The Church of Eleven22 - Wk 2: Mount Sinai – Who Tells You Who You Are: You…or Jesus?

Episode Date: March 13, 2022

The law is the diagnosis that we are all sinners in need of a Savior. Jesus is the cure.

Amen. Hey, if you got your Bible, grab them. We're going to end up in Genesis chapter 20. I mean, excuse me, Exodus chapter 20. Exodus chapter 20, we are six weeks away from celebrating the empty tomb. Amen? Six weeks away from celebrating the empty tomb. And last week we started out on Mount Moriah with Abraham and Isaac.

And each week we are heading towards Mount Calvary. Because on Mount Calvary, Mount Calvary holds a tomb, but that tomb could not hold a body. And that's where we're headed towards. And part of the reasons that we're studying these seven different mountains in the Bible is because our life is really a series of mountains and valleys and mountains and valleys. And no matter who you are or what's happening in your life, you're either on a mountain top and I hope from any of you that's your case or you're down in a valley or somewhere in between. Amen?

And so today we're going to talk about really what it takes to get to heaven. You ever ask that question? What does it take to get to heaven? And in order to look at that, we're going to go to the Ten Commandments, which are found in Exodus, chapter 20. A lot of Christians fight over where the Ten Commandments are. Most people think they're in like a courthouse in Alabama or something. I'm not sure about that.

But in the Bible, they are in Exodus chapter 20. But I need to give you just a little bit of context, because if we just dive into the Ten Commandments, the problem is that we have a tendency to just dive into a sense of morality and we can really miss the goodness and the grace of God in doing so. So last week we were with Abraham and Isaac, and Isaac's, excuse me, Abraham's great-grandson named Joseph, by the time you get to the book of Genesis,

Joseph is like the prince of Egypt. He's in charge of Egypt through a series of events that we'll talk about some other time. And then when you turn the page from the book of Genesis to the book of Exodus, just that one little flip of the page represents 440 years of silence from God. No recorded activity, no miracles of God,

and how many of you know that God's timing and your timing ain't always the same? You see, back to Abraham, God promised Abraham a promised land, but little did the children of Israel realize that the promised land went through Egypt and 440 years of slavery. And so, God often, I hope you know this, God often demonstrates his glory up on the mountaintops, but his love and his mercy down in the valley. Do you know that? That sometimes God's best work is not when times are going best in our lives, but when we feel like we are crying out to him. And so 440 years later, this was not punishment, this was preparation because God was building a nation. And so there's this Pharaoh.

The Pharaoh thinks he's the king, or he actually thinks he's God. And so he's afraid of how many Israelite babies they are. So he's like, we're going to wipe this out. So he says, we're going to take out all the little boys two years old and under. And so Moses is born. And Moses' mom says, nope, not doing this, puts him in a basket, puts them in the river, and says, good luck, God be with you. and then some of Pharaoh's family members find baby Moses. And they're like, we're not killing this baby.

We're going to raise him as our own. So they put an ad in the paper and guess who gets hired as Moses's nanny? His mama. You can't make this stuff up. And so Moses grows up in the house of Pharaoh so that he knows his place at the table. He knows the custom. Moses knows the garage code to the garage at Pharaoh's palace, all right? And then one day, this Egyptian is whipping an Israel.

and so Moses kills the guy. Then he thinks, uh-oh, and so he buries him like kitty litter style, just covers him up with a little bit of sand, and then the next day there's two Jewish people fighting, and Moses is like, what are y'all doing? And then they say to him, you're going to kill us like you killed the Egyptian? And he was like, what? Because all the secret stuff goes public, right?

You can say amen or Instagram, whatever you want, but it's coming out, all right? And so he comes out. So he don't know what to do, so he runs, and he hides, and then check this out. So he goes to this foreign land, and he gets a job as a shepherd, and for 40 years he's working for his father, in-law. That's a valley of the shadow of death, is it not? He's working for his father-in-law

as a shepherd, and shepherd is not a cool job. Christians think it's cool because of Baptist bookstores, but it's not cool. It's like the lowest of low jobs. And he's wondering around, and he's also, I'm sure he's thinking, God, I know you had big plans for me when I was growing up, but surely I have screwed all this up, and that's why now for 40 years I'm out here, just me and the sheep. But I just need you to know that our faithfulness never nullifies the faithfulness of God. That if you've got breath in your lungs, God's got a purpose and a plan for your life.

That the alarm clock and the empty tomb are empirical evidence to me that God's not done with you yet. And so Moses is out there just wondering around doing whatever he's doing. And then he sees a bush that's on fire. And apparently that wasn't that big a deal back then, but it was not being consumed.

It wasn't being burned up. So he goes to check it out and then God speaks through the bush. Moses, Moses, take off your shoes because you're on holy ground. Now, I don't know if you've ever thought about this, but how long has Moses been walking around this ground? 40 years.

And if I'm Moses, I'm thinking, you mean this ground is holy? I've been here for 40 years. Has it always been holy? Did it just get holy? Have I missed out on this for 40 years just walking around? You have no idea of the things that me and my sheep have done on this ground. Have I messed this up? Here's what I've been praying for you.

I'm praying like crazy that you would not show up today in the presence of God and miss the very presence of God. Because wherever he is, that ground is holy. And so God says, all right, Mo, here's what I'm doing with you, man. You go to Pharaoh and you say, let my people go. And so there's a series of conversations there because Mo doesn't think he has what it takes. And so God handles all of his problems. And then eventually Moses, by faith, goes.

And he stands before Pharaoh. And he says, I'm here on behalf of Yahweh, the one true God. And he says, let my people go so that my people may serve me. And the Pharaoh is like, I don't think so. scooter. This is my slave labor. This is how we're building Egypt. I don't think I'm letting them go. So then Moses comes back and says, tell you what, God says he's going to send 10 plagues. And I think on every single plague, Moses said, I'm here on behalf of the Lord. He says, let my people go, or I'm going to send locust, that my people may serve me. That word serve

in Hebrew and worship mean the same thing. Let my people go, or I'm going to send frogs so that my people may serve me. Let my people go. I'm going to send gnats. I'm going to turn off the sun, I'm going to turn the water into blood, that my people may worship me, that my people may worship me, that my people may worship me. You cannot stand in the way of the worship of the one true God. And then the last plague, and by the way, each one of those plagues was to take out one of the small G Egyptians gods. And then the last one was named at Pharaoh because he thought he was the king of kings. And so it's called the plague of the firstborn. And so he goes before Pharaoh and says, let my people go. Or the first one, or the first one,

of firstborn of you and your house, me and all of our households, all the animals, there's an angel coming, and if you don't let God's people go that they may worship him, then all of the firstborn will be taken from you. And then God tells Moses to go to his people and say, take a perfect spotless lamb, shed the blood of the lamb, put it on the doorpost of your house, and then, true enough, that night, the angel of death comes through Egypt. And whoever has the blood of the lamb on the doorpost of their house, the angel passes over. This is where Passover comes from.

And so there's weeping, there's gnashing of teeth, and Pharaoh says, all right, get out of here. And so Moses and all the nation of Israel take off, they leave. They grab a little gold on the way, and then they head towards the Red Sea. And then Pharaoh changes his mind, because he's like, whoa, what am I thinking? And so he sends his army after them to get them back,

and Moses finds himself in what looks like an impossible situation. He's got the Red Sea in front of him, and he's got Pharaoh's army behind him. And I'm sure he's thinking, this is impossible. but we serve the God of the impossible. And whenever you find yourself in what seems like an impossible situation, God is perfectly positioned to display that nothing is impossible with him. And so he cracks open the Red Sea, Moses and his people walk right through,

Pharaoh's army comes behind them, and then God swallows them up. And then when they get just past the Red Sea, if you ever look at like the maps in the back of your Bible, okay, Remember, God told them to go to the promised land, and when they come out of the Red Sea, all they got to do it, they just hang a left. It's like right there. But Moses won't ask for directions. He goes to the right, and they're just recalculating, recalculating for an entire generation. They're just wandering around out in the desert, right? And again, how many of you know that God does some of his best work when we're out in the desert, when we're in the dry place,

that he would love these people enough to burn away all of the idolatry. in their life so that they would be ready when Joshua takes over to take them into the promised land. By the time you get to Exodus chapter 19, by the way, I just did like 18 chapters of the Bible in 10 minutes, all right? And so by the time you get to Exodus chapter 19,

God is going to make a covenant with his people. And he is going to give us what we know as the 10 commandments. I want you to see it in 19 before we get to the actual 10 commandments, 10 commandments in 20. In Exodus 19, beginning in 3, The Bible says this, for the Lord called to him, that's Moses, out of the mountain saying,

thus you shall say to the house of Jacob and tell the people of Israel, you yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians. What did he do? He killed him, so that's not good. And how I bore you on eagle's wings. This matters. Before Israel ever obeys one law, God has already rescued the nation of Israel out of slavery from Egypt. Don't miss this. And the reason I say it is because the moment we start talking about the Ten Commandments, the moment we start talking about the commandments of God and the law of God, we have this tendency to believe, if I obey, then I will be accepted. But that's not how it happens here.

That's not the order that happens here. He says, you saw what I did to the Egyptians, how I bore you on Eagle's Wings and brought you to myself. That's what salvation is, that God would reach out and grab us in our our own slavery to our sin, and then he brings us to himself face to face with the Almighty God. He says, now, therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples. For all the earth is mine, and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel.

The rescue has already happened. You see, grace precedes salvation, which precedes obedience. Don't ever forget that. That identity precedes activity. And then God's going to give this beautiful gift of the Ten Commandments. There's actually 613. And I wanted to go through all of them, but it'll be like the TPC. It'll never get over. You understand what I'm saying? So we're just going to do the first ten. And so he's going to call Moses up onto Mount Sinai, and he's going to give him this gift of the Ten Commandments, really for a couple of reasons. The Ten Commandments are the Law of God. It's both a map and a mirror. It's a map that shows us how we, as sinful people, are to live before a holy and righteous God. That the Ten Commandments reveal the character and nature of God, but not only is it

a map for us to know how we ought to live, it's also a mirror that we hold up before ourselves and go, uh-oh, there's a problem. I got a real problem trying to live up to this. Now, a lot of people wrongly use the Bible like binoculars. They're like, oh, I see what you're doing, a bunch of sinners. That is not how weird to use it. It is a map and it is a mirror. And so we also find out in chapter 19 when you get towards the bottom that God is speaking through the thunder out loud

so that the people can hear. But the people are afraid. And the reason the people are afraid is because God and Moses are about to cut a covenant. And the way you would cut a covenant in the Old Testament is this, is you would take a lamb and you would literally split it in half

and lay it open. And whatever it is you agreed on, you would walk through that together. and what you were saying is if I don't do my part, may what was done to this land be done to me. And so the people are like, Moses, why don't you go and you tell us what he says? Chapter 20, verse 1. And God spoke all these words saying, I am the Lord of your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. Again, do you see this?

Identity before activity. How many laws have they obeyed so far? They don't even have a law to obey. It doesn't go like this. It's not like God showed up in Egypt and handed out the Ten Commandments as an exam and then said, hey, I'll be back on the midterm, and if you're pulling like a C, then maybe you graduate and I'll come back and take you out. That's not how it works at all.

You see, with the grace of God, the verdict comes before the performance. The verdict comes before the performance. And then God gives us these Ten Commandments for really two reasons. One, to see how we might rightly live with Him. and two, how we might rightly live with one another. Because in a matter of a month's time, it's going from a slave nation to a holy nation. It's going to go from a nation of wanderers

to a kingdom of priests. It's a really big deal. And then he's going to get into the Ten Commandments. And I'm going to teach them to you. And these things were taught to me by an elementary-age kid right when I got out of seminary, okay? And we're going to use our fingers,

and I need everybody to play along. I know some of you note takers going to have to put your pen down, pick it back up. And I need, even the cool people, Jerry, you too, all the cool people in here, all right? The dudes are like, I'm cool. You ain't that cool, man.

Get over yourself, all right? And so we're going to play along, and you're going to be able to remember these forever this way, all right? So everybody hold up one finger, and we can't move along until everybody in the house is going, okay? You online, everybody, all right? Every, okay, good. There's one God.

That's it. There's one God. And to which I would add a little commentary, I think God's saying there's one God, and it ain't you. All right, here's how he says it. You shall have no other gods before me. there's one God. Martin Luther says,

if we get this one right, all the other ones will fall in place. You see, because a lot of people live as if, like, you are God and the whole universe revolves around you. And I hope and pray that today would be your Copernicus moment. Copernicus was like the first scientist

that said, you know what, I have an idea. I don't think the sun revolves around us. I think we revolve around the sun. Because if you think that you're the center of the universe and everything revolves around you, it's a pretty miserable way to live. So number one, you shall have no other God, before me. Number two, do them sideways and do like this, like scissors, cut out the idols.

Cut out the idols. Here's how he says it. You shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them for I the Lord your God am a jealous God visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but show you bring steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. You see, back then, they would carve images of like animals and then bow down to the images of the animals.

And, you know, as progressive 21st century folk, we would be like, who would bow down to an animal? I don't know. We do it every football season, but who knows? You know, March Madness, okay, so any of you. But most of the time, we don't bow down to somebody else's image. We bow down to the image in the mirror. Like, have you seen your Instagram?

it's just to convince the whole world that you were worthy of worship. That's what it is. Or we bow down to some temporary thing. Like we fall in love with our house instead of the ministry that we can do in our house and that's why God gave us that house. Or we fall in love with this title

instead of working as unto the Lord and everything we do, we do for his glory. He says, cut it out. Cut out the idols. Number three, hold up fingers like this, first three fingers, and you see it makes like a W, okay? Watch your words. Don't use the Lord's name in vain.

Here's the way he says. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain. This doesn't just mean that you shouldn't use cuss words with God's name in it, which I don't think you should use cuss words with God's name in it.

But any time you treat the name of God instead of hallowed be thy name, you flippantly use the name of God. Whether that you use the name of God, at somebody else's expense for your own benefit. Or you flippantly use the phrase like you're a Jesus follower and you kind of flippantly say that with your mouth, but don't act like it.

Or you think God is some kind of eternal bellhop that exists just to go get you what you want. He says, watch your mouth. Don't use God's name in vain. Number four, hold up four like this. There are typically four Sundays in a month. We get two months that have five, but go with me here. There's typically four Sundays in a month.

Honor the Sabbath. and keep it holy. Honor to the Sabbath and keep it holy. Here's the way he says it. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God on it. You shall not do any work. You or your son or your daughter, your male servant or your female servant or your livestock or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth the sea and all that is in them and he rested on the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. Keep it set apart. Why? Because that's what God did. Just let me ask you,

do you Sabbath? Have you ever worked seven days in a row? Because when we do that, I struggle with this one. You ever notice that Christians today don't sin anymore? We just struggle. So I struggle with this one. That's called sin. When you don't Sabbath, it's just called a sin. But anyway, here's what you're saying. God, I don't trust you. I got this. Three of the most dangerous words you can ever say. I got this. And so God gave us the Sabbath as a gift.

You ever think about this? Why did God take a day off? He wasn't tired. He wasn't tired. And why did it take him six days to make everything? He could have said in one word. He's never been in a hurry, but he's always on time. You ever think about that?

And then the first thing Adam and Eve ever did. They were created on the sixth day. So their first full day, what did they do? Sabbath. Why? Were they tired? They haven't done anything. They just got created.

You ever been created? I don't know. Do you get tired? I don't think so. You just wake up and there we are. And everyone's the naked wife. Hey girl, what's up? That's what's going on?

What are we going to do on day one? Here's what I think. Rabbis and Jewish theologians call this commandment, the hinge commandant. Because if you look at them, the first three are about your vertical relationship with God, okay? And in five through ten are about our horizontal relationships with one another.

And then there's one in the middle. And if you don't know how to love and be loved by God, then there's no way you're going to be able to love the people that are around you. Maybe this is why Jesus said, the greatest commandment is this. Love the Lord of your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and the second is like it, love your neighbor as yourself. If you don't know how to be loved, beloved, then you'll never know how to love one another.

Do you Sabbath? Do you take a full day off every week to just rest and reconnect with the Lord? Now, Paul makes it clear in Romans. It doesn't matter what day it is. In fact, today's not even the Sabbath. The Sabbath is Friday afternoon to Saturday evening. But it's important, because think about it. Who even Sabbaths anymore?

Hobby Lobby and Chick-fil-A, right? And can we be honest? Who gets a little frustrated with that? Right? Driving home from church, you're like, woo, no line. You pull in for some chicken minis, and then you're like, oh, you Christians in your Sabbath. Right.

But God blesses it. So, remember the Sabbath. Keep it holy. Number five, do your hand like this. And then salute, say, yes, sir. Honor your father and mother. That's the fifth commandment. Honor your father and mother that your days may be long in the land

that the Lord of your God is giving. My daddy used to say, boy, the Bible says, I brought you in this world, I'll take you out. I was like, nope, I think that's the Cosby's, but I know what you mean, okay? You see, here's what's crazy. God always works in and through authority. And whether you had awesome parents

are terrible, abusive parents, God decided that they would be your parents, and he used your parents to shape you into who you are. And I know for a lot of us, it's real easy to honor our parents because they're very honorable. And for some of you, and I'm not in the camp that everything wrong with you

is because you didn't get hugged as a kid and you weren't breastfed. That's not me. I'm not trying to blame a previous generation on all your sin. That's not what I'm doing. But there are some dishonorable things that have happened to people.

There is no doubt. And I've had people say, well, I don't think you understand who my dad is. And I go, listen, I get you, but you're confusing. honor and respect. Respect is earned. The Bible does not say to respect them. The Bible says honor them. Honor is just given. In fact, Paul is going to say in the book of Romans that we should honor

everyone. Peter is going to say in one of his letters that we honor the emperor. And the emperor during his time was killing Christians. And here's what this means. It's very basic as this. Make sure every word that comes out of your mouth, whether your parents are living or not living anymore is honoring to them, and there's no graduation date on this one. Honor your father and mother. Number six. All right, now we're going graduate level. Go two hands here, right, five on one, one over here.

Thou shall not murder. Bang, like that, okay? I know it's dumb, but you'll remember it. Okay, so, thou shalt not murder. Now, it's about right here. If there is a final exam, an entrance exam, into heaven, and the Ten Commandments has something to do with it, it's usually about right here, people say, start to feel pretty good about themselves, okay?

Because you think, hey man, have you ever treated anything like it's God? Have you ever had an idol in your life? You worship something temporary. Have you ever, like, stump your toe and slipped? Have you ever worked seven days in a row? Uh-oh. All right. Honor your father or mother.

Well, I was a teenager, so that one's out. Okay. Don't murder. Got it. Never kill anybody. Then Jesus comes along. Sermint on the Mount. Jesus in his pesty Bible teaching says,

You have heard that it was said, thou shalt not murder, but I say to you, if you've ever hated your brother in your heart and even called him a fool, you're a murderer. So I have a confession to me. I am a murderer many times over, okay? One of the times I can remember, I've told you this before, Gretchen and I were driving along, having what we like to call robust dialogue, all right? That's why I'm like, why are you looking out of the window?

She's like, I'm like, what's wrong? Nothing? Why do you act so mad if it's not, you know, one of those kinds? And I can't even remember what she said, okay? She said something to me, and I'm driving along, and I got frustrated, and you should never do this, and I repent, and fellas, you should never, ever display any act of aggression in the presence of your girl. I did, because I'm a sinner, and I was like, I can't take this, and I punch my steering wheel. And by the grace of God, because he loves me, and he disciplines me because I'm his son, my horn got stuck on. Yeah, yeah. And she laughed, like, you're laughing, and it did not have the calming effect that she was open. Okay? So we're just driving on JTB, just, and she's just, ha, having a damn grand old time.

And my murder rate is just, I'm going to, like, serial killer, okay? And then I've got to go home, so we pull off and we pull up to the stoplight at, like, Kernan or wherever, and there's people, you know, they don't know what's going on. All they know is they're at the red light, and here I come, and they're like, hey, what's up? I'm like, get out of the truck. I murdered them, they're all dead, okay? That's right. Because what my horn was saying, if you listen to it,

if you translate the Greek of me, that's murder. That's what I was doing the whole time. Another time I murdered somebody, we could do this all day. It'd be fun. This is a few years ago, four years ago, and my son, JP is playing flag football at UNF. Okay? It's not real football.

It's flag football. You're not supposed to touch each other in flag football. And there's this kid reffing. It's probably 19 years old, all right? And this is like the championship game, and we're the returning champs, and JP's the quarterback. he drops back and he throws the ball and this big kid just trucks him. I mean just and I'm like,

hey, rough, like a 19-year-old UNF kid. I'm like, where's roughing the passer? And he looks at me and he literally says, I wasn't watching as loud as I could. I said, you have one job. I murdered him, okay? And then, right about then, one of you people from the other sidelines goes, hey, pastor Joby. And so I murdered her too, all right? Just dead bodies everywhere in my heart. All right. So, now, we're just over halfway through. And if you're grading yourself. Now remember, the standard here, it's not my stand. When I was in college, C's equal degrees. Can I get a witness, all right? That's not God's standard. You know what God's standard is? Be holy for I am holy. Yikes. So how are we doing?

Anybody in here have been like crushing it? Can we go to Leviticus and get to some of the hard stuff? Because this is easy. No, because then you'd be prideful, which is like the Rose Bowl of sin. It's like the granddaddy of them all. So you look, man, I know what your score is. You're old for six. For those of you that are out of college,

do you remember when you got to that point in your semester back in the day and you would look back over your, you know, you had to get a little progress support and be like, uh-oh, oh, no. I think I need 186 on the final exam to pull a C. I don't think there's enough time left. in the semester to do this, okay? So we actually had to take an F.

I know what you people do. You just go talk to your, like, my feelings got hurt, and they'd be like, oh my God, that's on us. We're so sorry. Why don't you just go take an app, all right? Don't even worry about paying. Somebody will do that too, okay?

So, gracious. So how are we doing here? Not good. Well, it keeps going. Number seven, put them up like this. Take these two. I'm not going to. You jump in, bro.

Okay. There we go. Right here. thou shall not commit adultery. Now if you brought your kids, explain what's happening back here. It's not good, okay? Thou shall not commit adultery. Now, again, this is the moment where somebody's like,

I've never cheated on my wife. Way to go, bro, except Jesus. And again, his pesky Bible teaching says, you've heard that it was said, thou shall not commit adultery. But I say to you, if you've ever lusted after a woman in your heart, then you're an adulterer. In other words, those aren't just pictures.

Those are people. That if you've ever treated anybody like a comming, for what you could get from them, then that's adultery. Sex, according to the Bible, is for married people. And according to the Bible, regardless of what any government says anywhere,

according to the Bible, marriage was God's idea. He made it up, so when he makes it up, he gets to define it. It's one man, one woman, one lifetime. That's what it is. And anything outside of that is not a struggle, it's not a feeling.

And I know somebody's like, we're married in our heart. No, you're not. It's not a thing, okay? It's not a thing. You're an adulterer even in your heart. That's what's going. on here, all right? Number eight, this is very important. Okay, you get three up on this side,

and then you got to hold this pinky down, because in some countries, if you steal, they'll cut your pinky off. I don't know if it's true, but we'll just say it is for the sake of this, all right? Thou shalt not steal, right? Now, stealing means to take something that's not yours. You're like, I don't steal. Okay, that time that you're using for Pinterest that work, that's not your time to be on Pinterest. That's called stealing. You're like, how does he know? I know, all right? So, there we go. Now, this is important. Okay, so thou shalt not steal. It's what says in verse 15. Now, this is very important.

Now take that pinky and you make it go, bing, like that shall not lie. You were like, I don't have a pinky. You got cut off because I'm stealing. Bing, I'm lying, I have a pinky. Got it? I shall not lie. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

Now listen, I've got some really hard news for some of you, okay? You, you are a liar. And I know that's offensive, all right? But you are a liar. Why? Because you lie. Actually, the reason you lie is because you're a liar, you're not a liar because you lie, all right?

It's just true. Like in here, I'm telling you, I had somebody come up to me and be like, that's a little offensive. You calling me a liar, I'm calling you a liar, yes. Somebody told me one time several years ago, this is a pastor, I don't, here's the thing. I'm not a liar, sometimes I just struggle with the truth.

Okay, you have more struggles than I have time for right now, okay, there's a lot going on there. And you're like, who me, all right, how about this? How many of you read this? I have read all the terms and conditions, and then you click the box. Liar. Me too, man.

Me too, okay? So you're a liar. Last one. Ten, hold them out like this, and then reach and grab something that's not yours. Thou shalt not covet. Here's the way God says it. You shall not covet your neighbor's house.

You shall not covet your neighbor's wife. His male servant, his female servant, his ox, his donkey, or anything that is your neighbors. What does it mean to covet? If you've ever watched HGTV, you're a sinner. All right? You are. You are.

Because you look at it. You're like, I want that. And some of you don't even want the new kitchen. What you want is a husband that knows how to build new kitchens. That's what you really want, okay? Let's be on. Or whatever your thing is, man, you could drive by the car lot. Whatever it is, all right?

Anytime you covet, what essentially you're saying is, God, I don't trust to you. And even though you've decided not to give me that, you're not doing it right. All right. So, how are we doing so far on the entrance exam to heaven if the standard is be holy for I am holy? I know how we're doing. Not good. In fact, this is how the people of Israel here. Again, we find out at the bottom of chapter 19

that God is speaking out loud on Mount Sinai. This is not just a one-on-one combo with Moses. They can hear the voice of God through the thunder. And they're thinking, uh-oh, verse 18. Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled and they stood far off.

because they thought, well, if that's the standard, we're dead. There's no way we can pull this off. And said to Moses, you speak to us and we will listen, but do not let God speak to us lest we die. Moses said to the people, do not fear for God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin. And the people stood far off while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was. they knew they could not live up to God's standard, and they knew what would be required of them, and they were thinking, uh-oh.

You see, James says it this way in James 210, for whoever keeps the whole all, but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it. There are so many people in church today, particularly around the southeast, and they believe if I'm a good person, then I'll go to heaven. Let me just ask you, good as compared to what?

The nightly news in your college roommate? Cool, man, you're crushing it. Good as compared to a holy and righteous, perfect God, not good. I mean, heck, we just established, you're not good. Me either. We're murderers and adulterers and liars and not good. So then what do we do? Because if you try to live your whole life thinking, if I obey, then I will be welcomed in,

that's a rough way to live. In fact, Jesus has this conversation with the guy in the New Testament. He's called the Rich Young Ruler, and he thinks he's kind of awesome, and he comes up to Jesus, and he says, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus is like, do, well, how are you doing on the Ten Commandments? And the guy goes crushing it. I obey all of the commandments all of my life. Apparently he didn't get to the liar one, you know what I mean?

And then Jesus says, yeah, yeah, yeah, there's only one. You're just missing one thing, one little thing. What's that? You love money more than you love me. Sell what you have, give to the poor. and follow me. And the Bible says, and he walked away sad. If you live your whole life thinking that you're performing before God trying to get him, trying to be good enough to appease him, you're going to be sad your whole life. And I'm telling you, that is the message of every other religion in the world,

save the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. I mean, if good people go to heaven, you ever wonder about this, how good? Is it like an 80%, 70%, no, no. The Bible says, be holy for I am holy. if good people go to heaven, how are you doing right now? Don't you think God owes you a progress report? Some of you don't have enough time left in the semester to do anything about it. You see, good people don't go to heaven. Forgiven people go to heaven.

And God knows this from the beginning. This is why right after he gives the Ten Commandments, the next section in the Bible, describes how to build an altar so that when you fail and when you sin and when you fall, you can make atonement for that sin. The Ten Commandments are not a checklist to tick off. for good Christian people, they are a bar of holiness set too far high for us so that we will know

that we need somebody to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves. You see, Moses is up on top of this mountain with the holy God and there's a bunch of people down there, a bunch of sinful people going, how do we get up there? And every other works based religion on the planet, which is all of them, says you work real hard and find your path and you climb to the top. The good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ is that the Lord Jesus Christ put on flesh and he came down the mountain on a rescue mission to do for us what none of us have the ability to do for ourselves. If you've got your Bible flip over to Romans chapter 3, this is precisely what Paul is going to talk about in Romans chapter 3. We're going to start in verse 20 and this paragraph, Martin Luther,

the great reformer, says that this is the most important paragraph ever written in the history of humanity. He says, that Romans 3.20 to the end is the chief point in the very center of the Bible. It's the thing that makes everything else make sense. Now verses 1 through 19 are basically what we just covered, that we are all sinners, every single one of us. And when he gets to 20, he says this. Because there's a bunch of us, man, you read the Ten Commandments and you look at it as a map and a mirror, and you go, well, what do we do now? I mean, if the standard is be holy for I am holy, and I think, holy moly i got i'm in trouble and so paul says for by works of the law no human being will be justified

in his sight for you just trying to be good enough to to appease god if you believe that if i obey then i will be accepted paul says for by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight that word justified is a legal term and the best way to remember it is that if you put your faith in Jesus Christ. And what it means to be justified is because of what Christ has done for me, from God's point of view, it's just if I'd never sin. Because Christ takes the full payment for my sin on the cross. But if you're just trying to be good enough, your good works, no human being will be justified in God's sight. Since through the law comes knowledge of sin, that the law is a gift to us so that we can know what sin is. That it's not just a guess, it's not just a fee,

feeling, the reason, the way that you know that you're speeding is because there is a speed limit. If there was not a speed limit, you would not know if you're speeding, if you're breaking the law. If you get on 95 and it just said, drive safe, some of you would go 123 miles an hour while putting on your makeup doing an Instagram live story. And you'd be like, feels kind of safe, not to us, but to you. Some of you would go 46 miles an hour in the fast lane in front of me, and that makes you feel safe, okay? Yeah, both of you're in trouble. So there's a speed limit.

So when he says that this law has been given that we may, he says, since through the law comes knowledge of sin, that's all the power the law has. The power the law has in our life is to make us know what sin is. Years ago, a grandson was out of town, and she put me in charge of the kids, which is dangerous. So I took them to one of those little trampoline, bouncy house concussion cube places. You know what I'm talking about? I'm convinced that the little, like, the little dock-in-a-box ER places sponsor those places to make all their money. I'm convinced, all right?

And so Reagan, she's 12 now, she's our toughest Martin at my house. She hardly ever cries. She cries at like animal commercials, but not to, like, pain, okay? And she's bounced, she falls off of something, and she comes up to me, and she's like, Dad, it popped. I'm thinking, oh, so we get in the car, we hustle to the ER, and they take an x-ray of her elbow. And sure enough, it's broken at the growth plate. You can just see it, big crack right through it.

right there. Now, what if I said, all right, Reagan, here's what we're going to do. We're just going to keep x-ray in this thing until it's fixed. That would be dumb, right? Why? Because the x-ray has no power to change the broken arm. All it cannot do is identify that the arm is broken. So people that think, oh, man, I'm bad. I know. I'll try to be better so that I will be justified before the Lord. Paul goes, no, no, no, no, man. The law is like an x-ray so that you will have knowledge that you have sin, but you need somebody else to do for you what you cannot do for yourself. So he tells us what has been done on our behalf, verse 21. But now, the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law. By the way, that's Jesus. The, not another,

the righteousness of God. And in the book of Romans particularly, when you see the word righteous, don't think right activity, think right identity. Don't think do better, think a right standing before God. But now, the right standing of God has been manifested apart from the law. This is what Martin Luther would call an alien righteousness. You hear me say it. I've said it like nine times already. This means that somebody came to do for us something that we could not do for ourselves. Then he says, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it. So he's like, so, but don't unhitch from the Old Testament because it matters like crazy. That everything in this book is about the coming of Jesus Christ. Like the story of David and Goliath is not about you can slay your giants at work.

Don't be dumb, man. No, no, no, no. The story of David and Goliath is that the greater David Jesus came to slay the biggest giant in our life, which is sin. That Noah and the ark is not a children's fable. By the way, I don't know how that one made the children's book, right? And after 40 days of raining, there were dead bloated bodies everywhere. Good night, Sally. I don't know how that happens, okay? But no, no, no. Jesus is the greater Noah, and he is the ark that if you will put your life in him, then you will be saved. The whole thing is about one thing, it ain't you. The whole thing is about Jesus.

He's saying the law and the prophets bear witness to this manifestation of righteousness that God said. Then he says, and then he tells us what we do about it. He says, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. I could probably do a sermon just on this sentence right here. All right, so what do we do, Paul? What do we do?

We see the Ten Commandments. I'm O for Ten. I'm bankrupt before a holy God, what do I do? He goes, okay, to have a right standing before God, the righteousness of God, you put your faith in Jesus Christ. Even me? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, for all who would believe. And that word believe is Pistuo.

Remember last week, stepping off the diving board? Not just believing that, but believing in, trusting in. And by the way, last week in our services at our campuses, 66 people trusted Christ for salvation for the very first time, right? And at the end of the first chapter of the book we wrote is a prayer of salvation. And I had four people email me this week that says that they put their faith in Jesus Christ. That's what it's talking about for all who believe. Then he says, for there is no distinction.

For all have sin and fall short of the glory of God. There is no distinction. For all have sin and fall short of the glory of God. Now he's not talking about there's no distinction in sin because there are distinction. in sin. Some of you are better at not sinning than others of you. Some of you struggle with sin that will blow your life up today. And some of us struggle with sin that's kind of the slow boil. You understand? So there are distinctions in sin, but what there's no distinction in, the Bible says, that the wages of sin is death. There's no distinction in death. That in our sin, we are all dead.

There's no distinction in dead. There's no dead, dead, dead or deadest. There's just dead. Like if we, by our own merit, if we said, all right, church, this is what we're doing this year, after beach baptism, what we're going to do is we're going to line up on the beach and we're all swimming to England, all right? Because they all need Jesus and sweet tea, so here we come, okay? And so let's go. Now, do you realize some of us, by our own effort, would make it farther than others of us, right? I mean, some of you would trip and fall on the sand, die right there and never make it.

And some of you, real fit types, you know, you would swim past the, like past the breakers and pass the horizon. But who would make it? No one would make it. We would all be dead. Some people dead on the shore. Some people dead in the breakers. Some dead just past where you can't touch.

And some people dead out there. But everybody is dead in their own effort. There is no distinction for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. This word sin, this is an archery term. It literally means miss the mark. Miss the mark. And you remember what the standard is for God. It's perfection.

Be holy for I am. holy. It would be like if you were in an archery contest and you draw back on the very first one and you miss, you missed the mark. Not only did you not hit the bullseye, you missed the whole target and you're like, oh, hold on, hold on. Give me another chance. And then number two, bullseye. Number three, Robin Hood. Do you get to move on to the next round? No. Even if you could shoot bullseyes a thousand times in a row, you have missed the mark and you miss the mark of perfection so you don't get to move on to the next round. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by His grace as a gift. If you are justified by the blood of Jesus,

if you have ever put your faith in Jesus Christ, it is a gift. It is a gift that you must receive. It is not something that you earn. It's not because you've been so good that God let you into heaven. It's by his grace that he justified you as a gift. Through the redemption, that is in Christ Jesus. He uses this word redemption from the word redeem. And everybody knows what it is to redeem something, all right? We've all participated in this.

I don't know if you use paper coupons anymore, but just go back a few days with me, all right? Have you ever redeemed a coupon? How does it work? You go out to the mailbox, you open the mailbox, you look in there, and you're like, I have been given coupons. I did nothing to deserve it.

I didn't earn them. I didn't write somebody and ask for them. I have just been predestined and elected to have coupons in my mailbox. And so you take out the coupons and you look through them and there's one for a free ham at Wind Dixie.

So what do you do? You go to Wind Dixie, you get your ham, you walk down to the little checkout place and they go, beep, that'll be, I don't know what a ham goes. $25. It'll be $25.

And you're like, maybe for the great unwashed, but I have a coupon for a free ham. And then what do we call it? What do you do with the coupon? You redeem the coupon, right? I give you the coupon, you give me the ham.

What did it cost me? Nothing. What did it cost the manufacturer? Full price. Now, it cost the ham. It cost the pig, everything, all right? That's kind of the same sermon, but that's what's happening. Now, if you get saved in line at Wind Dixie, you've got to let me know, okay?

One day you're going to be like, oh my gosh, that's what's happening. Whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith. That God put this alien righteousness, his son, Jesus, forward as a propitiated. Propitiation by his blood. That word propitiation. Say propitiation. One more time. Propitiation. Now, I know I teach on it all the time, but we've got a bunch of new people here. And listen, when we started the church, all the church growth experts told me, well, whoa, whoa, you kind of calm down on the theological terminology in the Greek and Hebrew words. To which I was like, hold on, man. If you can order a venti caramel macchiato, surely you can know propitiation, all right? And by the way, fellas, if you're ordering a caramel macchiato, repent, stand up, act like a man, drink it black. like God intended. Okay, anyway. This was wrong with us. So, propitiation simply means this, a payment that satisfies, a payment that satisfies. Satisfies what? Satisfies the law of God, satisfies the righteousness of God, satisfies the holiness of God. And so Jesus is put forward

as the propitiation for our sin. That means when Jesus endured the cross, he made the payment that satisfied the righteousness and holiness of God. A.W. Tozer says, the most important thing about you is what you think about when you think about God. Most of us think God's really frustrated with us. The God's really aggravated with us. The God's disappointed in us. The God's dissatisfied in us.

You know why we think that? One, because we remember how frustrating we were to our parents, right? I mean, heck, you're pretty frustrating to live with. You're a murderer and an idol-worshipper. and a liar. We just established this. And if you've got children, anybody got children? A little frustrating, is it not? I mean, I know the blessing, there's a little baby right there.

It's such a little fearfully and wonderfully made sinner that's so frustrating. Won't nap when they're supposed to. Just all they do is wake up every day like the seagulls on Nemo. Just mine, mine, mine. Done nothing to help you at the house, right? It's easy to get frustrated. In fact, I was having a conversation with one of my kids. I don't tell you which one.

just the other day because I was a bit frustrated and I looked at this little human that lives in my home and I said this, I said, listen, listen, listen, if you would just do what I say, your life would be so blessed, your life would be so smooth, your life would be, you would have it all together and then the Lord was like, say that again. If you would just do, see what you're saying.

Okay, but if Jesus is the payment that satisfies and you are in him, then God can't be dissatisfied in you. This is how he rejoiced. rejoices over you. This is why he delights over you. This is why he's not frustrated with you. He loves you. That God put forward as the propitiation by his blood to be received by faith. Have you put your faith in Jesus for the forgiveness of your sin? I've had people ask, okay, all right, I get Jesus died on the cross, but why did Jesus have to die on the cross for the forgiveness of my sin? Why didn't God just forgive? You know, I forgive people all the time, which is a hilarious

to think. You're not God. The reason you can overlook sin is because you're crappy. Me too. You're not holy. You're not righteous. Me either. The reason God can't just say, you know what, don't worry about it. It's because for God to overlook sin, it would be out of character with his holiness and his righteousness. For him to not judge sin, it would make him an unjust judge. Imagine if somebody did something horrible to your girls, horrible to your girls, and then they caught them. And then took them, them to trial. And you see this guy, caught red-handed. And the judge went, you know what, nobody's perfect. Don't worry about it. How would you feel, mama? Nope. You were an unjust judge. And God is perfectly just. And so why did Jesus have to die? Because even if God forgives us,

if you forgive somebody of something, then ultimately what you're saying is you were willing to pay the price to make the thing right. Like if you borrowed my truck and you wrecked it and you brought it back to me and you're like, I'm so sorry, will you forgive me? I would say, yes, I will. Not because I want to, I have to, all right? That's what Jesus said. So I would forgive you. But my truck still busted up. Implicit in my forgiveness towards you would be that I will pay the price to make this thing right. Even when God forgives us by us putting our faith in Jesus Christ, he paid with his son's blood to make things right between us and him. And we know this in our own justice system. You see, it's not only what we do, but who we do it again.

against that determines the penalty. We know this, right? It's not just what you do, but who you do it against that determines the penalty. And every time we sin, we slap the face of an almighty eternal God and it requires an everlasting punishment. Look, we know this. I've told you before. If you get mad and you walk out of here and you kick the tire, that's not good. But if you go home and kick your roommate, that's a crime. You kick the president, federal penitentiary. You kick the Pope? I don't know. Go to purgatory, all right? It's not even a real place. don't worry about it, okay? Yeah, you kick a person and it's bad.

You go home today, you kick your cat, it's not even a sin. Everybody knows that, right? It's not even... But when we sin against an almighty everlasting God, it requires an everlasting punishment. So, here's how... So then you're like, oh, well, it's not just the Ten Commandments. I'm not just O for Ten.

I have sinned against the Holy God? Mm-hmm. Well, what do we do? And so Paul's going to answer it. He says, he says the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction. For all have sin and God.

fall short of the glory of God and are justified by His grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God put forward as the payment that satisfied by his blood to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forebearance, he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus Christ. So what do you do when you look at the law of God and you realize, uh-oh. there's a problem, the problem is me. Then you put your faith in Jesus Christ.

You see, because of God's righteousness, all sin must be paid for. Because of God's mercy, he delayed the payment. That's what he means by a divine forbearance. He has passed over former sins. That's how you made it in here today, that he didn't squish you the first time you ever said. But because of his grace,

he made the payment on our behalf. He is the just and the justifier. If you look at the cross, at the cross, you see a perfect picture of God's perfect righteousness and God's perfect love. There are two unique beams that make a cross. And I want you to think about that vertical beam as God's perfect righteousness and he pours out his wrath on sin and his son became sin in our place. And he made the payment that satisfied. But in that horizontal where Christ has his arms stretch wide open that God demonstrated his love, his perfect love, for us and this, that while we were yet still sinners, Christ died for us. So what does that mean

with the gospel, I mean, with the Ten Commandments? Paul's going to say this by the time you get to verse 31. He says, do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means, on the contrary, we uphold the law. Here's the point. The law is the diagnosis that we are all sinners in need of a Savior. And Jesus is the cure for that diagnosis, for that diagnosis, that Jesus came and he lived the perfect life. He obeyed every law. He fulfilled every prophecy. He got a hundred out of a hundred on the test. And then he went to the cross in our place for anybody that would believe that when he pushed up on his nail pierced feet and he said, it is finished. A part of what was finished was the fulfillment of the law. Literally the word is Tettelestai. It means paid in full. And that he paid for us,

he took our place. A few years ago, there was this college exam academic scandal. Do you remember this? 50 people got indicted in it this past week on the 12th. It happened in California. That's where all the bad stuff happens, right? And there was a bunch of famous people like actors and actresses and a bunch of super rich people. And what they did is they wanted to make sure that their kids could get into the right college, like Ivy League schools and some of the elite colleges. So they paid somebody to take the college entrance exam in their place. They paid up to a half a million dollars. That's how dumb their kids are, all right? Here's a half a million bucks. My kid can't make it in. Will you take the exam in their place? And again, they're indicted, they should get in trouble, all the things,

all right? Now, you want to hear a real scandal of great. grace. You're going to hear about how scandalous the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ is? We've all been given this exam, not just the Ten Commandments, but God's Holy Law. And we've failed every single one of us. And then God gives us this invitation. At great expense to myself, I'm going to send my son to take the exam in your place. Hey, and if you want to stick with your own good works, good luck, but you're going to fail. But if you're going to fail. But if you're You want to admit it. I'm a sinner in need of a Savior.

I need someone to do for me what I cannot do for myself. I don't need a second chance. You've heard that before? We serve the God of second chances. I know what you mean. It's just totally theologically inaccurate. You don't need a second chance. Guess what you would do with a second chance?

Two Fs. Not good. If I gave my precious little daughter Reagan Capri, who's 12 years old in the sixth grade, a college calculus exam, how do you think she would do? Not good. Two reasons. She's 12 and she's a Martin. She's going to be struggling.

And if she failed and I said, don't worry about it, maybe you get a second chance. You just fail again. You don't need a second chance. You don't need to turn over a new leaf. We need a new life. We need someone to do for us what we can't do for ourselves. And when it comes to the heavenly interest exam, Jesus takes the test, lives a perfect life, dies in our place. And for whoever would believe put their faith in him, you and I would be made right.

righteous before God. We would have a right standing before him. And I want to give you that opportunity right now to put your faith in Jesus. I know some of you were thinking, well, didn't we do this last week? Uh-huh. Some of you are hard-headed though. You got right up to the edge last week and you're like, I don't know, but you know. You know. It's not because of anything that I have said, I have said, but somehow God is making it clear in your head and in your heart that right now is the day that you were ready to admit it. I'm a sinner in need of a Savior. That you believe that somehow when Christ died on the cross, that counted for you. And today, you're going to confess him as Lord and Savior. Would you bow your heads? Would you close your eyes? And if you would say that's me, and right now, for the

very first time, I am ready to confess Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. I know that I'm a sinner, and I believe that when he died on the cross, that counted for me. If that's you, right where you are, would you lift your hand high in the air? Would you say, Father, here I am, save me. Praise God. Lift it high and say, Father, here I am. Save me. Praise God. Our good and gracious, Heavenly Father, God, I thank you, and I praise you that even right now there is salvation in your house. Lord, I thank you that Jesus Christ came on a rescue mission for us, that you're not waiting at the top of the mountain in fire and thunder and clouds saying good luck making it up here, but you dress yourself as a servant.

You came on a rescue mission for us. You died in our place for anyone who would believe, and I thank you, and I praise you for the men and women that are believing in this moment right now. And God, for those of us that have been walking with you for a minute, would you just remind us that you are not disappointed in us, that you are not dissatisfied in us, that you have adopted us, that you sing over us, you dance over us, you're a good dad, and you love your kids. And Lord, we thank you that we can love you because you first loved us. We pray this in Jesus' name, and all God's people said, amen, would you please stand as we

respond? We're going to have a lot to respond to, okay? I saw a lot of people saying, here I am, save me. So we need to sing like save folks. We need to lift our voices to the only one who is worthy of our worship, and we respond by singing, and we respond by bringing our ties and our offerings, our first and our best, to say, I don't worship these carved images of this world, but I use these things to worship you.

And we respond by praying because he's a good dad, and he invites his kids to cast all our cares upon him because he cares for us. So let's pray, let's sing, let's bring. Let's respond.