You In Christ and Christ In You

We are on lesson four, and today we're going to talk about the first Adam. Now we have, so far, distinguished that there are two men, two representative men. One's Adam, the other's Christ. And an awful lot of what we are is because of where we came from. and that we came from Adam, and that all that humanity is, is because they are descendants of Adam. The principle in Genesis is, like begets like. That not only is true from a physical standpoint, but also a spiritual standpoint.

So, my first question is, why is it important to know something personal about our history in Adam? Why is that important? See, I know you're not going to answer right away, so I always get a chance to get it. Find out that you have a sin nature? Why is it important for me to know something about what I am or what I got from Adam? That I have a history in Adam. My history in Adam goes back to the garden, right? When Adam was created and actually when he sinned. And so it's good for me to know about that so that I kind of know, actually maybe because it answers a lot of questions I might have about why I do what I do and why I am the way I am.

What I wrote down is that we cannot become what we already are in Christ until we know what we were in Adam. To know who we were in Adam we must discover what Adam was since he's the head of the human race into which we were born. Thus we can understand the nature and condition of the life that we inherited from him, the life that continues to indwell us even though we're believers. Adam is Adam. And one of the things I'm hoping that we're going to come to a conclusion at before we finish up this course is that Adam is such a dirty dog that you'll abandon him, that you won't trust him anymore, and that you won't rely on him. that you'll walk away from him. The reason that Adam is so important to study is because you discover in Adam characteristics and traits and tendencies that you have that came with you being a human being because you came from Adam.

So when you discover that what God has done is placed you in Christ, the same holds true on that side. And as we go through, especially over the next three or four weeks, I think hopefully we'll understand that our position in Adam is a key to our understanding of what our position is going to be in Christ. Now, there are three aspects of our relationship to Adam. What are they? And I said, the hint was all has to do with sin. It's a pretty hard question without much prompting. What do you think? What are three aspects of our relationship to Adam? Just off the top of your head, give me one.

What did I get from him? I got a sin nature, right? So I have, what I have is the Adamic nature, the sin nature, the old man self. I got all that from him, right? So that's one aspect. It's the nature of sin. Give me another one. How about our genealogy? That's good. Genealogy is really good because I have a position in Adam, don't I? Genealogical position.

He is the source of what I am in Adam. So I can say that I have a position of sin, Adam. He's my source. I have a nature of sin, the nature, Adam's nature. And the last one is that I have personal sins. In other words, I do what Adam did. I practice just what he did.

The question I love to ask is when did you become a sinner? When did you become a sinner? Born? When Adam sinned? When Adam sinned. When he sinned, you became a sinner. Why? Because you were in him. You see that? You don't commit a sin like Adam did in order to become a sinner. You commit sins because that's what you are. See that? I use the example a lot that my dog barks because he's a dog. He doesn't meow. He's not a cat.

I sin because I'm from Adam. It doesn't leave me a responsibility and I say, well Adam made me do it. No. I have the responsibility before God. So what's our position of sin? And the verse I gave you is Psalm 51.5. And David said, in sin did my mother conceive me. So my position, my fallen ancestor, each of us is born into a doomed humanity, because my mother conceived me in sin. A couple of other verses, that in Adam we are declared to be dead and trespass in sins, because we're in Adam.

In Ephesians 2.1, I'm sorry, in 1 Corinthians 15.22 it says, in Adam, all die. I remember when my son John was first born, Donna was convinced that he didn't have a sin nature. Guess what? He proved her wrong. He had one. And why did he have one?

Because I came from Adam, Donna came from Adam, John comes from Adam, all the way back. So the result of our position in Adam, which is our source, is that we're dead to God and we're alive unto sin. Now, hopefully this will help us understand, when we're dealing with non-believers, this is who they are. Now, they may act nice. You know, you've heard people talk about non-believers and say, oh, that guy would make a great Christian. Really? If he came from Adam, how great could it be? or he's just a terrific person, he should be a Christian. Well, if in Adam all die, all are separated from God, what qualification does any man have coming out of Adam to be a believer? None. None. Okay. Okay, but what should we say? Are we all rotten? Yeah, we should say you're a dirty rotten scoundrel.

Well, probably the highest profile evangelist in our time is Billy Graham. And if you listen to him, he preaches when he's sticking to what he should stick to, which is salvation. He always has the same scenario. He puts man in a position of being separated from God and condemned and trespassing sin. That's where he always starts. Then he gives you the Savior. A man doesn't need a Savior unless he knows he's lost. So that's where you start.

You start with the position, as we would call, position of sin. Now, there are people that you meet that I think have the gift of evangelism, and they're able to talk to people about their position in Adam and present the Savior, and boy, I'm not one of those people. I can't name five people that I know of that ever became a believer because of what I told them. I'm always telling them way too much.

Okay, but you planted the seed. Say that again? You planted the seed and then the Holy Spirit works in it. Yeah, maybe. You know, it's the Spirit's job to do that. One of them was my brother, who the Lord took home. That was enough. I was satisfied after that.

So, how would you describe your sin nature or our sin nature? How would you describe it? Now, we're talking about our position of sin, because it resulted in our being a sinful being, or we have a sinful life. So, when you have a sin nature, how does that nature work? What does the nature do? Does it not give you a propensity to sin? Do you understand what I mean by propensity?

You always are leaning that way. You're always tripping over it. Sin is dogging you all the time. You have this nature within you that is at home and comfortable with sinning. And that's the only thing it's comfortable with. I like to make the illustration that sometimes believers say, well, I wasn't walking in the Spirit, but I wasn't sinning. Nonsense. Adam sins 24-7. If you're in the flesh, you're sinning. Why? Because the source of what's coming out of you, if it's Adam, it's only what he is. And he sins all the time. And the biggest sin that he commits is not believing. See that?

So, our source, by nature, in Ephesians 2.3, by nature we are the children of wrath. I can't overemphasize enough. about having a sin nature and being from Adam results in a condition of fleshliness of natural, carnal, separated from God existence.

There isn't anybody outside of Christ that ever did one act that was acceptable to God. You buy that? You understand what I'm saying? There's not a single act by anyone who's not in Christ that was ever acceptable to God. Because the entire man, the entire nature is enmity with God. And every single human being that shows up on the planet, shows up, that's the way he is. That's his source.

In 1 Corinthians 2.14, the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God. Can't receive them, can't know them. Why? They are foolishness unto him. For he cannot know them. It doesn't matter if he wants to. He can't. Why can't he?

I keep thinking back, I think you gave an illustration once about operating systems of computers. Yeah, that's a good, that's a good example. I don't understand computers well enough, real well, but I understand if you have one operating system. Yeah, they don't. Operating systems don't gel. I have no idea what you said.

We're talking about sometimes an example I give is that if you have a Windows-based computer and it runs on a Windows-based operating system like Windows XP or Vista, you can't communicate with a Macintosh, an Apple computer, because the whole system is different. You run into that same problem sometimes with emails, where it comes in in a format like JPEG, and it won't line up with what you're trying to receive. So when you open it up, you get a series of little X's.

It's incompatible. It doesn't go together. The natural man cannot receive the things of God. It has nothing to do with whether he wants to or not, or whether he's trying to. The statement is that he can't, because he doesn't have the equipment to receive them. I just had one of those dish things put on my house. Until that thing was up there, I couldn't receive anything off the satellite.

Do you understand the example I'm giving? I can't walk around like this saying, are you picking up any signals? You know? Or get out my rake and hold it up, you know? Hook the wire up, honey, to the TV. I can't do it because it won't work. It's not compatible. The natural man is not compatible with the things of God. He cannot receive them. It's important to know that. We're moving up to question five. Let me finish four.

The fallen nature, an important part of John, if you look at John 3.6, the Lord said, That which is born of the flesh is flesh. Which means that the sin nature never changes. It will not improve. And we'll talk a lot about that next week. The sin nature cannot be improved. You can dump as much holy water as you want on it and send it to boot camp and make it do all kinds of spiritual push-ups. Guess what? It's sin.

J. Vernon McGee has a... see if I can... He says that if you went out in your backyard and you spread manure around to get the grass to grow green, he said you don't go out there and hope the manure gets better, you just leave it alone. The atom nature is by definition self-centered, which means it's totally against God and it's irreparable. The thing that God demands Think about this.

What's the first commandment? I'm the Lord thy God, and I shall not have false gods before me. Who's he talking about? Who's the false god? Me! The sin nature is the false god. Because the sin nature is totally self-absorbed and focused. And God says, wait a minute, I'm God.

And you can't have anything other than me. in your focus. So, the very first thing that we are in Adam is forbidden by the first commandment. That sort of makes you, why go to the rest of them already doomed, you know? What good is it? I'm condemned because I have a false god before me and it's my sin nature.

By nature. It isn't because I decided to be that way, it's the way I show up. For they that are after the flesh do pay attention to the things of the flesh. That's what they do. Because the carnal mind is absolute enmity against God and it's not subject to God's law, neither indeed can it be. It has nothing to do with want to, it can't be. So then that they that are after or come out of the flesh cannot please God. Can't please Him.

Paul said in Romans 7.14, I'm carnal in Adam, I'm sold under sin. So where do your personal sins come from? I gave you a hint, and I actually have a couple of verses. Where do your personal sins come from? From the sin nature? From the sin nature. Whose sin nature is it? It's mine. I own it. It's me.

In Romans 3.23 it says, All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.

We grew up to be sinners in practice and that by choice. Hence we were desperately in need of a Savior. Have any of you ever committed a sin you really didn't want to? Somebody forced you to do it? Yes. He really didn't want to do it. That's my point. Nobody held a gun to your head. Even if they threatened you, you went for it because you thought it was of some value. So if you went for it, it would mean that you are responsible for your actions, right? That's right, you are.

Now in James 1.14.15, James says, But every man is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. So, where did it come from? It came from his own desires and his own sin nature. It drew him away. And then when lust has conceived, it brings forth sin, and sin then, when it's faced, brings forth death.

So, to sum up the three issues of the sin nature, a careful study of those three issues by the Holy Spirit will impress us with the awful truth concerning our history in Adam. we will be better able to appreciate the wonderful remedy that the Father has provided. I'm convinced that the number one problem in Christianity is that Christians think they're too good. Right? They're too good. Who can know it?

God looked over the earth and what did he saw? He saw only evil continually. That's all he saw. So I think when believers start down the road of spiritual growth, one of the things that happens is that the Spirit of God begins to show them who Adam really is.

I remember when I was first saved, the thoughts would go through my mind, there must be something pretty cool about me, God saved me. No. No. Not a thing. I learn as I grow spiritually how desperately wicked my Adamic nature is. And the only way I'm ever going to learn to abandon it is by knowing that. And that's why God will make sure that you don't miss any lessons in the study of Adam.

At the same time though, there's the study of Christ next to it. I think that's why it's really important, because we don't appreciate the totality of what God has done, not only for us, but to us, if we don't really understand exactly what it took God to deal with my sin nature. Dealing with my sins is one thing, but my sin nature is a whole other kettle of fish.

So, describe what substitutionary death means. Do you know what I mean by substitutionary death? Substitute. Calvin would know. I went to his game on Friday night and they'd substitute players in and out. Guy wasn't playing good, out he came. Yeah, Bonnie's a substitute. Bonnie's a substitute teacher. You know, the guy got three files out, he came and somebody else came in, went in the game. So, what is a substitutionary death? What is it? Something done on behalf of another. Okay.

Now, if I have this Adamic sin nature, and God in the Garden of Eden said to Adam, if you sin, you get 40 years of hard labor, a $15 fine, and 400 push-ups, right? What did he say if you sinned? You die. You die. In dying you will die. Oh, we did it again. In dying you shall die.

So, that's the penalty for sin. So Adam does a really sort of simple thing. He takes a bite out of a piece of fruit. Come on, I've sinned worse than that. Why does he fall? Because of that little tiny thing. Because he disobeyed God. Right? And so, when he does disobey God, he's now under condemnation of death. And oh, by the way, based on the principle of like begets like, how about Cain? How about Abel? How about everybody that came after Adam, all the way down to me? Do I deserve, am I going to die? Am I under that curse of death? Absolutely.

Somebody, the substitutionary death means that somebody is going to come and take my place. OK, now, substitutionary death in this case means more than what's what is it, the tale of two cities or Les Miserables, where that guy at the end says it's a far, far better thing I do than I've ever done before, where he goes and gives his life for his friend. The tale of two cities. There's a guy, and Paul even says, greater love has no man than to give his life for his friend. And there have been lots of examples of men and women giving their lives for people that they loved, right?

Substitution, is that what we're talking about here? Or maybe in the Civil War, you know, if you had a couple of dollars to rub together, you could pay somebody to go and enlist for you and take your place in the army And if he got killed, they considered that, you know, you were done.

Is that the same thing? Think about that. Christ's substitutionary death for me. Or is it more than that? What do you think? What do you think? Are you thinking today? He didn't just die for our sins, he died to give us a new life, a new nature. There are two aspects, more than two, but two basic aspects of the death of Christ. The substitutionary part of it had to do with the penalty for the sins that I've committed and actually the sins of the whole world. Was I included in that? What do you think?

Or did he do that by himself? The substitutionary death. He did it by himself. He's the only one that was qualified to pay the penalty. I couldn't pay the penalty for my sins. I mean, every human being that's ever been born, except for a couple, have all died, right? Did their death satisfy God about their sins? Not in the least. They died because they were sinners, but it didn't solve the penalty problem. So it takes God to die to pay the penalty, the substitutionary death. It takes somebody from the Trinity to do this. You know why? Why couldn't the Apostle Peter be the one? Or the Apostle Paul? I don't know, Abraham.

Yeah, that's the right answer. The Lord Jesus is not a sinner, doesn't have a sin nature, didn't come from Adam. So when he pays the penalty for the sins of the world, he's the perfect sacrifice. His death is acceptable to God because he doesn't have to make sacrifice for himself. Okay? His exemption from Adam was the Holy Spirit. His exemption from Adam was the Holy Spirit. That's right, the Holy Spirit was in essence his father. He did not come from Adam's line.

In 1 Peter 2.24, who his own self bore our sins in his body upon the tree. of Colossians 1.20, having made peace through the blood of his cross, Revelations 1.5, unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood.

Now, one of the things we're going to do, and we'll start in on it next week, the book of Romans is the survey course of Christianity. Do you know what I mean by that? When you go to college, if you're going to be if you're going to be a history major, the first course you take is Survey of the Western Civilization, which covers the whole thing. The Book of Romans is the book of salvation. It's the survey course of Christianity.

Up until Romans 1-1 to Romans 5-11, deal with the issue of sins and the work of Christ on the cross to pay the penalty for your sins. Next week we're going to find out from 512 on there's a whole new issue. It isn't sins anymore. But up until this point today we're dealing with the sins of man. The fact that every one of us have committed these things called sins which are falling short of the mark and every single one of them incurs a penalty and the penalty is death and Christ met every penalty for every sin that was ever or will ever be committed.

The will ever be committed is always an interesting part when you're dealing with believers and their spiritual growth when they think that they're worse than they really are after they're saved. And I like to say to them, well, you know that sin you're really worried about?

That's the one that wasn't on the cross, right? That's the one that didn't quite make it up. He must have forgot about that one. And the reason is because God had to be satisfied about your sins. It wasn't you that had to be satisfied. God did. Understand that? If you offend somebody and you have to make restitution, does it matter if the guy next to him says, oh, that's enough? Do you understand what I just said? Let's say that I offended Roger. Roger said, well, in order for me to forgive you, you're going to have to give me $100. And so when I get it up to $90, Vonnie says $90 is good enough. Now, Roger said $100.

The Lord said, if you sin, you die. And all of the sins have to be paid for to satisfy me, a holy, righteous God. That's why it took Christ to do it. In Romans, including Romans 5.11, what Paul sets out is the great doctrine of the substitutionary death of Christ for the sins of the world. He alone could die for the sins, past, present, and future, thereby paying the penalty for and redeeming all who believe. The blood of Christ takes care of the sins of the believer. There's going to be something else that's going to take care of the sin nature, but the blood of Christ takes care of the sins.

In Romans 3.24, we're justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

When you redeem something, you guys spend a lot of time down at the pawn shop, don't you? When you redeem something, doesn't it cost you something? If you go down and hawk your schwinn for 20 bucks, when you go back to get it back, it costs you 25. It costs you something to redeem.

What was the redemption price paid by Christ? What was the commodity he had to come up with? No. Commodity. Substance. What did he have to give to pay? His blood. That was the price. to declare his righteousness for the remission of sin. Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and their sins are covered."

So, now, up and through Romans 5.11, and even if you haven't memorized, I wish Earlene was here, she probably has it all memorized. Is that enough information for you to grow spiritually? Christ is our Advocate before the Father in Heaven, right? That's correct. He's there right now and we're seated in our bed.

That's right. Four Believers. Four Believers. Four Believers. That's right. Now we're seated in the heavenlies. Really. Even now. Or is that to be done later? Say that again? We're seated with Christ in the heavenlies. Now or eventually. Okay. The answer to that question is a position and condition answer. Positionally, I'm seated in Christ now in the heavens. Conditionally, I'm right here.

The advocacy is based on the substitutionary death of Christ. When I sin, you know, it isn't the Lord Jesus, because He's already paid for the sin that I'm going to commit this afternoon, and the Father looks at Him and His work, not my sinfulness. Because every sin that I will commit between now and the time that I get to go home to be with him has already been handled. And so his advocacy is based on the fact that all of my sins were taken care of in eternity.

Now, Satan is the accuser of the brethren. And maybe a scenario would be like this. Well, Bud sinned. Satan says, do you see that? Christ says, do you see my blood? That's the advocacy. It's already done. Well, that's probably what I was trying to get at on that was the fact that you should take John, first John, one man. Right. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Yeah. And if we say we have no sin, interceding for our sins. There's another aspect there. It's up to us to confess that. Well, there's another aspect there. If you investigate what the word confess means. To agree with God. To agree with God. And what are we agreeing with Him about?

The fact that I sinned? Or the fact that the sins are taken care of? Which one? Well, both. Well, let's think about it. What if you get convicted by the Holy Spirit and you have 412 sins and you remembered 411 but you forgot the 12th one? You can't remember all the sins. That's right. So what is it?

If I'm going to say the same thing as God says about me, what does He say about me? Confess it to me. Agree with me on the matter. Agree with me about you. What does He say about you? You're my son. You're in Christ. The reason for this course is to learn about our identification with this death, birth, and resurrection, right? And I have been, my confession as Father, is that I've been acting inconsistent with who you say I am. That's what sin is. But you know what? I agree with you. Not about my sinning, I agree with you about the position I have. That's a different thing. In 1 Corinthians 11 it talks exactly about that. If you don't judge yourself, then he'll judge you. Boy, what a grace that is. He expects us to confess our sins. He expects us to say the same thing that God says.

Here's a problem I have with confession. I came out of Catholicism. In Catholicism we have this whole sacrament called penance or confession. And here's how it goes. You go into the church on Saturday afternoon and you sit down in the pew and you try to remember all the sins you committed since the last Saturday. Then you go in the confessional box and you lay them out. I did 300 of these and 12 of these and one of those. And the priest says, is that it? And you say, yep.

And he says, okay, I absolve you go say a penance, you know, go say a bunch of prayers, or I don't know, give the guy back the five dollars you stole from him, or whatever, you know. And so when I come out, now here's the thought in my mind, and I think it's the same thought process that has moved out of Catholicism, and the whole issue is that I have to know and confess my sins. If I don't, then when he absolves me, I've missed one, or two, or five, or seven, and so I'm not forgiven.

The thing about 1 John 1.9 is that it doesn't relieve me of my responsibility to confess my sins, but what I find with the Lord is that if I go to Him with several, which is usually the truth, by the time I've gotten through the first one, He's restored me and we're on. We're back to fellowship. He is not interested in my sinfulness. He's not interested in how sorry I am or the fact that I got them all listed. He's not interested in that. He's interested in my having fellowship with him unbroken all the time.

And the fastest way to do that is just to acknowledge who you are and that you've acted inconsistent with who you are. And the restoration happens, bang. I remember the first time I had that discussion with Hal Malloy, he said, yeah, that's really neat, isn't it? I said, yeah, it really is me. So, the focus is on saying the same thing, not so much the catalog of my sinfulness. Let's see.

So, in question seven, I wanted you to read Romans 5, 12 through 19, and I wanted you to pick out seven ways in which Paul insists on the fact that Adam's act of sin affected the whole race. Understand the question? I wanted you to pick out, and there are actually more than seven, but I'm going to read through it and I'm going to highlight how it happened.

Therefore, just as through, here's the first one, one man's sin, by one man's sin entered into the world. One man's sin brought sin into the world and with it came death through sin. And so, here's the second one, death spread to all men because all men sinned. Two things, actually more, two things in that first verse that you can say how sin has affected the human race.

Verse 13, for until the law, I'm going to jump down to verse 15 because 13 and 14 are kind of a parenthesis. 15, but the free gift is not like the righteousness. Here's the third one, for if by the transgression of one the many died, Adam's sin, one transgression, everybody dies. affects the whole human race. Go down to verse 16. And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned.

For on the one hand, the judgment arose from one transgression resulting in condemnation. Because of Adam's sin, there was judgment by God. The whole human race was judged. And guess what? Every person in the human race lost. The verdict was guilty. and the sentence was proclaimed, condemnation, all because of what Adam did.

Verse 17, for if by the transgression of one death reigned, in other words, it's a dominant like a throne through the one, death reigned. Now, because of Adam's sin, Death is a reigning principle. Now, we Americans don't like the word reign because we've got the Constitution that says we're free. But death reigns. It's the controlling factor of the world. It reigns over everything. Death.

Separation from God. Because of what Adam did. Verse 18. So then, as through one transgression there resulted the one effect, condemnation to all men. I'm skipping through them fast, we're going to go back through Romans 5.12 very slowly in a couple of weeks. Verse 19, through one man's disobedience the many were made to become sinners. See that? So you go through those verses and you will see that the actions of one man caused all kinds of havoc to the entire human race.

Now, when we study that, go back and study Romans 5.12-21, we're going to go through the contrast of what Adam did and what this other man did to the Lord Jesus Christ. And the contrast is really, really stark. All men suffer the consequences of Adam's sin. Some men are privileged to enter into the grace of another man's actions. Remember when we talked a couple of weeks ago about what a representative man was? These are the two men.

Romans 5.12-21 is known as the doctrine of the two men. These are the two most important guys in the history of the world, Adam and Christ, because what they do affects so many others.

So, what's the difference between sins and sin? Notice in Romans 5.12 it says, by one man, sin, and here we go with a grammar lesson again.

This is singular, and in the Greek it has a definite article in front of it, the sin. And up until this time in Romans we have not seen the sin. Every reference up to this time has been sins, plural. So now we see the sin. So what's the difference between the sin and sins? You should know what one of them is, we've just been talking about, sins. What's the sin?

By one man, the sin entered the world. What is that thing? Isn't that the sin nature? That's exactly right. And so now when you study, from now on when you study Paul's epistles, in most cases, When you see the word sins, plural, he'll be talking about the activities of a sinner, sins committed, the actions that you do. When you see the word singular, sin, he'll be talking about the sin nature. And it's a very important but subtle distinction, because especially in covenant theology, they try to make sin, sins. doesn't fit. Because they don't know about sin nature.

So, Romans 5.12, by one man, the sin nature entered the world. And what happened when the sin nature came in?

You got all the benefits that came with it. What? What did you get? Boy, this is a retirement policy that you don't want to pass up. What did you get? You got death. Right? Wow, what a deal. What a deal. Which is separation from God. That's right. Who is life. That's right. Okay, did God forgive both sins and sin? Did God forgive, in His death on the cross, did He forgive your sins, if you believe, and the sin? How many think, yeah, he did? Chickens. How many said, well, maybe he did, maybe he didn't? How many said, no, they are different?

So, did he forgive the sins? Did he forgive the sin nature? What did he do with the sin nature? That's right. He condemned it. The sin nature, your sin nature was not forgiven. you as a person were, but your sin nature is not forgiven. But when we die and we go to God, our sin nature will have been forgiven? No. We still have a sin nature when we're out there? No. You understand my answer?

When you leave this planet, when you leave this planet, you don't go to the Lord with a sin nature. You don't show up with a sin nature. And so about four weeks from now we're going to talk about Romans 6. And that will explain why you don't show up with a sin nature. You have one in you, but you don't have one attached to you. That's the difference.

So God condemns the sin nature. He does not forgive it. Maybe to answer it this way, let's say you show up in heaven with a sin nature, you're still a sinner. You can't have any sinners in heaven, right? So what's going to happen? Somehow God has to come up with a plan to separate you, the person, from that sin nature. to say that, whoa, wow, by one man's actions sin entered in the world and all men have this sin nature, so if any man, any men are going to be with God, somehow God has got to come up with a plan to separate those guys from their sin nature so that they can be with God.

And that's what he did. That's the whole reason for the request. Can we say the sin nature was annihilated at that time? Here's what I think it is, and this is my personal opinion. Physical death is when the soul and spirit leave the body. The Old Testament says that the life of sin is in the blood. So when my soul and spirit leave my body, the sinful body along with its nature stays here. and I leave without it being attached.

If I'm a non-believer, that when I leave this planet, that sin nature goes with me, and whatever the fate of that sin nature is, is the fate that I'm going to have, because of Romans 5.12.

See that? We've got to close. I didn't finish all the questions, but we'll get to them. Father how we thank you for your grace and your mercy towards us and the fact that we can learn about sins and sin and then as time goes on we learn about the incredible grace and what you've done to make us totally accepted in your beloved and we thank you father we pray in his name amen