Romans 1:18-32 English Standard Version God's Wrath on Unrighteousness 18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. 24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. 26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. 28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. 29 They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, 31 foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32 Though they know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. Paul has finished up his introductory statements to the church in Rome and is not going to start into the first major part of the book of Romans where Paul is going to present the charges against the whole world. Then so that no one tries to exempt themselves, he will lay out the case individually against both Jews and Gentiles alike to come back and say that all of us, apart from Jesus, stand condemned.
Paul is first going to talk about the system of rebellion that has been in place for a long time and is as old as sin itself, though we specifically see man's rebellion ramp up after the Flood when the descendants of Ham become most of the evil nations in the world because they intentionally turn away from the LORD and instead make idols to worship. This led to corruption of many people groups, especially those we know as the Canaanites, a group of people so bad that God knew that if they intermixed with His people that His people would be corrupted by them and His people would have to come under judgment. This is the story of most of the Old Testament and God laid out that history for His people (specifically the priests and the Levites) before it ever happened in the book of Leviticus (see Leviticus 26:14-45). That passage in Leviticus and the one we read today in the book of Romans sound pretty close to one another only where God promises correction and grace for His people Israel, He promises judgment and wrath for the ungodly who will not repent. God knows the heart of His people and the only thing separating His people from the people of the world as far as outcome is His grace (which includes His good discipline of those He calls His children). Remember that Paul has just cited Habakkuk 2 where the prophet is asking God why He is taking so long to judge the wicked nations and letting sin go unpunished. Paul seems to lay out God's answer to the prophet's questions by saying that sometimes God's judgment on mankind is simply to give man over to his own evil desires and face the God-ordained natural consequences of their sin--personal sin affects others around you and there are plenty of examples in the Old Testament about the sin of an individual, such as the sin of Achan, affecting entire families or nations and marking them for judgment, There is an idea of Federalism in the Bible where the sin of the head of a family corrupts the whole family, the sin of the head of a clan of families affects the whole clan, the sin of the leaders of a nation can bring judgment on the entire nation and corrupt all the people, and the leader of all mankind, Adam, can the curse of sin and judgment for sin on all of mankind and all of creation since he was the federal head of all creation. All of the corruption that we see in today's passage is a direct result of Adam's sin, which will eventually lead us into the argument of chapter 5 that we need a Second Adam--one that can reverse the curse of sin and death. God will not let the wicked and unrighteous go unpunished and will eventually pour out His wrath on all ungodliness and unrighteousness. We'll see this in the "last days" in the book of Revelation and the prophets of the Old Testament also warned the people of this, even as early as Enoch who not only warned the people of the coming Flood, but also that one day the earth would be judged not with water, but with fire. The apostle Peter will warn people of the this coming day in his epistles and even quoted a passage about the great and terrible Day of the LORD during his sermon at Pentecost when, inspired by the Holy Spirit, he quoted a passage from the prophet Joel about how in the last days, God's Spirit would be poured out on His people and then the end will come. Paul and most of the early Church believed they were living in the last days, especially when they looked at the evil that was all around them in the Roman empire. They, like the prophets of the Old Testament and like the martyrs around the throne in heaven cried out, "How long O Lord?" Revelation 6:9-11 English Standard Version 9 When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had borne. 10 They cried out with a loud voice, “O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?” 11 Then they were each given a white robe and told to rest a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they themselves had been. Let's take a look now at what God says the reason for man's rebellion is and the process of judgment against mankind for their individual and corporate rebellion against God. Paul will lay out the indictment that everyone rebels and sins against God in spite of knowing about God and His invisible attributes through His creation. We have the idea that there are men that exist that will be judged and condemned for breaking the Law that they do not know, but since the Law is simply a reflection of who God is and His invisible attributes and those same invisible attributes are visible and apparent in God's creation (though it is marred now by sin, though it was perfect and good when initially crated), then all will be "without excuse"--the exact phrase that Paul will use in verse 20 to describe the state we are all in. This passage is also the answer to the common objection about the theoretical person that God has never revealed Himself to in the "bush country" somewhere (usually the question is posed about some privative tribe in Africa). Such a person does not exist! All of us have rebelled against what we do know and God owes us nothing to reveal more to us when we've already rejected Him because of what we do know. The do not honor God or give worship to Him. Their hearts are darkened and they are living in state of rebellion. They are unthankful and they are foolish in the eyes of God their Creator. Everyone knows He is God, but they want to be their own gods...our original sin. So, they they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and the imperishable God for perishable idols made by their own hands. They worshiped the creature rather than the Creator. As man became more depraved they desired more and more to rebel against God's character, nature and invisible attributes by being and doing things that are contrary Him will and nature. Their passions and desires were to be evil and to become well-practiced at doing and being evil and even to try to create new kinds of evil. God calls their desires and actions detestable and judges them worthy of condemnation and judgment. They may have started with lusts like gluttony and fornication but eventually devolved into pederasty and homosexuality (both things that were very much flaunted in Roman society--just take a look at what Nero was known for). The downfall of the Roman society was the corruption from the inside. They would also face the natural consequences of living according to their flesh and their perversions. This is part of God's judgment against ungodliness and unrighteousness, and helps to answer Habakkuk's question. Finally, Paul says that once man has reached this point of rebellion, the next phase is for God to give them over to a depraved mind. This is consistent with what we see in the Old Testament with Pharaoh where he hardened his own heart many, many times, but the last time God hardened Pharaoh's heart and gave him over to a depraved mind so that he would not repent. I think that's what Paul is saying here--there is a point of no return where people will rebel so hard for so long that God will send them strong delusions so that they will not repent. We never know when that is going to happen though, so as long as someone is still alive, there is still the chance for grace. The are full of sin, make sin their identity, celebrate their sin, and try and force others to celebrate their sin as well. The list of those who find their identity in their sin here is similar to the list given in 1 Corinthians 9-10 (also see the rest of the chapter and compare it to what is said in this passage) and Galatians 5:16-21. Notice in all these passages that these are descriptions of those who are not saved--these are not and cannot be descriptions of those who are saved. There is no such thing as a Christian murderer or a Christian thief, or a Christian liar, or a Christian homosexual or a Christian fornicator, or a Christian swindler. I could keep going, but you get the idea. God says these people that make these sins their identity deserve to die not just physically but to die the second death in the Lake of Fire. Look at the description where they require others to give hearty approval to their sin and their choice to live in it and make it their identity, and it explains a lot about our world today--we are here at the end of this list and that tells me that we are approaching a time of judgment and the destruction of those nations where this describes them. Is it the final judgment of the end times? I'm not sure, but it could be. Only by the grace of God and the power of the gospel do we have more time to repent. There will be a day though when no more men will repent and they will all resist the gospel and choose to curse God--a God they chose not to resist and blame for all their problems, though they claim they do not believe He exists. "The fool says in his heart there is no God." (Psalm 14:1, Psalm 53:1). 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Daniel WestfallI will mostly use this space for recording my "journal" from my daily devotions as I hope to encourage others to read the Bible along with me and to leave a legacy for others. Archives
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