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And I see some of you again,
some faces I know and some faces maybe I don't know. And so in
some cases I need to be kindly, be kind to me and remind me who
you are. So I'm grateful for this opportunity. And I'm also grateful for the
opportunity because every one of us needs renewal. And so speakers
as well as hearers need renewal. and to be able to step back and
to hear, to be able to think about the gospel and think about
the implications of the gospel is a great opportunity. And so
I'm gonna invite us both to be on a joint endeavor this weekend.
And so if you have your Bible with you or your phone, Romans
chapter one, we'll be basically doing, Romans is in five parts. We're gonna be doing part one,
two, three, four, and five each session. And it's gonna be the
wrath of God, the righteousness of God, the glory of God, the
people of God, and then the church of God. And so it kind of walks
through the various chapters until the end. So this afternoon,
we start with the wrath of God, and in an odd way, it highlights
the glory of God. And unless we understand the
wrath of God, we won't even understand the righteousness of God, and
we will not appreciate the glory of God. And so the challenge
of taking a whole book is what do you do with the scripture
reading? And so, So I'm gonna actually read the opening through
probably verse 18, where it launches into the large section on the
wrath of God. And so I'll be reading in the
New American Standard. And I was told that I could pick
my version. And so this is my old friend. And so it's got tape. And it's
where you know where everything's at on a page. So Paul. a bondservant of Christ Jesus,
or we could even say a slave of Christ Jesus, called as an
apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand
through his prophets in the holy scriptures concerning his son,
who is born of a descendant of David, according to the flesh,
who was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection
from the dead, according to the spirit of holiness, Jesus Christ
our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship
to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles
for his namesake, among whom you also are the called of Jesus
Christ. To all who are beloved of God
in Rome, called as saints, grace to you and peace from God our
Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. First, I thank my God through
Jesus Christ for you all, because your faith is being proclaimed
throughout the whole world. For God, whom I serve in my spirit
in the preaching of the gospel of his son, is my witness as
to how unceasingly I make mention of you, always in my prayers
making requests, if perhaps now at last, by the will of God,
I may succeed in coming to you, for I long to see you, so that
I may impart some spiritual gift to you, that you may be established,
that is, that I may be encouraged together with you while among
you, each of us by the other's faith, both yours and mine. I
do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that often I have planned
to come to you and have been prevented so far so that I may
obtain some fruit among you also, even as among the rest of the
Gentiles. I am under obligation, both to
Greeks and to barbarians. both to the wise and to the foolish. So for my part, I am eager to
preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome. For I am not
ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation
to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the
Greek. For in it, the righteousness
of God is revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, but
the righteous shall live by faith. For the wrath of God is revealed
from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who
suppress the truth in unrighteousness." And then Paul begins to describe
that they have the truth and they are suppressing it and the
consequences that come about from that. When I was younger,
I used to think that the Book of Romans was this giant piece
of paper that God just handed Paul and said, you know, this
church really doesn't have much problems. And I've prevented
you from getting there. And so therefore, I'm going to
let you write them the gospel. You're not going to be able to
preach to them. And so here, describe it to them. Write it
down. And there's a huge sermon that
can be preached right on that whole thing about delay. You
can see from this part that Paul wanted to come to them often
and was prevented. And we don't know how. If Satan
had a hand in it, just God's providence. Obviously Satan can't
do anything without God's authority. But somehow he was prevented
from actually getting there. And so for our lives, if we take
it just a cue from the Bible across the spectrum, you know
from the Old Testament with Joseph, and how he was sent ahead into
Egypt, and how the family ended up in Egypt, and out of the promised
land, and it wasn't very linear. You know from David that he was
anointed national hero, but then kicked out of the land, and then
had to come back in the land, and it was not very linear. Even
this apostle Paul determined in his heart to go to Rome when
he was in Greece, and yet ended up not going west, but east.
and spending two years in Caesarea in a prison. And so God has his
purposes for delays. Even this afternoon, we were
talking with friends who were kept from the mission field,
hearts desire, heartbroken, desired to go, not God's will. But now
it seems like maybe in the future, God may open up doors for them
again. God has his timing in his way. Paul was so eager to
bear fruit among the Romans and couldn't do it. And so he wrote
a letter. And in this way, the apostle
to the Gentiles has been bearing fruit with this letter for 20
centuries, where if he had just been there in person and just
spoken, it would have been given and then done. And so now, I
mean, so who knows why you're delayed in even the God-given
dreams and plans that God gives you. You have to trust him, we
have to trust him. So there's a whole lesson there.
We could just camp on that one and do it. But the point being
is that I thought the purpose of it originally was just merely
to give the gospel. Out of all Paul's churches, this
one seemed to be doing pretty well. There wasn't like that
impatience in Galatia, I can't even give thanks to God for you,
it seems like you're in a real problem. Or 2 Corinthians that
rejected him. Okay, they're doing well. And
here we get the longest letter Paul ever wrote. Because they're
actually, they're in canonical order, they just go from the
biggest to the smallest. So this is his biggest letter.
So that's one theory, the big piece of paper, okay? The other
theory was, after a while I realized, you know what, this is kind of
the gospel in logical form. There's objections, Paul answers
them. There's a lot of God forbids
in the King James, may it never be, can't be that way, stops
and turns. And so he's laying out an argument
from the very beginning to the end. And so it's like a compliment
to our narrative gospels, where you get in the narrative gospels,
Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, the description of Jesus' actions,
now you get an explanation of what it means. It's like, that's
really helpful. So now we got on the big piece
of paper, a gospel in logical form. But that still doesn't,
it still doesn't answer two other questions. So when I did reading
in a commentary on this recently, the author said there's actually
three potential purposes the Book of Romans. One is to give
the gospel. A second potential reason is
there's disunity in the church in Rome. There's a Gentile majority,
it appears, and a Jewish minority, and they're not getting along,
perhaps, or they're struggling, or they could get along better.
And if you walk through this book, you will see again and
again and again, Paul touching on the place of the law, the
place, you know, you say you call yourself a Jew, food laws,
day keeping, chapter 14, Jewish stuff shows up. And so having
a Gentile majority, maybe due to Claudius kicking the Jews
out in the early AD 40s, and then some have come back in.
There's a Jewish minority, the Gentile majority, and so how
are these going to get along? Hopefully tomorrow when we look
at chapter 9, 10, and 11, we're gonna take a good look
at ourselves and say how arrogant we might be actually. And cause
three times Paul tells the Gentiles in the church of Rome not to
be arrogant. And so it does seem like there is some aspect of
that truth. And if that is so, then okay,
the church of Rome is just like any other church. Even when doing
well, you can always improve. So overall, he commends them
at the end of the book in chapter 14, that you guys are full of
knowledge, you're able to counsel, you have no need for anybody
to instruct you. But, you know, there's still,
as the apostle, I speak to you as apostle to the Gentiles, I'm
authorized to bear fruit among the Gentiles. So even among you,
I'm gonna bear fruit. And here's the way that you could
be strengthened. And as he says here, established,
made even more stable and strong. So that's the second reason.
There is actually, they call this in studies, they call this
the occasion for the letter. In other words, what prompted
it. It's kind of like having chocolate around your three-year-old.
It ends up occasioning an interesting parent-child conversation. So
it's like, that's the occasion, it wasn't the cause. The cause
is then deeper in the heart. Third, is Paul is actually eager
to use Rome as a launch pad to go farther west. So if you know
your Mediterranean Sea, you know that kind of looks like a big
submarine, and on one side is Israel. Kind of that's the eastern
shore. On the far western side is that
little narrow strait of Gibraltar where the Iberian Peninsula and
current Spain is. And so Paul wanted to get there.
Chapter 15 tells us that. Italy, Greece are in the middle,
so you got Israel, Greece, Italy, Spain. He writes this from Greece,
hoping to have gotten to Italy, Rome, didn't get there, writes
the letter instead, ends up going east, imprisoned for two years,
then getting here by shipwreck to Rome. And there's where the
book of Acts actually stops. So beyond that is more piecing
things together. And we don't need to bother ourselves
with that. At this point, Paul's desire
is to go to Spain. So he's like a missionary that
wants support. He even says it in chapter 15,
it's like, hoping to be furthered along by material gains. And
if you have gained spiritually and if you give materially, that's
fitting. And so this is like a missionary
support letter. Now, when I considered that one,
I was like, hmm, it's interesting. It's like,
well, is he using these people? They're just a means to an end.
I don't like being used. That doesn't feel good to me.
So it's like, is that the whole thing? So if you isolate just
that purpose, this is just a missionary support letter and say, well,
why is the gospel there? Well, he's got to show them he's
worthy of support. You got to show them that he
knows his stuff. This is what I preach in all the world. This
is my gospel. Would you support me? It's like,
well, that's better. I guess I can see how they go
together. It's like, you want to get to
Spain and preach the gospel, but then it's like, but he's
also addressing the unity. Well, maybe if they're not united,
they'll be distracted by all their factions and then they
won't give freely. It's like somehow you got to
put all these pieces together. Okay. Now now if you have a different
solution I'm gonna propose a solution if you have a different you won't
come and talk to me about your solution Okay, there's because
it seems like all three are present. He wants to go to Spain missionary
letter They have a Jew Gentile issue of sorts, even if it's
just needing a little tune-up improvement, and he preaches
the gospel. That's plain. Like, the whole
letter is the gospel, and it's logically laid out, wrath of
God, righteousness of God, glory of God, people of God, church
of God. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
Okay. Well, here's my proposal. I'm
going to give you a proposal on how these fit together. Look
with me at verse 14. Often in Paul's letters, he transitions
from his introductory thanksgiving, which is very brief in verse
eight, and his introductory prayer, which he described more his prayer
life here than actually giving prayer. When he transitions from
thanksgiving to prayer, he often will say, brethren, I do not
want you to be ignorant of this. I do not want you to be unaware
of this. It's kind of like his way of
transitioning. And so that's in verse 13, which
means verse 13 may launch the body of the letter. But most of us perhaps have seen
verse 16 at least be in the kind of the launch of the body of
the letter where it's like the content of the gospel is given.
But if verse 13 launches the gospel, actually the content,
the body of the letter, then verse 14 gives a strong declarative
statement. I am under obligation, apostle
to the Gentiles, I am under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians,
both to the wise and to the foolish, I am under obligation Verse 15,
to preach the gospel. And so I'm eager to preach the
gospel to you also. It's not my choice. I must. I've been commissioned. I am
a slave of Jesus set apart for the gospel. Masters get to pick
what their slaves do. Paul, you're my slave. You're
gonna preach the gospel everywhere, which is really interesting for
a formerly bigoted Jew. who used to persecute followers
of the way. It's like, wow, this is a really
interesting assignment for such a Jew. And so he's launched into
the world, and he tells us right up front, everybody is my target. Almost like John Wesley saying,
the whole world is my parish. It's like, everybody's my target.
I don't care if you are civilized, Greek, or uncivilized, barbar,
a barbarian. I don't care if you're wise and
you've been educated. I don't care if you're a fool,
just stepped, as it were, just stepped into life and started
getting serious and thinking about things. I don't care. I'm
going to preach the gospel to you because that's my calling.
Everybody's gonna hear it. And that includes the capital
city, Rome. Okay, that seems to be, if that's
so, then wow, we got a big declarative statement. And then he goes,
four, verse 16. Four, verse 16. Four, verse 16. Four, verse 17. Four, verse 18. All of a sudden it drops in chain,
chain, chain, chain, chain. Like for is a Greek way of saying
for this reason or it gives an explanation. I am eager to preach
the gospel to you also in Rome for this reason. I'm not ashamed. Why are you not ashamed of the
gospel? For this reason, it's the power of God for everyone
who believes. Why is it the power of God for
everyone who believes, Paul? For in it, the righteousness
of God is revealed. Why is that so significant? For
the wrath of God is revealed from heaven. Boom, boom, boom,
boom, and then launches two and a half chapters of dense argument. So it appears like the desire
to preach the gospel in Spain fits within the body of the letter
and isn't outside of the body of the letter. In other words,
it's part of the argument. And that was eye-opening, because
if the mission to Spain is part of the argument of the letter,
And when we go to chapter 15, it receives a lot of press, quite
a bit of material, most of chapter 15. Where I've treated that in
the past, like he's done with describing the gospel, he's done
now with the body of the letter, back to personal stuff, back
to say hello to Julius and all the greetings in chapter 16,
back to the personal stuff. What if, What if then the mission
to Spain at the end of the letter actually caps off the letter
introduced in verse then 14 and 15, like I am under obligation
to preach the gospel to everyone, including you and including Spain. And I'm gonna give you an argument.
why this is good, why this is necessary, why I should do it,
and why you should be involved. In fact, your believing in the
gospel and your support of the gospel go together. That you cannot say you believe
the gospel if you're not living the gospel or living for the
gospel. Another way of putting this might
be that it would be hypocritical of us to say, I love the gospel
as a noun, but I don't love the gospel as a verb. And so if my heart isn't excited
about missions and missionaries, if my heart isn't excited about
telling my neighbors, my co-workers, others about Jesus, if my heart
isn't excited about other cultures and peoples and places hearing
about Jesus, It could be vertically in my society, in the various
levels, or horizontally out. If I'm not excited about these
things, then I have to question whether I've really taken into
account the Gospel message itself. Because this letter's organization
suggests these things go inseparably together. If you're just kind of looking
at this, you know, kind of like, and you should, you should just
kind of like, okay, I'll just step back a little bit. I just
wanna add as collateral evidence from 1 Corinthians 9, just really
brief, a statement that will help you to see Paul's mindset,
which encourages me, I believe I'm on the right track here,
but 1 Corinthians 9, has Paul talking similarly about
all men. Verse 19, I mean actually he
says that he is under obligation to preach the gospel. Verse 16,
if I preach the gospel I have nothing to boast of for I am
under obligation. Woe to me if I do not preach
the gospel. So there we get a similar statement
about, I am under obligation, I have to preach the gospel,
woe if I don't. And now we hear his emphasis
on all men, verse 19, for though I am free from all men, I have
made myself a slave to all men, so that I might win more. Martin
Luther, in his great book, Freedom of the Christian, lays this out
as part of his opening paradox, that a Christian is perfect Lord
of all, slave to none. In the area of faith, our conscience
belongs to Jesus, and he alone can determine truth. Free from
all, slave of none. But, with regard to my neighbor,
a Christian is a dutiful servant, slave of all. That's the area
of love. Having been freed by the gospel
of Jesus, our life is now freed up to give away. Our future is
secured so we can give it away. And we make ourselves, voluntarily
make ourselves a slave to our neighbor, or as Luther says,
to be a little Christ to our neighbor. And so Paul describes
making himself a slave. This is voluntary in order to
win the more. And then he says in verse 20,
to the Jew, I became a Jew. And then verse 21, regarding
the Gentiles to those without law, I was as without law, but
now without the law of God, I was under the law of Christ to win
those. And then to the weak within the
church, Weak in faith, I became weak that I might win the weak.
I become all things to all men so that by all means I might
save some. You see the attitude of Paul.
It's like, it doesn't matter whether it's Jew or Greek or
weak Christian, even though I'm a strong Christian, I'm second
and they're first. They're more important than me.
And then comes this very interesting phrase, verse 23, I do all things
for the sake of the gospel so that I may become a fellow partaker
of it. If I don't live, it seems like
Paul is saying, if I don't live how I just described, I myself
will not partake of it. And you go, Paul, what are you
saying? You're saying like, now this is the mystery of perseverance,
and all those in Christ do persevere. I believe that wholeheartedly.
So I'm not talking about some Wesleyan lose your salvation
thing. But I am saying, if the gospel really is believed, it
will manifest itself in this kind of attitude. And Paul does
describe the hypothetical and the what ifs at the end of the
chapter that if I don't live this way, I will be disqualified. I will not finish my race. So
I'm going back to this again. I really think this is so, and
I want us to catch it in Romans. If we don't live for the gospel,
we need to question whether we really believe the gospel. If
missions doesn't excite us, and evangelism doesn't interest us,
then we need to really question how deep the gospel has really
penetrated us. Because they go hand in hand. This is what I was saying at
the beginning. I want to be renewed. Bob Snyder's level of love for
the gospel, excitement over evangelism and missions is not where it
should be. I'm not saying this coming in like I got something
against you all. I'm saying this, I want myself
to be lifted and refreshed and revitalized in this because I
see this to be true. If I don't lay out myself in
all directions for any person, whatever background, identity,
seeking their salvation. I need to question how much this
gospel's really penetrated my heart. And so I'm gonna invite
us, I'm gonna invite us to explore together a re-look at Romans in this way and a practical way. We, I would dare say several
of you in the room could be up here and teach the book of Romans.
You know, God be praised, you know, you know this book, but
I want to look at it in light of bringing the bookends of it
and kind of keeping them outside of the body of material and actually
now bringing them into the thing and going, what if now with this
fresh light, we look at the book again, because is it not true
that I can take the same color and put it up against a different
background and all of a sudden different things show up? A background
gives a different feel and look to something, doesn't it? So
it's like, let's look again at the content of Romans in light
of the background, this backdrop of identity. Or not identity,
this backdrop of missions. OK. So with that in mind, the
reason why I brought up identity, my mind just triggered it, is
that I am intrigued by how often the idea, now think of it as
a concept, the concept of identity shows up in this book. How often
in this book do you hear the word called? Which is kalel in Greek, it just
means named. You know, it's not like you are
named, you are called sons of God. Okay, what's the significance
of being called and having that identity? Called as saints, chapter
one says, right? We just read that. Called as
saints, meaning called as holy ones. You're set apart for God.
Every one of you, if you are in Christ, you are just as set
apart for God as Paul. doesn't matter the specific mission
that the Lord Jesus your master has you on, you're just as much
wholly his property as Paul was, and your specific assignment
is just as important to Jesus as any other in that light of
that obedience and worship and how precious you individually
are as a believer. Maybe it doesn't play the same
role, but it plays importance because he died for you and reclaimed
your life. He wants you to be fruitful.
So, called. How about this as an identity
word? Glory. Having status. Having fame. The word name shows up, even
in chapter one, for his namesake. How about See, the other one I was thinking
of, boasting, shows up a lot in this book. How often identity
comes with something I can boast in that sets me apart, that makes
me different than my brother, my neighbor, my sister. Boasting. having a glory, having a name,
being called, all these kind of things, identity issues show
up in this book. And so I want to actually kind
of use that as a doorway to explore. And I do mean the word explore.
This is not to the point where I can maybe be called after this
conference to write down what I said at the conference, like
I did five years ago or something. This is more exploration, but
I wanna explore it section by section. So when we do wrath
of God, where is their identity? If we do righteousness of God,
where is their identity? If we do the glory of God, where
is their identity? People of God, church of God,
identity, identity, where is it? So let's do this together. Let's do then section one. Now please keep in mind, when
we look at section one, and we look at its two parts, Paul is
speaking to a church. He's speaking to believers. In
fact, he's speaking to mature believers. So it sounds like
at times, and it could be, it's a rhetorical device, you know,
say, you old man, like chapter two, verse three, do you suppose
this old man, when you pass judgment on those rhetorically, He's enacting,
he's acting out, it appears, what he would have in a typical
conversation with somebody who feels pretty good about their
performance and is looking down on others, he's calling them
to account. But please keep in mind, as he addresses these two
groups, he's actually speaking to Christians and not doing evangelism
on Mars Hill. So I would like us to think in
terms of backgrounds. When this is read, the people
who receive this letter will identify with one or the other
of these backgrounds. They will identify with either
having a Gentile background, that's chapter one, or a Jewish
background, which is chapter two, and into chapter three. Those two backgrounds probably
have analogies that have stretched across the centuries. Because
what defines the two backgrounds, according to chapter two, verse
12, is those who have the law and those who do not have the
law. Verse 13 and 12 and 13. Not that the Gentiles are without
a work of the law, they have conscience, they make laws, they
make rules, but they don't have a written copy of God's word.
They were left in their ignorance according to Acts 17. And so
they were left on their own in their ignorance. Prophets every
once in a while would speak to them and write to them and call
out to them and such. But Israel, ah, Israel received
God's written word. And Psalm 147 says, no other
nation was that privileged. And Paul also says in chapter
three, what advantage is it then to be a Jew, to be circumcised?
You have the oracles of God, which means you have not just
the written word of God, you have the promises of God. So
they had a lot of advantages being in covenant with God, having
written scriptures that recorded the promises God gave them and
bore witness so that when they're rebellious, God could point it
out. All that was in their background. The Gentiles left on their own.
So by analogy, I bet you could come up with, what does that
mean in our culture, right? Those who grew up with the Bible,
those who don't. Those who live in the lands with
scripture, those who don't. I remember reading an op-ed piece.
It was in the New York Times or something or other out there.
I forget which one it was. But, I have raised my children
without the word sin. That was the title. Obviously
very proud of this fact. Well, You know, when my wife
and I were watching a Charlie Chapman movie from a silent film
era, and he's waddling around with his feet stretched out this
way, all of a sudden, boop, the word sin appeared for the word
spoken in the movie. How many times does the word
sin appear in any movie you've seen recently, you know? It's
like, Our culture has changed. You used to, you know, 100 years
ago, very, you know, 200 years ago, America was very Christianized,
would have quite a bit of knowledge of the Ten Commandments and various
sins and different things. Right now, we live among many
people who grow up without the knowledge of such things. Even
though it's available, they don't know. And so maybe some of them
are from that background are here tonight. That was me. I
grew up not knowing the Tango. I didn't even know there was
a Moses. I didn't know anything about Jesus. And here I am. And
yeah, I'm from America. And yet some of you are like,
oh, I remember. I mean, I was going to church nine months before
I was born. I mean, I've been going to church
longer than I've been alive. So some of you, it's like, you
know the word of God. You know these things. So I think
you can identify with one of these backgrounds tonight. You
have a background in the word of God, written word of God,
or you don't. I imagine that's going to be. true for each of
us tonight. So what we're gonna do is we're
gonna take the first one. Second, in each of these messages,
I hope to like whip through, look through carefully, but quickly,
what Paul is saying to the Romans and then draw conclusions or
draw some potential lessons for us today. That's what I'm hoping
to do. So let's do first of all, we're gonna do the Gentile part.
And let me just walk through the text without reading every
word. Verse 18. For the wrath of God is revealed
from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who
suppress, I believe it's hold back, the truth in unrighteousness. That implies two things. Number
one, they have the truth. Number two, They hold it back. Verse 19 and 20 is Paul's proof
that they have the truth. Verse 19 begins with because. Verse 21 begins with the same
word, because, and is the proof that they have then held back
or suppressed it. So in verses 19 and 20, they
have the truth of creation, clearly seen, being evidenced through
what has been made, God made it obvious. He exists, His eternal
power, His divine nature. But verse 21 then says, even
though they knew God, now these are the Gentiles, these are everybody
who got the stars, they got the planet, they got They got some
pretty cool clouds that I saw going across Cincinnati today. They're like waves. It was really
weird looking. They were like silk kind of drapery
over this clouds. It's like God just does amazing
things with all sorts of things, right? And so they have this,
they have that. But in verse 21, it says that
even though they know God, they did not honor him as God or give
thanks. This is really interesting to
me. There's not a list of rules here.
Of course, they don't have the rules in the sense that they
don't have a rule book. This is relational talk. Even
though they knew God, they did not honor him as glorify and
they did not give thanks. They didn't do that. Sin at its root is relational. What is the greatest commandment? And the second? And how much of the Old Testament
hangs on those two? So everything can be summarized
relationally with love. Like, wow. What a different religion. No, it's not a religion. What
a truth. It's the reality. That's the way God is. God is
love and he set the world up on the standard of love. Love
me. Love your neighbor. Now, thankfully,
we have the word of God to show us what is genuinely loving because
our wicked hearts deceive us into thinking, I could never
do that. I love my kid too much. Maybe love is actually tough
love, we say sometimes. Love may look different, you
gotta be discerning, but still, it's all summarized under love.
Therefore, as Luther pointed out once, if loving God is the
greatest commandment, not loving God must be the greatest sin.
And so, wow, they didn't love God. They didn't thank him. They didn't honor him. It's like,
I don't know, maybe you got this, you know, maybe you were, you
got a good friend and, you know, it's like, hey, let's get together
for lunch, you know, on Friday. We haven't seen each other for
a while. Can we do, can we do this Friday coming up? And it's
like, yeah, let's do this Friday. And you get busy in a project
or you get distracted and the day, you know, the morning goes
on and you're like, oh man, this is so, I'm late. Oh, if I get there now, we won't,
Oh, they'll understand. I just got to keep going. And
the next day, Sunday, friend comes near. Hey, where were you
on Friday? I mean, I went, you know, to,
I don't know, this restaurant, you know, and we were there.
I was there. You weren't there. Where were you? You know, it's
like, well, I mean, I just, things came up. Things got really busy. And you're hoping a real friend
would understand. And the friend goes, well, I
was really looking forward to getting together with you. There's
some really big developments in my life that's happened recently. And I was really interested in
how your son's been doing. And I just mean, OK, but I can't
help it. I was disappointed. And all of
a sudden, our action appears different. It's like what looked
small. Now it seems big because the
person raised an importance in our lives. Like, oh, I belittled
you, didn't I? I made you just a task, an item,
and then even then put it underneath other tasks. And like, I cheapened
you. Will you forgive me? Honor is a big deal. It's not
small. How about Thanksgiving? I picture
this Christmas day. I'm from the north, and so there's
got to be snow outside. Everybody's coming in from the
cold and getting their boots off. And then aunt and uncle
or little kids are coming in. They're helping with the little
kids, getting their coats off, putting them up. Everybody's
having a good time. And hey, would you like some
hot cocoa? And we're going to open presents
a little later. And everybody's just a whir of
activity, just keeping track of everybody, making sure everybody's
happy. And yet Grandpa sits in his chair. Nobody's taking time to talk
to Grandpa, come over and sit with him and talk with him. But
it's his house. They wouldn't be here without
him. There'd be no moms and dads around, no grandkids around,
and yet nobody's giving grandpa the time, and they all leave. No thanks, no time. If we as people feel like something's,
this is offensive, like this is wrong, our conscience is right.
If we feel this way about people, what do you think about God?
who every day causes the sun to rise and the rain to fall,
and whose hands are life and breath and all things, apart
from whom we can do nothing? What do you think about God,
who Jesus says is kind to ungrateful and evil men? What do you think
about God? and the neglect. Oh, but we're
humanitarian. Oh, the philanthropy, meaning
love for man. Oh, the philanthropy, the big
heartedness, the care for the poor. But when one woman, a Bethany,
breaks a vial over Jesus, oh, we scold her. Oh, way too much. That's too, oh, $30,000 worth
of perfume all at once. Can you believe this? What is
this woman doing? And we scold her, and yet Jesus
defends her. She did a beautiful deed. She
did what she could. Honor, to whom honor is due,
is a big deal. And how much do we miss the mark? So at the core of sin is a broken
relationship in which God has given us existence and everything
with it, and we haven't acknowledged him, at least to the level he's
worthy of, or given thanks. And how much we're like the nine
rather than the one, even as Christians. not returning our
thanks. So, all that to just say, do
you see what the heart of the Gentile sin is? The heart of
the Gentile sin was not that, you know, breaking the rule,
boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. It's relational. God has manifested
himself and they've turned. They've turned and they've devised,
then verse 21 says, philosophies that explain him away. Just one
of the reasons why I think the Chinese man that came to me in
Bible study last year and says, I don't believe what you just
said. I mean, I don't see God. Our culture doesn't see God in
the stars and the heavens. Well, if you're in a Gentile
culture that's enamored and been just shoved in with all sorts
of this philosophy of verse 21b, that their heart became empty
and their foolish heart was darkened. Would you be looking for these
things? Would you even be aware? Is your instrument even tuned
to that frequency? And so it's obvious, but it's
suppressed, not just by individuals, but by cultures. It's always
there. May God open eyes and God, you'll
hear stories from how God does that. All of a sudden it just
dawns on somebody, this can't be by accident. Like, whoa, it's
beautiful. It's complex. It's whatever. Okay. First Corinthians chapter
1 verse 21 says, for in the wisdom of God, the world through its
wisdom did not come to know God. So the philosophies of the world
prohibited people from coming to know God. What happens then
as a result of breaking that relationship, God, well first
of all, they devise philosophies and then they move into idolatry.
In verse 23, they exchanged his glory for an image and they moved
into idolatry. Verse 24 says, therefore, he
gave them over. Verse 26, for this reason, he
gave them over. Verse 28, and just as they did
not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over.
Three times, therefore, God gave them over. For this reason, God
gave them over. God gave them over. The punishment
fits the crime and the punishment is the dishonoring of their body,
verse 24, in impurity. And I see bodies dishonored often. The exchange of the right use
of the opposite sex for same sex relationships, verse 26. If they exchange the glory of
God for an image, if they exchange the truth of God for a lie, God
hands them over to a power Culturally, and I have to be careful about
this because I don't want to like target individuals, especially
those who were abused as a child, and put the whole albatross around
their neck, not dismissing it as sin, but calling them to a
better life and yet not laying the whole weight on them because
culturally, I think this is a statement, He hands them over to the exchange
of heterosexual relationships to homosexual relationships.
And then their mind also is torqued. He gives them over to a depraved
mind. And you see the rest of the chapter,
societal strife and their societies unravel in fighting. Francis Schaeffer was pretty
famous once in saying that the churches dismissed the knowledge
of God in the 1920s, the leading churches of America. And one
generation later, our government dismissed the knowledge of God
in the raising of children, in prayer, in scripture, in schools,
even in oath-taking in government. And since that time, we've seen
the sexual revolution, 65 million abortions that have followed.
The breakdown of our society in different layer after layer
after layer. Obergefell in just nine years ago, I mean, just
such a radical shift. And if this, it seems to follow
the pattern so well of a culture, rejecting the knowledge of God,
not giving thanks, not honoring, and then God hands them over. And if that is so, then as Christians
we need to recognize this culture is not just going to be judged,
it is already under judgment. And no amount of politics is
gonna fix it. It's gonna have to be on the
religious level because it's gonna have to be a people acknowledging
God again and getting right with him in order to have the judgment
lifted. Because it is not a political
thing that is settled upon America culturally. I think it's judicial,
meaning from God. That's heavy. Now I'm gonna set
that over there and then turn to the other side. Chapter two. You can almost see the Jew off
on the side in the gallery looking down. And he's kind of looking
at the crowd at this whole discussion and going, yeah, yeah, that's
the way they are. You know, they deserve it. And so God, you know,
then all of a sudden Paul turns to them and say, therefore, you
have no excuse. Now he just got done saying in
verse 20, they're without excuse. The Gentiles are without excuse.
No, no, no. O Jew, he'll name them in verse
17, you are without excuse. What do you mean? In that everyone
who passes judgment for that in the thing in which you judge
another, you condemn yourself. For you who judge practice the
very same things. And we know that the judgment
of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. Or
do you suppose, O man, when you pass judgment on those who practice
such things, and do the same things yourselves, that you will
escape the judgment of God? If the first group represents
those who depart from the faith or depart from a knowledge of
God and in some sense are apostate and end up being godless, the
second group are hypocrites. Casting judgment on others, they
have a log in their eye and they don't see their own problems.
And as Jesus said, do not judge lest you be judged for the same
measure you use against others will be used against yourself. I remember when I was a young
minister in the Ohio River Valley, I used to minister that way in
Indiana, in Switzerland County. I met an older man, and he was
dying, and he told me, I have never failed anyone in life. And I said, Woodrow, weren't
you baptized at age 19? And you haven't been in church
since. Okay, you get the point. It's
like, it was in those days that I learned to do, I was learning
to do evangelism by take what you're given. It's like, cause
this one, he handed me a softball that way. It was like, it was
just, and he still wouldn't admit it. And I won't go into the rest
of the story, it was a while, but my point is, is that if we
are a hypocrite, we are saying such things and don't even know
it. It's glaringly obvious to others
that we fail miserably in the very same ways that we hold others
accountable. And so can you imagine the judgment
where God says, okay, tell you what, we won't go by my playbook,
can you give me your rule book? I'd like to take a look at that
one. And then turn over to page chapter three and like, how about
this one? You were really critical on Aunt Sally for this, but how
did you raise your kids? And what about this, this, this? I mean, the same yardstick I
use against others will be used against me if that's my attitude
of being critical. Notice these individuals have
a superiority mindset where the other individuals often come
into the church as failures. We see the two groups in the
Gospels between the sinners that accumulate around Jesus and the
scribes and the Pharisees and the hypocrites. Jesus treats
them very differently. I remember one time I was speaking
to a man back in the 1990s. And he was going on and on and
on about President Clinton's affairs in the White House and
how immoral he is. And then I pointed out something
within his own family that was a breach, it appeared, of marriage. And immediately he started defending
President Clinton. It was one of the most amazing
turnarounds. But I wonder, how many of us? Because is it not true? If we
find such things humorous, do we not do such things? And this is the danger of being
church people. The danger of being church people is, you know,
we're not holding up to our own standards. Yesterday I wore a
shirt from Williamsburg. My parents went there and they
brought it back. Road to independence. You know
how hypocritical it was in the 1800s for those who complained
about the tyranny of Great Britain to then turn around and hold
slaves? That was the last act of Ben
Franklin. Overture to the House of Representatives, 1790. Make
this right. This is a glaring inconsistency. Preachers pointed it out, but
others defended it. Our nation has done such. One of the books I read on American
history that I used in teaching at Hillsdale College was a book
by Andrew Delbanco. And he pointed out that in the
1960s, the left and the right, in a sense, both absconded from
personal responsibility of caring for needy people. Because the
left said, let the government do it. And the right got upset
over it and basically was like largely saying, well, they should
have done something differently. That's a generalization, professors
like to do that. But I found it to resonate true
with experiences that I've had with working with God's people
over the years. Many, many of God's people are
much more interested listening to the news that talks about
the bad things the liberals are doing when that time could be
reclaimed to care for our neighbors. We can easily shut that off and
reclaim a ton of time in our lives to do something active
and relational and helpful. But rather, it's a lot easier
to blame them and then sit back and do little. But according
to Ezekiel, and it's really challenging, Ezekiel chapter 16 verses 49
and 50 says, what was the sin of Sodom? And it does not list
homosexuality. It lists they had their food,
they had ease, they had leisure, and they didn't care for the
poor and needy. And don't read into this, I'm some gospel, social
justice preacher. I'm not talking anything like
that. I'm just talking, setting aside my projects and taking
care of people. Okay, that's all I'm saying.
But therefore, Ezekiel says, they did abominations, and thus
they did abominations. In the book of Genesis, you see
the same thing. Abraham is hospitable. Lot is
hospitable. Sodom is violent. And so, the outcry that goes
to heaven is both the inhospitality done to guests and the abomination
that Leviticus says the Canaanites were doing. The conclusion was,
I've urged and tried to urge our people at Countryside, if
you are upset about Obergefell, the cause of Obergefell is a
prosperous 20th century culture that looked after their own interests
rather than the interests of others and became consumed with
themselves. And if we don't think we're consumed
with ourselves, check with how many sporting events our grandchildren
are going to. We're overloaded with activities. So I'm just gonna say, again,
it's much easier as church people to like wonder about the foibles
and this and that and chapter one and go, whoa, whoa, look
at all this immorality, impurity, you know, and it's true. It's
like, it's a ugly story and yet to not recognize that if my heart
and my home are not open to other people, I'm contributing to my
societal decay. and I'm part of the initial cause
that led to it, a prosperous society that didn't use its extra
to care for people who had less, but rather used the extra to
indulge oneself, and an indulgent society never knows when to quit
and eventually gets perverted, it seems. So, here's what we
have. This is when we try to wrap it
up, okay? Now, I know it's like, whoa,
okay, you didn't get through all of chapter two. I can't get
through everything. Chapter two ends in chapter three. If you want to go through where
Paul treats the Jews, Paul treats the Jews in verse 17, 18, 19,
20, 21, 23, 24, where he says, you know, you
who teach others, do you not teach yourself? You who preach,
you shouldn't steal, do you not steal? Boom, boom, boom, boom,
boom. I tried to do that in just a brief way with us as American
evangelicals and just kind of go briefly with us. We need to
be careful lest God take the stick out of our hand and go,
well, how have you done? And what have you contributed
to the good of your culture? So I just tried to do a little
bit like that and go, what would that look like? And again, I'm
exploring. There's other ways. There's probably
ways that'll show up next week when God takes the stick out
of my hand and puts it up against Bob Snyder. And then it'll be
my turn. It's like, I don't know. But
look at chapter three, verse nine concludes. What then? Are
we better than they? And this is where we need to
camp. I'm gonna land the plane with this. Are we better? Are
we better? Aren't we tempted to say yes? Aren't we tempted to say, oh,
we're all sinners, but at least we're better, right? Are we better? Are we not all
under sin, meaning slaves of sin? Every one of us, this is
total depravity brought home. There's none righteous, no, not
one. There's none who seeks after
God, none who understands, none who does good, not even one. Our mouth is an open grave. We
speak lies. We don't know the way of peace.
Fear of God is not before our eyes. We think we're wise in
our own eyes. Think we know what we're doing.
We think we know. Is there none? So this is gonna be necessary
for missions and evangelism. This is Paul's first, it's almost
a blow because he kind of knocks pride in the first one. But it's
really true. He does the same thing in Titus.
He says, honor all men. He talks about submitting to
the government, speaking evil of no one, give consideration
to everyone, and then he says why. For we ourselves once were
foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various
lusts and pleasures, spending our lives in malice and envy,
hateful, hating one another. Why should I be considered to
my government? Why should I be considered to
my neighbor who doesn't know Jesus? Because we ourselves once
were foolish, enslaved to sin, hateful, hating others, envious. We ourselves. And the only reason
we're not is due to when the love of God appeared, he saved
us. Not by our own works of righteousness,
but according to his mercy. The only reason that makes me
different than you, than my neighbor, than my culture, is God's mercy. I am no different. I'm cut of
the same cloth. So that helps me then to approach
any sinner and go, I'm a failure like you. I haven't just failed,
I'm a failure. I flunked out like you. I need a whole nother solution.
To convince somebody from the culture who doesn't grow up with
the Bible, you have to show them the foolishness of their ways.
Paul shows what it leads to. Professing to be wise, they became
fools. It's like, well, did the sexual
revolution bring you freedom? Did the addictions to all those
things, drugs, sex, everything, bring you freedom? Maybe you
should reconsider that there's a different and a better way.
That was foolish. But to the hypocrite, you take
the rule book out of their hands and you turn it. Say, can I measure
you? Because I've been hearing a lot
of things coming out of your mouth. Those are the two ways
we evangelize, it appears like, to Romans. For those that aren't
convinced, now the brokenhearted, scoop them up like Jesus did
sinners. Bring them in. That's, they've
already gotten to the point. I admit, I'm a failure. and I
need Jesus. We'll talk about what God does
in Christ for all of us in the next section. But I hope this
tonight is a good way to bring us to remembrance. There are
two kinds of sinners. As Paul says in 1 Timothy 5,
some sins go ahead of people, some sin comes behind him. Those
that go ahead, boy, is the wrath of God revealed on them. But
those that come behind are storing up the wrath of God and it is
yet to be revealed. and it will not be pretty in
the day of judgment and the revelation of the wrath of God. So may the
Lord save both kinds of sinners and may the Lord grant recognition
to all of us. We are that kind of sinner. We're
not better. And if we can own that as an
identity, then we can be ready for missions. That's my prayer.
So let me pray. Father in heaven, Lord, we thank
you for this opportunity to explore together a book from a different
perspective, a book that we often cherish and know well. And so
continue, Lord, I pray, to lead us. This is an ongoing conversation. And so may you bless us even
as we interact in conversation, in lunch, and tomorrow. Lord,
we pray that you would be with us. We need to hear from you.
In Jesus' name, amen.
The Wrath of God
Series The Gospel & Mission of Christ
| Sermon ID | 1023232322191715 |
| Duration | 1:06:02 |
| Date | |
| Category | Conference |
| Bible Text | Romans 1-2 |
| Language | English |
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