Sometimes we need to step back and re-examine what it is that we believe. Many take our faith for granted, we tout the cultural narrative and claim we have read the Bible when in fact all we do it quote other people who claim to quote the Bible and we fail to have read it for ourselves. We claim to believe in God, and we even throw in Jesus for good measure. Our prosperity have clouded our eyes to our real need for Him.
I often hear from religious people, “All people are basically good.” That one statement alone tells me that person has not read their Bible. The fact is the Word from God says just the opposite. The fact is, according to scripture, mankind is sick! Mankind is going off the deep end. Mankind needs saving. If you don’t believe me, and you don’t believe the Bible, believe the evidence. Have you seen the news lately?
The fact is everyone needs to be saved. Saved from sin, saved from the world, saved from themselves. We are talking about salvation from condemnation.
I was going to title this message “We Believe in the Depravity of Man” but I soften it with “Man’s need for Salvation.” All of mankind is included in that statement.
It is easy to believe in a heaven, the place where God resides, the place of eternal bliss, eternal rest, and eternal life. Yes we believe in heaven.
But we do not want to talk about the place of condemnation, the place of “weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Luke 13:24); the place where “their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched” (Mark 9:48); place of eternal torment (Revelation 14:11); The place we call “hell.” The fact is we cannot believe in heaven without believing in the place of eternal punishment called hell. I believe in hell.
Because I believe in hell, I also believe mankind needs deliverance from Hell because we all deserve to go there, all needs salvation. The focus of this message today is our need for salvation.
Romans 3:9–18; Romans 3:23, Romans 7:14–8:2
We all need salvation, because we all transgressed the commands of God. None of us are innocent. None of us are clean. None of us are free from sin.
Romans 3:23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
But it was not always that way. Man was created innocent and blameless. You know the story, Adam and Eve had the whole Garden of Eden at their fingertips and God only made one rule:
Genesis 2:16–17 The LORD God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; 17 but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”
But because God is high and holy, any transgressions to the command of God brought a penalty – death: “for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.” Death, right from the beginning was penalty for sin. Well you know what happened. The serpent tempted Eve; Eve ate the forbidden fruit and passed the fruit on to Adam, then along came God. God asked:
Genesis 3:11b Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you not to eat?”
Then both Adan and then Eve played the blame game and did what people have done ever since – failed to take responsibility for their actions. Adam indirectly blamed God:
Genesis 3:12 The man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate.”
And the Eve blamed the serpent:
Genesis 3:13 Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” And the woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
You can blame your sin on whoever or whatever you want, you can fool others and even fool yourself, but you cannot fool God. God knows all. God knows who is responsible for your sin. Both Adam and Eve paid the penalty. They died and death and sin has been with us ever since. You see that has been the condition of human race ever since.
Those who say people are basically good has never read the Bible to see what God has to say on the subject. The fact is, man is inherently prone to do bad. We all have inherited a sin nature from Adam. Think about it, you don’t have teach a baby to misbehave, be bad, to be selfish, to be self-centered. Skip forward to the days of Noah – This is what God had to say about mankind so far in history, up to the time of the flood:
Genesis 6:5 Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
Then came the first great judgment on the Earth. God passed sentence on the sinfulness on the Earth, and all the Earth died except for Noah and his family. But even after the flood, God knew that humans have not changed. Noah got out of the boat and made a burnt offering to God:
Genesis 8:21 The LORD smelled the soothing aroma; and the LORD said to Himself, “I will never again curse the ground on account of man, for the intent of man’s heart is evil from his youth; and I will never again destroy every living thing, as I have done.
We are all naturally incline to do evil. You do not have to teach sin to a child. Sin comes naturally to us. God tells Jerimiah:
Jeremiah 17:9–10 “The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it? 10 “I, the LORD, search the heart, I test the mind, Even to give to each man according to his ways, According to the results of his deeds.
When someone says they are only following their heart – watch out! Paul tells us this very thing:
Romans 3:9 What then? Are we better than they? Not at all; for we have already charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin;
Paul is summing up what he has said in the first 8 verses in chap 3. "Are we better than they?" Are the Jews better off than the Greeks (Gentiles)? Jews have some advantages: They been God’s chosen people. God gave them the Law and many privileges. Paul explains in chapter 2 that God does not give them any preferential treatment, if anything, God will judge the Jew first and more severely because they have the law. The Jew had the Law, the Gentile had their conscience, and Paul charged both Jews and Greeks that they are "all under sin."
Under sin? What do we mean by under sin? Paul did not say they all committed sin, (which they had) but they were under sin.
R.C. Sproul said it best: “We are not sinners because we sin, We sin because we are sinners.”
Without Christ and the power of God to release us, we are all under sin, we are prisoners, or slaves to sin. We cannot help ourselves. It is in our nature to sin. You see we have inherited Adam’s nature.
Now Paul quotes OT Scripture as his authority. In verses 10-18, Paul quotes from at least 9 different OT passages, mostly from the Psalms and some from Isaiah and the Proverbs. This was a common practice among rabbis in that day, stringing together like pearls similar verses. They indicate their authority by stating: “It is written”
Romans 3:10 as it is written, “THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE;
Paul is quoting from Psalms 14:1-3 and Psalms 53:1-3. There is no one except Jesus who was righteous. When we read in Scripture of someone being righteous, righteous in God’s eyes that is, they were only righteous because God imparted His righteousness to them. No one has ever stood righteous before God by their own doings.
Isaiah 64:6a For all of us have become like one who is unclean, And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment;
Our absolute best fails to measure up before God. Unless God is in it, unless God commands it and empowers it, our best efforts and actions are just filthy rags before Him.
Romans 3:11 THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS, THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD;
None who understands – understand what? For one – we fail to understand the consequences of sin. “for the wages of sin is death.” (Romans 6:23a). We don’t fully comprehend the consequences of sin. Often it is a vicious cycle. The more sin, the less understanding. The less we understanding, the more we sin.
“THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD” If left to himself, fallen man would never seek after God. Scripture teaches us over and over is that God is the one who took the initiative. It is God who seeks us out, not the other way around. If we seek him, it is only because His Holy Spirit is drawing us.
John 6:44 No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up on the last day.
Herein is a basic problem, many do not answer the call of God. You see in these verses, Paul is quoting come from Psalms 14:1-3. To put Paul’s quotes into context, these verse from Psalms 14 and 53 start in verse 1 with the phrase: The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.” So Paul continues:
Romans 3:12 ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS; THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD, THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE.”
Are you catching the words used here? “All have;” “There is none;” “There is not even one.” None-Zero-Zip-Nada. This is all inclusive. It ropes in you and me.
“THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD, THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE” Do we realize, we do no good unless we are empowered by God to do it? Some say God will never send a good person to hell. And my answer would be “Good in whose eyes?”
Romans 3:13–14 “THEIR THROAT IS AN OPEN GRAVE, WITH THEIR TONGUES THEY KEEP DECEIVING,” “THE POISON OF ASPS IS UNDER THEIR LIPS”; “WHOSE MOUTH IS FULL OF CURSING AND BITTERNESS”;
Now quoting from Psalms 5, 10 and 140, Paul talks about our beings, parts of our body, our Throat, tongue, lips, mouth, and in the next verse, our feet. We cannot do good, in the eyes of God, even if we tried:
Romans 3:15–17 “THEIR FEET ARE SWIFT TO SHED BLOOD, 16 DESTRUCTION AND MISERY ARE IN THEIR PATHS, 17 AND THE PATH OF PEACE THEY HAVE NOT KNOWN.”
Now Paul is quoting from the Proverbs and Isaiah 59. For those “under sin” (and that would be us), we often look for a way to “get over,” to cheat someone, to gain an unfair advantage at the expense of someone else. It is because it is all about me. We are by nature selfish. And no peace is found for those caught up in sin.
Isaiah 57:21 “There is no peace,” says my God, “for the wicked.”
There is no peace for those caught up in sin. Peace only come from knowing Jesus.
Romans 8:6 For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,
Peace will never be found in the ways of the flesh, the ways of sin, but is only found in Jesus.
Romans 3:18 “THERE IS NO FEAR OF GOD BEFORE THEIR EYES.”
Herein lies the problem. Look around, if there was a fear of God, would many of the events in our culture and in our world be happening?
Proverbs 9:10 The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.
With no fear of God, we see that God is being left out of all things; Left out of our Government; left out of Schools; left out of our businesses; left out of our lives.
What standard shall we use to live by? The world tells us that we can be moral outside of God. If that is true? By who’s standards are we then moral? If God is out of the equation, who are you to tell what is moral and what is not? But the fact remains, one day Jesus will return. Everyone will have to answer before Him. I shake in my boots at that thought. I greatly fear God.
Herein is the fact. We cannot do good on our own. We cannot buy our way into heaven. We stand condemn. Paul sums up our condition:
Romans 7:18–20 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. 19 For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. 20 But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.
And in desperation he cries out:
Romans 7:24 Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?
We are hopelessly lost, we stand condemned, we cannot save ourselves.
Are you ready for some good news?
Romans 8:1–2 Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.
The key to escape condemnation is Jesus. It is all about Jesus. Do know Him (not just about Him)?
Are you one of those “who are in Christ Jesus?” Yes, all of man-kind is in need of salvation. And it is only through Jesus we can be saved.
It requires a drawing of Holy Spirit to come to Jesus. It requires a change of heart. Our hearts are desperately sick and wicked. Only by Jesus, through his Holy Spirit can change our hearts.
