The Christian Handbook - The Life of a Christian

All right. So we have been in a series titled the Christian Handbook Fundamentals

of the Faith, and our hope is that in the series, we get

to really dig down and look at the fundamentals, the foundations of all Christian

belief or the kind of the main Christian belief, and look at how what

we believe will impact how we live our life. I saw a quote recently

and I thought, this kind of summarized really well like our goal in the

series, and it said, true theology is practical. True theology is practical,

that there's a side of it that when we really believe something, it

is going to come out of us in a practice and in a way that

we live our lives. It's we're going to start to shape and mold us.

And that is our hope. So in this series, we've gotten to

so far go through who God is and breaking all of that down. We've

got to look at creation, we got to look at my notes. Where

am I um? We got to why am I missing it? I don't

know? Okay, who God is? And we get to dig down learn

what we believe, and when we start to like actually grab hold of what

we believe, we're expecting to see it transform our lives, shape our lives

as believers. And so what we're gonna do is I got ahead of myself,

just so just so you guys know, that's what happened. I got

ahead of myself. It's on the next page, which I'm not on yet.

We're going to go read through our text for today, because here we

love to go through the Bible, and then we're going to pray so that

God would be here even more so, I don't know how that works.

We're gonna pray and we're gonna ask that His presence would be here as we

read and understand and hear his word. So if you would turn with me

to Galatians five, we're gonna be reading Versus thirteen through twenty six. If

you do not have a Bible, we have bibles in the back for you.

We love to go through the Bible here, so you should get one

so that we can be on the same page. And if you want to

cheat a little bit, we'll have it up here on the screen for you.

Okay, that is a challenge, all right, So let's read it.

Galatians five thirteen. You, my brothers and sisters were called to be

free, but do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh. Rather serve

one another humbly and love, for the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this

one command. Love your neighbor as yourself. If you bite and devour each

other, watch out, or you will be destroyed by each other. So

I say, walk by the spirit, and you will not ratify the desires

of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to the spirit,

and the spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They're in conflict with each

other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. But if

you were led by the spirit, you are not under the law. The

acts of the flesh are obvious sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery, idolatry and

witchcraft, hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition,

dissensions, factions and envy, drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I

warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will

not inherit the Kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love,

joy, peace, forebearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness,

and self control. Against such things, there is no law. Those who

belong to Christ. Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Since we live by this spirit, let us keep in step with the spirit.

Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other. Heavenly Father,

we thank you for this time to gather in your name, to gather

as your body, as your church. And we asked that you would bless

this time, that as we open your word, that you have been preparing

our hearts even through the words that we're saying. And since we woke up

this morning to receive the word that you have for us, or got to

ask that whatever comes out of my mouth or God would be of you,

from your word and inspired by your holy Spirit, Lord God, or God,

that all of us would be built up by what your word has to

say. Or God, we give you this time, and we praise you

in Jesus name. Everyone said Amen. So in our series we started looking

at God breaking that down. We looked at creation, mankind, the Fall,

and for the last several weeks we've been breaking down the different aspects of

the Gospel. We looked at what the gospel is, we look at what

the gospel accomplished the last two weeks. Pastor Gay did an excellent job the

last two weeks looking at kind of the gospel future hope. So Christ's return

and the new heavens and new earth, let's look at Second Peter three thirteen.

But in keeping with this promise, we are looking forward to a new

heaven and a new earth where righteousness dwells. This is our future hope.

But the thing that's kind of cool is that this is not the only thing

that the Gospel tells us of this new coming creation. But it says that

when we believed the Gospel and put our faith in Jesus, that we now

are a new creation. Second Corinthians five seventeen. Therefore, if anyone is

in Christ, the new creation has come, the old has gone, the

new is here. Can you guys say new creation with me? New creation?

So that is that you, through Christ, are a new creation.

And the way that I kind of like summarize this thought, that's kind of

fun. God has made us new creations for his new creation. Okay,

So James one eighteen. He chose to give us birth through the Word of

Truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of all he created.

So this first fruits. Here is this idea that God. What God

has promised in the future, he has already started now in you. To

catch that what God has promised to do in the future, with new heavens,

new earth, new creation, making all things new, he started now.

But with us, with all of us who put our faith in Jesus.

Now this is going to kind of introduce us to something that's really important

for us to know as believers. And remember the first time that you.

I guess do you remember that when you first put your faith in Jesus.

Maybe the joy that you felt, or the relief, or the gladness,

the freedom, the love, knowing that Jesus had died for your sins and

called you to live a new life as a new creation. But then Monday

came and what happened. I was still there, right, My sin was

still there, My problems were still there. And we know that Scripture teaches

that we've been set free from sin. Yet I'm finding that now I have

this, I have my old lusts and old worries and anxieties still there.

But at the same time, I still know that I'm not the same as

I was. Something's different, something's changed. So now there's kind of this

tension that we live in internally, and this is what Christians referred to as

already not yet, that we're in the already not yet, that there's a

future hope coming, that it's partially realized now and will be fulfilled in the

future. This already not yet. And the other way that I think that

we can really process this is like, what is the Bible teach us about

who we are now in light of who we will be then, And that

is that we are already justified in God's sight, but not yet fully sanctified

in this life. Okay, fully justified, already justified in God's sight,

but not yet fully sanctified in our life. So for clarification, justification is

the work that Jesus accomplished on the cross, that paid for the debt,

owed our sins to God, satisfying his to make us in right standing before

God Almighty. And this has already been accomplished through the life and death of

Jesus Christ. So once you put your faith in Jesus, there's nothing left

for you to do. There's no work you can do, there's no action

you can do, because it's all done in Jesus, you're now completely righteous

in God's eyes. You might say that's amazing, that sounds amazing, But

I'm not. I'm not completely righteous. I can look at my actions day

by day and see that I'm not. And you're correct. Jesus has given

you his perfect righteousness. He's given it to you. His righteousness was given

to you so that when God looks at you, he doesn't see our blemishes,

but he sees Christ's perfection. And that is good news. And that's

what the Gospel means. It's good news. But still we are not completely

righteous. So what are we supposed to do with all of this which brings

us to the not yet peace. One day we will be perfectly righteous,

but that won't be until the end of all things, when God makes everything

new. But through our life we will progress bit by bit and become more

and more like Jesus and start to grow into our righteous state. Does that

make sense kinda? So here's a good way to sum it up. Already

justified, not yet fully sanctified. Okay, we need to remember that we're

already justified because our flesh will come against that. We'll talk about that in

a little bit. But that's what it's gonna come against. You're not,

Oh man, look at you messing up. There's no way you could be

right before God. No, we're already justified. It's a sanctification piece that

I'm we're working on. We're working on right. So sanctification is the process

of becoming more and more righteous, holy, and christ Like through the work

of the Holy Spirit than now in dwells every believer second Thessalonians two thirteen.

But we always save. But we ought always to thank God for you,

brothers and sisters loved by the Lord, because God chose you as first roots

to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief and the

truth. This is what we're gonna look at today, which is why today's

message is titled this the Life of a Christian who nice and simple. Except

for all of us who are believers know that it's not that simple. It

doesn't feel that sim We're like, yeah, I'm a Christian, I live,

I'm living this life, but it's not that simple. Salvation in a

sense is simple. I put my true and my love, my affections towards

Christ and his accomplished work. But that period between that moment and my daily

trusting in him until he returns or I go to be with him now doesn't

feel it doesn't feel simple. So we're going to crack into the text see

what it has to say about the Christian life. All right. Obviously there's

a lot of things that we could say about the Christian life. All right.

So when you're like you missed this, like okay, all right,

yeah, and I'll talk to you about it afterwards, that's totally fine.

We'll be here as a church preaching through what the Bible tells us to do

as believers until the end of time. Okay. So Lord, welling,

let's see Galatians five thirteen. Let's dig into it. You my brothers and

sisters were called to be free. Now we get to stop. It's awesome,

called to be free. He's right into the Galatians here. And there's

this kind of battle that's going on in Galatia between the different believers because there's

believers who were converted Jews who kept the Old Covenant are now trying to bring

that old Covenant and say you still must satisfy and meet the regulations of that

old Covenant, and Jesus to be right, and Paul says, no,

you have been set free from the law, set free from works. People

are trying to justify themselves according to works of the law. Paul is reminding

them they are free because of what Christ had done and accomplished to his life

and death, that he fulfilled the laws requirements for us, and that he

fulfilled the laws requirements for our own death. Because before not meanings requirements,

He's literally done at all, and that is good news. He says,

you're free, You're called to be free, but do not use your freedom

to indulge in the flesh. Okay, we're now given these these two ways

of living a Christian life, that being legalism or license. Okay, let's

break that down a little bit. These are really the two of the biggest

major pitfalls that we will have as believers that will kind of go in and

out of all of our life. It's not our hope, and we'll get

to that. Don't worry. There's a third option just to not make you

feel hopeless. But these two major options, when we hear of the good

news and receive this grace and start to try and walk out our life as

believers, we can run into two different pits falls, and we need to

watch out for them. Legalism is not only us trying to maintain our right

standing before God through our actions, but also policing the policing of others actions

in an unbiblical manner. Unbiblical manner because we tend to start to make things

a sin issue that Scripture has no problem with. Okay. Legalism is the

nasty habit of calling something that is a calling something a sin that is actually

just a personal conviction or preference. I've been in that boat on both sides.

There can be This can be the types of clothes that we wear,

or the music we listen to, the food we eat, the shows we

watch. Can those things be sinful? Yes, they definitely can. But

we need to know the difference between what the Bible actually calls sinful and and

what we think the Bible would add to the list if it got a twenty

twenty three update. Does that make sense? We already looked a couple of

weeks ago inside of the scripture sufficient, right, we believe that, so

we don't need to add to it. It tells us that everything we need

to know license is the opposite problem. It's going I don't need to do

nothing. I'm gonna do whatever I want. License says, Jesus paid for

my sins, so it doesn't matter how I live. Scripture rejects both of

these ideas flat out. Instead, we were given the correct way, all

right. We're ready for the correct way. Rather serve one another humbly in

love. Huh. We're called to be free, but do not use your

freedom to indulge the flesh, rather serve one another humbly in love. He's

given us what can be called Christian liberty or Christian freedom. We are free.

He's saying that you're free from lockkeeping, but not free to indulge in

your flesh, the flesh being the former way of life that made you need

Jesus in the first place. Right, So we're free for what to serve

one another humbly in love. So a couple of different ways that I'm gonna

say the same thing over and over again, a couple different ways, all

right, So that hopefully we let this sink in. That is, in

a sense, we have freedom not for ourselves, but freedom from ourself.

Okay. Now, of course this freedom's for us. It's freedom's totally for

us. In the sense that we're the ones who have been set free.

Right, but what is the freedom for? Well, now you no longer

have to keep the law to be right before God, so you're free in

that sense. You don't have to worry about that. You're also free from

the old ways that used to enslave you, so you're free from that.

So you're free to put yourself out of the way, serve others, love

and care for them because it's not about you. Okay, different way to

kind of put this or summarize it. I wrote this down, so it's

a little bit more of a boxed way to put its on on the screen.

Though, is the freedom is for you but not about you? Does

that make sense? Freedom is not for you? Where freedom is for you,

it's not about you. And legalism and license have this terrible trait that

it makes life all about you, either in a self righteous sense or a

self indulgence sense. Does that make sense? And that's not the Christian life?

We need to watch ourselves for what marks our life legalism, license or

self giving love? Okay? Politics farther Galatians fourteen through fifteen says, for

the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command love your neighbor as yourself.

If you bite and devour each other, watch out, or you will

be destroyed by each other. When we exercise our freedom in serving others,

we avoid both problems. The law gets fulfilled when we love. We can't

be anti law because when we love, we do with the law would have

required us to do to our neighbor. But we also see that without this

love that we will destroy each other through legalism. Why because legalism affords no

grace or mercy to another. That makes sense because legalism goes, look how

I'm living, I'm doing it right. You're not doing it right, and

we're all just trying to trying to be self righteous and don't mess up,

because then you can't point your finger at me. But I'm keeping it so

I can keep I can point my finger at you. How dare you slip

up? That's what legalism says, no grace, no mercy. License,

on the other hand, abuses grace in mercy. Does that make sense?

It abuses it because it goes I'm sorry for now as I read the consequences

of my own actions, But now thank you for bringing me back into the

fold. I appreciate him and then you go on and do whatever you want

again, creating the same problem over and over again, and you just abuse

the grace and mercy that your brothers and sisters want to extend to you.

Been on both sides of that as well. Paul gives us the solution.

He's going to open up a concept here that he's going to go on to

repeat, expand, and explain. So let's make sure we're listening. Okay,

five sixteen. So I say, walk by the spirit, and you

will not gratify the desires of the flesh. The walk that he's talking about

here is this idea of progression or the way that we conduct ourselves. So

walk progress by the spirit, conduct yourself according to the spirit. It's amazing

about the spirit that he's talking about is this is the same spirit that dwells

every believer who's put their faith in Jesus. And what's amazing about that same

spirit is that it's the same spirit, the same power that raised Christ Jesus

from the dead living within us. Walk by that spirit. Okay, I'll

hear you out. If you walk by the spirit, you will not gratify

the desires of the flesh. And that is do what the flesh desires.

But again we may say, Okay, well, I'm a believer, I

receive the Holy Spirit, but I sometimes do gratify the desires of the flesh.

And this easily can make us start to doubt our salvation pretty quickly.

But Paul helps us out here. Okay, so let's keep reading. For

the flesh desires, what is contrary to the spirit. In the spirit,

what is contrary to the flesh, They are in conflict with each other so

that you are not to do whatever you want. Paul is saying here is

that you have a literal war going on inside of you as a believer.

Fun right, Fun. You have a literal war going on inside of you

between your former life, your former desires, and your new life in Christ,

your new life given and by the Spirit. And what's more is that

they're at odds against each other, completely against each other. And it feels

like this sometimes, doesn't it? I think it helps. It can really

set us free as believers and maybe make a little bit more sense of our

life as believers to know this or else We're reading our Bible and one day

we're like I'm nailing. In other days you're like, oh, I'm a

sinner. Both they're true, probably not the nailing it part. But there's

days that we wake up going, today's the day I'm going to We're gonna

make it. I want to glorify God with everything. We give God glory

for as long as we can make it. And there's other days that we

feel like we just can't get it right. And some days that we wake

up in the morning we know we already messed up, and we just woke

up right, We're like, oh man, there's not gonna be a good

day. I already have problems. Says that it's warring within you so that

you don't do whatever you want, And really this is a good thing.

It's been for me. I know the spirit has stopped me from getting into

more trouble and other times where I wish that the flesh hadn't won in that

situation. But really, what this verse is talking about is that it's not

so that we don't do whatever we want in regards to our flesh, our

old way of life. Although I think it is fair to say that,

being that there is this war going on and that they're completely opposed to each

other, that there's this reality that when one wins, the other loses.

That's just what it feels like. And the reason for that is you're either

doing something that pleases the spirit or the flesh. No middle ground. We

like middle ground. It's gray. We can frolic in there and no one

knows we're there. It's wonderful. That's not what Scripture gives us, unfortunately,

life in the spirit, life in the flesh. But on the day

when Jesus returns and we are made complete and that flesh is completely done away

with, no longer has any influence or there's no more opposition within us,

we'll be truly free to live out our life and our eternal life in pure

righteousness. I long for that day what Greg talked about the last couple of

weeks our future. Hope you have a couple of days. Maybe you just

have a couple of hours, a couple of minutes every red light on the

way to church, and you are excited for that day Glaciers eighteen. But

if you were led by the spirit, you were not under the law.

Talking about the law again again, we're prone to law keeping or license.

But here it says those who were led by the spirit are under no law.

So We've just been given two things. If we walk by the spirit,

you will not indulge the flesh be led by the spirit, and you

were not under law. Both problems are taken care of. Are you seeing

a pattern, though? Is there a common denominator. Walk by the spirit.

You will not indulge in flesh be led by the spirit, and you're

not under law. The Holy Spirit helps us walk out this liberty. This

Holy Spirit helps us walk out this freedom. And we have a freedom as

believers, and that's freedom from law keeping, freedom from our former way of

life. I'm drilling that in. I'm drilling that in because we need to

remember that because we will default to one or the other. I will default

to one or the other. It's either I'm trying to be right before God

by what he said, or I'm feeling carefree. Paul is now going to

go into great detail to contrast these two ways of wife. So let's dig

in with him. Galatians five nineteen through twenty one. I love that he

says this, this is my precursor, whatever the word is. The acts

of the flesh are what obvious obvious, no mystery. We wish there was,

there is not. He starts off with a bucket term, sexual immorality.

That's not one thing, that's a lot of things, a lot of

bad things, sexual immorality. Sexual immorality is the bucket term for anything outside

of the God ordained pattern for sexual relations, which is that that is,

any sexual activity outside of the marriage covenant between one man and one woman.

The word here in the Greek is porneia, where our English word from pornography

can trace its roots from. And this word does include pornography, premarital sex,

adultery, homosexuality, etc. Impurity, debauchery. It's kind of just

like a party phase right in this section, idolatry and witchcraft. Now here's

the thing. We live in Olympia, Washington. Okay, So I wish

I could say that this witchcraft was like more metaphorical and not literal, but

it's literal here, unfortunately. This word in the Greek is pharmachaea, where

we our English word pharmaceuticals or pharmacy comes from, which means what drugs means

drugs people. And here's the thing. We also live in Washington. Right,

We're no, this is no mystery. Drugs go lower. Here's the

thing. These two idolatry, which is worshiping what any other God, anything

that isn't the One True Creator. And witchcraft, which could be actual witchcraft,

potions and stuff and stuff, and drugs. I like Harry Potter,

okay, so just just when you come from me later, I'm like,

I'm not illegalist, Okay. I watch Harry Potter and enjoy it. Here's

the deal. Drugs in witchcraft or paganism always go hand in hand. They're

always right next to each other. Drug use idolatry hand in hand. They're

never far from each other. Well, let's keep going on this list.

Hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions,

factions and envy, drunkenness, orgies and the like. This isn't an inexhaustive

list. He's like, just keep going on in your head. Paul has

a serious warning next. I warn you, as I did before, that

those who live like this will not inherit the Kingdom of God. Those who

live like this, the idea is the one who does these things, or

practices these things in an ongoing habitual way will not enter the kingdom. And

what kingdom is that it's God's kingdom. It's a kingdom we've been looking at

the last couple of weeks. Seems pretty glorious. It's God's kingdom or righteousness,

dwells. All those things aren't righteous. These are the actions that he

tells us are contrary to the spirit, and that we are not to indulge

in that. In fact, that those who walk by the spirit will not

gratify these desires. So what should we expect. Well, he gives us

a contrasting list, and this is what is referred to as the fruit of

the Spirit, and it's singular fruit. We just looked at the acts of

the flesh. This is the fruit of the spirit. Acts kind of meaning,

Hey, maybe some of us were like pointed out on that list and

other things, We're like, man, thank God, I'm not. That's

our self righteousness. Tell that to go away. There's but we might not

do all those things. But the fruit of the spirit and the way that

it shows up is singular. So we're gonna go down a list, but

we can expect all of these things, in one manner or or another,

for us as believers to grow into. Also, what's kind of cool is

that this word fruit here, Jesus used all the time in his ministry when

he's talking to his disciples, when he was teaching the crowds. Let's look

at one example, okay, John fifteen eight. This is my father's glory

that you bear much fruit showing yourselves to be what my disciples. They go

hand in hand. Let's look at what this fruit produces Glaciers five twenty two

through twenty three. But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy,

peace. This love here is isn't the feeling love, Just in case we

think there is. This isn't the feeling love. That's that's the action love,

the gop a love or we love through action love that moves you.

Joy, Peace. He is our peace, Prince of peace. Four barons.

We suck at this one. That's that's what that is right, kindness,

goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. Against such things,

there is no law. I didn't understand this verse for a second. For

a minute. I had to do some reading, and I realized that it

means exactly what it says against such things. There is no law. Who

what law is keeping you from being patient with someone else? That'd be a

good law. Wait, no, it wouldn't be a good law. We

need a law that says be patient. Right, I'm just kidding against such

things. There is no law, no one forbids these things, which is

kind of helpful for us to realize, Like, why if this is what

it's supposed to come out of us as believers to walk in, how would

we be under law? There is no law for these things. Does that

make sense? We get to walk these things out freely. There's no condemnation.

And Paul's going to give us the nail and the coffin to his argument

Glaciers five twenty four. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh

with its passions and desires. We need to remember this one. Our flesh

hates this verse. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with

its passions and desires. Remember what we said in the Second Corinthians. Let's

look at it five seventeen. Next one. Maybe no, oh, all

right, it's in my notes. It's also on our bibles. Okay,

thanks Ella, that's my sister killing it. Therefore, if anyone anyone is

in Christ, the new creation has come. What's gone, the old is

gone, The new is here. I could explain this to you kind of

not very well, and it'd be way longer. So let's have Paul do

it. Let's look at Roman six a couple of things. We're talking about

the Christian life. There's a lot of verses I didn't use. Okay,

I'm trying kind of. And so if you want to, in taking your

notes, write down these next these chapters I'm about to tell you and just

go read them because it talks more about the struggle and what we can expect

in all those things that would be John fifteen, Romans six, and Romans

seven gonna help you know about what Jesus has promised and what the Holy Spirit's

work in your life is going to look like and be, and what we

can hold on to because of what Jesus said. And in Roman six and

seven is explaining what has happened, what has been accomplished, what has done,

how we are to live in Roman seven is our struggle, thank you

so much. Roman seven is our struggle. But let's let's look at a

portion of Roman six. For we know that our old self was what crucified

with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with that

we should no longer be slaves to sin, because anyone who has died has

been set free from sin. Now, if we died with Christ, we

believe that we will also live with him, for we know that since Christ

was raised from the dead, he cannot die again. Death no longer has

mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once and

for all, But the life he lives, he lives to God. Thank

you, Paul. That's what Jesus did in the same way, in the

same way. Pay attention, right, we gotta pay attention. In the

same way. Count yourselves dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ,

Jesus. Pass. Sorry, those are the trick, Yeah, got

you. In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin, but alive

to God in Christ. Jesus. This verse I hear is so helpful because

you're like, okay, but you said it's dead, end gone. But

here it says count yourselves dead to sin, consider it dead. When it

shows up, you say you're dead. You have nothing. You're dead.

You died with Christ. You've been crucified. Because we're in this already.

Not yet, we're waiting. Okay, you can go the next one now,

next verse Therefore, do not let sin reign in your mortal bodies so

that you obey its desires. There it is, it's there, but it

doesn't have any power. It's no longer on the throne. It's no longer

reigning because christ is. Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as

an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer your ourselves to God as those who

have been brought from death to life, and offer every part of yourself to

Him as an instrument of righteousness. For Sin shall no longer be your master,

because you are not under what the law, but under what grace odds

grace. Sin no longer rules us. It has been dethroned, it has

been thrown down. It no longer has any control, so that we have

to obey its desires. That's done. We're good. We're just not good

at telling it and reminding it. So those desires come up in us and

we go, oh yeah, maybe I mean you, you've smooth words.

Our whole life as Christians need to be marked with the concert reminder that our

old self has been put to death and has no power over us. Because

your flesh is going to try to lie to you, your flesh is going

to try to lie to you and say I'm still the one in charge.

Besides, we had a great time. But it's not and it really wasn't.

Those things that we were that were now ashamed of from our former life.

But we have been set free. Paul says. Next, since we

live by this spirit, let us keep in step but the spirit. Here's

the spirit again, Spirit and flesh. Our lives as Christians, as I

stated earlier, is to grow into righteousness, the righteousness that we have been

given. We're going to grow into that. Right, It's like growing into

your dad's shirt. I don't know who has their dad's shirt. I don't

know. You get the idea, boots, maybe we see here Paul is

saying that as Christians are walk. Our life is to walk by the spirit

and be led by the spirit. So since we live by the spirit,

this is the spirit that gives us life, the spirit that has raised us

from spiritual life to spirit or spiritual death to spiritual life. We're alive now

saying, use it. It's there. It's be easy giving it to you,

keeping step with it. It's moving. You just pick up the pace.

And here's the deal. This is gonna be something that takes our whole

life to grow into. So also you're like, right, or you're dun't

get come down, right, Like this is something that's gonna take our whole

life, we can expect it to be hard, and that is okay.

I heard a pastor and he kind of had a cool picture. He was

talking about the prodigal son. Right. The prodigal son was still the sun.

He didn't never stop being the sun. Right, So when he found

himself where pigs are happy, in the pig pen, that's where pigs are

happy. Son's not gonna be happy for very long. That's kind of how

he put it. Is that us as sons and daughters of God, if

we find ourselves in pig pens, it's only a matter of time. So

we're like, I'm sick of this. I don't like this. I like

that, he says, walk by and keeping step with And how do you

learn to walk? Trial and error? I have a one year old son.

He could tell you, not even just him with his trying to speak,

but with his face that has scabs and scars on it, not too

many scars, but he's getting there. He'll get there, I believe in

him. He's walking and he's trying, and he's trying, and literally,

last Sunday, his face right here, he just had a big old scrape

on his face. And it's because you're gonna fall on her face a lot

when you're learning to walk, and sometimes it's really gonna hurt, and you're

really gonna regret even trying to walk. But we thank God for his grace

and his mercy to say, get up right, just like his parents do.

We pick up the kid and we go like, all right, you're

still crying. I believe you can do it again. Let's see, you're

gonna get farther this time. And then what's gonna happen is you're going to

learn and you're going to grow. You become stronger and more stable and mature

in your faith. But through what through your own strength, Nope, through

the power that's within us as we rely on him. This isn't something that

we get to white knuckle our way through. We're gonna find ourselves in one

of the two ditches again. And you will learn it. If you don't

want to listen to me, now, you will learn it. I've learned

it. We've all learned it. Maybe at one time or another if we

still haven't God's grace beat with you. Jesus gives us such a good answer.

If you go like, Okay, I'm supposed to do it, but

I'm not supposed to try to do it. It's not what I said.

Jesus says, abide in me. It's from that abiding. And how can

we abide? Well, there's a sense in which like abiding in him is

spending time with him, knowing him. That can be done through prayer or

God's word, time with Jesus. Just trying to saturate our thoughts, our

actions so that the spirit would start to produce this fruit in us. Let's

look at what Jesus had to say in John fifteen, just a little snippet

on the whole chapter. Little John fifteen. Remain in me as I also

remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself. It must remain

in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

I am the vine. You are the branches. If you remain in me

and I in you, you will bear much fruit Apart from me. You

can do what, nothing, nada, nothing next verse. If you do

not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and

withers. Such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire, and burned.

My wife encouraged me to put this one back in, so you're welcome.

Let's look at our last verse for today, Galatians five. Let us

not become conceited, provoking and envying each other. This is really good,

a good word to receive just by itself. Yep, sounds like you kind

of just maybe extended the list of flesh stuff that we shouldn't do. Sounds

good, But I think there's something that could be a little bit deeper here,

and we might miss I almost missed it. I think there's a good

reminder here that even as we're walking in our faith, as we're progressing and

growing in our faith, that we don't become puffed up. We start to

see growth in our own life and not others start walking around with the legalism

again, the go mmmm, I'm at this point and you're not. You

know what's funny about that is that we forget that like you weren't always like

this, and God and everybody else had to have patience with you two until

you grew, and finally that we don't envy other people's walks. And honestly,

I think I don't want to say this is good because obviously we shouldn't

do this right. It says, it says not okay, So let me

flip it a little bit. I find myself listening to pastors and going,

man, I wish I had their walk with Jesus. Man I wish that

I had their kind of faith. And they're like a hundred years old and

they've been following Jesus for eighty years. They put in the reps, they

put in the time abiding right, So I shouldn't be discouraged, but I

should use that as an encouragement and as an example for me to abide in

Christ through the years, so that when I reach an older age that I

would get to have a similar walk with Jesus. So can I get the

band ub? And I'm going to summarize. We're going to summarize by going

through a few verses that we've already looked at today, same text Glacians five.

Let's jump through them. You, my brothers and sisters, were called

to be free, but do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh.

Rather serve one another humbly in love. Next verse, please, so I

say, walk by the spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of

the flesh. But if you were led by the spirit, you are not

under the law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with

its passions and desires. Since we live by the spirit, let us keep

in step with the spirit. So we see something that's really cool here.

He's talking about this freedom. Freedom from our old way of life, freedom

from now legalism to go like, okay, well, I'll try to be

good. But a freedom that's in the spirit right, freedom from the law,

freedom from sin, and freedom to grow in love. So for us

as believers, here's the question. Are we are we? Are we growing

in our love? I would take that to Jesus in prayer, ask him,

Lord, what marks my life? Do you is your fruit? Am

I free from making life about myself? Or am I still trying to find

a way to cling onto it to make it about me? We see that

where the spirit is right, and we all know this verse right, we

either know the songs, we know the verse. Where the spirit is there's

freedom. Do you know what's incredible? We're gonna look at that verse because

it says something, and not just something. It says what we've been talking

about. Let's look at it. Second Corinthians three seventeen. Now the Lord

is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom.

And we all who with unveiled faces contemplated the Lord's glory, we see

him as he is. Now we can have relationship with him, we can

grow and and and be in his presence. What's happening to us when we're

contemplating his glory, when we're in his presence, as we behold him as

believers, as we see him, that we are being transformed into His image

with ever increasing glory, which comes from who the Lord, Who is the

Spirit? Right, we rely on the Spirit. We need the spirit.

We are given the spirit for a reason. This spirit, that spiritual life,

has raised us. The spiritual life is a seal on our life for

the day of redemption. The life of the Christian is one of sanctification through

the Spirit, relying on the Spirit and trusting him until the day when we

are made complete in Him. Amen. All right, would you guys stand

to your feet. We're gonna have a time of prayer. While we worship,

we'll have elders on the sides. We'd love to pray with you.

We'd love to pray with you. If you're struggling with feeling like you're bearing

fruit, if you're struggling with indulging in the flesh, if you're struggling with

legalism, we'll pray with you, and we'd love and happily pray for you.

And if you have any other need, we're here and we will pray

for you. If you don't feel comfortable doing that, which I hope you

do, take us up and compare with us. If you don't, you

can write it on a connect card, put it out in the box the

offering box switch. Also, if you can't prepared to give today, you

can do that as well. But we have a box out there, and

if you write your prayer requests on it, we'll pray for it this week

and we'll send it out so that others can be praying for it. And

if you just want the elders in the leadership or the elders just to see

it right private on there. That way, we won't send it out to

everyone. Okay, okay, let's pray, let's worship by Lord Father.

We love you, we thank you, we give you this time. We're

so grateful for your word. We just asked that you would already be working

in us, Lord God, and working out of us those things that make

life all about us. Or God, we long to behold your face and

behold your glory. Or do we want to know you? Or God?

We want our lives to be transformed by you, or God, that we

would do those things that agree with your spirit that you have given us this

new life. Lord God, we want to look like what you've created us

for. So please just help us. Lord, give us the grace and

mercy to see your grace and mercy in all the areas of our life.

Lord God, where we need it most. Or God, help us be

fully dependent on you this week. Help us find brothers and sisters that we

can do life with, Lord, so that they would be there to encourage

encourage us to rely on their spirit. Lord. We love you, we

want to know you, and are so grateful for how you constantly reveal yourself

to us, and how we constantly get to have different struggles in our life,

Lord that ultimately draw us to your feet and to your cross and to

your mercy and to your love and Lord God, help that be what image

we are being conformed to, or God, that we look more like you

and live like you, being salt and light everywhere that we go, or

it be with us this week we asked at this time was a blessing and

an edification of your body to your glorification and your glory in Jesus name.

Everyone said Amen,