“For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.” Romans 10:3-4 (Read Romans 10)

The apostle Paul had a sincere desire that his people, the people of Israel, would be saved. He prayed that they, too, would repent and place their hope and confidence in Messiah Jesus and His innocent sufferings and death for the sins of the world.

Paul wrote (Rom. 10:2-3): “For I bear them witness that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God.”

Why were so many of his fellow Jews not saved? Because they did not know of God’s imputed righteousness for Christ’s sake and sought their own righteousness based upon their obedience to the law. In fact, in their zealous efforts to keep all of God’s commandments and be acceptable to God by their own works, they rejected the perfect righteousness of their Messiah and Savior and failed to place their hope and trust in Jesus, who was crucified for their sins and is risen again in glory.

And this remains an obstacle for so many today, whether Jew or Gentile. People seek to be acceptable to God through their own works and lives and hope they have done enough that God will be satisfied and admit them into the joys of heaven.

What the physical descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob failed to understand in Paul’s day, and what so many fail to grasp today, is that none of us measure up to God’s standard.

Moses wrote of God’s standard in Leviticus 18:5: “Ye shall therefore keep my statutes, and my judgments: which if a man doeth, he shall live in them: I am the LORD.” The problem is that none of us has kept all of God’s commandments and judgments, and the Scriptures also say: “Cursed be he that confirmeth not all the words of this law to do them” (Deut. 27:26); “For there is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not” (Eccl. 7:20); and, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die” (Ezek. 18:20).

None of us measure up. As it is written in Isaiah 53:6: “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way …” But Jesus did measure up. He was holy and righteous under God’s law. The Scripture tells us that He “was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin” (Heb. 4:15); and the Scripture tells us that “the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isa. 53:6).

Because Jesus fulfilled all righteousness for us and then suffered the just punishment for the sins of all when He died on the cross — and He rose again in victory, showing God accepted His perfect sacrifice for sin — the righteousness of God, the only righteousness which avails before Him, is that perfect and imputed righteousness of Jesus the Messiah, received through faith in Him.

The Bible tells us in Romans 3:19-26: “Now we know that whatever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ to all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Jesus Christ: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he may be just, and the justifier of him who believeth in Jesus.”

Indeed Christ Jesus is the end — the fulfillment (telos) — of the law for righteousness to all who believe. Jesus fulfilled all righteousness for us and, through faith in His sufferings, death, and glorious resurrection, God “hath made us accepted in the beloved. In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace” (Eph. 1:6-7).

Do we then return to the law for righteousness before God? Never! We hold fast to Christ Jesus and the perfect righteousness which is ours through faith in Him.

Thy righteousness, O Christ, alone can cover me; no righteousness avails save that which is of Thee. To whom save Thee, who canst alone for sin atone, Lord, shall I flee? Amen. (“Thy Works, Not Mine, O Christ,” Horatius Bonar, 1857)

[ Scripture is quoted from the Revised 1833 Webster Version of the Bible.]

Romans 9

From the Revised 1833 Webster Version of the Bible

1 I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, 2 That I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart. 3 For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh: 4 Who are Israelites; to whom pertain the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; 5 Whose are the fathers, and from whom according to the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen.

6 Not as though the word of God hath taken no effect. For they are not all Israel, who are descended from Israel: 7 Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called. (Genesis 21:12) 8 That is, They who are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted for the seed. 9 For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come, and Sarah shall have a son. (Genesis 18:10) 10 And not only this; but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac; 11 (For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;) 12 It was said to her, The elder shall serve the younger. (Genesis 25:23) 13 As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. (Malachi 1:1-3)

14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? By no means. 15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. (Exodus 33:19) 16 So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy.

17 For the scripture saith to Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might show my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. 18 Therefore he hath mercy on whom he will have mercy , and whom he will he hardeneth. (Exodus 7:3; 9:12, 16)

19 Thou wilt say then to me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? 20 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it , Why hast thou made me thus? 21 Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel to honour, and another to dishonour? 22 What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: 23 And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had before prepared for glory, 24 Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles? (Isaiah 64:8; Jeremiah 18:1-6)

Formula of Concord (Triglot, p. 1081, paragraphs 57‐59, 60b, 62, 63; M. p. 716f.): “That one is hardened, blinded, given over to a reprobate mind, while another, who is indeed in the same guilt, is converted again, etc. — in these and similar questions Paul fixes a certain limit to us how far we should go, namely, that in the one part we should recognize God’s judgment. For they are well‐deserved penalties of sins when God so punished a land or nation for despising His Word that the punishment extends also to their posterity, as is to be seen in the Jews. And thereby God in some lands and persons exhibits His severity to those that are His in order to indicate what we all would have well deserved and would be worthy and worth, since we act wickedly in opposition to God’s Word and often grieve the Holy Ghost sorely; in order that we may live in the fear of God and acknowledge and praise God’s goodness, to the exclusion of, and contrary to, our merit in and with us, to whom He gives His Word and with whom He leaves it and whom He does not harden and reject … And this His righteous, well‐deserved judgment He displays in some countries, nations and persons in order that, when we are placed alongside of them and compared with them (quam simillimi illis deprehensi, i.e., and found to be most similar to them), we may learn the more diligently to recognize and praise God’s pure, unmerited grace in the vessels of mercy … When we proceed thus far in this article, we remain on the right way, as it is written, Hos. 13:9: `O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in Me is thy help.’ However, as regards these things in this disputation which would soar too high and beyond these limits, we should with Paul place the finger upon our lips and remember and say, Rom. 9:20: `O man, who art thou that repliest against God?’”

25 As he saith also in Hosea, I will call them my people, who were not my people; and her beloved, who was not beloved. 26 And it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said to them, Ye are not my people; there shall they be called the children of the living God. (Hosea 1:9-11; 2:23; 1 Peter 2:5-10)

27 Isaiah also crieth concerning Israel, Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved: 28 For he will finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness: because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth. 29 And as Isaiah said before, Except the Lord of Hosts had left us a seed, we had been as Sodom, and been made like Gomorrah. (Isaiah 10:22; 1:9)

30 What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, who followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith. 31 But Israel, who followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. 32 Why? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone; 33 As it is written, Behold, I lay in Zion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. {ashamed: or confounded} (Isaiah 8:14-15; 28:16; 1 Peter 2:5-10)

“For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment to the Son: that all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father who hath sent him.” John 5:22-23

In the Apostles’ Creed, believers have for centuries confessed that Jesus Christ, who “suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried,” rose again from the dead and ascended to the right hand of God the Father, and “from thence He shall come to judge the living and the dead.”

Jesus’ first coming was to fulfill the righteous demands of God’s holy law and then to make atonement for the sins of all by His innocent sufferings and death on the cross. But when He comes again, it will be to judge the living and the dead.

The Bible clearly teaches that Jesus Christ, God’s Son, will be our judge on the Last Day.

St. Paul wrote to Timothy that “the Lord Jesus Christ … shall judge the living and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom” (2 Tim. 4:1). And, in Romans 14:10, he wrote that “we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ.”

Jesus, Himself, said that the Father “hath given him authority to execute judgment also, because he is the Son of man. Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, to the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, to the resurrection of damnation” (John 5:27-29). And Jesus describes this judgment in the parable of the sheep and the goats recorded in Matthew 25:31-46.

Jesus said: “For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment to the Son: that all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father who hath sent him.”

What does this mean for us? Jesus is coming again to judge the living and the dead. Those who honor the Son by believing His Word, repenting of their sins and trusting in Him and His atoning sacrifice on the cross for their sins will be spared in the judgment — their sins are forgiven; they have been pardoned and forgiven for Jesus’ sake.

But those who do not honor the Son by repenting of their sins and trusting in Him as the Son of God and their Savior do not know or honor the Father either and will die in their sins. They will be condemned on the Last Day, the day of judgment.

It is as Jesus said in His conversation with Nicodemus: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. … He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God” (John 3:16, 18).

Dear Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God and Son of man, forgive my sins for the sake of Your holy blood, shed on the cross for the sins of the world, and cleanse my heart that I may honor You as my Savior and my Lord. Amen.

[Scripture is quoted from the Revised 1883 Webster Version of the Bible.]

“For as the Father raiseth the dead, and giveth life to them; even so the Son giveth life to whom he will.” John 5:21

Jesus said in John 6:44: “No man can come to me, except the Father who hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.”

That means none of us is, by nature, capable of making a decision to come to Christ because, as the Bible teaches, we are by our natural birth into this world “dead in trespasses and sins” (Eph. 2:1). It is only when God, by means of His Word, awakens us from spiritual darkness and death that we can know and come to Jesus and trust in Him and His atoning sacrifice for pardon and forgiveness (cf. John 1:12-13; 3:5-6; 6:63; Rom. 1:16-17; 10:17; Eph. 1:13-14).

Therefore, “as the Father raiseth the dead, and giveth life to them; even so the Son giveth life to whom he will.”

As God the Father raises the spiritually dead and gives them life through faith in Christ Jesus, so also God the Son gives life to whom He will through the preaching and hearing of His Word.

Ephesians 2:4-10 says it this way: “But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath made us alive together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not by works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.”

This makes it so important that we hear God’s Word and share it with others because it is through that Word that God’s Spirit calls us to faith in Christ and His cross and raises us up from spiritual darkness and death to faith and life in Christ Jesus! And it is through the Word that He keeps us in that faith!

Though none of us are worthy and all of us would, by our own will, reject Christ and continue in unbelief, Jesus mercifully intervenes and, through His life-giving Word, raises up those “whom He will” to faith and life in Him.

This, of course, means that when we trust in Jesus as our Savior from sin and eternal death, we have every reason to thank and praise Him — for dying in our stead and bearing on the cross the just punishment for our sins and for sending us His Word and by the Holy Spirit calling us from spiritual death and unbelief to faith and spiritual life in His name.

It is as the Bible teaches us in 1 Corinthians 1:30-31: “But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who from God is made to us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: that, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.”

We thank You, dearest Jesus, for raising us up from spiritual death to spiritual life through faith in Your name. Yours is the glory! Amen.

[Scripture is quoted from the Revised 1833 Webster Version of the Bible.]

“But Jesus answered them, My Father worketh until now, and I work. Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he not only had broken the sabbath, but said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God.” John 5:17-18 (Read v. 1-18)

Did Jesus sin when He, on the sabbath day, healed the man at the Pool of Bethesda who had been disabled for 38 years? Did Jesus sin when He told this man to stand up, pick up his bed and walk? The Jewish leaders accused Him of breaking the sabbath by not waiting until after the sabbath to help this man. They also accused Jesus of disregarding the sabbath by telling this man to carry his bed and walk on the seventh day.

On other occasions, Jesus pointed out the hypocrisy of his accusers by reminding them that even they would lift an animal out of a pit on the sabbath; reminding them that David and his men were not held guilty for eating the showbread only the priests were normally permitted to eat when he and his men were hungry; reminding them that it is lawful to do good on the sabbath; and telling them He is Lord of the sabbath (cf. Matt. 12:1-12; Luke 6:1-11; 13:10-17; 14:1-6). On this occasion, Jesus pointed out an even greater truth to justify His actions: “My Father worketh until now, and I work.”

While God rested on the seventh day from His work of creating the heavens and the earth and all that is in them, God did not cease working to preserve all things and to care for His creatures.

The Bible tells us in Nehemiah 9:6: “Thou, even thou, art LORD alone; thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth, and all things that are therein, the seas, and all that is therein, and thou preservest them all; and the host of heaven worshippeth thee.”

Notice that God has made all things (in the past) but that He also “preserves them all” (in the present).

And as the Father works, so does the Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.

In Hebrews 1:1-3, we learn that “God … hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.” Again note that the Son created all things (in the past) but that He continues in the present to care for and preserve “all things by the word of His power.”

So, for our Lord Jesus to care for a created being, this invalid man, and to heal him on the sabbath was perfectly in line with His ongoing work of “upholding all things by the word of his power.” And it certainly shows us that He is Lord of the sabbath, for the sabbath day was made to honor Him and to devote ourselves to His Word and His work (cf. Matt. 12:8; Isa. 58:13-14).

His Jewish audience recognized the truth Jesus expressed — that He was claiming to be God’s Son, equal with God. We read: “Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he not only had broken the sabbath, but said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God.”

Though the Jews recognized Jesus’ claim to be the Son of God and equal with God, did they believe it?

It is as John writes in the first chapter of his Gospel: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. … He came to his own, and his own received him not” (1-5,11).

Instead of recognizing the obvious truth — after all, who alone can just say the word and heal a man who had been disabled and unable to walk for 38 years? — they rejected Jesus and accused Him of breaking their sabbath laws. And when Jesus affirmed the fact that He is God the Son in human flesh and was doing the work of His Father in heaven, they accused Him of blasphemy and sought to kill Him!

The question you and I need to consider is this: Do we recognize that Jesus is God Himself in human flesh, who came into this world a true man to redeem us by fulfilling the righteous demands of God’s law and then suffering the just punishment for our sins and the sins of all by His death on the cross? Do we place our faith in Him and the redemptive work He accomplished for us? Or do we accuse Him of sin for pointing out the emptiness of our attempts to be righteous in God’s eyes with our own works and man-made traditions? Do we accuse Him of blasphemy for claiming to be God Himself and the only way of salvation?

As Jesus said, “My Father worketh until now, and I work.” God has been at work from the very beginning to send a Savior to crush the head of the old evil foe and to redeem us from sin and death (cf. Gen. 3:15; 12:3; 22:18; Psalm 130:7-8; Isa. 9:6-7; 52:13 — 53:12; etc.); and Jesus, God the Son in human flesh, continued that work and went to the cross for us to pay the price for our sins and redeem us (cf. Gal. 4:4-5; Matt. 1; Luke 2; John 19; etc.). Even now, He works when He sends men to preach His Word to us and grants us His Holy Spirit so that we might believe the Gospel and place our faith in Him (cf. Eph. 4:8-16; Act 2:38-39; Eph. 1:13-14).

Jesus works, even on the sabbath, to care for our needs and especially to meet our greatest need — forgiveness for all our sins and new life through faith in His name! Don’t reject Him! Look to Him in faith for pardon and forgiveness! Trust in Him to heal your soul!

O dearest Jesus, Son of God and Son of man, grant me healing for my soul. Pardon my sins for the sake of Your atoning sacrifice in my stead and lead me in the way everlasting. Amen.

[Scripture is quoted from Revised 1833 Webster Version of the Bible.]