Freedom from Our Greatest Enemies
Griffith Baptist Church – 4/27/08
A.M. Service
Text: Romans 8:1-4
Key verse: Romans 8:2 - For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.
The Introduction
Not long after a wealthy contractor had finished building the Tombs prison in New York, he was found guilty of forgery and sentenced to several years in the prison he had built! As he was escorted into a cell of his own making, the contractor said, “I never dreamed when I built this prison that I would be an inmate one day.” Today in the Word, July 12, 1993
Sin is a prison that no one escapes from and is the only prison where everyone begins their life.
Sometimes we think we can escape through other means but we are somewhat like the prisoner that escaped from a Sydney, Australia jail, and climbed underneath the hood of a truck. At the trucks’ next stop, he clambered out and found himself in the yard of another prison four miles from the first. - UPI
Paul gives us a wonderful treatise on what God has done in our lives to effect our freedom, release us from the grip of sin and make us His own.
(Review Romans 1-7 with conclusion in 7:24-25)
Transition Statement: Who are our greatest enemies? It is not what some people think but can be found in verse 2.
Body
1. Our Greatest Enemies (2)
A. Sin and death
B. One dark night while I was driving down a winding hill in Western Kentucky, our younger daughter accidentally pushed the knob controlling the lights. Suddenly there was pitch darkness. There was a great deal of excitement as we rushed down the twisting road until we managed to get the lights on. Sin brings dangerous darkness.
C. The use of the term, law, in verse 2, does not refer to the Mosaic law but rather a principle of operation
D. The twin terrors of humanity
i. Sin is the overpowering evil influence that leads us away and keeps us from a relationship with God
ii. Death is sin’s destructive end to those who reject Christ and submit to its influence. It is eternal death that is conveyed here, not physical death. (Hebrews 9:27 - And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:)
E. Two facts concerning our enemies:
i. Sin is never satisfied until it completely kills
ii. Death’s ultimate pleasure is hell
Transition Statement: God does not leave us in that bondage but gives us a way out.
2. Our Greatest Escape (3)
A. Jesus Christ
B. The Mosaic Law was not nor was ever intended to be sufficient to save
C. John 3:14-17 - 14And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: 15That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. 16For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. 17For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.
D. Christ accomplished what no one else could accomplish:
i. A perfect God disguised as a simple man (God sends His Son in the likeness of sinful flesh)
ii. A perfect God delivered as a perfect lamb (an offering for sin)
Transition Statement: We can be encouraged by what Christ has done that will spur us on to live for Christ more everyday.
3. Our Greatest Encouragement (1-4)
A. Freedom
B. The key phrase in found in verse 1 – in Christ Jesus
C. Freedom means:
i. Never having to fear judgment again (1)
a. Judgment for sin
b. Eternity in hell separated from God in constant torment
c. Colossians 1:21-22 - 21And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled 22In the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight:
ii. Always liberated of sin’s control (2)
a. This does not mean free of sin’s presence
b. This does not mean free of sin’s pressure
c. We still have a personal responsibility to rely on the Spirit to overcome sin
d. Romans 6:12-14 - 12Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. 13Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. 14For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.
iii. Being a special people that God’s grace can flow through (4)
a. That the requirement of the Law (Mosaic) might be fulfilled in us
b. 1 Peter 2:9 - But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should show forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light:
Concluding Statement: Living free means not looking back. It means looking forward and moving forward in the freedom Christ has given us.
Conclusion:
Do you find yourself defeated by sin?
Are you still living in bondage to sin?
Is God’s grace flowing through you?
