Tonight’s session is pretty short. Does that upset anyone?
What is the best gift you have ever unwrapped? In tonight’s session, we are going to talk about the gift you can’t give yourself. And the overall theme of the message this evening is that Jesus offers you His gift of a right relationship with God.
Every social circle, business group, and committee seems to have one: that guy with the incessant need to sour the mood of the party. That lady who destroys the positive atmosphere with a dire pronouncement. The deflating neighbor who points out the one crooked board in your new deck.
We all know a person who makes a beeline to the bad stuff; but if we are honest with ourselves, we have also played this role a time or two. This planet is full of depressing news, negative stories, and disappointing headlines. Things haven’t gone well on earth. We can’t run from this reality, but we can choose to focus on wonderful things God is doing in the mist of all this. The Lord is up to something.
The Book of Romans isn’t uplifting in its start. Paul began with the grim depiction of sin and God’s soon to arrive wrath. But Paul didn’t stop there. As we move into Romans 3, we discover that God hasn’t left us in this state. Thanks be to God: relief has arrived.
READ 3:21. Paul begins verse 21 with “But now. Those two words signaled a sudden change. What happened? What happened was GRACE. The rule-keeping Pharisee could now shed his old uniform. A new game had begun. (Paul was a Pharisee)
To fully grasp Paul’s relief at the sight of grace, you have to know his backstory. This man, formerly known as Saul of Tarsus, was an arch enemy of the Christian church, traveling tirelessly to stomp out every last spark of the fire. Sadly, he believed this cruel campaign pleased God. Then one day, on a road to Damascus, Paul encountered the risen Lord Jesus. His eyes were opened.
Paul became one of the most passionate preachers in world history Those words “but now” are significant. A righteousness apart from the law is now available.
Have you ever waited impatiently for the release of the next book in a sizzling series? Have you stood in line for tickets? This hints at the nervous excitement we call anticipation. Paul was anticipating righteousness.
READ 3: 22-26. In elementary school, you probably studied the rules of mathematics. You were called “right” when you got it right. You were “wrong” when you got it wrong. And the proper way to respond when you got your test back was to go back and correct them and make the wrongs right.
And it is here that we have a problem. No human has the power to put things right again, at least by God’s standards. God’s way is to move beyond a repair: He provides a new birth. This new birth comes by faith, by throwing yourself solely on the grace and mercy of God. How would you best explain God’s grace to someone?
We are justified freely, but our deliverance didn’t come cheap. Three words describe the price for freedom and you have heard them before:
1. Propitiation. The word carries the idea of appeasing God. Propitiation means a covering over of something. Because of our sin, we fully deserve to experience God’s wrath and anger. Propitiation is satisfying the righteous demands of the law, and removing the wrath of God.
2. Redemption. This word means to remove someone from the chains of bondage. Redemption often involved the payment of a ransom, a sum of money to cancel the debt. Scripture says that God’s children have been bought back. They have been redeemed from the power of sin and the curse of the law.
3. Blood. In the Book of Leviticus, God declared the value of blood. The blood of animals can’t pay off man’s debt. Only the perfect blood of a perfect man could cancel the curse once and for all.
READ 3:27-28. Boasting is the focus of these two verses. Where does boasting belong? Nowhere. Believers can’t boast because our righteousness has nothing to do with anything we have done.
Jesus is the Victor, the Champion, and the Titleholder. When a person comes to faith in Christ, he or she approaches the most High King as a humble, volunteering servant. He or she comes with crumbs in patched pockets—with no riches and nothing to share.
Jesus will have it no other way. What Pau condemned in v. 27 is the ridiculous notion that we played the hero in our own escape. This simply isn’t the case. Jesus deserves all the credit and glory for our salvation.
Maybe no place in the Bible exposes the sin of pride more effectively than the parable recorded in uke 18: 9-14. READ. Often, a story drives a point home more powerfully than anything else. Jesus told this story about two men praying in the Temple.
The unlikely, unsophisticated, irreligious tax collector came to God ashamed, with one simple plea: “God, turn Your wrath from me—a sinner”. The well-respected, well-known, well-versed Pharisee said, “God, I thank You that I’m not like other people—greedy, unrighteous, adulterers. Or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of everything I get.”
In the end, one man went home justified—right with God. Rom. 3: 27-28 tells us who: the one who, by faith, placed himself in the hands of God. And that is a gift from God—a gift that you can’t give yourself.
The planet is full of depressing news and disappointing headlines, but now we have hope. Relief has arrived and Christ has made a way.
• Take the do over. Receive Jesus’ gift of a right relationship with God.
• Step off the stage. Humbly give to God the areas of your life where you tend toward pride or boasting. Let Jesus take center stage of your life.
• Share the gift with others. Someone shared the gift of salvation with you. Pass it on to others and tell them about Jesus’ gift of salvation.
Since boasting is excluded, how will you express your faith to someone?
Jesus’ gift of a right relationship awaits us. Embrace the gift and share it.
