This series is taken from Burning Heart who are an organisation who are passionate about equipping churches with high quality, professionally produced and theologically rich teaching films and series. The Director is David Ingall who was the Rector of Holy Sepulchre London, an HTB Network church plant in the City of London. For more information visit their website https://www.burningheart.org

In session five David looks at banks, tragedies and Richard Nixon to help us work out judgement and the cross.

Bible Passage Romans 3: 22-26

²² This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, ²³ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, ²⁴ and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. ²⁵ 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— ²⁶ 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.

Key Theme

This message in the bible passage has two parts. The first is the problem, that we’ve messed it up and gone wrong. As Paul puts it, “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”
That immediately explains why the second part is necessary. We are in a mess and we need rescuing – or to use Paul’s language, justifying. So he
continues: “all are justified [or rescued] freely by his grace.” As he continues he explains that that happens through what Jesus did on the cross. It’s a beautiful little summary of the Christian gospel. But Paul doesn’t stop there. He continues, and it’s what he says next that really helps us.

We often ask why we need to be justified. It’s not that we think that we’re perfect. We know that we’re not. It’s just that we don’t see why that matters. We wonder why can’t God just ignore the things that we do wrong. Why does there need to be judgement? Why does Jesus have to die so I can be forgiven? Well Paul carries on. He tells us that for a time God did ignore what people did wrong. He writes, “in his forbearance God left the sins committed before [the cross] unpunished.”23 But then he tells us (actually twice) that the cross was needed “to demonstrate God’s righteousness” and so that God can both “be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.”24

Discussion Points

• Do you agree that if we want to understand the cross we need to understand judgement?
• Read Romans 3v22-26 – Why do we need to be ‘justified’? (v24) Why can’t God just continue ‘to leave sins…unpunished’? (v25) Does it matter that God is just? (v26)
• Do you ever think about judgement and justice from the perspective of the victims?
• Do the images of a debt being paid off and of Jesus bearing our punishment help you understand the cross better?
• In what ways is forgiveness better than forgetfulness?