“Heavenly Provision to meet High Expectations,”
Text: Romans 1:16-17
Intro:
Tonight I would like to bring you a message entitled “Heavenly Provision To Meet High Expectations.” I started out with a title simple called “Expectations,” but the more I worked on it, the more I realized that there is no way that we can live up to God’s expectations in and of ourselves.
We have God’s expectations…it is found in the Ten Commandments, and anything short of the Law is sin.
Sorry but there is no way that we can live up verses such as…:
Leviticus 11:45
"I am the LORD who brought you up out of Egypt to be your God; therefore be holy, because I am holy."
2 Corinthians 7:1 (NIV)
"Since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God."
Ps 15:1-5
As sinners how in the world are we to perfect Holiness, when by our very nature we simply cannot.
That is like asking an orange to be an apple…it just does not work. And that is just in area of Holiness.
What about His expectations for us in…love, forgiveness, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, and self control.
Quite frankly we could not possibly live up to His expectations and demands of Holiness let alone all of these other areas as well.
Illus:
A little boy was heard talking to himself as he walked across the backyard, baseball cap in place, ball and bat in his hands. "I am the greatest hitter in the world," he said. He threw the ball up, swung and missed. "Strike one," he said. But again, he told himself, "I am the greatest hitter ever." He threw the ball up again, swung and missed. He looked at the ball, and at the bat, and said, "I’m the greatest hitter that ever lived." He threw the ball up again and swung and missed a third time.
This time he said, "Wow! Strike three! What a pitcher! I’m the greatest pitcher
in the world!...
So how do we reconcile this gulf between where God is demanding we be, and how far our own ability will get us. I believe there is an answer, and that answer is found in the area of Righteousness found in our text.
Romans 1:16,17
Paul notes several things here
1) I am not Ashamed of the Gospel
Illus:
When I was a kid you would not have caught me dead wearing anything that had ear flappers attached to it. Now that I am becoming more and more follicley in impaired I welcome something furry with ear flappers.
Paul has found something that works…Never be ashamed of something that has transformed your life.
2) The Gospel brings salvation
3) Salvation is a product of the power of God
This deals with authority.
Jesus holds this authority by virtue of His work on the Cross.
4) Salvation comes because God gives us His righteousness.
Now here is the heart of the matter.
?Does anybody want to take a stab at how this might work?
?By God declaring us holy is He untruthful about who we really are?
?How can someone else’s virtue be passed onto us? Is not virtue kept or earned?
The Righteousness of God is not something to be feared.
One of the by products we have created within the church world is a fear of the righteousness of God.
A fear that there is no way that we can ever live up to the standard so we begin to despise it.
Isaiah 64:6 says “all our righteous acts are like filthy rags;” in comparison to God’s righteousness”
We begin to chaff against our inability to live up to God’s standard. Understand that the Righteousness of God is our friend. Does God have High Expectations of us in this area?,…Yes, but he also has provided his righteousness to span the gap.
Martin Luter had this same experience…let me read you his words on this subject.
“The words of Romans 1:18 "…the righteousness of God is revealed," …stood in my way. For I hated that word "righteousness of God," which, according to the use and custom of all the teachers, I had been taught to understand philosophically regarding the formal or active righteousness, as they call it, with which God is righteous and punishes the unrighteous sinner. Though I lived as a monk without reproach, I felt that I was a sinner before God with an extremely disturbed conscience. I could not believe that he was placated by my satisfaction. I did not love, yes, I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners, and secretly, if not blasphemously, certainly murmuring greatly, I was angry with God, and said, "As if, indeed, it is not enough, that miserable sinners, eternally lost through original sin, are crushed by every kind of calamity by the law of the decalogue, without having God add pain to pain by the gospel and also by the gospel threatening us with his righteousness and wrath!" Thus I raged with a fierce and troubled conscience. Nevertheless, I beat importunately upon Paul at that place, most ardently desiring to know what St. Paul wanted.
Martin Luther went on to say…
“At last, by the mercy of God, meditating day and night, I gave heed to the context of the words, namely, "In it the righteousness of God is revealed, as it is written, ’He who through faith is righteous shall live.’" There I began to understand that the righteousness of God is that by which the righteous lives by a gift of God, namely by faith. And this is the meaning: the righteousness of God is revealed by the gospel, namely, the passive righteousness with which merciful God justifies us by faith, as it is written, "He who through faith is righteous shall live." Here I felt that I was altogether born again and had entered paradise itself through open gates. There a totally other face of the entire Scripture showed itself to me. … And I extolled my sweetest word with a love as great as the hatred with which I had before hated the word "righteousness of God." Thus that place in Paul was for me truly the gate to paradise.
Here is how I believe it works.
1) We are all sinners Romans 3:23
2) A Penalty was demanded for that transgression
Rom 6:23 “The Wages of Sin are death”
3) Christ paid that penalty for us on the cross
Rom 5:6-8
4) Because our penalty has been paid we have been declared holy or innocent?
The term we use here is justified.
Our debt has been paid and we are free to go.
5) But we are constant need of that justification as we continue to struggle with that sinful nature.
We are justified as Christ takes on our sin.
Illus: This can be portrayed a couple of different ways.
1) The Umbrella
2) Marriage…When one person marries another they take on each others assets and liabilities. In the case, our Union with Christ, our liabilities our wiped out when we merge them with the assets of Christ.
Now how do we receive such a tremendous gift…
Our text says we receive it through faith.
Simply believing in God for Salvation.
Romans 8:1,2
What a deal.
Does God have high expectations for us in the area of righteousness…you bet. But his provides us with what we need to meet those expectations.
Now we can take what we have learned in the area of Holiness and apply it to His other expectations of us as well.
Love
Forgiveness
Service
Conclusion
Is there a day when we are going to be checked to see if we lived up to God’s expectations…YES.
Illus:
A young American engineer was sent to Ireland for a year. When he left, his fiancé gave him a harmonica. She said, "I want you to learn to play this: it will help to keep your mind off those Irish girls."
He wrote to her often and told he her that he was practicing his harmonica every night. After a year she met him at the airport, he grabbed her to kiss her and she pushed back and said, "Wait before you kiss me, I want to hear you play the harmonica."
Tonight if you are battling in a certain area allow Him to give you the provision to meet His expectations.
