Romans Series: Unashamed

Nine weeks we're gonna be in the book of Romans.

And uh, as we are in the book of Romans, we want to unpack what is such a powerful letter, and it's been a letter in the um in the New Testament that's just spoken for generations.

It's one of the most influential pieces of scripture that shaped the theology of church.

Um, it sparked movements of revival and reformation, it's brought so much personal transformation to people's lives.

And so I'm just so excited to jump into the book of Romans and really journey through God's word together.

And we're gonna look through its major movements in the next nine weeks and allow the Apostle Paul to show us how the gospel changes everything.

Somebody say everything.

And you know that that word change should be something that's pretty familiar to us because we're a culture that's obsessed with change, right?

Uh we change, we change jobs, we change houses, we change hairstyles, we change relationships, we change churches.

I mean, none of you would ever do that, but we we change.

Uh, and and we we pursue change, and there are podcasts that talk to us about uh change in waking up at 4:30 in the morning and new habits and new rhythms and cold plunge and red sauna and cold plunge and then red sauna and then and and you know, some of this is really good advice, and some of the change works, some of it succeeds, and we accomplish the change that we desire.

But I've also found something to be frustrating in life, and here it is that you can actually change everything around you and still be the same person inside.

Have you ever found that to be true?

That you've changed relationships and you still have the same insecurity?

You move to a new city and you still feel the same loneliness, even change routines, but you feel the same emptiness.

There is something inside of us that desires change and transformation, uh, but the deepest places of our lives cannot experience that kind of change through willpower alone.

We need a power that's greater than ourselves.

And I am here preaching through Romans and how the gospel changes everything, because I truly believe that this power isn't just a general higher power that will change everything in our life, but it's the power of the gospel, and the power of the gospel is found through the name of one person who can change everything, Jesus Christ.

In fact, it's our first core value as a church that Jesus is over everything, it's all about Jesus.

And Paul he writes to us, and he writes first of all to the Christians living in Rome, which is the center of power in that day.

It's the most powerful empire on earth.

Rome had political, military, cultural, uh, financial power.

Rome understood this concept of power.

And Paul writes to the church in Rome and effectively says, I have a power, I know a power that Rome doesn't have.

Listen to what he writes as we begin this series in Romans chapter 1, verses 15 and 16.

Romans 1:15

He says, That's why I'm so eager to preach the gospel also to you who are in Rome.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel because it's the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes.

First to the Jew, then to the Gentile.

What Paul is saying is, I know that when I'm gonna arrive in Rome, I'm not gonna preach a cultural idea, an opinion, a philosophy.

I'm not gonna just give you good advice.

I'm not gonna just talk about politics or self-improvement.

I am coming to preach the gospel and I am not ashamed of this gospel.

That's the reason why the title of our first message in this Roman series is unashamed.

Everyone say unashamed.

No, everyone look unashamed.

No, I'm just kidding.

That'd be pretty wild.

Everyone look unashamed.

I do know some people in my life that have no problem looking unashamed.

And you've heard a lot about them, my four boys.

And you're gonna hear a lot about like buckle up if you're like, man, okay, I just like this dude's got the same sermon illustrations.

It's because my life is pretty much the same.

It's like I'm surrounded by these four awesome little creatures, my four boys, and they they they embody this word unashamed.

Like I feel so bad for my wife, and the amount of male nudity that she has to endure every single day.

They are unashamed.

Every place that they walk is a toilet to them.

Or at the beach, be careful if you're three feet behind them because they're just gonna drop their drawers.

It's a toilet, and it's like I'm I'm that dad at the public beach that's having to shuffle sand and cover where my children have marked their territory.

Don't build a sand castle by the Christ family.

You don't know what you're gonna dig up.

But sometimes when we hear this word unashamed, we think that it's those kinds of acts of Christianity that are so audacious and at times obnoxious, or that caricature of that person with the bullhorn at Huntington Beach pier saying, turn or burn, and I am unashamed of the gospel.

I don't care what anybody thinks about me.

But Paul is actually getting at something deeper when he's talking about being unashamed of the gospel.

What he's saying is, I know what I believe, I know who I belong to, and I know what this gospel can do, and so I have confidence.

And that kind of confidence mattered in a place like Rome because by Roman standards, the gospel appeared shameful.

Christians announced that the savior of the world was a Jewish carpenter who was executed by the Romans on a humiliating cross, a torture device.

The message was not a message of power, which is what Rome was all about.

Really, the the whole virtuous life of a Roman person was to be someone that was honored, who had status and success and power and wealth and and influence.

And Paul was preparing to walk into the capital of the Roman Empire and announce that the man that Rome crucified is Lord.

And he knew that people would mock him, judge him, shame him, condemn him, call it foolish.

But Paul said, I am not ashamed.

Why?

Because Paul was not embarrassed by the cross, Paul was not intimidated by Rome.

Paul was not apologetic about Jesus because he knew that the gospel was true, and he had experienced the power for himself.

He had experienced the risen Jesus, encounter him, and his life really go from BC before Christ to after he encountered Christ.

And everything changed in his life.

And so Paul in this verse gives us three reasons why we can live with that same kind of confidence.

And the first reason is simply this that the gospel is good news.

I don't know what you came expecting to hear at a church on a Sunday morning.

If this is your very first time, welcome.

But we don't come bearing bad news, we come preaching good news.

Paul says, I have come to preach good news.

And I want to talk to you about how you can live unashamed with this good news by first understanding this good news and why it matters so much.

Paul introduces it in the opening words of his letter.

Let's look at Romans 1, verses 1 through 4.

Romans 1:1–4

He says, This letter is from Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, chosen by God to be an apostle and sent out to preach his good news.

Um sometimes that that word slave is like, whoa, like what does he mean in modern context?

We have to understand the uh ancient cultural context.

He's he's not talking about um abuse or anything like that.

He's talking about the fact that uh when he was lost and at his bottom, Jesus found him.

He says, I was chosen.

I did not just add Jesus onto my life.

Jesus found me on that road to Damascus, and he grabbed a hold of my heart and he showed me what it means to be truly alive.

And so now all of my life is under the lordship and leadership of my master.

It's it's a posture of humility.

So he says, I'm set out to preach this good news, and God promised this good news long ago through his prophets and the holy scriptures.

And here it is the good news is about who?

It's about his son in his earthly life.

He was born into King David's family line, and he was shown to be the Son of God when he was raised from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit.

He is Jesus Christ our Lord.

And so I just want you to capture that.

The good news is not good advice, the good news is a person, the gospel is about Jesus.

And in the Roman world, this this gospel was something uh that was something that they would have understood.

The gospel was a word that was talked about when a new Caesar was born.

There would be a herald that would go from city to city and would say, Hey, there's an announcement.

The new Lord, the new Caesar is born, the new ruler is born, or if there was a military victory, hey, the the new Caesar has won a massive victory, and now our Roman world and the world at large has now changed because of it.

Rome had its announcements of good news, and Paul arrives announcing a different king and a greater victory.

He comes in and says, uh, Jesus' Lord Caesar isn't.

And I just want to just pause for a moment and talk about how the gospel is not just good advice, it's good news.

And it matters so much because advice tells you here's what you need to do, but news tells you, here is what has already happened.

Sometimes in Christianity, we can relegate the gospel to good advice, be a better person, try harder to clean yourself up.

Um, stop cussing.

Read your Bible, go to church, try harder, and maybe if you're gonna do enough for God, God's gonna accept you.

But that's not the gospel.

In fact, that's very similar to a conversation that I had playing pickleball with one of my Mormon friends.

It's a great environment to build relationships, by the way.

Especially after you beat them.

But um we got talking about it, and essentially, uh, you know, that that's the that's the ideology.

That that's the religious ideology is be a good person, do enough good things, put faith, family, and friends first, and if you do enough good things, God will do enough good things for you here and there.

And if we're not careful, Christianity cannot be can it can become something not just like consumer Christianity, but but it's like karma Christianity.

Where if I just do enough good, if I perform well enough for God, he's gonna do enough good for me.

I'm gonna earn my way to God.

Religion says do, do enough, behave enough, perform enough, earn enough.

Work your way to God.

But the gospel announces done.

Jesus came, Jesus lived the life that we couldn't live, Jesus died the death that we deserved, Jesus carried our sin.

Jesus defeated death, Jesus rose from the grave, and now salvation is offered freely to everyone who believes.

The gospel is not good advice of what you should do, it's good news of what Jesus has done.

And here it is your salvation doesn't rest on your ability to reach God, it rests on the reality that through Jesus God came to reach you.

And that's good news because none of us could clean ourselves up enough to be on the same level with a holy, perfect, and righteous God.

Anyone here glad that Jesus didn't wait for you to get your act together before he came and he rescued you from the pit that you were in?

I know I am the place that you were in, the relationship that you were in, the mental state that you were in, the depravity that you were in, the hopelessness that you were in, the discouragement that you were in, the loneliness that you were in, the despair that you were in.

The gospel is that Jesus came for sinners, and you and I have found hope.

Jesus came for us, and this is the good news that is meant to be announced to a world that needs to come home.

The second thing that Paul shares with us in this passage is that the gospel has power.

Paul says in Romans 1:16, he says, For I'm not ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God that brings salvation.

Romans 1:16

When the gospel is proclaimed, received, and believed, God's power begins to go to work.

The gospel isn't just a message that you receive to inform you about what has happened.

The gospel is the supernatural power of God to transform you from the inside out.

See, Rome knew something about power.

And Rome could conquer nations, but Rome could not conquer sin.

It could build roads, but it could never build a road back to God.

Rome could establish laws, but it could not change the human heart.

Rome could put Jesus on a cross, place his body in a tomb, roll a stone in front of the entrance, station guards outside, but on that third day, Rome discovered the limits of his power because Rome could execute Jesus, but it could not keep him in the grave.

Can I get a witness at the 9:30 service?

The powers of this world and the powers of hell are no match against the supernatural power of the gospel.

And he is Jesus Christ our Savior and our risen King.

This empire that appeared unstoppable could not stop the spread of the power of the gospel.

These early Christians began sharing it everywhere that they went, and it transformed that empire into a Christian empire in just a few hundred years.

The power of the gospel.

The gospel carries a power that this world cannot manufacture.

We can't manufacture a life that promises to give us everything that we want if we make enough money, if we have enough followers on social media, if we have enough status, or if we feel respected, or if we have enough achievement in life, if we climb the ladder of status or influence, whatever it is that culture promises us to experience fulfillment in life, it will always leave us wanting more.

You can modify behavior, but only Jesus can make a new heart.

You can numb pain, but only Jesus can heal what is broken.

You can turn over a new leaf in your story, but only Jesus can give you a new life.

The truth is, is that there are some things that only Jesus can change.

And this is where it gets really personal for me because I grew up in church.

I'm a pastor's kid, which means I'm probably I have more of a sinful past than you do.

And uh I I just remember feeling that weight of performance as a church kid, as a pastor's kid, and feeling like the magnifying glass was on my life, and that I had to um act a certain way in church, and I had to put on a mask, and I I had to like earn this just this level of like I'm I'm spiritual enough, I'm good enough.

And that way of thinking really crept into my relationship with God, where I felt like I just had to keep earning and performing and doing enough good things to be in God's good graces, all the while struggling with with sin, with compromise, with secret hangups in my life that I hated.

I genuinely loved God, but I started to really hate who I was becoming.

I don't know if you've ever felt that.

You're like, I want you, God.

I'm singing these worship songs, like I want this life, but I'm just like hating the person that I'm becoming because I feel like I can't stop.

And I'm living in this cycle of guilt and shame and sin management, and it's a heavy weight to carry.

I remember carrying that weight even into my mid-20s, but I hit this kind of rock bottom moment in my mid-20s where all of the things that I was carrying and the choices that I was making, and the secret areas of compromise that I was leaning into in my life was suddenly exposed and revealed to the people in my life that I was trying to hide it from the most.

And it was in that moment where I had this intersection in my life.

Am I totally real?

Am I total am I vulnerable?

Do I do I bottom out?

Do I own this stuff or do I hide?

And God gave me that that that freedom.

God gave me that verse that we're gonna get to in a few weeks in Romans chapter 8, verse 1, that says that so there is now no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus.

Romans 8:1

And in that moment, I was I was totally open and awe and raw and real with the people around me and with God in that moment.

And I felt what I thought was gonna be condemnation, what I thought was going to be resistance, the love of the Father, and the love of those people wrap their arms around me.

And I felt, God say, John, you are not defined by your worst moments in life, you are defined by what Jesus has already done for you, and you belong to me before you do anything else better for me.

And I was met with love and grace by that community, and it was in that moment I experienced, I feel like grace for the very first time, and it rocked me and it changed me from the inside out that I didn't need to be perfect, I didn't need to keep performing, I didn't need to carry the weight of the image that I was trying to project to other people to feel that sense of fulfillment in life.

I could just be real, imperfect, and honest because the Bible says, even Paul says, that God's power is not made perfect in my perfection or my performance.

God's power is made perfect in my weakness, and it was in my weakness that his grace came in, and his power came in, and it transformed my heart, and it brought me so close into the loving arms of Jesus.

And then it was in his love that I became obsessed with his grace and his goodness, and I started following his ways, and I started experiencing freedom and victory over sexual compromise in my life, freedom and victory over freedom.

Fear, this courage started to break loose in my life.

Freedom and victory from trying to perform and get other people to like me and people pleasing.

No, no, no.

Freedom and victory.

It was also in that moment I recognize that it's not just forgiveness from my sins, but but later on in Romans chapter 8, I'm just so excited to get to Romans chapter 8, but the Bible says that the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead now lives in you.

Romans 8 · chapter mention Romans 8 · chapter mention

That word raise is another word for that in the Greek means awaken.

And God began to awaken these dreams in my heart.

God began to awaken these gifts in my life in that season.

I was such a fierce stutterer as a kid, like I couldn't get words out.

And I never wanted a microphone in my hand.

I'm a mellow middle child.

I'm like anything but this.

And God began to unleash this calling and this passion to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ because it has changed me from the inside out.

I know who I am without Jesus, and now I know what I've experienced because of the power of the saving work of the cross.

And I cannot hold it in.

I cannot keep it in.

I am unashamed of my story.

I can't live with shame when it comes to my story because what God has done in my life is too good to keep it in.

And I know that it's going to help other people.

I know that you need freedom.

I know that you need peace.

I know that there are gifts and dreams that God has given you, that He's waiting to unlock and unleash.

When you surrender yourself to the power of the gospel, Paul says that this gospel is for everyone.

I love that.

It's good news.

Romans 116.

First to the Jew, then to the Gentile.

In other words, everyone means everyone.

Jew, Gentile, political, socioeconomic, ethnic boundaries, all of these things that separate people.

The gospel doesn't belong to one race, class, party, generation, or background.

The gospel is for everyone.

And that means that it's for you.

Maybe you came in here this morning and you grew up in church.

Guess what?

The gospel is for you, fresh and new today.

Just like me.

I need the gospel to be fresh and new and relevant in my life.

I need to recite, rehearse, and remind and declare over my mind, over my family, and declare over my future the gospel over my life every single day.

Maybe this is the first time that you've ever even read the scripture and seen the Bible.

It's for you.

God brought you here on purpose today.

Maybe your life's going really good.

Awesome.

The gospel's for you.

Maybe you barely made it into the room today and you had a fight with your spouse on the way, and you wanted to give your kids away in the car on the way to church.

I've never been there, but the gospel's for you.

Maybe there's stuff that you're just so ashamed of.

The gospel is for you.

Maybe say, John, if you only knew what I brought into this room with, you wouldn't, you as the pastor of this church, wouldn't let me through the doors.

That couldn't be further from the truth.

The gospel is for you.

I know who I am.

I know what I've done.

I know the power of being real and being open and honest before the Lord.

The Lord is not a respecter of persons, he simply says, draw near to me, and I will draw near to you.

I'm not looking for the made-up version of you.

I want the real you today.

That's where I can get in and heal.

That's where I can get in and bring hope and transformation.

Paul doesn't say the gospel is for everyone who behaves.

He doesn't say the gospel is for everyone who fixes themselves.

He says it's for everyone who believes.

The ground at the foot of the cross is level.

We all need the gospel.

And I love how Paul anchors himself into this.

He says, For I am not ashamed of the gospel.

I think for many of us, we'd say we haven't rejected the gospel.

But that word ashamed can carry the connotation of hiding the gospel.

Maybe it's something where you feel confident telling people that you go to church or even the church that you go to, but when it comes to telling them the story of your own life and how Jesus has changed your life, that's where we can hide.

That's where we can become afraid.

That's where we can live ashamed.

Where we begin to edit parts of our story out of our lives when it comes to our lives outside of the four walls of the church.

Or perhaps the gospel has has become something that you've heard so many times it's just become familiar to you.

Maybe for so many years you've heard the message that Jesus has has died for you.

Like grace doesn't move you anymore, and forgiveness and mercy and the blood of Jesus and resurrection and salvation.

Maybe you just, I know the words, and it feels like watching a YouTube video, and you don't have YouTube premiums, so there's commercials.

And that one commercial just keeps keeps coming up.

And you just what you're waiting for that that that that skip button.

And it's just like, okay, I get it.

I get it, John.

Jesus is Savior, He's King.

I get it.

Mercy and grace and forgiveness and cross and resurrection.

I get it.

But may we never become calloused to the simple, profound, powerful gospel that we need to be real in our lives every single day.

I am 41 years old and I am a pastor, and I've been doing this for a long time.

And I need the kindness, the mercy, the grace, the forgiveness of God every single morning, every single noontime, every single evening.

I need the power of the God.

I am unashamed to tell you that I need the gospel and the power of the gospel in my life every single day.

Because this is the power that saves, this is the power that heals, this is the power that delivers us from sin.

This is the power that breaks chains.

Comfort her in this time of pain, which is a great starting point.

But Taryn was then able to share with our neighbor, yes, we're gonna pray for your comfort and we're gonna pray for your father's comfort, but we believe that Jesus is still alive, and we believe that the good news is that he's still in the miracle working business.

And so we're not gonna just pray for comfort, although we are gonna pray for that.

We believe and we've seen it at our church, we've seen it in people's lives that we know we've seen God dissolve tumors, we've seen God heal cancer, we're praying for a total and complete supernatural healing, and we can tell God is she she is not a believer, our neighbor is not a believer, but God is drawing her to Himself.

We're not only praying for her father's healing, but for her salvation because we are not ashamed of the fact that the gospel still works, the gospel still saves, the gospel still heals, the gospel is what our world needs.

We got lost and dying people in San Clemente in South Orange County that don't just need better advice, more podcasts about better routines and habits, that's great, that's fine.

We don't just need the gospel of self-improvement, the gospel of sin management, we need the gospel of victory, which is found in Jesus Christ.

He's alive and he's here, and he wants to meet with us because the gospel changes everything in your life.

And when you experience this for yourself, it's too good to not share with others.

And I believe God's gonna give us the courage to experience not just the gospel for ourselves, but man, the fulfillment of sharing our story with so many people even this week.

What would our community look like if we were unashamed of the gospel?

Would you pray with me all across this place?

Holy Spirit, we thank you for who you've sent here.

We thank you that you are moving, speaking, you are ministering to our hearts.

I pray that today would be a day where we recognize that we desperately need you, we're lost without you, and we need this story to not just be something that we've heard before, and then we just move on with our day and move on with our week.

But Lord Jesus, may your gospel, your good news, be fresh and be new and grab a hold of our hearts today.

Make it real for us, perhaps rekindle that first love with you today, rekindle that relationship.

Like remind us when you took us from the bottom of that pit and you put us on solid ground.

Like, remind us in that in this moment, remind us for that moment when you took us out of that unhealthy relationship and you showed us what true love really feels like and what it really means.

Remind us, Lord, that you still have the power to save and to heal.

May we not be ashamed of this, may we not hide this, may this not become ever secondary in our story or in our narrative in life.

May we not just tell people about the church that we go to, but may we boldly proclaim the gospel of the church that we go to.

And so would you just put your hands out?

I just want to empower you today.

I want to empower you to carry this good news with you wherever you go this week.

I want you to, I want you to just know that you know that you know, that you are a gospel carrier, that the Lord Jesus has chosen you.

He loves you and he came for you.

It's not about you doing more, it's about resting in what he's already done for you.

Receive his gospel fresh and new today, and may the power of this gospel grab a hold of every person's heart in this room.

Grip a hold of our heart, give us a burden for the lost.

May your grace become so beautiful and so ridiculous.

We're obsessed with it this week, and we revel in it this week in our time with you.

And God help us to be a light in the darkness.

Holy Spirit, we know that we cannot do this on our own strength.

We need your power, and you're not looking for perfect people, you're looking for people who are weak and needy and recognize that you are our only hope.

And so, Lord, fill us and use us to bring the gospel in an unashamed, bold, and courageous way in other people's stories and lives this week.

We pray this in Jesus' name.

I bless your people.

And everyone said, Amen.