God's action in response to our actions Rom. 1
God’s Actions In Response to Our Actions Rom. 1:18-28 EBC Sunday School 5/18
Charles Stanley in his devotional gives us some things we need to be gazing at:
1- God is not limited. God reaches individuals whose hearts are open to him.
2- God reveals himself to all in spite of them not having the Bible.
I. The Revelation of God’s Wrath (1:18)
A. Human history began with man knowing God. He not only knew God but he rejected the truth and turned from God. God gave Adam a set of things to do and one thing he couldn’t do. Adam made a choice to reject what God had requested (Gen. 2:15-17) thereof accruing the wrath of God.
1. Gen.2:16- C.I. Scoffield- “you may eat until your heart’s content”. Emphasing the freedom and permission of a loving and gracious God.
2. Gen. 2:17- C.I. Scoffield- “thou shalt not eat of it” – this construction emphasizes in the strongest way the certainty of death upon eating.
B. From his surroundings man knew there was a God who had the power to create
1. Psa. 19:1-
C. Hold (V.18)- literally hold down – man held down the truth without allowing God to work. They received the truth concerning the wrath of God but suppressed it.
1. Warren Wiersbe- They suppressed it in order that they might live their own lives and not be convicted by God’s truth.
D. Ungodliness- lack of proper reverence and devotion for God. C.I. Scoffield- this is a failure in the religious realm.
E. Wickedness- unrighteous acts. Sin attacks God’s majesty then His law. C.I. Scoffield- failure in the moral sphere having to do with attitudes towards man.
1. Is revealed- Present tense – God’s wrath is being revealed at the present
a. Rom. 1:24-32-
F. Hab. 1:13-
1. Man’s wrath is always tainted with sin, God’s wrath is always righteous
II. Explanation of God’s Wrath (1:19-20)
A. God, in his creation, has provided sufficient evidence of himself to hold accountable all who reject that revelation.
1. This is natural revelation. We can look around and see that the creation had to nave a creator. We can see that based on creation God is not a mere mortal.
2. C.I. Scoffield- No man is able to stand before God and say that he turned away from God because God did not give any light. All men have had the revelation of God, therefore all men are accountable to Him.
B. New American Commentary- Disbelief requires an act of rebellion against common sense. It displays fallen humanity’s fatal bias against God. Although the created order cannot force a person to believe, it does leave the recipient responsible for not believing.
1. People are without a defense for their unwillingness to believe.
2. Without excuse – without a defense.
C. John MacArthur- God’s wrath is universal, being discharged against all who deserve it. No amount of goodwill, giving to the poor, helpfulness to others, or even service to God can exclude a person from the all Paul mentions here.
1. Rom. 3:9,23-
a. John MacArthur- Obviously, some people are morally better than others, but even the most moral and upright person falls far short of God’s standard of perfect righteousness. No one escapes.
III. Rejection of God (1:21-23)
A. Bible Knowledge Commentary- People’s suppression of the truth is seen in their rejecting the clear evidence of God as the sovereign Creator and their perversion of that knowledge into idolatry. John MacArthur- God is also justified in His wrath and judgment because of man’s willful rejection of Him. Paul explicitly declares that though they knew God through this natural, general revelation, unbelieving men still rejected Him. Although man is innately conscious of God’s existence and power, he is just as innately and wickedly inclined to reject that knowledge
1. They turned from the very purpose God made them – to glorify Him.
a. Their thinking became futile (worthless, purposeless), their foolish (morally senseless) hearts became darkened. . When truth is rejected, in time the ability to recognize and to receive truth is impaired. John MacArthur- this is the root sin of pride which is at the very core of man’s downward spiral. Glorified him not – They did not give God his rightful place in their lives. Our pride stops us from thanking God for His many provisions to us. Neither were thankful- ingratitude is one of our worst sins. Remember the healed lepers- how many thanked Jesus. Became vain- became empty in their reasonings.
b. John MacArthur- To forsake God is to exchange truth for falsehood, meaning for hopelessness, and satisfaction for emptiness. But an empty mind and soul is like a vacuum. It will not long remain empty but will draw in falsehood and darkness to replace the truth and light it has rejected. The foolish heart that rejects and dishonors God does not become enlightened and freed, as sophisticated unbelievers like to claim, but rather becomes spiritually darkened and further enslaved to sin. The person who forsakes God forsakes truth, light, and eternal life, as well as meaning, purpose, and happiness. He also forsakes the foundation and motivation for moral righteousness. Spiritual darkness and moral perversity are inseparable. When man forfeits God, he forfeits virtue. The God-less philosophy of the world inescapably leads to moral perversion, because unbelief and immorality are inextricably intertwined.
1. Col. 2:8-
c. When the incarnation of truth and light came into the world, unbelieving mankind would not have Him. Because Jesus was the light of the world, they rejected Him, because their deeds were evil and they loved darkness rather than light. For the very reason that Jesus spoke the truth, they would not believe Him. That is the legacy of man’s refusal to glorify God.
B. The result is this is they became fools (stupid). Bible knowledge Commentary- Man’s refusal to acknowledge and glorify God leads to a downward path: first, worthless thinking; next, moral insensitivity; and then, religious stupidity (seen in idol-worship). We worship something that has no lasting value (money, homes, recreation).
C. J .Vernon McGee- Man is moving away from God, and right now the world is probably farther from God than at any time in its history. The fact of the matter is that every primitive tribe has a tradition that way back in the beginning their ancestors knew God. Dr. Vincent in Word Studies in the New Testament says, “I think it may be proved from facts that any given people, down to the lowest savages, has at any period of its life known far more than it has done: known quite enough to have enabled it to have got on comfortably, thriven and developed, if it had only done what no man does, all that it knew it ought to do and could do.” No people have ever lived up to the light that they have had. Although they had a knowledge of God, they moved away from Him.
D. Donald Gray Barnhouse made this observation – “Will God give man brains to see these things and will man then fail to exercise his will toward that God? The sorrowful answer is that both of these things are true. God will give a man brains to smelt iron and make a hammer head and nails. God will grow a tree and give man strength to cut it down and brains to fashion a hammer handle from its wood. And when man has the hammer and the nails, God will put out His hand and let man drive nails through it and place Him on a cross in the supreme demonstration that men are without excuse.”
IV. Result of God’s Wrath (1:24-28)
A. John MacArthur- Like an untended garden, when man is left to himself the bad always chokes out the good, because that is the inclination of his fallen nature. Man’s natural development is not upward but downward; he does not evolve but devolve. He is not ascending to God but descending from God.
1. This giving is not permissive it is judicial. They were blinded not because God withdrew his light but because God delivered them over to the natural result of their unbelief.
1. The major point is these verses is that when man continuously abandons God, God will abandon them. These verses vividly portrays the consequences of God’s abandonment of rebellious mankind.
a. Psa. 81:11,12- this is the nation Israel.
b. Hos. 4:17- Hosea reports the same reality
c. Acts 14:16- Paul declared this
B. Judge 10:13- When God abandons men to their own devices, His divine protection is partially withdrawn. When that occurs, men not only become more vulnerable to the destructive wiles of Satan but also suffer the destruction that their own sin works in and through them.
C. 2 Chron. 24:20-
D. 2 Chron. 15:2-
E. The most sobering thought in these verses – God gave them over.
1. Charles Stanley- When God is denied his rightful position as Lord over a man or woman's life, that pereson's heart will remain hopelessly empty. Instead of submitting to God, that person will fall into idolatry, finding some philosophy or object to which he devotes time and attention.
Without the Lord people will continue seeking new ways to satisfy the emptiness that only God can fill. Then taking the step from idolatry to immorality becomes all too easy. Some people are drawn to sexual perversion, some will worship wealth others will be involved in alcohol.
Scripture teaches idolatry and immorality will incurr the divine wrath of God. God uses a subtle punishment on them - he gvies them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper. There is no worse penality than to have the creator turn away and leave a beloved human creation to be devoured by that which he worships.
2. Look at verses
24- up to uncleaness (adultery, fornication, prostitution)
26- up to vile passions (sex with members of their own sex, women became lesbians, men became sodomites)
28- up to reprobate minds (unapproved mind). God gave them over to do what they wanted to do.