Romans 1:16-17
~18 min
SERMON OUTLINE
- I. It Is The Power Of God That Saves
- II. It Operates Through Faith
- III. It Reveals The Righteousness Of God
TRANSCRIPT
I greet you in the blessed name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
In a few days’ time, at the end of this month, we remember a very special day in the history of the Christian church — 31st October 1517 — known as the Reformation.
Why do we remember the Reformation? The Reformation is the root of our Protestant faith. Before the Reformation, for almost 1,000 years, the people were living in spiritual darkness and deception, and their faith was based on the superstitions and traditions of the Roman church.
The fundamental thing that started the 16th-century Reformation was actually the matter of indulgences. An indulgence is a piece of paper which the Roman church would sell to the people for the remission of their sins. In other words, if you buy them for yourself, your sins will be forgiven, and if you buy them for your loved ones who are already dead, you can save them from purgatory.
But the selling of indulgences was not the only thing they believed in. They also believe that salvation was attained by believing in Christ plus the church, plus Mary, plus the saints, plus the traditions, and plus performing all the necessary good works prescribed by the church in order to earn their salvation.
These were never taught in the Holy Scriptures. Although Martin Luther was the key figure of the Reformation, there were many other pre-reformers like William Tyndale, John Wycliffe and so forth who prepared the ground. Luther was actually a Catholic monk, so he knew what was taught in the Roman church, and he responded to the great corruption of the Roman church in misrepresenting the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.
It was the fruit of ten years of study, and in this period of ten years, Luther studied in particular the book of Psalms, the book of Romans, and the book of Galatians. As he studied the Holy Scriptures, he experienced what theologians call the ‘evangelical breakthrough.’ The Spirit of God opened the eyes of Martin Luther as he read Romans 1:17: “For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.” He realised that a person was justified only by faith, which means salvation is only by faith.
So, on the 31st of October 1517, Martin Luther, commonly known as the father of the Protestant Reformation, nailed his 95 Theses to the church door at Wittenberg. His purpose was to oppose what was taught in the Roman church.
Today we want to consider two essential verses that struck Martin Luther and changed his life, which subsequently changed the face of Europe and ultimately touched the whole world.
Please turn with me to Romans 1:16–17: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.” (Romans 1:16–17)
The title of our message is The Power of the Gospel of Christ.
I. It Is The Power Of God That Saves
Our first point is: The gospel of Christ is the power of God that saves.
Some Bible commentators believe that the theme for the Epistle to the Romans is summarised in these two verses. So this was not only the heart of the Apostle Paul but also the heart of the book of Romans.
Paul began by saying, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ.” Because of the gospel, Paul was imprisoned in Philippi. He was chased out of Thessalonica. He was mocked in Athens, was seen as a fool in Corinth, and he was known to be a troublemaker in Jerusalem. Even though the gospel was a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles, he was fully persuaded that this gospel was the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth.
So he was not ashamed to preach it. The very fact that he said, “I am not ashamed,” implies that some people might be ashamed, especially when they were faced with trials and tribulations. Paul was faced with death, but martyrdom was not able to silence him. He was imprisoned, but he considered his predicament not a disgrace, but even a privilege to suffer for Christ. He knew he had no reason whatsoever to be ashamed of the gospel.
For some people, they would have easily succumbed to the temptation of keeping quiet. Others would have walked away. I believe many of us would like to be identified with Paul in the same way. But the reality is that there might be times when we were ashamed.
Why do I say that? Perhaps there were times when we ought to speak, but we did not speak. When we faced rejections, hostilities, and even persecutions, we were afraid to talk about sin and our Saviour. People said all kinds of silly things about the gospel, about our Lord Jesus, yet we never opened our mouths to defend it. Paul was different. He was persecuted. He faced death. But never once was he ashamed.
Indeed, the Roman church has misrepresented the gospel of Christ. Today there are also many people out there who claim to preach the gospel message, but they have diluted the pure gospel and misrepresent our Lord Jesus Christ.
In recent years, there was this movement known as the health, wealth, and prosperity gospel. And the advocators of this movement promised the people that if you believe in Jesus, you will be blessed with good health and strength, you will be blessed with physical and material prosperity.
Where did all these teachings come from? They were never taught in the Holy Scriptures. In Matthew 8 a certain scribe who wanted to be his disciple came to Jesus and said, ‘I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest. And Jesus saith unto him, The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.” (Matthew 8:19–20)
In other words, if you are looking for comfort and if you are looking for those things to make your life better, Christ is not offering that. So to those people who are telling the world that if you come to Jesus, he will make you well, he will give you healing, you will never be sick, you will have all the blessings in the physical dimension — they are actually offering the very thing that Christ rejected.
A second man who also wanted to be his disciple came to Jesus and said, ‘I will follow you, but first let me go and bury my father.’ And Jesus said to him: “Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead.” (Matthew 8:22) Actually, the man’s father was not dead yet, because the Jews would bury their dead on the same day. He just wanted to stay around to get the inheritance. So he said to Jesus, ‘I will follow you, but first let me get my money.’ But our Lord Jesus turned him down.
Money and material comforts have prevented so many people from serving Christ. And yet today there are people who claim that Jesus wants to make you rich. They are actually offering the very thing that kept so many people from serving God. They have bypassed the true gospel of Christ. It was never about health, wealth, and prosperity. People just want to reinvent the gospel of Christ. They just want to reshape their own opinion of the truth. Dear friend, the Holy Scriptures will not allow us to do that.
Have you ever encountered anyone who said to you that the standard of the Bible is too high? Whether we are pastors, preachers, elders, Sunday school teachers, parents, or individual believers, we are not to give another standard, nor are we to lower the standard. We are to say what the Bible says. And we pray that we will never misrepresent the gospel because ultimately you and I are accountable to the Almighty God. We must never compromise the gospel to accommodate the itching ears of the world.
The Apostle Paul said, “I’m not ashamed.” And why was he so bold in preaching the gospel? The reason was given — for it is the power of God unto salvation. It is because of what the gospel is and what the gospel does. The gospel of Christ is powerful to save the souls of men and transform their lives. That is what it means. Paul knew it, and those who believe it must know it as well.
We sing the hymn I Love to Tell the Story. But why do we love to tell the story? Because it is the power of God unto salvation. We say we love to evangelise, but before we start to evangelise, we must first be convinced and fully persuaded that this gospel is the power of God unto salvation.
One pastor shared an interesting illustration about power. There was a vacuum cleaner salesman who went to a farmhouse. He walked into the farmhouse and, with his typical salesmanship fashion, he did not wait for the lady of the house to say a word. She opened the door and he walked straight into the living room and he said, ‘Ma’am, I want to tell you about this vacuum cleaner. It will suck everything in the house. You have to be careful. It is so powerful you might even lose your floor.’ And she was about to say something, but he stopped her immediately and said, ‘I’m going to show you how much this thing can do.’ He took out a bag of dirt, ashes, garbage, and junk and dumped everything around the floor. And he said, ‘Ma’am, if this vacuum does not suck all these things in two minutes, I will eat them with a spoon.’ Finally, when she got an opportunity to speak, she said, ‘Well, you better start eating because we have no electricity here.’
It may be funny, but I believe you understand the point. Before you sell the product, you better make sure there is power to make it operate.
Paul was not ashamed because he knew the gospel has power. The gospel is the good news, and the good news about Jesus Christ has enormous power that our finite minds can never fathom.
The word ‘power’ or ‘dunamis’ is from where we get the English word for dynamite. In other words, the gospel carries with it the omnipotence of God. The all-powerful God is behind it. God is the one who saves a person. He’s the one who regenerates a person.
Do you realise that many people truly want to change their lives? People want to have better experiences in life. You ask an alcoholic if he wants to change — of course he wants to change. You ask a gambler if he wants to change — you will get the same answer. If possible, they would even want to save themselves. Like the Philippian jailer who asked Paul and Silas, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” (Acts 16:30)
But we are totally powerless to change our lives, let alone save our souls. Jeremiah 13:23 says: “Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots?” The answer is no. We are all powerless. We cannot do a thing about who and what we are.
We may manifest some good works here and there, some works of righteousness here and there, but our nature remains the same — sinful. Only the gospel of Christ has the power to change us, to take us away from sin, Satan, from judgment, from death, and from hell unto salvation. It is the power of God unto salvation.
The Roman church will tell you, ‘The church has the power to save you. Baptism can save you. Good works can save you. Buying indulgences can save you.’ But the Bible says very clearly in Acts 4:12, "Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved."
And Jesus Himself said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." (John 14:6) There is no other way. Only the gospel of Christ is the power of God that saves.
Romans 5:6 says, "For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly." In other words, we are powerless, totally depraved. We cannot do anything to save ourselves. And Christ did for us what we cannot do for ourselves. The gospel of Christ is the source of an incredible power that can save and transform our lives.
Behind the gospel is the power of God. By His powerful command, God created the heavens and the earth. Behind every miracle in the Bible, there is the power of God. He was the one who opened the Red Sea and brought manna from heaven. When Christ lived on this earth, He had the power to cast out demons. He had the power over sickness. He had the power to provide for the people's needs. He had the power to calm the storm. He had the power to walk on water. He had the power over death, and He was raised from the dead.
But the greatest expression of His power is found in His ability to save and transform our lives — because we are dead. And it is His power that makes us alive and to live forever in His kingdom.
The word salvation means deliverance — to be delivered from sin, Satan, judgment, and hell. And only God through the gospel of Jesus Christ has the power to do that. So the power of God can bring salvation. But how? Verse 16 says, “to every one that believeth.”
II. It Operates Through Faith
Our second point is: the gospel of Christ operates through faith. Where there is faith, there’s the power of God operative in salvation.
What is faith? Faith is to believe. It is to believe in your heart that God has sent His only begotten Son to come into this world, live a perfect life, ultimately to die on the cross, shed His precious blood to save us from our sins.
To believe in our hearts that Jesus is who He said He was, and to believe in our hearts that Jesus died for the reason He said He died and rose again from the dead. And to believe in our hearts that we who believe in Him, though we may die, we will also be raised from the graves. God said it. I believe it, and that settles it. That is faith.
Salvation is not baptism. Salvation is not going to church. It is not conforming to certain rules. It is not morality. Salvation does not come from the church. Salvation comes when a man recognises that he is a sinner. He has no resources of his own, totally lost and depraved. And then he looks to the one who paid the price of sin on the cross of Calvary to save him. And he says, ‘I believe. I believe you are the only one who can save me. There’s none other name under heaven that is able to save me. Only Jesus saves.’
Does not matter who that person is. Verse 16 says, "To every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek." This is in line with what Jesus had taught His disciples in Acts 1:8, that the gospel be preached amongst all the nations, go out there, preach to all the nations, but beginning at Jerusalem. It was to the Jews first that the Messiah came. Jesus himself said, ‘I am not come, but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel (Matthew 15:24).
The preaching of the gospel to the Jews first has several important purposes. Firstly, it fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies. Secondly, it manifested the compassion of Jesus Christ.
The Jews were the ones who crucified Him and killed Him, yet His gospel was preached to them first. It was to the Jews first and also to the Greek because in God’s salvation plan, their rejection of the promised Messiah would open the gospel door to the Gentiles. That is why today you and I who are Gentiles, we have this blessed opportunity to hear and believe in the gospel. The salvation of God is not limited to any nation, any people, any race, but to everyone — Jew or Gentile.
So the Bible says the gospel of Christ has the power to save the one who believes. Can it save him? How can He change him?
III. It Reveals The Righteousness Of God
Verse 17: "For therein is the righteousness of God revealed." (Romans 1:17)
Our point is: the gospel of Christ reveals the righteousness of God. The reason why He can save us is because when we believe, the righteousness of God is revealed to us. In other words, it becomes ours.
About twelve years before the Reformation, in 1505, Martin Luther was caught in the middle of a storm of lightning. He was so afraid. But instead of looking up to the Almighty God, he looked up to the saints for help. Luther cried out, ‘Help me, Saint Anne. I will become a monk.’
So that same year he became a monk as he had promised. He observed all the rules in the monastery and lived a rigid life trying to obtain his own righteousness. He thought he could obtain his own righteousness.
But when he came to his first mass before the one living and true eternal God, he was struck with horror because he realised that he was unworthy to approach such a holy and righteous God. And he said, ‘With what tongue shall I address His Majesty?’
In other words, how can I call upon Him? I’m a sinner. My tongue is full of sin. How can I call upon such a holy and righteous God? He realised that there was a great barrier between himself and God — between the perfect holiness of God and his immorality — and all his righteousness were but filthy rags.
Luther began to see that all his penance, all his good works, all his efforts in trying to create in himself a righteousness, was useless. Absolutely useless. But from Romans 1:17, God was calling out to him, It is not your righteousness, but my righteousness, as revealed in the gospel of my Son Jesus Christ.
The word “righteousness” is used more than sixty times in the book of Romans. The reason why we are saved by faith is because faith reveals the righteousness of God. We are righteous not because of our own righteousness, but God has given to us His righteousness. You see, we can never be righteous by God’s standard. We can never be perfectly holy. We can never be without sin. So God says to us, If you believe in my Son, you will be righteous in my sight.
How can God do that? At the cross, Christ carried all our sins, and we received His righteousness by faith. At the cross there was this transaction which Martin Luther calls the wonderful exchange. That is why the Bible says, ‘Christ became sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of Him in Christ.’ (2 Corinthians 5:21). And when God sees us, He sees us clothed with the righteousness of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ.
God demands from man what man can never pay. He demands perfect holiness. Some people have a problem with this and they say, ‘That is not fair. That is unjust. How can God do that? Why doesn’t God just lower His standard?’
Well, let’s say God lowered His standard a little bit. Let’s presume God says, ’Well, in order to be saved, you just have to be a little intelligent.’ Would that be fair? No. That would not be fair for those who are intellectually challenged.
If God were to say, ‘In order to be saved, you just have to be a little rich.’ Would that be fair? That would not be fair for those who live their entire life in poverty. Or, ‘You have to be moral.’ What about those people who suffer and struggle with the problem of morality? That would not be fair.
So God set a standard that nobody can qualify and therefore nobody can boast. And then He said, ‘I will give you My righteousness, no matter who you are, if only you believe.’
Lastly, there’s this little phrase at the end of verse 17: “from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.”
The righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith, just as it was in the Old Testament. The people then were saved by faith, never by anything else. Remember even Abraham’s faith when he believed God, he was counted unto him for righteousness. (Genesis 15:6). It is not something new. It is the same thing in the New Testament. It is the same thing in our time. It is not from faith to works, or faith plus works, but it is from faith to faith.
From the faith of Abraham, to the faith of Isaac, to the faith of Jacob, to the faith of Moses, to the faith of David, to the faith of the disciples, to the faith of the reformers, and then today to our faith. It is still salvation is only by faith.
This morning we remember the Reformation. We pray that we are not ashamed of the gospel of Christ and we will not misrepresent the Lord Jesus Christ. But I would like to end by saying this: it is simply meaningless to remember the Reformation if we do not live by faith. He who is saved and made righteous by faith shall also live by faith. For the Bible says, “The just shall live by faith.” (Romans 1:17). The “just” are those who are justified — the believers. So you and I who are justified, who are believers, we have to live by faith.
Dear friend, are you careless in the way you live your life? Do you have this attitude that as long as I am saved, as long as I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, it doesn’t matter how I live my life? God forbids.
The way we live our lives has everything to do with our faith, because God who saves us at the beginning, He continues to save us, and He saves us to the uttermost. And the way we live our lives is the evidence that we are truly saved. He will give us the power to continue living in faith, believing in Him, loving Him, worshipping Him, and serving Him.
If you have forgotten whatever I have said, I pray that you remember these three things:
- The gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation.
- The gospel of Christ operates through faith — you must believe.
- The gospel of Christ reveals the righteousness of God.
Not our righteousness, but the righteousness of Jesus Christ. On that cross, He took our sins, and there was this wonderful exchange - we received His righteousness. And when God sees us, He sees every one of us who are believers clothed with the righteousness of His only begotten Son.
One day God will say to us, ‘Well done. Come here, My son. Come here, My daughter. Because I see the righteousness of My Son in you — not because of what you have done or who you are, but because of My only begotten Son.’
May we live such a life to the glory of God.
Let Us Pray
Our Father in heaven, we thank You for the Reformation. We thank Thee for not leaving us in spiritual darkness and deception. And Thou hast revealed to us that Thy only begotten Son, who came into this world, died on the cross, shed His precious blood to wash away all our sins. That is the gospel — the good news that only Jesus saves.
And the gospel of Christ has the power to save us. And the way the gospel of Christ operates is through faith. It is to believe in who Jesus said He was and what He said He did for us and what He promised to do for us in the future.
And even this faith to believe in Him is a gift from You. It cometh from You. Every aspect of our salvation cometh from Thee and Thee alone.
And the gospel of Christ reveals Thy righteousness. Indeed, the more we read Thy precious Word, the more we consider Thy gospel, the more we realise, like Martin Luther, all our righteousnesses are but filthy rags.
With what tongue shall we address such Majesty? No, we can’t. It is only by faith in Thy only begotten Son that we can call upon Thee, Abba, Father, and Thou will hear us. Because when Thou sees us, Thou sees the righteousness of Jesus Christ covering us, and all our sins are washed by His precious blood.
This is what we ought to stand for as a church, as a family, as an individual — that salvation is only by faith alone and not faith plus anything else. It is faith and faith alone that saves us, and it will save us to the uttermost. And we who are saved by faith — the just — shall live by faith also.
And may Thy Spirit of God, who indwells in our hearts, help us to live such a life to the glory of Thy precious name. We give Thee thanks, and we pray all this in Jesus’ name. Amen.
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