Episode Transcript
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Them. These are important versus for
us because here Paul deals with the fall
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of the human race and Adam and
the redemption of the race by the Lord
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Jesus Christ. And I mentioned this
morning that these two events, I believe
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very strongly, are the pivotal points
of history, surpassing great things like I
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mentioned, the discovery of fire,
the invention of the wheel, the printing
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press, things like that. And
Paul summarizes their importance in verse eighteen,
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saying, therefore, as one trespass
led to condemnation for all men, so
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one act of righteousness leads to justification
and life for all men. So in
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these ten short verses, Paul deals
with Mankind's union with Adam on the one
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hand, which leads to death and
condemnation, and with the Believers Union with
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Christ on the other, which leads
to life and righteousness. So this morning
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we looked at the first three verses, twelve through fourteen. Tonight we're going
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to spend some time digging into verses
fifteen through seventeen, but let's again read
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through all the verses. And so
please stand as I read Romans Five twelve
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through twenty one. This is God's
word for us. These for us this
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evening, so let's pay heed to
it. Therefore, just as sin came
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into the world through one man and
death through sin, and so death spread
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to all men, because all sin, for sin indeed was in the world
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before the law was given. But
sin is not counted where there is no
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law. Yet death reigned from Adam
to Moses, even over those who sinning
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was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one
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who was to come. But the
free gift is not like the trespass,
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for if many died through one man's
trespass, much more have the grace of
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God and the Free Gift, by
the grace of that one man, Jesus
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Christ, abounded for many. And
the free gift is not like the result
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of that one man's sin, for
the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation,
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but the free gift, following many
trespasses, brought justification. If, because
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of one man's trespass, death reigned
through that one man, much more will
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those who receive the abundance of grace
and the Free Gift of righteousness reign in
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life through the one man, Jesus
Christ. Therefore, as one trespass led
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the condemnation for all men. So
one act of righteousness leads to justification and
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life for all men. For as
by the one man's disobedience the many were
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made sinners, so by the one
man's obedience, the many will be made
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righteous. Now the law came in
to increase the trespass. Before Sin Increased,
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grace abounded, all the more so
that as sin reigned in death,
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grace also might reign through righteousness leading
to eternal life through Jesus Christ. Our
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Lord, this is God's word for
us this evening. We're going to need
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help in understanding it, so let's
asking for that help. Let's pray.
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Our Lord and our God, this
is your word for us this evening.
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We ask that, as we come
to it, that you would increase our
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gratitude for the grace that you have
shown to us. Or if we have
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not yet tasted of that grace in
Jesus Christ, and in the very hearing
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of this word tonight, we might
be driven to him, and this we
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ask in Jesus name. Amen,
please be seated. So this paragraph that
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we now come to, versus fifteen
through seventeen, is one in which Paul
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develops the differences between our being in
Adam and our being in Christ, but
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more fully understand that. Let me
just review a little bit of what we
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talked about this morning. When we
came to gather this morning, I pointed
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out that Paul is writing here about
Christ and Adam, and in verse twelve
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he began to develop an important comparison. Says they're in verse twelve, therefore,
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just as sin came into the world
through one man and death through sin,
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and so death spread to all men
because all sinned. And at this
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point he obviously intended to go on
with something like what we find in verse
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eighteen. That's the purpose of that
little dash there. So one act of
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righteousness leads to justification and life for
all men. But he doesn't go on,
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does he? When he got to
the point of saying and so death
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spread to all men because all sinned, he interrupts his thought. That's indicated,
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as I said, by that dash
at the end of verse twelve.
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So he pauses here as if he
senses that most of his readers would be
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confused by his words at the end
of verse twelve because all sinned. They
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would probably think, just as I
think we would, that Paul meant only
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that all people sin, when actually
he meant that all have been accounted cinders
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because of Adams first transgression, that
Adamson was imputed to the entire race.
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So I think Paul does the only
sensible thing here. He breaks off what
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he was saying to more fully explain
him self, and versus thirteen and fourteen
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are that explanation. We looked at
them this morning. In these verses he
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shows that the punishment for sin,
which is death, was in the world
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even before the law was given through
Moses and Mount Sinai. Therefore, since
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people everywhere died during this period even
though they were not technically transgressors of the
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law which was not yet given,
they must have been condemned not for their
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own transgressions, though they were guilty
of them, but for the sin of
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Adam. And that is Paul's argument
here, and we took a lot of
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time this morning to develop that.
Paul specific point is that we were condemned
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by reason of our union with Adam, just as we have now been saved
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by virtue of our Union with Jesus
Christ, and that is an important and
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great principle. It's one of the
things he's getting at here. We can't
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miss it. We're condemned not by
our sinful nature and not by the fact
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that we sin, as bad as
those sins are. We are condemned by
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the fact that in the garden,
at the very headwaters of human history,
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Adam disobeyed God and his sin was
imputed to us. That's the principle that
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Paul lays down here, and that's
important, you see, because God saves
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people through this same principle of imputation. Christ was obedient to God and we
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can, through the channel of faith, be saved, not by our own
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merit but by having our sins imputed
to Christ and having his righteousness imputed to
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us. And then Paul gets to
the end of verse fourteen and he says
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something very interesting. He Parallels Adam
and Christ. He speaks of Adam as
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a type of Christ. Notice his
words. Adam, who was a type
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of the one who was the one
to come. So the question is,
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how is Adam a type? How
is he a figure or a form of
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Christ? How is he like Christ? You know, I think, I
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think we can understand how Adam might
be a pattern of other human beings.
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Adam sinned against God. We do
that too. We Sin Every day.
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But how can he be a pattern
of Jesus Christ? How can sinful Adam,
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a mere man, represent it or
be similar to the sinless son of
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God? Is that really possible?
Well, Paul says that it is possible,
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and here's why he says that.
He says both Adam and Christ were
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appointed by God to be representatives for
other men. God appointed them to stand
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for others and in that way Adam
is a type of Christ. Both became
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heads of a particular bodies of particular
bodies of people. Each is the source
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of what can be called either the
old or the new humanity. The old
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humanity is the race as it stands
apart from Jesus Christ, lost in its
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sin, headed for destruction. It's
what we see today in the world around
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us. The new humanity is all
redeemed people who have been saved by Jesus,
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and the entire human rays is divided
into these two humanities by virtue of
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their relationship to to these two representatives. We talked about Covenant Theology this morning
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and that's what that's all about.
And finally, both passed on to others
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the effects of their disobedience or the
effects of their obedience. Adam's disobedience led
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to death for the entire race.
In Christ's obedient thence leads to life for
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those who believe in him. Now
Paul was thinking of all these similarities between
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Adam and Christ, I think,
when he said that Adam was a type
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of Christ at the end of verse
fourteen, and so he's ready to move
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on. But then he suddenly realizes
I think that's going to confuse people.
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I've just told them how Adam was
similar to Christ, but I've got to
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qualify that because that's not the whole
story. I've got to show them some
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important ways in which Adam is not
like Christ at all and in which Christ
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is much greater than Adam. In
fact, the differences are much greater than
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the similarities. So he stops and
in verses fifteen through seventeen, our text
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for tonight, he explains some of
the ways and which Christ is fundamentally different
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from Adam. He wants us to
understand deep in our souls who we are
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in Christ. So he says we're
condemned in Adam. That's absolutely true.
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That's the bad news. But here's
the good news. It's also true that
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the salvation we have because of our
union with Christ is far greater and it's
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far more glorious. Paul wants us
to fully appreciate just how amazing God's grace
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really is. Note that he's not
saying here that what was lost in Adam
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was simply regained in Christ. He's
not saying that at all. As far
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as Paul is concerned, the story
of redemption, the story of salvation,
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the story of God's grace, is
far, far better than that. In
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fact it is it's amazing grace.
So Paul's burden in these three verses,
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I think, is pretty simple.
He wants to contrast what Adam did with
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what Jesus Christ did and he wants
us to understand clearly that what Jesus did
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was far greater than what Adam did, that what Jesus accomplish was greater than
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what Adams started. So those are
the cliff notes, the summary of the
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message of these three short varts versus. What Adam did was vast and its
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results, but what Christ did was
greater in every way. What God has
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done in his covenant of Grace is
beyond all that we could ask or imagine,
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and it's so far outstrips what was
lost in the Covenant of Works as
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it was broken in Adam, that
it will blow your mind just to think
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about it. And so Paul walks
us through that argument. He walks us
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through that argument in three parts.
He gives us three great contrast here in
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these verses between Adam and Christ.
So let's just dig in and take a
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brief look at each of these contrasts. First, Paul says in Verse Fifteen,
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but the free gift is like the
trespass, for if many died through
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one man's trespass, much more have
the grace of God and the Free Gift
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by the grace of that one man, Jesus Christ, abounded for a many.
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The key contrast here in verse fifteen
is between the Trespass of Adam and
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the Free Gift of God. Well, and what way is the gift of
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salvation in Christ not like the trespass
of Adam? And what way is that
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gift much more so, I want
to suggest that the contrast is found in
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the word died in the first part
of the verse. The Sin of Adam
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brought death to all of us.
By contrast, the Gift of God brought
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life to many. Now I probably
don't need to do this, but I
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want to pause here for just a
moment and go on a little go down
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a little rabbit trail. Little excurses, I think is the right word,
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because I don't want us to be
misled or confused by Paul's use of this
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word many in this verse. Does
Paul mean here that by Adams sin some
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people died, but not all people? Is that why he uses this word
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many here? Well, the short
answer is no. We have to take
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a look at the whole passage here. Now back in verse twelve, Paul
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has already said that through one man, sin entered into entered into the world
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and death spread to all men.
And in in Verse Eighteen He reiterates that
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through Adam sin all men were condemned. So all in verses twelve and eighteen
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and many in verse fifteen here are
parallel. Maybe I can explain it this
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way, Paul. He's not even
thinking quantitatively here in Verse Fifteen. I
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think he's stressing instead the amazing multiplying
effect of Sin. He's saying that even
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though it was only one sin of
Adam, the many were impacted. He's
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not saying many, but not all. He's not even thinking of numbers here.
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I think this is what he's actually
saying. He's saying isn't it amazing
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that one sin, one stinking little
sin, can wreckt this kind of destruction
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on the many, on the whole
human race? And in regards to the
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many and to whom the gift of
life abounded from Christ, Paul also means
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many, for surely many will be
saved. All people won't be saved.
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You know the doctrine of universalism.
It's an absolutely false biblical doctrine, and
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even this passage shows that. Verse
Seventeen lets us know that life, eternal
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life, the reign of life,
comes only to those who receive God's abundance
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of grace, it's Free Gift of
righteousness. In other words, that free
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gift doesn't go to everybody, goes
only to those who receive him by faith
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alone, as he's offered in the
Gospel. Now, I I hope I
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haven't confused Y at this point,
but when you see the words all and
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many in this passage, you have
to be careful and make sure your understand
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just how Paul is using them and
not jump to the wrong conclusions. Like
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Universal Salvation, or that Adam sin
was imputed just to sum and not to
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all. It was imputed to all. So, with the hope that I
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haven't confused you, I'm going to
move. Let's go back to Verse Fifteen.
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Now the contrast here in this verse
is between death, which has come
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upon all because of Adam, and
life, which has been given to every
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believer in Christ. I want to
look at death and life for just a
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moment. Let's look at death.
You know, in a sense death is
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natural and the sense that were,
if we're left to our own devices without
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any supernatural help, it just comes, it just happens. You know,
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God told Adam and Eve if they
ate of the fruit of that one tree,
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they would die. Well, they
ate it and they died. You
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know, it didn't require any special
intervention of God to produce the effect.
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Sin Always produces death and it produces
it equally for all people. Because Adam
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sin, death came in a natural
and inevitable way upon the human ways race.
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Dear once it is easier to escape
even taxes than escape death. You've
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all heard of that great theologian,
Woody Allen. I'm sure what do he
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allen once commented that he wasn't afraid
of dying, he just didn't want to
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be there when it happened. Well, let me tell you what a Allen
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will be there when it will happen, as it will inevitably happen to him
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and to all of us. Will
all be there. But Paul says a
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great word here. But the free
gift does not like the trespass over against
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this natural outworking of the sin of
our first parents, resulting in the death
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of everybody. Stands the supernatural working
of our gracious God. Now, left
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to ourselves, are cause is hopeless. The God hasn't left us to ourselves.
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He has intervened to say of his
save US apart from anything we could
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ever do. Paul will write about
this later on. In Romans six,
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he says for the wages of sin
is a death. That's the natural part.
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That's something we earn. Death is
the wage we naturally earned from Adam's
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imputed sin. But he goes on. For the wages of sin is death,
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but the gift of God is eternal
life. In Christ Jesus, Our
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Lord, that's the supernatural part.
We're now out of the realm of wages.
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It's no longer a question of getting
what's coming to us. Salvation is
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something we can never earn or deserve. It's given to us as a free
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gift by God's Marvelous Grace. That's
how great God's salvation is. That's how
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great God's grace is. But Paul's
not finished. Here he goes on.
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Look at Verse Sixteen for just a
minute. Here he argues again. And
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the free gift is not like the
result of that one man's sin, for
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the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses
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brought justification. I think the Contra
rested here in Verse Sixteen Is Between the
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one sin of Adam, which brought
condemnation, and the many trespasses are sins
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which Adam and all of us who
followed him have committed in which are atoned
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for by the blood of Christ.
Let me put this contrast this way.
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Let's suppose, for the sake of
argument, that the one sin of Adam
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and eating of the forbidden fruit turned
out to be the only sin he ever
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committed and further that none of us
who came after him and all of human
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history ever committed another sin and attitude, thought, word or deed. No
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more sin except the first one of
Adam. Now that's hypothetical. I know
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it's impossible, but if that had
been the case, it would still have
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been necessary for Jesus to die to
save us. For Remember, no,
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Paul's argument here is were condemned for
Adam Sin. Adam was our federal head,
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he was our representative, and his
one sin was imputed to us.
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We would still need a savior to
rescue us from that one sin and God's
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condemnation which came from it. And
even if that had been the situation and
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Jesus had come to save us from
the effects of only that one sin,
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salvation would still have been glorious and
the angels would still rightly have used their
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time singing about Christ. You are
worthy to take the scroll to open its
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seals because you were slain and with
your blood you purchased men for God from
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every tribe and language and people and
nation. Revelation five. But you see,
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Paul says here that that's not the
situation. Adam's one sin was not
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the only sin that Christ died for. We Adam Sin many more times before
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he died at the age of nine
hundred thirty years. His sins were followed
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by countless billions of sins, by
billions of sinners, all of whom added
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their own arrogance, malice other vices
to the grim moral history of mankind.
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Now, back in Romans One,
twenty nine through thirty two, Paul has
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already summarized for us the true essence
of human history. He says that men
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were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They're
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full of envy, murder, strife, to sit maliciousness. They are gossips,
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slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of
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evil, disobedient to parents, and
on and on it goes. Not a
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very pretty picture the dear ones.
This is us, you know. I
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wonder just how many times you and
I have committed any of these and other
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sins. There are indeed many trespasses
in the world. You know, I
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often use an illustration from the evangelism
program evangelism explosion, which some of you
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are familiar with probably gone through.
It goes like this. Let's suppose that
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a person was a good moral person
and that he only sinned let's say three
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times a day and thought word or
deed. He only fell short of God's
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Perfect Standard three times every twenty four
hours. Now I think we would all
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agree had to be a pretty good
person, almost a walking angel. But
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if he sinned only three times a
day, that would be over a thousand
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sins every year, and if he
lived to be seventy years old, that
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would be seventy thousand sins credited to
his account. Now, if you went
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before a judge here on earth and
he opened up the books and he found
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seventy thousand felonies on your record,
he throw the book at you. He
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wouldn't only put you in jail,
he'd put you under the jail. He
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throw away the key. No,
there are many trespasses in the world.
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And here's the deal. And since
Christ died for such a vast accumulation of
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sins, is it any wonder that
palm marvels in this verse just how Great
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God's grace really is in our salvation? Paul says here that Adam, with
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his one sin, messed up.
He messed up big time. He got
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us into this mess. The Paul
also says here. You know that's true,
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but think of the contrast a hundred
and fifty generations of generational sin and
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corruption reversed by the grace of God
in Jesus Christ. You see us,
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dear ones, it's not just that
Jesus Christ has put the lid back on
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Pandora's box. It's so much better
than that. Christ liquidated our debt,
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he absorbed our penalty, he's acquitted
us in court and he's transformed our hearts.
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by His grace. He's put a
stop to the incessant, seemingly immutable
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pattern of Sin and judgment and condemnation. Paul simply marvels here this amazing grace.
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He's surprised by it and he says
to us, do you want to
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find something to be surprised about?
Don't be surprised about sin in a fallen
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world. There's nothing surprising about that
at all. What's marvelous, what's great,
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what's surprising, what's amazing, is
this transforming grace of God. Well,
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thirdly and finally, Paul goes on
to argue here in verse seventeen,
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that there's another great contrast between Adam
and Christ. He says if because of
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one man's trespass, trespasses, death
reign through that one man. Much more
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will those who receive the abundance of
grace and the Free Gift of righteousness reign
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in life through the one man,
Jesus Christ. I think the key to
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understanding this contrast here in verse seventeen
is to emphasize the word abundance and the
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phrase abundance of grace and the Free
Gift of righteousness, and the thought that
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those who have been abundantly blessed like
this can here and now as well as
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then in their reign in life in
Christ. So Paul's third contrast here compares
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the reign of death through Adams Sin
with the reign of life with those who
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trust in Christ. To put it
as simply as I can, the work
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of Christ in dying for US didn't
merely restore us to the position in which
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Adam stood before the fall, but
rather it carries us far, far beyond
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that. You See, when we
believe in Christ, we don't simply recover
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from the fall of Adam. Instead, Paul says, we are made to
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reign through Jesus Christ. God's grace
and salvation abounds. Not only are we
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forgiven but over and above that,
the righteousness of Jesus Christ is credited to
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our account. Now look at it
this way. Adam, before he fell,
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was righteous, but it was his
own righteousness as a created being.
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It was the righteousness of a man. Adam never had the righteousness of Jesus
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Christ upon him when he fell.
When he fell, what he lost was
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not the righteousness of Christ, he
lost his own righteousness. But you and
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I are not given back a human
righteousness. We are not clothed with the
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righteousness that Adam had before he fell. Where are given the righteousness of Jesus
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Christ. And further we're no longer
on probation like Adam was. Adam was
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made in God's and each he was
innocent, he was without sin, but
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he was on probation. There was
the possibility of his falling, and he
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fell. But True Believers in Christ
are not on probation. There's no possibility
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of true believers falling from grace.
We will stand in that final day of
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divine judgment and we stand now by
God's grace. By God's grace we are
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victorious because we don't attempt to stand
in our own righteousness like Adam did.
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Instead, we stand before God's throne
of grace. Covered in the perfect righteousness
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of Christ. You know, Paul
encourages us later on in this letter.
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He says, for I am sure
that neither death nor life, nor angels,
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nor rulers, nor things present nor
things to come, nor powers,
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nor height nor depth, nor anything
else in all creation will be able to
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separate us from the love of God, in Christ Jesus, Our Lord,
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Romans eight thirty seven through thirty nine. So let me close. I want
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to note again, you know,
this wonderful, amazing grace of God and
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we see this grace manifested throughout this
entire passage. You know, the word
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itself is used three times in our
text for tonight, twice more in verses
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twenty and twenty one. But maybe
you disagree. I don't know. Here's
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the thing. It sometimes seems to
me that the Christian church in our time
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doesn't think that God's grace is all
that amazing. I think a lot of
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people think that grace is rather bloise
a today. You know, it's it's
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almost expected by many Christians. It's
our right, they say. God has
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to show grace. That's just job, after all. That seems to be
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the attitude of a lot of people
today. Well, I think the Apostle
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Paul and this passage disabuses us of
that sinful attitude, not not to be
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an ogre to reign on our parade, but precisely in order that we might
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know the blessing of true grace.
He tells us here that God's grace abounds
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towards his people, has no limit. It overflows, there's no way to
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measure it. It's utterly amazing,
surprising, unexpected and it's greater than anything
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that you've ever imagined. You think
you have it all, Paul says,
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and then there's more, and then
there's more and on and on and on.
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It goes to eternity. And I
have to make this personal. Do
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you know this abounding grace and if
you do, are you rejoicing in it?
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Are you thrilled at the contemplation of
God's Amazing Grace? You know I'm
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getting old, but I become more
and more convinced each day that it's only
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when you and I and other Christians
are rejoicing in this abundant, amazing grace,
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as we ought to be, that
will be that will begin to attract
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the people who are outside the church. Dear ones, there are lots of
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things about Christianity that will always be
unattractive to the world, like holiness or
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discipleship, self sacrifice more, but
grace is not one of them. Grace
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is attractive, and those who have
received God's a marvelous grace, should be
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attractive to you. We are living
in a difficult time right now. It's
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going to con it's going to continue, I think, until you know God
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calls it off. Does your faith
attract others around you? Do you rejoice
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in God's grace? Do you feel
compelled to share God's grace with others?
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Do you really appreciate? Do you
really appreciate and know who you actually are
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in Christ? You know? In
case you let me just refrash your I
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wrote down some things this afternoon.
Who we are by God's marvelous grace.
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Who We are in Christ. This
is the just a few. In Christ,
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you're the salt of the earth,
you're the light of the world,
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you're a child of God, your
part of the true vine. YOU'RE A
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channel of Christ's life. You're a
Christ friend, chosen by Christ to bear
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his fruit. You're a slave of
righteousness, you're a son and daughter of
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God. You're a joint heir with
Christ. You're a temple of God,
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you're a member of Christ body.
You're a new creation. are a saint,
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a minister of reconciliation, your God's
workmanship. You're a fellow citizen with
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the rest of God's family. You're
a son and daughter of light and not
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of darkness. You're a heart,
a holy partaker of a heavenly calling.
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You'RE A partaker of Christ, your
God's living stone, built up in Christ
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as a spiritual house, a member
of a chosen race. You're a royal
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priesthood. You're a holy nation,
a people belonging to God, an alien
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and strangers to this world, and
you're an enemy of the devil. That's
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just a few I could find in
scripture. This is who we are in
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Christ and much, much more.
You know, this is who you are
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because of the abundance of God's grace
which overflows to you. I read something
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the other day, you know.
It says he said you are one of
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the king's kids. You eat at
the king's table. This is good news,
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news worthy of rejoicing over and worth
sharing with others. That is very
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attractive. So I would pray this
evening that all of us would be attractive
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and whensome Christians, that we would
always rejoice in God's amazing and abundant and
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transforming grace, that people would look
at that grace reigning in our lives and
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they would say, if that's what
Christianity's all about, and I want some
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of that. So may the Lord
bless you, dear ones, and cause
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you to know all this in your
own souls. For his son's Dear Sake,
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let's pray
