An Act of God

AN ACT OF GOD
ROMANS 3:19-28

Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. 20 For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. 21 But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— 22 the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, 25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. 26 It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. 27 Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith. 28 For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.
In the name of Jesus:
In the October 16 edition of the Columbus Dispatch, there was a picture of two men who worked for a local construction company. These men were tearing shingles off of a roof, which was damaged by a recent storm. The caption underneath the picture read: “Fixing an Act of God.”
Certainly God can work through nature, if He so chooses to do so. There are all sorts of acts of God, which are recorded in Scripture: plaques, locusts, darkness, earthquakes, and hail to name just a few. Scripture certainly does ascribe to God these acts of God at the time when they occurred. But what about today? The Bible doesn’t really speak about acts of God that are seen in or through nature. A lightening strike, hail strikes, a tornado hitting a church, may seem like an act of God, but how can we be certain? In fact, different groups of different persuasions will claim an act of God has taken place, for their own purposes, even though there isn’t a one to one correspondence revealed in the Bible.
For example, take some ill informed Christians who say that a hailstorm was God’s pronouncement on sin. It happened last week in Brooklyn New York. The Baptist congregation which has made the news for all of the wrong reasons: protesting at the funeral of servicemen and women among other things, had the audacity to say that a recent hail storm in Brooklyn was God’s judgment upon the Jews in New York who have rejected Christ. My question to the group is simply: then what about the Christian men and women who had their cars damaged as well? Was this an act of God judging them? Sadly, they would say yes, but the Bible doesn’t answer that question. God does say in His Word that God makes the rain to fall on the just AND the unjust. And God will not be mocked, He WILL punish sin, but does God act through these occurrences today? The Bible doesn’t say.
God does tell us in His Word for today that God holds the entire world accountable for its sinfulness. There is no distinction, God says, ALL HAVE SINNED. Listen to Paul in Romans 3: “Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. 20 For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. For there is no distinction: 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, “
God reveals in His Word through the Ten Commandments that He alone is God, that He gives His glory to no one else. God is in control and we are not. There are so many things in our lives that are out of our control, that we call them acts of God, because we can’t explain them. Insurance companies will speak about floods, tornados, and other things as acts of God, because they have no reasonable explanation as to why something happened when it did. These natural acts show us that we need to rely on Someone else, namely God, rather than ourselves. We are helpless and we see this when disasters strike. When we hold our works and ourselves up to God we are also helpless. God is not impressed by your religiosity, by your potential or good intentions. No, rather than impressed, God condemns you and all people as sinful and falling short of God’s glory.
God’s act of judgment is something that no one would be able to stand. To face God in His glory and we in our sinfulness is too much for anyone to bear. Our sinfulness separates us from God, so much so that human beings wonder if God even exists. Even Christians question where God is when they are in the midst of suffering. When suffering or any type of catastrophe takes place, people wonder is this God speaking?
God speaks to mankind most certainly and most clearly in His Word. And in His Word this day God speaks, telling us that even though we and the rest of the world are sinful people, God still loves the sinner. God loves sinners and the world so much that He HAS acted, doing something and no one else could do or would do. God has mediated this bridge, this chasm that exists between God and man because of sin by sending His one and only Son, Jesus, to be the Mediator, the only hope for a fallen world.
By nature sinful mankind is an enemy of God. But because of the act of God in becoming man in Jesus, sinful man has now been made friends with God, not by human works, but by God’s work, by His divine intervention. Through Jesus’ keeping of the Ten Commandments, His scourging, His bloody death on the cross God has acted and has slain the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Sins are washed away in Christ. Debts are paid by Christ. Transgressions are forgiven by Christ. This is what is known in our text as the righteousness of God in Christ. Man has been made right with God, friends with God, because of the life, suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus.
This righteousness of God is not of our doing. It is foreign to us; we play no part in it. God has decided, and has judged Christ in your place. It is as if God as the Judge of the world sits on His throne and hears your plea of guilty, yet by His Word He forgives you and declares you not guilty so that you may go free and live freely for Him.
Pastor George Stoeckhard, an old Lutheran pastor and professor put it this way: “This righteousness of God rests outside of us in God, in God's judgment, and so is as firm and immovable as God Himself . . . He whom God declares righteous is righteous, even though all the world and all devils condemn him, even though his own conscience pronounces him guilty and judges him . . .. The righteousness of which he speaks is identical to the forgiveness of sins.”
This forgiveness is offered freely. You are reconciled to God not because of what you have done, but because of what Christ has done for you. This reconciliation is yours. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference; only an act of God can restore sinners from ungodliness to communion with God. Only God can act and He has, for God justifies, pronounces righteous, unrighteous man; He 'justifies the ungodly'. (4:5)
Jesus has given His life as a ransom, so that you are no longer a slave to sin and the world, but are now free to give praise and glory to God. And so we boast. Not of ourselves, but of Jesus. We boast of what God has done for us in Christ. We boast of His forgiveness, His new life, His salvation, and we offer this to others in our work together as brothers and sisters in Christ and members of His Church. We boast of God’s love in Christ for nothing will ever separate us from Christ. For you and I have been purchased with a price, we belong to God! We have been purchased, not with silver or gold, but with His, Jesus, precious blood and by His innocent suffering and death, that we may be His own and life under Him in His kingdom, serving Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness.
May God empower us to boast of our God who saves us in Jesus!
Amen