Bible Studies Romans

ROMANS

The Epistle of Paul the Apostle

to the ROMANS

Introduction

These studies in Romans have been compiled and written by Rev. Daniel Hill, PhD, pastor of Southwood Bible Church of Tulsa, Oklahoma. He has graciously provided his notes so that they can be made available by E-mail and on the World Wide Web.

After graduating from high school in Scottsdale, Arizona, Dan Hill served in the United States Navy. Upon receiving his honorable discharge in 1965 he attended Arizona State University where he received a degree in Speech and History. Dan and his wife Patricia were married in 1970. Pat is also a graduate of Arizona State University and is the Executive Administrator for Village Missions International, which has its headquarters in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Following three years of teaching in the public schools, Dr. Hill enrolled at Dallas Theological Seminary where he received his Masters degree in Theology in 1976. During that time he also was working on research that earned him a Doctorate from the California Graduate School of Theology in 1977.

Dr. Hill pastored Grace Bible Church in Prescott, Arizona for three years, then returned to Phoenix where he was the Bible editor for Alpha Omega Publications and assistant pastor of West Side Bible Church. In 1987, the Hills moved to Hope, Arkansas where Dr. Hill served as pastor of Hope Community Church. In 1990, Dr. Hill accepted his present pastorate at Southwood Bible Church in Tulsa.

STUDYING THE VERSES

This not an interactive course. You can take all the time you need to complete your study. If you file them carefully, they will be readily available when you can get to them. You may get busy and have to slow down your study pace or lay a lesson aside for a few days or longer. That is not a problem because there are no deadlines or examinations.

Begin each study session with prayer. The Holy Spirit is your teacher, because these things are "spiritually discerned." In prayer you can re-establish fellowship with the Lord, if necessary, and renew your commitment to God and submission to His sovereignty.

Read the passage to be studied in the Bible several times. Try to understand the ideas even before you have read any comments.

Follow the discussion of each word. If there are other Bible passages mentioned, turn to them and read them, not only the verses but also the context. Try to see the connection between the parallel passages and the portion of ROMANS you are studying. Try to see what ideas are being amplified or illustrated.

The Lord bless you in your study of ROMANS.

The Epistle to the Romans

So often pastors, expositors, Bible teachers are asked what book of the Bible they would chose to have if they could only have one book for the remainder of their lives. The consensus is consistent in the answer...the book of Romans.

Of the thirteen epistles written by Paul, Romans includes the second longest introduction.

This introduction extends from v 1 through to v 17. It is only exceeded by the first two chapters of Galatians that comprise Paul's introduction of that letter. Galatians however needed a longer introduction because it was Paul's first epistle and it dealt with a problem in the Galatian churches, the problem of legalism.

Here, the epistle to the Romans does not deal with a specific problem. But Paul had never been to Rome at the time of its writing. So he includes a longer introduction to explain who he is, not so much by credentials (as in Galatians), but by person, who he is and why he is writing.

If we were to take a broad overview of Romans we would see two major themes separated by a parenthesis regarding Israel.

Romans 1-8, Our relationship to God

Romans 9-11, Paul's desire for Israel to be saved

Romans 12-16, Our relationship one to another

If we look at this epistle chronologically, as it fits into sequence with the other letters of Paul we can see a pattern:

Galatians: 48 AD, a strong stand for grace. Legalism having no part in the Christian way of life.

I and II Thessalonians: 52 AD, the individual relationship of believers to one another and the believer's anticipation of the return of Christ

I and II Corinthians: 56 AD, the cooperative responsibilities of believers in the local church. These are the epistles on ecclesiology, the function of the local church.

And then Romans: 57 AD, written from Corinth to a church Paul had never visited. The letter is somewhat impersonal but objective. It deals with the doctrine by which we function as Christians, such as:

·        Justification by faith

·        Living by grace and power of the Spirit

·        Serving the Lord with one another

In Ecclesiastes we note that Solomon's major theme was that we, as believers, enjoy life as we obey God's Word.

And these are not antithetical concepts. The reason we can enjoy life is because Christ has set us free from the Law and the oppressive laws of man. And that truth, which is explained in practical terms in Galatians, is now explained in theological terms in Romans.

Romans is without a doubt the crown jewel of the epistles.

It has changed the course of Christian history more than once. During the reformation it was the one letter that Martin Luther used to defend his position that we are saved by faith alone, that we live by faith alone, and we live according to the Scriptures alone.

Of this letter Luther said: "It is the true masterpiece of the NT, and the very purest Gospel, which is well worthy and deserving that a Christian man should not only learn it by heart, word for word, but also that he should daily deal with it as daily bread for man's soul. It can never be too well read or studied. The more it is handled the more precious it becomes and the better it tastes."

The French expositor Godet observed: "The reformation was undoubtedly the work of the epistle to the Romans as well as that of Galatians. Spiritual revival in the church will be connected to a deeper understand of this book."

Harry Ironsides said of Romans: "It is the most scientific statement of the divine plan for the redemption of mankind. It is the orderly setting forth of the Gospel that the mind of man craves, the declaration of man's need along with the gracious plan of God's salvation which culminates in His glorification."

It has been said that Romans is not an epistle about the Gospel it is the Gospel and to be ignorant of Romans is to be ignorant of Christianity.

Romans Chapter One

ROMANS 1:1

"Paul, a bond-servant of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God."

The style in which ancient letters were written differs from ours. The old world letter began with a three part salutation which included the writer's name, the person addressed, and a word of greeting.

Anything else added in this portion of a letter was seen as being very important.

Consider that in v 1 Paul states his name, then it is not until v 7 that he mentions the ones addressed and not until then to we find the cordial word of greeting.

So everything after the word PAUL in v 1 and prior to the phrase the beloved of Rome, in v 7 is an unusual addition to the salutation.

BUT IT IS A VERY IMPORTANT ADDITION because it tells us of the real writer behind the letter, the Lord Jesus Christ.

So even as he identifies himself, Paul does so in Christ. He begins with his name, Paul.

His Hebrew name was Saul, meaning "asked for". But he used his Roman name Paul, which means "little".

Use of this name shows an orientation to grace, he did not try to make anything out of himself that he was not. Paul was little, the Lord was great.

"A bond-servant of Christ Jesus"

Three statements of who Paul is. (Remember, while some knew him many others did not):

A bond-servant of Christ Jesus: As Paul begins this letter to those he did not know he takes the low road, not trying to impress them with who and what he is but with what the Lord Jesus has done in his life.

Paul has freely given himself as a bond-slave to Christ. Even when he was stopped on the Damascus road he responded to Christ by calling Him Lord.

The word bond-servant is DOULOS, which means "slave". The gentile mind of the Romans would see this as a bond-slave, one who serves under debt, so the translation is accurate.

The greatest bond-servant in history was the Lord Jesus Christ. He is described prophetically in the OT as God's servant.

In Philipians 2:7 we are told that Jesus Christ emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.

More than 50 times in the NT the believer is referred to as a SERVANT.

But we are also referred to as Saints, Children of God, the Beloved of God, Christian (taking the very name of Christ), Priests, Ambassadors, Friends of Christ, and many other titles much more noble that that of Servant.

But the first way Paul identifies himself is as a Servant.

BECAUSE THERE IS GREAT NOBILITY in being the servant of the King of kings and Lord of lords:

A Servant can be described in five ways:

1) The master has a legitimate expectation of obedience from his slave.

2) The slave has a legitimate expectation of provision from his master.

3) The slave's primary duty is to serve his master.

Ephesians 6:7, "With good will render service, as to the Lord, and not to men."

4) The secondary duty is to serve the ones his master directs him to serve:

Galatians 5:13, "For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another."

5) Therefore, as slaves of Christ we are to please Him, while we serve one another.

"called as an apostle"

Paul then identifies himself as one who is called an apostle.

This office established by the Lord Jesus Christ at his ascension was the highest ranking office of the church age.

It was given to the eleven disciples and to a few others. The apostles to the church such as Paul and John had authority over a number of churches. The last apostle was John who died in about 95 AD.

NOTE: Paul does not say he is an apostle but that he is called an Apostle.

Here again he is directing attention away from himself and to the Lord.

The word CALLED can be used for an official or royal invitation and for the discharging of the duties of an office.

Both aspects are in view here. Paul was called or invited by Christ to this office and as a servant he would then discharge the duties of this office.

This word CALLED which is KLEITOS is an adjective which is descriptive of the one who is called. It is found 10 times in the NT, three times in the salutation of this epistle.

We are all as believers called by Jesus Christ (v 6) and we all are called to a position, that of Saints (v 7).

This word CALLED and the corresponding verb has three directions:

1) Looks back to our calling at salvation

2) Looks ahead to our calling into eternity

3) Looks now at our calling to service:

PRINCIPLE: Our calling or purpose in life is directed by God, we are in his hands. What he calls us to be and what he calls us to do is far more important than what man calls us to be and do or even what we call ourselves to be and to do.

AND HERE IS THE POINT: Our identity must be determined by Him, not by others or by self.

Paul's identity was that of a Servant, and as an Apostle.

And Apostleship was defined by credentials and obligation:

1) His credentials were validated and authenticated by the miracles he performed:

II Corinthians 12:12 The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance, by signs and wonders and miracles.

2) His obligation was to evangelize and to edify believers by laying a foundation of Bible doctrine for the church.

Ephesians 2:19, "So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God's household, having been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone."

And it is that obligation that he now mentions at the end of verse 1.

"set apart for the gospel of God."

The third thing Paul says about himself is found in this phrase.

First, the word "gospel", which is found more than 100 times in the NT, refers to Good News. And that good news is the truth that God has for believers and unbelievers. It is not limited to salvation information, but to the full counsel of God's good news to man.

The word SET APART is AFORIZO, "to mark off boundaries".

It is a perfect tense in Greek, indicating that this had been done in the past and the results continue in the present.

Paul was a marked man, marked by the Lord for the Gospel.

Our English word HORIZON comes from this Greek word; the horizon is that which marks off the boundary between earth and sky.

So Paul was marked off by God for a ministry and that was to evangelize and to build up the church.

Paul was marked off by the Holy Spirit in Antioch for ministry.

Acts 13:2, "And while they were ministering to the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them."

NOTE: He was ministering already. He had left Tarsus and was involved in the service to the church in Antioch and then was called by God.

NOW SOME APPLICATION:

1.      Paul knew who he was, do we know who we are?

2.      Paul did not try to promote himself or use his human assets to influence others.

3.      Paul's personal sense of identity was wrapped up in the Lord Jesus Christ.

4.      He could see himself as a bond-servant, under the obligation of obedience. He could also see himself as an apostle, of the highest rank in God's service. He could claim that he was set apart for specific service, yet without boasting.

5.      This accurate understanding of self is only possible when we see ourselves from divine viewpoint.

6.      Paul knew his position in Christ, his place in the Lord's service, his purpose in the Lord's calling...do we?

7.      Whether it is our self image, our personal identity, knowing ourselves, or finding ourselves, none of this is of value unless it is from divine perspective.

Galatians 6:3, "For if anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself."

I knew a man once who had spent considerable time as an unbeliever "finding himself", and to a certain extent he did. He came to accept his place and purpose in the world, to be comfortable with his values and ethics. Then he accepted Christ as Savior. He told me it was like starting all over again. Concentrating not on what he thought but what the Lord thought...and that is a real key to the Christian life!

1.      Spiritual identity results in humility.

2.      Spiritual identity results in unconditional love.

3.      Spiritual identify results in service.

4.      Spiritual identify eliminates legalism and arrogance.

5.      Spiritual identity allows for acceptance, graciousness, and forgiveness towards others.

6.      Spiritual identify allows the believer to relax in life.

7.      Spiritual identity allows the believer to enjoy life.

PRINCIPLE: Apart from spiritual identity, defining who you are by what God thinks, the believer will be uptight, miserable, without service to others, and will burn out in the flesh trying to live a life he can never live.

Romans 1:2,3a

"Which He promised beforehand through His prophets in the holy Scriptures", concerning His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord...

Paul uses three prepositions in this verse to make three points about the Gospel. He uses "through", "in", and "concerning" to tell us the how of the Gospel, the where of the Gospel, and the who of the Gospel.

1.      How the Gospel came to us - God promised it previously in the Old Testament through His prophets. God predicted it and we now see a continuity and unity of the Old Testament and the New. Promises were made through men who also, as Paul, were called by God. The Gospel did not just suddenly burst upon the scene of history with the advent of Christ. It was the theme of words of the prophets and the works of Christ.

2.      How was the Gospel given to man? In the holy Scriptures.

The word SCRIPTURES is the word GRAFW, a word that was never used for oral communication, only that which was written down and could be read and studied.

This statement prepares his readers for the extensive reference Paul will make to the OT in this epistle.

We see a channel of inspiration: From the ultimate source of God, through His prophets, preserved for mankind in the holy Scriptures.

This verse confronts any who would say that the Bible is inaccurate. It is accurate because God revealed the Gospel, His Good news, through the prophets who were under obligation to accurately record what God revealed.

3.    The Who of the Gospel is mentioned in verse 3: "Concerning His Son..."

The preposition is PERI, which means fully around, as in perimeter.

Hence, the Lord Jesus is not just a part of the Gospel, He is the Gospel. He fully engulfs the Good News of God.

The Gospel in the Old Testament was promised, promises that were revealed in part. When the part that was revealed was believed by faith, man was saved.

But now all these promises, found in direct statements regarding the Messiah, in the sacrificial system of the Law, in typology, in analogy, are fulfilled in a person...God's own Son, Jesus Christ.

THE FIRST ISSUE OF FAITH: Do you believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God, as promised in the holy Scriptures, and that He died for your sins, according to the Scriptures?

If you do, you are saved. That is it, faith alone in Christ alone.

v 3b  Who was born of a descendant of David according to the flesh.

READ verse 4.

"Who was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead, according to the Spirit of holiness, Jesus Christ our Lord."

Verses 3 and 4 develop three parallels between the humanity of Christ and His Deity.

In verse 3, the humanity of Christ emphasized. He was born as a descendant of David according to the flesh.

The word “born” is GINOMIA which means "to become". It is used of a transition from one state or form to another.

Hence, the eternal God the Son "became flesh" rather than was born flesh.

This points to a historical change or transition that occurred at the virgin birth when the divine person took on a human nature.

The words PERSON and NATURE are important in that statement because the God the Son did not take on a human person but became a unique person, fully God, and at the same time, fully man.

John 1:14, "And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth."

This unique person, Jesus Christ, was a descendant of David as we see in Matthew, chapter 1. This looks at Jesus' royalty. He was a King, the King of kings.

In Revelation 22:16 we see that the New Testament closes with this same thought, "I, Jesus, have sent My angel to testify to you these things for the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright morning star."

So at the beginning of Matthew, the beginning of Romans, and at the end of Revelation, across the entire New Testament, we are reminded that Jesus is the King.

God would never have us forget that Jesus is the King of all kings. His royalty is from David and from His work on the Cross in addition to His divine royalty.

Every servant needs a master and our Master is a King.

The mention of FLESH in no way includes SIN:

Three things are seen in this reference to FLESH:

1.      Limitations: Being flesh he was limited. This included His deliberate setting aside of His divine attributes. He was surprised, there were things he did not know, there were things that caused him to grieve and to be troubled.

2.      Weaknesses: Physically the flesh caused Jesus to hunger, to be tired, to be worn out, to be thirsty, to have blisters and callous and sore feet.

3.      Temptations: In the flesh He had human volition and was tempted to sin.

Hebrews 4:15, "For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as {we are, yet} without sin."

But in the Flesh he also had three others things:

1.      The Word of God resident in His soul: As a boy he learned the word and increased in wisdom and knowledge.

2.      The filling and leading of the Holy Spirit; He depended upon the Holy Spirit for power and direction.

3.      And in the flesh He had human volition which was set to obedience to the Father:

John 8:28, "Jesus therefore said...I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me."

SO Jesus, JUST LIKE US, had limitations and weaknesses; but also, just like Him, we have the power of the Word and the power of the Spirit and we can decide who we will obey.

Romans 1:4

"And declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead;

The emphasis here is on Christ's deity. While the word "born" (or became) in verse 3 shows us how the eternal son of God entered into His humiliation, the word "declare" in verse 4 shows us how He entered into His exaltation.

The word "declared" is ORIZW, from the same root used for "set apart" in verse 1. It means "to mark off". Jesus Christ rose from the dead, never to die again. This marked off His humiliation from His exhaltation.

This marking off did not make him the Son of God but "declared" Him to be what He eternally was already, the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity.

The term "with power" describes the SON OF GOD, not the declaration or marking off. This further looks at the uniqueness of His resurrection, it gave Him power as the God-man forever in heaven and on earth. He continues in His uniqueness even now; and that quality of unique existence is with power.

POWER is the word DUNAMIS which is a noun indicating it was received by the Lord from the Father. In the New Testament, DUNAMIS always refers to a supernatural power.

In Philippians 3:10, this power is also made available to the believer in Christ

"That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death."

It is simple to say we serve a risen Savior. But the significance of that is as complex as it is powerful. The Cross demonstrated the Love of God for us, and the resurrection demonstrates that the power of God that is also for us.

The power of the resurrection of Jesus Christ is revealed in what happened after Christ was seated at the right hand of God - the Holy Spirit came to indwell every believer.

"according to the Spirit of holiness"

This is a Semitic title for the Holy Spirit who was at work in the humanity of Christ incarnate and in the resurrection.

Christ's full title is: Jesus Christ our Lord.

Paul uses this full title ten times in Romans:

1.      Jesus: Recognition of his humanity and historical beginning (v 3)

2.      Christ: Recognition of his deity and His mission as the Messiah.

3.      Our Lord: Recognition of his sovereign Lordship over us.

In verse 3 Paul dealt with His humanity. In verse 4 he dealt with His deity. And in verse 5 Paul examines His Lordship over us.

Romans 1:5

"Through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles, for His name's sake."

The words "through Him" describe man's only link with God and introduce the ministry of Christ as our mediator with God.

The pronoun "we" refers to Paul and the other apostles. So Paul, in describing the sovereign lordship of Christ uses himself as a personal example. He establishes this principle from the Scriptures (verse 2) and from what he knows to be true in his Christian experience. As he develops this epistle he will expand this concept to all believers.

The verb "received" is a Greek verb in the aorist tense, indicating that God has given grace in a point in time.

Application:

1.      Now what God gives cannot be taken away, for he is immutable, never changing.

2.      GRACE is given to man based upon what Jesus Christ has done. Ephesians 4.

3.      We cannot earn it nor do we deserve it, we can only employ it, tap into it so to speak.

4.      Too often we get into a rut of thinking that we have to earn more grace, even if the earning is by some supposed non-meritorious means. But that is not the character of Grace - grace is given in full, it is ours, we need only put it to use.

5.      God chose to deal with mankind in grace, that never changes. The problem of living by grace is our problem, not God's.

6.      In James 4:6, which is the only passage that seems to indicate a sliding scale of grace, He gives more grace. The contrast is to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and we have even more grace than that. "God resists the arrogant but gives grace to the humble." The verb "gives" is present tense, not to show increase but the consistency of God's plan

7.      Therefore, grace is yours, use it.

As Paul illustrates this he mentions both grace, God's policy towards man, and Apostleship, God's gift and appointment to Paul and the other apostles.

ANYONE OF US COULD make the same statement by replacing the word apostleship with the spiritual gifts God has given us and the positions of service to which we have been appointed.

So while the illustration is personal, the application is universal to all believers.

Now, what is it that allows us to tap into GRACE?

Paul mentions it next in verse 5, not by way of a mechanical process; that will come later, but by way of illustration.

"To bring about the obedience of faith among the Gentiles for His (Jesus Christ our Lord's) name's sake."

These two words "obedience" and "faith" are in apposition to each other. Paul is looking at obedience as that which BELIEVES something, not that which DOES something.

The major theme of Ecclesiastes is, enjoy what God has given you today.

HOW? By obedience to the Word of God: Eccl 12:13, "Fear God and keep His commandments, because this applies to every person."

SOUNDS GOOD BUT HOW? By faith, not by doing something but by believing something.

Principles:

1.      Faith is a volitional decision to trust God

2.      That decision is made in relationship to other things and systems we could trust in: self, others, government, a human leader, a spouse, a job, an education, health, wealth.

3.      We make a decision that we will trust God instead of trusting in other things.

4.      We make that decision once, then it is tested over and over again.

5.      Daily we have opportunity to trust God instead of other things, and when we continue in that resolve of faith-trust, we can enjoy life that day.

6.      At times we will put our trust in a specific promise we know from the Word. At other times our trust is placed in a person we know, God.

7.      That is how to be obedient, when we start trying to be obedient by what we do we end up trying to earn grace, which is impossible.

Paul then mentions the Gentiles because the large majority of his readers are Gentiles rather than Jews:

Acts 18:6 Paul states "From now on I shall go to the Gentiles."

In this we see that Paul understood his ministry and destiny in life and was pursuing what God wanted him to do. See Romans 1:14,15.

The motivation for this ministry is described in the phrase: "For His name sake."

Principle: Our highest motive is the person of Christ and His Grace.

The word NAME means much more than just what a person is called, it means their reputation, their character, their accomplishments, the sum total of who and what they are.

We can see this is the little phrase often said by believers but not really understood - for Christ’s Sake.

Matthew 16:25, "For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it."

Matthew 19:29, "And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life."

Here is a contrast to proper motive:

John 12:9, "Much people of the Jews therefore knew that he was there: and they came not for Jesus' sake only, but that they might see Lazarus also, whom he had raised from the dead."

Here was fascination over the miracles of Christ

II Corinthians 12:10, "Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong."

Principle: When we do what we do motivated by the person of Christ we are motivated by grace and that is the more excellent way for you as a believer.

Romans 1:6

"Among whom are ye also the called of Jesus Christ."

Now Paul is ready to shift his attention to the recipients of this letter.

In using himself as an illustration he does not want to make himself and the other apostles exclusive; these Gentile believers in Rome have also been called of Jesus Christ.

These believers belong to the Lord Jesus Christ who has called them unto salvation.

As we saw at verse 1, this word looks at both an invitation and the discharging of a duty. The duty is the decisions of faith-trust we put in God and His Word.

These believers in Rome belong to Jesus Christ just as much as Paul or any of the apostles do and we do too.

Romans 1:7

"To all who are beloved of God in Rome, called as saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."

Now Paul gets back to the salutation.

It is the beloved IN Rome, not the beloved OF Rome. And since the conclusion of the epistle seems to indicate that there were three local churches in Rome, this title looks both at our citizenship in heaven and our sojourn here on earth. WE are a heavenly people, we happen to live for a time on earth.

Paul does not, as he often did, use the term CHURCH. That term does not appear until Romans 16. The broader terms BELOVED and SAINTS indicate that there were a number of churches in Rome and internal evidence shows that these are made up of both Jews and Gentiles.

Regarding these churches, we do not know how the Gospel of Salvation originally came to this capital city of the ancient world. No Apostle had yet visited Rome.

Acts 2:10 does indicate that on the Day of Pentecost there were visitors in Jerusalem from Rome. Perhaps they carried the message of Christ home with them.

Paul wrote this letter towards the end of his third missionary journey from Corinth. This time and place of writing allows us to date the letter in either the late winter or early spring of either AD 57 or 58.

While Paul was writing this impressive epistle, he was also faced with a personal decision - where to go next. By all indications in the book of Acts he should have gone onto Rome, but he instead went to Jerusalem. It was in Jerusalem that God arranged circumstances that eventually got Paul to Rome but as a prisoner, under arrest, awaiting trial.

So while he is used of the Spirit to communicate great doctrines of grace, in his personal life and in his personal decisions he makes choices that follow his plan rather than God's plan.

Principle: God is the one who is faithful and God honors His word even when it is found in weak vessels of clay.

TWO TITLES GIVEN TO THESE BELIEVERS

1. BELOVED: This title is found eight times in the synoptic Gospels and there applied only to the Lord Jesus Christ. It shows the relationship of divine love between the Father and the Son. Not until after Pentecost and the start of the Church is this title applied to believers in Christ.

"Beloved" is a term that describes the relationship of God's love for us and our love for one another. Paul was fond of the term especially for those he had lead to the Lord. It speaks of and reminds us of our relationship to God, He loves us, and to one another, we are to love one another in Spiritual love. So this title is relational.

2. SAINTS: Here we have a title that is positional. At the moment of salvation we are set apart unto God.

It was a very high and lofty term in the Greek cultic religions. It looks at separation, purity, cleanliness, consecration.

The term is so sacred that it can only be applied to the believer as his life is found in Christ.

Displaying the qualities of being a saint would be impossible for anyone outside of Christ. But we share this position in Christ.

In the New Testament, all believers are called Saints with no regard to behavior. All are saints in Christ.

No individual in the New Testament is ever called a Saint; it is used only collectively for our position in Christ.

SUMMARY: The terms "beloved" and "saint" remind us of our relationship to God and one another and the basis for that relationship, that we are in Christ.

The Formal Greeting:

"Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."

The greeting of GRACE was common to the Gentiles. The greeting of PEACE was common to the Jews. Paul brings them both together.

Paul includes these two words, sometimes adding the word MERCY, in each of his thirteen epistles.

The order is important, it is always GRACE then PEACE.

Peace is that which flows from Grace...

1.      Grace is the unmerited favor of God to man. But it is more than that. It is the bestowal of favor where there should be wrath. It is grace given to those who are not only undeserving but deserving of the opposite, judgment.

2.      Grace then is not aided by merit or hindered by demerit.

3.      Peace is a condition not a feeling.

Romans 5:1 "Therefore having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ."

4.      The condition is constant, the feeling of peace may come and go.

5.      We have a sense of the condition of peace even when the feeling is absent.

This peace is not from man but from a divine source - from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

omans 1:8-17: PAUL'S PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP TO THE GENTILES

In verses 1-7 Paul established his official relationship to the church as an apostle of Jesus Christ. Now he establishes his personal relationship to these believers in Rome.

These verses might be seen as six windows into Paul's heart. How he felt about them and his ministry.

Each window is introduced by a verb phrase:

v 8 I thank

v 9 I serve

v 11 I long

v 13 I have planned

v 14 I am under obligation

v 15 I am eager

Romans 1:8

"First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, because your faith is being proclaimed throughout the whole world.

The word "first" is not followed here by the word "second". Here the word "first" implies importance rather than the beginning of some numeration or list.

Paul sees his attitude of thanksgiving because of these believers as being of first importance.

In ten of Paul's thirteen letters, he states that his relationship to others is one that causes him to be thankful.

"I thank my God through Jesus Christ"

Other than the Lord Jesus when He was on the Cross, Paul is the only New character that speaks of God as "my God".

This shows us the intensely personal relationship Paul had with God. God was not at a distance for Paul; He was close, He was his Father and his Friend.

Not only does the believer have a right to offer prayers to God because of Jesus Christ, but also he has a right to claim God as "MY GOD" because of Jesus Christ. There is nothing that we have and nothing that we can do in our relationship with God that is not through Jesus Christ.

All of our approach to God is based upon our acceptance in the person and work of Christ.

This phrase also demonstrates the divine order for prayer. All prayers are to be offered to the Father, in the name of the Son, and in the power of the filling of the Holy Spirit.

THE REASON FOR HIS THANKFULNESS

"Because your faith is being proclaimed throughout the whole world."

There are many things we can be thankful for when it comes to other believers. And many of these may cause us to pray for them. Paul picks out their FAITH above their salvation, their growth, their gifts, or their unity.

The reason is, is that FAITH is the distinctive by which we live. We are to live by faith (see v 17), we walk by faith, we relate to others by faith.

Faith is a decision a person makes, and many believers make consistent decisions of faith.

When we encounter believers who live by faith, who make decisions in life based upon the Bible teaching they have,anbd seeing that doctrine cause them to depend upon God in faith, we should be thankful. Paul knew enough about these believers to know that they were men and women and even children who lived by faith.

"Being proclaimed throughout the whole world."

This FAITH was well known to others.

"Proclaimed" is a very strong verb meaning "to be advertised". This was not some passive mention, but a strong proclamation of how the believers of Rome lives, by faith.

By this time persecution was beginning, Christians were being harassed, and it would get worse. This present reality, however, did not deter these believers, they kept on living by Faith.

Faith must always be in something, and for these believers, faith was in the Lord Jesus Christ and what they were coming to know about him in the Word of God.

Their faith was proclaimed in the world. The emphasis is not on the strength of their faith nor on the genuineness of their faith but on the publication of their faith, that others heard about it.

Romans 1:9a

"For God, whom I serve in my spirit in the preaching of the gospel of His Son, is my witness as to how unceasingly I make mention of you."

This is the second window into Paul's soul.

The verb "serve" is LATREUW which means "to serve as a priest". It is translated that way in the Septuagint (LSS) and is translated "worship" in Philippians 3:3.

Service is worship. When we serve the Lord as Servant Kings, every act of service is also an act of worship.

This understanding effectively removes the false idea of sp,e things being Secular and other things being Sacred. All is sacred to the believer who is in service to the King.

Paul's service is in the Gospel and we already noted that this word is not limited to the Good News of salvation alone but includes the full counsel of God's good news to the believer.

Paul is a servant tothe Word of God and to what Bible doctrine can do; it can bring the believer into a continually increasing personal relationship with God.

The word "preaching" is in italics indicating that it is not part of the original text, but by including it the translators show us how we serve in the Gospel.

We communicate it, we pass it on, we preach it, we teach it. It should be on our lips we rise up and throughout our day, to the time we bed our head. It is our priority in life and when something is our priority in life we begin to build our lives around it.

Paul says he serves God in his spirit.

The word "spirit" is sometimes used for the soul, but not always. Here it is used for the human spirit that is given to man at the moment of salvation.

Man is born with body and soul and born again with body, soul, and spirit.

The body is the environment of the senses. The soul is the environment of ideas and thought. The human spirit is the environment of divine relationship.

Hence, to serve God in spirit is to do so not merely formally through some physical activity nor according to one's own ideas and thoughts, but according to God's purpose and plan and based upon what God provided.

Three things are involved in Paul's service in communicating the Gospel:

1.      The Delineation of the Gospel: Romans

2.      The proclamation of the Gospel: Acts

3.      The protection and defense of the Gospel: Galatians

Then Paul calls upon God to be a witness to what he is saying:

"For God...is my witness ..."

Paul only does this a few times in his writings. Here, in II Corinthians 11:11 and in Philippians 1:8. The common thread in these passages is that Paul is trying to convey his intensely personal affection for those to whom he is writing.

Does this then imply that normally Paul may have appeared on the surface to be unloving, uncaring - perhaps so.

Luke 10:40, Martha accused the Lord of not caring about her because he engaged her sister in conversation while Martha was slaving away in the kitchen.

So Paul calls upon God to validate his statement.

Romans 1:9b, 10

"As to how unceasingly I make mention of you, always in my prayers making request, if perhaps now at last by the will of God I may succeed in coming to you."

Paul's prayers of thankfulness were followed by a prayer of petition or request, that he may come to Rome...

In Acts 19:21, prior to Paul going to Corinth where he is writing this epistle, he said: "I must also see Rome".

The only problem was that he ended up putting his own agenda into the plan and he would decide to go to Jerusalem first. But we know that God got him to Rome.

Principle: God will answer our prayers, be careful what you pray for.

Romans 1:11

"For I long to see you in order that I may impart some spiritual gift to you, that you may be established;"

The third window into Paul's soul sees his desire...Paul, at this time, wants to see them.

On a number of occasions he had set out for Rome only to be hindered and frustrated in his journey. But he continued to pray for the opportunity to go to Rome.

This was his desire but up to this time it had not been God's will for him to go.

His purpose is to impart to them some spiritual gift The pronoun is indefinite, notice the translation "some".

So this does not look at our spiritual gifts that will be discussed later in Romans 12. Paul uses this word in a general sense. This gift was the Word of God that was effective both for the salvation of the lost and the building up of believers.

The word "impart" is an aorist tense verb looking ahead to a point in time of communicating truth.

The Greek word METADIDWMI, means "to give", as in the sense of giving an offering. So it is the giving of that which one has to another. Paul has doctrine and wants to give that to the believers of Rome.

THE PURPOSE: "that you may be established."

"Established" is STEIRIZW and it is an aorist passive infinitive, and the grammar teaches us a great deal about this process.

The "establishing" occurs at points in time: the time of gospel hearing, the time of accepting by a faith decision, and the time applying the God's communicated Word..

The passive voice shows that we are established or set firmly in place by the Word, not by ourselves. The Word of God acts on us; we receive this stability.

The infinitive looks at a result; stability is a result of the hearing, understanding, and believing in or trusting in and the applying of the Word. It is initiated in us by the Word not by ourselves.

The word "stability" is often used for steadfastness of mind, the mental resolve and steadfastness that comes from the mind being influenced by BD.

SO PAUL PLACES THE EMPHASIS on what he wants to share with them, not on what he can do. He will bring the gift of Bible teaching; then it is the doctrine, not Paul, that will establish them.

End Romans 1:12

"that is, that I may be encouraged together with you while among you, each of us by the other's faith, both yours and mine."

The communicator, Paul, is encouraged when others become established.

An interesting principle is involved here. Giving that which God has given to you does not impoverish you but enriches you.

Normally when we give we think in terms of loss. But here Paul see that when he has the opportunity to teach positive believers he is blessed.

This is emphasized by the word "encouraged". In the Greek, it is preceded by the prefix SUM which means that this will be a joint encouragement.

This is the only use of this word in the Greek New Testament. Zodhiates defines it as receiving (passive voice) solace, comfort, encouragement in the society of other believers.

This kind of godly encouragement is something that can only be done in the community of the Local Church.

The motivation for this joint encouragement is found each other's faith. Paul was impressed and encouraged when he saw others who lived by faith.

None of us faces the same challenges and difficulties in life, but we do face similar situations. It is an encouragement to us when we come to see how others live by faith, firmly established in the Word, facing similar situations.

In other words, our faith rubs off onto other believers.

Romans 1:13

"And I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that often I have planned to come to you, and have been prevented thus far, in order that I might obtain some fruit among you also, even as among the rest of the Gentiles."

The Fourth Window into Paul's soul:

"I have planned..."

Here Paul is assuring them that his longing to come to them is not merely in words; he has planned to come to Rome, but to this time he has been prevented in doing so.

The word "planned" means to make something a priority. This mission to Rome had, at times, been a priority to Paul.

The verb is aorist tense, middle voice, indicating that this trip would be for his benefit as well as theirs, as stated in the prior verse.

Romans 15:23, But now, with no further place for me in these regions, and since I have had for many years a longing to come to you.

The word "prevented" is a passive verb indicating that HE did not prevent this mission from occurring but was prevented by outside sources.

Several things can prevent us from doing what we desire.

1.      Satan can hinder our plans.

I Thessalonians 2:18, For we wanted to come to you - I, Paul, more than once - and yet Satan thwarted us.

2.      Satan can hinder us; yet even when that happens we know that God is greater and He is in control. When this occurs it is because God allows it.

3.      God can hinder our plans.

Acts 16:6-10, And as they passed through the Phrygian and Galatian region, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia; and when they had come to Mysia, they were trying to go into Bithynia, and the Spirit of Jesus did not permit them; and passing by Mysia, they came down to Troas. And a vision appeared to Paul in the night: a certain man of Macedonia was standing and appealing to him, and saying, Come over to Macedonia and help us. And when he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.

4.      Our present responsibilities can keep us from fulfilling our desires.

Romans 15:20-22, And thus I aspired to preach the gospel, not where Christ was already named, that I might not build upon another man's foundation; but as it is written, They who had no news of Him shall see, And they who have not heard shall understand. For this reason I have often been hindered from coming to you.

5.      But we can also see that accepting a responsibility that is not our own can also hinder us:

Romans 15:24-26, Whenever I go to Spain - for I hope to see you in passing, and to be helped on my way there by you, when I have first enjoyed your company for a while - but now, I am going to Jerusalem serving the saints. For Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make a contribution for the poor among the saints in Jerusalem.

So what stands between you and following God's plan for your life? You do, no one else, nothing else. God is in control except when we take control from Him.

The best way for a Christian to operate is found in:

Proverbs 16:9, The mind of man plans his way, But the Lord directs his steps.

"That I may have some fruit among you also."

Paul desires to come to them so that he can have fruit or production among them:

Two things can be said of fruit:

1.      Fruit is born naturally, it is unforced and comes about as a result of proper conditions.

2.      Fruit denotes that which is genuine. Plastic bananas are easy to identify and they don't taste very good.

The production we seek, the fruit we desire to bear, will come not because we are trying to make fruit but because we observe the proper conditions of faith.

And it will be genuine fruit when it comes from faith.

Romans 1:14

"I am under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish."

The fifth window to Paul's soul states that He is under obligation. Paul understood his mission in life, his job as an apostle.

An obligation looks at a debt that is owed. And yet we are the recipients of the grace of God. How does grace line up with being under debt?

1.      God has accomplished for us what we could not do for ourselves. Jesus came to pay a debt that he did not owe because we owed a debt we could not pay.

The wages of sin is death, and we owed that debt of death.

2.      But grace did not end there. At salvation more than 40 things were given to us by the grace of God including our spiritual gifts.

3.      God has given to us the untold riches of His grace yet He never demands repayment.

4.      The debt or obligation is not demanded by God but should be accepted by us.

Corinthians 6:20, For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body.

5.      Paul accepted this obligation and placed himself under debt to fulfill the will of God in his life and ministry.

The extent of this obligation is found in the next phrase:

"To Greeks and to barbarians, to the wise and foolish."

Jesus Christ is an equal opportunity Saviour. No distinction whether by language (Greek or other Gentile languages) or by culture (wise or foolish).

Romans 1:15

Thus, for my part, I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome.

The sixth window into Paul's soul proclaims that he is ready for whatever God has for him

"For my part" is the same as saying "as far as I am concerned".

"Eager" means "to be ready", As he would later say to Timothy.

2 Timothy 4:2, Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.

"Prech" is an infinitive which views it as a result.

Today's preaching is often sharing of one's heart but true biblical preaching is a result of knowing the heart of God.

Preaching is the objective proclamation of what God has given us in His Word.

Romans 1:16

"For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek."

Romans 1:16-17 indicate Paul's attitude regarding his mission, ministry, and the proclamation of the Gospel.

You can see the progressive flow of these verses.

Paul: I am eager to preach the gospel in Rome.

Question: Paul, why are you so eager?

Paul: Because I am not ashamed of the Gospel.

Question: And why are you not ashamed of the Gospel?

Paul: Because it is the power of God for salvation.

Question: And why is it the power of God for salvation?

Paul: Because it reveals the righteousness of God.

This pattern is common to Paul. He loves to make a statement and then add to it logical support. The Greek language makes it very easy to do this.

BUT WHY DOES PAUL NEED to make this statement? Would he be caused to be ashamed of the Gospel? What occasion prompts him to say this?

1.      Rome was the capital of the world. Perhaps the place he was going might cause him to be ashamed. It was the seat of world culture and pride, the essence of pomp and power. Almighty Rome, the city set upon seven hills. Many may consider themselves far too refined to listen to the words of a preacher regarding some itinerant Jew who died on a Roman cross.

2.      Paul may also be tempted to be ashamed because of the opinion of the wise. Even in Athens, the academic center of thought and wisdom his message was rejected with scorn. Would the wisdom of Rome intimidate Paul?

But Paul says NO, he will not be ashamed of the Gospel because unknown to man it is the very power of God.

MEN NEED THE SAVIOUR, THEY NEED THE GOSPEL and Paul knows there is only one thing that can bring about salvation and that is the Gospel of God.

In Latin the word "Rome" actually means power and might, and Paul is going to set the power and might of the Gospel of God against the very Power of Rome.

Paul uses salvation here for the salvation of the unbeliever from sin and death and a destiny in Hell.

This is, as we will see, the only time he uses this word for our initial salvation in Romans. But here the unbeliever is in view...first the Jew and then the Greek

The order of these two groups of people looks at chronology, not priority. The Gospel first went to Jerusalem, then Judea, then Samaria, and the uttermost ends of the earth.

NOW WHAT BRINGS ABOUT THE POWER OF THE GOSPEL: It is given to everyone who believes...Faith is what unleashes the power of God.

NOW NOTICE SOMETHING IS THESE first 17 verses: We have faith in verse 5, in verse 8, and again in verse 12, then "believe" (same root as a verb) in verse 16. And now in verse 17 ...

Romans 1:17

"For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, But the righteous man shall live by faith."

That which we find at there very center of salvation and sanctification, in deliverance and in death, in our walking with the Lord and in our waiting upon Him...Faith.

Hebrews 11:6, And without faith it is impossible to please Him.

Romans 14:23, Whatever is not from faith is sin.

And here in Romans 1:17, The just shall live by faith.

When you were saved faith alone in Jesus Christ alone was the issue. Now that you are a Christian ...

Colossians 2:6, As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.

HOW ARE WE TO WALK IN HIM...by Faith.

Verse 17 describes the full scope of the Christian's life..

The pronoun "it", which is neuter singular, looks back to the word "gospel" in verse 16.

In the Gospel, the revealed good news from God, the righteousness of God is revealed.

"Revealed" is present tense, indicating that God's perfect righteousness is revealed, not only when it is taught but also when it is applied by the believer.

1.      God's righteousness demands our righteousness

2.      But man is incapable of perfect righteousness, the best he can do is a righteousness that is relative to man.

3.      Therefore, God provided a way He can give or impute to us His own righteousness.

READ 2 Cor. 5:21.

4.      At salvation this is done as a result of our faith in His Son

5.      And in the Christian way of life, it is accomplished the same way.

6.      Faith is what unleashes the power of God in the life of the one who believes.

7.      This shows us the power of God in doing for us that which was impossible for us and through this being able to have a relationship with us.

The revealing of the righteousness of God is said to extend from Faith to faith.

Paul quotes a passage from Habakkuk 2:4 which he had previously quoted in Galatians 3:11 and would be quoted by the writer of Hebrews in Hebrews 10:38.

The righteous man or just man (same word that we saw on Sunday used for Joseph) shall live by faith.

God originally said this to the prophet Habakkuk when He was condemning Israel.

FAITH has always, from the time of the fall, been the way man can both live unto God in God's power and please God.

Psalm 51:16-17, For Thou dost not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it; Thou art not pleased with burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise.

In this Psalm, David was not saying "do away with the sacrifices" but "do not see the mechanics of sacrifice as the way to approach God". The broken, repentant heart that approaches God by faith is what pleases God.

Would you care to guess how many times Paul will use the word FAITH as either a verb or noun in the book of Romans? More than 50 times in sixteen chapters.

In the NASB the word is found in nearly 500 verses. We could spend the next couple of years just studying that one word.

If you want to see faith in the Word you will see it, but if you do not, you never will.

Paul, in quoting Habakkuk 2:4 gives us the key to the CCL, we are to live by faith.

Faith was the only thing you could do at salvation and it is the only thing you can do now.

Get the order wrong and you will be either a fatalist. Take faith out or put some work in prior to faith and you become a legalist.

From Sin you are drawn to faith and then you put faith in the Cross and you are Saved or Restored.

Satan's great tactic against unbelievers is to keep them from believing in Christ; and he attacks Christians by trying to keep us from faith.

The verb "shall live" is the future, middle, indicative of ZAW.

We live "out from" or "upon the basis of" faith.

This life of faith benefits us, we can enjoy life by faith.

This verse is what all of Romans is built around.

We need the righteousness of God. How do we get it? By faith

Remember the simple outline:

Romans 1-8 our relationship with God.

Romans 12-16 our relationship to one another.

In the first eight chapters Paul establishes a need on behalf of man that man cannot fulfill himself. In doing this he shows that man must turn to God if he wants eternal life.

In Romans 1:18 to 3:20 we see Human History and Human nature as God views them and in doing so we see God's case against man, in three parts:

Romans 1:18-32 God's case against the Pagan Man

Romans 2:1-26 God's case against the Moral Man

Romans 2:17-3:8 God's case against the Religious Man

The result of this argument is that all are under sin. And we can do nothing about it.

Romans 1:18

"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness."

While there is a future aspect of the wrath of God in the Scriptures, the wrath of God here is revealed present tense.

The word "revealed" is the same as in v 17 where God's perfect righteousness is revealed. But in verse 18, "wrath" is revealed.

Wrath is ORGEI, the wrath of God or His Holy Indignation.

1.      Aristotle said of this word that it was anger mixed with desire and grief.

2.      When used of God it looks at the abhorrence of sin but also shows a longing that is mixed with grief for those who live in sin.

3.      In the New Testament, wrath is be avoided by the believer.

4.      The wrath of God is expressed not to the believer but to the unbeliever as a result of their condition separated from God:

John 3:36, He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.

5.      Paul will later in Romans tell believers that their faith in Christ has removed from them God's wrath:

Romans 5:9, Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.

This word "wrath", then, describes the other side of God's righteousness. If God loves, God will also have anger in the sense of rejecting and punishing ungodliness and unrighteousness.

In the OT the figure used for this was often "the hand of God."

Psalm 48:10, As is Thy name, O God, So is Thy praise to the ends of the earth; Thy right hand is full of righteousness.

If the right hand of God's righteousness finds you in faith, there is benefit and blessing. If it finds you in ungodliness and unrighteousness (as an unbeliever, without faith), there is wrath.

PRINCIPLE: For God's love to be of value it must have conditions and thus, it must also be the opposite of wrath. God wants to love his creatures, man, but if man rejects His provision of salvation, then there is wrath.

APPLICATION: Man must be adjusted to the Justice of God at salvation and the only way to do that is by having God's righteousness.

NOTICE SOMETHING ELSE: Paul does not begin with the solution which is Christ, but with the problem, man's sin. It is essential that man recognize his need prior to the consideration of God's solution.

Mark 2:17 Jesus said...It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.

Do we know that we are sick? The only way we know is by what God has revealed.

This verse also tells us the source of this wrath: It is from heaven. This is idiomatic indicating that this wrath comes from the very throne of God.

First wrath comes against ungodliness: ASEBEIA.

This is a word that is primarily used to describe a category of unbeliever. They are said to mock God, to reject God, refuse to believe God.

The word GODLY which is EUSEBOS is taken from a root word meaning "to honor" and "to adore". In the cultic Greek religions it was used for approaching the gods with a gift and that gift being accepted.

As we transfer it to the NT we can see in this word an approaching of God and fellowship or friendship relationship with Him.

HENCE: UNGODLINESS rejects the relationship man can have with God through faith in Christ.

Second, wrath comes against "unrighteousness."

Unrighteousness is ADIKIA in Greek and refers to sins that are against man. It points to immorality and the acts of sins perpetuated against others.

The INHUMANITY of man is not INHUMAN at all, it is ungodly.

Man abuses his fellow man, hurts the innocent and the ones unable to defend themselves because he has first rejected God and then secondly, God's creatures.

Jesus talked of the wrath of God coming against those who would abuse the innocent in Matthew 18:

Matthew 18:6, But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it is better for him that a heavy millstone be hung around his neck, and that he be drowned in the depth of the sea.

Matthew 18:10, See that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you, that their angels in heaven continually behold the face of My Father who is in heaven.

The words OF MEN expand this concept of wrath beyond the category Paul is immediately addressing. He will look at those who are in paganism and idolatry first, but so much of what is said in each category can apply to the others. There are those who reject a relationship with God and sin against the innocent in every category of mankind.

THE LAST PHRASE sets up how ungodilness and unrighteousness is developed - "who suppress the truth in unrighteousness."

The word SUPPRESS can mean to hold onto in a good sense or as it is used here, to hold down, to cover up, to suppress.

Man can cover up the truth of God, hold it down, but man cannot destroy it.

In order to suppress something, you must be aware of it, you must know it exists. This is not an ignoring but a suppressing of the truth of God.

The PAGANS of the ancient world had come, as we will see, to God consciousness. But they suppressed the idea of there being a creator and worshipped the created things of this world.

This suppression first come at the point of God consciousness.

The word UNRIGHTOUSNESS describes the manner in which the truth is suppressed. It is done influencing others through sin. The pagans would abuse others, child sacrifices, forced prostitution, molesting children, inflicting pain upon others. All part of the pagan rituals that suppressed the truth of God.

The next five verses (vv 19-23) describe man's journey from reality to religion. Here God the creator providing for man in grace, and man ended up worshipping animals and images. Man goes from the grandeur of God and ends up on the garbage heap of his own devices.

Romans 1:19

"Because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them."

This tells us why it is suppression and not ignorance.

This also answers the question regarding the heathen or those who have never heard about Christ. Are they responsible, why do they receive the wrath of God?

Because there is an evidence within them:

When we speak of revelation from God we normally think only in terms of the written word, the Bible. But there are other categories of revelation:

1.      Here we have man's inner consciousness. Man, in any culture, in any society, at any time in history, can examine himself. He is created being. And as a created being to some extent he establishes norms and standards, right and wrong.

This tells us a number of things. If I am a created being there must be a creator. If I can establish what I think is right and wrong then there must be an absolute right and wrong. There must be a standard that is higher, greater, grander than myself.

The standard of morality in some cultures may not be very high, but it is still there. Certain thing are evident, murder, violence, abuse. Man can quickly figure out that these things are wrong. And if there is a wrong there must be a right and then there must be a standard higher than man.

2.      In the next verse (v 20) God revealing himself through nature.

Now with these two we must recognize that they can make man aware that God exists, this type of revelation can even make man aware of the power and therefore, the judgment of God...but they cannot lead man to the love of God.

3.      That can only be revealed through His Son, Jesus Christ.

Hebrews 1:1-2, God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world.

4.      Jesus Christ incarnate is the revelation of God. He revealed to man the glory and the love of God. He is the living Word of God.

5.      Now that Jesus is risen and has ascended to the right hand of the Father, the written word contains the mind of the living word.

The Bible is the mind of Christ.

Romans 1:20

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.

Pretty straight forward isn't it. Nature reveals God. This is not even hidden, but is clearly seen.

First, we have in this verse the consistency of this revelation:

For since the creation of the world.

This shows us that every man who has ever lived has witnessed this revelation. Also that in nature, man's major opportunity is to gain a knowledge of God.

Second, we see the message of this revelation.

His invisible attributes, His eternal power, and divine nature.

Creation, nature, is a reflection of its creator. God's fingerprints are all over creation.

Psalm 19:1, The heavens are telling of the glory of God; And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.

The message is first general: God's invisible absolute attributes. Second it is specific: His attribute of power. Third it is tells of God Himself: His divine nature.

Third, we see the clarity of the message.

"They have been clearly seen ..."

This is an oxymoron. We have something that is invisible and yet at the same time it is clearly seen.

The unseen is God - The Seen is what He has created - The clearly seen is what creation reveals.

Not only are they SEEN they are also UNDERSTOOD.

Therefore, man is without an excuse.

This revelation cannot lead to salvation nor to a personal relationship. But it can lead man to a longing that comes from an unmet need to know the one who has created him and all around him.

At this point, man is conscious of God, and that consciousness of God demands a volitional decision.

Do I seek God my creator or degrees to creation itself?

Do I seek the one who made the tree or do I worship the tree?

Romans 1:21

"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."

"They knew God": That is from the revelation of consciousness and nature.

This refers to the knowledge of a fact apart from allowing the fact to become personal.

Instead: They did not honor Him as God or give thanks.

Two things here, they refuse to believe that the creator whose fingerprints are seen in nature is God. Therefore they did not have an attitude of thankfulness towards Him for how He made them or Creation.

David saw it, he knew it, and he gave thanks:

Psalm 139:14, I will give thanks to Thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Thy works, And my soul knows it very well.

Consider the one who is behind all this - Satan.

Satan's objective with an unbeliever is to obscure the knowledge of God. To hide that which is revealed by creation. So he removes God from creation and makes all this just a product of evolution.

Or, as we will see in the next verses, he gets man to hug the tree and worship what is created.

So rejecting what is evident result in the rejector become futile in his speculations.

FUTILE is a word that means "to render foolish". It can also be translated "vain" or "empty". So they become foolish or fools, vain and empty, in their thinking.

SPECULATION is a word that is used for imagination, what one thinks, but also for discussion and debate.

So this picture those who have rejected any idea of God as an all powerful creator sitting around discussing what is all around them in creation and trying to come up with some explanation, any explanation, other than the fact that God is the Creator and sustainer of all things.

Romans 1:22

Professing to be wise, they became fools.

PROFESSING means to assert, and it is active voice. They are not deemed wise by others; no, they will tell you how wise they are.

Wisdom is SOPHOS, but really they are FOOLS which is MORAINO, morons. And that is grammatically set as a verb because God wanted us to be able to see that this is passive voice and therefore, His estimation of what they assert themselves to be.

Romans 1:23

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.

And from this human wisdom (self-asserted) the unbeliever rejects the revelation of God and moves toward human religion.

Here we have idolatry. I think in the popular psychological approach to problems today we have some what obscured what idolatry is.

We seem to want to label anything and everything as idolatry. So sin become idolatry, distraction become idolatry.

But God places idolatry beyond these rather normal yet still harmful things that plague man.

Idolatry exchanges God's glory for that which is corruptible.

The exchange occurs in two phases:

1.      Truth is exchanged for error: The Bible shows that religion is a direct result of man's departure from the true God. All the wisdom of Egypt, Greece, and Rome did not prevent these nations from falling into idolatry. When one rejects God and His truth the results is religion in its vilest forms.

2.      The second exchange comes in the object of worship: Notice the digression in the objects of worship. From birds (they are in the air), to mammals, to reptiles.

Man, in rejecting God and His truth sets off on a path that ends up with the deification of animals, even snakes.

That is idolatry, going from rejecting God, rejecting truth, to an exchange of the true object of worship.

I think these extreme hazards of idolatry can be clearly seen in the next verses.

Romans 1:24

Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, that their bodies might be dishonored among them.

Here we see God's response to their rejection of Him.

The word THEREFORE looks back and then ahead. Back to the rejection and ahead to dishonor and depravity.

Verses 24 and 25 form a paragraph: First, cultic immorality is a result of the exchange of God's glory for the worship of created things; second, because they exchanged truth for a lie, they result was immorality.

NOW, WHAT DOES IT MEAN: "God gave them over in the lust of their hearts to impurity..."

They chose to abandon God and in turn, God abandons them. There is a certain amount of common grace and mercy God extends to all mankind. This is removed and man ends up living out life trying to satisfy his own desires.

God withdraws himself from man and the results can be easily seen in the depravity of our age and even the age to which Paul writes.

LUST cannot be fulfilled by man. Instead it escalates, gets more and more extreme in its desire to satisfy that which cannot be satisfied.

The eventual result is for man to combine the depravity of lust with religion. Thus, in many cultures worship is expressed through sex, prostitution, homosexuality, lesbianism.

In ancient Greece the belief was the gods would only be happy when they were having sex, and the only way they would have sex was to be inspired by the temple prostitutes and homosexual priests.

That is how perverse man can get when God is kept out of the picture.

This same principle is seen where God is said to "harden the heart" - which is a response of God to man's rejection of Him and His truth:

Ephesians 4:17-19, This I say therefore, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality, for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.

Man chooses to abandon God, God then chooses to abandon them.

Seven Downward Steps of Reversionism (Backsliding)

1.      Playing around with sin:

Romans 13:13, Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy.

2.      Yielding to sin and its power:

Romans 6:13 Do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.

3.      Habitually serving sin:

II Peter 2:14 They are ones having eyes full of adultery and that never cease from sin, enticing unstable souls, having a heart trained in greed, accursed children.

4.      Abandoning self to sin:

Ephesians 4:19 And they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality, for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.

5.      Being abandoned by God to sin:

Romans 1:24 Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, that their bodies might be dishonored among them.

Romans 1:26-27 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.

6.      Encouraging others to sin:

Romans 1:32 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.

7.      Experiencing Hell on earth:

James 3:6 And the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity; the tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body, and sets on fire the course of our life, and is set on fire by hell.

I Timothy 5:6 But she who gives herself to wanton pleasure is dead even while she lives.

AGAIN, GOD TURNS THEM OVER only after they have abandoned Him.

Lust of the heart vs. Lust of the flesh: The lust of the flesh may cease with age but the lust of the heart continues long after physical ability ceases.

Romans 1:25

For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

Here again we see the two exchanges, the truth for a lie is a parallel to the ones in verse 22 who profess to be wise.

The exchange of the worship of the Creator for the worship of the creature is parallel to the idolatry of verse 23.

The word LIE is preceded by a definite article, which makes it a specific lie. That lie is the lie that Satan has been trying to pass off as truth since the garden. It is the lie that is above all lies...that God is not God, hat other things, created things, even man himself, deserve the worship that is reserved only for the one true God.

In repeating what these rejectors do, three things are established:

1.      It further explains the nature of the offense.

2.      It reaffirms the grounds of God's condemnation

3.      It vindicates the severity of God's punishment of man's perversion

"Who is blessed forever, amen". Reminds us of the eternal nature of God. These other things are temporal, they do not last, God does.

Now, look at the results in terms of personal immorality.

Romans 1:26

For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural.

There is a word here that is not translated. It is the word EVEN, "For even their women..."

The last ones in a society to usually be effected by decaying morality are women. By using this illustration Paul is saying all virtue is gone.

The "natural" use is the relationship of man and woman. The use that is "against nature" is lesbianism.

This is the female expression of degrading passions.

In these two verse Paul uses ARSJN for men and QALUS for women. These are not nouns, they are descriptive adjectives which describe not the gender but the drive of a person. The same sexual drive that is described in animals by these two terms.

Romans 1:27

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.

Paul affirms that male homosexuality is also unnatural and then goes a step further in saying that it consists of indecent acts.

It is an error or aberration and receives due penalty:

The word DUE PENALTY involves justice, receiving what one deserves.

NOW WITH THESE TWO SINS I want us to be careful:

The old saying hate the sin and not the sinner must be applied.

We as Christian people must not become homophobic, we must not hate the homosexual, just stand against what they do.

The only hope for the homosexual is the same hope for the adulterer, the thief, the slanderer. Jesus Christ provides salvation and the Spiritual life for the ones who are saved.

Christians are very good at becoming hate mongers, and we must not allow that to happen. There are many homosexual men and lesbian women who are very aware of their lack of fulfillment and are receptive to the truth of God if it is expressed with the love of Christ.

We will see in verses 28-32 that the expressions of abandoning God and His truth are not always cultic depravity and sexual immorality. This rejection can also find its expression in sins.

Romans 1:28

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,

The contrast is to the ones who, in verses 22-23, exchanged the glory of God for an image. Here we have the ignoring of God, not seeing fit to acknowledge Him.

The words ANY LONGER are not there. The translator stretched them out from the infinitive but that is a little too much of a stretch.

These are those who ignore God, who act as though he does not exists or matter. While the application could also be to the believer, Paul is dealing with the unbeliever who does not know God.

RESULT OF THEIR SELF IMPOSED IGNORANCE: God gave them over to a depraved mind.

The result is that they do that which is not proper or fitting.

Romans 1:29

being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips,

BEING FILLED is a perfect participle that points to a fixed condition.

The word ALL goes with the first four nouns:

1.      Unrighteousness: As with verse 18 this is the acts of sins against others.

2.      Wickedness: This is evil that desires to influence others with evil.

3.      Greed: Basic meaning is to desire more. Not just with money but with anything in which man desires more and more as a result of not being satisfied with what he has.

4.      Evil: The desire to injure and retaliate, to harm others for the supposed harm they have inflicted upon you.

With the words FULL OF, it is as if Paul draws a breath and says from these four conditions that fill man you have the following list of sins.

Now whenever a list of sins is given in the scriptures Commentators try to arrange the list, categorizing the sins. But they usually fail. Because sins by their very nature are disorderly and irrational.

Romans 1:30,31

Slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents,

Without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful;

So we have seventeen (17) sins listed:

These are applied to the unbeliever, but we have similar lists applied to the believer:

I Corinthians 6:9-10, Do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, shall inherit the kingdom of God.

Galatians 5:19-21 Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you just as I have forewarned you that those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.

I want you to notice that is every list of sins we have some things that are extreme and yet also some things that some people might think are rather minor.

Romans 1: Boastful, disobedient children, unloving

I Corinthians 6: Covetousness, getting drunk

Galatians 5: Jealousy, envy, disputes, carousing

I do not think that any of us can read these lists and exclude ourselves. To a perfectly righteous God, any sin is abhorrent.

Romans Chapter Two

INTRODUCTION:

In his book of illustrations of Bible Truth, H.A. Ironside pointed out the folly of judging others. He related an incident in the life of a man called Bishop Potter. "He was sailing for Europe on one of the great transatlantic ocean liners. When he went on board, he found that another passenger was to share the cabin with him. After going to see the accommodations, he came up to the purser's desk and inquired if he could leave his gold watch and other valuables in the ship's safe. He explained that ordinarily he never availed himself of that privilege, but he had been to his cabin and had met the man who was to occupy the other berth. Judging from his appearance, he was afraid that he might not be a very trustworthy person. The purser accepted the responsibility for the valuables and remarked, It's all right, Bishop, I'll be very glad to take care of them for you. The other man has been up here and left his for the same reason!

Paul now shifts the focuse from the pagan man and his rejection of God to the moral man and his self-righteous judgment of others.

In both cases we are dealing with a problem of faith.

Remember Romans 1:17 which sets the theme for this entire book: "For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, But the righteous man shall live by faith."

The pagan man rejects the object of faith which is God. The moral man rejects the function of faith which is to put faith or trust in God.

Romans 2:1

Therefore you are without excuse, every man of you who passes judgment, for in that you judge another, you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things.

Paul uses the inferential particle DIO to connect the sinner of the previous context with the man who judges another.

THEREFORE: You are without excuse.

The scene set for us is one in which Paul has been critical of the one who is an overt sinner. While he has said the things of chapter one a group stands off to the side agreeing with Paul, nodding their heads, condemning those whom he is criticizing.

But then Paul turns to them and announces condemnation upon their act of judgment.

They are the ones who are without excuse...

He uses a vocative for the singular use of MAN. A bit rare in the Greek New Testament, but it is used to grab the attention of the ones who think Paul is on their side.

He wants to rouse them from their self-assuredness, to shock them into seeing that their sin of judgment is just as bad as the overt sin of the pagan man.

This condemnation upon the moral man allows us to understand some of the mental attitude and verbal sins he mentioned in the list of Romans 1:28-31. The ones who judge others who do the overt sins are practicing sins also...they are full of malice, they are gossips, arrogant, boastful, unloving, and without mercy.

They judge others, thinking they are doing God's work; but God needs no help from morality.

Morality is beneficial to society; but morality without spirituality leads to legalism, and legalism leads to the judging others.

Paul tells the moralist that by judging others he condemns himself because he too practices sin:

PRINCIPLES ON MORALITY AND IMMORALITY:

1.      Neither morality or immorality directly affect God.

2.      Morality and immorality do effect the human race, although I wonder if some people are affected by anything.

Job 35:4-8, ELIHU'S DISCOURSE

"I will answer thee, and thy companions with thee.

"Look unto the heavens, and see; and behold the clouds which are higher than thou.

"If thou sinnest, what doest thou against him or if thy transgressions be multiplied, what doest thou unto him?

"If thou be righteous, what givest thou him? or what receiveth he of thine hand?

"Thy wickedness may hurt a man as thou art; and thy righteousness may profit the son of man."

3.      God will punish immorality and apply divinely discipline when immorality is found among his people. This is the entire doctrine of chastisement (divind discipline).

4.      God will also punish morality when it is hypocrisy.

5.      Morality is related to the human race and does directly affect the human race, and it is always a part of God's plan for you. Eph. 2:10.

6.      However, morality without a relationship and walk with Christ will lead to self-righteousness, arrogance, and moral degeneracy.

7.      Therefore, the emphasis in God's plan is on our relationship with Him and a dependence upon Him which comes from a personal love for God. This is the first result of the link up of Spirit and Truth.

8.      Personal love from God, which comes from knowing and using His Word, comes first; the result of this is that we will have impersonal love for all mankind, loving others as Christ has loved us.

ILLUSTRATION: The rich young ruler who came to Jesus was operating in moral arrogance. He claimed to have done everything for salvation. Jesus tested his virtue. He was moral but for him the test came down to whether or not he would do as Jesus instructed him, give his money to the poor. He would not. He had no virtue.

9.      A personal relationship and walk with the Lord protects morality from becoming self- righteousness, arrogance, and moral degeneracy.

10.   Morality comes from volitional decision while virtue comes from the F/HS and the application of Bible Doctrine as resident in the soul.

THE BELIEVERS RESPONSIBILITY TO MORALITY:

1.      Morality is for the entire human race including Christians

2.      Morality is essential for orderly function in society and includes Divine Institutions as well as Divine establishment principles relating to authority.

3.      In Romans 8:2 the Apostle Paul calls the believer to live according to a rule higher than morality:

4.      "For the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death."

5.      James 2:8 directly relates this higher law to the Scriptures and sees the results in our attitude towards others, both believers and unbelievers:

"If indeed ye fulfill the royal law according to the Scriptures, thou shall love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well."

6.      A Christian living according to this higher law of the Spirit of Life, the Royal Law of the Royal family of God will encompass morality yet without making morality a standard for living the Christian Way of Life and without making it a standard for others.

7.      When the believer ignores the Royal law of the Spirit of Life and makes morality the standard, he falls into moral degeneracy and moral arrogance.

8.      When the believer ignores the Royal law of the Scriptures and also rationalizes morality, he falls into immoral degeneracy...as with the believers of I Corinthians 5.

Romans 2:2

And we know that the judgment of God rightly falls upon those who practice such things.

This verse refers directly to the one who practices overt sins, but it also implicates those who judge them.

"we know" - This is evident truth that can be determined by the very character of God. A lot of doctrine is not needed to understand that God alone is the righteous judge.

The word JUDGMENT, which occurs nine times in this chapter, is the key to the context:

This section begins in verse 1 with man in the seat of judgment and end in verse 16 with God on the throne of judgment.

In verse 1 man is condemned by his own judgment; in verses 2-16 he is condemned by God's judgment.

This JUDGMENT of God is evident by who He is, is according to a divine standard that is set forth in this section. The English fails us because it fails to consistently translate the preposition KATA. But finding it in the Greek text allows us to see the four standards of God's judgment and man's morality is not one of them:

·        Verse 2, Judgment is according to truth.

·        Verse 5, Judgment will be in accordance with your heart. God looks beyond the actions to the heart of man.

·        Verse 6, Judgment will be according to your deeds. Since God alone knows the heart of man He alone can correctly judge the deeds of man.

·        Verse 16, This judgment will be according to Paul's Gospel. This brings Paul as the inspired messenger of God into the picture. He brings to them and to us God's words.

While the thrust of this verse goes towards the overt sinner the one who judges him is also restricted by this verse.

"And we know that the judgment of God rightly falls upon those who practice such things."

If we understand this, we will leave judgment in the hands of God and not interfere with what is His divine prerogative.

Part of the faith by which we live is faith in God as the sovereign judge. Judging people is part of His divine work, that is His job. Do we put our trust in Him to judge or do we lack the faith that He will judge correctly.

Every time we are judgmental, we are not trusting in God.

SO THE PROBLEM FACED by the moral man who judges is a problem of faith.

This problem of faith is a result of personal delusion.

Romans 2:3

And do you suppose this, O man, when you pass judgment upon those who practice such things and do the same yourself, that you will escape the judgment of God?

The fact that Paul presents this as a possibility indicates that the answer is YES, they do suppose this. Paul is reading the thoughts of the moral man who judges.

The word "suppose" is LOGIZOMAI and means "to compute, to consider, to calculate, to deliberate". The judgmental man has come to a carefully thought out conclusion.

AND PAUL TEARS THIS CONCLUSION away by tearing away the deceptive security and smugness of the one who judges.

Now the moral man may judge the one who is untrustworthy, a cheat, the one who steals, the one who murders. But at the same time he gossips, he maligns, he is arrogant. He condemns the one who is involved in deceit while at the same time being unloving and without mercy.

He is critical of the one who lacks understanding while at the same time he is insolent and arrogant with the understanding he has.

PRINCIPLE: The most moral man in all of Rome cannot escape the judgment of God...all are under sin.

Romans 2:4

Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?

This shows the contrast between the one who judges and condemns and the one true Judge, God Himself.

How does God lead man to Himself? Not by Judgment, but through kindness, patience, and forbearance. God judges those who refuse Him.

Our Lord's earthly ministry was designed to draw men to God and He did not do so by judgment. And He had every right to judge!

John 12:47, And if anyone hears My sayings, and does not keep them, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world.

Kindness, forbearance, and patience show our God as being rich in His divine restraint towards mankind.

1.      Kindness: This word in the Greek refers to sensitivity and understanding. God knows us and is sensitive to what we are. He knows we are not perfect. He knows we are sinners and has made a provision in Christ for that.

2.      Forbearance: This word looks at God's tolerance of mankind even when man displays contempt and ignorance of Him.

3.      Patience: Even though mankind is deserving of judgment, God restrains His judgment, giving man opportunity after opportunity to turn by faith alone to Him.

Paul then takes the first word in the list KINDNESS, uses it again to indicate the entire list and tell us that it is these characteristics and actions of God that will lead us to repentance.

REPENTANCE is the Greek word METANOIA. In its simplest form it means to change one’s mind.

The changing of our minds is essential at salvation as well as in the Christ Centered Life.

In all the many ways it is used it always refers to that which precedes faith.

Acts 3:19, Repent therefore and return, that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord;

Hebrews 6:1, Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,

II Corinthians 7:10, For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation; but the sorrow of the world produces death.

Repentance is the changing of our minds regarding our condition, our actions, our sins, our needs.

Once the mind has changed it is ready to direct faith toward the divine provision and solution.

Therefore, repentance is the mental attitude that is expressed in confession. Repentance may be preceded by Godly sorrow but that sorrow ends at confession. Godly sorrow, repentance, confession all are designed to lead us to faith in the only solution for our sins which is the work of Jesus Christ upon the Cross.

Romans 2:5

But because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God,

Now that we have seen the character and actions of God towards us as sinners what about the character and actions of the moral man who judges others? In contrast to the Kindness, Forbearance, and patience of God we have three characteristic of the moral judge:

1.      Stubbornness: Whereas the character of God melts and moves the heart to repentance, here we have stubbornness which is only found here indicating that which is unwilling to be changed.

The result of others' sins are judged, then the one judging establishes for himself a false sense of security thinking he is okay.

If we as believers become stubborn, and in Ephesians 4:18 we are told that we can, we will never allow ourselves to be changed, transformed, into the image of God. God wants to mold us but if we harden ourselves against Him, there is no molding.

2.      Unrepentant Heart: A direct contrast to the desire and goal that God has for us. Having become stubborn we are unwilling to change, unwilling to even consider that we are wrong, in sin, in error and need to have a change on mind.

Romans 12:2, And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

3.      Storing up wrath for yourself: The word STORE UP is the Greek word THASAURIZO, from which comes the English word THESAURUS or a STORE HOUSE.

The one who is stubborn and unrepentant continues to judge others, living a lifestyle of anger towards others, bitter, vindictive, judgmental.

They continue to store up condemnation to themselves. They build up an inventory of hate. This one will never grow better but only grow worse.

These characteristics result in the anger of the one who judges and then...

"In the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God",

The day of wrath: while at times this refers to the Tribulation, it is also used of any time God moves judge man.

He is forbearing and patient, opportunity is given for repentance, but eventually, and be sure of this, God's wrath will come.

TOO OFTEN MAN DRAWS A FALSE conclusion from the silence of God. But God is patient, he allows man to keep on filling up the storehouse of his own guilt.

II Peter 3:9, The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.

Man's judgments lack the one thing that most characterize God's judgment, and that is righteousness. God perfect righteousness enables Him to be perfectly fair in all His judgments.

REVIEW TO THIS POINT:

·        This principle of moral judgment is not applied to courts, legal systems, parents, coaches, teachers, employers. A person in authority has an obligation to judge within that system.

·        When we morally judge others, we condemn ourselves because we are overlooking the fact that we sin also.

·        When we judge others we are taking that which is the prerogative of God to ourselves. He alone is the righteous judge.

·        Even God does not judge man until the proper time. He draws mankind to Himself not by judgment but by kindness (verse 4).

Yet in arrogance we judge others even when God does not and we store up anger in ourselves (verse 5).

The problem we face when we judge is a problem of faith. We do not believe that God is in control. We do not believe that he will judge, or that he will judge the way we determine. Hence, we lack faith in Him.

Romans 2:6

[It is God] Who will render to every man according to his deeds.

Here Paul quotes Psalms 62:12 in order to set up the next few verses:

Paul is not talking about salvation in this passage. He is not showing us how men are saved, because man is not saved by his deeds. He is showing us why man is lost, why he is condemned, and that his evil deeds are an evidence of this condemnation.

John 3:19, And this is the judgment, that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their deeds were evil.

Now lets take this out to the final expression of God's wrath on man which is the Great White Throne Judgment:

Revelation 20:11-15

This passage refers to a time after the Millenial reign of Christ.

Note verse 10: Satan is forever cast into the Lake of Fire

There are two judgments mentioned in heaven:

·        The Judgment Seat of Christ: For believers only

Mentioned in Rom 14:10, II Cor 5:10, and described in I Cor 3:12-15

Place of Reward based on what we did with what Christ provided.

·        The Great White Throne of Judgment: For unbelievers:

A demonstration of the Justice and Righteousness of God having provided salvation for the human race

The Lord Jesus who was judged for sins now judges those who rejected salvation in Him

John 5:22-27 tells us that the Father committed all judgment to the Son.

The dead who stand. This is not physical death but spiritual death. They are the ones who since their first death have been in Torments.

There are two sets of Books mentioned:

·        The Book of Life: Begins with every name of everyone born. When a person dies the first death (physical death) without Christ, their name is removed. Revelation 3:5 speaks of Christ removing names from the book of life

·        Books of works: When a person is removed from one book his works are recorded in these volumes.

An exact record not of sins, those were paid for at the Cross, but of works, deed, good works and deeds, a record of Human Good.

The judgment is out of the book of life. If the name is not there the books of works are open. Their good works are totaled up, a tally is made.

But their works, good deeds, cannot save them because they are found to fall far short of the finished work of Christ.

Then the Second Death:

Revelation 20:14-15, And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

Romans 2:7

To those who by perseverance in doing good seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life.

Paul distinguishes between two kinds of people. Those who do good and those who do evil. These distinctives separate the believer from the unbeliever not by way of works but by way of obedience. The believer is seen as one who has obeyed God and the unbeliever one who has not.

The believer of verse 7 is a seeker. One who sought and found the truth and ideally continues in the same work.

To preserver in doing good looks at the tenacity of the believer.

PERSEVERANCE or ENDURANCE is a mechanic in the Christian life. It is the daily result of faith that allows us to press on to the goal of the glory of God. It means that we keep ourselves focused on what God has for us in time as well as in eternity.

And it is in that atmosphere that we have the production of GOOD WORKS.

The word GOOD is AGATHOS, which immediately separates it from KALOS, the relative good that man can do. This word looks at GOOD that is of intrinsic value, incomparable, Divine good.

We must look at GOOD WORKS not according to our own standards but according to God's:

John 6:28-29, Some of the 5000 feed by Jesus who followed Him to Capernaum: They said therefore to Him, What shall we do, that we may work the works of God? Jesus answered and said to them, This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent.

I Thessalonians 1:3, We are constantly bearing in mind your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the presence of our God and Father.

The believers WORK towards God is a work of FAITH, and the believers WORK towards man is a work of LOVE.

There is not merit in either one, both are non-meritorious. We have faith IN God and we can Love one another only because Christ first loved us and we love others as he loved us.

So then, what distinguishes the believer in his work: His faith towards God and His love towards other believers.

Romans 2:8-10

But to those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, wrath and indignation.

[There will be] tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek,

But glory, honor, and peace, to every man that does good, to the Jew first and also to the Gentile.

In contrast to the believer who seeks the things of God and is obedient in faith here the unbeliever seeks things of self and does not obey the truth.

The words SELFISHLY AMBITIOUS contrast directly with the SEEKING of the things of God in the prior verse.

Their obedience to unrighteousness, wrath (anger) and indignation.

Unrighteousness refers to the unrighteous acts against others, the judging of others.

Wrath or anger is what they build up in their bitterness

Indignation is the passion that overcomes them as they pursue to fulfill their own agenda and ambitions.

The description is of a life that is totally lived for self. Once man begins to judge others this is the end result. Very soon no one will be good enough for them.

WHAT AWAITS THE LIFE LIVED FOR SELF?

Tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek,

The fact that Paul mentions Jews and Greeks shows us that there is no birthright to the Jew. They have tribulation and distress waiting for them just like the Greek.

Consider what a blow this was to the Jew who considered himself so much better than the Gentile.

Romans 2:11

There is no partiality with God.

The word PARTIALITY is a compound from to receive and to face. It was a legal term used when a convicted man faced the court for judgment and justice is blind.

Romans 2:12-14

For all who have sinned without the Law will also perish without the Law; and all who have sinned under the Law will be judged by the Law;

For not the hearers of the Law are just before God, but the doers of the Law will be justified.

For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves,

Paul recognizes that even Gentiles, without the OT Law, establish moral principles that parallel the Law and by these they are condemned.

This is expanded in the next verses:

Romans 2:15

In that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness, and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them,

This paralleling of the OT Law does not look at the laws of worship or sacrifice but at the moral code.

Man's conscience is seen as a debating forum in which there is guilt and exoneration, accusing and defending according to some moral standard which may touch upon the OT Law in some or many respects.

Romans 2:16

On the day when, according to my gospel, God will judge the secrets of men through Christ Jesus.

The phrase "on the day", reaches back to end of verse 13. The justice and righteousness of God will determine the deeds of man. Were they works of faith? Or were they works of evil?

So this looks ahead to the Great White Throne of God.

Romans 2:17-20

INTRODUCTION:

John Wesley speaking of religion in his day said: Sour godliness is the devil's religion. It does not owe its inception to truly spiritual people. I suspect that sour godliness oriented among unhappy, semi-religious people who had just enough religion to make them miserable, but not enough to make then good.

It was easy to condemn the pagan man of chapter one. By his attitude of rejection and his actions of sin he clearly condemns himself. The moral man of chapter two was a bit more difficult to condemn since he appears to be so good. Yet Paul built a case against him under three points:

1.      All men possess the light of creation, 1:20

2.      All men have the light of conscience, 2:15

3.      Men who reject this light condemn themselves, 2:12

In this case that Paul builds against the moral man he also touched upon the Jew. The one having the Law. And now he turns to the Jew and begins to build God's case against them.

This is the third group who has been nodding their heads in agreement to this point, but now it is there turn.

Romans 2:17,18

But if you bear the name Jew, and rely upon the Law, and boast in God, and know His will,

And approve the things that are essential, being instructed out of the Law,

While all men have the light of creation and conscience, some, the Jews, have the light of God's written word.

That they have a possession from God led the Jew into a false sense of confidence, thinking that all that had been said to this point had no bearing on him because, after all, he was a Jew.

Paul gives the religious Jew six distinctive:

1.      He bears the name Jew: This is a reference to nationality and citizenship in a nation that belongs to God. Ones who bore this title were proud of it.

2.      Rely upon the Law: They had the OT Law and relied upon it, or more accurately its Talmudic interpretations, for their social and civil statutes.

3.      They boast in God: The word boast actually means to flaunt or brag about God. The Jews knew God had a relationship to them and they flaunted this in the face of the Gentiles.

4.      They know His will: Interesting, Paul uses a simple form for KNOW. He does not grant them the recognition that they follow divine will, just know it.

5.      They approve things that are essential: This is the testing or proving of moral and ethical behavior. Much of the time of the Jewish Rabbis and scholars was spent considering moral and ethical issues.

6.      They were instructed out of the Law: Jews went to Synagogue school and learned the Scriptures and were taught the doctrines of the Word.

This is an impressive list!

Can you imagine the Jews who listened to Paul read off this list of possessions? They would smile and nod their heads and say "Oh, that is us, yes we are truly blessed...we are special".

But we have to go back to verse 13 to see the light in which this list is given...

Rom 2:13, For not the hearers of the Law are just before God, but the doers of the Law will be justified.

AND THAT WILL BE PAUL'S POINT. All the possessions are nothing without putting them into practice.

Romans 2:19,10

And are confident that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of the immature, having in the Law the embodiment of knowledge and of the truth.

The Confidence of the Religious Jew

The verb CONFIDENT is a perfect tense that describes a present condition that began at a past point in time. This is an attitude that is fixed, entrenched in the minds of the Jews.

Then Paul lists four roles of the Jews

1.      A Guide to the Blind: In the OT it was the Gentile that was often seen as being blind. The Jews had the opportunity to be a guide to them.

But to be a guide to the blind you must be able to see:

Matthew 15:14 Jesus said of the Pharisees: "They are blind guides of the blind. And if a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a pit".

2.      A Light to those in Darkness: Again, a reference to the Gentiles who were seen as those who dwelled in darkness. The Jews had the privilege of being a light to them.

This is in contrast to the blind who have no capacity to see. Here it is the darkness around them that prevented sight. The Jews considered themselves to be the light of the world.

3.      A Corrector of the Foolish: Not a judge but one who corrects. The word was used of the trainer-slave, one who came along side and taught, encouraged, corrected, and was an example.

The word FOOLISH is AFRON and means to be without reason. Hence it takes one who has reason to correct the one who is without reason.

4.      A Teacher of the Immature: DIDASKALOS, one who teaches with a purpose, with a goal in mind. And that would be to bring from immaturity to maturity.

The word IMMATURE is NAPIOS which means one who is unable to speak, the Gentiles were viewed by the Jews as having nothing of value to say or contribute.

And all this can be done by what is possessed: Having the Law the embodiment of knowledge and of the truth.

The OT Law did four things:

1.      It kept a lid on the disobedience of the nation of Israel

2.      It demonstrated the sinfulness of man

3.      It displayed the righteousness of God

4.      And it pointed the way to Jesus, the Messiah who would come.

Israel had the Law and they could have used it, but instead they abused it.

This job description is very good and is the privileged of the believer, Jews or Christians. But it can also describe the mission of the reformer who applies these practices to others and not to himself.

And that is the problem that Paul brings up in the next few verses, the inconsistency of the religious Jew.

Romans 2:21-24 (We will study this in Lesson 11)

"You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that one should not steal, do you steal?

"You who say that one should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?

"You who boast in the Law, through your breaking the Law, do you dishonor God?

"For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you, just as it is written (Isaiah 52:5 and Ezekiel 36:20).

PAUL TOLD THEN WHAT THEY HAD, told them the potential of what they could do in practice, what they should be based upon their position and then hits them with what they really are.

v 17-20 A nodding of the head

v 21-24 Facing up to what they really are

BUT NOTICE SOMETHING: Paul, who has just talked about judging, does not judge them. He does not say You are thieves, you are adulterers, you are blasphemers. Instead, he sets up situations and then asks them questions.

Before we examine these questions, let us consider our relationship to what Paul has stated in verses 17 to 20:

1.      As Christians, we also have a tremendous position in Christ.

2.      We have a name in which is found the very name of our Saviour, Christians. That title is only found three times in the Bible yet what a title it is.

3.      We can boast, properly, in God as our Father.

4.      We can, from the Scriptures, know the will of God

5.      From the doctrine we have we can proclaim that which is essential and that which is not

6.      We have a local church where we can be instructed out of the Word

7.      But what do we do with our position? What do we do with what we possess?

8.      Are we guides to the blind? Lights to the world that is in darkness? Do we train and encourage the foolish? are we teachers of doctrine to the immature?

9.      Too often, in Paul's day and in our day, we have so much by way of possession and so little by way of practice.

10.   Christians today are quick to reform others but very slow to allow God to reform them. Hence, we fall under the same indictment that Paul is getting ready to level at the Jews of his day.

Romans 2:21

You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You that preach a man should not steal, do you steal?

You who preach...

This is the first of a number of questions Paul asks of the religious Jews.

He will use this Socratic method of questioning through out this section. More questions will follow in Romans 3:1-8.

The question of v 21 is introductory: You teach others, do you not also teach yourself? Do you learn from what you are teaching to others?

Two words are used here:

Teach or Teaching: This is DIDASKW and it looks at that which is given verbally. This type of teaching is in two parts. First, there is the preparation of the teaching; and secondly, the teaching is intended to seek a result or a change of mind on the part of the hearers.

The Jews who were teaching the Word were able to cause a change in the ones hearing them, but they did not apply anything themselves. There was no change effected in them.

Jesus spoke of this situation in Matthew 23:1-2, "Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying, The scribes and the Pharisees have seated themselves in the chair of Moses; therefore all that they tell you, do and observe, but do not do according to their deeds; for they say things, and do not do them."

It is possible to communicate truth, have it become effective in others lives, while not having it effect the life of the one communicating.

This certainly is not the ideal situation, but it can be the real situation. God's word can even be effective to others when it is spoken by a jack-ass as it was with Baalam.

The second word used with a specific question is the word PREACH.

This is KURUSSW and refers to public proclamation. It was used in classical Greek for the work of the official whose job it was to announce government policy and proclamations especially any proclamation of war.

In the NT it is used almost exclusively for information related to salvation or deliverance of the believer.

It is seen as being much more specific than TEACHING and here is used for the communication of truth regarding stealing or thievery.

In both cases the issue is that the one who communicates must learn from what he communicates. The communicator is also a student of the Word.

As a pastor whose duty it is to study and teach, I learn when I study; but I also learn when I teach. I am under the same obligation as you to learn, think, and apply the Word that is taught from this pulpit.

Paul asks another question:

"You who preach that one should not steal, do you steal?"

The potential hypocrisy of this situation was also stated by Jesus regarding the religious leaders of his day:

Matthew 23:14, Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you devour widows' houses, even while for a pretense you make long prayers; therefore you shall receive greater condemnation.

Notice that there is a problem of sin and a coverup in this passage.

They are devouring widow's homes. This was a gimmick they used. They would say a recently deceased husband pledged his home and property to the synagogue or temple prior to his death. And they would move the widow out, forcing her to live with relatives.

Then they would cover this up with long prayers for the widow's well being.

This is PRETENSE...and this is one of the four ways man covers up dysfunctional behavior:

1.      Self Protection: Prevents you from depending upon the Lord and the Holy Spirit

2.      Pretense: Consciously living a lie or unconsciously failing to recognize what you really are.

3.      Denial: Not facing sin, weakness, error

4.      Demanding: Thinking that others owe you something, having unrealistic expectations of others and then demanding that they meet those expectations. When they do not, fall into self pity.

The hypocritical situation mentioned by both Jesus and Paul is dysfunctional. All hypocrisy is dysfunctional. This was being covered up by the religious Jews through pretense. Acting religious on the outside.

Matthew 23:27-28, "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness. Even so you too outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness."

Romans 2:22

You who say that one should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You that abhor idols, do you commit sacrilege?

Adultery and sexual sins were not new to the religious Jews. As far back as the exodus the Jews has a propensity towards sexual lascivisouness.

In I Samuel 2-5 the sons of the High priest, Eli, Hophni and Phinehas were involved in the molestation of the women who came to the Tabernacle.

Adultery was not some new vice then, nor is it today. Even in our age we see many Christian leaders fall because of adultery.

In Jesus day He taught where this all began:

Matthew 15:19, For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, slanders.

The next indictment (verse 22b) is one of idolatry:

"You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?"

The word ABHOR means to turn away from something because of its stench.

There was a well know practice in Israel that when a pagan temple or alter was torn down it was plundered, the best of items were kept by the religious leaders. Some of these even found their way to the Temple.

And yet we find through out the OT law the prohibition for any Jew to keep that which was an idol or used in idolatry.

Remember that one of Solomon's great problems was allowing his wives to bring their idols into Israel. There was to be a total and complete separation form idolatry and paganism on the part of the Jews.

The Jews would publicly abhor idols, yet hang onto them if they were of value.

Nothing new: In I Samuel 10:11-17 Michal, Saul's daughter and David's first wife had a pagan idol in her home.

Romans 2:23,24

You who boast in the Law, through your breaking the Law, do you dishonor God? the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you, just as it is written.

Paul refers to the scriptures in Isaiah 52:5 and Ezekiel 36:20.

The word BOAST is the same word we had in verse 17 where the religious Jew was said to boast in God. It means to flaunt, to brag about one's position or what one has.

Here they flaunt the Law. It came to be not God's Law but their Law, interpreted in the Talmud, superior to the Laws of others. It was flaunted in the face of the Gentile.

And then they were observed breaking this Law.

The result would be that the Gentiles seeing their actions would dishonor God because of them.

So the name of God (his character) is blasphemed by the Gentiles because of them:

Now the Jew who is hearing this will may say at this point that Paul is right, they have been hypocrites. But at least they have circumcision and no circumcised Jew is lost.

Romans 2:25

For indeed circumcision is of value, if you practice the Law; but if you are a transgressor of the Law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision.

Remember, he is speaking to Jews. Circumcision in the OT economy was of value but only if it was a sign of obedience to the Law.

CIRCUMCISION

Circumcision in the Age of Israel and for the descendants of Abraham was practiced as a sign of religious identification.

Circumcision today is practiced as a matter of health and carries not religious significance.

In ancient Israel circumcision meant several things:

1.      The parents were being obedient to the commands of God in that they were circumcising their male babies. Parents obedience, child had no say nor felling in the matter.

2.      Circumcision began with Abraham who was the single great great grandfather of a nation. This was a nation formed by God, Israel.

Thus, circumcision was a symbol of that special nation

3.      Circumcision served as a twofold reminder to the men of Israel, the men who were to be the spiritual and political leaders of Israel, God's nation.

A reminder in cohabitation: For a Jewish man to take a Gentile wife was fine, but the wife was to convert and any children were to raised as Jews, not Gentiles. Circumcision was a reminder of this.

A daily reminder that the Jewish man was part of a special nation. Every time he went to the tree he looked down and was reminded that he was different. During those often moments of contemplation against the wall he would think about the fact that he was different.

4.      By the time of the giving of the Mosaic Law, circumcision also had a symbolic spiritual significance of the cutting away of the flesh or the O.S.N.

Deuteronomy 10:16 Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked (arrogant).

NOTE: Actual physical circumcision was for Israel and when Paul used the term in the N.T. epistles it was either in reference to Israel or it was strictly symbolic of our determination to shut down the flesh, the O.S.N.

Colossians 2:11 In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ.

Therefore, Paul rejects actual physical circumcision as having any part in the Christ Centered Life.

Romans 3:1 What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision?

I Corinthians 7:19 Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God.

Galatians 5:2 Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing.

Circumcision was of value to the Jews of the Old Testament, but they were trying to make this physical sign more important than obedience.

But as any ritual, it was mechanical and when the mechanicism becomes more important than faith which leads to obedience, there is a problem.

Romans 2:26,27

If therefore the uncircumcised man keeps the requirements of the Law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision?

And will not he who is physically uncircumcised, if he keeps the Law, will he not judge you who though having the letter of the Law and circumcision are a transgressor of the Law?

We can see in this verse that Paul is talking about something a lot more important than the physical act.

Paul looks at the moral aspects of the Law, not the ceremonial aspects of the Law which would have included circumcision.

PRINCIPLE: Lack of circumcision could not condemn the Gentile any more than the presence of circumcision could save the Jew.

Romans 2:28,29

For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly; neither is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh.

But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God.

A TRUE JEW, in the spiritual definition, is one who is so internally as well as externally.

This is not a new concept. Any Jew should have been able to figure this out by going back to the patriarchs. There he would see that Jacob was a believer and the nation of Israel can through him. His brother Esau was not a believer and although they and the same parents, they were twins, the line of Israel did not come through Esau.

Notice in the verses the contrasts Paul uses:

1.      Outwardly vs. Inwardly

2.      Flesh vs. Heart

3.      Spirit vs. Letter of the Law

4.      Men vs. God

Here Paul tells them that true circumcision is of the heart not of the flesh.

Colossians 2:11, In Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ;

Romans Chapter Three

Romans 3:1-8

INTRODUCTION

Paul's statements to the Jews in Romans 2 could be taken to mean that there is no advantage to having the heritage of Israel.

He has stated that:

1.      The possessions of the law cannot save man

2.      That the ritual of circumcision cannot save

3.      That their position in Abraham cannot save

So chapter three opens with a question

Romans 3:1

Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the benefit of circumcision?

There are advantages to being a Jes, in each of the categories above. Spiritual possession is an advantage if it is used

Circumcision is an advantage to the OT Jew if this mechanic lead to faith and the reality of what the ritual meant

And being of the family of Abraham provided a spiritual heritage that was of benefit if renewed in each generation.

The word ADVANTAGE, which is PERISSON, means excess or surplus.

Romans 3:2

Great in every respect. First of all, that they were entrusted with the oracles of God.

Paul answers his own question. This is often his style of teaching. He takes the position of his objectors..."what advantage then is it to be a Jew?"

Then he answers so as to leave no opportunity for anyone to twist what would have been an assumed an easy answer. Paul was always having his words twisted by men of legalistic mentality, so he opens the possible objections in advance.

We see something here that is very subtle. In Chapter Two the word YOU is used as Paul addresses these religious Jews.

But here he uses a the verb in the third person, THEY. He removes the entrusting of the oracles of God, God's Word, from the Jews of his day and places it with the Jews of the past.

The word ORACLE refers to that which is spoken by God to man, His word, His message.

This was ENTRUSTED to the nation of Israel and those among the nation who by faith were saved.

ENTRUSTED is the aor, passive of PISTEUW, "faith."

With the passive it is translated COMMITTED, OR ENTRUSTED. It has the idea of God entrusting or trusting us with something.

In I Thessalonians 2:4 we see what our attitude and action should be since we too have been entrusted with the word of God. But just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God, who examines our hearts.

NOTE: Paul says they were APPROVED, and then ENTRUSTED; and because of that they have a RESPONSIBILITY to please Him.

II Corinthians 10:17-18, But he who boasts, let him boast in the Lord. For not he who commends himself is approved, but whom the Lord commends.

APPROVAL comes from God not men and not from self. It is a divine approval upon those who walk by faith. To them God gives even more...

PRINCIPLE: Whatever God entrusts to us is designed that we might please Him.

Paul seems to be starting a list in this verse. First of all, but then does not continue. He does not add anything to the list until:

Romans 9:4,5

"Who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption as sons and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service and the promises, whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen."

So the one thing Paul emphasizes now is that they have the Word of God entrusted to them and that is an ADVANTAGE.

But the advantage of the Word is only as it brings you to faith. Without faith in God and in His provisions of Grace and Power the word can be abused, misused, misinterpreted, and mis-applied.

The Word of God is such that you can get out of it what you want and need. Without embracing the Word as the greatest reality of life, which is done by faith in the writer of the Word (God Himself), you can get works, legalism, anger, malice, even evil out of the Word. But by faith in the Word you will see the glory of God and His love, His grace, that can be in you.

These Jews had the Word of God, a potential for tremendous advantage. Without the Word of God there is no advantage. And the Jews did not profit from the advantage they had. Why? Because they would rather embrace their religion and legalism that they could see than put faith in God whom they could not see.

Romans 3:3

What then? If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it?

So Paul refers to the ones who had the oracles of God but did not believe:

We have an introductory interrogative, "what"?

Today there are believers who do not set the Word of God as a priority in their lives. They are no different from the Jews in this passage.

What does it mean to "not believe the Word of God?"

1.      Man can say he believes the Bible exists. Yet that is observation not faith.

2.      Man can say the Bible is accurate in what it presents. Yet that is good scholarship, not faith.

3.      Man can say the Bible contains good principles for living. Yet that is only common sense and not faith.

4.      Man can say the Bible is from God and it is true in its entirety, revealing God's Word for man. And yet that is not believing the Word of God.

5.      To believe the Word of God is to not only attest to it as true but it is to trust in it as truth.

6.      Believing the Word is trusting in it for the very substance of our lives.

7.      We believe the Word of God when we trust in it as the greatest priority and reality in our lives.

But the Jews' unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it?

Paul addresses the Jews and asks if Israel's unfaithfulness justifies the withdrawal of God's faithfulness.

Yet the Old Testament is the story of Israel's unfaithfulness and God's faithfulness. Even when God's people had sunk to the lowest forms of idolatry, God remained faithful to His chosen nation.

PRINCIPLE: The faithfulness of God is not determined by man's faithfulness or lack of faithfulness, by man's trust in God or lack of trust, by man's faith or lack of faith.

God, in essence and action, is faithful to His chosen people.

This is a strong verse for the eternal security of Israel, God's chosen people. It verifies that He still has a plan for Israel and when we relate this aspect of His character to the believer today we know that:

His faithfulness to us is not dependent upon our faithfulness to Him.

Hebrews 13:5 God says: I will never leave you nor forsake you.

II Timothy 2:13, If we are faithless, He remains faithful; for He cannot deny Himself.

Romans 3:4

May it never be! Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written (Psalm 51:4), That Thou mightest be justified in Thy words, And mightest prevail when Thou art judged.

This verse begins with what is the first of ten violent denials Paul makes in Romans.

The phrase id MJ GENOITO , which translates "May it never be!".

FOUR FALSE IDEAS PAUL STANDS AGAINST:

1.      Here, that man's unbelief cancels out God's faithfulness, may it never be.

2.      Romans 5:20-6:2 Man's sin causes God's grace to be magnified. May it never be.

3.      Romans 6:14-15 Since we are under grace and no longer under the law we are free to sin as we please, may it never be.

4.      Romans 7:6-7 We are freed from the law so there must have been something sinful about the law, may it never be.

EACH OF THESE FALSE conclusions is wrong and irreverent.

Here in Romans 3:4 Paul uses this strong phrase to express his fear that anyone would draw a false conclusion from what he says.

Paul had to put up with many of the things he said being twisted and misunderstood either through ignorance or evil. He makes this strong statement to cut off any misunderstanding.

He states that man's unbelief cannot cancel out the faithfulness of God. He contrasts the word TRUE for God with the word LIAR for man.

Then he quotes from the confession Psalm of David: "Against Thee, Thee only, I have sinned, And done what is evil in Thy sight, So that Thou art justified when Thou dost speak, And blameless when Thou dost judge."

It is God who is offended when we sin. He is righteous and our unrightouness offends His Holiness.

Therefore God is justified and blameless when He judges man's sin.

And all of the lies of man cannot change that!

Romans 3:5

But if our unrighteousness demonstrates the righteousness of God, what shall we say? The God who inflicts wrath is not unrighteous, is He? (I am speaking in human terms.)

Here Paul even tells us that he asks the question from human viewpoint.

This question for the unbelieving religious man is similar to what Paul will deal with in Romans 6 for the believer.

Since we are told that where sin increases, grace abounds, even more (Romans 5:20), then it seems to follow that we should sin more so that grace will abound more.

But this would make God the initiator of sin and an approver of sin.

But we are reminded that the God who inflicts wrath, judgment, is not at the same time unrighteous.

Romans 3:6

May it never be! For otherwise how will God judge the world?

We already have seen in Romans 2 that God will judge in His good and perfect time. His judgment will be the judgment of righteousness. Again, this is a reference to the Great White Throne judgment as in chapter 2.

Romans 3:7

But if through my lie the truth of God abounded to His glory, why am I also still being judged as a sinner?

Here Paul assumes the position of the one who is a liar, as mentioned in verse 4.

Paul assumes the logical proposition.

Through, or as a result of, his lie God's grace abounded to the point God was glorified, why is Paul (as the assumed unbeliever) still facing the judgment of God?

If this was the case man's defense would merely be that through his sin God's glory was even more revealed to mankind. And thus God should not judge man.

Romans 3:8

And why not say (as we are slanderously reported and as some affirm that we say), Let us do evil that good may come? Their condemnation is just.

This of course is not true, it is a slanderous lie that has come against what Paul has taught regarding the greatness of the grace of God.

Do EVIL that GOOD may come? For GOOD he uses AGAQOS, the intrinsic, incomparable good of God.

God's goodness is not relative, it is not comparable, His glory is absolute.

It is not sin that glorifies God but His solution to the problem of sin...the Cross!

NOW PAUL IS READY TO SUMMARIZE

v 9 All are under sin

v 10 There is none who are righteous, not one.

v 11 There are none who seek after God

PRINCIPLE: Mankind has a need that he cannot fulfill

Paul presents this summary like the opening argument in a court case. He makes a charge in verse 9 and then follows it up with a fourteen count indictment.

In verse 19 there is even an opportunity given for the accused to give a defense but every mouth is closed, the defense has nothing to say.

Finally then, in verses 19b and 20 the verdict is announced:

All the world is accountable to God, because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.

Romans 3:9

What then? Are we better than they? Not at all; for we have already charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin;

WHAT THEN: The interrogative with the inferential indicates that Paul is now going to draw a conclusion regarding what has been said.

ARE WE BETTER THAN THEY? This looks back at verse 1 in which Paul asks if there is any advantage to being a Jew.

While there is advantage in what God has made available, this advantage is lost without application by faith. Without applying the provision of God by faith the advantage of position is nullified.

So Paul answers his own question: Not at all; for we have already charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin.

CHARGED is a legal term used in the courts to level a criminal charge.

All are under sin is an infinitive phrase indicating that man's position under sin is a result of something. The result is the fall of man not our personal acts of sin.

We sin because we are sinners...we are not sinners because we sin.

THREE TYPES OF SIN:

1.      Imputed sin. The entire human race was counted guilty when Adam sinned, 1 Cor 15:22; Rom 3:23b, 5:12, in Adam all die.

2.      Inherent sin, Romans 5:12a.

When Adam sinned he acquired an old sin nature. Therefore the old sin nature was brought into existence by Adam.

The human race inherits the old sin nature through physical birth through the chromosomes of the father, Psalm 51:5.

Every member of the human race retains the old sin nature after salvation.

Therefore Adam is a sinner and saved through grace just as any other member of the human race.

3.      Personal sin is a manifestation and result of having an old sin nature, I John 1:8-10. There are two kinds of personal sin: known sins and unknown sins, or sins we commit in cognizance and ones committed in ignorance.

PERSONAL ACTS OF SIN CAN BE DIVIDED INTO THREE CATEGORIES:

1.      Mental Attitude Sins: Thinking sins, this can be mental attitude hatred, adultery, vindictiveness.

As in Jesus' day with the religious crowd, we today often over look the mental attitude.

2.      Sins of the Tongue: Gossip, lying, slander, maligning. Making false statements, exaggerations (other then hyperbole as a teaching method).

Described in James 3:2-10. The tongue is unruly, evil, full of deadly poison.

3.      Overt sins: That which you do which is counted as sin in the Scriptures.

Sins listed in the Bible: Galatians 5:17-21, Romans 1:29-31, Proverbs 6:16-19, I Corinthians 6:9-10 and other passages

CONCLUSION: All are under sin, all are sinners, all sin.

Romans 3:10-18

As it is written, there is no one righteous, no, not one. There is none that understands, there is none that seeks after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable.

Their throat is an open grace, with their tongues they have used deceipt, the poison of asps is under their lips. Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.

Their feet are swift to shed blood; destruction and misery are in their ways, and the way of peace have they not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes.

Paul will develop a fourteen count indictment from the Old Testament: Psalm 5, 14, 36, 53, 59, 140 are all quoted as part of this indictment:

The indictment can be divided into three categories:

First, the extent of sin: Romans 3:10-12

1.      There is none righteous, not even one: Paul quotes from Psalm 14:1 and then adds the word, "not even one". There is a dramatic absoluteness about this negative. God's perfect righteousness is the criterion by which sin is judged and no man can produce the righteousness of God from his flesh.

2.      There are none who understand: This conclusion was made by God Himself in Psalm 53. From the flesh no one will seek after God to understand Him or His will.

The best man can do is come up with religion and ritual which is a feeble attempt to understand the vast magnificence of God.

3.      There is none who seek for God: Man from the flesh will eventually conclude that God is not worth seeking after.

4.      All turn aside: This is from Psalm 14:3 and 53:4. The verb means to incline towards, to lean against. In the negative as here it means that man in the flesh is inclined away from God, leaning by his tendencies and patterns of the Sin Nature away from God.

5.      All have become useless: The word USELESS is used in Matthew and Luke and in secular Greek for an unworthy salve. It was also used for damaged products and spoiled fruit. We are damaged, we are rotten creatures, we are unworthy of God's presence.

6.      There is none who does good: The inability of man from the flesh to produce that which is acceptable to God.

Second, Paul looks at the depth of the involvement of sin: Romans 3:13-17.

Figures of speech: Throat, tongue, lips, mouth, feet, eyes are used to show how man is totally engulfed in sin.

1.      The throat is an open grave: In the simple analogy the open grave gives off a stench. Here we can also see the analogy of Jeremiah 5:16 where the open grave is a pit, waiting for someone to fall in. Out of the throat comes corruption and decay ready top swallow up the victim.

2.      The tongues keep deceiving: In the Hebrew there was an idiom that refereed to the smoothed tongues which were filled with sweet words but intent upon deception. The verb DECEIVING is from DOLIOW which was a word used for fish bait intended to lure the fish so it could be caught.

3.      Poison under the lips: This is parallel to the asp, the deadly snake of Egypt and is a quote from Psalm 140:3.

4.      Mouth full of Cursing and Bitterness: Psalm 10:7. This is to speak a curse on someone, to damn them, to malign them with intense animosity.

5.      Feet Swift to shed Blood: From Isaiah 59:7-8. The feet carry the whole body towards sin. Here the idiom looks not only at literal murder but the thought of murder.

How many of us have given others those Looks that could kill.

6.      Destruction and Misery in their Paths: This is a picture of someone running over others, crushing them, bringing misery to others who are in their path.

Third we have the source of sin: Romans 3:18.

1.      And the path of peace they have not known: They are in darkness, living out anger, fear, and shame. And peace is far from them.

As seen in the prophets, the people call for peace, peace, but there is no peace.

2.      There is no fear of God before their eyes...

Proverbs 1:7, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; Fools despise wisdom and instruction."

Without the fear of the Lord there is no knowledge, there is no wisdom, there is no instruction.

So it is something not known and something not possessed that is the source that intimates sin for the unbeliever. They do not know the peace and they do not have a fear of God. For the believer we might ask...what is our excuse?

Romans 3:19

Now we know that whatever the Law says, it speaks to those who are under the Law, that every mouth may be closed, and all the world may become accountable to God;

"Now we know" - A known principle in the minds of the Jews.

The Gentiles were very unconcerned about the Law of Israel, the Law of Moses. It was in its inception, given to a nation. The ones under the Law are the Jews.

But because it reveals the holiness of God and the sinfulness of man, it also speaks to the whole world by way of judgment.

The word JUDGMENT is UPODIKOS and is a legal word used for the person who has been found guilty or who has lost his civil suite. He is judged and found guilty with no course of appeal.

The verb MAY BECOME is an aorist tense and is a MIDDLE voice and that means that this judgment is of benefit to the world because it puts the world under condemnation.

Here we begin to see a logical thread that Paul employs throughout Romans. Man is condemned and that is good because in his helplessness he then must depend upon the greater work of God.

PRINCIPLE: If there was any merit in man whatsoever, he could depend upon that rather than upon God.

Romans 3:20

Because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.

The OT Law was never intended to justify man. It was intended to condemn man.

Yet no sooner was it given that Israel started trying to do it:

Exodus 24:7, "Then he (Moses) took the book of the covenant and read it in the hearing of the people; and they said, All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient!"

The word JUSTIFIED is used seven times in this chapter and then eight additional times in the remainder of Romans. It is, along with faith, one of the major themes of Romans.

How is man justified? Romans 3:26 God is the one who justifies us, the one who have faith in Jesus.

RELIGIONS

It has been said that between Romans 3:20 and 3:21 lies the greatest separation, the deepest canyon, the widest gap imaginable by man. Man is a sinner and God is Holy. On the one side of that canyon is the wrath of God and on the other side is the acceptance and love of God. How can we bridge the gap? How can we go from one side to the other? We cannot. But when we are justified by God we find ourselves on the other side.

In examining Justification Paul does so in three parts:

1.      Romans 3:21-31 The Definition of Justification

2.      Romans 4:1-25 The Illustration of Justification

3.      Romans 5:1-11 The Results of Justification

Romans 3:21 through 31 the Definition and Explanation of Justification.

Most agree that this is the very heart of Romans but so go even further and say these verses are the very heart of the whole Bible. For it is here that we see what we are, what God is, and what God had done for us who could do nothing.

Romans 3:21

But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets,

The words BUT NOW introduce a dramatic contrast. Paul will often paint a very black picture and then dramatically show us the joyful present.

The word APART is very strong showing that the Righteousness of God is not Law dependent. The Law then nor legalism today can aid or enhance the Righteousness of God in any way.

The OT Law taught the fact of sin to man (verse 20). It gave cognizance to sin but this cognizance could only lead man to recognize his helpless condition.

This path ended at faith in God's provision. In the OT in what God had promised, a redeemer. In the NT, faith in the One who came and accomplished our redemption from sins.

God's OT Law demands that certain conditions be met prior to blessing. But man cannot meet the conditions.

Grace announces that Christ has met the conditions on our behalf.

HERE WE HAVE THE great distinction between religion and grace. Religion wants to earn, to achieve, to do, to accomplish and then receive its blessings due.

GRACE says we cannot do it. God must do it for us and then we must rest in what He has done though faith.

ILLUSTRATION: You go for a hike and tell friends that you are going to follow this very specific trail. You tell then you will be back well before tomorrow noon. If not they should come looking for you. As you hike you fall, twisting your ankle. You cannot walk on it. But you have food, your tent, all you need. And you know that tomorrow at noon your friends will come looking for you when you do not show up. Are you going to panic or rest? And why are you going to rest? Because you have faith in your friends.

Religion says hustle, Grace says "rest though faith".

Religious systems imply that God will compromise His righteousness or that man can some how satisfy God' righteousness through good works. And neither religious system works!

The OT Law and the Prophets witnessed the manifestation or revealing of God's righteousness. This is nothing new. There is a harmony to the Scriptures that is found in the Law revealing God Righteousness and in the prophets as they wrote of a Holy God.

Jeremiah 23:6, And this is His name by which He will be called, The Lord our righteousness.

Isaiah 53:11, By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities.

Romans 3:22

Even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no distinction;

God's righteousness and man's sinfulness are very far apart. How are they brought together? First, God does not condescend nor does He compromise:

The conjunction EVEN is in contrast to what was revealed and is now realized though faith in Christ.

This is the same Righteousness of God but is now specific in its appropriation:

Through faith in Jesus Christ...

Paul has already offered the idea of faith but has been general in the development of his argument. He talked about faith but did not give faith a specific object. Now he does.

Man is not saved by some random faith or a faith that describes some merit on the part of man. Man is saved by specific faith, not merely in God, but in Jesus Christ.

The French expositor Godet called faith the hand of the heart, taking what God has to offer and adding nothing to His free gift.

So the Righteousness of God through faith is appropriated by all who believe.

ALL...there is no distinction. Pagan, moral man, religious Jew...there is not distinction.

The repeating of the word FAITH as a verb, BELIEVE, shows God's perfect righteousness is given to anyone and everyone who believes.

The word BELIEVE is a pres, act, participle and with the article as here may better be translated The Believeing ones...or BELIEVERS.

The idea is one of faith alone in the right object of faith, Jesus Christ.

Romans 3:23

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

In verse 22 we ended with, "For there is no distinction."

Which both looked back to the ones who believed and ahead to the universal need for justification .

In this one verse we have man's worst and best described.

·        The worst part of man is that he is a sinner

·        The best part of man is that even in his doing good he falls short of the glory of God.

Middle voice, to man's benefit to fall short because he is now helpless but not hopeless. He must depend upon God.

The GLORY is DOXA and looks at that which is spoken well of so even what man does by way of good deeds falls short (present tense-keeps on falling short), or is inferior, deficient, when compared to the glory of God.

When used of God the word GLORY looks at that which is revealed of His character and His perfection.

Exodus 33:18-19, Then Moses said, I pray Thee, show me Thy glory! And He said, I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the Lord before you; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show compassion on whom I will show compassion.

THUS: Man's need is established by sin and the fulfillment of the need is taken out of the ability of man by his inferior good works. They just don't work.

Justification of self is so impossible for every member of the human race that we could liken it to all of lining up on the East Coast and trying to jump to England. Some may get farther out than others but all will fall short.

Romans 3:24

Being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;

Redemption: Three Greek concepts:

1.      AGOPAZW : To be purchased as a slave in the salve market but not removed. Emphasis on the price being paid and on the fact that Christ died for the entire human race.

II Peter 2:1 But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.

2.      EXAGORAZW : Means to be purchased and removed from the slave market. Looks at being redeemed from one thing to another. From the Law to Christ. Galatians 3:13

3.      LUTPOW : Means to be bought, taken out, and then set free. Emphasis is on the believers position in Christ as a free agent.

Ephesians 1:7, "In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace."

Here we have the last word used but with a prefix, APO which intensifies the act of taking us away from the slave market of sins once and for all. We are set free because the ransom has been paid. The emphasis is on the RANSOM being paid by Christ. We were held captive in sin but he wages of sin being death were paid by Christ.

In the next verse we are told of the ransom price

This REDEMPTION can be found in only one person, in Christ Jesus. The dative of advantage.

This REDEMPTION was a result of GRACE and brings about the gift of JUSTIFICATION:

What Justification is not:

1.      Justification is not forgiveness. It is more than forgiveness. While forgiveness is a part of it, it is not all of it. A child may throw a rock through a window and admitting wrong be forgiven, but he is still guilty. Justification removes the guilt.

2.      Justification is not a pardon. It is more than a pardon. A pardon covers sins of the past. No judge has ever issued a pardon for future crimes. Justification deals with the sins of the past, present, and the future.

3.      Justification is not a change in character. It is a change in position. Men and woman who have been justified by faith remain sinners. Sanctification is the process of dealing with changing the believer into an imitator of Christ. Justification provides a new position and not a new person.

4.      Justification is not a return to innocence. It is not "just as if I'd never sinned". It is a state of righteousness not innocence. The fact that we have sinned and fallen so short is the basis for greatness of what God had done in justification.

Justification is a legal term and looks at the pronouncement of a verdict. God declares the believing sinner righteous on the single condition of faith in His Son. It is a declaration of a verdict, not the infusion of a quality.

It does not build a holy and righteous character in the believer. That is process of sanctification:

Romans 3 deals with Justification

Romans 5 deals with Sanctification

Romans 3:25

Whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed;

God is the one who is offended by our sins and thus He alone is the one who must be propitiated. That word means satisfaction and through the ransom paid by Christ at the Cross to the Father, the Father's righteous demands were paid.

The Cost: The Blood of Christ...

The phase Blood of Christ or (Colossians 1:20) Blood of the Cross refers to the sum total of the violent deaths experienced by Christ on the Cross.

The word blood is used as a METONYMY, a figure of speech in which a noun is used to describe a larger event or whole.

ENGLISH EXAMPLE: I was reading Shakespeare the other evening...what was I doing?

OR He wrote a bad hand...means his grammar, style, form left much to be desired.

The use of the word blood then should remind the reader of the total violence of the Cross.

We are saved by the finished work of Christ on the Cross and that work was finished when he said It is finished (John 19:30).

After that he volitionally gave up His spirit into the hands of the Father.

John 19:30 Jesus...said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up his spirit.

The two deaths of Jesus Christ are mentioned in the plural use of the word death in Colossians 1:18 and in Isaiah 53:9

Our salvation is related to the Spiritual Death of Christ while our future resurrection is related to the physical death of Christ.

The death of Christ upon the Cross demonstrated God's righteousness. In the OT economy God passed over sins.

There was an atonement but not a taking away of sins.

When John the Baptist saw Christ and said "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the World", he introduced something so new that it was unknown in the OT. The taking away of sins, not merely the covering up of sins as in the Ark, but the taking away once and for all of all sins.

Romans 3:26

For the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

In the past the perfect righteousness of God was demonstrated in His covering of the sins of His people.

But now, His righteousness is demonstrated in that He is both just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

IN JUSTIFICATION GOD'S great character is demonstrated in that He was able to save us and make us a part of His family:

The Doctrine of Justification

The source of justification is God the Father: He is the highest of all the courts and all the judges and He has ruled that by His supreme power that we are righteous. Who can over turn his ruling.

The nature of justification is that it is a free gift: The word used in v 24 indicates that which is without payment and totally undeserved.

In John 15:25 this word is used in a negative way: Jesus said They hated me without cause.

There was nothing in Jesus that deserved hatred and in there is nothing in us that deserves salvation.

The principle of justification is grace: Grace is the single principle by which God bestows blessing on man. Grace is unaffected by the merit and demerit of the object of blessing.

God saves a part from any merit or demerit on our part.

The basis of justification is the Cross: The Cross was the place where the full demands of God were meet. Sin with its guilt and penalty was poured out upon Christ who said YES to every sin of every member of the human race.

The issue then is faith is Christ and what He did.

The condition of justification, the only condition is faith:

Romans 3:28 For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the Law.

Faith is our decision that we make to trust in the Cross work of Christ.

The agent of justification is the Holy Spirit: At salvation it is the Holy Spirit who applies justification to us.

I Corinthians 6:11 And such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God.

The Father initiates justification, the Son executes justification, and the Holy Spirit applies justification to the believing sinner.

The position of justification is union with Christ:

II Corinthians 5:21 He made Him who knew no sin {to be} sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

Romans 3:27-28

Where then is boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? Of works? No, but by a law of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the Law.

The result of understanding justification is that is should humble us.

BOASTING looks more at self congratulation rather than bragging but there is not room to congratulate self when we are justified by God.

EXCLUDED is an aorist tense verb and conveys three concepts:

1.      It has a summarizing force: it is the bottom line.

2.      It is a decisive force: Right here, right now.

3.      It has a final force: This is once and for all.

BY WHAT KIND OF LAW:

The question is: What kind of law excludes boasting, a law of work? NO!

A law of works would lead to boasting, to bragamonies, to emphasis on self.

Only by the law of faith is boasting excluded.

Romans 3:29-31

Or is God the God of Jews only? Is He not the God of Gentiles also?

Yes, of Gentiles also, since indeed God who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith is one.

Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law.

Paul has said a lot about the Law and now it may appear that the Law was useless, but may it never be.

The law brings awareness of the need and the necessity for redemption and justification.

Romans Chapter Four

INTRODUCTION

Paul has presented the doctrine of Justification in Romans 3:19-31. As he continues to address the religious Jews of Rome he uses an illustration of justification that p[re-dates the OT Law. He presents the case of Abraham.

Abraham is used in the epistles as an example of our life of faith. Abraham was the physical father of Israel by procreation. He is the Spiritual Father of all of us by way of faith. As he was justified by faith, so are we. As he was sanctified in his spiritual walk by faith decisions, so are we. As he anticipated by faith his ultimate glorification, so do we.

Romans 4:1-4, Justification Salvation by faith.

Hebrews 11:8, (see v 2, this is Sanctification of the Believer). Abraham was sanctified by faith decisions and faith obedience.

Heb 11:9-10, Glorification. He looked ahead to eternity by faith.

Abraham is one of the key figures in the Scriptures, being mentioned 285 times with over 70 references in the New Testament.

Romans 4:1

What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, has found?

Paul, continuing his Socratic style, asks a question. "What should we say or conclude when we consider Abraham."

"According to the flesh" refers to Abraham while it applies literally to the Jews who claim Abraham as their father, Paul is simply using the phrase to refer to Abraham while living.

"Has found" is a perfect, active, infinitive. A result, a conclusion found by Abraham as a result of what God did in justifying him.

Westcort and Hort do not find this word in the better manuscripts, so it may be in the margin of some Bibles.

Romans 4:2

For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about; but not before God.

Our works, our deeds do establish in the mind of others our character. Our deeds validate our mental attitude and our words. So there is a form of justification or a declaration of human righteousness from man as a result of our works.

If that was all that mattered, what others thought of him, then there would be a cause for boasting before men.

Romans 4:3

For what does the Scripture say? And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. (from Genesis 15:6)

It is the Bible that is the absolute final authority and the absolute criterion in this matter. Not rationalism nor empiricism. Not what appears to be right before man but what is declared to be right before God.

Paul emphasizes the Scriptures because then, as now, man, especially religious man, had added to the OT not only their own interpretations of the Law but additional laws.

They had taken the Law that was designed to show the total inability of man to justify himself before God and turned it into a systems of works for righteousness.

So they and we today are reminded of just how Abraham was reckoned with or imputed with perfect righteousness.

A simple equation: He believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.

READ 2 Cor. 5:21

To believe God is not only to believe that He exists. It is to believe also what God has to say.

In Genesis 15:4-6 Abraham is questioning God about his heir:

"Then behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, This man (Lot) will not be your heir; but one who shall come forth from your own body, he shall be your heir. And He took him outside and said, Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them." And He said to him, So shall your descendants be. Then he believed in the Lord; and He reckoned it to him as righteousness."

God made a promise to Abraham. and Abraham believed God.

We see here the true essence of faith...to trust is what God has promised when He has promised and at all times to trust in God as the One who is faithful.

James 2:20-24

"But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless?

"Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he offered up Isaac his son on the altar?

"You see that faith was working with his works, and as a result of the works, faith was perfected;

"and the Scripture was fulfilled which says, And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness, and he was called the friend of God.

"You see that a man is justified by works, and not by faith alone."

Both Paul and James look back to Genesis 15 as the time when righteousness was imputed to Abraham. Both agree this was a divine response to Abraham’s trust in God's promise.

James then jumps ahead in Genesis to Chapter 22 to illustrate when that trust was tested. Now the object o faith is God's promise and God's character that backs up the promise. But in both Genesis 15 and Genesis 22 the content of what is believed is Isaac!

Believe he will be your heir and believe that you could sacrifice him and God could restore him to life.

Genesis 22:5, "And Abraham said to his young men, Stay here with the donkey, and I and the lad will go yonder; and we will worship and (we will) return to you."

WHEN DID THIS OCCUR:

Genesis 12:1-4 Abram is obedient to God, he is a believer

Genesis 15:1-6 Abram believed God's promise of the seed who will be the Lord Jesus Christ through Isaac, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.

Genesis 14:9ff The first sacrifice that affirmed the belief Abram had in the plan of God

Genesis 17:23 Abraham is circumcised, 13 years after the events Genesis 15 when he believed God and this non-meritorious faith was reckoned to him as righteousness.

PRINCIPLE: Abram (Abraham after Genesis 17:5) was saved and credited with the righteousness of God, prior to any sacrifices and long before any circumcision.

Genesis 22. Abraham obeys God and is willing to sacrifice his only heir, his son. James tells us this was a demonstration of the righteousness that had been imputed years ago. His trust in God was put to the test and he passed.

Hebrews 11:17-19, "By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac; and he who had received the promises was offering up his only begotten son; it was he to whom it was said, In Isaac your descendants shall be called. He considered that God is able to raise men even from the dead; from which he also received him back as a type."

Romans 4:4

In contrast to that: Now to the one who works, his wage is not reckoned as a favor, but as what is due.

The word "favor" is CARIS grace! You cannot work for grace, you cannot earn it nor deserve it.

If something is given as what is due it is not grace.

A very simple work ethic is presented in this verse. If you work, you get what is due to you. If you do not work and yet receive the imputation, it is grace.

Remember the old song Sixteen Tons? The more you work the your deeper in debt, you owe your soul to the company store.

Same principle applies at salvation. The more you try to work for salvation the further away from salvation you get. The more in debt you become.

WORKS at salvation and in the Christian life do not work. They contradict grace and they move the unbeliever and the believer further away from God has for them.

Romans 4:5

In contrast now to works: But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness,

Here the object of our faith, our trust is the one who does something we have come to recognize we cannot do.

Only God can justify the ungodly. And all of Romans 1:17 through Romans 3:18 has demonstrated that we are just that, we are ungodly.

The word UNGODLY is a religious word, it is the antithesis of GODLY...but what does that mean?

GODLINESS: EUSEBIA, A WORD STUDY:

The common New Testament Greek word for godliness is EUSEBIA

·        It is not found in the Gospels and begins to appear only in the later epistles

·        But because it was a religious word it had a rich usage in classical Greek

Simply, the word was used as man made his approach to an idol. He was to have an attitude of godliness, which would include fear and reverence.

This attitude, however, was replaced as the idol was approached with an attitude of harmony. And as stated in classical Greek, admiration.

In the same way, the believer reaches for harmony with God through three stages:

·        Fear: Dominant concept in O.T.

·        Respect: Dominant concept in Gospels

·        Love: Dominant concept in the Epistles

The emphasis in EUSEBIA is to move into a relationship of harmony. This is based on knowledge and is friendship:

II Peter 1:3, "Seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence."

LIFE is the horizontal relationship, while GODLINESS is the vertical relationship.

Some of the German theologians have written extensively on this word:

·        One said that it was the good and careful cherishing of God that goes beyond fear

·        Luther: The recognition of dependence upon God that leads to the confession of human dependence.

In II Peter 1 we would see virtue as the recognized need for dependence and godliness as the action of this dependence.

·        Luther also stated: Godliness is to be at harmony with God.

The only non-cultic use we have is classical Greek is found in Lubker's Sopia Christis, Theologia vol 2, p 54 and is the idea of EUSEBIA man to man in which the idea of equitable bearing one to another is brought out.

We grow to have an equitable bearing with Christ, a friendship.

At the end of the earthly ministry of Christ, the Lord changed the relationship he had with those who believed in him:

John 15:15, "No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you."

A friend knows about his friend, knows what his friend is doing. A friend of Christ is a man or woman who has applied Bible truth.

Therefore, the approach to God and friendship with Christ is summed up in the approach of Godliness, coming to a relationship of harmony and friendship with Christ.

That is why godliness is called a mystery.

I Timothy 3:16, "And by common confession great is the mystery of godliness: He who was revealed in the flesh, Was vindicated in the Spirit, Beheld by angels, Proclaimed among the nations, Believed on in the world, Taken up in glory."

As unregenerate man we are ungodly. We can do nothing about that but God has done everything about it. He can justify us.

This comes about by faith or trust in the one who has the power to justify even those who are not His friends.

Romans 4:6

Just as David also speaks of the blessing upon the man to whom God reckons righteousness apart from works:

Paul now jumps ahead to another brief illustration prior to getting back to his discussion of Abraham. This is very wise because he will quote David. The religious Jew may be thinking at this point that all this is fine regarding Abraham but Abraham live prior to the giving of the OT Law (by about 600 years).

But David lived and ruled under the OT Law:

"just as" is a conjunction from the adverb KAQWS and means "just, exactly as", i.e., no difference in God's grace with Abraham, with David, with the people to whom Paul writes, or to us.

Blessing comes a part from works...we cannot expect to work for a blessing. God is greater in grace than that.

Romans 4:7,8

Blessed are those whose lawless deeds have been forgiven, And whose sins have been covered. Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will not take into account. (quoting Psalm 32:1,2)

Psalm 32 is a companion Psalm to Psalm 51, David's Psalm of confession after his sin with Bathsheba and his murder of her husband Uriah the Hittite.

In both Psalms he is overwhelmed by the grace of God and forgiving him of his sin.

PRINCIPLE: We will sin, and when we do, we can confess that sin and by faith return to fellowship with God. We should also be overwhelmed at the graciousness of God.

In Psalm 32 David encourages others who have sinned to return to the Lord for His gracious forgiveness.

Believers who are in some system of works get OOF and stay OOF due to their guilt and shame but God is gracious to forgive.

By quoting Daved in these Psalms, Paul brings what was true regarding justification by faith prior to the giving of the Law to what was true after the giving of the Law.

Abraham lived about 2000 BC. The Law was given in 1440 BC and David lived about 1000 BC.

Yet justification was not in any way altered by the absence of the Law or the presence of the Law or now, the fulfillment of the Law.

Verses 9 to 12 deal with the extent of the blessings.

Romans 4:9

Is this blessing then upon the circumcised, or upon the uncircumcised also? For we say, Faith was reckoned to Abraham as righteousness.

The prepositions used here show us how justification and blessing work:

The preposition "upon" is EPI, which is a superlative and looks at something resting upon something else. Here, the blessings of God are resting upon the believer.

There is blessing for the one who is justified: he is saved, he is in God's family, and he has tremendous potential.

When the verse states that it was "faith" that brought about the declaration of righteousness it uses the preposition EIS which can be translated with a view towards or leading towards.

It is faith, non-meritorious, that results in justification which is the imputation of Righteousness which sets up a potential for Righteousness in time and secures Righteousness in eternity.

But what we have right now is the blessing, all we need to do is recognize it. Are we aware of the fantastic blessings that are ON us right now.

Some who read this verse came up with two objections:

1.      This blessing by faith is only to the Jews, the circumcised. Abraham is the Father of the Jews so it is limited. But as we have seen, the imputation of righteousness came prior to circumcision.

2.      The other objection not stated could be that this FAITH system is only for the Gentiles, whereas the Jews have a Law / Works system.

Verse 10 starts to deal with these objections.

Romans 4:10

How then was it reckoned? While he was circumcised, or uncircumcised? Not while circumcised, but while uncircumcised;

The imputation of righteousness for Abraham came fourteen years after the events of Genesis 15 when he was justified by faith and credited with righteousness. Circumcision, occurring much later, was a sign of what God had done fourteen years earlier.

Romans 4:11

And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had while uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all who believe without being circumcised, that righteousness might be reckoned to them,

So Abraham becomes a great example of righteousness imputed as a result of justification by faith and faith alone in that it occurred prior to circumcision.

ABRAHAM IS THE FATHER OF ALL WHO BELIEVE and circumcision is not an issue:

1.      He is the father of the One Seed: The Lord Jesus Christ (Matthew 1 genealogy)

2.      He is the spiritual father of all believers, because the only way to become a believer is the same way he became a believer and that is by faith.

Galatians 3:29, "And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise."

3.      He is the earthly father of all Jews by way of Isaac and physical lineage.

PRINCIPLE: Abraham is the only member of the human race that was a righteous Gentile and a righteous Jew. He is the Father of all of us who put faith alone in the promise of God.

Romans 4:12,13

And the father of circumcision to those who not only are of the circumcision, but who also follow in the steps of the faith of our father Abraham which he had while uncircumcised.

For the promise to Abraham or to his descendants that he would be heir of the world was not through the Law, but through the righteousness of faith.

Here we see Paul making a transition to the fact that faith is the system by which Abraham trusted God for all things.

If we can trust Him for salvation we can trust Him for sanctification and glorification.

Every blessing of God comes to the believer by way of faith.

Romans 4:14-22 asks the question "What about the Law?"

Romans 4:14

For if those who are of the Law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise is nullified;

Simply put, you cannot have it both ways. God did not institute a system of Law for some and Faith for others. These Law systems, which are the systems of works vs grace, are incompatible and mutually exclusive.

If it is Law - notice what happens if Law is the system:

·        Faith on our part is made empty: Perfect tense. As soon as Law gets into the process faith is void.

·        The promise in God's part is destroyed: Again a perfect tense indicating that God's promises would be destroyed if Law-Works were the system.

Romans 4:15

For the Law brings about wrath, but where there is no law, neither is there violation.

This is the explanation of the previous statement.

For you see, Law brings about wrath. The phrase "brings about" is a very strong word for something that works according to a standard. Here the standard is the Law and wrath or the ORGE or anger of God works according to the standard of the Law.

This tells us that if we rely upon the Law-Works system there is only one outcome, the wrath of God.

In contrast, where there is no Law there is not violation or transgression:

The word "violation", PARABASIS, is technical and looks at violations or transgressions of a legal code.

In Romans 2:23 this word is translated "breaking the Law".

In Galatians 3:19 we read: "Why the Law then? It was added because of transgressions...until the seed should come to whom the promise had been made."

Now take away the Law and there is no identification of violation.

The OT Law with its 600 ordinances for living for all the Sons of Israel was very specific and yet it also gave freedom to Israel in the areas in which there was no Law.

Simply put: NO LAW = NO BREAKING OF WHAT DOES NOT EXIST.

The church today must understand that principle because so many believers try to establish law where there is not law. If God chose not to lay down a law in a specific area of life then that area comes under doubtful things, not the DOs and the DON'Ts.

One purpose of the Law was to show man that he was a transgressor of God's righteousness.

Romans 4:16

For this reason it is by faith, that it might be in accordance with grace, in order that the promise may be certain to all the descendants, not only to those who are of the Law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all,

So the Law system was never the system for obtaining righteousness, only for demonstrating to man that he was a sinner...all have sinned and come short.

And because the Law could not bring in Righteousness, it is Faith that is effective according to grace, in order that the promise may be to all the descendants of Abraham, both Jews (those of the Law) and Gentiles (those of faith).

The model then: OUR FAITH + GOD'S GRACE = THE PROMISE

Then Paul kinda rubs it in by quoting from Genesis...

Romans 4:17

As it is written (Genesis 17:5), A father of many nations have I made you. In the sight of Him whom he believed, even God, who gives life to the dead and calls into being that which does not exist.

Life to the dead here is life to Abraham and Sarah who are sexually dead.

"Calling into being that which does not exist" refers to the birth of Isaac, the heir who at the time of promise was even less than a gleam in his father's eye.

Now, Abraham's response to the promise ...

Romans 4:18

In hope against hope he believed, in order that he might become a father of many nations, according to that which had been spoken, So shall your descendants be (Genesis 15:5).

In the opening word of this verse we have the essence of true faith...In hope against hope he believed. But believed in what? In that which was spoken!

Here are some of the substitutes for faith we have around us today.

Modern Substitutes for Faith

Delusion: This is denial of reality which becomes a form of escapism. Some suppose they have great faith because they refuse to accept reality.

I heard once of an epitaph on a tombstone that read "Not dead, but sleeping". One of the grounds keepers at the cemetery was fond of saying, "He ain't foolin' anyone but himself".

We try to fool ourselves, deny reality, escape into a world of our own making. This is not faith.

Abraham had to face reality, he and Sarah were long past the age of child bearing, but the greater reality was not in his own mind, but in the Word of the Lord.

The Error: This type of faith runs through a course of logic that goes something like this: God is perfect (yes), a perfect God cannot create anything that is not perfect (yes), God created all things did He not (again yes)...Therefore all things are perfect and any imperfection, sin, is just an illusion of the mortal mind (NO!).

But that error forgets one thing. The perfect God gave perfect man free will. And perfection can do that! Even prior to that God gave a perfect creature, Lucifer, free will and that free will was misused.

Failure to take into account the entrance of sin and death into creation and divine judgment at the fall of man will lead to delusion, self deception, and error.

Presumption is a substitute for Faith. Here man has bought into the lie that the human mind can be so exalted as to touch upon the divine. Rationalism reigns supreme in this system.

So often in this system of false faith only that which agrees with the rational mind is believed. So if God's Word agrees with us, then good, it not, it is archaic and not intended to be applied today.

Matthew 7:21-23, "Not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles? And then I will declare to them, I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness."

LAWLESSNESS is ANOMIA which is anti-law or being a law unto self.

The fourth false system of Faith is to rely upon the supposed faith of another. This is called cre-du-lity. The tendency to believe too rapidly, without thought. In primitive cultures we see the native buying into and believing all that the witch doctor has to say.

But even in our sophisticated society we have those who by way of a false faith just buy into whatever is promoted as being of God. Such claims as God told me, God visited me, God told me to tell you, seem to abound in religious thinking today.

This is not faith, this is being a sucker for a showman. Ignoring what is plainly taught in the Word of God.

Romans 4:19-22

And without becoming weak in faith he contemplated his own body, now as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah's womb;

Yet, with respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief, but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God,

And being fully assured that what He had promised, He was able also to perform.

Therefore also, it was reckoned to him as righteousness

Seven Aspects of Abraham's Faith

1.      Abraham was not weak in faith: The word "weak" means to be feeble. He understood that the strength of faith was not in Him but in the Lord. Hence, there was not inner doubt but outward faith. True faith originates with God not with us.

2.      He did not look at his own personal inability: He was nearly 100 years old and was sexually dead but that problem was God's problem, not his.

3.      He did not look at the difficulties of circumstances: His wife, Sarah, was also old but the deadness of her womb was a circumstance and God was greater than circumstances.

4.      He did not see God's promise as impossible: With man many things are impossible. That is part of the reality in which we live. To deny it is to delude ourselves. But with God, all things are possible.

5.      He grew even stronger in faith: He knew that his faith was in something of great strength, the promise of God and therefore it was a strong faith. The more he matured as a believer the stronger his faith became because he knew more of the One his faith rested in.

6.      Who whole attitude was that of being fully persuaded as one who knows something without question.

His name ABRAHAM, meant Father of a Great Multitude. He had that name given to him by God prior to the birth of Isaac. And it was the name he used with confidence.

7.      Faith, true faith results in action: v 21b, "He was also able to perform".

Now all the promises of the birth of Isaac would not do any good if they were just talked about. I could hear Abraham and Sarah now, in the moonlight of Canaan, by the flickering fire, the tent shades drawn, talking about having a son...folks, they did not talk about it, they did it.

Faith takes the action! "Therefore also it was reckoned to him as righteousness."

Romans 4:23-25 show the application of these teaching to us.

Romans 4:23,24

Now not for his sake only was it written, that it was reckoned to him,

But for our sake also, to whom it will be reckoned, as those who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead,

Here Paul begins to lead into the imputation of divine righteousness in the Christian life, by introducing the resurrection of Christ.

Out total and ultimate acceptance by God comes in heaven and is a result of the Father's acceptance of Jesus Christ who endured the Cross.

One could be accepted into heaven, in the presence of the Father, until the Jesus Christ was accepted in heaven at the right hand of God.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ and His accession is important for four reasons:

1.      He is the heir of the Davidic Covenant: David was promised a descendant who would rule forever and that descendant is the Lord Jesus Christ.

2.      He is the Mediator of a New Covenant: And a mediator must be equal with both parties, God and man, and the one who sits at God's right hand is fully God and fully man.

3.      He is our High Priest: We need a man to represent us before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, alive, in heaven right now, is that man, our High Priest.

4.      He is our Saviour: He purchased us out of the slave market of sin, but without a living Saviour we have no place to go. He is our Lord, alive right now.

Romans 4:25

He who was delivered up because of our transgressions, and was raised because of our justification.

Jesus Christ went to the Cross because of our transgressions clearly taught in the OT Law.

And then He rose again because we were already justified.

The Christian Life is not good without a Living Christ.

Romans Chapter Five

INTRODUCTION:

Up to this point Paul has dealt with the God's case against the ujnbeliever and the resulting need the unbeliever has for what God has done in providing justification by faith. Now he turns to the believer, and while God does not have a case against the believer, the believer has needs that only God can fulfill.

Through the first six verses of chapter 5, Paul lists ten results of justification. These are the possession, profession, and potential of a Christian.

1.      Peace, v 1

2.      Access to God, v 2

3.      Grace, v 2

4.      Rejoice in Hope, v 2

5.      Rejoice in Adversity, v 3

6.      Perseverance, v 3-4

7.      Proven Character, v 4

8.      Hope or Confidence, v 5

9.      The love of God, v 5

10.    Production of the Spirit, v 6

Romans 5:1

Having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through means of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Using our volition we make a decision of faith in Lord Jesus Christ; result, justification, our eternal salvation, reconciliation, peace with God, face to face with God.

This is FAITH #1, salvation, in the next verse moves on to FAITH #2, the Christ Centered Life.

Romans 5:2

Through whom (The LJC) also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we exult in the hope of the glory of God.

"Stand" is a perfect tense ver;, we stand in grace. It is grace that keeps us alive. Grace that allows us to grow in Christ, and even when in reversionism, grace that allows us to continue and recover.

GRACE is the greatest motivation the believer has available to him.

GRACE here is something that we stand in; at the same time it is an introduction to the greater grace we can have.

That may seem contradictory until we realize that God has poured out His grace to us and that our problem is that while we are saved by grace and recognize that, so often we fail to see the grace of the CCL.

GRACE IS OURS, we have been introduced to it, will we access it now even more?

Romans 5:3a

And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations,

UNDERSTAND that if you have a goal you need to keep your eyes on the goal and not be distracted. Our attention, our concentration must be on the Lord Jesus Christ himself.

But we have all kinds of things that afflict us, and these attempt to distract us.

Paul is going to show how the problems of life, rather than being distractions, can work to bring our attention, concentration, focus, onto the Glory of God.

FIRST FOCUS: "And we exult in hope of the glory of God".

EXULT, BOAST or GLORY is a transitive concept. It demands an object. The problem is that many boast not in God but in self. In their adherence to the law or to works. See Romans 3:27.

We exult or boast on the HOPE: ELPIS, a confident assurance of that which is now not seen. Our hope is backed by the character-essence of God.

THEREFORE: We anticipate with confident boasting the hope (assurance) that we are in His plan and that plan will bring glory to him and advantage to us in time and eternity.

This FIRST FOCUS begins at salvation as we boast in Him in that we are saved. That boasting moves through life, and ends up in eternity when we bow before the Lord Jesus Christ.

BUT WE HAVE THE PROBLEMS OF LIFE that continually try to distract us from our focus on God's Glory:

SECOND FOCUS: "And not only so, but we also boast in affliction".

When affliction comes along, you as a believer have two choices.

Distraction avoidance by avoidance: Run away or just avoid those things and people that could distract.

David did this with Shiemi in II Sam. 16

But many potentially distracting situations and people cannot be avoided, so you have to deal with them and this is what Paul takes up in Romans 5:3b-4.

FIRST FOCUS establishes spiritual identity, SECOND FOCUS establishes personal spiritual destiny.

Romans 5:3b-4

Knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint.

"Knowing": A perfect participle, knowing in the past and continuing to know even in the midst of problem.

PRINCIPLE: Do not let problems take you away from doctrinal thinking.

Tribulation brings about perseverance, OR Affliction works endurance...

TRIBULATION - any pressure or problem with a potential for distraction

"BRINGS ABOUT" or "WORKS": Very emphatic word which means an effective and efficient working; and with the preposition KATA means according to a standard.

The standard is doctrine in your soul. This phrase specifically deals with the promises that you claim in the midst of problems and pressures that could otherwise distract you.

So when affliction comes, you apply doctrine, claim a promise, use a principle of truth, this brings about perseverance OR endurance.

Perseverance (works) proven character...

Endurance under pressure proves that whatever is allowing you to endure, works! Your endurance is the experiential proof of doctrine.

Both to self and as a testimony to others. Claim a promise rather than go into panic...doctrine works. Endure by taking a stand upon the greater reality of the word of God.

That is the key to endurance: Faith in the Word.

Others also see you under pressure and in the midst of problems and see you use the doctrine that has prepared you prior to the problem. You become a living testimony to them.

"Proven character (works) hope"

And we are right back to our FIRST FOCUS, "hope", or the assured reality of that which God has for us in his plan.

As doctrine is proved in the midst of problems, that works towards our Hope in the Glory of God.

So then, can you boast in problems...sure, because they can bring you right around to knowing that God has a perfect plan and that plan is going to glorify Him and give you the advantage.

So the Practical Process is:

AFFLICTION --> ENDURANCE --> PROOF --> CONFIDENCE

Romans 5:5

And hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

Romans 10:11 "For the scripture saith (Isaiah 28:16), Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed."

The idea of shame is one of disappointment. No disappointment at salvation, and no disappointment in hope, assurance of what God has for you.

REASON: Because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts, within the soul of the inner man, the real you.

HOW? "Through the Holy Spirit who was given to us."

In Ephesians 1 we see that the Holy Spirit resides in the believer as a seal, a down payment, on all the great things that are to come to the child of God.

Romans 5:6

For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.

Christ died for us when we were helpless sinners, when we were ungodly.

This verse looks back to Romans 4:5, "But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness,"

We were not friends of God, or godly, before we were saved. There was nothing in us that would cause God to send His Son to die for us, yet He did.

This is said to be at the right time...

Galatians 4:4, "But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law."

The preposition FOR is HUPER which is the preposition of substitution, "to put in place of"

Repeated in vv 7 and 8, emphasis is that Jesus Christ took our place when He went to the Cross.

Romans 5:7,8

For one will hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die.

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

In Romans 3:5 our unrighteousness demonstrated God's righteousness, and here, our unworthiness demonstrates God's love towards us.

His love is a sacrificial love. True love on any level, sacrifices so that the one loved can receive benefit.

No the other way around. Love never demands, love never takes, love never expects sacrifice on the part of the one who is loved.

Romans 5:9

Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.

PRINCIPLE: Jesus Christ did the greatest thing for us when were ungodly sinners, now he does for us much more...we are now His friends.

APPLICATION: Look ahead at all times to the Hope of the Glory of God. Even in the midst of problems.

HERE PAUL BEGINS TO set up the principle: If God could do the greater for us He can now do the less.

The greatest thing and most sacrificial thing God accomplished on our behalf was our Justification.

Now that we are justified by faith in Him and His work, we have much more...

What God can now accomplish for us is less but also greater, He did the greatest thing in saving us and now that we are part of His family He will do even more although it requires less.

Romans 5:10

For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.

Here Paul uses the word RECONCILED to look back to our justification.

Words become very important at this point:

Justification: Our salvation, faith in Christ the imputation of God's Righteousness.

Reconciliation: The declaration of peace (v 1) between God and man. A result of justification.

Saved: (SWDZW), a future tense looking at our deliverance in time, in the CCL, by our living Lord.

Romans 5:11

We shout with joy and praise God regarding this present position of peace and the potential it brings.

HOWEVER: Position and Potential does not bring about reality.

PRINCIPLES:

1.      In v 9 the believer is seen as being justified, this is God's justice recognizing the imputation of righteousness as a result of man's faith in Christ. This is the primary potential in our lives. Everything begins at justification. It is because of justification that we have a relationship with a Holy God.

2.      However, neither production or the realities of the Christian life can result from potential alone.

3.      While potential must precede capacity, potential does not automatically result in capacity.

4.      All production and realities of the Christian life come from capacity and are an automatic result of capacity. POTENTIAL + CAPACITY = REALITY

5.      In v 11 we have the expression of an attitude, a reality. The believer praises God for reconciliation. He gives God the accolades God rightly deserves. This is an expression of capacity in the life of the believer. All believers have the potential to do this but all do not. Because all do not have the capacity to do this.

6.      Between the potential of v 9 and the reality of v 11 we have the building of capacity. v 10 This capacity is built through our understanding of RECONCILIATION. As a result of justification there is peace with God. And God can now do much more for us now that we are His children. v 10 CHALLENGES US TO BELIEVE SOMETHING...BY FAITH

7.      In this model then the capacity includes truth, and faith in that truth, That in reconciliation there is no condemnation, no guilt, no shame, we have peace with God because of what He did, imputing to us His righteousness. And then capacity result is a reality: We can exult in God, praise Him, glorify Him, through our Lord Jesus Christ.

In verses 12-21 Paul, having shown us the model, now gives us a tremendous amount of doctrine upon which to build capacity.

Romans 5:12

Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned--

This verse looks back to Adam, the one man through whom sin entered the world and as a result of sin, death...both spiritual and physical.

Genesis 2:17, "But from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it [dying] you shall surely die."

So with Adam's disobedience there was sin and there was death to all mankind, because all sinned in Adam. This is inherited sin. Paul uses the verb SINNED to show that the human race is born into sin because we have the nature of sin, the Sin Nature, in us.

Romans 5:13

For until the Law sin was in the world; but sin is not imputed when there is no law.

FROM ADAM TO MOSES: Sin was in the world, death was in the world. But with the Law we now have the revelation of personal acts of sin. Once the Law was given we have the charge of God's Righteousness made against man. These sins, now defined, have to be imputed. The question is to whom?

The Law defined what sin was and was not and what was charged to man's account and what would be charged to Christ’s account at the Cross.

The OT Law brought to man the reality of personal acts of sin:

Principles:

1.      Adam's sin is imputed to the human race. In Adam we all sinned.

2.      The Law defines personal acts of sins. Thou shalt and thou shalt not...

3.      Personal acts of sin are not imputed to any member of the human race. You cannot impute something to someone who is already dead and we are dead because of the imputation of Adam's sin. Born spiritually dead!

4.      Personal Acts of sin were covered by God in the OT and then, at the Cross imputed to Christ.

5.      The OT Law describes what would be imputed to Christ at the Cross

6.      Prior to the OT Law, personal acts of sin were not specifically defined

7.      It took the OT Law to define personal acts of sin so they could be imputed to Christ at the Cross.

Romans 5:14

Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come.

Not sinned the same way, but we still sinned and we are sinners.

Romans 3:23, "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."

Here Paul uses death as an illustration, and a rather final one, of the fact that all mankind is in Adam and in Adam all are counted as sinners.

ADAM WAS A TYPE...

What Adam did infected the whole human race and what Christ did eaffected the whole human race.

A Few Principles:

1.      The typology between Christ and Adam is limited, as in all types.

The issue is that only two perfect men have ever existed, Adam and Christ.

2.      The first Adam was created perfect but by the exercise of his free will sinned bringing condemnation upon all mankind.

3.      The Last Adam was born perfect, no inherited or imputed sin, He lived a perfect life, no PAS, and was qualified to be the Saviour.

4.      The imputation of Adam's sin brings condemnation. the imputation of sins to Christ on the Cross brings justification.

5.      Therefore, Adam is a type in that one man brought condemnation while one man brought justification.

Romans 5:15

But the free gift is not like the transgression. For if by the transgression of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abound to the many.

This parallels I Corinthians 15:22, "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all shall be made alive."

Here the typology is dissimilar: Adam brought death, Jesus Christ brings Life.

NOTICE WHAT PAUL CALLS our justification, the imputation of God Righteousness to us...a free gift.

Relates back to Romans 3:24 Being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;

GIFTS cannot be earned or deserved, if they are they are not gifts.

In Adams transgression many died

In the gift by the grace of the one Man. the grace of God abounds to the many.

Romans 5:16

And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned; for on the one hand the judgment arose from one transgression resulting in condemnation, but on the other hand the free gift arose from many transgressions resulting in justification.

This is a passage that reminds us of the difficulty of the task of justification.

Adam's one offense caused as many spiritual deaths as there are physical births (less one). When a child is born he is or she is charged with sin, sin is imputed by the justice of God. This is a real imputation.

Three kinds of imputations:

1.      God the Father imputes to Christ that which does not belong to Him, the sins of the human race. Our sins, that were not His, were set to his account.

2.      God the Father imputes to man that which actually belongs to us in the first place. Romans 5:12, "Death spread to all men because all sinned."

3.      God the Father imputes to the believing sinner that which is not actually his. At salvation we are imputed with the Righteousness of God.

The perfect righteousness of God is credited to our account. God declares us to be righteous, which is justification.

II Corinthians 5:21, "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."

Christ is the last Adam, born like Adam prior to the fall. He is a facsimile Adam prior to the fall, whereas we are a facsimile Adam after the fall.

Because of one man's sin the entire human race is under condemnation. But because of one Man's sacrifice the entire human race is eligible for justification.

SO WE COME OUT OF VERSES 16-17 seeing how much greater the work of last Adam was than the fall of the first Adam.

And we have something much more, much greater by way of this free gift.

Romans 5:17

For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.

MUCH MORE is given to those who have now received the abundance of Grace and the gift of righteousness.

If death reigned over us before salvation now we will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.

To understand what it means to reign in life, consider for a moment what it meant to be under the reign of death:

No hope, discouragement, no confidence, wondering whether heaven or hell awaited you, wondering if life was even worth it, no victory, no assurance, no grace, no divine assets, no divine love.

All of that is changed with the imputation, the gift of righteousness, and the abundance of Grace:

To REIGN IN LIFE means to have the ongoing benefits of the victory over death. The Christian life is life that eliminates sorrow, guilt, fear, discouragement, doubt, and instead builds into the believer confidence, assurance, and the joy of having a intimate relationship with God.

If you do not reign in life through Christ and have faith, hope, and love, you will have shame, fear, and anger reign over you.

HERE Romans 5:17 does much of what Romans 1:17 has done to this point.

In Romans 1:17 the topic was faith and that topic continued to be the issue to this point.

Now we have something added to the Christian life. If God did the most for you when you were a sinner, now that you are a son, a saint, He will do much more for you.

Romans 5:18

So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men.

What Jesus Christ did for us was a gift; it was grace, and it was an act of righteousness which results in us having the gift, the grace, and even the righteousness of God.

The JUSTIFICATION OF LIFE connects to the previous verse where we reign in life through Jesus Christ.

What a Wonderful Life!

Romans 5:19

For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous.

What is the missing link in this process? Faith!

"will be made" is a future passive verb and looks at what God does for us when we put faith in His Son.

It is our faith in Christ that unleashes the action of God, thus the passive verb.

Romans 5:20

And the Law came in that the transgression might increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more,

Here, Paul reintroduces the Old Testament law.

Remember the question asked at the end of Romans 3?

Romans 3:31, "Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law."

The word "came in" is the Greek PAREISERCHOMIA and is a Greek theater term that describes the Law coming onto the stage as a minor actor to enhance the scene.

The OT Law came on stage to show that man is a sinner and is spiritually bankrupt in the sight of God.

PRINCIPLES:

1.      This statement anticipates Romans 7:7

Romans 7:7, "What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? May it never be! On the contrary, I would not have come to know sin except through the Law; for I would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said, You shall not covet."

2.      Paul, as a Jew was very self-righteous. The OT Law taught him of his sinfulness.

3.      Although a minor actor, the Law is from God and therefore it is perfect and Holy, expressing God's Righteousness and Justice.

4.      When set against man the OT Law teaches that man is sinful and cannot live up to God's standard. The bottom line of the OT Law its that it is Impossible!

5.      But Jesus taught and it is recorded in all three of the synoptic Gospels: Luke 18:27 that, The things impossible with men are possible with God.

6.      Therefore, while a minor actor the OT Law should get the academy award for best supporting actor.

Verse 20 continued:

"But where sin increased, grace abounds all the more."

The is a comparative clause which shows the superiority of Grace. Grace is superior to sin.

HOW DOES SIN INCREASE?

1.      Continuous increase in sin throughout history. From Adam to Christ to the Second Advent and even to the end of the Mill reign.

2.      One way this occurs is through the increase of people on planet earth. More people, more sin

3.      Another way is sin in the intensity of sin as man tried to eliminate God from their lives. Mankind becomes more sinful as time progresses.

II Timothy 3:1-5, "But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God; holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; and avoid such men as these."

4.      This increase of sin combined with inherit and imputed sin sets up an opportunity for Grace.

5.      Personal acts of sins, as defined in the OT Law, demonstrates that man has inherit and imputed sin and PAS show the divine verdict of death upon mankind.

6.      But grace always is greater than the sinfulness of mankind. If sin increases grace increases, grace is always out ahead of sin.

7.      The condemnation of man due to imputed sin opens the door for grace. Therefore, grace is the genius policy of God to those who are condemned. Our condemnation opens the door for grace and makes the grace of God even more brilliant.

It was one thing for God to condemn mankind because of sin but it is even a greater thing for God to develop a policy of grace towards condemned man.

When we read the Law we see the grace of God as greater than our failure and sin. What is impossible for man is possible with God.

When we say NO WAY God says...MY WAY

So the Law has a wonderful purpose then and even now. We can see in it the Holiness of God and the sinfulness of man.

So when the Law was written, sin was more defined, more definite, it increased

BUT WHERE SIN INCREASED grace abounded all the more.

Romans 5:21

That, as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

This statement serves as a transition to take the reader from the reality of grace in justification to the potential of grace and its reality in the CCL.

THE QUESTION THIS CHAPTER ENDS WITH: Does Grace Reign in your life?

Now in Romans 6 through 8 we will see how Grace can reign in our lives all the way to eternal life. We call this sanctification, the believer growing in God in the Christian Life by means of the Holy Spirit.

In Romans 5 we saw that, as a result of the fall and God's condemnation on mankind, we can have much more.

What we regain in salvation surpasses what Adam and the woman had prior to the fall.

Our God is God of MUCH MORE...We can be assured that whatever we have from grace far surpasses what we presently have. Wherever God leads you will be a place of MUCH MORE.

Paul builds Chapter 6 around two questions. The first one is in v 1 and the second one is in v 15. Following each is the answer to the question.

In each question he deals with that which can derail sanctification.

Chapter 6: The problem of sins

Chapter 7: The conflict of sins

Chapter 8: Our freedom from sins (Life in the Spirit).

Romans Chapter Six

Romans 6:1

What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace might increase?

Remember what he stated as a historical and logical fact back in Romans 5:20, "And the Law came in that the transgression might increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more."

Now if grace abounded where sin increased, why not continue in sin so there can more grace?

But the one who would come to this conclusion is doing so on a personal level where the statement was made on the historical and logical level.

It is true that in the unfolding plan of God we can see grace abounding when we; but that does not mean we, personally, should aim to sin so grace is made even grater.

As absurd as this sounds to us we often hear this when testimonies are given. The worse a person was as a sinner the greater the grace of God seems to be.

In college I was often called upon to give my testimony because of the riotous living I did up until my salvation at age 20. But I had a good friend who was raised by missionary parents who became a believer at age four or five and had a rather dull testimony. He did not get called upon that often. So occasionally he would make up a testimony. While he did not do the sin he spoke of, the people thought he did and so there was more sin and it appeared that there was more grace.

BUT REALIZE THAT THE AMOUNT OF GRACE IT took to save you or me or anyone was all the same. We all stood on the outside looking in, we were all under condemnation, we were all sinners who had fallen short of the glory of God

The answer begins with a dogmatic NO.

Romans 6:2

May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?

The exclamation is ME GENOITO and is a aorist, middle, optative.

The optative is the mood of wish or desire. It is Paul's wish that this not be their attitude or thinking. Middle voice speaks of personal benefit for them not to think this.

Then another question: How shall we who died to sin still live in it?

Paul contrasts a past aorist (died) with a future (live) to show the position we have, having died to sin.

So he looks back and then ahead and places us right in the middle and makes an abrupt declaration, we have died to sin.

In verse 11 he will look back to the event that made us dead to sins power and then at verse 12 he looks ahead to how we need not allow sin to reign in our lives...remember, we are to have the reign of grace in our lives, not sin.

Romans 6:3

Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?

By saying OR DO YOU NOT KNOW, Paul sets what he is about to say as an established fact true whether or not they know it.

ALL OF US refers to all believers, those who have put faith alone in Christ alone.

BAPTIZED: identified with Christ, this is the Baptism of the Holy Spirit that occurs to every believer at the moment of salvation.

The verb WERE BAPTIZED is an aorist, passive, indicative. This indicates that it was something we received in a passive sense. Indeed for most believing sinners they were not even aware of it. But it happened.

The Holy Spirit identified us with Christ, who he is and all that he did and all that he possesses.

Paul now explains what he means.

Romans 6:4

Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that, as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

The bottom line of this verse is: that "we too might walk in newness of life."

The word NEWNESS is KAINOTJS, a dative of advantage, and refers to that which is new or fresh in both form and quality.

Our new life in Christ is new, fresh, in its form and quality because, as we will find when we get to Romans 8, it is a life dependent upon the power of the Holy Spirit.

That word for NEWNESS is found only here and in Romans 7:6 where Paul talks of how we are to serve in the newness of the spirit rather than in the oldness of the letter of the law.

And Paul gets to that bottom line through two truths:

Retroactive Positional Truth: Looks to our identification with the death of Christ

Current Positional Truth: Looks to our identification with the resurrection of Christ.

In these verses Paul explains these truth by using the illustration of water Baptism which is a picture of the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.

I cannot say water baptism is not in view because water baptism, to this point in the Scriptures, has not been explained. It is in view but only as a picture of what was done by God to make these truth a true position in our lives.

Romans 6:5

For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection.

Here Paul begins to look at the attitude we are to have regarding the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, what God accomplished on our behalf.

Notice how easily it goes from BAPTISM to UNITED and that is because they describe the same concept, to be IDENTIFIED with Christ's work and person.

Two truths, two likeness, two identification. One deals with the Sin Nature having its power over us broken and the other deals with the manner of life we now live, the newness of the life we have.

Relating back to the thesis statement of Romans 5:21, a newness of life in which grace reigns.

Principles:

1.      Through faith in Christ, we are placed into union with Christ through the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.

2.      This Baptism identifies us and makes us a shareholder in Christ's life and death and life.

3.      This identification and sharing of Him occurs in two ways which becomes the foundation for retroactive and current positional truth.

4.      The first identification is with Him in His Birth, life, and Spiritual death.

These three resulted in Him being qualified to go to the Cross as the sin bearer and die in our place.

These three resulted in His impecability, He did not sin and the issue is not whether or not he could or could not (in humanity he could in deity he could not) but that He did not sin.

Hebrews 4:15, "For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin."

5.      To be identified with Christ in His death gives us the positional victory over the Sin Nature.

Romans 6:6, "Knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin."

That identification breaks the power of the sin nature over the believer. Any power the Sin Nature has after salvation is given to it by our volition.

6.      The second truth, the second identification is with Christ in his physical death, burial, and resurrection, ascension, and present session.

Notice that between spiritual death and physical death, Jesus, on the Cross said "it is finished."

What was finished was the sacrifice for sins and all that was necessary for breaking the power of the Sin Nature over the believer.

But then what??? We need a new life, if the old man, the Sin Nature is no longer the power, now what?

Philippians 3:10, "That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death."

The power by which we live in the newness of life is ours because of the resurrection.

What happened when Jesus ascended? The Holy Spirit descended. And the Holy Spirit is now our power for Grace reigning in our lives and the newness of life we can have.

7.      These two identifications provides Retroactive positional truth and current positional truth.

We were with Christ at the Cross, we are with Him now in glory.

The mechanics of positional truth is the Baptism of the Holy Spirit that occurs whenever a sinner believes in Christ.

Romans 6:6

Knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.

The "old self" has already been explained in this epistle. It is everything we were prior to salvation

1.      Romans 3:9 Powerless

2.      Romans 5:6 Ungodly

3.      Romans 5:8 A Sinner

4.      Romans 5:10 An Enemy of God

All that which we were is now past. The old man, the sin nature and its power over us is broken at salvation.

IT POWER OVER US IS BROKEN for a purpose: That our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.

The BODY OF SIN does not mean that our bodies are essential sinful. That is a Gnostic concept that developed from the Greek paganism and then found its way into the Catholic church and into the reformation and then into Victorian England and then to US fundamentalism.

Godeau, French Bishop, stated: What greater pleasure is there than the distaste for pleasure.

This contempt for the body and for pleasure arose out of neo-platonism and found roots in Gnostic dualism and flourished under Roman Catholicism.

But it has also found its way to the American Church by way of legalism. As someone once told me, if it feels good, it must be sin.

Fundamentalism has embraced the ascetic life that has its source in Roman Catholicism, a system that fundamentalism supposedly refutes.

But that attitude is not what we find in the JOY of living the Christian Way of Life.

The "body of sin" is the control of the sin nature over the body, but that control has been broken so we no longer need to be slaves to sin...

Even in the NASV I see a subtle legalism in their translation of this verse. The word SLAVES is a noun but in the Greek it is the verb DOULEUW and is a present tense of continual action.

And that is the point: Not that we no longer sin but that the continued power of sin over us is broken. We now have an option we never had before, we can now serve Christ.

Let me read to you two other verse that express this same concept:

Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered Himself up for me."

Galatians 5:24, "Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires."

Why in our passage in Romans 6 did Paul change from the word DEATH to the word CRUCIFIXION?

TWO REASONS: First, because he wanted us to see that bringing reality out of our position is a process...

1.      Death by crucifixion was a process that could last as long as three days.

2.      Once a person was nailed to a Roman cross, death was sure but that death was a process.

3.      No one ever really died by crucifixion but by suffocation that occurred once the body was so weak it could no longer lift itself up to take in air.

4.      In the analogy, the death of the Sin Nature is assured but it is a process we continue in as long as we are alive.

5.      Positionally it is dead but experientially it still clings to us gasping for ever breath.

6.      II Corinthians 4:10 Always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.

7.      You cannot concentrate on trying to kill off the Sin Nature, its death and eradication are sure in eternity. The analogy teaches us to do just what Jesus Christ did on the Cross...depend more and more upon the provision of God.

SECOND: Paul wanted us to see that this was something we could not do ourselves.

Donald Grey Barnhouse in his commentary on Romans talks of a murder mystery writer who said there were a 1000 ways to commit murder. A thousand ways, yet Barnhouse says there are then only 999 ways to commit suicide because while you could murder someone by crucifixion you can never crucify yourself.

Hence, the word is used here by Paul to shout loudly that this is not something you can do, it must be and has been done for you.

COUNTERFEIT CRUCIFIXION OF THE FLESH:

1.      Self Humiliation: This often takes the form of public confession of sins and telling others how real sinful you are.

In the 1930 this became popular among high society. Great halls were rented for Sunday evenings and after hymns were sung and prayers made people would stand and confess some of the most sorid of sins. Usually the next day a newspaper article would appear listing the confessors and their sins.

A columnist for the LA Times stated that the fault with these meeting was that a pint always became a quart in the telling...

While this was mental catharsis, it has nothing to do with crucifying the Old man.

2.      A group that originated in Russia also taught crucifixion of the flesh through humiliation; but their take on this was to practice nudity. They humiliatee themselves by going out in public nude to show their disdain for the flesh.

We do not do that but some people do try to show their disdain for the flesh, crucifying the flesh by appearance, or lack of. Unkempt appearance, soiled clothing, unclean bodies. Similar concept and also wrong.

3.      Another counterfeit crucifixion of self is through Asceticism. Self denial. The idea that if anything is pleasurable it is sin so deny all pleasure. This is the attitude that drives people to monasteries in its extreme form. But in a less extreme form but equally wrong is legalism and the denial of natural desires and longings.

4.      Self Abasement: Inflicting harm on the body, whipping the body into submission, starving the body, cutting it, bleeding in the middle ages fell into this category.

5.      Attempts at sinless perfection: The attitude that one can discipline himself to the point of eradicating the sin nature and then convincing himself that he has.

6.      Pretense: Living a false life that puts across the attitude that there is no sin in the life and then denial that there is even a conflict of sin in the life. Leads to arrogance and usually judging others.

7.      Christian activity and service: Crucify self by doing lots of Christian things, join a church, give, sing in the choir, on and on.

BUT ALL THESE ARE THINGS THE BELIVER DOES.

He is putting a nail through one wrist and through one foot and from one side he looks like he is crucified, but he is not. There is only the appearance and that is the best that man can come up.

Only God can and has crucified the Old Sin Nature.

Romans 6:7

For he who has died is freed from sin.

The sin nature was crucified with Christ, a past reality, something that God did. And it has a purpose: that the body of sin might be done away with.

Some translate this "destroyed", "made inactive", "neutralized".

But the problem with many of those translations is that they imply the absence of sin or the departure of the sin nature or that while the sin nature remains, it no longer effects us. And those ideas are contrary to what John stated in I John chapter 1:

v 8 If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

v 10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.

The fact is the sin nature was crucified with Christ, God did it and it was and continues to be a process.

AND THE FACT OF THE PROCESS IS THAT it has a purpose:

That the body of sin, the Old Sin Nature (Sin Nature), might be KATARGEW

WORD STUDY ON KATARGEW  

1.      The word is used 27 times in the NT. 25 times by Paul and once by the Lord in Luke 13:7 and once by the writer of the Hebrews.

2.      It is a compound of KATA and ARGEW which means to be idle. The KATA prefix makes it both intensive and intransitive.

3.      It then is idleness that is according to a set standard or condition.

4.      In the passive, as here in Romans 6:6 it can mean that something is caused to cease according to an outside condition. In this case the crucifying of the Sin Nature.

Paul used the word three times already in the book of Romans:

Romans 3:3 What then? If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it?

Romans 3:31 Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law.

Romans 4:14 For if those who are of the Law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise is nullified;

In each case, whether it is the faithfulness of God, the OT Law, or the promise of the Saviour, the object is not destroyed, only made idle or ineffective.

5.      So when Paul uses the word for the Sin Nature the idea is not one of destroying it, but making it idle, rendering it idle according to a the condition, the standard of the Cross.

6.      J.B. Phillipis in his expanded translation of this passage states: That the tyranny of sin over us might be broken.

7.      The condition for that to occur is a fact, the Old Self was crucified when Christ was crucified, the baptism of the Holy Spirit is the mechanics of that identification, that uniting of us with Christ in His death.

The issue now is: Do you believe it?

Barnhouse says the weapon that Satan held against us has been knocked from his hands, it lies on the ground, there for us to pick up, to claim, to use, will we do it? And only then can we have the practical victory of sanctification.

Back to Romans 6:7, "For he who has died is freed from sin."

We have an aorist active participle for DIED which precedes the main verb, FREED which is a perfect passive indicative.

We have died with Christ at the Cross: This is retroactive positional truth. The tyranny of the Sin Nature over us was broken when we, at salvation, were baptized into Christ and His death.

The word DIED is APOQNJSKW, and looks more at dying off than death itself.

Also used for a natural death, in both cases a process.

This happened, this occurred, the Sin Nature was crucified.

The result is that we are FREED FROM SIN and this is passive, not active, it is not a matter of our self resolve or self discipline that frees us from sin but what God did in Christ at the Cross...

The word FREED is from DIKAIOW  

I think it is interesting that the translators chose to use the word FREED for this Greek word.

The word is from the same root as noun and adjective JUSTIFIED or JUSTIFICATION. It means to be declared righteous as a judicial act.

Greek verbs that end in OW, which usually indicates the bringing out of that which is already true.

Here the true fact is that we are justified by faith at salvation. Also at salvation we have be baptized by the Holy Spirit into Christ's death.

We have died to sin and thus we are now declared righteous by God.

This is the main verb and it is PASSIVE

IT IS NOT SOMETHING WE DO!!

This word includes the idea that we are absolved, acquitted, cleared from any charges or imputation of guilt by the justice of God.

PRINCIPLE: When we start to struggle against sin we are trying to justify ourselves, to free ourselves from something that does not have any authority over us.

You are justified, absolved, acquitted in the divine estimation of God. So why do we still struggle with sin?

Look ahead to the end of Romans 7

Rom. 7:24-25 Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

Romans 8:1-2, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death."

PRINCIPLE: If you are struggling with sin chances are you are focused on the sin rather than the Saviour.

Romans 6:8-11. Paul includes at this point a few comments about the confidence we can have regarding our eternity with Christ. Then at v 11 he rolls this back to our present manner of life...remember that is the issue, letting Grace reign in you life and walking in the newness of life.

Romans 6:8

Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him,

The word "if" is a Greek first class conditional, so it should be translated "since" or "because".

The objective is eternity, we shall also live with Him.

The link is FAITH...we believe.

NOW WHAT PAUL IS GOING TO PULL on us here is that while we at thinking of the sweet bye and bye, eternity really begins for us at the moment we believe in Christ.

You have eternal life right now!

John 11:21-27

Martha therefore said to Jesus, Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.

Even now I know that whatever You ask of God, God will give You.

Jesus said to her, Your brother shall rise again.

Martha said to Him, I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.

Jesus said to her, I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live even if he dies,

and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?

She said to Him, Yes, Lord; I have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world.

Then to John 11:39, 40, 44

v 39 Jesus said, Remove the stone. Martha, the sister of the deceased, said to Him, Lord, by this time there will be a stench, for he has been dead four days.

v 40 Jesus said to her, Did I not say to you, if you believe, you will see the glory of God?

v 44 He who had died came forth, bound hand and foot with wrappings; and his face was wrapped around with a cloth. Jesus said to them, Unbind him, and let him go.

Now the point that in made in the conversation between Jesus and Martha and then with Mary is the same point Paul is making in Romans 6:8:11.

Eternal life begins right now in the very presence of Jesus Christ who was crucified, died, was buried, and is now risen from the dead to be seated at the right hand of God forever.

APPLICATION: Too often we think in terms of what we will have when we are with the Lord. But believer, we are with Him right now.

The Baptism of the Holy Spirit at set us into union with Him in His death and in His resurrection.

Romans 6:8 (again), "Now if [since] we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him."

The issue is: Do you believe this? Do you trust is this fact that Paul is stating?

Faith, belief, trust is always based upon knowledge of that which is trusted, so in the next verse.

Romans 6:9

Knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him.

KNOWING is OIDA which looks at the perception of an evident truth. This truth has been stated in the previous verse, Christ died and rose again and we are identified with Him in His death and new life.

HAVING BEEN RAISED: An aorist, passive, participle.

The passive voice indicates that the Father raised him from the dead, this was done to the Lord Jesus by the power of the Father.

John 10:17-18 "For this reason the Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father."

Jesus Christ had the power, the authority, to lay down his life in death and to bring it back in resurrection.

But He did not use this power or authority. He trusted in the Father to raise Him from the dead.

Romans 6:4, "Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life."

Galatians 1:1, "Paul, an apostle (not {sent} from men, nor through the agency of man, but through Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead)."

HERE IS THE POINT OF THIS: The Father raised Jesus to His new life...who is going to raise us out of sin and give us a new life. Us? Are we going to do this? NO, it is done by God.

The great truth of this passage is not that we live in a struggle against sin, fighting sin, focused upon sin, but that we live unto God by His will and His power and we focus our attention not on sin but on the Saviour.

Along about 787 AD at the Council of Nicea the idea that Christ had to die again and again to cleanse the believer from sin was first introduced. While a few spoke against this error, by 1215 at the Lateran Council the idea was fully adopted.

Transubstantiation is the idea that the Christian must not only confess His sins but again receive Christ, literally receive Him again in the form of the Lord's Supper. The bread and the cup actually become the body and blood of Christ.

No longer a memorial to the life and death of Christ, the Lord's Supper became an act of absolution from sins, crucifying the Lord again and again and again.

After the Reformation and in reaction to the reformers teaching, the Roman church, at the Council of Trent (1545-1563) establish their doctrine of the Eurcharist. The first of its canons state:

"If anyone deny that the body and blood together with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ...are truly and really and substantially contained in the sacrament, and shall say that He is only in it as a sign or in a figure, let him be accursed."

Little did the writer of Hebrews know that what he wrote about believers going back to the Temple to sacrifice in the first century could be so well applied to the heresies of the 16th century.

Hebrews 6:4-6 "For in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God, and put Him to open shame."

BUT THERE IS NO re-salvation. You have no need to be saved over and over.

The word MASTER is the verb form of LORD, death, which is the result of the fall, which is the result of sin, no longer keeps on Lording it over Him...nor us!

Romans 6:10

For the death that He died, He died to sin, once for all;

Death to sin is a done deal!

But the Life He lives, and His life we share, goes on and on:

But the life that He lives, He lives to God.

Jesus Christ died once and for all:

Hebrews 7:26-27, For it was fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners and exalted above the heavens; who does not need daily, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins, and then for the sins of the people, because this He did once for all when He offered up Himself.

Hebrews 9:28, So Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, shall appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await Him.

Hebrews 10:10, By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

I Peter 3:18, For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, in order that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit.

SO WHERE IS OUR ATTENTION DRAWN, WHERE IS OUR FOCUS. Death is a done deal, our attention is given to His life.

Remember Romans 5:21, As sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Romans 6:4, "Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life."

v 10 Continued: Jesus Christ now lives and he lives to God:

This is a present tense verb and a dative of advantage, for Jesus Christ in His resurrected life to live to God keeps on being an advantage to Him.

Throughout the NT we see that this is the emphasis, living with Him:

Acts 17:28, for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, 'For we also are His offspring.

II Corinthians 13:4, For indeed He was crucified because of weakness, yet He lives because of the power of God. For we also are weak in Him, yet we shall live with Him because of the power of God directed toward you.

II Timothy 2:11, It is a trustworthy statement: #For if we died with Him, we shall also live with Him;

I John 4:9, By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him.

Romans 6:11

Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin.

If our focus in the Christian life is to be on the resurrected Christ, what about sin? I mean, after all, a lot of believers spend a lot of time and a lot of Pastors give a lot of sermons about sin and a lot of believes do a lot of judging of others regarding sins...what about sin?

The word CONSIDER is the same word used in Romans 4 for IMPUTED...As God has imputed us with His Righteousness we are to now see ourselves, consider ourselves, think of ourselves, as dead to sin.

We are dead to it, not by what we do, not by our self discipline, not by our resolve, not by our strength, not by our morality, but by what God has done.

Christian, where is you focus, where are you? Are you struggling to stay dead, rather foolish, or are you alive unto God?

REMEMBER IN Romans 3, we had a choice: Man could try to be justified by a system of Law/Works or be justified by Grace/Faith.

The choice now continue in the Sanctification?

Will you try to grow by Law/Works or by Grace/Faith

AN APPLICATION COMES FROM THIS: How you relate to others will be determined by the choice you make for yourself. If you chose Law/Works you will relate to others by Law and by their Works.

If you chose Grace/Faith you relate to others by Grace (including Spiritual Love) and by their Faith.

Some points of application:

1.      Look at verse 14, For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law, but under grace."

SIN is singular and looks at the Old Sin Nature (Sin Nature); the verb is future tense indicating an assured outcome.

This is not something we wish for, it is something that is assured by the work of Christ. The reason it is assured is that we are not under the Law but under Grace.

2.      In the OT Law there was a lot of grace, a lot of compassion, a lot of fairness, a lot of love. For it revealed the person of God and His righteousness.

3.      But when the Law was given to the people they took out the grace and received it as merely God's demands on His subjects.

Exodus 24:7 Then he [Moses] took the book of the covenant and read it in the hearing of the people; and they said, All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient!

4.      In the NT we have laws also, lists of standards God presents.

LET'S ASK A HARD QUESTION: WHY???

Answer: To teach us how to maintain two very important relationships...First with God (avoid idolatry) and secondly with others.

PRINCIPLE: God desires that we have a good relationship with Him and that means to avoid at all cost those things that deal with idolatry. And God also desires us to have good relationships with others and that means we avoid the sins that hurt others (gossip, stealing, murder).

5.      In the Gospels (like the Sermon on the Mound), Jesus taught where these things began, in the mind.

Mark 7:21, For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, fornication’s, thefts, murders, adulteries, deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness. All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man.

In the epistles we must therefore harness our thoughts by setting our mind on Christ:

Philippians 4:8, Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things.

Romans 8:5-6, For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace.

And our passage Romans 6:11 Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

6.      Within every list of sins in the NT God the Holy Spirit included sins that would be considered mild by human standards:

Example: Galatians 5:19-21 Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you just as I have forewarned you that those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.

Outbursts of anger (one of those choleric things), disputes, envy, carousing; can anyone say that they will never do these things?

7.      With that we then see that the response of the Church Age believer differs little from the response of the Israel 2500 years ago at the foot of Mt. Sinai.

But we add to it: Not only We will do it all, we will be obedient, but now We will demand others obey them also.

So we set up the grace of God that shows us that we are sinners, weak, dependent upon the Lord, as a LAW system. And then try to force it on others.

8.      It was not by accident that the OT Law and the Sermon on the Mount was given on a mountain. This was a picture of the Law of God coming from God to man.

It is God centered and not man centered. In order to understand the Word, to live the Word, to be RIGHT according to the Word we must begin with God and end with God. How does God think is paramount in our lives.

God tells us to consider, to think, to use the minds he gave us with the Doctrine His Spirit teaches us to come to His V/pt...not to come to a rational for the reason we are taking this or that action.

9.      When we approach God with a Law/Works system we will project into God what we think will impress Him.

When we approach God with a Grace/Faith system we will allow God to project into us His thinking.

THUS THE ISSUE: Do we dwell on sin, on our weaknesses, on our faults, all of which God is very aware of. Or do we dwell upon Him and consider ourselves alive to God in Jesus Christ?

10.   God policy towards us is grace, His action is love, His method is forgiveness, the relationship we have with Him is one of acceptance.

At justification He accepted you when you were in the sewer of sin, in the pit of depravity, in dungeon of deception, in the prison of perversity, in the enclave of evil, in stench of self service...and He love you.

That is GRACE, that is LOVE, that is His FORGIVENESS, that is ACCPTANCE in His beloved Son Jesus Christ.

11.   We are not given in the NT extensive policy for our function as believers individually nor corporately (the believer or the church). Some of these are found but do not in anyway cover every situation.

HOWEVER we are given principles that are to be our attitude:

Matthew 26, Mark 14, Luke 22, John 18: Peter denies the Lord three times. There is no greater SIN!!

Less than 40 days later: John 21:15-17 The Lord makes not merely His acceptance of Peter but Peter's ministry and service a single issue...Do you Love Me?

What is the issue we make: Do you love the Lord.

WE MAY WONDER HOW IS THE WORLD GOING to see us, what testimony will we have in the World:

John 13:34-35, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another."

When a brother sins what are we to do? Galatians 6:1 ff tells us: Brethren, even if a man is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness; {each one} looking to yourself, lest you too be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and thus fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself.

How do we deal with the sins of others?

Proverbs 10:12, Hatred stirs up strife, But love covers all multitude of sins.

12.   We are to have the mind and the attitude of our Saviour Jesus Christ:

Philippians 2:3-5, Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind let each of you regard one another as more important than himself; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus,

Whenever we get involved with the Law/Work approach we are abandoning the freedom we have in Christ and the Grace God has for us:

Colossians 2:20-3:2

If you have died with Christ to the elementary principles of the world, why, as if you were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees, such as,

Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch!

(which all refer to things destined to perish with the using)-- in accordance with the commandments and teachings of men?

These are matters which have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body, {but are} of no value against fleshly indulgence.

If then you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.

Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.

13.   Here is a principle then if we are to think like God: You will never go wrong if you take you stand with grace, love, and forgiveness because that is where God stands.

NOW AT VERSE 12 WE BEGIN A NEW PARAGRAPH that is only three verses long. In this paragraph Paul establishes a principle that he will then deal with through Romans 7: To what will you yield? To the sin nature or to God?

Romans 6:12

Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey its lusts.

Here we have a contrast to the thesis statement of Romans 5:21. We are to have grace reign in our lives.

And thus here we are commanded, as a present imperative, not to let sin, singular, the Sin Nature, reign in our mortal bodies.

AN IMPERATIVE MOOD sets up a decision we are to make. The decision of the believer's volition is to let sin reign or grace reign.

If we decide to let grace reign we will, by faith, recognize that we are dead to the Sin Nature.

If, however, we make a decision to let the Sin Nature reign, we will end up (an infinitive of results) obeying its lusts.

LUST is EPITHUMIA and in some instances it can be a desire for that which is acceptable.

Matthew 13:17, A desire to see prophecy fulfilled

Luke 22:15, Jesus' desire to eat the Passover with His disciples.

Two basic mindsets on this word converge in the NT:

JEWISH CONCEPT:

The Jewish use of the word “lust” in the intertestamental period became a synonym for CHA-MAD, to COVET.

To control LUST the Jew would move towards asceticism, the denial of desires, fasting, meticulously keeping Talmud Sabbath laws, denial of sexual drives.

During this period the Jews also developed a theology of sin that demanded more legalism, denial of desires, and increase ethical reflection.

Self discipline became nor merely a virtue but a demand of the Talmud for conquering lust.

The view was eventually reached that desire is the chief sin and the will of God could be expressed in a single formula, not to desire.

HELLENISTIC CONCEPT:

In Greece another track was taken. There the Stoic concept was that LUST was the opposite of RATIONALISM.

Aloofness and separation from the sensual world was the way to conquer LUST.

Zeno grouped together sorrow, fear, sexual pleasure, and lust as the four chief passions.

Each of these arise, in the Stoic idea, out of a wrong attitude to possess and the anxiety that comes when they are not present.

From that position it was easy for the Greeks to put lust as part of the body which is the prison for the soul during one's lifetime.

The Greek Stoic would then struggle against the Lusts of the flesh.

AS IT IS USED IN THE NT some of both elements are brought together:

It can refer to an evil desire that takes one away from God and His Word.

Mark 4:18-19 And others are the ones on whom seed was sown among the thorns; these are the ones who have heard the word, and the worries of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.

Lust is also seen as that which is promoted by Satan:

John 8:44, You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature; for he is a liar, and the father of lies.

As with the Greek idea, LUST is seen as a desire to possess something or someone else.

Matthew 5:27-28, You have heard that it was said, You shall not commit adultery; but I say to you, that everyone who looks on a woman to lust for her has committed adultery with her already in his heart.

In the desire to possess, control, dominate someone else LUST is the inability to control ones own body:

I Thessalonians 4:3-5, For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from fornication; that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in lustful passion, like the Gentiles who do not know God.

Therefore, it is irrational, lacking sense, lacking the control we should be able to exercise from the mind to the body.

APPLICATION: When we speak of control of the body we must be careful not to think that the solution to this is stoicism or some extreme form of self control. That concept eliminates the freedom we have at times to lose control. To allow, within a proper setting, our emotions to fully express themselves. To have a joy that is unspeakable, and thus unable to be defined with words.

David had this in II Samuel 6 when the Ark of the Covenant was brought to Jerusalem and he, with total lack of control, took off his kingly robes and danced naked before the Ark...and we are told that a legalistic stoic, his wife Michal, criticized him for it.

Some might see Paul's, Peter's, John's use of the words lust of the flesh as a Stoic concept. That the body is the seat of lust while the soul is the seat of rational thinking. However, these writers use FLESH as a description of the Sin Nature, a concept unknown in the Greek world prior to the NT.

While the flesh, the Sin Nature contaminates and the body, it influences the soul.

For the believer the influence is the Holy Spirit ministering to the human spirit:

I Thessalonians 5:23, Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

I Thessalonians 5:24, Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass.

AGAIN, the emphasis is on what God will do, not what we do.

However, since it is God's desire for us not to be distracted, not to follow Satan's plan, not possess or control another, not to lack control of ourselves, LUST also violates God's will for our us.

SUMMARY OF LUST:

We must not fall into an artificial dualism or even trialism regarding who we are. As believers we are body, soul, and spirit. There three are a connected part of one whole, YOU. The person you are, the person God accepts.

Mankind has desires, there are things in life that we desire. Desire, is not lust.

There are desires of the human spirit:

Ecclesaties 3:11 He has made everything appropriate in its time. He has also set eternity in their heart, yet so that man will not find out the work which God has done from the beginning even to the end.

Because of what God has done to us at salvation, the spirit yearns for God and desires His approval, closeness, fathership.

There are desires of the soul:

We desire relationships with others, we desire friends, we desire that someone know us, that we are significant. In our soul we desire to be loved.

In our soul we desire what is good for others.

Romans 10:1 Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their [Israel's] salvation.

We desire to be with others:

Romans 15:23, But now, with no further place for me in these regions, and since I have had for many years a longing to come to you.

And there are also desires of the Body:

Luke 22:15, And He (the Lord) said to them (the Twelve), I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer;

Both food and fellowship

And we have a desire for physical intimacy, and sexual contact:

I Corinthians 7:5, Stop depriving one another, except by agreement for a time that you may devote yourselves to prayer, and come together again lest Satan tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

We are a connected whole, body, soul, and spirit. We must not separate or try to set one part against the other assuming God accepts one and not the other or one more than the other.

The only thing that can even pierce as deep as the immaterial part of man is the Word of God. It goes into us as a surgeon would when going into the very bone and marrow, which is not separated, but connected.

Hebrews 4:12, For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

When a surgeon gets to the bones and narrow, he is deep into the material part of man. The word goes that deep into the immaterial part of man.

The analogy of joints and marrow see the connectedness of the soul and the human spirit, not a separation.

Desire then is not opposed to God (as the Jews would have supposed), nor is it irrational (as the Greeks would have had it be). It is very much a part of who we are and the person God accepts by His grace.

Desire becomes lust when:

·        Our desires distract us from the wonderful things that God has for us.

·        When it is part of Satan's influence and plan (idolatry).

·        When our desire would be hurtful to another, when we would try to possess and control another.

Psalm 139:23-24, Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me and know my anxious thoughts; And see if there be any hurtful way in me, And lead me in the everlasting way.

·        When our desire takes over and we no longer control it but it controls us. We lose self control and we can then so easily hurt others and hurt ourselves.

Romans 6:13

And do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.

Here are the mechanics for the faith decision that we make to not let sin reign in our mortal bodies but to let grace reign in our lives.

In the KJV the Greek word is translated "yield"...

1.      The word is PARISTJMI and is a present imperative, indicating a choice on our part to keep on doing something.

2.      The word in its simple form means to stand before or along side.

3.      It has a legal meaning in that one would present themselves before a judge.

4.      It has a military meaning in that one would put himself under orders to his commander.

5.      Another military meaning is found in surrender, the enemy surrenders to one who is the conqueror

6.      It described a servant who would present himself to a ruler, to put himself at his Lord's disposal.

7.      It had a religious meaning in that one would present his sacrifice at the temple.

Romans 12:1, I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service [of worship].

SO THE WORD PRESENT or yield sets up a choice. Present yourself as an instrument or tool of the sin nature for the LUST of the sin nature to reign in your life.

OR PRESENT YOURSELF TO God for Grace to reign in your life.

CONSIDER THIS:

We all know how powerful of a force lust can be. We even have a criminal volition called crimes of passion which would be better termed crimes of lust.

All of us have at times been driven by lust. It is powerful, overwhelming, almost uncontrollable.

Yet as powerful as lust is, grace is more powerful.

If God tells us that grace is to reign through the Righteousness that He has imputed to us, then we know that grace is more powerful than lust.

If you want a comparison to help determine how powerful the grace of God is, consider that it is more powerful than any lust of mankind.

AND THE REASON GRACE IS MORE POWERFUL THAN LUST is because of what grace provides:

Galatians 5:16, But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.

This does not say that we suppress lust, that we deny it, that we put ourselves under a law system to avoid it. It tells us that the way we will not carry out the lust of the flesh will be by our Walk by the Spirit.

Walking was very common in the old world, something everyone did, a very non-meritorious action.

Galatians 5:17-18, For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the Law.

An extension of the Angelic Conflict. This is the covert, inward warfare. But it is not between you and Satan or even you and the Sin Nature. Here conflict is between the Holy Spirit (indwelling you) and the Sin Nature.

The Lust of the Sin Nature and the Holy Spirit are in conflict. Is the Sin Nature more powerful than the Holy Spirit or is the Holy Spirit more powerful than the Sin Nature?

This is a middle voice of advantage, so what is the advantage?

In order that you cannot do the things that you prefer.

You now have a more powerful option than just will power or self discipline. These do not always work when it comes to things you prefer or things you wish to do or are driven to do by the lust of the Sin Nature.

But the Holy is more powerful, He is more powerful than the Sin Nature (a thing) and more powerful than Satan (the supreme angel).

I John 4:4, Greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.

In 6:18 notice how Paul eliminates the law approach: But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the Law.

The Jews thought more laws would counteract lust, the Greeks thought the self disciplined life would take care of it. Both are wrong for the believer, we have the grace of God that allows us to be led by the Spirit. He is the victory.

Then in verse 22-23 Paul gives us specifics as what is produced by God in us that will eliminate lust:

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

The preposition AGAINST is KATA which looks at a standard set along side the fruit of the Spirit to establish then or define then. And there is not law standard.

THEREFORE: The antithesis to lust is grace which sets us the filling of the Holy Spirit, which then goes on to walking in the Spirit and the production of the fruit of the Spirit.

PRINCIPLE: If you yield to God and walk by the Holy Spirit producing in you love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness you will find no need to lust.

Galatians 5:15, If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.

"And do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God."

The word INSTRUMENT is OPLON and is as weapons and armor (but not as in the full armor of Ephesians 6).

The concept is one that includes the necessity for someone to do something with the instrument or the weapon.

An instrument or weapon is on no value, no use until it is placed in the hand of one who knows how to use it.

The word BODY is not found in this verse. The phrase used is MELJ UMWV, "your members".

Those members are weapons, they are instruments. The members are our total being, not merely the material but the immaterial, our emotions, our temperaments, our minds, the body itself are interments to be placed in the hand of God.

We are ALIVE FROM THE DEAD, Paul has already shown us that, and now we can yield to God as...

Instruments of righteousness: How do we do that?

God has declared us righteous at justification and we continue in His righteousness in sanctification.

Look back over Romans to what Paul has said of Righteousness:

Romans 3:21 through 26

Romans 4:5 and 6

Romans 5:17

Then also consider:

Romans 10:1 through 5 [Paul speaks of Israel]

Romans 14:17, For the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

Galatians 2:21, I do not nullify the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly.

Philippians 3:9, And [that I] may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith.

Also II Corinthians 11:12-15 Satan's counterfeit Righteousness.

HERE IS THE PRINCIPLE: We are not righteous nor do we have righteousness by what we do. We have righteousness because of what Christ did and what the Holy Spirit keeps on doing.

Being righteous is to be RIGHT and when we are right with God, both in relationship and in truth, then His righteousness will be formed in us.

Romans 6:14

For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law, but under grace.

Here the line is drawn, it is not drawn in sand to be changed by the whims of man, it is etched in the solid rock of the mind of Christ.

SIN is HAMARTIA and it is singular referring to the sin nature.

So it is the sin nature that shall not be master over you.

The verb is future and should read "shall not lord it over you".

The idea is one of dominion or rulership yet it is not total domination.

That would include the prefix KATA and is used that way when speaking of Satan's rule over one who is demon possessed, the rulers of the Roman Empire, and as a warning in I Peter 5:3 that the Pastor is not to rule over the flock in that manner.

So it is not despotic, absolute rule or lordship and that is because you, as a believer, have as a exercise of your will the liberty to make a decision by faith to consider yourself dead to the Sin Nature and alive unto God.

THEN WE HAVE AN EXPLAINATION of why this is a true statement:

For you are not under law, but under grace.

In the Sermon on the Mount we see two models or approaches to God and His Word and to the silence of God that determine whether the believer is on the path of Grace or the path of Law.

MODEL ONE, THE LAW: God is silent on a matter of decision.

Deuteronomy 12:32, Whatever I command you, you shall be careful to do; you shall not add to nor take away from it.

You make the fatal assumption that you have to figure out what God thinks. So you consider this verse, that doctrine, some principle. You bring in culture and societal norms. A conclusion is then made, this is what God thinks.

This model sees the acceptance of God determined by the believers ability to come up with a right answer. Right answer, God approves. Wrong answer, God disapproves.

That conclusion becomes a law not only for self but for others. Laws are then added to the body of Scripture and more laws result in less liberty.

MODEL TWO, GRACE: God's silence on matter of life require us to make decisions.

We depend upon God the Holy Spirit to lead us. We consider the doctrine we have yet know that no specific verse, passage, doctrine, or principle directly applies to the decision we face.

We make a decision that is appropriate for us and us alone.

II Corinthians 3:17, Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

Since this a conclusion we have come to we do not impose this upon the thinking of God or upon others.

God acceptance and approval of us is not based upon what we decide in the areas of life in which God has chosen to be silent.

We can then accept others even when they make a decision that is the opposite of the one we might make.

ILLUSTRATION: Do you send you kids private school, a Christian school, a Public school, or do you school them at home?

Nothing in the Word of God on this. I may go into the Word, be lead of the Spirit to make one choice and you may make another. God is silent on the matter so I cannot reject your decision or you.

WARNING: This model deals in those things in which God has chosen to be silent. Where we are given specific direction in the word of God, like with certain sins, or like with being a part of a LC, we need to, by faith, obey.

WHEN GOD IS SILENT WE also apply what we know of God: His grace, His love, His forgiveness, His acceptance.

You never will go wrong on the side of grace...

LET ME GIVE YOU AN EXAMPLE OF ALL THIS:

1. We have studied in the past the pressing issue of the Corinthian church, to eat or not to eat meat that had been offered to idols.

Paul begins his answer in I Corinthians 6:12, All things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered by anything.

I Corinthians 8:4, Therefore concerning the eating of things sacrificed to idols, we know that there is no such thing as an idol in the world, and that there is no God but one.

Read I Corinthians 8:7-13

Then in I Corinthians 10:23 he repeats: All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things edify.

Two applications:

1.      In Privacy, I Corinthians 10:25-26. Eat anything that is sold in the meat market, without asking questions for conscience' sake; for the earth is the Lord's, and all it contains (from Psalm 24:1).

2.      In Public: I Corinthians 10:27-29. If one of the unbelievers invites you, and you wish to go, eat anything that is set before you, without asking questions for conscience' sake. But if anyone should say to you, This is meat sacrificed to idols, do not eat it, for the sake of the one who informed you, and for conscience' sake; I mean not your own conscience, but the other man's; for why is my freedom judged by another's conscience?

PRINCIPLE: We have liberty but also must apply the laws of Love, Expediency, and sacrifice.

NOW PRETEND FOR A MOMENT you do not have this information. You live in Corinth, you got saved just prior to Paul leaving town. This epistle has not yet arrived.

What are you to do? God is silent...

Maybe some fellow believers have invited you over for steaks and you know the only place to get a steak is from the shambles, the pagan temple meat market.

So you begin to search the Scriptures. You have an Old Testament and you read:

Leviticus 19:4, Do not turn to idols or make for yourselves molten gods; I am the Lord your God.

Deuteronomy 11:16, Beware, lest your hearts be deceived and you turn away and serve other gods and worship them.

Exodus 34:14-15, For you shall not worship any other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God--lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land and they play the harlot with their gods, and sacrifice to their gods, and someone invite you to eat of his sacrifice.

Then you remember something you heard about a council in Jerusalem and how the leaders of the church said:

Acts 15:29, You are to abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication; if you keep yourselves free from such things, you will do well.

But was that just at the temple or did that mean at home too?

Now armed with this information, you make a decision. You decide that God does not want Christians to eat meat offered to idols. God was silent on this matter to this point, but now you think you know what God thinks.

So you start a crusade, you get a banner, get others to march, you picket the temple and the shambles, you chant, you sing, you light candles, you campaign against the sin of eating the idol's meat.

And remember, you have some pretty good verses to use on this matter. You can pull them out and get very dogmatic about what God thinks (or what you think He thinks).

Then you go to Bible Class one day and there the Pastor is reading Paul's first epistle to the Corinthians. And you find out that God was silent so you could have liberty.

All things are lawful for me, but not all things are expedient.

You were wrong, especially in trying to force your decision upon others.

But you would have even been more wrong in thinking that you had to figure out what God thinks...that is part of the fatal assumption of the Law.

Summary:

1.      Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the Law. Our focus is to be upon Him.

2.      In Grace God has given us instructions regarding our relationship with Him.

3.      These instructions are both in the area of things we are to do by faith, study His word, pray, assemble ourselves with other believers. And in the area of sins of idolatry that would distract us from our relationship with Him.

4.      In His grace God has also given us instructions regarding our relationships with others.

5.      These also are both positive, love one another, forgive, have compassion, be accepting of others as He is, encourage one another. And in the negative, do not slander, gossip, steal, harm, devour one another.

6.      In His grace God has given us lists of sins that tell us we are sinner and in desperate need of His grace and power.

7.      In His grace God has given us the power of the Word and the Spirit to guide our lives.

8.      When God declares in His Word that something is right or something is wrong we can say with confidence, Thus saith the Lord.

But when God is silent let us also be silent in love for one another.

SO THEN, WHETHER GOD HAS spoken or God has been silent, it is all grace!

Romans 6:15

What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? May it never be!

With the bold declarations of our freedom from the Sin Nature and that we are dead to sin, Paul now heads off a possible wrong conclusion.

Here SIN is a verb, indicating personal acts of sin that originate with the Sin Nature.

Remember, we sin because we are sinners.

This rhetorical question is similar to the one that began this chapter:

Rom. 6:1, What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace might increase?

There, the issue of continuing in sin, a dative noun. Here, a verb in the aorist tense so it is single acts of sin.

Paul has used in Romans the verb form for sin six times but until now it has been used historically of Adam or the whole human race or describing the unbeliever.

So this is the first mention in all that Paul has said in Romans where specific acts of sins are attributed to a Christian believer.

SINS ARE MENTIONED HERE because of the false conclusion that could be drawn from all that he has said of the believer being dead to the Sin Nature and no longer under the Law but under grace.

Would that mean that we could just engage in acts of sin without any results? He answers, "may it never be"!

This is a very common error made by those who think that removal of a law system and the believer’s stand in grace means that we have a license to sin all we want.

That type of thinking, however, is as much a part of the Law system as is legalism. We could also call the law system performance-based Christianity.

And the error of performance-based Christianity begins with a false view of God, or self, and of sin.

REASON: The person who says grace is a license to sin fails to see what sin is all about. They view sin simply in terms of God's absolute and often arbitrary standard.

But certain human attitudes and actions are declared by God to be sin because they harm our relationship with Him, with others, and even to ourselves in our own self image and self love.

In performance-based Christianity the believer’s view of God is that of a judge having decided certain things that man really wants to do are sin for no other reason than His decision.

But sin is defined in the Word because God loves us and wants us to love him, others, and self.

That is grace-based Christianity and sees God wanting His very highest and best for us.

In PBC we see God establishing a list of sins and we have to not do them. It is up to us.

In GBC we do not sin because we want a good relationship with Him, others, and self.

In the OT God was very specific in listing sins as a part of the Law. But even there we see grace. God's desire for His people to have good relationships:

EXAMPLE: The Ten Commandments:

1.      Thou shall have no other God before me.

2.      Thou shall not make for yourselves idols.

3.      Thou shall not take the name of the Lord in vain.

4.      Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.

5.      Honor your father and mother.

6.      Thou shall not murder.

7.      Thou shall not commit adultery.

8.      Thou shall not steal.

9.      Thou shall not bear false witness.

10.   Thou shall not covet.

COMMANDMENTS 1 to 4: Relationship to God

COMMANDMENTS 5 to 10: Relationship to Others

SO THEN, WHAT IS MY MOTIVE is not wanting to sin? I do not sin because the God of all grace has graciously told me what will harm the relationship I have with Him and with others.

Romans 6:16

Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness?

Paul explains why the reasoning of v 15 is unacceptable.

NOTICE: Paul gives no middle ground. He states only two absolutes. Either the believer has chosen to be a slave to sin or a slave of obedience.

This verse emphasizes the absolute status of the believer of being either in fellowship with God or out of fellowship, either spiritual or carnal.

DO YOU NOT KNOW: This is OIDA, a self evident truth. He is using a simple illustration that they all will understand. They knew about slavery.

You present yourself as a slave. This is volunteer slavery, and you do so knowing you will have to obey the one to whom you present yourself.

TWO ABSOLUTE CHOICES: No Middle Ground,

1.      Present yourself as a slave to the Sin Nature which leads to death.

2.      Present yourself to as a slave of obedience (to God) which leads to righteousness.

QUESTION: When does this choice take place? While out of fellowship or upon getting back into fellowship? Is this spiritual recovery or is this the first step in walking in the spirit?

Well, this is the first step you take in your walk in the Spirit. Romans 12:1. You cannot present an unholy, filthy sacrifice to God. And that is what we are when we sin. So we confess, depend by faith on the Cross, and then present ourselves to God.

This will LEAD TO RIGHTEOUSNESS...which here is a synonym for sanctification and eternal life (see v 22).

Romans 6:17

But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.

As Paul thinks back to salvation he praises God not man. So often we praise man for their faith in Christ but Paul shows us a much better perspective...thanks be to God!!

These believers in Rome are perhaps wondering how do they present themselves to God? What are the mechanics of this, it sounds difficult, it sounds like a struggle.

But it is no more of a struggle than when you were saved and by faith believed in Christ.

Colossians 2:6-7, As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, having been firmly rooted {and now} being built up in Him and established in your faith, just as you were instructed, and overflowing with gratitude.

Even when they were slaves of sin, they became obedient. How? By faith, by trusting in what God had done.

This faith came literally out of the heart, the soul of the believing sinner.

AND NOTICE THE OBJECT: "That form of teaching".

They received God's Word, His promise of salvation by faith in Christ.

AND NOW THEY ALSO were receiving God's Word, His promise of sanctification by faith in the power of the Spirit (Romans 8)

The word COMMITTED is passive verb that would better be translated DELIVERED or ENTRUSTED WITH.

The idea is difficult to translate but basically states that the teaching they received required a decision on their part.

JUST AS THE TEACHING THEY ARE now receiving requires a decision on their parts.

Will you believe it?

Romans 6:18

And having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.

That was positional, that was the subject of the first part of Romans 6, now make it experiential not by switching to some works system or performance based Christianity, but in the same manner in which you were saved, by faith.

The prohibition, the struggle that Paul will deal with in Romans 7 is not so much a struggle of sin and righteousness but a struggle of Law and Grace.

So the only way to grow in Christ is by faith, every good thing that comes to the believer comes by way of faith.

Law, works, legalisms, ritual, all these stand as rigid systems that can distract a believer from grace/faith.

Grace and Faith place a demand upon the believer and that demand is Spiritual Love.

Spiritual Love is not a rigid system, it is a grace system. Spiritual Love demands sacrifice and sacrifice is always hard.

Whereas a rigid system is easy, at least easier, it is defined, specified, you can follow it.

Grace/Faith and Spiritual Love are described, but not defined.

But it is only on the basis of Grace and Faith that we can progress towards friendship with Jesus Christ.

Two Promises, both from Philippians:

Philippians 1:5-6, In view of your participation in the gospel from the first day until now. For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.

How did they participate in the Gospel, by faith and now they continue in faith.

Philippians 2:13, For it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.

At salvation we became, at that moment, slaves of God's righteousness.

That was not merely positional but experiential, and that experience continued until we sinned, quenching, grieving, or lying to the Holy Spirit.

When we did sin and when we sin now, we need to deal with that sin by confession and faith and then present ourselves to God leading to His righteousness in us.

Romans 6:19

I am speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness, resulting in further lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness, resulting in sanctification.

WEAKNESS OF YOUR FLESH: Indicating that these are immature believers and in need of analogies and figures of speech to understand spiritual things.

While the unbeliever is in bondage to the sin nature, as a slave the believer is in bondage to God and God's righteousness.

We have freewill, God gives us the freedom of our volition to make the choice to present ourselves to Him.

JUST AS YOU PRESENTED: This looks at a past action, aorist tense.

Slaves to impurity and lawlessness: Things UNCLEAN and things opposed to LAW.

In the Gospels and in Acts, the adjective form of this word, UNCLEAN, is consistently used for unclean spirits or demons.

In the Epistles, the noun form found here, is used for anything that is unclean in the sense that it separates one from the presence of God.

So it is behavior and attitudes that are rejected by God and thus separate man from God.

The word LAWLESS is the word LAW with a negative prefix, opposed to law and thus authority.

Preceding each of these is a dative definite article which not only views these as supposedly beneficial for the one engaged in such activity but also see them as two activities:

Uncleanness and Lawlessness sum up the attitude and actions of the sin nature. One separates from God and the other separates from society.

THESE LEAD TO: INIQUITY: The same word as LAWLESSNESS.

The difference is that while in the first the man is doing this as a dative of advantage for self, thinking such action will be beneficial, here it is a accusative in which God declares this one as LAWLESS, in INIQUITY, and receiving no benefit from Him.

BUT NOW THE ALTERNATIVE: So now present (aorist tense) your members slaves to righteousness unto sanctification.

Salves to RIGHTEOUSNESS: The faith decision to be in a right relationship with God and to be right according to His Word.

The result is sanctification: HAGIASMOS, a word not found in the Gospels.

Refers to the work of God in the believer as the believer grows in the CCL.

II Thessalonians 2:13, But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God has chosen you [as firstfruits-justification] with a view towards [eternal] salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth.

All three aspects of our salvation are in this verse and notice how sanctification comes about: By the Holy Spirit and by faith in the Word.

LISTEN TO WHAT ZODHIATES says of this word: It is a process...it is similar to justification, which denotes not only the act of God's free grace in justifying sinners, but also the result of justification upon the sinner in making him just and equipping him to recognize the rights of God on his life. Sanctification refers not only to the activity of the Holy Spirit in setting man apart unto salvation and transferring him into the ranks of the redeemed, but also to the Holy Spirit enabling him to be holy even as God is holy.

WHAT BEGINS ALL THIS? A faith decision to present yourself, surrender to a right relationship with God and to be right by His word.

A DECISION OF FAITH, NOT WORKS, NOT A PROMISE, NOT A PLEDGE TO DO BETTER, NOT LAW, NOT EVEN OBEDIENCE...BUT FAITH IN THE WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT AND THE FAITH IN THE WORD OF GOD.

Romans 6:20

For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.

The word FREE in the Greek text had a political and social use in that it referred to one who was independent or free from any obligation or restraint.

Slaves of the Sin Nature have no obligation of righteousness nor the restraint of righteousness.

Romans 6:21

Therefore what benefit were you then deriving from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the outcome of those things is death.

The word BENEFIT is KAROS, fruit. Same as the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5 and the fruit of righteousness in Hebrews 12:11.

There was no fruit, no production, no benefit, no advantage in the former life.

ASHAMED is a complex passive with a deponent of the preposition EPI and means in the passive "to receive shame upon one's self".

Paul used this word earlier in Romans 1:16 when he said he was not ashamed of the Gospel.

Here the shame comes to the believer as he looks back at his life as an unbeliever. General rule, some cannot remember when they were not believers. The shame is passive, received, in light of the holiness of God.

It is passive, thus not an active force, a recognition that what was done as an unbeliever would have had an outcome:

FOR THE END OF THOSE THINGS, DEATH: Spiritual death and eventually eternal death.

Romans 6:22

But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your benefit, resulting in sanctification and the outcome, eternal life.

BUT NOW, address the believer

HAVING BEEN FREED FROM SIN and enslaved to God:

Both aorist, passive, participles: These two participles share a common point in time.

When we put faith alone in Christ alone.

PASSIVE VOICE: God did this. It was not our action that freed us from the Sin Nature and enslaved us to God but God's action of justification.

NOW we derive benefit: Again FRUIT:

But even the fruit is not the end product, the result of the fruit of righteousness is sanctification and the end of that is eternal life.

The word END or OUTCOME is TELOS, and does not imply a result but rather the finish line or the completion of the process.

In II Thessalonians 2:13 we have all three aspects of salvation, Justification, the passive receiving of God's righteousness, sanctification, glorification.

Romans 6:23

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

WAGES verse A FREE GIFT...

The word FREE GIFT is CARISMA, from the same root as GRACE, a grace gift from God.

In Romans 8:10 and 13 relates the life we have, and remember that we have eternal life now, to the Holy Spirit.

So the power for this eternal life is the Holy Spirit.

The sphere of this free gift of eternal life is IN CHRIST JESUS.

PRINCIPLES:

1.      This verse looks back to the time in which we were unsaved. We were on a course of life in which sin reigned in us and the outcome of that is death.

Physical death apart from Christ and the Second Death, eternity in the Lake of Fire.

2.      By comparison we now have received a free gift, the Holy Spirit placing us in Christ and there we have eternal life.

3.      The eternal life we have allows us to then live with grace reigning in our lives (Romans 5:21) and in the newness of life (Romans 6:4).

4.      God has made all this possible for us, it is a real potential of the believer and comes not by works but by faith.

5.      The wages of sin being death can be applied to the believer only in that when we do sin, get out of fellowship, we are in a temporal spiritual death (being out of fellowship):

Romans 8:6 For the mind set on the flesh (carnal mind) is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace.

I John 5:16-17 talks of sins that lead to death, a premature death of the believer who is in reversionism (backslidden).

Romans Chapter Seven

The struggle we read of in Romans Seven is a necessary link between the position and potentials we have as explained in Romans 6 and the reality of the Christian Life lived depending on the Holy Spirit, as described in Romans Eight.

We should remember as we progress through this chapter that Paul is looking at a progression. He really set us up for this in Romans Five where he spoke of the much more things that we have. His goal is much more grace, much more liberty, much more security, much more divine power, much more intimacy with God.

In Rom 7:11-3 Paul begins with an analogy. And interestingly, he pulls the analogy right out of the OT Law.

Paul is not afraid of the Law, in fact he honors the Law and is aware of its divine eternal purpose. He sees its purpose and its fulfillment in Christ. He sees that he can, even now a being free from the Law, go to the Law for guidance. He does this in his epistles several times.

I Corinthians 9:9 For it is written in the Law of Moses, You shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing. God is not concerned about oxen, is He?

While we are not under the demands of the Law we can make application from the law but these are application and not mandates. They guide and direct but they do not force and demand.

Romans 7:1-3

Or do you not know, brethren (for I am speaking to those who know the law), that the law has jurisdiction over a person as long as he lives?

For the married woman is bound by law to her husband while he is living; but if her husband dies, she is released from the law concerning the husband.

So then if, while her husband is living, she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress, though she is joined to another man.

Paul makes an analogy, and an analogy must not be taken too far. Analogies, like parables, are designed to get across one point of truth. We really fall into an allegorical interpretation of the Bible when we try to get too much out of an analogy.

In verse 1, Paul establishes that the only thing that can take a person away from the demands of the Law (and he is speaking expressly to the Jews of Rome) is death.

But remember: Back at the beginning of Romans 6 he talked of a death that was positional with and in Christ:

Romans 6:3-4 Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

Look ahead also to Romans 7:6 But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter.

Verse 2, the analogy to OT marriage Law: For the married woman is bound by law to her husband while he is living; but if her husband dies, she is released from the law concerning the husband.

Very simple analogy. Paul is not including divorce, he is not giving a message on the dissolution of a marriage, he is not including separation or annulment. He is making one point - married, both husband and wife alive, bound together by law.

If the husband dies, she is free from that Law.

Verse 3 - describes what happens if there is no death:

So then if, while her husband is living, she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress, though she is joined to another man.

Notice: There is nothing here about divorce, nothing assumes that they have separated. The only options are that the husband is still alive which would mean the wife is an adulteress or that he is dead which would means she is not an adulteress.

The analogy is applied in verses 4 to 6.

Romans 7:4

Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, that we might bear fruit for God.

We see how Paul applies the analogy and how it is not specific in every detail. Analogies usually are not.

WE AS BELIEVERS = THE WIFE

THE LAW = THE FORMER HUSBAND

THE NEW HUSBAND = JESUS CHRIST

In the application we, the believer (wife), is made to die to the Law through the literal earthly human body of Christ, His work on the Cross.

Paul has not introduced the concept of the church as the body of Christ in this epistle. And does not until Romans chapter 12.

MY BRETHREN: He is speaking to believers, this in not salvation but the living of the Christian Life.

The result of our positional death with Christ is that we can now be joined to Christ who was raised from the dead by the power of the Father.

THAT YOU MIGHT BE JOINED is an infinitive which views this as the result of our death to the Law.

We could not be joined to Christ if the former husband was alive but he, the Law, is not, because we have been made to die to the Law.

If we, having been joined to Christ, go back to the Law, it is like going back to a former husband.

Now what would you think, if you were married to a woman who had a former husband and you came home from work and there they were together in each others arms?

I do not think you would like it and I do not think Christ likes it when we go back to law.

In a further application of the analogy, Paul brings up an additional result...

That we might bear the fruit for God.

This phrase begins with INA, which looks at a result.

The result is that we bear fruit, which is a one word verb in the Greek and is an aorist, act, subjunctive which looks at a future events based upon present conditions.

The FRUIT we are to bear belongs to God, a dative definite article and dative noun.

THIS IS SET IN CONTRAST WITH v 5: The fruit of the Law is death.

Romans 7:5

For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law, were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death.

Now here we have a description. Much has been written and even debated regarding what the former husband in the analogy represents. Here we see that Paul is not specific but rather expansive.

WHILE WE WERE is a verb in the imperfect tense, completed past action.

Hence, when we were unbelievers, not having died to the law, not being joined to Christ.

The Law aroused sinful passions or affections:

PASSION is the word PAQEMA and looks at passive emotional influences that motivate.

These motives operated in us by way of the Sin Nature

In our members...

So the sin operates by way of the presence of the sin nature that is in us, with reference to the unbeliever.

And that brought about death (Spiritual Death of the unbeliever).

SO THEN: What we have died to and what is now dead to us is not just one specific aspect of this process but the whole process that leads us to spiritual death:

LAW  Sin Nature  SINS  DEATH

Paul's emphasis is on the Law because if you take out the first step in the process the process does not continue to the result of death.

Spiritual Death is defined by and demanded by the Law revealed by God so without the first the last does not follow in the logical argument.

THIS RELATES TO WHAT PAUL HAS already said of the LAW:

Romans 3:20 For through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.

Romans 4:15 For the Law brings about wrath, but where there is no law, neither is there violation.

Romans 5:20 And the Law came in that the transgression might increase.

Going back now to verse 4.

We see the new process that we now have in Christ.

Gordon Fee in his monumental work God's Empowering Presence, describes what Paul is doing:

By this language Paul is moving towards that life of the Spirit, who in Galatians 5:22 is responsible for producing such fruit.

In this verse, v 4, Paul then describes what happened at justification and the potential of our sanctification.

Romans 6:22 But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your (fruit) benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome, eternal life.

Hebrews 12:11 All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness.

TRAINED BY IT: Passive voice. The subject receives the action of the verb. This is grace. We not only receive the training itself...but the results of the training as well. People! This is grace all the way, GOD DOES IT ALL.

NOTICE the grace in this passage:

1.      God designs the race course, the training course in life.

2.      God designs the training schedule.

3.      3.God produces the results.

IN VERSE 11, the results of this training is the Peaceful Fruit of Righteousness.

James 3:17-18

But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle (considerate), reasonable (submissive), full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering (impartial), without hypocrisy. And the seed whose fruit is righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

NIV states: Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness.

DESCRIPTION OF RIGHTEOUSNESS:

Pure: Freedom from defilement or impurities.

Peace loving or Peaceable:

Root: Particularly in a single sense, the opposite of war and dissension.

Metaphorically: Peace of mind, tranquillity, arising from reconciliation with God and a sense of divine favor.

EIREINIKOS: One who is disposed to peace, Peaceable.

Considerate or Gentle:

To yield. Mildness in the sense of not insisting on the letter of the Law in a given case. It came to express moderation of kindness towards others.

Submissive or Reasonable:

Reasonable is to be easy to get along with, easily persuaded when the truth is presented. Not taking a stand when no stand needs to be taken.

This means that a person will seek that which unifies rather than that which divides.

Full of mercy:

Compassion or active pity. It has the sense of goodness, Mercy sees someone's problems then acts in a manner that is not deserved but full of mercy (the holding back of what is deserved) and grace (the extending of what is not deserved).

Impartial:

KRINO: To sift through the facts and then to decide. To judge but to know enough to withhold judgment or opinion until the facts are in. Or to know enough not to have an opinion in some matters.

DIA KRINO: To judge or make a distinction between two.. by adding the prefix KRINO is made stronger.

But our word is ADIAKRITOS: Used only here in Scripture.

It means without doubts...without division. It expresses the distinctive assurance and resolution of faith...so it means without wavering or unshakable.

Sincere or Without Hypocrisy

Originally it meant inexperienced in the art of acting. In the New Testament it came to mean one without hypocrisy or pretense, genuine, real, true, sincere.

The legalist is the one who pretends to be righteous but is in reality a bad actor full of arrogance, unrighteous.

Romans 7:6

But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter.

The word RELEASED is an aorist tense that looks back to salvation and is the same word used in the analogy of marriage in verse 2...wife is released from the Law concerning her husband.

Paul also used the word in Romans 6:6 Knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin;

It means "to make idle, to make of no effect". The Law still exists, the sin nature is still present in us but we have died to them, we are no longer under that bondage unless we chose to be. To go back to the former husband.

But when we do we make something, or someone else idle:

Galatians 5:4 You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace.

The word SEVERED is the same word we have here RELEASED. When we go back to the Law we make Christ of no effect in our lives.

But when we are in fellowship, the Law and the Sin Nature are of no effect in our lives.

BOUND means not only to be possessed but to be suppressed.

As long as you are suppressed by the Law you cannot be free to follow your new husband, the Lord Jesus Christ.

BUT WE ARE NO LONGER BOUND so that:

We serve in newness of spirit and not in oldness of letter.

Absence of the definite article before SPIRIT would indicate that Paul referees to the human spirit, that spirit that is created in man at salvation.

This reflects all the way back to Romans 2:29

But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit [in spirit], not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God.

The human spirit is that immaterial part of the believer that is given by God, belongs to God, ministered to by the Holy Spirit, is the place where truth is stored, from which truth influences the soul, and the part of man that serves God.

The human spirit is one third of what you are as a believer. It is one third of the connected whole of the body, the soul, and the human spirit.

AND THAT IS HOW WE ARE TO SERVE GOD, in the newness of the human spirit, not in the oldness of the letter of the Law.

SOME PRINCIPLES:

1.      Being made a creature in Christ is not small thing even for God. It took the sending of His Son and the Sacrifice of His Son, and the Resurrection of His Son to accomplish it.

2.      We are new creatures because we have something now we did not have before, a human spirit.

3.      In the human spirit we can now serve God in that spirit. That service is not from our ability, it is from all that God gives us by way of position and possession and potential.

4.      The human spirit and our new creature status came about by grace.

5.      When we want to go back to the letter of the Law we forget who we are, what we are, we forget about grace.

6.      It is impossible to serve God by the letter of the Law.

7.      And that thought begins to set up the conflict of this chapter. You cannot serve God, please God, have the freedom God wants you to have when you are bound by the Law, living in the Sin Nature.

Galatians 5:1 It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.

At this point, a new paragraph begins.

In Romans 7:1-6 Paul has shown that we are not under the Law. In Romans 7:7-14 he will show that a believer who chooses to put himself under the Law fails to avail himself to the resources of grace and is living a life of defeat.

Romans 7:7

What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? May it never be! On the contrary, I would not have come to know sin except through the Law; for I would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said, You shall not covet.

If we were bound by the Law, if we have now been released from the Law, should we conclude that the Law was sin?

Paul says, may it never be!

ALLA is the strongest contrast in the Greek

I would not have come to know sin except through law.

Here he removes the definite article so as to broaden out this principle. In the first use of NOMOS and in the last use in this verse he is referring to the OT Law.

But here, with this more general statement he referees to any law.

Romans 4:15, Where there is no law, neither is there violation.

We cannot assume that man automatically realizes that certain thoughts or words or actions are sin. Law indicates to us what is and what is not a violation.

EXAMPLE: Have you ever been driving down the highway and wondered, what is the speed limit? Am I going too fast, too slow? Until you see the speed limit sign, the Law, you do not know.

Paul adds one more point: For I would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said, You shall not covet.

This phrase begins with TE GAP which translates into for also...

This is an additional thought to the one just stated, not an explanation of what was just stated.

Paul uses COVETING or more accurately LUST.

Here we have EPITHUMIA and later the verb form EPITHUMEW.

This is the Greek word that translates the Hebrew CHA-MAD which is the prohibition of the tenth commandment.

Hebrew did not have a word for LUST, so this word was used; but in the Greek text the full force of this prohibition is made clear in that it is a prohibition against lust.

We have studied what causes DESIRE to become LUST.

Lust is uncontrollable, it desires to dominate or control others, it hurts others, it ignores the provision of God.

Paul states that apart from the OT Law he would not have known that this type of desire was sin.

So Psychologists will tell us that the desire for what one cannot have is the very first craving for wrongdoing in human development. When you say to your child "NO cookies", and they go for the cookie jar anyway, you are seeing that which is as old as the Garden of Eden.

Remember Adam and the woman, only one prohibition, yet they went for it.

Genesis 3:6 When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate.

NOW WE KNOW LUST IS SIN...BUT HOW DO WE KNOW? Because of the Law.

Verses 8-11 must be studies as a connected thought. Paul begins with the Law in v 8 and ends up in v 11 death.

Remember the pattern of v 5: LAW --- Sin Nature --- SINS --- DEATH

Romans 7:8

But sin, taking opportunity through the commandment, produced in me coveting of every kind; for apart from the Law sin is dead.

As soon as the law is stated - "Thou shall not covet" [lust], it is human nature to violate that law.

OPPORTUNITY or OCCASION is the word AFORMJ.

Used only by Paul, it means to make a start from a place. Militarily it was a base of operations. Also used for what was used to start a military campaign, the material, not the campaign itself. Used for capital in business but not the business activity itself.

So here the Law is seen as furnishing sin with the material or capital for its assault. The Law served as a starting place.

Kenneth Wuest sees the Law as the fulcrum that was placed under wrongdoing and lifted it to be sin.

The word WROUGHT or PRODUCED is to carry something to an end or to a conclusion.

And the end was a rebellion against the Commandment that resulted in coveting or LUSTING of every kind.

Then the explanatory GAR, the last part of this verse is an explanation:

For you see, without law (anathrous, any law) sin is dead.

The singular use of the word SIN would refer to the sin nature and without law the Sin Nature was dead or unknown to Paul.

THE SIN NATUE WAS the cause of spiritual death and it was producing sins, yet Paul did not know of the Sin Nature.

Principles:

1.      You cannot solve a problem until you know there is a problem

2.      The Sin Nature was dead in the sense of being unknown as a problem

3.      The OT Law, specifically the tenth commandment, brought cognizance of the problem.

All the other commandment of the decalogue are prohibitions against things said or things done. But the tenth commandment is a prohibition against an attitud...thou shall not covet.

In the face of that commandment is where Paul learned something.

4.      Paul learned from the tenth commandment that spiritual death comes from what is on the inside of man, not the sins the man commits. He recognized at that point that sin was a result of the Sin Nature.

5.      The culprit in this case is the Sin Nature, not the OT Law. The Law worked as a fulcrum to lift sins up.

Romans 7:9

And I was once alive apart from the Law; but when the commandment came, sin became alive, and I died;

When the Sin Nature was unknown, Paul says that he was alive, apart from the Law. Uses an imperfect tense, past complete action, he lived in the past and that life stopped in the past.

ONE MORE NOTE: Paul uses EGW, the 1st person sing pronoun, unusual in Greek grammar. This is the largest concentration of this pronoun found in any chapter in the NT. Found 8 times in vv 9-25. Paul is using to emphasize his personal efforts in this matter or struggle.

Paul employs a parallel to human development. He looks back to a time of child-like innocence.

The time of child-like innocence that we all have is innocent not because we are, we do sin, but we are not aware of the sins. Nor are we aware that it comes from the Sin Nature that is very much apart of us.

"But when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died."

The commandment came, aorist tense, point in time of hearing the commandment.

Sin revived, also aorist tense.

REVIVED is ANA+ZAW; ZAW is LIFE and ANA means to live again.

Sin, the Sin Nature, which was alive at birth resulting in spiritual death, now lives again, perpetuating that spiritual death.

I DIED, ceased to lived as before.

Romans 7:10

And this commandment, which was to result in life, proved to result in death for me;

The command had a view towards life but found that it had a view towards death for him.

WHY? The commandment was given, as were all commandments, to show the holiness of God and the sinfulness of man and how man cannot keep the commandments.

BUT REMEMBER WHO PAUL WAS, a religious leader, a Pharisee, a member of the Sanhedrine, a very learned Jew of the highest standing...certainly he could keep the Law couldn't he?

Well, he thought so and as he tried, he saw more and more the result was death for him.

Romans 7:11

For you see sin, taking opportunity through the commandment, deceived me, and through it killed me.

SIN is singular so we are still talking about the Sin Nature.

OPPROTUNITY is the same word we saw in verse 8, the fulcrum that lifts up our rebellious actions and defines them as sins.

Through the command: Thou shall not covet...

Deceived me, and through it [the Law] killed me.

Why was Paul deceived by the sin nature? The commandment clearly indicated that coveting was sin and Paul could clearly see that the sin of coveting was not external but came from the inside, from the sin nature.

What is the deception? It is the deception that caused Paul to think he could live under the law, fulfill the law, and again experience life unto God through law-obedience.

But he found that all his efforts at law-obedience came up short and resulted in defeat...and this defeat killed him.

THIS IS THE BOTTOM LINE OF PERFORMANCE-BASED CHRISTIANITY, it does not work!

The result is often more guilt, more loss, more sense of defeat, more sense of dread and death.

WHAT A SORRY STATE TO BE in, but Paul is not going to give up. His struggle in 7:14-24 describe how he continued to attempt to regain life, to be alive unto God in the flesh, by his own merits, his own self resolve, his own disciplines, and how it did not work.

Principles:

1.      All mankind go through a state of innocents based on ignorance.

2.      This gives way to a state of guilt based on cognizance.

3.      The Law makes man cognizant of sins and the sin nature

4.      Without the 10th commandment it was easy for Paul, a self-righteous Jewish leader, to see sins on the outside.

5.      The 10th commandment, however, placed sin on the inside and with that there was awareness of the Sin Nature.

6.      Coveting or Lusting is something no one else sees, no one hears it, but it is there, very real, very much sin.

7.      That sin was an evidence of the presence of the Sin Nature

8.      And that awareness brought about the recognition of spiritual death.

Romans 7:12

So then, the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.

There are no verbs in this verse making it a very dogmatic statement of truth.

The entire OT Law and the one commandment Paul has mentioned, thou shall not covet, are holy, righteous, and good.

This was true of the Law when it was given to Moses, and it is true of the Law today.

The OT Law continues to reveal the holiness, righteousness, goodness of God and the sinfulness of man.

Romans 7:13

Therefore did that which is good become a cause of death for me? May it never be! Rather it was sin, in order that it might be shown to be sin by effecting my death through that which is good, that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.

Paul picks up on that last term in the description of the Law, it is good.

GOOD is AGIOS which looks at a good of absolute character and value whereas KALOS looks at a relative good.

The question raised and can that which is good produce death?

THIS IDEA IS REJECTED BY PAUL, May it never be!

In order that the sin nature might become evident in that act of sin (lust), through that which was good, the commandment.

And that combination, the commandment and my sin nature, brought about death, in order that the sin nature may be seen for what it will ever be, sinful.

That last part uses an aorist, mid, subj verb which looks to the future.

Principles:

1.      The law shows us that sins come from the inside, the sin nature. And that the sin nature will always be sinful.

2.      The recognition of the sin nature results in a recognition of spiritual death.

3.      So the process again:

LAW ---- Sin Nature ---- SINS ---- DEATH

4.      And that process is exactly the route God wants it to take in our lives.

5.      It is only when we realize the outcome is death that we will realize we can do nothing about our situation.

6.      So the Law was designed to show mankind that it was impossible to be saved, impossible to impress God with keeping the Law because it could not be done.

7.      Rather than be a means of salvation it is a means of death.

That is true about any ridid system including the OT Law. Eventually the one who attempts to please God through some ridid system will realize his total inability to please God.

WHY? HOW? Because it doesn't work, that is why. It just does not work. So the person is eventually discouraged, disillusioned, and they drop out.

Romans 7:14

For we know that the Law is spiritual; but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin.

The problem is not the Law, the problem is what is inside Paul and inside you and me, the Sin Nature.

Reflect back to verse 6: We are released, no longer bound.

Yet even as believers we can put ourselves under the bondage of the sin nature.

Now when we think Sin Nature we usually think SINS.

But what follow this statement through to verse 24 is not a struggle of sins but quite the opposite, a struggle to bring one's life into conformity with God through law-obedience...but there is a problem, it does not work.

AND WHY NOT? Verse 14 tells us: the Law may be spiritual but I am of the flesh, under bondage to the Sin Nature.

Introducing Romans 7:15-24

The personal struggle Paul records in verses 15 through 24 is often seen as a struggle between sin and righteousness or a struggle between God's will and self will.

However, it is neither. It is a struggle between that which will not work and that which will work.

Consider the tone of Romans 7:15-24

For that which I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I {would} like to {do,} but I am doing the very thing I hate.

But if I do the very thing I do not wish to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that it is good.

So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which indwells me.

For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the wishing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not.

For the good that I wish, I do not do; but I practice the very evil that I do not wish.

But if I am doing the very thing I do not wish, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.

I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wishes to do good.

For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man,

but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind, and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members.

Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?

Some Observations:

1.      In these verses Paul mentions the law of God but never mentions God himself.

2.      In these verses there is no mention of the Lord Jesus Christ.

3.      In these verses there is no mention of God the Holy Spirit.

4.      Instead, we find Paul referring to himself more that thirty-three times.

5.      These verses represent the struggle of the believer who has gone back under the bondage of the sin nature.

6.      The desire is there to do what God wants but the divine enablement is not there.

7.      The conclusion is that in the flesh, we are all wretch men and women, verse 24.

PRINCIPLE: This struggle then is between the desire of the believer and the sin nature of man.

Lewis Sperry Chafer: "Two extended passages bear upon the conflict which continues in every believer between the flesh and the Spirit, and therein is presented the only way of deliverance. In the first of these passages (Rom. 7:15 to 8:4), the Apostle testifies, first, of his own complete failure and, second, of his victory. The failure is complete in spite of the fact that he has made his greatest possible effort to succeed.

“In Romans 7:15-25 the conflict is between the regenerate man (hypothetically contemplated as acting independently, or apart from the indwelling Spirit) and his flesh. It is not between the Holy Spirit and the flesh. Probably there is no more subtle delusion common among believers than the supposition that the saved man, if he tries hard enough, can, on the basis of the fact that he is regenerate, overcome the flesh. The result of this struggle on the part of the Apostle was defeat to the extent that he became a wretched man."

This chapter ends with Paul's recognition of his wretchedness and with what appears to be an ongoing struggle:

Romans 7:25

So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

Is that how we are to live? Is that all we have to hope for? A continued struggle between what we know is right and what the Sin Nature persuades us to do?

NO...that is where Romans 7 ends, but where we are to live, to abide, to have our joy and our life is in Romans 8.

THE KEY VERSE: Romans 7:23

but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind, and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members.

Verse 23 mentions three laws:

1.      A different law in the members of my Body

2.      The law of my mind

3.      The law of sin which is in my members

But in the conflict Paul has just outlined, his struggle is between just two laws:

7:16, But if I do the very thing I do not wish to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that it is good.

The Law of the mind, agreeing, stating God's law is good

7:17, So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which indwells me.

The law of sin which is in my members, the Sin Nature

7:21, I find then the principle (Law) that evil is present in me, the one who wishes to do good.

The law in my members, the Sin Nature

7:22, For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man,

The law of the mind, again, agreeing with the law of God.

But then there is this third LAW that Paul begins to see in verse 23, a different kind of law:

7:23, But I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind, and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members.

The word SEE is BLEPW which is a word meaning a single look or glance.

The word DIFFERENT is ETEPOS (heteros), totally different, another of another kind, totally different.

This totally different law that Paul gets a glimpse of at this point does two things:

1. It wars against the Law of the mind:

ANTI-STRA-TEU-OMAI means something a bit more than just to war against. Means to lead a army against. Only found in this passage.

Like a commander leading a whole battalion of troops.

2. Secondly, this different kind of law takes a captive, that captive is Paul and it does so in the midst of the law of sin or the Sin Nature.

Rather than making me a prisoner it should be taking me captive.

So let me expand this verse:

"But I get a glimpse of a completely different kind of law (not like the law of my mind that agrees with God's law nor like the law of the Sin Nature that is in me).

"And this law is in me, not something on the outside.

"And it leads a battalion of troops (God's grace assets) against the law of my intellect.

"And it takes me captive even when I am in the midst of the Law of the Sin Nature."

WHAT IS THIS THIRD LAW?

Look ahead to Romans 8:2, For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.

Romans 7 ends with defeat in the struggle because the victory in the struggle did not depend upon the Lord Jesus Christ.

But Romans 8 begins the victory...

And what a way to begin!

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

NOW WITH THIS IN MIND LET'S GO BACK TO Romans 7:15

Romans 7:15

For that which I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate.

What Paul does he does not understand.

What Paul does is a middle voice verb, hence the idea is that it is for his benefit.

However he does not understand GINWSKW, to understand in this way would mean that he has progressed in this knowledge to the point where he sees the active relationship of his desires or wishes to what is being done, but he does not see this.

What he wants to do he is not practicing.

He wishes, a mental attitude attestation, to do one thing and yet ends up doing something else.

Both WISH and PRACTICE are pres, act, indicatives indicating they are going on at the same time.

There in is the conflict: Between what is wished in the mind and what is done in practice.

He end up doing the very thing he hates (coveting).

Strong contrast ALLA, but what I hate I end up doing.

Again. both present active indicatives.

Romans 7:16

But if I do the very thing I do not wish to do, I agree with the Law, [confessing] that it is good.

The conflict continues.

The IF is a first class conditional, so this is a true statement and it is asked like a rhetorical question:

But what if I do the very thing I do not wish to do?

The conclusion is that if he does not wish to do it he has recognized it as sin and did so by way of the Law so he agrees with the law that it is good.

GOOD here is KALOS a relative good in relationship to what he is doing.

Uses this word to show that even in his mind he can see that what the law says to do, or not do, is better than what he ends up doing.

Paul is not rationalizing what he is doing as being a better idea. While we do that at times that is a conflict of another color.

Here he agrees that the Law is right, thou shall not covet or lust. But while he knows that he ends up not being able to do that.

QUESTION:

Does merely knowing right, having the knowledge of what is right lead to doing right. Does knowledge change behavior...NO.

What Paul has in the midst of this struggle is knowledge.

Furthermore his wish is to do what is right according to the knowledge he has

But the knowledge and the desire he has is not working

Remember the description of the adolescent believer from I John 2:14 I have written to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you...

The young man knows the Word of God and has gained some strength but then attributes the strength to self and falls.

Paul is saying the same thing here as he reflects on his progress in the faith. He knows, he wants, but he does not do.

What is missing is the power of the Holy Spirit and faith, trust, in that power to take the knowledge and the desire and make it a reality in the life of the believer.

Some Verses:

I Corinthians 8:1 We know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge makes arrogant, but love edifies. If anyone supposes that he knows anything, he has not yet known as he ought to know.

II Timothy 3:5 and 7 There are those who are: holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power...always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.

Romans 7:17, So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which indwells me.

Paul comes to a conclusion regarding what he wants to do and the Sin Nature that is in him.

He is not seeking to rationalize his sin or absolve himself from its responsibility. He is not saying "the devil made me do it."

What he is saying is that there is a conflict between rational thinking and sins. He says in his rational mind "NO", but he ends up in sin anyway.

So here is attesting to the conflict and the power the Sin Nature has in one's life.

Remember, its sovereign power over us was broken at salvation but it remains and we continue to infuse it with power by the choices we make.

Romans 7:18

For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the wishing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not.

This is recognition of the Sin Nature with all of it weaknesses, strengths, and trends.

From this recognition Paul makes the conclusion of total depravity.

And here he goes back to AGATHOS when he says nothing good dwells in me.

Paul stated in verse 16 that he recognizes the comparative value or goodness of the law in relationship to his actions of sin.

But here he concludes that there is nothing in him that is intrinsically good or good in an absolute or divine sense.

Then he states the wishing, the desire is there but he cannot do the good.

Here he goes back to KALOS again to emphasize the comparative value or that which he wants to do. When he talks of doing the good he uses KALOS but when, as in the next verse he talks of his desire, he uses AGAQOS, the desire to do the good of God.

Romans 7:19

For the good that I wish, I do not do; but I practice the very evil that I do not wish.

And instead of and set against the AGATHOS, he does evil.

Not even a good that is good in a comparative sense, but the practice of evil which opposes the grace of God.

And he does not want to do evil, he wants to do good but he does not.

Principle: When ever we get involved with trying to do good out of the energy of our own flesh, this is evil. It is exactly what Satan wants, he wants us to try harder, do better, attempt to bring our desires to reality by our own efforts.

Romans 7:20

But if I am doing the very thing I do not wish, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.

And he places the source of this inability at the Sin Nature.

The IF again is a first class condition, IF, and it is true.

Notice the conflict: He wishes in his mind to do one thing and yet he ends up, from the Sin Nature, doing the opposite.

Romans 7:21

I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wishes to do good.

From this he concludes that there is another law in him.

I FIND is EURSIKW, as in eureka, to have discovered a truth...

The word PRINCIPLE is LAW and so he has discovered through this struggle that a Law of evil is present in him.

True of all believers. The Sin Nature wants us to try to do good apart from God. Even if based upon the Word of God but to take the truth, the Word and try to work it according to the flesh.

The one who wishes to do good. That statement is a diminutive, a line that is to be thrown away because he has shown that all the wishing, all the desire he can muster up does not work.

Romans 7:22

For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man,

This is not a denial of the truth of the Word or the Law of God.

The words JOYFULLY CONCUR is the word DEIGHT. He has a delight with God in the Law, knowing that it is right, but unable to do it.

Psalm 37:3-5 Trust in the Lord, and do good; Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. Delight yourself in the Lord; And He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, Trust also in Him, and He will do it.

The issue is never knowledge alone. Attitudes and actions require knowledge if they are to change but that is only part, trust in Him, faith in what God and God alone can do must under grid all knowledge.

Commit to Him, depend upon and trust in the Holy Spirit.

Romans 7:23,24

but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind, and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members.

Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?

The word WRETCHED is TALAIPWROS and means to be physically exhausted, totally wasted from extreme effort.

That is what Paul has been through, a lot of self effort.

"Who will set me free from the body of this death?"

This is the first mention of a deliverance that is not in the form of a law, but is, rather, from a person.

WHO?? The Lord Jesus Christ!

Romans 7:25

Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

M.R. Vincent says of this last verse: "Paul says that so far as concerns his moral intelligence or reason, he approves and pays homage to God's law; but being in bondage to sin, made of flesh, sold under sin, the flesh carries him its own way and commands his allegiance to the economy of sin. It should be carefully noted that this last summation does not describe Paul after he has found the way of deliverance through Jesus Christ, but is a recurrence to his discussion of his state before he found victory."

You see, Paul concludes that while with his mind he wants to serve the Law of God, he instead, with his flesh, serves sin.

That is the conflict, you cannot just decide to obey God and have t count for anything in God's plan. You have to have more, you have to depend upon all that God has done for you by way of Grace.

Romans Chapter Eight

INTRODUCTION:

In A.D. 1100 Anselm the archbishop of Canterbury wrote a tract to console the dying. He first asked a series of questions designed to help the sinner realize that his own works could never save him. He then addressed the dying person with these words: Come, then, while life remaineth in thee; in Christ's death place thy whole trust. Let His sacrifice alone cover thy sin. Then, when thou standest for judgment, say, Lord, between Thy wrath and me I plead the death of Jesus Christ. I put it between my sins and Thee. His merits I offer for those which I ought to have, but have not.

As Paul comes out of the struggle of chapter seven he recognizes the futility of his human efforts and how he must depend upon the Holy Spirit.

Romans chapter eight is the greatest chapter in the Word of God on the Holy Spirit and the Spiritual Life; and it begins with a foundational principle that becomes the basis for all that we have in our fellowship and relationship with God.

Romans 8:1

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

The King James Translators added to this verse from v 4. But the addition becomes a condition and while that condition is very much a part of verse 4, it has no place at v 1.

There is no condition on our part that removes the one who has believed in Christ from condemnation. Through faith at salvation and the grace of God, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

IF WE ARE IN CHRIST JESUS, we are under no condemnation from God.

The word CONDEMNATION is KATA-KRIMA, the word "judge" with a prefix that would mean to judge according to a norm and standard, a legal judgment. This Greek word is only found here and in Romans 5:16 and 18.

This has application both to our relationship to God and to our relationship with one another.

THIS ABSENCE OF CONDEMNATION IS BECAUSE OF THE CROSS:

At the Cross God took all the sins of the human race and poured them out upon Jesus Christ. He willing accepted them and the punishment for them which was spiritual death.

I Corinthians 15:3, For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures.

If we have believed in Christ we are in Christ Jesus and we are under no condemnation.

I John 2:1-2, My little children, I am writing these things to you that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the whole world.

THIS ABSENCE OF CONDEMNATION CAN BE APPLIED IN THREE DIRECTIONS:

FIRST DIRECTION: IN OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD.

As a result of the cross we are forgiven:

Two Words for Forgiveness:

AFIJMI, which is only used in the Gospels in this form and then, only by Christ. AFIJMI looks at one half of the divine picture of forgiveness. As early as the days of Homer it meant the release of actual or legal control over a person.

In the N.T. it has two dimensions: (1) Forgiveness of sins, as accomplished by Jesus Christ upon the Cross, and (2) divine acceptance because of this forgiveness

The word is a judicial word that was used in the courts of ancient Greece to declare judicial forgiveness.

THE OTHER HALF of the divine provision of forgiveness is seen in the word:

CARIZOMAI, which finds its root in the word for grace. This is relational forgiveness.

That word is used in:

I John 1:9, If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

So we have two words for FORGIVNESS, one is judicial and the other is gracious.

PRINCIPLE: We can only have a gracious forgiveness if we first have judicial forgiveness.

THE SECOND DIRECTION OF THE application of the absence of condemnation is towards other.

THE ABSENCE OF CONDEMNATION means that we not only can forgive others but recognize that their is no condemnation upon others:

I Corinthians 4:1-5

The Corinthians were judging Paul's ministry as to his faithfulness, and they were lacking faith.

Faith in God in that He would guide, direct, and even discipline Paul.

NASV But to me it is a very small thing that I should be examined by you, or by any human court; in fact, I do not even examine myself.

KJV And to me it is a very small thing that by you I am judged or by a human day of judgment...

BUT (alla) I judge not my own self..

And here, with the English word "judge" we have a problem.

APPARENT CONTRADICTION:

I Corinthians 2:15 But he who is spiritual appraises (KJV: judges) all things, yet he himself is appraised by no man.

The spiritual man judges all things and is judged by no man.

This is ANAKRINW

But I Corinthians 11:31 instructs us to judge ourselves.

But if we judged ourselves rightly, we should not be judged.

Of course the answer to the apparent contradiction is found in the Greek words for judge.

The word used here is ANAKRINW, the word KPINW is judge with the prefix ANA it means to judge again or bring up a prior judgment.

So Paul does not allow for others to judge him according to past actions or judgments.

Sins were judged on the Cross, that is the past judgment.

As in I Corinthians 2:15 we judge things, situations, systems, but not people and we are judged in this manner by no one.

The correct use of the concept in I Corinthians 11:31 uses the word DIAKRINW, which means to thoroughly judge. We at confession thoroughly judge ourselves and thusly are not judged.

PRINCIPLE:

1.      These believers were judging again or bring up a judgment that has already been dealt with through the Cross and Paul's confession of sin.

2.      We have no right to individually judge another. We have no way of knowing whether or not the sin we judge has or has not been confessed and if confessed it is to be forgotten.

3.      Paul even says he doesn’t bring up these judgments against himself, once sin is confessed he forgets it.

4.      Furthermore, Paul was not one to get involved in all kinds of introspection and self centeredness. Paul avoided the I'm O.K. and your O.K. syndrome, no psycocybernetic introspection...yes, you can even become self centered in your sins.

Our relationship with other believers is based upon the fact that we are under no condemnation and they are under no condemnation. We can forgive then and establish a relationship with others:

Colossians 3:13 Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.

Ephesians 4:32 And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.

The third direction is towards ourselves and our own sins:

We can too often live in guilt over past sins but sins are forgiven and if we are believers there is no condemnation.

In I Corinthians 6:12 after giving a list of pretty extreme sins, Paul says: "All things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered by anything."

I Corinthians 10:23 , "All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things edify."

Paul can make that statement because he knows there is no condemnation. All sins were paid for at the Cross.

The motive therefore, not to sin is not fear of condemnation. There is not condemnation for you as a believer.

The believer was never intended to fear God when he sinned. He was to return to God.

Genesis 3:8-10

And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

Then the Lord God called to the man, and said to him, Where are you?

And he said, I heard the sound of Thee in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself.

Adam feared God instead of fearing sin.

If our theology begins here, we fear God because we are sinners. If it begins in the previous chapter, Genesis 2, we fear sin because it will break our fellowship with God.

Everything God does is being done to get us back to Genesis chapter two, and even better. A relationship with Him. Too many believers get stuck at Genesis 3 and they fear God.

Gen. 3:21 And the Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.

They need to go back to Genesis 2:25 And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

No sense of shame in the presence of each other (mankind) or in the presence of God. Why? Because there was no condemnation.

Remember the Little Child Believer? What did John say to them in I John 2:12

I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake.

The very basic principle of Christian experience is that we are forgiven and if forgiven, there is now no condemnation.

PRINCIPLES:

1.      We can have a relationship with God although we are sinner because we are forgiven, there is now no condemnation.

2.      We have this relationship expressed in Hebrews 4:16 Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need.

3.      We can have a relaxed gracious relationship with others in spite of sin because neither we nor they are under no condemnation.

4.      We all have judicial forgiveness and can extend that to gracious forgiveness with others and they with us!

5.      The absence of condemnation means that we must hold nothing against ourselves by way of guilt or shame. We are forgiven, there is no condemnation.

6.      The absence of condemnation eliminates any individual judging we may be tempted to do against others.

7.      And the absence of condemnation means that your sins will never be an issue in heaven. They are forgiven, forgotten, by God (no big screen TV showing all your sins).

I would think that there would almost be no end to applications you could make from this one unconditional statement of Grace...

Romans 8:1, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus."

Romans 8:2

For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.

Here we have two diametrically opposed laws. One that sets free and one that brings sin and death.

APPLICATION: If you were a salesperson and these were the two products you were to sell, which one could you find a buyer for.

Well Christian, that is our product. We can take to a world in bondage a message about a way to be free.

The LAW OF THE SPIRIT OF LIFE is the same higher principle of law that James refereed to:

James 1:25 "But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man shall be blessed in what he does."

James 2:8 "However, you are fulfilling the royal law, according to the Scripture, You shall love your neighbor as yourself, you are doing well."

In Hebrews it is seen as that better hope:

Hebrews 7:18-19 "For, on the one hand, there is a setting aside of a former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness (for the Law made nothing perfect), and on the other hand there is a bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God."

In II Corinthians 3:3 we find where this law is written: "You are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts."

SOME PRINCIPLES:

1.      The law of the Spirit of life is a law found not on tablets of stone but on the heart of the believer.

2.      It is a law possessed by the Holy Spirit.

3.      While normally a law regulates and controls, this law sets free.

II Corinthians 3:17 "Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."

4.      Since the Law of the Spirit is the Holy Spirit himself that law is not to be limited by a rigid system of law of legalism:

II Corinthians 3:6 "Who (God) also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life."

5.      The Law of the Spirit of life for the believer works in the believer at all times.

We too often think that the Holy Spirit is totally idle when we are out of fellowship and that is not the case:

James 4:5 "Or do you think that the Scripture speaks to no purpose: He jealously desires the Spirit which He has made to dwell in us?"

Galatians 5:17 "For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please."

6.      We are always free, we are always indwelled by the Holy Spirit, but to enjoy the benefits of freedom and the power and ministries of the Spirit we must be in fellowship, F/HS.

7.      And we are the Holy Spirit works in us continually cleansing us, conforming us, to the image and character of Christ.

As Paul comes out of the struggle of Romans 7, the great declaration of this new Law of the Spirit of life is...FREEDOM.

Now back in Romans 6:7 Paul stated: "For he who has died is freed from sin."

That was the positional death we have at the moment of salvation. There Paul uses the word JUSTIFIED which is a legal term for being set free from any indictment of law.

Here, in Romans 8:2 the word for freedom is not a legal word but a word that looks at the function of freedom.

The means of freedom back in Romans 6:7 was the baptism of the Holy Spirit wherein we were united with Christ in His death.

Here the means of freedom is the Holy Spirit but His continual working in the believer's life.

The verb SET FREE is a aorist tense that here looks back at what started at salvation and continues even today.

This freedom is related to the three stages of maturity we studied...more maturity, more freedom.

It is a freedom that allow the one who is free to be independent and in that independence submit, to act out of his or her free will to serve God.

Some Passages that Describe our Freedom:

Romans 8:21 "That the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God."

Nature, the environment, will one day be as free as you, the believer. I toss that in because we think of being as free as nature? Nature, to personify it, wants to be as free as we are.

Since the beginning of the church there are those who cannot stand the freedom the believer has:

I Corinthians 10:29 "For why is my freedom judged by another's conscience?"

Also Galatians 2:4 the Jerusalem Council: But it was because of the false brethren who had sneaked in to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, in order to bring us into bondage.

We are to maintain freedom so as to not be brought back into any rigid system: Galatians 5:1 It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.

We are to use our freedom to minister to others: Galatians 5:13 For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

We must not let it become a stumbling block: I Corinthians 8:9 "But take care lest this liberty of yours somehow become a stumbling block to the weak."

Peter touches on this also in I Peter 2:16 "Act as free men, and do not use your freedom as a covering for evil, but use it as bondslaves of God."

The Holy Spirit as the agent of freedom in the life of the believer uses the word of God to define this freedom: John 8:32 "And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."

The objective of the CCL, however, is not freedom, it is what you will do with your freedom.

Peter talked of those who promised freedom: II Peter 2:19 "Promising them freedom while they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved."

The Law of the Spirit of Life sets us free from sin and from death so that we can function in that freedom, free from bondage, serving God and serving others.

Jesus Christ set the precedent for our freedom:

1.      Jesus Christ set the precedent at the cross. He was free to reject the cross, but He recognized the Father's authority and became obedient even unto death,

Hebrews 5:8 "Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered."

Philippians 2:8 "And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross".

2.      The Lord Jesus Christ was totally obedient. His obedience at the cross results in our spiritual freedom.

3.      The application to us is that we need to exercise our volition towards self-discipline and consistently use our freedom for the learning, thinking, and applying of Bible doctrine.

We are free in the Spirit and that means we are free to live the Christ Centered life in freedom, not bondage, serving God and others out of our freedom.

LET ME GIVE YOU A RULE: If as you as progressing in your spiritual life, you are moving to greater bondage and law, there is a problem. If however you are moving towards greater freedom and grace, you are on the right track.

One is rigid and therefore predictable and comfortable.

But the only the other can lead you to places you never imagined, never even dreamed of, could not even hope for.

This freedom from the law of the Sin Nature and its resulting spiritual death is what Paul struggled against in Romans 7. He could not free himself from it, but now the Holy Spirit has come onto the stage, taken center stage, and given that freedom.

Again, this is functional. Positional freedom was the issue in Romans 6:3-11. Now we are into the living of the spiritual life.

Romans 8:3

For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh.

The Old Testament Law could not save man, and it cannot sanctify the believer. Paul demonstrated this in Romans 7.

Literally: The impossible things of the Law...

IMPOSSIBLE is AQUNATOS   

1.      Found in Matthew 19:26, Mark 10:27, Luke 18:27 where Jesus said: With men this (salvation) is impossible, but with God all things are possible.

2.      Also found in Hebrews 10:4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

3.      Therefore neither man nor the rigid system of ritual sacrifices could take away sins and provide for salvation.

4.      But God could do this and did this at the Cross.

5.      What God accomplished in the sending of His own Son not only provided for salvation but also for sanctification.

6.      So man can't, sacrifice can't, the Law can't...but God could and God did.

7.      Our part is faith: Hebrews 11:6 And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarded of those who seek Him.

The law is said to have been WEAK and this word, ASTHENEO means to be feeble.

Now Paul used this back in Romans 4:19 for Abraham who was not weak in faith. Here we have the weakness of the flesh.

Faith must be strong, because the flesh is weak...

When the OT Law was given Israel did not add faith, they added flesh.

Exodus 24:7 "Then he (Moses) took the book of the covenant and read it in the hearing of the people; and they said, All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient!"

I wonder what would have happened if the people had said, impossible! Grace would have abounded...

God [did] sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and [as an offering] for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh...

In the likeness of sinful flesh: Literal: In likness of flesh of sin. Using the preposition EN.

Very important phrase: God send His son not merely in the flesh, appearing as a man but separated from sin, nor in the flesh of sin which would have indicated that He sinned but in a likeness of that which the characteristic is sin yet he had no sin.

The dative followed by the double genitive is clumsy even in the Greek but Paul forces the point to grammatically show us that Jesus Christ, while being God, was also fully man yet without sin.

FOR SIN: Preposition PERI  the preposition of substitution.

And in the flesh He condemned sin. Same word as in v 1

So then, there is no condemnation...

NOW WHAT ARE THE PRACTICAL RESULTS OF THIS?

REMEMBER: Paul is still dealing with the idea of letting grace reign in our lives and walking in newness of life and serving in the newness of spirit.

Romans 8:4

in order that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

Here we come to the means of fulfilling the new life, the life of service, the life of Grace.

IN ORDER THAT is HINA, introducing a purpose

THE REQUIREMENT: The word is DIKAIWMA and is most often translated "ordinance".

It is singular and thus indicates the one ordinance of the OT Law. Found throughout the holiness code and specifically stated in a number of places such as:

Leviticus 20:26, "Thus you are to be holy to Me, for I the Lord am holy; and I have set you apart from the peoples to be Mine."

The requirement of the Law was for the believer to be holy as God Himself is Holy. This was impossible through the Law but is now possible through the Holy Spirit.

MIGHT BE FULFILLED: aorist passive subjunctive of PLEIROW 

Means to be filled to overflowing, and the aorist passive looks to a future reality and the passive indicates that the work is not ours to do but God's to do in us. We see it as impossible...

Then the condition on which this will be fulfilled.

Remember, this is possible because there is no condemnation. In that absence of condemnation we have God fulfill the requirement of the Law in us when:

Do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

The believer is not given numerous ways in which he or she can order his or her life. Only two, walk according to the flesh or walk according to the Spirit.

The REQUIREMENT OF THE LAW is holiness, the FULFILLMENT OF THE LAW is love:

Matthew 22:37-40

"And He said to him, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets."

Galatians 5:2-3, "Behold I, Paul, say to you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will be of no benefit to you. And I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole Law."

James 2:10, "For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.

Galatians 5:14, "For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Romans 8:5-8, Is an explanation of what walking in the flesh or walking in the Spirit is like:

Romans 8:5

For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.

Paul uses the word ACCORDING TO in this verse to show that he is building upon the statement of verse 4.

The life of the child of God according to the flesh or according to the Holy Spirit.

ACCORDING TO THE FLESH is the believer out of fellowship, not living by faith and truth:

They set their minds on the things of the flesh

MIND is PHRONEW and looks at the content of the mind, the thoughts, the attitudes. As a verb it means to think a certain way, a manner of thinking or a mind set.

So then the mind that is focused on the flesh causes the believer to walk according to the flesh.

And the mind that is focused on the Spirit causes the believer to walk according to the Spirit.

1.      This involves a volitional decision made out of our freewill.

2.      Any decision must have an object, what is being decided.

3.      Here, the choice is the flesh or the Spirit.

4.      The flesh is concerned with law, we will see that in the next verses

5.      The Spirit is concerned with righteousness (in relationship to God) and grace

6.      To make a decision or choice to the flesh is the normal bent of man. Paul showed that in his struggle in Roman 7.

7.      To make a decision or choice for the Spirit is not natural and demands a supernatural means of execution.

QUESTION: How do we have access to the Spirit?

Romans 5:2, "Through whom (The Lord Jesus Christ) also we have obtained our introduction (access) by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exult in hope of the glory of God."

We have access to grace through faith, that is the fulfillment of grace reigning in our lives.

Ephesians 2:18, "For through Him (the Lord Jesus) we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father."

We have access to the Father in one Spirit to the Father.

Now how do we gain access to the Spirit?

Ephesians 3:11-12, "This was (the revealing of the wisdom of God in the CA) in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and confident access through faith in Him."

PRINCIPLE: We have access to all that God provides in the exact same way in which we accessed eternal like at salvation, by faith.

God provides the Holy Spirit in whom we walk. How do we do that? By faith...

Romans 8:6

For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,

No one is going to purposely set his mind upon that which will bring death.

So the death that is here, which is the temporal death of the believer out of fellowship is not the obvious result of the mind set on the flesh, It is a hidden failing of the mind set on the flesh.

Romans 7:5, "For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law, were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death."

Romans 7:10, "And this commandment, which was to result in life, proved to result in death for me;"

Romans 7:13, "Therefore did that which is good become a cause of death for me? May it never be! Rather it was sin, in order that it might be shown to be sin by effecting my death through that which is good, that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful."

Romans 7:24, "Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?"

Paul did not say I will chose that mind set that will bring death, but rather he chose to use his human ability to keep the Law and the result was death.

PRINCIPLE: The mind set on the things of the flesh is the mind of the believer who tries to fulfill the requirement of the Law (holiness) and then tries to fulfill the law (love God and others) by law, by keeping law of any kind.

The opposite of that is to set the mind on the Spirit and the end result is life and peace.

How can we add anything to the Spirit, he is God! We cannot add anything to God by way of morality, by way of obedience, by way of good deeds, by way of discipline, by way of desire, by way of knowledge.

The only way we have access to the Spirit is by faith.

The result, no the object of faith, this is not the obvious but it is where it ends up...life and peace.

Paul uses LIFE to bring together the Holy Spirit here with the Law of the Spirit of Life in verse 2

LIFE cannot be physical life because all men have that. It cannot be the new life in Christ because all believers have that by way of the new man.

So it must be something that all believes have the potential for but not all believers experience the reality of and that is the Spiritual Life or that which comes from the new nature which is empowered by the Holy Spirit through faith.

PEACE is used here to link back to the result of justification in Romans 5:1 Therefore having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Peace is a result of justification which is by faith and a result of walking in the Spirit which is by faith.

The peace with God is the peace of Romans 5:1 where here is the peace of God that we have as we live in the World. We have peace.

WHY?? Because we are accessing God's power not struggling in our own power.

Peace is a state of rest, and it is God's purpose to have us enter into his rest.

Hebrews 4:9-10, "There remains therefore a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His."

BUT NOTICE: Just like death in the flesh, Life and Peace in the Spirit are not the initial obvious results. This come about progressively as one walks in the Spirit, yes, more life, more peace.

The mind set of flesh is hostile towards God.

HOSTILE is a word that means hostility but also enmity or active insubordination.

This hostility or enmity is established because man says he does not need God to meet the requirement of the law or to fulfill the law.

God says "be ye holy as I am holy," and man hostile to God says okay, I will do it.

He can do it in some measure himself. He can perhaps meet God part way or perform some work that will allow Go to meet him part way. But that is hostile to God being God and man being the creature.

Two reasons for the enmity:

·        For it does not subject itself to the law of God. Remember what law does, according to Paul in Romans 7:8, it produces rebellion.

Any rigid system will back fire:

Legalism: the proponents of legalism end up being the most lascivious

Emotionalism: They end up emotionally drained and often with mental and emotional problems.

Knowledge: They are often the ones who know the least about the Bible.

Rules and Law: They end up in inconsistency in their keeping of their own rules (Pharisees)

·        For it (the mind set of the flesh) is not able to do so:

The determination of the carnal believer is not able to meet the requirement of the law or fulfill the law.

Even if the desire is their, without out taking advantage of the access we have to the Spirit by way of faith, we are incapable of keeping law.

Romans 8:8

And those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

And how can we please God:

Hebrews 11:6, "And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.'

Pleasing God:

I Thessalonians 4:1, "Finally then, brethren, we request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that, as you received from us instruction as to how you ought to walk and please God (just as you actually do walk), that you may excel still more."

II Timothy 2:4, "No soldier in active service entangles himself in the affairs of everyday life, so that he may please the one who enlisted him as a soldier."

Colossians 1:10, "so that you may walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please {Him} in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God;"

I John 3:22, "and whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do the things that are pleasing in His sight"

SUMMARY TO THIS POINT:

1.      Romans 7 ended with Paul unable, even as a believer (a new man) to live unto God. Desire and knowledge could not accomplish this.

2.      Romans 8 begins with the absence of condemnation for the believer. Sin is dealt with at the Cross so sin is not the issue by way of condemnation. This makes the believer at all times acceptable to God.

Remember our study in Romans 1. God never abandons you or turns you over to sin. He never leaves you nor forsakes you.

3.      This absence of condemnation and our acceptance in Christ is a direct result of the Law of the Spirit of Life.

This looks back at salvation and the Work of God the Holy Spirit indwelling ever believer and creating in ever believer the human spirit which is a new disposition.

II Peter 1:3-4, "Seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, in order that by them you might become partakers of {the} divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust."

4.      That Work of God the Holy Spirit sets the believer free in Christ, free from the condemnation of sin here and back in Romans 6, positional free (judicial) from the power of sin.

5.      That new disposition in the believer brings about the desire to please God but does not provide the power to please God. Power is not inherit to freedom. Power is not inherit to desire.

6.      The power by which the new disposition functions is the power of the Holy Spirit, which is being filled with the Spirit.

Romans 15:13-14, "Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. And concerning you, my brethren, I myself also am convinced that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, and able also to admonish one another."

Philippians 1:11, "Having been filled with the fruit of righteousness which {comes} through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God."

Ephesians 3:19, "And to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God."

Eph. 3:18, "That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man;"

Now Paul is praying for believers these are not unbelievers. Paul does not pray that they will do something but that God will do something. That God will grant to then the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with power (dative of advantage for you)...

Grace Notes is a ministry of Village Missions International.

Introducing Romans 8:9-11

In verses 1-8 Paul lays down a foundation of grace. It will be God the Holy Spirit who will work in us that we might, when we walk in the Spirit, fulfill the requirements of the Law and fulfill the Law itself.

As God is holy we will be holy by the Spirit of God

As God loves us we will love Him and love others and fulfill the new commandment that Jesus gives us to love one another and this love comes by way of the Holy Spirit.

Paul includes three verse at this point to demonstrate that the glories and power of the Spirit and taking this potential to reality is something that is available to every Christian.

Romans 8:9

However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.

Paul includes the pronoun "you", which is not grammatically necessary and is used for emphasis.

Then there are two strongly contrasted statements: NOT in flesh BUT in the Spirit.

Here is one of the times in Romans that he declares that what they are doing they are doing right.

Romans 1:8, Romans 6:17-18, Romans 15:14, and here.

Paul has personal knowledge of their faith and their walk in the Spirit. Then he includes the reason they can be in the Spirit.

"However is EIPER, used of something that is assumed and could be translated "assuming that" or "providing that".

So, "Assuming the Spirit of God dwells in you."

The word DWELL is OIKEW, present tense, and means to be at in a particular place of belonging.

Paul's prayer was that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love...

OKIEW was used by Paul in Romans 7:17, 18, and 20 for the sin nature dwelling in him. He was trying to fight against it with him mind, but the mind would end up giving it power.

So the statement Paul makes here in Romans is not a reference to the Filling of the Holy Spirit which is synonymous with Ephesians 3:17 with Christ dwelling in our hearts through faith, but is the indwelling of the Holy Spirit common to all believers.

This whole argument that resolves the conflict of Romans 7 would really fall apart if the Holy Spirit was a second work of grace or if the indwelling of the Spirit and the potential reality of the F/HS, and walk in the Spirit was for only a few believers.

So Paul states: But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.

Not belonging to Christ is present tense and the genitive of possession (belonging to Christ) indicating that the person is not saved and does not belong to Christ.

Paul uses a first class condition IF to introduce this statement and the next. These are true statement, one defines the unsaved state of man and the other the saved state of man.

CONCLUSION: There is no excuse for not walking in the Spirit if you are a Christian, the Spirit dwells in you.

Romans 8:10

And if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness.

Again, a Greek first class conditional statement, "If, and this is a true statement..."

"If Christ is in you (and it is true that He is)"

NOTICE: Paul very easily equates the indwelling Christ with the indwelling Spirit. This shows us the understanding Paul had of the farewell discourse of Jesus where the Lord said that the Holy Spirit is the other of the same kind of comforter, as Himself.

John 15:26, "When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will bear witness of Me."

Our Spiritual Life is our walk in the Spirit which is equated with our walk in Christ.

Colossians 2:6, "As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him."

PRINCIPLE: We too often make a distinction where no distinction need to be made.

Here in verse 10 Paul states that the believers body is dead because of the presence of the Sin Nature...

But we have something as believers we did not have as unbelievers, we have the human spirit.

This verse looks back to Romans 6:4, "Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life."

Now Paul tells us what will allow us to walk in newness of life, the human spirit, that new disposition in the believer, that is made alive because of the imputation of God’s perfect righteousness.

Paul uses the same idiom here as at the end of Romans 7.

On the one hand...on the other hand.

This idiom is used to show conflict, something that is irreconcilable, not understandable.

Here the nominative case is showing the control, the influence, the potential power given to the believer in the imputation of Righteousness and the creation of the human spirit.

But the Holy Spirit is the one who makes these irreconcilable opposites, the old disposition and the new disposition, understandable.

BECAUSE THE NEW DISPOSITION under the power of the Holy Spirit, need not give way to the old disposition of the Sin Nature.

Romans 8:11

But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who indwells you.

This verse shows us how much power the Holy Spirit possesses:

The Spirit of God has the full power of God which was able to do the impossible, to raise Jesus from the dead never to die again.

And that same power of the Holy Spirit dwells in you, the believer. And although you are mortal, continuing to have the Sin Nature in your bodies, the Holy Spirit can give you life.

Not physical life, we have that, but the spiritual life that was mentioned back in Romans 6:4 Walking in the newness of life...

The word “quicken” in the Greek means to cause to be made alive, to give a fullness of life.

This not only looks ahead to the resurrection but also to the newness of life we can have right now.

Principles from these three verses:

1.      If you are a Christian, Christ indwells you and the Holy Spirit indwells you.

2.      If you are a Christian, you have a human spirit that is the new disposition that the Holy Spirit influences for you to will to do the will of God.

3.      The presence of the Sin Nature in the body, every cell of the body, results in death. But the presence of the human spirit in the body makes you spiritually alive.

4.      But it is only through the power of the Holy Spirit that we who are spiritually alive in Christ can walk in newness of life which is the life God's wants for us.

5.      This is a potential for all believers, all believers have a human spirit, a new disposition, and the Holy Spirit indwelling them.

THERE IS NO EXCUSE...

Romans 8:12-17 - THE APPLICATION OF OUR POSITION:

In these verses Paul lifts the believer out of the muck and mire of sin and death and places him in his new position as a child of the King, a Son of God, an Heir of the Father, and a joint heir with Christ.

Romans 8:12

So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh...

The "So then" sets up an immediate conclusion to the previous context which dealt with our position and potential.

"Brethren", Paul is addressing believers.

"We are under obligation."

The word "obligation" is OFELIETEIS and means when it is followed by an infinitive to be morally bound to perform a duty.

Galatians 5:3, "And I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole Law."

Receiving circumcision for spiritual advancement makes the person morally bound to the whole law. So what Paul does grammatically is makes the living in the flesh and according to the flesh the infinitive phrase.

Hence, we are not morally bound to the flesh or to live according to the flesh.

Romans 8:13

For if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; But if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

Our obligation is to live by the Spirit but this is not an infinitive so we are not morally bound to do this.

We have freedom, we have liberty, we chose by faith to live by the Spirit.

The obligation we face is a response to what God has done for us. We should view it as a debt, as an obligation, but it is an obligation in the midst of the freedom God gives us.

Paul had good reason to believe that these believers in Rome where walking in the Spirit.

A result of being lead by the Spirit or walking in the Spirit is given here:

"You are putting to death the deeds of the body."

This is not a condition this is a result!

Romans 8:14

For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.

Here Paul equates being led by the Spirit with our sonship.

Notice that here and in the next verse Paul uses the word SONS while in verse 16 he uses the word CHILDREN:

The use of these terms help us understand the work of the Spirit in us:

1.      When we were saved God gave us the gift of the Holy Spirit. From the moment of faith alone in Christ alone we have the indwelling Holy Spirit.

2.      God the Holy Spirit ministers inside of us, to the human Spirit giving us an assurance of faith.

3.      This assurance of faith looks back with confidence at salvation, to the present as we have faith dependence in all that God provides, and into the future as we look ahead to eternity with Christ.

Romans 1:17, "For in it [the gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, But the righteous man shall live by faith."

4.      We are taught by the Word of God through the ministries of the Spirit that we can live by faith.

Romans 10:17, "So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ."

5.      There is no condemnation for sin (Romans 8:1) so sin is taken care of by confession, restoring fellowship with God.

6.      Sin is not the problem, the flesh is the problem as it tries to live the spiritual life according to some system of human merit or some rigid system.

7.      If we are led of the Spirit, walking in the Spirit, having been filled with the Spirit, we are SONS of God.

8.      In Galatians 4:5-7 [Christ came] in order that He [God] might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba! Father! Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir through God.

What Paul does in these four verses (vv 14-17) is relate the indwelling Spirit to every believer in Rome who would be reading this epistle: Jews, Greeks, Romans...

1.      The Jewish Christians would relate to the idea of being a Son of God, v 14.

To be a SON meant that you had the characteristics of your FATHER, as we say a chip off the old block. To be led by the Spirit as one walks in the Spirit would see the believer conformed to the image of Christ who is the image of the Father.

2.      The Greeks understood slavery and the phrase Abba, Father, while a Syrian term was also used by the Greeks to express the idea on one's own father, or dear father. So instead of a spirit of slavery, many of the Greeks had be forced into Roman slavery, there is a spirit of adoption (understood by the Romans) that draws the believer near to God as his dear Father, in his walk in the Spirit.

3.      The Romans understood the practice of adoption of one's own child as a Son with full rights as a legal heir.

In v 17 they are told that what the Spirit does makes them not only heirs of God but joint heirs with Jesus Christ.

Galatians 5:18 also speaks of being led by the Spirit: "But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the Law."

We know that believers try to live according to the works-law principle but the Holy Spirit will always lead the believer to greater liberty and in that liberty there will be a reflection of God's divine nature.

READ 2 Peter 1:4 through 11.

Romans 8:15

For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, Abba! Father!

We could take this all the way back to Genesis 3 and the fall when Adam and the woman hide from God in fear.

The human spirit is not designed to fear God but to draw near to God as our dear Father.

The term ABBA, FATHER is used here and in two other places in the NT:

Mark 14:36 "And He [Jesus in the Garden] was saying, Abba! Father! All things are possible for Thee; remove this cup from Me; yet not what I will, but what Thou wilt."

By the Holy Spirit, who was leading Jesus to the Cross, our Lord could put his faith and trust in the Father to do what was not only necessary but best for Him.

Galatians 4:6 And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba! Father!

As in Romans 8:15 it is the Holy Spirit who does this in us as we are led of the Spirit, walking in the Spirit.

Romans 8:16

The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.

Remember that the human spirit in us is that new disposition that allow us to will to do the will of God.

It is the Holy Spirit in us that ministers and testifies to the human spirit.

Romans 7:22, "For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man."

Yet his joyful concurrence was not followed by obedience to the desire he had to do the law.

The ministry of the Spirit to the human spirit will not only give the desire but as we walk in the spirit will provide the power by which we can draw near to God seeing him as our dear, Abba, Father.

So what we have in this work of the Spirit in us is the Spirit giving us assurance of faith and production from His power as we walk in the Spirit.

I John 5:7, "And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is the truth."

READ 1 Corinthians 2:6-16 The Holy Spirit bears witness through the Word of God.

Romans 8:17

And if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him.

Our double heirship: First, as heirs of God because we are children of God.

Secondly, we are heirs because we are in Christ and we share with Him all He is and all He has.

And it is from this that Paul makes a specific application. We will share in the sufferings of Christ.

Philippians 1:29, "For to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake."

Romans 8:18-25 details being sustained in suffering by the Spirit:

There is perhaps no greater time in our lives that faith is sharpened, concentrated, clearly realized than under suffering.

When you can do nothing about the pressure, persecution, and problems you are under the only thing you have to hold to in faith in God and what He is doing.

1.      All problems in life are not designed to be solved

2.      God gives mankind freewill and we suffer as a result of that freewill

3.      God allows sin to continue in the world and we suffer the results of sin

4.      We live outside the Garden of Eden and in an imperfect world full of disasters and disease and we suffer as a result

5.      God allows us to suffer as He allowed His Son to suffer

6.      In the suffering we face we are drawn not to solutions but to faith

7.      In the sufferings we face we are drawn not to a system or a mechanic or often not even a promise, but a Person.

We know that God is God and when we place faith in Him we are giving a living testimony that He is who He is, the sovereign God of the universe.

Romans 8:18

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

This is a great statement of faith because we have no personal experiential knowledge of what is to be revealed to us.

Notice what Paul does:

He considers. He does not go into some emotional response or emotional delusion. He thinks, he considers with his mind.

·        The word "consider" is LOGIZOMAI and is present tense and middle voice. A continual action for one's benefit.

·        Our word LOGIC comes from this word, by way of Old French and then Middle English.

·        The Greek word comes from LOGOS, words, which are collected, reasoned, and concluded upon.

·        So the Word of God is taken and trusted in by faith.

He does not deny the extent of the suffering: Faith is what God is doing and Who God is does not exist in denial but in reality.

Too often we think faith overlooks reality but it does not, faith squarely stares in the face of life.

He compares the present with the future: His faith resulted in the Holy Spirit giving Him understanding, wisdom, and confidence.

He looked at the now and then he look to the future.

His conclusion is that what awaits us is far greater than what we currently face by way of problems.

How intense were Paul's problems?

READ 2 Corinthians 11:23-30 and 2 Corinthians 4:17

And how did Paul endure? By faith...

Romans 8:19-22

For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God.

For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope

that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.

Verses 19-22 are an illustration: Nature suffers as do we and yet will be set free as the believer is free and will be free.

Genesis 3:17 - The ground, earth, is cursed as a result of the fall of man.

This will occur at the second advent and extend through the millennial age and on to the creation of the new heavens and new earth.

This statement is made to show the certainty of things to come. Women suffer the pains of childbirth and one thing you are certain of, while the pain is extreme, it does not last forever and it not for naught...you end up with a child!

When the water breaks and the labor pains begin, you know that something is going to happen, something is going to change.

Romans 8:23

And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.

The doctrine is now applied to the believer.

While a number of applications can be made from this comparison of nature with the believer, let's look at one:

1.      Nature is good, it is orderly, but it is not perfect

2.      Earthquakes, tornadoes, tidal waves, drought, floods, extreme heat and extreme cold all demonstrate that nature is not perfect

3.      In the same way we can have lives that are orderly but we will never have lives that are perfect

4.      The human body is a pretty neat thing, and functions within a physical order, but it is not perfect. It gets sick, it suffers disease, it can be born with defects, it can be injured and heal yet not completely, it is not perfect.

5.      The lives we live may be orderly but even as believers in Christ in the CA, having the greatest measure of the Spirit yet given, we suffer and groan

6.      And just as with nature the suffering, the groans that are compared to labor pains anticipate what we will be at the redemption of the body.

Corinthians 15:51-52, "Behold, I tell you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed."

7.      And as we anticipate that time of complete redemption we wait upon God's perfect plan with faith

Romans 8:24

For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one also hope for what he sees?

Paul goes back to the character of our salvation, we have been saved in hope.

"Hope" is ELPIS and is a fem noun which view this as a result of God's grace and our faith. We have hope but hope in the Greek language looked at a confident expectation. Something you knew with confidence would occur...like the birth of a child once the labor pains kick in.

Hope or confidence that comes from faith meeting grace is a confidence in that which is not seen.

Hebrews 11:1, "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen."

Romans 8:25

But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it.

Hope or confidence follow faith and is a work of the Holy Spirit in you.

Galatians 5:5, "For we through the Spirit, by faith, are waiting for the hope of righteousness."

1 Peter 1:21, "Who (us) through Him (Christ) are believers in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God."

And what comes out of hope? ...Perseverance. And it is given by God not achieved by our works:

Romans 15:5, "Now may the God who gives perseverance and encouragement grant you to be of the same mind with one another according to Christ Jesus."

1 Thessalonians 1:3, "Constantly bearing in mind your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness (perseverance as in Romans 8:25) of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the presence of our God and Father."

And perseverance is one of those cycle right back to more faith and more hope:

Romans 5:3-5, "And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us".

James stated the same concept in his epistle:

James 1:2-3, "Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance."

Introduction to Romans 8:26-30

Paul sees the believer in time in these verses and describes what the Holy Spirit does in the believer.

He uses one illustration that shows us how the Holy Spirit works in the believers. This illustration of the Holy Spirit praying for us demonstrates the way all the ministries of the Holy Spirit to the believer function.

The Holy Spirit’s Ministries to Us

1.      Comforting: John 15:26

2.      Assuring: Romans 8:16

3.      Teaching: John 16:12-15

4.      Anointing: I John 2:20 and 27 (equip for a mission)

5.      Guiding: Romans 8:14

6.      Interceding: Romans 8:26

7.      Convicting: Galatians 5:17

Romans 8:26

And in the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groaning too deep for words.

Romans 8:26-27: The Holy Spirit Prays for us:

The immediate context is in view as well as the larger context:

IN THE SAME WAY: As we await with perseverance the ultimate redemption of the body with Hope, the Holy Spirit as awaits that with His ministry of intercession.

The larger context looks back to the groaning of nature and the groaning of the believer as we await ultimate redemption. As nature groan and as we groan so does the Holy Spirit in us as He intercedes for us.

ALSO HELPS: We have certain responsibilities that the Holy Spirit using the Word of God will lead us to accept. The one in view here is PRAYER. We pray and when we do pray the Holy Spirit also prays for us.

But we pray in WEAKNESS, imperfect, immature, and insufficient prayers. Our weakness put us into the position of simply not knowing what we should pray.

WE DO NOT KNOW: Not just sometimes, all the time.

Even if we are praying in accordance with the Word of God the content of our prayer is not a matter of our knowledge but the revealed will of God, revealed in the Word by the Holy Spirit.

And even when we pray in exact concurrence with Scripture, we do not know the perfect timing of God in any matter.

PRINCIPLE: We pray then in ignorance but the Holy Spirit prays for us with perfect knowledge.

EXAMPLE: II Corinthians 12:8 Concerning this (the thorn in the flesh) I entreated the Lord three times that it might depart from me.

Philippians 1:21-24, "For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain. But if I am to live on in the flesh, this {will mean} fruitful labor for me; and I do not know which to choose. But I am hard-pressed from both directions, having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for that is very much better; yet to remain on in the flesh is more necessary for your sake."

ILLUSTRATION: Augustine as an unbeliever was a nortoriously wicked man. His mother Monica was a Christian. When Augustine decided to go to Italy Monica prayed that he would not go, that God would prevent him. But he went and there it was that became a Christian. Her prayer was one thing, the prayer of the Holy Spirit was the opposite. Which one do you think God will answer?

HE HELPS OUR WEAKNESS: Greek ASQENEIA and it is a dative of advantage.

1.      There is an advantage to you to recognize your weakness

2.      In II Corinthians 12:2 Paul stated: He (the Lord) has said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may dwell in me.

3.      Only in our weakness will the power of God be demonstrated. Here Paul uses the power of Christ dwelling in the believer as a synonym for the power of the Holy Spirit.

4.      The ministry of the Spirit to us and in us is not one of power and power but one of His power and our weakness.

5.      Jesus Christ illustrated this as the precedent for our spiritual lives.

Corinthians 13:4 "For indeed He was crucified because of weakness, yet He lives because of the power of God. For we also are weak in Him, yet we shall live with Him because of the power of God directed toward you."

6.      This word was used for the OT heroes of faith.

7.      Hebrews 11/34, "[Who] quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight."

8.      PRINCIPLE: It will only be from weakness that we will have the power of the Holy Spirit active in our lives.

THE SPIRIT ALSO HELPS: The word HELP is a triple compound:

SUN + ANTI + LAMBANO and is used only twice in the NT, here and in Luke 10:40 where Martha asks for help in the kitchen from Mary.

The word means to come to the aid of another, helping them bear a load but not taking the load from them. Means to help not eliminate. The use of this word enlightens us to two application of the Spirit's ministry in us and to us:

1.      The Holy Spirit ministers to us in light of the Word of God.

John 16:13, "But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come."

2.      The Holy Spirit has preserved the Word for us, He allows us to learn the Word (illumination and interpretation). He gives us the strength to obey the Word as we Walk in the Spirit by faith.

3.      The Holy Spirit then works first in those things that are obvious from the Word that we are to follow and obey. This is a conscious enabling of the Holy Spirit to work the work of God in our lives.

John 6:28-29, "They said therefore to Him, What shall we do, that we may work the works of God? Jesus answered and said to them, This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent."

4.      But much of our lives deal with things in which God has chosen to be silent, and here the Holy Spirit works in those areas where there is no mandate of Scripture.

Example: Prayer, we pray for that which we know from the Word of God we are to have. But there are aspects of our lives in which we do not only know what to pray but do not even know these areas exists. Here the Holy Spirit comes to pray for us that which we cannot pray for ourselves.

Example: In teaching us we may know clearly from the Word of God some of what we need to learn and we depend upon the Holy Spirit to teach us. But there are things that we need to learn of which we are totally unaware. And yet here the Holy Spirit teaches us those things also.

5.      So then the Spirit helps us in areas in which we know we need His help and in areas in which we do not even know of.

6.      This word also looks at how the Holy Spirit helps us in tests, difficulties, and problems in life.

7.      The Holy Spirit is our strength, He enables us but does not automatically deliver us apart from our continued decisions of faith dependence.

The Holy Spirit in us and His work does not eliminate our responsibility to shoulder the load we are to shoulder and that responsibility is one of faith and dependence upon Him.

PRINCIPLE: The Holy Spirit does not help us only in those areas in which we think we need His help. He helps us in all areas, both that which we are conscious of and that which we are not conscious of. And His help never eliminates our volitional decision of faith dependence.

The word means to rescue in the sense that one happens upon another who is in need of help and gives them aid. In this context the believer has two who intercede on his behalf:

THE SPIRIT HIMSELF:

One question in this passage is whether the Spirit prays for us directly or does he indirectly give us the words that we can pray for ourselves. Here we are told that the SPIRIT HIMSELF, very emphatic construction, prays for us. The parallel is later given to Christ praying for us and He does not do so indirectly or through us but directly intercedes for us.

In v 27 it is God who searched the mind of the Holy Spirit, not the mind of the believer.

SO THIS INTERECESSION IS DIRECT...

BUT WHY NOT JUST FORGET about prayer since ours are done out of ignorance anyway?

1.      Christians need to pray as part of the process of progressive sanctification. Our prayers express our faith in Him and in His will.

2.      In God's sovereignty He has conditioned many of His actions on human asking. He often waits upon us to pray with faith so that when Divine Action does occur we recognize it as from Him.

3.      The Holy Spirit only prays for us as a helper, and thus, only when we pray. If we do not pray, He does not intercede for us. He is prays "off" of our requests.

GROANINGS TOO DEEP FOR WORDS:

GROANINGS is from a Greek word that includes the idea of deep emotion. It is the sign of oppression, the groaning of one deeply troubled by the pain of another.

Many assume that this means praying in tongues. That the groaning of the Spirit come out when the believer prays in an unknown tongue.

But there is nothing here to indicate that these groaning are audible and ever reason to see them as inaudible.

We have three groans in this passage:

·        v 22 The groan of nature: Silent

·        v 23 The groan of the believer: Silent

·        v 26 The groan of the Holy Spirit: Also Silent

Also they are too deep for words, unutterable. Which is why in the next verse the Father know the content of the prayer because he knows the mind of the Holy Spirit, not the words of the Holy Spirit spoken through the believer. And remember as we noted, it is the Spirit Himself who directly does the interceding, not through us.

Romans 8:27

And He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

Verse 27 looks at the effectiveness of this ministry of the Holy Spirit. And we can apply this same effectiveness to every ministry of the Spirit. God the Father searches the heart of the believer who prays. And the Father knows the mind of the Holy Spirit, because the Spirits intercession is always according to the will of God.

Three principles from this verse about the Spirit's intercession for us:

1.      They are Accurate: God know that the Spirit's groaning are intercession and lay bear all the deep hidden needs the believer has in his spiritual life.

2.      They are for those who are special to the Father: The intercession of the Spirit is for the Saints, those who have put faith in Christ and are set apart to God and a part of His family. You listen closely to the needs of those special to you.

3.      They are compatible with Divine Will: God the Holy Spirit is God and when He prays for us the Father knows that these groaning of intercession are according to the Father's will.

And all prayers that are in harmony with divine will be answered

1 John 5:14,15, "And this is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us {in} whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him."

The Holy Spirit loves us and the Holy Spirit desires for us to have the Highest and best of God, and He is God. Just as Jesus wept over Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit prays for us with great emotions. The content of His prayers would go beyond what we would understand or could even stand to hear.

THREE PRINCIPLES:

1.      The Holy Spirit prays for us when we pray for ourselves. If you want the Holy Spirit to pray for you, you need to start praying.

2.      The Holy intercedes with those prayers that we would never know to pray for ourselves. And God the Father hears from the Holy Spirit what we ourselves could never have told Him.

3.      While we are inadequate in our prayers, we have the assurance that when we pray we never pray alone...

Romans 8:28

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

This great promise of the Scriptures is so often quoted in times of need by the Child of God that often the context in which it appears of overlooked. But the context makes the promise even greater.

We can go back to verse 18 to see that Paul is talking about suffering.

At verse 25 we can then see what the believer does in the midst of the sufferings of this life and that is to have endurance that comes from hope that comes from faith.

Then in verse 26 we see what the Spirit does during of time of endurance, He prays for us.

In verse 27 we see what the Father does in relationship to the Holy Spirit.

And now at verse 28 we see what the Father does in relationship to us.

PRINCIPLES:

1.      As the believer suffers he is to endure by faith

2.      As part of our faith we pray to the Father. Prayer is a tremendous expression of faith.

3.      The Holy Spirit prays for us and His prayers are answered. We may pray take that the suffering be taken away (as Paul did in II Corinthians 12). But the Holy Spirit may pray that it remain.

4.      So then, even when suffering remains, we have a promise that God is working all things together for His good, therefore our good.

The KJV translates this verse somewhat differently, "And we know that all things work together for good..."

Leaving out the subject O THEOS, God. They make the subject all things.

But the verb is singular and all things PANTA, is plural. So while in some situations that could be okay, here we have the subject expressed within the verb.

Now in the Greek text the first limitation is given at the beginning of the verse...And we know that to the ones loving God, all things work together...

Having mentioned God as the object of the initial phrase, the verb then which is singular looks to that object as the subject of the second phrase.

EXPANDED: To the ones loving God, God works all things together for good.

Also, in the previous verse it is the Father who is the subject, he is the one who searches the hearts. And in the next verse, it is the Father who is the subject. He is the one who foreknew, predestine, to be conformed to the image of His Son.

PRINCIPLE: This is a direct work of God in our lives.

The words "for good" are EIS AGAQON which strengthens the fact that this good is divine good and not merely that which we assume to be good (KALOS) or even a relative good.

SO PAUL'S ASSERTION IS: God works all things in our lives together for His good which is the very best for us.

BECAUSE IT IS THE FATHER WHO DOES THIS, there are a few things this assertion does not mean:

1.      It states that the end of all things will be divine good, but it does not state when that goal will be achieved in the life of the believer.

Philippians 1:6, "For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus."

2.      The assertion does not mean that all things in and of themselves are good. There is not a blurring of distinctions between good things and bad things but that all things will work together for good under God's sovereign power.

3.      This working together for good is not some automatic process of life. That would be a positive fatalism. God alone can do this in our lives.

4.      The assertion does not mean that everything you experience has a good side. You may be the victim of anothers sin and God never calls sin or evil good..

This is not a logical deduction based upon cold reason but a promise based upon the character of our heavenly Father and our faith in Him and all that He promises.

Reason and logic would say that this is just not so. All things do not work together for good. But that is because we are limited in our understanding and in our viewpoint. As with prayer, we look at life from our immaturity, our in our imperfection and with our insufficiency. This limited ability on our part is illustrated throughout the Scriptures:

After Jacob sent his sons to Egypt to buy needed food and they encountered Joseph who they did not know and Simeon was detained by Joseph and the demand was made that they not return without Benjamin Jacob lamented:

Genesis 42:36, "You have bereaved me of my children: Joseph is no more, and Simeon is no more, and you would take Benjamin; all these things are against me."

But God was working this apparent evil together for good.

So rather than try and figure everything out, we instead put faith in our heavenly Father who has given us a wonderful promise, He works all things together for good...

ILLUSTRATION: This divine act of God could be compared to the skill of the apothecary who can take several poisonous ingredients and put them together in just the right dosage and make a medicine that is for our good.

1.      The good end of all things may be in time or in eternity.

2.      If in time we may be aware of the good or we may not. We may have suffering in our lives that results in good for someone else and we may never be aware of this.

3.      In eternity all the pieces of our lives are going to fit and we will see how they were put together the greatest good.

4.      In time we are most often not aware of how man can intend something for evil yet God can bring it about for good.

5.      Therefore, we are left with only faith and trust in God that what He has promised He will do.

Two Limitations are given in this verse: To the one loving God...To those who are called according to [His] purpose

So we have ONE LIMITATION PRIOR TO THE ASSERTION, ONE FOLLOWING.

TO THE ONES LOVING GOD: Present active participle of AGAPAW 

It is here that we run into varied opinions. And the problem is the participle which is an action word in the Greek language much as it is in English.

Does this refer to all believers or just to believers who are actively engaged in loving God?

In the more than twenty times AGAPAW is used as a participle in the NT in its context it at times appears to be positional of all believers and at other times it appears to be volitional of some believers. In our verse the key is the statement "And we know ..."

The benefit of this promise is not in the stating of the promise but in the faith acceptance of the promise. Question, do you believe it? Do you trust the One behind the promise?

Our faith in God (our trust in Him) and are love for Him are intricately linked together. Just as you will not obey someone you do not trust you will not love someone you do not trust. So it is faith which allows us to know this truth. Apart from faith we will not know it, we will not love God in a volitional way, and the promise, while true, does not benefit us.

SO THEN IS IT POSITIONAL? Yes, because the full burden is upon God to work all things in the lives of His children towards His absolute divine good.

IS IT ALSO VOLITONAL? Yes, because to rest in this promise you have to have faith in God and that faith allows you to love Him.

But does this make it CONDITIONAL? No, the grace of God in working all things together for His good and therefore the very best for us is a grace given to all believers.

Our love for God is not meritorious, our love for Him does not prompt Him to begin working all things together for good. His work in our lives is the work of grace.

TO THE ONES BEING CALLED ACCORDING TO [HIS] PURPOSE:

This limitation looks at the purpose for which we have been called.

Romans 8:29

For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren.

God's purpose is to conform the believer to His Son Jesus Christ and to do this for many.

NOW THE PURPOSE OF GOD FOR US can be seen in two ways:

First as to its character:

The purpose of God works according to the will of God:

Ephesians 1:11, "Also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will."

The purpose of God does not change:

Ephesians 3:11, "This was in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord."

The purpose of God reveals God's grace plan:

2 Timothy 1:9, "Who [God] has saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity."

The purpose of God works according to his power, not according to our works:

Philippians 2:13, "For it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure."

The purpose of God is fulfilled in His Son Jesus Christ, our Lord [previous two verses].

Secondly as to the objectives of God's purpose:

Since the fall, God's purpose has been to restore mankind to the relationship He had with man in Genesis chapter two. This is demonstrated by God seeking fallen man. Genesis 3:9 Then the Lord God called to the man, and said to him, Where are you?

In His provision of skins instead of fig leaves.

Genesis 3:21, "And the Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them."

Garments of skins which required a sacrifice that looked ahead to Jesus Christ.

His purpose was demonstrated in the flood that preserved Noah and his family. In Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, in the 430 years Israel incubated in Egypt, in Moses, in the Law, in the monarchy, in the division of the kingdom, in the captivity, in the prophets, all the up to the coming of the promise, Jesus Christ.

This purpose is realized when man believes by faith alone in Christ alone and when the believer is restored to fellowship with God.

Psalm 51:12, "Restore to me the joy of Thy salvation, And sustain me with a willing spirit."

But God's purpose also extends back prior to the time of the Garden to the angelic conflict:

I John 3:8, "The one who practices sin is of the devil; for the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God appeared for this purpose, that He might destroy the works of the devil."

Satan's work against man began at the fall and continues today in the dual attacks of independence [I do not need God] and fear [I am afraid of God].

Jesus Christ, in whom the purpose of God is fulfilled, showed us how we can be victorious over the attacks of independence and fear. The only way to see this is in the incarnation of Jesus Christ. That is why Satan always attacks grace. Apart from grace the attacks of independence and fear have their victory even in the life of the believer.

The prehistoric purpose of God is to demonstrate that He is a God of love and justice and equity to Satan who accused Him of unfairness in condemning him to eternity in the Lake of Fire. In accomplishing one purpose regarding Satan the accuser, God also accomplishes His purpose of restoring fallen man.

Jesus Christ said in John 14:6, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me."

In the Garden man and woman has the communion with God, the knowledge of God, and the Life of God. These were lost at the fall. In the book of Job they are presented as being forever lost by Job's three friends. But Jesus is the way, back to communion with God. He is the truth, the way back to the knowledge of God. He is the life, the way back to the life of God. But God's purpose does not merely deal with the past but also looks ahead to the future.

God's purpose is to bring us to glory, total, complete, extensive, never ending, glory in His very presence as adult children in His family.

Romans 8:30

and whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.

There are five steps that God takes that stretch from eternity past to eternity future that stand as being greater than anything we would ever encounter.

These steps fulfill the purpose of God.

Whom he foreknew: God's foreknowledge is the result of His omniscience. The omniscience of God knows all that is knowable. That which will happen, that which could have happened. Omniscience is unlimited and knows all the actual and all the alternatives of every decision of freewill made by every member of the human race.

Omniscience knows it all...

·        Foreknowledge is that part of all that is know which will actually occur.

·        Foreknowledge does not mean fore-ordination. Just because something is foreknown does not mean that the person having the knowledge before hand causes the event to occur.

·        Acts 26:4-5 Paul speaking to King Agrippa: So then, all Jews know my manner of life from my youth up, which from the beginning was spent among my own nation and at Jerusalem; since they have known about me for a long time previously, if they are willing to testify, that I lived as a Pharisee according to the strictest sect of our religion.

They knew but they did not cause.

·        With God's foreknowledge He knows and He plans for blessing and provision for man based on this foreknowledge.

Simple Illustration: If you have foreknowledge that it is going to rain that day, you take a rain coat or umbrella to work.

·        The foreknowledge of God deals with existence and long before the foundations of the earth were set, he knew you and I would exists.

·        And in His foreknowledge He knew that man would sin and that man would need a Savior.

Acts 2:23, "This Man [Jesus], delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death."

·        God's perfect knowledge of all that would occur allowed Him to establish His perfect purpose of salvation, restoration and glorification of man.

If any decision of man would have frustrated that perfect purpose God in His omnipotence predicted that decision from becoming a reality.

NOTE: God does not change the volition only the outworking of volition.

From foreknowledge comes predes-tination:

·        God knew from eternity past that you and I would believe in His Son as our Savior and He has made a wonderful provision for us and it is called predestination.

·        Predestination is for the believer only and has nothing to do with man prior to individual faith in Jesus Christ.

Ephesians 1:5, He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will.

·        Predestination deals with God's goal for the life of His child, the believer.

Romans 8:29, For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren.

·        God predestines us to be conformed to the image of Christ. In this purpose He provides equal opportunity for every believer.

·        Equal opportunity is founded upon what He gives to us, that is why it is equal for all believers.

·        All have the indwelling of the Spirit. All have the pattern of faith alone at salvation that provides the mechanics for the spiritual life.

Colossians 2:6, As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him,

·        All believers have grace, all believers have the Holy Spirit and the Lord Jesus Christ praying for them. All of us have the same potential for God the Holy Spirit producing in us the character of Christ, the fruit of the Spirit.

·        Predestination does not relate to our eventual destiny in heaven and certainly not to the unbeliever eventual incarceration in hell. It has to do with God's goal for us now, in time.

·        God prearranged plan for us allows us to say God is in control. He mixes together just the right amount of prosperity and adversity that we will be dependent upon Him and all that He provides for us.

The third step sees God calling us.

He foreknew that we would put faith in Christ, he provided a perfect plan for us once we did. Now He calls those for whom set a perfect plan.

·        This is the point at which we get into the picture. Up until now God in foreknowledge and predestination has acted according to His mind and His purpose.

·        God calls us by sending His Holy Spirit to draw the sinner to faith in Christ.

Matthew 22:14, For many are called, but few chosen.

The word CALL in that passage looks at a broad call to all who would come. It was used to call people to a public gathering.

Here in Romans 8:30 the word CALL is KALEW which means to call those who are expected to come and call in order that they may participate.

Used of a shepherd calling his sheep and of a father calling guests to a wedding feast.

Calls to privilege, call to duty, call to purpose.

·        So the ones God knew would believe in His Son, and the ones God provided for once they believed, are now called or drawn by the Holy Spirit to faith in Christ.

·        Harry Ironside told of giving his testimony as a young man and telling a crowd of how God called him, how God saved him, how God cleansed him, how God made him whole in Jesus Christ. All giving glory to God for what he had done.

A rather legalistic believe came to him afterwards and said Harry, you have told what God did for you, well what did you do for God.

Harry responded by saying I am sorry, I really should have mentioned that too. For my part, I was running away from God, I was sinning, I was rejecting, I was refusing to come to faith...but God after me faster than I could run away.

·        God called you to a purpose and the plan for reality of that purpose has been in place for you since eternity past.

After calling us and when we place faith in Christ the fourth thing happens, He justifies us.

All along in Romans, especially in Romans 3 and 4, we have being looking at what it means to be justified. It is God giving the believer in Christ His Righteousness.

In doing this God gives us the gift of worth, we are worthy in Christ...

II Corinthians 5:21, He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

Justification declares the believing sinner Righteousness and it is because of that that we are acceptable to God in the beloved.

Romans 15:7, Wherefore, accept one another, just as Christ also accepted us to the glory of God.

Once in the plan of God, with equal opportunity, the goal of God in our lives is that He glorifies us.

Glorification stands at the end of sanctification. But Paul uses an aorist tense indicating that this has already started and it has. In the process of progressive sanctification, the believer comes to glorify God more and more and in turn, is glorified by God in time and eternity. When God glorifies the believer it is always a reflection of Christ in us...He is honored, He receive the glory.

Romans 15:9, For Christ has become a servant for the Gentiles to glorify God for His mercy; as it is written, Therefore I will give praise to Thee among the Gentiles, And I will sing to Thy name.

The end of God's purpose is that we receive the glory God's plan holds for us. We have a place in heaven and at the rapture of the Church and our presentation in heaven we will share in the glory that Christ now has.

Glorification begins at justification, when we are saved. The Holy Spirit is given to us and the indwelling Holy Spirit becomes the means by which we glorify God. Glorification (Greek word DOXAZW) means to elevate to a position of honor. In heaven, every believer will be there in a position of honor.

And as a result of sanctification some believers will have rewards and therefore more honor than others.

Romans 8:31 is the application of these steps that God has taken for us to us:

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us?

What can we say to all this? THANK YOU!

Introduction to Romans 8:31-39

If we were just to begin at verse 26 listing what God has and is doing for us we would truly be overwhelmed:

The Holy Spirit prays for us. God the Father answers those prayers. God works all things in our lives together for his good and our highest and best. God has a purpose and that purpose includes us. From eternity past we were in the mind and thinking of God. He laid out a perfect plan for each of us who by faith believed in His Son. He called us, beckoned us to that plan, He justified us, He is now in the process of glorifying us. We are a part of His family over which His Son, our Savior Jesus Christ is the head.

Romans 8:31

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us?

Paul will let the critics have bring in their doubt as he does so often in this epistle. What shall we say to these things, the things that God has done, is doing, and will do for us. What can anyone say?

Paul makes a dogmatic statement that is to be applied to every Christian...If (First Class Conditional = "since God is for us")

There are no exceptions. If you are one of us Paul is saying then God is for you!

The preposition used is HUPER which is the preposition of substitution or being and acting in the place of another. It also includes the idea of protection, care, benefit, and favor.

Now we have an advantage these Romans did not have. We can look at this little word as it is used in other passages and even add to the list given here.

1.      Romans 8:34 coming us, Jesus Christ prays for us.

2.      Philippians 2:13 God works in us for His good pleasure.

3.      I Peter 2:21 Jesus Christ suffered for us to be an example for us.

4.      II Thessalonians 2:1 Jesus Christ is coming for us.

5.      I Timothy 2:6 Jesus Christ gave Himself as a ransom for us.

6.      Galatians 3:13 Jesus Christ became a curse for us.

7.      Hebrews 2:9 Jesus Christ tasted death for us.

8.      Hebrews 9:24 Jesus Christ entered Heaven for us.

9.      The greatest number of times this preposition is used though is when the Bible speaks of Jesus Christ dying for us, dying on behalf of us as in Romans 5:6 and 8.

Jesus Christ laid down His life for us, commending God's love for us, while we were yet sinner.

INDEED, IF GOD IS FOR US, Who is against us?

The answer: NO ONE!

THIS DOGMATIC DECALRATION OF TRUTH both takes away and adds to our lives:

1.      It takes away fear, it takes away the need to live in denial of reality, it takes away the need to live in pretense, it takes away the hurt of life.

2.      It adds to us security, it adds to us confidence, it adds to us healing, it adds to a God who will never leave us nor forsake us and will at all times be for us.

The God of the universe, our creator, His Son, His Holy Spirit is for us...they are here, with us, on our behalf.

AND WE HAVE SOMEONE WHO IS GREATER THAN ALL the armies who have ever marched or all the navies which have ever sailed, all the kings who have ever reigned, all the governments who have ever rules...God is for us.

II Timothy 1:7, For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and love and a sound mind."

WANT A LIST OF THINGS NOT TO FEAR:

v 35 Tribulation, distress, persecu­tion, famine, nakedness, peril, sword.

v 38 Death, life, angels, principali­ties, things present, things to come, powers, height, depth, nor any other created thing.

AND HOW DO WE NOT FEAR THESE THINGS that are the causes of fear for so many?

Hebrews 11:35b-39 Approved by Faith

Romans 8:32

He that spared not His own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?

Now the critic might ask, how far is God willing to go on our behalf. After all, as human beings we all have our limits, we may go far but only so far. There are always human boundaries that we set, would not be so with God?

But for you and me, God already has done the very most for us. He has gone to the greatest extreme to be for us. He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all. God went the distance for us.

The word "spare" is FEIDOMAI and means to treat with tenderness. God did not do this because to secure a means of salvation for us He had to judge His Son.

And to do that He had to deliver Him up:

Acts 2:23, This Man (Jesus), delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.

God was willing to go the distance before you even existed, before creation, before angels, from the eons of eternity past. God created us knowing we would fall, knowing we would need a Savior, knowing He would have to go the distance for us.

THERE IS ONLY ONE THING THAT WILL DO THAT and that is love. The love that God had for us motivated His not sparing of His own Son, His delivering up of His own Son.

God so loved the world that He had to sacrifice His only begotten Son.

Have we ever considered the weight of sacrifice that is found in John 3:16?

For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.

We have a saying today, Love Hurts. God knows that full well, love does hurt because love is tested in its willingness to sacrifice.

And not only did the Father love us that much but so did the Son for they are one in essence and God is love:

Ephesians 5:2, And walk in love, just as Christ also loved you, and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.

And His love for us is our starting point:

I John 4:10, In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

And then it goes on to the fulfilling of the new commandment we have to love one another and we can only do that as a result of God the Holy Spirit producing in us the fruit of Love:

Galatians 5:22, But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness.

If God did the greatest thing for us in providing salvation, he will now do the less, freely give us all things.

1.      Our salvation demanded of God the greatest sacrifice

2.      Our salvation demanded of God the greatest plan. To being His Son into the World as fully God and fully Man.

3.      Our salvation demanded of God the greatest love to motivate it.

4.      Our salvation demanded of God the greatest power to complete His purpose.

5.      And now we are His children, now we are born again, recreated into the image of Christ as the new man, now the Holy Spirit indwells us...how we He not now freely give us all things.

6.      If has already done the greater, what is it that He will now do the less.

7.      WARNING IN THIS: Satan loves to turn this around. Oh, salvation is nothing, no big deal. Getting to heaven, that is what is hard, that is where God needs you help, the verdict is still out on heaven.

People, it just is not so...He has already done the greatest thing for you, what is left is less.

Where as verse 31 took away our fear of opposition, verse 32 removes our fear of want.

This parallels very closely with Matthew 6:25-34 which the Lord summarized by saying: But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you.

Romans 8:33-35 THREE QUESTIONS:

Who shall bring a charge against you?

Who is the one who condemns you?

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Romans 8:33

Who will bring a charge against God's elect? God is the one who justifies;

CHARGE is EGKALEW and means to charge with a crime, to accuse, to call in a debt, to call to an audit (IRS), to arraign before a judge.

Who can do this to the ones God has chosen.

That term ELECT or CHOSEN is used here to strengthen the case.

Paul is saying in a sense: Who would dare to bring a charge against the one whom God has chosen?

Who do I offend the most? I know I occasionally offend people, but my miserable, finite, sinful life is always an offense to the very perfection and holiness of God. AND YET GOD justified me, gave me worth, gave me His righteousness.

Now who wants to accuse me and you? In Revelation 12:10 we are told that Satan is the accuser of the believer and he is before the throne of God accusing us, charging us, day and night.

But the debt has been paid. The charges taken to the Cross, and God sees us as having the worth of His imputed righteousness.

But he still accuses. Gary touched on this last night. We cannot hear what goes on before the supreme court of heaven but we listen to those Satan uses to build into us an attitude that says we do not count.

But God says you have worth because I loved you, my Son died for you, and I have given you my very righteousness.

I remember a little sign I once on a colleague’s desk: Satan is the accuser of the brethren, don't do his job for him.

Romans 8:34

Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.

The word "condemn" is KATAKPINW the same word we saw at Romans 8:1 where it was used in its noun form. Here is the verb and the verb rests on the noun. There is no one who can condemn because there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.

AND WHO REALLY HAS the right to condemn? Jesus Christ.

Yet He died for us, salvation, and more importantly when it comes to the condemnation we face from others, he was raised for us.

This reminds us and others that Jesus Christ is in heaven and the head of His church, His bride and the sovereign head of every believer.

HE DIED which was His choice for us

HE WAS RAISED UP which was the Father's choice for us

AND NOW HE PRAYS TO THE FATHER FOR US...

Who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.

The Holy Spirit intercedes for us from within us. Here the Lord Jesus Christ seated at the right hand of the Father, in glory, prays for us.

v 26-27 The Holy Spirit who prays for us while resident in us. He prays that our unrealized needs may be meet.

In verse 34, Jesus Christ prays for us at the right hand of the Father. He prays His redemptive work may be fully applied to the believer.

We noted that the Holy Spirit who prays from within us prays when we pray. But here the Lord Jesus prays for us, not as a helper as with the Spirit, but as our Lord and the head of the family to which we belong.

This ministry of the Lord Jesus for us in His present session actually began before He left earth. In John 17:1-26 we have His prayer for His own, it is a prayer begins there and continues now at the right hand of the Father>

Lewis Sperry Chafer said this of this ministry of intercession:

"As intercessor, His work has to do with the weaknesses, the helplessness, and the immaturity of the saints who are on the earth--things over which we have no control. He who knows the limitations of His own and the power and strategy of the foe with whom they have to contend, has become unto them a Shepherd and Bishop of their souls...The effectiveness of this intercession of Christ in the preservation of each believer is declared to be absolute. He is able to save to the uttermost, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them (Hebrews 7:25). That is, to save, to keep saved forever those who come unto God by Him and this on the ground of His ministry of intercession.

"So who would condemn the believer? If anyone had a right to it would be Jesus Christ. He is the head of our family. But He does not condemn the saints. No, rather He intercedes on their behalf, in their place, to God."

Romans 8:35

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Tribulation? Distress? Persecution? Famine? Nakedness? Peril? Sword?

While the first and second question dealt with our position in Christ in whom there is no condemnation and no charge to be made against us, this question deals more with our function as believers.

We were saved because God loved the world. And now we live because God loves us.

In Ephesians 5:2 we even read that we are to Walk in love, just as Christ also loved you, and gave Himself up for us...

We face the danger of being overwhelmed by so many things in life. In so many circumstances, in so much adversity, we can fail in faith and end up thinking God doesn't love me.

There are times in our lives where we might see ourselves living from crisis to crisis. No sooner is one resolved and we stop to take a breath than another hits. What is wrong? Does God no longer love us?

But that is the very point isn't it. God's love for us, His own, is greater than all the problems of life put together.

1 John 4:18, There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love.

1 Peter 4:8, Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins.

GOD LOVES US, HE WILL NEVER LEAVE US NOR FORSAKE US:

And that is why the Holy Spirit lead Paul to mention eighteen different things that we might think can separate us from God's Love but do not:

These seven things are part of the adversity that can come against a believer as a result of antagonism towards his faith [Paul experienced all of these].

They are placed in order of an increasing intensity. Tribulation all the way to Death by the sword [Somewhat prophetic in that Paul died by being beheaded, by a sword]

Romans 8:36

Just as it is written, For Thy sake we are being put to death all day long; We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.

This is a quote from Psalm 44:22.

Psalm 44 is rather unique in that it is a lament Psalm in which the writer, the choir director, laments the adversities the nation is facing and yet can find no cause for them in his generation.

Psalm 44:1-8 Looks back historically on the victories God had given to Israel

Psalm 44:8-19 Describes the present distress

Psalm 44:20-26 Calls upon God for deliverance

The real issue in this Psalm is that the people saw no current reason for the adversity yet they did not turn from God but rather to God. They did not say, God let us down.

They recognized that even in perplexities, even in the midst of not understanding what God was doing, He was God and He was the one, the only one, they could call upon.

Now jumping ahead a 1000 years to Romans, we see the same principle. We will face adversities. Some we will find reason for in others we will not.

But no adversity can separate us from the Love of God.

PRINCIPLE: Even in the midst of our tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword, we are not separated from the Love of Christ.

Romans 8:37

But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.

Here is the conclusion: Christ loves us and in all these things we can have the victory.

1 John 5:4, For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world-- our faith.

2 Corinthians 2:14, But thanks be to God, who always leads us in His triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place.

Even when talking of death Paul could proclaim the victory that we as believers have in Jesus Christ:

1 Corinthians 15:57, But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Romans 8:38,39

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,

Nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Paul ends this impressive chapter with a discussion on the believer's security in Jesus Christ.

I like what John Witmer says of these verses: "Absolutely nothing in God's creation can thwart His purpose for believers in Christ. What a climatic way to affirm the certainty of the believer's salvation."

Romans Chapter Nine

Introduction to Romans 9:1-13

What do we do with Romans 9, 10, and 11? Some see these chapters as a parenthetic, totally separated from chapters 8 and 12. They see these three chapters as an explanation of Paul's desire and love for Israel. Some do connect them with what Paul had to say back in Romans 3 and 4 regarding Israel and the salvation of the Jews through faith in Christ. I see a much stronger connection however.

Paul has been talking about justification by faith (chapters 3 and 4) and sanctification by faith (chapters 5 through 8). He has established a principle of faith both at salvation and in the Christ centered life. This strong emphasis on faith gives rise to a number of questions.

·        What about the sovereignty of God?

·        What about Israel under the Law?

·        Is this faith system a totally new system?

·        Does grace preclude the Jew from salvation?

·        Are there now two groups of God's people, Jews and Church?

·        What should the Christian think regarding the Jew?

·        And is there a future in God's plan for Israel?

All these questions and more Paul answers by talking three chapters to show how God has dealt and is dealing with Israel. By doing this Paul uses Israel as an illustration of what can happen, even to us, if we do not pursue God by faith.

There are three important statements in these chapters that bind them not only together but connect them to the rest of Romans:

Romans 9:30-32, What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith; but Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not arrive at that law. Why? Because [they did] not [pursue it] by faith, but as though [it were] by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone,

Romans 10:17, So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.

Romans 11:6, But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace.

These statements result in the conclusion that Paul gives in Romans 11:33-36

Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways!

For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor?

Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to him again?

For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.

And that fulfills the purpose of God, to bring many sons to Glory and in doing so give maximum glory and honor to His Son, our Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Romans 9:1

I am telling the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit,

Because God had called Paul as the apostle to the Gentiles and His work was mainly among the Gentiles, many Jews, even those who had become Christians, perceived him as rejecting his heritage and his people.

This perception, like so many perceptions, is wrong.

People perceive us in many ways, ways that are very different that the reality of what is in our souls or even what is going on.

About the only thing you can do in the midst of mis-perception is declare the truth. And that is what Paul does in this verse. He calls upon both the Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit to be his witnesses.

In both statements he uses EN with the dative of advantage. Our current position is in Christ. We are in Him; and He is in us.

In the Spirit is synonyms for both Paul and Jude for being F/HS or Spirituality.

So Paul's witness is that he is a believer [in Christ] and that he is spiritual [in the Holy Spirit].

Romans 9:2

That I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart.

Paul does not bring his sorrow and grief up as a validation of the truth. But rather as the statement of truth itself.

There were those who said Paul did not care about Israel any longer, that he turned away from his people, abandoned his roots.

Paul says this is not the case and the Lord and the Spirit are my witnesses to this...I have sorrow and grief over Israel.

Paul uses two words that are almost indistinct in meaning to show how deep his pain is and how continual his pain is. These words are so close in meaning that the emphasis falls to the adjectives GREAT and UNCEASING.

These sensitivities in Paul's heart then are heavy [mega] and continual.

Romans 9:3

For I could wish that I myself were accursed, [separated] from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh,

Paul's desire for Israel, my kinsmen he states, is so strong that he would even go so far as to lose his relationship with Christ if it would mean their salvation.

Exodus 32:31-32 Then Moses returned to the Lord, and said, Alas, this people has committed a great sin, and they have made a god of gold for themselves. But now, if Thou wilt, forgive their sin--and if not, please blot me out from Thy book which Thou hast written!

The Lord Jesus in the Garden, Matthew 26:39 And He went a little beyond them, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as Thou wilt.

The Lord Jesus Christ was the only one who was called upon to lose His relationship with the Father in order to provide salvation for those whom He loved.

Yet we see that same attitude that was in Jesus Christ in Moses and in Paul.

Romans 9:4,5

Who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption as sons and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service and the promises,

Whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen.

Paul describes his kinsmen, Israel, by listing seven spiritual privileges which belong to them:

This is parallel to what Paul said about the Jews back in Romans 2:17-21 when he spoke of the advantage held by the Jew and their great benefit of being God's people, if they would only use what they have to move on in faith (Romans 3:1-3).

Seven Spiritual Privileges:

1.      Adoption as Sons

2.      Divine Glory

3.      The Covenants

4.      The Mosaic Law

5.      The Temple Worship

6.      The Promises (especially concerning the Messiah)

7.      Descendant of the Patriarchs from whom came the Messiah who is God, blessed forever

Tremendous assets, tremendous privileges, tremendous position. Yet as Paul pens these words, Israel for the most part is lost and destine to eternal separation from God.

NOW THE QUESTION THAT IS BEGGING FOR an answer at this point is, if they had all this going for them, what went wrong?

Why have the Jews, for the most part, rejected their Messiah, Jesus Christ?

In Romans 9:6 through 33 (The remainder of the Chapter) the question is answered.

Romans 9:6 through 12 What is True Israel?

Let me give you the conclusion first: True Israel relates not to Moses and the Law but to Abraham and the Promise.

Romans 9:6

But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For they are not all Israel who are [descended] from Israel.

ISRAEL here is a reference to JACOB. In Genesis 32:28 God changed Jacob's name to Israel which means the one who has power with God or God's fighter.

Israel had twelve sons and from him came thirteen tribes (Joseph's two sons became two tribes Manasseh and Ephraim, half Egyptian).

Identification by tribe and family would assume that if one was a descendant of Jacob [Israel] then they were of Israel. But Paul says this is an incorrect conclusion.

For they are not all Israel who are [descended] from Israel.

The Jews made two mistakes in forming their spiritual identity. They thought that if they were physically related to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that they were true Israel.

But the next verse tells us this is not so..

Romans 9:7

neither are they all children because they are Abraham's descendants, but, through Isaac your descendants will be named.

Isaac was just one of Abraham's sons. Remember Hagar and Ismael? Genesis 16:1-15

The second mistake in their identity was that they determined they were true Israel by their relationship to the Mosaic Covenant, the OT Law.

But v 8 states that it is their relationship to the promise that will result in their spiritual identity:

Romans 9:8

That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants.

WHAT IS AMAZING is that Christians repeat these mistakes today:

1.      They assume they are Christians because their parents were or because they belong to a so-called Christian nation.

2.      They assume they are Christians (and others are not) by way of their obedience to some rigid system of law.

BUT JUST LIKE WITH ISRAEL our identification as believers will relate not to our heritage nor to our production, but to the promise, the same promise that was given to Abraham almost 4000 years ago.

Abraham's first son was Ismael, then fourteen years later Isaac was born. Abraham did not even understand that the promise was not to be through Ismael but through the son of promise.

Genesis 21:8-11, And the child (Isaac) grew and was weaned, and Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. Now Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, mocking. Therefore she said to Abraham, Drive out this maid and her son, for the son of this maid shall not be an heir with my son Isaac. And the matter distressed Abraham greatly because of his son. But God said to Abraham, Do not be distressed because of the lad and your maid; whatever Sarah tells you, listen to her, for through Isaac your descendants shall be named.

v 8 Makes the issue the promise not the progeny: That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants.

Now what is a child of the promise? Well, it is a child who has been promised.

LET'S GO BACK TO Romans 4:13-21

Now if someone makes you a promise, what is required on your part? You have to believe it.

With the promises to Abraham the same principle is true, and that is why Paul emphasizes the faith aspect in Romans 4.

Seven Aspects of Faith:

1.      Abraham was not weak in faith: The word means to be feeble. He understood that the strength of faith was not in Him but in the Lord. Hence there was not inner doubt but outward faith. True faith originates with God not with us.

2.      He did not look at his own personal inability: He was nearly 100 years old and was sexually dead but that problem was God's problem, not his.

3.      He did not look at the difficulties of circumstances: His wife, Sarah, was also old but the deadness of her womb was a circumstance and God was greater than circumstances.

4.      He did not see God's promise as impossible: With man many things are impossible. That is part of the reality in which we live. To deny it is to delude ourselves. But with God, all things are possible.

5.      He grew even stronger in faith: He knew that his faith was in something of great strength, the promise of God and therefore it was a strong faith. The more he matured as a believer the stronger his faith became because he knew more of the One his faith rested in.

6.      Who whole attitude was that of being fully persuaded as one who knows something without question.

7.      His name ABRAHAM, meant Father of a Great Multitude. He had that name given to him by God prior to the birth of Isaac. And it was the name he used with confidence.

8.      Faith, true faith results in action: v 21b He was also able to perform.

Now all the promises of the birth of Isaac would not do any good if they were just talked about. I could hear Abraham and Sarah now, in the moonlight of Canaan, by the flickering fire, the tent shades drawn, talking about having a son...folks, they did not talk about it, they did it.

Faith takes the action!

LET'S ALSO LOOK AT Galatians 3:1-14 and verse 17 and the conclusion in verse 29.

Romans 9:9

For this is a word of promise: At this time [next year] I will come, and Sarah shall have a son.

Paul quotes form Genesis 18:10-12

This promise was given by the Lord and Abraham believed it. Another proof that true Israel is based on the promise not on the progeny.

Romans 9:10-12

And not only this, but there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac;

For though the twins were not yet born, and had not done anything good or bad, in order that God's purpose according to His choice might stand, not because of works, but because of Him who calls,

It was said to her, (Genesis 25:23) The older will serve the younger.

Why did God say this? Was this an arbitrary choice by God to favor Jacob and reject Esau?

Study the life of these two and you find that Esau was the strongest, the bravest, the one most likely to succeed. Jacob was a schemer and a chilsler, which is what his name means.

Yet it was Jacob who carried on the promise...And God knew that his heart, his volition would be towards the promise and Esau's would not be.

Remember the difference between omniscience and foreknowledge.

What if neither Easu nor Jacob were positive? Then Isaac and Rebecca would have had a third son, guarantee it!

Because the promise would not be frustrated...

Romans 9:13

Just as it is written, Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.

A difficult verse if one does not understand omniscience and foreknowledge:

Some Principles:

1.      The word LOVE and the word HATE are both verbs, aorist, active, indicative. This indicates an attitude at a point in time. The point in time would have been when Esau and Jacob came to a point when they considered what Isaac told them regarding the promise. Esau dismissed it, Jacob accepted it.

2.      The word HATE is MISEW and of the nine words for hate and anger, can be the most mild. W.E. Vine says of this word: it can be used for relative preference for one thing over another, by way of expressing disregard for the claims of one person relative to another. God disregarded the claim of Esau because Esau rejected the promise God had made.

3.      In this passage in Romans 9, Paul quotes from Malachi 1:2-3.

"I have loved you, says the Lord. But you say, How hast Thou loved us? Was not Esau Jacob's brother?" declares the Lord. Yet I have loved Jacob; but I have hated Esau, and I have made his mountains a desolation, and appointed his inheritance for the jackals of the wilderness."

This was spoken by the Lord about 1500 years after Jacob and Esau lived.

The reference is not to Jacob and Esau but to their progeny or the nations that came from them. The Edomites came from Esau.

4.      Here in Romans 9, Paul is dealing with those who saw not special privilege but a special position because they were from the line of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

They had, as a nation, fallen into national arrogance. So Paul shows them the weakness of their logic. Esau came from Abraham and Isaac also but was not heir to the promise.

The Hebrew language is rich with hyperbole and that is what we have here as quoted from the Hebrew of Malachi chapter one. The extremes of love and hate are used to drive home a point.

THEREFORE: Why do they think they are automatically heirs of the promise? The promise is claimed by faith.

Romans 9:14-18

Paul has used two illustrations thus far, Ishmael and Isaac, and Esau and Jacob. These demonstrated that God did not work His purpose in Israel according to a human system of progeny. A son may be a first born but that was not the issue. Neither was the issue works but as we shall see at the end of this chapter, the issue is faith.

BUT EVEN IN THIS WE must be careful not to fall into the trap of seeing faith as a work of merit on our part which demands that God must respond. To do that would make God subservient to our faith and God is not subservient, He is sovereign. And that is what these verses establish.

Romans 9:14

What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!

Paul asks a question that would be asked by those reading this passage...and it is asked today. Isn't God unfair? Wasn't He unjust in His rejecting of Esau and His acceptance of Jacob.

Paul, as with previous rhetorical questions, gives the answer himself, an emphatic no, may it never even be considered.

The verb is in the optative mood, which indicates that some would think this but they should not.

Romans 9:15

For He says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.

Paul quotes from Exodus 33:19

In Exodus 32 and 33, Moses had just won two rounds of argument with the Lord. The first one occurred after the golden calf incident when Moses contended with God for the forgiveness of the people. The second argument which is still somewhat ongoing at least on Moses part is for God to God with and lead His people. God had said He would send an angel but Moses argued that that was not good enough.

Exodus 33:17, And the Lord said to Moses, I will also do this thing of which you have spoken; for you have found favor in My sight, and I have known you by name.

This term "find favor is thy sight" was used to express humility and faith in making a request upon which their was no reason for the request to be granted. The phrase then deals with the MERCY of God.

The phrase "I have known you by name" is often used of the relationship God had with Moses but is also found in Isaiah 45:1-4 where we find that God knew Cyrus the king of Persian by name and yet Cyrus did not know the Lord God. This phrase describes the sovereignty of God.

In Exodus 33 Moses requested that he might see the GLORY of God.

God's answer is that He will show His GOODNESS to Moses, not based upon His request, but because He is God and as God He will be gracious to whom He will be gracious and show compassion to whom He will show compassion.

IN OTHER WORDS, GOD IS GOD, and will do what He determines to do in fulfilling His purpose.

In Romans the quote from Exodus uses Greek words and states, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion."

MERCY is God holding back what we rightly deserve.

COMPASSION is God's choice to deal with us in an active manner of mercy based upon His essence.

"Mercy" is OIKTIRMWN and found only here in the NT. The noun form is often translated MERCIES as in Romans 12:1. From the time of Homer it looked at the active action of entering into empathy with another. SO WITH BOTH THESE WORDS we see this is the choice that God makes that is not based upon what we do or desire.

Romans 9:16

So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.

God is not under obligation to show mercy to anyone. He can make this decision as a sovereign choice.

NOW AT THIS POINT IN Romans 9, PAUL IS dealing with the false idea that man can do this or that, will this or that, and God must jump up and respond. We have already seen where the argument is headed and the last verses of Romans 9 pursue righteousness by faith not by law.

1.      The issue is Israel who had wonderful advantages but these did not result in reality.

2.      Those who belong to God do so based upon the promise, not on birthright or law observance.

3.      Now in verses 14-18 God is God, He alone is sovereign in the universe and His mercy and the action of that mercy will be given as He wills.

4.      We must not take this too far, the only plank in the argument Paul wants to nail down at this point is that God is God and we aren’t.

5.      Man deserves nothing and does not earn something based upon his own will or based upon his running (performance).

6.      To draw out from this any reference to salvation or sanctification ignores the remainder of the chapter.

7.      To show that this does not have any reference to salvation or sanctification, Paul's next witness of testimony is an unbeliever, the Pharaoh of the Exodus.

Romans 9:17

For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth.

This is a quote from Exodus 9:16

Exodus 9:16, But, indeed, for this cause I have allowed you to remain, in order to show you My power, and in order to proclaim My name through all the earth.

Could God have removed Pharaoh? Of course, He is God. But He did not and He did not because of His sovereign choice. His sovereign choice to not remove Pharaoh (probably Tuthmose III) so that God's power (another attribute of God) could be shown both to Pharaoh and in Pharaoh.

Other nations did hear of Israel's escape from bondage in Egypt and were awed by it.

Exodus 15:14, The peoples have heard, they tremble; Anguish has gripped the inhabitants of Philistia. Then the chiefs of Edom were dismayed; The leaders of Moab, trembling grips them; All the inhabitants of Canaan have melted away. Terror and dread fall upon them; By the greatness of Thine arm they are motionless as stone; Until Thy people pass over, O Lord, Until the people pass over whom Thou hast purchased.

So God's purpose with His people was demonstrated by His sovereign choice to not only let Pharaoh live but to elevate him to the position of power he had over Egypt and over the Hebrews.

Romans 9:18

So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.

So the bottom line in these verses is that it is God's choice to show mercy and God's choice (desire or will) to harden those who He chooses.

QUESTION: Is His sovereign choice an indiscriminate choice? Or is there a basis upon which He makes this choice? Especially when it comes to hardening the heart of man.

Romans 9:19-24 The potter and the clay illustration:

Romans 9:19

You will say to me then, Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?

This a question that is even often asked today. If God is sovereign, if He is God, if He made me, why does He find fault with what I do? This is an over emphasis on sovereignty alone.

The fatalist would have to answer this question by coming to the conclusion that God cannot find fault with us, because He made us. But this ignores the fact, demonstrated from the Garden and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, that He has also given mankind free will. Even to the extent of resisting His will.

This is demonstrated with the potter and the clay illustration.

Romans 9:20

On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, Why did you make me like this, will it?

Paul uses a very common OT statement to make a point regarding the sovereignty of God. God is God, and He alone is sovereign. Just as the pot cannot complain to the potter, neither does mankind have any right to complain to God.

In Isaiah 29:15-16 this same illustration is used to emphasize the omniscience of God. God who is not man is not equal man in understanding but superior to man, knowing all that is knowable.

In Isaiah 45:9-10 the potter and clay illustration is used to show the uselessness of arguing with God who has made you. Compared to a child complaining to a father or mother regarding his or her birth.

In Isaiah 64:8 it is said by the believer who puts himself into the hands of God and humbles him or herself before God.

SO THESE ADD UP TO THE fact that God is God and as God we are left with no room for complaining about His works.

Romans 9:21

Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use, and another for common use?

Notice the OR: used to show a change in the illustration, still the same figures, potter and pots, God and man. But now with a different application.

One potter, one lump of clay, two types of vessels, one for honorable use the other for common use.

So one potter can make two pots, knowing one will be used for honor (the believer) and one for dishonor (the unbeliever). But they come out of the same lump of clay.

PRINCIPLE: This argues against predestination for salvation because the lump of clay is the same. The difference comes when the vessels are finished. Not in the making.

These are not vessels of the temple because they were brass. These are household vessels or pots. They could look exactly alike, but in the use of them they may have honorable use or common use...cup collection. Some are just not for drinking out of, they have a place of honor in my study reminding me of trips taken and friends I have been with. Others I use every day.

Romans 9:22

What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction?

God is sovereign and He could will to demonstrate wrath and to make known His power.

This part of the verse looks back to God's sovereignty. No one can argue that God does not have a right to do this if He so chooses to do this.

BUT WHAT IF HE DOES NOT. What if instead He chooses to bear with much long suffering the vessels (the unbeliever or the Believer who is destructively OOF and in reversionism) who have been fitted for destruction.

That would be grace. And as with Pharaoh, God can demonstrate His power even through evil vessels.

SO HERE IS THE POINT, IF THE POT GOES BAD, WE cannot blame God and if God destroys then and there, it is His right. If He bears with endurance, that too is His right.

REVIEW

Romans chapter nine is a very logically developed argument that Paul uses to illustrate the previous four chapters. The issue of Romans 5 through 8 is that what we have is by grace and what we can access is to be accessed by faith.

Romans 5:21, As sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

How can grace reign in our lives? How can we walk in the newness of life, how can we walk in the Spirit? By faith alone...

But even faith must not be seen as that which is a work of our will that demands that God must act or bless in a certain way.

And what better way to show this than by examining Israel. And in using Israel as an illustration, Paul also shows us his heart, his desire to see his fellow countrymen saved. And by the end of these three chapters, Romans 9 to 11, he also shows that God is not finished with Israel. That His OT nation has a future in His perfect plan.

Romans 9: The Outline and the Argument

vv 4-5 The advantages Israel has as God's OT people

v 6 But advantage does not mean reality

v 6 All Israel is not Israel

v 6-12 True Israel is not established by physical desendency nor by adherence to the Law.

The issue is the Promise of God not the progeny of man or the proficiently of behavior.

NOW IN OUR THINKING this would be a perfect time for Paul to mention FAITH, but he does not. Not until the end of the chapter and then in Romans 10 we have the greatest chapter in the Bible on faith.

Paul holds faith back at this point because he wants to nail down a few more principles. To mention faith at this point could result in man thinking faith is a work that we can do that demands that God perform in a certain manner. And that would be tragic an is tragic on the part of many believers today.

So in Rom. 9: 15-18 Paul drives home the issue of God's sovereignty.

v 15 For He says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.

v 16 So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.

It is not our will or our works that cause God to be and act towards us with mercy, but His sovereign will.

A mistake would be made to end at this point. Paul is not talking about salvation or sanctification but only establishing God's sovereignty at this point.

He uses Pharaoh as an illustration, God allowed Pharaoh not only to live but to gain power so that God's greater power would be known throughout the world.

Then in vv 19-24 Paul considers if this sovereign action of God in mercy is indiscriminate. Is there anything on our part that God considers in His decision to show mercy to man.

The answer is given in the illustration of the potter and the clay which is really two illustrations using the same figures.

First: v 20 The pot cannot say to the potter, why did you make me like this. This part of the illustration goes back to firmly establish God's sovereignty.

Second: v 21-22 Two pots from one lump, one for honorable use another for dishonorable use.

v 22 God even endures with patience the pots who go bad in the making or in the oven. More on that in a moment.

At vv 24-29 we will see that God in His sovereignty will always preserve a remnant. That was understood by the Jews but it certainly was not understood that this remnant could be Gentiles!

Then in vv 30-33 Paul gets to the conclusion. It is by faith and by faith alone that the righteousness of God must be pursued by man...no other system works because any other system puts the emphasis back on man.

NOW LET'S GO BACK TO THE illustration of the potter and the clay:

v 22-23 God's right to not only make different pots but to endure with much patience the pots that go bad even then showing mankind His power.

What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? And He did so in order that He might make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory.

Jeremiah 18:1-10

v 1 The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord saying,

v 2 Arise and go down to the potter's house, and there I shall announce My words to you.

v 3 Then I went down to the potter's house, and there he was, making something on the wheel.

v 4 But the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter; so he remade it into another vessel, as it pleased the potter to make.

v 5 Then the word of the Lord came to me saying,

v 6 Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does? declares the Lord. Behold, like the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel.

v 7 At one moment I might speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom to uproot, to pull down, or to destroy it;

v 8 if that nation against which I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent concerning the calamity I planned to bring on it.

v 9 Or at another moment I might speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom to build up or to plant it;

v 10 if it does evil in My sight by not obeying My voice, then I will think better of the good with which I had promised to bless it.

The principles are very simple:

1. God is the potter, people, nations, all creation is in His hands.

2. If the pot goes bad the potter has the right to destroy it, or remake it into another vessel.

While this is not prophecy regarding the church it certainly allows for God to establish another people as His people.

3. The potter intention is not to make a bad pot, but it happens, sometimes the clay seems to have a mind of its own and will not be formed correctly.

4. This is not the fault of the potter but the fault of the clay.

5. If God has promised blessing to Israel and yet they do evil in God's sight, He can discipline them just as the potter can destroy the pot that goes bad.

6. If God has promised discipline to a nation and they repent, He can relent the discipline and bless them.

7. Their actions however cannot be blamed on the potter nor can the actions of man be blamed on God.

Romans 9:23

And He did so in order that He might make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory.

Notice the vessels are vessels of or belonging to mercy. They do not earn nor deserve the riches of His glory. These vessels are "prepared beforehand" for glory.

PREPARED BEFOREHAND is one word in the GNT which is found only here and in Ephesians 2:10

In Ephesians 2:10 it referees to the good works that God prepared in eternity past in which believers are to walk. Here it refers to believers themselves. Zodhiates says of this word that it is equivalent to predestination.

God, knowing you would believe in His Son, prepared in eternity past a plan for you and you, with the various divine operating assets of the believer, the power to walk in that plan.

This was done FOR GLORY, with a view towards glory; looking ahead to glory.

This statement then reflects back to Romans 8:29 and 30 and follows the same pattern: For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren; and whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.

verses 24-29 Another plank in the argument:

Even us...Paul is now going to use the Church as an illustration of how God took the vessels that the Jews saw as common and without honor, those horrid Gentiles, and made them into the remnant.

Romans 9:24

Even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.

Paul numbers himself with those who are called by God whether they are Jews or Gentiles. The church brings together people from all nations into one body, the body of Christ, His church.

Galatians 3:28-29, There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise.

God called us because in His foreknowledge He knew we would believe in His Son and because of this foreknowledge He prepared a plan for each one who would believe, and that is predestination (for the believer only).

Romans 9:25,26

As He says also in Hosea (Hosea 2:23 and 1:10), I will call those who were not My people, My people, And her who was not beloved, beloved. And it shall be that in the place where it was said to them, you are not My people, There they shall be called sons of the living God.

What God has done in calling the Gentiles to salvation is nothing that should surprise these Jews, but it did.

Throughout the history of Israel, God's nation was to be a blessing to all the nations, to the Gentiles. However they fell into national and racial arrogance and dismissed the Gentiles as not being worth salvation. But God consistently told them that He would bless the Gentiles even if they refused to.

Romans 9:27

And Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, Though the number of the sons of Israel be as the sand of the sea, it is the remnant that will be saved.

Paul goes to Isaiah 10:22 to further establish the principle. Isaiah states that only a remnant of Israel will be saved.

Romans 9:28

For a complete destruction, one that is decreed, the Lord God of hosts will execute in the midst of the whole land.

Here Paul looks ahead to the Second Advent and the destruction, the massive destruction that is predicted by God and yet even in that there is a remnant preserved. But Paul is also planting an idea that he will develop in Romans 11, that there is a future for Israel.

Romans 9:29

And just as Isaiah foretold, Except the Lord of Sabaoth had left to us a posterity, We would have become as Sodom, and would have resembled Gomorrah.

And just so no one thinks that this is done by the effort, the ability, the merits of man, he quotes Isaiah 1:9.

The LORD OF SABAOTH is the Greek equivalent of THE LORD OF HOST, the Lord of the Armies, Jesus' preincarnate military title.

And it is He who preserves a remnant, a posterity, in the midst of calamity. If He did not do this Israel and Judah would be like Sodom and Gomorrah, removed off the face of the earth.

Romans 9:30 through 33 Paul is ready now to form a conclusion:

PRINCIPLE: The issue as we have seen in Romans 2-4 with salvation and Romans 4-8 with sanctification is FAITH.

Romans 9:30-33

What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith;

But Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not arrive at that law.

Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as though it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone,

Just as it is written (Isaiah 28:16), Behold, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, And he who believes in Him will not be disappointed.

Romans Chapter Ten

INTRODUCTION:

In Romans chapter nine we saw Paul using Israel as an illustration of how salvation comes by faith. Not all Israel is Israel. True spiritual Israel is identified by the promise God made to Abraham and faith in that promise. In this Illustration Paul also shows us his hearts desire for Israel to be saved. A desire which is repeated at the beginning of chapter ten.

Now in Romans 10 the apostle extends this pattern or faith into the believers life or his or her sanctification. The principle is the same, faith at salvation and faith in the CCL. This chapter is perhaps the greatest chapter on faith in the life of the believer in the NT.

In Romans 10:1-15 we have a long paragraph with a single topic sentence appearing in verse 2. "For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge."

In other words, there is a right way, the way of faith which comes from a knowledge of God, and a wrong way, the way of zeal without this knowledge.

Paul will demonstrate the RIGHT WAY OF FAITH.

Romans 10:1

Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation.

Paul repeats his statement of Romans 9:1-3. He is using Israel to illustrate Romans 5 through 8 but this is not some sterile isolated illustration. It is his heart's desire for Israel to come to salvation, to believe in Christ and be saved.

NOTICE: He does something about his desire, he prays. And while that is often the only thing we can do it is a powerful thing to do.

Paul does not leave it with the prayer offered, he pursues his prayer by preaching in this chapter and the next to the Jews who have stumbled over Jesus Christ.

Romans 10:2

For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge.

Zeal, enthusiasm, excitement. The Jews of Jesus' day and Paul's day were said to be intoxicated with God. But this zeal falls short of what God's holiness demands.

This is really a tragedy. So often we believers lack zeal. We are short on the enthusiasm we should have when we consider God's great grace plan. And yet here we have those who have this enthusiasm but it is wrong because it is not a result of the knowledge of faith.

Paul uses the word EPIGNOSIS for KNOWLEDGE, this is a full knowledge, and knowledge that is not only intensive but also a knowledge that has proper results.

This is what the Jews lacked and this is what so many Christians today lack. Because they do not know God nor what He desires or even the grace and faith system he established, they have occasional bouts of enthusiasm but nothing that lasts, nothing that is stable.

AND CHRISTIANS TODAY end up doing the same thing these Jews of Paul's day did, they redefine who God is and what He desires in their own terms.

Romans 10:3

For not knowing about God's righteousness, and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.

Here we see what they did not know. They did not know about God's righteousness.

Their failure was in five areas:

1.      They failed to see God's Righteousness as absolute and uncompromisable.

2.      They failed to see God's Righteousness as the demand of any relationship with Him they could have.

3.      They failed to see that the requirement of the Law was that man be holy as God is holy.

4.      They failed to see that they could not obtain by works the Righteousness of God.

5.      And they failed to see that there is no one who is righteous, not even one (Romans 3:10).

Because of this failure to recognize God's righteousness, they ended up coming up with their own righteousness system.

NOTICE: They saw a value in righteousness but they did not know God's righteousness and so they substituted a human system of righteousness.

The verb is ZJTEW, a present active participle that accompanies not knowing the about the perfect righteousness of God. It means to seek or search out, and this they do, they seek out some alternative system.

AFTER ALL, IF WHAT GOD requires is too hard, just come up with your own system.

BELIEVERS DO THE SAME THING TODAY. They look at the demands of grace and they do not understand it, they see the Christian life as impossible, they see grace as impossible.

I mean, how can we really place our lives in God's hands? How can we really trust Him with our lives and the lives of those we love and the circumstances that surround those lives?

SO WE DO NOT! Instead we come up with our own system that satisfies our need to think we are doing what God wants.

HOW DO CHRISTIANS DO THIS TODAY?

With legalism. Instead of being holy as God is holy and living by faith, we live by petty rules and regulations. When we achieve a measure of success in these we pat ourselves on the back and convince ourselves that we have meet the demands of righteousness.

By a rigid system of Law: Many believers today who would deny any association with legalism live by the Law of the Bible as a means through obedience of arriving at God's righteousness.

They are constantly wanting to go back to some law system, the OT Law, the Sermon on the Mount, the Gospels, verses extracted from the context of the epistles as their rules for life and godliness.

This places a heavy emphasis on obedience but not as we have studied an obedience that comes from faith.

Emotions: Emotions are used to fool one's self into thinking that because you feel good, feel close to God, you are.

Emotions are wonderful if they are responding to the knowledge of God's righteousness. And if you are your emotional expression will be pure and will not be self centered.

Closely associated with emotionalism is ritual: The adherence to a rigid ritual system whereby the believer performs certain functions and in doing so feels spiritually satisfied and thinks that he or she has impressed God.

Benevolence can become a human system of righteousness in which the Christian thinks that by doing good for others and helping others he or she is serving God.

Now benevolence and helping others is much needed and is a vital function of the local church but this function follows faith, it does not replace it.

Christian activism: Many believers today think they have the righteousness of God when they go out and fight for a cause that they have assumed is God's cause.

Realize there were probably more social ills and social causes the believers of the first century could have gotten involved in than there are today, yet they did not. Now when we have the right and freedom to vote, to help in the process we do but not as a means of attaining righteousness.

Psychology: This is one of the big ones among evangelicals today. They reinterpret God's righteousness in terms of psychology.

Now the love many believers have with psychology comes about because psychology does do a good job of analyzing problems that people carry with them in life. As Christians we have too often failed to be sensitive to the need of emotional healing people have.

But the problem of psychology enters in when we go beyond this to using psychology instead of the Word of God's grace to solve the problems.

If they are meeting the demands of psychology, which often make good human sense, they assume they have the righteousness of God.

EXAMPLE: They often end up veering away from the Word especially when it comes to grace, and getting involved with psychological interpretation.

When any system of human righteousness is employed to replace God's absolute system of righteousness the individual believer does not and cannot under that system subject him or her self to the Righteousness of God.

And seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.

Romans 10:4

For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

The Greek text includes the conjunction which makes this verse an explanation of verse 3.

The first word is TELOS which is translated "end; goal; finish line; completion:.

In this position it is very very emphatic. Christ is the designed end of the Law, He is the object to whom the Law pointed as the only means of having the Righteousness which is required if man is to have a relationship with God.

The impossibility of the requirement of the Law should have lead the OT Jews to believe in Christ, God's provision.

Jesus Christ was born under the Law and did what no one else could do. He kept it perfectly during His sinless life and then gave His life for the penalty of sin. At that point the Law was fulfilled.

Galatians 3:11-13, Now that no one is justified by the Law before God is evident; for, The righteous man shall live by faith. However, the Law is not of faith; on the contrary, He who practices them shall live by them. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us-- for it is written, Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.

Galatians 3:22, But the Scripture has shut up all men under sin, that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.

Galatians 3:24, Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, that we may be justified by faith.

Galatians 3:25, But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor.

Galatians 3:26, For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.

DO YOU BEGIN TO SEE HOW foolish it is for the Christian today to try to live under the Law that Jesus Christ fulfilled?

Romans 10:5

For Moses writes that the man who practices the righteousness which is based on law shall live by that righteousness.

Paul quotes from the Leviticus 18 which looks at the relationships the OT Jews were to have with others. This is what we might call relative righteousness.

The righteousness based on the Law, what is also called here "that righteousness", was an appropriate standard for a nation and was given in part to contain Israel until the promise (the Messiah) would come.

It was good for living, it was good for human life, but it was not appropriate for the Righteousness that is required for a relationship with God.

James 2:10, For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.

Romans 10:6-8

But the righteousness based on faith speaks thus, Do not say in your heart, Who will ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down), or Who will descend into the abyss? (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart-- that is, the word of faith which we are preaching.

Some may think this is something new, a righteousness based on grace and faith rather than Law and obedience. So Paul again quotes Moses, this time from Deuteronomy 30:12-14. Paul goes back to the time Moses gives a final charge to Israel prior to their entering into the promise land.

In this charge blessing is promised for faith and discipline is promised for rejection. The prophetic portion of the charge indicates that the discipline could result in the Jews being dispersed and losing their nation. But it promises that when they turn to God in faith [with their heart] God will restore them.

The issue of this charge is FAITH, not Law. And as Moses was saying these words to that generation he told them that they had the message:

Deuteronomy 30:11-14, For this commandment which I command you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it out of reach. It is not in heaven, that you should say, Who will go up to heaven for us to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it? Nor is it beyond the sea, that you should say, Who will cross the sea for us to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it? But the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe it.

The grace/faith system was spoken of by Moses and is not something new.

And just as the work was near to the people to whom Moses spoke it is near to these who are reading this Roman epistle.

No one needs to go to heaven and get the message. No one needs to bring Christ back from the dead, He is risen. His word is now proclaimed...

NOTE: Upon writing these words Paul tells us that everything that is necessary for salvation by faith and sanctification by faith is here, it is complete!

In order to understand verse 9 we must first understand verses 6-7-8.

These are quotes from Moses' charge in Deuteronomy 30.

In that charge Moses deals with blessing, cursing, and restoration

The nation of Israel is in view and as a nation they are told they may rebel against the Lord and be cursed but they are also told that they can be restored.

Deuteronomy 30:10 [God will rejoice over you for good] if you obey the Lord your God to keep His commandments and His statutes which are written in this book of the law, if you turn to the Lord your God with all your heart and soul.

Notice: The obedience comes not in actions first but from the heart first which is where the decisions of faith are made.

This restoration is not difficult because the word is near to them.

Deuteronomy 30:14 But the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe it.

Compare Deuteronomy 6:4-7

If something is in your heart you are to believe it. If something is in your mouth you are to speak it.

In Deuteronomy 30:19 and 20 the choice Israel had to make is given:

I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants, by loving the Lord your God, by obeying His voice, and by holding fast to Him; for this is your life and the length of your days, that you may live in the land which the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give them.

This was not a choice in which there could be any question, the word was near to them, in their mouths, in their hearts.

The ones to whom Moses addressed this challenge were believers who would be in need of restoration or deliverance.

Whether the word is in the mouth or in the heart it is the same, it is the word of faith which Paul has been hammering away on ever since Romans 1:17

Notice the order which is taken from Deuteronomy 30 and that is taken from Deuteronomy 6:

The word is in the mouth and in the heart...

That same order is now followed in verses 9 through 15

The word is in the mouth and in the heart...

That same order is now followed in verses 9 through 15

Romans 10:9

That if you confess with your mouth Jesus {as} Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved;

First some exegesis:

1.      The verse begins with two conjunctions, one nominative that looks back to the preceding verse.

The word of faith that is in your mouth and in heart. This is the subject of verse 9

2.      The second conjunction is EAN  the 3rd cc IF.

This sets up potential or possibility

3.      Both the verbs CONFESS and BELIEVE are 2nd person, singular, aorist, active, subjunctives.

This is spoken to individuals with whom Paul does not identify. Some other group, the Jews for whom Paul's hearts desire is their salvation.

The aorist subjunctive is used to indicate a simple future occurrence. A time future whereas the future tense looks at a logical future.

4.      Both IN THE MOUTH and IN THE HEART are datives of advantage. There is an advantage when this confession is made and this belief is made.

Both are prepositional phrases using the word EVA, in the sphere of the mouth and in the sphere of the heart.

5.      The word SAVED is the 2nd person, singular, future, passive, indicative of SWZW

Here is the logical future, this is the outcome, the result of the two aorist subjective verbs, CONFESS and BELIEVE.

6.      SAVED as a future passive was used by Paul back in Romans 5:9-10

Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.

Clearly SWZW is used there not for justification but for deliverance from the wrath of God and deliverance to the life of His Son Jesus Christ.

Also used in the same form in Romans 9:27 And Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, Though the number of the sons of Israel be as the sand of the sea, it is the remnant that will be saved.

At the second advent although there will me many racial Jews, only a remnant will be saved or delivered from the wrath that is to come on earth.

7.      The use of the aorist active subjunctives for what man does and the future passive indicatives for saved, what God does, makes this verse more of a promise of what God will do than a demand upon what man must do.

Two statements, one result:

1.      Confess in your mouth Lord Jesus:

2.      Believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead:

3.      RESULT: You will be saved.

Romans 10:10

For with the heart man believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

The FOR is GAR  which is explanatory. So verse 10 explains verse 9.

The AND is not KAI but DE which shows some contrast. We might say But with the mouth...

The DE as a contrast makes the first statement of v 10 the most important, and faith is the most important part of these statements.

PRINCIPLES:

1.      Paul is addressing Israel. This is in the context of his desire for the salvation of the Jews, that they would believe in Christ as their Saviour.

2.      He is using principles found in Deuteronomy 30 which is a passage on the deliverance of Israel from discipline.

3.      The order Paul follows is the order found in v 8 and expressed in Deuteronomy 30:14 But the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe it.

4.      This order is reversed in Romans 10:10 For with the heart man believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

This is called introverted correspondence of Chiamos or a Chiaism.

The first statement of v 9 corresponds to the last statement of v 10.

The second statement of v 9 corresponds to the first statement of verse 10.

The Chiaism takes the first and last statement and encompasses the heart of the subject. So the A statements encompass the more important B statements.

So then: Confess Lord Jesus = Confess EIS salvation

Believe raised from Dead = Believe EIS Righteousness

Bullinger says that this form is used only in the most stately and dignified presentation of a subject. The most important portions of Scripture.

It demands that the full importance of what is being stated in the chiaism be observed in whole not just in part. In other words, verse 9 cannot be interpreted without verse 10.

5.      In speaking to the Jews Paul uses terminology that the Jews would understand. The Jews he addresses are out of the land which is the issue of discipline back in Deuteronomy 30.

For their deliverance, which looks at either salvation or sanctification, they were to confess with their mouths that which they have in their mouths.

Jesus Lord, promised Servant and Messiah of the OT. Fully God, fully man, the promised one, the Saviour. The once and for all sacrifice.

NOTE: This is confession to God not man. The Jews did not ever pray silently. All prayers were out loud, a verbal confession.

6.      The order today, in the Church Age, for us is seen in verse 10 and in verse 14.

v 14 How then shall they call upon Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?

Preacher - Hear - Believe - Call

7.      When anyone calls upon the name of the Lord with faith (in their heart) they will be saved.

If an unbeliever this is justification. If a believer, this is deliverance from divine discipline.

CONCLUSION: We read far more into this verse than God intended when we make this a public confession for a person's salvation.

SO WE COME TO TWO INTERPRETATIONS AND FOUR APPLICATIONS:

1.      Primary interpretation: The unbeliever Jews living in Rome were being encouraged by Paul to be saved. He presents the Gospel challenge in terms they would understand. Going back to Deuteronomy 30 and calling them to the place of blessing not in the Land but in Christ.

The issue in Deuteronomy 30 was faith and the issue here is faith.

2.      Prophetic Interpretation: Picked up from the future passive use of SWZW in Romans 9:27.

Here we look ahead to the Tribulation where the demand is made by anti-Christ to proclaim him as Lord.

The believers will not do this, instead they will confess with their mouths Lord Jesus.

Result is the opposite of what logic would dictate, grace is above human logic. They will be delivered, perhaps for some by death. But the promise is sure.

God will save them...

Look at verse 11 Whoever believes in Him will not be put to shame.

In Revelation 13 there is the demand to take the mark of the beast which in Revelation 19:20 includes worshipping the beast (DRRE). But in Revelation 19 he is cast into the LOF and in Revelation 20 those who took the mark and worshipped the beast are judged and sent to the LOF along with all unbeliever of all time.

So this will be a very real challenge to believers in the Tribulation, confess out loud Lord Jesus.

PRINCIPLE: The primary interpretation is to unbeliever and the prophetic interpretation is to believers.

And that opens up the applications...

1.      Application to Gentile unbeliever in Rome: They too can be saved by putting faith in Christ and if they do they will eventually have to make a choice. Is Caesar Lord or is Jesus Lord?

2.      This same application could be made today. The issue for an unbeliever is faith in Christ but there is nothing wrong with having him or her express that faith to God in prayer. Confess with the mouth (however today we have silent prayers in our culture).

In some cultures silent prayers are unknown even today so this could be verbal.

3.      To all believers of all time we must recognize that when we call upon the name of the Lord, He will deliver. This is not a demand or a condition but a promise of the Love that God has for us.

The emphasis is on God and what He will do for us when we depend upon Him by faith.

4.      A practical application of this is that whenever we make our faith known there will be deliverance from a lot of the pain that comes from living in a fallen world.

Young people here have found this to be true in school. When the fast crowd knows a young person is a Christian they have a tendency to stay away from them.

For with the heart man believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

The statement with the heart, looks at (believing) faith and faith has a view to righteousness.

This statement takes us back to Romans 3 where Righteousness is imputed to the believer at salvation.

The statement regarding the mouth confessing has a view towards deliverance.

BOTH THESE VERBS ARE present tense. Whereas in v 9 they were aorist tense.

SIGNIFICANCE:

1.      This verse looks at these issues, believing and confessing, after salvation.

2.      They are an ongoing process in the believers life.

3.      As we continue to faith in God and all that He provides we continue as servants of righteousness and increase in the relationship of Righteousness we have with God.

4.      As we continue to confess Jesus Lord we will have continued deliverance in the present. This is direct from God and indirect from our testimony.

Introduction to Romans 10:11-15

In Romans chapter ten Paul is really dealing with only one issue, the issue of faith. That single system that can approach the grace of God. This chapter along with Galatians 3 and Hebrews 111 stand as the three greatest NT passages regarding faith.

Now so far we have seen that faith is not a new system for obtaining righteousness but can be found even in the OT Law. It is not a system just for Gentiles, but for all mankind. We saw that faith is meets grace at salvation and in sanctification and spiritual recovery and deliverance.

Romans 10:11-15 The assured results of faith place in God:

Now Paul has been talking about confessing Jesus Lord which is to call upon the Lord Jesus (v 13). To call upon the Lord is to trust Him. One does not call upon or depend upon or lean upon that he does not trust. So the prerequisite to confessing Jesus Lord or calling upon the Lord is faith. Which Paul describes as believing in your heart.

NOW AT VERSE 11 Paul gives a result of faith reliance:

Romans 10:11

For the Scripture says, Whoever believes in Him will not be disappointed.

Paul quoted from Isaiah 28:16

BELIEVE is present, act, participle.

DISAPPOINTED is a future, passive, indicative.

The verb translated DISAPPOINTED would be better translated PUT TO SHAME since it is passive voice. Shows what God promises to do.

In I John 3:28 we see the same root used in a statement that look ahead to the BEMA:

And now, little children, abide in Him, so that when He appears, we may have confidence and not shrink away from Him in shame at His coming.

PRINCIPLE: Faith in Christ at salvation removes the potential for shame at the GWT. And abiding in Him by faith in the CCL removes the potential for shame for the believer at the BEMA.

Here the deliverance of verse 10 is applied practically. The normal way of thinking, in human viewpoint, would be to keep quite, don't talk about you faith, after all, what is it to just say Caesar is Lord or in the Tribulation, Anti-Christ is Lord? That would be an easier way.

But here is a promise on a promise...v 10 promises deliverance, and v 11 promises that there will be no shame in taking a stand for Jesus Christ.

Paul takes this promise from Isaiah 28:9-17a

Isa 28:9         To whom would He teach knowledge? And to whom would He interpret the message? Those just weaned from milk? Those just taken from the breast?

The first question reveals God's desire which is to teach man knowledge (I am the way, truth, life). And for man to understand the message.

This was a problem with Israel, they did not get the message of Grace, thought Righteousness could come by works.

The spiritual child cannot understand this. Relate to our study on the three stages of spiritual growth.

Isa 28:10 The simple message needed by the child: For He says, Order on order, order on order, Line on line, line on line, A little here, a little there.

The most the spiritual child can understand is rules, lines, order, and little at a time.

Isa 28:11 A prophesy of Jews being evangelized by Gentiles

Isa 28:12 The Goal of God for His people: He who said to them, Here is rest, give rest to the weary, And, Here is repose,

Hebrews 4:3 For we who have believed enter that rest, just as He has said, As I swore in My wrath, They shall not enter My rest, although His works were finished from the foundation of the world.

Rest is only for those who believe, not those who work.

Hebrews 4:10 For the one who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works, as God did from His.

This rest demands that we abandon any production based system.

But they would not listen.

Our refusal to listen results in a lack of growth. So all we can handle is what God has for the spiritual child.

Isa 28:13 So the word of the Lord to them will be, Order on order, order on order, Line on line, line on line, A little here, a little there,

But now this has a different result

That they may go and stumble backward, be broken, snared, and taken captive.

II Thessalonians 2:11 And for this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they might believe what is false,

Isa 28:14-15

Therefore, hear the word of the Lord, O scoffers, Who rule this people who are in Jerusalem, Because you have said, We have made a covenant with death, And with Sheol we have made a pact. The overwhelming scourge will not reach us when it passes by, For we have made falsehood our refuge and we have concealed ourselves with deception.

The delusion of religion resulted in a false confidence:

False confidence regarding death

Regarding Destiny

Regarding Discipline

The final word in this verse sums it up: DECEPTION

A Stone of Testing: The Lord Jesus Christ

Isa 28:16 Therefore thus says the Lord God, Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a tested stone, A costly cornerstone for the foundation, firmly placed. He who believes will not be disturbed.

The stone is costly: God paid the highest price to save us

It is a foundation stone: Matthew 7, the Solid Rock

BUT: They stumbled over it because they were not willing to approach by way of faith but rather by works.

Refer to the end of Romans 9:32-33 Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as though it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone, just as it is written, Behold, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense,

But notice the promise that is quoted in Romans 10:11

And he who believes in Him will not be disappointed.

PRINCIPLE: If you have faith in Christ there is no shame in the presence of God and He and He alone is the one who counts.

The body they may kill, but truth abideth still...

Any shame man may place of you will be removed when God exhalts you in glory:

Revelation 3:9 Behold, I will cause those of the synagogue of Satan, who say that they are Jews, and are not, but lie-- behold, I will make them to come and bow down at your feet, and to know that I have loved you.

Isa 28:17 God's standard is His Holiness not man's works: And I will make justice the measuring line, And righteousness the level.

The Justice of God and the Righteousness of God = His Holiness

PRINCIPLES:

1.      Shame comes when we reject faith

2.      For the unbeliever this shame will be eternal

3.      For the believer it will be temporary at the BEMA due to loss of what he or she could have had

4.      When man puts us to shame it is only temporary, limited to time

5.      Paul expressed this in II Corinthians 4:17 For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison.

6.      Faith in Christ, faith in God's grace provisions, removes the weight of shame

7.      You will never go wrong with faith

BACK NOW TO Romans 10.

Romans 10:12

For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call upon Him;

For the Jew to call upon Jesus Christ as Lord is saying that He, Jehoshua is KURIOS and would attest to His ability to save. This would not be said by a Jew unless he understood and believed that Jesus is the promised Saviour.

For the Greek to call upon Jesus was Lord would indicate that he had ceased to worship Caesar as Lord.

So in both cases, Jew or Greek [Gentile] the statement Jesus Lord is a touchstone of faith.

THIS VERSE ALSO ONCE and for all ends any idea that there are two systems, one of faith for the Gentiles and one of works for the Jews.

Romans 10:13

For Whoever will call upon the name of the Lord will be saved.

Perhaps as one last attempt to show that there is not two systems for believers Paul quotes the prophet Joel.

The FOR is GAR and is explanatory

Joel 2:32 And it will come about that whoever calls on the name of the Lord Will be delivered; For on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem There will be those who escape, As the Lord has said, Even among the survivors whom the Lord calls.

It is very important to see that in the context of Joel 2, the Lord is speaking to believers at the end of the Tribulation who will take their stand for Jesus and call upon His name...and they will be delivered.

AND AS WITH VERSE 9: SWZW is a fut, pass, ind. so would be translated DELIVERANCE.

Notice how universally Paul applies this WHOEVER...

Jew or Gentile, even Believer or unbeliever: If you call upon the name (Jesus) of the Lord, you are saved, delivered.

Romans 10:14

How then shall they call upon Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?

Paul asks a rhetorical question to bring up the argument so may have that they have never heard these things.

PREACHER -- HEAR -- BELIEVE -- CALL UPON

To call upon God is Faith reliance

1.      Call: Aorist, middle, subjunctive

2.      Believe: Aorist, active, indicative

3.      Hear: Aorist, active, subjunctive

4.      Preach: Present, active, participle

5.      And in v 15, Sent: Aorist, passive, subjunctive

NOTICE: The preaching is the present participle, this makes the communication of the word that which accompanies these other actions. Preaching the Word is constant, we then must make the point in time decision to hear, believe, call upon the name of the Lord.

The participles really makes the preaching less emphatic to these actions on the part of the believer.

Romans 10:15

And how shall they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of those who bring glad tidings of good things!

A quote from Isaiah 52:7. The last words of this quote from Isaiah 57 would be better translate: The ones announcing good things...

Isaiah 52:7 How lovely on the mountains Are the feet of him who brings good news, Who announces peace And brings good news of happiness, Who announces salvation, And says to Zion, Your God reigns!

That passage looks ahead to the Second Advent and the regathering of believing Israel in the mill reign.

But Paul applies the principle to those who communicate the Word of God, the Gospel and all the Doctrine of the Bible, and says that this is the announcing of good things.

PRINCIPLE: The preaching of the Word is to

Romans 10:16

However, they did not all heed the glad tidings; for Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed our report?

Paul goes to Isaiah again, here Isaiah 53:1 which is a passage that introduces the rejection of the Lord Jesus Christ, the great Servant of God.

Literally this says: Not all obeyed the Gospel...

To obey the Gospel is to put faith in Christ, and they did not.

The word HEED means to hear with a positive response. They did not have this.

They, unbeliever Israel locked into a performance based system, rejected what they heard.

REPORT is from the word for HEAR, thus, what is heard. And it is a dative of advantage. The advantage was to those who hear the Gospel, who hear the Word of God regarding Christ.

But they do not believe, they reject faith in Christ.

HENCE the advantage inherit in the Gospel is lost.

Romans 10:17

So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.

This advantage was lost because at the point of hearing of Christ they chose not to have faith in Christ. This was a test of faith or more so, a test of where faith would be placed. In Self or in the Saviour?

The first action of faith that has any purpose in the plan of God is faith alone in Christ alone.

At the moment of Gospel hearing there is a test of faith. Hearing about Christ demands a response and the only response that is acceptable to God is to believe in Him.

This relates back to the process Paul described in v 14

Preach - Hear - Believe - Call

Believing (having faith) follows hearing about Christ. That is true at salvation and continues to be true in the CCL.

PRINCIPLE: The more you learn about God your Father, the greater the demand of faith, but also the greater the target of faith. To whom much is given much is required, but to whom much is given is also given the capacity for greater faith.

Mark 9:24 Immediately the boy's father cried out and began saying, I do believe; help my unbelief.

Romans 10;18

But I say, surely they have never heard, have they? Indeed they have; Their voice has gone out into all the earth, And their words to the ends of the world.

Paul makes this very personal...But I say. Perhaps this is an objection he had even given to the Lord.

The objection is that Israel never heard these things, how would they have had the opportunity to hear and believe the message?

So he quotes from Psalm 19:

Psalm 19:1-4 David says: The heavens are telling of the glory of God; And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. Day to day pours forth speech, And night to night reveals knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words; Their voice is not heard. Their line has gone out through all the earth, And their utterances to the end of the world. In them He has placed a tent for the sun.

This relates back to Romans 1:20 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.

This natural revelation demonstrated the existence and power of God. It is a perfect revelation that can lead any man to seeking more revelation regarding God. The more that will be provided is the Gospel.

This revelation cannot lead to salvation nor to a personal relationship. But it can lead man to a longing that comes from an unmet need to know the one who has created him and all around him.

AT THIS POINT MAN IS AT GOD CONSCIOUSNESS and that consciousness of God demands a volitional decision...

Do I seek God my creator or degrees to creation itself?

Do I seek the one who made the tree or do I worship the tree?

NATURE SHOWS US that we can depend upon nature or depend upon God who created nature. We can trust the cycles of nature, the sun rising every day, the course of the stars.

CONCLUSION: We can trust God with the very details of our life and our eternal life.

SO PAUL TELLS US THAT LIGHT HAS BEEN GIVEN even in nature and yet this is not all, God has given more and more light.

NOTE: God gave more and more light to Israel. More prophets, more written word, more prophecies fulfilled. Yet the increase in light did not automatically result in an increase in faith.

PRINCIPLE: Unbelief can reject bight light as well as dim light.

In Israel's history it seems that as more light was given, rejection of that light increased. Unbelief increased, even to the point that when the Messiah came they rejected Him.

So in v 19-20 Paul shows how God is trying to draw Israel to faith.

Romans 10:19,20

But I say, surely Israel did not know, did they? At the first Moses says (Deu 32:21), I will make you jealous by that which is not a nation, By a nation without understanding will I anger you.

And Isaiah (Isa 65:1) is very bold and says, I was found by those who sought Me not, I became manifest to those who did not ask for Me.

God sent the prophets, God revealed the Word, God worked mightily in the nation, yet they rejected over and over again.

So much light, so much rejection. Did they come to take it for granted that they were a nation established by God, that they were God's people, that to them were given covenants and promises. That the Son of God Himself was promised to be their king?

More light...greater the unbelief.

So God approached them a different way: Have you ever watched a child, a young child playing with a toy. And watched when they tired of that toy and set it aside just to have another child come along and begin playing with it. What does the first child do? That's mine, give it back, you can't play with it. He had no interest in it until some other child wanted to play with it.

THAT IS THE APPROACH GOD USED WITH ISRAEL...

God understand this principle in fallen human nature and He uses it for His glory. He uses it even today to make people, to make Christians wake up. We see revival in many parts of the world, but not here. We see churches that offer nothing growing, yet not here.

God will use this aspect of human nature, our envy, our possessiveness, our jealousy, to get us to realize what we have and what He has given.

God in His desire to save many and to bring many of His children to maximum glory will at times pour blessings out on others to motivate us to faith dependence upon Him.

Paul gives four illustrations of this: First with Moses then with Isaiah.

1.      First, God told Moses that He would use a people who lacked organization.

I will make you envious by means of those who are not a nation.

Israel was of course very proud of it nation status, its government, courts, and laws. Just as we are.

But God would use those who lacked all these finer points of civilization, or goevenment, even the finer points justice and law.

Like tribes in Africa and South America. The Aborigine in Australia. The bush people of New Guinea.

AND HE SAVES THEM AND BLESSES THEM because the put their faith in Him.

2.      With Moses Paul points out that God would use a people who were far less intelligent than the Jew to arouse the Jews to envy.

I will make you angry by a nation that has no understanding.

We have the greatest Seminaries, the Greatest Bible Colleges and Universities, we have knowledge on top of knowledge. And then you go to the foreign field and see a man who has been saved only a year or so, with nothing but a New Testament or like in India, only part of one, and he is winning the lost to Christ.

FOR THE JEWS, we know they are an intelligent people. Over 12% of the Nobel Prize winners have been Jewish. They dominate the fields of science, literature, the arts, music, philosophy, economics.

And yet this brilliant people with tremendous minds, are often confronted by the ignorant savage who is untaught, unlearned in understanding who has believed in the Messiah the Jews rejected.

God's gracious salvation should arouse and awaken His people, but it so often does not.

3.      Then Paul jumps ahead to the time of Isaiah and tells them that God will save and bless those who are less motivated than the Jews.

I was found by those who did not seek me.

One of the characteristics of the Jews had been their zeal to know God.

Romans 10:2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God.

But their zeal was mis-directed and they sought God's righteousness by human effort, by works.

So God ends up saving and blessing a people who were not even thinking about God that often. The Romans, the Greeks, people even today who are thinking about God or seeking Him, end up being saved.

This is to arouse to envy, to make jealous, so that to those to whom much was revealed would seek the God of grace and love by faith.

4.      Even today we as Christians look at someone who has no interest in Spiritual things, and then they are saved and the next thing you know they are out distancing us in the Christian Walk of faith.

5.      And God will even go to those who are not asking for Him in any consistent manner.

I revealed myself to those who did not ask for Me.

The Jews were people of prayer, many prayers, some offered every day and every night. They had books full of prayers. They were asking for God but so often asking based upon merit in themselves.

Gentiles, well, they do not do much praying and they did not do much asking...but God revealed Himself to them.

God did this and told Israel He would do this to wake them up to what they had.

Even as Paul writes this he is telling the Jews to look at the Gentiles, the ones the Jews always considered so inferior, so lacking organization, understanding, motivation, and prayers...look at them, they have that which you rejected.

I hope God never has to do that with us but perhaps He already has.

Now Paul sets up the next chapter with the next verse from Isaiah 65.

Romans 10:21

But as for Israel He says, All the day long I have stretched out My hands to a disobedient and obstinate people.

What a beautiful picture of God's patience towards His people.

Four Thousand years ago Abraham trusted God by faith and now four thousand years later God is still stretching out His hand to unbelieving Israel. And in doing so demonstrates that He is not finished with His OT people.

Not only today, in the CA, can any Jew put faith in Christ and be saved...

But also, in the Tribulation period, God will again deal directly with the Jews and many will be saved.

I THINK ONE OF THE MOST AMAZING THINGS ABOUT THIS passage is to realize that in order to perish, in order to go to hell, in order to remain in unbelief, you have to resist the pleas of God who is stretching out His hand beckoning you to salvation, beckoning you to eternal life by faith in His Son.

And if God so earnestly beckons those who are unbeliever, do you not also think that He earnestly beckons you, His child, to greater faith and trust in all He has for you, His very highest and best.

Romans Chapter Eleven

INTRODUCTION:

In chapters 9 and 10 Paul has established the way of Faith that is extended even to Israel. Having rejected their king and His kingdom, some may think that God is finished with Israel. But that is not the case.

Romans 10 describes God's desire for Jews to be saved even during the Church Age and then goes on to show that God will again deal specifically with Israel in the Tribulation period.

PRINCIPLE: God's promise to His OT people has not changed, God is immutable, not subject to change. His promise is sure.

Numbers 23:19 God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent; Has He said, and will He not do it? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?

Romans 11:1

I say then, God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be! For I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.

Paul uses three argument to show that God is faithful even to unfaithful Israel.

1.      Himself as a Jew who has believe in Christ, v 1b

2.      A historical illustration during the time of Elijahm a time of great apostasy in Israel (the northern kingdom), v 2-4

3.      A present illustration that looks to God preserving a remnant in every generation, v 5-10

So the question is asked and answered:

God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be.

An absolute rejection of the very thought that God would change His mind.

Why do we change our minds? Because things happen that are out of our control, because circumstances change and we are not prepared for the change. Because we are surprised by the decisions and actions of others.

But God is not subject to change because God is not subject to surprise.

In His omniscience He knows all the is knowable and all the alternative and His plan is greater.

It was not surprise to God that Israel rejected her King and His Kingdom.

So his first illustration is personal.

Paul was an Israelite, of the tribe of Benjamin, a descendant of Abraham and he was saved!

PRINCIPLE: Anyone, in any generation, Jew or Gentile can put faith alone in Christ alone and be saved.

Now Paul goes back to the time of Elijah...

Romans 11:2

God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel?

This is taken from I Kings 19 when Elijah the prophet is fleeing for his life from Jezebel, the evil Gentile heathen queen of the northern kingdom.

He just defeated all the prophets of Baal but now fears one woman...ran all the way to Mt. Sina.

In his depression he complains to God:

I Kings 19:10 And he said, I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the sons of Israel have forsaken Thy covenant, torn down Thine altars and killed Thy prophets with the sword. And I alone am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.

In response to this first complaint God takes Elijah into a cave and allows him to see the power of nature. A wind so strong it tore the rocks apart, an earthquake, and fire.

But God was not in these.

Then the prophet heard a gentle blowing. This gentle breeze was the Holy Spirit and this showed Elijah that he must depend upon the Holy Spirit as his source of hope and protection.

Romans 11:3

Lord, they have killed Thy prophets, they have torn down Thine altars, and I alone am left, and they are seeking my life.

But in the next verse (I Kings 19:14) the prophet repeats his complaint: Then he said, I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the sons of Israel have forsaken Thy covenant, torn down Thine altars and killed Thy prophets with the sword. And I alone am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.

So the Lord promises in 1 Kings 19:15-17 that He will deal with those who desire to kill His prophets and the Lord also has Elijah anoint Elisha as the next prophet. Then the Lord tells this frightened prophet:

1 Kings 19:18 Yet I will leave 7,000 in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal and every mouth that has not kissed him.

Romans 11:4

I have kept for Myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.

PRINCIPLE: In human viewpoint we may think there is no hope. That we alone are left. But God will preserves a remnant even when we are not aware of it.

Three things we see from the illustration of Elijah:

1.      We too often forget that human knowledge is limited. We do not see very clearly and we do not understand all the issues. Elijah thought he understood it all but he did not. When God is in control (which He always is) things are never as bad as they seem. Our knowledge does not encompass the knowledge of God.

2.      We too often forget about God's unlimited power. Elijah forgot how powerful God was, that God was more powerful than the circumstances. We may see what is going on in the world and we may think that God has lost the battle but He never does. God cannot lose because He uses the opposition against Him to win. Elijah had no reason to despair nor do we.

3.      We too often forget about life's unmixable principles. If salvation is by grace then it can't be by works. If by works then it cannot be by grace. If salvation is by grace then we are not kept secure by works. Elijah came to a point where he thought he deserved something better, perhaps because he was so brave in the face of the prophets of Baal. But whenever man begins to think he deserves better he is trying to put God into his debt. But you can't mix works and grace. And the only thing we have to meet grace is faith.

Paul brings this historical illustration to a current application:

Romans 11:5

In the same way then, there has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God's gracious choice.

In the same way...indicates that God is not working in different ways at different times. We may have dispensational differences but the faithfulness of God is eternal.

GOD'S GRACIOUS CHOICE: Gracious Election, Remember that election comes out of God's foreknowledge and gives the believing sinner a way into the family of God.

This is grace, it is not a sovereign choice of God nor is it a method of works by man.

It is God providing a place in His family for the one He knew would believe in His Son for salvation.

ILLUSTRATION: When you send out an invitation to a dinner party with an RSVP you wait the response. And when you receive a response, that someone is accepting, what do you do? You set a place at the table for them.

God has set a place at the table for us, and that place was set from eternity past because God in His foreknowledge knew that you would accept His RSVP.

So Paul says there were thousands in Elijah's day and there are thousands perhaps in the city of Roman alone who are saved by faith and live by faith, not bowing the knee to Caesar.

Romans 11:6

But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace.

Systems of Works:

1.      With legalism. Instead of being holy as God is holy and living by faith, we live by petty rules and regulations. When we achieve a measure of success in these we pat ourselves on the back and convince ourselves that we have meet the demands of righteousness.

2.      By a rigid system of Law: Many believers today who would deny any association with legalism live by the Law of the Bible as a means through obedience of arriving at God's righteousness.