Word of Salvation – Vol.48 No.37 – October 2003

 

A Comprehensive Answer

 

Sermon by Rev A Quak on Romans 3:21-26

Scripture Reading:  Romans 3:9-31

Suggested Hymns:  BoW 73a; 176; 314; 396; 470; Rej 335

 

Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Whether we want to admit it or not, all is not well with humanity. Think back to the events at Columbine High School. When death comes in such a horrific and violent way, taking away teenagers, with all their potentialities unfulfilled and their years unrealised, we are left shattered.

Think back to the shootings at Port Arthur. Families were losing one, two, three members. A husband left on his own with the grief. The loss of peace and tranquillity in a part of the world that was supposed to be free from such things.

September 11 presents us with another graphic picture of humans bent on destroying other humans. So does the current situation between Israel and Palestine and in Afghanistan and in Iraq.

As we recall these events, we have to admit all is not well with humanity. But then again, we are not like those sorts of people are we? We are nice people who do nice things. Are we? Are we generally nice people who do nice things? To find the answer we should listen carefully to the following discussion that took place over a fence.

A fencing contractor was talking with a rich property owner about his chances of going to heaven. The rich man believed that God would be pleased with his efforts. He said, “I’ve lived a good life and been hardworking and giving to worthy causes. Sure, I hide some of my income so it doesn’t get taxed as highly but so does everyone else. And in my business you have to do a bit of lying and cheating but how else will I get ahead. All in all I’m OK, I’m a nice person”.

The conversation ended and it was time to build the fence. Two weeks later the fence was ready and the property owner came and had a look. He was shocked by what he saw because there were a number of gaps in the fence. Angrily he asked, “What have you done”. The fencing contractor replied.

“Well, as I was building I left a few gaps on the way. But don’t worry, there is a lot of fence still left and, in some places I even made it double thickness. The gaps only represent 2% of the fence, that means 98% is just fine”.

The rich property owner replied, “98% is OK, but you can be sure that the animals will still find the hole in the fence and get out. Near enough is just not good enough and I will have nothing left to show.” At that point the fencing contractor said. “You can see that truth when it comes to your fence, how come you can’t apply the same thing when it comes to your relationship with God?”

Are we generally nice people who do nice things? No we are not. In fact the message that God inspired the apostle Paul to write sees the issue quite differently.

Let’s start at Romans1:29-31. We didn’t read it before so we’ll look it up together. This is a description of humanity from God’s perspective:

“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, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents, they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless.”

It’s not very flattering is it. Yet the description continues. Earlier in Romans 3 we read these phrases:

1. their throats are open to the grave;

2. the poison of vipers is on their lips;

3. ruin and misery mark their way.

It’s a description of how sin works and the way it pervades our whole life. Throat. Lips. Feet. Hands. Hearts. Minds. Our anatomy is repulsive. Sin has taken hold of them all.

That same focus is found in our text, verse 23. It kind of acts like a reminder of all that Paul has been speaking about since Romans 1:18. When God looks at us He sees that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

We’ve all got a problem and that problem is one of personal sin. That sin is effecting us. In fact, it has sentenced us to a slow death. The wages of sin is death.

Sin does to us what pruning shears do to a flower. Take the shears and with one cut you separate the flower from its source of life. Initially the flower is attractive, still colourful and full of life. You may even have it that the buds bloom. But watch the flower over a period of two to three weeks and you will see the leaves wilt and the petals fall. You can try and stop the process. Surround it with water. Stick it in soil. Cover it with fertiliser. Glue it back onto the stem. But no matter what you do to the flower, it will never live again

This is what sin does. And, as God reveals His perspective on the matter, we are given a pretty clear signal. God hates sin. In contrast to our human sinfulness, God is holy and just. There is no sin in Him. In fact, sin is repulsive to God.

That means God can’t just wink His eye and say “boys will be boys, everybody does it.” And that means God can’t just declare an amnesty. “Amnesty” comes from the word amnesia – which is what happens when you bump your head hard and can’t remember who you are.

God can’t act this way because, to do so, would deny His character. God hates sin. Right throughout the Bible we see His response to sin. One of the most graphic pictures of His response to sin is found in Revelation 3:14-16:

“To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God’s creation. I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm – neither hot nor cold – I am about to spit you out of my mouth.”

The NIV has softened the picture somewhat. A more accurate picture would be to say, “You make me sick to my stomach. I want to throw up”.

Now I know that I’ve really hammered the point. But if we have any hope of understanding the significance of what is happening in our text we have to see this. We have to see that sin is the great equaliser. In God’s sight sin makes us the same.

It’s not as if there are light sinners, moderate sinners, heavy sinners, very heavy sinners and diabolical sinners. None of us, I’ll repeat that, none of us are more deserving of being saved than others. The way God deals with us is not based on our merits. It’s not as if God looked into the future and said, “Boy, Joe Durantes, who is the best Christian in this congregation, is going to be a useful person for my cause, I’ll choose him”. It’s not as if God looked into the future and said, “Mary-Jane Pokawitz is going to be pregnant as a teenager, then she will marry someone who is not the father of her child, then she will have a string of affairs, which will lead to a divorce, so I might just give her a miss”. It’s not as if God looks into the future of your life and then judges how good you may or may not be, and then makes His decision.

Think of sinful situations, all sinful situations. Through the eyes of God sin is the same. Sin is the great equaliser. When it comes to applying His work to our lives, all He can see is that great swell of humanity.

1. No one righteous.

2. Spiritually dead.

3. Throats are open to the grave.

4. Causing God’s stomach to churn so that He feels like vomiting.

5. None of us more or less deserving.

6. None of us even remotely interested in making the first move back to Him.

It’s a hopeless situation, except for one fact. Have a look at our text – verse 21: “But now a righteousness from God . . . has been made known.”

But now … and then verse 22 says that there is “…a righteousness from God … through Jesus … to all who believe.”

But now, verse 24, we “…are justified freely by his grace.”

But now, verse 25, “…God presented him [Jesus] as a sacrifice … to demonstrate his justice.”

But now, verse 26, God is the one “…who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.”

Those two little words … but now … are perhaps the most beautiful, and the most significant, in the Scriptures. In fact, our text has been described as the “chief point, and a very central place of the epistle and the whole Bible”.

To see why, let me tell you about Louis Slotin, one of the early scientists who was working with the effects of radioactive uranium. On May 21, 1946, he was experimenting to find how long it would take for uranium to be triggered into an unstoppable reaction. He was doing that by pushing two hemispheres together, then pulling them apart with a screwdriver at the last moment. On this day the screwdriver slipped. Instead of ducking out of the way he took off his gloves and tore the hemispheres apart with his hands. This stopped the chain reaction. His efforts saved seven others in the room, but he died nine days later in agony.

Twenty centuries ago the Son of the living God walked directly into sin’s most concentrated radiation. He allowed Himself to be touched by its curse, and He let it take His life. By that act He broke the chain reaction, the chain reaction of sin.

The wages of sin is death, and all have sinned. But now the chain reaction has been broken. But now a righteousness from God has been made known. God abhors sin, He hates what it has done. But God didn’t want to send us all to hell … that’s His heart for us.

“As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn form their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, O house of Israel?” (Ezek 33:11)

“God is patient, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9)

Sin separates us from God, but God hates the separation more than He hates the sin. God is willing to do whatever is necessary to take us home. To prove it He went from the state of being worshipped in heaven to being a baby in Bethlehem. But now a righteousness from God has been made known. A righteousness that deals comprehensively with our sin.

A righteousness from God has been made known. Righteousness comes because of redemption. You will find the word in verse 24. To understand the concept you need to realise that in Paul’s day slaves were captured in war and taken to Rome and sold. They would stand there, naked and in chains, and buyers would barter for them. Now, suppose you were on that auction block and someone in the crowd wanted to buy you. He kept bidding and raising the price until finally he bought you for an exorbitant price. Then, after the auction, he removed your chains and handed you a new wardrobe.

You ask him, “What do you want me to do?” And he replies, “You are free”. “But,” you respond, “I thought I was your slave. You just purchased me”. And he says, “That’s right. I did. But I have bought you and set you free”. That’s redemption, and it cost God the life of his Son.

A righteousness from God has been made known. Righteousness comes because of a sacrifice of atonement. You will find the phrase in verse 25. The concept actually means “to appease the wrath of God”. Some people are embarrassed by such a concept. They feel it doesn’t seem right to have to satisfy God’s anger. John Stott put it this way: “Where there is divine wrath, there is the need to avert it”. That is what the sacrifice of atonement does. God can deliver us from the guilt of sin because Jesus Christ paid the debt for us on our behalf. Christ bore our death penalty on the cross. We can’t pay the bill. We can’t even leave the tip. Jesus has made atonement on our behalf.

A righteousness from God has been made known. Righteousness comes because of justification. The word is found a number of times in our text. Justification is talking about a once-for-all-transaction. It means that God has declared us to be sin-free. The sin of our past. The sin of the present. The sin in the future.

Just as if I had never sinned or been a sinner. It is through this process that God brings us back into a right relationship with Him. It is a legal and formal acquittal of all guilt by God who is our Judge. All controversy between the believing sinner and God is over!

Redemption. A Sacrifice of Atonement. Justification. This is what it took for God to solve the dilemma of judging sin but restoring sinners into His family. That is the comprehensive answer. An answer that comes because an exchange took place – how it must have hurt the Father to do so.

For those who are parents, you know how unbearable it is to watch your children go through pain. My daughter was born with yellow jaundice. Every day for two weeks after we left the hospital we had to go back to the pathology clinic and have her heel pricked for a blood test. And every time she cried. After the second time I had to go on my own because my wife couldn’t bear it. By the end of the first week her foot looked like a pincushion. By the end of the two weeks I hated the sight of the clinic. The hurt of having to put your three-week old infant through such pain, knowing it was for the good, and helpless to do anything but watch was terrible. I’m sure you have your own stories.

Well, imagine what it must have been like for God the Father. The Father watching as His Son cried in agony from the cross – Why have you forsaken Me?

Why? Because at the end of the day the compassion which our heavenly Father has for us made Him send His innocent Son to bear the curse of our sin on the cross. God knew it was for our good. But how it must have hurt.

But now a righteousness from God has been revealed. Sinners sit up and take note – and that’s all of you – take note! God has established a comprehensive answer that can bring you home.

It applies to those who might be standing by the fence saying, “Yeah, I’m pretty OK”. You’re not “pretty OK”, you’re in deep trouble. I don’t care what good you want to name, there is no one righteous. You need God’s comprehensive answer.

But here’s the other part of the truth. You may well relate to Mary-Jane Pokawitz, who was pregnant as a teenager and then married someone who was not the father of her child and then had a string of affairs which led to divorce. You might be looking back on a life of anger, and living on the edge, and trying out all the pleasures that this world can offer. Maybe you look back to a teenage abortion, or the lifestyle of sexual conquests, or total hate for all in authority. Maybe your life wasn’t that full of events. Maybe you have done things that are so terrible you have hidden them in your subconscious.

But now a righteousness from God has been revealed and none of us, no matter what we have done, or perhaps are still doing, none of us are more deserving of being saved than others.

The wages of sin is death. But Jesus has come to break that chain reaction and put in place a whole new chain reaction.

Now we are crucified with Christ (Gal 2:20).

Now we are dead with Christ (Col 2:20).

Now we are buried with Christ (Rom 6:4).

Now we are made alive with Christ (Eph 2:5).

Now we are raised together with Christ (Col 3:1).

Now we are sufferers together with Christ (Rom 8:17).

Now we are glorified together with Christ (Rom 8:17).

That’s the way God revealed it. Have faith in His ways because they will never fail.

Amen.