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The Greatest Book in the Bible
Romans 1:1
It's all great...but if I
had to choose the greatest, well...we'll get to that. If in your life the bottom
is falling out, you'd better examine the foundation. You need a foundation.
We need a sure word, a solid word for unsure times. And today we're going to
begin to talk about a foundational book that changed the world. I've got
many books in my library, I love books. Books are important, and books have
great influence. Adolf Hitler, with his
twisted and warped brain wrote a book, Mein Kampf, and in that book he
espoused his Nazi philosophies. The results of the thoughts in that book was
a horrendous world war, the gas ovens, the Holocaust, six million Jews
exterminated. A book, Mein Kampf. Hitler got his ideas from
reading another book by Nietzsche, a perverted atheist--he hated God, he
declared blatantly, God is dead! Hitler drank from that book, and his mind
was warped. By the way,
Nietzsche is dead, and God is alive! Another man wrote a book,
Karl Marx, and Karl Marx wrote a book on communism, dialectical materialism,
Das Capitale. People read that book, the Russian Revolution was born, the
Communist Revolution. Millions of people paid with their life's blood,
others were enslaved, the world rocked and ruined by communism. A book, a
powerful book. Charles Darwin wrote a
book, The Origin of the Species, and there he talked about blind
evolutionary force and that man is not made, created in the image of God,
but rather he is an accident of nature, he has descended from the apes.
People read that book and made a monkey of themselves, believing that they
are an orphan of the apes. Books have power, but no
book has the power that the book that you have open in your hand right now
has, the power for good, for God, and power that has changed the world
radically, dramatically, and eternally, and the book that will go on through
the ages and it is the book of Romans. It has been called the constitution
of Christianity. Let me tell you the power
of this book. There was a Roman Catholic monk, his name was Martin Luther.
Martin Luther had tried to get right with God by ritual, by penance, by good
deeds, by all of the accouterments of the church, but his heart was empty.
He took a pilgrimage to We've entered into it
today, the power of the book of Romans. There was a man named John
Wesley. He was very religious, very well motivated, so motivated that he
left If I were shipwrecked on an
island and could only choose one book of the Bible to take with me, I
believe I'd take the book of Romans. Oh, but thank God we don't have to take
just one. Hallelujah, thank God we've got all sixty-six. Praise God for
that. But what a wonderful book, what a wonderful book is the book of
Romans. Now, we're going to look at
the book of Romans and we're going to think about it as the book that
changed the world, for indeed it did. And we're going to look at it like we
might look at some other books. For example, we're going to look at the
table of contents--what is in the book of Romans? Well let me just give you
a little outline here. The first three chapters of
the book deal with sin. They tell us what's wrong with the world. And then,
chapters four, five and six deal with salvation; thank God He doesn't just
show us our sin, He shows us a way out. And then chapters seven and eight
deal with sanctification. You found out as I found out--it's one thing to
get saved, isn't it, but it's another thing to grow in the grace and
knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And sanctification means
becoming more like Jesus, that's all it means. And so, you go from sin to
salvation to sanctification. And then, as you continue through the book,
when you get into Romans nine, ten, and eleven, it deals with
sovereignty--it shows how God is sovereign over the universe, how God from
eternity past to eternity future is in charge. What comfort we're going to
find when we get in this passage that deals with the sovereignty of Almighty
God. And beginning in chapter twelve where we present our bodies a living
sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, right on through the end of the
book, it deals with service--it shows us how to serve this sovereign God,
how to be in a very practical and a very real way the Christian we ought to
be. So, that's the preface to the book, that's the table of contents that
tells us what this constitution of Christianity is all about. Now we've talked about the
table of contents and the preface, let's talk about the author. Who is the
author of this book? Well, we know ultimately
the Holy Spirit is the author, but who is the human author? Well, let's
begin in chapter 1 verse 1: "Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be
an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God." He was a privileged Jew, he
was a very brilliant young man, he was an honors graduate of the University
of Tarsus, he was fluent in many languages, he was a world traveler, he was
very strict in his religion, very much a student, and very much aware of
world affairs. He also was a Roman
citizen. That meant that he had the privileges that Beside all of that, he had
the privilege of doing graduate work under a professor named Gamaliel.
Gamaliel was one of the best teachers, if not the best known teacher, in all
of that part of the world. Paul was his prize student. On top of that, Paul
was a part of the most strict religious sect in Judaism, the Pharisees, and
not only was he a Pharisee, but he said later on he was a Pharisee of the
Pharisees, he was the highest of the high, he was at the very top. This man
was prized and had a pedigree a mile long. But now I want you to learn some
things about him, what happened to him. He met the Lord Jesus, you
remember, on the road to Let me give you a couple of
verses that give an indication of why he changed his name. Ephesians chapter
3 and verse 8. He says, "Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints,
is this grace given." And then he says in First Corinthians 15 verse 9: "For
I am the least of the apostles." You know he saw himself in the sight of God
as a nobody; it doesn't mean he has an inferiority complex, he just knew
that he was what he was by the grace of God. Do you know who Reggie
White was? Reggie White is in heaven today.
He used to play defensive tackle for the Green Bay Packers. He was a
minister at heart, and was called 'the minister of defense!' It'd be just as simple to
stand in front of a moving locomotive as to stand in front of this guy when
he lines up and to try and block him out; it took a couple of men to hold
this dude down. But I heard this man, who was a passionate Christian, "I am
a nobody, telling everybody about somebody who can save anybody."
It was a powerful testimony.
And I just wanted to share a little love w/ the Packers prior to
their Super Bowl loss tonite! Now, you may be at
sometimes too big for God to use, but you'll never be too small for God to
use you. V. 1 continues, "A servant
of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle." Now look at the word servant.
That word means slave. It means a particular kind of slave, it's a word that
means bond slave. If a man got himself in debt and he could not pay the
debt, he became the property of the man that he owed money to in Bible
times. He was what they called a bond slave and he had to work for that
individual because he'd indebted himself to that individual. But the Bible,
in mercy, set a law [the law of jubilee,] that said after seven years all of
the bond slaves had to be set free. Sometimes a bond slave, at the moment of
his freedom, would say, Hey, wait a minute, I don't want to be set free, I'm
better off under this man than I was by myself, he feeds me, he clothes me,
he cares for me, he loves me, I'm like one of the family, I don't want to be
free, I love my master, I want to stay under him, I want to be his bond
slave. Well, if he made that decision that he wanted to do that, they called
the judges of Well, you say, count me out
Pastor, I don't want to be anybody's slave. You already are. Either you're a
slave of Christ or you're a slave of sin. Everybody is in bondage somewhere. You see, here's the thing.
The unsaved man said I want to be free, I am my own man. He proceeds to go
down into the worst degradation and bondage there is, the bondage of sin,
Satan and sin and self are cruel taskmasters. But when a man says I will
become the bond slave of the Lord Jesus, I love my master, then the Bible
says, "If the Son shall make you free you are free indeed." He discovers the
most glorious freedom in the Lord Jesus Christ. If I had ten thousand lives
I'd give every one of my lives to the Lord Jesus Christ, because it is
Christ, through that perfect bondage, that sets us free. Now listen very carefully
or you're going to miss this. A bond slave is not somebody who says, All
right since I'm his slave, it's no longer my will, I'll do his will. No, no.
That's good, but that's not good enough. A bond slave doesn't say his will
instead of my will, it says his will is my will. It is not laying down arms,
it is taking up arms for the one that you love. Have you ever thought of
the scripture that says, "Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you
the desires of your heart," that's over in Psalm 37. That sounds like too
good a promise for God to make, doesn't it? You say, Okay, Lord, I love you,
I want a million bucks. No, because if you say, Lord I love you, now give me
a million dollars, what was the desire of your heart? Money. Or you say,
Lord, I love you, give me the desire of my heart-fame and popularity. No,
the desire of your heart is popularity. But when, when you say, I
delight myself in the Lord, you can have the desire of your heart because
your desires are his desires and his desires are your desires and therefore
you can be a Christian and do whatever you want. Let me tell you something.
I get drunk every time I want to. And boy I hope nobody pulls that little
sound byte out of this message. I get drunk every time I want to. I don't
want to, never been drunk, never intend to get drunk, I'd just as soon eat
dirt. People say, Oh, if I
believed in eternal security, man I'd get saved and I'd sin all I want to.
Well, I don't sin all I want to, I sin MORE than I want to. If you still
want to, you need to get your wanter fixed, you need a brand new wanter, you
need to be born again. Paul says, I am no longer a big shot, my name is now
Paul, not Saul, I am saved, I am surrendered. ----- But let's continue to read.
Look at it again here. We're going to find something else out about the
author. He says called to be an apostle. He
didn't say, "I'm looking for a profession, I just believe I'll be an
apostle." No, I believe in the called ministry, and he says, thanks be to
God who counted me worthy of putting me in the ministry. I believe God put
me in the ministry. I've sometimes thought about what I might do if I
weren't in the ministry but I can't think of anything.
And this same chapter says we're all
called. Verse 6, "Among whom are ye also the called of Jesus Christ."
You say, Why are you
telling me all this about Paul? Because Paul said, You follow me as I follow
Christ. He's an example for you. So he was saved, yes he was. And, and he
was surrendered, yes he was. And he was sent, yes he was, he was called of
God; he had a purpose, a mission for his life. And I'll tell you something
else, now, watch it very carefully--he was separated. Now don't miss this.
He says here, "Separated unto the gospel of God." Now it's very important,
the key word there is not separated, the key word in my estimation is unto
the gospel of God. Now Paul had already been separated, he was a Pharisee of
the Pharisees, you talk about people who lived a quote separated life, that
is, all of the outward sins of the flesh he abhorred, he walked the straight
and narrow. They were so careful that
they paid tithe of mint, anis, and, cumin, that is when they were paying
tithes, they had a little mint plant,
they'd count all ten leaves, take one of them, the tithe, and give it to
God, one tenth of every sprig of mint, for example. Ye pay tithe of mint,
anise, and cumin. Paul was already separated
from sin. You see, if that's all the separation you have, you know what it's
going to make you? A proud, bitter, haughty Pharisee like the apostle Paul
was when he was persecuting the church before he met the Lord Jesus and
before he found the grace of God. Nature abhors a vacuum, and so if you get
these things out of your life but you don't get Jesus Christ into your life,
if you are separated from but not separated unto, you're going to become
nothing but an old Pharisee, that's what you're going to become. And you
need to ask yourself, Is there a little Pharisee in me? Ask yourself that
question, because you see, we're to be separated unto the gospel of our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ. Now what some people believe is separation is, I
don't smoke and I don't chew and I don't go with girls who do. Okay, neither
does a fence post. If you've got no more religion than a fence post giving
up things will not make you one iota more like Jesus Christ. It'll make you
a Pharisee, but it won't make you like Jesus Christ. You've got to be
separated unto the gospel of Jesus Christ and of course when you're
separated unto something you're separated from something. The word separated here is
the word we get our word horizon from. If you go off up to a tall building
somewhere, and look around three hundred sixty degrees as far as you can
see. That's the horizon. That's where the earth just tails off and that's
your world. Now, do you know how to change your horizon? Change your
location, just change your location. Every time you change your location you
change your horizon. So what determines your horizon is your center. So,
when Jesus Christ is your center, then that horizon is your world, you see.
You are separated unto him. When you find the Lord Jesus Christ, you will
find a new center. And then you're not going to be talking about what you
gave up for Jesus, that's foolish.
You're gonna understand what you have in the Lord Jesus Christ. We talked about the table
of contents, we've talked about the author of the book that changed the
world. Now let's talk about the hero of the book. Every good book has a
hero, and the hero of this book is the Lord Jesus Christ. vv. 1-4
Right up at the beginning of the book he moves it to the front
burner. He says, Folks, I'm the guy who's writing the book, but let me tell
you who I'm writing about, it is concerning God's Son, the Lord Jesus
Christ. If you don't know and love the Lord Jesus Christ you're not going to
understand the book of Romans until God puts the light on in your soul. It
is a book about the Lord Jesus Christ and, that's what Christianity is.
Christianity is Christ. The author of the book,
Paul, the hero of the book, Jesus. The theme of the book, the Gospel. Notice how it begins again.
Verse 1: "Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle,
separated unto," what? "the gospel of God." And right there he tells us the
source of the gospel. Paul didn't think it up. He said I didn't receive it
from man, neither was I taught it by man. It is the gospel of God, so don't
tamper with it, don't pervert it. Paul said to the Galatians, "If any man
preach any other gospel unto you than that which I've preached unto you, let
him be accursed." Why? Because a false gospel will lead to a synthetic
salvation that will lead to a very real hell. Paul is not trying to be
politically correct. He said if an angel comes and preaches any other gospel
let him be accursed. Paul said if I preach any other gospel unto you than
that which I've preached, I need to be accursed. It is the gospel of God. Why do we have churches
that are filled with moral worldlings who've never been born again? You
know, church is supposed to be a sheepfold, but it's more like a zoo. Why?
Because people have met religion, they've not met Jesus; they've met
denominations, they've not met Jesus; they've met programs, they've not met
Jesus; they've met causes, but they've not met Jesus. Christianity is not a
creed, not a code, not a cause, it is Christ. Meanwhile, many come to church
just for social reasons. Some
must get good cell signal here because they come to text or surf the web! But here at GBC it's all
about Jesus! You can take Confucius out
of Confucianism and still have Confucianism. You could take Buddha out of
Buddhism and still have Buddhism. You could take Mohammed out of Islam and
still have Islam. But you cannot take Jesus out of Christianity and still
have Christianity. To take Jesus Christ out of Christianity is like taking
the water out of a well, the blue out of the sky, notes out of music and
numbers out of mathematics. The source of the gospel is
God. The subject of the gospel, Jesus Christ. And the supply of the gospel
is in verse 5: "By whom we have received grace and apostleship." Do you know
what grace is? Grace is what makes God save people like us apart from works
of any kind. It is the sheer, absolute gift of God. The just shall live by
faith, by faith I receive the gift of God. By faith I receive the grace of
God. We're going to learn about that in the book of Romans, what a wonderful
book this is. A little boy came forward
in a church service and wanted to be baptized and they said, Well, son, tell
us how you got saved? He said, Well I did my part and God did his. Well they
didn't like that; they said, Well tell us about your part. He said, I did
the sinning and he did the saving. That's it! Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to thy cross I cling.
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