Did you know that nearly 25 years ago, the first of The Lord of the Rings movie came out. The Fellowship of the Ring was the first in a trilogy of movies from the books of the same name by the author J.R.R. Tolkien. The story is actually a sequel to the book The Hobbit. This story starts with the main character of the previous book, a diminutive human creature known as a hobbit named Bilbo Baggins. He was inadvertently brought into an adventure by a wizard known as Gandalf with a number of dwarves. During the adventure, Bilbo finds a ring that allows him to become invisible. He keeps the ring after the adventure and The Fellowship of the Ring starts out on Bilbo’s 111’th birthday. During the celebration, Bilbo pulls out the ring and uses it to surprise his guests as he publicly puts it on and disappears. He is escaping and going on another adventure. He sneaks back to his house to get ready to go but is met by Gandalf who asks about the ring. He says that Bilbo should leave it behind, and eventually, he does. Gandalf goes off and finds out the ring is the One Ring, forged by the evil Sauron thousands of years prior. Sauron poured out all his malice and some of himself into the ring. It was a part of him and desires to return to him. Gandalf directs Bilbo’s nephew Frodo to take the ring and leave his home. Frodo, along with his friends take the ring to the elves, but they cannot do anything. The ring needs to be destroyed, but no ordinary means can do so. It must be cast into the fire in which it was created, deep withing the enemy stronghold of Mordor, in the fires of Mount Doom. After a bunch of squabbling, Frodo volunteers to take the ring to Mordor, along with eight others. It is Frodo’s task to take the ring, but as they go along, the ring affects Frodo. It darkens him and he isolates himself, does not eat or sleep. He becomes fixated on the ring. It gets heavier as they go along. Near the end, it is just Frodo and his friend Sam. They are in Mordor, but Frodo can’t go on. They can see the Mountain, but Frodo has no more strength. Sam carries Frodo up the mountain, and when they are in the heart of the mountain in the Crack of Doom, Frodo is unable to cast it into the fire.

After all the miles traveled, all the suffering endured, and all the effort expended, Frodo fails at the very point where success is required. His willpower is not enough. His determination is not enough. His good intentions are not enough. The burden is simply too great. Many people think that having a relationship with God is similar to this. They think that they have to try harder or become better then they can come to God and satisfy what he requires. However, what we have been hearing since we started Romans is that we cannot do it. We cannot satisfy the requirements for righteousness on our own. Like Frodo at Mount Doom, we eventually discover that what God requires is something we cannot accomplish ourselves. In our passage today, we see that our story doesn’t have to be like Frodo’s. The gospel shows us that God has done for us what we could never do.

In the past few weeks, Paul has been doing a good job of putting us into our place and making us feel very miserable. We saw it last week when he wrote, “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.” (Romans 3:10-12) No matter how good we think that we are, we are just fooling ourselves. We are never good all the time. We never seek God all the time. We all turn away at some time. It is a sobering thought. We tend to think of ourselves pretty highly, like we are not that bad. Unfortunately, we are that bad. It is offensive to hear that, but it is the truth and while being offended we can actually get to the next step.

Trying harder is us trying to use the law to get better, but last week, the passage said that the law is only there to show us our sin. The law is a measure of righteousness, but it cannot make us righteous. That is where this passage comes in. Verse 21 says, “But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify.” You can tell from the “But now…” that this is a transitionary passage. All the previous passages tell us how bad humanity is, but they don’t give a way out. There were nearly three chapters of sin, guilt, condemnation, and inadequacy, but now there is something new. Now, we get the gospel, which isn’t what man can do for God, but what God has done for man.

As verse 21 says, “apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known.” The law was able to show sin, reveal guilt and diagnose the disease. It was imaging tool to show what is wrong and was never intended to cure us. But now, there is a way to be right and cure us. And it is not something that is new. The verse also mentions that the Law and the Prophets testify. It was always God’s plan to have a savior. The plan was always to have sacrifice, redemption, and forgiveness. The book of Isaiah has the wonderful passage about the suffering servant that points directly to the Christ. “By his wounds we are healed”. We always just missed the mark. The cure was there the whole time.

The passage continues, “This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile,”. (22) This righteousness, this cure, is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. This is not something that we can earn. It is not something that we can achieve or inherit. We can’t just grit our teeth and push through to get it. It is truly not something that we deserve. There is no difference between those who know better and those who do not. It is entirely dependent on believing in what Jesus has done for us. We must have faith that Jesus is our atoning sacrifice. He took the punishment for our sins on the cross and his blood washes us clean. When we have faith in that, that is all we need to be seen as right before God’s eyes. This is not something that we can achieve. There is no morality that brings us there. There are no religious acts that make us right. There is no level of self-help that can make us better. It entirely comes through faith in Jesus.

The reason behind this is simple, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (23) In last week’s passage, it was already mentioned that there is no one who is righteous, but here it is made even clearer. All have sinned. There is not a person who has not sinned, except Jesus. Every single person who lives, has ever lived, or will ever live is a sinner, no exceptions. Both the moral and the immoral are sinners. It doesn’t matter who you are, you are a sinner. The problem is within us. This is not some external force that needs to be solved. It is not a bacterial or viral infection that plagues us. It is a part of who we are. We like to look at others and compare ourselves. We might think that we are better than others because of one thing or another, but we are just looking at piles of excrement of various sizes. It’s still poop. The standard that we are to live up to is not what our neighbors are doing. It is not what society says. It’s not even what our conscience says. The standard that we are to live up to is nothing less than the standard of God himself.

I don’t care how good of a person you think that you are. You are not up to the standard of God. You could be the best person on the planet; you could have accolades and awards. You can change society and advance humanity into the future. You could bring about a utopian society and have wealth beyond compare. You could be more well known than any person in history, but you still won’t be God. The Lord is the creator of all things and is truth and life. Everything that he says is true, and he has power over all things. You are nothing, but a sinner who falls short of his glory. The world wants for you to think that as long as you are better than someone else, you are doing good. We compare ourselves with others just to find an advantage. The gospel calls for us to compare ourselves to God and see how short we fall. You might be better than your buddy at throwing the football, but you fall short of the record of around 80 yards. And even the record holder falls short of God. When we compare ourselves to God, it reveals a burden we could never carry and a standard we could never meet. It sucks, but it’s true.

Then there is the second half of that thought in verse 24. It says, “and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” The same people who are marked as sinners in verse 23 are the same ones that are justified freely by his grace. To be justified means to be made just or to be declared righteous before God. It is a legal term that means that nothing can erase our guilt. We are guilty of sin, and the verdict cannot be changed. The punishment for sin is death. That is what is deserved, but we are declared righteous before God. It is not something that can be earned. It is a gift given by grace. The word “redemption” means that we are bought back. We were slaves to sin, but God paid the price to free us from bondage. Christ paid a ransom for us that we could not pay. Again, the gospel message is not to work harder, but to accept what Christ has accomplished.

What Christ accomplished was nothing short of monumental. As the passage says, “God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished—he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.” (25-26) These verses explain how God can justify sinners without compromising his justice. The Lord doesn’t ignore people’s sin. Justice requires that sin be punished according to the law. Justice requires death as the punishment for sin. It does not require immediate punishment. Even in the original sin, when Adam and Eve ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, the punishment was not immediate. God told them that if they ate from the tree, they would surely die. They ate from it, but they didn’t die immediately like they were poisoned. That is what is sounds like, but they opened the door that death could come in. They did die; just not immediately. God does the same for all sinners. There is a tendency to think that if God is not immediate in his justice, then we must be good, but God shows his kindness in his deferred justice which also shows his righteousness.

That justice is nothing less than how he justifies us. We are justified because Jesus is a sacrifice of atonement for us. Jesus took the punishment that was due us. By his sacrifice, we are redeemed. It is through Jesus’ death on the cross, where his blood flowed, that we are made free. It is at the cross where justice and mercy meet, where wrath and grace intersect, and where judgment and salvation come together. Jesus took our place. Here we find the true glory of the gospel. This is how God can both demand justice and justify. God does not ignore sin. He doesn’t ignore the sin of anybody. He sees it and knows how terrible it is. He doesn’t look at us and tell us that we don’t have to worry about it. It’s okay. Sin is not okay. He poured out his wrath on his own son, who chose to die for us. The fullness of God’s wrath was on display against his own son for us. All the shamefulness, all the atrocity and unfairness, all the pain, and all the sadness, injustice, and betrayal that Jesus endured is what we were due. We were supposed to be on the cross, but Christ took that punishment for us. Sin is judged in Christ so that sinners can be forgiven. The cross accomplished what no person could ever do. It satisfied God’s justice while extending God’s mercy.

The passage continues, “Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. Because of what law? The law that requires works? No, because of the law that requires faith.” (27) Paul almost suddenly brings up boasting. Paul is talking about being justified by grace but next talks about boasting. You see when you start comparing yourselves to others, there is a danger of falling into boasting. Anytime you might seem better than someone at something, you want to brag about it, even a little. The Jews were a proud people. They were given God’s law and were considered God’s people, so they thought very highly of themselves. They must be special, they thought. This isn’t just a Jewish fallacy. It happens with anyone who has found success or favor. Yes, I am so good. I am so great. We want to boast, even those who really hate boasting want to boast even a little to make themselves look good. But here Paul says that boasting is excluded. There is no room for boasting in the gospel. We have nothing to boast about. It is all God. There is not even a small part that we can boast about. There is nothing that we have done to deserve the grace that God give us. As verse 28 says, “For we maintain that a person is justified by faith apart from the works of the law.” Salvation comes by faith. We have to trust in what God has already done. There is no amount of morality, religion, knowledge, heritage, or accomplishments that can save us. Faith leaves us empty handed before God. The same God justifies all people: Jews and Gentiles, Christians and non-Christians. All people are justified by faith in what Jesus has done, when they accept and believe in the gospel. There are no spiritual achievers in God’s kingdom, only redeemed sinners.

The last verse says, “Do we, then, nullify the law by this faith? Not at all! Rather, we uphold the law.” (31) Sometimes, we think that because salvation is by faith alone, then we don’t have to obey the law. We have faith, the law is useless. However, Jesus did not come to destroy the law. He said in the book of Matthew, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” Faith in Jesus is not the end of the law, but the fulfillment. The gospel does not replace the law, but it fulfills it. Through Jesus’ death on the cross and his subsequent resurrection, the law is fulfilled. The law shows us what we need, and Jesus fulfills that need. When we come to Jesus in faith and believe what he has done for us, then we start to be changed. We start obeying the law because we follow Jesus through his death and resurrection. It doesn’t even take any effort for us to do so. It just happens. It is a process that doesn’t click overnight, but because Christ fulfills the law, we start following it, not because we feel that we should, but because it starts becoming our default.

When we talk about sin and righteousness there are two possible responses that people have. We can be very proud of who we are and what has been accomplished, or we can be filled with the dread of our inadequacy. Paul talks about boasting, here. Even as seasoned believers, we can fall into this trap. In our lives of faith, much may have been overcome, and we are in a better place that we were. We can see the results and know that life is better. However, we can forget the struggle that happened or even think that we overcame, we pulled ourselves out of the fire. When we see others that are struggling and falling short, we can wonder why they are having problems. That is us forgetting that it is Jesus who did everything. It’s us boasting. But it wasn’t us. God did everything and we did nothing. There is no room for boasting. We all do it from time to time. It is a part of that sinful nature.

Then there is that feeling of inadequacy. We can hear all the things in the first three chapters of Romans and feel very crappy about ourselves. There is nothing that we can do. We are terrible sinners. No one is righteous. No one understands. No one seeks God. Everyone falls short of God’s glory. It can bring us down and make us feel worthless. It can feel like that no matter what we do, there is nothing that we do that matters. As you might have guessed, I fall in this latter category. I have never felt good enough. I know that I fall short. I am pretty proficient in a number of things, but none of that matters. For all my proficiency, it has gotten me nowhere. At the beginning of the month, I was passed over for a promotion, of sorts. My team lead retired and I applied for the position. I was highly qualified and could probably perform the job better than anyone else, but the position was given to someone who has been at my work for only two years and is about 20 years my junior. I was shocked and confused. It was devastating, and I felt like nothing that I did mattered. I don’t know why it happened, but it did. It is discouraging and that permeated through other parts of my life. I am not good enough, even the Bible tells me that. That’s why verse 24 is so important: “all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” I am not good enough, but I don’t stop there. God is good enough. God is the one who pours out his grace to redeem us. God is the one who can do what we could never do.

Frodo carried the Ring much farther than anyone else could. He had the strength to make it all the way to Morder, but he still succumbed to its power and tried to take it for himself. The burden proved too great even for him to do on his own. Even with Sam by his side, at the end he tried to do it by his own strength and failed. The first chapters of Romans reiterate this thought in that righteousness was never a burden that we were meant to carry. We are incapable to carry it. We could never become righteous, erase our guilt, satisfy justice, or overcome sin. We can never save ourselves. Through Christ, God has provided a way to righteousness, justified sinners, paid the price of our redemption, and satisfied justice, by pouring out his grace to us. The message of the gospel is not that we need to try harder. The message of the gospel is that God has done for us what we could never do ourselves through Jesus Christ. “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” (23-24) Those two verses hold both the bad news and the good news of the gospel: We all fall short. But God has provided what we could never achieve. We are not carrying the burden alone, in fact, we are not carrying it at all. It is all Jesus, and that is encouraging.