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We have assembled here tonight as people who really like to study. I am going to try to make some comments for you on Romans, Chapter 5. I am going to give you the whole chapter as the Lord leads me. We will see what he gives us in Romans, Chapter 5 starting with Verse 1 and 2. THEREFORE being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Verse 1 says we are justified by faith. Now brethren, Paul is not saying that we are justified by the faith of our humanitya, because I can say in my humanity that I have faith for something to appear and it does not appear. It must be the faith of the Son of God that justifies us, even the glorified resurrected life of the Lord Jesus Christ. Rev. Omar mentioned this morning the incorruptible seed. That glorified resurrected life is now pouring out of heaven, and when he lands on your heart and plants himself there, he becomes that incorruptible seed that a shoot will go forth from the power of the joined ground, which is your soul.
It is not by your faith, but it is by the faith of the Son of God which is now, Lord willing, dwelling in you. We are justified by faith. Now what is justification? Justification means to be made just, to be justified, to be made righteous in the eyes of God. Brethren, this is a righteousness that is of faith. At this point, at this time, it is not a realty. We know that we are not righteous because we can look at our hearts, and we can look at our life. We know that we are not righteous. But because the first one to be raised from the dead is dwelling in us, our whole ground is sanctified; the ground of our soul, and the ground of our body. Do you understand what I just said? We are sanctified by the presence of the firstfruit. As he comes to dwell with us, and reproduce his life in us, that incorruptible seed begins to grow and expands, and fills all of our earth into this great tree. While that is happening, God looks upon us and He says I will not impute sin unto you, but I will impute righteousness unto you, and I will hold back the wrath of God from you so that any mistake that you make, I will use it to teach you a lesson, and bring you into repentance, so that the potential in you to commit that sin will be rooted out of you.
This is justification. Glory to God. The very life of Christ is dwelling in your soul, the Old Testament type that we have of this. Do you know that the Old Testament is a type and a shadow of spiritual principles, so that we can understand? The type of it is the blood of the lamb being placed on the door of the Hebrew houses so that the angel of death would pass over. Brethren, when the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ is put on the door of your humanity, the angel of death shall pass over you. When we are justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ. As the Scripture says, before we came into this condition, we were the enemies of God. The Scripture says that we were alienated from God in our mind, by the way we think. The carnality of our mind made us God’s enemy. Our thoughts are negative and God’s thoughts are positive, because the flesh lusteth against the thoughts of the Spirit, and the one opposeth the other.
There is only one way to have peace with God, brethren, and that is through the destruction of the enemy. God makes peace by bringing His enemies into subjection. When our mind was at enmity with Him, He has made peace with us by bringing our carnal mind into subjection to the righteousness which is in Christ. Brethren, before you knew the Lord, you did not know sin. How would you know sin unless the Lord be imparted to you? When the written law was imparted to natural Israel, the whole world, we are told, was convicted of the obvious sins of behavior; behavioral sin. Thou shalt not murder. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not covet. Brethren, I declare unto you, the moment that the law of the resurrected Christ engrafts to your soul, and the mind of Christ begins to be formed in you, you shall begin to be convicted of the hidden sins of your heart. The old covenant was physical and the new covenant is spiritual.
The hidden sins of your heart. If you hate your brother, you are guilty of murder says the Lord. The new covenant of justification reveals the sins which are in your carnal mind, not unto condemnation. Brethren, with the blood there is no more condemnation in Christ Jesus, but it is unto your correction and unto your deliverance, out from under the bondage of this sin which produces death in your life. Referring to Verse 1 of Romans, Chapter 5. Therefore being justified, not by our faith, but by the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is his glorified Spirit in us, we have the peace of God because He has subjected our carnal mind unto His righteousness, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Verse 2. By whom also we have access by faith unto this grace, wherein we stand, and rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. What does that mean, the hope of the glory of God? Brethren, the hope is that the end result of this good work that he has shined in you, Christ in you, the hope of glory, the full maturity of his mind, unto the fullness of the stature of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Christ in you, the hope of glory. What we have now is the earnest of our inheritance. If you look up that Greek word translated earnest in Strong’s Concordance, it means down payment. When you buy a house, you put down a down payment, and the balance you pay out with a mortgage. What we have from God so far is just a taste, just a pinch of the glory of the age to come. It is your down payment. The Lord Jesus Christ has put a down payment on you. You have been bought with a price, brethren. His precious blood has bought you, and you are justified, and he desires to be birth in you. He has made a down payment on you. You are his property and he will possess you in the fullness. Christ in you, the hope of glory, not a tradition where you are imperfect and filled with sin, but have access to the delivering power of God, where His life in you is unto righteousness. His life in you will give you the ability and the power to flee from death and enter into life. It will swallow up the death of your carnal mind, so as not to live in a world with trouble, after trouble, after trouble.
Thank God for deliverance, but brethren, this is just the down payment. God has better things for us. As He permits, brethren, we must go on to perfection. Romans 5, verses 3, 4 and 5. And not only so, but we glory in tribulation also; knowing that tribulation worketh patience; And patience, experience; and experience, hope: And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us. I am just going to spend a minute on those few verses. What they are saying is the purpose that the Holy Ghost is given to us, and given to us in a manner that the Scripture describes as being shed abroad in our hearts, meaning sprinkled and spread over us, is that we are fallen. In Adam, we all die, but in Christ Jesus, all shall be made alive. The beginning of the process which will make us alive is the shed blood of the Holy Ghost in our hearts. Another name for it, we are told in another place, is the earnest of our inheritance. It is the mark upon our hearts.
Have you heard of the mark of the beast? Do not worry about the mark of the beast, brethren. Get the mark of God. Where? Get it on the inside of your mind. Get the mind of Christ that will operate your hand. Satan will see it. There will be so much of Christ in you, coming through you, into you, out of you, and upon you, that there will be no place found in you for the mark of the beast. Do not live in fear, but live in faith in God, in His righteousness in you, and through you, to such a measure that no such mark of the beast thing could cling unto you. I want to show you the mark of God in this Scripture. Ezekiel 9:3, 4; And the glory of the God of Israel was gone up from the cherub, whereupon he was, to the threshold of the house. And he called to the man clothed with linen, which had the writer’s inkhorn by his side; And the Lord said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof; in the midst of Jerusalem.
Verse 5; And to the others he said in mine hearing, Go ye after him through the city, and smite: let not your eye spare, neither have ye pity. Go through the city and smite. Verse 6; Slay utterly old and young, both maids, and little children, and women: but come not near any man upon whom is the mark; (of God) and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began at the ancient men which were before the house. You never heard of that before. Brethren, do not worry about the mark of the beast, but petition the Lord that the mark of God should appear on you. When you are sealed with the mark of God, the mark of the beast shall not cleave unto you. I would like to read you Verse 11. Let me point out to you that this marking is upon the faithful Israel, and it also typifies the church. The mark of God is being sealed on the foreheads of the faithful in the church. The angel of death passes over this whole world, brethren. You are going to have to have the seal of God in your forehead in order to survive.
Ezekiel, Chapter 9, clearly tells us that there is sin in the church in their mind. Verse 6 says slay utterly everyone that does not have the mark of the inkhorn on their forehead or their hand, but slay not any man that has the mark, and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began at the ancient men which were before the house. Brethren, that does not mean physically or chronologically old men. This Scripture is speaking about the elders of the church. Brethren, it is the hour for us to enter into righteousness. The mind of God, the righteousness of God, the integrity of God, will prevent you from receiving the mark of the beast, which is unrighteousness, immorality, unfaithfulness, and everything that is not of the life of God. Verse 7; And he said unto them, Defile the house, and fill the courts with the slain: go ye forth. And they went forth, and slew in the city. Verse 8; And it came to pass, while they were slaying them, and I was left, that I fell upon my face, and cried, and said, Ah Lord God! Wilt thou destroy all the residue of Israel in thy pouring out of thy fury upon Jerusalem?
Verse 9; Then said he unto me, The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceeding great, and the land is full of blood, and the city full of perverseness; for they say, or the unfaithful in the church say, The Lord hath forsaken the earth, and the Lord seeth not. Verse 10; And as for me also, mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity, but I will recompense their way, their evil way in my church if they do not repent, upon their head. Verse 11; And, behold, the man clothed with linen, which had the inkhorn by his side, reported the matter, saying, I have done as thou hast commanded me. There is judgment coming. Everybody knows that judgment is coming, but it is coming on the church as well as the world, and it is coming on the church first. God has His faithful in the church that have the mark of God. God has another thing, and both are in the church, that we are told in another chapter in the book of Ezekiel, that they have all kinds of abominations like pagan worship and every other evil work.
God said to the prophet, look at what they do. It is time for us to grow up, brethren. The hour of God’s winking at our sin is coming to a close. He expects us to begin to try to live righteously, and walk faithfully according to the commandments of God. His instructions to us are how we are to relate, not only to God, but to each other. Romans 5:6; For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. Verse 7; For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. Verse 8; But God commended his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. You see, God is not saying to us, I will not love you until you love me. He is not saying to love him. I will not forgive you until you come to a right attitude with Me. God is saying, no matter what sin you are in, I love you, and I will give you the earnest of my Spirit. I shed the Holy Ghost abroad in your hearts, therefore let men everywhere repent, and start to do righteousness.
Now I do not want you to misunderstand me. These judgments are not falling upon us because of our weakness because even though we try to be righteous, we fail. These judgments are falling upon members of the church who do not even try, who think that they can do anything they want with no fear of God. Do not let me frighten you. I am not here to frighten you, but there is an element in the church that has no fear of God. They do whatever they choose to do, and because the judgment does not fall quickly, they think that there is no judgment, but they think wrongly, brethren. They think wrongly, because the angel of death will surely come. Only those who fear with the true Spirit of God, even though they are not perfect, they are doing the best they can. I am not here to frighten you, but you must know the truth. The truth will set you free. Salvation is not automatic. Even if you have the Holy Ghost, you cannot willfully sin, because if you willfully sin, there is no more sacrifice that can cleanse.
Verse 9, Romans, Chapter 5. Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. Justification before God saves us from wrath. Brethren, the wrath of God lies upon this whole creation. That is Paul’s way of saying the angel’s wrath is about to pass over this whole world, and all the believers have the blood of Christ painted on their door. Another way of saying that is that incorruptible seed we talked about this morning, is being engrafted, and painted on your wall, and you shall be saved from the wrath of God, which is being executed by the angel of death. This is a spiritual power which will not continue forever. You come to church once or twice a week. You sing and dance, and listen to a visiting evangelist. You go home, you pray with your children, eat, drink, but it is not going to go on like this forever, brethren. One day you will open your eyes and the wrath of God will be visible. It is already visible, but we adjust and live with it, and abide in it, but it will not continue forever.
Only those who have been justified by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, only those who have the mark of God, which is stopping the mark of the beast from appearing in them, will survive. You cannot have two marks. It has to be either the mark of God or the mark of the beast. We have to choose God, and also have the blood of Jesus to be saved and delivered from the wrath of God, which is destroying this world. Those who are not spiritually wise, those who are carnal, they will not understand the earthquakes, the hurricanes, and they will go along with the times, and they cannot see what it means. The message is everywhere, but they do not believe it. For those of us who are justified, by the blood of Jesus, whose very life is engrafted to our soul, growing like a shoot out of a dry ground, we will escape the wrath because of his blood. Repent! While we are repenting, we are reconciled to God, by the death of his Son. Much more we recognize we shall be saved by his life.
Verse 10. For if, when we were enemies. We just spoke about that, that we were the enemies of the Lord through the way that we thought, but we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son. How are we reconciled to God by his death? What does his death without his resurrection do for anybody? Yet, the Scripture says because of his death we were reconciled unto him. Let me try to explain it to you. Jesus the Christ was crucified. He was raised from the dead and he ascended back up into the heavenlies. At this hour he is pouring out of his Spirit upon all of our flesh, and the Holy Ghost is shed abroad in our hearts. Because the Holy Ghost is shed abroad in our hearts, we are reconciled unto him. We are brought back into relationship with him. After we are brought back into relationship with him, by that seed being engrafted in our hearts, then we are justified, and we are saved from wrath. Then another thing is going to happen to us. Our soul will be saved. Three different processes, three different aspects of a total foundation of the whole man.
His death, which made the Holy Ghost available to you has reconciled us unto him. The engrafting of the seed, which is likened to the painting of the ram’s blood on the doors of the house of Israel has justified you in his sight. The growing up of that engrafted word, the formation of Christ in you, unto the fullness of the stature of the Lord Jesus Christ, shall save your soul. It is a process. Do not sit down and think there is nothing for you to do. There is a process. Serve God, brethren. There is a fear that is a reverence towards God, but not a fear that makes you afraid. Reverence God, honor His laws, and do the best you can to live by them. He does not expect more from you than you can do, but do not be deceived. There is a God in heaven, and every sin shall have its just recompense. Verse 11. And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement.
What is the atonement? Is it red human blood that poured on the ground in Calvary? I want to suggest to you, brethren, that it is not. It is the spiritual blood, not the red blood, not the human blood, but the blood of his spiritual life, which the Father raised from the dead, the life of our Lord in his resurrected condition. That blood when it engrafts to your souls, and you are justified unto God, it becomes your personal measure of the atonement; attached to you; purifying you; warring in you; that is increasing in you; working miracles in you; guiding you; directing you; saving you; resurrecting you. It must be inside of you. It can be revealed outside of you, but it has to wind up inside of you because Jesus said, behold, the kingdom of God, it is within you. Glory to God.
Verse 12. Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. As I said earlier, in Adam we all die. What does that mean? Another Scripture that supports this is Levi paid tithes while he was still in Abraham’s loins. That means that our God is so bright that He looks at a man’s loins and He sees all of the future children, not only for you in this lifetime, but for your sons, and for your grandsons. He can look ten generations into the future. He can look at you and call one of your offspring by name. That is amazing. That is our God. When Adam died, every one of his descendants died while they were still in his loins, some thousands of years of many generations forward. Because Adam died, all of his descendants will be born dead until such time as God’s provision for resurrection will be made available to mankind.
What happened when Adam died? Do you know that Scripture where God is speaking to Adam, and He said, if you eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall surely die. That Hebrew word translated die does not mean to cease to exist. If you have a Strong’s Concordance, you will find out that that Hebrew word means to become mortal. God never told Adam that if he ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that he would cease to exist. He told him that he would die to his immortality. Adam, when God first formed him, was immortal. He would have lived forever, but he had in him a potential for death. We have not sinned in the similitude of Adam. He was not in the same condition that we are in. We in this hour are in a condition where our very nature is dead. Adam was not in this condition. His nature was righteousness, but he had a potential to sin, which was under the authoritative control of that righteousness.
God said to him, hold on to your authority, because if that sin gets out from under your authority, and you obey the whisper of that sin instead of my commandment unto you, you shall die to your immortality, and you shall become a mortal man. The rest is history. Adam did exactly what God told him not to do. He yielded. Eve, the woman, heard the voice of the Serpent. She ate of the tree and they died to their immortality, and all of us died when he died. Ever since that event, known as the Fall, every human being born is born dead. How can I explain this to you? Because death is to be carnally minded. To put it another way, to be mortal is to have a carnal mind. You can say Adam became mortal, and his mortality is evident in the condition of his mind, which is carnal. Jesus of Nazareth had a mind which was righteous. It was glorious because he had the glory of the Father, and he was alive. Because he was alive, he said no man can take my life.
Verse 12. Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world. We are told that the woman was deceived, but the man was not deceived. What the Scripture is saying is that by the sin of one man, sin entered into the whole world. The man was not deceived. Because of sin came death, the death which is in the mind, which is carnal. So death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. We know all men have sinned. According to the Scripture we should all be dead. The scriptural definition of death does not mean nonexistence. It means mortality. Do you know what I am talking about? The Lord wants to give us back immortality. When Jesus said to you, I want to give you life, he is speaking about the regeneration. When Jesus speaks about the resurrection, he is speaking about the conversion from a condition of mortality to a condition of immortality. The condition of mortality that we are in, is an inherited condition. We have inherited it. We are born with a mind that is in a condition of death.
Because of that, all men have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. It is because Adam, our ancestor, sinned and the sins of the father shall be visited upon the children unto the third and fourth generation until, until, until. There is a promise in the Old Testament that says, in that day the parent, or the father, shall eat sour grapes, but the children shall not drink. What that means is that the day is coming that the sins of the father shall no longer be passed upon the children. How could this be? In Christ, brethren, the curse is broken. Verse 13. For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law. I touched on this earlier, so I will not take any time on it. I will just remind you of what I said. The Ten Commandments, the law that was given to Israel, revealed behavioral sins. The law which is in Christ, the law of the Spirit unto life, which is in the engrafted word, which makes you justified before God, exposes the hidden sins of your heart.
It may be very strange that your neighbor down the street sins on a regular basis and there appears to be no judgment, while you, who are living for God, every time you do one little thing out of the way, the Lord is right there convicting you of your sin. That because the law has been imparted to you. It is not a bad thing to be convicted of sin. It is a good thing. Verse 14. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. I pretty much covered that. We have not sinned as Adam has sinned because Adam was in a condition whereby God had given him power over sin, power enough to refuse to do it. Human beings are taken against their will because of the condition that we are born in. We are told that sin reigned without any restraint from Adam unto Moses. Why? Because when there is no law, sin is not imputed. Mankind was not convicted of his evil doings.
People were treated terribly in those days, but there was no law standing in righteous contrast against the wickedness. Brethren, men must be convicted of their sin, and that which will convict them of their sin is the righteousness of Christ being revealed through his people. Verse 15. But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto the many. If one man sins, without us having anything to say about it, surely much more by the grace of God, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, is the gift. How do I acquire it? I have something that I did not deserve, but how does it work for me? Brethren, the grace of God is God’s gift to you. That precious blood, that incorruptible seed, engrafted into your soul, which has been imparted to you, is an ability to keep the law.
I am going to say it again in another way. God will never justify sin. He will never accept sin. He will never excuse sin. We are under a period of grace, during which period He is giving us what we need to enable us to stop sinning. He is not imputing the sin unto us because we are in an in between stage whereby we are being converted from death unto life. God will not accept you in your sin, but He has given you the grace of Christ Jesus, Christ in you, the hope of glory, by which you can purify yourself, because every man that is of the Spirit of God purifies himself. Let us not be complacent, brethren. Let us not sit on a bench and think that there is nothing more for us to do. We must reach for righteousness. We must show God that we desire righteousness. Then what we do in the earth, He will honor in the heaven.
Brethren, the Lord has commanded us to water baptize. Water baptism is a covenant between us and God. Honestly speaking, what good does laying down in the water do for you? I tell you, brethren, it can do nothing for the spiritual man. But God has come to us, and He has said you can do nothing for yourself. You are dead in your sins. I have the power to impart righteousness to you, but I do not want this to be a one way street. I am going to make a covenant with you. Go down in the water, and when I see that sign of faith, I will cover your sin with my righteousness. Everything we do for God in this act of faith, there is no power in it, but the grace of God gives Christ, in you, the ability to attain to a condition whereby the glory of God is revealed through you. Verse 15 says; But not as the offense, so also is the free gift. For if through the offense of one many be dead, the many, all of us be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift of the Holy Ghost which comes by that grace, which comes by one man, because of the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, hath abounded or has imparted life to the many.
Verse 16. And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift: for the judgment was by one, by the one who died, unto condemnation, but the free gift is of many offenses unto justification. One man died and all of humanity was condemned. One man sinned and it condemned billions, but one man’s obedience has set them free. Let me give you the scriptural term. One man’s obedience has provided the free gift which has freed us unto justification. Verse 17. For if by one man’s offense death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory, and the future righteousness, which is the Holy Ghost, which leads to Christ, your hope in glory, shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ. The Holy Ghost, which leads to the incorruptible seed being engrafted into your soul; Christ in you, the hope of glory. The abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness will shine brightly because of one man, our Lord Jesus Christ.
Verse 18. Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. Brethren, because the man, Jesus of Nazareth, was declared righteous by his Father, we all now have the opportunity to partake of the Holy Ghost, which is being shed abroad in our heart, and having that incorruptible seed grafted into our soul, so that we can be justified, and eventually completed and save our soul. Because one man was found righteous, he reversed the curse. One man killed me, and we died to our immortality unto a life of mortality. Then one man’s righteousness is now supplying the grace of God, which is first recognized in us by the Holy Ghost, then justifying us, making us innocent in his sight, because the engrafted incorruptible seed is in you as your foundation.
Verse 19. For as by one man’s obedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. We talked about that already. Verse 20. Moreover the law entered, that the offense might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. Let me talk about this for a couple of minutes. Brethren, when that incorruptible seed engrafts to your heart, it will expose the hidden sin of your heart. Do not let your heart condemn you. Do not let another man condemn you.
The very calling of Christ on your life will reveal sin. What God wants you to do is confess it, and repent, and submit yourself to Him, that He might purge you. This is His purpose for you. Moreover the law entered, that their sins might abound. That was the purpose of the written law. Also it is a function of the spiritual law, which is Christ. Where sin abounded, when the written law entered in, but when the spiritual law, which is Christ, entered in, the forgiveness of sin abounded.
The impartation of the written law condemned the man, but the impartation of the engrafted seed, which is of the heart, is not condemning you. It is grace unto you unto life. It is a weapon. It is a vehicle which will produce the righteousness in you, which will impart life to you. The old covenant killed, the letter kills, but in the Spirit there is life. Verse 21. That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. That is the whole message, brethren. There is now no more condemnation in Christ Jesus, but do not be as the Pharisees. Do not whitewash your sins. Do not hold on to those sins in your heart. Let the Holy Ghost get those bones. Let him clean them up. Let him raise us from the dead, and let us live in the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ.
PRAYER
Father, I bless this congregation. I bless this ministry. I bless the leaders of this ministry. I rebuke the enemies of God wherever they are appearing. I rebuke the carnal minds of men. I sever all the plans of the enemy. I declare that your plans shall turn up to a foolish end, and that your counsel shall bring confusion upon you, and that every curse that tried to cleave unto this ministry, and everyone under it, shall be hindered, and fall to the ground like a broken arrow. I declare the life of God upon this ministry. I declare deliverance upon this ministry. I declare healing upon this ministry. I declare life and the fulfillment of every need for the ministry as a whole, unto the life of an individual. Let the redeemed of the Lord say amen. Amen.
Transcribed by mjs 05/02/16
05/06/16 1st Edit rh
