Roman Roads - 2024

Romans chapter 3 verse 9 to 26.

This is what the lord's word says. What shall we conclude then? Do we have any advantage? Not at all. For we have already made the charge that Jews and gentiles alike are all under the power of sin.

As it is written, There is no 1 righteous, not even 1. There is no 1 who understands There is no 1 who seeks god. All have turned away. They have together become worthless. There is no 1 who does good.

Not even 1. Their throats are open graves, their tongues practice deceit. The poison of vipers is on their lips. Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood ruin and misery mark their ways and the way of peace they do not know.

There is no fear of god before their eyes. Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law. So that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to god. Therefore, no 1 will be declared righteous in god sites by the works of the law, rather through the law, we become conscious of our sin. But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of god has been made known to which the law and the prophets testify.

This is the righteous this righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentle for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of god. And all are justified freely by his grace. Through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement.

Through the shedding of his blood to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness. Because in his forbearance, he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished. He did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time. So as to be just and the 1 who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.

Tom. Thanks very much, Chris. And good evening, everybody. And, welcome back. This is our first evening service of the New Year, and it's lovely to be together on Sunday evenings, isn't it?

To to meet and to hear the lord's word and to, praise god together. As, Chris said, this is a, a new series that we're beginning this evening. It's only a a 4 part series that will take us through January. But we've called it Roman Road, which is the name of 1 of those Goss all frameworks. So if you've ever heard of 2 ways to live, or bridge to life or 3 2 1, Roman Road is 1 of those.

In other words, it's something to learn in order to help us understand the gospel, but also to give us tools so that we might communicate it to to other people. And Roman Road is essentially 4 texts or 5 texts, just sentences really from the book of Romans, which we can memorize and learn and, will help us better to know and better to communicate the, the essential truth of the gospel. And we are looking today really just at 1 verse or 1 and a half versus chapter 3 verse 9. For we have already made the charge. That Jews and gentiles alike are all under the power of sin as it is written.

There is no 1 righteous, not even 1. Should we pray? Father we pray that you would please speak to every single 1 of us here this evening. There might be some here who would not call themselves at this time. Followers of the lord Jesus.

And there may be many reasons for that, but we pray that you would speak to them clearly this evening. We pray for those of us who already know the lord Jesus and have been amazed at the mercy that you have shown us in him. And we pray as we revisit our great need for Christ, that you would increase our appreciation of him, increase our, love for him. Give us, a fresh desire to follow him closely. And, we ask, so please speak, please speak to us lord.

We pray, in Jesus' name. Amen. So 3 verse 9, we have already made the charge. Paul says, we have already made the charge, and that word or that idea, carries with it the idea of accusing something accusing someone beforehand. So this kind of charge means to accuse beforehand.

So if you've ever seen any of those police dramas, you know, 24 hours in police custody, or, you know, on the on the streets with the met or you know, the the type of things, either the the real life ones or the dramatic ones, you will know that when they've got a prisoner, 1 of the things that they have to do in order to charge the prisoner is to reach a kind of evidence threshold. And so you may have seen those scenes in the police station where they will, they'll ring up the crown prosecution service, and they'll lay out all of the evidence. They'll set out the charges And then the CPS Crown Prosecutors Service will say, yes, the threshold has been met. You can charge. You can prosecute.

We can take this forward. But in order for that to happen, they have to omit that threshold. The charges have to be substantial enough They have to have evidence behind them before you can then take this forward. And so that's what Paul is really getting at here in verse 9. We have already made the charge.

We've been laying out the evidence. We've been setting forth the case. We've been ringing up, the great crown prosecution service. If you like in the sky and and seeing what the evidence against people is. And if we had time, if we'd been able to read through these chapters, we would have seen that Paul has been making his case very, very effectively.

He's taken all sorts of evidence and he's presented it before the world to say, these are these are guilty. We have we've met the threshold here. So it's interesting if you just turn back with me to chapter 1, He begins chapter 1 verse 1 with this glorious introduction. Paul a servant of Christ Jesus called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God. The gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures.

So here is a letter and it is about a gospel. It's a good newsletter. This is, a message that god promised beforehand in the Holy Scriptures. It's not something brand new. It's not something plucked out of the sky.

It's not a creation of Paul's own mind. This is a but always promised always foretold always prophesied that has now come into its fullness. He says it's regarding his son, who's the lord Jesus. Who as to his earthly life was a descendant of David. This is not just any old person.

This is 1 in a line of kings. Were looking at that this morning, weren't we? Psalm 23 islam of David. David, the great king, the Messiah King of the Old Testament. This lord Jesus Christ fits into his family tree.

He's the ultimate, the true Messiah. He's the son of David. And who through the spirit of holiness was appointed the son of god in power by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ, our lord. That is just a a wonderful that's the just crystalizing the gospel. So beautifully.

Who Christ is? What it's all about? But then in the rest of chapter 1, he shows us why we actually need this cheese us. Why we need to listen up as closely as we can to this gospel, and here's the reason. The charges against us.

And by us, I don't just mean some group somewhere. I mean us, I mean me, and I mean you, the charges against us are massive, and they are devastating. And he sets that forth in the next in the next few chapters. And so this first Roman road text is really all about the human condition. It's god's assessment of the human heart apart from the workings of his grace, all alike.

3 verse 9 are under the power of sin. We've made that charge. And so what we're gonna do this evening is to go back over that evidence to see the charges that can make Paul summarize with a sentence like that in 3 verse 9. And the purpose really of going over this evidence again is not so that we might run into a godless despair. Not so that we might run away from god and say, Woe is me, and I've gotta try and fix it somehow, or maybe I can't fix it, and I've just got a wallow in pity.

That's not the purpose. And the purpose of going over these charges is not so that we might go back under the law, that we might try again in our own strength. To put things right because firstly, we'll see that is not the solution God gives. And second, we'll we'll see it's frankly impossible. Our condition is too bad.

With no way we could do that. The purpose of going over this evidence and rehearsing these charges together is that we might run with grateful hearts to Christ, who is the only 1 raised in power and appointed to be the son of god who can take away all of these charges. Massive and devastating, though they are. Can take them all away and make us once for all and forever right with god, our father. That's the purpose of going over it.

So you're ready to go over the evidence, see what the crown prosecution service are gonna say about has the threshold been met? All alike are under sin. How does he know? Well, look at 1 verse 18 with me. Chapter 1 verse 18.

The wrath of god is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people. Who suppress the truth, not by accident, by their wickedness. Since what may be known about god is plain to them, because god has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world god's invisible qualities, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen being understood from what has been made so that people are without excuse. This is the first line of evidence really in the in the chapter.

And he's saying to us that nature, or this world in which god has put us, the creation all around us is a relentless preacher, a relentless preacher. Doesn't matter whether you are, sat in traffic, on the a 3. Or with the walking group on Saturday walking through some of the gorgeous, sorry, countryside, or whether you're staring at the stars in the night, you know, we are surrounded by this relentless divine preacher. Who is saying to us all the time that you live in a world designed by god an eternal, powerful, other creator. And day after day he proclaims to you and night after night he speaks to you.

Through this world that he has placed you in. But what have we done with that knowledge of god, our creator? We have not submitted and praised. We have suppressed it by our wickedness. We've suppressed it.

So the illustration that's often used is of the, the beach ball in the swimming pool, if you've heard that 1 before. That's what suppression really is. It's where you're you're taking something that was designed to float, taking something that's meant to be on the surface under the sun and with all of your creativity and force, you you have to hold it under. You have to suppress it. And that's not just the thing with a beach ball that you do once, is it?

You don't just hold it under and trust that it will stay there. It is a constant act You have to day by day week by week, put your energy into keeping this thing under the water. That's how Paul describes what we do with the knowledge of god, our maker. We don't wanna hear it because we wanna create our own origin story. We wanna live in our own world and run it our way.

And so we hold this underground under the water. That's 1 A team has suppressed the truth, but then he moves to the second charge. This might be the, the DNA evidence at the scene. Or this could be the CCTV from the petrol station. Or this is the next this is the next line of evidence.

Okay? 1 21 for although they knew god, and that's just thrown in, isn't it? Isn't it? Isn't it? There's no, like, no, let me prove it.

You. Let me let me show you that you do. See, you, well, we all know. We all know. He says, they knew god.

They neither glorified him as god nor gave thanks to him. And so that he seems to think is a very significant charge against us. That we have lived in this world made by god, and we have not been thankful to him. We've not thanked him for the life that he has given us and for the world that he's put us in. You might imagine, inviting somebody over for dinner and, you go to the shops and you buy all the ingredients to make a wonderful meal for them, and you even offer to put them up for a week.

And you make up the spare room, you hoover the carpet, you put your best linen, on the duvet, and you've you've you've got it all ready for them. And the guest just punches their way in, goes straight to the table without acknowledging you at all without thanking you for the invitation, eat all your food, goes upstairs, uses all your shower gel, has a shower, goes into the bed, walks out a week later without a word of thank, without a word of thanks. Without any acknowledgement at all that this has all been laid on and provided by a generous host. You just assume that it belongs to you anyway. And so you take it and you don't give thanks.

Paul says if you wanna know whether humanity is guilty before god, just look at their gratitude life. How grateful are how thankful are they for god and all that he's done? Well, that's the second line of ever Thirdly, 1 verse 22. Although they claimed to be wise, and don't we just do that. Claimed to be wise.

We know we know stuff, don't we? We know how other people should live. We know how we ought to live. We know how we got here. We know.

We know. Don't we know. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools. And exchanged the glory of the immortal god for images. Will you just let that sink in that sentence?

They exchanged the glory of the immortal god for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles. This is like the most terrible trade that you could you could imagine. I've told you before that, you know, when when kids get into things like Pokemon cards and, you know, football stickers and, football cards, you know, trade trading becomes quite a quite a big thing. You know, trading at school and trading church and trading wherever there are children, basically, who are collecting the same thing. And 1 of the things you really don't want to happen to you as a trader is for you to give away a shiny, precious rare card and to trade it for a duffer.

You know, you don't you don't wanna do that. Give away something precious for something common or or worse still for a counterfeit. That would be the very worst to trade something rare and beautiful for a fake. And yet we do it all the time, we have done it. We do do it.

With god, we trade the glory of the immortal god, which is worth infinitely more than any card, and we trade it away for an image. And here's the thing that wasn't accidental. You know, sometimes you get scammed into those trades, don't you? You get a counterfeit by accident. We chose it.

We chose to make that trade. We chose to give it away. It's a madness, isn't it? And yet Paul says Crown prosecution service, can anyone argue with it? It's the evidence against them at trade 1 verse 28 is the next line of evidence.

Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of god. So god gave them over to a depraved mind so that they do what ought not to be done. The old King James version has it. They did not like to retain god in their knowledge. They did not like to retain god in their knowledge.

So where was god? He was in our knowledge. It's not that he wasn't there. He was there. We just didn't want him to stay there.

We didn't retain him in our in our knowledge. You know, sometimes you get that information where somebody tells you something. And you instinctively know this, I need to I need to write this down. You know, someone says, this is this is the phone number that you need, or, this is the this is the code to the the shed or something. You think, oh, just hold on.

Let me just get my let me write that down because you wanna retain it. It's it's precious enough to hold on to. We did not think that god our creator was that type of knowledge. He was the sort that we did not need to retain. That we could let go that we could let out of our minds so that it didn't have to trouble us anymore.

1 verse 32 this is another charge. I'll read it to you from the, the new living translation. It says this. They they know god's justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die and yet they do them anyway and worse yet They encourage others to do them too. They know god's justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die and yet they do them anyway.

See, the truth is we know an awful lot more than we commonly think, don't we? It's not just that we know from creation that there is a maker. We actually know in our hearts that those who disobey god deserve to die. We actually do not there is some knowledge that every person has that if I'm a god hater, if I'm insulin, arrogant boastful, if I disobey my parents and all the things he details in his If I do those things, I know something in me knows I'm going against God and I deserve to die. And yet in my sin, I say, I don't wanna listen to that voice.

I'm gonna do it anyway, and I'm gonna act as cheerleader for others who wanna do it too. So it's like those cheerleaders you get at American stadiums where it's the base ball or NFL, and they're they're cheerleading on. That's what it says. We do it ourselves, and we cheerlead for others. We encourage them to do it too.

And so this is the charge that he's laying before us. That we are those who know so much and yet we suppress it all. My father has got rheumatoid arthritis, and, it's quite a a disabling condition for him. And, it's 1 of those immune conditions where his, his immune system is basically attacking his own his own joints as far as I can tell. They something goes wrong and it begins to your body begins to think that the bits that serve you are actually to be attacked.

And so he has to take immune suppressing drugs. Drugs to stop his immune system doing what it ought to do Well, in the same way, we were made to know and worship god. That is what we were created to do and yet we take this immune suppressing drug called sin. We take it so that we suppress the proper response We cut off the right response and we don't worship god as we were made to do. Pretty devastating, isn't it?

But unfortunately, it does get worse before it gets better. So remember the key verse 3 verse 9 for we have already made the charge that Jews and gentiles alike are all under the power of sin. But then moving from chapter 1 into chapter 2, he turns to the religious people. So you might imagine all the gentiles which simply means non Jews. They're in chapter 1 and they're in the dock.

And the charges have been made against them. And as they've been read out these charges, you might imagine that the Jews, the religious people up in the public gallery. And they're pointing down at the gentiles as the charges are read out. And they say, read another 1. Read another 1.

That's exactly what they're like. That's exactly what they do. All of them alike do that. Suff the knowledge of god. They're not thankful people.

They cheerlead for sin. They don't do the right things. Let's let's have some more of that, but then in chapter 2, Paul points up to the public gallery. And he says, I'm I'm not done with you. I haven't even I haven't even got started with you.

And you can see chapter 2 verse 1 how he goes. You therefore have no excuse. You who passed judgment on someone else. For at whatever point you judge another, you are condemning yourself because you who passed judgment do the same things. And then just read on with me to 2 verse 17.

Now you, if you call yourself a Jew, If you rely on the law and boast in god, if you know his will and approve of what is superior because you are instructed by the law. If you are convinced, that you are a guide for the sort of people in chapter 1, a guide for the blind, and a light for those people in chapter 1, a light for those who are in the dark an instructor of those people in chapter 1 for the foolish, a teacher of those people in chapter 1, those little children. Because you have in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth. You then who teach others. Do you not teach yourself?

You who preach against stealing. Do you steal? You who say that people should not commit adultery. Do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?

In other words, he's saying you, you love it when those non Jews get charged by the CPS. You love to see them behind bars. But hold on a minute. You do you not do the same thing? You had accused them of suppressing the knowledge of god.

Do you not do that? You who refuse to give thanks, do you not give thanks? You who hate the sinners, do you not do exactly what you hate? And here's the thing, you're more culpable. So you've got the law.

You've got the word of god. You've got the prophets. You've got more light to suppress. A bigger beach ball to hold down, and you manage it. You go on about how wrong these things are.

And yeah, actually, let's just rehearse what your own hearts are like. Do you not do yourselves? The very things you condemn others for. See, we can be guilty of this, can't we? It's so easy for us to look at the world and say, man, all the nonsense that they believe.

They go on about believing in themselves. They go on about loving themselves. I mean, how silly can they be? And yet when you and I sin, is that not exactly what we do? We're believing too much in ourselves.

We're loving ourselves too much. You who preach against those who believe in themselves. Do you not believe in yourself? You who say it's so silly to love yourself. Do you not love yourself?

Above other people. And so he points to these religious people. And he says, look, instead of using the law to run to Christ, you used the same law to say, we're better than. We're better than. Instead of taking that light and shining it on your own You went around shining it on other people's hearts, telling them off, telling them what they've done wrong.

When you yourselves are guilty, of the same. And so the question is after all of that, who who can escape these charges? Who can escape these charges? Augusta, great, theologian from church history. He said sin is the human being curved in on itself.

Sin is the human being curved in on itself. I often think of 1 of those quaver crisps when I think of that. You know, there's cheesy quavers that are all they're not straight. They're they're curved in on themselves or like a a leaf in the autumn, which has died and fallen to the ground. How do you know it's dead?

Because it loses its color and because it turns in on itself. It's a sign that it's dead. It's curling in on itself. And that's what he's saying. All alike du and gentile have curved in on themselves and we are guilty.

So chapter 3 verse 9 to 10 We have already made the charge that Jews and gentiles alike are all under the power of sin as it is written there was no 1 righteous, not even 1. Then if you saw in the BBC's coverage of of New Year's Eve, 1 of the things that they do is they have a live feed which shows new year coming in all across the the world. If you've seen that, as it comes in in different hours, And, you know, it shows you images of what people are doing all over the world as they're celebrating the new year. And, you know, in Rio de Janeiro, there's 2000000 people, gathered on 1 beach, having a big beach party and waiting for the new year to come in. Now, and then they did had a scene from, Tibet or somewhere like that, and you had these, these monks, who were in 1 of their monasteries or 1 of their temples who were in silence and solitude and we're praying for the new year to come in.

And all these scenes from the world, and you just think for, you know, in all of that great mass of humanity, there are so many It's quite moving. I found this. Look at it. There there are so many dreams and hopes there, aren't there? So many stories.

So many people, and all of them have got backgrounds, and all of them have got futures, and all of them have got things that they want to achieve in a way of seeing the world, and they're so different. They're so different. Even in London, as we've seen, 9000000 people. And yet in this 1 verse, he says all alike. Or for all of those differences, all alike are under the power of sin, all alike.

For all of the problems that they have have this 1 chief problem that they have fallen short of the glory of god. In 3 verse 22. Paul says there is no difference between Jew and gentile. Now that's just a shocking statement. There is no because they're they would say, no, no, there's a huge difference between Jew and Gentle.

There's there's what there are there is worlds of diff there is a cavern of difference between Jew and Gentle. And in some ways, there is. But in this regard, for all have sinned, and fallen short of the glory of god, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of god. The image we are to have is of a of an archery range. And you've got the target down at the bottom of the range, which is the glory of god, which is what we were made for.

And we're to imagine every human life like an arrow that begins and falls and falls so far short of what it was meant to hit all alike. Have fallen short of the glory of god. And I don't know about you, but as I was thinking about this this week, I think there are there are many points at which biblical Christianity rubs up against culture. There are many points at which biblical Christianity rubs up against culture. The belief in the miracle and in the supernatural.

Our world would say that's absurd that you can't believe in that, not in this rational, secular age in which we understand everything. We you can't believe in that. Some would say that sexuality and marriage, the Bible's teaching on sexuality at marriage. Is the is the is the place of greatest rub with the culture. I mean, again, I don't know if you saw the New Year's Eve coverage of the lights in London.

But it was just quite interesting again, wasn't it? First thing you see for a new year is the, the London eye all lit up in rainbow colors. And then the the the big statement comes. This is the big moral statement for the year. So we've had something, on the NHS, and we've had something on the coronation of the king.

Those 2 events. And then the the big the first moral teaching comes with that light show. It's been 10 years since same sex marriage was legalized. London is a place for everybody where you are free to be who you wanna be and to love who you want to There's your first moral command for 20 24 to the whole nation. You are free to be who you wanna be.

And to love who you wanna love. The Bible would say that that is not a freedom recognizable to god. That freedom is to live god's way, is to marry god's way, is to enjoy sexuality between a man and a woman in marriage and to enjoy it as it was create that freedom. That's real freedom. That's a point at which biblical Christianity rubs up against culture, isn't it?

Or what about this idea that there's only 1 way for people to be saved? I mean, have you heard of something more offensive than that? In a capital with 9000000 people of all kinds of different religions and race to say that for all of this great town. This great city there is only 1 name given. Only 1 way in which people can be saved.

Well, you can't be serious. Loads are different points, but surely this teaching here, this assessment of the human condition is the greatest point of friction with our culture. Isn't it? Do you think? I mean, let's go over it again.

Where do you hear words like this? Verse 10, there is no 1 righteous, not even 1. No 1 who seeks god. All have turned away together become worthless. There is no 1 who does good, not even 1.

Their throats are open graves, their tongues practice deceit, The poison of vipers is on their lips. Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood, ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know, there is no fear of god before their eyes. I mean, it's it's such a clash, isn't it? To a world that believes that apart from a few exceptions, most of us, most of the time, are actually pretty good people.

We do the right things by others, and we we're just inherently good. No. The Bible says There's an old prayer in the book of, the book of common prayer, which is an anglican prayer book, and, in the morning and the evening confession, it has these sentences about humans. And, you know, it's 1 of the reasons why it can be quite good to return to the same set of words over and over again, because in theory, although sadly, not often in practice, in theory, it can stop drift in these areas. As you rehearse what we're really like.

Well, he he's his 1. I mean, just have a listen to this. Almighty and most merciful father, We have erred and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep. We have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts. We have offended against thy holy laws.

We have left undone those things which we ought to have done, and we have done those things which we ought not to have done, and there is no health in us. But thou, oh lord, have mercy upon us miserable offenders. Misurable offenders. Miserable offenders. What a phrase that is?

No health in us. Misible offenders. And do you know, although it is a massive clash with our culture, if we think soberly about it, can we really argue that that is not true. I mean, you imagine an impartial alien arriving on our planet. And this impartial alien has access to newspaper cuttings and journals and the historical record and he's able to get together lots of information about human history.

And as he looks at it all, and he reads the newspaper cuttings, and he looks at what we've done in history, and he's got this massive information to try to find out what people are like, generally speaking, all over the world. And then somebody hands him Romans 3, 9 to 12 and he reads that and he thinks, yeah, that that fits. That fits. That that's that's a good description of what I've just discovered in their history and in their newspapers. It's true, isn't it?

We know god's ways and yet we don't do them. And you might be wondering, well, is all of this really true particularly if you're here and you wouldn't call yourself a Christian, you might think is this actually true? Is this re is it is it really this bad? Because some of the people I study with some of the folks I work with, some of the neighbors, I they don't they don't really fit this this is this actually true? And of course, it is worth saying that not every life looks the same, and not every person by god's grace.

Is as bad as they could be. There is a kind of restraining grace that keeps us from going to the max of what we could become That is true, and yet we would have to say that this is the fruit of every human tree. So if you look in an orchard of apple trees and you look at them all, some of them will look different. Some of them will have more apples than others, Some will be a bit smaller, some will be a bit larger, some will have fewer, some will have more, and yet they all have that same DNA, don't they? They all have the apple tree DNA and produce the same thing or same with the human tree.

This is our spiritual DNA, and these are the charges against us. And so I told you it was gonna be pretty bleak. But what is the purpose of all of this? Well, you remember where we began because Paul seemed to think at the start of this letter that despite all of these charges, there was some breathtakingly good news that it was worth sharing. And that news is the lord Jesus Christ, and it's what he's done for people like us.

And so you must understand that the purpose of going through these charges is that we might run to Christ and say lord. That's who I am. Take it all away and make me right. You're the only 1 who can. That's the purpose of setting it out in this way.

Nobody needs a savior if there's nothing to be saved from. In order to appreciate the worth of what Christ has done, we've gotta understand what the evidence was against us. And that's why he builds it up in this way. And so look with me. Lastly, chapter 3 verse 23 to 24 as he comes to this good news.

For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of god, and all are justified freely by his grace. Through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. You see, although 3 verse 9 says there is no 1 righteous, not even 1, There actually was just 1 exception to that. There was once upon a time, a man who came who was righteous in every possible way, who never for a moment held the knowledge of god like a beach ball under the water. Who always praised his father, who always loved his father, who always gave thanks to his father.

There is 1 who never sinned himself, neither did he act as a cheerleader for sin, but rather he loved purity and he loved holiness. And he hated sin, and he called sinners out of sin. There was just 1 who was perfectly righteous all of the time. And yet this very same 1 was treated so awfully by the people he came to save that he was nailed to a cross And yet in that act of human wickedness, god was doing something incredible for sinners like us, that the lord Jesus Christ went to a cross and he died for all, you know, all of those charges we've just looked at, all of them, all of those charges. He took each and every 1 of those.

Upon himself for you and for me so that all people everywhere without distinction, all people everywhere who call on his name, who trust in him can have those charges rubbed out and wiped away. And can be made right with god forever. All, Jew, Jentech, no matter what we've done, no matter where we're from, if we will call on the name of the lord and say, help, Jesus. Help, help, and need you to make me right with God help. Then we will be saved and made right with god.

That's what happened at the cross. We're told here that those who believe are justified by his grace, and that justification before god is a 1 time act. It's not a process. Justice is not a process. You don't start by trusting Jesus and then you're a little bit justified, and then you get a little bit more justified, and then you get a little bit more justified.

It is a 1 time act of god. It's a declaration. Holiness is something that we can grow in, but justification is a once for all declaration. As soon as a person says, Christ take my sin, Christ, I wanna follow you. They are right with god, then and forever.

Justified. That's what happens to those who trust in god. And you notice that this is an act of god, not an act of us. God is the 1 who does the justifying. We can't fix ourselves.

There's no way that we could get out of this dark valley. We need god to do the work for us. And the good news of this is that all who look to Christ can have all of those charges taken away so that the judge looks at them and says perfect innocent, righteous, loved, not guilty in my son, not guilty in my son. Let him go. Let him free.

Let her go. Let her free. Because Jesus has paid it all. It's wonderful, isn't it? And so it might be that you're not a Christian here tonight and you're You're wondering what to make of this.

You might be thinking, well, I just that just sounds like other people. It doesn't sound like me. Sounds like other people. It's not me. That's not a description of me I recognize.

Well, I'd encourage you just to go back over chapters 1 and 2. Ask the lord, say, God, if you're there, help help me to see. I wanna understand this. Give me if this is true, help me to see this is true. Or it might be that you're here and you just feel despair about the whole thing.

And you think, well, goodness, that, you know, if that's what I'm just like, I can't believe what am I gonna do? But you know, the thing about despair is a moment of despair can be a very precious thing. If you do the right thing with If you take it to god, if you take your despair to god and say forgive, justify. And it can be a good thing. It's 1 of the reasons we put on these hope explored courses.

You know, it's for non Christians to come and hear the good news. It's for Christians to revisit their foundations, but we'd love to have you. If you wanna know more about this gospel, then come along on Thursday. You'd be really, really welcome because this is the best news in all the world that though we are sinners, we can be saved by the work of Jesus Christ. And so for all of us, whether we've been Christians for a long time or not, this is the answer to our problem, isn't it?

Every time we sin, we rehearse this drama. We go over these things again. And the savior that we needed at the beginning is the savior that we need today. Christ to make us right with god Christ to be our savior. So let's bow our heads now and, pray and give thanks for him.

Just give you a moment or 2 to to think about what we've learned there and it might be you wanna just say thank you to god all over again for saving you from your sin. And it might be for the first time you wanna say help lord help I need you to make me right.