WWUTT 252 The Obedience of Faith?

The same way that God brought all things into existence, speaking them into existence, he said let there be light and there was.

He brings about saving faith in your life the exact same way when we understand the text.

This is when we understand the text studying God's word to reach all the riches of full assurance in Christ.

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Here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe Hughes. Thank you, Becky. Turn in your Bible to Romans chapter 16.

Today we finish our study of the book of Romans. Tomorrow we're going to be doing some highlighting, underlining key passages from chapters 12 through 16.

But as far as our exegetical study goes, today is the last as we'll be looking at Paul's closing doxology in Romans chapter 16 verses 25 through 27.

The apostle says, now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages, but has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings has been made known to all nations according to the command of the eternal

God to bring about the obedience of faith to the only wise God be glory forevermore through Jesus Christ.

Amen. This is what is referred to as a doxology and that word doxology comes from doxa which means glory and logia which means saying.

So it is a praise or a sort of a hymn to God and very often we will see the

New Testament writers conclude their letters with some form of a doxology. And I mentioned yesterday that my favorite doxology in particular is

Jude's at the close of Jude's letter. But this one is great too. As Paul says to him who is able to strengthen you and it's not that that God is merely able, but that he will.

That is really what Paul is saying here. It is God who will give us strength according to the gospel.

As we hear the gospel of Christ, we are continually renewed in our minds and in our hearts with the hope of God, the hope of his spirit that has been poured into us.

As it says in Romans chapter 5, and hope does not disappoint us, Paul says, because the

Holy Spirit has been poured into our hearts. So as we hear the gospel proclaimed and we know about our sins being forgiven and we are continually assured that we have peace with God and we know that after this life is over, we will be forever with the

Lord and we will be fellow heirs with Christ into his eternal kingdom.

It is by the constant reminders of the gospel that we know and understand these things and we are strengthened to him who strengthens you according to the gospel and according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages, but has now been disclosed.

So we talked about this yesterday, the mystery that is Christ Jesus that has only since been revealed to us in this time, but was not fully understood by those who lived in the

Old Testament on the Old Testament side of the cross. To give a better word picture of this, to kind of explain this even in a better summary than I was able to do yesterday,

Matt Smethurst on Twitter tweeted something that I thought was just great. He said, Old Testament is anticipation.

Gospels is manifestation. The book of Acts is proclamation. The epistles, which is the writings, the letters from the apostles is explanation.

And the book of Revelation is consummation. The Bible is about Jesus. So the whole

Old Testament is the anticipation of the coming of the son of God who is going to reconcile all of God's people to himself through the person and work of Jesus Christ.

The gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John is the manifestation of that promise of Christ who would come in the flesh,

God in the flesh, who would live the perfect life and die the death that we could not die to atone for sin.

In the book of Acts, it is the proclamation. So here is what Christ has done, the declaration of the gospel and the building of his church.

And then in the epistles, it's the explanation. That's where we get the doctrinal teaching and all of the deep theology comes out of the epistles explaining what it is that Christ has done and how he is the fulfillment of all the law and the prophets.

And then the book of Revelation is going to be the consummation, is going to be when God restores all things to its glorious perfection through Jesus Christ, making peace by the blood of his cross, as it talks about in the book of Colossians.

So there's a better summary of what it was that we were talking about yesterday. The mystery that was kept secret for long ages, but has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings has been made known to all nations according to the command of the eternal

God. So remember the great commission, the command that Jesus gave his disciples at the end of the book of Matthew and Matthew 28, he said, all power and authority has been given to me.

Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing in the name of the father and the son and the

Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even to the very end of the age.

So Christ had commanded that the gospel would go out and his apostles in obedience with that command did that very thing.

The mystery that was kept secret for long ages has been disclosed to the prophetic writings made known to all nations according to the command of the eternal

God. Jesus Christ, who is the eternal God, commanded that the gospel would go out.

And it was so to bring about the obedience of faith. So think about what we read in Romans 10, 17, faith comes by hearing and hearing through the word of Christ.

So when the gospel is proclaimed, obedience comes about in response to the declaration of the gospel, the people of God, those whom

God had predestined to be in him from the foundation of the world. Those who he had predestined to be conformed to the image of Christ, as we talked about yesterday and as mentioned in Romans chapter eight, that was brought about by the declaration of the gospel and God's people.

Those who had been predestined came to obedience. The, the, uh, their obedience was brought about by the declaration of the gospel to bring about the obedience of faith.

Faith comes by hearing the word of Christ, the commands to repent and obey.

These are not suggestions, okay? They're not Jesus saying, if you just do these things, then you will have eternal life.

When Jesus says, repent and follow, these are commands. Those who are his sheep will do them and those who are not his sheep won't.

So you know who the people of God are when they repent of their sins and they follow

Christ. That's how we know who they are. It is not for us to know who the elect are.

That's for God to know. We are to know the gospel and to preach it. And those who are his elect will repent of their sins and will follow

Christ. The declaration of the gospel brings about the obedience of faith.

You follow God. You are saved in Christ Jesus, not because you made a choice by your own free will.

You only made that choice because the spirit conditioned your heart to receive the gospel and you obeyed.

The same way that God brought all things into existence by speaking a command and it was.

That's what we read all the way through Genesis 1. God said and it was. God commanded and it was.

God said, let there be light and it was so. The same way that God brought about the existence of all things is the very same way that he brings about saving faith in your life.

God commands it. His word goes out. It is spoken into your heart and you obey.

Did the light resist the command of God? God said, let there be light and the light went,

I don't know. You know, let me let me decide. Let me buy a free will choice. Decide whether or not

I want to exist. God commands it and it is so. No human being has any sort of power or authority to resist the command of God.

So when God commands to obey, his people do. And those who do not,

God's glory will still be manifest in them as well as his glory will be shown through their judgment and their destruction to see that God is fully just.

God is so just that he could wipe us out as we are and he would be completely justified in doing that.

But because God is also a God of grace and love and mercy because he wants his full manifestation of glory to be witnessed by his people, then he has sent

Christ to redeem us from all lawlessness and purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works as is talked about in Titus chapter two.

It's in the book of Ezekiel where we read the story of the Valley of Dry Bones, where God tells

Ezekiel to go and speak to the Valley of Dry Bones, stand up, and then they do.

Okay, this is a picture of the gospel that is going out. But before we get to chapter 37, there's something very important that happens in chapter 36.

So the Israelites who had fallen away from the Lord, God, through his prophet

Ezekiel is talking about how he is going to restore his people. And here is what is said in chapter 36, say to the house of Israel, thus says the

Lord God, it is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came.

So what the Israelites deserve is to be wiped out, but for the sake of his own name, God is going to act and I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations in which you have profaned among them.

And the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Lord God, when through you

I vindicate my holiness before their eyes. I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land.

I will sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses and from all your idols,

I will cleanse you and I will give you a new heart and a new spirit and I will put within you the new spirit that I will put within you and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh and I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

This is Ezekiel 36 verse 27. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

Notice this is God saying, I'm going to cleanse you from your idols. I am going to cleanse you from your uncleannesses.

This is not God saying, repent and return to me, although that is what Israel needs to do.

But it's not just because God gave them an option and they did it, but because God did it.

God is the one who caused their repentance. And that's stated very clearly in 2nd

Timothy chapter 2 verse 25, where it says that God grants repentance. And we also see it stated twice in the book of Acts that God granted repentance to Israel and that God granted repentance to the

Gentiles as well. Repentance comes from God. It is not something that we do by some free will choice because our will, the inclination of our will is only to sin.

It is only to rebel against God. We have read in Romans chapter 3 that there is none righteous.

No one does good, not even one person. And then we get to Romans 3 23 for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and are justified by his grace as a gift as a choice.

No, as the gift of God, we are justified by his grace.

It is God who does this work, not us. If you made a decision to follow Christ, I don't take that away from you.

You absolutely did decide. But when we read the deep theology of the scriptures, what we come to understand is that we only made that choice because God changed our heart to make that choice.

We could not do it until he put within us his spirit that made us able to walk in his statutes and be careful to obey his rules.

We could not respond to God in a way that was holy and pleasing to God until he put his spirit in us to respond to him in that way.

In Titus chapter 3 verse 5, we read the following. He saved us not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the

Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our savior, so that being justified by his grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

So this regeneration of the spirit happens first before we are able to respond to the gospel of Christ.

Notice here that God says through the prophet Ezekiel in Ezekiel chapter 36,

I will put a new spirit within you. I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and I will give you a heart of flesh.

I will soften you is basically what the Lord is saying here. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers and you shall be my people and I will be your

God and I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses and I will summon the grain and make it abundant and lay no famine upon you and I will make the fruit of the tree and the increase of the field abundant that you may never again suffer the disgrace of famine among the nations.

Then you will remember your evil ways and your deeds that were not good and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominations.

It is not for your sake that I will act declares the Lord God. Let that be known to you.

Be ashamed and confounded for your ways. Oh house of Israel. Thus says the

Lord God on the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will cause the cities to be inhabited and the waste places shall be rebuilt.

God will cause these things to happen and the land that was desolate shall be tilled instead of being the desolation that it was in the sight of all who pass by and they will say this land that was desolate has become like the

Garden of Eden and the waste and desolate and ruined cities are now fortified and inhabited.

Then the nations that are left all around you shall know that I am the Lord. I have rebuilt the ruined places and replanted that which was desolate.

I am the Lord. I have spoken and I will do it. It is by the command of God that these things happen.

So then in Ezekiel chapter 37, what we see is the picture of the

Valley of dry bones. The hand of the Lord was upon me Ezekiel writes and he brought me out in the spirit of the

Lord and set me down in the middle of the Valley. It was full of bones and he led me around among them and behold.

There were very many on the surface of the Valley and behold they were very dry. In other words, they were dead.

They had been there for a long time. They were practically fossils. There was no way to put any life into these bones and God said to me son of man can these bones live and I answered

Oh Lord, you know and then he said to me prophesy over these bones and say to them

Oh dry bones hear the word of the Lord thus says the Lord God to these bones behold

I will cause breath to enter you and and you shall live and I will lay sinews upon you and will cause flesh to come upon you and cover you with skin and put breath in you and you shall live you shall know that I am the

Lord. So as I prophesied as I was commanded and as I prophesied there was a sound and behold a rattling and the bones came together bone to its bone and I looked and behold there were sinews on them and flesh had come upon them and the skin had covered them, but there was no breath in them.

Then he said to me prophesy to the breath prophesy son of man and say to the breath thus says the

Lord God come from the four winds Oh breath and breathe on these slain that they may live so I prophesied as he commanded me and the breath came into them and they lived and stood on their feet an exceedingly great army.

Then he said to me son of man these bones are the whole house of Israel behold they say our bones are dried up and our hope is lost we are indeed cut off therefore prophesy and say to them thus says the

Lord God behold I will open your graves and raise you from your graves Oh my people and I will bring you into the land of Israel and you shall know that I am the

Lord when I open your graves and raise you from your graves Oh my people and I will put my spirit within you and you shall live and I will place you in your own land then you shall know that I am the

Lord I have spoken and I will do it declares the Lord again by the command of God not by anyone's decision and so that we would know even further that it is not by our will that any of these things happen.

Do you do anything to raise the dead? Do you have the power to do that? If you were to die do you have the free will ability to raise yourself from your own death?

Can you see a find a dead person on the streets been run over by a truck they're dead there's no life signs in them whatsoever can you say to that person hey stand up let's go to the hospital over here and get you some help you have an ability to revive that person so they can go to the hospital and get help you can put the jumper paddles on them all day that defibrillator is not going to bring them back to life it's simply not going to happen you have no power to raise the dead so when we read in Ephesians chapter 2 that we were dead in our sins and our trespasses that is total it is final and there is nothing that you can do to raise yourself from the dead but Christ who has the power over the grave itself can speak into our deadness and raise us to life he spoke to Lazarus in a tomb and said

Lazarus come out Lazarus went in there going I don't know I don't know if it's the right time you know maybe

I'll make up my mind later on whether or not I want to obey this command no Lazarus got up out of his grave clothes and he walked out and this is the way that Christ gives life to every dead person who is dead in their sins and their trespasses the gospel was spoken to us in our deadness the

Holy Spirit was put into our hearts to receive the message of that gospel we heard it proclaimed we believed we repented of our sins we were remorseful over the evil that we had done and now we seek and pursue the righteousness and the holiness of God because God has commanded it not because we have willed it and this very picture that we've read here in Ezekiel 36 and Ezekiel 37 is exactly the thing that Jesus says to to Nicodemus in John chapter 3 it is this very conversation that they are having in the very famous section of the

Bible where Jesus says for God so loved the world that he gave his only son and whoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life

Jesus said to Nicodemus that in order to enter the kingdom of God he must be born again and Nicodemus in John 3 verse 4 said how can a man be born when he is old can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born and Jesus answered truly truly

I say to you unless one is born of water and the spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God and this is that very passage that we looked at in Ezekiel where God said that he would sprinkle clean water on us and he would put his spirit within us this is exactly what

Jesus is alluding to what it was that was written down by the prophet Ezekiel that which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the spirit is spirit so a person is not just born in the flesh but they are born again in the spirit a person who is in the flesh has no ability to birth themselves in the spirit it is only the spirit of God that has the ability to do that do not marvel that I said to you you must be born again the wind blows where it wishes and you hear it sound but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes so it is with everyone who is born of the spirit and this is the very picture that we see in the valley of dry bones where Ezekiel prophesied and the four winds came and gave life to the bones that had been raised up this is the way that the spirit of God works and this is the testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ that when it is prophesied we raise up in our deadness

God's spirit is put in us to receive the the message of that gospel and we are given life where previously there was death where previously we were dead in our sins we are now alive in Jesus Christ our

Lord because we heard the message of his gospel by the command of God we heard it we obeyed and now we live to the only wise

God Paul says Romans 16 27 to the only wise God be glory not to us but to God be glory forevermore through Jesus Christ amen

Gabriel Hughes is the pastor of First Southern Baptist Church in Junction City Kansas find out more online at www .tt