Amen. Please have a seat. And with you, join me in your hearts as I pray. Lord Jesus Christ, what an extraordinary thing it is that you have come to be among us. Thank you for what you've been teaching us through what you wrote through your servant Peter. For his insight into his Savior and friend Jesus and for the call to to suffer well and to know joy and the midst of that suffering on the way to glory. Thank you for the way that you bonded Peter and Paul together even in the first century to share a to share a division of labor and taking the gospel to Jews and to Gentiles and rejoicing together in the hope that we have and singing one song together to the church. I pray that as we go to your words given through Paul and the letter to the Romans that you would unite our hearts to the to the hearts of those servants. United our hearts to the spirit who raised Jesus from the dead and to make him alive to us now and Lord Jesus by the power of the spirit who lives in us make these words come alive for us. Make them jump off the page and be more than just words in a book. Let them be words straight from our Father's heart to us in Jesus name. Amen. I'd like to spend a few minutes with you today and the first few verses of the fifth chapter of Paul's letter to the Romans for four chapters in the letter to the Romans in this magnificently crafted Paul has been helping Jewish and Gentile Christians in Rome understand that they together stood before God's docket before the dock before God before his judgment seat and they were guilty. God had brought suit against the human race. He necessarily was going to bring punishment and execution against us for our sins and our crimes against him and against his law and for four chapters Paul talks about what God has done so that we don't have to bear his wrath. He talks about how one faithful Israelite had come forward and had agreed to pay the penalty for us and it laid his life out in sacrifice for us offering an obedience to God's law that we were not not only not capable of but not even interesting interested in offering so that we could be brought back into right relationship with God's law by faith by faith first the faithfulness first of the son who obeyed and went to the cross for us and then we in turn receiving that gift and in fact there's a bit of a theme given to the whole of Romans in Romans 117 where Paul says the just by faith will live and what he's doing in chapters one through four is telling us how it is that we can be just by faith so that he can get to chapter five to tell us how we can live and here's where his passion really comes out and in chapters five through eight of Romans Paul is telling us what it is to live now that we have been justified let me let me begin reading we're not we're not putting up verses for you I hope you perhaps might have a scripture that you can look at yourself having been justified therefore by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ having been justified by faith there's something on the far side of that peace with God it's a great thing that God has said not guilty because the son became guilty now you were free to go but you know it wouldn't be entirely good news if we were just sent away from that courtroom scene with our sins paid for a debts cancelled prison we don't have to go to and we could just go live because you know what before too long we'd be right back before that bar of justice because we'd mess up you know what the recidivism rate I love that word with the recidivism rate is for criminals who get out of jail recidivism means get it going back to jail you know what the rate is I don't either but it's really really hot
and you know there are certain people who even though they never get convicted they wind up in court all the time because they just live on the edge of the law that would be our story too if the judge just said I'm done with you have a nice day but this courtroom is a little bit different this is a courtroom in which we're given peace and all I knew to all I know how the only way I can think to communicate that sense of peace is to ask you to imagine the judge this judge has not just been measuring your law by some cold and personal standard outside of himself the standard by which you and I have been measured wanting is his own character he has necessarily been at war with us he has necessarily been angry and wrathful against us and what happens when he places our sin on his son and punishes it there is that his wrath turns to joy he no longer is angry with us but he finds satisfaction in us Paul uses a very interesting word back in Romans 3.25 when he talks about what God had done so he could be both just and justifier he's set forth Christ as the Greek word is he law staryon staryon means simply place he law is the beginning of the word that we get hilarity from as in God loves a cheerful giver it's the word that Paul uses there it's a place where God has made cheerful it's a plate Jesus becomes a place where God's frown turns to a smile because what happens is he is satisfied with the son's sacrifice for us so not just some cold code could be satisfied but the father's own heart could be satisfied and now he could look at Andy and he could look at even Jeffrey with a smile and not a frown and so what happens at this court instead of him just saying see you later have a nice day good luck I hope I don't see you back in my court is the judge comes down from behind the bench and he takes off his robes of justice and you see his casual wear underneath and he says you know what you need a home don't you let's go to my house you need a name don't you you take my name you're absolutely impoverished aren't you you need an inheritance my family estate is yours let's go we find that as we walk away from this courtroom we have along side us one who was a judge but who now is a father a father who's given us his name his estate and is set a place for us at his table and the table that we go to today is a reminder that we've got a place at his home but wait there's more he's not just like any other dad there are dads and there are dads aren't there here is a father who offers not just a place but access look at what Paul says next having we justified therefore by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ through whom also we have come to have access a way in by faith into this grace in which we have come to stand we have access what's he talking about the only way I can tell you what I think he means is to tell you about Michael Cards father Michael Cards didn't have a bad father but he had a busy father cartels a story of a working father who was a physician who for whatever reasons whether he didn't feel like he worked hard enough didn't make enough money whether he was just uncomfortable with other people when he would come home from work he would walk right past his family and into his study and shut the door and go back to work and Michael Cards talks about spending hours outside his father's study just looking at the light underneath the study door and looking underneath the door and seeing his father's shoes under his desk and just wishing he could be there with his dad that's not the kind of father we have we have a father who gives us access we have a father who doesn't come home at the end of the day and shut the door and leave us on the outside we have a father who just loves to be with us now some of us have horrendous images of a father that we have to overcome to imagine this kind of father others of us have good pictures of that I've got a pretty good one but now my dad was was he was depression era so he never knew how to say it he never could bring himself to mount the word son I love you son I'm proud of you and I remember a very testing moment when I was in high school and I was feeling too big for my bridges and we had a little argument and I just went off on him about how you never say this you never say that and it almost ended in physicals but after a while I found myself reflecting and he still would have beat my beat me up but fortunately we never found out but on the far side of that I found myself thinking about my dad and I realized even though he had never been able to articulate it he showed it all the time he was always there for my sporting events my choir singings everything I did that he could be there for he was there and he used to take me out to the ball field and for hour upon hour throw batting practice to me to his arm was about to fall off and he'd come home and he would fill our house with the smell of Ben Gay or absorbing junior or or winter green alcohol and I even now when I smell those smells they remind me of my dad well that's our dad our dad doesn't go in this study and shut the door and leave us on the outside imagining what it's like to be with our dad wants to be with us now it's it's necessary in Christian teaching for us to tell one another what we're supposed to do with Christian truth but sometimes it's not about here's what you need to do sometimes it's just about hearing that you have a father and you have a father who loves you
and you can figure out what to do from there but the challenge today is simply to believe the because of what Christ has done on the cross for you and me the judge has taken us home the judge has become our father the judge has taken pleasure in us and conferred his name upon us his estate and not only that he's offered us his time he's offered us himself I was kind of like this for my first son my first son had four legs and a tale that wagged he was a 95-pound Irish setter named Larry almost the coolest dog who ever lived second only to your dog my last year in seminaries Sherry and I lived in this tiny little apartment overtop a dry cleaner and my papers were always late it was sort of a spiritual discipline God put me in the lives of my seminary professors just to challenge them to be gracious and I remember several times working on a paper and I would only be working on this paper because it was past due and Larry would be lying on the floor on the other side of the room and just decide you know what he's working too hard it's time to go play and he would get himself up and he would just he would launch himself across the room fortunately it wasn't a really big apartment and he would just throw himself across my lap and just so that my hands couldn't do anything and then he would and he would just turn this this big old smiley Irish setter face in my face and he'd go that it's time to go play honest it never occurred to me to throw him off and say Larry I'm too busy when that dog got in my face and breathe that doggy breath on me I just said you know what it's time for a break I just delighted to be in his presence and if I sinner that I am selfish you know selfish individual that I am running on deadlines and everything else could have that simple automatic delight in my Irish setter being in my face and dad let's go play can you imagine the heart of the one who made heaven and earth so that people like us could rule on his behalf and when he saw that we were going to throw it all away sent his very own son out of his own love for us as Paul is going to say and and and later on in this very paragraph when we were in his enemies when we were weak when we were sinful when we were ungodly when he would send his son after us will he not delight in the slightest suggestion from us that we would like to be with him he's a thousand times more interested in being with us than we are with him so we have peace because we're justified we have access because we're justified and the third thing we have is we have a boast the last part of verse two through whom we have access through whom we've come to have access by faith into this grace in which we've come to stand and we boast at the hope of the glory of God your translations probably don't say boast do they they probably say something nice and churchy like rejoice or exalt maybe celebrate but no I'm sorry the word is boast the word is brag the word is stand up and shout and say our God rocks and your God doesn't this is this this is the picture from Isaiah the prophet when he says to when he says the people who were sucked into idolatry let's talk about your idols here for a minute you take a log and you cut it in half and half of it you use to warn your house and the other half you use to make a little goblin for yourself and you carve ears but does it hear no you carve eyes but does it see no your gods don't do squat for you why are you worshiping them no we have a God that we can boast it we have the kind of God who made the heavens in the earth we have the kind of God who when he saw us in Egypt when we couldn't do anything anything for our sorry hides he came down for us and he brought us out with a mighty arm and out with a mighty hand in an outstretched arm and he brought us through the wilderness and he gave us a promise land and when when we disobey yeah he sent us into exile but what he's promised is that he's going to come again and there's going to be a new Exodus a new trip through the wilderness a new journey into the promise land where there's be a new temple and there will be glory and we will live in it and what Paul believes has happened in Jesus death and resurrection is that glory promise is being worked out for us Paul believes and he's going to talk about this in chapter six chapter seven and chapter eight that the redemption that begins in chapter three that we access by faith that redemption is worked out in such a way that we have been brought out of our Egypt of sin and in chapter six what our baptism what our baptism pictures is that we cross the we cross over the boundary of death and we have union with Christ and we're going to walk through the wilderness and there's it's going to be struggling we're not going to have to deal with the law in every respect in Romans eight in Romans seven I'm sorry but in Romans eight there's a glory that waits for us the sufferings of which the sufferings of this world are just not worth comparing to and he's going to get us all the way home in the meantime we've been given a spirit of adoption that allows us to cry out Abba father and one day we will have the full adoption when our bodies are made perfect and we are going to boast and there's the biblical imagery and then there are the images that we all have of the kind of celebration that that this should bring to mind one of my most favorite no my favorite image of celebration is Jeff's least favorite it was 2004 when my Boston Red Sox brought it home yes now my brother Jeffrey Jakes reminds me that they were from the between the last time the Red Sox did that and when they did that in 2004 his beloved what was that this beloved I can hardly even say the word this team from New York had done that only 26 times so Jeff has plenty of memories Jeff has plenty of memories of this sort of celebration I don't know Orangewood volleyball whatever I think of Rocky running out the steps of the Philadelphia art museum
yes that's our picture that's our picture yeah and here's the deal we're not just going to get across the finish line as far as Paul's concern we don't just boast that he made us just barely get over the finish line look at the way he finishes this paragraph I'm not going to read the whole paragraph for you but I want to read a few few verses at the end verse 10 for if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of his son how much more having been reconciled will we be saved by his life not only that but boasting in other words not only are we going to get across the finish line saved by his death and by his resurrection but as we go across the finish line we're not going to be staggering and saying I'm so glad that's over it nearly killed me no what we're going to be saying what we're going to be doing is juke in and jive in and high five in one another and send our god rocks their gods don't and boasting in God through our Lord Jesus Christ through whom now we have reconciliation the peace that we have now the access that we have now are a promise of a boast that our God will show himself as raining lord and we will be in him and we will be pumped up as we go across the line so convinced is Paul of this that it cast its light back on the present look at what he does back in verse three remember the tail end of verse two is and we boast in the hope of the glory of God what he's going to do but then verse three but not only this but we also boast in our afflictions everything that comes our way that's not such a nice part of the story every tear every hurt everything that would push us away in God's hands is just a tool for taking us further up and further in look at the way Paul continues this boast or spells out this goes not only this but boasting we boast in our afflictions knowing that affliction produces endurance and endurance produces proven character and proven character produces hope and hope does not put to shame your Bible probably says something nice and safe like disappoint but the word is shame shame is when you feel publicly exposed you've taken a chance you've put your best out there and it hadn't been enough and everybody says oh look he's just hanging in the breeze she look at her what an idiot she should have just played it safe this is what he's saying isn't going to happen when we get there at the end of the day we're not going to be put to shame because all this stuff is not going to be able to separate us all this stuff is just going to be ways that he's eliminating the stuff in our lives that keeps us from the goal hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit that was given to us listen to the way Paul ends chapter 8 where he does more boasting what then will we say to these things if God is for us who is against us and the one who gave us only who did not spare his only son but on our behalf gave but on all our behalf gave him over how will he not with him give us all things how will he not with him give us all things who will bring a charge against gods who lacked God who justifies who will condemn Christ Jesus who died but rather who was raised who was seated at the right hand of the God who's interceding on behalf of on behalf of you will he condemn us no what will separate us from the love of God will what what will separate us from the love of God shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword as it is written and then he quotes Psalm 43 23 for your sake we are being killed all the day long we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered that rings kind of weird in this in this portion but here's what it means here's what it means yeah life is tough life kicks us in the teeth but because we belong to Christ and because all of our sufferings are our being conformed to the full image of who he is which includes not just the glories of his resurrection but the fellowship of his sufferings bring it on bring it on I am willing to take my measure as one of those who are part of his with Old Testament scholars like to call his Messianic people that if trial and tribulation or to come my way let them have their best shot they cannot take me out because I am his and he is doing a good thing in me but in all these things we more than conquer great word here the verb comes from the same word that Nike takes its name from which means victory the verb is Nikko I overcome I am victorious and Paul puts in front of it the a great proposition that works in English as well whooper or we do hyper we hyper overcome we more than kick we more than trounce our enemies
but in all these things we hyper win through the beloved for I'm persuaded that neither death nor life nor angels nor rulers nor things that are things in our circumstances nor things that are going to be things that we worry about might happen at two o'clock in the morning nor powers nor heights nor death nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God that's in Christ Jesus our Lord I don't know what sort of furnace you live in I don't know how God has to personalize the challenges for you all I know that is that I've lived long enough to be able to say with some authority that there is nothing that God will allow to be thrown your way that is not something that you will be able to look back on either in this life or the next and boast and be able to say right there right there it's where his power was the greatest I just want to close by telling you the brief story of my dad he's Tennessee Hill billing got educated beyond his intelligence rather than doing what the rest of the kid boys did either stay and work on the farm or go to work in the alcohol aluminum plant or declare they're rebellion by going off and work it in the railroad or starting a bar in New Orleans now my dad decided he was going to show them all and he went off to school and got himself educated so educated that he couldn't ever get the point of a free gift being given to him life with God through what Jesus Christ did on the cross for years and years and years and years after I became a Christian and then for years after my wife and I got married we would talk with my dad and try to help him understand that it was as simple as receiving a free gift on the very thanks giving weekend that we started to realize that he was starting to slide into sena dementia we had this one last conversation in which he made it perfectly clear that he wanted nothing to do with this gospel and then the dementia hit big time and he went through tuberculosis a hip replacement and getting over all the drugs and the medication and just got darker and darker and darker and darker finally a few years after that he got pneumonia that his doctor said this is going to kill him I don't think he's going to live through the night and that night just as I was getting ready to leave my dad this overeducated East Tennessee hillbilly who had no room in his life for God started to call out God I want you in my life I started out the door and I turned around and said Dad what's up
brothers and sisters something miraculous happened that night God gave him a night of lucidity God let him be his dementia had reduced him to the mind of like a four-year-older but for a few moments he was a lucid four-year-older and he was ready to hear the story and he was ready to receive and secure his place and happen I prayed with him and laughed that night saying okay Lord if you want to take him it's okay with me not that you were going to consult me but well you know you've had that you we've all had that conversation and I came back the next day and the doctor said something really amazing happened your dad's electrolyte said they reversed overnight and it looks like he's going to make it and for another day my dad couldn't understand what he had done that night and then his health did come back but the fog descended again and he couldn't remember it but you know what he was different he had he had always been pretty grumpy angry man this satisfied with his life feeling like he was a failure and from then on he lived for two more years and they were the most joyful years of his whole life he was a thankful man and if God can do that in the in a late octogenarian whom I had given up for dad he can do anything in you and me and you and I again we may not see it in this life it may be in the next life before we can see it but every detail every incident we will be able to look back on and say in that we boast in that our God as the worship team comes back let me invite you to this table at this table God shouts his affection for you this table where we picture the breaking we're in the breaking of the bread we symbol Christ giving up his body and in the and in the sharing of the cup we remember he shed his blood for our sins we reminded that he's not angry with us anymore not only that because we're invited to this table we're picked we're given a picture of the access that we have all the time 24 seven to our father and because of the forgiveness of our sins and his promise to get us home we can boast this will be a time in which we present our offerings as well as a response from ourselves to his offering of himself before I pray let me read some of the words that will be sung and you're this is a Michael card song of invitation to the table you're free to sing it along with us or you can just sit and listen but here's the heart of the whole thing come to the table and see in his eyes the love that the father has spoken and know you are welcome whatever you're crime though every commandment you've broken for he's come to love you and not to condemn and he offers a pardon of peace if you'll come to the table you'll feel in your heart the greatest forgiveness the greatest release let's pray oh our father may we run to the table for you have said it Lord Jesus as we present our offerings we first receive in our hearts the wonder of the offering of your very self a substitute for us in our lostness and now our friend along the way father in Jesus name we pray