The Bible from 30,000 feet,
soaring through the scripture, from Genesis to Revelation. [MUSIC PLAYING] Would you turn in your Bibles
please to the book of Romans as we cover this book
tonight in one fell swoop. The book of Romans in the
Bible from 30,000 feet. Let's have a word of prayer. Father, we've had
a time of worship. We've had a time of laughter. We now have a time of
study of your word. We want to comprehend
a little bit more about how this
book fits together. We study it as the
Book of Romans. Paul wrote it as a
letter to a group of believers
struggling with issues living in the city of Rome. Father, I pray that
we would not only understand how it fits
together, but understand what are the great principles
that you want us to practically use for our growth. We ask these things
in Jesus' name, amen. We come in the book of
Romans to the third section of the New Testament. The first being the
gospel accounts, which is roughly a 33 year
period of the life of Jesus Christ, a biography,
a biographical sketch seen through four lenses. That's the gospels, followed by
the historical writings of Luke in the book of Acts
covering another 30 years of church history. The first 30 years
once the church was born on the day of Pentecost
until almost the destruction of the temple in
Jerusalem, but not quite. Now we have the
letters, the epistles. These are letters from church
leaders to church congregations and the first one is
Paul's book to the Romans. Now you remember last
time we were together the Lord Jesus told the
church in Jerusalem, you will be my witnesses in
Jerusalem, Judea Samaria, and unto the ends of the earth. Geographically, Rome
would be considered the ends of the earth from
the perspective of Jerusalem but from the perspective
of the rest of the world, Rome was the very heart
of the world itself. It was where all the
action took place. It was where the power was
seated in the Roman Empire. Rome as a city had a
gravitational pull for Paul. That is Paul always
wanted to go to Rome. It was in his heart to do so. Toward the end of
the book of Romans, he said, I have longed to come
to you for many years now. And if by the will of
God, I plan to come. However, things didn't
quite go exactly how Paul wanted them to go. He had taken a few different
missionary journeys. He was on his way
back to Jerusalem. He was warned not
to go to Jerusalem. One of the prophets put a
belt around his waist saying, whoever owns this belt will
be so bound in Jerusalem. And they said, Paul,
that's your belt. You probably shouldn't
go to Jerusalem. And he said, why do you
mean to break my heart? I'm willing to die in Jerusalem. So he goes there,
is in the temple, the Jews spot him, falsify
a charge against him. He gets placed in Roman guard. And in Acts chapter 23 it says,
"The following night the Lord stood by him and
said--" now this is after he's been beaten,
after he's been arrested, after the plans that he
has made did not happen like he wanted them to happen. So everything is going wrong. The Lord appeared to him and
said, "Be of good cheer, Paul. Do cheer up, man. It's all good, for as you have
testified for me in Jerusalem. So you must also bear witness." At Rome there that night
the Lord promised Paul, you're going to get what
you've always wanted. You're going to Rome. You've been faithful to
testify of me in Jerusalem. People thought you
shouldn't come. You thought you should. Here you are. You've testified
for me in this city. Now you're going to give the
same kind of powerful testimony in Rome. That's why last week I said
Paul toward the end of our study was getting what he
always wanted, sort of. He's reached his goal, kind of. He wanted to go to Rome. He just didn't think he
would go as a prisoner. He thought he would go as
a preacher, a free agent being able to walk back
and forth on the streets and share the gospel. He didn't. He was arrested,
taken to Caesarea, spent two years in
Caesarea by the sea, went through a few
different trials before two governors
and one king. First governor was Antonius
Felix, second governor Porcius Festus, and then finally
before King Herod Agrippa II. After two years of these trials
and getting the run around, finally when the governor said,
are you willing to stand trial in Jerusalem, Paul
just put his hand up and used what was the right
of every Roman citizen called appellatio,
the right of appeal. And that is every
Roman citizen if he felt he wasn't getting a good,
fair shake down in a trial that he could appeal
his case directly to the Supreme Court, which in
those days was Caesar himself. He said, I appeal to Caesar. At which point Herod Agrippa
said to Porcius Festus, you know this guy didn't do
anything of a notable nature. He didn't really commit a crime. He could have gone free,
but he appealed to Caesar because he used that card, I
have to let him go to Rome. That began Paul's
journey to Rome, which ended in a shipwreck,
which ended in another boat. Finally he gets to Rome. That's where we closed
the book of Acts. By the time he
writes Romans however he has not gone there yet. He's just wanting to go. He writes Romans from
the city of Corinth. A little more of
that as we go on. But let me just kind
of begin where I began on our Sunday morning messages. We're going to Romans
on the weekend. I think it's
wonderful that we're able to take one night and
kind of look at the whole book, God willing, in one fell swoop. This was the book that rocked
the world of Martin Luther. It was reading
the Book of Romans that changed this guy who
was trying so hard as a monk to work his way to heaven. In fact, Martin Luther said,
"If ever a monk got to heaven by his monkery, it is I." He tried so hard to keep all of
the laws of the Catholic Church and no matter what
he did and no matter how many times he
confessed his sins and he confessed
every bad thought even if another thought followed
that bad thought while he was in confessional he
said, oh, wait a minute, I have another
thought that's bad, and he would confess it till
finally the priest in charge said Martin, get out of here. Go commit some real sin and
then come back and confess it. So he was trying really hard but
feeling miserable all the while and he came up to a phrase. The phrase that haunted him
was the righteousness of God. We're going to get to
it in chapter 1 verse 16 and 17 in a moment. The righteousness of God. He pondered that phrase. What does that mean, the
righteousness of God? And he thought it meant the
righteousness that I produce to earn my standing before God. I'm going to produce
through my sincerity and my hard works
enough righteousness to be right with God. That's how he interpreted
the righteousness of God from a Catholic
vantage point to me. Here's his own words. "I had greatly longed to
understand Paul's letter to the Romans and nothing stood
in the way except that one expression, the
righteousness of God, because I took it to
mean that righteousness whereby God acts righteously
in punishing the unrighteous. Day and night I pondered it
until I grasped the truth that the righteousness
of God is that righteousness whereby
through grace and sheer mercy He justifies us by faith. Thereupon I felt
myself to be reborn and to have the doors
open to paradise. The whole of scripture then
took on a whole new meaning." Go down to chapter
1 verse 16, "For I am not ashamed of
the gospel of Christ. It is the power of God to
salvation for every one who believes for the Jew first
and also for the Greek for in it the
righteousness of God is revealed from faith
to faith as it is written that just shall live by faith." In the book of Romans every
major doctrine appears. Every New Testament
doctrine appears. It is the Christian manifesto. It is Paul's Magna Carta. I've divided the book of
Romans into four sections. Chapters 1 to chapter 3 verse
20 is the first section. That's the wrath of God. The second section, chapter
3 verse 21 all the way to chapter 8 is
the grace of God. Chapter 9, 10, and 11
is the plan of God, and finally chapters 12
to the end of the book is the will of God. That's how the book lays out. Paul is covering our predicament
in sin, wrath of God, followed by the hope
through the gospel that God gives a
righteousness to us the grace of God, et cetera. Now there are important words
in this book that are repeated. The word "law" is repeated
in Romans 78 times. The word "righteousness"
shows up 66 times and the word "faith"
appears 62 times. Those are the most
repeated words in the book. Righteousness, law, faith. So here's the
message of the book. If you want to be right with
God, righteous before God, you can't do it through the
law or keeping a set of laws but by faith in Jesus Christ. That's the theme of the book. How to be right with God,
the righteousness of God, the righteousness
He gives to us. But it doesn't
come from the law. It comes by faith. Now go back to verse 1. I know we're still
in Romans chapter 1. That's why I said God
willing we'll get through it. "Paul, a bond servant
of Jesus Christ, called to be an
apostle separated to the gospel of God,
which he promised before through His prophets in the holy
scriptures concerning His son Jesus Christ our Lord who
is born of the seed of David according to the flesh, and
declared to be the Son of God with power according to
the spirit of holiness by the Resurrection
from the dead. Through Him, we have received
grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among
all the nations for his name, among whom you also are
the called of Jesus Christ to all who are in Rome beloved
of God called to be Saints." I mentioned that Paul
took three trips, three missionary journeys, and
then finally, this last trip to Rome as a prisoner. On his third
missionary journey when he was in the town
of Corinth there he stayed for
approximately 18 months. While he was in Corinth on
his third missionary journey, we believe it is from that
city that he wrote this letter to believers in Rome. Now, Paul had
never been to Rome. Always wanted to go. Heart's desire to go. Looking forward to going. He had never been when
he wrote this letter. He's writing to
Christians in Rome. The question comes if Paul
hasn't been to Rome yet, he hasn't been there
to start a church, yet a church has
already started in Rome apart from Paul who was like
the major church planter, who started it? How did a Christian
movement come to be in Rome that deserved
a letter like this from Paul to this place where Christians
were now gathering and growing, yet Paul had never been? I'm so glad you asked. Back in Acts Chapter 2
on the day of Pentecost, when the church is born and
the people gather in the temple area because they hear
the speaking in tongues, et cetera, that are going on,
it gives a list of who is there. It says, "Parthians,
Medes, Elamites, those dwelling in Mesopotamia
Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus, Asia, Phrygia and
Pamphilia, Egypt and the parts of Libya adjoining
Cyrene, visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes." That's how it started. Those visitors,
natural born Jews, those who converted
to the Jewish faith, are on pilgrimage to Jerusalem
the day of Pentecost happens. They want to know
what's happening. Peter explains the
gospel to them. 3,000 souls that day get saved. Huge altar call. Not five, not 10, not 20, not
wow, one person came forward. 3,000 people get saved. No doubt among those 3,000
were a sizable group of Romans who then went back to the
Jewish community in Rome, and that's how the
church started. So by the time Paul gets to
Corinth on his third journey, he hears about it and he
writes this incredible letter to the church of Rome. Here's what you
should keep in mind as you go through this book. When he writes this he has
three major groups in mind that he is writing to, pagans,
moralists, and religious folks, religionists let's call them. First of all, pagans,
there were Greeks. There were Romans. They were polytheistic. They believed in their
own worship system. They had their own
style, et cetera. Then there were
the moralists who believed that they
keep a moral code and work hard in their
own religious persuasion. Then there were Jewish
legalists as well as Gentiles, but mostly Jewish self
righteous religious folks. Paul has the pagan,
the moralist, and the religious person in
mind when he writes this book and he tells all of
them if you're a pagan and you have a false religious
system, if you're Jewish and you have the true God
that you're worshipping from the Old Testament,
if you're a moralist, no matter who you
are, every one of you has fallen short of God's
glory, God's standard. You can't on your own
make a righteousness that is worthy of God. And so he brings
that home, especially in the first three chapters. If you go down to verse 18 he
launches into the first section that we talked about,
the wrath of God. Look at verse 18. "For the wrath of God
is revealed from heaven against all and godliness
and unrighteousness of men who suppress the
truth in unrighteousness." And we have been studying
this on Sunday mornings. I'm not going to be laborate
or go much into depth except to say that's the first
section, the wrath of God. Now this is interesting. I have heard for years from
people who don't really know their Bibles,
but swear they do, and say, well, the God
of the Old Testament is a God of wrath, but the
God of the New Testament is a very different god. And that's why those
two systems are incompatible because
the Old Testament God is a god of wrath. The New Testament God
is a god of grace. Whenever I hear
that, I think a, you don't know your Old
Testament, b, you don't know your New
Testament, because if you knew your Old
Testament, there are so many beautiful gracious
promises that are given. The new covenant is promised
in the Old Testament. "I will make a new
covenant Jeremiah," 31:33, "with the house of Israel" not
based upon what they can do, but I'm going to write
my law in their hearts, or scriptures like Psalm 32. "Blessed is he whose
transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord does not impute iniquity." That's grace. That's favor. And they don't know
their New Testament. There's plenty of wrath
in the New Testament. It's the same God in the
Old and the New Testament. It's a balance of both. The wrath of God as revealed
from heaven, Romans 1:18. Ephesians chapter
2, you has he made alive Paul said who
were dead and trespasses and sins in which you
once walked according to the course of
this world according to the prince of the
power of the air, the one who now works in the
children of disobedience, and you were by
nature the children of wrath even as others. That is you are under the wrath
of almighty God, by nature. We'll get to the
Book of Revelation. The tribulation
period breaks out. Revelation chapter 6,
those who are on the earth are afraid of the judgments
that come out of heaven. And they say to the
mountains, fall on us and hide us from the
wrath of the Lamb. Have you ever seen
a wrathful Lamb? It sounds like an oxymoron. Look out, an angry lamb. Nobody hangs a sign
up, beware of lamb. But that is Jesus coming
back with the authority to judge the world. And that's highlighted
in the New Testament. So both testaments
showed that mankind is under the wrath
of God, but as we get in the second section
of Romans the grace of God is available. Now I'll take you over
to chapter 3 verse 19 where we close out this
section on the wrath of God. After speaking to the
pagan, to the moralist, to the religionist, he says
in verse 19 of Romans 3, "We know that
whatever the law says, it says to those who
are under the law that every mouth may be"
stopped and the whole world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the
deeds of the law no flesh will be
justified in his sight for by the law is
the knowledge of sin. So the gavel goes
down in the courtroom. The final verdict from
the heavenly judge is all are guilty, all have
sinned, all have fallen short, or it says here that
every mouth may be stopped and all the world may
become guilty before God. So the first three chapters,
Paul paints the picture that we are in a pretty
awful predicament and there's no hope. There's no ray of light. The judgment of God is coming. The wrath of God is coming. And that closes out verse 20. Between verse 20 and verse
21 is a Grand Canyon. There's a gulf. There's a division. He goes from the previous
subject, the wrath of God. He rounds the corner
to speak about as if to say, but wait a
minute, story's not done yet, and he pivots to
the grace of God. Look at the first
two words, but now. After painting such a
dismal, dark, black picture, after leaving us in
verse 20 in the dark cave of the wrath of God for our
sin, the light starts to dawn. But now the righteousness of God
apart from the law is revealed. I love this pivot
and this Grand Canyon between these two versus. To put it into words of
Chronicles of Narnia, the long dark winter is over
and Aslan is on the move. That's what we get in verse
20, but now, the righteousness of God, that is the
righteousness God provides for us
unrighteous folk. Apart from the law,
apart from anything you could do is revealed,
is showcased being witness by the law and the prophets. Now right here at
this section, this is what change everything
for Martin Luther. This is really what brought
on the great reformation. This is the verse that
years later Donald Gray Barnhouse, that
great Bible expositor from the 10th Presbyterian
Church in Philadelphia-- he was reading this and he drew
a heart in the margin of verse 21, and he said, this is
the most important verse in all the Bible, but now
the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed. So chapter 3 verse 21 all the
way to the end of chapter 8 is the second section
that is the grace of God. Look at verse 22. Let's just finish this out. "Even the righteousness of God,
through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference, for
all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being
justified freely by His grace, through the redemption that is
in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation
by His blood, through faith, to
demonstrate His righteousness because, in His forbearance, God
had passed over the sins that were previously
committed to demonstrate, at the present time,
His righteousness, that He might be just and
the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus." Now, there's three
key words that are important to our
theological understanding, that are in this section
that I just read. First is the word
justified, verse 24. Justification. Second is the word redemption,
also found in verse 24. And, third, the
word propitiation, which is a word I doubt
you used in the last month, unless you read your Bible
and quoted this verse. Justification,
redemption, propitiation. Let's take the first word,
justification, or justify. Paul likes that word. He uses that word, in
his letters, 30 times. Think he likes the word? 30 times he uses
it in his epistles. 15 of those 30 are used in
the book of Romans alone. It is a legal word. It's a forensic word. To justify somebody is to
bring them into a law court, and to declare a
person righteous. And then to treat that
person, who has been declared righteous, as though
they are righteous. So it's a declaration,
then an action based upon the declaration. It's a legal term. It's a forensic term. It comes from the law courts. Evidence is presented,
but I say, not guilty. Now, I'm going to treat you
as if you're not guilty. That's justification. God justifies us by faith. One way that I've seen
it, and I've told you how I've seen it,
to look at justified is by breaking the word apart. You're justified. I'm justified. God treats me just if I'd never
sinned, as perfectly righteous. That's justification. Second important word in
this section is redemption. Now, we're not in the law court. We're in the slave
market with this word. This word means to buy back. The word redeem means to pay a
price and set a prisoner free. You would go, in those days,
to a slave market, when slavery bounded in the Roman Empire,
and you could pay a price and bring a slave home, or
give a slave its freedom. It means to set free by
paying a ransom, a price. So the price has been paid
by what Jesus did on Calvary, and he set those of us
who were slaves free. Third is the word propitiation. It's been translated a whole
bunch of different ways by different modern
translations-- atonement, sacrifice. It's a hard word to translate. And so, propitiation,
even though it's hard, it's a pretty good word. Let me give an explanation
from an Old Testament text, and then I think
you'll understand it. Do you remember how I told
you before about this version of the Old Testament translated
into the Greek language, called the Septuagint version? Remember when we did
Between the Testaments, I gave you all that history,
talked about the Septuagint version. It's because Greek became the
lingua franca of the world, and so, down in
Alexandria, Egypt, these scholars
spent a lot of time taking the Hebrew Old
Testament, that people didn't speak anymore in the
Greek world, translated it into Greek. That's the Septuagint. In the Septuagint
version, the Greek version of the Old Testament,
this word-- same exact word-- the
Greek word is hilasterion, translated propitiation,
shows up 20 times in the Septuagint for the lid
of the Ark of the Covenant, called the mercy seat. So one way to translate this,
and would be very proper, God sent forth Jesus
as our mercy seat. You know what happened
on the mercy seat. God showed mercy. So blood was sprinkled on
the lid, the hilasterion, blood of an animal
was sprinkled. Underneath that, in that
box, was a copy of the 10 Commandments, the law of God
that the children of visual had broken. They had disobeyed. And so there was blood
covering their broken law. Jesus is the propitiation,
the covering, the mercy seat. Chapter 4 gives
an example of how God justifies, through Abraham,
the great patriarch of Judaism. He justifies people by faith. And so he says, let me
explain about Abraham. Abraham lived before there
was the law of Moses. And Abraham believed God,
and it was accounted to him as righteousness. So that's the
example in chapter 4. Chapter 5 talks
about the benefits of being justified by faith. A couple of them right up front. "Therefore--
chapter 5, verse 1-- "having been justified by
faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus
Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into
this grace in which we stand. And we rejoice in the
hope of the glory of God. And not only that, but
we glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation
produces perseverance." So here's the benefits of
simply believing in a righteous God, who freely justifies
you by that faith. And then he compares,
as the chapter goes on, Adam and Christ,
and shows you the contrast, shows you the similarities,
but especially the differences. Chapter 6 of Romans are
a series of questions, as if to anticipate blowback,
as if to anticipate somebody going, now, wait a minute,
Paul, what about this or what about that? So there's this
series of questions to show how the implication
of this personally-- being justified by faith--
what does it mean. So, for example, verse 1-- "What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin
that grace may abound? Certainly not." He answers himself. "How shall we who died to
send live any longer in it." So he follows this Q&A format. We've explained to you,
on the weekend services, that this is an ancient
both rabbinical and Greek Socratic method of
teaching, called the dia-tribo, the diatribe. You pretend that there is
a dissenter in your midst, asking you questions. You bring up the questions. You give an answer
to the question. And that leads the student
from a preconceived error into truth. That's how he
formats this section. In chapter 7, he shows us the
relationship between the law of Moses and the believer. If you look at verse
7 of chapter 7. Again, here's his
questioning style. "What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not. On the contrary, I would
not have known sin, except through the
law, for I would not have known covetousness
unless the law said, you shall not covet." So he's saying the
law served a purpose. The law showed you that
you're a lawbreaker. You read the law an go,
oops, I already blew it. You read the 10 Commandments. Broke that one, broke that one,
broke that one, broke that one. You broke them all. So the law served a purpose. It showed you you're a creep. [LAUGHTER] It amplified your problem. It put a magnifying
glass on your creepiness. And so, when you look at
the law, it's like, uh-oh. That's what you walk away with. Uh-oh, now what? Now, Paul will take that uh-oh,
now what, in Galatians and say, the law was a schoolmaster to
point us, to lead us to Christ. So he goes through
that in chapter 7. And then, in chapter 8,
it's a beautiful chapter we've been covering
on the weekends. The liberating, indwelling
Holy Spirit of God in the life of the believer. You should know-- if you
don't, I'll tell you, but most of you know, so
you'll just hear this again, and it'll serve to remind you-- that Paul mentions the
Holy Spirit only twice in the entire book of
Romans, chapters 1 through 7, but, in chapter 8, he mentions
the Holy Spirit 20 times in that chapter alone. It's the Holy Spirit's chapter. It's where it gets good. Your life filled
with the Holy Spirit, that's where life gets good. That's where you get the power. He's the source. So look at chapter 8,
verse 11, as an example. "But if the Spirit of Him who
raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who
raised Christ from the dead will also give life
to your mortal bodies, through His Spirit,
who dwells in you." The chapter just gets brighter
and brighter, and bigger, and culminates in
that beautiful section that we covered
this last weekend. Verse 35-- "Who shall separate
us"-- or a better translation-- "What shall separate us
from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, distress,
persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword? Yet, in all these
things"-- verse 7-- "we're more than conquerors--
that great single Greek word, hupernikao, we are super
conquerors, hyper conquerors-- "through Him who loved us. I am persuaded
that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor
principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things
to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing
shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which
is in Christ Jesus, our Lord." Amen. [APPLAUSE] I'm glad you're still
excited about that. If there's any experience
in your life not covered by what Paul just wrote,
tell me what it is, and I'll give you an all
expense, free, paid vacation to anywhere in the world want. Five star hotel, stay
as long as you want, if there's anything
that can separate you from the love of God that
isn't mentioned in this list. He covers it all. I can say that
pretty confidently, because I know none of
you will be able to. [LAUGHTER] So, beginning in chapter
9, we come to section three of this letter. Now, before we launch
into this, let me just remind you who Paul was. Paul was, at one
time, a Jewish rabbi. Paul was very
zealous for the law. He said, I'm a Hebrew
of the Hebrews. Concerning the law, a Pharisee. Concerning righteousness,
which comes from the law, he said this-- I was blameless. I was as near perfect in
keeping the law as possible. Now, once he came
to know Christ-- he was apprehended on
that Damascus road. He went to Damascus, left
Damascus, went to Arabia-- we mentioned that last
week-- for three years. In Arabia, I'm guessing,
at the foot of Mount Sinai, he had the parchments, the
scrolls of the Old Testament. He poured over what he knew
from the text of Scripture for three years. He had to get
retaught everything, understanding the Old Testament
through the lens of Jesus. And he came out-- and I'm kind of giving you this
background, because, I mean, Paul's letter to the Romans
is the most doctrinal, most theological, most expansive,
deepest of all of his letters. Again, he had never met
these people in Rome. He's writing a letter to them. He'd never gone to Rome. But he writes so expansively. Now, one of the
problems, and this takes us to section
number three, which is the plan of
God, the plan of God for Jew and Gentile. One of the problems that they
were certainly wondering about, or would at least wonder
about, is what about the Jew? If the Jew has rejected
Jesus as Messiah, if Israel has nationally
rejected Jesus as Messiah, what does God do
with that rejection? Did that take Him by surprise? Does He have a plan to
do anything with that, or are they just
kind of written off, because God made some
promises to them in the past? Are all those
promises negated now, because of their national
rejection of Jesus as the Messiah? And because there was a
mix in Rome, ethnically, of both Jew and Gentile,
this question would come up. And, indeed, the
Jewish people did reject Jesus as the Messiah. So chapter 9, Paul writes
about the sovereignty of God in election. The sovereignty of
God in election. Chapter 10, the sovereignty
of God in rejection. Yes, they rejected Jesus,
but God is sovereign. God has a plan for
that rejection. And, finally, in chapter
11, the sovereignty of God in reception, in bringing
them back, and restoration, receiving them,
and restoring them. So Paul is showing,
in 9, 10, and 11, God's sovereignty
with Jew and non-Jew-- and Gentile-- but especially
the Jewish nation, in calling people, in choosing
people, people who reject Him, and what He's going to do
with that, and the plan He has for bringing the
Jewish people back. Now, this section
is both doctrinal-- theological-- but also very
personal and very emotional. And that emotion comes
in chapter 9, verse 1. "I tell the truth in Christ. I am not lying. My conscience also bearing
me witness in the Holy Spirit that I have a great sorrow and
continual grief in my heart. For I wish that I, myself,
were accursed from Christ, for my brethren, my countrymen,
according to the flesh, who are Israelites." Boy, what a change emotionally. Chapter 8, Paul left
us on such a high. What can separate us
from the love of Christ? Nothing can separate us. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Now, I'm really bummed out. I have such a weight,
a sorrow in my heart. And what a statement,
that I could wish myself accursed, or cut
off, from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen,
according to the flesh. Now, I'm not going
to get into this, because this is going to be my
sermon for Sunday and Saturday. But I just want-- I want you to see
the shift, and I want you to know that the
reason he brings this up is because, well,
there was quite a bit of nationalistic pride
among the Jewish people. Paul would know that. Paul gives his pedigree
of his background in Philippians, chapter 3. It was the Jewish
representatives at the Jordan River when John the Baptist
was baptizing, who were there with their pomp and
ceremony, in their robes, and their denunciation
of Jesus and John. And John the Baptist tells
everybody there to repent. You know, he just sort
of cut to the chase. You know, no fancy stories,
no wonderful illustration or statistics. Just you guys are sinners. God's going to get you. Repent. And so these legalistic
Pharisees were there, and John looks at them, and
he raises up his eyes to them, and he says, and don't you
begin to think, in your heart, we have Abraham as our father. Because I tell
you the truth, God is able to raise up from
these very stones children to Abraham. So don't think, because
you are born Jewish, that you have some special
connection with God. Yes, you are God's
chosen people, but you have to ratify that
choice by your choice in faith to be a child of God, a
son or a daughter of God. So that takes us from
chapter 9 to chapter 10. Verse 1, same theme. "Brethren, my heart's desire
and prayer to God for Israel is that they might
be saved, for I bear them witness that
they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For they, being ignorant
of God's righteousness and seeking to establish
their own righteousness, have not submitted to
the righteousness of God. For Christ is the
end of the law, for righteousness to every
everyone who believes." In a few months, some
of you will join me in a trip of a lifetime. You'll stand within the
city gates of Jerusalem. It'll be exciting. And you're going to go up to
the Western Wall, that enclosure of stones that remain from
the Second Temple Period, from the time of Jesus. And you'll see very pious,
devout men and women, up at that Western Wall, moving
and shaking very sincerely, and saying their prayers to God. And it's beautiful to see
that kind of devotion. Sometimes I see that
devotion and say, I'd like to see that more
among Christian people. Their heart's into it. Their body's into it. They're not just mouthing
the words, ya-ya-ya-ya, yawning while they do it. They're into it. They're worshipping
the God of heaven. Yes! Amen. But I think of this verse. I think of the
sorrow that Paul must have had as he
went to Jerusalem, and I see all of their piety
and all of their devotion. And Paul says, "I
bear them witness, they have a zeal for
God, but it's not according to knowledge." In other words,
they misunderstand. They don't understand. They don't have the full
knowledge of the meaning of the text of their Torah. They don't understand that
their Torah can't justify them. Their law, their
Bible, all the words that they say they
follow and practice, they think they're
justified by that law. It doesn't justify them. They have a misunderstanding. They have zeal, but it's
not according to knowledge. So many people are zealous
for God, but they-- you know, it's like-- it's like the woman at Samaria. She was very zealous, but
it was a pagan worship system in Samaria. You Jews say Jerusalem
is the place to worship. Well, we have our own temple. Jesus said, hey, lady-- this is my-- Skip's
NSV, New Skip Version-- [LAUGHTER] --we know what we worship,
for salvation is of the Jews. That's what Jesus said. We know what we worship. And they did have a knowledge,
but Paul says the knowledge that you have, for some of
you, is a mis-knowledge, a misunderstanding. You don't really grasp the
meaning of that revelation from the Old Testament. So it's a zeal
without knowledge. "They, being ignorant
of God's righteousness, seeking to establish
their own righteousness, have not submitted to the
righteousness of God." Do you realize that mankind,
humankind in general, is addicted-- incurably addicted-- to working
for their own salvation? It's part of who we are. Oh, God, I'll do better. I'll earn it. You'll see. You'll love me more. God can't love you more, because
God can't love you any less. He loves you the
way you are, and He knows every thing about you. So he can't love you any more. But we're incurably addicted to
working for our own salvation. Paul-- "Concerning
the righteousness which comes from the
law, I was blameless." I remember struggling
when I would go to these classes in the
church I was raised in. They were called CCD classes. It was Catholic Catechism
doctrine classes. And it was taught
by nuns and priests, and they're telling me, you
know, how to get to heaven. And I had questions. Well, how do you know, when
you die, you'll get to heaven? Well, you'll know when you get
there, you know, basically. [LAUGHTER] I said, that's a
little too late. And I-- I was always the
kid who said, excuse me, I have a question. And, finally, I remember that
he got-- one of these priests got so upset with me. He said, you always
have these questions. It was just too hard for him. And I said, there is a
Protestant Church down the street from my
house, and I know a lot of the people
who go there, and they seem to worship
God very sincerely. Why is it necessary that
I go further to this one, and why couldn't
I go to that one? You're saying I'll go to
hell if I go to that one, and I'll go to heaven
if I go to this one. And, finally, he just
threw up his hands and said, go wherever you want. [LAUGHTER] So I did. [LAUGHTER] [APPLAUSE] "Christ"-- verse 4-- "is the
end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." Go down to verse 9. "If you confess with your
mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart
God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." So if somebody tells
me, I believe in Jesus. I believe He rose from the dead. I confess Him as Lord. I turn to him and say,
I believe you're saved. If somebody, in the third row,
of our church, or 10th row, comes forward in an
altar call and says, I believe Jesus is Lord, I
believe He rose from the dead, we receive them by faith. So why not, if somebody famous,
like a Kanye West, says, I believe in Jesus, I
believe He is Lord of all, I believe He died for my
sins and rose from the dead, why would we ever be
hesitant and say, well, I don't know about that? You-- you can't be. Why not? Can't God save anybody? Why not rejoice in that,
and why not pray for him, and support any overture a
person makes toward Christ? I applaud it. I remember when it
happened with Bob Dylan, and we went to his concert,
and I thought, you know, he preached more at that concert
than most preachers preach at church. [LAUGHTER] OK, I'm off the soapbox. [LAUGHTER] I'm continuing on in verse 11. "For the Scripture says,
whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame." He's quoting Isaiah 28. "For there is no distinction
between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord is rich
to all who call upon Him. For whoever calls on the name
of the Lord shall be saved." Now, he quotes Joel 2. Now, remember I told you, Paul
spent three years in Arabia. He's going through all
those texts and Scriptures. He's reorienting himself to
the Old Testament as a rabbi. Having said that,
I always marvel at his grasp of Scripture. You know, without a smartphone,
without a computer program, just to be able to go, Joel
2, voom, Isaiah 28, voom. Psalm here, Psalm there,
just stick it right in there. I do think it's
important that we have enough grasp of
Scripture so that, whatever we say we believe in and
we practice, we can-- if somebody said,
why do you do that? You don't say, I don't know,
we've always done that. That's not a good answer. Or, I don't know, they
do that at church. Not a good answer. You need to be able
to say, like what Peter said on the
Day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit fell upon
the church and the Gentiles said, what is this? And Peter said,
this is that, which was spoken of by the prophet. And he quotes Joel. We need to be able to
say this-- what I do, what I believe-- is that,
which the Bible says. We need a biblical backing
for what we believe. That's the real magic
here of Paul doing this. He just doesn't say,
this is what I think. He says, this is what
the Scripture says, and he lays it out
very carefully. So I want to challenge all of
you, all of us, to be Bereans. Acts 17:11 says those in
Berea were more noble and fair minded than those
in Thessalonica, and that they received
the Word of God with all readiness
of mind, but then searched the Scriptures daily
to see if these things be so. I'm teaching you the Bible. I'm doing what I think is
the clearest, cleanest, best way I know how. But don't walk away saying,
it's got to be true, because Skip said it. [LAUGHTER] Never get that lazy. Say, OK, I received
that, but I'm going to go check
it out to make sure. I'm going to search
the Scriptures to see if these things be so. OK chapter 11, verse 1, "I say,
has God cast away His people? Certainly not. I also am an Israelite
of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not cast away His
people whom He foreknew." Now, that question he asks,
has God cast away His people, some today, who are Christians,
believe the answer is, yes, God has cast
away His people. And what they say is,
because Israel rejected Jesus as the Messiah, God has rejected
them from being His people. So there is no special place
for Israel in the Kingdom Age, or in the future. All of those blessings
that God gave to Israel are now assumed in the Church. We are the New Israel and
all of the blessings God gave to Israel are our blessings. They're for the Church,
not for Israel nationally. It's very interesting
that they would say that, because it reveals an
inconsistent hermeneutic. That is, they're willing to
say all the blessings that God had for Israel are now
ours, but they won't say, all the cursings that God
gave to Israel are now ours. So it's inconsistent in
their interpretation. The truth is the
cursings are theirs and the blessings
are theirs, and God has a plan, in the future,
to restore Israel nationally and geographically
in the Kingdom Age. Go down to verse 24. Key Scripture. "For if you were cut
out of the olive tree, which is wild by nature, and
were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive
tree, how much more will these, who are natural
branches"-- that is, the Jews-- "be grafted into
their own olive tree?" Olive trees can last
hundreds of years. But branches get
brittle and broken, and they cease producing fruit. At which time, they
cut those branches off. But the root is still good. So they take young, tender
shoots off younger olive trees. They put a little hole in
them, and stick them in, and they produce fruit again. The picture is God has taken
wild olives, Gentiles, stuck us into the root of
Judaism, all the promises God made in the Old
Testament about the Messiah. The natural branches have
been laid aside temporarily, because, though it started
as a Jewish movement, by and large today, people
who believe in Jesus, by and large, are not Jewish. They're Gentiles. It's become a Gentile movement. The early church was
Jewish, but then the gospel went to the Gentiles. The Jews, though
there are some-- it's a blessed exception--
are believers in Messiah, for the most part,
they don't believe. Yet. But Gentiles do. God has grafted us in. His point is, if God can
graft in wild olive branches and produce great
fruit, wait until you see the restoration of the
natural ones, which he talks about throughout this chapter. Go down to verse-- oh, oh, wait, wait,
wait, verse 25. "I do not desire,
brethren, that you should be ignorant
of this mystery, lest you should be wise
in your own opinion that blindness, in
part, has happened to Israel until the fullness
of the Gentiles has come in." If you have an NIV, it says
the full number of Gentiles. Is that right? The full number of
Gentiles has come in. If you have a New
Living Translation, it says, till the full
number is completed. Am I right? Here, it says the
fullness of the Gentiles, the idea is there's
a number that represents the last
number, the full number. So, real quickly,
this is awesome. The early church was Jewish. That door closed quickly. Non-Jewish people
around the world embraced Jesus, by and large. God has done a work
among the Gentile, non-Jewish, people of the world. That's called the Church Age. We're in the Church Age. But, at some point-- God knows the point, God
knows the last number-- there's going to be
a non-Jewish person, a Gentile, who raises their
hand, or prays the prayer, believes in Jesus, and
that will be the last one. When that is the
last one, I believe that's when the Lord will
catch away His Church. When the Lord catches away
His Church, He turns a page and opens up the door to fulfill
the last part of the prophecy of Daniel 9, the
70th week of Daniel, the seven year period, where he
deals with the Jewish nation, to restore them and have them
believe in the Messiah, which they will by the end of
that tribulation period. That's why he says
in this chapter, "And all Israel will be saved." So that's called the
time of Jacob's trouble, Israel's trouble. Which means, if you, tonight,
have not received Jesus, you could be the very
person holding us up. [LAUGHTER] So would you get the show on
the road and say, yes, to Jesus? [APPLAUSE] Verse 28-- "Concerning
the gospel, they are enemies, for your sake. But concerning election,
they are beloved, for the sake of the fathers. For the gifts and callings
of God are irrevocable." That is, God made a
covenant with Abraham, and, even though they
broke the next covenant that God made with
Moses, God still made a covenant
with Abraham, and He is going to keep good on the
promises He made to Abraham. "The gifts and callings of
God to the Jewish people"-- that's the context of
this-- "are irrevocable." Chapter 12 to the end
is the last section of the book, which I'm
just going to skim over. It is the will of God. It is the graduation
section of the book. He's been very
doctrinal in this book. Chapter 12, he's very practical. "I beseech you,
therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you
present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy,
acceptable, which is your reasonable service." The most logical
thing you can do is give your body back
to God for Him to use. "Do not be conformed
to this world, but be transformed by the
renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that
good and acceptable and perfect will of God." Paul says, for 11
chapters, I've given you this doctrinal foundation. All of the things that I've
talked about in 11 chapters, he's calling the mercies of God. I beseech you by
the mercies of God. Now, you present
your body to Him. Now, he does it-- he speaks
about that generally. You go, hear am I, Lord. Take my body, use me, et cetera. And then, second, you
do it specifically. You submit to the government. I hear guitar behind
stage, so I know they're getting ready to come out. It's sort of like the
music, like, hurry up. [LAUGHTER] OK, so specifically he shows
our relationship, in chapter 13, to human government. This is how a
redeemed child of God acts in a world of
secular government. We submit to the
laws of the land. We pray for those
who are in authority. Then we should also do it to
the Church, body of Christ, present ourselves to
serve one another. I want to show you two groups,
chapter 14 and 15, very quickly, just a couple verses. Look at the first
verse of chapter 14 and the first verse
of chapter 15, and you'll see the two groups. "Receive one who is
weak in the faith, but not to disputes
over doubtful things." Look at chapter 15, verse 1. "We, then, who are
strong, ought to bear with the scruples of the weak
and not to please ourselves." Who are the two groups
he's speaking about? The weak and the strong. What does he mean? The weak are the
legalistic believers in the Church, who are very
narrow in their interpretation about diet, about what
you can eat and not eat, kosher and non-kosher. God wouldn't like
you eating that, or God didn't want
you to have that. Or days of the week to worship-- you have to worship
God on Sunday, or you've got to worship
God on the Sabbath. And they got-- Paul says, I worship
God every day. But those who are
weak, you've got to understand they're among you. And when he says weak,
they're weak in their faith. They're not strong in the faith. They don't have a strong,
biblical foundation. And, to Paul, he says,
those who are strong have a little more freedom
and liberality over things. They're not antinomian. They don't break God's law. They're not rebellious. But there's a freedom
in the Spirit. But those who are
free in the Spirit have to recognize you
hang out sometimes with people who aren't, and
yet you have to bear with them. So that takes us to chapter 16. Look at that, we're
going to make it. Even though it's overtime,
we're going to make it. [LAUGHTER] Chapter 16, let
me just say this. It's a list of names. It's one of my favorite
chapters in the Bible. You go, a list of names? I would like a list of names. They're hard to pronounce. But what if your name
were in that list? And here's why I like it, the
whole last chapter Paul is-- he mentions 26 people. Probably people he's never
met, he's just heard about. But he says, greet them. They're fellow workers. They're awesome. Of the names he
mentions, nine of them are women, who are
helpers, workers, servants in the Church. So that puts aside the idea
that Paul was misogynistic and a male chauvinist. He mentions the value
of strong, capable women in the Church, even those who
have helped him tremendously. He talks about-- this will throw
you for a curve, verse 22-- "I, Tertius, who
wrote this epistle, greet you in the Lord." You're going,
uh-oh, gotta change my whole theology of Romans. I always thought
Paul wrote the book. He did, and he didn't. Paul dictated the
book, but he had somebody taking down the notes. His name was Tertius. So he's saying, I was
Paul's amanuensis. I was Paul's personal secretary. He dictated it, I wrote it down. That's all that is. Now, when you get to the book
of Galatians, the last chapter, Paul will say this, "See
what large letters I have written with my own hand." Remember that? What this means is probably
Paul had an eye affliction. I'll describe why when
we get to Galatians. Don't have enough time. I'm over time. So he probably
couldn't see very well, so he had to write large letters
for him to be able to see. So he dictated the
letter of Galatians, but, at the very end, he
wrote his own greeting. Right? It's like signing the letter. See what large letters
I have written unto you, and he signs his name. But it was also written
by an amanuensis. The same with this. Tertius wrote it. Now, we close the book. Last benediction of
the book, longest benediction in
the New Testament. "Now to Him who is able
to establish you according to my gospel and
preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the
revelation of the mystery kept secret since the world
began, but now made manifest, and by the prophetic Scriptures
made known to all nations, according to the commandment
of the everlasting God, for obedience to the faith-- to God, alone wise, be glory
through Jesus Christ forever. Amen." Listen, I did this in one night. No, no, wait. I don't say that to get a clap. Don't clap. We're doing it on the weekend. We've been in it
for like 18 weeks. Martyn Lloyd-Jones of
Westminster Chapel-- we visited that not long ago-- last century, went
through the book of Romans with his congregation
for 14 years. Donald Grey Barnhouse
went through Romans with this congregation. Took him 10 years. He said, every week the
church grew in numbers and grew in faith
during that journey. So we've only done
it in one night. But here's something
else to close with. One of the early church
fathers, who I've always greatly admired,
John Chrysostom, asked that the book of
Romans be read to him aloud once a week for 18 years. Do you think he knew the book? Yeah. It was so foundational
to him, it anchored him. Now, your name is written
in this last book, or this last chapter
of the book of Romans, unless your name happens
to be one of these names. But it's still not your name. Your name isn't written here. But your name can be written
in the Lamb's Book of Life. And it doesn't matter if your
name's written in Romans 16, but it does matter
if your name's written in the Lamb's
Book of Life, or not. So, if not-- and maybe
you're that last Gentile-- say yes to Him. Father, thank you for this
time together that we've had. So enriching to be able to
go through the whole book of Romans and see all of these
sections from the wrath of God, the grace of God, the plan
of God, the will of God, personally, and for us, your
people together, the Church. We ask it in Jesus' name,
for His sake and your glory. Amen. Let's all stand. [MUSIC PLAYING] We hope you enjoyed this message
from Skip Heitzig of Calvary Church. For more resources,
visit calvarynm.church. Thank you for joining us for
this teaching from The Bible from 30,000 Feet.
