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Dec 29, 2019

The Benchmark We Fail

The Benchmark We Fail

Passage: Romans 7:1-25

Speaker: Brad Owen

Series: General Topic

To begin the new year, we’ll listen to one chapter for the whole good news: Romans 8. But the glory of that chapter can’t be appreciated apart from the sobriety and poignancy of Romans 7. The beauty of grace can’t be seen apart from the blessing of the law--even if the latter could not, on its own, create in us what it called from us.

Order of Worship

Call to Worship:  Psalm 119:137, Job 14:4, 15:12-14, Psalm 119:37, 10, 32
Sermon Title: “The benchmark we fail.”
Old Testament Reading:  Exodus 20:1-17
Central Text:  Romans 7:1-25
Benediction: Galatians 4:4-7
Post-Service Text:   Romans 8:1

Illustrations

Two Towers - Gollum & Smeagol

Big Kahuna - Honest Regret

Elizabethtown - Failed Greatness

Readings & Scripture

Call to Worship:  Psalm 119:137, Job 14:4, 15:12-14, Psalm 119:37, 10, 32

LEADER: Righteous are you, O LORD,
and right are your rules.

PEOPLE:  Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?
There is not one.

LEADER: Why does your heart carry you away,
and why do your eyes flash,
that you turn your spirit against God
and bring such words out of your mouth?

PEOPLE: What is man, that he can be pure?
Or he who is born of a woman, that he can be righteous?

LEADER: Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things;
and give me life in your ways.

ALL: With my whole heart I seek you;
let me not wander from your commandments!
I will run in the way of your commandments
when you enlarge my heart!

Old Testament Reading:  Exodus 20:1-17

Ex. 20:1   And God spoke all these words, saying,
Ex. 20:2   “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
Ex. 20:3   “You shall have no other gods before me.
Ex. 20:4   “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 5 You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

Ex. 20:7   “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

Ex. 20:8   “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. 11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

Ex. 20:12   “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.

Ex. 20:13   “You shall not murder.

Ex. 20:14   “You shall not commit adultery.

Ex. 20:15   “You shall not steal.

Ex. 20:16   “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

Ex. 20:17   “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s.”

Central Text:  Romans 7:1-25

Rom. 7:1   Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? 2 For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. 3 Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.

Rom. 7:4   Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. 5 For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. 6 But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.

Rom. 7:7   What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. 9 I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. 10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.

Rom. 7:13   Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. 15 For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. 17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

Rom. 7:21   So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

Benediction: Galatians 4:4-7

LEADER: But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. 6 And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” 7 So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.

PEOPLE: Thanks be to God! Hallelujah!

Post-Service Text:   Romans 8:1

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Related Scriptures

  • Psalm 19
  • Psalm 119
  • Matthew 5:17-20
  • Hebrews 7:19

Discussion Questions & Applications:

 

  1. When you hear about the Law of God, what are the first things that come to mind--positive or negative?
  2. What’s the Law for? How are severals ways it is spoken of--in the Old Testament or New Testament, or by Jesus himself?
  3. What all does Paul say here about the Law? In particular what is the relationship between the Law and sin?
  4. Why might Paul end this chapter on a poignant note?
  5. How does Jesus “deliver” us from the “body of death”? Why does that sound a note of thanksgiving in Paul?
  6. What are we to “do” with the Law, now in light of Jesus? 

Quotes: 

  • . . .what if it so happens that on occasion man’s profit not only may but precisely must consist in sometimes wishing what is bad for himself, for what is not profitable? - Fyodor Dostoevksy, Notes from Underground
  • The law is not a checklist we keep; it is a benchmark we fail. - Tim Keller

Sermons/resources:

Books

  • The Whole Christ, a book by Sinclair Ferguson detailing a particular theological controversy in 18th century Scotland which has contemporary relevance for how we think about the Law in light of Jesus

Related Media

InView Media Album 12.29.19