Speaker 1: 1st Baptist, baptist El Dorado, will you join me now in listening to our sermon from this week?
Speaker 1: You can turn to Romans, chapter 2.
Speaker 1: Romans, chapter 2.
Speaker 1: Let me read verses 1 through 11, our full passage this morning.
Speaker 1: Therefore, you have no excuse, o man.
Speaker 1: Every one of you who judges, for in passing judgment on another, you condemn yourself because you, the judge, practice the very same things.
Speaker 1: We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things.
Speaker 1: Do you suppose, o man, you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourselves, that you will escape the judgment of God?
Speaker 1: Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance, but because of your hard and impenitent heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself?
Speaker 1: On the day of wrath, when God's righteous judgment will be revealed, he will render to each one according to his works.
Speaker 1: To those who, by patience and well-doing, seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life.
Speaker 1: But for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.
Speaker 1: There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek, for God shows no partiality.
Speaker 1: Pray with me now.
Speaker 1: Lord Jesus, we thank you for this day, for this morning, for this opportunity to be in your word, to learn from your word.
Speaker 1: So, lord, holy Spirit, would you speak to us this morning?
Speaker 1: We ask this in Christ's name, amen.
Speaker 1: Well, first Baptist Church of El Dorado is full of hypocrites.
Speaker 1: I don't know if I have your attention yet this morning, but First Baptist Church of El Dorado is absolutely full of hypocrites.
Speaker 1: If you're visiting today for the first time, I'm very sorry to let you down.
Speaker 1: What do I mean by that?
Speaker 1: For every one of us in the room, if you were to take two fingers and put it right here on your wrist or right here on your neck, you would feel a pulse inside of you.
Speaker 1: That will let me know, and you know that you are a living, breathing human.
Speaker 1: And that lets me know, and you know that at some level, large or small, at some level in your life, there is some form of hypocrisy.
Speaker 1: It comes to all of us.
Speaker 1: How many of you have told a child he can't get up from the table until he eats his brussel sprouts?
Speaker 1: Well, you know good and well, you are not touching your brussel sprouts.
Speaker 1: How many of you have told employees at the office that the office printer is for office use only?
Speaker 1: But you know, in two weeks when the March Madness bracket comes out, you're going to print a couple copies for yourself.
Speaker 1: There's a level of hypocrisy in every one of us, in every one of us.
Speaker 1: We all don't quite meet the standard that we project.
Speaker 1: It happens to all of us.
Speaker 1: We all don't quite meet the standard that we project.
Speaker 1: It happens to all of us.
Speaker 1: But today, in Romans, chapter 2, I think Paul wants to ask the question what happens when hypocrisy rises well beyond Brussels sprouts and brackets?
Speaker 1: What happens then?
Speaker 1: What happens when hypocrisy leads to a level of self-righteousness where, all of a sudden, the people who claim to be part of the family of God are so wrapped up in their own self-righteousness that they are even on the outside looking in and don't even know it?
Speaker 1: They've trusted in something other than Christ for their salvation and up to this point, they don't even know it.
Speaker 1: What happens when our own hypocrisy and self-righteousness leads us to that place?
Speaker 1: I want us to see three things this morning as we walk through this text.
Speaker 1: The first is this self-righteousness.
Speaker 1: It falls short of the glory of God.
Speaker 1: Self-righteousness falls short of the glory of God.
Speaker 1: Look with me in verse 1.
Speaker 1: Therefore, you have no excuse, o man.
Speaker 1: Every one of you who judges, for in passing judgment on another, you condemn yourself because you, the judge, practice the very same things.
Speaker 1: If you were here last week, you remember in Romans, chapter 1, paul is writing this letter and he's speaking to the Gentiles in the audience and he starts calling out the sin of the Gentiles.
Speaker 1: And we talked last week how, in our sin outside of Christ, that we suppress the truth, we worship our idols.
Speaker 1: We talked last week about the number of sins that we run after when we worship our idols and suppress the truth.
Speaker 1: So Paul is condemning these Gentiles in their sin and you can almost imagine in this church that is made up of Jews and Gentiles, the Jewish individuals are likely sitting there as this letter is being read and they are giving very loud amens to this in Romans, chapter 1.
Speaker 1: They're saying amen to every line.
Speaker 1: They're probably telling Paul keep it up.
Speaker 1: They're probably saying, hey, we've been telling them these same things for years.
Speaker 1: We're glad you've finally written this letter to let them know, for more than just us, that they are lost in sin and worthy of condemnation.
Speaker 1: The Jewish individuals in the crowd are loving the book of Romans through the first chapter.
Speaker 1: The problem is, the page turns to chapter two and Paul turns the tables on the Jewish individuals and says this once again in verse 1 here that you have no excuse, that you've set the standard and you've condemned others because they don't meet that standard, while this whole time you don't meet the standard yourself.
Speaker 1: I mean, paul says that you're doing the very same things.
Speaker 1: So everything I named in Romans, chapter 1, about these Gentiles, you are saying your amens, yet secretly, when you're not in this room behind closed doors, you're doing the same thing.
Speaker 1: This is hypocrisy, isn't it?
Speaker 1: This is a level of hypocrisy that reaches to self-righteousness, that that they should be condemned because of their sin.
Speaker 1: I'm doing the same things, but surely I shouldn't be condemned because of it.
Speaker 1: That's not how this thing works.
Speaker 1: Verse two we know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things.
Speaker 1: You're not Jewish individuals.
Speaker 1: You're not wrong for looking at these who are in outward, wayward sin and saying from the outside, looking in, that sin has earned condemnation?
Speaker 1: Of course it has.
Speaker 1: Sin always has consequence and always earns discipline.
Speaker 1: But verse three but do you suppose, oh man, that you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourselves, that you will escape the judgment of God?
Speaker 1: Of course there's condemnation for their sin.
Speaker 1: But guess what, if you do the very same things, do you think there's not condemnation for your sin?
Speaker 1: Self-righteousness had infected at such a high level many in the audience hearing this letter.
Speaker 1: Jesus talks a lot about self-righteousness, doesn't he?
Speaker 1: In the gospels, often we see stories about the Pharisees, the religious elite, the ones who they knew all the Bible answers and had it all figured out.
Speaker 1: And yet in their mind, because they knew all the answers and because they did all the quote-unquote right things that they were already in, that they were accepted before the Father.
Speaker 1: What?
Speaker 1: Based off of what they do, based off of their works.
Speaker 1: And that's really what self-righteousness is.
Speaker 1: Let's define it.
Speaker 1: For those outside of Christ, our self-righteousness is just saying that anything other than Christ can save me, that my own works can save me, that if I in this life do more good than I do bad, I'll end up in a good spot on the other side.
Speaker 1: Surely I could get to heaven.
Speaker 1: Surely the Lord will let me in If I do enough good or if I avoid the bad.
Speaker 1: Or here's what we love to do in our self-righteousness.
Speaker 1: And I know I've done some bad, but praise God, I haven't done as bad as some of these others.
Speaker 1: I've sinned, but my goodness, at least it wasn't that sin, at least I didn't do that.
Speaker 1: That's how we justify things in our mind.
Speaker 1: But it's all the same self-righteousness.
Speaker 1: It's trusting in ourselves to save ourselves instead of Christ, even inside of Christ.
Speaker 1: Once we know Christ Jesus by grace, through faith, not by works, you know, self-righteousness can still have its way in us.
Speaker 1: We might not say my self-righteousness, we might not say our own good works got us to Jesus, but we might say they can sure keep us here.
Speaker 1: Or if I do good and do what I'm supposed to do, surely God will love me a little more, he'll favor me a little more, maybe he'll, you know, give a few extra good things to me if I can do the things he asks me to do.
Speaker 1: It's all about the motivation that in our self-righteousness.
Speaker 1: On the outside it may look like we're doing all the right things, but we know on the inside the motivation is off, because I'm doing the right things, but not out of obedience to a God who has saved me, but I'm doing the right things so that I can just look good in front of you all, so that I can impress you, so that as you're around the lunch table this afternoon you will look at each other and say, isn't Taylor doing a pretty good job at this?
Speaker 1: You know, I saw him help an elderly lady across the street the other day.
Speaker 1: Isn't he doing a good job at everything?
Speaker 1: And our self-righteousness just says that that is the motivation to be impressive, to look the part.
Speaker 1: And for all of us in our self-righteousness, what's so scary about it we see it here in these first few verses is that we often don't see it.
Speaker 1: We're blind to it in these first few verses is that we often don't see it?
Speaker 1: We're blind to it.
Speaker 1: I mean, the Jewish individuals in this crowd are condemning others for doing the very same things they're doing.
Speaker 1: They don't see how hypocritical this is and how off-base this is.
Speaker 1: But we don't see it either.
Speaker 1: Sometimes.
Speaker 1: I think about.
Speaker 1: We've talked about it before in 2nd Samuel, chapter 11 and 12.
Speaker 1: David the king has just made many mistakes.
Speaker 1: He's committed adultery with Bathsheba.
Speaker 1: He, he brought Uriah, bathsheba's husband home, but he's too loyal to uh to get involved with anything like that and and to to what David wants, to put him at the scene of the crime.
Speaker 1: So instead David sends him back to battle, but sends a letter to say, hey, put him at the spot where the fiercest battle is.
Speaker 1: And then everybody draw back and so obviously Uriah dies in that moment.
Speaker 1: And so now, if you're keeping track, david is an adulterer, he is a murderer, he is a deceiver, he is a liar, but he is the king and so he can justify it.
Speaker 1: He doesn't see what's wrong because in his mind he's covered his tracks.
Speaker 1: But then a few days later, in 2 Samuel 12, a friend, nathan, comes.
Speaker 1: David's blind to everything.
Speaker 1: And so Nathan tells a story.
Speaker 1: There was a poor man down the road and he had one little lamb.
Speaker 1: He loved this lamb like it was his child.
Speaker 1: The rich man across the street had every sheep, all the livestock, everything he could ever want.
Speaker 1: He had no needs.
Speaker 1: But the rich man had a friend over and wanted to have a celebration.
Speaker 1: But instead of drawing from his own livestock, he went across the street to take the poor man's one little lamb, and that would be the feast.
Speaker 1: In that moment, david's furious.
Speaker 1: How could he do this?
Speaker 1: He should be like bring him here right now.
Speaker 1: He should face condemnation for what he has done.
Speaker 1: And then Nathan drops this bomb.
Speaker 1: David, you are the man.
Speaker 1: He didn't see anything.
Speaker 1: David, you're the king.
Speaker 1: You have everything you could ever need.
Speaker 1: God has blessed you in so many ways and yet you looked at one of your soldier's wives and you said I can have her.
Speaker 1: David, you are the man.
Speaker 1: But in his own self-righteousness he could never see it until it was put right in front of him and then repentance could occur.
Speaker 1: We're blind to our own self-righteousness, our own efforts to earn favor with God by anything outside of the finished work of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: In 2020, a survey came out and I remember being absolutely stunned by it at the time, and I was equally shocked when I revisited it this week.
Speaker 1: The Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University.
Speaker 1: They polled many, many people and they found this that 65% of adults in the United States would claim Christianity.
Speaker 1: Now, we know how those surveys work.
Speaker 1: Those polls work.
Speaker 1: Anybody can check a box.
Speaker 1: You know we don't check.
Speaker 1: You know salvation records, baptism records, anything like that.
Speaker 1: Anybody can check a box, but 65% of the people in the United States claim Christianity of adults.
Speaker 1: The survey continued.
Speaker 1: The same group was polled and we got this answer that 33% of adults in the United States believe they will go to heaven based on their confession of sin and belief that Jesus is Savior.
Speaker 1: Let me say that again 33% of adults in the United States believe that they will go to heaven based on their confession of sin and belief that Jesus is Savior.
Speaker 1: Now let's walk through both of these again 65% of US adults claim Christianity.
Speaker 1: 33% of US adults claim they will go to heaven based on the confession of sin and Jesus Christ as Savior.
Speaker 1: Now, if you're doing math in your pew right now, you're realizing that two plus two does not equal four, that something's off in this moment, that two-thirds of people claim Christianity.
Speaker 1: One-third of people claim that they have been forgiven and that Christ, jesus, is Savior.
Speaker 1: What that tells me is, according to this poll, at least a third of people believe they are Christians but are trusting in anything other than Christ for their salvation.
Speaker 1: What is it they're trusting in?
Speaker 1: I don't know for everybody, that would be another poll unto itself but I would imagine many are trusting in their own goodness, in their own self-righteousness.
Speaker 1: Many are just saying I've been good enough or I'm trying really hard and therefore at the end of all this I'll get in.
Speaker 1: I think of we referenced it last week Luke, chapter 15, the prodigal son.
Speaker 1: We talked about how he ran to the far country, the prodigal son.
Speaker 1: We talked about how he ran to the far country.
Speaker 1: But we remember at the end there's an older brother as well and with that older brother he had been outside the house the whole time, very close, but outside the house.
Speaker 1: His problem was not that he ran to the far country, his problem was that he saw the father's house as something that he could earn.
Speaker 1: When the prodigal son comes home, this older brother is out in the field, working and working, and working for his father's approval and he is furious when he finds out this younger son just gets to come home, just gets to be a part of the father's house.
Speaker 1: He says but dad, I've been working here my whole life.
Speaker 1: Surely I've earned your love and earned your favor, to which the father has to say, hey, my love and favor is not something you had to earn.
Speaker 1: All that I have is yours.
Speaker 1: I want you to hear something this morning church, family, that you can be lost in your badness, but you can also be lost in your goodness.
Speaker 1: You can also say all the right things and do all the right things and do the moral things and look the part and even show up in this room, or a room like it, every Sunday morning and still not know Jesus Christ and still trust in your own efforts to be saved.
Speaker 1: So, first of all, self-righteousness falls short of the glory of God.
Speaker 1: But I also want to see this.
Speaker 1: Complacency falls short of the glory of God.
Speaker 1: Verse four or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance, but because of your hard and impenitent heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself.
Speaker 1: On the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed, do you presume on the patience of God to these Jewish believers?
Speaker 1: Let's be clear.
Speaker 1: We're going to see it throughout Romans.
Speaker 1: We see it throughout scripture.
Speaker 1: There is something very neat, very special about being of Jewish lineage.
Speaker 1: There's no doubt about that.
Speaker 1: Oh, I love the fact that in Genesis, chapter 12, god, setting forth his redemption plan, called forth a man named Abraham.
Speaker 1: Not because of anything good Abraham had done, but because God's desire to save the world.
Speaker 1: He wanted to create through the family, a large family that could be a blessing to the nations.
Speaker 1: And so he called out Abraham.
Speaker 1: And so it is neat for the Jewish individuals in the crowd today, as this letter was read 2,000 years ago, to be able to say my great, great, great and so on, grandfather is Abraham, is Isaac, is Jacob, is Moses, is David, is all of these people to the line of Jesus?
Speaker 1: There is power in that, there is beauty in that, there is beauty in that.
Speaker 1: But there's also a temptation to grow complacent, to say that, because of the fact that I was born into this family, because of the fact that this is who my great-grandfather is, whatever they might say, because of that I'm already in.
Speaker 1: Because of that, nothing more needs to be done.
Speaker 1: I'm in because surely my family gets me in.
Speaker 1: There's a temptation to use their own Jewishness as the standard.
Speaker 1: And now let's be careful because, as I said a moment ago, standard and now let's be careful because, as I said a moment ago, those kinds of things still exist today.
Speaker 1: Can we not use different things to be our standard to to get us in?
Speaker 1: I grew up in church.
Speaker 1: My, my parents were Christians.
Speaker 1: I grew up in a Christian home.
Speaker 1: We say that we were at church every day.
Speaker 1: The doors were open.
Speaker 1: Some days the doors were not open.
Speaker 1: My parents still got us there.
Speaker 1: We say I've been in this Sunday school for years.
Speaker 1: I even went on this mission trip.
Speaker 1: I've given towards this church for years and let me say that every one of those things is a beautiful thing, a beautiful thing.
Speaker 1: Praise God for every one of those things is a beautiful thing, a beautiful thing.
Speaker 1: Praise God for every one of those things.
Speaker 1: But none of those things will justify you before the Lord.
Speaker 1: None of those things are things that suddenly we get to say we are part of the family of God based on that alone, hopefully.
Speaker 1: So many of those things are a result being with the people of God.
Speaker 1: All those things are a result of what Christ has done, and now I want to be with the family of God.
Speaker 1: But nothing like that quote-unquote gets us in.
Speaker 1: And this is personal to me, because I'm your pastor, and as I'm your pastor and as I preach before you each week, I take seriously that task because it is my task and my duty to give you the truth, to give you the truth of God's word, because I believe I'll be held accountable for that and that one day, when I stand before the Lord and give an account for the things I've said from this pulpit, the things I've said to you personally, when I give an account, I don't think the Lord's going to look at me and say, taylor, how many names did you help get onto the membership of First Baptist Church of El Dorado?
Speaker 1: I believe he will look at me and say, taylor, how many names did you help get written in the Lamb's Book of Life?
Speaker 1: Did you give him the truth?
Speaker 1: Did you give him the gospel?
Speaker 1: Are we trusting in anything other than Christ for our salvation?
Speaker 1: Are we trusting in anything other than Christ, not just to save us but to keep us?
Speaker 1: What are we trusting in?
Speaker 1: Complacency, complacency.
Speaker 1: It falls short of the glory of God.
Speaker 1: The last point is simply this Everyone falls short of the glory of God.
Speaker 1: No one gets out of it this morning.
Speaker 1: Look with me at verse 6 through 11.
Speaker 1: He will render to each one according to his works.
Speaker 1: To those who, by patience and well-doing, seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life.
Speaker 1: But for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.
Speaker 1: There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek, for God shows no partiality.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about 6 through 11 for a minute.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about 6 through 11 for a minute, because here's what I'm wondering.
Speaker 1: I preached through five verses and it really sounds like the next six kind of ruined.
Speaker 1: The first five I preached through five verses about you can't trust in anything other than Christ to save you.
Speaker 1: And then verse 6, he will render to each one according to his works, and I didn't misread that.
Speaker 1: That's the word of God there.
Speaker 1: That is what Paul has said here in Romans.
Speaker 1: I think we've got to do a few things.
Speaker 1: Number one is this We've got to remember that Paul is making a large case in the book of Romans.
Speaker 1: You and I get to come in each week and we take a passage.
Speaker 1: Praise God, we do Each week, we take a passage and we walk through it.
Speaker 1: Remember when this was read?
Speaker 1: It was read in its entirety.
Speaker 1: It is one long letter, one long case.
Speaker 1: So Paul is making a case and this is a piece of it.
Speaker 1: And out of context, yeah, we might be able to say, is there works involved?
Speaker 1: But when you read the book of Romans, when you read any letter of Paul, when you read the New Testament, when you read the Bible, it is clear we are saved by grace, through faith.
Speaker 1: And yet we see in verse 6 that he'll render each one according to his works, and that's a true statement.
Speaker 1: We see in Matthew 25, jesus talks about the judgment that is to come, where the good will receive good and the bad will receive bad.
Speaker 1: Revelation, chapter 20, at the last things in the last day, there is that great judgment that is discussed, where the good will enter into eternal rest and the bad will enter into their eternal punishment.
Speaker 1: So there is very much a judgment of God based on works.
Speaker 1: So now, what do we do with that?
Speaker 1: And is this sermon ruined?
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 1: No, nothing's ruined because of this A few ways we think about it.
Speaker 1: One because of this, a few ways we think about it, one who's able to do good works?
Speaker 1: Who's able to do good works?
Speaker 1: It's those who know Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: Now, I don't mean non-Christians can't do good things.
Speaker 1: We look across our city, across the news and the world all the time and there's non-Christians that do amazing good, humanitarian things, give towards amazing causes, build up communities, build homes for others.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying good things can't happen by non-Christians, but I'm talking about good works, true godly good works Ephesians 2.10 type good works that God has prepared for those who love him.
Speaker 1: Who can do those kind of works?
Speaker 1: Those who are in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: But we can also think about it like this If we are to stand before the Lord and we'll stand according to works originally first there's a bit of bad news in that, because I look at my own works.
Speaker 1: Scripture even tells me that my works before the Lord are like filthy rags before him, if we're judged by our works.
Speaker 1: I'm a little nervous this morning.
Speaker 1: You may be a little nervous too, I think, if we could write out this morning kind of the story of our lives, of our good works, the things we've done.
Speaker 1: On a piece of paper, the story of your life and my life, might end up looking like a paper you turned in in college, or any of us turned in, where we just have a lot of X's and things crossed out, even the balcony.
Speaker 1: You can probably see the result of the story of your life and my life and you thought, oh Taylor, that's just of course, you did a few things when you were young.
Speaker 1: I just I fall short.
Speaker 1: I mean every page.
Speaker 1: I've sinned and fall short of the glory of God and the law.
Speaker 1: The pen of the law has rightfully condemned me in this moment.
Speaker 1: Nothing wrong with the law.
Speaker 1: The law is a beautiful thing.
Speaker 1: The problem is me that I've sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
Speaker 1: And so if I'm supposed to stand before a holy God and turn in the works of my life, I'm just nervous about what is going to be turned in.
Speaker 1: I'm nervous about the fact that there's no way I measure up.
Speaker 1: I'm nervous about the fact that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and guess what?
Speaker 1: I'm part of that all.
Speaker 1: So what in the world do I do?
Speaker 1: What will become of me.
Speaker 1: I turn to Romans 3, 21 through 24.
Speaker 1: But now the righteousness of God has been manifested, apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it.
Speaker 1: The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe for there is no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: The good news of the gospel is this that someone has come in my place and that I've fallen terribly short of the glory of God.
Speaker 1: And though my sin seems inescapable, my hopelessness seems like the final word.
Speaker 1: Someone has come and stood in my place, that Christ Jesus has taken my sin and your sin upon himself.
Speaker 1: Every bad work we've done, what we've done, what we've left undone, the complete righteous one, jesus Christ the righteous, has taken our sin upon himself.
Speaker 1: And now here's the unbelievable news I know we're Baptist and not super charismatic, but you might just get a little happy in a minute, because this is the good news of the gospel that this is all.
Speaker 1: I've got the filthy rags of my life that I have to turn in.
Speaker 1: And if I stand before the Father with my own works.
Speaker 1: There's nothing to it, but someone has stood in my place, and so, as I come before the throne room of a holy God, the works of my life are wrapped up now in the works of Jesus Christ the righteous.
Speaker 1: And so I have a new something to turn in before a loving Father who delights to see the works of his son, jesus Christ, and the righteousness of his son displayed.
Speaker 1: What in my life and I no longer have to come before the Lord on the basis of my own work, but truly wrapped up in the righteousness of Christ.
Speaker 1: There's my merit.
Speaker 1: Let me just ask you this morning is my merit?
Speaker 1: Let me just ask you this morning If you are going to stand before a holy God that does love you deeply and delights for you if you'd be able to come into the kingdom if you were to stand before a holy God.
Speaker 1: I want to ask you whose works do you want to turn in?
Speaker 1: Do you want to turn in yours?
Speaker 1: You think you got a shot?
Speaker 1: Some of you, I know you, you're good, but you think you got a shot.
Speaker 1: Well, let me ask you this Do you want to turn in the work of Jesus Christ the righteous, who has lived the perfect life, died the death you deserve, risen from the grave, defeating sin and death, and now reigns at the throne of God.
Speaker 1: Do you want to turn in his work?
Speaker 1: He became sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Speaker 1: That's exactly what the gospel offers the works of Christ on your behalf.
Speaker 1: Is there anything you're trusting in to save you?
Speaker 1: That's not Christ, jesus, anything at all.
Speaker 1: Your own works, your own righteousness, your own goodness.
Speaker 1: Is there anything you're trusting in to save you outside of Christ and even for the believers in the room?
Speaker 1: Is there anything you're trusting in to keep you?
Speaker 1: Is there anything you're trusting in that can earn you more of God's love or God's favor?
Speaker 1: Is there anything that you say if I can just do this, then I'll look the part.
Speaker 1: Then won't I be impressive?
Speaker 1: Is there anything at all?
Speaker 1: If there is, let me tell you what Paul wants to do.
Speaker 1: In Romans, chapter two, there's a picture I want to put on the screen, if you can see it.
Speaker 1: I was here a few weeks ago and they were fixing a spot up there and painting over it and they brought in this scaffolding.
Speaker 1: And even that picture doesn't do justice to just how terrifying that was and how tall that was and how I was praying that the painters were insured and it was a terrifying scene and they didn't care one bit.
Speaker 1: This was normal for them.
Speaker 1: They were climbing it like it was a terrifying scene and they didn't care one bit.
Speaker 1: This was normal for them.
Speaker 1: They were climbing it like it was nothing and they didn't seem scared at all.
Speaker 1: I was terrified, I didn't even get up there.
Speaker 1: But I look at it and I think this is a picture of our own self-righteousness, because what we want to do is we just want to build that foundation higher and higher.
Speaker 1: If I can just get the right pegs and the right bars in place and attach them together and just get the next rung of the ladder up through my own work, through my own goodness, by being enough, I can just rise to a higher level.
Speaker 1: And here's what I desire in my self-righteousness that if I can just get the scaffolding of my righteousness on my own effort high enough, then I can reach God.
Speaker 1: I can get there.
Speaker 1: If I just get it high enough, I can build it to where I can be accepted by God.
Speaker 1: Here's what Romans, chapter 2, wants to do.
Speaker 1: Here's what Paul wants to do he wants to grab a sledgehammer, walk over to your scaffolding and tear it to the ground.
Speaker 1: To the ground, to the ground.
Speaker 1: That if there is any part of you that is trying to make your way to the Father by anything other than the finished work of Christ, he wants to tear it to the ground.
Speaker 1: So that, why?
Speaker 1: So that in the rubble of your efforts you would find the cross of Jesus Christ and you would find a way to the Father, not by your works, but by what Christ has done, and that you would live in the freedom that my own goodness doesn't have to get me there, my own goodness doesn't have to keep me there, but from start to finish, it is all Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: And any good now that is done, that I am in Christ Jesus, is only done in response to what he's done for me, not to earn anything, but because I love the Savior who saved me and I delight to obey him.
Speaker 1: That's the Christian life.
Speaker 1: And if any of us are still trying to climb that ladder, maybe today is a sledgehammer day for you, where we tear it to the ground and say Christ Jesus, you and you alone.
Speaker 1: Maybe that's you this morning and you want to come down and we can talk together, we can pray together, we can grab a spiritual sledgehammer together and we can talk about Jesus.
Speaker 1: Maybe you want to come hear about Jesus for the first time.
Speaker 1: Maybe you want to come join this church.
Speaker 1: Maybe you just want me to pray with you.
Speaker 1: It could be about this sermon, it could be about anything in the world.
Speaker 1: However, you need to respond this morning.
Speaker 1: I'll be down front in a few moments.
Speaker 1: You respond, even if it's just on your own praying, right where you're at in the pew.
Speaker 1: You respond in these moments.
Speaker 1: Let me pray for us and we'll worship together.
Speaker 1: Lord Jesus, we thank you for this day.
Speaker 1: We thank you for the cross, thank you that we don't have to earn our way.
Speaker 1: Who among us could?
Speaker 1: But instead, christ Jesus, you have made a way.
Speaker 1: Instead, christ Jesus, you have done what we could not do.
Speaker 1: And so, lord, we give you praise, not of our own might and effort, but only by the cross of Christ.
Speaker 1: We give you praise, lord.
Speaker 1: So, lord, if there's one in this room, if there's two in this room, if there's anyone in this room that need to know you, would today be the day.
Speaker 1: If there's someone that just needs to do business with you, just in their own heart, right where they're sitting.
Speaker 1: Would today be the day?
Speaker 1: If there's someone that needs prayer for anything in their life, would they come chat with me?
Speaker 1: Would today be the day we just do business with you, lord, thank you for the cross.
Speaker 1: We pray this in Christ's name, amen.
Speaker 1: Would you stand as we worship together?