 We're going to be looking today at chapter 6, verses 1 through 11, here in the book of Romans. So let's begin reading together at verse 1. I'll read verses 1 through 4, and we'll get into our study. Romans chapter 6, beginning at verse 1, reading to verse 4. Paul writes, what shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not. How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore, we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. So Paul has been making it clear as we've gone through Romans in the last chapter that Adam, the first man, had sinned, and he made it very clear that death was the result. He had said in Romans 5, verse 12, just as through one man sin entered the world and death through sin, because all sinned. So when Adam sinned, his perfect nature had become corrupt, he has a sin nature, and what he has done is he has passed his sin nature on to us. Even though we didn't sin and haven't sinned in the exact same way that he did, we are still sinners. He says in verse 15, by one man's offense many died, and that was dealing a death blow to future generations. As he would later say, the wages of sin is death. Now because of this, God graciously sent His Son, Jesus, to ransom us. In chapter 3, and I'm going to read that to you, in chapter 3, verse 24, if I can get to it here, yeah, chapter 3 verse 24, he had said, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. And so we have been set free, we have been forgiven, God has done this tremendous work in us. As he has later, he will later say in chapter 6, the wages of sin is death. But God has graciously sent His Son to ransom us. Now the price of ransom is the life of Jesus Christ. Later on, Timothy would receive a letter from Paul, first Timothy chapter 2, and Paul would say this in verses 5 and 6. He said, there is one God, and there is one mediator, for there's one God, there's one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, who gave or offered up Himself as a ransom for all. The testimony that was given at just the right time, one God, one mediator, and Jesus is a ransom. So let me share a bit about that, the word ransom. The word ransom speaks of Him yielding up Himself to death as the price of redemption of all mankind. In other words, it was His life in exchange for the forfeited lives. You see, in the Old Testament, if an Israelite had financial problems, I don't know if you remember this or perhaps have been taught this in the past, but if an Israelite had a financial problem, he could sell himself. They call it later on, it was called being an indentured servant. So he was an indentured servant, though he had sold himself in order to get finances to take care of his debts and now it was owned by somebody, he actually could be redeemed. In the Old Testament, in the book of Leviticus, chapter 25, verses 47 and 48, it says, if a foreigner residing among you becomes rich and any of your fellow Israelites become poor and sell themselves to the foreigner or to a member of the foreigner's clan, he retains the right of redemption after he has sold himself, one of his brothers may redeem him. That's what Jesus did. He ransomed or redeemed us. He paid off our debt. In Colossians 2.13 and 14, Paul said, you were dead in your trespasses and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature. God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our trespasses, having canceled the debt that stood against us. He took it away, nailing it to the cross. So the law, the law says, do this and you shall live. Problem is, as we have failed to obey, we're going to see that later in Romans in chapter 10, verse 5, when he said Moses writes about the righteousness which is of the law, the man who does those things shall live by them. So we do those things and we live. Problem is, none of us do all those things. So as a result, we have the penalty or the debt that needs to be paid. And the Bible tells us in the Old Testament book of Ezekiel, chapter 18, verse 20, the soul that sins dies. So this penalty was paid by Christ on the cross. And so Paul is making it clear that the law had revealed the depth of our sin, of man's sin, but it also gives us insight into the depth of God's grace. Now Paul makes it clear that no matter the degree of sin, grace is still sufficient. Why? Because God forgives all of your sins. How many sins does he forgive? Every single one. Every single one. I don't know if you know this. I'm not going to be teaching this on Sunday, though there's going to be something I'm teaching on Sunday that could lend itself to this that I'm not going to, but I will say it here. And I could even say it here. Maybe I am saying it here. Yes, I am. It wasn't in my notes, it just came to mind. But in the early church, people would, because they put such a high premium on water baptism, they would save their water baptism, their step of obedience and faith to the very end because they had this connection in their mind with water baptism and redemption. And so they would put it off until almost the very end. Why? Because they didn't have a full, many did not, did not have a full understanding of the complete, complete cleansing of the beloved Christ, of all of our sins. Sometimes we may think that all of our sins up to the point of asking Christ to forgive us, all of those sins are forgiven, but any future sins are sins that we have to pay for ourselves. There are people who think that way, but the Bible doesn't teach that. You see, all of my sins, when Jesus died on the cross, were still yet future. And a single sin had been committed by me yet, because I wasn't alive 2,000 years ago. I only look like I was. So all of your sins, all of my sins 2,000 years ago, when Jesus died on the cross were still yet future. So how many sins did he forgive? All of them. Every single one. You mean even the ones I have yet to commit? Even those. Now am I saying we'll look at this in a minute. So let us sin so grace may abound. Absolutely not. We just need to be aware that that's how complete grace is. Sin infected every element of us, every single portion of our nature, but when we received Christ, he redeemed us completely. And every sin we ever committed has been forgiven if we confess and repent and turn from it and received his grace. A lot of Christians don't know that. So a lot of Christians can live in guilt, residual, a sense of I have to do something to pay the debt off. But the debt was paid. What I need to do is I need to live as if I'm set free. Years ago I was forced in one of my literature classes in college to read a book. I can't remember the name of it. I don't want to remember it because if I did, oh, I just did, but I won't tell you because I don't want you to read it. I had to read it as an assignment. But one of the things in the book was this, and I'll never forget this, that this person had a rabbit, one of these Goliath rabbits, and had put it in a cage. And that Goliath rabbit is just as its name says, it's a giant. And ultimately what happens is this Goliath rabbit outgrows the cage. His body fills the entire cage. And so, for some reason, the owner of that rabbit wants to do it a favor and takes it into a forest, which is his natural habitat, and he opens up the cage to let the rabbit out. And the rabbit begins to squeeze out of the cage. It finally squeezes completely out. As it climbs out of the cage there in its natural habitat, it's where it's supposed to be. It starts sniffing in the air. And as it sniffs the air, it's unfamiliar to him. The freedom of being out of that cage, a cage that has been his prison since he was very small. That was the only thing that he knew. That's the only thing he recognized. And so what does he do? As he's there in a forest that is intended for him to enjoy the rest of his life and freedom from the cage, the author of the book points out that the rabbit sniffs the air, turns around, and squeezes himself back in the cage. He was so used to being in bondage, he had no concept of what freedom is. And a lot of Christians, at the same way, we are so used to being in bondage that we don't know what freedom is. Paul is making the case for us to understand that. You have been set free from every single sin, the blood of Christ has cleansed us from all sin. And God will not remind us of those things. In Micah chapter 7, verse 19, in the Old Testament, it says, you will again have compassion on us. You will tread our sins underfoot, hurl our iniquities into the depths of the sea. And somebody once said, and put a no fishing sign right over it. Our sins will forever be out of sight, never to be seen, and never to be found again. So grace, according to chapter 5, verse 21, will reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ. And so with that, chapter 6 begins with a question. He says, what shall we say then, verse 1? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? So this is a question about grace, but it also has intrinsic within it a question related to obedience. You see, that's because grace can be misunderstood as permission, permission to continue in sin. Now in chapter 5, verse 20, he had said, where sin abounded, grace abounded much more. So it's continuing in sin permitted because it amplifies grace, the deeper the sin, the greater the grace. And so to the believer, is it something we're permitted to continue in? Because and that would have been one of the detractors of the apostle Paul, who would have said that he's minimizing the importance of the law, which shows us what sin is and all by telling us that we can be saved through faith, through grace, and all of that. And so he's saying, no, wait a minute, are you arguing that we should continue in sin so that grace may abound? But he goes on to say, no, God forbid, of course not. Now he had rejected that accusation earlier, if you remember back to chapter 3, verse 8. Somebody had said, why not say, let us do evil, that good may come? As we are slanderously reported and as some affirm that we say, you see, this is one of the things that, and I'll say this briefly, but this is one of the things that as somebody who got saved in that movement called the Jesus revolution and Jesus movement, grace, when we got saved, grace was so emphasized because it should be. But some people began to see grace as permission. Some thought, well, if I'm saved by grace, I can continue not so much in sin, they would argue that they're not continuing in sin. But they'd say, well, you know, but there are things I can continue doing that while they're not the kinds of sins that'll keep me from going to heaven, therefore I can continue doing them because after all, God is gracious and this is just my flesh, this is just the habits of my flesh and those arguments I've been hearing them for over 50 years. I can continue in sin. They may not be saying it specifically like that, but what they're saying is, oh, God knows me. God knows how I am. God knew me when he called me, you know, and I've heard that so many times and what it is is that it sometimes became an excuse to continue in sin. What has grace been given to you and me so that we can continue fornicating so we can continue getting drunk so we can continue doing drugs. Oh, wait a minute pastor, wait a minute, marijuana is legal now, just because something may be illegal doesn't make it right. We need to remember that. I had that argument again when I was 20 years old and I was a pothead. We used to call them potheads. I don't know what they're called now. We were called potheads and somebody told me that. Well, wait a minute, wait a minute, because we called marijuana herb. That's what we called it. You know, I can still do herb. Why do you say that? I'm a brand new Christian and they say, well, because the Bible says that God created the herb and the herb's good and I'm a brand new Christian and I'm thinking, no, that doesn't make sense. And I still remember saying, I still remember saying this to somebody. I said, yeah, we also have poison ivy, but we don't use it for toilet paper. I mean, not everything that may have a use is not the proper way to use it, right? It's just not. And so anything that takes me away from God, anything that causes me to stumble other people, anything that is a habit that I might perceive as a freedom. If it causes other people to stumble, isn't a good thing. And to try to give myself permission to continue doing those things that Jesus died to set me free from is to demonstrate I don't understand the grace of God at all. See, he says in verse two, how shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? So Paul sums up our freedom from sin by pointing to one act. Jesus's death on the cross and resurrection, which when we believed set us free. And that's what Jesus intends for all of us, all who trust in him, to be set free from sin's bondage because sin injures us. Now, we don't immediately live in the ideal freedom that he gives. It's a gradual process. It takes time, but ultimately it's completed. You see, I may be set free, but that doesn't mean I don't have besetting sins, sins of the flesh, sins that were habits, sins that became, that would actually define me for who I am. Maybe I had a hot temper, maybe I had a vulgar mouth. I don't know. I'm set free, but those are things that may take a while for me to actually find myself completely free from. We have not received the full understanding yet of what freedom in Christ is. But what we do is we press towards a goal. In Philippians 312, Paul said it like this. He said, not that I've already obtained all this or have already arrived at my goal. But I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. I am not what I am going to one day be. But I thank God I am not what I one day was. We're in process. And so the freedom of Christ is something we become more and more aware of that. And so what happens, and Paul is pointing this out and we'll see this in a moment, is Paul is saying that we're to pursue the Lord as we grow in grace. We need to understand that we have been set free from the domination of sin because we have been made alive in Jesus Christ. We're still prone to sin, but we can have victory through Jesus Christ. In John 834 through 36, Jesus said, most assuredly I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin. And a slave does not abide in the house forever. But a son abides forever. Therefore, if the son makes you free, you shall be free indeed. And so we believers are dead to what has been called the judicial guilt that's found in the law. It's this guilt that brought judgment and we're dead to that. We're saved by grace. We've been made righteous through Jesus Christ. Again in chapter five he had said at verse 19, for by one man's disobedience many were made sinners. So also by one man's obedience many will be made righteous. Now that doesn't mean that we never sin again. Obviously we sin every day. I have spoken to people in the past who believe in what is called sinless perfection. They believe that in Christ that they no longer sin. All I have to do when a man says that if he's married, is ask his wife, is he perfect? That's it, end of conversation. So obviously we all sin every day. And what we do have though is a victory that we can experience over the domination of sin. You see grace gives us freedom from sin, but it doesn't give us freedom to sin. So some have reinterpreted the word grace to mean permission. And I can do this until be righteous. But what they would be saying, and this is a term that was coined and I'll share this with you for a moment. What they would be saying is that Paul is teaching what we would today call a cheap grace. The word cheap grace or the word's cheap grace is a definition of grace that emphasizes benefits without cost. There was a German theologian, his name was Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I think back in 1937. And Dietrich Bonhoeffer said this, he said, cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, communion without confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ. Today there are those who will make what they call a profession of faith or a confession of faith, but they never truly have repented. You see the call to salvation through Jesus always includes repentance because repentance that's genuine is always demonstrated by a change of life. The one truly converted never takes God's grace lightly. And maturing Christians understand that discipleship has a cost. Remember in Luke 9.23 how Jesus said to all, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily and follow me. So following Christ is actually a decision of the will and it is a determination to be obedient. So it never takes the grace of God, we never take the grace of God for granted. We never look at it as something that gives permission to continue in the sinfulness of my life. I'm not going to continue to practice in sin. I'm going to live a life that separated a life that can be called holy. And by grace we live lives that bring glory to God and reveal a victory over sin. You see we have his power through the spirit and we have his direction by the word. He didn't leave us without help. He said, I will not leave you orphans. I will come again to you. Jesus spoke concerning the fact that when he was to depart that we could feel abandoned. He said, I'm not going to do that to you. You're going to have the Holy Spirit who dwells within you to power the Holy Spirit. And there are quite a number of people today I'll be teaching this on Sunday. This is what I'll be teaching on Sunday. The baptism of the Holy Spirit that's found in the book of Acts and the day of Pentecost which this Sunday is Pentecost Sunday interestingly enough. But see that is the missing ingredient in a lot of lives. I don't know if any of you are feeling frustrated and powerless. That's your missing ingredient. It's the power of the Holy Spirit. When I first got saved I thought the Holy Spirit was a theological notion. It was an idea that theologians had put together to give to us an understanding of the triune Godhead. But the Holy Spirit in my life even as a new believer was kind of like the silent party in the Holy Trinity. I had no idea what the Holy Spirit would do. And because I was raised in a religious system that actually defined grace as an activity on my part something I did to receive. I didn't understand that grace was God's free gift. For me the understanding that the Holy Spirit would be given to empower me because I'm powerless without Him was a foreign subject. And so when Pentecost occurs and all of that Jesus had given marching orders to the church. He had to go out into the world and preach the gospel. But he was speaking to a group of men who had already abandoned him. He was speaking to a group of men who had forsaken him in the garden. People who are not going to do that without power. See you have a command but you need the power to be able to do it. If you don't have the ability to do that what you're commanded that's only frustration and futility. And so in order for us to have a life that really is fruitful and demonstrating that God is with us requires the power of the Spirit. And that power of the Holy Spirit that works within us is what strengthens us from within to obey those things that He's commanded us to do. And so it's a discipline in my life to yield daily to the power of the Spirit and the work of God in me so that I might do those things that are pleasing to Him. And so when you receive Christ or wash free of all your sin but you still need His help and His power to be able to live for Him. And so when you get saved and you're washed and cleansed and declared to be righteous and all of that that doesn't mean that we never sin again. We're not perfect. We're not going to be completely perfected until we're in heaven. But it means, though, is I don't have to yield myself to the domination of sin in my life. I now have the power to refuse it. I now have the power to refuse it. I've had people tell me in the past, they've said, you know what, you know, I was with a girl and and then one thing led to another. And and I fell in sin and I have never understood that term. You fell. What do you mean? You tripped and fell into the bed. What do you mean? You you fell. Well, you know, when when all the engines are firing up, pastor, you're a man. Really? So you have no will or control. Now, I'm not speaking as a judge, by the way. I understand like they said, yeah, you're a man. I understand that I do. I used to. So you're saying you have no control. No, I mean, you know it when everything's moving. Really? OK, so if the girl that you're with is available to you, yes, and your engines are firing on all cylinders, OK, yes. You're saying you have no power to stop, right? Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying, pastor. And what if she said to you that she has HIV AIDS and is infectious? Do the engines keep firing up? No. Why? So the fact is, you do have self control. You're simply not exercising it. So when you say you can't, what you really mean is you won't. See, God has given you the ability to say, no, he has. That comes through the word and by the power of the spirit. So I cannot blame God for decisions I make. And no, we don't cheapen the grace of God. We simply rely on it and we discipline ourselves to pursue those things that please him. Well, he continues going here in verse three and he says, do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ, Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore, we were buried with him through baptism into death that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the father. Even so, we also should walk in newness of life. We also should walk in newness of life. And so what he's going to do is he's going to explain water baptism. Water baptism represents Jesus's death, burial, and resurrection. So when we are water baptized, we identify with these events. He's not saying that water baptism saves you, by the way, and he's not saying that water baptism is necessary for salvation. Those who teach that baptism is a requirement to be saved teach what is called baptismal regeneration. Remember, we looked at Mark 16, verse 16, where it says whoever believes in his baptized will be saved. But whoever does not believe will be condemned. And so let's say, well, look, you have to be baptized because it says believes in his baptized. In Acts two thirty eight, they quote this. They say, Peter said, repent and be baptized. Every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ. And so they believe that in order for you to be saved requires water baptism. Somebody said, those of the baptismal regeneration, persuasion, believe that baptism and for some repentance and confession are additional things that God requires before he grants salvation. But that's not taught in scripture. God's word, even as we've seen, requires faith in Jesus. When Paul was asked the question, what must I do to be saved? He gave a simple answer. Acts 16 31, he said, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. And then he said in your household, not that the household was saved along with the ones who were believing, but they would be able to go present the gospel and their household could be saved also. So water baptism is what follows and expresses saving faith in Jesus Christ. You believe and you're baptized. First Peter three twenty one, when Peter was writing a baptism, he said this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also, not the removal of dirt from the body. But the pledge of a good conscience toward God, it saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So believers in Christ are baptized, what he says, into his death. Being baptized into his death speaks of a genuine saving faith. When you're baptized, you are fully identifying with the one who died to save and justify us to be openly baptized into Jesus is a courageous declaration of faith, especially during that day. If a woman got saved and she was from a Jewish Greek or Roman household, she was actually making a statement that was extremely courageous. You see, during that day in the early days, if a if a Roman woman was to determine that she was going to follow Christ in baptism, the husband could put a stop to it. He had the right to do that. Not only did he have the right to put a stop to it, but under Roman law during that day, he also had the power of of life and death under the Roman system. The Roman husband took the power of life and death as it was given to him by the girl's father. So the girl's father had the right to kill her in the early days of the Roman Empire and the early days of Christianity. The Greek, a Greek woman would never turn to faith in Christ because the Greek husband had complete control of her also. And a Jewish woman for a Jewish woman to turn to Messiah Christ and Messiah Jesus, it was almost unheard of during that day. When she got saved and she followed in water baptism, that was an expression of courageous faith that was unheard of because she was willing to identify herself in such a way, following in open, confessional baptism. She was identifying fully with the one who died to save and justify her. It was courageous. And so it is a revelation to the to the world that we have died to sin and we're alive in him. So in the summer, when we have our baptism, when some of you perhaps may be baptized, many in the church will be when we have our baptism, you're making an open profession, a declaration, I am following Jesus Christ. And as a symbol of that, I am going into the water and I'm revealing my faith in this way. You see, Jesus died for our sins and we are to die to sins. Now, he says in verse four, he says, we were buried with him through baptism into death that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. So burial, as it's been said, naturally follows death being the event that finalizes it. When someone is buried and that burial is final and decisive. So when we went under or go under the water, we're identifying with the death of Jesus Christ, the death and burial. Our old nature is crucified with Jesus on the cross. So in being baptized, we're recognizing we are dead to sin, death, burial. But he says Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father. So he was actually dead, but he rose from the dead is the point. So when we're baptized, we're revealing that our old life is dead. Now, notice verse four, he says, the glory is of exercising of his power by resurrection that produces glory. So God raised Jesus from the dead and God imparts life to us. It's called newness of life. This is a life that is produced by the power of the Holy Spirit. So you put off the old man and you put on the new one. And the new man, according to Ephesians 4, 23, is renewed in the spirit of our mind. So what do you do? How do we know somebody is actually safe, not just in the water baptism, but the demonstration that I'm dead to my old life? It's a new life that you live. We put away lying, you put away anger, you put away stealing, you put away filthy language, you put away drunkenness. Instead, Paul said in Ephesians 4, because of him, we walk in love as the children of God. And that's the fruit of his spirit within us. He says in verse five, if we have been united together in the likeness of his death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of his resurrection. If we've been united together in the likeness, that word united, it's an interesting word. It actually speaks of being engrafted in or grown with. It speaks of being conjoined. It was used of a bud that would be grafted into another plant. So we have been grafted, if you will, in Jesus Christ. So if we've been engrafted in Christ, if we have his life flowing through us, his resurrection, his life guarantees our own resurrection. You know, as a pastor, one of the things that you one of the things that you do is you on occasion you perform you perform burials. It's one thing to to perform burial for somebody that you didn't know. In the earlier days, especially I would do burials for people I never really knew. I was simply asked to do it and I would do it. And there's always a certain sorrow in your heart for grieving family. Then sometimes you'll perform a burial for somebody that that you knew. And that's that's always very difficult because as you are performing that burial, you're thinking of relationship and friendship that you had with that person. Then sometimes you may do a burial for somebody that you knew and loved very dearly. I performed, for example, the funeral for a very dear, dear friend of Marie and mine. Her name was Connie Sines and Connie Sines was was a woman I'd known since I was like 30 and she had. She I was an assistant pastor and Connie and her husband, David, come to the office when I was the assistant and spoke to me and said to me, you know, we we go to Calvary Chapel, West Covina, but we live in the area and we like to come to the church. I was the assistant at that time, but we want to know something about the church. And so I said, well, what would you like to know? And we had a conversation and at the end of the conversation, she said, thank you. Connie was very direct and she said, well, thank you very much. And I said, of course, and she walks out in a minute later, I hear knock on my door again. She comes walking in and she hands me a check, a tithe check. She says, we're going to go here. Here's our gift. And so I said, it's not enough and gave it back. No, I and that was our introduction. And when our fellowship began, Connie and Dave were the hosts of the Bible study that the church began to meet in on Wednesdays. We already had been meeting at their house and eventually they were our pillars in our church. Very dear to me. But she got cancer a few years ago now. And Connie, I went to see her. And the last time I went to see her at her house. And and as I was there praying with her and talking to her, I still remember that she grabbed me by my hand. She was so weak and she had lost so much weight. She had pancreatic cancer. And she took me and she kissed my face two or three times. Little did I know she was saying goodbye because two days later or a day later, she had gone to heaven. But when I took her hand, she handed me a tithe check. Her last time check that she personally gave to this fellowship. So you you you see people when they go to heaven. Some people you didn't really know. Some people you knew some people you knew well. And then you bury your own father and you bury your own mother. I still remember when my father buried my grandmother. My father and I stood there next to the grave. And when that that small little. I call it a dozer, but it's got another name as a tractor with like a little plow. My dad and I are standing there and my my grandmother's place in the in the ground. And they pushed the dirt. And my father, who had my dad was very emotionless. He kept his emotions hidden and I'll never forget hearing the sound of MSC. He took in a breath and a groan that came out of my father. When it hit him, she's buried. She's dead. His mother. When your water baptized and you go down in that water, it is a burial. The old life, the old nature is dead and buried. And the water that goes over it is a grave. But when you come out, it's newness of life. It's a symbol that I am dead and buried, yet I'm alive in Jesus Christ. And the world sees that it's a testimony and and amen to that. And and so our old person, our old man, he calls it is crucified with him. In verse six, it says, our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin for for he who has died has been freed from sin. No longer slaves were no longer in bondage. We live in a new life. It says who died has been freed. A dead person is no longer responsible for their debts freed from sin. We're freed from that debt. We're in Christ. He paid our debt. We are no longer liable for them. Colossians two fourteen says that Jesus canceled the written code with its regulations that was against us. And that stood opposed to us. He took it away, nailing it to the cross. And so in verse eight, he said, if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. So when we were saved, our old man, it's called the old man, died to giving way to a new life and our our hope of life and eternity is is is is resting in his resurrection. In 1 Corinthians 15 20, Christ is risen from the dead and has become the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. While knowing in verse nine that Christ having been raised from the dead dies no more, death no longer has dominion over him. Death is no longer possible for Jesus. And in Jesus, it has no dominion over us. Jesus ever lives. And we also live because of what he has done for us. Eternal death has no lordship. It has no power. It has no authority over believers. And that's one of the things, by the way, that should keep us keep us strong. You know, again, when when when the enemy was using a serious disease, COVID, he was using it. But what but he did successfully. And I believe he has mouthpieces. I think we obviously saw that that keep you afraid. I don't know how to say this because sounds weird. Death in and of itself. I have no I have no fear of death itself, none at all. The Bible says that death is our last enemy. It's not a friend, but I don't I don't have fear of that. Why? Because Jesus disarmed the one who has the power of death. That is the devil. Jesus conquered him in his life and the life that Christ has now dwells in me. See, so one of these days and at my age is coming closer now than ever before. Every day is closer and it's OK. I'm not morbid about it. Just a fact. One day should the Lord Terry, somebody will hear that David was all aside. But I've heard this before. It came through greater voices than this one right now, including my own pastor, Chuck, who said something similar. And and I believe it was D.L. Moody who said something similar. When you hear that, D.L. Moody is dead. Don't believe it because I will be more alive at that moment than I've ever been. And that's Christianity. See death or death. Where is your sting? You know, why would I be afraid to enter into the presence of God? And the enemy has a tendency of keeping us afraid of those things. When, in fact, it's not that we want to celebrate death, but we awaken to the reality that when I close my eyes here, I open them there and and I will be in his likeness and at his right hand is joy forevermore. And and this is what we have as believers in preparing ourselves for. And so when I when I've seen Christians who have yielded to fear, I I understand some of it in that. And I'm just being real with you right now. I'll get back to the study. But maybe or maybe not. But I death itself isn't something to be afraid of. The thing that God has to prepare me for other things. You know, just I want to be prepared in every way. So my family carries on and things of that nature. I want to prepare for them, but in and of itself being gone. And being in the presence of the Lord. That's what I've been preparing for all these years for. It'd be like a woman who's about to get married, becoming a runaway bride. I mean, if you really wanted to get married, you would think that your wedding day would be the most beautiful day of your life. You would think that. So why run from something like that? Why not run towards it? Why not embrace it and why not enjoy it? And so fear of death. No, Jesus Christ died on the cross to set us free from that fear. It says in verse 10, the life that he lives, he lives to God. He lives and it brings glory to the Father and and and the Lord. Well, Jesus is making intercession for us. And so he says in verse 11, likewise, you also reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus, our Lord. By faith, remember that his resurrection and his life has made you alive, too. And because you are dead, realize that sin cannot control you. So by faith, offer yourself to God, not to a life of sin and understand that grace provides the power to overcome. The psalmist in Psalm 19 verse 13 said it like this, keep your servant also from willful sins. May they not rule over me. Then will I be blameless, innocent of great transgression. Keep me from willful sins. May my heart be knit with yours so that I might do those things that are pleasing. I've said this before and I'll close with this thought and it may seem morbid. It's not intended to, but seeing that we're looking at death and all I'll say it like this. I wanted to and I am living a life that one day should I go home to be with the Lord and whenever that may be before the rapture, the rapture should not happen. And I go home to be with the Lord. I know this that one day, one or two of my children, maybe all four, but one or two of them for sure, will come up and stand in in a pulpit somewhere, whether it's here, whether it's in the main sanctuary. And they're going to talk about me. I have made it my aim that when they stand up to speak about their father, that they can speak the truth about me, that they can say my father was this kind of man. He was a good man because somebody told my son, Joseph, when Joseph was in Bible college, somebody said, I feel sorry for you, Joseph. And my son, Joseph said, why? He said, because you see your father the way he really is. And my son, Joseph said to this guy, what do you mean by that? He says, you know, your father's something in the pulpit, but he's something else when he's in the world. And my son, Joseph says, you don't know my father. What my father is in that pulpit is exactly the way he is at home. I made it my aim that my children would know me in one way. I may be their father, but I'm still their pastor. And maybe their father, but I'm still their example. And I told my sons a long time ago, you don't need a hero outside of this house. You have one living with you. It's your father. And that was my aim and that has always been my aim so that I might be the man that one day they would stand up here and say, this is the dad I had. And so I am dead to sin, but alive to Jesus Christ. I want to live for Christ so that the testimony won't be a lie or a fabrication. It will be the truth. And Paul is simply saying that to us as believers. You can have freedom in Christ. You can be dead to sin's domination. That happens because of the power of the spirit that resides within you. Yield yourself to God and flee temptation to do otherwise.