How Can We Be Rght With God (Romans 3:21-25a)
INTRODUCTION:
Last Sunday ended with the verdict being rendered against sinful humanity, we are guilty before God. There is not one righteous, not even one. Paul in delivering this verdict then as if nailing the coffin on humanity shut writes, “…by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.” (Romans 3:20, NASB95)[1] Paul shows us that even the Law of God offers no remedy for sinful, guilty humanity. Through the Law comes the knowledge of sin. Obedience to the Law cannot help us, rather it just shows how sinful we truly are. If you are truly serious about spiritual matters then at the end of last week’s message you should have understood the hopelessness of the sinner, the hopelessness of each and every person who has ever lived or will live on this earth. If those of us who have sinned are already doomed and cannot possibly atone for our own sins; if fallen, sinful mankind cannot earn their way back into God’s favor even by carefully and meticulously following God’s Law to the best of their ability, what hope is there for anyone?
Down through history man has asked the question: How can man be right with God? Job asked it during his lifetime which was probably around the time of Abraham. In Job 9:2, he asks, “In truth I know that this is so; But how can a man be in the right before God?” (Job 9:2, NASB95)[2] This is the question that has plague mankind from the beginning, and the gospel answers this question.
This morning we move from weeks of looking at the bad news of the Gospel to looking at the good news of the Gospel. Paul first laid a foundation, the bad news, so that we would each know that we are under sin, that we are guilty before God, that we are deserving of God’s wrath and judgment and that in ourselves there is nothing that we can do to change that, we are hopeless and helpless to make ourselves right with God and escape His wrath and judgment. Let’s pray and then read our passage for today.
--PRAY--
SCRIPTURE:
Turn in your Bibles this morning to Romans 3:21-25a. Here we will find Paul’s answer to man’s plight and question, How can a man be in the right before God? Please stand if you are able in honor of the reading of God’s Word.
Romans 3:21-25a,
“But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no distinction; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith.” (Romans 3:21–25a, NASB95)[3]
THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD REVEALED (Romans 3:21)
Paul opens this passage with the little word, “but” which indicates that a contrast is about to be made. This contrast is wonderful, Paul contrasts man’s total depravity and inability to please God with God’s own provision of a way to Himself. In other words, Paul is going to answer the question that has plagued mankind since sin entered the world, “How can a man be in the right before God?”
Paul writes, “But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested…” (Romans 3:21a, NASB95)[4] Let the truth of this statement penetrate your heart, this is great news that Paul is giving to us, there is hope for sinful mankind. Let’s break this statement down a bit to understand it more. We already know the first word of this verse introduced the contrast. The second word “now” refers to a time. We are going to discover that the “now” refers to the incarnation of Jesus Christ, this is when the righteousness of God was revealed to us. The good news is that this righteousness of God is apart from the Law. What does that mean? It does not mean that this is just a restatement of the Law because we already know that we cannot keep the Law, and the Law cannot make us righteous or give us life, rather it reveals our sin and condemns us. What Paul is saying is that this righteousness of God that is being revealed to us is entirely apart from any law and entirely apart from obedience to any law, even God’s revealed Law. In other words, God’s righteousness is in no way based on human achievement, there is nothing that man can do in his own power to receive this righteousness, it is apart from human effort. Even the Law that God had given to the people of Israel did not teach salvation by obedience to God’s Law. They thought it did, but God gave the Law which is the standard of His righteousness in order to demonstrate to man the impossibility of keeping it by human effort.
Paul is declaring that the righteousness of God, apart from the Law, that perfect, eternal righteousness by which men can be right with God has been manifested or revealed. As we will see in the next verse this righteousness has been revealed in Jesus Christ for all those who believe.
Paul writes in the end of verse 21 that this righteousness of God apart from the Law was being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets. This statement was directed primarily to Paul’s Jewish readers, whose whole religion centered on the Law and the Prophets, a phrase that was used to refer to the whole Old Testament. Paul was saying that he was not bringing in some new kind of theology concerning righteousness, it was spoken of in the Old Testament.
The Law and the Prophets speak extensively about God’s perfect righteousness and they also affirm what Paul had said that man is unable to achieve the righteousness required in the Law by his own power or effort. The Law and the prophets all pointed to Jesus Christ, the perfect sacrifice for sin. The Law and the Prophets showed the perfect righteousness of God that would be revealed in Jesus Christ. The Mosaic sacrifices could not atone for sins, but symbolically pointed to Jesus Christ, who would be the perfect sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. Though the commandments, rituals, sacrifices, and godly principles taught in the Old Testament were and still are a part of God’s inspired Word, they could never remove sin, forgive sin, atone for sin, or give a new and righteous life to a sinner, no matter how hard and sincerely he tried to follow and keep them. Paul is clear that human effort will not make a person right with God, it must be the righteousness of God apart from the Law.
THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD THROUGH FAITH (Romans 3:22-23)
Paul having said that this righteousness of God apart from the Law has been revealed, he then goes on, “even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no distinction;” (Romans 3:22, NASB95)[5] This is exciting. Paul is telling us the good news, that the perfect righteousness of God cannot be obtained by human effort, but can only be acquired by faith. This has always been the only way of salvation. Faith in Jesus Christ is how we can be right before God. What is faith, true saving faith is belief, trust and surrender to the Lord Jesus Christ. True saving faith involves the exercise of the will, we might call this repentance it is a changing of our attitude about ourselves, our sin, and about God, we must understand that we are sinners and agree with God that we cannot save ourselves, we cannot in ourselves be right with God, we are helpless sinners and we must believe that Jesus Christ is the only one who can save us. True saving faith also must come from a sincere heart and the person’s sincere faith will be evidenced by a transformed life.
Jesus Christ is the revealed righteousness of God, everything in the Old Testament pointed forward towards Him, everything in the New Testament points back towards Him and it is because of this truth that He is the righteousness of God that He can impart divine righteousness to those who trust Him. Jesus demonstrated the righteousness of God during His incarnation by living a sinless life, by fulfilling the whole Law perfectly, and in His death He demonstrated the righteousness of God by paying the penalty, the whole penalty, for the unrighteous lives of every human being through all of history.
Paul says that this righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ is for all those who believe. There is no distinction. It does not matter if you are a Jew or a Gentile, a man or a woman, a boy or a girl, but it goes further than that because there is no distinction. Anyone who believes in Jesus Christ, whether they are a murderer, a prostitute, a rapist, a homosexual, a religious hypocrite, a false teacher, or anything else, they will be saved. Just as no one is good enough to be saved, no one is evil enough that he cannot be saved. The righteousness of God in Jesus Christ is available to all. All who believe in faith in Jesus Christ will be saved because in God’s eyes there is no distinction. Sin has leveled the playing field, and just as everyone apart from Christ is equally sinful and rejected by God, everyone who is in Christ through faith in Him is equally righteous and accepted by God. There is no distinction among those who are saved because there is no distinction among those who are sinners. “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23, NASB95)[6] As sinners we can never be perfectly righteous in ourselves. God’s glory is the expression of His perfect righteousness, and because of our sin we will always fall short of His perfect righteousness. Because we are all sinners that have fallen short of God’s glory, there is no distinction and when we in faith believe in Jesus Christ for salvation God’s perfect righteousness is given to us in Christ. Wow, that is amazing! That is what Paul says in the next verses.
THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD IS A GIFT (Romans 3:24-25a)
Paul writes, “being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith.” (Romans 3:24–25a, NASB95)[7] Being justified refers back to “all those who believe” in verse 22 and the “all have sinned” in verse 23. Just as there is no difference among those who need salvation, there is no difference among those who receive it, all who receive it by faith in Jesus Christ are “justified as a gift by His grace.” (Romans 3:24a, NASB95)[8]
Justified means declared righteous, or to declare the rightness of someone or something. Justification is God’s declaration that all the demands of the Law are fulfilled on behalf of the believing sinner through the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ. Justification is a legal term that refers to a legal transaction, it changes the judicial standing of a sinner before God, from one condemned and deserving of God’s wrath and judgment to one who is righteous. Justification is God imputing the prefect righteousness of Jesus Christ to the believer’s account, thus declaring the saved one fully righteous. Understand that justification and sanctification are two distinct parts of salvation that always go together, however justification is immediate in which God’s declares the believing sinner righteous in Christ, imputing Christ’s righteousness to him. Sanctification is God imparting Christ’s righteousness to the sinner transforming him to walk in righteousness in the Spirit, sanctification is a process. While justification and sanctification must be distinguished from one another, the two can never be separated. God does not justify someone and then not sanctify, whom He justifies, He sanctifies.
Paul says that this justification is a gift by God’s grace, and not because of any good thing in the one justified, because there is nothing within the sinner to merit the favor of God, only the opposite is true, the sinner should only merit God’s wrath. But through faith in Jesus Christ we are justified, and this is a gift by God’s grace. A gift by definition is something that the one receiving has not earned or paid for, but it is freely given. The greatest and most wonderful of all of God’s gifts is the salvation that is available through His Son, Jesus, and it is given completely out of God’s grace. The Law revealed God’s righteousness and condemned man’s sinfulness by exposing it in contrast to God’s righteousness. But grace is totally different, it reveals God’s perfect righteousness, but not only reveals it, but gives that righteousness to those who trust in God’s Son. The gift of God’s grace did cost God the suffering and death of His own Son, the separation of God the Son from God the Father and God the Spirit while He bore the sins of the world in His body on the cross, so that, for those who put their faith in Jesus Christ, there is nothing left to pay. Isn’t that good news, its all been paid for, it is a free gift by God’s grace.
How was this righteousness accomplished for us? Paul says that it was accomplished “through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 3:24b, NASB95)[9] Redemption is a word that means releasing or delivering through the payment of a price. It was commonly used in the Roman world of Paul’s day to describe the paying of a ransom to free a prisoner from his captors or paying the price to free a slave from his master. We are all prisoners of sin, slaves to Satan, and because of our sinfulness, because we are unable to bring ourselves up to God’s standard of righteousness, our redemption could only come through that which is in Jesus Christ. Only the sinless, perfectly righteous Savior could pay the ransom price to redeem sinful man.
How was this ransom price paid so that we might be declared righteous? It was paid by an atoning sacrifice. Because as sinners we cannot become righteous on our own, God in His grace provided for our redemption through the atoning sacrifice of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. The sacrifice of God’s own Son was not made in the hidden holy of holies or the most holy place in the temple, but out in the open on the place of the skull for all the world to see. Paul writes, “whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith.” (Romans 3:25a, NASB95)[10] This word propitiation carries within it’s meaning the idea of appeasement or satisfaction. But this is not man’s attempt to appease or satisfy God, in the New Testament propitiation always refers to a work of God, not of man. Sinful man is totally incapable of satisfying God’s justice except by spending an eternity in hell.
There is only one way that man could be reconciled to God, only one way that God would be satisfied or propitiated, the propitiation had to be made by God. For that reason, God in human flesh, Jesus Christ, gave Himself as a ransom for all. He appeased or satisfied the wrath of God against sin.
Paul writes that this atoning sacrifice, this propitiation was paid by Christ’s own blood. Peter said it this way in 1 Peter 1:18-19, “knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.” (1 Peter 1:18–19, NASB95)[11]
The Greek translation of the Old Testament uses this word “propitiation” to translate the Hebrew word for Mercy Seat, which was the covering on the ark of the covenant which was in the holy of holies or the most holy place in the Tabernacle and later the Temple. Remember this was where the high priest would go once a year, on the Day of Atonement, to make a sacrifice for the people. On that day when he would enter the holy of holies with blood, he would sprinkle the blood on the Mercy Seat, symbolizing the payment for the penalty of his own sins and the sins of the people. This was a yearly act that was prescribed by God and honored by the people, but this act had no power to remove or pay the penalty for a single sin. Why did they do it year after year? Because it pointed to the true and effective atoning sacrifice, the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Paul finishes this passage by again reminding us that we are justified through faith in the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ, by His blood shed for us. By this we have been declared righteous.
CONCLUSION:
How can a person be right with God? By faith in Jesus Christ and thus being declared righteous. If you do not learn anything else from the book of Romans, learn this: guilty, condemned sinners, which includes everyone of us, who deserve God’s wrath and judgment, by faith in Jesus Christ’s death can be justified before God. Declared righteous, having Christ’s righteousness imputed or credited to our account because His sinless death, the shedding of His blood satisfied the wrath of God against sin for all those who believe. Do you understand the enormity of this? Something that we were utterly incapable of doing because of our sin nature and our own sinfulness, God did for us as a gift of His grace. Jesus Christ, God in flesh, the perfectly righteous Son of God who knew no sin, God made Him to be sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ. God the Father imputed our sin to Jesus Christ and imputed Jesus Christ’s righteousness to us. That is the good news of the Gospel!
[1]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[2]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[3]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[4]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[5]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[6]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[7]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[8]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[9]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[10]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[11]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. La Habra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995