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Baptism doesn't save anybody. Joining the church has never saved anybody. It's an outward sign of what God promises to do inwardly. And the final analysis is not whether we're baptized outwardly, but are we baptized inwardly?
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Many Christian traditions place a strong emphasis on outward rituals for salvation. But today, on Renewing youg Mind, RC Sproul will show us that we have a tendency to think too highly of our own righteousness. We need to compare ourselves to God's law to get a real picture of who we are. Let's join Dr. Sproul now.
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We're going to continue our study of Paul's letter to the Church at Rome by turning our attention to the second chapter of the Epistle. And I would be reading from verse 17 through the end of the chapter. Indeed, you are called a Jew. And rest on the law. And make your boast in God, and know his will. 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. After Paul's elaborate discussion of general revelation and how the whole world suppresses the plain and manifest knowledge of God that he gives to every person in creation, he turned from this universal guilt of the human race and turned his guns, as it were, directly at his kinsmen, according to the flesh Israel, addressing them at the beginning of chapter two as calling them O man. And he began in this chapter to talk about the hypocrisy of those who were in a special relationship to God. Those who were God's chosen people in the Old Testament, who were living in the same kind of godlessness that manifested itself among pagans and Gentiles, who are foreigners and strangers to the covenant that the Jews enjoyed in their own history. And we talked about that dreadful experience of sinners who every time they sin, they are, as it were, making a deposit in the account of their corruption, which account is mounting exponentially as they are storing up wrath or heaping up wrath against the day of wrath. But our problem, beloved, as we listen to this, is that we fail to feel the weight of it. We are so hardened in our sin, we're so accustomed to our corruption, that we give our attention not to the law of God, but to the social customs of our culture and measure ourselves in conformity to those customs. And we measure ourselves not against the standard of God's perfect righteousness. But, as Paul will later write, he said, those of you who judge yourselves by yourselves. And judge yourselves among yourselves are not wise. You remember the parable that Jesus told of the two men who went up to the temple to pray? One was a Pharisee and one was a publican. And the Pharisee looked up into heaven and he prayed. He said, I thank you, God, that I'm not like other men, liars, adulterers, extortioners. Thank you that I'm not like that miserable tax collector over there in the corner. Now he's thanking God, you know. He's saying, there but for your grace go I. But he obviously has a highly exalted view of his own performance. Because he was judging himself by the curve of the culture. He had forgotten that God doesn't grade on a curve. He grades against an absolute standard of perfect holiness. And that's what at least the publican understood when he couldn't even lift his eyes to heaven and simply cried out, God, be merciful to me, a sinner. And having told the parable, Jesus then turned to his audience and he said, which of the men went to his house justified? Not the Pharisee who judged himself by himself and judged himself among others, but the publican who knew his sin and cast himself on the mercy of the court. That's why we have the Law read almost every Sunday here at St. Andrews, is that we can always hear that standard, see that mirror that reflects God's perfect character. And it is a mirror that we look in. And when I look in the mirror of the Law, every one of my blemishes become instantly obvious. I can't hide from what the Law reveals to me about who I am. No wonder Paul speaks of the Law as the schoolmaster who drives us to Christ. And so now he's talking here in the second part of chapter two about continuing on with this question of hypocrisy and the law. Verse 17, he says, Indeed, you're called a Jew. And as a Jew, you rest your case on the law. You have the Law of God, that's the glory of Israel. No other nation on the planet has such a clear manifestation of the Law of God. Now, we tend to think of the Law in terms of the Old Testament as being reduced simply to the Ten Commandments. But the Ten Commandments only the foundation of the law. And after the Ten Commandments are given, a whole host of laws are added to it that we call the Holiness Code. In addition to the Ten Commandments, we have the case law of the Old Testament that further reveals the character of God and shows us how far short we have fallen of the standard of that law. But if we can hide from the law, put the law in a basket, escape that mirror, shatter that mirror and just look around, we can always find somebody more sinful than we are and pat ourselves on the back. But we can't afford to do that. And God won't let us do that. He keeps coming to us with this law. And so here Paul says to the Jew, you rest on the law. You make your boast in God. You know his will. You approve the things that are excellent, being instructed out of the law. And you're even 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. Could we not extrapolate this critique that Paul gives to his kinsmen according to the flesh Israel, and apply it to us in the Church. We have the Word of God. We rely on the Word of God. We rest on our doctrine. We've been instructed by the Word of God. We are confident that we are called to be guides to the blind, a light to those who are perishing, a light to those who are in darkness. We instruct the foolish. We're the Teacher of infants, we have the form of knowledge and truth. Could that not be said also of us? You know, elsewhere, Paul rebukes the people for having a form of godliness, but not the substance of of it. The outward forms are there, but that form is an empty shell that once God bores through that shell and examines the heart, beneath the external form, there is no internal reality. That's the judgment that Paul is giving to Israel, but also has application to us. He goes on, you who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? These are not just empty questions. We as Christians all stand up and say, it's wrong to steal. You know, if you have a pledge campaign in a local church, don't ever count on receiving more than 80% of the pledges that people make, because people think nothing of not fulfilling their pledges. It's not just pagans who don't pay their bills, it's professing Christians who do that. The same people who shake their finger at the unbeliever for not being honest and forthright are practicing this very same things. They're stealing. You who say, don't commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who are poor idols, do you rob temples? You who make your boast in the law, do you dishonor God through breaking the law? We have the law of God, but what are we doing with it? We boast of it while we break it. And then here's the clincher here at the end of this section, he says, the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you. Do you know that one of the standard complaints and objections to people who are not involved in the church make about church members, It's a false accusation, but it's one you hear all the time where it says the church is full of hypocrites. You ever hear that? Maybe you've said it. I heard one minister, when he heard it, somebody said, the church is full of hypocrites. The minister said, yes, there's always room for one more. And then he went on to say, if you ever find a perfect church, don't join it. You'll ruin it. But hypocrisy is a damnable thing, as our Lord constantly had to rebuke the Pharisees who were the masters of masquerading, who pretended to have a form of righteousness that they really did not possess. But what happens is when people see us as Christians, we don't pretend to be perfect. You know that. You know, the church is filled with sinners. That's the only qualification. Well, it's not the only qualification, but it's the first qualification there is to join a church. You have to be a sinner to get in because there's no place for perfect people in the church. And one of the reasons that people call us hypocrites is that they notice that we're not perfect. But the hypocrite is the one who claims to be more righteous than he is. Now, that's a serious matter. And that's what Paul's talking about here, that we claim more righteousness than we possess. This is so destructive. And one of the problems we have, one of the real practical problems of ministry that we have in the life of the church is that we set the standard high for behavior. We encourage people to grow in their faith and in their sanctification, but at the same time, we're encouraging them to grow in their sanctification. We're also putting heat on them and pressure on them to make them feel that they have to pretend to be more righteous than they actually are. Do you ever feel that? I think we all feel that. And so we talk the talk, but don't always walk the walk. And the world is watching that. And Paul says to the hypocrite in Israel that the Gentiles are blaspheming God because of us, because of how we treat them. They say, and how many times have you heard it said, well, if that's what Christianity is, I don't want any part of it. Now let me just say two things about that. It's true that the Gentiles, the pagans, the unbelievers, blaspheme because of us, because of the horrible example and witness that we often give to them. On the other hand, if there's any comfort here, it's this, that if we treated them perfectly, they would still blaspheme God. So the fact that that we add to their impulse of blasphemy does not get them off the hook in the final analysis. One of my favorite stories, you know, that I've ever encountered was told to me by a Christian who was on the PGA Golf Tour and he had a friend on the tour who was not a Christian. And that friend the previous year had had a tremendous year and was voted Golfer of the Year. And at this tournament that he was the defending champion, he was honored for being the previous year Golfer of the Year. But this year, in which he was to be honored for the Previous year, he went into a tailspin and was playing terribly. But part of the honor for being named the Golfer of the Year was that he played in the Pro Am of the tournament where he was paired with the President of the United States, Jack Nicklaus and Billy Graham. That's a high powered foursome. You got the player of the year from last year. I'm not going to give you his name to protect the guilty. The President of the United States. I'm not even going to tell you which one that was because that's also a protective, terrible golfer. And you had Billy Graham and Jack Nicklaus. And so at the end of the round, this fellow walked off the golf course. He had played poorly and he was red in the face. And he went over to the practice tee and start hammering drives down the practice tee to get rid of his frustrations. And my friend sat down and watched him for a few minutes and he said, what's the matter? And he said, I don't need to have Billy Graham trying to shove religion down my throat all day. And so then he went back to beating the balls. And my friend, after a few more minutes, he said, really? He said, did Billy really put it to you today? And the golfer turned to my friend and he said, no, no, actually, Billy didn't say a word about religion. I just had a bad day. But why would he say that? Why would he say that Billy Graham was trying to shove religion down his throat when Billy Graham didn't say a mumbling word to him? Because Billy Graham didn't have to say a mumbling word to him. He knew who Billy Graham was and what Billy Graham represented and what Billy Graham stood for. And he was feeling crowded all day. He was uncomfortable in the presence of a man like Billy Graham. That's what happens. When I used to play golf, I didn't want anybody to know I was a minister because as soon as they asked me what I did, you know, I said, I teach, I do insurance, life, eternal life insurance, you know, that kind of thing. Because I knew as soon as I told them I was a minister, they'd start apologizing to me for their language, as if I never heard it and as if I never used it. And I would say, look, you don't need to apologize to me. It's God who's hearing everything you say. You don't need to worry about me. But they're uncomfortable. And so the gentiles will blaspheme God at every opportunity, but we don't need to aid and abet them in their blasphemy by being less than kind, less than loving, less than sensitive to them as human beings. Paul goes on in verse 25. 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 he goes on and talks here about the difference between outward circumcision and inward circumcision, the difference between the letter of the law and the Spirit. And he said, you people have the letter of the law, but you don't keep the Spirit, where people outside may be more sensitive to the spirit of the law than you are, even though they don't know the letter of the law. And he uses as his illustration this whole business of circumcision. Remember in Deuteronomy when God explains the significance of circumcision, and he says to them, if you keep my law and you keep my covenant, blessed are you in the country, blessed are you in the city, Blessed are you when you sit down, blessed are you when you stand up, blessed are you when you're in the gate, blessed are you in the living room, blessed are you in the family room, blessed are you in the kitchen, blessed are you all over the place. But if you break my covenant and violate the law, then what? Cursed are you in the country, cursed are you in the city, cursed are you in the living room, the dining room, the family room, the kitchen. Curse of you, wherever you are, that is, may you be cut off from all blessings that I give and receive the curse of judgment. That's exactly what the significance of this external sign is of circumcision. And Paul's reminding them that the very fact that they are circumcised does not guarantee the blessing. But if they remembered Deuteronomy, the second giving of the law, they would know that that sign of which they boast was the very sign that condemned them, marks them as covenant breakers. You see, the same could be said for us in our sign of the new covenant, Baptism. Baptism doesn't save anybody. Joining the church has never saved anybody. It's an outward sign of what God promises to do inwardly. And the final analysis is not whether we're baptized outwardly, but are we baptized inwardly? Do we possess the spiritual reality that the sign points to? That's what Paul is saying to the Jew. I know you're circumcised. All those people that crucified Jesus were circumcised. And the Pharisees thought that because they had biological roots to Abraham, that that guaranteed them their salvation. And there are people today who think, well, I was born in a Christian home, I grew up in a Christian home. I was baptized, I went to catechism, joined the church, enjoyed the sacrament. Do you see how easy it is for us to assume that we're in the kingdom of God just because we've been baptized or just because we joined the church, or just because we went through a catechism class or just because we were confirmed? We look on outward appearances. God looks on the heart. And in the final analysis, the only circumcision that matters, the only baptism that matters, finally, is the baptism of the heart. That doesn't mean that we should do away with the external. No, that's not what I'm saying. Jesus made it clear that we were to be using these signs of the covenant for the world to see. But we must always remember that they do not save us through the working of the work, by the deeds of the flesh, by the law. Nobody's saved. It's only through the Gospel. But if you ignore the law, you'll never feel the weight of the need that you have for the gospel.
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Well, as we continue to hear the bad news, we need to remember why it's important to hear these things. God's law shows us our sin and our need for a Savior. Today on renewing your mind, you heard a sermon from R.C. sproul's series through the book of Romans, and today is the final sermon you'll hear. So if you'd like to study Romans in greater detail, be sure to request a hardcover copy of Dr. Sproul's expositional commentary on Paul's letter. It's based on RC's sermon series, and we'll send it to you when you give a donation in support of renewing your mind@renewingyourmind.org but be quick, as this offer does end tonight at midnight. These early chapters of Romans condemn us for falling short of the glory of God. But Jesus came to pay a ransom for many. Next Sunday, we'll start a series in the Gospel of John. So I hope you'll make plans to join us here on renewing your mind.
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Sam.