Book of Romans - Ch. 2, Vs. 29-Ch. 3, Vs. 25 (05/12/2002)

We're starting at the second chapter, verse 29 of Romans.

Almost finished the second chapter, but there's a little bit left.

But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly, and

circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter,

whose praise is not of men, but of God.

John 4 24 says God is a spirit,

and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.

Now, he did not say that you can worship him if you want

to, or that you worship him some other way.

He was very specific in that he is a spirit, and you must worship him in

spirit and truth.

I have a question.

Can you know more than you're supposed to know?

Can you know more than you're supposed to know?

Russell,

that's exactly right.

You cannot know more than you're supposed to know, because you know what you know, and that's all.

How is it that we worship God in spirit and truth, Bill?

How do we go about doing this?

All right, all right.

Do we worship him when we sing?

Do we worship him when we come to church?

Is it when you give your time and money?

Is it when you're home?

It can be all we can...

It can be when we do all of these, but it is not because of any of them.

We worship God in our mind and heart.

I want you to start right now getting prepared.

We're in the study phase.

Later, we come to the worship phase.

Now, I don't mean that you cannot worship him now, but

now we come to Romans, the third chapter.

Verse 1.

Paul asks a question.

What advantage hath the Jew, or what profit is there in circumcision?

This law was given to Abraham, long before there was a law.

Abraham may well rejoice and extol himself among men,

but he cannot do that before God.

Much every way, chiefly because that unto them were committed the

oracles of God.

Now, surely unrighteousness cannot make us righteous.

Is that a true statement, Clarence?

Surely unrighteousness cannot make us righteous.

They can't do that any more than impurity can make us clean,

nor do works rather than faith justify.

For then a believer is not justified upon his believing, but by his works

after his believing, and faith is not the

justifying grace, but only a preparation to those works which justify.

For what if some did not believe?

What if some of the Jews didn't believe?

Shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?

No, you can't affect God in any way.

Will he still not make good his promise to them that do believe?

God works in us, not through us, but in us.

We have the witness in us.

It is not through us.

God does not work through me to you.

That would prevent my responsibility to him.

If he just worked through me to you, I would have no responsibility at all.

First John 5 10, we find he that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in

himself.

He that believeth not God hath made him a liar.

Because he believeth not the record that God gave to his son.

Joy, can you make God a liar?

Well, what does he mean?

I don't see any if.

All right, from a viewpoint of God, he doesn't, he does not become a liar

just because you lied about him.

This prevents such things as God told me to tell you.

He, yes, yes.

He didn't tell me to tell you something.

He told me to tell you something, but that's not, I'm not responsible for

your doing it.

He works in me and you to bring about his will.

In certain cases, it may seem as though he's working through me or you, but it's still in

me and in you.

Four, God forbid, yea, let God be true, but every man a liar,

as it is written, that thou mightest be justified in thy sayings and mightest

overcome when thou art judged.

Justified.

David, give me a good, a good definition of the word justified.

All right.

Justification is not the forgiving, forgiveness of a man,

but there is a declaration that he possesses a righteousness which perfectly and forever

satisfies them all, namely Christ's righteousness.

It is by Christ that you're righteous.

You're not righteous, but in him you are.

We're not righteous one to another only to God.

Faith is called a condition, not because it possesses any merit, but only

because it is an instrument, the only instrument by

which the soul designates or experiences Christ and his righteousness.

The act of faith, which thus secures our justification, secures

also at the same time our sanctification.

And thus the doctrine of justification by faith does not lead to licentiousness.

Good words, while not the ground, are the certain consequences of justification.

You're not justified.

We're justified because he said so.

We become just like Christ in Christ.

But if our unrighteousness commend the righteousness of God,

what shall we say?

Is God unrighteous who taketh vengeance?

I speak as a man.

I use the mode of a man.

Sin.

Let's talk about sin for a little bit.

We all have our share of it.

Bill, give me a definition of sin.

All right.

Sin is any want of conformity unto or transgression of the law

of God.

In the inward state and habit of the soul, also an offense against a

personal lawgiver and moral governor who vindicates his law with penalties.

The soul that sins is always conscious of that sin in us.

It's deep -seated, vile, and polluting.

That is justly deserves punishment and calls down the righteous wrath of

God.

Our sin proves God's righteousness.

Verge, how does it do that?

All right.

Can I sin against you?

That's right.

You sin only against God.

Now, I can wrong you.

You can wrong me, but the sin of it goes against God.

Without sin in the world, now the purpose of sin,

without it, we would never know love.

Is that right, David?

He first had to love us for we would not know

love without his first loving us.

Six, God forbid, for then how shall God judge the world?

Question.

How shall the judgment, how shall he judge all men according to their deeds

if no sin is punished?

If he does not punish sin, how can he judge

men for their deeds, Russell,

if there is no judgment at all?

You can't.

He can't.

The way he judges is by punishment.

How shall he judge all men according to their deeds if there is no punishment?

That's the outcome of his judgment.

Seven, for if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie unto

his glory, why yet am I also judged as a sinner?

Now, if I have sinned and it proves his

glory, then why am I condemned as a sinner,

Greg?

All right.

Just the seventh verse, for if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie

unto the glory of God, why am I yet judged as a sinner?

What?

That's right.

We sin because we want to.

Yes.

That's right.

For if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie unto his glory, why am I yet judged as

a sinner?

Because I sinned because I wanted to.

Through my lie, if when I sin, God shows his truth in punishing and

thus glorifies himself, why am I to blame?

You sin because you wanted to.

When a man commits murder and is hung, the government has made a greater terror to

evildoers, and every man's life is rendered more safe because they

hung him.

Romans 8, verse 3 -8, and not rather as we have been slanderously

reported and as some affirm that we say, let us do evil that good may

come whose damnation is just.

This becomes a real problem for the man that

is claiming to be a Christian.

He cannot fathom this.

He can't understand.

The end does not justify the means.

What do I mean by that statement, David?

That's right.

Some of the Baptist churches are practicing that.

The end justifies the means.

For they believe, having come out of the Baptist Church, I

can say this, quote, we must get people into the church

so they can hear the word preached, so they can then accept Christ, and we'll use any

gimmick to accomplish it.

Unforbid such an idea.

What then?

Are we better than they?

No, and no wise, for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles that they are

all under sin.

Outside of Jesus Christ, name me one other

person in this world that has lived a righteous life.

Everybody is sin.

Everybody.

Can Jews be justified in any other way than Gentiles?

Certainly not, because both are sinners, and if saved, it must be not by

their own works, but by believing in Christ.

Ten, as it is written, there

is none righteous, no, not one.

Emphatic.

No, not one.

There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God.

Now, we're taking the sinners,

the world's view, because as the world stands, none

are seeking God.

No man could ever say be saved unless God draw him to Christ.

Is that right, Clarence?

The only ones who he will reveal himself to are

those that he has known from eternity past.

It is as though he has a list of everybody that belongs to him.

In Ephesians 1 and 4, according as he hath chosen us

in him before the foundations of the world, that we should be holy and

without blame before him in love.

He chose us before there was any us.

These people, his chosen, are the only ones that would ever have been

born if sin had not come into the world.

I hope you understand that.

Go to Genesis 3, 15.

These are the only ones that will share eternity with him.

Matthew 11, 27, all things are delivered unto me of my father,

and no man knoweth the son, but the father,

neither knoweth any man the father save the son, and he to whomsoever the son will reveal

him.

He's been revealed to us.

But Galatians 1, 15, but when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's

womb and called me by his grace to reveal his son in me,

that I might preach him among the heathen immediately, I conferred not

with flesh and blood.

Paul says of himself, when God chose

to reveal to me, he revealed to every one of us

when he decided it was time.

Now, he doesn't decide, but when it is time, you will know.

Now, that's not just your salvation.

You will know every facet that you know when it's time.

Matthew 11, 27, if

left alone, what would happen to man?

You know,

would he be as sinful as the devil?

Yes, he would.

You'd be just as wicked as he if God left you alone.

Now, yes,

yes, they're busy doing their

evil part in the world.

11 states that no man seeks after God.

Let me make this statement.

You cannot refuse that which you do not seek.

So when God calls you, you will come, imperative.

And what does imperative mean?

That it will absolutely, without a doubt, happen, as he said.

So be careful when you make an imperative statement.

312.

They are all gone out of the way.

They are together become unprofitable.

There is none that doeth good.

No, not one.

No man is basically good if just given a chance.

I've heard that all my life.

Well, he's just good.

It's all covered up in this badness, but if we just give him a chance,

he'll turn out good.

Yes.

You have to learn to do evil.

There's no school that that you go to to graduate evil.

So no man is wicked because of society and his environment.

Know this, and I'll say it again.

If two things are so related that one is the condition of the

other, then the existence of one is the evidence that the

other is present.

What's that mean, Greg?

You turn the light on.

We can't see the electricity, but we see the light, so we know the electricity is there.

Now, I take it that you all believe that.

Let me give you another example.

If you have learned any spiritual truth, no matter how small it is,

but you know it's the truth, that proves that the Holy Spirit is in you.

You are a child of God.

Even though you can't see him, he's there.

Christ does not reveal his truth to anyone unless he knows it to be necessary.

Thirteen.

Their throat is an open sepulcher.

With their tongues they have used deceit.

The poison of asps is under their lips.

Throat is an open sepulcher.

This is a perfect participle.

A grave that has been opened with the result that it stands open.

Their mouth is filled with words that stink, like a newly opened grave.

He's talking about the Jew, whose mouth, fourteen, whose

mouth is full of cursings and bitterness.

They never speak, but in profaned oaths, blasphemies, and malice.

Their feet are swift to shed blood.

The expression, their feet are swift, denotes the

eagerness of the nation to commit crime, particularly, particularly

deeds of injustice and cruelty.

They thirsted for the blood of the innocent.

They hastened to shed it to gratify their malice or to satisfy their vengeance.

The world is full of that.

And don't think it's just in the Mideast.

It's right here.

Sixteen, destruction and misery are in their ways.

The tendency of their conduct is to destroy the virtue, happiness, and

peace of all with whom they come in conduct.

I can't imagine.

And the way of peace have they not known.

This is a case of all who are selfish

and who seek to gain their own purpose of crime and ambition.

There is no fear of God before their eyes.

This is the sin that ruined our first parents, Adam and Eve.

No fear of God.

David, it's hard for me to imagine Adam having walked with the

Lord, had no fear of

him.

But they were expelled from paradise and the sin has descended to

all of their posterity.

Nineteen, now we know that what things 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.

The description of a natural character of man which God gives in the

Bible applies to all men.

It is a description of the human race and shows that all men are sinners, guilty,

justly condemned, and that if saved it must be not on account of their works or

worthiness, but on account of the works and worthiness of Christ.

Do you realize how important Christ is

to us?

Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight,

for by the law is the knowledge of sin

justified, an act of God, removing the guilt and penalty of sin from

his chosen by faith.

And the bestowal of a positive righteousness, Jesus Christ, in whom that

believer stands a righteous person before God's law for time and

eternity, once for all.

This is a legal standing and does not change or affect the character of

that.

You thought when I become saved I'll be a good person.

My character has to be changed by the

indwelling Holy Spirit and progressive

sanctification.

Knowledge of sin.

Each morning when I get up I go to the mirror and I look

and I need to wash my face, my eyes, everything that I'm going to

use that day I need to clean it.

So now do I wash it in the mirror?

That's where I see it.

I have to go to the water.

That's the way the world is looking at the law.

I must go to the water of God's Word.

The mirror is the law, the basement is the gospel of Christ.

To hold on to the law is like a man jumping out of a plane with a bag of cement instead of

a parachute.

But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by

the law and the prophets.

Righteousness.

The righteousness of God is that righteousness which

God's righteousness requires him to require.

What did I say, David?

That's right.

He accepts only the righteousness of Christ, which is himself.

Even the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all of them that

believe, for there is no difference.

You see, it is Jesus's faith and it is by faith,

not works.

What is works?

Greg described or illuminate me on works.

What does the word mean?

Means what?

All right.

What if I didn't perform any acts?

All right.

Energy spent to obtain an end, whether it's mental or physical.

When you think that's work.

Boy, is it work.

Remember, you cannot believe on your own.

You must be compelled by God to believe.

I thought I was the one that believed.

John 644, no man can come to me except the Father which has sent me draw him,

and I will raise him up at the last day.

Verge, what does the word draw mean?

Well, you can't use the word now in the definition of it.

All right.

It means to drag, to compel.

In Philippians 129, for unto you it is given in behalf

of Christ.

Not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake.

Don't, let's not forget the suffering.

We're given the suffering.

129,

that's

right.

That's right.

That's right.

He's, he was always,

yes, he, he was, he was in the ark.

He, he compels you to come to him.

He does not compel you to go there, but to come to him.

23, for all we have, for all have sinned

and come short of the glory of God.

What does the all mean, David?

It means everybody.

There is not one exception.

The simple meaning seems to be this, that all have sinned and none can enjoy

God's glory, but they that are holy.

Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ

Jesus.

Freely, well, let me get your thoughts on freely.

Burge, what does freely mean?

All right.

Russell, what's freely mean?

Without what?

All right.

Fred?

All right.

Greg, what's freely mean to you?

It means without a cause.

Freely is without a cause.

Yes.

Yes.

Well, when he draws us, he makes us, then he gives us

a commission to go.

What did you want?

That's right.

He had to give himself.

That's right.

What an awesome statement.

It's a gift.

Something, the word gift, something bestowed on another person for the first person

will never need anything from anybody forever.

That's right.

That's the only gift.

Well, even that's in him.

By this definition, God is the only person that can give a gift.

Now we use the term at Christmastime or whatever, we give presents.

25, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through

faith in his blood to declare his righteousness for the remission of

sins that are past through the forbearance of God.

Propitiation, a big $10 word.

That by which God is rendered propious,

by which it becomes consistent with his character and

government to pardon and bless the sinner.

The propitiation does not procure his love or make him lovely.

It only renders in

consistence for him to exercise his love toward his sinners.

He cannot love somebody that does not belong to him.

We're going to stop here.

We'll start with 26 next week.

Does anyone have any questions?

All right.

All right, let me find it.

Well, I don't see it.

His, the, his righteousness requires his righteousness,

which is the only righteousness that he is required to require.

Well, I'll find it.

Greg, would you dismiss us please?