Greetings in the Name of Jesus and welcome to the PLN Sunday Night Bible Fellowship!
Thanks for joining our continuing bible study tonight presently dealing with the subject of living life under the New Covenant. As we've already discussed, since the Resurrection of Jesus Christ more than two thousand years ago, there is available to mankind the GIFT of a special everlasting AGREEMENT worked out between Father God and Jesus of Nazareth. The essence of the AGREEMENT is that by the shedding of His blood, Jesus PAID IN FULL for all the sins of all mankind for all time (Hebrews 9:12, 10:12) which provided a basis for the rest of us to enter into fellowship with Creator God simply by FAITH. By agreement, there's only ONE way to access that GIFT but everyone on earth is eligible to be a party to it if they choose to.
According to what your Bible actually says, all that's required is to confess with one's mouth Jesus as LORD and to BELIEVE in our heart that God raised Him from the dead. In sum, with the heart we believe which is counted as righteousness (right standing with God) and with the mouth we confess (AGREE to make Jesus our LORD) resulting in salvation (Romans 10:9-10) which includes eternal life (John 3:16, 36, 17:3, Romans 5:21, 6:23, Hebrews 5:9, 9:12, and many others).
Now, many believers act like there's more to receiving salvation than that but since Jesus, that's all there is to it. Are Christian believers instructed/encouraged to perform good deeds after they come into the Kingdom of God? Yes. Are those good deeds REQUIRED for maintaining our salvation and God's FAVOR in our lives? NO! Our FAITH is the only REQUIREMENT for salvation and His FAVOR cannot be earned which by definition is what makes it GRACE.
There is indeed a previous agreement called the LAW where good deeds and obedience ARE required, but that old agreement exists for those who haven't yet accepted the GIFT of the New Covenant. Its primary purpose is still for convincing people that they are incapable of coming into fellowship with God through their own goodness and that they therefore need to put their FAITH in Christ. If we try to impress God with our own goodness we won't get anywhere; but if we rely on the goodness of Jesus, we can get everywhere.
The Law of the Holy Spirit
In this week's Bible Study I want to begin to discuss the idea that life under the New Covenant is supposed to involve an ever increasing relationship with the Holy Spirit and that most Christians don't understand enough about what that involves. I'm sorry to put it so bluntly but that's the way I see it and the fact is I struggle to understand it too, just like everyone else. But the first step toward gaining understanding about something is the admission to oneself that there's something to learn, and the second is to PURSUE the related enlightenment. So, let's start this with a statement by the Apostle Paul that when we accepted Jesus as Lord, we were set FREE from the law of sin and death (which is referring to the LAW of Moses) by coming under a NEW law called the Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:2). The Spirit of Life is the Holy Spirit and I've referred to this verse in several of our previous studies.
In general, the word LAW means a governing system of principles and regulations that are designed to produce a particular result. In biblical terms God is holy and He requires us to be holy if we want to be in relationship with Him (Leviticus 11:44). His requirements are fully laid out for us in the Law of Moses but after thirty-five hundred years of trying, it's been sufficiently proven that because of sin people are INCAPABLE on our own of achieving the level of holiness God requires. Nevertheless, both God and people desire to enter into an intimate relationship together which is where Jesus comes in. He paid for our sin for all time and thereafter our FAITH in Him is counted as the righteousness we needed to come into the relationship. Under the Law of Moses we tried meeting the requirements by the flesh and always failed; under the NEW Law of the Spirit, we succeed in meeting the requirements by "walking" according to the Spirit (Romans 8:4) through FAITH in Christ.
Scripture says that walking according to the Spirit means to live by having one's MIND set (focused) on the things of the Spirit which is something that can only be accomplished by true Believers. Non-believers can ONLY have their minds set on the things of the flesh because they don't yet know the Spirit. So, they're carnally minded which is what we all were before we submitted by faith to Jesus as Lord. To be carnally minded produces death but the mind focused on the Spirit produces life and peace. The mind focused on the flesh is hostile toward God because it refuses to submit to His Authority even by faith which makes it impossible to ever please Him (Romans 8:5-8, Hebrews 11:6). In sum, when we become born again we come out from being carnally minded into a new way of life under the authority and direction of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus so that our MINDS can be "renovated" (transformed) from being only carnally minded to where we can increasingly know and accept the will of God for our lives (Romans 12:1-2). By transformation, we soon willingly submit to the principles and regulations that govern life in the Kingdom of God which the Holy Spirit teaches us as we go along through the Word (John 14:26).
The Leading of the Holy Spirit
Developing a MIND that's more focused on the Spirit isn't about learning to please God. Jesus already took care of that and now it's simply our faith that ALREADY pleases Him. No, learning to walk according to the Spirit is about making it possible for us to RECEIVE AND ENJOY the benefits of the New Covenant by faith. It's about helping us get to the point where we always get the VICTORY in everything we try doing or that we have to deal with (1 Corinthians 15:57, 2 Corinthians 2:14). And, it's about learning to allow Jesus to live His life through us instead of continuing to insist that ours is the only life to be considered (Galatians 2:20).
Friend, the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells within each true believer not because of what we say and do, but because of what we BELIEVE and in whom we trust. He resides within us so we can be more easily led into conformance with the Law of the Spirit which could also be called the Law of the Kingdom. Indeed, the Holy Spirit is working and speaking 24/7 to lead us into all Truth by teaching us how to live our lives as the adopted sons of God we have become (Romans 8:14). And, He leads by continually ADVISING us how we should make our decisions and choices. He doesn't force us to choose any particular way and He hasn't predetermined how we will conduct ourselves. We're FREE to go our own way or to go by His. If we get it wrong, He'll try again. He never gives up on leading us make the transformation and no matter how many times we choose to go the wrong way, He won't give up on us (Hebrews 13:5), He'll NEVER stop teaching and leading.
The Holy Spirit is the best Teacher the world has ever known and next week I'm going to continue to share what I can see in Scripture about this great Teacher. The reason for wanting to share on this subject is that I see a lot of us falling short of where we could be if we paid more attention to the quiet voice within each of us that's ALWAYS speaking. Seemingly, we often ignore Him altogether or we have trouble HEARING Him speak and I think it's time we changed that paradigm. The whole Body of Christ in the U.S. is crying out for a REVIVAL these days but it's not God who's holding it back. It's people, fleshy passive believers who have a worldly-tainted agenda. Get people focused on the Holy Spirit again following the agenda of the Kingdom of God and a full AWAKENING would soon be an inevitable result. Instead of continually asking God for a REVIVAL that He's not the One holding back, why don't we try asking the Holy Spirit based on John 16:13-15 to DISCLOSE to us how to remove the hindrances to it WE'VE caused? Ponder that for a while and I'll see you next week!
Thanks for joining our discussion tonight. We'll be looking for you again NEXT Sunday night on January 31. In the meantime may the Lord bless you with every spiritual blessing (Ephesians 1:3), pushing you to VICTORY in every area of life!
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Sinners' Prayer
If you've never invited Jesus to be your Lord, you can do so today by believing and saying out loud the following simple prayer:
Jesus, I declare today with all my heart that I believe in you and I believe that God raised you from the dead. I acknowledge that my sins have been forgiven for all time and I ask you to come into my life today and be my Lord and Savior. Thank you for salvation and eternal life.
If you were sincere as you prayed, God has already come into your life and you're a new creation, a totally new species recreated in His image. Now ask the Lord to lead you to a good faith-based, bible-teaching church where you can be equipped to fulfill your potential in the Kingdom of God.
When you get a moment have someone help you look up the following scriptures because they confirm what you've done by saying this prayer and believing what you said:
Romans 10:9
2 Corinthians 5:17
Ephesians 2:8
Prayer Requests
If you have a Prayer Request, please connect to the Link below and follow the promptings. The PLN staff members pray over Prayer Requests every Tuesday morning at 10:00 AM central time. Agree with us for God to answer your petitions.
About Prosperous Life Newsletter
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