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Click on this link to open the Scripture passage in a new window: Romans 10:8-13ESV
Romans 10:8-13 - The Word Is Near You
Let me briefly recap what we've learned so far about Romans 10 and then get into verses 8-13. We've learned that even in the Old Testament, under Moses' ministry, God did not demand that Israel earn His approval by perfectly obeying His Law. But God's approval was necessary to be saved (The Bible calls that being "righteous"-i.e., "right before God"). Many Christians struggle to find meaning in the Old Testament because they think it is about rules; that it's outdated and replaced by the New Testament. But what Paul says in verse 8 shows that his Gospel and Moses' Gospel is the same Gospel: "that is, the word of faith that we proclaim." They both preached that people are saved by being counted righteous when they believe in the Gospel. In other words, Paul is telling his readers that God offered salvation to Israel the same way He does to the rest of the nations: by believing a Message-what verse 8 calls, "the word".
We also learned that in verses 6-7, Paul was trying to explain that the Message of Salvation, the "word" Moses was telling the Israelites about, wasn't something far away they had to go and find-as if it depended on great effort. Look again in verse 6 at how Paul adds his comments to the portions he quotes from Deuteronomy 30: where Moses warns against thinking, "Who will ascend into heaven [looking for the way to be saved]?", Paul adds, "that is, to bring Christ down". He's saying that when Moses said this, the real meaning was that God, through Christ, brought the Message of Salvation near to us. So salvation comes by believing a Message, and that Message has already been delivered to us. What's left for us to do? What's our part?
I've told you before about how my mom explained the Gospel to me when I was about 5 years old. 100,000 years from now, in the New Heavens & Earth, I will still be telling this story and overflowing with gratitude to my mom for what she did for me that day! Being 5 years old, I didn't understand anything of why my sins deserved death, or how I had become a sinner, only that I had. I didn't understand anything of how Jesus' death on the cross saved me, only that it did. So what was left for me to do?
Most of us probably have at least seen someone in a movie or on TV served with a process notifying them of a legal action against them in court. If a defendant is not served with proper notice, by law, then the court cannot proceed because at least in the States, every citizen has the constitutional right to "due process". I remember an old episode of a TV show in which a doctor was being sued and the process server came in to see the doctor, carrying an envelope, but pretending to be a patient so he could get in the door. The doctor asked him to remove his coat, or something like that, to be examined and the other fellow asked him to hold the envelope he was carrying. As soon as it was in the doctor's hand, the "patient" said, "You've been served" and got up and walked out.
Since, in the Gospel, God has done everything necessary to save sinners through Christ, including delivering the Message to us, all we can do is receive it. Up until that point, we might not want it, we might hate God, we might resist the Gospel. But when we simply receive it, we are saved. But what does it mean for us to "receive the Gospel"? It must mean more than simply hearing it?
When I was a kid, probably 10 years old, I began to wonder how I could be sure that I was saved. So whenever I first read Romans 10:9, I thought I'd found the foolproof method I was looking for to guarantee my salvation. But I made two mistakes in how I understood verse 9 that led me to misunderstand the passage and so to miss Paul's point-that our part in the Gospel is just to receive it. I misunderstood this passage, I misunderstood how exactly I had "gotten saved", but I was still in fact saved. Yet my misunderstanding subtly shifted my confidence in salvation to something I did instead of resting in the Saviour who is the Fountainhead of joy for those who trust Him. And as I explain and then clear up the two mistakes I made when reading verse 9, maybe your confidence will grow stronger that you are in fact saved? I'm praying it will and I've been praying the last two days that stronger confidence in your salvation will result in more joy in your heart.
Mistake #1
[read v 9] I used to think that this verse meant that one of the two things you had to do to make sure you're really saved was to say out loud that "Jesus is Lord." I thought this was what "confess" meant.I don't know how many times I must have said those words out loud trying to make certain I did it right? How many times was that anxiety really behind my summer camp "rededications"? But the word "confess," in the original language here, does not mean "to say out loud". It means, "to agree". One of the problems faced by the early Church, shortly after the New Testament was written, was that when faced with the choice to denounce Christ or be thrown to the lions, an alarming number of Christians denounced Christ! Many of them thought it was just words but in their hearts they were still believers. When Christians confess, however, it is not just words. It agreement with the Message we have received. And so the words of agreement spring out of the inner conviction of the truth of the Gospel. Since the Word has come to us, near to us, all we can do is receive it by agreeing with it, by accepting it as truth. Words matter. If your agreement with the Gospel is fake, then your salvation isn't real either. And as Jesus warned in Luke 9:26, "whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels."
Mistake #2
When I was mistaken about what it means in verse 9 to "confess" I was also mistaken about what it means to "believe". I thought belief was much the same as "agreement". It's not. Confession is about expressing one's agreement. Belief is different. I could agree that Jesus rose from the dead but that doesn't mean it's personal to me. You see, Paul calls the Gospel Message he preached, "the word of faith" (verse 8). So when I hear the Word, its Message about who Jesus is and what He has done, in order to be saved by it, my agreement with its details need to become a matter of faith. That is, I need to trust in its power to save me. This Word is "near us" when it is personal, inside us, what we trust in.
I was talking with someone a few days ago and he was surprised when I told him that it was only in the last few years, 2005 I think, that I really came to understand what it means that the Gospel Message is about "justification by faith". But what joys God has awakened in me as I have come to grasp more deeply the magnificence of His Gospel! I want that for every one of you, so I don't want you to miss this point. The end of verse 9 promises that if you really agree with the Gospel and if you really believe, you will what? "...Be saved". I said earlier that having "God's approval" is necessary to be saved. The Holy God who is perfect in righteousness must approve of you and me otherwise His holy wrath will destroy us on the Day of Judgement.This is a problem. As Job said, "how can a man be in the right before God?" (Job 9:2). And as Paul quoted David, "There is no one righteous, not even one" (Rom. 3:10). Romans 10:10 lays out the solution to this problem [read]. Pulling together the two threads from verse 9 about "confessing" and "believing", it's cause for joy to see how God approves of us when we receive the Gospel Message. He sent His Son, Jesus, to live a perfectly righteous life and to die in the place of unrighteous sinners. So when we trust in the Son whom God sent, when we trust that His substituted righteousness and His substituted death covers our unrighteousness and satisfies the penalty for our sin, God is then pleased to declare that He approves. He will never disapprove of anyone who trusts in the Son of whom He approves. So Paul says, in verse 10, that by confessing and believing, we are justified and saved.
When we keep reading into verses 11-13, we can see that something else is going on here. The shocking truth that Paul is teaching here is that though the Gospel is for everyone it only saves some. Again, as I said last week, though chapters 9-11 are all about God's sovereignty in salvation, in chapter 10, Paul's words prove that "God's sovereignty is compatible with human responsibility."[i] Confessing and believing the Gospel justifies and saves anyone. Not just Jews. Not just people born in the right country or to the right families or to parents attending the right churches. This Gospel saves anyone. For the Bible tells me so. In verse 11, Paul quotes Isaiah 28:16, [read]. In verse 12, he heads off any charges of racism on God's part: [read]. Yet here he also suggests that people have to respond to the Gospel Message by calling on God to save them. Again, in verse 13, he supports this from the Old Testament, quoting from Joel 2:32, [read]. This is Paul's overall point here: that God does not have two sets of rules. Everyone is saved the same way when they receive the Gospel, when they agree with it, when they believe it. But there are two conditions. Some of you probably noticed the word, "if" in verse 9 and wondered why I didn't mention it. I'm mentioning it now. The word, "if" introduces two conditions necessary for the Gospel Message to result in your salvation and in mine.
Condition #1
"If you confess that Jesus is God." I used to think confessing Jesus as "Lord" meant committing to obey Him as Boss. It does include that but means much more than that. The word, "Lord" is not used something like "Boss" here. It's not a description of His position over you and me, it's His title. The word, "Lord", in the original language is "Kurios". This was a title the Jews used in Paul's time to refer to the God of the Old Testament. It was no small thing for a Jew like Paul to come to call Jesus by this title. It meant that Jesus is Jehovah God. The Gentiles also used this word as a title for the Emperor, for Caesar, when they worshipped him as a god, calling him "Kurios". For a Roman to call someone else Lord could mean a death sentence. So when Paul writes, in verse 9, telling this church of Jews and Greeks in Rome that to be saved they had to agree verbally that Jesus is "Kurios" or "Lord", he's not just saying they have commit to obeying Him but that they have to declare their agreement that He is God.
Condition #2
"If you trust that what He did saves you." Verse 9 says that we have to believe in our hearts that God raised Jesus from the dead. This condition must include belief that Jesus died (otherwise why did He need raising?). And this must include belief that He died innocently, a righteous man. Which must include belief that everything He said while He was alive was true. Which must include belief that God sent Him, as He claimed, to die for our sins so that we could have eternal life (c.f. John 3:16-17; 1:29; Heb. 10:5-7). So to trust in the fact that God raised Jesus includes trusting in all the other facts of the Gospel leading to His resurrection. In verse 9, Paul is referring to the resurrection as a summary of the whole Gospel story because when God raised Jesus it meant that Jesus had finished doing all that God sent Him to do. This is what you have to believe. This is what you have to receive. The Word that saves has come near to you: The Word that tells of God sending His Son so that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life. If you want the joy that God intends for His people you need this.
"All of us, to some degree live around the truth of the gospel but do not "get" it. So the key to continual and deeper spiritual renewal and revival is the continual re-discovery of the gospel"[ii]. - Tim Keller
