Deja-Vu All Over Again

Rom 1:21-23

Several years ago, Bill Murray starred in a movie called Groundhog Day. It was a movie about Groundhog Day, but something very different happened that day. It kept repeating itself and on Bill was aware that it kept doing that. No matter what he did, the same things happened every time the same way. It about drove Bill character insane until he was able to break the cycle.

Human history is pretty much the same thing. It keeps repeating itself and it appears that God is the only one that realizes it. Era after era the same things happen pretty much the same way. I can only imagine it about drives God insane.

As you read our text. A letter that was written almost 2000 years ago, you could swear that someone wrote those words yesterday.

PRAYER

I. How the World Sees God

A. Who needs God anyway?

1. It just amazes me how similar the world is today to the world that Paul wrote about all those years ago.

2. Look at 1:21a again.

3. Europe, once a bastion of Christianity is now so depraved that the “in” thing is to buy old church buildings to use as party places.

4. Less than 5% of any European country goes to church on a regular basis.

5. In Canada, they have passed laws aimed at churches who preach that sin is wrong as hate speech and the preacher can be jailed if the government decides to press it.

6. But they aren’t alone; we see it right here in the USA

a) We are trying to take God out of everything from schools to monuments.

b) If you want to get out of jury duty, just admit you are a dedicated Christian.

c) If you want to go to sensitivity classes at work just admit you are a dedicated Christian.

d) If you want to be ridiculed in the media, just take a stand as a dedicated Christian.

e) We are just a few steps behind in being as secular as most other nations.

f) It may not be long before “in God we trust” is merely a meaningless motto.

B. I know more than God

1. At the same time as all this is happening we are also advancing ourselves as god of the universe.

2. The fancy term is secular humanism.

3. Man is the center of all that matters.

4. Not only have we refused to glorify God, we now assume we know more than God.

5. Our scientific knowledge is by far greater than any knowledge God might have.

6. We know better than him about relationships.

a) Marriage is a useless institution.

b) A one parent family is just fine.

7. Science is greater than God.

a) If I can’t prove it scientifically, it simply cannot be.

8. We have a better grasp on truth than God does.

a) There is no such thing as universal right and wrong.

b) If it works for you then it’s fine.

c) If I need to change the truth to fit my opinion, then bye-bye truth.

II. How God Sees the World

A. Depraved and lost (1:26-31)

1. When you read verses 26-31 you see a great list of sins of the people, most of them dealing with sexual immorality.

2. But, that wasn’t their great sin. Their great sin is found in verse in verse 25.

a) They rejected God and worshipped other things.

b) Their perversions were a result of that decision!

c) Whenever a person or culture rejects God and his wisdom, they rot from within.

d) A few years back someone did a study on several primitive people found in the jungles of Africa and S. America. What they found about these primitive people is that they were actually descendants of once great empires! Because of moral decay these nations had fallen so far, that their people became simple primitive jungle tribes. All the great knowledge, culture, and science that they had possessed were lost.

3. When you take God out of the picture and replace him with you own desires, it’s like letting your little child paint over a Rembrant.

4. Don’t ever get caught up in thinking you don’t need God. You’ll find yourself the loser.

B. Deserve death (1:32)

1. Here’s the scary part. These people mentioned in verse 32 know that those who practice such things as were mentioned in the previous verses, are not only wrong, but deserve death.

2. But they not only continue to do such things, they approve of those who practice them.

3. If that isn’t a fitting picture of Much of America today, I don’t know what is.

4. It used to be that if you lived an immoral life you kept is well hidden because our culture wouldn’t accept that.

5. Now you can’t turn on the TV or read a magazine that doesn’t promote and idolize these activities.

6. If you speak out against them you are labeled as intolerant and dismissed as a religious freak.

7. God will deal with us if we don’t get our act together soon.

III. How the Church Sees God

A. I know more than God (2:1)

1. Paul just got done blasting the culture for going away from God, now he starts on the church.

2. Somehow, they had begun to think that the world was so evil that they would disassociate themselves from the world and send them all to hell.

a) They missed the point.

b) Granted, they were not supposed to condone what the world was doing or to participate in those activities.

c) However, God wanted them to do whatever they could to teach them the truth and bring them back to God. Not lock the doors from the inside and watch the world go hell and say, “well they are getting what they deserve.

d) They were under the misconception that THEY should be deciding who goes to Hell and who goes to Heaven.

3. Today we are in danger of doing the same thing. We are so righteously indignant with the sins of the world around us that we don’t want God’s mercy to work on their hearts, we want God to send them all to hell and we’ll be the willing mouthpiece for Him.

4. We act all righteous, but in secret or not so secret we do the same things as the world.

5. How many times have we seen Christianity greatly diminished because well-known “Christians” are caught doing the very things they speak out against? Too many!

6. The world acted as the world,

7. They are simply reaping what they sowed.

8. We act KNOWING how much God hates these things.

9. So who’s the greater sinner?

10. I think we are.

B. Who needs God anyway? (2:5-7)

1. Just as bad as thinking we know more than God is the actions you see in Christians that basically admit we don’t need God either.

2. We make decision about life and the future based on our wants and desires and rarely if ever bring them before God.

3. We say as a church we can or cannot do this or that long before we think to spend time in prayer and asking God to guide us in the decision that would glorify him and his kingdom.

4. Christians make far too many decisions without consulting God.

5. In our practice we are just like the world and say “who needs God anyway?”

IV.How God Sees the Church

A. Depraved and lost (2:2-4)

1. Paul makes is clear that those who live like the world are just as lost and depraved as the world.

2. It doesn’t matter if they call themselves Jews or Christians.

3. The outward appearance means nothing.

4. In case the readers didn’t catch the subtle admonition. He makes it plain as day at the end of chapter two.

5. READ 2:28-29

B. Deserve Death (2:8)

1. The same condemnation that God put on the world that rejected him is put on the Christian who rejects him.

2. READ 2:8

3. Last week and this week we have dealt with how bad man is.

4. Next week we will look at how good God is and how he has offered us a way to righteousness.