Lesson 22b

Alright, we are on lesson 22 of the Romans class. Lesson 22, and I think we rushed through questions 1 and 2 last week. So we are officially on question 3. And just go back and maybe... This is going to drive me nuts on my computer. I forgot my mouse. So I hate using the touch pad. It drives me nuts.

So let's just because we have a lot of people who weren't here last week. We'll just quickly go through the passage again. I always like to get the whole passage and what we're talking about, rather than just sometimes we focus in so much that we lose the context of the passage. So when you use that mouse right there. Now, I need to. Oh, yeah. I'm particularly long. It'll take 20 minutes to recognize it or so. So we are going through Romans 6, chapter 6, verses 12-17, and I read last week 12-18 for context. We'll quickly go through that just so we get everybody on the same page here. Beginning in verse 12.

Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, so that you obey its lusts, and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness. But present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.

For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law, but you are under grace. Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? May it never be. Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death or of obedience resulting in righteousness? But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed. And having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.

Alright, we'll skip down to question 3. Let me get down there. Question 3. No. Much mores, right? No. That was last week's answers. Much mores. Okay, you're getting me tired. No, that was last week. We were very excited about that. Are we, as believers, able to keep sin nature from reigning?

And the passage was Galatians 5.16. So let's read that. Well, let me get the answer before we read that. What do you say? Yes. Are we as believers able to keep the sin nature from reigning? No. Now we've gotten both. We have the troublemaker in the class now. Anybody else? Since we have both answers from Mike.

Yes? No? I think if you say we, it's something outside of us that enables us to do it. Well, personally, are you able to? If I walk in the Spirit, I'm able to. Any others? Any contrary to that? Okay, then we'll read Galatians 5.16, which gives us the answer. But I say, walk by the Spirit and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. So, what Russ said was true, if you are walking in the Spirit. So, what does walk mean? Lifestyle is in your walk, your life. Can't use the definition of the definition. Establishment. Establishment? So what does it say? Walk by the Spirit. What do you do when walking down the sidewalk? What does it mean by walk by the Spirit? Moment by moment.

What? Life? Control? Responsive to the Spirit? Guided by the Spirit? Yeah. Others? Walking is either being responsive, being controlled by, focused on, unity with, all the things that are based on unity with the spirit, that we are cognizant of, that we are relying upon. I don't know if I can, I'll have to do the tape.

It's basically, as I said, you're being responsive to it. I think it's in unity with the Spirit. You're not contrary to it. You're being guided by it. You are being, I said, in unity with it, with the Spirit. And it's a person in you. And you're cognizant of that.

It's when you're not, you're by the flesh looking at something other than Christ, you're not thinking about your relationship with Christ. It's all those things when you're not being in fellowship with the Spirit, is the best way I can maybe put it. So, interesting that, you know, from, oh, haha, you think I, you think I forgot, but my iron trap mind, These are the, if you want, these are the things that Winnie put together. Oh yeah. For the, you thought I forgot. Oh yeah. Great job buddy. Thank you. I remembered really. Yeah, it's just exploded, so.

Yeah, so this, what I handed out is the thing that Winnie put together years ago that I keep in my Bible and I keep on here. And it's a real good little cheat sheet on all the Greek mood, tense, voice, all that. So when we start getting greeky on you, and it's good maybe to have this around just when we talk about the aorist tense, or present, or all the different voices, moods, tense, all those different things. If you keep this around, this will give you a quick idea of what we're talking about.

So walking, when we say, but I say walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desires of the flesh. Walk is in the present, active, and imperative. So now that you have the cheat sheet, what does present mean? What does present mean? I am speaking in complete action. It's a continuous action. It's happening right now. So, and what does the active mean? ongoing, active. The subject produces the action. Yeah, so who's the subject in here? You are. We are. So we're the ones, continuously, we are, the ones who are walking, okay, and then imperative.

What does that mean? You must. What? You must. It's a fact. It's a reality, right? It's a command. So, it's saying you, on a continuous basis, you are the one walking by the Spirit. That's what you should be doing. That's the imperative command. So, as far as answering questions, are we as believers able to keep the sin nature from reigning?

Yes, we can if We do what Galatians 5.16 tells us to do. Continually, we are to walk by the Spirit. How are you doing today? What does that mean to you? You know, this is one of those ones where, as I say it, that's why I try to get with the walking. How do you walk by the Spirit? What does it mean at 3 o'clock today that you're walking by the Spirit? What does that mean?

A list? A refrigerator list? Depends on how the Broncos are doing. They are playing, they are playing. What does that mean? Did you say today? Today at 3 o'clock. They're not playing. I know that. I'm not a big fan to be honest. It's that Texas root, yeah. So what does it mean? I don't know if you know, these are one of those kind of generic things when we say it, but what does it mean in shoe leather? What does it mean to you, like I said, it's 3 o'clock today and you're walking by the school, what is that?

Where's your focus? What? Where's your focus? Where's the focus? On a person. On a person. It's present. It's present tense, which means it's continuous. You're doing it all the time. Could you say that the Holy Spirit has convinced you that you have a new life in Christ and that that's where all the value is rather than anything else? Yeah, others. Because I don't want to give what my thought is until I hear some others.

What does it mean? I agree with that and I'll expand on that. What does it mean? We say it, but what does it mean to you? Walking in the Spirit. Walk by the Spirit. 3 o'clock today, 5 o'clock today, 2 o'clock tomorrow. What does it mean? It means... I think one of the problems you have here in terms of trying to sort this out is that I view the Holy Spirit as giving me the power to do it. So if I walk by the Spirit, if I...

I solicit his help, then I'll be able to do it. And I think that's where it gets to be difficult, because the learning process to learn dependence on the Spirit of God is not something that you just pick up and go. You have to learn it. And you're the one that this life is being manifested through, but it's through his power and his agency, and you're dependent on him. Yeah, I guess I just want to kind of go on too with it. The walking by, it's one, you know who the person is. Studying the person gives you who you are.

As you know who you are, being convinced by the Holy Spirit, then when you walk around, things of the world, an election, an election goes by. And I'm so wiped out because my party didn't win. I think walking by the Spirit also kind of gets you to the point where, is that earthly or is that spiritual? Is that where we live?

Just an example, when you're walking down and you realize something, you begin to, as you grow spiritually and walking by the Spirit, I think you're understanding more of who you are. So when you walk, you're recognizing who you are not as a person in this world, you're positioned in Christ, in the heavenlies, I think it's just that understanding and that unity with Christ. It's focusing on the person. And as you do that, again, you begin to be convinced of who you are, and that begins to manifest itself. And as you do that, you know who you are, there's less when the music starts playing. less apt to dance, because I know who I am in Christ. And it's a process, it's not overnight. I have a one word answer. Source. Source. Yeah, source. Yeah, that would be good. Others. Yeah.

One other thing is that in the context here of these verses, we're talking about a single issue of the sin nature controlling man. the resurrected life of Christ controlling me. That's really what the issue is here. And so the Spirit of God has to persuade us, and he's about doing that. One, that we were enslaved to sin, because we're not sure about that issue early on. We think we're controlling everything, and we're not.

And two is that once I am persuaded that sin has a mastery over me, and I want to be free, Then I recognized that the work of Romans 6 is really imperative to my life in terms of freedom. Freedom what? To do what I want? No, freedom from this thing that's controlling sin, from sin. And the freedom is that now I can be alive under God where I probably never was before. But I have to understand this and trust God about it and rely on the Spirit for those principles to be manifested not only in the way I live, but to me personally, that I understand and live that way and say, well, I'm free now. You got to where I was going.

Because bringing it back to where, remember how I said, you know, I say this now after realizing, the books of the Bible and the epistles of Paul are not laid out chronologically. They're laid out as they reveal more. So we're in Romans 6. What was revealed here that we just learned?

Reckon yourself dead and alive unto God. Then you can go to this position of walking by the Spirit, and you won't satisfy the desires of the flesh. And you see as Paul goes along, he reveals more now. The basic fundamental thing is wrecking yourself dead unto sin, alive unto God. And as he goes forward, he reveals this truth to us. How do you do that? Walking by the Spirit. Then I don't have to respond to the flesh, because I'm dead to it. Remember? I'm dead to it.

So, I have a question. Do you think there is a link between reckoning and walking? Yes. I think that's interesting. I'm stuck on this word present in Romans. And it's interesting that if you look at that word, it has this idea of standing by. Standing by the source, to Mike's point. And as a result of having presented yourself, there is a lock.

So the link is a result of reckoning, presenting. These are all faith-based, placing a trust in it's absolutely the outcome, right? When you stand by or reckon or trust or, you know, place your faith in, as a result, you walk. That's just the natural outcome because that's... you are reckoning who you are in Christ, right?

Does that make sense? Yeah, I thought it. I'll put it in a military context. We were talking about it this morning. When you... enlistments in the military, what you do is you give them your members. And they say, thank you very much, follow me. And then they take you to a place called boot camp. And what are they teaching you? They're teaching you how to not be a civilian and how to think and act and function like a military person under that set of rules.

And what's interesting is that my reckoning, dead to sin and alive to God, and my presenting It's just the beginning. So now I think all believers go through a boot camp that teaches them and at the end of boot camp you think, oh I really am, I'm here, I'm now, in my case, I'm now a marine and I think like one and I act like one.

Hopefully I look like one. But I'm functioning that way now, but I had to learn how to do it, and I had to learn how not to do the civilian thing. So I had to learn how, and I have to learn spiritually that I am free from sin, I am alive under God, I did present, and I'm presenting, and He's taking that and He's teaching me to depend on the Spirit who will manifest that life through me. Yeah, I guess I wondered if this was a chicken and egg question, which came first.

But I think the reckoning is, even in Romans 6, remember all the truths I laid out that were before 12? Reckon yourself that therefore So now I think reckoning is what you do. This is the basic. Reckon yourself dead unto sin and alive unto God. As we progress, we begin to walk, understanding that truth. So it is maybe, as Mike said, a boot camp, but we start out with a reckoning, I think. This is where it starts. You reckon yourself dead and alive unto God. Basic. Black and white. Not a lot of meat to it, not a lot of process to it, not a lot of anything to it. Just by faith. Everything, all of this revolves around faith. That's why the undergirding of everything we do is by faith.

I would say presenting is a big part of that because I could reckon, but at the end of the reckoning I think, well now what? You turn it over to me, and I'm going to teach you how this goes. And that's why, like I said, the reckoning I believe is kind of the beginning part.

You consider yourself dead. Before anything, I was thinking about this coming in this morning, how many believers in great ministries and other stuff, or even just their spirits of growth, and I know people in ministries that are doing great ministries, but I wonder about if they really understand this. and have that peace that is understood by what we know of reckoning yourself dead and aligning to God.

And I'm firmly convinced, and we've talked about this many times, if you don't really understand the identification truths, there's a limit to your spiritual growth, I think. Because you're always being dragged down by this old man that you don't understand. You don't realize, you don't reckon yourself dead unto him. And all these truths that we begin to understand, that we are, by walking by the Spirit, we don't satisfy the desires of the flesh. But that's because we are dead.

And so I think there's a lot, you know, I was thinking about some ministries that I know of, and I thought, you know, I wonder if those people really, they're great ministries, and doing wonderful things with the Lord. But personally, do they understand this? Maybe that's a good thing, though. They don't have to go through the suffering, it just happens. I think it's one of those things, the Lord's working in spite. It's just personal growth, I think.

It's just one of those weird things that I'm thinking about the lesson as I'm coming in. The reckoning, I think, happens that considering yourself dead is first. And then you begin to walk. You learn how to walk. And again, the way Paul lays out these things, this was the bedrock in Romans 6 here. And then you reveal the boot camp. How do you do this? You know, we're getting it here too.

We're not under law, we're under what? Grace. Oh, why is that? Where was the law based? On the flesh. Grace is not based. Grace is spiritual. So we're learning a lot of these things as they come through. And again, I think the reckoning was a first. They're linked together, but I think the reckoning comes first and the walking afterwards. I'm going to be a little cliché. I'm going to read you something. It might work out.

So this idea of presenting to stand respectfully before to remain standing, be motionless, you know, this idea of I'm giving you my service. But it's not, I'm not doing anything other than standing before you. So, we might say that you need to stand before you walk, you know. This idea of, and it's the same concept of reckoning, same concept of presenting yourself by faith, but it is a standing motionless before, and that's the idea with this presenting.

We see obey, you know, in these next results, but it's a result of And obey might be synonymous with walking, right? We might use those same terms. But the presenting is prior to that. And so I think you're exactly right. There is this, I stand motionless before you in service, and you're the one that is going to do the living through me. And that's the walking. And so possibly that's, again...

Using those terms, actually, you know, we use position and condition. The old brethren used to use standing and walking. When you read that book, Sit, Walk, Stand, you sit first, and you stand, then you walk. But I'm not a runner. Sit, walk, stand. No, for the position and condition, it was standing and state, wasn't it? Yeah. So that's what I was getting at. Standing was the position. That's my position. You need to know your position first. What's immutable? What doesn't change? So I agree. The standing is first. It goes back to your point of where am I looking? And when you're presenting, you're not looking at yourself. That's the secret. You're looking at the One who does the walking through you. It goes back to what I was saying.

Knowing Christ, conforming, transforming, as you know that, your walk starts to resemble that. And there's something in the scripture, I think, that was about, and I should look it up again, it's like, who you hang out with is who you are like. There's some scripture, I went through it, and I gotta go back and try and chase it down. But it was something about, you know, about who you're with or something flavors you or something. I don't know. There's something.

I have to go back and try and track that down. But it was like, you know, didn't your parents, you know, you become like the people you hang out with. Don't hang out with those people because you're going to be, you know. As we hang out with Christ, know who He is, then we become like Him. We become like the people we hang out with. And so I think if we focus on Christ, then we become manifesting Him. And that's that walk. But we do it by walking by the Spirit. And what is walking by the Spirit? Trusting in Him. Him to convince us of these truths. We are dead to sin. We are alive to God. And He convinces us of that. And we walk by that. Unity. Trust.

He said, now reckoning oneself dead to sin, alive to God, does not make oneself. Interesting point. God so constituted the saint when he saved him, but the act of reckoning brings into better operation with beneficial results the working of this inner spiritual machinery. So again, it's one of those things.

It's true about us whether we believe it or not, right? It's faith. It's always faith, but our reckoning doesn't make it true. Again, that's a very important point. It's true about us whether we believe it or not. And that's really comforting when you suddenly realize that. How many times I've failed, and I realize I failed, but it's still true about me. God said it, it's true. Even though I may not believe it, and I have a whole list of things that God tells us about who we are in Christ and what we have and all these different things. Whether I believe it or not, it's still true about me. And that's a key. That gives you great peace too when you fail. That even though I fail, God still tells me this is true. So, going on, is there a question for Is there any middle ground in verses 12 and 13? If we look at Romans 6, 12 and 13.

Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal bodies so that you obey its lusts. And do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. Again, this is the same as reckoning dead and alive unto God, just expanded. He's now expanded it. But can I present my body to sin and God at the same time? No. So, I put it this way.

Can you be sort of pregnant? It's either one or the other. And there's not a middle line. There's not the yellow line that you run on. And that's where I can get on both sides. It's kind of like we were talking about the four corners. You can put your hands in four states at one time.

Can you do that with obeying sin and obeying God at the same time? Can you put it in both quarters or both halves? You can't. So whether we are either presenting our members to sin or to God at any given time, there's no middle ground where we might be doing both or neither. Have you thought about that one? There's two ways to look at this. Can I do one or the other, but can I do neither? Can you do that? You can't sit on the fence. You can't sit on the fence. There is no middle ground.

So you're either, now this kind of gives you pause to think, you're either obeying to sin, or presenting your members to sin, or you're presenting your member to God. You're in law then. You're under law. Not if you make it a law, but you're either, you're doing one, this is a process, you're either doing one, all the time you're doing one or the other. Yeah, I mean, if you're in the flesh, you're putting yourself under a law-based system.

But can you do neither? Can I just be neutral and coasting down the highway? It's been a rough week. I'm just going to coast. My buddy Strong used to say, if you think you live on the yellow line, this is the best hells ever going to be. Yeah. I mean, there is no middle ground. You can't just be neutral.

I'm just sitting, you know, if I sit back in a dark room and I'm just, you know, not having any TV, any movies, any books, any nothing, am I, which way, I'm still one or the other. 24-7, I'm either presenting my body to sin or to presenting it to God.

And I, you know, I think as we focus on Christ, as we know Him more, that's going to be more our focus and our time. as you realize who you are in Christ, all these truths we're going through, as you realize that, your focus becomes more. When you go around in the world, I find myself much more thinking about how God is working and how Christ is manifesting Himself. And I see that.

And it gives me all the things He's told me, the peace that surpasses all understanding, the rest that the world can't provide. As we've gone through this election cycle, I get all wound up in it, but I realize at the end it really doesn't make any difference. And as we'll see later, you know, that God is the one who establishes all authorities. Am I questioning him and what he did? No. So, but I rest in that because he's in control of it.

I see God working. And that's, as we're walking, we begin to see Christ manifest, God working. And that's where I think, you know, you're either obeying the sin, oh man, I'm looking at the world and I'm so wrapped up in the world. Am I focused on God at that point? I don't think so. I think we're starting to realize the eternal where I'm going. Again, the flip in 320 where we are citizens of heaven, that's where our citizenship is. All this garbage that we've gone through right now, our citizenship is in heaven.

So these verses actually kind of worried me as a young believer. It seemed really important to Paul to talk about presenting my members and obeying. I got pretty wrapped up and I got to obey. I did not want to have sin as my master. And it became a motivation to me to to figure out how to be a better Christian, to be quite honest.

I mean, that's what these verses said to me. Do you remember feeling that way too? I mean, anybody else ever read this and be like, oh man, I am not obeying, I'm mastery, oh my goodness, I don't even know what that, it's always been my mastery, how am I supposed to change that all of a sudden, you know? But it had me thinking I needed to almost memorize the scripture and I mean, this is really important.

But it goes back to the way that we've looked at this and studied it and what you guys have taught in the past weeks. This idea of considering and presenting is prior to any of this other stuff. This is bedrock. Yeah, and I could get wrapped up real quick as a young believer thinking about what I've got to do. Like, man, mastery? That's a big thing.

The thing is, you know, if you chart the cycles, typically the new believer is so high, everything is, you know, glorious, wonderful, but then the realization comes, and things start to get a little more level, and then sin starts hitting you, and you're wondering, why am I really a Christian? Am I not? And all those waves. Which at first had me scared of whether or not I was a believer.

Right. And that's what I'm saying. A typical pathway. But, if you know the identification truths first, You don't worry about it. It changes the game. And that's why I keep saying that this is so foundational in bedrock because it changes everything.

And I was going to say something about... I was always confused. Yeah, well, that's what I was going to say. I've been through all these, wondered how I got through all these, and how do you do that and get through this? And his head gets so exploded when I say this, but one of the best things he ever said when I first came here was to open the Bible and just read, and just read it to know him. That is a key. Because once you know Him, again, when you realize these truths, that's who your life is. And that's why I say, as you begin to know who He is, you begin to manifest that life.

So I was, you know, up and down. I've said that many times. I've been, you know, my life before this even, you know, as a Christian, a strong Christian, all this, but it was up and down, you know. And now it's much more level on a, and kind of, I hope, on an upward slope. It's peace. It's peace, the rest, all those things. But it's because, you know, I spend time every day trying to, trying to know Him. and read the scripture. And I don't read it as a great study, you know, that I'm really digging into it, like when I do these lessons. I just read it.

And that's one thing he told me right off the bat, and I am very appreciative of that. And his head explodes with that. It's the revelation. But that was one of the keys, is to know him. And again, that's one of the things, to know him. Forget about all the other stuff. To know him is the key. Because if you know him, who is our life? Him.

And that's where you really become to manifest this and to walk and do all these things. And it's not you. That's the overriding thing. I mean, we actively participate in it. But it's really the Holy Spirit, in my opening prayer, gave us the Word and the Holy Spirit. And by those two things, we're convinced of these truths. And we can walk. We're convinced of who He is. So, anything else? We'll go on to question 5.

What is the key phrase in verse 13? Let me read verse 13. And do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness, but present yourself to God as those alive from the dead and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. We touched on this a little bit in question 2, but what is the key phrase in this? I think it's keep on presenting yourselves to God as risen ones, alive from the dead. And then it goes on about your members. And I noticed in the interlinear where it says presenting your members as instruments of righteousness, it's actually translated weapons of righteousness. Really? Which I thought was interesting. I'll have to look that up and see.

Yeah, the key phrase is presenting yourself as alive from the dead. Again, the reckon yourself dead, that is one thing, that's to separate us. But now it's almost a therefore. Once you know that, therefore what? Present yourself. Okay, that's the step now. Once you reckon, the important part now, because you can reckon yourself dead and then just present yourself dead. What does that do for you? It's the first step. It's the first step, but if you don't go on the second step, that's why he's repeatedly said this, death, new life. Separation, new life. Newness of life.

So the key I think now for us, once you reckon that, it's a powerful thing to reckon yourself dead. Present yourself to God. Present yourself, your body, everything to God as instruments of righteousness. Or weapons. I like that. Weapons. That's advanced. Between the two? Yeah, I mean there's no middle ground on that. Newell has it this way.

The exhortation is, Believingly, to take the attitude of a risen one in Christ, and thus present yourself once for all to God, whether in prayer or thanksgiving or praise or service, you are alive from the dead. It is not that you make yourself alive by presenting yourself unto God, but since you are in Christ, you are alive to God in risen life. and you thus present yourself. And it becomes a habitual attitude. You keep on presenting your members unto God as a habit of life. He will now use them as instruments of righteousness, as before, you will remember, your members were instruments of sin.

So I like that. Again, we are alive, whether we believe it or not, we are alive to God. But as we reckon that, reckon or consider that, We now can present ourselves as instruments of God, be used of Him. That's cool. It becomes truth. It becomes a truth that you believe, you know, I am alive to God.

I always loved Colossians 3, that we, you know, we died but now we're hid with Christ in God. That's a double insurance policy. I'm in Christ, in God. Love that one. So again, I think it's important to understand that that these imperatives are directed to the resurrected man, not the other man. Yeah.

Well, again, when you think about it, would it be presenting to a dead body? This is all to the alive. The dead means nothing. Law abases anything. We're not dead. He was talking about, as a young believer, not understanding that he was co-crucified with Christ. And you read this you've been crucified, buried, and now resurrected, and that's where the conversation goes, to the resurrected.

Well, as I always said, you know, I went through, my whole thing was going, you know, if I sin, why am I doing this? I'm a Christian. Why am I doing this? You know, why do I do this? Am I a Christian? When you get frustrated. Am I really a Christian? Yeah. You go into, I can't, you're going to do this mode, and then finally you just, you kind of just, I know you're not neutral, but that's the way you behave, right? Because I'm trying to not let sin be my master and that's not working out so well. I think that's why we have Romans 7. It's for that exact reason. Now when you realize what's going on in 6 and you see 7, it's awesome.

The struggles that I went through trying to do this and trying to be good and trying to do all this stuff, as you said it in what initially you were saying, I needed to memorize Scripture. I needed to because that's what the Big Brethren did. It never worked. My efforts was all, let's go to Mike.

With a brother in prayer, you know, we have our first service in praying, and I'd listen to these brothers eloquently, you know, quote scripture in their prayers and everything. I thought, man, I want to be like those guys. I really want to be, because that's where the cool cats are. That's where the Christians are. Those are the real strong, you know, Christians. Baloney. You know?

And I say, I went back to John 10, 28, which was, you know, that was my anchor verse. I can't get out of God's hand. I'm still alive as a sinner, I guess, and I can jump out of his hand. No, I can't. God has me. You know, you can't get out, in John 28, you can't get out of his hand. That was my, you know, when I felt like I was not a Christian, you know, and I'm doing something like that.

But now, that's all gone. I'm dead. If a guy is condemned to death and he's going down to the electric chair and he keels over and dies, do they put him in the electric chair and zap him just because? He's dead. He's no longer. I like that saying, get over it. Well, getting over it is that you've been separated from this. Get over that. But again, until the realization of this, I always had doubts. And I like this because it really just makes it final. Done. And it's just so much different when you understand this and the growth that you can have by it.

And as I said, as you know this as we study Romans, now when you walk through the rest of his epistles, as we said with Galatians 5.16, oh wow, now I understand that. Because of what happened right here in Romans 6.

So I think it's really cool when you start reading through the epistles, if you start reading through the Bible like that, and you see the next epistle, what's revealed here? What is Paul getting at? What new little nuance of my Christian life is he laying out for me? And it's really cool when you start realizing that. I've started, as I go through reading it, I'm starting to try and, you know, see that a little bit more. What's he revealing to me now? What truth does he want me to know right now?

And then the next one will be, you know, the next epistle will be something different and something more. And it's kind of cool the way, once you realize it's not chronological, it's the way Paul is revealing truth, the way the epistles are laid out. Well, I guess we'll start on question six. We did much better today. That was, what, four questions? Three questions, four? Two. Two? No, four. I think three at least. Three, four, five.

So we will continue and we'll get through it next week. So let's close. Father, we thank you again just for this time. We thank you for any time that we can fellowship together. As children of yours in Christ, we just thank you for that special relationship that we have between believers and just the time in your word and what that means. Realize that the most important time we have in your word is to understand who your son is.

Because as we understand that, that's who we are. Because we've been baptized, placed into, we have the very life of Christ. He is our life. He is our history now. And what comfort, what rest we have in the tumultuous world that we live in, that you give us that peace, rest, and comfort because we've been placed into Christ. And again, we just pray for Vern in the next meeting, just that he will present the word accurately and prepare our hearts to receive it. We thank you again for just this time in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.