Heavenly Father we uh thank you we thank you for the gift of your word we thank you Lord that um that it speaks truth and Lord we we ask and pray this morning that the truth of your word would um would Pierce down into the deepest deepest depths of Who We Are

Lord that we would not be unmoved that we would not be unchanged as we encounter what your spirit is doing through your

word Lord I pray that um I pray Lord that you would give Pastor Luke um Clarity wisdom humility and confidence Lord um in the proclamation of your word this morning in in Jesus name

amen good morning everyone morning uh I'm Luke one of the pastors here uh and we've been walking through the book of Romans we've been going each week uh kind of unpacking what is probably for many people many theologians many pastors have considered to be one of the biggest highlights of the entire Bible and that is the Book of Romans and so it's a really dense book but it's a book that is so treasured because of how clearly it talks about the gospel the very thing that we're gathered here each and every single week to talk about to talk about Jesus and help us all grow closer to him now um you know as as pastors we kind of wear um we end up wearing a whole bunch of different hats right there's um trying to kind of like uh Define just exactly what it is a pastor does on any given week is notoriously difficult um and demonstrated by the fact that like Cameron today is we're talking about this right uh and sometimes on Sunday mornings we get up here and we've got a really pastoral very Shepherd message one of comfort and sometimes we get up here and we've got something that we really need to teach um and so today I'm feeling like I need to kind of have on the hat of profit a little bit now before any of you go out and tweet I guess you don't tweet anymore but any before anyone goes out puts a post on social media um and says Pastor Luke said he was a prophet hold up um uh what I mean by that cuz a lot of times what we think of of when we think of prophet and we've talked about this here before because we've done a series on the Minor Prophets and prophetic books in the Bible but so often when we think of that word Prophet we think of like future telling and kind of weird dreams that don't make any sense um and that's not necessarily even what the Bible emphasizes when it comes to prophets the prophets most often had a word of God for the people of God calling the people of God to return to God that is so often the message or what a prophetic word in the Bible ends up being is a word of God for the people of God calling the people of God to return to God it's a Invitational calling out to say come and know the Lord repent return and know the Lord and so that is what kind of I think of and what I think is a Biblical picture of a prophetic word and of sorts and in some ways that is kind of what preaching is every week here it's opening up the Bible it's saying this is the word of God and it is his your it is his message for you and you ought to heed it and come closer to God and so today's message is that it's a it's a message for you that I believe um that it will be a um this will be a a word that perhaps calls you up that perhaps is a wakeup call uh and and so it's a but it's also a really really good word it's a really encouraging word it's a word that refuses to leave us where we're at so we're going to pick up kind of where Cameron kind of left off but before we do that uh we're going to be in Romans Chapter 2 so if you want to you have a physical Bible with you like we've been encouraging you to um you can pull that out we have Bibles underneath the pews in front of you but we'll also have the scripture up on the screens as well we're going to be in Romans Chapter 2 so that's in the second half kind of what do you call that the last quarter of your Bible

Romans Chapter 2 now before we dig into that I want to kind of want to ask a kind of like a hypothetical question that I feel is in that is in perhaps the mind of some some people perhaps people who don't come to church haven't been to church have no interest in church uh and it's this question what good is it being a Christian if they look the same as everyone else they're just more

judgy right what good is it to be a Christian if you just look like everyone else who's not a Christian you're just more self-righteous about it what's the answer to that question right and is that a accurate representation of what Christianity is beginning to look like in America in our towns in our churches I um did a little bit of research yesterday I was trying to kind of find uh I was trying to find one study that kind of maybe perhaps did a survey of Christians to try and see where Christians perspectives on sin uh and things that God had kind of communicated and some of those beliefs I couldn't find one singular study that was comprehensive but I found like a number and kind of like a couple of different studies and rather than boring you with those and trying to parse out which each one means it was just generally kind of like looking at different ones and kind of all the different categories it was around like you know it covering different sin topics different things that the Bible says Christians ought not to live or do this thing there was about of like people who regularly attended church of that of the people who regularly did that 30% either said ah I don't really think that's that big of a deal or uh probably should be do I probably should change the way I live but I'm not so it was like roughly a third of people who were going to churches on a regular basis were unconcerned that their life did not match up with what the Bible said people who self-described said yeah I'm a Christian I'm a follower of Jesus you can find a number of these different studies on different particular topics um and there is always a percentage of people who were just like yeah I'm a Christian but you know that like one thing that Jesus says that I just don't like I just kind of ignore that and and that's a um I don't know that's kind of what the passage is going to or going to talk about today is what would God say to Christians who look no different than the world what does God have to say to people who would say you know what like it's it's not that big of a deal that I look or that my life hasn't changed at all since knowing Christ and so we're going to dive into this passage and um and kind of unpack what it says so these aren't just my words these are the words of the Lord so let's walk through this passage and let's see what the message is we're going to start up in chapter 1 picking up kind of where Cameron left off last week in verse 28 of Romans chapter 1 so that says this furthermore just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God so God gave them over to a depraved mind so that they do what ought not to be done they have become filled with every kind of wickedness evil greed and depravity they are full of Envy murder Strife deceit and Malice they are gossips Slanders god- haters insolent arrogant and boastful they invent ways of doing evil and they disobey their parents they have no understanding no Fidelity No Love No Mercy and all they although they know God's decree that those who do such things deserve death they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them so this passage right here Cameron talked about his main idea if you were here last week you kind of remember is that we as humans tend to suppress push down down keep underneath the water and ignore the truth of God it's our when when God's truth comes into our life and we don't like it we want to push it away hide it away in the closet and ignore it we suppress the truth of God and Paul here when he is writing that passage he's talking about largely unbelieving what we call Gentiles people who are not Jews and so he's talking about all these people who don't know God and he said they just they're sinful they approve of awful things and then all of the people who are listening to this passage reading along with what Paul's saying they're kind of like yeah go for it Paul yeah tell them how awful the world is all those people out there they don't come to church they don't know God they just kind of like do their own thing right like can you kind of hear that in our own context right how sinful the world is out there and how Us in this room we've got it together right and you kind of get this picture of um of kind of like the kind of the kid who is like kind of happy that their siblings getting in trouble right it's kind of just like yeah yeah you're you're going to be grounded right and and if I'm sure if you're a parent uh and when I was a parent like if I ever expressed any attitude like that I definitely also got punished right um and and that's what Paul's going to do here he's like he's talking about all these people who don't know God and now he's going to shift his focus in these next verses because he's been kind of it's been kind of hard kind of gave a hard word to those who don't know God now he's going to talk to the people who know God who have God's word and what does he have to say to them he says in verse one of chapter 2 he says you therefore you have no excuse you who pass judgment on someone else for at whatever point you judge another you are condemning yourself because you who pass judgment do the same things now we know that God's judgment against those who do such things is based on truth so when you a mere human being pass judgment on them and yet do the same things do you think that you will escape God's judgment or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness forbearance and patience not realizing that God's kindness is intended to lead you to repentance but because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God's Wrath when his righteous judgment will be

revealed so in short we could summarize these passages to say simply beware your judging heart is building up wrath because of your hypocrisy Paul's turning to the Jews the people who had the word of God at the time who knew what it meant to keep the rules of God to follow after God and he's like you guys are all sitting there feeling very content and feeling like you know what yeah all those other people they're doing all those awful things they deserve to be judged and then Paul turns to him and says well yeah you can feel that way but how are you behaving when the doors are closed when no one's watching you are you not living the same life that they are and Paul is calling them out now want to talk a little bit about um something that I think is in human nature um but happens a lot in Christian circles um there's like a fancy word for this and kind of like psychology and counseling it's called projection um but there's this idea and what I found even true in my own life right is that when we get say we're encountering somebody and you know maybe maybe even a loved one right maybe a sibling maybe a close friend someone in our Social Circle who just whenever they do that one thing that we just cannot stand right maybe they kind of act kind of conceited or maybe they have like a way of like uh cancelling on you or maybe it's a certain like whatever that thing is that you just like they do like a number of things that maybe bug you but there's like one thing that just really gets under your skin sometimes what happens when that's happening is that that particular thing that bugs you the most about some people is the thing that you yourself like don't like about yourself or you yourself struggle with right I I found this out um number of years ago I was serving in a Ministry with someone and I could not stand this guy I thought he was very self-conceited I thought he always wanted the spotlight he was just kind of always just kind of jockeying for position I was just like I can't stand that guy he's just he thinks he knows it all he doesn't I know it all right now you're all laughing because you obviously see what was going on there right sometimes it feels really comfortable for us to be accusatory of someone over here on how they're living than to look in the mirror and examine is that in my own heart are they simply behaving are they behaving in a way that maybe I don't behave that way but that's still in my heart it's how I want to behave or perhaps you know what I perhaps I feel really guilty over this particular thing but it makes me feel better if I can be angry angry about this person's thing and we need to be aware of that because when we do that we're falling into exactly what Paul's talking about here do you not keep up judgment when you judge others when you yourself live the same way so Paul is putting out this warning and then it kind of continues on in his argument he goes on to to verse 6 through

11 says God will repay each person according to what they have done to those who by persistence in doing good seek glory honor and immortality he will give eternal life but for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil there will be wrath and anger there will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil first for the Jew then for the Gentile but glory honor and peace for everyone who does good first to the Jew then for the Gentile for God does not show

favoritism so this little passage those couple of verses right there if you were to read verse 6 and then if you were to read verse 11 you'd find that they're essentially saying the F same thing verse six says God will repay each person according to what they have done verse 11 for God does not show favoritism summarize the point God fairly judges your heart and actions no matter who you are right he's calling out and he's saying like just because this is Paul Paul speaking to the Jews and he's like just because you are a Jew does not mean that you just get a pass you just get a free pass God is not one who shows favoritism God is the one who judges rightly he judges fairly it this would be God is not the parent who shows favoritism he's not The God Who says you know what like you're the special child you can do whatever you want uh and then he just goes over here and he's just mad at all the other ones right that's not God God is God does not show favoritism because if he did it would not be very righteous of him right if we go all the way back to kind of our key ideas of this of this of the book if we were to go back to one uh verse verses chapter 1: 16-1 17 as Paul saying he says I am not ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes first to the Jew then to the Gentile for in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed a righteousness that is by faith first to last just as it is written the righteous shall be shall live by faith and there's a number different ways that the righteousness of God is revealed um and one of the ways one of the ways that righteousness plays out in the Book of Romans is in God being a righteous and fair judge that God is fair that he's not just compromising and just saying oh you know what like it's like sin isn't a big deal the gospel isn't God saying sin's not a big deal he's saying it's a massive deal it's so massive that my son has to die for it that's God's righteousness on

display so if we go forward back into Romans Chapter 2 and we pick up in verse

12 Paul continues his argument here he says this he says all who sin apart from the law will perish apart from the law so he says okay all those who sin apart from the law he's back to talking about the Gentiles that he started talking about in the beginning those who um do evil um and suppress the truth he says they don't have the law and we'll talk about the law in a moment and all who sin under the law will be judged by the law for it is not those who hear the law law who are righteous in God's sight but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous indeed when Gentiles who do not have the law do by Nature things required by the law they are a law for themselves even though they do not have the law they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts their conscious consciences also bear witness and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times defending them this will take place on the day when God judges people's Secrets through Jesus Christ as my gospel declares all right so what is Paul saying there he's got all of this language and the law and someone's under the law and someone's not under the law like what is he saying so let's kind of break that section down a little bit we can summarize this by saying that God can judge us all because we all have the law right so it's kind of like if you were to get in trouble for something and you're like well I didn't know that was the rule right like teacher I didn't know I wasn't allowed to do that um and God's Paul's saying he's like no no no like you don't get to play that card because he talked about it earlier and he's talking about it now again says even though I should Define the law before we go any further so when the B when Romans talks about the law what is it talking about in one Essence it's talking about like the first five books of your Bible first five books of the Bible are what the Jews considered their law it's all of the the rules the regulations the Covenant includes the Ten Commandments if you've seen those movies um and all of that that's the law and it all governed how the people of God were to follow God how to behave how to live their lives how to conduct Society all of those things were included in there and that was all about how you set yourself apart and you were part of the family of God and so he's talking about people who don't have the law somehow have the law written on their hearts and that law that's written on their hearts is still a law that they can be judged by so what's he talking about what's he saying when he says well there's people people who weren't Jews who didn't have the first five of the books of the Bible they never read the Torah before like what do they have written on their hearts well I mean one simple way to kind of see to talk about this is just the the very simple conversation we have if I was to if I was to walk down the street we're walking down the street towards each other and we're both on the sidewalk and we're in America so we're we should be walking I'm walking on the right side of the sidewalk you're walking on the right side of the sidewalk coming the other way and for some reason I kind of just not paying attention and I just kind of bump into you right now any now what should happen right I was maybe on my phone I wasn't paying attention I was watching some Tik toks and I bump into you right I should say oh I'm so sorry like that was my fault I didn't intend to do that my bad right so sorry can I help you pick that up but if I instead just kind of like get out of my way like I get really mad right like like there's something inside of us that says well that's not that's not right right how is it that two strangers can have an interaction and come into um a dialogue over what is right and what is wrong about the way you're treating me is not correct right if we look across Society across the world across history why is it that civilizations tend to agree on like you know not murdering people not stealing things that don't belong to you why is that if they've never talked with each other it's not like all the like people got together and decided you know what I I'm going to like all right I'm going to go back to my tribe in Asia and tribe in the Americas and we're going to make sure to instill the same moral ethics in everybody right like they didn't have some sort of like way of communicating that but across history and across time each and every civilization grows up with this sense of what is right and what is wrong well where did that sense of right and wrong come from because it's it's it's more than just it's it it's something that seems to be Universal and if there's if you were to walk into a classroom on your first day of class and you see up on the chalkboard written rules you would have say h would you sit there and say I I guess those rules just spontaneously got there they just happen to be there I guess like you you wouldn't think that you would say well no no there must be a teacher who decided the rules and came and wrote the rules up on the chalkboard so that we could all see them and so similarly with us when we all in our Human Experience have these rules of how we ought to treat one another written on our hearts our conclusion should not be huh that's interesting our conclusion should be somebody wrote those there and Paul is saying those rules written on people's hearts even though they're there they fail to keep those rules so God comes up to the person who doesn't have the Bible and he comes and he says well did did give you these rules on your heart and you didn't even keep those and so I won't judge you for what you didn't have but I will judge you for what you did have and then Paul turns over and he looks to the Jews to those who knew God who had the word and he's like you guys you guys did know this you guys were aware of what God had said and then you also didn't do it and I will judge you for

that so God fairly judges our hearts and our actions and God can judge us all because we have um we have this written on our

hearts

now I want to I want to get nerdy um because I love I love being a Bible nerd it's one of the things I get really excited about um I was telling people earlier this week I'm like I'm really boring at parties unless it's like a Bible trivia party um and so we're going to talk about um like because Paul wrote this book wrote the letter of Romans at a particular time in his history and just like I can get up here and I can talk about like Tik Tock and Twitter or X or whatever the heck it's called now um like you guys all get that you guys are all like oh yeah if we were to replay this sermon in like 300 years from now somebody'd have to be like I don't know what they have I don't know future Google uh and look back and say like what what was he talking about Tick Tock like what was he what was that like it wouldn't get it right and so similarly when we look back into this book when Paul wrote it there's things that Paul knew about and that his audience all knew about and then he was able to reference those he was able to say like okay I'm going to reference this thing that I know most of you guys know about and then I'm going to kind of Riff on it a little bit so that I kind of make a point so what most people who uh study this passage have come to think is that Paul in this portion of Romans is largely borrowing a argument that's very familiar this is an argument this is the type of things Paul has been saying would have been like somebody would have been like oh I think he's quoting like such and such Rabbi oh I think he's quoting that one book they would have been like oh yeah I hear what Paul's saying and then the ways that Paul is changing what he is saying is making people go oh that's different and so Paul is thought to have been quoting from the book of the wisdom of Solomon now the book of wisdom of Solomon it's not in our bibles if you have a Catholic Bible or you came from a Catholic tradition there's a portion of the Catholic Bible called the Apocrypha the wisdom of Solomon is contained inside of that uh it's a place where the Apocrypha is books of the Bible that are not books of the Bible they're there books adjacent to the story of the Bible that have also been included in Catholic Bibles and so Paul is kind of quoting this passage he's quoting a passage from that book and he's like you guys are all tracking with what I'm saying but I'm going to change it a little bit so I want to read to you a portion of what he says out of the wisdom of Solomon so I'll have it up here on the screen but this is from that book The wisd wisdom of Solomon says but you our god this is the Jews talking to God are kind and true and patient and ruling all things in Mercy for even if we sin we are yours knowing your power but we will not sin because we know that you uh acknowledge us as yours for to know you is complete righteousness and to know your power is the root of immortality hm now if you listen to that and you hear that last particularly that last sentence for to know you is complete righteousness and to know your power is the root of immortality is that what Paul says here he kind of says something a little bit different doesn't

he see if I can find it

here

for all who sin apart from the law will be will also perish apart from the law and all who sin under the law will be judged by the law for it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God's sight but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous Paul is like no no no you guys are all thinking about that passage where it says to to know to know the Lord is is is the thing right to know you is complete righteousness Paul's like uh-uh just to hear the word just to know God is not complete righteousness to hear the word and then obey the word is complete righteousness Paul is turning the way they thought about things up on their head and so too for us right remains true it doesn't matter how much of this book you memorize have read how many sermons you've listened to if you've just ignored all of it right that's doesn't do you any good there are people who make their entire career out of reading and studying this Bible and making papers and teaching about it who don't believe in God simply understanding the Bible does not make you a Christian just because you can win at Bible trivia night because everybody goes to those just because you know all of those facts does not mean that you are a Christian that you have a good relationship with God just because you show up to church does not mean you have a good relationship with God so let's finish out Paul's argument and then we'll talk about this directly applied to our lives so we'll finish up starting in verse 17 Reading to 24 Paul continues he says now you if you call yourself a Jew if you rely on the law and Bo in God if you know his will and you approve of what is superior because you are instructed by the law if you are convinced that you are a guide for the blind a light for those who are in the dark an instructor of the foolish a teacher of little children because you have the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth you then who teach others do you not teach yourself you who preach against stealing do you steal you who say that people should not commit adultery do you commit adultery you who abhor Idols do you rob temples you who boast in the law do you dis you dishonor do you dishonor God by breaking the law as it is written God's name is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you so to summarize that is to say do we Blas we blaspheme God when we make a let me read what I wrote up there we blaspheme God when we make a proudly life when we live proudly live hypocritically based on our own goodness we blaspheme God when we proudly live hypocritically based on our own goodness when we're living a world where we're you know like man if everybody just listen to me everyone just did what I told them like everybody else like their lives are a wreck I got to figure it out right um I think Cameron told me about this quote or this sign that was on someone's um uh someone's office and now I'm going to butcher it um but it said something to the effect of like um please take any of my ad feel free to take any of my advice I'm obviously not using it right when we live a life where we think we've got it figured out if everybody would only listen to us but we have zero reflection or ability to look in the mirror to take and say you know what this also speaks to me not just to the person next to me right have we ever have we ever done that we ever read a verse ooh I want to I want to post that on soci social media and hope so and so sees it or like oh man like I I I really wish so and so I wish my husband or my wife or my kid or whoever was here on Sunday today because this was the message they really needed to hear right like we do that we we take the word of God and we say you know what ah that doesn't have any I'm good but that person over there needs to hear that probably cuz they're they look like they're a wreck right

and when we do that we're dishonoring God when when we say you know what I've got it all together I'm living the perfect life but really the thing is is that we our image that fake mask that we have up people can see behind that we rarely put off as good of an image as we think we are people are much more able to see the cracks than you think they are here's here here's a key question for today do we say one thing with our mouths but do a different thing with our lives do we say one thing I believe this thing I believe the word of God to be true I believe what God has said is the plan for my life the way of human flourishing I believe that but then when it comes to the way that I live my life I don't actually end up living that way my actions are not matching up with what I have said I believe I think or I

teach do we say one thing with our mouths but do a different thing with our lives it's kind of a um if you ever heard the phrase of classic wisdom do as I say not as I do right and and you know it's you know it's really tempting to say that perhaps to like those who are coming behind us whether that be uh you know if you've got kids right if a parent uh if you say like do as I say not as I do right um something that seems to be true is that the example usually beats out the words right the lived example of how someone lives not what they say tends to be the trump card a a kid follows after the example much more easily than the words of a parent and same for us as we speak into the world I I don't know who originally said this but there are not a lot of people you go out into the world talk to people who aren't all that interested in faith and you ask them do you want to read the Bible they might say ah not really it's kind of long um they might not read this but they might read your

life not everybody will read the Bible but they will read how you live they will read how you treat

them so what I need to do now is I need to kind of balance things out because this is one of the hard things about preaching the entire Council of God is I could probably just keep going um because like I I want to um but also because the art because what Paul has to say isn't finished yet I can't leave you there because if I were to leave you there I wouldn't have told you everything so I'm going to I'm going to skip forward a little bit because I think it's it would be it would be irresponsible of me to Simply have said all that I've said today and not finish the sentence so I want to skip forward because I need to answer this question because if you read this passage and this is it you're done what you could hear what you could hear me say is that we're saved by works what you could walk away from the sermon thinking as saying well I just need to work really hard I need to obey the law do the right things in order to earn God's favor and that is not what we teach it's not what I believe it's not what the Bible teaches right so let's finish the sentence in Romans 3: 20- 24 we'll talk about this passage much more next week but let's just read it in brief here 20 through 24 he says therefore no one will be declared righteous in God's sight by The Works of the law catch that no one will ever be able to keep the law written on their heart the law written in this book no one will ever be able to do it and no one will ever be declared right in God because they tried really

hard rather through the law we become conscious of our sin that law on the heart the law on here lets us know that we've messed up that we've fallen short but now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known to which the law and the prophets testify this righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe for there is no difference between Jew and Gentile for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and all are Justified freely by His Grace Grace through the Redemption that came by Christ

Jesus what is that saying saying by faith alone through Grace you are saved that you cannot earn God's favor I was talking about this in the baptism class and I used it there so I'll just use it here right we so often about the way we just kind of default think about the world to think about God and we think about salvation this is kind of the default narrative that people fall into imagine a massive Mountain one of those big mountains with a tall pointy Peak and up in that Peak is it's stuck up in the clouds so that you kind of can't see it and up there at the top of the mountain is where God's at and then we us humans are kind of down here at the bottom of the Mountain at the base of the mountain that's kind of where we're at and we by default think we realize the law shows us the law in my heart the law in the Bible shows that that mountain is Big the gap between where God is the gap where I'm at is large and we decide you know what I just need to do enough good things if I do more good than I do bad if I try really hard I just have a really good heart if I have really good intentions if I just kind of be a decent person maybe if I go to church every mon once in a while by doing that I'll find the right path I'll slowly climb that mountain and I'll eventually get all the way up there Paul says Nope uh people try that and they get lost on the mountain no one ever actually makes it to the top and the gospel truth is because that's still the situation us down here God up here if we can't get up there how do how does this get solved God God has to come down to where we're at and that's where the gospel starts starts all the way at Christmas with Christ coming and being born as a baby and laying in a Manger coming in flesh coming and inhabiting and being in the broken World surrounded by sin pain suffering and Brokenness and in living a life among us and with us and then dying on the cross he who knew no sin became sin who took our Brokenness all of our inadequacies and problems in sin and he took it he was nailed to the cross and along with him all of those things were nailed to the cross and then he died on that cross he was buried in the grave he stayed there for 3 days and then when he came out he left behind not just grave clothes he left behind all of that sin and Brokenness and he came into new life and we by faith when we say yes Lord Jesus that becomes credited to our account that becomes not just the story of Jesus that becomes the story in my heart of your spirit and my spirit and

so what are we doing here so what is how do we

how do we balance this right because Paul seems to have just said like shame on you for not following God's Commandments for ignoring him but then he's also saying but you you can never ultimately please God on your own anyway how do we balance these two truths I want to talk about well well first I want to show you where this is in the text if we go all the way back to chapter 2 verse we're going to start in verse one just to read this short section because this idea is right here this is the key idea

today you therefore have no excuse you who pass judgment on someone else for at whatever point you judge another you are condemning yourself because you who pass judgment do the same things now we know that God's judgment against those who do such thing is based on truth so when you a mere human being pass judgment on them and yet do the same things do you think you will escape God's judgment here's the key or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness of his forbearance of his patience not realizing that God's kindness is intended to lead you to repentance what Paul is saying he's like yeah you don't have to follow the law and we'll talk about this concept so much more as we go through the book of Romans I feel like I'm spoiling the ending but um the point here is that yeah you aren't like yeah you can't perfectly follow the law you won't perfectly follow God it's just not going to happen but God knows that and God has chosen you he's been kind forgiving and gracious and he's made room for you to be imperfect but he's not Christ didn't die on the cross so that we could just stay the way we

are God's like I didn't come die for your sin so that you could just kind of go all right cool it's kind of like if we were to think about um if you were to go to dinner with someone a good friend and your friend friend says you know what I'm buying dinner today all right do you buy the most expensive things on the menu do you say oh that's great I'm just going to buy all I'm going to buy like I'm going to buy like actually I'm going to buy multiple meals cuz this is going to be like my meal planning for the week right here um yeah I would like I would like the Tomahawk Steak um I would like fish and chips and you know and you just kind of B I want but I want all that to go and so like do you take advantage of your friend when they offer to um take you to dinner right and they say I'm paying do you take advantage of that no I mean you you you do take advantage of it like you still order your food right you enjoy the food but you don't go beyond to what is reasonable so that you disrespect or dishonor them that you're taking advantage of them I want to talk about this by quoting somebody um who I think said this better than I can so I'm just going to Simply quote them this is uh from Pastor Theologian Dietrich Bon Hofer he was a pastor in Germany around the early part of World War II um and he he received lots of criticism uh from all different angles when he was uh alive and serving and this is in his book um cost of discipleship which is a book I get all the small group leaders are reading and he talks about this he calls what he he talks about this idea called cheap Grace and I just want to read this section because I think he says the core idea better than I can today says this cheap Grace is preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance baptism without church discipline communion without confession Absolution without personal confession cheap Grace is Grace without discipleship Grace without the cross Grace without Jesus Christ Living and incarnate but instead costly Grace is the treasure hidden in the field for the sake of it a man will go and sell all that he has it is the pearl of great price to buy which the merchant will sell all of his Goods it is the kingly rule of Christ for those whose sake a man will pluck out an eye which causes him to stumble it is the call of Jesus Christ at which the disciple leaves his Nets and follows him costly Grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again the gift which must be asked for the door at which a man must knock KN such Grace is costly because it calls us to follow and it is Grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ it is costly because it costs a man his life and it is Grace because it gives man the only true life it is costly because it condemns sin and it is Grace because it justifies The Sinner above all it is C ly because it cost God the life of his son you were bought at a price and at what cost did God um what what has cost God so much cannot be cheap for us above all it is Grace because God did not reckon his son too dear a price to pay for our life but delivered him up for us costly Grace is the Incarnation of God while we were still Sinners while we were stuck while we were still imperfect and while we were enemies of God before we had ever done anything to make a choice to follow after God Christ died for you Christ saw you in your Brokenness and said no no I'm coming for you I'm going to save you from where you're at and that is given to you freely by faith but he's asking you to also follow after him the words of Christ say it this way if we turn to Luke 9: 23- 24 go ahead and put that up on the screen if it's there or I can just flip to it Luke chapter 9 23-

24 this is Jesus he said to them all whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me for whoever wants to save their life will lose it but whoever loses their life for me will save it Jesus is saying if you want new eternal life you've got to follow follow after me here in a few minutes we're going to have people being baptized and baptism is a physical telling of the Gospel with our bodies it's this image why do we why do we dunk people why don't we just sprinkle some water on them and call it good we dunk them because we believe it is the most clear picture of the Gospel to say that with Christ on the cross my sins were crucified he went into the grave as I go under the water and he came out of the grave in newness of life and so do I when I come up from the water I go into the water I went my old self when I first get into the tub I'm dunked under the water when I come back up my old self is Left Behind that's the picture of the Gospel that's what we believe and so why then do we continue to say we should just live like the old self Paul's calling us to newness of life to follow after him so I have two two questions first is to say what's the story that we're telling with our lives what is the Story of My Life telling is it telling the story of the Gospel not that I'm perfect not that I've got it all figured out not that I like magically just jumped from being a baby Christian to being super Christian but is it telling the story of someone who says Jesus I'm going to I'm going to follow after you I'm not going to do it perfect I'm going to try that telling the story of someone who's willing to say you know what I need to hear the gospel each and every single day what story is it

telling and then finally or two two more questions I guess one is to where have we ignored what God has plainly said you've been following Jesus for a while this is a word for you if you feel like ask the Lord am I ignoring you ask the Lord is there something where I've decided just going to pretend that's not there ask the lord it's much the same question that Cameron asked last week and then finally if the if the ground is level is flat we all stand at the same position at the foot of the cross how then ought I be treating other people if we all contribute nothing to Salvation except for our sin then how should I be treating and loving those around me do I have a heart of judgment or do I have a heart that sees them and sees the other person as a fellow sinner in need of Jesus Christ Heavenly Father Lord we come before you in need of your grace in need of your direction and your guidance and your Holy Spirit Lord I pray that this morning you would be Awakening ourselves to you so that we might clearly understand and see the life that you've called us to the life that you have freed us to live Lord you didn't die for us to stay where we're at you've died for us so that we might live in newness of Life Lord today I pray that this message ultimately I just pray that your word would have its effect in people's hearts in mind that you might be calling us closer to Jesus that we might understand what it means that you gave your son for us and how much that cost and how we might also understand how freely it has been given to us that we might know you and have salvation Lord I pray that you would be magnified in our hearts and that you would be told as the story of our lives in Jesus name we pray

amen