Resurrection Completed (Justification), Continuing (Sanctification), and Coming (Glorification)

 

Romans 8:8-11 – Resurrection: Completed, Continuing, and Coming – Sermon Outline

Intro: Those in heaven right now are there without their bodies. Does this matter?

Need: Yes! See that without our resurrected, glorified bodies, we cannot inherit the kingdom of heaven!

Theme: The Resurrection Blessings of Having Christ’s Spirit:

 

I.       Justification: Raised from our sinful flesh in order to belong to & please God. (8-9)

A.      Recall Paul has explained his inner struggle as a Christian in Romans 7.

       1.      The law of God is Paul’s delight after the inward man (7:22), but in his members/bodily passions, his sinful flesh possesses another law, the law that still loves sin and leads to captivity, death, hell, 7:23.

       2.      So Paul laments in 7:24, “O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from this body of death?”

B.      In our sinful, fallen state, we are body & soul separated from Christ, having no just standing with God.

       1.      We only have life “in the flesh” (8:8), a life unable to please God b/c enslaved to our sinful desires.

       2.      Such a person does not have the Spirit, and therefore is not justified, is not raised by Christ’s Spirit from the dominance of his sinful flesh/passions to serve with his heart/mind the law of God, 7:25.

       3.      Those without the Spirit of Christ do not belong to Christ, Rm. 8:9, & therefore cannot please God.

C.      But when you’re born again by the Spirit, you have justification, Christ’s righteousness by His Spirit.

       1.      So the first resurrection is the indwelling of Christ’s Spirit. Here we have Christ & His work united to us, indwelling us, so that God treats us as perfectly righteous in/through Christ’s indwelling Spirit.

       2.      In Christ our sins are atoned, & His obedience becomes ours. So the Father loves us b/c of His Son.

       3.      Is God the Father pleased with His Son? If you have Christ/His Spirit, He’s equally pleased with you.

       4.      Why? Because His Son lived and died for you, the Son’s life and death for you pleases God.

       5.      Thus you must have Christ’s Spirit indwelling you, not your sinful flesh, in order to please God.

       6.      Without Christ washing you, all your attempted righteous deeds from your sinful self disgusts God!

D.      Who is the Holy Spirit? He is God, the 3rd person in the Triune Godhead.

       1.      He’s the Spirit of Christ B/C Christ was indwelt & lived by the Spirit throughout His righteous life, sin bearing death, & by the Spirit He rose & ascended to the Father to pour that same Spirit out on us!

       2.      This is why Rom. 8:9 refers to the Spirit, the Spirit of God, & the Spirit of Christ in the same breath.

       3.      It is one and the same Spirit, promised by the Father and given to the Son after He atoned for sin & returned to His Father, having completed the work the Father gave His Son Jesus Christ to do.

       4.      Jesus was clear: “It is the Spirit that gives life; the flesh profits nothing” in John 6:63. So it is by the power of God the Holy Spirit that Christ was raised from the dead, & His people, soul & later body.

       5.      Rom. 8:9 indicates that if we have the Holy Spirit of Christ, we are indeed pleasing to God.

II.       Sanctification: Raised inwardly/spiritually now in order to live righteously. (10)

A.      When Romans 12:1-2 says to present your bodies as a “living sacrifice” it means your physical body.

       1.      For 8:10 says, “the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.”

a.       Since our bodies are not yet raised, that living sacrifice takes the form of “dying” to our sinful flesh.

b.       This is why we take up the cross daily, die to self daily, killing sinful lusts by the Spirit’s power, not by physically chopping up our bodies but by spiritually chopping up our sinful bodily passions.

       2.      Thus in sanctification we are to be living sacrifices, bodies that are set apart as the temple of God.

a.       We are filled/indwelt by the Holy Spirit, rendering to the Lord our “reasonable service” (The word service in Rom. 12:1 relates to the temple services of the Levites/priests, etc.) in all that we do.

b.       So we are not to be “conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” Rom. 12:2.

B.      Until we are raised bodily/glorified with Christ, we battle to present our bodies as living sacrifices.

       1.      Rom. 8:10 is clear that if Christ and His Spirit is presently in you, the body is still dead due to sin.

       2.      So the Christian struggles B/C the sinful flesh, the sinful desires don’t go away altogether until glory, when Christ returns and our bodies of sin die and are raised incorruptible, free from sinful desires.

       3.      Until then, we must starve our lusts, knowing they are still there. Indeed, this is why Paul cries out that He is a wretched man, and needs deliverance from this body of death, this lustful body/flesh.

       4.      In Rom. 7:25 Paul summarizes the Christian’s battle/struggle, to be this difficult one of serving the law of God with the mind/heart, but the law of sin with the flesh/bodies that are not yet raised.

       5.      This is a contradiction that will only be resolved by being clothed with our resurrected/glorified bodies.

C.      This is a difficult yet hopeful state – in Christ we are justified, please God, & are daily being sanctified!

       1.      Rom. 8:12-14 says that you will die (spiritually, eternally in hell) “if you live according to the sinful flesh, but if you by the Spirit put to death the sinful deeds of the body, you will live (spiritually, eternally in heaven). For as man as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the Sons of God.”

       2.      So the “Spirit is life” (8:10), sanctifier, B/C by Him we resist sin, the devil, & pursue righteousness, loving God wholeheartedly and our neighbors as ourselves.

D.      So the Christian lives both in & by the Spirit, raised out of the deadness of our fallen, bodily passions.

       1.      The Spirit that raises us sanctifies us -- we are killing the lusts of our body by the Spirit working in and with the Word of God, His commandments, His promises, all of it, causing spiritual growth daily.

       2.      Rom. 8:14 is clear, those who are the Sons of God don’t merely have the Spirit, but live by/are led by Him. The Holy Spirit is making the child of God more holy bit by bit, progressively sanctifying us.

       3.      So, justification is a resurrection completed by Christ’s Spirit; sanctification is a resurrection continuing/ongoing by Christ’s Spirit; Glorification is a resurrection coming, likewise, by Christ’s Spirit.

       4.      8:10 “the Spirit is life because of righteousness” can apply to the righteousness Christ’s Spirit gives to us in our justification, sanctification, and glorification.

a.       Justified: Counted righteous in Christ because of Christ’s righteousness, alive in Christ.

b.       Sanctified: Progressing in righteousness by the Spirit working in us, renewing our lives daily.

c.       Glorified: The Spirit “will also give life to your mortal bodies”, Rom. 8:11. A resurrected, glorified, righteous body that is incapable of sinning and only desires that which is good.

III.       Glorification: Raised outwardly/bodily later in order to receive eternal life fully. (11)

A.      Living by the Spirit to present our bodies as living sacrifices to God leads to being raised with glorified bodies when Christ returns. This is the Christian faith – without resurrection of the body, faith is futile.

       1.      There is no Christ without the empty tomb, and thus no salvation without the resurrection of the body.

       2.      Paul says in I Corinthians 15 that if Christ is not raised bodily, if there is no such thing as resurrection, we are of all men most to be pitied, for we have a false and foolish faith.

B.      8:11, The Spirit that raised Christ’s body is the Spirit that will raise yours:

       1.      The Spirit will do it because He already indwells you and possesses you/owns you!

       2.      So we do not await the Spirit’s indwelling, but His working. We have the Spirit of resurrection now!

       3.      This gives certain hope of our future, bodily resurrection. Christ is raised by the Spirit, and we have that same Spirit indwelling us now, making us spiritually alive and sanctifying us, soon to glorify us!

IV.       A Theology of Bodies: Bodily Resurrection is hard to understand because the Church today generally doesn’t understand the body. So let’s look at Scripture to understand glorification/resurrected bodies.

A.      Let’s begin with what we do understand the most: Jesus had a body on earth, and was raised bodily.

       1.      The body in which He died is the body that was raised, but it was raised a better body, soon glorified.

       2.      As the seed must die to give way to the tree and its fruit, so we must die in our sinful bodies for these mortal bodies to be raised up to new bodily life, glorified like Christ’s, by the Spirit dwelling in us.

B.      Jesus Himself came “in the likeness of sinful flesh”, Rom. 8:3, to condemn sin in the flesh.

       1.      He took on a body like ours, not inherently sinful, but one that is corruptible & capable of dying, capable of being tainted with sin, suffering under the curse of sin, etc. & He did endure all this for us!

       2.      Jesus experienced hunger, thirst, fatigue, suffering, sickness, and ultimately the painful and shameful death on the cross, suffering not just physical death but spiritual death, His Father’s wrath for our sin.

       3.      But now, Christ is raised in incorruptible and immortal flesh/body, no longer in a body of death susceptible to sin & temptation, but a body raised from all these things by the Spirit of Christ.

       4.      Thus it is a Spiritual, heavenly body that rises out of our mortal bodies, made after the image of the heavenly man Jesus and His Spirit, no longer after the man of dust’s image, Adam. I Cor. 15:42-49.

       5.      Rm. 8:11 is shorthand for I Cor. 15:42-49, the Spirit that raised Christ will raise us into Christ’s image, to a glorified bodily state that is immortal and incorruptible, not like the mortal and corruptible Adam.

C.      Consider -- Adam, to receive & remain eternally with God and receive life to its fullest, needed to pass God’s test on earth, then receive a glorified body in order to ascend to God’s presence in heaven.

       1.      Let me put it strikingly – Even Adam’s body in the Garden, before sin, was a mortal body, and therefore not fit for heaven. It was a body susceptible to temptation, to sinning against God by persuasion of juicy forbidden fruit and the tongue of Satan. It was a body that could suffer, die, & did.

       2.      It was a corruptible body, not fit for or worthy of being in God’s heavenly abode. God was with Adam in the Garden, but Christ is raised with God in human flesh in heaven itself, in His glorified body.

       3.      This is, after all, precisely what Christ the last Adam does for us – passes God’s test then ascends to heaven in a glorified body. Even Jesus had to receive His glorified body before He could enter heaven! His coming in the likeness of sinful flesh means his body on earth was not fit for heaven.

D.      If it is claimed that this is speculation and God COULD have permitted unfallen Adam into His heavenly abode while still in His mortal, corruptible body, Adam then could have sinned in heaven, because he was in a mortal body susceptible to temptation/sin/death. He could pull a Lucifer.

       1.      But I am not speculating. I Cor. 15:50-53 is clear – “Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does corruption inherit incorruption. 51 Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed— in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. 53 For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.” Rm. 1:23 says God is incorruptible, so we must be made like Him to be with Him.

       2.      Where brothers and sisters can we, not just corruptible but corrupted, not just in mortal bodies but bodies having suffered mortality, dead in trespasses and sins – how can we rise immortal & incorruptible so as to be fit for heaven, God’s kingdom?

a.       Only united by the Spirit in Christ, the resurrected God-Man, glorified in human flesh!

b.       He at this moment is meeting with us, doing so seated at the Father’s right hand in His heavenly kingdom, doing so in human flesh, in a resurrected body that is incorruptible and immortal!

c.       In Christ alone, we are presently seated with Him in the heavenly places spiritually, Eph. 2:6.

d.       One day, in Christ alone & by His Spirit, we will be granted access to heaven in the flesh, in a bodily state that is incapable of falling from grace/heaven itself. In bodies incorruptible, glorified!

e.       Only in Christ, who tasted sin, death, the devil, and hell itself for us on the cross, are all corruptible and mortal foes defeated. Christ has done it and proven it by rising bodily from the grave.

       3.      So only in union with Christ’s soul and risen, incorruptible and immortal human flesh/body, can one say what I Cor. 15:55-57 says, “O Death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory? The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

a.       No sting of death for me, b/c I’ve died in Christ and will be raised incorruptible, apart from even the possibility of sin.

b.       No strength of sin over me, for Christ has kept the law perfectly on my behalf, has condemned sin in my flesh and removed it by nailing it to the cross, and even now is sanctifying me by His Spirit such that, Rom. 8:4, “the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”  

V.       CONCLUSION: Without the resurrection of Christ to a glorified body -- sin, death, & Satan himself wins.

A.      If Christ did not take up His flesh to glorification, then He did not condemn sin in the flesh/defeat death.

B.      There is no salvation of the soul without resurrection and glorification of the body. The two are linked, because the image of God is possessed by us not just in our souls, but our bodies, male and female.

C.      “In the image of God He created them, male and female He created them.” Gen. 1:27. You can’t understand male and female without bodies, so without bodies you can’t be said to be in God’s image.

D.      Our resurrected, glorified, heavenly bodies bloom out of our corruptible, sinful, mortal bodies by Christ.

E.      So these bodies, corruptible by nature & now cursed by sin, do bear the image of God. But weakly, like a half-crushed caterpillar longing to be transformed into the glory of the flying, heavenly butterfly!

F.      So every Sunday is Easter, resurrection Sunday, the day Jesus rose from the grave.

G.     Children, you must consider something far more important than Easter eggs and family/friends/food.

H.      Consider the defeat of sin, death, and the devil when the Angel declared at Jesus’ tomb, “He is not here, for He is risen!”. So take up the cross, die to sinful self daily, with the sure hope of an incorruptible inheritance in heaven, received in the only garments fit for the High King of Heaven, in immortal, incorruptible bodies raised from the dust of the grave into the image of Christ Jesus Himself.

I.         This is why Romans 8:24 says we were saved in this hope, an unseen hope but a true hope.

J.       We, along with all of creation itself groaning under the curse of sin, eagerly await the resurrection, the redemption of our bodies in a sure, blessed hope. The Spirit has already done the work of glorification for Christ Himself, and has united us to Him! The Spirit already indwells us! Our resurrection is certain!

K.      Christ was raised for our justification, He continues to pour out His Spirit for our sanctification, and though we will die, the Spirit in our bodies will resurrect & glorify our bodies when Christ returns.  

L.       Thus we have a three-fold resurrection blessing through Christ & His Spirit: our justification, sanctification, & glorification, planned by the Father, accomplished by the Son, given by the power of the Holy Spirit that now dwells within us, the Spirit that drives us on to holiness and the hope of eternal life in glorified bodies, as Rm. 8:15-17 says:

M.     “For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.” LET US PRAY.