As always we will start from a little recap from previous weeks. In case you haven’t been here last time, we are going through the Book or Romans and we are up to a chapter 3. Last few Sundays we spent talking about the state of the world. The state of the church and the problem that exited at the time, which by the way even though changed it’s form, still remains relevant. Problem that Holy Spirit addresses through apostle Paul, fulfilling God’s plan. Slowly but surely we advance towards new way of thinking, towards a new perspective on following the Lord. Drifting away from justification by works, and shifting our attention to justification by faith. And ultimately are we going through the battle of religion vs living faith.
Last Sunday we discussed that being right with God does not come because of the national factor. It Does not come by the shire belonging to a specific group of people.
Romans 2:28,29
²⁸For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical.²⁹But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man but from God.
We talked that being religious does not help people. It did not help Jews to be right with God. And not gonna help us as well. So, religiosity is not what we are after. Loving God is not about following some rules, it’s not about having high moral standards or practicing certain activities. It is all outward and visual but not necessarily reflect inner state of man. If you think that going to church makes you right with God, it is not. It you think that to live for God it is to follow the set of rules, it is not. God pleased with people who are circumcised at their heart, in the Spirit. As it emphasized in the 2nd chapter.
Same as being a Jew, having a physical circumcision, practicing the law. Not gonna justify you before God.
It was very contrary view for the people of the day. And it produced a question among the Jewish(and not only Jewish) follower of Christ, question which we will address today:
Romans 3:1
¹Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision?
If belonging to God’s nation does not “buy” you pass to God’s kingdom. If it’s not a basis for justification. What’s a point then? Then what’s the difference between God’s people and the rest of the world? Why would you bother to live a life devoted to God. It does not make any sense. For hundreds of years people believed that this is how you get justified before God. By being one of His special people. By following the law. And if that is not true. If God will judge all people the same way, what advantage have His “special” people?
Romans 3:2-4
²Much in every way. To begin with, the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God.³ What if some were unfaithful? Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God?⁴By no means! Let God be true though every one were a liar, as it is written,
“That you may be justified in your words, and prevail when you are judged.”
The people of Israel do have an advantage. But, it is not what they thought. The advantage is not that God will treat their sin any different. It is not that God will evaluate their life according to some different standards. No, we already figured that God shows no partiality. He does not respect the outward circumstances of the man.
Verse 2 in ESV translation says “to begin with”. Which in my opinion is not the best way to put it. At least it does not sit right with me. Because, for me it assumes there will be some kind of list of things and Paul does not present a list things. At least not right here. But rather emphasize importance of one of them. I think the better way to put it would be like in KJV “Chiefly” or like NIV says “First of all”.
The most important advantage is that God trusted Jewish people with his word. It is to them God decided to revile Himself. Though them we have written word of God today. To them God reveled His will, His plans, and His ways. They have received God’s promises, His blessings. To them God sent His son. God decided to bless entire humanity via them. If that’s not an advantage I don’t know what is.
Romans 3:3
³ What if some were unfaithful? Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God?
Unfortunately big portion of God’s special people rejected God’s blessing. They did not believe in Jesus, the Son of God. The messiah, the savior of the world. And it might seems like now God’s plans failed, nullified. His very special people have blown it. And now the rest of the world not gonna get those sweet blessings of God because those guys messed it up!
Praise God, it is not the case. Let’s look into next verse. I will use a modern translation for sake of ease of understanding:
Romans 3:4 (NLT)
Of course not! Even if everyone else is a liar, God is true. As the Scriptures say about him,
“You will be proved right in what you say, and you will win your case in court.”
Luckily for us, there is nothing that can stop God’s plans. They will come into existence regardless. Because God is always true to His word. And the basis of His promises is Himself, and that is why we CAN and SHOULD rely on God more the anything else. God and His world are truly immutable. They never change. Even if every last man will turn away from God, he will still be true to the promises He made to people. So, faithlessness of God’s special people do not nullify His plans, but rather reveal the greatness of God. Because, He stays true even though people are not.
Romans 3:5 (NLT)
5“But,” some might say, “our sinfulness serves a good purpose, for it helps people see how righteous God is. Isn’t it unfair, then, for him to punish us?” (This is merely a human point of view.)
This section(few following verses) might sound a bit confusing at first. To underhand what it’s all about a bit better, we need to take into account a few things. Back in a Paul’s day it was common in philosophical and legal debates to pose a slippery-slope “what if” scenario — showing that a single premise, taken to its logical extreme, produces an absurd or unjust result.
What Paul is saying, and we talk about this for the last few Sundays, is that we cannot be justified by the work of the law. That the law only points to God’s justice, to His goodness. How exactly law points to God’s goodness? Because God forgives a sinner(Jew and Gentile), if that sinner repents, apart from his the works. And judges those who do not repent by their works. And it’s not a good news for the people who rely on their works, because we all broke God’s law one way or another.
But what people believed is that it is all about your works. You get blessing for obedience and curses for disobedience. That having the law justifies you.
So following Paul’s logic, which were foreign to them, they would go down that “what if” rabbit hole and pose a question. That if my sins show how good God is. That despite my faithlessness He is still faithful, that despite of my wrongdoing He still keeps His promises. Then we can say that my sin bring glory to God. And when God get’s glorified it’s a good thing, right? Which means my works glorified God, and it is very good. And if I’m doing a good thing, why I’m getting punished for that? It is unfair. So, Paul, you ether wrong and God not going to Judge His special people, or God is unfair to me.
If we will rephrase that statement it would sound like:
If God simply forgives sinners (Jewish or Gentile) without demanding perfect Law-keeping, is God still a just Judge?
We will be getting the long version of the answer throughout the entire book. But, short version is in the verse 6:
Romans 3:6
⁶By no means! For then how could God judge the world?
Back in the day this argument did not required any explanation. Because both Paul and his opponents believed that God is coming to Judge the world. It was not even a question. No one argued that.
What people argued is that God will judge Gentiles for their sins and justify Jews despite their sins. Because, one way or another they have glorified God. Weather though their obedience and faithfulness or though their disobedience and faithlessness God was glorified.
But it is only twisted human logic. That has nothing to do with actual truth. In such case God would not be able to judge no one. But we know that He WILL judge and he WILL render to everyone what they deserve.
Romans 3:7,8
⁷But if through my lie God’s truth abounds to his glory, why am I still being condemned as a sinner?⁸And why not do evil that good may come? — as some people slanderously charge us with saying. Their condemnation is just.
This new teaching of FAITH vs WORKS were misunderstood, rejected and fought against by many Jews. Because it did not align with their view of the world. So, they would use rhetorical tools, distorting Paul’s words and meaning to make it sound like absolute noses. Because they didn’t want to believe, and more then that they would withhold others from believing. By spreading roomers and lie. They chose to obey unrighteousness and rejected the truth just as we read in chapter 1. And Unfortunately they were condemned for that.
Romans 3:9
⁹What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin,
This is the bottom line for this entire argument. No one is in the privileged state before God. We all under the sin. And there is only one way out of it. Living Faith. But this is the topic for the next week.
Religion show surrender and give up to it’s successor - living faith. As humans we are good at creating retrials, systems and religions. And we might easily slip into the trap of religious faith.
Today Holy Spirit fights the same battle in me and you. As he did in the hearts of the Christians of the first century. Because we, the people, we would do anything in order to avoid building relationships with God. To this day, some “Christians” drift away from truth in to Judaism, in to other stuff. Why? Because they have no relationships with God. Because, they rely on logic and someonelses experiences.
Justification is not in belonging, in logic, rhetoric’s or works. It’s not about being good person. Having high moral standards and being vocal about it.
THE ENEMIES OF THE LIVING FAITH - that’s what we talking about. And this week it is logic and tradition, but there is more. There is a battle in you. Between Holy Spirit and Tradition. Maybe you grew up in strong Pentacostal tradition and it’s shaped the way you follow God. Maybe a Baptist tradition left it’s blueprint. Catholic, Ortodox it doesn’t matter.
God put you into His Church tonight to go back to the source. To go back to the Living Faith. To leave the bondage of the tradition. And it can be hard. It was not easy for Jewish believers back in the Paul’s day, not because they were bad people. But because they grew up with their tradition. Generation after generation. And it occupied a lot of their head space. Same with me and you. We tent to protect our tradition. We use logic and rhetoric’s. We do all the same things as people back in the day.
But we are not called into tradition. We called into relationships. Into the family of God.
Marriage example
We can compare it to the marriage. It’s not gonna be fully accurate. But it is very close to the truth, so, please bear with me. Growing up in your family you observe your mom and dad. They teach you verbally or non verbally about what the marriage is and how it works. Your view of the relationships getting derived from what you lived through as a kid. And then, you grow up and enter your own relationship. And it very well might happen that you start to treat your loved one in the ways you saw in your family. You have all this prejudges and assumption that you both carried over from your parents relationships. Good and Bad. And often they get in the way. Often they are the reason for the conflicts. Even when you don’t see it.
And now you have a choice. You can be stubborn and keep doing what you doing. Because you know it is right. Because, you saw it in your family and your parents are still together. And that’s not easy life. And far not all relationships can survive that. Especially if that’s the choice on the both sides. And we all have fallen for that at some point.
Or you can leave those experiences, that framework. And start getting to know your spouse. Start building YOUR own relationship instead of utilizing someone else’s. And of course there is room for error. And that’s why you should have people would help you not to do stupid and sometimes dangerous mistakes.
Maybe it never happened to you. But I’ve been subjected to that. When I was Yang and Stupid. Someone tells you or you just have this idea in your head:
“that’s how it should be, this is how it works. What you have is not right”.
And you go and try to live by that only to figure out that it’s actually doesn’t work. That for your family it does more damage than good. Even though it worked for your parents in the past. Or it works for that other family. Not always you can take someone else’s experience, even if it’s a good one. And apply it to your situation. There is no work around of getting to know your loved one. It is a big part of the very reason for the relationships.
WRAP UP
Today we should pray and ask Holy Spirit to reveal to us His truth. Maybe today we should let go of some thing. Things that shape our view of God in a wrong way. Maybe there are things that does not help us in building up our Faith anymore. Religious way of thinking. When we rely on tradition. On our favorite authors and preachers to shape our image of God.
We should not rely on the tradition. We should leave religious way of thinking. And get to know our God. Though His word.
John 8:31,32
³¹So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples,³²and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”