Romans – A Treatise
Chapter One
THE TESTIMONY OF CREATION
Scripture Reading: verses 18-21
FOR THE WRATH OF GOD IS REVEALED FROM HEAVEN AGAINST ALL UNGODLINESS AND UNRIGHTEOUSNESS OF MEN, WHO HOLD THE TRUTH IN UNRIGHTEOUSNESS; BECAUSE THAT WHICH MAY BE KNOWN OF GOD IS MANIFEST IN THEM; FOR GOD HATH SHEWED IT UNTO THEM. FOR THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF HIM FROM THE CREATION OF THE WORLD ARE CLEARLY SEEN, BEING UNDERSTOOD BY THE THINGS THAT ARE MADE, EVEN HIS ETERNAL POWER AND GODHEAD; SO THAT THEY ARE WITHOUT EXCUSE: BECAUSE THAT, WHEN THEY KNEW GOD, THEY GLORIFIED HIM NOT AS GOD, NEITHER WERE THANKFUL; BUT BECAME VAIN IN THEIR IMAGINATIONS, AND THEIR FOOLISH HEART WAS DARKENED.
In previous verses, Paul has set forth the righteousness of God on the principle of faith, whereby the creature is reconciled; he was thinking about the relationship with God into which a man can enter through the faith which is utter yieldedness and trust.
Paul now presents the serious conception of the wrath of God – an alarming and terrifying phrase; “revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness.” The verses in this chapter present the whole world guilty before God, marking a new step in the logical argument, reaching its consummation in chapter three. First, we have the righteousness of God revealed on the principle of faith. The way by which the creature may come into the presence of his Creator must be on the principle of faith, not works. The reason for this is that man has failed in his obligation to do those things which God commanded him to do.
The wrath of God was upon Jew and Gentile alike, but beginning here and going through Romans 2:16 the Gentiles are that portion of humanity directly under consideration. The displeasure of God against the Gentiles resulted not from caprice, or happenstance, but from their unrighteousness and ungodliness, these two words standing for their irreverence and impiety toward God and for their faithless and immoral conduct toward their fellow human creatures.
Ungodliness is worse than unrighteousness, though not generally so regarded. Our first and primary duty is to God. If we revere God as we should, we will respect His Word, His church, and His worship. Those who blaspheme the name of God, or speak lightly of any of His commands, are ungodly. Through passion, or some weakness, a person might do wrong to his fellow man and then, with a contrite heart, be filled with great penitence toward God for the wrong he had done. Such a one still retained his reverence for God. David did that. He did unrighteous things, but his reverence for God was unfailing and always brought him to repentance. The ungodly are not so; they do not take God into account in anything that they do.
“The wrath of God” is a phrase that describes the antagonism between the Creator and all sin and unrighteousness. It is an expression with which we are familiar in the Bible, being one of those in which human emotions are attributed to God in accommodation to the exigencies of human thought. It denotes His essential holiness, His antagonism to sin, to which punishment is due.
It is interesting that although Paul frequently speaks of the idea of wrath, it is strange that he never speaks of God being angry. In his Daily Bible Study series, pages 17, 18, and 19 of The Letter to the Romans, referring to thoughts of Dr. C.H. Dodd, William Barclay writes:
Paul speaks of God’s love, and he speaks of God loving. He speaks of God’s grace, and of God graciously giving. He speaks of God’s fidelity, and of God being faithful to His people. But, very strangely, although Paul speaks of the wrath of God, he never speaks about God being angry. So then there is something different here. There is some difference in the connection with God of love and wrath. Now, further, Paul only speaks of the wrath of God three times. He does so here, and he does so in Ephesians 5:6 and Colossians 3:6 where he, in both passages, speaks of the wrath of God coming upon the children of disobedience. But, quite frequently Paul speaks about the wrath, without saying it is the wrath of God, and he speaks about it in a kind of impersonal way as if it ought to be spelled with capital letters – The Wrath – as if it was a kind of impersonal force at work in the world. In Romans 3:5 he speaks of, “God who brings on men The Wrath.” In Romans 5:9 he speaks about being saved from The Wrath. In Romans 12:19 he advises men not to take vengeance but to leave evil-doers to The Wrath. In Romans 13:5 he speaks about The Wrath as being a powerful motive to keep men obedient. In Romans 4:5 he says that the law produces wrath. And in 1 Thessalonians 1:10 he says that Jesus delivered us from The Wrath to come. Now there is something very strange here. Paul speaks about The Wrath, and yet from the very wrath Jesus saves men.
Let us go back to the prophets. The prophets spoke about the wrath of God, and, very often, their message was that unless men were obedient the wrath of God would come upon them. How would that wrath be seen and operate? It would be seen in captivity and defeat, and national disaster. In other words the prophetic message was, “If you are not obedient to God the wrath of God will involve you in ruin and disaster.” In point of fact Ezekiel put this in another vivid way – “The soul that sinneth it shall die” (Ezekiel 18:4). Now if we were to put this into modern language we would use a different kind of terminology. We would say, “There is a moral order in this world, and the man who transgresses the moral law, soon or late, is bound to suffer.” This is exactly what J.A. Froude the great historian said: “One lesson, and one lesson only, history may be said to repeat with distinctness, that the world is built somehow on moral foundations, that, in the long run, it is well with the good, and, in the long run, it will be ill with the wicked.” The whole message of the Hebrew prophets was that there is a moral order in this world. The conclusion is clear – that moral order is the wrath of God at work. God made this world in such a way that we break His laws at our peril. Now if we were left solely at the mercy of that inexorable and implacable moral order, there could be nothing for us but death and destruction. True, the world is made in such a way that the soul that sins must die – if the moral order is to act alone. But into this dilemma of man there comes the love of God, and that love of God, by an act of unbelievable free grace, lifts man out of the consequences of sin and saves him from the wrath he should have incurred.
The wrath of God is the inevitable punishment of sin. It is there in the structure of the universe. And it is precisely from the consequences of our rebellion against that moral order that the love of God saves us, because of what Jesus had done for us.
Paul goes on to insist that men cannot plead ignorance of God. They could have seen what God is like from God’s world. It is always possible to tell something of a man from his handiwork. And it is possible to tell something about God from his handiwork.
Since man has failed, the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against ungodliness. In other words, man cannot make the excuse that he is traveling in ignorance. No, he is traveling in unbelief. Two pathways are open to us and we must make our choice. Either we will come to God through Christ in righteousness imputed to us by grace, or we go our own way in rebellion against God.
In order that we might see that God has given man every evidence of His power and Godhead, the apostle here goes back beyond the Cross of Calvary, beyond the pathway of our Lord Jesus, beyond Bethlehem, receding into the dim past and taking up the question from the evidences in creation itself. The underlying reason for this line of argument on the part of the apostle is that the Gentiles might be brought in guilty before God. It would be little use to condemn them by the law of Moses, or by any of God’s revealed relationships with His earthly people Israel, for they were outside the pale of that privileged company. Hence, the Word of God takes us back to creation itself, and, regarding the visible creation, it is stated: “That which may be known of God is manifest in them, for God hath showed it unto them.”1
In other words, condemnation of the Gentile is not because he refused the law of Moses, because he was never under law, but rather that he has refused the testimony of the visible creation. He may lift his eyes to the heavens by night and see that multitude of heavenly bodies traveling like millions of lighted torches through the limitless vault of creation's depth. God has endowed the Gentile with intelligence that gives the capacity of observation so he can behold the order of the heavens, and realize they are a testimony to a hand that is not only almighty but all-wise – the hand of God. In Psalm 19 we have it stated unequivocally:
The heavens declare the glory of God; and the expanse showeth the work of His hands. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech and there are no words, yet their voice is heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their language to the extremity of the world. (vs. 1-4, Darby translation)
God has presented a testimony to the eyes of all men so they may look up and learn from the visible creation that there is an Almighty, All-wise God in the heavens, and together with all the other created beings, they stand in relation to their God.
Remarkably, it is in connection with this display of testimony on the part of God that the apostle here speaks of the wrath of God being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness. Perhaps the thought is that as man watches the marvelous order of the visible creation by the intelligence God has given him, the glory of God is declared to him and he must hear God’s voice in it. That voice must indicate to him that God is a God of order, and the rebellion in his heart, expressed in ungodliness, is contrary to God. God’s harmonious order in creation is a silent reproof to man’s discordant life. Thus the wrath of God is revealed against all ungodliness.
Then we come to verse 20, which should be written on the conscience of every man, whether he has heard the Gospel or not:
For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.
This presents a truth often denied. In the visible creation, there is a convincing testimony concerning the true God and no human is beyond the range and power of that testimony. To us this is one of the most marvelous truths of the Bible: men may learn from the creation what Scripture calls “the invisible things of Him.” We must remember, creation is made after a pattern and the pattern is the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Word of God. Hebrews reveals this truth: “By faith we apprehend that the worlds were framed by the Word of God, so that that which is seen should not take its origin from things which do appear.” (11:3, Darby translation)
Behind the material creation there is a blueprint of Divine purpose of which the material creation itself is an expression. The blueprint of purpose is called “the invisible things of God.” It is what God had in mind when He made the worlds. It is put in cryptic language in Hebrews 1, speaking of the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, “by whom He made the worlds.” And in the Colossian Epistle we find the Lord Jesus is the One “by whom the worlds were made” and “for whom the worlds were made.” So the Word of God, personified in the Lord Jesus Christ, is the great pattern from which the material universe was framed. God has endowed all men with enough intelligence to look on the visible creation and discern therein this marvelous pattern of Divine purpose, sufficient to lead their hearts away from sin and bring them to a knowledge of the true God. Here is the great argument: since men have not taken note of this testimony of God in creation; since men have not turned from their evil ways, then they are without excuse. This is one of the most necessary foundation stones in the entire structure of God’s righteous dealings with mankind.
Footnote:
1 The argument of this verse is simply that those wicked Gentiles were sinners against the light, not being, in any absolute sense, ignorant of God. They were not as privileged as the Jews, nor did they possess the type of revelation that would afterward be revealed in Christ; but they knew God. The Father Himself had seen to that, for it is stated here that God had “manifested it to them.” The true meaning might actually be much stronger than this version indicates. The pronoun “it” is not in the Greek; and it would be more in harmony with Paul’s argument to translate the last clause, “For God manifested himself to them.” The information revealed in this verse is very important because there are still people in the world who are critical of God for His neglect of pagan nations prior to the Christian era. From this verse, it is we learn that the Gentile nations were not devoid of light and that there was a manifestation of Himself on God’s part to those nations. It should be kept in mind that Paul is here speaking of “the righteousness of God” in His dealings, not merely with the Jews, but with all mankind. Regarding God’s revelation to the Gentile nations: In the person of Adam and his descendants for over a thousand years, all the world knew the Lord, received commands as to how He should have been worshipped, and through the patriarchs were in direct communication with the Almighty. “Lamech, Noah’s father, was born before Adam died.” This means that no generation of history had any better knowledge of God than those generations from Adam to the deluge. In the family of Noah, the human race descended in a new beginning from a single source; and again the entire world knew the one true God; and, once more, through patriarchal communication with God, there was every opportunity for the Gentiles to have known the heavenly Father. From Noah to Abraham, the pure knowledge of God was kept alive in the world, and the true worship was carried forward by such faithful priests as Melchizedek. The Jewish nation never existed prior to Abraham. Therefore, until the times of that illustrious patriarch, all people of every description shared and shared alike in the available knowledge of God. Prior to Abraham, monotheism was known and honored, as attested by the ministry of Melchizedek, Priest of God Most High, and King of Salem, who received tithes from the progenitor of the Hebrew race, as recorded in Genesis 14:18-20; and which event shows that the knowledge of the one true God was widely prevalent in the pre-Abrahamic world. By the times of Abraham, idolatry was again rampant and increasing, but vestiges of the original monotheism remained, and possibly upon a rather extensive scale. In the gathering darkness of that long night of idolatry which was about to descend upon the Gentile world, God called Abraham and initiated the device of a chosen people, who would be the custodians of the promise of a Messiah, who would keep alive the true teachings of God, and who were designed to recognize, at last, the Messiah, when He should appear, and present Him to the entire world. This was a service laid upon Abraham, not merely for benefit of the Jews, but looking to the salvation of all people. Upon the occasion of the call of Abraham, God said that “In thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed” (Gen. 12:3). God even designed to give His reasons for the choice of Abraham, that being the ability of that patriarch to command his children after him, an ability which was conspicuously lacking in the Gentiles, and is still lacking (Gen. 18:19). All people, Jews and Gentiles alike, should thank God for the ability of Abraham, without whose abilities the title deeds of redemption might have been lost. Following the call of Abraham, the Jewish nation itself became a continual witness to the entire Gentile world of the one true God and His truth. A mere catalogue of examples how that witness blazed in the long pre-Christian darkness is astonishing. First, through Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and their families, many of the greatest men in the world, many cities, and vast populations of the Gentiles knew the one true God: (1) Abraham testified of “the most high God” to the king of Sodom (Gen. 14:22), and a similar testimony was available for the entire group of eleven kings mentioned in Genesis 14. (2) All the posterity of Abraham through Hagar and Keturah had knowledge of God, these being none other than the whole Arabic nation. (3) Through Lot, Abraham’s nephew, the whole nations of the Moabites and the Ammonites knew God. (4) Through the judgment against Sodom and Gomorrah and the disaster to Lot’s wife, the overthrow of those cities was demonstrated as a moral judgment of God upon wickedness. (5) The salvation of Lot and his daughters, coupled with the prior prophecy of the doom of the cities of the plain, were facts known throughout the East. (6) Because of Abraham’s wife, Sarah, “God came to Abimelech (King of Gerar) in a dream by night” (Gen. 20:3). (7) Through Jacob, all of Israel; and through Esau, all of the Edomites had knowledge of the true God. (8) Through Jacob’s son, Joseph, all of the Egyptians, from the throne downward, knew the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Nor did such glowing witness disappear with the fading of the patriarchal names into history. A great leader of the Jews, Moses, appeared; and through him, God visited the entire Egyptian nation with a whole series of the most astounding miracles of pre-Christian history, the one invariable element in all of those miracles being the circulation of knowledge of the one true God. All of the plagues were directed squarely against the popular idol gods of the Egyptians. Through Moses, God even gave a personal message to Pharaoh, as follows: “And in very deed, for this cause have I raised thee up, for to show in thee my power; and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth” (Exodus 9:16). Let it be remembered that Pharaoh was the most powerful monarch of antiquity, and it will be clear that God in no sense neglected to provide the Gentiles with all the light they needed, and with far more than they were willing to receive. That God’s method of causing His name to be declared throughout all the earth was successful is proved by the events centering around the name of Rahab the harlot of Jericho, who, some forty years after the Exodus, said: “I know that the Lord hath given you the land ... for we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt. ... For the Lord your God, he is God in heaven above, and in earth beneath” (Josh. 2:9-11). The first of the Old Testament prophets was Jonah who carried the message of the one God to Nineveh, the largest city of those times, whose king, nobles, and all of the people repented and turned to God, the fact of which is attested by none other than Christ (Matt. 12:41). Therefore, at the time of Nineveh’s conversion, concurrent with the contemporary apostasy in Israel, the knowledge of God, at that particular time, probably centered in Nineveh, the great Gentile city, and not in Jerusalem. Then, there is the testimony to the Gentiles by means of the captivities, first of Israel, later of Judah. Everywhere the Jews went, they took the knowledge of God with them; and there were doubtless many of the Gentiles who learned the truth through this means. Thus, Nebuchadnezzar learned the truth from the Hebrews in the fiery furnace; thus the Medes and Persians learned it from Daniel, when, in God’s providence, he became the third ruler in the kingdom (Dan. 5:29). It is extremely significant that a great ruler, Cyrus, commissioned the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem after the captivity, out of respect to his knowledge of God and the words of his prophets (2 Chron. 36:22,23). Throughout the days of the Judges, in an earlier era, there were repeated demonstrations of the power and righteousness of God who not only punished the sins of the heathen world, but those of His own people as well. Throughout the whole period of the theocracy, every nation was given many powerful examples of God’s power and righteousness, practically all of the wondrous deeds recorded in the book of Judges having to do with the preeminence of Jehovah and His superiority over the pagan deities, as, for example, in the destruction of Dagon’s temple by Samson (Judges 16:29), and in the case of the destruction of Baal by Gideon (Judges 6:28). The years of the monarchy continued the witness, the knowledge of God being so widespread in that era that the kings of the earth either came in person or sent their envoys repeatedly to Israel, and to the prophets, as for example, in the case of Naaman and his lord, the king of Assyria (2 Kings 5:5), and that of the king of Syria (2 Kings 6:13), and in the instance of the queen of Sheba (Matt. 12:42). It was the near-universal knowledge of the true Jehovah which made it possible for the great Gentile philosophers and writers to mention the Lord in their writings. Further, the writings of Plato, Xenophon, Cicero, and other philosophers, which still remain, together with the quotations made by Justin Martyr and Clement of Alexandria from those which are lost, prove that the learned heathens, though ignorant of the way of salvation, were acquainted with the unity and spirituality of God, and had just notions of His perfection, of the creation and government of the world, and of the duties which men owe to God and to one another. In addition to that great wealth of revealed knowledge which existed throughout the Gentile world, there was always, of course, everywhere, such witnesses of the glory and power of God as provided by natural creation and the moral law within human beings themselves. Paul mentioned the latter type of witness in his address at Lystra, “Ye should turn from these vain things unto the living God, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and all that in them is: who in the generations gone by suffered all the nations to walk in their own ways. And yet he left not himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave you from heaven rains and fruitful seasons, filling your hearts with food and gladness” (Acts 14:15-17). The good earth itself is thus named as a witness of God’s existence and his goodness toward people. The order and symmetry of the universe, the marvelous balance in nature, the incredible complexity and efficiency of the natural world, and the heavens which declare the glory of God, are all witness of the glory of God; and yet it must be noted that none of these things tell men anything of God’s love, or of the way of life. The pre-Christian Gentiles also had access to the moral government which is built into man in the form of a conscience. This somewhat extended review of the question of just what revelations the Gentiles had received has been given for the reason that they are not generally considered, and from the further fact that a knowledge of these things is essential to the vindication of God’s righteousness in all of His dealings with the pre-Christian world. In view of the facts, as revealed in the sacred Scriptures, Paul was fully justified in writing to the citizens of ancient Rome that God had indeed manifested Himself to the Gentiles.
