Sermon Tone Analysis

Romans 3:1-8

Paul as a travelling Church Planting Evangelist/Missionary is going from city to city, starting in the Jewish synagogue and sharing the message of salvation through Jesus.

In doing this, there is no doubt that he has encountered many arguments to his message.

It appears that in these verses we see three of those arguments.

In this passage he is asking and answering them as if having a conversation with those who are arguing with him.

These questions still appear today!

They may look a little different (baptism, church membership instead of circumcision), but the devils tactics are the same throughout time!

Why change what works, right?

Paul has said there is no difference between Jew and Gentile, between a religionist and other men (chapters 1–3).

All men stand before God guilty of sin and condemned.

Now at this point Paul imagines the religionist seeing exactly what he is saying.

The religionist also sees the tremendous weight of Paul’s argument;

so he is straining to counter Paul with three arguments, arguments often made by Christian religionists and church members who profess Christ and attend church only enough to salve their consciences.

I. What’s the Point?

In other words, “What value is there in being a Jew/a religionist—in being circumcised or baptized—if all are guilty before God?

(3:1–2)

What do you do with the Jew who is Abraham’s seed?

The promise of God to Abraham was that his seed (the Jewish nation) would be the children of God.

A. The Truth

But Let’s take a side trek here:

What is God’s plan for the Jews?

Why did Jesus Christ come to the Jewish nation and come to earth as a Jew?

Very simply stated, the Jews were God’s special people.

They had been born by a special act of God.

It all started long, long ago.

God had wanted four things.

1.

He wanted a people who would love Him supremely and give Him their first loyalty.

2.

He wanted a people who would witness to all other nations that He and He alone was the one true and living God.

Ac. 13:26, 47.)

3.

He wanted a people through whom He could send the promised Seed, the Savior and Messiah, Jesus Christ, to all men everywhere.

4.

He wanted a people through whom He could send His written Word, the Holy Bible, and preserve it for all generations.

In searching the earth for such a people, God could find none.

God could do only one thing.

He had to find one man and through him begin a new people, a new nation.

1. God found and chose Abraham and through him established the Jewish nation.

God chose one man and challenged him to worship God supremely.

If that man would worship God supremely, then God would cause a special people to be born of his seed.

That man was Abraham.

Abraham was the first Jew.

In the Old Testament the Jews and their land (Palestine) were continually pointed to as the very special people and land of God.

They were called …

⇒ God’s special people (De.

7:6).

⇒ God’s peculiar people (De.

14:2; 26:18).

⇒ God’s peculiar treasure (Ex.

19:5; Ps. 135:4).

⇒ the Lord’s portion (De.

32:9).

⇒ the Lord’s land (Le.

25:23; Je. 2:7; 16:18; Ho. 9:3).

⇒ the holy land (Zec.

2:12).

However, the Jewish nation failed to obey God supremely.

The whole plot of the Old Testament centers around God’s pleading and dealing with the Jews.

Again and again, He gave the nation the opportunity to obey Him.

He dealt with them in mercy and in judgment, but at every turn they refused to heed His pleading.

2. God chose the family of David.

God made another specific move, He chose one faithful family within the Jewish nation and gave to that family one great promise.

The family was that of King David, and the promise was that of the Messiah, God’s great King, God’s very own Son.

God’s Son was to come through the line of David and establish an eternal nation of people who would love God supremely.

However, the Jewish nation again failed God.

They misinterpreted God’s Word—the prophecies of His coming.

a.

The Jews misinterpreted God’s Word by saying the seed of Abraham included only the Jewish nation.

In their minds, God had no children except the children of the Jewish nation.

The Bible says explicitly that the seed of Abraham is Christ, and the special people of God are those individuals within all nations who worship God supremely because we are in Christ.

b.

The Jews misinterpreted God’s Word by saying that the eternal kingdom promised to David was the Jewish nation and the Jewish nation only.

They expected Israel to be established as an earthly nation forever and all other nations to be subservient to Israel.

But again, God’s promise was not that narrow, nor was it that prejudiced.

The Bible says there is not, and never has been, any respect of persons with God.

God did say that Christ was to come from the Davidic line, but He also said that He was going to establish an eternal nation made up of people everywhere who would love God supremely.

By misinterpreting God’s promises, the Jews failed to be the missionaries to the world that God had chosen them to be.

They became earthly bound and materialistic minded.

They twisted the idea of the promised Messiah to fit their own schemes.

They conceived of Him as One who was to establish an earthly kingdom for the Jewish nation alone.

They failed to see that God was speaking …

of an eternal kingdom of righteousness

of a kingdom that is of another dimension entirely—the dimension of the spiritual

of a new heaven and a new earth that would give each person an eternal life beyond just one earthly generation

3. God then made a third choice.

This He did by sending His own Son into the world through the Jewish nation.

God sent Him so that the world through Him might be saved.

However, man rejected God’s Son and crucified Him.

This act—the killing of God’s Son—was the final blow.

When man slew the only Son of God, the whole world was involved.

Both Jew and Gentile were represented symbolically in the Jewish religionists and the Roman authorities.

They both actually did the plotting, sentencing, and execution.

In His eternal purpose and plan for man’s salvation, God took the sins of all men and laid them upon His Son while He was being slain upon the cross.

He allowed His Son to bear the sins of the world.

Then He took His Son and raised Him from the dead—never to die again.

He did what man had always failed to do: in His Son’s resurrection God began to build a lasting kingdom of righteousness, a new nation that is presently being made up of men from all earthly nations who desire and are willing to follow Jesus Christ supremely.

He is calling out and forming a new people who have genuinely been born again—spiritually.

These new born people shall live eternally—beyond just one earthly generation.

These people are identified as His church, as a body of people who genuinely believe and follow Him.

They are destined to be the inhabitants of the new heavens and earth.

God, acting solely upon His own through the death and resurrection of His Son, has fulfilled His promises to both Abraham and David.

All the people of the nations of the world now have the opportunity to become children of God, the special people of God.

B. The Misunderstanding

Now that we understand God’s plan for the Jews, we can get back with a little better understanding to the Jews arguments.

If a man is born a Jew (born into a Jewish family) and he professes to be a Jew, a follower of God, is he not acceptable to God?

If not, then what profit is there in being a professing Jew, a follower of God?

You are saying there is no advantage in being a Jew or a child of Abraham.

The application of this passage concerns every man.