If you would open your Bibles
to the book of Romans, Romans chapter 3. Romans chapter 3. Let me start off this morning
asking everybody two questions. Now it's real important that
you're honest when you answer these two questions. Okay? The first question is, have you
ever disobeyed your parents? Ever. Have they ever told you
something and you just didn't listen to them? Or maybe you
just didn't do exactly what they said. Okay? Now I'm assuming
everybody in here is like me and they've disobeyed their parents.
The second question is, have you ever been punished for disobeying
your parents? If you're like me, the answer
to that question is yes, yes, yes, yes, a lot of times. Now,
it's important that you can say yes to those two questions because
if you can, then what I'm gonna say this morning is really important
and you need to listen. So look at verse 12 of Romans
3. It says, they are all gone out
of the way. They are together become unprofitable. And this is the important part
I want to focus on. There is none that doeth good. No, not one. It says here that
none, nobody does good. Not even one. So we've already
admitted that we disobeyed our parents, we've disobeyed and
we've been punished before. So we all admit that that's us.
But it's not enough to say that sometimes we disobey or sometimes
we act out. It says here that we don't ever
do good. This started a long time ago. As all of us have heard this
story of Adam in the garden. God created man. He named the
first man Adam, and Adam was made perfect. But Adam sinned. He disobeyed God. And every man
and woman since Adam has been born into sin. Now what is sin? A simple definition for sin is
disobeying God. So everyone in here has been
in trouble before. Some of us, like me, more than
others. When I was a boy, I got in trouble
a lot. I got so many spankings. I was
so bad that one time when I was getting a spanking, I did something
bad and had to get another spanking right after the spanking I just
got. Every time my parents caught me disobeying, I would get in
trouble. They punished me for it. But
can I tell you guys a secret? Now my parents are here, but
they're not listening, so listen. They didn't always catch me. Sometimes I disobeyed them and
did stuff and they didn't even know about it. Now I don't say
that to brag or to say that you should do that, but I say it
because every single time we disobey, every time we get caught,
Now, we may not realize it, but God sees every single thing that
we do. And he also knows and sees every
single thing that we think in our minds. Now, that should scare
us because I disobey a lot and I do things I shouldn't do a
lot. There are times, even today, as an adult, Often we like to
think, and I like to think, that I don't do as many bad things.
But the reality is that it's just that my parents aren't around
to catch me doing everything. But I do things now, even as
an adult, that I shouldn't do. Things that aren't nice or aren't
honest. And I don't feel bad sometimes
when I don't get caught. One day, all of our sins. One day, all of my sins will
be accounted for. I'm going to have to stand up
and I'm going to have to answer for every single sin that I did. Every time I disobeyed, every
time I lied, every time I did something I shouldn't have done. So, we all sin. What's our reaction
when we're asked about our sin? What do we do when we get caught
or someone calls us out for sinning? What do we do when we know a
punishment is coming? Well, one thing we do is we hope
that someone steps in. There's a story that I don't
remember because I was little. I was probably four or five,
and I was at my grandparents' house with my family. And I was
sitting at the table, and two seats over was my dad. Well,
I did something I shouldn't have done. So my dad stood up, and
he's going to walk between the next person and me, and he's
going to grab me and give me a spanking. Well, my grandmother
was sitting on the other side of the table. And everybody knew
I did something wrong. But the minute my dad stood up,
my grandmother stood up. And she was a little old lady.
And she took off running around that table and jumped in front
of my dad and got in between us and said, he'll be all right.
He doesn't need it. And she saved me. How many times
I wish she'd have been there for me and other times to save
me from getting a spanking. What are other things that we
do when we get in trouble? When we know a punishment's coming,
I'm going to give you a list of things that I've done before.
Now maybe some of you all have done these too. But if I do something
wrong and my parents or somebody says you're in trouble, here's
some of the things I do. Sometimes, I apologize. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't
mean it, I didn't mean it, I didn't mean to do it. Maybe that'll
help. Sometimes, I cry. Just start crying and maybe they'll
be nice to me or take it easy. Sometimes, I beg. No, no, no,
no, please, please, please, I don't want a spanking, please, please,
please, no, no, no, no, no. Sometimes, I try to bargain. But I won't
do it again. If you don't give me a spanking
this time, I won't do it again. You can give me two next time,
but just not this time. Sometimes we play dumb. I didn't
know that I wasn't supposed to do it. Nobody told me that I
wasn't supposed to lie. And then sometimes we lie about
it. I didn't do it. It wasn't me. And then sometimes even worse,
it's a combination of those. We get in trouble and my mom
or dad would say, you go to your room, you're getting a spanking.
Well, let's first off go with the lie. Well, I didn't do it,
it wasn't me. And then they say, well, you're the only one in
here. Okay, so that won't work. So now let's play dumb. But I
didn't know I wasn't supposed to touch that. Well, I've told
you five times you're not supposed to touch that. Okay, that one
didn't work. Well, let's go to apologize. Well, I'm sorry, I'm
sorry. And then we'll just cry and see
if that helps. We do all of these things after we get caught sinning,
we just sin more. When we get caught sinning and
we're going to get a punishment, what's our reaction? Let's lie. Let's do another sin to try to
double down so we don't get in trouble. Now why do we do all
these reactions, okay? Because I'm willing to bet most
of us have tried most of these. We do them because we want to
lessen the punishment or not get punished. Why do we keep
doing it? Because at some point, one of
them has worked for us. At one point, we convinced our
parents or someone that we didn't know any better. Or we convinced
them that we were really sorry, so we didn't get the punishment.
So, kids, let me warn you about something. These things, these
strategies, these reactions to the things you do, they might
work on your mom or your dad. They might work on your teacher.
They might work more often on your grandparents. But none of
these will work with God. There are millions of people
right now who have a plan that when they go before God, that
they are going to try one of these strategies, if not all
of them. They're going to come before
God and they're going to answer for their sins. And they're going
to try to lie. I didn't do any of those things
you said. They're going to play dumb. I didn't know I wasn't
supposed to do that. They're going to bargain. But
I did all these other good things instead of that. They're going
to beg. Please, please, please don't give that punishment to
me. They're going to apologize. I'm sorry for doing it. And they're
going to cry. But none of it works with God. The Word tells us that men and
women will say these things. But God's reaction to them will
be, I never knew you. Depart from me. If none of our
ways will work, if we know we're going to get a punishment, and
it's going to be a doozy, it's going to be a bad punishment.
If we know that we can't do anything about it, what should we do?
Turn over to Luke chapter 12. Luke chapter 12. So I'll repeat. If we know that
none of our excuses and none of our ways is going to get us
out of trouble when we stand before God, what should we do? Luke chapter 12 verse 31 says,
But rather seek ye the kingdom of God, and all these things
shall be added unto you. Fear not, little flock, for it
is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. In 1
John 2, it says, my little children, these things write I unto you,
that you sin not. And if any man sin, we have an
advocate with the father, Jesus Christ the righteous. So it says
here, God says, my children, don't sin. But then it says,
But if you sin, you have an advocate in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now
what does advocate mean? It says the Lord Jesus Christ
is our advocate. A definition of that word says
a father who defends his child who is unable to defend himself. If you've sinned and you're in
trouble, you go to the Lord and ask for his help. Now, the second
part of this, the first is that we've all sinned and we need
a punishment. Here is where the good news of salvation in the
Lord Jesus Christ comes in. We're sinners, we're guilty,
we must be punished, and someone has to save us. Someone has to
come to take our punishment for us. The Lord says, I am the good
shepherd. The good shepherd giveth his
life for the sheep. Turn over a couple pages to Luke
18. Luke 18 verse 19 says, And Jesus said unto him, Why
callest thou me good? None is good. Which we've heard
that. Nobody's good. None is good save
one. That is God. So there is somebody
who's good. It's God. And I love how it uses
the word save one in here. That's why before the foundation
of the world, that God sent his son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to
take our place, to take his children's place. He lived perfectly without
sinning. Then he paid the price for all
of our sins. When he died on the cross, he
was a willing substitute. Now turn one page to Luke 19. Luke 19 and verse 10. Why did the Lord Jesus Christ
come? Verse 10 says, For the Son of
Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. Lost is
another term here for someone who sinned, who can't find their
own way. And it says the Son of Man, the
Lord Jesus Christ, has come to seek. He's going to find them
and he's going to save them. Now, the third part in this,
of this story, is who gets the credit for doing the saving?
Do we get the credit? Is somebody going to tell us
that's a really good job messing up? No, they're not going to
give us credit. Do your parents get credit for
catching you when you get in trouble? No, they don't want
to catch you. Well, it's not they don't want
to catch you, they don't want you to sin, they don't want you to disobey.
No, the only person who gets the credit, gets any credit at
all, is the person who takes the punishment. John 16 says,
be of good cheer, I have overcome the world. Who is going to be
the most thankful for someone who takes their punishment? Who
is going to look very differently at the person who takes their
place? The one who was saved, that's who's going to look differently.
As the songwriter wrote, thank you, Lord, for giving to me thy
great salvation, so rich and free. So in just a second, I'm
going to tell us a story. But first, let me emphasize what's
coming in it. When it comes to salvation, only
one person is worthy of praise because he did it all. The Lord
Jesus Christ chose us. He came for us. He died for us. He's risen from the grave and
sits on the throne victorious, and he gets all the credit and
all the glory. Now, everybody listen. I'm going
to tell you a story that I heard when I was a little kid, and
I love it. It's one of, if not my favorite
stories that I've ever heard. There was a school a long time
ago out west. And this was in a time where
all the kids in the area went to one school in one room. So they'd have a room like this
and everybody from the little kindergartner up to the biggest
kid in the school all went to the same school and they learned
in the same room. Well this school had a group
of really, really rough kids. They were tough. And they would
run off all the teachers. They couldn't keep a teacher
because these kids were so tough. So finally one day they get to
school and there's a new teacher in town. And this teacher starts
off by saying, this is your school kids, so I want you all to make
all the rules and the punishments. The kids think that's a great
idea. So slowly, one at a time, they raise their hand and start
offering some rules. One of the kids raises his hand
and says, I think that a rule should be you can't be late for
school. OK, well, what's the punishment for that? And he says,
how about you have to stay after school if you're late? OK, that's
a rule. And another kid raises their
hand and says, I think that you shouldn't talk back to the teacher.
OK, what's the punishment for that one? You have to do extra
homework. OK, that's a rule. So they went
around making rules. And after they got almost done,
there was a big kid in the back, Jimmy. And Jimmy raised his hand. And everybody called him Big
Jimmy. And Jimmy raised his hand, and he said, we need to make
a rule about stealing lunches. We've got a problem around here
of people taking lunches, and we need a rule. The teacher says,
OK, that's a rule. Well, what's the punishment going
to be for that rule? It's going to be 10 lashes. The teacher says, Jimmy, that's
a really tough punishment for that rule. And Jimmy says, well,
we got a problem with it, and it ain't right. Somebody shouldn't
take your lunch. He says, OK, that's a rule. Now
a lash, OK, is the teacher would take a stick. And they would
give you 10 hits or spankings with the stick in front of all
the other kids. That was about as bad a punishment as there
could be, and it hurt. So everything was going really
good in the school. The kids were following their
own rules, and when something happened, somebody would get
punished, but everybody knew what was coming. Until one day, Big Jimmy
walked into the teacher and said, Teacher, somebody took my lunch. Somebody has eaten all of my
lunch. The teacher said, OK, well, somebody's
got to be punished for that. So all the kids came in, and
they all gathered around. And the teacher stood up in front.
And the teacher said, kids, somebody broke Jimmy's rule. Somebody
ate Jimmy's lunch. And somebody is going to be punished
for it. So all the kids were sitting
quiet with their heads down. After a couple minutes, finally,
there was a little boy in the front of the room, the littlest
boy in the whole school. little Billy and little Billy
slowly raised his hand and the teacher looked over at him and
he said teacher he said I ate Jimmy's lunch and the teacher
said Billy you got to come up here and get your punishment
now Billy was a poor kid and he was wearing his overalls and
he had real dingy dirty overalls and so he stood up and he took
his jacket off you could see his ribs Jimmy didn't have enough
to eat But the teacher said, somebody's got to pay. So he
said, Billy, I want you to lean over the desk, get your 10 lashes,
get your punishment. The teacher raised that stick
back, and a loud, deep voice from the back of the room stood
up and said, don't you hit that boy. And it was Jimmy. Jimmy stood up, and he started
walking to the front of the classroom. And the teacher said, Jimmy,
somebody has to be punished. Your rule was broken. Your lunch
was eaten. Somebody's got to be punished.
And Jimmy kept walking, and he took off his jacket. And he said,
teacher, you give me Billy's punishment. So the teacher said,
OK. So Jimmy stood up in front of
the whole class, leaned over that desk, and he got 10 lashes
in front of everybody. Well, the rest of the day went
on. And when school ended, it was time to go home. But little
Billy, he wasn't interested in going home. Little Billy was
looking around that room for Jimmy. And when he found him,
he ran to him and he gave him a hug. And he said, Jimmy, thanks
for taking my whoopings for me. That is what the Lord Jesus Christ
did for his children. We broke his law. We disobeyed Him. We spit in
His face. And He, instead of taking His
punishment out on us, in His mercy, He came, and He took us,
and He held us close, and He took the punishment that we deserved
on Him. We deserved death, but He stood
in our place and died for us so that we don't have to. And
when we look at our Lord, he's the one who we give the praise
to. And he's the one that we give
the glory to. And because he stood in our place
and he took our punishment, we love him for it. You kids, when
you see us, adults come to this place and we have to go. I know you don't feel good. I
know you don't want to come, but you have to come. That's why
we come, because we know that we deserve death. We deserve
his wrath. And he's taken us, and he's holding
us close in his hand, in his arms, in his bosom. And he said,
don't hit that one. That one's mine. And he took
the punishment for us. And we come here because we love
Him and we want to hear about Him and we want to hear our pastor
stand up or whoever's here talk about the wonderful grace, the
wonderful love, and the wonderful mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ. Okay? All right.