How can you know you are dying unless someone tells you ‘you have a terminal disease’? How do you know you need to be set free unless someone tells you ‘you are a captive’? How can you tell something is wrong unless someone tells you what is right? That’s the essence of the rest of Romans 1. Before Paul gives us the blessing of the gospel in detail, he must first tell us why we need it so badly.
18
What is wrath? Some translations use the word “anger”. But it’s not emotional anger like a human would use, wrath is the reaction of a holy God against evil. If you touch a hot stove you get burned. If pure holiness touches evil, it gets “wrathed.” The wrath of God comes now in the form of degrading sin and wickedness, and in the future in the form of eternal separation from God and all that is good.
It involves judgment of two things: godlessness (19-27) which is rejecting that there is a God, and wickedness (28-32) which means “injustice” and involves the things we do to other people.
These two failures of the human race show how we have failed to live up to the pure character of God as portrayed in the two parts of the Law:
(Mark 12:29-31) ’Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this: ’You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these."
(from Deut 6:4-5)
Notice there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile here. As Paul will say “All have sinned”
Suppressing the truth means first that you know the truth, but when you learn of our evil and God’s purity, we deny it or push it away by going further into sin.
We as humans like to think that if I don’t admit something exists, then it doesn’t exist. “Perception is reality” is the old saying. When it comes to knowledge of God, though, that doesn’t wash.
God has actually revealed Himself to mankind in two different ways, natural revelation and special revelation. Natural (or general) revelation is the creation, special revelation is the Scriptures and the person of Jesus Christ. First, in verses 19-20, we see natural revelation.
19 – 20
Paul says that ever since the creation, the existence of God has been “plain” and “clearly perceived.” It really doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that there is a plan to the universe around us. The more we study, the more complicated and wondrous that plan is. Some scientists can and do try to put down anyone that accepts a God-created universe. That’s because science can only explain what it can study and replicate. They try to tell us that the universe simply obeys the laws of physics. But those laws are simply the way God decided the universe should operate. The more they study physics, especially quantum physics, the less they really know how the whole thing operates.
But Paul says there are two attributes of God that you can easily see just by looking around you—eternal power and divine nature. In other words, just look at what we see and it is easy to conclude that there is a master behind the machine, one with great power and not a human (limited) nature.
Psalms 19:1-3 The Heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. 2 Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge. 3 There is no speech, nor are there words, whose voice is not heard.
We like to think that it was some cosmic accident that created the universe. But I think it takes more faith to believe that than to believe in a Creator. We are not a lot different in our minds than the people Paul wrote about—mainly that men don’t want there to be a God because that might mean we would have to be accountable to a divine being.
21 – 23
There’s an old song that goes “you gotta serve somebody.” Jesus said “you cannot serve two masters.” You will have a god. If it isn’t God Almighty, then it might be yourself, or something else. Anything that takes the place of God is an idol, whether that’s a statue of wood or metal, or dollars and cents, or of human intellect.
Paul says they “became futile in their thinking.” “Futile” means “empty” or “profitless.” Since God is the only One who truly has and sustains life, ignoring or denying Him makes about as much sense as deciding you don’t need to breath.
People need a god, so if the Lord God isn’t it, they’ll find something else. Today people worship physical beauty or prowess; they worship sensuality, riches, political or spiritual power, and intelligence. None of those things are bad, if they are done in such a way that glorifies God in us and in the world around us. But without God, such worship is just idolatry, no different than bowing before Ba’al.
There are two stages to this pushing away the Lord God in favor of some other god—the first is to make man god, and the second is to make sin god.
24 – 25
God basically took his hands off and let man do what he was naturally inclined to do. Influenced by Lucifer in the Garden of Eden, man worships himself first. Exchanging the truth for a lie is that anything that takes the place of God is a lie and not really God and not able to bring life.
Again, there is nothing wrong with expressing intimacy between humans, but only when it is done in the way God designed, between a man and woman in marriage. But we hijack intimacy without God and think it satisfies. It does not.
Here Paul is talking about cultic prostitution, which was rampant in that part of the world at that time. He returns to talk about sexual immorality in regular life in a moment.
26 – 27
Our passions are okay, as long as they glorify God. But when we turn away from God willfully, God takes off the brakes and our passions become “dishonorable.” When you have no God to be accountable to, the human can invent all kinds of perversions, and that’s what Paul talks about here.
Yes, clearly Paul is talking about homosexuality here. Homosexuality is just one of the ways man perverts God’s plan, but it’s not the only one. Someone offends us greatly (our pride) so we murder. We can’t get what we want by asking God or telling the truth, so we lie or steal. We don’t go to God with our problems and dysfunctions so we use drugs to “escape.” But make no mistake, Paul clearly teaches that homosexuality is a perversion. He says they “receive the due penalty for their error.” Abandoning God has a price. When you go against God’s plan there is a consequence. One that comes to mind is that you can’t procreate (God’s command in Genesis 1:28).
So now Paul talks about some of the other ways that a “debased” mind will take us the more we abandon God.
28 – 32
I won’t go into detail about each of these—partly because we know innately that they are wrong, our conscience tells us so, even when we try to ignore it. But you see, it’s a slippery slope. Once you go away from God and give into the flesh, you slide further and further into things you never thought you’d do.
At the end, not only are you “practicing” these things, but you encourage others to do the same.
Mark 9:42 "Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.
Conclusions
I think that based on this section, and our own experience and knowledge of human history we can come to some conclusions.
1. Man is basically evil, not basically good
2. God, who is all good, has revealed Himself and His nature to man through creation.
3. Part of that revelation is the difference between the goodness of God and the evil of man. Even if we deny it, we know it innately. History teaches us that (Hitler). 2 year olds teach us that (where do they learn to lie?). Our own conscience teaches us that. To misquote an old phrase, “we get judgment the old fashioned way, we earn it.”
4. God’s wrath against evil is displayed in part by the very fact that people tend to suppress the truth of God in their lives and go further and further away from Him into sin. When given the opportunity, man will sink lower into depravity every time (think: Lord of the Flies).
What does this say to us?
1. We need a rescuer (thanks be to God for the gospel)
2. We can’t rescue people, only God can
3. Don’t be shocked at sin, be forced to your knees
4. Strive in the Spirit to be anti-unrighteous
Evil – seek to do good (2 Cor3:18 “are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another”)
Covetousness – give liberally
Malice – Envy – seek all God’s goodness for others
Murder – be one who shares the gospel of life
Strife – Be a peacemaker
Deceit – Speak the truth in love
Maliciousness – always have God’s love for those around you
Gossip, slander - seek to speak that which builds up
(you get the idea)
The good news in this somewhat depressing section? Notice in 1:17 that first the righteousness of God is revealed as a gift to us. When we feel our worst, God has us right where he wants us, not for an excuse to hurl lightning bolts of judgment but to give His pure life to us who need it!
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