The Gospel on Trial (Romans 3:1-8) | Louis Azuma

Speaker: We're continuing on in Romans chapter three.

So why don't you turn there in your Bibles.

Now, one thing that you may have noticed about Romans so far is a lot

of these sermons sound the same, right?

They sound pretty similar, and that's because we're, we're following

someone's train of thought, right?

And honestly, though.

It took me a long time to, to really understand some of the things

that we're talking about here.

When I was in middle school and high school and I was, especially when I was

a freshman in high school, it took me so long to admit that I wasn't a Christian.

It took me like a probably two years of being faced with God's word and

then comparing it to my life and realizing that I wasn't a Christian.

It took me like.

A long time to admit.

In fact, we used to do these things where we would, um, our high school, when I

was in high school ministry, we would go and meet on campus and like, um,

we would have a Bible study on campus.

Like all the true north students that went to my school.

We would go and, and talk about about the Bible.

Sometimes we'd have pizza, we'd do all this cool stuff and my mom really

wanted me to go to those and I hated it.

I didn't want to go 'cause I knew that when I would go

there, someone would ask me.

Hey, what's your testimony?

When did you become a Christian?

And I did not want any of that smoke.

I didn't wanna deal with it.

I was so convicted.

I was like, Nope, not for me.

So I would tell my mom, I went, and then I would not go, or I would tell

her, oh, I went and the door was locked and I couldn't get in, and I would just

make up all of this stuff to get out of it because I did not want to admit.

Then what I started to do is then I would make up like a fake testimony.

Like, oh, I went to summer camp when I was in junior high and I, I heard this sermon

and whatever, and I became a Christian.

When I would try to make up stuff to like, sound right, I just wanted, I

just didn't want to acknowledge the fact that I wasn't a Christian, right.

That my, my whole life up that point, I wasn't good enough.

I didn't deserve to go to heaven.

In fact, I deserved God's wrath.

And maybe that's you right now.

Maybe you've heard a lot of these sermons and, and you feel like you're,

God's almost putting you into a corner and you're like, I, I need to get out.

In fact, that's where a lot of these people in Paul's that Paul's writing

to, that's what they feel like.

That's what a lot of them feel like.

It's, you're gonna see in our passage, there's people that are, that are

trying to escape what Paul is saying.

They're trying to escape what God is saying in the book of Romans,

and they're gonna come up with some really creative ways to get out of it.

There's some really creative ways to either say, well, that doesn't apply to

me or Paul, what you're saying about God.

That can't be true.

People make up all kinds of things, maybe.

For you, you've had a conversation with someone, you, maybe you are a Christian,

you have a conversation with someone about the gospel, and then they try to throw

you like a side, a sidetrack, and they say, well, what about the person in, in

the jungle who's never heard the gospel?

Or, oh, well if God is good, why do bad things happen?

Those are real questions, but usually we ask those things so we

can get out of, well, what about you?

Right?

And that's what I want you to, to think about tonight is we, we cover

Paul's argument and all these questions that he's answering, I want you to

think about, well, what about me?

What about me?

And so I want you to be able to affirm something about God.

I want you to be able to affirm God's master plan of faithful judgment.

This is the, almost the, the penultimate step in Paul's argument.

So it's the second to last thing before we reach his like big conclusion that

we'll see next week, um, in chapter three.

So what happens in the book of Romans, right?

That what we've been seeing.

Is that Paul's making a, like they're all connected, right?

These aren't just isolated things that you can just look at and say, oh, cool.

I like that.

I like that.

I like that.

Um, Paul's making an argument, right?

And he's, he's getting to this conclusion right here.

No one is righteous, right?

No one deserves to go to heaven.

Everyone falls short of God's perfect standard and on his way there, right?

We've covered a lot of ground.

We've talked about how, um, everyone is responsible because everyone knows.

What everyone knows that God exists.

Everyone knows that there's a God and that every everyone knows

that they are accountable to him.

And we also know that everyone, regardless of religious background,

isn't good enough, right?

No matter how much you know, no matter how many Bible verses you memorize,

no matter who your parents are, no of us ultimately are good enough.

None of those external things make us good enough for God.

And then what we'll see next week is that all of us inherently are.

Sinful.

And so when Paul's making this argument, a lot of the people in

his audience are Jewish and like we talked about last week, they are

really holding onto the fact that, well, I'm part of God's people, right?

I'm Jewish.

I have the signs of God's people.

I know the Bible really well.

They, they hold onto these external signs.

Maybe that's you, maybe you're holding onto Well, I was baptized.

Or I go to church or I serve in church, or I know that I'm a sinner, you hold

onto these external things that maybe don't even make you a Christian.

And so what these, but what the Jewish people actually did a lot in

the early church is they would not just respond by objecting verbally.

They would actually respond violently.

There was a guy, um, his name's Steven, and in.

He, uh, there's a story about him in the Bible and this guy named Steven, he

was like a normal person in the church.

He, his, his like serving position, his ministry, he, his job was to help

the widows make sure they had food.

'cause the, in that culture, they didn't have enough.

Um.

They didn't have, they couldn't get jobs.

They didn't have as many rights as people do in our culture.

And so he, his job was to make sure they got food.

And Steven started talking about some of the things that, that Paul

talks about here, how no one's righteous before God and how well,

you know, I know that God, I.

His people were, were ethnic in the Old Testament, but in really

what it's about is your heart.

It's not about those external things.

It's about your heart.

And the people got so mad at him, they said in Acts six that he's blaspheming,

he's saying bad things about God.

So in the early church, the Christians actually were accused of disconnecting

themselves from the Old Testament.

Isn't that crazy?

The Christians, they said, the Christians don't like God.

So the Jews would say, oh, the Christians don't like God, and

they actually end up killing Steven because he believes the things that,

that we're teaching in this letter.

Isn't that crazy?

If you lived 2000 years ago, you were in danger from some people

for believing the things that you're hearing from this letter.

Now, the, the Jews, their objection to what Paul's saying.

It comes in like three stages in our passage.

Okay.

And these are those.

Three stages.

So the first thing, the first argument that, that Paul is gonna

tackle here is that the gospel is an attack on God's people.

So what you're gonna see in the first couple verses is he's gonna ask,

what's the point of being Jewish?

Right?

If, if really, what a, remember we talked about last week?

I showed you that milk carton, the fake milk carton I made that said

true Jew instead of true moo, right?

That if true Jewishness, if really being part of God's people is about your heart.

Then what's the point of the Old Testament?

Right?

What's the point of the law?

What's the point of the sacrifices?

What's the point of the temple?

Why do we have all this stuff, right?

What, why did God waste 39 books of the Bible on that part of, of

religion when really it's just been about your heart the whole time?

So that's, that's one thing they're gonna say.

They're gonna say that it's, it's Paul, your, your disconnect

from, from the Old Testament.

The other thing they're gonna say is, well, what about

all these promises God made?

To Israel, right?

God made all these promises to Israel.

He made promises to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.

What about those?

If God breaks his promise towards those people, how do you know

he is gonna be faithful to you?

That's a valid question, right?

If you're saying that, well, God's not gonna fulfill his promises

to Israel, then what about you?

How do you know that God's gonna fulfill his promises to you?

And Paul's gonna ask that address that question, and then the next thing

he's gonna talk about is there's these people who are gonna say something.

How can God punish my sin if my sin is actually showing his righteousness?

If my sin shows that God is a good judge, then why is it, how can

God punish me for helping him out because my sin is really helping him?

That's kind of a weird argument.

That's like saying, well, should I right?

Maybe you've heard it this way.

You should sin so that God can forgive you more.

'cause it shows how forgiving God is, right?

That's kind of a similar argument to what they're gonna say.

Anyway.

So all that to say, that's what we're gonna be looking at is three

objections that people might have to what we just talked about last week.

So look with me at Romans three, verses one and two.

So first objection is what about God's people?

What about the juice?

What's the whole point?

First one, then, what advantage has the Jew, or what is the value of circumcision?

Verse two.

Much in every way, which by the way.

That's not what you'd expect Paul to say, right?

You tell him to say no, it doesn't give you an innate advantage, right?

That's the whole point of Romans two, I thought, is Paul

contradicting himself now?

What's happening?

Why is he saying that Jews have an advantage when he just said that

they're just equally guilty before God?

That's confusing.

And he says, why?

To begin with, first of all, the Jews were entrusted with the Oracles of

God, the words of God the Jews got.

They received what God said.

So Paul doesn't say, the Jews have no advantages.

He says they have a lot.

And then he says, first of all, what's funny too, I don't know if you guys

know who Charles Barkley is, he does the same thing that Paul's doing here.

He says, first of all, he's a guy, he's a sports guy on tv.

He says, first of all, and then he doesn't say anything after, like

he doesn't say second or third.

He doesn't make any other points.

He just says, first of all, for everything, that's what Paul's doing here.

He says to begin with, and then he says nothing.

He just makes one point, he says, first of all, and then that's it.

But I think what he's doing is he's saying.

This is really the biggest advantage.

This is the main advantage.

This is the one that you really need to care about.

The first advantage that the Jews have is that they have God's very words.

He doesn't say it's the temple.

He doesn't say it's promises to Abraham.

He doesn't say it's stories about miracles that God did.

He says it's, they have the very words of God, and you have that same

advantage today if you think about it, you have the very words of God.

In fact, you have more.

Of God's words.

You have better access to God's words, and I want you to be thankful for that.

But I also want you to feel the right way about the fact that you have God's words.

So for our first point tonight, write down like this, treasure

what God has written for you.

I want it to be precious to you.

I want you to treasure it.

I want it to be special to you, and I want it to be important.

I want it to be valuable.

That's why I picked that word treasure.

There's no greater privilege anyone can have than having the written words of God.

And maybe you've never thought about this, but think about it the opposite way.

What if you never received anything from God?

No written words.

You didn't know who Jesus was.

You didn't know how someone paid for your sin.

You didn't know that God loved you.

You would be a totally different person if you had never

heard of any of those things.

In our culture, we really like written, original, written things.

I saw this recently.

There was a sports autographed card that sold for $12 million,

um, which, when you think about it, I also found that, so George Washington's

own copy of the Constitution.

That he like signed, like his actual copy was worth less than this card.

George Washington's copy of the Constitution was 10 million.

This card was worth almost $13 million 'cause it has Kobe's signature and

it has Michael Jordan's signature.

$13 million for this one card with two signatures on it, right?

Two really like what four words.

On this card, but because it has those very original words, right, the

very words of Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan, it gets sold for $13 million.

In fact, this is the second most expensive sports collective of all time, and it's

only half of the most, which is Babe Ruth, babe Ruth's World series Jersey

from the 1930s, which was $24 million.

Which is crazy.

So people are spending this type of money.

Think of all the things you could buy for $13 million.

Think of all the Dr.

Pepper you could buy for 13.

Um, 13 million.

It's a lot of money, right?

Someone spent $13 million on this card just to have it, right?

Like, what good does this do them?

Like, like, cool.

They can show it to you when they, when you come over to their house

like this does not really help them.

Like this isn't gonna help them get a job.

This isn't gonna help them be like a good family member.

This isn't gonna help them live a second longer of their life.

Like this is not gonna do anything for them, but they

think it's worth $13 million.

Right.

So what's the advantage of having this card?

I mean, you look cool.

You could sell it for more money maybe, right?

But why?

Why would you buy it in the first place?

Well.

I want you to think about what's the advantage of

having written words from God?

Right?

Why?

Why did God write a book?

Because I think a lot of us, if we're honest, we'd say, I

would rather God show up, right?

A lot of us think, oh, I wish I was one of the disciples.

I could have seen Jesus and talk with him, or, I wish I was Moses

and I could have heard God's voice.

Because I think a lot of us, if we're honest, that's how we feel.

I wish God would just appear to me and show me that he's real and

tell me what he wants me to do.

Why did he have to give me a book?

I don't like books.

Books are confusing.

Books are old.

Books are hard to read.

Books are boring.

Why did God give me a book?

I would, why didn't he give me a YouTube video?

Why didn't, because he could've done that, right?

Why doesn't he just show up to every single person and

show them that who he is?

Why did Jesus even go back to heaven in the first place?

Why couldn't he just stay down here and walked around and, and

he could have eventually talked to every single person, right?

Why didn't he do that?

It's really easy to, to forget the advantages and actually why?

'cause God's really smart.

I hope we all realize that God isn't like, oh, I never thought of that.

I didn't know YouTube would exist.

God knew YouTube would exist.

God knew that you would maybe rather see him and hear him,

but instead he gave you a book.

So why, why would that be?

Well, I want you to think about this.

Think about even like with, um, think about with Abraham.

Okay.

Let's say you're one of Abraham's servants.

Abraham said, you're living with Abraham in around like Iran.

That's where Abraham was from, and you're one of Abraham's service.

And Abraham says, Hey guys.

Um, God told me that we have to move across like hundreds of miles to

this land that he's gonna give me.

What would you say he'd be like, one, who's this God that you're

talking about, never heard of him?

Two.

Why do we have to move three?

How do you know he said that?

Four.

What did you eat for dinner last night?

Right?

You'd be like, what are we doing?

And then when God tells Abraham, Hey, you need to do some stuff to show that you're

part of my people, you'd be like, hang on.

Why are you sharpening the rock?

Let's not do that.

Right.

That would be weird.

That probably went over most of your heads.

That's okay.

That you'd be like, what are we doing?

Because God only gave that to Abraham, right?

He didn't give it to Abraham's servants.

He didn't tell Abraham's servants.

Hey, but also what if Abraham misinterpreted it, right?

What if Abraham heard what God said and then was like, Hey guys, uh, we're gonna

move across the, you know, the desert.

We're gonna, we're gonna walk with our camels all the way across

and move there side of thing.

And what if God really didn't mean that?

Or what if Abraham forgot half of what God told him?

Right?

So the thing with getting a vision from God is that.

One, you might forget it.

You might forget parts of it.

Right?

You might misinterpret it Also, how you know it's really from God.

Also, eventually you're gonna wanna write it down anyway because you're

not gonna be able to, to just replay it all the time perfectly.

So there's, there's a lot of things that are wrong with that are maybe

disadvantages of having a vision compared to having a written sentence.

Here's what God said, right?

Because Abraham can't be like.

This is what God said.

Don't take it from me.

Take it from God.

Because Abraham has to say, God told me this.

Right?

It's kind of like when you tell your siblings, right?

When your, when your mom says, Hey, um, can you tell your

siblings to take out the trash?

And you go, tell your siblings, take out the trash.

Mom said so, and they're like, really?

Did you, did she really say that?

Or are you just making that up?

You are like, no, no, no.

Mom said so like, believe me, mom told, and then what do you have to say?

Go ask mom.

That's all you have to say.

Unless your siblings trust you for whatever reason.

I don't know why they would, but, um, so I want you to think about if God

just gave everyone a vision, you'd have no way of actually knowing whether

those visions agreed with each other.

'cause you have to talk about it.

And then someone could make it up, someone could lie about it.

But the fact that you have a book from God means you can say, here's what God said.

God said, you know, fill in the blank and you, you read a sentence, right?

God said,

Jesus wept.

And you can say that.

That's what God said.

Easy, right?

God said in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

You can point to the Bible and say that if someone says, well, I

don't know if he really said that.

You can say, well, look, here's what he said.

Don't take it from me.

Take it from God.

So there's advantages to having the written words.

Also, if you forget it, guess what?

You can read it, right?

Imagine if you got a vision from God and then you forgot what he said.

You are like, oh, I don't know if he said this or this.

What do you do?

You, you said to pick something, right?

So there's advantages to having a written word.

Also, they're so accessible, right?

Because you can, you can copy it, you can pass it on to someone,

you can give it to someone else.

So they're easy to study because you can sit down and

think about it and look at it.

There's a ton of advantages to having a written word, but also, I don't

just want you to be grateful for it.

I want you to enjoy it.

That's why I picked that word treasure.

I don't want you to be like, all right, cool.

I know I'm supposed to like the Bible.

Great.

I want you to feel a certain way about the Bible.

It's kind of like, so, um, I went to someone's house recently and,

um, they were awesome hosts and they made great food, but unfortunately

they put cilantro in their food and I, I don't like cilantro.

So I was very thankful for their food and I ate it and I enjoyed it a little bit,

but I really didn't like it that much.

Right?

'cause it had cilantro in it.

But I was grateful for it.

I appreciated it.

And maybe that's where you're at with the Bible.

Maybe you're like, I'm grateful that God gave me a Bible.

I appreciate it, but I'd really prefer if it was something different.

It's really just not my thing

versus.

If you went to In-N-Out, you wouldn't just be like, well, I'm really,

if I thought, you know, if we came over to that person's house and they

said, Hey, let's just go to In-N-Out.

I wouldn't be like, oh yeah, thank you.

I'm really grateful.

I'd be like, that's awesome.

Best idea you've had all day.

Let's definitely go to Inn Out.

Right?

I'd be excited about it.

I'd be think if they, or if they told me beforehand, like, Hey guys,

we're having In-N-Out for dinner.

Right?

Imagine if you, I told you, Hey, we're having In-N-Out at True North.

Bet you would, you would be way more excited about True North, right?

You would enjoy it more.

You would enjoy the process of eating more because like I'm sitting

there eating, you know, this meal that I'm really grateful for.

I'm sitting there eating this meal and I'm just like, I'm eating it.

I'm digesting it.

I'm chewing it, but it's not like I'm not savoring the meal.

You know?

And maybe that's you with your Bible.

You read it and you're like, it's like you're going to the dentist.

It's like you're eating that, you're eating that meal.

You're like, I'm grateful for this, but it's not my favorite.

I'm not enjoying this.

I want you to, to feel like your Bible is in and out.

I want you to enjoy your Bible more than you enjoy in and out or your

favorite food or whatever, because that's how the Bible talks about itself.

The Bible compares itself to really good food.

And so I want you to feel a certain way about the Bible.

I want you to feel like I need the Bible.

Like it's, I'm so excited to, to, to read it.

I'm so excited to hear someone talk about it.

I'm so excited to listen to his sermon.

I'm so excited to memorize it, and I want you to enjoy it because

that's God's design for you.

God's design is for the Bible to be your food.

God's design is for the Bible to be.

Like treasure to you.

That's what you, that's what his word says about itself.

I want you to see that the Bible is sweet, that the Bible is enjoyable,

that the Bible is precious.

That the Bible is awesome because that's the way God designed it for you.

And the the reason is not because it's some old book that tells you what to do.

The reason that you're, that the Bible is supposed to be.

This awesome thing for you.

I realize I didn't even show you this picture.

Isn't this just make you smile?

Isn't this so good?

See, y'all just like visibly reacted to that, right?

When was the last time you had that type of reaction for God's word?

Right?

When was the last time that you saw your Bible and were like, that's awesome.

I'm so excited for that.

Right?

I would say that most of you probably would rather think

about this than think about this,

and honestly that that shows that there's something wrong with us, right?

Because we love this more than this, and

that shows that there's something wrong with this.

So what if you're like, oh, how do I get there?

What do I do?

Well, one, ask God.

So many of, so actually the longest chapter in the Bible is about the Bible,

Psalm one 19, and most of it is prayers for the, it's the guy talking to God

about the Bible, and he's asking him, sometimes he's asking God to help him

feel the right way about the Bible.

He's asking God to, to help him feel the right way about God's work.

So ask God like, and I've legitimately prayed this before, I've sat down

before my Bible reading and said, God, I don't feel like reading this right now.

Please make this better to me than inn out.

I have actually prayed that

I've sat down and been like, God, I want to like this more than inn out.

'cause I know it's better for me than inn out.

Pray that it's, that's, that's a viable prayer.

You can pray that prayer or pick your favorite food or whatever.

And the goal is for your spiritual taste buds to change,

and God can do that for you.

But also the, the like.

Also kinda like with, with coffee, right?

A lot of people don't like coffee at first, but it's an acquired taste, right?

They, they, that's what your parents tell you because you try coffee

and you're like, this stinks.

This is terrible.

Why do you drink this every day?

One 'cause they need it and then they start to like it.

Right.

That's a lot of times how your relationship with the Bible is gonna work.

You start because you need it.

You say, I'm gonna die without this.

God's word gives me life.

God's word gives me wisdom.

I am foolish.

I need help.

I need God's help.

I don't just need human help.

I need God's help.

And so where do I go for God's help?

I go to the Bible.

'cause the Bible is God's word.

The Bible gets me God.

This is the closest I'm gonna get to hearing God speak out loud, is

reading the Bible and I need it.

Then you read it and you read more of it and you say, oh, this actually

God knows what he's talking about.

God, there's no one like the God that I read about in these pages.

There's, there's no one like this.

God, no one talks like him.

No one says the things that he says.

No one knows me the way he knows me.

And you see those things and you're like, oh, this, this starts to make sense.

And you read it.

You encounter God in his word and he changes you.

So I want you to, to see God's word the way.

That God designed it to be for you.

God didn't design Bible reading to, to be boring or lame.

And the way you get there is sometimes an acquired taste, and sometimes

you don't feel like it at first.

And you start, and then you start and, and it gets better as you go.

But also God will help you with that.

And if you, you ask him, there's, there's a lot of prayers in the

Bible that are, God help me, like the Bible, help me feel the way I'm

supposed to feel about this thing.

Anyway, I spent way too long talking about that, but that's okay.

So we're talking about objections to, to God's word, right?

Objections to this passage.

So the first objection was that the Gospel's attack on God's people.

The second objection is that the gospel is an attack on God's promises.

It makes God unfaithful to the Jews.

So look at verse three and four here.

So what if some of the Jews were unfaithful, right?

They disobeyed God does their faithfulness or faith?

Let faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God.

And then Paul says, by no means when you see that in the Bible, by no means, that's

like the strongest way Paul can say no.

That's like absolutely not.

No way.

Not at all.

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 were judged.

So this thing right here in quotes, right, that's a quote from the Old

Testament, that's a quote from Psalm 51.

Psalm 51, is when David is praying and he's confessing his sin to

God, he's saying, God, I messed up.

And part of confessing sin is acknowledging God.

You have the right to judge me.

You're God, I'm not.

I'm guilty.

That's what confessing sin is.

It means agreeing with God about your sin.

So that's what David's doing in this Psalm that Paul's quoting.

So Paul is saying, actually, this is what the Old Testament says, and

this is what I'm saying, that God is faithful even when he judges sin.

God is faithful even when he judges sin, which is really

interesting when you think about it.

You probably.

This might be new for you.

God punishing sin is him keeping his promises.

God punishing sin is him keeping his promises.

So our second point tonight, see God's faithfulness in his judgment.

See God's faithfulness in his judgment.

I want you to see when God punishes sin, he's being true to who he says he is.

When God condemns something for being sinful or when he sends a person to

hell, he's being true to who he is.

He's following through on what he said he was going to do.

He's keeping a promise.

Usually, we only think of God's promises in a positive light.

Like, oh God promises that he won't lose any of his people.

That's great.

That's just an encouraging promise, right?

To know that that.

No Christian, no real Christian will ever lose their salvation.

That's such an encouraging promise.

But another of God's promises is also that no one will escape his

judgment if they're not saved.

That's, and so when God follows through on that promise, he's keeping

his promises, he's being faithful.

One of my friends from.

Seminary from school.

He, um, had five kids and they were crazy kids.

And one of the reason they were crazy kids is because my friend was not very

good at following through as a dad.

So what happened is he, his, he had three boys that were like eight to

four, and they would do something crazy and he'd be like, stop it.

And they would do it again.

He'd be like, stop it.

And they'd do it again.

He'd be like, stop it.

And he wouldn't do anything about it.

He would just sit there and be like, oh, stop that.

And then just like keep doing his thing.

And he never followed through on anything.

He would just tell him to stop it and then nothing would happen.

So they learned, oh, he just says, stop it, and I can just keep doing it.

So they learned that their dad was not faithful to his promises.

They learned, oh, my dad doesn't keep his word so I can just keep doing it.

He's never gonna do anything.

Sometimes that's how we think about God.

Well, I sinned and nothing bad happened.

I sinned.

Nothing bad happened.

I'll sin more.

Nothing bad happens, I'll sin more.

Nothing bad happens, and we trick ourselves into thinking that God is not

faithful to His promises, that God is just gonna keep being patient forever.

Like we talked about a few weeks ago, we talked about that, that God's patience

is meant to lead you to repentance.

It's not meant for you to keep on going and going and going down.

You're a sinful path.

So I want you to remember that God is not just faithful to keep his good promises.

He's also faithful to keep his judgment promises.

So if you think God is like my friend who just says, stop it, and then doesn't do

anything, you're tricking yourself, right?

If you're sitting here and, and you know, oh, I'm sinning and nothing's

bad, nothing bad's happened to me yet.

You're really saying, God, you're not gonna keep your promises.

That's what you do when you keep on sinning, even as a Christian.

If you're a Christian, you say something like, oh, God will forgive me anyway.

Well, God promises to discipline his children because he loves you.

He doesn't want you to keep sinning.

He doesn't want you to keep hurting yourself by sinning, and so he'll

stop you from sinning eventually.

He'll either.

'cause he, he loves you too much to let you keep sinning.

And so he'll either stop you by helping you see that it's wrong

and repent from it, or he'll stop you by disciplining you and he'll

prevent you from sinning that way.

But don't act like God is unfaithful to his word and keep

on sinning and ignoring him.

I want you to see that whenever God follows through on his judgment, it's him

being, it's him having integrity really.

It's him being who he says he is.

God always is who he says he is.

He won't ever not be something that he isn't, right.

And so if we say, you know what, God, you're just, you're a good judge.

If we, if we affirm that, then you can count on him to punish sin, even if

you think that you're gonna be the one person to get away with it, or you think

you're the one person that can hide it.

God is faithful in good ways.

Also in ways that maybe aren't so good for you, if you think that

you can escape God's judgment.

And that's what these people that Paul was writing to thought, they

thought, well, we're part of the right group so we can escape.

And that's not true, and that's not true for you if, if you just come to church and

say you're a Christian and have no heart change, you have no relationship with God.

You've never trusted Jesus to save you.

You just have all the external things, right?

And you say, well, I'm part of the right group.

I can escape God's judgment.

That's not true.

God is faithful and he will follow through on his promises.

Then our third objection was that the gospel is an attack on

God's righteousness, and this is maybe a question that you might

feel is more relevant to you.

How can God punish my sin if my sin is actually helping him show hise?

If my sin is actually giving an opportunity for God to show

that he's a good judge, how can God punish me for that?

I thought I'm, I'm doing God a favor.

Well, that type of objection really is just us trying to work

our way around God's justice.

We're trying to get out of the consequences for our sin.

So our third point tonight, don't try to outsmart God's justice.

There's a couple.

Arguments that you'll see in these few verses that are really just

people trying to play word games to not admit that they're going to

suffer punishment for their sin.

It's really people just trying to, to outsmart God and, and get around his

consequences that he'll give them.

I tried to do this with my mom a lot.

Um, I, so she would ask me to clean something.

And I'd be like, well mom, I'm not the one who wants it to be clean,

so really you should clean it.

I shouldn't have to clean it.

That's what I would tell my mom.

Right?

This is BC Lewis, and I would tell my mom, well, you're the one who

who wants it to be clean, so I'm not the one who wants it to be clean.

I really don't care if it's clean or not, so you should do, you

should be the one who cleans it.

That's really me trying to like just get out of doing

what I'm supposed to do, right?

That's just me saying, well, mom, I tolerate more.

Gross stuff than you do, so you should clean everything.

Right?

That's not really a good argument.

And so I would try to use that to get out of what I was supposed to do, right?

Which was what my mom told me to clean things, right?

There's some creative ways that you might think you can

play word games and get around.

God's judgment and may maybe not, you think that maybe someone, you know,

might think that, and so the first one comes up in verses five and six.

So if our unrighteousness serves to show the righteousness

of God, what should we say?

Right?

I'm helping God by being unrighteous.

That's what they're saying.

You see that here, they're saying, I'm being unrighteous, that lets God judge

me, which shows that God is righteous.

So I'm helping God show that he's righteous.

That's what, that's, that's what they're saying.

They're saying that it's not fair for God to punish me 'cause I'm helping him.

And then what does Paul say?

Definitely not because how could God judge any sin?

He's saying that, well, if, if you think this way, you're saying that

God shouldn't do anything about anything bad in the world, which

really is how no one lives, right?

Because if, if, if you are gonna argue that, well, God shouldn't

punish me 'cause I'm helping him show his righteousness, then guess what?

If I.

Stole all your money, then I'd say, well, I'm just helping

God show his righteousness.

So you can't do anything bad to me.

I don't deserve to go to jail.

No one lives like this, right?

No one actually lives like this.

So it's really just a word game to get out of something that we don't like about God.

The second way this happens is in the other two verses.

If through my lie, God's truth abounds to his glory, why am I still being condemned?

Same kind of.

Thinking here, right?

I'm lying.

It's making God look really good.

It's like me saying, oh, well, um, I should just pretend

like I'm an awful person.

So that way people think Shay is super patient and kind and

loving 'cause she's married to me.

That's a terrible idea.

Right?

But that's what they're arguing.

They're saying I should keep sinning so that good things will happen.

Right.

I should keep sinning so that God can show more of his forgiveness or more

of his grace or more of his justice.

And Paul doesn't even really argue with these people.

He's just like, look, they're just playing games.

They're just trying to play Word games and, and get out of what's really

true and what they know is true.

And I think what happens.

Sometimes, and I, I know I've had this conversation with a lot of people.

You start talking about, oh, like you start talking with someone, you're

sharing the gospel, you're, you're trying to help them understand the

gospel and, and become a Christian.

And then they bring up all of these other things, and then it usually comes down

to, well, they just want to keep sinning.

And, and maybe that's you, maybe you have all these questions.

Some of 'em are valid questions.

I'm not saying those questions are all bad, but if that's you

tonight, if you're sitting here.

No.

And you know, look, I've, I've tried to just make up a bunch of

things and get, get out of this type of conversation, right?

I just don't wanna deal with it.

So I'm coming up with all these arguments of why I shouldn't become a Christian.

Because really what it comes down to is, is you love your sin or you don't wanna

submit to God, or you don't trust God, or you don't think God's good, right?

Don't try to.

Skirt around those, the real issue, right?

If you have a real question, great, ask your question.

But if you're just throwing up smoke screens, you're, you're,

we are wasting your time.

'cause you're not helping yourself, and ultimately you

are still under God's wrath.

Even if someone answered all your questions and you said, I still wouldn't

become a Christian, then you're just throwing up smokescreens and you're,

you're just wasting your own time.

So,

and maybe right for you, maybe it's God will forgive me

anyway, so I you keep sinning.

Or maybe for you it's, well, my sins not hurting anyone.

Right?

And those are just things that, excuses that we make even as

Christians, right, to keep sinning.

So really what this comes down to is that we're all trying

to evade the inevitable truth.

That we're guilty, we're sinners, and.

The problem is if you never admit that you're a sinner, you're never going

to turn from your sin and trust Jesus.

Right?

You, you can't keep your sin and embrace Jesus.

Jesus says you can't serve two masters.

And so if, if that, even if, even if you are a Christian, maybe there's a

sin that you just don't wanna repent of 'cause you love it too much.

You can't hold on to both.

You have to admit it.

You have to bring it into the light and let God deal with it.

That's the only way you're going to overcome a sin as a Christian, and

that's the only way you can ever become a Christian in the first

place is if you, you bring your sin.

You just stop making excuses and you stop trying to, to get around why.

It's okay.

Let's pray and we'll go to small groups.

God, we are grateful that you love us enough to tell us hard things.

We're grateful that you know that even though some of us will reject you.

You still love us enough to tell us the truth, and we pray that tonight

as we think about what you've said to us, that um, we would remember that

it's coming from your love for us.

The reason that you warn us is because you care.

You didn't have to tell us anything.

You didn't have to share the gospel with us.

You didn't have to give us an opportunity to repent.

Um, but you put us in the way of the gospel so that.

We might respond to it and embrace you and be with you forever.

So I pray tonight as we go to small groups, that we would be focused,

that we would learn things, we'd ask good questions, um, and that we

would honor you in our discussions.

We pray this in Jesus name, amen.