Romans 12.17b-Paul Commands Romans To Continue To Carefully Consider Words And Actions That Are Considered By All Men To Be Virtuous
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Wednesday November 18, 2009
Romans: Romans 12:17b-Paul Commands Romans To Continue To Carefully Consider Words And Actions That Are Considered By All Men To Be Virtuous
Lesson # 425
Please turn in your Bibles to Romans 12:17.
Last evening we studied Romans 12:17, which contains a prohibition and a command and addresses the conduct of Paul’s Christian readers in Rome in relation to the unsaved.
In the prohibition, Paul commands the Roman believers to continue making it their habit of never repaying evil in exchange for evil to anyone.
This evening we will note the command in which Paul directs his readers to continue to make it their habit of taking into careful consideration words and actions which are considered by all men to be virtuous for the purpose of manifesting these virtuous words and actions through their conduct.
Romans 12:17, “Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. Respect what is right in the sight of all men.”
“Respect” is the nominative masculine second person plural present middle participle form of the verb pronoeo (pronoevw) (pron-o-eh-o), which means “to take into careful consideration” that which are virtuous words and actions in the opinion of all men but in accordance with the will of the Father for the purpose of manifesting them before men through one’s conduct.
The verb pronoeo functions as an imperatival participle, which indicates that Paul is commanding his readers that they must continue taking into careful consideration virtuous words and actions in the sight of all men for the purpose of manifesting them before them through their conduct.
This is a “customary present imperative,” which denotes that the Roman believers’ must continue to make it their habit of taking into careful consideration that which would be considered by all men as virtuous words and actions for the purpose of manifesting them before men through their conduct.
Paul’s statements in Romans 1:8 and 15:14-15 imply that they were obeying this command.
Romans 12:17, “Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. Respect what is right in the sight of all men.”
“What is right” is the accusative neuter plural form of the adjective kalos (kalov$) (kal-os), which means “virtuous” since this English word describes something that is conforming to moral and ethical principles or is morally excellent and upright, which kalos denotes.
The adjective is in the plural referring to virtuous words and actions.
The word describes words and actions that are considered as virtuous by all men in the sense of being morally excellent and conforming to the highest moral and ethical principles of men with the caveat that this conduct is in accordance with the will of the Father.
So Paul is commanding the Roman believers to continue making it their habit of taking into careful consideration that which would be considered by all men as virtuous words and actions for the purpose of manifesting them before all men through their conduct.
“In the sight of all men” is composed of the preposition enopion (e)nwvpion) (en-o-pee-on), “in the sight of” and the genitive masculine plural form of the adjective pas (pa$), “all” and the genitive masculine plural form of the noun anthropos (a*nqrwpo$) (anth-ro-pos), “men.”
The noun anthropos denotes a “person, human being” and is used in a generic sense for the human race.
The word is modified by the adjective pas, which is used attributively emphasizing the totality of the human race and specifically refers to unregenerate humanity.
The word anthropos functions as the object of the improper preposition enopion, which pertains to value judgment and means “in the opinion” or “in the judgment of” all men.
Therefore, Paul is commanding the Roman believers to continue making it their habit of taking into careful consideration that which would be “in the opinion” or “judgment of” all men as virtuous words and actions for the purpose of manifesting them before all men through their conduct.
So in this second command that appears in Romans 12:17, Paul wants his readers to continue to make it their habit to take into careful consideration words and action which are considered by all men to be virtuous for the purpose of manifesting them to men by their conduct.
This command speaks of the believer’s royal ambassadorship.
The moment the believer was declared justified through faith alone in Christ alone, God gave them two royal commissions: (1) a royal ambassadorship (2 Corinthians 5:20), which represents Christ before the unbeliever and (2) a royal priesthood (1 Peter 2:5, 9), which represents himself before God.
At the moment of his salvation, the church age believer was given a royal ambassadorship in which he is to represent the absent Christ who sits as the right hand of the Father and present the gospel message of peace with God to the unsaved through faith alone in Christ alone (2 Cor. 5:20a).
The believer’s responsibility is to clearly present the gospel message to the unbeliever and the rest depends upon the convincing ministry of God the Holy Spirit (John 16:7-11).
The church age believer as a member of the royal family of God represents his King, the Lord Jesus Christ, on official business.
This official business is the communication of the gospel or the good news that Jesus Christ died for every sin committed in the human race-past, present and future and has reconciled us to God the Father with His death.
An ambassador is a high-ranking minister or member of royalty sent to represent his nation in a foreign country.
As spiritual ambassadors, the church age believer represents the Lord Jesus Christ in the devil’s kingdom.
The church age believer represents the King of kings and Lord of lords, the Lord Jesus Christ who is now absent from the earth because He sits at the right hand of God representing us before God the Father as our High Priest.
As royal ambassadors, believers are responsible for “witnessing” to the unbeliever, which is communicating God’s plan of salvation to unbelievers on a personal basis in two ways: (1) The example of your life (2 Cor. 3:3; 6:3). (2) Your words (2 Cor. 5:18-21; 6:2).
Just like an ambassador in the natural realm has his instructions in written form so the church age believer’s written instructions are found in the Bible.
Just like an ambassador in the natural realm does not belong to the country to which he is sent so church age believers are citizens of heaven, and do not belong to the devil’s world (Phil. 3:20).
Every church age believer as a royal ambassador for Christ has the responsibility to proclaim the gospel to the unbeliever.
The gospel means, “good news” and at the point of salvation the gospel is the presentation to the unbeliever regarding God’s victorious proclamation of Christ’s death, burial and resurrection, which delivers the believer positionally from the power of the old sin nature and Satan and eternal condemnation.
The gospel is the good news to the human race that God has made a peace treaty with the entire human race and the terms of that peace treaty is accepting the gospel message through faith alone in Christ alone.
1 Corinthians 15:3-4, “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Old Testament Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.”
Romans 1:16, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.”
Every believer in the church age, as an ambassador for Christ, has the responsibility of presenting the terms of God’s peace treaty to the unbeliever and the terms of the peace treaty is to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ (Acts 16:31; John 3:16, 36).
The reward for witnessing is a part of your blessings in time and eternity (Dan. 12:3).
So in Romans 12:17, Paul commands the Roman believers to continue making it their habit of never repaying evil in exchange for evil to anyone.
Romans 1:8 and 15:14-15 indicate that they were not repaying evil for evil.
The implication of this prohibition is that they were to be magnanimous towards the unsaved.
They were to practice forgiving their enemies just as God in Christ had forgiven them and raised them up and seated them with Christ when they were His enemies (Romans 5:6-8; Ephesians 2:1-8; 4:30-32).
In the command, the apostle wants his readers to continue to make it their habit of taking into careful consideration words and actions which are considered by all men to be virtuous for the purpose of manifesting these virtuous words and actions through their conduct with the caveat that they are according to the Father’s will.
Again, Paul’s statements in Romans 1:8 and 15:14-15 indicate that their conduct was virtuous in the opinion of the unsaved.
This command refers to the function of the believer’s royal ambassadorship, in which the believer through his words is to proclaim the gospel to the unsaved.