About Jesus

About Jesus Steve Sweetman

Romans 3

In the previous verses Paul was pretty hard on the Jews. He did not spare any words by telling them that they weren’t any better than the Gentile sinner. So in chapter 3 verse 1 he asks a very natural question that someone might ask him after his discourse about the Jewish people. He asks, “what advantage, then, is there in being a Jew, or what value is there in circumcision?” After what Paul has just said you might think the answer to this question is, “none“, that is, there is no advantage at all. Paul does not answer this way, but says verse in 2 that there is an advantage and it is “much in every way”.

In verse 2 Paul begins to list the reasons why Jews have an advantage. “First of all…”, he says, “they have been entrusted with the very words of God”. Paul says “first of all” as if he was going to give a list of a number of points, yet he must have been sidetracked because he never did finish his list.

Being “entrusted with the very words of God”, would be a great advantage over the Gentiles. It would be like getting a head start in a marathon. Having God’s will laid out for you would surely help you in the development of being God’s people.

You might ask, "what are the words of God"? Well, they are every word that God spoke in Old Testament times. God spoke to many individuals, and He spoke to prophets that passed God's words on to Israel. Examples of this would be the personal things God talked to Adam about, to Abraham about, and to many others about. God spoke to Abraham and promised him, his descendents, and his offspring certain things. God spoke through the prophets to Israel, words of encouragement, instruction, rebuke, and judgment. Israel had all these words at their disposal.

In these, “the very words of God”, were promises of salvation as well as Israel's future. Paul anticipates an argument, so he asks the question in verse 3, “what if some did not have faith? Will their lack of faith nullify God’s faithfulness?” Paul clearly and simply answers in verse 4, “not at all”. Just because Israel did not believe the “words of God” that they were entrusted with does not change the way God would act in His faithfulness.

We know that God would not change His mind concerning these things because the Abrahamic Covenant that is spelled out and confirmed many times in the Old Testament was a covenant that God made with Himself. God said that He would do certain things with and for Israel. He did not enter into covenant with Israel. He entered into covenant with Himself. He promised Himself to bless Israel, and that is what He will do in the end. This will be seen at the end of this age.

This verse is important for those who believe that the Jews have no more significance in the eyes of God, and that the church is the only people of God these days. Paul clearly says that Israel’s unbelief did not nullify God’s promises to them. Therefore, whatever God promised to Israel in Old Testament times, He will fulfill. God promised Israel complete restoration, and that He will do at the end of this age.

Genesis 15 gives us an understanding to why Israel's unfaithfulness doesn’t discount God's faithfulness. Genesis 15 recalls the covenant ceremony concerning the Abrahamic Covenant. If you read the chapter closely, you will see that Abraham was asleep when the covenant was ratified. God did not make a covenant with Abraham. He made it with Himself. God covenanted with Himself to do certain things, and the fulfillment of these things did not depend on Israel, but God alone. This is seen in the fact that Abraham did not participate in the confirmation ceremony.

This is what it means when Paul says in verse 4, "let God be true and every man a liar." God promised Israel certain things. God cannot lie. He will do as He says. In comparison to God, every man is a liar.

In verse 5 Paul is implying in his answer that our unfaithfulness is actually showing forth God’s faithfulness even more. If this were the case then one might think, “that God is unjust in bringing His wrath on us”. This too is a natural question that Paul anticipates people asking. If God’s faithfulness and love towards man is more clearly seen and demonstrated because of our sinfulness, why should He then judge and condemn us? Why doesn’t God just let us sin so He can be even more loving by having mercy on us while we sin?

In verse 5 Paul quotes from Psalm 51:4. The Psalmist speaks about being proved when God speaks and judges. What God says will come about. How He judges is proved to be just. God cannot lie. He cannot speak falsehoods. He cannot judge unjustly.

What Paul asks in verse 5 he specifically says is a human argument, and that it is. Anyone who understands Scripture knows the point Paul is making is purely humanistic, but he makes it because he anticipates someone asking it. This is how Paul writes in the book of Romans. It is a defense of the gospel. He makes a point. He asks the questions that people would ask, and he answers the question.

The point that Paul raises in verse 5 is this. If our unrighteousness brings out God's righteousness more clearly, why does he judge us for being unrighteous. In fact God should be happy with out sin, because our sin makes His sinlessness even more visible to everyone. That is logical, but it is humanistic.

In verse 6 Paul counters that argument by saying" certainly not. Paul says that there is no logic in that point. If that were so, how could God judge the world, he says. The point about God judging the world is understood by both sides. Paul believes his opposition believes that God will judge the world, and He will because man is unrighteous and sinful. So if God will judge the world, then even though our unrighteousness shows God's righteousness more clearly, it still needs to be accounted for at the day of judgment.

In verse 7 Paul continues this train of thought. He gives an example of unrighteousness. He states that if his untruthfulness enhances the truth of God and shows God's glory, why does God still call him a sinner? This is a question that Paul's opposition will ask. It is logical from a humanistic standpoint.

Paul says in verse 8 that he has been slandered by some when they say that he is teaching people that they can “do evil that good may result”. You will see this come up again later in Romans. When Paul gets into his argument that salvation is by faith alone, some got the idea that he was saying that the more we sin, the more we do wrong, the more God can have mercy on us, so let’s go ahead and sin, because we know God will give us grace anyway. Paul was not saying any such thing, but sad to say, some were saying that of Paul, and some Christians even today live as though Paul was saying just that. Paul says that those who believe this, live this, and say that he teaches this should be condemned.

Many Christians today live a very sloppy life. They sin, thinking that God will forgive every sin. But, they fail to understand that true repentance plays a very important part in the forgiveness process. There is no forgiveness without true repentance, so if you expect to sin, thinking God will forgive you anyway, you better think again.

No One Is Righteous (ch. 3:9-20)

These verses, from Rom. 3:9 to verse 20 are transitional verses. Paul gives a quick conclusion with some Scripture to back up his point and then ends this section with the next topic he will be addressing.

In verse 9 Paul asks, "what shall we conclude?" Another question that he asks is, "are we any better?" The word "we" refers to the Jews. The question is meant to sum up what he has explained so far. The only logical conclusion is that “Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin”. This means that God has “given us all over to sin” and the resulting judgment of God‘s wrath and anger. In verse 10 He begins to quote from Psa. 14:1 – 3 and 53: 1 - 3, “there is none righteous, no not one”. That doesn’t sound like our “I’m Okay, You’re Okay” mentality. That was a popular book back in the early 1970's that basically said "we're all okay. Let's hot worry about ourselves."

The idea that Jews are in the same boat when it comes to sin would not sit well with the Jewish leaders. This is one reason why Paul experienced the same trouble from the Jews that Jesus had experienced. He is telling the truth about them and they don't like it.

Without commenting on each quote Paul uses, he does say in verse 12 that, “all have become … worthless”. Remember our definition of the word “depraved”. Depraved means worthless. We see here again the historic doctrine of the “Depravity Of Man”. If you really want to understand how God feels about mankind, read verses 10 through 18. It paints a very bad picture of us, something modern man refuses to believe about himself. The final thing that is said about man in the list of depravity here, is that we "do not fear God". Not fearing God is our basic and underlying problem that makes us what we are, sinful and depraved.

Paul ends these quotes with Psa. 31:1, “there is no fear of God before their eyes”. This may be one of the fundamental sins of man. We have no fear of God. Whether you interpret fear as “reverence for God, or just “simply being afraid and scared”, both have been lost from the minds of man. We no longer reverence God. We are no longer scared of who He is and what He can do. The awesomeness of God has been replaced in our thinking with some vague concept of a God who might be out there someplace, and loves us despite anything we might do.

In verse 19 Paul says "we know that whatever the law says, it says for those who are under the law." There is some debate over what law Paul is really speaking of. Is it the Law of Moses, and if so, why doesn't the NIV and other translations capitalize the word "law". So, some people believe it is the Law of Moses Paul is speaking of. On the other hand, some people say it is "law" in general, that is any law. Whatever the case, I believe what Paul is speaking about concerning law would apply to both.

One result of what Paul is speaking about here is that the Law of Moses doesn't apply to Gentile Christians. It was meant for Jews. This is important because the major problem in the early church was over Christian Gentiles having to obey the Law. What Paul says here should tell us that the Law of Moses wasn't written for Gentiles, so when they become Christians it does not apply to them.

Even if what Paul is speaking of here is "law in general, that would be fine. It does not take away from his point, which is that law can make no one righteous, as he says in verse 20. This would apply to the Law of Moses, and if it applies to God's Law, it surely would apply to any man made law. But, humans always have a tendency to add their own laws to God's gospel, which in my opinion is blasphemy.

One thing to note about how we should view the word "law" here. In the particular Greek New Testament that I have, the word "the" does not appear in the text. So, it's not "the law", as the NIV puts it. It's merely "law". That would support the idea that Paul is speaking about law in general terms.

I personally believe what Paul is talking about here is "law" in general terms. One reason is what I've just said. The word "the" does not appear in front of the word "law" in the Greek text. Along with this, you will note in verse 21 we see in the NIV that in the same verse the word "law" is used twice. Once it is not capitalized and once it is. The verse reads, "now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and Prophets testify." The reason why the first law is not capitalized is because the word "the" does not appear in the Greek text. The reason why the second "Law" is capitalized is because the word "the" does appear before the word "Law" in the Greek text, suggesting it is a particular Law that Paul had in mind. When Paul adds the words "and Prophets" to the word "Law", we know that it is the Law of Moses he had in mind.

Verse 20 presents a great truth in the good news of Christ. Paul gives one reason for the existence of the Law. The reason is to silence every mouth and to make the whole world accountable. “Therefore”, as Paul puts it, “no one will be declared righteous … by observing the Law, rather through the Law we become conscious of sin”. We should note here, that the “whole world” is now accountable to God. No one is left out, whether you have the Law of Moses or not.

Note the word "declared". God "declares" us righteous. That doesn't mean we are righteous. He only views us as righteous. Righteous simply means living right according to God's standards, even as God Himself lives. God thus will view us as living right if we accept what Paul is about to say.

No law in the world, whether it is God’s Law or a man made law can make us righteous in God’s eyes. If God’s Law can’t do it, lets not think that any of our ecclesiastical laws can do it either. Sad to say, but we always tend to settle into a salvation by law, and usually the law is our own that we have made up. We always have to feel that we need to do something, or obey something to be made right before God. This is not the case and this is how Paul introduces his next topic, which is, “righteousness by faith”.

Righteousness Through Faith (ch. 3:21 – 31)

This is my definition of the word righteous. Righteousness is being perfectly right all the time in the essence of who one is. The very nature of God is that He is totally right in who He is all the time. Therefore if someone is righteous, then who he is righteous, and what he does is righteous. The point to my definition is that that righteousness is a state of being, not simply about things we do or don't do. Paul has stated in earlier chapters that no man has ever been righteous.

Paul has stated that we are all worthless, all unrighteous. He has also stated that the only way one can be righteous is to obey God’s Law all of the time, in every small detail, which we can't do and never will be able to do.

We thus have a problem. God demands righteousness from us, because that is His nature. He is perfect and right in every aspect of who He is. He cannot expect anything else from His creation. The problem that faced God and man was, how to get man to be righteous? God instituted the Law of Moses to Israel so she would know how to be righteous, but the Law could not make Israel righteous. It only pointed out more of their sin.

Here in chapter 3 verse 21 we begin to see God’s answer to this problem. Paul says, “but now a righteousness apart from law has been made known”. This would be a shocking statement to the Jews since they knew that righteousness came by obeying the Law of Moses. Paul is now telling the Jews, and everyone else that there is a way to become righteous, and it has nothing to do with law. A matter of fact both the Law of Moses and Prophets have testified to this righteousness. Paul is saying that the Law and the Prophets foretold this way of being righteous, something the Jewish leaders did not see in the Law and Prophets.

We need to note in verse 21 that Paul uses two terms. He uses the word "law", and the word "Law". When he says that there is a righteousness apart from law, that's any law. The word "law" is not capitalized and there is no direct article in front of it. That is to say, "law' means any law. "The law" would mean a specific law. He does use the term "The Law" when he says that it testifies of this righteousness. This is my point. Because Paul is not using the definite article "the", and because our English Bible does not capitalize "law", he is not talking about the Law of Moses. He is talking about law in general. He's simply saying that there is absolutely no law that can make us righteous before God. For further discussion on the difference between "law" and "Law" see my notes in the previous section.

This new righteousness comes by “having faith in Jesus Christ”, or “trusting Jesus Christ”. Having this faith means we trust that Jesus did what was necessary in order to give righteousness to us, or, to declare us as being righteous, even though we aren't.

In verse 22 Paul says that this righteousness is “for all”. Why is it for all? Because “all have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God”. If all have sinned, then all are eligible to believe.

In verse 22 we have the introduction of the word "faith'. "Faith" needs to be properly understood. If it isn't, we will not understand what Paul is saying. We will misrepresent him completely. Faith simply means trust. The word "faith" is misused in our generation. We speak of the Baptist faith, the Catholic faith and so on. Faith in that sense of the word is not faith. We should not use faith that way. When Paul speaks about having faith in Jesus, or believing in Jesus, He means that we must trust Him, trust Him with our very lives, which includes our salvation, our declared righteousness.

In the last part of verse 22 and in verse 23 Paul says that anyone can put their trust in Jesus. He is saying that this trust isn't just for Jews, but for Gentiles too. He says this because what he has just said, and can be seen in verse 23. Since he has just proved all are sinners, it is then only logical that all can put their trust in Jesus in order to be declared righteous.

In verse 24 Paul says that, “all … are justified freely through the redemption that is found in Christ Jesus”. This is a great verse. Our salvation is “free” because of God’s grace towards us. It is free, we do not have to pay for it. We do not have to earn it by obeying laws and doing good. It is totally free. We who are worthless and depraved can find salvation free of charge. Salvation might be free, but it's not cheap. Jesus paid a very great price for this salvation. It is so expensive that only He has the ability to pay for it.

We have three new and important words that appear in these verses that we have not seen before. They are “justify”, “redemption” and “atonement“. What do these words mean?

Justification, or to justify is from the Greek word “dikoisis”. You might notice both “righteousness”, and “justify” are from the same Greek root word. To justify a person is “to declare or pronounce that person righteous, or right and just”.

This means that God the Judge has acquitted or released us from our sin and due punishment, and has declared or pronounced us who trust Jesus, as being righteous. Justification is the “actual legal pronouncement by God”. I say legal, because God had contracted, or agreed, or covenanted with Himself to do this for us. A covenant is often a legal contract.

Paul says that this justification is “free” to us, but it wasn’t free for God. There was a price paid. Jesus paid the price on the cross. Jesus. in His perfect life did the necessary work so we would not have to work for our justification. This very expensive gift has come free to us only because Jesus was the one who paid for it.

The next new word we want to look at is the word “redemption”. The Greek word used for “redeem” or “redemption” is “exagorozo”, which means “to buy out”. There is another Greek word used for “redeem” and it is the word “lutroo”. This is the word that is used here in Romans 3:24. “Lutroo” is defined as “a release once a ransom is paid”.

There is a slight difference between “exagorazo” and “lutroo”. “Exagorazo” puts the emphasis on the price that has been paid, while “lutroo” stresses the actual releasing once the price has been paid.

Redemption therefore is the purchasing of someone’s freedom. The word is often used when someone buys out a slave’s freedom. This is exactly what Jesus did for us. He purchased, or bought out our freedom from sin and its penalty. The price that He paid was His own blood. The Scripture say that He “purchased our freedom with His blood”. We need to understand that Jesus purchased this freedom from God, not the devil as some think. As Paul says in 2 Cor. 5:21, “God made Him (Jesus) who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God”.

The third new word that appears here in chapter 3 is the word “atonement”. The Greek word “hilaskomai” is the Greek word that is translated as “atonement” here in chapter 3 verse 25. Not all translations translate “hilaskomai” as atonement in this verse, We won’t get into that now. The Greek word “katallasso” is the word that is translated as “atonement” the most in the New Testament. This word means “to change”. “Katallasso” was the word often used in the exchange of money in Paul’s day. Today we might say, “can you change a ten dollar bill into two five dollar bills”?

“Katallasso” in the Biblical sense means that God “has changed us from being His enemy to being His friend”. “Katalasso” is often translated “reconcile”. So when we hear the word “atonement”, we need to understand that it means “becoming friends with God”, because of Jesus’ shed blood on the cross has taken away our enemy status.

Verse 25 says, “God presented Him (Jesus) as an atoning sacrifice…” As I mentioned above the Greek word for “atoning” that is used here is not the one usually translated as atonement. The specific thought here is that God made Jesus to be a sacrifice that “turned away God’s anger from us”. Why was His anger turned away from us? Because God’s anger was poured out on Jesus on the cross. Therefore God no longer had to be angry with us.

This is my paraphrase of Rom. 3:23 to 25. “We all have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God. God has freely and without cost, declared us totally right and just, even as He Himself is totally right and just in who He is, by His grace when He purchased us for Himself by Jesus Christ‘s death. God turned away His wrath and anger from us so we would be no longer enemies but friends, through trusting in the blood of Jesus”.

Paul says in verse 25 and 26 that God did all of this for us to demonstrate His justice. What does this mean? Paul continues to say that sins committed in the past did not get punished. Because God is just He cannot go forever without punishing someone for all of the sinful acts committed in times past. So to satisfy His sense of justice, God punished Jesus for all of our sinfulness. This satisfied God’s justice and showed His mercy towards us at the same time. God could now feel good because someone was punished for sin, even though it was Jesus who was punished. In one moment of time God both loved us and satisfied His justness. What great love He has for us.

In verse 27 Paul says that because of this demonstration of love there is no way we can boast. We did not do anything to receive this mercy to boast about. Jesus did it all. We cannot boast about obeying any law that has made us right and just before God. It was all done by Jesus. Verse 28 is another one of those key verses. It says, “ we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from the Law”. Let me say, if God says that His own law justifies no one, then any law that we make up certainly is meaningless when it comes to our salvation. To think any differently would be telling Jesus what He did on the cross was not good enough, and that we need to add a couple more things. What a horrible thought. Sad to say, we have done this many times throughout history.

Paul concludes this section by reiterating the fact that there is no difference between the Jews and Gentiles when it comes to being declared righteous. We all come to God through the “same faith”, through trusting Jesus alone for our salvation.

We need to note something very important here. Your understanding of what I am about to say will determine how you view end time prophecy. Paul says that there is no difference between Jew and Gentile here. We need to understand that there is no difference between Jew and Gentile when it comes to salvation. We've all sinned, and we all can be saved. Paul is only talking about salvation. There remains a difference between Jew and Gentile when it comes to what I call "prophetic history". Without going into great detail, through that Abrahamic Covenant found in Genesis 12:1 to 3 and elsewhere, God promised Israel certain things that would last forever. He promised that they'd be a great nation and that they'd have a particular portion of land, among other things. Some of these promises have not yet been fulfilled. God will fulfill them. Israel will always be a distinct and special nation in God's sight forever. There are so many passages that point this out. Paul also speaks to this later on, in chapter 9 through 11. He has to clarify the Jewish place in prophetic history in this book of Romans because of what he has just said about there being no difference between Jew and Gentile in this passage.

In verse 31 Paul makes it clear that he is not nullifying the Law of Moses by what he just said. He says that he still "upholds" the Law. That is to say, Paul still believes there is a place for the Law of Moses. It's just not the same place that it once had. He will explain later.

chapter 2

chapter 4

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