Faith That Works/Available Light: An Interpretation of Romans II, Part 3

Romans 2, from the start

We just demonstrated that if we approach Rom 2:14 starting with Rom 2:29, we find that Paul is not speaking of Gentiles who’ve never heard the gospel. Rather, he’s speaking of saved Gentiles whose hearts have been circumcised by the Spirit. It’s these who “obey the precepts of the law” because the Spirit has re-shaped their hearts to love God and their neighbors — thus fulfilling the law.

(Rom 13:10 ESV)  ¹⁰ Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

But we should take another run at Rom 2:14, this time from the start of the chapter, to be sure we get the same result.

Therefore you have no excuse, O man

What is the flow of Paul’s argument?

(Rom 2:1 ESV) Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things.

Paul’s theme sentence for this section includes the fearsome statement: “you condemn yourself.” This is not a message of hope for those without the gospel but condemnation deserved by every single one of us.

In short, because we all judge others and none of us meets the standards we impose on others, we all condemn ourselves. The moral law that is innate within us all reveals enough of God’s law to damn us.

O, man  — you who judge

(Rom 2:2-3 ESV)  ² We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things.  ³ Do you suppose, O man–you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself–that you will escape the judgment of God?

Again, it’s pretty hard to miss the condemnation Paul announces — not for failing to accept the preached gospel but for failing to live up to the standards we impose on others.

Or do you presume … ?

(Rom 2:4-5 ESV)  ⁴ Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?  ⁵ But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.

In v. 4, Paul introduces a new thought: the kindness, forbearance, and patience of God, leading to repentance. But absent repentance, because of our “hard and impenitent heart” we will suffer condemnation.

God’s forbearance

The reference to God’s forbearance looks ahead to —

(Rom 3:23-25 ESV)  ²³ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,  ²⁴ and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,  ²⁵ whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.

There was a time when God passed over sins without repentance.

The passage also anticipates —

(Rom 9:22-24 ESV) ²² What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction,  ²³ in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory–  ²⁴ even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?

Who are these “vessels of wrath prepared for destruction”? At least, the Gentiles. Compare Paul’s sermon on Mars Hill —

(Act 17:30-31 ESV)  ³⁰ “The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent,  ³¹ because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”

And his sermon at Lystra —

(Act 14:16 ESV) ⁶ In past generations he allowed all the nations to walk in their own ways.

In short, the Gentiles deserved destruction for the reasons stated. It’s not that they didn’t have the Law of Moses or that they rejected it, but that they rejected God’s law as revealed in their moral natures.

Of course, Paul had just condemned the Gentiles in chapter 1 in even plainer terms —

(Rom 1:18-21 ESV)  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.

Thus, he must explain to his Jewish readers why the Gentiles, who were far removed from God, are invited into the Kingdom. And the lesson begins with God’s patience and forbearance — and his call for repentance. God had been patient with the Gentiles in order to call them to repentance at the right time.

They merit damnation, but it pleases God to be patient and to give them the opportunity to turn to him.

The Jews, too

Paul is certainly speaking of the Gentiles’ deserving damnation at the end of chapter 1, but chapter 2 is actually a broader argument. Consider —

(Rom 2:1 ESV) Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things.

(Rom 2:3 ESV)  ³ Do you suppose, O man–you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself–that you will escape the judgment of God?

The repeated “O man” (v 1 and v 3) repeats a phrase found in —

(Mic 6:6-8 ESV) ⁶ “With what shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?  ⁷ Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?”  ⁸ He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”

This famous passage condemns the Jews for relying on their rituals and the Temple cult rather than justice, kindness, and humility with God. And isn’t Paul’s point also that the Jews condemn the Gentiles and yet cannot rely on their Temple rituals while they fail to be just, kind, and humble to those they judge so harshly!

That is, after all, why Paul soon says,

(Rom 2:21-24 ESV)  ²¹ you then who teach others, do you not teach yourself? While you preach against stealing, do you steal?  ²² You who say that one must not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?  ²³ You who boast in the law dishonor God by breaking the law.  ²⁴ For, as it is written, “The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.”

This is the very same argument made in greater detail! Indeed, it could be argued that Paul is more concerned in these verses to condemn the Jews than the Gentiles. What he says is true of everyone, but the charge of hypocrisy seems particularly pointed to the Judaizing teachers who likely claim that the Jews enjoy some sort of superior moral standing before God.

(Rom 2:4-5 ESV) ⁴ Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?  ⁵ But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.

That means that Paul is also saying that God has been patient with the Jews (not just the Gentiles), hoping for their penitence, and that indeed fits the narrative of the Scriptures — and sets up such later arguments as —

(Rom 9:26-28 ESV)  ²⁶ “And in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘sons of the living God.'”  ²⁷ And Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the sons of Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will be saved,  ²⁸ for the Lord will carry out his sentence upon the earth fully and without delay.”

In other words, Paul is saying that God delayed the coming of his Messiah to give the Jews more time to repent, but most will not repent. Judgment is coming. Jerusalem would soon be destroyed by Titus just as Nebuchadnezzar had destroyed it before.

Don’t forget that John the Baptist’s ministry was a cry for repentance. Jesus often preached in similar terms. It’s not just the Gentiles who needed to repent in faith.

(Jer 5:2-3 ESV)  ² Though they say, “As the LORD lives,” yet they swear falsely.  ³ O LORD, do not your eyes look for truth? You have struck them down, but they felt no anguish; you have consumed them, but they refused to take correction. They have made their faces harder than rock; they have refused to repent.

(Eze 18:30-32 ESV)  ³⁰ “Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one according to his ways, declares the Lord GOD. Repent and turn from all your transgressions, lest iniquity be your ruin.  ³¹ Cast away from you all the transgressions that you have committed, and make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit! Why will you die, O house of Israel?  ³² For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Lord GOD; so turn, and live.”

With these thoughts in mind, the next passage fits very nicely —

God shows no partiality

(Rom 2:9-11 ESV)  ⁹ There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek,  ¹⁰ but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek.  ¹¹ For God shows no partiality.

Verse 9 reinforce the arguments made earlier — that Paul is condemning both Jews and Gentiles.

But v. 10 seems to suggest that some do good and so deserve immortality. Is it possible? Is there anyone who truly “does good”?

(Rom 7:18-19 ESV) ¹⁸ For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.  ¹⁹ For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.

Well, no. Is there another possibility?

(Rom 8:2-4 ESV)  ² For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.  ³ For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh,  ⁴ in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

Well, Paul says — much later in Romans — that Christians “walk … according to the Spirit” and so satisfy the “law of the Spirit of life”  so that “the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us.”

Now, this has a double meaning, right? Christians are credited with righteousness. They are deemed righteous by the work of Jesus. But because they have the Spirit and walk with the Spirit, they in fact show the work of the Spirit in their lives — walking according to the Spirit.

Thus, those who have the Spirit are the ones who do good and who “obey the truth” and “who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality.”