Boker Tov! It IS a good morning. The Lord God of Israel is still on His throne, and His will is carried out in the earth, always, as we learned in Daniel 2:21. In the real time that this broadcast is going out, the whole world has been waiting for the American elections to be over, and all Americans have been waiting for the political ads and texts and emails to STOP! Whew! I won’t miss those at all....
Does anyone else have post-election hangover this morning? My husband watched the returns until 2:30 this morning. I told him I could not, was too sleepy.
Ok, this morning, with me on about 5 hours of sleep, we are going to begin, before we go on to Romans chapter 2, by drilling down on verses 18-20 of chapter 1. They are verses that deserve our scrutiny, although there are diverse theological opinions as to what they clearly say. Let’s read them together. As before, I am using a translation of the New Testament, the Brit Chadasha called The Apostolic Writings, by Andrew Gabriel Roth.
18 For the wrath of Elohim from heaven is revealed against all the wickedness and ungodliness of men, those who suppress the truth with wickedness.
19 Because the knowledge of Elohim is revealed among them; for Elohim revealed it among them.
20 For, from the foundations of the world, the invisible things of Elohim are seen by the wisdom in the things He created and were made eident by His Eternal Power and Divine Majesty, so that they would be without excuse.
The number one characteristic of unrighteous, ungodly, lost-without-Christ people is that they suppress the truth. We see this passage "book-ended" by Paul's statements to that effect, in verses 18 and 25.
This morning, I was watching a news channel which is trying its darnedest to ignore the results of the election that was held yesterday, if you are watching this broadcast in real time. The network is doing this in an attempt to sway the hearts of the voters, by painting a false picture to their viewers, the electorate. Campaigns do the same thing. Facts are distorted, left out entirely, blatant lies told. I'm not saying that this network or that one is ungodly. I am saying that they bend the truth to suit their own purposes. It is the way of the world in these dark, evil days.
Interestingly, Paul asserts in verses 19-20 that godless people, in their heart of hearts, KNOW the truth, one evidence of God's supremacy being His amazing creation all around us. Unfortunately, rather than bowing their hearts in worship to almighty God, through His Son, Jesus Christ, these people choose to worship created things, most often, themselves or other created beings. They proclaim themselves to be 'smarter than the average bear' (vs. 22). They believe themselves to be "enlightened", intellectual, not falling for foolish "Bible stories" or praying to “the great sky fairy”, as I’ve heard God called.
“But Elohim has chosen the simple ones of the world to shame the wise, and He has chosen the weak ones of the world to shame the mighty; And He has chosen those of humble birth in the world, and the despised, and them who are nothing, to bring to nothing them who are something: So that no flesh might boast before Him.” 1 Corinthians 1:27
Paul allows these people, who make this deliberate choice, "no excuse" for their unrighteousness. They are unrighteous because they have made a conscious decision to reject God's plan for mankind's redemption, and more importantly, for their own.
They make a very, very short-sighted, foolish exchange. They trade, or exchange, the glory of the immortal God for some other "idol". Be sure you understand --- an "idol" can be anything and anyone that takes the place of God in our lives. Some versions of verse 25 say this "they exchanged the truth of God for 'the lie' ". What is "the lie" referred to here? It is the assertion that ---
"There is no God; therefore, He cannot be known. Since He does not exist, I am not accountable to Him. I am my own god."
What I want to focus on, however, is this idea of these people being “without excuse” as far as them having sufficient information to make a righteous decision. The Lord God declares through the apostle Paul that they are without excuse whether they have heard the gospel of Jesus Messiah, Yeshua HaMashiach, or not. God has given them enough information, mainly through their God-given good sense and through the wonders of nature and that He will hold them responsible according to that standard of measure. He holds us all accountable to the knowledge and wisdom He has given us.
On page 395 of TAW, there is a footnote which addresses this point. I will read it verbatim. “For if they had clung to nature, yes and also to Scripture, they from both would have learned from the Master of both. Nature shows by open things and Scripture too by plain things!” The writer, Master Ephrem, here seems to be rebuking both pagan and Yehudean (Jewish) groups, the former being in the “nature” group and the latter being tied to the Scripture via the Tanakh, the Old Testament. It was common to associate pagans with nature worship; the Greek word “paganos” literally means “a forest dweller.” Nevertheless, Mar Ephrem’s point is that if by either discipline people searched for Messiah with an open heart and disciplined effort, they would have found him.”
Terry Baxter, the co-founder of GoServ Global, speaks of the internal witness and the external witness of God. The internal witness is that one which God placed within each and every human being He has created, which of course means all of us. The internal witness refers to that God-shaped void which is part of the human experience, that space inside each of our hearts which can only be filled by the presence of God alone. There is a popular song from recent years called “Flying Without Wings”, by Westlife. It begins, “Everybody’s looking for that something, one thing that makes it all complete.” The song, being a worldly song, of course, lists a bunch of wonderful things people seek and pursue, to fill that void. They are wonderful things, experiences, people, but they are not God. Only He can inhabit fully the space He created in our souls that longs for Him. St. Augustine spoke of the internal witness like this: “Thou hast created us for Thyself, and our heart is not quiet until it rests in Thee.”
Then, there is what theologians, including Baxter, call the external witness: God’s Visible and Invisible Creation. When people begin to earnestly search for truth apart from preconceived teachings or notions, the horrendous, numerous lies of the theory of evolution begin to be stripped away. In fact, many scientists have come to faith in God as they have deconstructed the theory of evolution by looking honestly at the truth in plain sight. There exist many thousands of unexplained phenomena which point to our benevolent Creator, our Almighty God.
As Baxter points out, there is now a third witness, one which he calls “the written witness of God.” We have God’s written word, in which He reveals Himself, most perfectly through the LIVING Word of God, His Son. Be very sure of this. Those who close their minds and hearts to these witnesses can never stand before God on Judgment Day and say, “No one ever told me.” As verse 20 says, “they are without excuse” . . . for their sin and unbelief. God has left His imprint literally everywhere.
Allright, we are going to now move into chapter two.
Just to reiterate, this letter was written to the Jewish and the Gentile believers in Messiah Yeshua, in the large pagan city of Rome. We have been honing in on Paul's description of the unbelievers, the pagan Gentile peoples who comprised most of the population of that city. More broadly, Romans 1:18-32 described pagan people groups around the world. There's not a doubt in my mind that the Jewish Christians, reading chapter 1, were lapping it up.
The Jews had for hundreds of years viewed themselves as "better than". So, certainly they were nodding and "amen-ing" as they read the description in Romans 1:18-32. "OH! The depravity and guilt of those pagan Gentiles!"
Then, they turned the page and began to read chapter 2. That's when the hammer came down.
There's a tendency to "cherry-pick" verses in Romans 2. We must resist that tendency. Paul was verbose, to say the least; and, he was leading up to God's message of grace in chapter 3. In order to get there, Paul had to destroy the Jewish Christians' self-righteousness, which he did quite handily in chapter 2. Paul is trying to get the Jewish believers to see the truth he makes plain in verse 11. Let’s look at that verse first. It says,
“For there is no respecter of persons with Elohim.”
Over in Romans chapter 10, verse 12, we hear a similar message.
“And in this, it discriminates neither Yehudeans nor Arameans. For there is one MarYAH, over them all, who is abundantly generous towards all who call on Him.
Now then, let’s look at verse 1 of chapter 2.
“There is therefore no excuse for you, O man, who judges his neighbor; for by judging your neighbor, you condemn your soul; for you that judge do practice the same things.”
Hypocrisy much? Have you heard that old saying that goes like this: when you point your index finger at another person, you have three or four other digits pointing right back at yourself. uhm-hmm....These new believers still saw themselves as a better class of people than the unbelieving, pagan Gentiles who openly and flagrantly engaged in riotous sin. Paul points out that the Jews were little better than they! The Jews put on the adornments of Judaism (circumcision, feast days, etc.), but many of them were hiding the sins they so lavishly practiced. The difference was that the Jews believed that their "chosen people" status would protect them from God's judgment. Not so!
Let’s read some more verses, 2 through 6:
And we know that the judgment of Elohim is in accordance with truth, in regard to those who practice these things. 3 And what thinks you, O man, who judges those who practice these things, while practicing them yourself, that you will escape the judgment of Elohim? 4 Or will you abuse the riches of His kindness, and His long suffering, and against the advantages to you? And are you presumptuous of the kindness of Elohim that brings you to repentance? 5 But, because of the hardness of your heart that does not repent, you lay up for yourself a store house of wrath for the day of wrath, and for the revelation of the judgment of the upright Elohim: 6 Who will repay every man according to his deeds.
You see, sin is never without consequences. Sin destroys. Those consequences may be realized in this earthly life, and/or they may be realized in the next life. This is true even for the follower of Yeshua HaMashiach. Here’s an example. If you eat a poor diet throughout your life, you may develop high blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity and/or diabetes. If you make those choices when you had the ability to make better ones, you may reap the consequences of those decisions in this life. In other words, you may reach the next world sooner than you had expected! In the same vein, if you sin by cheating on your spouse, many lives will be affected negatively, in this life. This is true whether you later repent or whether you don’t. This is true whether you are a believer in Yeshua HaMashiach or not. Sin destroys.
The word “practice” in these verses is important. It refers to repeated offenses without sincere repentance. It does not refer to the occasional lapse into a “sin that so easily besets us”.
There’s one of two things at work in these verses. 1) Either he is addressing this to folks who are deceived about their salvation - - they think they have been converted through faith in Yeshua, but their lives don’t evidence it. And, so, they still walk in darkness. Or, 2) They have never been converted at all, and this is evidenced by their sinful, hidden practices. In other words, those who truly belong to Yeshua (in Hebrew, the tzaddikim, do not live a life of hypocrisy. They are the same, day in and day out. They follow God’s rules for righteous living. Do we lapse into sin? Yes, but we then bow, confess it and ask for forgiveness and restoration. While true believers will not come under God’s judgment as concerns their eternal salvation, our works after our salvation will be examined and judged. Our motivations for our good works will be examined, and we will then be rewarded accordingly. Paul speaks of this elsewhere.
Likewise, as verse 6 indicates, those who have rejected Yeshua, “THE Way, the Truth and the Life” will have their works judged, and they will be “repaid” accordingly. Does this mean that there are levels or degrees of eternal damnation? Certainly seems to be the case. Next verses.
7 To those who, by patience in good works, seek glory and honor and immortality, to them He will give eternal life. 8. But to those who are stubborn and do not obey the truth, but obey iniquity, He will repay them with wrath and fire. 9 And tribulation and anguish will be to every man that does evil, to the Yehudeans first, and also to the Arameans. 10 But, glory and honor and peace to everyone who do good, to the Yehudeans first and also to the Arameans.
In verse 7, you see the outworkings of faith, that is, patiently doing good works as the way to attain “immortality” on this earth. The thing is - - these actions look a lot like the actions of someone who is trying to “work” his or her way to Heaven, don’t they? The key is the motivation - - whether you are working for something (to attain Heaven) or you are working out of love and gratitude to Someone, who has already signed your entrance slip in His own blood. The motivation is everything.
Now, in your translation of the Scriptures, you may not see the word “Aramean”; you may see “Greek”. So, which is it? Who was Paul referring to? There are a few different schools of thought on that...
Some, like AGR, who translated the word “Aramean” believes that it was the people group that Abraham came from, you remember - - “Our father was a wandering Aramean”, the Jews are fond of saying. The Arameans were a Semitic people group who originally lived northeast of the Promised Land and East of the Jordan River. The patriarch Jacob was called an Aramean in Deuteronomy 26:5. Some of the 12 tribes elected to live east of the Jordan River, intermingled with the Arameans.
Then, there is a school of thought that Paul’s use of the word “Greeks” refers to when the 10 “lost” tribes, those northern tribes who split from the Southern Kingdom in the days of Rehoboam. It was the descendants of those “lost tribes” who Paul was referring to as the “Greeks”.
In both these positions, it can be deduced that the Gospel was first given to the Jews, the Yehudeans, and then to their extended Semitic cousins and then to the pagan Gentiles.
However, some Christian theologians sort of ignore the existence of the Hellenistic/Greek Jews altogether and translate the word as “Gentiles”. Some of you may have that as the word you see in verse 9. This would refer to the pagan polytheists that stood in stark opposition to the monotheistic Jews.
So, which is it? My personal opinion is that either interpretation one or two is more correct, but I will leave that for you to decide for yourselves. The order in which the gospel was delivered is not as important as the truth that slams down like a boulder in the next verse, verse 11, namely that God is no respecter of persons. In other words, the people group you are from is not that big a deal, because as our Mashiach said at the end of the book of Matthew, our commission is to share that good news “with every creature”, all people groups.
The next verses concern the role of Torah in people’s lives. Let’s examine them, verses 12 thru 16.
12. For those without Torah who sin, will also perish without Torah; and those under Torah who sin will be judged by Torah. 13 For not the hearers of Torah are righteous before Elohim; but the doers of Torah are being made righteous. 14. For if Gentiles who do not have Torah, but naturally do the things of Torah, they, while without Torah, become a Torah unto their souls. 15 Additionally, they show the work of Torah as it is inscribed on their hearts; and their conscience bears testimony to them, while their reasonings rebuke or defend one another,
16 in the day in which Elohim will judge the secrets of men, according to my Good News by way of Yeshua the Mashiach.
In these verses, Paul is affirming the centrality of Torah as God’s rules for righteous living, sanctification, set-apartness, whether for the Jewish people or for non-Jews. In other words, Paul is saying that Torah is for everyone. Some Christians are put-off by the word “Torah”, which is translated “Law” in most traditional Christian translations. But, the Hebrew word “Torah” simply means “instruction.” The Torah was never strictly given only to the Hebrews anyway. The group that came forth out of Egypt was a “mixed multitude” according to Exodus 12:38-40. This means the people who fled Egypt included a sizeable number of Egyptians, whose eyes God opened. They recognized a sinking ship when they saw one, decided to convert to Judaism (otherwise they’d not have been allowed to go with the Hebrews), and left when the Hebrews did.
Verse 15 hearkens back to what the prophet Jeremiah said when he prophesied about the New Covenant Father Yahweh said He would make in the future. The verse is one many of you viewers can call up from memory, Jeremiah 31:31-33. This is from the CJB translation.
30 (31) “Here, the days are coming,” says Adonai, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Isra’el and with the house of Y’hudah. 31 (32) It will not be like the covenant I made with their fathers on the day I took them by their hand and brought them out of the land of Egypt; because they, for their part, violated my covenant, even though I, for my part, was a husband to them,” says Adonai. 32 (33) “For this is the covenant I will make with the house of Isra’el after those days,” says Adonai: “I will put my Torah within them and write it on their hearts; I will be their God, and they will be my people. 33 (34) No longer will any of them teach his fellow community member or his brother, ‘Know Adonai’; for all will know me, from the least of them to the greatest; because I will forgive their wickednesses and remember their sins no more.”
Jeremiah, though, did not foresee that Father Yahweh would include the Gentile nations in this prophecy, instead thinking it would pertain to only the kingdoms of Judah and Israel. But, in Yeshua, the Gentiles join with and become part of spiritual Israel, with the same Torah, the same instructions for godly living. Paul is not suggesting that the Gentiles could pull instructions for godly living, righteous living, out of thin air. But, like all true followers of Father Yahweh and Yeshua Hamashiach, they should learn and follow the written Torah, apart from Pharisaic “fences” that “go beyond” the plain meaning of the Torah, as this latter practice is what Yeshua warned about, repeatedly. “Traditions of men”, so called.
About the latter part of verse 16 and the term “My Gospel”. The Aramaic uses the Greek term “evangelion” here, as opposed to the Aramaic word “sevartha” (hope) or “karazutha” (preaching). The Aramaic also uses “evangelion” in 2 Timothy 2:8. AGR believes its use here and in 2 Timothy means that Paul is referring to some kind of written document. By the time Paul began to write his letters, it is highly likely that Matthew’s gospel, the earliest gospel, was already circulating. He could have been referring to that or to some other written account of the life and work of Yeshua, now lost to the ravages of time.
In verses 17 to 23, Paul returns to his earlier theme of hypocrisy. He gives examples of stealing, committing adultery and desecrating the holy Temple as examples of sins that might have been going on among those who called themselves Tzaddikim (righteous ones). In those verses, again, he holds up the Torah as the standard by which such hypocrisy would be measured, and remember, he was talking to followers of Yeshua, born-again, “saved” people, of both Jewish and “Greek” descent. This points to the fact that Paul never advocated for violating, or worse, abrogating Torah, as this would be an insult to Elohim, whether the Father who initiated it or the Son who perfectly emulated it. Numbers 23:19 and Malachi 3:6 remind us that He does not change his mind.
Next, in verse 27, Paul quotes from the Old Testament books of Isaiah (52:5) and Ezekiel (36:22.)
“For the name of Elohim”, as it is written “is blasphemed among the Gentiles on your account.”
I have heard it taught that violating the 3rd commandment, “Thou Shalt Not Take the Name of the Lord Your God in Vain” means more than not using God’s name in a curse or in a haphazard fashion. The additional layer of meaning is that you shall not bring disgrace on the name of the Lord, through your actions. Let’s look at those two verses. First, Isaiah 52:5 - - -
So now, what should I do here,” asks Adonai,
“since my people were carried off for nothing?
Their oppressors are howling,” says Adonai,
“and my name is always being insulted, daily.
And, Ezekiel 36:22 - - -
22 “Therefore tell the house of Isra’el that Adonai Elohim says this: ‘I am not going to do this for your sake, house of Isra’el, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have been profaning among the nations where you went.
This is a very serious charge that the apostle Paul is making toward the Roman believers. It is also a cautionary tale for us as followers of Yeshua HaMashiach. Think about it. What does the most damage to the effort of bringing people into a relationship with the one, true God? It is often the transgressions of people who claim His name. SO many people get turned off from pursuing godliness, particularly in the ecclesiastical settings we often call “church”, because some member has blasphemed the name of God through their actions. Congregations have fractured over such carnal behavior, etc. The work of the kingdom of God has been slowed, thrown off track....it’s heartbreaking and appalling. Sadly, the more well-known the people at the nexus of the mess, the more damage is done. Don’t ever, ever think you are too godly to fall. The enemy of our souls is wily and, as the Lord Himself said, the enemy “prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.” Guard your heart. Don’t let yourself become lion’s meat.
The last few verses of this chapter play off the theme of circumcision of the heart, which Jeremiah alluded to, to a couple of points about physical circumcision. Let’s read the rest of the chapter and then break down this final section, as we get ready to close.
“25 for circumcision is beneficial if you fully understand and properly perform Torah: but if you depart from Torah, your circumcision becomes uncircumcision. 26. And if uncircumcision should keep the commandment of Torah, would not the uncircumcision be accounted as circumcision? 27 And the uncircumcision, which from its nature completes Torah, will judge you, who, with the Scripture and with circumcision, transgresses against Torah? 28 For it is not the one who is on the outside a Yehudean, who is the real Yehudean neither is circumcision that which is visible in the flesh, 29 but he is a Yehudean who secretly is one and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter, whose glory is not from men, but from Elohim.
Circumcision was a fairly common practice in the Middle East; it was not mutually exclusive to Hebrew or Jewish groups. Remember that when TAW says “Yehudean”, it is referring to those from the tribe of Judah, i.e. Jews. According to Jeremiah 9:26-30, these pagan nations circumcised their males without following the Torah. Paul is making the point here that it is not just the physical act of being circumcised that fulfills the law of Father Yahweh. Physical circumcision was to be done for the right reasons, namely to honor and to submit to the will of Father Yahweh, and for no other reason. If the man failed to follow the covenant that accompanied circumcision, then his circumcision would be deemed at best irrelevant and at worst a mockery. On the other hand, in speaking of the Gentiles who came to know God apart from a solid understanding of Torah, Paul makes the point in verse 27 that not only will they shame the Jews-in-Name-Only, but that the Spirit of God will then deepen that “nature” understanding, guiding them to perfect the practice of the Torah of Elohim. This is the very definition of sanctification, that process that sets apart the follower of Yeshua from the world, as the Holy Spirit works in each believer to mold him or her more and more into the image of God (imago Deo, in the Greek), that is, to walk more and more like the revealed image of God, Yeshua, HaMashiach, who is all-in-all.
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