All right, well, let's get off in this word for a minute. What y'all got to give away? Boy, we are in some goodness. The book of Romans. Romans 3, 13. Romans 3, 13. And it says in their throat is an open sepulchre. And with their tongues they have used deceit. the poison of asthma is under their lips. And so I read that this morning, and well, and I remember, kind of remember reading that. And I was reading Psalms 5 this morning, and I get over there, and Psalms 5, 9 says, their inward part is very wicked, and their throat is like an open sepulcher that flatters with their tongue. And I was going, oh, wait a minute now. I just read that in Romans. That's right. That's where Paul pulled that from. It is. What do you think he's talking about there? Their mouths are like an open tomb. Well, you know, what is it? Hate? Hate is like taking poison and expecting somebody else to die? An open tomb would be like you were talking about that flood that y'all had to go get those caskets and all that that was floating. What was in those caskets? We don't know. It was a dead body. Death was in them. And an open tomb was basically saying what was coming out of it was just death. No life coming out of an open tomb unless you're dealing with Jesus, unless you're dealing with a resurrection. We're talking about whatever was coming out, their throat, what was coming out of their heart, their throat was like a just a grave site that had been cleared out and open and all you found in it was death and bones and lifelessness. And that's what's coming out, lifelessness, death. And that's the reference there that humanity, mankind, without the working of Jesus, the only thing man can give away is death. The only thing you can give away is lifelessness. And that's what Paul prefaced that with, that there is none that is good in and of themselves. There is none that is righteous in and of themselves. There is none who seeks after God by himself. only thing man does of himself is produce death because man is corrupted, man has fallen. That's what he illustrated in Romans 1 in verses number 18 to the end of that chapter. He painted a picture of this world without God involved in their lives, it's just lifelessness, it's death and what Paul was attempting to do was make a reference that you looking at the rest of this world as somebody who was of the Jewish nation who had an advantage from the rest of the world because you had the oracles of God, you had the Word of God, the rest of the world didn't have that, you had it. But in reality, it was an advantage to you, but you're no different than them either. You're just as full of death as they are. Because the law of God that God gave was not to make you righteous. The law of God was given to show you that you were full of death. that you were full of sin, that you were selfish, and that you needed mercy no different than this world that was without the oracles of God. And God was using you as an instrument to go proclaim and publish His news of His righteousness, which is by faith, to a world who was without Him. And so what Paul does with such great clarity is that which he included himself in this, is that all of us, all mankind, are fallen and corrupt and stand in need of the righteousness of God, which is found only, only in Jesus. And he uses that word in chapter number three. Look in chapter number three. And he says, in verse number 25, verse 25, 325, when it says, whom, that is going back to Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His own blood. The idea of set forth would be that You ever been in a business deal with somebody, whether it be buying a car, buying a home, buying anything out there, and you've been negotiating with somebody, and you're dealing on both sides, and you both give, you set forth your final offer. in the sense that you present here, whether you write it down or say it, you got it down here and say this is my bottom dollar right here, 5,000 is what I'm gonna give you for that vehicle. You set it forth before them and put it in their hands saying that's the solution to our talking right now. You give it to me for that, I'll walk away with it. But that's the bottom, that's the top dollar I'm gonna pay or the bottom dollar I'm gonna accept. You set that forth before Him. And the image is that God's final solution or only solution that He set before mankind is His Son, Lord Jesus Christ. He's His only answer. He set Him forth as His only propitiation. That word means to be a satisfied covering. that no other covering can satisfy the heart of God or the way of God except His Son. So He set Him forth before us as His only answer. There is no other answer. There is no other way. There is no other person. He is God's final only solution for mankind. He set him forth to be the propitiation by his blood through faith to demonstrate his righteousness because in his forbearance and times past he looked over and in lieu of what he was going to do in Christ because he's his solution, he's his answer and he set him forth before. He presented him to us and we've all been in situations like that where we presented something to somebody and laid it out before them and said this is all I got, this is all I can do This is what you get in this and either you can accept it or walk away from it. And God set forth His Son and said you could either trust Him or live without Him. But when you live without Him, there's a consequence that you have no other means to cover you before Me. And the law can't do it and that's what He's making a point about. The law was never intended to be set forth as a covering. The law was given as he says, and look, if you would, in verse number 19. Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, that every mouth, every mouth should be stopped and all the world may become guilty before God. therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in its sight for by the law is the knowledge of sin." It only gives you knowledge of sin, it can't redeem you, it can't transform you, it can't convert you It is just given to give knowledge that sin is sin and you are sinful and your sin is exceedingly sinful and you need His mercy. You need His covering. And because He gave the law, the law was in preparation to set forth His Son to say, okay, this is your condition. This is your problem. You are separated from me as a result thereof, but I'm setting forth an answer for that, a solution. And it's the only solution I got, and the only solution you have to be covered from that. Through faith in His blood. That's right. Yeah, by His blood through faith. That's where that propitiation is applied through faith. When you trust it, when you're convinced of it, you entrust your life, you confess in agreement with God that yes, He's the covering that God has given what He set forth. That's when that propitiation covers you. You get covered and it's considered to be righteous. Faith is the only way to be righteous with God. Yes. And, um, so in verse 11, uh, three, three, 11. Yes. There is none that understand it. And there's none that seek it. They have to God. There's gotta be, you know, I know through faith, through preaching the word, we hear the word. I know that's where, where the, It just starts. How can they know? How can they know unless they hear somebody preach it? But I was a ship without a rudder and without a sail for a long time. And my ship finally hit ground, like dark, and I finally came out of the ship. but I knew that there was people that were praying for me. No doubt. You can, Brother Shannon, what you could do on every one of those when he says there is none righteous, no not one, there's none righteous of himself. Yeah. You can say there is none who understands, no one understands by himself. You had to have God. I had gotten myself to somewhere listening to the preacher preach, or hearing somebody's sermon, as much as I think there was somebody standing in the gap for me, saying, this is the wayward child that's gonna stray, and God brings him back into the fold, and God's mercy in honor of that prayer request, gave me a chance to repent of what I was doing. Which was the work that God had put in their hearts to do, to pray, to intercede. Yeah, because this is all, look in John 17, look in John 17. When you go look these passages up in the Psalms, Psalm 14, Psalm 53, Ecclesiastes 720, Psalms 5, all these are taken out of the Psalms and a few other passages, but in John 17, notice how this talks about us. Jesus said, he spoke these words, John 17 one, This is this high priestly, this is Jesus praying. Now watch. Jesus spoke these words, lifted up his eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hours come. Glorify your son that your son also may glorify you. Now watch verse two. As you, Father, have given him the son over authority over what? flesh. All flesh. All flesh. Everybody. All flesh. Watch. Yes, everybody. Everybody. Jews. Gentiles. Everybody. Everybody. All flesh. Throughout the ages. Throughout time. Okay. Everything. Remember everything the New Testament teaches us that everything was reconciled in Him both in heaven and on earth. Yeah. Through from the beginning of time to the end of time it was all pulled together in Christ. Yes. Well He says you have get, watch this verse 2, as you have given Him authority over all flesh that He the Son should give eternal life to as many as you have given Him. As many as the Father had given Him. That He gives eternal life to as many as the Father gave Him. Everybody was in that category of being, you didn't seek God of Himself, didn't do good of Himself, All we were was a sinner. This passage is telling us that what made the difference in us was not ourself, but Christ Jesus who made the difference in us. And He made the difference in us when He fulfilled the mission that His Father gave Him. Not just the mission that He gave Him, but that mission was given to Him to redeem people for the Father. As many as you have given me, that I have authority over all flesh, that I should give eternal life to as many as you have given me. Verse three then tells us what eternal life is. and this is eternal life. What is it? That they who couldn't know me may know me. And the only true God in Jesus Christ whom you have sent. Remember there was none, we wasn't seeking after Him. We wasn't looking for Him. We didn't want nothing to do with Him. We left to ourselves, left to ourselves, left to ourselves. we would be in the same condition that we were and what he describes everybody that's in that condition now outside of this divine work of grace. Is there a fork here where this is made known to us and we decide to accept Jesus or we decide to reject Jesus. There is the responsibility of us to respond in faith. In faith. In faith, because it's always going to be through faith. So those that do then believe, but then there's those that don't. And those that don't are the ones that have not been given to him. Okay. But they had a choice. Everybody has a choice. Okay. But the difference between... We don't know how many choices we're gonna get. Exactly. But not only that, we don't know the extent of how that choice comes to them. Of them hearing... Well, he's already, he did that. He, he's done that. That, that's where you get into, uh, what Romans one is doing. Paul's taken us back since creation. man without God and specifically the Gentile world prior to the gospel infiltrate in the Gentile world lived with a reprobate mind and did whatever they wanted. Yeah, yeah. I mean even through judges it talks about that. Acts chapter 14 tells us specifically that God left them to themselves and He didn't intervene. So you got a whole world of people out there that never knew anything of Him, never heard anything about Him, operated like humanity operates in their fallenness, but didn't know who He was, didn't know anything. All they had was creation. which creation can't reveal His redemption, it can just reveal that there's a creator and that creation and revelation only condemns us. Just like conscience, the conscience can't convert you, it can only condemn you. The church cannot convert you, it can only condemn you. There's only one light that delivers men and that's Christ. God's given us four great lights, creation, conscience, the church, and Christ. And there's only one that delivers. Everything else is designed to condemn us so that we see the need for Christ, that we need Christ. And that's what Romans is teaching us, that They had the law. The law was just condemning them. The Gentile world had a law to themselves and the law that they operated based on their conscience. It condemned them. The only thing that can rescue them is Christ. And that's where he refers to we have the power of God, the means of God, which is the gospel, the good news of this redeeming grace in Christ. We preach that good news because that good news is what reveals to mankind that God's done something. He set forth an answer for us that we couldn't answer ourselves. And that He has done in Him, in Christ, what was needed to rescue us from our sinfulness. Go to Acts chapter 14 before we, look in Acts chapter 14. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. I mean, all this, this is what we're working with. We often forget. No, we, we, yeah. We, we often, we often. We often forget in our day that we live post on the other side, this side of the cross prior to that. You're talking about thousands of years of people living without any revelation of who God was but still would be held accountable to Him. Except for those that God spoke to like Abraham. Well, Abraham, that's right, but God didn't speak to everybody. That's the thing. He called out Abraham by himself and started something at Abraham to bring. And all those were in the line to bring about Jesus. It wasn't like God just decided when he saw Abraham, so I'm gonna make Abraham the forefather of Jesus. No, that was in his blood, that was in his loins before Abraham even knew who God was. That was all God working that out. But Acts chapter 14, look what he says in... Verse 15, men, why are you doing this? People were bowing to them, thinking that they were a great God. He said, we also are men with the same nature as you and preach to you that you should turn from these useless things to the living God, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that are in them, who in generations past, bygone generations, allowed all nations to walk in their own ways. Nevertheless, nevertheless, He did not leave Himself without an unredeemable witness. What I mean by unredeemable, in that He did good to them, He gave them rain, He gave them fruitful seasons, He filled their heart with food and gladness. All those things were a witness to Him as Creator, but none of those things could make it clear who this Creator was. None of this was, If he did, he wouldn't allow them to walk in their own ways. He would have been a difference maker in their life, but he wasn't a difference maker in their life. He just let the rain fall on the just and the unjust. He gave them fruitful seasons. He gave them what they needed to survive in this world by his natural laws, but he did not introduce himself to them for who he was. As a result, now we gotta keep that in mind, that these people lived and died without him. But what they had condemned them, because they had creation, they had their conscience that condemned them, that they were sinners against one another. That's why they have laws and why civilized societies have laws that protect from stealing and lying and murders. And they deal with people that do all those things, even though they didn't have the law of God, they still operate it within that law. That's what Romans is teaching us. The Gentiles were just like, like, like the Jew in the fact that they were a law to themselves, even though they didn't have the law of God. but you who condemn them because of their lifestyle, you're doing the exact same things they did and you had the Word of God. And because you can judge that they were doing wrong, or somebody else does wrong, puts you in condemnation now. That if you can judge somebody for doing wrong, that means you know the difference between right and wrong, and now you accountable for that right and wrong, and you were just like them, and you need a redeemer just like they did. And that redeemer, the only one God set forth is Jesus. And see, I can see where, if you take the Gentile and the Jew, having this discussion about Jesus, it would be probably easier for the Gentiles to accept Jesus than the Jews. Yeah, oh, God was at work doing something in their heart, and they said, man, we wanna hear about this Jesus. Yeah. The Jews. Jews said, we have God. They had a grip on him, that we do it in our way, we got the law, they don't have anything, they're the heathens, they don't have nothing, and you're telling us we got something different? and we're slaves, we're, you know, that we weren't free. Yeah, that's right, yes. And it's difficult for even Americans here to see some of this because we want to say that we're free. You see, we don't realize how in bondage we were under sin and that we need a king Lord and Master to get us out from under sin. Americans don't want to hear that. They don't want to hear that they're in bondage and enslaved. We need a righteousness that is acceptable before the throne of God. We cannot produce that. Nobody can. Only it can be transferred to us when we trust Jesus. That's it. That's it. When we trust Jesus, God gives us his righteousness. God will judge the world by the righteousness of Christ. And if you're not in that righteousness, which is by faith, through faith, your judgment will be according to your unrighteousness. But when you're covered in Him, your judgment is based on His righteousness, which was without fault, without sin, blameless, holy, not guilty. That's the point of why we put our confidence in Him and why God set Him forth is that the only solution for life and death and everything else in it is my son, because he's the standard by which I'll judge. I won't judge everybody by the law. I'm judging everybody by the standard of righteousness, which is Jesus. The law was just given to you to reveal that you're not righteous, and you need the righteousness of Jesus. You need the righteousness of God. We all need it, amen? Both Jew and Gentile, the whole world needs it. Well, look, we gotta head on in. They gonna be looking for us, and it's pouring down out there. Yeah. If it ain't wet now, it ain't gonna get wet. Yeah. Father, we thank you. We bless you. Help us with these things. Teach us and use us to publish your good news. Amen. Love y'all.