Well, the title is probably—sounds strange because Romans is not a simple book. I'll tell you that right at the beginning. I spent over two years working on the commentary, and it was like, at so many points, I just wanted to give up. It is not a simple book, but you can reduce what Paul says down, what his main points. Now, you're talking about what every little verse means. No, that's not simple. But yeah, his overall message, I think we can simplify.
And why I particularly want to is because that's what all the other churches do. They simplify it, but they simplify it to a wrong message. We're saved by faith alone. Our works play no role in our salvation. And that's their simplified version of Romans. And that's not what Paul is saying. We can simplify it, but it's not quite that simple. Okay. So as Anabaptists, and for, I would say, the majority of you here, at least half of you, what we'll be sharing this morning is going to be review.
You've heard me speak on Romans before. For some of you, this is probably the first time that you would have heard this. So as conservative Anabaptists, whether it's our congregation or anyone you go to, they are going to believe that how we live is going to affect our ultimate salvation. Now, once Anabaptists cross that barrier and say, "You can live in open sin, and it's not going to affect your salvation," and there are Anabaptists who've crossed that line, you're pretty well now in the Protestant world.
I mean, I'd say that's one of the dividing lines between Anabaptists and Protestants is we do believe, no, after you are saved, you can't just live in willful sin. Now, none of us are going to live perfect. I mean, we all understand that. But you can't just openly live in sin or decide you're going to ignore direct commandments of Christ and it not affect your salvation. But then we get tripped up. Protestants will throw this out.
Romans 4:25, "For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness." It looks like, oh, well, they've got us there. Yeah. Works don't play any role in our salvation. And we get tripped up on that. So that's why I want to share this message this morning.
In fact, I've heard at least two sermons preached in this church quite a number of years ago, and not by members of our congregation, from Romans 25, and they get up and say, "See, your works don't affect your salvation." And yet that's not what they really believe. I mean, I knew those people. It's like, you don't believe that. You wouldn't allow someone in your church who was living in open adultery or something.
But yeah, they've been so, what should I say, intimidated by the Protestants that we end up getting tripped up. So since this year is our 500th anniversary, I didn't finish reading that. Now, to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt. But to him who does not work but believes on him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness. Like I say, you just take that verse alone, and it sounds like, well, yeah, the Protestant message is the correct one.
But as Anabaptists, we don't just take one verse or five verses. We take the entire New Testament. We take the entire book of Romans as well. So the letter to the Romans in no way contradicts what Anabaptists have historically believed. So let's keep that in mind. What we have historically believed is totally in harmony with the book of Romans. All right. So these are the three things we're going to be looking at today. We're going to be going over these things. That's it. These three points. All right?
This is how you make Romans simple because this is his basic message. Okay? And if you're going to understand Romans correctly, you've got to remember these three things. Otherwise, you're going to come up with a very different message than what Paul was writing and what his readers understood and what the early Christians understood. We know what they believed about Romans just a few decades after Paul. We know what they believed in Rome, the people he wrote to, just a few decades after Paul died.
So it's not like, oh, we got to figure this out 2,000 years later. It was figured out 2,000 years ago. I mean, they understood him. So there's two phases of salvation. If you don't get that, then yeah, you're going to be totally turned around by these proof texts that are thrown out. There's two different laws. Okay? You got to remember that as you go through Romans. And then there's two kinds of works. Okay? All right. So let's move forward from there. So we're going to start with two phases of salvation.
All right? And this is so important to remember, and that's where I'd say 99% of the people mess up. It's like they talk as if salvation—there's only one phase of salvation—and they get stumbled either on one end or the other. So our initial salvation is through faith in Christ, and it's totally made possible by God's grace. In fact, our entire salvation is always only possible by God's grace. God does not require any prior godly works from us. It's a free gift. Okay?
So some Anabaptists don't understand this part of things. I've never been older to Amish, but I hear that, yeah, a lot of Amish, if you ask them, have you been saved? And they say, "Well, I hope to be." And okay, yeah, they're understanding only the second phase of salvation. We should all be able to say, if we have given our life to Christ, if we're a baptized Christian, we should be able to say, "Yes, I have been saved." There should not be any question about that. Okay.
So all God requires us to enter into salvation, to enter into eternal life, is faith and repentance. So what happens at this initial salvation? Well, okay, all your past sins are washed away. You start with a clean slate. You are justified. God declares you righteous, not because you really are righteous, but because He gives that as a gift. You're born again. You're a new creature in Christ. You're made a part of the church of Christ, not this local body, but the worldwide church of Christ.
You are adopted as a child of God. I mean, all of this happens at your initial salvation. And when we talk about two phases, we don't mean, oh, well, you're half saved at that point. No, you are totally saved. If you fell over dead once you got saved, if you fell over dead the next minute, you're guaranteed paradise. You are saved. So that part should be clear to us. And like I say, a lot of Anabaptists will get stumbled on that part, and they act like, "No, it's just in the future." Okay?
So we got to understand there's two phases, that yes, we do get saved. We are saved. But the Scriptures use several tenses, both past, present, and future, in talking about our salvation. So let's look at some of the verses that apply to the first phase. "For by grace, you have been saved." What's the tense? It's past or past perfect. "You have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, that no one would boast." Okay? So we don't try to hide that.
We don't hide that verse. We have no problem with that verse. We've all experienced this if we are a born-again Christian. Okay? We have been saved through faith. We didn't earn it in any way. And He didn't save us because we were so godly. Okay?
2 Timothy 1:9, Paul says, "Who saved us"—what tense?—"past and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was given to us in Christ Jesus before times eternal." Another one, "Not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but according to His mercy, He"—what tense?—"past saved us through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit." So there is a past phase that we have been saved. We should be clear on that.
No one should go through life, "Well, I hope I'm saved. I hope I'm going to"—you should know in your heart, "I have been saved. You have entered into eternal life." But that's not the end of everything. That's where Protestants stop. Okay. Those verses, that's the end of it. And that's not honest. It's taken just part of the Bible and not the rest. About—I think Bill was there six years ago. I was at Soldiers of the Cross, seven, maybe.
And I was actually just—I was sharing a message on discipleship with the young people. And I was talking about the victorious cycle of how prayer affects our faith, which affects our—our faith affects our prayer, and our prayers affect our obedience. And when we live an obedient life, then that will affect our faith, which then our faith will be stronger. We will pray more. We will obey more. And it just keeps going in that direction.
And when I got through, when I sat down, then the next speaker, he said, "Well, I'm going to table what I was going to talk about." I don't know what he was going to talk about. And then he just went through—and there's maybe three or four more of these proof texts—about our past salvation. And he said to the young people, "Now, God wants you to obey, but it doesn't affect your salvation. I mean, it's good to be obedient." And I'm sitting there like, "This is an Anabaptist conference?" And I just stood there.
And yeah, he went through the whole thing telling the young people, just picking. And I felt like, "Well, yeah, what about all these other verses you're leaving out?" Anyway, yeah, we don't do that. We take the whole Scriptures. Okay. So now let's look at the second phase. We maintain our saved condition by holding fast to our faith and living faithfully in obedience to Christ's commandments. Okay? So we never save ourselves, and we're never worthy. It's always going to be grace.
But yeah, once we are saved, Christ does expect us to have some appreciation for this huge gift that He gave us at His expense and follow His commandments. He said, "If you love Me, you will obey My commandments." I still clearly remember February 1st, 2003. I doubt that date means anything to most of you. I remember it was a Saturday morning. And this was back when I lived in Texas. And we lived in a typical David Bercot setting. It was on a small country road.
And then the last turnoff, the road ended in just a dead end. Boom. That was it. The last turnoff was a mile from our house. So after the last turnoff, there were a total of four houses, one of ours. We were the very last one at the dead end. Okay? So trucks didn't come down there very often, I mean, traffic in general. And then at the dead end, which there was no room for a semi to turn around there, then our driveway went back literally a quarter of a mile to our house.
And then we were surrounded by woods and all of that. Okay. I'm just giving you the setting. So we had made our carport into an office for me. It's where I did my writing. And also, I was practicing law at that time. And then we built a separate carport. So I'm there in my office. This is a Saturday morning. And suddenly, I hear outside the office this loud truck. I mean, I mean, not just heard it, felt it.
Man, it's like, "What in the world?" I mean, why would a semi—I mean, this was like right outside of my office it felt. And I'm thinking, "Why is a big truck out here?" I mean, it's either a semi or it's a monster dump truck or something. I mean, this thing is big. And then I thought, "See, I mean, we haven't ordered anything. What would this be?" So I go out my door, and it stops. I thought, "Okay. It turned their motor off." And then I step out in front of my office. And we had a big area there. No truck.
Truck's gone. Just disappeared. I mean, it's like, "Where did this monster truck go?" And I looked. You could see all the way down our quarter-mile driveway. No truck inside. No sound. Nothing. It's like, "When the house"—Deborah, is your truck?" "Yeah." I said, "There's no truck out there. It's gone." And so we were a little puzzled. I went back to work like, "I don't know." She looked up in the sky, and she noticed there was a streak across the sky. And then she got on the internet and just checked news.
And yeah, it wasn't a truck I was hearing. It was the Space Shuttle Columbia coming apart. And it was—well, it was right over that part of Texas, right near the border of Louisiana. And yeah, the parts came down all in our county and the counties around it and all of that. I can't believe. I don't know how many miles up it would have been at that point. I can't believe it was that loud and that much vibration on the ground. But wow, that was an experience I won't forget.
It's too bad it was a tragic experience for the people on it. Now, the point of that is it got launched. It got off the ground. It did its task in space and all of that. But that wasn't enough. It did not make it home—it did not make it to the finish line. And that's the way it is with the Christian life. We get saved, but Paul describes it as a race, a race of endurance ahead of us. It's not a race we run alone. I mean, Christ is going to give us the power.
If we walk closely with Him, we're not going to do it on our own strength. But it is a race. We have to get to that finish line. It's not all over when we get saved. Like I say, if you fall over dead right then, yeah, then it's over. But most of us don't. And so we have a walk ahead of us. Now, as most of you know, I am not a fan of the statement of faith that was passed in Garden City, Missouri, in the early 1900s.
I've complained about it a lot because the Anabaptists already had a statement of faith, a Dordrecht confession that it's a bit lengthy, but yeah, you couldn't go through it and misunderstand about salvation. Now, Garden City wanted to bring us Anabaptists into the Protestant world and yet hold on to the need for obedience. So everything is put into Protestant terms. But even there, they do get it right.
They say, "We believe that it is the privilege of all believers to know that they have passed from death unto life, that God is able to keep them from falling." And yes, amen. We would all agree to that. But that the obedience of faith is essential to the maintenance of one's salvation and growth in grace. So yeah, they do have both phases there. And like I say, when you read the whole thing, it's not how I would want to word it, but they do get it in there. It is in there that obedience of faith is essential.
And like I say, when you cross that line where it's not essential, you're no longer an Anabaptist. I mean, you can call yourself one, but yeah, you should call yourself a Protestant because yeah, you've crossed over, I think, the essential boundary. Now, again, I want to emphasize this second phase of salvation is not apart from grace. And I don't think any of us think that. People who recognize the two phases of salvation, we get accused of, "Oh, you're practicing works of righteousness.
You think you're going to save yourself. You think you're good." No, we know we are only saved by grace. But just because we are saved by grace, because it will still be a gift in the end, none of us will ever deserve eternal life in the end, it doesn't mean that God does not require obedience. If we continue on in Exodus, we're going to see what happened to the Israelites. And Paul points to them. They got saved, you might say.
They got out of Egypt, crossed the Red Sea, but they did not make it to the Promised Land because they disobeyed. Not just once, but it was a whole wilderness, 40 years of disobedience. Now, Paul also makes this—we read the one verse from Romans, Romans 4, that people like. But Paul also says this in chapter 2, "God will render to every man according to His works." Now, a lot of Protestants say, "Well, He's just talking about rewards in heaven after once you get there.
We won't all have the same rewards." And that's true. There will be different degrees. I mean, Jesus makes that clear. But He says eternal life. He's not talking about rewards beyond salvation. He says eternal life to those who, by perseverance in doing good, seek for glory, honor, and immortality. So right at the beginning, He has an introductory chapter. Of course, He didn't do chapters. That's man-made. He has an introduction. Then He starts right off.
He gets into works, and He makes it clear, "You are not going to have eternal life unless you persevere in doing good." Okay? So if you misunderstand Romans, you have only yourself to blame because Paul starts off—he wants to make sure his readers, when he gets into the discussion about the initial phase and grace and that, "Look, I've told you at the beginning, if you don't persevere in doing good, you're not going to have immortality." So he starts off—that's his note. Okay? He gets that out of the way.
And then he goes talks about these other things. But that gets ignored by so many people. He says, "This is continuing. But to those who are contentious and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness, there will be indignation and wrath, yes, tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man who does evil." Okay? So if we do not obey, there's going to be tribulation and wrath. I mean, He says that. All right? So there's the one phase that He goes into next.
But He starts with the second phase and makes it clear, "You are going to be judged on judgment day by your works. And if you haven't obeyed, then you are going to inherit tribulation and wrath, not eternal life." Okay? Romans 6:16, "Do you not know that to whom you yield yourselves as slaves to obey, you are the slaves of the one whom you obey, whether of sin leading to what?" Oh, you're still saved, once saved, always saved? No.
"Leading to death or of obedience leading to righteousness." So again, He doesn't just say it at the beginning. He keeps saying it all throughout Romans. Yeah. But I mean, the way Paul is not—he wouldn't have gotten an A-plus in grammar in school. I mean, Peter says, "Our blessed brother Paul," he says things that are hard to understand and that people twist. And I'll testify, spending two years in Romans, his gift was, I guess, probably the best missionary that's ever existed.
But yeah, his letters, as Peter says, the longer things, harder to understand. Again in Romans, "Those who live after the flesh mind the things of the flesh, but those who live after the Spirit mind the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death." Now, He's not talking about the death everyone dies because you're going to die that whether you're carnally minded or not. He's talking about eternal death. But to be spiritually minded is life.
And He's talking about eternal life because you're going to have life on this earth, whether you're spiritually minded or not, and peace. So Paul talks about both phases. And we're really misusing Romans when we act like, "Oh, there's just one phase of salvation." Again, if you live after the flesh, you will die. But if through the Spirit you put to death the works of the flesh, you will live. But he points out through the Spirit, you're not going to do it on your own strength.
You're going to need the Holy Spirit to do that. I've always liked this quote from Menno Simons, "No matter how much we may talk or argue about the Scriptures, this rule will remain firm and can never be broken. If you live after the flesh, you will die." End of discussion. You can go wherever you want. Paul makes it clear you can't live after the flesh and think you're going to inherit eternal life. All right. So we said there's three things, two phases of salvation we've just talked about.
Now we're going to look at there's two different laws, two kinds of law. Acts 13:39, Paul says, "Everyone who believes is justified from all things from which you could not be justified by what? By the law of Moses." Okay? So there's the law of Moses. But that's not the only law that exists. I want to tell you about a legal case. This is a real one. It's a case of B&S International Sales Corporation. This was in 1960. They were a, I guess, wholesaler would be the term.
They sold poultry, but they didn't have their own farms. They would buy from poultry farms and then resell. They would buy in huge quantities and then resell. All right. So there was a firm in Switzerland. And so they asked him, "What quote can you give us on chicken? We want to buy some chicken. So give us a quote." And they were buying, I don't know, what, tons? It was a big, big sale. So they came up with a very good price, and they shipped them the chicken.
Now, some of you have an agricultural background, so you'll get how this all comes in, or I think any of you sisters will. Okay. Now, when they got the chicken, it turned out it was stewing hens is what they primarily got. They got some fryers and broilers in there, but it was mainly stewing chickens. Okay? Well, they're ticked off, and they stew. And we ordered USDA chicken, and you said in a stewing hens.
Well, it went to court, and the court said, "Chicken can mean broiler, fryer, roaster, stewing hen, all kinds of chicken. All you ordered was chicken. And you ordered USDA chicken. And if you look at the USDA rules or regulations, it talks about these four or five different types of chicken. You ordered chicken. And the price they gave you was below what anyone could buy broilers or fryers at. I mean, they would have gone in the hole.
So at that price, you should have understood you're going to get stewing hens or whatever." So they lost. Okay? The word chicken had a lot of different meanings. Still does. All right. Law can mean a lot of different things. It was so many words. Okay. And Paul uses law in the same letter. Paul talks about two different laws. And boy, if you don't keep up with what he's saying, again, you're going to get turned all around and come away thinking, "Oh, law is bad. There's the gospel versus law.
That's what Luther came up with. Law, commandments versus gospel. No, it's the gospel versus the law of Moses. Two very different things." Again, Romans 2, right at the beginning of his letter, "Indeed, you are called a Jew." His letter is all about Jews and Gentiles, about the Mosaic law, about circumcision. That's the focus of the letter of Romans. "Indeed, you are called a Jew and rest on the law." And he's talking about the law of Moses.
"You're a Jew," he says, "and make your boast in God." And the background to Romans is set out in Acts 15. So it's good in our Bibles you have Acts before Romans. And you read Acts, you can see, I mean, everywhere Paul goes, the Jews are upset with all these Gentiles receiving salvation without becoming Jews. They remain Gentiles. They are not circumcised. They do not live by the law of Moses. They're still Gentiles. And the Jewish Christians want them to have to become Jews.
"And certain men came down from Judea and taught the brethren, 'Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.'" That same conference, this is the Jerusalem conference, is often called, "Some of the sect of the Pharisees who believed rose up." And again, these were believing Pharisees.
They were Christians saying, "It is necessary to circumcise them and to command them to keep the law of Moses." This is the whole background, the whole historical context of Romans, is that the Jewish Christians, they were fine for Gentiles to come in. They were excited for Gentiles to be coming to the true God. But they wanted them to become Jews. They were still thinking the law of Moses somehow had saved them. And Paul has to keep pounding this in. You were not saved by the law of Moses.
And you're not going to get saved now by the law of Moses. It is through the sacrifice of Christ and the teachings and commandments he gives us. All right. Now, Paul in that same book of Romans, I mean, talks about the law of Moses, and he turns right around Romans 8, "For the law of the Spirit of life." Is that the law of Moses? No, it's a whole nother law.
"The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death." Again, still in Romans, because the carnal mind is enmity against God. In other words, we already talked about it. You can't live carnally and think you're going to be a friend of God. For it, that is the carnal mind, is not subject to the law of God. All right? So there's the Mosaic law. He says that doesn't do anything for you except maybe lead you as a guardian, whatever, towards Christ.
But you're not going to get saved. I mean, none of that is going to make you righteous. But there is a law of God that if we want to be friends, we are going to be following His law. So law, L-A-W, did not end with Christ Jesus. The Mosaic law, the law of Moses, was fulfilled. Okay. Dirk Phillips. Now, this is not Dirk Willems, the one who saved the man who fell through the pond. Dirk Phillips was a contemporary of Menno Simons. He was one of the better Anabaptist writers, I would say.
He's not as well known, though. "It is false exegesis," that means interpretation or explanation, "of Paul's words to compare the ordinances and institutions of the Lord with circumcision or uncircumcision." I read that wrong. "It is false exegesis of Paul's words to compare the ordinances and institutions of the Lord," talking about Christian ordinances, "with circumcision or uncircumcision of the flesh." So our Anabaptist forefathers recognized what the Protestants were doing, what Luther was doing.
Wait a minute. You're taking Paul's words about the law of Moses, and you're acting like this applies to the institutions and laws of Christ. And Paul makes it clear in his letter. I mean, you got to take the whole letter. I mean, you can't piecemeal it. Okay. So the Dordrecht Confession. So this is the original when the Anabaptists finally wrote down a confession of their theological beliefs. Dordrecht is the one it's not the only one. It's the one that became the standard. Article 5, "The law of Christ.
He has declared all men to be His children who through faith as obedient children, he'd follow and practice what the New Testament contains." Okay? So from the beginning, the Anabaptists understood we have the Mosaic law, which does not save us, and we have the law of Christ, which along with His blood. I mean, you can't just take the law of Christ, and some of the liberal churches try to do this. Okay. We're going to just take the Sermon on the Mountain, and they don't live by it, but they think they do. Okay?
Yeah. We'll just take His teachings. No, you're not going to get saved by just taking His trying to take His teachings. You got to get saved first. You got to be born again. The blood of Christ has to cleanse you. Okay? But you still have to obey the law of Christ after that. But you can't just take the law of Christ in itself. That's going to save you. All right. Everyone with us, we've talked about the two phases of salvation, two different laws, law of Moses, law of Christ. All right? Anyone? I lost. All right.
I'm trying to make this simple, or else my whole sermon title is wrong. All right. Finally, we come to two kinds of works. So all of this is in Romans, two phases of salvation, two different laws, two different kinds of works. Now, one of these works is essential. The other kind of works is unnecessary and can be even bad. Okay? But there are two different works. All right. So don't leave here without this being clear in your mind. Okay? Two different works. Okay? Two different kinds.
And we talked about how words can mean different things. So let me just see if this is on my screen. Okay. So the word standard, something considered by an authority as an approved model. Okay? When we have church standards, this is the model. This is the model of excellence, how we should live. Our standards don't cover everything, but it's part of it. Okay? So standard can mean something good. You're talking about something being the gold standard. That expression means, yeah, this is the excellent.
This is what you want to do. This is the standard. But standard doesn't always mean the best. Okay. So how many of you have dealt with cows or beef or anything like that? Been? Okay. Very good. All right. So this is something you probably already know. Okay? So when you're talking about grades of beef, you think standards there at the top? It might sound like it is. This is the standard.
And you go to a butcher shop and say, "I want the standard." Well, he'll sell it to you, but it's not going to be what you are expecting. So the USDA so it has different grades of beef. The very best is prime. Okay? When you go to a good steakhouse, that's what you should be getting. Okay? And then below that is choice. Still make a pretty good steak, I think. And then there's select. And I think it used to be called good. Okay. That's the next grade. All of this is edible. Everything's fine with it.
It just gets tougher. The meat gets tougher as you go down the scale. Okay? Standard is almost at the bottom. Okay? So you get standard beef. You're talking about maybe stewing for stews or something like that. You're not going to go to a steakhouse and say, "I want a standard grade steak." You're not going to like that. Okay? And then commercial is still edible, but that's usually what I don't know what they make out of it. Hot dogs? I'm not sure what. But it's something that is fit for humans to consume.
But it's at the bottom. Okay. So standard can mean two different things. Works can mean two different things. Standard is sometimes the excellent thing, and sometimes it's towards the bottom. Works can be something good, and they can be something not so good. Okay? So there's two kinds of works. There's the works of the law of Moses. Okay? Those aren't going to help you in any way at all. And then there's the works of faithful obedience to Christ. Those are essential. Okay? So one doesn't help you.
And if you think you're saved by the works of the law, then it's actually going to pull you down. And that's what Paul keeps hammering on in letter after letter after letter. You are not saved by the law of Moses. And Gentiles don't have to live by it because it isn't going to contribute one thing to their salvation. But works of faithful obedience, all the Bible writers talk about favorably. Okay. So Galatians 2:16. I've said to a number of people to understand Romans, it's best if you start with Galatians.
Galatians is a lot easier book to understand than Romans, and it was written before Romans. If you read Galatians, you see the whole context. I mean, Paul is really clear. If you read Galatians and you think he's talking about Christian works, wow, you don't read carefully, I think, is about all I can say because he hammers that in, and he gives a number of illustrations in Galatians about the law of Moses. We're not saved by that, but the Jews were trying to force the Gentiles into that.
"Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law," he's talking about the Mosaic law, "but by faith in Christ Jesus. For by the works of the law, no flesh shall be justified." Okay? So again, we're not saved by the law of Moses. Okay. What are the faithful works of obedience to Christ? Well, as I said, these are essential after our initial salvation, but we do not earn our salvation through these works. Salvation, again, is always a gift. Don't ever forget that.
And sometimes Anabaptists, I think, have been guilty of that and thinking, "Well, okay, I've earned my salvation," or, "Yeah, if I live a good enough life, it's still going to be a gift." But Christ wants to see that we really love Him, that to talk about how much you love Christ and how much He did for you and then just ignore His teachings, no, you don't appreciate what He went through for you. It's just words. It's not in your heart. Okay. We've read this before.
Go back to it because we're talking about works now. "God will render to every man according to His works." All right. So works is not a bad word. Even if you're talking about the law of Moses, it's not bad. It's only bad if you think that's how you get saved. The law of Moses was something good. God gave it for a reason. Okay? Again, according to His works. Now, some translations, because this contradicts Martin Luther, doesn't contradict Paul. He's the one writing. It contradicts Martin Luther.
Instead of putting works there, they put deeds. It's the same word as works, same Greek word, but they switch on there just so you don't think works can somehow be good. It's a little dishonest. If you're going to translate the Bible, translate it honestly. I mean, I don't like it when translators do that. Okay. "Every man according to his works, eternal life to those who by perseverance and doing good seek for glory, honor, and immortality." Again, he's talking about the second phase of salvation here.
Works are good in the second phase. They're not essential before that. "But those who are contentious and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness," we've already read this. This is review. "There will be indignation and wrath, yes, tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man who does evil." Okay. I'm going to go back to this quote in Acts. But what I find so frustrating and so dishonest and you can be dishonest in this life and get away with it.
It's kind of silly to be dishonest with God and to think that you can get away with that. So this wouldn't happen in real life. And that's the odd thing. We do stuff with the Bible that we wouldn't do with a legal contract or a business work or something like that. So imagine a situation where a man dies. He has no children or wife. He's survived by two nephews. One is John, one is Peter. Okay? And this would follow most wills.
The first paragraph in most wills is sort of an introduction, names who the will's from and says of sound and mind and all of that. Okay? And then usually paragraph two is where the person is leaving most of their stuff to. Okay? "I leave blah, blah, blah to my wife or to whomever." Okay? And then the third paragraph, the typical wording that we all used when I was practicing law was, "The rest and residue of my estate then goes to so-and-so." Okay? So imagine a situation that a man dies, survived by two nephews.
So the second paragraph of his will says, "I leave the house and farm to my nephew John." The third paragraph says, "The rest and residue of my estate, I leave to Peter." Okay? So Peter goes to court and says, "It's all mine." Look at paragraph three, and they present paragraph three to the judge. "The rest and residue of my estate goes to Peter. It's all mine." Okay? Like I say, this would never happen in the real world. And the other side would say, "Well, yeah, but look at paragraph two.
Yeah, you get the rest after John gets the house and farm." You would never do that as a lawyer. I mean, you would probably have your license suspended, and you would get a severe reprimand from the court. Like I say, you don't do that in human life. And yet we pull those kind of tricks. We think we can pull those kind of tricks on God. So I've seen so many books on Romans, so many booklets, I should say, they just skip chapter two. They briefly go in the introduction. Let's get to three.
Ah, saved by faith in chapter four. Yeah, see, works playing a role. But you just skip chapter two where he starts off saying, "Works are going to affect you." Okay? Last month, maybe we're still going through it, I was downstairs, and I noticed the Sunday school literature. And I just glanced at the booklet, and it was, "Oh, Romans." I thought, "Oh, well, this is good." I looked at the back. I'm not going to say who it was, but it was an Anabaptist publishing house. I thought, "Well, good.
I'm interested in what they tell the children about chapter two." Guess what? They go into chapter one, then they skip two and go to chapter three and four. It's like, "Wait a minute. You can't do that. You can't just skip a whole chapter." It's like, again, my illustration with going on a will. Well, see, paragraph three says it all goes to Peter. Yeah, but you got to read chapter two. First, it says the house and farm goes to John, then Peter gets the rest.
But I mean, it's like, do we think if we pull these tricks that somehow God's going to be bound by it? So on Judgment Day, no, we skip chapter two of Romans in our church. So yeah, don't look at my I mean, come on. It's so silly to think we're going to get away with this on Judgment Day, something you would never do in the business world, the legal world. You wouldn't pull those kind of shenanigans. But we think we can do it with God. I mean, that's terrible. Okay. So this is interesting.
"Then Peter opened his mouth and said, 'In truth, I perceive that God shows no partiality'" that's between Jews and Gentiles, "but in every nation, whoever fears him and works righteousness is accepted by him.'" This is Peter. "Whoever works righteousness is accepted by him." And this is the only place I've been able to find in the whole New Testament where the phrase works righteousness appears. And yeah, check your Bible CVC another place.
It's the only one I know where it appears, and it says that's what we want, that he who works righteousness where the Protestant world says, "Oh, that's works righteousness. That's something bad." Well, I guess they'll have to take that up with Peter and the Holy Spirit. James 2:24, "You see then that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone." So why is that not contradicting Paul? Because Paul, when he talks about works not affecting us, he's talking about generally the works of the law of Moses.
Now, there is another kind of works. I'll just mention this, and then we'll close up here. I will close. A lot of people, they say, "Okay, I'm going to just close here," and then they go on 20 minutes later. So before your baptism, before your initial salvation, you do not have to have any good works. Now, it's good to have them. Cornelius had them, and God chose him to be the first uncircumcised Gentile to receive salvation. And he did it because of Cornelius's works and his prayer life. Okay? So it's good.
But then you get to the Philippian jailer. I mean, he didn't have any works. The guy probably beat up a bunch of people that day and was cursing and maybe worshiping some idol. And then he has a meeting with Paul, and that night he gets saved. He believes. He's baptized. No works at all. So yeah, you can come without any prior works. Now, we would be hesitant to baptize someone. Would want to see a little bit of fruit. But again, you don't have to have it. Okay? So just so we understand that.
But you do have to have it once you get saved. Then we want to see that somebody is walking with God. And that's what James is talking about. Once we have been saved, then ultimately, Judgment Day, a man is going to be justified by his works and not by faith alone. And that's the only place in the Bible where the term faith alone appears as well. All right. So our conclusion, this is what we've talked about, two phases of salvation. The initial phase, no works required. Faith and repentance is all we need.
It's fine if we have a godly life. And then after we have been saved, then we must walk faithfully to enjoy our ultimate salvation. There's two kinds of law, the law of Moses, the law of Christ. You obey the law of Christ. You don't have to obey the law of Moses. Two kinds of works. There's the works of the Mosaic law, and there's the works of obedience to Christ. One's good. The other you don't need.