Romans 3:9-12

"What then?  Are we Jews any better off?  No, not at all.  For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin (Romans 3:9)."  This is pretty much telling us that everyone including the Jews are under sin.  No one is better off.  Well you may ask what about Romans 3:1-2?  Yes the Jews have an advantage over the gentiles, they were given the oracles of God.  So they know the law but yet still  are unfaithful to it.  So the Jews have an advantage over the Gentiles but are not better off because they all are under sin.
" None is righteous, no not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God.  All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one (Romans 3:10-12)."  Once again Paul emphasizes that we are all under sin.  Paul also says something very interesting, no one seeks for God.  What does this mean?  It means that no one on his own seeks for God.  Now what is this part about no one does good?  What about that time I helped that old lady across the street or when that guy dropped his wallet and I gave it back to him instead of taking it?  Are those not good deeds?  The issue Paul is addressing here is that prior to salvation people do perform actions that resemble goodness, but these actions are still stained by evil, since they are not done for Gods glory and do not come from faith.

The Lords Prayer Luke 11:2-4

Luke 11:2-4
Father, hallowed be your name
Your kingdom come
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our sins,
for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us.
And lead us not into temptation.

-God provides us our physical needs day by day
-A continual confession of sin

Matthew 6:9-13
Our Father in heaven,
Hallowed be your name,
Your kingdom come,
Your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts,
as we have also forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

Romans 3:1-4

What if some were unfaithful?  Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God?  By no means!  Let God be true though everyone were a liar....(Romans 3:3-4).  Although we are unfaithful to God, he is always faithful to us.

Romans 2: 12-16

 For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law.  For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified.  For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law.  They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus ( Romans 2: 12-16).  This passage says so much.  I feel like this is talking directly to people who "call" themselves christians.  Lets get real for a second.  And if you are unsure who I'm talking to... if you say you are a christian and continually have sex with your girlfriend/ boyfriend or get drunk on the weekends or drink underage, etc I'm talking to you.  For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified (Romans 2: 12-16).  I know some of you might be thinking... "but I don't believe sex before marriage is a sin and so on..."  Well the only thing I have to say about that is Romans 2: 16.  "...on that day when, according to my gospel, God JUDGES the secrets of men by Christ Jesus."

Romans 2: 1-5

"Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges.  For in passing judgement on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things" (Romans 2: 1).  As christians we have got to stop thinking we are better than everyone else or think we are in a better situation than nonbelievers.  Let me give you an example of what I'm trying to say.  I'm in math class and I ask the guy beside me how his weekend was. Of course the only thing anybody in college ever does is party, so he says "It was so fun man, I got so drunk I don't even remember friday night."  Which is really humorous to me because I classify having fun as actually being able to be aware of the things I'm partaking in.... anyway thats not my point.   My initial thought is "wow this guy is lost and somewhere deep in my mind, my heart and maybe even my soul "I'm like I'm better off than this guy, this guy needs help not me," but the truth is I was struggling with lustful thoughts the day before.  Although these thoughts may be unintentional they are wrong.  God clearly tells us this.  Just because we are saved doesn't change the fact that at one point in our lives we were going to hell and that we are in need of a savior every single day, because without him we are in the same boat as everyone else.  You condemn yourself when you judge others not because you are judging them but because you are condemning them  for the exact same thing you have done, which is rebelling against God.
"But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgement will be revealed" (Romans 2:5).  There it is guys.  Gods wrath is coming.  And whose fault is it?.... the computer for making you lust....the broken world we live in?  No.  Its yours, its mine. "...you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath..."  As christians we need to stop living for religion and start living for God and live our lives according to what we "say" we believe in.  And for those of you who don't know jesus there is hope.  Jesus.  Stop living your lives for yourself.
This last verse reminds me of a band called Impending Doom and specifically the last few verses of the song "There Will Be Violence." It says " ...for the unbelievers who repeatedly try to retain their faith in humanity, I promise there will be violence."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9w1gWJBjQrM

Romans 1

I feel like whenever someone reads the bible they should be required to be listening to bands such as Impending Doom, With Blood Comes Cleansing or For Today.  If you don't know who these guys are you should.  I feel this kind of music invokes feelings within us that do justice to how we should react to God.  Fear, action, awe, adrenaline and so on.  Romans 1:16 starts off with this, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it IS the POWER of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also the Greek.  For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written "The righteous shall live by faith.""  I love the first part of this verse, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel."  I don't know about the rest of you, but to often I find myself being ashamed of the gospel.  When I'm surrounded by nonbelievers I tend to hide my faith.  I feel like this comes form the natural desire for us as humans to want to be accepted by everyone.  As christians I feel like this needs to change.  Yeah you may loose a few friends or you may be singled out, but thats all worth pleasing god or bringing someone to christ.  God tells us to "... make disciples of all nations..."(Matthew 28: 19).  Romans 16-17 also reveals to us that the gospel is the saving power of God, in which the righteousness of God is revealed.

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them (Romans 1:19).  There is no excuse guys,  God has given us sufficient evidence of his existence, the fault is with those who reject the evidence.

The rest of Romans 1 gives us foresight of what our lives look like when we choose not to honor or give thanks to God.

As christians we need to honor God and never forget that we are all sinners who deserve death.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9w1gWJBjQrM  - Impending Doom

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hy0wUz29z6M   - With Blood Comes Cleansing 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKhg9vHqiCI    - For Today

God Gave Me This Day

I was walking to my nine o'clock class today and an interesting thought popped into my head.  Why am I alive today?  Is there some reason why God has given me another day to live?  And then I thought to myself what if I lived every day of my life as if there was.  On any given week day this is how my day pans out:  wake up hours before I have acquired a sufficient amount of sleep in order for me to function properly, walk to class with my headphones in, ignoring everyone I see, show up to class half awake, repeat this process until I have gone to all my classes and then go home and do home work.  To most of you (including me) this may seem like a perfectly fine way to go about your day.  Your tired so you don't want to talk to anyone, your busy with school so you go to class, you want to do good in school so you pay attention in class and ignore every one around you.  I feel that God calls us to go about our day a little different.  This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it (Psalm 118: 24, ESV).  There is one key point that I want you to notice about this scripture.  It says "let us rejoice and be glad in it," not "let us rejoice and be glad in it we feel good or are well rested or aren't busy."  The point I'm trying to make is that we need to be perceptive to God and his will for our lives daily.  I feel as christians we take life for granted.  God clearly warns us about living our lives this way in James 4: 13.  Now I'm not telling you to skip class or talk during the entire class period or something ridiculous like that.  Im just saying live everyday for God and to be perceptive to his will throughout the day.  God has given you this day for some reason.  Be that to share the gospel with a specific person or to just make much of him and less of you.  As christians we have to start living our lives different.  So i'll end this with the same question I asked before.  Why am I alive today?