Romans Chapter 16:24-27

See, if somebody says, well, I'm walking in the grace of God and they're disregarding what Jesus has told us, they're disregarding the word of God and they're disregarding the Bible, it does give me pause. I wonder, do they understand grace? Spurgeon said, the grace that doesn't change your life will not save your soul. When you understand Jesus died for you, even though you didn't deserve it, even though you hadn't earned it, life changes, friend.

Welcome to Cross the Bridge with David McGee. It's often fought against, but the bottom line is, we should obey God and the Bible. Find out why this is important today as Pastor David continues in Romans 16 with his teaching, Grace. Here's Pastor David. Romans chapter 16, verse 24. And he says, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen. Amen is a Hebrew word meaning so be it. If you've ever said, amen, you're speaking Hebrew. Say, amen.

Amen. So you're speaking Hebrew. Say, hallelujah. Hallelujah.

You're speaking Hebrew. Hallelujah. Hallell praise God. Praise God is what you're saying when you say hallelujah. So it mentions grace. What is grace? Is that a girl's name? Yeah, I guess.

Is it what you do over the meal? Yeah, that too. But what is it? What is grace? Grace is getting what you don't deserve. Grace is getting what you don't deserve. Now I've talked to some people and to me, it's just a comical statement that people make occasionally. They say, well, I just want what I deserve.

You probably perhaps over time have made that statement. I don't want what I deserve because I know that through my wrongdoing and through my past, I deserve to be punished. I deserve bad things. That's what I deserve.

So keep that in mind when you're at work or something. Whoa, what do I deserve? No, you don't.

Don't say that. I don't want what I deserve. Grace. So you get what you don't deserve and perhaps you're sitting there going, what don't I deserve?

I got a list and it pretty much encompasses your whole life. Here's what I mean by that. Today, because of the death of Jesus on the cross, you can know for sure that your sins are forgiven, that the shame and the guilt of the things that you've done wrong can be washed away by your belief in Jesus Christ. Your past can be pardoned so that's grace for the past. You can sit here today and know that even though you don't deserve to go to heaven because you haven't been perfect and perfection is God's standard, that you can sit here today with the assurance that you're going to heaven.

You can have assurance for the future. And today, friend, when you opened up your eyes today and you took that first breath, you were not owed that. As your heart beat through the night while you slept, as God kept you alive, that was not something He owed you or something that you deserved. Your first breath today was a gift from God. And maybe that's why we call it the present.

Look at this, friend. Grace for the past, grace for the future, knowing that the last breath you take here will be the first breath you take there, and grace for the present. That's why they call it amazing grace, isn't it? And how often are we just, yeah, amazing grace, amazing.

No, no, no, no. Amazing grace. They asked John Newton, the guy who wrote Amazing Grace, they said, told us, you know, they were asking him some theological questions and he just stopped him and said, you know what?

Two things I know. I am a great sinner and Christ is a great savior. Doesn't it all come down to that? Jesus is a great savior. Amazing grace. I was talking to some guy, well, you're all about grace. Praise God.

Yep, we are. You know, there's this attitude of, well, that's just greasy grace. In other words, you know, just give me grace and I'll act whatever, however I want to. No, no, no, no, no, no.

No. When you truly understand the grace of God, it's going to change your life. It's going to change your heart. You're not going to be the same when you realize the grace of God. And when people talk about, well, there's too much grace. Friend, let me ask you a question. How much grace does a sinful person need to have a relationship with a holy God? I think a lot. If you're sitting here today, well, I just need a little grace.

No, no, no, no, no. You need a lot of grace. I need a lot of grace. So while we recognize that God has given us grace, you know what it'd be good to do?

Only give grace to one another. So important. So important for you to understand. So important for you to receive. So important for you to give to other people. Important word.

Important word. Look at verse 25. Now to him who was able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery kept secret since the world began, we'll read on, but now made manifest and by the prophetic scriptures made known to all nations, according to the commandment of the everlasting God for obedience to the faith. Now, what is all that talking about?

Well, I want you to notice one thing. Now to him, capital H, whenever you see capital H, when you're reading the Bible, it's talking about God. It's a pronoun him, but it's talking about God. Now to him who is able to establish you. Thank you, God. You, God. You know, you establishing yourself in the faith.

That's not the way it's supposed to go. God establishes you in the faith. If you're trying to establish yourself in the faith, I'm not saying there's not things you need to do and decisions you need to make and priorities and commitments, but God is the one that pulls you in. People say, well, I found the Lord. Well, God wasn't lost. I understand the statements, but God was the one looking for you and chasing you. Sometimes some of us for years before we responded, God is able to establish you in the faith.

This is so important. It says in Jude, now unto him who is able to keep you, to keep you and to present you faultless before the throne of his glory. Faultless before the throne of his glory. Who can do that? You can't do that. Who can do that?

He can do it. The Bible also says that he that started at work in you will be faithful to complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. Again, note the pronouns. It didn't say, you know, it was going to be, it's all up to me.

No, no, no, no. That's not what it said. Says he who started to work in you. Who started to work in you? God.

Who's going to finish it? God. He will keep you. He will establish you. If you get sidelined, he'll pull you back. If you wander off, he'll chase you. This is so important for us to understand.

Why? Because here's the life lesson. God is a keeping God. God is a keeping God.

That little ironic blessing that I pray at the end of the service, may God bless you and God keep you. God is a blessing God. God is a keeping God. Jesus in his prayer said that he won't lose any. That tells you the keeping power of God. So understand that God is a keeping God. So now we got grace. We got God is going to keep us. Man, what a good word.

And let's notice something here. Verse 26 for obedience to the faith. Obedience to the faith. So much is explained in this book of Romans. There's so much, there's so much deep theology and yet there's so much practical advice. There's, it explains salvation, justification, sanctification, the plan of Israel, relationships with one another, relationships with leaders, the government. It's just an incredible book.

For, you know what? If you're, if you're newly saved, you've just come to ask Jesus to forgive you of your sins recently. It's a great book to read. If you've been walking with the Lord for years and years, great book to read.

It's just, it's, it's been an incredible joy to walk through it. And here's a concept that we need to understand obedience. Obedience.

Now I just talked about grace. There's a balance to the word of God. And let me mention this obedience.

What does that mean? To obey? Obey what? Obey God. And, and you know, as spiritual leaders follow God to follow them and obey them. And Romans talked about being, uh, you know, submitted under leadership and godly authority.

And we touched on that a couple of weeks ago, but here's the thing. Obedience. See if somebody says, well, I'm walking in the grace of God and they're disregarding what Jesus has told us. They're disregarding the word of God and they're disregarding the Bible.

It does give me pause. I wonder, well, well, do they understand grace? Spurgeon said the grace that doesn't change your life will not save your soul. When you understand Jesus died for you, even though you didn't deserve it, even though you hadn't earned it, life changes friend. And you desire to say, okay, Jesus, after you did this for me, what can I do for you?

What are you asking me to give up or what are you asking me to pick up? And he'll show you through his word and through Bible study devotions and teachings. But here's the life lesson. We should obey God in the Bible. We should obey God in the Bible.

It may shock you. I don't, may not, but you know, I love hymns. I love hymns. The lyrical content of hymns is incredible that we did that.

What a friend. And, but even the older hymns, the hymns of the reformation Luther and, uh, and some of these other folks, just incredible. And, and talking about obedience, there's that hymn trust and obey.

I don't know if you're familiar with it, but I want to share some of the lyrics. It says, when we walk with the Lord in the light of his word, what a glory he sheds on our way. While we do his good will, he abides with us still and with all who will trust and obey. Trust and obey for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey. As you're following the Lord, as you're obeying the Lord, there's a joy that comes with the life that's being poured out. A lot of times I see people who say, well, I've been born again.

I say, great. You know, where you go to church? I don't go to church. Are you active in any sort of fellowship? No, I'm not active in any sort of fellowship. Serving God in some way.

No, not really. And then sometimes that discussion will lead to, you know, Gee, am I really eternally secure? You know what God, you may differ with me on this view, but if somebody is not living for the Lord, it's kind of dangerous for them to feel all secure because they said a few words.

Those people need to be concerned. Often the people that are concerned about being eternally secure don't need to be because God is a keeping God. But you know, when somebody is wandering around in the desert and they're wondering if they're right with the Lord, you know, I use it as an opportunity to say, you know, you need to come back to God. You need to be in fellowship. You need to be in the word of God.

Again, we see this obedience pop up in a couple of places. Acts chapter six, verse seven says, then the word of God spread. The number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem and a great many of the priests were what? Obedient to the faith. If you grew up with the notion that none of the, none of the Jewish people received Jesus Christ as the coming Prince.

I'm sorry. That's wrong. This verse says many of the priests, you think they were Gentile priests. No, they were Jewish priests who came to the Lord. Second Peter says, and so we have the prophetic word confirmed. Now this speaks about prophecy in this verse and I'll touch on that in just a second. Which you do well to heat as a light that shines in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. Knowing this verse that no prophecy of scripture is of any private interpretation for prophecy never came by the will of man, but by holy men of God, as God spoke as they were moved by the holy spirit.

Well, what in the world does that mean? God moved upon man who wrote the Bible, but this is God's word. In other words, when you go to write a letter, I guess we don't do that much anymore, but you would take a pen in your hand and you would write it. Well, you wouldn't say the pen wrote the letter.

God used men to write the Bible, but men didn't write the Bible. They were given prophetic power from the holy spirit. And this is the referred to as the more sure word of prophecy. Well, what's the secret?

Well, the secret is being revealed constantly. You get to, and it's an unveiling constantly of the word of God. You get to the book of revelation, which is the last book of the Bible. It's the revelation of Jesus Christ, the final revealing of Jesus Christ. Also, Paul says my gospel. You see that verse 25, now to him who is able to establish you according to my gospel. Did Paul come up with a new gospel?

No, no. But Paul but I do, you know, at first glance, I was like, what is it? My gospel. Isn't it the gospel? It's possessive. Paul changes it from the gospel to my gospel.

And that is so important. You know what? You'll have a hard time finding anybody in the South that's not heard the gospel or a twisted version of it, but that's not the question. It's not, have you heard the gospel?

So have you responded to it? Has the gospel gone from being the gospel to your gospel? Thank you for listening to Cross the Bridge. We'll return to David's teaching in just a moment.

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Again, that number is 877-458-5508 or online at crossthebridge.com. Friend, do you have a heart for the lost? I invite you to send us the first names of your lost loved ones and we will have hundreds of people praying for them. Just go to crossthebridge.com and click on the prayer button and you'll enter their name. And if you put your name and email address in there, I'll send you free resources to equip you to pray and teach you how to reach your lost loved ones.

Please don't wait. This is so important. So please again, go to crossthebridge.com and click on the prayer button and send us the first names of lost loved ones. We'll send you some free information and together we can partner to deliver the good news of Jesus Christ to the whole world, the whole book for the whole world. Now let's return to David McGee's verse by verse teaching in the book of Romans. Verse 27. Now I'm going to, this is closing number one, okay, just if you're sitting there because I'm going to take an opportunity after I explain this verse to go back through briefly through the Roman road. Verse 27. To God alone wise be glory through Jesus Christ forever.

Amen. Jesus, I want you to remember this. I love watching the history channel, love watching the discovery channel, but occasionally they have these weird, you know, tomb of Jesus things and let me just, you know, if you're taking notes, you may want to jot this down. Jesus is alive.

Okay. Jesus is alive. Now if Discovery Channel tell you something different, discount it.

History Channel tell you something different, discount it. Jesus is alive. Jesus died for you and where is he alive? He wants to live in you. He wants to live through you. This final life lesson here is Jesus died for us and wants to live in us. Jesus died for us and wants to live in us. Do you understand that you will be the only Bible that some people ever read? In other words, what you do with your life, that will be the representation not only of the Bible, but of Jesus himself. And as you die to yourself and live for him, you begin to look more and more like him.

You begin to respond more and more like him with more love. You walk in more power that we so desperately need. Why? To draw people to him. To draw people to him. Why? Because we're following him. We're looking more and more like him and perhaps this morning going, I don't look anything like him. I'm not talking about physical.

I'm talking about acting like him, emotionally, in relationships, being like Jesus. Why? Because the world needs to see it. They need to see it. Paul is greeting some people here. He's not been to the church at Rome.

He's writing this epistle in front of him coming, before he goes to Rome. And they received this word with such glad hearts that they knew him when he showed up. And I want to thank you guys because, you know, you received the word of God with glad hearts. I feel privileged and honored to teach here because God has brought people here that are hungry for the word of God. You guys sit under, you probably realize this by now, that the teachings are longer than some other churches. That's by design.

It's by purpose. We want to give a highlight, a spotlight to the word of God and to the teaching of it. And you guys sit through these longer services.

That's part of why we have really comfortable chairs. And because you're hungry for the word of God. You hear the word of God with glad hearts.

And yeah, you're challenged sometimes, but you're also encouraged. And what we see in the book of Acts, Acts 28, 15, it says, and from there, when the brethren heard about us, they came to meet us as far as apa forum and three ends. And when Paul saw them, he thanked God and took courage. Let me share something with you.

As pastor, I don't get to hear every God story in this place, but I tell you what, the ones I do, they encourage me. The emails I get from you guys, the encouragement I receive in the hallways or the restaurants or the different outings that we do, they encourage me. And I want to encourage you guys. And then we build this relationship, what, of encouraging one another.

Encouraging word, hearing the word, being encouraged and encouraged, encouraging others. I want to take you quickly in the last couple of minutes through the Roman road. And here in is the challenge. I'm going to share the Roman road with you. The Roman road is a series of verses, and I would encourage you as a young believer. I did something that changed my life and you can do something in 30 seconds that will change your life is in the back of your Bible, right down the verses I'm getting ready to give you. And then it, if you're afforded the incredible opportunity of sharing the plan with the salvation, with somebody, you won't have to wonder what verses to share.

You'll know automatically. Here's my challenge to you. If you know Jesus as your savior, I challenge you to share the Roman road with at least one person in the next week.

You were really filled with the spirit of God. You really want to go for it. Shoot for three. Have you sit here and go, well, I don't know, but I have opportunity. You tell God you're willing this morning to share with one person and watch what happens in the next week. You tell him this morning, you're willing to share with three people. You watch what happens in the next week. God will make sure I'm telling you, God will open doors.

Somebody will come up to you and go, man, I don't know. What's this world coming to huge open door. God will do that for you. Just make yourself available as a young Christian.

There's a little room. I was teaching guitar. I said, God used me.

And the first guy came in and having problems with life. I said, Hey man, you know, you need to give your life to God. Ask him to forgive you of your sins. He said, I know you're right.

No, you're supposed to say maybe one day or something like that. So I asked him, I said, you want to pray? He said, yeah, I'll pray.

Let him to the Lord. I'm so jazzed. Got so stoked. The next guy came in. He goes, wow, you really seem happy about something. He said, Johnny, the guy before you just gave his life to the Lord. He got born again. The young man looked at me. He said, so if I was going to get born again, how do you do something like that?

Thank you, Jesus. And as a matter of fact, later that night, there was another student that was going through some hard times. I prayed with him. So I was teaching guitar. Three people in the night received Jesus as their savior. God wants to use you. No doubt about it.

Are you available? But you hear this Roman road and be able to share. I'll run through it very quickly. And if you're here today and you're not sure about the plan of salvation or how you can be forgiven, you're going to get it in just a few seconds. Romans three 10 says, as it is written, there's none righteous. No, not one.

I'll explain it to you so you can explain it to others. Nobody's righteous. None of you folks are righteous in and of yourself.

Not me. None of us are righteous. Meaning we've done everything right.

We've all done something wrong, which is what three 23 says for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. God's standard is perfection. And it doesn't matter how close or how far you are to perfection.

You're under the standard. How good is good enough? You can't be good enough to approach God in and of your own self. These two verses mutilate the concept that Christianity is a club of do-gooders.

That if you act right for long enough, then you can join this exclusive little club. That's not what the gospel is. The gospel is, even though you've done things wrong, Jesus is willing to forgive you, even while you were sinners.

Romans five eight says, but God demonstrates his own love towards us. And then while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Jesus didn't die for you. When you came to church, Jesus didn't die for you. When you opened your Bible, Jesus died for you while you were still in your sins. Why you didn't deserve to be forgiven. Grace, Romans six 23, for the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

You literally get to pick your paycheck in life. The wages of sin or death. That's what we deserve, each and every one of us. But God is willing to give us a gift, Jesus Christ, and we can be forgiven of our sins. Well, how do we do that? Certainly we've got to be good enough for long enough or go through catechism or confirmation or whatever.

No, no, no, no. Romans 10, not in 10. That if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised them from the dead, you will be saved for the heart. One believes under righteousness and with that mouth confession is made unto salvation. You pray. That's why I lead people openly in a prayer. I want them to say it out loud.

Why? Because they're confessing. Are they believing in their heart?

You know, only that person knows. I'm offering them my opportunity. I'm going to offer it to you in just a moment. So what elite little group does this apply to that can pray this prayer? We got to be really, really good person for a really long time before you can ask God to forgive you. No, it's not what it says.

I'm going to include one in the Romans road that some people don't include, but Romans 10 13 for whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. Whoever, you're a whoever. Your friends are whoever's. Your coworkers, whoever's.

People you go to school with or whoever's. If anybody asks God to forgive them, they can be saved. If you know Jesus as your savior, take these verses seriously. Jot them down in your Bible.

Look for somebody to share with this week. Ask God for that opportunity. If you're here today and you're not sure that you know Jesus as your savior, I want to give you that opportunity. Friend, do you know for sure that your sins have been forgiven?

You can know right now. I want to lead you in a short, simple prayer, simply telling God you're sorry and asking him to help you to live for him. Now God wants you to pray this prayer so much that he died to give you the opportunity and the ability to ask him to forgive you.

Please pray this prayer with me out loud right now. Dear Jesus, I believe you died for me that I could be forgiven and I believe you were raised from the dead that I could have a new life and I've done wrong things. I have sinned and I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things. Please give me the power to live for you all of my days in Jesus' name.

Amen. Friend, if you prayed that prayer according to the Bible, you've been forgiven. You've been born again. So congratulations, friend.

You just made the greatest decision that you will ever make. God bless you. If you prayed that prayer with David for the first time, we would love to hear from you. You can call us toll free at 877-458-5508 to receive our First Steps package with helpful resources to help you begin your walk with Christ. When you call, ask about this month's special offer featuring David's devotional book, Cross the Bridge Every Day. This inspirational book offers 365 daily devotions as well as a detailed topical index to help you grow deeper in your relationship with the Lord. Cross the Bridge Every Day is available now for your gift of any amount. Again, the number to call is 877-458-5508 or you can go online to crossthebridge.com. Thank you for listening. We pray that you will join us next time as we continue to cross the bridge.