In this episode, Bob George provides profound insights into the relationship between the law and spiritual death, emphasizing the emptiness that comes from merely playing church. He explains that the law’s true purpose is to highlight human sinfulness and its inevitable consequence, death. This powerful discussion outlines how spiritual life is only achievable by moving beyond religion into a living relationship with Christ, who offers the gift of grace. By freeing believers from the confines of the law, Christ invites them into a transformative journey toward salvation and eternal life.
Welcome to Classic Christianity Radio with Bob George. Bob’s clear, timeless teachings on the complete forgiveness and unconditional love of Jesus Christ will transform your life as you learn about God’s amazing grace. Let’s join Bob as he teaches us from God’s Word.
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Now, did I know I was under the law? I didn’t know it. I didn’t pay attention to it. But it still was true. I was under a death penalty. I was still empty inside. I didn’t know it was because I was dead spiritually, but I sure knew I was empty spiritually. Even though I went to church on Sunday and gave my dollar a week. If I felt generous that week. So you can play church over here. And you can be aware of your emptiness over here. Why? Because the scripture tells us that the purpose of the law is to manifest your sinfulness and to show you that you are sinful and to show you that there is a consequence for sin called death and you are dead spiritually and in need of spiritual life. That’s the purpose of the law. Not to use it as a standard of holiness because you cannot keep it. but to show you your death. Death is final. It’s bad. There’s no spiritual life over here. I mean, you can play church. Don’t get me wrong. You can play church. You can dress up. You can go to church every Sunday. You can give tithes, offerings. You can play religion. In fact, that’s what Satan gets you to do. Satan says, I sure the heck, I’m not going to teach you that you’re dead and there’s a life available to you, so I’ll teach you how to be religious. Teach you how to go to church. Teach you how to dress up and look good. Teach you how to lie spiritually. Couldn’t teach you how to evangelize. I can teach you anything. You can be taught anything, but you’re dead. It’s not the case of how bad you are or how good you are. It’s how dead you are. The wages of sin is what? Death. Sin shall not be your master, which means when you’re under the law, sin is your master. He’s your owner. You’re just like a slave with an owner, a mean one. That takes you and manipulates us, coerces in every way, shape, or form, came to what? To steal and destroy and kill. That’s Satan. That’s your land over there. Now, what is salvation, guys? Oh, you’ve sinned. You need your sins forgiven. You know we’ve never gone beyond that? You’ve sinned and you need your sins forgiven. That’s salvation. To this day, that is the major teaching in Christendom. That all you need is to get your sins forgiven. Why? Because basically you’re a good person. No, you’re dead. Dead. You’re a stinking corpse, dead. Don’t care how nice you look. Don’t care what kind of spiritual perfume and deodorant you put on. You’re dead. And we said, no, no, no, no, no. You’ve got to be politically correct. That’s not very nice to say about those sweet people. I mean, there’s some nice people over there. Yeah, but they’re dead. Yeah, there’s probably some nice corpses around, but they’re dead. And we have to understand this is what God had to come to do. Not just to take away your sins. Your sins are what caused your death. So if I didn’t take away what caused it, why would I give you life? Because if I didn’t take away what caused it and I gave you life, the next time you sin, you’d be dead again. I had to free you guys from that whole realm over here. The whole realm that you live in. The whole realm of it. Under the control. Prisoner. Locked up. Until what? Faith in Christ should be revealed. Now guys, who in the world is going to be capable of taking you out of that state of death into life? Is Buddha going to do it? Is Mohammed going to do it? Is any man that you know going to do it? These people would get up and say, oh, well, this religion is, they’re bull. Religion. All of it is junk. All of it. Including the Christian religion, if that’s all you have is religion. It’s all, what he says, dung. Compared to that of what? Knowing the only one whose life was capable of of being laid down, totally taking away the sins of the whole world, not covering them, taking them away. And was raised from the dead so that you and I could be raised from the dead. New citizenship. As an example, you have, let’s say we have a map of And of the United States. And at the lower end of that map, do we have that map on the computer? On the, yeah, there it is. On the southern end is Mexico. Northern end, Canada. Now let’s say that you were born in Mexico. And in Mexico, and again, these are just examples. In Mexico, it’s a tough life. You got a tyrant that’s your master. And he reigns, does he not? As long as you’re there, he reigns. But one day somebody comes and comes and gets you, as we showed last week with James and his wife, and picks you up and moves you over to Graceland. You’re no longer over here. And that’s why it says you used to live there. Shall sin, if we died to sin, shall we live in it anymore? You don’t live there anymore. You don’t live under the sin principle. God, folks, is not dealing with you as a born-again believer. And James, I wish you guys would just get up and move again. Will you do that for me? In fact… Let’s all of you move out of there. All of you who are born again, move out of there. And what I’m saying is you’re all under the law. So when you move, you’re moving out of the law. So get out of there. Empty that place out. You’re over here now in Graceland. And I can see you better too. Now you’ve got one couple back there that wants to stay dead. And if they want to stay dead, that’s their choice. But you’re dead under the law, and if you stay there, you’re going to go where you want to go. Because you don’t want to go to Graceland. You want to stay under the law, dead. And you’ve got a privilege. You’ve got the right to do that. And you’ve got a choice to do that. But to those who said, no, no, I want to live. I don’t want to live under that law. It kills me. I want to live under grace. I want to be led internally by the spirit of God. And now they’re over here. Brand new, brand new place. They’ve moved out of Mexico and now they live in the United States. And in the United States, you can choose many, many places to live. That’s why they call it the United States, is because it’s states that are united one to another. And even though different states can have different laws, they’re all under the one law called America. The United States of what? America. You are now children of the living God. You are now… Not a Baptist or a Presbyterian or a Methodist. Your identity isn’t where you park your body on Sundays or Saturdays. Your identity is who you are. You’ve been made into a new creation. You’re over here now. You’re no longer over there. Now, you say, well, can I go back? No, you can’t go back. You absolutely cannot go back any more than a caterpillar can go back, or a butterfly can go back to being a caterpillar. He’s a new creation. But you can visit close by. And that’s what a lot of Christians do. They say, well, I know I can’t go back, but I’m going to sit on this aisle right over here where Gene is. Close as I can get to the law, but realizing that, no, I’m not under it, but I’m close to it. Because it was my friend. Heaven forbid. Heaven forbid. Now let’s read this. Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? In other words, it says where the law is, grace increases. Where sin increases, grace increases all the more. So he said, well, then should we go on sinning so that grace can increase? He said, by no means. You died to sin. You’re over here. You died where you lived. That’s sin and death over here. Guys, do you realize… That God is no longer dealing with you on the basis of sin and death. Do you realize that? He’s not dealing with you on the basis of sin. Not if you’re over here. You say, God, I did it again. He said, did what again? Well, the sin that I committed yesterday, it’s been taken away. Well, the sin I’m going to commit tomorrow, it’s been taken away. What are you coming to me for? For the sin issue. I’ve dealt with it. I dealt with it 2,000 years ago. I dealt with it at the cross. Your sins were judged. The verdict was guilty. The punishment was death. And I took it all. That’s why there’s none left for you. That’s why it says in the Bible there is now no condemnation awaiting you who belong to Christ Jesus. Well why is there any condemnation awaiting you? I deserve some condemnation. He said that’s not the issue. The issue is I’ve dealt with it. And I dealt with it in the most harsh way that I knew. I crucified my son so that that blood that was shed for you could be put on you, and you could be identified with him, and through that identification, be free from sin. I’m not dealing with you on the basis of sin today. Now that’s a far cry from that continual teaching is, Joe, you keep on sinning, brother, and God’s going to get you. And you keep on sinning, Jim, and God can take your business away from you. Or you keep on sinning and I’m going to take my cowboy tickets away from you. It’s a far cry because that’s not true. It’s not true. Do we deserve punishment? Yeah. Do we get it? No. No condemnation. Why? Because that was God’s plan. He said, I’m not going to be dinking around with you folks for thousands of years. I’m going to deal with sin one time. I’m going to deal with it. I’m going to judge it. I’m going to eliminate it. To all of those who come to Christ by faith, you’re in a different realm. You live in a different community. You live in a different country. You no longer live in Mexico. You live in the United States. You no longer live in Canada. You live in the United States. You’re under the rule and the reign of the United States. You’re a different ruler. Our ruler is Jesus. Their ruler was Satan. Which do you want to live in? Satan’s world or God’s world? You got a choice. Over here, what does this world bring you? Misery? Misery, doesn’t it? It sounds so good. It sounds so tempting. But the end of it is death. Death.
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Be sure to go to bobgeorge.net to find our in-depth and practical Bible study guides. Each Bible study will teach you more about Jesus and will help strengthen your relationship with God. Now back to our classic Christianity radio program.
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Remember, we’re coming close to New Year’s. Do you remember New Year’s parties when you were lost? How many of you remember New Year’s parties when you were lost? Have you ever been a dumber thing in the world? You sit around and blow these dumb things out and twirl your little deals and get half drunk. And they go, oh boy, did I have fun. I got such a headache I can’t walk today, but was that fun. Fun. The most boring thing you ever go to in your life. Boring. But we make it look good. You see all this stuff on television. You see these young ladies… dressed up in these scantily clothed girls and saying, oh, it’s fun to be bad. And I think, have you ever been in that realm? Giving your bodies up like a piece of chattel? Like a toilet seat? And turning your bodies over to any Tom, Dick, and Harry that wants to come along and use you? Make you feel good? You feel like a tramp. Don’t tell me you feel good. We know better. The sexual stuff that is going on today with teenagers is unbelievable to me. It’s what’s going on. And yet we sit back and say, oh, well, just boys will be boys and girls will be boys. Nonsense. You had better discipline your kids and teach them that this stuff will drive you to destruction. A girl many times, a guy, especially girls, have to live with that all their lives. The guilt of it. And instead of men having respect for women and having a respect to treat a girl decently, it’s not the thing to do anymore. That’s law land. That’s over there where you don’t even know right from wrong. You know, the purpose of the law is to define what sin is. And we sit down and say, oh no, we rename it. If you rename it, you can redefine it. But it’s there to teach you what sin is and what the consequence of sin is. And so guys, you now live in a new realm. You live in a new location. This is called Graceland. Under Graceland, there’s no condemnation awaiting you who belong to Christ Jesus. Under Graceland, you are not people who get forgiven. You are forgiven people. You’re not people who ask if you’re going to walk by faith because this is Graceland and it’s faith land. Over there is law land. Over here, you’re living in a new realm altogether. To ask for what you already have would be ludicrous, wouldn’t it? You have eternal life. You have been given an eternal inheritance in Christ Jesus. You have all of the promises, everything that belongs to Christ belongs to you because what he’s saying here is you have been identified now with Christ. It says you have been baptized. And what is interesting, folks, is when it talks in verse 3 in chapter 6 of Romans, don’t you know that all of you who are baptized into Christ were baptized into his death? And instead of glorying in the fact of you’re in Christ now, we start paying attention on baptism and put emphasis on baptism. Well, guys, there’s a physical baptism and there is a spiritual baptism. Remember John the Baptist said that I baptize with water, but in a few days the one coming after me whose sandals I’m not worthy of untying will baptize you with who? The Holy Spirit. So when you come to Christ Jesus, the Spirit of God comes to live in you, to indwell you. And the Bible says if the Spirit does not live in you, you do not belong to Him. You cannot be saved apart from the life of Christ. The Spirit of God who now comes to live in you baptizes or places you into His body. He is now the head, you are the body. You’re not the body of Christ over here. There’s only two of you there. You’re not the body of Christ. There’s the body of Christ. There’s the graveyard. Here’s the body of Christ. There’s the dead. Here’s the living. And so he says to us that you were baptized into Christ, were baptized into his death. We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death and And again, we get all hung up on the baptism instead of the fact that this is an act of God. This is not an act of man. This is an act of God where He places you into His body. So that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. In other words, I’m identified with the one who died to take away my sins. I’m identified the one who was buried in order to prove his death, and I’m identified with the one who was raised from the dead so that I could be raised from the dead. I’m in Christ. All that belongs to Christ belongs to me. He’s seated in the heavenly, so am I. You say, well, no, you’re here. Well, spiritually, I’m there. I’m already there. That’s what negates to me this idea that you could lose your salvation. To me, it’s nonsense. It’s nonsense. We had somebody try to stop our program when we were out in California. Was going to picket the church for sponsoring us there because we teach you have eternal security. Say, dumb and dumber. Anybody thinks that you can lose salvation does not know what salvation is. Period. You just don’t know what it is. Because if you can lose it, it’s all tied up in sin. But you can out sin the grace of God. Well, I’ll tell you, you can’t out sin the grace of God. As a matter of fact, if you’re in Christ, your sins have been wiped away never to see him again. So how are you gonna walk away? If you’re in the light as he’s in the light, how are you ever gonna get in darkness? So at any rate, everything that belongs to Christ is yours. He’s your inheritance. Do you believe that, guys? I mean, is that good news or is it just ho-hum? It seems to me it should be good news. We’ve been united with Him. In His death, we certainly will also be united with Him in His resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with Him so that the body of sin might be done away with. And that we should no longer be a slave to sin. Because anyone who has died has been what, guys? What does it say? That’s in verse what? Six? Seven. What’s it say? Because anyone who has died has been what? Freed from the law. Again, back to the law. You’re not under it. Do you understand that? If you’re saved, you’re not under the law. You may be saved and be stupid in your teaching and get yourself back under the law or keep yourself under the law. But if you’re saved, you’re not under it from God’s standpoint. You’re just fooling around. You’re just pretending you’re over there. But you’re not from God’s standpoint. That’s not where you are. You’re over here. So you say, what are you hanging on to that over here for? That killed you. Don’t you know that the wages of sin under the law is death? That killed you. What do you want to hang on to that for? And there are people who tenaciously want to hang on to that. Why? They’re either lost or they’ve never known their identity in Christ. Never known it. Sad. The dynamic, my friends, of evangelism is not just you get your sins forgiven. It’s the fact that you have been placed into Christ. That’s the dynamic of evangelism. God has placed you into his son. You’re in the son. I’m crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live. Yet not I, but Christ lives in me. And the life that I live, in this flesh of mine, I live by faith in the son of God, the one who loved me and gave himself for me. That’s who you are. Transferred. No longer over there. Look, that’s empty. No longer there. Don’t belong to that over there. Stay away from it. Rejoice in what you have. Now, if we died to Christ, we believe that we’ll also live with him. Verse 8, chapter 6. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he can’t die again. Death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once and for all. But the life that he lives, he lives for God, to God. In the same way, King James says reckon. Reckon yourself death. I reckon so. We say I reckon so. Count yourself. Count on it, guys. In other words, believe it. That’s what he’s saying. Put your faith in it. Quit talking like you’re one way over here when in essence you’re still over here. Is there anything the law can do to you today as a born again believer? No. Not really. Can you make it appear as if he’s doing something to you? Yeah, you can imagine it. But it’s all imagination. It’s not real. We believe that we live with him. He can’t die again. He died to sin once and for all. He’s not going to die again. Is there any more forgiveness to be executed on your behalf by God? Is there? And if there was, what would he have to do? Die again. Is he going to do it? No. How many of you believe Jesus is coming back? What do you say is going to happen when he came back? Going to come back to bear sin? No, he said, I’m going to come back to bear sin, but to bring salvation for those who are waiting for me. Why isn’t he coming back to bear sin? Seems like there’s sure been a lot of it since he was here. Before he’d done it. The quality of the life of God, the life is in the blood. It’s not just a liquid that you’re talking about when you’re talking about the blood of Christ. You’re talking about the life of Christ. He laid his life down for you and me. the shedding of his forfeiture of his life, was of such quality, being God, that it was capable of reaching back to Adam and forward to this very day and on. And so, he says, reckon yourself dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore, don’t let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Is there sin in our mortal bodies? He says it’s there, but don’t let it rain. You don’t need to let it rain. Because how does it rain? By the law. What is the rain of sin under the law? What’s the rain? What control does that have over you? The wages of sin is what? Death. Not under that anymore. So offer your parts of your body as instruments, don’t offer as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life and offer parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. Why? Look in your Bibles, folks, that’s where you’re going to find this. Verse 14, for sin shall not be your master. Because you’re not under law, but under grace. Meaning that if you’re under the law, sin is your master. Where you say, well, I know a lot of people that are under the law, but they sure are nice acting people. I don’t care how nice they act. That’s not the issue. The issue, the Bible says, that if you’re under the law, sin is your master. You’re being mastered by someone other than who came to master you. And that’s God.
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Until next time, walk in faith, be good to one another, and praise the Lord. Amen.
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Put Jesus first in your life and turn your life around.
