Listen
Transcript
Brothers and sisters in the Lord, last Sunday morning we looked at the first six verses
of Romans chapter 7.
You may recall that we sought together that what Paul does in those verses, he compares
the law to a husband who is exacting and demanding, very, very critical, never lifts
a finger to help us with the work and a husband who manages to bring out in his wife all the
worst of her characteristics.
Now very obviously when you talk that way then the very next question that begins to
arise concerning the law is what is the matter with that law?
After all wouldn't you talk that way about the husband of a wife when she tells you
how mean an exacting and demanding and critical and unhelpful that he is the natural reaction
is what?
It's to say what kind of a jerk are you married to anyway?
What kind of a jerk is the law?
If all it does is it brings out the worst that is in me, what is the matter with the law?
What is the issue that Paul now begins to address in verse 7 of Romans chapter 7 when
he says what then shall we say that the law is sin?
In other words is there something wrong with the law?
God's commandments are they wrong that they bring out all this negative stuff in me and
the answer is always Paul's favorite phrase by no means.
May Gennoy tell may it never be God forbid let it never be.
He says in verse 12 the law is holy and the commandment is holy and just and good.
There is nothing wrong with the law.
There is nothing wrong with God coming to you and to me and telling us how it is that
we ought to live.
The law says Paul is holy and it is just and it is good.
It is geared for the well-being of God's people.
Well now we're really in trouble aren't we?
We can no longer blame it on the law.
It's not the husband that is bad.
He is right in all of the demanding and the exacting demands that he makes off my life.
And so if it isn't the law that's got a problem, who's got a problem?
Well Paul goes on to say you and I have the problem and all the law does is it brings out
in the open what really lives in my heart listen to these verses as he goes on.
He says if it had not been for the law I should not have known sin.
I should not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said you shall not covet.
But sin finding opportunity in the commandment brought in me all kinds of covetousness apart
from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law but when the commandment
came sin revived and I died and the very commandment which promised life proved to be death.
To me what is he saying?
Well what he's saying interestingly enough is this he says there was a day before I really
knew what it was that God wanted of me.
I looked at myself he says and I compared myself with other people and I compared myself
with myself and I thought I was doing pretty good.
He says I thought I was one of the best people in the world going but then he says there
came a day when God revealed to me his law.
God began to show me how he wanted me to live particularly he says God began to show me
that keeping the law is not merely outward behavior but rather a matter of inner attitude.
That's why he talks in this passage about I would have not known what it is to covet
if the law had not said you shall not covet that's the tenth commandment.
And of all the commandments it's the most spiritual.
Spiritual in the sense that coveting is something that you do in the inside it's not
necessarily that visible on the outside.
The Pharisees and the days of Jesus you will recall.
They looked like white washed sepulchres on the outside they looked very nicely.
They knew just how to behave correctly outwardly they wouldn't think of killing anybody.
But inwardly said Jesus you're full of dead men's bones because inside they were full
of envy and strife and murder and Paul says there was a day I thought I was doing pretty
good until God came along and he began to show me it isn't good enough not to kill.
God doesn't even want me to have anger in my heart towards somebody at least unholy
anger.
And Paul says there came a day I used to think it was I was okay it's not enough not
a committed luxury.
God doesn't even want me to lust after another person within my heart.
He says alright I heard those commandments and I said to myself that's not so bad I can
do it.
And he heard God saying that if he could do it and could do it perfectly he'd be alright.
And so with full determination he said I can live the way that God wants me to live and
he began trying to reach out to correct behavior before the face of God not only outwardly
but inwardly also and what did he discover.
Well he puts it into words later in the chapter the good that I would I could not and the
evil that I would not do that I do because he discovered the law far from being an
instrument that would lead him to life now became an instrument of condemnation because
all it did is it brought out in him all the sin that was there the more he strived to
reach it the more he discovered that he couldn't and that he wouldn't he was a slave to
sin that is the natural man the law cannot change you it can only bring out your rebellion.
Let me give you an illustration picture it this way you've got somebody working for
you they've got two left hands you don't hear very well either and they are as uncoordinated
and as clumsy as they come.
Now as long as you make no demands on that individual you cannot tell that individual from
any other individual can you and he or she could pass him or herself off as the proverbial
a limping champion I mean how do I know that you're no good you look just perfectly fine
but now you begin to make demands you tell him I want you to be here seven o'clock
tomorrow morning he shows up seven o'clock tomorrow night can't hear you right misinterpret
what you're saying you send him out for the hammer a claw hammer and he comes back of
this ledge hammer you've told him you want him to do this chore and the moment that he
begins to carry out that chore you begin to discover this man has no skills has no abilities
to do any of the things that you're asking him to do what is happening is that your demands
are laying bare what lives inside him pulses that's what the law does the law is good you're
totally within you're right to make those kinds of demands of the person that you've hired
for those skills but you see the very demands that you make upon that individual are bringing
out that which lives within his life his incompetence more than that the law actually stirs
up the sin that lives within us notice how Paul puts that in verse eight he says sin finding
opportunity in the commandment brought in me all kinds of covetousness sin he says finding
opportunity in the commandment brought or worked in me all kinds of covetousness the phrase
there finding opportunity can also be translated or understood as a folkroom we all know I think
what a folkroom is when you want to move a heavy rock and you've got a crowbar then you
find a small piece of rock or a piece of wood and you stick that far under the crowbar
and then you pry the laws of physics are such that four times distance on one end translates
into four times distance on the other end with a little loss maybe for friction car jacks
work that way crowbars work that way claw hammers work that way and what Paul is saying
here is sin that is that principle that power of sin is so strong that it uses the law
as a folkroom to pry sin out of my life ever notice when somebody comes along to you
and commands you to do something then right away there is an initial reaction of rebellion
that says who were you to tell me what to do not only that but when they keep insisting
that you do it and you start trying to do it but you can't then what happens you become
more and more angry and you become more and more frustrated because these demands that
people are making on me is bringing out the garbage that is living in my life you're
rubbing my nose in my failure and there isn't anybody around that likes to have their
nose rubbed in their failure and so the law becomes a tool used by sin to work out in
me all kinds of stuff it's important to understand that because you'll find sometimes you can
go to church do you ever have that you go to church and you leave feeling worse than
when you came before you came in the church you thought you're pretty good you don't
model husband model wife model child head your marriage altogether and then you begin
to listen to the word of God and God begins to show you what kind of a husband you ought
to be what kind of a wife you ought to be and what kind of a business man you ought to
be and the light begins to dawn and your sin is beginning to be laid bare and there is
an anger that sometimes rises up within our hearts that says I don't want to hear this
kind of stuff I don't want my sin exposed I would rather live in a fool's paradise
thinking that I'm doing okay the law is intended as a source for laying bare what lives
within my heart by the law says Paul comes the knowledge of sin it is a good thing when
we are alive enough to hear what God is saying and to hear what God is doing and have it
stir up within me the things that need to be brought out into the open so they can be
dealt with big question that people ask then of course is what's wrong with the teaching
or what's wrong with the church or what's wrong with God or what is wrong with God's law
that he makes me feel so badly there's got to be something wrong with the law if it
can stir up in me all that negative kind of stuff Paul addresses that now in verse 13
he says did that which is good then bring death to me do you hear what he's saying did
that which is good then bring death to me you notice how anxious we are to put the blame
on God if you wouldn't tell me all these things that you want if you don't make all these
demands on me then I wouldn't feel so inadequate and I wouldn't feel so terrible so therefore
God it's your fault you're using the law to kill me did that which is good then bring
death to me and the answer meganoito by no means it was sin working death in me through
what is good in order that sin might be shown to be sin and through the commandment become
sinful beyond measure that sin might be shown to be seen and become sinful through the
commandment beyond measure do you hear what he is saying it was never God's purpose for
the law to be able to change your life or my life the more we know outside of Christ what
it is that God wants from us the harder we try to live that way on our own the more we
will discover we will always be inadequate we will always be defeated we will always
be discouraged because the whole purpose of the law is to lay bear and show for all the
universe to see the scene that lives in my heart outside of Jesus Christ Paul says in
Galatians the law is a custodian a school teacher to lead me under Christ because Paul's
whole message in the Bible and his whole message in the book of Romans particularly is that
I cannot bear good fruit being married to the law and the only one you will recall from
last week who can deliver me from that is Jesus that's why later in this chapter Paul
cries out and he says wretched man that I am who will deliver me from this body of
doubt that he proclaims with a triumphant shot of faith thanks be to God who who through
Jesus Christ gives me the victory thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord it is Jesus
who saves it is Jesus who delivers us from the power of the law that whole system of
performance it is Jesus in union with whom we finally bear fruit the problem is in order
to lay hold of Jesus and to receive all the forgiveness at all the grace that it is that
he's got to offer I have first to be brought to a point where I know that I cannot do
it myself you ever noticed in your own life how hard that is intellectually we confess
the gospel intellectually we say yes Jesus is the one who saves me yes Jesus alone is the
one who can make me bear fruit but deep down in the depths of our heart there is often
so much pride that says I'm not so bad after all I may not be perfect but I'm not so bad
and I may not be able to keep the commandments of God 100 percent but then I can maybe keep
them 65 percent and that's a little bit better than most of the people around me and we
cut ourselves off from the grace of God in Jesus Christ and so when Jesus Christ begins
to work in your life it in my life he begins with a law puts the pressure on me shows
me the impossible standards God wants me to reach today shows me impossibilities of reaching
that kind of high fills me with despair and condemnation shows me what really lives
in my heart brings out stuff in me that I thought was never there and he does it so that
broken humbled to the dust I might cry out to God for mercy and find in Jesus Christ the
forgiveness and the healing and the restoration that only he can bring I believe there were
some of us here this morning we're married to the law we've begun to understand something
of God's incredible demands and we've come to understand the urgency and the importance
of leaving up to the righteous demands of God and we've been trying really hard we try
to be good husbands we try to be good wives we try to be good kids we try to be good employers
we try to be good employees but oh it's so hard is it not because for every moment of
success that I have I encounter another resounding sound of defeat and I go through a lot of
my life feeling guilty that vague sense of condemnation that says you're not really measuring
up come that final day God's going to pull something out of his bag he's going to throw
it in your face and we miss out on the joy of our salvation because the fruit that we bear
is bad Paul's message in the book of Romans and Romans chapter 7 in particular is
you'll never get anywhere being married to the law and he says the only one who can deliver
you from the law his name is Jesus Jesus gives these words of invitation he says come to me
all who labor and are heavy laid and and I will give you rest take my oak upon you and learn
from me for I am gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your sues the only one
who can help us bear fruit of righteousness so Lord Jesus who not only graciously forgives all
our failures and all our defeats and all our discouragement who comes to live within my heart
by the power of his Holy Spirit renews my mind renews my spirit renews my whole being
so that with every part of my being I now can live in a realm of grace knowing that my place in
God's kingdom is not determined by my goodness or by my actions but by the righteousness of Jesus
he is the one who delivers me from the curse of the law from the power of sin
assures me that I'm one of God's children assures me that God loves me and that God will be with me
he'll bind up my hurts and heal my pains and restore my broken heart
and he'll help me to live as one of his children that's the invitation this morning as we
join together for communion want you heed that invitation want you give up whatever attempts
you're making to establish your own righteousness will you receive forgiveness and cleansing and healing
and restoration believing that because of Jesus we're set free from that whole system of law
and the demands of the law are now written on our hearts
and by God's grace our hearts will respond
it doesn't yet appear what we shall be but when he comes in glory we shall be
as he is there is now therefore says Paul no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus
please join me in prayer Lord we're gathered here this morning from any different walks of life
and Lord we confess that in all of our lives there is so often that attempt
at trying to secure our own sense of righteousness and whenever we do we fail
and this morning we just want to thank you for Jesus we thank you Lord that he died and that he
arose and that he is coming again in glory and that he is poured out his Holy Spirit
and we thank you Lord that we can come to him this morning just as we are
some of us here this morning Lord we are convicted of sin
we've given into things that we ought not to have given into and we feel guilty and condemned
some of us here this morning Lord we are so keenly aware that we haven't got what it takes
to be the kind of husband or the kind of wife or the employer or employee that we're called upon to
be and for years we've hidden that fact even from our own selves and we've just tried so much
the harder to be so good and we failed so miserably
help us to understand Lord that the light of your word
is geared to bringing out in us all that which is evil not because you want to condemn us
but because you want to lead us to Jesus and Father this morning as we join together in communion
touches with your grace touches with your power touches with your love
by faith let the chains be broken set us free that we might live and serve you with gladness and
with joy through Jesus Christ for it's in His name let we pray amen