Thursday, January 18th | Newness of Life

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That's right. You guys can help us keep the conversation going by supporting the show. You can share it online with your friends and your family. You can leave us a good five-star review on iTunes or Spotify. Absolutely nothing less than five stars for any reason or under any circumstances.

I'm even going to leave you a couple of links in the description to help you do that. 1 John 1.7 says this, As Christians, the driving force behind what we do should be love. Yes. And that is what 1 John is about. John talks about love so much because it is the marker, it is the hallmark of Christianity. Everything we do should be motivated from a sense of love. Now, that's not to say that we are just sort of like gushy and like overly emotional and we don't stand up, you know, firm on truth. But we do that from a motivation of love.

Not to be hateful, not to be antagonistic, not to be confrontational, but because we love God and we love people and we understand that you've got to get doctrine right in order to have a relationship with God. That's right. You walk in the light as He is in the light. And then the result of that is that you have fellowship with one another.

Right. It doesn't mean that you're always—and some of us, like, I'm an introvert, right? Like, I don't gravitate towards people naturally. But when you walk in the light of Christ and you are following His ways, it does become easier. It does become something that you find joy in. You may not ever seek out intentionally to have fellowship all the time, but there is a joy to it that comes with speaking and living life with like-minded Christians. Yeah, and a unity, a sense of camaraderie, you know, a sense of togetherness, a bond that happens. You see that a lot in youth ministry, that camaraderie.

I do. That's actually something that we, you know, it's one of our core values. It's something that we drive toward. You know, one of the things that we prioritize in all of our programming is chances for students to simply be together, to spend time together. You know, we just came off of New Year's, and our big event for New Year's is a lock-in. Yes.

And I'm a part of several different groups on Facebook and on social media, like other youth pastors sharing advice and tips and asking questions and things like that. Well, I love that you say that, because you know it's Thursday. I do know it's Thursday. You know what Thursday means. Thursday, this is our segment. Advice that no one needed. That's right. And here's the advice that no one needed, coming from your boy, Ryan, today.

Mr. Ryan Hill. Get ready. Buckle up, because here we go. I see in a lot of these groups people complaining about the idea of a lock-in. And as a student growing up, I can remember looking forward to with intense excitement, lock-ins. If someone's listening and they've never heard of, they don't know what a lock-in is, maybe they grew up in the olden days or maybe they're not familiar with Christian youth activities.

Are you a time traveler from the 1600s or what? What is a lock-in? So a lock-in is literally what it sounds like. You get a bunch of teenagers dropped off at the church, and you are there overnight. Some people will do it for a couple hours. Some people will do it for a stretch of hours. We do ours for 12, so 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. And people hear that and they're like, Oh my gosh, how do you do that with a bunch of teenagers running around, hopped up on caffeine?

Do you stay up all night? What in the world? Well buddy boy, Mr. Hill's going to tell you how we do it. Get ready. I'm going to unlock it for you. Because I get it.

I understand. It can be overwhelming. We had 75 teenagers running around staying up all night. Is that the biggest lock-in we've done here?

It's one of the biggest. All night. And everyone stayed up all night, including the adults.

How do you do that? Number one, you've got to make sure you have caffeine that adults will like. So don't get a bunch of monsters if your adults are coffee drinkers.

You've got to know your volunteers. One of our adult volunteers is not a coffee drinker, but I do know that she likes Diet Dr. Pepper. So the fridge was stocked with that.

You've got to have caffeine that your adults are going to like. I was wondering what those Diet Dr. Peppers were. I saw a bunch of them. I was like, what?

Yep, that's what it is. The second thing is pace yourself. Pace yourself. Because if you try to program every moment of a 12-hour lock-in, you are going to hate everyone, especially yourself, at 4 a.m.

Going to have a bad time. There is a natural slump that occurs from the hours of 2 to 6. That is the dead zone, we call it. And if you try to power through that dead zone, you're going to have a bad time. Like when you say power through, you mean like plan activities? Yeah, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom every moment of the day.

You're going to be exhausted. You know, a lot of people don't know this, but Dr. Shah actually started his vocational ministry as a youth pastor. He did. I feel like we ought to kind of get him in here, see if he can review the lock-in plan.

I would like to submit my plan for review. Yeah, like rate it on a scale of 1 to 10. That would be fun.

Let's do it. Write in and let us know if you've ever been to a lock-in, what was that programming like for you? Did you love it? Did you hate it?

Were you somewhere in between? Or if you are running lock-ins and you have some tips and tricks, hey, I'm always open to learning. So write in and let us know. 252-582-5028 or you can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com.

We'll be back after this. That's right, and every day is a new revelation to guide you on your Christian journey toward a more meaningful and purposeful life. You can pick up your copy today from our website. That's ClearViewBC.org. Or you can grab both books on Amazon, Apple Books, and Audible.

That's 30 Days Through a Crisis and 30 Days to a New Beginning by Abaddon and Nicole Shaw. And if you have any questions or comments, please let us know. We'll be back after this. We'll be back after this. We'll be back after this. We'll be back after this. Welcome back to Clear View Today with Dr. Abaddon Shaw, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com. Or if you have any questions or suggestions for new topics, send us a text to 252-222-5028. We'll be back after this. We'll be back after this. Welcome back to Clear View Today with Dr. Abaddon Shaw, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com.

Or if you have any questions or suggestions for new topics, send us a text to 252-582-5028. That's right. We are chugging right along through this fantastic week. Happy Thursday to everybody listening. Dr. Shaw, happy Thursday to you.

Happy Thursday to you as well. You said chugging right along, and all I could think of was just Thomas the Train. Choo choo! Oh, I thought you were going to say the Muppets when they were like moving right along. Oh, no, but now that's stuck in my head. Yeah, that was a great song too.

We are here in the Clear View Today studio with Dr. Abaddon Shaw, Ph.D. and New Testament textual criticism professor, Carolina University author, full-time pastor, host of today's show, also former youth pastor. A lot of people don't know that. Yes, yes. A lot of people don't know that. When you organized events for the youth, we talked about this in the intro a little bit, how did you, because they have to be planned.

Yes. The students need instruction. Dr. Shaw and I have talked about this, but if you don't show up with a plan, the teenagers will quickly implement their plan. That applies not just in youth ministry but school, because I was a principal. I would tell the teachers, you don't have a plan?

They'll have one, and then you'll be frustrated, so you better have one. How did you bring your structured planning for activities in and reconcile that with like the chaotic wackiness that is the American teenager? Oh, wow. Well, the thing I had to learn was to have fun. One of the things that Ryan and I talked about when he first came to Clear View was, I want our youth to have fun, because sometimes you have this mindset that, well, we're going to guys get into the word, and this is serious business, and this is, and some kids maybe, but most are like, I don't want to be here tonight. Yeah. Yeah, this is not something I'm passionate about.

This guy is. Maybe my parents are, but I'm not having fun. So having fun is critical.

And then as they're laughing, as they're having a good time, you're giving them the truth. So I had to spend time really planning out how much fun activity we're going to have, how much teaching time, what is my lesson, what is my topic going to be. So all these things were part of the planning process.

That's true. I didn't know these things in the beginning, but in time I learned, but then by that time, I was already transitioning into being a pastor. And so a lot of things kind of got left. One thing that the two of you guys do very well that I think personally is a weakness for me is that you keep things new. You keep things new and fresh with the students.

You are always keeping things new and fresh from the pulpit. It's so important because we struggle with the oldness of life. We struggle with the oldness of our sin problem. And so newness of life, what does that mean? How does that work where we are free to live the life that God promises us?

How can we do that? Because there is a struggle. On one hand, you want to, but on the other hand, you can't. And so the newness of life is promised to us, and we're going to talk about that today. Well, there's a sermon that you preached, a series that you preached, really, a couple years back called The First Gospel, which we're going to turn into a book. And there's a big part in that where you talk about, in order to have the newness of life, you have to remember that it's not just about being forgiven from your sin, you're also delivered from sin. The power of sin. And there's a big difference that I think a lot of Christians, myself included, have overlooked.

Right, right. And Paul talks about this in Romans chapter 6. He says, what shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?

Certainly not. How shall we who die to sin live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we were buried with him through baptism into that death that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, here's the phrase we just started the show with, even so we also should walk in the newness of life. And it sounds great, but people don't realize the deep doctrine that is behind the newness of life. Because I think we all feel like, I just want life to feel new and exciting. I asked Jesus into my heart, so boom, my life is new. I have that experience, that newness of life. And when it starts to feel old or feel like it's not new and exciting anymore, then maybe something's wrong with me. So the question for our listeners and our viewers are, do you find yourself living in defeat? Do you find yourself frustrated with your constant battles against old hangups and old habits?

Do you wish you had the newness of life that is promised in the Bible? So if so, keep listening. This is the episode for you. You came to the right place.

Good luck, my friends. So it begins with chapter five of Romans. All right, so this episode is sort of focused on Romans.

Right. Chapter five, six, and seven. So in chapter five of Romans, Paul explains to us that all of us have come into this world sharing everything in the Adam's family plan. It's like the dum, da da da dum.

It's like you go to the... I was thinking about more the phone plan. Yeah, yeah, I like the share everything Adam's family plan.

No, I'm just kidding. When I hear Adam's family, I think the same exact thing. You see, under this family plan, Adam signed us up for the physical and spiritual death, judgment and condemnation, and sinners by nature. I mean, this is what we are signed up for.

That's crazy. He's signed right on the dotted line. You don't have an option, right, when you come into this world. We're locked into this plan, and that's why lost people do what they do. Sometimes even saved people live under the old family plan, and they try to stop, but it doesn't work. And that's what Paul is talking about here in Romans chapter 6 starting in verse 1.

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? So they try to be gentle and loving, but end up getting angry and bitter. They try to please God the old way, and they fall every time.

They try to live free, but they're still bound by old habits and addictions. Jesus came into this world to bring us a second share everything family plan. That's the one I was going to say, because this other one's non-transferable.

It's non-refundable. You got to get out of Depravity Mobile. Yeah, I'm locked in. I love that. All right, man, that was pretty good.

I had a joke I was working up towards, but now I just got to bow out. And in that plan, the new plan, he signed us up for abundance of grace, gift of righteousness, justification of life. In a sense, when God sees me, he sees Christ. And righteousness, or righteous by nature.

Thank goodness. Thank goodness he sees Christ and not me. And you said this even in a sermon a couple weeks back, where we don't have to Christian harder. I think you actually coined it.

Yeah, Ryan coined that, yeah. You don't have to be a Christian harder. And that's kind of like what you were talking about. Like in the new year, I'm going to do this, and I'm going to do that, and I fail every time. Right. So fight the urge to live by rules.

Fight the urge to just have a list of to-do's. Because yes, you need the to-do's, and we can come to that, but they can only happen after the foundation is laid out. After you have the house, then you can furnish the right furniture.

That's right, that's right. But if you start furnishing without having the house, you may be in the wrong house, you may be in somebody else's house. I thought this was my house. You may be in a house that is condemned.

I mean, think about that. You're in a condemned house. There's a big sign out there that says, do not enter. And you're going in there and trying to put in all the nice things, and cleaning it up.

And somebody comes and says, you got to get out of this, because it's going to fall on you. We did that as teenagers. I don't know if y'all did that, but we were so bored with nothing to do. We would go into like old decrepit houses and just hang out. There was nothing we were doing, just wanted to be vagrants. I don't know why we did that.

But that's kind of the model that we use for ourselves in our spiritual lives. We set up shop and we're trying to like, just make this house work. Imagine if you guys had done that, and you were like moving your beds in, and set up an Xbox. Guys, this house is about to fall in. This house is not the place for you.

It's done. This is not the one for you. And so Paul's question, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? The answer comes back, certainly not. How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? You are dead to sin. Think about that. You are dead to sin. I can't go back to it. It's not that I shouldn't.

Right. Now think about yourself in a cemetery. People are afraid to go to a cemetery, but think about it.

That's the safest place you can be because there's nothing but dead people. Ain't nobody gonna rise up and hurt you. No one can hurt you.

You may hurt yourself, but no one else will. And then Paul says in verse three, this is Romans six, verse three, or do you not know? So what do you not know? What are the facts that Paul wants us to know? Do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?

So think about that. The heart of salvation. We're all born in the family of Adam, the family of sin. We have a sin problem and we have a sin nature. Jesus took care of that first problem by becoming our substitute, right?

Right. And then comes the second problem, my sin nature, and he also took care of that. It's the blood that cleanses us from the debt of sin, or sins, but we still carry the family germ of sin, okay? So blood has cleansed the debt, but the family germ of sin is still there, passed down to us from Adam. What we need is to get out of the family of sin. Debt of sin, family of sin, two different things. The blood cannot get us out of the family. The only way to get out of the family is by death.

I talked about that in one of our services. You have to die. So Jesus not only died as our substitute, but he also died as our representative. Because when he died, and kind of like we said, that baptism is a picture of that, us dying with him. It's not us spiritually dying really, but it's a symbol of what has happened within us because we died with him.

Right, because he's our federal head. Right. So he died, and we are in him, we also died. Died to what?

Died to the family of sin. Right. And so we try to suppress sin by fighting it, and I'm not going to get angry. I'm not going to get angry.

Today's I'm going to be great. I'm not going to be angry. And you may not be for a little while, but sooner or later somebody does something, says something, and there's the anger. What God does is he deals with our sin nature by removing the sinner, not removing the sin. He removes the sinner. It's not enough just to die from the old family. You also have to be born again into the new family. I guess that's where the newness of life comes in.

Right. Being born again, there's a new life. That just as, this is Romans 6-4, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. So not only did we die in Christ, but on the third day we were also raised with him. We died in him as the last Adam, and we live in him as a second man.

So we don't, that's a good point, because we don't have to do anything to try to manifest feelings of newness of life. We've already been raised. It's been done. It's a reality. It's been done.

What has been done has to be by faith accepted. Right. Right. Right. Right. So it's not hard to take the heart that we, take to heart that we died with him.

It's hard to understand that we are alive with him. Wow. That's true. Yeah. That's deep. That's an important clarification for us.

Yeah, Romans always does this to me, where I'm like, I'm trying to, not that I'm trying to follow along as losing me, but every verse is so packed with something rich that by the time I digest this one, there's something else coming in that's building on it. Right. It says right here in verse five, for if we have been united together in the likeness of his death, remember we talked a lot about the union with Christ in our series at Clearview.

Right. So if we have been united together in the likeness of his death, certainly also, we also shall be in the likeness of his resurrection. So what is interesting is the imagery that Paul uses to describe this death. It's baptism.

So I've explained that many times. Baptism is my death, burial, and resurrection with Christ. We actually just had an entire episode on baptism last week. That's right. So if you're listening to the show, you can scroll back not very far and find that episode. It was one of our best I think we've ever done. Go check that one out.

It's super helpful. So now you're no longer a slave to sin. Knowing this, this is Romans 6, 6, knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin. Someone says, why do I still sin if my old nature has been crucified?

Now think for a moment. When a person dies, it does not mean that they are eradicated. Yeah, it's not a Star Wars thing where they just fade away and become a force ghost. Gone.

Yeah, they're just gone. No, the body is gone, but the spirit lives on, either before God, in heaven, or in hell, waiting for judgment. Our old nature is no longer alive in the flesh. It is only alive in the spirit.

We have been set free. Verse 7, for he who has died has been freed from sin. The spirit is still there, but no longer in the body. So God deals with our sin nature by making us weaker and weaker, by removing the sinner, by putting us to death. This is the process of what it means to die to self. And you don't have to go crucify yourself.

You have to simply reckon it. So listen to what it says in verse 8. Now if we died with him, this is past tense, if we died with Christ, we believe that we should also live with him. Knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more, death no longer has dominion over him, for the death that he died, he died to sin once for all, for the life that he lives, he lives to God.

So what do we do with this knowledge? Remember it all began with knowing this. Verse 11, likewise you also reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. This is the big action step.

This is a huge point. Here's all the explanation, now here in verse 11, this is what you do. God is not asking you to go crucify yourself. He does tell you to pick up your cross and follow me because now you're learning what it means to be dead. Now God is crucifying things in your life. He's saying reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin. In the south, that means something a little... I reckon I'll be there, it's not that. Reckon is a counting term that means calculated, accepted as a fact. That you're dead to sin.

Right, by faith, except that you are one with Christ. And just know when you go in that direction there's going to be a fight. The enemy will tell you all kinds of things about you and how horrible you are and what you did last night and how you were about a month ago and how you were this morning.

I mean he will fight you tooth and nail and we have to keep our eyes on Christ. So this is something that you and I talked about I think a couple weeks back. It was off mic but we were talking about... I think we were actually talking about Romans in the sanctuary after Saturday Night Service. One of the things that I do or that I used to do, I still sometimes do and I think a lot of Christians do is they misappropriate or they link together spiritual things and metaphorical things. When we talk about spiritual truths and spiritual transformations it's a metaphor for a different way of thinking. And I guess here the temptation is Paul is saying, hey look, just think as though you've died. Pretend like you've died. Or act as though you've been made alive in Christ. And what he's really saying is, know that it's a fact.

Right, reckon it is done. Just the way you reckoned it a fact when you got saved. Wasn't that a fact for you? Like, I know I'm saved and so Jesus is my Savior, my King. How do you know that? By faith I believe it. So also by faith believe that you died, you were buried, you have risen to walk in the newness of life.

It's a fact, it's done. Well it's hard to do that. How about your salvation, is that hard too? No, no, no, I get that.

But in the same way you have to get this. And then know that you have died in Christ, you're alive with Him, now that you have reckoned this, what's next? Your mortal body belongs to God. Your eyes, ears, mouth, hands, feet, every inch of you is God's. So that's why in 1 Corinthians 6 Paul says, do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? You were bought at a price, therefore glorify God in your body and your spirit which are God's. And verse 13 says, and do not present yourself, your members, as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. And that's everything, your mouth, your ears, your eyes, what you watch, what you hear, what you speak, even what you eat, where you go, what you touch, all these things now belong to God. So you want to use them, get permission from God. Yeah, and that changes the newness of life conversation because it's not just, man, I'm trying to stop doing these things and I'm trying to do better, I'm trying to live a godly life. You're misunderstanding the conversation. It's Christ in you that is bringing that newness of life.

It's already happened, it's already reality. You need to wrap your mind around it, but it's already been applied to you. You'll hear people say things like, if you want to be saved, you have to become a slave of Christ. Some of my heroes say that, and it's just not biblical. It sounds good, but it's not biblical. God does not want my old self that was a slave of sin. Are you willing to be a slave? I had this guy come to me with the book from a famous preacher, who I respect very much, but on that matter I think he gets it wrong. He said, now, Pastor Shaw, I'm going to tell you something. I'm going to tell you something. A slave, that's where it is.

You have to be a slave. And I'm like, do you really think God wants your old, dead, sinful, slavish thing to be part of his life that he wants to use in changing this world? He wants that which has passed from death to resurrection. He wants an heir. He wants me to present to him that which already belongs to him. That's a big difference.

That's huge. So when I hear someone say, my money or my house or my time, my job, my body, there's a problem. Either you are still lost in sin because you say that, or you don't get it. If everything is now his, I'm no longer to sin because these eyes, mouth, hand, feet belong to him. We are his slaves. So what new now is his. Right.

Right. And it's more than we can get into on a 30-minute show, but there's so many. I want to link our other show, our other podcast, in the description notes of this. It's Sermons by Abaddon Shaw, Ph.D. We're going to link it.

The one that we just did a couple of weeks ago, we'll link the one that this one is based off of because they're so deep and because we just don't have the time to dive into them as we want to. But on that show, they're completely unfiltered and they're completely not uncut, but you know what I'm saying. It's the full thing. You're getting the full message. There's more in there. There's more in there. It's a great resource for you to grow in your understanding of what it means to walk in the newness of life that's already been applied to you because that's our heart here on the Clear View Today show is that we want you to grow in your faith and your knowledge of who God is.

That's right. If you enjoyed today's episode, if it was helpful for you, write in and let us know 252-582-5028. You can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com. Be a part of what God is doing through our Clear View Today show.

God's moving in powerful ways. We want you to be a part of that. Scroll to the bottom, click that donate now button and become part of our Today show family.

We want to encourage you to visit MightyMuscadine.com. Use that promo code TODAY, that's T-O-D-A-Y when you check out and a portion of those proceeds come right back here to the Clear View Today show. What's coming up tomorrow, Jon? Tomorrow we've got a very special guest on the Clear View Today show.

Oh, he's actually, this is crazy. He's calling me right now. Hello.

Should I answer it? Sure. Hello.

This is Jon on the Clear View Today show. Dr. Questions himself? Dr.

Questions. Hand me that hat right there. Hand me that hat. One second. I got the hat. Yes, sir. I've got the hat right here. We're doing Friday lightning round questions tomorrow right here on the Clear View Today. So same time, same station. Make sure you tune in. We love you guys. We'll see you tomorrow on Clear View Today. Bye.