Paul, now goes on to tell of his having received grace and apostleship—the interest he felt in the Romans, &c.
In v. 16, 17, he is not ashamed of the gospel, for it is God’s power in salvation to every one that believes. Its character was “the righteousness of God,” when man had no righteousness for Him; revealed on the principle of faith—not law or effort from man of any kind; and wherever there was faith in man, it was appropriated. It is “on the principle of faith to faith.”
Now begins a detailed examination of the state of man to which the gospel applied. He begins with the world before the flood (v. 19, 20); what might be known of God as Creator, leaving them without excuse. Then the heathen world (v. 21-32) after the flood. For it was then that idolatry began to overspread the earth. Men did not like to retain the knowledge of God which they possessed, and He shut them up to their desire (v. 28). Here let me say a word on this deeply solemn truth—God giving up a sinner to what be desires. There are cases of God hardening the hearts of men, and shutting them up to what they wished. ‘Tis true— in this chapter of the heathen; true in Isa. 6:9-109And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not. 10Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed. (Isaiah 6:9‑10) of the Jew; and true in 2 Thess. 2:1111And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: (2 Thessalonians 2:11), of the professing Christian world. Yet, in all these cases, He only exercises this solemn power when men have hardened their hearts first against him. We find in ch. 9 an instance cited in Pharaoh, whom God hardened; and, if He did, Pharaoh had first hardened himself against God,
In the opening of chapter 2 we have the case of those who were doubly condemned—first on condemning the evil that they saw in others, and practicing the same things themselves. They reasoned and moralized about these things, and did the same. The judgment of God, which is according to truth, would overtake them, and they would not escape. The goodness of God meanwhile was leading them to repentance, if they had an ear to hear.
Verses 6-16 give us the aspect of the throne of God in righteousness; teaching us that the consequences and issues of the course that man pursues here in this world are sure. If he sought for “glory, honor, and incorruptibility” (this is the true word for “immortality,” which we have in verse 7), “eternal life” would be the sure result of such a course. On the other hand, “indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish,” is most surely the issue of the course of those who are “contentious; and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness.” If the former was the case, we know that it was grace that had wrought; but he does not here speak of the moving power.
In the day when God would “judge the secrets of men, by Jesus Christ,” each would be judged according to the light and privileges he had enjoyed. “As many as have sinned without law (i.e., the Gentile, &c.), shall also perish without law: and as many as have sinned in (i.e., under) the law (i.e., the Jew) shall be judged by the law.” The “work of the law” was to condemn those under it—to give the “knowledge of sin.” The conscience of the Gentile did this “work of the law,” in condemning him (v. 15). Conscience is the sense of responsibility united to the knowledge of good and evil. God took care, when man fell, that he should bear away this “conscience” from His presence; every man possesses it. Who ever has lived up to his knowledge of good?
From ver. 17 to ch. 3:18, the apostle takes up the case of the Jew: showing that his advantages only brought him in more responsible, and more guilty than those who did not possess them. They had the law, and circumcision, and “the oracles of God,” and they used these things to minister to their pride; and became worse than the heathen around them, who possessed no such advantages. “The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you.” (ch. 2:24.)
Some might ask, “What advantage, then, hath the Jew?” in the presence of such a sweeping condemnation of the race. Paul gives him credit for all he had, and his advantages were many. “The oracles of God” were committed to them. But if they were unfaithful, God’s faithfulness remained the same (ch. 3: 1-8). If every man was a liar, let God have His own place— “let God be true.” Yea, even their unrighteousness commended His. The Jews, then, were not better than the Gentiles, even though possessing the advantages they had—advantages which more distinctly demonstrated their guilt. The Jew would gladly have heard of the vile and abominable wickedness of the Gentile; and looked with abhorrence upon it; but when the very oracles, of which they boasted, told forth the solemn thought of God about themselves, in the words now quoted by the apostle (v. 10-18), their mouth was closed forever. As if he had said, “You talk of the oracles of God, which you possess; let us hear what they say of your own selves.”
“In verse 19, he sums up the whole race—Jew and Gentile. The conclusion of his whole argument from ch. 1: 18. Thus, “every mouth” is “stopped,” and “all the world” is brought in subject to, or under judgment before God.
How blessed, beloved reader, to have God’s verdict so plainly before our eye. We need not wait till judgment-day to know it. It is given to us now, that we may accept it as our true state. How blessed to bow to His solemn, sweeping condemnation: Our mouth stopped by God Himself. No need to say, when forced to it like Job (ch. 40.), “What shall I answer thee I will lay mine hand upon my mouth.” It was bitter to him to learn it—it is bitter for us to learn it. Yet a necessary and wholesome lesson. But it is God who has Himself stopped our mouth, and left us not one word to answer. It is ever His way to reduce us to our true place of utter vileness, as irrecoverably and hopelessly bad and evil in His eye, and then to disclose to us how He has devised a way to bring us back through redemption, by Christ’s precious blood, in such a way as brings glory to His own name. This is what lie now does, having first laid bare the state of all men in His sight.
One could suppose for a moment, as to ver. 19, the world, after its 4000 years of probation and trial, under the eye of God, as if it were enwrapped in a pall of inexorable judgment, out of which not one soul could rise—not one soul presume to have a shade of difference from his fellow, and God disclosing the grandeur of the way of His own righteousness in justifying the ungodly through the blood shedding of His Son Jesus Christ.