The Great Escape….Romans 2:1-9
Sermon by Pastor Dennis R. Gleason -- November 21, 2004
According to a UPI news item, the Metropolitan Insurance Company received some unusual explanations for accidents from its automobile policyholders. The following are just few:
-An invisible car came out of nowhere, struck my car, and vanished.
-The other car collided with mine without warning me of its intention.
-I had been driving my car for 40 years when I fell asleep at the wheel and had the accident. -As I reached an intersection, a hedge sprang up, obscuring my vision.
-I pulled away from the side of the road, glanced at my mother-in-law, and headed over the embankment.
-The pedestrian had no idea which direction to go, so I ran over him.
-The telephone pole was approaching fast. I attempted to swerve out of its path when it struck my front end.
-The guy was all over the road. I had to swerve a number of times before I hit him.
-The indirect cause of this accident was a little guy in a small car with a big mouth.
UPI News.
A radio news series about honesty in America talked about excuses. The commentator said that people use three types of excuses when guilty of wrongdoing.
The first is outright denial - a rejection of any involvement. Sometimes this is done even though the person is obviously guilty.
The second is the "It's not my fault" excuse. The person looks around for someone he can blame. (Often it is a loved one - a husband or wife or parent. Sometimes it's the boss.)
A third form of excuse is the "I did it, but...." approach. In this instance the person blames circumstances for his shortcoming. Either he's been struggling with some illness or the assignment wasn't clear or the car's been giving him trouble.
Ten Most Used Excuses:
1. I forgot.
2. No one told me to go ahead.
3. I didn't think it was that important.
4. Wait until the boss comes back and ask him.
5. I didn't know you were in a hurry for it.
6. That's the way we've always done it.
7. That's not in my department.
8. How was I to know this was different?
9. I'm waiting for an O.K.
10. That's his job--not mine.
Our text for today is found in Romans 2:1-9
1You may be saying, “What terrible people you have been talking about!” But you are just as bad, and you have no excuse! When you say they are wicked and should be punished, you are condemning yourself, for you do these very same things. 2And we know that God, in his justice, will punish anyone who does such things. 3Do you think that God will judge and condemn others for doing them and not judge you when you do them, too? 4Don’t you realize how kind, tolerant, and patient God is with you? Or don’t you care? Can’t you see how kind he has been in giving you time to turn from your sin?
5But no, you won’t listen. So you are storing up terrible punishment for yourself because of your stubbornness in refusing to turn from your sin. For there is going to come a day of judgment when God, the just judge of all the world, 6will judge all people according to what they have done. 7He will give eternal life to those who persist in doing what is good, seeking after the glory and honor and immortality that God offers. 8But he will pour out his anger and wrath on those who live for themselves, who refuse to obey the truth and practice evil deeds. 9There will be trouble and calamity for everyone who keeps on sinning—for the Jew first and also for the Gentile.
His argument is essentially this: Have you ever criticized anyone for anything? Who of us could truthfully say “No”? Then you are without excuse, because your criticism arises from the fact that you have a conscience, which now recognizes the sin in another person because it is aware of the existence of sin in oneself. We have never lived up to the light of our conscience, whatever it might be. Therefore, any of us who have been critical of someone else has thereby written his or her own condemnation.
The issues at hand are issues that will be brought to the court of God and there will be no human code of judgment brought to bear. The principles of God’s judgment are declared clearly for us and they show that the result is going to be absolute condemnation without even the remotest shadow of hope for any one who attempts to approach God with any brand of human righteousness.
There are two different words in the Greek that give us our English word for “judgment”. The words are krino and katakrino. Krino is the simple word often used for a judgment on the level of selection, choice or estimate. In Acts 27:1 Paul says, “When it was determined that we should sail into Italy…” That is how krino is used. The other word, katakrino, is a much stronger word and is used in the Bible of the judgment of death, condemnation by a judge. In John 8:10 it is used by Jesus to the woman taken in adultery when he asks, “Has no one condemned you?”
There are essentially seven principle grounds upon which men judge other men. We won’t have time to look extensively into these individually, but men judge other men on the basis of
1. race,
2. civilization,
3. culture,
4. wealth,
5. education,
6. ethics or
7. religion.
We use these things to separate us from others who are not nearly as good as ourselves. However, from the point of view of God, all men are on the same level and need the grace God offers us through Jesus Christ and his sacrifice on the cross for us.
The first thing we have taken note of from our text today is that men are without excuse.
The second thing we see is that there is no escape for us because we are without excuse.
One of the most important reasons that we should prepare to meet our God is that we are going to meet our God at some point in our existence. The second verse of our text makes it clear that the judgment of God will be according to the truth.
What Paul is saying here is that unless a person’s case is settled out of court through a meeting with the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, people are going to come to the judgment bar of God. People will be forced to look upon themselves as they are in reality…that is as they really are in the sight of God. All of the truth that man has wished to avoid will come to light. This truth will be the light that penetrates the whole being of man until every part will stand naked before the eyes of God. Man is in complete revolt against God, has renounced the divine lordship, denied his responsibility before God, has opposed the wooing of the gospel and daily refuses the evidence of his lost and helpless condition. Man has been completely ruined by Adam’s fall. We all have been touched by his sin and because of it are separated from God until we come to Christ and accept Him as our Savior and Lord of our lives.
The Apostle Paul is quite clear as he comes to this part of his letter to the Christians in Rome that we are without any excuse. Try as we might, we will never be able to excuse our sin and sinfulness. The truth of God’s Word has been written across the conscience of mankind…and the judgment is that we are without excuse before God.
The first verse of this second chapter begins in the Greek text with the word “Therefore”. And you will remember I always remind you that when the text says “Therefore” you need to stop long enough to see what it is there for. Normally we expect it to refer to something that has gone before and we look back in the text to see what it was that the writer us using it to draw a conclusion from what has gone before. However, in this verse the word does not point backwards, but it points to what is going to follow. You could translate it as “For the following reason…you are inexcusable…whoever of you passes judgment on another person.”
We could translate verse three in this manner: “You dummy-do you really figure that you have doped out an angle that will let you go up against God and get away with it? You don’t have a ghost of a chance.” Put simply…there is no hope of escape.”
Humanly speaking we can examine the question of escape in this way. When a man transgresses human law there are basically four chances of escape from the consequences of that transgression:
First of all, when a man commits a crime it is possible that it will go undiscovered. If no one is aware that a person has committed that crime, punishment can be avoided.
Secondly, it is possible that following the commission of the crime the criminal may flee beyond the boundary of jurisdiction which could punish him.
Thirdly, one might be apprehended and place on trial for a crime only to have a failure of the prosecution of the case and be released on a legal technicality and be set free.
In the fourth place, a criminal may be captured, tried, convicted and then incarcerated for the crime only to escape from jail or prison.
Whatever the possibilities of escaping human justice, there will be no escape from the law of God. There is no escape!
While that is true, we must recognize that there is a way to have your case settled out of court.
The Bible clearly teaches us that the issues of eternity are settled in this life. We have the opportunity to accept God’s grace in this life and benefit from his mercy, but we have to do it in this life. There will be no second chance once death comes to us. We can accept his mercy and grace or face his wrath.
The next thing we need to consider is what is often called “common grace”. Verse four of our text speaks to us of the riches of God’s kindness, forbearance and patience. Paul tells us that the intention of God in showing us his kindness is that it will lead us to repentance.
God continually pours out his blessings on mankind. Remember the scripture tells us that the “rain falls on the just and the unjust as well.” Why is that? It is the grace of God. We have food to eat, clothes to wear, ample money to spend, homes to live in. Why is that, especially when we look at much of the rest of the world where that is not the case? It is the grace of God. The fact that we have enough is due to common grace. We do not deserve it!
Common grace of God brings blessings to the saved and unsaved men and women on earth, which allows them to live in peace, to amass fortunes, and to live in health is the product of the kindness, the forbearance and patience of God.
God is good to us. He shows us his kindness in many ways.
God offers us forbearance. That is “toleration” a word that means “a holding back, a delaying”. It is as if God has raised a thunderbolt of wrath and judgment in one hand and then with his other hand he restrains himself from the judgment that is so well deserved. Applied to mankind in general, God simply tolerates those who will not heed the call of his grace in Jesus Christ.
And then there is the patience of God. Paul speaks of the longsuffering of God in this passage. Patience as used here has the idea of slowness in avenging wrongs.
When man sinned against God, his rebellion was an attempt to cast off the rule and authority of God over the human heart. Man wanted to be God himself. This was not a cry for God to move over and let man share the throne of his life. No, it was a demand that God get off the throne and let man have it all to himself. If people are going to be saved, they must get down off the throne and acknowledge that God alone is God.
The purpose of the goodness of God, of his forbearance and longsuffering is to lead man to repentance.
A little boy in a Sunday School class once said that repentance was being sorry for your sins. A little girl added that it was being sorry enough to quit.
How are we to understand this word “repentance”? Repentance is a word that indicates a change of mind. It is a soldier’s word. The true idea of repentance can be found in the military command: “About face!” A group of soldiers are facing south and the command “About face!” is given. They immediately pivot and come to a new position facing north. That is the Biblical view of repentance.
That is God’s purpose when it comes to his kindness shown to us. He intends that all the goodness he showers on us will lead us to repentance and to accept the mercy and grace offered to us in Christ Jesus.
When we accept Jesus Christ as the payment for our sin and seek God’s forgiveness for our sin, we have the means of escape from the penalty of sin which is death. Our case is settled out of court and we will never stand before the judgment bar of God. Jesus Christ has already done that for us. Remember, when God looks at us after we have accepted his grace in Jesus Christ, God never sees our sin again. It is just as if we had never sinned.
That is the great escape available to us all.
What we have seen in this text today should propel us forward in sharing our faith with those around us. Without Christ there is no escape for those without Christ as their Savior. There are only two options open to mankind…Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior or Jesus Christ as Judge.
Prayerfully let God lead you to those you know who need Jesus and will allow you to share your story of how you came to know Jesus. Let’s see what God will do.
--Dennis Gleason
