Romans chapter 3. Let's read
verses 9-31. Romans 3 verse 9-31. What then? Are we better than
they? No, and no wise, for we have
before proved both Jews and Gentiles that they are all under sin.
As it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one. There
is none that understandeth. There is none that seeketh after
God. They are all gone out of the way. They are together become
unprofitable. There is none that doeth good,
no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulcher.
That's a grave. With their tongues they've used
deceit. The poison of snakes is under
their lips. whose mouth is full of cursing
and bitterness, their feet are swift to shed blood, destruction
and misery are in their ways, and the way of peace have they
not known. There is no fear of God before
their eyes. Now we know what things soever
the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law, that every
mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before
God. Therefore, by the deeds of the
law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight, for by the law
is the knowledge of sin. But now, the righteousness of
God without the law is manifested. Being witnessed by the law, there
the word means the first five books of Moses, being witnessed
by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God
by faith of Jesus Christ. Unto all and upon all them that
believe, for there is no difference. For all have sinned and come
short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace
through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God has
set forth be a propitiation through faith in his blood to declare
his righteousness for the remission of sins that are passed through
the forbearance of God. To declare, I say, at this time
his righteousness, that he might be just and the justifier of
him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is
excluded. By what law? Of works? No, but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a
man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. Is he the
God of the Jews only? Is he not also of the Gentiles?
Yes, of the Gentiles also. Seeing it is one God which shall
justify the circumcision by faith, that is the Jews, and the uncircumcision
through faith, that is the Gentiles. It's one God that justifies both
through faith. Do we then make void the law
through faith? God forbid. Yea, we established
the law. Now everybody here has come from
a busy week, full of all kinds of activity, and you probably
got lots of activity planned this afternoon. But I want you
to take some time now and give me your attention. I have a message
here that's the most important thing you could ever hear. This
is the most important thing you could ever hear. Every person
here one day is going to stand before God in judgment. Every
one of us in this room. None of the vain religious activities
that religion is engaged in is going to benefit any at all. None of the possessions that
you've accumulated, none of the achievements that you've gained
in this world are going to benefit you whatsoever. We brought nothing
into this world and it's certain we can take nothing out. We're
going to go out of here just like we came in and we're going
to stand naked before God. In that day that we come before
Him, none of these things that take up all our time and all
our attention and that we so feverishly give all our time
and attention to, none of this stuff is going to benefit us
any whatsoever. None of it. And that day we stand
before God, if we expect to be accepted of God, we're going
to need to be perfectly righteous. Perfectly righteous and perfectly
holy. We're going to have to have all
of our sins paid for so that we're justified. We're going
to have to have obeyed the law of God from our womb all the
way to the last breath we draw. We're going to have to be perfectly
holy, holy, pure within, a heart, a nature, holy to stand before
God. We must not look to our persons
for what we need. We must not look to the law for
what we need. We must look to Christ only. Christ is the only one who can
present us to God faultless and without blame, the only one.
In the day we stand before God, we must be found in the Lord
Jesus Christ, not having a righteousness of our own, which is by the law. but standing in the righteousness
which is by the faithfulness of Jesus Christ alone. That faith
which is, that righteousness which Christ is for his people. We must stand in him alone. All
right, let's look at this first thing. We must not look to our
persons for what we need. Now, usually when confronted
with the thought of sin and when confronted with the thought of
judgment, men like to look to themselves. They like to look
to their person. Well, am I really all that bad?
Am I as bad as what he says I am? Well, the Holy Spirit used Paul
to establish the truth that it does no good for any sinner to
look to his person, to look to himself. None at all. And it's
ingenious the way he did this. Look at verse 9. He says, What
then? Are we better than they? No,
and no wise, for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles
that they are all under sin. Now the Spirit begins in chapter
1 using the pen of Paul to describe the awful sinful condition of
Gentiles that God had given them the light of nature. And Romans
1.25 says, they changed the truth of God into a lie and worshipped
and served the creature more than the Creator who is blessed
forever. Amen. And for this cause, God
gave them up to vile affections. And he lists this long list of
vile affections. Homosexuality, all unrighteousness,
fornication, envy, proud, boasters, haters of God. On and on and
on he goes through this whole list. Have you ever heard preachers
preach on text like that? They take a text like that and
they'll preach against all of those particular sins and tell
you you should not do those particular sins. And the whole message will
be taken up with how if you do those particular sins, you're
unrighteous, you're ungodly, you're unholy, you should not
do those particular sins. And so somebody sitting there
listening thinks, well, let me clean up the outside of the platter.
And they clean up the outside of the platter, and they get
themselves all cleaned up, and maybe they join the church, or
maybe they start doing some religious exercises, and they think now
they're righteous. And those that are sitting there
hearing the message, who have already cleaned up the outside
of the cup, they're just so proud of themselves that they don't
do those things. Oh, I'm thankful I'm not like
those folks. And so they all stand there like the Lord described
in Isaiah 65, 5. They say, stand by thyself, come
not near to me, I'm holier than thou. And God said, these are
smoke in my nose, a fire that burneth all the day. That's not
how the Spirit of God moved Paul to use all those particular sins. That's not how the Spirit of
God moved Paul to use them. As soon as he gets through giving
those lists of sins, knowing what religious men who have self-made
men, self-righteous men, self-sanctified men, knowing what they would
think, the Spirit of God turns Paul to them. And he makes this
statement in Romans 2 verse 1. Therefore thou art inexcusable,
O man, whosoever thou art that judges. For wherein thou judgest
another, thou condemnest thyself. For thou that judges doest the
same things. The same thing. Each one here
this morning, in your flesh, the natural man is sin. It doesn't matter if you're a
believer or you're not, it's still sin. That's all it is. It's the product of Adam. That's
all it'll ever be. Our Lord said, out of the heart
proceed evil thoughts. He's talking about the nature.
He's talking about the flesh. He's talking about what we are
as we're born in Adam. Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts,
and murders, and adulteries, and fornications, and thefts,
and false witness, and blasphemies. These are the things which defile
a man. That's what the Spirit of God
is talking about when He has Paul turn to these religious
men who are sitting there thinking in their hearts, well, I'm glad
I don't do that stuff. And he says, no, you do the same
thing. You do the same thing. The Lord
said, now you Pharisees may clean the outside of the cup and the
platter, but your inward part is full of ravening and wickedness. Look down at Romans 2 and verse
28. Now here is the point. Since
we're dealing with the heart, we're just going to take the
first part for now. Romans 2, 28. Paul says, for he is not
a Jew which is one outwardly. Can you just imagine what the
Jews would have thought when they heard Paul say that? Can
you? Here's a man who once was with
them in their camp and then he's making this statement, he is
not a Jew which is one outwardly. No sinner is a true child of
God, pure and holy within, by things we do in our outward flesh. In the flesh. Verse 29 says,
but he is a Jew which is one inwardly. A true child of God,
pure and holy, is one in the new man. Now listen to this,
which after God is created. He's created. He wasn't there
before. He didn't exist before. He's
created. He's created. And God created
him. And everything that God creates
is good. And God created him in righteousness
and in true holiness. Not that put on fake stuff that
he was pretending he had, but in true righteousness and true
holiness. That's how God created the inward
man. Verse 29 says, whose praise is not of men, but of God. There's no one to praise for
this but God. So now having proved that the
Gentiles are all sin in their flesh, and the Jews are all sin
in their flesh, men in religion are sinners in their flesh, men
outside of religion are sinners in their flesh, The Spirit of
God moves Paul to conclude his argument in our text in verse
9, Romans 3, 9. What then? Are we better than
they? Paul was a Jew. Are we better
than the Gentiles? No, in no wise. For we have before
proved, both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin. All. Now here's God's description
of the natural man with which we're born the first time, verse
10. As it is written, there's none righteous, no not one. He
may appear outwardly to be righteous by the things he's doing, but
God says there is none righteous, no not one. There is none that
understandeth. Now outwardly the natural man
may appear to understand. He may even learn true doctrine. This is a scary thing. He can
learn true doctrine in his head. in his head. But this is what
God says, there's none that understand that. He don't get it. He don't
get it in here. He don't have a love for Christ
and a love for his brethren. There's none that seeketh after
God. He may come to church. He may read his Bible. He may
pray a lot. But until God's given him a new
heart, he hasn't sought God. Now he's seeking something else.
He's seeking to impress you or to soothe his conscience or to
convince the other fellow that he's righteous. But he's not
seeking God. He's coming for some other reason. They're all
gone out of the way. They're together become unprofitable.
There's none that doeth good. No, not one. Now the works he
does in themselves might be good works. It might be beneficial
to somebody else and help somebody. God might even use him to help
one of his own sheep. But until he's been made new.
Nothing he does is good. He's not good. None good. No,
not one. But it's worse than being not
good. This is what they are. This is
what a natural man is. Their throat's an open sepulcher.
Their tongues they've used to seek, the poison of Asp is under
their lips, their mouths full of cursing and bitterness, their
feet are swift to shed blood, destruction and misery are in
their ways, the way of peace they've not known, there's no
fear of God before their eyes. All these things they're doing,
chiefly, the natural man is doing to God, to Christ, chiefly, while
he's sitting in a pulpit, claiming to praise Him, and while he's
standing in a pulpit, claiming to preach Him. but preaching
men and man's work and man's doing and turning him over to
the will of the people like Pilate did. That's what he's doing right
there to God, right there. So it doesn't do any of us any
good to look to self. That's the end of self right
there. That's the end of how we are
the first time, how we're born. Don't look to that. All right,
secondly, we must not look to our law keeping for what we need.
All right? That's another thing when confronted
with sin. A sinner, he'll look to the Ten Commandments. He'll
go over there and get him a good dose of the Ten Commandments
and say, well, let me see if I can't clean up my act a little
bit. Verse 19. Now we know that what
thing soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the
law. Now that means somebody not under
the law. Huh? I mean, isn't that what
that says? If it only says, if whatever
it says, it only says to them who are under the law, somebody
must not be under it. Believers are not. Believers
are not under the law. We're under grace. We're under
grace. Watch now. What does it say to them who
are, who's under the law first? Well, everybody born the first
time of Adam. Jew or Gentile, religious or
irreligious, all in their unregenerate, natural-born state are under
the law. And what does the law say to those who are under the
law? Verse 19, it's given that every mouth may be stopped and
all the world may become guilty before God. This is not what
we hear the law say to us at first. when God, before God has
given us ears to hear what the law says about us, that's not
what we hear the law say about us. It don't stud our mouth,
and it don't make us think we're guilty before God. Men use the
law unlawfully to look at it and say, I've done pretty good
on this part. I need to work on that part a
little bit, but I'm getting better at this. I'm a whole lot better
at this than I used to be. That's not what the law was given
for. That mouth's not been stopped yet. That person hasn't become
guilty yet. But when God teaches the child
in the heart what the law says, the law shuts the mouth from
boasting. The law shuts the mouth from saying, I've kept the law.
And it declares us guilty before God. There is not one child of
Adam that has ever kept the law. All are guilty. All are guilty. All are guilty. And there's not
one believer by our obedience that has kept the law. Not a
one. Not a one. Not one. Verse 20 says, Therefore by the
deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his
sight. For by the law is the knowledge
of sin. No sinner can find acceptance
with God. He cannot find justification
from his sins by the law, because the law was not given for us
to seek life by the law. That's not why it was given.
Unregenerate sinners think that's why it was given, but that's
not why it was given. It was given to give us a knowledge
of sin. Look at Romans 5 verse 20. Romans
5 verse 20. We're going to come back here
in a moment, but Romans 5 verse 20. Moreover, the law entered that
the offense might abound." Now he's been talking there in Romans
5 about the offense of Adam. By one man's offense, death reigned
by one. And he says, and then the law
entered that the offense might abound. The law entered So that
whenever the Spirit of God speaks to us in the heart, to His child
in the heart and makes us to hear what the law says, we will
hear in that every aspect of that law that we've broken, we
will hear the awful, awful, the heinous act that was committed
by that one transgression in the garden, whereby we died in
Adam and fell into sin and death by Adam. And all men did. That's why it was given. That's
exactly why it was given. And then our sin becomes exceedingly
sinful to us. So exceedingly sinful to us that
all those things that we thought were righteous, all that law
keeping we thought was righteousness becomes sinful to us. Look at
Romans 7. Romans 7. Romans 7 verse 7. What shall we say then? Is the
law sin? God forbid. No, I had not known
sin, but by the law. For I had not known lust, except
the law said thou shalt not covet. But sin, taking occasion by the
commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For
without the law, sin was dead. He didn't see his sin. This is
Paul speaking. He couldn't see his sin. He had
the law. But what he was coveting was
the riches of God's glory, the riches, the glory that belongs
to Christ. That's what he was coveting.
He wanted the glory of saying he had fulfilled the law. He
wanted the glory of saying he'd kept it. And he was covetous
for all his religious deeds. And Paul was apparently wealthy
too. He was covetous for his riches as well. He was covetous. But see, he was taking the law.
And because he was dead in sin, it was... Remember over in Philippians
3, Paul said, as touching the law, blameless. If you wanted
to look at him outwardly, as far as the law goes, he was a
Pharisee of Pharisees. You wouldn't have found anything
wrong with him as far as the way he was measuring up outwardly. But all of that is what Paul
is referring to here as concupiscence. It was the lust of his flesh.
It was him trying to come to God by his doing rather than
bowing to Christ. And he says, verse 9, for I was
alive without the law once. But when the commandment came,
sin revived and I died. When God made him hear the commandment
and told him what the commandment said, his sin became alive and
then that man he thought was alive died. He died. And the commandment which was
ordained to life that he thought was I found to be unto death,
for sin, taken occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and
by it slew me. And wherefore the law is holy,
and the commandment is holy, and just, and good. Was then
that which is good make death unto me? God forbid. but sin,
that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is
good, that sin by the commandment might become exceedingly sinful."
The death wasn't in the law. The sin wasn't in the law. Nothing
was wrong with the law. The law made him see all the
sin and the death is in me. It's in me. I haven't kept it.
I haven't kept it. Look over at Galatians 3 verse
21. Galatians 3 verse 21. Now you know the situation in
Galatia. There were believers there and men were coming down
and they were doing just exactly what men in our day are doing.
They were saying, we believe on Christ. We believe on Christ.
But you've got to keep the law. You've got to keep the law. And
they were bringing sinners back under the law, trying to do that.
And Paul tells us here, Galatians 3.21, he says, is the law then
against the promises of God? God forbid. For if there had
been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness
should have been by the law. But the scripture hath concluded
all under sin, we just read that, that the promise by faith of
Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. Now be sure
you see that, the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be
given to them that believe in Jesus Christ. But before faith
came, or before Christ came, the faithful one, and from his
faith to the faith he gives to his child, before that came in
our hearts, we were kept under the law. Shut up unto the faith
that should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster
unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after
that faith has come, we're no longer under a schoolmaster.
So we cannot look to our law keeping. If I cannot look to
my person because it's sin, and I can't look to my law keeping
because it was given to give me the knowledge of my sin, and
it shuts my mouth in guilt, then how am I going to be justified
and made righteous and made holy to stand before God in that day? We must have Christ. We must
have Christ. Look at verse 21, Romans 3.21. Hold your place in Galatians. We're going to come back there.
Romans 3.21. But now the righteousness of
God without the law is manifested. It's without our deeds, it's
without our law keeping, and it's without the moral law. The
moral law tells you what is right and holy and good. The moral
law tells you what righteousness is, but it don't tell you where
righteousness is found. It tells you you're a sinner,
but it don't tell you where you can be justified. But the gospel does. The gospel does. That's where
the truth comes. The gospel comes through the
truth. But it is witnessed by the law and the prophets. And
there the law means the first five books that Moses wrote and
all the prophets. It's witnessed by the whole Old
Testament Scriptures. Here's where it's found. Even
the righteousness of God by faith of Jesus Christ. Now if you've
got a Bible that tries in every way possible to take the offense
out of the cross, it probably says by faith in Jesus Christ. If you've got a pen, write of. Of. Is that of God that's right
there before it, should that be in God? No, that's of God. and so should by faith of Jesus
Christ. Even the righteousness of God
by the faith of Jesus Christ. The righteousness of God by the
faithfulness of Jesus Christ is witnessed throughout the whole
Old Testament Scriptures. Whenever the Lord appeared to
those on the road to Emmaus, it says, beginning at Moses,
that's the law, and all the prophets, that's the prophets, he expounded
unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.
From beginning to end, this book's about Christ. It's a hymn book. Romans 1.1. Paul, look there
with me, Romans 1, 1. Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ,
called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God. It's God's gospel, the gospel
of God, which He had promised to for by His prophets in the
Holy Scriptures. And here's what it is concerning
His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. That's the Gospel. That's where
righteousness is found in Christ. It's by the faith of Christ Jesus
who was obedient unto the death of the cross that sinners are
made righteous. Now be sure to get that statement.
It is by the faith of Jesus Christ who was obedient unto the death
of the cross that sinners are made righteous. Look at Romans
5 with me. Romans 5. You see, the greatest faith there
ever was is the faith of Christ. Because when Christ went to that
cross, Christ laid down His life there and He submitted all to
the Father, trusting the Father that once He laid down His life
to raise Him again. He as God raised Himself, but
He's trusting the Father to raise Him. And everything He did as
He walked this earth, He did trusting the Father as a man,
as the servant of God. He's equal with God as God the
Son, but He took upon Him the form of a servant. And He became
obedient even unto the death of the cross. Now watch this,
Romans 5.17. It's by His righteousness. Romans 5.17. He's a picture of
Adam in reverse. Look at verse 17, for if by one
man's offense death reigned by one, much more, they which receive
abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness, see it's
a gift, shall reign in life, where's that righteousness going
to come from? By one, Jesus Christ. Therefore, as by the offense
of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation, that is
all those he represented, Even so, by the righteousness of one,
the righteousness of one, you see that? The righteousness of
one. You wouldn't change that of to in, would you? It's the
righteousness of one. It's the righteousness of Christ.
The free gift came upon all men whom he represented on the justification
of life. For as by one man's disobedience
many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many
be made righteous. Moreover, the law entered that
the offense might abound, that of one offense in the God, but
where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. That as sin
hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through
righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. You
see, every person whom God shall save by His grace shall be made
righteous this one way. This one way. Not by us, we're
sinners. Not by the deeds of our law keeping,
by the obedience of Jesus Christ. By the righteousness of Jesus
Christ. Now look back at our text, Romans
3.22. The righteousness of Christ is
unto all God's elect and it's upon all them that believe. Verse 22. Unto all and upon all
them that believe. His righteousness is unto the
elect of God. It's appointed for them. It's
worked out for them. It's reserved for them. For it
was only for them that Christ died. He said, I lay down my
life for the sheep. And he turned right around to
some other fellows and he said, you do not believe because you are
not my sheep. And His righteousness is upon
all them that believe, because we've been circumcised in the
heart." Look back at Romans 2.29 again. Now He said to us in the
beginning, by something you do. You're not a true Jew. Now He's
dealing with the law. By the law. How are we going
to be made righteous? That's obeying the law. How are
we going to be made righteous? Romans 2.29 says, neither is
that circumcision which is outward in the flesh. Verse 29, circumcision
is that of the heart in the Spirit and not in the letter. It's not
in the letter. Whose praise is not of men, but
of God. You know what outward circumcision
was? Outward circumcision was the first act whereby a newborn
child was brought under the covenant of works and thereby required
to keep all the law of God, under the law of works, under the covenant
of works. That circumcision brought him
into that covenant and now he's required to keep all the works
of that covenant. But circumcision of the heart,
it pictured true circumcision, and circumcision of the heart,
which is in the heart, in the spirit, by the spirit of God,
it's the first act that we experience as newborn babes, whereby we're
made newborn babes. whereby we're brought under the
everlasting covenant of grace and we have to do only what that
covenant of grace requires us to do. And there's only two things. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and love one another. That's it. That's it. That's
it. Why anybody would want... I know
why I turned to Galatians 6. Why anybody would want to want
to bring their little infant and sprinkle him with some water
or dump him down in water and say that's the new covenant form
of circumcision when it is not. I was going to say I have no
idea, but I do have an idea. and why preachers will try to
get a man to go into the baptismal waters and then come out. As
soon as they get him out, they take him from Mount Zion straight
back to Mount Sinai and bring him under the yoke of the law.
I'll tell you why they do it. I won't tell you. God will tell
you. Look at Galatians 6.12. As many as desire to make a fair
show in the flesh, they constrain you to be circumcised. And when
Paul uses the word circumcised, he's using it because that's
the first thing that brought you into that covenant so that
you had to keep all the law. So when he uses circumcision,
you can take any commandment they choose. They usually choose
Sabbath keeping because they want you in a seat, and they
choose tithing because they want your money in the basket. You
can do what the rest of them, you can pretty much do what you
want to, but you've got to do them too. That's pretty much it. Why do they do that? Here you
go, verse 12. Only lest they should suffer
persecution for the cross of Christ. If they preach to believers
being freed from the law by the obedience of Christ, that Christ
is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believes, they're
going to get rejected by their friends. and they're going to
lose their salary, and all that stuff's going to happen to them.
And they don't want that. They'd sooner deny Christ than
deny themselves that nice living and that nice life. But here's the other thing. Neither
they themselves who are circumcised keep the law, but desire to have
you circumcised that they may glory in your flesh. So they
can come up to God and say, look at these wonderful works we did.
Look at what we got them to do. Look at all the things we constrain
these people to do. And God will say, you're nothing
but a worker of iniquity, a worker of iniquity. Verse 14, here's
the truth. But God forbid that I should
glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the
world is crucified unto me and I unto the world. For in Christ
Jesus neither being a Jew availeth anything, neither being under
the law, being in a religious law keeping availeth anything,
nor uncircumcision. Being outside and not even having
the law of God. But here's what matters. a new
creature. That's what he's talking about
in Romans 2, 29. A new creature being created anew. He's holy
within and now he's been brought to see Christ who's the end of
the lawful righteousness where the law's been fulfilled completely,
totally, thoroughly by Christ, by the obedience of one and he's
been made the righteousness of Christ. And so he rests in Him. He rests in Him. And as many,
watch this, as walk according to this rule, Let a man take
the law of ten commandments as his rule of life, I'm going to
take this rule as mine. Faith, which worketh by love,
because if you read Galatians, he'll tell you the law is not
of faith. You can't have both. You can't have this rule and
that rule. You can only have faith or law. You can have grace
or works. You can have your flesh or you
can have Christ doing the work and saving his people. But it
can't be both. Now, as many as walk according
to this rule, peace be on them and mercy, and upon the..." Look
at those last words, "...the Israel of God." You know why?
Because all that walk according to this rule are true Jews. They're
the Israel of God. Whether they be naturally Jewish
or Gentile, they're the Israel of God, God's spiritual people
that He's called out. Alright, go back to the text
now. Let's see this. I just want you to see Christ
did it all. Why is it that all those God
saves are all saved only by the righteousness of Christ through
faith? Verse 23. For all have sinned and come
short of the glory of God. But here's the good news. Justification
from all our sin is by God's grace through Christ paying all
the debts that we owe. Look at verse 24. Being justified
freely by His grace through the redemption that's in Christ Jesus.
Free grace means it's not by my merit, it's not by my work,
it's not by anything done in me. I was dead in trespasses
and in sin. I could do nothing by myself.
God chose whom He would freely by His grace and He gave us to
Christ and He gave Christ to come and redeem us. And redemption
means the payment that the debt of God's people owed that payment,
He came and paid it. He came and paid it all. The
justice of God demanded it and He paid it. Because when God
chose His people and put them in Christ, Christ became our
elder brother. He's the Son of God and we're
children of God. And so by law, He's the near kinsman. And He's
got the lawful right to do it for the elect of God. And so
He came forth and He laid down His life and He made payment
to God's justice, which is eternal death. Eternal death. Not the
death when you take your last breath here. There's a death
after that. It's called the second death.
He died that eternal death on Calvary's tree when he sat there
in the agony being separated from his God, which is what that
eternal death will be. He bore it. And because he's
God, he eternally satisfied that justice. And the scripture says
that when he said it is finished, He was declaring it's done. The
payment's made. And when God raised Him from
the dead, God declared He did it. They're justified. Now what
does that mean if you're justified? What does that mean when it says,
by His one offering He entered into the Holy of Holies having
accomplished eternal redemption for us? What does that mean?
It means we owe nothing else to the justice of God ever again. That's as good a news as you
can give. You can't break God's law. Not a believer. He can't break
it. Now, I'm a sinner. In my flesh, I break it constantly. That's all I do. I never keep
it. I don't ever keep it. But that's not me. Paul said,
that's not me. That's my flesh. And in my flesh
dwells no good thing. But this new man that's laying
hold of Christ and trusting Him to have done it all, he says,
I've done it all. He says, if you're justified,
it means you've never sinned. There's no record of it. And
you cannot, sin can't be laid to you. It can't be laid to your
charge. That means the law of God has
nothing else to say to the believer for all eternity. That's how
fully Christ paid the debt of his people. If you get a hold
of that, if you get a hold of that, or whether, if that gets
a hold of you, God gets a hold of you in the heart and teaches
you that. That will not make you want to run out and sin.
That'll make you. That's the only message that'll
make you want to obey Him and walk after Him. That'll make
you look at that law and love it and say, I delight in it.
I delight in it. All right, now let's skip. I'm going to have to skip some
things and get down here. Look at verse 25. It says, Whom
God set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood. You
know the Old Testament picture of the propitiation. In the Holy
of Holies, there's the Ark of the Covenant, there's the broken
law, there's the mercy seat on top of it, and the high priest
would go in there once a year. with the blood of a lamb that
died in the place of Israel. Not in the place of all the Gentiles.
Israel. That's who He died in the place
of. And He took that lamb in there and He was representing
Israel. And He walked in there and He sprinkled that blood before
that mercy seat seven times. Number of perfection. Seven times. And God said, I will meet with
you from above the mercy seat. So you've got that priest here
and you've got God here and you've got the mercy seat in the middle.
And they're meeting right there in the blood on the mercy seat.
Christ is the High Priest, Christ is the Lamb, Christ is the Mercy
Seat, Christ offered His own blood into the holiest of holies
in the presence of God, and there, in Christ Jesus, God will meet
with His people. That's what it means when it
says, He set Him forth to be a propitiation through faith.
Now this does mean in Christ, faith in His blood. It means
I've come to God believing. His Son accomplished my redemption,
justified me, and God will receive me in His Son. And He will. He
will. And here's why God will accept
us through faith in Christ. The reason He only accepts us
through faith in Christ. Verse 25. Because Christ declared
His righteousness for the remission of sins that are passed through
the forbearance of God. To declare, I say at this time,
His righteousness that He might be just and the justifier of
him which believeth in Jesus. God is just. The whole reason
Christ came was to declare God righteous. God is just. This
is how just He is. God will not impute. He will
not charge sin where sin is not and He will not charge righteousness
where righteousness is not. If you read the law, you'll see
that. That's imputation. If God charges it, it's there.
It's there. And so before He would charge
His Son with sin, He hath made Him sin who knew no sin. He made Him sin for us who knew
no sin. And God was just to charge Him
as guilty and pour out the sentence that his people deserved in our
room instead. And so by doing that he's made
the full payment that justice demanded and now God is just
to show his people mercy and he must show a mercy to remain
just because their sins are paid for. Perfect righteousness is
brought in for them. When that Spirit of God enters
in and He makes us righteous and holy within, and through
that makes us willing to believe on Christ, the reason God charges
us with righteousness and imputes the righteousness of Christ to
us is because He's made us righteous. We're righteous in Christ. We're
righteous in Christ. Christ dwells in us and we dwell
in Him, and we've been made righteous in Christ. He's just. He's righteous. And
everything He does to save His people is righteous. Alright
now, the Spirit of God concludes this whole matter for us and
gives us some objections we might encounter. And He says in verse
27, He tells us here that the principle of faith is the only
principle that's going to exclude boasting. Where's boasting then?
At all what we've said is excluded. By what law? Of works. You know
if you have any part in this work of salvation, you're going
to boast. And I would too. We're going
to say, we did it. I did it for a long time. But, no, it's excluded
by the law of faith. The law of faith. God is faithful.
A triune God entered into a covenant to do this work for his people,
and the whole work's a work of faith. God the Father trusted
the Son to do this work, to manifest his righteousness and justify
his people. In faith, Christ finished the work, trusting the
Father to justify Him as His holy righteous servant by raising
Him from the dead. And He continues to accomplish
the pleasure of the Lord by calling and sending His preachers and
teaching His people because He's faithful. And in faith, the Spirit
of God creates God's elect in newness of life and reveals this
truth in them. The whole work is a work of faith. And when He gives faith to lay
hold of faith, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith
to faith. from Christ who is faithful to
those he gives faith and we believe on him, from then on brethren,
we stop boasting. The whole work is a work of faith.
Everything about it. That principle is the only principle
that's going to exclude boasting. Here's the conclusion that the
Spirit of God gives, verse 28. Therefore we conclude that a
man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. without
the deeds of the law. Is He the God of the Jews only?
Is He not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also. You
know why He's saying that? You know why He's giving you
that statement? Saying it's one God which will justify the circumcision
by faith and uncircumcision through faith? Because the Gentiles don't
even have the law. They didn't even have the law.
at all. Abraham's the one he's going to use for an example in
Romans 4. And Abraham, the Ten Commandments
didn't come to 430 years after Abraham was alive. After God
already told him, you're righteous. What was his rule of life? He
didn't have the Ten Commandments. He walked by faith and did work
by love. That's what it was. The Spirit
answers in objection then, and I wanted to get to this, that's
why I'm rushing. Romans 3.31. Do we then make void the law
through faith? God forbid. Yea, we establish
the law through faith. Through faith we establish it.
The Spirit of God's not undoing everything He's just told us
here. He's not bringing us to this point now and then turning
us back to the law and saying now you have to establish the
law. Not what He's doing. For what the law could not do,
and that it was weak through the flesh, God sent in his own
Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned
sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled
in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."
Christ fulfilled it. Christ fulfilled it. Establish
means to make it stand. And Isaiah 42, 21 says, the Lord
is well pleased for his righteousness sake, he will magnify the law,
and he will make it honorable. By the obedience of one shall
many be made righteous. Concerning the law, Christ said,
I didn't come to destroy it, I came to fulfill it. I have
to use this illustration, but if something, if that glass right
there is filled full, can you put anything else in it? It's
full. That's what Christ did. He fulfilled
the law for His people so that the law has nothing else to say
to them ever again. And in fact, those who are in
the Spirit of God are not in the flesh, we're in the Spirit.
So that God doesn't even regard us in the flesh. Now, He'll chasten
His child when we turn, but His chastening hand is to turn us
from turning from Christ. When we turn from Christ, He
turns us back to Christ. If we turn to the law, He's going
to turn us back to Christ. If we turn to our works, He's
going to turn us back to Christ. So then, whenever He gives us
this faith, through the Gospel, by His grace, He casts down every
imagination, every high thing that exalts itself against the
knowledge of God, and He brings into captivity our every thought
to the obedience of Christ. And we submit to Him in faith,
and we say, I haven't made void in the law. I've established
it. Look at Him and you'll see how
much I have, how fully I have. However full Christ established
it, that's how full I've established it. Through faith. Through faith. Now that sounds like something
that's an important enough subject that we ought to be hearing preached
every time we attend a church service. Shouldn't we? We should. And the very God who we're going
to have to stand before has charged this earthen vessel, this nobody
with no power and no ability whatsoever in front of you to
preach this message every time I stand in front of you. This
is the message of the book. This is not a part of the message
of the gospel. This is the gospel. This is the
gospel on every page of the book. And I'm determined, as long as
God will enable me, and it's his goodwill for me to preach,
to know nothing among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I guarantee you this will make
good fathers and good mothers. This will make good sons and
good daughters. This will make good workers and good employees
and good employers. This right here will do the job
that no morality preacher will do. This job, this word right
here is what we're sent to declare. This is it. And this is who you
gotta have. So listen to me now. You who
are sitting here without Christ, turn from your flesh, turn from
your law keeping, and lay hold of Christ. lay hold of Christ. Paul said, I want to be found
in Him, not having my own righteousness which is after the law, but the
righteousness which is by the faith of Christ. That's what
I want to be found in, His faithfulness. I pray God will bless it. Amen.