Marked on the Heart
Prayer: Look on me with a heart of mercy, O God, according to Your generous love. According to Your great compassion, wipe out every consequence of my shameful crimes. Create in me a clean heart, O God; restore within me a sense of being brand new. Amen!
Today I want to start this sermon where I would like to end this sermon. This is the place or posture of having a circumcised heart. It is the gospel the good news of Jesus that brings us to this place... In this hour of worship our hearts should be bent towards repentance from our sins and turned towards God and God alone. Why? Because God sent his son Jesus to die for us so we can live eternally with Him.
John 3:16 ESV
16 “For God so loved the world, [i] that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
Paul continues this letter (2:12-29) to the Church at Rome
Where we will continue to discover the revelation of God’s judging and saving righteousness in the gospel of Jesus Christ. We will continue to learn that God judges' sin and at the same time manifest his saving mercy.
Paul is very explicit sharing this to the church of Rome, what he knows, seen, and heard concerning the people of God and of this world
God's wrath is not a reckless rage, an uncontrollable anger, a senseless fury, or an unjust vengeance. The wrath of God is a precise and controlled response to the belittling of his holiness. Everyone who perishes under the wrath of God in eternity will not be because God lost his temper with them and mistreated them.
Righteousness is the quality or state of being morally correct and justifiable. It can be considered synonymous with "rightness" or being "upright".
A person is righteous coram deo, that is, he is in a right relationship with God, when he simply receives the imputed obedience of Christ and the
forgiveness of sins through faith. ... A human person is not righteous in God's eyes because of his choice or commitment, his good works or his piety, his emotions or intellect. He is righteous because of the forgiveness of sins through faith in Jesus.
Paul continues in verse 12:
12 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. 13 For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified.
Point 1: Not only hearing but doing is what makes the difference
Paul states this: if you sin without knowing what you’re doing, God takes that into account. But if you sin knowing full well what you’re doing, that’s a different story. Many of us know exactly what we are doing as we sin. We know right from wrong, but we decide to write our own laws in life and choose to hear what we want to hear. Many of us has been diagnosed with Selective Hearing...
Merely hearing God’s law is a waste of your time if you don’t do what he commands. Doing, not hearing, is what makes the difference with God.
“Put the word into action. If you think hearing is what matters most, you are going to find you have been deceived. If some fail to do what God requires, it’s as if they forget the word as soon as they hear it. One minute they look in the mirror, and the next they forget who they are and what they look like. 25 However, it is possible to open your eyes and take in the beautiful, perfect truth found in God’s law of liberty and live by it. If you pursue that path and actually do what God has commanded, then you will avoid the many distractions that lead to an amnesia of all true things, and you will be blessed.”- The Book of James
Here’s my point: just because a person hears the law read or recited does not mean he is right before the one True God; it is following the law that makes one right, not just hearing it.
Not only hearing but doing is what makes the difference.
14 For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them 16 on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.
Point 2: God will judge the secrets of your heart
“God knows my heart”
Do you have any secrets in your heart?
Paul proclaims that outsiders who have never heard of God’s law follow it more or less by instinct, which confirms its truth by their obedience. It is your obedience to the word of God that reveals truth.
God’s law is not something alien, imposed on us from without, but weaved into the very fabric of our creation. There is something deep within them then and us now that echoes God’s yes and no, right and wrong.
Illustration: The red angel in the left ear and the white angel in the right...
Our response to God’s yes and no will become public knowledge on the day God makes his final decision about every man and woman. This is the Message from God that Paul proclaims through Jesus Christ judging the secrets of your heart
17 But if you call yourself a Jew and rely on the law and boast in God 18 and know his will and approve what is excellent, because you are instructed from the law; 19 and if you are sure that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, 20 an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of children, having in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth— 21 you then who teach others, do you not teach yourself? While you preach against stealing, do you steal?22 You who say that one must not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?23 You who boast in the law dishonor God by breaking the law.24 For, as it is written, “The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.”
Point 3: Religion Can’t Save You
Paul goes hard in the paint towards the privileged, chosen people of the church
Paul states: If you’re brought up Jewish, don’t assume that you can lean back in the arms of your religion and take it easy, feeling prideful because you’re an insider to God’s revelation, a connoisseur of the best things of God, informed on the latest doctrines!
This sounds like the people and church today, who swims in the pool of knowledge without the lifeguard on duty.
Religion can't save you!
Paul tells Timothy: Even though they may look or act like godly people, they’re not. They deny His power. I tell you: Stay away from the likes of these. They seem always to be learning, but they never seem to gain the full measure of the truth.
So, you have it all together? Paul challenges the individual who has it all together. Message:
I have a special word of caution for you who are sure that you have it all together yourselves and, because you know God’s revealed Word inside and out, feel qualified to guide others through their blind alleys and dark nights and confused emotions to God. While you are guiding others, who is going to guide you? I’m quite serious. While preaching “Don’t steal!” are you going to rob people blind? Who would suspect you? The same with adultery. The same with idolatry. You can get by with almost anything if you front it with eloquent talk about God and his law. The line from Scripture, “It’s because of you Jews that the outsiders' frown on God,” shows it’s an old problem that isn’t going to go away.
Religion can't save you!
25 For circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law, but if you break the law, your circumcision becomes uncircumcision. 26 So, if a man who is uncircumcised keeps the precepts of the law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded [b] as circumcision? 27 Then he who is physically [c] uncircumcised but keeps the law will condemn you who have the written code [d] and circumcision but break the law. 28 For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical. 29 But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man but from God.
Point 4: The gospel identity of a man is marked on the heart
Paul: circumcision is of value only if you keep the law’s teachings. But if you keep breaking God’s rules, you are no different than those without the mark.
Don’t you see: It’s not the cut of a knife that makes a Jew. You become a Jew by who you are. It’s the mark of God on your heart, not of a knife on your skin, that makes a Jew.
Recognition comes from God
Look on me with a heart of mercy, O God, according to Your generous love. According to Your great compassion, wipe out every consequence of my shameful
crimes. Create (the act of producing or causing to exist) in me a clean heart, O God; restore within me a sense of being brand new. Amen!
Communion:
1 Cor. 11:23 For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for [a] you. Do this in remembrance of me.” [b] 25 In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.