From Guilty to Grace (Romans 2-3)

Buckle up, besties. We are back in our Bibles. If you are new here, hi, welcome. My name is Dana and this is Gospel To Go, the bite-sized Bible study you can take with you anywhere. Today we are in Romans and we are skimming sort of through Romans chapters 2 and 3. If you guys listened to last week's podcast, it's going to be sort of similar. I had a lot of good feedback on it, and I realized while writing this week's devotional that it's pretty similar to the lukewarm talk, but there's a lot of good stuff in here, and so I really wanted to go over it in today's podcast. It's something that might feel a little uncomfortable at first, but it's freeing if we let it be. In Romans, wait, hold on. I feel like I need to give you guys an update. What? We're like one minute in. I'm already rolling right to the punches. That is not me. That's not me at all. Hold on. I need to give you all an update. Oh, what a week it has been. What do I need to update you on? Okay, I have some wedding stuff that's coming to fruition, which is good. Praise God. I've got my seating chart almost figured out. I should not say seating chart. Not really like where everyone's sitting, but I have the layout of my venue, which has been something hanging over my head for weeks. I'm really glad that that's figured out. So that's good. What else do we have going on? I launched my sub stack last week, which I did cover in last week's podcast. But now that we're like almost a weekend, I feel like I've got the groove of it a little bit more. I'm still feeling a little bit like a grandma on Facebook for the first time, trying to figure out like how the platform works and how often I should post and sort of trying to gain like my cadence here on Substack, I try to post at least one note a day, which is kind of like a tweet, if you will. And then I want to post at least one article a week. I'm really aiming to do for two. Like Mondays are going to be my encouragement articles. You guys will get those straight to your email if you're subscribed. All subscribers will get the encouragement email on a Monday morning. So that's one thing that I'm really, really excited for. I just feel like it's a fun way to connect with you guys through like writing like it just seems more intentional and personal I feel like when it's written like when you guys are like literally receiving an email from me in your inbox which I think is really cool so if you have a sub stack or if you've been curious about it and you want to download it I would love if you'd follow along subscribing to the newsletters is free. I also do have a paid tier on Substack if you guys are interested. That's what I was talking about with writing my devotional. It's $5.99 a month or $59 for the year for unlimited access to all of my archived posts, my chat, so we can like chat in the thread and I like respond to all of you guys, whatever. And then also the highlight really is the devotionals. So how it works and I tested it last Sunday and everything seemed to go well. If you guys are one of my paid subscribers, I love you. Thank you so much for being on this journey with me. If you feel like there were any hiccups or if you loved it, if you hated it, like I want your feedback. So never be afraid to message me. But essentially guys, how it's going to work if you are a paid subscriber receiving weekly devotionals is every Sunday a PDF is going to drop, which means it'll be posted in my sub stack and also emailed to you. And it's going to be like a 12 to 13 page PDF that you can download, you can print out, you can have it on your iPad. If you like to take notes on your iPad. I wish I was an iPad girly. I'm not. Maybe one day when I buy an iPad, I will be. But essentially, the PDF has like a theme. For example, this first month here, we are dissecting Romans chapters one through eight. The theme is transformed as a whole. There'll be a little bit of a title page going over what we can expect to learn this week, how to get the most out of your packet, and there's a couple pages for notes, and then we dive right into it. There's six devotionals because they drop every Sunday. You're getting a devotional for Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. And so each day will have a theme, a reading, so it'll tell you what to read. And then it will have like a devotional. I've actually basically written like a little devotional for each of the readings. And then you're going to have three journal prompts and a prayer. So if that's something that you're interested in, if you're kind of looking for a sort of guided study, I really encourage you to check that out. You can cancel at any time. And then also along with the PDF will be a video that drops and it's going to be me basically going through the packet with you and like explaining things, reading the devotionals, reading the verses out loud to you in case you don't have a Bible. There just wasn't room for me to put the Bible verse on the page. Like I feel like it just looked really wordy. So you can always follow along or listen along to the videos. And those videos are exclusive to Substack only. So it's not like it's very personal. It's actually super like I literally think I filmed in like my hoodie last week just like sitting in front of my computer. Like it's very chatty. Like it's not like I got ready and I'm like sitting in front of my computer or my phone with my microphone out like scripted filming a video. This is very like one-on-one personal and like I said exclusive to Substack. So I just hope you guys find some value in that. But anyways, it's basically what inspired me to write this week's podcast episode. So we are in Romans, like I said, kind of breezing through chapters two and three. And in Romans, Paul is writing to people who knew the law. Okay, these were not outsiders. These were the ones who taught it. They're the ones who defended the religion, identified themselves as God's people. On the outside, it looked like they had it all together. and I feel like this is something I've been struggling with truly so much lately and something I really want to like identify and get better at during this Lenten season I'm recording this on Ash Wednesday's first day of Lent um 40 days and 40 nights Jesus made a sacrifice and then you know on Easter he rose from the dead right so we're kind of preparing our hearts all through Lent to build up to like the last supper and the crucifixion, last supper, the last supper and crucifixion where Jesus suffered, right? And we're reminded of like Jesus dying for our sins. And I'm just trying to become a better person overall during Lent. I've noticed that this is going to be my 29th Lent, you guys. And if you don't know what Lent is, it definitely a Catholic thing I am Catholic but it just like I said it kind of like where you supposed to give something up That I guess what I getting at 29 lengths Okay you guys I had 29 lengths now And every year I like oh I got to give something up I got to give something up. It's not, I feel like I'm just now realizing it's not about what you give up. It's what you gain. So you don't always have to like, I am so used to like, oh, I'm just going to give up sweets. I'm going to give up chocolate. and then Easter is going to roll around and I'm going to get to indulge in it and go right back to how I was before and just like add it right back into my routine, have it every night, right? Like ice cream, popcorn, you know, whatever it is that you're giving up, you're not going to give it up forever, right? You're, you're making a sacrifice because of what Jesus did for us. But I feel like this Lenten season, I truly want myself to actually change and I want to gain something from it. I am trying very, very hard to give up gossiping, which kind of sounds very silly when you say it out loud. It seems a little adolescent. Also, just like I just said, we weren't giving things up, but I truly think that if I abstain from gossiping and also talking about other people and engaging in conversations where we're maybe laughing about something or I'm trying to think of like instances where I feel like I'm gossiping or oh my gosh can you believe this like I was just looking up a picture of Hillary Burton Danny and I are like on a one tree hill kick and I looked up a photo of her because we were looking up what all the cast members look like now and I knew she had gray hair but I was just like oh my gosh like I can't believe how old she looks and immediately I call myself because that's obviously rude like it's mean you can think these things but like it's unnecessary to say out loud it's unnecessary to engage in a conversation with Danny about it. Like, obviously there's some things that we can like talk about and yes, she's a celebrity, but truly like to my core, I knew I felt convicted in that moment. And I was like, she looks really good actually for like, I'm trying very hard to catch myself when I start to say something that's maybe rude or a little off, like just out of line and replace it with something positive. So for example, with that Hillary Burton example, I'm looking up this photo and I'm thinking yikes like she definitely looks 40 I don't even know how old she is over 40 and immediately I caught myself and I was like I'm not going to start a conversation about this because it's rude and like what does this truly like literally what does this conversation do for me or for Danny like we're not gaining anything from it so there's no reason to even like say this out loud and instead I was like she looks really good I don't think she's had there's so many people that have had work done in our environment in our society and I think truly she looks very good for her age you can kind of tell that she hasn't had like all this like crazy work done so I guess that's just like I went way off on a tangent just now but I feel like that is what's going to really help me become like I'm not just giving up like talking about people I'm trying to actually change my ways and gain something and make a difference in my life like the whole reason that I'm even on this journey with Jesus, I mean, amongst lots of other things. The reason I guess that as a lot of you know, I started this is because I want to prepare my heart for marriage and for my family. And I cannot build a family if I'm rooted on like conversations about other people. Like if my whole personality is like bringing up other people and what they're doing and what they're wearing and what they look like, like that is number one, completely distasteful, wrong and ugly. And number two, it's a direct reflection of me. I know that. And number three, like I'm trying to raise little humans, like lovely little, little babies. Like I don't need them looking up to somebody who has a potty mouth. That's another thing I really need to work on, swearing. So anyways, that's what I'm working on for Lent in case any of you care. But the whole point of me going off on that tangent was that I want you to know that when I'm podcasting, I feel like I'm often speaking to you and you may feel like I'm speaking at you, but know that like when I was looking at this episode, I'm like, this is like, I'm talking to me. Like I am talking to me here. So just know that I don't want you to ever feel like called out. Like I'm definitely talking to myself here as well. Okay. So again, Paul is like writing to people who on the outside looked like they had it all together. And maybe a lot of you think that of me, like from just like strictly my tech talk, right? Because social media is a highlight reel and my podcast is, I feel very intimate and I love that I like get to kind of come on here and be like super real and raw with you guys. Like I do not have it all together, like not even in the slightest. So let's get back into the episode because I like to go off on tangents here. Um, knowing the truth is not the same as living it. Okay. So just because these people were the ones that taught it, defended it, identified themselves as God's people. And on the outside looked like they had it all together. It's not the same as truly living it. Okay. Faith through works. Religion can so easily become performance. We all know someone who wears like the cross necklace, you know, knows the language, maybe even has like a Bible verse in their Instagram bio. But the real question is, are they actually living their life surrendered to God? Because I was that person. Like I've worn cross necklaces my whole life. I've always had a Bible verse in my Instagram bio, but not until like eight months did I actually start surrendering things to God and truly trying my very, very best every single day that I wake up to live for God. And if we're honest, the question isn't even about them. It's about us. God is not impressed by appearances. He made you in his very image. Do you really think that you are earning a seat in heaven based on what you showcase externally? we? Like that's already enough for God. Hello. He literally, you're beautiful. You're incredible. And he made you in his image. That is not what's getting you a seat in heaven. Okay. Paul says a person is not a Jew who is one outwardly. No, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, meaning religion is not defined by what you wear or what's on the outside of you, right? It's who you are and where your heart posture is. He's dismantling spiritual status. True belonging to God is not about heritage. It's not about tradition. It's not about routine performance. Like it is the posture of your heart. Do you guys know what I mean when I say like heart posture? Like, you know, in your heart truly to your core, if something that you are doing is out of spite, if something you're doing is for applause, or if you're truly doing it to be a good human and to please God. So I talk about this a little bit and I think it's day two of my devotional circumcision, which I'm sure we all know what that is. Back in the day, it was the outward sign of covenant in that culture. Like it was the law to be circumcised, but Paul says the real sign is inward transformation. Like sure, be circumcised, but are you inwardly like living? Does your heart, is the posture of your heart somewhere where we know true to your core, you know that you are living for God because that is the real sign. That's where that comes from. Outward faith without inward surrender is so hollow. It is possible to look spiritually mature and remain completely unchanged That is such a sobering thought That is honestly where my Lenten promise to myself kind of comes from It is very possible to look spiritually mature on the outside I do it every day I think posting on TikTok like gathering my thoughts getting a script together getting in front of my camera with a microphone, like on the outside, I know my scripture. I know where my faith is. But inwardly, am I then getting in my car and like rushing to work and disobeying the law by like going over the speed limit because I'm late to work and then like cussing and being like angry at myself or like getting road rage or like getting to work and like feeling super like overwhelmed and just not maybe respecting myself by like what I put in my body or maybe I didn't like exercise that day I'm not I'm not self-respecting I'm not getting on my knees and praying like you can very much look spiritually mature on the outside and then remain completely unchanged. Transformation begins when we stop managing our image and we start inviting renewal. Okay. Like you can manage and manage and manage your image all you want and you can rebrand and you can get out your notebook and you can be like, this is what I'm going to do. Like, this reminds me of like me preparing for my wedding on the outside. Oh, I can feel it. I can feel it. The Holy Spirit. Thank you. Truly, this is such a good analogy. I know the list. I can picture it in my phone, what I want to do every morning and every night. Ice roll, whiten my teeth, put my eyelash serum on, wash my face, cleanse my face, exfoliate my face, and moisturize my face. Gua Sha, do my massages, do everything that I want to do so that I know that my skin and my body feels the best on my wedding day. Well, guess what? It's not about that. It's not about the dress. It's not about what I look like, what Danny looks like. It's not about what our bridesmaids and groomsmen look like. It's not about what our venue looks like. It's not about what our seating chart looks like. It's not about figuring out where everyone's sitting because guess what? That is the day. That is your wedding day. That's not your marriage. And have I ever come on here and said, I'm preparing for my wedding day. No, I say I'm preparing my heart for marriage because I read an incredible article. Wait, I will link this for you guys in the show notes. This article is incredible. I'm sorry to keep bringing up Substack, but seriously, if you have one, you need to read this. I actually think you might be able to read it even without Substack. It was incredible. It was called, it's titled Checkmate. The bride was always the plan. And it's comparing essentially Adam to Jesus and how at the end of Jesus's life, he was pierced at the rib, right? And blood and water flow out. And that is Christ's sacrifice, right? On the cross for us, his bride. Christ's bride is the church. Okay. So Christ is to church as Adam is to Eve and how was Eve made from Adam's rip. This is incredible. You guys have to spend some time to read this. It's so good. So I will leave that linked down below. Um, so you guys can like actually read it for yourself. Cause I don't even know if I will be able to do a good job, like regurgitating it for you. You just have to read it for yourself. But the whole reason that I even was like going off on this tangent is because I want to prepare myself for marriage. It is marriage is supposed to be a direct reflection of Christ's love for the church. And so when you're doing things on the outside to prepare yourself for something and not on the inside, you're really actually not doing anything at all. Then Paul shifts even deeper. He quotes scripture over and over. He takes Psalms and prophecies to make one point very, very clear. He's like, no one is righteous. No one, not a single one of us, not you who teach the law, not you who are priests, not you who are beautiful and powerful and are king. No one, literally no one gets out of here scotch-free scotch-free scotch-free how do you i don't know all of us are under the power of sin we're literally all sinners we're all under the power of sin like satan has a hold on all of us that is that is true like um until we until we rebuke it until we say it out loud like sin has a hold on all of us by weaving together these psalms and the prophets he shows us that the law cannot justify anyone. The law exposes sin. It makes us conscious of it and it silences our excuses. So think about it like this. Imagine you're standing in front of a mirror with a massive stain on your shirt. The mirror shows you exactly where the stain is. It's revealing the stain. You're looking in the mirror and you're like, okay, I have a stain on my shirt, but the mirror can't wash it away. The mirror cannot do anything. That is what the law does. It reveals the stain, but it has no power to remove it. So following the law cannot save you. Following Jesus does. I just wrote this. Literally that line is in my, I think, day four of the devotional. Following the law cannot save you, but following Jesus does. Looking in the mirror is not going to get your stain off your shirt, but it's going to expose you to it. And then you're going to do something about it to remove it. And that's where hope breaks in. Imagine you've just been sentenced to life in prison for a crime that you actually committed. okay like whatever crime you want picture it you just committed that crime and you are now sentenced to life in prison I mean sit with that for a second like how do you feel your life as you know it is over no appeal there's no escape you're like sitting there like wow my life is actually over and then someone walks in and takes your place this man that you don't even know he takes the blame he accepts the sentence and you're declared not guilty you're released you're free there's absolutely no punishment left to pay that is justification after chapters and chapters of diagnosis there's finally hope we are declared righteous not because we earned it you and i did absolutely nothing for jesus to die on the cross for us hundreds and hundreds of years ago we didn't earn anything but jesus decided to pay for it that man that walked into your cell at the prison and said, I'm going to take away all of this for you and you're free. Literally no punishment left to pay. That's Jesus. For we maintain that a person is justified by faith apart from the works of the law. That is verse 28, but what chapter is that? Three maybe? Sorry. Yeah. Romans chapter three, verse 28 says, for we maintain that a person is justified by faith apart from the works of the law. so if salvation is by grace how could there be any room for pride grace is earned it's a gift and you can't boast about a gift that you didn't buy i might be losing some of you guys here i feel like i've combined a lot of these devotionals like into one big long script and like we're kind of jumping around i feel like i should have read these verses to you um but i hope that it's making sense i have another analogy for you i know you guys love the analogies i literally love putting them together. It's kind of like borrowing your sister's shirt, your sister, your best friend, whoever, your mom, you borrow their shirt, you wear it out, and you take all the compliments as if you paid for it for yourself like by yourself The praise doesn belong to you Like you wearing it That great Like you have it on right now but you enjoying something that was given You borrowed the shirt You didn pay for it You didn earn it That is what it would mean to boast in your salvation You didn achieve anything Again we did not do anything today that made Jesus Christ get on that cross many, many years ago. You did not outperform someone else for that. You didn't earn it. At the cross, comparison collapses. We're not comparing ourselves anymore. Okay. 2026 comparison is dead. We're not doing it anymore. We're not doing it. Okay. At the cross, picture yourself like kneeling at the feet of foot of Jesus at the cross. Comparison collapses because the ground at the foot of the cross is level. We all stand there the same. We are all equal. This goes back to us being all sinners. We're all equally in need of mercy. We're all equally dependent on grace. Faith is not something that you put on like your sister's shirt that you borrowed. Okay. It's not surface level. It's supposed to change you from the inside out. You do not have to work towards righteousness. Okay. There's nothing. You don't need to earn it. You don't need to work for it. You don't need to get all burnt out over it. Okay. In Christ, righteousness is already given to you. like how freaking cool is that are we kidding thank you jesus thank you jesus you're literally incredible you're incredible it's already given to you god meets you where you are always please don't forget it you are never not worthy enough you are never too far gone god will always meet you where you are no matter what you have done no matter where you are at in your life right now you can get on your knees and ask for his grace and his salvation and he will come to you he will meet you, he will pick you up. I promise you. He will meet you right where you are, not where you pretend to be, not where you think you should be, not where you perform to be. He will meet you where you actually are. And that changes everything. That changes everything. Our God is amazing. And he is the same. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He will always remain the same? Like, do we, I just feel like we forget that like Jesus, the one that literally carried a cross and got up there and died for us so that we could have a chance at eternal life and everlasting life with God in heaven. He's, he still lives today. Like, do we understand? Like, I feel like I used to idolize like, Oh, I wish I would have gotten the chance to like live back then and meet Jesus. Like, no, that, that God still lives today. And we do, we have the chance to know him and we can create that relationship with him but we got to work at it a little bit too okay between last week and this week I really really really truly hope that we have like dug ourselves a little bit out of a rut I don't know where you guys are listening from but man in northeast Ohio we have just been like slummed is that even a word like slumped is that what I'm trying to say? We've just been like snowed in. It's tough. But over the last like four or five days, we've reached like 50, 60 degrees. So it's lovely. The sun has been shining and I don't have to wear a coat. I'm sure winter will come back for one last kiss goodbye because that's how it works in Ohio, usually somewhere around mid to end March when we really think it's over. But for now, I'm seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. And I feel like when we get into that slump, especially like midwinter blues, like right after Christmas, it's just like dull and dark and dreary. I've talked about this, but I really hate January and February. I literally hate these months. I hate them. I shouldn't say hate, but they're almost over. It's fine. And we made it through and we're alive and it's great. God is still good. But what I was trying to say is I feel like we can really get into that slump and like kind of just start to like get lazy around our faith and just other things like being disciplined and other things in our life that are important as well. And so I don't know if anyone else is feeling that. So I'm really hoping that the last two episodes feel refreshing for you. Again, I always, always love to hear your feedback. So please never hesitate to message me on Instagram. Like truly guys, can I tell you something? When these episodes go live on Friday, I get so giddy. Like I'm so excited for you guys to listen to them. And then I'm like constantly checking my Instagram DMs on a Friday because I'm like, I get to talk to my besties. Like, so please never hesitate. I always tell you guys, please reach out to me on Instagram. If you're going to DM me, I never check my TikTok DMs. I just don't. There's a lot of like mojo and like, just like a bunch of like randomness in there, some spam. Like I just don't check it. So yes, I would love to hear from you. Reach out to me on Instagram. If you feel like this podcast resonated with you or if you love it, I would love, love, love if you shared it with a friend. Um, every time we share, every time we like comment, you know, follow along, whatever it may be, save it, download it. Um, it gives it that boost to like, hopefully reach more people and bring more people to Christ, which is amazing and fun. And you guys know my goal. I just want to get up and have a big party with y'all in heaven. So that is, uh, that's my mission with this platform, God's platform here, but yeah, that's it. You guys, that's it for today. I hope that you guys have had a lovely, lovely, lovely week. And I hope you have a most phenomenal, I can't even talk right now. It's 930 at night. Can you guys tell I've been like laying down recording this? It's been a week, but, um, I love you guys. And I hope that you have a phenomenal weekend. Oh my gosh. I just realized something. I knew this podcast seemed so weird at the beginning. Remember when I was like, why am I rushing into this right now? I never let us in prayer at the beginning. Wow. Oh my gosh. We need to pray you guys. If you are somewhere that you can do this safely, let's bow our heads and I will lead you out in prayer today. Lord God, thank you so much for the strength to broadcast this episode and get these words out and make them make sense. Hopefully they made sense to my friend on the other side of this podcast today. Thank you for this platform. Thank you for using me as a vessel and thank you for speaking through me to hopefully resonate with my friend on the other side. I am just so grateful for you, Jesus. I'm so grateful for you. I love you. And to my friend on the other side, I hope that whatever it is that they are maybe battling right now going through, maybe they're struggling with lukewarmness. Maybe they're struggling to come to you, Jesus. Maybe they don't feel like they're worthy enough. Maybe they feel like they can't get on their knees and pray. Maybe they're feeling embarrassed in their faith or slow in their faith or late to their faith. Remind them, Jesus, that they are enough. They are always enough, no matter where they're at in life. They can come to you, Lord. I ask that you rest your hand on them, Lord. Rest your hand on them and allow them to come to you. Give them grace. In Jesus' name, I pray. Amen. I think it's time for bed, y'all. I think it's time for bed. So I'm going to love you and leave you. I will see you next week. Again, thank you so much for being here. I love you. I've already said that a million times, but don't forget, Jesus loves you too.