"The Righteousness of God Through Faith in Jesus Christ" (Rom. 3:21-26)

Transcript:

Reading of God's Word. Our sermon text tonight is from Romans, chapter 3, verses 21 through 26. If you have a pew Bible, this is on page 11 18, 11, 18. Hear now the word of the Lord from Romans, chapter 3, verses 21 through 26. But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it.

The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believed 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, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood and to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. This is the word of the Lord. Please be seated.

And as you're taking your seats, let's join our hearts together tonight in prayer. Gracious heavenly Father, we need the justification that you provide to us through faith in Jesus. We had no hope without it. We could strive and stress and climb and try to work our way to salvation our entire lives and we would never come close. Close.

It is only if you bring salvation near to us that the preaching of the gospel of Jesus as we confess in our mouths that Jesus Christ is Lord and believe in our hearts that God raised him up from the dead, only then are we saved. And so we pray, Father, tonight, that you would work in us that faith that you would draw to faith again tonight to trust in him. And Father, potentially for the first time, if there is anyone here who does not yet know Jesus, we pray this all in Christ's name. Amen.

Well, this morning we considered together what it is that makes us clean from the unholy pollution of sin. And the answer was that we need Christ through his death and in his righteousness. That's given to us by the Holy Spirit. And we receive this through faith in the repentance that leads to life. Tonight we consider a related question, but it is a different question.

If cleanness deals with questions of holiness, tonight we are considering questions of righteousness. This is not so much a question of how we can be cleansed from our sin, but how we can qualify to enter into God's kingdom. And as we think about the standards for entering into God's kingdom, kingdom, we have to Be very clear about the fact that these are the highest imaginable standards, even higher than. These are infinitely higher standards, high as heaven itself. As Jesus declares to us, we must be perfect, as our Father in heaven is perfect.

Now, that standard is higher than we can possibly imagine because we so often compare ourselves to other people. Maybe you like. My family has been watching some of the Olympics over the last week or so. And as you watch these incredible athletes, literally the best athletes from around the world doing these things that they are doing, they make it look effortless. They make it look so easy.

You look at this and you say, yeah, I'm pretty sure I could do that. And that is an absolute lie. You could not come even close to what they do. And these are the best of the best. And if you imagine and try to think about where they got to be the best of the best in the world, you get tired even thinking of the training regimen.

They've been on up at four or three or five every day, eating meals that are absolutely regimented for the kind of nutrition that they need, that they're at the gym or on the ice day after day after day, that they have fallen down that mountain far more times than they have skied down that mountain, that they have done all of these things and training, training, training, getting feedback and trying to grow and grow and grow to just have one chance to compete for an Olympic medal. And even some of these people, as good as they are, when that chance comes, they do not live up to the performance they want. There was this poor figure skater from the United States. After all this training, he was so good at quad spin or something that he could do, but when it came time to do it, he fell down multiple times. And that has to be devastating.

But we are told in the Scriptures that there is something at stake that is of far more importance than Olympic medals. And we are also told in Scriptures that the qualifications we seek is not just something akin to being the best of the best in this life. Jesus tells us that we have to actually exceed Olympians in righteousness. In his day, the Scribes and the Pharisees were considered the best of the best. And Jesus said in Matthew 5:20 that unless your righteousness exceeds righteousness, Olympians like the Scribes and the Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

As easy as they make it look, you are required to do better. And if you don't, you will never enter. Now, those are terrifying qualifications. If they can't do it, if they can't measure Up. How on earth are any of us going to exceed that righteousness?

Well, the good news of the gospel that we are considering tonight is that we are justified by faith alone in Christ alone works. Do not enter into it. Qualifications that we must meet. Do not enter into it. We are justified by faith alone in Christ alone.

So two parts to our sermon tonight. First of all, we are justified by faith alone in verses 21 through 24. And then second, we are justified by faith in Christ alone. So let's look at the first part. We are justified by faith alone in verses 21 through 24.

Now, going back to Heidelberg Catechism number seven. We were taught there that we were all condemned not for the sins that we had done, although those add to our condemnation. Rather, we are condemned because of Adam's guilt, our first forefather in life, the one from whom all of us are descended, all of us are born in him. All of us are cursed. Therefore, because he sinned, because he fell short and his guilt was imputed or credited, was put on our account even before we were born.

We enter this life behind the eight ball in terms of guilt before God. Now this brings us to Heidelberg Catechism 20, where the question is, are all people then saved through Christ, just as all were lost through Adam? Is this sort of an automatic thing that comes to all people? All were lost in Adam, and now all are saved in Christ. And the first part of the answer should give us pause.

No, that's not the way this works. And we see why it doesn't work in verses 22 and 23. For there is no distinction. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. What started first in Adam, we have inherited.

And like this awful family trait, we have continued to walk in the footsteps of our Father Adam and evil, and have sinned in all the ways that we have. All have sinned and all fall short of the glory of God. Now, what are we to do about this again? How do we qualify if all of us have sinned and fall short of the glory of God? The natural tendency is to want to think that we can measure up, to look at whoever we might consider to be moral exemplars, righteousness exemplars.

And we look at them on top of Mount Righteousness. Maybe they're skiing down, about to perform in front of us, these righteousness Olympians and our own age. And we want to think that if I could just climb Mount Righteousness to get to them, that's how I'll do this. And so in our lives, we stay busy, we keep moving. We tell ourselves, I think I'm making progress.

When we mess up, we are so quick to excuse ourselves. When others mess up, we are so quick to judge. At least I'm not like them. But the scriptures warn us, they turn this down. The Scriptures say that we are not climbing ever higher.

We are not making progress. We are only exhausting ourselves as we are running full speed off an inclined treadmill. No matter how hard we run, no matter how difficult the setting we've set for ourselves on the steepness of our incline, we remain stuck. We're not actually making progress. We're stuck in unrighteousness.

But if we can't work our way out of salvation, what then are we to do? Well, this gets to the second part of Heidelberg Catechism 20. No, it is not automatic that all will be saved in Christ, just as all were condemned in Adam. But only those are saved who, through faith, are grafted into Christ and accept all his benefits. This is and should be a shot to our pride again.

We like to look at these great Olympians, these great ones, and think, I think I could actually do this. I remember very vividly when I was a child that we went to, was one of the few times, you know, there was no major league baseball right where I lived. But we traveled once. We went to Kansas City and went to a Royals game, and we were there, and I was watching these pitchers warm up in the major leagues and. And I was watch.

I was playing baseball that year and I. I said to my dad, I'm pretty sure I could throw that fast. And dad said, okay, son, they're throwing in the 90s. I could, I'm sure, probably barely break 40. But from a distance, it looked not that difficult. I could do that, and we can't.

We cannot do it by ourselves. The only way that we can qualify is if our qualification is handed to us, credited to us, given to us when we are grafted into Christ. The imagery here is that we are so connected to Christ, so woven into Christ, so united to Christ, that we are rewarded on the basis of his performance. This is what Romans 3:24 says, that we are justified even though all of us have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. All who are justified by, or those who believe are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

This word justified, is a word that means to be declared righteous, counted righteous. Even when we are not personally righteous people, we are counted righteous in Christ. Because our sins have been forgiven as those have been put on Christ. And he suffered and bled and died in our place. And as Christ's righteousness is imputed or credited to us, there's a great exchange of the Gospel, our sins on Christ, his righteousness on us.

He who knew no sin became sin for us, that in him we might become the righteousness of God. We have still not become righteous, but we are counted righteous in Him. It's as though we are given a gold medal because of Christ's times, because of Christ's performances. This justification then is not something that we earn. It is something that was earned by another, by Christ, by the redemption that is in Christ, not according to our merits, not according to our righteousness, the works that we have done.

But it is by grace. It is given as a gift, not as wages, not as something we earn, but given as a gift. How is this gift given? Well, again, not by works of the law, but by faith. And now we're going to sort of go back.

I started a little bit into the section. Let's go back to the first part of this section that we studied in verses 21 and look at the way that Paul contrasts different ways to try to attain righteousness. He says, but now, in other words, through Christ, now the righteousness of God has been manifested, has been shown off apart from the law. The righteousness of God is not given by those who keep the law really, really well. It's, it's manifested apart from all.

However, this isn't to break with the Old Testament. Indeed all the law and the prophets bear witness to it. The whole reason the law was given was to prove that none of us can keep the law. And we need a mediator. We need a Savior.

We need someone who can keep the law on our behalf. One who is a true and righteous man and one who is true God. The one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. And so we read in verse 22, this righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe, not all indiscriminately, but for all who believe. Heidelberg Catechism 21 reminds us true faith, this faith that is required to lay hold of Christ again is not just knowledge.

It's not just believing in the truthfulness of this knowledge in the Gospel. It is also a whole hearted trust which the Holy Spirit works in me by the Gospel that God has freely granted not only to others, but to me also, forgiveness of sins, eternal righteousness and salvation. Now I am guessing that probably you know from something in your life. The pain of failing to measure up in some aspect of your life, the stinging words of a disappointed and disapproving parent, the teacher who tried as hard as you could, the teacher who wrecked your gpa, the coach who never gave you the opportunities to play the boss, who promoted everyone before giving you what you thought was your due consideration. Now, our problem is not that God is biased or that God is arbitrary.

Our problem is actually the opposite. Our problem is that God is perfectly consistent in his righteous standards. Which means that when we fall short, and we do fall short, God does not have a path for us to earn our way back into his good graces. And so the question is, are you trying to run that treadmill up to the top of Mount Righteousness? Are you worried and weary?

Are you frustrated by your failures? Are you desperate for rest and relief? Well, though God does not provide a path for us, for us to blaze by our own works, I have such good news about what God has done. Praise God for the justification that he freely provides to all those who look in faith to His Son, Jesus Christ. So what then must we believe?

What must that faith be in? Well, this brings us to the second part, part of the sermon in verses 25 through 26, that we are justified by faith in Christ alone. Catechism question number 22 reminds us that Jesus himself commissioned his apostles to preach His Gospel. Now, we've been studying that in the Book of Acts. We've seen several sermons of the Gospel preached to very different kinds of people, from Jews and Jerusalem on a high feast day to Gentiles, both the Ethiopian Eunuch.

And recently we've seen Cornelius in Caesarea with his whole family and friends gathered to hear the message by which they might be saved.

Well, we have a summary of that Gospel in the Apostles Creed, which we recited twice this morning and this evening. But we also have a brief summary laid down in Scripture here in verse 20. And I want to look particularly at this again just to back up that those who look to Christ Jesus in faith are justified by his grace in verse 24 as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward. Now let's stop just there for just a moment. God put forward his own Son, Jesus Christ.

We should not miss that. The first, that the Apostles Creed is really stated as a summary of what each person, the Godhead, is doing in our salvation, that God the Father is almighty and creator of heaven and earth, and that God the Father sent His Son into the world and that Jesus Christ God's only begotten Son came into this world to accomplish our salvation for us in our place. And then that Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Trinity, who proceeds as we confess in the Nicene Creed from the Father and from the Son, is given to apply and take what Christ has done and to give it to sinners like you and me to build up his holy Catholic Church and to provide for the communion of saints, to apply Christ's blood for the propitiation, the forgiveness of our sins, and to seal us until the resurrection of the body that we might know life everlasting. What we see in the Apostles Creed is that our faith does not consist about what we can do for God, but rather about what God has done so graciously for us. So first God put forward Christ, but the second part we see this is God put forward Christ as a propitiation by his blood.

Propitiation is a word that we perhaps don't use a whole lot, but it's a good Bible word. We need it. It means an atoning sacrifice. It is not simply someone who carries away our sin. That word is expiation.

Theologically, to carry sin away, to take sin away, propitiation gets into the bloody, gory details of how that sin is taken away. As the Father offers His Son and sends forth His Son as a sacrifice, as the Son, our great High Priest lays down his own life as a bloody sacrifice who takes in our place our sin, a substitute for sinners, who bears the wrath that we deserved and who died in our place. And the word propitiation gets this idea that by his shed blood he appeased, he propitiated God so that by that propitiation he gained God's favor for us. And because Christ has been put forward as a propitiation, what this means is that we can rest from the endless efforts that we that we put forward trying to earn God's favor. God provides it.

He gives it to us through faith in Jesus Christ. It means that if your family has an argument on the way home tonight, Christ's blood is still there to atone for your sins. It means that you can reach out to talk to your pastor about sin, sins that maybe nobody else knows about, but that you cannot shake because there is real power in Christ's bloody propitiation. And all of this we read that God put forward Christ as a propitiation by his blood. All of this we read at the end of verse 25, is to be received by faith.

Again, this is not a message of what we can do for ourselves and but that we are called to trust in Christ that by that faith God gives to us. By this faith we receive what God has done for us through salvation in Jesus Christ. And this is hardly a passing comment, but in these last two verses we read that this is to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he is had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just or righteous. And the justifier, the one who counts as righteous, the one who has faith in Jesus.

Part of what this whole scheme shows us is that, you know, if we can't climb Mount Righteousness on our own, if we can't qualify as the best of the best, because as good as we might be, we are going to fall short of the infinitely high standards of being perfect as our Heavenly Father is perfect. There's a real question about God's righteousness. Okay, so God counts us as righteous. I know my life, you know your life. That would be a lie to count us as righteous unless our sins truly had been propitiated by the blood of Christ and unless Christ's perfect righteousness truly, truly had been imputed or credited to us because we had been united, joined, wed to Christ as our great bridegroom, where he is saving his church, the Bride.

Well, our application in all of this is that we are called to faith, trust in Christ alone for, for your salvation. This morning we talked about the concerns of cleanliness. Not physical cleanliness, but ceremonial cleanliness, ceremonial impurity, uncleanness. And really, what all of those ceremonial things in the Old Testament law pointed forward to was the uncleanness of the iniquity of our souls. The danger of the circumcision party was to believe that we could be justified, cleansed and counted righteous by our works.

Now, certainly the circumcision party did not exclude the importance of faith. But faith for them was not enough. You could not come directly to Jesus to be cleansed from your impurities by faith in Him. You had to go through the process, the Old Covenant, Jewish process of circumcision and food laws. And there's something about this that resonates with us, right?

We live in a world where the only way to gain favor is by doing something for someone. Children, as you're in school, your grades depend on the quality of the work that you turn in at school. I hate to say it, that will mark the rest of your life when it's no longer written assignments and math problems and papers. One Day, you'll get a job. And adults, you know that your job, your career, your work, your promotions, your compensation, all of these things will be based on something that an accountant can measure.

Your billable hours, your productivity, your achievements. And we go around in life judging people by the clothes they wear, the house they live in, the car they drive. We judge churches by the buildings, by the bodies in the pews, and by their budgets. We judge children for the actions of their parents, and we judge parents for the behavior of their children. And even within our own families, we get irritated when we do not believe that a spouse is doing his or her fair share or when children are more demanding than we think they should be.

And so again, there's something within the world's economy that we are so steeped in that makes sense. It's got to have something to do with performance, right? That's got to have something that I need to contribute as my part to this whole equation, doesn't it? And in that thinking, it makes total sense for us to think that God, maybe he must be the really big helper who helps me to qualify, who helps me to climb Mount Righteousness so that I can qualify at the end of the day to be some Olympian of righteousness.

But praise God, this is not what the Scriptures hold out to us. Praise God. God is honest enough to say that not one of us is righteous, that all have sinned and falls short of the glory of God. And praise God even more that there is an alternative way by which we might be counted righteous. The righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law.

We can't reach God's righteous standard, absolute perfection according to the law. Again, Matthew 5:48. You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. You can't measure up. You can't trust that you're going to be graded on some curve.

You're on your own and you stand condemned. But through Christ, by faith in Christ. God himself qualifies you by counting your faith as righteousness. Your faith is not a work that you do which is righteous in itself. Your faith is the instrument by which you lay hold of Christ and all the blessings that he offers you in the Gospel.

Because of Christ's propitiation, the burdens of your sin have been lifted off of your shoulders and they bore down on Christ at the cross. Because of Christ's propitiation, the thunder of God's law from Mount Sinai was silenced once forever when our Lord cried out, it is finished. The fires of hell have been extinguished by the blood and the water that poured from our Lord's side. Your debt has been paid. Your soul is set free.

Hallelujah. What a savior we have in Christ. And because of the gift of Christ's own righteousness, you can't fall short. You can't improve his righteousness. You can detract from Christ's righteousness.

You cannot be disqualified, laid off, or excluded from Christ's eternal inheritance and your portion in it. You cannot be dismissed, overlooked, forgotten, or forsaken in his kingdom. Do not pass me by, O gentle Savior. And he promises that he will not because Christ has already seated you in the heavenly places with him. And all these benefits he gives to you by grace, as a gift and by faith.

Therefore trust in Christ alone for your salvation. Let's pray.

Father, we need this reminder of the Gospel of Jesus. We are so prone to look to ourselves, to trust in ourselves.

We are so quick to excuse our own faults while propping ourselves up by looking down on the faults of others. We are so tempted to judge ourselves by how far we think we could make it up the mountain of righteousness. And yet all of us fall short. All of us have sinned and fall short of your glory. And I pray, Father, that we would flee from any attempt to qualify ourselves by our own works of righteousness, which you look upon as filthy rags.

And instead that we would look to Jesus Christ to receive as a gift the propitiation that is by his blood for our sins, and to receive his righteousness that he gives us by faith. I pray, Father, if there's any in this room who does not yet know Jesus, who is struggling and wavering in their faith in Christ for him alone, for his righteousness in the Gospel, I pray that your Holy Spirit would draw once again to Christ through faith all who need it. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.