[Romans 3:9-20] 2026.07.26 The sinner in the Mirror
[Romans 3:9-20] 2026.07.26 The sinner in the Mirror
The sinner in the Mirror
Big Idea: The law of God exposes our true, utterly sinful selves — all alike under sin's power, and not even one of us righteous — so that every mouth is stopped before the judgement of God.
1. No one righteous, not even one (vv.9–12).
2. The law exposes our sinful personhood — throat, tongue, feet and eyes (vv.13–18).
3. Every mouth is silent before the God who speaks (vv.19–20).
When was the last time you find yourself in a scary situation?
As a parent, one of the scariest times in my life was when I couldn’t find one of my children in a shopping centre.
When Zoe was a little girl, I took her to a very big toy shop to look at some toys.
I told her to stay with me, but she would often wander away to look at a particular toy for a long time.
Before I knew it, she suddenly disappeared.
I then started to panic and started running around the shop to look for her.
After what must have been the longest five minutes, I decided to go to the entrance of the toy shop.
I prayed hard and very soon afterwards, Zoe came out and ran towards me.
As human beings, when we face a threatening situation, we often respond with fear.
There are four ways we respond to fear:
We fight the fear, we take flight from the fear, we freeze in fear or we may fawn over our threat, trying to please the person who’s threatening us.
Even though we don’t like fear, it’s actually a good thing to have because it helps us to survive.
In today’s passage, we come across what initially sounds like a strange verse: There is no fear of God before their eyes.
However, the Bible says that it’s actually a bad thing not to have the fear of God.
To not have the fear of God is often the description of the worst people in the Bible.
Why is it a good thing to be terrified by God? What does it look like?
How do you respond to the fear of God?
Please open your Bible with me to Romans chapter three, beginning from verse nine.
We’re going to see three things:
1. No one righteous, not even one (vv.9–12).
2. The law exposes our sinful personhood — throat, tongue, feet and eyes (vv.13–18).
3. Every mouth is silent before the God who speaks (vv.19–20).
Before we begin, let’s pray, “Father, please help us to see your words more clearly, that we may know what it means to fear you. For Jesus’ sake, Amen.”
1. No one righteous, not even one (vv.9–12)
Paul has spent the first two chapters of the letter to the Romans explaining to us that the Gentiles were guilty of sin before the Holy God, and the Jews, who had the law of God, were also guilty in the presence of a Holy God.
In today’s passage, Paul emphasises once again that there is no one righteous, not even one.
Look with me at Romans chapter three beginning from verse nine, “What then? Are we any better off? Not at all! For we have already charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin,” Who are the ‘we’ that Paul was referring to?
An Australian commentator by the name of Leon Morris suggests that the ‘we’ here refers to Christians.
We are not better than the Jews and the Greeks.
Chinese Christians are not better than Chinese non-Christians.
We Christians say that everyone, Jews and Greeks, are all under sin.
All of us, have been slaves of sin.
Jesus says in John 8:34, “Truly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin.”
Are Christians better than other people?
Not at all!
Look with me at verses 10-12, Paul says that what he’s saying is nothing new; it’s been written in the Old Testament of the Bible: “as it is written: There is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. All have turned away; all alike have become worthless. There is no one who does what is good, not even one.” (vv.10–12, quoting Pss 14:1–3; 53:1–3; Eccl 7:20).
Paul emphasises that there is not even one righteous person among us, not one good person among humanity.
Not one.
In verses 10-12, we see a kind of chiasm happening.
Chiasm refers to a structure in literature which starts and ends with a similar idea.
As you come to the centre, you see the heart of the person’s argument.
And so, take a look at this diagram: The top part and the last part are very similar: (The top) There is no one righteous, not even one.
There is no one who understands. (The bottom) There is no one who does good, not even one.
We then move to the middle.
There is no one who seeks God.
All have turned away, all alike have become worthless.
In the middle of the argument, we see the rationale behind what makes as person righteous.
A person’s righteousness is defined by that person’s relationship with God.
A righteous person seeks God, a righteous person chases after God, a righteous person actively and intentionally find out what God wants and does it.
However, who actually does it?
Nobody.
There is no one righteous, not even one.
Friends, if we think we are more righteous, then we need to hear Paul’s words again in verse nine: “What then? Are we better off? Not at all!”
Don’t fall for a self-marked righteousness test.
Left to ourselves, we won’t seek God, we would turn away from God, and we would become worthless.
And so, if you are seeking God, if you are turning away from your sins and turning to God, you are a miracle.
Though you might think that it was you who decided to seek God, it was actually God himself who has moved you to come and listen to His word today.
If you are a member of the Church and you see someone coming here for the first time, see that person as a precious miracle of God.
Welcome them, talk with them, encourage them, be the kind of person God would want you to be because it’s God himself who brought that person to Church.
Conversely, if you are only here because you had to, then repent, turn back to God, and ask God to so work in your heart so that you will understand his righteousness.
You can’t make yourself follow God; only God can do that.
As we prepare to combine our 9:15 English and Chinese congregations over the coming months, remember who we are before the Lord Jesus.
We don’t come before him with any righteousness of our own, with any goodness of our own.
Ultimately what unites us is not our shared culture, our shared background, but our shared trust in our Lord Jesus Christ.
Right now, among the 50,000 households within our 10-minute radius there is not one person who would naturally come to know God on their own.
And so, join us as we fall on our knees and pray every Tuesday, that God would open the hearts of the unseeking that they may seek God.
Pray also for the Welcome to Life ministries, like the Welcome Tent and the Welcome to Life courses, as we share the love of God with them when they come to our Church.
2. The law exposes our sinful personhood — throat, tongue, feet and eyes (vv.13–18).
Throughout the Bible, God teaches us what his righteousness looks like.
For the law exposes our sinful personhood – throat, tongue, feet and eyes.
Look with me at verses 13-18, “Their throat is an open grave; they deceive with their tongues. Vipers’ venom is under their lips. Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood; ruin and wretchedness are in their paths, and the path of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes.”
Sin takes over all of our body, from our throats to our feet, from our eyes to our tongues.
When we go to the GP, often the first instruction they give is 'open your mouth and say ahh' — the mouth tells the doctor what is happening inside.
Paul runs the same examination: if you listen to a person's throat, tongue and lips for long enough, you learn the state of the heart.
Firstly, our throats are like open graves.
As a minister, I would go to cemeteries to conduct burial services.
The holes they dig are quite deep; you don’t want to fall into it.
Yes, it’s still a deep hole, but it’s not empty; it’s already occupied with a dead body.
Ceremonially, for the Jewish person, it’s unclean.
Nobody wants to fall into an open grave.
And yet, that’s what our throats are, for we deceive with our tongues and we have vipers’ venom under our lips.
We say bad things with our mouths, don’t we?
When we gossip and we unfairly criticise other people, we say things that dissolve trust.
Our mouths are filled with cursing and bitterness (vv.13–14; Pss 5:9; 140:3; 10:7).
This is not merely swearing or saying bad words when we hurt ourselves.
It’s constantly saying bad things about other people, to hurt them, to belittle them and to destroy their reputation.
And that’s just our mouth!
Paul then moves to the feet.
We have feet that are swift to shed blood.
This is not talking about people who are forced into a corner and they had to reluctantly hurt someone in self-defence to survive.
These are people who run to violence, people who are keen to hurt; they may even be keen to kill.
They bring ruin to their victims and they bring wretchedness to themselves.
They are familiar with bloodshed, ruin and misery but they are strangers to the path of peace (vv.15–17; Isa 59:7–8).
Paul then gives the diagnosis of his patient.
The diagnosis in Verse 19, “There is no fear of God before their eyes”; every symptom above traces back to this.
Of course, the patient is us.
The diagnosis of our miserable heart, our violent inclination feet and our toxic tongue is our lack of the fear of God.
That is, the root cause of what makes us unrighteous people, the reason why there is not one righteous person among us, is not because we don’t have the right education, nor is it because we don’t have enough resources and opportunities to do good.
We are not righteous because we don’t have a fear of God.
To put it another way, if we have the fear of God, we will be genuinely righteous.
The Bible tells us that if you are to be truly successful in life, not according to the world’s standard, but to God’s far superior standard, you must live in fear.
The Bible tells us in Proverbs 1:7, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and discipline.”
When we fear God, we will have a proper understanding of how the world truly works, for we will see ourselves as we truly are, miserable, unrighteous, toxic sinners, who are doomed to face God’s judgement.
To have the fear of God is be terrified at the prospect of facing God’s wrath forever and to repent and turn back to him.
It’s only when we realise the terrible danger that we’re in, when we realise that we’re one heartbeat, one breath away, from spending an eternity in the fires of hell, that we’re truly ready to live the righteous life that God wants us to live.
Left to ourselves, we would have no fear of God in our eyes.
What does a lack of the fear of God look like?
It’s not caring about how we serve him.
It’s not being serious about meeting up together as God’s people as the Church.
It’s not practising what we teach.
It’s being toxic and bitter, wreaking havoc while being wretched.
It’s not fearing the God who hates our sins.
In contrast, Jesus knew exactly what it means to fear God.
Jesus has never sinned, but he was willing to take up the wrath of God against our sin so we who trust Jesus wouldn’t have to.
When Jesus was getting ready to face God’s judgement, he was distressed; he was afraid.
The Bible says that he sweated great drops of sweat which looked like blood.
Jesus, the perfectly righteous Son of God, was living in fear of God, because he was about to face the judgement of God against us, the unrighteous enemies of God.
And yet, Jesus, even when he was stressing out in great fear, said to God, “Not my will but yours be done”.
It’s because Jesus has faced God’s judgement against us that we can have a right relationship with God.
Jesus has saved us so that we will have a proper fear of God, so that we can live in righteousness.
There will be times, many times, when our hearts will prone to turn away from God.
That’s why we need one another’s help to remind us of what it means to truly walk in the fear of God.
One of the ministries we have started in our Church are the 121 ministries.
We want to have good Christian men and women who will walk with other Christian men and women to help them better walk in the fear of God.
We’re calling this the Walk with Me ministry.
The Walk with Me ministries is a discipleship programme that works by walking with a companion, helping each other walk in the way of peace that the world does not know (v.17; Prov 1:15–16, 33).
In a world marked by divisions, let’s be a Church that makes the way of peace visibly known, as we worship and have fellowship with one another, not just for our sake, but also as a glimpse of what the gospel of Jesus looks like, in full view of the households around us.
And let the gospel detox the tongue.
When we have after-service conversations and church group chats, let’s make sure we watch our tongues.
Watch out and stop your tongue before you utter any words with bitterness.
Choose silence over toxic speech.
By the Holy Spirit, detox the tongue.
3. Every mouth is silent before the God who speaks (vv.19–20)
In contrast to our toxic tongues, there will come a day when every mouth is silent before the God who speaks.
Look with me at verse 19, “ Now we know that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are subject to the law, so that every mouth may be shut and the whole world may become subject to God’s judgment.”
Paul’s attention is now back on the Jews.
They had the law, and the law speaks to them.
However, though they had the law, they failed to obey it.
And so God’s judgement will fall on both them and the Gentiles.
On that day, their mouths would be shut because they could not boast that they would be any better than the Gentiles. they would be guilty as charged and they would not be able to appeal the sentence.
In the show Border Security, they would often show people arriving at the customs at the airport who tried to smuggle cigarettes or food or drugs into Australia.
At first, they would argue that they had nothing to hide.
Then, when the custom officers show the evidence, some would try to argue that they didn’t know anything about these.
Others will have nothing to say, because the evidence was too clear.
That’s what it would be like for us on that day.
Look with me at verse 20, “For no one will be justified in his sight by the works of the law, because the knowledge of sin comes through the law.” (v.20; Ps 143:2). 'The law' here is the whole Old Testament; it includes everything in the law, the prophets and the songs of the Old Testament.
The law of God shows us what true righteousness is and how we’ve fallen short of it.
A Bible commentator described the law like this: “it is the straight-edge of the Law that shows us how crooked we are.”
In this verse, God has made it clear that No one will be justified in his (God’s) sight by the works of the law.
Since there is no one righteous, no one will be justified by the law.
What the law teaches is good, but the very fact that we fail to keep it show that we’re bad.
However, knowing that we’re sinners is the first step for us to turn back to God.
If we don’t know about God’s furious judgement against our sin, then we would have no fear of God in our eyes.
If we have no fear of God in our eyes, we would continue to sin and work our way toward hell.
Instead, when God exposes our sins and graciously give us the fear of God, we could do one of four things.
Remember how our bodies respond to fear? Fight, Flight, Freeze or Fawn.
1. We could fight God, but that would be useless.
It’s like an ant fighting against a whale.
Our chance is zero.
2. We could take flight from God, but that also would be useless.
Where can we flee from God’s presence?
3. We could freeze and not do anything, but that only decreases the time we have to turn back to God.
Taking for granted that we could turn back to God today but won’t, is the riskiest gamble of all
4. We could fawn or fake our praises to God, but God knows.
We can’t pretend to love God without God knowing what’s really on our mind.
And so, how should we respond to the fear of God?
We should fall on our knees and pray.
We need to cry out to our Father in heaven and ask him, beg him, to have mercy on us sinners.
Knowing the law of God, seeing that we’re sinners heading for eternal judgement in hell, ought to instill in us a holy fear that drives us to Jesus Christ.
It’s a holy fear that first listens to the still small voice of God, as he reveals his will for us in Christ through the Scriptures.
It’s about placing our hands over our mouths in order to listen.
And once we’ve heard God’s word, we preach it, we teach it, we live it,
All of us are people who once have turned away from God but now have been turned back to God in Christ.
And so, we will bear with one another, we will forgive one another, just as Christ has forgiven us.
We will see ourselves as crooked sinners in light of God’s perfect law, but sinners being broken and shaped into the image of Christ, day by day.
Over the coming week, spend some time in God’s word, then sit in silence as you pray.
Think of the word of God as a mirror.
It’s a mirror that has no filters to make you look good or feel righteous.
It will show you your error, your sin, your bitterness, your toxicity, your wretchedness.
At the same time, it will show you the wonder, the grace, the love, the kindness, and the patience of God.
As you see yourself in the mirror that is God’s word, fall on your knees and by faith, run toward Jesus, who alone can lead you to walk in the path of peace.
If you are not reading your Bible daily, can I encourage you to start doing it.
Don’t be someone who looks into the mirror but doesn’t do anything to fix your appearance.
Instead, as the Bible tells us in the Letter to James, “But the one who looks intently into the perfect law of freedom and perseveres in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer who works—this person will be blessed in what he does.”
Why is it a good thing to be terrified by God? What does it look like? How do you respond?
It’s a good thing to be terrified by God, because being terrified by God drives us to fall on our knees and turn to Jesus Christ.
A person who has the fear of God would do everything he can to live a life worthy of the calling he’s received, not turning away from God again but to always turn to Jesus in repentance.
A person who has the fear of God responds by faithfully, joyfully, prayerfully, walking the way of peace as they follow Jesus Christ, the one who feared God perfectly.
Here are three questions for us to think about:
1. Where am I still unwilling to let God's law expose the sinner I truly am?
2. How does what I say with my tongue reveal the toxicity inside of me?
3. What would it take for my mouth to fall silent before God and to listen to his words of grace?
The law of God exposes our true, utterly sinful selves — all alike under sin's power, and not even one of us righteous — so that every mouth is stopped before the judgement of God.
Let’s pray, “Father, thank you for revealing your word to us. As we look into your word, we see our own crookedness and wickedness, we see our ignorance and arrogance, and we see how we’ve turned away from you, instead of seeking you. Father, please forgive us. Please help us to constantly come back to you, fall on our knees, and seek you and to fear you. Father, be merciful to those of us here today who don’t fear you, that we might realise the danger that we’re in. And not just for those of us who are here today, we pray especially for those who aren’t here, who are one heart beat away from hell. Father, move their hearts today, that they may come before the Lord Jesus, our Lord and our Redeemer, and in whose name we pray, Amen.”