Uncondemned Series

Recovered By Grace: UNCONDEMNED

Romans 8

Introduction

In our study of the book of Romans, we have covered the basic ideas:

-The Good News is God’s Power to Save Everyone 

-Everyone needs saving - all have sinned.

- We cannot overcome on our own.

-Salvation is a matter of God’s grace, accessed by faith / trust.

-When we trust, God credits us with righteousness.

-Only the power of grace can overcome the power of sin.

Paul's Testimony of the Power of Sin

7:9 Once I was alive apart from the law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died.

7:15 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.

7:19 For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.

7:20 Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

7:23 but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me.

7:24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?

Ken Stegall wrote, “It pictures the struggle of knowing the right thing to do and being unable to do it. It is a struggle that every conscientious person has experienced or is experiencing." Without an intervention from God, we have no hope of winning this war … we are condemned … but that is not God’s plan!

WE ARE UNCONDEMNED!

7:25, 8:1 "Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! ... Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus..."

Why We Stand Uncondemned! Five Promises Paul expresses about the uncondemned life we have in Christ:

1. WE ARE UNABLE, BUT JESUS IS ABLE TO SET US FREE (Romans 8:2)

Romans 8:2 "because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.”

God knew the only answer to our sin problem was to send “his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering” (vs 3). Our freedom from sin is that it no longer holds us captive. He reminded them in chapter six that when they were baptized they ‘died to sin’.

2. WE CAN RESET OUR MINDSET (Romans 8:6-13)

Contrast those who live by the flesh and those who live by the Spirit! (8:6 The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace.) Yarbrough: This word occurs in only three verses in the NT, all in Romans 8. The CSB uses “mindset”; The NET “outlook”; The CEB “attitude”.

This is the way we think and we allow the Spirit of God to govern how we think.

To have the mindset of the flesh

-Minds are set on what the flesh desires.

-The mind governed by flesh is death.

-To live by the flesh is to be hostile to God.

-Unwilling to submit to God.

-Cannot please God

To have the mindset of the Spirit

-Minds are set to what the Spirit desires

-Experience life and peace

-The Spirit gives life and hope.

-Yarbrough: The Holy Spirit is mentioned thirty times in Romans and twenty times in Romans 8 alone.

Those who follow Christ have reset their mindset to spiritual life!

3. WE ARE PART OF THE FAMILY! (Romans 8:14-17)

Romans 8:14-17 "For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And 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."

We have been adopted into God’s Family.

-God is our Abba, Father.

-The Spirit testifies that we are God’s children.

-We are heirs, co-heirs with Christ.

-We share in both sufferings and glory.

Even in ancient times, families struggled and often there were those who did not have a family because of various circumstances. In Christ, everyone has a family to believe in them, help them, strengthen them, and love them.

4. WE ARE FOCUSED FORWARD IN HOPE! (8:18-30)

Glory is coming!

Romans 8:18-21

"I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God."