My text this morning will come
out of Romans chapter 3, but if you would, first turn with
me to Romans chapter 1. Romans chapter 1. Here in the first chapter of
Romans, the Apostle Paul exposes the evil, iniquity, and unbelief
of the Gentile nation. In verse 21, he says of them,
when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God. In other words,
when God revealed Himself to them by way of conscience, by
way of creation, they saw His glory and His power, couldn't
deny it, But they did not believe nor glorify Him as God. I've been often asked how do
people in foreign lands that have never heard the gospel,
how can they be held responsible for not believing in God? By just looking at the stars
in the sky at night. The sun and the day, all the
provisions that God makes through creation is enough to send every
man and woman to hell without excuse. Paul goes on to say in verse
21, that neither were they thankful, but became vain in their imaginations,
and their foolish heart was darkened. They worshiped everything but
God. Verse 22, professing themselves
to be wise, they became fools, and they changed the glory of
the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible
man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things. Three times in Romans chapter
1, three different times, Paul says that God gave them up, or
God gave them over. First, verse 24, God gave them
up to uncleanness. He gave them up to do what they
would. He let them have their own way. That's one of the worst things
that could ever happen to a man or woman, for God just to give
up and let them have their own way. All the uncleanness and
wickedness of their evil imaginations, God just let them go. God just
gave them up to it. And I'm telling you, it's the
worst thing that can happen to a man or woman. It's for God
to give them up and let them have their own way. They served
the creature. They served creation. They served
themselves more than the God, the Creator that created them.
And men and women are still serving and worshiping themselves. You
might ask, how so? Well, the average churchgoer
will attribute their salvation to what they do. They'll tell you that it has
to do with a free will decision that they made. God gave them
up. God's given them up. Unless He
intervenes in their life by divine intervention, they're goners.
God gave them up secondly into vile affections, unnatural affections
in verse 26. God gave them up to a reprobate,
a degenerate mind, verse 28. A mind that was completely void. and contrary to anything good,
decent, and holy. God just gave them up. My, isn't
that such solemn words? Those are such solemn words.
He gave them up to uncleanness. He gave them up to vile affections.
He gave them over to a reprobate mind. And I'm telling you what
a picture this is of this wicked world and its nations in which
we live in today. What is it that rules and reigns
today in the hearts of most folks? It's idolatry, dishonesty, unnatural
affections, corruption in every area of life. And I'm telling
you, this is a description we have of this fallen world of
humanity in which we live. And beginning in verse 29, we
see that nothing has changed since Paul wrote this over 2,000
years ago. Verse 29, being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication,
wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, debate,
deceit, malignity, whispers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful,
proud, bolsters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection,
implacable, which means non-forgiving, unmerciful, who knowing the judgment
of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death,
not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.
And as I said, we have a pretty accurate description here in
Romans chapter 1 of this fallen, unbelieving, God-hating world
in which we live. Then, in Romans chapter 2, the
apostle deals with a whole other group of lost sinners. He exposes
the hypocrisy of this religious world in which he lived. In the religious world in which
he lived and in the religious world in which we live. It hasn't
changed any. Not much has changed in that
area either. Religion in Paul's day and modern
day religion are both complete shams, they're frauds and ones
of pretense. People who claim to believe in
God have a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.
And you ask, well, how so? Well, men and women who profess
religion and godliness, the fear of God and the pure worship of
Him, they deny it all by their actions. They deny the efficacy
or the effectiveness of God in salvation and claiming that man
has to help God to save him. God needs your cooperation in
the matter. Man has to lend his will to God's
will in order to accomplish redemption. That's denying the power of God. God is able to save sinners to
the uttermost. That's a strong word. He's able
to save sinners to the uttermost that come unto God by Jesus Christ,
seeing that He ever liveth to make intercession for them. And
if Christ is interceding for me, if Christ is interceding
for you, child of God, as your mediator with God, then everything's
going to be alright. He died to make my salvation
certain. I hear folks say today that Christ
died to make salvation possible. No sir, that's not true. He died
to make salvation certain. And Christ died to make salvation
certain for His elect people. And if I am one of God's chosen,
I will be saved. You can write it down. You can
write it down. And save to the uttermost. And
that word uttermost means fully, completely, entirely, forevermore. Now, notice how Paul exposes
these religious frauds here in Romans chapter 2 verse 16. He says, in the day when God
shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to
my gospel. You know, no man, no woman can
hide anything from God. All things are naked and open
before Him. Verse 17, Behold, thou art called
a Jew, and resteth in the law, and maketh thy boast of God.
and knowest His will, and approvest the things that are more excellent
being instructed out of the law, and are confident that thou thyself
art a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness,
an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, which hast
the form of knowledge, and of the truth in the law. Thou therefore
which teacheth another teachest not thyself, Thou that preachest
a man should not steal, do you steal? Thou that sayest a man
should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? Thou that
abhorrest idols, do you commit sacrilege? Thou that makest thy
boast of the law through breaking the law, dishonest thou God? For the name of God is blasphemed
among you, the Gentiles through you, as it is written. For circumcision
verily profiteth if thou keep the law, but if thou be a breaker
of the law, circumcision is made uncircumcision. Now what Paul
is saying there is this. If you're gonna trust in an outward
act of circumcision, and not keep the rest of the law perfectly,
your act of circumcision doesn't profit you a thing. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. If you're
going to endeavor, now listen to me, this is so important.
If you're going to endeavor to be saved by the keeping of the
law, then you're going to have to keep the whole law. Every
point of it. And you're going to have to keep
it perfectly. You can't just take a good stab at it and hope
it comes out OK. You've got to keep the law perfectly,
all of it. That's why Paul said, tell me
ye that desire to be under the law, do you not hear the law?
Don't you hear what the law is saying? For whosoever shall keep
the whole law and yet offend in one point is guilty of the
whole law. So, in Romans chapter 1, I'm
trying to set the foundation here for our text. But in Romans
chapter 1, Paul shows us the evil and the wickedness of the
Gentile nations. Their wickedness was open and
public. It was in your face. Right up
front. And then in Romans chapter two,
we see the evil of the religious Jews, which was in secret and
hidden. They committed their evil under
the disguise of religion. The sin of the Gentiles was outward
and up front. The Jews' iniquity was of the
heart and mind as well as indeed, and that's pretty much religion
today. But notice that Paul closes chapter
2 by exposing the false claims of religion with these words.
He says, He is not a Jew, which is one outwardly. He is a true
Jew, which is one inwardly. A man is not a believer. A woman is not a believer. They're
not a child of God who is one outwardly in profession. One
is a Christian, a child of God, who is one inwardly. You see,
this is a matter of the heart. You remember what the Lord Jesus
said? He said, you believe that man shouldn't commit adultery,
but I'm telling you that if you look at a woman in lust, you've
committed adultery. It's a matter of the heart. Our
Lord said, thou shalt not murder. But if you hate a brother in
your heart without a cause, you've committed murder. It's out of
the heart proceeds these evil things. And that's what Paul
is saying in verse 29. Circumcision is of the heart.
It's not of the letter of the law. The pagan is wicked and
outwardly and makes no claim of God. And then the religious
are wicked inwardly and profess holiness all the while hiding
their sins under a profession of religion and their claim to
believe the Bible. And Paul brings it all down to
this. In Romans chapter 3, and speaking
of both the Jews and the Gentiles, he says this, there is no difference. No difference. I don't care if
you go to church every time the doors open. If you don't have
a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ in truth
and in spirit according to this Word, you're no different than
the biggest drunk in town on the corner of the street that
has never graced the door of a church. There's no difference
in the Jew or the Gentile. No difference in religious people
and unbelievers. There's no difference. Why? Because
they're all under sin. Look at Romans chapter 3 verse
10. As it is written, there is none
righteous. How many? None. 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. In Psalm chapter 14 it says,
the board looked down from heaven to see if there was any that
did understand and seek God. What did God find? They're all
gone aside, every single one of them. They are all together
become filthy. There's none that doeth good,
no, not one. In Genesis chapter 6 verse 5,
in the days of Noah, God saw that the wickedness of man was
great in the earth and that every imagination Every imagination
of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that
he had made man upon the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.
And the Lord said, I'll destroy man whom I have created from
the face of the earth. Well, my preacher, it sounds
to me like you don't believe there's any hope for any of us.
Oh, no, no. I don't believe that at all.
Verse 8 of Genesis 6 says, But Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. That's the only hope that there
is, is that God might show us grace and mercy in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Our only hope of redemption is
that we might find grace in the eyes of the Lord. Have you found
grace in the eyes of the Lord? Here in the third chapter of
Romans, Paul talks about the law of God. He talks about how
the law rendered every man and woman guilty before Him. Look at verse 19. Now we know that what the law
says It saith to them who are under the law that every mouth
may be stopped and all the world become guilty before God. If
you have a marginal Bible, mine says subject to the judgment
of God. All the world becomes subject
to the judgment of God. This is talking about both Jew
and Gentile. This is talking about the pagan
and the religious. This is talking about every mouth
being stopped. Isn't that what your Bible says?
All the world, every mouth may be stopped, all the world become
guilty. This is talking about all men and women being guilty
before God. Paul says, now we know. There's
no doubt that this is true. God's people know it so. Now
we know that what the law sayeth. Well, what does the law say?
Well, the law says that we should love the Lord, God with all our
heart, mind, soul, and strength. Do you love God with all your
heart? All your mind, all your strength. The law says, Thou
shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. Well, I like my neighbor, he's
a pretty good guy, but I don't love him near as much as I love
me. Let's just be honest. The law says, As you would have
men do unto you, do even unto them. The law says, Thou shalt
have no other god before me. The law says, Thou shalt not
covet, Thou shalt not lie, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou
shalt not steal, Thou shalt not kill. And as I said a moment
ago, a lot of these things are issues of the heart. Here's one,
the law says, Be ye holy, for I am holy. Now we know what the
law says. To whom does the law say this?
The law says this to all who are under the law. That's what
it says. Who's under the law? Let's answer
this question. All who are under the authority
of God, every single one of us, every man and woman on God's
green earth. Every man and woman who's under
God's sky, everyone that has ever been born, lived, died,
has been under God's law. Every Jew, every Gentile, every
pagan, every religious man and woman, young, old, male, female,
that's ever taken a breath is under the law of God. What does
the law say to all? The law says that you've got
to be perfect to be accepted. You can't offend in one point
or you're guilty of all of it. There are no degrees of perfect. You can't be almost perfect.
Christ said, Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father
in heaven is perfect. The law says the soul that sinneth,
it shall die. The law says that the wages of
sin is death. You've got to keep the whole
law perfectly now, all of it. The laws and the commandments
of God are unchanging. They're unbending. They're unrelenting. They're inflexible. In other
words, in order to be accepted of God, You cannot think evil,
you cannot speak evil, and you cannot do evil. You can't sin
at all. What then is the conclusion of
the matter? Look at verse 20. Therefore,
by the deeds of the law, there shall no flesh, no flesh be justified
in his sight. For by the law is the knowledge
of sin. Paul said, no flesh. Now what
does that mean? That means no flesh. It means
no flesh. There's no difference between
us now. By the deeds, keeping of the law, no flesh shall be
justified in God's sight. Now what is it to be justified
before God? I'll make it real simple for
you. It's to be accepted of God. It means to be approved of God. But you've got to be perfect
to be approved and accepted of God. It means to be a child of
God. It means that God acknowledges
you as not guilty. Not just as if you've never sinned,
but you've never sinned. Therefore, by nature, by birth,
by choice, by practice, we cannot be justified. Because all have
sinned. That's three. Right back to that
again. The law was never given to save. What? That's right. The law was given to reveal to
us our sin. Did you hear that last part of
verse 20 there? For by the law is the knowledge
of sin. In Romans chapter 7, verse 7,
Paul said, I would not have known sin, but by the law. For I had
not known lust, except the law had said, thou shalt not covet.
You see, the law reveals our sin. The law declares us guilty. The law shuts our mouths. I can
remember being caught in a lie by my parents, and I knew I was
caught. I just shut my mouth. I knew
I was guilty. They knew I was guilty. Wasn't
no need to lie anymore about it. That's what the law does
to sinners. It shuts their mouths. It shuts
all our mouths. All those that come to God through
Christ. The law reveals our helplessness. Thank God for His law. It shows
me that I don't have the ability to keep His commandments. The
law brings some to Christ. The law is our schoolmaster to
bring us to Christ. Well, again I ask, is there any
hope? Is there any way to salvation?
Is there any way to God? Is there a way of holiness for
you and I? If I can't have a righteousness
based on the law because of my sin, is there a righteousness
that can be obtained other than by the law? That's a very good question.
Yes, there is. And that's the Gospel. Verse
21. But now, now, right now, the
righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being
witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness
of God. How do I get that? Which is by
faith of Jesus Christ. It's by the faith of Jesus Christ. It's not by your faith. It's
by His faith. It's not by your faithfulness
to Him. It's by His faithfulness to you. It's by the faith of Jesus Christ
unto all and upon all the world. No. Them that believe. Isn't
that what it says? For there is no difference. So what does Paul mean when he
says there is no difference? There's no difference between
the people that God saves but the difference that God makes.
No difference. There's no difference as to a
man or woman's need of the gospel. We all need it. Look at verse
23. For all have sinned and come
short of the glory of God. How many? All of us. All come short of glorifying
God. All come short of being glorified by God. All come short
of God's commandments. All come short of God's requirements. All come short of justification.
All come short of acceptance with God. All come short of holiness. All come short of righteousness. All come short of being glorified
with God. There is no difference. No difference
in the way that sinners are saved. Look at verse 24. Being justified
freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ
Jesus. It pleased God, friends, by the
foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. You know,
preachers today tell folks to believe, but I wish they'd tell
them what and who to believe. Believe! Believe! The redemptive
work of Christ on behalf of His people is two-fold. Now listen
to me, I won't keep you much longer. His obedience, Christ's
obedience before God as a man, satisfied the Law. The Lord Jesus
Christ was the only man that ever lived that kept the Law
of God perfectly. His obedience before God as a
man satisfied the law. The law is unchanging. Christ
didn't go around the law. He didn't find a loophole here
or He didn't slip in some other way. He didn't compromise the
law. He didn't make it easier to keep.
Our Lord Jesus kept the law in every thought, every word, and
every deed. He did it perfectly. He knew
no sin. He had no sin. He did no sin. His obedience was perfect. Look over. You're close by. Look
over. You may not even have to turn the page. Romans chapter
4 verse 6. Look at this. Even as David also describeth
the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness
without works, saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are
forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to
whom the Lord will not impute sin. Now do you know what that
word imputed means? It means reckoned or changed
to us as if it were our own. God charged, God reckoned Christ's
righteousness to us as though it was ours. Matter of fact,
it is ours. It is ours. The perfect righteousness
of God. My iniquities have been Not just
forgiven. I mean, that's true. And thank
God it's true. But sin wasn't just swept under
a rug. Christ paid for it. There was
a cost. It's free to us, but it cost
God His Son. It cost Christ His life. And
not only is my sin gone, but I had the very righteousness
of Christ. Secondly, remember I told you
it was twofold. Christ went to the cross. And
on that cross is our sin offering. He satisfied God's law and he
honored God's justice. The law says, do this and live. God's justice says, because you
haven't done this, you're gonna die. Jesus Christ came and he
honored the law and he satisfied God's justice. That's the best
news this sinner ever heard. He went to the cross, and there
he died the death. He paid the debt of sin's wages
for all whom God gave him before the foundation of the world.
All their sin. Past, present, future. Well, brother, you preach that
and people will sin. No, no, no. God's people hate their sin.
Look at verse 25. For God has set forth His Son,
Jesus Christ, to be a propitiation. Now that's not an easy word to
say and maybe even harder to understand. Do you know what
propitiation is? The actual Greek word for propitiation
means a mercy seat. Mercy seat. Propitiation is the
mercy seat in the tabernacle, which was over the Ark of the
Covenant where the tables of stone, the Ten Commandments were
that had been broken. And the mercy seat was over the
broken law. And once a year that high priest
would come in and he would sprinkle the blood on the mercy seat,
the blood of atonement is what it was called. And once a year
in the Holy of Holies, God said, I'll dwell between the cherubims
on the mercy seat. That is where I'll meet you on
the mercy seat. That's where God meets His people. God would meet and commune with
those who believe because of the blood on the mercy seat. And it's the blood of Christ
that is shed to be our propitiation, our appeasement with God. So what do we preach? It's pretty
obvious what we should preach. What do we declare to sinners?
We declare first of all that there's no difference between
any of us. None. We all need the same message
of salvation. We all need the same gospel of
God's mercy and grace in Christ. What is the good news for sinners?
Verse 26, to declare, that's what preaching is, to declare,
I say at this time, His righteousness. That's it in a nutshell. We preach
His righteousness. Ours is filthy rags. Why would
we talk about our righteousness? Why would we dare stand before
God and say, Lord, haven't we, haven't we, haven't we, when
our righteousness is filthy rags? We declare His righteousness
that He might be just. He's the just one, the only just
one. And He's the justifier of him
which believeth in Jesus. He's both just and justifier. So, look at verse 27. Where's boasting then? It's excluded. By what law? Of works? No. The law of faith. The law of
believing. Therefore we conclude that a
man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. Is He the
God of the Jews only? Nope. Is He not also God of the
Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also. And then He says again, for there
is no difference. No difference, friends, except
the difference that God makes. Oh, I love the question that's
asked in 1 Corinthians 4 verse 7. Whom maketh thee to differ
from another? A child of God knows. Knows by
experience. Knows by divine revelation. God
makes the difference. God makes the difference. I didn't
make any difference. No difference between any of
us. We would not come to Christ that we might have life. We cannot
come. We don't have the ability. We
don't have the will to come. God made us willing in the day
of His power. That's the difference. That's
who made the difference. Paul goes on to ask, what hast
thou that you did not receive? Isn't that another good question?
What do any of us have that we didn't receive from God? Absolutely
nothing. Salvation is of the Lord. Salvation is the gift of God. Now, if thou didst receive it,
why dost thou glory as if thou hast not received it? You see,
every child of God glories in their Savior, the Lord Jesus
Christ. Why? Because the Lord hath done
great things for us, great things, whereof we are glad. We quote
this verse all the time. I'm going to quote it to you
again. For by grace are you saved. And that's not of yourselves.
Oh, I wish folks could get a hold of that. Grace is not of ourselves,
it's of God. That not of yourselves, it's
the gift of God. You can't purchase it. You can't
earn it. You don't deserve it. You can't
merit it. It's God's gift. To His people,
not of works lest any man should boast. I'm convinced Paul wrote
that because he knew we would. Folks do it all the time. Look
what we're doing for Jesus. Not of works lest any man should
boast. For we are His workmanship. Perfect. God don't create any junk, does
He? I've heard that said. That's true. No. Not created
in Christ Jesus unto good works which God hath before ordained
that we should walk in them. Oh, may God get all the glory
and all the honor in the matter of the salvation of sinners.
There's no difference between us but the difference that God
makes. May the Lord add His blessings
to His glorious Word. Brother Tommy Day, would you
dismiss us in prayer please? Heavenly Father, what can we
say other than thank you? Thank you, God.