 The time of our sermon this morning, a revelation of wrath. This is part two, we're in Romans chapter one. Our text runs from verse 18 through verse 32. We've begun by examining these two verses that opened the section, verses 18 and 19. Revelation of wrath, part two. So the modern day professing church has unashamedly sold itself out to an idolatrous God of its own making. They've taken their golden earrings, so to speak, all the trinkets that they plundered from the Egyptians. They've thrown those into the warming fire of false religion and lo and behold, this golden calf has come out, right? Look at this thing that popped out of the fire. This is our God, they would say, who delivered us out of bondage to unhappiness. Or this is our God who has delivered us out of bondage to fret or worry. This is the God at every funeral who takes everyone who dies to a better place, right? This is the God who we are worshiping. He accepts you just as you are. That's the golden calf of false religion. And they prattle on incoherently about notions of love and goodness and kindness. And you seldom, if ever hear anything of significance about sin, justice, judgment, wrath or hell. It's just not a part of the vocabulary in the church today, it would seem. Anyone who comes down off the mountain top with a word of the living God in his hand is a hellfire fanatic. So what do they then do? What do they do with that? Paul tells us exactly what they do, 2 Timothy chapter four, verse three. The time will come, Paul says, when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they heap up for themselves teachers, right? They gather teachers around themselves and they will turn away their ears from the truth and be turned aside to fables. Why is that? Why is that? We're talking about the truth of God here. We have the Bible in our hands. God's revealed word to you and I in our hands. Why would they just so abjectly, willfully reject that? Why is it? Because this world, and certainly most professing Christians today have labored diligently to suppress that truth in unrighteousness, holding it down, keeping it at arm's length. We don't want to hear it and so we push it away from us, deny it, as if simply putting their hands over their eyes will make the danger go away. Putting their hands over their eyes doesn't make the danger go away. As if saying that it isn't so means that it isn't so. And it makes it all the easier, we would think, if we just don't talk about it, we just don't bring it up, we just ignore it and people can go their lives day after day, month after month, year after year, simply ignoring the inevitability that one day you're going to die. You're going to die. Every funeral that you attend should be a reminder that there is an accountability coming. You are going to face death. You're going to face judgment. It's appointed for men to die once, then judgment. Just give me somebody who will tell me what I want to hear. That's what the church says today. They go around looking for people, looking for pastors, looking for churches to tell them what they want to hear. Just give me somebody to tell me what I've decided that is the truth that I will accept. That's my truth, that's what I want, give me my truth, as if truth resides somehow in you. Without all that attitude, that worldly philosophy is going to be a big problem if you spend any intellectually honest time at all in the Bible. Because the Bible is full of, it's chock full of, replete with impassioned and fiery references to God's wrath and God's righteous judgment. You simply cannot escape it if you look at your Bibles. And I would grant to you, that's why most people want nothing to do with the Bible. The Bible is really, really, really clear. And just as God pours out His love and mercy and grace upon those who trust in His Son, so also God pours out indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish on everyone who does evil. It is simply true. Nahum, chapter one, verse two. God is jealous and the Lord avenges. The Lord avenges and is furious. I get furious going down the highway and seeing one billboard after another that God's not mad. Yes, He is. And He has every right to be. The Lord avenges and is furious. The Lord will take vengeance on His adversaries. He reserves wrath for His enemies. The Lord is slow to anger, great in power and will not at all acquit the wicked. Jeremiah, chapter 30, verse 23. Behold, the whirlwind of the Lord goes forth with fury, a continuing whirlwind. It will fall violently on the head of the wicked. Do you hear that? It will fall violently on the head of the wicked. The fierce anger of the Lord will not return until He has done it, until He has performed the intense of His heart. In the latter days, you will consider it. The expectation or the reality of God's wrath not merely peculiar to the Old Testament alone. It's all over the New Testament. We'll be addressing the wrath of God several times in the book of Romans alone. One of the books in the New Testament that most expresses the truth of God's just wrath. We'll consider it yet again from Romans chapter one, verses 18 and 19 this morning, verse 18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. Paul begins with his proclamation of the gospel, the proclamation of his theme, that in the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed. In the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed. Why? Because the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. We need the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. We need that gift of righteousness that is a gift of His grace because wrath has been appointed. Wrath has been appointed against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, verse 18, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness because, verse 19, what may be known of God is manifest in them for God has shown it to them. In other words, that revelation of wrath is just. And we're going to see this morning how Paul, in our text, upholds the justice of God's wrath as revealed from heaven. Paul begins his exposition of the gospel in Romans chapter one with a revelation of wrath. That present tense of that verb translated is revealed there in verse 18, makes reference to a constant, ongoing revelation. It's a present tense verb. The wrath of God, not only or merely revealed during the Old Testament, it's not something revealed only in the future when the Lord returns on a great day of wrath. Paul is saying in verse 18 that the wrath of God is being revealed even now, an ongoing revelation of wrath. God's wrath is currently being revealed in what we see going on all around us. We'll talk about that more as we work through Romans chapter one and Romans chapter two. You'd have to be blind not to see it. Whereas the righteousness of God was revealed specially, you could say in the preaching of the gospel, verse 17, the wrath of God revealed from heaven. In other words, from a place where every eye can see it, so to speak. This revelation of the wrath of God then is constant and it is universal, constant in that it is being revealed at all times, universal in the sense that every eye can see it. It's revealed to all men, all mankind. How then, think with me then, how is it that that constant and universal revelation of wrath given? How is it given to us? How is it that everyone sees it? Well first, the wrath of God is revealed in the scriptures. First, in the scriptures. We see it throughout the scriptures, briefly in the curse of the garden. All humanity plunged under the curse. The flooding of the earth. A revelation of God's wrath. In the destruction, fire and brimstone, rained out of heaven upon Sodom and Gomorrah. We see it in the history of the Bible. God's dealings with Israel. Almost an incessant, persistent revelation of wrath in the death of Ananias and Sapphira, Acts chapter five, in the New Testament, right? The death of Ananias and Sapphira. The death of Judas. The death of Herod, eaten by worms. Coming day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God throughout the Bible. The wrath of God is revealed from heaven. Secondly, he brings that revelation of wrath to bear upon the consciences of men. It's revealed to the consciences of all men. Verse 19, listen. Verse 19, what may be known of God is manifest in them. We're gonna talk about that verse. Is manifest in them for God has shown it to them. Verse 20, you notice that in verse 19, God has shown it to them. Who's he talking about? All mankind. God has shown this revelation of his wrath to them. Revelation of himself, he's shown it to them. Verse 20, these things are understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power in Godhead, so that they are without excuse. Verse 32, they know the righteous judgment of God. That those who practice such evil or deserving of death, it's applied to their consciences, right? Yet they not only do the same, but also approve of those who practice them, violating their own God-given conscience. Chapter two, verse 15, they show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves, their thoughts accusing or else excusing them. So one's witnessing to a UCF student in the apartments, they're off campus, and he said he didn't believe in God at all, had no thought about God whatsoever, had grown up a completely blank slate, one of the few blank slates I've ever witnessed to. And so I started with his conscience. Have you ever done something wrong and your conscience accused you, you became aware because of your conscience that it was wrong? That is an accountability from God proving to you there will be a coming accountability for all your sin, right, the conscience is God's God-given warning system. We know right from wrong. Where did that sense come from? God gave it to us. When you preach the gospel in which the righteousness of God is revealed, you are preaching to someone, regardless of who they are, regardless of what background they have, you're preaching to someone who knows that his righteous wrath is revealed from heaven. How does he know it? Even in his own conscience. Third, it's revealed in the physical and temporal consequences of sin, pain and suffering. Romans chapter eight, verse 20, even the creation is subjected to futility. We see the results of man's sin, even on the creation, even the creation awaits the glorious liberty of the children of God. We see the revelation of wrath in the consequences of sin. Fourth, in the death of everyone on the planet, in the reality of universal death, we see a revelation of God's wrath. We see the constant and universal revelation of wrath in increasing ungodliness. All around us we see that very thing, in the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. They become futile in their thoughts, verse 21. Foolish hearts become darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools and worshiped the creature rather than the creator. So God gives them up to uncleanness. We see people being given up to uncleanness all around us, verse 24. God giving them up to vile passions, doing that which is unnatural, verse 26. God giving them up to a debased mind, verse 28. In other words, the present ongoing revelation of God's wrath in the judicial removing of natural restraints to sin. In other words, giving sinners over to the natural inclinations of their own corrupt and fallen hearts to do that which is unnatural, even to mankind, but mankind made in the image of God, doing that which is unnatural to man made in the image of God is an indication, a revelation of the wrath of God. Only a blind fool could argue that that isn't exactly what is happening all around us in our day today. 2000 years after Paul penned these words. God's wrath, in other words, what Paul intends to communicate in verse 18 is that God's wrath is operative, operative in this world. It's a holy and just, fixed and determined opposition to all that is evil. And it is merely, merely a faint foreshadowing of the severity of God against the unguiliness and unrighteousness of men yet to come. Now his wrath is tempered. It is tempered with patience, long suffering, forbearance. It is tempered with mercy. It's tempered with common grace. Turn now while there is time. Or look at chapter two, look there at verse three. If you do not turn, do you hate despise the goodness, the riches of his goodness, the forbearance, long suffering of God, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance, then in accordance with your hardness, your impenitent heart, you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath. And lastly, the wrath of God is revealed at the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. See the wrath of God poured out on Jesus Christ. If you are in Christ through faith, then that wrath was reserved for you, poured out upon him. But the cross, in the heavens, so to speak, display of the righteousness, the justice of God's wrath, the unavoidable justice of God's wrath. God, if he will pour out that wrath upon his own son, will certainly judge the wicked. Having considered then the origin of this wrath in part one, Last Lord's Day, let's now advance in our text to consider the object of wrath and the reasons for wrath in part two. First, consider with me the object of God's wrath, verse 18, the object of God's wrath. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. God's righteous wrath is directed against an object. That object is all the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. In other words, God's wrath is not arbitrary. God's wrath is not fickle. God's wrath is not capricious. God's wrath is judicial. It is retribution. It is recompense against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. It's not arbitrary. God's wrath is poured out then in judgment and the pouring out of God's wrath is just. It is righteous. God's hatred of sin isn't baseless. God's hatred of sin isn't arbitrary. God's indignation against sin is righteous. One has said that God's love, as the Bible views it, never leads God to foolish, impulsive, immoral actions in the way that its human counterpart too often leads us. In the same way, in the same way God's wrath in the Bible is never the capricious, self-indulgent, irritable, morally ignoble thing that human anger so often is. It is instead a right and necessary reaction to objective moral evil. God is only angry where anger is called for. In other words, God's wrath is judicial. Now God's wrath is judicial. One, in the sense that it is the determined, righteous, fixed response of God's holy character against sin. It is judicial. Two, in that it is the determined and fixed resolve of a holy God to justly punish the sinner. Not only is it his character, his hatred for all sin, but it's also God's determined resolve to punish the sinner. And third, it's in the sense, judicial in the sense, that it is just. The punishment always fits the crime. Punishment always fits the crime. Paul anticipates objections to this, and the first of the objections that Paul anticipates is given to us in chapter 3, verse 5, where Paul asks the question, is God unjust who inflicts wrath? And someone might even qualify that objection and say, is God unjust who inflicts this degree, this level, this severity of wrath? Could God be accused of unrighteousness for taking vengeance? I was witnessing, to some matter of fact, in the same area there next to UCF, when it's to a woman who said that she couldn't worship a God who is cruel that way. A God who would actually burn people, torment people in hell. She couldn't fathom worshiping or serving a God who was cruel that way. That God was unjust, God was unrighteous in meeting out that punishment against sinners. You know, you and I, if we consider injustice in the world, we consider sin in the world. You and I can see a sense of the righteousness of justice, can't we? I was reading an article earlier in the week about a 16-year-old girl who had been kidnapped by ISIS. If you can imagine what would happen to a 16-year-old girl who was kidnapped by ISIS. There were hundreds of people in her village who were murdered, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, lying dead on the village, all across the village. This girl tortured, raped. She was abused physically, emotionally, abused for months. She finally escaped. But you and I, in seeing something like that, reading about that, considering that happening to a 16-year-old girl, imagine if that were your daughter. You and I get a sense, don't we, of the injustice of that tragedy, the injustice of that abject wickedness. And what is the response of our hearts against something that wicked, that evil? Justice, justice must be served, right? Justice poured out upon those wicked people. Maybe you heard the account of an abortion, a clinic worker who really for the first time had examined or had seen the effects of the abortion doctors' syringe on the baby in the womb of his mother as it sought to squirm and wriggle to get away from the forceps or the claws that would rip off his arm, rip off his leg, right? And you and I, in looking at that atrocity, God, please pour out justice. Bring about your righteous justice on this wicked world. We catch a glimpse, don't we, in the wickedness that we see, the wickedness that we're able to comprehend of the necessity and of the righteousness of God's judgment and of God's justice. And we, if you've got half a brain in your head, two brain cells to rub together, you're crying out for justice. We're not holy like God is. You and I can sense injustice in that way and you and I are sinful. God is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. It's His holiness that is offended. His character, His righteous character that is offended and His holiness cries out for justice. Do you see? God is just. Could God be accused of unrighteousness for taking vengeance on unrighteous sinners? Certainly not, Paul says. Why? Why? First, God's wrath is revealed against rotten fruit. God's wrath is revealed against rotten fruit, verse 18. It is revealed against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. These two terms used by Paul are meant to include sin of every sort. Sin of every sort. All sin committed by sinful men. It's interesting, the first term has in mind the sin that is against God Himself. It is ungodliness, right? The second term has to do with injustice or sin against others. Now think about that with me for a moment. Think about the two tables of the law, right? If you think about Paul's two terms in relationship to the two tables of the law, then Paul has in mind any transgression of the first table of the law, those commandments that address our relationship to God, and he calls those sins ungodliness, and Paul has in mind any transgression of the second table of the law, those commandments that address our relationship to our neighbor, translated here as unrighteousness or injustice. And Paul even puts them in that order. Begins with ungodliness and extends to unrighteousness. It is sin in any of its forms. The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all known sin, every one of them. My little white lie? Yes. It is not little. It is not white. It is a lie. We are commanded to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, referring to the first table of the law, commandments one through four, and we are commanded to love our neighbor as ourselves, father, mother, brother, sister, neighbor, referring to the second table of the law, commandments five through 10, and so then just righteous wrath is appointed apportioned for any violation of God's law, whether against God himself or against our fellow man, whether ungodliness or unrighteousness. In other words, the entirety of our sin is comprehended in that statement. Many consider only the sins of unrighteousness and they neglect the many ways in which they sin against God. I have not stolen or I have not lied, which is a lie. I have not committed, you have in your heart with your anger. I have not lust, yes you have. But they don't consider the many ways in which they sin against God. They consider only their unrighteousness. I was talking to a guy at lunch a while back and he says, you know, I've just never seen myself as a sinner. I'm a good guy, right? I do good by my co-workers, by my family, I do good. Doesn't realize his ungodliness, right? Ungodliness. Even if it were true, you hadn't sinned against your neighbor in that way. There are many ways in which we sin. The commandment, the greatest commandment is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, all our strength, all the time. So, it would go without saying then that the greatest sin is to break the greatest commandment and not love the Lord our God in that way which we are incapable of doing. We'll be capable of that by God's grace in eternity, not on this side of eternity. It is sin against God. Wrath is apportioned for ungodliness and unrighteousness. Many people in considering their sin only consider sins of commission. The things that they've done wrong, so to speak, and do not consider all the ways in which they are guilty of sins of omission. Paul wants to be clear. All sin is liable to the just and righteous wrath of God. All sin will be paid for. So, in pouring out his wrath against sin, God is administering justice. Pouring out wrath, God is just. It is a judicial, retributive wrath. God is just in pouring out his wrath against sin. Secondly, not only is wrath revealed against rotten fruit, ungodliness and unrighteousness, but God's wrath is revealed against a rebellious root. It is revealed from heaven against men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. The second reason that God is just, that the justice of his wrath is upheld is because men willfully choose to reject the God who created him. Men willfully choose it. The verb translated suppress in verse 18 refers to men holding something down, restraining something. The same word is used in 2 Thessalonians 2 verses 6 and 7. Listen to those verses and how the word is used. Now you know what is restraining, that's that word, that he may be revealed in his own time for the mystery of lawlessness is already at work, only he who now restrains, same word, will do so until he is taken out of the way. Speaking of the restraining of sin, here men are restraining the truth of God, suppressing the truth of God, holding it down. Men are willfully holding down or restraining the truth. The truth is known, right, that's the implication, the truth is known, sinful, fallen, rebellious people simply hold that truth at arm's length. Don't let it get near to me. I don't wanna talk about it, I don't wanna hear it, don't wanna see it, don't wanna think about it. In addition to all their ungodliness, in addition to all their unrighteousness, this rebellious suppression of the truth of God renders men deserving of the righteous wrath of God. Now what truth there is Paul referring to? What truth are men suppressing? Look at verse 19. Because what may be known of God, the truth that may be known of God is manifest in them for God has shown it to them. They're suppressing even that which God has manifest in them. For since the creation of the world his invisible attributes are clearly seen. They're clearly seen, so I'm gonna attribute them to something else, right? That's all the result of evolutionary forces at work. There is no intelligent design. How did this giant canyon get here? It looks like it was created by a giant flood of... No, it was not created by a flood of water. It was created by a river over millions and billions of years, right? Suppressing the truth in unrighteousness. His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead so that they are without excuse. We're gonna talk about those verses, Lord willing, next week. Because although they knew God, do you get that? They knew God, they did not glorify him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts. Their foolish hearts were darkened, professing to be wise they became fools, changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man, birds and forfeited animals and creeping things. That truth of God, they held down, they suppressed in unrighteousness. Turn with me quickly to John 3.16. I'm gonna look at this text again this week. John 3.16. God's wrath is justified against this rebellious root. Certainly justified against the rotten fruit, but for men to willfully suppress this truth, to reject this truth in unrighteousness, draws upon themselves the righteous just wrath of Almighty God. Look at John 3.16. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. Verse 18. He who believes in him is not condemned, but he who does not believe is condemned already. Why? Because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten son of God. He should have believed. He did not believe. Why? Because he's suppressing the truth in unrighteousness. Verse 19. This is the condemnation. This is the verdict. Here's the verdict. That light has come into the world and men rejected that light. They loved darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil. So what did they do? They chose the darkness rather than choosing the light. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light lest his deeds should be exposed. But the one who does truth comes to the light that his deeds may be clearly seen that they have been done in God. In other words, the judgment of condemnation which is pronounced against them is the judgment of their own choosing. How many of you have told your kids that you're disciplining your children and they're growing up? Listen, if you do that again, you're asking me to spank you. If you do that again, you're asking for it. The judgment of condemnation which is pronounced against them is the judgment of their own choosing by rejecting the light in favor of their sin, in favor of their ungodliness and unrighteousness. All that God does then in judgment upon the sinner are simply terrifying implications of the sinner's own choice. Do you see? No one suffers under the wrath of God except those who have chosen to suffer under the wrath of God. You cannot plead ignorance. What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and yet lose his own soul? What a fool's errand it is to suppress that truth and unrighteousness and to imagine somehow that it's all just going to work out in the end. And death is pending. Death comes. It is nearer now than it was a moment ago. The outpouring of God's wrath is in keeping with his justice. It is a just and a righteous wrath. It's just because it is poured out against a rotten fruit and it is just because it is poured out against a rebellious root. So God's wrath is judicial. Those who suffer the torments of God's wrath receiving themselves the penalty do their sin. They suffer. They suffer exactly what their sin deserves. Not simply against some of their ungodliness and unrighteousness but against all of their ungodliness and unrighteousness. Not merely against what you would consider your big sins, your serious sins, but against every single one of your sins. All of them deserve the righteous and just retribution of God. And all of them will receive their due. All of them will receive their due. Chapter two, verse two. We know that the judgment of God is according to truth against those who practice such things. It is righteous. Chapter two, verse five. In accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God who will render to each one according to his deeds. God's wrath, God's justice is not arbitrary. Job 34, verse 10. Therefore, listen to me, you men of understanding. Far be it from God to do wickedness and from the Almighty to commit iniquity, for he repays man according to his work and makes man to find a reward according to his way. Surely, God will never do wickedly, nor will the Almighty pervert justice. Because God is holy, God must also be just. God's perfect holiness, the holiness of his character is that which is offended by sin. Habakkuk 113, you are of pure eyes and to behold evil and cannot look on wickedness. So God's justice then, his determined response to all sin displays his holy opposition to sin, displays his holy hatred for sin. God's wrath, therefore, is the punishment that justice requires for every offense. God is just. Now the justice of God's wrath then is further upheld by the reasons that Paul then gives for the wrath of God in verse 19. Look at verse 19, 18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness because you're the reasons. What may be known of God is manifest in them for God has shown it to them. Now first, men sin, men in sin reject revelation. The justice of God's wrath is further upheld because men in sin reject revelation. What may be known of God is manifest in them and they reject it. What may be known of God is literally in the Greek the known of God. Literally in the Greek the known of God could be better translated than that which is known of God. That which is known of God. That which is known of God is that which has been revealed to them, made available to them, given to them. It is that which they have rejected. Godless men then are without excuse. Without excuse. There is no excuse for sin against God. No one can ever say I didn't know. Simply cannot say what about that one in the wilderness who's never seen? No excuse. We're going to get there in Romans 1. No excuse. No one can ever say I didn't know. Of course you've known. Of course you've known. You've been suppressing that truth in unrighteousness. Verse 28, that suppression even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge. I don't even want him in my head. Right? Anything about him I want out. I want to deal with that. It is something. Have you noticed how like militantly objectionable the scientific community is to anything that even smells like creationism? Right? They will blacklist people. Unbelievable. Why? Because they are working hard to reject the truth of God in their unrighteousness. And there is really, really good, excellent Christian science going on today. I will not entertain it for a moment. Even verse 28, even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge as the judgment of God against their suppression of the truth of God. God gave them over to a debased mind to do those things which are not fitting. Being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness. They are whispers, backbiders, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedience of parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful, who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death not only do the same, but also approve of those who practice them. That knowledge of God is laid upon a man's conscience. Madness, madness. Men have no excuse. They reject God, and they incur his wrath. Second, men not only reject what is manifest in them, that revelation, men in sin, reject the revealer himself. They reject the revealer. What may be known of God is manifest in them. Why? Because God himself has shown it to them. God has condescended in grace and mercy to reveal himself to man. What is man? You are even mindful of him, the psalmist asks. And men would rather have darkness than light. And listen, we can talk about these things in terms of them being to other people out there. Those unrighteous men who would rather have darkness than light, that was you. If there's any desire in your wicked heart for the light, it's because God has authored it there through faith. God has given it to you by his spirit. So we can't be haughty. That's us. And we should cultivate in our own hearts and minds a healthy fear of a living God. Our God is a consuming fire. We'll consider how God has shown it to them beginning next week, Lord willing. God's wrath is just because sin in any shape, any form is inexcusable. Sin is inexcusable. Psalm 7, verse 11, God is a just judge and God is angry with the wicked every day. If he does not turn back, he will sharpen his sword. He bends his bow and makes it ready. He also prepares for himself instruments of death. He makes his arrows into fiery shafts. AW Pink talks about this and says that we should meditate frequently on the wrath of God. It might seem strange as Christians to meditate on or think on the wrath of God. And I submit to you that it's important we should do so. With AW Pink, one reason that we should meditate frequently on the wrath of God is that our hearts, as he puts it, may be duly impressed with God's detestation of sin, God's hatred of sin. Having more of a comprehension of God's hatred for sin should be a helpful aid in our fight against sin. God is omnipresent in the fullness of his deed. He is everywhere all at once. He is present in every act of sin. He's there with every thought, with every word, with every deed, God sees. Your heart laid open, laid bare before him. We need to impress upon our hearts the reality of God's detestation is hatred for sin. Secondly, to beget a true fear in our souls for God. The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. The fear of God should inhabit the life of the Christian as well. In this sense, Hebrews 12 verse 28 says, Therefore, speaking to those who profess Jesus Christ, therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. Reverence and godly fear in this case are not synonymous. There's a nuanced distinction between them and we are to serve him acceptably with reverence and a godly or a godward fear. Y verse 29 Our God is a consuming fire. Third, we should meditate frequently on the wrath of God to draw out our soul in fervent praise to Jesus Christ for having delivered us from the wrath to come. Paul will now spend the rest of this section through chapter 3 verse 20 establishing the justice and the righteousness of God's wrath against all human sin. His wrath is just wrath toward all the Gentiles even those who have been given no special revelation. They are without excuse and God's wrath against all Jews. Those who have been given the oracles of God such that all mankind such that every mouth will be stopped. All the world will become guilty before God. There's no work that you can do by which you can be justified in God's sight. God is absolutely crushingly uncompromisingly just. So how is it then that you and I being so unjust can be declared just in a sight? How is it that you and I who just like the others were children of wrath, sons of disobedience, just like the others suppress the truth of God in unrighteousness, in our ungodliness, how is it that as unjust as you are, as unjust as I am that we can be declared righteous in God's sight? How is it that we can be justified what God has made away in great love with a great love with which he loved us? God has made provision for our sin. It is an astounding testimony of the grace and mercy of God. Absolutely staggers the mind to think that you and I living in unchecked rebellion against him while we were in our sin. God demonstrates his love toward us. Amazing. If you will abandon yourself to Jesus Christ and trust yourself completely to him, trust him as Lord and savior than you through faith will be saved from the wrath that is to come. God promises that. And you can do that while you're sitting here. Not a moment of delay is necessary or needed or appropriate. It's only more sinful rebellion. Turn now. Why would you persist with the condemnation of God over your head? The wrath of God hanging over you. Why would you persist? It's simply more suppressing the truth of God and unrighteousness. And you deserve that wrath. You're going to get what you're choosing. Chapter 3, verse 24, being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by his blood through faith. Through faith, Jesus Christ becomes my propitiation. That's an important word to lay hold of. What is a propitiation? It's a sacrifice for me, for you that takes and fulfills the wrath that you deserve. The wrath of God rightly reserved for me due to my own sin is poured out full measure all of it is spent, all of it exhausted on, in this case, the perfect Son of God in my place. That is a propitiatory sacrifice. Jesus Christ becomes my propitiatory sacrifice in that all of the wrath that was reserved for me that is just and righteous against my sin in its entirety is poured out on Jesus Christ. He takes it all to the point that that is spent. It is exhausted. He drinks the cup to the dregs. There is none left. The wrath that was reserved for me has been set aside. It's been averted. It's been propitiated. It's been satisfied. He is then my propitiation and I am free. And because God actually meets out the punishment, pours out the punishment that is righteously due my sin because God pours that out on Jesus Christ, God remains uncompromisingly just. His justice is upheld. He remains uncompromisingly just and now the justifier of the one who has put his faith in Jesus Christ. Do you see? Turn to Christ. Put your faith in him. The depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. Amen. How unsearchable are his judgments, his ways past finding out. It is staggering in its beauty. Staggering in its majesty. Staggering in its grace and in its love and in its mercy. Through him, to him or all things. To whom be glory forever. Amen. Let's pray. Father in heaven, Lord we are just astounded at your love, your grace, your mercy, your kindness, your goodness, your patience. Lord thank you for all that you have done to make a way to make provision for our sin and the person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you God that you spared not your own son but delivered him up for us all and now in him willing freely giving us all things. We're so grateful to you Lord for this gift and it's all the sweeter when we come to a greater understanding of our own sinful condition the state of our own heart, our own soul, the depth of our depravity and the depth of wrath that our sin deserves. All the sweeter when we contemplate your grace and your mercy to us and all the sweeter when we consider all that Jesus Christ did on our behalf at the cross and all the sweeter knowing Lord that we'll spend an eternity worshipping you in heaven worshipping you in the new heavens in the new earth thanking you Lord for this glorious blessing. Thank you for these truths I pray that we would meditate on them walk in light of them and I pray Lord that you would continue to build your church continue to turn men from their sin turn men from their wicked madness and turn them to the saviour for your everlasting praise and worship In Jesus name we pray all these things Amen