Thank you, Mark, for leading us this morning. We appreciate that. Good morning to everyone. It was a gorgeous morning this morning, a little bit chilly to start on the farm. I was riding a mule down the road to do chores there, and boy, I should have put on a sweatshirt. So it's kind of nice to feel the fall air, especially after all this heat and humidity.

On the last Sunday of each month, we celebrate the Lord's Supper. Jesus has given us two ordinances in the church to observe: baptism and communion. He commanded that we remember his death, his burial, and his resurrection often through the ordinance of communion until he comes. The purpose of this is to remember, to proclaim, to appreciate, and give thanks for what Jesus accomplished at the cross.

Now, for the last several months, we have been working through the book of Romans in our communion services. We are in this first section of this great epistle; chapter 1:18 to 3:20 is a section where Paul is writing concerning the condemnation of all men. The Bible clearly teaches the universal sinful condition of men. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. God has examined mankind and found each and every one a sinner, by nature in Adam and by practice in each one's life. Romans 3 tells us there's no one righteous, no, not one. All, like sheep, have gone astray. 

This is crucial. This is vital, foundational truth for us to understand, that every man born in Adam is a sinner in need of a Savior. Our text today, at the end of chapter 2, is going to explain, expose, really, the fallacy of religion: a system of works and laws and rites and rituals meant to save us, to make up for our sin by doing good. This works-righteous, law-centered plan of man to save himself is common to all religions in our world. Perhaps the premier example of this was the Jew of Paul's day. Just as Saul of Tarsus had once been, the Jew to whom Paul writes in this chapter was trusting in three things to get him to heaven.

One was his heritage, his tradition or lineage. He thought that he was right with God simply by being a physical descendant of Abraham. Second was the law. He believed that because he possessed and had been given the law of God, he was in the covenant justified before God. Third was his circumcision, salvation by sacrament, by surgery in this case. He believed that this ritual, this rite, this identification with the nation saved him from the wrath of God. The rabbis even taught that Abraham would stand at the gates of hell and not let one Jew in.

The purpose of this passage of Paul's writing in Romans 2 is to systematically dismantle each of the three legs of this stool on which the Jew took his stand, in which he trusted for his eternity. Now, I just want to comment before we begin our study that nothing has really changed. For those who are religious, these are the very things that men are trusting in today. They're trusting in their works. They're trusting in the law. They're trusting in their association or heritage, lineage in some system. 

I remember a man telling me one time, “My grandpa was a Seventh-day Adventist, and my dad was a Seventh-day Adventist. It's good enough for me.” They are so often trusting in a sacrament, or religious rite, or ritual, such as baptism, as in so many Protestant churches. My friends, this faith is futile. It's empty. None of these things can save. Men get very upset when you challenge these ideas, when you expose their futility. The Jews of Paul's day became incensed to the point of picking up stones and killing the messenger that brought the good news of the gospel, such as in Stephen's case.

But I want you to think about something as you consider the difficulty of confronting religion, false doctrine, and a false way to heaven concerning self-righteousness and law keeping as a means of salvation. Let me ask you a question. Was Paul insensitive to write these things? Was he being hateful and intolerant? Was it a mean and nasty thing to expose the lies on which these people were depending for their eternity? No. It was a loving, gracious thing to tell the truth, to help them understand their false security, to give them the good news message of salvation through faith alone in Christ alone.

And it's the same today, my friends. It's difficult to tell someone these truths, to show them their sin and the futility of a religious system. But it's necessary, for if a man does not know he is sick, he will not seek a cure. Most men today and in Paul's time did not know that they were deathly ill, in danger of eternal hell in the lake of fire. What more loving thing can we do than to tell the truth and lead them to faith in the only Savior, Jesus Christ, to help them find true peace, true security, assurance of salvation—not in themselves, not in their religion, but through faith in Jesus.

Let's look at our text together. Romans 2:12, please, for our study this morning. We're going to read down to the end of the chapter.

Romans 2:12, "For as many as have sinned without law will also perish without law. And as many as have sinned in the law will be judged by the law. For not the hearers of the law are just in the sight of God, but doers of the law will be justified. For when Gentiles who do not have the law by nature do the things in the law, these, although not having the law, are a law to themselves, who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them in the day when God will judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel."

"Indeed, you are called a Jew, and rest on the law, and make your boast in God, and know his will, and approve the things that are excellent being instructed out of the law, and are confident that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, having the form of knowledge and truth in the law. You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? You who say do not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who make your boast in the law, do you dishonor God through breaking the law? For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you, as it is written."

"For circumcision is indeed profitable if you keep the law. But if you are a breaker of the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision. Therefore, if an uncircumcised man keeps the righteous requirements of the law, will not his uncircumcision be counted as circumcision? And will not the physically uncircumcised, if he fulfills the law, judge you who, even with your written code and circumcision, are a transgressor of the law? For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh, but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit, not in the letter, whose praise is not from men, but from God."

I've given you three points on your outline this morning. First, we're going to look at sin and law. Second, according to my gospel. And third, circumcision of the heart.

The Jew to whom Paul writes rested in the law of God. He believed that he had favor with God because he had the knowledge that he possessed; he had the form of the law. Verse 17 in our text again says, "Indeed, you are called a Jew and rest on the law and make your boast in God and know his will, and approve the things that are excellent being instructed out of the law." They thought that because they had the law, that they taught the law, esteemed the law, and that they bound men with it, that God was pleased with them. 

But what they did not understand was that the standard of the law is not to have it. It's not even to try to keep it. The standard is perfection. One must keep the law perfectly in order to be justified by it. We see this so clearly in the greatest law sermon ever preached, the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7. This passage is so often misunderstood; it's often misapplied in an attempt to make application for the new covenant believer in Christ. 

The sermon that Jesus gave was identical to the purpose of what Paul writes here in Romans 2. It was preached to a group of legalistic Jews who were seeking to establish their own righteousness through keeping the law. And the purpose of the sermon, of the law in general, is not for man to keep to establish his own righteousness, but it's meant to show how sinful man is and how far short he falls of God's righteousness. 

Jesus starts the sermon with what we call the Beatitudes, blessings. These verses are often taught as a standard for us to aspire to. Blessed are the merciful, for they will obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, and so on. Let me ask you, how merciful do I have to be to obtain mercy? How pure in heart must I be to be blessed? Jesus explains that he came not to destroy, but to fulfill the law. 

He came to fulfill the law. This list of Beatitudes can only be lived by one person, Jesus Christ. Because the standard is not to try: it is to do. In verse 19, Jesus says, "Whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments is least in the kingdom of God." If you break one little commandment, commit one little sin, you are least. He summarizes his message in verse 20. Listen to these words and think about how they would pierce the soul of the religious Jew to whom he spoke: "For I say to you that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven."

What if I were to say, with authority and truth, to my Roman Catholic aunt or sister or cousin, "You must be more righteous, you must be a better person than the Pope or Mother Teresa to get into heaven?" That would be a true statement, by the way. That's what Jesus is saying to these Jewish people sitting on this hillside. He's preaching these words in order to show them that they are not keeping the law, that they are not righteous, and they're in deep trouble. 

He's showing them as he did with the rich young ruler that the law is not merely an outward superficial requirement. "I didn't kill anybody, right?" But it searches the depth of the soul in motive as well as action. "You have heard it said of old," Jesus says, "the rabbis taught you that you shall not commit adultery, but I say to you that if you've lusted after a woman, you've committed adultery with her in your heart. You're just as guilty." 

Unless we have any doubt about what Jesus is saying in Matthew five and on through the entire sermon, listen to verse 48. "Therefore, you shall be perfect just as your Father in heaven is perfect." My friends, hear this stunning statement. The standard to enter God's heaven is this: absolute perfection, complete and total righteousness. I love the clarity with which Jesus ends his law sermon, leaving the religious Jew exposed, hopeless before the law of a holy and righteous judge.

Turn over to Matthew seven with me at the end of the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 7:21. "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father in heaven." What is the will of the Father in heaven? Jesus tells us in John 6 to believe on the one whom he sent. 

Verse 22, "Many will say to me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name? Have we not cast out demons in your name and done many wonders in your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you. Depart from me, you who practice lawlessness.'" 

And now Jesus ends his sermon with this great message. What are his sayings? "Do not lust, do not be angry in your heart, be perfect as God is perfect." Look at verse 24. "Therefore, whoever hears these sayings of mine and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain descended, the floods came, the winds blew and beat on that house and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock. But everyone who hears these sayings of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain descended, the floods came, the winds blew and beat on that house and it fell, and great was its fall."

What is Jesus saying? What is his message? His message is this: you are looking to the law. You're trying to justify yourself by this massive system you have built on religion and works and rites and rituals. But here's the truth: you do not keep the law of God. You do not do these sayings of mine. You have built your house on the sand, and when the righteous judge comes, when the God who judges according to truth opens his eyes to you, when the truth opens the books, you will be found wanting. Because the truth is that every man falls short of the righteousness of God. 

And that is the message that the Jew listening to that sermon was to walk away with: "I built my house on the sand. I'm in trouble. I'm a sinner. I need a Savior." This is the purpose of the law. You might say, "Well, I'm not sure about that. What is the purpose of the law?" Paul says it was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come, to whom the promise was made. 

Verse 21, "Is the law then against the promises of God? Certainly not." Listen to this. "For if there had been a law given which could have given life, truly righteousness would have been by the law. But the scripture has confined all under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe." But before faith came, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed. Therefore, the law was our tutor, our schoolmaster, our disciplinarian, to bring us to Christ, in order to be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we're no longer under a tutor.

Romans 4:14 says, "For if those who are of the law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise of no effect, because the law brings about wrath; for where there is no law, there is no transgression." My brothers and sisters, the problem for the Jews is made abundantly clear in Paul's words at the end of Romans 9. Turn over to Romans 9 with me, please. These are important truths for us to cement in our minds, to understand clearly, largely for the purpose of witness.

Romans 9:30. "What shall we say then? That Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained to righteousness." Remember, Jesus said you have to be righteous; you have to be perfect to get into heaven. Gentiles weren't pursuing righteousness through the law; they didn't have the law. Paul says they weren't pursuing it, but they found it. How did they find it? The righteousness of faith. 

"But Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness, why? Because they did not seek it by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone. As it is written, 'Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whoever believes on him will not be put to shame.' Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved, for I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge." Verse 3 is so important. "For they being ignorant of God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own righteousness have not submitted to the righteousness of God, for Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes."

This is equally true for the religious man today—the mainline Protestant, the Roman Catholic, any and all who would seek to establish his own righteousness through the law and not choose to submit to the righteousness of God through faith. Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. The law cannot save for one very clear and important reason: man cannot keep it.

In our text in verse 21, he says, "You therefore who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? You who say do not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who make your boast in the law, do you dishonor God through breaking the law?" And then he says, "For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you."

As we've already seen in several texts this morning, every man is a sinner. Every man falls short of keeping the law of God, of doing the sayings of Christ, of being perfect as God is perfect. Therefore, every man deserves the penalty of sin, which is death—eternal death in the lake of fire. James 2:10 says, "For whoever shall keep the whole law and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all." 

Ponder that statement of truth from James. Paul has already said in Romans 2 that there's no partiality with God, that God judges according to truth. What is the truth? The truth is that I, as every man born in Adam, am a sinner. The law was added—there's no law from Adam until Moses. The law was added; the law was given not to help me with that sin, but rather to expose that sin. To bring condemnation. To bring death to me. To show me my dead and sinful condition and my need for a Savior.

Romans 5:12 says, "Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world and death through sin, thus death spread to all men because all sinned." For until the law, sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam who is a type of Him who is to come. He says that even though there was no law and men weren't transgressing the law, they still died. Why? Because they were in Adam. 

Romans 5:15, "The free gift's not like the offense. For if by the one man's offense many died, much more the grace of God and the gift of the grace of the one man Jesus Christ abounded to many." In verse 19 it says, "For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one man's obedience many will be made righteous." This is good news, my friends. We see the problem made clear, and we see God's solution for the sinner in Adam. The fact is that we are condemned in Adam. We are born sinners by nature because of our father in Adam.

You know, twice in my life, I’ve been at war with Iraq. Why was I at war with Iraq? I remember in college, it was in 1990, '91. We went to war with Iraq. Why was I at war with Iraq? Because my federal head—the President of the United States and the Congress, or however that worked out—declared war on Iraq. And I, by nature of being a U.S. citizen, was at war. Adam sinned in the garden, my federal head. What the Scriptures say is that every man born in Adam is born a sinner, is condemned in Adam.

The text says we were made sinners. We were condemned that death reigned, even when there was no law in the sons of Adam. Our condemnation came by the one act of one man in the garden. Now, religion teaches us that the reason we are condemned, the reason we are bad people, that God will send us to hell, is because we do bad. And we do bad, and by doing bad, we eventually become bad. 

So what's their answer? They get the problem wrong, so they can't get the solution right. The remedy in religion is to do good and do good and do good until we become good. But here's the problem. The clear truth of Romans 5 and chapter 2 that we're studying this morning is not that we do bad; the problem is that we are bad. All men are made sinners in Adam. 

So then the Biblical solution is not an outward confirmation to some law which no man can accomplish anyway, but the solution is to change who we are on the inside: regeneration, new birth, recreation. Paul calls it here “circumcision of the heart.” Remember, the problem was on the inside. What did God do? He went in there with His scalpel and He cut out the heart of stone, and He put in a heart of flesh. This was promised all the way back in Ezekiel chapter 36. 

He said, "I will sprinkle clean water on you; you shall be clean. I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and all your idols. I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you." Our dead spirit is quickened, made alive, a new spirit. "I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh, give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them." 

My friends, this promise from Ezekiel is fulfilled in Christ. Ultimately, it will be fulfilled in the nation Israel, to whom the promise was made. But we see a pre-fulfillment in the church age. We are blessed out of the covenant made with Israel. The promises of the new covenant are in effect today in the church age— the new covenant in His blood. 

And my friends, this means so much to us. Because the essence of it is that we have been released from law, sin, and death. We have been conveyed into the new kingdom, given new life, and now live under grace, righteousness, and life. Romans 6 tells us we died to sin, the controlling power of indwelling sin. 

Romans 7 tells us we died to the law, what we were held by, we've been released from, and now we serve in the newness of the Spirit. And Romans 8 tells us that we now live by the Spirit, and not by the letter. I want you to look at one more passage before we close. Romans 8:1-4. Such a tremendous passage. Listen to this promise: "Romans 8:1, There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death." 

"For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh. On account of sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit."

The lost man in Adam, as we see in Romans 7, the legalistic Pharisee that Paul was, was dominated, controlled by, in bondage to the sin that dwelled in him. Look at Romans 7:23, what does he say about himself? "I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members." And then he says, "Who will deliver me from this?" Where can I find deliverance from this sin in me? 

Romans 8:2. "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death." What the law could not do because of the power of indwelling sin in the flesh, God did. That's the good news, my friends. God did it. Jesus came and dealt with sin where sin dwelt in the flesh, and He gained victory over sin and death and hell. He fulfilled the law. 

And because of regeneration, because of circumcision of the heart, because of His life in us, we now have victory over sin. We have victory over death and hell in our union with Him in His death, burial, and resurrection. Romans 13 tells us that the righteous requirement of the law, the fulfillment of the law is love, agape love, self-sacrificial love. This is the command of the new covenant: believe Jesus and love one another. 

What can we do in Christ that we could not do in Adam? Love. And by this they will know that we are His disciples, that we have love for one another. Our brothers and sisters, we have so much more in Christ. We are blessed beyond description because of His indescribable gift of grace, and that is why we have a life, we live a life of thankfulness in service to our Lord, taking this glorious gospel message to the world. 

And my friends, that's why we come here together this morning: to give thanks, to praise, to worship, to remember, and to proclaim His death until He comes. Let's close in prayer.

Father, we're so thankful for Your word, Your clear word. Over and over and over throughout the scriptures, You give us this same good news message and clear statements about the world, about religion, about ourselves, about who You are, and about the salvation that You provide in Christ. Thank You for Jesus. Thank You for what He did on the cross. Thank You that You're our Father through faith in Him. In His name we pray, amen.