Reformation of the Heart Old Testament Lesson: Ezekiel 36:22-28 New Testament Lesson: Romans 7:14-8:17. Tuesday, October 30, 12

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2 When it comes to living what we consider the life of a disciple (living rightly), the key player is your heart. Your heart controls your passions Your passions control your words & actions Your words & actions demonstrate your character

3 Do you run the Christian life out of Fear? 2. Out of vanity? 3. Out of sheer joy?

4 Ezekiel 36: Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the LORD God: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came. 23 And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the LORD, declares the Lord GOD, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes. 24 I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land.

5 25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. 26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. 28 You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God.

6 Romans 7:14-8:17 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. 15 For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. 17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

7 21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

8 Chapter 8 1 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.

9 6 For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 7 For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot. 8 Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. 10 But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.

10 12 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. 13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 14 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. 15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, Abba! Father! 16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. PASTOR: This is the Word of God. PEOPLE: Thanks be to God.

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19 Do you run the Christian life out of Fear? 2. Out of vanity? 3. Out of sheer joy?

20 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living)

21 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) Mommy, I don t want to do naughty things but I keep doing them and I want to stop because it doesn t make me happy to do those things. Josephine Tarasovitch

22 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living)

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24 I felt that I had been born anew and that the gates of heaven had been opened. The whole of Scripture gained a new meaning. And from that point on the phrase the justice of God no longer filled me with hatred, but rather became unspeakably sweet by virtue of a great love. Martin Luther

25 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living)

26 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) 2. Running out of pride (vanity-based living)

27 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) 2. Running out of pride (vanity-based living) Cleaner than when coming out of baptism, and cleaner than Adam and Eve before the fall, the cross of the seller of indulgences has as much power as the cross of Christ.

28 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) 2. Running out of pride (vanity-based living) As soon as the coin in the coffer rings, the soul from purgatory springs.

29 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) 2. Running out of pride (vanity-based living)

30 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) 2. Running out of pride (vanity-based living) 3. Running out of joy (joy-based living)

31 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) 2. Running out of pride (vanity-based living) 3. Running out of joy (joy-based living) This life therefore is not righteousness, but growth in righteousness, not health, but healing, not being but becoming, not rest but exercise. We are not yet what we shall be, but we are growing toward it, the process is not yet finished, but it is going on, this is not the end, but it is the road. All does not yet gleam in glory, but all is being purified.

32 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) 2. Running out of pride (vanity-based living) 3. Running out of joy (joy-based living) The heart overflows with gladness, and leaps and dances for the joy it has found in God. In this experience the Holy Spirit is active, and has taught us in the flash of a moment the deep secret of joy. You will have as much joy and laughter in life as you have faith in God.

33 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) 2. Running out of pride (vanity-based living) 3. Running out of joy (joy-based living) Marriage does not consist only with sleeping with a woman everybody can do that! but keeping house and bringing up children. The husband and father washing smelly diapers may be ridiculed by fools, but God, with all his angels and creatures, is smiling not because the father is washing diapers, but because he is doing so in Christian faith.

34 1. Running out of of fear (fear-based living) 2. Running out of pride (vanity-based living) 3. Running out of joy (joy-based living)