Romans 1

Study Guide 124: Romans 1-3 THE QUEST FOR RIGHTEOUSNESS Overview The first three chapters of Romans carefully argue that all men are guilty before God. No one who relies on his observance of the Law will be declared righteous in the divine court. The Law, as a moral revelation of righteousness, offers no hope; it testifies against us so that “ every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God” (Romans 3:20). Yet the devastating critique of our human condition ends on a note of hope. God has found a way to give us a righteousness that is apart from Law. Romans’ argument is interspersed with theological terms that we need to understand. CIRCUMCISION. The Old Testament rite was a physical sign and symbol of a person’ s participation in the covenant God made with Israel. Paul argued, however, that true circumcision is of the heart: a person in the covenant must live by the covenant’ s regulations. The true Jew is one inwardly, not just in the flesh. CONSCIENCE. Evidence that Gentiles have an implanted moral law is found in conscience. Every culture has standards of right and wrong, and every person fails to live up to what he himself believes is right. Conscience offers no hope, but is as condemning as the Law.

Commentary I remember how guilty I felt. As a young teenager, I had traced pictures of female underwear models from the Sears catalog, and hidden the “ pinups” under my mattress. When Mom changed the sheets, she found them. And left them, exposed on the top of my bed. Burning with shame, I’ d tried to brazen it out. With attempted enthusiasm I hurried out to the back garden to offer Dad, who was trimming a peach tree, my help. There were other times I felt guilty too. Like the time John Weimer and I picked the only plum on the new tree just before it ripened. Mom had been heartbroken; she’ d looked forward so much to tasting that one plum. John and I hadn’ t even eaten it! We’ d opened it and thrown the still-hard flesh of the fruit on our garage floor. Guilt. Sometimes it comes because of a willful choice of what is known to be wrong. Sometimes it overwhelms us for unwitting failures. Either way, to feel guilt is pure agony; a recognition of our failure and inadequacy. Feelings of guilt are common in our society. Sometimes the feelings are rooted in specific acts. A spouse is unfaithful. A mother neglects a young child who is later injured. A teenager lies to his parents about where he is going. A businessman cheats on a government contract. Sometimes our feelings of guilt are rooted in the growing awareness that we are unable to cope with life. We fall short over and over again. Somehow we must be to blame. The sense of guilt grows. Plagued by the awareness of our inadequacy, we may try any of several approaches to break free. One approach to handling guilt is to deny it. Our feelings of guilt, we say, come from hang-ups that society imposes on us. So we insist that everyone has the right to do his own thing, that there are no absolute moral standards that are binding on us. Another approach to handling guilt is to explain it away. We look back into our childhood and find reasons why we couldn’ t help ourselves; we made some of those bad choices because we had to. Often criminal behavior is explained away as being due to societal conditions rather than the individual’ s choice. Denying personal responsibility is a popular way to attempt to rid ourselves of guilt. A third approach to handling guilt is to punish ourselves. We feel “ bad,” and so we drink, or fail at our work or marriages to make ourselves suffer. Somehow we hope that if we suffer enough we won’ t feel guilty, even though failing actually will deepen our general sense of guilt and worthlessness. A fourth approach to handling guilt is to construct a system of do’ s and don’ ts which we can live up to. Then we reassure ourselves of our goodness by meticulously keeping the rules we construct. If we still feel guilty, we compare ourselves with others who don’ t live up to our high standards, and remind ourselves how much better we are than others. This has historically been a favorite approach of the religious. Of course, there’ s a fifth approach. Just enjoy sin! The first pangs of conscience will recede if we throw ourselves into the pursuit of sinful pleasures. Perhaps we can sear our consciences enough so that we will no longer be troubled by guilt — except late at night when we wake up feeling empty and fearful and alone. Guilt is such a big thing with us, and is felt so intensely by so many, that it is hard to grasp the fact that the Bible does not really speak about guilt feelings. Instead, Scripture speaks only of real guilt, of responsibility for acts of sin. Even here, guilt is hardly a dominant biblical theme. Young’ s Analytical Concordance lists only 6 New Testament references to guilt or guiltiness, and of the 17 Old Testament references, 8 are found in Leviticus 4-6 and refer to the sin offerings through which guilt was to be covered. God seems far more interested in speaking to us of forgiveness than of guilt! The most frequently used Old and New Testament words which speak of forgiveness have the same root meaning: to send away. In each case, what is sent away is not those feelings of guiltiness aroused by our sins or our inadequacy, but the sin itself. It is the sin that is forgiven and sent away. The act of God in forgiving us through Jesus is the source of a new freedom for us. The New Testament quotes an Old Testament promise: “ I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more” (Hebrews 8:12). In another place this is repeated: “ Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more” (Hebrews 10:17). Because of Jesus, our sins have been dealt with fully and completely. As far as God is concerned, the issue is settled. Forgiveness is so complete that sins are no longer even remembered. Then what of guilt? Because our sins are dealt with and sent away, we are no longer guilty! We stand uncondemned before God! Justified by faith, we now “ have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1). And in Jesus we can find inner peace as well. Sometimes guilt feelings linger on after we have accepted Jesus and His forgiveness. This is one of the things we learn to overcome as we grow in our faith. A child frightened by a dog may grow up terrified of even the tiniest poodle. The fear remains, long after the reason for fear is gone. Often Christians feel guilt long after Christ has taken away their sins, and the real guilt is gone. How good to grow to the place where we can acknowledge the nature of sin, can accept Jesus’ forgiveness, and can go on in our Christian lives freed from bondage to guilt feelings after the guilt is gone. Yet before we can discover this freedom we must face the grim facts that Paul presents in the first three chapters of Romans. We must realize that we are guilty before God and utterly without hope in ourselves. Only when we face that fact are we likely to abandon our futile attempts to deal with guilt on our own, and come to Jesus for release. LINK TO LIFE: YOUTH / ADULT Write the word “ guilt” on the chalkboard. Ask your group members to write down one or two words that describe how guilt makes them feel. Then list their suggestions on the chalkboard under “ guilt.” In a brief minilecture cover the ways suggested in the commentary that people try to deal with their feelings of guilt. Discuss: “ Which of these approaches do you think most people would be likely to use? How have you in the past tried to deal with guilt feelings?” After 10 or 15 minutes of discussion, move into Romans. Point out that while God’ s way of dealing with guilt is forgiveness, Romans 13:1-14 makes it clear that each of us must face the fact that we are guilty (not just “ feel” guilty) before we are likely to turn to Jesus for salvation.

The Power of God: Romans 1:1-17In his introduction Paul affirmed first that God has good news for humankind in Jesus Christ, His Son, who “ was declared with power to be the Son of God by His resurrection from the dead” (Romans 1:4). The Gospel, the Good News from God, is infused with this same life-giving vitality, for “ it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile” (Romans 1:16). And what does the Gospel message reveal? That there is a righteousness from God, which is available to human beings, and that it is “ by faith from first to last.” Thus Paul’ s opening paragraphs are filled with promise. God has a message for us in Christ, a good word about a salvation which does not depend on what we do to earn it, but comes as a gift which can be received only by faith. Later in Romans Paul examined each theme introduced here. He explained carefully the astounding nature of “ salvation,” and how it is that both life and righteousness are involved. Later too Paul helps us understand the nature of “ faith.” But first of all, Paul wanted to make sure that we fully understand why we need this salvation. The reason is grim. Without salvation, we have no spiritual life. Without it, we have no righteousness. Without it, we stand guilty and condemned before the holy God. There is no hope for any person aside from the by-faith salvation that God offers us in Jesus! No wonder Paul saw himself as “ obligated both to Greeks and non-Greeks, both to the wise and the foolish” (Romans 1:14). Paul had the Gospel, the message that can bring life to the lost. As a fellow human being like you and I, Paul was obligated to share the Good News of salvation with all.

The State of the Lost: Romans 1:18-3:20 As Paul penned these first chapters of Romans, one reality dominated his thoughts. That thought is stated in a critical verse in Romans 5:1-21 : “ By the trespass of the one man [Adam], death reigned” (Romans 5:17). Our understanding of salvation must grow from our awareness of man’ s utter lostness. All too often human beings begin their thinking about relationship with God with different assumptions. To some, a human being seems a person born with spiritual life who forfeits that life only when he personally chooses sin. Others believe that a person is born neutral. To them, the issue remains in doubt until the final judgment, when our acts will be weighed in a set of divine balances. If, at that time, there is more good than bad (so the thinking goes), eternal life will be the reward. Paul had no such image of man. He took seriously the Old Testament picture of the Fall, and was convinced that all human beings are born spiritually dead and alienated from God. Both by nature and by choice, human beings willingly choose sin, even when they know the good. So the basic question is, “ How do human beings receive spiritual life?” This is a question that Paul himself never asked or even thought of in his early years. As a young Pharisee, the 30-year-old Saul assumed that life was his, and that he could please God by a rigorous keeping of the Law. Only later, jolted by the appearance of Jesus on the road to Damascus, did Saul go back to probe the untested assumptions on which his whole life had been based. Now, writing to the Romans, Paul realized that there would be many others like himself who would not have traced the implications of the Gospel back to the basics. So in the first three chapters of this book Paul sought to demonstrate the deadness of humanity. He sought to prove our guilt, and utter lack of righteousness. Paul argued that we do not die spiritually because of sin; our sins demonstrate that we are spiritually dead. Human beings never needed Law to show them how to live. Mankind’ s need has always been for life itself — something that is not communicated through God’ s Law. Spiritual deadness (Romans 1:18-32). Paul was familiar with the sinful lifestyle of the pagans, a lifestyle adopted and expressed in the stories of their gods and goddesses. The Gentiles had not come to this depraved state because they had no opportunity to know God. Paul pointed out that ever since Creation, God’ s invisible qualities have “ been clearly seen” (Romans 1:20). That which can be known about God through nature “ is plain to them” (Romans 1:19). The question is, “ How have human beings responded to God’ s revelation of Himself in Creation?” What has happened is that, when confronted by God, “ they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him” (Romans 1:21). Instead they reacted against Him, exchanging “ the glory of the immortal God” for dead images and idols. An analogy helps. We’ ve all seen two lovers walking side by side. We’ ve seen their hands brush, then seen them grip. The love that exists between the two attracts: a touch stimulates a handclasp, and soon an embrace. We’ ve also seen what happens when a hand brushes a hot iron or stove. There’ s a sudden jerk; the hand is pulled away. Instead of attraction there is repulsion. This, Paul said, is what has happened between God and man. When God brushes against human beings, unveiling just a bit of Himself in creation, humanity jerks away! Humans desperately repress the truth, not thinking “ it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God” (Romans 1:28). To Paul and to us this reaction is evidence of the spiritual deadness of humanity. To contact God — the Bible’ s God of love and righteousness — and to be repelled! And then to choose all sorts of corruption and wickedness rather than Him! How plain it was to Paul as he went on to list the spiritual and moral wickedness that human societies have so clearly displayed. Such people must be both guilty and spiritually dead! If there were any life at all, they would respond as a lover to the God who loves each of us so. LINK TO LIFE: YOUTH / ADULT Bring several copies of the day’ s newspaper to your session. Explain Paul’ s argument in Romans 1:1-32. Then ask your members to scan Romans 1:26-32 and the newspapers to find modern-day evidence that mankind is spiritually dead and in rebellion against God. God’ s judgment (Romans 2:1-16). Paul then made it clear that God will surely judge the sins of humankind. No human being can lightly condemn others, for we too have sinned, and deserve judgment. What is called for is repentance. The Jew might be proud because he knew more of God than the Gentile. He had received God’ s Law. But what God is concerned with is not knowing good. It is doing good that counts (Romans 2:7-11). Romans 2:14-15 are an interesting aside which have often been misunderstood. These verses read: Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the Law, do by nature things required by the Law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the Law, since they show that the requirements of the Law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them. Paul here was pointing out that the Jews, recipients of the revealed Law, were not the only ones with moral standards! The Gentiles too had a moral nature, and a conscience that identified moral issues and led them to set up standards of right and wrong by which to judge themselves and each other. “ By nature” they do what the concept of Law requires: they weigh, measure, and evaluate human behavior by moral criteria. They realize that moral failure calls for judgment, and they try to excuse and defend their failures. When God’ s Judgment Day comes, both Jew and Gentile will be shown to have fallen short of whatever standards each approves! This is helpful for those who are honestly concerned about God’ s “ unfairness” in failing to reveal His standards to everyone. God will not judge pagans by Scripture’ s standards of right and wrong. He will judge all men by their own standards. But it makes no difference. For all fall short. The failure of individuals and of societies to live up to standards they themselves establish is additional evidence that men are both lost and dead. There is no help for us in ourselves. LINK TO LIFE: YOUTH / ADULT You may want to lecture on the question “ Are the heathen lost?” Key points are: God has revealed Himself to all human beings (Romans 1:19-20; cf. Psalms 19:1-4). All have moral standards, and God’ s judgment will be based on the standards a person holds (Romans 2:12-14). The sinful condition of humanity is demonstrated in the fact that individuals do not choose to respond to the truth they do possess, or live by the standards that they hold. Thus divine judgment is just: all do have some knowledge of God and of morality. Anyone who is lost will be judged because of his or her own personal response to God Himself, and his or her own sins. Jews and the Law (Rom. 2:17-3:8). Paul then spoke directly to the Jew, who relied on the Law and “ brags about your relationship to God.” Simply knowing the Law does not make a person superior: one must observe the Law. In essence, Paul was accusing Judaism of having become a religion of externals. It took pride in having the Law, but Jews “ dishonor God by breaking the Law.” Judaism took pride in physical circumcision, but ignored the inner circumcision of the heart accomplished only by God’ s Spirit. The Jews had many spiritual advantages (Romans 3:1-2). But their unfaithfulness (Romans 3:3) had not shaken God from His commitments. God will still judge those who sin. Righteousness (Romans 3:9-20). Up to this point Paul had sought to demonstrate that all humanity is spiritually dead, and thus under God’ s judgment. Human beings are repelled by contact with God. They choose wicked acts, and even though Jew and Gentile alike have moral standards, they do not live up to them. Then Paul moved from demonstration to proof! And for proof, he went back to the Old Testament, quoting various Psalms which tell us “ there is no one righteous, not even one” (Romans 3:10). This collage of Old Testament verses goes beyond argument. The evidence of history and personal experience Paul drew on is impressive. The statements of God in His Word are conclusive. It is at this point that Paul returned to the Law. Whatever the Law has to say, it speaks to those who are under the Law (e.g., the Jewish people). And what it says is that all are guilty! Crushed by requirements that no one has ever perfectly met, the mouth of every human being under the Law is silenced, and “ the whole world [is] held accountable to God” (Romans 3:19). Since it is the function of the Law to condemn the sinner and demonstrate guilt, “ no one will be declared righteous in [God’ s] sight by observing the Law.” Instead “ through the Law we become conscious of sin” (Romans 3:20). So humanity is lost. We are spiritually dead, and the very Law to which the Jews looked with such hope is actually an instrument of condemnation.

What Is the Gospel? Romans 3:21-31Paul launched Romans by referring to the Gospel — Good News from God. What is that Good News? How is it possible for God to provide us with a “ righteousness from God, apart from Law” ? Paul then said that “ this righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe” (Romans 3:22), for there is no difference between Gentile and Jew, since all have sinned. The basis on which God makes this offer is the blood of Christ, poured out as a “ sacrifice of atonement” (Romans 3:25). Our salvation rests on the work of God in Christ; there is no human contribution. God’ s grace, His free choice to give what we do not have and cannot earn, is at the root of salvation. All God asks from us is faith. Paul also noted here that the Cross demonstrates not only grace but also God’ s justice. In the past too God offered believers forgiveness. But how could the holy God let sin go unpunished? The Cross shows the God who does not relax His standards. The penalty which justice demands — death for the sinner — was paid by God Himself. Ours is not cut-rate salvation. Ours is no cheap forgiveness. But it is God who paid the price in the blood of His Son. The Gospel, then, is simply the message that God forgives guilty sinners, and does so righteously, on the basis of Christ’ s sacrificial death. Law and faith (Romans 3:27-31). To all who object that this robs the Law of honor, Paul responded, “ Not at all!” The principle of faith does exclude human boasting. And it makes salvation accessible to all. But this principle of faith actually upholds Law. What Paul meant is, the Gospel finally puts Law in clear perspective, establishing in every eye the role that God has given the Law — not the role human beings mistakenly assigned to it. The Law’ s place as the revealer of our lostness is established. The Law’ s role is even exalted, for now we know. Law itself is a compelling call to look to Christ for a righteousness which can come only as God’ s gift, and only through faith. LINK TO LIFE: YOUTH / ADULT Have each group member write a paraphrase of Romans 3:21-26, trying to explain the Gospel to a contemporary friend by expressing the concepts in these verses in modern terms. It may help them to know ahead of time that the word translated “ sacrifice of atonement” is translated “ propitiation” in older versions. Propitiation emphasizes averting God’ s wrath by satisfying the demands of righteousness, while “ atonement” emphasizes forgiveness and removal of sins enabling establishment of a harmonious relationship with God.

Teaching Guide Prepare Study carefully the flow of Paul’ s argument in these chapters so that you understand the main points.

Explore Launch class with an exploration of your group’ s ideas about, and experience with guilt. How does guilt “ feel” to them, and how have they tried in the past to deal with guilt? See “ link-to-life” above.

Expand

1. Explain Paul’ s conviction that humanity is truly lost: without life, guilty and condemned. Sketch his first argument for this position (Romans 1:18-32), and distribute newspapers so your group members can look for contemporary evidence of Paul’ s point. See “ link-to-life” above.
2. In a minilecture sketch Paul’ s moral argument. In brief, this is that Jew and pagan both have standards of right and wrong, and that both violate those standards. The violation of one’ s own moral standards is the basis on which God will judge sin. If you want to explore the question of “ Are the heathen lost?” see the method suggested in “ link-to-life” above.
3. To help your group members clearly define the Gospel, have each paraphrase Romans 3:21-26. Work then on a group paraphrase that clearly expresses God’ s way of salvation.

Apply Conclude with a minilecture that “ puts together” what you have explored. Paul demonstrated that all are lost (1:18-3:8) and proved it from Scripture (Romans 3:9-18). Those guilt feelings talked about at the beginning are rooted in reality: we are guilty. God’ s Law is not a solution to our problem, for Law is intended to make us aware of our spiritual death and lostness. “ Through the Law we become conscious of sin.” The solution is found in the death of Jesus, and the righteousness that God gives us through faith. Invite any in the group who are troubled by guilt to talk with you later about how to receive and experience forgiveness.