The Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus
This glorious law of liberty in which we are born into, we are called unto, and we standfast in in Romans 8:2 is described as the Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. And we covered “the Law…” part of that and some characteristics about law to help us understand how God works; to help us understand how secure this liberty is.
We saw a few things about law:
#1 A law is always true given the same circumstances
#2 A law is proven through much experimentation
#3 A law does not change.
So our freedom in Jesus Christ is a Law. It’s not a suggestion. It’s not a possibility. It’s a Law! It’s always true, we can prove it over and over, and it will never change. I’m freedom from the law of sin and death is law itself. And that carries alot of weight. But what seals this law in heaven is that is not just law, it’s the law of the Spirit; the Holy Spirit. We covered law in general, but whose law is this? Well it’s the Spirit’s law. When someone tells you that you must do something that you think you have to do, what do you ask? Says who? I am FREE from the law of sin and death because the Spirit says so!
And I believe this is a good place to preach one our most foundational Christian doctrines: the diety of the Holy Ghost. (What is the Trinity?) Let us understand that what makes us free is the law of Almighty God the Spirit. It’s not just A law, it’s God the Spirit’s law. Our freedom is decreed by God the Father. Our freedom is wrought by God the Son. And can I say this? Our freedom is made real by God the Spirit. Our freedom is appropriated by God the Spirit. Our freedom is made effective by God the Spirit.
If we are to walk after the Spirit in liberty, I think that it would help us to know that we’re following after God himself. The bible says that Noah walked with God. The bible says that Enoch walked with God. You can walk with God today. David said, “He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness…” That’s Jehovah-Rohi (The Lord is my shepard). That He (that person) that holds my hand, that person that walks beside me is the high and holy one. His name is El Shaddia (The Almighty God) His name is Elohim (The creator of the heaven and earth) Jehovah-Jireh lives inside of me (The Lord will provide). I AM THAT I AM has made his abode in me. To serve in the newness of Spirit is to serve Adonai (The Lord is Master). And it’s His law that made me free from the law of sin and death.
It’s God’s law that makes me free! Our freedom is made sure because it’s God’s law that makes it so. This was not thought up by man. No God’s thoughts are not like our thoughts. The work was not done by man. No it was God that died on the cross and was buried and rose again the third day. And it wasn’t man that drew you to him and saved you and baptized you into the body of Jesus Christ. It was God. And it’s still God that draws you now, that speaks to your soul, “Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away…” “Come away with me!” he calls. David said, “To day if ye will hear his voice…” Paul said, “If you hear his voice…” Jesus said, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:…” That wasn’t his humanity speaking. That was his diety! (If it’s possible to seperate them)
To walk after the Spirit is to walk after God; to walk with God. To be filled with the Spirit is to be soaked and saturated and overwhelmed and controlled by the all knowing, all powerful, almighty God. 2 Corinthians 6:16 “…for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them and walk in them…” I believe that to walk after the Spirit, really and truely is to let God Almighty walk in you. So it’s important if you are seeking to serve God, and have the power of God in your life, it’s important to come to know that the Holy Spirit is not an abstract magical power that we in our fleshly minds and sinful bodies and ignorance are to somehow attain. But the Holy Spirit is God, infinitely holy, infinitely wise, infinitely mighty, infinitely loving and compassionate and tender, who’s desire is to take possession of you and use you according to His most perfect will.
The Person of the Holy Spirit.
So I want to cover a few things regarding this wonderful person, the sweet Holy Ghost that abides in us. Now, the bible says that God is spirit. We must worship him in spirit, yes. We must serve him in spirit, yes. It’s all spiritual, but just because God is a spirit doesn’t mean that he’s not a person. All the things that the Spirit of God does in the bible can be ascribed to a person. They’re something that a person does. I know when we think spirit, we may think just a floating mist that influences things. Yet I want to say this: The Holy Spirit is more real, more influential, more able that the flesh on our bones. He is a person; and a very active person. And according to the scriptures, he’s a very active person on our behalf.
(Remember when we went through the New Testament and saw all the times that God had filled his people with the Holy Ghost. Person after person, time after time God has made his Spirit known. I want you to see that the Spirit of God is very active, and active on our behalf)
1 Cor 2:10, He searcheth all things for us
Rev 2:7, He speaks to us in the churches
Gal 4:6, He cries in our hearts
Rom 8:26, He helps our infirmities; He makes intercession for us
John 15:26, He testifies of Jesus to us
John 14:26, He teaches us all things
John 16:12, He guides us
Acts 16:6, He forbids us
Acts 13:2, He calls us.
He does all these things for us. I want to say this: The Spirit is the perfect person to walk after. The bible says that “…there’s a friend that sticketh closer than a brother!” All of us have had crowds that we’ve run with, friends that we’ve hung out with. What was it about them that drew you to them? Or why did you keep company with this person? There was something about their personality that you liked or maybe got some benefit from. There was something about their person that attracted you and convinced you to walk after them. The Spirit of God is the perfect person to walk after. There’s something about the person of the Holy Ghost that draws me to him. (Repeat the list)
What a wonderful friend we have in the Holy Ghost. You don’t have to worry about this friend’s faithfulness. He’s cares about you. He’s got your best interest at heart. He’s making sure that we might know Him and the power of his resurrection. He’s the perfect person to walk after. If you want to walk with God, if you want to press on to mark of the high calling in Christ Jesus, the Holy Ghost will lead the way. Just follow him, he’s the perfect person to walk after.
#1 He’s perfect in his knowledge
1 Corinthians 2:9-11 “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.”
The Spirit of God is perfect in his knowledge. I certainly don’t know everything. Look, I’ll just be honest. I’m finding this out more every day. I’m an ignoramous. Man, I’m dumb. Some of the things I think, say, and do; I just prove to myself over and over, I know so little. Sometimes, I like to think of myself as the jack of all trades, but I realize that I’m a master of nothing. I don’t know everything. But there’s someone living inside that does know everything. He’s perfect in his knowledge.
There’s somethings I’d like to know. There’s somethings I’d like to learn, but more and more there’s one things that I want to know more of and that’s I want to know God. And I want to know the things of God. You say, “What are the things of God?” I don’t know. But he knows. Jeremiah said, “Call unto me and I will shew thee great and might things!” What are those great and mighty things. I don’t know, but he knows. The Spirit of God knows. And if you really want to know, you better to get to calling unto him. If we’re ever gonna know anything about God, it’s gonna be the Spirit of God that teaches it to us. We might want to follow after him? We might want to walk after the Spirit? He’s perfect in his knowledge.
The bible says that if man be in Christ,hold things are passed away, behold all things have become new! I’ll tell you one thing that God has made new in me, when I got saved: That’s my knowledge. I’m telling God wiped my hard drive clean. He erased my knowledge. My problem is that I didn’t know it. You know how they say that you can erase stuff from your hard drive, but it’s actually still there. For it to be completely erased, it needs to be overwritten. Ever since I’ve been saved, God’s been overwriting my knowledge all this time.
I think about my three years at Faith Baptist Institute, and then six years away from there, all the struggles that were going on inside of me, and wondering why in the world God has me up there. And not knowing what God was doing with us when we got back. Feeling my heart grow cold to things of God and seeing myself drift from the narrow way. I didn’t understand what God was doing. Or even it was God that was doing. But that last camp meeting, God let me see that he knew what was going on the whole time. I didn’t know what he was doing, but HE knew what he was doing. Thank God, he’s perfect in his knowledge!
You might not know why you’re going through the things you’re going through. You might not know why he let certain things happen to you. Maybe you don’t have the knowledge you wish you had. Oh but the Spirit of God has got that knowledge. The Spirit of God knows why you’re going through what you’re going through. Isaiah 46:9-10 “I am God, and there is non like me, Declaring the end from the beginning.” God knows the beginning from the end. God knows how this thing is gonna turn out. No wonder he helps our infirmities. No wonder he makes intercession for us. If you love him. If you’ll just trust him. If you’ll go with him, and walk after him, he’ll take us to the other of side of this thing, and when it’s over, he’ll look back with you and say, “Do you understand now?” We might not understand now, but he does, Amen? He knows! He’s perfect in his knowledge.
#2 He’s perfect in his love
Romans 15:30 “Now I beseech you, brethren, for the Lord Jesus Christ’s sake, and for the love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in your prayers to God for me;”
We talk about the love of God the Father: For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son… For God commendeth his lord toward us in that while we were yet sinner Christ died for us.. And we talk about the love of Jesus, God the Son: The life I now live, I live by the faith of son of God who loved me and gave himself for me… Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it… But what about the Holy Ghost and the love of the Spirit.
Our freedom is decreed by God the Father. Our freedom is wrought by God the Son. Our freedom is made real by God the Spirit. Our freedom is appropriated by God the Spirit. Our freedom is made effective by God the Spirit. Who was it that sought you when you were a stranger to God? When you were in the mire and muck of sin, who sought you there. In love, the Spirit of God followed after you and pleaded with you. How many times did we reject him and turn aside from him, but in love, he kept trying to reprove us of wages of sin, of judgment to come, and of the righteousness in Jesus Christ. Like a mother, who was it that carried you, and travailed with you, and birthed you into the family of God. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit. You mama has a love for you that’ll never die. How much more the Spirit of God who brought you to Jesus Christ, who led you and drew you to Calvary. Only one that loves you can do so great a work in your life. The Holy Spirit is perfect in his love.
And who is that’s helping you today work out that salvation? “Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.” Whoever it was that begun it, will perform it! Paul said, “Are ye so foolish, having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?” Paul told the Hebrews, “Let us go on to perfection…” There’s only one way we’re gonna get down that road, and that to follow after the one that put us on this road in the first place. And in his love, the Holy Spirit has to deal with our murmuring, complaining, our unbelief, our doubting, our SIN! In love, he calls us back to him. In love, he guides us and leads us in paths of righteousness for his names sake. Oh sometimes in prayer, when the Spirit of God has come upon me, it’s all love. Love! Love! And I’ll cry, “I don’t deserve your love! I don’t deserve you love!” The Holy Spirit is perfect in his love.
#3 He’s Perfect in His Goodnes
Nehemiah 9:20 “Thou gavest also Thy good Spirit to instruct them…”
John 14:16 “…he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;”
God the Holy Spirit is good. I remember Preacher Allen and others would say that it’s probably a good idea to hang around someone that is more spiritual than you, because they’ll encourage you in this Christian life. They’ll help you. They’ll rub off on you. Versus hanging around someone that is less spiritual. They’ll keep you down. They’ll drag you off away from God. Find someone that’s going after God. I can’t think of any better person to follow after than God the Holy Spirit.
He won’t lead you the wrong way, that’s for sure. When contemplating this thing about walking after the Spirit, and being filled with the Holy Spirit, my mind is alway brought to the fruit of the Spirit. What is the fruit of the Spirit? “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.” Number 6 there is goodness. That’s in Galatians. In Ephesians, it says, “(For the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth;) Proving what is acceptable unto the Lord.” In Ephesians there’s three, and in Galatians there’s nine. And they’re different but one item: goodness.
What is it we tell our children before we leave them alone somewhere? Be good. I tell you, there’s one thing that God wants of his children and that’s to be good. We can learn goodness and do goodness if we walk after the Spirit, because the Spirit can be nothing but good. And if there’s any goodness in me, it’s the Holy Spirit that dwells in me.
First of all, he’s good to me. And that testified to by his actions which we covered:
1 Cor 2:10, He searcheth all things for us
Rev 2:7, He speaks to us in the churches
Gal 4:6, He cries in our hearts
Rom 8:26, He helps our infirmities; He makes intercession for us
John 15:26, He testifies of Jesus to us
John 14:26, He teaches us all things
John 16:12, He guides us
Acts 16:6, He forbids us
Acts 13:2, He calls us.
All these are good things. And if we follow after him and be filled with him, our actions will testify of the goodness of God. We’ll do good things. Look at Apollos, he was MUCH HELP to the brethren. “We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus, unto good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them.” How do we walk in them? Walk after the Spirit. I’m telling you, if we follow after goodness, goodness will follow after us. What did David say, “Surely goodness and mercy should follow me all the days of my life!” If we follow after goodness, goodness will follow after us. I tell you I want to be good. I want to do good. The bible says that against such there is no law.
There is not a law against the fruit of the Spirit. But there is a law for it, amen. “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.” Walk after the Spirit, and you can’t go wrong. Listen, the law of the Spirit is not just a principle that we need to grasp. It’s something that needs to grasp us. We don’t need the Spirit of God to help us produce goodness in our life. We just need to let the Holy Ghost be good through us. I know it’s subtle, but it’s a world of a difference.
(Glove example)
When we try to produce the fruit of the Spirit with our wisdom, and our righteousness, and our love, and our power, we’re severely limited. But through the power of the Holy Ghost, there is no limit. Against such, there is no law! There is no limit.
He’s perfect in his goodness. God is good. God in the person of the Holy Ghost is good. Oh the thought, that God saw fit to dwell inside of me. (Expound, He leadeth me)
#4 He’s Perfect in His Concern
Ephesians 4:30 “Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God..”
1 Thess 5:19 “Quench not the Spirit”
The Holy Spirit is a very active person on our behalf. We’ve established that. However, that’s not to discount that the Holy Spirit is also reactive because of us. Depending on how we respond to the work and action of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit as a person, like any normal person would do, reacts accordingly. However, a normal person, can either over-react or under-react. There’s certain friends or family, that we have to be real careful about how we say things, or they’ll get their feelings hurt. Or there’s someone in our life that all or nothing. If least little things doesn’t go their way, they shut the whole things down. They don’t talk to anybody. They just crawl up in their little hole and punish everybody by withdrawing their presence. They over-react. Or maybe you’re the one that actually does that. Now we’re human and fleshly and imperfect and sinful and prideful and hateful, and we’re prone to do things like that. That’s why we don’t make a very good friend sometimes.
But the Holy Spirit is not like that. Like I said earlier, the Spirit is the perfect person to walk after. He’s a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. He’s infinitely wise. He’s infinitely loving and compassionate. IF we ever grieve the Holy Spirit of God, rest assured that he’s justified in his emotions. Not only does the Holy Spirit love, but he hurts too. He can be grieved. And his grief is justified; meaning God the Holy Spirit has every right to be grieved with us when he is. He never over-reacts or under-reacts. Why? Because he’s perfect in his concern for us.
When is grief justified? Look at the person I described earlier. (Repeat) That person is concerned only with themselves. But when we’re concerned about others and we want the best for others, our loved ones, our family, our children. And when they do things or say things or believe things that are detrimental to them, that draw them further from God; Oh we have every right to be grieved. Likewise, the perfect person of the Holy Spirit is concerned for us.
1 Cor 2:10, He searcheth all things for us
Rev 2:7, He speaks to us in the churches
Gal 4:6, He cries in our hearts
Rom 8:26, He helps our infirmities; He makes intercession for us
John 15:26, He testifies of Jesus to us
John 14:26, He teaches us all things
John 16:12, He guides us
Acts 16:6, He forbids us
Acts 13:2, He calls us.
He is active on our behalf because he’s concerned about us. He’s trying to be lead us and help us get through this life. And his concern is perfect. If He’s grieved at us, he ought to be. Stephen cried at those Pharisees, “Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost!” Stephen filled with the Holy Ghost, could feel and express the grief of God. Remember the spies at Kadesh-Barnea. I think the sad truth is that we’re mostly like the 10 spies that rebelled against God than we are like Joshua and Caleb. Joshua and Caleb said, “Let’s go in. Let’s possess what God has given us!” The other 10 said, “No, we can’t do it.” God was practically pulling them into the promised land. He was clearing the way. Deliverance after deliverance. Miracle after miracle. He had them by the hand and was taking them into the promised land. And they fought and resisted and said, “No, I want to go back!” And the bible says that “How long will this people provoke me? And how long will it be ere they believe me?” God was grieved. God wanted the very best for them. He was perfect in his concern for them.
Likewise, the Spirit of God, that leads us through this wilderness is perfect in his concern for us. When God chastens us and deals with us it’s because we most certainly need it. We’ve grieved him. We’ve grieved his Spirit. His Spirit is his most inner being. We grieved his most inner being; his Spirit. And like in that wilderness, the Holy Ghost is going to with the rebellion in us and carcasses are going to have to fall… Why? Because the Spirit is perfect in his concern for us.
“…My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuke of him: For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he recieveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live? For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness. Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.” Heb 12:5-11
I think perfect concerns means not only justified grief, but also justified chastisement. Do we think that we can grieve the Holy Spirit of God over and over and Him not react. No he is perfect in his concern for us. (You think about that example of the Shepard… broken leg)