If you look at Romans chapter
three, verse 19, it says, now 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. Verse 20, therefore by the deeds
of the law there shall no flesh Be justified. Now, what is it
to be justified? It's to be made right with God. It's to be declared by God in
His sight, and that's the key, justified in His sight, that's
the key to this. Now, not in man's sight. Our
sight is limited. But God's sight is omniscient. God knows the heart, all right?
So to be justified is to be declared in the sight of God to be not
guilty. It's to be declared in the sight
of God to be perfectly righteous, justified in his sight. And this
does not come about by deeds of the law. He says, for by the
law is the knowledge of sin. Now we dealt with these verses
here last time. But I want to go back and deal
with them again because we're making a transition here. And
the transition, you remember how we've talked about how to
follow the divine logic. You know, somebody once said
that the gospel is not logical. Well, it may not be logical to
man, but it is certainly logical to God. The word, the word, word,
Christ is the word. We get our, you know, it comes
from the Greek word logos. Well, then we get our English
word logic. Christ is the logic of God. When God, through the
prophet Isaiah, God commanded the people under the preaching
of the gospel in this way. He said, come, let us reason
together. Though your sins be as scarlet,
they'll be as wool, though they be red like crimson, they'll
be white as snow. And so that's the logic of God
is what we're talking about. We're not talking about men being
logical, because man by nature is illogical. To attempt to be
righteous in the sight of God by our works is the most illogical
thing you can do. Isn't it? Because we're sinners. And he says there in verse 23,
all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. In other
words, in every attempt that we make or that we try to make
ourselves righteous in the sight of God by our works, we miss
the mark. So it's an illogical thing. It's
man trying to do the impossible. So why was the law given? Well,
you remember the apostle, he had summarized the gospel in
the first 17 verses of Romans chapter 1 as the revelation of
God of the glorious person and the finished work of the Lord
Jesus Christ. That's the summary of the gospel.
Given the fact that God is holy and just and righteous and truthful
in his very nature, and he cannot be otherwise. God cannot act
in any way. Whether he damns sinners or saves
sinners, he must do so on a just ground. Is that correct? He must
be righteous. If he condemns anyone, he's just
in doing so. He is not unfair. He is not illogical
or unreasonable to do so. He does so because it's a right
thing to do. It's a just thing to do. Now,
if he shows mercy, if he shows love, if he shows grace to a
sinner, he must do so on a just ground. He cannot do anything. He cannot be an unrighteous judge. And he cannot show mercy or love
or grace in salvation at the expense of or without acknowledging
and honoring His justice. Now we know that. That's God.
Now we are sinners. We don't deserve God's favor.
And there's nothing we can do to deserve God's favor. There's
nothing we can try to do to earn God's favor. There's no religion
that we can engage ourselves in that would earn God's favor.
There's no sincere, listen, we can be as sincere as we can be,
we can try to be as humble as we can be, but we'll never be
in a position where we can say, now I deserve God's favor, now
I've earned it. If God ever gave any of us what
we've earned or deserved, what would it be? Damnation, isn't
that right? And that's what he means here.
By deeds of law shall no flesh, and no matter who you are. Now,
we'll all make excuses, sometimes for ourselves, and especially
for our family. I'll tell you, that's a burden
that every true believer in every generation has had to bear, isn't
it? Oh, oh, wait a minute. There's none righteous, no, not
one. Oh, except my grandma. There's none that do a good,
oh no, except grandpa, you know. We make the gospel like a country
song, you know, that draws at our heartstrings, you know. But
is it truth? What does the word of God say?
This is in his sight, in God's sight. And the Bible says that
God commands all men everywhere to repent because he has appointed
a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by
that man whom he hath ordained and that he hath given assurance
unto all men and that he hath raised him from the dead. And
I don't care, listen, I love my family. I love my mother,
I love my father, you do too. But when it comes to righteousness,
where do they stand? And if it doesn't equal the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ, what does the Bible say? Condemned. Now that's it. And that's the
only, you say, well I don't like to hear that. Well that's the
word of God. That's the logic of God, isn't it? And it has
nothing to do with how much we love our family, love our mothers,
our fathers, our grandmothers, grandfathers, our children, aunts. We love them. But here's the
point. Unless you stand before God having
a righteousness that equals the demands of his law and justice,
you will be condemned. You are condemned. Isn't that
right? God, the law of God, and this
is what he's saying. He says those who are under the
law. Under the law, I believe here,
refers to people, sinners, who are trying to be saved, trying
to be forgiven, trying to be pardoned, trying to be made right
with God by their works. In other words, sin has dominion
over them. We'll talk about that later on
in Romans. They're under the dominion of sin because they
don't know Christ. They don't know his righteousness.
They have not been brought to God by unfaith and repentance
of dead works. So why was the law given to such
people? Why did God give the law to sinners when he knew that
sinners couldn't be saved by their works? He gave it to expose
the problem. And so what's Paul doing here,
remember? Paul had already talked about how the gospel is the revelation
of the righteousness of God. All right? Why do I need the
righteousness of God? Now the righteousness of God,
what is it? It's the righteousness of God that is manifested in
Jesus Christ, the God-man, who by himself, as the surety and
substitute of his people, died on the cross, obeyed unto death
to put away our sins, and established the only righteousness whereby
God could be just and justify sinners like us. It is His righteousness
imputed, charged, accounted to us." That's what the righteousness
of God is. It is in every way opposed to the righteousness
of man. In other words, there's nothing
of man, sinful man, that is involved in this righteousness of God.
It's all Christ, it's all grace. Grace reigns through righteousness
unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. It is the entire merit
of his obedience unto death. And so that's what Paul's been
doing. He's been showing why we need the righteousness of
God. Now, I always bring this up too. Has man ever had a righteousness? And the answer is yes, when he
was originally created. Adam, but what did he have? He
had the righteousness of man. And he lost it, didn't he? How
did he lose it? By sinning. You see, that's why
we believe and preach the righteousness of God in Christ. If man could
be righteous, as Adam was before the fall, in himself, we'd lose
it. But here's a righteousness of
God that we can't lose and it cannot be contaminated. This
is what the whole gospel is about. It's the revelation of the righteousness
of God. So the gospel is the revelation of the righteousness
of God. Why do we need it? Well, because we're sinners and
we know that by deeds of law there shall no flesh be justified
in his sight, according to God's standard. Now man's standard
is much lower than God's standard. Man will tell you you're okay,
you're all right, you're sure, you're safe, based upon all kinds
of things that are opposed to the word of God. But God's standard
is high. It's as high as his son. And
he will not, he will by no means clear the guilty. So here's the
question, how can I, a sinner, be found not guilty in his sight? Well, here's the answer. Now,
here's where the transition comes. Here's where Paul's answering
the question by definition. He says in verse 21, but now
the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being
witnessed by the law and the prophets. Now that refers back
again to Romans 1, 16 and 17, the gospel is the power of God
and the salvation to everyone that believe it, to the Jew first,
the Greek also, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed.
And this righteousness of God, what's he talking about? Well,
it's without the law. Now we know that this righteousness
of God does not negate, ignore, or deny the law of God. How do
we know that? Well, the Bible says that Christ,
the Lord Jesus Christ, was made under the law. Now what does
that mean? Now you remember he says here
that, verse 19, now we know that what things soever the law saith,
it saith to them who are under the law. Well, that's people,
as I said, I believe that's talking about people who are trying to
be saved by their works. Well, Christ was made under the
law, Galatians chapter four, verse four. In the fullness of
the time, God sent forth his son, made of woman, made under
the law. In other words, that all of the
working, all of the conditions of the law, to keep the law,
to perfect the law was for the people of God, for the elect
of God was placed upon the shoulders of the Lord Jesus Christ. He
was made of a woman, that's his humanity, he had to become a
man in order to be made under the law, to keep the law, to
die, that was the penalty, that was the condition, and he was
made under the law. And he did it to redeem them
who were under the law. All right, the law condemns all
sinners, all right, based on their works. It condemns all
sinners to whom sin is imputed. But Christ was made under the
law for his people to whom God imputed their sins to him. And
he redeemed them by his blood. So this takes us back to that
glorious revelation found only in the gospel wherein the righteousness
of God revealed. The word now simply refers to
the to the actual obedience unto death of Christ at the cross
as he walked this earth. And the Bible says this, that
in salvation for the justification of God's people, the Lord Jesus
Christ is the end of the law. for righteousness to everyone
that believe it. He's the end of the law. He's
the fulfillment of the law. He's the perfection of the law.
He's the finishing of the law. That's the word that, you remember
in John 19, 30, when Christ hanging on the cross, he said, it is
finished. He finished the task. He completed it. Daniel, he made
an end of sin. He finished the transgression.
He brought in everlasting righteousness. And that's what he did. And so
Christ, crucified and risen, is the end of the law. So when
it says here in verse 21 that the righteousness of God without
the law, the context shows us that he's talking about without
our works of the law, without our obedience. What's the context? By deeds of law shall no flesh
be justified in God's sight. And he said it's manifested,
set forth in a very public way. Not hidden, not revealed. You
see, the gospel ministry and Christianity is no secret society. You know, a lot of these cults,
you know, one time a fella was here, we were having a guest
preacher in, and he came here to visit a fella in town here.
He was a deacon or something at a Baptist church, and he got
offended. And he wanted to come to me and
talk about how he didn't believe what was being preached. And
he said, you're all a cult. He said, we're a cult. And I
said, well, sir, you don't even know what a cult is. I said,
first of all, the first ingredient of a cult is a dynamic, charismatic,
mesmerizing leader. And I said, that ain't me. In other words, his word is law.
Well, my word's not law here, God's word is. And of course,
it's been proven in our history that you're all not here just
to follow me, because I left, and you're still here. Even though
I did come back, you can't get rid of me. But that's number
one. But the second thing about a
cult is they're secret. They don't want that charismatic
leader. people coming in and talking
to the people that follow him. Well, I don't care. I told that
fellow, I said, you talk to any one member of this church, and
I said, if you can talk them out of it and get them to leave,
then that's it. It'll break my heart, but I said,
you go ahead. I said, we're not secret. We're
open with what we believe. We don't try to hide it. We're
not a closed society. Anybody that wants to come here
and sit and listen is welcome to come here and sit and listen.
But it's manifest, and that's the way it was. Christ, this
wasn't some secret society for the spiritual elite. This was
open and aboveboard. He said it was manifested. And
he says it was witnessed by the law and the prophet. This is
what the law of Moses was all about. We're gonna talk about
that this morning out of Colossians. How Christ is the substance of
the law. Not just the law of Moses, but
the law of God at any time. It was all given to typify, foreshadow
Christ, to show us the sinfulness of man and his need of God's
grace based on the righteousness of another, the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is what the prophets
preached. They didn't preach a gospel of
works. Moses didn't preach a gospel
of works, salvation. It was grace all the way. From
the very beginning, when man fell, God revealed it in the
seed of woman, and in the blood of sacrifice, the righteousness
of another, imputed righteousness, that's what God revealed. And
that's been the gospel ever since, and that's what Moses believed,
and that's what the tabernacle was all about, that's what the
sacrifices, the priesthood, even the dietary laws, the Sabbath
laws, they were all about God's grace through the righteousness
of another. They had other functions as pertaining
to the physical nation of Israel, but their ultimate substance
was Christ and his righteousness in the gospel. And that's what
it was all about. So when he says this, look back
at verse 22. And Paul said that at the beginning.
He says, the gospel of God, which he afore promised through the
prophets. But look at verse 22, even the
righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ, unto
all and upon all them that believe, for there's no difference, for
all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Even the
righteousness of God, by faith of Jesus Christ. Now there's
a lot of translators who'll say, well that should be translated
by faith in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ, but I gotta be
honest with you. I believe the King James translators
got it right here because of the context. Now, let me make
a distinction. What does the Bible talk about
when it talks about the faith of Jesus Christ? And what does
the Bible talk about when it talks about faith in Jesus Christ? Well, let me say this first.
No sinner is going to be saved except that God brings that sinner
by sovereign power in the new birth to believe in the Lord
Jesus Christ. You must believe in the Lord
Jesus Christ or you shall not be saved. But now believing in
Christ is not the product of the power or the goodness or
the free will of man. It's the product of God's sovereign
power and grace through Christ in the new birth. You must be
born again or you cannot see the kingdom of God. You cannot
enter the kingdom of God. If man is left to himself naturally
to believe in Christ, he will never believe. All right? Now Paul talks about believing
in Christ in these verses, later on especially. But that's not
his main subject here. His main subject here is the
righteousness of God. And what is the righteousness
of God? It's the merit, not of what you do for God, it's the
merit of what God does for us in Christ. That's what the righteousness
of God is. And I was talking to a fellow
about this one time, the faith of Jesus Christ. And you say,
well, you mean Christ redeemed us just by his believing? No,
no. The faith of Jesus Christ refers
to his faithfulness to fulfill all righteousness for us as pertaining
to the everlasting covenant of grace made before the foundation
of the world. God chose a people in Christ and gave them to Christ,
made Christ their surety, and placed all of the conditions
of their salvation upon Christ, and Christ, the Son of God, agreed
to fulfill those conditions, and he was faithful to do everything
that was required. That's what that's talking about.
His faithfulness to do for me what I could not and cannot do
for myself. Now does that mean that we don't
have to believe in him? No, we do have to believe in
him. But it's his faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness. Remember
that in Lamentations 3? It's of the Lord's mercy that
we're not consumed. Great is thy faithfulness. God
is faithful. God the Father is faithful. God
the Son is faithful. God the Holy Spirit is faithful
to do what? To fulfill all things that they
purposed and promised from the foundation of the world to the
salvation of his people. And Christ was faithful. The
Bible says he set his face like a flint to do the work. He told his disciples, he said,
for this reason I came into the world. When he was baptized,
beginning his public ministry, he told John the Baptist and
the people, he said, suffer it to be so for us to fulfill all
righteousness. He's the end of, and that's what
he's talking about, that's what the righteousness of God is.
The righteousness of God is not our believing in him. Yes, we
must believe in him, but the righteousness of God is the merit
of Christ's work that he was faithful to accomplish in his
obedience unto death. So I believe that the King James
translators got this right. You know, here's the thing. The emphasis today in false Christianity
is not what Christ really accomplished on the cross because most of
them believe that he died for everybody, even those who perish. Now, if you believe that He died
for everybody without exception, even those who perish, then I'm
going to tell you something. You cannot really have faith
in Him because He doesn't make the difference. If you believe He died for everybody,
even those who perish, then you believe you're saved because
you believe in Him. Your faith is not in Him. Your
faith is in your faith. Now, that's right. You say, well,
I didn't think of it that way. Well, that's our problem. That's
why, you remember what it said up here? There's none that understandeth. That means we don't think of
it that way, naturally. It has to be pointed out to us.
It has to be preached. It pleased God by the foolishness
of preaching, see? That's what we're preaching.
That's what we're saying. That has to be, you know, we
don't know these things by nature. And when we say, well, I didn't
think of it that way, all we're simply saying is, well, I'm a
sinner who didn't know any better. And that's us by nature. And
we don't know any better until the Spirit of God intervenes
and brings us under the preaching of the gospel and gives us life
to believe. But here he's talking about the
faith of Jesus Christ. Then it says in verse 22, unto
all and upon all them that believe, for there's no difference. Now,
the phrase unto all, And upon all them that believe would be
better translated simply unto all that believe. Now there's
believing, okay? And these words have to be interpreted
in their context. And what he's saying is this.
He's saying that the righteousness of God is imputed, we could say,
imputed to, given to, freely given to, to a person as evidence
by their believing. How can I know that God chose
me before the foundation of the world? The Bible says God chose
a people. Jim talked about that last week
in God's distinguishing grace. Great message. Romans 9. God
said it's not of him that runneth, nor of him that willeth, but
it's of God that showeth mercy. God chose a people before the
foundation. Now, who are they? How can I
know that if I'm one of them, can I know? Well, Randy preached
that in his message, brought out of darkness into God's light. How can I know that God has justified
me, imputed righteousness, that my sins were imputed to Christ
and his righteousness is imputed to me? How can I know that? How
can I know that Christ died for me on that cross, redeemed me,
paid for my sins, established that righteousness for me? How
can I know that? Well, how can I know that I've
been born again by the Spirit, that I've been brought out of
darkness into that light? Well, do you believe in him?
As he is revealed in the scriptures, in God's word, as the God-man,
Righteousness, whose death, whose obedience unto death secures
my eternal salvation unto glory. How can I not? Upon all them
that believe. And he says, for there's no difference.
And what he means there in verse 23, for all have sinned and come
short of the glory of God. You know, we are all, we can
talk about all the differences between people. Lot of people
on this earth. All you gotta do is drive I-75
a couple of times. See how many people on this,
and they all got cars in Georgia. And they all drive the same day. They go up to Atlanta, you know,
and you can't even hardly get around up there anymore. Lot
of people and a lot of differences. But here's one area where there
is absolutely no difference between any of us. We're all sinners,
and we all come short of the glory of God. None righteous,
no none. What is the glory of God? Well,
Christ is the glory of God. Here he defines sin. That's the
most common word in the New Testament for sin, hamartia. You may have
heard that. It means to come short. It means
to miss the mark. What is the mark? The mark is
righteousness as revealed in Christ. You say, well, I just
love everybody. Well, you don't love everybody
like Christ loved everybody, loved his people. You say, well,
I'm just going to try to be good. Well, that's OK, but you're not
going to be as good as he is good. He said, there's none good
but the Father. You say, I'm going to try to
be as sincere and as charitable. Well, that's OK, too, but you're
not going to make it. You're going to miss the mark.
That's why we need the righteousness of God. And we're all equally
need. You say, well, the thief on the
cross, he needed it more than the apostle Paul. No, he didn't.
Paul said he needed it more than anybody. He said, Christ Jesus
came into the world to save sinners of whom I am chief. Well, that
thief's below you, isn't he, Paul? No, I'm chief. See that? Listen, the old woman
at the well, Married how many times? Five times, and she was
living with another man? Well, Nicodemus, a member of
the Sanhedrin. Who needed it more? They both
equally needed it. And when God saved the woman
at the well, it didn't take more grace to save her than it did
to save Nicodemus, if Nicodemus was ever saved. Dealt with that
this morning on TV. Somebody say that he was. Well,
he may have been. I hope he was. That's okay. I know this, whoever
saved Nicodemus, the woman at the well, Paul the apostle, the
thief on the cross, whatever, whoever saved, it is totally
100% by God's grace based upon Christ's righteousness imputed
alone. Period. That it? Well, that's
what he's talking about here. It's the righteousness of God
by faith of Jesus. You see, our faith is not our
righteousness. His faithfulness is. His faithfulness
to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves. Okay.