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Sermon Notes of Rev Dr Ivor J.W.Oakley (Strandtown Baptist Church 19-02-1978)
This passage takes us up to the
very heart of things, and certainly to the very heart of the epistle. There is
enough in here for a series of lectures! Arguments, counter-arguments, fine
shades of meaning, many difficulties, star-studded with many theological terms
– the righteousness of God, the law, justification, grace, redemption, blood,
propitiation….. For the average congregation this could be very theological,
very theoretical, and very remote.
All of this is based on the concept of the righteousness of God. Romans 1:16-17: The Gospel of Christ.. is the power of God unto salvation… for therein is the righteousness of God revealed. We don’t often think of the Gospel in this way. Righteousness is both an attribute, and a gift. Having revealed God’s righteousness, Paul speaks of the gift of righteousness. What does this mean? The gift which God gives to men is righteous standing. He declares them, because of this gift, to be righteous, and treats them and acts towards them as though they were absolutely and perfectly righteous. This is a wonderful and thrilling fact which the New Testament writers get excited about. Righteous standing and position are things that man does not have at all – in fact he is very unrighteous. But God in amazing grace gives man righteousness. As far as he is concerned, they are righteous because of his gift.
Paul begins by making it clear that men desperately need this gift. He draws together a number of quotations from Psalms, Proverbs and Isaiah like a string of pearls to describe human nature (in the manner of the Jewish Rabbis).
· In character – There is none righteous, no, not one (3:10). No-one seeks after God. All have declined from the divine pathway. In summary, There is none that doeth good, no, not one (3:12).
· In tongue – only destruction, deceit and bitterness (v13-14).
·
In conduct – by nature we are oppressive, murderous and
quarrelsome (v15-16)
The reason for it all is that There
is no fear of God before their eyes (3:18). This is a strong case, and it is
essential to make it. Men will never accept this gift till they see that they
need it.
William Joy of Bath said in his
old age: “My memory is failing but there are two things that I never forget:
That I am a great sinner, and that Jesus Christ is a great Saviour”.
This indictment stops everyone
in his tracks. The law finds everyone out. Every mouth is stopped, and the whole
world is found guilty before God. For all have sinned and come short of the
glory of God (3:23). Why do we
need God’s righteousness? Because we have none of our own.
Paul is not suggesting that we
are all as bad as one another, but that we are all short of God’s
righteousness. But sin is like arsenic –it does not matter whether we have a
ton of it or just a grain of it – either dose is enough to poison. It is not a
question of degree, but of direction, not how far the ship has gone on her
voyage, but where she is heading.
God’s law requires a perfect
obedience from us, or our case is lost, and we stand under condemnation of
broken law. We desperately need the sentence against us to be reversed. Do not
our hearts bear witness to the truth of this statement? These are no curiosities
of the past, not just an interesting phase of early Christian thought. Look at
life and the plight of everyone of us. We are poor lost guilty sinners.
This is the greatest problem of all men in every age – how men who are in the wrong can be put in the right. How can they be pronounced and treated as righteous? How can they be at peace and at home with God? To this supreme problem, the Gospel addresses itself and has the only satisfactory answer. The Gospel will not make sense unless the fact and condemnation of sin is acknowledged.
We cannot bestow this gift on
ourselves. We are bankrupt. The natural reaction is to seek a do-it-yourself
religion. Not that good deeds are bad, but they are not enough, or good enough.
God expects a perfect obedience and we cannot give that. But what we cannot
provide, God is able to offer us as a gift. This was no afterthought – it was
promised in the Old Testament Law and Prophets.
God not only forgives sins. He
also says we are to be regarded not just as pardoned criminals but to be
declared to be absolutely righteous. He reinstates us. A king may pardon, but
does not reinstate the criminal to the position of one who has not broken the
law. Christ’s righteousness is put to our account. Our sins are imparted to
the Saviour. His perfect righteousness is imparted to us.
If we look through blue glass,
everything is blue. If we look through yellow glass, everything is yellow. God
looks at us through Christ and sees us as perfectly righteous, the same colour
as Christ. He pronounces us acceptable, satisfactory, at peace with the law,
acquitted, and treats us as innocent men though we are utterly guilty. Therefore
our whole relationship with God is changed – not by our trying to keep the law
but because of a gift from the loving heart of God.
Therefore there is no punishment or sentence against us. “Justification” is the term for this process. Divinely appointed and provided righteousness.
Here is the section with all the key words bunched
together.
Being justified freely by his
grace (3:24). This gift comes from God’s mercy, and is to the utterly
undeserving. God’s grace, unmerited favour, is the sole reason and spring of
it. Then to underline this – “freely” – an absolutely free gift. It
comes gratis to men. Salvation for nothing – though it was a costly thing –
to God and not us. It does not cost us anything, and if we bring anything to pay
for it, he will throw it in our face. He gives it away freely.
Rowland Hill was preaching at a
fair when he saw men selling wares by auction. Hill said “If I was to hold an
auction too – to sell wine and milk without money and without price.
My friends over there are finding difficulty in getting you up to their
price. My difficulty will be getting you down to mine”. Charging £1 a time,
or a pilgrimage of 100 miles – there might soon be a response. But not when
it’s a free gift.
Through the redemption. This takes us to the cross where he paid the price of our freedom. He died in our place, to pay our debt and endure our penalty. The price of redemption was his blood. His life was given in sacrificial death. Nothing less could have procured our salvation. The Law-giver is now the Christ-giver. He bore our sins in our place.
“At one tremendous draught of love
He drank damnation
dry”
The effect is propitiation, which turns away
God’s wrath that was upon us. The sentence is revoked. We are no longer to
know God’s displeasure or the terrors of hell. Sin has been expiated –
covered. Therefore God has been propitiated.
Whom God hath set forth – God did not send a third party who was an innocent substitute. God’s gift was of himself, in Christ. God requires propitiation by his justice and God provides it by his mercy. He is at once the one who propitiates and the one who is propitiated.
Brownlow North’s conversion- he was under deep conviction of sin for months. One night he was unable to sleep, and started to read Romans 3. Then new light dawned. He struck the book with his hand and sprang from his chair saying “If that scripture is true, I am a saved man. That is what I want. That is what God offers me and that is what I will have”.
The righteousness of God
which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe (3:22).
Whom God sent forth to be a propitiation through faith. (3:25). This gift
is to be received by faith, by those who believe on Jesus. The elements involved
in faith: with our mind we assent to the truth of the Gospel and with our heart
we commit ourselves to it. This is real trust in him who died for us and rose
again. Faith accepts, relies, depends, appropriates, confides, and leans on
Christ.
Such faith is absolutely opposed
to relying or depending on self. David Dickson said: “I have taken all my good
deeds and bad deeds, and cast them in a heap before the Lord, and have betaken
me to Jesus Christ in whom I have full and sweet peace”.
All who have faith are within scope of the gift of God’s righteousness. Unto all them that believe (3:22).
“O that the world might taste and see
The riches of his
grace.
The arms that
compass me
Would all mankind
embrace”
Faith ventures on him and ventures entirely.
The purpose of the gift was to be effective to forgive
sins that God had passed over in Old Testament, before Christ came. Then, its
purpose was that he might be just and the justifier of all that believe in
Jesus. God has been just. He has punished sin and yet saved man. He has
satisfied the claims of justice. The death penalty has been carried out. Sin has
received due desert. At the same time there is immediate and perfect
justification for men. “Jesus Christ died for man and also for God”. The
cross was the perfect harmonizing of his love and justice.
Mercy and truth are met together, righteousness and peace have kissed each other (Psalm 85:10). He is just in punishing, and merciful in pardoning. The riddle and the problem were solved at Calvary. The just and holy God righteously pronounces the sinner justified.
This message is at the very heart of the Gospel, and the
very heart of Christian experience. It contains the essence of Christian faith.
It is the good news of the Gospel. When a sense of guilt bears down on man, all
efforts to amend are unavailing. Prayer seems to have no effect. What can a
poor, guilty, condemned sinner do? – Just at this point is the good news of
the gift of perfect righteousness in Christ. The heart receives it, and
conscience receives it – and the result is peace.
William Cowper (1731-1800) (Author of “O for a closer walk with God”, “God moves in a mysterious way”, “Hark my soul it is the Lord”, “There is a fountain filled with blood”). He was in deep despair, walking up and down in room deeply agitated. He sat near the window and opened the Bible for consolation. The passage which met his eye was Romans 3:25. “I immediately received power to believe… I saw the complete sufficiency of what Christ had wrought for my pardon and entire justification. In an instant I believed and received the peace of the Gospel.” The result of receiving the gift is joy unspeakable and a life full of glory.
