{Would You Like to Know Where Your Mind is Taking You?}

What is the mark of a true believer? Do you ever ask yourself this question? If you ask yourself this question where do you go to find the answer? Today we will look at Romans 8:5-11 to answer the question, “what is the mark of a true believer?” Looking at Romans 8:5-11 also answers the third question, “where do I go to find out what a true believer looks like?” The answer, the Word of God. I also want to add the Word of God is the only reliable place we can get our information. God has graciously and with a warning gave us everything we need to know.  We are without excuse. Placed between Paul’s worship of Christ and His setting the believer  free from their condemnation of sin he briefly stops to give  a picture of a true believer and an unbeliever.

{The Requirements of the Law Are Fulfilled in Christ!}

Do you not know? Have you not heard? God did it! God sent His One and only Son in the likeness of sinful flesh as an offering for sin. Why did He do this? We read in Romans chapters 1-3 that men do not fear Him, they do not honor Him, and they exchanged His incorruptible glory for an image that is corruptible. {The man that Romans speaks of is me, and all humanity.} This man made image  will fade away but the God who always was, will always be! The God of heaven and earth, who man rejected, sent His Son to die for our sins and to accomplish in us what the Law could not do.

{Who is the Man in Romans 7:14-25?}

Have you ever heard someone who claims to be a believer say, “I do not sin.” Before I say anything about this statement lets go to the Bible and see what it has to say.

If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. if we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us. 1 John 1:8-10

{What Do You Want to Blame For Your Sin?}

It is human nature to want to blame. There have been times in my life that I knew I was in the wrong but wanted to blame my reaction to a situation on someone or something else. Can anybody relate? The blame game goes all the way to the beginning of man’s creation. Come with me and we will read how Eve blamed the serpent and how Adam blamed God.

Then the LORD God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?” He said, ” I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself.” and He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” Genesis 3:9-11

The man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate.” Then the LORD God said to the woman. ” What is this you have done?” and the womans said, ” The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”  Genesis 3:12-13

{Freed to Walk in Newness of the Spirit!}

In the beginning, God said, Let there be… and by the word of His power, there is. Then God said, “Let us make man in Our own image, according to Our Likeness. He formed man out of the dust of the ground and breathed the breath of life into Him. He placed the man in the garden of Eden to cultivate it and to keep it. He commanded the man saying, ” From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.” {Genesis 2:16-17}

That day came!  The crafty serpent, satan, tempted Eve she took and ate. She gave also to her husband Adam and he ate from the forbidden tree.  God kept His covenant promise and put all of His creation under a curse and death entered the world. God took the man and the women He had made and drove them out of the garden.