So growing up as a young kid in the Mormon church, it was church-focused, family-focused, and it was a delightful time.

We moved to a small town in Utah when I was 10.

As I got older, the doctrine, it started changing and asking us to do things that I just, I didn't understand.

And I looked around me and everyone was okay with it.

I just, I would look around going, am I the only one that thinks this is weird?

They had asked us to go do baptisms for the dead.

These are people that died before the church was Chris created.

And I thought it was really strange.

And everyone was like, don't you feel the spirit here?

And I didn't feel the spirit.

I didn't feel the spirit at all.

But they would have us fast so that we could feel the spirit.

I thought, well, if I break my fast, then I don't have to do the baptisms.

So I opened my lunch, opened a bag of Cheetos and eat them.

And then the people around me ratted me out.

So the Sunday school teacher came over and said, we need you to be spirit-filled right now.

You need to be ready to be able to baptize them.

And I said, well, the spirit told me to eat the Cheetos.

That's kind of when I started really shifting, really questioning things.

And being in a small town, it's not an easy thing to say you don't want to be Mormon because people leave you because they don't want to be associated with you Because...

you're going to lead them astray.

It was hard, but I stayed course.

So I went and talked to the bishop that I was struggling in the church.

I was struggling with my testimony.

I didn't have one, that I really didn't want to be Mormon, and I didn't understand why I was getting so much pushback.

By the time I walked home, he had already called my parents.

They were really angry with me, and so they made me go to church.

I didn't want to.

I didn't want to be Mormon.

I didn't know what I wanted to be.

So one of my neighbors, Kristen, had invited me to go to One and All, but back then it was CCV.

I said yes.

I didn't want to.

And it was helping me break the Mormon belief and embrace the Christian.

I realized the importance of challenging churches and just anyone that you think that has authority.

I hope you challenge that.

To ask and make sure that they think Jesus is who you know Jesus to be.

And if they're true godly people, they'll appreciate it.

Because it helps strengthen their testimony too.

Right?

There's something about defending something you believe in.

I think that's how it's supposed to be.

My son told me he was so grateful that I was able to get out of the Mormon church.

He didn't know what he would have done if he had to do it.

And he just thanked me.

He told me he was proud of me.

So my family, my kids...

know the real Jesus and their kids and their kids right so I broke the mold and it wasn't easy but I'm so grateful I did I just, I love that about Pam's story.

It's an amazing story.

And we're in a season around one in all, in all three of our campuses and our ministry, really all around the world, where people are coming to Christ literally every weekend now.

And there are are times in a movement like this that I feel the need to be able to clarify some things and make sure we understand what the gospel truly is.

I get a lot of questions, a lot of new people seeking Christ through all of our campuses, and so it is now time to necessary to do a sermon like this.

And I'm excited what we're going to do this weekend.

I want you to turn in your Bibles.

If you have a phone, an iPad, whatever, as long as it's on silent.

Romans chapter 10, verse one through four.

I want to look very closely at a passage.

And as I heard Pam's story, you know, I grew up in a church where the pastor would often say things that seemed outlandish to me.

Now they weren't outlandish.

I grew up in a pretty good church.

They just seemed outlandish to me because I was ignorant concerning the scriptures.

And I was the kind of kid, and I'm talking about 10, 11, 12 years old, I started asking these questions.

And I wanted to raise my hand during the sermon.

Now, don't you do this.

But I wanted to raise my hand during the sermon and say, wait a minute, but what about this?

And I accidentally, I was so rambunctious and excited.

There were a few times I said, yeah, but before my mom took her hand and grabbed a wad of my hair and pulled it, and that's why I'm losing my hair still today.

But she would say, don't you dare, because it was just impulsive.

out.

It did make me want to discover what the Bible really said.

Because sometimes the pastor would say something like, we all know, and he would say something, but I didn't know.

And I wanted to know where the Bible said that, where the scriptures are.

And so I, at a young age, I got my little red New Testament.

Remember those little red New Testaments and red letter edition?

And I would read it, and I wanted to discover.

I'd ask my parents questions.

Oftentimes, they didn't know the answer.

I would ask my pastor, and he thought I was a troublemaker.

But I was really just wanting to know.

And then something beautiful happened.

A guy in Southern California by the name of Charles Swindoll and a guy from Atlanta, Charles Stanley, came on WHBC in the little town of Elizabethan, Tennessee from 7 to 8 o'clock every night.

We didn't have headphones and we didn't have Bluetooth in those days.

So I would take the stereo speakers and I would lay on the carpet where the speakers would go in each ear.

And I would listen to them.

And you know the funniest thing happened?

It's like they knew exactly what my questions were.

It's like somebody called them up and told them, this is what Jeff Bynes and Elizabeth in Tennessee struggles with.

Would you preach a sermon on that?

And every time I got down on the carpet to listen, it was like, these guys know me.

The reality is they knew their Bible well, and they knew human nature well, and they were great pastors because they actually preached sermons that mattered.

They were answering questions people were asking.

Now, what I want to do, this is one of those times.

One of those times when there's a lot of you asking questions when it comes to why Christ is unique, why is he different than any other religion, and why should I put my faith and confidence in this?

So I'm going to go to a difficult passage.

We're going to work our way through it and going to answer some of these questions.

So this is the Apostle Paul writing to the church at Rome.

This is the theological treaties of the Bible.

This is it right here.

There are many scholars and there are many church fathers that said, if you had no other book other than the book of Romans, you would be able to understand the gospel in its entirety.

In verse 1, Paul says, Brothers and sisters, my heart's desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved.

Now, do you get that already?

He's assuming they're not saved.

For I can testify about them, they are zealous.

That's a word that just means there's great passion, okay, for God.

But their zeal is not based on knowledge, since they did not know the righteousness of God and sought to establish their own.

They did not submit to God's righteousness.

Christ is the culmination of the law, so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes.

So right away, here's what you learn.

You learn that it is possible to be extremely passionate about something, certain about something, zealous about something, and spend your entire life believing it.

wholeheartedly thinking and knowing in your mind that you're right only to discover you've been wrong the entire time that's harsh most people have no trouble acknowledging this in every area of life except one now if you think what do you say well I'm saying imagine that there's something you believe religiously philosophically whatever And you're so certain, you're zealous, you live passionately, and then something happens when you're older, you realize you've been wrong the whole time.

Just think of Angel fans who think they're going to win the World Series every new season.

That'll kind of put it in context for you, right?

I had a golf lesson.

Most of you know I love golf.

It's going to be real practical this weekend.

Most of you know I really enjoy the game of golf.

One of the most famous teachers in the game of golf is a guy named Hank Haney.

He taught Tiger Woods when Tiger Woods was winning all of his tournaments.

It just so happened I was in Scottsdale, Arizona a few years ago, and a friend of mine bought me a lesson with Hank Haney.

It was supposed to be a half hour.

He spent two hours with me, me and Hank Haney.

And at some point, he looked at me, and he put my head in his hands, and he said, young man, you have no idea how the golf swing actually works.

Now, you've got to understand that hurt because I told him, hey, I was taught the game by Nick.

Price, that's Mickey Price's older brother.

I know the golf swing.

And he kept telling me, no, you don't.

I thought I knew how the club's supposed to work.

I thought I knew how the golf is supposed to be played.

He said, you got no clue.

That was humbling.

58 years old, I've been playing the game wrongly, which would explain most of my scores over the course of my life.

There's a YouTube guy that I'm absolutely addicted to over in Phoenix.

They call him Sergeant Curtis.

I got a video and I can't stop watching them.

Because he is a police officer.

He served in the police for many, many years.

And he shows videos where police run into sovereign citizens.

I don't know if you've heard about these people.

But it's a movement in America.

There's a group of people who believe that the governmental laws do not apply to them.

Because they don't consent to them.

They really believe that this will work when they get pulled over.

They declare themselves as separate sovereign citizens.

And so every time they play this game, they get arrested.

It never works.

Then they go to court and they try to play the same game and they get thrown into the slammer.

I think the reason I'm addicted to it is because the look on their faces.

They're so surprised.

I mean, even though it's never worked for anybody.

They truly believe that they can print up their own driver's license and print up their own tag and not be arrested and not get insurance on the car.

They truly believe this.

They've read on some website.

They are totally convinced.

And I think the reason I like to watch it is it always ends the same way.

They get pepper sprayed.

The cop breaks out the window and drags them out.

I don't know why, as a pastor, I enjoy that so much.

But I got to tell you, sometimes I'll just fast forward to the end just to see them break the window.

I mean, it's uncanny.

I've always said I had a fear of flying for a very long time.

I was terrified.

And I think that God took that away from me because I think God knew I was going to be flying a lot as I got older.

I can't explain it.

Suddenly now my most favorite place to be is on an airplane because no one can bother me.

And I put Coldplay on the headphones and I'm out.

On those flights to New Zealand, 13 hours, I sleep the whole way.

It's beautiful.

Now, I want a pilot who's passionate about reality and truth.

Don't you?

I don't want a pilot to get out and say, you know what?

I truly believe this is the way an airplane should work.

You know, I don't care what you truly believe.

I'm not interested in what you think is true.

I want to know how this multi-million dollar machine actually works, and I want you to be a professional concerning how it works.

Let's operate on truth and fact, not passion and zeal.

Again, when it comes to this kind of thinking, most people would agree with me.

In every arena of life except one, what is it?

Religion.

And suddenly everything changes.

So in some of the debates I've had around the world, I hear this all the time.

All religions are fundamentally the same, only superficially different.

And I've shared with you before, when you make a statement like that, it's because you are totally ignorant of other religions.

People will say to me, but Pastor Jeff, have you not seen other religious people?

They're so sincere and so devout.

And I usually say, yeah, like Jim Jones and David Koresh and Charles Manson.

Yeah, they're pretty sincere.

They're pretty serious.

In fact, I don't know how much you know about Anton LaVey, who wrote the Satanic Bible.

I can promise you, he was convinced he's right and zealous.

I don't go down this path very often because there are some things I just don't want to give public press to.

But you know, there's a large growing movement in America.

There are people who still worship Satan and the occult, and they believe, they earnestly believe that if you sacrifice a child and drink the blood of the child, it will give you youth.

Do you know that?

And you will live longer.

It's a reality, folks.

We can't put our head in the sand.

The purpose of this weekend, I actually don't wanna discuss other religions.

I wanna discuss our faith, Christianity.

And I want to first of all give a word to the skeptic.

Skeptics will say, oh, come on, Pastor Jeff, even you Christians, you can't even agree.

And that's their reason there's so many religions.

Well, first of all, you think you mean religions, but you don't.

You mean denominations.

Denominations within Christianity like Baptist or Presbyterian, Reformed, Pentecostals, Charismatics, Methodists, Anglican.

And then non-denominational churches like this one.

Now, in this case, the statement that they are fundamentally the same, only superficially different applies.

Because all the denominations, not religions, all the denominations I just mentioned, they have believed in the same core truths for over 2,000 years.

The difference in these different denominations has to do with how the leadership functions, who's elders, who is not an elder.

Do the elders lead the church?

Does the senior pastor lead the church?

Is there a lead team that leads the church?

They often differ on spiritual gifts, which ones are in operation today, which ones have faded or passed away.

And sometimes they'll differ on the forms of prayer and the sacraments.

However, what you need to understand is the theology of salvation, atonement, heaven, hell, sin, grace, forgiveness, and all the rest, primary theologies of the church have never changed for 2,000 years.

Never changed.

In fact, a few years ago, I was over in Turkey, a place called Iznik, which is really modern day Nicaea. And if you know anything about the council of Nicaea, AD 325, the church was expanding.

It had been 300 years and the church was exploding.

And suddenly, like any dogma, there were false teachings that started to creep in the church.

So over 318 leaders from all over the known world gathered in this one place.

And they came up with what is called the Nicene Creed.

In the creed, they don't determine the beliefs that had already been done with Jesus and the apostles.

They simply affirm the beliefs of Jesus and the apostles as discovered in scripture.

I don't know why I've never read this creed to you, but I'm going to right now.

And this is the creed that the church has kept for over 2,000 years.

It has not changed.

It goes like this.

I believe in one God, the Father Almighty.

maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible.

I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, I'd love that, the only begotten Son of God, born of the Father before all ages, God from God, light from light, true God from true God, begotten, not made.

And this is a word consubstantial, which means of the same substance.

So when we talk about Jesus, when we talk about the Trinity, we're talking about one being, so I am a human being.

Jesus is a God being.

God is a God being.

The Holy Spirit is God being, distinguished in three persons.

So consubstantial means that Jesus is the same substance, being, as the Father.

Through him all things were made.

For us men in our salvation, he came down from heaven, and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary and became man.

For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate, He suffered death and was buried and rose again on the third day in accordance with the scriptures.

He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.

He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.

I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son is adored and glorified, who has spoken through the prophets.

I believe in one.

holy, Catholic, don't be confused here, small c, this is a Greek word that means universal.

So the Nasaian Creed says, I believe in one holy, universal, and apostolic church.

I confess one baptism for the forgiveness of sins, and I look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.

Amen.

Now here's the point.

2,000 years.

2,000 years.

We might have different denominations within Christianity.

But for 2,000 years, the fundamentals have not changed.

These are the things Jesus taught.

And as you've heard me say, he rose from the dead.

I'm following that guy, right?

So when different denominations enter into debate, it's not over core theology.

We agree, rather, it's on practice.

Practice like a baptism.

Some denominations baptize children.

It's what we call covenant theology.

They believe that you baptize a child and when the child becomes an adult, he claims the baptism that was performed by his parents.

Other people ask the question about communion.

Do we take it every week?

Do we take it every other week?

Do we take it every quarter?

Other people talk about tithing.

Does the New Testament teach it or does it not?

These are matters of opinion.

These are matters of interpretation, but in no way impacts the core fundamental doctrines of the Bible that have not changed in over 2,000 years.

So when people say...

How can you Christians claim the truth when you disagree with each other?

That statement is born out of ignorance.

We've agreed with each other for over 2,000 years.

Now, this is the reason that Jehovah Witnesses and Mormons are not Christian, but rather cults of their own choosing.

And many have been led astray.

And the reason they're led astray is because there are many similarities, but fundamental, we're going back to fundamental differences.

For instance, let's take Jehovah Witnesses.

Actually, you can say this about Mormons too.

They reject Jesus as God the Son.

They refer to him as a created being, like an angel.

So their claim is that Jesus is not the same substance as God.

He's merely a man.

He's not equal with the Father.

And that, my friends, is a core attack on the core doctrine of salvation.

There's a great passage in John 8 where Jesus says, this is verse 58, Very truly, I tell you, Jesus answered, before Abraham was born, I am.

Wow.

Jesus is saying, I was in the beginning before anything was ever happened.

I was with God in the beginning.

I am just as responsible for the created order as God himself.

Now, I've had some of my friends in Islam, when I share this verse with them, they usually say one of two things.

Number one, the Bible's been changed.

That's another conversation we had.

Or often they'll say, that's not what he meant.

And then I will read verse 59.

If he didn't mean that, you explain to me why the Jews picked up stones to stone him.

Because they knew what he was saying was blasphemy.

He was claiming to be God.

But it's also an attack on the core doctrine of salvation.

Listen carefully.

A finite being cannot pay the infinite penalty our sins deserve.

If Jesus is just a man, he can't pay the penalty for all our sins.

He can only pay the penalty for his, even if he had no sin.

Only an infinite being can pay an infinite penalty.

Jehovah Witnesses and Mormons strip Jesus of his divine nature and nullify the work of atonement on the cross.

Folks, listen, if you didn't get what I just said, Let me bring clarity here.

The beauty of the Christian gospel is not that God substituted a creature in our place.

That would be cruel.

But that God substituted himself.

Christmas, Emmanuel, God with us.

That's why Jehovah's Witnesses don't like to celebrate Christmas.

It's incredibly inconvenient.

Especially when all of Christmas is about Isaiah 7.14.

which says, therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign.

The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son.

We'll call him Emmanuel, God with us.

Matthew 1.23, the virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Emmanuel, which means God with us.

This is the uniqueness of Christianity and the depth of God's love for us.

Now, but here's the greater point of Romans 10.

Sincerity, passion, zeal.

Do not ipso facto mean truth.

A person can be sincerely wrong no matter how passionate or zealous they are.

And the reason we accept this in every other arena except religion is because, one, we don't believe what 2 Corinthians 4 says, the God of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ who is the image of God.

If there is an evil one, as Jesus said there was, if there is a prince of the power of the air, as Jesus said there is, that his primary weapon is deceit.

Deceit.

To make you think you're on the right path, but you're on the wrong one.

And the second reason is because too many people are not convinced that God has revealed the truth about us, about God, about eternity, in the person of Jesus Christ.

validated by the resurrection.

Again, he rose from the dead.

I think I'm going to listen to that guy.

That's why the resurrection is the most important doctrine or historical occurrence in the Christian faith.

If there's no resurrection, we're all wasting our time.

First Corinthians 15, the apostle Paul told the church at Corinth that if there's no historical resurrection, we should be pitied.

Now, in Going back to Romans 9, one chapter earlier, listen to what Paul says in the same context.

So now I'm in Romans 9, verse 1 through 5.

I speak the truth in Christ, I'm not lying.

My conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit.

I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart, for I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race, the people of Israel.

Theirs is the adoption to sonship.

There's the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises.

There's are the patriarchs and from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah who is God over all forever to be praised.

You hear what Paul is saying?

Paul says, there's a part of me that if it meant that my people, the Israelites, the Jews could come into the kingdom of God, if I forfeited my salvation, Paul said, there's a part of me that would.

That's how much he loved his own people.

And notice he said, Their advantages are off the charts.

Theirs is the adoption.

God sovereignly selected Israel.

Now, don't worry.

This is not a political sermon.

I know we're in the Middle East right now.

This has nothing to do with that.

This is strictly gospel, okay?

But Paul says they were sovereignly selected by God through whom the Messiah would come.

Their entire national history is a foreshadowing of the coming Messiah.

All of their feasts, celebrations.

foreshadow the work of Jesus on the cross, the sacrificial lamb that was slain before the foundations of the world.

God's plan from the beginning was to step into our world and die the death we deserve so that we could live the life Jesus deserved.

Theirs is the glory.

Israel had the Shekinah glory of God that dwelled among them in the tabernacle, in the temple, in the Holy of Holies.

Imagine, God chose Israel and said, I'm just going to hang out with you guys in the Holy of Holies.

The Shekinah glory of God.

There's where the covenants, Paul says, the promises associated with the Old and the New Testament, the Old and the New Law.

the promise of redemption, salvation, all coming through the Israelites.

And theirs is the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob.

Yet Paul says they are lost.

And as a result, Paul says, I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.

I have made several trips to Jerusalem over the last few years.

And I can tell you, I have never met a group of people who believe more.

that they are the chosen of God, blessed by God, protected by God, in a right relationship with God, than the religious Jew.

And if you know anything about their history at all, it would be difficult to deny that something supernatural has prolonged their existence.

It's a way of life for every religious Jew in Jerusalem.

They dedicate their life to every day going to the tabernacle, going to the synagogue, rather.

reading, studying, rituals, feasts.

But Paul says even so, their zeal is not based on knowledge.

And because of that, they're lost.

Back to Romans 10.

Brothers and sisters, my heart's desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved.

For I can testify about them, they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge.

Since they did not know the righteousness of God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness.

Again, I am not certain there is a more dedicated group of people on planet earth to the laws of Yahweh than the religious Jew.

The commentaries on the law poured over day after day, the Talmud, the Mishnah, the Midrash, the Rashi, unparalleled in other religions.

And while the majority of Israel today is secular, If you go to Jerusalem, you're going to find thousands and thousands of religious Jews who are uber zealous, uber zealous about what they believe.

And Paul says, one more time, that they're lost.

It is possible to be sincere and spend your life being religious, doing good things, reading, praying.

meditating, going to the temple, going to the synagogue, keeping the law, doing good deeds, even exuding with benevolence for the poor and impoverished and still be lost.

Now, some of you hear that and you might say, man, that just does not seem fair.

You're not thinking.

Fairness is not what you want.

You don't want fairness.

You don't want justice because if you want justice, you're in big trouble.

Justice requires that you be zapped because of the sin in your life and mine.

We are sinners against God.

And if all you're looking for is fairness and justice, none of us would be breathing.

So it's important to notice the two distinctions then that Paul makes.

And you find them in verse 3.

Since they did not know the righteousness of God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness.

So there are two ways, isn't there?

And you know what?

It's amazing.

This was written hundreds and hundreds, a couple of thousand years ago.

It's still applicable because every religion on this planet falls into one of two categories, establish your own righteousness or two, submit to God's righteousness.

There's no other category.

Unfortunately, every other religion except one falls into the first category.

That's why we went to Great Lakes to show you in Ernest Becker's The Denial of Death that won a Pulitzer Prize, published the same year of his death.

He said, as he traced history, human history, Asia, Africa, Europe, all cultures have concocted their own religious beliefs in an attempt to justify their existence and silence the voice of impending death.

And every system except one is based on establishing...

one's own personal righteousness, where we say, I don't know what's after this, but if I do good, as I define good, I will make myself acceptable to the gods or God, if there's only one.

I will earn my way.

I will merit my way into good standing with God by achieving personal righteousness.

The entire book of Romans, the entire book is Paul showing you how you First of all, that's false.

And second, it doesn't logically work.

Why?

Let's say you're going on the 210.

Well, let's not do 210.

That brings up too many painful memories.

Let's say you're going down Arrow here, and you're going 90 miles an hour, and you get pulled over by a policeman.

And he comes over, and he says, you know you were doing 90 miles an hour?

And you say, yes, officer, but I've kept all the other laws.

Oh, well, go ahead.

No, no, it doesn't work that way.

You're only righteous under the law if you keep it perfectly.

You've got to keep it all.

That's why Paul says in chapter 3, verse 10, there is no one righteous, not even one.

There is no one who understands.

There is no one who seeks God.

All have turned away.

They have together become worthless.

There is no one who does good, not even one.

You may read that like I did, but I didn't understand the context and say, wait a minute, there's nobody that does good.

I know people who do good.

No.

The context of Romans 3 is absoluteness.

So he's saying there's no one righteous, absolutely, not one.

No one who totally understands.

No one who totally seeks God.

You got it?

Because if you're going to relate to God under the law, you got to do absolutely everything perfectly to be considered righteous or declared righteous under it.

So Paul's using the argument in the absolute sense.

He says, but if you want to be declared righteous under the law, if that's the way you're going to relate to God, if that's the way you choose to relate to God, no one wins because nobody keeps the law perfectly.

You may be a model citizen in other areas.

You get caught going 90 down an arrow, they're probably just going to take you straight to the jail.

Unfortunately, the Bible says that the wages of sin, when you violate God's righteousness, is disintegration and death.

That's why in Romans 3, now I'm going to read these texts.

I'm almost finished already.

Shorter sermon.

No Pinocchio.

I'm serious, but I need you...

Let's let the passage, let's let the scripture speak.

Here's what he says.

Romans 3, 9, 19.

Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God.

Therefore, no one will be declared righteous in God's sight by works of the law, rather...

Through the law, we become conscious of sin.

The only thing the law is designed to do, to tell us and show us that our face is dirty.

You can't be saved under it.

If you choose to relate to God by law, like every religious system ever concocted other than Christianity, you lose every time.

And I promise you, you will significantly overestimate your own goodness and significantly underestimate God's holiness.

So one, you establish your own righteousness, or you've got a second option.

Submit to God's righteousness.

In verse 3 of chapter 10, one more time, they did not know the righteousness of God and sought to establish their own.

They did not submit to God's righteousness.

Christ is the culmination of the law.

So the question is, it's the million-dollar question.

And by the way, when we start this series, guess what series we're going to do next month that we start next week?

Romans.

We're going to...

We're going to go places we've never been before, but it's going to require you to actually look at scripture.

I can't entertain you as much.

Listen, what is the righteousness of God?

Verse 25, God presented Christ as the sacrifice of atonement through the shedding of his blood to be received by faith.

Atonement originally meant at one meant.

So our sin divides us and separates us from God.

But what Jesus did made us at one with God.

Our sin alienates us.

Jesus brought us back.

Let's keep reading.

He did this, did what?

Presented Christ as a sacrifice on the cross to demonstrate his righteousness.

Now I gotta stop right there.

Paul's argument is there's two ways to be right under the law.

One of two ways.

Let's take man's law.

If you want to be right, declared right under the law, you either keep the law perfectly, right?

Don't speed.

Or if you do break the law, you pay the penalty.

And after you've paid the penalty through fine or jail time, when you get out, you're declared righteous again under the law.

God is the same way.

One of two ways.

You either keep his law perfectly, which no man can do, or you pay the penalty for breaking it.

And the wages of sin is death.

The problem is with you and me, we don't want to do either one.

This is the beauty of the gospel.

God is both holy, pure, and righteous.

Thank God, the God we serve, the only God of any religion, is loving our Father.

How can God, in His holiness, punish your sin and love you at the same time?

He can't violate one part of His nature.

only to keep another part of his nature.

That would be an oxymoron.

Well, not an oxymoron.

It would be a tragedy against his own nature.

This is the beauty of the gospel.

God satisfies the requirements of his holy nature.

But rather than punishing us, he comes to earth, Emmanuel, God with us, takes the punishment we deserve.

So that we can go free.

So the requirements of God's holiness have been met.

Sin has been punished.

And the requirements of God's love have been met.

He took our punishment and nailed it to the cross.

Because in his forbearance, he had left sins committed before and unpunished.

Verse 26, he did it to demonstrate.

Did what?

Died on the cross to demonstrate his righteousness.

How does that demonstrate God's righteousness?

Because sin has been punished.

righteous requires that sin is punished.

On the cross, sin is punished.

At the present time, and I love this, so is to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in him.

Not only is God just that sin has been punished, but he's the justifier.

Took our punishment.

This is the gospel.

And that's why in Romans 1.16 that we'll go deeper into in the series, I'm not ashamed of the gospel, he says, because it's the power of God.

Whose power?

Not yours.

Not your power.

God's power that brings salvation to everyone who believes.

First to the Jew, then the Gentile.

For in the gospel, the righteousness of God.

Not your righteousness.

A righteousness that is by faith from first to last.

Just as it is written, the righteous will live by faith.

God's righteousness saves you.

Because he met the requirements of the law on your behalf.

Pastors love to preach out of Romans.

We love to preach the gospel because we know we're rotten sinners like everybody else.

And we need grace and we need forgiveness.

But here's the good news of the book of Romans.

And this is where I want to hone in.

I really am almost finished.

It just took longer to read that scripture.

Listen, Paul says everybody gets to choose how they'll relate to God.

You get to choose.

If you choose law, you're in big trouble.

Nobody is going to be declared righteous under the law.

And every religious system outside of the Christian faith chooses law.

I'm going to do this.

I'm going to travel here.

And I'm going to prove myself good.

And the Bible says that will never, ever work.

Or you can say, you know what?

I am going to choose grace.

I'm going to choose Jesus.

I'm going to choose this.

I'm going to choose God's righteousness over my own.

And I'm going to trust by faith.

that what Jesus did on the cross puts me in good standing with God, and I'm going to go out and live my life knowing that I am secure and saved for eternity.

How could you not like that?

Now, let me finish.

This is what I want to say to any of you in the room or listening to my voice, wherever you are in the world, you better choose, and you better choose soon.

Man, if you've been putting this off, I don't dramatize the end times.

You know I very seldom preach about the end times.

I've done a few series on Revelation.

But can I tell you something?

No matter what your position on the end times, man, it looks like we're in it.

I mean, I can't deny that.

I don't know how long they last.

In Revelation 20, then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it.

The earth and the heavens fled from his presence and there was no place for them.

And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne and books were opened.

Another book was opened, which is the book of life.

The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in those books.

The sea gave up the dead that were in it and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them and each person was judged according to what they had done.

Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire.

The lake of fire is the second death.

And anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.

Why?

If you choose to relate to God on the basis of law, then your sin cannot come into the presence and live in eternity with God because he's holy and pure.

It's got to be dealt with.

And the reason Jesus says, I'm the way, the truth, and the life, and nobody comes to the Father except through me, is only Jesus atoned for your sin.

It's not a statement of arrogance.

It's a statement of truth.

This is the way to the Father.

And the Bible says there's a great white throne.

It's a pure throne.

And not it is a judge.

And there's no bribing this judge.

You know, he's got the goods on all of us.

And according to Revelation 20, there are two, well, there are plural notice.

You've got books and then the book.

And in books, those are the people who've chosen to relate to God on the basis of law.

And in that book, you've got on one side your name, and on the other side, everything you've ever done over the course of your life.

I mean, what if we published that book and put it in the library?

Would anybody want that?

Every evil thought, everything that you've done, every revenge you've taken, everything.

So the books are books of the people who have chosen to relate to God on the basis of law.

But notice the other book is singular.

And in that book, all you have on one side is a list of names.

And on the other side, Jesus.

That's it.

Your sins have been separated from you as far as the East is from the West.

In Romans 10, I pray for Israel.

There's a revival in Israel.

There's about 10,000 people who have come to Jesus.

I'm sure Paul's heart...

is wounded for the nation of Israel.

I'm sure that God is wounded and you better be careful.

If you ever read Joel 3 and Joel 3, 14 and 16, you'll read that it's best not to mess with Israel.

It's best to kind of let God do what he's going to do and you worry about your own bad self.

But can I tell you, this is your moment.

This is your moment.

Every time somebody like me preaches the gospel, this is God's extension of mercy to you once again.

But you cannot keep sitting week after week and hearing a message like this and doing nothing about it.

Because there are still some of you, your certainty of going to heaven has nothing to do with that, but everything to do, you say, I'm good.

I'm a good person.

I never killed anybody.

Good for you.

Good for you for not killing somebody.

That's a good thing.

But that's not going to get you into heaven.

You're going to heaven by the grace of God.

And if I were to ask you, will you go to heaven when you die?

And you said yes.

And I said, how do you know?

You say any other thing other than Jesus, you've missed the boat.

Jesus, that's why.

Man, if you're here this weekend and you have never bent your knee, bowed your head.

And admitted, I can't do, I will never be good enough.

The only hope I have is by putting my faith in what Jesus has done.

I'm praying you do that this weekend.

We say that everybody gets a chance to respond to God's invitation.

RSVP, I love it.

Repent.

Repent of what?

Repent of thinking you're good enough to earn merit and favor to get into heaven.

I don't care how many times you come to church or read your Bible or pray.

I'm glad that you do.

And we're going to talk about Romans.

That's the natural result of someone who understands faith in Christ.

Yes, but it doesn't save you.

Say you're sorry.

Say you're sorry for the sins you have committed because we all have.

B, verbalize your trust.

Say, I can't do it on my own, but according to what Paul said in the book of Romans, according to the gospel, everything that needs to be done for me has been done on the cross of Jesus Christ.

And by faith, I trust in Jesus.

for my eternal salvation.

And then P, plunge your past.

Man, if you're in this room and my voice, wherever you are and you haven't been baptized, why?

Your hair's gonna get wet.

I'm so sorry your hair's gonna get wet.

I mean, Jesus only just stretched his hand and died for you.

I think you can get your hair wet.

Acts chapter 2, day of Pentecost, first sermon that was preached, the first gospel sermon.

They said, what do we do, Peter?

What did Peter say?

Repent and be baptized, every one of you, every single one of you.

You need to receive Christ, do it.

If you need to be baptized, do it.

Don't wait any longer.

By the way, if you strayed away, come back home.

You can do that too.

And trust in Christ.

Maybe some of you need to forgive yourself because Jesus has already done that.

Father, thank you for the power of the gospel.

I pray your blessings and anointing over every sermon that will go out this weekend, that those far from God will come near, and we will celebrate as people come to you in humility and are baptized, forever changed, raised to walk in a newness of life, secure in salvation that Christ has offered.

In his name we pray, everybody said, amen.