Trinity Evangel Church

Isaiah was the first to write that “the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea” (Isaiah 11:9). Habakkuk picked it up, “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea” (Habakkuk 2:14). There is no sea without water, and there will be no square inch of ignorance of, let alone rebellion against, God. Those who already have the “light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6) long for the days when true knowledge and worship of God is unchallenged.

We are tempted to act like the apparent ignorance about this knowledge is too great a chasm to bridge, and/or man’s modern rebellion against this knowledge is too entrenched. Discouragement takes as much effort as falling down the stairs; anyone can be discouraged when they look for sin. Sin abounds.

Yet even with such straightforward and hopeful prophecy many Christians have learned pessimism in the name of the Lord and we have taken up the worst worldview. We have been taught to doubt the prompt fulfillment of His Word, and we have become like a group of characters that Bunyan might have named the Little-faithed. We have been taught as if patience in a sovereign is a passive fatalism. Such negativity assumes the worst *about God*.

But God is not busy elsewhere. He is never without a witness to Himself and His glory. There is already no place on the planet that can claim pure cluelessness. His Word always accomplishes His purpose, whether that Word opens ears or that Word *closes* ears; men often show the success of God’s Word *as* they refuse it. And that He works in ways that surprise natural men shouldn’t be surprise to spiritual men. That He stands in a position of ready grace will amaze us for ten-thousands of years. All day long He holds out His hands to the disobedient, and that is not giving the disobedient the upper hand.

Romans 9 opens the curtain to God’s eternal purpose of election; some believe and some don’t according to God’s will. Romans 10 shows what the working out of God’s will looks like on the ground, and how those who don’t believe don’t have a good excuse. God is sovereign, men are responsible. And this is especially true for the Jews. Of all peoples, Israel wasn’t ignorant, they were obstinate.

In these final verses of Romans 10 Paul shows that Israel was not ignorant of the Word, and in fact that, during this part of God’s plan, they fulfilled it by refusing it. Paul makes his point with two questions, four Old Testament quotes, and all of it is aimed to encourage us that the Word of God has *not* failed.

# Global Reach (verse 18)

On one hand, no one calls on someone he doesn’t know. On the other hand, it’s not like they didn’t know.

> But I ask, have they not heard? Indeed they have, for

> “Their voice has gone out to all the earth,

> and their words to the ends of the world.”

> (Romans 10:18 ESV)

Hearing requires preaching. Preaching announces the goods (Romans 10:15). And while the good news is very specific, it isn’t totally unheard of. **Have they not heard?** They have most definitely heard.

Paul borrows the exact words from the Greek translation of Psalm 19:4; it’s an inspired quote. Those lyrics referred to creation, in particular the heavens and the sky as “day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge” (Psalm 19:2). It’s a universal language, and the **voice** of these figurative teachers have gone global.

Who are the **they** that have heard? It’s *all* men under the sun, in all places with a sky, in all times no matter the position of the stars. That’s the point about general revelation, and this is the point Paul picks up on in Romans 1 about the Gentiles. They *know*.

How does that help in the argument of Romans 10:18? Yes the “word of Christ” is special revelation, and not each and every person may have heard it yet, but there is no excuse under heaven. The gospel goes out to a global audience. Paul is not making an apostolic allegory out of Psalm 19; John Calvin observed, and dismissed, those thought to show “most piety” who interpreted the sun going forth as Christ and took the heavens as a reference to the apostles.

If the message has been heard among the Gentiles, then Israel has no excuse.

# Prophetic Provocation (verse 19)

Paul explicitly calls out Israel, here and again in verse 21.

> But I ask, did Israel not understand? First Moses says,

> “I will make you jealous of those who are

> not a nation;

> with a foolish nation I will make you angry.”

> (Romans 10:19 ESV)

Hearing and knowing work together. Haven’t “they” heard? Yes. Didn’t Israel in particular know? Yes. The ESV’s **understand** is fine, but it’s a form of the same word from Romans 10:2; Israel had a zeal for God but not according to “knowledge.” But the problem in verse 2 wasn’t that the knowledge was obscure or beyond reach, the problem is that they didn’t accept it.

In answer to whether Israel knew, **First Moses** means that we’ve got more than one answer coming. This first answer in verse 19 quotes from Deuteronomy 32:21. Not only did they know that righteousness comes by faith not by their own works (see Romans 10:3, 8). Israel knew 1) that the Lord’s blessings would abound beyond their borders, and 2) that they would be mad about it.

This is the first of a few strategic references to **jealousy**. Paired with **anger** it's not positive, it's punishment. (Fathers are commanded *not* to provoke their kids to anger, Ephesians 6:4). And yet there is something that was meant for the Jews that they *naturally* should see as theirs. We don’t know yet whether or not the bitterness would be the bitter end or if the jealousy would provoke something better (see Romans 11:11, 14).

God Himself will provoke jealousy, “**I will make jealous**,” and He do it by *blessing*.

If we had a map of redemption and tried to find ourselves, the label “You Are Here” sits on top of Romans 10:19. Even with the Christian principles that figured into our founding and that still have fingers in many of our common practices, from a Jew’s perspective we are a Not-Nation, another ID10T-Nation. And yet we are among those who, by receiving blessings from God not promised directly to us, are God’s tools to finish promises He did give directly to Israel. This is part of what I mean when I use the adjective *jealousable*. This is definitely what the phrase Kuyperian Dispensationalism tries to capture.

# Expectation Reversal (verse 20)

Here is some of that “not a nation” and “foolish nation” getting grace that grated on Israel.

> Then Isaiah is so bold as to say,

> “I have been found by those who did not seek me;

> I have shown myself to those who did not ask

> for me.”

> (Romans 10:20 ESV)

This is the second answer to whether Israel knew. They were told that they would be made to look foolish and they were told that the foolish ones would be made to receive blessing.

Isaiah is **bold** because it this is hidden in plain sight. The quote is from Isaiah 65:1, and 65:2 is coming up in verse 21. The Israel-ism-ness, the Israel-centricity had been confronted; remember Hosea’s kids (referred to in Romans 9:25-26), “No-mercy” and “Not-my-people.” There are the natural, so to speak, and the unnatural, the expected/unexpected. These are the same ones that weren't a nation or weren't the *right* nation.

God is making sons out of pagans! He’s giving an inheritance to the prodigal son’s foreign barkeeper.

To know God, to be loved by God, to be blessed by God, these are *not* just better hopes for heaven realities. We have the light of the gospel *now* and living by faith that Jesus is Lord has spiritual and material fruit, invisible and visible results, eternal and economic impact, which enables our better grasp of success and suffering, and all that works together to make the Jews jealous.

Israel was God’s chosen nation, and they had privileges that no other people had. This was the LORDS’s doing. But they did not get it as grace to them, or expect that God would send this grace around the world.

# Open Invitation (verse 21)

There were seasons of revival and faithfulness to the covenant, but so much of Israel’s history was disbelief in the Word and disobedience to it. This follows with Isaiah 65:2.

> But of Israel he says, “All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people.” (Romans 10:21 ESV)

**All day long** emphasizes the constancy of His patience. That the Lord **held out my hands** is a human figure of speech for openness, receptivity; this is the only use of the word in the NT. But they were **disobedient** and **contrary**, “obstinate” (NASB). The KJV has “gainsaying,” which means saying against, so denying or contradicting, opposing.

And while this is bad, it is prophetic. They fulfilled prophecy by refusing it. All this makes us wonder if God is done with Israel, which is where Paul picks up in chapter 11: "Has God rejected His people?"

# Conclusion

Of course we are not encouraged by the rejection of God’s Word we see around us. And, of course, we’re supposed to live by faith not by sight. Also, we should be encouraged that God not only pays better attention than us to that rejection, but that in His sovereign will He means *good* to those that love Him and are called according to His purpose.

This is the best kind of pressure: we are to live in such a way that equips a generation to bring about the end of the age; the jealousable in Christ provoke the Jews to receive Jesus as the Messiah and the Kingdom comes. By receiving (and rejoicing in and stewarding) the blessings of God’s grace to us in Christ the Lord—blessings that we were not seeking—we are a jealousable people in His hands.

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## Charge

God’s Word is a training manual, it tells us what to do with our hands. Manual derives from the Latin word *manus*, meaning hand. What we believe comes out through our hands. The Lord gave you hands to cook and clean and show hospitality and compassion. The Lord gave you hands to type and turn pages, to write and read for His name. The Lord gave you hands with which to shake, or hug, or hold out to others. Be jealousable with your hands as instruments in the Lord’s hands.

## Benediction:

> The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. (2 Corinthians 13:14, ESV)

Proverbs was written/edited by whom for whom for what? Solomon collected it for his sons so that he could teach them to know wisdom and instruction. The Lord blessed Solomon with wisdom on earth, not for some esoteric existence. As a father he gifted his sons by passing on this knowledge and discretion.

A workable definition of wisdom is "skill for living." I recently saw another good angle on this: “Wisdom comes from knowing the patterns God built into creation." ([source](https://twitter.com/dmichaelclary/status/1643217836360310785?s=20)) This recognition-ability helps us not pet the king's fur backwards, so to speak. All this is good.

And while of (stinking) course there is application for those in any and every station under the sun, the primary "for what" of Proverbs, the chief end of "for what" with wisdom, the telos of "for what" in skill for living, is glorifying God *in ruling*. Solomon was teaching his sons the family business: kingdom administration. “The proverbs of Solomon, son of David, king of Israel:”

> to receive instruction in wise dealing,

> in righteousness, justice, and equity;

> (Proverbs 1:3 ESV)

One of the first principles when leading any group of people is to recognize the pattern that a whole bunch of them are going to be *stupid*. There are rich and poor, diligent and lazy, righteous and wicked, wise and stupid.

A little more than a year ago I read _The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity_. This booklet has less words than the book of Proverbs, and while the author isn’t a Christian he offers an astute non-inspired complement to the inspired Word. The definition of stupidity is really helpful: choosing things that don't benefit *anyone*, including oneself. “A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.” (Loc. 245)

With that definition in mind, Proverbs has a lot to say about stupid people. “Stupid" is a genus with a variety of character species. In Proverbs Solomon shows the patterns of the simple/naive, the fool, and the scoffer. They are on a spectrum of agreeableness to aggressiveness, but they all share the stupid gene. They are all throwing soup on paintings, some just have stronger arms and more chunks.

Proverbs is a Stupid Vaccine, a Treasury of Stupid Antidote, it's the Handbook for Ruling a Nation with Fools, it's wisdom that gives rulers skills against stupid people. (And to be clear, I am mostly thinking about people, not decisions. A foolish moment from your two-year old isn’t the same as a stupid person who is characterized by foolish choices year-in and year-out of their adult life.)

Before I give the headings, a few things. First, this ruling-wisdom works for all lesser magistrates. It applies at every level of organization. That starts with your own *feelings*. If you did nothing else with these skills, do *self-rule* when you see your own thoughts wanting to squirt off the path of wisdom through an open gate into the fool’s field. Cut them off. And then obviously there's a bunch of use for fathers (and mothers) dealing with stupid choices of sons (and daughters). Likewise, take notes: teachers, bosses, neighborhood association presidents, city council members, Christian nationalists.

Second, as Christians we are in line to be *rulers*. This is our future. The present isn't a game per se, but you are going to use all this *after* the school of life. The Lord has made us a kingdom and priests, and we “shall reign on the earth” (Revelation 5:10). Blessed are those who share the first resurrection, “they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years” (Revelation 20:6). You've got a governing position appointed for you in the Millennial Kingdom, so here's where you're putting in some reps to get ready. Proverbs in this sense is about Christ as the wise King teaching His sons their work.

Third, the stupid people are mixed in everywhere. Cipolla’s *first basic law* is: “Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.” I’m going to curate some of the counsel for us, use different words to concentrate our pattern recognition. But there's a subtle message in Solomon's arrangement of the Proverbs themselves: stupid people come up in all sorts of situations.

# Expect a Miracle

When I say to expect a miracle, I mean expect that it is going to take a miracle to fix stupid. Isn't this part of the reason we're so frustrated? We think it's *natural*, or at least obvious, to not choose things that benefit no one. And it *is* obvious, just like it's obvious that men didn't crawl out from being frog larvae and stretch their legs before inventing satellites and sending them into space. Stupid is a way of looking wrongly; that’s just how it looks.

My favorite proverb is not in the book of Proverbs.

> But a stupid man will get understanding

> when a wild donkey’s colt is born a man!

> (Job 11:12 ESV)

The word for "stupid" here has the nuance of hollow, so “empty-headed” (NKJV); “An idiot will become intelligent” NAS), “The witless will become wise” (NIV). It is just as likely for dimwits to become discerning as it is for a donkey’s baby to come out a human being; it will take a miracle.

> Crush a fool in a mortar with a pestle

> along with crushed grain,

> yet his folly will not depart from him.

> (Proverbs 27:22 ESV, see also “a hundred blows” 17:10)

If you can't beat stupid out of someone, why would you think your charming smile is going to work? You're casting pearls before pigs that can't tell the difference between dirt and their own dung. Be wise, recognize the pattern, don’t lose your mind when stupid follows its trajectory.

# Stay Above the Fray

Two of the most well-known proverbs on responding to fools hit one right after the other in Proverbs 26:4-5. They almost seem too clever because on the surface they say the opposite. But unlike Democrats, the wise can see a play on words, get the joke, and understand better.

> Answer not a fool according to his folly,

> lest you be like him yourself.

> (Proverbs 26:4 ESV)

We don't really have to guess what **according to his folly** means, there is plenty of fool fodder in Proverbs.

A fool exalts himself, to the point that he isolates himself (since no one is as wise-in-his-own-eyes). He has at least 11 followers on Twitter and 9 of them are bots who agree with him.

> A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire;

> He rages against all wise judgment.

> (Proverbs 18:1 NKJV)

A fool loves to tell you what he thinks; while you’re talking he’s outlining his response. A fool “gives full vent to his spirit” (Proverbs 29:11), and one of the reasons he’s more and more isolated is because that means less people are around to challenge his opinion.

> A fool takes no pleasure in understanding,

> but only in expressing his opinion.

> (Proverbs 18:2 ESV)

A fool can only see what's immediately in front of him, he is perpetually short-sighted. He will lose the relationship to win (he thinks) the argument.

> Precious treasure and oil are in a wise man’s dwelling,

> but a foolish man devours it.

> (Proverbs 21:20 ESV)

Don’t let the fool devour your time and your energy; it would be better to meet a she-bear robbed of her cubs (Proverbs 17:12).

> If a wise man has an argument with a fool,

> the fool only rages and laughs, and there is no quiet.

> (Proverbs 29:9 ESV)

> It is an honor for a man to keep aloof from strife,

> but every fool will be quarreling.

> (Proverbs 20:3 ESV, see also not meddling in 26:17)

Keep your head level and stay above the fray. Walk away. “Leave the presence of a fool, for there you do not meet words of knowledge” (Proverbs 14:7). Rhetoric is the art of a good man keeping his pie-hole shut, said Quintilian, or that’s at least what his first draft might have been.

# Play the Long Game

Let's go back to the answering two-step in chapter 26.

> Answer not a fool according to his folly,

> lest you be like him yourself.

> Answer a fool according to his folly,

> lest he be wise in his own eyes.

> (Proverbs 26:4-5 ESV)

Yes, we're to do the opposite of verse 4, but not in an inconsistent way. These verses don't cancel each other out. Don't respond in kind, respond to show the kind you’re dealing with. Don't engage in a corn-stalk sword-fights, light their stalk on fire to show it's true nature.

It's the fool who thinks he must change everyone else's mind in one minute. The wise man pays attention to timing, and he knows his audience. His audience is *often* others who are watching the argument. “When a scoffer is punished, the simple becomes wise” (Proverb 21:11). Think *second* level consequences.

How does the Lord respond to the stupid? He certainly *sees*, which means we ought to take heart that we don't need to collect all the evidence for Him. The Lord keeps track. And the Lord often lets them have more of what they want, not because it's okay, but because He loves the pattern He made. Those who won't self-rule will self-ruin; “they shall eat the fruit of their own way” (Proverbs 1:31). No matter what, it is consistently the case that He is not worried.

The Lord has a variety of plays in His repertoire. In the moment when we feel that we've only got *one* response, we've lost our nerve.

> “Chronically anxious families (including institutions and whole societies) tend to mimic the reptilian response: Lacking the capacity to be playful, their perspective is narrow. **Lacking perspective, their repertoire of responses is thin**.” (_A Failure of Nerve_, Loc. 1289)

At times the stupidity is targeted at us personally. If we can't overlook an offense we're not as glorious as we thought.

> The vexation of a fool is known at once,

> but the prudent ignores an insult.

> (Proverbs 12:16 ESV)

> Good sense makes one slow to anger,

> and it is his glory to overlook an offense.

> (Proverbs 19:11 ESV)

You can only be calm and playful by fearing the Lord. “Vengeance on the stupid is mine,” says the Lord. Let Him take it seriously. You’re not defending yourself as much as showing that the fool shouldn’t trust his eyes that tell him he’s wise (Proverbs 26:5).

# Never Flatter Fools

Our rulers are flattering the stupid (think transgenderism, which is sort of a nuclear level stupidity of causing irreversible damage with no true benefits for anyone). Our society rewards the fools, we bail them out, we give them the microphone, we empathize with their (self-identified) oppression. Our nation fears men, or the mob, or the made up mob we have in our minds.

> The fear of man lays a snare,

> but whoever trusts in the LORD is safe.

> (Proverbs 29:25 ESV)

You do not have to accept the stupidity. We're living in a culture-wide Objectivity Room where things are silly and our governing class either expects our agreement, or isn't blessed enough to boldly stand against stupid and coordinate greater protection from it. It’s not won by the Constitution, but by submitting to Christ.

So because Christ is Lord, fear the Lord and say what He says and let the stupid fall where they will.

> Whoever rebukes a man will afterward find more favor

> than he who flatters with his tongue.

> (Proverbs 28:23 ESV)

But the pattern reveals that only certain people learn.

> Whoever corrects a scoffer gets himself abuse,

> and he who reproves a wicked man incurs injury.

> Do not reprove a scoffer, or he will hate you;

> reprove a wise man, and he will love you.

> (Proverbs 9:7–8 ESV)

The righteous will groan when wicked fools rule over them (Proverbs 29:2), but even here the Lord is giving us wisdom to rule for the rejoicing of others when it is our time.

# Conclusion

Lightning round:

- Be careful little ears what you hear. (Psalm 1:1)

- Walk with the wise. (Proverbs 13:20)

- Try to at least *appear* smart. Watch your mouth. (Proverbs 10:19; 12:23; 13:3; 17:28\*)

- Discipline your sons. (Proverbs 13:24)

- Vote! And not for stupid people! (Otherwise we’ll be a cause of our own groaning per Proverbs 29:2)

- Love discipline/feedback. “He who hates reproof is stupid” (Proverbs 12:1)

- Build up big walls of self-control. (Proverbs 25:28)

Stupid people are like the poor: always among us. Stop freaking out that so many people are so stupid. It is not wisdom to respond to stupid people *for no one's benefit*, that is the essence of stupid.

"Understand oh stupid people, when oh fools will you be wise." (Psalm 94:8) The Hebrew word here has the nuance of being dull (ESV), not sharp, of being senseless, like an animal, so "brutish" (KJV). We have every reason to take refuge in the Lord as our stronghold, to trust Him to wipe out the wicked, and to fear Him for sake of learning the skills for ruling.

Darkness is discouraging. Our poets associate darkness with the cold, with the unknown, with fear, with evil, with death. To be in the dark is to be ignorant, often it describes what it feels to be sad, even to the point of despair. So many psalms begin with the author in the dark. So many societies before the incarnation existed in the dark. The world around us today is like Egypt in the ninth plague; it’s so dark that they can't even see their gender in front of their faces.

The modern dark is a worse dark because it has been chosen. Men have always loved darkness, but we're throwing ourselves down into depraved loves like pre-Jesus pagans. It's one thing to read the gross behaviors of the Caesars, each one with his own little Epstein Island inventions. I'm not trying to take anything away from Sodom and Gomorrah, nor from the continual evil intentions of antediluvian mankind. But all those were before grace and truth took on flesh.

Jesus called those who believed in Him the "light of the world." He followed that identification with a principle: "nether do men lyght a candell/& put it under a busshell/but on a candelstycke/& it lyghteth all that are in the house" (Matthew 5:14-15, Tyndale). Applied to periods of history, what came before Jesus was tenebras, Latin for darkness. What came with Jesus was lux, light. And based on the Sermon on the Mount passage we could refer to our days as modius, the word for a bushel basket. We had the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ! And we've gone and stuck our heads under a 50 gallon measuring bowl.

But, beloved, "the light shines in darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it" (John 1:5)! The eternal Logos--the Word--is the life and light of men. His lamp cannot be dimmed or defeated. In flesh He was put to death, His body was buried, but He rose from the dead with resurrection light that will not, that cannot, be turned down, turned off, put out.

Let us walk in the light, rejoice in the light, and while the residue of darkness is all around us, remember that the rule of darkness has already been broken. It's on a timer.

There are a few passages that I'd like to compare from the Gospel of John, two that are "I am" statements. Then I'd like for us to exult together in the glories of the light of the gospel that shines for us.

Jesus spoke to [the scribes and the Pharisees], saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12)

Jesus said to [Martha], “I am the resurrection and the life.” (John 11:25)

In Him was life and the life was the light of men. (John 1:4)

In John 8 Jesus is talking to religious professionals who were committed to their unbelief. Unbelief is spiritual darkness. They couldn't seen Jesus for who He really was, and in failing to see Jesus truly they couldn't see anything really. In Jesus is understanding, so those who believe in Jesus walk in His sunshine. We see the light, we see by the light. The light is glory, and even the Greek word for glory (δόξα) includes the idea of brightness, brilliance, shining.

In John 11 Jesus is talking to those mourning the death of Lazarus. Of course Jesus waited on purpose when He heard Lazarus was sick for sake of showing off His glory (John 11:4, 6). Mary and Martha were in the darkness of grief, and though they believed truly, they did not see fully. Jesus did have power to heal Lazarus and keep him from dying, but preventative miracles weren't the full display. Jesus told Mary that He is the resurrection and the life. He is the bring-back-from-the-dead one, the come-back-from-the-dead Lord. It is as much a part of His nature as being the Shepherd of the sheep.

So we've got resurrection-life and light. As John opens his account, he starts with a summary of what's going to be seen. These are not coming attractions, but coming attributes. Jesus is God, He is the revelation of God, He is the Creator God. He is “the true light” (John 1:9, and John said “We have seen his glory” (John 11:14).

“His life is the light of men.” At first it might seem backward; His light would be life. And that is true. But His life is our light. In the life of Jesus we see heavenly wisdom, creative power, divine love, perfect holiness, redeeming grace, eternal truth.

Light is essential for life. Sunlight is the source of energy used by plants to convert light energy into chemical energy that enables growth and fruit. As grass and trees catch the light and grow tall and fruitful, so the Son of God is light to our souls for strength.

His light has caused us to be born again. His light has taken us from dead to alive; what greater energy is there? His light has transformed our hostility into love, our unbelief into submission and worship, our despair into joy. It is a supernatural light, a divine light, imparted to our hearts that we might live. His life is light that is our life.

As the sun—or a candle or a lamp or an always-on flash bulb—shines, so we can see. Darkness is blindness, and those who are in darkness stumble (Proverbs 4:19). Those who are in darkness hide where it’s hard to see (John 3:20). Light exposes. Light shows what’s there. Light opens our eyes.

His light has pierced the underground caverns of our ignorance and our uncertainty. We know good and evil, we know heroes and villains, we know male and female. The light shines on our history, on our present, on the telos of all mankind. We see how things fit together, how they work together for good for those who love God. The light shines on our risen Savior, the King of kings and Lord of lords.

His light reveals what our real problem is: we have all broken His law. His light reveals the only solution: one Mediator between God and man, the man Jesus Christ. His light reveals the way for disciples: walk in the light as He is in the light and we have fellowship with Him and with each other.

Light shatters illusions. We are not dreaming. We believe in the light and in His light we see.

The light was given to mark the days. On the first day of creation God said, "Let there be light," and there was light, and it was good. God separated the light from the darkness. On the fourth day of creation God gave “lights in the expanse of the heavens” to “be for signs and for seasons, for days and years.” These lights rule over the day and over the night; the rosy dawn signals the new day. It is not the clock (or coordinate signal from satellites) that runs the world, the sun defines our rhythms and our rejoicing.

Why are we here today? It is because of the Resurrection Light! When the Son of God rose from the grave on the third day in accordance with Scriptures, nothing could remain the same. The first day of the week, Sunday, sets the tone of the whole weekly cycle.

BC and AD are only the match tip (or BCE and CE - Before Christ Embodied / Christ Embodied if you prefer). Every Sunday Christians gather because the Light of the world crushed the darkness on His way out of the tomb. We assemble for oil in our lamps, for a corporate visit with the Light that our faces would shine when we return to our vocations in His light. His light regulates the rhythms of our days.

Only those in the light can be tempted toward discouragement like we are. Because of the light we see the deceit of darkness, the despair of those in darkness, the dead end of darkness. We can see enough to see that men with buckets on their head become bizarro world, clown world, upside down world.

But this is part of the glory of the light. Of course you can see the bad beside the good. Of course you can see the destruction and waste chosen by those who hate the Light. That's because of the life you have in His light.

When “pitch darkness” was over Egypt for three days, “a darkness to be felt,” all the people of Israel still had light where they lived (Exodus 10:21-23). There was light in Goshen! Beloved, we have the Light.

There is light in Christ Jesus who “abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel” (2 Timothy 1:9-10). Death is dead and darkness is on the run. Let the world bring its biggest bucket. They already tried to bury the Light in a tomb; the grave could not hold Him. Blessed are all who take refuge in Him (Psalm 2:12).

"A dark hour makes Jesus bright." —Robert Murray M'Cheyne

He is the light of the world, the resurrection and the life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in darkness, and the light has conquered.

Jesus came into the world as light so that all the ones believing in Him may not remain in darkness (John 12:46), so you who believe have been delivered from the domain of darkness and transferred to the kingdom of His beloved Son (Colossians 1:13). “At one time you were in darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light, for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true (Ephesians 5:8-9).

[May you be] strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. (Colossians 1:11–12, ESV)

While explaining how it came to be that so many in Israel had rejected the good news about Jesus, Paul couldn’t help but uncover his beautiful feet. The prophet Isaiah said preachers of good news had beautiful feet, and Paul was showing his feet, so to speak, which is exactly what they needed.

We don’t stop saying what needs to be said because the person doesn’t want to hear it. We don’t need to start saying a bunch of other things that they do want to hear. It’s counterproductive to say things that don’t have the power to give hearing hoping that those things will give hearing. We say what needs to be said because, especially with the gospel, it is the power of God to give hearing.

Romans 10:14-17 is the second paragraph in a row that, while still giving an account for Israel’s unbelieving, is pointing them to the way of believing. Jesus is Lord, true for the Jew, true for all. “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (verse 13). So many were not confessing the Lordship of Jesus, but that is the confession, that is the only hope.

The majority of this paragraph outlines the process of how men come to faith. It starts with them not knowing who to call on and ends with them calling. But verse 16 seems out of place in this evangelism encouragement, and verse 18 picks back up the thread of disbelief through the end of the chapter. Here are glories of the gospel and mercies of God to send us the gospel and the reminder that not all will receive the gospel.

Four questions launch this consideration. They are rhetorical questions in that they all have an obvious answer, but the form (subjunctive mood verbs) presses not just toward the answers but to the necessary sequence of action. Every question starts with “how can” and every answer comes back “they can’t.” Collectively the questions get to inescapable quotation at the end of verse 15.

How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? (Romans 10:14–15a ESV)

Here’s a temporal illustration. If you didn’t trust that someone on the other end would always answer and then be able to send help you wouldn’t ever call 911. In a critical moment you wouldn’t depend on a hit or miss system. There’s an entire network of communication and resources and readiness that make calling on 911 a credible action. And of course it doesn’t matter how available or able the system is, if you had never even heard of 911 you’d not make the call. Someone has to tell you about it, share the number, assure you with stories or stats that 911 works.

The Lord is believable. Why call on anyone who isn’t listening, or who isn’t powerful or faithful? This is why in the previous verses “call on” and “believes” are basically interchangeable; perhaps one is the motivation and the other is the expression, but the two go together.

And logically before someone believes they have to hear. Hear/heard/hearing appear five times in this paragraph. And before the hearing there has to be telling. Verses 14 and 15 use forms of the Greek word κηρύσσω which the ESV (following Tyndale, KJV, NASB) translates as “preaching.” That’s fine, though we’ve got plenty of ideas about preaching and preachers that may not be all beneficial. It’s a public announcement, an official proclamation. It could be used of political heralds, but just as often for prophetic oracles. These are preachers, proclaimers, speech-ers.

In what is arguably my favorite chapter in the Bible, Paul connects for the Corinthians the ideas of gospel, proclaiming/preachung, and Jesus as Lord.

And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim (κηρύσσομεν) is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. (2 Corinthians 4:3–5 ESV)

Paul publicized “Jesus is Lord.” He was a bearer of tidings, a messenger of these glad tidings.

They need to hear, they need to see. Seeing (the glory) comes by hearing (the gospel).

And such a message isn’t self-originating to the messenger. A messenger is sent (ἀποσταλῶσιν). This is the final question. There is a sender of the preachers. The title “apostle” refers to a sent one.

Paul could have gone off on the nature of the commissioning, which he doesn’t, because it’s not his main concern here. It is worth a minute to say that while every believer has a testimony and while every disciple has disciple-making responsibilities, Romans 10:15 isn’t adding the burden of an evangelistic vocation to every Christian. Pastors “do the work of an evangelist” (2 Timothy 4:5), but even they can be distinguished from apostles, prophets, and evangelists (in Ephesians 4:11). Equipping the saints for the work of ministry is crucial, and even a witness, but it’s not precisely what Paul is referring to in Romans 10.

As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” (Romans 10:15b)

This is from Isaiah 52:7. The entire verse associates with Jesus is Lord.

How beautiful upon the mountains

Isaiah 52 is a good word from the Lord, a word of news that Israel would be delivered from captivity in Babylon and restored to their homeland.

The beautiful … feet are ironic, because the feet of one who traveled—and this image suggests it was a long distance—would be physically beat up, dirty, smelly, unpleasant, anti-beautiful. Hermes was the messenger of the gods, son of Zeus, known for the speed of his winged sandals. But these messengers are men, with all ten toes, and their message is such life that their travel sacrifices belong with a poetic beauty.

How different would your life be had you not heard the good news! In the Isaiah passage, τῶν εὐαγγελιζομένων [τὰ] ἀγαθά, “the ones good-newsing the good (things).” In the next verse it is the actual noun εὐαγγέλιον, from which the Latin * ēvangĕlĭum*, into English as: evangel.

By way of application, how beautiful are the feet of William Tyndale who translated the Word into English words for us to read. How beautiful are the feet of those who lay fiber-optic cable and put up cell towers to get us digital audio copies to play/hear whenever we want. But especially in Romans 10 these preachers/evangelists are sent in person with the GOODS, the treasure.

While the preceding sequence is about those who have not heard, verse 16 is about those who have heard but have not believed.

But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?” (Romans 10:16 ESV)

As seems to be more and more the case, pronouns matter. Who are the they? “They” are always getting blamed for things. In some ways, the obvious answer seems to be the Gentiles. The non-Israel-nations didn't know the message. But 14-17 are aiming us toward 18-21 which include four verses of OT quotes about how Israel did know and they didn't listen.

Not all is part of the reason for these chapters.

The quote from Isaiah is from Isaiah 53:1. It brings all the Suffering Servant ideas with it, the one who was “despised and rejected by men” (verse 3), the one esteemed “stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted” (verse 4). “They made his grave with the wicked” (verse 9), he “was numbered with the transgressors” (verse 12). This is a dreadful word, a word of suffering. It was a word that was extremely disagreeable to the Jews even though it was the only word of salvation.

The word obeyed may surprise us; we think of the gospel as something to be believed. But the Greek word is a play on words. Here it is ὑπακούω - “I obey” compared to ακούω - “I hear.” Obeyed actually includes the idea of submitting oneself to what has been delivered. And in fact, the gospel message demands surrender.

Here is the conclusion on the power of the Word.

So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. (Romans 10:17 ESV)

The word of Christ is of course the word about Christ, but in another way it is from Him. Christ Himself is in the Word of the gospel.

A dehydrated man who keeps pushing the water bottle away doesn’t need an explanation about the hydrological cycle, he needs to drink the water. Paul argued with philosophical idolators (Acts 17); he had answers for doubters. But the power was not in eloquence or evidences per se (see also 1 Corinthians 2:1-5), other than the announcement of the authority of the Lord Jesus.

A good-newsing one is needed. Natural revelation makes accountable but doesn't bring faith (see Romans 1:18ff). The word causes hearing. So power, directly. Comes through a messenger, but does not require a Council of men, not from the Pope’s chair.

Church, you know God. You have the truth. You have heard what is good, you have heard the GOODS. It is evangel, it is gift, it is treasure. “Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that w should be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures” (James 1:18).

The word of Christ is beautiful such that we consider the feet of the messengers beautiful who bring it. The word of Christ is dreadful, in that it ruins our own esteem of self-righteousness. Yet the word of Christ is powerful to save.

you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God;

for

And this word is the good news that was preached to you. (1 Peter 1:23–25 ESV)

May the Word of Christ do its work!

I was reading Joshua 1 yesterday, and three times there is the call: “be strong and courageous.” This starts as the Lord’s command to Joshua, and becomes the reply of the people to Joshua’s instructions. Christians, you have heard the Word of Christ, the Word is doing its work to birth and build up your faith. The Word reveals His power, the Word works powerfully in you. Meditate on His Word, and be strong and courageous.

May the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places. (Ephesians 1:17-20, ESV)

While explaining how it came to be that so many in Israel had rejected the good news about Jesus, Paul couldn’t help but uncover his beautiful feet. The prophet Isaiah said preachers of good news had beautiful feet, and Paul was showing his feet, so to speak, which is exactly what they needed.

We don’t stop saying what needs to be said because the person doesn’t want to hear it. We don’t need to start saying a bunch of other things that they do want to hear. It’s counterproductive to say things that don’t have the power to give hearing hoping that those things will give hearing. We say what needs to be said because, especially with the gospel, it is the power of God to give hearing.

Romans 10:14-17 is the second paragraph in a row that, while still giving an account for Israel’s unbelieving, is pointing them to the way of believing. Jesus is Lord, true for the Jew, true for all. “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (verse 13). So many were *not* confessing the Lordship of Jesus, but that is *the* confession, that is the only hope.

The majority of this paragraph outlines the process of how men come to faith. It starts with them not knowing who to call on and ends with them calling. But verse 16 seems out of place in this evangelism encouragement, and verse 18 picks back up the thread of disbelief through the end of the chapter. Here are glories of the gospel *and* mercies of God to send us the gospel *and* the reminder that not all will receive the gospel.

# The Beautiful Word (verses 14-15)

Four questions launch this consideration. They are rhetorical questions in that they all have an obvious answer, but the form (subjunctive mood verbs) presses not just toward the answers but to the necessary sequence of action. Every question starts with “how can” and every answer comes back “they can’t.” Collectively the questions get to inescapable quotation at the end of verse 15.

> How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? (Romans 10:14–15a ESV)

Here’s a temporal illustration. If you didn’t trust that someone on the other end would always answer and then be able to send help you wouldn’t ever call 911. In a critical moment you wouldn’t depend on a hit or miss system. There’s an entire network of communication and resources and readiness that make calling on 911 a credible action. And of course it doesn’t matter how available or able the system is, if you had never even heard of 911 you’d not make the call. Someone has to tell you about it, share the number, assure you with stories or stats that 911 works.

The Lord is believable. Why **call on** anyone who isn’t listening, or who isn’t powerful or faithful? This is why in the previous verses “call on” and “believes” are basically interchangeable; perhaps one is the motivation and the other is the expression, but the two go together.

And logically before someone believes they have to hear. Hear/heard/hearing appear five times in this paragraph. And before the hearing there has to be telling. Verses 14 and 15 use forms of the Greek word κηρύσσω which the ESV (following Tyndale, KJV, NASB) translates as “preaching.” That’s fine, though we’ve got plenty of ideas about preaching and preachers that may not be all beneficial. It’s a public announcement, an official proclamation. It could be used of political heralds, but just as often for prophetic oracles. These are preachers, proclaimers, speech-ers.

In what is arguably my favorite chapter in the Bible, Paul connects for the Corinthians the ideas of gospel, proclaiming/preachung, and Jesus as Lord.

> And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim (κηρύσσομεν) is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. (2 Corinthians 4:3–5 ESV)

Paul publicized “Jesus is Lord.” He was a bearer of tidings, a messenger of these glad tidings.

They need to hear, they need to see. Seeing (the glory) comes by hearing (the gospel).

And such a message isn’t self-originating to the messenger. A messenger is **sent** (ἀποσταλῶσιν). This is the final question. There is a sender of the preachers. The title “apostle” refers to a sent one.

Paul could have gone off on the nature of the commissioning, which he doesn’t, because it’s not his main concern here. It is worth a minute to say that while every believer has a testimony and while every disciple has disciple-making responsibilities, Romans 10:15 isn’t adding the burden of an evangelistic vocation to every Christian. Pastors “do the work of an evangelist” (2 Timothy 4:5), but even they can be distinguished from apostles, prophets, and evangelists (in Ephesians 4:11). Equipping the saints for the work of ministry is crucial, and even a witness, but it’s not precisely what Paul is referring to in Romans 10.

> As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” (Romans 10:15b)

This is from Isaiah 52:7. The entire verse associates with Jesus is Lord.

> How beautiful upon the mountains

> are the feet of him who brings good news,

> who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness,

> who publishes salvation,

> who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.”

> (Isaiah 52:7 ESV)

Isaiah 52 is a good word from the Lord, a word of news that Israel would be delivered from captivity in Babylon and restored to their homeland.

The **beautiful … feet** are ironic, because the feet of one who traveled—and this image suggests it was a long distance—would be physically beat up, dirty, smelly, unpleasant, anti-beautiful. Hermes was the messenger of the gods, son of Zeus, known for the speed of his winged sandals. But these messengers are men, with all ten toes, and their message is such life that their travel sacrifices belong with a poetic beauty.

How different would your life be had you not heard the good news! In the Isaiah passage, τῶν εὐαγγελιζομένων [τὰ] ἀγαθά, “the ones good-newsing the good (things).” In the next verse it is the actual noun εὐαγγέλιον, from which the Latin * ēvangĕlĭum*, into English as: evangel.

By way of application, how beautiful are the feet of William Tyndale who translated the Word into English words for us to read. How beautiful are the feet of those who lay fiber-optic cable and put up cell towers to get us digital audio copies to play/hear whenever we want. But especially in Romans 10 these preachers/evangelists are sent *in person* with the GOODS, the treasure.

# The Dreadful Word (verse 16)

While the preceding sequence is about those who have *not* heard, verse 16 is about those who have heard but have not *believed*.

> But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?” (Romans 10:16 ESV)

As seems to be more and more the case, pronouns matter. Who are the **they**? “They” are always getting blamed for things. In some ways, the obvious answer seems to be the Gentiles. The non-Israel-nations didn't know the message. But 14-17 are aiming us toward 18-21 which include four verses of OT quotes about how Israel did know and they didn't listen.

**Not all** is part of the reason for these chapters.

The quote from Isaiah is from Isaiah 53:1. It brings all the Suffering Servant ideas with it, the one who was “despised and rejected by men” (verse 3), the one esteemed “stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted” (verse 4). “They made his grave with the wicked” (verse 9), he “was numbered with the transgressors” (verse 12). This is a *dreadful* word, a word of suffering. It was a word that was extremely disagreeable to the Jews even though it was the only word of salvation.

The word **obeyed** may surprise us; we think of the gospel as something to be believed. But the Greek word is a play on words. Here it is ὑπακούω - “I obey” compared to ακούω - “I hear.” Obeyed actually includes the idea of submitting oneself to what has been delivered. And in fact, the gospel message demands surrender.

# The Fruitful Word (verse 17)

Here is the conclusion on the power of the Word.

> So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. (Romans 10:17 ESV)

The **word of Christ** is of course the word *about* Christ, but in another way it is *from* Him. Christ Himself is *in* the Word of the gospel.

A dehydrated man who keeps pushing the water bottle away doesn’t need an explanation about the hydrological cycle, he needs to drink the water. Paul argued with philosophical idolators (Acts 17); he had answers for doubters. But the power was not in eloquence or evidences per se (see also 1 Corinthians 2:1-5), other than the announcement of the authority of the Lord Jesus.

A good-newsing one is needed. Natural revelation makes accountable but doesn't bring faith (see Romans 1:18ff). The __word__ causes hearing. So power, directly. Comes through a messenger, but does not require a Council of men, not from the Pope’s chair.

# Conclusion

Church, you know God. You have the truth. You have heard what is good, you have heard the GOODS. It is evangel, it is gift, it is treasure. “Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that w should be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures” (James 1:18).

The word of Christ is beautiful such that we consider the feet of the messengers beautiful who bring it. The word of Christ is dreadful, in that it ruins our own esteem of self-righteousness. Yet the word of Christ is powerful to save.

> you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God;

>

> for

> “All flesh is like grass

> and all its glory like the flower of grass.

> The grass withers,

> and the flower falls,

> but the word of the Lord remains forever.”

>

> And this word is the good news that was preached to you. (1 Peter 1:23–25 ESV)

May the Word of Christ do its work!

----------

## Charge

I was reading Joshua 1 yesterday, and three times there is the call: “be strong and courageous.” This starts as the Lord’s command to Joshua, and becomes the reply of the people to Joshua’s instructions. Christians, you have heard the Word of Christ, the Word is doing its work to birth and build up your faith. The Word reveals His power, the Word works powerfully in you. Meditate on His Word, and be strong and courageous.

## Benediction:

> May the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places. (Ephesians 1:17-20, ESV)

I went out of my way last Lord’s Day to say that “Jesus is Lord” is an entire worldview. That confession is not less than soteriological; “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” All these confessors are saved from sin, saved from God’s wrath, saved from hell. Acknowledging “Jesus is Lord” is a dividing line between life and death, between eternal riches or eternal desolation. But “Jesus is Lord,” if true, cannot be narrowed to a Christian’s “personal faith.” It is a confession with cosmological realities, from root to fruit, earth and the heavens.

Is there any more promising, brightening, comforting, rallying three-word statement? “I love you” means a lot in certain contexts, and “just do it” has caught on in a hustle culture. “He is risen” works well in these weeks before Easter. I’ve actually been quite animated by “all are yours” in 1 Corinthians 3:22. That was the finale of Paul’s reasons for the Corinthians not to be fussy over their favorite preacher of the cross. “So let no one boast in men. For all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, and you are Christ’s and Christ is God’s” (1 Corinthians 3:21-22). “All are yours” is a worldview, an abundance rather than scarcity mindset, a gratitude rather than a grasping attitude. And as good as “All are yours” is, that depends entirely on the reality that “Jesus is Lord.”

It is the “mother-thought” of an “all-embracing life system.” It’s hard not to think of Abraham Kuyper’s manifesto:

[T]here is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, ‘Mine!

And though it’s almost always translated in English as “square inch,” Een duimbreed is a common Dutch idiom for a very small distance, it’s one "thumb's width. Our confession of faith is not just a confession required across the globe, it is a confession that applies to the globe, and the planets and stars and highest heavens. Yes our confession saves our souls because we acknowledge what is true about Jesus, but in that acknowledgement we get everything that concerns Jesus.

Perhaps you’re concerned that that is reading too much into Romans 10:9. I hear you. But sit with me for a little longer in the mediation sauna.

As we teach our kids about the Lord Jesus and as we teach them to believe that He is risen, we don’t ask them to read the whole library first. We teach them the ABCs. When they can put together letters, they can put together sentences, and sentences add up into books and books, by God’s grace, lead to wisdom. And for those who are “in Christ Jesus,” Jesus is “wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.” (1 Corinthians 1:30-31)

But if we put the confession in context in Romans 10, we will find that perhaps we have not gone quite far enough in our consideration that Jesus is Lord. Jesus is the Door (John 10:9), the entrance is narrow, but He is master of the whole house; your afternoons will never be bored exploring it all.

Paul is explaining why so many Jews rejected Jesus as the Messiah and refused to confess Jesus as Lord. Romans 9-11 are all about the historical fact of it, and whether that meant the end of God’s work among Israel. Many Jews misunderstood, and we’d rightly say that they willfully misunderstood, the Law’s demands as pointing them outside themselves when they desired to establish a righteousness of their own. But in addition to that, can you imagine what it might mean for a people raised to revere Yahweh as the covenant-keeping, cosmos-keeping LORD, to confess Jesus as Yahweh in flesh?

The Greek word for “Lord” in Romans 10:9 is κύριος. It can be used in reference to human lords, but throughout the Septuagint κύριος consistently translates Yahweh = LORD, the “I am” (Exodus 3:15) (over 6,000 times in the LXX per Morris). For the Jews to make such a confession involved more than just changing their view of the sacrificial system but of the cosmos.

Yahweh is the creator. Yahweh delivered His people from Egypt in the Exodus. Yahweh promised and then provided victory for them as they conquered the peoples of Canaan. Yahweh gave guidance through His Word and instructions for proper worship. Yahweh was worthy of thanks, of awe, of adoration in Psalms. He is the Judge, the Shepherd, the King and Ruler, with all authority and power. Want blessings? Call on Yahweh. Want blessings? Confess Jesus is Yahweh. So the Jews knew what they were getting by their confession.

The Gentiles in Rome were putting themselves in an entirely different danger. As I said last Sunday, the Emperor didn’t mind the worship of many gods in the Empire, but he most certainly wanted to be seen as sole lord at the top. To confess Jesus as Lord was taken as a direct challenge to Caesar’s authority, and so the temptation would be great to keep quiet about it. You can believe God raised Jesus from the dead, but hold your mouth. Paul says, salvation and riches and honor depend on the confession. It is more than a private conviction.

We considered from Romans 10:5-7 that salvation is impossible, since none of us obey perfectly and none of us could conceive or carry out the incarnation or resurrection. And yet salvation is accessible (10:8-10); it’s clear and it’s in Jesus. We “confess,” or as Tyndale translated it, “knowledge with thy mouth that Jesus is yͤ Lorde.” Verse 10 repeats verse 9, comparing justification and salvation.

Verses 11-13 move on from what Moses writes to what “Scripture says.” Paul quotes the prophets Isaiah and Joel.

There’s more than just Moses’ word on salvation.

For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” (Romans 10:11 ESV)

Paul reuses this quote from Isaiah 28:16, though only the very last part of the verse, which he just quoted in Romans 9:33. The apostle had a lot of ammo to choose from in the arsenal of prophets, and he liked firing this round. It is Scripture, so it is the Lord’s Word. And the Lord says through Isaiah that 1) it’s about the one who believes and 2) that the ones believing will not be put to shame.

Shame before whom? Before God? Before the world? It turns out, “Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies.” (Romans 8:33) There’s no dishonor, no humiliation, no disappointment for those who believe because God accepts all the believing ones.

For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. (Romans 10:12 ESV)

It is not just the hope of the Jews, nor now exclusively for Gentiles after all but the remnant of Israel rejected.

There is no distinction for what? There’s no distinction for how to be saved. This is an explanation of the Isaiah quote (“For…”). But Paul has been making an ethnic distinction for a chapter and half, the same distinction he introduced in Romans 1:16, regarding the distinction among those who need to be saved. This is important. Just as there is no distinction between male and female for how to be saved (Galatians 3:28), there is absolutely a glorious distinction in how they fulfill their roles as saved men or women. So Paul is not flattening Jews/Greeks into one in all ways.

In fact, those with God’s revelation in the nation of Israel should have attended to God’s intention to make His glory known among the nations (see Psalm 67).

Jesus is Lord, and He is Lord of all.

Bestowing His riches, not in a zero sum game, but out of His “all.” The Lord is plentifully supplied; there is no lack in His accounts, His arsenal. His fields are full (see Psalm 50:10-12).

Call on takes over duty for believing, and is used again in verse 13. It means to look to another for help. In verse 12 it is a substantival participle (τοὺς ἐπικαλουμένους), “all the ones calling on Him.”

For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” (Romans 10:13 ESV)

This quote comes from the prophet Joel 2:32. Calls on the name of the Lord is a formula of worship, in particular supplication (Murray). In 2 Timothy 2:22 Paul even can summarize the Christian community: “along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.” Believers are the Lord-callers.

Salvation is not a bootstrapped project, a rigorous religious climb, or available to the zealous. It depends the name of the Lord. Confess “Jesus is Lord” and you will be saved, call on the name of Jesus as Yahweh and you will be saved.

Our confession of faith: He is Lord of all. So all are yours because Jesus is Lord.

On a personal level, this is the humbling truth that turns us from vain self-puffery to the joyful fruitfulness of those who call on the Lord.

“He is trying to make you humble in order to make this moment possible: trying to take off a lot of silly, ugly, fancy-dress in which we have all got ourselves up and are strutting about like the little idiots we are.” (Mere Christianity, Location 1689)

It is vanity, as in discouragement-inducing-futility, to try to make something seem great that isn’t great. We are not great. The Lord, though, is great and greatly to be praised.

On a worldview level, the “Lord of all" parts, the "riches" parts, spill into chapter 11, and the jealousability He is working among us. God blesses those who confess Jesus as Lord over all the world.

did [Israel] stumble in order that they might fall? By no means! Rather, through their trespass salvation has come to the Gentiles, so as to make Israel jealous. Now if their trespass means riches for the world, and if their failure means riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their full inclusion mean! (Romans 11:11–12 ESV)

As the redeemed, you live in forgiveness according to the riches of His grace (Ephesians 1:7). As the regenerated, He has purposed to show the immeasurable riches of His grace in the coming ages (Ephesians 2:7). As the saints of God, you have heard the unsearchable riches of Christ (Ephesians 3:8). Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord of all. Apart from Him, life is merely busy and barren. Call on the Lord in the days of toil, and trouble. His riches are for all those who call on Him.

And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. To our God and Father be glory forever and ever. Amen.

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. (Philippians 4:19–20, 23, ESV)

I went out of my way last Lord’s Day to say that “Jesus is Lord” is an entire worldview. That confession is not less than soteriological; “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be *saved*.” All these confessors are saved from sin, saved from God’s wrath, saved from hell. Acknowledging “Jesus is Lord” is a dividing line between life and death, between eternal riches or eternal desolation. But “Jesus is Lord,” if true, cannot be narrowed to a Christian’s “personal faith.” It is a confession with cosmological realities, from root to fruit, earth and the heavens.

Is there any more promising, brightening, comforting, rallying three-word statement? “I love you” means a lot in certain contexts, and “just do it” has caught on in a hustle culture. “He is risen” works well in these weeks before Easter. I’ve actually been quite animated by “all are yours” in 1 Corinthians 3:22. That was the finale of Paul’s reasons for the Corinthians not to be fussy over their favorite preacher of the cross. “So let no one boast in men. For all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, and you are Christ’s and Christ is God’s” (1 Corinthians 3:21-22). “All are yours” is a worldview, an abundance rather than scarcity mindset, a gratitude rather than a grasping attitude. And as good as “All are yours” is, that depends entirely on the reality that “Jesus is Lord.”

It is the “mother-thought” of an “all-embracing life system.” It’s hard not to think of Abraham Kuyper’s manifesto:

> [T]here is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, ‘Mine!

And though it’s almost always translated in English as “square inch,” *Een duimbreed* is a common Dutch idiom for a very small distance, it’s one "thumb's width. Our confession of faith is not just a confession required across the globe, it is a confession that applies to the globe, and the planets and stars and highest heavens. Yes our confession saves our souls because we acknowledge what is true about Jesus, but in that acknowledgement we get everything that concerns Jesus.

Perhaps you’re concerned that that is reading too much into Romans 10:9. I hear you. But sit with me for a little longer in the mediation sauna.

As we teach our kids about the Lord Jesus and as we teach them to believe that He is risen, we don’t ask them to read the whole library first. We teach them the ABCs. When they can put together letters, they can put together sentences, and sentences add up into books and books, by God’s grace, lead to *wisdom*. And for those who are “in Christ Jesus,” Jesus is “wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.” (1 Corinthians 1:30-31)

But if we put the confession in context in Romans 10, we will find that perhaps we have not gone quite far enough in our consideration that Jesus is Lord. Jesus is the Door (John 10:9), the entrance is narrow, but He is master of the whole house; your afternoons will never be bored exploring it all.

Paul is explaining why so many Jews rejected Jesus as the Messiah and refused to confess Jesus as Lord. Romans 9-11 are all about the historical fact of it, and whether that meant the end of God’s work among Israel. Many Jews misunderstood, and we’d rightly say that they *willfully* misunderstood, the Law’s demands as pointing them outside themselves when they desired to establish a righteousness of their own. But in addition to that, can you imagine what it might mean for a people raised to revere *Yahweh* as the covenant-keeping, cosmos-keeping LORD, to confess Jesus as *Yahweh* in flesh?

The Greek word for “Lord” in Romans 10:9 is κύριος. It can be used in reference to human lords, but throughout the Septuagint κύριος consistently translates *Yahweh* = LORD, the “I am” (Exodus 3:15) (over 6,000 times in the LXX per Morris). For the Jews to make such a confession involved more than just changing their view of the sacrificial system but of the cosmos.

*Yahweh* is the creator. *Yahweh* delivered His people from Egypt in the Exodus. *Yahweh* promised and then provided victory for them as they conquered the peoples of Canaan. *Yahweh* gave guidance through His Word and instructions for proper worship. *Yahweh* was worthy of thanks, of awe, of adoration in Psalms. He is the Judge, the Shepherd, the King and Ruler, with all authority and power. Want blessings? Call on *Yahweh*. Want blessings? Confess Jesus is *Yahweh*. So the Jews knew what they were getting by their confession.

The Gentiles in Rome were putting themselves in an entirely different danger. As I said last Sunday, the Emperor didn’t mind the worship of many gods in the Empire, but he most certainly wanted to be seen as sole lord at the top. To confess Jesus as Lord was taken as a direct challenge to Caesar’s authority, and so the temptation would be great to keep quiet about it. You can believe God raised Jesus from the dead, but hold your mouth. Paul says, salvation and riches and honor depend on the confession. It is more than a private conviction.

We considered from Romans 10:5-7 that salvation is impossible, since none of us obey perfectly and none of us could conceive or carry out the incarnation or resurrection. And yet salvation is accessible (10:8-10); it’s clear and it’s in Jesus. We “confess,” or as Tyndale translated it, “knowledge with thy mouth that Jesus is yͤ Lorde.” Verse 10 repeats verse 9, comparing justification and salvation.

Verses 11-13 move on from what Moses writes to what “Scripture says.” Paul quotes the prophets Isaiah and Joel.

# The Lord of All (verses 11-12)

There’s more than just Moses’ word on salvation.

> For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” (Romans 10:11 ESV)

Paul reuses this quote from Isaiah 28:16, though only the very last part of the verse, which he just quoted in Romans 9:33. The apostle had a lot of ammo to choose from in the arsenal of prophets, and he liked firing this round. It is **Scripture**, so it is the Lord’s Word. And the Lord says through Isaiah that 1) it’s about the one who **believes** and 2) that the ones believing **will not be put to shame**.

Shame before whom? Before God? Before the world? It turns out, “Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies.” (Romans 8:33) There’s no dishonor, no humiliation, no disappointment for those who believe because God accepts all the believing ones.

> For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. (Romans 10:12 ESV)

It is not just the hope of the Jews, nor now exclusively for Gentiles after all but the remnant of Israel rejected.

**There is no distinction** for what? There’s no distinction for *how to be saved*. This is an explanation of the Isaiah quote (“For…”). But Paul has been making an ethnic distinction for a chapter and half, the same distinction he introduced in Romans 1:16, regarding the distinction among those who *need to be saved*. This is important. Just as there is no distinction between male and female for *how to be saved* (Galatians 3:28), there is absolutely a glorious distinction in how they fulfill their roles as saved men or women. So Paul is not flattening Jews/Greeks into one in all ways.

In fact, those with God’s revelation in the nation of Israel should have attended to God’s intention to make His glory known among the nations (see Psalm 67).

Jesus is Lord, and He is **Lord of all**.

**Bestowing His riches**, not in a zero sum game, but out of His “all.” The Lord is plentifully supplied; there is no lack in His accounts, His arsenal. His fields are full (see Psalm 50:10-12).

**Call on** takes over duty for believing, and is used again in verse 13. It means to look to another for help. In verse 12 it is a substantival participle (τοὺς ἐπικαλουμένους), “all the ones calling on Him.”

# The Lord of Salvation (verse 13)

> For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” (Romans 10:13 ESV)

This quote comes from the prophet Joel 2:32. **Calls on the name of the Lord** is a formula of worship, in particular supplication (Murray). In 2 Timothy 2:22 Paul even can summarize the Christian community: “along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.” Believers are the Lord-callers.

Salvation is not a bootstrapped project, a rigorous religious climb, or available to the zealous. It depends **the name of the Lord**. Confess “Jesus is Lord” and you will be saved, call on the name of Jesus as *Yahweh* and you will be saved.

# Conclusion

Our confession of faith: He is Lord of all. So all are yours because Jesus is Lord.

On a personal level, this is the humbling truth that turns us from vain self-puffery to the joyful fruitfulness of those who call on the Lord.

> “He is trying to make you humble in order to make this moment possible: trying to take off a lot of silly, ugly, fancy-dress in which we have all got ourselves up and are **strutting about like the little idiots we are**.” (_Mere Christianity_, Location 1689)

It is vanity, as in discouragement-inducing-futility, to try to make something seem great that isn’t great. We are not great. The Lord, though, is great and greatly to be praised.

On a worldview level, the “Lord of all" parts, the "riches" parts, spill into chapter 11, and the jealousability He is working among us. God blesses those who confess Jesus as Lord over all the world.

> did [Israel] stumble in order that they might fall? By no means! Rather, through their trespass salvation has come to the Gentiles, so as to make Israel jealous. Now if their trespass means riches for the world, and if their failure means riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their full inclusion mean! (Romans 11:11–12 ESV)

----------

## Charge

As the redeemed, you live in forgiveness according to the *riches* of His grace (Ephesians 1:7). As the regenerated, He has purposed to show the immeasurable *riches* of His grace in the coming ages (Ephesians 2:7). As the saints of God, you have heard the unsearchable *riches* of Christ (Ephesians 3:8). Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord of all. Apart from Him, life is merely busy and barren. Call on the Lord in the days of toil, and trouble. His *riches* are for all those who call on Him.

## Benediction:

> And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. To our God and Father be glory forever and ever. Amen.

>

> The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. (Philippians 4:19–20, 23, ESV)

Automated transcript of the sermon audio, generated with OpenAI Whisper (small.en). It has not been checked against the recording and may contain errors, especially in names and Scripture references.

And some of you are already going, oh great, an entire talk on discipline. And this is related to principles of discipline. Some of you are already wondering, is this personal discipline? Is this me spanking my kid? Is this the Lord spanking me? And that's the thing about principles is the answer to that is yes. It is supposed to be related to principles that will transcend all those particulars and like a lot of good things, personal discipline is something that we wish we had without having to do the work to acquire it. We want the fruit but we don't want the growth that produces the fruit. I mean, it is like a lot of things.

Really, we want the outcome that is without the process to get to that outcome. I would like to have read a lot of really good books, Which is unfortunately not quite the same thing as actually having read them or doing the work I'd like to have financial security without having to make any sacrifices or do the work to get there I'd like to be able to play the piano like a concert pianist without sacrificing years of my life to get there I'd like to be healthy and fit But I don't want the unpleasant and hard repetitions of exercise to get me there And I don't like eating only half as much dessert as I actually want I May want to be fresh and alert in the morning to get up and do my work But I don't want to go to bed on time when there are so many fun movies to watch and so many fun conversations to have.

In other words, I'd like to be a person of discipline, but without the unpleasant process to get there. And I have a sense that I'm not alone. The difference between discipline and the other process I spoke of, though, discipline particularly, is that discipline itself, we know, is a gift from God. It is an evidence of His love for us. Reading good books, saving money, strenuous exercise, getting good sleep, and all the rest of those things that I mentioned might be examples of disciplined behavior. But discipline is a gift from the Lord. It is a gracious gift from the Lord to help us become who we are becoming, who He wants us to be.

And if we do what we are supposed to do, we are blessed for it. And according to Proverbs, that blessing includes all sorts of good things. Life direction, chapter 6.23, chapter 10.17, oftentimes monetary wealth, chapter 6.6-8, chapter 10 verse 11, long life, chapter 10 verse 27, and plenty more, which I'd like to take a look at with our time together tonight. So in the interest of defining some terms, let me offer for some working definitions quite simply. And though the principles here apply to all of humanity in general, God disciplines those whom He loves. Chapter three, verse 11. So for our purposes, I'll be talking about the discipline that comes from God to His people.

And this is discipline for Christians of both wise and foolish varieties. And yes, even among Christians, they're both. So discipline is training. And a person who exercises personal discipline, or self-discipline, is what we would call a disciplined person. And that disciplined person evidences that, in whatever capacity that he has disciplined, he has been trained, ultimately by God, sometimes by self, sometimes by his parents. But the degree to which you are disciplined in an area is the degree to which you have been trained in that area. Now, for some people, that training comes hard, particularly for the foolish and stubborn.

And for some people, the training comes easier. And sometimes those people just make it look easy. And you may be tempted to think, well, that's just a disciplined person. He's wired that way. Maybe, or maybe in that particular area of discipline, he is wiser. He is more teachable. He is more given to response. He is more given to instruction, to heating the instruction of those who care about him. So being disciplined is a little like being wise in this. A wise person, say like Solomon, is not necessarily wise in every context or every way.

Solomon was the wisest man to have lived at the time when he was alive, and yet when it came to the ways of romance, we know that he was not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed. And that has been a stumbling block for Christians for generations. How can we say that Solomon is wise when he had so many wives and concubines? Well, one thing we know about wisdom is that just because a person is wise in one area does not mean, and he may even be categorized as a wise person, and yet it doesn't mean he has nothing more to learn. Likewise, that's the same way with discipline. You may find, and many of you may have known, somebody who was very disciplined, extremely disciplined in diet, in sleep, in exercise, and was actually quite lazy or stubborn or foolish when it came to relationships or money or work. So just because a man may be disciplined in one way doesn't mean that He doesn't have room to grow in others.

The point is this. All discipline is from the Lord. Whether it's from your parents, or from your boss, or from yourself, as you're giving yourself a kick in the hind parts to get out of bed in the morning, it is from the Lord. And it is a gift. And for some, that gift leads to repentance in life. For others, it does not. It depends on how we receive the gift. It's that sum of what we can control. is on the full wise spectrum somewhere. You have foolish, you have wise, and you have everyone. And nobody has yet arrived where he will be eventually. Fools don't learn easily, the wise do, and all are subject from discipline of the Lord because he loves us.

But disciplined persons, so those who have been trained in whatever capacity, are necessarily self-disciplined. That means that the discipline is imposed by one or two parties. That is yourself or somebody else. And our own experience helps us to make this distinction, but Scripture really doesn't. As far as God's word is concerned, it's all from Him. And so we would do well to orient our thinking along those lines as well. And so when we are tempted to buck against discipline or resist it, keep in mind whom you're resisting ultimately. And as suggested by my title, I'd like to now offer some principles of discipline drawn from the book of Proverbs.

So without further ado, I have four, and it is not, by any means, presumed to be an exhaustive list, but hopefully it is helpful. So first, discipline is an evidence of God's love. Verse 3, 11 and 12 says, My son do not despise the Lord's discipline or be weary of his reproof, for the Lord reprooves him whom he loves, as a father, the son in whom he delights. So the discipline of the Lord is from the Lord. And if you are being disciplined by the Lord, it's because of his love for you. So children, your parents discipline you because you have their last name, because you belong to them, because they love you.

from the Lord as it helps to produce the peaceful fruit of righteousness. The same is true of God to us. In His kindness, the Lord does not leave us to figure things out on his own, but instead he has a hundred thousand million ways of training us, of disciplining us in His kindness to help shape us. Really, that anyone improves to any degree in any capacity anywhere anytime is owing to God's common grace. But when it comes to His people, He helps us to get better through constant discipline. Sometimes the discipline takes the form of natural consequences. For example, lost trust is a natural consequence. You can be totally forgiven, but it takes a while to rebuild trust. Or bankruptcy. Sometimes things happen to you. Sometimes it is your own fault. Other times the discipline comes through human means like parents, administering a spanking, or law enforcement, enforcing a night in jail. Either way, it is from God because he doesn't want us to continue in sin or for sin to become enticing. Proverbs

19 18 says discipline your son for there's hope. Do not set your heart on putting him to death. Sometimes this is I think in the in the Solomonic section of Proverbs, and he speaks in pretty extreme terms sometimes. This verse addressed to parents, but if you were to consider it from the perspective of the eavesdropping child, he can look and see that it's proof that God loves him. The fact that that child has a parent who is willing to discipline him is proof that he also has a Heavenly Father who has delegated that responsibility to his earthly father. As long as his son is alive and is subject to the discipline of his earthly father, remains hope for his soul.

And after all, it is the soul with which we are primarily concerned. We're not concerned here with mere behavior modification or obedient devils. We're concerned with the formation of character in our children and being the vehicles through which God will discipline them. Parents who can consistently regard themselves as stewards do very well. Chapter 13 verse 24 says, whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him. Again, more extreme language here. You go so far, Solomon does, as to say that if you fail to train your son, you must hate him. It is loving to train, even if the training is not fun or if it hurts.

It should be our aim to raise children that we'll actually like when they're fully grown, and who, if we've trained them well, and then also for our part to be the sorts of people that our fully trained children will like and turn. So there's responsibility for us as parents, there's responsibility in terms of how we administer discipline and also how we make our own decisions and become the sorts of people that we want our kids to like when they grow up. God is not vindictive. He is righteously vengeful by any pleasure that he derives from disciplining those whom he loves comes from the awareness of what we are becoming and what the discipline will produce in us.

It's not because he particularly enjoys seeing us in pain. Any father who has been pained by having to spank his child has experienced an echo of this, no doubt. And still in God's love and in his sovereign goodness, he is pleased to discipline us. The right sentiment is captured for us in too small a script in chapter 23, verses 13 to 16. I will read it for you. And it says, do not withhold discipline from a child. If you strike him with a rod, he will not die. If you strike him with a rod, you will save his soul from sheol. My son, if your heart is wise, my heart too will be glad. My inmost being will exalt when your lips speak what is right.

A loving father delights in the wisdom of his son. There's no father in this room who would not be tickled pink if his son became wise or at least as wise as he is and all of us want our sons to surpass us. A loving father delights in the wisdom of his son, but if he hates his son and leaves him to his own devices, not only will he have raised an enemy in the end, but a jerk to boot. God does not do this with us neither should we do it with others, particularly those that we are given to raise in discipline. Second, discipline makes you wiser. Through the discipline of the Lord, we learn hard lessons and gain wisdom.

Wisdom is the sort of thing that we want other people to have. Those around us have been really nice if they were all wise. It'd be a lot easier for me, right? That's what everybody thinks. So most of us want to have, but most of us don't want to get it. And perhaps that is why in his blunt simplicity and wisdom Solomon said, here's the start, get it. The beginning of wisdom is this, give wisdom.

You can gain wisdom through experience or through observation. Observation would be reading the Bible, would be reading good fiction, studying good history. It could even be keeping your eyes open when you see a toddler having a fit at the supermarket and seeing what happens. Be instructed. And experience is a very effective and a more cruel teacher. And that is, you can gain wisdom by things happening to you directly and learning hard lessons. My preference is the first one. I much prefer learning by observation and being instructed. And Solomon says as much when he says things like observe the ant. Pay attention. Notice. Rather than what happens to the animals needing to happen to you as well. Paul even told the Corinthians in chapter, 1 Corinthians chapter 10, that the experience of Israel and the Exodus took place as examples for us. Man, really? It seems like there'd be more to it than that. And no doubt there was, but that's a hard providence for those Hebrews. If you'd have told them, guys, what you're going through right now is

is so that some Gentiles a couple thousand years from now will be instructed. So just hang in there. But that is, it may be a hard Providence for the Hebrews is a grace to the Corinthians and who knows what sort of grace you are being to others or where you can find gracious instruction from the Lord so that you too can gain wisdom. Well, like the Corinthians, our job is to learn from the hard lessons of the experience of others and to gain wisdom accordingly. The alternative, as I said, is to undergo those hard lessons ourselves, which is also very effective but way less fun. This is the discipline we have in view.

And one key to getting wisdom is to get rid of foolishness. Chapter 13, verse 1, a wise son hears his father's instruction, but a scoffer does not listen to to rebuke. It is wise not only to listen but to accept your father's discipline and to read the Bible. Human fathers are a stand-in for the Heavenly Father, not a not a substitute, not a replacement, a stand-in. And a way for a son to honor the Lord is by honoring his father. Likewise, it is important when human fathers represent our Heavenly Father that they work to do so well. We want to represent him well. We don't want to give our children a skewed conception of what their Heavenly Father is like because it's distorted by us, but no doubt it will be because we cannot do it perfectly. Nevertheless, that is our aim.

Assuming everyone in the equation though is working to be faithful and obedient, the whole process works quite well. Children are repenting, dads are repenting, dads are striving for holiness, they will represent the Lord well if their wives. God uses human fathers sort of prophetically as they speak to the children and they speak to their sons on God's behalf. So the point then, sons, is this. Hear your father's instruction. It is good for you. Not because your dad is perfect, but because your Heavenly Father is using him as a vehicle to discipline you and to shape you. Implied in this heating then is obedience, giving heed to what he says. We know this from the second half of the verse, but a scoffer does not listen to rebuke. But also we know it from more of Proverbs. Chapter 19 verse 20 says, Listen to advice and accept instruction that you may gain wisdom in the future. Wisdom is the byproduct of listening to advice and accepting instruction and observation and study, but it starts by paying attention. Once again, the beginning wisdom is this.

Get wisdom. When you do those things, it will have the desired effect.

That's not the same thing as merely accepting consequences. That's bypassing the listen to advice part. Far too many of us are willing to accept consequences for boneheadedness, but Solomon seems to imply that that kind of pain is actually preventable by paying attention to advice and to instruction. He says in chapter 22 verse 15, folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it from him. Far from him no doubt. According to Solomon here, foolishness is bound up in the heart of the child. It's not just sitting there on the surface waiting to be knocked off. It's actually bound in place and it needs to be knocked loose. And the lovingly administered rod of discipline is the perfect tool to make that happen. Chapter 12 verse 1 says, whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid. The sort of knowledge that is mentioned here in Proverbs is close enough, nearly synonymous with wisdom, that I'm lumping them together under this principle.

Knowledge and wisdom, knowledge doesn't come naturally to most of us, at least not sufficiently. You can, if you are breathing and your eyes are open, you're going to learn some things. That's not what we're talking about here. Rather, knowledge is linked with discipline and it usually comes hard. Solomon is teaching here that the one who loves discipline loves knowledge. Discipline and knowledge are not the same thing, they're connected. Knowledge comes when we discipline ourselves. The student who elects to do his homework before watching TV shows evidence of the right sort of discipline and love of knowledge because he acts wisely.

So you see the chain there. That behavior is an evidence of what is going on in his mind, in his heart, and his thought processes look like it. When a young man loves discipline, notice he doesn't have to like it to love it. When he loves discipline, not necessarily likes it, he loves it because he knows it benefits him, helping him to acquire knowledge. On the other hand, if he's just sitting there gritting his teeth, angry at his dad for daring to discipline him, if he is just hating reproof, Solomon calls that stupid. He who hates reproof is stupid. Do you love discipline?

You don't have to like it. Do you love discipline? Do you recognize his benefits? Or do you hate waterproof, making you stupid? Proverbs 19, 27 says, cease to hear instruction. The new American standard calls that discipline. Cease to hear instruction, my son, and you will stray from the words of knowledge. Same thing here. If we blow off the discipline that we receive, we stray from the words of knowledge. Remarkably, you can still hear the words and know what is right and stray from it. So hearing and doing are different things. We let the flesh take over sinfully and willfully, sinning willfully while we are totally aware that we're going to regret it later on or invite God's chastisement for it.

We stray from the words of knowledge. Now, lots of us do this. That is when you know better. You know better and you do it anyway. When that happens, you have strayed from the words of knowledge. Chapter 23 verse 12 says, here's our word instruction, render discipline again in the New York Standard. Apply your heart to instruction and your ear to the words of knowledge. And your ear to words of knowledge. Instead of straying from the words of knowledge, it is far better and may God help us to instead apply our ears to them. That will make us wiser. It also brings honor, which is our third principle. Discipline brings honor.

You know, it's funny. I was thinking about this when I was preparing, like who wants to listen to a talk on discipline? It's usually the discipline people. Right? And yeah, I get it. I'm sorry. But it is something that we all need to hear and love because there is honor in it. And honor for honor's sake is not our aim. We want to honor the Lord. We want to represent Him well and bring Him glory. But there is nothing wrong with pursuing honor in so far as it enables us to better honor Him.

honor befits the honorable and the honorable are disciplined. Chapter 13 verse 18 says poverty and disgrace come to him who ignores instruction, but whoever heeds reproof is honored. I've been fortunate to work with a lot of different types of young people in a host of capacities the last 20 years and I mean lots of people in general, but I'm thinking of young people in particular here and the vast majority of those that I've have worked with have been the sort who will respectfully listen to reproof, but then do nothing to change their behavior, at least not quickly. Well, that is, I mean, mercifully, sanctification is not a snapshot.

It is a movie, right? But that is ignoring instruction, and it is a recipe for poverty and for disgrace, not for dishonor. Conversely, we respect a person who's humble enough to actually listen to correction. I don't know about Solomon's time, but I suspect it was similar to our own. People don't like to be corrected. And so they're inclined to disregard, to not heed, reproof. But if you find someone who earns a rebuke, that is, he's been wrong, he has sinned, done something foolish and then receives that rebuke graciously and thankfully he tends to stand out. More often the sort of person who earns a reproof is not the kind of one who will pay attention to it.

Turns out we humans are stubborn people and it takes a while to shape the statue of David out of that gargantuan piece of marble. Do you wish to be honored? Well, be honorable. Do you know how? He'd reproof. If you wish to be honored, be honorable. If you wish to be honorable, he'd reproof. Neglecting discipline, whether from yourself or from others, is a good way to ensure poverty and shame. Chapter 5, verses 22 and 23 read, Awaken man's iniquities will trap him. He will become tangled in the ropes of his own sin. He will die because there is no discipline and be lost because of his great stupidity. This here is then an extreme byproduct of a lack of discipline and a warning of where it leads, gross sin.

A man who is not disciplined will soon find himself in a world of hurt and be completely devoid of honor. We know that it is an evidence of God's abandoning wrath when he stops disciplining men for their sins. This is what it means for men to be given over to the full consequence of their sin as Paul expresses in Romans chapter one. And may he keep us from that. Discipline brings honor. Last, discipline. Practicing discipline makes you more godly. There you go. Any of you ever seen The Muppets Take Manhattan? Yeah, in the funny movie, The Muppets Take Manhattan, Kermit the Frog finds himself offering advice to the marketing team for ocean breeze soap.

They spent all night there frazzled, strung out on caffeine and sleep deprived. Have you spent many long hours brainstorming a new slogan? They run a couple of them by, uh, Kermit who has amnesia at the time. And he says, I don't like any of them. Have you tried something like this ocean breeze soap will get you clean. And the little Muppets heads go, turn to him. You mean just say what the product does? No one's ever tried that. Of course, the results of the simple approach are meteoric sales motion, breeze, soap, and wild success and all of a sudden, even though he doesn't know his name is Kermit, he's famous and rich.

Taking a page from Kermit the Frog's handbook, I'm going to try the same thing here. Practicing discipline will make you more godly. Now, this is something of a catch-all principle simply because there's so much more to left over to say than is covered by the first three principles. The reality is that there are countless benefits that come to us when we practice wisdom, when we are disciplined. In the Christian, discipline yields teachability, which yields intelligence, which yields godliness, which yields discipline. And so, depending on how many times you've gone around the loop, that discipline continues to come from the Lord and shape us until, at least in a certain category, you don't need to keep being spanked.

And so then you are disciplined yourself. It is a cycle. Chapter 15, verse 32 says, whoever ignores instruction despises himself, but he who listens to reproof gains intelligence. Ignoring instruction is self-destructive. It is an act of self-hatred practically to ignore instruction. But you will get smarter if you listen to reproof. Now, this presupposes that there's somebody around to instruct you, but take heart. If you're listening to this message, there's a high likelihood that you have someone in your life who will tell you when you're being foolish, you should listen to them. If nothing else, I'm giving you encouragement now.

And Solomon says nothing about the tone or the delivery of the reproof. At least not in the passages we've read. There is an... there is... and I'll talk about this as we wrap up, but it's important to be gracious in your delivery. And, you know, common sense and scripture also talk about the importance of being qualified to speak, Galatians 6. But the reality is that the wise man will receive instruction regardless of the source, and the foolish man will reject it regardless of the source. Most people are in between. They'll gain some instruction and reject the rest, depending on the variables. They may like the delivery, they may like the person, they may fear the deliverer, they may disrespect the deliverer and be cause to disregard him.

But if you will listen to reproof, you will gain intelligence. It's a fact, people. Like, it doesn't have to be true correction. It doesn't even have to be right. And from the process, you will benefit. If you are instructed and the instruction is off base, even there, there's benefit in the exercise. So you just don't win if you dismiss it out of hand automatically. You can pray for it, you can perfectly receive it, and you may actually go ahead and graciously, humbly dismiss that reproof. But you probably benefited from having gone through that process along the way anyway. Chapter 25 verse 8, 28, 28 says, A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls.

But he who listens to reproof acquires understanding. Man, this is an absolute gem from the book of Proverbs. Solomon still here contrasts the man without self-control with the man who listens to reproof. who listens to a proof is contrasted with a man without self-control. Interesting opposites there. We can safely and logically put the fool in the same category as the man without self-control. Both have no self-control and not only if he has no self-control, not only is a man dishonorable, not only does he hate himself, but he's also rendered himself very, very vulnerable. People without self-control are subject to a whole host of sins that the self-controlled and disciplined are not.

Teachability, then, is a hedge against vulnerability. Teachability is a hedge against vulnerability. Listen to reproof. It will protect you. chapter 6 verse 23 says, For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life. The godly man is on the path to blessedness. Discipline directs the godly man in the way that he should go. Whether from God, directly or through other means, the reproofs of discipline are the way of life. Chapter 20 verse 13, Love not sleep lest you come to poverty, open your eyes and you will have plenty of bread. Okay, so the beginning of wisdom is get wisdom, but this seems like a pretty low requirement as well.

Like open your eyes and you will have plenty of bread. No, maybe there was, maybe the bedrooms were full of bread back then, but probably not. Mostly start by getting your body out of bed and you're already on the right track. Like show up, be there, and you will have plenty of bread. Chapter 10, verse 17. The one who follows instruction is on the path to life. This is related to one a couple verses ago. But the one who rejects correction goes astray on the path of life versus going astray, not unlike Tolger's progress. The man who can follow instructions will be on the path to life. All right, so there are life via a host of other principles on discipline even itself that we can draw from Proverbs.

But this should give us plenty to work on for now. So as we wrap up, I want to offer some takeaways. First, when it comes to yourself, be humble. You're just not where you're going to be. Years from now, at the end of your life. And you're not going to get there without the directional, shaping, corrective, loving discipline of the Lord, which often comes through human means And doing the study, I have also been benefited by meditating on exactly how good and how sweet the discipline of the Lord is. It yields honorability, wisdom, direction in life, prosperity, happiness, and more. And it is totally humbling.

At times it's downright embarrassing, but we're on this path together, right? When it comes to yourself, pursue wisdom. The man who actively pursues wisdom will practice discipline along the way. Listen to instruction. People offering correction probably love you. And even if they don't and they're just trying to be jerks, God still loves you. And He may have sent them along for a reason that you didn't anticipate. It is good for you to be a delight to instruct. It's good for you. And a person who is teachable, a person who listens to instruction, a person who is a delight to instruct, is not. That does not, being like that does not make you weak or gullible.

In fact, Scripture is clear that the reverse is the case. Being a person who listens to instruction does not mean that you're weak or gullible. Refusing to listen to instruction actually is what makes you vulnerable and stupid. And since most of us don't want to be vulnerable and stupid, the formula is pretty simple, even if it's not easy. When it comes to yourself, deny yourself. Deny yourself. Learn to say no and yes at the right times for the right reasons. If you're like me, you don't always feel like a disciplined person. When that happens, imagine that you are disciplined and act accordingly. The reality is you probably know what you're supposed to do.

Soon, you may be wise enough that the spankings are no longer necessary. Last, when it comes to yourself, work hard. Buckle down and act like the person that you want to become. Slay your sin and remain qualified to speak into the lives of others. Stop making excuses, close your mouth, and even invite correction. The exercise is probably good for you, regardless of the counselor. When it comes to others, bear in mind that you have the incredible opportunity to be a vehicle of grace to other people. You have a vehicle to be used, you have the opportunity to be a vehicle to be used by God in his discipline of other people.

So when it comes to others, leave room for grace. We need to cultivate an environment where people are actually working hard to be faithful. Like they're working hard to be obedient and do what they're supposed to do. And then they're giving grace and redirection when they fail. And maybe our children, and maybe someone in our life-to-life group, and maybe somebody else, but as long as they're not being idiots, foolishly sinning, and then rejecting wise counsel, there's lots of room for patience and grace if we would but disciple with eyes of faith. When it comes to others, be patient. Maybe you want those around you to be more disciplined, just so you won't have to listen to their lame excuses.

I don't blame you. Maybe you need to be more disciplined as God's vehicle of disciplinary blessing to your children. Well, we know that God blesses faithfulness and he blesses obedience, even when it's done badly, but developing into the people that we are becoming takes more time than most of us would like. And evidently, God doesn't mind the process. When it comes to others, be faithful. You never know how your words or your actions are going to be used by God to instruct others while being attentive to your own qualification and readiness to speak. So having done that, go ahead and open your mouth when you need to help somebody else grow.

And so then by God's great grace, may we be vehicles of grace and discipline to others as he disciplines them, and man, thank God that he loves us enough to discipline us. Let's pray. Father, as we fight the flesh And we want to be more disciplined people, help us to be humble enough to pursue wisdom and to be faithful where we are. And little things, and may those little things, we get big, the little faithfulness, we get big faithfulness's all to your glory. We pray that you would help us to be attentive first to ourselves, to being qualified, and to be an optimistic and gracious and patient with others but then being courageous to go ahead and speak.

And may we not be characterized among the foolish, among the vulnerable, among the stupid, but instead be those who love, reproof, even when it is not administered the way we would prefer. That takes humility that most of us don't have naturally, so we ask you to give that to. And we have enough faith to know that we need more. And so we ask you to increase our faith that you may use us as you see fit. And so thank you for your word and the instruction that it gives and just help us to go ahead and obey it. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen.

Salvation is the most impossible thing and also completely available. We do not have any ability to make it happen, and yet it is fully accessible. It is not hard to see, and yet generations of men have missed it, including generations of those who had God’s Word pointing to it. It was right there in front of them, and it is the good news for us today.

In Romans 10:5-13 Paul has written what is perhaps the word on how to be saved. How many gospel presentations have ended with Romans 10:9? It is a great call to faith. But it is in the middle of a paragraph, which itself is near the middle of Paul’s argument about why so many Jews did not confess that Jesus is Lord.

“Jesus is Lord” is the Christian confession. “In God We Trust” as the motto of the USA is a step up from

It’s what we make public with our words, and there are no limits on how it affects what we do. It acknowledges the nature of Jesus, it acknowledges our relationship to Jesus. It proclaims who He is, what He’s done, and it is why we can be saved. As this section of Romans 10 reveals, Moses pointed to Jesus, Isaiah pointed to Jesus, Joel pointed to Jesus, and yet a bunch of religious people kept looking at themselves.

Verses 5-13 could be divided into two paragraphs (per Tyndale and Calvin), as verses 5-10 are what “Moses writes” in the law, and verses 11-13 are what “Scripture says” from a major and a minor prophet; the law and the prophets are concerned not only with righteousness, but with faith. That’s what connects both paragraphs together. Paul is concerned with “righteousness based on faith” (verse 6), with the “word of faith” (verse 8), with “believe in your heart” (verse 9), “believes” (verse 10), “believes” (verse 11), and a version of that with “call on” the Lord (verses 12-13). We look to another, or salvation is impossible.

The first proofs Paul provides are a contrast between law-based righteousness and faith-based righteousness, but even the first part of the faith-based righteousness is what it won’t presume.

Law-based righteousness has a big problem, and the Jews knew it:

For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. (Romans 10:5 ESV)

This is a reference from Leviticus 18:5, a passage Paul also used in Galatians 3:12. In its original context it summarizes how the LORD called the Israelites to live differently than the Egyptians where they came from and the Canaanites where they were going to. The simple rule was: obey and live.

The based on is a good way to translate it. But the awkwardness (to us) of the original word order sounds provocative: “the righteousness, (which is) the from the law (one).”

The implication is that perfect obedience was necessary, and that’s certainly how Paul understood it in Romans 10 (the apostle James makes the same point in James 2:10). And Paul had already said that none are righteous, no one does good, the law stops every mouth from making an excuse, and all have sinned (Romans 3). When righteousness is a human product, it needs to be a perfect product. And unlike so many churches advertise, no imperfect people are allowed.

As impossible as perfect obedience is, salvation is actually more impossible. Paul uses a similar line of argument as found in Deuteronomy 30:12-14. It’s the alternative kind of righteousness, righteousness based on faith, and what that faith won’t say and what it does say.

But the righteousness based on faith says, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down) “or ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). (Romans 10:6–7 ESV)

This is “the (from faith) righteousness” with the prepositional phrase between the article and the noun. And this faith-based righteousness speaks, it is the subject. Putting it this way sets up the attitude of faith.

The two comments in verses 6 and 7 are striking. In Deuteronomy 30 Moses is exhorting the people to obey the commandment because it is clear. It is perspicuous, able to be expressed and understood. It is the word that Moses is referring to in 30:12, that word of revelation is not something in highest heaven, and it is still the word in 30:13, it is not something in the deepest sea. Both the heaven and the sea are impossible-to-reach places, far off places, unattainable places. Even if they wanted to, men couldn’t get there to get the word.

Paul sees the end of the word that Moses had in mind. The end of the word is Christ Himself, and Paul applies the words of Deuteronomy to some Christological categories. Faith-based righteousness accepts but certainly doesn’t make the incarnation happen. Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down). No one can obey the law completely, and no one can ascend to heaven to get the Messiah and make Him come down.

So also faith-based righteousness accepts but certainly doesn’t make the resurrection happen. The abyss is the deep sea, which often had the idea of the place of the dead, but Paul’s parenthesis clarifies that it is the place of the dead. Do not say ”Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). No one can bring the incarnated and crucified Messiah back up from the dead. It’s impossible.

We’re still talking about faith-based righteousness.

This is still from the Deuteronomy 30 passage, but verse 14.

But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); (Romans 10:8 ESV)

Again, this is saying that it is clear, it is near, so near that it’s already in mouth and heart. And this is the word of faith; Paul says he’s making the same point as Moses.

There is enough here that I plan to pick up with it again at this point next Lord’s Day. But note that mouth and heart are repeated, and in the same order as verse 8, which are the order in Deuteronomy 30:14. Also note that the identity of the Christ as Jesus refers to His personal coming down in flesh, the incarnation, and God raising Him refers to His bodily coming up in the resurrection.

because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. (Romans 10:9–10 ESV)

Confession is the great Greek word homologeo (ὁμολογέω). To break down this compound word is more “same wording” but it’s often described as “say the same thing.” It carries the idea of acknowledging something in public, in particular professing allegiance.

William Tyndale avoided using the word “confession” as much as possible in his English translation of the New Testament because of the baggage the Papists stuffed into the word. So Tyndale has: “For yf thou shalt knowledge with thy mouth that Jesus is yͤ Lorde.” We don’t use “knowledge” as a verb, but I like it.

Jesus is Lord. That should be more than what we think, it should be what we declare. It’s formal in so far as it is an exclusive affirmation; the nature of Jesus is that He is Lord, and when we think of Lord we think of Jesus. Jesus is not someone other than Lord, and there is no other Lord than Jesus.

This confession challenges those who think Jesus was merely a good teacher. As Lewis pointed out in his Lord, Liar, or Lunatic argument, a good teacher wouldn’t claim to be God in flesh. That man is either crazy, a cult-leading manipulator, or He is who He says He is. This confession also challenges those professing Christians who claim that Jesus is Savior but not necessarily Lord. A cottage industry of teachers claim that grace makes obedience to Christ as Lord optional, that acknowledging Jesus’ Lordship requires a second stage of the Spirit’s work.

We know the believing part. What is the confession part? Why is it first? It seems to be first in following the order from Deuteronomy 30:14. In Paul’s summary in verse 10, heart then mouth is the order we expect. We speak from the abundance of the heart. But it’s a public commitment, not just internal and private.

Jesus is Lord is an accessible statement, a necessary statement, and a world-transforming statement. This confession directly challenged the authority of the Roman Emperor, who was regarded as the supreme ruler and deity of the Roman Empire. By proclaiming that Jesus is Lord, the early Christians were essentially declaring that there was a higher authority than the emperor, which was a direct threat to the social and political order of the empire. It threatened the traditional polytheistic religious beliefs of the Roman Empire, which held that there were many gods and goddesses who deserved worship and sacrifice.

No man is an ultimate authority, over his household, his state, his nation, or his flock. Every husband, governor, president/king, pastor, boss/master is under the Lord Jesus Christ. They either use their position to serve the Lord, or they will be judged by the Lord.

For as much as this confession brings persecution, it is the inevitable truth. Jesus is the way, and the truth, and the life. Jesus is Lord.

Christ did obey perfectly, Christ did accomplish supernatural feats. Salvation is in Him. We did not come up with the incarnation or the resurrection, as concepts or in power. Salvation that was impossible for us is accessible in Christ.

Our confession of faith that Jesus is Lord is the evidence of salvation—we’re saved in Christ alone, it is our recognition of authority—He is the Lord of lords, it is the driving incentive of our worship and mission—He is worthy of praise/devotion and hope, it is the confidence for our ethics and enjoyment of all His creation and spending of energy in His name.

“Knowledge with thy mouth that Jesus is yͤ Lorde.” You know it, let others know it. It is the truth, it is your confession, it is your salvation, it is an entire way of life and worldview.

If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed. Our Lord, come! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. My love be with you all in Christ Jesus. Amen. (1 Corinthians 16:22–24, ESV)

Salvation is the most impossible thing and also completely available. We do not have any ability to make it happen, and yet it is fully accessible. It is not hard to see, and yet generations of men have missed it, including generations of those who had God’s Word pointing to it. It was right there in front of them, and it is the good news for us today.

In Romans 10:5-13 Paul has written what is perhaps *the* word on how to be saved. How many gospel presentations have ended with Romans 10:9? It is a great call to faith. But it is in the middle of a paragraph, which itself is near the middle of Paul’s argument about why so many Jews did not confess that Jesus is Lord.

“Jesus is Lord” is *the* Christian confession. “In God We Trust” as the motto of the USA is a step up from

“E Pluribus Unum” in a way, but it’s not specific (which God?) or binding (trust for what?). To some it’s merely “ceremonial deism,” it’s “No longer religious in nature, the phrase has become, rather, a historical artifact, a public recognition of the role of religion in national life, and an expression of patriotism” ([source](https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/918/in-god-we-trust#:~:text=No%20longer%20religious%20in%20nature,and%20an%20expression%20of%20patriotism.)). But “Jesus is Lord” is no artifact, it is *the* fact.

It’s what we make public with our words, and there are no limits on how it affects what we do. It acknowledges the nature of Jesus, it acknowledges our relationship to Jesus. It proclaims who He is, what He’s done, and it is why we can be saved. As this section of Romans 10 reveals, Moses pointed to Jesus, Isaiah pointed to Jesus, Joel pointed to Jesus, and yet a bunch of religious people kept looking at themselves.

Verses 5-13 could be divided into two paragraphs (per Tyndale and Calvin), as verses 5-10 are what “Moses writes” in the law, and verses 11-13 are what “Scripture says” from a major and a minor prophet; the law and the prophets are concerned not only with righteousness, but with *faith*. That’s what connects both paragraphs together. Paul is concerned with “righteousness based on faith” (verse 6), with the “word of faith” (verse 8), with “believe in your heart” (verse 9), “believes” (verse 10), “believes” (verse 11), and a version of that with “call on” the Lord (verses 12-13). We look to another, or salvation is impossible.

# Impossible Salvation (verses 5-7)

The first proofs Paul provides are a contrast between law-based righteousness and faith-based righteousness, but even the first part of the faith-based righteousness is what it won’t presume.

## Salvation requires *perfect* obedience. (verse 5)

Law-based righteousness has a big problem, and the Jews knew it:

> For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. (Romans 10:5 ESV)

This is a reference from Leviticus 18:5, a passage Paul also used in Galatians 3:12. In its original context it summarizes how the LORD called the Israelites to live differently than the Egyptians where they came from and the Canaanites where they were going to. The simple rule was: obey and live.

The **based on** is a good way to translate it. But the awkwardness (to us) of the original word order sounds provocative: “the righteousness, (which is) the from the law (one).”

The implication is that *perfect* obedience was necessary, and that’s certainly how Paul understood it in Romans 10 (the apostle James makes the same point in James 2:10). And Paul had already said that none are righteous, no one does good, the law stops every mouth from making an excuse, and all have sinned (Romans 3). When righteousness is a human product, it needs to be a perfect product. And unlike so many churches advertise, no imperfect people are allowed.

## Salvation requires *supernatural* feats. (verses 6-7)

As impossible as perfect obedience is, salvation is actually more impossible. Paul uses a similar line of argument as found in Deuteronomy 30:12-14. It’s the alternative kind of righteousness, righteousness based on faith, and what that faith won’t say and what it does say.

> But the righteousness based on faith says, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down) “or ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). (Romans 10:6–7 ESV)

This is “the (from faith) righteousness” with the prepositional phrase between the article and the noun. And this faith-based righteousness speaks, it is the subject. Putting it this way sets up the attitude of faith.

The two comments in verses 6 and 7 are striking. In Deuteronomy 30 Moses is exhorting the people to obey the commandment because it is clear. It is perspicuous, able to be expressed and understood. It is the *word* that Moses is referring to in 30:12, that word of revelation is not something in highest heaven, and it is still the word in 30:13, it is not something in the deepest sea. Both the heaven and the sea are impossible-to-reach places, far off places, unattainable places. Even if they wanted to, men couldn’t get there to get the word.

Paul sees the end of the word that Moses had in mind. The end of the word is Christ Himself, and Paul applies the words of Deuteronomy to some Christological categories. Faith-based righteousness accepts but certainly doesn’t make the *incarnation* happen. **Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down).** No one can obey the law completely, and no one can ascend to heaven to get the Messiah and make Him come down.

So also faith-based righteousness accepts but certainly doesn’t make the *resurrection* happen. The **abyss** is the deep sea, which often had the idea of the place of the dead, but Paul’s parenthesis clarifies that it is the place of the dead. Do not say **”Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).** No one can bring the incarnated and crucified Messiah back up from the dead. It’s impossible.

# Accessible Salvation (verses 8-10)

We’re still talking about faith-based righteousness.

## The way of salvation is clear. (verse 8)

This is still from the Deuteronomy 30 passage, but verse 14.

> But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); (Romans 10:8 ESV)

Again, this is saying that it is clear, it is **near**, so near that it’s already in mouth and heart. And this is **the word of faith**; Paul says he’s making the same point as Moses.

## The way of salvation is in Jesus. (verses 9-10)

There is enough here that I plan to pick up with it again at this point next Lord’s Day. But note that **mouth** and **heart** are repeated, and in the same order as verse 8, which are the order in Deuteronomy 30:14. Also note that the identity of the Christ as **Jesus** refers to His personal coming down in flesh, the incarnation, and God raising Him refers to His bodily coming up in the resurrection.

> because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. (Romans 10:9–10 ESV)

**Confession** is the great Greek word *homologeo* (ὁμολογέω). To break down this compound word is more “same wording” but it’s often described as “say the same thing.” It carries the idea of acknowledging something in public, in particular professing allegiance.

William Tyndale avoided using the word “confession” as much as possible in his English translation of the New Testament because of the baggage the Papists stuffed into the word. So Tyndale has: “For yf thou shalt knowledge with thy mouth that Jesus is yͤ Lorde.” We don’t use “knowledge” as a verb, but I like it.

**Jesus is Lord**. That should be more than what we think, it should be what we declare. It’s formal in so far as it is an exclusive affirmation; the nature of Jesus is that He is Lord, and when we think of Lord we think of Jesus. Jesus is not someone other than Lord, and there is no other Lord than Jesus.

This confession challenges those who think Jesus was merely a good teacher. As Lewis pointed out in his Lord, Liar, or Lunatic argument, a good teacher wouldn’t claim to be God in flesh. That man is either crazy, a cult-leading manipulator, or He is who He says He is. This confession also challenges those professing Christians who claim that Jesus is *Savior* but not necessarily Lord. A cottage industry of teachers claim that grace makes obedience to Christ as Lord optional, that acknowledging Jesus’ Lordship requires a second stage of the Spirit’s work.

We know the believing part. What is the confession part? Why is it first? It seems to be first in following the order from Deuteronomy 30:14. In Paul’s summary in verse 10, heart then mouth is the order we expect. We speak from the abundance of the heart. But it’s a public commitment, not just internal and private.

**Jesus is Lord** is an accessible statement, a necessary statement, and a world-transforming statement. This confession directly challenged the authority of the Roman Emperor, who was regarded as the supreme ruler and deity of the Roman Empire. By proclaiming that **Jesus is Lord**, the early Christians were essentially declaring that there was a higher authority than the emperor, which was a direct threat to the social and political order of the empire. It threatened the traditional polytheistic religious beliefs of the Roman Empire, which held that there were many gods and goddesses who deserved worship and sacrifice.

No man is an ultimate authority, over his household, his state, his nation, or his flock. Every husband, governor, president/king, pastor, boss/master is under the Lord Jesus Christ. They either use their position to serve the Lord, or they will be judged by the Lord.

For as much as this confession brings persecution, it is the inevitable truth. Jesus is the way, and the truth, and the life. **Jesus is Lord**.

# Conclusion

Christ did obey perfectly, Christ did accomplish supernatural feats. Salvation is in Him. We did not come up with the incarnation or the resurrection, as concepts or in power. Salvation that was impossible for us is accessible in Christ.

Our confession of faith that Jesus is Lord is the evidence of salvation—we’re saved in Christ alone, it is our recognition of authority—He is the Lord of lords, it is the driving incentive of our worship and mission—He is worthy of praise/devotion and hope, it is the confidence for our ethics and enjoyment of all His creation and spending of energy in His name.

----------

## Charge

“Knowledge with thy mouth that Jesus is yͤ Lorde.” You know it, let others know it. It is the truth, it is your confession, it is your salvation, it is an entire way of life and worldview.

## Benediction:

> If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed. Our Lord, come! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. My love be with you all in Christ Jesus. Amen. (1 Corinthians 16:22–24, ESV)