How many times have you said, 'I would rather do it myself!' During the summer of 1970, my cousins, my brother and I, worked at a V-1 gas station in Rawlins,Wyoming. Customers would pull up, roll the window down and say to me, 'fill'r up!' While the gas was being pumped, I washed the windshield, checked the oil and water, as well as the tire pressure. It was a full-service station.
Likewise, the gospel of Jesus Christ is a full-service station. We shame the attendant by preaching a doctrine of self righteousness rather than a doctrine of His righteousness. Paul explains that he is not ashamed of the gospel of full service. He knows it is the power of God unto salvation to all that believe. Romans 1:16 A scripture in Ephesians 2:8-9 explains, 'for by grace are you saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God.' Faith in Jesus Christ is the criteria for full-service.
Paul quotes two contradictory statements from the Old Testament. In Romans 3:10 he quotes David from Psalms 14:1 saying;
‘there is none righteous, no not one!' He expands, 'For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; 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.' Romans 3:23, Romans 1: 29-31
Then in Romans 1:17, he quotes Habakuk 2:4;
'the righteous man shall live by faith.' How do you go from none righteous to righteous man? That is the mystery of the gospel explained in the Book of Romans. First one must be convicted of his own sins and that is Paul's emphasis in the opening chapter.