God Revealed It to Them
18For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, 19because that which is known of God is revealed in them, for God revealed it to them. 20For the invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity; that they may be without excuse. 21Because, knowing God, they didn’t glorify him as God, neither gave thanks, but became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless heart was darkened. 22Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, 23and traded the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed animals, and creeping things. 24Therefore God also gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves; 25who exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and empty, darkness was on the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. Then God commanded light to be, and the formlessness, the emptiness, and the darkness gave way. If light drove these back, then those who have not received Christ will always be in confusion, emptiness, and darkness, because they refuse the light and will not acknowledge that God is the Creator.
Because people are God’s handiwork, they can come to know him naturally. Just as a painting tells you whose work it is, everything God has made holds clues that lead to him. But those who refused the light drifted far from God, and hearts meant to be filled with light they filled instead with the pleasures of the flesh and the worship of idols. Peel a boiled egg, and you will find it is not perfectly round; one end is hollow, as if a slice had been cut away. The human heart is much like that. Made to be filled to fullness, it is left hollow and empty when it turns away the grace of God. The hearts of those who keep God’s absolute grace at a distance will be as empty as that hollow in a boiled egg.
Romans 1:18
18For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,
This is how Paul declares God’s wrath against those who refused his grace. God so loved these people that he gave the life of his Son for them, yet when they were ungodly and practiced unrighteousness, he was angry. They would not accept the truth as truth. They judged everything with themselves at the center, and that is why they thought their conduct justified even while they acted unjustly. Those who do not know sin to be sin do not repent, and in the end they stayed in their sin until judgment came upon them. God did not choose them to be sinners destined for judgment. They were judged because they did not repent of their sin.
Genesis 2:16-17
16Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; 17but you shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.”
Before Adam ever met Eve, he first received a law from God. He could eat freely from the trees of the garden, but he must never eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for if he ate it he would die. This was a law God had laid down, but it also expressed his love: he cherished Adam’s life. Had Adam kept from that tree as God had said, no trouble would have come at all. But when Satan stirred them up, the human righteousness lodged in the deepest place of the human heart led Adam into sin in the end. The serpent asked the woman whether God had really said they were not to eat of any tree in the garden, and she answered that they could eat the fruit of the trees of the garden, but that God had said of the tree in the middle of the garden that they must not eat of it, nor touch it, lest they die. We can see how far her answer strayed from the word of God. God had told them exactly what to do and what not to do. Satan, by contrast, mimicked the word of God closely, yet with negative and lying words he led people onto the path of death. Here the woman, taking courage from Satan’s words rather than from the will of God, is setting out to do what she herself wants.
Since it was Adam who heard the command from God directly, we cannot know whether Adam passed it on wrongly or the woman lied, but this is precisely the evil mind of a humanity that has taken in Satan’s scheme. Without the faith to keep God’s word, Eve twisted it. She abandoned the word that eating the fruit meant certain death and turned it into a command neither to eat nor to touch, and then she read it in a self-centered way, as a worry that they might die. And when we see Adam eating the fruit Eve handed him, we learn that human beings can never master sin. The moment Adam ate, every human being became a sinner, and we fell into the wretched state in which death reigns.
Having built a wall of sin between himself and God, Adam hid from God among the trees. When God called out to him and asked where he was, Adam answered that he had been afraid because he was naked, and had hidden himself. This is what sin does: it makes us ashamed of the body God so beautifully made. God loves without condition those who have received the gospel. Even so, God’s people go on feeling small and ashamed — because they have no money, because their health has failed, because they are unsure of their looks, and for any number of other reasons. Sin keeps us from coming to God just as we are. God helped Adam realize what sin he was committing. He asked Adam who had told him he was naked, and whether he had eaten from the tree God had commanded him not to eat from. He was showing Adam the consequence of his sin. He was teaching him that defying the word of God is sin, that human greed is sin, and that giving in to Satan’s temptation is sin. Yet Adam did not understand. Instead he turned the blame back on God, saying he had eaten only because the woman God had given him handed him the fruit. To the very end Adam dodged his responsibility for defying the word. You need to see the God who labors to give Adam a chance to repent. Only then can you repent and turn from the way you were going. In Adam you will see yourself. Perhaps you hear yourself complaining that you could not help sinning because the job God gave you, the spouse God gave you, or the health and means God gave you made life so hard. If so, I hope you will repent.
Those who sinned were driven out of the garden of Eden, but God, who had known that people would sin, had another plan to save them: the Lamb, Christ, would atone for their sin. I have wondered how much better it would have been if Adam, though he had sinned, had not denied his fault but had confessed it honestly. Yet if he had been the kind of man who could own his disobedience, he would have thought once more about what God had told him when he was about to eat the fruit. God, who had held Adam close with deep love, must have been greatly disappointed. Again and again Scripture records that God saw that it was good. So I picture him rejoicing day by day as he created the world to give Adam a good and comfortable home. Light and darkness, the sky, the land and the seas with every kind of plant, the sun, moon, and stars, the birds and the fish, and then on the sixth day every kind of animal — as he made them, he called them very good. On the sixth day he created man in his own image and told him to be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth. He told him, too, to subdue the earth and have dominion over every living thing that moves. When God spoke these words to Adam, he would have spoken with delight, like someone presenting a long-prepared gift. When God saw that it was very good, it meant that everything had gone as he planned. And every part of that plan was for Adam. God looked forward to Adam’s happiness in the garden of Eden. But in a single moment a foolish human being ruined it all, because Adam, whom God had set over the world to rule it, rose in rebellion against God’s true love.
They had heard, and so they knew, what they were to do and what they were not to do. But they could not master their desire, and they wrecked the whole order of creation. As a result, thorns and thistles sprang up, and from Adam’s day to our own, natural disasters have never ceased. How it must have grieved God to watch the world he had made so beautifully fall apart. He had wanted Adam and his wife to rule the world happily together in a garden of Eden where everything had been perfectly prepared, enjoying peace and rest. But they threw that grace away. Watching a world he had seen as good fall under a curse, even the almighty God would have felt the hurt of a painter whose work has been damaged.
God wants you to live as his treasured children, enjoying peace and rest. He gives salvation, grace, and faith freely, and he has enfolded you in his abundant grace. Having received such love, you must not suppress the truth in unrighteousness. With thankful hearts, become people who exalt the name of God.
John 3:18-19
18He who believes in him is not judged. He who doesn’t believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the one and only Son of God. 19This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their works were evil.
Just as the world has been judged, those who do not receive Christ have been judged already. Paul declares that all such people stand under the wrath of God. Look closely at Adam, who ate the forbidden fruit, and at the ungodly and the unrighteous, and you will find the same thing in all of them: when they lost a thankful heart [the beginning of all evil], they loved the darkness rather than the light. When the wind blows across a lake and ripples rise, every image reflected on the water trembles. If you do not know that the reflection is only an illusion, the trembling will frighten you, and you will lose all hope of going on. The real thing stands outside the lake, yet you are looking only at its reflection. When people leave God, they forget what is real. Everything the world reflects back to us is illusion, and yet, afraid that the illusion might vanish, people live in constant unhappiness. God has told us that we are his holy children. If you believe that, as God’s children, you are different in nature from the world, you can stand tall on the rock. Your wounds can heal, and you can plant both feet on the ground and walk on with strength.
Once his relationship with God was cut off, the first man, Adam, could see nothing but his own body. In the same way, those who sin see only themselves. So at times they grow proud, at times they feel small, and at times, unable to find their way, they are anxious; on their own they make evil judgments and decisions that cannot be undone. With a world already under judgment as their standard, they cannot overcome Satan’s temptation and end up choosing death. Christ came to save people whose hearts are this dark, yet they have no spiritual eyes to see his light.
John 2:24-25
24But Jesus didn’t entrust himself to them, because he knew everyone, 25and because he didn’t need for anyone to testify concerning man; for he himself knew what was in man.
Jesus calls those who do not receive the word sinners, and he does nothing together with sinners. Above all, in the work of accomplishing atonement, he cannot work with people who have no righteousness. Since God does his own work himself, he needs no one’s testimony. Adam heard the command that if he ate the fruit he would surely die, and yet he defied the word. Nor was Adam the only one told in advance. We too have heard beforehand what will happen until the end of the world. So that his people would not defy his word, God caused the Old Testament prophets to foretell the coming of the Messiah, and they spoke in detail of Jesus’ first coming. Just as foretold, Jesus came to this earth on the appointed day, and through the cross, the resurrection, and the ascension he fulfilled every word of the covenant. Only when we believe this and live it out can we leave the place of sin where Adam stood.
Romans 1:22-25 records how people behave once they have become vain in their reasoning. People of the world ask why, if there is a God, he does nothing while the world sinks so deep into corruption. Paul gives such people a precise answer.
Romans 1:22-25
22Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, 23and traded the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed animals, and creeping things. 24Therefore God also gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves; 25who exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.
People who are empty, without the word, have traded the glory of God for the likeness of created things, and those are what they serve. To serve money, to serve one’s own body, to set stone and wood and the gods of this world above the glory of God — this is idolatry, and this is sin. When people made in the image of God refuse to keep God in their hearts, Satan will surely take that place. He knows well how fickle and weak-willed people are. To obey God’s command, we must lay down our own righteousness. Knowing that people do not readily obey, Satan tempts them, giving them the courage to choose the world. That whisper has to be firmly rejected, but for those who sit in the place of sin it is never an easy decision.
Exodus 20:3-5
3“You shall have no other gods before me. 4“You shall not make for yourselves an idol, nor any image of anything that is in the heavens above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5you shall not bow yourself down to them, nor serve them, for I, Yahweh your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and on the fourth generation of those who hate me,
God plainly commanded us not to make idols and serve them. But those who do not glorify God make idols and serve them, and in their lusts they dishonor their bodies among themselves. Through such pleasures of the flesh they lost eternal life, and those who commit such sins could not become God’s people. Of this the apostle Paul says in verse 25 that it is because they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator. Those who have forsaken God and exchanged his truth for a lie worship idols fashioned in the likeness of created things because they do not grasp how great God is. God has said that what is known of him is revealed in them, yet people refuse to look at it.
This is a problem, because once people commit the sin of rejecting God, they live ever more wickedly to prove that there is no God. To cover their own sin, they oppose God and deny him. When someone rejects God, a longing rises in them, without their even knowing it, to fill God’s place with something, and so they serve created things instead. Those who have left the Creator make images of corruptible man, birds, beasts, and creeping things and serve them as idols, never knowing that this is sin.
Even when a corruptible human being deceives others by claiming to be God, people serve that person as a god, becoming Satan’s slaves. Watching people being deceived, I used to wonder how anyone could trust a liar so completely. But listen to Paul, and it becomes entirely believable. The deceiver and the deceived have both received the spirit of Satan; that is what makes deceiving and being deceived possible. Even when a corruptible man only imitates God, those who have grown spiritually dark are ruled by an evil spirit, which is how they can walk the road to death without a doubt. Birds, beasts, and creeping things are creatures that people are meant to rule. Yet the very ones who should rule over creation make images of animals, serve them, bow down to them, and entrust their souls to them. They cast away the glory and eternal life God so longs to give them, and they fall on their faces before corruptible men and idols, begging for peace and rest. What could be sadder or more heartbreaking? Sin swings people around at will, heaps sin upon sin, and drives them into the pit of death, and still they cannot discern it. Satan’s scheme is to brainwash people slowly — like a frog put into cold water that is warmed little by little: it never thinks of jumping out, and it dies where it is.
There are many products that symbolize sexual minorities, and many objects that symbolize Satan. There are even dolls made to look human while leaving it hard to guess whether they are male or female. This is a strategy to wear down children’s resistance. Through cartoons, films, songs, and the whole culture industry, that resistance is being removed and children’s judgment clouded. As you enjoy these things with the children who will one day take their place in society, I hope you will explain them well, with the word of God as your standard. If a neighbor hands you rice cake and makes a point of telling you it was offered to the spirits, that person has a purpose in saying so, and for the sake of their salvation you must not eat it. But Christians can eat such food regardless, because God created all things in the world. When someone claims that a certain object is their symbol, you must weigh their purpose carefully and discern.
You must sound the trumpet of the gospel so that people may receive Jesus Christ. Because no one in the world was destined from the start for hell, you must preach the gospel for their salvation. Hold the lamp high to proclaim Jesus Christ, the light of the world. Even those who obstruct the gospel are precious souls who need to be saved, so strive to lead them onto the way of truth, that they may not go down into the valley of death. Take off the dark glasses they wear and teach them how radiant and beautiful the light of God is. Bring the gospel to those who deny God, and make known to them that nothing is of greater worth than God. On the one side, proclaim the gospel boldly; on the other, labor to set your own faith upright. Such is the wise saint, one who knows the word rightly.
Romans 1:20
20For the invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity; that they may be without excuse.
People say it is unfair for those who never heard the gospel to go to hell. But anyone can see God’s power and divinity through the things he has made; anyone, then, can know that God is the Creator. Those who bear the image of God can know him by that alone, and that is why no one can plead the excuse that they never heard the gospel and did not know that God was the Creator. In nations the gospel has not yet reached, people worship corruptible man, birds, beasts, and animals. No one taught them to fashion idols and bow down to them, and yet, astonishingly, that is exactly what they do. God has given them what can be known of him, and that should send them looking for the Creator; instead they make images of created things and worship them. To say you could not believe in God because you never heard the gospel is no excuse. This shows what a wonderful gift it is for us, his people, to know the almighty God, to serve him, and to live lives of thanksgiving.
Psalm 104:2 says that the Lord covers himself with light as with a garment. Christ is light, which leaves the world nowhere to hide before God; every sin is laid bare, and so when judgment comes the world has no excuse. When the light of Christ shines, what is filthy will be shown to be filthy, and what is evil will be shown to be evil. Only those who know that they are filthy and evil can repent, but the world is darkness itself and has no strength to turn back. So you must sound the trumpet of the gospel and lead its people into the light. There are people who hear the gospel in the darkness, follow the light of Christ, and come out onto the way of truth. The Holy Spirit guards them so that they do not go back to the place of sin, and he pours out on them a spirit of repentance. He helps those who have received Christ to be sanctified through faith, and he blesses them as God’s people, set apart from the world. Like the father who waited for his son to come home after the son had squandered all his father’s wealth in the world — waiting because he was still his child — God never abandons those who have confessed their faith; to the end he shows them grace so that they can turn back.
The apostle Paul longed for the church in Rome to have a mature faith that knows God and gives him glory. He wanted them to understand what thanksgiving is, to live lives that hold fast to the faith, and to be as happy now as if they were already living in heaven. May you, who likewise know and serve God, live always in the fullness of joy.