The Gospel of God’s Power and Righteousness

QUOTES FOR REFLECTION

“Christ pervades all Scripture, as salt all waters of the sea, as light the brightest day, as fragrance the garden of choice flowers.”

~Henry Law (1797-1884), Cambridge-educated Dean of Gloucester in Christ is All

“The righteousness of God is God’s righteous initiative in putting sinners right with himself, by bestowing on them a righteousness which is not their own but his. The righteousness of God is God’s just justification of the unjust, his righteous way of pronouncing the unrighteous righteous, in which he both demonstrates his righteousness and gives His righteousness to us.” 

~John Stott (1921-2011), British Anglican pastor and theologian

“The righteousness of God is not that by which God is righteous but that with which he clothes man when he justifies the ungodly”

~ Augustine (354-430), North African church leader, explaining Paul’s understanding of “righteousness” in the Letter to Romans (A Treatise on the Spirit and the Letter)

“God allowed his Son to suffer as if a condemned sinner, so that we might be delivered from the penalty of our sins. This is God’s righteousness, that we are not justified by works…but by grace, in which case all our sin is removed.”

~John Chrysostom (c. 347-407), Homilies on the Epistles of Paul to the Corinthians

“He Himself took on Him the burden of our iniquities, He gave His own Son as a ransom for us, the holy One for transgressors, the blameless One for the wicked, the righteous One for the unrighteous, the incorruptible One for the corruptible, the immortal One for them that are mortal. For what other thing was capable of covering our sins than His righteousness? By what other one was it possible that we, the wicked and ungodly, could be justified, than by the only Son of God? O sweet exchange! O unsearchable operation! O benefits surpassing all expectation! that the wickedness of many should be hid in a single righteous One, and that the righteousness of One should justify many transgressors!”

~The Epistle to Diognetus (c. 150AD) 9:2-5.

“The operation of the Church is entirely set up for the sinner; which creates much misunderstanding among the smug.”

“Don’t expect faith to clear things up for you. It is trust, not certainty.”

~Flannery O’Connor (1925-1964), American author

SERMON PASSAGE

Romans 1:14-17 (ESV)

Romans 1

14 I am under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish. 15 So I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome.

16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”

Romans 3

21 But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— 22 the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, 25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. 26 It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Romans 4

5 And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.