Romans: The Revelation Of Righteousness Part 8 – Lawson and Aaron Perdue
Romans Part 8
Romans Part 8: The Revelation of Righteousness from Pastors Lawson and Aaron Perdue. In this episode of Grace For Today, discover how we can now live through the spirit of Jesus Christ!
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Romans Part 8 Transcript
Praise the Lord, friends. I am so glad that you are connected with us today. I am gonna be sharing with my son, Aaron, we’re talking about Romans 8. It’s my favorite chapter of the Bible. It’s talking about the Spirit of Christ now lives in us and how we live as believers. Thank God. When God gave us Jesus, He gave us everything. Amen. And so open your heart and receive the word of God today. Blessings. Praise the Lord, friends. I am so glad that you are connected today and we’re sharing from Romans 8. And wow, this is an amazing chapter talking about the life of the Spirit that is in us, talking about who we are as believers and what we have as believers. Years ago when my life was really transformed. This is over 40 years ago. And we started in a Bible study and I was raised in this traditional church, but my mama said, “Well, I think we need to start a church and call it Romans 8 church.” Well, praise God. That’s a great aspect because she began to understand all of the good things that are really given to us in Romans 8. And we’ve talked about how in Romans 1, Paul talks about the gospel is the revelation of righteousness. And Gentile sinners need righteousness. They’re caught up in philosophy, idolatry, lust, all kinds of sin. He talks about in Romans 2 how Jews or religious people, churchgoing people need righteousness. They’re caught up in legalism. He talks about in Romans 3, everybody needs righteousness and God made righteousness available in Jesus. He talks about in Romans 4, the way you receive righteousness is by grace through faith. And then he talks about in Romans 5, when we believed on Jesus, we left the reign of sin and death, and we came into the reign of grace and righteousness by faith in Jesus. And then the next three chapters, Roman 6, 7, and 8, he talks about how we live as believers. Praise God. Since we’ve been made the righteousness of God in Christ. He says in Romans 6, we don’t wanna sin because we’re dead to it, we’re free from it, we have authority over it and it’ll kill you. But he said in Romans 7, just like sin will kill you, legalism will kill you. And Romans 7 actually ties back to Romans 2 where Romans 6 ties back to Romans 1; but then in Romans 8, it ties into Romans 3, 4, and 5. And it says, praise God, now that we believed on Jesus, we are made the righteousness of God in Christ. And when you understand that, it changes your life. Amen. Now the first thing that he talks about is the new creation. And in the first 11 verses, he talks about, first of all, the legality of the new creation. And then he talks about the mentality of the new creation. And then he talks about the reality of the new creation. And so he says in Romans 8:1-4, there is therefore now no judgment against those. “There is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” Now we’re gonna talk about what that means, because that’s different than most Christians believe it is. There’s two aspects of the flesh. There’s actually the aspect of this worldly, sinful, ungodly flesh, like getting drunk, chasing women, sinning, right? But there’s also a very religious aspect of the flesh. And that’s talking about envy, strife, hearsay. And I grew up in a very religious church, which is actually a very carnal church, because legalism is carnality just like worldliness is carnality. And there is a good friend of mine wrote a book years ago. I still communicate with him. His name is Don Krow. We still support his ministry, but he wrote a book on “USDA Choice Flesh.” And there’s this worldly, ungodly flesh, which most of us in the church know is flesh. But there’s also this, like I grew up in a legalistic church where they stick their nose up at everybody and think they’re better than everybody else. And that’s flesh and we don’t need that-
Well here, he’s probably talking about the religious type of flesh, ’cause he talks about the law of sin and death, which is referring to-
So he says there’s no judgment against those who are in Christ Jesus. So if you’re born again, Jesus took all of your judgment to cross and there’s no judgment. He says, “For the law of the Spirit of life,” in verse two, “in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.” I like your observation, Aaron. “For what the law could not do,” the Old Testament law, “in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh. That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” We’re not trying to get it in our own strength and power, but we’re completely trust in Jesus. That’s the legality of the new creation. Man, we are completely set free. We are completely righteous and that’s all by faith in God’s grace, by faith in Jesus.
This really zealous law-keeping, this really zealous… There are people in the Christian walk who are very religious about law-keeping. And we said that this can lead to an extreme type of anger, but there are other forms of thinking out there where people say, “These are the rules. You have to do this. And if you don’t, I’m gonna burn your city down.” So this is trying to bring about redemption apart from Jesus. When people are trying to bring about righteousness, redemption apart from Jesus, trying to bring about justice apart from Jesus, it just leads to extreme rage. And we see that in different movements in the world today.
Even in years past, there’s been a lot of wars fought because of things like this and they are actually ungodly. And I don’t wanna really get into that, but he goes on and begins to talk in verse five through verse seven about the mentality of the new creation. He says, “Those who are of the flesh do mind the things of the flesh.” People that are trying to get in their own strength or power, people who are living for the devil, they talk about it, they think about it. They’re ungodly. But he says, “Those who are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.” So when we’re born of God and following the Holy Spirit, following Christ and the Spirit of Christ in us, we should be talking about the things of the Spirit. The things of God. He says, “For to be carnally minded is death.” Now we talked about two kinds of carnal mindedness. There’s this worldly, right? Ungodly, carnal mindedness, but there’s also this self-reliance. This self-trust, this religious carnal mindedness. He said, “For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” Jesus said this in John 6:63, He said, “It’s the Spirit that quickens; the flesh profits nothing. And the words that I speak to you, they are Spirit and they’re life.” So you can tell whether somebody is spiritually minded or carnal minded and that’s whether they have a focus on the word and a focus on Christ and the things of God, or they don’t. And he said, “To be carnally minded,” to think on the things of the world, “is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” You know what? As a believer, you need to renew your mind and begin to focus on good and godly things. I love Ephesians 4:22-24. In Ephesians 4, Paul actually says this in verse 22, he says, “Put off the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts.” And then he says in verse 23, “Be renewed in the spirit of your mind.” And then he says in verse 24, “And put on the new man, which after God,” in the likeness of God, “is created in righteousness and true holiness.” True holiness isn’t how long you cut your hair and how much makeup you wear or don’t wear, about not just wearing all black clothes, that’s not what true holiness. True holiness is something that comes from the Spirit and it will affect the outward man, but it’s not all about the outward man. It’s about a relationship with God. And you know what? When you understand that, it changes the way you live your life. And so he says this, he said, “To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” If you focus on the word and focus on the things of God, it’s gonna lead you to life and peace. “Because the carnal mind is enmity against God.” The carnal mind, the unrenewed, unregenerate mind is an enemy of God. “For it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” You know what? You gotta renew your mind once you’re born again. And you were talking about Romans 12. And in Romans 12:1, when Paul says, “I beseech you now therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your body a living sacrifice, holy, and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.” And then in verse two, he says, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” You know what? If you wanna let Jesus live His life big in you, you gotta renew your mind. You gotta begin to think like God. And so he says, “So they who are in the flesh cannot please God.” Now there’s two aspects of being in the flesh. The first one is you gotta get saved. If you’re not saved, you’re in the flesh. And I justify that by Romans 7:5, it says, “When we were in the flesh, the motions of sin, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.” So the flesh cannot please God, but there’s also this worldly religious, right? The flesh that Paul was dealing with and he wasn’t saved. He’s talking about his experience. He wasn’t saved. He was trying to please God apart from Christ and you cannot do it.
And he was enmity with God. Even Jesus said how long you’re gonna kick against the pricks?
So in one aspect, when it says, they who are in the flesh cannot please God, it’s talking about when you’re not born again. And you can be a religious person and not be saved and need to receive Jesus. And many watching me maybe like that. And you need to know that you know that you’re born again, that Jesus is living in you. Billy Graham said this, he said, in his opinion, even over 50% of the people in the United States of America who call themselves believers are not truly born again. And so there are countries that if you’re born in this country, they make you a member of such and such church. And there’s a lot of people in those countries. I’ve been there.
This was about six years ago, but I read an article by Eric Metaxas, who’s a great Christian writer. I think he’s gonna be speaking at an Andrew Wommack event.
[Lawson] Oh, wow.
But he was referencing a study done. They pulled like thousands of Americans and thousands of Christians just ask them, how do you get to heaven? And over it was around 50% of so-called evangelical Christians basically believe that everyone’s going to heaven and there’s not just Jesus is the only way to heaven.
Man.
So that kind of goes along with what you were saying about Billy Graham.
That’s completely against the gospel. There’s only one way to be saved and that’s believe on Jesus. And what happens is when you believe on Jesus, God changes who you are in the Spirit. And he talks about this in Romans 8:9, really through verse 16, but nine through 11, he hits it. This is the reality of the new creation. He says, “But you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwells in you.” You’re either saved, you’re either born again and the Spirit of Christ lives in you, or you’re not. And he says, “If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His.” You’re either 100% born again, 100% saved, you have the exact same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead living in you, or you don’t. And he says, “If Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is alive because of righteousness.” Man, it is not about what we do. It’s about what He did. If Christ be in you, it’s not the body; it’s the Spirit. The Spirit is either Jesus is in you, or He isn’t. And he says in verse 11, “But if the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal body,” your physical body, “by His Spirit that dwells in you.” Amen. That word in the Greek quicken is the word zoopoieo and it means to restore to life or to give increase to make alive. Praise God. Jesus made us alive. We’ve got the life of God in us. Amen. How did you receive that life? You believed on Jesus. Praise God. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and life. No man comes to the Father except by Me.” He said, “I am the bread of life.” He said, “Whoever drinks of this water that I give him shall have in him a well springing up into everlasting life.” That’s what that talking about. When you believe on Jesus, you’ve got the Spirit of Jesus, the exact same Spirit of Jesus living in you. He says, because of this brethren, we ought to change the way we live. Amen. “We’re debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.” You do not owe your flesh the time of day. I know sometimes Christians say, “I’m gonna flesh out.” No, you don’t need to flesh out. You don’t owe your flesh anything, don’t do that. He says, “For if you live after the flesh, you shall die.” Go back to Romans 6:23, “The wages of sin is death.” “But if you through the Spirit do put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.” There’s neither male nor female in the Spirit. You’re the children of God the moment that you believe on Jesus. And when you believe on Jesus, the Spirit of Christ comes to live in you and He leads you into your sonship as a child of God. He leads you into freedom as a child of God. This is not bondage. This is not legalism. This is not a book of rules. “The kingdom of God,” it says this in Romans 14:17, “is not meat and drink, but it’s righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.” You’re made right with God. You let the peace of God rule you and you have joy in the Holy Spirit. Hallelujah. He says, “You have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but you have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, ‘Daddy, God.'” God is our Father. So the Spirit leads us into sonship. He leads us into freedom. It says, “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are God’s own children.” Verse 17 says, “And if children, then we were heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ.” In other words, He leads us into our divine rights and privileges as the children of God. Thank God, we got some divine rights and privileges. He leads us into the promises. Glory to God. “If so be that we suffer with Him.” If you identify with Jesus in His death, amen, we also may be glorified together. You can identify with Him in His resurrection. Praise God. If you identify with Jesus on the cross, if you receive salvation, amen, you can live in eternity with Him. Praise God. We’ll talk about that when we come back after the brief break. So stay tuned. Friends, I’ve been teaching from my series on “Romans: The Revelation of Righteousness.” Romans is actually my favorite book of the Bible and I teach this class. I’ve been teaching it for years at Charis Bible College in Woodland Park with Andrew Wommack. And so I’m teaching about the gospel is the revelation of righteousness. You wanna get ahold of this. I have a book on it. I also have a four CD mini-teaching on it. And then most recently, we’ve done the 16 teaching USB that you can get just as we’ve been teaching it here on television. And so you wanna get ahold of this revelation. If you get ahold of this revelation, it will change your life. So “Romans: The Revelation of Righteousness.” Thanks so much for being with us today. I’m sure that you’ll enjoy this great teaching and you’ll wanna share it with your friends. Blessings. We appreciate you. Praise the Lord, friends. I’m so glad that you stayed tuned. We are sharing on Romans 8. We talked about that we have a brand new life in Christ. And man, when you have that brand new life, if you renew your mind, you can begin to see the victory that Jesus won in your own life. Now he begins to talk about this hope that we have in Christ and some of the challenges that are on the earth in verse 18 on down through verse 24. And he says, “I reckon, I think that the sufferings of this present time aren’t worthy to be compared with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creature,” that’s talking about our physical body, “waits for the manifestation the sons of God.” Waits till Jesus is coming again. We’re gonna get a glorified, immortal, eternal body. It’s never gonna deal with some of the temptation and challenge, difficulty that we had. You talked about that earlier, that there’s a lot of people that have these difficulties. They think these difficulties come from God, but they’re not from God. Read verse 20, Aaron, on down through verse 24.
“For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope, because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body. For we are saved by hope, but hope that is seen is not hope, for what a man sees, why does he yet hope for? But if we hope for that which we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.”
Amen, so he’s talking about we’re waiting for Jesus to come again. And until Jesus comes again, we still live in this physical body. So this creature, this physical body has challenges because of Adam’s transgression, because of him who subjected the same in hope. Adam didn’t fix his eyes completely on God. And he got enamored more with this tree of knowledge of good and evil and this temptation and his wife than he did God. And it got him in trouble and it got all of us in trouble. But Jesus came to redeem us from everything that Adam lost. And the last enemy that will be destroyed is death. And that’s when Jesus comes again and we’re gonna be, it says, “The dead in Christ,” in 1 Thessalonians 4, “will be raised first.” “And then those of us who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air, so will we ever be with the Lord.” So we have this hope in the gospel. And Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:19, if we don’t have this hope, we’re the most miserable. So we gotta keep our hope in Jesus. Praise God. And looking forward to His coming. And what is the worst thing that can happen to a believer? What’s the worst thing that could happen to you as a believer on this earth? You could die. But what happens if you die?
You go to heaven.
And you live forever in the presence of God. So the worst thing that could happen to you is you could die and go to heaven and you’ll live with God in eternity. So praise God. You know what? We don’t have a lot to fear as believers. “Perfect love casts out all fear.” And he that fears is not made perfect in love, because fear has torment. But we, it’s not fear. We have hope in Jesus and we have hope in the gospel. Now he goes on and look at what he says in verse 26 through verse 28, he says, “Likewise the Spirit helps our weaknesses, for we don’t know how to pray like we should, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings that cannot be uttered.” I believe that one translation or a paraphrase says it this way, the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings that cannot be uttered in an intelligent language. I believe that’s actually talking about praying in the Holy Spirit. And when it says the Spirit helps our infirmities, helps our weaknesses, in the Greek, it says something like this. He takes hold together with us against our weaknesses. And so until we get to heaven, we have the guarantee of the Holy Spirit. And if we’ll rely on the Holy Spirit, you can be baptizing the Holy Spirit and receive your personal prayer language. And when you pray in the Spirit, it’s like the Holy Spirit is taking hold together with you against your weaknesses. He says, “And he that searches the hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because He makes the intercession for the saints according to the will of God.” So who is searching our hearts and mind? I believe that’s Jesus. So we got the Holy Spirit praying in us. We’ve got Jesus who’s making intercession for us. And He’s making an intercession according to the will of God the Father. And he says, “We know that all things work together for good to those who love God, who are called according to His purpose.” So man, we know and we know. I had a man come and minister that to me. I was going through a really difficult time. We had some staff members with trouble, difficulties, and I’d been very gracious to them. And then they kind of made a mess and he came and we know, and I’m telling you, it is so much better today. It’s not even funny. Praise God. God brought better people. God’s helped us. We’re moving forward. We’re reaching more people. We got a strong staff. Amen. Andrew Wommack prophesied over me one time. And your mother, this was over 10 years ago. And he said, “You guys are capable of pastoring thousands and thousands of people.” But he said, “You don’t have the right people around you yet.” And you know what? God has brought those people to us and that’s helping us move forward and be able to do what God has called us to do. But look at this in verse 29 and verse 30, he says, “For who He did foreknow, He did predestinate to be conformed to the image of Jesus.” That’s really God’s goal for us as believers, to be conformed to the image of Jesus. Jesus is our goal. “That He might be the first born among many brethren.” But look at this in verse 30, “For whom He did predestinate.” I believe God had a plan for us before the foundation of the world. It talks about that in 2 Timothy 1. “He also called.” When did He call us? He called us at the cross. Jesus said, if I be lifted up, I will draw all men or all judgment to Myself. “Those He called who He justified.” Now, how are we justified, Aaron? Romans 5:1.
Through Jesus.
Through Jesus.
By faith in Jesus.
Faith in Jesus and faith in the blood. Amen. Faith in Jesus. So I believe He predestinate us before the foundation of the world. He called us at the cross. We’re justified when we believed on Jesus. And to those He justified, He glorified. I believe that’s when Jesus comes again. We get this glorified, immortal, eternal body that’s never gonna struggle with all these difficulties that we have today. Isn’t that wonderful? We have a great hope in the future. A great hope in the gospel. He says, “What shall say to these things?” in verse 31. “If God be for us, who can be against us?” Now we know that God’s for us. How do we know God’s for us?
Because He sent Jesus.
Because He sent Jesus, exactly. Verse 32, “He who spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?” Man, if God would send Jesus to die for you when you were in sin, when you were ungodly, why wouldn’t He give you peace? Why wouldn’t He heal your body? Why wouldn’t He prosper you? Why wouldn’t He help you? Amen. Man, if God would give you Jesus, He would give you anything. Man, good things come from God. And they’re all wrapped up in Jesus.
Amen.
Amen. Jesus provided salvation, healing, freedom, peace. Amen. Prosperity. All in His death and resurrection.
That’s awesome.
You can read that. Amen. Isaiah 53:4-5, 1 Peter 2:24, 2 Corinthians 8:9, all show us those things. Now he goes on. Man, and he… So when God gave you Jesus, He gave you everything. And he begins to talk about in verse 33 through verse 39 our hope in the love of God. “Who is gonna lay anything on the account of God’s elect? Can I put anything on your account, Aaron?
Nope.
Nope. I can’t send for you, can I?
Mm-mm.
Amen. You didn’t inherit. No generational curse from me.
Nope.
Now I know that’s poor English, but there’s people that think that, “My God, I can’t get along because my dad…” That is a lie from the pit of hell. You cannot get a generational curse from God your Father, ’cause He doesn’t have one to give you. Amen. And so He says, “It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns?” Who can condemn you? Anybody? No. “It’s Christ who died that’s risen again.” Jesus is praying for us the right hand. Peter, Jesus told him, “listen, before the cock crow you’re gonna deny Me three times, but I’ve prayed for you that you will not fail and when you’re converted, you will strengthen the brethren.” And as soon as Jesus was raised from the dead, He told the first people that saw Him, “Go tell My disciples and Peter, tell Peter.” And Peter was the first preacher on the day of Pentecost and got 3,000 people born again. Man, He is praying for us. Isn’t that marvelous?
And I just love the rest of this chapter too. He just talks about that nothing can separate us from the love of Jesus. There isn’t anything-
Amen.
that can separate us.
No amount of time, no amount of space, no difficulty, no problem, nothing. Praise God. Jesus loves us. Amen. And that is the good news. Well, thanks for tuning in. Praise the Lord. If you wanna get more of this teaching, get the series, get my book. Praise God. God wants to help you and bless you. We love you. God bless you.
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