Here's Pastor Alan Wright with today's blessing, a biblical faith-filled vision for your life. Good news. God has made his home in you. At Sinai, the mountain trembled. The people stood back.
Even Moses could only glimpse the glory of God, but Jesus promised. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. John 14. in you, child of God. I bless you to marvel today at the mystery of Christ in you.
Moses knew the glory. of having God near, but you know the miracle of having God within you. You are His. He's made us home. In you.
Pastor, author, and Bible teacher Alan Wright. I need you. And we need each other. Because when we come together and we begin to think about the things of God, and we think about the goodness of God, and we think about what He's done for us, and we worship Him, and we release our hearts to Him in worship, and we choose to exalt Him. What are we doing?
We're sowing into the things of the Spirit. and you reap from the Spirit. That's Pastor Alan Wright. Welcome to another message of good news that will help you see your life in a whole new light. I'm Daniel Britt.
Excited for you to hear the teaching today in the series More Than Conquerors, the study of Romans 8, as presented at Ranulda Church in North Carolina. If you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program, I want to make sure you know how to get our special resource right now. It can be yours for your donation this month to Allen Wright Ministries.
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More on this later in the program. But now, let's get started with today's teaching. Here is Alan Wright. If you're new with us, we're in a study of the Epistle of Romans. And we are now in chapter eight.
Someone has said that Romans chapter 8 is the greatest chapter. in the greatest letter. in the greatest book of all time. It is a crescendo of what Paul has been. Teaching In the first seven chapters.
And so it's worthy of time, and we're spending five weeks just in Romans chapter 8. And today we come to verse 5. Those who live according to the flesh. set their minds on the things of the flesh. But those who live according to the Spirit set their mind on the things of the Spirit.
So flesh doesn't mean your physical body. It means Paul uses it to mean The old nature apart from Christ or the old nature? nature before we knew Christ that wanted to just live life. By our own rule, and be sovereign over our own lives. not be yielded to God.
Verse 6, for to set the mind on the flesh is death. But to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God. for it does not submit to God's law indeed it cannot. But those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit. If in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to Him. But if Christ is in you. Although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life.
Because of righteousness. Not your own righteousness, but his righteousness. It's life. Verse 11, if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you. He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit.
who dwells in you. Yeah.
Okay, precious beloved, are you ready for some good news? If you're in Christ. Christ is in you. For the Christian, it means you have become. The habitation.
of the Most High God. Little Jimmy was always in trouble at school, always having to be called into the principal's office. And he acted up again, got called into the principal's office, and the principal this time decided he was going to try a different approach. Try a spiritual approach with Jimmy. Try to get them to be aware that You know, God is there and seeing all this.
So little Jimmy comes in, and the principal says, Jimmy, Where is God? Jimmy just had a blank look on his face. The principal asks again, Jemmy? Where is God?
Now Jimmy looks kind of frightened. And the principal asked a third time, I need you to tell me. Jimmy. Where is God?
Jimmy goes running out of the principal's office, sprinting down the hallway. His friend Bobby sees that there's terror on his face. And Bobby says, What's wrong, Jimmy? And Jimmy shouts out to Bobby as he's running. He says, God's missing, and they think I took him.
What's that tripper? Where is God?
Where is he? People have been asking the question. ever since time. Is he on a mountaintop? Is he behind a cloud?
Is he in all the plants and the earth? Is he in the sun? Is he in the moon? Is he nowhere? When life hurts, people are asking, where's God?
And people are confused. They're asking, where's God? And we come to this Section of Romans chapter 8, this moment of crescendo and this amazing epistle. And Paul, in setting us up for what we're going to see as this chapter rises to its finish. Of declaring that there is nothing that could separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
He now begins to talk to us about the Holy Spirit. Seven chapters, he's not been talking about the Holy Spirit. He's been talking about the problem of sin. and how Jesus and his finished work of the cross is the answer. But now in chapter eight, Twenty-two times the spirit is mentioned.
The chapter about the presence of God. And he comes to us and says that The Spirit of God is dwelling inside the heart of every believer. Let me just start here at verse 9. You, however, not of the flesh, but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.
So here Paul is very plainly defining what it means to be a Christian. What he's saying is it means to be a Christian. is not that you have assented to all the right doctrines, as important as doctrine is. It doesn't mean that you have proven you can live a certain behavioral code. as important as It is to Let our lives reflect.
The goodness and glory of God. And being a Christian is not. About Morals. or a political party or a What Being a Christian is, Paul says. you have the spirit of Christ.
We have a lot of routine phrases we Christians use to talk about this. We'll talk about. having Jesus in my heart or People will say when they became a Christian, I prayed to receive Jesus in my heart, or I've accepted Christ in my heart. We might even be bolder to say we're the temple of the Holy Spirit. But I want to today to lead you into a deeper contemplation.
of what it means. And to invite you to consider the breathtaking implications. of what Paul is saying here. That, Christian, you are the dwelling place of God. One Sunday evening in 1947, a pastor named Robert Munger.
preached a message in his Presbyterian church in Berkeley. Called my heart Christ's home, in which he envisioned his heart to be like a a home that had many rooms. And in this little allegory. He talked about all those different rooms, like starting with the study. A place of books and thought and He talked about how he wanted to invite Jesus into all of his thought life.
And he talked about the dining room, the place where we express our appetites, and how he wanted to welcome Jesus into changing all of his appetites, and the living room, the place where we meet with friends, and how he knew that Jesus wanted to meet with him. And he talked about all the rooms of his heart. And it got noticed, and they put it into a little booklet, a little tract. called My Heart, Christ's Home, and that's been translated into at least a dozen language a dozen languages and and distributed at least ten million times. I've read that little book in college.
I remember being impacted by it. Thinking about our ho our heart like a home, and if Jesus is residing in us, have I fully welcomed Him into every part of my heart? As I reread it this week, after all these years, it might be I would. Say it some things a little differently. It could be a little moralistic sounding the way you read it, but it does intrigue you to think about if God has taken residence in us, is there a way in which we welcome Him more or less?
And maybe that's what Paul is talking about in verse 5. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, But those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.
Some interpreters say that those who are according to the flesh, that he's merely talking about those who have yet to meet Christ. But but probably and most people agree It's something similar to what we saw in Romans 7. where you can be a Christian and you can have the Spirit of God. and yet there still is a tug of war inside of you. And there can be a way in which the old nature, the flesh, meaning the the sin nature, some translations call it, or more rightly, just the old part of us that had not yet fully submitted to God.
There every Christian knows that that you don't become a Christian and suddenly everything within you is constantly, always gladly yielding to everything God wants for you.
So maybe he's talking about that. He says something similar in Galatians where He says in Galatians 5, 17, the desires of the flesh are against the spirit. and the desires of the spirit are against the flesh. And he is talking about Christians here in Galatians, for these are opposed to each other to keep you from doing the things you want to do.
So there is a battle between the flesh and the spirit. And Paul envisions us as something like a farmer when he comes to Galatians 6:8. He says, For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption. But the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.
So I think he's saying here that our thoughts and our Our Our contemplations And our activities are like seeds that a farmer is sowing. And you get a choice into which direction you're sewing. I think we all could understand this. that there are times in our Christian life where we just we find ourselves We're just sowing our thoughts and our mentalities towards the things of the Spirit. And as you do, you reap from the Spirit.
Right.
So every time I come and I get the privilege of worshiping with you on a Sunday morning, I sow into the things of the Spirit. I'll be honest with you, I don't always come in on a Sunday morning all chipper. I might have had a really hard week or something, and I might have been in a bad mood coming, but I need you. And we need each other. Because when we come together and we begin to think about the things of God.
And we think about the goodness of God, and we think about what He's done for us, and we worship Him, and we release our hearts to Him in worship, and we choose to exalt Him. What are we doing? We're sowing into the things of the Spirit. And you reap from the Spirit. And I reap.
I reap every time I'm with you. I've been reaping today. I about preached myself giddy at the first service, and I'm feeling it already coming on me now. It's just. There is a way, right?
But if you just sow to the flesh. And you get that flesh telling you all the things that aren't true and all the things that are bad, and you choose to meditate on those things, and you think on those things, and you choose activities that are just flesh activities.
Well, you reap from that, but you reap in a way that is corrosive. That's what he's saying, I think. At verse 6 of Romans 8. To set the mind on the flesh is death. But to set the mind On the spirit is life and peace.
I want life and peace, don't you? And as much as Pastor Munger's little sermon. And that little booklet has impacted millions with the image of Jesus moving from room to room in our heart. the idea that Paul shares here is something that is much more breathtaking. And that's what I want to contemplate with you.
In order to think about the idea of God being in you and how unspeakably awesome this is. I want to take you back to the old covenant. The old covenant, a covenant. in which the people of God were given the law by God. But as Paul explained in Romans 1 through 7, They couldn't keep the law.
The law is good and holy and right because it comes from God. Everything God says, if he says, you shall not kill, then God is saying that he himself is not a murderer. If he says you shall not lie, he's saying he is truth and honest. This is the nature of God. But the law came alongside of sinful people, and it didn't help them.
It just highlighted how sinful they were. And in some ways it exacerbated the problem of sin. That's what Romans 1 through 7 teaches us. But when they got the law It was so glorious.
Well, let's look in Exodus chapter 19. where we see some pieces of this narrative. Exodus nineteen ten, the LORD said to Moses, Go to the people and consecrate them. That is to set them apart in holy ritual, consecrate them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their garments. Symbolizing You're doing all you can to set yourself apart for something very holy.
And to be ready for the third day. For on the third day the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people. Verse 16. On the morning of the third day there were thunders and lightnings and a thick cloud on the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast, so that all the people in the camp trembled.
So here is the awesome glory of God. that is being manifest in a way that the people had not encountered before, And The presence of God is so glorious that things happen. Thunders and lightning and a cloud and a trumpet blast, and the people were terrified. Rightly so. Verse twenty The LORD came down on Mount Sinai to the top of the mountain, And the Lord called Moses, his mediator, to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up.
And the Lord said to Moses, Go down, bring down. and warn the people. lest they break through to the Lord to look, and many of them perish. And also let the priests Who come near the Lord consecrate themselves, lest the Lord break out against them. I think that's an odd phrase.
The Lord breaks out against them. I don't even know what it means, but I don't think you want the Lord to break out against you. You see what he's saying here. He's saying, I'm going to come and I'm going to appear in my glory. At least in part.
And you gotta warn the people, they can't even look. It will It will be too much for them. You say Moses was unlike any other person who'd ever lived. Because he had met with God so up close. But there was still a great limit to it.
And Moses yearned to know more of God. He yearned to see more of the glory of God. And in Exodus 33, Moses said, please show me your glory. And the Lord said, I'll make all my goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim to you my name, the Lord. Yahweh.
And I will be gracious to whom I'll be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I'll show mercy. But the Lord said, You cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live. The boldness of Moses to ask for the presence of God. and to see the glory of God. But not even Moses would have dared to ask God, would you come and take up residence in me?
Maybe hide me in the cleft of a rock and see part of your glory. And Moses would be near God on the mountain. And when he would come down to share with the people what God had been saying. His face was literally radiantly glowing so brightly that the people were afraid of Moses. Eventually, he just started putting a veil over his face.
so that the people wouldn't be scared. And be blinded by the radiance of his face, just a reflection. of God's glory. God wanted to meet with his people. And he gave instructions to establish a tabernacle.
which was a tent of meeting. a mobile meeting place with God. can move with the people. And he gave specifications that there would be an outer court. And then there would be An inner court called the holy place And in that court there the priests could minister.
And they could wash things and they could burn sacrifices. Minister And then there was a thick curtain. And behind that thick curtain. Was a little room called the Holy of Holies. And in there was the Ark of the Covenant, which was a...
big box that contained the Ten Commandments and had a golden lid.
Solid gold lid with gold cherubim. that had been crafted on to it, and were facing one another. And God said once a year, On yon Kippur, The Day of Atonement. The high priest and only the high priest will be allowed to come in on that one day, in this high holy moment in the life of Israel on the fall. and will be able to bring in the blood of an innocent animal is a mark of payment in part for the The sin of the people.
And sprinkle that blood. on that golden lid. And that is called the mercy seat. And this is what God said about it in Exodus 25:22. Therefore, there I will meet with you, there on that mercy seat.
And from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim that are on the ark of the testimony, I will speak with you about all that I will give you.
Now I get I I say all of this because I'm wanting you to to lead you towards the the the the jaw-dropping and breathtaking news that A Christian is a person in whom the Spirit of God dwells. Because There's nobody in the old covenant that Any such thought That You can't even get near God. It's too Sinful people can't get near God because He's too holy and too glorious. There's a picture of it, you see. And I don't know how to explain it except that, you know, think about the sun.
Alan Wright, our good news message, God in you, from the series More Than Conquers, an unhurried study through Romans 8. Stay with us. Pastor Alan is back here in the studio sharing his parting good news thought for you for today. In just a moment. Did you know Allen Wright Ministries is much more than a radio broadcast?
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the creator of the cosmos. The Holy One of Israel. the Most High God. Dwelling? In us?
Um This is the promise of the Holy Spirit for every single Christian, and that's what we're Exploring today. Today's good news message is a listener-supported production of Alan Wright Ministries.
