The Righteous Judgment of God (Part 8)

SERMON: GM15-068

SERIES: Renewal Through Romans: The Gospel Defined, Explained & Applied

SETTING: North Kelso Baptist Church

SERVICE: Sunday AM (August 9, 2015)

SECTION: The Perversion of Righteousness (Romans 1:18-3:20)

SUBTITLE: The Righteous Judgment of God (Part 8)

SCRIPTURE: Romans 3:12-18

SUBJECT: All men are guilty

SUMMARY: Paul proves all men are guilty of sin since there is no difference between the Greek and the Jew by using the OT Scriptures which prevents anyone from relying on their own efforts for salvation.

SCHEME: To motivate genuine believers to proclaim the gospel


TITLE: The Righteous Judgment of God (Part 8)
TEXT: Romans 3:12-18

TRANSLATION

“What then? Are we any better? Not at all. For we previously charged both Jews and Greeks that they are all under sin. Just as it is written, ‘There is no righteous, no not one.’ There is none who understands; there is none who seeks God. All have turned aside; together they became unprofitable; there is not one doing kindness, there is not so much as one. Their throat is an opened grave; with their tongues they deceived; the poison of asps is under their lips; whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their fee are swift to shed blood; ruin and misery are in their ways; and the way of peace they did not know. There is no fear of God before their eyes.” (English Majority Version, from Majority Greek Text)

THEME: All men have sinned
THRUST: which is proved by the OT scriptures

TRUTH: Paul proves that all men are guilty of sin since the Jews are no different than the Greeks by using OT Scriptures as evidence proving again from claiming justification by their own efforts.

THUMBNAIL

1A The Sinful Heathen (1:18-32)
2A The Sinful Hebrews (2:1-3:8)

1B The Judgment of God Declared (2:1-16)

1C The Jews deserved the judgment of God (2:1-5)
2C The Jews determined the judgment of God (2:6-10)
3C The Jews doomed by the judgment of God (2:12-16)

2B The Judgment of God Discussed (2:17-29)

1C The Jews Misunderstood their status (2:17-24)
2C The Jews Misunderstood their symbol (2:25-29)

3B The Judgment of God Defended (3:1-8)

1C The Favor by the Judge is not nullified (1-2)
2C The Faithfulness of the Judge is not nullified (3-4)
3C The Fame of the Judge is not nullified (5-8)

3A The Sinful Humanity (3: 9-20)

1B Humanities Sinfulness Is Presented by Paul’s Exclamation (9)

2B Humanities Sinfulness Is Proved by Paul’s Evidence (10-18)

1C Proved by the evidence of their condition (10-11)

1D All men are unrighteous (10)
2D All men are unreasonable (11a)
3D All men are unrepentant (11b)
2C Proved by the evidence of their character (12)

1D Disobeyed (12a)
2D Depreciated (12b)
3D Damaged (12c)

3C Proved by the evidence of their conduct (13-18)

1D Their conduct is seen in their wicked words (13-14)

1E Words likened to the vileness of a sepulcher
2E Words likened to the venom of a snake

2D Their conduct is seen in their wicked ways (15-18)

1E …their murderous ways
2E …their miserable ways
3E …their mutinous ways

The Righteous Judgment of God
Romans 3:12-18

Review:

We are in series that has been looking at the Perversion of Righteousness. Last week we began looking at the third and final point in this second section of Paul’s letter.

We are looking at The Perversion of Righteousness which begins in 1:18 and runs through 3:20. In this section we looked at The Sinful Heathen, The Sinful Hebrew, and now we are looking at The Sinful Humanity.

It seems that Paul is still using the literary device known as a “diatribe” and he is answering anticipated objections from either real Jews or an imaginary opponent.

And so last week we began looking at the fact that all of humanity, both Jews and Gentiles, Heathen and Hebrews were sinful. So we looked at Humanities Sinfulness Presented by Paul’s Exclamation in verse 9. So we looked at three parts of Paul’s exclamation. First, we looked at…

1C The Inquiry

“What then? What is the conclusion from the preceding discussion? It is like the Jews are collectively asking, what does it all mean? What should we believe? What should we take away from what you just said?

[The reason they ask this question is because of…]

2C The Implication

Are we better than they? I think the Jews read Paul’s statement in vss. 1-2, and they were thinking that maybe we do have some advantages over the Gentiles. So it is understandable that after hearing that they have the advantage of having God’s word and that there is some profit in circumcision, they might think, “Wow, maybe we are better than the Gentiles.”

[So, this forces Paul to come back with…]

3C The Indictment

Not at all. There is an emphasis here in the Greek that we miss in the English. You could say it this way, not at all in the least.

For we have previously charged both Jews and Greeks that they are all under sin. Paul is referring to his overwhelming indictment of all men, Jews and Gentiles in beginning in chapter 1:18 all the way through chapter 2:29

And then we began looking at our second point, which was Humanities Sinfulness Is Proved by Paul’s Evidence (10-18). This point runs from vss. 10 through vss. 18.

Paul is going to prove once and for all and conclusively that all humanity is guilty of sin and of being sinners. Paul will prove his point with extremely damaging evidence. As a matter of fact Paul will prove his point by using the Scriptures as exhibit 1 and the evidence of mankind’s sinfulness as exhibit 2.

Paul says, “As it is written…” This is Paul’s way of introducing OT Scriptures. Paul’s purpose in citing these verses is to substantiate his accusation that he made in verse 9 – “…previously charged both Jews and Gentiles that they are all under sin.”

[The fact that all of humanity is sinful is…]

1C Proved by the evidence of their condition (10-11)

[The very first evidence about humanities condition is that…]

1D All men are unrighteous (10)

“There is no righteous, no not one.” Man is incapable of doing that which is right in the presence of God.

Paul is talking about man’s inner character. The inward nature of man is so corrupt that no man can do a single thing that is righteous by God’s standards. Paul wants to make sure the church at Rome did not miss this point, because he added, “no not one.”

[The second evidence about humanities condition is that…]

2D All men are unreasonable (11a)

“There is none who understands…”

All men, both Jew and Greek do not have the ability to fully understand God’s truth or God’s standards of righteousness.

[The third item of evidence about humanities condition is that…]

3D All men are unrepentant (11b)

“There is none who seeks after God.”

The natural or the unsaved man seeks his own interests, his own pleasures, and his own desires. Therefore Paul says, there is none who seeks after God.

Paul proves the total and absolute sinfulness of humanity by offering up proof by submitting the evidence of man’s sinful condition, and it ain’t pretty – man’s condition is unrighteous, unreasonable, and unrepentant.

[Let’s dig into our…]

TRUTH FOR TODAY

[Secondly, Paul maintains that the total and absolute sinfulness of both the Jews and the Greeks is…]

2C Proved by the evidence of their character (12)

Not only is the condition of man bad, but his character is just as bad or worse. We see the character of humanity characterized as…

1D Disoriented (12a)

“They have all turned aside…” The Greek verb gives the primary meaning of leaning in the wrong direction. In a military setting it refers to a soldier who running the wrong way. We call this soldier a deserter.

The natural and overriding inclination of the human nature is to against God. Our nature is driven to do everything contrary to the will of God.

God says be pure – man becomes as immoral as he can become
God says one man one woman – man says same sex marriage

Isaiah wrote, “All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way.” (Isaiah 53:6)

Humanity are deserters, they are running the wrong way, away from God and toward, death, destruction, and eternal punishment.

This is from birth. Because their nature is disoriented. Listen to Psalm 58:3, “The wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies.” (Psalm 58:3, NKJV)

[So, we see humanities character as totally disoriented. Paul also offers up evidence to prove the sinful character of the Jews and the Gentiles by showing that their character has…]

2D Depreciated (12b)

“…They have together become unprofitable…”

Close your ears, you may not like what Paul says here. Humanity is spiritually worthless. They are useless.

This verb was used of milk that had turned sour and rancid and was useless or worthless to drink or to be used for butter or cheese. The milk was no good for any use. Man’s character had depreciated from being part of creation that God had called “good” to now being worthless or useless.

Useless in what sense? In the sense that…

• A branch separated or cut off from the tree cannot live nor can it produce any fruit

• Meat that has spoiled or gone rotten cannot be used to provide sustenance to hungry people

• Salt that has lost its saltiness or flavoring is useless to flavor food or to preserve food

• A light that is covered over and hidden from view is worthless or useless to provide light when needed

Do you get the idea? The natural or unsaved man is useless for the purposes of God.

Listen God did not save you because He saw something valuable in you. He didn’t save you because He thought you were worth saving. God did not save you because He knew your potential.

God saved you because He had a unique and loving relationship with you in eternity past, freely, unfettered, and uninfluenced that resulted in your being elected to salvation for His good purpose and pleasure. That is why He saved you. At least this is as much as we can fathom from Scripture in this finite, human state.

[Humanities character is both disoriented and has depreciated from good to useless. Paul isn’t done yet. He also offers up evidence of character that is…]

3D Damaged (12c)

“…There is none who does god, no not one.”

Here Paul rips apart all of man’s ideas about his goodness. The, “I am doing the best I can,” isn’t good enough. Nor is it true. No one does his best.

First of all, this seems to be a repeat of the first thing Paul said against humanity and seems to be a bit of a summary of what he has said.

Second, the verb refers to what is upright, especially what is morally upright. Against God’s perfect righteousness the unsaved man has no ability or desire to do anything upright and good by God’s standards.

Men want to think that they are good and do good things. Jews think they are good and do good things and Gentiles think they are good and do good things. But there is not one human being that has ever done good by the standards of God.

Illustration:

A man in Scotland was walking through a park one day. He had a carrying case for his bible. A group of young people thought it was a camera bag and asked him if we would take a picture of them. The old man said to them, “I already have your picture. It is here in my case.” Naturally the kids were surprised and asked him, “When and how did he take their picture?” The old man took out his bible and read Romans 3:9-20 to them and said “That is a picture of you.” And he tried to share the gospel with them.

It is true isn’t it? Isn’t this section a true picture of the character of humanity, whether it is a Jew or a Gentile?

[Paul has offered up evidence to prove the sinfulness of humanity. He offered up evidence in relationship to their condition, their character, and now he will show the total sinfulness of humanity as it is…]

3C Proved by the evidence of their conduct (13-18)

It is no secret that a person’s character will manifest itself in his everyday life, or in his conduct.

Remember what Jesus said to His disciples: “…for out of the abundance of the heart he mouth speaks. A good man out of the reassure of his heart brings forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth evil things.” (Matthew 12:34-35, NKJV)

Don’t be confused here – Jesus is talking about a good man from human standards, not from God’s standards. This verse does not contradict what Paul has been saying. Jesus was showing the Pharisees that the evil words they spoke showed what the true nature of their heart was.
[Paul offers up evidence that says…]

1D Their conduct is seen in their wicked words (13-14)

Paul is very descriptive concerning their wicked words, first he says that their speech or their…

1E Words are likened to the vileness of a sepulcher

“Their throat is an open tomb…”

The speech or the words of man stink and are offensive to God and show that inside the man is a defiled, depraved, and deceitful heart or nature.

[The spiritually dead heart can only generate spiritually dead words that are of no use to God. So, man’s conduct can be seen in his words which are vile like an open grave. Well, humanities conduct can also be seen in their…]

2E Words which are likened to the venom of a snake

“…with their tongues they have practiced deceit, the poison of asps is under their lips.”

The natural or unsaved man is deceitful and with their words they keep on deceiving. Keep deceiving has the basic meaning of luring and was used of baiting a hook by covering it with small pieces of food to hide the danger of the hook. The tense of our verb shows that this deception is continual or repetitive.

Unsaved men are liars and are deceitful as a normal part of their everyday life.

You remember that both John the Baptist and Jesus described the Pharisees as a brood of vipers, snakes. They called the religious leaders snakes from a snake pit.

I discovered that the fangs of a deadly snake normally lie folded back in the upper jaw of the snake. But when he snake throws his head in order to strike their hollow fangs drop down and when the snake bites the fangs press a sac of deadly poison that is hidden under the “lips” of the snake which injects the venom into their victim.

But look at the venom of the wicked, it isn’t snake poison, “whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness.”

Their venom is foul speech. Curses that offend man and God. One day God is going to judge the speech of sinful humanity.

[The spiritually dead heart can only generate spiritually dead words that are of no use to God. So, man’s conduct can be seen in his words which are vile like an open grave. Man’s conduct can also be seen in…]

2D Their conduct is seen in their wicked ways (15-18)

It is not only way we say that makes us subject to the judgment of God, it is also by what we do. Here Paul lists at least three activities that subject all of humanity to the judgment of God. Paul list…

1E …their murderous ways

“Their feet are swift to shed blood…” Is worth noting that the first recorded sin outside of the Garden of Eden was murder. Men have committed murder ever since. J. Edgar Hoover in his day said a murder was committed every 40 minutes somewhere in the USA. I wonder what it is today.

From cannibalism to serial killers to moments of heated passion and abortion mankind has been murdering since Cain.

I don’t have to throw out a bunch of boring statistics to prove to you that murder is a prevalent sin among men even in our country. Even though you probably haven’t committed murder, the seed is in your nature.

As a matter of fact, Jesus said that an angry thought is traced to murder.

It is only by God’s grace and the various restraints that we respond to that have preventing that seed in us in coming to full harvest.

Robert Haldane wrote, “The most savage animals do not destroy so many of their own species to appease their hunger as man destroys of his fellows to satiate his ambition, his revenge, or his cupidity [greed].”

[Not only is humanities conduct seen in their murderous ways, it can also be seen in…]

2E …their miserable ways

“…destruction and misery are in their ways…”
Our verb for destruction is actually a compound verb, and means breaking in pieces with the result of completely shattering which causes total devastation.

There is a wanton, unimaginable, and frightening thing happening in our country where men kill, torture, rape, abuse, or destroy other human beings for no reason other than the sheer joy of destroying or shattering something or someone.

This wanton destruction leads to misery. This is utmost pain and despair.

[So, humanity is murderous and they are miserable in their actions. But Paul tells us about…]

3E …their mutinous ways

“And the way of peace they have not known.”

Paul is not talking about inner peace. He is referring to a moving away from peaceablness like you would on a ship when mutiny destroys the peace aboard ship and between captain and crew.
It seems humanity does not want to have peace but goes to great length to create some type of mutiny and is disruptive towards peaceful existence.

Why is this so true? What causes this wanton destruction, misery, and breaking of the peace? We see this in verse 18. What causes mutinous ways?

“There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

God who should upon the very thought of Him restrain and restrict this type of behavior has been rejected man humanity. Men not only ignore God but they live as if God does not exist.

Humanity has rejected God and therefore they have been abandoned by God and they have freed to act out without restraint from their sinful wicked nature and behave mutinously because they no longer have even fear of God.

Psalm 36:1 reads, “Transgression speaks to the ungodly within his heart; there is no fear of God before his eyes.”

I want to prove from our passage that all men are sinners and therefore are in need of the gospel.

We will have to wait until next week to look at the third and final point to this message. In the meantime…

Five Lessons Taught By This Passage:

1. It demonstrates the tragic blindness of the Jews with regards to their OT

They boasted that they had the “oracles” or the words of God and were proud that they alone had them and no other nation had them, and yet they did not know them. They were blinded to their need and the depth of their own sin.

2. It demonstrates the universality of sin

No other passage of scripture proves the absolute universality of sin like vss. 10- 18. When you share the gospel and attempt to prove that all men are sinners and in need of salvation, here is where you turn. You can use Eph 2 also, but prior to man being drawn to salvation the HS must convict them of their sin, this is the place.

3. It demonstrates the terrible character of sin

This passage gives you a picture of what man really is by his natural birth.

4. It demonstrates what must be understood in order to understand the gospel

Paul announced the gospel in vss. 16-17 and said it is the power of God to save. Why is the gospel necessary? Why does man need to be saved. Why do we need the power of God in order to be saved? Right here is the preparation for the gospel.

This passage shows the tremendous need for the conviction of sin. Chapter 3:10-18 is a perfect exposition, or explanation of chapter 1:18.

Listen, in the majority of cases, the salvation process is not an instantaneous process. The HS must begin driving home this point – that all men are sinners, dead in trespasses and sin and are fundamentally and thoroughly sinful. This takes time in most cases. This takes presenting this passage and these truths a number of times, over time. The HS in His timing awakens a sinful soul to the reality of its sinfulness and then begins to cause the awakened soul to be convicted, to be concerned or grieved, and to repent. Until the dead and sinful soul is awakened to its utter sinfulness there will never be repentance.

True conversion, true regeneration is a work of God through the HS who imparts to the mind the heart, and the life a new, humble, prayerful, and radically God- centered and Christ focused orientation which is a reversal of the natural godlessness of our fallen condition.

Conversion is something that is actually pursued by the sinner when the HS begins the process in the heart of a sinner. Several things take place:

• Self-examination and awareness of the sinner’s sinful condition
• Self-humbling and prayerful repentance
• Whole-hearted commitment to Jesus Christ
• There is an awareness that the sinner has been pardoned & accepted by God based on the works of Jesus Christ the Son through the HS.
• There is an awareness that the newly saved soul is an heir of salvation and heaven’s glorious inheritance

You don’t get this in mass evangelism, raise your hand and repeat after me, or Jesus loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. This is why we have more spiritual abortions than conversions.

[And finally…]

5. It demonstrates the contrast between the sin of humanity & the glory of God

In spite of the blackness and darkness and devastation of sin, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law to save sinners.

When you look at the blackness of sin you see the shinning glory of God. You see the amazing grace of God in contrast to this horrible sinfulness of humanity.

There are no greater words than Christs when He said, “Her sins, which are many, are forgiven…” (Luke 7)

Humanity is horribly sinful, God is truly glorious!

[What do you say that we wrap this up?]

CONCLUSION

The Application for North Kelso Baptist Church:

Paul has declared and demonstrated that the Gentiles are guilty as sinners and are rightfully under the condemnation and judgment of God. Paul has also declared and demonstrated that the Jews are also guilty as sinners and are also rightfully under the condemnation and judgment of God.

Today, we have seen that Paul both declare and demonstrate that all of humanity, all Jews and all Gentiles are guilty as sinners and are rightfully under the judgment and condemnation of God.
Paul has demonstrated this truth by skillful exclamation of his point, and by skillfully offering up evidence, and by a skillful explanation.

All men, all of humanity are guilty

SUMMARY: Paul proves all men are guilty of sin since there is no difference between the Greek and the Jew by using the OT Scriptures which prevents anyone from relying on their own efforts for salvation.

Today I wanted to motivate you as genuine believers to proclaim the gospel to all men because they have sinned against God, and God is angry with them every day.

What Should You Do?

Remember that all men are slaves of sin and they sin because they are ruled by sin

Ask the Holy Spirit to strengthen and empower you in order to resist the temptation to follow the flesh and engage in wicked words or ways

Share the gospel with any and all members of humanity