Radio Broadcast Tuesday 02/11/2025

Classic Christianity – Book of Romans P50 (02-11-25)

We Who Are in Christ Jesus are of One Body, The Body of Christ Himself

~ “We have different gifts according to the grace given us. If one’s gift is prophecy, let him use it in proportion to his faith; if it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is giving, let him give generously; if it is leading, let him lead with diligence; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.”

Everyone of us who has the Spirit of God living in us, has the SAME Spirit. We have the SAME Body. We are ALL members of the SAME Body of Christ Jesus. And because of that, we each are given jobs to do to serve the body of Christ. Therefore, do what the job that God has given you to do. Be who you are. Serve each other in the LOVE of God who wants to live his Life in and through you.

And a certain ruler asked Him, saying, “Good Teacher, having done what, will I inherit eternal life?”
And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good, except God alone.

~ “Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.” 1 John 5:12

~ Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life; the one believing in Me, even if he should die, he will live. And everyone living and believing in Me shall never die, to the age. Do you believe this?” John 11:25,26
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~ Therefore I urge you, brothers, on account of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.

For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but think of yourself with sober judgment, according to the measure of faith God has given you. Just as each of us has one body with many members, and not all members have the same function, so in Christ we who are many are one body, and each member belongs to one another.

We have different gifts according to the grace given us. If one’s gift is prophecy, let him use it in proportion to his faith; if it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is giving, let him give generously; if it is leading, let him lead with diligence; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.

Love must be sincere. Detest what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Outdo yourselves in honoring one another.

Do not let your zeal subside; keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord.

Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, persistent in prayer.

Share with the saints who are in need. Practice hospitality.

Bless those who persecute you. Bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but associate with the lowly. Do not be conceited.

Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Carefully consider what is right in the eyes of everybody. If it is possible on your part, live at peace with everyone.

Do not avenge yourselves, beloved, but leave room for God’s wrath. For it is written: “Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, says the Lord.”

On the contrary,

“If your enemy is hungry, feed him;

if he is thirsty, give him a drink.

For in so doing,

you will heap burning coals on his head.”

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Romans 12:1-21

Pray to God:

Do you really want to know the WHOLE Truth of what is going on today?

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you.” Matthew 7:7

Lord Jesus, teach me the truth of the world today and give me the wisdom to know the truth and identify the lies of the devil. Thank you God.”

~ “We were studying through the 12th chapter of the book of Romans, and we’re going to pick up again today as a segment of that. So if we’ll turn to chapter 12, verse three, grace given me, I say to everyone of you, do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself in sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith that God has given you. Now, again, guys, why is the apostle Paul saying these things? It’s because people, and you’re going to deal with this, who get into spiritual gifts and begin to get puffed up over the gifts that we have and and so he’s saying to us is, let’s not get all hung up on your gifts. I’m going to explain to you what those gifts are, but let’s not walk around thinking we’ve got the special one from God. And everyone who doesn’t have it is kind of out to lunch. And so he’s saying, don’t be thinking more highly of yourself than you ought. Instead, we’ve got to be thinking of ourselves with sober judgment in accordance with the measure of faith that God has given us. Now, just as each of us has one body with many members, and if you’re looking here at me, you see a head, and you see a body, and this body is made up of many, many parts. And though its parts are many, they form one body. My I don’t walk on my hands. I have hands that are there to do things. You have parts of your body that are there to do things that that are not doing something else. I don’t blow my ears, I blow my nose. Everything is set in God’s economy to be used in proportion with the way in which God created you. And so he’s saying that we all have one body and in many members, but these members don’t all have the same function. And so it is with Christ, and we need to keep that in mind that our body parts don’t all have the same function, never intended to and, but that they form one body. So it is in Christ, we, who are many, form one body. There are many people in this room, but it forms a single body. In Christ, just as each member belongs to all the others, so every part of my body belongs to this body. And if my finger hurts, my whole body hurts. And he’s saying, I want you to equate that with the body of Christ, that we all belong to one another through our relationship with Christ, Jesus, don’t we? He is the head. We’re the body.” ~ Bob George

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Join Bob George in this chapter by chapter exposition of the letter to the Romans. Available for download the complete series on the Book of Romans. Romans has been described as the most dynamic, life changing document ever penned. It is a study in systematic theology, a defense of the Gospel, and a practical guide to Christian living all in one.

Announcer 0:12
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Bob George 0:29
We were studying through the 12th chapter of the book of Romans, and we’re going to pick up again today as a segment of that. So if we’ll turn to chapter 12, verse three, grace given me, I say to everyone of you, do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself in sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith that God has given you. Now, again, guys, why is the apostle Paul saying these things? It’s because people, and you’re going to deal with this, who get into spiritual gifts and begin to get puffed up over the gifts that we have and and so he’s saying to us is, let’s not get all hung up on your gifts. I’m going to explain to you what those gifts are, but let’s not walk around thinking we’ve got the special one from God. And everyone who doesn’t have it is kind of out to lunch. And so he’s saying, don’t be thinking more highly of yourself than you ought. Instead, we’ve got to be thinking of ourselves with sober judgment in accordance with the measure of faith that God has given us. Now, just as each of us has one body with many members, and if you’re looking here at me, you see a head, and you see a body, and this body is made up of many, many parts. And though its parts are many, they form one body. My I don’t walk on my hands. I have hands that are there to do things. You have parts of your body that are there to do things that that are not doing something else. I don’t blow my ears, I blow my nose. Everything is set in God’s economy to be used in proportion with the way in which God created you. And so he’s saying that we all have one body and in many members, but these members don’t all have the same function. And so it is with Christ, and we need to keep that in mind that our body parts don’t all have the same function, never intended to and, but that they form one body. So it is in Christ, we, who are many, form one body. There are many people in this room, but it forms a single body. In Christ, just as each member belongs to all the others, so every part of my body belongs to this body. And if my finger hurts, my whole body hurts. And he’s saying, I want you to equate that with the body of Christ, that we all belong to one another through our relationship with Christ, Jesus, don’t we? He is the head. We’re the body.

Now, folks, that’s why the body of Christ is not this room. The body of Christ is not Baptist, or the body of Christ is not Seventh Day Adventist, or the body of Christ is not Church of Christ. The Body of Christ is born again people. And you can have born again people sitting in this room, and you can have lost people sitting in this room. Christ Church are the saved people sitting in this room, not the lost ones. You might belong to an assembly, but you don’t belong to JESUS UNTIL you belong to Jesus. Do we understand that? So Christ isn’t interested in Baptist or Presbyterians or Methodists. He didn’t form those denominations. Believe me. He is only interested in Born Again people. He isn’t going to save any Catholics or Baptist or Charismatics or anybody else. He’s only saving people. This is not an organization. It’s an organism. He is the head. We are the body. So this group of people, those who are born again in this group, belong to people who are born again in other groups and born again in other groups all over the world. And that’s why, in Christ, there is no Hebrew, there is no Gentile, there is no slave, there is no free, there is no black, brown, blue, purple, or anything else. It’s all one group of people who have been introduced to Christ, Jesus and to become a part of his body. Now that’s Jesus Church. And when people come along and say, unless you belong to my church, number one, it isn’t their church. If it is, you don’t want to belong to it, that you’re not saved, that is nonsense. And any group that says that is a cult, that you have got to belong to my church, have my membership, have my stamp of approval on you. In other words, I’m going to stick Smuckers on your jar, and you’re a Smuckers from that day forth, and if you ever leave Smuckers, you’re gone, and with a name like Smuckers, it’s got to be good, and that’s the way we are. If it’s a Baptist, got to be good. Presbyterian got to be good. That’s nonsense. God never came to form denominations. He came to form a relationship, an individual relationship, with you and with him, so that you and I can walk into the presence of God, where the curtain has been rent from the top to the bottom, not by man, but by God, and walk into the Holy of Holies calling him Daddy, Father and receiving mercy in our time of need. That’s the good news of the gospel. And whenever you are around somebody that says, if you don’t belong to my group, you’re lost, stay away from it. It’s a cult. No one is ever going to be saved by belonging to People to People. You’re only going to be saved when you belong to Christ. Jesus attached to the head. But once you’re attached to the head, and you’re attached to the head, you’re attached to the head, we become attached to who? One another, and that’s why you can go into any parts of the world and meet a people from China, from Japan, from Germany, from Russia, who are born again, an instantaneous communication of spirit. And sometimes you can’t even speak English, God forbid, and I can’t speak Russian, but it doesn’t matter. There’s a communication of spirit. Have you noticed that, how when you meet somebody, it’s truly born again. There’s just a communication of spirit. You can’t even explain it. And you can also tell when there is no communication of spirit.

And so he’s saying that is what it means to think in sober judgment, not in pie in the sky. Hey, this is our organization. You know, look what we Presbyterians are doing. Look what we Methodists are doing. Look who cares. The issue is, what are you doing? Are you being led by Jesus? Jesus is not leading this group. He leads people. He leads people, individually. Jesus, when he was here on this earth, said, and this is God speaking as Archie Bunker said, not too bad of a Christian. God on this earth said, I have put aside the prerogative of deity. I’ve put aside the some of the characteristics of deity. And when I’m on this earth, in my flesh and blood, I’m going to do nothing except what the Father tells me to do. I’m not going to say anything unless the Father tells me to say it and how to say it. And incidentally, as the Father sent me, so send I you. How did he teach us to live? In dependency upon the Father. Did he teach us to try to emulate Jesus? What would Jesus do? What Jesus did was what his Father told him to do. What are you to do? What the Father tells you to do. I don’t think the father is going to be telling too many of us to walk across water or to walk on water. Have any of you done that recently? Ski maybe, not walk. You see, the issue is that we’re not to emulate we’re not to become a monkey. We’re not to be saying necessarily the same words that Jesus says. We’re not to be an ape, aping things, monkeying things, a parrot, parroting things. That we’re to be an individual. God gave you fingerprints of your own. He gave you a life of your own. And he said, what I want to do is to work individually in your life, and I want to work individually in your life and your life, and that’s the dynamic of this Christian life, is being able to be uniquely who you are. You’re a child of God, and that’s what we have talked about so many times. Our image is not in what we do, our identity is not in what we do. It’s in who we are. I am a child of the living God. I didn’t earn it. I didn’t deserve it. I received it by the mercy of God, and so did you. And that’s the only identity that I want on me, child of the living God. I don’t want Baptist stuck on me, Presbyterian, People to People or anything else. I don’t want those labels stuck on me. That’s not who I am. I’m a child of God who’s been made a child of God by God Himself, reborn into the newness of life in Christ, Jesus, and that’s the only identity that I want. I would be a child of God whether I was sitting in this assembly on Sunday, or whether I was sitting in another church on Sunday, it makes no difference. I’m a child of God, and we need to understand that. But you see, we come down saying, Oh no, no, no, no, no, that child of God, forget that. You don’t got to remember, if you join us, you’re going to be a Baptist, you’re going to be a Presbyterian, you’re going to be a Methodist, you’re going to be a Charismatic. You got to be those things said, No, you don’t.

If you’re a child of God, you’re a child of God sitting here. You’re a child of God at work. You’re a child of God at play. You’re a child of God wherever you are. And that’s why, when you understand who your identity is, you can recognize when you’re in the wrong place as a child of God, you know you’re in the wrong place when you’re in the wrong place, and you also know you’re in the right place when you’re in the right place.

And so he’s saying to us that just if each of us have one body with many members, and these members don’t all have the same function, so in Christ, we all form one body, and each member belongs to the others. Now he’s saying, we all have different gifts. We’re a part of one body, but we have different gifts. So God gives gifts to you, and He gives gifts in accordance with the grace given us. If the man’s gift is prophesying. Now he didn’t make himself a prophet. Now, some people do, and some people stand up and make themselves prophets, and that’s they look like a man made prophet. If God has given you the gift of prophesying, he said, let him use it in proportion to his faith. What does that mean? In proportion to his faith? If God is telling you to prophesy something, do it otherwise, keep quiet. Do we understand? If, on the other hand, if it’s serving, then let him serve. If you have the gift of servitude, serve, if God gave you the gift of teaching, teach. If it’s encouraging, let him encourage, if it’s contributing to the needs of others. In other words, giving, let him give generously. Now isn’t that a new thought? Give generously to the needs of people, if it’s leadership, let him govern diligently. Now, some people come and say, Oh, well, you can’t have a body. This little leadership stuff is nonsense. You know, you don’t you shouldn’t be organized. Folks, you can’t function without organization. That’s why it gives you the gift of organization. That’s why it gives you the gift of leadership. If it’s showing mercy, let him do so cheerfully. Now you say, Well, what is my gift? How many of you know basically what your spiritual gift is through your hands? Not too many, but some of you do know. You know how you can kind of get an indicator as to what your spiritual gift is? Get a whole bunch of you and sit at a table on Sunday morning and you gotta go to church and let one of your kids knock over a glass of milk, and you’ll see what your gift is.

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Bob George 14:06
To the gift of servitude, they’ll be down there cleaning up the milk. To someone who has the gift of encouragement. Oh, don’t worry about it, sweet. It can happen to anybody. To the person with the gift of admonishment, you ought to watch what you’re doing on Sunday morning. To the gift of teaching. Let me tell you how things spill. Let me explain that to you. You have all of these different gifts that you will see come out of you naturally by just spilling a glass of milk, and that’s exactly and then, if you’ve got the gift of leadership, why you will try to arrange the table a little differently so that you don’t hit the milk when you when you’re trying to eat breakfast in the morning, you got all of these things that God will show you what your gift is. If you’ll let him. Now, thinking along that line, and let’s say that someone spilled the milk at your table, how many of you think maybe you might be able to identify what your true gift is? Now, after this milk has been spilled? Let me see your see your hands. You got a little better clue on that. Well, follow that. In other words, follow that. That’s a natural what God has given you is a natural gift to help people, the person who wants to get down and clean up the milk and all that, that’s a natural thing. And it says, go be a helper. That would be a group of people that would probably be called Deacons in the church servants, people who help and serve. Many of you have shown that to me over these years, that that is your gift. You love to help and you love to serve. And we’ve got some people that are unbelievable in that capacity. And so that’s where you begin to identify now, what is the purpose of spiritual gifts to edify yourself? I believe that God gave me the gift of teaching. I don’t sit in a room by myself and teach myself in order to edify myself. God doesn’t want us to use the gift for that. You don’t sit around and serve yourself. A cow doesn’t drink its own milk. A tree doesn’t eat its own fruit. It bears fruit for others. The purpose of a spiritual gift is for the benefit of the body. You have ears to hear why? So that my body can hear what’s going on. You have a tongue to speak with, why? To edify the body. So there’s no exception to the fact that a spiritual gift given by God, not the ones that we dream up, but a gift that is given by God is given to you for the edification of the body, to serve the body, to help the body. Do we understand that every part of your body is to serve the body? Is it not? If I’m hungry, my hands help to serve that. My mouth helps to take care of that. Teeth, all of those things are there to serve the function of the body.

So you and I sitting in this room, all of us have gifts, and the purpose of the gifts is to serve one another in love, not only to serve here, but to serve out into the marketplace. Because sometimes, when you’re using your gifts out in the marketplace, you’re serving people by them watching you and saying, Where is that coming from? And that gives them an opportunity to know that where it’s coming from is from God. Apiritual gifts. Now he says, there’s all kinds.

Now let’s turn back to the book of Ephesians. Ephesians, four guys, I’m glad to know that you bring your Bibles with you. It’s vitally important we do that even though we have that up on the screen. This should be a supplement, not a substitute for so because we are we definitely are going to be getting into our scriptures always. Let’s go into Chapter four. As a prisoner of the Lord. Then I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling that you have received. Be completely humble and gentle, be patient, bearing with one another in love, make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. Now he tells us, there’s one body. There’s not a Hebrew body and a Gentile body. There’s one body. There’s one Spirit. There are people who teach that you’re born again and then later on, you receive the Spirit. That’s nonsense. It’s impossible. If the Spirit of God does not live in you, then you don’t belong to Him. So there’s no way of being born again, and then later on to receive the Spirit. That’s impossible, that’s false teaching. When you’re born again, the Spirit of God comes to live within you. There’s not two spirits. There’s not the one you’re born with, and then another one that you get. There’s one Spirit. Who is that Spirit? The Holy Spirit, and who’s the Holy Spirit? The third person of the Trinity, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. I want to ask you another question. How many of us would ever have known that, had it not been for Jesus coming, would you have known who, who God was? Would you known that God existed as a God, the Father God, the Son God, the Holy Spirit? Would you have known that apart from Jesus? No, not at all. But when Jesus did come, he explained the Trinity. That’s why he said, I begin in all authority in heaven and earth. Therefore, go and make disciples, baptizing them the name of who? The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey the commandments that I gave you and lo, I’m with you always, even to the end of the age. Why did he say that? To identify them with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who were the Hebrews, identified with the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob. At least, they had a trinity, but that’s who their God was. Who’s your God with the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob, but they didn’t know who he was until Jesus came.

Now, folks, people have trouble with the Trinity. Some people and a seminary professor once said that anyone who tries to or denies the Trinity will lose his soul, and anyone who tries to understand the Trinity will lose his mind. And that’s probably true. Now here’s the reason. God is what? Spirit. Let me ask you, what’s the spirit look like, any of you seen one lately? I don’t mean in your imagination, seen one. No, we’ve not seen one. God is Spirit, and you must worship Him in spirit and how? In truth. So we know something about the Spirit, truth, truth, truth. You cannot put flesh and blood around a spirit. So now, when you hear God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, what’s the first thing you do in your mind? Well, you put flesh and blood around them, don’t you? You kind of envision what the Father looks like. You kind of envision what the Son looks like, what the Holy Spirit looks like, is that sober thinking? Is that what’s talking about? Thinking soberly? No, because you can’t dress up a spirit. So can three of you be one? No. But in the spiritual realm, can three be one? There’s an egg. An egg is made up of a shell and a white and a yolk. Is it not? Which one’s the egg? Now, if you put an egg up in the attic and decided that the people down the kitchen are having some problems, and you took the yoke, put it down in the kitchen. Would there be any less of an egg in the house? Would there still be an egg in the house? Yeah, the yoke could be down here, white and shells up there, but there’s still an egg in the house. Now, I don’t know where that helps you with Jesus or not, it does with eggs. You, but in essence, that’s what God did. The yoke came down to this earth. They’re no less God. There was still the white and the shell, but the yoke was down here, ministering to us, down here, until he went back to the Father and then sent the white to live in all of us. And so we may not be able to comprehend all of that, but we can apprehend it. Can we not? And so the Trinity is something that don’t try to put flesh and blood on you can’t do it. How? God exists in three and yet is one that’s spiritual stuff, and you gotta apprehend it, but please don’t try to comprehend it, because you cannot comprehend spirit any more than you can comprehend what people want to comprehend, and that is foreknowledge, all of that type of thing. That’s God’s stuff. We have no point of reference to it at all, none at all. Can’t even enter into it.

And so he’s saying to us, there’s one Body, there’s one Spirit, just as you were called to, one Hope, not two hopes, one Lord. There is not Jesus is Lord, and Buddha is Lord, and Mohammed is Lord, and all that nonsense, there is one Lord. And that one Lord came to this earth, took upon himself, our humanity, entered into our death with us, so that we could enter into eternal life with Him, one Lord, one Faith, not two, not a Hebrew faith and a Gentile faith, not a Muslim faith, not a Buddhist faith, one faith. And who is that faith in? One God,who is Jesus. Don’t ever let someone tell you all we all worship you here that all we all worship same God. Nonsense, nonsense. There’s only one God, and he doesn’t contradict himself. If the God we worship the same God of the Muslim, then whoever, if God, wrote both of those books, he must be a nitwit, because he contradicted himself all over the place. There’s one God, there’s one faith, there’s one baptism, there’s one Father of all, who is overall and through all and in all. But God’s given us the grace and has given us as Christ proportionate.

So going down now into verse 11, it was he God who gave some to be apostles. Now we’re going to see how he ultimately formed the early church. He gave, first of all himself, did he not? And then to those men, those inner core were his followers, His apostles. And one of the criteria for being an author of the New Testament was to be an apostle or an amanuensis of an apostle, to have been with him for his baptism, death, burial and resurrection, and seen that, observed that. And so we realize that he gave, then some to be apostles now who was to carry out the teaching of Jesus when he went away, Did not Jesus say I’m going away, but it’s good for you that I am going away, for when I do, I’m going to send my Spirit to live in you, and you’re going to be my body? But who were the authorities in regard to the Word of God right after Jesus ascended, who were they? The apostles, and if you wanted to know what truth was, or you were having a wonderment about it, that’s who you went to, the apostles. They were the authority.

Announcer 27:11
Thank you so much for tuning in to Classic Christianity with Bob George. We hope you’ve enjoyed today’s program. We truly hope that today’s message has inspired you to walk a life of faith in the Lord find more information online at BobGeorge.net. There you will also find available CDs, DVDs and Bible studies available for purchase. It’s through your help that we are able to spread the good word of Jesus Christ. Until next time, walk in faith be good to one another and praise the Lord. Amen.