Bible in a Year… Day 14 (Romans 3-4)

We’ve reached the end of week 2. I’d like to say it’s been easy this week as well, but I’d be a liar. I’ve had to shuffle around my posting schedule quite a bit to keep these coming daily… with travel due to work, I’ve found that it’s sometimes necessary to wrap up the writings in advance of the day and schedule them for posting.

So, I’ve come clean. If you’ve thought I’ve been great about picking this up daily, don’t keep those false thoughts… life affects my ability to do this on a regular schedule daily, just as it does every other believer I’ve known.

Anyway, it’s Saturday, so we’re back in the epistles again… Romans 3-4.

Today’s notes:

Romans 3:9-18 (NIV)
⁹What shall we conclude then? Are we any better? Not at all! We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin. ¹⁰As it is written:

    “There is no one righteous, not even one;
    ¹¹there is no one who understands,
    no one who seeks God.
¹²All have turned away,
    they have together become worthless;
there is no one who does good,
    not even one.”
¹³“Their throats are open graves;
    their tongues practice deceit.”
“The poison of vipers is on their lips.”
    ¹⁴“Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”
¹⁵“Their feet are swift to shed blood;
    ¹⁶ruin and misery mark their ways,
¹⁷and the way of peace they do not know.”
    ¹⁸“There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

Our sinful state is definitely not a pretty picture. Verse 18 pretty much boils it down to the basics though… without a healthy understanding of God, how would you expect people to behave?

Yeah… pretty much however we want.

Romans 3:21-24 (NIV)
²¹But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. ²²This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, ²³for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, ²⁴and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.

Here’s the good news that counters the nastiness of our sinful nature that Paul describes earlier in Romans 3… despite all our sinfulness, righteousness is still obtainable! Not of ourselves, of course, but direct from God, through the sacrifice of Christ, through faith in Him.

Amazing grace, indeed.