From 1st Presbyterian Church of Chattanooga, here is Dr. Michael Milton. Sin is a power that we are all under, and it is a power that kills. Sin is a power that kills. Sin is universal. The whole world is held accountable to God. There is a pervasive lie that is going on in some segments of the church today, and it is this that there is no wrath of God against sin, and that is not what the Bible teaches. In fact, the condition of the world today, the world apart from God in Jesus Christ, is under the wrath of God. The Bible declares faith comes from hearing and hearing through the Word of Christ. Welcome to Faith for Living with Dr. Michael Milton, the radio outreach ministry of 1st Presbyterian Church of Chattanooga, a ministry with one great passion and belief that faith comes from proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ as found in God's Word, and that faith in Jesus Christ is faith for living. This week, Dr. Milton brings to us a message entitled, A Message for Sinner's Only, as we continue our series, A Word from another world, Messages from Romans. The Bible text for today's broadcast is from a book of Romans chapter 3, verses 1 through 31. Here again, is Dr. Michael Milton with today's message entitled, A Message for Sinner's Only. Some years ago, my wife and I were in Paris. When you're in Paris, there are a couple of things that you want to see, the Eiffel Tower, and you want to go to the great museum, the Louvre Museum. We did, except it was about to close, and so we said, well, what are we going to do? So we took off running through the Louvre to go see the Mona Lisa. So we're running hall after hall passing the greatest artifacts in Western civilization, just one after another, and we finally get up and we're out of breath and the guards are coming to shut the thing down, and we look and we say, yeah, that's her alright, and we head back out. And you know, sometimes I've got to tell you, I feel like that when I am going through the Bible because there are so many treasures there for you. And this morning is no different as we come to chapter 3 of the Book of Romans. And I'll be reading only a portion of that chapter, but let me set the stage for you in Romans chapter 3. There has been an indictment of the Gentiles. They didn't know they said, Paul shows their still guilty before God. And then Paul levels an indictment against the Hebrews who were there because they said, well, we had the law and the prophets. Isn't that an advantage to us? Paul will go on to teach that there is an advantage, but in this case the advantage hurt them because they were disobedient. So the fact they didn't know, didn't get you off the hook, the fact that you knew and doubled your trouble. And so Paul comes to the place where he says in verse 9 of chapter 3, what then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin. All are under sin, and we're going to explore what that means. All. And so I want to bring a message for today that I'm calling for sinners only. I am learning a lot from what I consider to be one of the deepest, most meaningful philosophical television shows that has ever existed. The Beverly Hillbillies. But in one episode, Granny, desires to market her special mountain remedy to her new Beverly Hills sophisticated neighbors. It gets into the hands of Mrs. Driesdale, who is the banker's wife. And it ends up that she really likes the remedy a whole lot because the alcohol content is pretty high, I think. But at the very end of the show, we learned that the remedy was really worse than the disease. And that reminds me of the situation that we've got here. The Apostle Paul is turning to the Gentile world and to the Jewish world, and he's pointing out their religions, their philosophy, all of which are seeking to remedy the distance between themselves and the God that they know exists, because either he has been revealed through special revelation, through the law and the prophets, in the case of the Jews, or he has been revealed through general revelation in the heavens and the law written on their hearts in the case of the Gentiles. Paul says that they're all guilty, the remedy is worse than the disease. You know, that's the case that I've found in my own life. But I've tried to remedy things my ways in use manipulation or force or my supposed intellect or experience to get rid of the most basic, painful problems in my life, it has always ended up a disaster. Now this is what Romans is saying about the human condition. Romans gives in fact a divine remedy for the ills that we face. It's a remedy that works. It begins quite frankly with simply this. Sin is a power that we are all under, and it is a power that kills. That's number one. Sin is a power that kills. The diagnosis begins with the diagnosis of the disease itself, and it says something about sin. Here's two things it says about sin. First of all, sin is universal. Paul uses the word all. In fact, listen, as Paul quotes from Isaiah, he says, none is righteous. No, not one. No one understands. No one seeks for God. Paul really didn't support a seeker friendly sort of situation because he said there are no seekers. No one seeking God. Now you say, well Paul's talking about the Jews and the Gentiles at the Church of Rome. Well, Paul actually says, in verse 19 that the whole world is held accountable to God. But someone says, I watched a PBS special, and there was an anthropologist there, an archaeologist, and they found a civilization previously undiscovered, and it was pristine and it was beautiful. In fact, the people who went, you say, did everything they could not to infect that civilization with their Western ideas. Okay, but the Bible says that they're not in a pristine situation. They're in sin. More than that, the Bible says that not only is sin universal, but sin is absolutely total. Paul says, no one understands. Verse 11, not to tell a Greek that you can't understand. To tell a Hebrew that you can't understand is an affront to their sense of dignity and their pride. They valued their learning, and certainly their contributions in law and in government were unsurpassed. Paul says you just don't understand, and that is the condition of the world. You see, sin is not only universal, and that we're all affected by it. And we are all, in fact, as Paul says under it, and what does that mean? It means sin is a power. It is a power that is killing you. It is like a vice grip of Satan that is just tightening, and tightening, and no philosophy, and no religious ritual can stop the tightening. Paul says, you are under the power of the sin, and it's total. It is infected, you're very reasoning, so that your philosophies all begin with the wrong premise. Your understanding of your religion is infected, a gash, in a spaceship, and we know what that means. If it's not fixed, but we know that what happened to Colombia with a gash and up in space. But what I want to tell you this morning is that the Bible is saying that there is a gash in our souls, and it is a sin that kills. And unless that gash is remitted, then you will go through life. And enter as a spaceship would enter an atmosphere. You will enter the troubles and challenges of life with a gash in your soul, and the hot plasma of pain in this world will continue to enter your life unless it is remitted. And unless it is remitted, you will go with that gash into eternity. Now Paul makes it quite clear that sin is something that kills, but we want to understand also that Jesus is the power that cures. He focuses in verses 21 through 25, on what I call a couple of things, what I call power, or rather position and power. The first is position. The righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, though the law on the prophets bear witness to it. He is saying the Old Testament was focused in this. There is absolute unity in the message of God and the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, absolute unity of message. The Old Covenant bore witness to it, the law on the prophets bore witness that you cannot have a righteousness before God unless God himself provides that righteousness. The Old Testament is a New Testament concealed, the New Testament, the Old Testament revealed. And the revelation is that Jesus Christ is the righteousness, and when you have faith in Him you have a position with God where you possess the righteousness of Christ. And I love the Heidelberg catechism that we affirmed the faith that we affirmed from it, where it says it's like you've never sinned because you have the obedience of Jesus Christ in your life. That's position. But Jesus is the power that cures two things we need to understand about that power, and the first his power is revealed in his blood. Look what it says here in verse 25, it speaks of Jesus Christ who redeems us. Listen, what is happening is redemption means to free, to liberate, to release, and that vice grip is not only cut off, but it's reverse, and the wound is healed. Through Jesus Christ, in verse 25, and God put forward as a propitiation by His blood to be received by faith, what is a propitiation? In the Old Testament, just one example, after the Battle of Jericho the people of God took on AI, and they had a tough time of it, in fact they got whipped. And the reason is it was revealed that there was sin in the camp that someone had disobeyed God, that in fact, Aiken, one of the soldiers had taken idols. And so something very terrible happens to Aiken and his old clan. He is brought out, and he was stoned, and it says they burned them with fire, and stoned them with stones, and they raised over him a great heap of stones that remains to this day. Joshua 726, then the Lord turned from his burning anger. There is a pervasive lie that is going on in some segments of the church today, and it is this that there is no wrath of God against sin, and that is not what the Bible teaches. In fact, the condition of the world today, the world apart from God in Jesus Christ is under the wrath of God. Now God's wrath is not something I can fully explain. It is not emotional the way I understand emotions, and anger the way I understand anger, but I know this he stands in his holiness apart from the sin in my life and in your life. And there must be a covering for it, a propitiation, and the Bible says he has provided that through his son, and not only through his son, but specifically through the blood of his son. Aiken's blood was required, and they went on, and there was victory at AI, because God's wrath was turned from Israel. And in your life and in mine, when we receive Jesus Christ by faith, what do we receive? One of the things that happens is the wrath of God, which was poured down upon his son, becomes a propitiation for my sins and yours. It becomes a covering for my sin. When I was a little boy, I remember standing in this little place called the Tabernacle near my house, and we would, there was sawdust on the floor, and I'd stand up on these pine benches to look over the heads of the adults to see this lady play in the accordion and this other lady play in the guitar. And our brother, of all the plumber by day, preacher by night, and he was leading us in singing, there is power, power, underworking power in the blood of the Lamb. And I looked around and I thought, that is a really weird song. I don't understand it. All this talk about the blood of the Lamb. But in the Bible, blood is life, and the precious blood, the sinless blood of Jesus Christ became a covering for your sin. Let me put it like this. It was a physician, 2006, his name is Dr. Weinstein from the Bronx, and he went on a mission trip in El Salvador, and this heart surgeon was working on this young man, Fernando, and 12 hours into the operation. The boy began to lose a lot of blood, and Dr. Weinstein knew that unless something happened immediately, the boy would die. The boy needed blood, but it was be negative. It was hard to get, but Dr. Weinstein had that type of blood. He removed himself from the operating table, went over in the corner, wiped his arm, drew the blood, and after a pop tart and a cold drink returned, and Fernando was saved by the blood of Dr. Weinstein. You see, what happens to us when we receive Jesus Christ by faith is we receive new life through his blood. And the great physician is here this morning. It is not only rare, it is unique only to one person in human history, and that is Jesus of Nazareth. His is the only blood that is acceptable in your God-made soul. Well, you received him today. Recently, I've been reading the sermons of Frederick Beakner, Presbyterian writer and preacher. One of his early sermons, he wrote about a story, a real-life story that he encountered, of a recovering alcoholic and an inner-city mission in Southside Chicago. And this guy was standing outside the inner-city mission, and he looked really awful, and he was holding up a white poster board, and he had written just with a permanent marker, Jesus saves. And Beakner says that as he looked at that, he was embarrassed. He went, because his religion was too respectable. I mean, he was an embarrassment to Christianity. How are people going to be able to respond with a guy like that holding up a sign like that? He said it would have been better if he would have written Christ's sades, at least that had a theological connotation, but saying Jesus's sades was a very personal thing as if this guy had some access to the Nazarene. But as he walked away, embarrassed by the scene, he began to realize in his heart that that was the perfect picture of faith in Jesus Christ, and of the religion call the way in the Bible, that he, in fact, was the recovering alcoholic. He, in fact, was the homeless man, and he thanked God that it was so personal that he could speak the name Jesus. As I read the sermon, I began to think also that in a real way Christianity is summed up in that picture, and Jesus is the one holding the sign, because you didn't expect God in a feed trough. You did not expect the prince of glory with no place to lay his head, and you could not imagine the king of kings and Lord of lords on a cross between two criminals with the message whoever comes to me. I will not reject this morning. In Romans chapter 3, we see that sin kills Jesus cures. We're sinners, we need a savior, and Christ Jesus by his blood is the way we're brought to God. How many here will walk away from that simple sign, because your religion is too respectable to be that simple. How many here will receive and even live your life under that banner? Jesus saves. We all fall desperately short of God's holy, perfectly righteous standards, and yet by his death and resurrection, Jesus Christ bridges this castle and reconciles sinners to God. O Mike Milton joins us in studio right now. Dr. Milton, the Jewish nation was under the law in biblical times. Is anyone under the law at this time in history? Well, again, that question has got to be impact, because law is one of those words, several words that in the Bible that have multiple meanings, the word law, whenever it's mentioned by Paul or Jesus or another biblical New Testament writer, but in particular, you've got to ask, is it one of three kinds of law? Is it ceremonial law, old covenant ceremonial law, signifying something that God was doing? Is it theocratic law that is the law that God gave to Israel when God governed a nation of Israel, which no longer exists, a nation that was responsible directly to God? There was no king. This is pre-divided and pre-soul. Is it theocratic law, or is it, in fact, moral law and moral law continues? And we are not under ceremonial law. It's been fulfilled in Jesus Christ. We're not under theocratic law because the theocracy no longer exists. We are under a moral law, and that moral law to do what God requires us to do morally requires us to turn to the Lord Jesus Christ, who fulfilled not only ceremonial and theocratic, but he fulfills the moral law. He fulfills what God requires, and so when we receive the righteousness of Jesus Christ, we then are able to go and to follow God's law. So we're certainly under the moral law. Every human being is. God didn't give the tink amendments for nothing. All of us are to follow God. We just can't do it without the power of the gospel until it begins with being saved by God through Jesus Christ and then following the Lord. But we're not under ceremonial, not under theocratic. We are under the continuing moral law, which requires us to turn to Christ and the gospel. Well, thank you, Dr. Milton. If you like an audio copy of today's message, be sure to call or write and ask for a message for sinners only. At right to a set, Faith for Living, 554 McCauley Avenue, Chattanooga, Tennessee, 37402, or call us at 423-648-79914. That's 423-648-79914. You can also hear today's teaching on our website at faithforliving.net. This program is also available for downloading onto your iPod through iTunes.com. Faith for Living with Mike Milton is an outreach ministry of first Presbyterian church of Chattanooga, with a passion for God's word, a heart for God's world, and a commitment to God's grace. Our mission is to gather and grow strong disciples of Christ, to be sent forth, to make new disciples. To learn more about the ministry, visit us on the web at faithforliving.net or call 423-267-1206. That's 423-267-1206. Now until next time, on behalf of Mike Milton and first Presbyterian church of Chattanooga, may you grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, with a living Faith and of Faith for Living. I'm Dan Parker, and this has been a presentation of first Presbyterian church of Chattanooga.