For our reading from Holy Scripture, we turn this evening to the Epistle of Paul, to the Romans and the 8th chapter. We read the first 17 verses. Romans chapter 8, verses 1 through 17. Let us hear the Word of God. Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Because through Christ Jesus, the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. What the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us who do not live according to the sinful nature, but according to the spirit. Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires. But those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace. The sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law, nor can it do so. Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God. You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature, but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin. Yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who lives in you. Therefore, brothers, we have an obligation, but it is not to the sinful nature to live according to it. For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God for you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear but you received the spirit of sonship by him we cry Abba, Father the Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children now if we are children then we are heirs heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory may God bless to us what can only be his own word you will find my text this evening in verses 10 and 11 of the portion we have just read but if Christ is in you your body is dead because of sin yet your spirit is life because of righteousness and if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who lives in you. The opening words of that text contains the expression Christ in you. I think it's true that we don't use that or think of that as often as we should. Our preference is to think in terms of our being in Christ or being in Christ Jesus. But here in this 10th verse, that is reversed. We read Christ in you. And that means, of course, not Christ in the church corporate, but Christ in each and every believer. As is made clear by the words immediately preceding the 10th verse, If any one does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. Now, of course, there's no contradiction, nor is there even a supplement in connection with Christ in you and you in Christ. The Apostle Paul begins this wonderful chapter with the expression, those who are in Christ Jesus. But here in the 10th verse, he reverses that to speak of Christ in you. Two sides of the same kind then. Not that it is possible for someone to be in Christ and not for Christ to be in them. But that whoever is in Christ through faith, Christ is in that believer. Each and every one by his Holy Spirit. The great doctrine and the wonderful reality of union with Christ can therefore be looked at from these two complementary sides. There are various adjectives that are used in order to describe union with Christ. in terms of God's plan and purpose his covenant that union is federal given to Christ the whole company of the elect from before the foundation of the world for him to represent in his life and death and burial and resurrection union with Christ has that federal covenantal aspect to it But it's also termed mystical, or vital, or spiritual, because that union is beyond our understanding, our ability to explain and lay out in detail, but a glorious reality nonetheless. Federal, mystical, or spiritual, but there's another adjective, mutual, mutual. We in him, he in us, if Christ be in you. Now I want to suggest to you that we should think more than we do about Christ being in us. Not give up thinking about the other for any reason whatsoever. But simply because thinking too much about our being in Christ can lead to this train of thought. We are incorporated into him. The name of Christian is given to us. Therefore, we are to live as such. Quite true. And we think of our, as Paul says here in verse 12, our obligation. our duties our sacred obligation and duties if we think too much of that we're not thinking enough about the resources that we have to be what we ought to be and what Christ in us does is to strike that note it isn't merely that we are in him incorporated by divine action but that he is living and active in us living and active dynamic in us by the power of his holy spirit and therefore there are bound to be results aren't there bound to be results bound to be consequences Christ in you and in me as it were cannot lie fallow unproductive wherever he is activity energy dynamism is present and follows and that's what i want us to think about tonight that's what my text calls upon us to do if christ be in you what so what what are the results what are the effects of this indwelling and the big answer is in verse 2 the law of the spirit of life in christ jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death and that's an explanation of what sometimes we think is the greatest statement conceivable there is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in christ jesus now there's none none at all nor will there be ever but condemnation you see is but the effect the sentence of being enslaved to sin and liable to death if slavery to sin and liability to the punishment of sin is removed then condemnation ceases to exist the law of the spirit of life in christ jesus has made every believer free from the law of sin and death and that is what paul is expounding certainly in this opening section that we've read bondage to sin bondage to death and he shows how Christ in the believer cancels both the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death with regard to sin we're no longer under its dominion we're no longer in the flesh we're no longer hostile to God we're still exposed to its power but bondage, dominion and power are two different things and that's a vital distinction for us to remember it's difficult to remember it at times because we sin so often grievously repeatedly and we can be led to think as a result of the activity of the evil one that we are not believers at all there's a distinction that we must remember we are no longer under sin's dominion though we may also all we may often sorry often fall foul of its power but my concern this evening is with death what are the results the effects of christ dwelling in the believer with reference to death that's what these two verses that i've taken as a text refers to if christ be in you the body is dead because of sin the spirit is life because of righteousness and if Christ is in you then the spirit will quicken your mortal bodies that's what he's affirming how then are we to think of death what are the results of Christ in us with regard to death? Well, here's a one-word answer. Life. Life. With regard to death, Christ in us spells life. That's what I want us to consider this evening. And in order to do that, let's look at some of the terms that Paul uses in these two verses in order that we may be clearer in our thinking. First of all, you see in verse 10, if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin. And again in verse 11, your bodies, with the adjective mortal, liable to death, prefacing it. So here he's talking about the body. Now, in the verses that immediately proceed, he uses the noun flesh, which the NIV translates by the expression sinful nature. Verses 3 through 9, constantly, flesh, flesh. Now he comes to verse 10, and he doesn't use that term anymore, for which sinful nature is an adequate rendering, or a workable rendering anyway. But now he's talking about the body, not the flesh. He's not talking about sin. He's talking about this. Each and every one of us has one. Our physical body, our makeup, our constitution, but not merely a matter of our limbs and our nerves, but also the flesh, the body, has a mind, thoughts, and desires. We're a psychosomatic unity. And that is what he's talking about here by means of this word body that he emphasizes twice. Then the next thing we have to note is this. this word spirit, does it refer to the Holy Spirit in verse 10? Or the human spirit? There's no capital letter in the Greek text, but that doesn't settle the matter for us. And here we can't have all our respected authorities on our side because they disagree. We have to make some judgment call ourselves. And what I suggest to you is this, that spirit in verse 10 is not the Holy Spirit. It is our human spirits. Body and spirit, that's us. Body and soul too. Soul and spirit are frequently used in interchangeable ways. Where there's a distinction, soul refers to a human being in relation to other human beings spirit refers to a human being in relation to God body and spirit that's you that's me and what the apostle is saying then here is this that if Christ is in us body and spirit then here are the results the body is dead because of sin the spirit is life because of righteousness he's depicting this striking contrast and what he's doing is describing the present reality and state of the believer on account of sin the body has become mortal liable to death liable to decay disintegration but the spirit has become life and the spirit has become life through righteousness that is christ's righteousness adam's sin has introduced death not merely physical spiritual and eternal but christ's righteousness has introduced life and it's a reality here and now and already. So then the question is, how does Christ in us affect this death to which we're all exposed? And the answer is radically, irreversibly, powerfully, in terms of life. So when you as a Christian, find that death crosses your path in any shape or form. Think life. This is quite different from the way in which those who are not Christians refuse to think of death. I'm not suggesting to you that you adopt the kind of denial the Christian science movement adopts or that personalities in the media world and other areas of life adopt where they think in terms of the achievement and prowess of the deceased. Or they don't even think of them as deceased. But some of them is living on still. Somewhere, somehow. That's an avoidant. I'm not saying run from death. Refuse to think about it. Refuse to face it. I'm saying face it and triumph over it. Think life. If Christ is in you, think life. Why? Because already you have life in your spirit now and forever. If Christ is in you, your spirit is life because of righteousness. Life for our spirits now, and life for our bodies later. If Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin. But the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead, if he is living in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who lives in you. Here's a complete answer. Here are the results of Christ in you and in me. Life now, life to come, death killed. What a gospel. let's take each of these in turn life to our spirits now what has happened through our being joined to christ is that we have been born again joined to him means that no longer does spiritual deadness characterize us it can't new birth is life it's new life it's life from above it's eternal it's heavenly and each and every one of us are born in sin and are dead toward God on account of sin and that state of deadness toward God expresses itself in ignorance of God, even hostility to God, self-indulgence. This is what the flesh means. They that are in the flesh mind the things of the flesh. This is what's important to them. The world, self-gratification, achievement, possession, prestige, all of it is life to them. But it's death in reality because God is not in all of their thoughts. Not in all their ways, they know nothing of him. In terms of the riches of his grace and kindness and peace and mercy. Spiritual deadness rules and reigns. That's what he means by flesh. The mind of sinful man is death. Hostile to God. The Apostle Paul says in the pastoral epistles that those who live in pleasure are dead while they live. Those who live in pleasure are dead while they live. But when someone has become a Christian, that is no longer their condition. You remember how he puts it so strikingly, the beginning of Ephesians 2. And you, he says, who are dead in trespasses and sins, living according to the ways of the world and the ruler of the kingdom of the air, Gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature, following its desires and thoughts, by nature the objects of wrath, dead in trespasses and in sins. The spirit, i.e. human beings in relation to God, alienated, dead. But when Jesus Christ is trusted, when sinners come to him by faith, then they are joined to him who is life, and he becomes their life. He regenerates, he revitalizes, he renews lastingly, and they are alive and alive forevermore. So is this how you think of yourself? if you love God if you trust in Jesus Christ if your desire is now to live in a very different way to walk in accord with his commandments trusting on his promised aid looking to be led by the Holy Spirit in paths of truth and righteousness and love and mercy how do you think of yourself I tell you you're alive it isn't that you merely have this kind of interest or that somehow by the various means that God mysteriously has appointed and used, this is now you. Namely, your parents were Christians and so, well, this is how they live, this is how I live. If this is how you live, it's because you're alive. You've been made alive from the dead. Similarly, with regard to baptism, that is a sign and seal of this engrafting into Christ if you trust in him not in the water but in him then that baptism points to its reality you're alive to God you're in fellowship with him you call on him in prayer you sing his praise you read his word you seek to serve him that's heaven begun below the spirit is life because of righteousness life for our spirits now is the result of Christ indwelling us by his spirit he's there believe it don't doubt it the evidences are there and do you not know something at least about that wonderful spirit of adoption that we read about. Bearing witness with our spirits that we are the children of God and enabling us to cry. And it's a strong verb. To cry out to the most high and holy God of heaven and earth. Abba, my Father. That's life. That's life eternal. Don't doubt it. Believe it. Rejoice in it. Because this chapter that begins with no condemnation, you know how it ends, don't you? No separation. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, things present, things to come, height, depth, nor anything else in all creation. What exists beside creation? Nothing, except God. Nothing in all creation is able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Jesus Christ our Lord. No condemnation. You have nothing to be afraid of from God anymore. No separation from his love in Jesus Christ. And then somewhere in the middle of that chapter, doesn't Paul say, what shall we say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? No opposition either. No opposition worth talking about, that is, because he specifies an infinite number of things. But they're all of no account whatsoever. If God is for us, and in Jesus Christ he is, and we have the witness in our hearts by the Spirit that he is, and we're alive to him, and we'll never know death in our spirits again. It's a deathless life that you and I have now in our spirits. But there's life for our bodies too. God made us body and spirit, body and soul. And what he has done in quickening us from spiritual death is not the sum total of what he has in mind in terms of our so great salvation because he's going to deal with these bodies as well. He will quicken our mortal bodies through his spirit that dwells in us. Now the body is where sin resides in us. It's where it operates. It operates in terms of generating strong desires that the Bible calls lusts, lusts of the mind as well as the lusts of the flesh. And these desires become so powerful that they translate themselves almost, it would seem, apart from any volition on our part into expressions of our will and decisions and actions and words and so on. Sin dwells in our bodies. It no longer reigns. We are no longer under law but under grace. Sin will not have dominion over us. It's impossible. Jesus Christ is the one who now reigns. But sin still resides and has power over us and it was sin wasn't it that brought death into the world in terms of its being a penal evil death as punishment is impossible without sin as transgression and so death affects our bodies still it's the last enemy it's a present reality we have to confront it it's an approaching enemy stalks us, rears its head, reminds us of its existence suddenly, unexpectedly, tragically and powerfully and there is nothing that we can do about it we are as helpless in the day of our death as we are in the day of our birth these things are not at our determining our lives are in the hands of the great creator and the sovereign who is able to save and to destroy the poet says scepter and crown must tumble down and in the dust be equal made with a poor crooked scythe and spade death lays his icy hand on kings and it's a reality that we have to face and confront but there is something that it cannot do, more than one thing actually but there's one thing it cannot do it cannot kill the spirit because the life that has been given to you and me because of Christ's death and resurrection is a life that triumphed over death. He died, was buried, He rose again the third day. That life that He laid down, He took again. And it's that life in His resurrected human nature that has been transplanted. into your spirit and mine, so that we are, as far as our spirits are concerned, deathless. Neither death, nor life, nor, and so on, can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. You think of all that death can do. It has an awful separating power. You fill in the details. But there's one bond, one tie before which it is powerless. That is the bond between the sinner who trusts in Jesus and Jesus himself as that sinner's Savior. That is an irrefragible relationship. That's why Jesus could say, whoever believes in me shall not see death. Death in the sense of abandonment by God, forsakenness by him, exposure to his wrath and displeasure. We'll never know that. Jesus knew it. He bore it. He endured it. He extinguished it. That life that you have in your spirit that enables you to look to God and say, My Father, is a life that you will have when you draw your last breath. Death cannot kill the spirit. That's why dying is falling asleep in, in Jesus. Our eyes close to this world and immediately open and see the one who loved us and gave himself for us. But there's something else about death and it is that it doesn't have the last word over our bodies. It's lost its grip, its power over our spirits, born from above, adopted into the family of God, heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. But it might seem as if when these bodies, we know each other well enough now for me to be able to say to you, you're looking a bit older than I remember you eight years ago. You can say the same thing about me. That's us. That's humanity. That's mortality. It's inevitable. Paul isn't saying here, he isn't talking about mortification of the body. He's saying the body is dead. It means that it's liable to death. There's no way out. Except the Lord returns. And it seems as if the breaths that we are now taking are among our last. And we don't know how many more we have. None of us knows. And surely it will appear, when your body and mine is sown in weakness and in dishonor, it seems as if death has the last word. And to some degree, to some degree, sin and Satan have not totally lost. They have totally lost. Why? Because those mortal bodies, what is sown in weakness will be raised in honor. What is sown in shame will be raised in glory, sown in corruption, raised in incorruption. Just as the Lord Jesus Christ emerged from the tomb with the same body with which he suffered and in which he experienced death, so your body and mine will share in exactly the same triumphant power. It will be raised. And we'll be looking better than we've ever looked. And we'll recognize each other. Now, are you sure of that? Why are you sure? How can we be sure? Well, there are many reasons, of course. But what I want you to note is the reason the Apostle gives here. He labors the point that he wants to make. You know, some students, when they run out of material to write in an essay, they repeat themselves or include something quite unrelated. Not so the Apostle. There's no padding in Scripture. If there's repetition, it has a purpose. And here is repetition. The Spirit that dwells in you. Look at this 11th verse. That's what he's emphasizing here. If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who lives in you. He repeats Himself. Here's the reason. God's Holy Spirit that indwelt Christ the Mediator did not merely dwell in his spirit his relationship with his father the communion that he had with him but it dwelt in his human nature in all its frailty in all its weakness in the whole gamut of human emotions which our Lord experienced in accord with the gospels The spirit of God and his humanness are not contradictory. The spirit dwelt all that he said, all that he did, even through the eternal spirit he offered himself to God. That same spirit that reanimated his body dwells in your body and mine. and in the body of everyone who believes in him. Now, how is it we were made? God breathed into us the breath of life, and dust became a living being. Now tell me that there's no such thing as a physical resurrection. And there'll come a time, won't there, when that same spirit, who has already animated your spirit and mine, and who will have borne us into the presence of Jesus Christ, will put forth his power, and our bodies will be reconstituted, and transformed, and reanimated, and made like unto the body of his glory. The salvation that is in Jesus Christ is the complete total answer to sin and death and whoever believes in him will never really die but live forever. Amen.