that Jesus was willing to submit to the will of the Father.

If you go back to the garden of Gethsemane, you go back to Jesus's prayer.

Obviously, we know that there was a lot going on in Jesus's heart at that time, and he was always willing to do what the Father asked him to do.

But he even was pleading with him in prayer, saying, lord, if there be any other way to do this, can it be done?

Let this cup pass.

But we know that he ends that prayer with, nevertheless, thy will be done.

And that's a hard prayer to pray because sometimes the will of God is not what our will is.

And the true question is, is that are we going to be willing as believers?

Are we going to be willing as those that are children of God to look at the Father and in prayer say, lord, this is my desire, but I want your will to be done.

Your will is the first and foremost thing that I want to be accomplished in my life.

That's true submission.

I believe that's what it means to be a quote, unquote good Christian is not to be successful.

The Bible never says that.

It is required of a steward.

It required of a servant to be successful.

It says that we're required to be faithful, faithful to him who has called us.

And so verse number 20 here, here's, here's his synopsis.

Here's everything.

This is, this is everything wrapped up into one thing.

He says, moreover, the law entered that the offense might abound, meaning the law is there to show us where we fall short.

The Law is there not to save us.

I cannot create any law that makes us righteous.

Okay?

The.

The.

The Mosaic Law, which was followed for.

For many years, in which is for many people, people are still trying to follow the Mosaic Law today.

The Mosaic law cannot see it.

Middletown Baptist Church law or rules cannot save.

For many years, people had thought, well, maybe we can just create good Christians by creating a rule book.

And this rule book will.

Will be, hey, this is the way that you're supposed to be.

And if you look like this and you talk like this and you act like this, and you don't go here, and you go here, and you show up to church every single time the doors are open, you are a good Christian.

But what we've tried to do over the years, and I've.

I have been guilty of this.

Some of you maybe have not grown up in this.

God bless you for it.

But the reality is, is that sometimes we can fall into the trap of thinking that we have to perform to be a good Christian.

And we go off of the rules.

Not of scripture, but we go off of the rules of one individual's convictions or preferences.

What I want to tell you here this morning is what it means to be a good Christian is not looking like Pastor Josh exactly.

Or preaching a sermon like Pastor Josh.

What it means to be a good Christian is to love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength.

To love our neighbor as ourself.

And the Bible says if we love God, we will obey him.

And so what does that mean?

We follow him and we follow his will.

God's will for your life might not be the exact will for my life.

You know what?

You know what God's will is for my life?

To be the pastor of Middletown Baptist Church.

To be the father to Micah, Nora, and Silas.

To be a husband to Alicia.

Now, if some of you said, well, I think that's God's will for my life, well, we're gonna have some problems, okay?

Because you're not Micah's dad.

You're not the pastor of the church.

But I can tell you that God does have a will for your life.

And at the end of the day, God's will for my life and God's will for your life will intersect when it comes to the idea of giving him glory and praising him and honoring him and following his will.

And so he says, moreover, the law entered.

We.

We.

Alicia and I went to a Christian school, and there was something called demerits there.

Any of you ever know what a demerit is?

You get in trouble and they write you a little demerit.

They slap it on your desk and you get in trouble for that.

And if, if you got 15 demerits, you couldn't play sports, okay?

So I liked sports.

So I was like, I can't.

I can't get 15 demerits.

So what I saw as demerits was this.

I've got about 14 demerits to play with through, through the week.

And, and if you went one week without a demerit, you could earn it off.

So what I. I formulized in my mind was this.

I can, I can afford to get in trouble here, right?

Cause that's not.

That's only going to be three demerits.

And I can get away with that because.

And, and you see, that's a silly way to think about it, but that's sometimes what we do with the law.

We manipulate the law to fit into our desires.

Well, I can get away with this.

Certainly can't get.

If I get 15, then that's when it really hurts, folks.

The first.

My.

My heart.

My heart wanting to break the rules was where I was wrong.

The.

The idea here is that the law cannot save.

Rules cannot save.

Only what can save is Jesus Christ.

The law is there, as it says here, to show that we fall short of the grace or the goodness of God.

We need his grace.

It's like the Bible says that the law is like a mirror.

It reveals who we really are, and it shows us that we are sinners.

And so there is a principle of showing the law to those who are in pride.

Why?

Because the law should humble us, and the grace comes to those that are humble before God.

And that's what we can see here, is that he says, moreover, the law entered that the offense might abound but where sin abounded.

Which means this.

So the law shows us that we're all sinners.

And if we're all honest with ourselves, the law is going to show us that we all are sinning more than we actually want to admit that we're sin.

And because the reason why we know that is because Jesus comes and he says, you've been told that what you do is a sin, but I'm going to tell you what you think about as a sin.

And everyone's like, whoa, that's something I don't want to hear.

Because for me, I'm.

Maybe, maybe you're different than me.

But I'm good enough in some ways to not have people see me do bad, right?

I can kind of like manipulate myself to make myself look good in front of people.

But what Jesus says is that I know your heart in.

In your mind.

I know your mind and what you're thinking about.

And therefore I know that you're not sinning outwardly, but inwardly you're sinning.

And eventually that inward sin will manifest itself in outward ways.

So he says, this being the case, sin of balance.

And by the way, I think we could all say that in way of testimony if we were honest with ourselves.

Sins abounded in my personal life.

Sins abounded in our midst.

Sins abounded in our culture.

Sins abided in our world, abounded in our world for a very, very long time.

And it will continue to abound.

But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound.

I think that's beautiful picture here.

It's this idea that, yes, in our flesh we are.

We are those that desire the things of our flesh, lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes and pride of life.

But then there's God's grace.

God's grace is bigger than our sin.

Now, I have to be cautious here.

I think I've hit on it a few times.

I gotta hit on it one more time.

This is not to say that we just abuse the grace.

We are all to strive to be like Christ.

None of us should wake up in the morning and go, well, like, like I did many years ago, I can afford a couple demerits today.

No, wake up in the morning striving to be like Christ.

If my heart is going after sin the moment I wake up in the morning, there's an issue there.

There's a heart issue there.

And so this is not to say that, hey, guys, sin is.

Sin is just something we're going to do.

Grace is going to balance.

So just live your life the way the world lives.

No, it's to be different in many other places.

In scripture, the Bible says, be holy, for I am holy.

The Bible says that we're to be different, distinct, unique, striving after him.

But the goodness is, is that even when at our best, at our best, we are failures.

And therefore, where sin abounds, grace abounds so much more.

That as sin hath reigned unto death, verse 21, even so my grace reigned through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.

May grace reign in our lives.

I think that there's so much to be said about living a life that has experienced grace, because if we truly experience grace, we're able to show that grace to other people around us.

And so Paul states Hey, in sin that brings death, grace brings life.

Grace brings righteousness.

And so grace reigning through righteousness means this, that.

That we have an opportunity not to live a perfect life, but to live a life resting in the truth of God and growing in the truth of God.

And so therefore we are called in Titus, chapter 2, verse 11 and 12.

For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men.

So grace is there for salvation.

But grace is also there to teach us how to live our lives properly.

It says this, teaching us that, denying ungodliness.

This is Titus 2:12.

I would encourage you to think about this verse, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lust, we should live soberly, righteously and godly in this present world.

And so the grace of God here, what it says here is, it's not just for salvation to get me to heaven, but grace is there also to teach me how to deny ungodliness and lustful desires in this world.

And grace is there to teach me to live soberly, seriously focused, living righteously and godly in this present world.

So God's grace is not just for the eternal matters of heaven, but it's also for the matters of today.

Because technically we're supposed to be living lives that are reflecting eternity right now.

And so that's what he's saying here is he says, yes, grace is so sufficient for our salvation, but grace is also sufficient for us to live godly lives, so that as sin reigned unto death.

If we want to go back to that, the Bible says it's a terrible picture, but it talks about how the dog returns to his.

His vomit.

That's how we are when we return back to our sin.

We go back to that thing that's detestable.

We go back to that thing that.

That Romans chapter 5, verse 8 says in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

So it's not a large leap to say this.

The sin that nailed Jesus to the cross is the sin that I'm going back to and finding my joy in that eventually will bring forth death.

And so what does he say here?

He says, don't go back to that.

Live a life that is not reigning unto death, but reigning in grace and through righteousness into eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.

And so grace reigns to eternal life.

God's grace gives us something to take with us now and through eternity.

It's giving us this idea that we can live a life of quality now.

We can live a life of joy now.

We can live a life of abundance now.

And not in abundance of the way the world calls abundance and material wealth necessarily, but abundance in spiritual riches.

Abundance and knowing that we have confidence in Him.

And so he says here that it's so much, it's so much more important to understand who we are in Christ in comparison to who we are in our flesh.

Now, even though we need to know who we are in our flesh, we need to let that go behind us.

Remember what it says.

Therefore, we are in Christ.

We are new creatures.

Old things are passed away.

Behold, all things become new.

Paul says, I'm looking forward to the things which are before me, not behind me, not to who I was.

So many times we look back to who we were before we came to Christ and we look back to our mistakes and our problems.

And I'm going to tell you that, yeah, you can, you can learn from your problems, but don't rest in your problems.

Don't rest in the sin that you committed in the past.

Understand that God, if you were a believer in Jesus Christ, there is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Jesus Christ.

Therefore, if he's not judging you for the sin that you have committed, don't go back and say, you know what, ah, I just gotta keep paying for that.

I gotta.

No, the idea is moving forward in the grace of God.

There might be some people here that are struggling with a past sin, either before you were saved or even after you were saved.

And the Bible says, yes, we don't condone sin.

But the focus here in this passage and many other passages, especially Romans chapter 8, is that we don't live defined by our sin.

We live defined by, by the grace that we find in Jesus Christ.

And I would say this if you understand the grace of God, and I kind of sound like a broken record because I'm saying this every week, but if you understand the grace of God, you are able to extend grace to others around you.

Because, like, look, look, there's that passage in scripture that, that Jesus talks about the, the parable of the guy who was forgiven this debt that he could never repay.

Then he goes out right after that and gets a guy who owes him just a little bit of money, takes him by the throat and says he needs to be killed, right?

He didn't understand forgiveness, he didn't appreciate forgiveness.

And so I would, I would venture to say that if we don't extend grace to those around us, we, number one, either don't understand the grace of God or we are willingly rejecting that grace.

Of God in our life.

And therefore we're saying, you know what?

I don't need God's grace because I can handle it myself.

Folks, I'm going to tell you, we're all in need of abundant grace.

For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves.

It is a gift of God, not of works.

Lest any man should boast.

Ephesians 2, 8, 9.

None of us have a reason to boast.

I don't care where we're at.

I don't care how many years I stand behind a pulpit.

I don't care how many classes that I take.

There is never a reason to boast in what I have done.

There's only one person that we can boast in as a Christian, that is Jesus Christ and what he has done for us on the cross.

And so here we see.

Yeah, I used to read Romans 5 and say, thanks, Adam.

Really appreciate what you did for me.

You brought sin into this world.

But let me tell you feel.

I think theologically speaking, if we were Adam, we would have been there too.

Okay?

And the reality.

And by the way, just a side note, just, just a little side note here.

Paul is speaking in.

In Adam being a real person that.

That committed a real sin, Jesus references Adam as a real person married to Eve.

So therefore, we need to be very careful about this idea that Genesis is a big allegory, that Adam is just a picture of humanity.

Though.

Though there can be some similarities to the idea that Adam represents humanity.

We must believe that Adam was a real person who committed a real sin, who eventually led to the death.

And because why?

Because Paul references him as a person.

Jesus references him as a real person.

And therefore I thought that was important to throw in there.

But we cannot blame Adam for our sin.

We cannot blame our society.

Does society play a role in it?

Sure.

But what does James say?

I can't blame anybody else except myself.

When my.

When that temptation comes, I buy into that temptation.

And instead of resting in the grace of God and resting his righteousness, I say, no, that's what I want.

But the beauty is that there's forgiveness.

The beauty is, is that we're going to sin today.

It doesn't condone it.

It doesn't justify it.

It doesn't say that, hey, you know what?

Just keep sinning.

But no, the reality is, is that there's beauty in the forgiveness of Jesus Christ.

I don't know about you, but if I was God, I would not welcome myself back in.

I would say enough's enough.

Now Now I do need to make another point here.

This does not mean that when we sin, either as an unbeliever or as a believer, that we are exempt from the consequence consequences on this side of heaven.

If I, if I commit sin, even though God forgives me, I might still have to pay earthly payments for that.

It's the reality.

Some of you can speak to way of testimony.

I can speak of way of testimony.

I can't just live scot free in this world like, oh, I can keep sinning and God forgives me.

So you know, just like I keep going back, I keep going back.

No, like I've used this analogy before, I could be doing something wrong and, and drive my vehicle on the road and, and lose control of that and make a bad decision in that regard and, and get hurt really bad.

And God can forgive me for that sin.

But there might be a physical thing that I have to deal with the rest of my life.

And that's a one way of a picture, but sometimes we deal other baggage in our life.

And so it doesn't mean that everything is going to be wiped away in, in the way of consequences on this side of heaven.

But there's no more condemnation when it comes to our eternal standing before him.

And God's grace abounds much more.

But I want to challenge you here today, and this will be the last thing that I say.

I want to challenge you today with this idea of taking responsibility for sin, but then realizing that I can't do anything about my sin other than relying on Jesus Christ to overcome that sin in my life, to give me victory in that, to forgive me and to give me a new life in Him.

And so here today, I don't want to shame anybody.

It's not my job.

My job is never to shame anybody.

My job is to point you to the truth of Jesus Christ, to point you to what the word of God says about grace, what the word of God says about sin.

What does sin bring?

Sin brings death, destruction, pain, all of those things, darkness.

But then on the side of grace, what does grace bring?

Grace brings light, life, forgiveness, righteousness.

And so if we could be characterized by anything in our life, I think one of the things that we should want to be characterized by is grace.

We're all at each other's throats in our culture, sometimes within the church.

And there's a time and a place to stand on truth.

But there's also a time and a place to extend grace to people and patience with people.

And I think that we look at Jesus Christ, and we realize his example for us in that regard.

It's a free gift.

We talked about it last week.

I could.

I could have a gift in the lobby.

You could take that gift or you could leave that gift, but at the end of the day, it's offered to you.

And so here this morning, that gift is for all, for those that have believed, for those who have not believed.

Are you willing to take that gift of grace today and live in that gift and rest in that gift?

Well, I'm going to conclude there.

I'm going to ask everyone to stand with me, every head bowed, every eye closed, as the music plays here this morning.

We're going to take a time for you to respond to the preaching of the word of God this morning.

And if you can think of any verse to meditate upon here this morning, think about this.

Moreover, the law entered that the offense might abound, but where sin abounded, grace did much more abound.

Are you resting in that grace here today?

Are you trusting in anything else to give you satisfaction, to give you hope, to give you peace, to give you comfort?

The Bible says it is by the grace of God that we have anything that we have in our life.

Every good gift and every perfect gift comes down from the Father above.

And so, therefore, today I challenge you, encourage you to meditate upon the grace of God and what that means for you today.

Lord, I pray that you'd be in this time of invitation, working hearts and lives.

There's anyone that needs to know you as savior, to experience your grace today through faith.

Lord, I pray that today be the day.

But all those that are out there that might be a believer but have been struggling with the concept of grace, struggling with the concept of work, struggling the concept of guilt and condemnation.

Lord, I pray that today could be the day where they're freed from the bondage of sin, freed from the burden of sin and being, resting and believing in your grace.

And so, Lord, I pray that you be in this time of invitation.

We ask all these things of Jesus.

Amen.

As the music plays, follow us.

The Lord leads here this morning.

Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast.

I hope that this sermon has been a blessing for you.

You would like to find out more information about our channel, church or this sermon, you can find us at middletownbaptistchurch.org or find us on Facebook or YouTube.

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Thank you so much.

God bless.

Have a wonderful day.