Please open your Bibles to Psalm 81. Psalm 81. For the choir director on the Gidduth, a psalm of Asaph. Sing for joy to God our strength. Shout joyfully to the God of Jacob. Raise a song, strike the timbrel, the sweet sounding lyre with the harp. Blow the trumpet at the new moon, at the full moon on our feast day. For it is a statute for Israel in ordinance of the God of Jacob. He established it for a testimony in Joseph when he went throughout the land of Egypt. I heard a language that I did not know. I relieved his shoulder of the burden. His hands were freed from the basket. You called in trouble and I rescued you. I answered you in the hiding place of thunder. I proved you at the waters of Meribah. Selah. Hear, O my people, and I will admonish you. O Israel, if you would listen to me, let there be no strange god among you, nor shall you worship any foreign god. I, the Lord, am your God, who brought you up from the land of Egypt. Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it. But my people did not listen to my voice, and Israel did not obey me. So I gave them over to the stubbornness of their hearts to walk in their own devices. Oh, that my people would listen to me, that Israel would walk in my ways. I would quickly subdue their enemies, and turn my hand against their adversaries. Those who hate the Lord would pretend obedience to him, and their time of punishment would be forever. But I would feed you with the finest of the wheat, and with honey from the rock, I would satisfy you." This is the word of God, would you pray with me. Our Father in Heaven, as we have been reminded in this psalm, you are a God of tender mercy. You are not a God who delights in the destruction of people. You are a good and a kind God. You are patient in long suffering. And you call upon even your stubborn people, Israel, to turn away from their sin, to listen to your voice, so that you would shower them with mercy and grace. We thank you that you do not delight in the death of the wicked, that you would prefer grace. We thank you that you are a God of salvation, And that as we gather here today, we are a testament to that. We thank you that you have saved us from the world, out of our sins, out from under your judgment. And that you have made us to be your beloved people. And that it is the supreme desire of our hearts, oh God, to listen to your voice. to walk in your ways, to offer our hearts to you, and to be satisfied by you alone. We thank you for your goodness to us. And we offer our hearts to you as an act of worship. And we pray for your blessing upon our continued singing. And as we open your word, Lord, I pray that you would provide help by your spirit to understand your truth and to take heed to what you have revealed. Father, we thank you for Christ. We thank you that he has died for every one of our sins, that we are now free forever because of him. And we pray this in his name. Amen. It is with a deep sense of solemnity that I invite you to open your Bibles with me to Romans chapter 1, and I want to direct your attention to two verses, namely verses 24 and 25. The title of our message this morning is The Judgment of Sexual Freedom. Let me begin by reading verses 24 and 25 in your hearing. The Apostle Paul writes, therefore God gave them over in the lust of their hearts to impurity so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever. Amen. This is the word of God. My body, my choice. That is the mantra of millions of Americans. My body, my choice is a political slogan used by those who advocate for abortion. At a recent roundtable discussion on so-called reproductive rights, Vice President Kamala Harris said the following, and I quote, the President and I are unequivocal in our support of Roe v. Wade and the constitutionality of Roe v. Wade and the right of women to make decisions for themselves with whomever they choose about their own bodies. And needless to say, the right of women to make decisions about their own bodies is not negotiable. The right of women to make decisions about their own bodies is their decision. It is their body." In other words, my body, my choice. Since the Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade in 1973 to legalize abortion, it is estimated that 62 million babies have been murdered in this country. About 1 million babies are aborted every year in the United States of America. That is about 2,700 abortions every day. 2,700 every single day. That is 114 babies every hour. On average, that is one baby being aborted every 31 seconds. That is staggering. And this is sanctioned by our federal government. Planned Parenthood is the single largest provider of abortions in this country, and it is substantially supported by our federal government. Last year alone, Planned Parenthood received $617 million in federal funding. The atrocities of the abortion movement in this country far exceed those in the Nazi Holocaust against the Jews or the transatlantic African slave trade. Abortion is the atrocity of all atrocities. It is the holocaust of all holocausts. It is our national reproach, our national sin, our national shame. It is the greatest moral evil of our times and it is not even close. And what is more, it is based upon flawed argumentation. The argument of my body, my choice is fatally flawed because it fails to recognize that a baby living inside of a mother's body is distinct from a woman's body. An unborn baby is a separate human being with its own DNA, with its own gender, with its own blood type, with its own vital organs. So no woman has the right to kill her baby. It's not her body and it's not her choice. Abortion is not about reproductive health. It has nothing to do with health care. It is murder, plain and simple. A human baby is not like a tumor that needs to be removed from the body, but a precious life that needs to be protected. But what is it that really drives the abortion movement in our country? To be sure, there is a complexity of motivations, but there is one thing that really drives the abortion movement more than anything else, and that is the quest for sexual freedom. What people really want is sexual autonomy. People want unfettered sex with no consequences. When you hear people say, my body, my choice, what they are really saying is that they want the freedom to have sex with whoever they want, whenever they want, without any responsibility, even at the expense of sacrificing their children. Dear people, sexual freedom is one of the idols of this country. Millions and millions of people in this country bow before the God of sexual freedom. And those who worship the God of sexual freedom sacrifice their children upon the altar of sexual freedom. Why is there such a thirst in this country for abortion? Because of our nation's unbridled, unrestrained, unashamed craving for sexual freedom. The 1960s was a dramatic turning point in our nation's history. It was a tumultuous decade in which our nation underwent a revolution, a sexual revolution. A younger generation of Americans revolted against the sexual moral values of their parents and their grandparents. Up to that time, sex within marriage was the cultural norm, but it was replaced with a new cultural norm, that is, having sex outside of marriage with whoever you want. It was at that time that premarital Casual sex began to be normalized and celebrated in American life and culture. And sexuality became a common part of the national conversation and began to be commonplace in popular culture in things like literature and music and television. The sexual revolution that began in the 1960s progressed in the decades that followed at such breakneck speed that we are living arguably in the most sexually perverse culture in the history of the world. In the history of the world. Everywhere you look, you find sexual perversion. It is ubiquitous. It is everywhere. It dominates the entertainment industry from music to movies to television. It dominates our government and our educational system. It dominates the White House, the schoolhouse, and the jailhouse. It dominates marketing. It dominates commercials. It dominates the workplace and the marketplace. It dominates the military and the ball field. It is even in the checkout lane at the grocery store where sensual magazines are carefully placed to draw your attention to sexual perversity. And with the advent of the internet and personal computers and smartphones, the accessibility and intake of pornography in this country is so massive that it boggles the mind. There is an insatiable desire for sexual perversity in this culture that is breathtaking, that is staggering beyond our ability to conceive. As I stand before you this morning, we have not one but two great national sins. One is the murder of the unborn whose blood cries up from the ground to God, and the other is sexual perversity. As we have already noted, one is the result of the other. These two things are married, if you will. And both of these have been our national sins for decades and decades. Now, with all of that in mind, I want to ask you a very sobering question, and that is this. Is our country under the wrath of Almighty God? Is this country, the United States of America, under the wrath of Almighty God? The answer is emphatically yes. It is emphatically yes. There is no question that this nation that we live in and that we love is under the wrath of God. Another way to say it is that we are living in Romans chapter one. And I cannot think of a passage that is more relevant to our times than Romans chapter one. When you read Romans chapter one, it's as if the apostle Paul wrote this letter yesterday while living in 21st century America. What we learn in Romans 1 is that our national sin of sexual perversity is not only worthy of God's judgment, but listen, it is God's judgment. It is God's judgment. That is why I have titled this message, The Judgment of Sexual Freedom. I agree with Billy Graham, who said many years ago, if God doesn't punish America, he will have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah. At this point in our study of Romans, we are now looking at the second major section of the book, Roman numeral 2, the gospel explained. And the way Paul begins to explain the gospel is by explaining our need for the gospel. Before we can appreciate the good news of the gospel, we must first appreciate and understand the bad news of sin. Until you can appreciate the cure, you have to appreciate the disease. We are calling this letter A in our outline, the need for righteousness, and the way Paul establishes our need for righteousness is by proving our condemnation before God. He begins with number one in our outline, the condemnation of Gentiles. At this point, you can think about Romans like a road trip. Romans 1, 1-17 is like driving through Yosemite National Park, where there is so much beautiful and glorious scenery as Paul introduces to us the gospel that he preached. But when Paul begins the body of this letter in verse 18, it is like entering into a dark tunnel. And when you enter into this tunnel, you are surprised by how dark it is and how long it is. It begins in 118 and it does not end until chapter 3 and verse 20. That is a long, dark tunnel of man's sin before God. We will not come out of this tunnel and see light again until chapter 3 and verse 21. Admittedly, this is a very, very difficult section of Romans. I feel the weight of the difficulty of this text, but it is absolutely essential if we are going to truly understand our spiritual sinful condition before God and why we so desperately need the gospel of Jesus Christ. The long, dark tunnel begins with the reality of God's wrath in the opening part of verse 18. Paul affirms here that sinners are indeed in the hands of an angry God. From there, we drove further into the tunnel by looking at the reasons for God's wrath in verses 18 to 23. Why is God so angry with sinners? Paul gives us two reasons. He is like a prosecuting attorney. who masterfully gives to us two reasons. Number one is because sinners suppress the knowledge of God that is revealed in creation. And number two is because sinners refuse to worship God. Instead of worshiping God, sinners exchange the glory of the incorruptible God for the worship of idols. As we have noted, the most fundamental problem with man is a worship problem. This was true in the ancient world of Paul's day, and it is also true in our modern advanced world today. At his heart, sinful man is an idolater. The heart of man is an idol factory, as John Calvin has said. The chief sin of man is that he refuses to glorify God. Sinful man will worship anything and everything except God, the creator. For this reason, God is angry. God has every right to be angry with sinners. The wrath of God is completely justified. That brings us now to a new section, the revelation of God's wrath in verses 24 to 32. And I have to warn you, as we drive through this portion of Romans 1, it is the darkest part of the tunnel. My dad was a career army man who fought in the Vietnam War. And he used to tell me when I was a kid that in the jungles of Vietnam it was so dark that you could not see your hand in front of your face. It was the darkest place he had ever been. And that is how this portion of Romans chapter 1 is. It is the darkest part of the tunnel. Donald Gray Barnhouse, who was a faithful expositor of the Word of God in a previous generation, wrote a four-volume commentary on Romans, and he called this text, the one that we are in this morning, the most terrible passage in the Bible. The most terrible passage in the Bible, and he is right. There are numerous passages in the Bible that deal with human sin and divine judgment, but there is no other single passage quite like this one. It stands apart. It is unique. And one of the many things that is so astonishing about this passage is that it is like a snapshot of American culture. It is a clear and a dramatic portrait of our national sins. Again, we are indeed living in Romans chapter 1. Now, we know that God is angry with sinners, and we know why God is angry with sinners, but not until now does Paul explain what the wrath of God is. The text that is before us in verses 24 to 32 is so critical to our understanding because it reveals the nature of the wrath of God. As we think about the nature of God's wrath, there is a passage outside of Romans that has come to my mind time and time again that speaks to this issue, and that is Psalm 90 and verse 11. You don't need to turn there, but listen to Psalm 90 and verse 11. The psalmist, that is Moses, asks a question. Who understands the power of your anger? Who understands the power of your anger and your fury according to the fear that is due you? The power of God is beyond human comprehension. God is far more powerful than you know or realize. God demonstrates his power in a myriad of ways. God demonstrates his power in his ability to create the world by the mere breath of his mouth. God demonstrates his power by his ability to sustain all things and by his ability to govern and rule over all things. God is an infinitely powerful being. But another way that God demonstrates his power is in his ability to judge the world. God's power to judge the world, dear people, is awesome. It is breathtaking. It is astonishing. Who understands the power of God's anger? The answer is no one fully understands the power of God's anger. But even with a limited partial understanding of the power of God in judgment, that is enough to make us to fear God. And as I stand before you today, I tremble before God and I fear the power of his judgment. So what is the nature of God's wrath? How does God express his wrath? He does so in multiple ways. If you'll look on your notes, I've provided a number of ways that God expresses his wrath in the Bible. The first one is cataclysmic wrath. This is when God brought catastrophic judgments upon the world. in the worldwide global flood of Noah's day when he drowned every living thing, every human being that was not inside the ark. Another example of this would be when God rained fire and brimstone from heaven literally upon the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Another expression of God's wrath is consequential wrath. This is the principle of sowing and reaping. God is a moral being and his creation reflects his moral character. God has made the world in such a way that there are natural, built-in consequences to sin. If a person sows sin, he or she will reap destruction. You reap what you sow. Thirdly, there is eschatological wrath. This is the final day of the Lord in the future. This is that time of future wrath at the end of the age, just prior to the return of Jesus Christ in the tribulation period when God will unleash three series of divine judgments upon the world from heaven, the seven seals, the seven trumpets, and the seven bowls of wrath. And then fourthly, there is eternal wrath. This is when unrepentant, unbelieving sinners are cast into hell forever. Hell is pictured in the Bible as a lake of fire which burns forever and ever. Hell is the place of eternal conscious torment where the smoke of their suffering goes up forever and ever. It never ceases. It never ends. Who can understand the power of God's anger? But none of these expressions of God's wrath is what we find in Romans 1. We know that God is angry with sinners and we know why God is angry with sinners, but how does God express his holy and righteous anger against sinners in Romans 1? What we see in Romans 1 is what is called abandoning wrath or the wrath of abandonment. If you will look at verse 18, Paul says, for the wrath of God is, and I'm emphasizing the word is, accenting that word, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven. Several weeks ago when we were in verse 18, we noted that the verb revealed is a present tense verb. And so when Paul speaks about the wrath of God here, he is speaking about the wrath of God that is right now at this very moment being revealed from heaven. And so as we gather here in this building this morning, right now at this very moment, the wrath of God is being revealed. It's being poured out from heaven upon the world. How? By giving. Unrepentant, unbelieving sinners over to their sin. That is so frightening. Paul says this not once, not twice, but three times in verse 24. Therefore, God gave them over. In verse 26, for this reason God gave them over. In verse 28, and just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over. These are some of the most frightening words in the Bible. Now the structure of Romans 1, 24 to 32 unfolds into three sections. You'll find this on your notes. Number one is man's abandonment to sexual perversity in verses 24 and 25. Number two is man's abandonment to homosexuality in verses 26 and 27. And then thirdly, we see man's abandonment to a reprobate mind in verses 28 to 32. And as we think about these three sections, there appears to be a progression that is unfolding as man spirals further and further and further down into sin. This morning, we are only going to look at the first section in verses 24 and 25. Next week, we will begin to look at the second section, which will take several messages. There is so much for us to think about and to consider in verses 26 and 27, especially given the times that we are living in. And then we will look at the third section in verses 28 to 32, probably in one single message. Now last week I gave what I called a chart or a map of man's devolution in Romans 1, and I have that again for you on your notes, and I've added one line to it. So if you'll look at that, the map of Romans 1, 18 to 25, it begins with the clear and constant witness of God's self-revelation and creation. From there we see in this inverted pyramid, if you will, man knows God but suppresses the truth of God. And then man refuses to worship God. And then man's thinking becomes futile. And then man's heart becomes foolish and darkened. And then man becomes self-deceived about his true spiritual condition. And then man worships idols instead of God. And then man's abandonment to sexual perversity. What a dark, dark tunnel. Let's now drive through the tunnel of these two verses, beginning in verse 24 with the word, therefore. Again, I want you to notice how Paul continues to use logical arguments. He continues to make his case That sinful man is under the wrath of God. You have all of these for's and therefore's, all of these logical connectors. He says, therefore, God. Notice here that God is the subject of the verb. Up to this point, in verses 18 to 23, Paul has primarily focused on what sinful man does to God. In verse 18, man suppresses the knowledge of God. In verse 21, man does not glorify God. In verse 21, man does not give thanks to God. In verse 23, man exchanges the glory of God. And we talked last time about how when people refuse to worship God, terrible things happen to them. There are natural consequences for rejecting God and refusing to worship him. In verses 21 and 22, man's thinking becomes futile, man's heart becomes darkened, man becomes a fool in verse 22. And we noted that all of these are passive verbs. And that is very important because it does not tell us what man does, but what happens to man because of what he does, namely, when he rejects God. When man refuses to worship God, futility indwells the mind, darkness settles on the heart, and he becomes a self-deceived fool, unable to see his true spiritual condition before God. These are the natural consequences of rejecting God. But now in verse 24, Paul focuses on what God does to man. Therefore, God gave them over. Again, God is the subject of the verb. God is the one doing the action. God is not passive. God is not a bystander. He is personally and actively involved in expressing his wrath against sinful men in this way, by giving them over. Giving them over to what? Giving them over to sin. This is judicial abandonment. This is the wrath of abandonment. One way God punishes man's sin is by giving man over to his sin. But we must be very, very careful at this point because Paul is not saying that God is responsible for people's sin. God does not make anyone sin. That is not at all what Paul is saying. These are people who are already immersed in sin. They already do not want God. They already refuse God and suppress the knowledge of God. They want their sin. And at some point, God has enough and he hands them over to their sin. He lets them go. He gives them up. He lets them have their own way. So God is not making them sin. He gives them over to the sin that they already want, that they are already eating and drinking. He removes the restraints of conscience. He removes the restraints of common grace, and he lets them go. Now imagine that you know somebody who is involved in terrible things, and that person is bent on continuing in their terrible behavior and terrible lifestyle. And in love, you try to restrain that person and keep that person from going down what you know is the road of destruction. But as that person continues to fight you and resist you, you eventually just have to let them go. And this is what God does to sinners who are resolute in their rejection of Him and in their refusal to worship Him. God lets them go their own way as an act of judgment. So listen very carefully. God's punishment for sin is more sin. God's punishment for sin is more sin, more and more and more and deeper and deeper and deeper sin. Sin is the punishment for sin. God gives sinners over to their sins so that they spiral deeper and deeper down into this path of darkness. And sin is its own punishment. It is its own punishment because it eventually brings misery and destruction. You find anybody who is bent on living a sinful ungodly life and give them some time and you will find a very miserable person. Now some commentators use the picture of a boat in a river as an illustration of what God is doing here and I think it is a very helpful illustration. I want you to picture sinful man sitting in a boat like a canoe or a kayak on a river. And the sinner is in the boat and he or she is paddling as hard as he can to get away from God. He does not want God and he is trying to get away from God with all of his might. He wants to have his own way. But God is holding the back of the boat, restraining the sinner. But as man continues to resist God, eventually God lets go of the boat so that the sinner goes his own way down the river. But does God simply let go of the boat or does He do something more? I think He does something more. I agree with Doug Moo in his commentary on Romans. He says this on your notes, God does not simply let the boat go. He gives it a push downstream. Like a judge who hands over a prisoner to the punishment his crime has earned, God hands over the sinner to the terrible cycle of ever increasing sin. That is a dreadful, terrible picture. That is hard for me to read that. What is the particular sin that God hand centers over to? In verse 24, it is the sin of sexual perversity. Therefore, God gave them over in the lust of their hearts to impurity so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. Notice that these are people who have already given themselves over to sexual sin. They already wanted sexual sin. And in his judgment, God gives them over to the lust of their hearts for sexual sin. Now there are some people who have the wrong thought of God altogether. They think that God is a cosmic killjoy. Nothing could be further from the truth. God created us for joy. God created us for pleasure. God created us to enjoy Him forever and to enjoy His good gifts to us, one of which is sexuality. We are sexual beings. Why? Because of God's good and wise design. Human sexuality is not only for procreation, it is for pleasure. It is for pleasure. So listen very carefully. Sexuality is God's idea. It is His idea. God created us to eat food, not just for our survival, but for our pleasure. God gave us something in our mouth called taste buds, where we can enjoy the taste of food and give honor and glory to Him for such pleasure. And in the same way, God created us to enjoy the pleasure of sexuality within marriage. between a man and between a woman. And so sex within marriage between a man and a woman is a beautiful thing. It is a thing that honors God, that glorifies God. But sinful man is not content with God's created order. Sinful man is not content with God's arrangement. Sinful man does not want restrictions on his sexuality. Sinful man wants so-called sexual freedom. My body, my choice. I can do whatever I want with my body. I can have sex with whomever I want, whenever I want, even if that means sacrificing children. Listen, man worships the God of sexual freedom. That is one of the largest, most powerful idols in American culture and life. But the Bible warns us that the human body is not made by God for immorality. There are consequences to that. We are to honor God with our bodies, which is something sinners given over to sexual sin refuse to do. They take that body that God has so marvelously given to them, and they use that body in dishonorable ways in the name of sexual freedom. And so why do we live in a culture where sexual perversity is so rampant? Why is it so rampant here? Why is this arguably the most sexually perverse culture in the history of mankind? Because God has given this nation over to its sins. When a nation, a culture, and a people reject God and refuse to worship God, This is what happens. God gives them over to their sexual sins. Again, sexual perversity itself is worthy of the wrath of God, but it is also the wrath of God. By itself, it is the wrath of God. So-called sexual freedom is God's judgment. But why would God do this? I mean, this is very harsh. This is very strong. Well, Paul reminds us why God would do this in verse 25, For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. This is essentially a repetition of verse 23, when sinful man refuses to worship God and worships idols instead, God hands him over to his idols, one of which is sexual sin. And so a culture that is immersed in sexual perversity as ours is, is the consequence, it is the direct consequence of idolatry. There is idolatry first, And then that is followed by this pit of sexual perversity. And sadly, tragically, sinful man thinks this is freedom. This is what will make me happy. This is the lie that Paul mentions in verse 25. Verse 25 is essentially a repeat of verse 23, but there is this nuance of language in verse 25 that he doesn't give in verse 23. He now adds this element of the lie. They exchange the truth of God for a lie. The lie is that I don't need God. The lie is that I can live without God and be happy, be satisfied, and be content, and live the good life. But living without God, sooner or later, always, always brings destruction. It always brings misery. Sexual freedom does not bring freedom. That is a lie. Sexual freedom brings bondage. It brings guilt. It brings shame. It brings regrets. Real freedom is found in obeying God. That's freedom. The ability to do what pleases God, not to do whatever I want in my own eyes. Now, this leads to a really big question. When God gives people over to their sins, as he does here in verse 24 and 25, is it terminal? Is it a permanent thing? For many, many people, it is terminal. For many, many people, it is a permanent thing. Many, many people will do nothing but continue to paddle their boats away from God down the stream, not realizing that there is a waterfall downstream. And eventually they go over the edge and they fall to their everlasting ruin. For many, many people, when they are given over by God to their sins, they eventually die in their sins and they perish in their sins forever in hell. And that is a tragedy. But it doesn't have to be that way. It doesn't have to be that way. Why? Because the God who gives sinners over in judgment is also a God of mercy. Mercy to a degree that is beyond human comprehension. If the sinner in his boat will repent of his sins and cry out to God for mercy, God will listen. God will hear. God will receive that sinner and save that sinner. One reason God hands sinners over to their sins is to bring them to the end of their sins when they will finally cry out to God for salvation. This is something that I pray for those that I know that are lost, who live in rebellion against God. I pray that God will bring them to the end of their sin when they will finally say, I don't want this anymore. It is a miserable life. I cannot live without God. And they cry out to God in repentance and in faith. And so, in mercy, God lets sinners see the misery, the destruction, the emptiness of life without him so that men will call upon his name. And so, how does God express his wrath? In cataclysmic wrath, in consequential wrath, in eschatological wrath, in eternal wrath, and as we have been seeing this morning in Romans 1, in abandoning wrath. But there is another way that God expresses his wrath. And you'll see this on the bottom of the back of your notes, redemptive wrath. This is the wrath of God that Jesus experienced in our place on the cross for our sins. And what is really, really remarkable is Romans 8.32 in light of Romans 1. Romans 8.32 is a long way away from Romans 1, but we have to look at it this morning. I'm sure that you are familiar with this verse, probably read it a hundred times, but there is a connection between this verse and Romans 1 that perhaps you've never seen before. Romans 8.32, he who did not spare his own son, but delivered him over for us all, how will he not also with him freely give us all things? That verb back in Romans 1.24 and 26 and 28 is the verb didomi, to give over, to hand over. It is the exact same verb that Paul uses here in Romans 8.32. Yes, God gives sinners over to their sin as an act of judgment, but there is something else that God has done. He has given Jesus over to our sin as an act of judgment. God the Father gave Jesus over to suffer the wrath of God, to pay the price for our sins. The wrath of God was revealed from heaven against all of our ungodliness and our unrighteousness that was laid upon Christ, who died for our sins. This is the redemptive wrath of God. Don't miss the connection between Romans 1 and Romans 8.32. May the name of our God and Father and the Lord Jesus Christ be praised forever. Our Father in heaven, this text is so hard. It is so hard for me to preach this. These are such difficult, difficult truths. We are humbled by the power of your anger and we are most humbled by the power of your anger in expressing your wrath toward your own son for our sins. We thank you, O God, that you delivered over Jesus for all of us. so that we could be set free from our sins. Father, I pray that if there are any who are here who have been given over to their sins, who suppress you, who refuse to worship you, that you will bring them to the end of their sin. that you will show them the misery of life without God, the futility, the emptiness, the destruction of life without God, and that you will cause them, O God, to cry out to you for mercy. We thank you for your amazing mercy. We are saved only because of your mercy. Therefore, we give you all the glory and all the honor for our great salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray, amen.