Passage: Romans 1:18-23
The Big Idea
Romans 1:16-17 gave us the good news: salvation is a free gift received by faith alone. Now Paul shows us why it must be by faith alone. We were made to bear God’s image, and we broke it. We are sunk, and there is nothing we can do about it. But Jesus restores everything sin broke.
Fill in the Blank
The greatest peril facing the human race is __.
Paul’s answer: the wrath of God.
That doesn’t mean God hates people. God loves people. But sin is the most disgusting and destructive thing in the universe to Him, because He is holy. So God must hate sin, and yet He chooses to love sinners. Something had to be done.
Enter Jesus and the cross: God’s perfect solution to remove the sin He hates from the people He loves.
But to see our need for that solution, we first have to understand what we need to be saved from. No religion, no good deeds, no trying harder, no church attendance, no secret knowledge and no political ideology can fix it.
Two Questions
Is it right for God to be this angry at sin? Sin is the opposite of everything God is. It’s His world. Yes, He has every right to oppose what breaks His creation.
Is everyone guilty? Yes. Romans 1-3 proves it beyond a shadow of a doubt. If we start by agreeing, “I am guilty before God,” these chapters will make sense. If we think we are better than others, they will rub us the wrong way. No one is good. No one (Romans 3:10-12).
Read: Romans 1:18-23
Wrath revealed (Romans 1:18)
In verses 16-17, God’s righteousness was revealed in the gospel. That’s the good news. Now the bad news is revealed: the human race deserves God’s wrath.
We need to know the problem before we will accept the solution. You will never sign up for chemotherapy if you don’t understand what cancer does.
The wrath is not the good news. It is the worst news, and it shows us why we need the good news.
Ungodliness and unrighteousness
- Ungodliness is people against God.
- Unrighteousness is people against people.
We were made to be God’s image bearers (Genesis 1:27), to show the world what He is like. Instead, every sin shows something awful. That is how we “suppress the truth.”
Without excuse (Romans 1:19-20)
God has not hidden Himself. Creation shows His eternal power and divine nature. And He gave us a living template of what He is like when He created people. The fact that we wrecked that image is no excuse to blame God.
They knew God, but (Romans 1:21)
- They did not glorify Him as God. It’s not that we didn’t know Him. We did, and we refused His will.
- They were not thankful. We choose to be bitter against God over our own consequences.
- Their thoughts became futile and their hearts darkened. Broken minds and broken hearts. When we rejected God’s kingdom for our own, we gave up the joy and life that came with it. Now we long for broken things. It’s like drinking salt water.
Professing to be wise, they became fools (Romans 1:22-23)
Rejecting God doesn’t make us smarter. It makes us foolish. We traded the glory of the incorruptible God for images of corruptible people and animals. And we became like what we worshiped: driven by urges, always breaking, always growing old, always dying, always thirsty, never satisfied.
For a powerful parallel, read Jeremiah 2.
But Then Jesus Came
We are all guilty of breaking God’s image, and we have suffered brokenness ourselves. But the gospel was given, good news to broken people. God has taken away the sin of all who put their faith in Jesus. He restores us to be the image bearers we were made to be, and He puts His Spirit in us to show the world what He is truly like.
We are forgiven and healed. God is not angry with us. He never will be. He will never treat you as a sinner again (Romans 5:1; 8:1).
Read It Again Through the Gospel
Go back through the passage and see what the gospel fixes:
- Wrath against ungodliness: In Christ I am declared innocent. He is not angry with me.
- Suppressing the truth: God has helped me truly know Him. The relationship is restored.
- Did not glorify Him or give thanks: Now I can glorify Him by faith and simply be thankful.
- Futile thoughts, darkened hearts: My mind is being renewed to learn His ways (Romans 12:2). My heart is full of His light (2 Corinthians 4:6).
- Professing to be wise: I can gladly admit I am a fool who knows nothing and can do nothing, and He becomes my wisdom (1 Corinthians 1:30). Humility instead of pride. That glorifies God as I humbly live as His image.
Grace Takeaway
The bad news is worse than we thought. The good news is better than we imagined. Everything sin broke, Jesus restores, and He does it as a gift received by faith alone.
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