Point 1The law helps us know sin
Romans 7, verses 7 through 13 says this: What then shall we say? This is the Apostle Paul. That the law is sin?
By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin.
Now don't miss that. Sometimes when we get to the end of a sentence, we kind of start to daydream. We're engaged in the first part of this, half the sentence, the second half we have a little bit of attention deficit in the world, and by the time we get to the end of the sentence we're like, that's the most important part of this sentence, in my personal opinion. I would not have known sin. So we see here that the law helps us what? Know sin.
That is what makes it, that's why its purposes are, that's what God's will is for the law when he sent it into the world. So what is this? What is the law's will and purpose? What is God's will and purpose for the law? That we might, there you go. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, "You shall not covet." But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. What produced it? The law? But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, actually it is sin, not the law, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. We can see the covenants because of the law. Anywho. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. So we see here the commandments, the way that it works with sin. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me.
So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. This is the second thing I want us to focus on today. The first thing is we've got to know sin. The law helps us to know sin. The law helps us to see sin in our members. The law helps us to realize that sin is a present-day reality. We don't look past sin. The law forces us to look at it face to face. That's what the law does. But in the midst of all of this, the way that the law works with sin to reveal sin, to almost exacerbate sin in our lives, verse 12 says, and this is in his conclusion as he answers a question that he sees or senses or feels has been presented to him, because he speaks so negatively of what the law does, right?
What it causes, what it is, our inability to live according to it in every part, the redeeming fact of Christ, because we could not be justified by the law. He speaks in kind of a negative way about that people are questioning, so it's not important at all, right? So we should abolish the law, right? So we should not think favorably about the law, right? How many of you know that's happening today? We have people that don't have a true understanding of the law.
They don't have a good understanding of what it is at all. So at the very conclusion, and this is an important one, you should underline it even in your Bible, is, so the law is what? Holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin that brought death to you. It was sin that produced death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin. I like that: in order that sin might be shown to be sin. How many of you know that there's a problem today with us calling sin, with us knowing that sin is sin? That's what the law helps us to do. It helps us to know sin.
So what do I know when we have a world that doesn't know sin, that they don't know when sin is sin? What do I do when the church doesn't know when sin is sin? What do I think? I'll tell you what I think. These are a people who don't know the law of God.
Especially if we have churches filled with people who don't and can't determine when sin is sin, what are they doing on Sunday when they crack open the Bible, when they look into and read from God's law, his gospel?
What are we, is this just, are we on Sunday just merely giving a motivational speech? What are we doing? Because if we were preaching his Word, we would know sin. We have a generation that does not only know sin, it's not only out in the world, we have a people who profess to be believers who don't know sin. This is a problem, and it's a massive one. It is a massive problem. It was sin producing death in me, though it was good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin. That's the third thing I want you to underline: "and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure." So not only can we call sin, but we see sin as sinful beyond measure. Notice here the shift between a non-believer and a believer and their relationship to the law. Notice that the relationship changes, but the law does not.
Notice, our perspective changes, but the law does not. The law has always been good, it has always been holy, it has always been without reproof, it is everything.
But its purposes are specific. What are its purposes, Shawn? That we might know sin. How do I know we have a wrong relationship, and in many churches today, many people that sit in the churches today, with the law, how do I know we have an improper relationship with the law, an improper perspective of the law? Because we don't know when sin is sin, and sin is not a big deal to us. That's a problem. Notice that last week we talked about the conflict that exists between sin and our members, right, the flesh and then our mind. He uses these two terms: the mind is renewed and the body, the flesh, is still broken. This is a believer. We landed on that. If you weren't here last week, go back and watch it, but this is Paul talking about Paul as a believer. We gave some good reasons. We talked about the three cases, we looked at those three cases, and we decided that we feel, at least I'm imposing this on you of course, that this is a believer. At least I do. All right, this is good. So let me go back. We've got to know sin. That was the first thing. That's towards the beginning of chapter 7, right? Listen: yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. That's the first thing I want to focus on. The second thing is, where is it at? I didn't know. I should have underlined it. I see you for seeing, season number two.
I don't know, I'm lost. Where's the second thing? Sin sees an opportunity. Let me go read through this.
Okay, yeah, so that sin might be shown to be sin. That was in verse 13. Wow, I should have started from the... Have you ever tried to find something and then you start from the beginning and you realize it's all the way at the end, and you always say to yourself, the next time I do this I'm starting at the end and working myself backwards to the beginning, because I always find it towards the end. So sin is sin. So the first thing is to know sin, the second thing is sin might be shown as sin, and then the third thing is that sin is sinful beyond measure. I like those. You should think through those this week. However, I'm not really talking about those, I'm just talking about the first one, which is that we should know sin. So let's start with the law. You can put in your notes, if you like points, I mean maybe you could throw a point one in here: there is law. How many of you agree that's true? There is law. It is my position that the main point of the book of Romans up to this point is that God is gloriously righteous in justifying the ungodly. You can say amen to that. He does that by faith alone. How many of you are happy that it is not by obedience in every part of the law? Because it's pretty... I'm glad that it is by faith alone, apart from works. For all you people who are looking for a way to retire in your Christian life, I want you to know that although we're not saved by works, we are created in Christ Jesus for good works.
Okay, the difference is, in the Old Testament we were working for rest, now we are working from rest. See the difference?
Our relationship with work changes because our position changes.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 11:33
That's really important. By faith alone, apart from works of the law. Romans 4:5 says this.
Look it up. Go backwards. If you're on 7, you go backwards probably two pages, and it says this: and to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.
How can this be? How can God justify, declare righteous, the ungodly, who simply looks away from themselves to Christ and trusts in him? How does God acquit people who are sinners?
How does he do that? The answer came in one of the most important statements in the Bible, Romans 3:24-26. I'm going to give you three seconds to try to turn there and then I'm going to read it. Why, you ask? Because it's good for you to read it, not just hear it. Romans 3:24-26.
God put forward Jesus Christ, his Son, to die in our place, so that he would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. What is that song? "I got faith." You better... What is that song? Is that a song where I just make it up in my head? Huh? Yeah, you gotta have faith, the faith, that you know. I like that song, but what this Scripture is saying is you don't just got to have faith, the faith, the faith, the... Because they do the, at the end, you know, it's almost like a Southern preacher: got to have faith, though, you know. So, wow, that was a tangent, right? But it's not just that we have faith, it's that we have faith in Jesus. This is key, because a lot of people believe in Jesus. They believe he was real. They do not believe he is the Savior, nor do they believe he is God.
That's the key. That's how he justifies us in spite of our iniquities. That's how he justifies us in spite of our disobedience of the law. That's how he, listen, the law is an accuser. It accuses us. It shows and reveals our failures. But Jesus justifies those who believe in him in spite of our failures.
He died. He was perfect and obeyed the law in every sense. He died, he resurrected, and his resurrection is important, because if we're buried into a death like his, what good is it to just be united in a death like his but have no resurrection? Today, in other words, because we are united in a death like his, we're resurrected in a life like his. There should be a dramatic change in someone who becomes a believer in Christ, because we are united in his death that we might be resurrected in his life. You know what his life was like? Real holy. We should begin, even from day one, to begin to see a shift in the sanctifying power, or the saving power, sanctifying us out in our lives day by day. We should see a difference.
We should see a difference. This is the high point of the book so far. Jesus, who was crucified, is the sin-bearing Redeemer. We who trust in him are
Point 2The gospel assumes God's law and will
Justified. God, who gave him, is righteous. That's the gospel of Christ. Now, there is a massive assumption underneath the gospel. The assumption is this. Underneath the entire gospel story we all have an assumption, and the assumption is this: that there is law, and there is order to everything. I mean, you agree with that. We see that everywhere. The Creator of the universe has revealed his will, and it is the law. That's his will.
So you can help yourself a lot. You could help yourself a lot, you could save a lot of time on your knees. I'm not saying you shouldn't pray, I'm not saying that, but you can save yourself a lot of time, because some of you spend all your time praying to the Lord, asking for his will, and I'm pretty sure if we could hear him crack open the heavens and audibly speak down to us, and the room, you know, rattle from his thunderous voice, we would hear: "The law is my will for you." You can help yourself a lot.
The reason why we're constantly praying and beseeching him for another will is we don't like the will that he has. "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." What is that? The law. You know what's happening in heaven? His will is pure. That up there is holy. It is perfect. It is without spot or wrinkle. It is righteous and it is good, and when people live, they live according to his will, which is the law.
You know what happens down here? We're lawless.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 18:01
That's not his will for mankind. It's not. And so we need to understand this.
Now, so every time we think of the gospel, every time we hear the gospel, the assumption is there is law. The Creator of the universe has revealed his will, and it's law. When the law is not obeyed, there is, write this down, I think this is, I mean, there's more than these three things, but I'm giving you some stuff to think through. When the law is not obeyed, there's guilt, there's real condemnation, and there's real punishment when the law is not obeyed. So the existence of the law in the universe, the revealed will of God, creates the foundation for law breaking and guilt, law keeping and righteousness, court and judge, justification and condemnation. All of these great things rest on this one assumption as we crack open the gospel and we read from its pages: there is law, and it's God's will. So when Paul proclaims that there are lawbreakers, how many of you could agree that's you, that there are lawbreakers, there's guilt, there is a court, there is a judge, there is a guilt-bearing substitute, there is faith, there is justification by faith alone apart from law keeping, when Paul proclaims all of these things, the assumption in all of our minds, without giving it much credence or much thought or much evaluation or much meditation, is that this is all because of the law. In all, the law is there.
We assume the law. We don't focus on the law all the time, but we know it's there. We know that it is a foundation for everything that happens in the gospel.
No law, no lawbreaking. So we see lawbreaking because we know there's a law. No lawbreaking, no guilt.
No guilt, no court. No court, no judge. No judge, no justification, and no need for incarnation or crucifixion.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 20:52
So all this that happens in the gospel story all happens because of God's will, the law.
The whole reality and the whole glory of redemption hang on the existence and the excellence of the law. Let's look for a second, just with me, you're not going to be able to turn to them, but I gave you a slide. Paul speaks shockingly, from Romans 1 till here and the remainder of Romans, in case you're wondering, but I'm just going to do till here, of the law. Now you need to understand the context in which he speaks, and the context everywhere of where he spoke, there is this idea about the law that shifts when Christ dies and is resurrected. It is not that God's will changes, because he is the same yesterday, today, and forever, right?
It is not that his will changes or the law changes, it is that our relationship with it changes through Christ, through faith, through belief.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 22:14
So now he is speaking, much of the time he is speaking to people who, listen, they have a general affection for the law. Let's talk about the Jews. Can we just talk about this? You need to understand the dynamic of what he's speaking into. See, because God gave the law to the Jewish nation, they have an overall appreciation for the law. As a matter of fact, some might even, if they picked you up against another Jew and you looked at the lifestyle, they might think that you as a Christian do not love the law as much as a Jew. All right, that's important. So now he's speaking into this kind of a situation. He's speaking to this type of people, and they are, in some sense, if you will, appreciators, lovers of the law. That's the way it seems. So when Paul begins to talk about these things in the Scriptures I'm about to mention, you need to understand this would create massive offense in the hearts of the men listening. They would say, this is heretical. How dare you come against the law?
How dare you, in any of your language, to even tiptoe and to speak of it in negative terms, would be the greatest offense to men, specifically Jews.
So the reason I stress this is to throw into stark relief the fact that Paul says many negative things about the law. It's amazing. It should, in some ways, it should make us tremble. To speak the way Paul speaks about the law of God is shocking. Listen to this. You have them up here. Romans 3:20. Good. They did, there we...
Actually, we do. I forgot them downstairs. Curtis and the team had to run around and figure that out, and there were passwords and stuff, and so can we just thank them for dealing with me? Yeah, praise the Lord. Okay, some examples. Romans 3:20. Here's some things he says about the law. By the works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight. Jews would have flipped out with this. I just would have flipped the lid. What are you saying? God gave us the law.
It's Paul. How can you go from saying you'll never be justified by the law but it's good, righteous, and holy? Huh? What?
For through the law comes the knowledge of sin. Romans 3:21: But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been manifested.
Romans 3:28: We maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law. Man, that makes me want to just sing in a falsetto voice, really high, for no apparent reason. Just, I don't know why. It's good stuff. Romans 4:13-14, the promise to Abraham, I'm not going to read it all: was not through the law but through the righteousness of faith. For if it is those who are of the law who are to be heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. Romans 5:20: Now the law came in to increase the trespass.
That's just crazy talk right there. Romans 6:14: For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace. This would have been foreign, specifically to a Jew. It gets worse. I put that on there, it's not in the Scripture, but I said it gets worse.
And I dotted myself since I doubted the verse just above. Romans 7:4: Therefore, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead. In other words, and we say it with trembling care, the law bars us from marrying Christ.
That's what Pastor J.R. Preached about a few weeks ago. Are you with me today? Only death to the law can free us from the law to belong to Christ. There's more. Romans 7:5: For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. Romans 7:6: But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code. The law hinders life in the Spirit. You must be released from it, and the continuation of that is so that you may serve in the newness of the Spirit. This is amazing coming from the mouth of a man, specifically a man that calls himself a Pharisee of Pharisees, a lover of the law and every jot and tittle of the word. It's just strange.
You need to get it in the context in which he speaks it. This is strange talk coming from a man like Paul. It's strange.
It doesn't make sense, and for many of them, see, his position has changed from who he was to who he is. How many of you can testify to a change in position?
That means, then, his perspective on the law has changed. His relationship to the law has changed. And this would be strange to people that he once used to rally against those who had the same opinion. I lay it out here before you so that you will feel the urgency of the question that begins the text this morning, Romans 7:7: What shall we say then? Is the law sin?
Let me give you a couple verses. Psalm 119:97. This is some Old Testament saints. This was their perspective of the law, right? Because we talked about the New Testament and our perspective of the law and what it should be, but let's look at the Old Testament and their perspective. Let's hear from the voices of Old Testament saints. Psalm 119:97: Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day. Or Psalm 1:2: His delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. So hear the words of Paul. It would have landed on the listener as utterly obscene, confusing, and bordering sacrilege. It would have been offensive, especially for those who had studied the Torah. This would have been offensive. It would have been a strange thing for Paul to say. So the question I asked, because I ask a lot of questions when I'm studying: does any of this matter to Paul? People's feelings, what he's sharing, our perspective of the law, does any of it matter?
I believe this. I believe it matters to him what you think about the law, not just what they thought about the law, and it matters to him what you do with the law. It really matters. It matters immensely.
Point 3The law is holy, righteous, and good
You can write this down. I'm going to talk about two things real quick about the law, two things real quick, and then we're out of here. I'm going to be on time today, and it's going to be a miracle. Holy, righteous, and good. That's what the law, that's what in this Scripture we read today, that's what it called the law. You should go underline them. That's what the law is. That's not what the law was, that's what the law is. Even with our relationship to the law changing through Christ, the law is still holy, righteous, and good. It was holy, righteous, and good, and it is holy, righteous, and good. Why is it the same? Because God is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and it's his will. It's his will. It's his ultimate will. How many of you know that when we go to heaven we get a new body? We've been redeemed, okay, and we get a new body, and there will be no what? Just throw out some stuff. There will be no sickness, tears, what? What was that? Strife. What was that? Pain. Amen. Oh, preach it. No kidney stones.
Oh hallelujah, right? No kidney stones. What else? What is it? Condemnation. What else? Gender. What else? What else?
Sin. Yes, that's good. Yeah, that's true. That's good. Good job. So, you know, that's God's will, that's the law, that none of that will be present. It's still his will, and he'll get what he wants in the end. And although sin has come in and worked counter or against the law, one day he will purify completely man and remove anything that is a perpetrator against the thing he desires, and he will create a place that is fully righteous, fully holy, and fully good. That's his will. So Jesus doesn't abolish that.
He makes it possible for God's will to come to fruition in eternity. And although you are currently wrapped in the flesh and there are still broken parts of you, because of Jesus' death and resurrection and him obeying the law in every part, God will get what he wants in the end. He'll get it: holy, righteous, and good. His answer is given immediately, Romans 7: What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Answer: Nope. By no means! Or, may it never be so.
The law is not sin. Romans 7:12, he puts it positively: So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. Be sure you see the force of what he's saying. Not only is it not sin, and not only is it holy, and not only is it righteous, or just, but it is also good. No one's good but God. And his will, it's good. And that's the next level, because how many of you know that people can do the right thing but have the wrong heart?
So it takes it to the next level. Not only is the law right there that we might obey the law, but the heart of the reason behind the law is actually good. Its intention is good. I mean, I can do things my wife asked me to do, but I can do it with a begrudging spirit, not even rolling my eyes, and, listen, the thing I do is no longer good because of the heart that corrupts it. So in other words, Paul is really just going crazy here. He's saying the heart of the law is good. That's why we have a massive problem, we have a massive problem when today we have people wanting to unhitch themselves from the law.
In other words, so you're saying, I know our relationship changes, I don't have to talk about that, you want to unhitch yourself from God? Is that what you're saying? Are you with me today? It's a problem. Notice here in the Scripture we talked about last week, 14 through 25, we have here Paul saying that he sees the law as good. A non-believer doesn't see the law as good. He sees it as good. What? His relationship has changed with it. Okay, there's another place, Romans 5:7 says this: For one will scarcely die for a righteous person, though perhaps for a good person someone would dare even to die. No one will die for, one will scarcely, will hardly, maybe, but hardly maybe, but probably not, but maybe would die for a righteous man. That's what it says. Maybe, with a punctuation. Though perhaps for a good man someone would dare even to die.
It's speaking to the heart of goodness. Justice or righteousness seems to focus on what is legal and right to do. Goodness seems to focus on what is helpful and caring to do. I'm going to say it again.
Righteousness seems to focus on what is legal and right to do. Goodness seems to focus on what is helpful and caring to do.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 37:10
Do you see how he takes the law from being righteous to the next level? They aren't in conflict with each other, but they are two ways of seeing and acting, each appropriate in its own way. Why does this matter? So when Paul says the law is holy and righteous and good, he means that the law is not only a rigorous standard of what is right and just, but it is also helpful.
The law expresses care as well as correctness.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 38:01
The law expresses care as well as correctness. So let's listen to Paul's defense of the law as holy, righteous, and good, Romans 7. I'm just trying to get us back there. We're going to read this a couple times. On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. How many of you know the danger of not knowing sin? So the law is good, then, isn't it? Are you with me today? I am so grateful that when I sin, I know that it's sin, and that's good. How many of you know that sin will take you further than you ever wanted to go, and to darker places than you ever wanted to trod, and it will destroy your life? How many of you know that? I don't know why I'm going with meth, let's just go with that one. Meth may seem good to a man, but in time we realize that it destroys a man on another level than other drugs.
Why? Because
Sin kills. Sin kills. You know why? Sin will find you out.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 39:21
You know why? Your sins, you'll be found out for your sins. You know why? Because it kills. And the cancer that was within, that no one sees, one day will become the cancer that kills you from without. It kills, it'll find you out, because it kills, because it destroys, because it changes the very way you look.
Sin does not just change your inside, it changes and affects your outside.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 39:56
Go look at people who've been drinking for ten years and then people who've been doing drugs for ten years, and different types of drugs, and look at what they look like now, and then get those pictures of what they looked like ten years ago and now, and once they're saved, look. Just look. Because what's on the inside, you think is hidden, will one day affect every part of you, including the outside. It kills. So I'm thankful. So Romans 7: On the contrary, I would not have come to know sin except through the law. For I would not have known about coveting, and coveting, knowing about coveting, affects how I live.
So let's go to knowing sin. I'm going to do this real quick. Paul says in Romans 7:7, I would not have come to know sin. Why is this an argument to talk about the goodness of the law, and how does this help us? I'll answer it this way: there is a great sadness that
Point 4Not knowing sin leads to destruction
Comes from not being saddened by knowing our sin. Let me give you some examples, and you can fill them in on your own time, because I'm going to try to be on time today. Here are some results of not knowing sin. I'm going to give you three, and I want you to go home and make more. Marriages dissolve for those who do not know their sin. You're like, what do you mean, Shawn? Well, affairs. Well, anger. Well, outbursts of rage.
Well, selfishness. Well, putting yourself above others. Well, pride.
Well, lovers of money. Are you with me today? And if you don't know it, guess what? You do the behavior. It remains in the marriage.
If you don't know sin, then why would you want to stop sin? Because we know sin, because we know sin kills, we don't want to continue in sin. Should we continue in sin that grace may abound? No. Sin kills. If you don't know sin, men and women too, but I just want to pick on men sometimes, I'm scared of women, but I can pick on men, and this is a massive problem, and some of you asked why I've dropped this bomb every once in a while. It's because it's a massive problem. You just go do some research on this, for men in the church who wrestle and struggle with the addiction of pornography. I mean, if you don't know that's sin, that's going to hurt your marriage. It's going to hurt your marriage.
You're like, oh no, that don't affect me. Yeah, it does. It affects you, it affects your marriage, it affects how you relate to your wife, it affects you, it affects you guys, it affects you. It affects you. People move more and more towards self-destruction when they don't know sin is taking them there. There is an eternal loss that comes by way of not knowing our sin. Eternally we burn in hell when we don't know sin.
If there's any hope and any faith and any joy and any peace and any love, it will come by way of knowing sin.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 43:35
If there's going to be any love, any hope, any joy, any peace, it will come by way of knowing sin. We must know today what sin is. We must call sin, and sin must be an offense to us. We must be pulled by it must be disgusting to us, or else we won't know love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, and self-control. We won't know it. And do you know one of the clearest evidences of sin in this room right now?
Some of you have just interpreted what I said to mean we should experiment with sin so we can know it. I mean, you would never say that in a small group, but you thought it. Some of you thought it. Now you're scared, he's looking over here at me. I'm not, I'm looking at the empty spaces because I get nervous. I'm introverted. I make eye contact, I'm like, oh no, I'm going to burn and fall into a pit of ash.
You know the clearest evidence of this is that some of us have translated "no" we should know sin as experimenting with sin. In other words, some people are going, well, the pastor just said try sin and see if you can get to know it better, so I'm going to do it. Some people live like that.
So I know that's how you think. You're like, I don't think like that. Then why do you live like that? Because your life is born out of your thinking.
If you think wrong, you do wrong.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 45:15
They're connected. That's why his number one goal is to renew your mind and a renewed mind. See sin as sin. So you can stand up all day long, you can be baptized, you can give your testimony, you can profess to be a Christian, but if you continue on in sin, not caring, not seeing it as sin, not being appalled by sin, you need to question whether you're saved. Are you with me today? That's what 1 John says, that's what Romans says, that's what it says. Sin is powerful.
No, you don't need to experiment with a particular sin in order to know the power of sin in your life. We have this, so I'm, listen to this, we have this idea that if I'm going to be able to, let me say it this way. We got in a conversation yesterday in a small group about this, and I think this is important to mention, right? There are people in the church, I think I'm going to go about it this way, there are people in the church that think that because they didn't go to prison or stab somebody or shoot somebody or do a drive-by or do drugs or be addicted to drugs for years or be in a motorcycle gang, or I mean, not all gangs are bad, there's some good gangs, but then there's some really bad, like basically like the mafia or mob gangs, you know what I'm talking about, right? And all of this, like, I didn't do all of that, so I don't really have a testimony. Oh yeah? Jesus didn't do that. That's what we were talking about yesterday in a meeting, and somehow or another today we think we got to be bedfellows with sin for a long period of time, and actually the most despicable sin, because in that very whole idea it lets us know that we don't even understand sin, because it's all despicable, that we have to be bedfellows with the greatest sin to actually have a testimony. Let me ask you a question: is the testimony you, or is the testimony Christ? Because you had sin, he had none. Who are you testifying about? I don't care about you living in sin for ten years. I could care less. I could care less. I could care less.
Who I care about is the one who didn't sin, who died and resurrected, that if I would be united to him, no matter how much I sinned, I'm made new.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 47:40
That's who I want to know about. You know, too many of us are trying to tell people about our past sinful life, and the reality is you tell on yourself that you love sin more than you love Christ, and you celebrate it, and we glorify it. We glorify it because we talk about it all the time.
We give it more power than it should have. God is more powerful than our sin.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 48:07
You should know sin, but you should not be bedfellows with it.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 48:19
Some will say, well, you have to experience something to know it, so I best be experiencing some more sin so I can know it. They will not say you don't have to experience something to know it. No one says that. No one goes, well, for you to really be able to understand what I went through, you will have to go through it, so you really can't help me. Yes, I can. Yes, I can. I don't have to. This is a true story. I don't have to be in a drug deal, the drug deal goes sideways, and get my bulldog to eat somebody's face to protect myself, and I don't have to do that to then be qualified to speak to somebody who lived that kind of life. I don't have to be quiet. I don't have to do that to bring hope in their life, because Jesus Christ goes into the prisons, it goes into the churches. Are you with me?
We need Jesus to be preached to the churches as much as the prisons, because there are just as many people inside the church claiming to be Christians who are in bondage to sin than in the prisons.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 49:10
Are you with me?
And so we want, we're always trying to figure out how to be qualified to have a relevant voice, to be worthwhile, to do all of that. You don't have to be participants to understand and know sin, because Jesus knows sin better than all y'all. Let me give you an
Point 5Those who resist sin's pull know it best
Example. Let me give you a parable and I'll close. Let me give you a parable, let me give you a story. Let's say there are three guys and they're standing on the edge of this well or pit or huge, dark, endless hole, and wrapped around their waist is a rope, around all three men, and the rope is thrown off into the pit, a stone in the pit. Some of you might have heard this story. It's a good one, though.
And this rope is, let's just say, a 100-pound, 150, 200-pound test, meaning this: at 200 pounds it snaps and you're released. But it has to work up to moving over 200 pounds for it to break the rope. How many of you know that went fishing? There are different tests of line. You have two-pound test, it means you're probably not going to catch something over two pounds, because once it goes over two pounds it'll pop the line. That's how strong it is. So we have a 200-pound-test rope, and it's dangling off into the pit, and slowly, one by one, the tension on the rope of the man to my right begins to pull on him. We can't see what's pulling, we just know it's dark and it's down there.
Something dark and something down there begins to pull the rope of the man. It is wrapped around his waist or chest or somewhere around there, and begins to pull. He digs his heels in and begins to resist, and the pressure of the pull, the pressure of the pull begins to increase: 10 pounds, 20 pounds, 30 pounds, 40 pounds, and the man feels the tension of the rope begin to crush his stomach, begin to just rub in and burn his skin, and he just gives up and he jumps in. Men who watch pornography, in other words, the pressure of the temptation is too great and we just jump in. Click. And we look at that image. It's a good example. Then the second man. The second man's there, he has the rope around his waist.
He begins to feel the pressure of the rope being pulled down into this deep, dark pit, and the pressure begins to increase around the second man, and 10 pounds and 20 pounds and 30 pounds and 50 pounds and 60 pounds, and he's beginning to be crushed, and he's bleeding a little bit where the rope is digging in, and he's pulling and resisting the pull, and he's resisting it more, 100 pounds, 110 pounds, and it becomes too great. He feels his ribs are about to crack under the pressure, and he just jumps in. Men, click. And we look at that video. Are you with me? Then the third man. The third man.
The third man is there, and the pressure begins to mount on the rope. Now he's seen two other men jump. He's seen the weight of the pull. How many of you have ever felt the pull? And so he digs in his heels, and 10 pounds and 30 pounds and 40 pounds, he begins to feel the rope cinch around his belly, chest, and he's bleeding, 70 pounds, 100 pounds, 110 pounds, 120 pounds, a rib cracks, and he digs in all the more. 150 pounds, 170 pounds, 180 pounds, and he can't breathe and he doesn't know if he's going to make it, and 200 pounds, 210 pounds, snap. The line breaks, and he falls backwards, and he makes it. He doesn't click. He doesn't fall to the pressure of the pull. Who do you think understands and knows the pull greater?
Is it the first man, who only experienced 40 pounds of pressure, 40 pounds of the pull? Is it the second man, who made it all the way up to 110 pounds? Does he know the pressure of the pull and the pull of sin? Or is it the third man, who felt the pressure, who experienced the pull, who knew it in every part and did not click, who did not do that thing, who did not submit to the pull? Are you with me? Which one of these three men knows sin the best?
It's important that you know sin, but when I say that, it's not that you should go do it more that you might have a better relationship, but to know sin is to be empowered to say no to its pull. How do we do that? Christ died and he sent his Helper.
What is that game where you stand on opposite ends and you pull against each other? Tug of war. Some of us have been playing tug of war but without a Helper, and Christ sends a Helper who helps us resist the temptation, resist the pull of sin. And let me tell you, the person who doesn't sin, who doesn't fall prey to the temptation, who doesn't fall prey to the pressure and jump in, that person knows sin greater than the one who jumped. So today, men, we're talking about men, I used one example, I talked about men, talked about men. Maybe when you reach out to somebody in the fellowship, maybe the person you should reach out to is the one who knows sin most, not the one who knows it little.
Maybe the one you should reach out to is the one who knows sin most, not the one who knew it in part.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 56:25
See, we've got it wrong. See, we think knowing sin is doing a lot of sin, and we go to people who can relate to us, who've done the same sin we've done, but they only know sin in part, they only know sin's pull in part, but the one who said no, that's the person we should talk to, because they don't just know sin in part, they don't just know sin's pull in part, they know it in every part, they know it in fullness.
They know it in fullness. I'll close with this statement.
And all of this is kind of an introduction for next week, in the conclusion of this section: those who know God's law is good tend to be those who know sin best.
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