Sermon Tone Analysis

Pray

Read Romans 3:21-31

Last week we were in the 21-26 the paragraph on God’s Righteousness and Justification.

The last two weeks we covered quite a few topics.

So I’ll start with a brief review of where we were.

In Romans 3, 21-26 Paul introduces us to this idea of God’s righteousness and our justification.

Because God is a righteous or a just God, in the cross is this demonstration of His righteousness, or justice.

Our faith in the person and work of Jesus at the cross is the means by which we escape the hold that sin has on life, and where we escape the wrath of God.

By our faith, God imputes his righteousness to us, and it is by that imputation that he declares us righteous in His sight, thus beginning the Christian walk.

Now, the question before us this morning is Why?

So far we have been given this problem of sin, that we all share, then we learned that Solution to this Problem is that God declares us righteous by faith in Jesus.

Then last week we looked at the Origin of the justification, was God and his grace, the method of our justification was the cross, and the means of our justification is faith, Now this morning we are going to look at Why? Why did God prescribe that our justification would be by Him?

The summary of that paragraph is the last verse, romans 3:26.

I would like to take apart Romans 3.26 this morning.

SLIDE RO1

He-the He is God the Father---Did IT-that is-sacrificed His son Jesus at the cross to-that is the reason why- to demonstrate.

that is to show or to make known publically.

To whom is God the Father demonstrating His righteousness.

For the whom, we go back to Ro 1.18, and Romans 3,23 says all have sinned and fall short of the glory so therefore

Therefore, the wrath of God is revealed against all mankind, now…in RO 3.26

Going on.

Slide Romans 2

God demonstrates His righteousness.

That is his goodness, His justice, His truth.

Demonstrated even though His wrath is revealed.

Right alongside of His wrath.

One one side the wrath of God, on the other His righteousness, goodness justice, and honesty on the other.

At the present time is this new era of salvation-the new testament time we are living in, no longer under the Old Covenant.

And we can really end it there, and it would stand alone.

In this new era, God the Father, sacrificed His son Jesus at the cross to show all of humanity, His righteousness, His goodness, and His justice.

The cross points to God the Father’s righteousness to all of humanity.

Slide Romans 3

SO AS TO-in order that-or for the purpose of God the Father being BOTH Just and the one who Justifies.

God is both-The one who delivers the wrath, and the one who delivers the grace.

We talked about God’s righteousness two weeks ago.

God is the God we fear, the one who has wrath against sin, the one who excutes true and honest judgement, and we should fear Him, but now…He is the same God who freely delivers grace and justifies the sinner, He is the same God.

He is the same God who has righteous anger toward sin.

Toward those that turn away from him.

That same righteous anger of the Old Testament that swallowed up Pharoahs army, with the red sea, the same God that opeend the erth to swallow the Israelites, the same God that killed Uziah when he reached out his hand to take hold of the Ark and David was so afraid that he could not bring the ark back.

He is the the just God, AND he is the God who justifies.

He is the same God that took on Flesh, and took that wrath- THAT same just and deserved wrath upon himself, so that he could justify----Whom?

Everyone?

No just those who have faith in Jesus.

To all God the Father is just, but to some- those who have faith in Jesus, He is also the justifier.

God the Father is the one who justifies us.

We do not justify ourselves.

Yet this is what we do constantly.

It is in our everyday life.

It is how we answer.

It goes way back to the garden, when Adam and Eve first sinned.

They knew the wrath of God would come upon them by eating from the tree they were not supposed to eat from, and when God came to confrot them, Or when they were in the court of God, and he laid out the charges against them, they attempted to JUSTIFY themselves, right?

Adam said-It was the woman that YOU put there with me, she gave it to me, and Eve said-It was the serpent, it is an attempt to be just in the court of God.

But God is the ONE who justifies, not us.

If it were up to us, then when we reached heaven would all stand around shaking hands, saying congratulations you made it welcome, then we hand you a ribbon, and God would be standing there kinda like at a graduation ceremony shaking your hands saying you did it, that is great, you justified yourself.

But that is not the way it works It was Jesus who went the cross, not us.

It is God who is both just and the one who justifies.

It is God who does it.

It is God is the one who brings us into His kingdom.

This way God gets the glory-not us.

And God is very particular about who gets the glory.

This idea is something that is said over and over again in the Old testament.

The prophet Isaiah talked about this very thing.

There is a passage from Isaiah chapter 42, that really emphasizes this idea.

This what God says, and by the way not just any God, the creator of the heavens that big majestic God who makes the earth, and gives breath to his people.

Right here it is-Romans 3:26 in the Old testament-It is the I the Lord who calls you into righteousness.

God is the one who will take hold of your hand.

It is God who does this to open eyes that are blind, to free the captives.

and to release the prisoners.

I am the Lord!

God says.

I will not yield my glory to another.

God does things for His glory-He does things so that we know He is God.

This is an important idea in all of scripture.

Why did God rescue the Israelites our of slavery from Egypt, cause they were somehow a better people than everyone else? Nope.

He does it to show how good HE is.

He does it to show others that HE alone is God, no one else.

Watch this,

Exodus 7.17 by this you shall know that I am the Lord, Ex 8.22 that you may know that I am the Lord.

I will leave the other 5 references in Exodus where God says so that you may know that I am the Lord, for some other ones.

It is Deuteronomy 29.6, 1 kings 20:13-Behold I will give it into your hand and you shall know that I am the Lord Is 49.26

It goes on and on-these are just a few, It goes on an on God saves us so that We will know who he is and that He will get the glory.

If we were the ones who justified ourselves, then we wouldn’t need the cross.

If we were the ones that justified ourselves, then we could get the glory, and then we could boast, that is why Paul says this.

Since it is not by the law, but by faith, there is no boasting!

We did not do anything, there is nothing of us to boast on, God did it to show that He is just and the one who justifies.

Our faith is not reason for boasting.

He is God of not just a specific group of people but he has -through the public demonstration of His righteousness at the cross as in verse 21, 26 and 26-made himself known to all-to everyone-everyone has this opportunity BY FAITH to fully justified by the God who is both Just and the one who justifies.

It is not by works that we are justified, and faith is not a work, but faith that saves is faith that works.

Our faith in Jesus is a faith that effects the way we live.

Our faith causes us to love Jesus and that makes us want to serve Him.

We are no longer caught up in our self, and this world because we no longer love this world.

That last verse really concludes this section of God’ justification and Paul will then begin to focus a on the true saving faith that receives justification.But there are important things to consider about this section, because Christians and non-Christians alike often struggle with the facts Paul presented here that God is just and the one who justifies.

This idea is very God focused, today, Christians and non-Christians alike are being misled by placing the emphasis on the person and their behavior.

What this is saying is that our works do not justify us, our faith does, then as a result of our faith we have good works.

It is very important to understand this, because misunderstandings on this can result in you not understanding the gospel, or your need for the gospel.

The world misses this and a result do not see their need for the gospel.

Since in the gospel the glory of God is revealed, missing this causes us to miss the glory of God.

So here are two things we need to understand.

God is just.

God judges justly.