Sermon Tone Analysis

Why Christ Had to Die

 

April 16, 2006 – Easter Sunday

 

*Romans 5:1-11*

 

Focus:Easter is all about God helping us to be as good as we should be.

Please turn in your Bible to Romans chapter 5, and as you do I will relate what two other preachers have said about this passage: Charles Haddon Spurgeon said that preaching is like throwing a bucket of water at a row of bottles.

Some of the water goes in some of the bottles.

But by talking to people personally, you have the opportunity of topping off every bottle and making sure none of the water spills.

Stuart Briscoe says, “If I had the chance to go back over the 42 years that I’ve been preaching, I’d like to sit down with all the people I’ve ever preached to and ask them, “Do you really feel that Christ is your Savior and your Lord?”

I can’t do that.

But I want to explain to you in the simplest possible terms why Christ died for you, the significance of that, and what it should mean to you.”

So let’s read today’s passage, Romans chapter 5 verses 1 through 11: /‘Therefore, since we have been made right in God's sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us.

\\ Because of our faith, Christ has brought us into this place of highest privilege where we now stand, and we confidently and joyfully look forward to sharing God's glory.

\\ We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they are good for us—they help us learn to endure.

\\ And endurance develops strength of character in us, and character strengthens our confident expectation of salvation.

\\ And this expectation will not disappoint us.

For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.

\\ When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners.

\\ Now, no one is likely to die for a good person, though someone might be willing to die for a person who is especially good.

\\ But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.

\\ And since we have been made right in God's sight by the blood of Christ, he will certainly save us from God's judgment.

\\ For since we were restored to friendship with God by the death of his Son while we were still his enemies, we will certainly be delivered from eternal punishment by his life.

\\ So now we can rejoice in our wonderful new relationship with God—all because of what our Lord Jesus Christ has done for us in making us friends of God.

“/

 

The Bible explains carefully that the human condition is serious indeed.

We could live our lives as reasonably happy people.

We can get things reasonably well organized.

We can get ourselves into a relatively comfortable situation and never really feel that life is all that serious, that the human condition before God is all that drastic.

Yet, if we are to take what the Scriptures say seriously, we have to come to terms with the fact that the human predicament is extreme.

What we are in ourselves is fundamentally at odds with God.

That’s the root problem.

The technical term for it is /total depravity/.

It’s not a biblical term, but it’s an accurate one, provided we understand it correctly.

Dr.

J.I. Packer put it this way: “Total depravity means not that at every point man is as bad as he could be, but that at no point is he as good as he should be.”

That is the fundamental human condition in a nutshell.

According to Scripture, our righteousness is as filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6).

The New Living translation says we are so infected and impure with sin that that when we display our righteous deeds, they are nothing but filthy rags.

Pretty graphic!

Some people try to persuade us that we are totally rotten and despicable, utterly, thoroughly, totally depraved.

I, understandably, react to that!

They think the Scripture is saying, “At every point of your life you are as bad as you possibly could be.”

Rather, I like to think that there is no point in our lives at which we are as good as we should be.

We have come short of God’s glory says Romans 3:23.

In the Romans 5 passage, there are various words that describe the human condition.

In verse 6 it says we are “powerless.”

In the same verse it says we are “ungodly.”

In verse 8 it says we are “sinners.”

In verse 10, we’re “enemies.”

These all have a slightly different nuance that simply can be added up in this whole concept: At no point are any of us as good as we should be.

We have fallen.

We have failed to be what we were created to be.

That is the meaning of the word /sinner/: Someone who comes short, someone who misses the mark.

One of the sad tragedies of our being sinners is that there is a certain powerlessness about us.

This powerlessness manifests itself in different people in different ways.



Martin Alfonse, a Methodist pastor in Madras, India, told an interesting story: His father, an orthodox, dedicated Hindu, became seriously ill.

As a result of his illness, he went around trying hard to get proper medical care; none was available to him.

In desperation, he turned to some Christians.

They prayed quite specifically for his healing, and he was healed by a dramatic, divine intervention.

At that point he became convinced that Jesus Christ was Lord.

As a result of a specific, physical need being met, he acknowledged Christ as Savior.

Now, there was a certain /physical /powerlessness about him that was the direct or indirect result of sin.

But Christ was able to intervene.

Martin Alfonse’s experience was totally different.

He had an overwhelming sense of inferiority.

It was so severe that he was practically crippled in his everyday relationships with people.

But somebody told him that Jesus Christ could heal him in the area of his inferiority complex, that he would begin to understand his true worth as somebody whom Christ loved.

When he heard this message, he turned to Christ, and Christ became his Savior and Lord.

He was met not like his father at the point of physical need but at the point of his deep /psychological /need.

Both were powerless as a result of sin.

It manifested itself in different ways.

Pastor Alfonse went on to tell about a delightful family in his congregation.

As is normal for Hindus, they had been looking for inner peace.

They went through all the rituals of their religion.

They were totally committed and deeply involved, but at no point did they ever get close to the sense of an inner peace.

Someone told them it was possible for people to experience peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

They heard it, and they believed it; Christ became their Savior and Lord.

They were met not at a point of physical need or the point of psychological need but a point of clear, acute/ spiritual /need.

All were the result of sin, powerlessness manifesting itself in different ways.

That is the human predicament—not that at every point we are bad as we could be but that at no point are we as good as we should be.

As a result of this, there has been a debilitating impact of sin in our lives.

We’re sinners, and we’re powerless.

This powerlessness can manifest itself not just in passive inability but in active hostility.

We engage in ungodly behavior.

We behave as those who are at enmity with God.

We become rebellious.

We shake our fists in the face of God.

We deride his name.

We disobey his commands.

We go about showing that we have no time for God at all.

We enthrone ourselves, and we dethrone God, and we do all we can to resist him in our lives.

Not that at all points we’re as bad as we could be, but at no point are we as good as we should be, manifested in powerlessness, ungodliness, hostility, and sin.

That’s basically the human condition.

Now, I wonder, honestly, if deep down you see yourself in any of those categories.

I wonder if deep down you acknowledge that there is something fundamentally wrong with who you are as a person.

Has that sunk in?

Do you believe it?

What we /do /is a manifestation of what we/ are/.

If you look at the terms “sinner” and “powerless,” this will give you the impression that what we do is wrong because we fail to do what we’re required to do.

If you look at the terms “ungodly” and “enemy,” you’ll see that that suggests we do the things that we are forbidden to do.

We call these “sins of omission” and “sins of commission.”

Now some people who have lived rebellious lives have no difficulty whatsoever identifying specific sins of comission.