Romans 10:1-15 (#38.2026.02.22)

Scott Keffer [: 00:00:02

Hi, if you're looking for greater hope, assurance, and confidence through the shifting sands of life, then join me on today's episode as we dig deep into the Bible to discover rock-solid truth for life and living from the God of the Bible. I'm your host, Scott Keffer. Hi, and welcome to today's episode. As always, for a deeper experience, you can go to the show notes and download the blank insight sheet Fill in the blanks along with the group. Depending on how you're listening to this, there will be a link to the episode website at beholdingbibletruth.com, and a sheet with the answers is included as well. Enjoy today's episode. Well, let's stand and read Romans 10, please. Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation.

Scott Keffer [: 00:01:00

For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God not in accordance with knowledge. For not knowing about God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. For Moses writes, man who practices the righteousness which is based on law shall live by that righteousness. But the righteousness out of faith speaks as follows: Do not say in your heart, who will ascend into heaven? That is to bring Christ down. Or, who will descend into the abyss? That is to bring Christ up from the dead. But what does it say? The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart. That is the word of faith which we are preaching, that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

Scott Keffer [: 00:02:06

With the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness. With the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. The scripture says whoever believes in him will not be disappointed. There's no distinction between Jew and Greek. The same Lord is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call on him. For whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved. How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? How will they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good things. The word of the Lord.

Scott Keffer [: 00:02:56

Thanks be to God. So I think shared before, when I came to Christ, it was really John MacArthur and John MacArthur's ministry that helped me learn the scriptures. And then there was a woman who ran the Bible Distribution Center, Shirley, my, uh, one of my deep mentors who taught me to love the word of God. And as you love the word of God and go through it, you need to go line upon line, precept upon precept, which means walking through the things you like and walking through the things you don't like, which means walking through the things you understand and walking through the things you don't understand. Which means walking through the things you agree with and walking through the things you don't agree with. So here we are in the midst of a section of Scripture which creates a lot of all three of those. A lot of I don't understand, I don't agree, I don't believe, I don't— right. And so the tendency is not to walk through it at all.

Scott Keffer [: 00:04:04

But the fact is, here it is in the, in the midst of one of these, certainly the most critical books in the New Testament, with the Book of Romans. Because we just can't understand and fully agree on what all this means. And at the core of this is walking through the sovereignty of God over his mercy, and then where does responsibility fit in, and how does that fit in? And is man responsible? And he answers that, yeah, that's the case. And then he says, well, you know, continue to ask, what about Jews who are not coming to Christ? And then what's our responsibility in the midst of that? So all of these are being, you know, laid down. Uh, there's deep, um, uh, wisdom here that we're trying to figure out. So thank you for walking through it with me. So here we are in the midst of it because he's asking, you know, what about unbelieving Jews in Romans 9, which— and he talks about the sovereignty of God and mercy, and now he's talking about some sense of responsibility So God's sovereignty over salvation, which is the first piece, God's sovereignty over salvation, which is what he laid out in Romans 9, right, that God is sovereign over mercy. He has mercy on whom he will have mercy, right? That's God's sovereign right, does not remove, in this case, hard prayer and share, right? So the Apostle Paul says, brethren, to those who are believers.

Scott Keffer [: 00:05:39

So he's speaking to us as believers. My heart's desire, he says, my heart's desire, me personally, is what? And my prayer to God for them is for their salvation. So know God's heart for the lost. Does God have a heart for the lost? Because in the midst of his sovereign mercy that he chooses some and not others, does God have a heart for the lost? Yeah, that's the case. There is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. One sinner who repents. Again, in the midst of this, as I said, as you go over the sovereignty of God, you tend to say, well, is that right? Is it okay? Is it fair that God has sovereignty over them? What about not only what about who he chooses, but what about who he doesn't choose? And how do I figure all that out? We need to run to the core and recognize God is just. He's merciful to whom he be— he'll be merciful.

Scott Keffer [: 00:06:41

And it's hard for us to say, how about those who aren't? But how about the fact that any receive mercy? Reminder, all deserve justice, and some receive mercy. So God's heart is for, for the lost, those who repent. The second, I said, know God's message. Know God's message for the lost. In Romans, he calls it what? Underlined the word of faith. He calls it the word of faith. It's called different things. He said, but we preach Christ crucified.

Scott Keffer [: 00:07:20

Christ crucified. Now he's talking specifically here about the the Jews and the message. Remember, right, it says in 1 Corinthians that the message of Christ crucified to someone who's born Jewish, it's a stumbling block. Like, how would a Messiah, how would the Messiah come, right, in the flesh and die on the cross? That does, for, for a Jew, that doesn't make sense because cursed is the man who hangs on a tree. So the fact that Messiah didn't come conquering, that Messiah would come ride in on what? On a donkey? That does— that's not my Messiah. So it's a stumbling block for Jews. For Gentiles, for Greeks, what is it? It's foolishness. A God who, right, a God who hangs on a cross, that's just foolishness, right? So recognize here.

Scott Keffer [: 00:08:21

So what's God's message? He said, we preach Christ crucified, and that is called the gospel. The gospel. So he says, I'm not ashamed of the gospel. That's the message, right? And in fact, the message isn't just that, although he clarifies that in Corinthians, that Christ came according to the scriptures, that he died, he was buried, and raised. He said, that's the essence of the gospel. But the scriptures are the gospel. The scriptures are the gospel. The message isn't just the full counsel of God, right, is the gospel often boiled down to 4 laws or, you know, all of that where we're trying to take the message.

Scott Keffer [: 00:09:06

But the fact is, when Jesus walked with, with the guys along the way, he opened up the scriptures and he said, The Old Testament testifies of me. And he showed them in the Old Testament all the places— the, the, the— what's the right word— the aha of going through the Old Testament and looking at how often it points to the Lord Jesus, from Genesis all the way through, right? All the way through to Malachi. All of it is pointing to the Lord Jesus. And you say, oh, there he is. Oh, there he is. Oh, there he is. Oh, there he is. There he is.

Scott Keffer [: 00:09:48

So God's message— know his heart, know his message, but also know his power for the lost. Know his power for the lost. Because you could— you can confuse God's sovereignty and his mercy to be que sera sera. In other words, you can say, well, that means God's going to do whatever he wants to do. Sovereignty is not fatalism. Sovereignty is not fatalism. Yes, Bill. You said sovereignty is not fatalism.

Scott Keffer [: 00:10:20

Fatalism, right? Fatalism. Hey, God's going to do whatever he's going to do. Why do anything? He's going to show there's responsibility here. Paul says, all right, I pray I pray. What does that mean? Prayer must matter when it comes to God dispensing his mercy, right? He said, I pray. I have a heart. I pray and I share. So this is really important.

Scott Keffer [: 00:10:48

Let's walk through 2 Corinthians. It says, even if our gospel is— the gospel is veiled. Really, it's veiled. Who's it veiled to? Those who are perishing. Well, who's veiling it in a sense? The god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving. The god of this world, who's that? Satan. So now think about it. In Romans, it says that they are purposefully suppressing truth.

Scott Keffer [: 00:11:26

So that's individuals, and yet there's a spiritual component that Satan is blinding their eyes so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. So he says, we do not preach ourselves, but what do we preach? Christ Jesus as Lord. Interesting, when you walk through here Right. Pay attention to how he identifies. We preach Christ crucified. That's Messiah crucified. We preach. What's he say here? We preach Christ Jesus as Lord, not just Savior, but Lord.

Scott Keffer [: 00:12:11

Messiah, divinity of God, promised one. Jesus, humanity of God.— as Lord. We preach him as Lord. For God who said, light shall shine out of darkness. Well, who— what's he do? What does God the Father do? So think about this. We go back— his sovereignty in, uh, in, in giving out mercy. So he's saying there's darkness, right? There's darkness in our heart. And the Old Testament says we have a heart of stone.

Scott Keffer [: 00:12:48

We have a heart of stone. It's dead. We're dead in our sins and trespasses. There's darkness. Where does the light come from? God has to shine it, speak it forth into the heart. And this is the God who spoke into being all things out of nothing. So he's saying the heart is in darkness and it's dead. God has to speak his light into our heart.

Scott Keffer [: 00:13:14

And then he takes our heart of stone and he replaces it with a heart of flesh. God the Father does work, right? What does he do? He shines in our heart to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Messiah, in the face of Christ. So in 2 Timothy, he says that the Lord's bondservant needs to be gentle. And he says, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition. Is that hard? Yeah, you ever argue with an unbeliever? That's not easy, is it? That's not easy, asking questions. What about this? What about that? He said with gentleness, right? If perhaps— what? Underline, God may grant them repentance. Well, that's interesting. So I just share with gentleness and humility, and God grants repentance.

Scott Keffer [: 00:14:17

I don't grant repentance. I don't perform repentance. God has got to speak light into the heart. I always say it's like, you know, we're holding up a Rembrandt to a blind person. Don't you see? Don't you see? No, they don't see. God will grant repentance. What does it do? Leading to a knowledge of truth, that they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will. So it's a great reminder unbelievers are held captive by their own unwillingness, and they're held captive by Satan, and they're also, in a sense, God blinds them with judicial justice, right? But the essence is, right, God's got to do a spiritual work.

Scott Keffer [: 00:15:10

If you have somebody in your life you've been praying for and sharing with, right, you know that the hardness of the heart, the unwillingness to say, don't you see? Can't you see? Well, what? You know that, right? The hardness. And then all of a sudden somebody flips and you say, where did that come from? Came from God speaking forth. So you need to understand God's heart. We need to know his message and also God's power for the lost. God's power for the lost. So what's he talking about here? The whole of Romans is about how do we sinners obtain the righteousness of God. In order to be in right relationship with God, you have to be righteous as he is righteous, and you have to be of the same nature as him, right? How do you do that? That's what we're talking about here— obtaining the righteousness of God. So he says zeal for the law doesn't save you.

Scott Keffer [: 00:16:15

He's saying, but you know, I'll testify that the Jewish folks, right, have a zeal, but zeal for the law doesn't save you any more than the law does. So he says in Philippians, he said, I was a, you know, he said, if you want to have confidence in the flesh, I far more. He said, check it out, right? I was born of the tribe of Benjamin, right? I'm a Hebrew of Hebrews. I have the ultimate resume. If you want to hang your hat on your personal resume, Paul's saying, I have a resume beyond any others. So he's saying— what's he saying? I'm a Hebrew of Hebrews, as to the law a Pharisee. What does that mean? The first 5 books of the Bible, they memorized by heart. The first 5 books of the Bible, to be a Pharisee, they memorized by heart.

Scott Keffer [: 00:17:19

That's why Jesus said to them, you think that in the scriptures you have salvation, but you're unwilling to come to me because they point to me. So you memorized the scriptures, but you missed the fact that they were pointing. So he was saying, I was a Pharisee, right? As to the law, I knew it, I memorized it. As to zeal, heck, I was a persecutor of the church. As to the righteousness which is found in the law, what's he say? So if those things worked, if it was your resume, it was where you were born and your origin, if you will, like I've got the perfect resume. But he said, no, I count all those things as Dung. Yeah, rubbish. Rubbish.

Scott Keffer [: 00:18:12

So for as many as are the works of the law, for as many as are of the works of the law, they're what? Under a curse. It's written, cursed is everyone who does not— this is it— abide by all the things It's really important to study the law, 600 and whatever commandments, and think, how you doing? Well, the fact is, if you boil them down to 10, how you doing? But see, he showed us in the garden, if you boil it down to one, how you doing? Which is do not eat of the tree. He said it's not the number of commandments, recognizing if God were to lay out commandments to understand the holiness of God, you would need an infinite number, not 600 and some. You need an infinite number to understand the holiness of God. But to understand the sin of man, just go to the garden. Do not eat of the tree. You had everything they wanted, everything they needed, and they wanted what they didn't have. That's the nature of sin.

Scott Keffer [: 00:19:22

That is the nature of sin. So Christ is the goal. Christ is the goal. Messiah Christ, Messiah Jesus, is the goal, the fulfillment, and the culmination of the law at all points. Study through the Old Testament and look for Jesus. Look for Jesus. The law has become our tutor. What's it doing? Our master.

Scott Keffer [: 00:19:57

It's It's our, it's our headmaster. And what's it doing? To lead us. It should point. It's pointing. Ever drive by those signs on the side of the road, you know, with the, the lights and the arrow? It's all pointing. It's pointing to the Messiah. It's pointing to him. You missed it.

Scott Keffer [: 00:20:19

So that we may be justified by faith. So he's saying it's not merely a lack of knowledge, it's literally a moral resistance. It says they were unwilling to submit. And above wrath— remember, when you see wrath, you need to put righteous justice. Right above it, righteous justice, because we get confused with the word wrath. But saying, for the righteous justice of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. What do they do? They suppress the truth. That is an active verb.

Scott Keffer [: 00:21:16

That means they were at work suppressing The truth, because it's that which is known about God, is evident within them, saying, for there's no excuse. So he's saying they were unwilling to submit to God's righteousness. So what did they do? They create their own. Now, what we do, we create our own. Here's the path, here's how it goes. So what is that today? I think it's spirituality, you know, spirituality. I put the word out into the universe. How did it do the universe? One of the guys I know really well, I love him, he's a, he's a wonderful heart, um, Jewish, and we were chatting, he was saying something about the universe like you put it out into the universe.

Scott Keffer [: 00:22:12

Have you heard that? Put it out into the universe. I said, that's really interesting, Bob. I said, imagine your daughter, right, who you've done a lot for. Imagine if they were asking her, you know, who's helped you a lot, and she said, oh, my house. Yeah, my house has been really helpful, and if I need anything, I just call upon my house. And he said, what are you talking about? I said, imagine she just said, right, the reason, right, I've been helped is my house. I said, that would be weird, wouldn't it? He said, yeah, it'd be weird. I said, because you built the house.

Scott Keffer [: 00:22:50

So imagine if she thought her, her help came from the house, not from you who built the house. So I said, if God built the universe, why are people calling upon the universe? Why would they call upon the one who built the universe? And who sustains the universe, calling upon the universe. So spirituality is okay, but not Jesus Christ, not Messiah Jesus. You notice that Jesus is God, Jesus is the only way? That's because we're unwilling to submit. We're unwilling to submit. So if you flip over, God's righteousness, the righteousness of God, how do we attain it? Is by faith, based on faith. So Paul says that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the law, but, but what? That which is through faith in Christ. He's saying the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith.

Scott Keffer [: 00:24:04

The righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, which again, it's no big deal, but even as believers talk about, you know, when I received Christ, when I got right with God, when I got Huh. See, it's our nature to think it's right, the Copernicus problem, like the universe revolves around me. Of course I did it right. But he's saying it's the righteousness which comes from God based on faith. So he says, do not say in your heart in the middle of the scripture, and you think, what is he talking about here? What's he talking about? Well, he's referring to Deuteronomy 30:11-14. So Moses says, right, to the people of God, right, here's the law. He's saying, here are the commandments of God. And the people are saying, oh, this is too hard, it's too, you know.

Scott Keffer [: 00:25:06

And so he says, for this commandment which I command you today is not too difficult, nor is it out of reach. So the people were saying, well, I don't get it. I don't get it. I, I, it's too far too, right? Uh, I think it was Mark Twain who said, not a believer, he said, it's not the things in the Bible I don't understand that's a problem, it's the things I do understand. See, even unbelievers, you can read through scripture, you can say there's a lot of things I don't, but the things I really do, right, like don't call somebody an idiot or a moron or a fool, that's really clear. Okay, do not envy, do not write. So the things we don't— so the people were saying, oh, this is too much, right? Moses said, wait a minute. He says, it's not— you're saying it's too difficult for you, or it's out of your reach.

Scott Keffer [: 00:25:58

It's in heaven that you should say, who will go up to heaven for us to get it and to make us hear it that we may observe it? Nor is it beyond the sea, like they're saying. Oh, it's too hard. Somebody's got to go up to heaven and get it. Moses is saying it's right here, the Ten Commandments. I have the commandments from God. They're saying, who's going to go up to heaven? Or who's going to go across the sea? It's too hard. Everybody get what they're saying? People are saying, wait, Moses is saying it's right here. No, what is that? What would you say those are? Excuses.

Scott Keffer [: 00:26:31

Yeah. Oh, it's too much to understand. We need to know it's too far away from us. So he's saying, wait a minute. It's not beyond the sea, but the word is— notice how he says, but the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe it. So those are all excuses. Well, I don't really understand who's going to go up to heaven and get the word. Who's going to go across the sea and get it? So people are saying it's not near, I don't get it.

Scott Keffer [: 00:26:59

Moses is saying, yeah, yeah, it is. So Paul is now referencing that So what's he talking about? People are going to say, well, this, you know, the gospel is, it's not accessible, it's not understandable. So first of all, they're going to say, so he says, do not say in your heart, we must ascend to heaven. So he says, who will go up for us into heaven? In other words, he's saying it means what they're saying is, who's going to bring the Messiah down to us. We need to go to heaven in order to get the Messiah and bring him down to us. We get that? So we need to go into heaven to get— so Paul's saying, don't say that. Just like Moses said, don't say that. I'm telling you, don't say that.

Scott Keffer [: 00:27:49

Why don't you need to go to heaven to bring Christ down? Because he's already descended. That's called the Incarnation. That's the incarnation. Jesus Christ has already descended. So just like they were making excuses back then, he's saying the word of God is here. Then what else are they going to say? Oh, who's going to go? Who's going to cross for us? They're saying, right? So then same thing, we must descend. We must descend into the abyss. And that's the same thing as if we have to bring Christ up.

Scott Keffer [: 00:28:38

We have to bring Christ up from the realm of the dead. Who will cross for us? Well, Christ has already been raised. What's that called? Resurrection. So Paul is saying, as a non-believer, right, in particular with the Jewish background, you're going to say the same thing they said to Moses. Moses said, here's the word of God, here's the word of God, the commandments. And they're going to say, oh, who's going to go up to heaven to bring down what God wants us to do? Moses is saying, it's right here. Well, who's going to go across the sea to show us what we need to do. We, in other words, we need to be the ones.

Scott Keffer [: 00:29:23

We need to be the ones. But he says in there, right, resurrect. So incarnation and the resurrection. I thought, you know, one of my business mentors, Dan Kennedy, used to say, got a farmer in Iowa, his neighbor came over and he said, 'Can I, can I have your tract— you know, rent your tractor or use it for the day?' And he said, 'No, no, there's a storm coming in Kansas.' The guy said, 'Well, storm in Kansas, what's that have to do with anything?' He said, 'Well, if you don't want to— if I don't want to do anything, any excuse will work,' right? And so if I don't— right, if I don't want to believe, any excuse will work. And at the core of that is, what do we need to do to bring this about, right? It's not near, it's not accessible, it's not available. Salvation is not achieved by us ascending or descending, but by faith. So there's a, there's a piece in there. If you think about this, you look at that inscription, you think, why did he refer to that? Does that make sense? Do I need to know that, right? I don't know, doesn't totally make sense to me.

Scott Keffer [: 00:30:41

I got to study through and say, why did he do that? What's he referring to? For us as Gentiles, it doesn't have a whole lot of context unless I go back into the Old Testament and see the context, right? So he's saying the word of faith is near and accessible. And it's accessible to all. It's accessible to all. I always tell that story when I was in Russia and we were sharing the gospel with a soldier, and he said, he said, God can't forgive me. And I said, really, why not? He said, you have no idea what I've done. You have no idea what I've done. He said, it's unforgivable. And I said, I have no idea what you've done.

Scott Keffer [: 00:31:41

I know what I've done, right? You know what you've done. God knows what both of us have done. God provided an answer for me, and God provided an answer for you. And there isn't a sin that you can commit, or I can commit, or anyone can commit that wasn't paid for on the cross. If you put your faith in Christ, right? So when he says it's available to all, anyone and everyone, not only despite your background, it's irrelevant, but despite the sin, despite the sin. I mean, I've sinned in your past where you say, can he really forgive me for that? Is his blood sufficient for that? It is. So it's near and it's accessible and it's available to all. So he says if we confess with our mouth and believe with our heart.

Scott Keffer [: 00:32:34

Okay, so let's look at that. Confess what you believe. Underline in your heart. In your heart. In other words, can people just say the words? And I mean, we tend to say, okay, if you want to, just pray this prayer. We do that all the time. Is that prayer going to save people? It's not going to save people. I mean, we're trying to help people, right? Yeah, we're trying to help God, right? So pray the prayer.

Scott Keffer [: 00:33:05

Prayer's not going to save you. Nothing's changed in your heart. If God hasn't taken your heart of stone and given you a heart of flesh, nothing changes. So the mouth comes out of the heart. What's happened in the heart? It's got to be a heart change. And it's a verbal expression of inward allegiance, which means a change of allegiance. It's a change of allegiance, right? What's that mean? What's that mean? Doing some work on, on, uh, some different AI programs we're using. I asked, who, who do you serve? Who do you serve? Who, who do you swear allegiance to? Well, we know that, right? So, at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow, every tongue confess.

Scott Keffer [: 00:34:10

That quotes from Isaiah where the Lord says, turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth, all kinds of people. Why? For I am God and there is no other. So he says, I have sworn by myself, right? I've sworn by myself. And the word literally means I seven myself. Seven is Stands for what? Perfect. So it's, it's I, 7, myself. I swear by myself. I swear by myself.

Scott Keffer [: 00:34:48

That's why when Jesus came, he said, don't swear by the temple, don't swear. Let your yes be yes. So God's saying, God's saying, I swear by myself, the word has gone forth from my mouth and will not turn back, that to me every knee will bow. And every tongue will, will sever themselves. It's the same thing when God says, I sever myself, I swear by myself, and the result is you bend a knee and swear by yourself to me. You swear allegiance to me. When I went back and saw this, and I think I've shared this before, I like, um, 'Every tongue will confess Jesus as Lord. Every knee will bow.

Scott Keffer [: 00:35:34

Every tongue confess,' rather than swear allegiance. It does sound a lot more serious. So I don't like that, but that's the essence, isn't it? Who do you swear allegiance by or to? Who do you serve? And so this is confessing with my mouth a change of allegiance in the heart. It's a change of allegiance in the heart. It's just not, I'm saved, here are the benefits, God's going to forgive me, but it's changing my allegiance from me to the Lord. Confess Jesus as Lord, it means to swear allegiance. So he says, you confessed Jesus as Lord. Jesus as Lord.

Scott Keffer [: 00:36:32

That's a hard one, isn't it? That's a hard one. Why? Because I want to be the captain of my own ship. I want to be the master of my own destiny. I'm an American. I'm an American. I, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm Marlboro Man. I, I ride across the, you know, the plane by myself. And it's the, you know, they, they just say it's break glass in the event of emergency.

Scott Keffer [: 00:36:59

God, that's what I want. Like, when I'm in trouble, I want to be able to break the glass and you come and help me. But I want to keep allegiance to me. I want to keep my allegiance to me. So this is a change of allegiance. Change. And that's why he says turn to me, which means your allegiance is in a different direction. Turn to me and be saved and believe that God the Father raised Jesus Christ from the dead.

Scott Keffer [: 00:37:33

This man, Jesus Christ, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God— there's his sovereignty— you nailed to the cross by the hands of godless men and put him to death. But God raised him from the dead. God did the impossible. In other words, God has power over death, which means he has power over all things. Do you believe that God has power over all things in your life? Except for this and this and this, which you're not answering and taking care of and doing the way I want. I do believe you have all power theoretically. And that's the challenge for the Christian life, isn't it? To go from, I know the answers, like in the multiple choice test, I get a 95, I got them down. But then applying that to my life, I know that God is sovereign, I just don't know he's sovereign in this.

Scott Keffer [: 00:38:36

I know God ends up right. The challenge is how do we apply it, right? Believe that God raised him from the dead. And a reminder here that faith is the fruit— back to the hard part— of the sovereign mercy that the Spirit of God through the Apostle Paul outlines in 9. So in 9, we see the sovereign mercy And he reminds us that faith is the fruit of that sovereign mercy, and that Jesus Christ is the Savior for all who call upon him, Jew and Greek. Who hears my word, believes him who sent me, has eternal life now and does not come into judgment, then when is that? When you see him face to face. Yeah, on that day. We get that there's a present to salvation, there's a past to salvation, and there's a future to salvation. That future to salvation is glorification, right? When we see him face to face.

Scott Keffer [: 00:39:56

Salvation is all of those things. You've already passed out of death into life, right? So he's saying the word of faith, word of faith. So God is sovereign. He's sovereign in mercy. He's sovereign in who he right, shares that mercy with who he calls out of darkness, right, then do we have a responsibility? Because that's the challenge— God's sovereignty and responsibility. Yes, if the word of God is near and accessible to all, someone must share it, he's saying. So I put the sovereign mercy of God should fuel your mission. Your mission.

Scott Keffer [: 00:40:54

The sovereign mercy of God should fuel your mission. Certainly it fuels the mission of the Church. Go therefore and make disciples. Go therefore, verb, and make disciples, teaching them to observe, baptizing them, right? So there are active verbs which are responsibility for the Church. So the sovereign mercy of God fuels the mission of God. So for us individually, right, for us individually, I think the one thing when I think about Paul— let's go back to the Apostle Paul. Paul says, you need to know, brethren, what my heart's desire. So he says, my heart's desire Right? I don't have naturally a heart's desire for the lost.

Scott Keffer [: 00:41:47

Here's why. I naturally have a heart's desire for me, right? I'm saved, I'm good, right? I don't naturally have a heart's desire, right? And the lost are frustrating, sometimes feel like the enemy. So a reminder here, they're held captive by the enemy. They're not the enemy. They're all captive by the enemy. They're not the enemy. So have a heart for the lost, which means I need the Lord to change my heart. Very simply, Lord, help me to have your heart for the lost.

Scott Keffer [: 00:42:26

Give me a heart for the lost, for those who are broken and apart from you. Reminds us in 1 Timothy, Christ Jesus, Messiah Jesus, came into the world to do what? Save sinners. Jesus said he came— the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost. So his heart is for sinners. So he says, in the beginning, a reminder: be a prayer. My heart's desire and my prayer to God, be a prayer It's the same word. I looked, I looked it up to see it's the same word as prayer. Be a prayer.

Scott Keffer [: 00:43:07

I said, is there a different word for someone who prays? And I would say prayer. Be a prayer. In other words, pray for the lost, which you do. I'm assuming you've got family members, friends, business colleagues, right? That you pray for. And then be a sharer. A sharer. Not so easy, is it? That's the hard part. How do we share? How do we share? Well, we share the message, right? Christ crucified, the gospel, the good news, right? How do we share that? I found in our past it required us to learn how to share.

Scott Keffer [: 00:43:53

Learn how to share. Gotta learn how to share. Beth will say, oh, you know, the lady said this, or I'll be in a situation and somebody said this, and I thought, oh— afterwards you think, oh, I should have said— how many thought of that many times? Well, you can't know. You can't know. It's like playing a game and all of a sudden you're face to face with a situation you've never played. You've never been there before. You can't say, I should have. What you need to say is, next time And the way you have to do that is I've got to have literally phrasing.

Scott Keffer [: 00:44:26

Okay, so next time around, what would I say? What would I say? So that means, you know, early on we went through Evangelism Explosion, Navigator training. You've got to be prepped to learn how to operate because essentially it's, you know, whether it's football or Olympics or whatever, these folks have trained. They don't know the, the actual game time circumstances. You don't know. But they prep to as many as they can. You need to be prepped. That's all. Need to be prepped.

Scott Keffer [: 00:45:04

Have some version. Remember, we need God's help with that. We need God's help on what to say, when to say it. Um, and recognize it's rarely— are you there at the moment? For most people, it's just a, it's a journey. Most people can't say, you know, it's 2 o'clock on a Tuesday afternoon, and I mean, some people can, but for most people, it's a journey. So we're, you know, we're, we're sowing seeds. Sometimes a word here, it's a word there. But the more I'm prepared and, and have an answer, if you will, prepared to give an answer.

Scott Keffer [: 00:45:38

So be a prayer and be a sharer, right? So Understand that sovereign mercy of God does not relinquish our responsibility to pray and to share, just any more than it removes the responsibility of unbelievers to respond. They are responsible to respond. We're responsible to pray and share. That make sense? All right. Write down an insight. Well, it says he's our dread champion. He certainly fought battles for them. The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle.

Scott Keffer [: 00:46:17

Lift up your heads, O gates. Yeah, there's— he's a conqueror, and he's the— you know, I get he's the conqueror, and he came as a conqueror for them, but that the Messiah would be a lamb, that is— that's a stumbling block for Jews and foolishness for us. But God is a lamb. In Revelation it says that the number of them was myriads of myriads, thousands upon thousands, saying with a loud voice, worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing. Lamb who was slain. What? Well, may the Lord bless you. May he keep you. May he cause his face to shine upon you.

Scott Keffer [: 00:47:03

May he lift up his countenance and grant you shalom deep in your soul. And know that the God who called you is also the God who keeps you. May he bless you and keep you always. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thanks for listening. I hope you have greater hope, assurance, and confidence in your life, and a deeper trust in the God of the Bible, in His Son Jesus Christ.

Scott Keffer [: 00:47:32

Until next time, may the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. And may the Lord lift up His countenance on you and give you His peace, His shalom, in your soul and in your life. Until next time, may God bless you and keep you.