God's Judgment, part 2

We often hear the question, why do bad things happen to good people? This assumes something about people. If you're good enough, bad things shouldn't happen to you. If you're good enough, bad things should not happen to you. Christians should not be burdened with this particular question. Rather, we should be burdened by the question Why do good things happen to bad people? Why do good things happen to bad people? There are actually Psalms that ask this question and cry out to God, why are you exalting my enemy over me? Why are you letting good things happen to bad people? See, the first question says, I expect that I'm good. I deserve goodness. The fruit of this worldview is anger towards God because he's never going to give you all that you expect. The second question assumes I'm bad. I do not receive what I deserve. This leads to praise and honor and thanksgiving towards God. Really, to get to the heart of the question, are we good or bad? This has been the question for philosophers for ages. Ever since man was created, we've been asking this question, are we good or bad? Am I good enough and deserve a blessing, or bad and deserve wrath? Well, the question I have before you is, how do you determine this? How do you evaluate your own goodness or badness? How do you think about it? There's a couple ways we can do it. We find somebody to compare ourselves with. That's usually the most helpful way to make yourself feel better. You can always find somebody who's worse. Bad news is that somebody also thinks you're worse than them. There's also just coming up with, you know, my standard. This is what I think is good. As long as I kind of stay near that line, I'm going to be alright. I'll be a good person by my own standards. If you're a Christian this morning, God has given us His standard. God has given us His word. That is what should inform us if we're good or bad. So, let's turn to our text. We're in Romans chapter 3. That'll be found on page 940 of a Pew Bible. If you don't have a Bible, please take that with you. It contains the words of life that tells us who we really are and how God saves us. I just want to read the description. Chapter 3, beginning in verse 10. As it is written, none is righteous, no not one. No one understands, no one seeks for God, all have turned aside, together they have become worthless. No one does good, not even one. Their throat is an open grave. They use their tongues to deceive. The venom of ass is under their lips. Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood, and their paths are ruined in misery. In the way of peace, they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. This is what God says about all people. No one's good. The text tells us, God's Word tells us the most important things that we need to know. Truths about Him and truths about us. It tells us that God is true and we are liars. It tells us that we're unfaithful and God is faithful. It tells us we're sinners and God is just. It's important that we understand both sides of this. We're sinners saved by God. He's true, we're liars. One great Christian philosopher, theologian said, to have true wisdom is to know God and yourself. To know God and yourself. See, we too often want to figure out who we are with our own understanding, with our own desires, with our own standards. To really know who we are, we have to say, God, what did you create me to be? What do you say about me? Because that is truth. We're going to see the truth of who we are, unfaithful, and God is faithful. The goal being that we might put our faith in the faithful God. Our passage makes two important claims. One about God, one about us. We're in the beginning of Romans. We're actually just concluding that first section. So if you're new with us, we're in Chapter 3. Paul has been building up an argument. You go to Romans 1 16 through 17. Paul makes this grand declaration. The righteousness of God has been revealed. It is received by faith. The gospel of God is the power of God to save sinners. We must believe what God has said and what he's done for us. All that then leads to what he establishes in Romans 1 18 through 320. No one is right. We all stand before God and will not be able to give an excuse. We will have no excuse. 118 through 32 established the clear principle, we're all idolaters. We've all rejected God. We've suppressed his truth. We don't thank God. We don't honor God. We exchange his glory. We exchange his truth. We reject him. Chapter 1, 18-32 establishes that we have all gone astray, and He gave us over to our own sin. Chapter 2 makes it very clear, not even the religious sinner has an excuse. Actually, your standard, because God gave you His law, is higher. You have a greater accountability. God is not partial. He will render to each and every one according to His works. And then chapter 3 says, no one has done good. Chapter 3 establishes that clear universal principle. All are sinners. No one has done good. Chapter 3 starts asking the question that the Jew would want to ask. Is there not any advantage to being a Jew? It kind of surprises us here. Paul says, yeah, there's an advantage. You've been given the truth of God, it's been entrusted to you. What, does it benefit us? Is there some way that we're better off? No. Because you rejected that truth. You exchanged the truth for Allah. Friends, it's a very hard lesson we'll continue to go through. The final section on sin in Romans. What God wants us to do is to stop trusting ourselves and to trust Him who's good and right. The ultimate goal here is that we might have faith and real faith. Faith in the one true source of life, the one truth, the one solid rock upon which we can build our lives, Jesus Christ and His righteousness. You see, faith is not just nodding your head, oh, I agree with that, that's good. And faith is saying that. Those are the words of life. I'm going to cling to those. I'm going to hold onto them with all the strength that I have. And I'm going to commit my desires, my thoughts to be transformed by that truth. It's not just mere acknowledgment of what the truth is. It's saying I am completely dependent upon it. As your body needs food, you're saying my soul needs the truth of God. Will we place our faith in God or in ourselves? Let me read our text. As you can see in the outline provided in the bulletin, there are two major sections. There's two basic questions. Is there any advantage to the Jew? Yeah. You've been given the oracles of God. Verse nine, what then? Are we any better off? No, because we're all under sin. Hear the word of the Lord. Then what advantage has a Jew, or what is the value of circumcision? Much in every way. To begin with, the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God. What if someone were unfaithful? Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God? By no means. Let God be true, though every one were a liar, as it is written, that you may be justified in your words and prevail when you are judged. But if our unrighteousness serves to show the righteousness of God, what shall we say? That God is unrighteous to inflict wrath on us? I speak in a human way. By no means. For then how could God judge the world? But if through my lie, God's truth abounds through his glory, why am I still being condemned as a sinner? And why not do evil that good may come? As some people slanderously charge us with saying, their condemnation is just. What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin. As it is written, none is righteous, no not one. No one understands, no one seeks for God. All have turned aside. Together they have become worthless. No one does good, not even one. Their throat is an open grave. They use their tongues to deceive. The venom of ask is under their lips. Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood, and their paths are ruined in misery. In the way of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. Now we know that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight. since through the law comes knowledge of sin. Will you pray with me? Father, we ask that you would give us, through your word, the knowledge of sin. Lord, by your grace, you do not let us see how sinful we are, because we would be undone But by your grace, you reveal our sin to us so that we can repent and repent and repent. Lord, I pray that we would not protect our sin to death, that your Holy Spirit would burst through and tear down the structures we've created to protect our sin. Reveal these things, Almighty God. Through your law, help us to see who we are according to your word. Help us to see ourselves truly according to what you say. Because it's true. Free us from our self-deception so that we might glory more in the Christ who died to set us free, to forgive us, and to make us whole again. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. As I did last week, I want to quickly walk through this so we can pick up the texture of this passage. Paul has just gone in chapter 2 after dismantling and deconstructing the worldview of the religious hypocrite. The last two sections there, but if you call yourself a Jew, you're lying on the wall and boasting. Verse 25, for circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law. He just went after the two sacred things that Israel held to and said, this is what makes us special. So the next question has to be a logical one. Well, is there any advantage? Is there any value? You just said that our disobedience makes it as if we weren't circumcised. So what is the advantage? And Paul wants to answer this question. And he says, yes, you've been given the truth of God. Now you have to see, he's trying to hold two points in tension here. God has blessed the Jewish people in the past more than any other people because they have been given the law. That's one point. The Jewish people are blessed more than any other people in the history of the world up to this point because they had the law. The second point is God will judge the Jewish people just like all other people because they broke the law. Verses three through four ask a question that doesn't immediately appear to be connected with the first act, but it is. The connection is this. God gave the Jews the oracles, the truth, and they're then asking, has our unfaithfulness nullified what you said? Has our sin actually nullified the good thing When has God ever needed or depended on man for anything he's doing? Absolutely not. Let God be true. Everyone, we're a liar. Our lie does not make God's truth untruth. Our unfaithfulness or our faithlessness does not make God's faithfulness any less faithful. He is faithful and true. We're unfaithful liars. Verses 5 through 8 are disturbing. They're disturbing that we actually realize we act, we think this way. To think in a human way, that means to not be logical, to be foolish in sin. Well, if I were unrighteous and served to show God's righteousness, why would He judge us? Look, we're glorifying God with our unrighteousness. He's going to have to judge the whole world, and he's impartial. He's already established that. He's just. He's going to render each according to his deeds. But if through my life, God's truth abounds through his glory, why am I still being condemned? Why not do evil at good night? Why not do evil at good night? How twisted we are. Paul then says, this is what some people say of us. Their condemnation is so obvious, I'm not even gonna answer the question. Verse nine, it has to establish. God is faithful, we are unfaithful. Verse nine, it has to say, well, are we any better off? Okay, we have an advantage, are we any better off? No. Jews and Greeks, we're all under sin. Being under the law does not mean you are not under sin. It just means you're supposed to know it. Being under the law does not mean you're not under sin. The law reveals sin. He's establishing this very clear argument. No one. And you can see in your bulletin the way we can break this down. We've all rebelled against God. We've all sinned with our mouths. We've all sinned with our actions. And in the end, there is no fear of God before their eyes. Verses 19 and 20 say what he's been saying all along. No excuse, there's no answer. When you stand before God with your sin, there's no answer you can give. Your mouth will be stopped. We will be held accountable by God. Let's begin looking. At the first half, we are unfaithful, God is faithful. Let's look at a pattern in the text. I want you to see something here. Verse 3 references their unfaithfulness and God's faithfulness. Verse 4, God is true, everyone a liar. Verse 5, our unrighteousness is contrasted with God's righteousness. Verse 6, my lie, God's truth. I'm sorry, verse 7, my lie, God's truth. Over and over again, we can see what it says about God and what it says about us. He's faithful, true. We're unfaithful liars. In the larger context, Paul is calling us to have faith. Paul is calling us Because by faith in Christ alone is how we're going to be saved from all this sin he's convincing us of by the law. The goal is to have faith. Because we are unfaithful liars in our relationship to God. He's faithful and true. So what is faith? Because this is very important. Because if you were to ask one of these Jews who is addressing here, he would have said, I have faith. But Paul's point is they're condemned, so they didn't have true faith. The whole point here is that they were given the words of God, but they didn't believe them. See, true faith, again, it's not hot, it's not nodding. It's not just saying, yes, that's right. True faith acknowledges it as true and commits to saying, I'm going to love that truth and commit my life to it. Faith is not saying these are good for you. Saying it's good for me. Faith not only says these things are right, it says I'm going to delight in them. Faith not only says I need help, I need saving. I'm dead and I need new life. Faith sees the power of God as its only good. And is willing to wait and wait and wait for God's power to move. Faith says, I don't, God doesn't need me. There's nothing I need to do while I'm waiting on God other than say, I'm trusting you, God. Here's this problem that I can't fix. Will you help me see what's wrong with my heart? And I'll wait on you. Faith turns to God and says, I've sinned against you, and you alone, and you alone can heal me. Oh, God, would you please do a mighty work? I surrender. Faith is you seeing, I don't think about God. I actually reject God regularly. It's clear I don't really care about God. This is why He'll condemn me. Faith in what God says, that you were created to be a worshiper, and yet you've been worshiping everything but God. And then looking and seeing, His Son. God has sent down His Son to live that perfect righteous life that I could not live. Then that Son died on the cross. Though He was righteous, He was condemned as a sinner. As if a sinner. He was crushed for sins He did not commit. He was crushed for the sins of everybody who believes in Him. The wrath of God is satisfied when Jesus Christ died and cries out, Finished. If you're not a Christian this morning, it's not quite finished. Because you'll stand before God and you will have to give an account and you will be crushed. But if you believe in Jesus this morning, your sin's finished. If you believe in Christ and say, Christ, I commit my life to you because you died on my behalf. You died for my sins. You're risen again. I trust you to save me, to heal me, to make me whole. It's finished. Your sin's done. You no longer fear God in terms of the judgment. Now you begin to fear God, to worship Him, to give reverence. Non-Christian, faith is seeing Christ was crushed. Affirming that, hoping in that, and now setting your direction to say, I am going to live for Christ. I will deny myself and follow him. If you're a Christian, faith is this, seeing Christ was crushed for your sin. Seeing that he has set you free from the guilt. He set you free from the power of sin. You're no longer under sin if you're in Christ. You're under Christ. He set you free. Quit pretending that somehow you living in sin is going to glorify God. Ask Him to forgive you. Look at the first two verses. God has spoken to His people. We have to hear what God has said so that we know what to believe. Now, we're not the Jewish people, but we're like them. Raise your hand if you've got a Bible. Raise your hand if you're holding a Bible. You've been entrusted with the oracles of God. You have in your hands the very word of God. For the Jews, they rejected it. We can reject it. We actually have more than the Jews. First of all, at this time, one tribe may have had one book of the Old Testament in their possession. How many Bibles do you have at home? At one level, there's just a quantity of volume of how much of the Word of God we have. Beyond that is actually more important. The Jews had oracles which are promises. We have the fulfillment. It's a higher standard because we know the Old Testament makes more sense to us than it does them. Because we know that every promise has been fulfilled. We know that Christ is the fulfillment of the law. We see that in Romans 10. We've been entrusted with sacred truth. What are we doing with it? Do we properly recognize this? This isn't some archaic book. This is how God speaks. God speaks. This is where He speaks. Do we recognize it as His authority? When God speaks, do we say, yes, God? We're trying to figure out if there's another passage that might let us get around that truth. Does the Word of God inform us? constrain us and transform us. Do we read God's Word so we can win an argument? Do we read God's Word so we can worship Him more faithfully? See, God's Word is sacred. There's a paradox here because there's something about God's Word you will not learn anything if you don't go home with. The only way to truly study this book is to approach it with humility. I'm submissive to this word. We are submissive to this word. Humility is required to learn any truth of God. At the same time, real learning brings humility. We have a lot of teachers. The evidence of a good education is that you realize how much you don't know. When we actually learn something of God, we actually realize there's so much more we don't know. Also, I want to admit, reading the Bible is daunting. Not only the depth of knowledge, but the literature, the different kinds of literature, the different kind of time span that it covers. So I want to recommend we have a How to Read the Bible Sunday School class. This is an important skill to learn. How to handle, how to properly receive God's Word, please, please consider sitting in on the rest of that class that just started. It's important that we receive it humbly and properly. Let's look at the second point here. God has given His Word. His people have rejected His Word. His people have rejected His Word. Look at verse 3. What if some are unfaithful? Does their faithfulness nullify the faithfulness of God? By no means. Something our language doesn't have is the double negative, or we're not supposed to use the double negative. I do it anyway. That the powerful declaration by no is, are you kidding me? How can you even ask that question? By no means. This is what we have to see throughout history. Man's never contributed anything to God's plan of salvation unless you count sin. We have never contributed to anything in God's plan of salvation except the problem that has to be resolved. God has made promises, and he has said, I will die before I don't keep these promises. Genesis 15. Really, we know now, he said, I'm going to die so that I keep these promises. We go back to the simple message of Genesis. What man intends for evil, God uses for good. He doesn't need our contribution. He doesn't need us to be faithful, to fulfill His faithful promises. No, God is always working over against us. This is the power of God. He not only makes promises that seem impossible, He uses our own evil to bring about His goodness. God has promised salvation. He will bring it about. This is what it means to be sovereign. He has said He will do it. He will surely do it. He, the good work He committed to do for us, He will do it. The good work He began in us, He will complete it. We have to trust His word. We have to stop believing the law. Now, I want us to remember something from chapter 1. We all share the biggest problem. We all have that in common. It's a God problem. Our problem, everybody in this room, the most basic problem that causes all the simple consequences is suppressing the truth. The biggest problem is exchanging the truth of God for a lie. We've decided, no God, I hear what you say, but I don't like it. There must be some other way. See, it's important that we all acknowledge that this is the most basic problem. We're idolaters, we reject God, we reject his truth, we suppress it. Because there's something that happens when we sin or we're innocent. We like to think we're isolated in our sin. Satan likes to make us think we're isolated in our sin. that this is so unique you need special help. The most basic problem that all of us have is that we've suppressed God's truth. You're not isolated in your sin. We're all sinners the same. We don't trust God. We trust something else. There's nothing unique or special any of us need other than the gospel of Jesus Christ because it alone saves sinners. It all comes down to this. Is the gospel really the power of God to save sinners? Again, if you go back to 16 and 17, he's not talking to non-Christians. He's talking to the church. I am eager to declare to you, the Church of Rome, the gospel. It is the power of God to save sinners. If there is a sin, you're not alone in your sin. You're just like everybody else. And what we all need to do is point one another to the truth of God, the truth of his gospel, that alone can save us. This is a truth that we need to think about as a church. Every church has acceptable and unacceptable sins. Every church has an unsaid list of acceptable and unacceptable sins. The hard part about the acceptable and unacceptable sins is we're usually not aware of them. So one, this is why I like new people coming to Jefferson Park. They often I'm helpless to see. Oh, yeah, that's something we do that's kind of strange. That's something we, that's a sin that we assume is acceptable when it's not. So we as a church, we can take on sins and pretend they're acceptable. More so, we can say, oh, that sin, that's unacceptable. Again, we all share in the one basic sin. We suppress the truth. We're either going to be a gospel that says the power of God can restore every kind of sinner and heal and save every kind of sinner and forgive every kind of sin, or we should stop calling ourselves the Church of Jesus Christ. If there's unacceptable sins, we're denying the power of God to save sinners. We as a church have to be ready, have to be committed to being a church that says we're sinners. We're seeking to be forgiven. We're seeking to be corrected. We're seeking to be one because Christ says He is the way, the truth, and the life, and we're all going to commit to Him, and we're not going to believe the rest of the lies. And we need one another to know what is the way, the truth, and the life over against our lives. A couple ways to do this. I'm thankful for all the questions on what this actually looks like. One, we need to be less judgmental of others and be more judgmental of ourselves. So stop talking about other people's sins and start talking about your own. Two, be ready to show grace. Just expect somebody's going to sin against you. If somebody wants to ask, you know, why should I not go in Jefferson Park? Well, there's 182 sinners. That's why you shouldn't go in Jefferson Park. Sinners sin. Just go ahead and expect somebody's going to sin against you. That way, you're ready to forgive and show grace. We shouldn't be surprised when somebody sins against us. The truth is, we're all sinners. We should all expect grace. Very quickly, I want to cover verses 5 through 8. Again, this is actually going to be picked up in chapter 6 more directly. How does my sin relate to God and why don't I just sin more so the mercy of God and the righteousness of God is shown more? I have to admit that I used to think in this human or foolish way. When I first became a Christian, I remember going to my grandfather and asking, Is Judas Iscariot in heaven? Because the way I was thinking, I thought, well, he did exactly what God wanted him to do. He handed Jesus over. He did exactly what the Old Testament said he was going to do. Why would God punish somebody who did exactly what he's supposed to do? I'm thinking my grandfather took me to John 17. Well, no, it's very clear. He's the son of perdition. God used his evil for his good. He didn't cause his evil. It shows the power of God. It's the foolishness that thinks, well, if we do something and it glorifies God, even if it's sin, shouldn't God be happy with me? No. God is happy with faith. God is pleased with our trust in Him. He's never condoning sin. Let's jump to the second half. The second half of chapter 3, beginning of verse 9 through 20, the second half of our sermon, at least. We're all under sin. God is our judge. We are all under sin. God is our judge. Here we're concluding this very difficult three-part series on sin. Paul's concluding his argument. He wants to make a universal and clear argument. Is there any advantage for the Jews? Yes. Are we any better off? Absolutely not. They're not any better off because they're under sin. They've done sinful deeds. They've thought sinful thoughts. They've said sinful words. They're sinners. What we have to realize is he's speaking to a people who thought they had some kind of special status. that maybe God would grade them on a curve because they had the oracles of God and they've affirmed so many good truths, but no. He's saying everyone will be judged based upon their works. He wants to make it very clear. The benefits God gives you in these spiritual gifts do not cause them to grade on a curve. Everyone will be held accountable for their sin. The first people I want to talk to of the children of Jefferson Park Baptist Church. You have a great advantage. You get to hear the Bible at church, at home. You have a great advantage in that you're going to hear and see and know about all the things of God. But if you do not place your faith in Jesus Christ, you are not better off. It's easy to think. It's easy to take all this for granted. It's easy not to see clear sin. It's easy to think, you know, my family is a Christian family and therefore I'm a Christian. It's just too easy. You see, we're all going to stand before God alone. We can go through that hard list of verses 10 through 18. Notice how individual it is. None, no, not one, no one, no one, not even one, no one. God's going to judge us all individually. Everybody is going to stand before God. You are going to stand before God, and you are going to have to give an account for all that you've done. Mom and Dad will not be there for you to point and say, but they were believers. The only person who can possibly stand by you when all your sin is revealed is Jesus Christ, if you believe in Him. The only person who can help you when you are standing before God is Jesus Christ. Believe he died for your sin to forgive you. He alone can speak for you. And if you trust him, he will. Parents of Jefferson Park, I have warnings for us. We have to be careful not to pretend our children are not sinners. We have to be careful to pretend they're not sinners. Again, going over to Romans 1, nobody causes your children to sin. It comes from the heart. That little sinful heart with those precious eyes. That's what causes them to sin. You know, I try this with my daughter so much. I like to ask the why question, because the book told me I'm supposed to do that. I think it's right. You know, I want to get to the desire. I don't want to just get to the action. I want to get to the desire, but it's so frustrating. It makes me sin. It doesn't make me sin. I sin in response to it. Why'd you do that? I don't know. What do you mean you don't know? I don't know. I forgot. It just happened two minutes ago. So I want to acknowledge that the instruction I've given you, it's hard. Trying to get to heart issues, that's hard. But if we're seeking to just set a bar and say, here's the standard, that's dangerous. That's dangerous. We cannot pretend our children are not sinners who participate in sin and have sinful desires and have sinful thoughts. We're training hypocrites. Be careful. The second thing I want to warn us all of is teaching them that Christianity is related to their being in a Christian family. And I don't think anybody does this explicitly. I think it's something we just, we accidentally, tacitly do. A child's Christian identity needs to be tied to Christ and the church God has given us two institutions. The family is a sacred institution. The church is a sacred institution. We too often mix these two together. Be careful in how we're bringing these two things about. No one is born into being a Christian, unless it is they're born again from above. Being born into a Christian family does not make them a Christian. Being born from above makes them a Christian. The church has been given the ordinances, baptism, Lord's Supper, to set apart Christian from being raised in a Christian family. Make sure these things are distinct and clear. Third. Third warning. We need to stop pretending we're not sinners. Again, I challenge you and I warn you. I challenge you. Talk about your sin more than your child's sin. When they sin, seek to show them, I have that same temptation. I have that same sinful desire. I do the same thing. I need you to forgive me. That helps them see what sin truly is. I've spoken to the children of the church, the parents of the church, now I want to speak to every member of the church. Membership is a good thing. I've been accused of being a church membership Nazi. I believe it is clearly prescribed in the scripture and it is clearly expected of everyone who claims Christ. But just like we do with everything God gives us good, we corrupt it. So if we're holding on to the fact that we're a church member and that's why God needs to give us some kind of an advantage, if that is what makes us better off, foolish. If your trust is in how long you've been a church member or how many things you've done for the church, you've gotten it all wrong. Church membership is beneficial when it points you to having faith in Christ and growing in Christ. The whole, all the parts working together to be one body so that everybody's built up into Christ. If we just focus on being in the church, get it all wrong. And it actually ceases being a church. Do not trust your church membership. Trust Christ alone. We're gonna move to a very powerful phrase. all are under sin. For we have already charged, this is verse 9, for we have already charged that all, both Jew and Greek, are under sin. You need to realize something. Sin is more powerful than us. That's why you shouldn't flirt with it or play with it. It's going to win. Sin is more powerful than we are. We get entangled in it. The phrase is important. We're under it. Everybody born of Adam, everyone who's not born again in Christ, is under sin. This is our default position. We're born sinners because we participate in the sin of Adam. We'll get to that in Romans 5. We're all inclined to sin. Now, being under sin means we are not able to do anything that is sinful. Every single thing we think, desire, or do is tainted with sin. Now, I want to make sure you hear me right. I am not saying that everything we do is as sinful as possible. God gave us over to sin. By God's grace, we're not as sinful as we could be. But what we have to realize is that there's a poison. There's a treason. The poison's on my lung. We sing of that. We believe that. There's a treason in my heart that poisons all my love. All of my life has some taint of sin. There's no such thing as a perfectly good deed. Let's just take walking an older lady across the street. It's a very Boy Scout thing to do. That in itself is considered a good deed, but think about how you might go about that. Hey, there's an older lady. I want to go help her. That's good. But then as she takes her arm, you're thinking, she must think I'm a nice guy. As you're walking across, others are going to say, wow, what a nice young man. You may be thinking, maybe she's got a butterscotch, maybe a Werther's. Maybe I'll get a reward for this great deed of kindness. And I'll say no to show my piety. Act has some taint of desire mode of problem. We have to see this as being to be under sin. We're under its power of persuasion. It lies. It entices our desires. And those desires, when they're stirred, when those lusts are stirred, temptation happens. And we act. We say sinful things. We do sinful things. It all comes from within. We are predisposed to sin. That's our disposition apart from Christ. I want to walk quickly through this list, verses 10 through 18. Again, I believe here we see three parts. You sin against God. Again, our biggest problem is our God problem. We sin in words. We sin in deeds. And I believe this is progressive. Because the heart of every sin is a sin against God. He begins and ends with the sin we have against God. Our sin in words, we first express that sin and then we act on it. Our sin against God is always first and foremost our sin. We have sinned against you and you alone. The language is so powerful and universal. All have turned aside. Together they've become worthless. No one is good. Let's camp out here. Go to Genesis 1 later and look at how man was meant to be the pinnacle of creation. Men and women made in the image of God with honor and dignity. And we said, we want to exchange that for sin. We want to exchange being made in the image of God and being his ambassadors and being a spokesperson for worthless pursuits, for judgment. No one does good. No one fears God. There's not a proper reverence. The second thing we see in verses 13 through 14 are sinful words. And this is why this is so concerning is that our words reveal our heart. Our words reveal our heart. There are certain things that happen that help people really say what's on their mind or what they think or what was already in there. What we say comes from within. This is why hanging out with a drunk person is always interesting. You actually hear what they think. They're no longer hindered. They let it go. A trial brings us about. When you're under a trial, when that squeezes you, what comes out? That's what's inside. It's poison. It's an open grave. It deceives, the venom, the curse, the bitterness. We have to see that all coming from the inside. That's what Christ has come to forgive us of. That's what Christ is coming to heal. That's what Christ is coming to renew. Our words betray us. We're supposed to be boasting in Christ, but instead we're full of bitterness. We're supposed to be blessing, but our mouth is full of cursing. Finally you see there that it ends up in action. There's bloodshed. We run after ruin and misery. There is no peace. Let's look at verses 19 to 20 as we conclude. If you've been with us, you'll hear these words. He says nothing new here. Now we know that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. This tells us who we are and who God is. how we've sinned against Him. It tells us how He saves us. So that every mouth may be stopped. We will not be able to say, God, this is why I did this. Don't you see the circumstance that calls me to sin? That's what that means. There's no answer for sin. There's no reason to be trying to trick God into thinking there's an answer for sin. No. We'll be held without an apology. We won't be given an answer. We can't give an answer. mouths will be stopped. We will be held accountable for everything we've done, unless we believe Christ is judged for us. I want to move ahead, go ahead and give you a preview of what's next. Everybody look at chapter 3. Look at verse 21. Look at the transition. But, now let's It's closed with pretending. Pretend that's not a but. Pretend it's a therefore. What if God actually gave us what we deserve? What if he doesn't stop what we deserve? What if he doesn't step down and intercede and change the course of history in our lives? Therefore, as because God promised he wouldn't again crush the world with water, he burned it in flames. He destroyed every living soul because every living soul had put their fist up and said, I don't care, God. Therefore, he crushed them. That's what would happen if he gave us what we deserve. Praise God it doesn't say that. But now. the righteousness of God over against our own righteousness. But now the righteousness of God has been manifest apart from the law. Although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Christ Jesus for all who believe. There is no distinction for all who sin and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by His grace as a gift. Through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by His blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in His divine forbearance, He had passed over former sin. By faith, we don't get therefore. By faith, we get but. By faith, we get the redemption, the deliverance from that judgment. By faith in Christ and what He did for us, we do not have to answer for our sin. Christ is our answer. Let's pray. Father, we praise You that You did not leave us alone, but You stepped in. You interceded. You changed our lives by sending Your Son and Your Spirit to transform us and to change us, to give us New birth from above. New life. Lord, as Christians, help us to be committed to living that new life by faith together. I pray that we would see it's not at the works of our hands, but it's the work of Christ. We thank you for his work for us, for saving us from outside of us, because we could not save ourselves. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.