Sermon Tone Analysis

What is Faith?

That’s a difficult question for our contemporary culture.

Merriam-Webster Dictionary offers several definitions of faith.

This is the one that most Christians would identify with: belief and trust in and loyalty to God.[1]

However, our contemporary culture would probably identify more with this one: firm belief in something for which there is no proof.[2]

In my research, I came a cross a site that offered 10,500 quotes on faith here are three.

Faith isn't faith until it's all you're holding on to.

- Anonymous.

So what is this fuzzy faith that one is supposed to hold on to when there is nothing left to hold on to?

You block your dream when you allow your fear to grow bigger than your faith.

- Mary Manin Morrissey , inspirational author and speaker tell us that We block our dreams when we allow our fear to grow bigger that our faith.

Our faith in what?

Our faith in faith?

Keep your dreams alive.

Understand to achieve anything requires faith and belief in yourself, vision, hard work, determination, and dedication.

Remember all things are possible for those who believe.

- Gail Devers.

Actually, Gail Devers two time Olympic gold medalist in the 100 meter sprint makes it clear that the proper object of our faith is oneself.

In our culture it is quite good enough to have faith in faith.

Seemly, at step above that is having faith in oneself.

The popular exhortations “to have faith” or “have faith in yourself” are, at best, a closed system of faith.

In both cases, the person exercising “faith” must turn that faith back on himself or herself as the object of one’s own faith.

While we begrudge no one a health doses of confidence, our culture has generally abandoned God as a real object of faith.

This leaves one philosophically and practically to do the best one can.

Within this cultural context the best one can hope for is to assert concerning faith is that “I have faith that by my own efforts everything will work out fine for me even though there is no proof that everything will actually work out fine.

This a 21st century works-based rightness.

Faith is believing I can make everything work out right.

Lest we be too harsh concerning our neighbors striving to exercise some form of faith in the secular context, we should take a look within the church as well.

Between 2005 and 2010 The Barna Group conducted research to ascertain the status of faith among those self-identifying as Christians.

Among finds is one that particularly relates to our topic this morning.

The research revealed that 58% of Self-Described Christians over 18 believed that if you are a good person or do enough good things, they can earn their way into heaven.

So what we see in large measure with in the Church is a return to a works-based system to attempt to earn a good standing with God.

This is exactly what Martin Luther, John Calvin and the Reformers were trying to Reform.

This reformers were taking their stand on gain a right standing with God through faith alone directly from the Apostle Paul.

In Paul’s day, in the era of the Reformers, and within the Church today a lack teaching on the part of pastors and consequently a lack of knowledge of the biblical doctrine of justification by faith alone is at the heart of the problem.

This morning my hope is to clearly expose the contours of this doctrine within the passage before us so that our hearts rejoice in the redemption that we enjoy through faith alone and that we will see in this doctrine God in his wisdom, righteousness, and glory that will draw us joyfully to worship Him.

We begin by looking at . . .

Four Characteristics of Biblical Faith

Biblical faith comes from outside ourselves.

Faith is the gift of God (Ephesians 2: 8).

Biblical faith has an object outside of ourselves: We believe in someone: Jesus Christ (Romans 3:22a).

Biblical faith has content outside of ourselves: We believe in something: our redemption through the atoning death of Jesus (Romans 3:24-25a)

Biblical faith produces a result we could never achieve: We are justified - declared righteous by God (Romans 4:5)

Now let’s take brief look at how all of this works together in the text to form . . .

The Doctrine of Justification by Faith Alone

In order to help us follow the doctrine of Justification by Faith Alone in this passage, I’ve taken the liberty of paraphrasing the passage the passage along the following outline to help us clearly see the contours of the doctrine in this passage and present it in everyday language.

God will not declare us “right with God” (righteous) because we keep the law of Moses (or any other way of “earning” salvation).

Romans 3:20

God has revealed how we can be “right with God” without “earning” God’s favor or our salvation.

Romans 3:21

This “rightness with God” is given to everyone who, by faith, believes in Jesus Christ.

Romans 3: 22

This “rightness with God” is available to everyone because everyone has sinned, everyone (who believes in Jesus) is declared right with God (justified).

Romans 3:23, 24

God, by his grace, freely declares those who believe in Jesus to be “right with him”.

Romans 3:24

God’s grace was made visible in God’s giving of Christ as a blood sacrifice of atonement (covering) for sin that pays the price for our release ( redemption) from the bondage of sin.

Romans 3: 24, 25

We receive by grace release from the bondage and penalty of sin (redemption) when we by faith we believe and receive the atoning sacrifice of Jesus.

Christ’s atoning sacrifice which secures our freedom from sin (redemption) and makes us right with God (justified) given by God grace is recieved by faith in Jesus.

Romans 3:24-26

God demonstrated his faithfulness in keeping covenant through deliverance (God’ righteousness) by leaving past sins unpunished in view of what he would later do in Christ .

Romans 3: 25

All of this grace proves that is God righteousness (faithful in keeping his covenant) and that God is just (establishes what is right), and God’s authority and justice in “making right with him” those who have faith in Jesus.

Therefore, since our right standing with God (righteousness) comes to us by grace, through faith in Jesus and through no effort of any kind of our own, we can not boast in our “achievement” of “being right with God” (righteousness).

All glory for our being declared right with God (justification) is for God alone.

Romans 3: 27-30.

In closing, let’s take a few minutes to consider . . .

How We are Blessed by Faith

Paul quotes King David when he writes in Romans 4:7

and in the following verse (Romans 4:8)

Faith is a blessing to us personally, to our church, to our communities, and to our world.

Faith is a blessing to us personally because it comes to us individually by God’s grace as a gift.

Though this faith, supplied by God, we believe in Jesus Christ and that his atoning sacrifice as set us free from the bondage of sin and made us right with God.

This is a supreme blessing, because without the faith that God supplies none of the is possible.

By grace through faith alone in Jesus, God has done for us what we could never do for ourselves.

This is enough to generate an eternity of grateful worship from us individually.

It’s enough that every Sunday when we gather here together our worship should be deep, rich, and profound because we can never say “Thank you” enough to our heavenly Father for what his done for us by grace through faith alone!

Faith is a blessing to our church because it is the union that we enjoy with Christ through his redemption that binds us together as His Body and as a Family of God (Ga 3:28) - it is our only basis for confessing that we are brothers and sisters in Christ and behaving accordingly (Eph 4:32).

Finally, faith is a blessing to our communities and to the world because it provides for us individually and as a church the message of Grace.

This message of grace is this:

Everyone who by faith believes that Jesus Christ, in his death, paid the penalty for his or her sin is declared by God to be in a right relationship with Him.

You don’t have to earn it.

You simply receive it by faith.

This is the message of grace we seek to spread.

When we receive our right standing with God by faith in Jesus, when we stand here blessed by alone, rivers of living water will flow from us in worship to God and service to others that will bless us personally, bless our church, bless our communities, and bless our world.