Humanity's Rebellion and the Transformative Power of the Gospel

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And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. [00:00:29]

We’ve been learning that in creation, God has made sufficient of himself known to all of us as his creation so as to leave us without any excuse for not honoring him and praising him and giving him the glory that he deserves. We’ve also discovered, however, that because of who and what we are, we suppress the truth about God. [00:02:43]

It’s the kind of anger that a cancer specialist feels against that which is ravaging his patient or her patient. It’s the kind of inevitable anger that a father would feel towards that which was ravaging and destroying his son or his daughter vis-à-vis drugs or whatever it might be: a necessary and understandable revulsion to that which is causing deterioration and sadness. [00:04:44]

The worst thing would be if God was indifferent—if God simply said, “Well, go ahead and do whatever you want to do; it doesn’t matter to me at all.” But it matters very, very much to God. And that is why he has set a day of judgment. And Paul is making clear that that day will come, but he has also executed his judgment in the here and now. [00:05:25]

When a culture turns its back on God, turns into itself and decides, “I’m going to do whatever I want to do,” then here it reaches, if you like, the bottom line. But the behavior, as we saw—and I need to keep reiterating this—the behavior as expressed is not the root of the problem; the behavior is the result of the exchanges that have been made, the consequence of making these decisions. [00:09:22]

Because when you look at this list, you realize how it is very easy not only to say “Look at them” à la 26 and 27 but “Look at them” à la 28–32—which is exactly the reaction of the Jewish people, because homosexuality was regarded by the Jews as absolutely abhorrent. It was regarded as a gentile problem. [00:11:13]

Sin, you see, doesn’t leave our rational faculties alone. This is a very important thing. When we talk about depravity, when we talk about total depravity, we don’t mean that everybody’s as bad as they could possibly be. The Bible doesn’t mean that. What it means is that there is no dimension of human existence that is unaffected by sin. Sin is a condition before it is ever an action. [00:15:58]

And so we live in a culture where the only hymn we really sing is “Anything Goes.” And anything goes. So if anything goes, who’s to say what ought not to be done? Just look at the phrase: he “gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.” You see, when oughtness goes—when oughtness evaporates in a culture or in a society… [00:18:19]

Essentially, the bottom line is that when a culture eliminates God, standards disappear, and society crumbles. Standards disappear, and society crumbles. I mean, it’s not just a product of being old that we’re able to look at the morning news and say, “Goodness gracious, how did we ever get here?” Children are saying the same thing, actually. They recognize it. This is not a safe place. [00:21:02]

Now, what he’s saying is very straightforward. “They know God’s righteous decree”: after death comes judgment. “They know God’s righteous decree”: “In the day that you eat of this, you will surely die.” They know that. But the knowledge of that is not sufficient to cause them to step away from it. Even when their conscience is at work, nevertheless, they continue to do it. [00:33:09]

So what’s our posture to be? Let’s stop. What’s our posture to be? In other words, not… I use “posture” in terms of heart expression. Well, I think the first response is confession: that we need to confess self-righteousness; we need to confess that we are often on the wrong end of this. But it’s not to be, in terms of speaking to our friends and neighbors, admonition—just decrying what’s going on all the time in the culture. [00:35:40]

Our homosexual friends are not our enemies. They’re no more our enemies than a greedy adulterer is our enemy. Let’s pray: Father, thank you that your Word, as painful as it is, often, to proclaim and to receive, is an expression of your great love for mankind. And we marvel that in your wrath you remember mercy, and that in the gospel you have provided the answer to our own rebellious hearts. [00:40:54]

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