Alba 3-20-2022
THE MOUTH AND THE HEART
Romans 10:1-13
Bob Feller, pitcher for the Cleveland Indians and inducted in the baseball hall of fame in 1962, began his major league journey in 1936, at age 17, fresh off his family’s farm in Van Meter, Iowa.
It was during his rookie season that Feller earned the nickname “Rapid Robert” because of his devastating fastball and high strikeout totals.
The story is told that when Bob Feller was 9 years old, his teacher asked him to write an essay about an oak tree. Here are the ideas that he put in his theme:
An oak tree can be cut down and sawed into boards. You can make baseball bats out of them. You can also make home plates out of the boards. You can make bleachers out of the boards so people can watch baseball games.
At the age of nine years, he was saying - “For me to live is baseball.” In the letter to the Philippians, the apostle Paul wrote that there was something else that consumed him. He said, “For to me, to live is Christ.”
So much so was that true that he wanted everyone else to put their trust in Jesus for their salvation. Just as much as he had fought against Christianity before his conversion; now Paul fought hard, laying his life on the line many times, for the sake of the gospel.
So he writes in Romans 10:1-13 the following:
1 Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved. 2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.
3 For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God. 4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.
5 For Moses writes about the righteousness which is of the law, “The man who does those things shall live by them.”
6 But the righteousness of faith speaks in this way, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’ ” (that is, to bring Christ down from above) 7 or, “ ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’ ” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).
8 But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith which we preach): 9 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.
10 For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. 11 For the Scripture says, “Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.” 12 there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. 13 For “whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
Here again, the apostle Paul expresses his deep concern for his people, his countrymen. It is his “heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved.”
Here in Romans Chapter 10 Paul is declaring that God’s Promise has come in Jesus Christ Himself! In quoting from Deuteronomy 30: 11-14 Paul is saying, “You don’t have to go up to heaven because Jesus has already come to you.”
“You don’t have to go down to the depths, because Jesus has already been raised from the dead! Jesus is God’s gift of grace, not the law.”
Then he says that the righteousness of faith is in your mouth and in your heart and “that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”
Then he adds in verse 13, “whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
If God were to ask, “Why should I let you into heaven?” what would your answer be? This is at least one place in scripture that you can go for an answer. There are others that are just as important. But today lets examine what is involved with the mouth and the heart.
First, we are told to...
1. Confess With Our Mouth
The word confess in verse 10 is from the Greek word that literally means "to speak the same thing". That means that our confession about Jesus is to be the same thing that God has revealed to us about Jesus in the Bible.
That Jesus was born of a virgin, lived a perfect life, went to the cross to pay the penalty for our sins, rose again on the third day, and He now is in heaven until He comes again to gather up His people.
When we confess with our mouth, God wants us to be saying the same thing that He says about Jesus. Nothing else brings salvation.
Also to confess carries the idea to profess: to declare openly, to speak out freely. This then means to give a public declaration of agreement with what God has declared in His Word.
You know what Peter said in Matthew 16:16 when Jesus asked, “Who do you say that I am?” Peter's reply was “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.”
Jesus commended that confession saying that it was His Father in heaven who revealed that to Peter. And God has revealed that to us through the pages of scripture as they speak to our hearts.
How important is it that we make a confession of our faith in Jesus with our mouth? In Matthew 10:32 we are told that if we confess Jesus before men, Jesus will confess us before God, but in verse 33 He tells us that if we deny Him, He will deny us also.
Here is what Jesus said, 32 “Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in heaven. 33 But whoever denies Me before men, him I will also deny before My Father who is in heaven.”
And in Luke 9:26 Jesus says, “For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, of him the Son of Man will be ashamed when He comes in His own glory, and in His Father’s, and of the holy angels.”
And verse eleven of this tenth chapter of Romans says,“Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.”
Now, because “confessing” is so important to our salvation we always ask people (when they’re being baptized) to repeat the good confession, the same as Peter's confession in Matthew 16.
In fact, let’s just repeat it here this morning. “I Believe (echo) that Jesus is the Christ (echo) the Son of the Living God (echo).
So we are to confess with our mouth our faith in Jesus but we also must...
Believe in Our Heart
And what are we to believe in our hearts? We are to believe that not only did Jesus die on the cross to take the penalty for our sins so that we could be forgiven; but also that He rose again!
The resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ is basic to our faith.
I Corinthians 15:3-4 says,“Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.”
And then those verses are followed telling of the many times and the many people who saw the risen Christ, giving proof of the resurrection.
Without that event, I Corinthians 15:17 says that if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins! But then
I Corinthians 15:20 shouts out the message: “But now Christ is risen from the dead!"
That is the faith that should be in our hearts as we confess that Jesus is both Savior and Lord of our lives. Because, as verse thirteen says, we are to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.
But what does that mean? What does it mean to call Jesus “LORD”? It means He is the one who is your "Master"; the one in charge.
If I try to make my relationship with Jesus to be based on ME… on what I think is right and wrong, He is not my Master.
But if I confess that Jesus is Lord, I am surrendering that right. When I confess Jesus is Lord, I’m surrendering control of my life. I’m putting Jesus in charge.
Christians at the end of the first Century were called on to never confuse the lordship of Christ with that of Caesar.
Their declaration was always to be: “Jesus Christ is Lord,” and never “Caesar is Lord.” Many went to their death because they understood that.
Calling upon Jesus as “Lord” does not indicate any kind of “take it or leave it” attitude. It is a radical profession of faith.
We can’t claim that Jesus is Lord, and then act as if we are kings and queens who sit on the throne.
So does simply calling on the name of the Lord result in salvation?
Some may think it implies this, but we know that Jesus said not all who call him Lord will be saved.
In Matthew 7:21-23 Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.
22 Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ 23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
He is talking about people whose hearts are not right with God. A person can say all the right things and still be wrong. A confession that saves comes from a heart that wants change.
Just “calling upon Jesus” does nothing if our heart are not sincere in wanting Jesus to be the Lord of every facet of our lives.
Jeff Strite, a minister whose sermons I like told about his brother, Jack. Jack had a gift to be able to repeat what someone else was saying as soon as they said it, as they were saying it, word for word.
But, even though Jack could say the same thing as anyone he met, that didn’t mean that he necessarily believed or agreed with what was said. He merely echoed what he heard.
That can be a problem within the Kingdom. There are many people who belong to a church, who have said the good confession, have repeated with the preacher: “I believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of the Living God."
BUT somehow what they have said with their lips never quite makes it to their hearts. I think there are could be a lot of people who claim to “know Jesus as their Savior”, but they really don’t.
They know Jesus is “the Savior”, but they don’t know Him as “their Savior” because they’ve never given Him their heart and surrendered their will to him.
If we were asked, “Do you believe in Jesus”, or “Do you believe in God?” The answer to these questions should likely be, “Yes”.
But the question needs to be asked of us, “Do we know Jesus Christ as the Lord of our life? And have we surrendered our heart and life to Him?”
Too many people have too many gods to just ask, “Do you know God?” The answer might just be, “Which God”?
With the rise of eastern mysticism, Hinduism, Islam and the Muslims, Humanism, Multi-culturalism, Judaism, Atheism, and the teachings of the Theory of Evolution, it’s no surprise that many in our nation don’t know who God is.
So, is knowing about Jesus the same as “calling on Jesus as Lord”? I would have to say an emphatic “NO!” Even Satan knows about Jesus.
He knows that Jesus is the Son of God and the Savior of the World. But in no way is Satan “calling on Jesus” to save him.
Jesus is the only way of salvation. We are to call on His name, the name that is above every other name, for our salvation.
True confession is a profession of what we believe in our heart. It is not a mere agreement to a known fact. It is a statement of faith, validating what we believe in our heart to be true.
Jesus said in Luke 6:45c “Out of the abundance of the heart (the) mouth speaks.”
Many have used the Lord’s name in vain, or simply used it in a statement such as, “Lord have mercy?” Surely using the Lord’s name in these ways has nothing to do with salvation. And it doesn’t!
The confession that saves comes from a believing heart. A heart of repentance, expressing a plea for help. It is not simply a call to get out of trouble, as in a foxhole scenario.
Rather it is a sincere call of desperation for deliverance by those who have recognized their sinfulness and desire for forgiveness. So we call out for help, and call on His name.
That call includes an understanding about our lost estate, our sin, and need of a Savior; about the necessity of a change of heart and change of life; and about the reality of death and judgment; about heaven and hell.
It involves a desire and intention to be different after calling on His name, not seeking forgiveness simply to go out and live the same as before. But instead wanting the grace of God each and every day.
Aren't there people you have met people, who, you could tell they were Christians just by their actions? They didn’t have to say a thing to you about Jesus, you could just see Him imprinted on their very being. Yet their words also confess their faith.
That's what the Lord wants... for all of us.
But one more thing. If Romans 10:9-10 stood alone in the New Testament, it might be fair to infer that there are only two conditions of salvation.
But this verse does not stand alone. There are other passages that speak of our response that are essential for salvation, as in the case of repentance and baptism (Acts 2:38), and that of faith and baptism (Mark 16:16).
There are no legitimate grounds for thinking that any one of these passages excludes the conditions mentioned in the others.
Faith, repentance, confession, and baptism are all divinely shown as means for us to respond to Christ for salvation. None of them outrank any of the others. They are all important.
And the condition of the heart is always important. When the Ethiopian ruler wanted to be baptized, Acts 8:37 records that Philip said to him, “If you believe with all your heart, you may.”
And it says that he answered and gave the good confession saying,
“I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.” And he was baptized based upon the words of his mouth and the condition of his heart.
When your mouth confesses and your heart believes, it means that you believe that Jesus is God in the flesh who was able to lay down His life and take it up again, and is now at the right hand of the Father in heaven.
It means that you are putting your trust in Jesus for your hope to get to heaven, not in yourself. Because He is the only way. And you rejoice to know that there is coming a day:
That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:10-11)
CONCLUSION:
Henry Ward Beecher was a Congregationalist clergyman in the 1800's and brother of Harriet Beecher Stowe the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin.
When Henry was a boy, he had a teacher at school who asked one of the boys in class a question which the boy answered. The teacher became angry and told the boy he was wrong and commanded him to: "Sit down!"
The boy was obviously confused because he'd thought he'd answered correctly, but he sat abruptly down. Several boys were asked the same question, they gave the same answer and were promptly rebuked by their teacher.
Finally Beecher was asked to stand and answer the question. He gave the same answer, and was commanded "Sit Down!" But Beecher held his ground and insisted that the answer was correct.
For a few moments the teacher stormed at him, but seeing Beecher wasn't going to give up he smiled and said: "Well, boys, you were all correct, but Beecher was the only one sure enough to stand up for it."
Many people have lost their faith in Christ because they simply lacked the courage to stand up for what they believe.
They have grown so used to apologizing for their faith that once someone mounts a serious challenge to that faith they just give up and sit down.
May we hold firmly to the faith, and confess with our mouths and believe in our hearts that Jesus Christ is risen from the dead.
