Romans 3:21–26Scripture
All right, everybody turn your Bibles to Romans chapter 3, and I am we're going to look at verses 21 through 26. I think you guys looked through 21 to 26, but that's what I'm doing, 21 to 26 is what we're doing this morning, and we'll read that together. I'll give you a few moments to turn your Bibles there.
In case you're wondering while you're looking that up, Romans 3, I love to play basketball and I just keep injuring myself.
Pastor J.R. Asked when I would ever learn, and I said, it's all right, I can still beat you in basketball one-footed, and he didn't think that was funny, and he had some comebacks and they were really good, but I won't share them because he didn't have the mic and I do. But I don't know for sure, but I think I chipped a chunk of bone off by my ankle, and so I'm meeting an orthopedic Monday, it's no big deal, but it don't feel good.
So I'm hobbling along, but I'm okay. Let's read this Scripture this morning, and then i'll just share with you what's on my heart, maybe we'll do some little looking through the Bible together and prepare our hearts. Actually, we see a
Point 1The shift from man's depravity to God's gift
Shift here happen in these verses, particularly verse 21. Commentators will actually say that the shift began in 20. Some commentators will say that the shift began in 21.
It's a moot point. The shift began. All right, and as of this morning, we see this shift go from the depravity of man to faith as a gift from God. And now, for about three chapters, and then actually even going on through chapter 8, off and on, we see the process of salvation and how that is unfolded in the lives of men and God's involvement in that process, sovereignly working that out. Right now, just so you know, this has been great cause for debate in greater evangelicalism more than any other subject. Some of the things we're going to be talking about, our job is not necessarily to hold a defensive position for any particular theological position that people hold, but rather to take a look at God's Word and let his word speak to us directly to our hearts as it is. That's our job. And I'll tell you this, it's a hard job, because many of us, when we approach God's Word, we come with a predisposition about what we feel to be true. So I'm going to read the Scripture this morning, read it, and we need to read it as an introduction to a greater conversation that's going to be taking place, and then I want to talk to you about two mindsets that shape how we read, how we hear, and how we interpret God's Word. And this may to some be offensive, particularly as we go through and read Scripture, but I think that it is all of us to some degree or another, I believe, have pockets in our life where both of these worldviews shape our thinking. No one's excused. Not everyone has a biblical worldview in all parts of our life. We have some secular ways we see things, that's the reality. Now, God is doing the work, not only to initiate the faith that we have, but to work out and perfect the faith that we have, so we know that there's room for improvement in the way that we see life. All right. Paul spoke of himself as a sinner, the greatest of all sinners, because he understood that he was not perfect. He's perfect, and made righteous and justified to God, he's perfect in that sense that God has covered him, but he is sanctifying him in a process. We see this struggle when Paul speaks to the church and he says, "I do the things I don't want to do, and I don't do the things I want to do. Who's going to save this man?"
I've got issues. How many of you know that although you gave your life to Christ, you have some issues still, right? That is because God is still doing a work in you, and the good news of the gospel is what he begins, he perfects. Another translation would be, that which he authors, he finishes.
Notice who does the work. God does. God gives the faith, God grows the faith, and God perfects the faith.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 5:00
That is a biblical worldview. A secular worldview says, I start my faith, I work through my faith, and I finish my faith, and the fight gets burdensome, because it wasn't your burden to carry, it was his burden to carry. Now, that's a secular worldview, because everything we do is in the temporal, it is through our own strength, it is through our own ambition, it is through our own efforts. So Paul begins to speak about this, and let me tell you, Romans is a very theologically heavy book. Okay, this is for people, I'm not saying it's not for unbelievers, I think it is, because it is the gospel, but he moves into some deeper subjects, that in this particular section of Scripture he is beginning to talk about it.
So I'm going to prepare you with some other Scriptures, kind of as an introduction, by looking at the different worldviews that shape the way we interpret Scriptures, particularly even this throughout chapter 8. All right, here it is, Romans 3:21–26 says, "But now," making this shift from the depravity of man, what sin has done, "but now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned" (he has been spending a lot of time saying we all got problems) "for all have sinned 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." Let's just stop right there.
This is where you can go wrong real quick with the secular worldview. We see it all throughout greater evangelicalism, and it is that
Faith is something we do, and faith is something we will, listen to me, faith is a gift from God that no one can boast in.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 7:29
We're going to go through some Scriptures today that back up these verses that we're going to see pop out, talking about election and predestination, and no matter how much you want to delete those out of the Bible, they're there. So what we're going to do is we're going to look at some verses today because he's beginning to talk about how we receive this faith, and this faith is a gift from God and God gives it. All right, so a secular worldview would say this, and this is what we've seen in the church, and I'll kind of go to a way that maybe to some degree how we have used "by faith"
To get a miracle, because I think that we can see it more clearly there.
How many of you know that faith is not a crowbar to get what you want from God and make him do what you want?
Pastor Shawn Gray · 8:21
We should go to prayer, we should do that, we should have faith, but you need to understand it's not some, it's a gift from God, right? It's a gift from God. There are some people who will have an illness, will come to the church, will be prayed for by the elders of the church, be prayed for by their family, and will not receive the healing that they long for. Have you ever experienced that?
The church at times has been guilty, I even at certain times in my life have been guilty, of saying to people, you just need more faith.
That's a secular worldview. It's saying that your healing, your miracle, your salvation, and everything depends on you. Paul has been talking for three chapters, saying all of you need help and God is the only one who can help, and you are rolling down a depravity hill, and unless God reaches in and saves you, you're doomed.
There's no way you can will yourself to be better and then to be justified by that. You cannot do it.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 9:41
So let us not miss that as we make this turn and forget everything we've been talking about for three chapters by then switching over to a secular mindset and going, now I'm in my strength, I'm going to go do it. Because you undermine everything he's been telling you not to do, and particularly the Jews. We're doing all right, so we've got to be very careful.
And then it goes on and says, "to be received by faith." We're going to read later on in some Scriptures that God gives a measure of faith to each person. "This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins." Now it's beginning to set up this idea that there are nonbelievers who have a problem with God because he's passed over sins.
It's just frustrating, and they begin to question his righteousness, his goodness, his real, true desire to make sure everything is right. And so this is why God, so God is solving a problem by sending his Son, and it is not just, it is to cover our sins, it is that, but it is also to prove he is righteous. That's very important, don't miss that, because "in his divine forbearance he passed over former sins," it was to show his righteousness "at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus." So let's talk about these two mindsets real quick, and then I'm going to maybe unpack some things in this Scripture, kind of mention a few things, but I'm going to give us some tools that we can maybe go in and further unpack this even on our own. The secular mindset
Point 2Secular and biblical mindsets start differently
Versus the biblical mindset. One of the reasons it's hard to communicate biblical reality, not only outside the church but inside the church today, to modern secular people is that the biblical mindset and the secular mindset move from radically different starting points, radically. Now, why is that important, and Shawn, why are you talking about that? If you don't start from the right place when it comes to reading God's Word, you'll miss the truth of his Word. Some call it, I said Jesus, some call it narcissism, some call it reading the Bible with me as the starting point and not God as the starting point.
Our interpretation of God's Word breaks down when everything hubs from us and not from him.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 12:34
Where you start affects your interpretation. Now, this is important, so let's go to the secular mindset. What I mean by secular mindset is not necessarily a mindset that rules God out or denies in principle that the Bible is true. That's not what I'm saying. It's a mindset, however, that begins with man as the basic given reality in the universe. Now, why do I, what do I say that isn't ruling God out? Because in the church today we have people who have this mindset, call themselves Christians, and they may or may not be, we don't know, only God knows, and hopefully in our relationship with him and by the change we see in our heart and life, we will have assurance that what we declare is true.
But the reality is some of us have a secular mindset where everything begins with us. When we pick up the Bible, we're thinking about us and we're going, how can these verses help me and my problem? Some of us sing songs this way. We love the worship services that are secular in nature and work themselves out from us. We don't like the ones that start with God and work themselves towards us, because it makes us feel unholy in his presence, and that, quite honestly, makes us uncomfortable, and those songs people don't shout on so much. It shapes everything, even in the church. So all its thinking starts with the assumption that man has, listen to this, basic rights and basic needs and basic expectations. How many of you have an expectation when it comes to life and God and church and your work and your paycheck and your, we have expectations. Listen, it shapes so much of what we do, or our wants. So all of secular thinking starts with the assumption that man has basic rights, basic needs, basic expectations, and basic wants, and then the secular mind moves out from those things searching to find answers to remedy those things. This has infiltrated the Christian ranks today, this kind of thinking. We pick churches based on this, we read our Bible based on this, we pray based on those things. How would it change the prayer life of our prayer life, if it wasn't based on I expect this, I want this, I need this, I have a problem? See, your prayer life, if you take it, and I'm not saying you shouldn't ask for healing, I'm not saying that, I'm saying, i'm saying that we've got to be really careful and take inventory. If your entire prayer life is based on those things, you might have a secular mindset, and if you want your prayer to be the way that God intended it to be, first of all, just pray what Jesus taught us to pray. Secondly, secondly, we need to have not a secular mindset but a biblical one, so we're going to talk about that in just a minute. I believe that the secular mindset, this is the mindset we were born with and that our secular society reinforces virtually every hour of the day, and social media, online, and motivational podcasts, blogs, and Paul calls this mindset in Romans 8:6–7 "the mind of the flesh." He actually says it's corrupt, it's destructive, and it undermines the purposes of God, and says that it is the way the natural man thinks, First Corinthians 2:14. It is so much a part of the way that we think that we hardly even know that we're thinking that way, and it's not godly. Matter of fact, sometimes we credit God for doing some great work in our life when we're actually opposed to him. We actually celebrate and say we worship God when in actuality we are in a service and worshiping ourselves. We think we're pleasing God, but we're not God pleasers at all, because we have built a graven idol, and it is our name. It is so easy in the life of the church to rob God of glory, to say that we did something rather than he did something. Come on now, give me, just stay with me here, the Bible is replete with challenges telling us to be careful, calling us into warning to not make this about us, and particularly, please, if ever, don't make salvation about you of all things. Why? The biblical mindset, this is a good one, and I think all of us to some degree, I would hope many of us today have a biblical mindset, but just don't think because you have a biblical mindset in many things that you do not have a secular mindset in some things, because we are being perfected. All right, I know you've been in church a long time, but you can be in church and be wrong. Jesus called them snakes and a brood of vipers because they thought there was nothing
Point 3The biblical mindset puts God at the center
In them that could grow or change. The biblical mindset, the biblical mindset is not simply one that includes God somewhere in the universe and says that the Bible is true, the biblical mindset begins with a radically different starting point, namely God. God is the basic given reality in the universe. He was there before we ever even existed or before anything was in existence. He is simply the most absolute reality. You would not even be here if it were not for him, and I know you like to think God needs you, but he doesn't, and I will say this, and you know, I think
God is pleased with our worship, but he don't need it.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 19:25
He lived just fine for all eternity without you, and there were seraphim and cherubim and all kinds of things in heaven worshiping him and he was good. Matter of fact, he knew how to step outside himself, worship himself, get back inside himself, we see it in Genesis, where worship's needed, he's self-sufficient and he's God all by himself.
And that's important for us to understand, because when we come to worship, listen,
You didn't make his day, you made yours by rightly putting God in the right place in your life.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 19:59
This is about you, this is not about you pleasing him or saving his day or making him happy today. He's not bipolar like you, he's happy all the time. Are you with me? He's not unwell. And so the biblical mindset starts with the assumption that God is the center of reality. All thinking then starts with a conviction that God has basic rights, notice the same things here, it has basic rights, has basic expectations, has basic wants. Notice, in a secular mindset it starts with us, but all the stuff is the same: rights, motives, wants, expectations, and needs. God, biblical mindset starts with God, understanding that he has some wants, he has some expectations, he has some rights, and he has some needs. All right, and notice, I'm just going to say this, you hear the word "needs" and you think, good, I need to meet those needs, and you don't meet him, he meets them. He meets them. If he has a need, in Romans where he sees that because he's passed over sin that it makes people question his righteousness, he settles that. He didn't ask you to settle that, he settled it. He sent his Son that people may see that he is righteous and he is just and he still judges sin, and he put that on his Son and he judged his Son according to the sins that he passed over. Are you with me? He meets the need. He has a need, he meets it. He don't need you to meet it. A secular worldview would say, I need to meet him in his need, oh, God has a need, I can help him? No, you can't help him. He helps himself. He helps himself. I got into a great conversation recently with somebody who may or may not be in the room, and I thought it was a great conversation, I thought it was a great question. Somebody said, I'm just coming to the reality that God is self-sufficient all by himself, right, and that he wants glory. How many of you know that God wants glory? And began to wrestle with that, and when we have a secular mindset, which we all struggle with this at some time, we begin to evaluate God wanting glory through the lens of the secular world and our own personal issues, and then we begin to go, well, God's a narcissist. And that was the conversation. I don't know how well I feel about God being a narcissist, this just seems a little bit much. And I'm not wrestling with seeing God as a narcissist. Well, and I said, and I think this is important to understand,
Narcissism is not that you look at yourself a lot, it's that you are incapable of admitting any wrong.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 23:08
That's literally the definition of that, you're you're incapable of ever admitting you're wrong. That's an actual psychological issue. God doesn't have that problem, because he doesn't do anything wrong.
Are you with me? So when we see God, right, and we start with him and his righteousness and his goodness and his perfection and his awesomeness, you can't see him as a narcissist because you start in the right place. But if you start with you, we begin to work God in his glory down to our human perspective and we shape an idol that is unrighteous, unholy, unloving, unkind, unjust, and just flat-out terrible.
We make a god like us.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 24:11
The biblical mindset moves out from the Sinner and interprets the world with God and his rights and his goals at the center and the measure of all things. This is important when we read through Romans, the rest of Romans, it's important, it's got to start with God. So every single time you open up a Scripture or a verse and you read a verse or four or more, verse or four or more, you need to say, let's start with God at the center. You've got to be intentional about it, because naturally you will do the opposite.
And what the biblical mindset sees as basic problems in the universe are not the same as a secular mindset, and what they see, because what makes a problem is not first what fits the rights and needs of man but what fits the rights and goals of God.
Point 4Assurance rests on God's work, not ours
I want to spend some time focusing on God's work outside of us, because God has done a lot of things outside of us. I know this is a long introduction, and I'm going to try to close with a thought and have you go home and use these resources that I'm giving you here real quickly. You're going to have to write these Scriptures down. Hopefully you can turn with me, I'll try to give you some time in between each Scripture, but here we go.
Let's see what God is doing in the Bible outside of us, outside of this idea that he needs us. What we're trying to do, particularly in this message and the messages leading up to later chapters in Romans, and what I believe the author is trying to do, is turn our attention on the great objective divine realities outside of us that God is working out, that God has accomplished to establish his invincible purposes of salvation, and in focusing on God's great work rather than our great work, the aim is to experience the full assurance of hope based on what he's done, not what we've done.
Assurance does not come in finding hope in what you've done. You'll wonder every day if you're saved. Assurance comes from knowing that God authors and perfects it.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 26:20
So you can go through First John, and you can learn about assurance all day long, but if you still are secular in your thinking and you find assurance in what you do and don't do, you will never feel assured and you will live a miserable life always thinking you're doomed. So Paul takes what I believe First John has said and he begins to put some teeth on it and say to us, remember that God is in control, find your assurance in knowing that if God authors it, he will perfect it in you.
That's good news. That takes some pressure off of us. Honestly, as a pastor, that takes some pressure off me. In altar calls, I mean, there were years where I could not sleep at night because I was so heavily burdened with the fact that if I did not pitch it right, people would go to hell and not come to him.
He don't need me. This is the God who shows up and wins people in dreams, shakes people, picks them up by their heads, shakes them over the pits of hell and says, turn or burn. In different parts of the world you have people leading the mafia being woken up and Jesus telling them to turn to him, and much like, actually, much like Paul had, where he gets knocked off his mule, they get knocked off of their high horse. That's kind of cool. I don't know, I don't know that's kind of cool. And they realize, I need to turn towards Christ and repent. There was no sermon, there was no conference, there was no altar call, there was, Billy Graham wasn't even there, it wasn't even there. Did you know people can get saved mowing their lawn without ever stepping in the church? I don't know how that works. They hear the gospel, though, because that is the way that God calls. He calls through the preaching of the gospel, not a secular gospel, which fills many of our churches today, and if you listen on Instagram any amount of time, you will realize there's some really cool things said about God's word that are really secular in nature and don't save anyone. It's important. And why am I saying this? Am I saying this to say that we're good? No, we've got problems here. I've got problems. It's just a full-time job every day to make sure I don't go secular. I've come from moments in my past where we rallied people and created so much emotion in people's hearts, they responded, didn't even know what they're responding for. There are many people that might possibly one day be in hell, and I, and the only way I can sleep at night even thinking about this is, no, God is in control, and it does, he don't, listen, if I mess it up, he can come in and he can fix that. All right, now that don't mean that I could just go be an idiot. I don't need to continue my path of being an idiot into idiocy, I don't need to do that. But I realize that there are some people that, if it scares me, that I have worked into such an emotional state they responded to the gospel thinking they're saved but are not truly actually saved, because God didn't call them yet, I called them, and there's a difference between when I call someone and when God calls someone through the gospel. There's a difference, and God will call who he pleases. And in focusing on the great work rather than ours, the aim is to experience the full assurance of hope. Assurance comes not only from assessing our subjective participation in salvation but even more importantly it comes by our meditation on the objective foundation of salvation. Let me give you some Scriptures, all right, and I'll just throw this out there and then I'm going to give you some Scriptures, because we're about to hear a lot of these words: election, predestination, faith, and they are connected, and so if we approach this from a secular mindset, we're going to miss it, and we're not going to walk into extra assurance, we're going to miss it. Ephesians 1:3–6 says, 6, says this: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places." In case you're wondering which one will come from you and which one comes from him, he just went ahead and said it: all comes from me. "Every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us," and then listen what he connects, so he pulls out one of the spiritual blessings and he begins to speak about it, because it's the most important one, it's the most important one to speak about, that is hard for a secular mindset to embrace. It is this.
So, every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places comes from him, and then he pulls one out, extrapolates it: "even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world." Well, that ain't fair. That's not fair. "That we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved." Some of you right now are already triggered, and I know, because I have a background, this is trigger-inducing for me, even though there is a plethora of Scriptures that back up how I might interpret this differently. Just stay with me and know this, I'm just going to say this right here as we go into this: know that this has become one of the most divisive things in our fellowship, in the church, the greater evangelical church. It just has, the way we interpret this, but this is not the gospel, it is how the gospel was brought forth.
But you can come to God regardless of how you interpret predestination, election, and all of that. Are you with me? And we can love one another, not agreeing fully. Well, let's just take a look at some Scripture, and by the way, I have not said what I feel about this position. There are two, and we'll give them a little bit later. Further, God's work of predestination, as it says, is rooted in the good pleasure of his will. Did you catch that when we read it?
It is rooted in the good pleasure of his will. Go back to verse 5 of Ephesians 1:5: "He predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will." Not yours. So don't get it convoluted here.
If I have to trust in someone's will for salvation, it ain't going to be mine.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 34:11
I can find assurance in believing and trusting in his will, because if he wills it, boom, it's done.
Man, that's good news. You should be shouting me down right now. You don't have to, but in your heart of hearts I know you're going, whoop, anyway, but whatever. So that's good news, his will, and it's aimed, look at where he does this, "according to his will," and look where it's aimed: "to the praise of his glorious grace." So I would say it this way: to the praise of his glory because of his grace. Notice, if you make it secular, you make it about your will, and then you rob him of glory and you don't praise him. I'm trying, and the Bible is, I'm going to say it again because I like it, this is my new Blue's Clues word for the week: replete with dismantling secular mindsets, so that we will have assurance in him and not us. It's replete. I'm going to say it two more times before it's over, but anyway, and I can do whatever I want, I broke my ankle anyway. Because if you start with man, his rights, his wants, rather than starting with the Creator and his rights and his goal and his will and his, the problem you see in the universe will be very different for you, and the way you interpret his Word will start with man and therefore affect the true interpretation of the Bible entirely. Let me tell you then, what good is it to you if you don't get it right? Ephesians 2:8–10 speaks about this same subject: "for by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing," it's not of your own doing, "it is the gift of God, not a result of works." You've been saved by grace through faith.
God is gracious, you are not. He gives faith, you don't muster it up.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 36:15
"This is not your own doing, it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." Hebrews 12:1–2, one of Brook's favorites, it's her favorite, I'm not going to read as much as she would like me to, but I think she likes this one. Am I right? Is this the one you like? This is the one you like. Okay.
"Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight," in case you didn't know, you trying to strive to earn it is a weight, cast that off, "and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder," you didn't find your faith, he found your faith, "and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God." That's good stuff.
John 15:16. Let's go to the, let's go to the Beloved to see what he has to say about faith, since we're going to be talking about faith the next three chapters, and see what he has to say about salvation, let's see what he has to say about Jesus, let's see what he has to say about predestination, God's selection, and God's sovereignty. John 15:16 says, "You did not choose me." Well, that breaks down a lot of theology right there.
"You did not choose me, but I chose you." In other words, if you get the first three chapters right, you'll know we were so depraved we could not,
That's why it's grace, because he chose you even though you could not choose him.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 38:23
That's good. That's important. Let's not rob God of glory. "But I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide." So in case you're ever wondering if sanctification is a second work, it is not, it is a progressive work. Not only should you bear it should abide.
You shouldn't have rotten fruit in certain seasons and unrotten fruit in other seasons. "So that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you."
That's encouraging. Give me some of that, please. The problem is, if it starts with God, you'll care about his will, and you'll want his will even if his will makes you uncomfortable. So you can read that, he'll give me whatever I want, because we sometimes are secular and we want something, and so we look at Scriptures like that and we say, whatever you ask in the Father's name, he'll give it to you. John 6:44: "no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day." Now, do what you want with that was pretty straightforward. Romans 8:29–30 says, "For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified." By the way, when you get to heaven and the day he completes his glorification by giving you a new body, everybody, and everybody said, with my broken ankle.
Matthew 22:14, and there's a bunch more and you can go look at them, you can go look them up, there's hundreds. Matthew 22:14: "For many are called, but few are chosen." Well, God, why? See, be careful, because you started with you and not him.
Each mindset sees different problems. Is the basic riddle of the universe, is the basic riddle of the universe how to preserve man's rights and solve his problems? Is that the riddle to be solved, say, the right to be of self-determination, or the problem of suffering? Is that really the issue today, or is the basic riddle of the universe how an infinitely worthy God in complete freedom can display the full range of his perfections, what Paul calls, literally, quote, "the wealth of his glory," his holiness and power and wisdom and justice and wrath and goodness and truth and grace? Is that is that the riddle of the universe to be solved? Which of those depends on your worldview. If you start with man at the center, with the natural tendencies of the human heart to assert his rights and wants and will, you'll assess the biblical teaching of election and predestination very differently than if you start with God and with his goal to manifest all that he is in the full wealth of his goodness for the purpose of his glory. See the difference?
And for you, at this turn, in the juncture, verse 21 of chapter 3 through the remaining, if you get it secular, you'll miss it all.
If you make it about you won't see him in this next year, because he will only be seen as he is, not as you conjure him to be. And I'll close with this, and this seems like a huge introduction, and it is, and I'll go back and read the Scripture, and this is my closing thought. With this in mind, I'm trying to get us, before we move into this, to understand God is trying to solve a problem, and it is that he is righteous, and although he showed forbearance in sin, he's still righteous, but although men see him as unrighteous because of that fact that he passed over sin and he had forbearance with us, he still shows his righteousness, and he don't have to show nobody nothing because he is who he is. That's grace. That's grace. And so as we move into this, as we close out the first three chapters, I want you
Point 5The gospel is help available, not help wanted
To understand this:
The gospel is not a help-wanted sign, the gospel is a help-available sign, and he's the help you need.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 43:52
All right, he's the help you need. Now, with an understanding that it is God-central that we should hear this, let's read it again, not us-central: "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith," there's that word, we've got to get understanding about faith and who gives that, "the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift." I think he's reminding us, remember, faith, belief, and salvation come from, it comes from me, people, because we've already proven you can't help yourself.
You can't help yourself. "For all have sinned 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." Here it is again: "This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus." Now listen. So, Shawn, why did you talk about a secular mindset, a biblical mindset? Why didn't you talk about faith?
Why'd you look at the Scriptures about faith and salvation and predestination and election and God chose and it's for his glory? And why are you doing all that? Because you'll just miss this whole thing and you'll interpret it totally different if you don't have a biblical mindset. And ladies and gentlemen, it's very easy to do.
It's very easy to do. I know you think out there in the world with all the dirty people out there that they're the most carnal people, but listen,
Just because you're inside the church doesn't mean there is not some carnality happening within it.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 46:08
We've got carnal mindsets, we've got carnal behaviors, we've got carnal ways of thinking, and God is trying to, listen, renew our mind by his Word. His Word, not your interpretation of his Word, not your, I'm going to adjust these things, and this must have been what he was doing. Listen, there are just some things you've got to take by faith.
I'm glad he gives it, because I couldn't even take it by faith if it was not for him giving it.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 46:43
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