Skip to content

The River ChurchSermons

Righteousness

Righteousness Explained

Josh Yates · Sunday, 1 June 2025 · Romans 3:21-31 · 48:42 · 7,595 words

Romans S6 · 3:21-31 Lake Orion

There is no public page for this message yet — the transcript below is the whole of it.

The sermon explores Romans 3:21‑31, showing that God's righteousness is given through faith in Jesus and that all have sinned and are justified by his grace alone. It stresses that true forgiveness comes at the cost of Christ's death and calls believers to stop praising God while still trapped in their old habits. The speaker urges listeners to walk out of the “prison cell” of sin, trusting Christ's sacrifice for freedom and adoption as God's children.

What this sermon is about

Ranked by keyness against every other sermon in the corpus. Each one is a word this sermon actually said — nothing here was written by a model.

cell 15 coach 11 prison 12 game 14 chair 14 propitiation 10 sin 67 justifier 7 forgive 20 blood 13 morality 6 atonement 6

Topics

Atonement & Sacrifice 12 Sin 11 Faith 7 Righteousness 7 The Law 6 Justification 3 The Gospel 3 The Wrath of God 3 Freedom 2 Prayer 1 Grace 1

Scripture referenced 25

Verified against the transcript. A reference the recording does not support is never listed here.

Romans 1 1:35 Romans 1 1:53 Romans 1 2:45 Romans 1:17 2:50 Romans 2 3:00 Romans 2 4:24 Romans 2 5:25 Romans 2 5:27 Romans 3 6:17 Romans 3 13:08 Romans 3:21-31 13:50 Romans 3:21-31 13:54 Romans 1 16:04 Romans 1:21 16:31 Romans 1:20 16:49 Romans 1:22 18:41 Isaiah 53:10-11 26:48 Romans 1:26 33:34 Hebrews 9 34:31 Leviticus 16 34:51 Leviticus 16 34:58 Leviticus 16:14-16 34:59 Leviticus 16:14 35:02 Romans 1:30 35:51 Romans 1 37:53

Transcript

Every word, as spoken, with the second it was said. Each word links to its own entry in the index.

Pre-service announcement — 9 lines, 0:40. Excluded from every count and search on this site, kept here so nothing is hidden.

Hey everyone, my name's Keaton, and thanks for checking out this message today.

We're so glad that you're here, and we want to connect with you and your family.

The easiest way to do that is to text RIVERCONNECT to the number 97000.

There, we can answer your questions and even help pray for you.

You can also visit our website at theriverchurch.cc to learn more about us and what we have going on as a church.

Finally, if you want to support the work we're doing here at the River Church financially,

please head to our website, click the Give tab at the top of the page,

or you can text the amount you want to give to 84321.

Thanks again for joining us. We hope you're blessed by today's message.

Good morning again. It's so good to be able to be together this morning to lift up the name of the Lord

and to dig back into His Word.

And we are in the book of Romans.

We will be, realistically, we will be in the book of Romans until our Christmas series this year.

We're going to be digging in for a while.

And so it's a great book that teaches us so much about who God is and what He's done.

And every week I try to give us a little bit of a synopsis because I know sometimes we're in and out,

especially summer, we can be somewhat transient, going all over the place.

And that's awesome that that's going to happen.

We're going to be gone for a couple weeks of summer too.

But Romans is just a book full of who we are, what we've done, and what God has done in response.

I think it's probably a good way to say it.

It's just an amazing book that tells us what God has done.

And so in Romans 1, we learn,

we learn that God's wrath really is justified, that the gospel is an amazing thing,

and the gospel has come to give us life and salvation.

But as I've been saying from the beginning of this series,

we have to know how bad the bad news is before we can know how good the good news is.

And so in Romans 1, we learned that our response to God was that we worship the things that are made

rather than worshiping the God who is there.

And we see that in our lives.

I mean, we all do it.

I mean, here I am, we're in Michigan and Detroit, right?

I give some worship to them when I go to their games.

That's what we do.

When we go to cheer for our teams, we are worshiping our teams.

When we go to a concert, we're worshiping the person on the stage.

When we give our time to a project, we're worshiping that project.

I mean, worship is putting time, effort, and worth into something or someone.

And so we were made to worship, and often we worship things rather than thanking God.

We've seen the consequences of our response because we've traded God's truth for lies,

and our lusts have taken over.

We've traded our unity with God for passions that have been continually more hedonistic,

more sinful, and more debased.

We see that all over Romans chapter 1.

It's one of the biggest chapters that people don't want to talk about.

They like up through verse 17.

But then 18 through, I think, 31 is the end of that chapter,

and people don't want to talk about that because it lists who we are and what we've become.

And then in Romans 2, Paul goes, well, I know some of you are sitting back saying,

yeah, all those people, all those people that do all that stuff.

He says, no, you're doing the same things.

You're doing the same things.

In fact, you may get mad at them, but your attitudes, your stuff that you're doing is the same.

And sometimes we can sit back in judgment and be like, I'm just not as bad as you.

There is no room for that in God's kingdom.

There is no, I am not as bad as you.

All of our actions reveal a heart full of sin.

Doing the right things don't save you.

Remember, doing the right things don't save you.

There is no scale on this earth that's going to weigh your good works against your bad works,

and the big guy upstairs is just going to let me in.

That's not how this works.

In fact, I've got to tell you this morning, I hate it when people call him the big guy upstairs.

He is not the big guy upstairs.

He is the king of kings.

He is the Lord of lords.

He is Jehovah.

He is our savior.

He is God, and he loves you.

That's a lot different than the big guy upstairs, okay?

Sorry, that's a different message.

You got extra this morning.

But we have to repent.

We have to repent of our sins.

Repenting is turning back away from them.

But it's only possible by a change.

It's only possible by a change of God's spirit in us.

We can't make that decision even on our own.

And we learned in Romans 2 that God's law is written on our hearts inherently.

I mean, we all have a moral code.

Whether we follow God or not, we all know that murder is wrong.

Where do you think that came from?

It didn't come from you.

Why do we think that life is valuable?

I mean, let's, again, here's a little extra again.

If we really believe in evolution and survival of the fittest and all this kind of stuff,

there is no morality.

What Hitler did was not wrong if we have no sense of morality.

If we have no sense of morality, if we have no sense of morality,

if we have no sense of morality,

if we have just, it's just how things happen in the world.

That's where, that's that line of logic.

We have our morality because there is an intelligent designer.

His name is the God of the universe, Jesus Christ.

And so it's written on our hearts, even though we don't want to admit it.

God's law is written on our hearts.

We're not good inherently.

I got to tell you, you know, I see, I see shirts that say you are enough.

You're not enough.

He is enough.

But we learned that in Romans 2.

We learned that in Romans 2.

Our seal of God is not in the things we do, going to church,

being kind, singing worship songs.

All of those things can be faked.

But what can't be faked is a heart that's turned toward God.

Doing for Jesus will not turn into being with Jesus unless you give your heart to him.

We can do a lot of good things, but it's not, we're not human doings.

We're human beings.

We're meant to be for God.

The doing means nothing if our heart doesn't belong to Christ.

But we also have to understand that God is loving, forgiving, and gracious.

But he is also jealous.

He's a God that will and must bring wrath.

He's a God that will not turn on sin.

He is righteous and he is a consuming fire.

And then Romans 3, last week, continued that theme.

Sin is the ultimate leveler.

We're all the same.

We learn that our character and our conduct have completely turned away from God.

We are utterly depraved.

Apart from God reaching down to us, we have no hope.

And the cause of that is that we have, every one of us, turned to our own way.

Every single one of us.

We've fallen away from God and even ran away, we've ran away from God.

Today, we hear,

But now, Romans changes today.

We get to talk about the salvation of God.

Just to warn you this morning, it's been a long couple of weeks for me.

I'm exhausted today.

I'm already emotional.

Hang on, okay?

God's grace has just overwhelmed me in the last week or so.

We've spent so much time talking about sin and its effects and consequences.

That God is righteous and judging us.

We're by nature, object of wrath.

We've done all the things our own way.

And the reality is that there's no one else.

There's no one who understands.

We're all understands.

God is angry at sin.

But we have to understand this.

God is angry with people who have Bibles too.

He's angry at all sin.

We are all under sin and God's word helps us see that.

There's no one who understands.

No one who seeks God.

The problem is our hearts.

We're deceitful and wicked.

We need a heart transplant.

We need a savior.

And so I have two questions for you this morning.

As we begin, we're going to talk about it at the very end.

How much, just think about it for a second.

How much does it matter that God,

that God is fair?

How much does it matter that God is fair?

All right.

And then how much does it matter that God forgives?

How much does it matter that God is fair?

And how much does it matter that God forgives?

I reffed basketball when I was in college.

Basketball is kind of my game.

That's what I played.

I've played, I've coached, I've officiated.

You might all think soccer's my game.

I love soccer and it has become a game that I love,

but I never played it.

I coached up to U10, all right.

And I can't do practices.

I just love soccer.

I love coaching game days, really.

Just so you know, we're in mourning at our house.

We did lose Thursday, two to one.

I'm just going to throw it out there.

My daughter played the game of her life on Thursday

and just played awesome.

But the reality is, is we wish the season wasn't over.

It is.

So we've shed some tears this week.

Well, Cindy and I have.

Everybody else has too.

But basketball is kind of my game.

It's always been, I mean, I love all sports,

but basketball is the one I know the most about.

And I reffed up and said,

until I think Kylie was probably about five years old.

So it's been 15 years since I've reffed

because I just don't have that kind of time

to be able to do that.

I'd like to again, eventually.

Maybe once Cindy graduates,

I might dip my toe back into officiating.

But I was reffing at this school

in a place called Sio, Oregon,

back in probably 1997 or eight.

Sio is a very, very interesting town.

It is a small town.

It's a logger town.

It's, I don't know, a bunch of hicks.

All right.

That's just the way it is.

And so I go out there and I'm reffing this game.

And when you reff lower levels, I was still learning.

You always reff a freshman and JV combo.

Back in 97, I was earning a hundred bucks a night

just to run up and down the court for three hours

and get yelled at and all kinds of other things.

But the reality is,

me and a partner reffed both games.

And we always talk as referees

that if you call a tech, you throw him out.

So if you tee up a coach, you tee up a player,

let's not have one reff throw the guy out

because then he can just throw him out.

He can just get mad at one reff, right?

And so the first game, this coach for SIO

was just going nuts, right?

He was just being a jerk.

It was an assistant coach on the bench

that was just every call.

It didn't matter what it was.

We go to the JV game,

come to find out that was the JV coach yelling at us.

And so now he's the head coach

and we're doing the best we can.

There's not a lot of space around the court.

The walls are right on the court.

It's a smaller gym.

And so finally, first half,

this guy just yells at my partner

all the way down the side.

He's like, that's enough tech.

Now the guy's got to sit down.

And basketball, once you get a technical foul as a coach,

you can no longer stand up and coach.

You have to sit down.

That's just the rule.

So second half comes along and I make a call.

I remember all this.

I made an offensive charge call,

sent it the other way.

He used some choice words to describe what he thought of me

and I ran him out of the gym.

I'm like, that's it. You're done. Get out of here.

Threw him out.

I had to stand there and wait for five minutes

for this guy to leave the gym.

I was this close to forfeiting the game.

Then we go into the locker room after the game.

He will not open the locker room for us.

Fans are going nuts.

Leaders will say, we went out the back door

because we were a little concerned for our safety.

Now that coach,

realistically, he thought we were being unfair.

He wanted things to be fair.

We were doing the best we could.

We're fallible humans. We wanted things to be fair.

My forgiveness reached its end

and I said, bye-bye.

I'm thankful that God doesn't do that to us.

As we dig in today, it seems as though

God's fairness and forgiveness are kind of at odds

in the passage we're going to read.

In order for God to be fair or just,

he has to judge sin. He has to deal with it.

But if he forgives,

does he just wink his eye at us

and say everything's okay

and not ever deal with the sins

that we've committed?

What does it actually mean that God's forgiven us?

Sometimes I think that's how we treat

forgiveness, is that we go,

God's just like, yeah, you're good.

And that's what forgiveness looks like from God.

Martin Luther called this section of Scripture

the

chief point and the very central

place of the epistle of Romans

and of the whole Bible.

The British preacher Martin Lloyd-Jones

once said, there are no more wonderful

words in the whole of Scripture

than just these two words.

But now.

And we hear them now. So let's turn our Bibles to Romans

chapter 3. Our devices, whatever.

If you don't have a Bible this morning or a Bible app,

you can download the River Church app.

Give you all the information about what's going on in the church

as well as gives you a copy

of the English Standard Version

in that app as well.

So let's read verses

21 to 31.

It'll be on the screen. Oh, you know what?

No, it won't. I just remembered.

I was supposed to put in my slides

and I didn't get those in. I was going to

do it between and I didn't do it. He's like,

where are my slides? It's not

his fault. All my fault.

We were on

staff retreat this week and I was so out of

schedule and I dropped that

ball. If you can pull it up quickly,

that'd be awesome. See what you can do.

Romans 3, 21 to 31.

If you can't, I get it. No problem.

Romans 3, 21 to 31.

We'll read it now.

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested

apart from the law, although the law

and the prophets bear witness to it.

The righteousness of God through

faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe,

for there is no distinction.

For all have sinned and fall

short of the glory of God

and are justified by His grace as a gift

through the redemption that is in Christ

Jesus, whom God put

forward as a propitiation by

His blood to be received by

faith. This was to show God's

righteousness because in His divine forbearance

He had passed over former

sins. It was to show His righteousness

at the present time so that He might

be just and the justifier

of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Then what becomes of our boasting?

It is excluded. By what kind of law?

By a law of works? No, but by the

law of faith. For we hold that one is

justified by faith apart from the works of the law.

Or is God the God of the Jews?

Only. Is He not the God of the Gentiles also?

Yes, of the Gentiles

also, since God is one who

will justify the circumcised by faith

and the uncircumcised through

faith. Do we then overthrow this law

by this faith? By no means.

On the contrary, we

uphold the law. So this

passage is absolutely full

of doctrine. Full of

doctrine. We could spend time on so many

individual topics here. We see

justification, which is the idea

that God looks at us as

though we have never sinned, just as if

I'd never sinned. The shift

in salvation history from

what was happening in the Old Testament

and how God dealt with sin in the Old Testament

to now how God has dealt with sin

through the cross of Jesus Christ. Total

shift. There's the ideas of sin,

faith, grace, that

big theological word that nobody understands

we're going to talk a little bit about this morning,

propitiation. Everybody

reuse that word on a daily basis? I know

I do.

Forgiveness and God's justice.

Huge topics. We're going to touch

a little bit on them all this morning.

But the first thing we have to notice here is that Paul is

referring back to chapter 1, verse

17, where he says,

For in the righteousness of God is revealed from faith

for faith, as it is written,

the righteous shall live

by faith. He's referring back to the righteousness

of God. He spent talking

about the time, he spent time

talking about the need of a Savior.

Now this righteousness has been given

to us, given to those

that believe. And so

in verse 21 he says that it's been

manifested apart from the law, although the law

and the prophets bore witness to it.

See, the difference between the law and God's

righteousness, it's put against

each other. I love this word. It's juxtaposed

here. It's a fun word

for me. It's put

against one another. When we look

at verse 20 right before it, it says that

the works of the law, no human

being will be justified in its sight because

through the law comes the knowledge of sin.

See, the law has no

justification in it in the Old

Testament. You're not, nobody

was justified of their sin

in the Old Testament because the law

revealed what sin was. It was a list of things

that God gave to people to say, hey,

this is what you cannot do if you're going

to have a relationship with a holy God.

Now he gave a way to have a relationship

through the sacrifices of the Old Testament

because the Bible also says

that without the shedding of blood,

there's this word again, there is no

propitiation of

sin. We'll get to the word in a little

while. Okay, so you'll understand what that

means here in a little bit. The law

makes us accountable. The law

tells us what sin is

and the law shuts our mouths

because we have nothing to say about any righteousness

that we think we may have. Remember that rich guy

that says, man, I obey all the Ten Commandments.

I do all this stuff. What did Jesus say?

Go sell everything. Ooh, maybe you

were more about greed than what he thought

he knew. He may have obeyed the letter of the

law, but in his heart, there were

problems. Kind of like us.

We can do a lot of good things, but in our

hearts, there's still problems. The law didn't

provide a solution to sin, just a knowledge

of it. The law couldn't save.

He says, but now, the righteousness

of God has been manifested.

It's been given to us apart from the law.

The law and the prophets testified

to this righteousness, but it

wasn't that righteousness. The law

told us what sin was. The prophets

proclaimed the Messiah, who Jesus was,

who would save the world from their sins,

Jew and Gentile alike. Jesus

would come. And so then we look at verses 22

and 23, and this righteousness is

given to those that believe.

In Jesus Christ.

It is through faith in Jesus Christ.

Faith only in Christ.

Not in the works we've done. We've just spent

three or four weeks talking about all the

works that we've actually done. So I'm not

going to rehash that today. We

come to God empty-handed and

desperate. And if we come to him

any other way, we don't

understand it. And if

we think in any way we can save

ourselves, we are missing

the cross of Christ.

I've got to tell you this morning, if you think in

any way in your heart

that you have saved yourself,

you're wrong. I don't want to say it that

bluntly, but it's true. It's only

through Christ. I don't bring anything

to the table. Don't. Because any

good in me comes from Jesus. Any

good in you comes from Jesus.

It's him working through you.

That's the beauty of the gospel. I

don't have to strive. I

simply have to let Jesus live

through me. That's the beauty of it.

We can stop trying so

hard. Don't do. Be.

There's a difference. Doesn't mean it doesn't

take effort. Doesn't mean it doesn't take decisions and that we have

to just, I have to decide every day to let Jesus

live in me. Because there's a lot of me that

would rather live rather than let Jesus live in me.

I think that's true of every single one of us. God's

work in Christ is for every single person,

but it's only activated

for those who believe. Every single

one who believe. This is not

just mental assent.

I believe it. I know it in my head.

I'll use the same illustration I've been using for years.

I think it's effective. If I sit

in a chair down here, if I'm going to go to this

chair down here, I'm like, this is a sturdy

chair. I love this chair. I believe in this chair.

It'll hold me up. I'm a bigger

dude. I really got to take a look at chairs before I sit down

on them. The reality is, is

that if I talk about this

chair and talk about this chair and talk about this chair

and talk about this chair, you say, well, sit in the

chair. Oh, not going to happen. I'm not sitting

in that chair. Do I really believe in the chair?

I don't actually believe in the chair until I

put all of myself in it.

All of my

self in it.

See, a lot of people talk about belief. A lot of people

here talk about belief. Have we put everything

the cross of Christ? It's when

we know we're separate. We're desperate

for him. That's when we know that we've been

poor in spirit, like Jesus talked about in the

Beatitudes, when we've mourned over our

sin. We know we have no hope

apart from Jesus Christ. And that's

when life changes. And

that's what Paul's trying to tell us today. Verse

23, the context of this passage, we

all read that all have sinned

and fallen short of God's glorious standard.

Many of us who've grown up in the church, we know

this verse, but we never think about the

context. We never think about the verses

before and after it. It gives us so much

more oomph. Think about what we've seen

so much in Romans in the last three, four

weeks. All have sinned. Yeah,

that's all we've heard about. Paul has laid

it out. I've often thought we should call

our churches the first

church if we all stink. The way it is.

First church if we're all hypocrites. I don't know.

All those things. Let's be honest.

All have sinned and fallen short of God,

of the glory of God. We were made to be

God's glory bearers. We were.

We were made to be bearing the

glory of God himself.

Presence of God. So more than the fact

that we've missed the mark, which is what the word

sin means, it means that you're

taking a shot at a

bullseye and we've completely missed the target.

We haven't even hit the target.

It's totally off base.

We've missed the mark. But more than that,

my friends, we have lost the ability

to reflect the glory of God.

We've lost the ability

to reflect the presence of God

because we've been tarnished

like a silver tray or a silver

cup gets tarnished. It doesn't

shine like it used to. We've been

tarnished by sin. Every single one

of us. But the righteousness

of God is given to us

through Jesus. And that glory

will return one day. And can

return as he continues to mold us and

shape us into the image of Jesus Christ.

And then verse 20, verse 24, he says

and we are just

so he says for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory

of God. We stop there. Thank you.

Great job on the back there.

And we are what?

Justified. How awesome is that?

We stop. All have sinned and fallen short of God's

glorious standard. What's the next line?

And are justified

by his grace as a gift.

Praise God. It's not

just about our sin. It's really about

God's grace now. He's established

how much we stink. It's time

to talk about how awesome God is

and what he's made us. See, we're

justified. Verse 25, it

goes on and it says

it says whom God put

as a gift through Jesus Christ.

Whom God put forward as a

propitiation by

his blood. There's that word. All right.

How is this given to us?

It's given to us freely.

My friends, this is not a moral

change in us because we still

sometimes we think, man, I came to know Jesus and I

still stink. I still make bad decisions. Here's

what happens. God is in the process

of sanctifying us. That's another big

theological word that is becoming more like

Jesus. My friend, I would love to

tell you it's going to happen tomorrow. It's not going to complete until

you get to heaven. That's when the sanctification

process completes.

But justified, you are that right

now. You know what it is? It is a change

in legal status. You are no longer

guilty. You are now forgiven.

That, when you come to Christ, your legal

standing before God goes from guilty,

condemned, death

to life, freedom, and

forgiveness in an instant when

you come to Jesus Christ. That is a

beautiful gift and a beautiful picture of the word

justification. It is 100%

his grace and 0% of

our works through redemption

this idea of redemption here

through the redemption that's in Jesus Christ

the word is

apolytrosis in Greek

it's meant to be liberated

by paying a price. It was

the picture of somebody

coming and paying a price

to set free a slave

from a life of indentured

servitude. That's the

picture of redemption. It ain't

just no wink. He paid

the price because he

loves you. Our debt has

been paid by Christ

alone. It's only in and through Jesus

that we're saved. And then in verse 25

he says that he presented Christ. It's

not going to be on the screen because I didn't put it in there anyway.

I wasn't going to put it on the screen.

Isaiah 53 verses 10 and 11

I want to read this for you. Isaiah

53 verses 10 and 11 says this.

It just blows my mind.

Yet it was the will of the

Lord, all caps, that's

Yahweh, the covenant name of God.

It was the will of the Lord

to crush him. He has put

him to grief. When his soul

makes an offering for guilt,

he shall see his offspring.

He shall prolong his days. The will of the

Lord shall prosper in his hand. Out

of the anguish of his soul he shall see

and be satisfied. By his knowledge

shall the righteous one, my servant,

make many to be

accounted righteous. He

shall bear their

2,000 years earlier

it was God's plan from the beginning of time.

As soon as that snake tempted Eve,

as soon as Eve ate

the fruit, as soon as Adam ate the fruit,

as soon as they felt shame, God's

plan from the beginning was to crush Christ

so that the relationship

could be restored between us

and him. From the beginning of

time, he loves you

that much. Jesus was not

an innocent third party.

He is God himself taking on

God presented Christ. He placed

him forward as our

propitiation. That's the sacrament.

Sacrifice of atonement here.

Propitiation is a payment

in order to satisfy

wrath. That's what

propitiation means. Some authors

or some translators want to translate this verse

as something called expiation, which

basically means it's just a satisfying

of a debt. No, that's not

what Paul's saying here. He's saying this

is a payment to satisfy the just

It's a propitiation for sin.

A wrath quencher,

if you will. It's a sacrifice that's

satisfies God's anger. It's a

sacrifice that's accepted by faith in God

and only through the shedding of Christ's blood.

Commentator Christopher Ashe says

this. He says, so it is not just that God

hates the sin but loves the sinner.

God hates the sinner

and his wrath rests upon him.

If God loved me but just didn't like some of the

things I did, then the lesser

sacrifice of expiation

would be sufficient. But God

hates me as a guilty rebel.

He is very angry with me and

right to be angry. I know we don't like to hear this

about God, but think if somebody

came and did something horrendous to one

of your children. You would hate them

and you would be righteous in that

anger. That is what God

sees as sin and sinners.

It is from this awful truth

though that the gospel

of Jesus rescues me.

The paradox of the gospel is that

as Luther put it,

God loved us even as

he hated us. We must

not soften God's wrath.

For if we soften God's

wrath, we diminish his justice

and we minimize the sacrifice

of the cross.

I've said it many times this way. If we

think our sin is small and not a big deal,

the cross is small and not a big deal.

But if we understand that our sin is

offensive to God and he hates

the fact that it's even in our lives

and he hates us in that,

the cross stands taller

than it all. And how can we not

worship Jesus Christ

for what he has actually done?

Then by the end of 25 and 26,

it was to show

God's righteousness because in his divine

forbearance, he had passed over former sins.

It was to show his righteousness at the present time.

So God

showed his righteousness through the cross.

The cross is proof

that God has the right to forgive us.

It proves that he's right to call guilty

any that don't call upon

the name of Christ. When we really look at

the cross, we see God's love poured out

upon us. I can't say

it enough. God died.

That sounds like it should be

like, oh yeah, an oxymoron. That's exactly

the word I was looking for. It's an oxymoron.

It shouldn't make sense. It doesn't

make sense. God died.

And we're going to be talking all this about more

and more and more and more about what Jesus did for us in the coming

in reality, through his divine

forbearance, ultimately in the Old Testament

of the Old Testament believers, saints,

those that follow God, they were left

unpunished, unpaid for.

Why? He knew the cross was coming.

He was going to pay for it.

And so he gave those saints in the Old Testament

an ability to have a relationship with him

through the sacrificial system.

It was brutal. The people

knew what their sin

was. Because if you look at the

sacrificial system of the Old Testament, blood

continually flowed in the temple

and in the tabernacle. Because our sin,

the only way to pay for it is death. And so he

covered over those sins

looking forward to the cross because he knew

it was coming. He knew it was coming.

And their faith in God was counted to

them as righteousness. But think about

it. These sins that weren't atoned for.

Abraham was a liar. Moses,

he was disobedient. David,

he was a murderer and adulterer.

Samson, he was a fornicator and he was

prideful. And more. God counted their

faith to them as righteousness. And their

sins were paid for at the cross

of Christ. Just like yours and mine.

But then we can say, but that poses a big problem.

Is God right to let those sins just

slide? And we can think that God was

a horrible judge. But then he says in

verse 26, it was to show his right

justices at the present time after

the cross of Christ, what Paul is saying.

I love this part of the verse.

So that he might be just.

What does that mean? That he might be just.

He is a good judge. He put off the penalty

because a judge has the right to do that.

So he might be just

and the

of the one who has faith in Christ.

We can be united with Christ because

what is called the substitutionary

atonement of Christ.

That just means Jesus

died as my substitute.

I deserved it. Jesus paid

it. I'm free. Praise

God. That's what the gospel is.

The payment is made.

This idea of propitiation, the Greek word here

is hilasterion. It's only used

one other time in the New Testament in Hebrews 9

5, which talks about the atonement cover

of the Ark of the

Covenant. It's also

called the mercy seat

at the Ark of the Covenant. And so when Paul

is writing this, he has this in mind

of the mercy seat of God. This was

a Jewish audience he was writing to. Remember,

I'm going to go back to Leviticus 16.

You're like, what? Yeah, Leviticus.

Leviticus chapter 16. I just want

you to hear this. Verses 14 to 16 and 30.

In verse 14 it says this

to 16. This is what the priest would do.

And he shall take some of the blood

of the bull. This is of like

the Day of Atonement when he was sacrificing for all

of the people of Israel. He shall take some

of the blood of the bull and sprinkle it with his

finger on the front of the mercy seat

on the east side. And in front

of the mercy seat he shall sprinkle some

of the blood with his finger seven times.

Then he shall kill the goat of the sin

offering that is for the people and

bring its blood inside the veil and do with

its blood as he did with the blood of the bull,

sprinkling it over the mercy seat

and in the front of the mercy seat.

Thus shall he make atonement for the holy

place because of the uncleanness

of the people of Israel and because of their transgressions

all their sins.

And he shall do so for the tent of meeting

which dwells with them in the midst of their

uncleanliness. Verse 30 says

this. For on this day shall

atonement be made for you

to cleanse you. You shall

be clean before the Lord from all

your sins.

That was the Old Testament. The

propitiation for all of our sin

was made at the cross of Christ.

At the mercy seat of the

cross where mercy sits.

Christ is where our sins are taken

care of. Paid for. Because when we

understand this almost too much.

I don't deserve this. I don't.

I don't deserve to have one of my sins paid

off let alone all of them. And

not just paying off my sin. Loving

me in the middle of my brokenness.

Loves you in the middle of your brokenness.

He's a just and justifier.

Just God and he's a justifier of

murderers. Of adulterers.

Those that have traded the truth of God for a lie.

Lesbians. Porn addicts.

Of drug dealers. And addicts.

Of fornicators.

Of thieves. The greedy. The

deceitful. The gossipers. The malicious.

The arrogant. The boastful. Those that

disobey their parents. Those that have all understanding.

No fidelity. No love.

No mercy. That whole list

that he listed in Romans chapter 1

is connected to this passage right here.

He is the just and justifier

of every single person that's on that list.

One and say everybody's bad.

Yeah everybody's bad.

God provides salvation for every

single one. How can we

not love those people instead

of telling them how bad they are?

Through Christ. And the justice

of God is satisfied. And the

mercy of God is complete.

At the cross of Christ. Praise

God. How much does it matter that God is

fair? Immensely. Because he's

just. He has to punish sin.

And we've all been found to be in

sin a ton. In order

for God to be who he says he is, he's

gotta punish sin. And he has.

He punished sin by Jesus

dying in my place. How much does it matter

that God forgives? It matters

immensely because without forgiveness, God

is not a merciful, gracious God. He has

forgiven us all through Jesus

if we accept him as our Savior.

Friends, God sets people free

from sin and death through Jesus.

Remember today, God sets

people free from sin and death through

Jesus Christ. I'm gonna finish

this morning with more of that passage

or that sermon that I read from Eric Lutie

in the gospel. I told you about that video on

YouTube. If you haven't watched it, I still encourage you

to do it. But this is more of his

message about the gospel and I'm gonna read

it a little more later in the series.

But I wanna read what I read to you last week and

then read a little bit more today. It'll take

a couple minutes, but I think it's important that we hear it. It's a

great place to end this morning.

He says, I'm gonna introduce you to the gospel.

You are a rebel against the living God. It's your

natural disposition because you were born in sin.

We're all in a prison cell and it takes the grace

of God to awaken us to the fact

that we're lost and we can't get out. We're

headed toward destruction fast. The enemy

because of our rebellion against God has

legal rights to harm and harass our life.

There you are behind a prison cell yelling

help, I need out. Can't get out because

the prison bars are impenetrable.

You cannot escape. You're doomed because when the

enemy comes in at the very end, he's gonna

finish you off because he has legal right

to do it. He will relish

every minute after, Cesar. You're a mighty

man and he stands between you and

the accuser and he takes the

hit that was rightfully yours.

the blow that was intended for you.

It's an extraordinary reality.

He was turned into a pulp

died for you.

Over your prison cell, it was always said

condemned, separated eternally

from God and guilty.

Jesus takes the blow. It suddenly

switches. When you realize what Jesus Christ

has done, it says justified,

forgiven, and redeemed.

Here's the problem. Most of us have stopped

with the good news right there. The blood of Christ

has been shed. He was killed. That is unbelievable news.

But we're still in the prison cell. We're praising

God within the cell saying, thank you

for forgiving me. Thank you for changing the sign above

my cell. And God's word says,

could you check the door? Because my blood

was shed for more than just forgiveness.

Forgiveness was the avenue through which

he could make the escape for us. He is in

interested in just dealing with the consequences

of the penalty of sin. He also dealt with

the problem of sin. Test the

door to the prison cell and you're going to find it's

unlocked. Walk out of your

cell. Smell the open air of freedom

and liberty and walk the life of Jesus.

And when you get outside of this prison cell,

there is what's like a chariot waiting.

It's like an emissary for the king is waiting for you.

And he says the king beckons you into his

presence. Do you realize how bizarre this

is? That you, the rebel, undeserving,

completely undeserving of

the living God to give up his life for you, he's now

set you free. And the king

is beckoning you into his

very presence, into his throne

room all the time. Are you

sure you have the right person? I'm a rebel. I spat

in his face. How could he want me now?

The king beckons you and wants you to live

where he lives. Not just the

penalty. Not just the problem.

Not just an invitation into his very near

presence, but he wants to adopt you

as a child. You are brought in and invited

near to the very heart of God. Some of us

in this room are still sitting in that prison cell.

Maybe we know Jesus. We are still gripped

by the things of our past.

We're still gripped by who we used

to be. Some of us in this room are

gripped by anxiety. I was for this

past week. I went back to my prison cell

reminded who my Jesus is.

Tuesday prepping this message was one of the hardest

things I've done in a long time. My anxiety

came back up like it was back in

COVID out of nowhere. I was in

chains this week. I stand here today

free as a Jesus. Some of us got to

walk out of our prison cells. Doesn't mean you're not

going to go back into it sometimes because

we're afraid. We're scared that it's not

true. We think we have to carry

the burdens on our own. We think we have to figure it out

on our own. We think we've done too much. We've

been stupid again. We've whatever all those things

are. No, the cross is bigger.

His love is greater. Check the door.

If you don't know him this morning, there is a

love that is available to you that is greater than

any love you'll ever know. It's not always easy.

He's loved. Couldn't live this life.

In fact, I'm convinced I wouldn't be alive today

if it wasn't for Jesus. The years of my

life. We could have plenty of testimonies of that

here this morning, I'm sure. Of what he's pulled us out

of and the things we go back to and we come out of

time to walk out of the prison cell. All

have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, but

we are justified by

Christ and he is just

and he's a justifier of your soul.

Will you give him your heart if you've not yet done

so? Because if you stand before a

holy God without Jesus Christ

as your savior, his wrath doesn't

fall on him. It has to fall on

you because he is just. But

if you call on the name of Jesus,

believe in your heart that he's the

son of God and confess through the mouth

that God raised him from the dead, you'll be saved.

And your sin will be paid for. It'll be

nailed to the cross and then he becomes your

justifier. Christian, if you're

still in the cell this morning, I want to come and pray

as we sing the final song here a little bit. Please do.

For people at guest services that would love to speak with

you, love to pray with you, I'm available to do the same.

All have sinned and fallen short of

God's glorious standard. Sin has been paid for

if you'll call on it. Thank you for your love for us.

I am continually blown away by how

you love, by how you care. I loved hearing

the words of my daughter on Thursday

crying over a game that we lost.

God even cares about stupid,

strict, final soccer losses.

You do. If there's people here today that don't know

you, I pray that they would hear your heart for them.

The cross of Christ you gave for

us. Those that are still living in their prison

cells, God, I pray that they test the door. I know

that can be real scary. Sometimes

we just like what we know. There's freedom

available. Just pray. Hear your voice

above all the noise. You are

just. Justified.