Pathway to Victory

Speaker 1

Hey, podcast listeners, thanks for streaming today's podcast from Pathway to Victory.

Pathway to Victory is a nonprofit ministry featuring the Bible teaching of Dr. Robert Jeffress. Our mission is to pierce the darkness with the light of God's word through the most effective media available, like this podcast.

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Now here's today's podcast from Pathway to Victory.

Speaker 2

Hi, this is Robert Jeffress and I'm glad to study God's Word with you every day. This Bible teaching program on today's edition of Pathway to Victory.

Speaker 3

Ladies and gentlemen, I don't care what the Congress says. I don't care what the Supreme Court says. I don't care what the President of the United States says.

The Judge of all the universe has spoken and he has said homosexuality is a perversion. Abortion is murder.

Speaker 1

Welcome to Pathway to Victory with author and pastor Dr. Robert Jeffress.

First Timothy 3:16 says that all scripture is God breathed and useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness. Yet some people would rather pick and choose which parts of the Bible to follow.

Today on Pathway to Victory, Dr. Robert Jeffress shares what happens to those who openly defy God's commandments.

Now, here's our Bible teacher to introduce today's message. Dr. Jeffress.

Speaker 2

Thanks, David, and welcome again to Pathway to Victory. When I look back over my life, I'm grateful to God for allowing me to take vacations with my wife and daughters and now my grandchildren. We have so many great memories of our refreshing times away. But of all the places we've traveled, I can tell you that no vacation has surpassed our adventures in the Mediterranean. The stunning Greek islands and the majesty of the Italian coastline are breathtaking. Plus, we'll visit major sites where the Apostle Paul carried the gospel in the first century. The dates for this tour are May 5th to 16th. Please go online to ptb.org and reserve your spot on the Pathway to Journeys of Paul Mediterranean Cruise.

I've spent a lifetime studying the writings and the leadership of the Apostle Paul. He's one of the heroes of our Christian faith, and one of the finest books I've come across is an illustrated guide to the Apostle Paul. The Bible comes alive when you begin to understand the culture in which it was written and the places where the Apostle traveled. With pictures, diagrams, and maps, this illustrated guide has become a treasured resource in my own studies. Let me send you a copy today. This illustrated guide to the Apostle Paul is yours when you give a generous gift to support the growing ministry of Pathway to Victory. In fact, I'm going to include the journeys of Paul map and brochure so that you can pin the precise locations where Paul traveled and their meaning to you.

More details later, but right now let's pick up the study in Romans Chapter one that we began yesterday. I've titled this message "When God Lets Go."

Speaker 3

Romans Chapter one is a scathing indictment against homosexuality. But it's much more than that. Romans Chapter one has a message for all of us, heterosexuals and homosexuals alike. It is a sobering truth. And the truth is those who abandon God will be abandoned by God to their own self-destruction. Turn to Romans Chapter one as we discover what happens when God lets go.

Now remember, we're in that section of Romans chapter 1, verse 18 to chapter 3, verse 20, in which Paul is describing why we all need the righteousness of God—a right standing with God. He goes through in these two and a half chapters a list of everyone who is guilty before God. They don't lose their sense of need for God; they simply substitute the false for the true. That's what the unbeliever has done. So what happens to the person who does that? That's what verse 24 explains. It explains the downward path toward destruction of those who reject the knowledge of the true God.

Look at chapter one, verse 24. "Therefore, God gave them over in the lust of their hearts to impurity that their bodies might be dishonored among them." This downward path manifests itself in three ways. First of all, God abandons unbelievers to immorality. Look at verses 24 and 25. "Therefore, God gave them over in the lust of their hearts to impurity that their bodies might be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator who is blessed forever. Amen."

Secondly, God abandons unbelievers to abnormality. Look at verses 26 and 27. "For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions. For their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural. And in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another. Men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error."

The Bible says homosexuality is both the cause of and the result of God's judgment. And I want you to notice the three statements here the Bible makes about homosexual behavior. First of all, homosexuality is degenerative. By that, I mean it is unnatural. That word "unnatural" in verse 26 means it is against nature. But secondly, notice what he says: homosexuality is degrading. Again, in verse 26, he says it is a degrading passion.

Now, what do I mean by that? What does Paul mean by that? Because we have a mixed audience here today, and because we have some children present today, I'm not going to go into detail about what it means. But let me just say this: if you think all homosexuals do is hold hands and kiss or even try to simulate heterosexual acts, you are sadly mistaken. Some of the perverseness in their practices and what they do to, quote, express their love for one another cannot be mentioned in public. But what they do does explain why the homosexual population has so many more STDs and hepatitis and other kinds of disease than the heterosexual population. It's because what they do is degrading. It is unnatural. It goes against nature.

And that explains the third thing that Paul says about homosexuality in verse 27. Not only is it degrading and degenerative, Paul says homosexuality is destructive. Look at what he says: "He says that homosexuals receive in their persons the due penalty of their error." Now, some people believe this due penalty they receive in their bodies is the coming judgment of God, and that may be true. But others believe this due penalty they receive are the physiological consequences of engaging in unnatural sexual practices.

Now, this comes not from Focus on the Family; this comes from the government's Center for Disease Control. Did you know homosexual men are 8 times more likely to contract hepatitis? And they are 14 times more likely to contract syphilis than heterosexual men? Now, how do you explain that? Why are they 8 times more likely to have hepatitis, 14 times more likely to contract syphilis than heterosexual men? It's because what they do goes against nature. It is unnatural. And you certainly see that in AIDS. Yes, it is true that the effects of AIDS have spilled over into the heterosexual population. But make no mistake about it, AIDS is primarily a homosexual disease.

Don't take my word for it. Listen to the words of Matt Foreman, the executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, in an address he made to homosexual activists. This is one talking to one of his own, a group of homosexual activists. He says, "Folks, with 70% of the people in this country living with HIV being gay or bisexual, we cannot deny that HIV is a gay disease. We have to own up to that."

Do you hear what he's saying? I've been misquoted in the press. I've never said that 70% of homosexuals have AIDS. But what he's saying here is 70% of those with HIV are engaged in homosexual practice. The Bible says homosexuality is a destructive behavior.

Dr. Milton Helpern was the chief medical examiner for New York City. He is considered the father of modern forensic science. He makes no claims about being a Christian, nor does he condemn homosexuality on moral grounds. But I want you to listen to what he says about the destructive nature of homosexual relationships. He writes this in his biography entitled *Where Death Delights*. Now, I found this in a commentary I was reading, and I was so astounded by what he wrote that I thought this writer, a Christian writer, is making this up or he's exaggerating what Dr. Helper said. So I went back to the original source to see if this is what really the chief medical officer for New York City had said. And it was word for word.

Listen to this: "It is not my role to condemn homosexuality as such. And I leave it to the psychiatrists and psychologists to try to figure out why people practice homosexuality. Having performed 60,000 autopsies, I say this: it is high time that those who deviate from the norms should understand the risks. I don't know why it's so, but it seems that the violent explosions of jealousy among homosexuals far exceed those of the jealousy of a man for a woman and a woman for a man. The pent-up charges and energy of the homosexual relationship simply cannot be contained. When the explosive point is reached, the result is brutally violent. But this is the normal pattern for these homosexual attacks: multiple stabbings, senseless beatings that obviously must continue long after the victim dies. When we see these brutal multiple wound cases in a single victim, we just automatically assume that we are dealing with a homosexual victim and a homosexual attacker."

Is that not astounding? The chief medical officer for New York City. Why is that? Why is there such vindictiveness and brutality in homosexual relationships? It's because what they are doing is abnormal, it is degrading, and it leads to destruction.

The Bible says when a person abandons God, God abandons them to immorality, to abnormality. And thirdly, he says he abandons unbelievers to depravity. Look at verse 28. When a person has rejected God and replaced the knowledge of the true God with a false God, sometimes it does lead to homosexuality. But that's not the only sin that it leads to. Look at verses 28 to 32. "And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind to do those things which are not proper. Being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful. And although they know the ordinances of God that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but they also give hearty approval to those who practice them."

Time doesn't allow us to look at each of these; they are mainly self-evident. But I want you to notice the last two expressions in verse 31 of a person who has abandoned God—the kind of depravity that he falls into. He uses the word "unloving." Verse 31, they become unloving. That seems like a harmless word, unloving. But this word in Greek refers to an unnatural family relationship.

I read recently of a great illustration of that: a mother who just gave birth to an infant daughter. As soon as that daughter was born, the mother took duct tape and placed it over the infant's mouth and dropped the infant in a garbage dumpster. Now that is unnatural. That is unloving. What is it that possesses a mother to do that? And you say that is awful; ladies and gentlemen, that is no more heinous than a mother making the choice to butcher her own baby while in the womb through abortion. It is all the same thing. It is a sign of a depraved mind that would take the life of a child. That's what he's talking about here, unloving.

And then he uses the word in verse 31, "unmerciful." That word means ruthless. It means without mercy. The downward path that leads us away from God always results in immorality, abnormality, and depravity. But will you notice the climax of this downward path? It is not homosexuality. It is not being unloving and unmerciful. The final thing he says in verse 32 is not only do people practice these things, but they give hearty approval to those who practice them as well. That is the final sign of being abandoned by God: that you applaud that which God absolutely hates.

And ladies and gentlemen, that is what is happening in our country right now. We are condoning what God has condemned. We are calling natural what God calls unnatural; we are calling good what God says is evil. Ladies and gentlemen, I don't care what the Congress says. I don't care what the Supreme Court says. I don't care what the President of the United States says. The judge of all the universe has spoken, and he has said, homosexuality is a perversion. Abortion is murder. And make no mistake about it, the message of Romans one is that the individual, the nation that abandons God and his law, will be abandoned by God for its own self-destruction.

And that is what we're witnessing in the United States of America right now. We have abandoned God. We have abandoned his word. We have called good what he has called evil. And God has taken his hands; he has removed the restraints, and he is allowing us to follow the downward path to our own destruction.

Well, Pastor, is there any hope? I'm one of those people who feels like I'm on a downward path away from God. That may be true of you. Maybe your downward path has led you into sexual immorality, or maybe it's taken a different form in your life—addictions in your life that you just can't overcome, or just a general sense of despair. You think you have been abandoned by God. Is there any way to reverse that and start on the path up toward God? The good news is there is.

Remember the story again of the prodigal son. There he was in the far country, far away from his father, living in depravity, despair, depression, eating the slop that was only meant for the pigs. Yet the Bible says one day he came to himself and he said, "I don't want to live like this any longer. I will get up and I will go back to my father." Luke 15:20 says, "And he got up and he came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion for him and ran and embraced him and kissed him."

The son started walking toward the father. But the Father, who had searched the horizon every day for any sign of his son, one day saw his boy on the horizon. And when the son was walking, the father started running to his son. He hugged him, he embraced him, and he forgave him. And God will do the same for you if you're willing to take that one step toward God. Confess your sin. Put your faith in Jesus Christ. God will come running toward you, ready to forgive anything and everything you've done.

Pastor, you don't understand the depravity I've been involved in. I've been involved in sexual immorality. I've been involved in addiction. I've been involved in all kinds of sin. God could never forgive me, could he? I want you to turn over to First Corinthians, chapter 6, verses 9 and 10. Words of tremendous hope for any of you who feel like you've been abandoned by God. Listen to this. Paul writes, "Or do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. For neither fornicators, that is, those who are involved in premarital sex, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, shall inherit the kingdom of God."

Now, some people put a period right there and they don't read any further. Ladies and gentlemen, the truth is every one of us is guilty of one or more of these sins. And that's why none of us can make it to heaven. The kingdom of God is shut off from us. There's nothing we can do to get to heaven, but there's something God can do for us to make sure we go to heaven. Look at verse 11. I love these words. Paul says, "And such were some of you." Some of you Corinthians were adulterers, covetous, idolaters, homosexuals. "Such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the spirit of our God."

Ladies and gentlemen, regardless of your sin, regardless of the depravity you've experienced, your sins are not too numerous. They are not too serious not to be cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ. The blood of Jesus Christ can wash us from all unrighteousness. That is the truth. That is the hope that we all have. Isn't that great that we serve that kind of God? It doesn't matter who you are or what you've done; God is willing to forgive you.

Whenever I think about that truth, I think about the story of John Newton who wrote *Amazing Grace*. You know the story of John Newton. He was an infidel; he was a slave trader. He was involved in every kind of debauchery imaginable until God reached down and saved him. And not only did God save John Newton, he called him to be a pastor, a preacher of the Word of God.

Some years ago, a group of us went to Olney, England, where John Newton pastored. And I remember walking into his church, and it had a big pulpit way up there. I climbed up the steps and opened the Bible and read from a passage of scripture, Ephesians 2, about God being rich in mercy, able to save us through grace. After we finished in that little chapel, we walked outside to the cemetery behind the church where John Newton is buried. We stood in front of his grave, and there was his tombstone. It made such an impression on me that I took a picture of it so I could remember forever what the words said.

John Newton's tombstone reads, "John Newton, once an infidel and libertine, was by the rich mercy of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, preserved, restored, pardoned, and appointed to preach the faith he had long labored to destroy." No wonder Newton was the one who wrote those words: "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost but now I'm found; was blind but now I see."

Listen to me. It doesn't matter how far you have wandered away; you are not beyond the reach of God's amazing grace. God only gives up on those who give up on him.

Speaker 2

Romans 1 was written not to keep people out of the kingdom of God, but to draw them into his kingdom. And all over the country today, even the world, men and women are choosing right now to accept this amazing grace. I know it's true because you often write or call to tell us. At Pathway to Victory, nothing gives us greater joy than hearing how these daily programs are making a difference in your life.

It's all made possible, of course, because our listeners give voluntary, generous gifts to Pathway to Victory. Listeners often tell me how much they appreciate the unfiltered teaching they receive on Pathway to Victory. We don't dodge the tough issues in the Bible like the one I address today. And that's because God wants to draw men and women into the kingdom, not exclude them from it. We know you value this as well. You often demonstrate your support by sending your gifts to Pathway to Victory.

I can tell you that your generosity is elevating the name of Jesus Christ all across our country and even our world. Thanks so much for linking arms with us today. When you give a much-needed financial gift, I'll say thanks by providing the book I mentioned earlier, an illustrated guide to the Apostle Paul. You'll enjoy thumbing through the resource for many years to come as you become acquainted with the cultural influences in Paul's day, the same ones we're dealing with in 2025.

Thanks in advance for receiving your financial gift today. We couldn't possibly provide these daily programs without your support.

Speaker 1

David, thanks, Dr. Jeffress. Today, when you invest in the ministry of Pathway to Victory by giving a generous gift, we'll say thanks by sending you the book *An Illustrated Guide to the Apostle Paul*. It comes with a copy of the *Journeys of Paul Map*, and that's an ideal reference companion. To request this special package of resources, call 866-999-2965 or visit our website at ptv.org now. When your investment is $75 or more, we'll also send you the audio and video discs for the *Grace Powered Living Teaching* series featuring Romans Chapters one through eight. Ask for your copy of the *Grace Powered Living Teaching* set when you call 866-999-2965 or visit ptv.org. You could always write to us. Here's that address: P.O. Box 223609, Dallas, Texas 75222. Again, that's P.O. Box 223609, Dallas, Texas 75222.

I'm David J. Mullins. You know, there are countless individuals who call themselves Christians, attend worship every week, and do their best to live by the rules. But in their hearts, they've never really put their faith in Jesus Christ. Discover why self-righteousness is a concern—that's Friday on *Pathway to Victory*.

*Pathway to Victory* with Dr. Robert Jeffress comes from the pulpit of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas. You made it to the end of today's podcast from *Pathway to Victory*, and we're so glad you're here. *Pathway to Victory* relies on the generosity of loyal listeners like you to make this podcast possible. One of the most impactful ways you can give is by becoming a Pathway Partner. Your monthly gift will empower *Pathway to Victory* to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ and help others become rooted more firmly in His Word. To become a Pathway Partner, go to ptv.org/donate or follow the link in our show notes. We hope you've been blessed by today's podcast from *Pathway to Victory*.