Rejoicing and Trusting in Christ's Ability

Let's turn to Romans chapter 10.

You'll notice that first verse begins talking about prayer. Romans 10 1 to 15. Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation. For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God but not in accordance with knowledge. For not knowing about God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. For Moses writes that the man who practices the righteousness which is based on law shall live by that righteousness.

But the righteousness based on faith speaks as follows. Do not say in your heart, who will ascend into heaven? That is to bring Christ down.

Or who will descend into the abyss? That is to bring Christ up from the dead. But what does it say? The word is near you in your mouth and in your heart. That is the word of faith which we are preaching. That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart a person believes resulting in righteousness and with the mouth he confesses resulting in salvation. For the scripture says whoever believes in him will not be disappointed.

For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek for the same Lord is Lord of all abounding in riches for all who call on him. For whoever calls on the name on the name of the Lord will be saved. How then will they call on him whom they have not believed and how will they believe in him whom they have not heard and how will they hear without a preacher?

How will they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good things. Let us pray. Father we thank you for your abundant grace. The grace that comes only from you. The grace that is obtained only by faith. The grace that is offered to us to be received by faith. Father we thank you for the fact that you've given us Roman 10 and you have revealed these things to your apostle Paul.

A man who lived for his own self-righteousness for a time but you changed his heart. Father we pray tonight that your word would embolden us give us heart reason more reasons and deeper reasons to rejoice in you and that you would also change the hearts of those that we love that do not know you. Father this is our prayer. We pray this in Jesus name.

Amen. I guess I should say that the proposition give you the proposition of the sermon and then you can see if this is in the text. The proposition basically is that we worship a holy God who loves the world by offering his righteousness to us totally undeserved and it is received by faith in Christ alone.

God is gracious. He offers us something that we could never attain on our own and I know that many of you and I know that in your prayers and our prayers around the dinner table and the breakfast table many times we are praying for people in our families that we know that need the Lord Jesus Christ as far as we can see and you have that burden. Well Paul begins this statement about his burden for the Jewish people who are like himself rebellious resistant to the gospel resistant to the thought that Jesus is the Messiah of the world and yet he is troubled by that and but it is the Christian's attitude that we earnestly desire the salvation of others and that is part of our prayer life a major part. So he is Paul is expressing really his love for people his own people but he goes beyond that because we know he was all over the Mediterranean world preaching the gospel because of the love of Christ in his heart that God had put there and so he loves those people Jew and Gentile as well. So if you look at the text there he begins by this prayer and he testifies that there are Jewish people and there'd be many people with a Jewish Judeo or Christian background who do the same thing they have a zeal for God but they do not have it according to knowledge and that is what is missing is part of the things that are missing is that they're unaware or not paying attention to the holiness of God himself that God is perfect in his nature he is pure he is without sin and that's what we say Jesus Christ was without sin and so this zeal without knowledge is a zeal with religious spiritual blindness you can be very religious but totally blind to the grace of God and Jesus at this time in his day and age he was he was facing leaders who shut their eyes to the work of Christ they were they were zealous but they were zealous without repentance they did not have spiritual eyes the blindness and the lack of knowledge exists because they were not wanting light they were not wanting God to anyone to look into their hearts and say you need to repent of your sins so they pushed away and Matthew Henry says it this way they did not know because they would not and shut their eyes to the discovery and love darkness rather than light and that is a frightening thought but that's what Paul is dealing with that was what Paul had been and so those who love darkness that do avoid repentance we could even find that me we if we don't want to repent on something we might avoid the light as well but they were depending on their own selves and not submitting to the righteousness of God and so they chose to think that their salvation or their nirvana or their future blessings wherever it was going to be could be done by their own efforts by their own working out of their own salvation because they could perform pretty good it's good enough to get across the threshold into heaven that's the philosophy of mankind but Paul made this statement about it as he was as he was praying for the church in Philippi after he had been converted he was praying for them deeply and he said this he says he praised for the Philippians and and for himself that I may be found in him not having a righteousness of my own derived from the law but that which is through faith in Christ the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith so was it not Christ's zeal he said my meat is to do the will of him who sent me his righteousness was worked out on our behalf he lived perfect that perfect life and yet Paul is saying I want that righteousness that comes from God by faith you remember the two men who were standing there in Luke 18 the story of the two men who went to pray and one was a Pharisee and he says this Jesus tells the story two men went up into the temple to pray one a Pharisee the other attacks the collector the Pharisee stood and was praying to himself God I thank you that I am not like other people swindlers unjust adulterers or even like this tax collector what is being missed it is not submitting to God is not submitting to God's righteousness is not recognizing that God is righteous and that we are unrighteous so there's a number of things we miss the righteousness of God and therefore we do not feel the need or some people do not feel the need to be seeking a savior they don't think they need one okay but what people are missing as Paul was talking to to even Jewish Christians and proselytes there in Rome as he was writing to them as well as to gentiles he was saying they were missing the foreshadowing of Christ in the old testament it's like when when Abraham took Isaac up to sacrifice him and he was going on in this great test and God stopped him and he provided a ram that was caught in the bush that was a very foreshadowing of the sacrifice of Christ as our substitute for our sins well they missed the prophecies of Christ because when they talked about a kingdom that was going to last forever it was not the kingdom of David or Solomon there's never been one like that is the it is the king himself the Lord Jesus whose kingdom lasts forever that was foreshadowed that was prophesied and they were missing the importance of the of the covenants of grace all through the old testament especially finally symbolized and carried out in the real blood of Jesus Christ that that new covenant was in his blood they were missing that and they were missing the messiah the one they should trust with and put their faith in as Abraham was saved by faith as well because he put his face into the living God so that's where we come to in these verses and so but we can rejoice in something we can rejoice that in what Christ has done we're not blind if we are believers we've been awakened we can see now God we can see what God has planned uh Spurgeon put it this way Christ has come to give us come to give us the righteousness that the law demands he's come to give us the righteousness that the law demands the goal of the law is to send us to Christ when we see our sin and we see our need of him and and the person sees the sees their need of Christ it should propel them to go to Christ in Galatians it talks about what transpires in a person's life as you realize the law begins to press on you and you realize that oh I I'm in sin I'm not I can't make it to heaven on my own look at what's wrong with me I need I need relief from this well Paul writes to the Galatians but before faith come came we were kept in custody under the law being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed therefore the law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith thank God for the law for God's applying it to our hearts to help us see us the moral law is designed to bring us to Christ the ceremonial law was designed to foreshadow and teach what Christ was going to do and what he did so it's like we had the shadow and now we have the substance in Christ we had the predictions of what was going to happen and then Christ came and now we see it more clearly in space and time history Jesus did what the law could not do so the end and goal of the law was to bring us to Jesus Christ to let us see that he is perfect Christ perfectly fulfilled that law and he imputed us the righteousness that comes that's supposed to be our his and to us and Christ's death has made full satisfaction he's fulfilled every law that we've ever broken or ever will break justification is applied to every person who believes now Christ fulfilled the law on our on our half he he took his good record record and and gave it to us and he took away our bad record that's the exchange that he did so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous Paul declares in Romans chapter 5 Jeremiah said the Lord is our righteousness that's always been the case so the good news is that Christ offers mercy and grace which he purchased and we know he purchased that and one person points out that it is impossible and it is unnecessary to try to keep the law as a means of salvation Christ is the goal of the law and therefore we should study Christ he has fulfilled it on our behalf so the purpose of the law is to establish love love for God love to God and to cause us to to long for him you know Jesus summarized the the the law of God and two things which we read this morning he said ask the questions about the law and he said to him you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind this is the great and foremost commandment and the second is like it you shall love your neighbor as yourself on these two commands hang all the law and prophets the law of God the moral law is is to love Christ with all our heart to keep his commandments because he redeems us and he's kept that law for us and now he's given us credit for it so Christ himself is the very embodiment the very fulfillment fulfillment of the of the law of God in his life and his death and because of his love for his people he suffered and because of his love for us he is standing in heaven or sitting in heaven right now at the throne of God interceding for us Christ is the goal of the law he is the aim of all he is the end of the law for us so we look down at verse five and six and seven we see we realize that Christ is the only viable solution before a holy God he's the only viable solution to our sins before a holy God and he talks about that about how the righteous shall live by faith the the faith in in the word has always brought joyous salvation due to the Christian we rejoice that what Christ has has taught us what the the scriptures have taught us bring us to him and we know that we belong to him we are saved we're forgiven we're pardoned that brings us that brings us joy but it's not human striving that braves us joy oh no the contrast here is between the law works and faith and he's going to go through this God has already revealed our human inability to please God our human inability to to earn salvation our human inability to live the the the the law the life that God wants us to live so we're promised grace through faith God has already made the provision and it look in verse five he's quoting from Leviticus he says therefore Moses writes that the man who practices the righteousness which is based on the law shall live by that righteousness that's Leviticus 18 5 it says you shall keep them my statutes and my judgments by which a man may live if he does them I am the Lord that's a big if if he does them because we can't do them and so if we're going to live by that standard then we're going to be judged by that standard we we can't live out the law we can't love God with all our heart or our neighbors as ourselves we we just have not done that but God expects obedience he's never removed that expectation so only perfect obedience can justify a man but Christ has fulfilled that obedience for us that's the great news Galatians 3 12 11 and 12 says this now though that no now that no one is justified by law by the law before God is evident for the righteous man shall live by faith however the law is not of faith on the contrary he who practices them shall live by them the law was to drive us to Christ and it was and Christ fulfilled those demands and so what do we do where do we put our trust it's like it says in Hebrews the believer does this fixing our eyes on Jesus the author and perfecter of faith who for the joy set before him endured the cross despising the shame and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God Christ has lived that life for us he's died that that death for us and he is sitting at God's right hand on the throne interceding for us because why because God the father has accepted the life and sacrifice of Jesus Christ to cover every single believer to declare you righteous in his sight because of the work of Christ you know this passage in verses six and seven is rather interesting it comes from Deuteronomy chapter 30 verses well 12 13 and 14 and it Moses is expecting in the book of Deuteronomy he's expecting believers to love God with all their heart someone who says I think William Henderson said that the the book of Deuteronomy is really centered on Christ it's talking about Christ what Christ is going to do and his promise so one thing is obvious when you look at that verse it says do not it says do not say do not say in your heart who will ascend into heaven to bring him down that would be absurd some people complain well God is not near I can't feel him I can't find him but he is near Moses was saying that to the people he's been near you see you've seen his work you've seen what he's done he's come he's giving his word he's given you the word of God to you and then Christ came himself living in space in time on this earth for three three three and a half years demonstrating and loving people and giving his life for us so it is clear that we can't go up to heaven and pull Christ down that's absurd no we can't go pull Christ up out of the grave we couldn't make him rise on our own that's that's absurd no Christ alone he secured the father's approval he is sitting at the right hand of God if we trust in Christ and his ways then then we do have eternal life that that's without a doubt now as we look at this the sinner's path is is the path of self-justification and it is impossible and it is difficult and it's futile we cannot acquire Christ on our own terms I meant to share this earlier but I'll share it now a few weeks ago I was talking with a man who was traveling through Charlotte and he had some knees and I was talking to him about it and so I I presented the gospel to him and I asked him about his faith and what if he had faith in it faith in it how he intended if he was going to enter heaven how he would do that he he clearly told me said well you know I know that my good works are going to out balance my bad works and I shared the gospel with him and he said oh yeah I believe in Jesus but wait a minute you haven't caught the message he was trusting that his works good works were going to outweigh the bad and in that in that balance of justice and God was going to let him in he did not understand that righteousness is by faith by faith in Christ alone and so when Paul was writing this he's telling the people the word is near you and that means that Christ's promised word Christ is exhibited in the word Christ is offered in the word he's there and of course we know that he's there personally by the word in the spirit so the scripture of the old and new testament all testify to Christ the gospel is near us it is proclaimed can you imagine anyone trying to think that they could actually try to go to heaven and pull Christ down do you think anybody actually thinks that they could actually do something like that do you think that anybody could pull Christ up from the grave that they could acquire Christ and kind of draw him to themselves that's fanciful that's that's that's off the charts and yet there are those who think they have complete ability to to please God in their own works but we don't we don't have to go and find God's word in heaven or in the depths of the sea God's word is revealed to us and scripture is revealed to us in creation is revealed to us particularly in the person of Jesus Christ so Christ the living word has been proclaimed for a long time and the way of salvation has been proclaimed for a long time because in Habakkuk 2 4 there's that famous verse but the righteous will live by faith and that's never changed and Galatians 2 is this one every believer can feel this and sash out this from their heart as they think about the life which I live in the flesh I now live by faith in the son of God who loved me and gave himself up for me what a testimony to what Christ has done Christ has done all that needs to be done he came down from heaven and he came up from the deep he came up from the grave now we just simply need him to work in us we need to seize the promises of Christ trust what he said he is the object of our faith the promises that if we believe in him we will be saved now the point Moses emphasizes here in Deuteronomy is that the law has been given in the context of grace all Deuteronomy is talking about what God has already done and bringing the children of Israel out of Egypt what did he do he brought them out of slavery and he took them into the land of Canaan well God has brought taken us out of sin and he's brought us into what our Canaan is the eternal kingdom of Jesus Christ Canaan was representative of what God was going to do in eternity so the parallel is there and the real difficult task is not for us to undertake we don't have to pull Christ here and pull Christ in from there he's already accomplished all the work that needs to be done in his incarnation his death his resurrection his ascension and his promise to return Christ has done all the work our role is to trust in him that's why Jesus said to the disciples and who had all kinds of burdens but all kinds of misgivings like we may have he said take my yoke up on you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls whatever a person's burden whoever you're talking to or sharing the gospel with Jesus Christ can carry their burdens he can take them away they do not have to strive for salvation they find it in Jesus Christ alone so how is the word close to us in Deuteronomy chapter 5 verse 6 it says he says I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt out of the house of bondage the word of faith what is that well God has shown himself many times even in the days of Moses they didn't catch it but Jesus explained it well who was God God was with them all the time and yet they're thinking well well how do we know what God is doing how do we know what God's word is didn't you see the manna come from heaven and Jesus says he is that manna didn't you see the water gersh brush out of the rock Jesus is that living water they didn't see it they were blind they were not trusting in the living God who was doing these things right before their eyes we do not have to go and look for God here and there he is near us he's declared himself and so in the heart Paul says the word of God is close to us this he comes close to us and he applies that word to our hearts and the word of God revealed in scripture preached and taught produces faith in in a person if you believe it will he will produce faith in you Christ will come first give you faith and then and then you will trust in Christ so the word of God promised is is there in verse 9 and 10 and how is it to be received to be received by by faith in him alone and it goes through this series about if you notice in verse 9 he says that if you confess with your mouth and believe in your heart the the things about Jesus Christ that he was dead buried and raised again and he died for your sins and you trust him as your savior yeah if you do that but it says it it says if you say that with your mouth first and then then and then believe in your heart well in the next verse it talks about well if you believe in your heart and then compress it with your mouth well actually it's the same thing whichever one you put first because if you confess Christ first with your heart what does that mean that means you are independent on Christ as your Lord you're confessing to Christ and confessing him as Lord he already has your heart and in your heart if you're trusting in him with your heart what does that mean well the heart is the is the center of our of our being it includes our our intellect our emotions our volition our desires and our wills and all of our up up wrapped up in Christ and so if we trust him then then we then that is how we trust him and we put our faith in him in that way that's why Jesus came to many people and as he said in the New Testament he says therefore everyone who confesses me before men I will also confess him before my father who is in heaven the confession identifies your faith that's what he's saying here now then in verses 11 through 13 it really declares that there is no ability and there is no status that we have that makes us righteous before God there is none it is by faith alone that we are favored by God the believer will not be disappointed it says there in the in that verse 11 he's quoting from Isaiah and he's saying you know in the Old Testament the Jewish people had come to the point when time Isaiah was preaching that they were facing judgment they were facing judgment God is probably giving them a hope beyond that judgment and that if they put their faith in him they will not be disappointed but this is more than being delivered from Babylon this is being now for us as Paul applies it it's being delivered from from the final judgment and the judgment for our sins so yeah we will not be disappointed we will not be discouraged so there is no distinction doesn't matter whether you're Jew Gentile Roman or whatever where you're successful whether your successes outweigh your failures or your failures outweigh your successes whether you're known or unknown it doesn't matter if you have put your eyes and of faith on Jesus Christ you are his child you are his forever so it doesn't matter whether or not you claim a genealogy with the descendants of Abraham or you are a Jew or you're a Greek or a Gentile whatever if you believe in Jesus Christ you are in his family and so those who trust in Christ's ability to grant them righteousness will be saved it talks about the treasures that we have there in 12b if you look at the second part of 12 he says he says for there is no distinction between Jew and Greek for the same is lord of all all abounding and riches in grace all who call on him and this is a very interesting thing that think about the riches of God that comes to you as a believer that is offered to you God desire God is rich he owns everything but he is here saying he desires to bless us he desires to bless us but also when he as he desires to bless us he blesses us with generosity unmeasured generosity there's a small verse which I overlook sometimes I've been overlooking but I've thought this time in John chapter 1 verse 16 it says this it says for of his fullness of Christ's fullness of God's fullness we have all received and grace upon grace we've received blessings from the fullness of God grace upon grace now how can you illustrate that well one illustration I love is this and and I don't know if you've been to the Atlantic Ocean lately or we look at the Pacific I think the wave formations are a little bit different but if you stand on the shore and you sit there and you look that wave comes and so many seconds later there's going to be another and you could probably look in the distance and see that some are making up and they're going to be coming it's wave upon wave upon wave it's grace upon grace upon grace that God is promising us as believers in Christ you've experienced you can look back in your life you say God was gracious to me there God was gracious to me there and it comes way upon wave and that is the grace of God so there is no comparison of anyone or anything or us to the work of Christ and what he's promised to us and and giving us his riches you know when we come to Christ what do we trust in it is Christ's word it is Christ's revolution revelation it is Christ's incarnation it's Christ living and dying and rising again it's Christ interceding it's Christ sending the Holy Spirit it is Christ promising his return and is Christ with us all the time our focus and our trust is upon Jesus Christ Christ offers himself to all the world as the one and only redeemer it's very clear because it is Christ who justifies the ungodly he's the only one who can what a joy that we do not have to pretend to accomplish the impossible as though we can live in our own righteousness because we can't we die in our own righteousness we can live because Christ has come to justify the believer the one who comes to him in faith we need not carelessly claim our good works out balance our bad and there is no comparison to Christ perfectly obeying the law even unto death and then there's this strange statement how dare I how dare we to try to compare our works to the works of Christ which he's already done and offered to the world it's what what we already read in Romans chapter 8 for the believer there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus absolutely none because Christ has fulfilled it now then I'm going to close out real quickly on verses 14 and 15 you know what they say but we're called by God by his grace but we're also called to be a testimony to the grace that we've received to the riches that have been poured out upon us grace upon grace but we're called to share that and so we need to make this part of our prayer like Paul made it part of his prayer that God would give us those opportunities and give us those privileges of being someone who points others to Jesus Christ that's what we need to do and so that's why Paul is quoting Isaiah he's talking about yeah it's going to be wonderful because God's going to you know bring something out of this captivity but also Isaiah is saying how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good tidings but it's more than just being brought out of that captivity that they were in in Babylon it's looking toward the time of Christ and that's how Paul is applying it here so we need to pray we need to pray I need to pray more for God to give us those divine appointments where we can share the gospel not that we force it but that God would open up those doors and that we would have the privilege of appointing others more clearly to Christ we have much to rejoice him we can rejoice that Christ has accomplished the law for every believer we can rejoice that Christ has come for us and risen for us and intercedes for us we can rejoice that by faith alone not works but by faith in Christ and his works we are justified we are freed from the burden of the law as a means of salvation we are accepted and improve approved but Christ because Christ has a fulfilled all these things and he is accepted before the father sitting at the right hand of the throne of God we can rejoice because Christ's love is commended to us and we are sent as his ambassadors to commend his gracious love to other people you know it doesn't matter what our person's background is it doesn't matter what they've done or what sin they harbor in their heart when they believe in Jesus Christ you immediately you immediately become his heir you become his child you become his beloved his beloved child this is possible only because of Christ's ability Christ's work and so make it our prayer that let no one of us trust in our pride that we think that we can supply something to our salvation that we can earn it in any way Christ alone is the end of the law for salvation the holy God loves the world by offering us his righteousness undeserved yet received by faith in Christ alone let's pray father we thank you for your great grace and mercy we thank you that you love us that you that you cared for us that you've done this work that we could not do that you fulfill the law that we could not fulfill nor keep and that you have placed this salvation in our hearts because you put that saving faith in us and you've wooed us to yourself and you've called us your own and you've adopted us and you've loved us and you are even now pouring out grace upon grace because you love your people oh father open our hearts and minds to rejoice in what you have done in all of your abilities to answer the prayers and to give glory to your name we pray this in Jesus name amen