Title: It's Different Now!!/Romans 3:21-22
Content 'It's different now!!' / Romans 3:21-22
On April 14, 1912, at 11:40 p.m., the 40,000-ton Titanic, a super-luxurious large passenger ship, collided with a floating iceberg and sank in two and a half hours. Of the 2,200 people on the ship, about 1500 lost their lives in this accident. When a ship sinks at sea, the only way to survive is to get help from outside. There is no possibility for those on board the ship. People with cancer cannot cure themselves. Even if you are a doctor, you should seek help from other doctors. You can only survive if you get help from outside.
No one can be saved by their works before God. Some people live a life of amazing good deeds. He donates all the money he has saved over his lifetime to an orphanage or nursing home. Some never get married and serve the disabled for a lifetime. It is very precious and wonderful. However, such good deeds cannot save that person. Because good deeds do not solve the problem of one's sin.
Many people think that if they do a lot of good deeds, they will go to heaven. Why do you think so? Because they take the problem of sin too lightly. But sin is like cancer cells. Doing good deeds when the problem of sin has not been resolved is like exercising and taking medicine for a person with cancer to live. If the cancer is not removed by surgery, the person will die soon, no matter how much exercise he or she does.
So, the only way for all sinners to live is to seek outside help. We can live only when someone solves the problem of sin such as cancer and makes us righteous. But the road has finally been opened. Verses 21, 22, "Now besides the law, the one righteousness of God has been revealed … through faith in Jesus Christ" The law, like X-rays, plays a role in revealing how serious a person's sins are. X-rays are an examination instrument, not a treatment instrument. The law does not cure sin, but exposes it. Therefore, the law cannot save a person. But apart from the law, the righteousness of God came to man. Just as a rescue team arrived in a helicopter to those in a sinking ship, God's righteousness came from outside to those who could not do anything about their sins. The righteousness of God came to people through faith in Jesus. Because Jesus died on the cross for our sins, our sin problem is solved and God justifies us.
'Now' is 'now' in English, which means that the road has been opened. 'Now' means that you are no longer in a sinking ship or a cancer patient, but have a new life. 'Now', you have to live a new life with the life you have regained. We are now living in a completely different era. Although nothing has changed outwardly, it is spiritually reborn.
'Now', 'now' is different. Even after we believe in Jesus, whenever the temptation of sin comes, we must clearly declare to ourselves that 'it is different now'. Whenever my friends suggest, 'Let's spend the night in a PC room!' or 'Let's go watch a pornographic video!' We should no longer be bound by vague fears or superstitions. You should not be afraid to hear ghost stories or rumors circulating among your friends. 'Now' is to live with common sense and wisdom in faith. We should no longer be disappointed with our own frustrating circumstances and plight. You may not be able to study well, and your family circumstances may be difficult. But 'now', he gets up from that despair and does his best in the little things he can do. Then God begins to work through those little things. We can be sexually and physically inferior. But 'now', we acknowledge ourselves as we are before God and see ourselves through God's point of view. It is to overcome the feeling of inferiority by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Pastor Namhee Won