check. All right. By the way, that song I anticipate with our congregation will become another ancient words. Amen. It was written by the Gettys specifically because pastors said to them, can you write a song that would prepare us for our congregation with a song that would prepare them for the sermon. So we sing, speak O Lord. And that's what we're singing. And if you will take your Bible and turn to the book of Romans. The book of Romans. We are in chapter two and our text today is verse 25 through verse 29. And on the inside of your worship folder is a half sheet of paper. And I encourage you to get that half sheet of paper out and fill in the notes. It's a very good habit. You know, we, in Sunday school, we handed out notebooks because we're studying now the cults. So if you want to really dig into understanding what all these different cults, all the popular cults are teaching, we've got videos and notes and a notebook and everything. But that notebook is a good place to put these sermon notes so that way you don't lose them. All right, you might notice a strange title for today's sermon. It is Baptism and Other Lucky Charms. You might, what in the world is that about? I think as we get into the text, it will become very, very, very clear. Paul has said to the moral religious Jew, and by application to the moral and religious professing Christian, those who say they're followers of Jesus. I believe in Jesus, right? Every one of you here would probably, if I said, are you a follower of Muhammad or Jesus? You'd say, well, Jesus. Amen? Kind of quiet. if I'm speaking to a bunch of Muslims there. You don't have any guns under your overalls do you? So, we are in chapter 2, Romans chapter 2, and He is saying to them three things. The first thing is there is no hope in your good works. So, verse 1 through 16 He makes it crystal clear there is no hope for you in your good works. In verse 17 through 24, he says, there is no hope for you in your Bible knowledge. In other words, people think, yes, yes, yes, Paul, I understand what you're saying about sin and how God is angry at sin, but I'm exempt from that because compare my morality to the hot and taut in wherever hot and tauts live. Right? I mean, good night. I mean, I'm way better than them. So compare my morality with theirs. And on the level of comparative morality, I'm exempt from the wrath of God. And Paul just pounds away in verse 116. He says, you are absolutely not exempt from the wrath of God because you stand here pointing your finger at those dirty, rotten, no good heathen who do all kinds of horrible things. And you are doing the same thing. We just have different ways of doing it. Polite ways, legal ways, business ways that are like, you got to go along to get along. I mean, if you're going to make it in business, you're going to be successful. You got to lie here, say this there, and make some untruths. And, you know, you go to the cocktail parties and you sleep around with whoever you need to to get around. But goodness, I'm not as bad as those guys. Isn't that how we think? So that comparative morality is no refuge. Paul is taking his, I was watching some interesting videos of the javelin that we have given to Ukraine and how absolutely effective those are in destroying the Russian tanks because In the past, they would have rocket launchers and it was a straight line. And the rocket launcher wasn't that powerful. But the javelin doesn't work that way. The javelin works on going straight up and then hitting the tank from the top. And the reason that they did that is because the Russians had built their tanks very powerful in the armor on the outside. It's kind of a complicated explanation, but bottom line, their exterior armor was very powerful and was impervious to rocket launchers, but the top was not. because all of the previous anti-tank weapons were straight line, right? You shoot it and it goes straight like a bullet. But the javelin would go up and then hit the tank on the top at its point of vulnerability. And goodness, you can see some incredible footage of tank, I mean, just whole columns of tanks being blown to smithereens. What does that have to do with the price of bananas? Paul is using his spiritual javelin to completely demolish the refuges where people hide, where moral and religious people hide. And if you witness to them and you say, you are under the wrath of God, they say, no, I am not because one, two, three. And the three arguments they use are comparative morality, I'm better than them. Then the second argument was, I have knowledge that they don't know. I have a Bible. I have a Bible in my house. I go to a church that teaches the Bible. I teach the Bible. So I'm not under the wrath of God. And Paul totally takes his spiritual javelin out, puts it on his shoulder, homes in, pushes the button that says it's locked, and then shoots and boom. That's the end of that refuge. That is what good biblical preaching does. If you come to a biblical church and you are hunkered down in your stronghold, and you have in your mind, I don't need Jesus. I mean, I like Jesus, but I don't need to be putting my faith only in him as my savior. I don't need to be following him. I don't need to have some sort of radical conversion. I mean, I know those crazy Christians, they get all radical. you know, wear crazy t-shirts that say things like repent or else and turn or burn and they stand on street corners with signs. I know some of those crazy Christians. Or some real lunatics, they take a pocket full of tracts and they go and knock on your door and they give you a gospel tract and try and encourage you to get saved. That's all right for them. But I don't think that that kind of commitment is what is necessary. I'm hunkered down behind the fact that You compare my morality with those guys and comparative morality, I shine. Paul says, you're not going to be judged with comparative morality. You're not going to be judged in comparison with somebody else. You're going to be judged by your works. And 100% of us have done bad, evil works. So he blows that tank out of the ground. He blows that stronghold in verses one through 16. And then in verse 17 and following, the Bible knowledge stronghold. Yes, but I know God's will and I give a thumbs up to God's will. And if you were to ask me, I even teach what God's will is. And if someone said to me, well, are you in favor of transgender surgery? Well, no, no, no, I don't think that's right. And well, what about homosexuality? Oh, that's atrocious and outrageous. And you just, you know, with great bluster will say, I don't believe or act like those horrible people. And Paul says, yes, you do. Let me clarify that. God says, yes, you do. God Almighty, he says, you do the same things, you just simply have different polite ways of saying it and doing it. You don't go right up and, you know, like a skirt chaser, you know, go to a bar and wait for the last woman on the bar stool to be completely smashed, take her home and fornicate her, and then, you know, you go to the next one the next night. You don't do that. But you do. have all kinds of heart sins that relate to sexual immorality. Amen? So what Paul now is going to deal with is the final refuge, the final stronghold, the last refuge of religious hypocrites, and it's this. I have been baptized. I have been circumcised in the Jews, right? Notice something in verse 25 and following. Take your pen, and I look at repetition. Verse 25, for circumcision, underline that in green. Indeed, it's profitable if you keep the law, but if you're a breaker of the law, your circumcision, underline it again, has become uncircumcision. Three times in that verse, the topic of circumcision comes up. Then verse 26, therefore if an uncircumcised man, underline it there, keeps the righteous requirements of the law, will not his uncircumcision, underline it again, be counted as, three more times in that verse, the topic of circumcision is dealt with. Then verse 27, and will not the physically uncircumcised, underline it again, if he fulfills the law, judge you who even with your written code and circumcision, underline it again, is your page starting to turn green? There's a lot being emphasized about circumcision. And then verse 28. he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision," there it is again, that which is outward in the flesh, but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and the circumcision, there it is again, underline it, is that of the heart and the spirit and not in the letter. So, I didn't count how many times, but it's a whole bunch of times. Ten times. And those five verses, right? 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. Five verses ten times. What's the theme? Now, if you're just sitting there reading your Bible, and you're not coming to a biblical church that explains the Bible, then you're sitting there thinking, well, what'd I waste time reading that for? That has nothing to do with me, right? That's about as in place in my life as a ham sandwich at a bar mitzvah. I mean, it's just like, what's the point? The point that I want you to see is that the Jews used circumcision, which was the sign of the covenant, the symbol of the covenant. They used it the same way we use our religious rituals, and that is as a talisman. It was a magic amulet. that said, oh, if you've been circumcised, you're good to go. In fact, their own rabbi said, no circumcised Jew will ever enter hell. Another rabbi put it this way. He said, Father Abraham is at the door of hell checking every single Jew to see if he's circumcised. And if he has somehow gotten off the path and ended up at the door of hell, He's going to be turned away from hell by Father Abraham because of the sign, the symbol, the ritual, the talisman, the good luck charm. You see, I'm trying to compound synonyms so that you will see how you treat your faith. We live in a pseudo Christian world that has an endless list of good luck charms that protect the so-called Christian, that allows them to live with heart wickedness, convincing themselves that they don't need to be genuinely converted, they don't need to be a real follower of Christ at the heart level, because they have the external symbols. Make this strong connection in your mind. When you see the word circumcision, just think of a symbol, a sign, a ritual. Let me give you, we have a thousand of them, and many of them are phenomenal, good, circumcision was a good symbol, right? God came up with that. God told Abraham, all right, I'm gonna give you a land seed and blessing. The seed promise was really driven home by then God saying to him, you're going to have the symbol of circumcision, which relates to the seed promise. That kind of make sense? I won't go into all the details of what circumcision is. If you don't know what it is, ask your husband later or look it up at home or whatever. It just is like, we don't need to go there. Think of it as a religious ritual, okay? So here you have this religious ritual that has now taken the position of being a good religious symbol, but it symbolizes something. You see, the point of it is not the symbol. The point of the symbol is not the symbol. The point of the symbol is what it symbolizes. The point of the sign is not the sign. The point of the sign is what it signs, what it signifies. A good example is your wedding ring. If I get soap on my hand and I take my ring off and for some foolish reason put it on a sink and then walk out of the restaurant and leave my wedding ring, how long do you think it's going to last there? Someone's gonna swipe it. So I go back, rushing, half hour later, my ring's gone. Did I all of a sudden get unmarried? No, I'm still married. So the sign, whether it's there or not there, it's nice to have the sign there, right? I mean, you want that sign there because it signifies, what? It signifies your life commitment to your wife, your husband. Right? Till death do we part, one woman, one man for one life. That's what it signifies. I remember I worked for a company back in the 70s. And I was a young man, so the older guys thought it was their job to sort of coach me on how to live. And he goes, oh, what you need is get a wedding ring that is a size too big. Like, why do I want a wedding ring that's too big? They said, because with your hand in your pocket, if the girl's coming on to you, you can slip it off with one hand and they won't know that you're married. And so, boom. That way you don't have to take it out of your pocket and kind of unscrew it and say, do you have any soap around here I can get this thing off, you know? You can just slip it off in your pocket and she'll never know. Now, that guy had the symbol, but did he have the meaning of the symbol? He did not have the meaning of the symbol, he was an adulterer. So, if you don't have what the symbol symbolizes, your symbol is nothing but a lucky charm, is nothing but a talisman, it's nothing but a ritual and a rite. On the top of your notes under the introduction there, it should say the last refuge of religious hypocrites is rituals like circumcision. One of the most wicked things that you could ever imagine is for a church to tell you that you don't have to have the reality of the symbol to have the symbol. Did you know that? There is a massive, massive organization called Roman Catholicism And they teach a heretical, unbiblical teaching called ex opera operato. Ex opera operato. I looked it up on about 15 different Catholic websites as I prepared, just to make sure I had their definition. I had heard about this in seminary. I was shocked in seminary that anybody believed this, or that they tried to make it sound biblical. But I just wanted to reaffirm in my mind, okay, this is what the Council of Trent taught. And here's what it says. Just going through the religious ritual, whether there's any faith in you at all or not, or any holiness of the person performing the ritual, those things are completely irrelevant. All that matters is the ritual. That's why you baptize a baby. Does a baby exercise faith? No. But according to Roman Catholicism, water baptism removes original sin. without any participation of that baby at all. So if you have a ritual that you jump through the hoops and you go through this ritual, you have the sign, you have the symbol, you have the ritual, you have the talisman, then you're good to go. because it has nothing to do with your personal conversion, it has nothing to do with your personal faith, it has nothing to, you know, and I remember asking the professor, I said, this is really confusing to me because everything in the Bible talks about the importance of that person exercising real faith and following that up with a holy life. And he said, here's a way to think of it. When you go to the hospital for an operation, They put you out, right? Boom. You're laying on the table. You got, you know, right? I mean, you're not even breathing on your own, basically. You're just laying there, gone, right? You don't know what's going on. The doctor comes in. He performs the operation. He takes out your gallbladder or does whatever he does. You don't know anything. You don't, in your mind, say, I really believe that he's doing this. There's no personal holiness. You could be a gang-banging mafiosa. You could be a holy living missionary. Doesn't matter. The operation takes care of the situation without any participation of you at all. And he said, that's what the Roman Catholic Church has taught for centuries. about their sacraments. That's why they're called sacraments. We don't call them sacraments. Baptism is not a sacrament, it's an ordinance. It was ordered by the Lord. But they call it a sacrament because sacramental theology says just by doing the work, just by going through the hoop, you get the automatic grace of God and benefit of that ritual. That is a demonic lie. That is about as corrupt as you can possibly get. You know, just go through this. I mean, it's like wearing a cross because, or who was it, Saint Huachama Jigar that, you know, helped you while you're traveling. Right? Christopher. Now, he's got desainted or something, didn't he? But you don't see too many of those St. Christopher medals anymore. But just having that, just having that magic lucky charm, then is what's supposed to help you travel better or, you know, you're driving could be crazy, but St. Christopher will watch over you. See, this is what has leaked over into Bible-believing churches. Where, let me give you a couple of examples of symbols. A cross, is a cross a great symbol? It symbolizes the substitutionary death of Christ for our sins. But having a cross around your neck or cross earrings or a cross tattoo on your forehead or something, that's gonna do nothing for you except make it hard to get a job. Right? Get a big cross tattoo on the middle of your foreheads and try and go get a job somewhere. So what I'm saying is having the symbol is not the point. The symbol is not the point. The symbol is pointing to something. The symbol is symbolizing something. And Paul is saying they don't have the reality of what the symbol is symbolizing. Notice what it says in verse 25. Circumcision, the symbol, Water baptism is another symbol, a wedding ring. How many completely immoral women on their wedding day wear a white gown? You know, I hadn't really thought much about that, but when I was doing weddings, someone asked me one time, I know that girl, and she's going to wear a white gown at her wedding. I said, ugh. Right, what do you do? I can't control their life. You know, I used to have to. But what does a white gown symbolize? It's the purity of the bride. I don't know what that says about the guy wearing a black suit. But he says, you have the cross, you have baptism, you have wedding rings, white gowns. What about the Lord's Supper? The Lord's Supper is a symbol. Do you realize there are churches that teach that it actually has like, like it's radioactive or something and when you eat it, it glows in you and makes something magical happen in you no matter what. I mean, see what I'm trying to stress is the witchcraft is very appealing to people. Why is witchcraft appealing to people? Because if you say abracapocus in the right order, and bibbidi-bobbidi-boo, and shake this magic stick a certain way, then it doesn't matter if you are a fornicator, an idol worshiper, a whoremonger, a liar, it doesn't matter what kind of a wicked life you are living, the bibbidi-bobbidi-bing happens, and poof, and the magic sparkle dust appears. It has nothing to do with your life. So, the appeal of witchcraft is I can live in my sin and still have power over stuff. I can still make things happen. I can still, ooh, right? I don't know if you wiggle them that way or wiggle them that way. But, you know, they have all these little rules that you got to follow in order for your magic spell to happen a certain way. But the disconnect is that the power is available to wicked people. You can use this alleged power no matter how you live. And so that's what is the appeal to church goers. Hey, I went to church. Let's see, I went to church. Let's see, it's 52 weeks this year. So I went to church, 25. So God owes me a few drunks. I can go out on the weekend and get, because I mean, I did that for him, so, right, he should pay me back and let me do that. Or I gave a certain percentage of my income, you know, 2% of my check. They don't make the connection in their mind they've been robbing God of 8%. But they, well, I gave God 2%, so he should do this, right? And it has no connection with whether they're living a holy life, whether they're worshiping God. All right, so on your notes. Number one on your notes, your sign cannot save you because the first point Paul makes in verse 25 is that disobedience nullifies, makes null and void. It voids out, it cancels out the sign. You have a sign. The sign symbolizes your commitment to Christ. The death and resurrection of Christ, the Lord's Supper symbolizes for us, it signifies for us, it is a ritual that points to a greater reality. We're not having this just because we got something to crunch in our mouth and swallow. I mean, you do that when you go to a restaurant, you eat something and swallow something. You're not having the Lord's Supper. The Lord's Supper is pointing to, are you genuinely trusting Christ alone as your savior? And has he radically changed your heart? So the symbol points always, always, always to a heart reality. The ritual always points to a heart reality. The amulet, which is supposed to be this aura that repels demonic evil. Well, I'm okay, I had the Lord's Supper. That's not how the Lord's Supper works. So on your nose, fill in your nose. Your sign cannot save you. What you are relying on cannot save you. The ritual, the rite, the liturgy, the hoops that you're jumping through. I'm trying to throw out as many words, because I know what you're going to say is this. Well, that's how it is with signs and symbols, but I believe in rituals. So it doesn't apply to me. No sign symbols, rituals. Oh yeah, that's for sign symbols and rituals. I don't believe in that. I believe in liturgies. It's like, okay, I don't know how many other synonyms to throw out there to catch you. I don't want you to have this false trust. Uh, let me give you a good, a good one. People rely on. I walked an aisle and prayed the sinner's prayer. Right? Boy, we hear that all the time. I ask a person who is cheating on their wife and robbing God, and they are apathetic about spiritual things and causing trouble. And I say, well, you know, how's your relationship with God? Oh, I'm fine. I got saved when I was 16 at a summer camp. I walked an aisle and asked Jesus into my heart. Walking an aisle, first of all, is not in the Bible. Asking Jesus into your heart is not in the Bible. What the Bible commands you to do is repent and believe the gospel. But even if you say and praying a prayer to God saying, I do repent and believe the gospel in my prayer, that prayer is nothing more than a magic charm if you're not following it through with what it means. What did you say? Lord, I want you to forgive me of all my sins because I'm going to be a great sinner the rest of my life. No, you're saying, God, I want you to forgive me of my sins because I'm trusting Christ as my Savior, and I want to submit to him as my Lord. I want to follow him. But you've not followed him. You see the point? So what you symbolized with your walking forward and praying is not a reality. It's simply a dead ritual. It's an empty ritual. It's wearing a wedding ring that is one size too big so you can slip it off in your pocket when the girl shows any interest in you. Let me show you how in the Old Testament this happened. Go back to Samuel, 1 Samuel, way back at the beginning of your Bible. Numbers, Deuteronomy. So it's after Judges, if you can find it, 1 Samuel. If you can, just jot it down and listen real carefully. 1 Samuel chapter four. 1 Samuel chapter four. God had given to Israel lots of symbols, lots of signs, lots of rituals, lots of things like he has with the church. He's given us a cross, he's given us his Lord's supper, he's given us baptism, those kinds of things. But they did with these signs and symbols the same thing we do in America. The same thing we do, that they did in Israel, we do now in the 21st century. And one of the symbols that God gave them was what's called an ark. Not Noah's Ark, but the Ark of the Covenant. Some of you watched Raiders of the Lost Ark, and when they finally found it, and they opened the thing, everyone got, you know, blasted with radiation or something, and they turned into skeletons, fell over dead. That is the idea that people have about God's magic symbols. Oh, there's this arc, and we better not touch it because it's glowing with radiation, or it's glowing with magic power, and we better not take the lid off because it's glowing with magic power, right? So your relationship to God has nothing to do with the arc, but that's not what God said. Look what happens in chapter four. The word of Samuel came to all Israel. Now, Israel went out, this is 1 Samuel 4, 1. Israel went out against the Philistines, and they encamped beside Ebenezer, and the Philistines camped in Aphek, right? So they're gonna go to battle against the Philistines. And the Philistines put themselves in battle array against Israel. And when they joined battle, Israel was defeated by the Philistines who killed about 4,000 of them. And when the people had come into the camp, the elders of Israel said, why has the Lord defeated us today? Now, without knowing the rest of the story, why had the Lord defeated them? Their sin. God says the ark was a symbol of what? God's presence. The ark was a symbol of God's presence. Jesus Christ, when he came, was the embodiment of God's presence. People pressed all around him who did not get healed. One lady reached in and touched the hem of his garment, and he said, who touched me? Remember that? Why, when everyone was pressing in on him, were they not getting healed, but she reached in and she did get healed? You see, he's not a talisman. He's not like, I mean, a Chernobyl nuclear plant that's been exploded, and it's just no matter what goes there, if it's ducks or birds or coyotes, they're gonna drop dead. Jesus was not that way, and the Ark was not that way. The Ark was not going to be God's talisman. The Ark was not going to be a symbol that you could relate to when you needed it, like a rabbit's foot. What am I rubbing? What are you supposed to rub? A genie lamp or something? What else? Do you rub a rabbit's foot? I guess you can. Rub it on your head or something. So they're going to battle, but they're going to battle against the Philistines. Now, were the Philistines comparatively more wicked than Israel? Absolutely. So comparative morality did not save them. Is it Israel or is it Russia who's going to battle with the Philistines? Is it Israel or Russia? It's Israel. So being God's people did not shield them or protect them or exempt them from the wrath of God, did it? Being God's people, comparative morality, all of the things Paul is dealing with in the New Testament are not shields from the wrath of God. I'm better than him and I have a talisman and I'm Israel, I'm one of God's chosen people. So verse 3, 1 Samuel 4, 3. And when the people had come into the camp, the elders of Israel said to us today, why has the Lord defeated us today before the Philistines? I've got the solution. Here's what we need. This is why we messed up. Let's bring out the Ark of the Covenant. The Ark of the Covenant of the Lord from Shiloh to us. Now, is God omnipotent and omnipresent? He didn't have to move from Shiloh to there to help them, right? But that's their thinking. They're thinking that this magic lucky charm is going to protect us. And so let's go get the Ark of the Covenant. Let's run and get the Ark of the Covenant and we'll bring it to battle and you watch God do his thing. Because once this glowing Chernobyl comes into the camp, it's gonna wipe out all of the Philistines. Verse four, so the people sent to Shiloh that they might bring from there the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord of hosts. And of hosts was added there because he's not just the Lord, he's the Lord of hosts. The hosts are the armies, the angelic armies of God. So the God we serve is the God who has thousands upon millions of angel warriors at his disposal. And they're all at my disposal as long as I've got this box. I got my magic box called an Ark. So run to Shiloh, get the magic box, bring it into the battle. Then it says, when the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord had come into the camp, all of Israel shouted so loudly that the earth shook. And when the Philistines heard the noise of the shout, they said, what is the sound of this great shout in the camp of the Hebrews mean? And then they understood, oh boy, they've got the Ark. Now they're thinking the same thing. They're beginning to shake in their boots because the Hebrews have the magic box. They're bringing the talisman. They're bringing the lucky rabbit's foot. Verse seven, so the Philistines were afraid, and they said, God has come into the camp. And they said, woe to us, for such a thing has never happened before. Woe to us! Who will deliver us from the hand of these mighty gods? These are the gods, see they're still thinking of God in plural, who struck the Egyptians. Like we heard about this God of the Hebrews. With all the plagues, be strong and conduct yourselves like men, you Philistines. that you do not become servants of the Hebrews as they have been to you. Conduct yourselves like men and fight. So, verse 10, the Philistines fought and Israel, because they had the magic box, wiped them out in no problem at all. Is that what it says? See, I see, sometimes I change what it says, so see if you're listening. It says, the Philistines fought, Israel was defeated. Israel was defeated and every Israelite fled to his tent. And there was a very great slaughter. There fell of Israel 30,000 foot soldiers. And on top of that, the magic box was captured. Oh my goodness, now what are we gonna do? You see, God will not be used as a rabbit's foot. God will not be used as an amulet. God will not be used as a talisman. If you want the power of God, you need the holiness of God. You need the spirit of God. You need to be obedient before God and have heart holiness. You cannot just say, oh, well, it's time to do it. All right, we're up by the pulpit. Now, pulpits, there's another magic box for you. Oh, I'm speaking behind the pulpit. And I remember hearing one well-known preacher said, and it has to be made of wood. Right? So they've got rules for their magic boxes. So the Ark of the Lord was captured by the Philistines. And you know what's interesting? Eli. discovers, right? He didn't want the box to go there in the first place. And now he's in Shiloh, and it says in verse 13, now, when he came, there was Eli sitting on a seat by the wayside, watching, for his heart trembled for the ark of God. And when the man came into the city and told it, all of the city cried out. And Eli, when he heard the noise of the outcry, said, what does the sound of the tumult mean? And the man came quickly and told Eli, Eli was 98 years old. And his eyes were so dim that he couldn't see. And the man said to Eli, I am he who came from the battle and I fled today from the battle line. He said, what happened, my son? answered and said, Israel has fled before the Philistines, and there has been a great slaughter among the people, and your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, which God had prophesied He was going to kill them because they were disobedient rebels." They were church assistant pastors, so to speak, who were sleeping with the women at the church. And God says, I'm going to kill them. And it says, and the ark of God has been captured. So Eli gets two bits of bad news. Hophni and Phinehas die and the ark has been captured. When it happened, when he made mention of the ark of God, that Eli fell off his seat backward by the side of the gate and broke his neck and he died. So there's a lot of things go wrong when you start treating God like a rabbit's foot. when you start treating God's symbols and signs and rituals as though you just blatantly do them and doesn't matter, I can do whatever I want, and they exist to protect me from God's wrath. All of these symbols just exist to protect me from God's wrath so that I can go on sinning. I can go on living the way I want to live. I can go on visiting witches and palm readers. I can go on attending godless churches that don't open the Bible and preach the Word of God. I can go on doing all this because I'm shielded because I have the magic box called the Ark, or I have a cross around my neck, or I have been baptized, or I have taken the Lord's Supper. I mean, on and on and on and on and on. The number of rituals that we have as some sort of escape from God's wrath is amazing. The rest of the story is very interesting. I'll summarize it. The ark was taken into the temple of Dagon, who was the Philistine god. Of course, they had a whole bunch of gods, but Dagon was like the king god. And they said, okay, well, we captured their God. Now we've got the magic box and we're gonna put it in with our gods and it's gonna work for us. See how they think? Oh, the Jews, we beat them. So their God must have been upset with them somehow, but now his power is ours. Little did they know. So they take the ark and look at chapter five. The Philistines took the Ark of God, brought it in from Ebenezer to Ashdod. When the Philistines took the Ark of God, they brought it into the house of Dagon and set it beside Dagon. And when the people of Ashdod arose early in the morning, there was Dagon fallen on his face before the Ark of the Lord. So Dagon, the statue has to bow before the King of Kings, right? And so I'm like, well, how'd that happen? So they set Dagon back up and put him in his place at the end of verse three. And when they arose early the next morning, there was Dagon fallen to its face to the ground before the ark, and not only just fallen, but his head and the palms of his hands are broken off. So only Dagon's torso was left. Therefore, so it goes on and on. Point being, God's not gonna be used as a talisman by anybody. You worship God and obey him. You worship him by obeying him. You don't worship him by simply having a cross around your neck or having been baptized or having umpteen other external rituals that you go through. But I go to church, that's just a ritual you're going through. If the heart is not there, In other words, if you say, oh honey, do we have to go to church again? Well, you know, we're supposed to, and you know, oh boy, okay, if I have to. You know, and off you go, dragging your lip on the bottom, lip on the ground, and you know, man, you've got the external ritual, but you don't have the reality, do you? Right, God's people love being with God's people. God's people, did you not love singing those songs? And God's people don't stand there like this. during a song. That's not what God's people do. God's people are like, I love you, Lord. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. Thank you, God. I once was lost, and now I'm found by your grace. I was spiritually blind, but now I can see. I mean, you're thinking of these words like, that's me, God. That is totally me. That is I'm singing to you, because if you don't hold on to me, I'm going to be lost. And then before the sermon, you're singing. Speak, oh, Lord. Yes, the word of God is going to be opened in this church and the pastor is going to get up and he's going to preach it. So I'm singing these words. Speak, oh, Lord, I want you to speak to me, God. The unsaved guy who is going through the exterior emotions is like, oh, boy, it doesn't speak to me because he's only got bad things to say to me. Right. Let's go back over to Romans chapter two. God will not be used as a rabbit's foot. Romans chapter two. There are only two paths, as the great theologian, who was the wicked band that played Stairway to Heaven? Led Zeppelin, as the great theologian Led Zeppelin said, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run, there's still time to change your mind, you're young. Right? So they're singing in the song, yeah, there are two paths. Take your time. Don't get on the Jesus path yet. You've got time, you're young. You've got time to change your mind, you're young. That's Satan's lie, isn't it? Postpone it, put it off, drag your feet, maybe later. You know, I heard the pastor preach, get saved, follow Christ last week. And I'd said to the Lord, well, you know, I should probably get around to doing that. But manana, after all, we've got a number of Spanish people in our church. And so we Anglos like to swipe words that help us and, you know, we can say to God, manana. You know, tomorrow, I'll do it later. Not right now, I'm not gonna get sold out right now. Then you're following the great satanic theologian, Led Zeppelin, who is telling you, there's still time to change, you're young, put it off. Put it off till later, put it off till later. My plea to you is you may not have the rest of the day. You may not have a week. You may not have a year. You don't know. Why play with that? You know, what I think of people who say later, I think of it as somebody who jumps out of an airplane with a parachute at night when it's over cloudy, overcast. And they don't know how far up the plane is or how low the plane is. And they're like, well, we might be 30,000 feet, we might be 300 feet. If you jump out of a plane and you don't know how close to the ground you are, how quickly should you pull that cord? Probably pretty quickly, right? You wouldn't say, there's still time to change, you're young. I'll pull it. Yeah, I'm getting around to pulling it. And the person beside you is like, man, you've been waiting on pulling that cord. You know, we've been falling for a minute now. We've been falling for two minutes now. We've been falling for three minutes. Yeah, there's time to change. You're young. Then bam! And the ground comes up a lot faster than you realize. You play with God, and you're playing with fire. So your sign, your symbol, your ritual, your lucky charm cannot save you, and you notice on your notes it's because your disobedience voids out the sign. That's what he says in verse 25. Circumcision is indeed profitable, right? Signs are very profitable. Having a wedding ring is profitable. Having the Lord's Supper is profitable. There's all kinds of benefits to that. One of the benefits is not that it saves you, and another that is not a benefit is that it doesn't shield you from the wrath of God. He says, It's profitable, and then circle the next few words, if you keep the law. It's of no value to you if you are a breaker of the law. If you are a law keeper, I would like to meet you because you're the first person in all of history that qualifies as a law keeper. You realize, if you say, I'm going to be saved by my ritual, I'm going to be saved by my circumcision or baptism, There's two paths you can go by. One is the path of self-righteousness, which is a guaranteed loser, because there's none righteous, no, not one. The other path is the path of Christ's righteousness, which is a guaranteed door opener. You get the righteousness of Christ credited to your account, and you're in, period. You have the righteousness of Christ. But if you say, I don't care about that stuff, I don't need that stuff, I've been a faithful church member since I've been in my mother's womb. And I mean, I was going before I was born and I was in the cradle roll. And so when I get there, I'm just gonna tell him, you know me, God, you know how good I've been. He'll say, yeah, and I know how sinful you've been. And there the trap door opens up. So the word of God is very clear about this. Turn over to Galatians, Romans, Corinthians, Galatians. Two books, two or three books to your right. Galatians. Paul is making this crystal clear. Now, why doesn't he make it crystal clear in chapter 1 and 2? Why doesn't he make it clear that salvation is a free gift in chapter 1 and 2? Because he's trying to show you if you're a Gentile you're going to have some sort of mental argument against God that I'm good enough to get to heaven. And if you're a moral Christian Church member, you've already got all of your ammo loaded. You know why you're going to stand fine with God on judgment day. And he has to break you down. He has to completely undermine your self-righteousness. He has to completely destroy, get that javelin, get your tank that you're hiding in and blow it to smithereens. You cannot trust in your good works, which is nothing but comparative righteousness. You cannot trust in your heritage, well, I was born a Catholic, I was born a Baptist, you know, it doesn't matter whether you're Catholic or Baptist. It's the same set of arguments I've heard on both sides. I knock on doors all the time and I come, so I'm not picking on any particular religion. This is what Baptists say all the time. It's what Presbyterians say. It's what Methodists and Catholics and Lutherans, they all claim, I'm good enough, and when I stand before God, he's gonna just tell me, oh, you have been really good. I'm just so glad you're here. You're gonna bless the whole place. So, God, through the writings of Paul, has to destroy what you are trusting in. He has to blow up your fortress, your stronghold, your pillbox. All right, so in Galatians, here's what he says. Look at chapter three, Galatians chapter three. And look at verse 10. But as many as are of the works of the law, what I mean, of the works of the law means you're trusting the works of the law to save you. You're relying on your good works to get you to heaven. As many as are of the works of the law are blessed because they're so good. They are under a curse. They are cursed by Almighty God, for it is written, cursed is everyone who does not, and underline this phrase, continue in all things which are written. Continue in all things. If you say, I'm gonna stand before God and plead my baptism, you have now put yourself on the path of self-righteousness. If you do that, you are now obligated by God to have obeyed continually every single jot and tittle without fail from the time that you've had any consciousness of reality. You have to be absolutely, unswervingly, unvaryingly, absolutely perfect if that's what you're going to rely on. In case there's anybody still thinking, well, yeah, I think I can do that. Let me give you some brain medicine because you're a lunatic. God's word says you are a wicked sinner. I am a wicked sinner. I am hopeless outside of Christ. If I leave Jesus over here, Christ's righteousness, and I rely on self-righteousness, I'm good enough to earn my way to heaven, which is what Roman Catholicism teaches. It's what all of the mainline liberal denominations, Methodists, et cetera, et cetera, Lutheran, on and on, all the mainline denominations, they all teach this. They all teach it doesn't matter, Jesus, first of all, they don't believe that Jesus is God anymore. They don't believe that Jesus is the only way to heaven anymore. I'm not telling stories out of school. Look their headquarters up and look at their doctrinal statement, listen to their meetings, their gatherings of their bishops and their pastors and hear what they say. They openly say, Jesus is not the only way to heaven. If you're just a sincere person, That's what the Pope is saying. You do not even have to be a believer in God if you are a sincere atheist, he says. The Pope says, if you are a sincere atheist, you will go to heaven. Amen. That's atrocious heresy. But that's why you need to be in this book, don't you? And so here's what the Apostle Paul, if you've got a Catholic background, Saint Paul, says in verse 10, 310, as many as are of the works of the law, if you're gonna rely on that path, you're gonna put your hope in your self-righteousness. I'm gonna stand before God and tell him you would not believe what a good person, I had to put up with my husband. You know what I had to put up with? You know all things, God. I mean, that certainly qualifies me as a saint at least. He says, okay, you've now been cursed because you have to obey every single thing. Then he says in verse 11, but that, what? Underline those next two words, no one, no one, no one. No one is justified by the law in the sight of God. No one is, how many people are justified in the sight of God? By their works. So on judgment day, let me read it again. I'm not sure I'm reading this clearly. Verse 11, but that no one is justified by the law. Well, that excuses me, though. See, I'm not counting there. See, what I'm trying to do is show you how your perverted, wicked brain works to try and get you out of the corner that God has put you into. God has put you in this corner, and it's this. You are a sinner on your way to hell, and if you stand before God, relying on your good works, you're ignoring a life of wickedness. You're ignoring a life of sin. The only way to deal with that life of sin is who? Jesus Christ. So he says, verse 11, that no one is justified by the law in the sight of God, and isn't that an interesting phrase, is evident. Like, duh. Isn't that what he's saying? No one's gonna get right with God by their works, duh. That's evident. Because justification is by faith at the end of verse 11. The just have life by faith. You're justified by faith alone. It's not by your works. But understand, when you put faith in Jesus Christ, it is a radical life-changing situation. Then he says, verse 12, the law is not of faith. The law was never created to save you. The law was, I mean, The pill bottle says, do not take more than so many pills. You take the whole bottle of pills. Oh, that's all right. I'll just take the law. I'll take the label right off the pill box. Is that going to save me? No, the law has told you not to do that. You take that law and swallow it, it's not gonna save you. The law is not designed to save anybody. The law is there to tell you what is right and what is wrong and to condemn you for breaking the law. You are guilty. I am the law, obey me. You've disobeyed me, you are guilty. That's the law's purpose. It doesn't save, it doesn't help save, it doesn't add to our salvation, it doesn't give us a final boost into heaven. All it does is tell us what God's right and wrong is and condemn us when we break it. The law is not of faith, verse 13. Christ has redeemed us from the curse of, do you see that? So here's the solution, Jesus Christ. Christ has redeemed us from that curse. The law has cursed you because you are guilty. Now, When you sin against God, your solution is not to try harder to not sin against God. That's just simply adding more law. Now, when you sin against God, you run to Christ. Lord Jesus, without you, I don't have forgiveness. I need your forgiveness. I need your cleansing. I need your strength and your power. Jump back to Romans with me. And he says this. The end of verse 25. If you are a breaker of the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision. Is everyone clear about that? In other words, I don't want you to think that somehow, if I'm a breaker of the law, my circumcision shields me from the wrath of God. If I'm a breaker of the law, my baptism shields me from the wrath of God. If I'm a breaker of the law, my taking the Lord's Supper shields me from the wrath of God. That's not what Paul is saying. Paul is saying, if you are a breaker of the law, you've now nullified all of the different rituals and signs. Therefore, if an uncircumcised man were able to keep the righteous requirements of the law, note to himself, and he can't. You understand that? If an uncircumcised man keeps the righteous requirements of the law, does anybody keep the righteous requirements of the law? Nobody. You see, we're not talking about comparative righteousness. Paul has already destroyed that. What are you saying is there is none righteous. There's none of us who keep the righteous requirements of the law. God is not going to have a judgment of people who don't know the law and then a different judgment for people who are like better than those people. And if you're better, then comparatively, you're gonna make out better, no. If a man keeps the righteous requirements of the law, and note, we don't, but if it were to have happened, let's hypothetically say that there was an individual who was able to keep the righteous requirements of the law, then his uncircumcision would be, and the Greek word here is logizomai, which means credited or accounted or imputed. Now, Paul is not going to develop the doctrine of imputation in this section, but I want to show you, jump over to chapter four. And look what he says in verse three. What does the scripture say? Romans 4, three, Romans chapter four, verse three. What does the scripture say? Abraham believed God and it was what? Credited or counted or imputed. Now, we're gonna dig into this, but I want you to underline this just to have this in your back pocket for when we get there. Now, verse four says, to him who works, the wages are not what? There it is again, counted, credited, imputed as grace, but as debt. But to him who does not work, but believes on him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is what? Underline it again, accounted, credited, imputed. Then verse six, David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes, counts, credits, righteousness apart from works. Drop down to verse eight, blessed is the man to whom the Lord shall not. Are we seeing a theme here? Imputation, the great, great, great doctrine of imputation. We're gonna be coming to that in a few weeks or months. But Paul is giving us sort of like a glimpse into the future from verse 26. And there is so much more to cover, I'm frustrated, but I wanna make sure we take the Lord's Supper. So we're gonna continue this next time. All right, let's go to the Lord. Lord, help us to avoid the dangerous thinking that somehow going through rituals and signs and symbols without a heart change is going to somehow shield us from your wrath. Lord, you have said to the people in the book of Romans, it is because of their hard and unrepentant heart. It's their hard and unrepentant heart. Lord, we don't want hard, unrepentant hearts. We soften our heart before you, Lord Jesus. Right now, we soften our hearts before you. We ask you would be gracious and forgiving. Cleanse us from our wickedness and our iniquity. And our only hope in that cleansing is the blood of Jesus.