Romans 2:1-16
“No Excuse”
March 27, 2011 - Third Sunday in Lent

         My excuse this morning is that I got up at 3:30 to take our daughter to the airport. Bob Wennberg, my old college professor, used to say “Always have an excuse for whatever you do. If you fail, then you’ve got your excuse. If you succeed, you get double credit.”

         As nice as it is to have an excuse for everything, whether it’s a missed day at school or work, a botched assignment, or even some deep moral failing, our text today teaches that there are no excuses, there is no excuse, when you and I stand before God. Each person is equal before God, condemned or justified, depending on what that person has done.

         That last bit is the sticky part of our text today, because as we’ll see in a bit, it doesn’t seem to be exactly in line with the way we’ve usually understood Paul or even understood the Gospel. If you’ve grown up in or hung around an evangelical church much at all, then you’ve probably learned that God’s judgment of Christians is not at all on the basis of what we’ve done, but on the basis of what we’ve believed. It’s faith, not works, that matters.

         So this morning we’re going to push that common evangelical understanding a bit in order to grasp how Romans 2 fits in with that phrase which bookends Romans, “the obedience of faith.” Neither Paul nor Jesus ever intended us to separate genuine faith from genuine good works. The warnings which come later in Romans about “works of the Law” were not meant to downplay faithful obedience or to imply that anyone can have real faith in Jesus without doing the things He asks.

         Last week we heard that those who ignore what can be known of God in and through His creation are “without excuse.” This week verse 1 of chapter 2 begins with the idea that those who judge others for doing wrong “have no excuse.” In fact, they condemn themselves because they are doing the very same things.

         Who is it Paul addresses in verse 1 when he says, “you who pass judgment on someone else”? Is it anyone who presumes to pass final judgment on another human being? Or is it more specifically aimed at Jewish people passing judgment on Gentiles from the Jew’s superior position of knowing God’s law?

         It doesn’t matter a great deal. The overall message of this letter is that both Jews and Gentiles are equally guilty before God and equally in need of grace. There’s a warning here to Jews not to presume too much on their Jewishness, but that warning can be more broadly applied to anyone who thinks he or she is better in God’s eyes than someone else.

         There’s no excuse because, Paul says, “you who pass judgment do the same things.” This is not just about hypocrisy like some family-value politician or televangelist who gets got in the act in a hot-sheet hotel, doing exactly the sort of thing he rails against in the media. That’s bad, but Paul warns against all sorts of pride which make us imagine that we personally will escape God’s judgment, as he says in verse 3, while others who look worse in our eyes will stand trial.

         Paul intimates here what he’s going to say clearly in chapter 3 verse 23. Everyone is sinful in God’s eyes. We must all understand that you and I are just as much in need as anyone of the blessings listed in verse 4: God’s “kindness, forbearance and patience.” To think that we may judge others and at the same time escape judgment is to show contempt for all the grace and mercy God shows us, especially if He’s been kind enough to save us from some of the grosser sins.

         Not judging others is rooted in understanding that everyone is going to be judged by God. Again, the common evangelical idea is that judgment is different for believers than it is for non-believers. Those who don’t know Jesus end up like verse 5, storing up a pile of God’s wrath against them. But there’s no wrath for us, no judgment for us, because the grace of Jesus covers all our sins. But Paul says, “you are storing up wrath against yourself…” And in verse 6, “God will repay everyone according to what they have done.” Not just the worst sinners, not just unbelievers, but everyone.

         This may be the most overlooked teachings in Paul’s writings and indeed in the words of Jesus and in the New Testament. In Matthew 16:27, Jesus said, “For the Son of Man is going to come in His Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what each has done.” At the very end of Scripture in Revelation 22:12, John records Jesus saying it again, “Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what each has done.” It’s not Paul’s idea. It’s Jesus.

         What happens then to what Paul says in Romans 3 about being righteous through faith, not through works, being justified by grace, not by what we’ve done? Where does our whole theology of God’s mercy and forgiveness in Jesus Christ land if we will all be judged by what we’ve done?

         One way to handle what Paul says here in chapter 2 is to make it all hypothetical. This is how, some interpreters say, it would be without Jesus. If it weren’t for grace, we would all stand before the Lord to be tried and condemned for sin. Judgment by works is an hypothesis Paul works up to show how bad off we would be without faith Christ.

         The problem with that hypothetical interpretation is Paul says nothing to give us that idea. He doesn’t say, “Now suppose it were the case…” or “Just imagine how bad it would be if…” or anything like that to show he doesn’t mean it all literally.

         No, he says, “God will repay everyone according to what they have done.” It’s a quote from Psalm 62:12. Nothing hypothetical about it in there. He spells it out in detail in verses 7 and 8. “To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life. But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger.” No excuses.

         Verses 9 and 10 specifically address the issue of whether anyone will get preferential treatment on the day of judgment. No, “There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile; but glory, honor and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.” In case we didn’t get it, there’s verse 11, “For God does not show favoritism.”

         Judgment by works is not hypothetical. It’s going to happen to everyone. That includes Christians who trust to the grace of Jesus. It’s not opposed to the Gospel, it’s part of the Gospel. Jump ahead a little bit to our last verse this morning, verse 16, “This will take place on the day when God judges everyone’s secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel declares.” We can’t escape getting judged by God for what we’ve done by believing in Jesus. Believing in judgment is part of believing in Jesus. It’s in the Gospel message.

         The question, then, is how to fit grace and judgment together. It’s like trying to open a file from an Apple computer in Windows or get digital TV broadcasts on your old analog television or burn propane in your gasoline car. You can do it, but it’s a bit complicated. That’s the way God’s truth is sometimes because that’s the way our lives are sometimes.

         In verses 12-15, Paul reiterates once again that having and knowing Jewish law is not enough. Whether you sin without the law or whether you sin knowing it, you will be judged, he says in verse 12. Verse 14 argues that even Gentiles who never heard of the Ten Commandments are still responsible for what they do know. They have a natural moral sense, their consciences, which is really the law of God, “written on their hearts.”

         So Jew or Gentile, everyone is responsible for however much law is available. Conscience or code, it doesn’t matter. Each person will be judged according to what each person does in response to whatever moral information each person has. No excuses.

         What really matters is what Paul gets at in verse 13, “For it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous.” Whether it’s a pious Jew who studies Torah night and day or a brilliant pagan philosopher who’s written books on ethics, just “hearing,” just knowing what’s right, is not enough. It’s whether or not we do it that will be judged and will be the basis for God’s decision about who is righteous.

         For those of you who studied James this past year, it should sound familiar. His emphasis on works as part of genuine faith raises the same issues. James 1:22 says, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.” What gets overlooked is what we hearing now: Paul said exactly the same thing.

         Back to that vexing question: What happens to salvation by grace through faith? If I’m going to be judged by what I’ve done, if I got to make myself good enough for God, what hope is there? I can’t judge others, because I’m as much a sinner as they are, and we’re all going to be judged. But then how can anyone be saved?

         Trying to make the complicated simple, Paul does not say that anything but faith in Jesus Christ will save you. He’s not saying you or I can make ourselves good enough for God’s judgment. No one will be saved by his or her own moral ability. But he is saying that doing good, doing what God asks, is part of salvation. The Gospel Paul explains in Romans is a Gospel that results in the “obedience of faith.” Faith doesn’t eliminate obedience. It makes it possible.

         Your five year old son’s room is a mess. It’s a disaster. So you tell him, “Clean your room.” You know very well the project is beyond him. The bedclothes have been pulled off to build a fort; there are broken toys and dirty clothes all over the floor; there are smashed Oreos in the carpet; and there are tiny Legos pieces in every corner and crack and crevice. Left on his own, he’ll never get it done.

         Yet you don’t want to do it for him. What kind of little boy are you raising then? So you tell him, “Clean your room, and no excuses, buster!” Then you wait for a response, even a small one. A t-shirt gets picked up and put in the hamper, a few Legos are gathered. Then what do you do? You kneel down and start helping. His first little act of obedience is also an act of faith, of trust that if he does what you ask, you will help him do what you ask.

         Of course, once you pitch in, you want him to stay with the project. It can’t be that you start scraping up the Oreos and picking up the socks and underwear while he goes off to the family room to watch television. Again, what kind of child does that raise? No, the obedience needs to continue. You’re helping all along. You’re making it possible. But he still needs to do what was asked.

         That boy’s room cleaning is like the obedience of faith. Take the woman at the well we heard about this morning in John 4. Jesus knew what was up when He said, “Go, call your husband and come back.” He knew she had no real husband, that she had had a string of men in promiscuous relationships that left her life a mess. But Jesus’ request gave her an opportunity for the obedience of faith, an opportunity to tell the truth.

         That Samaritan woman did tell the truth, in a way. “I have no husband,” was a half-truth designed to conceal the mess underneath it. But Jesus accepted it for the tiny act of trust and faith that it was. “You are right,” He said. “What you have just said is quite true,” He told her. It wasn’t much, but it was faith, faith expressed in the tiniest speck of obedience to God’s desire that she tell the truth. And it was enough.

         Paul knew we all make a mess out of our lives, so that no one has the right to judge or condemn anyone else’s mess. And he knew that the only way out of the mess is the help and grace of Jesus Christ. But he also knew that faith in Jesus includes obedience to what God wants for us in Christ. Believing and obeying begin together, even if the first step is small.

         You know what it’s like to face a mess like that child’s room. Maybe it’s a whole house that’s succumbed to chaos because you’ve been too busy. There are daunting financial messes we get ourselves into. Some complicated and painful family relationships feel just impossible to sort out. Or like the woman at the well, you may have made a moral mare’s nest out of your life. We look at all those messes and what do we say? “I just don’t know… where to begin.”

         We begin by believing and obeying. It’s not “works righteousness” calculated to save us. Faith brings us to that first step, to quit making excuses and to tell the truth, to pay back what’s been stolen, or to apologize for some hurtful action. To offer a bit of forgiveness, or to share a little food, or to speak a kind word. Those are not works by which we save ourselves. They are acts of faith, good works which spring out of and come from faith that God in Christ is at work for us and in us.

         Obedience is the result of what God does, the same way getting the little boy’s room cleaned up is the result of what his mother or father does. But that doesn’t mean what the boy does is pointless or needless. In fact, what matters most is that he learn to obey. But it all comes originally from his parents, just as our faith and our obedience all come to us from God by the grace of Jesus Christ.

         So Paul says in verse 13 that it’s not those who merely hear the law, but those who obey it who will be justified, who God will declare righteous. That’s not hypothetical. That’s the plain truth about how faith at work in our lives. We quit excusing ourselves and trust Jesus with one tiny step of obedience. Then He steps in to take us further than we’d ever go alone, to help us grow far beyond our own ability in both faith and obedience.

         There’s no excuse, no excuse for those who imagine themselves better than others and free of God’s judgment. There’s no excuse because we all know what we should do and fail to do it. But the Gospel good news is that there’s no excuse not to step toward Jesus in obedient faith. He’s waiting in grace and love to help us clean up the mess we’ll never conquer on our own. He taught us that He can work with the tiniest beginning in our hearts, the merest mustard seed of faith growing into the tiniest sprout of obedience. Why not take that step? There’s really no excuse.

         I saw someone take a step of obedient faith this past week. It was a small, faltering step, but that person started by telling the truth. Now God can meet that person with the grace and love of Jesus Christ. He will meet you too, stooping down in grace and love to pick up the broken toys of your life. Why not accept His gift, His grace, His help today? There’s no excuse not to.

         Amen.

Valley Covenant Church
Eugene/Springfield, Oregon
Copyright © 2011 by Stephen S. Bilynskyj