Latest / Reformed Thinking / Not Ashamed of the Gospel: God’s Power to Save (Romans 1) | Matthew Henry

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Not Ashamed of the Gospel: God’s Power to Save (Romans 1) | Matthew Henry · Reformed Thinking

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You know, usually when you think about ancient Rome, your mind
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probably goes straight to those big cinematic visuals.
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Right, like the epic movies. Yeah, exactly.
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Wait, I mean precisely that you picture those gleaming marble
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columns stretching up into the Mediterranean sky.
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Right. Oh, definitely.
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The architecture alone is staggering.
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And you imagine triumphant generals coming back from these
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sweeping conquests with Chariots full spoils.
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Maybe you think of the sheer overwhelming spectacle of the
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Coliseum. It is the picture of
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invincibility. Right.
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You just imagine the absolute peak of human civilization at
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that time, like a society that had conquered the known world
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and set the standard for, well, everything from aqueducts to
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military strategy. It just looks so pristine from
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the outside. I mean, it was the undisputed
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center of the known world. If you were a Roman citizen, you
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really believed you were at the apex of human achievement.
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Yeah, they were the standard bearers, right?
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Spot on for law, engineering, civic organization.
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To the Roman mind, everything outside their borders was
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barbaric, and everything inside that was the height of
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enlightenment. But then you pick up this
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specific letter, written to a small group of people living
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right in the shadow of all those magnificent monuments.
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And when you read the words of this letter, suddenly that
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gleaming marble starts cracking right before your eyes.
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You look past the statues and the Senate floor and you see a
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society that is honestly just rotting from the inside out.
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It is a striking contrast to consider because you have the
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outward glory of the Empire, the military might, the
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philosophical schools, all set against this diagnostic
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landscape of the human heart that is, well, entirely bleak.
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Yeah, strips away the veneer. It really does.
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It exposes a core of corruption that no amount of marble could
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cover up. Well, welcome to Reformed
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thinking. We have a fantastic deep dive
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lined up for you Today. We are taking an extensive look
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into Matthew Henry's commentary on Romans chapter 1.
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I am very much looking forward to this.
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One, our mission today is to unpack the Apostle Paul's
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brilliant setup of justification by faith, and alongside that,
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his incredibly unflinching description of the human
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condition. It is a heavy text for sure.
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It is so as the designated learner here, I am just thrilled
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to dig into this material. I will be throwing out my
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questions, testing out some analogies on you, and making
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sure we define our terms as we go.
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We are going to make sense of this dense text together.
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And I'm looking forward to walking through the historical
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context in the analytical side of Henry's thoughts.
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Matthew Henry has this really unique way of taking soaring
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theological concepts and grounding them in the practical
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realities of the human heart. Yeah, he really brings it down
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to earth. He does.
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It is a rigorous text, but the clarity we get when we break it
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down carefully makes the effort entirely worthwhile.
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Awesome. Let's just jump right into the
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opening of the letter then. So Paul begins in verses 8
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through 15 with Thanksgiving, and Matthew Henry points out
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that Paul makes God the alpha and Omega of his praise.
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Yes, that is a key observation. Right, he writes.
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First, I thank my God it is not just some polite throat clearing
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greeting before getting to the real business, Henry says.
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It is good to begin everything with blessing God.
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It is a very deliberate framing for everything that follows,
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Paul speaks with delight, saying My God, which Henry notes makes
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every single mercy sweet. Because of the relationship
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aspect. Yes, because it implies a
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covenant relationship. When you have a covenant with
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God, you are not just addressing some distant deity, you know?
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You are addressing a God who has made binding promises to you.
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Wow. Yeah.
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And he thanks God for these Roman Christians, many of whom
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he had never even met face to face.
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See, that part stood out to me immediately.
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I mean, he is praying for complete strangers, right?
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He sits down to write this masterwork of theology, and he
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starts by thanking God for people he only knows by
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reputation. But he is praying for them
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because, well, their faith is spoken of throughout the whole
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world. The whole Roman Empire,
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essentially, yeah. Henry points out that Rome was a
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highly visible city. It was a city upon a hill, to
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borrow a phrase. Everyone took notice of what
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happened there. So if you were a Christian in
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Rome, you were basically living in a fishbowl.
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The historical context is really crucial for understanding why
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their faith was so famous. Henry brings up the Roman
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Emperor Claudius. Oh, right, the banishment.
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Yes. Claudius had actually issued an
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edict that banished all the Jews from Rome.
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This meant the Jewish Christians who formed the core of the early
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church there were suddenly uprooted.
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Just completely kicked out. Banished, scattered throughout
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the vast Roman Empire, they lost their homes, their livelihoods
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and their community. But eventually they returned.
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And wherever they had been scattered during that exile,
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they left a very good report behind them.
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Henry. It's a fascinating irony here.
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If they had not been persecuted and scattered, they might not
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have become so famous for their faith.
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That is incredible. It did like the persecution
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actually amplified their witness.
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It did. It acted like wind on a fire.
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Instead of blowing it out, it just spread the embers all over
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the empire. But Henry also drops a fairly
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heavy historical observation about Rome's later years here.
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He does not hold back on that front.
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No, he doesn't. He looks at the shining early
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church and then he talks about how Rome degenerated over the
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centuries. He says that while it was a
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flourishing church in Pauls day, the fine gold became dim.
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Yes, Henry is writing from his own historical vantage point in
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the late 17th and early 18th centuries, so he is looking back
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at the long, complicated centuries of church history.
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Right, he has the benefit of hindsight.
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Exactly. He references an old book called
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The Practice of Piety, pointing out that Rome dealt
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treacherously. The Church there degenerated so
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much in its doctrine and practice that this very epistle
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to the Romans actually acts as an epistle against the Romans of
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later eras. Man, that is a sharp critique it
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really. Is it shows how a church can
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start with incredible renown for its faith, a faith spoken of
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throughout the whole world, and eventually lose that entirely
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through theological drift. That is a really sobering
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thought for you to consider as a listener, especially if you
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think a good reputation guarantees future fidelity.
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I guess a reputation for true religion means you have to be
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super vigilant to preserve it. Vigilance is absolutely
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required. But going back to Paul, he says
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he prays for these Roman believers without ceasing he he
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mentions them expressly in his prayers and he expresses this
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deep desire to visit them. Not as a tourist though.
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Right. He doesn't want to go to Rome
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just to see the sights. He wants to impart spiritual
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gifts. He wants to establish them in
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the truth. But then he also says something
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that really surprised me. He expects to receive comfort
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from them. What's fascinating here is how
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Paul views the concept of mutual faith.
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Yeah, tell me more about that. Well, consider who is writing
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this. He is an apostle.
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He has incredible authority, direct revelation from Christ,
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and massive spiritual insight. He's basically at the top of the
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hierarchy in human. Terms.
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Yet he never positions himself above needing the spiritual
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encouragement of ordinary believers.
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He wants to impart to them, yes, but he also says he wants to be
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comforted by their mutual faith. Iron sharpens iron.
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Oh, that makes sense. He expects the Roman believers,
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these lay people living in the capital, to minister to him just
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as much as he ministers to them. It shows a real humility.
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He doesn't see himself as like the lone dispenser of grace who
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never needs a refill. A very apartment way to put it.
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He also mentions thanking God through Jesus Christ.
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Henry stresses this point heavily in the commentary,
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arguing that all duties and praises are pleasing to God only
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through a mediator. It is not just generic praise
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thrown up to the sky hoping it lands on the right desk.
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Precisely in Henry's theological framework, which aligns with
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Orthodox Protestant thought, sinful humans cannot approach a
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perfectly holy God directly. The gap in purity is too vast.
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So we need to go between. Yes, every prayer, every act of
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Thanksgiving, every tear shed in repentance must pass through the
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mediation of Christ to be acceptable.
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Christ's perfect righteousness covers our imperfect prayers,
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making them a sweet smelling savor to God.
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OK, let's unpack this concept Paul brings up next, because it
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confused me at first glance. The debtor concept.
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Yes, he calls himself a debtor to both the Greeks and the
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Barbarians, to the wise and the unwise.
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I mean, how does someone become a debtor to people they have
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never even met and who haven't given them a dime?
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Henry explains this concept of spiritual debt in two ways.
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First, Paul's receiving made him a debtor.
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He was entrusted with massive talents and gifts from his
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master, and he was expected to trade with them for his master's
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honor. So it's about stewardship.
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Yes, we are stewards of the goods we receive.
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If God gives you a gift, you owe it to God to use it for others.
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Second, his specific office made him a debtor.
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He was called and sent to do a specific work by Christ.
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OK, let me try an analogy on you to visualize the setup.
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I'm all ears. Think of a highly specialized
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tutor. Let's say a wealthy benefactor
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approaches this tutor and gives them a massive grant, like a
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huge sum of money. But the strict stipulation of
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the grant is that the tutor must educate a specific town for
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free. Now the tutor owes a massive
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debt to the grant provider, the benefactor.
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But the way the tutor pays off that debt to the benefactor is
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by giving their time and teaching to the townsfolk.
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That tracks, yes. So the tutor is a debtor to the
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town, but only because of what they received from the
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benefactor. That is a highly accurate way to
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conceptualize it. Paul feels an immense obligation
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to distribute the gospel because of the sheer magnitude of the
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grace he received from Christ. He owes Christ everything, and
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Christ told him to go to the Gentiles.
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Therefore, Paul owes the Gentiles the gospel.
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And because that town is made-up of all sorts of people, the
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tutor has to adjust their teaching style.
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They have to change their approach completely when
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speaking to, say, a kindergarten class versus giving a lecture to
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the local college professors. Henry points out that this
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mirrors Paul perfectly. He adjusted his preaching style
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based on his audience. When he spoke to the plain
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people at Lystra, he talked about rain and crops.
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But when he spoke to the polite philosophers at Athens, he
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quoted their own poets and talked about the unknown God.
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He was paying his debt to both the Greeks who thought they had
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a complete monopoly on wisdom, and the Barbarians who were
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considered uncultivated and ignorant.
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He delivered the appropriate portion to each speaking their
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language conceptually that. Takes a lot of skill.
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It does, and this readiness to pay his debt, no matter the
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audience, is what drives his desire to go to Rome.
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Even though Rome was a perilous public place where he would face
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intense opposition, he felt he owed them the truth.
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So if he is so eager to go to this dangerous city to pay his
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debt, what is the currency he is using?
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What is he actually preaching? That brings us right to verse
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16. Yeah.
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He is ready to preach in Rome and he says the famous words, I
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am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ.
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Henry gives a whole list of reasons why someone like Paul
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might actually be tempted to feel a great deal of shame about
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his message. You really have to put yourself
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in the mindset of the ancient world.
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The Gospel was a massive social scandal.
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It was completely countercultural.
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How so? Well, Henry notes that the
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founder of this faith was hanged on a tree.
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Crucifixion was not just painful, it was the specific
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execution method reserved for common criminals, rebels and
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runaway slaves. It was designed to be
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humiliating. Yes, and the doctrine itself was
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plain. It did not have the
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sophisticated rhetorical flair or the complex logical puzzles
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that the Greek and Roman scholars admired so much.
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And the followers of this movement?
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They were generally despised. They were largely poor,
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uneducated, and considered the dregs of society.
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Why does Henry place such weight on the shame aspect though?
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I mean, why was the cross such an intense social stumbling
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block back then? Today people wear crosses as
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jewelry. It has completely lost its shock
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value for us. It goes against every natural
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human instinct regarding success, victory, and divine
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favor. Think about what the Roman
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Empire values. Strength, mostly.
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Exactly. They value dominance, physical
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strength, and intellectual superiority.
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Their gods were figures of immense might who crushed their
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enemies to walk into the capital of that empire and claim that
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the savior of the world, the true Lord, suffered A
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humiliating, agonizing public execution at the hands of Roman
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soldiers. That would just sound crazy to
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them. It was utterly absurd to the
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Roman mind. To associate yourself with that
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executed man was to invite intense ridicule and likely
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physical danger. Yet Paul boldly declares he is
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not ashamed. He is not ashamed because as he
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says, the gospel is the working and might of God unto salvation.
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I'm looking at Henry's notes here and he makes sure to point
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out that this is offered to the Jew 1st and then to the Gentile.
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Right, the historical priority. The lost sheep of the House of
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Israel got the first offer based on the historical covenant, but
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upon their broad refusal, the apostles turn to the Gentiles.
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Now everyone stands on the exact same level.
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The ground is level at the foot of the cross.
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Both Jew and Gentile are equally miserable without a savior, and
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both are equally welcome to the Savior if they believe.
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Which must have been a tough pill to swallow for some.
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Oh, that concept would have been entirely shocking to the Jewish
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believers who considered themselves the peculiar, set
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apart people of God inherently superior to the Pagan nations
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around them. Now verse 17 is where the core
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proposition really lands in the gospel.
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The righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith and
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Paul quotes Habakkuk 2.4. The just shall live by faith.
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The phrase from faith to faith is dense, and Henry dissects it
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from multiple angles to draw out its full meaning.
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What's his first angle? One interpretation he offers is
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that it moves from Old Testament expectation to New Testament
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realization. You have the faith of the
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ancient prophets, looking forward to a coming Messiah,
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moving to the faith of the apostles, looking back at a
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Messiah who has already accomplished the work.
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He also mentions moving from depending on God directly, like
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Adam did before the fall in the garden, to depending on a
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mediator now that the relationship is broken.
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Yes, that is another layer. Adam had direct communion with
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God based on his own innocence. We do not have that luxury.
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We must have faith in a mediator.
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And Henry has a third angle, right?
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He does the progression in a believer's own life.
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It goes from the initial faith that justifies a person at the
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moment of conversion to the continuous, persevering faith
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that maintains a Christian daily.
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Faith is everything in this equation, from the very
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beginning of the Christian life to the very end.
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And this righteousness revealed is of God's appointing.
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It results from a satisfaction of infinite value.
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Henry stresses that this completely cuts off any human
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boasting. We cannot claim a righteousness
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resulting from the merit of our own works.
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Because we didn't earn it. Right.
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We didn't earn it, so we can't brag about it.
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That is the crux of Paul's argument in this entire letter.
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Henry uses a vivid medical analogy to explain what Paul is
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doing structurally in this chapter.
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He says the apostle acts as a skillful, honest surgeon.
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Oh. I like this one.
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Before the surgeon applies the plaster or administers the cure,
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he first has to thoroughly search the wound.
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He has to convince the patient of their severe guilt and the
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impending wrath before he shows them the way of salvation.
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If the patient doesn't know they're dying, they won't accept
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the cure. Building on Henry's medical
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idea, he mentions that the medicine prepared will not cure
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the patient if it be not taken. Think about it, you could have
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the most perfect absolute cure for a lethal disease sitting in
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a glass bottle on your shelf. Right, just gathering dust.
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Exactly. It could be formulated Florida
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State by the greatest scientists on earth.
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But if you don't open the bottle and actually ingest the
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medicine, it does absolutely nothing for you.
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The cure has to be internalized through belief.
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Faith is the act of drunking the medicine.
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The. Gospel is the cure, but if the
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gospel is the cure, what is the disease?
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We have to look at the wound, yes.
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The surgeon has to expose the wound, and this logical
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progression transitions us directly into the revelation of
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God's wrath against humanity's suppression of the truth.
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Paul pivots from the glorious cure to the horrific disease.
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Verse 18 says the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against
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all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men.
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So Paul says they hold the truth in unrighteousness.
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Henry explains This is having some general ideas about the
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being of God and the fundamental difference between good and
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evil, but actively holding those truths captive.
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Henry describes an unrighteous, wicked heart as a dark dungeon
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in which many a good truth is depained and buried.
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A dark dungeon? That's a striking image.
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It is. Humans know the truth by nature,
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but they suppress it so that it won't influence their actions.
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They don't want the truth telling them how to live.
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If the gospel is the cure, let's look closer at the symptoms of
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the disease. This brings us to the witness of
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creation in verses 19 through 23.
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This is what the allegiance called general revelation,
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right? Yes, general revelation.
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God has revealed his invisible attributes, His eternal might
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and Godhead clearly through the things that are made, Henry
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says. This leaves humanity entirely
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without excuse. The sheer design, the harmony of
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the universe, it all points directly to an intelligent
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creator. Henry notes that the Workman is
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known by his work. Like the watchmaker analogy.
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Precisely When you look at a finely crafted watch, you know
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there is a watchmaker. The sheer variety, order, and
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beauty of the physical world, from the stars in the sky to the
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intricacies of the human body, abundantly prove there is a
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creator. Natural light is enough to keep
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humanity from idolatry, even if it is not enough to reveal the
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specific intricacies of the Trinity or the history of
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redemption. So you can look at a mountain
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range or a Galaxy and know that God is powerful and eternal, but
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humanity failed completely at this basic level.
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They knew God, but they didn't glorify Him as God.
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And here is a striking detail in the text.
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They were not thankful. Yeah.
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Henry pinpoints unthankfulness is the absolute root of sinful
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departure from God. Why is gratitude, or the lack of
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it, such a big deal here? Insensibility to God's mercies
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is the bottom layer of the human issue.
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Gratitude acknowledges dependence.
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When you are thankful, you are admitting that you are not
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self-sufficient, that every good thing you have comes from
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outside yourself, from a benevolent creator.
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So unthankfulness is like a Declaration of Independence.
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Yes, when humanity refused to be thankful, they were essentially
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claiming self-sufficiency. They did not improve the means
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of knowledge they had, and so they were justly considered
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unthankful rebels. And what happens next is a
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catastrophic cognitive collapse. Cognitive collapse.
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Yes, because they rejected the truth of their dependence.
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They became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish
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hearts were darkened. So the ingratitude literally
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breaks their ability to reason properly.
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They became fools while professing themselves to be
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wise. Henry points out the sheer irony
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in the ancient philosophers. Here it's.
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Quite a list he provides. It is.
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These were supposedly the most brilliant minds on the planet,
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the men who debated the nature of reality in the marble halls
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of Athens and Rome. But look at what they actually
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worshipped. The Barbarians worshipped the
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sun, which Henry says was at least the most visually
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impressive idolatry. It's big, it's bright, it gives
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warmth. Right, you can sort of see the
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logic. But the learned Egyptians, with
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all their architecture and mathematics, worshipped oxen and
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onions. The Greeks, the masters of
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philosophy and logic, worship diseases and human passions.
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And the Romans, the masters of law and civic order, worshipped
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the Furies. It is a devastating critique of
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human wisdom divorced from God. When the intellect refuses to
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bow to the Creator, it doesn't just become neutral, it becomes
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absurd. It really does.
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If we connect this to the bigger picture, Henry specifically
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references a quote from the Roman philosopher Seneca, which
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was preserved for us by Augustine.
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Seneca was a brilliant stoic, a tutor to the emperor Nero.
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He wrote extensively mocking the vulgar religion of his day.
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He knew it was fake. He did.
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He ridiculed the ignoble route of gods that superstition had
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amassed. He saw right through the
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nonsense of the Roman pantheon. But Seneca still participated in
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the worship. Augustine observed this about
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Seneca. He worshipped that which he
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censured, he did that which he had proved wrong, and he adored
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what he found fault with. That is the tragedy of it.
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He went to the temples, offered the sacrifices and bowed down
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simply out of compliance with custom and social pressure.
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Which is the perfect textbook illustration of holding the
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truth and unrighteousness. Seneca knew the truth about the
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absurdity of these adults. His intellect grasped it.
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But he locked that truth in a dungeon within his own heart and
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participated in the lie anyway. To maintain his social standing
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and his political influence. He suppressed what he knew was
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true. Here's where it gets really
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interesting. Think about the sheer absurdity
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of idolatry. Paul says they changed the glory
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of the incorruptible God into images of corruptible man,
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birds, and beasts. If natural revelation is so
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overwhelmingly clear, if you can look at the stars and see
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Creator with eternal might, how does human intelligence misfire
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so badly that the wisest empires end up bowing down to an onion
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or a statue of a bird? It points to a deliberate active
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suppression of reality. Right.
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It's like holding a giant, fully inflated beach ball underwater.
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Oh, that's good visual. The natural buoyancy of the ball
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wants to shoot up to the surface.
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It takes constant, deliberate, exhausting physical effort to
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hold it down in the dark water. Humanity is actively, constantly
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pushing the truth of God down because acknowledging it rising
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to the surface would mean submitting to it.
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And we don't want to submit. And because humanity put all
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this effort into suppressing the truth, swapping the glorious
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Creator for the pathetic creature, God responds.
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But he responds to the judgment that is absolutely terrifying in
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its passivity. Passivity.
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Yes, this brings us to verses 24 through 27 and what Henry calls
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the soreness of spiritual judgments.
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These might be the three most terrifying words in the text.
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He gave them up in Greek, Paradok and Audisus.
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It is repeated 3 times in this short section.
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Three times. The judgment here isn't fire
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raining down from the sky like Sodom and Gomorrah.
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It isn't a flutter, A plague. It is a spiritual judgment, and
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Henry notes that spiritual judgments are the Soros, the
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most dreadful of all possible punishments.
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God takes off the bridle of restraining grace.
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He leaves humanity to its own desires.
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He simply lets them alone. Wait, I need to push back here
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because this is a common point of confusion for anyone reading
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this text. Is Henry saying God actively
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makes people worse? Does God force them to commit
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these acts as a punishment? We have to clarify this because
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it sounds like God is causing the sin.
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No, Henry absolutely insists that God is not the author of
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sin. This giving up is a righteous
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judgement of permission. OK, permission, yes.
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The fault lies entirely with the sinner's wicked heart.
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Let's examine the mechanics of this judgement.
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What does it actually mean for God to withhold restraining
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grace? It suggests A theological
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reality that the only thing keeping human society from
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defaulting into total violent degradation at any given moment
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is God actively holding back the tide of human corruption.
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So he is actively restraining us.
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Exactly. We are completely beholden to
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the restraining grace of God for preserving any decency, any
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order, any basic morality in human nature.
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When He removes that restraint, society naturally plummets under
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its own weight. Let me use another analogy to
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clarify Henry's point about God not being the author of sin in
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this Please do think of a doctor with a patient who is entirely
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aggressively obstinate. The patient violently refuses
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all medical treatment, tears out the IV lines, shouts at the
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nurses, and insists on drinking a bottle of poison they brought
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into the hospital with them. A.
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Terrible situation, right? The doctor tries to stop them,
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warns them of the fatal consequences, but the patient
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fights back. Finally, the doctor steps back,
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throws up their hands and says have it your way, I'm leaving
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the room. When that patient succumbs to
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the poison, the doctor isn't responsible for their demise.
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No, of course not. The doctor didn't kill them.
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The disease, the poison, and the patient's willful, stubborn
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choices are entirely to blame. That is precisely Henry's
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argument. God giving them up isn't God
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forcing them to sin. It's God stepping back and
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allowing them to face the natural, devastating
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consequences of the poison they violently insist on drinking.
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And Henry makes another sharp observation here.
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One, by the divine permission, becomes a punishment of another.
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The punishment for sin is very often simply more sin.
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The degradation is the penalty. So they're given up to
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uncleanness and vile, unnatural affections.
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Henry references the historical practices of figures like Solon
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and Zeno, who passed for wise men, great lawmakers and
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philosophers, but were historically infamous for these
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unnatural acts. He brings up the abominations of
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Sodom. He says those who dishonored God
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are given up to dishonor themselves.
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He notes that a person cannot be delivered up to a greater
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slavery than to be given up to their own lusts.
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It is an awful recompense. They refuse to understand the
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God who made them, who gave them dignity as image bearers.
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And so they became worse than the beasts, acting entirely on
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degraded instinct. This removal of the bridle, this
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terrifying letting go, doesn't stop at physical actions.
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It penetrates all the way down to the very core of human
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reasoning, which leads us to the final stage of ruin in verses 28
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through 32. The reprobate mind.
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Verse 28 states that because they didn't like to retain God
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in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind.
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Henry draws a really sharp distinction between knowing God
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and acknowledging God. In the Greek, it's the
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difference between gnosis and epic gnosis.
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A vital distinction. The pagans have the knowledge of
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God. They had the gnosis.
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They couldn't help but the light of creation shone right in their
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faces. But they didn't acknowledge him.
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They lacked the epignosis, the relational recognition.
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They didn't retain him in their knowledge because the idea of a
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holy God thwarted and contradicted their lusts.
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They simply didn't like the idea of God.
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This raises an important question.
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What does a reprobate mind truly look like in action?
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Henry defines it as a mind void of all sense and judgement to
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discern things that differ. So they can't tell right from
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wrong. Correct.
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It is an inability to distinguish right from wrong,
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light from dark. In spiritual things, the moral
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compass doesn't just point slightly off North the magnet is
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completely destroyed. It is a blind, seared conscience
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that is entirely past feeling. The judgement is reconciled to
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sin, Henry says. When the judgement is reconciled
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to sin, the person is in the suburbs of hell.
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A chilling praise. The suburbs of hell.
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It means you aren't just doing wrong and feeling guilty about
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it. Your mind is actually rewritten
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its own code to believe the wrong is right.
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It is the result of judicial hardness.
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First, people harden their own hearts through repeated
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rebellion, and eventually God seals that hardness as a
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judgement. And the result of this reprobate
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mind is a roster of ruin. Paul lists 23 specific sins that
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were reigning as national sins in ancient Rome. 23 It's a
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brutal, exhaustive list. It includes haters of God.
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Henry points out. The sheer madness of a rational
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creature hating the very fountain of its own being.
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Includes those without natural affection, meaning parents cool
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to their own children and children violently disobedient
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to their parents. Henry notes that when duty fails
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on one side, it commonly fails on on the other.
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Unnatural parents are punished with disobedient children and
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vice versa. It's a complete breakdown of the
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family unit, the basic building block of society.
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But Henry offers a crucial leveling thought here.
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He states that every human heart by nature has in it the seed and
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spawn of all these sins. Every human heart.
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Yes. He doesn't let anyone off the
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hook. This brings the entire argument
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back to the core proposition. No one is exempt.
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Jews and Gentiles alike share this corrupted nature.
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Every single person listening, every person Paul wrote to,
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every citizen of Rome has the potential for this exact list of
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23 sins lurking in their chest. Therefore, everyone is utterly
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reliant on the Gospel cure mentioned back in verse 16.
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So what does this all mean for us?
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Let's bring this ancient text into clear focus for you today.
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Take the phrase inventors of evil things, which is right
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there in the middle of that list of $0.23.
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Yes. Think about that phrase.
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Think about how much deliberate, calculated effort humanity puts
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into finding new ways to do wrong.
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We aren't just stumbling into sin by accident.
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Humanity shows a dark creativity.
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We engineer new ways to deceive, new ways to exploit each other,
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new ways to indulge our senses. We use our brilliant minds, the
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intellect God gave us, to invent new forms of wickedness that
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previous generations couldn't even imagine.
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The more deliberate and politics sinners are in inventing evil
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things, the greater the sin. They are quick of invention and
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sin, using all their intellectual faculties to figure
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out how to bypass moral laws. Yet they remain stark fools in
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the thoughts of God. They use the intelligence meant
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to glorify the Creator to instead mock Him.
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And that brings us to the very end of the chapter, verse 32,
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which Henry calls the highest aggravation of all, the absolute
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bottom of the downward spiral. Paul writes that they know the
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judgement of God. They know deep down, through the
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remnants of conscience, that these acts are worthy of eternal
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death. But they not only do them, they
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take pleasure in others who do them.
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They join a confederacy for ruin.
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Henry points out that the violence of a present temptation
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might hurry someone into committing a sin in a moment of
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weakness. Sure, in a moment of panic or
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lust. Right.
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But to sit back coolly and calmly and be pleased with other
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people's sins is to love sin for sin's sake.
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It is defending, justifying, and encouraging others to do the
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same. It is building a community
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around rebellion. It's one thing to fall into a
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mud puddle. It's another thing entirely to
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build a grandstand next to the mud and puddle and cheer while
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other people jump in. Recisely.
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And that requires a completely reprobate mind.
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Let's summarize the overarching logic of Paul's argument here
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before we wrap U. We started with the heights of
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the Gospels. Capability.
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The gospel is the might of God unto salvation, offering a
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righteousness that comes entirely through faith, entirely
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outside of our own works. Yes.
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Then, to prove how desperately necessary that cure is, Paul
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takes us down into the absolute terrifying depths of human
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depravity. He demonstrates that humanity
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had the light of creation, but suppressed it out of
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unthankfulness because they suppress the truth God gave them
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over to their own desires. This led to degraded actions,
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which led to a reprobate mind, which resulted in a society
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fundamentally fractured by 23 distinct variations of
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rebellion. The conclusion is inescapable.
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It is No one can possibly be justified before God by any
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works of their own. The law only condemns.
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The disease is fatal and the patient is completely incapable
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of curing themselves. They don't even want the cure,
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which makes the medicine at verse 16 the only hope for
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anyone. That is the exact point Paul is
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driving towards setting up the rest of his magnificent letter
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to the Romans. This has been a massive scope of
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material. We've gone from deep pastoral
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love with Paul praying constantly for people he has
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never met, to an unflinching clinical diagnosis of human
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corruption that strips away all our pride.
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And the core take away remains the absolute necessity of a
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righteousness that comes from outside ourselves, grasped
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entirely by faith. Well summarized.
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As we finish up, I want to leave you with a final provocative
31:38
thought to Mull over. Building on that last verse,
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taking pleasure in those who commit wrong, think about the
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concept of modern entertainment. That is a relevant connection.
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How often does our society consume media or cheer for
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narratives that glorify the exact list of destructive
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behaviors Paul outlines here? Are we finding our leisure in
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watching others commit what we profess to reject in our own
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lives? It is a challenging question.
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It is. Are we sitting in the theater or
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scrolling on on our phones, actively taking pleasure in the
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inventors of evil things? It's something worth examining
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in your own life. Thank you so much for joining us
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for this deep dive into Matthew Henry's commentary.
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We love digging into these texts with you here on Reformed
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Thinking. Until next time, keep examining
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the text and keep asking the hard questions.