The Road Best Traveled -- A Sharing Life -- Romans 10:8-17

Introduction
We are on a journey called life aren’t we?
It is one long road that begins with our birth and ends with our death.
While we are on that road, we must continually consider whether we are on the road best traveled.
If we are on the road best traveled, we will certainly be on a road that he Lord has directed for us.
The book of proverbs tells us that if we trust in the Lord with all our hearts and lean not to our own understanding acknowledging God in all our ways, The Lord directs our path.
He will direct our path.

Describing the Biblical Text
That is significant because it does not say that he directs us down the path.
He Directs the path.
Think about that He determines the path we walk when we are trusting Him.
How could be on anything less that the best traveled road?
Well this passage speaks to that road as Paul is describing salvation for the Jews is obtained exactly the same way that it is for the Gentiles.
Salvation is through Faith in Christ.
Yet the world does not see that unless the church is about the business of communicating the gospel.
The church must be sending people who are faithful tellers of the good news so that we can live a sharing life on the road best traveled.

Narrate the Contextual application
We can see then that the message of salvation is important.
It is the message that declares our rescue from sin.
The message of the gospel is the message that declares one righteous in the eyes of God.
It crosses all cultural barriers and social limitations.
It is a message that must be preached and we must see that it is preached.
The life that is trusting the grace of the Lord will not be put to shame.
It cannot be put to shame for in that life, the very presence of God is dwelling.

Life Application (thesis)
Do we want people to be aware of the life changing power of the Gospel of Jesus?
Do we want them to know what Jesus has done for them?
Do we want them to know that the simple faith in Jesus is the key to Justification from God and eternal righteousness?
Then, we must send people out with the gospel of Jesus Christ to see people come to faith.

SO WHAT!! (Outline)
This morning, we will look at three green lights on the road best traveled leading us to live the sharing life.
The righteousness of man depends on the gospel of Jesus.
As we look at the preaching described in verse 8, we see the results in verses 9 & 10.
With the heart a person believes resulting in righteousness.
We can all remember the OJ Simpson case can’t we? It did not matter what anyone thought about the case, all that mattered in the criminal trial was what the jury said. They pronounced Orenthal James Simpson not guilty. Therefore, the state had no compelling reason to punish Mr. Simpson.
As we have said in the past, righteousness is the same thing as justification which is God pronouncing us not guilty.

Yet, that not guilty verdict has to come from somewhere.
It comes from our expression of faith.
It comes from our believing that Jesus Christ is Lord and that God raised Him from the dead.
Yet, our faith does not occur in a vacuum.
It does not occur detached from something very important.
Our faith occurs relative to the gospel message being preached or presented as the case may be.
As many of you know, I like to look at Acts 2 as a model on which to base a NT church.
This is a model for a new fledgling church or for an older established church.
The key is to follow the prescription set out for us there.
It is at the end of chapter 2 that we see something pretty amazing happening.
The Lord was adding daily those who were being saved.
I love the way Dr. Luke puts that.
The Lord added, not forgetting that salvation is always the work of the Lord.
Yet these conversions were not happening in a vacuum.
They were happening because the church at Jerusalem was preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
The church was continuing in doctrine, fellowship, worshiping and praying.
As a result, they were winning souls to Jesus.

As I am praying for the vision at LABC, it will certainly include those things that we see mentioned in Acts 2 in order that we might see the Lord add souls.
That we might see people believing unto righteousness and confessing unto salvation should be our ultimate goal and then discipling those people to continue winning others to Jesus.

A second green light for us to remember is that the gospel cannot be limited by ethnic or social characteristics.
Look at verse 11-12
There was a time in our country when it really mattered whether you were white or not. The very first church that I pastured 20 years ago had a balcony but it was not like the balcony here.
The balcony in that church was there for what the church history called “the colored members.”
The church was segregated. Some time in the early 1900’s the African American members of the church asked for their letters and went down the road about ½ a mile and started a church for blacks.
I have heard it said that Sunday Morning is the most segregated hour in America.
I believe it.
Yes, I know I the studies that say that people want to worship with people like themselves and to be homogeneous.
Yet, I believe that we have created that culture with our own tendency toward only preaching the gospel to those who are like us.
What if Christianity had never reached beyond the walls of Judaism?
We would all be bound for hell right now.
When we are being exclusive with the gospel or we are saying that their kind can reach those people we are in essence saying go to hell.
I had a realization just this week regarding race. I saw two boys walking down the road neat Henry James of Greensboro Road and they were wearing the low pants. All of a sudden I saw one of the boys reach down to his thigh and grab his pants. It was a good save because had he not caught them, they would have been around his ankles. I admit that I laughed but then something hit me. To me he was just a nameless faceless African American boy like so many I see every day. Yet, he is somebody and he deserves to hear the gospel of Jesus.
Will He hear it from us or will he die and forever be condemned to a Godless, torment called hell.

There is a third green light that we must examine this morning.
We are to send forth preachers.
I think the Bible is very clear on the mandate.
It is commissioned in every one of the gospels and in the book of acts.
Yet, the church is very lax at this point.
We set up programs and call them visitation and feel good about ourselves but we don’t tell anyone about Jesus.
Look at verse 13
Do we see that?
Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved.
The series of questions
How will they hear without a preacher.
It is so simple faith comes by hearing
If it is that simple, why aren’t we doing anything about it
Where are we?
We are lost on the road best traveled.
It is time to find our way by living the sharing tlife