The Romans Road, this is an excellent lesson for today. This is a good set of verses to share with people when you talk about God and salvation. If you ever find yourself talking about salvation and they are not willing to believe that Jesus is the way to God, the only way to Heaven. Have you ever spoken to someone who says “As long as you’re a good person and you do good things, you’ll go to heaven”? That is dangerous thinking because God does not take us into Heaven because of what we do or don’t do… he takes us into Heaven when we have acknowledged Jesus as our Savior and become saved. We repent and live in the Word of God.

Everyone is a sinner, we are all liars, thieves, murderers, etc. Yes, even murderers! Have you ever been angry at someone? God says that anger burns the heart and therefore we have murdered our enemy (even though not literally). This makes us murderers, too. Scary huh! Stealing? If you’ve ever used your work computer to send jokes or browse the internet, you’re stealing from your work. Same with calling in sick when you’re not. All sins are equal in the eyes of the Lord.

Here we go:

Romans 3:23, 6:23, 10:9 – The Romans Road

3:23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

Study notes for this:
Some sins seem bigger than others because their obvious consequences are much more serious. Murder, for example, seems to us to be worse than hatred, and adultery seems worse than lust. But this does not mean that because we do lesser sins we deserve eternal life. All sin makes us sinners, and all sin cuts us off from our holy God. All sin, therefore, leads to death (because it disqualifies us from living with God), regardless of how great or small it seems. Don’t minimize “little” sins or overrate “big” sins. They all separate us from God, but they all can be forgiven.

6:23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Study notes for this:
You are free to choose between two masters, but you are not free to manipulate the consequences of your choice. Each of the two masters pays with his own kind of currency. The currency of sin is death. That is all you can expect or hope for in life without God. Christ’s currency is eternal life—new life with God that begins on earth and continues forever with God. What choices have you made?

Eternal life is a free gift from God. If it is a gift, then it is not something that we earn, nor something that must be paid back. Consider the foolishness of someone who receives a gift given out of love and then offers to pay for it. A gift cannot be purchased by the recipient. A more appropriate response to a loved one who offers a gift is graceful acceptance and gratitude. Our salvation is a gift of God, not something of our own doing (Ephesians 2:8,9). He saved us because of his mercy, not because of any righteous things that we have done (Titus 3:5). How much more we should accept with thanksgiving the gift that God has freely given to us.

10:9 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.

Study notes for this:
Salvation is as close as your own mouth and heart. People think it must be a complicated process to become a Christian, but it is not. If we believe in our hearts and say with our mouths that Christ is the risen Lord, we will be saved.