No Excuses

Excuses we use

Tim Keller shows us what the Jews of Paul’s day were proud of. “All this boils down, basically, to a pride in their moral decency and virtue.”

Their nationality — their being Jews.

Their having the law of God.

Their relationship to God as a people.

Their ethical knowledge and ability to make correct ethical decisions. The law of God gave them many detailed rules and regulations which they followed. It gave them a sense of being very pleasing to God, as they saw others making the wrong choices.

Their knowledge and education in the law. They did not just have the law, but they mastered it.

Their disseminating this knowledge of God’s law to others. They spread the knowledge of the law everywhere.

Romans 2:12–16 CSB

12 For all who sin without the law will also perish without the law, and all who sin under the law will be judged by the law. 13 For the hearers of the law are not righteous before God, but the doers of the law will be justified. 14 So, when Gentiles, who do not by nature have the law, do what the law demands, they are a law to themselves even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts. Their consciences confirm this. Their competing thoughts either accuse or even excuse them 16 on the day when God judges what people have kept secret, according to my gospel through Christ Jesus.

I know a lot about God.

Paul is making the case in this passage that everyone, even nonreligious people, have a basic morality, or knowledge of the Law.

Yet he is confronting the Jewish people (the religious people of the day) for them resting their knowledge of God’s Law rather than the grace of God in Christ.

There were Gentiles (nonjews) who didn’t know the law, yet they were following it better than the Jews.

If you are resting in your knowledge to be accepted by God then you are in for a rude awakening.

You might have all the answers, but do you know God?

Romans 2:17–24 CSB

17 Now if you call yourself a Jew, and rely on the law, and boast in God, 18 and know his will, and approve the things that are superior, being instructed from the law, 19 and if you are convinced that you are a guide for the blind, a light to those in darkness, 20 an instructor of the ignorant, a teacher of the immature, having the embodiment of knowledge and truth in the law—21 you then, who teach another, don’t you teach yourself? You who preach, “You must not steal”—do you steal? 22 You who say, “You must not commit adultery”—do you commit adultery? You who detest idols, do you rob temples? 23 You who boast in the law, do you dishonor God by breaking the law? 24 For, as it is written: The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.

I am a good person.

The Jews not only boasted in what they knew about the Law, but how well they supposedly followed it.

Paul is challenging how good they actually were.

The reality is these Jews were boasting about following the Law and teaching nonJewish converts the way to follow it, and yet they were breaking the Law even as they were teaching it.

He says they were blaspheming the name of the God among the Gentiles because they Gentiles were seeing their hypocrisies and saying “they are a bunch of liars and crooks.”

That’s what some of your friends are likely saying.

They see you coming to church, acting all holy, but they know you don’t act like that around other groups.

Your good deeds are not grounds for your relationship with the Lord, they come from you relationship with the Lord.

By grace you have been saved, not by works, so you can’t boast. Eph 2

Romans 2:25–29 CSB

25 Circumcision benefits you if you observe the law, but if you are a lawbreaker, your circumcision has become uncircumcision. 26 So if an uncircumcised man keeps the law’s requirements, will not his uncircumcision be counted as circumcision? 27 A man who is physically uncircumcised, but who keeps the law, will judge you who are a lawbreaker in spite of having the letter of the law and circumcision. 28 For a person is not a Jew who is one outwardly, and true circumcision is not something visible in the flesh. 29 On the contrary, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is of the heart—by the Spirit, not the letter. That person’s praise is not from people but from God.

I have done all the right things.

Now Paul confronts their belief that because they were circumcised then they are good with God.

Maybe because you were born into a specific family you think you are good.

Maybe because you were baptized or go to church you are good with God.

Paul is saying that what matters isn’t on the outside, but on the inside.

Romans 2:28–29 ESV

28 For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical. 29 But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man but from God.

True faith will show not in us just being good people, but in us being different because God has and is changing us.

Romans 6:4–11 ESV

4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. 7 For one who has died has been set free from sin. 8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. 10 For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. 11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

this is what Baptism represents, a death to our old selves, and rising to new life in Christ.

We aren’t saved because we know a lot, do all the right things, or because we have been baptized or confirmed or something like that.

We are saved because we believe in Jesus and He is making us a new person.