Today on Real Life Radio. For we know that the law is spiritual, but I'm carnal. Why?
Sold under sin. I don't remember being sold.
Well, you have to talk to mom and dad, Adam and Eve. They sold us under sin, and we were born with this sin nature within us. This is Real Life. Welcome to Real Life Radio with Pastor Jack Hibs. I'm David J.
Thanking you for joining us today as we listen, learn, and are challenged by God's Word, the Bible. Hey, I'm very excited to promote this new book by Dr. Tim LaHaye. Not only a mentor of mine, but a precious friend, a man who encouraged me to write books. Dr.
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dot com. On today's edition of Real Life Radio, Pastor Jack continues with his series now called "The Book of Ephesians," and a message titled "From Death to Life, Part One." Ephesians is a letter the Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus, showing every believer who they really are in Christ. And here, Paul reminds us just how far God reached out to rescue us. You see, before we came to Christ, we were walking through life without purpose or really any real hope. But this dark truth is exactly what makes the good news shine so brightly.
It's the backdrop that lets the light of God's grace shine through.
So today, Pastor Jack teaches us that we were all born into sin and alienated from a holy God. But the good news is that we don't have to stay there. Jesus went to the cross to free us from sin and death, and with Jesus as our mediator, we're now part of God's family.
Now, with his message called "From Death to Life," part one, here's Pastor and Bible teacher Jack Hibbs. We only die once as a Christian, but if you die as a die without Christ. Not a Christian. The Bible teaches that you'll die twice. You'll die a physical death, and you'll die a spiritual death for all eternity, and you'll live in that spiritual death.
That's a terrible thing. That's why Jesus went to the cross. He doesn't want you to go there. But the real you on the inside is the part that will live forever. Isn't that amazing, Jack?
This is pretty depressing. I told you it was a black velvet background here, so next week can shine all the better. We're not talking about a kind of dead. We're not talking about a symbolic dead or a positional dead. We're talking about, in fact, the truest meaning of the word biblical terms: death to the spirit.
Men are born dead. And let's study this a little bit. What is the the mode of death for us, for all who are born into the world? Watch this. Look at verse two.
It says, "Oh, I'm sorry." Verse one, and you, He made alive who were dead in trespasses and sins. Trespasses and sins. Mark those down for a moment. The word trespass, trespass means a deviation of an intentional error to wilfully sin. That's the word trespass.
It's pretty direct. It's wilful sinning. To transgress is to premeditate the sin. Watch this. Get up tomorrow morning, and you say, "Hmm, you know what?
I am going to go knock on, you know, my neighbor's door." The The wife or the husband, depending upon who you are, they're away on a business trip, and I'm going to go over there tomorrow, knock on their door, and flirt with that girl or flirt with that guy. And you say that's terrible, that's transgression. It's to say I'm going to go do this thing next Sunday, and you plan it. It's premeditated sin. It is called transgression.
It's a. All sin is totally unacceptable to God. It's horrible and hideous. But in a sense, it's worse. It's premeditated sin.
Why?
Because the Holy Spirit says, "Don't do that," but you still make plans to do it. Don't go. Don't do that. Don't do. And and you just blow him off and you do it.
Transgression. Willful sinning. The word "sin" here means to sin by missing the mark of the standard. You know the term; you've heard it before. It's a it's an Olympic term.
It's an archery term. The guy sets up a target. It's got the yellow, the blue, and the red. The guy pulls an arrow out of the quiver, draws it back, shoots his arrow. And he misses the bullseye, and he lands right on the yellow spot.
And the guy would yell back at the archer, "Sinner." Meant that he missed the mark. That's all the word means. You missed the mark, and it's not intentional. This is what the word means. The word means to know what's right and to put every bit of effort to do what's right, and yet still miss it.
I mean, you got that baby. You're just like right there. You slick the feathers on the arrow, you know. Get that baby laid down there. Got the sights on that thing.
I got it steady as a rock. Let it go, and you miss. You had absolutely 100 intentions of hitting that bullseye, and you missed it. You had great intentions. And you can even say, "I'm not like this bonehead over here next to me.
That guy turned around, shot the judge. That's transgression." God's standard is don't miss the mark. Who's guilty? The sinner or the transgressor? Both are.
They've missed the mark. They've missed the mark. The Bible tells us that we are all guilty of being sinners. You know what? The truth is, we're all guilty of being transgressors too.
How many of you? How many of you have your driver's license? Raise your hand. I should say, how many of you drive without your driver's license? That guy, put your hand down.
There's a couple of policemen in here right now. I saw your hand. They saw your hand right now. He's over here. He's got the hat on.
No, kid, kid's not going to come back. He's listen. If we've gone over the posted speed limit, we've said, "Oh, oh my good, oh 35. I'm doing 45. I better slow down.
That's sinning to transgresses. It's 35. Oh man, that's transgression. We're guilty." All of us, and that's our dilemma. Romans chapter seven verse fourteen says, "For we know that the law is spiritual, but I'm carnal.
Why?
Sold under sin. I don't remember being sold.
Well, you have to talk to mom and dad, Adam and Eve. They sold us under sin, and we were born." With this sin nature within us, Romans chapter five, verses twelve through fourteen. Jot it down if you don't have the time to go there. Romans five twelve to fourteen. It says, therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, Adam, and death through sin are actually through that sin that Adam committed.
Things began to die. From that moment on, and in this way, death came to all mankind. That's us, because all have sin. How's that? This Bible was written before you and I were born.
Yeah, but you know what? You're a sinner. How is it? Because you got Adam in you. Even though you and I have never committed the sin, we've got that nature in us, and by position, by inheritance, we're sinners.
But don't be disappointed. The day will come when you and I will grow up and start to commit our own sins and do our own thing. There was a time when we sinned in our ignorance. We didn't know anything. We were just, we what I would call innocence.
We might have been children. We didn't know, and we innocently sinned. But there comes a time of accountability when we sin willfully. We understand that. And it's called teenage years.
Seriously, I'm not kidding. I'm not kidding about that. It's true. That's when the kids are finding out what's what in their life, and do I believe mom and dad anymore? And I experience.
They cut. They a lot of teen rebellion is hooked to them finding their own faith in God. They've heard you talk about it forever, and they don't believe you anymore. They're they're searching all the water, testing everything, seeing what the deal is, and they got to come to their own faith. And a lot of that is exposed through teen rebellion.
They are becoming responsible for their own sins. It's a very critical time. We need to pray for them greatly. Romans three twenty three says, "For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God." That is God's standard, and the word is all, and all means all, and that's all that all means. Galatians three twenty two, Galatians three twenty two says, "But the Scripture has confined all under sin, that the promise by faith, that is in Jesus Christ, might be given to those who believe." Isn't that amazing?
That's what the scripture says.
So dead here means absolute dead, and it's a universal death, and it's continuing even now in the world because of sin. And the point that Paul is trying to make right here is that we've all been born under this sin, and that we are all dead to God. And a dead man can do absolutely nothing to help himself. And I hope you see the beauty in what all this means. And I sure hope you're having a right heart as this word goes out.
You can sit here and go, "Man, that's offensive, man. This really upsets my pride and my ego. This can hurt you." Or you can say, "Wow, I mean, I'm no angel. I mean, I'm not as bad as that guy, but I'm no angel. I understand that.
Why did I do the things that I did? Why am I doing what I'm doing?" Well, it sounds like to me that I've been sold under sin. There's really not much I can do about what happened in the past, but it sure sounds like I've got some control over the future. And that you do. It's by coming to faith in Jesus Christ, coming to Him in faith, and accepting what He has provided for you as forgiveness.
But you cannot do anything. To save yourself, that's why our works before God is lunacy. Oh God, I prayed twelve hours today. You think God's impressed? Oh boy, there's twenty-four hours in a day.
Oh God, I prayed twenty-four hours today.
Well, you know there's seven days in a week. Oh God, I prayed all week.
Well, you know there's fifty-two weeks in a year. You see what I'm saying? What do you stop? Hey, I'm doing pretty good. I didn't do this.
I didn't do this. I didn't do this. And God says, "Well, that's great. But did you visit the homeless? Did you feed the motherless, or the, or whatever?" Well, that's an orphan.
There's sins that we don't commit, but then there's sins that we commit by not doing the things we're supposed to do. That's just as bad. It's still missing the mark. You're listening to Real Life with Pastor Jack Hibbs. To learn more about this ministry or to catch up on some previous episodes, go to jackhibbs.com.
That's jackhibbs.com. And now let's get back to today's message. Once again, here's Pastor Jack. And we have to. This is a very serious study, and you're supposed to be very depressed tonight.
Because this is a heavy thing, and then next week you're going to like drag yourself in and say, "Man, last week was a drag," and I really need this message.
So we've got to really pipe down on this. We are not only born in this valley. We're going to see in a moment that we have a road that we've all traveled on in this valley, but I heard something today. I cannot even believe this is true. It's printed up.
It's documented. I went to the back of the book to see if it was true. I find it hard to believe. But at the University College Hospital in London, England, there's a guy there by the name of. He's a philosopher.
Supposed to be pretty famous. I personally never heard of him, but his name is Jeremy Bentham. And he left that school, that teaching hospital school, there multi millions of dollars for their expansion and for their future. Only under these conditions, only if he could sit on the board of directors as long as the school, the teaching hospital school, lasted. That was in his will.
And if they did not agree to that, they could not get a dime of the money. He's been on that board for 159 years. The guy is wrapped in a bag with formaldehyde, and they bring him in in a wheelchair for every monthly board meeting in London. And the chairman says, when his name is called at roll call, the chairman responds, "Present, but not voting." This is not a joke. I read this.
This is documented. And I'm I do the same thing you're doing. This is nuts.
Well, they want the money, and there's executors to this case to make sure it all works out throughout the years. Before we came to Jesus Christ, we could not vote. We were that dead. That's the point. We were that dead.
We looked good. We went around town, but we were dead to God. We lived our own way, and the proof you might say I don't buy it. The proof is you did your own thing.
So, well, so what? The proof about you and I being alienated from God is that we went out and fulfilled our own lusts and our own desires. We'll see this in a moment. We were spiritually dead. And isn't it a beautiful thing?
Once you come to Christ, you try to do those things again. You know, you you backslide. You back backsliding is the worst. You know, you look at a Christian. I see we've been at church long enough now to where I've seen people come in and then they'll go and then they'll come back in.
And when they come back in, the poor things are thrashed. They look like they've only been gone for about a year. They look like they've been gone for five years or ten years. And they come walking in. You go, how you doing?
And they're thrashed because the world has just shredded them up. Why?
Because they're a Christian, but they've walked away from God. And the Lord is so good, He'll just let them get shredded to pieces. And the Holy Spirit's look—you know—you're going. Come on, Holy Spirit, let's go over to this strip bar. Not me.
Oh, come on. No, I'm not going. Oh, come on, let's go over here and let's do some drugs. Come on, Lord. Not me.
Oh come on, let's just go. Let's just go sleep around for a while. Not me. And the Holy Spirit stands on the shore and waves. I'll see you when you get back.
And you'll come back. Man, are you thrashed? It's a it's a rough rough ride out there.
Well, before we ever came to Jesus, we did those things. Didn't think a thing of it. In fact, we were premeditating when we were going to better it. Cause we were dead toward God, we could just sin at the drop of a hat.
Now you go out and sin, and you're a mess. You can't even sin good. You're trying to go out. Hey, man, let's just pull this thing off. And as a Christian, you're like a you're like Don Don Knotts, you know, in a bank robbery.
It's great, great, just an absolute mess. But look at verse two now. Verse two, he says right here. In which you once walked according to the course of this world. In which you once walked according to the course of this world.
We're going to look at three things tonight, which are the accomplices to our death. Mark them. Three things. You know them very well. The first thing is right here in verse two.
He says that we walked according to the course of this cosmos. That's the word in the Greek. Number one thing that was an accomplice to our death was the world, the world, the material or immaterial regions of creation. Literally, the world, invisible and visible things, the creation. To walk according to the course of this cosmos, this world.
What is he meaning?
Well, we'll find out in a moment. But our number one enemy. To us, being spiritually dead is the world.
So you mark that down. And this word "walked" this is a great word that Paul used here. It means to tread all around, to tread all around, to walk at large, to be occupied with the world. Isn't that a perfect definition? You turn on the TV, and it's sick.
I don't want to get off into this, but I want to mention this one thing. I think America. I am so embarrassed of the United States. I used to think it was you know kind of okay, and then I've traveled abroad, and when it comes to standard of living, we've got. Let me be really honest with you, okay?
We've got toilets that flush better than anybody's.
Okay, we have. I'm not kidding. We have the softest toilet paper in the world. I'm not joking. We have the softest toilet paper in the world.
You know what? It used to be. It used to be. We had the best-looking highways in the world. I don't know what's going on with our roadways.
But I tell you what. I'm not so impressed anymore. You get out and you get you get looking around, and the standard is slipping. And let me tell you something. I love America, red, white, and blue, man, and I'd die for it today.
And it's the greatest nation in the world still. But the thing is. The world that has crept into our nation and into our system—that is, oh, extruded through the television set into your ears and your eyes—is the worst junk going out there. We've got things on TV where you don't even have to watch the program, but they'll show a clip about whoever these talk show bozos are anymore. Each one trying to outdo the next one about this girl's going to tell her boy or her husband on TV in front of the nation that she's got a girlfriend, and he's supposed to, and they all watch his reaction.
What's he going to do when he when he finds out his wife's a lesbian? And the world laughs and snickers and stuff and Paul says in Romans, you know what? You laugh at that stuff, you're guilty of it, because you're approving of it by laughing and playing with it. And our nation is sick with this. It is a sad and tragic thing what's happened to the America.
And by the way, judgment's coming, the United States. Billy Graham said it 20 years ago. If God does not judge America, He will have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah. Kind of goes back to the announcement tonight, doesn't it? About what's going to be allowed in Hawaii, which will be allowed in the 49 states if we don't pray and we don't react.
A tremendous thing—the world system to tread all around and to walk about at large, to be occupied with it, to love it—and it's the picture. The picture's painted like this: the world. And and we walked like that once, but the world is like that. It's the world. You know, if you you're driving on Interstate 15 to Salt Lake City and you're 45 minutes away from Vegas.
And you can see the hills glowing at three o'clock in the morning. The hills are glowing over the mountains. Like, what is going on? You're wondering, what is going on? And you come around the hill, and what do you see?
You see way out there. You see Vegas. And you know people like they they turn the corner and they see the oh Vegas. You know they're like, oh man, the world. Oh, and and it's like nuts.
The world loves the world. Jesus says the world is in love with itself. It loves the world. The world loves its own. It's amazing.
And and we're not of the world anymore. Jesus says we're not of the world anymore. He says if we were of the world anymore, the world would love us. The world hates us. And it goes down to that simple thing.
The world can't stand us. Because I think this sounds a little simplistic, but when you were maybe you know going to the party for the first time in your life, and people are standing around, and there's always somebody there, there's always somebody that just oh come on, come on, have a beer, you know I'm nine years old. Oh come on, or whatever you know, come on. And the more, the more that the ringleader can get, the more people he can get in his sin. The more comfortable he feels, and he listen.
This is a trick. Any young people in here? Listen, it's a trick. The more people that this calloused heart can get doing his thing, he feels more justified, and he feels a little bit less responsible to God because he's not the only one doing it. Everybody's doing it.
That's why he says, "Come on, do it." Oh, come on! Everybody's doing it. Come on! What they are saying is that I'm guilty, man. I feel guilty.
But I want to do this. But there's this struggle within me. And though if more of you do it, I won't feel so bad. It's a trick. But the world loves its own.
And he's talking about walking around this world system, and the world saying, "Come on, baby, enjoy. This is great. This is the world, man." And you go outside, and you go to other places of the world, and you know what those countries want to be like? They want to be just like America. Statue of Liberty?
No way. They want to do the things Americans can do. Wouldn't it be awesome if we were exporting holiness and righteousness? The Bible says that if a nation has holiness and righteousness in its borders, it will flourish as a country. Pastor and Bible teacher Jack Hibbs here on Real Life Radio with his message called "From Death to Life, Part One." Thanks for spending part of your day with us today.
You know, this message is part of Pastor Jack's series called "The Book of Ephesians." It's a series through Paul's letter to the Ephesians, discovering the riches, the walk, and the triumph of every believer. And we'll continue on the next edition of Real Life Radio.
Well, Father, as we come to the end of this week, we thank you for your faithfulness and all that you provided for us this last week.
Now, and Father, as we look to the weekend that's ahead, we pray that we would give our time to you, dedicating our time to you in our leisure, in our fun. Maybe some of us have got to work this weekend.
Well, Lord, whatever we do, we pray that we would do it all to Your glory. And Father, just strengthen our families and bless us in whatever we endeavor. May we put You first in Jesus' name. And all of God's people said, "Amen." Hey, thank you again so much for listening. And if you'd like to hear or see more of what we do here, you can always go to jackhibbs.com for all the latest on what's going on with this ministry.
And please, if you're ever in the Southern California area, come see us at Calvary Chapel Chino Hills. We'd love to see you there in person. It has been so good to be with you today, and I pray you find yourself in the grace and. Mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ. See you on the next episode.
This program is made possible by the generous contributions of you, our listeners. Visit us at jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com. Until next time, Pastor Jack Hibbs and all of us here at Real Life Radio wish for you solid and steady growth in Christ and in His Word. We'll see you next time here on Real Life Radio.
