Amen. It’s good to be here tonight. We’re broadcasting now, and so we’re going to turn to the word. It is good to be back here again this evening. I’m glad to see the ones who are here with us. Praise the Lord. Let’s just continue to pray for our brothers and sisters who are not feeling well this evening. This is probably going to be a very short message. I suspect I really don’t have many notes written down. Normally, I have quite a few notes prepared when I preach, but that’s not going to be the case tonight. We’re just going to take some time and do a little exposition here on these verses we’ve been reading.
If you want to turn to the Book of Romans chapter 3, I will read from verse 20 down to the end of the chapter. Starting in verse 20, it says, “Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time His righteousness: that He might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. Is He the God of the Jews only? is He not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also: seeing it is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith. Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.”
Let me pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, as we go into Your word, I pray You take our time, Lord, as we give a few minutes to study the scripture tonight. Father, just bless it. Father, let it be illumination, Lord, to our pathway. Father, just help us to have a clear understanding of what’s written in Your word, and through it, Lord, may we have a closer relationship with You. Let it be now. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen. Amen. Praise the Lord.
Well, I just want to take a little time and go through these verses that we’ve read over tonight. You know, there’s so much here. I think I’ve already spent three sermons just focusing on a few different words here, and I thought I could continue to do that, but there’s really, I think, most of the rest of this we’ll get to later on as we go through. So, we’re just going to kind of go down here verse by verse and just talk through these things in the context of the rest of the letter here from Paul and so forth.
So, verse 20 says, “Therefore by the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified in His sight.” The Apostle Paul here starts out in verse 20. He’s really continuing his thought from prior chapters and prior verses, and he’s bringing his conclusion here. He’s focused a whole lot on how no one was able to ever actually keep the law, and that really, the law could never justify anybody because it could never really be kept. No one could live up to it. The purpose of the law was never to justify someone. It was really to show people how short they came to what God expected. It was created really to magnify and help man see their imperfections because God knew nobody could keep the law when He made it.
I mean, God knows everything. God knows that when He gave the rules and the law to Moses and other things down through the Bible, mankind was not going to be able to live up to it. The first commandment—love your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your might and love your neighbor as yourself—God knew when that first commandment was written that there was not a single person on the face of the Earth who was going to be able to keep that commandment perfectly all the time, all day, every day, for the rest of their life. God knew that.
So, the law, in one sense, was there to show you, “Yeah, this is what God expects,” but He didn’t actually write it out with the belief that we were actually going to be able to keep it. That’s why He accompanied all of the sacrifices with the law because He knew no one was actually going to be able to do what He had said. So, the sacrifices were there in expectation of God knowing no one is going to be able to keep this law, no one’s going to be able to keep these rules, therefore these sacrifices are going to come in to symbolize what happens when you can’t keep it. That’s why Paul says here, “By the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified.” No one could actually keep the law and therefore be justified by it. By the law is the knowledge of sin.
The whole thing was designed to make the keepers of the law aware of their inability to keep the rules and to focus their attention not on the rules but on what it takes to actually make things right. A sacrifice, a death, has to occur because of their inability to live up to what God expects. The law—by the law is the knowledge of sin. At a certain point, the scribes, the Pharisees, the Jews lost sight of that. They lost sight of the purpose of the law pointing us over here to these sacrifices that are to point us towards the thing that deals with our inability to live up to the rules. They lost sight of that, and instead, they became obsessed with the rules, and they actually got into the frame of mind of thinking that the rule-keeping justified them rather than seeing it as a type that pointed towards something that actually would justify them in times to come.
So, verse 21, Paul goes on to say, “But now the righteousness of God without or outside of the law is manifested.” The law itself, Paul concludes, can’t do anything to actually justify us or actually to make us righteous. But now, here, Paul is on the other side of the advent of Christ. Christ has gone to the Cross. He’s come; He’s fulfilled what the law was pointing to, and now the righteousness is being manifest. It says, “outside of the law.” It’s not something in the law itself, but on the outside, and it says here that this righteousness was witnessed by the law and the prophets.
The Bible, the things written in it, the writings of Moses, the Psalms, the writings of the prophets—they were all pointing to something. They were pointing to Jesus, and those writings in the Old Testament are a witness of the righteousness that would come through Jesus Christ. Verse 21, that’s why he says, “But now the righteousness of God without or outside of the law is manifested and is witnessed by the law and the prophets.” Amen.
Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all them that believe. So, this is the righteousness that the law and the prophets were pointing to, right? The righteousness, the holiness, the salvation, the justification, the propitiation—all of that that the law was pointing to, it’s the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ. Amen. It was all pointing to that. That was a witness to that, and Paul is telling us exactly what Jesus said—it’s all wrapped up in Jesus. Jesus said, “I am come to fulfill the law.” Jesus was the fulfillment of the law.
If we have that faith in Jesus Christ that is talked about there in verse 22, the righteousness of God which comes by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that what? That believe. That believe. That believe what? That believe Jesus was the fulfillment of it all. That Jesus was what it was all pointing to.
Then he goes on to say, “For there is no difference.” For there is no difference. And again, this goes back to Jew and Gentile. There’s no difference. There’s no difference between the law-keeper; there’s no difference between the non-law-keeper; there’s no difference between the person who grew up in church; there’s no difference between the person who didn’t; there’s no difference between the Pharisee; there’s no difference between the slave, the rich, the free, the poor. Get my English right—there is no difference. Everyone is in the same predicament, everyone is in the same problem spot, and everyone has access to the exact same solution. There is no difference. This is what he’s getting at. There is no difference. There’s no difference. There is only one way. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me.” He is the only solution. We’re all in the same predicament, and we all have the same solution. The law could never do it for anybody, but the faith of Jesus Christ will bring us righteousness upon us and unto us when we believe. Amen.
Verse 23 says, “For there is no difference; for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” We’re all in that same predicament. Verse 24, here’s the good news—being justified freely, free of charge, simply because we believed. Justified—He’s our justification. He is our answer that will get us out and get us our pardon. Being justified freely,
free of charge, by His grace, simply because He loves us and wants to show us something good, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Amen. Through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
And if I stayed on these verses and did one more word study, that word “redemption” would be the next one I would have done. We’ll just talk a little bit about that as we pause here perhaps on this verse. But redemption, here, he talks about the redemption that is in Jesus Christ. Now, what is redemption? Redemption—well, redemption is the story of the Bible. The story of the Bible is the story of redemption. Genesis is the story of man’s fall from grace. The rest of the Old Testament is pointing towards the Redeemer who would come. The Gospels are the life of the Redeemer lived out, doing the redemption. Amen. Then the Epistles are pointing to the reality of the redemption that has come, and then the Book of Revelation points us towards the conclusion, the completion of the redemption. Redemption is the story of the Bible. Redemption is the whole framework. Redemption is what this is all about at this point for us. Amen.
Redemption is in Jesus Christ. He is our Redeemer; He is the one with the power to redeem us. When man fell in the Garden of Eden, sin entered, and man became a slave to the master of sin. Man became a slave to death, and by becoming subject to death, the one with power over death had power over man, which is none other than the devil. The devil is the bringer of death, the angel of death, the one with power over death. Jesus tells us that very clearly in the Gospels. When man sinned and fell, they fell into the possession of the devil—that is man’s natural state. Man has fallen into the possession of the devil, and that’s where mankind is. Man has to be redeemed. What do they have to be redeemed from? They have to be redeemed from sin, from the penalty of death, from belonging to death. That is what redemption is about.
When sin came into the world in the Garden of Eden, it wasn’t just man and woman that sinned and fell. When they fell, they took all of creation with them: “Cursed be the ground for your sake.” All of creation fell into a curse because of what Adam and Eve did. Sin didn’t just bring about a curse on Adam and Eve; it brought about a curse on the entire creation. It’s not just man and woman that need to be redeemed; the whole creation needs to be redeemed. Redemption is about the whole thing. God is not in the business of crumpling up His creation and throwing it away in the trash to start over. God is more creative than that. God isn’t going to let the devil win or have the last laugh. God’s not going to let the devil make off with creation. God is going to reclaim creation; God is going to redeem creation, and His mechanism, His plan for redemption, was always Jesus Christ and the Cross.
Being justified freely—let me pause reading there and just go over to 1 Corinthians 15. I just want to read a few verses here to put with this on redemption. 1 Corinthians 15:20: “But now is Christ risen from the dead and become the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward, they that are Christ’s at his coming. Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet.” What are we talking about? Redemption—Him taking control. “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did put all things under him. And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.”
Amen. Notice there in verse 28, he uses the word “subdued.” Christ is subduing creation, subduing mankind, subduing the enemies of death, hell, and the grave, subduing the Earth. Redemption is in Christ Jesus. It is His power; it is by His authority, because of what He did on the Cross, that He is able to come and redeem all of creation, to redeem lost mankind. He is going to fully accomplish redemption. As we read in these verses, redemption is not something that’s done in a day, is it? As we read through here, these things take time; they happen in phases. Redemption doesn’t happen all at once. The process of subduing all of the earth and bringing it back into God’s possession is a progressive thing. It happens in stages. The first thing He did was start by redeeming the souls of lost mankind. That’s what’s available to us today. Our souls can be redeemed. We sing the song, “I’m redeemed by love divine.” Our souls today have been redeemed. When we find Jesus Christ, when He comes into our life, when we’re saved and born again, we’re no longer subject to that second death. We’re free from the penalty of sin, the second death. In that way, we’re already redeemed at that stage.
Amen. But we’re waiting for further redemption; there’s more to come. One day, God is also going to redeem our mortal bodies by Jesus Christ. He is the life; He is the one who will redeem the mortal bodies of mankind when that day comes. Hallelujah! That’s the next phase we’re waiting for. We’re waiting for the day of redemption when our bodies will be redeemed as well and made perfect, pure, and restored to what they should be. Amen. But that’s still not all of redemption, because beyond that, there’s a whole world to be redeemed. We know in time, Jesus Christ will redeem it all. That’s what we’re reading about there in 1 Corinthians.
So if we go back to the Book of Romans chapter 3, there in verse 24, it says, “Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” Redemption is in Christ Jesus. Amen. Redemption’s not in me; I don’t have the power to redeem myself or to redeem you. As we read there in 1 Corinthians, Jesus Christ is subduing everything unto Himself. It’s His power to subdue; it’s His power to bring reconciliation between man and God. It’s Him subduing the things of God to God. Amen. And it is in Him. Redemption is in Jesus. It’s invested in Him; it’s achieved through Him. Hallelujah! Hopefully, that gives us maybe just a tad of insight into redemption there. Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption—a special commission, a special ability—that is in Christ Jesus alone.
Verse 25: “Whom God hath set forth to be the propitiation,” the appeasement for our sins, the thing that will turn away the wrath of God. How? Through faith, simply by believing in that propitiation, through faith. Amen. Faith specifically in His blood. We’re not just believing in any old thing about Jesus. There are lots of people who believe in God, lots of people who believe there was a Jesus, but that doesn’t do anything for you. You need more than that. It’s faith in His blood. And of course, that doesn’t mean just believing He had blood flowing through His veins; more specifically, it’s talking about that He died to pay for my sins. That’s what that phrase “His blood” entails. You know, in one sense, you could cover yourself in the blood of Jesus, and it wouldn’t do a single thing for you. I want you to think about this: the Roman soldiers stood at the Cross of Jesus, and how many of them do you think got Jesus’s blood on their hands as they drove in the nails? The blood of Jesus did absolutely nothing for them. You know what? Some of them were probably somewhat covered in it by the end of that day. Just mere blood—that doesn’t do anything. Amen. So as we realize, as it talks about the blood of Jesus, it’s something deeper than just having blood on you or being covered in that way. It’s talking about what He did as a sacrifice, what that blood means. Amen. What that blood means is that He died a willing sacrifice, a perfect sacrifice for our sins, to redeem us to God. Amen. To be our propitiation, to turn away the wrath of God, to be justified freely by His grace. It’s specifically having faith in these things that are obtained through His blood. That’s how we obtain righteousness, salvation, and holiness—all of these things.
Amen. When we reach the point where we no longer believe in these things the right way or view them correctly, what we place our faith in becomes something different from what we truly need for salvation. The true thing that makes a difference is not just a matter of belief in a superficial way; it requires genuine belief. Justification comes from believing these things correctly, not in a false manner. If we believe falsely, we are not justified, and His blood does not cover us. To put it simply, Jesus died for our sins because He loved us, even though we are imperfect. His perfect sacrifice means we can go to heaven, have eternal life, and experience a life changed by the Living God. We can have a new birth.
God set forth Jesus to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of past sins. Notice this: Jesus’s blood is for the remission of sins. This is significant because, according to Acts 2:38, baptism is also for the remission of sins. However, the remission of sins comes through the blood of Jesus Christ and through having faith in Him. Jesus instructed His followers to baptize those who believe, indicating that belief precedes baptism. The remission of sins also comes through His blood and faith in it, covering past sins and extending to present and future sins as mentioned in First John.
In Romans 3:24-25, Paul explains that we are justified freely by His grace through the redemption in Christ Jesus. This is not a matter of our own merit or works, but of God’s grace. There is no boasting in this; we cannot brag about our contribution because it is all God’s work. Our faith itself is a gift from God. Paul emphasizes that the only boasting we can do is that we believe in the truth of this salvation. We are saved not because of special knowledge or actions but because we have faith in the goodness of God and His free gift of salvation.
Many people wrongly believe that salvation comes through their own efforts or adherence to certain rules. However, salvation is purely by faith in the goodness of God and His promises. Verse 28 concludes that a man is justified by faith without deeds of the law. This applies to both Jews and Gentiles, as God is the God of both. The law was not set aside by faith; rather, faith establishes the law. Paul will elaborate further on this in the next chapter, showing how the law pointed to Jesus Christ and that faith in Him was always the means of salvation.
Paul highlights that even in the Old Testament, salvation came through faith in the Redeemer who was to come. Job, for example, spoke of a Redeemer who would come and make things right, even though he did not know Jesus’s name. Abraham and Moses also had faith in this coming Redeemer. Their faith was in what the law and prophets pointed to, which was Jesus Christ. The Pharisees and Jewish traditions had distorted this understanding, but the true faith was always about believing in the Messiah. Salvation, therefore, has always been through faith in Jesus Christ, regardless of the specific name or detailed understanding at the time.
As Paul prepares to delve deeper into these concepts in the following chapters, he lays the groundwork by affirming that salvation comes through faith alone. Let us take this understanding to heart. Heavenly Father, thank You for Your goodness and grace. Bless each person here and those listening online. May these words encourage and help us. Thank You for Your light and understanding. Even in darkness, You have guided us and pulled us out. We worship Your mighty name and commit everything to You in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. Praise the Lord. You are dismissed, brothers and sisters.