If you can turn your Bibles with me to Romans chapter 3 verse 27 through 31. Romans chapter 3 verse 27 to 31. Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith. For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.

Or is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles also? Yes, of Gentiles also, since God is one who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith. Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means. On the contrary, we uphold the law.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we ask for your blessing over this time. We pray that you would cause our hearts to be moldable. You give us ears to hear and a burning desire, Lord God, to be doers and not just hearers. We pray that your word would have its authority and its power.

That all the fluff, Lord God, that sometimes surrounds what we do, that you would help us, Lord God, to get to the core of who you are and your message. That your living word will be at center stage. That your people will hear the voice of your son Jesus and follow him.

We thank you, Jesus, and we pray. Amen. Again, as you guys know, we're continuing the study in Romans. And, you know, after we get through three chapters, and we're going to be, you know, many more chapters to come on the subject of faith, justification by faith alone. And if you pay attention very superficially, and I can almost guarantee you, it's kind of like Isaiah.

If you follow along superficially, after a while, you're going to like, "Enough judgment." You know, judgment for this city, judgment for this nation, judgment for this sin, and that sin. And you're just going to like, "Judgment, judgment, judgment, judgment." Sixty-six chapters of this. But you have to pay very close attention, because there's a reason why it's there, right?

If, especially the book of Romans, it gets into the nitty-gritty of how faith works and what justification really is. Because a superficial understanding of our faith leads to a very superficial application of our faith. And so our life is directly a reflection of what we understand and how we are convicted by the things that we profess.

We can profess it without meaning anything, right? You can say you're a fan of Lakers, right? Anybody can say that. You can say it. But you can see it by the life. You can see what they really believe and who they really are. You know, the Gospel message itself in 1 Corinthians 118 says, "For the word of the cross is folly, it's foolishness to those who are perishing, but to those who are being saved it is the power of God." Now, some of you who've been raised in the church and you've heard the Gospel since you were in your mother's womb, and you'll say that you didn't become a believer maybe until high school or college or later on in life.

But you don't ever remember the Gospel being foolish. Because you never had to really think about it. I mean, you've been told since you were a little kid that Jesus Christ died for your sins and He loves you and that your sins are atoned for. So just like, "Oh, that sounds about right.

We have a God who loves us unconditionally, the Son of God." So you never really seriously considered the foolishness of the message of the cross. See, there's also a negative part of that. I mean, good thing that you grew up in the church and you were around the Gospel, but the negative part of that is that sometimes we don't take to serious consideration why it would be foolish to the world.

Some of you may have become a Christian later on in life and you may have remembered at one point in your life that somebody tried to share the Gospel with you and how just foolish that message was. That the Son of God stepped off of His throne and offered His Son, offered Himself as a living sacrifice for us.

If you grew up hearing that, it may not sound weird, but if you hear that for the first time, that's strange. Why would, if I told you that I have $100 in my pocket, I'm just going to give it out to you. You'd just come up, right? How many of you would believe me?

Some of you. Very naive, right? Maybe he might. I don't want to lose him. A lot of you, it's like, "Come on. Look at his clothes. He can't afford that." I'm kidding. Some of you, most of you are going to, you know, from deduction say, "That's not going to happen.

You're not going to believe me." Right? But we're talking about God. We're talking about Son of God compared to just even His creation, not even Him, just His creation. What He was able to do simply by His Word. That that God saw a little speck, a bacteria, a small little bacteria, and for whatever the reason, thought that we were precious enough that He would pursue us and give His only begotten Son to save us, and we never questioned that.

It's like, "Oh, okay. I'll take that." And because sometimes we haven't thought seriously about what it is that we confess. One, we have a hard time understanding why the non-Christians are so, you know, rejecting of the Gospel. And two, because we don't fully understand, we don't dig and examine what it is that we profess to believe.

We just assume it. Of course I believe it. We just assume it. That it doesn't drive us deeper into a deeper walk with God, deeper appreciation, deeper sanctification. You know, we've been talking about justification by faith, right? It's by faith alone. And the simple message of the cross is, you cannot earn your salvation.

There's nothing you can add. The Scripture says that we were dead in our trespasses. We're dead. Not weak, not astray. We're dead in our trespasses. So God did not send a rope down saying, "Hey, you need to climb this up. How do you do that? How do you save a dead person from doing that?" You can't.

We were absolutely, utterly helpless that Christ came, and even the faith that we had, He had to revive us. You know, whenever we talk about salvation by faith alone, if we're not careful, we have two ways that we end up ultimately rejecting this truth. The first, we call this cheap grace.

Where it's just passed out, and it's like, "Oh, anybody want it? So I'll take it. Well, why not? What have you got to lose?" Right? We don't live in places where we're risking our lives. You know, we want to go to churches where nice air conditioning, good Sunday school program, and so it's just a matter of choice.

Do I want to be here or there? So there's not much sacrifice. So when gospel was preached as a free grace, as a gift, why not? I'll take it. What do you call somebody who takes advantage of the grace of generous people? Don't think about the complicated SAT words, just the immediate knee-jerk reaction.

What do you call somebody who takes advantage over and over again of somebody who's gracious? Maybe a freeloader? Somebody who has more stronger emotions, jerk, or you know, like, we call them a freeloader because he just, "Oh, that person's gracious. I'll take it." Right? "If it's free, it's for me.

Give me three." You know what I mean? "I want it." And so we've taken the grace of God. Okay, and again, a dangerous way to receive the grace of God is just cheap. "I'll take it." Right? "Well, it's free. It's nothing we do." Right? "It's not about what we do.

It's what He did." And you have these cliches we throw around. Christians are not perfect. We're just forgiven. And so we throw these cliches around to justify all kinds of sin in our life. But it's okay because salvation is by grace. It's only by faith. It's not by works.

So we have that end. And then we have the other end where, you know, we've been taught since we were young, you know, that you have to earn everything. You want to get a good grade, you have to earn it. They're not going to give it to you. Money doesn't grow on trees.

You have to earn that. If you're a respectable, honorable person, you don't go and get free stuff. You're supposed to earn it. This is what we teach our children. This is what we teach, you know, when we're adults. And so we have a hard time receiving that which is free because it puts us in a position of humility.

And we don't want to be humble. I remember years ago, it's been maybe about six, seven years now, you know, I was out in Santa Ana and I ran into this older gentleman. And he was probably maybe in his late 60s, early 70s. You know, I spent so much time out on the street talking to different guys and I know some guys were trying to, you know, they're trying to maneuver to kind of get stuff from you.

And, you know, I've been around that enough to kind of immediately like bells go off. But this guy was so genuine. I started talking to him and I found out that he was on disability and he didn't have his family around. He wasn't from this area. He moved out here, got disconnected with his family.

And then he had a heart attack. And because he had a heart attack, he ended up in the hospital and he was there for about four or five months. Well, while he was there, he couldn't follow up on his disability check. So he has to check in and fill out forms in every month.

And he couldn't do that for four or five months. So basically he got dropped. So by the time he was released in the hospital, he had to start this process over. But the problem was that process would take a minimum of six months. So he came out and he had to wait another six months.

But the problem was the time I met him, it was very cold winter in California. It was like 52 degrees or something. It was like freezing weather. So anybody from outside of California, you might laugh at that, but it was a pretty cold winter, before California winter. And I could tell he had bronchitis and he was coughing.

And so he was sitting on the side. So I started having conversation and we talked together. And so I thought, you know what? Maybe I can, you know, I don't know if I can help you for six months, but if I can take you and put you in a motel down the street here, that maybe when the weather gets better, you know, we'll see.

Maybe I can find some more funds, but maybe when the weather gets better, you can kind of, you know, see what's going to happen. And so literally I had to beg him to come with me because he was like, "No, no, no, I don't want to do that. It's going to cost too much money." And you know, coughing the whole time.

I said, "No, no, don't worry about it. It's not going to cost much money." And I, you know, I know a motel down the street here and it's not too far from here, about a two mile drive from here. I said, "Well, it's not going to be expensive. They have a special discount, you know, on a weekly basis and sometimes a month." And so I literally dragged him and dropped him off, you know, and then I would come visit him every other day or something and bring groceries and do what I have to do.

But the whole time I would see him, he would say, "Oh, no, Peter, that's not, I just, you know, don't bring anything. Don't do this." And how bad he felt. So literally, I was like, I was just, every time I was like, "Don't worry about it, you know, it's not a lot of money.

Don't worry about it." And I would try to encourage him to stay. Well, that process went on probably about two, two and a half weeks. And then all of a sudden, I go over to check up on him and he's not there. So I said, "What's going on?" And I went down to the office and he said, "Oh, the old man, his name was Robert.

He said he checked out." And I said, "Oh my gosh, what happened?" You know, and finally he did it. And then I checked my message, phone, but it wasn't, it wasn't this phone now. I mean, it was just, that's just my message. And then he left a message on my answering machine, message, whatever, answering machine, whatever.

So he left a message on there and I was playing it and he was choking up and crying the whole time. And, you know, Esther remembers we're talking about it and, and he was crying and he was saying, you know, "Thank you, Peter, for what you've done." And, you know, "Nobody's ever done this to me, done this for me." And it really wasn't a lot of money, but he says, "Nobody's ever done it, but I can't accept this anymore.

I just feel, I just can't rest. I can't, I feel guilty taking your money. And so, you know, thank you for what you did. I'm not, I'm, you know, I'm not going to forget you." And then he just took off and I never ran into him again. It was a very short period of time.

It was, I was probably maybe three, three weeks I spent with him. But during that three weeks, I mean, this was such a kind old man and just ran into certain circumstances and, and he just, you know, and it broke my heart when I found out he just left.

And it was, again, it was in the cold middle of winter. And I was thinking about that and it's like, you know, we would look at that and say, "Well, that's an honorable thing that he just doesn't want to hand out." Because everybody else is like, "Gimme, gimme, gimme." But it's like, "No, no, I'm going to earn my way.

Even if I'm homeless, I don't want a handout." And we may look at that and say, "Oh, that's an honorable guy and all the more why we want to help him." See, but that's us. There's some, some people who receive the grace of God and say, "Okay, gimme, you know, if it's free, just gimme all of it." And we don't think too deeply about what that is.

And then there's some of us who receive it, but, you know, it's received by confession. But every part of us is kind of like, "I, this is not good. I need to earn some of it." And how that deeply hinders not only our appreciation of what it is that we have, but us coming to him.

See, what Paul's been laying out for the first three chapters and on, he begins in verse 27, it says, "Then what becomes of boasting?" He says, "It is excluded." It is excluded. How pride ruins everything. It really ruins everything. You know, those of you who have children, you know, we can recognize pride immediately because, you know, we're always comparing our children with other children.

It's like, "Oh, man, he grew an inch. He's so tall. Look how big that kid is." We even compare the size of our, the kid's poop, like, "What? He's doing what? Your kid slept four hours? My kid slept six hours." Right? It's like, "Oh, he's so athletic. Look at this.

Look how sharp his nose is. He knows the multiplication at that age?" And instead of appreciating the various gifts and various talents of other children, you know, like deep inside, we're like, "What's wrong with my kid? Why isn't my kid doing that?" You know? At the core of it, it's pride.

You know, we're perfectly fine until we see what other people make. You know, we're perfectly fine with our car, and then all of a sudden we see what other people drive. And this inner need to compete. And at the core of it, it's pride. And see, pride is at the core of every corruption that you and I experience.

In the very beginning, when Adam and Eve was tempted, Satan said to Eve, "If you eat of this," what did he say? "You will be like God." That was the temptation. It wasn't that they didn't have food. It wasn't like they were so hungry they needed to have food.

The whole Garden of Eden was filled with food. It wasn't the only attractive fruit. The promise was, "If you eat of this, your eyes are going to be opened. You're going to be like God." That's why they ate of that tree. And ever since then, man's primary motive is self-exaltation, self-determination.

It's about self, self-glorification. That's why we work hard at school. We raise our children to be better. That's why we work hard to get ahead. We make more money. That every part of us, we work out. You know, the time that we spent, the way we present ourselves, all of a sudden is so that we could be better than what's around us.

Not realizing that this rat race is at the core of what's killing us. It's at the core of what's killing us. It's slowly deteriorating who we are. It affects our marriage. It affects our friendship. And it affects the church. We have a church filled with people who believe that they are better than other people or that they're worse than other people.

And they just can't get satisfied. And you have frustrated people. And it affects everything. That's why when Jesus came, he did exactly the opposite. You know, the whole Jewish system, the law was given to them to humble them so that they would bring them to Christ. Instead, they used it as a system of hierarchy, like who's better, who's closer to God.

So when Jesus Christ came, he came completely outside. He didn't go to the temple. He didn't go to Jerusalem. He was born in a strange city. And then he started collecting disciples from the city of Galilee, a town known for fishing. Not known for temple worship or sacrifice. Just fishermen and tax collectors.

And he gathered a bunch of these people who had been utterly rejected by the religious system. But he deliberately did that. And the whole reason why he did that was because at the very core of what's corrupting mankind, it's its innate desire, knee-jerk reaction to self-glorify themselves, even in the context of worshiping God.

Even in the context of preaching the gospel. Even in the context of serving one another. We self-glorify ourselves. And so Jesus comes in completely outside the box. You ever wonder, you get Apostle Paul. Apostle Paul was a celebrity among the Jews. When he was under trial, King Felix said, "Your great learning has made you mad." A king already knew who Paul was.

Even before he came in front of it, he knew who he was. Because he was famous. He was possibly a member of the Sanhedrin, possibly. At the minimum, he was a direct disciple of Gamaliel. And yet, when he became a Christian, what happens? He doesn't, God doesn't say, "You know what?

Let's use that. Let's use his position and preach the gospel." I mean, wouldn't that be great? Today we're in the middle of election season, and everybody is pretending to be Christian, right? Because that's the only way you're going to be elected. Then there's a part of all of us thinking, "Oh, only if we can get a real Christian in the office, things can happen." Right?

Man, the highest office in the United States, only if a real Christian, right? Because we think that that person could be useful, or maybe a movie star. You know what I mean? Their famous movie star, and they say, "Yeah, you know, Jesus and me, like that." He's a Christian.

Revival! Right? Or a basketball athlete, you know, talks about, "I want to thank my Lord Jesus Christ." Yes! Revival! Right? Somebody of significance, somebody of power, who's confessing to be a Christian. Now they're going to make a mark on Christianity. Apostle Paul was a celebrity. Apostle Paul was educated.

Apostle Paul had position. Jews looked up to him. A Pharisee would have worked all his life just to be where he was. Yet he encounters Jesus on the road to Damascus, and then, you know what happens to him? He becomes a tent maker. I'll bet you that man has never made a tent in his life until he met Christ.

I'll bet you he never. I'll bet you he wasn't a tent maker by trade before he met Christ. Because this guy was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. He was a Roman citizen. He had money. You know, you don't become a disciple of Gamaliel living on a farm.

His dad was probably a very wealthy, very wealthy Jewish businessman. And then he meets Christ, and then he gets thrown out of that. Thrown out of the Pharisaic system, thrown out of the temple, thrown out of the thing that he's, him and his dad may have been working for all his life, and all of a sudden, you know, he's writing Philippians.

I know how it is to be content in every and all situation, whether I have a lot or a little. Right? Why don't you just use him in that position? That's what we would think. If he was a person of prominence, wouldn't God be able to use that? Why did he take him out of that and make him nothing?

Why waste all of that energy, all of that prestige, all of that honor that he was getting from the Jewish community, and then make him start as almost like a peasant? Because the whole system of corruption of mankind is about self-elevation. Jesus came as a carpenter to a family of no significance, lived most of his life in Galilee, did most of his ministry in Galilee with a bunch of fishermen who, again, were of no prominence.

Scripture says the Lion of Judah came as a Lamb of God. A lion, the lion turned into a lamb to be a sacrifice for us. It goes against everything that you and I are taught to pursue. See, the Gospel message flips the world upside down. It is not simply a change of direction.

See, the repentance that leads to salvation isn't simply, "You know what? I've been cheating. And I've been lying. And I've been struggling with purity. And so I repent of these things." See, repentance basically is recognizing our whole life and our whole being that I've been headed the wrong direction.

Every thought that I had, every desire, what I thought to be right and wrong, it was all wrong. And so when we encounter Jesus Christ, it all changes. Not just the way we speak. Not just the way we do taxes. We completely change. We're born again. In Isaiah 53, 2-3 it says, "For He grew up before Him like a young plant and like a root out of the dry ground.

He had no form or majesty that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him." There was nothing attractive about Him. You would think, you know, He could have come as the handsomest man, the tallest man, the most athletic man, the most built, strongest, most intelligent, because some of that would attract some people to Him.

But He said, "No, He came as nothing, no beauty. He was despised and He was rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and as one from whom men hide their faces." There's nothing about Him that a natural man would be attracted to. Not the world, the same things that attract us to movie stars and basketball stars.

He had none of that. Nothing external. Yet He was despised and He was esteemed. And not only did He come that way, He said, "If you want to follow Me, you pick up your cross." Not only am I going to die, if you want to live the life that you're pursuing, the life that you've been laboring to pursue, you must also die to that, because that's what's killing you.

Hebrews chapter 13, 12, 14 talks about Jesus. It says, "So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through His own blood." You know what it means in the Scripture to be outside the gate? If you're punished inside the gate, you're punished and hopefully that you would repent, and that you would still be inside the gate, it's really for your benefit.

But when somebody's taken outside the gate, you are banished from the city. And only the worst of criminals, only somebody who has committed the worst infraction of the law would be taken outside the court and they would usually be stoned. So when the Scripture says that Jesus was taken outside the gate, it meant that He was utterly rejected by His own people.

He says, "Therefore, let us go to Him outside the camp." Outside the camp. How counterproductive and counterintuitive it is for us to try so hard to build a life inside the camp when Jesus went outside. And He calls us to come out. And isn't that what He said? If you find your life, if you seek your life, what did He say?

You will lose it. Now that doesn't mean that if you live selfishly, self-exaltation, that one day you're going to wake up and you're going to die early. No. The very thing that you think is going to cause life is actually causing death. And He calls us to come outside.

If you think about even the symbol of the cross and what that signified at that particular time. Today, every once in a while, you'll see a hideous image of an ISIS terrorist with a beheaded, somebody's head who's beheaded and they would raise it up for people to see and they're flaunting it with everyone and we're disgusted.

The whole purpose of why they're doing that is to basically serve as a threat to anybody else who messes with them. You get in our way, this is what's going to happen. If you don't submit to us, this is what's going to happen. And as disgusting as that is, that is their goal, is to bring fear and threat and humiliation and dominance over anybody who watches that.

Well the cross served the same purpose for the people who created it. It wasn't simply a capital punishment. It was to serve to humiliate whoever went against, and at that particular time, the Roman government. So they didn't even carry that out with their own citizens. Only foreigners were put on the cross.

And the whole purpose of that, one, is to humiliate you. So the first thing that they would do is strip you naked. Now I know we have pictures, we have images of Jesus on the cross and he's usually well covered for modesty purposes. But the actual crucifixion, the first thing that they did was to strip you naked.

This all happened publicly. It doesn't matter how rich you are. It doesn't matter how educated you are. It doesn't matter what kind of family background you are. Once they strip you naked, there is no pride. Once they completely take that away from you, you're standing in front of a crowd, stripped absolutely naked.

Whatever was important to you is no longer important to you. That was the beginning of the crucifixion. And then they would mock you, and you know the beating process. And the whole purpose of that is after they beat him, they give just enough life, give up just enough energy so that he would hang on that cross, sometimes 7, 8, 9, 10 days.

So that every human being, everybody in that area that would walk by this cross, that this cross and that person's humiliation and that person's suffering would serve as a reminder to anybody, "You messed with us. This happens to you." When a nation chooses to have a symbol on their flag, we choose what is good, what is powerful.

So in the United States, they chose the stars that represent the colonies, the states, and eventually it became 50 states. And so we have that because what we're saying is that collectively, all these states collectively, we are powerful together. It's almost like having 50 nations together as one. And so our flag represents that.

The Russian flag has the hammer and sickle, the communist symbol. And basically what that means is the power of the people. The people have collectively got together, and so we're strong in this way. But the symbol, the banner that every Christian is under is the cross. Symbol of humiliation, symbol of suffering, symbol of rejection, symbol that takes us outside the camp.

And it is an absolute oxymoron for Christians to be under this banner and to be pursuing our own life. Everything about justification by faith screams out, "Be quiet." We have no power but His power. That's why Paul says in Galatians 6, 14, "But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world." We have been crucified with Christ.

Now let me stop here for a second. This is nothing new to you. This is nothing new to you. Justification by faith is not anything new to you. You've probably heard it hundreds of times. The question that he's trying to answer is, if that's the case, if salvation is by faith alone in verse 31, then do we overthrow the law?

Then what is the purpose of the law? Do we need the law? It's about what he did, what we do doesn't matter, so therefore why even talk about it? He says, if that's the case, is that the case? If salvation by faith alone doesn't nullify the law, what is the answer?

By no means. Not only does it not nullify the law, it says on the contrary, we uphold the law. We establish the law. Again, a superficial, cheap understanding of grace stops right there and it's like, "Oh, we're saved by grace, so let's just, you know, how, as long as I feel love for him in here, it doesn't matter." But he says, no, by no means.

Romans 6, 1 and 2. What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? If my sin highlights his grace, then do we just keep sinning and then that just kind of highlights his grace? By no means. How can we who die to sin still live in it?

Inconsistent with the very salvation that we profess. In fact, Ephesians 2.10, he says, "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works." He saved us for good works. He didn't save us by good works. He says he saved us for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in him.

Diederik Bonhoeffer says of this cheap grace, "Cheap grace is a grace we bestow on ourselves. It is not the grace that God has given. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without repentance. Cheap grace is baptism without church discipline. Cheap grace is communion without genuine confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ living and incarnate." Genuine faith does not abolish the law.

It actually establishes the law. And let me make that very clear in case anyone is confused, because there's some confusion language in our generation. That somehow if you're gospel-centered that we don't need to focus on pursuing righteousness and holiness. Scripture is absolutely crystal clear. He says, "Do we nullify the law?

By no means. On the contrary, we establish the law." When you look at the way Jesus looked at people, he distinguished between three different kinds of faith. No faith, right? People who had no faith utterly just rejected him. They heard the Word of God and said, "I don't believe this guy.

Let's crucify him." And then there was little faith. That his disciples when the storm came, they were anxious and said, "Hey, Jesus, do you care that we're going to die?" He wakes up. Remember the first thing he says? "Ye of little faith." He saw their anxiousness and he said, "Hey, you need to be, you need to suck it up, man." No, he says, he looks right through that and says, "It's because you have little faith.

You don't know who I am." Remember that when the disciple, when Peter's walking on the water and he's, "Let me come to you." And as he's coming, the storm comes and he begins to sink. Jesus raises him up and he says, "Ye of little faith." In other words, their life and their anxiousness was evidence of the kind of faith that they had.

And then he would encounter some Gentiles. And he was amazed by their great faith. Remember the centurion? He comes and he says, "I have a servant who's sick." And Jesus says, "Well, where is he?" And he said, "Oh, you don't need to come. I have many servants myself and if I just tell them to go, they'll do it.

So you're powerful and you're, you know, clearly you're a prophet. Just send somebody." And Jesus says he was amazed because he saw great faith. Same thing with the Gentile woman that comes, the Canaanite woman said, "You know, my daughter is sick." And Jesus says, "It's not right for us to give to pagans, to pigs." And instead of being offended, she says, "Well, even the pigs, they take the scrap off of the master's table.

So have mercy on me." She says, "You of great faith." So he saw right through that. See, faith, when it is genuine, always produces righteousness. Let me tell you, you know, like I had a conversation with an atheist. And again, this is a common conversation that I have with an atheist.

Typically the conversation would go, it's like, "Wow, you guys are based on faith. We're based on science. You know, your thing doesn't make any sense. So you have to make a leap of faith, even if it's completely nonsense, but we're dealing with facts." You know, and I've learned years ago, going out and talking to people that it doesn't do any good to get into this back and forth and like, who's right and who's wrong.

So usually when they get like that, I just sit there and I just ask questions, you know, and say, "Oh, it's like that. So where did that come from?" And so, "Well, you know, from monkeys." And where a monkey comes, "Well, we are from Mamiba. Where did that come from?" It was a big bang, you know.

And so, "Where is that?" It was like, you know, there was matter that was there. What was there before that? Usually obviously you keep asking like, "I don't know." And the answer that they would give is, "Well, you don't know where that comes from. You're rejecting God because you don't know where he comes from, but you receive science." And I say, "Yeah, but I believe that one day that if we study enough, that science is going to teach us where we came from." It's like, "Okay, let me get this straight, okay.

So you're rejecting God because you don't understand him. You don't know where he comes from, what his origin is. And so, therefore, you reject him. So you say our faith in that is ridiculous, right? Sounds like to me you have faith in science. You don't know, you have no idea now, but you believe that if you stick with it long enough that science is going to answer all your questions.

Am I right?" I say, "Yes." "So how is that not the same thing?" "It's just not." Usually that's where it ends. It's just it ends. You're stupid. The end. That's usually how it ends, right? They can call me stupid. I didn't call them stupid, right? Faith is the reason why we do everything.

Let me just get to the application of that, okay? Today you came here by faith. If you didn't have faith, you wouldn't have been able to come here. Now I'm not talking about faith in Jesus. You got in your car and every time you crossed a green light, you had faith that the other driver that's coming on the other side was going to stop.

And if you didn't believe that, you wouldn't have been able to come here. Because every time you see a green light, you're going to have to stop, right? Because I'm not sure if that guy, maybe he's a teenager, he's got a license, he can't determine what's red and green.

Maybe that guy's colorblind. Maybe he just doesn't care, you know what I mean? But at some point you have to believe that these people are going to follow these rules and that's why you're able to drive through this thing or else you can't survive. Everything in life requires some kind of faith, right?

You buy a house, the bank is taking a chance on you based upon your credit and all this stuff. They're taking a chance, okay, we believe that you're going to be faithful and you're going to pay this back based upon your credit. But in the end, there's nothing guaranteed.

Everything in life depends on faith. But the question is, where is this faith, right? What is your faith and what does that lead to? So typically we think faith is just, oh okay, we feel it in here, so any pressure of application of this is legalism. If you read the whole book of Hebrews, Hebrews is a bunch of, at one point, professing Christians who are going back into Judaism, like into workspace salvation, and the author is trying to convince them, why would you go back to that when Jesus is superior to everything?

And the whole point of Hebrews is justification by faith through the blood of Jesus Christ. That's the whole point. You know, the difference between Romans and Hebrews is Romans is basically teaching us the essence of the gospel in detailed form, talking about the new covenant. Book of Hebrews teaches justification by faith in connection to the Old Testament.

But at the end, the conclusion is the same. It's justification by faith alone. And both of these books dissect it in two different approaches. When we get to chapter 11 of the book of Hebrews, he's making a conclusion of justification by faith. And so, chapter 11 of Hebrews is the chapter of faith.

But here's what he says about faith, and I'm not going to read all of it, but highlight. Hebrews 11, 7. "It is by faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household." He said, faith caused Noah to believe in God, and that's why he did this ridiculous thing, building this ark in the middle of the desert for a hundred years.

It wasn't his works, but it was faith that caused him to obey God. Same thing with Abraham. Hebrews 11, 8. "By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance." See, Abraham was already a rich man. And God said, "Well, do you believe?" And he said, "Yes, I believe." You know, "Then come out." He said, "Ah, I don't know.

I'm already comfortable here." He said, "No." He said, "No." He said, "No." The reason he believed was because he believed in the promises of God that he followed. So his actions were evidence that he had genuine faith. Again, just read one more. Hebrews 11, 17. "By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son." Even something as incredible as offering up his son, who was supposed to be the line of the promise of God, he said even that he was willing to offer up because he had faith.

Let me get to the conclusion of this. Because the question is, then does salvation by faith nullify the law? It says, "Absolutely not. We established the law." Then how does it establish the law? Practically speaking, right? If you've embraced justification by faith without deep contemplation, maybe you have at one point but you haven't recently, it automatically leads to a superficial application in life.

Because we just assume. You know, when you bring the gospel to the students in China, some of you guys who've been there with us before, you know, it takes them a long time to come to faith. You know, it takes them a long time. And as they're thinking through, they understand the consequence of what this means.

So they'll question about the validity of the Bible. They'll question about creationism. They'll question the communist system versus capital. I mean, they examine where did the Bible come from? Do I really believe this? Was Jesus really the son of God? How do you compare other religions? And they go through all of this and sometimes it takes them years.

And then even after they've heard all of that, they take time to say, "But do I really believe this? Do I really believe this?" And they wrestle over this for a long time. And then when they finally make a decision, they've counted the cost. And there's an immediate defect.

And you can see it in their lives. Because they've examined themselves. So if our whole salvation hinges upon faith, shouldn't we be much more careful to examine that this faith is genuine? See the mistake we make is, "It's by faith. Oh, that was easy. If it's by faith, I heard it.

I believe that that was easy." Instead, if it hinges upon this faith, and if everything is founded upon this particular faith, shouldn't we take careful time and examination to see, "Is this genuine?" If it is not about works, it's not about our pursuits, it's not about our knowledge, it's not about our talent, it is on faith that if it is real, has power to even move mountains.

If the whole building is founded upon that one cornerstone, don't you want to make sure that that cornerstone has no cracks? Don't you want to make sure that that cornerstone is the perfect stone for that corner? Because anything you build on that is going to be like building on sand.

It's going to crumble. You know, when I was in China, there's a term called "guanxi." Some of you guys who know Chinese know what guanxi is. Guanxi basically means connection or relationship. And in China, they say everything functions under guanxi. No matter how much money you have, how educated you are, you have to have connection.

So there was a guy, an official of the school that we were at, and he was all about guanxi. Some of you guys know his name, Charles. He named himself after Charles Barkley. And he was a little bit closer to my age, so whenever I was in China, I spent most of my time with him.

And so everything was about guanxi, this guy. And when I met him, he was already educated. He was an English teacher, and he was kind of moving up. But this guy had connections with the weather bureau. I mean, literally, we would sit down and say, "Oh, you know, we're having an activity next Tuesday, and I hope it doesn't rain." And he would say, "Wait a second." And he would punch a number, and he's just like, "Hey, you know, is it going to rain Tuesday?" And he'd say, "It's not going to rain." Like, "Who'd you call?" "Oh, it's my friend from the weather bureau." You know?

And this guy had connections everywhere, because he believed that his way of advancing in life is guanxi. So he invested everything in guanxi, and so he was trying to have guanxi with me. He didn't know I was a pastor. He didn't know, you know, he was cooking up with the wrong guy.

But he, he, I'm from America, and I have all these young people coming, and so we have kept in touch, and every once in a while, he'll still email me. Usually when he needs something, you know, he'll email me, and he'll say, "Hey, what's going on, Peter? Do you have access to the computer?" And whatever, right?

But for his life, all of it was dedicated to guanxi, because guanxi meant everything. Right? If our whole salvation is founded upon faith, then shouldn't we be careful to examine if that faith is real? If that faith is genuine? If it is little? If it is big? If that faith has atrophy?

If that faith is non-existent? See Paul tells this church in Corinth, there's all kinds of chaos coming in, all kinds of bickering, all kinds of division, immorality in the church. And he says, in conclusion of the two letters that he writes, 2 Corinthians 35, "Examine yourself to see whether you are in the faith.

Test yourselves, or do you not realize this about yourself, that Jesus Christ is in you, unless indeed you fail to meet the test." We receive this grace so superficially, without even questioning, we just assume, "Of course I have faith." And Paul says, "If you have faith, why does your church look like that?

Why do you do this? Why is the world so important to you?" So Paul's not saying that, "I don't think you're a Christian." That's not what Paul's saying. Paul's causing them to say, "Take a look at what you confess. Take a look at what you confess to believe, and see how you're living.

Is your confession, and your life, consistent with the things that you confess?" It's not about works. He's not saying that if you do good works, you're going to be saved. But if it has genuine faith, would it not change us? If we genuinely believe that our loved ones are headed to hell, would that not change us?

Our friends, our co-workers who are sitting next to us, that we confess in this comfortable safe room every week about the judgment of God that's coming, and we really believe that, would that not change us? If we really believe that this world is headed toward destruction because of pride, and we really believe that Jesus Christ came to save us from this empty way of life, in comparison to the knowledge of knowing Jesus Christ, wouldn't that become rubbish?

Why is it still so attractive? Why are we still so numb? Why are we still the same before and after we believed? So the question is, do you not believe? Or have you forgotten? Have you forgotten the grace of Jesus Christ? Have you forgotten when you first heard the Gospel message and God opened your eyes, and when you believed for the first time, how that changed everything?

It changed everything. Every suffering that you experienced, now it made sense that that's why you suffered, because we were in a broken world, that God orchestrated all of this to bring you to Him. That when you realized for the first time, the Son of God knows my name. Jesus knows my name.

And that fact alone changed you. That fact alone caused you to come before His throne in tears. You know me. Why do you care about me? If you believed that, wouldn't that change us? Wouldn't that change the direction of our lives? Wouldn't that cause us to pursue Him with all our might?

Wouldn't that cause us to have compassion for those who do not know Him? If we believed. See, justification by faith does not nullify the law. No. It established the law. It changes us.