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Romans 1:18-20 · Providence Baptist Church - Sermons

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We are justified by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.
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So, upon completing this statement, in Paul's very logical way,
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! He loops back to the beginning to help us understand mankind's need of salvation.
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Our need to be justified.
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Our need to avoid the wrath of God.
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This gospel he's not ashamed of, because it's the power of God for salvation.
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He wants us to be very clear what we need to be saved from.
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Now, we're going to speed up our study a bit and spend today and the next Lord's Day
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finishing up chapter 1, Lord willing.
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But I do not want the lessons of verses 18 through 32 to be lost on us.
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At the conclusion of our study of this chapter, you ought to either feel a great condemnation for your lost state,
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and, I pray, will flee from the wrath to come to the mercy of Christ,
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or you ought to feel an abundant, overflowing gratefulness,
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having already received Christ's mercy in the salvation of your soul.
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So, Romans chapter 1, verse 18 through 23.
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Let me remind you, beloved, that this is God's word to us.
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It was written for his glory and our good, and so we would do well to listen to it
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in order to believe its promises and obey its commands.
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And Paul goes on,
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For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.
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For his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature,
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have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world and the things that have been made.
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So they are without excuse.
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For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him,
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but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
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Claiming to be wise, they became fools,
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and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
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Some weeks ago, I pointed out the logical progression of Paul's writing.
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Paul's writing is full of fours and therefores, one assertion building on the next.
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I like preaching Paul because I'm a very linear thinker.
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I don't like making lots of loops, so I enjoy this kind of writing.
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We saw one four at the beginning of verse 16 and another at the beginning of verse 17.
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And here we see one at the beginning of verse 18, 19, 20, and 21.
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As we proceed through chapter 1, we see a therefore at the beginning of verse 24 and two fours in verse 26.
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All of these are just the fours and therefores that begin in verse 16 through the end of the chapter.
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I'm just pointing this out to you simply to show you the logical progression of Paul's case.
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Don't miss the fours.
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This is the way he most regularly wrote, and it's the way he most regularly preached the gospel.
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We can read in Acts chapter 17, verse 2 and following.
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And Paul went in as was his custom, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the scriptures,
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explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead,
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and saying, this Jesus whom I proclaim to you is the Christ.
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Now, Paul wasn't exerting his own ideas, right?
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He was reasoning specifically from the scriptures, from the Old Testament text.
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He was taking up the word, and he was clearly, with some logical progression, explaining the need, right,
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for Jesus to suffer and to rise from the dead.
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Why did he do it in this way?
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He spoke to their minds with the scripture with the intent of getting through their minds
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by the power of the Spirit to their hearts.
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He was just simply using ordinary means that God might do something miraculous in the lives of his hearers.
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And we see this to be the case.
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In fact, Luke records it for us in verse 4 in this way,
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and some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas,
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as did a great many of the devout Greeks and not a few of the leading women.
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So why take the time to do such a thing?
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I'm just trying to say to you that it is good for us to engage our minds,
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whether you find yourself in Christ or not this morning,
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whether you want to be here or somehow got drug here,
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it is good for you to engage your mind in the argument that Paul here is making.
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It is our prayer that he might do something miraculous, the Lord, in your life as you think about these things.
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Paul progresses neatly from one assertion to the next,
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which is why for today I don't have points for the sermon.
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I'm just going to follow his four format throughout the text,
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beginning in, of course, verse 18.
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He says,
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For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men
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who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
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In verses 16 and 17, remember that Paul states that the gospel is the power of God for salvation.
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For in it, verse 17, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith.
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As it is written, the righteous shall live by faith.
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So in verse 18, he begins his explanation of why anyone would care that the gospel is the power of God.
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He begins telling us why we need the righteousness of God that comes through faith.
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He doesn't just assume that we know it.
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Power of God for salvation, right?
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The righteous shall live by faith.
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He begins to rewind and begin to make the case that we are not righteous by ourselves
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and we need a righteousness that comes from God.
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God's righteousness.
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The reason, he tells us, is the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness.
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It's something to be afraid of.
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God's wrath seems to be a very unpopular idea in modern evangelicalism.
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But Paul's inspired writing offers up as the very first reason someone would receive the truth of the gospel
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is the fear of God's wrath.
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He begins there.
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Now, God's wrath is not the same as the kind of uncontrolled venting of anger that we are likely to exhibit.
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Rather, it is a determined indignation.
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God justly feels angry at sin as it is an offense to him.
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It's an offense against him.
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It is bad for us and it wreaks havoc for others.
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It is objectively wrong.
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And so, therefore, God has a determined indignation against sin of every variety.
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God's wrath is righteous wrath.
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And it does not detract from his loving kindness.
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Rather, it magnifies his mercy and grace as all of his divine attributes are held in perfect balance.
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We have to be careful as we open up the word and look at our God that we don't over-inflate one aspect over another.
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They're all held in perfect balance.
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This is the doctrine known as the simplicity of God, although it may be a bit misleading of a term.
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It means he's always who he is all the time.
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All things at all times.
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He's not given to fits of emotion like we are.
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He is not swayed by whims.
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Listen to just a few texts that speak of God's wrath.
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Psalm 90 in verse 7 through 9.
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Isaiah chapter 9 and verse 19.
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Through the wrath of the Lord of hosts, the land is scorched.
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And the people are like fuel for fire.
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No one spares another.
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Jeremiah chapter 7 and verse 20.
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Therefore, thus says the Lord God, behold, my anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place upon man and beast,
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upon the trees of the field and the fruit of the ground.
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It will burn and not be quenched.
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Unless you think that this was only an Old Testament reality,
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maybe fall victim to the error to think that our God has changed from Old Testament to new.
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God's wrath was a major part of Paul's theology.
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We see it here just in chapter 1 of this tome of Paul's writing.
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Here are two other texts that proceed from Paul's hand.
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Ephesians 5 and verse 6.
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Let no one deceive you with empty words.
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For because of these things, the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.
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In Colossians chapter 3, verse 5 and 6.
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Put to death, therefore, what is earthly in you, sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness,
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which is idolatry.
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On account of these things, the wrath of God is coming.
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God's wrath is a settled reality against sin.
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He is a just God and He justly does and will punish sin.
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Whether or not you realize it, you want God's wrath to exist.
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You want justice to be served.
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It is proper that Kim Il-sung and Pol Pot and Saddam Hussein and Vladimir Lenin and Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin and Mao Zedong.
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If you don't know who these people are, you need to know who these people are.
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Many of them are socialists, as a note.
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It's proper that they're punished for the heinous crimes that were carried out by their commands and at their hands.
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We want justice to be done, right?
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Beyond our power and beyond our control, we want justice to be established.
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We want a God that sets these atrocities right.
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But if we understand the nature of our sin,
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if we get that our sin is the rejection of God as creator and king,
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that our sin as just as grievous,
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then we will understand the deserved wrath against all sin.
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God, because He's just, must punish sin.
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He is perfectly just, right?
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He's not like any judge that has ever lived, right?
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He doesn't dismiss some things and punish other things.
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He is perfectly just.
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He always rightly judges sin.
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He must do it or He ceases to be God.
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And this is a good, good thing.
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If you haven't placed saving faith in the personal work of Jesus Christ,
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then you will pay the penalty for your sin.
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You will endure God's wrath forever.
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And this is just.
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Think it not unfair.
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It is the good and proper thing for our God to do.
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If you have placed saving faith in the personal work of Jesus Christ,
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then He, Jesus Christ, paid the penalty for your sin.
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God maintained His justice in punishing your sin in Christ,
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that you would be set free from its penalty and its power.
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This is the doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement.
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And it is the core of the gospel, right?
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Astoundingly in our age, there's debate amongst, I will say,
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in quotation fingers, Christian circles about this doctrine.
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If you dismiss penal substitutionary atonement,
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Christ died in our stead in order to satisfy the wrath of God
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that was aimed at us,
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then you're denying the gospel altogether.
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Each and every one of us deserves God's wrath.
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If God were to be entirely fair,
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we would all be consumed in a moment and then punished forever.
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This would be the right thing for Him to do.
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But because of His loving kindness toward us,
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He sent His own Son,
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that His Son might live the life that He expected of us
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and die the death that we deserved.
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So that in that gospel belief,
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all who believe in that gospel,
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the power of God,
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we would be granted the righteousness of God, right?
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That we would be justified,
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that we could stand before God forgiven.
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And note that God's wrath does not discriminate, right?
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As I've made the point already,
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it is revealed against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men.
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These two words, ungodliness and unrighteousness,
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are very similar in the Greek language.
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They are almost but not quite synonyms.
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The first stresses a severed relationship with God.
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The second focuses on the activity that proceeds from that severed relationship.
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The one on whom God's wrath is revealed
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is not living as an image bearer of God,
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but in contradiction to that created purpose.
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And in so doing, suppresses the truth.
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Presses down the truth.
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Now, Paul is going to continue to develop our understanding
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of the fallen nature of man
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and the deserved wrath for those apart from Christ
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until halfway through chapter 3.
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But before we move on from this verse,
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we need to note something that will have bearing on our study
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in coming weeks.
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This will be important and increasingly important.
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Paul states,
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The article before reveal,
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the article is,
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it's not in the original language,
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but it's properly added into our text
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as the verb translated revealed
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is in the present form,
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which means that not only will God's wrath be revealed,
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but it is currently being revealed.
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That the unrighteousness are presently under the judgment of God
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and will, apart from saving faith,
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be under the judgment of God forever.
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It's currently playing out in the world in which we live.
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We will need to understand the profundity of this verb,
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understand the rest of the chapter
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and, frankly, the world that we live in
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and into the rest of our text.
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The wrath of God revealed from heaven
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against ungodliness and unrighteousness.
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He goes on in verse 19, right?
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The for here is referring to the suppression of truth.
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For what could be known about God is plain to them
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because God has shown it to them, right?
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Here's the truth suppression happening.
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Sinful man denies the truth that God has revealed to them
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and so, he'll go on to say in verse 20,
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they are without excuse.
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Now, I like the translation that we preach from.
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This is the English Standard Version.
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Many, many years ago,
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we decided to pick a translation to preach from
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in the hopes that others would have the same.
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And if you don't, that's entirely okay.
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There are many good translations out there.
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But I'll tell you, when we made that decision,
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it was hard for me because I had an NASB 95
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that I really enjoyed a lot.
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And it was difficult to give it up
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as the primary preaching text.
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And so I'm always eager to confer with my NASB 95
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and see the way those translators rendered some of these texts.
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And it's not always helpful,
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but in this case, I thought it was particularly helpful.
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Listen to the way they rendered these Greek phrases.
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They say, verse 19,
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That's fascinating.
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Those Greek phrases can also be translated in that way.
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ESV says about God is plain to them, right?
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Here, they root it with the evidence
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that's actually put within us.
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And Paul's going to develop this idea later in chapter 2, I believe.
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So what could be known about God is plain to them
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or is evident within them,
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for God has shown it or made it evident to them.
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For, verse 20, right?
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He's developing this even further.
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For God's invisible attributes,
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namely His eternal power and divine nature,
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have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world
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in the things that have been made.
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So, they are without excuse.
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Two things can be clearly observed in the natural world.
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One, Paul says there is a creator God.
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Whether we know exactly who that creator God is
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as revealed in Jesus Christ or not,
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we know by looking at nature that there is a creator God.
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And two, that He is eternally powerful.
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And everybody seems to know this in our age,
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which is a suppression of the truth.
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So, let me read to you just a bit.
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This is from John MacArthur's commentary on this text.
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He gathers a lot of stats together in just a way that I don't have time for.
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So, I'm going to read what he gathered together.
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I'm not sure he had time for it either,
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but I don't want to suggest I'm busier than John MacArthur,
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but I'm going to lean on him and the commentary here at this point.
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Listen to some of the things, right?
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There's just some examples of things that can be observed,
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things that display our God as a creator God
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and eternally powerful.
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At any given time,
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there are an average of 1,800 storms in operation in the world.
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The energy needed to generate those storms
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amounts to the incredible figure of 1.3 billion horsepower.
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By comparison, a large earth-moving machine has 420 horsepower
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and requires 100 gallons of fuel a day to operate.
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Just one of those storms,
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producing a rain of 4 inches over an area of 10,000 square miles,
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would require energy equivalent to the burning of 640 million tons of coal
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to evaporate enough water for such a rain.
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And to cool those vapors and collect them in clouds
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would take another 800 million horsepower of refrigeration
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working night and day for 100 days.
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I don't know how he figured that out.
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It's pretty incredible.
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Agricultural studies have determined
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that the average farmer in Minnesota
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gets 400,700,000 gallons of rainwater per acre per year,
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free of charge, of course,
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and my addition is for now.
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The state of Missouri has some 70,000 square miles
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and averages 38 inches of rain a year.
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That amount of water is equal to a lake
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250 miles long, 60 miles wide,
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and 22 feet deep.
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God blesses with rain,
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is the point.
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The U.S. Natural Museum has determined
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that there are at least 10 million species of insects,
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including some 2,500 varieties of ants.
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There are about 5 billion birds in the United States,
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among which some species are able to fly
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500 miles nonstop across the Gulf of Mexico.
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Those are hummingbirds, by the way,
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that can do that.
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Mallard ducks can fly 60 miles an hour,
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eagles 100 miles an hour,
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and falcons can dive at speeds of 180 miles an hour.
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The Earth is 25,000 miles in circumference,
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weighs, I don't, this is an astounding number,
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how we figure this out.
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Let's say approximately,
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6 septillion, 588 sextillion tons,
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I don't even know what those numbers mean,
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and hangs unsupported in space.
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It spins at 1,000 miles per hour
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with absolute precision
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and careens through space around the sun
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at the speed of 1,000 miles per minute
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in an orbit 580 million miles long.
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We get our seasons from that astounding reality.
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The head of a comet may be
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from 10,000 to 1,000,000 miles long,
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having a tail 100,000,000,000 miles long,
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and travel at a speed of 350 miles per second.
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If the sun's radiated energy
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could be converted into horsepower,
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it would be the equivalent
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of 500,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 horsepower.
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Each second, it consumes
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some 4 million tons of matter.
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To travel at the speed of light
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across the Milky Way,
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the galaxy in which our solar system is located,
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would take 125,000 years.
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And our galaxy is but one of millions.
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The human heart is about the size
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of its owner's fist.
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An adult heart weighs less than half a pound,
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yet can do enough work in 12 hours
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to lift 65 tons one inch off the ground.
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I think he's talking about the...
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Never mind.
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I'll make that more confusing
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if I say what I think he means.
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A water molecule...
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I love this one.
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A water molecule is composed
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of only three atoms,
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but if all the molecules
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in one drop of water
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were the size of a grain of sand,
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they can make a road
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one foot thick and a half mile wide
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and would stretch from Los Angeles
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to New York.
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Amazingly, however,
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the atom itself is largely space,
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its actual matter taking up
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only one trillionth of its volume.
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Except to a mind
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willfully closed to the obvious,
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it is inconceivable
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that such power, intricacy, and harmony
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could have developed by any means
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but that of a master designer
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who rules the universe.
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It would be infinitely more reasonable
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to think that the separate pieces
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of a watch could be shaken in a bag
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and eventually become
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a dependable timepiece
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than to think that the world
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could have evolved
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into its present state
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by blind chance.
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It is just statistically impossible
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that we exist
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apart from a creator God
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and there's so much
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to be observed
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in the world around us.
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If we are not suppressing the truth,
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we will realize
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there is a creator God
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and you can call that God
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whoever you want that God to be.
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I'm telling you,
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it's the God of the scripture.
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And so we should listen
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to what he says
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because he's eternally powerful
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and he's either going to pour out
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his wrath on you
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or he's going to grant you
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the power of God
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for salvation.
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Right?
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No one,
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the end of verse 20 tells us,
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will have an excuse.
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No one can now plead ignorance
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or will be able to plead ignorance
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on the day of judgment.
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It will be impossible.
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God will say,
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I showed you
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what you needed to know,
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that I existed.
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Donald Gray Barnhouse,
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this is the quotation
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on your bulletin this morning,
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said,
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will God give man brains
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to see things
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and will man then fail
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to exercise his will
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toward that God?
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The sorrowful answer
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is that both of these things
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are true.
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He goes on to say,
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this wouldn't fit
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on your bulletin today,
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God will give man brains
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to smelt iron
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and make a hammerhead
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and nails.
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God will grow a tree
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and give man strength
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to cut it down
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and brains to fashion
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a hammer handle
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from its wood.
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And when man has the hammer
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and the nails,
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God will put out his hand
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and let man drive nails
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through it
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and place him on a cross
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in the supreme demonstration
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that men are without excuse.
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Paul goes on to develop
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the sinful thoughts
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and how they lead
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to sinful behavior in man.
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And as I note the time,
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I think we're going to pick up
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these last verses
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in more detail
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next week.
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Yeah, we are.
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Right.
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For although they knew God,
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they did not honor him as God
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or give thanks to him,
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but they became futile
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in their thinking
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and their foolish hearts
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were darkened.
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Claiming to be wise,
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they became fools
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and exchanged the glory
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of the immortal God
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for images resembling
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mortal man
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and birds and animals
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and creeping things.
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So just briefly note
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these last three verses
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and then we'll look at them
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at greater length next week.
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Note the progression.
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The worship of God neglected,
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the futility of their thinking,
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the foolishness of their hearts,
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the idolatry of their actions.
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The worship of God neglected,
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the futility of their thinking,
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the foolishness of their hearts,
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and the idolatry,
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misplaced worship
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of their actions.
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Dear listener,
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have your part in this text
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to be only who you once were.
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We all have to identify this
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with this text in some way.
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My hope is that it'll only be
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to identify it
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in who you once were.
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Do not let it be said of you today
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that you are a futile thinker,
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a foolish-hearted idolater
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upon whom the wrath of God lies.
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The one who made you
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offers to you salvation this day
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if you would simply come to him
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for mercy.
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Ezekiel 33, 11 says,
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As I live, declares the Lord God,
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I have no pleasure
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in the death of the wicked,
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but that the wicked
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would turn from his way
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and live.
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Turn back, turn back
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from your evil ways,
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for why will you die?
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If you only find yourself
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in this text
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to be who you once were,
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then don't we have
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great reason this day
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to rejoice in the saving work
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of Jesus Christ
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on our behalf?
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As we meditate on that
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who we once were,
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we know that it is only
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by grace alone,
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through faith alone,
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in Christ alone
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that we are not
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the very worst
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of sinners.
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sinners.
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So until next week,
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let's pray that these verses
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will rightly affect
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our understanding
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of the good news
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as it is the power
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of God for salvation
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to everyone who believes.
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Let's pray together.
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Let's pray together.