Sin, Justification, and the Struggle

I. Romans Chapters 1-6: A Foundation for the Gospel

Introduction: Briefly introduce the section as a review of Paul's foundational arguments leading up to the powerful message of chapter 8. Emphasize his focus on our complete inability to save ourselves and the all-sufficient work of Christ in justification. Highlight the concept of federal headship in Adam and Christ. We are just about at the half way point of the book of Romans. That’s not too bad, we’ve made it through the first half in 5 months, which is about on par for our usual timeline to finish a book in around a year. I wanted to take this opportunity to do an overview of what we’ve covered so far in the book, and make sure that as we take this thorough exegetical approach to the book of Romans, that we don’t miss the bigger picture of what Paul is teaching us.

This sermon provides an overview of Romans chapters 1-7, tracing Paul's argument from humanity's universal guilt and inability to save itself to the glorious truth of justification by faith alone in Christ, ultimately highlighting the ongoing struggle with sin that sets the stage for the triumphant freedom found in Romans 8. It emphasizes Paul's profound yet simple articulation of the Gospel message: that despite our wretchedness, there is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.

Chapter 1: The Guilt of Humanity

God's wrath is revealed against unrighteousness.

Romans 1:18: "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth."

We are covenant breakers. Adam, Abraham, Moses, David, all broke the covenants that God made with them. Jonty Rhodes defines a covenant as "An agreement between God and human beings, where God promises blessings if the conditions are kept and threatens curses if the conditions are broken." The conditions? Perfect personal obedience. The blessings? Eternal life and communion with God. The curse? Death and eternal separation from God.

Creation reveals God, leaving no excuse.

Romans 1:20: "For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse."

Creation all bears the “fingerprint” of its creator. This world screams from its very atoms, intelligent design! We’ll deal with a verse in chapter 2 where Paul references that the law is written on our hearts. The idea of lex naturalis has been around as long as philosophers have. This idea of a natural law that can be perceived by all of mankind across all countries and cultures.

Chapter 2: God's Impartial Judgment

God judges without favoritism.

Romans 2:11: "For God shows no partiality."

Even though God has called us out and set us apart as His own, this status is by His grace and not something we earned through our own merit or works.

1 Peter 2:9: "But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light."

We are indeed a people who have been set apart, but we have no ability to merit our own justification. That atoning work could be done by grace, through faith in Christ alone.

The law's work is written on their hearts.

Romans 2:15: "They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them."

We don’t get to claim ignorance before God. He is just, and Romans 3:23: "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,"

Hypocrisy blasphemes God's name.

Romans 2:24: "For, as it is written, 'The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.'"

Even the Jews, God’s chosen people, through whom God chose to reveal Himself and His character to the world, were unable to merit their salvation. They knew this, too, which is why they had the sacrificial system, but they also knew that they could never be saved by it.

Hebrews 10:1-4 explains that the Law and its repeated sacrifices were merely a shadow of the true reality to come in Christ and could never truly perfect or take away sins.

Hebrews 10:1-4: "For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins."

Chapter 3: Justification by Faith

Scripture declares no one is righteous.(Psalm 14:1-3, 53:1-3)

Romans 3:10: "as it is written: 'None is righteous, no, not one;'"

There is no mechanism for justification apart from Jesus. We are only capable of meriting death and wrath for ourselves, and only Jesus is judged just before the Lord.

Law brings knowledge of sin, not justification.

Romans 3:20: "For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin."

We speak often of the idea of the Law as a mirror. It is the perfect standard and revelation of God’s character that is set before us. We are all made in the image of God, and the Law was the mirror that revealed just how marred an image we are.

There is only one way to be justified.

Romans 3:22b-24: "For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,"

We earned death, but the free gift of grace that is given to us is that we are now seen as not only just, but also righteous before the Judge, if we would only believe in Jesus as our Savior, and submit to Him also as our Lord.

Chapter 4: Abraham Justified by Faith

Justification by Faith alone is not a new concept, but is clearly shown in God’s declaration of Abraham as righteous. Why? Because…

Abraham's faith was counted as righteousness.

Romans 4:3: "For what does the Scripture say? 'Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.'"

God’s covenant with Abraham had not yet been confirmed. The confirmation ceremony of the covenant would happen several verses later. Before the institution of the covenant, Abraham believed God’s words to be trustworthy and true, and on that account alone, God makes a judicial declaration that Abraham is righteous.

Faith justifies the ungodly.

Romans 4:5: "And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness."

Paul is clear here. Jesus doesn’t need help saving you. His final words on the cross are just as true now as they were almost 2000 years ago when He uttered them. It is finished.

Christ's death and resurrection justify us.

Romans 4:23-25: "But the words 'it was counted to him' were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification."

BY FAITH ALONE

Chapter 5: Peace and Reconciliation Through Christ

Justification brings peace with God.

I believe Paul’s point in the overall structure of the letter points to a truly simple Gospel message. We were dead in sin with no hope of saving ourselves, and if we have faith, this idea of both acceptance of Jesus as Savior, and submission to Him as King, we receive a “not guilty” verdict before the Heavenly Judge on behalf of the perfect and sinless life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

Romans 5:1-5: "Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us."

Along with our justification, inarguably the best part of the Gospel, we have these other amazing blessings that are added to us. For the first time since the Garden, we have access to and communion with God. We also have peace with God. We are no longer at war with a righteous God as the unrighteous, but we have been declared righteous on Jesus’ behalf. And we have hope, this forward-looking faith, in the unchanging character of God, and His faithfulness to keep His promise.

Christ died for us while we were still sinners.

Romans 5:8: "but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

Amen

Adam's disobedience and Christ's obedience contrasted.

Romans 5:19: "For as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made righteous."

I told you when I preached this several weeks ago, now that I understand this to be the Federal Headship. Federal, meaning representative. We have a federal government that represents us, and sure, we get a vote and all of that, but historically, when our president declares war on any particular country or group, we don’t get much choice in the matter. At that point, we are at war, whether we like it or not. Federal headship works in a similar way. Adam was the representative of all mankind, and with his sin, all mankind fell with him, and the world was cursed because of Him. Now, Paul says, we have a new, better, perfect, holy, righteous Federal Head, and while we may still cringe at the idea of saying that we inherit, or have imputed to us, Adam’s sin, I don’t hear anyone crying foul that, in categorically the same way, we now find ourselves counted righteous before a holy God, not on our own account, but on the account of our new Federal Head, Jesus.

Chapter 6: Dead to Sin, Alive in Christ

Baptism unites us with Christ's death and resurrection.

Romans 6:4: "We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life."

We were dead in Adam, now we’re alive in Christ. We were baptised into death, along with Jesus, then, just as he was raised to walk in newness of life in His resurrected body, then ascended into heaven, in like manner, we are to walk in newness of life.

Corinthians 5:17: "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come."

Consider yourselves dead to sin, alive to God.

Romans 6:11: "So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus."

Sin's wages are death; God's gift is eternal life.

Romans 6:23: "For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."

The wages that we work for could only ever earn us God’s wrath, but through faith in Jesus, we receive the free gift of eternal life. If we just meditated on that truth, we would begin to see, again, just how great a chasm lay between us.

Note: Emphasize that alongside our justification, we receive access to God, peace with God, and hope in God, restoring the relational aspect lost in the Garden. We were not just delivered from something (wrath), but delivered to something (communion with God).

II. Romans Chapter 7: The Struggle with Sin Under the Law

Introduction: Introduce chapter 7 as Paul's poignant exploration of the believer's ongoing struggle with indwelling sin, even after justification. Emphasize that this chapter sets the stage for the triumph of the Spirit in chapter 8. But our Justification is not the end of our battle with sin, it’s the beginning. It’s not until, as Paul so clearly works out here in the first half of Romans, we have received the Holy Spirit that our flesh truly begins to wage war on our spirit. Before, we were fully submitted to and dead along with the flesh. We were stuck in a life enslaved to false Gods, mostly to a worship of ourselves as we’re told over and over that we can do it all if we just believe in ourselves. Richard Sibbes puts it this way…

Integration of Sibbes and the Parable of the Sower:

Introduce Richard Sibbes' analogy of the believer as a garden under cultivation. "'The good seed of the Spirit has been sown,' Sibbes reminds us, 'but weeds (sinful tendencies) continue to sprout and must be diligently pulled out.'"

Connect this to Jesus' parable of the sower: Our hearts, once hard ground, are now good soil through God's grace, receiving the finest seed of the Gospel. However, even good soil needs tending.

Explain: "'We must look to our hearts as gardeners do to their gardens, to pluck up weeds as soon as they appear, otherwise they will overgrow the good herbs.'" This ongoing effort reflects the reality that while our hearts are renewed and indwelt by the Spirit, the remnants of sin remain.

My father-in-law recently shared a concept from a podcast about the posture of gardening – how tending to the earth often involves being prostrate, with our faces close to the soil. This physical posture can reflect our spiritual posture before God. While the struggle against sin is a real war, we don't fight it with striving in our own strength, but by humbly submitting ourselves before the Lord, meticulously "picking out every little weed" of sin as we offer ourselves to Him in prayer, meditation, and the study of His Word.

Emphasize: "'God delights to walk in his garden, the soul of a believer, and to smell the sweet spices of his graces.'" Even in the struggle, the fruit of the Spirit and the imputed righteousness of Christ are pleasing to God.

Exegetical Outline:

A. Freedom from the Law Through Union with Christ (7:1-6)

Paul here is using this marriage analogy to say that in the same way, as a Jew, he was married to the Law, and bound by it, now that the Law has been fulfilled, the Law has passed away, and he is now wedded to Christ, along with the rest of the Church as… wait for it… His Bride.

Paul gives us the main purpose we have in being wedded to Christ (v.4) to bear fruit for God.

Not only is the law no longer binding, now that Christ has fulfilled it, but we now have the Holy Spirit, which Paul is affirming is far superior to the law, “which held us captive.”

B. The Law and Sin (7:7-12): Revealing Sin, Not Conquering It

Controversial Verse: 7:7

Roland introduced this last week, and graciously left it for me to “tackle” in the Deeper Dive episode, then I somehow find myself here again presenting this argument again.

I highly recommend that, if you enjoy some solid theological weightlifting, go home and do your homework on the “I” debate. When Paul speaks of himself here in the first person, is he talking about himself before or after his conversion? More on this later. Let’s dig in.

Read v.7:7-12

Clearly articulate the Reformed perspective: the law, though good, reveals sin and our inability to keep it perfectly, even for believers.

The Law is holy and good (7:12). The law is still useful today in that it still reveals God’s character, and as we’ve touched on before, we still reference the 10 commandments today as part of what the life of a believer looks like. Jesus referenced them, then reframed our thinking on what it looks like to follow the 10 commandments when he summarized the whole law in just two statements.

Matthew 22:37-39: "And he said to him, 'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.’”

The "I" Debate

Summary of the Opposing View: The alternative interpretation suggests that the "I" in Romans 7 primarily describes Paul's struggle under the conviction of the law before his conversion, highlighting the universal human predicament apart from saving grace.

Implications of the Opposing View:

Understanding of Sanctification: This view suggests that the intense struggle is more indicative of immaturity or a failure to fully embrace available grace, rather than the ongoing reality of the believer as simul iustus et peccator (simultaneously righteous and a sinner).

Experience of Believers: Believers experiencing significant inner conflict might be led to doubt their conversion or feel excessive condemnation if Romans 7 is not understood as a normative description of the ongoing struggle for the regenerate.

Role of the Law: The law is often seen primarily as a tool for condemnation and revelation of sin to the unbeliever, with less emphasis on its role in the ongoing life of the believer who is empowered by the Spirit for obedience.

Controversial Verses (7:14-25): The "I" Debate

Present the different theological arguments (pre-conversion, new believer, mature believer).

Clearly articulate the dominant Reformed perspective: this describes the lifelong struggle of the believer with remaining sin (simul iustus et peccator). The "I" is the regenerate self longing for righteousness.

Briefly touch on the significance of key verses like 7:14, 7:18, and 7:24 within this debate.

C. The Believer's Inner Conflict (7:13-25): The War Within

Describe the agonizing reality of indwelling sin in the regenerate heart.

If you’re still feeling confused on the I debate, let’s keep reading and see if the context from the rest of the chapter gives us any more context.

v. 14. Present tense. Paul’s exclamation here is just as bad, if not worse than anything we saw prior, but now, we have Paul crying out in the present tense that he is sold under sin! This get’s to the heart of the human condition.

John Owen, in his extensive writings on indwelling sin, used the analogy of a stubborn and rebellious tenant living within the house of the believer's heart. Even though the rightful owner (the Holy Spirit) has taken possession, the old tenant continues to resist and cause trouble, requiring constant vigilance and effort to subdue.

v. 18. Paul clarifies here that there is no good in his flesh, implying that there is good in him in the form of the Spirit. At the same time, Paul is giving this vivid image of that stubborn and rebellious tenant, who is very much there until the day we are fully sanctified and glorified. The second half of the verse sounds to me like a yearning of the new man, still wrestling the old man to glory. The already and not yet. The weeds that keep popping up in the garden. The simul iustus et peccator. The stubborn and rebellious tenant.

v. 24. I’ve said several times before that as we get closer to the mirror that is the Law, we can see just how dirty(sinful) we are. Another metaphor I came across is The Musician's Ear: A novice musician might be satisfied with playing the correct notes. However, a seasoned musician develops a far more discerning ear, noticing subtle imperfections in tone, timing, and harmony that the beginner would miss entirely. Likewise, as we grow in our faith and our spiritual senses are sharpened by the Spirit, we become more attuned to the nuances of our sin – the selfish motives behind seemingly good deeds, the subtle pride lurking beneath humility, the lingering bitterness we thought we had overcome.

D. Deliverance Through Jesus Christ (7:25)

Thanks be to God! Our eternal destiny is secure. Jesus has conquered death forever.

While we can be assured of our salvation in Christ, our flesh is condemned. It’s not coming with us. Every one of us will die a physical death, in that moment, we will be freed from the old man, and receive a new, perfected resurrection body.

III. Conclusion (Leading to Chapter 8)

I take great comfort in the fact that I can relate to Paul, and I know you can too, in that idea of the already and not yet. We are promised salvation, but we are also promised that trials will come. Persecution will come. Evil will come. Though the fatal blow of Jesus’ sacrifice has already been dealt, in another way, we live in the already and not yet of satan’s influence on our flesh, and his desire to separate us from the Father. In the midst of all of Paul’s vulnerability, he feels he has built up enough tension to ensure the main point of his letter is clearly understood. Romans chapter 8:1: "For there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." Paul recenters on this simple, but unbelievably profound articulation of the Gospel. We are no longer condemned. In other words, our debt has been settled. We are no longer enemies with God, but we have access to Him as Father, we are no longer at war with Him, but we can now hope in Him and His Goodness