Turn to Romans chapter 3. Our subject this morning is justified
by faith without the deeds of the law, without my personal
keeping of the law. Only a guilty person, only a
person who knows what the guilt of sin is, will really appreciate
the doctrine of justification. You will really get something
out of it. I have studied it. It has really strengthened me,
helped me, And if we are able to get a hold of this, it really
sets you free. You really understand something
of liberty. That's what Paul told the Galatians. Stand fast in the Lord. They're
in Galatians chapter 5. Stand fast in the liberty wherewith
Christ has made us free. He has set us free. But the only
way a guilty sinner can be set free in God's court, because
in God's court, there's no backdoor deals going on. Ain't none of
that going on. No, in God's court, the only
way to be set free is to be completely justified and cleared of all
the charges. All charges. And when we've been
cleared of all charges, He can say, let him go. Let him go. He's justified. There's no charge
against me, against you, in Christ. Now, Paul has been building up
to this since chapter 1. You know, he spoke of the righteousness
being revealed in the gospel. It's the power of God. And there
is a righteousness revealed in the gospel. And then from that
point on, he started showing us in the Romans how that there
are none good, no, not one. Paul has set forth in chapter
1 through the first part of chapter 3 that every human being is guilty
before God. All humanity is without excuse
for breaking God's law. There's no excuse. And in verses
10-18 of chapter 3, Paul gives 14 indictments against man, the
human race. And he starts with what is written
in the Old Testament. It's nothing new. This is written
in the Old Testament. Psalm 14, 1-3. Psalm 53, 1-3. Tells us there's none good. No,
not one. This is not something new. It
tells us in the Old Testament You can go all the way back to
the beginning. In Genesis, God looked down from heaven and there
was none that understood. There's none that seeketh after
God. None. Not even Noah. That's why it
says, Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. God made himself
known to Noah. He revealed himself to Noah,
and he made the gospel plain to Noah, and Noah understood
it and believed it. Noah believed God like Enoch
believed God, like Abel believed God, and like you and I believe
God. Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord, just like you and I have. God has saved us by His
grace. So Paul, he uses the Scripture
to bring these indictments. Paul starts out in verse 10,
he says, there's none good, no, not one. And he ends with this,
no fear of God before their eyes. There's none good, no, not one.
And it just goes downhill from there to the point where there's
no fear of God, absolutely no fear of God before their eyes. And then he says here in verse
19, Now, we know this is something we know. This is knowledge. This is not just knowledge of
some facts, but we know this in such a way that it's life-changing.
We know that what thing 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." He's telling us here how
far-reaching the law of God is. It's to everyone. Every mouth,
he says, every mouth may be stopped. The law spoken of here is the
moral law of God that's written on the heart of every person
that comes into this world. Jew and Gentile, and both are
bound by this law. They are bound to observe it
and obey it, but none have. None have. That rich young ruler
said, all these I've kept from my youth up. No, you haven't. In fact, you haven't kept one
of them. And the Lord proved it by telling
him to go sell all that he had and give it to the poor, and
come follow Me." And he went away sorrowful because he was
very rich. I'll tell you something else
he was very much of, covetous. He couldn't let it go. He couldn't
let it go. The law said, Thou shalt not
covet. And he didn't realize that he was breaking the law.
And to offend in one point of the law, You've broken the whole
law of God. God's law is one law. If you
offend Him one point, I mean one infraction, it may just be
what you and I would consider a small infraction. With God,
there's never a small infraction. But we would consider something
to be a small infraction. You've broke the whole law of
God. The whole law. Because the law of God is a spiritual
law. And you've broken it. Everyone is under the spiritual
reach of the law. Remember the Lord spoke to those
Pharisees. He said, you have heard that it's been written
in old times, thou shalt not commit adultery. And He said,
but I say, to look on a woman, to lust after her, is to commit
adultery already. You see, that's the part they
didn't get. They thought they could look all they want. As
long as I don't do anything, I'm all right. No, you're not. You have broken the whole law
of God. You have just committed adultery. You have just lusted. And those Pharisees said, we
haven't done this. Oh yes, you have. To hate your brother, to
hate your brother without a cause." Who's my brother? Everyone. Everyone, either in Christ or
in Adam. Everyone's my brother. Those Pharisees thought they
kept the law, they got away with it. No, the Lord came and He
said the law was spiritual. Paul said that the law was spiritual,
I'm carnal, sold under sin. It's what I am. The law pronounced
every person guilty and stops every mouth. And we have no excuse,
Paul says here. We're without excuse. The holy
law of God exposes us for who we are. Therefore, he says, because
of this, by the deeds of the law, there shall no flesh that
is man be justified in his sight. Look over in Psalm 143. Psalm 143, Hear my prayer, O
Lord, give ear to my supplications. In Thy faithfulness answer me,
and in Thy righteousness, and enter not into judgment with
Thy servant. For in Thy sight shall no man
living be justified. There is not a just man on the
earth that does good and sins not. That's what the Scripture
says. Therefore, by the deeds of the law, there shall no man
be justified in God's sight. For by the law is the knowledge
of sin." The law exposes our sin, our sinfulness. The law
says, you broke this, you did this. The law condemns us. And this being the case, the
law can't save us. The law cannot give me what it
demands. It can't give me what it demands.
The law of God cannot justify a criminal. It can't justify
a criminal. And it can't make us righteous
before God. The only thing the law of God can do is condemn
me. That's all it can do. And that's
what Paul is driving home here. In that Roman congregation in
that church in Rome, there were Jews as well as Gentiles. And there were some coming in
trying to get them to keep the law. You can read over in Galatians
where they were trying to get the Galatians to keep the law
of Moses in circumcision. And you can read that in chapter
5 in Galatians. And if that's so, Paul said,
you're bound to keep the whole law, and if that's so, Christ
died in vain. If righteousness can be achieved
by my keeping the law, the death of Jesus Christ is totally useless. It's totally useless. But now
listen, all is not lost here. Paul says, by the deeds, by my
keeping the law, no flesh can be justified in God's sight because
no flesh can do it, but all is not lost. Listen. In verse 21,
"...but now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested."
There is a righteousness. There is a righteousness, and
this righteousness is of God, because Jesus Christ is God. He is God in the flesh. There's
a righteousness of God without the law and is manifested. I
don't know that there is a more important statement in the Word
of God than what is being said right here in verse 21. There
is a righteousness. God demands righteousness. God
demands perfection. And God has provided that perfection
that He demands. He has provided it Himself in
the person of His Son. God has provided it. In the gospel, we are told of
a righteousness by which we can be saved. We can be justified. And we're not talking here about
God's personal holiness. We're talking about a righteousness
that is given to us, that was produced for us, first of all,
by the grace of God. He didn't owe it to us. The wages
of sin is death. That's all God owes and He's
going to pay that up. He's going to pay that up. The
soul that sinneth shall surely die. He'll see to it. It's appointed
unto me and wants to die. But this righteousness, which
is by the grace of God through the work of Christ, is without
our obedience to the law. But now the righteousness of
God without the law, it doesn't mean the law was totally ignored
and set aside. It's saying this, without my
obedience to it because I couldn't keep it anyway. I couldn't keep
it. It's not without the perfect
obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, it's His obedience, but
not mine. Not mine. And it's manifested, he says
here. It's manifested. How? In the gospel. In the gospel. This is the reason that the gospel
is the power of God unto salvation, for therein is the righteousness
of God revealed." How you and I can be just before God, how
God can justify us. And he said it's revealed, listen,
it's revealed in Moses and the prophets. It's nothing new. Moses and all the prophets testified
of this righteousness. They testified of it. Look over
in Isaiah 53. They had this, they read this,
and this righteousness, this salvation was testified in the
Old Testament. Look in Isaiah 53, listen to
verse 11. Let me read verse 10 with it.
"...Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him. He hath put him to
grief, when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin. He shall see his seed, he shall
prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in
his hand. He shall see the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied.
By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many..." Here's
how. "...he shall bear their iniquities." Somebody's got to pay for it.
Somebody's got to pay the penalty. And He paid our penalty. He paid
our sin debt. He shall bear their iniquities.
Look over in Jeremiah chapter 23. They had these scriptures. In Jeremiah 23, let me... in
the verse... 5 and 6. Behold, the days come, saith
the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous branch, and
a king shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and
justice in the earth. In his days Judah shall be saved,
and Israel shall dwell safely. And this is His name whereby
He shall be called, the Lord our righteousness." The Lord
our righteousness. Now I want you to look at one
other portion of Scripture, Psalm 85. In Psalm 85, look in verse 10. Let me make sure I've got it right
here. Psalm 85, verse 10. Mercy and truth are met together. Righteousness and peace have
kissed each other. When did this happen and where
did it happen? At the cross. At the cross. At the cross, mercy
and truth met together. At the cross of Jesus Christ,
righteousness and peace kissed each other. Truth shall spring
out of the earth, and righteousness shall look down from heaven.
Yea, the Lord shall give that which is good, and our land shall
yield her increase. Righteousness shall go before
Him, and shall set us in the way of His steps." Moses, the Law and the Prophets,
testify, they witness this righteousness that's in Christ. He says in
verse 22, "...even the righteousness of God, that is, the righteousness
provided by God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all
and upon all them that believe, for there is no difference." This perfect righteousness. Paul
is telling us that it's provided by God, it's not imputed to us
by anything that we do, it is imputed to us through faith in
the Lord Jesus Christ. This righteousness is provided,
listen, first of all, by the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. His faithfulness, His obedience. And it's imputed to us, it's
charged to us, it's laid to our account through the faith. through
the faith that God gives us. Faith is a gift of God. Faith
doesn't make up any of this righteousness, it just receives it. Just like
this glass here receives water. And before you and I can have
any part of this righteousness, we have to be made one in Christ.
And that is by the operation of the Holy Spirit in the new
birth. And when that happens, when that new birth happens,
that's when you believe. Dead people don't believe. The
living believe. The living believe. And this righteousness of God
is unto all and upon all that believe. For there's no difference. There's no difference. It's upon
all and to all that believe. Every nation, every tongue, there's
no difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament
believer. There's no difference between the Jew that believes
and the Gentile that believes. There's no difference between
a man that believes and a woman that believes. With God, we're
one. We're one. There's no difference. Don't you wish we could see that?
There's no difference. For all have sinned, this is
what God sees, all have sinned and come short of the glory of
God. All have sinned and missed the mark of perfection. God demands perfection. You don't
want Him to demand anything less. If He did, He wouldn't be God. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. All are equally dead in trespasses
and sins. All are equally lost. There's
no such thing as barely lost, or little lost, or greatly lost. No, lost is lost. Lost is lost. For all have sinned and come
short of the glory of God. Being justified, verse 24, being
justified freely by His grace through the redemption that's
in Christ Jesus. The blessing here he's speaking of is justification. And it's completely opposite
of condemnation. There's a whole host in hell
right now that's under the condemnation of God. And there are some sitting here
who believe God. You've been cleared of all charges.
You know in your heart you deserve just what they got. But you know
that Jesus Christ took what you deserved. And you are justified
in the person, in the righteousness, in the doing and dying of Jesus
Christ. And the cause of this blessing
He gives us here in verse 24 is the free grace of God. As Carl read back in the study
there, out of John 15, Christ said, you haven't chosen me,
I've chosen you. I've chosen you. Every child
of God knows that. They know that. God chose us,
Christ redeemed us, the Holy Spirit called us, regenerated
us, the whole work is of God. It's of God. And the very source
of this blessing is the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. He has
redeemed us from our sins. He paid the price, He bought
us back. He bought us from the hands of justice. Justice owned
us. Justice had a legal claim on
us. And he paid the price that justice
demanded. Obedience and death. And he says here in verse 25,
"...whom God has sent forth." This is of God. God did this. God did this. The whole scheme
of salvation is of God. That's why Jonah said, "...salvation
is of the Lord." whom God has set forth, that
is, God has manifested Him, God has clearly, clearly, openly
made this known. God has set Him forth to be a
propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness,
His righteous obedience for the remission of sins. Not my obedience,
for the forgiveness of my sins. God can forgive me of my sins
through the righteous obedience of Jesus Christ, not only in
His life, but also in His death." Also in His death. "...for the remission of sins
that are past..." What's he talking about, the sins that are past?
He's talking about the Old Testament saints. That's who he's talking
about, the Old Testament saints. They believed the gospel, they
believed the promises of God, or you can go over in Hebrews
11 and read that. They embraced those promises.
They hugged up to those promises. And through the forbearance of
God, God looking forward to the cross, Christ is said to be the
Lamb of God slain before the foundation of the world. Nathan
came to David, and he exposed his sin with Bathsheba. He said,
thou art the man. David said, whoever did this
ought to die. Well, David, you did it. You did it and you ought
to die. But he says, you're not going
to die. God's put away your sin. Looking all the way to Calvary.
God put away the sin of all his people from the first one to
the last one at the cross. at the cross. The word here, propitiation,
is a reference to the mercy seat. Remember, that's where the blood
was sprinkled, at the mercy seat. That's where God met sinners,
is at the mercy seat. That's where the blood was sprinkled,
at the mercy seat, the blood of atonement. Christ is a propitiation
to God for our sins. Christ satisfied God. God, listen, God satisfied God. Get a hold of that. God satisfied
God. He is the propitiation to God
for our sins. He's reconciled us to God. We
are reconciled to the law of God. It's at peace with us. It's at peace with us. God's
law is not against us in Christ. He says here, "...to declare,
I say at this time His righteousness..." Make it loud and clear. Make
it loud and clear. "...by whose righteousness we
are saved." His righteousness. to proclaim His righteousness
or to manifest that perfect righteousness provided by Christ for every
believer. To declare, I say, at this time,
His righteousness. God saves sinners in such a way
that His justice, His truth, are not compromised. They're
not compromised. They're not violated. In fact,
they're glorified. It is said of Christ that he
magnified the law and made it honorable. And he did it for
us. He did it on our behalf. Where's
boasting then? The Jews boasted about their
keeping the law, having the law and keeping, they bragged about
that. They boasted about it. He says it's excluded. Through
what law? How is it excluded? Well, it
ain't by the law of works, because that gives you room for boasting.
Through the law of faith, the principle of faith. Faith just believes God. You believe God. Abraham believed
God. And it was accounted to him for
righteousness, imputed to him for righteousness. There's no room for boasting
because all have sinned. All boasting is cast out. The principle of faith destroys
bragging. Paul said that he gloried in
the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. That was his glory. Our boasting
is in the cross of Christ. It's in Christ crucified. That's
our boasting. It's in our Lord. Here's the
conclusion. The conclusion is this, we are
justified by faith without the works of the law. All that was
said is to bring it to this conclusion. We are justified before God.
Now, a person who's never experienced the guilt of sin, this means
nothing. This is boring. This is boring to a person who's
not guilty. But if you're guilty, this, to
me, is exciting. You know, you know you're guilty.
You walk into court, you've done, say you've shot somebody, you've
killed them, you've murdered them, purposely, like David did
Uriah. He purposely did that. You walk
into court, and the penalty is death. And you walk into court,
and you find out you're justified, you're cleared. That's not even
on the record, it's gone. And it's gone because Jesus Christ
put it away. He actually died under the penalty
of the law. That was against me, against
every one of his people. That really happened. Sit around
and think about it. I call myself a believer. You
call yourself a believer. When you really sit down and
think about it, a man was executed A man was executed around 2,000
years ago, the God-man. But yet a man was executed so
that I might live and that I might go free. He died and was buried
that I might go free. And the law can't go beyond the
grave. That's right. You know, if a man is guilty
of something here and the law puts him to death, when he dies,
that's the end. You're not going to dig him back
up. You're not going to dig him back up and say, well, we found
some more stuff out on you. Well, it's too late. It's already
dead. You ain't going to dig him back
up. Christ died. He put my sins away. They're
gone. I'm justified in the righteous
obedience and death of Jesus Christ, and his blood cleanses
me from all unrighteousness. His blood answers for my sins."
Get a hold of that. And then he says here, and I'll
close, in verse 29, is He the God of
the Jews only? They claimed He was. The Jews
claimed He was their God, and the Gentiles had no part in this.
They were just all going to die and perish. But no, he's saying
this. He's not the God of the Jews
only, but also Gentiles. Is there not just one Creator?
There's only one God and there's only one Creator. He said, yes, He's the God of
the Gentiles also. He's our God too. Seeing it is
one God, We shall justify the circumcision by faith and uncircumcision
through faith." That's just a way of saying it's all by faith.
It's just by faith. Justification is by faith in
Christ. Do we make void the law of God through faith? Do we just
toss it aside? No. He said we actually fulfill
it. In Jesus Christ, and this is
real, in Jesus Christ, I have fulfilled God's law. In my representative,
in my substitute, I have fulfilled God's law. It can't demand any
more of me. Ooh, isn't that good? Isn't that
good? What if you committed a great
crime and the police were out looking for you? The law was
out looking for you. You wouldn't be sitting there very comfortable,
would you? You hear a siren take off. Why is it when you hear
a siren, first thing you do is look at your speedometer? Because
you think you know you're guilty. That's the first thing you do.
I don't care if you're going under the speed limit, you look
at your speedometer. But I tell you this, when that
is taken away, when that is taken away, and you're not under the
law as a rule of life no more, you're not under that law, you're
under the grace of God who fulfilled the law for you. and provided
you with that righteousness he demands. You're free now. You're free. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them who are in Christ Jesus. I want to close it on that note.
That's a good note to close on.