Episode Transcript
The title of the message tonight is "Riches and Righteousness."
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"Riches and Righteousness."
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In our study of the book of Proverbs, we've learned a lot about the different contrasts
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between people who walk the path of God and those who don't walk the path of God.
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And we'll probably continue to learn that throughout the book of Proverbs.
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But tonight's a little different.
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Tonight we won't be learning about the difference between the two different kinds of people,
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directly at least, but the two different kinds of possessions that people can have.
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There are essentially two types of possessions that we can acquire.
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And I want you to notice that I didn't say two types of possessions that we can possess.
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But I said acquire because before you can possess them, you must acquire them.
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Everybody comes out of the womb empty-handed, don't they?
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Everybody.
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What does a man have that he didn't first receive, the Bible says?
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We're literally born with nothing, not even a shirt on our back.
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We're born with nothing.
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And every possession that we'll ever have will be acquired in one of three ways.
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It'll be something we were given, something we earned, or something we stole.
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Every possession that you'll ever acquire will be acquired one of three ways.
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It'll be something that you were given, something you earned, or something you stole.
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So possessions fall into these two categories, so to speak,
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and all possessions are either given, earned, or stolen.
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Possessions are very important to us, aren't they?
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We keep locks in our doors to protect our possessions.
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And when we run out of space at the house, we rent storage units.
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I had a man I was talking to one day.
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He was a businessman, and he said, "I don't care where you build them.
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You build a storage unit."
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He said, "People will fill it up."
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That's what he told me.
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Why?
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They're possessions.
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And they'll rent storage units out, so they can hold more possessions.
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And most of our possessions fall into the first category here in verse 4.
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If you'll look in Proverbs 11 and 4, and that is the category of riches.
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Underscore the word riches, please.
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Now, if you'll go down a little bit further in the verse and underscore the word righteousness.
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Righteousness.
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That's Brother James walking in, if you all hear anything.
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Righteousness.
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So Solomon is talking about the difference between two types of possessions in this verse.
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Riches and righteousness.
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And following the order of the text, as the Holy Spirit gives us, we're first going to learn about riches.
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And Solomon says, "Ritches do something."
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Riches have a characteristic.
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Riches function in a certain way, particularly, if you look back in your text, riches profit.
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You see?
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They profit.
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And the Hebrew word translated profit means to ascend, means to go up.
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Does anybody follow the stock market at all?
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You follow a little bit?
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Anybody else?
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Me and my dad enjoy following the stock market.
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And if you own stock, you always want it to do what?
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You want it to ascend.
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You want it to go up.
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If you have a bank account, how many of you all follow your bank account?
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I hope everybody does that.
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But if you follow your bank account, you also want it to ascend.
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You want it to go up, not down.
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And that's what this Hebrew word translated profit means.
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Possessions are possessions.
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We can acquire possessions, but not all possessions are profitable.
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But all riches are.
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All riches profit.
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For something to be profitable, it has to be useful.
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That's part of profitable.
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In fact, this same Hebrew word profit, the word profit also means to be useful.
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And the reason is the value of our possessions is measured by the benefit that we receive from those possessions.
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If I save $50,000 in Monopoly money, then I have increased my possessions.
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But that money does not profit me.
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I've made no profit because it's not useful to me.
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Gossip is not profitable to me, but Bible truth is.
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I can acquire knowledge about something going on in one of y'all's houses.
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And that knowledge is not going to be useful to me.
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But if I acquire knowledge from God's word, that is going to be useful.
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So that knowledge that I acquired would be profitable.
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Acts chapter 20, verse 20, Acts chapter 20, verse 20, Paul said,
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I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you.
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In other words, if I had knowledge that would be useful to you in the kingdom of God, I did not hold it back.
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Jesus taught us that there are riches, profitable things that we can possess on earth.
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And then there are riches, profitable things that we can only possess as children of God.
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Both are riches, both are profitable.
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And earthly riches, don't ever think that they're not profitable because they are.
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And that's the riches that Solomon is talking about tonight.
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He's talking about riches, possessions that are profitable to us here on earth.
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And I thank God for those riches.
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Earthly riches allow us to enjoy a nice home.
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Earthly riches allow us to receive good medical care.
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Earthly riches allow us to eat well.
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Earthly riches allow us to live comfortably.
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Earthly riches provide us a sense of earthly security.
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Earthly riches are profitable to us, but they are only profitable for certain things.
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And they are only profitable for a certain period of time.
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That's the key.
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Riches profit not when it comes to aging.
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You can put all the cream you want to on your face.
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Drink all the plexus.
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It may give you a better quality of life, but you're still going to get old and die.
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Because all the money in the world is not going to keep us from dying.
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Riches profit not when it comes to love.
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Because you can't buy somebody's love and faithfulness.
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The richest woman in the world was married to the richest man in the world.
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And he learned that money couldn't keep her home.
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So she took his riches and left.
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But riches profit not when it comes to love.
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But most importantly, riches profit, look back in your text, not in the day of wrath.
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Riches profit not in the day of wrath.
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And notice that it is the day of wrath.
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Not a day of wrath, the day of wrath.
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We're talking about an exclusive, a specific day of wrath.
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I look at a calendar almost every day at work.
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I have to make schedule for everybody, and I have to keep up with schedules
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if people are going to be off to go to the doctor or do something else.
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We got court on a particular day.
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And I'm always looking at a calendar.
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And I get aggravated at some of the holidays that are put on these calendars,
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days that don't belong on there, in my opinion.
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But there's a particular day that's on God's calendar.
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He's the only one that has access to see that calendar.
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We can't see it.
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But it's on God's calendar, and that is the day of wrath, the day of wrath.
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For the past 6,000 years, the world has been counting down to this day of wrath.
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It's an actual day, an actual time, an actual occurrence.
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It is already written on God's calendar, and we're counting down
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every time you go to bed and you wake up the next day.
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We're one day closer to the day of wrath.
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This is a day when God no longer extends His patience and His mercy toward sinners.
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It's the day when Christ will sit on His throne as the judge of all the world.
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The Psalms talk about this day.
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The prophets talk about this day.
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And as you can tell, the proverbs talk about this day.
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When you get into the New Testament, it talks about it some more.
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But it's when Christ will sit on His throne as the judge of all the world,
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and guilty sinners will be condemned forever in His wrath against them.
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That's the day of wrath.
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It's Judgment Day.
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The day of wrath is a specific time, once again, that's already set on God's calendar.
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If you'll write down in your notes or your margin, Acts 17, verse 31,
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talking about this being a specific day that's already set on God's calendar.
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Acts 17, 31 says, "Because He hath appointed a day."
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That means God has taken His calendar,
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and He has appointed a certain day in which He will judge the world in...
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If you have your Bibles open to that, righteousness.
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If not, make a middle note in your mind or in your notes.
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He will judge the world and sit with Me.
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Righteousness by that man whom He hath ordained,
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whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the dead.
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You can't hold court if the judge is dead.
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God has raised the judge from the dead,
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and that is the one that God has appointed to judge the world,
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and God has appointed a day when court's going to be held.
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And Jesus will judge the world, once again, very important, in righteousness.
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Man, I just love how seamless the Old and New Testament is.
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Now, the day of wrath will occur when Christ returns.
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So, when we're talking about the day of wrath,
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it's not a specific day where God says, "Okay, on this day, day of wrath."
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But what is the day of wrath to a particular group of people
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is not the day of wrath to another group of people, okay?
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But it is the day of wrath, the day of wrath.
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So, God's appointed this day, and this day of wrath will occur when Christ returns.
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When Jesus returns, the Lord Jesus will raise the dead.
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When the Word of God was preached unto them,
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and they hardened their hearts against God, they wouldn't repent,
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those people are going to be raised.
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Now, when we talk about a day, it's not necessarily a 24-hour day.
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It's talking about a period of time.
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It's not like the creative day, the evening and the morning, or the first day.
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It's never said about the day of the Lord.
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But when the Lord Jesus returns,
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there's going to be a series of events that takes place,
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and one of these events is going to be the resurrection of the unbelievers.
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They're going to be raised.
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They're going to be judged.
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It'll be a day of wrath.
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And they are people who hardened their hearts at God's Word,
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and they would not repent.
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Romans 2, verse 5 says,
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"But speaking to the unbelievers, speaking to the person who is appointed to this day of wrath,
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he says, 'But after thy hardness and impenitent, non-repentant heart,
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treasurest up unto thyself wrath against,' here it is, the day of wrath.
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Now, the day of wrath that the Apostle Paul is speaking of in Romans, chapter 2,
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is the same day of wrath that Solomon is speaking of in Proverbs, chapter 11.
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And so Paul in Romans, chapter 2, is telling the hard-hearted person, someone who's like Pharaoh,
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doesn't matter what you tell them, they're not going to have anything to do with God.
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They're not going to confess their sin.
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They're not going to receive his son.
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They're not going to acknowledge God as their creator, and Jesus as the Savior he sent.
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Not going to happen.
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And so Paul is saying, okay, that type of person, when they resist God's Word,
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and they refuse like Pharaoh, they harden their heart, they refuse to listen to God's Word,
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they're treasuring up wrath.
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They're putting wrath in the bank, storing, heaping up more wrath as they live
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throughout their lives against the day of wrath.
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In other words, this wrath is stored up until the day of wrath,
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and then all the wrath that's been stored up because God's angry at them.
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He holds his peace. He gives them time to repent.
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He waits until this day of wrath when the world's going to be judged.
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But it's stored up. It's not going anywhere.
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And so on the day of wrath, those people are going to be judged,
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and all of their hard-heartedness and all of their unrepentance
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and all their bullheadedness and rebellion against God,
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all that wrath is going to be poured out on them.
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Romans 2.5, "But after thy hardness and impenitent heart
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treasures up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath and revelation,"
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look here now of the what kind of judgment?
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Righteous judgment of God.
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Remember, Christ is going to judge the world in what? Righteousness.
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And now here in Romans 2, Paul says that, and again, a different writer,
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but the same Holy Spirit still teaching about the day of wrath.
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And he says it's going to be a righteous judgment.
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And being a righteous judgment, these people are going to be unrighteous,
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and so they get wrath.
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Every time God gives someone an opportunity to repent
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and they harden their hearts, they mock the preaching of God's Word,
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they try to go in and like that man and shoot a pastor
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and they hate Christians, they're treasuring up the wrath of God.
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They're storing up greater condemnation against themselves.
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"And in the day of God's wrath, no amount of earthly riches will profit them."
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Money may have gotten them a long way when they were here on earth,
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if they were rich, but it's not going to get them anywhere on the day of wrath.
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They won't be able to buy, bribe, influence, intimidate the judge of all the earth.
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They won't be able to hide from the judge of all the earth.
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It won't be any place they can go hide.
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When Christ returns, sinners will be dispossessed of all their earthly riches.
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They possess the riches, but they don't own the riches
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because everything belongs to God.
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And everything is given to us for the brief time that we have here on this earth
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as our possessions.
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We're merely stewards of those possessions,
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and then when we die, we give those possessions up.
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But they're going to be dispossessed of all their earthly riches.
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They may live again, but they won't be able to reclaim what previously belonged to them,
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and they will stand before God without them to be judged by His holy law.
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And God's holy law demands that the guilty sinner be condemned,
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so their riches will not profit them.
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"In the day of wrath, riches do not profit," look back in your text,
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"but righteousness delivereth."
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If you have your Bibles open, underscore the word "righteousness."
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We've heard that, haven't we?
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Christ is going to judge the world in righteousness.
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He is going to have a righteous judgment.
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Righteousness is the condition of being right before God,
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being right in His eyes, being right according to His law.
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And being counted as righteous in God's eyes delivers.
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Why? Because if God is going to, if Jesus, if God through Christ,
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is going to judge the world in righteousness,
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then those who are righteous will be judged as righteous.
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Won't be any wrath. God's not angry at righteousness, is He?
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If it's going to be a righteous judgment, then the righteous will sell through it.
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So, "riches do not profit in the day of wrath,
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but righteousness delivers from that day of wrath."
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Being righteous in God's eyes, it delivers what?
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Look back in your text, it delivers from death. From death.
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Now, the word "delivers," if you're taking notes, in the Hebrew,
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it means to be snatched away.
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Man, this is good. It means to be snatched away.
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Righteousness snatches us away from death.
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Righteousness, now, death is the result, here, let me put it to you in order.
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Wrath is the result of unrighteousness.
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Death is the result of God's wrath.
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In God's wrath, on account of our unrighteousness, He will say,
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"Depart from me, you work as an equity. I never knew you."
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And He is going to condemn. This will be the second death,
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the book of the Revelation calls it.
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Righteousness spares us from God's wrath.
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On the opposite end, it gains God's approval,
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and thus it snatches us away from death.
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So, unrighteousness delivers us to death.
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Righteousness delivers us from death.
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Say it again. Unrighteousness delivers us to death.
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Righteousness delivers us from death.
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Unrighteousness causes God to be angry with me.
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That's the day of wrath.
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Righteousness causes God to be pleased with me,
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and thus the day of wrath, for the unrighteous,
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becomes the day of salvation for the righteous.
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The day of deliverance for the righteous.
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So, at Christ's return, the unrighteous will experience
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the wrath of God and the second death.
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The righteous will experience this snatching away,
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this deliverance from death, this salvation from death,
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and eternal life.
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Just as God has appointed the day of wrath for the unrighteous,
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so God has appointed the same day as the day of salvation for the righteous.
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1 Thessalonians chapter 5 verse 9.
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1 Thessalonians chapter 5 verse 9 and 10 says,
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"For God hath not appointed," listen to this now.
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There's that word appointed.
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God has appointed a day in which Christ will judge the world in righteousness.
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The unrighteous will receive God's wrath and experience death.
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But God, it says, "hath not appointed us to wrath,
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but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ."
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I'm going to repeat that again in verse 9, where we move to verse 10.
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And I want to listen to the inflection of my voice.
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"For God hath not appointed us to wrath,
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but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ."
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God appointed a day in which He would judge the world in righteousness
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by that one man whom He raised from the dead.
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So through the person of Jesus Christ,
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God has appointed the unrighteous to have wrath.
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Through that same man, the Lord Jesus Christ,
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God has not appointed us to wrath,
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but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ.
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The same man, the same judge, the same day.
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One group experiences judgment unto death.
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The other group experiences judgment unto life.
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Watch the difference.
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One group is unrighteous, wrath, death.
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The other group is righteous, pleasure, and everlasting life.
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When Jesus came up out of that water in the river Jordan, He was righteous.
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He said, He told John, "Suffer to be so, for we must fulfill all righteousness."
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And when He came up out of the water, God the Father didn't say,
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"This is my Son in whom I am really angry."
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He said, "This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased."
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For God had not appointed us to wrath,
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but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us.
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That whether we wake, that means whether we're alive or asleep,
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or whether we're dead, when that day comes,
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we should live together with Him.
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Man, that's good.
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Now, this righteousness that we have is obtained by faith.
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Romans chapter 3 verse 21, "Righteousness delivers from death."
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How is this righteousness obtained?
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Remember, there's only three ways to acquire this possession.
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Earned, stolen, or given?
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One of the three.
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Romans chapter 3 verse 21 through 26,
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"But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested."
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The only people who are going to be able to stand before God
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and be delivered from death through righteousness
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are those who have the righteousness of God.
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The only people who have the righteousness of God
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are those who obtain it, how?
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Without the law.
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You see that? Is that still up there?
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The righteousness of God, that's what you have to have
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to be delivered from death on the day of wrath.
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The only way to have it is without the law.
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And God has manifested, see that word manifested?
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God has manifested the way in which we can obtain
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the righteousness of God without obeying the law.
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He's manifested it to us.
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How's He manifested it to us?
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In the gospel.
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How do we receive the righteousness of God without the law?
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Through that ban, God has ordained to judge the world in righteousness.
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Being witnessed by the law and the prophets,
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the law bore witness to the fact that there had to be righteousness without the law.
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How did the law bear witness to the fact that there has to be a righteousness without the law?
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You would think the law would be bragging on itself and saying,
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"No, you need me for righteousness."
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But the law itself told us we could not obtain righteousness by the law.
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There has to be a righteousness without it.
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That's why the same God that gave the 10 commandments through Moses,
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also upon giving those 10 commandments, gave a high priest to make a sacrifice
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on the day of atonement to put blood on the mercy seat
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so God could look at that blood and be pleased.
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Righteousness without the law.
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Righteousness through a substitute.
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Who died for us?
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Verse 10, we just looked at in Romans 3, 21.
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Who died for us?
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But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested
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being witnessed by the law and the prophets.
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Isaiah 53, all we like sheep have gone astray.
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We've turned everyone to his own way.
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And the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.
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Verse 22, even the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ.
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The righteousness of God is acquired by faith,
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and that righteousness comes from Jesus Christ.
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That's who it comes from.
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And it's unto all and upon all them that what?
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Believe, for there is no difference,
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for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God,
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being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
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Whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood.
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Not the blood of the goat on the day of atonement,
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but his blood to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins.
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Isn't that great? Not your righteousness, not my righteousness,
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but the righteousness of Jesus.
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His obedience to the law, not ours, in that puts away our sins.
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He says for the remission of sins that are passed, for the forbearance of God,
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to declare, I say at this time, his righteousness, that he that is God might be just.
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That may just meaning he will never ever, ever bend on the requirements of his law.
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He's going to hold those requirements. He's going to be just,
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yet at the same time, the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.
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I'm going to be just. I am going to judge Abigail strictly by my commandments.
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I'm not going to cut her any slack.
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But because she believes in Jesus,
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I'll apply the strict obedience that Jesus had to my law to Abigail's account.
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So I'll be just at the same time.
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I'll be the justifier of her who believes in Jesus.
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My goodness, that's good.
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Righteousness delivers from death.
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The word delivers again, the Hebrew means to snatch away.
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Now, that's what Jesus is going to do when he comes.
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He's going to snatch away the righteous to deliver them from the wrath
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that the unbelieving world will receive.
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This snatching away is commonly referred to as what? The rapture.
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The rapture is not a biblical word.
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It's not a word in the Bible.
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It's a word used to describe this snatching away,
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which is here in the Old Testament.
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We're reading about the rapture in the Old Testament.
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1 Thessalonians 4, verse 16 through 17.
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"For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout,
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with the voice of the archangel,
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and with the trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first."
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That's the righteous.
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"Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up,"
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caught up is the word,
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"together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air,
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and so shall we ever be with the Lord."
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The Greek word translated "caught up" means to catch away.
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Catch away, snatch away. It's the same thing.
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The day of wrath is a day the believers in Christ will be snatched away,
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caught up into the clouds.
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They'll be snatched away from eternal death,
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for they shall not perish but have everlasting life.
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Now, I'll close, and I do not have the Scripture in the slides.
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It came to me before church while I was back there in my study
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just a few minutes ago.
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But again, I told you that all possessions are acquired one of three ways.
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They're either going to be earned by you, they're going to be given to you,
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they're going to be stolen by you.
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And righteousness is by grace, righteousness is by faith,
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but I couldn't help but remember that precious Scripture
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that really nails it down.
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Again, earned, stolen, or given.
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And the Bible says that there's only one way
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that the righteousness of God can be acquired, and that's as a gift.
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Romans chapter 5 verse 17, if you're taking notes, says,
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"For if by one man's offense death reigned by one much more,
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they which receive abundance of grace," listen now,
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"and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one Jesus Christ."
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The only way, don't you let anybody tell you
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that you've got to do a certain amount of work,
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that you've got to be committed, that you've got to do A, B, C, and D.
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Earned, stolen, or received as a gift is the only way.
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And the Bible says it is the righteousness of Jesus, not yours.
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It's the righteousness of God, not yours.
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It's acquired by faith.
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It's received as a gift, the gift of righteousness by one man,
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and one man only, not you, not me, but him, the one who died for us.
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"Thou, Father, we thank you so much for your precious word.
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Thank you, Father, that riches profit not in the day of wrath,
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but righteousness delivers from death."
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Hallelujah!
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Thank you for the gift of righteousness that's received by faith,
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believing the truth of what Christ has done.
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He obeyed the law.
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He was the atonement.
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He shed the blood.
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And by faith in his blood, it's a propitiation for our sins.
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In his precious name we thank you. Amen.
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Yes, sir. Oh, we've got a poem.
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"Ritches reward but rot in due course.
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The earthy man holds them what treasure he hath,
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but soon he will only know sorrow and loss,
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his profitless riches of flame in God's wrath.
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O righteous man seek the riches of one,
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whose head found no pillow nor foxhole did own,
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yet gaveth he righteousness to poor ones like me,
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that riches eternal would be mine for free."
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Oh, that's wonderful.
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It reminds me, since it's a gift, those riches can't buy it.
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Isn't that good? Man, thank you for the poem, Brother Shepherd.
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Praise God. Amen.
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