Footprints #241

Having dealt with the Gentile sin problem Paul, in Chapter 2, turns his attention to the Jewish problem i.e. the church! 

It is easy to feel superior. After all, I don’t do the kinds of sins Paul recorded in chapter 1. In fact, compared with societies low life’s I’m pretty good. That is just the attitude that Paul attacks in the first half of Rom.2. In the second half of Rom.1, he presented those who blatantly sin. His depiction prompts those in the “front pew” to shout “amens” as loud as their judicious voices allow. But it is just that attitude of moral superiority that Paul now attacks in Rom.2:1-16. 

The apostle moves inexorably toward the conclusion that all have sinned (Rom. 3:23). He has dealt with what some see as real sinners, an approach that has won over many moralists. They have sided with Paul. At the very point that he has them fully with him, however, he turns his guns on them. They also, he points out, are sinners. Of course, they are nice church members. Compared with the really nasty people, they appear good in their own eyes. 

But – and here is Paul’s point – they don’t look so good in God’s sight. Their airs of moral superiority are also sin, even if it is invisible to them. Such people suffer from the sin of goodness, the most hopeless of all sins. There is nothing so offensive to God or so dangerous to the human soul as pride and self-sufficiency. Of all sins, it is the most hopeless, the most incurable. Such goodness feels no need to repent or seek God’s grace. 

Thus Rom.2 creates a major shift in Paul’s argument. Finished with speaking to prostitutes, perverts, homosexuals, & thieves, he’s now ready for church members. Are you ready for that? The apostle wants each of us to recognise the depth of our personal sin. He urges us to see and feel the deceptiveness & depth of our problems so that we might recognise the greatness of His offer of salvation and our need for it, no matter how “good” we might appear in our own eyes.