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The Gospel That Reveals God’s Righteousness (Romans 1) | Frank Thielman · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to Reformed thinking. So imagine for a second that you
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are a wealthy Roman patrician. Right living in the 1st century.
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Yeah, living right in the middle of the 1st century, you own
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these massive estates. You wield, you know, significant
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political leverage in the city. You're at the very top of the
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food chain. Absolutely.
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The surrounding culture tells you constantly that you are,
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well, practically a God compared to the foreign slave sweeping
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your marble floors. I mean, society is built brick
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by brick on the idea that human value is measured by bloodline,
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by wealth, and by cultural refinement.
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It was an incredibly rigid hierarchy.
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It was so now imagine a letter arrives in your city from a man
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you've never met. You sit down in a crowded room
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to hear it read aloud, and his opening argument basically boils
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down to this You and the enslaved foreigner standing by
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the door are on the identical footing, and both of you were on
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cosmic death row. Which is just a staggering thing
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to hear in that culture. It really is.
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So today for you listening, we're doing a massive verse by
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verse analysis, a deep dive into Frank Thelman's commentary on
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the 1st chapter of Romans. Our mission for this deep dive
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is to understand the radical nature of Paul's message in its
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original Greco Roman context. Yeah, we're going to unpack how
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this letter just shatters those ancient social hierarchies.
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Right. And we'll breakdown the precise
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legal mechanisms of God's justice and wrath.
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It's a stunning document. I mean, when you read a letter
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written to a relatively small 1st century church community,
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you really don't expect it to completely upend modern
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assumptions about fairness and, you know, human autonomy.
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You think of it as just a historical greeting.
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Yeah, but it's not some quaint greeting.
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It is a highly calculated legal argument that dismantles the way
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humanity organizes itself. Paul is walking into the
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intellectual capital of the world and laying down a
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challenge that flips the entire Roman justice system on his
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head. Let's set the stage here,
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though, because if Paul is going to completely level the social
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hierarchy, putting the elite Roman and the enslaved foreigner
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on the same playing field, he has a massive logical problem A.
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Huge one. He is writing to Christians in
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Rome, which is a church he didn't plant.
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It's full of people who don't know him.
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Before he can present these radical arguments, he has to
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establish his right to speak to that room in the first place.
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And we see this in his elaborate opening credentials.
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His theology is completely inseparable from his identity as
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a messenger bridging the Old Testament and the non Jewish
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world. Right, the letter format itself
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is unusual. Yeah, so the structure of
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ancient Greek letters was typically really brief, very to
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the point. You'd have the sender's name,
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the recipient's name, and a quick greeting.
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Like hey, from me to you. Spot on.
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You might write something like Apollonios to Thunus.
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Greetings. It was purely utilitarian, but
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Paul completely blows up that standard format.
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He uses the longest letter opening of any of his writings.
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It takes 7 dense verses just to introduce himself.
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Wow, 7 verses just to say hello. Yeah, and he identifies himself
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with three specific titles right out of the gate.
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He calls himself a slave of Christ Jesus, a call apostle and
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one set apart. OK, let's stop right there at
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the first title Slave in the Greco Roman world, identifying
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yourself as a slave was not a networking strategy.
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I mean, it was a position of total degradation.
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Why would he lead with that? To a Roman citizen it would
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sound absurd, just completely backwards.
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But Paul's operating from a highly specific Jewish context
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here. When he calls himself a slaves
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of Christ Jesus, he is intentionally aligning himself
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with massive historical figures. Like Moses.
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Yeah, Moses. Joshua, the prophets in the
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Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures.
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Those leaders were frequently called slaves of the Lord.
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So Paul is claiming immediate prophetic authority.
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Oh, I see. So he's not saying I'm a victim
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of society. Not at all.
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He is saying he is the authorized envoy of the supreme
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King, and then he says he is set apart for the gospel that comes
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from God. And the Greek word there is you,
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Angelian. I want to pause on that word,
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you Angelian, because this is where the cultural collision
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really happens. That term was not originally a
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religious church going word, was it?
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No, not at all in the Roman context.
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In the Greco Roman world, you Angelian was a political term.
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It meant a joyful, world altering announcement.
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Tied to the Emperor. Right.
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Usually, yes. Yeah.
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Tied to a military victory or the Emperor himself?
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To give you a clear historical visual, there is a famous stone
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inscription from 9 BC. It was found in Pre Anne, which
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is a city in Asia Minor. What does the inscription say?
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It celebrates the birthday of the Emperor Augustus.
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The text literally refers to his birth as the beginning of good
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news, the You Angelion for the world.
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It was seen as bringing global peace and prosperity.
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The Roman emperor was viewed as a divine figure, bringing a new
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era of stability. So when Paul uses that specific
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word to describe his message, he's intentionally hijacking
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Roman imperial propaganda. Precisely.
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Paul's making a subversive claim.
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He's saying the true joyful news of worldwide significance is not
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about Caesar sitting on a throne in Rome.
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That's bold. It is, but he's also drawing
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heavily on the Jewish biblical use of the term.
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If you read the book of Isaiah, the word refers to the joyful
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tidings of God arriving to rescue Israel from exile and
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disaster. So Paul is blending this ancient
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Jewish hope with a direct challenge to the Roman state.
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And the content of this joyful news is centered entirely on a
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person. Paul gives this fascinating dual
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description of Christ. First he describes Jesus from a
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neutral sort of human angle, saying he is born from David's
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offspring according to the flesh.
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But then Paul shifts gears. He describes Jesus according to
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the Spirit of holiness, marked out as the Son of God in
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sovereign strength by his resurrection from the dead.
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Paul is laying down a massive theological claim here.
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He is arguing that the ancient Hebrew scriptures are completely
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incomplete without this specific message about Jesus.
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Jesus fulfills the ancient promises made to King David
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regarding a royal bloodline. The human side.
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Yeah, but his resurrection triggers a completely new age.
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The resurrection is the moment Jesus begins to function as the
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Son of God in sovereign strength.
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He is the first to enter into a new immortal physical existence
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which signals the end of the old era of sin and death.
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I'm curious how this specific opening countered the historical
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divisions that popped up later in the church because people
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constantly tried to pull these two things apart, the Jewish
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history and the new message of Christ.
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It is brilliant how Paul's introduction refutes those
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historical errors before they even fully developed.
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Take Marcion in the 2nd century for instincts.
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Oh, right, he wanted to get rid of the Old Testament.
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Yeah, Marcion looked at the Old Testament and decided it was too
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harsh, so he tried to discard it entirely, trying to separate the
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Christian God of grace from the creator God of the Jews.
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But Paul's opening shuts that down instantly by rooting the
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message firmly in the writing prophets and the Davidic line.
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You just can't have Paul's message without the Hebrew
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scriptures. You can't.
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And on the flip side, you had groups trying to make it
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exclusively Jewish. Like the ibianites?
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Right. You had groups like the
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Ibianites who tried to reduce Christianity to a localized
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Jewish sect. They view Jesus as a great human
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teacher, a moral example, but nothing more.
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So they denied the divine aspect.
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Yeah, and Paul shuts that down by highlighting Christ's divine
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designation and sovereign strength through the
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resurrection. Both errors fail when you read
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these opening 7 verses. The message is deeply rooted in
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history, but it breaks the boundaries of human limitation.
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I mean, think of this opening as a highly calibrated, heavily
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footnoted resume. Paul is applying for the job, a
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theological guide to a church he didn't start.
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How does he balance his heavy-handed Apostolic authority
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with the fact that these Roman Christians already have their
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own established community? He does it with incredible
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diplomacy. He calls them dearly loved by
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God, and so they are called to be holy.
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He takes the standard Greek greeting of health or joy and
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replaces it with grace and peace, blending Greek and Hebrew
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blessings. That's a nice touch.
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It is He establishes His supreme authority, yes, but He speaks to
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them as members of the same divine family.
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So Paul's resume establishes his right to speak.
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But why Rome? If his goal is to talk about a
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Jewish Messiah, why is he so desperate to reach the capital
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of the Pagan world? That's the big question.
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And the answer lies in the unique demographics of the city
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and Paul's specific mission to disrupt social barriers.
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After the intro, the letter shifts to his audience.
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The reason Paul is so determined to reach Rome is that his
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specific message is designed to obliterate the very caste
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systems Rome used to maintain public order.
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Yeah, Paul gives thanks to God because the faith of the Roman
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Christians is known worldwide. He tells them.
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He prays constantly, asking God to finally allow him to visit
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them. He says he wants to impart a
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spiritual gift to them so they might be strengthened.
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But then almost immediately, he corrects his own language so he
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doesn't sound arrogant. He does.
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He uses a very specific verb there.
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He says he wants to share. The Greek word is meta do rather
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than give. That's interesting.
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Yeah, he diplomatically avoids sounding like he is swooping in
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from above to fix them. He clarifies that he wants to be
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encouraged together with them through their mutual faith.
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It is a stunning display of leveling the ground between an
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apostle and a local congregation.
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He places himself alongside them.
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And then he takes that leveling concept and applies it to the
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entire Roman world, which is where things get really tense.
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He states that he is a debtor to Greeks and Barbarians, to the
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sophisticated and the foolish. That would have hit a nerve.
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We need to stop right there. What did the word barbarian
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actually mean to a 1st century Roman?
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It was not just a geographical label for someone living outside
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the borders, it was a viciously degrading slur.
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The entire Roman society was built on strict vertical
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hierarchies. At the top you had the educated,
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noble born Greeks and Romans. The elites.
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Right. They possessed the wealth, the
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culture, the philosophical training.
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At the absolute bottom of the ladder were the Barbarians.
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The word itself originated because the Greeks thought
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foreign languages sounded like stammering.
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Just bar bar bar. So it was a mockery of their
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speech. Yeah, which bled into a mockery
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of their humanity. They were viewed as innately
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inferior. To give you context on how deep
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this prejudice ran, the philosopher Aristotle explicitly
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taught that Barbarians were naturally deficient in
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intelligence. Karis just said that.
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He did. He argued that a barbarian and a
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slave were essentially the same by nature, that they were born
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to be subjugated by the Greeks. The elite viewed them as living
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tools entirely devoid of reason, suitable only for physical
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labor. Wow.
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So try to picture the physical setup of a Roman household
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church at this time. You'd have the wealthy master of
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the house, a Roman citizen, hosting the gathering, and
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sitting in the same room hearing this letter read aloud would be
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his slaves, the very people society labeled as Barbarians.
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Sitting right next to each other.
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If a highly educated leader today said they owe the
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identical intellectual and moral debt to a celebrated academic
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and someone utterly marginalized by society, it would turn heads.
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How shocking was it for Paul to claim that this new message
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levels the playing field so completely?
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It was wildly offensive for Roman citizen with philosophical
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training. The idea that a religious
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teacher owed the identical obligation to an elite patrician
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and an uneducated foreign slave was absurd.
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Because Roman society glorified those social boundaries.
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Absolutely. The power structure depended on
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making sure the sophisticated and the foolish never occupied
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the same social standing. Yet Paul says his divine
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Commission obligates him to all of them equally because all of
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them stand before the Creator on equal terms.
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Well, if Paul is completely leveling the social hierarchy,
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putting the emperor and the enslaved foreigner on the
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identical footing, he has a massive logical problem.
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By what legal standard can they possibly be treated the same?
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The Romans measured work by bloodline and wealth.
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Paul has to introduce a completely alien justice system.
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Right, because if salvation is based on belief rather than
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pedigree, all human hierarchies collapse.
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And Paul all writes that he is not ashamed of this message.
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Which is a bold statement on its own, considering that a cross
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centered religion would seem utterly shameful to a status
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obsessed Roman culture. Crucifixion was a punishment
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reserved specifically for slaves, pirates, and rebels.
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It was designed to be humiliating.
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Completely. It was designed to strip a
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person of all honor and display them as garbage.
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To say that your ultimate allegiance is to a crucified man
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was to invite intense social ridicule from the elite.
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Yet Paul says this message brings saving might to everyone
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who believes, to the Jew 1st, and also to the Greek.
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And then we hit the central phrase, the engine driving the
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entire letter. The righteousness of God is
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revealed from faith to faith. And he backs this up with a
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quotation from the ancient prophet Habakkuk.
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The one who is righteous by faith will live.
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I'm hung up on the word righteous.
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Usually if I call someone a righteous person today, I mean,
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they do good things. They pay their taxes, they help
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their neighbors. They don't lie.
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Are you saying Paul is using this word completely
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differently? Yes, we have to strip away our
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modern moralistic definition. The Greek word Paul uses is D
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chaosine. For the average person living in
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the Roman Empire, this word meant strict fairness and equity
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in a courtroom setting. So it's a legal term.
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Very much so. To give you a mental image, the
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emperor Nero minted coins in Alexandria around the same time
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Paul was writing this letter. On those coins was the image of
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the goddess Equitus Equity. She stood upright, holding a
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perfectly balanced set of scales.
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The label stamped on that coin was Dikaya's sign.
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So when the Roman Christians heard the righteousness of God,
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their first thought would be a judge holding balanced scales,
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administering perfect, impartial, unbending justice.
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Thought on, but Paul's also drawing heavily on his Jewish
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background. In the Septuagint, the Greek
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translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, righteousness often
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referred to God taking up the cause of the oppressed.
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So it was an active thing. Yeah, an active rescuing
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concept. It meant God stepping in to
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vindicate his people against their enemies.
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So Paul is combining these ideas.
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God is perfectly fair and impartial, treating the Greek
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and the barbarian the identical way with his balance scales.
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But God is also actively moving to rescue people.
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Wait. If a human judge acquits a
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clearly guilty criminal, we call that a corrupt judge?
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That is the opposite of balance scales.
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It sounds like it. Yeah, Paul says God declares
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guilty people to be in the right based on faith.
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How does Paul resolve the tension of God maintaining his
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strict fairness while clearing the guilty?
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This is the genius of Paul's argument.
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He resolves this tension by explaining the substitutionary,
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atoning death of Christ. God does not simply ignore the
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crimes or pretend the guilty or innocent.
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The penalty still has to be paid.
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Right. The penalty for the rebellion
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must be paid to maintain the balanced scales of justice.
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Christ steps in as a substitute. The theological concept here is
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propitiation, which is tied to the ancient mercy seat.
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You use the term propitiation and mercy seat.
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That sounds like heavy theological jargon.
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Break that down for me. What does that actually look
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like visually? To understand it, you have to
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like, mentally step inside the ancient Jewish temple on the Day
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of Atonement, OK? Setting the scene.
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Inside the Most Holy Room sat the Ark of the Covenant, a
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golden box. Inside that box were the stone
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tablets of the Law, the strict unbending rules that the people
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had broken. The law demanded justice.
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Above the box was the presence of God.
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So God is looking down at the broken law.
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Exactly. I mean precisely.
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If the Holy God looks directly down at the broken law, the
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result is wrath and judgement for the people.
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But on top of that box was a golden lid called the Mercy
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Seat. And the high priest would take
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the blood of a sacrificed animal and sprinkle it on that golden
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lid. Yes, the blood acted as a
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buffer. When God looked down at the
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broken law, He saw the blood of the substitute first.
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The penalty had been paid. The demands of strict justice
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were entirely satisfied by the sacrifice, allowing God to
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remain entirely fair while releasing the guilty from
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punishment. So the judge isn't corrupt.
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Right. Paul is saying Jesus is the
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ultimate mercy seat. Christ's sacrificial death
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absorbs the penalty. The guilties are acquitted
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because the Son of God took the sentence.
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So justification is a past tense judicial decision.
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It's an acquittal in God's courtroom.
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It's not an ongoing process of trying to act better, so the
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judge will eventually let you go.
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No, the verdict has already been handed down.
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The Greek patrician and the barbarian slave both walk into
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the courtroom with massive rap sheets.
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Neither has an advantage, and both are offered the very same
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substitute. And because this acquittal is
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received strictly through faith, not through cultural achievement
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or noble birth, the ground at the foot of the cross is
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perfectly level. God doesn't wait for a person to
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improve their behavior and then declare them righteous.
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He declares them righteous, based entirely on faith as a
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free gift. And then the behavior changes as
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a result of that new status. Absolutely.
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Well, to grasp the magnitude of this acquittal, you have to
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understand the severity of the charges.
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Why is humanity on trial in the 1st place, and why is God's
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fierce reaction considered fair? We move from the revelation of
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God's saving grace to the revelation of His wrath, because
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His wrath is the proof of His strict fairness.
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Yeah, without the fairness of the wrath, the grace has no
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legal backdrop. Just doesn't make sense.
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Paul writes that God's wrath is currently being revealed from
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heaven against all impiety and unrighteousness of human beings
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who intentionally stifle the truth.
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Notice the present tense there. This is not just a future event
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at the end of the world. It's happening right now in
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daily life. And Paul insists that God is
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entirely fair in doing this, because humanity has no excuse.
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Paul relies on the concept of general revelation here.
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He says the invisible attributes of the Creator, specifically His
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eternal sovereign strength and divine nature, are clearly
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perceived through the things that have been made.
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It's all around us. Anyone can look at the physical
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universe, from the complex orbit of the stars down to the sheer
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strength of the ocean, and conclude that a brilliant,
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intensely strong creator made it.
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And because of that clear, undeniable evidence, the core
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offense of humanity is laid bare.
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Paul says that although they knew God, they refused to
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glorify or thank Him as God. They received the gifts of
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creation but refused to honor the giver.
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They wanted the benefits without the authority.
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Right. And what's fascinating here is
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how Paul tracks the downward cognitive spiral that results
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from that single refusal. Imagine a company stealing a
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revolutionary patent but adamantly refusing to
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acknowledge the original inventor over time, because they
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deny the creator's original blueprints, they forget how the
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machine actually works and end up breaking it.
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That's a great analogy. They stifle the truth, and the
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machine of human reasoning breaks down.
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They're holding the broken gears, claiming to be brilliant
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engineers while the whole factory burns down around them.
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That is a highly accurate picture of what Paul was
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describing. The cognitive faculties of
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humanity are shattered because they severed themselves from the
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reality of the Creator. Because they refused to
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acknowledge God, their reasoning processes were rendered futile
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and their foolish hearts were darkened.
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I thought they were so smart. While claiming to be wise, they
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became babbling fools. They rejected the source of all
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reason, so their own capacity to reason broke down.
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Paul uses a brilliant illustration of this breakdown,
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the idolatrous exchange. Humanity traded the glory of the
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incorruptible God for images of corruptible humans, then birds,
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then quadrupeds, then reptiles. It's a complete de evolution.
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Notice how the list descends from the sky down to the dirt.
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It mimics humanity's moral descent.
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You start by worshipping a human form, then you move to the birds
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in the air, then the animals on the ground, and finally you're
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bowing down to a snake in the dirt.
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It's a deliberate theological de evolution.
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In the Genesis creation account, humanity is positioned as the
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pinnacle of creation, made in God's image, passed with ruling
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over the birds, the animals, and the creeping things.
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So they flick the order. Yeah, by worshipping those
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things, humanity voluntarily gives up its crown and subjects
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itself to the very things it was supposed to govern.
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They exchanged the truth for a lie, choosing to Revere the
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creature rather than the creator.
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Think about how we do this today.
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We don't necessarily bow down to wooden statues of birds or
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bronze reptiles, but how often do we take a good thing, like a
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career, financial security or a political movement and elevate
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it to the ultimate thing? We do it constantly.
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We demand that our created circumstances provide the peace
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and security that only the Creator can offer.
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And when you make a created thing your ultimate source of
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meaning, it will eventually crush you because was never
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designed to bear that weight. So the machine is broken, but
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how does the inventor respond? The punishment must fit the
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crime perfectly to maintain the judge's equity with those
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balance scales. Because humanity exchanged the
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truth for a lie, God responds with an exchange of his own.
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It's terrifying, really. We look at the specific
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penalties got an X, proving that his judgements are not arbitrary
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lightning bolts from the sky, but are the natural outcome of
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human demands. 3 distinct times in this text, a solemn phrase
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tolls like a bell. God handed them over.
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It is judicial language. God acts as the judge, issuing a
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sentence that perfectly mirrors the offense.
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What's the first one? First, Paul says God handed them
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over in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness and the
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dishonoring of their bodies. Because they dishonored God, God
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allowed them to dishonor themselves.
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And second, God handed them over to dishonorable passions.
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The text points specifically to females and males exchanging
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natural sexual functions for unnatural ones.
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Right and 3rd God handed them over to a worthless mind.
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What is fascinating here is the brilliant word play in the
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original Greek because humanity tested God and deemed him not
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worthwhile. The Greek word is it Akimasan.
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God handed them over to a worthless a dokimon mind.
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Oh well, a dokimasan and a dokiman.
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You can hear the repetition in the words They found God
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unqualified for their worship, so God gave them minds
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completely unqualified to make moral decisions.
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Wait, isn't that entrapment? If God breaks their ability to
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reason, handing them over to a worthless mind, how is it fair
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to then punish them for making bad, irrational choices?
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It's not entrapment because God is not forcing them against
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their will. He is simply removing the
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restraints. It's a terrifying reality of God
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saying your will be done. Giving them what they want.
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Yes, humanity demanded autonomy. They demanded to operate without
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the Creator's rules. So God steps back and gives them
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precisely what their rebellious hearts crave.
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The worthless mind is the natural consequence of
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disconnecting from the Source of all truth.
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That makes sense. The sexual exchanges Paul
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describes are portrayed as a physical parallel to the
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spiritual exchange of idolatry. Humanity traded the natural
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design of creation for a parody of it, just as they traded the
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true creator for fake idols. So the penalty corresponds
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directly to the crime. God steps back, and the result
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is total societal collapse. Paul illustrates this resulting
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chaos with a terrifying rapid fire list of 21 social ills.
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It's a brutalist. He lists things like murder,
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which makes sense, but then he lists gossip, disobeying
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parents. Why do those things belong in
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the same list as murder? Because they all stem from the
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very same root of rejecting the Creator's authority.
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When you sever society from a transcendent truth, all
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relationships become transactional and predatory.
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So everything breaks down. Everything.
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Why does rejecting God lead to disobeying parents?
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Because if there is no ultimate creator to honor, the concept of
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honoring earthly authority completely dissolves.
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Why does it lead to gossip and slander?
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Because if human beings are not made in the image of a holy God,
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they have no inherent dignity, so you can destroy their
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reputation for your own social gain.
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The breakdown of trust and the tearing of the social fabric are
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the inevitable results of philosophical rebellion.
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I read that in the original Greek, the alliteration and
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rhyming in this list are intense.
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They are. For instance, the words for envy
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and murder are fonu and fonu. They sound almost identical.
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The words tumble over each other chaotically in the sentence
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structure. So Paul is basically dropping a
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1st century rap verse to highlight how chaotic society
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has become. That is a great way to put it.
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The rhythmic chaos of the language perfectly mimics a
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culture that has lost all rational grounding.
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It moves from general evils like greed and malice to specific
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harms like murder and treachery, and then focuses on specific
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types of people. Gossips, slanderers, bullies.
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Paul claims in verse 32 that these people know full well the
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righteous decree of God that these actions deserve death, yet
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they applaud others who do them. Does every person really
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inherently know this, or is Paul making a massive rhetorical
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assumption to trap his audience? He's tapping into a universal
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acknowledgement. In antiquity, across various
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ancient cultures, whether Roman, Greek, or barbarian, the idea
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that cosmic offenses brought severe penalties was widely
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accepted. People intrinsically knew that
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rampant murder, treachery, and malice tore apart the fabric of
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reality and invited divine retribution.
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But Paul is definitely setting a rhetorical trap here.
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Well, by detailing these extreme, mostly Gentile vices,
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he gets the self-righteous moralist, perhaps an unbelieving
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Jewish reader or sophisticated Greek philosopher, to nod along
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an agreement. Oh, I see the moralist sits
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there listening to the letter, nodding and thinking, yes, those
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pagans are terrible and deserve judgement.
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By securing that agreement, Paul establishes the total depravity
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of humanity. He sets the stage perfectly for
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Chapter 2, where he will spin around, point his finger at the
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listener, and prove that the moralist sitting in the judge's
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seat is equally guilty of rebellion, just in a more
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refined way. Man, that's brilliant.
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So what does this all mean for us today?
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Let's review the massive arc of this discussion.
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We started with a credentialed messenger, Paul, acting as an
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authorized envoy, bringing a message designed to completely
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destroy social hierarchies. He told the elites of Rome that
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he owed the identical debt to them as he did to the uneducated
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marginal Barbarians. We looked at the shocking legal
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mechanism of a strict judge maintaining absolute fairness
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while acquitting the guilty entirely through the
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substitutionary sacrifice of Christ acting as the mercy seat.
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And we saw the absolute equity of God's wrath.
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It is not an arbitrary loss of temper, it's a perfectly
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tailored judicial response to humanity's cosmic rebellion.
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They demanded autonomy. Right.
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Humanity demanded autonomy from the Creator, descending into
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irrationality and idolatry, and God responded by handing them
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over to the logical conclusions of their own twisted desires.
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So I ask you to reconsider how you view justice.
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Do you evaluate fairness through the lens of social status,
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weighing people's worth by their education, their wealth, or
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their cultural refinement? Or do you see humanity through
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the strict level playing field established by the Creator,
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where every single person is guilty and every single person
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is offered the very same rescue? It changes everything.
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It really does. We often think of divine
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judgement as fire raining down from the sky.
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But based on this text, what if the most terrifying judgement a
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society can face isn't a sudden disaster, but God simply
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stepping back and giving that society what it demands?
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If God's wrath is handing us over to our own unrestrained
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desires, how should that alter the way we evaluate what
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cultural freedom actually looks like?