Thank you so much for joining us on the line of fire. Michael Brown here. We're going to have an unforgettable day today on the broadcast as we talk about the difference between saints and sinners. And you're going to be infused today with faith and with truth and with courage. And I believe for many, it's going to help.
Start to remove that cloud of condemnation, that burden that always keeps you down. It's going to start to lift as you get showered with truth from the word of God. That dry ground is going to start to become fertile and wet and rich, and plants and flowers and life can grow out of the soil of your heart as that cloud of condemnation gets off of your back. Remember, all this month we're teaching out of the book, Go and Sin No More. Every single lesson that we've had so far, every single scripture we've quoted, every single quote, they're all found in this book.
Thelineoffire.org, excuse me, in the book, Go and Sit No More, which is at thelineoffire.org. While you're there, first thing, if you're not getting our frontline newsletter, our equipping life-changing newsletter, right there on the homepage, sign up. It says subscribe, click there to get it.
Okay, here's what I'm gonna do. Since the way that the New Testament addresses us as believers is saints, not sinners. Holy ones. Those set apart to God. Called holy.
and called to be holy. Again, look in 1 Corinthians 1. Paul doesn't say to all the sinners in Corinth, and he could have, because there's a lot of sin there. But to the Saints in Current. to the holy ones in Corinth.
set apart to be holy, called to be holy. What what I want to underscore is that we should have the mentality Not that we are sinners, miserable sinners who always do the wrong thing, who never get it right, who are always getting God grieved. We should have the mentality we're saints. We've been washed with the blood. The Holy Spirit lives within us.
We're God's children. We've been set apart as holy now. We're called to live out holiness. That's our identity. Sin is not the rule of our lives.
Sin is the exception to the rule.
So, anytime I'm reading a verse, Right. And I'm reading a verse. Every time it says wicked, sinner, anything negative, I'm going to make that that, really negative. And if it's a word like righteous or godly, I'm going to make that very, very positive. And I'm going to ask you, okay, who are we as God's people?
As New Testament Believers. Who are we? When you read Psalm 1, Right? And there's a contrast between the wicked and the godly. Which ones are we?
Right? It's very clear.
So, Psalm 1. Verse 1. And verse five. Blessed, truly happy is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, or stand in the way of sinners, or sit in the seat of mockers. Therefore, the wicked will not stand in judgment, nor sinners in the assembly of the Righteous.
Yeah, that's contrast there. Psalm twenty-six. Verses 9 through 11. Do not take away my soul along with sinners. my life with bloodthirsty men And whose hands are wicked schemes, whose right hands are full of bribes.
But I lead a. Blameless life. Redeem me. and be merciful to me. See, we're not the sinners, the wicked, the ungodly, the unrighteous.
We're the believers. As we read in the Psalms, that's where we identify. Psalm thirty seven. Verses 37. And thirty, eight.
Consider The blameless. Observe the upright There is a future for the Men of peace. But all sinners will be destroyed. The future of the Wicket. will be cut off.
We're not the sinners, we're not the wicked. We're the righteous, the upright, the blameless. We've gotta renew our minds, friends. Psalm fifty-one. Verses 12 and 13.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation. Grant me your willing heart to sustain me. Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you.
Now that we are renewed in the Lord and forgiven, we'll teach. The sinners and the transgressors, your wife. That's not who we are anymore. We're now your people. We now teach them.
Again, we go on with hundreds of verses. Psalm 104. Verses thirty-four and thirty-five. Psalm 104. Verses 34 and 35.
May my meditation be pleasing to him as I rejoice in the Lord. But may sinners vanish from the earth, and the wicked be no more.
So That's the difference, right? May my meditation be pleasing to the Lord. I'm not one of the sinners. and not one of the wicked. Let's keep going.
Proverbs. We go over from Psalms to Proverbs. Proverbs 1:10. My son. If sinners had entice you.
Do not give in to them.
Well that's not who we are. That's uh what we do. We're not l like those people. We've been changed. Proverbs 11.
31. Quoted in 1 Peter 4. Proverbs 11, 31. If the righteous receive their due on earth, how much more the ungodly? And the center.
See, we are contrasted. Our mentality is: we are the righteous in Jesus, not the ungodly, not the sinner.
Some of you are like, but if I think like that, it won't be true. If you're born again in Jesus, it's true. You stand as righteous in God's sight.
Now, if you're living in willful unrepentant sin and casting off his yoke, you begin on your face and plead for mercy. But for everyone else seeking to live for the Lord, Honor the Lord? Please the Lord. You need to identify as righteous before the Lord, as set apart as holy. as one is the upright.
And that will help you do the right thing. That'll help you think differently. That'll help you cast off this joke of I'm just a bad person, always does bad things. It does not help produce godliness or holiness. Proverbs thirteen six Righteousness.
guards the man of integrity, but wickedness overthrows the sinner. Proverbs 13. 21 and 22. That was Proverbs 13, 6.
Now Proverbs 13. 21 and 22. Misfortune pursues the sinner. But prosperity is the the reward of the righteous. A Good man.
Leaves an inheritance for his children's children, but a sinner's wealth is stored up for the Righteous. Oh yeah, we can go on and on. Proverbs 23, 17. Do not let your heart envy sinners. but always be zealous for the fear.
of the Lord. Or Ecclesiastes. Ecclesiastes 2. 26. to the man who pleases him.
God gives wisdom, knowledge, and happiness, but to the sinner He gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who Pleases God. You see the contrast there. Ecclesiastes 7:26. Which one are you? Which category are you in?
If you're a believer, you're in the category of the one who pleases God, not the sinner, not the rebel. Ecclesiastes 7 26. I find more bitter than death The woman who is a snare whose heart is a trap, and whose hands are chains. The man who Pleases God, will escape her. But the sinner She will ensnare.
Alright, let's keep going. Ecclesiastes 9. Chew. All share a common destiny, meaning death. the righteous and the wicked, the Good?
and the bad, the clean and the unclean. Those who offer sacrifices, those who do not. As it is with the... Good man?
So with a center. as is those who take oaths, so those who are afraid to take them. You see the contrast. Throughout the word, if you're reading the Old Testament, Old Testament, Old Testament, Saint, sinner, Saint, sinner, Saint Sinner. Wicked, godly, wicked, godly, back and forth.
And you're constantly identifying with the godly. You're constantly identifying with the righteous. You're constantly identifying with those who fear God. and the wicked, the sinner, the transgressor. That's the world.
That's who you used to be.
Now carry that mentality over into your own life today. God's not looking at you as, you wicked sinner and transgressor.
Now the only time, let me say it again, in the New Testament. where believers are addressed as sinners, as in Jacob, James, the fourth chapter. Because they were living in adultery. They were living in sin. They were oppressing the poor.
They were doing wicked things.
So they're addressed as sinners.
Some would even claim not all of them are even believers and are being addressed as sinners. But the way when we are written to by God, even with words of rebuke, He's writing to the holy ones, those who've been set apart. In the prophets, a few more verses. Isaiah 1. 27 and 28.
Zion will be redeemed with justice. Penitent ones with righteousness, but rebels. Sinners both be broken, and those who forsake the Lord will perish. You're just turning in, you're saying, what are you doing? I'm emphasizing the difference in tone and the beauty of the righteous and the godly versus the ugliness.
of the rebel those who rebel. I mean, I've got verse after verse I could give you. Remember the New Testament, John 9. Verses 30 to 33: The blind man, now healed, talking to the religious leaders. You don't know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes.
We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly man who does his will. Nobody has ever heard of opening the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing. God does not listen to sinners.
The one who healed me is not a sinner. Sinners are the rebels. Sinners are the unrighteous. Sinners are the ones who reject God. If you are following Jesus, your primary self-identity should not be, I'm just a sinner.
It should not be your primary self-identity. If you're struggling and God's showing you your flesh, yes, that can be intense and He's bringing us to repentance and cleansing. The refiner's fire is at work and junk's coming up. But it's because there's gold and silver in there that he's purging away all the dross and all the junk.
So so listen to what Paul writes, Romans 5, 6 and 8. You see At just the right time when we were still powerless, crews Christ died for thee. ungodly. That's who we were. That's who we were.
God demonstrates His own love for us in this, while we were still sinners. Christ died for us when we were sinners.
Now he's made us holy. through the cross, now we're to live. that holiness out. All right, we're going to keep going with New Testament witness. Stay right here.
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Call 1-800-771-5584. one eight hundred seven seven one fifty five eighty four. or online at T R I V I T A Tri Vita dot com Thanks for tuning in, friends, to the line of fire broadcast. Michael Brown, my delight and joy to be here with you five days a week to help equip you and empower you, to help you stand strong on the front lines. Remember, listen to what Jacob, James, writes in chapter 5, verses 19 and 20.
My brothers if one of you should wander from the truth, and some one should bring him back, Remember this. Whoever turns a sinner From the air of his way, Will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins. In other words, this is someone who is a brother and sister who has now fallen away. They are living like a sinner. They are on the path of death.
They're not one of us anymore. If you can bring them back. If you can bring them back, right? They're no longer going to be sinners.
Now they're going to be in right relationship with God.
So Here's Here's what we have to do. As we deal with sin, as we think about sin. On the one hand, Don't play games with it. Don't play games with it. It's hard to feel free.
It's hard to experience the joy and the love and the goodness of God. It's hard to walk in. And in real liberty and the fullness of our inheritance in the Lord. If if if we're playing games with sin. because you're going to feel unclean.
And you're not going to enjoy intimate fellowship with God, and His joy won't be your strength, and you won't have that sense of divine favor and approval. And oh, I got the wind at my back. No, you you won't have that. The wind won't be at your back. All right?
But if you deal ruthlessly with sin, where is you say no to it, you don't play games with it. It shows your seriousness about the Lord. Even if you fall the next day, Lord, I hate this. I want to please you and honor you. And i if if you want to then stay free from condemnation, You need to accept What God says.
You need to accept what God says. When he says, I forgive and I forget, I cast your sins into the depths of the sea. I will remember your sins no more. If the perfect God says that. The one who is infinitely above us in every way, beyond our wildest imaginations.
If he can say I've forgiven you, And I've forgotten. I remember your sin no more. Who are we to well? I I still think I have to think about it more. No, if you've dealt with it, if you hate it and you've turned from it, move on!
It doesn't define you anymore. And when you keep, oh, I feel so guilty about what I did. God forgave you. The people you sinned against forgave you. You're not holier than God.
You're not better than them. That's just our flesh. or the devil trying to drag us down.
So It's so important. As we move forward, That The holiness that we live out Is grace, empowered, and holiness. We're going to start on that tomorrow, and we're going to spend a lot of time on it next week as well. And then we've got a very intense message from a Hebrew word that'll... I pray and hope and believe will stay with you for life that could really save you from falling and from destruction.
But before we talk about grace-filled holiness even more, I just want to take a few more minutes. and deal with this self-condemned attitude. of never good enough. never working hard enough, not like others. Let me first address that last point, not like others.
You don't know what others go through. You don't know the struggles they have. Have you ever committed a certain sin as a believer, you struggle in a certain way, you think, I'm the only one who struggles with this, or I'm the only one who struggles with doubt, or I'm the only one who thinks thoughts like this?
Well no. Do other people know that you struggle with that? No.
Well, in the same way, you don't know that they may struggle with the very same things.
So don't think that everybody around you is perfectly holy. And you're the only one who ever struggles. You're the only one who ever thinks the wrong thought. You're the only one who who doesn't pray or or whatever, right?
So I don't mean that none of us pray. I mean, struggles to pray on a regular basis in a devoted way. Everybody struggles in one way or another. There are no perfect saints here on this earth yet. The only one that was perfect was Jesus that walked this earth.
All right, everyone else, we're works in progress.
So Compare yourself negatively to everybody else.
Now, if it's valid, if you know that someone is living differently than you, because you, you know, it's your spouse, or you work the same job and you're next to each other, okay, then be encouraged by their example. If God can help them, He can help you. But don't just assume that you're the only one that struggles. You're the only one that has a doubt. And sometimes from the pulpit, we don't share our humanity enough.
You know, we don't share struggles we've been through or things we've worked through or something that we're processing right now because. We don't want to discourage people.
Well, being honest, if you've gotten through the thing, if you've come out well, if you're processing it in a healthy way before God, that honesty can be liberating for others, all right? But here's the other thing. I want to encourage you to If you still struggle with those condemning thoughts, You know, obviously you ask God for help. And you begin to confess, Lord, you're good, you want to bless me, you want to do good to me, I'm your child, and understand that condemnation is doom. Condemnation is doom and gloom.
It's over. To hell with you. There is no condemnation for those who are in Messiah, Jesus. There is no sentence of doom over you. You have been redeemed from hell.
You are a heavenbound child of God. There is no condemnation in Him. Take a passage like Psalm 103. And read it over and over and over about the goodness of God. and the character of God.
And the mercy of God. It's It is It is so helpful, so life-giving, so life- changing The soul renewing, oh, bathed in the Father's love. Or Micah. Chapter 7. I believe beginning in verse 17, Who is a God like you?
He forgives sin, he overlooks the transgression of the remnant of his people, and says he doesn't hold on to his anger forever. because he delights in showing mercy. Just walk around the house saying, Lord, you delight in showing mercy. You delight in showing mercy. You take delight in your children.
I'm your kid. I'm your child. And then just pray that God changes your heart and mind as you renew your mind according to the word. It's beautiful. It's life-giving.
It's life-changing. And you can live free from condemnation. And when conviction comes because you've blown it, you run into the Father's arms. You don't run from them. You run to them.
Let him embrace you with his forgiveness. Let him teach you what he wants to teach you. Let him correct you where you need correcting because it's all life-giving from our God.
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