50 Days of Wisdom

Paul, in Romans chapter 3, verses 21 to 31, looks at the satisfying nature of the gospel because it's a gospel that satisfies. The first half is about how it satisfies the sinner and the situation the sinner is in, and the second half is about how it satisfies God. You might say that the first half is how Christ died for sinners, and the second half, how Christ died for God. And in those verses the word "righteousness" appears four times. Sometimes it's translated as "justified," but it's the dominating word. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, one of the definitions of righteousness is "the state of acceptance with God, a right relationship to God, or justification, the state of being justified by God." And that opens for us the essence of the theme of the gospel. The gospel is about righteousness. It's about how unholy sinners can be made right with a holy God so they can be with Him in heaven forever. Job, in chapter 9, asked that essential question: "How can a man be right before God?" And that is the all-prevailing question. How can a man be right before God? How is a sinner to escape His inevitable judgment? And by the way, did you know that every religion in the world attempts to answer that question? All religions, with the exception of the true one, follow the same path. They are all a religious effort on the part of man to achieve a rightness with God through human achievement, all of them. It doesn't matter whether it's the worship of Molech, Baal, or Allah. It doesn't matter if you're a Mormon, a Jehovah's Witness, a Roman Catholic, a Shintoist, a Buddhist, or a Hindu. It doesn't matter what you call it; they are all the same. They all attempt to be made right with God by earning it through human achievement. But the Bible is very clear that men cannot be right with God based on anything they achieve or based on anything they do. The question then comes: how can you be right with God? If you can't achieve it by morality, by ceremony, or by religious activity, then how can you be right with God? And that is the ultimate and most important question that any human being will ever ask and have answered, because being right with God is the only way to escape eternal damnation in an everlasting hell. But Paul has shown that no one can be made right with God on the basis of human effort. In fact, Paul has made it unmistakably clear that there is, according to verse 10, "no righteous person, not even one." So what happens in the opening three chapters of the book of Romans is that the whole world is damned and condemned. And at the judgment seat of God, there is no man with an adequate defense. And this, of course, is particularly devastating to the religious man because he believes he can earn his way into heaven. And, of course, the world is full of religious people because humanity is inveterately religious. But in the case of the Jews, they believed that they could be made right with God by meticulously maintaining the Law of God revealed in the Old Testament and extrapolating from that Law endless commands that they had invented. They created insulations around the Law so that you never got close to violating the Law of God. But they believed that you could become right with God by keeping the Law, obeying the Law. Well, the Apostle Paul, in these opening chapters, has literally shredded that great error by saying that it is not possible to be made right with God by keeping the Law. And that was the conclusion in chapter 3, verse 20: "By the works of the Law, no man will be justified"—be made righteous—"in His sight." In other words, the way to God is not possible by any human effort. It's only possible by divine accomplishment. By the work of Christ on the cross. Therefore, repent and believe! GTY.org (TM11-2 ) – The Gospel Satisfies the Sinner's Need

Today's Wisdom

Day: 998

August 12, 2026

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Grace and peace,

My name is Mark Paul from Wauchula, Florida, and like the Apostle Peter said in 2 Peter 1:14, "I know that the laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent." Consequently, my goal is to leave a legacy that will continue to advance the kingdom of God long after I have departed. In other words, bear fruit for eternity. And by simply reading and sharing my free eBooks, you too become contributors to the advancement of His kingdom. Thank you for partaking in this endeavor, and I look forward to greeting you on heaven's shore.

The Truth in Love,

Mark Paul - Servant of God

Now grant, O Lord, that when the souls who read these books cast their eyes upon these lines, their minds may be illuminated and their consciences convinced and awakened, that they may see with their eyes, hear with their ears, and be converted so that You may heal them. Amen!