HOW TO CRUCIFY KING SELF IN YOUR MARRIAGE
Romans 6
There have been many kings in the world. The Russians used to have a king that was so vicious that they called him “Ivan the Terrible.” The English had a king that was so ferocious that they called him “Richard the Lion Hearted.” I say to you today that the most vicious and most ferocious king in all the world is “King Self.” The sixth chapter of Romans calls him a king. King Self has done more to damn more souls and blast more lives and has brought more unhappiness to man than all the kings of all the ages combined. King Self is the chief cause of divorce and destroyer of the family.
Do you have problem today that is really serious in your life? Do you have something that overpowers you, and just defeats you over and over again, and you seem unable to rise above it? It’s King Self. The Bible says twenty-five times more about him than it does about the devil, because when you can handle King Self, you can handle the devil and the world, but until you find the answer to this king, you are in bondage.
First of all, I want to raise several questions and conclude by telling how he can be crucified:
What Do I Mean by KING SELF?
King Self is just another name for the old sinful, selfish nature on the inside of us. In Romans 6:6 and Colossians 3:9 and Ephesians 4:22, King Self is called “the old man.” In Galatians 5:16 and 5:19, King Self is referred to as the “flesh.” Generally, when you see “sin” in the singular in the New Testament, it’s referring to King Self.
David tells us in Psalm 51:5 from where King Self originated. He says, “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me.” David was not saying that his mother sinned in bringing him into the world, but that by his being born into the world, he was born in sin, and King Self was in his life when he was born into the world.
How Does King Self Assert Himself in Life?
He asserts himself by self-assertion in every area; self-exultation, self-will, self-righteousness, self-consciousness – just looking out for number one. In a word, King Self is that evil disposition which we inherit, which rebels and resists the dominion of Jesus Christ and causes us more trouble than anything under the sun. It is not surprising that Paul would write a whole chapter telling the believer how to crucify King Self. Paul says in Romans chapter six that there are four things we must do:
1. You Must REALIZE That King Jesus Has Already Nailed King Self To The Cross, if you would be free from King Self and hope to gain a victory over him for life. When Jesus died on the cross, He accomplished a two-fold crucifixion.
a. Jesus nailed our actual sins or evil deeds, or transgressions to the cross (Isaiah 53:5-6).
b. Jesus also nailed King Self to the cross. The Bible says in Romans 8:3 that Jesus Christ condemned or broke the power of King Self. Not only did He die for our actual sins, but also for our “sin,” or what we are. Every time you witness baptism by immersion you are witnessing a picture of the death of King Self, because Paul says in Romans 6:3, “Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized or placed into Christ were baptized into His death?” Into His death to what? Baptized into His death for sin – King Self! “That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even we also should walk in newness of life.” God does not intend that His children be under the dominion of King Self. Jesus nailed him to the cross. Jesus dethroned him. Jesus has gained victory over King Self, and you must REALIZE it. Until you realize this, your theology or doctrine is wrong, and you can never enter into the victory.
I was reading of the famous plastic surgeon, Dr. Maxwell Martz. He removes ugly scars and big noses and all kinds of disfigurements from people. He says that even after he does the surgery, these people continue to think of themselves as being ugly and they, therefore, continue to live defeated lives.
2. You Must RECKON Yourself to Be Dead Unto King Self And Alive Unto King Jesus!
Since Jesus Christ has nailed King Self to the cross for we are in Jesus – which we are through the baptism of the Holy Spirit which occurs at the time of the new birth – if this is our experience, then Paul goes on to say in verse 11, “Reckon ye yourselves also to be dead unto sin and alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” The key to understanding this verse is the verb “reckon.” Reckon in this verse doesn’t mean what it means when you and I say “I reckon my ball club is going to win.” That’s just hoping. Reckon here is the word of the mathematician – the accountant. It’s logizomai. It means “to compute” and “put down as a fact as definite as 2 +2 = 4.” Dealing with mathematical truth, reckon is to count as an accomplished fact, believe with all your heart and doubt not, that you are dead to King Self and that you’ve had a resurrection unto a new life and you have a new King – King Jesus whom you are accountable to, and you don’t have to bow down to King Self any longer! This is probably the most transforming truth in all of holy Scripture for the people of God. Here is the Magna Charta! Here’s what the saints need to hear in this day. They need to hear there is liberty in Jesus Christ through Jesus’ death and resurrection on the cross. Reckon yourselves dead, reckon yourselves to be alive as those who have been raised from the dead. When the Bible says you are dead, please don’t misunderstand, it does not mean that sin cannot entice you. It doesn’t even mean that you can’t respond to its enticement. It does mean that if you reckon it, and this is in the present tense which means this becomes a pattern of life that every day you live, you are to reckon that you are dead to sin because of Christ’s death to sin, that King Self cannot rule your life, you do not have to say yes, and by that reckoning, by faith in your heart, you are on the road to victory.
Now rather than reckoning King Self as dead, we think He’s forever alive and we seek to coexist with him – we try to handle things ourselves. We try to improve King Self by educating him. We try to improve him and often this is what it means when we rededicate our lives. We are actually rededicating King Self by saying “I’m going to do better.” But how can you improve a monster? You can’t. That’s why God has put him to death. King Self has been dealt with at Calvary. We are to believe it and nail it down in our lives and know that he is dethroned. Jesus has dethroned him. We do not have to obey him, we do not have to say yes, and when that pattern is in our soul and that’s a part of our doctrine and of our belief, the Holy Spirit will begin to work and when you center it on a given sin you can handle every last one of them, including lust, or jealousy, or gossiping, ill will, unfaithfulness, or insincerity. If you know it and believe it in your heart, you are going to rise up and find victory. When in the midst of the dogging of King Self, you suddenly lay hold upon a little bit of victory, and you find yourself plagued with wrong attitudes and with an inactivity in your body, an inability to rise above, and suddenly you lay hold upon this truth and you just feel yourself being lifted and you sense it in your soul – what a joyous thing it is my friend. That’s what God expects us to do every day we live until it becomes a pattern of our life.
You are not only to reckon it, he goes on to say then you can renounce the actual sin of King Self and live as a man resurrected from the dead! King Self is a defeated foe. You don’t have to obey him. You don’t have to as long as you don’t make the mistake that many people make – you label it as weakness instead of calling it the wicked sin that it is. You say, “Oh, I’m just human. I’ve just got to do this – my sin is this, another man’s sin is this. I have a bad temper – I’m lazy, but somebody else is something else.” As long as you mark up your sins of King Self as weakness rather than wickedness you are going to be bound. I know some people who are lazy and they think they’ve got to be lazy all their life. You don’t have to be! I know some people who think they’ve got to gossip the rest of their life and they’ve got to hold grudges the rest of their life. They don’t have to be this way. Jesus died and rose again that we might be whole – that we might be so different that an unbelieving world would be electrified even to meet and talk to us. So Paul says because of the victory of Christ, renounce these sins in the power of the King and cause them to fall in your life. In verse 11 he says, “Likewise reckon yourselves also to be dead indeed unto sin but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
3. We Must Not Let Sin REIGN In Our Mortal Body.
Paul draws a conclusion from verse 12. “Let not sin therefore reign” – bosaluo – that means a king. “Let not sin reign in your mortal body as King so that ye obey its evil desires.” Now why does he say your mortal body? Is the body sinful? The body is no more sinful than the soul. Jesus came in a body, but the body is the avenue through which King Self attacks you. He says we don’t have to let it reign in our mortal body. Why don’t we? Because Christ has dethroned King Self but He has done much more than that. If you are a child of God, He has given you a new nature. He’s given you His resurrection life. You are alive from the dead! I’m not suggesting for one moment that you are going to do this within your own power, but I am talking about any child of God that is born of the Spirit of God, baptized into the body of Christ, has the resurrection life in him, and as Hebrews 6 says, he’s tasted of the powers of the world to come, and we don’t have to say yes to King Self because we have a victory over him in the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, and the experience is in our own hearts if we will only appreciate it.
The worst thing that evangelists and preachers have ever done to our evangelical people and some of our Baptist people is to keep them in bondage by actually preaching that you’ve got to stay in bondage all your life. You’ve got to stay in bondage when the Bible calls us unto freedom and holiness. I have heard men who call themselves wise with doctor’s degrees tell large congregations “the only difference in a lost man and a saved man is that the saved man is forgiven and the lost man is not.” That is the most erroneous theology that was ever proclaimed from a pulpit. Forgiveness is but the edge of salvation. Salvation is to experience God, and the resurrected life of Jesus to the degree that I’m able through His power to be a new man in a world that’s lost so that the world may see a man alive from the dead walking the streets of this city. Verse 12 teaches two great truths:
(1) Sin will dominate your life if you let it.
(2) God gives you the power to overcome sin in your life.
I n that power you can renounce all the sins of the flesh that’s mentioned in Galatians 5:19-20 – there are 17 of them: Adultery, fornication, lustful heart, a jealous spirit, a quarrelsome spirit, contention, drug abuse, idolatry of material things, just to name a few. What in the world is the answer to this thing? You say, “I pray about it.” I say to you, until you bring it to the cross and understand Christ’s victory, you can pray all you want to, but you’ll never have the victory. I have had people come to me all the time saying, “Pastor, I’ve rededicated my life, I pray, I’m reading my Bible and I’m teaching a Sunday School Class, but I’m a defeated person. I have no joy, no real life in me. What’s the trouble?” The problem is you have not used the method of God – you haven’t brought it to the cross. You are trying to work it out yourself and you are dealing with a tyrant. You are dealing with the most cruel, vicious enemy this world has ever known and unless the Son of God has dealt with him, you and I are sunk, but He has dealt with him, and you and I need to enter into that victory. We can renounce the sin of self. If your are going to sin and continue this way, don’t justify yourself! Don’t say, “I have to.” You don’t have to do any such thing – Christ has delivered us if we will only enter into that deliverance.
4. We Must Turn Our Mortal Bodies Into A Weapon Of RIGHTEOUSNESS for King
Jesus.
To realize that King Self has been nailed to the cross by King Jesus, and to reckon it as a definite fact, and to renounce in the power of the resurrection those things which bind you and keep you from being the man in your home, the man in your church, the person God would have you to be, and come out a free man and testify to the world how it happened, is the most thrilling thing this side of heaven. There’s one other thing – He says not only to renounce in your mortal body, but he says to turn this mortal body into a weapon of righteousness for King Jesus, rather than using the body for King Self, just turn the tables on King Self, and use this old body against sin and for King Jesus! Unless I’m using this body for King Jesus, I’m using it for King Self. Unless you are using this mortal body to honor King Jesus, I am honoring King Self. Here is where many people misunderstand. They think, “Oh, I can have a wonderful experience in my heart, I can believe on Jesus, I can be baptized and then I can sit down and do nothing.” In the very idleness of your life there is nothing but a garbage pot of self. It’s when you get in motion for the King that you’ve found the victory immediately, but not until then. Every visible part of the body can be used as weapons for God in the fight against sin, and when you begin to fight with the body, victory comes. The word that is used in verse 13 says, “Do not use the members, (that means the parts of your body as instruments – hopla “that’s the word weapon) don’t actually use your body as a weapon for sin against Jesus.”
He gave you that wonderful tongue not to gossip and spend your time doing nothing on the telephone, but to get out and share Jesus and sing His praises with the tongue! You can’t use the tongue for Jesus sincerely and use it in the prattle and foolishness of this age. It is so disappointing sometimes when people who call themselves Christians use their tongues for everything except the Word of God and that edifying message which the world desperately needs to hear.
Think of these wonderful eyes He’s given us. He didn’t give us these eyes to lust upon the flesh. You say, “I have a problem of lust in my heart.” The first look is not sin, the second is. What in the world are you going to do about it? Jesus took that look to the cross, and when you begin to reckon it to be dead and you do it long enough, it will die in your soul, and you will rise up to praise God that you were delivered from lust. Use your eyes for that which is wholesome and beautiful. You may have to limit television a great deal, and you’ll never look at another Playboy Magazine or any of this garbage that’s coming off of the presses of this world today. In Job 31:1, Job prayed that his eyes might be sanctified and that’s my prayer – that my eyes might be sanctified to God. God has called us unto holiness in this world, with our eyes, with our lips, and with our minds.
A lot of people are having trouble with their minds today. They are thinking wrong. You say, “I can’t do anything about it.” Yes, you can do something about it. If you have a wrong attitude toward someone, you ought to get up every morning and say “this thing was killed at Calvary. Jesus took this thing to the cross. Thank you Jesus.” Claim the victory of the cross and the blood every day you live.
How about your hands? What are your hands doing? These hands are one of the most sacred things in this world. If we are going to do any ministry at all we’ve got to use the hands. How would you like to shake the hand of an unclean man or of and adulterer, adulteress or a liar? No one wants to. How would you like for such a person to lay his hands on you to pray for you? The hands of Jesus are beautiful, and our hands are to be beautiful so people will say we’ve not handled the corrupt things of this world or done any of the ungodly things in the world – we want them to say his hands are clean- that’s what God expects – clean hands and a pure heart.
Where are your feet taking you? I discovered a long time ago that we do what we want to do. Our values are all turned around. If I don’t have a dedication for Jesus commensurate to my dedication to hunting or some other past time, I’m not worth my salt and worthless to the kingdom of God. People can get up early to go on vacation, or do anything they want to do and the feet take us where our heart is and where our commitment is! Rather than let these feet take me to the hell holes of this world, and to worthless living one meeting after another that has no relation to eternity or the kingdom of God, I say to Jesus, “I sanctify these feet to walk where you would have walked, where people are dying and need a word from me, where I can bring the message of hope.” When I do this my whole body becomes an instrument of righteousness, and I build it in the parts of my life and I build it in the pattern of my thought. It’s in my theology, it’s in my belief and I may fail, but I won’t fall too far and I may get defeated, but I can’t be constantly defeated because I’ve got the doctrine, philosophy, and Jesus in my soul – I have understanding and I’m armed for battle – Praise the Lord! Are you armed?
That is the only way under the sun to overcome King Self! I read of an old King who wanted to make a radiant Christian very unhappy.
1. He said, “I’ll confiscate all his good.” His advisors said, “That won’t do any good, he doesn’t have anything to begin with and all his riches are in Christ.
2. He said, “I tell you what I’ll do – I’ll put him in solitary confinement.” They said, “You can’t do that because he says he has a Friend who goes with him everywhere he goes.”
3. The King said, “I’ll cut off his head.” The advisors said, “Oh no. That won’t do because he goes around saying for me to die is gain.” The King turned to his advisors and said, “What in the world can I do to this man to make him unhappy?” A very wise man in the counsel said, “If you want to make him unhappy, make him sin.”
There is not a truer word that has ever been spoken. That’s exactly what King Self is trying to get you to do all the time – make you sin – make you compromise – make you give in to your weaknesses, and call it weaknesses rather than wickedness. The result is that you are dying all the time and becoming more and more unhappy.
I ask you today, have you seen the problem of King Self in your life? You may be wondering what is wrong with you. It’s not the devil, primarily, don’t give the devil too much credit – he’s on the outside- King Self is on the inside, and you don’t have to continue serving him. Jesus has dethroned him, and you need to realize it as an accomplished fact. You need to renounce those things in your life which are wrong , and turn that body around in an offensive weapon against Satan and use every part of it for the glory of Jesus name. I beg you today not to listen to King Self, but accept the victory of Jesus. Today say no, and rise to be what God would have you to be, risen from the dead! That what He’s called us to.
5. How to Apply The Truth of This Message in Relation to Your Wife.
Be sure to read of the specific attitudes and actions a man must take to conquer “King Self” in His marriage and home; See pages 107-116 inThe 10 Absolute Life Changers of Men.