Romans 2:6-16

 

It is somewhat difficult to subdivide chapter 2 because Paul is dealing with a single topic without any clear distinct parts. However, it is probably best to look at the first five verses as stating this general premise with this section developing it and then the final verses bringing it to a conclusion. 

This passage is sandwiched between two verses that say essentially the same thing. On one end we have verse 6: “[God] will render to every man according to his deeds” and on the other end we have verse 16: “God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel.” It is interesting that Paul connects the idea of judgment to that of the gospel, the gospel which he preached (hence “my” gospel)--the idea of a final judgment is taught in the Old Testament, but it is stated much more clearly and certainly in the gospels. The picture of the great judgment, as we know it today, comes from the words of the New Testament, though it is built upon ideas in the Old Testament. And especially the revelation that the judgment would be by Jesus Christ comes according to the gospel. Perhaps Paul is trying to ward off the suggestion that this idea of judgment is irrelevant under Christianity by reminding his readers of its connection to the gospel.

The basic premise of this passage is this. God will bring about judgment to every man. Every human being will be judged by God. And that judgment will be fair and accurate. Everyone who does well will be rewarded and everyone who does wrong will be punished. There is an inevitable sense of contrast. You have it verses 7 and 8 and then again verse 9 and 10.  On one hand, we have those who with patience and perseverance pursue glory, honor, and immortality, those that worketh good. Those will receive eternal life, glory, honor, and peace. On the other hand, we have those that are contentious. The meaning of the word is debated. If we take it as the KJV translates it, it means those that rebel and argue with God, those who will not make peace and submit to his authority. But others take the word as meaning self-seeking and greedy; the NET Bible translates it “selfish ambition.” In either interpretation, it means those who put themselves and their own interest about God, so we could use the word self-centered. They are those who will not accept and obey the truth but instead follow unrighteousness. They are those that do evil. They will receive indignation, wrath, tribulation, and anguish.  You could say that verses 7-8 describe attitudes while verses 9-10 describe actions.

The conclusion is this. Because God is righteous, he will recognize and reward righteousness in man. But if man is unrighteous, then he will receive the wrath of God.  God's judgment will be according to truth. Sin will be recognized as sin; goodness will be recognized as goodness.

But at this point in Romans, Paul is especially trying to drive home the point of verse 11: “For there is no respect of person with God.” God will judge fairly and accurately. We know that sometimes human justice is not fair. Sometimes judges and juries are influenced by personal prejudices--sometimes we think that a person must be guilty or innocent because of their occupation, their appearance, their ethnicity, or social standing. That is why justice is always pictured as wearing a blindfold--because in dealing with justice, we should be blind to these external considerations. And God's judgment will be impartial and it will be fair. And specifically, God will not give any special discrimination between Jews and Gentiles; as verses 9-10 make clear, God will use the same standard for judging the Jews as the Gentiles.

Among the Judaism of Paul's day, there were two common ideas about the way to be right with God. One was LEGALISM, the idea that man could become right with God by doing good works, that he could tip the scale of God's justice in their favor by doing what was right, that his good deeds could counteract his sins. The other common idea was COVENANTAL NOMISM, which was the belief that salvation came through membership in the Jewish covenant. And this sometimes came quite simply down to the idea that a Jew could be saved simply by being a Jew. One of the Jewish writers said that Abraham stands at the Gate of Hell to prevent any Jew, even a wicked Jew, from entering there. They said that God used one scale for judging the Gentiles and another one for judging the Gentiles. And for our purposes here, I'm going to add a third thing--something that could arise from either legalism or covenantal nomism but which could also arise on its own, and that is COMPLACENCY. Complacency is the idea of smugly assuming one's relationship with God, assuming one's own righteousness and safety. It may be on a basis, such as legalism or nomism, but it may just arise without any basis at all. One of Charles Dickens' characters, speaking of some event, says "It shook me in my habit--the habit of nine-tenths of the world--of believing that all was right about me, because I was used to it." (Dombey and Son) That is what complacency is. Whatever begets it originally, it settles in by force of habit. When we speak of complacency in our relationship with God, it is this idea that we must be in a right relationship with God because we haven't taken any pains to think otherwise and because God hasn't done anything terrible to us. That goes back to what Paul says earlier in the chapter about despising the mercy and forbearance of God. There is a danger that we will confuse God's mercy for his approval rather than as a call to repentance. 

These were three factors present in first-century Judaism. And in some form or another, they are still very much around. Today, just as then, there are many who believe they can find peace with God through doing good works and avoiding sin or who think that God will accept them because they are part of a certain family, social unit, or religious group—and far more who just assume that they are in a right relationship with God for no particular reason.

And Paul is arguing against all three of these ideas in this passage. First, the mere fact of the coming judgment should shake the complacent. The fact that there is a judgment coming, there will be a time when all acts and attitudes will be evaluated should cause us to do some self-judgment now. The man who could calmly and smugly look at the sins of his neighbor without looking at his own heart should awake at these words.

Second, the fact of judgment speaks against the legalist. Look at verses 7-10 again. Paul pictures the judgment in binary terms; that is, it is one thing or the other. It is not, those who mostly by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory, etc. He does not say, those who are usually contentious. While there are other places in the Bible that suggest that there will be degrees of reward and punishment in judgment, fundamentally, there are only two verdicts--guilty or innocent; not mostly guilty or mostly innocent. In other words, the legalist's idea that he could find salvation by doing more good works than evil was an illusion. There was no justification that way.

Finally, and I think Paul's main point, was to combat covenantal nomism. He makes it quite clear that God's judgment will be the same for both Jews and Gentiles. The Jews could not expect to be saved simply because they were Jews. God used exactly the same standard for the Jews and the Gentiles.

He knew the Jews might object: “But we're not Gentiles; we're special. We have the law.” And to answer that we have verses 12-15. Verse 13 specifically: “Not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified.” The point is that there is no virtue merely in knowing the law if you don't obey it. The Gentiles did not have God's revealed law, but they did have God's law in their conscience--this is proved by the fact that Gentiles did sometimes do righteous things; their own conscience bears witness to the fact that they had some degree of law. And so they would be judged and be punished in so far as they broke that law. Those who sinned without the law will perish without the law. The Jews had a clearer and more extensive revelation of the law. But that did not mean they would be judged any less severely. As many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law. This brings home the point that Paul began the chapter with. The Jews looked down on the Gentiles for their sinfulness, but that looking down was based on the fact that they knew God's law which, in its turn, was a judgment against them.

In short, the Jews faced the judgment of God just as surely as the Gentiles, because, like the Gentiles, they had sinned against the law as they knew it. They were part and parcel with the unrighteousness of man against which the wrath of God is revealed from Heaven.