Trusting Jesus - Rom 3:20-26

Intro

So we’ve been doing some different messages recently but we’re going to get back into our series on Romans. I want to give a recap of the message of Romans so far, and as a summary we will be looking at Romans 3:20-26, so you can turn there now. If you have trouble finding it, just open up to the table of contents to find the page number.

While you’re turning there, I want to just remind you guys that we want to be respectful and attentive. This is God’s Word we’re learning about. Please be respectful when there’s a leader speaking, and if you have questions don’t worry, we’ll have a time after the message for small groups and discussion after.

I want to start by telling a quick story.

When I was about 9 years old, my family went to Knott’s Berry Farm for my birthday. I had never been before, and it was a lot of fun. My parents bought me a rubber band gun, we had some frozen lemonade, I saw Snoopy. It was a pretty great time. But one thing about me as a kid, is that I was terrified of roller coasters. I actually have a fear of heights. Anyone else? So while I was at Knott’s we didn’t go on any of the intense roller coasters until my dad told me I should ride the Jaguar with him. Now, the Jaguar is not the most intense roller coaster ever. But, to 9 year old me, I looked up and could hear people screaming like crazy over my head as they rode the coaster. And I thought to myself, “Well they don’t even seem to enjoy it, and I know I’m scared of heights, so why should I go on the roller coaster?” And I argued with my dad about not getting on. Well, my mom got involved, and she said, “If you don’t ride this roller coaster, then you can’t open the lego set I got you for your birthday.” And I got really upset. I’m pretty sure I cried. But I wanted to open this lego set so bad that I went on the Jaguar. I was so terrified. But, as the ride sped up, I actually loved it. I kinda forgot that I had a fear of heights. And at the end of it, I wanted to ride the Jaguar again.

This story is really a story about trust. I was so afraid that I didn’t want to trust my own parents! But I should have; they knew I would actually enjoy the roller coaster. I should have trusted them. Our passage, Romans 3:20-26, talks about the importance of trust, and the importance of what we place our trust in. We’ll start in verse 20.

Section 1:

Romans 3:20 For no one will be justified in his sight by the works of the law, because the knowledge of sin comes through the law

This passage says that no work of the law (or good action) will justify a person before God. To be justified is to be made right with someone else. So the first part of this passage is telling us that we can’t undo our sins by doing good works.

And to be honest, I’m guilty of this. One time in high school, I pranked a friend of mine by setting out a plastic chair that had a broken leg and having him sit in it. He fell over and his food went all over himself. In the moment I thought it would be a funny little prank, but I ended up hurting his feelings because I did that publically in a school cafeteria. You might think a prank like that is funny, but not if you’re the one on the ground, covered in food, with everyone staring at you. Now I tried to make up for it by paying for his next meal, but I realized that even if I did something to make up for the bad thing I’d done, it didn’t automatically fix our relationship. It didn’t erase the bad thing I’d done to hurt him and his feelings. And he still felt hurt at the end of the day. Just because I did something good didn’t undo the bad.

Now we’re gonna think about this in our relationship to God.

Can you think of some words that describe what God is like, for example, God is holy? (perfect, loving, kind, powerful, etc)

All these things are true: God is wonderful! And yet we still do things that are against His Word, things that hurt ourselves and others. The sins that we commit against God are so much more serious than just a mean prank. If you get in a fight with your sibling, your parents put you in timeout. But if you get in a fight with the president, you’re going to jail for the rest of your life. Now think of how much more authority and power God has. When we rebel against what Him, the consequences are serious. Eternal separation from Him in hell.

We can’t undo that consequence by doing good things like reading our Bible, being baptized, or going to church. Those things won’t save you. Those things are all good and great, but none of them were supposed to remove your sin and make you right with God.

Some of you, especially if you grew up in the church, may have already known that. But have you ever felt like you couldn’t pray to God because of how you felt after sinning? Have you ever thought, “Man, if I were God, I don’t think I’d like me.” I know I have felt like that several times. And the temptation can be to try and clean myself up before I go to God. We can try to get rid of those guilty feelings by doing things, but Romans is clear that we are not made right with God by being good enough.

The last section of this verse says that knowledge of sin comes through the law. Basically, God’s Word reveals to us how holy God is, and that we are sinners. You don’t have to answer out loud, but have you ever stolen something? Have you ever lied? Have you ever disrespected your parents? Did Jesus ever steal something? Did Jesus ever lie? Did Jesus ever disrespect His parents? Those are just three of the Ten Commandments, and I’m willing to bet that you’ve probably broken at least one of those rules. I’ve broken all three. God’s Word makes us realize how holy God is, but it also makes us realize we’ve messed up and need help badly.

That sin harms our relationships with others. The prank I pulled on my friend harmed our relationship. I’ve shared this with you guys before, but when I was in middle school, my parents had a lot of fights. They would yell at each other and either wake me up or keep me awake past midnight. It was a really difficult time for me. Both my dad and my mom could have handled that a lot better, but their fighting specifically affected my relationship with my dad. We’re not as close as I’d like us to be, but part of that is because I was hurt by some of the things he said when he was yelling at my mom. That’s an example of how sin doesn’t just affect the person you’re sinning directly against, it impacts other people too.

But most importantly, sin separates us from God. When we sin, we are rejecting God. We basically are saying “God, I know that you want me to tell the truth, but I don’t really care what you want: I’m gonna lie anyway”. God cannot stand sin because He is completely perfect, and the Bible is clear: God will judge sinners. That means that God would judge every single one of us the same way that I walked through the Ten Commandments, and if you’re guilty of breaking one of them, then you’re guilty as if you broke all of them. Do you think you would be guilty or innocent if God judged you? I know that God would find me guilty! So does that mean we are without hope? Let’s keep reading.

Section 2:

Romans 3:21–23

But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been revealed, attested by the Law and the Prophets. The righteousness of God is through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe, since there is no distinction. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God;

This passage says here that there is a righteousness of God that is found apart from the Law or God’s Word. He’s talking about Jesus. That means that instead us needing to perfectly measure up to this set of commandments, God sent Jesus to live a life that perfectly followed these commandments for us.

See, before we talk about how important it is that Jesus died for us, we have to recognize how important it is that Jesus lived for us too. He didn’t just show up, die, and leave. He was born, grew up the same way you and I did, and went through so many of the same experiences. He was happy, made friends, hung out with his family. But there were times where he was sad, scraped his knee, was made fun of by others. He lived a regular life.

Just for a minute, think of your last couple weeks. Maybe for you, you think of the really cool things that have happened. Maybe you had a nice break from school. Maybe you traveled for the holidays and got to see friends or family. Maybe you got a really cool gift for Christmas that you’re really stoked about. I’ve had holiday seasons like that, where everything feels like its going right.

For some of you, the holiday season was difficult. Maybe plans fell apart. Maybe family is sick right now, or maybe they’re not getting along and fighting. I remember a couple of years ago, my grandparents came to visit for a week during Christmas break. Right after they got here, my grandad wasn’t feeling too well so he took a Covid test and found out he had Covid. So my grandparents had to drive all the way back to Mexico on Christmas Eve. That sucks. Maybe that’s where you are, dealing with loss or sadness.

Wherever you are on that spectrum between happiness and sadness, Jesus was there too. He was just as human as you or me, and He relates to your suffering today. The difference between Jesus and us is that it doesn’t matter if things go right or things go wrong, we still sin. Jesus never did. Jesus’ life was consistent and perfect. Even though both good things and bad things happened to Him, unlike us He never sinned.

All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Most people today probably don’t believe this. Most people believe that they are naturally good. They believe that they may make some mistakes, but generally they’re a pretty good person. So if you were to ask somebody who’s not a Christian what God would think about them, they’d probably say something like “Well God is probably pretty chill with me.”

But remember earlier what I said about the Ten Commandments. I went through only three, and I failed every one! They point out to us that we’re actually not as great as we think. A couple weeks ago, I told a story of how my mom used a mirror to point out the gum that was tangled in my hair. The Ten Commandments and God’s Word in general is like that mirror, that shows us what’s wrong with us even if we don’t realize it. And the punishment for our sin is death.

So what’s the answer?

Section 3:

Romans 3:24-26

they are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. God presented him as the mercy seat (or sacrifice), by his blood, through faith, to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his restraint God passed over the sins previously committed. God presented him to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so that he would be just and justify the one who has faith in Jesus.

The last section tells us that everyone’s fallen short, but this section tells us that despite that, we have redemption through Jesus Christ’s death. Jesus took our place and died for us when we should have been the ones who died for our sins. Think of that for just a minute. Jesus, who we said is a real person just like you and me, died for you. That’s what we remember when we take communion. We remember that Jesus offered up his body and his blood in our place and died so that we could live.

You may be thinking to yourself, “Why did Jesus have to die? Why couldn’t God just forgive everyone without sending His Son?” That’s a great question.

At my school, I had to write big papers. I would write fifteen page papers, sometimes several of them, in a semester. I would spend weeks researching and writing, and it took a long time and a lot of work. Maybe you also have papers or exams that take a lot of time and work. How would you feel if you saw someone cheating on a paper or test, and the teacher just ignored it because he wanted to be nice? Is that fair? Of course not!

In the same way, God can’t just ignore our sin even if He is kind or nice to us. Sin is still sin and has consequences. Romans tells us that the wages of sin is death. That means that whoever sins, will have to die. But, like we saw, God sent Jesus to step in and take the consequence on Himself. That way, God was both fair because there was consequences for sin, and He was gracious by having Jesus take those consequences for us.

Now, our first verse, verse 20, told us that no one can be justified by good actions. Look at verse 26. God sent Jesus to not only show He was just, but also to justify whoever has faith in Jesus. “Justify” means to make right. So instead of looking to our actions to make us right with God, we have to trust in Jesus to make us right with God. Instead of depending on ourselves, we depend on Jesus! If you’ve never heard about trusting in Jesus before, or want to talk more about what that looks like, talk to me or Megan. We’d love to chat more about that with you.

Conclusion:

We are made right with God by trusting in Jesus. We’re going to pray real quick thanking the Lord for providing a way of salvation, and then we’re gonna talk about that in our small groups.

Focus on knowing Jesus, salvation, and the Gospel

Focus on knowing why Jesus had to die, why their sin was a big deal

Put some thought in to how to maximize the 45 minutes - no more H/Ls, maybe have an activity that relates to the teaching

Teach 20 mins, then have questions (either big group if not a lot of people, or two groups with helper, then maybe review questions at the end with candy, does not have to be same gender, stay in the same room)

Give your helper some assistance in what they should ask the kids

Be more mindful about our traditions and customs in the group, talk about it next leader meeting

Check pastors perspective from yesterday