Two Truths and a Lie

Matthew McDonald

The Romans Road • Sermon • Submitted 3 years ago

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If you have a copy of God’s Word with you, I invite you to open it with me now to Romans chapter 1. We are going to be in Romans chapter 1 this morning, as we continue in the beginning part of our new journey down the Romans Road. Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve begun to walk together through this incredible book of the Bible together. And last week, we were looking at the things that Paul says that he prayed for, and we were talking about our own prayer lives, and I was reminding you that God already knows the things that we need, and that when we pray, our prayers need to rely on our relationship with Jesus and the content of our prayers need to be centered on God’s purposes. We were seeing that we can bring our requests and needs to God, but more important for us in our prayers and in life is our relationship with the Father, and His purposes and tasks for us as we know Him and make Him known. And this morning, we’re talking about why that is the case.

So, open your Bibles with me to Romans 1, and if you don’t have your Bible with you this morning, you can read along with us on the screens to my left and right, but we are going to be reading this morning from verse 18, and as we do so, I invite those who are able, to stand with me wherever you are as we honor the Lord at the reading of His Word:

Romans 1:18–32 NASB95

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful; and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.

Lord, Jesus, You are holy. You are wonderful, and the only One that is worthy of our praises. And this morning, we have gathered together as Your church to fix our eyes once again on You and on Your purposes for us. We want to live before in a way that is pleasing to You. We desire that You would be glorified in the ways that we serve You in knowing You and making You known. As we study Your word together this morning, would You come and show us how to do this better than we are doing it in this moment? Would show us the truth about You and about ourselves, and reveal in us those things that we can change by the power of Your Spirit working in us, so that we will be more like You. In Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.

Thank you, you may be seated. And as you find your seat this morning, I invite you to take out your listening guide, either from your program or from our Facebook page, but as you do that, I want to tell you a story. It’s one of my favorite stories. It’s a true story, and it is a story that most of us are very familiar with. and yet, it answers a fundamental question that many have been asking. In fact, it is the foundation of the text that we are studying this morning.

I have heard the same question asked over and over again in all different arenas of life and by all kinds of people. People from all walks of life, from all kinds of different political opinions, from various cultural backgrounds are all asking the same question: how did we get here? How, as a nation, as a society, as a world, as the human race, get to the place that we are now?

How is it that grain rots in silos, stored for tomorrow or to hold a price, while people starve to death? How is there so much corruption in freely elected government, and why do the people have to fight against the government that they elected to get them to do their will? Why is their injustice and racial inequality? What is the source of all of this violence and hatred? How is it that we fight for the lives of trees and turtles, yet murder our children without a second thought? How did we get to a place where evil is celebrated and good is hated? How, friends, did we get here?

And there are lots of answers to this question. Some say that it is the fault of the current Presidential administration, while others blame the previous one. Some point at one political party or the other, whichever they don’t vote for. We blame taking God out of schools, video games, and a lack of gun control. The list goes on and on of the politicians, the courts, the economic systems, the governmental policies, the media, and many other entities that we blame for our problems. However, in all of these answers, there something missing. The same thing is missing from each and everyone of these explanations, and it’s something that we don’t like to talk about: ourselves.

You see, long ago, before any of the evil we face was in the world, there was a garden. It was a perfect place. It was a place that God made for you and I. There was not evil. There was no death, no sickness, no famine. It was a perfect place. Every kind of fruit tree was in the garden. Every kind of fruit that you could imagine, and there were two special trees in the Garden. One of them was the tree of life. Its fruit is unlike any other fruit, because those who eat its fruit would have eternal life. But the other tree was the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And God put the first man and the first woman into the Garden. God made them in His image. He called His creations good. He told them that they could eat from any tree in the garden they wanted, even the tree of life; But they couldn’t eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil because if they ate from that tree, on that day they would die.

And one day, as the woman was going about the garden, she was near to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And the serpent, the most cunning of all creatures, spoke to her. And asked, “Did God really say that you can’t eat from all the trees of the garden.” And the woman answered, “yes we can. God said we can eat from any tree in the garden that we want to…there’s just one we can’t eat from…that one. We can’t eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, because if we eat from it we will die.”

And when she said this, the serpent laughed… “you won’t die,” he said. “God doesn’t want you to eat that fruit because He knows that the moment you eat it, your eyes will be opened, and you will become like Him.” And when the serpent said this, the woman looked at the tree. She saw the fruit, that it looked delicious. She liked the idea that she could be like God herself, and so, she ate some, and she convinced her husband, Adam, to eat some.

And in that moment, sin and death entered the world. They saw they were naked, and they hid from God. Of course, God found them. He covered their nakedness by the shedding of blood, making clothing of animal skins for them. He kicked them out of that perfect place, and man kind has been cursed by death ever since.

And as we turn towards our passage this morning, what I want you to see is that the root of our problems, the way that we got to where we are, is that we chose a lie over the truth. Look at verse 18-20 of our passage:

Romans 1:18–20 NASB95

As you look at your listening guide this morning, the first thing that I would have you to note is this, that

God’s wrath towards man is evident and earned

What am I saying? What is Paul saying to us in these verses out of Romans? And the answer is this: it is plain to see that our God is a righteous God. He is the Holy God of the universe. He is the one that decided what is right and what is wrong. Outside of God, right and wrong don’t make any sense. But God decided what is right and wrong, and everybody knows it.

Everyone knows right from wrong. From birth, you know what you should and shouldn’t do. God made all of creation to point us to Him. He made us in His image, to point each other to Him. He put us on our planet, in a unique place from which we can view the marvels of His universe. It is an amazing thing that while the stars and the heavens are beautiful, there aren’t many places in our universe where it is easily seen. God put us in a unique and wonderful place to observe His creation, and to see His fingerprints all over it.

And what Paul is saying goes all the way back to the garden we just spoke of. God made us. He told us who He is in everything that He made, including in ourselves. He gave us things to marvel at that could only come from Him. God didn’t just say that He is good. He didn’t just say that He loves us, He showed us in everything that He made and gave freely to us. God revealed Himself to us, and He made us for His own, good purposes. Do you know, it says in Genesis 2:15 that

Genesis 2:15 NASB95

Then the Lord God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it.

God put man in the garden to take care of it. He gave us a job, taking care of His creation. It also tells us in Genesis 3, that God would come and walk with Adam in the cool of each day. And so, God made us to be in relationship with Him, and to serve in His creation. We were made for the worship of God. We were created to see the goodness of God all around us, and to be reminded of these two truths, of who God is and who He made us to be.

But God also gave us a choice. He told us not to choose sin and death. He warned us not to seek evil, and He told us what would happen when we did; but we did it anyway. We chose evil. We chose sin and death. We earned God’s wrath for ourselves. And the reason that we’ve spent so much time on this first point is that it is the foundation of our problem. Why are things the way that they are? Why is there evil and suffering in the world? Why is God’s anger stored up against us? Look at verses 21-23

Romans 1:21–23 NASB95

For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.

Why is God’s wrath towards man evident and earned? Well, because of the second thing I would have you to write down, that

Our guilt was born in desire for creation over the Creator

You won’t die! You will become like Him! And they ate the forbidden fruit. God made us in His image. We were already like God, we were reflections of who He is. He told us who He was, who we were, and why that mattered, but that wasn’t good enough for us. We chose to buy the lie that God was holding back from us. We bought into the idea that we might know better than Him, and we’ve been doing the same thing over and over again ever since.

It says that we chose not to honor God or to give Him thanks, but we gave in to thinking about futile, foolish things. In other words, we turned our attention from the goodness of God to things that don’t matter and that can kill us. We decided that we were wise, and showed ourselves to be fools.

We are like children on Christmas morning, more concerned with what’s in the boxes than the love of the person that filled them for us. We didn’t know anything, but that didn’t stop us from acting like we did. Adam and Eve were the first to choose to pursue creation over the Creator, but you and I still do the same thing today.

The text says, in verse 21, that we exchanged the image of God for one of corruptible man, and birds, and animals, and creatures. And what it is saying is that people started desiring God’s creation instead of God. See, you were made to worship. You were created to worship God, you were made to desire Him and to worship Him. And the root of our problem, the base cause of the brokenness we see all around us in our world today is right here in verse 21, that you and I set our desire on something other than God.

Let me tell you something. What desire, what you truly set in your heart as your desire will be what you pursue with your life. I can see what your desire is. Other people can see what your desire is by what you do, because what you set as your desire will be what you pursue. If you desire entertainment, you will fill your time and your life with pursuing entertainment. If you desire wealth, your life will be consumed with getting it. Whatever you set as the desire of your heart will be what you pursue.

This is why Jesus says be careful where you put your treasure. Be careful where you invest your life. In Matthew 6:21, He said

Matthew 6:21 NASB95

for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

You will invest your life in the things that you desire. You were created to desire God. Desire for God should be the very core of who you are. Your desire for Him, my desire for Him, should be the very centerpiece of our lives. I mean, ALL OF CREATION points us to God. All of the universe declares His goodness. We are born with an understanding of what is right and wrong because of Him.

And our problem is that our desire isn’t God. Our guilt before God is rooted in the fact that we don’t desire God above everything else. Look at verse 24

Romans 1:24–25 NASB95

Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

We were made in God’s image, but rather than desiring Him, rather than being pointed to Him, we bought into the lie that we could find something better. And God let us pursue what we wanted. He let us pursue death over life. And rather than realizing that we were headed the wrong way, instead we filled our hearts with a desire other than Him, until there wasn’t room for Him anymore. In other words, as you write down our next point,

Our guilt matures in false worship that breeds corruption of thought

This is why desire is so dangerous, because you will worship what you desire. We’ve talked about this before, that the word worship means worth-ship. Worship is the declaration of worth. You worship what you declare as most valuable to you, and your greatest value is what you desire. So, as you set your desire on something other than God, you will begin to worship that desire. Your desire will become god to you. And as the One True God allows you to pursue the desire of your heart, and your life becomes consumed by worshipping what it is that you want, your mind is consumed by it as well.

What we’re talking about here is idolatry. When the desire of your heart is something other than God, you will worship whatever you have put in His place. You might not call it god. You might not go to a temple to worship it, but you will worship it all the same. You’ve seen this before, you just didn’t recognize it as idolatry. No matter how much money that man makes, it will never be enough for him. No matter how bad life falls apart around her, she won’t put that bottle down. No matter how badly his family needs him, that promotion is just outside of his reach. Sure, God demands that I live in holiness, but partying is far too much fun. Besides, there will be time for all of that later.

And it all starts in your thought life. You don’t have the money for that new boat yet, so you dream about it. You spend all of your free time looking at pictures of it. You enjoy the beach so much, that you stop giving as much to the Lord so that you can save a little more for that beach house. It fills your mind. You think about it all of the time, because that is what you do when you worship something. This is why people that are crazy about Jesus think about Him all the time. They talk about Him all the time. They are always looking for ways to be involved in the work of His Kingdom. Why? Because when you are worshipping God, that’s what life looks like. You and me were made to worship. And whatever you have made the desire of your heart, whatever you have purposed as the center of your heart, that you will worship.

We haven’t even talked about the most dangerous of these false gods, and that is yourself. You can worship yourself instead of the living God. You can desire your self-pleasure, and your fulfillment above pleasing Him. And here is the thing: it starts in your thought life, but it grows from there. Look at verse 26

Romans 1:26–31 NASB95

For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful;

Friends, a corrupt thought life is bad enough, but it doesn’t end there. What happens next, as you are taking notes, is that as false worship fills your thoughts and corrupts your mind,

Corrupt thinking brings about corrupt actions

The chain from your mind to your hand is shorter than you think. When you allow your mind to dwell on it, it is already too late. As Christians in our world today, we like to focus in on verses 26 and 27. We like to look at the exchange of the natural order for the unnatural as only pertaining to homosexuality.

And let me be clear, these verses do say that. Homosexuality is sinful. It is wrong in the eyes of God, it is unnatural, and these verses allude to receiving the penalty of their error. It is alarming the amount of disease, depression, suicide, and addiction in the homosexual community. I understand people will tell you that they have the desires for these kinds of acts, and that they didn’t choose to have those temptations. But having a temptation and entertaining it as a desire are different things. Having a desire and acting on it are different things.

Homosexual acts are sinful in the eyes of God, as are thoughts and desires that you entertain. But so are acts of lust between a man and a woman. So are thoughts and desires that you entertain when temptations arise in you for a member of the opposite sex. It’s sinful to live and to act as you are married when you are not, and there are often horrible consequences from these acts as well. But what I want you to see is that the list of unnatural acts doesn’t end with homosexuality, in verse 27. Look at verse 28. Paul reiterates it.

Romans 1:28 NASB95

And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper,

When you choose to worship something other than God, when you choose to deny Him and to worship something else in His place, your depraved thoughts will lead you to corrupt actions that are not natural. These things aren’t our natural actions, they are a result of our idolatry.

We pick on homosexuality, and it is sinful. But what of the other things on this list? Unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, envy, murder. What about these? Do you harbor greed? Have you harbored anger in your heart as unforgiveness towards another? Jesus called that murder. What about strife? Fighting and squabbling? What about deceit, lying and intentional cheating others for your benefit? What about malice, that is holding ill feelings and desires for another person? Gossip? Slander, talking bad about another person? Insolence? That is rude disrespect towards another? Boasting? Arrogance? What about disobedience towards our parents?

Friends, the Bible just said that these things are unnatural. They are sinful acts that we commit because we are worshipping something else, because we purposed in our hearts to find something for ourselves that we feel is better than God. These things are no worse than what you are pointing a finger at other people for doing because ALL of it is born out of a rejection of God.

And the worst part is that these things are destroying us, and we don’t even see it. The world around us is falling apart. The whole place is burning down, and we’re looking around like it’s somebody else’s fault. And I don’t want you to miss this: look at verse 32:

Romans 1:32 NASB95

and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.

What’s that? They know the ordinance of God and the death they deserve, but the celebrate those that do evil. Isn’t that where we’re at today? Isn’t that the question that we started with this morning? How did we get here? How did we get to the world burning down? And the answer is we brought ourselves here. You brought yourself here. You see, the last thing you should write down this morning is this, that

Corruption in our thoughts and actions will corrupt us absolutely

How did we get to where we are? You got here by worshipping the wrong gods. And I don’t care who you vote into congress. I don’t care who sits on the Supreme Court. I don’t care who is in the White House, or the governor’s mansion, or the county commission, none of those folks can fix this for us, because every last one of us is corrupt, and all that corruption can bring about is bigger, worse corruption.

And there is only one solution to corruption: repentance. We are corrupt, and the only solution to our corruption is our repentance. Repent means to turn around and go in the opposite direction. You and I need to repent. We need to leave the gods we have put in our hearts, and return to the love we were born with, the Love of the One, True, God. And because we are corrupt, the only way that we can do that is through the Lord Jesus Christ.

See, just as God covered the nakedness in the garden through the shedding of blood, He has made a way for our corruption to be washed away through the shedding of blood. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died a sacrificial death on the cross so that your corruption could be washed away, so that your relationship with God could be restored. This morning, I told you that you are corrupt, and broken, and without excuse, deserving of death. But, if you will turn to Him, you can also be forgiven, born again, and live forever.

It all comes down to the truth of God or the lies of false gods. If this morning, you are asking the question how did we get where we are, you already see where the lies have led you. This morning, won’t you come surrender to the only truth that can make you clean? We have an answer to our troubles. His Name is Jesus. I’m going to pray for us, and as we sing, I’m going to be standing right over there, waiting for the heart that is ready for something different than what this world can offer. If today you hear Him calling, harden not your heart.

Let’s pray together: Lord, Jesus, forgive us. Forgive us for the ways our hearts have been corrupted. Forgive us for pursuing desires for things other than You. We know that they have led us to this place where we deserve the death and the suffering that we are experiencing. Lord, would You forgive us? Would You wash away our sins in the blood Jesus? Would You restore our hearts to Yourself, that we might have the Life that only You can give us. In Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.

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