If you'd open up your copies of God's Word to Romans chapter 3. Romans chapter 3. And if you would stand with me as we read God's Word. Romans chapter 3. I'm going to be reading from verse 27 down to the end of the chapter. Romans chapter 3, verse 27. And the Word of God reads, Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? Of works? No, but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith, apart from the deeds of the law. Or is he the God of the Jews only? Is he not also the God of the Gentiles? Yes, of Gentiles also, since there is one God who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith. Do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly not. On the contrary, we establish the law. The grass withers, the flower fades away, but the word of our God will stand forever. You may be seated. Heavenly Father, we ask now that you would bless both the preaching and the hearing of your word. That the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our heart might be pleasing in your sight. that we might hear your word with reverence and with fear, that I might preach in a demonstration of the spirit and of power for your glory. Get me out of the way. Help me just be a vessel used not for my own praise, but for the praise of your own name in Jesus name. Amen. This is Lord's Day 24 on the Heidelberg Catechism, question and answer going through biblical doctrines. And this week is on the topic, on the doctrine of justification by faith alone, producing in us a life of thankfulness and obedience to God. If you remember from last week, and some of you weren't here last week, to remind you because these two sermons kind of go together even though they're standalone. Last week we talked about the doctrine of justification by faith alone. That our acceptance with God is not based on our performance, but as the old hymn puts it, another's death, another's life, I bank my whole eternity. And so we talked about last week that our sin was laid upon the Lord Jesus Christ after he lived in his active obedience, 33 years of perfect law keeping. He then died on the cross. Our sinful record was credited to him. So therefore, by faith alone, we might receive his righteous record, what we call double imputation. Our sin on Him, His righteousness on us. So that was what we talked a lot about, or I talked a lot about last week. This transfer of our sinful record to Him and His righteous record to us. And in the context of Romans 3, the Spirit is teaching us Even though we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, God is just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. So that was a little bit of the overview of last week, but I want to speak to those maybe in this room who aren't justified before God, who don't know their acceptance with God. Because everything else I'm gonna say is on the basis of you knowing that you're justified before God. Think about it this way. Take a food you like. The example I thought of online was pancakes. So pancakes is a pretty classic food that people enjoy. But if you're allergic to pancakes, pancakes aren't a blessing to you. You want to do everything you can to get away from the taste, the smell of pancakes. And that's what it is for the unbeliever to God's law. That they don't, they can't love God's law because God's law is a curse to them. God's law is judgment to them and God's law brings the wrath that he has for them. So my question for you is, Are you justified before God? Are you accepted not based on your merit? Not based on your earnings? Not based on your doing? Because everything else I say on the importance of God's law and obedience will be nothing to you. Because the law can only be a curse. to those who are outside of Jesus Christ. It's only a blessing and a gift to those who know their Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. So think in your own mind, do I know that my basis before a holy God is on the death, the burial, the resurrection of Jesus Christ alone and nothing else? Because only with that framework can we rightly, as believers, walk in obedience to God's commandments. But if you don't know your justified status, everything I'm going to be saying is like you hearing about pancakes, but the whole time you know you're allergic to them. And that's what the law is to someone who has not experienced the saving, justifying grace of the life, the death, the burial, the resurrection of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. But for those who do know their Savior, verse 31 is for us. If you look at verse 31 in the text, it says, do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly not. On the contrary, we establish the law. What is the question being put out? Some people are going to hear justification by faith alone. They're going to hear, So what you're telling me is I am right with God, not because of law keeping, because what does the moral law, the Ten Commandments do? It condemns me in my sin. And what you're telling me is because the law of God condemns me, and my only hope for a right standing with God is on the basis of the doing and dying of another, namely the Lord Jesus Christ. And I'll say, yes, that is what I'm telling you. So some people might then say, well, then we might as well get rid of the law. We might as well not care about the law anymore if my righteousness is based on the doings and dyings of another. Shouldn't we just make void the law and set it aside? And the inspired answer is, certainly not. Some translations will say, God forbid. that we would have the thought in our mind that somehow justification by faith alone, based on the doings and dyings of another, namely the Lord Jesus Christ, would ever cause us to say, let's sin that grace may abound. Why? Because Christ came, as the old hymn says, to save us from God's wrath. and to make us pure. That's from the hymn Rock of Ages. He came to save us from God's wrath and to make us pure. And so we don't set aside the law of God, but instead the law of God is now a blessing to us where we seek to establish and walk in it. So my main point, the main thrust of this sermon is simple. Justification by faith alone leads us to establish and walk in God's law. Chapter 16 of our confession, paragraph two puts it like this on the importance of good works and obedience to God's law. So listen to this section as it explains the reason why we walk in obedience to God's commandments. says, these good works done in obedience to God's commandments are the fruits and evidences of a true and lively faith. And by them, believers manifest their thankfulness, strengthen their assurance, edify their brethren, adorn the profession of the gospel, stop the mouths of the adversaries and glorify God, whose workmanship they are, created in Christ Jesus thereunto, that having their fruit unto holiness, they may have the end everlasting life." So that section in the 69 Confessions says, why do we do these good works? For many reasons, but a primary reason is to show according to James chapter 2, that our faith is genuine saving faith. And by it we adorn, we show the beauty of the gospel of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. And so, do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly not. On the contrary, we establish the law. But before we get too much into specifics and thinking about the law of God in our life as believers, I wanna give a reminder that maybe some of you know, maybe some of you haven't heard though. Because I think so many people when they think about the Christian life of obedience, their tendency is to live a life of continual and constant discouragement in the Christian life. continue to feel the weight of sin and never, ever experience the wonderful liberating power of pleasing their Heavenly Father. And so I want you to think about these two categories. There's two extremes as we think about keeping God's law in the Christian life. The one extreme that we don't want to fall into is that somehow in this life, I can perfectly, without sin, obey God's law. Most of you should know very clearly that you can't do that. Because if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourself and the truth is not in us. 1 John 1.8. But the other extreme, which I think we're more prone to if we're not careful, is that somehow we think that everything we do as those who have God as our Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ as our perfect mediator and Savior, and the Spirit indwelling us is somehow displeasing to God. And there's no way in which we can ever do anything pleasing to our Heavenly Father. Think about it this way. You have a young child. And the father tells the son to go clean up his room. And he goes up, he does it with a sincere attitude, he goes up to clean his room, but when he's up there, of course, if he's a little, let's say seven-year-old child, he's not gonna clean the room in perfection. He's not gonna clean the room in a way where there's nothing dirty there, but the father doesn't come up and start yelling and screaming at him. Why? Because he did it sincerely, wanting to please his dad. And so in the Christian life, This is the same reality. that we as believers in Jesus Christ can do things even though they're imperfect in a way that pleases our Heavenly Father. So when we obey the commandments from faith in the Lord Jesus Christ with a heart that loves Him, God is very, very well pleased. Let me show you that this isn't just Sam's opinion. This is actually the words of our confession in chapter 16, paragraph six. It says, yet notwithstanding, what that's getting at is the paragraph before, and just for the sake of time I won't read it, talks about how even our best works can't merit eternal life. Our best works, because they're not perfect, can't somehow merit everlasting life because our greatest works are still polluted with sin. Yet, notwithstanding, meaning don't forget what was just said, yet notwithstanding. the persons of believers being accepted through Christ, their good works also are accepted in him, not as though they were in this life wholly unblameable and unreprovable in God's sight, but that he, looking upon them in his son, is pleased to accept and reward that which is sincere, although accompanied with many weaknesses and imperfections. Did you hear that last section? God is pleased to accept and reward that which is sincere, although it's accompanied with many weaknesses and imperfections. This is exactly what I'm saying. And our forefathers, in the confession, wanted to encourage God's people by saying, God sees your obedience to his commandments. in Jesus Christ as you're indwelt by the Spirit, and he is pleased as a good and gracious heavenly Father to reward and to accept, that's which is sincere, although it's accompanied with still remaining sin. And so as we think about obedience to God's moral law, we must keep that in mind, that your life as a blood-bought, spirit-indwelt, believer can be pleasing to God. And so we've seen that justification by faith alone doesn't cause us to put aside God's law, but instead motivates us because what does justification by faith alone do? It encourages us that God is willing and able and wants to reward and accept the obedience of his people. Why? Because they have a right standing with him. And instead of being under God's wrath as a condemning judge, we're now under God's mercy as his friends and his children through the doings and dyings of another, our Lord Jesus Christ. So now I want to take a few minutes for those who might not be convinced about the importance of God's law in the Christian life to maybe try to, for a few minutes, reason with you on why the law of God is a necessity for us. And the scriptures will say over and over, on the evidence of two or three witnesses, every case is established. I want to give you two or three or maybe four reasons, briefly, on why the law of God is for us today. Think about our Lord Jesus Christ. When he's asked in the Gospels, what is the greatest commandment? And what does he say? love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength. And the second is like it, love your neighbor as yourself. Well, in that he's quoting Deuteronomy 6, 5 and Leviticus 19, 18. And he says, on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. So what were the 10 commandments? They were showing us what it looks like to keep the two great commandments, love towards God and love towards neighbor. Maybe you're not convinced by that one. Let me use another one. Romans 13, owe no one anything except to love one another. And then he says for the commandments, and then he names some of the 10 commandments. You should not commit adultery, you should not covet, you should not bear false witness. He names like five of the 10 commandments. And he says, and any other commandment is fulfilled in this word, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. And then he says, love therefore is the fulfilling of the law. Every Christian would agree, I believe that we should love, right? And what does the Spirit say love looks like? Love is the fulfilling or the fulfillment or walking in what? The law. What do we know what love looks like? By obedience to the law. A third example, think about Romans 8, verses 3 and 4. For what the law could not do, because it was weak by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, or in account for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh. Purpose statement. That the righteous requirements of The law might be fulfilled in us as we walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. What law does he have in mind? Not the ceremonial law, of course, because that was abolishing Christ. He is the true sacrifice. But Jesus Christ says, I didn't come to destroy the law or the prophets. I came to fulfill them. What law was he coming to not destroy? the moral law of God, summed up in the Ten Commandments, as we walk, not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. One last example. Think about Hebrews 8, the New Covenant blessings. Hebrews 8 is quoting Jeremiah 31 on what the New Covenant is, and the first blessing of the New Covenant. Very important. The first blessing that God says is the blessing of being a New Covenant member. What does it mean to be a New Covenant member? It means to be someone who is in the blood, because what was the New Covenant given? Jesus says, this is the New Covenant in my blood. Through the doings and dyings of our Savior, Jesus Christ, he brought in the New Covenant. And what's the primary blessing of the New Covenant? That I might sovereignly write my law upon your hearts." And some people might say, well, doesn't everyone have the law written on their heart? Well, yes, but just like everyone through the heavens declaring the glory of God has some knowledge of God, but that's not saving knowledge. Everyone has the law written on our heart, but it's not in a saving way. God, in the new covenant, savingly writes his law upon our heart, that we might love it and be able to obey it. So these four texts in the scriptures in the New Testament very clearly teach that God teaches us not to set aside the moral law of God, but instead establish it and walk in it as the way in which we show our thankfulness and gratefulness to the God who has saved us. We don't keep the law somehow to merit acceptance with God. That was last week, right? The first use of the law, it shows us our condition condemned by God. But why do we keep the law as believers? Because we're so thankful that God has redeemed us by the doings and dyings of another, the Lord Jesus Christ, that we as his beloved children want to do whatever we can to please him. And so he gives us the law as that rule of life to say, my dear child, you love me, right? And every true believer is going to say, yes, God, I love you. I wish I loved you more, but yes, God, I love you. Yes, God, I love you. And God comes and says, well, my dear son or daughter, here's the roadmap of what I've given you to show you what love towards me looks like. The Ten Commandments. God has given it to you saying, you love me, right? You want to honor me, right? You care about what I care about, right? And every true believer says, yes, God, I want it to be more, but yes, God, yes. And God says, here's a love gift to you. I haven't left you in the dark about what it looks like to please me. I haven't somehow left you to say, well, I hope I'm pleasing God today. I hope what I'm doing is acceptable to God. But God has come in love and in grace and says, my dear son or daughter, here it is. Walk in it and please me. That's the moral law of God. And so as we think about these commandments, let's think practically how it would look like to walk in these commandments. Let's think about the first commandment. You shall have no other gods before me. What would that look like? And we have to remember in the commandments there's both negative and positives. So a lot of commandments are put negative, but the positive is also. there too. So you shall not, you shall have no other gods before me. That's a negative way of putting it. The positive is you should have Jehovah only as your God. And so what would it look like to keep the first commandment practically? Do you desire, do you want to love God's being more than anything else? Have you chosen and received Jehovah, the true and living God, for yourself? Not just God generically, but you as a believer, you've come to say, God, I love you, I desire you, and it looks like delighting yourself in the Lord. It looks like rejoicing always in the Lord. Again, I say rejoice. It looks like setting Jehovah as the one true and living God, not being drawn away to other false gods. Like Jeremiah says that are cisterns, but they're broken cisterns that can hold no water. It looks like coming to Jehovah, the true and living God, and saying, you are my God. It looks like Joshua when he says, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord, or we will serve Jehovah. That's what keeping the first commandment looks like. It looks like choosing. and revering Jehovah as the true God. The second commandment. And some people get confused. What's the difference between the first and second commandment? Well, the first commandment, you shall have no other gods before me. The second commandment, you shall not make for yourself a graven image, has to do with the way we worship the true God. The first commandment teaches us you should only worship the true God. The second commandment teaches us how we should worship the true God. And the scriptures teach us we should only worship the true God as He's told us to worship Him. And so this looks like, in personal worship, a delight to spend time in God's Word. reading it, meditating over it, delighting in the truth that I get to worship God with an open Bible and access to him in prayer. It looks like delighting in him as you're keeping, if you have families or if you're married, keeping family worship in the home, where you read a section of scripture, not long, but just do something. You pray, you might sing. And it looks like loving and delighting in the corporate means of grace. of coming and basking in that God would feed us by His Word and the Spirit each and every Lord's Day for our good. That's what it looks like to keep the second commandment. You have a love for God's worship. The negative is don't make any carbon image. The positive is do you love God's worship? Do you love to worship Jehovah, the true and living God? as Jehovah has said in his word. The third commandment has to do with loving and adoring God's name. What would this look like practically? Do you desire in your thoughts, in your words, and in your deeds to speak well of the God whom you say you love? Do you desire to walk in a way where you're not using his name in vain, but the contrary to taking God's name in vain is you are constantly being thankful to the God who has saved you and has given you every good gift from above? It looks like a thankful spirit of using his name rightly. Instead of taking it in vain in a flippant way, your attitude is, how can I reverence the name, the attributes, the word, and the works of the God who I love? And you seek to bless His name and not curse His name. You seek to make much of His name and not belittle His name. As Romans chapter 2 says, because of unbelieving Jews, what happened? The name of God was blasphemed among the Gentiles because of them. What does a true believer say? God, I don't want your name to be blasphemed. I don't want your name to be taken in vain. So God, let my thoughts and my words and my actions be in such a way that your name is hollowed among the nations. That your name is hollowed among my co-workers. That when people see me, they realize that I want to honor God's name. That when they see you, they realize this person is serious about the God he says he worships each and every week at his church. And it's seen by him blessing his name. The fourth commandment, remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. In the old covenant, it was on the seventh day. because they were remembering God making the world in the space of six days and all very good, and resting on the seventh. Why do we meet on the first day of the week, or Sunday, or the Lord's Day? Because on the first day of the week, Jesus Christ rested from his works in redemption. The old covenant looked back to what God had done in creation. In the new covenant, we look back at what Jesus did in resting from his works of redemption. And in the Old Testament, what did it look like to keep something holy? Well, if you had a holy priest, they were set apart for worship. And so to keep the Sabbath day holy, the Lord's day holy, is to set the day completely apart. It's not the Lord's hour, right? It's the Lord's day. God doesn't say keep the Lord's hour holy. He says keep the Lord's day holy or the Sabbath day holy. And that would look like, keeping the whole day wholly set apart for worship. Six days we have other things to do, but on the first day of the week, it's set apart exclusively for worship. So do you desire to keep this day? Do your children see that this first day of the week is different from every other day? Does your spouse or your friend say, wow, You really are different on this day. This day is really unique to you. You spend this day differently. This isn't just like any other day to you. This is a holy day. This is what I like to call the Christian holiday. We have one every week. The Lord's Day is a Christian holiday. As a day where people can say, wow, you treat this day different than every other day. And it's shown in your thoughts and your words and your deeds. The sixth commandment. or excuse me, the fifth commandment, honor your father and mother, which involves honoring God the authority, whether in the church, whether in the civil magistrate, or whether in the family, seeking to honor those whom God has put over us, seeking to honor their persons and their offices, to pray for them. Do you respect and honor those who are over you, whether in the church, whether in the family? whether in the government that we have in the United States, whether good or bad. God doesn't say, honor them if they do good to you. God says, honor them, period. Of course, if they tell you to do something God forbids, we don't. But the general habit is us to honor those who have authority over us. Does that look like your life? The sixth commandment, which teaches us to not murder teaches us to respect and love our fellow human beings who are made in God's image. Not to speak bad of them, because Jesus says if you have anger in your heart towards your brother without a cause, you've already murdered him in your heart. So it looks like by the grace of God seeking to honor people, realizing life is valuable in my words and my thoughts and my actions towards others. The seventh commandment, you shall not commit adultery. The positive is being faithful in marriage or being faithful whether you're married or not. Impurity of thought and word and deed. Seeking to be pure with the thoughts that come into your mind, pure with the words that come out of your mouth, and pure of the deeds that you live with your body. The eighth commandment, you shall not steal. Looks like the positive is working hard, laboring hard, whether that's as a homemaker, in the home being a faithful homemaker, and that's a gift of God. I will be forever grateful that my mom was a homemaker. I will forever be thankful that she was willing to sacrifice even the ridicule of some people to stay at home and care for her children. I will be forever grateful for that. And so whether it's working hard as a homemaker, Or it's working outside the home, hard working, laboring, because the scriptures say if someone's not willing to work, let them not eat. And so there's a working hard, a laboring with our hands, whether in the home or outside the home. And there's a seeking not to desire what belongs rightfully to other people. The ninth commandment, you should not bear false witness against your neighbor. The positive is, you would seek to build up and encourage your neighbors. So do you desire to encourage your brethren? Do you desire to encourage people in the church? Is your lifestyle one of not tearing down people, but encouraging people? Everyone already, this world is so much about tearing people down, about making people look silly, about making people, belittling them. May it not be for you. As a blood-bought believer, may you be distinct. Is there never a time for critique? No, of course not. The Apostle Paul called out false teachers publicly. But our general course of life should be one of building people up. Do you desire to build people up? Are you known to encourage people? Because that's what it looks like to positively keep the ninth commandment. To build people up in the service of the Lord. To encourage them when you see them walking in a way that's pleasing the Lord. Encouraging them when you see them doing things that maybe five years ago they wouldn't have done. Do you desire to encourage God's people? in what they're doing in everyday life. The 10th commandment, you shall not covet, which shows that every commandment ultimately starts in the heart. The 10th commandment should scream to us that the commandments aren't just external, they're internal. The Apostle Paul says, what then shall we say, is the wall sin? Certainly not, on the contrary, I would not know sin except through the wall. And then the commandment that got the Apostle Paul was the 10th commandment, for he said, you shall not commit adultery or you shall not covet. And so the 10th commandment teaches us that we might have the opposite of being a covetor or being jealous over other things is being a thankful person, is being someone who's thankful to what God provides. Is your life marked by thankfulness or do people see you as someone who's always grumbling and complaining? Or are you someone who is marked by a thankful spirit Because what is the antidote, what is the medicine to someone who is fighting against breaking the 10th commandment? To each and every day that your life would be marked by being thankful to the God who didn't have to save you. And my dear friends, if you're a believer, you are always doing better than you deserve. You are always doing better than you deserve. Shouldn't that, in the very least, make us thankful that we are always, at every moment and every day, doing better than what we rightly deserve? And should that not cause you to be thankful and grateful to the God who saves sinners in the Lord Jesus Christ by His Holy Spirits? These are the Ten Commandments. These are practical ways to think. So as you think about the commandments, think about the negative and the positive. The negative, admonition. The positive, commandment. So we've seen, hopefully that you've seen that justification by faith alone is not somehow a means that calls us to be lawless and disobeying God's commandments. God's justifying grace is one of the motivations to obey his law. Because if we love God from the heart, if you love someone, what do you want to do? You want to please them. You want to do the things that you know that are pleasing in their sights. And God comes and gives you his law that you might walk in what pleases him. So think about in your own life. Can you say like David, oh how I love your law. Can you say that with an honest heart? Oh, how I love your law. How silly that sounds to some of our ears, because some of us think, oh, how I love the gospel. And yes, we should say that, but David says, oh, how I love your law. The Apostle Paul, who probably preached the gospel better than anyone who ever lived, said, for I delight in the law, according to my inward man. This is true Christian life. To say that God, through the doings and dyings of the Lord Jesus Christ, has rescued me, and therefore I can say, oh God, because I love you, my God, I love your law. Why did David love the law? Why did Paul love the law? Not because the law in itself, but because they loved the God of the law. Because they loved the God of the law. And therefore they said, oh, how I delight in your law. In the psalmist in Psalm 1, as we sang, blessed is the man who walks not after the counsel of God, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the sea of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord. And on his law, he meditates day and night. May your desire to be one of saying, God, help me love your law more. Help me think about what it looks like practically to obey your law and walk in it because you love the God of the law. Don't you love God? How is that shown practically, that you walk in obedience to the law of God in whom you love? Amen. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for this time and we ask for your blessing on it. In Jesus' name, amen.