Our scripture reading for this morning's sermon comes to us from Romans chapter 1, verses 16 and 17. But what I'd like for us to do is just read from the beginning of the chapter so that we have a greater sense of the context of the passage for this morning's message. So if you would, open your Bibles to Romans chapter 1 so that we can read from Romans 1.1 to Romans 1.17. Romans 1.1 through Romans 1.17. So let's give attention to the reading of God's Word. Romans chapter 1 beginning in verse 1. Hear now the word of the Lord. Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures concerning his son who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the son of God in power according to the spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ. To all those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world. For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I mention you always in my prayers, asking that somehow by God's will I may now at last succeed in coming to you. For I long to see you that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you, that is, that we may be mutually encouraged by each other's faith, both yours and mine. I want you to know, brothers, that I have often intended to come to you, but thus far have been prevented, in order that I may reap some harvest among you as well as among the rest of the Gentiles. I am under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish, so I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome. 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. For in it, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith. As it is written, the righteous shall live by faith. May God add his blessing to this reading from his holy and inspired word. We may not realize it when we read the letters of the Apostle Paul, since we're reading them from the New Testament, that for the Apostle Paul, his Bible was the Old Testament. If you ask Paul, Paul, turn in your Bible to your favorite passage. Of course, he would have to unroll the large scroll. He wouldn't be able to just hold it open in his hand. Or he would perhaps recite it from memory. It would be a passage from the Old Testament. Paul frequently, and in a number of different places throughout his epistles, regularly quotes the Old Testament to make his point. Not only was he doing so because he wanted to be able to make a connection to his Jewish audience, people who were formerly Jews who had become Christians, but also because he wanted to bring the authoritative, prophetic, and holy word of God to bear in his own apostolic ministry. Well, as much as that is true, we also find that here in our two brief verses from Romans chapter 1, verses 16 and 17. Because at the conclusion of verse 17, Paul quotes from the prophet Habakkuk. He quotes Habakkuk 2.4, the righteous shall live by faith. I think it's important that we understand the background of this passage, because in understanding the background where Paul gets this passage from the prophet Habakkuk, I think it gives us a fuller picture of why Paul sets forth these two verses as the thesis statement of the entire epistle. Perhaps you remember from your English high school days when you had to write that thesis paper. I remember mine vividly. I stayed up late. I left it to the last minute, but the last minute is just as good as the first, right? Stayed up to the last minute, wrote that paper on Julius Caesar, turned it in after having been up until four o'clock in the morning and was greatly discouraged to have failed the paper. That's why I'll never forget it as long as I live. But see, Paul's letter is not like my horrible paper on Julius Caesar. Paul's letter, he sets forth the main point of the whole epistle here in verses 16 and 17. But why is it, why is it that Paul quotes Habakkuk 2.4? And how is this verse integral to the rest of the entire epistle to the Roman church? Well, you see, Habakkuk was a prophet of God, as we all know, seeing his name there in the Old Testament, and with one of those books given to his name. He was a man who was deeply concerned about the importance and the necessity of godliness. Holiness of righteousness among God's people. But when he looked out upon the land of Judah, Israel had already been carried off into exile. When he looked out upon the land, he didn't see righteousness, holiness, and godliness. He saw violence, wickedness, idolatry. Imagine, if you will, as we look out upon our own land, when you see the wickedness that is so widespread. Well, this cut Habakkuk to the core. And so he pleaded, he cried out, he interceded on behalf of Judah, and he asked the Lord to intercede in a miraculous way. And God answered Habakkuk's prayers. But perhaps, and basically in a way that Habakkuk did not expect, the Lord answered his prayer and he said, yes, I see the wickedness, I see the violence, I see the idolatry, and so I'm going to raise up the Babylonians. And the Babylonians are going to come in, and they're going to destroy your land. They're going to destroy the temple, and they're going to carry you away into exile. If you ever want to read an angry man in the Bible, Read Habakkuk. He was upset. He was confused. Oh Lord, how on earth can you allow such a wicked nation, these pagan Gentiles, to carry us away into exile, to destroy your land and to sweep away the righteous with the wicked? Habakkuk was well aware of the wickedness of his own people but he was even more aware of the wickedness of the Gentile Babylonians. He was perplexed and he cried out to the Lord and asked him, Why? How could you do such a thing? How could you do such a thing? And the Lord answered him graciously. See, God was under no obligation to answer his prophet and in a sense I think it's perhaps inappropriate for the prophet to question the righteousness of the Creator. As Paul might say, who are you, O man, to question God? God nevertheless was kind to him and merciful to him and answered and gave him the answer that Paul gives to us here. Habakkuk, the righteous shall live by faith. The righteous shall live by faith. Now, at first glance, we might think, and perhaps maybe even Habakkuk, you know, had to think about it for a while. Lord, how does this answer, it's such a simple statement, how does this answer assuage my conscience? How does it help me in the face of such, you know, an enormous injustice, at least as it appears to my sin-fallen eyes? You see, that answer, the righteous shall live by faith, drives us even further back to an older passage from the Old Testament. Drives us back, perhaps you've even thought of it already, to God's dealings with Abraham. He believed the Lord and he counted it to him as righteousness. Remember Genesis 15, 6? And in fact, Abraham's circumstances were very similar to Habakkuk's circumstances. Abraham was told by God in Genesis 12 Abraham I'm going to be your God I'm going to give you many offspring my blessing shall extend through you to all of the nations Abraham didn't have any offspring how could this blessing extend throughout all the nations if Abraham had no one through whom these blessings could be passed on and so god came again to abraham and abraham uh you know told him oh lord i don't have an heir i only have eliezer of damascus the one to whom i shall give all of my possessions and so god took him outside and he said take a look at all the stars of the heavens and if you can number them that's how many offspring you shall have now do you see the similarities between abraham's circumstance and Habakkuk's circumstance both were facing the absence, the apparent absence of God's covenant faithfulness. Habakkuk wondered, Lord, how can you sweep away the righteous? What about your covenant promises? Abraham looked out and he saw the stars, but as many stars as he saw, he still looked and he knew that he didn't have an heir. There was an apparent absence of God's faithfulness. Yet, what did Abraham do? He believed the Lord. He took the Lord at his word. And because he took the word of the Lord, the Lord counted him righteous. As Paul later on says in Romans and elsewhere in Galatians, he accredited Abraham with that status of righteousness. That in terms of the law of God, Abraham was not merely innocent, but that rather he was righteous. God looked upon him as if he had completely fulfilled every single obligation of the law. I think the same can be said for Habakkuk. Habakkuk looked out upon his own bleak circumstances, the absence or the apparent absence of God's covenant faithfulness, and was nevertheless reminded of that justifying faith, the righteous shall live by faith. And that is the hope to which God pointed Habakkuk and that is the hope to which Paul points us. And this is why it is so crucial that we understand that Old Testament background to these few words that Paul quotes so that we ourselves can understand both the power of the Gospel, that it's the power of God unto salvation, the scope of the Gospel, that it is first for the Jew and then for the Greek, as well as the nature of the Gospel, that it is by faith alone in Christ. So the power, the scope, and the nature of the Gospel. Now, given the Old Testament background, that we've had before us here, hopefully we're in a better position to understand the power of the Gospel. I think for far too many people, they look in upon the church and all they see is somebody in a suit perhaps delivering what they believe are merely good platitudes, maybe some good advice, maybe some kind words. They look in upon the church and they look at the preaching of the Gospel and they think it's merely empty talk. It was Karl Marx who famously said that religion is the sigh of an oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, the soul of a soulless condition. It is the opium of the people. You see, Marx looked in on the church and he said, it's just simply a drug. What do you mean? Well, when people had hunger pains in their bellies, when they were freezing from the cold, when they were suffering from great illnesses, when they were perhaps being persecuted for one reason or another, Marx's idea was, tell them about utopia. Tell them about heaven, that one day things will get better. Just wait, one more day, things will get better. When we all get to that great pie in the sky and the sweet by and by, we'll all be better. There will be no more tears, there will be no more suffering. It's not yet, it'll be one day in the future. And so Marx believed with that kind of pie in the sky talking, those kinds of words that people would be pacified and that they would go about their own lives somewhat at least temporarily forgetting about the hunger pains that they felt, the suffering that they were enduring, the illnesses that they had, because, well, things are horrible now, but yeah, one day it will improve. That's what the world sees when it looks into the church. But, beloved, this was not at all the way that Paul understood the gospel. Paul was convinced at a number of levels that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. The power of God unto salvation. The gospel of Jesus Christ raises the dead to life. It was C.S. Lewis who once said that just because a miracle occurs slowly does not mean that it is not a miracle. Just because a miracle occurs slowly does not mean that it is not a miracle. Think, for example, about the miracle of life. How many people are desperate for a child and are unable to conceive? There is when someone can truly appreciate the miracle of life. Something, for the most part, essentially, that man is unable to reproduce, to produce, say, in a laboratory. It's a miracle. Well, beloved, such is the nature of our salvation. We can certainly look at Lazarus and say, wow, that's a miracle. Christ called to him and he was raised from death to life in an instant. Some of my favorite words in the King James Bible. Remove the rock, but oh Lord, he stinketh, for he has been in the tomb for three days. But here, Lazarus is raised from death to life. Well, beloved, such is the nature of your own resurrection. when God called you out of darkness into light. He raised you according to what Paul says is your inner man. And though it may transpire over a long period of time that it culminates in your resurrection from the dead on the last day, it is just as miraculous as the resurrection of Lazarus. You see, in the power of the Gospel, God unleashes the same power that He did in the creation of worlds. In the very sin-fallen creation around us that we see, that even in spite of its sin-fallen nature, it is still beautiful and awe-inspiring. Everything that you see around us came about as a result of God speaking His Word, which means, beloved, that same power that brought this world into existence is the same power that raises you from death to life. As Paul says, for God who said, let light shine out of darkness, has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Beloved Paul knew the power of the gospel. He knew that it was the power unto salvation, that it has the power to transform life. Indeed, Paul himself, you could say, was exhibit A. He was a man who was breathing anger and hatred and murderous thoughts against the church of Jesus Christ. And in an instant, he was changed. He was raised from death to life. And the lion that he was, he became, if you will, a ferocious lamb willing to lay his life down for the sheep because Christ, through the power of the Gospel, had transformed the Apostle Paul into his own glorious image. Beloved, this is why Paul was unashamed of the Gospel. It is the power of God unto salvation. But as powerful as the Gospel is, the way that God has designed things is that we have to believe in Christ. We have to have faith in Him. And so this means that no one can be saved apart from faith. And this is one of the steady drumbeats that Paul pounds throughout his epistle. The gospel is most certainly the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes. And when Paul says, for everyone who believes, he brings in, if you will, the scope of the Gospel. The Gospel has power. It is the power of God unto salvation. But the scope of the Gospel, in this sense, is universal. For it is the power of God unto salvation for everyone who believes. Whether it was Abraham's Amen to God's promise, Whether it was Habakkuk's faith in the midst of his own trials as he looked to the covenant promises that would ultimately be fulfilled in Christ or in Paul's emphasis here in his epistle, it is for everyone who believes, everyone who has faith. We're saved by faith, not by works, in what Christ has done on our behalf. But here is one of the amazing things about the nature of the gospel, which is why Paul was so passionate about it, is that it is for everyone who believes. God's mercy, beloved, is wide and it is deep and it has been dispensed universally through the preaching of the gospel unto every tribe and tongue and nation. Do you realize that there was a time in history when the sun used to set on the gospel? Why? Well, because the gospel was confined to one nation on earth. It was confined to Israel. And the sun would set upon it. But beloved, in the light of the revelation of Christ, the sun no longer sets upon the gospel. Because with the events of Pentecost and all of the nations that were present, There's a sense in which that curse from the Tower of Babel is being reversed and that people who are divided by tribe, tongue, and nation and divided by their languages are now being united in Christ in whom, according to Galatians 3.28, there is neither Jew, nor Greek, nor slave, nor free, nor male, nor female. We are all being united in Christ. And so this is why Paul says the gospel is for everyone who believes, but he does stipulate. He stipulates that it is first for the Jew and then for the Greek. If you remember from your Bibles, from your Old Testament, remember God first came to Abraham. And then he came to Israel and made the covenant with them at the foot of Sinai as those dark ominous clouds rested over the mountain. And Jesus did not descend from Gentile nations, but from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. This is why later in Paul's epistle he says to Israel, for along the patriarchs and from their race according to the flesh is the Christ who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen. But even though it goes to the Jew first, It is still dispensed to everyone who believes. Which I suspect means that most of us in here, being Gentiles, have been brought near by the blood of Christ. We who are aliens and strangers to the commonwealth of Israel, aliens to the covenant promises, have been brought near by the blood of Christ. What a tremendous blessing. We who were once on the outside are now on the inside. We who were not a people are now a people. We who were once dispersed and scattered, left to follow our own ways, have been brought together by the great shepherd of the sheep, who has laid down his life for us. And so, beloved, the power of the gospel, it is the power of God into salvation. The scope of the gospel, beloved, is universal. and that it is first for the Jew and then for the Greek, which means this, beloved, that Paul's words here are relevant for every single person that has ever lived, does live, or will ever live, whether Jew or Greek, whether Jew or Gentile. There is no one who can claim that Paul's message is irrelevant. There is no one who can claim, well, that's nice for you, so long as that makes you feel better. But that's not my truth. My truth is something else over here. Those words don't fly with Paul. Because it is for everyone who believes. This message is just as relevant for the believer as it is for the unbeliever. And it is the hope for believers, but it is also the needed message of salvation for the unbeliever. That the unbeliever needs to repent and look to Christ by faith. Because no one can claim they do not need Christ because all, as Paul says later on in his epistle, all people, Jew and Gentile alike, lie under God's condemnation for their sin. They lie under God's wrath. And so this is why Paul was so vehement as we even read earlier in the portion before verses 16 and 17 that Paul was so eager to preach the message of the gospel even to the Romans and as you see in the rest of Romans, to the ends of the earth. So the power of the gospel, it is God's power unto salvation. The scope of the gospel, it is universal. But what about the nature of the gospel? Well, Paul here in our two verses explains that in it, the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed. What does Paul mean when he says the righteousness of God is revealed? Well, Luther, when he first contemplated these verses and gave great thought to them, he believed that what Paul was talking about is he thought it was the righteousness and the holiness of God that was revealed in the Gospel. And this is why Luther said, Do I love God? I love God. Sometimes I hate Him. Because all Luther could see is this holy and righteous God and he thought, how can I, such a sinful person, have any hope of standing in the presence of this holy and righteous God? And in one sense, I think we can agree with Luther, not on the hating God part, that's not advisable at all, but we think we can agree with Luther in saying, well, yes, most certainly the gospel does reveal God's righteousness to his people, his holiness, Because it shows God's covenant faithfulness throughout the ages. I mean, if God made a promise and then didn't fulfill it, He wouldn't be righteous, now would He? I mean, there's only so often that you can ask somebody to do something and then if they don't keep their word, they renege on their promise, that you'll consider them trustworthy. So the Gospel most certainly reveals God's righteousness to all of His words, where Paul says elsewhere that in Christ all of the promises of God are yes and amen. But beloved, there is something more that is revealed here in the Gospel. Do you remember going back to Abraham? That when God made this covenant with Abraham and He said, so shall your offspring be, and Abraham believed God and God counted it to him as righteousness, that God had Abraham take a number of animals, cut them in half and lay them in parallel rows. The process that was going on there was that God was making a covenant with Abraham. The typical thing to do with that kind of a procedure was to cut the animals in half and for both parties, both sides of the agreement to walk between the severed animal halves and it was in effect to say if either of us break our word in this agreement then what has happened to these animals may it happen to me. And so God had Abraham cut those animals in half who walked through the animal halves but God alone. And not only did God alone walk between the animal halves but Abraham was asleep. That's about the strongest way that I can think of God saying, if I break my word, may the curse fall upon me. But if you, Abraham, break your word, may the curse fall upon me. So that in it, the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed because God has promised to our forefathers that He would bear the curse of the covenant for our own failures, for our own wickedness, for our own sins. But even more so than that, remember that Abraham believed and God counted it to him as righteousness. So that in the Gospel, that righteousness that God gives to His people by which he accounts them perfectly in conformity to God's law is given. That's a tremendous blessing. It's as if, it's as the Heidelberg Catechism in question 60 explains it. He says, how are thou righteous before God? And the answer says, only by a true faith in Jesus Christ, so that though my conscience accuse me that I have grossly transgressed all the commandments of God and kept none of them and I'm still inclined to all evil notwithstanding God without any merit of mine but only of mere grace grants and imputes to me the perfect satisfaction righteousness and holiness of Christ even so as if I had never had had nor committed any sin yea as if I had fully accomplished all that obedience which Christ has accomplished for me inasmuch as I embrace such a benefit with a believing heart. All of this, beloved, comes by faith. And faith alone. Do you notice in these two short verses how frequently Paul mentions faith or belief? Four times. It's the power of God unto salvation for everyone who believes. The righteous shall live by faith, for it is revealed from faith to faith. Paul is hammering faith, faith, faith. I can remember when I was in college, I had a fun job. I got to work retail security for a major retail chain, which meant I got to walk around in plain clothes, carry a radio and handcuffs. And for the most part, it was a lot of fun. But I can remember, it's the most frightened I've ever been in my entire life. Because we went out to arrest a rather tall individual. And he wasn't just tall, but he was muscle-bound. And we had information that he was armed. Which, why when you're 18 years old, you would go after an armed man without a gun, I don't know. We'll chalk it up to stupidity or foolishness, or maybe on a good day, bravery. But I can remember being so scared. I went out, I had several other of my co-workers with me, and as we had one of our guys with us, who it gave me great comfort to know that he was a green beret, black belt in judo, and that he once hurt his back because he was bench pressing 500 pounds. I thought, good, you take care of him, I'm going to watch. But even then, I've never been this scared in my life. You've ever heard, hopefully you've heard the phrase, maybe, scared stiff? I was scared stiff because there I stood and all of a sudden my back got so stiff I could hardly move. I was standing there and all I could think of is let's end this, let's end this. If we're going to do this, let's do it. Let's stop standing around talking. I was scared stiff. I could barely move. Beloved, I think that fear that I had is but a fraction of what our fear would be. standing before a righteous and holy God knowing that we are stained with guilt and with sin and with shame apart from Christ. I can think of no greater terror. Something that would instill the greatest fear in the most stout-hearted of people. On the other hand, beloved, I can think of no greater blessing than to be able to stand in the presence of a righteous and holy God knowing that there is no guilt, there is no shame, there is no condemnation because of what Christ has done for you and for what Christ has done for His church. That we stand righteous and holy in perfect conformity to the law because of what Christ has done for us and laying hold of that promise not by our works but by faith in Christ. Faith alone in Christ alone by God's grace alone. Such is the nature of the gospel. We no longer know God as our judge but only as our loving Father who has given to us Christ our older brother who has laid down his life on our behalf who has laid down his life for the prodigal who refused to come home and who stubbornly wallowed in the mire of sin. Beloved, this in a nutshell is why Paul was unashamed of the gospel because he knew of its power, that it was the power of God into salvation, because he knew of the extent of its scope, that it's universal, that it is relevant for the Jew and for the Greek, and because he knew of its nature, that it was by faith alone in Christ alone that these blessings are received. Which means this. Beloved, There is no greater pressing need in this world for you or for anyone else other than the need to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. That is our greatest need. If you were to list the greatest world's problems, hunger, starvation, pollution, you name it, whatever the case may be, corruption, the greatest problem that the human race has is sin. And that makes the gospel of Jesus Christ our greatest need. So as we read in the preparatory form, if you do not know the Lord Jesus Christ, call out to Him. Call out upon God for His mercy that He would grant to you faith and enable you to trust in Christ that you would receive those blessings that Paul has promised, those blessings that Habakkuk laid hold of, those blessings that Abraham received that God has so mercifully and bountifully poured out upon His people. But beloved, I hope you also see the importance, the relevance, and if you will, the great application that is found in the gospel of Jesus Christ. For not only does it give us that assurance of the hope of salvation so that we no longer have our sin before us, But, beloved, it also gives us the hope that we need in the face of life's challenges. I think so often we're ready to say, yes, O Lord, I'm ready to trust you with my eternal destiny, but I'm just not so sure about tomorrow. I'm suffering from illness. Where are you, Lord? I'm in great pain. I have lost a loved one to death. Where are you, Lord? I have lost a child. I am stressed out beyond all belief. I have people who hate me, who persecute me. O Lord, I'm uncontent. O Lord, I look out upon my land and I see wickedness. Where are you, Lord? And to all of those questions, the Lord kindly reminds us of His covenant faithfulness. And He says, The righteous shall live by faith. For it is indeed in the face of all of life's challenges, whatever they may be, that we recognize that God has given us all of His blessings in His Son. And that if He has given us all of these blessings in His Son, then how will he withhold from us all of these other secondary and tertiary things? Who can bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. For neither death, nor famine, nor sword, nor persecution, nor hatred, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all of this world will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ. For in this we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. Beloved, that is the thesis of Paul's letter. And I dare say and pray it should be the thesis of our lives. Let's bow together in a word of prayer. Father, we give you thanks for the gospel of your Son. For in it we have the blessing of the forgiveness of sins through faith in Christ. And so we pray, O Lord, for those who have yet to place their faith in Christ, that you would enable them to do so by your grace. That you would transfer them into the kingdom of your Son, bring them out of the darkness into the light. But, O Lord, even for those of us who are within the light, who at times close the eyes of faith because we are fearful or because we lack faith, we pray, O Lord, that you would grant to us even the faith of a mustard seed, that in the face of those challenges of life, even like those challenges that Habakkuk saw, That we would recognize that indeed you are faithful to your covenant, that you are faithful to your word, and that you are sanctifying us, that you are glorifying yourself in and through us, and that you are bringing us faithfully to our destination of that celestial city of the new Jerusalem. Until that day, we pray, O Lord, that you would fill us with faith, with hope, and that we would remember that the power, that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation, first for the Jew and then for the Greek, For in it the righteousness of your holy being is revealed from faith to faith. Impress upon our hearts the truth that the righteous shall live by faith. We pray and ask all of these things in Christ's precious and holy name. Amen.