Walk in the Spirit

ROMANS 8:1-4

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Well I meant to mention for the for the Wednesday service all I typically bring is pizza. If it we'll we'll have some food, but if there's something specific you think you might want, just let me or Genie or Karen know and we'll see if we can do that. Um all right. But let's let's go ahead and pray. Uh Father in heaven, thank you for your blessings, and again, thank you that we can be here together. We ask for your guidance as we study together because we're in Romans, Father. It's a wonderful book, it's a difficult book to follow sometimes, so we need your clarity on it, and we pray that you would help us be encouraged in it and help us be brought closer to you in Jesus' name. Amen. Alright, we are continuing our study in Romans, moving on into chapter 8. We often don't take more than one chapter at a time in the New Testament, but I I mentioned this is leading up. Um I'm looking ahead, and um I want to do Romans 9 through 11 next year, which is kind of a unit, and it's a very controversial unit, we might say. So we're gonna after Romans 8, I'm I'm pretty sure I'm going to look at prophecy a little bit. I I we didn't do a whole lot of that last year, and I mentioned to you, you may have forgotten, but I mentioned to you my issue has been there's a lot of promises to Israel in the Old Testament. So I've I've been wanting to, and then when you get to the New Testament, you just don't see much about it. So what does that mean and what's going on with that? So um we'll talk some about that. I think that would be good for us to do um just to consider it. Anyway, um, we are in Romans 8 today. Romans 8, at least in my mind, is one of the greatest chapters in all the Bible. It's been called the inner sanctuary within the cathedral of the Christian Bible. Um, reason being it sets before us some of the you know most wonderful blessings that God has provided for us. We're it makes clear we're indwelt by God's Holy Spirit. We are free from condemnation. We are adopted into his family. We are destined for resurrection and glory. We can be full of hope because of God's love for us and because of his promise to bring us good in every circumstance that we encounter. You know, it's difficult, but and you'll recall that verse towards the end of the chapter says God works all things out for good for those that love him. So it's a wonderful chapter, it really is. That said, this chapter also contains what I believe to be one of the biggest textual cases for Calvinism as far as soteriology. Again, that being the idea that those saved were elected an eternity past for salvation, which I have stated very strongly. I do not believe. And most of the churches not believe throughout the centuries. Nevertheless, as you would expect, there are certain passages that come across as Calvinistic, and one of those is certainly in Romans 8. It'll be several several sermons before we get there, but I just wanted to let you know it's on the radar. Uh now, as we pick it up at Romans 8, most commentators that I looked at make the point that Paul, as he is resuming his thought, uh he concluded at the end of chapter 5. Chapter 5 ended with Paul saying, the result of grace is eternal life in Christ. Most of us are probably aware, you know, we've been here a while and we've been through several of Paul's writings. Paul doesn't care to take a digression. You know, he'll be going along with something, then something pops in his mind, and he's, oh, I need to explain that a little further. So he'll divert, and that's what he has done in chapter six and seven, albeit it's still definitely related. Um, but chapter five ended again with Paul saying the result of grace is eternal life in Christ. So you see the I'm just gonna read so you see the connection. Chapter 5, verse 20, the law came along to multiply the trespass, but where sin multiplied, grace multiplied even more. So that just as sin reigned in death, so also grace will reign through righteousness resulting in eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Therefore, there is now no condemnation in Christ, Jesus. So that last sentence there was from Romans 8, verse 1, and you can tell it just flows right into it. Um what happened at the end of chapter 5 is that Paul begins to address misconceptions that he thinks may have arisen from what he's just written about grace. In other words, to say that grace abounds, are you gonna make the logical connection then where sin abounds, then grace abounds all the more. Are you gonna make the logical connection that, oh, okay, well, if if sin makes grace abound, let's just sin more. That's basically the question he asks. And at the beginning of chapter six, and you'll recall, he says, no, that's not what I'm saying, absolutely not. Don't take it that way. Um, he talks about then in chapter six how we have a new life in Christ. He actually does give a precursor, I think, to chapter eight, because he says we are no longer slaves of sin, but we are slaves to God. And then we saw in chapter seven what we have been studying, he elaborates on the relationship between sin and the law and how we're all impacted by that, ultimately culminating in his own testimony about his personal struggles with sin. And just a brief revisit to that last sermon. I'll I'll digress following in Paul's footsteps. Paul doesn't say, you remember in Romans 7 at the end of it. For those of you who weren't here, Paul talks about what a wretched man he is. He doesn't say how much of the time he's frustrated with himself. Sometimes people are frustrated in their Christian life. Read what Paul said, and they assume, I think, that Paul is talking about somebody who's barely ever doing the right thing. You know, somebody maybe wants to do right, but they're most always doing wrong. I I don't think that's what he means. Do you? Someone truly wanting to follow Christ has been enabled by the Spirit and can follow him, although clearly not perfectly. That's the point he's making. When you're an older Christian like Paul, and like some of us, and you have been walking with God for years, and you've seen progress in your spiritual life at times, maybe times not. But even if you're riding a wave, you might say, things seem to be going pretty good, there are going to be times that you really relate to Romans 7. All of us can say that. And in the sense of following God and avoiding sin and that kind of thing, if your life becomes better, your standards actually go up. I think I mentioned this last time. The more righteous you are, the more you will understand righteousness. And how much ground really you have to cover. You you begin to, it's like God reveals a certain amount to us, and we say, Okay, I need to try to do this. And you get there and you think, oh, that's great. And then, oh no, I did this, or I think this way, or my voice is like this, you know, I say these things, and that's not good. So, in other words, you you begin, it's like God reveals more to you, okay, that's good. Let's keep moving toward living a Christ-like life. So, even if Paul's the most righteous person on the planet, he would still have this sense that he's not always obeying God the way he wants to. He realizes this and ultimately appeals then to Christ to save him from his body of death. I think that's probably what jolted him back to his original topic because basically what he's been talking about is justification, which means being saved by grace, not works. And so I think when he says that, he's oh yeah, I was writing about this. Let's get back into that. So we're just going to cover the first four verses of chapter eight today. Before I read it, um, well, I read the end of chapter five already. I'll just I'll read it again so it all flows together. The law came along to multiply the trespass, but where sin multiplied, grace multiplied even more so that just as sin reigned in death, so also grace will reign through righteousness, resulting in eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Therefore there is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus, because the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, since it was weakened by the flesh, God did. He condemned sin in the flesh by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh as a sin offering, in order that the law's requirement would be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. So Paul begins by saying in chapter eight that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ. He then goes on to explain how that is so in light of all he has said about the law and how we are still dealing with the flesh. Now it's a simple declaration, right? There's no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. Since God, the Father, does not condemn Jesus, neither will the Father condemn those who are in Jesus. That's that's it. They are not condemned, they will not be condemned, they cannot be condemned again, those who are in Christ. According to Poole, not Howard. I quote this commentator named Poole sometimes and always makes me think of him. But anyway, the Howard Poole used to attend here. The phrase in Christ imports that here is a mystical and spiritual betwixt Christ and believers. And this is true, you'll you'll recognize this immediately, I think. This is sometimes expressed by Christ being in them, and here by their being in Christ. So Christ is in his believers by his spirit, we are in him by faith and trust. Point is we are one with Christ. And since we are one with him in identity, he has given his life to us, he has provided his life for us. And we do need to let that sink in. Our standing has not just been improved in Jesus, our standing with God is radically altered. We are not under less condemnation. That's how we feel sometimes. We're not under less condemnation. Paul says we're under no condemnation. You're under no condemnation. That makes sense, right? Being in Christ means we're one with Jesus. Uh, he is our head, as Guzzik says, you can't acquit the head and condemn the hand. You can't drown the foot as long as the head is out of the water. It's because we're in Christ and joined to him that we have the verdict of no condemnation. And we are joined to him when we believe in him and receive Christ. We're joined to him. Praise God. Now, I will note here some of you may have the statement at the end of verse 1, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. I didn't look at the the um versions, I just noticed that, noted that on something I was studying. So maybe maybe you don't, I don't know, but it seemed to indicate that a number of them have that. That statement is not found at the end of verse one in the older man manuscripts. And in the CSB I quoted from, it's not there either. Uh, it's at the end of verse 4, and it's probably at the end of verse 4 in your Bible, and it's in the end of verse 4 in most all translations, I think. But it appears that someone added it at the end of verse 1. At some point in copying the manuscripts, they decided they needed to add something. We might ask why would they do that? I'd be afraid to do that. I'd be afraid to stand to the Bible, but they people can only speculate why scribes do that, but it's generally thought they do it to try to clarify something they think really could be misconstrued or misinterpreted. So they may think that statement, there's no condemnation for those in Christ, is a little too absolute. They may have said, let's clarify this a little bit. Well, the fact is Paul's gonna clarify it himself, they didn't need to go and add it. I mean, he clarifies it all through there, so I don't know why they did that, but just so you're aware, we do need to decide, you know, with the Holy Spirit's guidance as we study scripture, what is Paul saying here and what does he mean? And so if Paul really didn't put that line in there, as it would appear, he did not, again, is saying just as it reads, there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, period. But as we've said, and some of you may be thinking, but you're all the is there always a but? Well, there's warning passages in scripture, we understand that. Being in Christ means you're in him. But if you're in him and being in him as Christ is righteous, if that's now your identity, God has taken you and placed you in Christ, and you so then too are righteous in him, and therefore there can be no condemnation to you. Now, people want to focus on the wonderful news of chapter 8, verse 1, and they should. It's wonderful news. But it's, and I will say it's an integral part of the gospel. I I thought, is that the gospel? It's not the whole gospel, right? Because you think of internal of eternal life, we're given eternal life and forgiveness of our sins through Christ, but there's no condemnation. That's part, that's a corollary. I can't say the word part of it, you know what I'm trying to say. So it's it's a big part of it. But sticking to the text here, because I thought I I want to focus on this, but then I thought also I need to stick to the text and what Paul is saying. Sticking to the text, Paul is he he doesn't develop this any further in the sense of there's just no condemnation in Christ. Now, why does he do that? And I read, and yeah, he's done that through the first five chapters, and so he's made that point. His primary focus there was what we call justification by faith. Again, that we're saved by grace alone and not works. And he's just coming back to that now after his little divergence in chapters six and seven, and he's saying, okay, this is the summary statement of all that. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. All right. So he's summing that up, and that's clear. We're justified in Christ. Justification addresses what we might say with my court background, the expunging of our past sins, the sin record. He expunges it. The guilt for all past sin is removed. That's wonderful. But Paul is indicating clearly there now needs to be more that is discussed, namely the issue of living victoriously over sin. Our initial salvation is through faith that puts us in Christ. So now we want to know what that means for us as we go forward. Now, this can seem a little controversial, and hopefully I'll phrase it in the right way, in a helpful way. Paul's indication in chapter six is that justification by faith is an initial act that just wipes the slate clean, but it's not continual in the sense that it makes no difference at all how we live. Now, we've talked about this uh quite a bit and recently, but it's a focal point and it's a question that gets raised. So I'm gonna rehash it again. There is a group of Christians, they're small, but they exist. I heard them debating some this week on something. They're often referred to as free grace Christians, and they believe that once you receive Christ, you can go out and be a serial killer. It does not matter what you do, it's irrelevant. Again, they're a small group, but they're a vocal group. They make some good points. I heard the guy in the debate. He has trouble with the warning passages, but uh but they make that point. Um the other two ideas are are very much related. We've talked about them. So on the on the Baptist Calvinist idea, and and they're a little bit different in the way they frame it, but it's basically the same idea, and that is once you are saved, you're really saved. If you were once you are really saved, you're saved, and you can't lose it. Right? So so, but they give credence to the warning passages because they'll say, well, if somebody goes out and becomes a serial killer, that is indicates they never were really saved to start with. Okay, you all are familiar with that problem. Uh the other views there are many of you that I hold, and I know some of you probably don't, then that's fine. But and that is that if we're in Christ, we know we're in Christ, and and but God doesn't alter our free will such that we can't leave it if that's what we choose to do. Um now, for me personally, that seems more comforting than the other, because at any time I say, do I believe in Christ? Well, yeah, well, I'm saved, I don't have to worry about it. And and so the other view, it seems to me, you could think you're saved and not really saved, which seems a little strange. But anyway, all that, those ideas are pretty much the same. It gives credence to the warnings, in other words, however, you view the ultimate outcome of that. So this is controversial, I say, to some people, and we understand it. You think about it, and you say, Well, okay, you're saying we weren't saved by works. Are you now saying that works is what keeps us saved? And this is why, this is why Romans is so long, I think, and why Paul is laboring to get this across. No, it's not what keeps us safe, but you can run away if you just are bound and determined to, and sin is what would warp your mind in such a way that you would think, Well, I I want this instead of Jesus. So this is why he spends this time on all this, and he's saying the ability to do a work is a grace. We can't do it without God's power. That's what he's spending a lot of time on here in Romans 8. We are called to live holy because we're in Christ. We can't serve two masters. He said that we can't serve, we can't be slaves to sin and also slaves to righteousness. Now, Paul has already made clear at the end of chapter 7, this is a struggle. It's it's not simple, but we are to live for Christ. Now, again, salvation, where he says there's no condemnation in in for those in Christ, that is simple. But verse 2, again, what it says is there is no condemnation because the law, the spirit of the life in Christ, has set us free from the law of sin and death. We are set free from it. But he's saying lack of condemnation is one thing, but it's not all we need to know. We are called to live holy lives without sin. We are called to live to God. That is what is referred to as sanctification, which you all have heard that term. Justification is that we're saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. But sanctification means we are to become holy since God has saved us or be holy. And so, if it comes down now to that I'm forgiven, how do I become a holy person in my behavior, in my life? That's right. And so Paul has already said, again, that's easier said than done. Don't think this is not a struggle. It's not a struggle for your salvation, though. Just understand that. Okay. But he but again, the warnings are there that while it's not a struggle for your salvation, if you just say, I don't care how I live, then's when it can become dangerous. So it's not a matter of having to be perfect, it's just we belong to Christ. Have his Spirit in our lives, the Holy Spirit in our lives, our desires do change. If the Holy Spirit's living in you, your desires do change. Chapter 8 is going to explain how the Spirit helps us go forward and live more Christ's life. Paul is going to refer to the Holy Spirit some 20 times throughout this chapter. He's only referred to it in passing earlier. Okay, Paul is, again, he's already said, indicated the change has to be internal. There has to be a change in the nature, or the fruit is not going to be good. Because the law, again, can try to force a person to do the right thing, right? But ultimately, that's not the issue. An inside change is needed, meaning that we would live in a way that we're driven to do the right thing. We want to do the right thing from a righteous impulse. So what he's doing in there in verses 2 through 4 then is introducing us to the contrast really between the life in the spirit and life in the flesh. And it's just the introduction. He's not going to get real deep into it. But as a preacher, I was able to get probably more out of it than you would think. I'm sorry. I'll explain why in just a minute because he he says a word that's helpful. In chapter 7, he's already talked about what we see in verse 3. The law can do many things, it can guide us, teach us, tell us about God's character. But the law doesn't give energy to us, it doesn't give energy to our flesh. It gives us a standard of how to live and then gives us no power for doing the living. A fellow named Manson, not Charles. Some of you know him. That's all I think of when I hear Manson, that poor family. If you don't know who he is, don't look it up. You don't need to know. But anyway, the commentator Manson says, Moses' law has right but not might. Sin's law has might but not right. What Paul is doing then is saying the law of the Spirit has both might and right. That's what he's getting to. And again, commentator Poole again says the law is weak to us because we are weak to it. The sun cannot give light to a blind eye, not from the impotency in itself, but merely from the incapacity of the subject it shines on, right? So the sun shining, a blind person can't see it. Uh it's not because the sun's not giving light, it's just the blind person can't see it. He's comparing us in that sense, or the person that's not in Christ to that blind person. And likewise, we don't have any strength to uphold the law in our natural state. That's Paul's lamentation in chapter 7 to some extent, because he's still battling the flesh. But the second part of verse 3, Paul says God condemns sin by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh as a sin offering. And let me just say that. Clearly, Paul is speaking very carefully there. And boy, do I understand that. And trying to parse through his words, as you've probably sensed. I don't want to say the wrong thing. And it's uh, you know, difficult because I want to be precise in my language. And Paul is definitely doing that here. He could not say that Jesus came in sinful flesh, obviously, because Jesus was sinless. Um, he can't say that Jesus came in the likeness of the flesh, because Jesus is human. So he says she came in the likeness of sinful flesh, he was human yet not sinful. And the thus he condemned in the flesh of Jesus. God condemned in the flesh of Jesus, and he bore the condemnation we deserve. And that's why, of course, we are again under no condemnation in Christ. None. So that's wonderful. But he's saying there the law could only detect sin. Christ defeated sin. So that's verse three. I want to go back to verse two for just a moment. Christ defeated sin, but we're told here the law of the spirit of life in Christ has made us free from the law of sin and death. In effect, what's happening? Romans 8:1 is saying we are free from the guilt of sin. And then in Romans 8.2, he's saying we're free from the power of sin. And you're well, well, now what? And as Paul has already stated, we still battle the flesh, and it has a strong pull on us, and we inevitably sin at times. I believe this is indicating we don't have to. As Paul was also saying chapter 7, we are free from sin's dominion. So then the point is, I know it sounds like in a way Paul's talking about both sides of his mouth, but from our saved state, death no longer has lasting power against the believer. But you see the problem, he says you're free from the power of sin. Chapter 7, we struggle against sin. So you're free from sin. No, you're not. Yes, sure. No, you're not. It's what it sounds like. And we understand the flesh causes the problem. So the question maybe that comes to our mind, or at least came to mind, was, well, how much power do we need to defeat the flesh? That's the issue. In Jeremiah chapter 31, I'm not going to turn there, some of you'd be familiar with it, but God said there, that's when he said, the new covenant is coming. He's going to write his law on their hearts and on their inward parts. The idea being, the idea being, of course, instead of exposing an eternal law on a rebellious horse, i.e. the old covenant, he's going to transform the heart so those laws are built in. A factory-installed job, we might say, uh, which suggests the inner nature will be inclined toward those laws. And Paul is affirming this. And so he says later in verse 12, we are not obligated to the flesh any longer. He's going to spend some time talking about how we overcome. For the time being, let's just finish it by looking at verse 4. And I'm going to read verse 4 again. In order that the law's requirement would be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. And that's the idea that got me. So he mentions that we are to walk according to the spirit. And I want to focus really on this idea of walking our remaining time. Some of you are aware, I've mentioned it before. For exercise, I started walking, I guess, a couple three years ago. My knee can't take running. And we were just a little too far from the gym. I felt like I needed to do something. Everything I read said that walking is really good for you, good for your health. Um, and I think it has been to some extent. Not as good as I would hope. I still can't just eat whatever I want to, whenever I want to, but I guess that's to be expected. Uh so I started trying to walk a couple of miles, you know, not that much, two, three days a week. And I've got up more than that now, gradually increased my walking over the past few years. What Paul is saying, and we understand this, he's saying our spiritual life is a walk. And that's really a good physical, it's really a good analogy with our spiritual life. In fact, you know, it's often called a spiritual walk. We refer to it as that. Life is a walk, it consists of individual steps. When you're walking, each step has to be taken individually. You may take a thousand steps in a row that are successful. And the next one you may twist your ankle because you came up on something you weren't expecting. And what you what you can't do is ever say, I'm walking so well, I don't need to worry about any obstacles that might make me stumble. Remember, James says we we all stumble. Actually, he says we stumble, we all stumble in many ways. That's what how James says it. We never get to a place where stumbling is not a real possibility, where it's not a danger. And that's because there's always the law of gravity. I use that analogy, you may, I don't know if you remember it, but we use that as an analogy for sin a sermon or two back, how sin pulls us down. So there are obstacles in your way that you can see coming, but others sneak up on us. I was walking last, I can't remember now if it's about a year and a half ago, I think. And I was feeling great. I was getting in more steps, and kind of out of the blue, I caught a glimpse of this person riding a bike toward me. Now I had plenty, they ride them on the sidewalk sometimes uh instead of the road. I had plenty of time to move, but I was distracted. What do you think I was doing? Yes. Phone. Looking at the phone. The thing, the thing, Richard's just he's so disappointed, I can tell you. But I was, I was looking at it, and I just I had plenty of time to move, but I just, you know, I just caught it, I thought it was coming at me, and I just tried to jump, and I don't know what I did to my knee. But it was painful, and I didn't know if I was gonna be, I was about, um, I was probably about three-quarters of a mile from home, and Mariah was there, and I was saying, I think I'm gonna have to call her to come get me. I didn't know if I could get back, but I you know I finally sucked it up and hobbled back to the house. Um there there's always the law of sin in your members, and so we have to be alert. It's it's gonna be there until we're delivered from it through the resurrection. Even when we get to verse 23, Paul talks about how we're groaning, looking forward to the redemption of our new bodies, which we can all attest to. The younger ones, maybe not yet, but you will. Um, yeah, I remember people telling me, uh, you'll eventually feel it too. And I'm like, Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, you do. Even Alex now is saying, Oh, Dad, I'm hurting. I'm like, just hush, you don't even know what you're talking about. Um, but anyway, before we're resurrected, before the new body, before we are freed from the law of the sin in our members, we have another law which has been available, which is available to empower us. That's what Paul is saying, the law of the spirit of life in Christ. And the spirit of Christ is given to us inwardly when we believe, it's born again, born from above. That resource is the resource that is more powerful than the law of sin and death. That's what he's saying. And we know this because Jesus showed himself to be more powerful in sin and death. He was sinless and he rose from the dead. He conquered both. And having done so, the life that he gives us in his spirit is capable of overcoming this other force in our members. Now, he's not going to make us, but he is intent on working through us and with us. The law of the Spirit of the life in Christ Jesus, again, verse 2, has made me free from the law of sin and death. Now, we obviously we understand, and again, as I've said, we're never going to get to a point where we can say, Oh, I'm walking just fine now. You know, I'm doing great. I'm walking downhill. I'm free from the law of sin and death. In the sense of no more struggle for me. Because that's not what he's telling us, right? It's rather the spirit empowers me to overcome sin and death and frees me from its bondage and power as I walk in the spirit. But as with all walking, it's a matter of individual steps every day for the rest of my life. And for some of you, that's oh no, it's exhausting. It it is. I remember them asking John MacArthur, you know, he was getting older, and they they said, um, what do you look forward to in Christ returns or some of that effect? And he said, I just look forward to not having to struggle. He said, I'm just I just get tired, you know. Um good point. Um, but I've told you this before. Don't, and I've had to learn this. Don't fret so much about what's coming up down the road. Just worry about the next 10 steps. Don't just deal with those. Handle those, and then deal with the next 10 steps when you get there. Because again, it's every decision I make. And that I started thinking about songs at this point. Every breath you take, you remember that song? Every move you make, every step you take, I'll be watching you. Well, I won't be watching. I need to be watching myself, but you we all need to be watching ourselves. Taking care in every decision. My walk has to be in the spirit. Because if it's not, it won't be. Very profound. Uh, but that is the point. It's only through the power of the spirit I can overcome. I can't do it on my own. That's how Paul closed chapter 7. Remember, I serve the law of God with my mind, but the law of sin with my flesh. If it's left up to me, I'm not stronger than me. You know, that's the problem. I'm not stronger than my flesh. Sin in me is part of me. How am I gonna conquer myself? I can't. There has to be an external power that gives me internal strength. I have that in the spirit. That is given again when you believed in Christ. And again, he doesn't, he's not gonna make you, that's not his objective, is to make you a robot. He is going to work with you, with your spirit, to empower you. So then the question is, well, okay, good, how do I exploit that power? Walk step by step in the spirit each day, each decision. We don't stumble when we walk in the spirit. That's Paul says in Galatians 5.16, walk by the spirit, and you certainly will not carry out the desires of the flesh. Sounds like a nice Christian cliche, but it's just the truth. And you may be thinking, well, can you give us a little more details on that? Well, I've tried to give you the mindset at least initially. There's another song. I'm not gonna read it. I think I pulled it up, but it's one foot, it's called, it's a kind of a rock song that was out in 2017, but it's a good one. It's one foot in front of the other, and basically what he's saying is you gotta keep going in the face of uncertainty and adversity. Just one foot in front of the other, just keep going. That's an introduction to it. That's what he's saying here in introducing it. Now he's gonna get more detailed, and we'll do that as we go through. But it's depicted in many times again in scripture. We have a walk, walk worthy of the calling you're a call. Walk by faith, walk in love, walk this way, talk this way. That's another song. Not that. Um, but every time we make a choice, it's gonna be a step forward or a step back. And that's what people say, I take one step forward and two steps back, and that's what we do sometimes, but keep trying to step forward. If we walk in the flesh, you'll end up on a rough trail. And it's people who go too far on that path that can get lost and really find it difficult to get back. That's the point. So this walk requires diligence. We've got to keep our eyes open. I have to in Black Mountain, or what we call Black Bear Mountain now. I think I've told somebody I've seen more black bears this year than ever. I just had got back one day this week from walking, and I looked out the window at our back glass because they have a trail in our backyard now. They come down through there and they go around the side road, and then they go over into another little section of forest over there in front of the neighbor's house. And um I looked out the window and there was this big black bear in the yard. I sent a picture to the boys. Alex said, Dad, that bear looks like it's 500 pounds. And it wasn't that big. I blew the picture up before I seen it, but but I mean it was big, though. It was still, it probably was 250, 300 pounds. I didn't want to meet it, that's for sure. And the other thing, I'd just taken something out of the microwave. That's my cooking. Remember, I wasn't there this week, so I was cooking the microwave. So I took something out and um I could smell it, it smelled good. And I remember hearing stories about that, how good they smell, and I thought, is that thing gonna try to come into the house and take my burger? Uh I was a little concerned about that. But I was thinking, you know, five minutes later, and I could have had an encounter with Mr. Bear. And that's why when I tell my wife anytime I'm going to walk, here's what she says: head on a swivel. Head on a swivel. You gotta be looking all the time. And that's our spiritual walk. Head on a swivel. Be diligent, keep your eyes open, be vigilant, be sober. There are spiritual dangers. There is a devil who wants to trip you up. He'll appeal to your flesh, he'll distract your mind, he'll do what he can to make you forget what you're supposed to believe and what you're supposed to do. Remember, God loves you. God sent his son for you to die for you. And he God wants you to be in a relationship with him. It's not that God's looking at you like, oh, just mess up and I'm on. We know better than that. You don't do that with your loved ones. Don't ever think that God does that with us. Our problem sometimes we take walking for granted. It becomes so habitual we can stumble with the slumber walk that I was mentioning before, you know, we're not really paying attention and we're easily distracted. And the problem is it is our fleshly pull. It's awfully hard to keep our attention focused on what it's supposed to be on all the time. We're easily distracted. We have times when we're just weaker than other times, when it doesn't matter to us as much as it should. We're not fighting the fight like we should be. We just want to cave in and have and take the path of least resistance. So maybe that's the question too. Well, any tips for what you need to do? Well, I think we've kind of alluded to it. I'll just say a couple more things and we'll wrap it up. One, you have to have somewhere to go. Even if I'm not walking anywhere for a specific purpose to get my walk in, I'd use I go ahead and map out a route. Because if I don't, then I won't know how far I went. I won't, I'll just be I'll be wondering instead of walking. Well, actually, I'll be walking and wondering, which uh you can do, but walking is a way to get to where you want to go. See, you you can ask yourself, where do you want to go spiritually today? When you go to bed tonight, if you're saying your prayers, where where do you want to talk, or what do you want to talk to Jesus about where you've been and that sort of thing? Where do you want to go tomorrow? Where do you want to go down the road? Because again, I said we need to focus more on the 10 steps in front of us, and that is true. But if you're thinking about further out and where you want to be, and you know how many every year, and what example you want to be for your children or grandchildren, or what where you want to be in a place to maybe help think how do what what path do I need to be on to get there? That sort of thing. If if we have no goal, we can be walking, be walking aimlessly. Uh so walking in the spirit, walking in the spirit requires direction from the spirit. Okay, and a lot of times that's moral. Yes, we understand that. And we generally know what's right and wrong. The problem is we don't want to do it. Though that that issue is not too big an issue of not knowing what the direction is. We just don't want to take it. That's an issue of strength. We'll come to that in a moment. There's also just following Christ in different things, be it be it tuned to the where the spirit wants you to go or to the spirit's prompting. I mentioned my friends who lost their son a few months back. I mentioned them on Wednesday night as well. I used to work with the mother. In fact, she worked for me maybe for a year or so. Um I'd only briefly spoken to her since her son died. I'd sent her some text. I tried to go to work there at the courthouse. She wasn't there. It's one of those things. I know them pretty well, but I don't know them real well. So it's like in the sense we don't hang out together and I just don't go to their house. And it was just on my heart. I felt like maybe I should try to talk to her again because you know we lost Seth, and um, and so maybe you lost children, and you understand it's just a little different thing. And uh so I'd been thinking, maybe I should just try to write over there again. I don't know. And I prayed and I told God I wasn't sure and what I need to do. And I'm sitting at Dad's Thursday, and lo and behold, here comes Sis, and out of the blue, she hands me a receipt for Dad's funeral that they had asked me for at the courthouse. They wanted to have that. So I thought, well, there's my answer. That's an easy step. So I went over there. Sure enough, she was there. We got to talk for quite a while and we grieved together and we hope together, you know, and those things. So take direction from the spirit, of course. And then the other thing again, we need the strength and the ability, we might say. Unless you're older, you probably don't get too tired walking. But as you get older, you realize it. Malcolm and Chris were trying to get me to go on these hikes. They go on these long hikes. Like, you know, I told Malcolm, I'm like, you know, I'm probably in four mile shape, but I'm not in 20 mile shape. And if you take me in that mountain, you're gonna have to call a helicopter to come get me out. Because that's not gonna work. I even I was walking on the beach the other day and it was it was just really hot, and I walked about four and a half miles, and I honestly did not know if I was gonna make it back. I thought I was gonna have to sit down. And um I wasn't in pain, it's just I was just exhausted. I just couldn't, I I hadn't felt like that since football practice, probably. It's been a long time. I I didn't know if I could swing my leg forward, in other words. Um the only way to deal with that, we have to stay close to Christ for power. If we sin, it does zap our power, but just keep walking. John tells us God is quick to forgive us. Um and I think what Paul is saying is that this problem of falling into sin when I really want to do better is actually something that can be fixed provisionally, step by step. Yes, if we know sin's coming up, we're supposed to run from it. We understand that. But if if you're fallen or if you're just weak, just keep taking steps forward in the spirit with Christ. And it's not always gonna be suddenly everything's great or suddenly normal if we flipped up or whatever, but it's one right decision, then another, then another in God's spirit, and you're moving forward. So as I determine the ball in the spirit with God, he will give me guidance to live in a way that's different from my flesh, and of course, you as well. And we can live with his power to help us overcome our flesh. Being born again does change where your mind is. That's what Paul says in Romans 7. When he's talking about the frustration he he had, he said in verse 22, I delight in the law of God according to inward man. So embrace God's law in your heart and mind, and your flesh will be forced to follow. But we'll talk more about one of these battles as we go through Romans 8. Let's pray. Father in heaven, thank you so much for your word. Thank you for the encouragement you give us. Thank you, Father, that we're we're not condemned, we're stand before you righteous in Christ. Thank you for your great love for us, Father, that you sent Christ to die on our behalf and that you love us and we love you, Father, and we want to follow you and we want to worship you in a way that's honoring to you. So we pray that you will help us. We do fight our flesh. We know you're sympathetic to that. We thank you for it. And we pray that you'll help us, though, Father, to just have our minds and our hearts toward you so that we would follow you. Um, we also just now want to thank you for the food that we have. We ask for a blessing on it. Thank you so much for it and uh all the all the abundance you give to us. Thank you, Father, in Jesus' name, amen.