Romans 5:12,15-17 NLT When Adam sinned, sin entered the world. Adam’s sin brought death, so death spread to everyone, for everyone sinned. (15) But there is a great difference between Adam’s sin and God’s gracious gift. For the sin of this one man, Adam, brought death to many. But even greater is God’s wonderful grace and His gift of forgiveness to many through this other Man, Jesus Christ. (16) And the result of God’s gracious gift is very different from the result of that one man’s sin. For Adam’s sin led to condemnation, but God’s free gift leads to our being made right with God, even though we are guilty of many sins. (17) For the sin of this one man, Adam, caused death to rule over many. But even greater is God’s wonderful grace and His gift of righteousness, for all who receive it will live in triumph over sin and death through this one Man, Jesus Christ.
Who Is Your Husband?
Romans 7:1-3 NLT Now, dear brothers and sisters–you who are familiar with the law–don’t you know that the law applies only while a person is living? (2) For example, when a woman marries, the law binds her to her husband as long as he is alive. But if he dies, the laws of marriage no longer apply to her. (3) So while her husband is alive, she would be committing adultery if she married another man. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law and does not commit adultery when she remarries.
- The law is a bad husband.
- The law is overbearing, critical, judgmental and mean spirited.
- The law always points out what you did wrong and not what you did do right.
- The law just sits around the house all day and criticizes all that you do and never lifts a finger to help you do anything.
- The bad thing about this husband is that he is always right.
- What Satan does is take the law and accuse us based on that.
- The one good thing about the law is that it shows us the moral standards that are wrong and it is designed to show us that we need Jesus to deliver us from sin.
- The law is a husband that can’t make you any better.
The law does not have the ability to change us. In other words, we cannot read something in the law and then simply because it says it, have the ability to stop doing whatever it says that we are doing wrong.
Romans 3:20 NLT For no one can ever be made right with God by doing what the law commands. The law simply shows us how sinful we are.
Romans 3:28 NLT So we are made right with God through faith and not by obeying the law.
- The only thing that separates Christianity from every other religion in the world is that it is based on grace through faith and not through works.
Every other religion says that you have to do something in order to please this deity. God says, “You just have to come to me and believe that I did it all.”
Christianity is about what has already “been done” and not by “your doing.”
- We are not saying that right, good works are not necessary but we are saying that your motive cannot be to try and get God to be pleased with you or to pay Him back.
- The law is an impotent husband.
The law can never produce anything in you. The law had no power to help you do what is right.
Romans 8:3 NIV For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh,
- God brought you someone else to marry.
- Marriage is as long as you both shall live. The law is never going to die. The plan of God had something even better. God decided that since the law could never die, then you could die.
Romans 7:4-6 NLT So, my dear brothers and sisters, this is the point: You died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the One who was raised from the dead. As a result, we can produce a harvest of good deeds for God. (5) When we were controlled by our old nature, sinful desires were at work within us, and the law aroused these evil desires that produced a harvest of sinful deeds, resulting in death. (6) But now we have been released from the law, for we died to it and are no longer captive to its power. Now we can serve God, not in the old way of obeying the letter of the law, but in the new way of living in the Spirit.
- The law was your first husband and you have been released from your first husband so that you can be married to Christ.
- We have died with Christ so that I can be released and marry someone else.
As a believer we have been released from marriage to the law so that we can be married to Christ.
Romans 7:4 MSG So, my friends, this is something like what has taken place with you. When Christ died he took that entire rule-dominated way of life down with him and left it in the tomb, leaving you free to “marry” a resurrection life and bear “offspring” of faith for God.
- Fall in love with your New Husband.
Think about this: You used to be married to a critical, faultfinding, overbearing, mean-spirited husband. You used to be married to a husband that always sat around and pointed out everything you did wrong and never lifted a finger to help you do anything.
But now you are married to a loving, compassionate, kind, and forgiving Husband. Now you are married to a Husband who doesn’t look at what’s wrong but points out what is right in Him. Now you are married to a Husband Who believes you can be better, you can do all things In Him and then gives you the power and ability to do them
Here is how you move to defeat sin in your life: Fall in love with Jesus. Long to know Him more. Hunger for His presence.
How would you wives feel if your husband came to you and said that because he had been reading the Bible and he found out that committing adultery is wrong in the law and therefore he decided that he was not going to commit adultery?
Or, how would like your husband to say, “That when you walk in the room I am smitten by you and I love you with every fiber of my being and you will never have to worry about me committing adultery.”
Ephesians 5:2 MSG Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with him and learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant. He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that.