To The Moralist

the hypocrisy of “self-righteous judgment” especially when there are none righteous.

HBI - Stop trusting your morality because God’s judgement is impartial

GA - Jesus bore God’s wrath so receive his grace.

Intro

“You are without excuse oh man” Think of all we have been going through from the perspective of the jewsih person. after hearing Romans 1, the Jewish hearer would have been in complete agreement with Paul's condemnation of the Gentiles. "Imagine sitting in the congregation in Rome. Paul has just finished describing idolatry, sexual immorality, envy, murder, deceit, and every kind of wickedness. You're thinking, 'That's right! Those people deserve God's judgment.' Then, before you can catch your breath, Paul looks straight at you and says, 'Therefore you have no excuse...'"

How many of us do the same thing. I have been like that as well, watching someone get arrested and tackled to the ground thinking they deserve what they are getting, without realizing that I to am deserving of wrath. I am no better then they are. Therefore you are without excuse oh man. The moralist would say, I am better then that person. I have only stolen a little bit, they robbed a bank. I have only lied to my spouse, they cheated on them. I have only looked at another with lust, they acted on it.

You are without excuse oh man. we learn today, as kind of a part 2 from last week that we can sometimes trust in our own morality and lose sight of Jesus. But if we are trusting in our own morality, our own goodness and not on Jesus then what we are doing is storing up wrath for ourselves. so how do we fix that?

1-4 – Our Poor judgement

From the beginning we need need to learn about the moralist.

A moralist is a person who strongly emphasizes moral principles, right conduct, and ethical standards—often judging others by those standards—while tending to view themselves as upright or superior on the basis of their own morality or behavior.

So with that in mind lets see the message to the moralist.

Romans 2:1 CSB

1 Therefore, every one of you who judges is without excuse. For when you judge another, you condemn yourself, since you, the judge, do the same things.

Therefore we are without excuse we are told. Firstly because of the great news of the gospel of Jesus that enables us to have a right standing before God, and Becaue we all know and have seen that there is a God we must not suppress the truth but glory in God.

No excuse is the main point here. The problem is when we judge others and think that maybe we are better then them, or maybe just not as bad as they are . But we are warned that we do the same thing that they do. all sin is bad in the eyes of God.

Romans 2:2–4 CSB

2 Now we know that God’s judgment on those who do such things is based on the truth. 3 Do you think—anyone of you who judges those who do such things yet do the same—that you will escape God’s judgment? 4 Or do you despise the riches of his kindness, restraint, and patience, not recognizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?

We have a few ideas here.

it is not that we are not to judge ever, that is not the point here. Recognizing and judging whether something is right or wrong, which Scripture clearly requires Christians to do

It is not that we are not to hold each other accountable, it is not that we are not to practice judgement in church discipline. The problem is hypocritical judgement on those living in sin when we tend to be doing the same thing that they are doing. God’s Judgement is based on truth. We judge based on the speck in our brothers eye when we sometimes have a tree sticking out of our own eye.

God knows all

Do you think anyone will escape the judgement of God? we judge based on what we see and think we can hide from God what we are doing. But no one can escape the judgement of God.

God’s Kindness.

right now God is showing grace and kindness to us, giving us a chance to truly turn to Him. The reason we see why he is showing us kindness is to give us a chance to repent of our sins.

God’s patience shouldn’t be interpreted as God approving of someone’s behavior.

Someone might say:

“I’ve been doing this for years and God hasn’t punished me, so I guess God doesn’t care.”

Paul says that’s exactly the wrong conclusion.

The moralist takes for granted their good life, and he views the absence of God’s judgment as confirmation he is righteous

But God’s delay is not an endorsement

It’s kindness from God intended as an opportunity for repentance

When the moralist dies and faces the righteous judgment of God, he or she will realize that those good years were wasted, Paul says in v.5

Paul contracts the moralist’s self-serving judgment with the judgment of God which will be righteous

God doesn’t grade on the curve

We won’t get by with the nonsense we tell ourselves; how we’re good enough because we’re not the worst we could be

If none of us are good enough then we are all guilty

How often do we rest on the kindess of God and use it as an excuse to keep sinning. We are all without excuse, not one of us is better then the other. We may not be murderers but according to the book of Mathew we are guilty enough to be judged by harboring anger in our hearts. We may not have committed adultery in person but if you have lusted after another then you are still guilty. we are all guilty so before we run the risk of seeing the drunk on the street, or the man who couldnt stay faithful to his wife remember that we are also guilty.

But the good news is that as we read in verse 3, God has shown us kindness and mercy, even in our sin. Of old we could be judged and die for our sin but God’s kindness now leads us to repent and say I am guilty. Let the kindness of God lead you to him, not to judge others for what they are doing wrong in not having a relationship with Him.

5-11 – God’s Impartial Judgement

Our judgement fails, because we are often guilty of the same things that we judge in others, that is the beginning of the message that we see here. So we must fall on our knees and in repentance because the judgement of God is impartial.

Romans 2:5 CSB

5 Because of your hardened and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath, when God’s righteous judgment is revealed.

unrepentant hearts store for themselves wrathfor when Jesus is coming back. kind of scary to think about but this can be a thing of joy as well because you have time. The question to think about though as we continue is what are you storing? where are you treasures. again as we mentioned last week, what do you glory in?

Romans 2:6–7 CSB

6 He will repay each one according to his works: 7 eternal life to those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor, and immortality;

What about works then?

A few things are clear to us. our works will not save us because our own works towards salvation are like filthy rags, they wont help.

Works though are an outpouring of our faith in Jesus. Salvation is by grace through faith alone, but our works are a sign of that, the bible calls them fruit. We will bear fruit in accordance to our lives. so then this is not contradictory. but what does it mean? Think of it this way:

If someone claims:

“I love God.”

but their entire life demonstrates hatred toward God and rejection of everything He commands, their claim becomes questionable.

Conversely, genuine faith produces a changed life.

Take for example the law.

The law of God was set up to give the Jews a way to follow the Lord God and have a relationship with Him. If it would have been possible for the law to save them then they would have not needed the sacrifices. This echoes that same idea. The moralist who is seeking glory and honor and immortality – God will give them eternal life if they possibly could be righteous and perfect as our heavenly father is perfect.

There is something missing and we are either seeking it or trying to exchange it for all the wrong things. What we are missing out on is not doing enough good but rather lacking the glory of God. there is a universal human condition. If we could keep the law perfectly and do good, we would be saved by it. But our condition is one of sin and therfore we need Jesus.

Romans 2:8 CSB

8 but wrath and anger to those who are self-seeking and disobey the truth while obeying unrighteousness.

better to see moral Jew and Gentile- every man (v.1); judgment of others common to all moralists; judgment on every man (v.6); Jew and Greek (9,10); 12-15- judgment on those with Law and without Law.  God will judge all people on the same basisby what they have done with Jesus.

Romans 2:9–11 CSB

9 There will be affliction and distress for every human being who does evil, first to the Jew, and also to the Greek; 10 but glory, honor, and peace for everyone who does what is good, first to the Jew, and also to the Greek. 11 For there is no favoritism with God.

The main point is stated twice (6, 11)—God will judge every person impartially based on deeds

       those persevering in doing good (7)

note “seek for” doesn’t mean obtain.  Perfection is required (Matt 5:48; James 2:9-10). There is no partiality with God’s judgment and no advantage to being Jewish. There are only two outcomes—life or wrath. So, people, let’s examine your works. Do you have any wrong deeds? and those selfishly ambitious (8) For everyone, there is one of only two fates based on what is done.  But the conclusion of the argument is that no one is able to avoid wrath (2:12; 3:9, 19-20).

so who is The moralist:

trusts his own righteousness, presumes upon God's kindness, stores up wrath for himself, and deserves God's impartial judgment. We also learn about the Lord’s judgement. The Lord will render punishment to unbelievers according to the degree of a person’s sinful deeds

The sold-out moralist isn’t bothered by that arrangement He’s already convinced he will get a passing grade He’s told himself that his days are filled with good deeds and he has conveniently overlooked his sins That’s the conceit of the moralist

He has declared himself to be righteous and expects God to agree with his decision The moralist has an unrealistic view of sin, both of others and himself

As paganism gave rise to an increasingly evil and depraved society, it produced opportunity for men to distance themselves, one from another Some declared themselves to be better than others. It became possible to make judgments of “good” and “bad” Which gave rise to a pecking order of morality within society.

But that pecking order was self-serving and relativistic and not at all according to the standard God uses So while men were judging themselves above God’s wrath, they were only fooling themselves. God has been watching them as they sin, storing up wrath. And one day the Lord will bring that wrath according to their deeds

That is why it goes back to repentance. Because we can never do enough good to earn salvation.

how do we appeal to the moralist? The moralist must come to appreciate his or her own sin and that the standard of God is exact, unbending and not in their favor

The best lesson for the moralist is the one Jesus taught There is no one good but God alone And unless we equal the goodness of God, we cannot

So then what we need to remember is this:

Jesus bore God’s wrath so receive his grace.

We are told here that we are storing up for ourselves wrath for the day of judgement. Then if no one is good, we are all evil what hope is there? There is hope in Jesus who bore our wrath on the cross. so we can give it all up to Him.

the standard set out for us that we are to folllow as followers of Jesus is perfection, so then what can we do? we must turn to the lord and strive to follow Him. Jesus asked the question in the gospels where is your treasure, what are you valuing here on earth? are you the moralist who trusts his own righteousness, presumes upon God's kindness, stores up wrath for himself, and deserves God's impartial judgment. We also learn about the Lord’s judgement. The Lord will render punishment to unbelievers according to the degree of a person’s sinful deeds

Where is your treasure, what are you living for? do not drift back into moralistic thinking. Live in light of the heavenly treasures we have. Understand that none are righteouss, that we need jesus, that we are no better then the person that seems worse then us and maybe has done worse things.

God looks past all of that, he looks past all the walls we put up, all the things we try to hide behind and His ruler is something that we can never hope to measure up to. But with Jesus it is possible.

so Instead of storing up wrath through self-righteousness and unrepentance, store up treasure in heaven by living in grateful obedience to the grace you've received in Christ.