Romans 1-4: Justification - The Righteousness of God
By: Wayne ODonnell
Date: Sunday, March 30, 2008
Website: http://bible.ag
Introduction - Rom1:1-17
Everybody has an outline? Good morning, and it’s good to see you all again. There’s a few people I haven’t met yet.
We are going to be talking about Romans 1 through 4. Romans 1 through 4, the righteousness of God, justification. In verse 1: “Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God, which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures, concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord,” Rom1:1-3.
The theme of this book, the book of Romans, is the gospel of God. Now it is incorrect to picture Jesus as trying to persuade the Father to forgive us, because the gospel was God the Father’s idea from the beginning. You notice it says “He had promised...by his prophets...concerning his Son,” Rom1:2-3.
The word “gospel” is from the old English, something like “good spiel”, meaning good news, and it is good news because it is the gospel of God, not of man. It is something about what God has done for man. If it was something about what man has to do for God, something else that we have to do for God, that wouldn’t be good news. But it is about what God has done for man.
In Romans 1:16-17, “I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth... For therein is the righteousness of God revealed.” The book of Romans is about salvation. Salvation is comprised of three parts: the righteousness of God is justification. That is our salvation past. The glory of God is glorification. That is our salvation future. That is found in Romans 5 through 11. And the will of God, sanctification, is salvation present. That is found in Romans 12 through 16. And today we are going to look at justification in Romans 1 through 4. So that is the division of the book.
Now believing in the gospel, directly results only in justification, that is, receiving the “righteousness of God”. The “righteousness of God” doesn’t mean that God is righteous. It means righteousness from God, just like the gospel is the gospel from God. So believing the gospel results in justification, but because of the way we are justified, justification always results in glorification and sanctification. So that is why the main proposition of the book of Romans is, “All who have been justified will be glorified, and all who have been justified are being sanctified, because of the way in which we are justified.” So the gospel is “the power of God unto salvation,” (Rom1:16) all three parts - justification, glorification and sanctification - because “therein is the righteousness of God” (Rom1:17), justification, revealed. And justification, in turn, results in the other two. That is the theme of the book of Romans.
But we are going to just focus on justification today. So in Romans 1:18 Paul begins - that was the introduction - Paul begins the four chapter division on justification.
The Ungodliness and Unrighteousness of Men - Rom1:18-32
The first section here is the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. And Paul starts out in verse 18, “For the wrath of God...” How many of us would start our presentation of the good news of the gospel with the wrath of God? But, you know, if there is no wrath of God there is no need for the gospel. And the wrath of God is the biggest problem that every person that comes into this world faces. It is not our finances. It is not our health. It is not our social life, it is how are you going to deal with the wrath of God?
Why doesn’t God just stop being angry? That would solve the whole thing, right? Well, he is angry because he is a just judge. He is angry at—as it says here—“against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men.” Rom1:18.
You notice that the order is ungodliness and unrighteousness. The order is important because ungodliness leads to unrighteousness. You can’t have morality apart from godliness.
What is ungodliness? Romans 1:21, “When they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful.” Failing to acknowledge the Creator, failing to be appreciative of his gifts, that is all it takes to be ungodly. And that leads to unrighteousness.
Because men are ungodly, God has allowed us to become thoroughly unrighteous as a judgment upon us, upon our ungodliness. Our bodies are affected in 1:24. “Wherefore God also gave them up... to dishonour their own bodies between themselves.” Our souls are affected in Romans 1:26. “God gave them up unto vile affections” and emotions. Our spirits are affected in Romans 1:28. “God gave them over to a reprobate mind.” Thoroughly ungodly and unrighteous; thoroughly unrighteous because of our ungodliness.
There is a list of unrighteous deeds in Romans 1:29-31. “Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, Without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, [and] unmerciful.” This is the condition of man. So that is the first section.
The Judgment of God – Rom2:1-17
The second section begins in chapter two verse one. It is about the judgment of God.
We learn three things about the judgment of God. First of all, it is according to truth. In Romans 2:2, “But we are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth against them which commit such things.” In other words God’s judgment is righteous and the standard is truth.
Secondly, it is according to deeds in Romans 2:6. “Who will render to every man according to his deeds.” There are two groups of people in the judgment. Group one, “To them who by patient continuance in well doing,” that is, doing good all the time without fail, perfectly, “seek for glory and honour and immortality, eternal life: But unto them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish,” Rom2:7-9.
That is a sequence going from the heart of God into the heart of man. It starts off with God seeing our unrighteousness and having indignation in his heart. And then that is expressed by wrath, outward wrath from God. It is received as tribulation in the person that suffers it, the wrath of God. And then, because he is suffering that tribulation, he has anguish in his heart.
The previous section we looked at shows which group we fall into, group one or group two, because we saw before that we are “filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness,” Rom1:29. We are obviously in group two, those that obey unrighteousness and receive the punishment at the judgment.
Thirdly, we see that God’s judgment is according to law. Hi, Sal. Romans 2:12-13. We are on page two at the top. “For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law: and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law; (For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified).”
So this is not good news. Some sin with the law. Some sin without the law. Some perish with the law. Some perish without the law. But all sin, and all perish. That is God’s judgment. That is how we will fare in God’s judgment.
The Law Says All Men Are Sinners – Rom2:17-3:20
The next section is about what the law says about this. The law says that all men are sinners. Romans 3:9, “We have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin.” That means all servants under the master of sin.
“As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one...none that understandeth...none that seeketh after God...all gone out of the way...together become unprofitable...none that doeth good, no, not one,” Rom3:10-12. And Paul is not just saying this under the inspiration of Scripture. These are all single quotes scattered throughout the Old Testament, the testimony of many different prophets in the Old Testament. Throats are open sepulchres, swift to shed blood, destruction and misery in their ways, no fear of God, the way of peace the have not known, no fear of God. (Romans 3:13-18.)
“Now we know that what things soever the law [says], it [says] to them who are under the law,” that’s the Jewish people; the Gentiles never were given the law, “that every mouth may be stopped,” Jews and Gentiles alike, “and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin,” Rom3:19-20. That’s the best the law can do for you, to help you to know that you are a sinner.
Justification By Faith – Rom3:21-31
Now we are ready to look at the section on justification by faith. What was that you said? Oh, you are amening for the good part coming up even before we get there? Voice: “Yes, before we get there.” Ok, because you know it is coming.
So far we have seen that men are under the wrath of God because of our ungodliness and unrighteousness. We are worthy of judgment, and the best the law can do for us is help us to know that we are sinners.
In verse 3:21, “But now...” Now the good news, now the gospel. “...the righteousness of God,” the righteousness from God that he provides to man, “without the law is manifested, being witnessed [to] by the law and the prophets.”
We don’t have to keep the Ten Commandments to be counted just before God. Jesus was asked by one man: “Good Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life? And he said unto him... if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments. He saith unto him, Which? Jesus said, Thou shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not steal...” Matt19:16-18. In other words, he is going through some of the Ten Commandments. And it is true that if you can keep the law perfectly—as we saw in chapter two—“patient continuance in well doing...” Rom2:27, then you will be justified by your works.
But Jesus was trying to get this man to see and realize that he was not going to be able to do that, and he was trying to get him to see his need of salvation. So rather than teaching salvation by keeping the Ten Commandments it is showing the opposite. It is showing that we are not going to make it that way. So we don’t have to keep the Ten Commandments to be accounted just before God. God is providing a righteousness to us without the law, without any law, without any good deeds, or else it would be a righteousness of man and you don’t find the righteousness of man in this division. You only find the unrighteousness of men.
So it is without law, this righteousness of God. And it is by faith in Romans 3:22. “Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe.”
Justification does not require repentance, being baptized, being good, going to church, going to confession. If any of these things were required this would be the place for Paul to tell us because he is giving us a complete treatise on justification here in chapters one through four. But Paul says that the righteousness of God is given to all them that believe, including those that haven’t been baptized, including those that haven’t repented, including those that haven’t ever gone to confession or gone to church. Even if they had done none of those other things God promises to all them that believe they will be justified. Voice: “Amen.”
In fact, if we do anything else for the purpose of justification other than faith alone, we don’t have faith in Christ because we don’t think what Christ did on the cross is sufficient to satisfy God’s justice.
Now there are some Scriptures scattered throughout the New Testament that seem to indicate that more than faith alone is required when the context is not understood. For example, John the Baptist preached the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins. (Matt3:2) We saw that Jesus preached, “Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” (Matt4:17) when I was here several months ago.
But in the survey of Matthew, we saw that even though Jesus preached repent in the first part of his ministry, he stopped preaching repent in the second part, because the nation didn’t repent, and the kingdom was not at hand anymore, and so it wasn’t relative to those people.
But even though he stopped preaching repent in the second part of his ministry in Matthew, some people today continue to preach repent based on the fact that Jesus preached repent, and don’t even realized that he stopped preaching repent. There may be valid reasons for preaching repent, but it is not because Jesus preached repent in the early part of his ministry, because he stopped.
So it is important to understand the context. That is all I am saying. And, like I said, this is a complete treatise on the subject of justification. If repentance or any other thing was necessary, Paul would be gravely negligent to omit to tell us what else we need to do because he said we need to believe.
The book of John is entirely about how to have eternal life and it is by faith alone. The Greek word pistos (pis-tos’), translated faith, believe, and trust is used more times in John than any other book in the Bible, because the purpose of the book of John was to show us that ... “These [things] are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.” John20:31. Not, being baptized you might have life, or going to church you might have life, or being good you might have life, but that believing you might have life through his name.
The next paragraph tells us how can God justify us merely by our faith. And he does it through redemption and propitiation. In Romans 3:23, “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” ...being condemned and punished. That is what we would expect, anyway, because God is a just God. But it says, “For all have sinned...being justified.” Now how can God do that? How can a just God do that?
Well, it is by his grace. We don’t deserve it. Grace means getting something good that you don’t deserve. And it is freely. But that still doesn’t explain it. What explains it is that even though it was free for us, it wasn’t free for God. It wasn’t free for Christ.
Redemption means when a poor person sells himself into slavery, a rich relative pays the price to buy their freedom again. That is what Christ did for us. He paid the price that we should have paid on the cross. That is redemption. So the price was paid. It is not that it wasn’t paid. He was our substitute.
“Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood,” Rom3:25. Propitiation is when somebody is angry with you, and then they are appeased and they are not angry at you anymore. And we saw when we started off this division that “the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men,” Rom1:18. And Jesus bore that wrath, and that is why God is not angry at us who believe...at any person who believes, has faith in Jesus’ blood, God is not angry at them anymore.
So even though Christ died for all, if we are self righteous, if we want to be self righteous, we can trust in our own righteousness, and we can be judged for our own works, and we can suffer the wrath ourselves at the judgment. But if we trust in Christ his substitution will count for us. He received our sins and we receive his righteousness. Philippians 3:9, “[Being] found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.” So he receives our sin. We receive his righteousness if we want to put our trust in him. Or we can be self righteous and see how it goes at the judgment.
The next paragraph is about how God is “just and justifier of him who [believes] in Jesus,” Rom3:26. Romans 3:25, “To declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God.” When it is talking about his righteousness here, it is not talking about a righteousness which he gives to man. It is talking, this time, about his righteousness. Is he a just judge or not? When he passed over David’s sin of adultery and murder, how could he do that and still say that David is a man after his own heart? It is because he looked forward to the death of Christ for David.
“That he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus,” Rom3:26. Now if he justified us and we are sinners—and we are—and that was the end of the story, then he wouldn’t be just, because the Bible says in Proverbs 17:15, “He that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both are abomination to the LORD.”
God was able to justify the wicked—that’s us because we received the righteousness of Christ—, and condemn the just—Jesus who was just—, without being unjust, because Jesus willingly took our sins. This way and this way only God can be just and justifier.
So we need to understand that it is important that God remain just also. He doesn’t just overlook sin or forgives. He can’t just say I forgive you because then he wouldn’t be a just judge. If we had a judge downtown that let the guilty go all the time we would be putting a new judge in there I hope. But Christ paid the price so God—which was acceptable to the Father—and so God could then justify the wicked.
The Law Says Justification Is By Faith – Rom4:1-25
Ok, the next section is about what the law says about justification by faith. First of all, the law says that righteousness is ‘imputed’ righteousness for Abraham in chapter four verse two. “For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but not before God. For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness,” Rom4:2-3
Abraham was not in himself actually righteous. He had to be ‘counted’ as being righteous, even though he was not. And this righteousness is only available, the righteousness of God only available, to him that worketh not. Romans 4:4-5, “Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.”
When your employer pays you it is not grace. It is debt because he owes you what you have earned for your work. Even if he helps you do the work, he owes you because you put in the hours. If he pays you when you don’t even show up for work, that’s grace.
There’s two kinds of men mentioned here. There is ‘him that worketh’ and ‘him that worketh not’. If you are one of the ‘him that worketh’ you are not justified. The only way you can be justified is if you are one of the ‘him that worketh not’, because you have to get completely outside the system of works in order to be justified. There is a system that is works, judgments, and rewards. There is a system that is faith, grace and gifts. You have to be in that faith, grace, and gifts system in order to be justified. If you are ever at all in that works, judgment, and rewards system, you won’t survive the judgment.
The next paragraph talks about imputed righteousness without works. “Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works, Saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin,” Romans 4:6-8
So it is not merely that God forgives our bad works and helps us do good works. It is that our works don’t enter into the equation for justification at all. It is without works. It is an imputed righteousness, not a righteousness that we have because of our works. He just counts us as righteous for Christ’s sake.
Now the only way to be justified, based on all of this, is to avoid being judged by our works. If we are ever judged we will perish. It is important to understand that even though God will judge every man according to his deeds as we saw in Romans 2:6, “every man according to his deeds”, not all will go through the judgment personally, since Christ already went through the judgment for those who believe on him.
Hebrews 9:27-28 says: “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many.” Many believers, maybe some of us sitting here today, won’t die even once even though it is appointed unto man once to die. Why? Because Christ already died for us if you have believed on him. And even when we do die, the New Testament says we fall asleep, because it is appointed unto man once to die, and if we have believed on Christ we have already died in him. And that is the same with the judgment. He already went through the judgment so we won’t go through the judgment. We only go through the judgment once. There is no double jeopardy even in our court system.
And we see the actual judgment in Revelation chapter 20 beginning in verse 5. “This is the first resurrection. Bessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years,” Rev20:5-6. Notice they are raised up and there is no mention of a judgment for these in the first resurrection.
A thousand years later there is going to be another group raised up, and they will be judged, and they will be condemned. The last judgment is not to determine who is justified and who is condemned, but rather simply to determine how much punishment each person in the judgment will be sentenced to.
In Revelation 20:7-15, talking about the second death: “And when the thousand years are expired... I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books [plural] were opened: and another book [singular] was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books [plural], according to their works.” Because the books, plural, are the books that contain their deeds. “And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.” That is the judgment talked about in Romans 2. And all these people, none of them survive this judgment. “And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.”
So you don’t want to be in this judgment. You don’t want to be judged by your works. You need to be completely outside that system. You need to have your faith in Christ, who already went through the judgment, who already was judged, who already was condemned, who already did die, who already did bear the wrath.
The next paragraph is on inheriting the promise. “For the promise...” Rom4:13. I won’t read all this, but it is basically that God took Abraham out and showed him the stars and said, “So shall thy seed be,” Rom4:18. “You are going to have a lot of descendents”, even though Abraham was very old and had no child at the time.
And Abraham believed the Word of God, and so it was counted unto him for righteousness. (Rom4:3) Abraham was justified the same way we are by faith in God’s Word. The content was different because Christ hadn’t come yet, but all men through all time have been justified by faith alone in God’s Word.
In the middle of this paragraph it says, “According to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be,” Rom4:18. That was the word that Abraham believed. That was the Word of God that Abraham believed. And the Word of God that we need to believe is that “he that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.”
So Abraham “was strong in faith giving glory to God,” Rom4:20. Faith is not presumption. It is not presumptuous to have faith. It gives God the glory due his name because he will keep his Word, and if you have faith, you are saying that you believe that he will keep his Word. He is not a liar. “And being fully persuaded...” Rom4:21. Faith is always fully persuaded. “And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness,” Rom4:22.
Now, the best part of this, beginning in Romans 4:23-25, is that this was written for us. “Now it was not written for his sake [Abraham’s sake] alone, that it was imputed to him; But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.”
So these doctrines we have talked about, that Paul shared, Paul didn’t put these in here merely because they are theoretical or philosophical. Paul, by putting this last paragraph in here and saying that this was written for us, is summing up this division because he wants an invitation. He wants you to act upon these doctrines and these words.
And so if there is somebody here today that hasn’t received the righteousness of God, hasn’t put that kind of faith in Jesus, then this is the time to do that. We are just going to close our eyes and bow our heads for a minute. Tell him that you trust in his Son as your substitute, and that you accept the righteousness he offers you. He will give you his righteousness just for asking because the Word of God, Romans 3:22 says, “The righteousness of God...is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all...them that believe.”
And if you are a Christian here, just pray in case anybody here that doesn’t know the Lord, that they would understand this and put their faith in him. Father in heaven, we ask your grace that we would all understand this and we would all have faith in the sacrifice of your Son so that we might all have the righteousness of God and eternal life. Amen.
