ROMANS: How to Not be Ashamed of the Gospel

This podcast is the Ministry of Grand Parkway Baptist Church.

For more information in our church, please visit Grandparkway.org.

Amen.

If you got a Bible, take it and open up to uh Romans chapter nine.

If you don't have a Bible, there's one on your row.

I'm on page nine hundred and forty-five.

And by the way, if you don't have a Bible, uh you can just take one of those with you today as our gift.

We'll gladly get some more, won't we, people?

And so uh we've been preaching through the book of Romans.

Like I said, we took a break, and today we're gonna uh pick up and we're I'm just gonna read and and teach from five verses in the Bible.

And these are verses in the Bible.

Someone asked me one time, they said, Why is it that when you go to church, most sermons are always about the same thing?

Uh and I said, Because that's not always true, but but but but preachers sometimes get afraid of what the Bible says.

And so I want to talk to you this morning about how to not be ashamed of uh of the gospel, because when we pick up in Romans 9, Paul really is kind of picking up on a thought that something he said way back in chapter 1.

I just want to read it to you.

You stay in Romans 9, I want to read from Romans 1, verse 16.

Romans 1:16

He says, For I'm not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.

For in it, in the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith, for faith, as it is written, the righteous shall live by faith.

And so the Bible tells us that the gospel comes from faith and for faith, and and then that the righteous will live by faith.

And so everything we read, like in this month, for the next two months, we're gonna take three chapters of the Bible, and you say, What are you why are you talking about how to not be ashamed of the gospel?

Because there are things in the Bible that you and I are gonna be sometimes tempted to apologize for.

Hello.

Just checking to see if you're out there.

There are things in the Bible that are gonna so cut against what culture says is okay and acceptable and all this stuff, you're gonna kind of want to shrink back and kind of and by the way, I'm not saying be the guy that goes to work kind of like guns blazing.

I'll tell you what, pow, pow, pow.

Ask me any Bible question.

No, no, no.

But we don't have to shrink back because here's the thing when you and I apologize or act sheepish towards what the Bible makes manifest and clear, you are marring the character and the integrity of a holy God.

You don't want to do that.

You just don't want to do that.

And so, what do I mean?

How to not be ashamed of the gospel?

This is kind of an introduction to the next three chapters that we're gonna spend the next two months in.

And this is what the Bible says in Romans chapter 9, verse 1.

Romans 9:1

He says, I am speaking the truth in Christ.

I am not lying.

My conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit.

I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart, for I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen, according to the flesh.

They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises.

To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ who is God over all, blessed forever.

Amen.

Now, what do you mean?

How to not be ashamed of the gospel?

Let me just give you three things.

It's kind of a you just kind of keep these in mind.

Number one, there's a love that requires explanation.

There's a love that requires explanation.

In other words, in my life, there ought to be some things that I love that you just can't quite get your head around.

Every once in a while, people come to me because people come to me for counsel or come to this church and they ask me to do things or ask me to be a part of things, and I have to just graciously say, you know what, I can't do that.

That violates what I believe.

I'm not judging you, I'm not hating on you, I'm just kind of standing up for what I understand the Bible to say.

And that doesn't always go well.

Sometimes I go home, my wife says, How was your day?

You don't want to know.

Because it bugs my wife when people don't like me.

Uh, because I think they used to, not as much anymore, but but it does it, does it not bother you?

Y'all are like, oh I get I I bet your wife's used to people not liking you.

Uh ask her, I don't know.

But here's the deal uh at the end of my life, I'm not gonna stand before a bunch of you, I'm gonna stand before one God.

And I'm gonna have to give an account.

And so if you're visiting today, it's not that I don't care about what you think, I just don't live for it.

Oh, I lost some of you there.

I know, I know you like preachers that care because you're but but it and so but but but here's what I'm saying: there's there's some there's a love that requires explanation.

There's some things I love, like I love golf.

My family doesn't understand that.

My family is a bunch of redneck from East Texas right now.

They are so excited because the cold weather has come.

I'll tell you where my family is today.

They're in the woods with camouflage on, baiting deers where they are right now.

And they're looking at each other, going, yeah, boy, I saw the movie Girl and he was an eight-point, he's about a two-to-and they got the boon and crockett point system.

I can't come to Thanksgiving unless I can recite that to my dad.

And I'm like, Dad, but I pastored church and blah, blah, blah.

Yeah, but your brother shot a 10-point last year.

And my wife is like, Really?

And I'm like, that that would be my family.

There's some things in your life that you love that should require explanation.

And for Paul, it was the Jewish people.

That's what he says in verses 1, 2, and 3 when he says, Hey, I'm speaking the truth in Christ.

I'm not lying.

My conscience bears witness in the Holy Spirit.

I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart, for I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen, according to the flesh.

Now, unless you know kind of the context of this, you're like, okay, so what?

That's just a big collection of meaningless words in the Bible.

Well, let me just say this a couple verses just to kind of remind you about Paul's relationship with the Jews.

Paul was a Jew, he was a Pharisee of Pharisee, very educated.

He graduated magna cum laude from the religion school of being religious, okay?

He believed the Bible and he was mad about it, all right?

He was their hero.

He was the guy everyone wanted to be like, and one day he realized, hey, you know what?

There's a difference between being religious and having an actual relationship with God.

He opted for this because God revealed himself to them.

And the Jews didn't like that.

Matter of fact, don't turn there.

This is Acts chapter 23, verse 12.

Acts 23:12

It says, When it was day, the Jews made a plot and they bound themselves by an oath, neither to eat nor drink till they had killed Paul.

There was more than 40 who made this conspiracy.

Forty Jews said, Let me tell you something, we're not going to eat or drink until we kill this guy.

2 Corinthians chapter 11 24 tells us that Paul says, Five times I received at the hands of the Jews, the forty lashes, less one.

2 Corinthians 11 · chapter mention

Five times I was beaten with thirty-nine lashes.

I was beaten with an inch of my life, okay?

Now that's the context.

I probably should have read that first and then read how he says here in Romans 9, I wish I could be cut off, separated from Christ.

I I wish that could happen.

Now, he finishes chapter 8 by saying, Nothing can separate us from the love of God, which is ours in Christ Jesus.

And so Paul's not talking about a possibility.

He's not saying, hey, I wish I could kind of go to hell so these people could go to heaven, because nothing can separate him from the love of God.

But what he is saying is, hey, I have unceasing anguish in me.

I got this gnawing burden in me.

I want my religious friends to not just be religious, but have a relationship with God.

And it bothers me.

Does it bother you that some of your friends don't know God?

Or have you just grown accustomed to it?

You're like, oh, okay.

I mean, that's his thing.

Who am I to judge?

Who said anything about judging?

I mean, it's just, I mean, there ought to be some things and some people that you love that require explanation.

Like last night, I went to a wedding.

I went to the men's retreat this weekend, took a suit, and drove back and went to a wedding on the north side of town and didn't get home last night until 10:30, okay?

I love weddings.

My favorite part, it was open bar, free beer, free wine.

It was awesome because I had to get my kids out of there because the white people started getting on the dance floor.

And I said, all right, white people are dancing.

We gotta go.

That means the liquor's kicking in.

And so took my kids out.

But before that, I sat at a table with a guy who announced to me that Lake Travis in Austin is down 60 feet and we need rain.

And I just said, I'll be praying for rain in Austin.

No, grab my arm.

Pray for rain in Lano.

That's where we need it.

We need it to rain in the hill country, sort of wash down into the lake.

And I'm like, man, I don't care about Lake Travis, the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone.

I don't care about none of this.

But I thought to myself, this cat loves to talk about water.

Matter of fact, he said water is going to be like gold.

It's going to be a currency that states are going to barter with each other with.

And I'm like, I'm just here for the free chicken.

You can have my free beer, okay?

But he just, and I just thought, you know what?

This is one of those things this guy loves that requires explanation.

Okay.

So I'm standing in line to get in the buffet.

Wedding started at 6.

We're in line at 8:30 to eat dinner.

Yeah, Emily Post is writing those people a letter.

We're like, what kind of?

We got to be going.

Hey, when you invite people to your wedding, we didn't come to watch you take pictures.

Bam.

You like apples?

How about them apples?

Make us sit around and wait while people get drunker and drunker while you're out there taking pictures with your Uncle Bob and all that.

But also, by the way, hey women, when you got invited to a wedding, we don't care what you think.

You're there as a guest.

Just shut up and eat, alright?

I have more people.

What'd you think about that?

What'd you think about that?

Da, da, da.

I just kept saying, I think it's not your wedding, is what I think.

And by the way, y'all's wives don't like hearing that.

So I'm in the line, and the kids like, I'm just here to get ideas about my wedding.

I'm like, you better straighten up, ain't no man gonna take you on, girl.

But I didn't say that part, I just kept it to myself.

But I'm in the line, and one of our people was there, tapped me on the back, and said, What are you preaching about tomorrow, preacher?

I'm preaching about who you would you be who would you be who would you be willing to go to hell for?

Never mind.

That's what Paul says here.

He says, I wish myself accursed, cut off from Christ.

In other words, it's not possible, but if it was, I would gladly change paces with these with these people, my kinsmen according to the flesh, the Jews.

Why?

Because I love them in a way that it requires explanation.

You say, Well, I don't know what you mean.

Some of you, your spouse has been unfaithful, and you took them back.

And every time you get around your family, your family looks at you and mumbles like, I tell you what, I would have done.

Hey, you gotta it's a great way to explain the gospel.

Hey, I forgave my husband, I forgave my wife.

Why?

That doesn't make sense because God forgave me.

That doesn't make sense.

And Paul says, Hey, I love these people who beat me five times with 39 lashes last night at the reception.

This is, and this isn't funny.

You need to pray for me.

Some kid walked by and was looking at my 15-year-old daughter, and the thought went through me, I will follow you into the bathroom and I will shank you like we're in prison.

And I didn't I didn't skip a beat, it just swole right up in me.

Can't walk by doing this, look at my 15-year-old.

And I was just, she had her back to him, and I was just staring at him like, look at me.

We will go out in that grassy patch where those white chairs are.

It'll be like WWE.

I'll take a chair to you yourself, my man.

Don't think I ain't a redneck.

I get sent home, please.

Burr Rabbit, don't throw me in that briar patch.

See some college football.

I've been sleeping on a rock all weekend.

I'm not in a good way.

My back hurts.

Kid kept getting up and getting coffee.

What kind of 17-year-old kid drinks that much coffee?

I'd be talking, I could feel him walk by, and I'd my chest, you know, man, when you feel when you used to get in a fire, your chest get all thick.

I'd be getting yoked up, like, mm-hmm.

And that little voice said, Hey, by the way, there's a love that requires explanation.

Murder requires explanation too.

Yeah.

See, because I love my daughters, you can't come for them.

You can't just roll up your punk self, hey man, how old your daughter?

Old enough for me to kill somebody over.

That don't make for good wedding conversation, by the way.

The guy next to me said, You got a funny sense of humor for a preacher.

I said, Who's kidding?

Paul said, Hey, these people beat me.

These people, 40 of these people.

Now get this.

Here's the problem with you all.

Here's why evangelism is hard for you.

Because all the things you love make sense.

All the people you love, they love you back.

See, this whole thing, here's what keeps you from being ashamed of the gospel.

That you love some people and it requires explanation.

And for Paul, it was the Jews.

The second thing that keeps you and I from being ashamed of the gospel.

And oh, by the way, Paul's really, let me just say, Paul's just really saying to of the Jews what all great leaders, spiritual leaders in the Bible have said.

Moses said the same thing back in Exodus 32.

Moses, God got sick of Israel just sinning, and God told Moses, hey, get out of the way.

I'm gonna wipe them out, and I'm gonna make you a father of many nations.

And if you're a leader at work or you're leading your family, or you got some responsibility, you should ask yourself this.

Do you just want to be the next Abraham or do you want the people you lead to experience the benefit of all God has for them?

Because we got enough people, especially in church, we got enough people, enough pastors, they're like, I want to be the next whoever.

I want to be the next Abraham.

But do you want your people to understand the word of God?

Do you want them to experience the presence of God?

Because Moses knew himself enough to know, hey, God, me is not enough.

Because he told God, he said, Hey, unless your presence goes up with us, don't lead us out of here.

We don't want to go to the promised land without the presence of God.

We don't want to get in there and have a land flowing of milk and honey.

Translation, we don't want to have a big fat retirement.

We don't want to have a nice house and cars and enough money to travel and see the grandkids.

Nothing wrong with any of that, by the way.

Nothing wrong with any of that.

But if you have that without God, that's never going to be right.

And man, you're just going to keep building bigger houses for your wives and buying her a newer SUV.

And she's saying, I don't want the stuff.

I want the presence of God in our marriage.

I want to wake up beside a spiritual man, not just a man that likes sleeping with me.

I want to know that this is rooted in something bigger than you and me and the amount of money we bring home.

I want to know that the presence of God is over us.

And so when your wife is always like, give me more, give me more, give me more, and you're going, that's all I got, she doesn't want more of you.

You can't take her to the promised land, and that'd be enough.

You ever wonder why rich people in Hollywood kill themselves?

If it was about math, that would be easy.

But this isn't about math.

This is about music.

Do you hear that music?

Does it kind of resonate and rise up in you?

That's what Paul says.

Like all great spiritual leaders in the Bible, hey, listen, I would gladly take their place.

I would go to hell if these people could go to heaven.

But God didn't accept Moses' offer, didn't accept Paul's offer, because as great as they were, they were both sinners.

And sinful people can't die for other sinful people.

It requires a sinless person to do that.

But that's a whole nother sermon.

Second thing that keeps you and I from how to from not being ashamed of the gospel, and this is really the bulk of the sermon, is just to embrace that God is at work on a scale that we cannot comprehend.

God is at work on a scale that we cannot comprehend.

You say, well, that sounds like a general statement that preachers say just to cover themselves.

No, that's a very specific statement that I say to inform you and I that God, Isaiah 55, God is on the record in the Old Testament is saying, hey, my ways are higher than your ways, and my thoughts are higher than your thoughts.

As high as the heaven is from the earth.

That's how, that's how far above your capacity to understand things that I am working.

And I know that all of us, listen to me, church, all of us, we want to say, well, we want to, I you think you want a God that you can understand and you can explain, but you don't.

Here's why.

Because a God that you can understand everything and explain everything, He is not worthy of your worship and He's not deserving of your wonder.

And God says, Hey, my ways are higher than your ways.

Translation, I'm gonna do some things the way that you would not do them.

Are you okay with that?

Because we'll get into it next week in chapter deeper into Romans chapter 9, and God's gonna put three questions on us, and one of them is gonna be, who are you, old man, that you should answer back to God?

Romans 9 · chapter mention

Who do you think you are to tell me how to do what only I can do?

If you could do this, you already would have.

But you can't.

Boy, that offends us.

That, whoa man.

He said, What do you mean?

God's at work on a scale.

People always bring up to me different things I get in conversation, and I don't mean in the Serengeti in Africa.

I mean up here at the Home Depot on Highway 6 and at the first colony mall, right up here, where I'm talking to some little kid, and his mom comes over, I'm sorry, he kind of gets away.

I'm like, he gets away.

You got mine want to keep your eye on this kid, okay?

I'm a good stranger.

Not all strangers are good.

And she's like, he's really fascinated with you.

I said, because we're on the same wave level.

How old is he?

He's four.

Yeah, that's about where I think on.

And she said, You're great with kids.

What do you do for a living?

Whoopsie.

Dad rolled up, other kids rolled up, teenage son rolled up, like, what is this?

This isn't this is like a buffet, son.

There's more here than you can handle, okay?

But I just said, uh I actually I pastor a church here in the city, and the woman blurted out, we're Presbyterians.

I said, Well, do you want a cookie?

You say, What do you mean?

That's what we all do.

What do you mean?

Because right there after the first three verses in verse 4, look at what Paul says.

Paul says in Romans 9, verse 4, he says, They are Israelites, and to them belong any list, the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law.

Romans 9:4

These are the things in the Bible that we read and preachers just skip over, and they never tell you, hey, this is what this says and means.

I want to tell you what it says and means.

He says, but number one, he says, and to them, these seven benefits of the Jews, people always bring up to me, what about the guy in Africa?

What about the Jews?

We're Presbyterians.

I'm just random, crazy stuff, and they think when they say something, all of a sudden, tick-tock, game's locked, you can't say anything.

And I'm like, Because she said, We're Presbyterians, and what I heard was, we have Abraham as our father.

You say it differently.

Oh, my granddaddy was a Baptist pastor.

We're Catholic.

Oh, we go to Methodist Church.

My family helped found.

Somebody told me this week, my family helped found the Methodist Church here in Sugarland.

And all I heard was, we have Abraham as our father.

What do you mean?

When when Paul says, hey, to them, they have the, you know, here's the benefit he says to them belongs the adoption.

Notice it doesn't say A.

It also uses a definite article: the adoption, the glory, the covenants.

What does he mean?

When he says the adoption is when used of Israel, this refers to God's uh selection of the Jews as an elect nation by which he would bring salvation to the world.

Remember back in chapter 1, Paul says, I'm not ashamed of the gospel.

It is a power of God unto salvation, to the Jew first, and then to the Greek, to the Gentile, to the religious person, and to the non-religious person.

By the way, the Jews took this and they consumed it upon their lust and they made it about their national heritage, not a personal relationship.

That's why when you're reading the New Testament and Jesus is having a conversation with the Jewish religious leaders of the day, and they would get frustrated because they were losing to the truth, they would blurt out, We have Abraham as our father.

And Jesus was like, What?

What?

It's like in Matthew chapter 4, don't turn there.

Matthew 4 · chapter mention

John the Baptist is baptizing, and people are streaming out there to go be baptized because they've become Christians, and the Pharisees are like, We want to go too.

And so they come out there, and John the Baptist, this is the kind of man you want to sit by at a wedding reception.

This is the guy that says crazy stuff, okay?

John the Baptist sees them coming and says, Hey, you who told you to flee from the wrath to come, you brood of vipers?

Don't you want to hear somebody say that to somebody before you die?

Who told you to flee from the wrath to come, you brood of vibes?

Of vipers, you go and bring forth fruit in keeping with repentance, and then I'll baptize you.

And don't even suppose he's reading their mail.

And don't even suppose to say, We are sons of Abraham, because my father can make from these stones sons of Abraham.

And I know some of you think, Pastor, sometimes you need to be more gentle in social settings.

Listen, I can get you a polished pastor off the internet today.

He'll be here next week.

There's a lot of them out there unemployed because they sorry.

They don't preach the Bible.

They have affairs.

They're not men of integrity.

They're not men of fire.

They're just a bunch of sissies looking for jobs.

I can get you one of them.

I can go to Walmart.

They got dental insurance.

We ain't got that here.

But I'm sitting there, and the lady says, We're Presbyterians in the shoe department at the men's dealers in the first colony mall.

And her kids are standing looking at me like, say some crazy stuff, John the Baptist.

She says, We're Presbyterians.

And I said, I'm a Homo sapien.

And I got opposable thumbs.

And the dad's kind of like and the wife looked, he's like, Oh, I'm sorry.

Who's running this show here, Billy Bob?

And she says, Well, I mean, I and I said, I wasn't, I wasn't trying to proselytize.

You asked me, remember, you asked me what I do for and I told you.

And you kind of like, what she said was, we have Abraham as our father.

Checkmate.

My granddaddy was a Baptist preacher.

What's that got to do with you?

Oh, we're Catholic.

Okay.

I'm not making fun of any of that.

Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Methodists, Baptists, hey, be careful.

You don't waste your life touting your religious tradition at the expense of having a personal relationship with God.

Because unless you understand the doctrine of adoption, that what Paul says in Galatians 4, he says, hey, but when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons.

And then he says, And because you are sons, see, God relates to sons differently than he relates to servants.

I'm not a servant, I'm a son.

Every once in a while, uh somebody here will ask me, one of the guys on staff on Wednesday, how are you coming on your sermon?

It's about halfway there, but he's my dad.

He loves to tell me stuff.

He'll tell me.

And they think I'm being dismissive.

I'm not.

My wife's like, you should tell them you actually believe that.

You gotta tell other preachers that we got the wrong cats here if we gotta tell them that.

Well, I mean, I just think it sounds like you're being flippant.

That's a statement about them, not me.

Because Paul says, hey, and by the way, because you're sons, because you're daughters of God, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into your heart, crying, Abba, Father, so you're no longer a slave, but a son.

And if a son, then an heir through God.

Chuck talked to us about that this little bit this weekend at the men's retreat.

And I was just sitting there going, Yeah, they're gonna get a double dose of this come tomorrow morning.

Because God says, Hey, here's the first benefit to the Jews.

They have the adoption.

They were the first people that God said, Hey, you once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God.

They have the adoption.

Secondly, he says they have the glory.

This refers to God's presence.

The distinguishing characteristic, by the way, of God's people is his glory.

That's the thing.

That's why Moses said, if you don't go up with us, what else is going to distinguish us from all the people on the earth?

We don't want to just have a bigger, better building or more money in the bank or cooler hipper technology bolted to the ceiling.

We want the glory.

A lot of people were shocked this morning.

I don't know if you know, but it rained this morning.

Like hard, okay?

People were like, I watched the weather.

I didn't see this coming.

And I just, the thought went through my head.

Can you imagine being a little kid back then?

Because when I was growing up, I had two three pairs of pants, or excuse me, two pairs of pants and three shirts.

And so when I would get up, it was just a matter of wearing which one wasn't stinking the worst, okay?

But my daughter gets up, my 10-year-old gets my phone or my wife's phone and scrolls to the weather to plan what she's gonna wear.

I'm over there drinking my coffee thinking, my mind, these kids got it well these days.

Man, can you imagine being back in biblical times and little kid asking his dad, Dad, what's a weather report for tomorrow?

It's cloudy with a chance of glory.

Because God says, Hey, by the way, to them belongs the glory.

The glory refers to the manifest presence of God.

You say, What do you mean?

This is from Exodus chapter 40.

Exodus 40 · chapter mention

Just let this wash over you and affect the way you think about coming to church.

He says, This is the tabernacle, which was where people met to meet with God.

It says, and the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.

Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled on it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.

And throughout all their journeys, whenever the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the people of Israel would set out.

But if the cloud was not taken up, then they did not set out till the day that it was taken up.

For the cloud of the Lord was on the tabernacle by day, and the fire was in it by night, and in the sight of all the house of Israel through all their journeys.

They didn't move unless the glory of God moved.

If the glory of God moved, they didn't want to stay where they are and say, Well, this is comfortable for us.

We kind of like it.

We got good schools, we like our neighbors.

This is good.

We're squatting right here.

Now they would get up and say, hey, the cloud's moving.

And their kids would start picking up their jacks and their jump ropes.

Why?

Because we're moving.

Because that's what Paul picks up on when he says in the New Testament, whatever you do, whether you eat or drink, do all for the glory of God.

He says, just, hey, live your life in such a way that the glory of God is on you.

Go to work tomorrow and look at your workers, your co-workers in the face and say, hey, man, do you experience the glory of God on your life?

Be prepared for them to go.

I got no idea what you're talking about, man.

That's a joke.

We should ask ourselves that.

See, he says, to them belongs the glory.

To them belongs the adoption.

To them belongs, thirdly, the covenants.

The covenants.

That's the Abrahamic covenant, the Mosaic covenant.

God oathed himself.

And every time God makes a covenant with man, he's revealing to us something about himself.

He doesn't need our help.

We need his understanding.

Not only do I want you to know this about me, God seems to be saying, He's saying, Don't just know this about me, but never forget it.

That's why you read in the Old Testament, God would make a covenant, and the people would violate the terms of the covenant, and then God would stay faithful.

And the Bible says, though we are faithless, God is faithful.

And when they were marching into the promised land, God told Moses, hey, by the way, put some of them on Mount Ebal, and some of them are on Mount Gerizim.

And these people over here are going to call down the people and tell them, if you violate this covenant, here's all the curses God's going to bring on you.

And these people on this mountain are going to call down on them and say, But if you obey God, here's all the blessings God's going to bring down on you.

And they marched in the valley with all this washing down over them in stereophonic super satisfaction.

And they walked into the promised land and violated the covenant.

And God stayed faithful.

And God just kept on keeping on.

And God said, though you're faithless.

Matter of fact, God told him at one point, you've played the harlot on every high hill and under every green tree.

Because, see, God just robbed them of impression management right off the bat.

Translation, don't come into my presence and kind of blow sunshine up my shorts.

I don't want to hear it.

I know what you really like.

You ever been in church and heard religious people pray?

And thought to yourself, that cat doesn't know what he's saying.

You can't do that in the presence of God.

God doesn't believe that lie.

And he's not harsh about it, but he is insistent upon it.

See, when God said, Hey, by the way, tell them to your children and to their children and their children.

Why?

Because when God makes a covenant, hear this, beloved.

When God makes a covenant, he doesn't just write some stuff down on paper, he carves his name in history.

And says, Don't ever forget this.

Because I'm a God of covenant.

Fourth thing he says, the benefit of the Jews is the giving of the law.

The giving of the law.

See, there was a time when it was considered an honor to be given the law of God.

We live in a day when it seems to be a burden, something that kind of holds you back from self-expression and real freedom.

You say, What do you mean?

If you're in Romans 9, just turn back a couple pages to Romans chapter 3.

Romans 3 · chapter mention

You still with me out there?

Am I talking to anybody this morning?

Because I can talk to myself at home, okay?

Okay, I'm just checking.

By the way, if you're visiting today, I'm not mad at anybody.

It just gets on me sometimes.

I told my wife last night, driving home from that wedding.

I got home at 10:30.

How you feel about tomorrow?

Well, I feel fool.

Well, go with don't hold back.

I'm not gonna hold back, but I don't want to hurt my people.

I don't want you to leave and go, man, he was kind of getting after us today.

No, no, no, no, no.

I don't want you to be, I don't want you to apologize for God ever again.

Don't go to a funeral and apologize for God.

Don't find yourself in a situation surrounded by people who don't believe the things of God and then apologize as if that's going to make God somehow more appealing to them.

If God doesn't reveal himself to them, they don't stand a chance.

Just like if he didn't reveal himself to you, you don't stand a chance.

You say, what do you mean?

To them, the giving of the law, Romans chapter 3, verse 1, then what advantage has the Jew?

Romans 3:1

That's a great question.

Paul says, hey, what advantage is there to being 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 some were unfaithful?

Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God?

By no means.

Let God be true, though everyone were a liar, as it is written, that you may be justified in your words and prevail when you are judged.

Now that's kind of a when you see something like that in quotes, and Paul in Romans 3 is quoting something.

What he's quoting here is he's quoting David from Psalm 51, verse 4.

Psalms 51:4

Psalm 51 is a psalm of confession that David wrote after he committed adultery with a woman named Bathsheba and had her husband killed.

So if you feel today like, hey, I've kind of done some really bad sinful things, I'm not excusing that, but you're in great company because in the Bible is a man named David who committed adultery and murder.

And then he wrote these words.

In Psalm 51, verse 4, the whole verse says this, against you, talking to God, against you, and you only have I sinned.

Psalms 51:4

See, sin is sin not because it violates your conscience or it kind of deters your self-development, or maybe it hurts your reputation on Facebook.

That doesn't make it sin.

Sin is sin because it violates the nature of God.

It makes whatever you choose to do seem more satisfying than sin.

Matter of fact, you've only committed two sins in your entire life.

Isn't that good news?

That's what God says in Jeremiah chapter 2, about verse 13.

Jeremiah 2 · chapter mention

My people have committed two sins.

Number one, they've forsaken me.

Bad idea.

They've forsaken me.

And number two, they've dug for themselves wells that hold no water.

All of my sins and your sins fall into that category.

That's what David did.

David forsook God.

And this is what he writes.

He says, Against you and you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you, here's where we pick up, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment.

Do you hear that?

See, the reason, the main reason we blame God and charge God with wrongdoing is we're ignorant of what his word actually says.

David is saying, I've done evil in your sight, and I will be judged by your words.

So everyone else's opinion in me doesn't matter.

I don't get to my friends and say, hey, what do you think?

And then say, Oh, God's a God of love and God's a God of forgiveness.

True statement.

But God's also a God of holiness and he hates sin.

See, here's the problem.

Let me just point this out to you.

When David says in Psalm 51, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment.

We don't like the Bible because we come to the Bible because we want to be justified in our words, and we want to be blameless in our judgment.

And when it comes down to either you being justified or God being justified, proved right, the Bible's going to prove God right every time.

Every time.

Every time.

And so David says, by the way, and Paul picks up on it in Romans 9 when he says, They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law.

They've been entrusted with the very oracles of God.

So they above all people should understand the blamelessness of God's judgment.

I told the first service I might as well tell you.

See, we don't want to, we want to say it's not my fault, somebody else's fault.

When I was in the eighth grade, it was 1978, by the way, if you want to do the math.

1978, in eighth grade, I had Mr.

Parker for science, for life science, a black textbook about that thick.

I don't remember anything the book said.

But I remember the first day, Mr.

Parker pulled out a drawer and pulled out a wooden paddle about that long and said, I will not tolerate foolishness in my class.

I will smite you with the rod of correction and discipline if you act in an untimely manner.

Are there any questions?

And then he went, wham, and just flicked his wrist, and it sounded like a drum went off.

And I thought, I don't think I want any part of that.

But foolishness was pent up in my heart.

I forgot to tell you, when I was in that eighth grade class, I was already on probation.

Because I was a thug.

And I don't brag about that.

So students, don't sit out there.

I see somebody like, oh, see, mom, he was a thug.

He turned out to be a preacher.

There's hope for me.

Hard, loving, straight thugging.

Shut up.

You're not Snoop Dogg.

Stop it.

You may smoke the same thing, but that doesn't mean you're a rapper.

Anyway.

Oh, by the way, this may be news to your parents.

There's an epidemic of pot smoke and pearly white middle-class, upper-class kids in Sugarland.

Some of y'all like, not my kid.

Back to Mr.

Parker.

One day he took me and Pat Pilgrim and Johnny Hicks out in the hallway because when you acted up, he would just open that drawer and go, come on.

Walked out there, and there was a corner post.

His door was right here, and then stairs down there, and then there's a landing and turned and went down to the second floor where the office was.

He never took you to the office.

He said to us, I handle my business.

I misspelled business till I got in the 10th grade.

I thought it was B-I-D-N-E-S-S.

He came out there and he would say, Hold up that corner post.

And you had to hold up the corner post of that thing.

And he, like he was trying to hit a pitch of wedge, he normally hits 125, 140.

He would turn his hips and his shoulders and whoop bam! He hit Pat Pilgrim twice, and the cat went to his knees, like, uh, uh.

I heard him say under his breath, please, Jesus, come back.

But Jesus didn't come back.

And Mr.

Parker just put his foot on him and just pushed him to the side.

And Johnny Hicks walked up.

I was like, I ain't following that.

Johnny Hicks walked up there and put his hands on there.

Mr.

Parker gave him three hard so hard, did your legs like you having a baby or they're cutting Gus's leg off in Lonesome Doug.

He hit you so hard you'd forget how to talk.

I never forget this.

I remember a thing we talked about in life science eight, okay, in eighth grade.

But I remember Johnny Hicks taking his hands off that thing and turning around, shaking Mr.

Parker's hand, saying, Thank you, Mr.

Parker.

I deserve that.

And I'm sorry.

And I thought, oh, please, hammer, don't hurt him.

Maybe you're so overwhelmed with gratitude, you can just let me go.

And he took his glasses off, took his handkerchief out, wiped his forehead off, and said, wiped some tears out.

Said, I appreciate that young man.

You're gonna make it in life.

McClennan, get up there.

I did not shake his hand when he was done.

I'd never been hit that hard in my life.

I mean, I saw Jesus.

I was like, woohoo! I walked back in, one of my friends, how was it?

I can't feel my legs.

He goes, Did you cry?

And I was like, I ain't letting him see me cry.

He can beat me off.

I don't care.

He could kill me.

I ain't crying.

Now, why do I tell you that?

Well, I tell you that is because when it comes to the Bible, one of two people is going to be justified or proved right.

You are God.

And you've got to make up your mind which one of those you're comfortable with.

In your dating life, one or two people is going to be justified.

In the way you spend your money, one or two people is going to be justified.

In the way you do marriage, one or two people is going to be justified.

That's just the way it's going to be.

And David said, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment.

See, we're going to get into the thick of it next week.

This is not the thick of it, please.

And God's going to say, Who are you, old man, that you should answer back to God?

Do you think I need you to tell me how to do what only I can do?

No, I don't.

Fifthly, he says the benefit of the Jews, they have the temple worship.

They have the worship.

We get a glimpse of this in the temple.

He's talking about the stuff.

How do you worship God?

You get a glimpse of this in Isaiah 6.

It opens up, and Isaiah says, In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord lofty and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple.

And above him were seraphs, these angelic beings, these seraphs with six wings, with two wings that covered their feet, with two wings that covered their face, and with two wings they flew.

And they were calling out to one another: Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.

The whole earth is full of his glory.

You don't have to be a smart person.

You don't have to go to church a whole lot or have church closed to realize, uh-oh, something's going on.

I'm not the biggest person in this environment.

How long does he have to do the math and crunch the numbers to realize I by nature am not holy and I'm coming to worship a God who is holy, holy, holy?

Uh-oh.

You say, Well, I don't get it.

Here's the question: how can people who are not by nature holy draw near to a God who is by nature holy?

God goes through this great details to tell people how to approach him by means of a blood sacrifice, which testified to the gravity of sin and got them used to the idea of innocent substitute dying in the place of a sinner.

You ever notice how people say all the time, Pastor, I'm just gonna start reading the Bible from the very beginning, read it all the way to the end.

And I just smile and think, ma, ma, I'll give you a couple months.

They're gonna burn through Genesis, they're gonna read through Exodus, and they're gonna die about two pages into Leviticus.

And be like, mm-mm.

They're gonna come back and say, I didn't understand that Leviticus.

So I just skipped it, went to Numbers, it wasn't much better.

Yeah.

And I tell them, hey, by the way, the book of Leviticus is just a reminder that you can't do it.

You gotta cleanse this and offer that and purify this and all this stuff.

And if you get into the book of Hebrews in the New Testament, it says, when these priests offered the same sacrifices which can never take away sins.

All that stuff could never make you right with God.

All your religious, empty traditions and rituals don't make you right with God.

You don't come to church to get right with God.

You come to church because you are right with God and you want to learn.

That's a crazy word for church, isn't it?

Learn?

Not entertain.

Here to entertain you.

If you want to come up to me, and occasionally people do and say, hey, what can I expect this church to do for me?

Give you directions to another church.

We got enough ticks on the dog.

We got enough people who don't know God.

You just want to come in and go, just, just, hey, stir me, stimulate me.

No, thank you.

You think I want to give my life to that?

Now, some of you are thinking, man, you're the most hateful person I've ever heard.

But some of you are thinking, about time.

I'm so sick and tired of going to church and it being like a show.

Just teach me the Bible.

Just that's all we have.

That's all I have.

Every Sunday, I'm going to teach you the Bible.

Going to love you.

Not going to apologize.

Oh, well, this Sunday, this is going to be something out of the Bible.

Imagine that.

It says in Hebrews, these people offered, when each priest stands and offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.

And then it turns and talks about our high priest Jesus and says, But when this priest offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God.

And since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool.

See, what God is doing is getting you an eyes.

That's why there's so much instructions in the Old Testament around worship and temple worship.

Why?

Because it makes you long for the sacrifice.

It makes you long for the Lamb who's coming to take away the sins of the world.

And when John the Baptist saw him first on the scene, he just burst out and said, Behold, the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world.

Oh, maybe there's hope after all.

And all the people were like, whoa.

When this Jesus walked into Jerusalem on what we call the triumphal entry, and people all around were selecting their lambs to observe another religious ritual.

The Lamb of God was coming to be slain for the sins of the world.

And the Jews were given the worship.

They were given the promises.

I'm just about done, you with me?

I usually don't preach this long.

Somebody talk to this woman over here.

No, actually, I told my wife last night driving home.

I said, I think my part needs to be shorter tomorrow.

She kind of had that good luck with that.

The promises.

Because here's the thing.

You're going to meet people that are going to say, Oh, I believe in God, but what about the Jews?

And you ought to be able to say, What about the Jews?

What about the seven benefits that God gave to the Jews?

What about the promises?

It refers to the promises of God as it relates to the Messiah and the surety of his coming.

You go back in Genesis 3.15, where God spoke the first messianic promise and said to the serpent in the Garden of Eden, He will crush your head and you will strike his heel.

You'll bruise his heel.

And then you go all, put your finger down there, and then go all the way forward into Luke's gospel and the birth narrative of baby Jesus, where he says, And this will be a sign to you.

You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.

You put your finger down there, and every promise between there and there are yes and amen in Christ.

Yes and amen.

It's not a promise that God is made.

And God gave all these promises to the Jews.

And by this point, you've got to be thinking, well, how could these people not believe?

They had the promises, they got the patriarchs, the three fathers of the Jewish nation, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Are you kidding?

Now, after all this, of all the people on the earth who believe in Jesus, surely these people would believe, given all these privileges.

And yet the Bible says he came to his own, and his own received him not.

They stumbled over Jesus.

You ought to be thinking, beloved, how can you have all this and not see it?

Well, let's just get down in this room.

How could you have all this and not see it?

You see, because this isn't math.

Salvation is not a natural thing, it's supernatural.

Paul says, I'm not ashamed of the gospel because it's a power of God and a salvation to anyone who believes.

To the Jew first, and then to the Gentile.

It's as if God were saying, by the way, it's coming to the Jew first, and then they're going to say no, then it's going to come to the Gentile.

And then God says, By the way, I'm going to circle back around to the Jews later on.

Why?

Because I'm working on a scale you can't comprehend.

You can't get your head around what I'm doing.

Lastly, the stakes couldn't be higher.

Look at verse 5, and we'll be done.

Verse 5, he just simply says, To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ who is God over all, blessed forever.

Amen.

What do you mean?

Hear it again.

From their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ who is God over all and blessed forever.

Anybody ever says to you, well, the Bible never says Jesus is God.

That's a lie.

Here's one of the many times it does.

And from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ who is God.

It tells us three things about Jesus.

Number one, he is God.

Christ is God.

Jesus Christ is God.

He's not the junior executive of the Godhead.

He's not a plan B.

It's not God had plan A, which was humanity in the garden.

Uh-oh, that didn't go well.

Plan B, Jesus.

No, he's been plan A all along.

All along.

He's God.

Secondly, he's overall.

He's sovereign.

That's what Paul says, so that in all things Christ would be preeminent.

He's pre-existent and he's pre-eminent.

And thirdly, praise is fitting of Him.

What do you mean?

He says He's blessed forever.

That's the Greek word eulagatos.

Ulagatos.

It's translated in the ESV blessing, but it really means praised forever.

You say, What do you mean?

Here's what it comes down to, and I'm done.

When you begin to see how God is moving on such a large scale that you can't quite get your mind around it and you understand another part of it because next week we're going to understand more of it.

And some of you are going to come up and say, Oh, so are you a Calvinist?

No, I just believe the Bible.

I just believe the Bible.

You want to label everybody so you can win some little argument.

Good luck.

Go waste your life with somebody else.

There are people in my city who don't know Jesus.

I don't have time to sit around with other people.

Oh, well, I think this.

I think it's not about what I this is what I know.

That Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the chief.

And if God could save me, a kid that was on probation in the eighth grade and got many weapons, and I deserved every one of them.

Then who is there in this city that he can't save?

Who is in this room that is beyond the pale of God?

None of you.

None of you.

You begin to understand how God is moving on such a large scale.

Does it offend you?

Do you think I wouldn't do it that way?

That's not the way I was taught it.

Or does it just give you another reason to praise God?

Do you just think, oh yeah?

Yes.

Yes.

That's what God intended.

That's why the Bible says of Jesus, He is to be forever praised.

I appreciate your patience today.

Stand to your feet.

Let me speak a blessing over you.

Hold your hands out.

Once you are not a people, you are a wayward, sinful, arrogant, insolent, stiff-necked, rebellious bunch of weasels.

But now you are the people of God.

He's adopted you.

He's proud of you.

He loves you with an everlasting love.

He set you free.

Depart now and live in your God ordained freedom in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Bless you.

You're dismissed.