0903Romans 050111

Maybe I hang out with a rough crowd, but everyone that I know well enough to know the details of their life has, at some point, found themselves in a mess. For some, that part of their life is ancient history; for others, it is on-going struggle—they seem to move from one mess to the other. Still others—probably most of us—fall somewhere in between.

Again, maybe I hang out with a rough crowd (mostly church people, by the way), but I've also learned that the vast majority of our messes are of our own doing.

A friend admitted to me recently, "I have sabotaged every significant relationship I have even been in. I'm alone today and it's my fault."

A high school buddy of mine called me not too long ago and said, "My son is in jail. His drug problem began about the time my wife and I got a divorce—because of my affairs."

A pastor I know said, "I hid my alcoholism from my congregation, and even from my wife, for years before it caught up with me."

Of course, we can create more respectable messes than these. By this I mean messes that don't have the same stigma as drugs, alcohol, and extra-marital affairs. We can create a mess of our marriage by subjecting our spouse to years of stern disapproval. We can create a mess of our health by overeating and neglecting physical activity. We can create a mess of our careers through financial mismanagement or lack of leadership skills. And if we're really good at it, we can make ourselves look like victims in the process: "Poor guy, his wife just up and left him for no reason; poor guy, he had a heart attack out of the blue; poor guy, the economy turned and he went bankrupt."

The fact is, when life becomes messy it's nearly always our own fault. How's that for good news? Am I cheering you up yet? It gets better, I promise.

We all have something in common. We're all sinners.

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:23)

And sin, by its very nature, messes things up. That's all sin can do, because

The wages of sin is death. (Romans 6:23)

Nothing good can ever come of sin, because sin is incapable of producing good. It wreaks havoc. When we mess with it, it makes a mess of us. Therefore, in order for our lives to work, we need to experience God's amazing grace; we need to become brand new people in him.

There is a sense in which this happens at salvation:

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old is gone, the new has come! (2 Corinthians 5:17)

But this is just step one. God's work of grace in our lives doesn't end at salvation, it begins at salvation. And as we walk with him, his grace transforms us—changes us into brand new people.

When you find yourself in a mess, you need God's grace. The good news is: even if it's a mess created by your own sin, God's grace is available. In Romans 5, Paul wrote...

Where sin increased, grace increased all the more. (Romans 5:20)

That means as much grace—or as much help—as you need to get out of the mess you've created, God will give. As much mercy as you need to experience full and complete forgiveness, God will give. As much of his power that you need to turn your life around, he will give. As much peace as you need to overcome your fears, he will give. As much acceptance as you need to be free from guilt, he will give. You cannot out-sin God's grace in your life. You cannot make such a mess of things that he is no longer able to help you out. That's how powerful his grace is.

Now, every time I teach this truth, inevitably someone will say to me, "Are you implying that I can go out and sin all I want—live it up and party down and have a great time, and then ask God for forgiveness and he'll forgive me?"

This question has a serious flaw, because it reveals that the person who asks it doesn't have a clue about what sin really does to you, or what experiencing God's grace does to you.

Here's a personal example. Last week, in a rush I picked up a computer monitor and felt a surge of pain go through my shoulder. I ignored it and went about my usual business through out the day. The next day at 3:00 a.m. I woke up and literally couldn't move. The pain was unbearable—not only in my shoulder, but in my right arm, and my fingers were numb. After a couple of days of this, I went to the doctor. He prescribed some medication, some physical therapy, and told me to stay in bed for a week. As it turns out, this injury isn't fatal; it won't kill me. In fact, through the miracle of medical treatment, I can expect a full and complete recovery.

So then, what's to stop me from going out in a few weeks and doing it all over again? After all, the doctor can cure me. What's to stop from picking up two, three, or four monitors at a time—and tossing them in the air and catching them? I'll tell you what's stopping me: I know how bad a shoulder injury hurts, and I don't want to go through that again. In fact, if I could afford it, I would hire someone to pick up everything for me from now on—my ink pen, my knife and fork, the TV remote, and on and on.

If you make a mess of your life with sin, God will forgive you, but why in the world would you intentionally want to create that kind of pain for yourself? Anyone who views God's grace as a free ticket to go out and "have fun" with sin is in for a rude awakening. The wages of sin is death and it always, and I mean ALWAYS, leads to misery. And anyone who has made a mess of their lives with sin already knows this.

So, today, as we look again at Romans 5, I want to show you three things you can do to get out of the mess.

1. Accept God's grace.

Forgiveness is a free gift. You don't earn it or deserve it. And his forgiveness is total and complete. Your wife may not be ready to forgive you—neither may your boss, your children, your parents, your friends, or your enemies—but God has forgiven you completely. Look at what Paul wrote:

(v. 6) You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.

The ungodly: you and I fall into the category. We're the ones he died for. And then Paul said,

(v. 8) God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

God forgives us in spite of the fact that we don't deserve it. In fact, even before we had considered asking for forgiveness, before we felt even a hint of remorse, he had already died for our sins.

Notice what it says in verse one:

(v. 1) Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Justified—it means forgiven, declared not guilty, just as if I'd never sinned. We receive this justification through faith, through accepting it as a free gift. Remember the verse in Ephesians:

For it is by grace you have been saved through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9)

Recently a pastor told me, "Accepting God's forgiveness at salvation was easy for me, but when I have sinned in my Christian life, accepting God's forgiveness has been more difficult—because I'm constantly reminded of how little I deserve it."

I can relate to what he is saying, because I have felt that way too. But this attitude reveals a lack of understanding of the scope of God's forgiveness. We tend to think that God can forgive small sins, but not big ones. Or old sins, but not new ones. But I want you to understand that when Jesus Christ died on the cross, he died for ALL sins—the ugly ones, the wicked ones, the stupid ones—ALL sins.

Paul goes on to say,

(v. 9) Since we have been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him!

The fear of God's wrath is a thing of the past for Christians—we have been saved from it. We don't have to live in dread of what God is going to do to "get even" with us, because the punishment that our sins deserved was paid for by Jesus Christ. It's not fair, is it, that he should have to die for our sins and we should get off scot-free. It's not fair at all. It's not fair at all. It's not what we deserve. But it's what we've been given. Accept it. Every day. Just like you accepted it on the day of your salvation, accept God's forgiveness in your life. Even more than accepting his grace...

2. Celebrate God's grace.

Paul uses the word "rejoice" three times in this passage. Let's look at two of them right now.

(v. 2) And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.

(v. 11) ...we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ in whom we have now received reconciliation.

Grace is a cause for rejoicing; it's a cause for celebration.

When I was in college, one of my friends scheduled an impromptu, last-minute celebration. He invited several friends over and we ordered pizza, wore silly hats, played some games, and sang songs. He labeled the event a "Pardon Party." He told us, "I've been forgiven, and I want to celebrate it." We pressed him for details about which sin he had been forgiven for, but he wouldn't divulge the specifics. But he had the right idea about understanding God's grace: It's a cause to rejoice.

If you've made a mess of your life through sin, God will forgive you. Accept it, and celebrate it. Even before the outward circumstances of your life improve, celebrate the inward miracle of God's forgiveness.

Just because you ruined yesterday doesn't mean that you have to miserable tomorrow. It's not that we minimize our sin, or that we fail to recognize the damage it has done. It's that we see God's grace for what it is—pardon, absolute and complete forgiveness.

In a Psalm of celebration, David wrote...

Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits— who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you love and compassion... he does not treat us as our sins deserve, or repay us according to our iniquities... Praise the Lord, O my soul. (Psalm 103)

When you've made your life a mess, accept God's grace, celebrate God's grace, and thirdly...

3. Use God's grace.

What do I mean by "use God's grace"? I mean, use it to build your life upon and use it to turn your life around. Look at verse 1:

(v. 1) ...we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand.

We stand by his grace. His grace is our strength for daily living. When our lives are filled with sorrow and pain—either through our own mistakes or circumstances beyond our control—God's grace has the power to get us through. In fact, God's grace has the power to use our sorrow and pain for his glory and for our good. Listen to what Paul said...

(v. 3) ...we rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance produces character; and character, hope.

Your sufferings—whatever their cause may be—can be used to strengthen you. Paul said they give you three things: perseverance, character, and hope.

Perseverance teaches you, "I can overcome anything—even my own sinful mistakes—through the power of God's grace in my life.

Character teaches you, "And through his grace, I can become the kind of person who doesn't make such foolish mistakes."

Hope teaches you, "Because, through his grace, he's making me into a new person; he's making me like Christ."

Use God's grace in your life. Let it be your source of strength—the foundation you stand upon.

You all know who Chuck Colson is. Today he is the head of Prison Fellowship, a best-selling author, and one of the most influential Christians in the world. Thirty years ago, however, he had made a mess of his life through his involvement with Nixon and the Watergate scandal—a mess that included his going to prison. God used that mess not only to turn his life around, but to give him a platform for ministry that continues to this day.

Use God's grace in your life. He can take the mistakes you have made and turn them into something useful.

CONCLUSION

Many years ago, the great violinist Niccolo Paganini was performing before a packed house one evening, surrounded by a full orchestra. As he began the final piece one of the strings on his violin snapped. In his genius, Paganini was able to continue playing the piece on the remaining three strings. A moment later, a second string snapped. Still, Paganini continued—playing the concerto on the remaining two strings. And then, a third string snapped, but still Paganini continued to play. He finished the piece, note for note, with one string on his violin. When the performance was over, the crowd rose in thunderous applause. Paganini, being the humble musician that he was, raised his violin in the air and proclaimed to the audience, "Paganini, and one string!" He cued the conductor, the orchestra began playing, and he performed his encore, note for note, with one string on his violin.

If you've made a mess of your life with sin, you may be tempted to say, "I have lost so much. I have so little left. I've wasted everything." But the fact is, even if you're down to one string, God can still make music with your life. That's why Paul said,

(v. 5) And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the holy Spirit whom he has given us.

If your life is a mess—if you're down to one string—God's grace is the answer. Accept it. Celebrate it. Use it. Build your life on God's grace, and God's grace will turn your life around.

(c) Steve May