Great difference in a sermon
and a message. Sermons are a dime a dozen, but
it's what the Lord puts on a preacher's heart that he must bring. And, uh, I feel this is what the Lord
would have us read this morning. Romans chapter one. and we'll read two verses, verses
16 and 17. The Apostle Paul writes and says,
for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power
of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth. To the Jew first
and also to the Greek or Gentile. For therein is the righteousness
of God revealed from faith to faith. As it is written, the
just shall live by faith. I want to just give us this morning,
and I would title the message this, 10 Gospel Thoughts. 10 Gospel Thoughts. Back in verse 1 of this chapter,
Paul says the gospel belongs to God. He calls it the gospel
of God. And he says in verse 3 that it's
concerning his son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. Since Jesus Christ is God incarnate,
it is also appropriately called the gospel of Christ as Paul
terms it here in verse 16. I am not ashamed of the gospel
of Christ. The gospel of Christ is the good
news of what he has done for sinners. It's nothing to good people,
but it's good news to sinners. The old poet said, a sinner is
a sacred thing. The Holy Ghost hath made him
so. Until and unless the Holy Spirit
of God convinces you of what you really are, your answer will
always be, well, I'm as good as anybody else. Well, how good is anybody else? Just good enough to go to hell.
That's all. And that's how good we all are.
And if you want to repeat that, you may. This is how good we
all are. We're just good enough to go
to hell. The Apostle Paul states the good
news of Jesus Christ in various terms. He says in 1 Timothy 1.15,
this is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation. This
is worthy that all should accept this. It's worthy of all acceptation
that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. Is it ever really dawned on you
that that's why He came to save sinners? He never came to give
us a Christmas story, no. He never came to perform miracles,
no. He came to save sinners. Paul said it like this in Galatians,
He loved me and gave Himself for me. That's good news to sinners. And if it's not good news to
you, if it's not exciting news to you, it's because you don't
really think you're a sinner. You don't really need Christ. You need a good person's savior
because you're a good person. You don't need a sinner's savior
because you're not a sinner. But here in these verses, Paul
gives the same message, the same good news, unaltered, still up
to date. He says it, I am not ashamed
of the gospel of Christ for it is the power of God unto salvation. I want to consider these 10 verses
for a little bit or these two verses for a little bit in 10
particulars. And, uh, I'll move quickly through
these 10 things. So y'all won't go to sleep. And
I promise it'll go quickly. If you're interested. If you're not interested, it'll
seem like four hours. And if you're not interested
in the gospel, your problem is not with me. It's with you and
with the Lord. And the number one is this, that
we see in these verses, Paul's stance toward the gospel. What he says concerning, where
does he stand? What is his stance? He says,
I'm not ashamed of. Now many render this that Paul
is actually saying, I'm proud of the gospel. Not only am I
not ashamed of it, I'm proud of it. And this is true. It was, it's true. It's what
the Lord did on the Damascus road and appearing to him that
changed his life. The good news of Jesus Christ,
what Christ did for him, dying on the cross. And it's true for
me, it's true for all God's people. But I believe the wording here
in our King James is in emphasis of Paul's stance in contrast
to others. He's saying, I'm not ashamed
of the gospel like so many others are. I want you to know I'm not
ashamed of it. Like so many who claim to be
preachers of it, but they're actually ashamed of it. They're not ashamed to twist
it and pervert it and put God on the little end, put God at
the mercy of men. They're not ashamed to do that.
But they're ashamed of the gospel as it is, that God is sovereign
and He saves whom He wills. and He justly damns the rest. That's who God is. God would still be just if He
damned us all. That's the Gospel. That He did
not choose to let us all perish in our sins, but through sending
His Son, the Good News of Jesus Christ, He has rescued us. That's Paul's stance. I'm not
ashamed of this gospel. And number two, the substance
of the gospel. What is it? What is it? Well,
we read it right here. It's the power of God. That's
the substance of it. It's the power of God. If you
go out of here and you asked 25 people tomorrow, what is the
gospel? there's no telling what kind
of answers you get. But mostly, you would hear something
like, well, you know, it's the story of Jesus. Well, Paul says,
he said here in verse 3, it's concerning God's Son, Jesus Christ. But what it really is, and he
says it here, it's the power of God. It's not the possibility of what
God can do. It is the very power of God to
do what He wills to do. And it's not the plea of God
begging you to let Him do. It's the power of God to do.
That's the very substance of the gospel. It's the power of
God. And then number three, the strength
of the gospel. How far can it go? What does
it accomplish? How strong is it? Well, it is
the power of God, Paul says here. This is why I'm not ashamed of
it. It's the power of God to do anything he wills, with whom
he wills, when he will. It's this power that brought
blind Bartimaeus to cry out, have mercy on me, thou son of
David. What caused him to do that? Power. The power of God. It's this power of God that calls that woman with the
issue of blood to say in her heart, if I can but touch the
hem of his garment, I know I'll be whole. She didn't get that
off the TV or out of the newspaper or even off the gospel tracker
from some preacher. That's something God put in her
heart. I know if I could get to him, That'd be my answer. It's the power of God. What caused Zacchaeus, the little
tax collector, instead of acting like a gentleman, to act like
a kid and run climb a tree just to see Jesus? What done that
to him? The power of God did that to
him. What caused that leper to say
to the Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean? He never
questioned whether Christ could, he just questioned whether he
would. If thou wilt, thou canst. I know you can, if you will. What put that in his heart? The power of God. That's the
substance of God. That's what it is, the power
of God. That's the strength of the gospel. That's how strong
it is. And here in the text, Paul said,
it is the power of God, how far? Unto salvation. And that little
word unto, it means as far as, that's what it means.
As far as. Remember on one occasion, our
Lord took his disciples in a ship and he said, let us pass over
unto the other side. He was saying, let us pass over
as far as the other side. That's how far we're going. That's
what unto means. And when they got to the other
side, they had no more need of a boat. It had carried them unto. as
far as the other side. And we'll have no more need of
salvation when the power of God is finished because its strength
is unto as far as salvation, full salvation, the strength
of it, the power of God. And then number four, we learn
in this text, these verses, the subjects of this salvation. Who are they? Well, it's certain,
not possible, not potential, but certain to everyone, every
single one who truly believeth. It came the gospel, the good
news, to the believing Jew first and also to the believing Greek
or Gentile. Its subjects are of no national
distinction. The middle wall of petition is
broken down between Jew and Gentile. The subjects of this salvation
are believers from every kindred nation and tongue. That's the
subjects of it. Are you a believer? Do you believe
it? And number five, I'd say something of the structure of
this verse, verse 16. Now understand the gospel does
not become the power of God when we believe. Oh no. That's the
Armenian story. The gospel is the power of God
that causes us to believe. We don't make it anything. It
makes us something. See, the act of believing is
not our gift to God. It's God's gift to us. That's
what he said in Philippians 1, it is given unto you to believe. That's the structure of the verse.
And then the sixth thing we're moving right along here and you
are very quiet. I hope you're listening. Number six, the satisfaction
that it achieved. Verse 17. The key element is
the righteousness of God. Understand this, the righteousness
of God apart from Christ and what he done. God could only
be righteous by damning you and I forever. We offended his holiness and
in ourselves are not sorry for it. And infinitely holy and righteous
God could not overlook what we are
without destroying what He is. He is holy. He is righteous. That don't change. He is immutable. But in the Gospel, the good news
of what Christ has done for us, the judgment of God that He bore
in our stead, because of that, the justice of God is satisfied. The righteousness of God is not
violated. And Paul says here, it's revealed
in the gospel of Jesus Christ. It's in him that we are made
accepted. Philippians 1.6, we're made accepted
in the beloved, not made acceptable, but made accepted. It's not that
God has done his two His part, and you've got to add your two
cents. No, we're made accepted in the blood who is Jesus Christ. And then the seventh thing would
be the secret of how this all works. Verse 17 says, for therein,
that is in the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed. How? From
faith to faith. What does that mean? I understand faith is the gift
of God to believe. Faith is not some mustered up
human confidence because about as fast as you can muster that
up, somebody else shoot it down. Faith is the gift of God. And
the secret here, how this works is from faith to faith. What
does that mean? From faith to faith. Matthew Poole, a noted commentary
of long ago, he said this about it. Paul saith not from faith
to works or from works to faith, but from faith to faith. What he's saying is it begins
with God And it's everlasting in God. You didn't do anything to initiate
it, God did. You didn't do anything to accomplish
it, God did. And you can't do anything to
keep it, God has. It begins with believing God
through the gift of faith that he gave you. And it continues with believing
God. the gift of faith that he gave
you. Sounds to me like Jonah had it
right. Salvation is of the Lord. Like the little boy, me and daddy
killed a bear, but he shot it. So, you know, you hear people say all these
statements like, I got saved. Nobody ever got saved. Somebody
had to save them. It was God. Did you ever hear of a drowning
man that got rescued? No. Somebody had to rescue him. Did you ever hear of a lost man
that got himself found? No. Somebody had to find him. Did you ever hear of a dead man
that got alive? No. Somebody had to raise him
from the dead. And that's where you and I were,
dead in trespasses and sins. But God, but God, He did it. He did it. Believe in God. through faith
that he gives. If you believe God, it's of God. And if you believe you'll keep
on believing it's of God. And if you ever don't believe
you never did believe because what God does is forever. All right. The eighth thing.
The source of it all. And I've already hit on this
one. I can't help but hit on that every time I turn around.
The source of it all. Lest anyone misunderstand, God
is the source. Salvation does not involve us
getting God's attention. It involves him getting our attention. He initiates it because you by
nature came and didn't even want to. When you do desire the Lord,
it's because He's already worked in your heart and given you that
desire. Salvation is the Lord. Oh yeah,
Jonah was right. He didn't just say it's from
the Lord. Everybody knows that. But he says it's of the Lord.
He's in the fish's belly. And he says, if there is any
hope for me, it'll be God's doing. Jonah wasn't starting no campaign
of how to get out of here. No, couldn't do that. If there
is any salvation, it'll be God's doing. It's of the Lord. Christ
said it, John 6, 37, all that the Father giveth me, shall come to me. How many is
coming to Christ? All that the father gave the
son. All that the father giveth me
shall. Not might or ought to or I wish
they would. But he said they shall come to
me. Nobody else will, but all of
them will. And when they do him that cometh to me, I will
in no wise that is not under any circumstance. Will I ever
cast them out? Paul said it like this Ephesians
one, four, according as he, God, the father had chosen us who
believe. in Him, Jesus Christ, before
the foundation of the world. He's the source. He's the source. Again, in II Thessalonians 2.13,
Paul said, But we are bound to give thanks always to God for
you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the
beginning chosen you to salvation. Oh, yeah. Let me start over. But we are
bound to give thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved
of the Lord. Not because of your love for
him, but because of his love for you, beloved of the Lord. Because God has from the beginning
chosen you to salvation through sanctification, that is, that
setting apart work of the Spirit, and belief, that God-given faith
work, belief of the truth. God is the source. All right? Number nine, the simplicity
of the gospel. Second Corinthians 11.3, Paul
said, but I fear lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled
Eve through his subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted
from the simplicity that is in Christ." Notice he didn't say
corrupted by the simplicity, or corrupted in the simplicity,
but corrupted from away from the simplicity that's in Christ. Now some try to make it difficult and our adversary the devil is
behind that difficulty and I want to say to you very plainly this
morning and those of you that have questions in your heart
where you stand with the Lord I want you to get this real clearly
John 5, 24, Christ said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that
heareth my word and believeth on me hath everlasting life. Not going to have it, but hath
already everlasting life. John 635, I am the bread of life. He that cometh to me shall never
hunger. And he that believeth on me shall
never thirst. You say, well, I know all about
that scripture. I know you do. He that believeth on me. Now
he didn't say he that believeth enough. He that believeth more than you
do. but he that believeth." Do you
believe? You say, well, yes, I hope so. No, you don't hope so. Do you
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, who he is, what he has accomplished? If you really, really do in your
heart believe that, you didn't do that for yourself. And his declaration is that you
have everlasting life. Don't make it difficult. Don't
make it difficult. I'm not a promoter of easy believism. Come on down the aisle if you're
having a chill bump or a twitch in here. muscle or anything,
just come on down now, that's God talking to you. Come on down
here, shake the preacher's hand, you believe Jesus Christ, I will
cross your sin. Yeah, well you're saved. No, not talking about
that junk. Talking about there's something
in here, if it really is in your heart, that you know this, you'll
die before you'll deny this. Then you didn't do that for yourself.
You didn't. He that believeth, he that believeth. Don't make it difficult. But I don't believe like I ought
to. He didn't say believe like you ought to and you'll never
perish. He didn't say that. He said believe on me and you'll
never perish. Christ said believe and you believe. The devil says you don't believe
enough. And you take His Word over Christ's Word. Just believe. And believe what you believe. And quit telling yourself that
you're afraid you don't believe enough what you believe. In Acts chapter 8, There's a
beautiful story. The Lord sends his servant, Philip,
down into the desert. And there he meets a man riding
along in a chariot in Ethiopian. And this Ethiopian man, he's
reading from Isaiah 53. And Philip asked him, say, do
you know what you're reading? And the fellow answers and says,
how can I? Except some man guide me, I got
no idea what you're talking about. And he asked Philip to join him
in the chariot. And he continues to read Isaiah 53. He was led
as a sheep to the slaughter, like a lamb before his shearers,
so open is he not his mouth. And then he stops reading and
he asks Philip, says, say, is this prophet Isaiah? Is he talking
about himself or is he talking about somebody else? And the
Bible says then that Philip, beginning at the same scripture,
preached unto him Jesus. Well, they ride along and they
come to a body of water. I don't know if it was a river
or a lake or whatever. The Ethiopians said, Why can't I be baptized? I believe. Now, Philip wasn't a Baptist,
or he would have said, oh, you've got to prove yourself first.
You just now made your profession. You've got to let people know
that you really mean business. No, people have nothing to do
with it. You've got to show people you're
serious. There's a waiting period before
you can be baptized. Just believing is not enough.
That's not what Philip said. The old boy said, why can't I
be baptized? And here's what Philip said,
if thou believest with all thine heart. If you sure you got this
settled about what you believe right now and from now on, thou mayest. And the Ethiopian eunuch said,
I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Of course, that
statement would include, I believe all that the Bible teaches about
him and what he did for sinners like I. and Philip baptized him. The only prerequisite to baptism
is believing. Baptism is simply a public profession
of faith that one does believe. We're talking about the simplicity
of the gospel. Believe and be baptized. And the last thing, the security
of this. I've heard people say, and I
hadn't heard this around here, thank goodness. But I have heard
people say, I know at one time I was saved, but I don't know about now. Well, listen again to John 5,
24. Christ says, verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth
my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting
life, and shall not, that is, absolutely cannot, come into
condemnation, but is passed from death unto life. That's everlasting life. We've
passed from death to everlasting life. It's impossible to pass
from everlasting life back into death because everlasting life
is everlasting. Verse 17 concludes with these
words, it is written, as it is written, the just shall live by feelings. Is that
what it said? No, the just shall live by faith, not mustered up confidence in
flesh, but faith, the gift of God by which we first believed
and keep on believing. God's children are secure in
Christ and preserved and protected He said in John 10, 28, I give
unto them eternal life and they shall never perish unless. No, the word unless is not in
there. They shall never perish. Neither shall any man pluck them
out of my hand. In my position as your pastor,
I've witnessed Many situations through the years when elderly
saints leave this world and their children with no heart for God,
no heart for the church, and really in a lot of cases, no
heart for their parents that just died. But when the parents are gone,
here they come, ready to cash in. Ready to claim
every dollar, fight over every piece of furniture
and every gun, fishing rod. Well, that's their right. That's
why they do it. It is their right. Can I say this morning as God's
children, We have a right. The devil says bigger failures
you've been. You ought not even show up to
claim anything. I better not stay on this or
y'all associate this with some specific family. that I'm talking
about. I'm talking about several of
them, many of them through the years. Young'uns that you'd think,
the way they had done, wouldn't dare even show up at the funeral
and say, I care. But they do show up, not because
they care, but because of what they want. But as God's child,
you have a right to show up. And being the failure that you've
been and I've been is not the issue. And the devil says you
ought not even show up. You ought not claim anything.
Just keep your mouth shut. But as a believer, you have a
right to all the promises of God in His Son to His children. You're in the will. You're in the will. John 10 3, he calleth his own
sheep by name. Christ named you in the will. This is one of my children. All
I have is theirs. Don't listen to the devil, you
have the same right all God's children have. Open the Bible
and read the will. Be not faithless, but believing.
But I don't believe enough. How much is enough? How much is enough? I'm talking
to us this morning about believing. Since your Convinced that you're perishing
and I'll stop with this Since you're convinced that you fail
so much And you're just stuck there Why don't you do this just
one more time on your way to hell Say what Paul said here
and Believe this And see what it does for you For I am not
ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto
salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first and also to
the Greek. To the Jew first and also to
me. It's the power of God under salvation. Thank you. Let's stand.