Part 3: The Power Of The Gospel And The Wrath Of God (Romans 1:16-25) Series

Most of you guys know I cut my hand a few months ago. I was using a kitchen knife in a way that a kitchen knife wasn't designed to be used, and I nicked the base of my pinky. I went to Urgent Care, thinking I would just need a couple of stitches to stop the bleeding, and then I would be on my way. But just before the doctor stitched me up, he said, "Mr. Jackson, can you flex your finger?"

And I couldn't do it. Then he said, "I'm going to run a pen up one side of your finger and down the other. Let me know if there's any point where you can't feel it."

And I couldn't feel the pen. And the doctor said, "You've cut a tendon and the nerve. You need surgery and probably several months of therapy."

Well, that wasn't the answer I wanted to hear. But it was the diagnosis I needed. There was a treatment for my hand, but until I understood the bad news, I couldn't just jump to the good news that eventually I would regain the use of my hand. I had to deal with the bad news first.

And that's where we find ourselves as we talk about the wrath of God this morning. Before we can really understand the good news of the gospel, we have to deal with the bad news of where we stand before God. Please open your Bibles to Romans 1.

1. Outlining Romans

This morning we are going to move past Paul’s introduction and into the real heart of the letter. And this would be a good place for you to find a blank page in your study journal and just sketch out this outline of Romans. The overall theme of the letter is the righteousness of God. Look again at verses 16-17:

16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”

From there, you can break Romans up into four sections.

The wrath of God, which we will get into today. From 1:18 to Chapter 3, verse 20.

Then the grace of God, from 3:21-8:39

After that, we will get into the plan of God, in Romans 9-11. And fair warning, this is going to be some of the densest doctrine and theology you’ll find in the Scripture, but it also answers a question so many of us ask, and that is, “what is God’s plan for the Jews? Are they still God’s chosen people? Will they just automatically be saved?” (Spoiler alert—There is one, yes, they are, and no, they won’t.)

Finally, from Chapter 12 to the end of the letter, you see the will of God. This is where Paul gets really, really practical. How should Christians live in the world? What is their relationship to the government? How should they act toward one another?

2. From faith for faith (v. 17)

There are a couple of things I want us to see in verse 17 that are so important: First, the righteousness of God that we have in the gospel is a “revealed” righteousness. Not an earned righteousness. Human beings unaided could never have conceived or still less attained it.

Second, you see the reason for the revealed righteousness. It is “from faith for faith.”

What does this phrase “from faith for faith” mean? Different translations handle this in different ways. The King James Version says faith to faith. The Amplified Bible really helps our understanding when it says that the righteousness from God is “both springing from faith” and “leading to faith.” In other words, righteousness is both the starting point of salvation and the goal of salvation. How does that work?

This statement should remind believers that justifying faith is only the beginning of the Christian life. A lot of times we imagine saving faith as being the end goal. A “get out of hell free” card. And usually when we think about that attitude, we picture someone who made a profession of faith as a child, and then think they can live their lives however they want. Paul’s going to have a lot of words for that attitude later on in the letter.

But let’s look at it the other way– because I think there’s an equally dangerous temptation toward legalism. A lot of good church people think that saving faith forgives your sin, but from that point on you are trying to stay in “God’s good graces” by doing good works.

Tim Keller puts it this way. He says, “Many people think Jesus died merely to forgive us. Our sins were laid on him, and we are pardoned when we believe in him. That is true, but that is only half of Christian salvation. If that were all Jesus did, we would then only receive a new “wiped clean” slate. It would be up to us to add credit to our account. But when Paul says we are saved from faith for faith, he is saying that we’ve been declared righteous, not just declared “not guilty.””