rosegarden

2. a. Because Jesus came in the flesh to die for mankind. He was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon Him and by His stripes we are healed. He was despised and rejected by men. b. We suffer because of the curse brought on by the sin of Adam. We suffer in childbirth, pain, grief,rejection, persecution, sin in the world, struggling to pay for our homes, expenses, etc. c. The ground was cursed, it would produce thorns and thistles, working by the sweat of our brow. Because of man's sin there is frustration, bondage, groaning...man has polluted the environment and made a real mess of things and not at all what the Lord originally created. d. The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. e. The coming again of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and the resurrection and redemption of our bodies where we will spend eternity with Him.

1. a. 7 b. We are led by the Spirit, adopted by God, the witness of the Spirit that we are His children, heirs and joint heirs with Christ, suffering with him cannot be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us. c. For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God.

6.a. The Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God inspiring us to pray "Abba, Father". b. We are adopted by God being his child we can trust, rely and depend on Him. c. We must have personal assurance by the Holy Spirit of our salvation because having it gives us the faith, encouragement, and excitement to desire after and know and serve God. If you don't have that how can you know you are saved? d. I wondered: what is life all about, is this all there is? We must seek and desire after God knowing that we are helpless to save ourselves in our situation and we need Him. He even give us the faith and grace we need to do this.

5.a. Mortify or put to death means... not by doing this in our own strength, but as the Holy Spirit reveals things to us, we stop in our tracks and do not do the old things out of habit but, yield our members as instruments of righteousness to the Holy Spirit putting to death the deeds of the flesh. b. It looks like a person denying themselves. c. To be led by the Spirit is to walk, trust, submit, obey the prompting of the Holy Spirit daily in our lives. d. In actual practice it looks like we stop sinning and start demonstrating the fruit of the Spirit. e. Putting to death and being led fit together because only as we are led by the Spirit are we able to mortify the deeds of the flesh. f. We yield, the Spirit works in us.

4. a & b. No, we do not have to sin, nor are we compelled to sin. God forbid, how shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein. c.d. Yes, it is possible to live for two hours and even four hours of wakefulness without sinning. e.f. One & two days maybe not, when we slip back into the flesh, but, if we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. g. Defeatist attitude ... from our flesh. h. Not from scripture, because the scripture states "The law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus has set me free from the law of sin and death."

3. a. No, we cannot be a true Christian unless the Holy Spirit lives in us. When I surrendered my life to Christ, He sent His Holy Spirit to reside in me and I felt his glorious presence. b. Upon salvation the Holy Spirit comes to indwell in us. The fullness is when we receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit with evidence of speaking in tongues (our heavenly language). c. We remain full of the spirit by walking in the spirit not in the flesh and if we do sin, confess, repent of our sin, immediately putting it under the blood.

2. a. It means to think on the things of the Spirit. b. You think on things above (the things of God - get into the Word of God, being lead by the Spirit of God. c. You just know, they are things of the flesh...and you don't feel uplifted or encouraged as when you are encouraged in the Lord... they feed your flesh but your spirit is malnourished. d. It is deliberate when we are walking in the flesh. e. It is habit sometimes when we are doing these things, but need to be aware of this and quickly change our minds. f. The Holy Spirit convicts, leads and guides and we need to keep tuned in and yielded to the Holy Spirit. e. It is not right living by force of will, because without the Holy Spirit we can do nothing ...cannot serve God, please God, or lead a Holy Life.

- Obedience to the law cannot save us because it has been weakened by the flesh and it is powerless to save. - Jesus Christ dying for our sins and us accepting Him as Lord and Savior by faith. For the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus has set me free from the law of sin and death, for what the law could not do, in that is was weak through the flesh, God sent His only son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit.

I believe through experience and understanding that the "I" person - is me. I have been regenerated but did not understand that I am nothing on my own but it is Christ in me who is everything. Knowing now, that I was crucified with Christ, Reckoned dead to sin but alive to God through Jesus Christ, yielding my instruments unto righteousness. Learning to walk in the Spirit and fulfilling the law by yielding to the Holy Spirit which gives me the power to live a holy life.

- Doctrine of total depravity.... I really don't know my own heart. The Bible says, The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it. Lot of times we say something and then can't believe it came from our mouth. - We are made in God's image, but the good in us is corrupted. In every aspect, man is flawed. Our flesh is corrupt and even the good we do may be with the wrong motives. - Modern man does not believe he is a wretch. He believes he is somewhat good and can improve on himself, self help books, trying to keep the law. Man cannot save or improve himself. The law or being good cannot save us. We need a Savior, Jesus Christ the Righteous. - This differs from what the Bible teaches... which says, There is none that doeth good,no not one Ps. 14:3

- What the law does Well: The law gives us the knowledge of sin. - What it does poorly: It can't deliver us from sin. - It is powerless to save us because it does not have the power to save because it is weakened by the sinful nature. - We need a savior, who paid the price for our sin, Jesus Christ the righteous one, who alone delivers us as we walk in the spirit and not in the flesh. He gives us the power to do this as we walk in fellow ship with Him.

- Because by the law is the knowledge of sin and the flesh responds by coveting all the more. The more we are told "Do Not", the flesh wants to do it all the more.

Things that rise up in you that the human nature wants to do that are not of God. It is our sinful flesh. The things that we are told not to do, we do.

- No, there is no middle ground we must choose either to be a slave to sin or slave to Christ. - We long for independent freedom because of wanting to be independent and control our own lives. - Fear commitment, failure, paying the price, when we need to be dependent on Jesus who is the Author and Finisher of our Faith.

- Good doctrine affects the way we live. Without good and sound doctrine, we would live carelessly. We need to be connected to a good church that teaches sound doctrine. - We should honor good doctrine because it teaches us truth and gives us a witness in our spirit that it is truth. It gives us a good foundation, whereas, we can teach and disciple others in the faith. - We need to avoid false doctrine, the doctrine that doesn't agree with the Bible. Our church has a 7 month Catechism course - Building Firm Foundations which gets everyone on the same page. New people come to the church with teachings that are false and need to know the truth, this course really helps them.

- A pattern of obedience is the distinctive mark of a slave. - Because by doing acts of righteousness I am allowing myself to be a slave to God. - By doing bad things I am allowing myself to be a slave to sin. - Slavery or bondage is broken by the cross of Christ, we are free. - Wholehearted obedience to Christ teachings and inner desire to obey Christ manifesting itself in obedience breaks this bondage. - I need to change my ways and put God first. Need to seek Him more for direction and not just do what I feel like. He needs to be more in my life than what I allow.

- We offer our bodies daily as instruments of sin or of righteousness by yielding, submitting, or allowing. - We can sin unconsciously because we are human and want to please our flesh and are not walking in the spirit. We need to be God conscious and resist the devil and he will flee. - We can begin to offer our members deliberately to God by choosing to yield, submit and allow our members to be instruments of righteousness. - We need to change our daily habits by submitting ourselves to God and resisting the devil. We need to spend time in the Word of God, pray, stay in fellowship with Him, fall in love with Jesus over and over again.

- We should not be obedient to a false master letting sin reign in our mortal bodies - to be slaves to sin bringing death, - But we should in obedience present our bodies as instruments of righteousness unto God our Righteous Master to be slaves to righteousness bringing life.

- We are to reckon, consider (by faith) ourselves dead to sin but alive to God through Jesus Christ. - No, It is a fact that through Baptism we were Baptized into Christ's death. By faith we reckon that when he died I died. - We have victory over sin because the essential power of sin has been broken in our lives by the cross and we are no longer compelled to be habitual sinners.

- Knowing that our old man was crucified with Christ that the body of sin might be destroyed, - Therefore, freeing us from slavery to sin. - A dead person is no longer a slave to sin. I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless, I live, yet not I but Christ lives in me and the life that I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. We are no longer to live in the flesh but to walk in the Spirit by the faith of the Son of God.

- Paul is referring to a historical actual death. - Talking about Christ's death on the cross. - By being Baptized into Christ, this death becomes our own - This is not theological mumbo-jumbo it does have some basis in reality because being dead to sin, we become alive to God through Jesus Christ.

- Buried corresponds to death. Being covered by the water in Baptism symbolizes death. - Rising out of the water symbolizes resurrection.

- We have been buried with Him in baptism unto death (not to serve sin any longer) and as Christ was raised from the dead, so are we raised to walk in newness of life. We are dead to sin but alive to God through Jesus Christ. - Our baptism with Christ symbolizes a Spiritual union not a Physical one.

- Knowing that our life is a mess and there is nothing we can do, we ask Christ into our life to be our Lord and Saviour. - We must be water baptized. Knowing we are buried with Christ in baptism into death - We reckon ourselves dead to sin but alive to God through Jesus Christ. Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that we should not serve sin.

Adam is the head of all created things,the first man, human as we are. When we realize our sin and ask Jesus to take over our lives because we ourselves made a mess of them, he honors that and comes in. He then becomes our head and leads us and guides us by His Holy Spirit. If Christ is not our head and we have not accepted what His Blood has done for us, we cannot change and become more like Him.