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Eternal Blessings from God
RO81-02© Berean Memorial Church of Irving, Texas, Inc. (1977)
Please turn with me in your Bibles to Romans 6:19-23. Our subject is "Two Kinds of Slavery."
Slavery
We have learned that the difference between slavery and freedom is a matter of having one's will controlled by another, or having one's will
controlled by himself. You remember that in Romans 6:16, we learned that one is a slave of whoever controls his will. Paul said, "Don't you know
that to whom you yield yourselves (that is, your will) his slaves you are whom you obey, whether of the sin nature unto death, or obedience to
absolute righteousness."
Children
So, the principle laid down by the apostle Paul is that slavery is a matter of who controls your will. And the control of one's will indicates
that there is some authority over you – some superior authority over your will rather than yourselves. For this reason, applying this to
the natural relationships of life, it is obvious that children, because they have authority of parents over them, are the slaves of their parents.
They are not free in their wills in many respects. Wives are the slaves of their husbands from a scriptural point of view, because husbands are the
final authority over the will of the wife.
That is limited, of course, always, in any of these applications, by evil. Nobody has the authority over your will to direct your will to do that
which is evil. Parents do not have authority over their children's will to direct their children to do what is evil. A parent does not have the
authority to direct his child to engage in pornographic photography, for example. That is an evil. And at that point, the child is not obliged to
be subject to his parents. A wife is not obliged to be subject to immoralities that her husband would seek to direct her toward. At that point,
she is to obey what is the standard of righteousness.
Employees
Employees are the slaves of their employers because employers exercise authority over employees. Pupils are the slaves of teachers, because
teachers are the authorities over the pupils, and so on.
The basic principle is that whoever controls your will is the authority over you, and when somebody controls your will, you are a slave. Whatever
other words you may want to use to describe it, that is the relationship. Life in the era in which we live, which is the era of the angelic warfare,
is based upon this principle of lines of authority – some who exercise authority, and some who are slaves under that authority.
The apostle Paul uses this principle of slavery to illustrate the condition of all mankind. People are slaves, we have seen, of either the sin
nature, with which we are born; or, they are slaves of God, which we enter when we are reborn. People are compelled, thus, to do evil, or they are
compelled to do absolute righteousness. And this is a very important principle. If you have not learned this, you're going to have some real
problems in understanding what comes further in the book of Romans. You must understand that if you are a slave of the sin nature, you are compelled
to do evil. You can just forget any idea that you can do one speck of anything that is pleasing to God. If you are a slave of the sin nature, which
you are when you're an unbeliever, you can do nothing but evil. You produce sins or you produce human good, and both are evil with God. If you are
a carnal Christian, and you have reverted to the old lifestyle, you are again serving the sin nature, and you can produce nothing but that which is
corrupt and evil.
On the other hand, if you are a believer, you are under the enslavement to produce absolute righteousness. And when a slave rebels against his
master, then the master gets out the disciplinary action. Sometimes it's a whip across the back of a slave in order to bring him back into the
line of the authority of the master. And you and I, who are slaves of absolute righteousness, I guarantee you, will feel the whip of God's
discipline across our backs if we dare to try to live a life that is incompatible with absolute righteousness. You have no choice in this matter.
Your will is overridden.
A lot of Christians have a life of misery simply because they've never understood the fact that they are slaves of absolute righteousness. And that
is going to be their lifestyle because that is the only thing their master (God) will permit. So, Christians must recognize the fact that they are
slaves of absolute righteousness. And they must recognize then that their physical bodies were once enslaved to the sin nature for evil, but are
now enslaved to God for absolute righteousness. The unbeliever and the carnal Christian then have their wills directed by Satan, while the spiritual
Christian is under the direction of the Holy Spirit.
Birds of a Feather Flock Together
People with the same master, you will find, will gravitate toward each other. That is the principle that we describe, which is known in the
common phrase "birds of a feather flock together." The real mental attitudes, and the real character traits of a person, can be discerned from
those who are close to them, often, far more readily than you can discern it from the person directly himself. When a person has bad mental
attitudes; when a person has negative qualities; and, when a person has defective character traits which are condemned by Scripture, they will
then resort to hypocrisy. They will resort to a front (to a pretense) – to a mouthful-of-teeth smile, and external graciousness and culture,
and one thing or another, in order to cover up that they have a bad mental attitude. They have negative resistant qualities, and they are rebels in
certain respects to what they have heard from the Word of God.
So, you will not be able to discern what this person is really like. But you can bypass all that by spotting who the close friends are. If you
can spot the close friends, you will find someone among that group that isn't putting on a front, and you will spot that the qualities in that
close friend are what this person is really like. So, you will see the negative qualities; you will see the mental attitude; and, you will see the
whole picture – not through the individual, but through the other birds of his same feather that he associates with. And that is one of the
things that has been at the heart of what Paul is saying. If you are a slave of Satan, then you are going to reflect the qualities of your father,
the devil, and you will gravitate toward people who are of that ilk. If you are a slave to God the Holy Spirit, then you will reflect the qualities
of absolute righteousness, and you will gravitate toward people who have those characteristics. So, one way or another, you can discern about other
people something that reflects what they really are internally from those who are about them externally.
Shame
Now, Paul has pointed out that there is no benefit whatsoever from a life where Satan, through the sin nature, controls the will. He has called the
production of that life a production of shame. And we've gone into considerable detail on elements of shame, some of which were pretty shocking.
There is no development of personal character that reflects the image and likeness of God when we are slaves of the sin nature.
Death
The end product of
the enslavement of the sin nature has been described by the word "death." This is what is true of sin nature production. The stench of death is
everywhere about those who are slaves of the sin nature. The end product of enslavement to the sin nature is death, and death means separation from
God.
Separation from God – Left Alone in the Universe
2 Thessalonians 1:9 expresses this very forcefully for us. The apostle Paul says, "Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the
presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His power." What is the end product of being under the enslavement of the sin nature? It is to be left
to yourself – to be left alone in the universe: "Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from
the glory of His power? 2 Thessalonians 1:9: left alone in the universe. That is death.
Now, God is glorified in the era of the angelic warfare in which we live, when sinners can be blessed right under Satan's nose. This is something
in which the devil is irked. It irritates him, and it aggravates him to no end for believers to be blessed right smack under his nose. And
this is the glory of grace – that God has come up with a way of blessing you and me right under the devil's nose, when Satan is doing
everything he can to prevent us from finding blessing and fulfillment.
Security
God's blessings are always delivered, furthermore, in the context of one great and marvelous word, and that is "security." This is something we
often seem to forget about how God deals with us under grace. Blessing we understand, and blessing we seek. But there is never any blessing which
is delivered from God which is not attached by security. When God blesses, you don't lose it. When God blesses, He sees to it that it's a secure
blessing. And that goes from the point of salvation (that blessing) to the point of rewards in heaven. You cannot lose the blessing of salvation.
You cannot lose the blessing of the rewards in heaven that you have stored through the exercise of your spiritual gifts under the directions of God
the Holy Spirit.
God Does it Alone
The only basis for secure blessings from salvation to rewards in heaven is obviously if God does it alone. If you and I are involved in bringing
blessings to ourselves, then something is going to get fouled up. But if God alone is involved in bringing blessings, then we'll have security.
Blessings
There are all kinds of blessings that you think you have in your life. Some of you have had many blessings that you've already secured on December
25th, which was Christmas. And some of you have already broken your blessings. Some of you kids got some tremendous blessings in the way of toys,
and some of you have already busted them. And there's not much security in your blessings.
Now, those blessings are evaporative in nature, and what we bring about just does not have the quality of security about it, because there has to
be a way of achieving blessings to keep them secure, and only God has the means of doing it. And if you and I are brought into blessings on His
method, then the blessing is secure. It's going to be as exciting, as thrilling, and as great years later as the day you got it.
The Integrity of God
God's method of blessing is very simple, and that is that he has to be true to Himself. Therefore, all blessing has to be based upon what we may
call the integrity of God; being true to Himself; and, being true to what He is.
Perfect Justice
And the basis of everything that God is (the absolute controlling factor of everything that you could describe about God that we learn from the
Bible) is the fact that He is perfect justice. Some theologians have made a serious mistake of thinking that the controlling factor of God is
sovereignty. That is not true. The controlling factor in God is not sovereignty. The controlling factor of God is perfect justice. God's
sovereignty can't do nothing that perfect justice will not first authorize. If you're going to reduce it down to the one quality in God that is
the controlling factor, this is it, folks: perfect justice.
Let's put it this way. God is standing here ready to dispense blessings? He can only dispense those blessings when they are first screened through
His perfect justice. And His perfect justice, then, selects the target toward which God's blessings can be fired. There is only one target that God's
perfect justice will permit Him to strike, and that is the target of absolute righteousness. There is nothing that God's perfect justice will permit
Him to bless except absolute righteousness.
Grace
How is that going to be accomplished for you and me? How in the world are we ever going to get the blessing of salvation, for example? How are we
going to get the blessings of rewards in heaven? How are we going to get temporal blessings that we need in time – if God's justice will
permit Him to bless only absolute righteousness? And that's where the marvels of God's planning comes through, because God has formed a channel
through which those blessings will flow, and that channel is called grace. And that's what the apostle Paul has been trying to teach us up here
through the sixth chapter of the book of Romans – that grace is the means by which God's perfect justice can bless absolute righteousness,
because it is grace that imputes to you and me absolute righteousness.
Therefore, in the sight of God, you possess the target that God's justice will permit Him to deliver blessings to you. If it were not for that,
there could be no blessings to us.
God has done it All
Grace has been turned free, of course, by what the cross of Jesus Christ has done that has permitted grace to work. If God's justice, through the
channel of grace, can strike the target of absolute righteousness, then there is only one result to describe the product, and that is secure. On
this basis, it's secure. God has done at all. Where are you involved in this? You have absolute righteousness, and here the blessings are flowing
out to you until you're just showered and covered with the blessings of God. As the psalmist has described it, "my cup runneth over." You get to
super grace level; you've develop the container (you cup of blessing); and, God fills it to where it's overflowing. Then the book of James says,
"He gives more grace, and He give us more grace, and, indeed, your cup runneth over.
You could not possibly produce something like that on your own. It's a divine method. It's a fantastic method, and it's a sure-shot method. Any
decisions, therefore, that you make under these conditions are going to be decisions which are secure. The results will be secure. But what the
devil tries to do – let's put it in terms of the sin nature. When you are acting as a slave of the old sin nature, the old sin nature is
striking against this channel of grace with a variety of things that want to come in there to affect the decision, and to affect the blessing:
emotionalism – that wants to come in. And Christmastime, as I said, is a great time for emotionalism to come in to try to affect the blessing.
And if you let it, the result is not security.
Self-Efforts
Babbling in the so-called tongues is a high expression of emotionalism among the charismatics. What are they trying to do? They're trying to find
blessing with God. On what basis? On the basis of productivity from the old sin nature, when the only blessings are what the Holy Spirit can bring
from God's perfect justice to the imputed righteousness in us. People make such tremendous efforts themselves. Some people believe that by their
tithing they can gain blessings with God. Some people believe that by their morality they can gain blessings with God. And God knows that we need
all the morality we can get today. And that indeed is the scriptural pattern. But your doing of what is morally right is not going to secure you
any lasting blessings. It is only what God does as a result of leading you into morality that produces secure and eternal blessings for you.
You can think of all kinds of hustling, and efforts, and trying, and what people are doing to find something that they think is of value, and
something that will please God. And all over this system of grace blessing, there are things being fired at by the old sin nature to try to affect
the so-called blessings of God. And the marvels of grace is that God says, "I'm not going to let you touch it. I've got blessings for you like you
can't imagine. Eyes have not seen, and hears have not heard the blessings I've got for you. And I'll guarantee you that I have set up a system such
that, no matter what you shoot, and no matter all the idiotic things you do to try to gain favor with God, I'm not going to let you touch the
beauties of what comes through the grace channels. The grace channel protects from these exterior idiocies and these exterior contaminants that we
try to impose on Him.
You must understand this principle of how God works. God is glorified during this period of the angelic warfare when sinners are blessed right
under Satan's nose, and it produces blessings which are secure and permanent. And this is how He does it. He always delivers them in the context
of security, and we cannot lose them. When you lose what you think is a blessing, you know for sure it was never delivered to you under the context
of grace security. The only basis for securing rewards in heaven is this basis of God working alone. It is what God the Holy Spirit produces on the
grace channel that stores treasures in heaven.
Heavenly Rewards
That's why you walk up to that offering box today, and you could drop a large chunk of money in there that is totally useless relative to eternal
rewards. But you can drop the same amount of money, and have it totally recorded as huge reward in heaven. It is God's perfect justice, functioning
under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, through the grace system of giving, that strikes absolute righteousness, and then God bless, and then He can
honor what you do.
God's method is very simply to satisfy the demands of His own perfect justice which permits Him to bless nothing less than absolute righteousness.
The operational technique for this is grace, which acts as the channel for perfect justice to bless absolute righteousness, which is then imputed
to us. And grace acts as the protective shield against all the sin nature evils that try to intrude on these blessings.
Christians are enslaved to God, and they have their wills directed by the Holy Spirit. And that's why Christians can produce the divine good that
does secure divine blessings. So, God does all the work, and God receives all the glory. The Bible makes it very clear to us that He will not share
His glory with anyone else. All the divine blessings are therefore eternally secure. He never blesses us because of what we do. What we do usually
stands in the way of maximum blessings.
This does not mean that we are not to be active in the Lord's work. It means that we are to be active in a way that is cooperative with God's
justice so that grace may function; the Spirit of God is free to lead us; and, we are functioning on doctrinal principles. God never blesses
because of what we do or what we are. So, the principle of divine integrity is that God's perfect justice will only permit Him to bless absolute
righteousness.
Now, at this point, we come back to why we're gathered today – Bible doctrine in the soul, because it is Bible doctrine in the soul that
enables you to keep from plugging up this grace channel. It is a doctrine in the soul which enables you to be compatible with the leading of the
Holy Spirit, and to keep you from doing something which blocks up God's maximum blessing.
You can just decide today what you think God really wants of you in some respect, or what God has in store for you in a certain respect that you
would consider a blessing. And the first thing you have to be concerned about is whether you are blocking the channel of God delivering that
blessing to you. If you have been frustrated in achieving that blessing, that would mean so much to you, you better back off and see whether
there's something in your life – maybe just a little bit of lack of faith; lack of trust; lack of confidence; or, lack of waiting upon the
Lord that keeps His perfect justice from delivering that thing that would be a blessing to you, that He wants to deliver to you because you have
the target of imputed righteousness. It is something in us that is hindering God's flow of blessing. He cannot be contrary to His own integrity.
So, in verse 22, we read, "But now, being made free from sin." We have reviewed what it is to be a slave of sin, and that the end result of all
that is death. Verse 22 comes into the contrast. The word "but" looks like this in Greek. It's the conjunction "de," and indicates a contrast. The
word "now" is "nuni." "Nuni is an adverb of time, and it emphasizes the presence point in time – "the right now." The apostle Paul is using
this phrase, "right now," as he often does, to indicate a time change. There is here a clear dividing line between what is past and what is now
present. And "de nuni" ("but now") refers to this dividing line. The apostle Paul is emphasizing that there is a clear line between your past
production, as a slave of the sin nature, and your present production as a slave of absolute righteousness under God the Holy Spirit.
It introduces a contrast here, in other words, between verse 21, that ended in death, and verse 22, which is going to end in an absolute change.
These two words give us a very strong indication that Christians have experienced a profound change in the spiritual depth condition which they
had by natural birth. Not everyone in the human race has undergone this change in lifestyle from death that they were born with. But now, for
some of you, this is true, and consequently, there is a change of lifestyle, and it is not gradual.
Again, I must stress, we are not yet to Romans 7:7, where we start talking about how to be a godly person in your experience. We are still talking
about what is true of everyone here – the rottenest, sneakiest, lowest-down person here today, of which there must be several, I'm sure. But
that has nothing to do with what you are. Paul is still saying, "I want to tell you what God has said about you. I want to tell you how God looks
at you." And you get God's perspective on yourself, and that's where you start.
Now, gradually, what God has to do for you in the future is what you are going to become in experience. But we're still talking about positional
truth here. But now, here is a distinctively different position that you hold from what you held in the past. That is what he's saying to us here.
Not everyone has had this change, but those who have had it, have had it completely. It's not by degrees. It's a complete change. These words carry
a sense of relief and joy, therefore, for us as Christians. God alone has done this. We could not change our masters, obviously. It took that
system of perfect justice, shooting through the channel of grace toward absolute righteousness, that could bring about this change of slave masters.
And God has done it.
Things are really different for a believer with God as his new master. God is determined to pour unrestrained daily blessings on His children. I
can assure you that God is determined to pour unrestrained, daily blessings. So, if you're walking around with a lot of ills; a lot of troubles;
a lot of burdens; and, a lot of unhappiness, you have the channel of grace clogged up for some reason, because He is determined to pour blessings.
To be Free
For what reason? Because on this side, here in the presence, something very dramatic has happened. And that is described by this word in the Greek
Bible: "eleutheroo." "Eleutheroo" means "to be free." It means "to be released from restraint." It is in the aorist tense. Therefore, that tells us
that He's looking at a point in the past when this happened. Well, that's the point of salvation. It is in the passive voice, which means that you
didn't do it. It happened to you. You were passive in the matter of salvation. And it is in the participle mood, which means that a spiritual
principle is being stated to us here – that we have been set free from the sin nature at some point in the past (He's talking to Christians),
as the result of something that God has done to us, not as a result of something that we did.
That's why we need to get back to the picture. Here's the grace line, and perfect justice is shooting through that grace context to the absolute
righteousness goal of God of saving us. The truth of doctrine has set us free. Freedom from the slave master of Satan was achieved by God's
efforts. Now we are not told that we should try to act as if we're free. Again I stress to you that we are told that we are free.
For this reason, we read, for example, in Galatians 5:1: "Stand fast, therefore, in the liberty with which Christ has made us free. Be not
entangled again with the yoke of bondage. Stand fast in the liberty that you have." You are now free from the old sin nature. This is not a
promise of a possibility, but a statement of reality. "In Christ" means freedom from the sin nature. That is positional sanctification.
Reality
I have great reservations about this idea of possibility thinking. It is not a matter of possibility. It is a matter of reality that you and I
have been freed from the domination of the sin nature. You may not live like that, but you are fully capable of living like that.
"We have been freed from." The word "from" is this little Greek preposition "apo," which means separation. From what? From sin: "hamartia." This
is the word for "sin" in which the Greek Bible uses in terms of missing the mark of God's absolute righteousness. It is singular in the Greek
– not plural, so that it indicates the sin nature. If it were plural, it would indicate individual acts of evil.
The Sin Nature
Furthermore, it says, "the sin," so that it's very definitely specifies what we call the old sin nature. The sin nature for a Christian,
for this reason, is no longer his master. He has been freed from it. The sin nature for us is more of a nuisance which persists in seeking our
attention and persists in seeking our indulgence. The sin nature is no longer your slave master. It is just a nuisance. And Christians are to be
pictured not as under the sin nature, as wrestlers in combat. But the Christian is to be viewed as the wrestler who's on top of the sin nature in
a meet. Defeat is the potential that the Christian can experience.
Paying attention to the old master, Satan, is possible, and that is very tragic. In 1 Peter 5:8-9, Peter says, beginning at verse 8: "Be sober.
Be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, like a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour; whom resist steadfast in the faith,
knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world." Now, if you are a slave of sin nature, it would be
pointless to tell you to resist, and that the devil would flee from you, because you could not resist. You are the wrestler that's on top. You are
the potential winner.
Paul says, "But now (on this side of the line of salvation where you are at the present time) you have been released from the slave master ship of
the sin nature. And something more wonderful has happened. The word "and" is actually this conjunction "de," which indicates a contrast. The
contrast is that you became a new kind of slave: "douloo." The King James says, "You become servants." That's wrong. It should be, "You became
slaves." The word means to enslave. Again it's in the past. It's aorist – at the point of your regeneration. Again it's passive. The change
of ownership was done to you by God, not by yourself. That's why it's secure. I hope you caught the drift that if God's perfect justice gives you
something through the channel of grace, that can only strike absolute righteousness, that makes salvation secure, and, therefore, you can never
lose it. All Security is based upon that method. So, you became the slave. This is a participle – a spiritual principle.
A Slave of God
A slave of what? A slave of "theos" – a slave of God. You have identified your new slave master. Furthermore, the Greek says, "the God,"
meaning God the Father. Now you have a new Father, and this is an eternally secure ownership because of the way it was brought about. This is what
Jesus meant when He said, in John 10:28: "And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. Neither shall any man pluck them out of My
hands." Why is that true? Because of the way it came about. All self-efforts of man to free himself from Satan's tyranny are hopeless.
Well, the result of all this are some new benefits. You were in the past slaves of the sin nature, and now you have become slaves of ground.
Here are the new benefits, "Now you have." This is our old friend "echo." The word means "to possess." It is present tense, which means
constantly in possession. It is active. The Christian himself possesses this. It is indicative – a statement of truth. Now we get that
word we had before again. What do you possess? "Karpos." The word "karpos" means "benefits" or "profit." Every Christian receives these through
the grace channel.
Sanctification
"Unto" is the Greek preposition "eis," which means "resulting in holiness" ("hagiasmos"). And you remember that this is actually the word for
"sanctification." The word is "sanctification." We have a new benefit because we have a new slave master unto sanctification. Now this, of course,
refers to experiential sanctification resulting from our positional sanctification. This is all the opposite now of all those terrible things we
described last time. It is all the opposite, for example, of what Galatians 5:19-21 says, when it says, "The works of the flesh are manifest, which
are these: adultery; fornication; uncleanness; lasciviousness; idolatry; sorcery; hatred; strife; jealousy; wrath; factions; seditious; heresies;
envying; murders; drunkenness; ramblings; and, the like, of which I tell you before (as which I told you in the past), that they who do such things
shall not inherit the kingdom of God."
Holiness
Holiness is not a feeling. It is being a slave in the exercise of your will – of your master, God, through the meaning of the Holy Spirit.
The dwelling Spirit is guiding.
Eternal
So, Paul says, "You have a benefit unto sanctification." And, again, it's this same word "de" again that we've had (this conjunction), adding an
ultimate result: "And the end," which is the "telos," which means the final result is everlasting ("aionios"). This word means "eternal." We can
illustrate the meaning of this word in 2 Corinthians 4:18, where it has a contrasting use. Paul uses this word: "Why we look not at things which
are seen, but at things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal (temporary), but the things which are 'aionios' (eternal)."
And that's an excellent illustration of the use of that word. If you wanted to run this down through the Bible, you would find that the word
"aionios" is used about God, Who, of course, is without beginning and without end.
In Romans 16:26, it is used to describe the kind of redemption that Jesus Christ has provided.
In Hebrews 9:12, it's a redemption which is eternal in duration.
Eternal Life
It is used of the salvation which a Christian possesses in Hebrews 5:9. That's great to know – that the salvation that you have is of
eternal duration. That's why it's called eternal life.
Eternal Security
I've never been able to understand why people who think you can lose your salvation have not been bothered by the fact that God called it "eternal
life," instead of "six-months life," or "two-days life," or "six-days life," or something like that. Eternal – Hebrews 5:9 says, "The
salvation we have is of eternal duration."
It's used of the kind of life that you have received as a believer. John 3:16 speaks of that, and you can compare that with John 10:28.
It's use of the judgment of God against unbelievers in Hebrews 6:2. God's judgment is of eternal duration against unbelievers.
Hell is Eternal
One of the worst uses of this in the Bible is that this is the word that's used to describe the nature of the fire of hell (Matthew 25:41).
Jude 7 says that, "The fire of hell is "aionios." So, when someone like the Jehovah's Witnesses come along and tell you that hell is only
temporary, and that God is not going to permit a human being to sit in the scorching physical torment of hell forever, just take him to
Matthew 25:41 and Jude 7, and point out to him that the Greek word that's used there only means eternal duration. And that's exactly what
God means.
This is going to be an eternal duration for what God calls our "zoe," which is the Greek noun for life – the quality of existence, in
contrast to death." It connotes communication with God rather than separation from God. Eternal life describes the end of our lives as slaves
of God. Sanctification, in time, sends in the blessings of eternal life in eternity with God. Our sanctification, in time, climaxes with this
kind of eternal life in eternity with God.
So, this is a very fantastically marvelous thing that the apostle Paul has said to us here at the end of this chapter in verse 22: "But now,
having crossed over from the side of eternal death to the side of eternal life – that dividing line of all of your personal life's history,
you have been made free. You have been released from the slave mastership of the sin nature. That is a statement of fact. It is not something that
you should seek. Do not seek to be free from your sin nature. You are free from your sin nature. What you need to do is learn how to
function as a free man.
In the days following the civil war here in the United States, one of the problems that the slaves, who had been emancipated had, was that they
did not know how to act as free men now. They only knew how to act as slaves. And they tried to keep living as if they were slaves. What happened
to Israel when they crossed out of Egypt – the Exodus generation? God takes them across the Red Sea, in that dramatic effect; He brings them
over to the other side; He brings them out into the wilderness; and, then they have a little problem with some water and food, and do you remember
what they said? They turned to Moses and said, "Why they you brought us out here?" God said, "The reason I brought you out here was to give you
freedom, you ding-a-lings. What do you mean: why did I bring you out here?"
Well, what was their problem? They were slaves with no security, which, incidentally, is one of the reasons for slavery. Slavery provides security.
That's why God says, "A wife is to be the slave of her husband," because God wants women to be secure. He wants them to be provided for. He wants
them to be elevated. He wants them to be on the level of being cared for. He doesn't want them to be descended to the level of men. So, He provides
this kind of a relationship. And they knew that security. Whatever else was true about them, they had food, and they had some kind of a place to
live, and they had some kind of a provision for their ills. And they kept looking back to Egypt where they had security: "Why did you bring us
out here?"
Well, this is the thing – that God has made you free from the domination of the sin nature. And because God has done it, it is a secure
freedom, and you never have to worry about losing it again. You are now the slave of God, and He will provide. And when you look back in the past,
when you were a slave of old sin nature, it was shame. Now he says, "You have a different kind of benefit. You have a benefit of fruit unto
holiness. And the ultimate end of your positional sanctification (that's what he means by "holiness" – you've got this freedom. Now learn
how to act as a slave that is free in Jesus Christ. The end of this holiness that you have (the end of this freedom from the sin nature) is going
to be everlasting life.
Everlasting Life
The climaxing factor (what he means by this word "telos," the end, is going to be everlasting life. The Holy Spirit was very careful not to say
that you have the benefit of everlasting life as the result of your godly living. You don't get everlasting life from your holy living. You have
holiness as a result of how God the Spirit lead you. But the end of this holy life is going to be climaxed with everlasting life. And that's life
with God. That's life on the finest level. That's life in the maximum blessing.
God Works on Integrity
However, above all, learn what most Christians have such a terrible time learning, and why they're forever out there trying to do something to gain
God's blessing. Learn the principle of a God who works on integrity, a God who has to be true to Himself. And whatever blessing you think you have
today, or whatever blessing you may see this morning, if you don't get it this way (if you don't seek it this way), you have zero nothing, and you
will save yourself a great deal of grief. It comes from God's perfect justice, protected by His grace, and delivered to the imputed righteousness
in you. And He will not deliver anything to your imputed righteousness when you're out of fellowship with God the Holy Spirit. When you're out of
fellowship with God the Holy Spirit, you have blocked the channel of His delivering anything to you. But if you understand this principle of the
way God works, then your fondest dreams are going to be realized. Your fondest hopes are going to be experience. And you will not be chasing
rabbits, and you will not be chasing things such that, about the time you think you caught them in your hand, they have slithered away from you.
Dr. John E. Danish, 1977
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