Romans 13:8-14

We began chapter 12 with an appeal for the Christian to live out his faith within his life—to give himself over to God and be transformed. In the verses that followed, Paul showed how this changed live should be lived in various situations—and now we come to this passage. The idea seems to be almost that Paul couldn't list every possible situation that a Christian would face, and so he gives this passage which shows how Christians should live in a more general sense. This is, so to speak, the Christian's rule of thumb.

We are talking still about the life of the Christian, the life of one who has been transformed by the renewing of the mind; this is how those who are just by faith should live. And there are three ideas in this passage regarding why we live this way; three ideas that guide us as we seek to understand how we ought to live in various circumstances. They are ideas we have met with before in Romans, but here Paul brings them together as a sort of trifecta of spiritual ideals—the ideas and reality which must enter into our hearts and minds to bring about that renewing that transforms our life.

The first is JUSTICE. Paul ended the last passage by talking about how we ought to discharge our duty to the government, even to the basic matter of paying our taxes. He directly picks up on this idea with the first phrase of verse 8: “Owe no man any thing.” The Family Bible Notes paraphrases that: “discharge, at the proper time, all just obligations.” Barclay says there were some Christians in the early church who took Christ's words about forgiveness to mean that Christians were no longer under obligation to pay their debts. 

But, as we talked about in our previous lesson, Christianity does not remove the duty of justice—of rendering to every man their due. That applies to the government, and it applies to one another as individuals. We have duties and responsibilities of various kinds—whether in the family, the community, the place of business, or the church—and as Christians it is more important to fulfill them, not less. With great grace comes great responsibility. 

But justice, as important as it is, cannot be the sole motivation of life. Duty and obligation do not go far enough to fuel the life of man. They are, in the end, fences that protect the garden of life—they are not the soil in which anything grows. The soil out of which the best of life grows is not justice but LOVE.

That is the continuation of verse 8: “Owe no man anything, but to love one another.” Barclay titles this section: “The Debts Which Must Be Paid and the Debt Which Never Can Be Paid.” (175) Justice goes to the finish line and then stops; love always goes the extra mile. 

In the abstract, these two ideas—justice and love—sound like opposites or at least like competing ideals. Justice is precise and abstract; love of personal and passionate. But to Paul they were not opposed; in fact, they were interconnected. This is the end of verse 8: “For he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.” For the Christian, love is the foundation of justice. That is why love is something bigger and more far-reaching—because it is the massive bedrock on which the palace of justice is built.

Love is the foundation and motive behind justice. Paul says that 'love worketh no ill to his neighbour.' If we had a complete love for all men, that would lead us to treat them all fairly. Love leads us to justice and justice teaches how to love properly.

Justice means this--if you borrowed 100 dollars from someone, you would pay it back when the debt came due. But you could pay that debt for many reasons—for fear of repercussions, out of a sense of duty, or out of a sense of personal pride. But if you truly loved and cared about the man you borrowed from, then you would be even more motivated to pay the debt. That is what I mean by saying that love is the motive behind justice. But here is the difference. If you are guided solely by justice, you will pay the debt and that's the end of the matter. The demands of justice have been met. But if you are guided by love—if you truly love and care about this man—then even after the matter of the debt is settled, you will still have an interest in him and in trying to help him.

So we have these two principles—love and justice—which work in tandem as the motive and guide of Christian behavior. But they are not specifically Christian ideas. As I mentioned before, justice is one of the four cardinal virtues of pagan philosophy. And while Christianity has a unique emphasis on love, it is true that nearly everyone recognizes the importance and value of love.

But there is a third principle here, one which is very unique and specially Christian; one might say it is peculiarly Christian—certainly, many in the world would call it peculiar. This third principle provides an explanation or context for love and justice. This third principle is what I am calling WAKEFULNESS.

Verse 11 begins: “And that, knowing the time.” This is a little awkward in English. The idea seems to be that Paul is connecting this statement “knowing the time” with what has come before. The NET Bible translates it: “And do this because we know the time.” This knowledge of the time is given as a reason or motivation for acting in a certain way—whether Paul is pointing back specifically to the talk of love in verse 10, the entire passage, or the entire ethical section of Romans all the way back to 12:1. We began by saying that the Christian must have a renewing of the mind—that seems to imply that transformation is largely connected to knowledge. And here Paul says that our knowledge will lead to us acting as we ought to act.

But what is it that we know? We know the time. But the word for time here does not mean time in general. In the Bible, it is frequently translated 'season'; it has the idea of a specific period or length of time; often, it has the idea of the time at which something happens. Here, Robertson translates it: “the critical period.” Specifically, it is the time to wake out of sleep; it is the hour of awakening. Paul expands on his meaning in verse 12 by saying: “The night is far spent, the day is at hand.” Knowing the time seems to mean knowing that it is night, and the last hours of the night, just before dawn.

Most commentators take Paul's words to have reference to the second coming of Christ. In 1 Thessalonians 5, Paul is speaking of the end of this world and the beginning of the next and uses this same imagery of night and day. 

Paul was very much conscious of the reality that one day the story of this world would come to an end. (See 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 and 1 Corinthians 15:52) Paul may have thought it likely that this time of return would come within his own lifetime. However, I don't think these words should be twisted into a prediction; as if Paul were saying that the Lord's return was very close. Paul knew better than to try to set dates. This is what he said to the Thessalonians: “But of the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that I write unto you. For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night.” (1 Thessalonians 5:1-2)

However, whenever Christ returned, that return was not—in itself—the sum of Paul's hope. Speaking of the possibility of his execution by the Romans, Paul told the Philippians: “For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better.” (Philippians 1:23) Paul had the expectation of being with Christ, even if he didn't live to see Christ's return. This is also one of the main themes of 1 Thessalonians, that those who have died will share equally in Christ's glory with those who are alive on that day.

So we have this fact—the fact that this world is coming to an end; that someday everything will be brought to a conclusion. And that, in any event, the story of each of man has its conclusion. Life itself is a short thing. This is the reality we live with—that we have only limited time and it could run out at any moment.

And this is a reality most people recognize. Most people realize that the individual life of man is short and uncertain. Whether or not they believe in that the world as a whole could end soon, they realize that it could end for any of us tonight. And you will frequently hear people, even the world, use this as a motivation to live better. You will hear exhortations to be kind and thoughtful and treasure the people in your life because you never know how much time you have left.

There is a motivation to live as we ought to be; specifically, there is an urgency to live as we ought, based on the shortness of life. We may not have time to fix all our mistakes before the end.

However, there is a problem with this. This reality—the reality of the shortness of life and the inevitability of death—may lead men to live better; but it may also lead them to live worse. It is a motivation for altruism but it is also a motivation for egoism. Even in St. Paul's day, there were many who lived with this idea: “Let us eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we may die.” Our own day has put the philosophy into an acronym. YOLO: you only live once. Life is short, so enjoy it while you can.

We all live under the advancing shadow of the tombstone, but so far as morals, all that shadow can tell us is: “Whatsoever thou dost, do quickly.” Death cannot tell us how to live.

And that's why it's important to understand Paul's point here. Because Paul was not interested in the darkness of death, but in the light. Paul's main point is not about the shortness of the night but about the nearness of the day.

You might ask: why does that distinction matter? 

Well, suppose a man became a Christian as a boy of fifteen. Throughout his young adulthood, he was active in his church; led his wife and children through the faith, and continued working for God throughout his life until fifty-five years later at the age of 80, he is diagnosed with a terminal illness and told he only has a few hours left to live. Lying there on his death bed, he looks around at his family and comments: “Well, if I had known I was going to make it to eighty, I wouldn't have had to become a Christian so early. I could have lived all my life as a sinner and waited until I was sixty, at least, before repenting.”

I think we recognize instinctively that such a viewpoint is wrong and that if a man truly said that, we would question the state of his soul or his mind. 

Therefore the possibility of imminent death or Christ's return cannot be the sole reason for our actions. It can be a motivation, but not a guide; it is a spur, not a map. WAKEFULNESS means realizing the shortness of life, and the reality of death, but it means more than that.

But understand what it means, we have to look more closely at the contrast that runs throughout the passage--the contrast between night and day.

In the night we have SLEEP, and in the day we have WAKEFUNLESS. This is verse 11. In verse 12 we have the WORKS OF DARKNESS and the ARMOUR OF LIGHT. Verse 13: in the night we have those walking in various sins. We have rioting which is basically Greek for partying like a rock star; drunkenness, which means the same thing in Greek as in English; chambering, which means fornication; wantonness which means a lack of self-control or concern for what is right or proper; strife which means quarreling or fighting; and envying, which is self-explanatory. (Barclay 179) These various sins are distinct, but I think we can sum it up by saying that those who do such are walking IUNDULGENTLY, satisfying human desires with no concern for either love or justice. William Barclay gives this definition for wantonness which fits the entire list: “It has been defined as 'readiness for any pleasure.' The man who practices it has been said to know no restraint... The idea is that of a man who is so far gone in desire that he has ceased to care what people say or think.” (Galatians 5:16-21) That is the way people walk in the night; in the day we are to walk HONORABLY or decently. Verse 14 does not directly continue this metaphor, but the implication seems to be that in the night we have PROVISION FOR THE FLESH and in the day we have those who have PUT ON CHRIST. In verse 11, Paul speaks of our SALVATION which seems to sum up the day. We do not have the opposite mentioned, but we can find it in Ephesians 5:6; here Paul is speaking of darkness and light and lists sins various similar to the works of darkness listed here, adding this warning: “Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience.” We come back again to the beginning of Romans and to the WRATH of God which is revealed from heaven against the sins of man.

This is the clear contrast Paul lays out here. And there is a strong possibility that I am reading way more into this than Paul actually meant, but I think at least this may help us understand.

We have this contrast between night and day. And night is pictured as the evil side, the side of sin and wrath. But we also have to remember this: “And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.” (Genesis 1:4-5) Night isn't evil, because it is something created by God; night and day both had their part in that original creation of God.

And this world and our life in it, our human, physical life—is something good, something created by God. It has been corrupted by sin, but that doesn't change this basic fact. Some day God will destroy this earth, but only because of the corruption, not because it was a bad idea from the start. If we are to say that night is the life of this world as it is and day is the life of the world to come, we have to recognize that both are made by God and both are or may be good. So why do have this picture of a sharp contrast, as if this world were pure evil?

So, let's think of the routine of an average man. In the evening, he changes into night clothes, maybe has a late-night snack, and then goes to bed. He sleeps through the night and then in the morning, when the alarm goes off, he gets up, takes a shower, gets dressed in his work clothes, and then goes off to work. That sounds pretty average.

But suppose the man thought that the morning was never going to come; what if he went to bed believing that night was simply going to last forever? Obviously, there is no point in setting the alarm clock if there is never going to come a time to wake up. There is no point in getting up and getting dressed if work time is never going to come. And if there is nothing beyond the evening to consider, you might as well eat the entire carton of ice cream instead of just a little bowl before bed.

In other words, the average man sees night as only one part of life and not necessarily the best or most important part. Most of what he does at night, he does with reference to the fact that morning is coming. It would be entirely different if he believed that night was all there was.

And just so, there is a difference between the people of the world—who, for the most part, in whatever words they would use, believe that this world and this life is all there is, that our existence as we know it is the whole of existence and there is nothing else (or nothing of importance) beyond it—there is a difference between that and the Christian who recognizes that this life is only part of the whole picture, as the hours of the night are only a part of the twenty four hours of the day. Things that would be perfectly natural and understandable if night were endless, become silly or reprehensible when you know that day is coming.

I always struggle to wake up in the morning, a fact which is worsened by the fact that my work requires that I get up very early. And so, every night I have five or six alarms set for the morning. Occasionally, I'll have trouble falling asleep, so that by the time I do fall asleep it's only a couple of hours until I have to get up—on those nights, it becomes particularly urgent to make sure the alarms are set because it's going to be so much harder to wake up. But even on nights when this isn't the case, I still set the alarms, because I still know that the morning is coming. I come back to what I said before—what is really important is not the shortness of night so much as the nearness of day.

I would argue, then, that “knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep” does not merely mean: remember every day could be your last, though it does include that realization. It means knowing that even your last day will not be the end. The problem is not with living in this world; it is living without reference to the fact that this world is not all. Even if we had the certainty that we would live to the age of Methuselah and that Christ would not return within our lifetime, it still wouldn't change the fact that life is temporary and fading away, and that day is coming—and that day is what is really important. 

There is at least a sense in which we can say that night exists for the sake of day but day exists for its own sake—we sleep to be rested for our life, but life does not exist solely to tire out for sleep. And you could debate the complete truth of that on a physical level, but I think it is true on a spiritual level—our life in this world is not evil, but it does not exist for its own sake or on its own terms. “Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.” (Hebrews 11:3) The things which are seen—the physical, material world—exist because of, on account, and for the sake of the things which are not seen.

And therefore, living in this world, we can live with a knowledge of things that go beyond this world. We can live in the morning even while it is still dark. When I leave the house to go to work, it is still dark outside, but I am already up and dressed and (physically if not mentally) ready for the day; because I know that the day will arrive and I have to be ready for it.

That is why we come back to what I said at the beginning, that these three things—love, justice, and wakefulness—stand together as the guiding principle of the Christian life. Love gives the motive and justice sets the boundaries. But wakefulness reminds us that these principles are not merely arbitrary personal choices of our own; we have not picked them out at random from a pile of other possible principles. These are principles of the day.

If a man had lived his whole life in the darkness, he would think it silly to imagine light pouring down from the sky to fill the earth. To those of this world, love and justice and the rest of the virtues seem equally silly. They often seem irrelevant and out of place, as if they came from some other world. And so they do, just as the light of our world comes from a star 93 million miles away. But it is the energy of the sun which makes life possible on this planet, and it is God and God's work that makes life possible anywhere.

And yes, I realize we're getting lost in metaphors—my point is that as Christians, we have a source and pattern of life that goes beyond this world. We live in this world, but we do not find the source, aim, or guide for life in this world, because we recognize that this world is only one part of reality and not the most important part. We live in this world in the light of another. And that is why the hope of Christ's return is so important—not merely because it means the cessation of this life, but because it means the triumph and consummation of that life. Thomas Troeger wrote: “Match the present to the promise:/Christ will come again./Make this hope your guiding premise:/Christ will come again./Pattern all your calculating/And the world you are creating/To the advent you are waiting:/Christ will come again.”

But how do we do that? How do live for the day while it is still night? The same way we do it in a physical sense. By getting up and getting dressed. This is verse 12, as we have already referenced: “Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.” Basically, get out of your pajamas and into your work clothes—or, rather, your war clothes, for Paul is thinking of arms and armor, the preparation for a battle. 1 Thessalonians 5:8 gives us more insight into this armor: “But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation.” This in turn reminds us of Ephesians and the armor of God. I'm not going to review all that here—the idea is simply that as those who are living for the day, we prepare ourselves with the weapons of the day. We walk honorably, as in the day, not in the shameful and self-indulgent ways of the night.

But, again, how does one do that? How can we live a decent life and how do we obtain this armor of light?

Well, as we already mentioned, this side all falls under the general heading of wrath—living in the darkness leads to wrath—while on the other side, we have salvation. And this is what 1 Thessalonians 5:9-10 says about that: “For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him.” It is God's will that we escape wrath and obtain salvation, but only through the atonement provided by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This answers to verse 14 of our text: “Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh.” So many people in the world are making all their plans and designs in order to satisfy the desires of sin. But we are told specifically not to do that but instead to put on the Lord Jesus. Christ has given Himself to us as a sort of armor or cloak to protect us from the darkness of this world. We can walk as those in the light, because in us lives He who is the light. And therefore, no matter how long or short our life is, we can live together with Him. But all that is only possible through faith, as it is written that the just shall live by faith.