Sermon Theme
There is no way for anyone to make themselves presentable to God and accepted into Heaven.
This sermon celebrates the greatest victory of all that has been WON FOR US. What we cannot do for ourselves.. be reconciled to God and gain Heaven.. God has done for us through Jesus Christ. This is the greatest source of COMFORT and ASSURANCE for Christians. Their acceptance with God and gaining Heaven is not based upon their ongoing ‘performance’. It has nothing to do with church attendance, tithing, good deeds or anything else we might try to do. Likewise, this victory gained for us in Christ alone, is the source of greatest HOPE for those who as yet do not have a relationship with Jesus. There is nothing they can or need to do to earn His love or make themselves right with God. All we need He did on the cross and that He made clear when on the cross He said.. “IT IS FINISHED”.
This sermon celebrates this victory in Christ .
Sermon outline
- THE GREATEST VICTORY OF ALL
- THE STING TAKEN OUT OF THAT WHICH WOULD CONDEMN US
- THE RISEN CHRIST THE BASIS OF THIS VICTORY
Readings reproduced on this page:
The Holy Bible: New International Version. 1996, 1984. Grand Rapids: Zondervan
Sermon Outline
Readings
Romans 7:14–8:4 (NIV84)
14We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin.
15I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.
16And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good.
17As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.
18I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.
19For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.
20Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
21So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me.
22For in my inner being I delight in God’s law;
23but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members.
24What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?
25Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.
1Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,
2because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death.
3For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man,
4in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit.
Text
1 Corinthians 15:50–58 (NIV84)
50I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.
51Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed—
52in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.
53For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.
54When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”
55“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”
56The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.
57But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
58Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
