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Today's scripture reading is from Paul's letter to the Romans, chapter 1, verses 16-18,
and chapter 3, verses 21-31, as printed in the liturgy.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation
to everyone who believes, first to the Jew, then to the Gentile.
For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith
from first to last, just as it is written, the righteous will live by faith.
The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the ungodlessness and wickedness
of people who suppress the truth by their wickedness.
But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the law
and the prophets testify.
This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.
There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the
glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came
by Christ Jesus.
God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement through the shedding of his blood to be received
by faith.
He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins
committed beforehand unpunished.
He did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the
one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.
Where then is boasting, it is excluded.
Because of what law?
The law that requires works?
No, because of the law that requires faith.
For we maintain that a person is justified by faith, apart from the works of the law.
Or is God the God of Jews only?
Is he not the God of Gentiles too?
Yes, of Gentiles too, since there is only one God who will justify the circumcised by faith
and the uncircumcised through that same faith.
Do we then nullify the law by this faith?
Not at all.
Rather, we uphold the law.
This is the word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.
Good morning, Christ Church.
It is summertime, and that means that it's time for summer reading.
And I wonder if we have any John Grisham fans here.
People have read John Grisham's books, seen his movies, or just people who generally like
courtroom dramas.
That's what we should be imagining right now is this courtroom drama.
And the human race, the whole human race is there in the dock before our maker and our judge.
And what is the case against the human race?
It's that we've been made with this exalted status.
We've been made to have a relationship with our creator God, and yet we've fallen from glory.
We've fallen very short of the glory for which we were made.
We've fallen from a very great height.
And the evidence has been stacked up against us to prove that we're all under the power of sin
and the penalty of death and the wrath of God.
And we're in this position of being condemned and under condemnation.
And the situation seems absolutely helpless and hopeless.
But if you've seen these John Grisham movies, read the books, you know in these courtroom dramas
that typically there's someone, just before the verdict is rendered, someone bursts through the doors
at the back of the courtroom.
And what are they?
They're sweaty.
They're out of breath.
They're disheveled.
They haven't slept.
It's usually some poorly paid intern, right, that's stayed up all night long, digging up
new facts about the case, putting together a new brief to overturn the verdict.
And that's what's happening right here in this text.
Today we come to this dramatic moment, these joyful words in verse 21, but now.
But now.
We're looking at the Apostle Paul and his magisterial epistle to the Romans.
And in Romans chapter 1, 2, and 3, he's painted for us this picture of how dark and bleak and
despairing and hopeless the human condition is apart from the grace of God.
You just heard it in Romans 1, 18.
The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of
people who suppress the truth in their wickedness.
And for three chapters, Paul has been making the case that we cannot provide a righteousness
that will justify ourselves before God.
We are convicted of sin and therefore we're helpless and we're hopeless before him.
And so when you hear this but now, it's a word of great relief.
But now, thank God that there's a way out, that God has provided a way out.
From the very first sentence of this letter, Paul has said that he's here to talk about
the gospel of God.
And he's told us in the thesis of this letter in Romans 1, 16, and 17 that the theme of this
gospel is the power of God for salvation.
It's a righteousness that comes not from us but from God himself that he gives and that
we receive by faith.
And now, Paul says, now that you've seen over these first three chapters the utter necessity
of being saved by God, that there's nothing that we could do that would be adequate and
sufficient to save us, Paul says, but now.
And now I'm ready to unpack for you the gospel, Paul says.
But now, and I want to emphasize the nowness of this but now.
We should hear that as just now.
Just now in this particular moment because Paul is preaching and he's writing a very short
time after the events of Jesus Christ.
The incarnation, the crucifixion, the resurrection, his exaltation to the right hand of God.
And Paul is saying that just now, just now this event has happened that's changed everything.
That's the watershed moment in human history.
This just now thing that's shifted from B.C. to A.D.
That's put the universe back on its axis.
That has just now happened.
Listen to what he says in verse 21.
But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been made known to which the law
and the prophets testify.
What has happened just now is not brand new.
It's actually quite old.
It was promised to Adam and Noah and Abraham and Moses and David.
And it's all captured for us in the law and the prophets.
But these promises have just now come to fulfillment in Jesus Christ.
And this has just now been made known to us.
What has been made known?
Paul is shifting the focus now from our human problem of sin to God's provision of salvation.
And he's shifting the focus now from human rebellion to God's righteousness.
That what has been made known is God's righteous way of righteasing the unrighteous.
God's just way of justifying the unjust.
That this is God's last minute break through the door at the back of the courtroom
to answer the sorry and solemn situation that we're in.
A situation of absolute condemnation.
And God is saying, but now.
There's actually a way to be put right in relationship with me.
And I want you to know that this but now begins a whole new section of this letter
of which our text today is really kind of the executive summary
of one of the most important and central sections in all of scripture.
And today I'm going to attempt to do the impossible
which is to tackle three really big theological words.
I ran this by my kids last night.
They had no idea what these words meant.
And I'm assuming that may be some of us as well.
We're going to hit three really big words.
You ready for these big words?
Like seminary level words?
God sent Jesus to redeem, atone, and justify us by faith.
Redemption, atonement, and justification.
I hope you'll at least know a little bit more of what these mean by the end of this sermon.
First of all, God sent Jesus to redeem us.
Verse 24 says that all are justified freely by his grace
through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
And I want you to focus on that key word, redemption.
Redemption, what does it mean to call God not only our creator,
but to call him our redeemer?
Why would you as a church, why would you name your church redeemer
or church of the redemption?
It must be a fairly important word if you're going to put it in your name
and in your logo, right?
So it's one of those great New Testament words.
What does it mean?
Well, redemption means to be bought out of the slave market.
It means that someone has come and paid the price for your release.
It's an economic word.
And in the ancient world, they had no bankruptcy laws.
And so if you were a farmer and you fell into debt and you couldn't pay the debt,
you would lose your land and you would become an indentured slave.
Or if you were a soldier in the military and you lost a battle,
you would be taken as prisoner.
And this slave or this prisoner needed someone to come and pay a ransom price for their release.
And many of us can't really relate to being a slave or being a prisoner,
but I think almost all of us in the Bay Area can probably relate to having debt.
Anyone have debt?
You went for that university degree.
You tried to buy that house here in the Bay.
And you know that huge weight and load of debt.
And your freedom has been massively compromised by your debt.
And there are many things you can't do until you get that weight of debt off of you.
Some of us daydream, at least I daydream, about someone coming from outside,
you know, just miraculously paying that debt for me and setting me free.
Well, Paul says in verse 24,
All are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
Someone has come and paid the ransom for slaves, prisoners, and debtors like us.
We were in a helpless situation.
Our position was pretty much like the Israelites in Egypt who were slaves and they were in captivity,
except our slavery was to sin and to the dark powers of this world and to death itself.
And we couldn't pay the price to purchase our release and our liberation and our freedom.
But the gospel says that someone else came and paid that price for us.
This is how Jesus even talks about himself.
In the gospel of Mark chapter 10, he says that the Son of Man did not come to be served,
but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.
Jesus is saying that he came to ransom us and to deliver us and to pay that price
so that the prison could be open and our chains could be unlocked and we could be made free.
Jesus didn't just come to tell us about the love of God.
He did come and tell us about the love of God.
But the totality of Jesus' actual coming and his living and most especially his dying and his rising again,
that is what provides the payment price that's essential for our deliverance.
And it's his coming and his teaching, those were essential, but they didn't save us.
It was Jesus ransoming us on his cross.
That is what set us at liberty and it's the only way out for us.
And I want you to notice that God's grace is what provides this redemption.
Paul says again, he says,
All are justified freely by God's grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
It's God himself and he alone who provided this ransom price for us.
This one that we've been looking at these past three chapters in Romans,
this one that we provoked, this one that we defied,
this one that we ignored and neglected and disobeyed,
this one against whom we rebelled.
In his grace and in his unmerited favor and his infinite kindness,
though we had done nothing to deserve it,
he took action at infinite cost to himself to plan our redemption,
to initiate our redemption,
and to provide everything we needed to be ransomed and therefore reconciled to him.
And so that's my first question to you today is,
Do you know God not only as your creator, but as your gracious redeemer?
Do you know him as your merciful deliverer?
And when you pray, do you spend time saying,
God, thank you for your redemption in my life?
Now, verse 24 provokes multiple questions,
like how exactly did Jesus ransom us?
And what was the ransom price?
And how did he secure our redemption from slavery and our deliverance from this captivity?
And that's what brings us to our next big theological word.
You ready for it?
You got redemption?
We ready to move on from redemption?
Okay, next big theological word.
God sent Jesus not only to redeem us, but to atone for us.
Atonement.
This is verse 25.
It says,
God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement through the shedding of his blood to be received by faith.
This is one of the most important verses in the whole of scripture,
and it's a central and essential doctrine for the Christian faith.
Paul says,
But now, something new has happened.
A new redemption has come about.
And how does that redemption work?
Paul says,
God presented Christ.
God publicly set Jesus Christ forth.
And on the cross, God made this public declaration.
And what did God declare?
God declared the atonement through the shedding of blood.
This Greek word can be translated sacrifice of atonement or an old English word that's propitiation.
Okay?
Propitiation.
And what does it mean to propitiate?
It means to turn aside someone's wrath.
Or to satisfy and pacify and absorb someone's wrath.
And we've been at pains to show these past few weeks that the wrath of God is not his crankiness.
The wrath of God, rather, is God's settled judicial opposition to evil.
Right?
There's a reason why God's wrath has been provoked.
We learn in Romans 1.18,
The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven.
Why?
Against all the godlessness and wickedness of people who are suppressing the truth by their wickedness.
And we actually know something about wrath.
We know that when we love someone and we see them destroying themselves, or we see them destroying the lives of other people,
we feel there's something in us that's opposed to their self-destruction.
Right?
We feel a hostility rising up against us as we see them destroying the lives of other people.
And God's wrath is like that, except it's utterly pure and it's absolutely infinite.
Now think about this, if God tolerated evil, if he didn't feel wrath against evil,
if he winked at everything that opposed what's true and good and beautiful,
if he disregarded the things that deface and damage and destroy his creation and his creatures,
would we be able to call God a good God?
Would we be able to say that he's a just God or a loving God?
And this is really the driving question throughout the whole of the Bible.
How can a just God rightly pour out his wrath on sin without destroying us sinners,
whom he made and whom he loves?
And how could God make unrighteous people like us righteous without overthrowing his entire moral order
and just turning the moral universe completely upside down?
And the answer to that question is in verse 25,
God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement through the shedding of his blood.
You see, propitiation carries with it this idea that someone has been offended
and someone has done the offending and something needs to be done,
something's necessary on both sides to make it right.
And what Paul is saying is that the God whom we offended has provided a way whereby the offense can be dealt with.
God presented Christ.
And if you follow the argument so far, we never could have presented something on our side
that would have been adequate or sufficient to make things right.
And so God, in his wisdom, in God, in his grace, contrived a way.
And he presented Christ on the divine side.
And Jesus Christ presented himself on the human side
so that the justice and the wrath of God came down not on us,
but on Christ himself, on Christ instead.
God presented Jesus Christ.
Is this not brilliant?
Is this not beautiful?
Jesus absorbed the wrath of God and atoned for our sins
so that sinners like us would not be destroyed,
as we certainly would have been,
but so that we can be saved.
And I'm belaboring this point because so many Christians and so many churches
are losing this truth of this great substitutionary exchange.
You see, sin is us substituting ourself for God
and putting ourselves in the place where God deserves to be
and only God deserves to be in charge of our lives,
in charge of everything else.
But salvation is God substituting himself for you.
Putting himself where only you deserve to be,
on that cross, bearing the penalty and judgment for your sins.
And what Paul is saying is that in the cross,
the grace of God has propitiated the wrath of God
through the Son of God.
And this is why Christians cannot stop talking about
and singing about the cross of Christ.
It's the one symbol of the Christian faith.
It's not the manger at Christmas, though that's so wonderful.
And it's not the star of Epiphany, though that's great as well.
And it's not the empty tomb of Easter,
which is absolutely necessary for us.
It's not the dove of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
Our one symbol is not the hammer and chisel of Jesus,
the common day laborer.
It's not the loaves and the fishes by which he fed the hungry.
Sorry, Bill.
That's not it.
It's not the boat from which Jesus taught the crowd.
It's not the basin and the towel with which he washed the feet of his disciples.
What is the one central symbol of the Christian faith?
It's that cross of Good Friday.
And for 2,000 years, this ugly, cruel, horrible, detestable symbol
of death, failure, humiliation, pain, and agony
has been for Christians a symbol of victory, life, freedom, and glory.
What have we done with this cross?
We make the sign of the cross on ourselves.
We make the sign of the cross on one another.
We put this cross on our churches and our signs and our logos.
We engrave this cross on our Bibles and communion tables and tombstones.
We wear the cross on our rings and on our necklaces.
We tattoo the cross on our bodies.
Why do we do this?
Because the Christian faith can be accurately summarized
as the faith of Christ crucified.
And why is that?
Because here on the cross, according to verse 25,
God presented Christ as the propitiation
for God's settled judicial opposition to evil.
God presented Christ to absorb God's wrath through the shedding,
not of our blood, which surely would have been just,
but through the shedding of God's own blood.
God said, wow, this is way beyond me.
But the apostle John says it like this in 1 John 4.
He says, in this is love.
Not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son
to be the propitiation, to be the sacrifice of atonement for our sin.
God's own great love propitiated God's own holy wrath
through the gift of his own dear son who took our place
and bore our sin and died our death.
Isn't that astonishing?
We don't seem very astonished by this.
It's astonishing.
If you're exploring the Christian faith,
do you see why this propitiation and this atonement
was necessary for you?
To have any hope at all?
And do you see that the cross is both a vivid demonstration
of God's righteous justice against sin
as well as God's righteous love and compassion for you, a sinner?
And if you're a Christian,
can you see how God amazingly,
wondrously pulled this whole thing off for you
by substituting himself in your place?
Can you see that the resurrection of Jesus from the dead
is not merely the reversal of a defeat,
it's rather the proclamation of a victory
that God came and won for you
that you never could have won for yourself?
If this is true,
if in Christ's resurrection from the dead,
God has proved that this propitiation is sufficient for us
and his atonement is absolutely adequate for us,
then what more is there to be done
than to fall at the feet of our risen Lord today
and just worship him and say,
oh my God, thank you.
Thank you.
All right.
Two big theological words down.
All right.
You're about to get a seminary degree.
You ready for a third?
A third big theological word.
God sent Jesus to redeem us,
to atone for us,
but not just to redeem and to atone.
He sent Jesus to justify us by faith.
And this is what he says in verse 26.
He did it to demonstrate his justice
at the present time so as to be just
and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.
God is the just justifier.
We've already heard in verse 24
that he justifies us freely.
And in verse 28,
that we're justified by faith.
And next week,
we're gonna hear that God justifies the ungodly
and that Jesus was delivered over for our sins
and he was raised to life for what?
For our justification.
There's the word.
What in the world does it mean?
What does it mean to be justified?
Well, it means way more
than merely being pardoned or forgiven.
Now, this is Berkeley,
so I know that we all appreciate the value
of having a validating performance record
that opens doors for us.
Amen?
Having a validating performance record
that opens doors for us.
You know that if you wanna get that advanced degree
or land that competitive job,
what do you have to do?
You gotta send out your academic record.
You gotta send out your vocational resume
and pile up all your grades and your merits,
all that you've achieved and you've accomplished
and all of your experiences.
And you gotta put that together.
You gotta take it out to the institution,
to the university, the corporation,
the firm, the practice, whatever.
And you've gotta say,
this is my validating performance record.
And because of what I've done,
I'm worthy of this position.
So please, oh please, accept me.
And if you're found worthy,
those doors will swing wide open for you
and you're on your way to pursuing your goals
and your dreams.
And that's what justification is all about.
But it's not about the performance record
you put together.
It's about the fact that God has given you
not just a good performance record.
God has given you not just a great performance record,
but that God has given you
the performance record of Jesus Christ
who lived the life you were meant to live.
God has given you his very own divine righteousness.
So that if you're justified,
God has declared you to be right with him
just as Jesus is right with him.
And you can know now
what the future verdict is gonna be
on that judgment day.
You don't have to wait and wonder.
You can know it right now
that you've been justified.
That though you are more deeply flawed
and sinful
than you ever dared believe,
you're more profoundly loved
and accepted by God
than you ever dared to hope.
That's what it means to be justified.
And if God has already given you
his acceptance
and his validation,
then we no longer need to be
running around the world
looking for everybody else's acceptance
and validation
and asking them,
am I worthy?
Because God has already said,
you're worthy.
Thank you.
That is so rare.
I appreciate that.
Friends, you see how
this is so much more than being forgiven?
Because forgiveness is a negative,
but justification is a positive.
Right?
Forgiveness says you have been set free
from the power of sin
and the wrath of God,
but justification says
you've had bestowed upon you
all the status, benefits,
rights, and privileges
of Jesus Christ himself.
Forgiveness says
you may go,
but justification says
you may come.
Forgiveness says
you've been let off the penalty
that your sins deserve,
but justification says
you're welcome
into all of my love
and my presence.
You know,
if you,
if any of you ever,
you know,
wins the Congressional Medal of Honor,
that means that you've done something
that is above and beyond
the call of duty,
that you've risked your life
in unwavering devotion
and extraordinary heroism
and absolute selflessness
for a cause
that's way bigger than yourself.
You know what?
Jesus did all that for you.
He won the Congressional Medal of Honor,
but to be justified
means that Jesus takes that medal
off of himself
and he pins it on you
so that you get all the honor
that he deserves
and all that he won for you.
This is what Paul is saying
in 2 Corinthians 5.
He says,
God made him who had no sin
to be sin for us
so that in him
we might become
the righteousness of God.
On the cross,
Jesus was treated
as if he did everything
that we had done
so that when we believe
we are treated
as if we did everything
that Jesus had done.
God grants
and he credits to me
the perfect righteousness
of Christ
as if I had never even sinned
nor ever even been
a sinner
and as if I had been
as perfectly obedient
as Christ
was obedient
for me.
That's what justification means.
Isn't it amazing?
If it's true
and maybe you're wondering
whether or not it's true,
if it's true,
it's amazing.
And Paul says that
the only way to receive
all of these things
that God has done for us,
redemption,
atonement,
justification,
the only way to receive
these things
is simply by faith.
He says in verse 22,
this righteousness
is given through faith
in Jesus Christ
to all who believe.
He says in verse 25
that all this is to be
received by faith
and he says in verse 26,
God is both the just
and the justifier
of those who have faith
in Jesus.
Justification is by grace alone,
it's in Christ alone
and it's also by faith alone.
This is not a cooperative project
between you and God
where he provides his son
and he provides the cross
and you provide faith.
No, faith is not about
you contributing.
Faith is always just about
simply receiving.
Faith is the eye
that looks to Jesus.
Faith is the empty hand
that receives this free gift.
Faith is the mouth
that just drinks in
the living water.
redemption,
propitiation,
justification,
all these amazing,
big, wonderful words,
all the righteousness of God
has been provided
in Jesus Christ
as a free gift of grace
that he sovereignly places
where?
Only in hands
that are empty
and open
like this.
That's what faith
is all about.
And if that's true,
if it's true
that we bring
absolutely nothing
and God provides
absolutely everything,
then shouldn't we
be the most joyful people
on the planet?
Can I get an amen?
Shouldn't we be,
I mean,
come on,
let's,
I mean,
shouldn't we be the most
free
and liberated people
in our city?
Should we not be people
who are worshiping God
and singing his praises
with every ounce
of energy,
with all of our might
that we can summon up
from our depths,
the depths of our being?
Friends,
all hope
was lost,
but now.
All hope was lost,
but God.
All hope
was lost,
but God
has made known
his righteousness,
but God
has presented
Christ,
but God
has become
the just
justifier
of those
who have faith
in Jesus,
but
now,
but
God.
Thank God
for that.
In the name of the Father,
Son,
and Holy Spirit,
Amen.