Romans (2010)

Our challenge is to put into practice the reality we possess at salvation. Paul is laying the foundation for the spiritual life which begins with KNOWING what has already been accomplished. The provision we possess as believers is the freedom NOT to sin, not the freedom TO sin. We’ve always had the freedom TO sin. An irreversible break from our old nature has occurred and we are forever different. Sin is not dead but our proclivity to be comfortable in it is not the same. Reality is that we are slaves to righteousness, but free to respond to the master we choose, sin or righteousness. See how being under grace removes the mandate of law and gives us a freedom that wasn’t there for Old Testament believers. God’s righteousness gives life. Learn the about the life experiential righteousness can give.

Note that the class number (#78) on the video is incorrect.

For the believer, the sin nature’s authority is a dead thing. To keep relying on him for orders and expecting victorious results is like jumping on the chest of a dead man. It’s futile, even a little disgusting. Our assignment is to climb out of the rut of old habits and focus on the mindset that we are completely new, completely different. When the opportunity arises to exercise our volition, relying on truth as its source, we begin building a new path above the familiar trench of muck and decay into the reality of the capacity for life in Christ. As a believer we are not commanded to be justified again. Our command is to be sanctified, an ongoing process of living the spiritual life, a result of our identification with Christ in the newness of His resurrection and a unique privilege for the church age believer.

The foundation of understanding our passage is the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. At that baptism the Old Man, everything we were before salvation, is crucified with Christ. He’s dead. We never have to kill him again. In his place we have been given a New Nature with new options. We don’t need to slap our New Nature awake periodically, but we do need to learn how to volitionally tap into the new life which is already ours. Sin did not die, but its power to rule is destroyed. This means we still must deal with sin, but the options we are given in our New Nature give us the power to do that through fellowship in confession and growth in our new Nature. Learn how the grammar of the passage clarifies any question regarding imperatives necessary to apply in our new lives and ones that are no longer an issue.

As a believer what is my relationship to sin? Did the Baptism of the Holy Spirit destroy it completely so I can approach a higher realm of perfection? Are we in our resurrection bodies? The comfy carpet of self-serving sin has been yanked as our foundation and replaced by the potential of spirituality which we had NO capability to exercise before salvation. That’s a huge difference. We’re supported by a different mattress and given a PhD in spirituality before we’ve even matriculated. Do we risk attending class so that we can begin to exercise our elite position or remain satisfied with the honor and return to life as it was, filthy but familiar? What died? Is sin dead or is it the old guy who was so comfortable reclining in the filth? The old guy is dead. Beating that dead horse is futility. Serving the new master is life.

Romans 6 introduces us to a radical change that takes place once at salvation. The change isn’t an experience. Understanding identification is the reality, a prerequisite to comprehend how experience can be realized. Picture the act of baptism, going under water, as a teaching tool. Just like Christ, we are not only dead to sin, but further, buried to it. Christ did not remain dead and buried, and like Him, we too emerge from burial to a unique position where sin’s power over us is defeated, creating a fundamental and permanent change, giving us an open ended potential for the spiritual life. Beyond mere ritual, Christ performs the reality by means of the Holy Spirit to raise us up with Him, free from the tyranny of sin.

We begin with a summary of what Pastor Dean learned at the Southeast AIPAC Regional Outreach Director’s Summit for Christian Leaders.

Understand our new identity in Christ and the exclusive role the Holy Spirit has in our walk. This may be an abstract concept, but it is reality that is truer than empirical evidence can support. We are baptized by the Holy Spirit at salvation, a purification rite for us into Christ’s death which creates our own death to the tyranny of sin. But we continue to sin. The solution is supernatural, but ours none-the-less, to walk by the Spirit using knowledge of the Scripture which leads to a mature response to grace and abundance in this life. What are the eight baptisms and the roles some play in the life of the church age believer?

Spiritual life begins when we believe in Jesus Christ as savior. This is not an end moment or a pause, but the initial thrust of God’s after burner that propels our potential to consume truth and focus on the transcendent difference God provides in our nature that empowers us to live differently in this life with consequences in time and eternity. Knowing who we are in Christ is the cornerstone of understanding spiritual growth. From there we move through Paul’s explanation of spiritual growth as a choice, plus truth, and the impossibility of achieving that growth independent of the Holy Spirit.

Phase II salvation is related to sanctification; learning to think and relate to one another. It takes time to rethink the baggage that comes from living in this world. May we conclude that the ethical, moral man is spiritual? Is the mandate to the Church to make it comfortable for everyone to fit in? What is the role of the Holy Spirit in spirituality? Contrasts and definitions of life, death, spiritual life and sanctification are clearly given in this lesson so that these terms are no longer a mystery in the Christian life.

May we have a conversation with just anyone about spirituality and have confidence that we’re even talking about the same thing? Spirituality is a popular term today, but its meanings vary widely. Without a Biblical absolute as a definition, any conversation about Spirituality is simply shared ignorance. As one's born positionally dead, how do Christians, in their newness of life, avoid LIVING as though they were dead and realize the potential God has for us to live in the righteousness He has provided?