WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.219 I think it's hard to analyze sometimes what we are thinking. 00:00:06.219 --> 00:00:11.960 Even what we're thinking ourselves spiritually, sometimes maybe by the way we live or by the 00:00:11.960 --> 00:00:16.240 way that we are proceeding in our lives. 00:00:16.240 --> 00:00:21.839 And I think even within the church it's difficult sometimes to assess exactly where we are with 00:00:21.839 --> 00:00:27.199 respect to Jesus Christ and what we think of Jesus Christ. 00:00:27.199 --> 00:00:31.759 Jesus Christ is not good for me. 00:00:31.759 --> 00:00:34.219 He's good for my mantlepiece. 00:00:34.219 --> 00:00:37.679 He's good just to have there now and again. 00:00:37.679 --> 00:00:45.799 I'm good and religious enough for Him and for me. 00:00:45.799 --> 00:00:54.320 I am religious enough, and I think I'm religious enough for God, for Jesus Christ. 00:00:54.320 --> 00:01:01.280 The redemption, the gospel of being born again is really for others. 00:01:01.280 --> 00:01:02.280 It's not for me. 00:01:02.280 --> 00:01:06.239 Well, maybe in word, but I don't really believe that. 00:01:06.239 --> 00:01:12.039 I'm not really in need of redemption at that level. 00:01:12.039 --> 00:01:18.079 And we may, even though we would be horrified to verbalize that, it may be that that is 00:01:18.079 --> 00:01:23.159 by our lives and by our understanding how we live. 00:01:23.159 --> 00:01:28.759 You may be here today and you're not a Christian by your own profession and testimony that you're 00:01:28.759 --> 00:01:34.039 maybe vaguely interested, or you're here because you've always come here or because 00:01:34.039 --> 00:01:39.120 you're forced to come here or because you think you ought to be here and earn some favor 00:01:39.120 --> 00:01:40.120 with God. 00:01:40.120 --> 00:01:43.359 There may be a multiplicity of reasons why we're here. 00:01:43.359 --> 00:01:48.799 But what Paul is doing here in the gospel in Romans chapter 2, as he's being doing up 00:01:48.799 --> 00:01:54.679 till now, he's very clearly making a case for the gospel of Jesus Christ. 00:01:54.679 --> 00:02:00.640 He's laying the ground for the gospel of Jesus Christ as he presents it to this church in 00:02:00.640 --> 00:02:02.280 Rome. 00:02:02.280 --> 00:02:04.359 And it's absolute truth for us, isn't it? 00:02:04.359 --> 00:02:08.919 So today in St. Columba's in Edinburgh, at the top of the royal mile, it's just as relevant, 00:02:08.919 --> 00:02:14.159 it's just as significant for us, because it's absolute truth that affects all of us in our 00:02:14.159 --> 00:02:15.159 lives. 00:02:15.159 --> 00:02:18.519 And what he's doing is he's making a powerful case. 00:02:18.520 --> 00:02:22.800 He's making the powerful case that every single individual needs redemption. 00:02:22.800 --> 00:02:23.800 Okay? 00:02:23.800 --> 00:02:25.920 That's a simple truth, isn't it? 00:02:25.920 --> 00:02:30.120 He's making the case that everyone needs redemption, because the church in Rome that 00:02:30.120 --> 00:02:35.080 he's writing to was kind of divided, as we've seen. 00:02:35.080 --> 00:02:39.760 So there was non-Jewish people there who'd come to faith in Jesus Christ from pretty 00:02:39.760 --> 00:02:41.800 radically wild backgrounds. 00:02:41.800 --> 00:02:45.400 And there was others who were Jews who had come from very religious backgrounds, and 00:02:45.400 --> 00:02:50.000 they were divided, and the Jewish people who had the privilege and the knowledge, they 00:02:50.000 --> 00:02:55.719 were looking down on the others, and they thought there was a kind of level of need, 00:02:55.719 --> 00:03:00.080 and they felt that they were much better than everyone else. 00:03:00.080 --> 00:03:06.599 And this division was possibly led by an individual, as Corrie mentioned last week, or maybe when 00:03:06.599 --> 00:03:14.680 the U in the singular is used, it's referring to a characteristic representative of the 00:03:14.680 --> 00:03:21.480 Jewish nation, or the Jewish people like someone might say, you as a Scotsman, but really representing 00:03:21.480 --> 00:03:26.520 all the Scotsman that there is, or Scots women, or Scots people, or United Kingdom people, 00:03:26.520 --> 00:03:31.840 or European citizens, whatever it might be, a representative of all of them. 00:03:31.840 --> 00:03:38.319 Either way, Paul is expressing that the Jewish people, and possibly the individual himself, 00:03:38.319 --> 00:03:45.359 is guilty before God as focusing on the personal responsibility. 00:03:45.359 --> 00:03:48.120 They were saying, we are the people. 00:03:48.120 --> 00:03:49.120 That's what we say, isn't it? 00:03:49.120 --> 00:03:52.280 That's what Scots people say, we are the people. 00:03:52.280 --> 00:03:53.280 That's what they were saying. 00:03:53.280 --> 00:03:57.359 That's what they were saying, they were the people, that they were the most, especially 00:03:57.359 --> 00:03:59.519 they were the people of God, you know? 00:03:59.519 --> 00:04:05.280 And if any people could ever claim to be in God's good books, surely, it was the Jews, 00:04:05.280 --> 00:04:09.840 it not as we read through the Old Testament, surely they deserve to be treated as special 00:04:09.840 --> 00:04:13.199 because of who they were. 00:04:13.199 --> 00:04:17.720 They were God's chosen people, so they could stand in judgment on those who weren't God's 00:04:17.720 --> 00:04:18.720 chosen people. 00:04:18.720 --> 00:04:23.439 They didn't need Christ like other people, like the Gentiles, or like the non-Jews. 00:04:23.439 --> 00:04:26.759 They were loud and proud. 00:04:26.759 --> 00:04:33.600 And it's interesting, I think it's interesting, to consider the ongoing and fascinating and 00:04:33.600 --> 00:04:42.400 deep-seated reality in our society, as we've seen even in the news this week, of anti-Semitism. 00:04:42.400 --> 00:04:51.879 A separate people by design, or by choice, by rejection, or by perception. 00:04:51.879 --> 00:04:59.439 We still find a uniqueness within their lives and even within the way they are treated and 00:04:59.439 --> 00:05:01.760 the way sometimes they treat others. 00:05:01.759 --> 00:05:06.719 There are two problems here, particularly that's highlighted in this passage with regard to 00:05:06.719 --> 00:05:09.519 the Jewish people in the church in Rome. 00:05:09.519 --> 00:05:12.240 Now, don't switch off because you're not a Jew. 00:05:12.240 --> 00:05:16.800 Don't switch off because you think it's an old-fashioned kind of problem, because you'll 00:05:16.800 --> 00:05:25.039 find that the characteristic personality or characteristic traits are applicable to us 00:05:25.039 --> 00:05:29.439 all, particularly as church people, because they were church people. 00:05:29.439 --> 00:05:34.240 The first one was that they bragged, they boasted about their relationship with God 00:05:34.240 --> 00:05:35.240 and the law. 00:05:35.240 --> 00:05:39.920 In verse 17 it says, You, you call yourself a Jew, you're lying, and boast in God. 00:05:39.920 --> 00:05:45.600 And then in verse 23 it says the same thing, you who boast in the law, you dishonor God. 00:05:45.600 --> 00:05:48.120 So they were boasting. 00:05:48.120 --> 00:05:50.079 They had a bad attitude to who they were. 00:05:50.079 --> 00:05:56.159 They were boasting in their ethnic heritage in the fact that they knew all about God, 00:05:56.160 --> 00:06:01.520 that God had revealed His law to them especially, to no one else, to them especially. 00:06:01.520 --> 00:06:05.240 They were educated in the things of God and they were there to teach other people about 00:06:05.240 --> 00:06:06.240 God. 00:06:06.240 --> 00:06:09.960 They were called to be a light to the nations, a separate people. 00:06:09.960 --> 00:06:14.480 And so they boasted about that and they boasted in God. 00:06:14.480 --> 00:06:15.480 That was the first problem. 00:06:15.480 --> 00:06:21.520 The second problem was they trusted in the outward rituals of their religion. 00:06:21.520 --> 00:06:24.040 They trusted in the outward rituals of religion. 00:06:24.040 --> 00:06:27.640 In verse 25 forward is that kind of difficult passage about circumcision. 00:06:27.640 --> 00:06:35.560 That Old Testament covenantal sign that they were given to set them apart as God's people. 00:06:35.560 --> 00:06:42.520 And they were relying on that privilege that they had of being part of the covenant community. 00:06:42.520 --> 00:06:48.520 They were content just with the outward badge of belonging to the Jewish nation that was 00:06:48.520 --> 00:06:50.879 shown in the sign of circumcision. 00:06:50.879 --> 00:06:56.879 They didn't really think about what it signified, what it meant in their hearts. 00:06:56.879 --> 00:07:01.879 And how it was always supposed to be a heart religion of love and of grace. 00:07:01.879 --> 00:07:03.519 They lost sight of that. 00:07:03.519 --> 00:07:08.279 So they were relying on their rituals and they were also bragging about their relationship 00:07:08.279 --> 00:07:10.519 with God. 00:07:10.519 --> 00:07:13.959 And there was two outcomes to this. 00:07:13.959 --> 00:07:17.759 Two outcomes to their bragging and relying on the outward things. 00:07:17.759 --> 00:07:22.599 The first was that they dishonored God because they didn't teach themselves. 00:07:22.599 --> 00:07:27.639 Verse 21 says that they were people who dishonored God. 00:07:27.639 --> 00:07:32.120 When you teach about others, you don't teach yourself and so on. 00:07:32.120 --> 00:07:37.920 And you therefore, verse 23, you boast in the law and dishonor God by breaking the law. 00:07:37.920 --> 00:07:46.000 You don't teach what you, you don't teach to yourself what you proudly want to present 00:07:46.000 --> 00:07:47.000 to others. 00:07:47.000 --> 00:07:53.639 You're applying it in pride to them, but you're not thinking that you need your heart to be 00:07:53.639 --> 00:07:54.639 changed. 00:07:54.639 --> 00:07:59.439 So it's really, what Paul is highlighting is their abject hypocrisy. 00:07:59.439 --> 00:08:05.040 Now, listen, people in church, abject hypocrisy. 00:08:05.040 --> 00:08:06.879 It's to church people. 00:08:06.879 --> 00:08:11.319 It's not just people who are struggling with any kind of moral code. 00:08:11.319 --> 00:08:13.639 This is the most religious of the most religious. 00:08:13.639 --> 00:08:19.919 And he says, you're abject hypocrites because you're dishonoring me because you're not applying 00:08:19.919 --> 00:08:21.839 the truth to your own hearts. 00:08:21.839 --> 00:08:23.680 You talk about stealing. 00:08:23.680 --> 00:08:24.680 Are you stealing? 00:08:24.680 --> 00:08:25.680 You talk about adultery. 00:08:25.680 --> 00:08:28.039 Are you committing adultery? 00:08:28.039 --> 00:08:30.000 You talk about robbing temples. 00:08:30.000 --> 00:08:32.919 Strange thing to say, robbing temples, but apparently it was a big problem. 00:08:32.919 --> 00:08:36.159 It was there to bring in a law to stop it. 00:08:36.159 --> 00:08:41.879 The Jews were robbing pagan temples to steal the idols, to sell them for money in the name 00:08:41.879 --> 00:08:44.279 of God. 00:08:44.279 --> 00:08:50.399 And it was, they were just breaking God's law all over the place, even in His own name, 00:08:50.399 --> 00:08:51.399 selling them. 00:08:51.399 --> 00:08:56.799 They taught, not only did they not teach themselves, that they taught their own version of the law. 00:08:56.799 --> 00:09:01.600 That's why Jesus says all the time, and when He's teaching He says, you've heard it said, 00:09:01.600 --> 00:09:05.000 well, I tell you, He wasn't abandoning the Old Testament. 00:09:05.000 --> 00:09:09.840 He was putting right there wrong interpretation of the law. 00:09:09.840 --> 00:09:17.120 They were doing their own thing, and it didn't reflect well on them. 00:09:17.120 --> 00:09:24.399 Matthew, Jesus said, Matthew 23 verse 15. 00:09:24.399 --> 00:09:25.399 Coming up. 00:09:25.399 --> 00:09:30.240 Woe to you, scribes and phas, hypocrites. 00:09:30.240 --> 00:09:33.840 You travel across my, one of my favorite verses of the whole Bible, cross the land to see 00:09:33.840 --> 00:09:38.120 to make a single proselyte, and when He becomes able, make them twice as much as a child of 00:09:38.120 --> 00:09:39.120 hell. 00:09:39.120 --> 00:09:40.120 Make them twice as much as you do to yourself. 00:09:40.120 --> 00:09:42.759 That's gentle Jesus, making mild speaking. 00:09:42.759 --> 00:09:46.600 He says He makes you twice as much a son of hell as you are. 00:09:46.600 --> 00:09:54.759 He exposed the hypocrisy of the misrepresentation of the truth that they took, and they bore 00:09:54.759 --> 00:09:57.600 hellish children. 00:09:57.600 --> 00:10:03.639 Miserable, horrible, legalistic, vicious, unloving children. 00:10:03.639 --> 00:10:04.639 That's what He's saying. 00:10:04.639 --> 00:10:11.279 And in Matthew 15 verse 14, He says similarly to them, you let them alone, they're blind 00:10:11.279 --> 00:10:15.639 guides, and if they blind lead, the blind both will fall into a pit. 00:10:15.639 --> 00:10:20.120 They were supposed to be the ones who were bringing people, as we saw in these verses, 00:10:20.120 --> 00:10:24.720 to the light, who were supposed to teach in knowledge and truth, who were supposed to 00:10:24.720 --> 00:10:29.000 be instructors of the foolish, but they weren't. 00:10:29.000 --> 00:10:31.759 They completely lost sight of their calling. 00:10:31.759 --> 00:10:33.399 They were immature and childish. 00:10:33.399 --> 00:10:36.039 They weren't wise at all. 00:10:36.039 --> 00:10:40.079 Sons of hell. 00:10:40.079 --> 00:10:41.079 Strong words from Jesus. 00:10:41.079 --> 00:10:44.120 They dishonored God because they failed to teach themselves. 00:10:44.120 --> 00:10:51.799 The second thing, the outcome, the second outcome was they caused other people to blaspheme. 00:10:51.799 --> 00:10:56.679 Verse 24 says that, you know, because you break the dishonored God and break the law, 00:10:56.679 --> 00:11:01.240 the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you. 00:11:01.240 --> 00:11:07.320 So they were morally weak, you see, and they were idolatrous in reality. 00:11:07.320 --> 00:11:08.519 And the world saw them. 00:11:08.519 --> 00:11:12.639 That quote is taken from Isaiah because the same thing happened in Isaiah when the people 00:11:12.639 --> 00:11:16.379 of God in the Old Testament turned away and worshiped idols. 00:11:16.379 --> 00:11:22.960 It caused the people around them to blaspheme and say, you've got a useless God. 00:11:22.960 --> 00:11:25.200 You can't even be bothered serving Him. 00:11:25.200 --> 00:11:27.159 You had a bunch of hypocrites. 00:11:27.159 --> 00:11:28.639 God's name was blasphemed. 00:11:28.639 --> 00:11:31.279 The world mocks. 00:11:31.279 --> 00:11:41.720 The world blasphemes our God because we don't live, and they didn't live according to the 00:11:41.720 --> 00:11:45.319 redemption that we have been gifted. 00:11:45.319 --> 00:11:51.960 And what was happening in effect, and what still often happens today, is that the irreligious, 00:11:51.960 --> 00:11:59.920 the non-religious, they do God's law outwardly better than the religious who are self-righteous 00:11:59.920 --> 00:12:01.040 and hypocrites. 00:12:01.040 --> 00:12:05.160 So you can go in any street and any pub or any workplace, and you can see people who 00:12:05.160 --> 00:12:11.920 are nicer and better and more loving than those who profess to be Christians or believers. 00:12:11.920 --> 00:12:21.480 They are doing by nature what is in their hearts, and Paul speaks about that here. 00:12:21.480 --> 00:12:29.159 And when the level, the field, when it's a level playing field, outwardly they are nicer, 00:12:29.159 --> 00:12:30.159 better people. 00:12:30.159 --> 00:12:33.800 That's hugely challenging, isn't it? 00:12:33.800 --> 00:12:35.920 They gave God a bad name. 00:12:35.920 --> 00:12:43.000 These people here in Rome, these Jewish people who profess to believe, they dishonored God. 00:12:43.000 --> 00:12:44.000 Okay. 00:12:44.000 --> 00:12:45.560 So what did it mean? 00:12:45.560 --> 00:12:49.000 What did it mean that they dishonored God in this way? 00:12:49.000 --> 00:12:52.840 And this particularly, can I ask you to listen to this? 00:12:52.840 --> 00:12:58.240 If you felt that up till now it's kind of a religious kind of disagreement from thousands 00:12:58.240 --> 00:13:01.559 of years ago that doesn't really relate to us, can I ask you to listen to this? 00:13:01.559 --> 00:13:07.480 Because it's at the very core of the gospel message with all its privileges and all that 00:13:07.480 --> 00:13:12.879 we know where we are today as we take God's living Word and apply it to our own hearts 00:13:12.879 --> 00:13:14.200 and to our own lives. 00:13:14.200 --> 00:13:21.080 The first thing we know and recognize is that their knowledge, their knowledge condemned 00:13:21.080 --> 00:13:22.080 them. 00:13:22.080 --> 00:13:23.080 Okay. 00:13:23.080 --> 00:13:24.080 They had great knowledge of the Bible. 00:13:24.080 --> 00:13:26.520 They had great knowledge about God. 00:13:26.520 --> 00:13:31.360 They had huge privileges with respect to the law. 00:13:31.360 --> 00:13:33.920 And remember what the law was? 00:13:33.920 --> 00:13:36.280 What was the law? 00:13:36.280 --> 00:13:39.120 It was the Ten Commandments, wasn't it? 00:13:39.120 --> 00:13:41.759 What's the Ten Commandments? 00:13:41.759 --> 00:13:46.399 Love God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. 00:13:46.399 --> 00:13:48.080 It's laws of love, okay? 00:13:48.080 --> 00:13:49.080 They're relational. 00:13:49.080 --> 00:13:51.319 They're relational laws, laws of love. 00:13:51.319 --> 00:13:55.759 That's what they had, and they'd fail miserably because they misunderstood the purpose of 00:13:55.759 --> 00:13:57.279 the law. 00:13:57.279 --> 00:14:04.519 The law that they were given by God was to point them to God and to point them to their 00:14:04.519 --> 00:14:09.639 need of God because they couldn't fulfill the law. 00:14:09.639 --> 00:14:13.480 It was to point them to the places where they didn't love Him and where they didn't love 00:14:13.480 --> 00:14:14.679 their neighbor. 00:14:14.679 --> 00:14:21.480 It wasn't there to make them to foster pride and self-righteous and tick off commandment 00:14:21.480 --> 00:14:22.480 one. 00:14:22.480 --> 00:14:23.480 Yes, commandment two. 00:14:23.480 --> 00:14:24.679 Yes, commandment three. 00:14:24.679 --> 00:14:25.679 I've done it. 00:14:25.679 --> 00:14:27.360 It wasn't meant for that. 00:14:27.360 --> 00:14:34.919 It was meant to expose their need and for them to go to God and ask Him to help them because 00:14:34.919 --> 00:14:36.960 they were lost sinners. 00:14:36.960 --> 00:14:44.720 It wasn't a moral code for them to expertly dissect and obey on their own terms, but not 00:14:44.720 --> 00:14:47.160 allow to seep into their own hearts. 00:14:47.160 --> 00:14:49.000 Are you hearing that? 00:14:49.000 --> 00:14:51.759 Am I hearing that? 00:14:51.759 --> 00:14:55.639 That the law is not something with which we beat other people who are less moral than 00:14:55.639 --> 00:14:59.120 us and tick the boxes. 00:14:59.120 --> 00:15:05.560 It is for us to go to and recognize, I don't love God and I don't love my neighbor perfectly. 00:15:05.559 --> 00:15:11.959 I need a redeemer and I need the Holy Spirit to enable me to live this law of love so their 00:15:11.959 --> 00:15:13.719 knowledge condemned them. 00:15:13.719 --> 00:15:17.359 And that can apply to all of us. 00:15:17.359 --> 00:15:20.759 But also their religion condemned them, didn't it? 00:15:20.759 --> 00:15:26.519 Because they were relying on their rituals, the outward behavior, the act of circumcision, 00:15:26.519 --> 00:15:32.479 the covenantal signs, but it exposed their abject hypocrisy. 00:15:32.479 --> 00:15:34.719 They lived religion on the outside. 00:15:34.720 --> 00:15:36.759 They were Pharisees and scribes. 00:15:36.759 --> 00:15:45.200 They were good people as it were on the outside, but they didn't allow the religion of their 00:15:45.200 --> 00:15:50.320 fathers and the religion that God had given them to expose their hearts. 00:15:50.320 --> 00:15:53.519 They allowed religion to hide their hearts. 00:15:53.519 --> 00:15:55.960 Mmm, that's interesting. 00:15:55.960 --> 00:16:00.080 We can use religion in exactly the same way, to hide our hearts. 00:16:00.080 --> 00:16:01.279 We can come to church. 00:16:01.279 --> 00:16:02.480 We can read the Bible. 00:16:02.480 --> 00:16:04.120 We can be morally upright. 00:16:04.120 --> 00:16:09.560 Then we can compare ourselves to others and we can hide, use the outward trappings of 00:16:09.560 --> 00:16:10.560 religion. 00:16:10.560 --> 00:16:13.120 I'm definitely going to go to church today. 00:16:13.120 --> 00:16:14.120 That's important. 00:16:14.120 --> 00:16:15.759 I want to be seen to be going to church. 00:16:15.759 --> 00:16:19.120 I want to be there and I'll fulfill that particular requirement. 00:16:19.120 --> 00:16:27.399 I'll tick the box and we'll allow the outward trappings of religion to hide our own sense 00:16:27.399 --> 00:16:35.799 of need and our own sense of abject spiritual poverty before the living God, trying to earn 00:16:35.799 --> 00:16:40.799 His favor, which we know is insulting to God, don't we? 00:16:40.799 --> 00:16:45.120 Because He sees our hearts and He's provided the answer for us. 00:16:45.120 --> 00:16:47.360 That's what the law was intended to do. 00:16:47.360 --> 00:16:48.840 It was to bring us to Christ. 00:16:48.840 --> 00:16:54.759 It was our school teacher to bring us to Jesus Christ, to help us to see our need of Christ. 00:16:54.759 --> 00:17:01.319 So their knowledge condemned them, their religion condemned them, but much, much more importantly, 00:17:01.319 --> 00:17:07.519 as we begin to draw it together, they condemned Christ. 00:17:07.519 --> 00:17:12.799 So their knowledge condemned them and their religion condemned them, but then they used 00:17:12.799 --> 00:17:16.079 that to go on and condemn Jesus Christ. 00:17:16.079 --> 00:17:21.359 And that is what Paul is exposing. 00:17:21.359 --> 00:17:26.199 He's bringing them to see that everyone is on a level playing field and all need the 00:17:26.199 --> 00:17:27.319 Redeemer. 00:17:27.319 --> 00:17:28.559 They condemned Christ. 00:17:28.559 --> 00:17:34.240 And verse 20 speaks about the instructor of the foolish, teacher of the children, having 00:17:34.240 --> 00:17:37.879 in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth. 00:17:37.879 --> 00:17:46.759 Who's the embodiment of the law of knowledge and truth as Jesus Christ? 00:17:46.759 --> 00:17:47.759 Okay? 00:17:47.759 --> 00:17:50.399 They missed the whole point of Christ. 00:17:50.400 --> 00:17:52.200 They didn't get Christ. 00:17:52.200 --> 00:17:55.200 This is post resurrection and ascension, remember that. 00:17:55.200 --> 00:17:56.480 But they didn't get Christ. 00:17:56.480 --> 00:18:02.100 They were still hanging on to their Old Testament religion and knowledge. 00:18:02.100 --> 00:18:03.920 But they didn't get Christ. 00:18:03.920 --> 00:18:10.360 They didn't understand that He lived the law, that they professed to love the law of love, 00:18:10.360 --> 00:18:12.400 the law of God's love. 00:18:12.400 --> 00:18:21.000 He's the only human being, the only person, divine human being who loved God and loved 00:18:21.000 --> 00:18:24.600 others perfectly. 00:18:24.600 --> 00:18:31.519 So that He said in Matthew 5 verse 17, don't think I've come to abolish the law or the 00:18:31.519 --> 00:18:32.519 prophets. 00:18:32.519 --> 00:18:35.600 I've not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 00:18:35.599 --> 00:18:43.279 So all of the Old Testament law of love that we have, that the Jews failed to see, Jesus 00:18:43.279 --> 00:18:49.599 was coming to fulfill that law, to live that law, to live the perfect life that they couldn't 00:18:49.599 --> 00:18:52.879 live. 00:18:52.879 --> 00:19:00.480 And then to die, the death that we deserve, you see, and we receive His righteousness. 00:19:00.480 --> 00:19:03.599 And the law was there to lead them to Jesus. 00:19:03.599 --> 00:19:06.039 Isn't that the tragedy? 00:19:06.039 --> 00:19:08.599 It was there to lead them to Jesus. 00:19:08.599 --> 00:19:12.599 And what did they do? 00:19:12.599 --> 00:19:14.759 They crucified Him. 00:19:14.759 --> 00:19:20.039 It was there to lead them to Jesus and they crucified Him. 00:19:20.039 --> 00:19:25.719 He was what they always failed to be under God. 00:19:25.719 --> 00:19:28.039 He was the perfect Israel. 00:19:28.039 --> 00:19:31.079 He was the representation of God among men. 00:19:31.079 --> 00:19:34.879 He was what they prided themselves in being. 00:19:34.879 --> 00:19:39.039 He was the fulfillment of what they were supposed to be as ambassadors. 00:19:39.039 --> 00:19:48.559 He succeeded where they failed miserably so that we can take these verses, or these characteristics 00:19:48.559 --> 00:19:52.799 in verse 20 and apply them most powerfully to Jesus Christ. 00:19:52.799 --> 00:19:55.279 He was the guide for the blind. 00:19:55.279 --> 00:19:59.399 He was the light for those in darkness. 00:19:59.400 --> 00:20:01.440 They were supposed to be a light to the Gentiles. 00:20:01.440 --> 00:20:05.960 Isaiah 42.6 says that, but they failed. 00:20:05.960 --> 00:20:10.400 They were darker and darker than anything they pointed. 00:20:10.400 --> 00:20:15.240 They made people condemn God rather than bring people to the light of God. 00:20:15.240 --> 00:20:19.519 So Jesus in John 8.12 says, I am the light of the world. 00:20:19.519 --> 00:20:20.960 I am the light of the world. 00:20:20.960 --> 00:20:25.400 He's the instructor of the foolish. 00:20:25.400 --> 00:20:28.160 He is the teacher of infants, of the immature. 00:20:28.160 --> 00:20:29.480 He spoke to the non-Jews. 00:20:29.480 --> 00:20:32.800 He spoke to the chaos and to the children who would sit in his knee. 00:20:32.800 --> 00:20:34.800 He spoke to the uneducated. 00:20:34.800 --> 00:20:40.600 These were the ones he did all the things that Israel had failed to do because they forgot 00:20:40.600 --> 00:20:43.240 their calling. 00:20:43.240 --> 00:20:44.800 What did they do? 00:20:44.800 --> 00:20:47.000 They crucified him. 00:20:47.000 --> 00:20:55.120 And it's interesting that that is the act that categorically exposes their condemnation 00:20:55.119 --> 00:20:59.719 and their guilt and ours. 00:20:59.719 --> 00:21:04.639 The law boasters murder the law giver. 00:21:04.639 --> 00:21:08.279 Oh, the irony, isn't it? 00:21:08.279 --> 00:21:14.599 Ironic that the law giver is nailed to a cross by the law boasters. 00:21:14.599 --> 00:21:17.639 I'm going to use two big words there and then I'm going to make simple words. 00:21:17.639 --> 00:21:23.719 They exacerbated their guilt exponentially, just showing off. 00:21:23.720 --> 00:21:31.680 I'm not actually, but they are great words, but it just made their guilt far greater in 00:21:31.680 --> 00:21:38.240 a huge, to a huge degree. 00:21:38.240 --> 00:21:44.039 And in the very act of that rejection by them, when they rejected the law keeper, he's working 00:21:44.039 --> 00:21:46.440 out their redemption. 00:21:46.440 --> 00:21:57.720 Given that an amazing paradox that the law keeper himself becomes the law breaker to change 00:21:57.720 --> 00:21:58.720 everything. 00:21:58.720 --> 00:21:59.720 Do you see that? 00:21:59.720 --> 00:22:08.000 2 Corinthians 5, 21, for our sake, God made him to be sin who knew no sin, sin, so that 00:22:08.000 --> 00:22:11.799 in him we might become the righteousness of God. 00:22:11.799 --> 00:22:28.000 To the law keeper, Jesus becomes the law breaker on our behalf and takes the just price for 00:22:28.000 --> 00:22:37.039 our fellow nursing and walks into death and drinks the cup of God's wrath to the very, 00:22:37.039 --> 00:22:40.440 very end. 00:22:40.440 --> 00:22:47.000 They condemned Christ, they missed the whole point. 00:22:47.000 --> 00:22:55.960 And I close with a simple, two simple and profound applications, okay? 00:22:55.960 --> 00:22:57.039 Two very simple ones. 00:22:57.039 --> 00:23:01.720 One is we apply it, our hearts are the problem. 00:23:01.720 --> 00:23:03.920 Let's forget about the Jews now. 00:23:03.920 --> 00:23:07.320 Our hearts are the problem. 00:23:07.319 --> 00:23:13.919 It must, we must be warned by Scripture that at no point is our Christian faith simply 00:23:13.919 --> 00:23:17.000 the outworking of a moral code. 00:23:17.000 --> 00:23:22.439 We are not just trying to live a certain way in order to please God. 00:23:22.439 --> 00:23:24.439 We will never do that. 00:23:24.439 --> 00:23:28.200 We will become proud and self-reliant. 00:23:28.200 --> 00:23:34.240 You can never rely, and it's important never to rely simply on your Bible knowledge, however 00:23:34.240 --> 00:23:41.000 good or great that might be, or your Christian privileges and upbringing, or your family's 00:23:41.000 --> 00:23:48.480 faith, or the denomination you belong to, or your religious observances. 00:23:48.480 --> 00:23:54.120 You can't rely on the, don't go around relying on these things as if they will stand you 00:23:54.120 --> 00:24:00.640 in good stead when you stand before Jesus Christ on that day of judgment. 00:24:00.640 --> 00:24:08.680 We need to recognize that the heart of the matter is the matter of the heart. 00:24:08.680 --> 00:24:17.720 It is as you come and I come and stripped back to absolute individuality before God, 00:24:17.720 --> 00:24:20.800 it is our heart that matters this morning. 00:24:20.800 --> 00:24:27.720 It is knowing that we need a new heart, and this hard, stony, self-righteous, proud, judgmental, 00:24:27.720 --> 00:24:36.799 arrogant, lustful, heart of ours needs changed, and only God can do it in Jesus Christ through 00:24:36.799 --> 00:24:39.559 the Spirit because He's paid the price. 00:24:39.559 --> 00:24:42.839 It's a great freeing, redeeming message. 00:24:42.839 --> 00:24:48.000 Apostasy always moves the focus from the inward to the outward. 00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:51.160 Please remember that, because we're all tempted to do it. 00:24:51.160 --> 00:24:54.960 I'm as tempted as anyone else, probably more so. 00:24:54.960 --> 00:25:00.519 Everybody always moves the focus from the inward to the outward, from humble obedience 00:25:00.519 --> 00:25:02.600 to empty formality. 00:25:02.600 --> 00:25:08.279 If you're relying on empty formality, know that you're hurtling down a one-way street 00:25:08.279 --> 00:25:11.799 with a devil on the back towards apostasy. 00:25:11.799 --> 00:25:20.079 That's where you're going because it is absolutely vital that we recognize that our hearts are 00:25:20.079 --> 00:25:23.799 the problem but that Jesus Christ is the answer. 00:25:23.799 --> 00:25:33.200 The second application I make is kind of related to that, is that Christ is everything. 00:25:33.200 --> 00:25:39.200 Paul is getting that across in these early chapters as he sets out the gospel, and as 00:25:39.200 --> 00:25:42.200 he sets out our need of the gospel that Christ is everything. 00:25:42.200 --> 00:25:49.879 So as you come today, with all your pain and your confusion, maybe with your lack of identity 00:25:49.880 --> 00:25:55.040 and your brokenness, bruised and mattered by the evil you see around you, or sometimes 00:25:55.040 --> 00:26:00.720 that you sense within your own heart, by division and by the threat and the horrible reality 00:26:00.720 --> 00:26:08.720 of death, it all stems from God's broken laws of love. 00:26:08.720 --> 00:26:10.520 That's what it stems from. 00:26:10.520 --> 00:26:14.360 It stems from humanity turning away from His laws of love. 00:26:14.360 --> 00:26:16.760 Love me first. 00:26:16.760 --> 00:26:19.560 Love one another. 00:26:19.559 --> 00:26:22.919 And Jesus Christ is the only answer to that. 00:26:22.919 --> 00:26:27.519 If we think there's another answer, we're on the road towards apostasy. 00:26:27.519 --> 00:26:30.839 Jesus Christ is the only answer we have today. 00:26:30.839 --> 00:26:35.159 So you may be in your heart of heart sitting thinking, I'm uncomfortable with heart religion. 00:26:35.159 --> 00:26:39.159 I don't like this talk of being humble before God. 00:26:39.159 --> 00:26:41.440 I don't like the vulnerability of it. 00:26:41.440 --> 00:26:46.480 I don't like the change that it expresses and above all, I don't like the loss of control 00:26:46.480 --> 00:26:49.000 that it assumes. 00:26:49.000 --> 00:26:52.640 I don't need Christ. 00:26:52.640 --> 00:26:59.599 I'll get by with my morality by being accepted here by my religious friends, by outward observance, 00:26:59.599 --> 00:27:07.039 by doing my best in so thinking I will crucify Him. 00:27:07.039 --> 00:27:10.559 That's what you're saying. 00:27:10.559 --> 00:27:11.880 I will crucify Him. 00:27:11.880 --> 00:27:18.000 You may have been coming to this church for 70 years and never let Christ Jesus into your 00:27:18.000 --> 00:27:19.400 heart. 00:27:19.400 --> 00:27:26.920 And you're saying today, I will, I have, I am crucifying Him. 00:27:26.920 --> 00:27:29.160 I don't need a redeemer. 00:27:29.160 --> 00:27:30.559 I don't need a Savior. 00:27:30.559 --> 00:27:33.880 Can I just say He is everything. 00:27:33.880 --> 00:27:36.359 Christ is everything. 00:27:36.359 --> 00:27:41.559 And we never graduate from these two great laws. 00:27:41.559 --> 00:27:43.480 Love one another. 00:27:43.480 --> 00:27:45.440 Love your neighbor. 00:27:45.440 --> 00:27:48.600 Love God. 00:27:48.600 --> 00:27:50.720 Let's bow our heads and pray briefly. 00:27:50.720 --> 00:27:58.799 Father God, help us to love you because we can't on our own, but we know that by grace 00:27:58.799 --> 00:28:06.880 and by accepting what Jesus has done and accepting that we are forgiven and covered in your righteousness, 00:28:06.880 --> 00:28:13.240 not our own, but yours, help us in gratitude to live for you. 00:28:13.240 --> 00:28:19.480 And grant us eyes to see, may we not be like the religious Jewish people in the time of 00:28:19.480 --> 00:28:28.759 the church in Rome who rested on their knowledge or who rested on their ritual and help us 00:28:28.759 --> 00:28:33.279 to humbly come and recognize that Christ is everything. 00:28:33.279 --> 00:28:36.839 And may that be our great hope for Jesus' sake. 00:28:36.839 --> 00:28:43.839 Amen.