Sermon Cloud

Just How Bad Are We?

I mentioned last week that, in the Apostle Paul, we are dealing with one of the finest theological minds – if not the very finest – in church history.  He was astounding.  Today’s Bible passage will prove it.  If you have any doubts at all about the intellectual capacity of this man, today should dispel them.

First, the passage.  Then the analysis and application.

Romans 3:9-20.  What shall we conclude then? Are we any better? Not at all! We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin. As it is written: "There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one." "Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit." "The poison of vipers is on their lips." "Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness." "Their feet are swift to shed blood; ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know." "There is no fear of God before their eyes." Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin.”

Now, try to imagine the poor stenographer attempting to keep up with Paul.  The verses pouring out of him like an eruption of a volcano.  The first thing I want you to realize is that, even before we analyze the spiritual significance of these statements…

…all of them are direct quotations from the Old Testament.  All of them.  By topic.  From memory.

1. Romans 3:12.  All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one." A direct quote of Psalms 14:1-3and Psalm 53:1-3.  By the way, if you want to have a little fun.  Mark this down.  Read Psalm 14 and Psalm 53.  You’re in for a surprise.  They are virtually identical.  It kind of makes you wonder if they had some sort of copy machine back then.  And this is also a direct quote of Eccles. 7:20
2. Romans 3:13.  "Their throats are open graves;  
   their tongues practice deceit."  He’s quoting Psalm 5:9
3. Romans 3:13.  "The poison of vipers is on their lips." Quoting Psalm 140:3
4. Romans 3:14 – quoting Psalm 10:7
5. Romans 3:17 -- Isaiah 59:7,8
6. Romans 3:18 -- Psalm 36:1

It’s a blitz.  An intellectual tidal wave.  Can you imagine what it would have been like to be in a debate – a diatribe – against Paul?  I’m sure all this came so easily to him because he had heard the questions before.  He had called upon these Bible references before.  He knew what they said.  He knew what they meant. 

I’m sure his opponents were overwhelmed.  We should be, too.  These are the words of a spiritual genius.  An inspired, God-controlled genius, to be sure.  But a genius nonetheless.  I hope that all of us will apply ourselves to become such people.  Read the Bible.  Study it.  Know what it says.  Know what it means.  And how to rightfully apply it. 

That is not impossible.  It is not beyond you.  This is a book.  A readable, understandable book.  All you have to do is crack the cover and prayerfully read it.  You’ll learn.  A little at first, more as you go.  You’ll understand.  And you will surely change. 

All that to say this.  You can believe what Paul is saying.  You can trust that his conclusions are accurate.  God can be trusted.  The Bible can be trusted.  And Paul, our instructor who is using the Bible to teach us, can be trusted. 

That’s the good news.  The bad news is that the message in this passage is not good news. 

What Paul is talking about is the basic moral condition of every human heart apart from Jesus Christ.  It’s not pretty.  Jews and Gentiles are no different.  Greeks and Barbarians are no different.  You and me are no different.  Nobody is better. 

Theologians describe this as “the total depravity of man.”  Our complete inability to do anything to please, understand or seek God.  That’s hard for a lot of people to accept.  We will freely admit we have faults.  We don’t like to pretend that we are perfect.  We don’t like political who try to come off like that. 

But there’s a limit.  We’ll admit that we’re not perfect.  But we don’t like to confess that we’re not righteous.  We don’t like to admit that we’re rebelling against God.  We’d rather tell others that we’re seeking Him, but we just haven’t found Him yet. 

I want us all to get a handle on this, me included.  We are all great sinners.  If you saw the wonderful movie Amazing Grace, you heard the actor playing John Newton say this.  I know only this.  I am a great sinner.  And Christ is a great Savior.” 

That’s profound.  Unless you know the depth and extent of your sinful nature, you will never grasp the greatness of God’s grace.  Until you see the height of your pride, you will never understand the magnitude and the superb nature of God’s solution. 

Imagine if you were sick, really sick.  But you were convinced that you well.  We all saw your symptoms.  We begged you to see a doctor or go to the hospital.  But no, you insisted that you were perfectly healthy.  How will you ever get better without a cure?  And if you are spiritually sick, how will you ever get better without the Great Physician? 

Well, let’s face it.  We’re bad.  We’re really bad.  In fact, it’s worse.  I gave the example of our being sick.  Actually, that’s not the case.  Each person, apart from Jesus Christ, is not only sick.  That person is dead. 

That’s the Bible view.  There are only three views of mankind’s moral nature.  Optimists say that man is well.  Pessimists say man is sick.  The Bible says that man is dead. 

Two from men.  One from God.

That’s what Paul is saying here.  Quoting verse after verse.  As far as being able to please God or understand Him, mankind if dead.  We should hear echoes of Genesis 2:17.  God’s warning to Adam, telling him not to eat the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  “”You must not eat from the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”  They ate it.  And they died.  Not only physically.  But spiritually as well. 

I really need to drive this home. I really need you to understand what I’m saying.  What Paul is saying.  Apart from Christ, you are as capable of pleasing God as a corpse.  What would happen if someone told it to do something?  Nothing! 

What would be missing?  Life!  Think of a corpse. Everything is there.  The bodily organs, the limbs, the brain.  All the nerves and muscles.  Everything that would ordinarily enable it to function.  Just one thing missing.  Life!  But that affects everything! 

Now from that fact. Of our spiritual deadness.  And it IS a fact, not just an opinion.  Other conclusions follow.  And Paul lists them all. 

First of all, morality.  In verse 10.  There is no one righteous, not even one.  First, we need to understand that Paul is talking about sinners from God’s point of view.  From our 
point of view, we’d always find righteousness in someone, especially ourselves.

Most Christians define a sinner as someone who is just little bit worse than they. 

And somehow, we think our righteousness is comparable to God’s righteousness.  It isn’t.  We are not righteous.  None of us.  Verse 12.  There is no one who does good, not even one. 

So, first, no righteousness.  Second, no understanding.

Again, verse 10.  There is no one who understands.  Now this obviously refers to spiritual perception, not knowledge in general.  People know things.  They have information.  But what they don’t have is the ability to put it into any kind of valid spiritual perspective.

Paul said this in1 Corinthians 1:18-21.  For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written:  "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate."  Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.

Paul had been debating Greeks as well as Jews.  And Greek philosophers freely admitted that they could not prove the existence of God through human reasoning. 

What happens when that happens? 

Well, Paul has already explained it.  In Romans 1:21.  For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 

It isn’t that we are completely ignorant of God. And it isn’t that we are totally incapable of understanding where He is leading us.  It’s just that we don’t want to go there.  We choose not to go there. 

We choose not to believe.  And we aren’t going to ever believe unless we choose to do so.  We’ve all met people like that.  Logic means nothing.  They have their predispositions, their prejudices.  They aren’t going to accept any information that leads than to any conclusions other than the ones they already believe. 

Haven’t you noticed this on those debate television shows where two people from opposite sides argue about an issue?  Doesn’t it seem like they are coming from two different worlds?  That they are talking about two completely different sets of facts?  You have your truth.  I have mine.  Does that sound at all familiar? 

It isn’t that they can’t understand.  They choose not to.   

I notice this about the liberal host of one of those debate television shows.  He never allows the conservative to make a point. He never allows the guest to provide contradictory information.  He always interrupts, cuts them off.  “What about this?”  “But what about that?”  Because if he were ever to have to accept the fact, he would have to accept the conclusion toward which the fact leads. 

Third.  A failure of the will.  Verse 11.  No one seeks God.  Again, remember that we’re talking about this from God’s point of view. 

You may know someone who claims to have always been seeking God. They went to this church and that church.  Sought this experience or that one.  Traveled here.  Traveled there.  I’ve been seeking God, they say.  I just haven’t found Him. 

But God would have a different view.  A totally different view.  And that is what Paul is talking about. 

It isn’t that they’ve been seeking God.  In fact, just the opposite.  They’ve been running away from God all the while.  In the completely opposite direction.  Whenever God gets close – in any religious environment – he or she runs away to another church, another experience, another environment. 

That’s the main reason why I don’t fully accept the seeker sensitive approach to church evangelism.  Because, according to Scripture, there is none who seek Him. 

If there’s any seeking to be done, God will be the One doing it. 

So what’s the bottom line?  How can we be so helpless?  If we have no righteousness.  If we have no moral capacity.  If we have no will.  Then what about all the Bible verses that offer salvation to sinners?  What good are they if the sinner cannot possibly respond?  Aren’t we all like Elijah, preaching to a valley of skeletons, full of dry bones? 

No.  The fact is that we CAN comprehend salvation.  If we choose to do so. 

Welcome to the concept of the Free Will of man.  Made in the image of  God, our wills are free.  It is our minds that are captive. 

The will is always free.  All choices are freely made.  The will is always free to choose what the mind thinks is best.  And it always WILL choose what the mind thinks is best. 

And what exactly is that?  What does the mind think is best?  Well, guess what?  The mind of a sinner NEVER thinks that God’s way is best.  The will is free to choose.  But the mind doesn’t want to submit to God.   Doesn’t want to serve Him.  Doesn’t want to be a slave to Him. 

The mind is wrong, of course.  The way it wants to go is toward darkness and misery.  The end is death.  There is a way that seems right onto man, but the end thereof is death.  So unless God changes the way we think – we will always choose to turn away.  Freely choose to turn away. 

That’s how bad we are! 

Is this starting to get discouraging?  Wow.  We can’t do this.  We can’t do that.  We can’t make the right choices because we don’t think straight.  Doesn’t it make evangelism start to sound impossible?  Like spreading grass seed on concrete?  In fact, doesn’t is start to sound like trying to start a new church in a cold, hard ground of Bedford, New Hampshire? 

Well, yes.  And no.  Actually, the situation is really encouraging, not discouraging.  Think about it this way.  We don’t have to worry about persuading the person to change his or her will.  We can let them make their choice.  All we have to do is provide information to inform their mind.  We don’t have to sell.  We just have to tell.  And we can be assured that God will cause the seeds we plan to grow and multiply. 

If we sow the Word of God, God will cause there to be a harvest.  In fact, I’ve had this thought.  Maybe – when we talk to people about the Lord -- we should let them off the hook a little.  Just tell them the truth.  Just let them know.  How about we just tell them that they can’t really respond to God unless He first works on them to change their heart?  Wow, you say. We couldn’t do that.  Why not?  Why not? 

Isn’t that what they need to know?  Isn’t it vital that they know, as least indirectly, how bad off they are?  How desperate is their situation?  How little confidence they should have in their ability to think things through? 

Anyway, if people – apart from Christ – are really as bad as Paul says they are – then telling people they can’t respond unless God works on them is actually helpful. 

Then God can work on them.  And even with that, they MIGHT still reject Him.  Even with as much information as you can provide, with as much Bible details as you can give, with the Spirit of God actually calling them by name, they still might resist. 

But at least their rejection of salvation will be an informed decision.  They will have chosen hell. 

But even if they don’t understand – or accept -- that Hades is their eventual destination, they will at least know that they are rejecting salvation through Jesus Christ, freely offered with grace through His sacrifice on the cross. 

At least then it won’t be their rejecting Christ because they can’t.  It will be because they won’t. 

Now read with me, again, Romans 3:10-17.  Listen again to these verses about the sinful condition of man.  It sounds like us when our kids were little. Me talking to our son Karl.  Karl, don’t climb that tree.  Karl, be careful.  Karl, you’re not climbing that tree, are you?  Karl, did you fall out of that tree? 

It’s like that.  The same thing repeated again and again.  God repeats Himself, telling us the same thing.  Repeated over and over.  Shouldn’t we listen?

Romans 3:10-17.  As it is written: "There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God.  All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one." "Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit." "The poison of vipers is on their lips." "Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness." "Their feet are swift to shed blood; ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know."

Verse 12 does not say that everyone tries to do good.  Some do better than others.  But we all fail.  It doesn’t say that.  What does verse 12 say? 

Apart from Christ?  “All have turned away, they  have together become worthless.  There is no one who does good, not even one.” 

They have all turned away.  This is from God’s point of view.  It’s not that people tried to do good, be righteous enough to reach heaven, but fell short.  Not at all.  Paul is saying that all not only didn’t reach high enough toward heaven…but that they actually turned away. 

In the Greek, the word for turned away is usually translated “wander.”  Deviate.  Like sheep.  Who just go off by themselves, follow their own noses.  Just get lost.  That’s us. 

The way to God is clear.  It is through the cross of Jesus Christ.  There is only one way. Marked clearly all throughout eternity.  All of Scripture points toward it.   

Do you see it? 

And just as importantly, do you see the desperate condition of everyone you know who is attempting to live life outside of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ? 

Repeatedly, God tells us that their situation is so bad that it couldn’t possibly be worse.  They are literally dead in their sins.  Their true condition is that they are totally without excuse. 

That’s our message.  That’s our prayer for all we know who don’t believe.  There are a million ways to wander.  There are a million wrong paths to follow. 

Anything that leads anyone further away from God is one more step closer to hell. 

Anything you can say to turn their thoughts toward God. 

Anything you can think or do to influence them. 

Any good information about Jesus Christ that you can provide. 

WILL bring them one step closer along the one way.  One step closer to the cross of Jesus Christ.  One step closer to Heaven. 

Let’s pray.