Episode Transcript
[00:00:07] Speaker A: Hi and welcome to the unveiling. I'm Tim, one of the hosts. Along with Ajay and Mark. We are three guys discussing the one true gospel. We hope you're encouraged by this episode. Let's dive right in.
2nd Corinthians 3:17 tells us that now the Lord is the Spirit. And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
Welcome back, everybody. This is the unveiling. I'm Tim. Mark and Ajay are here, and we are going to be talking today about. I don't know if you caught this, but maybe freedom, huh, guys?
[00:00:42] Speaker B: Sounds good to me.
[00:00:44] Speaker A: Right?
So I think what we're going to start with today is we're going to talk about freedom from.
And these are the things that grace gives us is the things that we don't longer have to be afraid of, afraid for, or things like that. So I think most believers understand the idea of being saved from something, like from sin, from hell, from judgment, from separation. But the new covenant doesn't just rescue us from something.
It releases us into. Into something like we've been freed from striving fear, performance and punishment, but we've been freed to rest, trust, fail safely, and grow honestly, and to live as sons instead of servants.
Christ doesn't just remove chains. It creates space for a new way of living. And if we only preach freedom from and not freedom to, we're going to miss half the gospel.
[00:01:43] Speaker B: So.
[00:01:43] Speaker A: So be on the lookout. We may get to it today or we may get to it on another episode, but we're going to do Freedom 2 as well.
Guys, who wants to kick us off this afternoon?
[00:01:54] Speaker B: Well, I think I would like to. And I want to start off by pointing out something I really liked, what you just said, that if we only understand what we've been freed from, we're missing half the gospel. We're missing what Paul called the riches of our glory's inheritance. All the things that we have in Christ that we've been set free to walk in, to receive, really the joy of our life is what we've been set free to. So I wanted to start out with the scripture here. And this is Jesus himself speaking in Luke 4:18. And he's actually quoting the prophet Isaiah, who spoke, oh, probably a thousand years at least before Christ came talking about the Messiah. And so this is Jesus quoting a prophecy about himself. He says, the spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind to set the oppressed free to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.
So in that one prophecy, Jesus is giving us a nice little O foreshadow about what his death and resurrection would bring. And that's freedom from captivity, release from the darkness, freedom from oppression.
And I'll let the other guys chime in.
What kind of darkness is he talking about? What kind of oppression, what kind of captivity have we been set free from as Christians?
[00:03:38] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Again, as always, it's nice to see you both. Yeah. I think before we dive into some of the specifics, I would like us to again go back to the scriptures like we always do, and what the Bible talks about, you know, what we are freed from. In order to be freed from, you need to be in captivity to something.
Yeah. You know, by way of analogy, right. If someone has sickness, there are two things. There is disease and there are symptoms. Right. Many a time we experience the symptoms, but the root cause is a disease. So the symptoms might manifest in many ways. I think we are going to talk about a lot of the symptoms, but I would like to see, you know, what the Bible talks about, what the disease is and what we are captive to.
I want to read a couple of Scriptures.
Romans 6, 17, 18.
But God be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. Do you see that it says, like, though you were slaves of sin.
And in Romans 7:14, for we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin.
And John 8:34, the Lord himself said, most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin.
So the Bible is clear here. Right. You know, Adam sold himself to sin, and through Adam, all of his children have become slaves of sin. You know, we can talk about this a lot more later, but the main point that I wanted to draw attention to is what are we slaves of? Right. You know, in order to be freed, you have to be slave of something. And the Bible clearly says we are slaves of sin.
[00:05:40] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:05:41] Speaker B: That's one of the things that I had focused on in my studies here to Ajay.
Obvious. I think most people, including unbelievers in the world, understand that Christ came to take our sin, to die for our sin. Now, they may not believe that he accomplished that or that he was God, but most people know that was the primary reason in Christianity that Christ came.
And as I think about sin and him freeing us from our sin, I kind of think about it in two ways. One, I think about it in that he's freed us from the consequences of sin in a number of different ways. Obviously, he's freed us in our relationship with him.
The consequences of sin no longer condemn us. They no longer separate us from God, because he took that upon himself.
And then another way we've been freed from sin is as a just read. And Romans, I think he said 6:17.
Also in 6:14, a couple verses before that in in the KJV, it says, for sin shall not have dominion over you, for you not under the law, but under grace.
So beside being freed from the consequences of sin and our relationship with God, we're also freed from being a slave to sin to where we have to do it. We have no power in us to overcome it. And even though those are two different levels of things, I think they're connected because there's power.
Sin kind of loses half of its attractiveness when it no longer can condemn us, when it no longer is this giant boogeyman hanging over our head. I think that frees us up in a way. And Paul also says in Romans 7:4 that for when we were in the realm of the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in us.
So there's an aspect to sin, to the law that actually arouses sin because the law condemns us. And as long as that's hanging over our head and we have to try to stop sinning, it's actually really counterintuitive. But Scripture tells us over and over again that the law is the power of sin and that it actually arouses the sin in us. So we've been delivered from that dominion, which I think is a key point. And that if we do not come out from under the law, we do not come out from under the dominion of sin. We are still slaves to sin, and we don't have the ability, well, we never have the ability to overcome it ourselves, but we have the ability. Once we become Christians, we have the Spirit in us who works that at us.
[00:08:39] Speaker A: Mark, I feel like I need to jump in here for a second and clarify something. When you say we're free from sin, it doesn't mean we're not going to sin. We are still going to miss the mark. The freedom is that. And you said it. But I want to make sure it's clearly defined. We're free from the guilt. We're free from the conviction, the condemnation of those things that we've done wrong.
It doesn't mean we are suddenly perfect. So when people walk around going, oh, you Christians think you're so holy and you're so good. No, I'm with Paul. I'm right behind Paul, maybe, but I'm with Paul. I feel like I'm chief among sinners. Maybe I'll take second place, but I don't know.
[00:09:18] Speaker B: We feel that too, Tim. So thank you.
[00:09:21] Speaker A: I appreciate that. But we don't have to. You know, I look at David as a great example in the Old Testament. He's, he screwed up so many times and all he would do is kind of figure out he screwed up and go, darn it, I screwed up. God, let's, let's, let's take that as a, you know, a lesson and move on. And he did and that. And he just kind of shrugged it off because he wasn't being condemned for it.
[00:09:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I appreciate you pointing that out. And we do want to make that really clear. We're not saying that we will never sin again once we come to the one true gospel by faith. We're saying that the consequence of that sin no longer condemns us, no longer is applied to our account with God. We're no longer charged for that sin. That's one level. But then there is an aspect of it. Scripture tells us that as you come to Christ in freedom, free from that condemnation, free from the law and sin hanging over your head, you will see. And I mean, I could definitely see when I look at my life. I was a Christian for 35 years, still not completely understanding the freedom we have in Christ.
And once I came into the one true gospel, which is righteousness by faith from first to last, as I look at my life, sin decreased.
So as Paul said, it's that law, it's sin hanging over our head with all its guilt, shame and condemnation that actually arouses us to sin more.
So there's still sin in our life, but it doesn't have the same power and hold it had before we come to Christ even in our actual lives here on earth. But as you mentioned, the consequence in our relationship with God has been completely removed. And somehow that puts wind beneath our wings to really live this life in a more Christ focused and joyful and sinless.
When I say sinless, I meant less sin than if we keep trying to do it ourselves.
[00:11:30] Speaker C: Yeah, I want to double click on something you said, Mark and Tim also. Like, you know, what is the consequence of sin? Right again. The consequence of sin, the Bible says, is the wages of sin is death.
So the soul that sins Must die. That's what the law also says, right?
In fact, in the beginning, very Genesis, the Lord said, if you eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, you will die. So the reason for all the things that we do, right, the things that we are not supposed to do, in fact, you know, it's not so much about not supposed to do, but we are not, we are falling short of the glory of God.
All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
So God created us for glory.
What sin does is we are causes us to live short of the glory of God. And that happened by death, right? You know, the day that Adam sinned, death came upon humanity. And again, what is death, right? Death is above. The Bible is clear. I am the way, the truth and the life. He that has a son has life, and he that does not have the son does not have life. So the Lord Jesus Christ himself, the man Jesus Christ, that is our glory, right? You know, God created us to be in Christ, to be like Christ, to be shared in the life of Christ. So the ideal man in God's sight is our Lord Jesus Christ.
So anything short of Lord Jesus Christ is falling short of what God intended us to be.
So in the garden, I think let's go to the garden a little bit. Because everything started in the garden.
So in the garden, when God created man, they created Adam and Eve. And there are two trees. One is the tree of life and the other is the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
And God wanted the man to participate in tree of life, which is our Lord Jesus Christ himself, right?
And even if you go all the way to the revelation, whoever has believed the Lord said, whoever has believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, they have the right to partake of the tree of life. So from the beginning to the end, God's intention is that we partake of the tree of life.
But man did not do that, right? So he partook of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and brought death upon himself.
And Bible says In Romans chapter 5, verse 21, just as sin reigned in death, so the way sin reigns over humanity is through death, that is through absence of life of Christ.
And what salvation brought us is like, you know, the life that we lost in the Garden of Eden, God gives us back through Jesus Christ.
So when you sin, the wages is death and the opposite of sin is righteousness, right?
If you are righteous, you will have life.
So that is the reason of salvation, right? In salvation Lord Jesus Christ through his death, burial and resurrection. And the Shed blood. He gives us the gift of righteousness. When we receive the gift of righteousness, now we have the life of Christ. The difference between believer and unbeliever is not so much, okay? Oh, unbelievers sin more and believers sin less.
The difference is unbelievers don't have the life of Christ and the Spirit of Christ in them, and believers have the life of Christ and the spirit of Christ in us.
And because of that, I think, Mark, you were saying, right? You know, now we are not left to our own devices when it comes to sin. Now we have the Holy Spirit of God, so we can live by the old flesh, old thinking, and still submit to sin, even though we are not slaves of sin, because habitually we have been doing that all our life. Or we can start walking in the freedom, right, when we realize that we are no longer sins. You know, that's what Romans 6:14 says, right? Sin shall not have dominion over you because you're not under the law, but under grace. What that means is under the law, you were under death because law brings death.
Under grace, you are under life. You know, because now we have the life of Christ. For one thing is we don't have to obey sin because we are freed from sin through the blood of Lord Jesus Christ.
And second is now we have the life of Christ in us to live by that life. That's how we slowly start walking in slavery. I mean, walking free from sin, right? You know, before we were habitually walking in slavery to sin. But now, because of the life of Christ, we can slowly but surely walk in more and more freedom from sin.
[00:16:22] Speaker B: Yeah. That's awesome, Ajay. And if I might, Tim, just jump in here.
When you started that whole thing out, Ajay, you said you wanted to double click on freedom from sin. In keeping with our computer jargon, I want to scroll back one page and just as we keep bringing up Romans 6:14, which is one of. I know it's one of all three of our favorite scriptures says, for sin shall not have dominion over you.
Or in the NIV says, shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.
So for every believer out there and unbeliever, if you want to be free from sin, you first. He says right here, you're not under the law, but under grace.
If you bring the law in, you're giving sin its power over you back.
So that is like a starting point. It's kind of a. How. How do I get. How did I get to freedom from sin? It's by first Christ taking us out from under the law in into his grace. I wanted to read you Romans 7:4, which is another one of our corporate favorite scriptures here.
Paul says, so my brothers and sisters, you also died to the law through the body of Christ that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead in order that you might bear fruit. For God right there holds so much in it, doesn't it?
So there's an order of things here. You first died to the law with Christ when he went to that cross. We are identified with him, we are in him, we die with Him. Unless we do that first, we cannot belong to another.
In the KJV it says that we might be married to another to him who raised Christ from the dead. And what I love about the end of this, if so many people are concerned with good works and righteous acts, this is giving you the formula here. It says we first die to the law through Christ, then we belong to him who was raised from the dead. And then it produces fruit in us.
So many people are so focused on the good works and self improvement and behavior modification and performance, performance.
You know, it's good to want fruit in your life, it's good to want good works in your life. But it's the how. How do I do that? Do I go and listen to a 20 part series on getting rid of sin in my Life and another 10 part series on being a good dad, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera? No, that's not the how. Trying harder is not the how. As my good friend Tim would say, it's a hamster wheel. You just run faster and faster and never get anywhere. The how is dying with Christ, putting your faith with him through your faith, dying with him on that cross, being raised with him so that you might belong to Him. And what is that going to do? That's going to produce in you effortlessly the spirit's going to do it in you to produce fruit. And that's freedom. That's one of the main freedoms Christ to get gave us was freedom from the law. Without freedom from the law, we can't get to freedom from sin. And so many other things that we're about to talk about.
[00:19:55] Speaker A: You know, I don't know if everybody can hear this as we talk on through these podcasts. Mark and Ajay, I mean these guys, these guys were born with shovels and a Bible in their hands. So these guys can dig and dig and dig and find so much great gold and depth in being able to hit a Subject, because I'm going to tell you on this subject, I only need one verse. Romans 8:1. For there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. And that's, that's the freedom we've been talking about right there. We aren't condemned anymore. For when we screw up, we know when we screw up. God knows when we screw up. We will even tell him, lord, I missed the mark on that today. And he'll go and pick yourself up, dust yourself off, let's keep moving in it. And that's wonderful. I live for the ability to make mistakes and not feel like I'm condemned.
Yeah.
[00:20:47] Speaker C: In fact, what you both said, they beautifully tied together. Mark said we are not under the law anymore. And the result of that is there is now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. So we died with our Lord Jesus Christ to the law.
In dying to the law, we also died to death, which is a dominion of sin in us. And then we go to the other side, you know, he that has believed in me. They pass from death unto life. You know, that's what happened, right? In passing from death unto life, we also pass from condemnation to no condemnation. And the results of no condemnation. Tim, what you said are like, they are, I think, what is the right word? They are very, very far fetching, the results of not being under condemnation. I'm sure, you know, we can, we will talk about it more and more, but for a believer, the starting point is no condemnation.
Many of the Christians, you know, after they are saved for many, many years, they don't understand that we are not under condemnation. They go in the cycle of, okay, yeah, I believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, now I'm a believer. Then, you know, they try hard to live this exemplary life, right? Oh, testimony, you know, I want to be a good testimony.
And then they start trying hard and then they fall and then they start beating up. You know, this cycle goes on and on.
So only when you come to a place of there is now no condemnation team, like you said, that is a starting point for a real freedom.
[00:22:20] Speaker A: And I want to encourage anyone who's listening this today. We keep telling you there is no condemnation for the those who are in Christ Jesus. How many times are you condemning yourself? How many times are you putting yourself above God because you can't let something go and go, okay, I blew it. Let's pick myself up and keep moving. Because you think, oh, I know me, I know I'm terrible and this and that. No, God doesn't see you like that. Quit looking at yourself like that. Look at yourself how God is looking at you.
[00:22:48] Speaker B: Amen. Amen. Amen. Freedom from the voices in our head, right, Tim?
[00:22:55] Speaker A: I'd be lonely without those, Mark.
[00:22:57] Speaker B: Well, if they're good voices, if it's the voice of the Spirit, that's great. But if it's the voice of guilt and condemnation, that you can probably live without. Tim.
[00:23:05] Speaker A: Amen, brother, Amen.
[00:23:07] Speaker B: So Tim brought up Romans 8:1 Romans 8, chapter 8. I just want to say, throughout the history of Christianity, great theologian and just your average believer in the street throughout the ages, this chapter has been considered one of the greatest chapters in the Bible because it is so rich in what Christ has done for us, accomplished for us, and the things we receive through that. And Ajay just used an interesting phrase that he was searching for there. Far fetching was the word he used.
And I love that expression.
And I really, really love it.
In congress with the word ramifications, one of the great joys of my life, once I came upon this one true gospel, the message of God's grace, Jesus Christ himself.
And I started to think about the ramifications.
And I don't think, in my opinion and experience, not enough Christians, even pastors, spend enough time just sitting and meditating and contemplating the ramifications of the gospel of what Christ accomplished, the ramifications of these truths.
In Romans 8, it says, Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. If you are in Christ, you have no condemnation from anywhere. You are free. And then Paul goes on in the next verse to say, because.
I love when he puts the becauses in there. It's not just enough to make the statement. He tells us the how and the why. Because through Christ Jesus, the law of the Spirit who gives life, has set you free from the law of sin and death. And those two verses there pretty much tie everything together.
Ajay and Tim and I, the scriptures we've quoted and the points we've made, it ties it all together concerning the law, concerning freedom from sin and death, how he did that by introducing a new law.
And that new law is not the same as the other law where there were conditions that had to be met. This law, the conditions were met for you by the Spirit who gives life. And it was that very Spirit who goes to people and draws them to Christ in the first place. So as always, it's all Jesus all the time.
[00:25:42] Speaker C: Yeah.
I want to list a few things that we are freed from to be more specific. I think that will help us all we talked about the disease and the symptoms. The disease was basically sin and death, right? You know, sin brought death upon us. Disease is death.
Everything we do, all the bad that we experience in this life, you know, all the hurt and pain and grief we give to each other, it is because of the death, right? Because we don't have life of Christ in us. So that's why, you know, the death actually manifesting in us are all the things that we do and there are symptoms. I think if we specifically call them out, that will help a lot to everybody. I'm going to go through the list. I don't think we can actually go into more details. You know, maybe we can go next time with scriptures, but a few things that few key things that we are freed from in day to our practical, day to day practical life. You know, everything is a consequence of not being freed from condemnation. We are, there is now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. But how they practically manifest is, you know, we are freed from guilt.
Most of the people, you know, they live in guilt. And so we are freed from guilt even when we sin, right? We know that, you know, our sins are cleansed. And even when we sin, we are righteous.
So we are freed from guilt, we are freed from shame, we are freed from inferiority complex and we are freed from fear and we are freed from having to perform always. Right? You know, this mindset of I have to earn something in life.
So all our life, you know, we're trying to perform to earn. We are freed from that and we can just rest and we are free from seeking approval most of the time, you know, we are constantly trying to seek approval from others. We are freed from that as well.
So these are the few things, you know, that I wanted to list, but I don't know, Tim and Mark, if you have anything that you wanted to list that we are freed from in our practical day to day living.
[00:27:48] Speaker A: I'm going to steal from Pastor Paul because every time I do, he makes me sound better and I have his permission to quote him, by the way.
So Paul always said that God isn't against effort, he's against earning.
So we're free from the pressure of trying to earn something without knowing whether we've reached that point or not. You know, I mean, we were constantly, it's. We're being manipulated and controlled sometimes from the pulpit, sometimes from our own mind, sometimes from other people that we have to do certain things in order to be blessed, earn God's favor, you know, not have God turn away from us. This is all terrible way of thinking about God. God isn't the rule maker and he's not sitting up there with a scoreboard. He loves us. He's our Father. And like we love our children.
Yeah, they can mess up, but we still love them.
[00:28:42] Speaker B: It doesn't change our identity, their identity or who they are. Whether they're good kids or bad kids, they're still your kids.
That's how it is with the Father God.
Tim, I want to point back, just for a moment, back to your point about being free from the voices of condemnation and guilt and shame that we get in our own heads. Whether that's the devil, other believers, ourselves, other people, our families. This is a great line here, and it's Colossians 1:22, says now he has reconciled you by Christ's physical body through death to present you wholly in his sight without blemish and free from accusation.
Let me ask you out there, people, who can accuse you when the God of all creation, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, says, you are holy in his sight without even a single little blemish, that's who you are. And that is the freedom from condemnation and accusation and any shame, no matter where it comes from, you can say, you know what? I am holy in the sight of my Father and I am without blemish, so be gone.
[00:29:58] Speaker A: Amen.
[00:29:59] Speaker B: Here's one quick one I want to talk about, and that's the freedom from religion, freedom from religious activities, religious traditions, can't eat meat on fry or fish on fry. You know, the plethora of religious activity. And I've got a couple good scriptures here, if you guys are good, just to take a moment and then it might be good. And Tim is usually the one that reminds us, if we finish with the caveat, that what we're not saying is that sin is okay, that it's okay to use your freedom as a cover up for evil. That's not what we're saying. And secondly, that's not what trusting in Christ and His grace alone leads to. Just to kind of wrap up with that. If you guys are good with that.
Okay, I'm going to go on to the freedom from human rules here. Let you guys chime in. And then Tim, if you want to wrap us up on that and give us our final summary, then we'll be done.
[00:30:58] Speaker C: Okay, I want to jump in again. I think symptoms versus disease. I think one of the things, the reason why we get into guilt, shame, condemnation and everything is you already mentioned this mark, but I wanted to say it again, we are freed from the law. You know, that is the biggest thing, right? We are freed from the law, and that's why there is no condemnation. You know, when we understand that we are freed from the law, that makes a big, big difference. So all these symptoms. Yes, yeah, they are there, but the reason for all these symptoms is we are still putting ourselves under the law.
So, yeah, I also wanted to point that out. I think for it is very, very important to realize that we are. We said it in different ways, right?
Trying to earn things, trying to perform.
But the underlying reason is that, you know, even after being saved, we think that we have to keep the law in order to either keep our salvation or in order to earn blessings from God.
But if you go back under the law, you will invariably fail. And then you will go in this cycle of guilt, in condemnation cycle. You just keep going in that one. So one of the things that I want our listeners to walk away with today is we are completely and absolutely freed from the law. There is no more. We will never come under the law.
It doesn't mean that, you know, we are just going and out and sinning carelessly. But where there is no law, there is no condemnation. So we are freed from the condemnation, punishment of the law. And when we realize that, we will start to begin in freedom. Freedom of grace.
[00:32:37] Speaker B: Awesome.
So I wanted to give one quick definition to any of our new listeners out there right now.
Whenever we use the word law, or for that matter, the Apostle Paul or one of the apostles talks about the law.
They're not just talking about the Ten Commandments. They're not talking about the Levitical laws or the rabbinical laws. They're talking about a whole mindset and mentality of earning by rules.
They're talking about every church I've ever went to. Everyone has their own set of spoken and unspoken rules. Every denomination, everybody that's not walking in the complete freedom of Christ, they add things. And I want to read you Colossians 2:16 here. This is the Apostle Paul talking. He says, therefore, do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a new moon celebration, or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come. The reality, however, is found in Christ.
Then later on, he goes on in that same chapter, since you died with Christ, to the elemental spiritual forces of this world, why, as though you still belong to the world, do you submit to its rules? Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch. These rules which have to do with things that are all destined to perish with use are based on merely human commands and teachings. So what Paul is saying, saying here now is that Christ has brought us freedom from religion.
And religion is not the same thing as the gospel. The Christian religion is a system of rules that you have to keep. Yes, you start by putting faith in Christ, but then you need to be part of a small group. You need to tithe 10%, you need to do this. Some churches say you can't dance, you can't play cards. Everybody puts these rules on. Some churches say you have to celebrate this day or that day is holier than other days, or you can't eat meat on Fridays. They all add these things. And Paul's saying, you have been set free from those. In Galatians 1, in referring to the law, Paul says, it is for freedom. You have been set free. Do not be burned again by a yoke of slavery. And the slavery he's talking about is that worldly system of rules. Do this, don't do that. Yeah, Mark.
[00:35:08] Speaker A: And I'm gonna be my usual self here. I've got something I like to bring up anytime we talk about these freedoms because one of the first things people think of is we're gonna be, you know, with no law, there's complete freedom. So we're just gonna go do what we want.
And I gotta say, we're looking at that all wrong if that's what you think.
If I love somebody, I'm not going to hurt them. And I love Jesus and I love my God and my Holy Spirit. I don't want to hurt them. I don't want to do something against them. I don't want to miss the mark. So my behavior isn't being controlled by the fear of punishment for breaking the rules.
It's driven more by.
I want to be good as I can without making it a self righteous thing. So I'm not earning anything by being good. I just don't. I just want to do it out of the love, out of the excess of love that God has given me for myself and for him. So it's not, it's not freedom to go off and do whatever you want without regard to anything. It is rather a freedom of not being chained to it as behavioral modification by fear, but rather as changing your mind and your attitude and becoming the desire of your heart.
[00:36:24] Speaker B: Well, you're in good company, Tim, because the Apostle Paul agrees with you very strongly. He says I have the right to do anything because I am in Christ. I can do anything. And it's not going to make me no longer a child of God. It's not going to separate me from God. But he says, but not everything is beneficial.
I have the right to do anything. But not everything is constructive. No one should seek their own good, but the good of others. And that's what the spirit of God produces in us when we rely on him instead of ourselves trying to be good.
[00:37:04] Speaker A: I've got a buddy, Grant. I don't know if I have the permission to quote him, but I'm going to do it anyway. Living on the wild side here. He used to say, yeah, I've got permission. I've got a license to sin. What's your excuse?
[00:37:17] Speaker B: Yep, you got a hall pass, but that doesn't mean you're not gonna.
[00:37:22] Speaker A: So this sounds like a good place for us to stop now. I think I heard you guys talking about this being one episode.
[00:37:28] Speaker B: Man, were we wrong.
[00:37:29] Speaker A: We. There's way this is too rich, way too much for one episode. So there will be more coming.
But before we jump off, guys, you got anything you want to wrap up? You know, a thought sticking in your head. You're like, I just got to get this out before we leave today.
Rj.
[00:37:45] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was going to wrap up with some other scripture, but I think that is more fitting for the next episode, Freedom 2. But. So that's why I want to actually again reinforce or restate whatever we all said.
Romans, chapter, chapter 8 from verse 31.
What shall we say to these things?
If God be for us, who can be against us?
He who did not spare his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?
Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies.
Who is he that condemns? It is Christ who died. And furthermore, he is also risen.
And who is even at the right hand of God, who makes also intercession for us.
So I want to leave this with our audience.
There is no charge against us, right? Who shall bring a charge against us?
It is God who justifies. You know, nobody can condemn. Nobody can bring a charge against somebody whom God justifies.
Absolutely that. They're calling God a liar. They're calling God a false judge. But God is a righteous judge.
We are justified by God, therefore nobody can lay a charge against us. And who is it that condemns? It is Christ who died. If someone condemns us, or if we condemn ourselves, we are saying that Christ's death is in vain. So it is God who justifies. It is Christ who died. Therefore, there is no charge against us. There is no condemnation. This is the freedom that we have.
Amen.
[00:39:29] Speaker B: I love what you said there, Ajay, and I always think of it this way.
As Paul says, there's only one who has a right to judge us, and that's God. And he's the very one who died for us. The only judge is the one who himself justified us.
[00:39:44] Speaker C: Yep.
[00:39:45] Speaker B: So, man, that is freedom right there.
So I wanted to close just with an analogy that I shared with you guys a number of times, but I was thinking about it today and got a little bit of a new insight on it. So when it comes to the good things that come out of us in our lives, Scripture and the Apostle Paul tell us over and over, those aren't things we do. Those are the fruit of the Holy Spirit in us through our union with Christ. And I always thought of it this way with the fruit analogy, that think about an apple tree. An apple tree doesn't squeeze and work hard to push apples out. He doesn't get in a small group with other apple trees to study ways to push more fruit out. He doesn't go into a big, beautiful building with sound and lights and comfortable chairs to hear an expert apple tree at the front teaching him, guilting him, cheerleading, or even shaming him into producing more beautiful apples. What does an apple tree do? He sinks his roots deep into the rich soil, the good soil. He reaches out and draws in the living water. He turns his leaves to the sun and what happens. Effortlessly, beautiful apples are produced. That's the Christian life right there. And as I thought about that today, I thought, wait a minute. There's a big difference, though, between apple trees and people.
Apple trees don't have a choice.
You, believer, have a choice where you're going to sink your roots, what water you're going to drink, what are you going to turn your leaves toward? Are you going to plant yourself in Christ alone?
Or are you going to plant yourself some of your roots in the law and in good works? Or some people are just planted completely there? And I would say, as Jesus said, remain in me and I will remain in you. Abide in me and I will abide in you. You, when you are married to that Christ of ours, you will produce good fruit. He will do it in you.
[00:41:49] Speaker A: I'm not sure. I'm not sure I can add a word to that. Guys, those were some beautiful sentiments, but I will say something.
And that has to do with the Bible's verse. Ajay, you can probably quote this better than I can because it's usually you saying it, but the Bible tells us that our faith, our position in Christ comes from Christ, not works. Because if it were by. If it's by grace, then works are of no use. And if it were works, then grace would be of no use. So it's one or the other. You can't mix them. They just don't go together.
So I choose the one that gives me more and more and more hope. Because if I got to do works, it's going to rely on me. And I don't have a whole lot of hope in that.
[00:42:38] Speaker B: And more freedom, too. Tim.
[00:42:40] Speaker A: Yes, sir. We've got. Yes, sir, you are absolutely right. Well, this has been a fun night, guys.
I'm feeling. I'm feeling way up from when we started, to be honest. I always do after these things. So why don't we pick up the conversation again next week and hopefully we'll talk to you the next time.
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Well, that's it for us today. As always, God bless and we will talk to you the next time.
[00:43:30] Speaker B: Alone days of my life.
