as the effectual agent, as the
effectual power, as the effectual cause of justification and redemption. You might ask yourself why these
things are important. Why is it that Paul would write
these things in such detail? And how is it that we find in
so many places, as we'll get over into chapter 6 after a while
and start to see some teaching there, what is it that we see
sometimes that seems contradictory? For example, where James would
say, faith without works is dead. You show me your works and I'll
see your faith. and other places like we looked
at some of us last night in chapter 6 where it talks about at the
end in verse 21 and 22, but now that you've been set free from
sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads
to sanctification and in its end eternal life. There's a lot
of small phrases that seem to contradict Paul's strict teaching
of justification by faith alone. And we'll get into those, and
we'll understand those. But in order to have a good understanding
of what else there is to learn, we need to have a grand understanding
of what the gospel is, and most importantly, what the gospel
does. So, let's look at the Word of
the Lord tonight, verse 21, and let's go down through verse 26,
and we'll finish up this little section of Scripture here, and
part our ways down to verse 27 for next week. But now the righteousness
of God has been manifested apart from the law. although the Law
and the Prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God
through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there
is no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the
glory of God, and are justified by His grace as a gift through
the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as
a propitiation by His blood, to be received by faith. This
was to show God's righteousness, because in His divine forbearance
He had passed over former sins. It was to show His righteousness
at the present time so that He might be just and the justifier
of the one who has faith in Jesus. So let's take this piece by piece
and let's ask ourselves what each of these phrases means and
what the implications are for this teaching. First, keep in
mind that Paul has already established several times over that justification
is by faith. That the gospel, the good news
of God is that by faith we can be saved. However, we need to recognize
that the language of Paul, not only here but in other places,
he actually says that faith is not the agent of salvation, but
faith is the means through which we grasp and receive salvation. It is the means through which
we apply salvation to our life. But salvation in itself, and
I will use the term salvation and redemption and justification
interchangeably, if I may, Salvation in itself is indeed by the grace
of God. God, in His unmerited mercy,
in His unmerited favor, through His unmerited love, saves His
people. That is the base, bottom, foundation,
brick and mortar, footer, reality of the gospel. That God, in His
gracious love and mercy, saves His people. The Old Testament
saints did not understand the entirety of what God was doing.
They did not understand the totality of what God would do to satisfy
His judgment. They didn't comprehend the full
vision of the mystery, as Paul would say, the mystery of Christ
that's now been revealed to us. They did not have the explicit
details of Jesus being God incarnate and coming and living a holy
life and dying an atoning death. as a substitute. They didn't
grasp the entirety of that, but it was only by faith alone in
the fact and in the work of God's mercy that one would be justified. And it is only by God's grace
that one is justified. And so when we come to this text
today, we revisit it to some degree. because it is all of
this in context that Paul is talking about. He's not saying,
this is true, then this is true, then this is true, then this
is true. We see this four, and four, and four, and four, and
four, and it gives an explanation even explicitly by saying, this
was to show. This was to show. And so as we
start, let us look at verse 24. And it's in the middle of a sentence
and it says, are justified. What is it? For all have sinned
and fallen short of the glory of God and are justified by the
grace of God that He gifts to them. Let me just put it that
way. The grace of God is a gift. Now many people would like to
argue, well the grace of God is a gift that we must accept.
The grace of God is a gift that we must reach out and take. The
grace of God is a gift that is offered, but it's not necessarily
effectual in itself. Friends, the Bible says that
the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. It doesn't say
that the gospel is the offer of God for salvation. It does
not teach us that it is the offer of God to salvation. It says
it is the power of God unto salvation. so therefore we are not ashamed
of it. Unbelief, in some sense, is being ashamed of the gospel
of Christ. Unbelief, or having a desire to see a humanistic
center to the gospel, a humanistic center of salvation, a free will,
if I can go ahead and punt that back in there real quick, is
a is a manipulative thing that humanity likes to do because
we, in our nature, in our flesh, in our fallenness, love to be
God. We love to be in control, and
we want to not have God as our merciful, gracious Savior, but
we want to have ourselves as our Savior. And so, we've fallen
short of the glory of God, and all who are justified are justified
by His grace as a gift. Through, how does that work?
See, this is what Paul is trying to teach us. How is the gift
of God's grace justifying to the sinner? Now let's talk about
justification for just a moment. Justification is a term that
we pull out of the English New Testament. It is an idea that
we infer out of the language of redemption and salvation. But what is being justified? What does it really mean? In
a nutshell, it means that someone who stands before a judge is
right in the eyes of the judge. That everything that they are
and everything that they're done by the standard of the law They
are just. They are just. Justification
is sometimes understood as an excuse for doing something which
might otherwise seem contrary to the law. For example, we see
in law enforcement where they shoot people sometimes in altercations. And they have a legal term in
law enforcement circles and in the judicial system that that
is a justified shooting. And it's always an investigation.
And they look at the facts, and they look at the circumstances,
and they watch the tape, and they listen to the testimonies of the witnesses
and of the officer and those around, and they say, they give
a ruling, okay, according to the law, because it's illegal
just to shoot people, it's illegal to murder, but it is justified
to take a life in certain circumstances. So that when we look at those
types of things and understanding justification, that's not the
point of being justified before God. God is not looking at our
sin and saying, okay, where's the excuse? Why were you able
to do these things? I'll help you find the reason
why you can do them. As a matter of fact, Paul's already
written, even in the same chapter, he says that all mouths will
be stopped He says in verse 19, Now we know that whatever the
law says, it speak to those who are under the law, so that every
mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable
to God. For by the works of the law no human being will be justified
in his sight, since through the law comes the knowledge of sin.
So what Paul is teaching there is that even though the law is
given, even though we can try our very best to follow it, we
are sinners at heart, therefore we have already fallen. apart from the glory of God,
we've already been declared guilty, even before the law was given,
we were guilty before God, so that there is no defense on our
account. We cannot stand before God and say, oh, but God, you
don't understand why I said what I said, because that guy's meanie.
or this guy's being ugly, or I had to put him in his place,
or I'm just telling it like it is, as we like to say, or I'm
just speaking truth. No, we're not speaking truth
when we're ridiculously annoying. We're not speaking truth when
we're being a horse's patootie. We're not speaking truth when
we're being a jerk. We are just sinning. And when
we sin, we sin against the holiness of God, we sin against the judge
of all the cosmos, we sin against the Creator who owns all things,
we sin against His holiness and His righteousness and the establishment
of His own glory, and we spit in the face of this very being,
even the smallest disgruntled frown. that comes from a disdained
attitude is worthy of eternal damnation forever and ever and
ever because God is the just judge of all the universe and
we are guilty before Him. So what in the world is Paul
talking about then when he says that you are justified not by
the works of the law, that means you're not justified by being
obedient, but you're justified by grace, by the mercy of God. Now let's ask ourselves this
question. Is it right that God in His holiness say that James
Tippens is righteous when I'm not? No, it's not. It's wrong
of God, it's evil of God to declare me innocent, to declare me holy
when I'm not holy. It's evil of God to declare any
of you holy if you're not holy. It's evil of God to declare you
just, and in another search, turn the law on its head and
say, it doesn't matter that you broke the law, it doesn't matter
that you're guilty, it doesn't matter that you deserve the punishment
of my holiness, it doesn't matter that you deserve my wrath, I'm
just gonna let it all go. That's wrong. It's wrong. So
Paul, because that is wrong, goes on to describe why God did
what he did, and why it's not evil for God to do what he did,
because God has satisfied some things according to the law,
according to his own holy requirements. So, we're justified by His grace
as a gift. through the redemption that is
in Christ Jesus. I want you to see that for a
moment. What has happened here? See, redemption by definition
means that someone has been purchased. If you have a coupon and you
take that coupon and it says if you buy one thing of potatoes,
you get another one for free. Without that coupon, if you have
two potatoes on the cart, then you pay for two potato bags.
With the coupon, that coupon, the manufacturer, whoever printed
that coupon, gives to the grocer the money that's required in
their teal to pay for the potatoes that you take home for free.
That's called redemption. Same thing with like greenback
stamps in the day. Remember that? I mean, man, I have licked a
ton of those. I hope they weren't poisonous. and other things where
you redeem something to get something else. So by the definition of
redemption, Jesus Christ and the spilling of His blood, look
at that, through the redemption of Jesus Christ, it talks about
who God put forward as propitiation by His blood, through the redemption
of, excuse me, through the shedding of blood of Jesus Christ, we
have been justified as a gift by God because Christ suffered. Now, there are people who would
like to argue with you, and this is my a-ha pray to the Lord above
that this is not the first time you've ever heard this, but when
you think about what the gospel is and what Jesus has done, and
you start hearing the term justification and propitiation and redemption
and all these things, a lot of times people in the church just
sort of tune out. They just sort of just tune out.
And okay, we hear big words, we're not doing big words, I'm
not studying to be an elder, and I'm not going to seminary,
I'm just gonna pretend like I didn't hear that, and we're gonna go
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and we're just gonna ignore it. Don't
ignore it, because they're words written in our English Bible.
They're words that are written there, and they're important
to understand. When we think about Jesus dying,
and we think about the fact that redemption came through the blood
of Christ, we must ask ourselves, What did that do? How is it that
Jesus died in our place? So when we think of penal substitutionary
atonement, that term, that phrase, actually means a punishment that was substituted and made
right. Can you hear that again? A punishment that was substituted
and made right. So, penal substitutionary atonement
is what happened with Jesus Christ. That's what happened. Jesus took
the penalty. He took the curse. He took the
consequence. You've all heard the term penal
system, right? That's being incarcerated or
locked away. You've understood that that means
that someone is paying for their crime. And if the judge sentences
you for a year and you don't serve a year, you've not served
your time. But once you've served your time,
you satisfy the law, you satisfy the judgment, and you satisfy
your guilt. And even though you've given
everything and you've given your time in jail or in prison, when
you get out, you're still guilty of what you've done, but you've
paid for it. Now, we cannot pay for the sins
that we commit against God. We cannot pay for the sinner
that we are in the context of God's righteousness. We cannot
satisfy, listen to this, God's sentence of death. Did you hear
that? No human being can satisfy the
sentence of death, for the wages of sin is death, but the free
gift of God is eternal life. Now people would argue with that
and say, wait a minute, we're going to suffer in hell. You're
going to suffer hell, which is the judgment of God. But at no
time, if you stay in there for 400 trillion years, if you stay
in the wrath of God, will the smallest lie ever be atoned for. I want you to hear that again. If you were to stay in hell for
400 trillion years, the first lie you ever told when you were
six months old, or ten months old, or however old you were,
when your mama said, what's in your mouth? And you went, nothing.
because the cookie was behind your back. You could not pay
for the sin of lying in 400 trillion years of wrath. Why? Because look at the measure.
Think about this for a second. Y'all pay close attention. Kids
in the back, y'all pay close attention to what I'm saying.
You can never, ever pay God for the affront that our sin is to
Him. Let me put that another way.
God is infinitely holy. So to violate His law, it takes
an infinite punishment. So this idea of purgatory, this
idea of working off your sins, it's an impossibility. So not
only can you not be justified in the sight of God by obedience,
neither can you be justified in the sight of God through wrath. That's why judgment is eternal.
That's why hell is forever. That's why there is only one
way that God could redeem us, and that is by becoming a man
Himself, and obeying the law Himself, and dying Himself. You see that? And that's what Paul is about
to teach us about what Jesus did. Let's look at it. for all
have sinned for the glory of God, verse 23, and are justified
by His grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ
Jesus, verse 24. And then verse 25, whom, and
that pronoun there is what? It's pointing to what? Who? Jesus.
Jesus whom God put forward. Now let me just break that down
for a second. What the Bible is teaching us
right here is that God crucified Jesus. You want to hear that
again? Is that the Father crucified
the Son. It's not just here, it's in many
places, but this is one of the most explicit realities of what
God has done. The Scripture would say that
it pleased the Lord to crush Him. Him meaning Jesus Christ,
Messiah. Why would God put forth Christ
as propitiation? I heard Richard Dawkins lecture
one time and say, what kind of a maniacal, evil God would kill
His only Son for the sake of wicked people? The very God that became man. That's who. The glory of it all. is that God put Christ forward. He put Him forward. He gave Him. He offered Him. He pushed Him
over on the mantle of sacrifice. He orchestrated, established,
decreed, made happen, everything, even in the will of the hearts
of men, that they would speak and do that which He preordained
for them to do, in order that the Christ might be crucified
on the cross, so that His justice may be displayed. so that His
righteousness might be displayed." Now you might not see it, and
maybe you do, but I want you to, before you see it, I want
you to understand the emphatic problem, if Christ had not died
as a replacement for us. That would mean that God would
be wicked. Why? Because what happens to the saints
of the Old Testament? People like to say, well, they
know they never knew about Jesus, so they just got put in a holding
tank, like a fish tank of souls, until Jesus could go. And they
go, ah, see, that's ridiculous. Scripture doesn't teach that.
Some people say that they went into limbo or to soul sleep.
and they were awoken when Jesus, quote, went to hell. He did not
go to hell. Hell does not exist yet. Hell is the eternal wrath of
God that begins on the Day of Judgment. Where are the souls
of the dead who are reprobate? In the presence of God, waiting
for Him to cast them into the lake of fire. See, we have so
destroyed the simple teaching of Scripture by myth and legend
that we have our own ideas of what the afterlife is even like. People say, well, you know, God's
not going to be in hell. He created, He's going to throw
you in it. Jesus will throw you into hell and stand there and
bring His judgment upon you for the rest of all of eternity.
You see. And the only way to escape it
is what? To be redeemed by Jesus Christ.
And the only way that's effectual is that God put Jesus on the
cross. And what did He put Him on the
cross for? Look at this. Whom God put forward as a propitiation
by His blood. Now let's think about that for
a second. That word is not in the English
vernacular. Outside of Scripture, I have
never seen it used in any piece of literature that I've read. I've never seen the term used
in a court of law. I've never seen the term used
in legal briefings. But I have seen it used a lot
in Jewish writings and in Scripture, related to the offering of the
Lamb. Propitiation by definition means
this. Pay attention. That God's right, He's just,
and looking at sinners and saying they deserve judgment. Okay?
That's a true statement. He must have His judgment, His
vengeance, His wrath satisfied. Somebody has to suffer for the
crimes of sin. Otherwise, the law is not satisfied. Otherwise, the judgment of God
is not satisfied. Otherwise, no one can have redemption. God cannot say, you're just forgiven.
He must have His wrath satisfied. Propitiation means that the wrath
of God is satisfied. So ask yourself this question.
How is God's wrath satisfied in regard to my sin? The answer
is, because God killed Jesus. Because God killed His Son. Because
God put Christ forth as a sacrifice to be the propitiation, the satisfaction
of His justice, of His wrath, of His vengeance. If we are not comprehending this
very deeply, it's okay. Because on the surface, all we
need to know is that God is just because Jesus has paid for the
sins of sinners. And people will tell you all
over the world in liberal places. When I say liberal, I'm not talking
anything about politics. I'm talking about liberal in
thought who would subject the Word of God to mere literature
rather than being authoritative. And people will tell us, pastors
will tell us, teachers will tell us, is that whether Jesus died
or not, God is loving and He will forgive people. That's a
hogwash. That's baloney. That's cheap
baloney. It's nasty. It's a terrible tragedy
for someone to say that God can forgive sinners without satisfying
His judgment. The judgment of God is satisfied
in the person of Jesus Christ. And it says, who put forward
Christ as propitiation, as a propitiation by His blood. Because without
blood there is no, what? Forgiveness of sins. Without
something dying, there is no remission of sins. There's no
expiation. There's no propitiation. There's
nothing that can take away the penalty of sin. There's nothing
that can justify a sinner unless something dies. The picture of
what God was to do before the foundations of the world through
Jesus Christ the Son in order to save sinners is depicted even
in Genesis 3 and the fall of man, where Eve and Adam both
disobeyed God willfully and rebelliously, and they ate of the trees in
the center of the garden, and then they were ashamed because
their eyes were opened, and they saw that they were naked. And
so they went into the garden and they affixed themselves clothing
to cover their nakedness because they were ashamed. And God came
into the garden and He gave His judgment that they were guilty
and that they would die, just as He promised that they would.
And as a matter of fact, they had already died spiritually. And so because of that, then
God took an animal, we do not know which one, and He killed
the animal, and He took the covering of the animal, the skin of the
animal, and He covered Adam, and He covered Eve's nakedness,
which represents their ashamedness, their guilt. And at that time then, He decreed
what would happen in the world as it was currently created,
that things would die. that men would die, and that
there would be a way out of this death, and it would be through
the seed of the woman who would crush the head of the serpent.
This is the foreshadowing of Jesus Christ. This is the first
gospel presentation that's given in the entire Word of God. It's
the first time the gospel of Jesus Christ was ever preached
to a human ear when Jesus Himself spoke to Adam and told him that
the seed of the woman would come. and He would crush the head of
the serpent. He would pay for the sins of His people. Without the shedding of blood,
there is no remission of sins. Without the shed blood of Jesus
Christ, God's wrath is not satisfied. But you might say, what do I
do with this? How am I to know if the blood
of Jesus is applied to me? Isn't there something I must
do? Isn't there some place I must go? Isn't there some way of living
that I must live that I might atone for my sin? Isn't there
something that's happening? Isn't there something that I
can give to God? What can we give to God that
would satisfy His judgment that Christ did not do? Nothing. What could we say to God that
would satisfy His judgment over the fact that the holy man God,
His Son, died in our place? What could satisfy Him? Nothing. It is to be received by faith.
It is not to be received by faith in works. It is not to be received
by faith in fruit. It is not to be received by faith
in faith. It is not to be received in any
other way except by faith alone in the truth that God has satisfied
His judgment. He has no longer listened. He's
no longer angry. He's no longer wrathful. He no
longer looks at us through the eyes of a judge, but He looks
at us through the eyes of a father, and He sees His children whom
He had pity upon, and before the world ever began, purposed
to save them through the blood of His Son Jesus Christ, who
would become like them, and obey where they could not obey, and
would take their place in death, and pay for them what they could
not pay." This is the pure An unadulterated
gospel. This is the purest reality of
everything that's ever been taught in the entirety of the Scripture.
There is no hidden message here. There is nothing convoluted.
There is nothing for us to sit and wonder what really is meant
by Paul. It's very clear that God is satisfied
with His people, that there is no debt that they owe, and that
there is no sin that will cause them to perish, for Christ has
satisfied Him and His judgment. Therefore, we are free. We're
free. We're free. And no amount of
good, and no amount of sin, no amount of doubt, no amount of
faith can separate us from the love of God. Nothing will please
God any more than He's already pleased with us. Even when we
sin, as John would say, what does he say in 1 John? He says
that these things are written that you may not sin, but if
you sin, you have an advocate with the Father. Who is it? Jesus
Christ the righteous, who is our propitiation. Sometimes I think the God of
Christianity in so many of our minds is more akin to the God
of Islam. A vengeful God that's just waiting to smite us, but
if we stay the course, if we stay humble, if we stay contrite,
then maybe He'll escape. We'll escape His gaze. We've
read John's Apocalypse. Nothing escapes the gaze of God. The blood of Christ atoned for
His people, and by faith we believe. By faith we receive. Faith is
not Anything but believing that God has done everything. Why this? Look at this next part
of verse 25. God did this in order to show
His righteousness. Now, I gave a prelude to this
last week, I think, if I can remember what I said. That God's
righteousness is displayed in the killing of Jesus Christ,
and God's righteousness is displayed in the salvation of His people.
Both. God's righteousness is displayed
because, look, in His divine forbearance. What is forbearance? We who have student loans and
owe Uncle Sam money because we borrowed it to go to school,
we know what forbearance is. Forbearance is, you owe this
money and payment is due, just not yet. It's coming and the
interest is counting, but just not right now. Matter of fact,
when you graduate college, you get six months forbearance and
then it depends on how much you make as to how much you pay.
You'd be shocked to know that most people go into forbearance
for decades because they cannot pay their student loans because
it is so exorbitant in our culture. But forbearance does not wipe
away the guilt. Forbearance does not wipe away
the debt. It just delays the payment. And so when God forgave
Adam and Eve, and He did, who paid for their sins? See, if
Christ had not been the point of creation, if Jesus had not
been the point of it all to begin with, then God is just reacting
to what man does, and that's not true. Isaiah 46 would teach
us very clearly God does not react to men. God purposes the
steps of men and decrees them. So, if God were to forgive Adam,
and God were to forgive David, and God were to forgive Joshua,
and God were to forgive Moses, and God were to forgive the sons
of Noah, and God would forgive all these people of the Old Testament, He would not be good if He did
not intend to put the sins of these on Jesus Christ. So if God had never sacrificed
Jesus and He had allowed all these Old Testament saints to
have eternal life, then no one would have paid for their sins
and God would be unjust and unrighteous and unholy. So the killing of
Jesus Christ displays God's righteousness because God had withheld His
judgment. Now do not mistake this forbearance
of God, as Paul has already argued very clearly over in chapter
2, do not forsake this forbearance as a lack of exercise of judgment. There is a judgment coming for
the reprobate. There is a judgment coming. There
is wrath coming for those who do not believe. So beloved, today
is the day of salvation. Now is the time for faith. Not
tomorrow, and not yesterday. Do you believe on Jesus Christ,
the one who satisfied God's judgment against you? Do you believe that
Christ, do you trust in Christ, do you hold fast to Christ, who
satisfies the wrath of God? This moment, and this moment,
and this moment. This was to show God's righteousness
because in His divine forbearance He had passed over former sins. I think that's clear enough.
The last thing we'll see tonight is found in verse 26. It was
also to show God's righteousness at the present time. Listen to
this. At the present time. What does
he mean by at the present time? Well, at the present time when
Paul wrote this letter. At the present time when Jesus
died. At the present time when there
was an opportunity to share the gospel. At the present time thirty
years after Jesus died. At the present time tonight.
In this present day, God's righteousness is displayed in the giving and
the shedding of the blood of Jesus Christ as propitiation
because He not only forbade former sins, He also shows His righteousness
at the present time because He is just and He is the, look at
this, justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus Christ. Do
you see that? Your faith does not bend God's
arm to save you. God saved you through the finished
work of Jesus, and you believe it because God saved you. God saved you. And He is just
to kill Jesus, because He forbore your sins. He forgave your sins
in Christ before Christ died. And He's just to forgive you
because Christ paid for your sin. Now let's take it to this
big elephant in the room. If Jesus is propitiation for
sin, then who in the name of heaven is awaiting the judgment
and the wrath of God. Those who do not and will not
believe. God is the justifier of the one
who has faith in Jesus Christ. Do you believe in Christ this
evening? God is your justifier, not you. Do you believe that
Christ atoned for your sins? Are you trusting in Him fully?
Then God is your justifier. He has satisfied His own wrath
with His own Son, with His own plan, and He calls it the Good
News. Why is it so difficult for people
to see that? People want to say that Jesus
paid for the sins of all humanity, every individual in the world. If that is true, then God is
the justifier of all of them, and all of them will come to
faith in Jesus Christ when they hear the Gospel. This is not
an issue of the freedom of the will versus the sovereignty of
God. That's like saying, is a kernel of rice a locomotive? There's
no comparison. It's not even apples to oranges.
It's not even in the contest of fruit. There is no pitting
of the creature against the Creator. There is no comparison of what
man has done in contrast to what God has done. It just doesn't
work. Verse 27, we'll just say, we'll
just throw it out there, the question that Paul gives, what
becomes of our boasting? You see the point. There was
much to boast about in the lives of the Hebrew people, even those
who believed on Christ because of the grace of God. to the point
that even some of the Roman non-Jewish Christians would say, well, you
know what? Israel's better off. We're sort of a second-class
believer. Paul says, there's no distinction
for all of sin and fall short of the glory of God and are justified,
bestified by His grace as a gift through Jesus Christ who redeemed,
who God satisfied His wrath through the blood of Christ to be received
by faith. Nothing comes of our boasting. It is excluded. It is destroyed. It is in the same manner that
every mouth may be stopped because of the law, every boast is stopped
because of the gospel. Every excuse is stopped because
of the Word of God, and every boast is stopped because of the
work of God. So with that, we rest. With that,
we hold. And we are amazingly joyful,
amazingly saved. We are saved in such a way that
we cannot fathom it. We cannot escape it. We cannot
work our way out of salvation. We cannot abandon God's work. We cannot run from Him. We cannot
escape the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. It cannot be
done. No matter how bad you want to die in your sin, if Christ
paid for your sin, you will not die. Let that sink in for a minute.
Let's pray. Lord, how wicked our hearts can
be as we think on those things that You've
written through Your Apostle Paul to the Roman church about
our tongues and our minds and our hearts and our feet and our
hands. the very essence of our being,
what we are and what we've done. We forget just how offensive
sin is to you. But Father, even long ago for
some of us, before we believed on Christ, You purposed to save
us in Christ. And You were able to withhold
Your judgment For those who believe that You
alone were their hope, without the particulars, they just trusted
in You. Father, how much more glorious
is it that we have the explicit Gospel? We have the particular
teaching of truth that Jesus Christ satisfies Your anger and
Your judgment and Your wrath and Your justice. All that we
deserve was poured out upon Your Son. And He deserved it not. So that
you are just in your sentence to say that we are justified.
As if we've never sinned, Lord, we stand before You because Christ
has borne it all. We stand before You in Your judgment
as Your children, adopted and beloved. We do not fear. And Father, as we continue to
work in this letter, help us to comprehend it. Help us to
establish a strength of faith and a wall that can help us to
see the strength and the might of Your Gospel and of Your grace
that surrounds us and protects us and secures us. We thank You
for Your Holy Spirit, Father. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.