Romans Series: The New Life

Colonels, we're gonna continue in our Roman series, and so please help me welcome up Pastor John.

Let's go.

Good morning, everyone.

Man, I got I got saved all over again with that tithing message right there.

How about you?

Let's go, Pastor Taryn.

Um, man, so good to be in the house of God.

Uh, want to welcome everyone joining us online.

Can you put your hands together?

Welcome our online family.

We love you.

And thank you for streaming in and joining us.

We're in a series in the book of Romans, and we're gonna jump into Romans chapter eight today.

Anyone got a hard copy of the scriptures?

You just want to wave it in the air like you just don't care, loud and proud with your hard copy.

I love, I want to encourage you to buy a hard copy.

Hey, we have free Bibles.

You didn't have to buy it.

We got free Bibles.

Um, and uh man, get a hard copy of the scriptures.

Uh, there is something about highlighting and underlining and uh, man, just something about it.

No judgment, no shade on digital apps and all that sort of stuff.

That is that's that's cool.

That's just as good.

Uh, it'll be on the big screen as well.

I just think there's something so good about bringing your Bible to church.

Bring a journal, bring something to take notes with, because I believe God's got some stuff to deposit in your heart.

And it's just stickier Monday through Saturday when you write it down and you're able to come back to it.

Because today uh we're gonna be talking about living the new life through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Last week we talked about Romans chapter six, uh, what it's like to be dead to sin and alive in Christ.

But the question is today is what does that new life look like?

What does that new life look like on Monday at work?

What does that new look that new life look like in my thought life?

What does that new life look like when I consider what's possible in my faith?

What does this new life that Christ has given us actually look like?

And so today, if you're taking notes, the title of my message is simply that.

Paul wants to talk to us about the new life.

And in Romans chapter 8, he's gonna speak to us about three things.

Romans 8 · chapter mention

I'm gonna kind of give you the trailer before the movie.

I'm gonna give you the three things that we're gonna dive into today, and then at the end of the sermon, we're gonna uh make room for the Holy Spirit to minister to us.

I believe the Holy Spirit wants to do some work and uh do some amazing things in our lives.

And so we're gonna create space for that in the room.

But Romans 8 shows us three things because we belong to Jesus and his spirit lives within us, Paul's gonna show us that one, we have a new standing and it's gonna change the way that we walk.

Paul's gonna show us that we have a new mind and it's gonna change the way that we think.

And Paul's gonna show us that because the spirit of the risen king lives within us, it's gonna change what we believe is possible when we face impossible situations.

And so as we read, I just want you to bring your own life into this message.

And here's the question today: where do you need to begin living from what God has already given you?

Romans chapter 8, verses 1 and 2.

Romans 8:1

Are you with me?

All right, we're gonna jump in.

Paul says, there is therefore, or in our translation, so now there is no condemnation.

Someone say, no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus.

And because you belong to him, the power of the life-giving spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death.

Before Paul talks about how to walk, Paul tells us where we stand.

He says, If you belong to Jesus Christ, if you have said yes to him, therefore, now, present tense at the 9:30 service, there is therefore now no condemnation over your life.

I want you to know that as you walked into this church and in this space today, you will never hear a word of condemnation against you because conviction is different than condemnation.

The enemy is a liar and he's an accuser, and he constantly wants to condemn you over the sin that's in your life.

But last week we talked about how your identity has changed because of Jesus Christ and you saying yes to him.

You are dead to sin and alive to Jesus Christ.

And so now the verdict has been declared.

There is, therefore, now no condemnation, Paul says, over your over your past, over your present, and over your future.

It is forgiven and you are free in Jesus Christ.

That is good news today.

No condemnation for those who belong to Jesus Christ.

If you belong to Jesus Christ, your guilt has been dealt with, your shame has been dealt with, and now you can come near to God.

And there's something that's really powerful about this truth that changes the way that you walk.

There's a new confidence, there's a new authority, there's a new victory because you now know the truth of your standing.

I've told the story a few times before, so just bear with me if you've already heard it.

But it reminds me of middle school.

I was like the shortest kid in my class.

My parents were very scared about my future, so they took me to a growth specialist.

This exists.

And we went to a growth specialist, and uh in the doctor's office, she said, We're gonna take an x-ray of your hand.

Because apparently, if you take an x-ray of someone's hand, uh, she said, we're gonna be able to tell within two inches of how tall you're gonna be when you're a full-grown adult.

And I'm like, oh wow, my palms became very sweaty at that time.

And it was in that office that I developed a prayer life for the first time in middle school.

I said, God, five three, five foot three, because my mom's five foot two, she's a little shorty.

And I said, I like I gotta be told by my mom.

Five foot three, let's go.

And then all of a sudden I got like real bold and name it and claim it, and I got real Pentecostal.

And I and I and I got my my faith started to build up.

I said, five foot eight.

God, five foot eight, because I thought, you know, most girls are maybe five foot six-ish, or you know, and I hadn't kissed any girls in that period of my life in middle school.

So if I ever had any hope in kissing a girl, I had to at least be at sort of kissing height.

Five foot eight, dear Jesus.

I started speaking in tongues, and so you know, I'm just like, I'm faking it.

No.

Um, so so I started praying five foot eight.

All right, and then the doctor comes in and she has this uh this folder.

She opens the folder, there's a graph on it, and she says, John, are you ready to see?

I'm like, I don't know if I'm ready.

She said, look at the end of that.

And uh there was a um a dot there at the end of the graph, and it said, Um, John, you're and she said, out of her mouth, you're gonna be anywhere from 5'10 to 6 foot.

I said, God is real, God is alive.

I jumped to my feet.

I became, I think I recommitted my life to Christ that in that doctor's office.

The next day I walked through the hallways of Shelby Junior High and Shelby Township Middle School with a swagger to my step.

And I said, ladies, you better buy low because this stock is on the rise.

I know who I am.

I might look like I'm four foot nothing, but there is a five, ten, to six-foot man trapped in here.

You better get on it.

Because I knew what was declared to me, the truth that was declared to me of who I was, it changed the way I walked.

And what Paul is telling us is something even far more powerful than knowing something about your future destination.

He's saying, because you know what Jesus has done in your past, that there is therefore now no condemnation because he took it all upon his back, so you don't have to put any of it on yours.

You can now live from a place of victory, not fighting for it every day.

You know how to deal with sin because it's already a defeated loser.

And the enemy is a liar, and he's gonna try to accuse you and say, You can't come back to church because you screwed up this past week.

Maybe you had a powerful moment at the altar last Sunday, but you've gone back to some thought patterns or habits or practices, and you feel guilt, shame, and condemnation that is not from the Holy Spirit.

Conviction pulls us into a loving God who has already declared us righteous.

God has given us a new standing and it changes the way that we walk.

And I just want to touch on this condemnation and conviction piece for a moment because for some of us, uh, we keep hearing the words you're hopeless.

We keep hearing you're disqualified, we keep hearing don't even bother coming back to church or cracking open the Bible or trying to pray to God.

He doesn't care about you anymore, he doesn't hear it because of what you've gone back to or how far you've fallen.

That couldn't be further from the truth.

Conviction, check this out no condemnation means that I can receive correction without believing that I'm rejected.

I think about this with my boys.

I have a conversation every once in a while with my boys, and I want to just always remind them about the relationship that we have and their standing with their father.

And so I'll I'll ask my boys, I'll say, I'll say, Who who am I to you?

And most of the time I'll get dad, and then when they're feeling cheeky, my three-year-old will say, Johnny boy, yeah, who am I to Johnny boy, you know, and then run away.

Um, who am I to dad?

And then I will ask, and who are you to me?

And they'll say, I'm your son.

And I said, That's right.

And as your dad, I want you to always know that I will never stop loving you, that you are mine.

And as a son, I want you to know that you can always come to me with anything that's on your heart and you can talk to me about anything.

I know they're gonna get to a point someday in middle school and in high school where they're not gonna come to me, where they're gonna wanna run and hide, but I want them to know at an early, early, early age, as earliest as they can comprehend it, that their dad has declared you belong in this family, you have right standing with your father, and you can come and you can receive healthy correction without ever being rejected.

And some of you need to hear that.

The Holy Spirit brings loving conviction.

Last week was a Sunday that was about holy loving conviction of sin and confession of sin and repentance from stuff that is hurting us and distancing us from a relationship with a dad who says, You can come near to me to the throne of grace.

Receive forgiveness, be reminded of your identity, and you have right standing.

And now let's walk forward in confidence, in authority, in a spiritual swagger, knowing that sin has been defeated on the cross.

Jesus is victorious, and you belong to him.

The second thing that Paul brings us into is that we not only have a new standing that gives us a confidence in our walk, but we have a new mind, the mind of Christ.

This is life in the spirit.

The new life gives us new thoughts.

Romans chapter 8, verse 5, Paul says that those that are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things, but those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about things that please the Spirit.

Romans 8:5

Notice what Paul says.

He says, Things that please the Spirit.

This raises a question that reaches deeper than thoughts that just make me feel better.

Does this thought please God?

Does it honor him?

Is it in alignment with who he is, his word, his will, and his ways?

Paul identifies that we struggle with this war in our mind at times.

It's called the sinful nature.

In Greek, it's the flesh, it's this um part of us, it's the stuff in us that's still a part of the fallen nature that needs redemption, that needs sanctification, but it's this it's the stuff inside of us that wants to live on its own terms, wants to depend on itself.

Um, it can look like temptation, it can look like pride, it can look like unforgiveness and bitterness, it can look like um resentment, refusing to forgive.

It's this stuff that's at war inside of us.

And what Paul is saying is because we belong to a new king, his kingdom has a new way about it.

And the new way about his kingdom produces a new way of thinking in the sons and daughters of the king.

That there's actually, if you can think about it this way, he's juxtaposing culture's thoughts versus kingdom thoughts.

And I'm gonna use culture as something synonymous with uh worldly thoughts or fleshly thoughts or the thoughts of our sinful nature, the thoughts that are opposed to the will and the ways of Jesus Christ our King.

And what he says is that those that have the Spirit of God, the natural byproduct, is a renewed way of thinking that's in alignment, or let's use the word congruence with Christ our King.

Romans 12, 2, we're gonna get into it in a few weeks, tells us do not be conformed to the pattern of this world or our culture, but be what?

Transformed by the renewing of our mind.

How does this happen?

How do we go about this?

Well, I was at a conference recently, and one of the preachers was just hitting a point that I think is so powerful.

So many times we want to live for Jesus, our heart is for Jesus.

Um, but if we're really honest, we don't we want his will in our lives, but we don't know the words in this book.

And biblical illiteracy is at an all-time high where we want the blessings from this book, but we don't want to actually consume the bread of life in the pages of this book.

And our culture is led by thoughts, feelings, and opinions, but resists authority.

And even in Christian culture and church culture, we want Jesus, but we don't actually take the words of Jesus, the teachings of Jesus, and the commands of Jesus, and put it over our mind as a roof and house ourselves under the shelter of his authority.

We we want to feel close to Jesus, but oftentimes, if we're really honest, we treat the words in this book as opinions, suggestions, or preferences, and not as the infallible, authoritative, inerrant word of God that is meant to have complete transformative power over our lives when we submit ourselves to it.

This is the battle between culture thoughts and kingdom thoughts.

Here's what it sounds like.

Culture says if it feels right, I follow it.

But the kingdom teaches me that I bring my desires under my Lord Jesus, and I don't have to let every desire lead my life.

I allow Jesus Christ in his way and his will to lead my life.

Uh um, culture says they hurt you, so make them pay.

But but Jesus teaches me to forgive.

Jesus teaches me to actually love my enemies and pray for those that persecute you.

Jesus teaches me to not clap back with bitterness on social media.

Jesus teaches me to bless those that don't feel blessable.

Jesus teaches me to do things that I don't feel like doing.

And actually, why?

It makes me more like him.

Culture says get more, keep more, and your security is in what you have.

But the kingdom teaches me I have all that I need in a good God who loves his kids.

And he is Jehovah Jirah, he's my provider.

I don't have to have a scarcity mindset because I am a part of a kingdom, and kingdom culture is a culture of abundance and provision.

My God loves me and he will never fail me.

So no matter what the market is doing or what my bank account says, I can live with peace and confidence and trust in God.

Right?

Culture says, make sure everybody knows how important you are, but the kingdom teaches me to serve in obscurity if nobody gives me an applause.

Are we living according to culture's thoughts or the king's thoughts?

There's a difference.

And here's what Paul says As the Spirit renews my mind, my life increasingly becomes more and more like the one I sing about on Sundays.

Jesus Christ.

I don't study this book to get more information.

I don't study this book to sound smart in front of you.

I am obsessed with this because I know that in submitting myself to his thoughts in this book, I will become more and more like his son Jesus Christ.

And that is the goal of life.

Romans 8, 6, he says, so letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death, but letting the spirit control your mind leads to what?

Life and peace, aka what everyone in the world is looking for.

Letting the Holy Spirit be the authority to direct your thoughts from the minute you wake up instead of your phone, instead of your email, instead of worry, instead of fear, gives you what?

Life, peace, dare I say, happiness, contentment, fulfillment, the stuff that everyone is searching for.

I just want to tell you, there is no greater feeling than honoring God.

And your life becoming more and more congruent with what's in this book and what's coming out of your life.

I didn't say perfection, but I said more and more congruent.

God wants progression, God wants sanctification.

We can grow every single day to become more and more like Jesus Christ.

And there can be a consistency to what's in here and what's modeled out here.

And it leads to life and peace as we grow in agreement with God.

The new life, Paul tells us, it changes the way that we we walk, it changes the way that we we think, and it changes, he says, what we can believe is possible.

Go with me to Romans chapter 8, verse 11.

Romans 8:11

Paul says this he says, the Spirit of God who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you.

And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by the same spirit living in you.

Let that sink in for a moment.

The same spirit that raised Jesus Christ from the dead in that dark, cold tomb 2,000 years ago, lives in you.

If you said yes to Jesus Christ, you belong to him.

And it says that moment of salvation, God deposits his Holy Spirit in your life.

He fills your life.

And what Paul tells us is that the Holy Spirit is the Same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead.

There is a reality there that we have to sit with for a moment.

One day, all of us are gonna die, our mortal bodies, Paul says, in transition from this life to the next life.

And this is not the end.

Because our bodies will be resurrected and glorified.

And the Bible says that we're gonna have bodies like Jesus.

It says that we're going to be like him one day.

We will all be resurrected.

God will bring all things back into restoration, and we're gonna have our new glorified bodies.

But what Paul is speaking here to is that Jesus' resurrection is both a pledge someday, but it's also a pattern for our faith and our belief that we have access to today.

In other words, what I'm saying is that resurrection is the new standard.

Okay?

The spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you.

And here's what that means.

The hardest thing to pull off in human history was resurrection.

Who else pulled that off?

Jesus Christ.

That spirit lives in you, and that now is your new present reality.

Which means what falls underneath that, then that seems impossible.

That seems hopeless.

That seems like there is only a supernatural God could do that.

What falls underneath that?

Everything.

Which means, what can you believe God for?

I don't know if you believe this.

That is the new standard.

Everything falls beneath it.

Meaning, no matter what the diagnosis is, meaning no matter how far the prodigal child has run, meaning, no, no matter how hopeless the financial situation is, you actually have zero permission to be faithless.

And you have every reason, in fact, a command from Jesus over and over and over again.

With God, all things are possible.

With man, nothing is possible, but with me, all things are possible.

If you got faith, the size of a mustard seed, you can tell this mountain to get into this sea and it will go.

I mean, Jesus would say stuff like this.

And now we actually have his spirit in us that had the power to raise him from the dead in that cold, dark, empty tomb.

What I'm telling you is that you not only need to get your faith up, but you need to get your faith way up today.

This isn't hypot Christianity.

This is what the Bible says.

The Bible is about a life that walks with confidence because there is now no condemnation for me because I'm in Christ Jesus.

This is the gospel and how it changes everything.

There's a growing congruence in my walk with what is in the book and what's coming out of my life.

And then there is also a crazy faith that I grab a hold of because resurrection is the new standard.

I remember when I was in that seven-month pit of anxiety, and I felt like I was in a prison.

Anxiety and then the depression and insomnia that came with it, I felt like I was in a prison where someone hid the key for me and it was so dark and hopeless.

But I remember in that season, I reminded myself that I belong to Jesus Christ, and because I belong to him, he loves me and he's with me in the pit.

But the same Jesus that is right down with me at the bottom of this pit is the same Jesus that I have in me, and his spirit, the spirit of the risen king, lives in me, and I just continued to hold on to that hope.

And I remember one day when that anxiety and that depression and that bleakness over my life broke.

I began to live in that life and peace that was promised to me.

And I can stand here as a testimony to say, I know what you might be experiencing right now, I know when that hits, I know what it feels like, but I cannot just believe that that is the new normal for the rest of your life because resurrection is the new standard, and if God did it for me, He can do it for you.

I remember when doctors told Taryn and I that having kids on our own would be a medical impossibility, and now today, because resurrection is the new standard, we kept hoping, we didn't know the timing, and yeah, we had to wait, and God did a lot of forging and forming in that process.

But man, it is crazy to be standing up here just a few years, it seems like after those prayers that felt so hopeless, and our home was empty to now have four wild boys causing havoc in our house, destroying things.

And I'm saying, praise God, because resurrection had the final word.

I'm all about doctors, I'm all about practical help.

Believe me, I'm all about that, but that does not have the final word over your life, my life, or our story.

The risen king does.

I remember this past year as they found our little three-year-old Beckett floating in a jacuzzi, all black and blue, water filled his lungs.

Pulled him out, and they were doing CPR for minutes.

I remember Taryn telling me, I wasn't there.

Taryn was there, and she said, I anchored myself to the fact that the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lives in me.

And I began to speak in my heavenly language.

I began to pray in the spirit and intercede on behalf of our little three-year-old boy's life.

And I said, Be raised through the power of the Holy Spirit.

And she said, as I began to intercede and wage war with my heavenly language, I prayed in the spirit.

I depended upon the spirit.

In that moment, water came out of his mouth, breath came back into his lungs, and the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead put breath back into my little Beckett's life.

Because resurrection is the new standard, which means I can't control all the results, but I can control my response to impossible situations.

I have no permission to be faithless.

I will not make agreements day in and day out in my life with doubt and despair because God is too good and he's done too much in my life.

And if he can do it for me, I believe he can not only do it for you, but he can do so much more.

I believe the Holy Spirit wants to work today.

I know so many of us are bringing into this room or watching online wounds and maybe it's a prodigal that's so far away you've been praying for.

I want hope to rise again.

Maybe it's a dream that's been dead.

I want to give you permission to dream again.

Maybe it's a diagnosis and you don't know where to go and what to do.

We have a supernatural God.

We have the great physician.

Maybe it's a financial situation that seems so bleak.

And we have Jehovah Jira, and you're his kid, and he loves you.

And so I want to actually invite us to stand today.

And stand as a representation that the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead is raising your faith in the room right now.

Raising your faith in your heart, raising your faith for what is possible.

And I want to invite Taryn to the stage because we've just been praying and sensing from the Lord some things that we believe God wants to do in our community this Sunday.

And so, Taryn, would you just share and let's just lean into what God wants to do?

Yeah, I really felt like there's some people that there's a miracle that you know you need.

It just came right to your mind.

And there's people who um you've you've put things on the shelf and things that you've prayed about many, many, many times, some of you for many years, some of you hundreds of times in prayer.

And I just really felt like the Lord wanted to increase your faith today and just invite you.

Would you believe me again?

Because we do not have permission to look at our current reality and change our theology about what we're seeing in the natural.

We have to fix our eyes.

My theology doesn't depend upon what I'm seeing currently.

God is who he says he is, he is the healer, he is the provider, God is good.

And I just feel that the Lord wants our faith to arise and well up inside of us.

And so I'm just gonna call out a few things that I believe the Lord wants to bring resurrection power and breathe his Holy Spirit life and inject miracles into your story and into your home and into your family.

And so, right now, if you need healing in your body, I want to invite you to come to the altar.

If you need any measure of healing in your physical body, come to the altar.

If you want to stand in, don't be shy.

I know there are people in this room that need healing in their body.

God wants to resurrect your body.

Does anybody want something brand new in their body where they've been afflicted?

Come to the altar.

If you wanna stand in proxy for someone, I believe that we can stand in proxy for someone in our life that needs healing, come to the altar.

We're gonna pray for you.

We're gonna believe that God's gonna bring resurrection.

If you need healing in your mind, like John was talking about, anxiety, depression, just that loop of thinking that you can't get your way out of.

And you want God to give you a new mind and breakthrough, peace and wholeness.

Come to the altar.

I believe there are people who have prodigal, prodigal sons and daughters, but also there are people where your mom, your dad, your siblings are not walking with the Lord, and it feels hopeless, it feels discouraging.

God wants to breathe resurrection life.

Come to the altar.

We're just gonna have our ministry team up here and pray for you guys and believe for resurrection.

Yeah, if you need to tell somebody, hey, I gotta scooch out of the way, this is your moment.

And church, I just wanna invite you right now, because I'm not a professional Christian.

The spirit of the living God doesn't just live in me, he lives in you.

If you call yourself a born-again believer, the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead now lives in you.

And so I want to activate you.

You can extend the hand, you can come and pray over people as the Lord leads you.

Get out of your seat.

Let's be the body of Christ.

So, right now, in the name of Jesus, I speak over everybody that needs healing.

We command by the authority of Jesus Christ that all sickness, all disease, all infirmity would go now in Jesus' name.

And I command your bodies to be raised back to life.

I speak resurrection power over your physical bodies from the top of your head to the soles of your feet, would you be made brand new?

Everything that's out of alignment, come into alignment right now in Jesus' name.

And if there's anybody in this room that has cancer, or anybody that's standing in in proxy, I believe that this is a cancer-free zone in Jesus' name.

So right now, upon the authority of Jesus Christ, we rebuke you, cancer, we curse you, cancer, we evict you, cancer, we say you have no rights, you have no authority, you have no place in the body of Christ.

Your time is up.

If you need healing in your mind, just place your hands on your head.

If you need freedom in your mind and in your thoughts, just place your hand on your head right now.

In Jesus' name, I speak resurrection power and life over your mind.

I say the old is gone and the new is come.

I thank you, Jesus, for freedom.

I thank you for joy.

I thank you for peace like a mighty rushing river to come in right now in Jesus' name.

We speak to prodigals.

We thank you, God, that you are bringing the lost home.

We declare by the power of your name and the victory of the cross that today is the day of salvation.

So where we have felt hopeless and discouraged, God, you're lifting our heads.

God's saying, get ready, they're coming home.

Get ready, they're coming home.

Get your hopes up in Jesus' name.

Yeah, the Lord wants to bring breakthrough in finances where there's um hopeless financial situations.

If that's you, just come up to the altar.

There's space.

The Lord wants to bring miracles in your family, miracles in marriages and kids.

Yeah, we're just gonna have the ministry team continue to pray and let's worship and just bring before the Lord whatever that thing is that you need.

The Holy Spirit is here.

He is the God of the impossible.

So we lift our eyes, not to what we see in the natural, but we lift our eyes above the clouds.

To Jesus, King Jesus, the one that sits on the throne, the one who has all authority, all power, all dominion in heaven and on earth.

He says, Nothing is impossible for me.

Nothing is beyond my reach and my grace and my power and my provision.

And so let faith well up inside of us today.

Let's worship him.

Holy Spirit.

Holy Spirit, would you come?

Holy Spirit, would you make