Not Saved By Faith Alone, Not Grace Alone, Works Are Essential, Romans Series, Part 6, David Bercot

Well, today we are moving to chapter 2 of Romans. We're going to look at the first 10 verses of the chapter. And it's funny, this is the chapter that I would say most often gets skipped over in Romans, and yet it contains the key to the entire letter to the Romans. If you skip chapter 2, you are definitely going to miss out on what the book is about.

However, ever since the Reformation, it's become common in sermons and pamphlets, as I said, to just ignore this chapter and to pretend that Paul begins his real message with chapter 3. Here, chapter 2 is what puts all of the rest of Romans in perspective. If you don't get chapter 2 down, then you are going to misread the rest of Romans. Yet I know I couldn't even count the number of times I've heard sermons. I've heard many of them in this church, not from our people, but in the past when we've had visiting speakers. They will come in and, okay, let's open our Bibles to Romans, and they just start in chapter 3. Now, I realize, yeah, sometimes you have to preach from chapter 3.

In a few weeks, I'll be preaching from chapter 3, but I mean, this is not because they're going through and they just happen to be at chapter 3 at that point. No, they just skip, we're going to start with chapter 3 or sometimes with chapter 4, either one. And they'll preach from there and they'll act like, well, this is everything that Paul has to say about salvation. And they imply that this is everything the New Testament has about salvation. Just, you know, and you've all heard the expression, the Romans rode to salvation. And somehow that Romans rode to salvation does not include chapter 2. It's skipping over to chapters 3 and 4.

Now, oddly enough, I have never in my life heard a speaker who's just come and picked chapter 2. And we're going to talk about salvation this morning, and let's turn to chapter 2 of Romans. Now, maybe some of you have experienced that. I have never in my life. I've heard, like I say, numerous, numerous from chapters 3 and 4. And this is playing games with God. You know, I used the illustration a few months ago. It'd be like taking a will, and let's say that the parents have died and they've left all of their belongings, and the first paragraph says, "To our son James, we leave the house and the farm or this or that."

And then the next paragraph says, "And all of the rest of the estate goes to our son Andre." And Andre says, "Okay, well, let's read the will." We start here with paragraph 3. It says, "The rest and residue of the estate goes to Andre." Okay, now we know what the will says. I mean, it's like, what kind of game are you trying to play? But that's what we do when we jump over to chapter 3 and 4 of Romans and ignore chapter 2. It's misrepresenting Paul, and it makes it seem that Paul is directly contradicting his Master and ours, Jesus Christ. Of one thing you can be absolutely certain, any theology that makes Paul contradict Jesus is bad theology.

And yet it is done all the time. A few months ago, Daniel shared those clips from various speakers who were saying, "Well, you can't go to the teachings of Jesus. You've got to go to Paul." No, I mean, that Jesus' teaching, that was for another time. And that's what I heard for years and years. No, Jesus' teaching, that was a dispensation just a few years that this was offered to the Jews, and they rejected it. So, okay, that's over. Now we go to Paul. Or some in my church would say, "That's in the millennium." Yeah, Jesus' teachings, that's going to apply in the millennium, but that's, we're not living in that age now. You know, Paul is what we go to now.

Well, that is terrible theology. Paul never, ever contradicts his Lord and teacher. And if any human speaker or teacher gives you the impression he is, you can be certain that he is misrepresenting Paul. Jesus said a disciple is not above his teacher. Paul is never above Jesus, and Paul would have never claimed or ever consciously taught anything that would contradict Jesus. Jesus said, "Do not be called teachers, for one is your teacher, the Christ." I mean, it is okay to use the word teacher because we do see it throughout the New Testament, but what he's saying, you don't set anyone else up as the teacher, even Paul. It is Jesus Christ who is the teacher.

The apostles themselves only reinforce the teachings of Jesus. For that reason, a person cannot properly understand Romans until he first understands Matthew. Or another way to put that is a person cannot properly understand Paul unless you first properly understand Jesus.

So you're going to get Jesus down, and then Paul falls right into place.

One of the things, as you know, I'm working on an early Christian commentary of Romans. I've finally finished a week ago the first preliminary draft. There's going to be a number of drafts before it's ready for publication. But one of the things I couldn't help but notice was when the early Christians are discussing Romans, they're constantly quoting Jesus. I mean, verse after verse, yeah, they quote, "Jesus said this or that." Jesus said this or that.

And they're just reading Paul as, well, yeah, he's reinforcing what Jesus said. They don't see Paul as saying something different. They would be very surprised if they knew the state that exists in Christianity today where people have set up Paul as a rival to Jesus. And well, we go by the teachings of Paul, and Jesus' teachings, no, that doesn't apply to us or doesn't apply to our age. I mean, they would have just been shocked. The only ones who were seeing anything close to that were the Gnostics, and even they weren't saying that. They were just twisting the teachings of Jesus.

So when they read Romans, they immediately recognize Paul is reinforcing the teachings of Jesus. In the book of Romans, he builds on Jesus' teachings about the Jews and the Gentiles. And that's his main focus is the problems between the Jews and the Gentiles. He builds on what Jesus said, and then his teachings on salvation in Romans, again, it's just built on what Jesus said and what he practiced.

So as I said, they invariably quote the teachings of Jesus that Paul is augmenting when he's writing Romans. So always remember, Paul does not contradict the teachings of Jesus. He reinforces them. If that's the only thing you walk away with today, I'll feel like I've accomplished something. Paul never contradicts Jesus.

So let's jump in now to Romans chapter 2. I will put it all up here. If you want to follow in your Bibles, that's fine as well. Dan said he forgot his reading glasses. So I'm hoping these are going to be big enough, Dan, that you'll be able to read them from. For the beautiful same time. Okay.

Okay. So Paul starts off talking about unrighteous human judges versus God's righteous judgment. And then he gets into salvation as he talks about God's judgment. So Romans 2:1, "Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge. For in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself. For you who judge do the same things.

But we are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth against those who commit such things. And do you think, O man, who judge those who do such things and do the same, that you will escape the judgment of God?" Now, Paul is not saying that every human judge is guilty of doing the same things that he was judging somebody else of doing.

On the other hand, it was a very common practice. It's common in all human judging. Generally, the early Christians saw that Paul was talking about the Gentile judges because that's where he's been coming down, you know, from chapter 1. Again, as we all know, the chapters are man-made, so there's no division there. He's been talking about all of these sins of the Gentiles, and then he talks about their judges.

And it was so common that in Roman justice, which was better than probably the justice in any other country on earth at that time, but for all of its advancements, it still had many flaws. There was definitely one code of justice for the poor and a different one for the rich. So the judge who was sitting there condemning a poor man for doing something, the judge may have been doing the same thing, but it was like, "I'm different, you know, I'm a magistrate, I'm a peer." Or they would judge their fellow peer. If you were the one in power, if you were the magistrate and this fellow over here, he might be just as rich or richer than you.

In fact, he might be richer than you, and you'd like to have his home. And so, yeah, you condemn him for something that you yourself might be guilty of. Or often they condemn people for stuff they didn't even do. And then they, yeah, took their home, took their possessions. I mean, it happened all the time. You're reading Roman history, and it's like, "Wow, that seems to have been the norm." So, yeah, Paul is saying, you know, you Roman judges, you know, you're doing this, and you're going to answer to God. But it also fits every one of us. If we're judging people, condemning them, and we're doing the same thing, yeah, we are condemning ourselves in the process.

You know, I mentioned Paul throughout Romans is reinforcing Jesus. What did Jesus say? "With what judgment you judge, you will be judged. And with the measure you measure out, it will be measured back to you again. And why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not consider the beam that is in your own eye?" Jesus is not saying we can't have congregational discipline, that you can't talk to a brother about a sin or that sort of thing.

But he is saying we are not to have judgmental attitudes where we notice everyone else's faults and ignore our own. He wants us to concentrate on our own sins.

Paul continues, "Or do you despise the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long suffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?" Throughout history, people think because God hasn't done anything to them, they're going to get away with it.

And people often decide there isn't a God because some wicked person has gotten away with something. God didn't punish them in this life like Hitler. And so they say, "Well, there must not be a God." But the message of the scriptures, no, there is a God. No one is going to get away with anything. Every one of those persons is going to answer.

John Chrysostom writes on this verse, "Someone might say, 'Until now I've escaped punishment.' To make such a person fear, Paul is saying that things are not with God as they are here. For here, one person is punished while another one who does the same things escapes punishment." That was extremely common back then. It still happens today.

But in the hereafter, it will not be the same. For then he who judges knows the truth. No innocent person is going to be condemned on judgment day, and nobody who is guilty is going to get away with their sin. It doesn't matter how well they covered it up in human life. It doesn't matter if they're a dictator like Kim, and nobody can do anything. No one can touch them in this life. That they will answer to God for that.

And so God doesn't immediately punish us, Paul says, because he wants to give us time to repent. If I complain about, you know, Joe down the street who's got all of these sins and all of that, and that God hasn't punished him, you know, I should think about myself. What if God had, you know, what if I had died when I was 30 years old? I mean, you know, I was totally not sure what to believe about God at that point. I was floundering and all of that. And God was merciful. He didn't deal with me right then. He gave me time to repent and turn my life around. And that's probably true for most of the people here in this room, or certainly for a lot of you.

So, yeah, we shouldn't be looking at so-and-so. Why hasn't God dealt with him? It's like God's being merciful, just like he was with me and with, I think, all of us here. But like I say, too many people in the world and maybe in the church think that this means they're going to escape punishment. Romans 2:5, "But by your hardness and impenitent heart," impenitent meaning you're not repentant, "you store up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God." We're going to just look at this verse for a minute.

Here Paul uses a form when he says you store up. It's a form of the same Greek word that Jesus used in the Sermon on the Mount where he said, "Store up, do not store up treasures on earth, store up treasures in heaven." That same word he uses a form of it here about storing up wrath.

So it's like we've got two storehouses in heaven. One we're storing up our deeds of love and mercy. Jesus, you know, Jesus told us that, that those are being stored up there. They're not forgotten. But Paul is telling us also there's another storehouse that your wrong deeds, you're storing them up as well. So we have two different storehouses there. Now, the good thing about our wrong deeds is we can repent and they can be forgiven. It's not, uh-oh, they're there, I can't ever be cleansed from that. No. I mean, Jesus offers forgiveness. That's the nice thing about that storehouse.

But I think it was Chrysostom who pointed this out. Paul doesn't say it's God who's storing up wrath. The way he says it is you store up for yourself wrath. In other words, you're choosing your own judgment. You're storing all of this up that's going to bring wrath. You're the one doing it. I mean, God's not wanting to put wrath on you. You're storing all of this up and going against, even if you're not a Christian, if you've never even read the Bible, never heard of it, everybody does have natural law built into them. I mean, they know so many things are wrong: stealing, adultery, murder, assaulting people, cheating, all of those things. I mean, there is, I don't think any tribe on earth that does not have a conscience to know that is wrong.

And so God will have a basis for judgment, even for people who haven't heard the gospel. Now again, Paul is only reinforcing Jesus' teaching. Jesus spoke a lot about the day of judgment. We're not going to look at all of the verses. I'm just going to quote one for an example.

He told the unbelieving Jews of his day, "I say to you that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for you." So Jesus made it clear there's going to be a day of wrath. There's going to be a day of answering. Not a day of wrath for everybody, but for those who do not believe, who reject God.

But what does Paul also call it the day of revelation? There's several reasons. I'm going to look at three of them. It's going to be the day on which God's wrath is revealed from heaven. Like I say, right now, maybe the majority of people in the United States, certainly in Europe, feel like either there isn't a God or it's not a God that you're going to be accountable to. And yeah, it's going to be revealed. No, there is a God, and he isn't pleased with how people have behaved here on the earth, how people have laughed and scorned at him and rejected him, written him out of books and everything else.

Yeah, he is going to reveal himself. He is patient, but that day of revelation is going to come. It's also going to be the day that Jesus will be revealed in his full glory and power. We've only known him here on earth, not us personally, but the ones who did know him, they knew him as a human in the incarnation. But he's going to be revealed that we right now embrace in faith, but we will actually witness it in his full glory and power.

He said, "On that day, on the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all." This is Jesus talking. "Even so, it will be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed." That's the term Jesus used, that he is going to be revealed, and it's going to be in power, and it's going to be in glory.

When I was reading this verse, the thought came to my mind. It vexes me just to think about it, but I don't know how many years ago this was. Probably 10 years ago. It seems like it was more recent than that.

I believe it was the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which if I'm not mistaken, is in New York City. And some quote artist, his piece of sculpture or art, whatever you want to call it, was a glass full of urine with a crucifix in it.

And that was put in the museum as art. And when Christians objected, it's like, "Hey, free speech, you know, this is just free speech." Now I can guarantee you the Metropolitan Museum of Art, if that had been something against Muhammad, if that had been a mockery of Muhammad, they would not have put that in there. If that was mocking Native American religions, uh-uh, there's no way they would have put that in there. If it was mocking a racial minority here in the United States, free speech, uh-uh, no, free speech isn't, no, that's going way beyond the line. "Oh, you're mocking Jesus Christ." "Oh, yeah, sure. Yeah, this is art." And that's fine. Jesus is patient.

They scorned him. They laughed at him when he was here on the earth. Up to the moment he died, they scoffed at him. So yeah, he knows that's going to be there. But those people will answer. They will see that this Jesus they've mocked, they're going to see him in glory. And for them, it will not be a pleasant day. For those who've embraced Christ, it's going to be a wonderful day.

The third reason is called the day of revelation. It will be the day on which the secrets of the hearts of all people and the hidden sins of all people will be revealed. Jesus had said, "Nothing is hidden that will not be disclosed and nothing covered up that will not be revealed." So it will be a day of revelation for us as well. There will be nothing hidden. And probably I shouldn't say that just in a negative sense because there's a lot of wonderful things people do that are hidden that we don't know because they follow what Jesus said. They don't advertise when they give. They don't let their left hand know what their right hand is doing.

People don't even know. I mean, I know the work in Honduras. We've had donations. People just, it was anonymous. We have no idea who, you know, made this possible, this health clinic or this and that. But God knows those things. I think those are going to be revealed as well. So it's not just the bad deeds. It's both.

Okay, now this is the meaty part. Romans 2:5-10. And here Paul is talking about the second phase of salvation. And what does he say this righteous judgment? He's been talking about judgment day. Okay, what is it going to be based on? Well, we're going to go, before I answer that, let's go to Jesus. What did Jesus teach us about salvation?

In his parable of the vine, Jesus revealed that there are two phases of salvation, two stages, however you want to put it. He said, "I am the true vine and my Father is the vinedresser." I know you've heard me preach this many times. To me, it's a passage we can't hear enough. "Every branch in me that does not bear fruit," he, talking about his Father, "takes away. And every branch that bears fruit, he prunes that it may bear more fruit.

You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. If anyone does not abide in me," that means remain in him, "he is cast out as a branch and is withered. And they gather them and throw them into the fire and they are burned."

So what are the two phases? You may be thinking, well, he didn't say anything about two phases there. Well, the first phase is getting cleansed. Jesus said in that passage, he was talking to his apostles. He said, "You are already clean." Okay, so they didn't, they got cleansed before they became a branch on the vine. We don't become a branch on the vine until we have first been cleansed. That's the first stage of salvation. The second stage is remaining on the vine. Getting on the vine isn't the end, Jesus tells us. He says that if you don't produce fruit, you'll ultimately be cut off of the vine and thrown into the fire. So yeah, those are the two stages.

It's first getting on the vine, the cleansing that has to take first place first. We become a branch on the vine. The second phase is living out our life, remaining on the vine until the day of our death.

Jesus said it's going to depend on your producing fruit. What fruit does he want to see? You know, in this life, we may imagine we're still on the vine, but on judgment day, all will be revealed. It may be Jesus has cut us off the vine and we still go to church and we still go through the motions, ignoring perhaps what most people see that this person is no Christian at all. He or she uses the name, but they're not. And Jesus doesn't even recognize us as a branch on the vine any longer.

Okay, so what fruit will Jesus be looking for on judgment day? Jesus said this. It's a verse you don't hear quoted very often. "The hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear his voice and come forth, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, those who have done evil to the resurrection of condemnation."

How many of you have heard that quoted very often? Yeah, okay, a few hands. That's good. I have not heard it in very many sermons. I mean, I know it's come up here and there. It's not like John 3:16. I mean, everyone wants to quote that. They don't want to quote John 5:28 and 29. So Jesus is saying the primary fruit he's going to be looking at is whether we've done good or done evil. Now that sounds simplistic, and everyone is going to tell you, no, that's not what matters. I mean, what Patrick was saying, that you're talking about works, whether you've done good or not, man, you need to, hey, you need to find out what the gospel is.

That's not what it's about. That's what I'm constantly told. That's what no doubt many of you have heard as well. That's Jesus talking. He's going to be the judge. I mean, he ought to know what he's going to look for on judgment day.

He repeated the same message throughout his earthly ministry. In the Sermon on the Mount, he said, "Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven." So it's doing his will. "Many will say to me in that day," he's telling us, look, there's going to be a lot of surprises on judgment day. He's telling us this in advance. "Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and done many wonderful works in your name? And then I will declare to them, I never knew you.

Depart from me." What does he say? "Depart from me." You who practice lawlessness. It gets back to what we do. Now I know how people try to shove that verse away and they say, well, he says, I never knew you. That means they never got saved. Jesus didn't say you never got saved. He said, you practice lawlessness. That's an expression. I never knew you. The same in other ones, he says, I don't know you. Well, again, that's an expression. He does know you. He knows who you are. They said, well, what do you mean you don't know us? We've been, you know, we've eaten with you, done all of these things.

It's an ancient expression. Therefore, Jesus says, whoever hears these sayings of mine and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who builds his house upon the rock. So once again, the test is whether we have obeyed Jesus' teachings. I mean, that should be so simple. And it was to the early Christians. I mean, no one's arguing against this, except the Gnostics who are saying, nope, that doesn't have anything to do with your salvation.

We're not going to read this whole passage. I'll just quickly just mention it. We've all read the, it's not really a parable. It's an illustration of the sheep and the goats. Jesus said he's going to separate, he's going to gather all the nations, all the people before him. He's going to separate the sheep from the goats. It's totally based on what we do with our lives. Did we feed the poor and the hungry? Did we provide drink for the thirsty, clothed the naked? I was in prison and you visited me. I was sick. You came to me. Yeah, what did we do with our life? He says nothing about theology. It doesn't mean theology doesn't matter anywhere because there are other verses.

But he tells us, he's the judge. He's saying, look, this is what I'm going to be looking for. And you better be certain that this is in your life, that you're not going to stand there. No, I never visited the sick. No, I never saw anyone in prison. No, I've never helped feed the hungry. I mean, well, you've just set your eternal destiny to be apart from heaven, to lose eternal life. So Jesus repeatedly makes it clear that on judgment day, we're going to be judged on the basis of our works. I know that sounds like heresy.

This is Jesus talking, our Lord. And you may be thinking, but Paul says we're saved by faith alone. Okay, we don't go to Jesus. We go to Paul. He says we're saved by faith alone. In fact, if we think our salvation depends upon our works, then we are eternally lost. I have been told that so many times. I've heard that.

Well, if you think that's what Paul teaches, notice what he says next in Romans. This is Paul, Romans 2:6, who will render to every man according to what? According to his works. This is Paul. He doesn't contradict Jesus. He says the same thing that Jesus says.

Yeah, I know what people will say though. Okay, Paul is saying that Christians will receive varying rewards based on their works. That yes, if you've done a lot for Christ, if you've really shown a lot of love to people and you've done that, yeah, you're going to have a greater reward in heaven than somebody who's just done very, very little. But they say, no, Paul's not talking about our ultimate salvation. Well, then let's look at what he says next.

Romans 2:7-9, eternal life to those who by patient continuance and good work seek for glory and honor and immortality. No, he's not talking about extra rewards, which there are. I mean, there will be different rewards based on what our life has been. But no, when he's talking about a judgment based on works, he says eternal life to those who by patient continuance and good work. But to those who are contentious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, it will be indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish. So can you see that Paul says exactly the same thing that Jesus had said? And that's what we should expect. A disciple is not above his master.

But you may be wondering, and it's a legitimate question, but now I thought Paul said, by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not as a result of works. Ephesians 2:8-9. He says some similar things in Romans 3 and 4. And indeed, Paul wrote those very words, and they are in no way to be minimized. We're not going to hide those or shove them under the rug and play games the way so many people do.

Yet neither are his words in the present passage to be ignored. Now these seemingly contradictory statements are in perfect harmony because in Ephesians 2, he is speaking about the first phase of salvation, of getting on the vine. You don't have to produce any works to get on the vine.

Go to the book of Acts. Look at the different people who got converted. For example, a Philippian jailer. I mean, he's a total pagan.

A miracle happens. He comes, he's worried he's about to get killed because his prisoners have escaped. Paul assures him no one has escaped. And he takes Paul in. If you want to say he did any works, he bathed his wounds.

And Paul shared the gospel with him. He got baptized that very night. I mean, like I say, if you want to say he had any works, it was he bathed his wounds when he preached on the hill of Areopagus, pagan Greeks, you know, worshiping idols. Not very many listened, but a few did. They believed they got baptized. There's no works that they did. We don't have to do anything in the way of works to get on the vine. The fruit has to be produced once we are on the vine. So there's no contradiction there. Let's just go back. Notice the tense. If you look at the tense, it usually makes it clear. He says, by grace what?

You have been saved. What tense is that? That's past or past perfect if you want to be technical. Okay, so yeah, he's talking about, yeah, when you got saved, that was purely by grace. There were no works involved. Now some people come to baptism with having done a lot of works. That's admirable. But a person can be saved coming to baptism without any at all. But here in Romans 2, he's speaking about the second phase of salvation where works do matter. So Paul doesn't contradict himself. There's a verbal contradiction, but it's easily harmonized.

You might wonder, well, why does he begin his discussion with the second phase of salvation? Wouldn't logically he want to start with the first? Well, go back to the very beginning of Romans. Who does he address his letter to? It's to the saints who dwell in Rome. So he is addressing the letter to people who have already been saved. So they've already been saved. They need to worry now about the second phase of salvation. So that's why he starts with that, the second phase that there will be a judgment based on works.

Furthermore, since he will be writing much about salvation by grace through faith in the chapters that follow, Paul wants to make certain at the outset that his readers do not misunderstand what he's about to say. So he tells us first there's going to be a judgment based on works. I'm going to be talking a lot about grace and about getting saved without works. But I'm going to, at the beginning, tell you, you are going to be judged based on your works after you have been saved, after you come on the vine. So don't misunderstand what I'm about to say. Now he doesn't just leave it at that. Chapter 6, he comes right back, talks about works again, and he does it all throughout Romans, just to be sure that no one misunderstands him.

But you can play games and just pick this chapter and that and come away with a totally different message. But there is one important thing to remember. Even though Paul does not talk about grace in this chapter, we should never imagine that we could obtain eternal life apart from God's grace. That is apart from his mercy and his loving kindness. He would have good reason to cross every one of us off of the list to obtain eternal life.

So God's grace is essential in phase two of salvation, just as it is essential in phase one. Eternal life will always be a gift, but it is a gift conditioned on our godly works, our obedient response to God's love. That is, once we have been saved, once we are on the vine.

Now, these following quotations show that what I've just described is the historic faith. In other words, what I've just been sharing with you, don't walk away thinking, or if you're listening to this through the channel, don't think, oh, David Berceau teaches this or that. This is David Berceau's view. It has nothing to do with my view. This is the historic faith. This is how Christians understood Jesus and Paul in the very beginning.

Origen, let the heretics hear, he's commenting on this very verse. Let the heretics hear that God pays back to each one, not on account of his nature. The Gnostics saying, if you have a saved nature, you're saved. That's it. Your works don't matter.

But on account of his works. In the second place, let believers be edified or maybe be warned would be a better translation. So as to not entertain the thought that because they believe this alone can suffice for them. On the contrary, they should know that God's righteous judgment pays back to each one according to his own works.

We're going to be closing with these quotes. John Chrysostom, here Paul awakens those who had drawn back during trials, and he shows that it is not right to trust in faith alone, for that heavenly tribunal, that's judgment day, will also inquire into our works.

Ambrose Astor, therefore those who seek eternal life are not merely those who believe correctly, but those who live correctly as well. The auditor, we will be judged based on our works. After our baptism, we need to patiently persevere in good works. It is not sufficient to haphazardly do righteous deeds. Rather, the eternal blessings are reserved for those who are willing to undergo the difficulties of walking with God throughout their lives. It's not just a one-time thing. It's walking throughout our lives.

Clement of Rome, this quote is significant because Clement wrote this probably the year 97, 98. I mean, this is right at the same time that the apostle John was on earth. I mean, there's no gap in time. I mean, you go right from the New Testament to the uninspired writers, the people who came after the New Testament. Clement of Rome writes, "Let us therefore earnestly strive to be found in the number of those who wait for him in order that we may share in his promised gifts. But how beloved will this be done? It will be done only by the following things. If our understanding is fixed by faith towards God, if we earnestly seek, there's no gap in there.

It's just I'm going from one slide to the other. If we earnestly seek the things that are pleasing and acceptable to him, if we do the things that are in harmony with his blameless will, and if we follow the way of truth, casting away from us all unrighteousness and iniquity."

Second Clement, it's the oldest sermon we have outside of the New Testament. We don't even know who gave it. It was preserved along with the letter from Clement of Rome. And so people attributed it to Clement. It could have been from him. It's certainly no older than, say, about the year 140 AD.

It says, "For he is faithful who has promised that he will reward everyone according to his works. If therefore we shall do righteousness in the sight of God, we shall enter into his kingdom." Justin Martyr, "Each man goes to everlasting punishment or salvation according to the value of his actions."

Hippolytus, "In administering the righteous judgment of the Father to everyone, Christ assigns to each person what is righteous according to his works. Those who have done good will be justly assigned eternal bliss. To the lovers of wickedness, there will be given eternal punishment." Now realize this sounds like heresy to so many Christians today, and he's just restating what Jesus said. There is nothing different in there. The one reason people don't notice Romans 2, I forgot about this slide. I'm going to squeeze this in here. I said I was going to end with those quotes. So I apologize for that.

That our translations play games, and it really, really annoys me. I do appreciate the Christians who have studied Greek, who have the capability of translating the New Testament Greek writings into English. We're all blessed for their ministry. But they also have a weighty responsibility, and that is to translate what it says and don't play games with the translation. But it's very hard for people to resist that. I've never translated, so maybe I would fall in the same pit if I were a translator.

If you've never noticed the subject passage in Romans that we just read, one reason is that most Bible translations render this passage in such a way as to obscure Paul's message. Whereas Paul says in verse 6 that God will render to each man according to his works, today most Bible translations render this passage as he will render to each man according to his deeds. Now, deeds and works are one and the same thing. But theologically, see, we've been told works are bad.

That's works righteousness. That's bad. No, your works don't matter. So where Paul says our works do matter, the translator put deeds in there. So we don't realize it's the same word. Theologically, the interchanging of these two words is both significant and it's purposeful.

In the passage quoted in Ephesians, Paul uses the word ergon when he says, not as a result of works. Ergon is normally translated works. When he says in Romans that God will render each man according to his works, he uses the identical word ergon. So here you see, once he says we are judged based on our works, the other he says we have been saved not based on our works. Similarly, in verse 7, Paul says that eternal life comes to those who persevere in good work. Yet most popular English translations render the phrase good work as well doing. So when you render it, it says continuance in well doing. Well doing, what does that mean?

And yet Paul uses that same word ergon, work. I mean, it's so clear what it means. So the translators are not being spiritually honest. They shade that. So when you read Romans 2, you don't realize, okay, now here he's clearly saying we are going to be judged based on works. It will affect our salvation. So they take out works and they put these other words. And then in Romans 3 and 4, they put works and then they can preach, see, works play no role in our salvation. That is deceptive. It is very, very wrong.

So the English reader doesn't realize that Paul has made statements in chapter 2 that are verbally contradictory with statements he makes in chapters 3 and 4. Of course, his statements can be reconciled when we realize that in chapters 3 and 4, Paul is talking about the first phase of salvation. Chapter 2, he's talking about the second phase. So he knows what he's talking about. I mean, it's a verbal contradiction, but it's not a contradiction in ideas. Now, one of the reasons why the early Christians didn't fall into this trap is that they're reading it in the original Greek. So in every one of these places, they're seeing the same word, ergon, ergon, ergon. So they get it.

Yeah, we see our translators playing these games and putting different words to be deceptive, I have to say. All right, so the final verse, tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Gentile. But glory, honor, and peace to every man who works what is good, to the Jew first and also to the Gentile.

As I mentioned before, in Romans, Paul is not writing a theological treatise about salvation. That's the way people use Romans today. And it certainly has a lot to say about salvation. It's not wrong to quote from it. But he's not writing a thesis on salvation. He's addressing the strife between Jewish and Gentile Christians. So even when he talks about judgment day, he ends up saying, the reason I'm mentioning this, it doesn't matter whether you are a Jew or a Gentile. You are going to be judged based on your works, on what you have done, what you have not done. It doesn't matter Jew or Gentile. You are going to be judged the same way.

So we will close with that. So any response? Yes, Daniel. Merely for other listeners, did Paul really say faith alone? No, Paul never uses the expression faith alone. That's what people quote Paul as saying. Yeah, thank you. I assume that most of you realize, and I do need to clarify that. Yeah, Paul says you're saved by faith or by grace through faith. Paul never says you are saved by faith alone. In fact, there's only one place in the whole New Testament where that phrase faith alone is used. Does anyone know where that is?

James 2:24. James 2:24, where he says, you are not saved by faith alone. That is the only place where that expression appears. So yes, thank you for clarifying that for anyone who's watching this or for those of you who are present. Yeah, Paul doesn't say that. People have put that in his mouth. If you like this message and want to hear more like it, go to Scroll Publishing's website and check out all the different books and audio messages available. Scroll is a place for people who are seeking the truth, who are looking for the historic faith, who don't want spins or complicated interpretations. And don't forget to like, subscribe, and share this video with others.

Thanks. God bless.