Word of Salvation – May 2026

Scripture Readings: Eph 2:11-20; Rom 7:7-25; (with Lord’s Day 2 [Q/A3-5])

Sermon: “The positive of bad news.”

Rev John Zuidema

 

Congregation, most people recognise there is bad news. You only have to listen or watch the evening news and you can become aware of it.  And if you are anything like me, I am getting tired of being reminded of the bad news.  I would much rather be reminded of some good and positive news, such as peace between nations that have been at war, or a cure for some terminal illness, or how a disaster has been averted.

Or to bring it closer to home, you have received an email that the tax office made a mistake in your favour and will deposit $$$ into your account.   Or your scans have come back all clear!  Or a broken relationship has been healed!  Or the lovely Christian girl has finally agreed to have dinner with you for a first date!

Well, this morning I have the positive of knowing bad news.  It may seem like an oxymoron, but it isn’t.  In fact, it is great news.  Most Sunday morning worship services contain a segment that we call the law section.   The leader of worship will remind us of God’s law and his will for our lives.   They might read the Ten Commandments or some other section of God’s law or will for our lives.  He may then lead in a prayer of confession for we all know we stand guilty before our holy God.

However, when a leader of worship does this, it is not to shame you publicly or hold some power over you.  The reason a leader of worship mentions God’s law and will for our lives is to help us appreciate the sweetest and the good news of the forgiveness we have in Christ.  So mention God’s law and our sinfulness is a very positive thing to do!    Knowing our failures and our sin before God leads us to Christ, the only Saviour for sinners who repent. So, God’s holy law is a great blessing to us, and it exalts Christ.

Just imagine when we appear before the judgement seat of God, and no one told us that we needed to be forgiven of our sins by trusting in Jesus’ completed work of redemption.   That would just be awful.  It would be like a doctor failing to diagnose a skin blemish as a melanoma that could kill you!   So, strange as it may seem, we need to know the bad news which, with the Lord’s blessing may lead to healing and renewal!

So, to highlight our failures before God’s law is positive for by doing so, we can highlight even better news about the Lord Jesus Christ and the eternal healing he provides.   In fact, there is joy in knowing our condition and the remedy God has provided.   Paul uses the same principle in Eph 2.

First, he tells them the bad news of sin in verses 1-3.  Then he tells them about God’s great love and the quickening power of the Holy Spirit 4-6.  Then he tells us that we receive this by faith, not by works and it is all of grace, in verses 7-9. Then he tells them about their privileged position in serving their King in verse 10.

And just in case they have forgotten it, he reminds them again of their original position in verses 11-12 they were Gentiles, without Christ, without hope and without God in the world!  That is what the Ephesians were before and what we were before we came to know Christ as Saviour.

Our greatest problem is not war, sex or same sex marriage, money, or gambling or computers.   Our greatest misery is that without Christ we can never be right before a holy God and never enjoy eternal life!  Without Christ we will always be spiritually wretched, poor, and hungry.

But thanks be to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, because in His grace, he gave us his law so that sin does not have the last word.  In fact, because God’s law highlights our sin, we who were once far away have been brought near (v13.).   Hence, as a result, Ephesians 2:19; remind us, we are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household.

So, if a Christian were to ask you, “How do you know God is not pleased with you and that you need a Saviour?”  This is the answer, “God’s law tells me.”  When I prayerfully read the Ten Commandments or hear them read, the Holy Spirit convicts me that I have failed to live according to God’s righteous law.   Hence, God’s law reminds me of the need to have a Saviour.

But how do we convey that to a non-Christian?  One of the hardest things to do in Christian ministry is to make people understand their sin and standing before a holy God!   Now there have been several attempts. We could use the ‘Anglican’ model of “Two ways to live.” Very useful.  We could use the Christian Explained or Explored version and ask people whether they have ever lied or stolen or not loved someone.  Also, very useful.

But Hebrews 11:6 reminds us that if we wish to please God, we must believe God exists.  Without the gracious work of the Holy Spirit, sin alienates us from a loving God.

1 Corinthians 1:18; “The word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, …”

1 Corinthians 2:14. “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him”

2 Corinthians 4:4, “The god of this world [Satan] has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.”

So, if we wish people to realize their sin before a holy God, we should start by praying that the Holy Spirit will work in their hearts making them aware of God and receptive to our appeal.   We could consider presenting God to them through general revelation.  We could begin with Genesis and the creation story.

I say Genesis and creation, for Scripture tells us that man can know God for God has made it plain to them (Romans 1:18-20).   We could speak about God’s divine attributes, his power, his nature, and from all things that have been made.  And I repeat, God has made it plain to them.  If I had taught them, it may have been lacking.  But God has taught them, he has made it plain!

Of course, God’s creation won’t bring them to Jesus.  Well, go back to Genesis again, for God’s law was already present in the early chapters of Genesis.    God’s desire for Adam and Eve was that they would love him and so he gave them a law, “You can eat from all the trees, just don’t eat of that one tree or you will die.”  But they failed and we failed. That’s our misery.

But don’t despair.  The passage we read from Romans 7:7-25, not only gives us the bad news but ends with the good news.  This passage first reminds us of the law and its purpose. Romans 7:7; “I wouldn’t have known what coveting was unless the law had said, ‘do not covet.’”    We could add, “I don’t know what stealing is unless the law had said, “Do not steal” or “do not murder” etc.   Now this doesn’t make the law bad or evil or irrelevant or cause us to be depressed.   On the contrary, the law is good and positive, because it makes us see how sinful we are before a holy God who is the ultimate good.

Now we could put our head in the sand and say we can live without God and without his laws.  But that would be unwise for Scripture teaches that we live and move and have our being in God and it is to him we must all give account!   (Act 17:28).

One of the difficulties with some evangelism and outreach programs is that they place no emphasis on the law of God!  All they speak about is God’s love and Jesus’ love and the power of the Holy Spirit.   Yet, without the law of God, sin has no meaning, it is dead.  In fact, God’s love has no meaning.

If we remain unaware that God’s law says, “do not covet” how would we know that the breaking of this single law is enough to make us guilty before a holy God and to send us to hell.   That is why Paul says the commandments brought death to him for they made him realize that those who do not obey God’s law are spiritually dead!   And that is humanities misery and a continual misery for we continually muck it up!

Romans 7:15 is not only a bad golfer’s verse, it actually sums up our continual struggle.  “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.”  What a bummer!   Instead of living a life that is totally directed towards God and connected to our neighbours, we continually fail to love God and our neighbour as ourselves as God’s law says we should.     God’s perfect law is good!  That’s the norm.  That’s where the bar is.  And every time we fail to love God or neighbour, we are below standard, and this is precisely of what the law makes us aware.

Now please don’t look at the law as a list of do’s and don’ts.  That is unwise.  That is what the rich young ruler did and what the Pharisees insisted upon. Do this and you’re good, do that and you’re bad!  That mentality won’t get us anywhere!   Rather, we need to look for the essence of the law, the thing behind every precept and law.   And the one thing behind every law is the command to love God and neighbour.

Our whole life, our heart obedience, must be motivated by an intense desire to be in harmony with Him.  Our mind with his mind, our will with his will, our desires with his desires, our word with his Word, our deeds with his deeds, to live in perfect fellowship with him.

Likewise, when it comes to loving our neighbour!  If you don’t love your neighbour who you have seen, you cannot love God whom you haven’t seen.   A Christian cannot say he is unable to love his neighbour.  We may not always appreciate what they do or have done or what they have said, but we have to love them.  Oh, if only we would live according to the laws of our Maker we would be happy!

So as you live your Christian life, don’t take away the law, for the moment you do, everything goes askew, everything fails.  Then you will feel no need to love and obey God.  You will soon feel that you don’t owe your neighbour anything.  And before long, you won’t feel that you have to repent.

You won’t think you need to be redeemed. You won’t realize your sin.  And you will certainly not understand grace.  You won’t see the need for Christ, the cross, the resurrection, indeed, you will throw God out altogether!  And unless something miraculous happens, you will never have peace with God or enjoy his blessing and will be destined to be separated from God for an eternity!

Now we know that none of us can love God perfectly.  Paul’s words ring in our ears, “When I want to do good, I find I do the very thing I didn’t want to do.”   There is this constant struggle. I want to please God, but I often please myself instead and hence are guilty of all sorts of sins, not least, idolatry.  I want to love my neighbour, but my jealousy and pride restrains me.  Hence, we miss the mark with our neighbour as well. Our misery is our inability to love God and to love our neighbours.  We simply don’t have it in us.   Our nature is to hate God and our neighbour.

Romans 8:7; says, “The sinful mind is hostile to God.  It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so.”  And to think that you and I were like that at one time. As Paul exclaims in v24; “What a wretched man am I. Who will rescue me from this body of death?”  And we say with Paul “Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

That is the plus, the positive of God’s law! That is grace working in our lives.  It points us to Christ!  And because the Holy Spirit is working in us, we gladly we run to him, no longer depending on our works and wisdom, and we cry out, save us!    And with heartfelt thanks, Jesus comes along and does what we couldn’t do!  He fulfils the law perfectly by loving his Father in heaven and his earthly sinful neighbour even unto dying on a cross for our sin.

The love of God is as old as creation, but the sum, the total of it was revealed in Jesus Christ.  God, who requires love, has given love, and that love was flesh and blood in Jesus Christ.   And now that Christ has defeated death through his resurrection, those who believe and look to him can also love, because he lives in us with his Holy Spirit (Rom 5:5).

Now some people say we are sadists and we are being terribly cruel when we remind each other of the law and our sin and misery!  They would be right if we didn’t mention the God’s love to us in Jesus Christ.   There is tremendous joy and comfort in knowing God’s law and our sin and misery for it shows the immeasurable love of God in Christ.   Without God’s law we live forever without the light of God on our lives, in utter darkness.   With it, we come to live in the glorious light of Jesus forever.  There is no greater joy and comfort than that!

Some people will say, “Give us grace and not law – we live in the age of grace.”  But the truth is that without the law, we would never know grace.  Without the law we would never know Christ. And without the law we would never be saved.    Hallelujah, what a God, what a Saviour!  No wonder the Psalmist could say that he delighted in God’s law.   May we do the same.   Amen.