I want you to consider for a moment two different doctors. Both are equally competent, but the way that they deal with their patients is quite different. Let’s imagine that you’re not feeling well so you go to both doctors who both do the same thorough examination and run the same tests and both come up with the same diagnosis.
The first doctor tells you that everything is fine and that all you really need to do is to get some more rest and take some vitamins and you’ll feel better soon. But the other doctor gives it to you straight and tells you that you have cancer. But the good news is that it has been caught early enough that there is a treatment that is 100% successful in curing that kind of cancer.
Which of the two doctors is going to make you feel the best right off the bat? The one who gave you what seems like good news, right? But which one is going to give you the best chance to really be healthy in the long run? The doctor who first gave you the bad news, but then followed it up with the good news, right?
In this first part of the book of Romans, Paul is serving as a kind of “spiritual doctor” as he writes to the churches in Rome. And most of the first two and a half chapters of his letter has been devoted to making a diagnosis of the spiritual condition of his readers. Before he can get to the good news, which he has only hinted at so far, he has to first make sure that his readers first understand their true spiritual condition necessitates that they receive the cure that is offered by the gospel.
In the passage we’ll look at this morning, Paul summarizes everything he has said so far and gives his final diagnosis. Go ahead and turn in your Bibles to Romans 3 and follow along as I begin reading in verse 9:
What 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, as it is written:
“None is righteous, no, not one;
no one understands;
no one seeks for God.
All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
no one does good,
not even one.”
“Their throat is an open grave;
they use their tongues to deceive.”
“The venom of asps is under their lips.”
“Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.”
“Their feet are swift to shed blood;
in their paths are ruin and misery,
and the way of peace they have not known.”
“There is no fear of God before their eyes.”
Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.
(Romans 3:9-20 ESV)
On the surface, this isn’t a real encouraging message. To be given the honest diagnosis that we are all under sin is not a pleasant thing. But on the other hand, there is great hope and joy in knowing that God knows our depraved condition even better than we do and still loves us enough to provide the treatment that is 100% effective in curing the sin problem that we all have.
So as we go through this passage together this morning, it is my prayer that God’s Word will lead you to do one of two things this morning:
• Perhaps there are some of you here this morning who have never come to the place where you’ve received an accurate diagnosis in which you recognize the seriousness of your sin. For you, my prayer is that you will understand that this morning and that as a result you will find the cure by responding to the gospel by committing your life to Jesus.
• For the majority here who have already made that commitment, my prayer is that as you understand better the depth of the sin in your life, you will gain a whole new appreciation for the cure that Jesus has provided for you through the gospel.
Let’s begin by putting this passage in context. In the first part of chapter 3 Paul was dealing with some objections that he expected his fellow Jews might raise in response to his teaching that the Jews were in need of the gospel just as much as the Gentiles. And in that diatribe that we looked at last week, Paul pointed out that the Jews did indeed have an advantage over the Gentiles – they had the Word of God.
But now Paul returns to his original diagnosis of the spiritual condition of all men. And Paul pulls no punches here. He doesn’t give the Jews, in particular, any kind of false hope. He doesn’t minimize the severity of the spiritual sickness that infects both Jews and Gentiles. While it was true that the Jews had the advantage of possessing the oracles of God, it was equally true that when it came to their salvation, they were no better off than the Gentiles because they, too, were “under sin”. This morning as we study this passage, we’re going to discover that…
Salvation comes only to those who are
silenced by their sinfulness.
The greatest barrier that the Jews faced in dealing with their sin, is that they didn’t recognize that, they, too, were “under sin” and needed the salvation that comes through the gospel just as much as the Gentiles did. It seems like nothing much has changed in the last 2,000 years. The greatest barrier that prevents men and women from responding to the gospel today is still the fact that they don’t want to admit that they are sinners. Most people will argue that they are pretty good people. They don’t kill, or steal, or lie – at least not too much. They generally treat people pretty well and even give to charity. Many of them are even “spiritual” or “religious”.
But as we’ll clearly see this morning that kind of self-diagnosis that many people make is completely wrong and therefore they don’t get the proper treatment for this terminal spiritual disease with which we are all infected. Like the Jews, they wrongly conclude that other people may need the gospel – “that’s great if it’s right for you” – but that they really don’t need it in their lives.
Paul has laid out his case clearly in the first part of his letter. He writes that he has “already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin.” But he is now going to summarize that argument one last time and support it with the Old Testament Scriptures. It’s interesting that the way he uses these passages from the Old Testament mirrors the structure of the first part of his letter. As we take a look at the passages that Paul is citing here, we can go through them pretty quickly and easily get the sense of how Paul is using them here.
Paul begins by citing the first 3 verses of Psalm 14:
The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.”
They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds,
there is none who does good.
The LORD looks down from heaven on the children of man,
to see if there are any who understand,
who seek after God.
They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt;
there is none who does good,
not even one.
(Psalm 14:1-3 ESV)
If we were to go back and look at this entire Psalm, it would be clear that this Psalm is primarily talking about non-Israelites since later in the Psalm David does write that “God is with the generation of the righteous” – obviously a reference to God’s chosen people. And I’m sure the Jews would have been quick to point that out to Paul.
The next three passages cited by Paul are similar. They are all from the Psalms and they all refer to the enemies of David or Israel and therefore are describing the Gentiles:
For there is no truth in their mouth;
their inmost self is destruction;
their throat is an open grave;
they flatter with their tongue.
(Psalm 5:9 ESV)
They make their tongue sharp as a serpent’s,
and under their lips is the venom of asps.
(Psalm 140:3 ESV)
His mouth is filled with cursing and deceit and oppression;
under his tongue are mischief and iniquity.
(Psalm 10:7 ESV)
This is exactly how Paul began his letter – by describing the sinfulness of the Gentiles. And once again his fellow Jews would have been right on board with him. But just like He did beginning in chapter 2 of Romans, Paul is about to turn the tables on the Jews. He continues his argument by citing a passage from Isaiah 59:
Their feet run to evil,
and they are swift to shed innocent blood;
their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity;
desolation and destruction are in their highways.
The way of peace they do not know,
and there is no justice in their paths;
they have made their roads crooked;
no one who treads on them knows peace.
(Isaiah 59:7-8 ESV)
Here, God is very clearly speaking to the Jews. He is describing how they have turned away from God and how their sins have separated them from God. Paul uses the Jews’ own Scripture here to prove that they, too, are “under sin” and in need of the gospel.
Paul concludes with one last verse from Psalms that both summarizes everything he has taught so far and reveals to his readers the root problem that causes all men to be “under sin”:
Transgression speaks to the wicked
deep in his heart;
there is no fear of God
before his eyes.
(Psalm 36:1 ESV)
Man’s condition, as confirmed by these Old Testament passages, is summed up by Paul in verse 9 with the phrase “under sin.” That is Paul’s spiritual diagnosis for the disease with which all men are infected. So let’s see if we can better understand what Paul means by that phrase so we can make sure that we can make sure we understand our diagnosis and get the right treatment for that spiritual disease.
What does it mean to be “under sin”?
• To be in slavery to sin
The preposition “under” that Paul uses here is a word that means to be totally under the power, authority or control of something or someone. We don’t just “do sins”, we are completely under the power of sin. When we get to Romans 6, Paul is going to expand upon this idea and describe how all men, apart from the gospel, are slaves to sin, and therefore have no choice but to submit to it. And because all are slaves to sin, it means that there is nothing we can do on our own to earn our release from that bondage.
What is sin?
I know this seems like a pretty simple question and most of you are probably wondering why I’m even taking time to answer it. But while I think most of us could give a pretty good dictionary definition of sin or even an accurate theological definition, this passage helps us to understand the essence of sin at an even deeper level.
For instance, many of you probably know that the most commonly used word for “sin” in the New Testament and the one Paul uses here was an archery term that literally means “to miss the mark”. So we understand that sin means that God has set a standard and we have missed that mark. While that is true, it still doesn’t really get us to the heart of what sin is because with that definition there is still a tendency to focus on what I do rather than who I am. That definition leads us to the conclusion that I sin because what I do doesn’t hit the mark.
But I think Paul has made a pretty good case that sin is not merely a matter of our outward actions, but rather that it is a matter of the heart. And when we understand that, we find that at its core, sin is…
• The resistance to finding my joy in God
We see in this passage that sin is primarily concerned with our relationship with God. Paul begins in verse 11 with the idea that no one understands God or seeks Him and he concludes in verse 18 by revealing that the root cause of sin is that there is no fear of God. Everything else in between just describes the results of not having a right relationship with God.
This all began in the Garden. God had provided everything that Adam and Eve needed for their complete joy. They could eat from all the trees in the Garden, except for one. And God had prohibited them from eating from that one tree, not because He wanted to rob them of some pleasure, but rather because He wanted to protect them from the consequences of something that would ultimately rob them of their joy. And most important of all, they had an intimate relationship with God which should have been their primary source of joy.
But Adam and Eve decided that what God had given them was not enough, so they chose to try and find joy in the one thing that God had not given to them. And from that time forward every sin that has ever been committed by man is essentially our resistance to finding joy in God and in His purposes, plans and ways. Let me give you just a few examples:
o Every form of sexual immorality can be traced to our resistance to finding joy in God’s ways. God designed us to find joy in the sexual relationship within the marriage of one man and one woman. So every act of sexual immorality – adultery, homosexuality, pornography, etc. – is sinful because it is a choice try and find our joy outside of God’s plans and ways.
o Stealing of any kind can be traced to our dissatisfaction with what God has entrusted to us. That is true whether it is stealing someone’s material possession or stealing time from my employer or stealing someone’s dignity. That’s essentially what happened the Garden. Adam and Eve stole something that God, in His sovereign wisdom, had chosen not to give to them.
o Even something like gossip is always a result of not finding our joy in God. Usually gossip is an attempt to bring someone else down a notch or two so that we can feel better about ourselves, which just means that we aren’t willing to find our joy in who God made us to be.
David certainly understood this idea that sin is the resistance to finding joy in God when he wrote these familiar words after his sin with Bathsheba:
Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you may be justified in your words
and blameless in your judgment.
(Psalm 51:4 ESV)
While the physical acts of adultery and murder that David committed were done with and against other people, David recognized that at its core, his sin was that he failed to find joy in God and God’s ways.
The consequences of being “under sin”:
• A darkened mind in which I am not at peace with…
Because all of us are under sin without the gospel, our minds have been darkened, and as a result we are incapable of being at peace with God or with other people. We could certainly spend a lot more time here, but we only have time to touch on each of these briefly. First, let’s look at how being under sin prevents us from being at peace with God:
o God
In this passage, Paul describes three ways in which sin impacts our relationship with God:
…no one understands…
…no one seeks for God…
…There is no fear of God before their eyes…
The word that is translated “understands” here is compound word that literally means “to send together.” It conveys the idea of assembling individual facts into an organized whole, in much the same way we take individual pieces of a jigsaw puzzle and assemble them into one complete picture.
One of the consequences of being “under sin” is that our broken relationship with God keeps us from understanding the big picture. That was certainly the case with Adam and Eve. Because they couldn’t see the big picture, they didn’t understand that God had their best interests at heart by prohibiting them from eating from one tree, so they went ahead and did it anyway.
When Paul uses the Scriptures to claim that no one seeks for God that seems a bit over the top, doesn't it? After all, aren’t there at least some people who seek God? But let’s see if we can’t figure out what Paul means by that.
The first thing we need to note is that the verb Paul uses here is compound word that means to “seek diligently.” So it is more than just a casual seeking of God. But it still seems like there are at least some people, like Billy Graham, that do that.
But if we go back to the Garden again, I think we can understand what Paul is saying here. Up until they sinned, Adam and Eve had an intimate relationship with God in which they did seek God like that. But as soon as they sinned one of the results was that they quit seeking God like that. In fact, when they heard God in the Garden they ran and hid and they went from being seekers of God to being sought by God.
That is what being under sin does to every single person. It keeps us from pursuing God because I think deep down every person has some awareness of his or her sin and that makes us reluctant to really seek out a holy God.
Finally, we see that being under sin takes away our fear of God. When we resist finding our joy in God, we find that instead of being in awe of the Creator, we are awed by things which don’t deserve that kind of reverence.
Being under sin means that I am first of all not at peace with God. But it also leads to me not being at peace with other people.
o Other people
I’m not going to go into much detail at all here. Let me just point out a couple of ways that being under sin impacts our relationships with others.
In verses 13-17, Paul focuses on two areas in which we are not at peace with others – our words and our actions. The imagery that Paul uses here also shows how completely our relationships with others are impacted – from head to feet.
When we are not at peace with God, we find that it is also impossible to be at peace with others.
Most of Paul’s letter so far has been devoted to providing the diagnosis of the spiritual sickness that is summarized by the phrase “under sin.” And Paul is just about ready to describe for us the treatment that is 100% effective in providing the cure for that illness. But before we’re ready to hear that good news, we must first submit to the diagnosis about our sin. Earlier I shared with you the theme of this passage:
Salvation comes only to those who are
silenced by their sinfulness.
I think that is exactly the point Paul is making in verses 19-20:
Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.
The Jews had completely misunderstood the purpose of the law. The Jews had viewed the law like a window that they could look through to see into the lives of others and observe and about judge the sins of others but never see their own sins.
But in reality, the law functions more like a mirror. As I go through the day I often get dirt on my face and never even realize it. But when I look in the mirror that dirt is revealed. The mirror shows me that there is a problem, but it can’t do anything to wash away the dirt. All the mirror can do is give me the diagnosis which hopefully leads me to seek out the soap and water that is needed to wash away the dirt.
That is the way God designed his law to work for the Jews, but instead using it to see just how far they had fallen short of God’s righteousness, they used the law to excuse and justify their sin. They had spent all of their time arguing about why they were special, why the law or their religious practices or their heritage somehow exempted them from the need for the gospel. While that continued talk might convince them they weren’t sick, they were. And it was not until their mouths were stopped by the realization that they were under sin and in need of God’s righteousness, not until they were silenced by their sinfulness, that they could receive the cure.
The truth is that at some point in each of our lives every one of us is going to be silenced before God by our sinfulness. We can either willingly do that right here and now while we still have the opportunity to receive the cure from God or else we will do it one day involuntarily when we stand before God and it is too late for that cure.
Salvation comes only to those who are
silenced by their sinfulness.
In the early 20th century a major newspaper invited several famous authors to respond to the question, “What is wrong with the world today?” G.K. Chesterton’s response was by far the shortest. His reply: “Dear Sir, I am.” I think he had come to the place in his life where he was certainly silenced by his sin.
Earlier, I told you that I was going to ask you to do one of two things this morning.
There may be some of you this morning who have never come to the place that, like G.K. Chesterton, you have been silenced by your sinfulness. You may see the sin in others. You may justify or excuse your sin or blame it on others. I want to invite you this morning to choose to accept God’s diagnosis that you are “under sin”. Until you do that you will never be able to receive the cure that will free you from your slavery to sin.
If you do make that decision, this morning, it’s really important that you share that with us so that we can help make sure that you get the proper treatment for your sin through faith in Jesus. There are several ways that you can do that:
• Fill out the information on the Connection Card on the flap of your bulletin and give it to me or one of our Greeters after the service.
• Come talk to me or to one of our elders after the service.
• Contact me or one of the elders this week. Our contact information is in the bulletin and on our website
For the rest of you who have already been silenced by your sin and responded by placing your faith in Jesus, I hope you have a much greater appreciation of the magnitude of the forgiveness you have received. So in just a moment as we pray together I want to encourage you to pray a prayer of thanksgiving to God for that forgiveness.
Let’s go ahead and bow for prayer. I’m going to give all of you a few moments to respond to God through your personal prayer and then I’ll close our time.
