Romans Chapter Four

Sovereign Grace Family Church

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August 18, 2022

00:00: For those of you, I know a lot of you guys are new, my name is Keith, I'm the pastor of Sovereign Grace Family Church, and I have been, before my time away, because I've been out with surgery, I have been going through the book of Romans, and we've been just going chapter by chapter through the book.
00:18: I know that if you haven't been here before, you didn't know me before, then you may be a little bit behind on what we're doing, because I don't want to start over.
00:26: Let me just give you a quick overview of what we have talked about so far.
00:33: Alright, so, in Romans 1, 2, and 3, Paul follows a very basic structure of what he is trying to accomplish.
00:47: He is explaining the nature of the Gospel.
00:50: In fact, that is the thesis of the book, is the Gospel of God, or the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
00:54: What is the Gospel, and how do we understand it? He begins in chapter 1 by explaining the universality of sin.
01:02: And what that means is that sin is something that affects everyone.
01:07: And he begins in Romans 1, 18 by saying, the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness and ungodliness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
01:16: And so, part of the reason why men behave the way that they do is that they know God exists, but they don't want to follow Him.
01:23: They don't want to worship Him.
01:25: They would rather have themselves be on the throne.
01:28: They would rather be their own authority, their own God.
01:31: And so, they suppress God, they suppress the truth, they do their own thing.
01:34: And so, that is what he begins to explain in Romans chapter 1.
01:38: That's the problem.
01:39: In Romans chapter 2, he expands that.
01:42: And you say, well, how do you expand universal? Well, he begins to expand it into the issue of the Jewish community.
01:48: So, he begins to address the Jews' sin.
01:51: Because he says, you who have the law, you think that you're better off because the Jews have the law.
01:57: He said, but you're not, because you're not keeping the law either.
02:00: You see, if somebody who doesn't have the law, if they sin, that's bad.
02:05: But you do have the law, and you're still not keeping it.
02:09: So, you're not better off, you're actually worse off.
02:11: You're in a worse condition because you yourself find yourself in a condition where you're judging the world.
02:18: You're saying the world is sinful, but you are a hypocrite because you're just as sinful.
02:23: So, we see this in Romans 2.
02:25: In Romans 3, he explodes with this crescendo where he begins, beginning in verse 9 and 10, he said, This is why I said to you, there is none righteous, no not one, there's none who understands, there's none who seeks after God.
02:41: All have turned aside, all have gone their own way.
02:43: The venom of asps was under their lips, and their feet are swift to shed blood.
02:48: And the way of peace they have not known.
02:50: There's no fear of God before their eyes.
02:53: That's Romans 3, 9 to 18, around there.
02:58: I'm quoting from memory here.
03:00: So, you understand, all of this is expressing the universality of sin, and what we would say, what we would call total depravity.
03:10: All men are sinful.
03:13: Not just some men, but all men.
03:17: And all men are dreadfully sinful.
03:19: You say, well, I know some guys who are pretty good guys.
03:23: Well, we could argue from a human standpoint, that there are people who are maybe better than others in the sense of willingness to keep the rules, and be moral, and treat each other well, and all those things.
03:36: But when we compare ourselves to the holiness of God, when we compare ourselves to the righteousness of Jesus Christ, there is no way, we're nowhere close.
03:45: I don't care who the best dude in the world is.
03:48: He's nowhere compared to Jesus Christ.
03:50: In fact, I often use that standard.
03:54: I say, if you take Christ, and you put Him over here, and you take somebody who is maybe the worst person you can imagine, who do you think? Some people say Hitler, Stalin, Genghis Khan, right? Put somebody like that over here.
04:10: And you say, okay, where are you at on the scale? People say, I don't know, I'm kind of in the middle.
04:14: No, compared to Jesus, you're right over here.
04:17: Because your heart is desperately wicked.
04:19: The Bible says, the heart of man is desperately wicked.
04:21: Who can know it? If I took all of your thoughts, and put them on a picture, and played them for all the guys in the room for 30 minutes.
04:29: Yeah, I know you, and I know you don't want that.
04:31: Right? That's the reality.
04:34: The heart of man is desperately wicked.
04:38: So, Paul's expressing that.
04:41: Then, at the end of chapter 3, beginning around verse 21, he begins to give the remedy.
04:48: The remedy to this is that God provides justification for sinners because of the work that Christ has done on the cross.
05:00: The justification, and the word justification means to be declared righteous, this justification comes not because of what we have done, but because of what was done on our behalf, through the substitute, who is Jesus.
05:16: And Jesus receives the punishment that we deserve, so that we can receive the reward that He earned.
05:25: He earns a reward, He gives it to us.
05:29: We earn punishment, He takes it from us.
05:32: We call that the great transaction.
05:34: God made Him who knew no sin, to become sin for us, that we could become the righteousness of God in Him.
05:42: That's that great transaction.
05:44: And Paul says, because of this, God can be both just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Christ.
05:53: God remains just because He punishes sin, but He is the justifier because He justifies the ungodly by punishing their sin in Christ.
06:03: So God gets to remain holy and gracious at the same time.
06:08: Not giving up either one.
06:10: He doesn't give up His holiness, and He doesn't give up His grace.
06:13: He doesn't give up being righteous, and He doesn't give up being loving.
06:17: He can do both at the same time because of the work of Christ.
06:21: That's Paul's whole argument down to chapter 3.
06:24: Now we come to chapter 4, which is our chapter for today, and we get a case study.
06:34: The case study is Abraham.
06:38: Paul uses Abraham as a case study of the Gospel.
06:44: So we're going to read chapter 4, then we're going to pray.
06:50: Now I'm going to read out of the ESV.
06:52: If you have a different translation, it should read close enough that we all ought to be able to follow along.
06:58: What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather, according to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.
07:14: For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.
07:19: Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift, but as his due.
07:24: And to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.
07:31: Just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works.
07:38: Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered.
07:43: Blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin.
07:47: Is this blessing then only for the circumcised or also for the uncircumcised? For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness.
07:55: How then was it counted to him? Was it before or after he was circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised.
08:02: He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised.
08:10: The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised so that righteousness would be counted to them as well.
08:17: And to make him the father of the circumcised who are not merely circumcised by, but also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised.
08:27: For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.
08:36: For if it is the adherents of the law who are to be heirs, faith is null and the promise is void.
08:42: For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression.
08:48: That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring, not only to the adherents of the law, but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all.
09:00: As it is written, I have made you the father of many nations, in the presence of the God in whom you believe, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.
09:10: In hope he believed against hope that he should become the father of many nations.
09:14: As he had been told, so shall your offspring be.
09:17: He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old, or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb.
09:25: No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith and he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.
09:35: That is why his faith was counted to him as righteousness.
09:39: But the words that were counted to him were not written for his sake alone, but also for ours.
09:44: It will be counted to us who believe in him, who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.
09:56: Father in heaven, I thank you for your word.
09:59: I pray now that you would first and foremost keep me from error as I seek to explain your scriptures.
10:06: I pray that you open the hearts of these men to the truth.
10:10: I pray, Lord, for the believers that they would be edified, for the unbelievers that they would be terrified.
10:14: Lord, that we would quake at the idea of entering into eternity without Jesus Christ.
10:21: I pray this in Jesus' name.
10:23: Amen.
10:25: Alright.
10:27: So, Paul has made an argument, and now he is using an illustration to defend his argument.
10:36: Paul is, in many ways, an apologist.
10:41: The word apologist means someone who makes a defense for something.
10:45: And Paul often, in his letters, makes defenses for either his teaching or his own authority as an apostle.
10:52: In fact, some of the writings in Thessalonians and things like that and Corinthians are Paul defending his own apostleship.
10:59: So, Paul is an apologist, and he has made a bold claim.
11:05: And the claim is this.
11:07: You are not justified by your works.
11:09: You are justified by faith in Jesus Christ.
11:12: That's what chapter 3 ends with, that argument.
11:15: You're not justified by what you do.
11:17: You're justified by what Christ has done in your place.
11:22: And now, he gets to his argument from the Scripture.
11:27: He begins to use the Bible as his argument.
11:31: And he chooses the one person in the Bible who would have been considered to be the greatest by everyone up until that point.
11:40: He uses Abraham as his example.
11:44: I want you to think just for a moment just how important Abraham is in the history of the world.
11:50: Not just in the history of Christianity, but think about Abraham in the history of the world.
11:55: The three largest monotheistic religions in the world all claim to have Abraham as their ancestor.
12:04: Jews believe Abraham as their ancestor.
12:08: Christians believe Abraham as their ancestor.
12:11: Even Muslims would say Abraham is their ancestor.
12:15: All of them claim to have Abraham as their father.
12:18: When I was in university, I actually wrote a paper which was about that.
12:23: About how there are three religions that all claim the same patriarch.
12:28: I do believe Christianity is the one correct.
12:30: Obviously, that's the one I believe.
12:32: And I do believe that's what the Bible says.
12:33: I believe that's true.
12:35: But all three religions claim to have him as their patriarch.
12:38: So, Abraham has a very important place in the history of the world.
12:42: Not just in the history of Christianity.
12:46: So, Paul is using Abraham as his example to show how Abraham is the patriarch of not only Judaism, but of Christianity.
12:58: Because he asked this question.
13:00: What shall we say was gained by Abraham according to the flesh? Now, let me put that into maybe modern language.
13:11: He's saying this.
13:12: What did Abraham earn by his works? What did Abraham earn by his works? His answer is nothing.
13:21: Now, that may sound weird because Abraham did a lot of good things.
13:24: In fact, Abraham has some of the most impressive acts of faith in the Bible.
13:29: What's the greatest act of faith that you can think of that Abraham did that demonstrated he truly believed what God said? Yeah, he was willing to sacrifice his son, right? Now, I don't know about y'all.
13:41: I don't know how many of you have sons in here.
13:44: I have two sons and one on the way.
13:46: This is number six.
13:48: This is my sixth child.
13:50: I'm going to be like Mike Brady when my wife has this.
13:52: I'm going to have three boys and three girls.
13:56: And I can't imagine if God were to speak to me and say, Keith, take your son, your only son whom you love.
14:08: That's what he said to Abraham.
14:09: He says, take thy son, thy only son whom thou lovest, up on the mountain and sacrifice him as a burnt offering.
14:21: That means slit his throat and light him on fire.
14:25: He ain't going to do it.
14:27: It would be hard.
14:29: I would have to be fully convinced that God was speaking and I didn't have to eat a bad burrito or something.
14:36: I would have to know for sure.
14:40: Yes, sir? So did Abraham's son know what life was? We don't know for certain.
14:46: I just preached on this.
14:48: I've been in Genesis for a while, so I just preached on this like a year ago.
14:51: And I made the argument that we don't know for certain, but he was not a little boy.
14:58: By this time, based on the ages, he would have been probably teenage years.
15:02: And the fact that Abraham tied him up, some people think that tying him up was the fact that he was struggling.
15:09: But I think Abraham was like 90-something years old, and here's a teenage boy.
15:13: I think he would have had a hard time tying him up if he wasn't willing.
15:16: Well, he carried him.
15:17: It doesn't say he carried him.
15:19: He said he carried his own sticks.
15:21: He says, what's his name? Isaac carried...
15:25: In fact, it's a picture of Christ carrying the cross.
15:28: He carries the sticks that he's about to be burned on.
15:31: So there's a picture of...
15:33: Isaac is a picture of Jesus because he is the only son of the Father about to be sacrificed.
15:39: So Isaac becomes a picture of Christ in that.
15:41: But yeah, Isaac was old enough to go up there, and I do think he was willing.
15:46: I actually think he was a willing sacrifice, but I can't prove that.
15:49: That's just my opinion.
15:51: But like I said, if you go back and read it, it's interesting to think about him being a teenager, not a little boy.
15:55: Yes, sir.
15:56: I'm saying between what he said...
15:59: I'm looking at he had to be a little boy instead of a teenager because he had to have a little big struggle with a teenager versus a little kid.
16:07: Yeah, but the text says he was older.
16:09: It's not an opinion.
16:10: The text says that he was older.
16:12: He wasn't a little boy.
16:14: Did he sacrifice him? Huh? No, he was...
16:20: He tied him up.
16:23: He was laid out on the altar that he had made up like stones and wood.
16:29: He laid him on the altar, and he was about to take the knife and come across here.
16:36: A lot of people think he was going to stab him, but that's not the way sacrifice was done.
16:39: Sacrifice was done by slitting the throat.
16:41: So I believe the knife was at his throat.
16:44: And it says, The angel of the Lord said, Lay not your hand upon the child.
16:50: And then a ram was caught in a thicket where Abraham saw the ram, and Abraham replaced Isaac with the ram.
16:59: That's a picture, again, of substitution.
17:01: Christ becoming the substitute, right? So Christ is pictured two ways.
17:04: He's pictured first by Isaac, the sacrifice, and then the substitute of the ram taking the place of Isaac.
17:11: And so the ram becomes...
17:12: But he's willing.
17:13: The narrative in Paul's point is he's willing to do it.
17:18: I don't even know I could walk up the mountain.
17:20: And it was three days.
17:21: The other thing, from the day that God called him to do it to the day that he went up the mountain took three days' walk.
17:27: Can you imagine how hard that would be to walk three days next to your son knowing you're going to take a knife and split his throat open? Yeah.
17:39: Go ahead.
17:40: You think he kind of figured it out because Isaac asked him not to sacrifice him.
17:47: God will provide.
17:49: Jehovah-Jireh.
17:49: That's where that term comes from.
17:51: I think what though? I think maybe he figured that God would change his mind.
17:57: I don't know.
17:59: He said God will provide.
18:01: The book of Hebrews says this.
18:03: It says, Abraham was certain that God could raise him from the dead.
18:07: So I think Abraham believed that if he killed his son that God would raise him from the dead.
18:13: Now that's faith.
18:15: I mean honestly, if he really believed, if I take his life, God will give it back.
18:20: Because Isaac is the promise of the covenant that God made which was your children will be as the sands of the sea.
18:29: He's the only one.
18:30: Now you can talk about Ishmael or you can talk about his adopted son which is Eleazar of Damascus.
18:41: There were two other children.
18:43: But this is the son of the promise.
18:44: Isaac is the son of the promise.
18:46: Given to him through his wife Sarai and given to him to say through this child will your descendants come who will be as numerous as the sand of the sea.
18:55: So he believed if he killed him he would be brought back to life.
18:59: So he's doing this in faith.
19:02: And again, I tend to think Isaac is receiving it in faith.
19:06: I can't prove that but I tend to think that way.
19:09: That these men are acting in faith.
19:11: But Paul is using this example to say this.
19:16: What did Abraham receive because of his works? The answer is nothing.
19:23: Look at verse 2.
19:24: For if Abraham was justified by his works he has something to boast about but not before God.
19:35: For what does the scripture say? Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness.
19:41: Now I've got to show you a timeline on this because it's important.
19:44: That phrase, Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness that is a quote from Genesis 15-6.
19:57: Now when did Abraham offer Isaac? Genesis 22.
20:06: Alright? So we have several chapters and this actually is several decades of time between this and this.
20:15: When was Abraham counted righteous? He believed God.
20:21: It was counted to him as righteousness.
20:22: It says it in Genesis 15-6.
20:24: That's when it happened.
20:26: He's counted righteous here.
20:27: So does his works make him righteous? No.
20:32: Because he's counted righteous before these things.
20:35: That's the point Paul is making.
20:38: That Abraham's righteousness was by faith not by works.
20:48: And Paul is saying he was counted righteous before he did these great works of faith.
20:56: That's the key.
20:57: Yes? So Paul is saying that it's not counted as a gift but it has its due.
21:04: Okay, we haven't got there yet.
21:06: That's verse 4, right? No, it's okay.
21:08: It's okay because I want to make...
21:09: I'm building a point because verse 4 he says now to the one who works his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due.
21:17: What he's saying is if you work for your salvation then it's not a gift.
21:22: If you work for your righteousness it's not a gift.
21:24: It's just like if you went to your job you work 40 hours at the end of the week the employer comes and says I have a gift for you.
21:33: It's a paycheck.
21:35: You say that ain't a gift.
21:36: That's what I earn.
21:39: Right? That ain't a gift.
21:40: I worked all those hours.
21:42: You're paying me for my hours.
21:44: That's my wage.
21:45: That's not a gift.
21:49: But if I give you something that you don't earn that's a gift.
21:54: And that's what righteousness is for us.
21:57: It's not something we earn.
21:59: It's something that is given as a gift.
22:02: That's Paul's point.
22:03: Abraham didn't earn it but received it by faith as a gift.
22:08: Does that make sense? To the one who works that's the person who's working for something his wages are not a gift but his due.
22:23: That's what he earned.
22:25: Due is what you earn.
22:27: Yeah.
22:28: But look at verse 5.
22:29: And to the one who does not work but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly his faith is counted as righteousness.
22:41: This is the Gospel.
22:44: Honestly, I could spend weeks on this.
22:46: Because this is the heart of everything we believe.
22:50: That our righteousness is not our own.
22:54: Paul says the righteousness that we have is an alien.
22:58: In fact, this was the term Martin Luther used.
23:01: Alien righteousness.
23:02: And that doesn't mean like alien.
23:04: No, not that kind of alien.
23:05: Alien means something from the outside.
23:08: Right? Your righteousness is not something that comes from within you.
23:14: Your righteousness is something that comes from outside of you.
23:17: Paul says I stand having a righteousness that does not come from within but that comes from faith in Jesus Christ.
23:25: Does not come from keeping the law but comes from faith in Jesus Christ.
23:29: A righteousness which comes by faith.
23:32: That is alien.
23:33: It's from the outside.
23:35: Christ is perfect.
23:37: You are imperfect.
23:39: Christ is sinless.
23:40: You are sinner.
23:42: Christ is whole.
23:45: You are broken.
23:45: You are wounded.
23:47: Christ's goodness becomes yours.
23:50: Your badness becomes His.
23:54: This is it.
23:55: You didn't do anything to earn it.
23:57: You didn't do anything to deserve it.
23:58: If you go to heaven and God says why should I let you into My kingdom and you say anything other than Jesus Christ alone, you are going to be found wanting.
24:11: Because that's the only thing.
24:12: It's Christ.
24:14: I helped old ladies across the street.
24:16: I was in the Boy Scouts.
24:17: I gave all my money to the poor and the afflicted.
24:20: It will not earn your way to heaven.
24:22: All those are good things.
24:23: And I ain't saying don't help old ladies.
24:25: I ain't saying don't give away your money.
24:26: I'm not saying good works are unimportant.
24:29: I am saying they do not produce the righteousness that God requires.
24:33: The only righteousness that produces the righteousness that God requires is the righteousness of Jesus Christ.
24:40: I remember I told this story but some of you are new so I can tell it again.
24:42: There was a dude who came to the church one time and needed food.
24:47: He was living on the street, having a tough time.
24:49: Came to the church.
24:50: Hey, you got any food? Yes.
24:52: We go into the kitchen and I start pulling out bread and peanut butter and stuff that we had in the cupboard and I was giving him some food.
25:00: Well, during this, I'm sharing the gospel with him.
25:04: And he says, I said, I'm trusting completely in Jesus Christ for my salvation.
25:13: I can't trust in anything I have done.
25:15: I have to trust completely in Him.
25:17: Right? This is part of what I'm saying.
25:19: And the dude says, Oh, preacher, you can't think like that.
25:26: I said, why? He said, you've got to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps.
25:30: You can't trust and rely on other people.
25:33: I said, dude, you're homeless and getting a peanut butter sandwich because you ain't got nothing.
25:37: Talking about pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps.
25:39: First of all, the biggest hypocrite in the world is you right now because you're so dumb you don't realize what you're saying.
25:45: But two, when it comes to righteousness, I ain't got no boots and I ain't got no straps.
25:53: I ain't got nothing.
25:55: I have nothing to hand the Lord of glory to say this is why I deserve Your grace.
26:04: The song that we sing, I don't know if you all sing it here, but it's a hymn.
26:07: Nothing in my hand I bring, only to the cross I cling.
26:12: Naked come to Thee for dress.
26:16: Helpless stand before Thee at rest.
26:20: That's all I can do.
26:22: I have to trust in Christ because I don't have righteousness of my own.
26:26: I have to trust in His goodness because my goodness is not enough.
26:31: My wickedness, my sins are crimson red, the Bible says, but He washes them white as snow.
26:39: You understand? That's why you need Christ.
26:42: You try to go with your own righteousness, you will find yourself busting hell wide open.
26:47: And you can come to me later and tell me how good you think you are.
26:50: But all I have to do is walk you through the Ten Commandments and show you that you are a man worthy of hell, same as me.
26:57: The Bible says all liars will have their place in the lake of fire.
27:00: Have you ever told a lie? And you will have your place in the lake of fire if you don't trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.
27:06: Because all liars will have their place in the lake of fire.
27:11: And that's only one of the Ten Commandments.
27:13: Should I do more? Jesus said, if you ever looked at a woman with lust, you've committed adultery in your heart.
27:18: Is there any man in this room who can say you've never looked at a woman or a man, I don't know, with lust? I'm just saying.
27:29: I ain't trying to be funny.
27:30: I'm just saying.
27:31: Tell me that you stand here pure as the driven snow.
27:34: You're not.
27:34: Right.
27:40: I remember one time I went to, I was in Burger King.
27:44: Right there on River City, Burger King.
27:47: And I was talking to this dude behind the counter.
27:49: Young man.
27:50: And I said, hey, I want to ask you a question.
27:53: I want to share the Gospel with you.
27:55: He said, would you consider yourself to be a good person? He says, well, sure I'm a good person.
27:59: I said, have you ever told a lie? And he says, well, yeah, I've told a lie.
28:01: I said, what do you call people who tell lies? They're liars.
28:03: I said, have you ever stole anything? He said, I ain't sure.
28:06: I said, what do you call people who steal stuff? They're thieves.
28:08: I said, so you're a lying thief, man.
28:10: That's pretty serious.
28:11: I said, but here's a big one.
28:12: You ever look with lust in your heart? You ever looked at a woman to lust after her? And he said, no.
28:18: I said, you've never looked at a woman to lust after her ever? And he said, no.
28:21: I said, are you gay? And he got kind of mad.
28:27: What you saying? I said, are you gay? And he goes, no.
28:33: What does lust mean? I said, you ever look at a woman and have dirty thoughts? Oh, yeah, all the time.
28:44: That's lust.
28:48: You don't prove your point.
28:52: So you understand.
28:54: All we like sheep have gone astray.
28:58: Every one of us has turned to his own way.
29:00: But he has laid the iniquity of us on him.
29:04: That's what Isaiah 53 says.
29:06: We are like sheep who have gone astray.
29:07: But God lays our iniquity on Christ.
29:10: He becomes our scapegoat.
29:13: That's a biblical concept.
29:15: You understand? Back during the time of the tabernacle, they would pull a goat out.
29:18: They would pray the sins of the people over that goat.
29:21: And they would send that goat off into the wilderness.
29:23: And that goat represented expiation.
29:26: Expiation was the idea of carrying away the sin.
29:31: Jesus Christ comes.
29:32: Our sin is placed upon Him.
29:34: And He takes our sin from us as far as the east is from the west.
29:40: And Paul is telling us, Abraham, who lived 2,000 years before Jesus, pointed to Christ because he believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness.
29:52: You see, Christ and the Gospel is the point of the Bible from the beginning to the end.
29:57: It's not just that last one-third.
30:01: The whole Bible points to Him.
30:04: From the very moment sin entered the world, the need for a Savior came.
30:08: And the promise of a Savior came when God looked at the devil and said, one day there will come a seed of the woman who will crush your head, though you will bruise His heel.
30:17: That was a promise that Jesus was going to come.
30:20: Later, we see God make that same promise to Abraham that through you, all the nations of the world will be blessed.
30:27: How is it that all the nations of the world are blessed through Abraham? Because of Christ.
30:32: Because in Christ there are people from every tribe, tongue, and nation who will be saved because of Him.
30:41: And then later, one of the sons of Israel, because Abraham had Isaac.
30:45: Isaac had Jacob who was called Israel.
30:47: And Jacob had 12 sons.
30:48: And one of those sons was named Judah.
30:50: And when Jacob was dying, he looked at Judah and he says, the scepter will not depart from your house, for Shiloh will come.
30:59: And when he comes, the nations will bow down to him.
31:03: That was a promise of the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.
31:07: The one the scepter belonged to was Jesus.
31:11: It was given to Judah, but it was because of the line of Judah that the Lion of the tribe of Judah would come.
31:19: Jesus Christ.
31:21: Christ is throughout the Bible.
31:22: And faith in Him has been the one way of salvation for people of all time.
31:28: Now you say, the old people didn't know His name.
31:31: Yeah, but they knew He was coming.
31:33: They knew Shiloh was coming.
31:35: They knew the Promised One was coming.
31:37: This is why when Jesus came into the world, so many people said, are you the one who is to come? Because they knew He was coming.
31:47: Christ is the promise of all the Scriptures.
31:50: And Abraham is a picture of faith.
31:53: And it says that he believed and God counted it to him as righteousness.
32:01: Now, verses 6, 7, and 8, Paul quickly talks about David as he just talked about Abraham.
32:10: And he's going to go back to Abraham in a moment, but he quickly jumps to David.
32:15: He says, just as David speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from worse, blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered.
32:28: Blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin.
32:33: Let me tell you something.
32:35: That's the blessing that you want.
32:37: People always talk about health and wealth and prosperity and all these things.
32:42: Blessing.
32:44: Praises go up.
32:46: Blessings come down.
32:47: We all hear that stuff.
32:49: The one blessing that matters most is not that you're healthy or that you are wealthy, that you've got a big house or a big family.
33:00: The one blessing that matters most is that your lawless deeds are forgiven and your sins are covered and God will not count them against you.
33:10: That's the blessing that matters.
33:13: So I'm going to tell you something.
33:14: You can live a poor life, but it ain't going to be compared to your eternity if you're in Christ.
33:20: And you can live a rich life, but it ain't going to be compared to the eternity of hell that awaits you if you're outside of Jesus.
33:28: The only thing that matters is if you trust in Christ.
33:31: That's the only thing that's going to change your destiny is if you trust in Christ.
33:36: And that's the key to all this is blessed is the man whose lawless deeds are forgiven, whose sins are covered.
33:46: Now, beginning at verse 9, I may not make it through the whole chapter today, but I'm going to try to get at least most of it done.
33:53: I'm going to try to stop right at 45 minutes so you guys can have a good break.
33:57: We've got about 10 minutes left.
34:00: Beginning at verse 9, he asks the question, is this blessing only for the circumcised or also for the uncircumcised? Now, before he answers the question, I just want to explain why he's asking this.
34:13: The Jewish people were known and distinguished by their circumcision because that was the covenant that God gave to Abraham as a sign of their relationship.
34:27: They were in a covenant together.
34:29: God said, here's how you're going to show the sign of the covenant.
34:32: You're going to have all of your male children circumcised on the eighth day.
34:37: Circumcision is the cutting off of the tip of the foreskin of the penis.
34:41: This was going to be the sign that your people are different.
34:46: Which is interesting because it's a hidden sign.
34:49: I mean, unless you live in a nudist colony, don't nobody know if you're circumcised or not.
34:53: But it was a sign that was given at birth, eight days after birth, but it was given so that these children were separated, designated, as the people of Abraham, which were the people of God.
35:09: Right? And so now, Paul is asking this question.
35:14: God has given a promise.
35:15: He's given justification by faith.
35:18: But is this promise only for people who have been circumcised? Or is it also for the uncircumcised? The reason why he's asking this question is because during this time in history, by the way, this is in the 50's, and I don't mean like the 1950's, I mean like the original 50's.
35:40: Jesus died around year 30.
35:43: The first book of the Bible was written around year 48 to 49.
35:47: Probably was either the book of Galatians or the book of James.
35:49: One of those would have been first.
35:51: And then after that, most of the New Testament was written between the year 50 and the year 77.
35:58: I'm sorry, 70.
35:59: So it's a 20 year period.
36:02: The New Testament is written by several different authors.
36:05: There's Paul being one of the primary authors, and then you have the Gospel writers and the others.
36:10: So these books are being written.
36:12: One of them, of course, is Galatians.
36:14: That's the first one.
36:15: This one is Romans.
36:16: It's written, like I said, in the 50's, maybe 60's.
36:20: Paul writes this book at a time when the Jewish people were saying to the Christians, believing in Jesus is not enough.
36:30: You also have to follow all of Moses' laws.
36:33: The most important is you have to be circumcised.
36:36: If you're not circumcised, you can't be saved.
36:41: And Paul argues, if you want to get Paul's argument for that, read Galatians.
36:46: It's a short book, six chapters.
36:48: I preached through it a few years ago here.
36:51: And it is Paul's argument against the Judaizers.
36:56: The Judaizers was the group that said for you to be saved, for you to be saved by Christ, you first have to be circumcised.
37:03: You first have to keep Moses' law.
37:06: And Paul says that is not the case.
37:09: That Christ has come to save the circumcised and the uncircumcised.
37:15: Now, think about that when we read this question again.
37:20: Is this blessing only for the circumcised or also for the uncircumcised? For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness.
37:30: How then was it counted to him? Was it before or after he was circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised.
37:35: Now, I'm going to go back to my timeline.
37:40: Genesis 15, 6.
37:42: He believed God, it was accounted to him as righteousness.
37:44: Genesis 22.
37:45: He offered up Isaac, showed a great act of faith.
37:47: When was he circumcised? Genesis 17.
37:53: Two chapters after this.
37:55: So Paul's argument is this.
37:57: His righteousness did not come by circumcision because his righteousness came before he was circumcised.
38:05: Circumcision was added later.
38:07: His righteousness came by faith.
38:11: You get the picture? And that's what he just says.
38:15: Was it before or after he was circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised.
38:22: Verse 11.
38:23: He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had.
38:27: The righteousness that he had.
38:28: Not that he was going to have, but that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised.
38:35: I get excited.
38:36: I don't know about you guys.
38:37: This is a big deal to me.
38:39: This is important.
38:40: Because he says, the purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised so that the righteousness would be counted to them as well and to make him the father of the circumcised who were not merely circumcised but also walking the footsteps of the faith of our father Abraham before he was circumcised.
38:57: For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be the heir of the world did not come through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.
39:04: That's the point.
39:07: Salvation is not by law.
39:10: Salvation is by faith.
39:11: Does that mean the law doesn't matter? No.
39:13: The law is good.
39:14: And we should do the law.
39:15: We should love the law.
39:16: We should want to be righteous people in our actions.
39:20: We should want to fulfill the law of God and live by the fruit of the Spirit.
39:24: Love.
39:26: Joy.
39:27: Peace.
39:28: Patience.
39:29: Kindness.
39:29: Goodness.
39:30: Gentleness.
39:31: Faithfulness.
39:32: Self-control.
39:33: That should mark all of our lives if we claim Christ.
39:36: That's the fruit of the Spirit.
39:38: But we are not saved by those things.
39:42: Those things are the fruit of our being saved.
39:47: A tree bears good fruit because it's a good tree.
39:54: The fruit doesn't make the tree good.
39:57: The fruit demonstrates the goodness of the tree.
40:02: Therefore, our good works don't make us good.
40:06: They demonstrate that God has changed our hearts.
40:09: This is why Ephesians 2 says, For by grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves.
40:16: It is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.
40:20: For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.
40:31: So the Christian arithmetic is the only word I can think of right now.
40:41: The math problem of Christianity is Christ plus nothing equals salvation.
40:54: If you put anything there, my works, my goodness, my church attendance, my giving, my treating old ladies good, or walking old ladies across the street, or being a Boy Scout, whatever.
41:04: You put anything in that hole, you have missed the Gospel.
41:08: It is Christ plus nothing equals salvation.
41:11: But salvation equals good works because that's the fruit of salvation.
41:18: If you put good works in that hole, you've missed the Gospel.
41:23: It's Christ plus nothing equals salvation and my salvation produces good works.
41:28: If I say Christ plus works equals salvation, I have a false Gospel and I am missing out on the rest that I can have in Jesus.
41:36: Because when I learn that Christ is my righteousness, I can finally have my Sabbath.
41:42: I can finally have my rest.
41:44: Because Jesus says, Come to Me, all ye who are weary and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
41:52: If I want true rest, I will find it in Jesus Christ and Him alone.
42:01: I think that's a good place to end.
42:02: Let's pray.
42:03: Father, I thank You for Your Word.
42:05: I thank You for these men.
42:07: I pray that this Word would be an encouragement to them.
42:10: And Lord, that if they are trusting in anything other than Christ alone, that they would repent of that and trust in Him and find their hope and their Sabbath in their Savior.
42:19: In Jesus' name, Amen.