SERMON: The Reality of Divine Retribution—Part 2

Romans 1:28-32

Twin City Bible Church | twincitybible.org/media/sermons/

The passage in Romans has the flavor of a courtroom, where the apostle Paul makes the case beyond a reasonable doubt that mankind is guilty and deserving of God's just judgment. Paul is primarily aiming his remarks at the Gentiles. The ultimate point of the early chapters of Romans is that all mankind is guilty of sin before God and deserving of God's wrath. God has revealed his power, glory, and majesty through creation, which is available to all people all the time. Despite this general revelation, people have chosen to dishonor and replace God, worshiping themselves or other things.

 

Retribution: A form of punishment, a reprisal or reckoning, that is affirmed in phrases stating, "God gave them over". This means God intentionally consigns or delivers people over in response to their rejection of the truth, preferring a lie, the lie of Satan, that they can live independently of God. God hands over those who love the lie and worship other things.

I. Perverted Carnality: God's retribution includes handing people over to perverted carnality. This progresses from lust in the heart to impurity and carnal sensuality, leading to homosexuality. Homosexual desires and actions are overt evidence of the decadence to which God abandons people as a due penalty for dishonoring and replacing Him. People exchange normal physical relations for indecent relations, which scripture describes as unnatural and contrary to God's design.

II. Pervasive Depravity: God turns some people over to something more broad and comprehensive.

• Depraved Mind: Because they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind. They put God to the test according to their own standards and refuse to have God as part of their knowledge, deliberately ignoring Him. God is actually placed in the emphatic position, literally stating "this God they did not acknowledge". Depraved originally meant that which has not stood the test and was once used to describe substandard coins. Here, it describes a mind, the seat of reasoning, moral reasoning, and moral willing, that is substandard. As a result, their reasoning is unapproved, even counterfeit, leading to improper moral choices. They live with no direction or purpose, like someone lost in the woods without a compass, in a prison of their corrupt mind, doing what is improper and indecent. Behavior and wrong thinking go together.
• Things which are not proper: This refers to what is morally inappropriate or fitting.
• Group One (4 sins): Being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, and evil. "Being filled" suggests being dominated by these sins, not half-hearted. The terms end in IA in the Greek.
• Unrighteousness: A comprehensive term.
• Wickedness & Evil: Refer to actions that harm others and an internal disposition.
• Greed: An inordinate desire to have more, unlimited selfishness, disregard for others.
• Group Two (5 sins): Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice.
• Envy: Extreme displeasure at another's enjoyment, resenting them. The acute displeasure aroused by another person's privileges or pleasures.
• Murder: Envy can lead to murder.
• Strife: Contention between people, a quarrelsome disposition.
• Deceit: Being crafty and cunning, manipulating others to promote self. Being crafty, cunning for personal purposes.
• Malice: Spiteful.
• Group Three (12 sins): These sins connect back to the statement "they are" and are in the same Greek form. Sins of speech are common in Paul's writings.
• Gossip: Sharing morsels of information, possibly true, with an evil purpose.
• Slanderers: Speaking against someone openly to cause damage.
• Haters of God: In total opposition to God and His laws, setting themselves as their own authority.
• Insolent: Having a lofty sense of self-superiority and treating others as beneath them.
• Arrogant: Having contempt for everyone except self.
• Boastful: Constantly bragging with evil intent, making unsubstantiated claims.
• Inventors of evil: Displaying ingenuity in devising new forms of wrong.
• Disobedient to parents: Refusing to honor those to whom honor is owed, lacking gratitude and showing contempt for family authority, preferring to rule themselves.
• Without understanding: Acting stupidly, choosing to ignore wisdom and harming themselves and others.
• Untrustworthy: Breaking agreements, covenants, and contracts without remorse.
• Unloving: Without natural affection, leading to a rupture in family relationships.
• Unmerciful: Without pity, cruel and ruthless.
• Verse 31 Alternate Translations: senseless...faithless...loveless...merciless.

Verse 32: Although they know the ordinance of God, including that those who practice such things are worthy of death. They are not acting out of total ignorance. God has revealed Himself enough for people to know right from wrong, and they are judged on what they know. The ordinance of God is a righteous decree and a just ordinance. They have enough knowledge to know they shouldn't live and act the way they do, understanding the ultimate penalty of their evildoing is death and eternal separation from God.

They not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who do all this, encouraging others to do the same. They take enjoyment in their own wickedness and evil and they take enjoyment in the wickedness of others and even applaud the wickedness of others. Those who encourage others to pursue evil commit a greater evil than committing the evil themselves.

This passage is primarily aimed at the Gentile nations, reflecting the collective experience since the fall. The evidence is sufficient to bring an indictment and show that man deserves God's retribution.

Conclusion: Man's wickedness is so great that he can never save himself. Only God can rescue someone through a gracious intervention by His Spirit to convict a person of their sin and overcome deep-seated blindness and perversity. There is hope in Christ, and God extends His mercy to any kind of sinner. The good news of the gospel is freedom from enslavement to sin. The problem is transgression, and the cure is to come to Christ in faith and repentance, seeking forgiveness from Him.