"Best Of"-Finding Purpose: Romans

This is Robbie Dilmore from The Christian Car Guy and Kingdom Pursuit, where we hear how God takes your passion and uses it to build a kingdom. Your chosen Truth Network Podcast is starting in just a few seconds. Enjoy it and share it. But most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing the Truth Podcast Network.

I can do this, but I can't do that. Do you feel like your efforts to reach God, find God, and please God are futile? Do you feel like your faith is dead or alive? Looking at scripture will help us answer these questions. Join us on Finding Purpose, glorifying God by helping men find their purpose for living.

For more information on the ministry, please visit online at findingpurpose.net or connect with us on Facebook. Let's listen to guest speaker, Pastor Kenny Jones, as he talks about how God's purpose for living has changed. He leads us through Romans, teaching us how to be a Christian without being religious. The reason why is because Paul does not mince words.

He does not hold anything back. He packs a heavy punch for you to see how bad sin is, how egregious it is before a holy God. And that's what Paul does. He unpacks in the clearest of terms for us tonight, how serious God takes sin. And remember, like we talked about last week, remember that Paul, the entire book of Romans, is unpacking the power of the gospel. And tonight, especially when you're going through messages like this through 18 to 32, that's what you have to hold on to, because as you're walking through these verses, it's easy in your mind to get gloomy and get depressed about the situation. And in a lot of sense, you should, because it shows you the depravity of what takes place in our hearts and how of our fallen nature. But you have to grip tight to the gospel of Jesus Christ, because that is the power, the only thing that can save us from our sin.

The only thing. And tonight, that's what we're going to be doing is looking at, and the title of our message tonight is looking how God's wrath upon sin. Another way for us to understand the latter half of chapter one is this. You've got to understand the ugliness before you can see just how good and gracious and loving and how merciful God is. That's what we're going to see tonight through this section of scripture.

So again, I hope that you got one of your outlines and that you can follow along with us and take notes along the way. And especially, because this is one of those messages that is just a heart warmer, and this is just going to warm your heart to the nth degree and to the next. And so, as I was preparing for this message tonight, I mean, it's meant personally, personally, as a pastor of Capital Community. I mean, this just this is one of the things that even for myself, you just see the ravages of sin. And so tonight, my heart is this is to one, if you are a Christian, I pray that you're going to have a higher view of sin, you're going to have a high view of sin. What I mean by that is you're going to take serious sin, you're going to take it very seriously. Number two, men, a lot of you in this room tonight don't know Christ. Maybe even last week, you begin to feel the Holy Spirit begin to move in your heart and you want to know more about Jesus, you want to know about the gospel of God, you want to know about the man who was descended from David, you want to know about the man who was called the Messiah.

Well, guess what? This is what he came to do and is to be is to save you from God's wrath. And so tonight, my prayer is twofold is for you to have a high view of sin. And if you don't know Christ, you'll come to saving faith today. Today, today, if you hear his heart, if you hear his voice, do not harden your heart. That's my prayer for us this evening. So open up your Bible Romans one. And tonight we are going to be looking at four points, as you can see in your outline. And so let's follow along with us tonight.

And let's start off with our first point. The wrath of God is revealed on those who suppress the truth of the gospel. The wrath of God is revealed on those who suppressed the gospel. Let's look in verses 18 through 32. Excuse me, 23. The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.

And let's just stop there. In order for you to understand verse 18, you have to connect it back to verse 16 and 17. Because remember, verse 16 and 17 are some of the most important verses in all scripture. Because how do you know Jesus? How do you come to a saving faith? How are you delivered from sin? It's by faith in the Son of God. The righteous shall live by faith. And that is that you have to start off with those verses, because when Paul says for it is, what he's doing is saying is God's gospel, the gospel of God came because of sin.

That's the connection we see there. So then let's look at the words for the wrath of God. The Greek word wrath is orge, where we get our word orgy.

Now a lot of times when you think of that word, you think of rampant sexual behavior, but the Greek does not go there. The Greek word describes God's passionate indignation on sin. That's what the word is describing, the wrath of God, his anger on sin. Now it's not bits of anger.

It's not sporadic. He doesn't get mad one day and the next. No, it is perfectly balanced with all of his attributes with love and justice and grace and mercy. But what we find in the Bible is that he is passionate about his anger on the sin of man.

And that's what we see here. In fact, we see Paul used the wrath of God in other letters as well. Write down these verses so that you can go back and flip to them. Ephesians 5 six, let no one deceive you with empty words for because these things, the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Colossians three six, on account of these things, the wrath of God is coming.

And why is it coming? Why is it cosmic treason before God as R.C. Sproul calls it again? Paul goes back to Genesis chapter one.

He's going back to the fall of man. You may be asking, Kenny, why are you calling me a sinner? I'm not a sinner.

I'm not. Paul is. Paul's calling you one.

Paul's calling me one. And Paul's taken us back to Adam and Eve with the fall of man. And there, when Eve took the fruit and their sin happened and she gave it to Adam. We are given sin by our inherited nature by Adam and Eve. We got our sin because of our first mother and father.

That's how we got it. And then look where the wrath is coming from. God from heaven, from heaven.

It's meaning that God who dwells there in heaven. This is coming from God. It's not some self-righteous punishment or wrath coming to a select group of people.

No, Paul is clear, just as he says to the Jew and to the Gentile. It's revealed to all because all have sinned. And look at that word right there in verse 18 is revealed, meaning in the Greek, it's brought to light. God's wrath is brought before our eyes. Let me give you a couple of biblical references you can write down. First, we see it in the regards to the flood. This is one example of God's wrath revealed. Remember in Genesis chapter six through eight, God saw the sinfulness of man. And what did he say about it? He regretted making mankind.

Regretted. We see it further into scripture with the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis chapter 19. We see it even in John's Revelation and the bowls of wrath there in Revelation chapter 16. Men, let me give you an example that you see every day. Death. Our friends, our family, you read them in the obituaries.

Men, it wasn't supposed to be like that. Adam and Eve were supposed to dwell with God forever. And by the way, I'll go ahead and give you the good news. That's what we're going to do one day with Him in the final consummation of the kingdom.

We will be with God forever and worship Him forever. So death is even being revealed to us. Men, no one wants to be called a sinner.

No one likes to hear that they are in sin or even in trouble. But men, you have to understand how bad it is. It's just like, for example, when you sense danger, all your emotions begin to kick in. You begin to maybe have butterflies in your stomach or some other emotion. It's like one time I was in college and we were going on a hike with some friends and we were going along the trail and we found a lady who had fallen off the trail and broken her leg. And as soon as we approached her, she was scared to death. She was all alone. And until me and my buddies got there, she didn't know what to do. She was stranded there with her leg broken in the middle of the forest. But I'll never forget her face because she could just feel the danger. What's going to happen?

She began to play the what if game. And then already, as we can see in verse 18, that's the sense we need to have, a seriousness, a weight behind this idea of the wrath of God that's being poured out upon sin. So do you feel the weight already? And I pray you do as you're taking it seriously the way God takes sin seriously. And then he moves on in verse 18. Look with me at what he describes. Why is the wrath of God coming out? He says, for ungodliness and unrighteousness. Ungodliness in the Greek is translated as irreverence, a lack of respect or refusing to give honor to where honor is due. If you look at the word unrighteous, it's doing wrong and it's iniquity, it's injustice, it's hurt. Let me explain it to you in another way. You know the Ten Commandments, you have five on one side, five on the other.

Think about it this way. The first five show spiritual issues, sin against the holy God. That's what you can say with unrighteousness. And the other five are moral. Do not steal, do not kill those.

That's what you could take there, for example, with ungodliness. And we have to see this. And this is what God is demanding punishment for. That's why his wrath is coming out. And then Paul goes a little bit further by suppressing the truth. That's exactly what we are doing.

We are suppressing the truth of the knowledge of who God is and what he has done. Men, a lot of you know that I have three beautiful girls. They're eight, five, and three. And they're wonderful girls. And one day, come this summer, my wife and I were playing in our backyard with the girls.

And we have like a little toy car that we push around for our youngest. And she was standing on top of the car and we kept telling her, don't step on it, don't step on it, don't step out of it. And guess what happened? Of course, it broke. A piece of her broke off.

And it was funny to watch. And if you have kids or grandkids or nieces or nephew or just watch little kids, what happened is that she's slowly beginning to back away from the situation. It's like she didn't even want you to see. It's like she had like a cloak around her. Like you couldn't see her. And yet, we saw the whole thing fall down right before our eyes.

Men, that's exactly what is happening here. We suppress the truth. Suppressing the truth is very serious in the sight of God. And when we do that, we become a fool, as Paul says. Psalm 41 says, the fool said in his heart, there is no God.

There is no God. And so when you look at verses 19 through 20, what Paul is saying is that you are suppressing the truth even though the knowledge of God is all around you. What Paul is saying is that every single day, through nature, through conscience, through life, that is an example of God. And I want you to put on your theological thinking caps for a second and write this term down. What Paul is talking about here is a thing called general revelation. General revelation.

Let me give you a definition. Bob Godfrey says this, who is a pastor and a professor of theology. He says, general revelation is God's clear display of His glory and power in the works of creation and providence. It's God's display of His power through creation and providence.

Let me give you an example. Turn in your Bible very briefly over to Psalm 19. Psalm 19. David here is writing and giving us a clear example of this idea of general revelation. He says in verse 1, the heavens declare the glory of God and the sky above proclaims His handiwork.

Day to day pours out speech and night to night reveals knowledge. I'm going to stop there in verse 2. But if you kept reading all the way to verse 6, what David is showing you is how the sky above is displaying and showing us God as our creator. He's telling us the stars above, the sun in the sky is pointing us to God. That's what David is showing us. And Paul says even in verse 20, that's in all around us.

How God who created Orion like he says in Amos 5-8. The God who put eternity into our hearts. The God who gave us a conscience as we're going to unpack in Romans chapter 2. That is our moral governor between right and wrong. Men, do you realize that when you were born your parents didn't say, hey Kenny, I think for Kenny we're going to pick out this type of conscience.

No, that's not how it worked. God gave you that moral governor, the conscience to be able to determine right and wrong. And think about it men, another example of general revelation of God's glory and creation on display. If you put your hand right here in the middle of your chest, I hope you hear your heartbeat. I hope you do. If you don't, come talk to me.

I'd be curious just to talk to you in general. But if that's a joke gentlemen, you can laugh at stuff like that. But in reality, think about your heart beating and the air that you're breathing now is all a gift from God. And what Paul is saying is all that displays God. Which means, as he says, we have no excuse. God is everywhere. God is everywhere. He says it right there.

You have no excuse. And then he moves further on. You can see in verses 18, 19, and 20 with the conjunction of four. And that is a way for us to understand that is Paul is putting building blocks one on top of the other. Building this case for us to see why God's wrath came upon sin.

And here's another building block. Look with me in verses 21 through 23. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him. Verse 22.

How many be wise? They became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and the creeping things. What Paul begins to say, show us here as he's pushing the snowball and the snowball effect is happening.

It's getting bigger and bigger as it rolls down this hill. Is that when we suppress the truth of God, we become like fools and our hearts are darkened. We already saw a fool there in Psalm 14 one. But remember what Jesus says, don't call anybody a fool. Because the context of the term fool is a moral issue. When you understand the word fool, you always need to put it right beside the term wickedness. You're wicked. And that's what Paul is saying. You're a fool. You're in wickedness. My grandmother, when I was growing up, considered fool to be a cuss word.

Really. Even my dad, his mother considered it a cuss word. In fact, I even grew up in a house where the words dumb and stupid, we still have it in my house, are considered cuss words. Men, the truth of the matter is no one likes to be called intellectually inferior. Deeper than that, as Paul's getting to, no one wants to be called morally inferior. But that is what Paul is saying. Because you have suppressed the knowledge of God. And you don't see His creation and providence at work. When you do that, you become a fool. You become a fool.

And then he goes on a little bit further. You don't honor God. You don't honor God. Men, do you realize, according to John 15 five, that apart from Christ you are nothing. Apart from Christ you are nothing. That's pretty humbling, isn't it?

It's easy for us to have the pride of life and think for a moment. Well listen, I've built my empire like Fred Sanford. I've built my kingdom.

Sanford and Son, you young guys, that's a television show. Yeah. So, how are you going to grow if you don't know the classics? Okay. And so, but you build your empire, whether through possessions or even just mentally.

All that. Men, remember, as the Westminster Catechism reminds us, our chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. Never forget 1 Corinthians 10 31, whether you eat or you drink, whatever you do, all for the glory of God.

Remember what Jesus said in John 5 23, Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. That's how serious it is. And then out of 23, look what happens. The factory of our heart begins to push out idols. Our heart begins to produce idols. There in verse 23, For images resembling mortal man, birds and animals and creeping things. Our idol factory begins to kick in. And men, it's clear, this is what happens when we begin to suppress the truth of the gospel.

It's serious. Which then leads us to our second point. The wrath of God is revealed by letting you go.

By letting you go. Look with me in verse 24 and 25. Therefore God gave them up and the lust of their hearts to impurity, to dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshipped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever.

Amen. It says there in verse 24, God gave them up. Men, those are words you never want to hear. Giving up.

In fact, I don't even, I'm not too fond of that phrase. Because giving up means that you have surrendered. You've yielded control. And what Paul is saying is God, when we begin to suppress the truth, gives us up to the lust of our flesh. Let me say it another way. What Paul is saying, what God is saying, is that if we reject him, if we continue to go down a path of sin, God will allow sin to do its thing and your heart will be hardened.

And in that act, he gives us up to the depravity of our sin. Just let that sink in. That's a dangerous road, isn't it?

That's a very dangerous road. You may be asking, well Kenny, that's not fair. God's not fair. He's just. And he's holy.

And he's perfect. And God is under no obligation to give grace. No obligation to give grace. There is no injustice on God. But what happens when we don't accept the free gift of grace that he gives to us through Christ alone, when we begin to suppress that he is creator and his providence is in everything that we see, when we begin to suppress that, we can be sure, sure as we are born, that he's going to give us up.

He's going to give us up. And look what happens. It's all tied together. We see idolatry, immorality, he's talking about sexual immorality, and all that there starts in the heart. Man, a great example of this is Herod. Herod had numerous opportunities to come to God.

Numerous opportunities. But he didn't. And what happened to the heart of Pharaoh? Exactly.

It was hardened. I was reading an article in my preparation for tonight about repeat offenders in the court system. And I was reading this fascinating article and basically at the very end of it, it was getting to the point where repeat offenders are coming back into the court system, and the judges over the last, I forget, course of number of years, are finally allowing the sentences to get longer and longer and longer. In fact, a lot of men and women who were incarcerated, who had been in prison before, are now sometimes in prison for life. Men, if we begin to go back and turn from God, again, I'd be remiss not to say it one more time, God will give us up to the lust of our flesh. And then Paul ends with a doxology. Isn't that interesting?

Who is blessed forever, amen. I was reading one commentary, one from a liberal commentator, and I don't do that much. I just want to see what the enemy is saying, okay? And that's a joke. That's a joke.

But in all seriousness. But I was reading this one commentator who said that this is one way of Paul mocking sinful behavior. That's not the case. What Paul is saying, again, he's writing through the inspiration of Holy Spirit, is he is giving his affirmation of what has just been said. And who said it? God said it. So he is saying amen to the fact that God is pouring out his wrath, and those who suppress the truth can expect punishment upon their sin. So he says amen. Which leads us men to our third point. Our third point. The destructive power of what happens when we suppress the truth of the gospel.

We see the destructive power of what happens when we suppress the truth of the gospel. Men, I know if you're like me, you're guilty of allowing house projects to be kicked to the curb sometimes. Well, at least I am. And you know when you drive up to your house and you see rotten wood, and you say, man, I'll get to that windowed seal. I'll get to that windowed seal. And you say it over and over again, and what always happens is time goes by, and you forget about it, and you forget about it. And then you go to that one guest bedroom no one ever goes into, maybe from your wife to hide from you.

Men, you've got to give me something. That was a joke too. And so you go in that guest bedroom, and then you realize there's a little breeze, and then you realize the window frames just cock out a little bit, and then you realize, wait a minute, the rotten wood. And you realize that bottom little piece of wood there is all rotten. Men, that's exactly what Paul is saying here in 26 and 27. If we don't take care of that little piece of rotten wood, if we don't take care of the issue, and as God lets us go, you're going to see the ugly nature of what takes place. And Paul packs a heavy punch in these, and he's moving into a very, it's a hard example, very hard to read through, men, of what happens. He's moving in verse 26 here.

He's moving now, again connecting from the previous verses in 23 to 25. He's giving the example of what sexual morality and homosexuality is, which is if you suppress the truth of God, this is what happens. Paul here starts off with the description of first going to women.

Interesting. When you think about sexual morality, a lot of times women are not always the first example you go to, and Paul does that for a reason. He even says in Scripture, they're women.

What do you mean by that? It's because women are seen as the fairer sex. And what Paul is saying here is that he's starting off with women to show that even they are practicing sexual morality and homosexual behavior.

Charles Hodge in his commentary on the book of Romans says this, Paul refers to the degradation of females among the heathen, because they are always the last to be affected in the decay of morals, and their corruption is therefore proof that all virtue is lost. That's why he starts off with women. And to show that they are going into the sexual devious behavior. And then men, he goes right to males.

He goes right to males. And they are practicing homosexual behavior. They are practicing sexual immorality. The reason why Paul is bringing up homosexual behavior is this. It's because homosexual behavior is not only a sin against God, but is a sin against nature itself.

It's not natural behavior. What Paul is saying is that God did not design sexuality to be this way. He's saying that because of the egregious nature of sin, with sex is a good thing between a man and a woman and a husband and wife.

What he's saying is now it's been corrupted and turned over and flipped over and stomped on. That's what he's saying in these verses. Being a Christian is not about being religious, but about having a dynamic, alive relationship with Jesus Christ. You've been listening to Finding Purpose with Pastor Russ Andrews, glorifying God by helping men find their purpose for living. You can discover more about finding your purpose in life by checking out the resources at findingpurpose.net or connect to Finding Purpose on Facebook. Pastor Russ would also like to extend a special invitation for you to join him and over 300 other local men to study God's Word together every Tuesday night at 7 p.m. in downtown Raleigh. Find out more at findingpurpose.net.