Die for live

Continuing our study of our Romans letter, we restart the year by continuing with a very, very powerful teaching. And I also remind the brothers and visitors what is the heart of this letter and it is up to here that we have seen the Apostle Paul show us one thing: man, woman, human beings cannot be saved by themselves, they need a savior and that savior is Jesus Christ.

In the first Chapters, Paul dedicates himself to showing that the unconverted, the Jews who are the people of God, and today we could say, the Evangelicals or the Catholics, or any Christian, no one can be saved by their own works of justice, all of us, he says, fall short of the glory of God because we have sinned. No human being by himself can be saved and that is why God has provided Christ Jesus. Salvation is why? By grace, by God's generosity to us. When the man, when the woman, understands his inability to be saved by himself and accepts the work of Christ on the cross of Calvary and says to the Father, 'Father, I believe that your Son is the savior of my life and of humanity and I confess it with my mouth', the Lord says, 'it's okay, daughter, there is no condemnation for you, now I justify you'.

And the Lord then credits us with justice, credits us with holiness and heals our debts and we are right with God. That is why the Apostle Paul says further on, "...now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus."

Why do you say that? Because when you are in Christ there is no condemnation. Christ annulled, he says, the act of decrees that was contrary to us on the cross of Calvary. The devil can no longer accuse you. Your works can no longer prevent you from entering the Kingdom of God. God already tells you, 'I receive you as my son'. You receive papers for what? Of adoption to the Kingdom of God. Say amen, even if it's to cheer me up a little. Glory to God.

You receive a birth certificate that says, 'This is a new creature. He receives citizenship papers better than those of the US. You become a citizen of the Kingdom of God through Jesus Christ. And that's what Paul says.

First it paints a very black, very gloomy picture. No one can be saved, everyone has sinned, but he says, you know what? The solution is Christ Jesus. Grace, forgiveness, mercy, just connecting to the blood that flows from the side of Jesus Christ. That is the mystery of the Gospel.

And so Paul elaborates all of that in different ways, it's by grace. Now in Chapter 6, as an accomplished theologian and as a very coherent thinker that he is, he qualifies what he has just said and anticipates a logical error that some can make very conveniently and he, as I said, anticipates that error and neutralizes it immediately and Chapter 6 is dedicated to pointing out what that error is.

Let's go forward in Chapter 6, to verse 12, these two verses, 12 or 13 to 14, summarize in a sense all of Chapter 6. It says: “....Let sin not reign therefore in your mortal body, so that you obey it in its lusts, neither do you present your members to sin as instruments of iniquity, but present yourselves to God as alive from the dead and your members to God as instruments of righteousness, because the sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law, but under what? under grace."

Let us always remember that, brothers. We are not under the condemnation of the law, but we live under the grace of God. Now, you know what the problem is when that is said so many times in churches, that we always have a tendency to go to extremes. The doctrine of grace is one of the most beautiful doctrines that God has given to the church. The doctrine of grace takes our attention away. The doctrine of grace invites us to rest in God and in the works that Christ accomplished on the cross of Calvary. The doctrine of grace takes away from us that sense of condemnation and insecurity about our eternal salvation and that we are depending on the sway of our works and our humanity, so prone to betray us time and time again.

The doctrine of grace removes the frailty of the doctrine of salvation. But do you know what could be the error too? That many times we can fall so in love and get so excited by this idea that I am saved by grace, that I forget that God also expects me to live in holiness.

How many say love to that? And that I must be obedient to God's commandments. the doctrine of grace does not neutralize the doctrine of holiness. What the doctrine of grace says is the following: God saves you freely. Now, once you're saved, he expects you to live holy.

That is, God justifies you so that you can sanctify yourself. Some people think that one has to be sanctified first in order to be justified. And there are many churches that go to the opposite side and say: you have to live a proper life and everything is law, everything is commandments, everything is 'you have to do this, you have to do that, you can't do this, you can't do that.’ And people sometimes get the idea that they have to act for God to save them, they have to live well for God to save them. And the doctrine of grace changes the order and says, 'No, you have to save yourself and then live well.' Or it also says, 'As you are saved, then you have to live according to God's commandments'.

And what Paul does in Chapter 6 is try to maintain a balance between the two doctrines and that, because the church does not understand this, has led the church of Jesus Christ through the centuries to some tremendous extremes. I believe that today in the 21st century part of the problem of many Christian churches that are very merciful and very theologically advanced is that the pendulum has swung to the side of grace. So, it's all about accepting, loving, tolerating, not mentioning sin too much so that people don't spoil their lunch after the service. And don't leave the church, because if you do then you are going to hell.

And then, there is a kind of fear of talking about sin because they are afraid that if they talk about sin they are neutralizing the doctrine of grace. And what God wants is that we maintain a healthy tension between both things, that we understand that our salvation does not depend on our works, but our works express our salvation. You understand? The two things are linked.

Take, for example, let's say the light. Light is an energy and linked to light is inevitably driving away darkness, one thing goes with the other. Light implies driving away darkness. There can be no light if there is darkness, yes or no? Because wherever there is light, darkness flees, so it's the same idea. If you have the light of salvation within you, that means that there can be no darkness that contradicts the presence of light in you. There are many people who say, 'No, I am saved. I am saved by grace,' but his life does not reflect. His life is darkness. So the Bible says, no.

That is why Paul says, faith without works is dead. It is not that he was saying that works are what justify faith or make it possible. But he is saying that where there is true faith in God and in the word of God, if there is no action that evidences that faith, then there is a lie there. For example, he says, you cannot tell a person who is hungry and naked, 'Brother, I love you very much, God bless you. I'm going to pray for you,' and you have 50 dollars in your pocket and you don't even give him ten pesos to buy food and a coat, or whatever, right?

He says, 'No, if you have love, your love will overflow into action because love is not just something that exists in theory. Love manifests itself in some way. And it's true.

Then you have to bless that person with mercy, with action, covering him, providing him, showing him love. The same is with grace. If God has saved you, if God has touched you, if God has instilled his spirit within you and now you are a child of God, it is not possible that then you live practicing and enslaved to sin.

Now, he's not saying that you have to live an absolutely perfect life, because no one else can, but he's saying, 'Your life can't reflect a pattern of sin. Your life cannot reflect a hardened conscience that sins unruly and does not feel pain and fear and anguish for that sin, but your life must reflect a loyalty to the holiness that the Gospel calls for.

And that's why Paul in Chapter 6, look at how he begins by saying: “... what then shall we say? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?".

That word persevere is very revealing, because it means 'will we remain in sin, will we live in sin, will we insistently practice sin, will sin define us? That is the idea of persevering.

For grace to abound: why is he asking that question? Wherever you see the word pues, it usually means that it is referring to something earlier.

Look at what verse 20 of Chapter 5 says, look there a little while. It says "... but it was introduced so that sin might abound, but when sin abounded, grace abounded all the more."

Paul is saying something here that is absolutely essential for us to understand. It is one of the elements that is repeated several times throughout the Bible, and it is the following: why did God provide the Jewish law if he knew that the Jews would eventually reveal themselves as incapable of living according to the law? , as a step. He had to exile them, he had to take them out of their land, because they were not capable of living according to his commandments.

What interested God, brothers, was not, by the way, it was not like God was surprised one day and said, 'Gee, these people that I raised this nation, I expected that they would leave me. to obey, and what a surprise to me that they are behaving badly.' No, God had, remember that God's plan is an eternal plan, from eternity to eternity. Nothing takes God by surprise. Everything that has happened in history, God has planned and expected. God established the law to establish what I call, a legal precedent for all mankind.

He took Israel as a microcosm of humanity. Israel was like a representative of all humanity. Just as Christ is the Son of man who represents all humanity in his sacrifice on the cross. And when Christ died on the cross, he was dying, hear me this, all humanity with him. In what sense? In that he was carrying in his body all the death of all men who deserved death for their sin. He carried it on the cross. I believe that in potential, in potentiality, and I hope here that theologians like Dr. Edwin Villafañe and Gregory are not going to accuse me of this later. But we could say, I am not going to insist too much on this, but we could say that in a judicial, potential sense, on the cross, Christ was potentially bearing all the sins of humanity, present, past and future, because he was the Son of man, and he represented the death of a humanity that deserved death.

Now, Israel, in that judicial sense, I believe, that exemplifies humanity and God was creating a universal, judicial precedent, through his dealings with this people. He gave them the best possible conditions: his word, his spirit that dwelt within them, raised them up as a people. And so, he established a number of commandments and laws and precepts and moral principles and told them, or he said to himself, 'now we are going to see if they are capable, as a microcosm of humanity, of living according to those principles. And obviously they couldn't. He knew they weren't going to make it. Because he was already thinking, looking forward to the future, when he was going by grace to forgive humanity.

And this town that he raised in the best conditions and that he provided all the possibilities for them to live according to his commandments, totally failed. And by extension, then, he could say, 'nobody can now say that they can live according to my commandments. All have sinned, all fall short of the glory of God.

God is a being who thinks judicially, legally. He established a legal, judicial precedent through Israel and prepared something for then what? In order to save all humanity according to grace.

Leave me, I have said something very serious and now I am going to prop it up well, since I do not want them to think that I am playing the theologian guille here. Look, for example, let's see, I'm trying to find some passages here that might help me state this better. Let's go to verse 29 of Chapter 11 of Romans.

It says, “.... For irrevocable are the gifts and the calling of God, for as you also in another time were disobedient to God, but now, you have obtained mercy for their disobedience, so these too have now been disobedient, so that by the mercy granted to you, they too may obtain mercy. Because God held everyone in disobedience for what? To have mercy on everyone."

And look, when Paul begins to think, and there are other verses. When Paul begins to think about how complex God's salvific plan has been, all the things that God has done throughout history, and how he has managed to lead the human race to a dead end, where they had than to admit and throw your arms to the side and say; "Certainly, I cannot be saved by my own actions."

As Paul contemplates the complexity of God's plan of salvation, verse 33 leads him to wonder and make a statement of awe, saying:

“....Oh, depth of wealth, of the wisdom of God and of the knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways priceless”

In other words, for God to come up with such a complex judicial plan, for him to do one thing at the end of it all, and that was to show his grace and his mercy.

One of the things that Paul traces throughout the entire book of Romans is that idea and we see it in the Book of Ephesians as well. Everything that God does through humanity is simply for his glory. He has made all things so that it is evident that he is the one who saves, not the man.

Remember that I have said that God's greatest controversy is this matter of man taking the glory and not giving it to him. So, God managed through the law to show that it is by grace and not by works. God developed a number of commandments and told mankind through Israel, 'See if you can live by them?'

The law, Paul says, is just a ruse, it's a method, an instrument that God has used to point out sin. I was telling the brothers this morning: think of a STOP sign on a street. Think for a moment about a street where there is no STOP sign and you travel down that street every day and since there is no STOP sign, you just drive past that block and there is no problem. But one day, the city decides to put up a STOP sign and you happily keep driving, you don't see the STOP sign, you pass it and there is a policeman who is immediately behind you, honking his siren.

How many know what I'm talking about? You don't have to raise your hand. And you say to the policeman, 'Well, I'm sorry, Mr. Policeman, I didn't see the sign. I've always passed by here and never saw a sign.' The policeman says, 'No, wait a minute. Since that sign was put up and you did not respect it, you are already violating the law.'

The Bible says that where there is no law, there is no sin. And God used the law, brothers, to establish violation. The law was not the ultimate purpose of God to save humanity, because he knew that they would not be able to do it. The law was simply an intermediate step and God gave STOP signs everywhere to the Jews and the human race. You shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not bear false witness, you shall not eat this, you shall keep the Sabbath, this and that. And everywhere he put hundreds of STOP signs and who is to say that there hasn't been a STOP sign violation at some point in his life. Always. We all have.

And Paul says, 'That's the only function of the law is to show humanity that they can't save themselves.' to humanity on his white horse and says 'I know you can't do it by yourself. Now enter into the grace that I have prepared through my Son Jesus. That is the work.

Now notice that. It says here that when sin abounded, then grace abounded all the more. What happened? When man was already lost in his sins, as Ephesians says, then the grace of God was poured out abundantly on humanity. The rain of blessing and forgiveness that fell on humanity was far greater than the number of sins that humanity had committed.

The second Adam, notice why they call Christ the second Adam. Because it was like the human race represented in it, just as the first Adam represented the first human race, and for the sin of one, the whole race, because it exemplified the race, was cursed. Now, by the obedience of the other second Adam, potential humanity was blessed but with more abundance of blessing than the curse that fell through Adam. That's in Chapter 5. Read it and praise God for that blessing that is in Christ Jesus.

Paul says, over and over again, the richness of the plan of salvation through grace is far greater than the curse of living without Jesus Christ. We enter into the blessing of God. So, although there was sin, although the law served to point out all the sin that was in humanity, God's grace was much more abundant.

Now what's up? That there are wicked minds out there that said, 'Wow, let me see, if where sin abounds, grace abounds, well let's sin more so that there will be more grace. How convenient! TRUE?

There are people who thought that way or could think that way. Or there are others who would say, 'well, since it is by grace, then that means that what I do does not matter'. And there are people who have fallen into that error, people who are very fearful of God and very learned in the examination of the word who say that if you are saved, you are going to go headlong, they become so radical, and that is a a contradiction that cannot be resolved in Calvinism is hyperdeveloped, because many times there is in theology, that if you are saved, you cannot be lost, once you accepted Christ and if God wants to save you, he is going to put you upside down, jondion, as we Dominicans say, inside the sky, even if you don't want to do it because he dictated it.

For me that is a mistake, because there is always this matter of that call, that call that is inescapable that yes, salvation is by grace, but you have to live, with the help of God a life that shows that you are truly saved. And you cannot hold on to the fact that it is by grace and therefore continue to sin. I believe there are many evangelicals who make that mistake and live careless lives, brethren, and perhaps here among us there may be some who are so conscious of the grace aspect that we forget that God expects us to live in holiness, to live in surrender to God. Mister.

If someone can lower a little bit, your earphone may be a little bit too high. Would you lower it a tiny little bit? I'm just hearing some translation. Can you lower, Sharon, just a tiny little bit? Just a little bit so that we can…. Ok great! Just, whoever, I am so sensitive to sound many times that…., maybe I'm the only one here. But thank you, forgive me for clarifying that…. De todas formas.

Again, brothers, let us be careful not to neglect ourselves. God is calling his people to be more careful than ever. The devil has been released on humanity like never before. Satan has been given power in this culture like never before to take lives. The power of sin that exists in the 21st century, I believe, is much more burning than at any other time in history, even in the Roman or Greek Empire or even when the world lived in paganism. Because it is tremendously sophisticated sin. It is a sin accompanied by the power of reason that can resist and deconstruct God and take him apart, and turn God into an electrochemical impulse of the brain.

Today, man has acquired a capacity to explain everything and subject everything to the electrical, to the chemical, to the biological, which can even blur even God himself, and can justify his sin in terrible ways.

Today, we have rational, philosophical, theological demons that have penetrated humanity. And today it is more dangerous than ever to walk in the world. Jesus said that in the last days things would get so difficult that God would shorten the days of the great tribulation because otherwise no one would be saved, brothers. God would shorten those days of sin.

And it is the truth, today we have to entrust ourselves and our children every day to the mercy, to the protection of God because there are lions out there who want to kill, steal and destroy the soul . And unless we live sober and vigilant lives, we are not going to win the battle.

The word says "... be sober and watchful because your adversary, the devil, walks around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour."

The word also says “...take care of your salvation, how? With fear and trembling”.

And that same passage says it in another place, right there, in that same passage he is talking about God being the one who does the work and this and that and he says, “... therefore take care of your salvation."

There is a contradiction there which is part of what we are talking about here. God wants the 'baby fad' to be taken from us, as they say in English, the innocence that we often have as Christians. And I believe that there are many people who come to the churches every day and every Sunday but do not understand how serious it is to walk in the Gospel and that it is a matter of sobriety, of being careful, of how we walk before God, of being careful when opening that we open you up to the tempting, destructive work of Satan.

If there are areas in your life that are open to attack from the enemy. If there are areas of your life, of your conduct, of your mental life, of your behavior, of your relationships with others, whatever, secret practices that we have, I beg you in the name of the Lord, close those doors as much as possible. soon as you can Because we have an enemy that does not forget any debt and can often wait days and days, and even years of sinful practices to one day profit from those areas with interest.

And the Apostle Paul says, 'do not allow, do not persevere in sin even when you have received grace from God'.

Come on, back to verse 12, I'm already landing. Let's go to verse 12 again in Chapter 6. I think we can better understand what it says here in verse 12, Chapter 6 “...so let not sin reign in your mortal body, so that you obey it in its lusts...”

There is an important word here 'reign' and another word 'obey'. The one who submits to sin, the one who practices sin makes sin his king and becomes a slave to sin. The devil makes use of a very big trap that he continually sets for us and that is to believe that if I simply take a little escape from time to time, or commit a little sin here and something there that I can live with impunity. The Lord says that when we sin and practice sin, sooner or later sin ends up possessing us, mastering us.

And God says, you are free. Christ has set you free. Do not let sin, let nothing rule over you except Christ Jesus and God. Every human being has two beings to serve: either they serve God or they serve Satan; either they are slaves of Jesus Christ or they are slaves of the devil; Either they are slaves to justice or they are slaves to iniquity.

And God tells us, which of these two kingdoms do you want to serve? Obviously the Christian is called to submit to the Kingdom of God, to the spirit of God. Let's be careful. I think that one of the problems with this culture is precisely that there are many people tied up. We are tied to so many things. The problem, for example, with the homosexual world, is precisely that they entered that world, practiced sin, and when they wanted to leave, they realized they couldn't and then they said, 'Go, I can't. So that means it's genetic. I was born that way.’ Why? Because it's easier for you to say that than to fight against sin. There comes a time when you say, yes, if I submit to this fight I'm going to die, so I better accept it and get into it.

And so to them, the idea that a person can get out of homosexuality, wherever the word ex-homosexual is mentioned, these people react like a horse that has been spurred. Because? Because that tells them that what they are living is a lie. They need to believe that this is what they are, because they are enslaved. So when there is someone who has freed himself from that with his struggle and whatever, that contradicts his idea. Because? Because many times sin is so addictive, brothers, that when we want to get out of it, we discover that we are trapped inside it.

That is why I tell young people, for example, young people, if you, for example, have visited a page, and I say this because it is something that is affecting young people so much, the Internet, for For example, pornography is destroying youth on the Internet, men too, and women are becoming more addicted to it every day. If you have never done it, don't try it because you can get caught up in it. If you have never entered into any sinful attitude of improper practices, it is better not to do it once. If you haven't tried a marijuana cigarette, or a stronger drug, don't do it, because you get trapped many times and sin then reigns over your life, it establishes itself, it takes over you and if you are in it, don't submit to it. do not stop fighting. Seek help, talk to someone you can trust. Give yourself away in an appropriate way. Talk to a pastor, talk to a mature person, and force yourself to come out of hiding.

One of the most powerful things to break the sin trap is to denounce yourself, bring it out in some way and speak it out. That is why Paul says, "...confess your sins to one another so that you may be healed."

One of the strongest ways to break the trap is to humble yourself. How humiliating it is to say "I have sinned" before another human being! But it is the beginning of healing, living transparent lives and seeking help from God. Pray, confess, cry out to the Lord.

Brother, I can tell you something, the only thing that God seeks, I believe, is internal conflict for him to cover us with his grace. When there is internal conflict and there is a person who is struggling and wanting to please God, for that person there is no condemnation, I would say.

Look, what God does not want is the person who is sinning and sinning and does not feel compunction, does not feel pain, does not feel repentance and is not trying everything possible, with the help of the Holy Spirit. But if you want to please God, mercy, grace will always be there with you, trying, working with you, helping you, taking you. Don't give up the fight, in other words.

Many are struggling with different things. God says 'Son, daughter, what I want is for you to look for me, for you to trust, for you to acknowledge your sin, for you to accept my grace, for you to seek help, for you to speak to others, for you to seek the resources what is in my kingdom and I will be with you. And in that battle I am going to glorify myself. In that fight I am going to instill in you the things that I need to instill.

The Apostle Paul struggled with interior things, which we do not know what his nature was, he says that God sent him a messenger of the devil to humiliate him, and three times he came before the Father saying, 'Lord, deliver me from this', and what was the Father's response? Enough my grace. Because? Because my power is made perfect in weakness.

He wanted to tell her, 'look, I'm not going to take that away from you even if you want it, because my grace is working on it. So if you have a battle in your life, I am telling you, that battle is an indication that God is working, paradoxically, in you.

Now, it doesn't mean that you practice it because of that, but I am simply telling you there is mercy, there is blessing, there is hope, and one day the Lord is going to give you complete victory. The important thing is not to give up the battle, do not take your hand off the plow, do not give yourself over to sin, do not persevere in sin. God still in that, is also glorifying himself.

"....Do not sin then reign in your mortal body so that you obey it in its lusts, nor do you present your members to sin as instruments of iniquity".

Which members? Hands, my eyes, my mind, my body, all parts of my being. The word present, 'paristemi', is a very profound word that you will find later in Chapter 12, where it says “present your bodies as a living sacrifice, as a living sacrifice”.

The idea of presenting is like delivering, it is like a child when it is presented to God, who is consecrated to him for his use and for his dominion. That is what we do with our children. And Paul uses that same concept here, of presenting our life. He says, 'don't give up your being, don't give up your body, don't give up your mind to do things of iniquity.'

Our life, brothers, our body, our mind, our resources must be consecrated to please the Lord, to bring glory to the Lord, to bless humanity, to please God who has rescued us. And we have to say, 'my body, my life, I'm not going to give it up to the devil. I am not going to submit my life for sinful purposes because I am a temple of the Holy Spirit.

What does Paul say, for example, about having contact with prostitutes as was done in the century in which he lived, with sacred prostitutes and all this? He says, 'you are a temple of the Holy Spirit, your condition is to be an exalted being, to be an angel here on earth, to be an instrument of justice, how are you then going to include within your body an energy What is going to make the Holy Spirit live with sin within you? Our condition is rather that of beings that have to be used for the glory of God, therefore we cannot allow our body to be used for something that is contrary to what God wants.

"... but present yourselves to God as living from the dead and your members to God as instruments of justice."

Why? ".....because sin will not have dominion over you since you are not under the law but under what?, under grace".

That word 'rule over' is the same word that is used for Christ 'ecurios', the Lord 'ureguei' is the Greek word that is translated here overrule.

In other words, we have only one Lord, brothers, is Christ Jesus. The only Lord to whom you must submit and to whom you must not resist is Christ Jesus. All the other lords who demand their subjection, you must tell them 'not here, I serve Christ Jesus'.

Any area of your life that is contrary to the values of the Kingdom of God, any area of your life that contradicts or belies the lordship of Christ in your life, point it out and resist it in the name of Jesus.

Look how Paul, I'm done with this, as he says "... I will not let myself be dominated...", First Corinthians, Chapter 6, verse 12:

He says , “...all things are lawful for me but not all are convenient. All things are lawful to me what? but I will not let myself be dominated by any."

In other words, don't be dominated by anything in your life that belies the Kingdom of God. And so far I realize, I have used many images in the area of sexual morality, but let me tell you that this idea of not letting sin reign in us refers to all dimensions of life. Money, for example, should not reign in the heart of a Christian human being, particularly a Christian, no one but the Christian... if money occupies the center of our life and we are willing to sacrifice the Kingdom of God for money, the values of the Kingdom of God for money, then our king is money.

If I subject myself, for example, to a cursing and obscene mouth that is always saying bad words, then I have subjected myself to gossip. If I am a spiteful person and I have a grudge there that I do not release, and the one who does it to me, pays me, and I am always measuring people through rancor and through the law, and criticizing others and all this, that contradicts the principle of grace, forgiveness, mercy, love of the Kingdom of God and therefore, I am subjecting myself to a sinful principle, which is called rancor, which is called judgment. And I have to say, 'I am not going to let myself be held to any of those things because I am free in Christ Jesus.'

Nobody say, brothers, that there is something that you are doing, or that I'm making we can't break All that there is of sin in us, everything can be subjected to the discipline of the Holy Spirit. Say amen to that.

Look what it says, I'm going to look for one last quote here that I want to share with you about precisely that point. Well, you know, it says 'no temptation has come upon us that is impossible to resist but God, along with the temptation provides what? the exit.

Any of us having any kind of struggle, let's not say 'I can't break that.' No, no. 'I was born like this and that's how I am and that's it...' No, brother, Christ Jesus has set you free from all slavery. That is why we Christians should aspire to live powerful lives, lives of perpetual transformation. Whatever it is, the Lord can defeat it in your life. Any problem, do not say, for example, "I am a depressed person, I suffer from depression and that is how I am going to die all my life." Christ can break the power of depression in your life, because it contradicts the abundant life that he has commanded you to live.

Do not say, 'I am a person who cannot speak to anyone because I get nervous and I am not good enough to testify to them.' No, in Christ Jesus you are more than conqueror, you can do everything in Christ Jesus.

I think Paul is referring to the fact that no negative, sinful principle that contradicts the Kingdom of God should enslave us, nothing, nothing of this world, because we are free in Christ Jesus. And since we are free and we are made a little lower than the angels, how are we going to submit to the devil or to sin or to anything that contradicts the exalted condition in which we live?

It is an invitation, brothers, this year not to let us live mediocre lives, lives subjected to indolence, that I cannot do this, that I cannot go to church. So many people make good resolutions at the beginning of the year: I want to be a woman of God, I want to bless my congregation, I am going to take a discipleship class, I am going to serve in the church, I am going to help something in the Kingdom of God. And two or three months arrive and tiredness and time come, and work or a failure or a problem and we return again to a mediocre life.

And Paul says “... do not let sin reign in your mortal body”. Rather make your members members of justice, that you live positive lives, lives that reflect the glory of God in you. Do not lend your life to anything that contradicts the exalted condition that God has made possible through grace in you through Christ Jesus. Live a victorious life, an overabundant life, a winning life. Present your members as instruments of justice. Amen.

We are going to stand up this afternoon. Read that passage because it has so, so, so much to teach us. God has told us, this afternoon, 'my grace is simply a starting point for you to live a holy and powerful life that reflects the values that characterize me.

My grace is not a license to sin. My grace is a platform so that you, freed from condemnation and uncertainty, have enough energy and confidence to undertake bold things that no other human being is allowed, so that you conceive high visions of a moral, ethical, triumphant life, so that you dare to aspire to the best of yourself; so that you do not live crawling at ground level, but soar to the heights like the eagle that I have made for you.

My grace is to allow you to enter into the enjoyment of all that I have for you, not for you to lie down to sleep and live a minimal life, but quite the opposite, I hope you live a maximum life , a life that honors my Son, that honors my Kingdom, that honors my word, that tells the world, 'this person is living at a level that is not possible for a human being.' Therefore there must be something supernatural in him or her and then that people who live at that height, because they have been liberated by the grace of God, will be contagious, irresistible. People will want to come where we are because they will see the liberating power of Christ through us. That is the great struggle of this generation, brothers, to live up to the Gospel, to live up to the Christ who paid the price.

And I want to live at that height. I ask the Lord 'help me, Father', and I want to have companions like you also in that battle. Amen.

We are going to be a church that is characterized by being ethical men and women, men and women of integrity, men and women who are fighting the good fight every day. When we get up, we immediately put on our armor, back to the fight. And if we fail in the course of the day, we repent, we confess sin, we go before the Father, we are healed and we take the sword in hand again and continue until one day he finally takes the sword from us and tells us, 'ok, now enter my rest.' Amen. In the meantime, don't give up the fight. And there would be the title of this sermon 'Don't give up the fight', keep going, keep going in the faith. Don't hold on to anything. Don't give up on anything. Do not admit defeat in anything, because the Christ that God has made dwell within you is more powerful than any inertia that the universe can bring to your life.

Father, we surrender ourselves anew to you. We confess that you have called us to live high lives, exalted lives, Lord, and we need you, but this afternoon, Lord, we say, 'We will not stop trying. We will not use cheap excuses. We will not hide behind your grace, but freed by you, we will live lives that exemplify the highest values of the Kingdom of God and that honor the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross and honor your incredibly complex and eternal plan. that you have prepared to save this humanity and bring it to the point of culmination that is Christ Jesus and salvation through his work.

And one day, Lord, we thank you so much that you will take all the threads of human history and of the universe and you will unite them all in your Son Jesus Christ and you will make him, in effect, the apex, the unitive element of all creation, the entire universe and every language will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.

Thank you, Father, because we are part of that incredibly complex fabric that you are making and we have entered into your plan. We bless your people, Father. Allow us to be a church that brings joy to your heart, that brings joy to your Father's wounded heart, for this creation that has betrayed you so much, Lord. We want to be different. We want to please you, so come Holy Spirit. Come and help us. Give us strength today. renew our strength in that sense in the name of Jesus we ask. Amen. Amen.