GOD’S GOODNESS AND SEVERITY
Romans 11:17-24
INTRO: Taking our commitment lightly
Much of the time, I really hate God’s severity. Hell forever? Ugh. And people hate to associate with people who believe that, so it hurts my outreach. It is beyond my understanding, and so in my pride makes me question God at times. So why do I affirm hell and God’s severity? Because He says that’s how it is! And I trust Him more than my feelings, my experience or my reason alone.
If some of the branches have been broken off, and you, though a wild olive shoot, have been grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing sap from the olive root, 18 do not boast over those branches. If you do, consider this: You do not support the root, but the root supports you. 19 You will say then, “Branches were broken off so that I could be grafted in.” 20 Granted. But they were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith. Do not be arrogant, but be afraid. 21 For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either.
22 Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off. 23 And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. 24 After all, if you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more readily will these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree!
I. The history.
A. The root: God’s plan of salvation announced right from the fall
B. Branches broken off: Israel’s history of denial
C. Branches grafted in: outsiders came to dominate
II.Consider in general the (goodness and) severity of God
A. God’s severity stems from His justice and His love. He does not acquit a guilty friend, nor does he leave a son undisciplined such that he continues in His self-sabotaging sin.
1. Pastor and author Tony Evans says this about God: “Holiness is the centerpiece of God’s attributes. Of all the things God is, at the center of His being, God is holy. Never in the Bible is God called, ‘love, love, love,’ or ‘eternal, eternal, eternal,’ or ‘truth, truth, truth.’ On this aspect of His character, God has laid the most stress.”
2. Our struggle with God’s severity and judgment stems from our inability to see ourselves in our darkness.
3. There was a man who worked with children who lived in sewers - somewhere in South America I think. He used to go into the sewers himself to try and help the children who were living there. Imagine you had been one of those children - virtually blind through living in the darkness underground. Filthy through living in the waste from thousands of homes. Maybe this man offers you a chance to leave. You jump at the opportunity, but has he leads you out, as your eyes become accustomed to the light at the end of the tunnel, you start to see the state that you are in. You start to see the excrement on your clothes and in your hair. And no matter how hard you try to brush it off, the stains will not go away. And of course, the nearer you get to the light coming in from the entrance of the tunnel, the dirtier you appear. Naturally you would shy away from ever coming out of the sewer until you’re fit to be presented to the outside world. The problem of course, is that you cannot be made clean until you come out of the filth of the sewer, and by coming out it’s inevitable that you will be made aware of your own filth.
4. If we are to see God’s holiness, it is certain that we will recoil at our own sinfulness. We will then also better understand God’s sedverity.
B. False Churches are the primary idea here:
1. This can happen again (in reverse), Don’t be arrogant in your position as “church members”
a) We are not in “our” plan of salvation that some Jews participate in, but in God’s plan, that they enjoyed before us, and can still.
b) Jews ignored over and over, were judged, and now we repeat their error! We hold to the teachings that our ears enjoy, and we behave as we want, to then claim cheap grace. Fear, hard to understand under security, is needed. Oh God have mercy and give us holy fear of your severity!! Our insider status is no license to sin or be faithless!
2. Illustrations from Revelation
3. Ch.2, Ephesus church, lost first love, though orthodox and serving. Would be no more if no repentance.
4. Laodicea – spit out, Pergamum – come against w/ sword
5. This same Paul wrote in Rom 8:28-30 that God’s purpose for those loving him begins with his foreknowledge and foreordination and ends with their glorification.
C. False Believers:
1. you also will be cut off.” These solemn words of the apostle remind us of the words of Jesus: “Every branch in me not bearing fruit, he cuts it out” (Jn 15:2a); “If anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away as the branch” (Jn 15:6a)
2.
D. Arrogant Believers
1. God disciplines those He loves, Heb “My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, 6 because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son.” 7 Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father? 8 If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. 9 Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! 10 Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. 11 No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.
III. Consider in general the goodness (and severity) of God
A. Don’t think Israel’s situation is without remedy
B. Goodness to those who persist in faith
1. Hebrews 11:6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
C. Goodness to those that recognize their need in humility.
1. The Bible teaches us that, “God humbles the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God and He will exalt you in the proper time.” (I Pet. 5:5,6)
2. "Longing to leave her poor Brazilian neighborhood, Christina wanted to see the world. Discontent with a home having only a pallet on the floor, a washbasin, and a wood-burning stove, she dreamed of a better life in the city. One morning she slipped away, breaking her mother’s heart. Knowing what life on the streets would be like for her young, attractive daughter, Maria hurriedly packed to go find her. On her way to the bus stop she entered a drugstore to get one last thing. Pictures. She sat in the photograph booth, closed the curtain, and spent all she could on pictures of herself. With her purse full of small black-and-white photos, she boarded the next bus to Rio de Janiero.
"Maria knew Christina had no way of earning money. She also knew that her daughter was too stubborn to give up. When pride meets hunger, a human will do things that were before unthinkable. Knowing this, Maria began her search. Bars, hotels, nightclubs, any place with the reputation for street walkers or prostitutes. She went to them all. And at each place she left her picture - taped on a bathroom mirror, tacked to a hotel bulletin board, fastened to a corner phone booth. And on the back of each photo she wrote a note.
"It wasn’t too long before both the money and the pictures ran out, and Maria had to go home. The weary mother wept as the bus began its long journey back to her small village. It was a few weeks later that young Christina descended the hotel stairs. Her young face was tired. Her brown eyes no longer danced with youth, but spoke of pain and fear. Her laughter was broken. Her dream had become a nightmare. A thousand times over she had longed to trade these countless beds for her secure pallet. Yet the little village was, in many ways, too far away. As she reached the bottom of the stairs, her eyes noticed a familiar face. She looked again, and there on the lobby mirror was a small picture of her mother. Christina’s eyes burned and her throat tightened as she walked across the room and removed the small photo. Written on the back was this compelling invitation. ’Whatever you have done, whatever you have become, it doesn’t matter. Please come home.’ She did."
IV. Invitation:
A. do you want God’s mercy and not his severity? Humble yourselves and seek him, for the first time, or with the recovery of your first love.
