Exposed: The Great Cover-Up, Part 2

Last week, with the suggestion
that really the reminder, the observation that men really want
to sin. They are inclined to sin. They
want to sin. They want to commit crimes. They
want to do misdeeds. And the worst part of that, the
second part of the equation is they want to get away with it.
They want to sin with impunity. They want to commit crimes. and
never get caught, never get prosecuted, never suffer the consequences
of their wrongdoing. I suggested a number of scenarios,
a number of famous cover-ups, Watergate being one of them,
where men commit crimes and then immediately proceed to cover
up their crimes or to attempt to do the same. And that cover-up
continues, not just following the crime. Sometimes it precedes
the crime itself, a preparation. for their sin and a preparation
to cover it over. Sometimes it follows long after
the crime for years and years. Sometimes we read of one being
arrested and convicted of a crime that took place years ago and
yet somehow, seemingly almost in their own conscience, the
crime was covered over. Of course, my favorite scene
continues not only to the courtroom where, through some lawyer’s
assistance, the crime is attempted to be covered over anew, but
my favorite part of that is what law enforcement calls the perp
walk, right? Where they’re taken out of some
jail cell or on the way to the police vehicle or from the police
vehicle, and all the while they’re attempting to cover their face.
They can’t even sin proudly. They want to get away with murder.
They want to sin with impunity. And God’s Word tells us that
the greatest attempt of all of these kinds of crimes was the
crime of attempting to hide God, to cover over God so that they
could sin. And God exposes it all. And he tells
us that great account in the first chapter of Romans. We pick
it up and all the way back in verse 13, where we can get Paul’s
perspective on the gospel itself. Paul wrote there. And I do not
want you to be unaware, brethren, that often I have planned to
come to you and have been prevented thus far, in order that I might
obtain some fruit among you also, even as among the rest of the
Gentiles.” Paul desired to go to Rome. He had made that clear
to them. His efforts had been thwarted, but it wasn’t because
he was ashamed of the gospel. Verse 14, I am under obligation
both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish.
Thus, for my part, I am eager to preach the gospel to you also
who are in Rome. For I am not ashamed of the gospel
of God, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone
who believes. To the Jew first and also to
the Greek. For in it, that is in the gospel,
the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith as it is
written, but the righteous man shall live by faith. For the
wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness
and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. Because that which is known about
God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them.
For since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes,
His eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen
being understood through what has been made so that they are
without excuse. For even though they knew God,
they did not honor him as God or give thanks, but they became
futile in their speculation, and their foolish heart was darkened.
Professing to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory
of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible
man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.
Therefore, God gave them over in the loss of their hearts to
impurity that their bodies might be dishonored among them. For
they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served
a creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever. Amen.
For this reason, God gave them over to degrading passions. For
their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural.
And in the same way, also, the men abandoned the natural function
of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another. Men
with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own
persons the due penalty of their error. And just as they did not
see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to
a depraved mind. To do those things which are
not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness,
greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice, they
are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful,
inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding,
untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful, and, although they know the ordinance
of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death.
They not only do the same, but give hearty approval to those
who practice them. Paul’s great design in this section. Having already affirmed to the
Roman church of his desire to come there and to preach the
gospel makes it known to them that he was eager to come and
do that very thing. Paul was eager to come and to
preach the gospel because it was the gospel of God. And as
the gospel of God, it had the power of God. And it had the
power of God because it bore and presented the righteousness
of God. The righteousness of God is absolutely
crucial because there is no righteousness in humanity. There is no righteousness
in man. That’s his great point in verse
18. We are absolutely desperate for the righteousness of God,
which brings the power of God for salvation, because we have
no righteousness in ourselves. That’s Paul’s primary point here. What he wants to do here in chapter
18, all through chapter 3, verse 3, and I just told you, Tony,
and I told you to listen to this. It’s incessant! It’s one small
step about us if you may. We are all incessant! No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, What Paul does, though, here,
particularly in chapter 1, is articulate the sinfulness of
the Gentile world, the heathen, if you will. And from verses
18 through 32, he declares that we are all to take up the cause
of the justice. Perhaps it’s to then snap back. No, they didn’t. And Paul’s conclusion
is that we are all under sin. We have all sinned and fallen with impunity to sin
and to live. Even though I have to cut by
explaining. Sure, sure, sure. The response is what we looked
at last week. It’s the very first thing in the passage. The wrath
of God is revealed from heaven, heaven. Very first thing that
Paul addresses is and last and last Lord’s day. Just a very brief review. There is no righteousness in
any of us. that as one said, men in themselves
are exposed to condemnation, destitute of any righteousness
which can satisfy the demands of God. We have no righteousness
of our own. And since we are thorough going
sinners, we are desperate for the righteousness of God. Those
clothes, those robes of righteousness that allow us to stand before
a holy guest. It is a powerful motivation to
to go and to preach the gospel to others. Your friends aren’t
just in trouble, they are doomed. Damned, they are under the guilt
of their sin. And God’s wrath should motivate
us to evangelism. There is indeed a pressing and
awful need, as one said. We must be those who take the
good news of salvation because they are in utterly desperate
straits. This wrath we saw is real. The
word is used to speak of an impulse of propensity, but it is an impulse
of propensity towards anger, indignation. Vengeance translated
in various forms in the New Testament, but often as wrath. And as we saw in the book of
Romans, it is very legitimate to refer to the book of Romans
as the book of wrath, because twelve times in this official,
far more than any other, wrath is taken up as the great subject
and developed and developed in full. We saw also last week by way
of a very brief review that the sad feature of the wrath of God
in our day and age is almost a reaction out of shame. We are ashamed to even discuss
it. Philosophers for thousands of years have tried to reason
that God cannot possibly be a God of wrath because it’s a weakness.
Anger is a weakness. It is wholly unbecoming of God
to be angry. And as a result, many Christians
in our own days, if they speak of the wrath of God at all, they
speak of it and try to explain it away out of some kind of shame
or embarrassment of God. As a result from the pulpit,
there’s a tendency to ignore the wrath of God, to play the
subject down because the subject has become almost completely
taboo. So we say, even as we suggested
last week, even if we allow God a little bit of leeway after
all, he’s God, let’s let him have a little leeway with his
temper, his temper. Right. But aren’t there better
qualities, shouldn’t we be focusing on better qualities of God? And
as I pointed out last week, there are far more references in Scripture
to anger, fury and the wrath, wrath of God and of God than
there are to The character qualities of love and forgiveness. Scriptures constantly ascribe
anger to God, not out of shame, but as fact. We don’t need to be ashamed of
God’s wrath. God’s wrath isn’t like our own.
God is holy. We are not holy. And when God
is angry, God is an arbitrary in his anger. He doesn’t fly
off the handle. He is consistent in standing
against evil. And as we saw last week, it isn’t
like our anger at all. It isn’t a flying off the handle.
It isn’t erupting, losing it or any of those other ways that
we refer to our own anger. When God exercises his anger,
it is always righteous indignation. And so we saw that we have a
great misunderstanding. That’s why we’re embarrassed
about it. We have a great misunderstanding about God’s wrath. But until
we know that God is a God of wrath, that God has the right
to be angry and that God, an angry God, is a fearful thing. I was admonished by one sister
to share with you a portion of my own upbringing. And my conversion
to Christ was largely because my eyes were open to the fact
that God is an angry God. For years, I had lived smugly
under the truth that was presented to me, that God loved me and
had a wonderful plan for my life. And I knew this because I knew
in giving myself to God, God was getting a good thing. And for years, I lived with that
smugness. But I knew in my heart, I was
not a Christian. I didn’t live like it. I didn’t
look like it. And until one day I took a little
class called Great American Speakers. And in that class, I had to draw
five speeches from American history. We would. As God would have it,
I drew four sermons, the fifth speech that I drew was Lincoln’s
House Divided. Even that speech was built on
a biblical passage. And I knew that God was trying
to get my attention because nobody else. I mean, there were probably
only 10 sermons in the entire mix and I had five. And I started researching and
delivering these and I had fun doing it. Lincoln’s speech is
a powerful, if not interesting treatment of the biblical text.
Then I came across another little ditty that was amusing for its
day, had no real staying power with me. It was called a beauty
of a life of service. It was interesting. And just
when I thought I would get out of the class, With my neck and
my own pride intact, I came across a little message that Jonathan
Edwards delivered in the 1700s called Sinners in the Hands of
an Angry God. Well, they must have misprinted
it. An angry God, and I began to read about myself and for
the first time in all of my life, Someone told me that God is angry
and that he’s rightfully so, and that I am the sinner in God’s
angry hand. And it was that punctuation mark
in my life that God used to bring me to knees of repentance. God
is justly angry with sinners all day long. Their sin is displeasing. It is odious to him. It sickens
him. It angers him. And in an instant,
he could justly exercise that anger and they are wiped out
for eternity. So when Paul says the wrath of
God is revealed, it is already present, it is already being
poured out. And I shared with you that I
loved I loved the way Piper put it. John Piper paints the picture
of the wrath of God as a hurricane and that if you step away from
God, if you step away from holy things, you young people preparing
to go out into the world and to college, you step away from
God and you step into the wrath of God. You go away from the
way of obedience, from the paths of obedience. And that’s why
I say you get a ticket. If you get a speeding ticket,
that is the wrath of God that is already being poured out.
That’s a minor taste of it. But the wrath of God, you don’t
need to wait until the end of the world to get a view of the
wrath of God. The wrath of God is already being
revealed. It has been from all time. And so we saw God’s response
to the cover up is the wrath of God. It is already being poured
out. The wrath of God is revealed
from heaven. And it brings us to point two. We are examining the great cover
up that God has exposed, and I’m giving you the details of
this monumental conspiracy. The first of all was God’s response
to the cover up. Secondly, though, I want to look
this morning at the nature of the cover up. What exactly took
place? What is God so angry about? That’s what we want to talk about
this morning, the nature of the cover up, verse 18. Where Paul
says, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against
all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth
in unrighteousness. Paul continues on to show just
exactly towards what or towards whom God’s wrath is directed. Last week, we were instructed
that God’s wrath is not arbitrary or capricious. Here, Paul shows
that it is justly called down from heaven by sinful humanity. The wrath that is already being
revealed, Isn’t just a bad dream. It’s not just an irrational,
uncontrolled fury by God. That is the wrath, that is the
anger of a holy God, a merciful God that is literally being called
down from heaven. As one said here, the apostle
proceeds to describe the awful state of the Gentiles living
under the revelation of nature, but destitute of the knowledge
of the grace of God revealed in the gospel. Now, there’s a
whole lot of discussion about these two big words and ungodliness
and unrighteousness. The basic question is, are there
two camps? Is there the camp of the unrighteous
and the camp of the ungodly that are both crying out to heaven
to bring down God’s wrath? Or is there only one camp? I would take the latter. I would
say that there are two distinct concepts, but together their
functioning is one. The ungodliness and unrighteousness
of men. Two names for the same thing,
and they’re essentially almost blended together to give the
full description of the state of humanity. The ungodliness
and unrighteousness of men, as one said, they cannot be viewed
complete as completely as separate entities, both represent sin,
rebellion against God. The first view sin is a lack
of reverence for God, and the second is a lack of reverence
for his ordinances. We’ll clarify that as we go.
Nevertheless, there are two words there. And the order of them
is significant. Ungodliness is laid as kind of
a foundation, if you will, that leads to unrighteousness. Though
both are sinful and Though either one of those sinful conditions
would call down the wrath of God, the two conditions are related. Sinful attitudes toward God lead
to sinful treatment toward our fellow men. That’s the bottom
line. As one person said it much more simply. Impiety is the precursor
to immorality, that’s true. If you have a sinful attitude
toward God, Ultimately, that’s going to play out in how you
treat others, isn’t it? But let’s look at them individually
first. What is ungodliness? Ungodliness essentially is living
as if there were no God. Stronger still, it is living
as if there were no God and treating Him accordingly. Pretending as
if He doesn’t exist. Sinning high-handedly. It is
living in a violation of reverence, as one said. Impiety toward God
is another. And look at the way Paul describes
it. That little word, all, and note
the comprehensiveness of that. All ungodliness and all unrighteousness. And I believe that both words
are carried under that word, all. any degree of ungodliness
and any kind of unrighteousness is utterly displeasing to God.
So when you’re thinking that you’re sinning with impunity
in some little minor act of unrighteousness towards your fellow, towards
your neighbor, There is no such thing. One person painted this
picture, I really appreciated this. A lack of spirituality
and outright immorality, how often? Do men disregard the mere
absence of a spiritual reverence for God as justly exposing them
to his wrath? And I thought that is so good.
What on earth is he saying? Right. I mean, I knew there was
something there and I had to read it like eight times. How
often do men in general disregard the mere absence of a spiritual
reverence for God as justly exposing them to his wrath? I’ll tell
you what it means. From time to time, you hear somebody
say it’s a nice person, right? It’s always a nice person. Good
people, we would call them. You hear some nice person offer
up the excuse, well, I’m not a churchgoer. And they would
go on to say that they’re not murderers, thugs, they’re not
drunkards, they’re not vile sinners, they just don’t do religion,
right? You hear it all the time. They don’t actively argue against
the existence of God, they think that there is a higher power,
but neither do they actively love or submit themselves to
him. Neither do they gather with God’s people, neither do they
submit to his authority and that alone. That casual indifference
to God is reason enough to reap the whirlwind of God’s anger,
that’s what. That’s what the commentator was
saying. All ungodliness, all unrighteousness, any of it in
any degree brings down the wrath of God. Ungodliness, as we saw,
just points to that perversity of a religious character. Unrighteousness. The other word, the other element
of this pleading down the wrath of God is the element that is
referred to as unrighteousness. Now, this word, you know, has
significance primarily to human relations. Sinning against our
fellow man in all its various forms. Listen to how some describe
it. Injustice toward men. Another
said that it is sin regarded as contempt of God’s claims on
man or as a breach of his will. Unrighteousness refers to what
is moral perversity or immorality, and so the abundant call for
the wrath of God goes forth. It begins with their hard attitude
toward God and it terminates in sinful conduct toward others
and it’s complete. One Puritan said it this way,
so far from rendering to their creator the love and obedience
of a grateful heart, they trampled on his authority and strove to
rob him of his glory, failing then in their duty towards God
and having plunged into the depths of all ungodliness. It is no
wonder that their dealings with fellow men were characterized
by all unrighteousness. But mind you. The spiritual slide
is far from complete. What begins with wrong attitudes
toward God and proceeds in sinful behavior toward people must be
hidden. We’ve got to find a way to cover
it over because we have to live here. We have to live with these
people against whom we’re sinning. The conscience is strong. We
know that we’ve sinned. And as such, they instinctively
know that what they think, the way they treat God, their sinful
behavior toward others, involving others, they know that it’s all
wrong. They could be broken, they should
repent, but an easier approach is simply to reason God away.
To suppress him at all costs, this is the great cover up. And
Paul tells us further, that these are those who suppress the truth
in unrighteousness. In their sin, they go about with
a full court press, trying to keep God from seeping through. Their practical righteousness
begins to press forward And it reacts on the inward man, trying
to repress their own conscience, blinding their own understanding,
hardening their heart, said one. As another painted the picture,
this individual silences the haunting fact that there is a
claim he will not meet, a will he ought to love, but to which
he prefers to his own. The majesty of an eternal righteous
one, he thrusts below his consciousness or into a corner of it and keeps
it there that he may follow his own way. That’s the whole goal. The whole goal is an attempted
cover up. The sin is there. The crime’s been committed. Now,
what we’ve got to do somehow is to hide the crime, cover it
up. Conscience will tell us what’s right. The conscience is a God
given mechanism to steer us. To repenting of what’s evil and
to doing what’s right, if we’ll only listen with the will. Once
it is under attack by evil motives, becomes dysfunctional. As one said, the penetrating
description of the essential nature of sin is that it is always
an assault upon the truth. The attempt to suppress it, bury
it out of sight, obliterate it from the memory, It is the essence
of sin that it can never be more than an attempt to suppress the
truth and an attempt which is bound in the end to prove futile. God will have his way. God has
given us a conscience for our own benefit. It’s the warning bell that is
supposed to go off and warn us that the way that we’re going
is not good. And if that conscience is suppressed. And it often is ultimately. The next morning that goes off
is the wrath of God. And so the truth is held down,
it’s thwarted, it’s muted and hindered. It is the truth about
God, the truth concerning God, the works of creation, the law
of God, all of which was presented in full. As one said, Scripture teaches
that the wicked make an attempt to suppress the truth. The fool
is constantly trying to convince himself that there is no God,
even when he’s confronted with the voice of God addressing him
by means of special revelation. He still refuses to capitulate. And this is what I’ve said a
thousand times. What makes the whole effort of
apologetics Nothing more of a hobby to me.
Apologetics. You’re not going to save anybody
by apologetics, necessarily. It isn’t more facts that they
need. I remember one of the most absurd
scenes in all of Scripture, right, the arrest of Jesus, the arrest
of Jesus, and all of a sudden Peter gets bold and he reaches
up and draws his sword and whacks off a chunk of Malchus’s ear.
Remember what the Lord did? The Lord picked up the thing
flopping in the dirt, put it back on Malchus and healed him
on the spot. And the soldiers all had a revival
and they said, Lord, we repent. No, that’s not what happened,
is it? They kept right on arresting Jesus. It isn’t more facts that
they needed. The world has the truth. The
world knows that there’s a God. But they suppress it. They hold
it down. They know what’s right. They
know what’s true. And they press it down, they hold it back, they
suppress the truth in order to sin with impunity. You want proof? That’s what Paul offers. That’s
what Paul offers in verse 19 is proof. Proof to this statement
that they suppress the truth in unrighteousness. And that
brings us to point three, proof of the cover up. If this case
were being played out in court, this is where the evidence would
be offered. You’ve made this grand suggestion
that they are attempting to suppress the truth in unrighteousness.
Where is your proof? Paul says here it is. Because
that which is known about God is evident within them because
God made it evident to them. Now, as in many places in Paul’s
writing, there’s a connection issue here, what is the clause
modifying some say that Paul is telling us the reason that
the wrath is being poured out. Others say that it’s providing
the justification for that suggestion that some suppress the idea of
God. I take the second point here.
Paul is giving us the evidence. He’s giving us the reason. Now,
all of that draws down the wrath of God. And so ultimately, it
doesn’t matter. How can it be said that men hinder
the truth in unrighteousness? How can that be said? They hinder
the truth because there is a clear manifestation of truth to them.
God himself told them. God himself has made it clear
to them that they are sinners. And so I take it to be connected
to that immediately preceding clause. They knew God. The bottom line is they don’t
act on that knowledge. God’s given them a clear view
of himself, a clear understanding of who he is. Go back to the
passage and just look at it in its simplicity. They suppress
the truth in God, in unrighteousness, because that which is known about
God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them.
And we’ll go on to look at the specifics of what God has revealed
shortly. But this knowledge, they have
it. God’s given it to them. You remember. What is it, 37
chapters that Job had to deal with his friends? All who knew
about God better than Job, who was the focal point of the entire
book. And finally, after 37 chapters, Job, you know, kind of pauses,
right? Questions begin to bubble up
in his head. And God responds. Do you remember God’s response?
I want to take you to look at nature. I want to take you on
a nature walk, Job. And I’ll let you inform me. I’ll
let you teach me, Job. If you would, I want you to turn
to Job chapter 38. And mind you, this is godly Job.
If you find Psalms, all you do is go left one book, find chapter
38, and you’ll meet us there. The bottom line is it is beyond
inconceivable, and it happens every day. This great argument
of sinful men who tries to reason God away by saying, where is
he? He never gave me a Bible, he never
gave me tablets written on stone, he never did miracles in front
of me. Oh, really? Where is the proof of God? When
did he ever tell me about himself? If he’s real, why doesn’t he
just show up? Years ago, there was a hugely
popular song, a secular song. He’s still here. Sadly, playing
in stores and restaurants and the lyrics, when I first they
immediately caught my attention and then they utterly shocked
me. They seized my attention. And it’s practically an anthem
for the atheist. And they illustrate the sinner’s
attempt to reason away God himself. The lyrics go like this, if God
had a name, what would it be? And if you called it to his face,
if you were faced with him in all his glory, what would you
ask him if you just had one question? And all of that just kind of
puts God in this convenient little box, reduces him to almost nothing. But it’s the chorus that turns
my stomach. What if God was one of us? Just a slob. Just a stranger
on the bus trying to make his way home. What if? The whole
statement there is a statement of doubt. God doesn’t exist.
If He existed, He would come down and be like one of us. A
great prick. And Jesus was like one of us. And Jesus died on our behalf. Because I made it evident to
them. Listen to what he tells Job,
righteous Job. Look at chapter 38, verse 1. The Lord answered Job out of
the whirlwind and said, Who is this that darkens counsel? by words without knowledge, gird
up your loins for you. When I laid the foundation of
the earth, when I laid the foundation for producing not only day and
night, but seasons, where were you? Did you set the timing of the
Earth? Either in its orbit or in its rotation? Since you know, or who stretched
the line on it? I know. There have been attempts
to measure the size, not only the size, size of the, so it’s
a weight, weight, weight, weight. I mean, what? Assume zeroes at
the end of it, you can’t count it anyway, it’s heavy. Very,
very, very, Very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,
very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,
very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,
very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,
very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,
very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,
very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,
very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,
very, very, very, very, When the morning stars sang together
and all the sons of God shouted for joy. Or who enclosed the
sea with doors when bursting forth it went out from the womb.
He tries to use these anthropomorphic terms, these simple terms that
we would understand. Doors. He tries to describe to
Job, tries to draw Job out. Job knows full well there are
no doors. There’s water. And it’s perfectly
measured, and it’s in this cycle that is constantly recircling
throughout the earth, otherwise we would be flooded. When I made a cloud, verse 9,
it’s garments in thick darkness, it’s swaddling bands, and I placed
boundaries on it, and I set up bolts and doors, and I said,
thus far shall you come, but no farther, and here your proud
waves shall stop. Exactly enough water. So that
we could go swimming. But not so much water that we
would all be drowned. Comes right to the edge of the
beach and stops, right? Have you ever in your life commanded
the morning and caused the dawn to know its place? Now he takes
up the sun. Where were you, Job? How did you set the timing of
the earth? How would you? If you cause the dawn to know
its place, verse 12, that it might take hold of the ends of
the earth and the wicked be shaken out of it, it is changed like
clay under the seal. They stand forth like a garment
from the wicked. Their light is withheld and the
uplifted arm is broken. And over and over again, all
the way down through chapter 39 through the very end. God
takes Job on a walk through creation. A nature walk, if you will. And
he reminds Job that he alone is God, that he has revealed
himself in that. That if we would pause and to
look, we would see and know that there
is a God. Paul says that’s basic. That
is the bare minimum. It’s absolutely inexcusable if
you don’t at least have a bare understanding, a bare belief
in a higher power. The Bible speaks very knowingly
of people who write stupid lyrics. About things that aren’t true.
And the Bible has said for centuries, the fool has said in his heart,
there is no God. Psalm 14, one. No matter the
proof, no matter the testimony from God, regardless of how clearly
the message goes forth, they repress it to the point of doubt.
They smother the very idea of God, though clearly revealed
to them. How do we know they’re repressing
and suppressing the knowledge of God? One said it well when he said
they might have said they do not suppress the truth and unrighteousness
for God has not declared it to them as he has done to the Jews. He had, however, sufficiently
displayed in the works of creation, his almighty power, wisdom and
goodness and other divine attributes so as to render them without
excuse. In their ungodliness and unrighteousness,
keep in mind. This is a church going crowd,
remember? This isn’t the church going crowd that we’re talking
about. This isn’t religious knowledge gleaned from years of faithful
attendance in Sunday school. These are the heathen. These
are the godless, irreligious people. And neither are they
the benefactors of having heard the gospel. Suddenly and clearly,
clearly articulated to them through whatever means, suddenly presented
to them. Nevertheless, Paul says they
are guilty. They’re absolutely culpable because they have a
knowledge of God, incomplete as it may be, it is clear as
a bell. The knowledge that they have
been given is enough. It’s enough. One pastor said, even entirely
apart from the special revelation Through the gospel, whichever
any Gentiles have never heard, God has made himself known and
continues to do so. Paul concludes by saying, for
God has made it evident to them. God teaches men and women every
day. God teaches us about who he is
and what he’s done every day. And it was fascinating as I began
to study this last couple of weeks and look, I remember googling
at one point, amazing facts of nature. And all these websites
that talk about all the amazing things. And I started looking
at some of them. The ant, get this, the ant can
lift 50 times its own weight. You won’t want to write these
down. It can pull 30 times its own weight. The flea can jump
350 times its body length. And I started to become enamored
with these things. These are just great stuff. The dragonflies have eyes with
as many as 30,000 facets so that they can furnish the intense
vision required in capturing darting fast prey. There you
have that. The cocoon of a silkworm can be unrealed to provide, if
you want to take the time to do this, it can be unrealed to
provide a filament over two thirds of a mile long. Captured by these fun facts.
It amazes me to watch a nature show, how you can watch a nature
show and have them come up with the most ungodly conclusion. Reason God right out of the picture
when you have all of these incredible facts. But then. Along about 10 days
into this study of all these cool websites about bugs and
stuff that happens on the earth and how big the sun is, how fast
the earth is spinning and yet we don’t fall off. I remember
God’s testimony. And God’s testimony is powerful
stuff. Turn, if you would, to Psalm
65. I loved what God said to Job, how
God took him on a nature walk, but God does the same thing throughout
Scripture. In Psalm 65, this time he uses
David. to school us. And I want to pick it up, if
you would, in verse four, how blessed is the one whom you choose
and bring near to you to dwell in your courts. We will be satisfied
with the goodness of your house, your holy temple by awesome deeds. You answer us in righteousness,
O God of salvation. You are the trust of all the
ends of the earth and the farthest sea. And he begins to get into
it. He begins to look out on creation and to see you are almighty
God. It is powerful. who establishes
the mountains by his strength, being girded with might. And
I love living here in Colorado. We drove down to Denver on Thanksgiving
Day, and I love looking at the snow covered mountains. And yet,
as much as I love them, I look at them and so often I rarely
think, God, put that mountain there. who establishes the mountains
by his strength, being girded with might, who stills the roaring
seas, the roaring of their waves, the tumults of the peoples. They
who dwell in the ends of the world’s earth stand in awe of
your signs. You make the dawn and the sunset
shout for joy. You visit the earth and cause
it to overflow. It begins here to talk about
the sustenance of God’s creation. That God didn’t just set it in
motion and stand back and watch like a top. God is actively engaged
in the miracle of providence every day. You visit the earth
and cause it to overflow. You greatly enrich it. The stream
of God is full of water. You prepare their grain, for
thus you prepare the earth. You water its furrows abundantly.
You settle its ridges. You soften it with showers. You
bless its growth. You have crowned the year with
bounty, and your paths drip with fatness. The pastures of the
wilderness drip, and the hills gird themselves with rejoicing.
The meadows are clothed with the flocks, and the valleys are
covered with grain. They shout for joy. Yes, they sing. God says that which is known about God
is evident within them, even within their hearts, because
God made it evident to them. God taught the Sunday school. In all of these works of creation,
God has made himself abundantly clear. Day to day pours forth
speech. Night to night reveals knowledge. There is no speech,
nor are there words. Their voice is not heard. The
line has gone throughout all the earth. Day by day by day,
God is revealing himself. He is constantly pouring out
a testimony of who he is. That ultimately, Paul will say
is inexcusable to not come away with a basic belief, a basic
faith that God exists. Fertullian. First century church father said
it this way, and we’ll close with this. He spoke plainly about
God’s revelation of himself in nature, and he said this, it
was not the pen of Moses. That in initiated the knowledge
of the creator, the vast majority of mankind, though they never
heard the name of Moses, to say nothing of the book. Of the knowledge
of God, of Moses is. Is nothing. In nature, he said,
is the teacher and the soul is the people. We’ve been given
a mighty gift from God just by virtue of the fact that we’ve
been born on Earth. This daily testimony of God, of his nature
and who he is. Next Lord’s Day, we’ll begin
to pick up the details of this cover up, cover up. Which is
verse 20, which will tell us exactly what God has revealed.
His eternal attributes, his eternal power and his divine nature. It’s about before our almighty
God. Our merciful God, we thank you. We thank you for the grace that
you gave in the testimony of yourself. And in the abundant
mercy that you give in opening our eyes to our own sinfulness
and to our desperate need of a savior. Father, you found us
likewise without excuse. And we have in our hearts their
standing that we knew that there had to be something more. But
even that even that was a gift of your hand. We thank you and
praise you. We have no cause to be proud.
We have every cause to be thankful. That out of your abundant mercy,
you saved us. Grant us your grace, father,
as we go forth. Grant us the grace to glorify
you in these great gifts that you’ve given to us in Jesus name. Amen. I’m