Paul Explains The Math Of Salvation

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Romans 8:3-4

3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

 
 

For the last two days, we’ve looked at only two verses in total. Today, we’ll look at two more, but there will be a payoff when we see that what Paul has explained in verses 1 and 2 will be put together in verses 3 and 4.

As we have discussed previously, the Law was God’s gift to Israel on Mt. Sinai. It was meant to be a light and a guide, and if followed, it would release blessing and life to the world. The Law was a good thing. The problem was that the Law was working with rebellious humanity, and the good Law could not fulfill its purpose when it was used by bad people. This what Paul means by:

3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do [Romans 8:3a].

The Law wasn’t the problem; the people were the problem. But God was planning all along to use the Law as a trap against sin. The Law was the trap and Jesus was the bait, and at the crucifixion, God sprung the trap. Jesus gathered the sin of the world onto Himself, and when He died, He took death down with Him:

3 By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh [Romans 8:3b].

What the Law did was gather sin into one place; what Jesus did was gather the Law’s penalties onto one person. The Law set out clearly the consequence of disobedience—death—and because the Law was given to Israel, the consequences for disobedience fell upon Israel. Jesus, being Israel’s Messiah—the Anointed One—was the representative of His people. Jesus was Himself perfectly obedient, but through His baptism at the hands of John the Baptist, He showed that He completely identified with His people. Jesus, being the perfectly obedient Israelite, died on the cross on behalf of His disobedient people, thereby taking the consequence of disobedience—death—on Himself, and when He died he carried death down with Him. But because Jesus was perfectly obedient and died for the world in an act of steadfast love, He was raised to new life by the power of the Holy Spirit; though He came back up, sin and death stayed down. So, when Jesus was raised to new life in the Spirit, He permanently defeated the power of sin and death and satisfied, once and for all, the terms of the Law:

4 In order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit [Romans 8:4].

Because of what Jesus did, the Spirit now enables the Jesus-people to actually fulfill the Law. All of us who are in Christ now live by the Law of the Spirit who gives life.

This is the Gospel in a nutshell:

· God Himself fulfilled the law’s demands by sending His own Son.
· God pulled sin into one place and nailed it to the cross, thereby defeating it.
· As a result, we who now live by the Spirit are actually enabled to live faithful lives.

In the rest of the chapter, Paul will explain the implications for Christians that we now live according to the Spirit.

 

TONIGHT - Romans Kickoff Bible Study

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I will be preaching and leading a study at Asbury through Paul’s Letter to the Romans all fall. The kickoff Bible study is TONIGHT (8/28) in the Asbury Sanctuary, 6:30-8:00 PM. Going to be out of town? First of all, cancel your plans. Secondly, the study will be live-streamed.

Dinner is available beforehand starting at 5:00 PM.

 
 

Asbury is a Bible-reading church. Reading and loving the Bible is a central goal and value for us, because reading the Bible will change your life.

 

In Romans 12:1-2, Paul says that if want to know God’s will for our lives, we need to have our minds transformed:

 

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.[12:2]

 

We are all affected by ideas, and the way to transform your mindset—your thought-patterns—is to focus the right ideas.

 

Romans, in all its depth and complexity, is exactly the kind of thing that can transform your mindset, if you are willing to put in the work and seek to first understand and then to think about what Paul is saying.

 

So, as I mentioned above, this fall we will be reading through Romans as a church at Asbury. I’ve put together a reading plan that parcels out a small amount of reading for each day, Monday - Friday (though our reading plan STARTS on this Sunday—don’t miss that!); each day there is that day’s Scripture reading, and then I’ve written some commentary to help you get the most out of your reading. What I am calling Romans Part 1 will cover chapters 1-7 and will take us through the month of September.

 

This is going to be good.

 

Pick up your Romans book at Asbury this weekend so you can start with us on September 1. Readings start on SUNDAY this week!

  • If you live in Dallas, email Sandie and she’ll tell you how you can pick yours up for yourself there in town.

 

Each day’s reading is posted here at 3:30 AM, and if you are on my Bible mailing list, it will be emailed to you at 4:30 AM (Central Time).

 

"Judge Not, Lest...."

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“Judge not, that you be not judged. 2 For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.”
— Matthew 7:1-2
 
 

Today’s Scripture: Romans 2:1-11

 
 

2 You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge another, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things. 2 Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth. 3 So when you, a mere human being, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God’s judgment? 4 Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?

Paul’s point here is that we tend to judge ourselves by our intentions and other people by their actions—we give ourselves a pass for the very same sins that we point out in others. And if your sins haven’t yet caught up with you, that’s only because God is showing you forbearance because he wants to give you time to repent!

 

5 But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed. 6 God “will repay each person according to what they have done.” 7 To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life. 8 But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger. 9 There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile; 10 but glory, honor and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. 11 For God does not show favoritism.

Because, sooner or later, every person will face judgment; no one gets to avoid it:

“For God does not show favoritism.”

Paul will go on from here to explain how the Jews are in no better position than are the Gentiles.

The Good News? The gospel is for both Gentiles and Jews.

Paul vs. My Pagan Ancestors

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Today is the day we first see Paul hold nothing back. Done with the pleasantries, he goes straight at the heart of the matter, damn the torpedoes. Hold on tight, because here we go.

 

Today’s Scripture: Romans 1:16-32

 
 

16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile. 17 For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed—a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.”

Paul’s thesis statement for the entire letter: the gospel is a powerful, glorious thing that is saving the world and everyone in it, regardless of ethnic identity, if they are but willing to trust God.

This theme will be unpacked by Paul over the next 16 chapters.

 
 

And then Paul goes straight for my ancestors!

What I mean is, Paul spends the rest of chapter 1 explaining why the Gentiles (i.e., everybody who is not part of Israel, i.e., not Jewish) need to be saved.

The short answer: because they are all idolatrous sinners!

I’m not Jewish; one of my brothers did a genetic test a few years ago and shared the results with me: unsurprisingly, my ancestors all came from northwest Europe. So, at the time of Jesus, my fathers and mothers were prowling the great primeval forests of Germania and Gaul, painted in pagan warpaint and killing Romans, worshipping their false gods around druidic blazes.

And Paul unflinchingly explains why they had no excuse for their sin and violence.

 
 

18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

It was obvious to all ancient people that God (or gods) made the world, and if God made the world, then it follows there are right and wrong ways to behave. Paul’s point: even ignorant pagans knew that they often behaved in wicked ways. “A law written on their hearts,” or, as we would put it today, “conscience”. In other words, they couldn’t say, “It’s not our fault—God never gave us the Ten Commandments.” Paul’s reply, “You knew enough, and what you knew you didn’t keep.”

 

21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.

What’s the result of humanity’s refusal to acknowledge God? Well, God gives us over to our desires. And a result of this is our ignorance (though we think we’re smart) to such an extent that the ancient peoples literally worshipped idols and statues.

 

24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.

Idolatry is worshipping something created rather than the Creator. We worship what we think will give us what we don’t have; worship is our focused attention on what we most desire.

One of the consequences of idolatry is sexual sin. Sexual sin is the worship of the human body rather than the Creator of the human body; sexual sin is what happens when we want pleasure on our own terms, that which is right in our own eyes. Because idolatry is a both a result of foolish rebellion and a cause of further foolishness, Paul sees “unnatural” sexual activity—sexual activity outside of the covenant of marriage, founded on the male/female union—as the paradigmatic example of pagan sin. Paul is talking about homosexual activity here, but I think the implication is larger than that and includes all forms of sexual sin. (I’ll have more to say about this at Bible study tomorrow evening (6 PM—be there!), but I think digital pornography is about the purest form of idolatry that there is, because it is about the focused desire of another person’s image.)

The brokenness that results from sexual sin is its consequence and proof that it’s wrong.

 

But Paul is not only concerned with sexual sin; rather, it is for him an excellent example of the consequence of pagan idolatry. So, he goes further and it is quite the indictment—buckle up:

 

28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy.32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.

And boom goes the dynamite.

That is some list—hard to see what other forms sin might take that Paul doesn’t here condemn.

The point: the Gentiles (I’ve been calling them pagans) have no hope apart from the gospel. Their idolatry has caused them to be utterly corrupted by sin.

(Paul will spend the next 2 chapters explaining how the Jews are not actually any better.)

Consider that last paragraph of chapter 1—doesn’t it pretty much sum up the state of the world today in many places?

The Good News—which Paul is building towards—is that Jesus died for my pagan ancestors even as they worshipped the dark powers. Thanks be to God!