Allan Scott's Blog

2 Covenants, 2 Glories: A sermon by Allan Scott preached on 1/9/2011

 

Allan_scott_two_covenants_two_glories_jan_9_2011

 

Do Christians have a sin nature?

Question:

I know we still sin - just ask my kids! But, the old man teaching .... I wonder about that. If we are crucified with Christ, are we still sinning in the old man, or the new man??

Answer:

Wow what an amazing question!

Remember that in the beginning Adam had no sin nature. He had complete open fellowship with God and was perfect. No sin nature! Yet even though he was a sinless man with no sin nature, he sinned. How was that possible? He still could be tempted by the lust of the eye's, the flesh and the pride of life...even without a sin nature! When Adam disobeyed there was a spiritual change inside of him. He became dead to God, alive to sin. Had a evil heart and sin was living inside of him. Now man's default condition is to be just like Adam because we have all come from him. Adam lost his position before God and acquired a sin nature because of HIS OWN DISOBEDIENCE. now all humans have a sin nature because of ADAMS disobedience.

but then.......

A second Adam came. He was like the first, with no sin nature. His Father was the Holy Spirit (Adam came straight from God as well), thus no sin nature was passed to Him! Like Adam He was tempted with the pride of life, lust of the eyes and flesh (40 days in the wilderness). Everyplace where Adam failed, Jesus succeeded. He obeyed perfectly under the law for 33 years, and died with no sin nature. When He died, our old man died with Him. He became our sin, and we became his Righteousness. The life He died to sin He died once and for all (and we were in HIM! Gal 2:20) Thank God that Jesus (second Adam) was successful where first Adam had failed! Therefore we died to sin once and for all! To sinning-no ( it says that Jesus died to sin-what sin did He die too?...He never sinned!), but to the condition of death(sin nature) that we were in, in first Adam!

At the cross you and I (our sin nature, old man and wicked heart) were baptized into His death and done away with. We were also buried with Him and rose with Him in newness of life! The lineage of Adam had been broken. Just like Adam cursed mankind with a sin nature because of his one act of disobedience, Jesus has blessed you and I with a sinless new God nature BY HIS ONE ACT OF OBEDIENCE. Our sinless nature is not because of our obedience and disobedience, but because of Christs obedience.

Adam lost it for all of us when he disobeyed. Christ won it back for us when HE OBEYED. So you have a sinless nature totally dependent on the perfect performance of Jesus Christ. Now we know that someone with a new nature can still be tempted and sin (Adam was tempted and sinned and Jesus was tempted and did not sin). You and I can still be tempted and sin even without a sin nature. The difference is, we will never lose our sinless nature, because it is not ours to lose. It is Christs. He earned it..It was His act of obedience!

The best part of this is, sin is no longer our master. We can still be tempted, but we have victory because Christ already won! We are no longer victims of sin. We do not have to obey it...It is not our lord...A person with a sin nature can't help sinning...it is part of their nature. You and I have a God-nature (as an act of grace....Christ in us). We desire to do good works because our default setting is to act with a nature that comes from from heaven! And even if we do sin, our nature and position in Him is secure, because it was His performance...not ours! We have a faithful high priest who has made us forever accepted in His presence, because he was rejected. God turned His face from Christ so that He would never turn it away from you!!!!! Christ was cursed so you could be blessed, with acceptance, blessing and a new nature. Unlike Adam-you will never lose your new nature because of your messing up. Yours is kept by faith in Christ and faith in HIS PERFORMANCE!

Christ was the firstborn of many sons and daughters of God...His Father was the Holy Spirit. When He rose, many Sons and Daughters transferred from the sinful lineage of Adam into the sinless new lineage of God, with the Holy Spirit as there Father! Do you think Gods lineage has any sin associated with it? NO way! And you are of that lineage!!! Good news! You are a child of the KING!

Pure and Blameless!

God has made every believer pure and blameless forever! He did this for us on the cross. In the past! Before we ever committed a single sin, Christ died for all of them!

God never intended for His people to live in guilt and shame. The proof lies in Hebrews 10 where it speaks of why the old covenant was failing...(Law = blessing or cursing based on man's ability to obey or dis-obey).

Hebrews 10:1&2

¹The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship. ²If it could, would they not have stopped being offered? For the worshippers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins.

The law could never take away our guilt, shame and sins! It still can't today! As a matter of fact, the the Bible says that the law was given so that sinning would INCREASE!

Romans 5:20

The law was added so that the trespass might increase.

So the law was added to increase sinning AND it could ( and still can't) never take away our shame, guilt and sin! ACTUALLY, the law was meant to be an annual reminder of sins!!!

BUT, the new covenant (grace) is superior to the old covenant (law)...Why?

Hebrews 10: 9b-14

He sets aside the first to establish the second. ¹⁰And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.¹¹Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. ¹²But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. ¹³Since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool, ¹⁴because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

Even our sinning can't reverse the fact that those in Christ have BEEN MADE perfect! The old covenant was an annual reminder of sins. In the new covenant there is NO REMINDER of sins! God is not foolish! He did away with the old because it could not make the recipients of that law holy and blameless in His sight! In this new covenant we have been made blameless and perfect forever! Hence the lack of need for sacrifices for sin..Because by one sacrifice, God has cleared us of our guilt FOREVER!

I am not condoning sinning! I am simply stating that guilt, shame and the law will not decrease sinning...They will increase sinning! God's love, power, acceptance and freedom in Christ will teach us to stop sinning (not through manipulation and guilt..THE LAW). Only by His loving presence in our lives built on the foundation of this superior, everlasting covenant! On the basis of this we enter boldly before the throne OF GRACE TO OBTAIN MERCY IN TIME OF NEED...Why do we enter boldly? Because we are pure, blameless and holy. NO FEAR OF JUDGEMENT FOR US FRIENDS!

God will never put anything YOU that He already put on HIS SON on the cross! 

Those He Foreknew...

We come into this world with a mind and understanding that automatically revolves around us. That is the state of the fallen world and the fallen human race. It is why Satan was ousted from heaven, He said "I am god" and " I will be like God". He wanted to be the center.

This is the sin that will keep every condemned human out of heaven. When we in our own mind trump God's righteous judgments and create a god or a relative morality that suits us. We say in our heart, "It's my world and I create the rules that suit me!"

The problem is that the whole world is wired to work His way, for His glory. He is the center of everything. Not us.

When we come to a saving knowledge Jesus Christ, the Word says that God supernaturally baptizes (immerses) us into Christ body. That means everything that Christ experienced we experienced. When He died, we died. When he rose, we rose.

Rom 6:2  By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?
Rom 6:3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
Rom 6:4  We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
Rom 6:5  For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.
Rom 6:6  We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.
Rom 6:7  For one who has died has been set free from sin.
Rom 6:8  Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.
Rom 6:9  We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him.
Rom 6:10  For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God.
Rom 6:11  So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

As a new creature, God has killed the sinner....that is, God has killed us! Now it is no longer we that live, but Christ in us, the hope of Glory!

Gal 2:20  I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

Col 1:27  To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

Now the problem is this...We have a new man, no sin nature (it died with Christ!) and Christ is in us...BUT, we have the old mind that has been programed to think about things from our perspective (where we are the center of the universe). Modern day Christian thinking and teaching is full of this logic and reasoning! It is natural....but in the Bible it says that there is a way that seems right to a man, but that way leads to death.

God is calling us to have an understanding (through the power of His Spirit) where HE is the center. This is totally against the grain of everything that we have known. That is why Paul said,

Eph 5:26  that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water word...

Our minds must be renewed and cleansed. Our  ways of thinking have to be brought in line with the way that HE sees. We need His understanding and HIS reality. After all, His understanding and reality are the only true understanding and reality....

Sometimes this is challenging. This however is the definition of the word repent: to have a change of mind....

That being said, read the following scriptures:

Tit 1:2  in hope of eternal life, which God, who never lies, promised before the ages began....

Rom 8:28-30 
And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.
For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.

1Co 1:9  God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Eph 1:4-5 
even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love
he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will,
to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.

Psa 139:13-17
You are the one who put me together inside my mother's body,
and I praise you because of the wonderful way you created me. Everything you do is marvelous! Of this I have no doubt.
Nothing about me is hidden from you! I was secretly woven together deep in the earth below, but with your own eyes you saw my body being formed. Even before I was born, you had written in your book everything I would do. Your thoughts are far beyond my understanding, much more than I could ever imagine.

Eph 2:10  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Now ask the following questions:

Did you choose God or did He choose you?

Who gets free choice, God or you?

If you get the choice, who is at the center of your theology? Is it God or you?


Rom 11:36  For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.

All things that God initiates HE gets the glory for. All things that man initiates man gets the glory for....So who initiates salvation?

It is God...He chooses...AND HE CHOSE YOU IF YOU HAVE CHRIST IN YOU.

Your whole christian walk is designed to work when He is at the center working out His will in you. Your ability to change and grow even is up to HIM. He started it and HE will finish it. The question is not weather you can fail...BUT CAN GOD FAIL....Your salvation is not your to loose! ITS HIS!

HE STARTED, HE WILL FINISH IT! YOU RECEIVE IT! IT IS ALL ABOUT HIM AND HIS ABILITY TO GET THE JOB IN YOU DONE! THE TRUTH IS THAT IT WAS DONE BEFORE IT STARTED! Before the creation of the world....

When we put God in the center, it takes us out of the center. He gets the Glory and we get to relax! We are CHOSEN IN HIM FROM BEFORE THE BEGINNING OF THE WORLD. ALL OF YOUR DAYS WERE PLANNED.

David said:

Psa 139:4
 
Before I even speak a word, you know what I will say,
and with your powerful arm you protect me from every side.
I can't understand all of this! Such wonderful knowledge is far above me.

Psa 139:13-17

You are the one who put me together inside my mother's body,
and I praise you because of the wonderful way you created me. Everything you do is marvelous! Of this I have no doubt.
Nothing about me is hidden from you! I was secretly woven together deep in the earth below, but with your own eyes you saw my body being formed. Even before I was born, you had written in your book everything I would do. Your thoughts are far beyond my understanding, much more than I could ever imagine.

The Gospel, Powerful or Powerless?

"I am not ashamed of the Gospel, it is the power of God unto salvation for all who believe..." Are we seeing the power of the Gospel demonstrated around us? The true saving power of the Gospel was not revealed unto me until after the first 6 years of my Christian walk. I lived under condemnation (With out even realizing it!) and constantly tried to gain the approval of God through the things that I was doing. I had the spirit of an orphan.

Little did I know that the Gospel had the power to completely set me free from sin and guilt and condemnation! The power to overcome addictions! The power to really set people free! When the complete Gospel is preached, people are really set free! There is a victorious Christian life through Christ! We can walk in complete freedom and rest with Christ! He is truly the Prince of Peace.