Monday, March 6, 2006. It was Day 2 of the week-long Spring Prayer and Power Conference hosted by Dave Roberson Ministries in Tulsa, OK. I had booked the detached living quarters that were part of a bed and breakfast for me, Candace and Stephen, two of my children.
I got up that morning around 3:00. The first meeting of the day started at 8:30. I made a pot of coffee, sat down at the kitchen table and put in the first message of the Born Again Trail, the series taught by Pastor Dave Roberson.
Pastor (Jim Martin, Dayton OH) had talked about the Born Again Trail and the impact it had on his ministry. From time to time he’d encouraged us to listen to it. So, on the first day of the conference I purchase all six volumes, a total of 60 messages on cassette tape.
My schedule that week: 3:00 rise and shine. Make coffee. Listen to three messages. Attend two morning sessions and an afternoon session with Candace and Stephen. Bed.
Why am I sharing this with you?
The Born Again Trail opened my eyes to the truth about what happens when we confess Jesus as our lord and savior. The truth about the spiritual change that takes place in us and why it matters literally changed how I began to approach things in my life.
Now that we’re born again, we have the same spiritual DNA as Jesus! Did you hear me? We have the exact same spiritual DNA as Jesus! We’re exactly like Him except we’re not deity. That is the only difference. Ladies and gentlemen, let that sink in. And because of this, Romans 8:17 boldly proclaims “And if children (and we are!), then heirs, heirs of God, and (here it comes!) joint-heirs with Christ.”
Now listen to me. There is not one verse in the four gospels that hint at Jesus believing He was a sinner and the Son of God. Not one. If we are joint-heirs with Him, how can we believe this about ourselves? How can we believe that we’re both a sinner and a child of God?
The simple truth? We shouldn’t because it’s not true.
I want you to “hear” what Pastor Dave says 47seconds into the very first message of the Born Again Trail.
“We found out in Romans that sin will not have dominion over you. You’re not under the law but under grace. And for a believer to really walk in victory the first transformation that we’ve got to have is to that fact, I mean totally transformed to the fact that sin does not have dominion over us. And anything we’ve been set free from
that we continue to justify, then you’ve taken away from the Holy Spirit what He needs to set you free with.
“So to really walk this born again trail out that’s the first transformation — that sin no longer has dominion over me. And all of the cohorts or by-products of sin which was poverty, sickness, disease, and depression — all those things that accompany spiritual death — they don’t have dominion over me either.
“So to really, really have victory the first order of transformation, in other words, the first thing the Holy Spirit is going to do in your life using that new nature is transform you to the fact that none of these things have dominion over you. I’m saying this not to bring you under condemnation. I’m saying this to set you free.”
Ladies and gentlemen, Jesus has made us free! Praise God! Hallelujah!
As I’ve said over and over in this series: Sin no longer has dominion over a born again believer because she no longer has a nature that’s ruled and dominated by sin. Turn with me to Romans 6 and we’re going to read verses six and seven.
6Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin [the sin nature] might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. 7For he that is dead is freed from sin.
Each time I read verse 6 “should not” waves its hand at me. It gets my attention every single time because of the truth it communicates. Even though you and I no longer have a nature that links us to Satan — that links us to spiritual death — we can choose Satan over our new nature. Ouch! I know that hurt. But we all know that it’s true.
After transcribing Pastor Dave’s comments, the Lord reminded me of the passage in John 8 where Jesus tells the scribes and Pharisees they are not free from sin, from the sin nature, even though they believe they are.
(33) They answered him, We be Abraham’s seed, and were never under bondage to any man, how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free?
(34)Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant (slave) of sin.
(35) And the servant (slave) abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth ever.
(36) If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.
Now here’s the question I have for you. What is the freedom that Jesus provides for us? It’s freedom from the sin nature. It’s freedom from Satan’s dominion over us. We should take a moment and give the Lord some praise! Hallelujah!
Now, I love the way Colossians 1:13 describes this.
Who (God, the Father) hath delivered us from the power of darkness (the control and dominion of Satan through the sin nature), and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son (where love and light dominates).
If we back up to the beginning of John 8, we will see how the freedom Jesus talks about plays out with the woman caught in adultery. You know the story. It’s a story about how the religious leaders set up the woman and then tried to use her to set up Jesus. You have to know that the religious leaders set her up because she is the only one they bring to Jesus. Where was the man? Can you say set up?
The passage begins showing Jesus teaching in the temple. All of a sudden He hears a woman’s voice pauses. He begins to look around. Where is the voice coming from, he thinks to Himself? He hears her crying and pleading for mercy. And then he sees her.
Three temple guards are carrying a half-dressed woman who is struggling violently to get free. They drop her and she lands awkwardly on the floor in front of Him. She looks up at Jesus as she pulls her clothes up around her shoulders. Her tears are flowing. Her eyes are pleading. Her body is shaking uncontrollably.
The religious leaders rush in behind them. They look at the woman and then they look at Jesus. You can see the disdain in their eyes and hear the sarcasm in their voices when they speak. “Master, we caught this woman committing adultery. We know, and so do you, that the Law of Moses says we must stone her.” Oh how they must have rehearsed their lines!
I want you to visualize this ladies and gentlemen. The religious leaders then look around at “their audience” and then issue the triple-dog dare of the day: “Good master, surely you are not going to disagree with Moses are you?”
You can hear the crowd gasp and look at each other. They’re enjoying this “impromptu theater”. It’s as if they’re looking for the person who yelled “E.F. Hutton.” Oh, come on. You’ve seen the commercial! (Laughter) All eyes are on Jesus. I want you to see the religious leaders. I want you to see the smug looks on their faces. “He’s a cornered rat,” one of them whispers. “He has nowhere to go,” another one says. A third man says, now listen to me, “The woman is as good as dead.”
Do you see the scene? The religious leaders didn’t care about the woman. They wanted Jesus. They wanted to disgrace him. They wanted him to be a law breaker. They wanted to discredit Jesus. They wanted to shut him up!
So, instead of responding to them, Jesus seeks His Father’s heart. Remember He says in John 5:30 “I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me.” Jesus bends down and doodles in the dirt while the scribes and Pharisees continue to press Him. I love the way Jesus could tune them out! When it came to anything that was against his Father’s will Jesus was “dull of hearing”!
Now, do you remember the triple-dog dare? “Good master, surely you are not going to disagree with Moses are you?” Let’s pick up the record with verse 7.
So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.
Pow! The religious leaders never saw the blow coming!
In verse 9 we read “And they which heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last.”
There is something that we need to see and that we need to understand. We can have no doubts about what I’m about share with you. The Father’s heart, ladies and gentlemen, is to always, always, always offer mercy and forgiveness. Let me say that again. The Father’s heart is to always, always, always offer mercy and forgiveness.
So Jesus looks up and asks the woman “Where are your accusers? The ones who pronounced you guilty. The ones who condemned you to death.” The woman says “Lord, they’re gone.” I can just see her looking at Jesus wondering what punishment he would pronounce on her. But oh the Father’s heart is on full display!
Look at verse 11.
“And Jesus said unto her (Now read this carefully.), Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.”
Why did Jesus not judge her? Why did He allow the guilty to go free? The woman was guilty ladies and gentlemen. She violated the Law of Moses. But Jesus knew the day was coming where He would bear the judgment for her sin and we see this In John 3:17.
“For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn (judge) the world; but that the world through him (because He would be judged as sin in its place) might be saved.”
Jesus tells the woman to “Go, and sin no more.”
I can just see Jesus looking at the woman and saying sternly: “You knew the law said you would die if you committed adultery, right? And yet you did it any way. You do know that was really stupid, right? Don’t you dare let it happen again.” I can see Him smile as He says “Now go home and praise the God of Abraham for his great mercy.”
There is one other time in scripture where Jesus tells someone to “sin no more”. It’s the passage about the impotent man at the pool of Bethesda in John 5. Again you know the story.
An angel would stir the waters and they would become healing water. People would rush to get into pool. But this man could not walk and no would help him into the water. Jesus asks him if he wants to made whole. Of course the man says yes! So Jesus tells him to take up his bed and walk. He’s later confronted by the religious leaders who didn’t like the fact that he was made whole on the sabbath. The man said he didn’t know who had healed him because he didn’t get his name.
Now jump down to verse 14.
“Afterward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee.”
What I want you to see is this: when Jesus tells the woman and the impotent man to sin no more, He’s saying “You can make a willful decision to never sin again. You can override your sinful desire to commit sin. If you don’t the law will condemn you and you will pay dearly for your sin.”
Likewise, ladies and gentlemen, we can override our new nature and willfully choose to sin. We can choose to give into thoughts that drive us to lust after things to satisfy the flesh. The woman and the impotent man had a nature that drove them to commit sin. Our new nature, now listen to me, our new nature has no interest in committing sin. In fact, our new nature doesn’t even know how to commit sin!
Ladies and gentlemen, this is why it is impossible for a Christian “to be a sinner saved by grace”. Grace doesn’t make allowances for sin. Grace empowers the child of God to walk free of sin!
There is not one verse in the Bible — not one — that says a Christian is a sinner saved by grace. Go ahead. Use any research tool you like. Type in “sinner”, “saved”, “by”, “grace” in the search bar and see how many verses pop up. You won’t find any! None!!!!
So, if the Bible doesn’t say a Christian is a sinner saved by grace, then why do so many preachers preach it and why do so many Christians believe it? The Bible has the answer. Let’s look at First Timothy 4 verses one and two.
(1) Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith (And they my be departing from the truth on purpose.), giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils;
(2) Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron.
It should not surprise us that Satan is behind this devilish doctrine. He knows that when a child of God understands who he or she truly is, his kingdom will be in a world of hurt. So he continually uses deception to keep us oblivious to God’s truth. And the primary way he does this is through the pulpit. Breaks my heart. We see this in both Galatians and Second Corinthians.
Let’s read Galatians 1 verses six through nine first.
(6) I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ with another gospel:
(7) Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
(8) But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.
(9) As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accused.
Now turn with me to Second Corinthians 11. We’re going to read verses 13 through 15.
(13) For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.
(14).And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.
(15) Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness, whose end shall be accordingly to their works.
I want to close with something else Pastor Dave says in the Born Again Trail.
“A great injustice has also been done to the new believer because of incorrect teachings about the grace of God. Instead of being taught that God’s grace “frees” him from sin, he is taught that grace “covers” him while living in sin. This wrong doctrine makes the new believer an easy target for the devil, leading him away from using his faith in what the Word says to overcome his flesh, and instead, into the deceptive thinking that he can live a lifestyle of habitual sin and still go to Heaven.”
The belief, the doctrine, that a Christian is a sinner saved by grace leads to a lifestyle of habitual sin that, if not repented of, will lead the child of God out of an eternity with their Father and into an eternity in the lake of fire. You are not a sinner who has been saved by grace. You were a sinner but now you’re a sinner no more because of God’s grace! Praise God!
P.S. If you’d like to check out Pastor Dave’s Born Again Trail, you can find it at www.daveroberson.org/series.
