Romans 7:7-25 LAW, SIN, STRUGGLE, VICTORY

 

The letter to the Romans was written by Paul to explain how sinners can be made right with their Creator - a holy God.  

To be right with God! This is the most important matter anyone will ever have to consider in this life- more than a career choice, choice of a marriage partner or choice of a pension plan. 

From the letter to the Romans, we learn that being right with God does not happen through self - effort, but through an act of God’s free, sovereign Grace alone.  All that we must do is look to Christ. 

Look to Jesus and believe!  

Look to Jesus and live! This is the gospel!  When this happens, we are finally alive- dead to sin, now truly alive to God (Rom. 6).

We are now dealing with a weighty text. If you have been a Christian for a time, what you find here will correspond to your experience. 

In our text we find four important words: Law, sin, struggle, victory. You will recognize these concepts interwoven into this passage. Here Paul reflects on his personal struggle with the reality of his sinful nature. It is the reflection of a mature believer, and if you will accept this – this is a description of your and my struggle; your victory and my victory. 

1.      LAW 

In Romans 7 Paul addresses the matter of the law of God and our relationship to it.   What is the purpose of God’s law? Some reflection is needed.    

God has created human beings in His image. Therefore, they must reflect is His holy nature. Sin has made mankind unholy.  

Sin makes us drifters away from God. 

Our desires are inclined away from God and contrary to God’s nature.  

We lose our sense of purpose and finally it becomes ‘each to his own’. 

The final result is chaos and anarchy. Were it not for the common grace of God, there would be no telling what would have happened to us long ago. If God did not restrain sin in this world    who knows where we would have landed by now.  This common grace is found in Romans 2:15. There we learn that the law (of God) is written on their (gentile hearts while their conscience also bears witness.  

Under Moses God presented special revelation, special grace. He gave the people of Israel a written code, embodied in the 10 commandments. This law carries over into the New Testament. Jews and Christians are indeed a privileged people, because we are in possession of God’s thoughts.  

BUT sadly, we find that we rarely ever obey the law. 

We do not desire to be godly or holy. 

On the contrary, the saga of Genesis 3 continues:  forbidden fruit (the standard set by God in Genesis 2) are often seen by us as a challenge to test God. Our sinful nature rebels against prohibition and perversely it seems to be even stimulated by prohibition - hence 7:5 : our sinful passions, aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.  

Did you read that?  Here it is suggested that the law tempts me to sin. 

Question:  Is the law then evil? This is precisely the question that 7:7 asks:  "What then shall we say? That the   Law is sin?" And the answer is an emphatic No!  

What then is the purpose of the law? The purpose of law is to give definition to sin– hence 7:7b- "For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet”. How do I know that coveting someone else’s possessions is wrong?  The LAW tells me so!   

7:8 “But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment produced in me all kinds of covetousness.” The mere knowledge of the law is no barrier to sin. In fact, Paul says that knowledge of a particular sin actually makes it worse, because our sinful nature now not only knows that it is wrong to covet, BUT NOW it actually wants to taste that forbidden fruit of covetousness- i.e.  by letting our hearts roam freely to covet our neighbour’s possessions, and even our neighbour’s wife, as did David when he saw, coveted and took Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah, his trusted soldier (2 Samuel 11).  Covetousness is dangerous, because it is a sin of the heart which precedes the next step – taking what is not yours.  The law gave definition to that sin – and so we read, apart from the law covetousness lies dead. If he had not known that covetousness was sin, it could not be sin (7:8b).

In 7:9 Paul reflects on a time when he was not aware of the implications of the law: “I once was alive apart from the law…”   meaning that he lived, but he had no convicting knowledge of the law. 

When he was a Pharisee, he gave the command to have Stephen killed (Acts 7:54ff). You shall not murder (Ex 20:13). In his blind zeal he did not only desire to kill Christians. He had them actually murdered.   

BUT WHEN the commandment (the law) came alive to him in Acts 9, he became another man! 

He died to the old Saul, and he became Paul. 

Sin now became a reality for Paul, so that he could truthfully speak of himself as chief of sinners (1 Tim 1:15).  And so, sin, the very thing that the law judges, has ironically become the means by which Paul has  learnt the terrible holiness of God and righteousness of the law.

When the holy law truly finds you, it kills you.  This shows the holiness, righteousness and goodness of the law (7:12).   

[ NB. 7: 7-12 is written in the past tense]

SIN

In 7:13-25 Paul now speaks in the present tense as he relates to the reality of his experience of sin. 

Some have held that Paul is speaking here as an unconverted man. 

Others think that he was thinking here of his conviction of sin, prior to his conversion.  

Others suggest that he is speaking here as an immature believer at the beginning of his Christian experience. 

People generally find it hard to believe that Paul could confess to having a struggle with sin. But we have every reason to believe that this refers to Paul’s experience as a mature believer.  The truth is this: the closer we get to Jesus the more we begin to understand the sinfulness of sin.    

Let’s see how he does this:

7:13 Is the law then bad? And does it really kill me? No, NEVER! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good (i.e. the law)  in order that sin might shown to be sin, and through the commandment (law) might become sinful beyond measure.  If anything, the knowledge of the law actually heightens the sense of sin. 

 7:14 “For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of flesh, sold under sin. The law of God is spiritual, meaning that the law is of divine origin.  It is a reflection of God’s character.  By way of contrast, “I am of the flesh, sold under sin“.  

Paul is not speaking here out of his pre- converted state. 

He wasn’t talking as an immature believer. 

He was stating a fact about Christian experience.  Two things are true about Paul and every believer :  

(i) We have died to sin and we have been raised to newness in Christ (Rom 6:4). We are justified.  

(ii)  But  we  do still struggle with sin. This is a part of our reality. We still have a sinful nature,  which is being sanctified progressively. 

STRUGGLE

7:15:  "For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I am doing the very things that I hate."  He struggles to understand himself. His actions are not always in accordance with his new nature  (6:4). And he hates it.

7:16  "Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good."  His conscience tells him that every time he sins, he agrees with the law. The law is good. It is always right.  

7:17 "So now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.”   Paul is not making excuses.  He is not saying,” the devil made me do it."   What is he saying?  He is simply owning up to the fact that he is capable of sinning. Remember the position from which he speaks – he is a new creation in Jesus Christ - Rom 6.   His   sinful nature does not define him. It is not His identity.  But the fact that he still sins does exist.

7: 18,19 : "For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that I, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do that which is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good that I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing."  Again, an affirmation of what he has said before.  

He knows what he is by nature- raised with Christ from the dead. 

He knows what he does not want to be. 

He hates sin! 

He is deeply sensitive to it.   

That is the difference between a Christian and a non- Christian.

7:20  is  a repetition of 7:17. "Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin  that dwells within me."  Sin for a Christian is a powerful reality  and  it is quite overwhelming at times, and while it may  overwhelm him at time, notice that  he  does not condone it. He does not say, “I am a victim”. He takes responsibility.  

And so he elaborates on this in 7: 21-23.   He delights in the law of God in his inner being; but he struggles with sin.  Here is a spiritual man wrestling. 

He has come face to face with the holiness of God in the face of the law. 

And he knows he has no human  answer  to his problem.

VICTORY

7:24.  All this leads him to an agonized cry, "Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?"

He wants to be free from the presence of sin. 

The fact is that while we live in this broken sinful  body and in this broken, fallen, sinful  world we will never be free from the presence of sin.  This will only happen when we finally get to glory! 

And so, Paul cries out, "Wretched man that I am… who is going to help me". 

Is the law going to help me?  

No! The law, which is holy, righteous and good has no power to save! 

The knowledge of the law actually makes it worse. 

Who then will  deliver me from this  dilemma?  

The FINAL  answer is found in 7:25: "Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord."  

The final answer to our salvation and our assurance is not found in law keeping and despairing ; it  is found  by resting completely  in  God’s grace through the finished  work of our Lord Jesus  on the cross.  

CONCLUSION

1.      Paul has been dealing with the subject of “freedom from the law” (7:1-6). 

2.      He has shown us that each believer has an ongoing struggle with remaining sin. Believers, including mature believers, still struggle with sin.

3.      If our freedom and our salvation and our assurance  depended upon the law, it would all end with “wretched man that I am”. The law is not the answer to the believer’s struggle with assurance.  Believers trapped in legalism always struggle with assurance, because they never know whether they are good enough!  A  believer needs  something  other than  the law in order to find assurance. 

Our text shows us VERY clearly that our only hope and assurance are found in Christ ALONE. 

We must rest on the work of Christ from first to last. 

When we rest in Him, there is true peace, true victory 

This text is so very valuable, because it helps us to understand   the nature of the gospel: It is free and it is  freeing! It is victorious !

The law cannot free us. Law, sin and struggle are a reality, but this is not where we end. We end  in victory when  we own  Christ's  merits  won  for us on the cross. 

Thank God for Christ in whose righteousness and merits I stand, and in whose perfect righteousness I shall be presented   before the Father in the day of His appearing.  This is the ultimate victory  I  need ! 

Amen

 

ROMANS 7:1-6 Law and Grace

 

THE ARGUMENT SO FAR IN PAUL’S LETTER TO THE ROMANS

 1.       1:1-17 Introduction

2.      1:18 - 3:20   Here Paul shows us how the whole world is guilty before God.  All of us have sinned.  All of us are sinful by nature and sinful in practice.  “There is no-one righteous, no not one” (3:10). We all have belittled His glory (3:23). We all have exchanged His glory for the things that He has made. All of us are idolaters. All of us treasure the things made by God more than we treasure God (1:23).  Therefore, a holy, just, good God is now revealing His wrath against this substitution of His glory. This leads to God’s righteous “wrath and fury” (2:8).   This is  where we all are heading. This is the bad news!

3.       In 3:21 we find a radical announcement, and from here to the end of Romans 5 Paul shows us that there is a way to get right with God.  It is called justification by faith. We are taught to look by faith to Jesus, whom God put forward (on the cross) as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.  All our guilt is absorbed in Christ's suffering and death (3:24-25). Those who look by faith to Him are justified. All it takes is to look and believe. Nothing more! No law of works needed (3:28). We receive our salvation as a free gift (5:17-19). This is the doctrine of free grace. Jesus plus nothing is everything!

4.      In Romans 6:1 & 6:15 this doctrine of free grace raises a great objection: "What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may abound?"(6:1) Someone was arguing, "If I, sinful being that I am, am justified simply by looking to Jesus – an act of sheer grace – well then let me  go on sinning. Does your doctrine of free grace not imply that the more I sin, the greater the grace of God will appear to be?“  The same reasoning is found again in Romans 6:15:  Paul shows us that this is warped logic. His response to this objection is both times, “No!“ [1]  Why not? Because people who are justified (freed from sin) have died to sin (6:10). That means that they will not continue in sin! “Sin will not have dominion over you, since you are not under law, but under grace.“ (6:14).

5.      Romans 6:2-23: The fruit of free grace (trusting in Christ) are superior:   they lead to sanctification and ultimately eternal life. The fruit of trusting in the law is that the law will not be able to make you righteous. The purpose of the law is not to save you. It can at best only expose you and shame you  for who you are – and this leads to death (6:23)

 Romans 7

We are now going to learn that living under grace provides us  with  far greater power and  motives for abstaining from sin, than  we can obtain from living under the law.  

Our relationship to the law should now be clear. We are free from the law in the sense that we do not need to keep it to be saved from the wrath of God. That does not mean that we can now ignore the law. We can’t! It remains God’s holy law, and the 10 commandments remain God’s holy standard. And if  you love Jesus, you will keep His commandments.  

But, thank God, you will not have to rely on your keeping of the law to make it to heaven.   And now Paul explains a little more about the Christian’s new relationship to the law. He does that by using an illustration from marriage.  

Paul is still essentially answering the objection found in Romans 6:15 -”Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace?"

In Romans 7:1-3 he uses marriage as an illustration. When two people are married they make a legal vow before God. 

• As long as they live that married couple is bound by the law to remain together.
• When a spouse dies, that law is no longer binding.Their partner is free from that vow.
• They are free to remarry if they so choose. Their remarriage will not be considered adultery (7:3). 

7:1-3  can be summarized like this:  legal obligation ends with death.  Before Christ took us as His own, we were bound to the law. The law held us accountable before God. It was the standard by which God was judging us. Breaking that law is  sin, and here are the consequences:  the wages of sin is death” (6:23). 

In  Romans 7:4ff  we read of another death: “you have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you belong to Him who has been raised from the dead…”. Now, if you become a believer in Christ you die to the law. You die to your old life regulated by the law; you now live under Christ.   And so we  read in 7:4:  "Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God."  

Death to the law happened when you were joined to Christ. The old contract or legal obligation is over.  The moment you  meet Christ you die to the law and you enter into  another marriage. Christ is, so to speak your new "husband".  

In the Bible He is frequently  spoken of as the bridegroom (Mk 2:19-20; Jn 3:29; Matt 25:1-13; Rev 21:2, 9-10).

And the aim of this "marriage" (as is true of any marriage) is that you "bear fruit for God." (7:4). There it is. That means that when you are converted you have new desires, a new attitude, you make new choices, and your actions produce God glorifying fruit!  It is inevitable!  You have been planted in new soil, and you must produce fruit in keeping with your repentance. 

So, being set free from the law does not mean that we can do as we please. Yes, we  were released from legalistic, joyless service, but we  were not released from service!   

7:6 says that we now serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.

 In this way Paul answers  the objection posed in   Romans 6:15. 

So then we find that it is impossible for those that are under grace to love lawlessness!  

Also, the indwelling Holy Spirit renewing you through His sanctifying power cannot produce bad fruit in you.  What is inside must come out.  You must bear fruit for God to prove your attachment to Christ. Spiritual fruit prove that you are a Spirit filled Christian.

And we shall see, as we make progress through Romans 7 that this does not mean that Christians won’t sin. We will, but it does not make us happy. Paul will confess that he does struggle with sin. This is something that makes him unhappy, when it happens.  But thank God that his salvation is not grounded in his perfect keeping of the law, but it is grounded in Jesus’ finished work on the cross.  And for that Paul is eternally grateful. And he loves the Lord Jesus because of that, and he serves them with a full heart because of that, notwithstanding his faults, sins and shortcomings

A further illustration[2] 

This  illustration will help us to clarify the relationship between law and grace, between our former life under the law and our present life under Christ:  

There one was a man, a bachelor, to whom all his domestic chores became very tedious. So, he decided to employ a housekeeper. In her work contract he drew up a long list of rules   and expectations and to make a point, he stuck his rules to the kitchen wall, as a perpetual reminder to her :  

·       Meals are to be served at eight, at one and at six

·       Dishes were to be done immediately after each meal

·       The house was to be kept spotlessly clean at all times

·        Linen was to be changed once a week  

·       He even went into minutest details:  don’t pour tea leaves or coffee grains down the kitchen sink        Etc.

Needless to say, the housekeeper didn’t always stick to his rules. In fact, she soon began to resent them, and the more she thought about all the rules the more resentful she became, because she knew that she wasn’t that perfect someone. And to be spiteful, and in sometimes in rebellion   she even  secretly poured the tea leaves or coffee grain down the kitchen sink…

She knew that there was precious little point about challenging him for all his rules, for he was after all her employer, and he was a strict man. 

And then, after some time, the unthinkable happened … he asked her to marry him!

And things became very different from that time. She grew to love him. He even took down the rules from the kitchen wall. She became his bride- the queen of the home. Their relationship  had changed drastically. Because she loved him, she wanted to do that which she knew he would appreciate. She did it freely and willingly. And he loved her because of  her love for him – and not because she did things always perfectly.  There was a distinct difference between her past and her present experience  

This illustrates the believer’s relationship with the law.

The law in itself, though it is fair and just, it doesn’t please us. 

We know that we are not perfectly inclined to keep it, and because of that we begin to resent it. And often we are discouraged because of that.  

But when we are converted, we love the One who has taken our burden caused by the law away.

We love Him because He has given us new life, new hope and a new destiny.

And we do not find his commandments burdensome (1 John 5:3).

There is a different quality about this relationship – and it comes from the heart (6:17).

The former comes from a sense of coercion, but there is no joy in it.  The latter  comes  from a heart of love.

And now let me ask you … why do you do the things that you do ?

Because you feel you have to?

Or because you love Him?

 

---

[1] Gr. mē genoito  (μη γενοιτο)  - may it not be!  – Vocative;  [Romans 3:4; 3:6; 3:31; 6:2; 6:15; 7:7; 7:13; 9:14; 11:1; 11:11]

[2] I have adapted this story from Stuart Olyott’s commentary on Romans, p.65ff

ROMANS 1:16,17 DO WE NEED ANOTHER REFORMATION?

 

The world changed on October 31, 1517.  Martin Luther[1], a Roman Catholic monk and a teacher at an Augustinian seminary had had enough.  He was greatly disturbed by the sale of indulgences. Let me explain.   

A Catholic bishop, Albert of Mainz (1490 – 1545) was the overseer of two bishoprics, but he wanted even more power and influence. He desired an additional archbishopric over Mainz. At that time the practise of buying of such bishoprics[2] was the done thing. It was actually against church law to have more than one bishopric, but money talks. And greedy pope Leo X (who needed money to build St. Peter’s basilica in Rome) allowed him to do this against the payment of a huge sum. Albert borrowed the money from a wealthy man[3].  He obtained the electorate of Mainz in 1514.  But how was he going to pay back for this?  He procured the services of a Dominican monk, Johan Tetzel, who was known for granting indulgences on behalf of the Catholic Church in exchange for money. Indulgences were guarantees underwritten by the pope that sins committed could be forgiven by means of a payment into the church coffers.  

This spiritual abuse made Martin Luther angry. He had to speak out, and so he took his pen and began to write his famous 95 theses. He posted them on the door of the castle church in Wittenberg. The theses or protests were designed to spark a debate,  but it did far more. It started a huge fire in the church, community and country, and soon it spilled over into other countries around Germany. 

The corruption of the church had been named and exposed for what it was. The common people saw that clearly. And the 95 Theses revealed that the church was corrupt, greedy and in dire need of a thorough going reformation.  

The 62^nd Thesis of Luther’s Ninety-Five Theses powerfully declares, “The Church’s true treasure is the gospel of Jesus Christ.”  The Roman church of Luther’s day had lost sight of the gospel of Jesus. Just as in the days of Jesus and the Pharisees, the Catholic church of Luther’s day had obscured and replaced the simple gospel of Jesus with manmade traditions and a system of self-righteous works and performance. I remind you that the Gospel does not focus on performance, but on reliance in Jesus ALONE. The gospel teaches us to rest in Jesus and His work of the cross.

Reformation Day celebrates the liberating gospel of Jesus Christ. Christ plus nothing is everything! The 1517 event set off a spark which ignited the hearts of many – men like Martin Luther, John Calvin, Ulrich Zwingli, Menno Simmons, John Knox, and so many other preachers. They were like matches ignited  by  God,  who used them in in turn  to ignore   the thirsty souls of the people  who  had  for so long walked in darkness – a repeat of Isaiah 9:2:  

“The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.”  

They directed the people’s attention to the gospel of Jesus. They showed their people that what they needed most was the gospel of Jesus. They needed that great Word from the true Shepherd more than they needed words of popes, bishops and  priests.  

The Reformation started a gospel preaching, missionary movement which spread like wildfire. It brought renewal to the church. The church started singing songs of praise to God. Luther loved singing. He taught the church to sing. New hymns were written.  Sermons were preached from the Bible and in the language of the people. People were converted, changed and renewed by the Word of God.   

We celebrate Reformation Day,  even 508 years  later. We remember the  day  the gospel was given back to the church, after many years of darkness, in  a similar way in which the Jews celebrate  Hanukkah[4] (Festival of lights),  commemorating the recovery of Jerusalem and subsequent rededication of the Second Temple at the beginning of the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire in the 2nd century BC.

Martin Luther’s Conversion

Luther’s encounter with the gospel was a journey – like yours and mine! The actual date of Martin Luther's conversion is disputed. Some think that it is before the posting of the Ninety-Five Theses. It seems more likely however, that Luther’s conversion happened in 1519. In reading the Ninety-Five Theses, it is clear that Luther still held on to a number of formative Roman Catholic doctrines. At that point, he tried to correct the church from the corruptions.  But Luther’s own testimony tells us that his conversion happened while he was lecturing through the Psalms a second time in the early months of 1519.  Shortly before his death, Luther reflected on his conversion,  and  in 1545 he said this:  

“Meanwhile, I had already during that year returned to interpret the Psalter anew. I had confidence in the fact that I was more skilful, after I had lectured in the university on St. Paul’s epistles to the Romans, to the Galatians, and the one to the Hebrews. I had indeed been captivated with an extraordinary ardour for understanding Paul in the Epistle to the Romans…  a single word in (Romans)  Chapter 1, “In it the righteousness of God is revealed”… had 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… 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 … most ardently desired to know what St. Paul wanted. 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….Thus that place in Paul was for me truly the gate to paradise.

Romans 1:16,17

This is the text that finally settled it for Luther. A little background to the letter is needed. 

Paul writes this letter to the Romans, probably from Corinth. When he wrote this letter he believed that he had fulfilled his ministry in the eastern Mediterranean region (15:17-23). From there he had hoped to go west, even as far as Spain (15:24), and he hoped to visit the Roman Christians (1:10), whose faith was reported upon (1:8), fulfilling a promise to them, and perhaps to solicit their help as a supporting church (15:24). The Roman church was probably born as a result of Pentecost, when Jews were present in Jerusalem  at the feast of Pentecost (Acts 2:10). There the Holy Spirit touched the lives of many, and subsequently the many returned back to their homes carrying the good news of the gospel with them, giving rise to gospel communities – churches, everywhere as they went. Within a few hundred years (and after much suffering) the Christian gospel would conquer the Roman empire and Europe, and the east, and North Africa. These early Christians were the matches that the Holy Spirit used to light fires everywhere. The gospel was the fuel which they carried. The gospel is God’s solution to save the world from itself, and most of all, to save it from His terrible wrath (see Romans 1:18ff).

Pray now that the gospel will save the world of our day, as our world currently heads into big trouble. There is no healing in sight for the many angry nations now at each other’s throats.   Our world has no power whatsoever to save itself. The world needs real salvation, and the gospel of God is given ALONE to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of Jesus’s Name among all the nations (1:5). That  was Paul’s mission – the gospel for  a perishing  world: 

“I am  under obligation to both Greeks and to Barbarians…”  (1:14). 

Paul’s great confidence for the world is the gospel of God (1:1,15,16). Is it your confidence, or are you still thinking that we can fix this world simply through politics and diplomacy, through education and replacing  Christianity with  all sorts of cheap  and useless philosophies? Let me ask again?

·       How was the world changed in Paul’s day?

·       How does the gospel work to change society?

·       How did it change Luther and Germany and so many other nations?

Look at 1:16,17.  Paul says, 

“for I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also to the Greek”… and then he gives the punch line, “For in it (i.e. the gospel) the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written (in Hab.2:4),  ‘The righteous shall live by faith’”.

What is it in the gospel that makes the difference in the world? It is the righteousness of God. Luther struggled with this, because he constantly thought of self - righteousness, when in truth that thought is furthest here. He hated God, because He knew that in himself he could not attain to that standard. But Paul speaks here not of self- righteousness as a means  for being justified  before God. No! He speaks of an alien righteousness, a righteousness imputed or given from the outside.  It is the righteousness of God, freely given to sinners who believe  on the merits of  the death of His Son who died for sin, so that whoever looks to Him is not condemned (i.e. is justified). By this righteousness imputed, I am counted righteous and I receive the power to be righteous.  It is THAT which Martin Luther finally understood, and this changed EVERYTHING. This is the Gospel!

How do I receive that righteousness? 

Answer: By faith. 

What is faith? 

Faith is believing the gospel of God! That means that you believe and receive  all that is there in the gospel for you: Jesus  died for your sin and He exchanges His  righteous life for your unrighteousness.  

DO YOU BELIEVE THAT? When you stop trusting in yourself , stop looking at yourself , and when you look to Jesus and all that He is for you, then the Holy Spirit  does that great work  which happened at Pentecost  in a large scale , and again at the Reformation. 

Do we need another Reformation? 

Don’t you see that what our churches and our world lack  most at this time  is that God centred perspective? We are  all so focussed on human solutions. We are caught up in secular philosophical thought systems that contradict and deny the power of the gospel.   Repentance and believing the gospel is the ONLY cure for the world. Right now we need  fundamental change within  and the gospel of Jesus alone contains the cure for that.   If not, we will soon destroy ourselves in this generation.

The church must not forget the lessons learned during the Reformation. 

We cannot forget what happens when the gospel is obscured and distorted and replaced by false cures procured from the devil’s medicine box. 

We need a new Reformation because everything else has failed and is failing. Humanism and its allies are bankrupt. 

We need God's help to reform our world again! 

We need Holy Spirit anointed preachers that radically believe in God and His word and preach it fearlessly and care little for public opinion. 

We need the truth as it is in Jesus. May God have mercy on us!

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[1] Martin Luther :  10 November 1483  – 18 February 1546

[2] Simony  is the act of selling church offices and sacred things. It is named after Simon Magus, who is described in the Acts of the Apostles as having offered two disciples of Jesus payment in exchange for their empowering him to impart the power of the Holy Spirit to anyone on whom he would place his hands. The term extends to other forms of trafficking for money in "spiritual things”

[3] Jacob Fugger -  a major German merchant, mining entrepreneur, and banker.

[4] Occurs roughly around the same time as Christmas