Romans #6 - Crazy Grace: Bad News for “Good” People

[Music] nice [Music] well are you having a good day i'm about to ruin it we're in romans chapter 3. we're going through a great book of the bible we're in romans chapter 3 and in romans 1 and 2 paul tells us that god's evaluation of the human condition is that we are sinners that we are fallen that we are the problem and we are not the solution it's a bit like going to your doctor and your doctor being really honest with you i'll give you an example from my own life some years ago i wasn't doing well physically i had allergies and i was getting bloody noses and i couldn't sleep and i had heartburn and i was just not well i had a nervous eye twitch because i was stressed everybody in the church thought i was flirting with them i wasn't i was just a little freaked out and uh what happened then was uh one of my kids uh looked at grace who was in the third trimester with one of our soon-to-be-born children and looked at me and said daddy are you having a baby too and i was like no i have a i'm having an ice cream baby i need to make some lifestyle changes so i go to the doctor and uh the doctor says okay you need heartburn medicine you need sleep medicine you need anxiety med all of these medicines and so then you do the terrifying thing where you look at the potential side effects and you're like it's worse than what i have the side effects are worse than what i have so i go to another doctor who was kind of rude a bit direct and reminded me of myself so now i know what you feel like this doctor said well you know what your problem is i said what is that you are your problem i didn't pay for this i can get this for free uh so the doctor said no no you are wrong in the way you think and in the way you live and you are your biggest problem i said so you need you need to change you need to accept reality and change i was like oh boy so now i've got two doctors so i've got two choices the first doctor was we'll give you a bunch of medications to mask the problems the other doctor was you need to make some drastic changes so i got a burrito and prayed about it and uh and then and then i thought you know i'm gonna go with doctor number two so i did everything that doctor number two said i started changing my diet i started eating well taking my vitamins doing all the things i was supposed to do and guess what the diagnosis was correct but i needed to accept that before i could receive the remedy and i'm happy to report years later i just had a big you know annual checkup perfect health everything is good and fine the point is at first what that doctor said seemed very unloving and a bit harsh but it was his way of bringing me to reality because there was hope for me and things could be improved if i was willing to accept reality similarly the god of the bible is called a great physician and what we see in romans 1 and 2 is kind of the human checkup it's the human condition knowing that we are not going to like the diagnosis that we are sinners that we are fallen that we are rebels that we are the problem not the solution then the apostle paul here in romans 3 he answers four common objections in the same way that i argued with my doctor my doctor was telling me you need to do this i don't know you need to do that i'm not sure i agree and then i had an excuse for everything he answered my objections here paul is answering our objections and so we're going to look at objection number one in romans 3 1 through 2 and this is people who are outside of the church peering in on those of us who are in the church coming to this conclusion there's no benefit to church involvement the basic argument is okay i should go to church i should read the bible i should pray but i've met some of those people they're no better than me if it doesn't work for them why would i try something that isn't working what advantage has the jew he's talking there about the person who grows up in faith grows up in church grows up in prayer grows up in scripture there's a familiarity with the god of the bible or what is the value of circumcision this was their external demonstration of an internal transformation for us it would be our equivalent today of something like baptism it's publicly recognizing who your god is much in every way to begin with the jews were entrusted with the oracles of god and what he's talking about here are jews and gentiles these were racial cultural groupings in that day that had conflict much like there are racial cultural conflicts in our day one group thought we're the good people and they're the bad people the other group thought no no we're the good people they're the bad people god says you're all the bad people jesus is the good person right and so that's how god sees history and humanity and what he's saying is this that ultimately they did get a blessing and the blessing was the word of god and the word of god is what god blesses god doesn't bless people or races or nations or cultures god blesses his word and if you come under his word you're in the place that he blesses and if you leave the place of blessing blessing does not follow you consider it this way the bible says that god is a father i've got five kids if my kids are trying to do the right thing i'm going to help them if my kids are trying to do the wrong thing i'm not going to help them god is a father for those who seek to obey him he will bless and help them for those who rebel he will not and the point of the bible is two-fold it's to improve your life and to grant you eternal life and so if you believe the bible and you obey the bible it actually makes a difference in your life and the point of the bible is to introduce you to jesus christ to be your sin your savior as a sinner so that you can receive eternal life whether or not you meet jesus and go to heaven if you obey the bible there still are benefits for this life not the ultimate benefits but there are benefits in this life i'll give you one example when i was growing up i grew up catholic and my mom knew the lord i did not i didn't have really much interest in god but even sitting in church they would read from the old and the new testament and just hearing scripture gave me some guard rails that really did improve my life even though i did not yet know jesus okay don't get drunk don't have a kid out of wedlock certain things don't steal don't kill anybody some real basic guardrails that kept me out of a lot of trouble so there are benefits to knowing god's word and there was a study that was recently done by a group called back to the bible they did a national survey of 400 000 people looking at their bible reading habits and they come came up with something called the uh the power of four effect and that is if you read the bible one two three days a week minimal change in your life four days a week radical change in your life as soon as god's word becomes the majority of your week your week begins to change they saw that those who have god's word on the majority of their days during the week their emotional life improved their depression went down their anxiety lifted their addictive tendencies and self-destructive decisions decreased their hope for the future increased literally it was a radical transformation and when paul here is talking about the oracles of god he's talking about ultimately the word of god and so you being here is a real blessing i love you it's good to see you and i want god's word to be a blessing to you and when it comes to god's word there are really only three ways to view god's word i could just briefly summarize a lot of scholarship some people think that this is perfect and it's ultimately from god that's what i believe that's what we believe amen that's what we believe at the trinity church the other view is that this is not from god this is about god from us as a result it's not perfect it's imperfect it's a bunch of myth fable folklore stories it may be moral examples but it doesn't really reveal to us the truth of god the third category is a combination of the first two hearts are from god parts are from us parts are perfect parts are imperfect it used to be that the role of quote unquote scholarship was to determine what was true and false and today we've all sort of appointed ourselves as scholars and so we read it is that true or not true and usually we pick out the things we like god loves me of course he does look how awesome i am good job god good picking okay what else does it say here heaven i like heaven yea heaven heaven yay hell hell no i don't like that at all no i don't like that at all i'm not gonna do that oh no god's telling me what to do with my pants yeah that's probably not what it meant in the original hebrew that's probably not what it meant and so what we do is we pick and choose and what ultimately he is saying is that god's word is true and we'll be judged according to god's word and the more that we obey god's word the more we live in god's blessing okay the more we live in god's blessing the second objection is there's lots of hypocritical believers i know people who go to church and they pray and they read the bible but i don't see any real change in their life they're no better than i am he says this in romans 3 3-4 what if some were unfaithful does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of god by no means let god be true that every one of you were a liar and immediately some of you are like i'm not a liar you just did you just did because he said we're all liars as it is written he quotes the old testament that you may be justified in your words and prevail when you are judged when you are judged and the point is this there are people who are not faithful to god maybe they start but then they don't continue maybe they're raised in a believing home but they don't continue that legacy of faith and what he's saying is if if people are faithless and or unfaithful does that mean that god has failed no how many of you have seen god be faithful to you even when you were unfaithful to him have you experienced that if you're a christian at some point this is all our story that ultimately god is faithful to his word that is exactly what the apostle paul is saying if you have received jesus christ as your lord and savior god is faithful to you even when you are not faithful to him paul says elsewhere that even when we are faithless god is faithful okay if you are not a believer in jesus christ then god is still faithful to his word and his word says that he will judge you so either way whether you're a believer or an unbeliever god is faithful to his word to either bless you or judge you that's what he says and he's driving all of human history toward a final judgment you need to know that the most important day of your life is the last day and you will close your eyes and you will open them and you will give an account not to amir but to god and ultimately when we stand before god it will be for judgment if we belong to the lord jesus it will be a judgment of works for eternal rewards and blessings if we do not belong to the lord jesus it will be an eternal judgment in hell where the punishment literally fits the crime and so he is driving all of us to this very incredibly important decision who do you think jesus is what do you think jesus does have you received jesus so that you can avoid judgment because if you have good news god is faithful to you point number three or objection number three it is unloving and unrighteous for god to punish people this is more the emotional response and objection romans three five through 5-6 but if our unrighteousness our false flaws and failures serves to show the righteousness of god what shall we say the god is unrighteous to inflict wrath consequence punishment on us i speak in a human way by no means for then how could god judge the world now here's what happens we want god to judge the world right we set up little thrones on social media we're our own little judges we don't even wait for god to judge i got my little twitter throne guilty guilty guilty guilty guilty we judge the world we're in a world that is filled with constant judgment and we like to judge everyone else but we don't like anyone to judge us this is the human problem and condition it's become very popular today to talk about everybody else's sin but not our own their failures but not mine to blame them for things that i've done and what he's saying here ultimately is that this issue of judgment is absolutely right that if we feel that we have a right to render verdicts about behaviors then why does god not have that same right and ultimately where he is driving all of his arguments in romans is that god will judge everyone in one of two ways so let me tell you it's either jesus or hell i could just be really clear i hope i was clear right jesus or hell what are your options door number one jesus door number two kindling those are your options jesus christ was judged in our place and he endured the wrath of god for us the story of god is this we are bad god is good god came down to save us his name is jesus christ he was good we were bad we thought he was bad that's how bad we are so we murdered god jesus did something extraordinary incomprehensible truly on the cross and that is that he took our place and he put us in his place that he took all of the judgment and gave us all of the forgiveness that he took all of the unrighteousness and gave us his righteousness that he took our death and gave us his life he took our separation from god and gave us reconciliation to god the jesus christ on the cross was judged in your place for your sin paid your price to god and endured the wrath of god so that you could receive the love of god if you know this this is why you love jesus amen and what this means is you don't worry about dying and being judged and the wrath of god you sleep better your burden is lifted and you don't worry about this life ending in fact if you're honest you're kind of looking forward to it because this planet stinks this planet totally stinks this is why people keep moving they're like it stinks where i'm at they move and they're like it stinks here too that's because we need a new planet and we need a king jesus to make it all right and better and he's in the process of doing so so if you receive jesus he's judged you're not he's condemned you're not he experiences the wrath of god you don't he dies you live if you reject jesus the only other judgment is the judgment of jesus if you reject jesus the only judgment left is the judgment of jesus and let me just say this you don't need to face the judgment of jesus and the wrath of god in hell right now you can make the most important decision that you will ever make and that is to receive jesus christ as your lord and savior to thank him for what he did for you and to follow him because he knows where to lead you i love you with all my heart i don't want to see any of you in hell i want to see you all in heaven i want to see you forever if you're in hell i'm not coming to visit so i'm inviting you to join the rest of us in heaven and what i would tell you is this people make a lot of decisions that they regret i have never met anyone who has regretted receiving jesus christ i remember anywhere like yeah my burdens were lifted my sin was forgiven my relationship with god was reconciled my conscience was cleared my eternity was secure worst decision i ever made how many of you have received jesus as lord and savior and you're really really glad for who he is and what he does amen amen objection number four if god works it all out in the end you should not be angry with me the point is we've made a mess but god fixes the mess and if he fixes the mess why should he be upset with us that's the basic objection in romans 3 7 through 8 but if through my lie god's truth abounds to his glory if my lying makes his truth all the better if my darkness makes his light shine brighter why am i still being condemned as a sinner why not do evil that good may come as some people slanderously charge us with saying their condemnation is just this is the old argument that the ends justify the means that the ends justify the means and what it is that we do bad god does good and that we take credit for god's good this is how bad we are we've all done this right you do something bad it works out you're like you're welcome but no no no no no no i'll give you an example uh some years ago i met a pastor great pastor loves the lord teaches the bible dynamic ministry uh didn't know who their dad was never met their father their father was married and then had a girlfriend didn't tell the girlfriend that he was married okay so is this good or bad oh you're being judgy being very judgy thank you for being judgey and so what happens then is he gets his girlfriend pregnant doesn't want his wife to know so he abandons his pregnant girlfriend never meets or does anything to contribute to the well-being and upbringing of his son years later the son becomes a christian husband father pastor and says you know i want to meet my dad so he looks up his dad and he goes to meet his dad and he meets his dad and he tells him dad i've met jesus i'm teaching the bible i'm married i've got kids god's been very good to me tells this story the dad literally says something like this he says well i guess it was a good thing i slept with your mom like oh yeah we have a we have a prize for you you're amazing it's so what well you know if my adultery brought you into the world and you know you're here and you're blessing people then kind of i'm blessing people we should drug that drug test that guy he's not dealing with how many of you wives clearly see that he didn't do a good thing amen all the wives have all the husbands are like i could go either way no the wives are clear the wives are real clear that no no it's naughty and i'm gonna shoot you okay so but what he's saying is this if i do bad and god does good then why does it why don't i get credit for the good because god gets credit for the good we get credit for the bad amen amen again it's genesis 50 20. this is the story of joseph what he says to his brothers who did horrific evil against him what you did was evil but god used it for good that doesn't mean that we're good it means that he's good and he gets credit for the good and so what he's trying to do he's trying to get us all to this conclusion that we're sinners and we need a savior there we are a problem and we need a solution how many of you are feeling a little judged a little discouraged right now you're like it's a little harsh don't worry it's going to get worse um romans 3 9-17 that was the warm-up this is something that the theologians will call total depravity or pervasive depravity okay and what it means is this it means that all of a person is infected and affected by sin i'll start with a simple analogy so here's my nice clean water god made us like this clean pure holy he said we were very good very good sin then enters into the human condition we all inherit it romans 5 from our first father adam and if i were to drop poison or pollution into this water how much of it would be infected and affected all of it there wouldn't be a portion that would be preserved so it is with a human condition your mind is infected and affected by sin your heart is infected and affected by sin your will is infected and affected by sin and those who don't believe in the bible think that a part of them is good well i just followed the science why do you trust your mind well because it makes sense to me well you've had some crazy thoughts i've known you a while and then sometimes we'll just say follow your heart every hangover started with that assumption every hangover started without assumption the point is that all of us is infected and affected by sin so i want to break it down and look at all the components of the human being and how it's infected in effect he talks about our nature we'll unpack these what then are we jews those who grew up in church with the bible any better off not at all we've already charged that all jews and greeks everybody are under sin that means ruled dominated controlled by as it is written he quotes the old testament no one is righteous no not one it's very negative very binary very judgy very accurate what about our mind well i i i went to college i have more degrees in fahrenheit i'm very very smart no one understands they have a lot of knowledge but not a lot of wisdom we call that college uh also motive no one seeks for god we'll talk about that how about your will all have turned aside together they have become worthless deed no one does good not even one word their throat is an open grave they use their tongues to deceive the venom of asps is under their lips their mouth is full of curses and bitterness what about the body their feet are swift to shed blood emotion in their paths are ruined in misery and the soul and the way of peace they have not known when you go to the doctor they literally give you a checkup from head to toe this is god's checkup of humanity from head to toe he literally starts with stick your tongue out let me look down your throat that's literally where he starts he starts with nature this is something that you will only learn in the bible you will not hear in any other educational format that you are not just a sinner in your behavior you are a sinner by nature it's not just what you do it's who you are therefore you can't just have behavior modification god needs to give you nature regeneration that god needs to fundamentally change you at the level of being that's how bad we are and that's how great the need is and so how many of you have raised a kid and you've seen that they come it's like it's like a groupon you buy when you get one you get a kid and they throw in a free sin nature have you noticed that and if you raised a kid did you need to teach them to lie or steal you know what the difference is between an angry selfish child and a terrorist size that's it they all are going to do the same thing right and so even if you're parroting a kid you're like why do they do this because they need a new nature we need a new nature and so much of our world is trying to control behavior and what god wants to do is change nature until things change in here things can't change out there there needs to be the change in the want to before there can be the change in the how-to so he talks about nature in addition he talks about our mind and he says no one understands god we have plenty of conjecture and speculation in philosophy but we don't have wisdom or revelation that we even take the mind that god gave us and we use it to argue against god rather than agree with god this happens in politics this happens in philosophy this happens in spirituality and religion of all sorts and kinds that god says something and we use the mind that he gave us to argue against him or even to reverse course and to judge him how about motive it says that no one seeks god now immediately we're offended by this no no no no i'm seeking god we don't seek god we seek the gifts that god gives god is a giver who gives gifts we don't seek the giver we seek the gifts god i would like it if you healed me god if i pray please answer my prayer god i need a job so please give me one god my spouse is driving me crazy fix them amen we want god to answer our prayers and provide for our needs but we don't want god to tell us what to do we just want to tell god what to do it got really quiet in here and some of you say but what about seeking well the good news is this that god is the one who seeks us see in genesis 3 when our first parents sinned they ran and hid from god and god came seeking them it's been that way in human history ever since jesus christ comes and he says i came to seek and to save the lost the point is god is not lost and we're looking for him we're lost and he's looking for us how many of you you weren't looking for god but he was looking for you how many of you you weren't looking for god but he found you so if you seek god it's because he sought you first and this is the wonder of god that god is pursuing people who are running from him and so the hope is not that we are seeking god but that god is seeking us and this is even the story of the apostle paul who writes this his story was that he was absolutely religious he had no relationship with god he was not seeking god but jesus came down and found him and he talks about the will he says that we've turned aside that ultimately jesus christ says that he is the way early christians before we were called christians were also called people of the way meaning there is a way and that's god's way and we've turned aside that we now desire to wander off the path we desire to rebel against god our will is to not obey god but to disobey god what that means ultimately you could see where this goes we need a new nature we need a new mind we need god to restore our motives we need god to change our will and the result is deeds he says no one does good that's very negative and some of you are so offended i can see it and i'm so glad to offend you because i believe in equality so i believe in offending everyone so let me just do this for you you have been lied to since you were little you're a good person no you're not ask your spouse they'll they'll tell you the truth you have a good heart no you don't you're special oh you are you are you're a special kind of naughty that's what you are and what he says is that no one does good like i do a lot of good things here's the difference the bible says that man looks at the outward god looks at the heart have you ever done a good thing with a bad motive we call this dating right i brought you flowers because i want you to trust me so i can take advantage of you howdy right this we do we do nice things with naughty motives true it's true well i'm going to give them a gift so that they're obligated to me i'm going to be nice to them so that they align with me in the fight i'm going to do really great things out here so that people think really well of me to for something to be a truly good deed the motive of the heart as well as the actions of the hands or the words of the mouth need to all be done out of pure love for god without mixed motives therefore you could say yeah i yeah there's always something in it for me and it's not always for god and others there's always something in it for me and what he wants us to do is not look at bad people and compare ourselves to them but to look to jesus and compare ourselves to him because god's categories are not good and bad people but bad people and jesus who is perfect in addition he talks a bit about our words and the words that we speak and he says that our our words come from a place of death within us and it's like the stench of death jesus says something similar when he says religious people outwardly they look great like white wash tombs but inwardly it's the stench of death religion is the opposite of relationship with jesus religion is all about performing outwardly for people and not being transformed inwardly by god this is where jesus says of religious people with their lips they honor me but their hearts are far from me and what he's talking about here is how people speak to one another can we just say that this has been a brutal year that we we are a divided country we are a conflicted country but now technology has afforded us the opportunity to communicate more than ever and what we communicate is death and not life and it is just as the apostle paul prophesied it is it is bitterness and cursing bitterness i hate you you said this you did this i judge you i condemn you i shame you i publicly you know scorn you and then curse literally i'm putting a curse over you you'll never change this is who you are this is your identity there's no hope for you there's no future for you we live in a culture of death that's what he's saying and he says that the words that come out of us they literally kill people an asp was a a deadly reptile it was believed that cleopatra died by suicide through an asp that's what he says here is an asp there are certain things that we say and they literally poison and destroy people and see there's this little line that we tell kids sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me that's not true that's not true how many of you something has been said and it was deadly it was lethal it was devastating and he says that as long as there is death in here it's out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks jesus says that if there is death in here there will be death out there and it is the stench of death i don't know if you've ever smelled a dead body a decomposing body there is nothing quite like it it is horrifying some years ago when crisis and tragedy hit in haiti i was part of a small medical mission that brought relief supplies we landed and we were delivering them on the ground churches collapsed people dead horrific trauma and there was no governmental services to pick up the dead and decomposing bodies so they literally just left them on the street corners over days people are literally just blowing up and filling up until they explode it was the most apocalyptic thing i'd ever seen and as we were pulling bodies out of rubble and trying to save people's lives and deliver medical supplies the stench after a few days of these decomposing bodies in the streets was so overwhelming that i literally had to take the peels of oranges and shove them in my nose just so that i could smell something other than that because i was i was on the verge of throwing up all day every day here's what god says when i hear everything that everyone is saying i feel like i'm going to throw up see we live in a day now with social media that we get more information and news than at any time in history and it makes us sick and unhealthy imagine being god he hears everything he sees everything he knows everything and he never gets to quote unquote turn his phone off he's constantly aware you and i need to have a little empathy and compassion meaning we look at things from god's perspective you consider how frustrated we are with this planet imagine being the perfect god who made it perfect and made us perfect and then seeing what we have done with what he has made he then talks about the body and he talks about feet that are swift to shed innocent blood there was a historian will durant he recorded 3241 years of human history and he said that there was only 268 total years that he could not find a war these people killed these people and then these people killed these people it is feet that are constantly heading to shed blood and we will hear that and we will say thankfully i've never killed anyone let me say this the leading cause of death in our country is still abortion we keep getting this count i wish they would have the other count that the most dangerous place to be is still a mother's womb that should be the safest place to be the greatest threat to human life is hands of a physician that took an oath to preserve life and even during our recent crazy year churches were closed and clinics were open because death is essential and god is not now if you're here and you've participated in the murder of abortion because that's what it is jesus did die for you there is forgiveness for you there is now no condemnation for those who are in christ but we cannot as a culture and a nation think that we have evolved beyond some sort of barbarous act where we take innocent human life we take the most innocent human life and i hear it all the time what about justice for the marginalized and the outcasts what about those who haven't gotten out to vote yet who's going to vote for them see paul's condemnation of humanity is essential and it is just he additionally says that our emotional life is ruining misery it's ruining misery that there is roon in here so we bring misery out there we tend to be burden-givers not burden-lifters we tend to harm people not help people that emotionally we are unwell until god remakes our emotional life we are emotionally unwell and then he summarizes all of this with the soul he says that they do not know the peace of god until you have peace with god you cannot have the peace of god and until you have the peace of god you cannot bring the peace of god that the soul is troubled and it is it is unhealthy and unwell now as we read all of this this is something called total depravity or pervasive depravity and what paul is articulating is that all of a human person is infected and affected by sin now as i was preparing this section it was very curious a song came on and it was by luke bryan how many of you like luke bryan okay okay i'm gonna fix that uh i'm gonna fix that okay so luke bryan has a song comes on let's tell me some of you heard the lyrics i believe most people are good and i laughed out loud luke if you're watching you're a heretic you need jesus okay you're a heretic you need jesus we're not going to sing that as a worship song because it's not true you can't read romans 3 and say i believe most people are good you're like no they're not they're not they're not okay and that means even santa's a heretic because he has two lists what are the two lists naughty and nice if santa was honest it would be jesus and everybody those would be the two lists right that we tend to think that god grades on a curve and what he sees is perfect and imperfect that's why jesus said to be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect now now let me say this that uh he quotes seven old testament texts here and he's trying to get us all to agree that we are sinners and we need a savior we have a problem he is the solution now what happens is it is easier for us to see this in those people amen some of you read this you're like this such a good sermon i'm gonna send it to all my horrible friends and my ex-wife they're gonna really benefit from this okay it's all of us that's why he uses words like all none no one everyone and no human being total or our pervasive depravity is that all of a person and all people are infected and affected by sin now immediately the little attorney that lives in you is going to want to defend you we've all got a little attorney he's like oh i'll stick up for you okay and so he comes out and what he says is all this you're you're you're not there's people worse than you this is what we always do we find someone worse than us and we become friends with them so we look better okay and if you're like i don't have a friend like that i hate to tell you you're that friend i hate to tell you you're that friend and when we do something really bad we always just last resort pull out the hitler card at least i'm not hitler well congratulations yeah you get a gold star on the moral chart you're better than hitler gosh you know that's like a high jump that's this high you're like all right i made it okay so there is a difference between total depravity and utter depravity utter depravity is you're as bad as you could possibly be okay and what god does he puts some restraints to keep us from descending into utter depravity paul told us in romans 2 one is a conscience even if you don't know god you know that some things are wrong right it's interesting today we have people taking to the streets and looting and protesting and rioting and demanding and they're like there is no god there is no law there's no right and wrong i'm very upset and appealing to a standard that i deny exists because they have a conscience and even if they don't know god they know that some things are wrong in addition he's going to tell us in romans 5 that there is death that some people stop because they die that's how god stops him and for the rest of us there are certain things that we would do but we might die and that gives us restraint in romans 13 he's going to tell us that in addition god gives government and law and law and some of you would do things you're like i would do it but there's police and we're in arizona so after i get shot they're going to call the police and if you're new that's how we roll write that down that's helpful information okay or i'm going to get arrested i'm going to need to get an attorney this is going to be a legal battle okay i would do it but there is law that constrains and restrains me people who don't believe in human depravity what do they want to do let's get rid of the cops oh yeah that'll fix it then people can be free to their full potential oh my gosh let's hope that doesn't happen if they are evil all they do is maximize their evil they bring hell up they don't bring hell down well let's get rid of government let's get rid of rule of law let's get rid of parents let's get rid of authority oh satan said that and it's been a real problem ever since it's demonic and it's the heart of the demonic this is why certain places and even certain cities in our own nation today that don't believe in human sinfulness you know what we need to do we need to get rid of law we need to get rid of parents we need to get rid of police we need to get rid of military we need to get rid of first responders and we need to let people do what they want and then we wonder why the whole thing collapses and everybody gets in their car and drives to arizona so welcome we're the fastest growing city and county in america and you're like those people are crazy i'm going to arizona okay so welcome but understand that there is a problem and that is that we don't understand the human condition okay now in hearing this a couple of things some of you will immediately defend yourself so let me let me ask you a question what if all of these restraints and constraints that god provides to keep us from slipping from total to utter depravity were removed and eradicated so imagine you couldn't die you're immortal like god originally created us no death so nothing you could do would take your life no fear of death now imagine that there was no law no police no soldiers no courts no judges no lawyers no prisons no consequences now imagine you could have unlimited power and money you could do whatever you want question would you do some bad things oh god everybody's like i don't know yeah you do yeah you do right how many of you if you could kill a few people oh pastor mark i never thought about that yeah wow lord oh that's no okay see even if you have a name or a face you're guilty okay i'm just telling you how many of you if you could get revenge on them you're like i would watch liam neeson movies and do it that's what i do to them i torture them how many of you would do some horrible things see we've all got a shadow side and even if we know jesus there's still some lingering flesh in us and if it weren't for the constraints and restraints of god we would be worse than we are that doesn't mean that we're good it means that we're bad and that god is good and that god's goodness restrains our badness therefore we don't take credit for it we give god glory for it so let me compare it's really the word versus the world and this is always the same old battle so to summarize the world says i am good the word says god alone is perfect the world says i decide right and wrong the word says god defines right and wrong the world says i blame external systems the word says god blames my internal sin the world says i rebel against authority the word says god rules with all authority the world says i deserve tolerance the word says god deserves repentance the world says i am a victim the word says god and others are my victims the world says i accept myself the word says god forgives me the world says i love myself the word says god loves me the world says i make myself better self-help self-improvement self-esteem self-actualization the word says god makes me new not just better but new okay you've got a decision to make between what the world says and what the word says that's what paul talked about at the beginning the oracles of god coming back to the scripture because the truth is you don't know who you are until you know who god is the two most important things you can learn is who god is and who you are until you know who god is you don't even know who you are because you have no one to compare yourself to until you meet god and so in hearing this let me say a couple of things number one fall the sin the human condition of rebellion it alone explains life on our planet how many of you think that earth sucks right now please be honest have you been to 2020 it's horrible right you're looking you're like it's horrible why is it horrible now some of you believe in evolution which is adorable it's adorable it's so cute you're like just give it time we have it's not going well amen like i don't know about you it doesn't i don't believe in evolution i believe in devolution i don't believe we were monkeys but we're getting there i think i think i think we should turn the evolutionary chart around right you're like i if i wake up with a sloped floor and i'm dragging my knuckles i'm not shocked right time is not going to fix our problem number two it gives us our dignity back some people say oh but pastor mark this low view of humanity it's very negative no it's actually very positive because what it says is you were made for more you're not an animal you're an image bearer that you were made here you fell to here jesus resurrects you to hear and so this is not what you were made for you were made for more it gives you your dignity back it gives you your dignity back number three it gives us the basis for the human desire for equality there's everybody right now everybody should be equal everybody should be equal you know what we are we're equally fallen we're equally sinful we're equally rebellious we equally need jesus so you know what black and white need jesus republican and democrat need jesus men and women need jesus young and old need jesus poor and rich need jesus we're all equal we messed it up he's our only hope that's our equality that's our equality in addition this allows us to be honest if i'm a good person and i'm struggling i probably shouldn't tell you and if i can fix my own problems then i should probably hide what they are if i'm a sinner totally depraved a hot mess minus the hot i just tell you i'm not doing so good and i need help you could just come clean and be honest amen and we call that christianity the difference between christianity and religion is this religious people are bad and sneaky and hide it and christians just are honest about it like i am really a mess and i really need help great his name is jesus and we love him and he loves you and he loves us and we're here to help if you're a good person you got to hide your bad and if you fix your own problems you can't ask help when you need it the most that's why the bible uses these words like rebellion folly self-abuse madness treason hatred death spiritual adultery missing the mark wandering from the path idolatry insanity irrationality pride selfishness blindness deafness a heart heart a stiff neck delusion unreasonableness and self-worship sin includes not just commission the bad things we do omission the things we don't do some people say so they're like i don't know why you're upset i didn't do anything that's the problem the husband who doesn't provide for his family it's a sin of omission the parents who don't raise their child it's a sin of omission the citizen who expects the government to take responsibility for the things that god assigns them responsibility for it's a sin of omission we're all just walking around like i didn't do anything somebody take care of me god's like you have responsibilities and your sins are sometimes commissioned where you do something you shouldn't do but oftentimes it's omission you're not doing what you're supposed to do that's where indifference and apathy and cowardice are horrendous sins it also includes our thoughts our words our deeds our motives and some people will say well we're just living we're sleeping together we're doing this we're doing that it's not like we're breaking the law it's like we're doing anything bad here's what i would tell you it's worse than that it's a cosmic crime well nobody got hurt god was hurt well we didn't break the law you broke god's law well we didn't do anything wrong actually god says you did god says you did and this is a very poignant personal point for me i uh i grew up in a neighborhood with the green river killer and ted bundy i grew up in a neighborhood with two serial killers okay they actually found a dead body at my little league field a prostitute that was murdered that's where i grew up and part of what the teaching of the bible gives us is the freedom to have a category of people who are evil if you are a parent and all you tell your children is people are good give them the benefit of the doubt everybody's got a good heart you are placing them in harm's way okay i have a particular heart for women and children and i've been criticized over the years that mark yells only at men i don't yell women and children i give children bibles and suckers i i don't know okay but i believe that and i know that there are such thing as evil women okay but i'm not going to talk about that and what i'm going to talk about is because i could see him and i'm scared so what i'm going to talk about i'm talking about evil men how many of you men know that there are some men who have they have run through those restraints and constraints that god has given and they are sliding from total depravity to utter depravity and they're evil and they're dangerous okay there are people like that now most people are just foolish that's that's most of us but some people slide from foolish to evil because sin is like gravity okay if if you don't pursue wisdom eventually foolishness pulls you toward evil okay this is why when evil happens someone needs to do what jesus did and get in the middle to protect the innocent this is love and some people say how could a loving god judge people how could a loving god send people to hell how could a loving god not i've got a door on my home and if you kick it down i will get between you and my family because i love them okay god has a family and he has a home and if you want to be part of the family you're welcome in the home but if you want to harm the family you will deal with the father i need i need you parents to have this category if somebody says hey can your kids come stay the night at our house you better get to know the family this used to happen all the time so we have five little kids people come up in church they'll be like hey can your kids come stay the night at our house nope well why i don't know you well what do you think it's a dangerous place that's what i assume until i know otherwise when it comes to a little kid okay i pay people in places i believe are unsafe until i confirm they are safe because if i'm going to air with the child i'm going to err on the side of safety and caution okay um you need to keep this category that some people are evil that some people are dangerous they're not beyond god's help but they may be beyond your help okay i'll give you two examples and i want to i want to drive this home and i want to encourage all of you but especially you men to have a heart for women and children i was a brand new pastor i've been a senior pastor half my adult life 25 years and i was a young pastor and there was somebody in our church that a relative of theirs got convicted as a predatory sex offender pedophile child abuser molester and they wanted me to talk to them as they were headed off to their prison sentence so i went to meet with him and i sat down with this person and uh i asked him i said are you guilty and they they actually smiled and it was more like bragging they said yes there was no there was no guilt and i said well did something happen to you when you were little did someone abuse you did something happen to you that caused this they said not that i know of so i looked at this man and it was like looking into the face of the devil i asked him i said then why do you hurt children he smiled and he said i like to break them i looked at him i said sir i'm glad you're going to prison and if you don't meet jesus you're going to hell and i don't feel bad about that because i don't want you to be with kids forever until there's a nature change a mind change a heart change the old you needs to die most horrifying moment that i can remember in pastoral ministry i was preaching six sermons a sunday and by the last one i don't even know what i was talking about people come up and be like i don't agree with what you say like i don't agree with what i say i don't even know what i'm talking about it's the sixth one man i had a young woman she just turned 18. i think she was a college student she came up to me i was literally in the front row band is playing and uh she comes up to me she said pastor mark i turned 18. oh congratulations she was a new christian i bought her first bible she was part of our church family and she said my whole life i want to meet my dad i never met my dad my mom always said you can't meet your dad your dad's a bad guy and she said so when i turned 18 i found my dad i said really she said yeah she said i flew out and met him now the band is playing i got to go up and preach i said what happened she said he raped me i literally started to throw up i i'm a dad i got little girls and i just started weeping i just broke i just said sweetheart i am so sorry that is not the father heart of god i am so sorry this world is not a safe place and it is not filled with all good people okay and i need you to have that category you hear that what is that that's a baby [Music] that got born and needs to be protected amen amen so here's the conclusion bad news for good people if you're good you don't need god if you're good you don't need jesus if you're good you don't need to change that's bad news for you romans 3 18-20 there is no fear of god before their eyes yeah what about god i judge god i ignore the bible i'm a good person this doesn't apply to me now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law just so you know there is a law and there is a law giver so that every mouth may be stopped and the whole world may be held accountable this is a day of judgment to whom to god for by works of the law what we do our social justice our woke-ism our cause-ism our religious self-righteousness nothing by works no human being will be justified in his sight since through the law comes knowledge of sin if you read this book accurately it shows you how bad you are and how good god is and it gives you a diagnosis that should create in you a crisis that should send you running to jesus for forgiveness and what we live in is this day where everyone is talking about what about justice what about justice what about justice great how about god's justice before we have our justice how about he gets his justice think of it in this way everyone is so aware of all the ways that i've been aired against or sinned against look what they said or look what they did or look at look at how much has been done to me look at god god has never done anything wrong to anyone and everyone has only done wrong to god that god has experienced injustice at a level that is greater than all of human history combined offending one another and ultimately if we believe in justice we believe that god has a right to his justice and i'm just sick of people who are walking around and saying i'm a victim and not first saying i'm a villain i have a problem with people saying here's all the things they've done wrong without starting with the things that they have done wrong it is repentance of our sin not their sin it is his judgment not our judgment that we should concern ourselves with and he says that there is no fear of god there's no recognition of god there is no awareness of god and you're stupid until you meet god you are stupid until you you may be educated but you are not wise and the result is the fear of the lord is the beginning of wisdom what it says is start with god who god is what god says what god does that's how you get wise and what he's saying here is that there is an external authority and you will be judged by that law and that law does not change furthermore there is a day of judgment and when that day of judgment comes no one will be defending themselves all mouths will be silenced you can't stand before god say well it was a genetic disposition my parents were bad i grew up in an injust culture it was systemic and not my fault somebody hurt me when i was little there will be no excuse when we stand before god all mouths will be silent guilty think of it in this way sin rebellion is so horrific just look at what god does satan and demons sin first they get cast out of god's presence jesus doesn't come for them jesus doesn't die for them jesus doesn't rise for them there is no hope for them there is no grace for them there is no salvation for them there is only hell for them we should get what they got that's justice instead we get jesus and that is grace and it's crazy grace we then sin against god and the result is death when someone does something bad we give them a death sentence god looked at humanity and gave humanity a death sentence the only way that god could stop us from sinning is to stop us from living and then the whole planet is cursed every inch of creation is infected and affected by our sin and then jesus christ comes to the earth and god has to die to fix the problem we have made if you're a good person then why did jesus die if you can fix your problem then why did jesus die furthermore hell will be filled it's a narrow path and a narrow door few enter it and pass through it and then god is going to set this planet on fire and start over so one of two things are true god is overreacting or we are under reacting i'm going to bring the band up and i know you're thinking what song are we going to sing now yeah i believe most people are good that was an hour of bad news now i got two minutes of good news the next word we're gonna get into it next week come back the next word is but okay good good good and then he says but jesus christ okay so yay oh finally some good news okay all right i need little keys come on give me little keys need a little drum though these people have put up with a lot they've been yelled at by a crazy middle-aged man for an hour they need they need a little groove give me a little groove okay here we go i have good news for all you bad people okay number one i am all wrong but jesus christ he made it all right amen i am unrighteous see you agree with me on that point don't you jesus christ but jesus christ made me righteous thank you jesus okay i am worse than i can imagine but jesus christ is better than i can fathom amen hey this is not golf we don't do golf claps for jesus i know you're in scottsdale but you got you got to graduate to college football okay i am my problem but jesus christ is my solution i am god's enemy but jesus christ made me family i am a child of the devil but jesus christ made me a child of god amen i am under the wrath of god but jesus christ put me under the grace of god i am a sinner jesus christ is my savior i am dead jesus christ makes me alive and i was headed to hell but jesus is taking me to heaven amen you

Channel: Real Faith by Mark Driscoll

Views: 8,287

Rating: 4.9436622 out of 5

Keywords: Mark, Driscoll, ministry, thetrinitychurch, scottsdale, arizona, bible, teaching, gospel, theology, jesus, biblestudy, faith, bibleverse

Id: FB3zLytCFfA

Length: 64min 46sec (3886 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 19 2020