Romans 2.11-God Judges Mankind Without Respect to Persons Because He is Impartial
Prairie View Christian Church
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Sunday August 19, 2007
Romans: Romans 2:11-God Judges Without Respect to Persons Because He is Impartial
Lesson # 51
Please turn in your Bibles to Romans 2:1.
This morning we will continue with our study of Romans 2, which contains twelve principles regarding God’s judgment of mankind.
Thus far in our studies of this chapter we have noted the first seven.
This morning we will study the eighth principle, which appears in Romans 2:11, namely, that God judges mankind without respect to persons because He is impartial.
Romans 2:1, “Therefore you have no excuse, everyone of you who passes judgment, for in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things.”
Romans 2:2, “And we know that the judgment of God rightly falls upon those who practice such things.”
Romans 2:3, “But do you suppose this, O man, when you pass judgment on those who practice such things and do the same yourself, that you will escape the judgment of God?”
Romans 2:4, “Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?”
Romans 2:5, “But because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.”
Romans 2:6-8, “who WILL RENDER TO EACH PERSON ACCORDING TO HIS DEEDS: to those who by perseverance in doing good seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life but to those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, wrath and indignation.”
Romans 2:9-10, “There will be tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek, but glory and honor and peace to everyone who does good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.”
Romans 2:11, “For there is no partiality with God.”
“For” is the causal use of the post-positive conjunction gar (gavr), which introduces an explanation as to the reason why believers will be rewarded for producing divine good by growing to spiritual maturity and why unbelievers will receive eternal condemnation for rejecting Jesus Christ as Savior.
“There is” is the verb eimi (ei(miv), which denotes that God’s character and nature possesses a certain inherent characteristic that is identified by the noun prosopolepsia, “partiality.”
“No” is the objective negative adverb ouch (ou)x), which is in the emphatic position of this declarative statement and is employed with the indicative mood of the verb eimi and emphatically negates the statement that there is partiality with God.
Paul emphatically declares that there is absolutely no partiality with God and is making an emphatic denial that there is any imperfection in the character and nature of God.
“Partiality” is the noun prosopolepsia (proswpolhyiva) (pros-o-pol-ape-see-ah), which is composed of the preposition pros, “face” and the verb lambano, “to receive,” thus the word literally means, “to receive face” meaning the accepting one’s person.
The idea behind the word is that of looking to see who someone is before deciding how to treat him, thus to judge them by their appearance and on that basis showing them special favor and respect.
The word pertains to judging purely on a superficial level, without consideration of a person’s true merits, abilities, or character.
The Middle Eastern custom of greeting was to bow one’s face to the ground and if the one greeted accepted the person, he was allowed to lift his head again.
The accepting of the appearance of a person was a Hebraic term for “partiality.”
The noun prosopolepsia refers to judging a person on the basis of externals or pre-conceived notions, and shows partiality or favoritism and meant to make unjust distinctions between people by treating one person better than another.
The concept of impartiality is depicted in the popular symbolic Greco-Roman statue of justice as a woman blindfolded, which signified that she is unable to see who is before her to be judged and therefore is not tempted to be partial either for or against the accused.
Many times she is pictured with her hands tied suggesting that she can not receive a bribe.
In Romans 2:11, Paul is teaching that God is no respecter of persons and is not tempted to be partial and cannot receive a bribe.
He is not looking at the person on the outside but rather He is looking at the conduct to see whether it reflects His righteousness or unrighteousness.
God does “not” give consideration to anyone because of their race, gender, social status in life, wealth, influence, popularity, or appearance.
All these things are externals but God looks at the heart of man and even judges the motives of men, no matter how “righteous” their actions may appear to other men.
1 Samuel 16:7, “But the LORD said to Samuel, ‘Do not look at his appearance or at the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for God sees not as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.’”
1 Corinthians 4:5, “Therefore do not go on passing judgment before the time, but wait until the Lord comes who will both bring to light the things hidden in the darkness and disclose the motives of men's hearts; and then each man's praise will come to him from God.”
Romans 2:11, “For there is no partiality with God.”
“God” refers to the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ representing the Trinity as the Judge of all men.
God’s attributes of justice (Psalm 89:14; Romans 3:24-26), righteousness (Romans 3:24-26; 10:3), love (1 John 4:7), truth (Psalm 31:5; John 14:6) and immutability (Hebrews 13:8; Malachi 3:6) are all related to the fact that God is impartial and guarantee that it is impossible for Him to be anything but impartial.
The righteousness of God means that His character has perfect integrity in the sense that His character is perfectly sound, upright, honest, perfectly whole, undiminished, sound, unimpaired and in perfect condition, which guarantees that God is impartial.
It means that God has perfect virtue in the sense that His character is perfect moral excellence, goodness, which guarantees that God is impartial.
Romans 13:10 teaches that love does no wrong to one’s neighbor, thus love is connected to God’s righteousness, which also guarantees that God is impartial.
The fact that God is immutable means that God will “always” be righteous, justice and love His creatures by doing right by them, thus guaranteeing again that God will always be impartial with men.
God is impartial because He is truth meaning that God’s judgment is based totally on reality, it is based on the facts and is totally and absolutely impartial in that He does not have one standard for the Jew and another for the Gentiles (See Romans 2:2).
Therefore, God is impartial because He is perfect justice, righteousness, love, truth and immutable.
The Scriptures consistently speak of the absence of favoritism or partiality in the character of God.
Deuteronomy 10:17, “For the LORD your God is the God of gods and the Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God who does not show partiality nor take a bribe.”
Matthew 22:16, “And they sent their disciples to Him, along with the Herodians, saying, ‘Teacher, we know that You are truthful and teach the way of God in truth, and defer to no one; for You are not partial to any.’”
1 Peter 1:17-19, “If you address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each one's work, conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay on earth, knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.”
Ephesians 6:5-9, “Slaves, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ; not by way of eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart. With good will render service, as to the Lord, and not to men, knowing that whatever good thing each one does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether slave or free. And masters, do the same things to them, and give up threatening, knowing that both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him.”
Colossians 3:23-25, “Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance. It is the Lord Christ whom you serve. For he who does wrong will receive the consequences of the wrong which he has done, and that without partiality.”
In the positive sense, God does not show partiality to any one race, creed, color, or gender since God desires all men to be saved and thus Christ died for all men, both Jew and Gentile alike.
1 Timothy 2:4, “God desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”
1 Timothy 4:10, “For it is for this we labor and strive, because we have fixed our hope on the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of believers.”
The fact that God is impartial implies the spiritual principle presented by Paul in Galatians 6:7-8.
Galatians 6:7-8, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.”
Just as God does not play favorites or show partiality, so believers are commanded to be impartial and not play favorites.
Leviticus 19:15, “Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great, but judge your neighbor fairly.”
Therefore, since believers are commanded to be impartial, it is a sin to be partial or show favoritism to certain individuals because of their wealth, social status or outward appearance.
Deuteronomy 1:17, “You shall not show partiality in judgment; you shall hear the small and the great alike. You shall not fear man, for the judgment is God's. The case that is too hard for you, you shall bring to me, and I will hear it.”
Proverbs 24:23, “These also are sayings of the wise. To show partiality in judgment is not good.”
James 2:1, “My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism.”
In the local assembly, it is a sin to show partiality to certain people who are rich, powerful and well-known at the expense of those who are poor, weak, or despised.
James teaches that such partiality is often shown to the very ones who are oppressing, cheating and exploiting believers and to be guilty of this is to slander the Lord (James 2:2-13).
The believer does not love his neighbor as himself when he plays favorites (See Mark 12:28-31).
In Romans 13:8-10, the apostle Paul teaches the Roman believers that love does no wrong to one’s neighbor, thus to show partiality is not loving one’s neighbor as oneself.