Posted on 07/17/2010 12:31:55 PM PDT by pastorbillrandles
What God requires…He provides Posted on July 17, 2010 by billrandles
For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ for therein the righteousness of God is revealed…Romans 1:16
The book of Romans is unique among the epistles in that it isn’t polemic, that is it isn’t trying to refute any error. Romans is therefore a clear rendering of the Gospel of salvation . Paul calls it the “Gospel of God” , and takes us from the bankruptcy of Jew and Gentile to the glorification of man and creation, all realised by the gospel.
Paul begins with the declaration that in the Gospel, “the Righteousness of God is revealed”. In order to appreciate and grow in the gospel, a thorough grounding in the teaching of Romans is necessary, and for that to happen, the meaning and use of the term “Righteousness” has to be defined. Biblically, there are several possible definitions;
* Righteousness, dikiaosune – refers to uprightness of conduct, equity of character. It means to have all good qualities in perfection.
* Righteousness- can also mean uprightness, rectitude, conformity to God’s standards.
* Righteousness- is also a status- Right-Standing- being “in the right”,”Right with” a law , authority or person in authority.
The Beginning of the Gospel in Romans is an emphasis on the bad news first. God is a Holy God and can only accept perfect Righteousness from man. There is a saying that illustrates this and is quite profound-
“The Righteousness that He (God) requires , is the Righteousness that His Righteousness requires Him to Require.”
Furthermore we are warned of the coming day of Judgment, in which the standard will be absolute Righteousness and Truth. At the great accounting God will require perfect Righteousness of each person.
But after thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God;Who will render to every man according to his deeds…(Romans 2:5-6).
This is the bad news, that we are all on our way to a Judgment of our lives by a Holy God who can accept nothing less than absolute Righteousness from those whom He made in His Image. Eternal, happy Fellowship with Him requires total Righteousness and we have none to offer Him. We have not been morally upright, we have not conformed to God’s standards, by our we have forfeited the right to dwell in God’s universe. What are we going to do?
God himself offers to us the answer. Romans declares that it is Jesus,
…Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; Romans 3:25
Jesus is the offering God made unto Himself. God has “set him forth” as the ‘satisfaction ‘ offering, His life offered to God for us satisfies the requirements of the Righteous nature of God, the broken law of God, the offended Holiness of God.By the resurrection God testified that He is satisfied in the offering of Jesus.
In short, here is the Gospel .A Righteous God, has made a righteous way to cleanse and renew unrighteous sinners, by exchange. In God’s plan, Jesus assumed our unrighteousness before God, and was judged with our judgment, so that we could be given as a gift ,his Righteousness the very status before God that He rightly deserves. As Paul put it,
For He hath made Him who knew no sin, to be sin for us, that we might be made the Righteousness of God in Him.(2 Cor 5:21)
Amen!
Thank You, Pastor Bill, for doing a study in Romans. I absolutely LOVE this Book!
My Daily Thread is all OT, so I come to Your Thread for Your NT Perspective. Thank You!
May You Be Blessed!
How so the Jews?
10As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: 11There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. 12They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. 13Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: 14Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: 15Their feet are swift to shed blood: 16Destruction and misery are in their ways: 17And the way of peace have they not known: 18There is no fear of God before their eyes. 19Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.
20Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.
The Law shows us that we have all sinned and need justification
The Jews were seeking God´s justification at least 4,000 years ago. As a religious movement they´ve done reasonably well. They´ve lasted.
O LORD, hear my prayer, listen to my cry for mercy; in your faithfulness and righteousness come to my relief. 2 Do not bring your servant into judgment, for no one living is righteous before you.
We´ll part company here as I think it can be.
Louis Jacobs in his ¨Principles Of The Jewish Faith¨ details Moses Maimonides of the 12th & 13th centuries AD in detailing his Third of these Thirteen Principles: ¨...this unity is not a body nor the power of a body, nor can the accidents of bodies overtake Him, as, e.g., motion and rest, whether in the essential or accidental sense.
Yet far from an unbeliever, I am yet agnostic to the sense that Jesus is divine, but that the United States could not have been founded without Christianity seems a given that I think many have missed.
31Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah:
32Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD:
33But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.
34And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.
No more Law written on stone, God promises a New Birth- the Law written on the heart-(where the problem always has been)
Thank you Pastor Bill
I have recently realized the manifestation of this scripture in my own life(on hind sight).
I had determined in my ‘head’ that I was not going to show mercy because of repeated painful incidents against my own person, and yet that decision went against my heart’s desire to love at any or all costs. Now in my defense, when I determined in my head not to show mercy I don’t believe it was a conscious decision to deny mercy, but a conscious decision to protect myself.
And yet as I entered into the situation, I can safely say I was unable to abide by my head decision and found myself showing mercy and grace beyond what I thought was possible. I recognized it as God showing this person mercy and grace through me because it was written in my inward parts and on my heart. Overwhelmingly humbling, especially when I realized that my determination to protect myself was contrary to my stated goals. If I determine I need to protect myself, my goal cannot be attained at ‘any or all costs’. But God did protect me even as He ministered to another.
GLORY TO GOD! The gospel duplicates itself in those who believe- thank you for that testimony-
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