Put on Christ

In Romans chapter 13 the apostle Paul tells us to lay aside the deeds of darkness and walk in the light by nature. We are children of darkness, and the Bible uses that metaphor to describe sin and that we love by nature.

We love darkness rather than the light because our deeds are evil as believers to live differently literally would claim to be lights in a dark world today on Renewing Your Mind, Dr. RC Sproul returns to Paul's letter to the Roman church. In chapter 13 beginning at verse eight. Paul explains how to fulfill the law through love that we must be in the light, we look briefly at the beginning of verse nine last week of no one anything except to love one another. I made reference to all of the attempts of been made to use this is the classic proof text that would prohibit Christians from ever enter into any kind of indebtedness and I hope we were able to demonstrate last week.

That's not the point of this text with the text does make mention of an obligation of something that we do all and a debt that can never be remitted fully in this world we can pay our debts to the bank. We can pay our debt to the store. We can pay our debt to the credit card company but our debt in this world to love our neighbor is never discharged until we cross into heaven.

This is a perpetual obligation and indebtedness that is given to us in the great commandment which calls us to love the Lord our God with all of our heart strength and soul, and so on, and our neighbors as we love ourselves and immediately hear the apostle links. This obligation of love to some of the 10 Commandments.

The conclusion he reaches is this for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. I want to come back to that in just a moment. Then he mentions certain the commandments you shall not commit adultery.

You shall not murder, you shall not steal, shall not bear false witness, you shall not covet. And if there's any other commandment all or summed up in this saying, namely you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Now when Paul lists some of the 10 Commandments, the ones that he mentioned are those that are often described as coming from the second table of the law and if we look at the beginning of the 10 Commandments, the first few prescribe our responsibility to God in the vertical plane and then the focus of the 10 Commandments moves to our responsibility of how we treat each other as human brains with respect to no adultery, no murder, no stealing, no coveting, no false witness in the light, but we notice here that the ones that are mentioned are the ones that's prescribed behavior on the horizontal plane describe our behavior toward each other.

And Paul is saying here that whoever loves another has fulfilled the law. This is not any serious departure from what our Lord himself.on the matter, or what was found in the great commandment that I've already alluded to, that concludes with the statement, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Now this brief passage here has created lots of consternation, particularly in the second half of the 20th century and again, particularly in American liberal Christianity, where with the publication and popularization by Joseph Fletcher in his book situation ethics, the basic thesis of that borrowed from a more sophisticated treatment of ethics by the Princeton scholar Paul Lehman ethics in the Christian context. Fletcher develop this famous concept of situation ethics, and whereby he reduced the entire law of God, one essential precept, and that is the law of love that he would quote. For example, from St. Augustine where Augustine was famous for saying, love God and do as you please. When Augustine said love God and do as you please and as he expressed that in its more profound fullness. He was saying that if your decisions on how you treat your fellow person are always motivated by a love for God a singular love for God really don't have to worry about the law because what the law reflects is what is pleasing to God. And if you love God you can do as you please. Because you will be doing what pleases God said simple love God and do as you please name and if you really love him. What will please you is what pleases him. And what pleases him, is revealed to us in his law as a rule of love of situation is this love God and do what the love of God requires in every human situation, apostle Paul, in speaking of the love of God.

On one occasion said let not fornication be once named among you, as befitting sayings in other words, the possible thing I can envision any earthly situation that would justify disobedience to God's law of purity. When Paul talks about love here. He's talking about love fulfilling something he's talking about the purpose of the law. The goal of the law where the law takes us. Ultimately, and where it takes us is the love of our neighbor further on. He says you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Augustine commented on that as well. There's this question associated with this text. We know that as part of our fallen nature affect a strong part of our fallen nature is a kind of distorted self love which is rooted and grounded in selfish minutes and so some interpret the great commandment to love your neighbor as you love yourself to mean you are to love your neighbor as much as you sinfully love yourself. Others look at this text and say no.

There is a legitimate virtuous kind of self love that is not a sin that is not a violation of the law of God, and that it is perfectly natural for human beings even on fallen human beings to have a simple affection for themselves. We are called to deny ourselves in certain situations, but we are not called to hold ourselves in absolute contempt because we are made in the image of God and there is a certain dignity that God assigns to us. We can easily inflate that importance and self-worth as Paul is addressed already here, in his letter to the Romans. But at the same time there is not the idea implicit in the great commandment that the love of the self is inherently evil, know which way is intended by the law. We don't know.

So either view of that could possibly be right. But in any case, we do know that we have a kind of self-love and that we are to love our neighbor as much as we love ourselves.

The other question is what this would mean to love your neighbor and who is your neighbor number. Jesus was a given that question who is my neighbor in terms of an attempt to get him to exegete the Old Testament great commandment calls us to love our neighbor as much as we love ourselves. And Jesus could have answer that question very simply and directly as a rabbi by saying look in the Bible says love your neighbor the Bible is saying by that love everybody because everybody is your neighbor, your neighbor is not just somebody that lives next door or down the street or in your neighborhood again. Parenthetically, we hear this terribly distorted idea that the basic essence of Christianity is the universal fatherhood of God and the universal brotherhood of man, and I have to keep repeating that the Bible nowhere teaches the universal brotherhood of man by nature. Jesus told us we are children of Satan. We belong to his family.

Now I am laboring the point that were not all brothers the unbeliever out there in that community is not my brother, but he is my neighbor, and what the Bible does teach is the universal neighborhood of man and that the law of the neighborhood in which God is the supreme Mayor is the law of love that is to be given to everybody again who is my neighbor. Jesus doesn't say everybody is your neighbor all people. Neighbor answered that question differently.

You know how you answer the question, who is my neighbor's illusion neighbor man went down from Jericho fell among thieves. Steve is him and robbed him left in the road for bed then he tells the story of the priest and the Pharisee who common across the street to the other side and ignore the bleeding fella but a Samaritan who had no business dealings with the Jews saw this man in the street took compassion went out of his way, bound up his wounds took him to the in paid the innkeeper for his continual treatment.

There and then went on his way. Jesus answered the question, who is my neighbor with the parable of the good Samaritan so we see the biblical responsibility extends to all people.

Just a quick recapitulation of this horizontal aspect of the law to remind you that the love that we are to have for our neighbor that is revealed in the law includes these things we love our neighbor. We love our fellow human being we will commit adultery because adultery is the hatred of our neighbor.

It is the destruction of our friends of our family shall not murder or steel. Love your neighbor and then help yourself.

Their possessions if you love people. You don't slander them poison everybody to them. Don't stab them in the back behind their back.

That kind of behavior violates the specific law of God and most of all, violates the law of love. I can't love you and slander you at the same time God understood that God understood what destroys human relationships God understood and understands what destroys and fractures love Paul sums this up by saying love does no harm to a neighbor is not a simple way of putting if you love your neighbor friends you don't harm your name by stealing from them or slandering being jealous of amending this bearing false witness, backstabbing if you love somebody you want to harm this way were supposed to live as Christians that were supposed to be known by the love that we have for one another. Therefore, Paul concludes love is the fulfilling of the lot. Now granted this is just a really quick short and terse treatment of that theme here in Romans, Paul wrote a whole chapter to the Corinthian's when he explained to them what it means to love. First Corinthians 13 is not a treaties on romance. It's a treaties of loving one's neighbor and what that means right. The tone changes now in verse 11 and I got a plunge on and do this, knowing the time, but now it is high time to awake out of sleep for now. Our salvation is nearer than when we first believed. The night is far spent the day is at hand.

Therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. Now, as Paul enjoins a certain kind of behavior and prohibits another in this section he preface it by reminding the people what time it was. I say this to knowing the time. Knowing that it's high time that is high time to wake up. It's not time to take a nap. This is a time that requires vigilance, alertness, and diligence. Why, for now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed. Well let's unpack that. Is this again. Another one of those examples were the apostle believe the return of Jesus was going to come fully and finally within his lifetime and then later had the changes old theology of the future's many critics assume what is Paul talking about when he says there salvation is nearer than it ever was. Some refer that to the closeness of the advent of Christ. The Paul anticipated in the first century and he may have been thinking in terms of the destruction of Jerusalem.

Here saying wake up, wake up is closer than you think. Any day now, the judgment of God is going to come upon you.

Maybe most commentators, I think, and rightly so.

Think of what Paul is talking about is the consummation of our salvation when we pass into glory holding you missing a question. How old were you 10 years ago. I can answer that for you for 10 years younger than you are now. How old will you be 10 years from now.

Again, you can do the simple math. Given your age at the moment, but the deeper question is where will you be 10 years from where will you be 20 years from now let me cut the Gordian knot here and say where will I be in 50 years, no doubt about that. I might've been his probe.

50 years from where will you be some of you young people, God willing will still be here, where we ran 100 years, but now in the fullness of time 100 years is not that long and 50 years only half that 10 years is only 1/10 of how old you are, it's time to wake up because the day is approaching the end of our lives is a processor, I think Paul's. Our salvation is near. Then when we first believe what salvation is nearer now than when we first leave I thought that when we first believed we were saved is not the way we talk as Christians. When you say I was say February 13, 1957, 11 o'clock I'm safe. And then the preacher comes they will buoy your lot closer to salvation now than you were when you were first sight first sight helmet� Be safe for something time third time for time no hear what Paul is dealing with air the tenses of the verbs of the Greek word so so so to my means to say and that word appears in the biblical text and every one of the tenses of the Greek verbs which are far more than what we find in English. There was a sense in which you were saved from the foundation of the world.

There's a sense in which you were say.

There's a sense in which you were being say, there's a sense in which you have been say there's the simple errors you are saved, there's the present active. You are being saved, there's the future you shall be saved. There's a future perfect.

You shall have been saved and salvation is unfolded biblically in all of those different increments and in the ultimate sense of salvation is not something that you experience when you were born again.

That was one aspect of salvation but the fullness of your salvation does not take place until your glorification you enter in to heaven. Paul is addressing believers sis fullness of your salvation is much closer today than it was when you first believe no friends.

That is not bad news. That's good news. The fullness of our salvation comes closer to us with every passing hour, but that has implications uses a figure from the normal daily movement of the sun difference between night and day since the night is far spent, and he's describing that time that is passed already as the nighttime were now in the last watch of the night, the dawn of the fullness of our salvation is about to break through the day or the time of darkness is passing the time of the fullness of living in the light is at hand. Again, this metaphors use over and over and over again in the Scriptures that by nature. We are children of darkness, and the Bible uses that metaphor to describe sin and that we love by nature. We love darkness rather than the light because our deeds are evil people of darkness because it conceals us from exposure, but when we are brought into the fullness of the day.

Then we are known for what we are the night. Paul says as far spent the day is at hand. Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let's walk properly as in the day, not in rioting and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lust, not in strife and envy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts earlier in this book we looked in the very first chapter of the letter to the Romans and we saw the thematic introduction to the doctrine of justification. I mentioned on that occasion that when Luther understood that through the interpretive eyes of his patron St. Augustine and understood the gospel of justification by faith. For the first time I remember I told you that Luther wrote uses when I saw the gospel the gates of paradise opened and I walked through and so we know that one of the impacts of the book of Romans, and church history was that God used this epistle of Paul to awaken Luther and to bring about the Protestant Reformation. But now we come to another one of those passages where there was a young man who, in defiance of his mother's Christian commitment in defiance of God live the life of unbridled licentiousness. He had fathered a child out of wedlock. They had involved himself in the gross practices of the pagans of his day and he was a brilliant student of philosophy, but he was as corrupt in the flesh as he was brilliant in his intellectual acumen one day standing in a garden where children were playing and they had a refrain as they were playing a little children's game and the refrain was simply this total.

I got total. I got total Lego which means pickup and read pick up and read and when it really is Augustine heard those children's words.

His eyes fell upon a large Bible that was chained and he let the Bible just open up anywhere in his eyes fell upon the printed page, usually read, not in rioting and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lusts, not in strife and envy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its less than like a lightning bolt. The word of God pierced his heart and this was the text used by Almighty God to convert the soul of a really is Augustine whose ministry continues to this place, even tonight, not in rioting and drunkenness. The reference there in the text is to the practice of the pagan religion under the aegis of the god Bacchus who was the God of the great, the God of the vine and he was the sponsor of the ancient buck an alien, which was an orgiastic feast involving gluttony and unbridled sexual behavior and intentional works to get drunk so that in the drunken stupor. The pangs of conscience could be silenced and people could then engaged in on bridal sin. The bucket nearly that's what some view here in Augustine's eyes fall upon the text� Not in this debauchery really is not in this kind of lifestyle not in this kind of hedonism not of this kind of unrestrained licentiousness, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh, and on use of the term from which the word Providence, don't provide opportunities for sin. The old country preacher said if you are trying to get over drunkenness, don't tie your horse to the post in front of the saloon.

Don't make provisions. If you struggle with sexual temptation. Don't subscribe. The Playboy or other such things don't make provisions for human sin and weakness. Luther put it this way. He said I can't stop the birds from flying around in the air near me but I don't have to let them nest in my hair. That's what it means by not making extra provisions to accommodate our base desires. Instead, provide for your soul, put on Christ and walk his people who walk in the that's Dr. RC Sproul, in his classic way of getting right to the point. So often we fall into sin because we like to tiptoe right up to the edge of our temptations. In his early years before he was converted. Augustine once famously prayed Lord, give me chastity and continence, but not yet Paul is directed to make no provision for the flesh applies to as old as in today's lesson is from Dr. RC Sproul series through the book of Romans, and each Lord's day here on Renewing Your Mind. We are privileged to make our way through this series.

Dr. Spruill spent 59 Sunday evenings preaching through this book when he served as pastor of St. Andrews Chapel, we be happy to send you all 59 sermons on a single USB drive for your donation of any amount to look at her ministries. Our offices are closed course on the Lord's day, but that you can still make a request when you go online to Renewing Your Mind.work delay sermon was number 54/59 which puts his close to concluding the series.

If you been thinking of requesting this USB drive. Let me have recommend that you contact us right away to receive the entire series. 59 sermons at all. When you go online to Renewing Your Mind.org and in advance let me thank you for your generous donation well in Paul's day, the young church was struggling with the idea of eating meat sacrificed to idols. Was it okay were was it not okay will the church today is in dealing with that specific issue. We do have our fair share of disputes next Sunday. RC will turn to chapter 4.

The show is the law of liberty, we hope you'll join us next Sunday