Romans 2
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Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things. We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.
Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things. We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed. He will render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek.
He will render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek.
Romans 2:
INTRO:
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To the honest person. To the person who’s life is ruled with humility and understanding. To the person who is able to look at themselves, and see where they fall short. To the person who has become so acquainted with their own inner struggles that they have no option, but to lean on Jesus every single day…
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To this honest, humble, struggling person… Chapter one said it all.
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God’s wrath is revealed in the consequences of humanity being given the reins to live as they wish.
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Humanity rejected the plan of their creator… humanity rejected the design of their designer… Humanity rejected the purpose which was wired into them…
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So… as verse 24 of chapter 1 told us… God gave them up. God handed over the reigns and let humans do what they desired to do..
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And then, in so many words… God told them… - “There will be consequences.”
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We have all lived the consequences. WE continue to struggle with the consequences. We see the consequences being played out in our world every day…
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We learned two weeks ago… that it is the Gospel that reveals righteousness to the faithful. Believer… you are righteous in the eyes of God… and by faith, you are called to walk in that righteousness..
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But last week, we learned about the other thing that the Gospel revealed…
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It reveals the wrath of God… more specifically… it reveals the anger and the displeasure of God…
-God’s wrath led Him to give humans up to their rebellion.
-When humans began to live according to their own design, something broke in them.
-As a result, many of us have grown hopeless and weary of our struggles..
-And as a result, we have turned to Jesus.
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You see… the Gospel doesn’t reveal anything in vain. There is a purpose. It reveals righteousness to the believer, as and encouragement and a challenge to live lives that glorify God..
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It reveals wrath to the unbeliever… So that they would see their desperate need for a Savior… and turn to Him to find forgiveness… and righteousness.
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FOR MANY PEOPLE… CHAPTER ONE WAS SUFFICIENT… We get the point. There is none righteous, no not one… and we are amongst those who desperately need Jesus.
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But… many will read chapter one, and they won’t see any personal application.
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Many will read chapter one and only see the wickedness of the unbelieving world - They will stand back from a disposition of self righteousness and make judgement.
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They will say… “We are good. We are obedient. We are right… but those people out there, they are wicked and deserving of condemnation, death, and hell-fire.”
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To this crowd… to the religious person whose identity is defined in their adherence to rules, laws, rituals, and attendance…
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To those who think they are good and right…
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PAUL WROTE, CHAPTER TWO.
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This entire letter to the believers in Rome is about the Gospel… what it means, how it applies, it’s significance, how it transforms… and so on..
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But the Gospel… the good news… will not find a home in the life of any person, who thinks that they are already good.
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It is not “A Good News”… it is “THE GOOD NEWS”… And if you already think that you are a good person and that God is happy with you and all your goodness… then - you won’t realize how truly, and desperately, you NEED THE GOOD NEWS OF JESUS IN YOUR LIFE.
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So that’s why Paul begins this letter with a few chapters which clearly, and unequivocally declare every person’s need for Jesus..
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-This is why the life insurance salesman gives you the worst case scenario which might play out for your family when you die.
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-This is why the vacuum salesman dumps a sloppy mess on your carpet before he demonstrates the amazing power of his device.
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You won’t think you need anything, until you truly understand… that you have a NEED.
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maybe.. JUST MAYBE… there are high minded religious people in Rome who won’t think that chapter one applies to them.
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So Paul wrote:
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Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things. We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.
Romans 2:1-
There is a transition happening here… As people read about those who are broken sexually, or violet, or evil, or full of murder, or slanderers, or inventors of evil…
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…they might think… I’M NOT LIKE THAT. I DON’T DO THAT STUFF. THIS IS NOT ABOUT ME.
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But Paul, in a very subtle way, has a way of implicating the pious priest along side of the violent prisoner.
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Walk into any church… into any religious setting… you will find those who have a way of stirring up strife… you will find deceit… YOU WILL FIND GOSSIPS. There will be foolishness.. some will disobey parents.
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And, certainly, you will find some who give approval to others who do these things.
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that’s why chapter 2 begins with:
THEREFORE...
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As the gossip looks on with judgement towards the homosexual… or as the haughty person looks on with judgement towards the haters of God… Paul tells them… YOU WHO JUDGE… YOU HAVE NO EXCUSE....
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Sure, you are a good religious person… YOU ARE IN CHURCH EVERY WEEK.. You dress up nice, you are clean cut. You know all the words to your favorite hymns. You say all the right stuff. You’ve memorized Philippians… -
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But, you also think that God is so pleased with your performance… that He overlooks their sin.
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This was the kind of issue that Jesus was repeatedly addressing to the Pharisees.... In it says:
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He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt:
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you know the story...
Two men went to the temple to pray.. one a pharisee, and the other a tax collector.
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The tax collector hung his head low, beat his breast and cried out for mercy, declaring that he was a sinner..
++But the pharisee, -he prayed like this:
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The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’
Luke 18:
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The tax collector, no doubt, was not as religiously devout as the Pharisee..
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But here’s what Jesus said of him:
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I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Luke 18:
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Why did the religious man fall short of the awful horrible tax collector?
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Everyone who is arrogant in heart is an abomination to the Lord; be assured, he will not go unpunished.
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But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”
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..Look back at today’s passage… chapter 2 verse 3… - Paul is talking to people who think, because of their good deeds… that God will overlook their bad deeds..
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In verse 4 he talks about the kindness of God, and how these readers have been misinterpreting it. They thought, because they paid their religious dues… that they could get away with their sins… because God was kind… because God was patient.
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So far, so good… -In church on Sunday, singing the songs, saying the right things, doing all that they could do to look like a good, pious, spiritual person…
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But on Monday… treating their employees unfairly, being mean their spouse, provoking their children, cheating the customers, lying their way into a better profit, being rude to waitress, cussing people out in traffic, watching porn on the computer, and kicking the dog....
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God is kind… God is patient… I’m doing the Sunday stuff really good. I have the bumper sticker. There’s a fish on the business card that I’m giving to the clients that I’m lying to.
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So many “church people”… -presuming on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience…
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BUT THEY HAVE IT WRONG… God’s kindness is not something that gives you permission to live in hypocrisy…
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Look at vs. 4 again… what is the purpose of God’s kindness?
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God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance.
God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance.
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This is what God wants for these hypocritical religiously arrogant people… But instead… they are banking on just the opposite.
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Vs. 5 says they are storing up wrath… -Normally, this verb “storing” refers to “good works” being safeguarded in heavenly storehouses… - treasures in heaven… things like that..
Everyone who is arrogant in heart is an abomination to the Lord; be assured, he will not go unpunished.
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But in it says:
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but these men lie in wait for their own blood; they set an ambush for their own lives.
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this term “set an ambush”… can also be translated: “those who deal in murder, store up evils for themselves”.
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Basically… -it’s not going to be forgotten.
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For the forgiven believer who has been gifted with righteousness.. our sins are separated from us… as far as the east is from the west..
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But to the prideful one… who never comes to the Lord in humble repentance… God is keeping tabs.
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We see in verse 5, another manifestation of God’s wrath… there is the present reality seen in verses 18-32, where, because of humanity’s sin, we experience the displeasure and anger of God through natural consequence...
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But there is more than the stuff we’ve brought on ourselves..
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God is going to act on all of His offense… the day is coming..
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Until then, we find comfort in the fact… that he’s waiting… He is not in a hurry to declare wrath and judgement upon people..
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SLIDE 13
The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.
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There will come a day when the timeline of God’s patience on this topic will come to an end.. On that day, this is the promise that He will fulfill.
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He will render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek. For God shows no partiality.
Romans 2:6-
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Notice the context of the audience. It’s mentioned twice here… and that’s significant.
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The religious Jews declared themselves righteous because they had the temple, they had the sacrifice, they had the holidays, and they had the law…
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They also declared that the Gentiles were barely worthy of stoking the fires of hell.
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So… when Paul grouped them together… with the same kind of merit and the same kind of punishment… when Paul said that God shows no partiality… they must have been shocked.
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Paul is obviously directing this section at the religious Jews… that become more clear as we read on in verse 12.
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For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified.
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Verses 14-16 go on to say that even the Gentiles, who don’t have the written law, sometimes do what is written in the law by nature… -They discover good and right ways of doing things, and they do them.
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Now, a lot of crazy ideas of have come out of verses 12-16… - Doctrines of annihilation for those who have never heard the Bible have been built on these passages. -Doctrines of salvation apart from the Gospel have been built on these passage.
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All of those doctrines, are built out of context to this passage… and out of context of the scriptures as a whole.
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The message here is simple. It doesn’t matter if you are a Jew or a Gentile… it doesn’t matter if you know all the right things… -What matters, is that you do the right things…
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James expounds on this:
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But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.
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Paul was talking to hearers only… Paul was talking to the Pharisees that Jesus spoke of in … who were diligent to tithe from their herb garden, but ignored the weightier matters of the law.. justice and mercy and faithfulness.
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Jesus called them blind guides… who would induce vomiting to expel a bug that flew down their throat because it was considered unclean… but in comparison, had no regard for the camels that they were swallowing.
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But if you call yourself a Jew and rely on the law and boast in God and know his will and approve what is excellent, because you are instructed from the law; and if you are sure that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of children, having in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth—
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you then who teach others, do you not teach yourself? While you preach against stealing, do you steal? You who say that one must not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who boast in the law dishonor God by breaking the law.
Romans 2:21-
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Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves,
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For, as it is written, “The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.”
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Paul preached to the hypocrisy of the religious person… Paul preached to those who lived by a double standard… and it’s a timeless message.
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Isn’t it incredible, that this rebuke continues to be applicable, even now… nearly 2000 years later…
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The double standard of religious hypocrisy has existed all throughout church history and continues to be alive and well today.
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*People want their religious experience… but they also want to live as they please.
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*People want to claim some sense of security if their idea of God… but they also want to embrace every social and political whim of popular society.
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NOW, TAKE HEART… PAUL ISN’T SPEAKING TO THE TAX COLLECTOR FROM JESUS’ PARABLE.. We struggle, we might fall, we might be severely rough around the edges, we might deep thorns in our flesh the drag us down often…
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This isn’t about the Christian who struggles to obey… this is about the religious person, be they a Christian or not… who simply won’t obey, because they are weighing their religious devotion, against their unrepentant compromise.
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In vss 25-28… he tells the religious Jew, that they can’t depend upon their circumcision if they are going to break the law..
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To put that in terms that the modern church might understand..
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YOu can’t bank on your baptism, if you are not living a life of obedience to the glory of God.
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It doesn’t matter if you were confirmed if you have never repented and given your life, by faith, to Jesus Christ.
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It doesn’t matter if you grew up in church… if you dad’s a pastor… if you own a Bible… if you attend every Easter… or even if you attend every single week.
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Your religious activity means nothing, if you have never given your life, by means of repentance and faith… to Jesus Christ.
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This very lesson to the Romans continues all the way up to verse 20 of chapter 3… and it builds a beautiful case for what is to follow.
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SLIDE 20
It is not by our deeds, that we are justified.. - it is only by faith.
It is not by our deeds, that we are justified.. - it is only by faith.
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We’ll continue with this lesson next week, and close here today… Pray.
