And then when you take your Bibles and open to Romans three this morning, Romans three, as we. Finish up some. Things from last week and move on to that which is before us, Romans three verses 21 through 26 will be our text for this morning. Romans three, beginning in verse 21. The apostle says, but now the righteousness of God, apart from the law, is revealed. being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ. To all and on all who believe, for there is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance, God had passed over the sins that were previously committed to demonstrate at the present time, his righteousness, that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. Let's begin with prayer. Father, this morning, I pray that this passage would be used by the Holy Spirit to Number one, convict those who do not know Jesus Christ as their Savior of their need. And number two, for those who are believers, would you deepen our understanding of the work that was accomplished on our behalf at the cross of Jesus Christ? And I pray that that would indeed spur us on to faithful service for you. In Jesus' name we pray these things. Amen. You no doubt have either used the phrase or heard the phrase, hey, I've got some good news and some bad news. What's the question that follows? Which do you want to hear first? Which do you want to hear first? Well, backing up to last week, Paul gives us the bad news first. In this letter to the Romans, Paul has spent the opening chapters basically doing this. He's been reading out the charges that God has against the entire human race. Starts with Gentiles, narrows it into the Jews, and as he is wrapping up this indictment, Paul wants to show us that all of us, Jew or Gentile, all the human race, No exception. Everyone is guilty of something in the eyes of a holy, loving, heavenly father. And he says it doesn't matter whether you're a religious, churchgoing, Bible reading type or a non-religious person, we're all the same. And so we come to As we looked at last week, Romans three, verse nine. And here is the conclusion to Paul's opening couple of chapters. He says, what do we conclude then? Are we better than they? And he's speaking specifically to his religious Jewish brothers here. Are we any better than the rest of humanity? He's asking them his conclusion. Not at all. For we have previously charged that both Jews and Greeks, they're all under sin. Every human being shares this standing. The standing, the judgment, the title, sinner. We share that positionally before a holy God. And we share it practically and conditionally. This is what we do without God's intervention. We are sinners. And so as you stand there before the judge, On your left hand is the drug dealer. On your right hand is the terrorist. In front of you, the murderer. Behind you, mom, neighbor, pastor. We're all on the stand together. There is no one who is exempt from this. And in verses 10-18, Paul reads out these charges that are against us. And these are all taken from another part of the Bible. Remember, from last week. What Paul does is he appeals to Scripture. His accusation here is not his own call. He's not being judgmental. He's not in a bad mood. What he is doing is giving the verdict of Scripture. And we read last week, verses 10, 11, 12 and following, we'll just highlight, there is no one righteous. There's no one who understands. There's no one who seeks after God. All people have turned aside and together they become unprofitable. There's no one who does good. No, not one. This is the allegation of the Word of God. This is God's judgment call. So the question before us is how do we plead? We stand before that judge and this is written down and this is called out before him. How do we plead? Verse 19 gives us the proper response where the Bible says, Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped and the whole world may become guilty or accountable to God. Guilty before a holy God. Our mouths should be stopped. We should be like the person who is in an argument, and you come to that point in the argument when, oh, I was wrong. And there's nothing more to say. And the mouth is shut. And the question stands before us. Do you accept these charges? Do you plead guilty to them? You might have been a Christian for many, many years. Maybe perhaps you even know the right answer to that question of how do you plead? But do you and do I, do we really deep down accept these charges? Turn back just a couple of chapters here. Look at a few verses in chapter 1. Extremely humbling verses. Verse 29 of Romans chapter 1. Being filled with all unrighteousness. Sexual immorality. Wickedness. Covetousness. Maliciousness. Full of envy and murder and strife and deceit. Evil mindedness. They are whisperers. Backbiters. Haters of God. Violent. Proud. Boasters. Inventors of evil things. Disobedient to parents. Undiscerning. Untrustworthy. Unloving. Unforgiving. Unmerciful. And as you look at that description, You see everything that is wrong with the human race. But as you look at that description, perhaps you're like me and it's like looking in a mirror and you say, that's me. This is who I am. Gossip and God hating. Arrogant, murderous, greed, disobeying parents. You know how natural disobeying parents is? The parents in here know, right? It's very natural. It's from that depraved nature from the very beginning, bent and perverted and dark. And it's you and it's me. And still we say, well, I'm not really all that bad. And we start comparing. But how about that verse that we read that almost everyone in this room knows? Romans chapter 3, verse 23, telling us that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. I love what one commentary, one commentator says regarding this verse. The harlot, the liar, the murderer, all short of God's glory. But then again, so are you. Perhaps they stand at the bottom of a mine and you on the crest of an alp. But you are as little able to touch the stars as they. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Hey, I got an idea. Let's all line up on the beach at the Atlantic Ocean and we will go ahead and swim to Africa. We'll just we'll get in the water and we'll swim across to Africa. All of sin and fallen short of the glory of God, see whether you swim, whether you swim 100 yards or 100 miles. At the end of the day, you're dead in the water. I should have taken swimming lessons. I don't think that's going to help. I don't think that's going to make you enable you to make it to Africa. And that's the point of verse 20 here in Romans three. Therefore, by the deeds of the law, no flesh will be justified in his sight. For by the law is the knowledge of sin. And you might think, oh, I'm not so bad. I'm not so bad in the eyes of God. But if I am so bad, maybe maybe what I can do is is to try a little harder to be good, to try a little bit more to make God smile at me. And so we think, well, if I take his law seriously, Well, if I obey the Ten Commandments the best I can, if we could all just be better people. But when we look at what the Bible says, that no one will be declared righteous in God's sight by observing the law, that condemnation that we read about earlier in Romans 3, reigns true. This is what the Bible says. that no one will ever be accepted by God because they've obeyed the law. Ever. In fact, if you try observing and obeying the law, you'll very quickly realize how sinful you are. Being good won't get you to God. Just like swimming instructions won't get you to Africa. And so you and I are on the stand. The charges have been read. They're irreversible and true. Our mouths are stopped. And there's nothing that we could ever do to alter God's verdict. Sinner. And I think it's important for us to feel the weight of that. Because it is so easy for us to be self-righteous. And say, yeah, but, as we talked about last week, I mean, look at my heritage. Look at my history and what I've grown up in. Or look what I do every week. And we base our so-called righteousness on our deeds. Rather than feeling the weight of the verdict of God, you are guilty. You are a sinner. You are rebel. You are cursed. And that is our problem. But that is the bad news. That's the bad news and good news and bad news. What do you want first? Well, give us the bad news. And Paul does that. He gives the Gentile, he gives the Jew the bad news. And it would be cruel to leave it like that. So if I came up to you and said, hey, I got good news, bad news, what do you want first? And you say, hey, give me the bad news first. That way the good news will cheer up the rest of my day. And I give you the bad news and I say, well, there you have it. OK, we'll see you. And I walk away. You're not going to let me walk away. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. You said you had good news, too. Right. And God doesn't do that either. He doesn't leave us in the bad news. The good news is coming. Oh, wait, do we have a word for that? We do. The word is gospel. The good news is coming and it begins in verse 21 where the apostle says, but One of the most wonderful words in the Bible is this three-letter word, but. Because it takes everything that was before, all of the bad, all of the condemnation, all of the sinful standing, all of the influence and the rebellion that I am caught up in. It takes all of that and says, hey, something different is coming. Something new is going to happen. But God interrupts life. And I'm so thankful that God interrupts my life. You say, do we have any examples in Scripture of God doing that? Right. Hundreds and hundreds of examples. Let's look at just a couple of them. First Corinthians, Chapter 6. If you would turn over to First Corinthians, Chapter 6. One of my favorite passages of Scripture. I shared this with the teens. Just a few weeks ago. As one of the great messages of hope that we can give to unbelievers, to our unbelieving friends, First Corinthians chapter six. Beginning in verse nine. Again, another bad news, good news situation. Do you not know? First Corinthians six nine. Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor adulterers, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners. None of these will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. You were there, but you were washed. But you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of God. And we see the testimony of God interrupting the life of man where man would say, hey, God, just let me do my thing. Just let me live my life, let me make my own decisions. And the apostle says, here's what you were. You were making your own decisions. You were making a mess out of this life that God gave you. And praise Him, He interrupted. But God came in. You were this, but you were changed. God did a work in your life. I've got up on the screen for you Hebrews chapter 10. And notice what the Bible says. Beginning in verse 11, every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly The same sacrifices which can never take away sins. How futile. How hopeless. Well, I'm going to offer these sacrifices and I hope it's good enough and I hope it appeases God, but it can never take away the sinful tendency in my life. That which I do because I'm a sinner. It can't do that. Notice how it continues. But this man, speaking of Jesus Christ earlier in that chapter, but this man, after he had offered one sacrifice, not many, not repeatedly, one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God from that time, waiting till his enemies are made his footstool again. God interrupts man's life. Man says, OK, what I'll do is offer sacrifices. Right. But those sacrifices are insufficient. They will never take away your sin. We needed God to intervene. Another passage in Ephesians chapter two. Now. Think about this passage for a minute, therefore, remember that you once Gentiles in the flesh. Who are called uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision made in the flesh by hand. Okay, so you Gentiles who are called non-religious by the supposedly religious, unholy by the supposedly holy, far from God by the supposedly close to God. Those of you Gentiles who carry with you that condemnation from the Jewish people, who again, by the way, Paul has already shown in Romans, we're all on the same page. But you carry that title with you. That at that time you were without Christ. You were aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and you were strangers from the covenants of promise. Having no hope. That's where we are in Romans 3. No hope. Sinner. Don't seek after God. Don't understand. Can't reach God. Sinner. Guilty. Rebel. That's where we are. No hope in Romans chapter three. Without God in this world. But again, God intervenes. Very next verse. But now in Christ Jesus, you who once were far off. Yeah, that was us. He was just talking about us. You who once were far off. What has happened? You've been brought near by the blood of Christ. These passages all talk about how God intervenes, how God interjects himself into man's life when he says, no, God, no, God, let me live the life of a fool. Let me do it my way. And God says, all right, but I'm going to give you hope so that you don't have to continue in that path going down that street. Another passage that you might want to look at is 1 Corinthians chapter 15 verses 12 through 22 that talks about God interjecting himself into man's plan. But God making a huge difference, making all the difference in the hope of humanity. But in Romans chapter three. We read here, but now the righteousness of God, apart from the law, is revealed. being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets. Let me read down to verse 24. Even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference. And before we move on, let me just say this. That sometimes we are very quick to quote Romans 3.23. Look at the context in which Romans 3.23 falls. For there is no difference Jew, Gentile, there is no difference. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. And similarly, all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Salvation comes the same way. So they're all sinners, all saved the same way. being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. There is no difference between the Jew and the Gentile. All of sin, all are justified or made right, declared righteous by the divine judge in the same way. And so we ask the question, OK, well, how did he make us right? Because we were guilty. What did he do? Because the judgment of sinner guilty came down on me. This is who I was. We were guilty, how did he make us right? Well, a couple of words that we have to pay attention to, first of all, is that word freely. It was at no cost to me, we can't say it was of no cost, it was a great cost, but it was of no cost to me. It was this gift that was freely given. Paul teaches that here in Romans chapter 3, that it was a free gift given by his grace, given by his perfect favor, and given for his good pleasure. A couple of verses that will help us understand that a little bit more. For it is God, Philippians chapter 2 verse 13. It is God which works in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure. He takes pleasure in changing man from rebel to companion, from rebel to son. Ephesians chapter 1 verse 5. Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Christ Jesus to Himself according to the good pleasure of His will. This work of salvation is a work of grace. God's perfect favor freely bestowed upon whom? We'll get to that in just a minute. It is accomplished, the Bible says here, through redemption. But whoever receives this, these people, this person has been redeemed. In other words, God purchased us. He bought us. Jesus bought us with his own precious life, and the next two verses give us some detail as to what took place in that redemption. Verse 25, Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by his blood through faith. To demonstrate his righteousness because in his forbearance, God had passed over the sins that were previously committed to demonstrate at the present time, his righteousness, that he might be just. And the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus propitiation, that's a word we don't use too often. I have never heard it in my entire life, someone use it apart from the scriptural context. I've never heard anybody use it in casual conversation. You say, what is propitiation? Simply put, propitiation is the satisfaction of God's wrath. But I like to illustrate it in this way. A year and a half ago, a little over a year and a half ago, little Claire was brought into our home. Okay, so little Claire, nice little baby, oh, so cute, so cute. Not so cute at two in the morning. Okay, at two in the morning, for that first month or so, what did we hear? That once delightful little... turned into a blood-curdling scream. As her lungs strengthened at two o'clock in the morning, it was horrible at two in the morning. And so what happens when that baby is just screaming, screaming, screaming? I don't know what maybe in your house, everything's calm and everybody. Oh, she's communicating maybe in your house. That's not what happens in our house, in our house. The alarm goes off. And everybody's trying to do something to help that baby. What does she need? What does she need? Because she can't just say, hey, I want this. So what do we do? We check her diaper. Oh, that's OK. Or we get rattled. Shake, shake, shake. She looks at. You start screaming more that wasn't it and we check the toes You know to make sure they're not all crunched up in the little booty. She has on all right. That's okay She's not being pinched and then finally someone comes up with the bright idea. Hey get a bottle And we come in and come in with a bottle and and as soon as you turn the corner the screaming intensifies and it's more and more and more and as you stick that bottle in the baby's mouth it becomes a Relief. Relief. The bottle comes to the rescue. And that baby's discomfort, that baby's wants and maybe needs, it's satisfied. It's appeased. Now, in a much greater sense, in a much greater sense, God's wrath. This is the sinner. This is God, and His wrath is kindled against the sin of man. And it needs to be fleshed out and applied to the sinfulness of man. What's going to happen to appease the wrath of a holy God against rebellious man? Something needs to happen. This is where propitiation comes. His wrath kindled and burning against us as sinners was appeased by something. What was it? The Bible tells us it is the blood of Jesus. The blood of Jesus Christ. God's righteous anger needed to be appeased before sin could be forgiven. This happened when in His love, God sent His Son, His own Son, who then willingly sacrificed His own life on the cross for you and for me. He died so that we would not have to die. The wrath of God was appeased through that propitiation that shed blood of Jesus Christ. And really, verses 25 and 26 provide a solution to a great problem. Because if you go down this road, you have to eventually ask the question, how can God be just? Righteous. How can he be just and at the same time declare righteous and ungodly, wicked, sinful person? How could he do that? God is righteous in judging sin. But how can God be righteous in justifying the sinner? The problem is answered only in the cross of Christ. And in a doctrine which we call the substitutionary death of Christ, again, He died and faced the penalty, the wrath of God, so that I wouldn't have to. At the cross, God devises a plan whereby He could justify, make righteous the unrighteous. without in any way compromising his just and holy character. See, there are a lot of people who want to want to compromise God's character. And they want to say that, well, he overlooks man's sin. Well, he kind of turns his back and ignores it and forgets about man's sin. God can never do this. He is holy and just He can never be satisfied until sin is judged. And sin was judged in the body of Christ. And here is the heart of the Good News. Here is the heart of the Gospel. That God's love and justice come together and meet. His perfect love for His creation. With His justice looking at them as those who have rebelled against Him, He cannot turn His back. And they come together. Where do they come together? They come together at the cross. Verse 26 says that for the one who places his or her faith in Jesus receives a new judgment. The new judgment is not guilty sinner. The new judgment is now favored, justified, made right, free, righteous, forgiven. This happens because of the work of God. The key to this, we read here in Romans, is faith. Again, verse 25, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood through, there it is, through faith to demonstrate his righteousness because in his forbearance, God had passed over the sins that were previously committed to demonstrate at the present time his righteousness, that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. The key to this new standing This new verdict that's being cast down is faith. You say, OK, well, what is faith? Well, the Bible helps us in giving us a definition in Hebrews 11, one which many of you know. It is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Many years ago, I heard another illustration that helped to describe faith. And when I heard about the Bible translation efforts in Georgia, it resonated with me because of this illustration. There was a missionary family who went to a tribe in Africa. And they went with the specific purpose of helping another missionary who was there in the translation efforts, getting the Bible into their own native language, making the Bible readable for them. But they ran into a huge problem. And I hope you don't run into this problem. But they ran into a huge problem. The problem was that that tribe had no word for faith. We have a lot of different words for faith, don't we? We use faith interchangeably with trust. I trust in Jesus. I have faith in Jesus. I rely on Jesus. I depend on Jesus. I believe in Jesus. But they hit this roadblock. And we're having great difficulty communicating that thought and translating it into this native language. Well, listen, without faith, you're going to have a real problem translating the Bible without faith. Because, see, if you don't put faith in Jesus in the Bible, these people stay in their guilty position. Guilty, guilty, guilty without faith. So after quite some time, trying to decide how are we going to do this? How are we going to communicate when there is no word for faith? They came up with another word. And there was a word that meant something very similar, but was described in a different way. The word meant to sit down with your whole weight. The idea is you come home after a long day of work or after all afternoon sitting in traffic and you walk into the house and you see your recliner and you plop down into your recliner. You set down with your whole weight. There's not it's not a rickety chair where you are. You're really careful to sit in it. It is that recliner which you can plop down in. Well, in this village to sit down with your whole weight was a perfect illustration of what faith is. Because faith is really sitting down with your whole weight on Jesus Christ. It's putting all your weight on Him. He's strong enough to catch us when we rely on Him. It means I stop working. I stop trying to be right. I stop trying to look good. It means going back to the beginning of Romans 3, having your mouth stopped, because you know you're wrong, and then looking at Jesus Christ dying for you to forgive all your sins, and you see that you are weak, but you see what Jesus has done and continues to do, and He is strong, and you sit down with all of your weight on Jesus, and you say, Jesus, I surrender. you plop down and give it all to Him. Thank you, Jesus, for the work of the cross. I can't save me, but I set myself down my complete weight on You, because You can. That is faith. And anyone who has faith in Jesus is entirely and eternally forgiven for free and forever. And so we take note of this passage here, that although God's justification is provided for all men, God justifies him who believes by faith in Jesus. God's gracious gift of salvation. All men are sinners, but all are justified the same way, by personally receiving by faith that free gift that was given to them by God the Father in His Son Jesus on the cross. You say, OK, how do we make the application? Well, first of all, we all need God's intervention. We all need God to say, hey, here's the bad news. And without this bad news, you're not even going to understand the good news. Here's the bad news, but here's where I come in. We need God's intervention. And some of you in this room, some of us have already yielded. We have sat down on Jesus and allowed God to break into our lives. And that gift that he gave has been received. My prayer is that an understanding of this passage is going to push us to a deeper devotion as I grow in my understanding of the whole work that God has done on our behalf at the cross. Maybe that starts by understanding propitiation a little bit more. Justification. Free. Faith. But some may have never received the gift that God provides in Christ. You still carry with you the judgment. Guilty. It's there. It's over your head. The question has to be, won't you allow God to justify you today? To make you right with Him today? Believe. Trust. Lay your whole weight on Him. And call upon Him to be your Savior. Would you pray with me? Father,