Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

All humans are broken, lost, sinful, bent away from God and in on themselves

: All humans are broken, lost, bent away from God and in toward themselves, and from this reality has sprung all of the brokenness in our world.

But God is making everything right through the gospel - the good news that Jesus has given himself as a substitute for us in en raised from the dead proving his Lordship over even death itself

All brokenness and evil in the world stems from this reality, and humans stand in desperate need of forgiveness of their sin and reconciliation with God

God has achieved this by Jesus offering himself as a substitutionary sacrifice on our behalf to pay the penalty for our sin and raising him from the dead

We receive this grace through faith in Jesus

God raised him from the dead

Key term - justification - made righteous before God, declared to be “not guilty”

I. Results of justification by faith

A. We have peace with God

Romans 5:1

Justification

We are not only forgiven of our sin, but we are declared to be “not guilty”

The clearing of all charges against us leads to real, tangible results

Peace

We have all inherited what the Bible calls a sin nature; we are bent away from God, in toward ourselves.

Because of this, the Bible describes us as enemies of God (as we will see in ) - scholar Leon Morris says it this way:

An enemy is not a person who comes a little bit short of being a friend; it means someone in the opposite camp.

Application: We do not need to be anxious or fearful about our status in God’s eyes

Does God like me?

Is God angry at me?

How can I be sure that I have peace with God?

At the right time = the right time in human history, and the right time when we were powerless to save ourselves from our sin

Contrast: human love vs. God’s love

It isn’t easy to find someone willing to die even for a good person

Jesus died for sinners who hated him

Argument from greater to lesser

We have been justified by his blood, so we will be saved (preserved, kept) from the wrath of God

We were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, so now that we are reconciled, we will be saved by his life

B. We have access to God

peace is joy resting; joy is peace dancing

Access

Technical meaning of this word is “introduction”

It refers to the introduction to the ruling chamber of a king - you cannot come into this kind of place without an introduction

But “introduction” also implies a one time occurence, whereas Paul is trying to say that we have ongoing, continual access into the presence of God

Continued access to the chambers of a royal person

This grace in which we now stand

This is an uncommon way to use the word “grace” in the NT

It is Paul’s way of saying we have been brought into a place of favor with God, and so have free access to God himself

Application: It’s easy for us to gloss over this, but this should honestly floor us

God pays attention to your prayers

But God doesn’t answer my prayers how I want him to?

Prayer is relational before it is transactional

We should be amazed that God hears and pays attention to our prayers

Even if he doesn’t answer them how we want him to

Illustration: Parents don’t always answer their kids’ requests according to what is wanted

II.

Because we have peace with God, we rejoice

Because we have peace with God and free access into his presence, Paul says that our response is that we can rejoice.

In Paul’s mind, peace and joy are two sides of the same coin in terms of blessings of the gospel.

He gives three things we can rejoice in.

Peace and joy are twin blessings of the gospel: as an old preacher put it, ‘peace is joy resting; joy is peace dancing.’

A. We rejoice in the hope of the glory of God

Romans 5:

Hope

Hope often means for us a sort of vague wishful thinking about what may happen

I hope the Blazers win the NBA Finals in 2020

For Paul, hope was about living in light of something that has been guaranteed but not yet revealed

We are being conformed to the the image of Jesus - he is actually growing and maturing our faith so that we become better people, so that ultimately we will perfect reflect the glory of God

We great hope for our future

Jesus is coming back to judge all things, restore all of creation, and grant his people eternal life with him

Glory of God

God himself and all of his character and purposes

Fulfillment of our purpose to reflect the goodness of God himself into the world he has made

We were made in the image of God to participate in and reflect his glory

Paul said in

But our hope is that we are moving toward fulfilling God’s original plan for human beings to share in and reflect his glory into the rest of creation

Our lives are headed somewhere - to a greater maturity in our faith, to looking more and more like Jesus until one day we fully reflect the glory of God

B. We rejoice in our suffering

Romans 5:

Rejoice = boast

Strange word to use with connection to suffering

Suffering

We rejoice in our suffering because it has purpose

This word is a strong term - not referring to minor inconveniences, but to real hardships

Sometimes it’s not popular to say God has a purpose in our suffering because people make insensitive, overly specific, and presumptuous statements about the purpose God has in specific human suffering

Hurricane Katrina - God’s judgment on New Orleans

We should not speak for God - we are not the prophets of the Bible who had a direct word from God to give

But the alternative is to say there is no purpose in suffering, which is to say our suffering is meaningless

Endurance

“Persistence”

It is used of the soldier who, in the thick of a hard battle, gives as much as he gets; he is not dismayed by the blows he receives, but fights on to the end.

Character

Difficult to translate to English

It refers to the quality of being approved on the basis of a trial

“Tested-ness”

Illustration: “It’s character building”

Hope

It does not put us to shame - our hope does not disappoint us

Because God has poured his love into us through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us

Paul, in Ephesians, says that the Holy Spirit is given as a “seal” or guarantee of what is to come - God’s love being poured into us through the Holy Spirit means we have been given a taste of the new creation and resurrection life that Jesus is bringing, and it is the guarantee of our future

We rejoice in our suffering because in it we see the purposes of God to bring us to a place of greater character, maturity, faith, and hope for our future.

C. We rejoice in God himself

Ultimately, our greatest hope and joy is in God himself

We do not want to celebrate what God does over who he is

God himself is the source of our peace, strength, comfort, hope, and joy

Illustration: What if I only enjoyed what Kelsey did for me instead of enjoying her?

Application

We also don’t want to make the mistake of doing things for God and never spending time with God