01.7.2. Gods Just Judgment On Jewish Unbelief

Chapter 7ii - God’s Just Judgment On Jewish Unbelief

God’s judgment against the unbelief of the Jews is just (Romans 3:1-8). Three questions are raised and answered in these verses. All the questions are actually answered in the answer to the first question. Anticipating the questions, as was Paul’s manner, he answered them before they were raised. In his answer to the third question, “But if our unrighteousness is giving approval to the righteousness of God, what shall we say? is God unjust, the One who inflicts punishment? I am speaking according to man” (Romans 3:5 -translation), Paul’s speaking according to man was his apology for discussing something so contrary to truth. This insertion in the last part of this verse was for Paul’s protection against false accusations that were being brought against him. The apostle answered the question: “Absolutely not; otherwise how shall God judge the world? For if the truth of God by my lie abounded to His glory, why am I also being judged as a sinner? and not as we are being blasphemed and as some report us to say, Let us do evil, that good may come? whose judgment is just” (Romans 3:6-8 -translation).

Paul had been condemning the Jews in Romans 2:17. He called them hypocrites. They were religionists, but they were not saved. Their circumcision was of the flesh, but their hearts had never been circumcised by the grace of God. Paul proved his accusations in the last verses of Romans 2:2-29. Knowing the Jews would, in the light of his condemnation, question the advantage of being a member of the chosen nation, Paul answered it: “Much in every way. For in the first place because they were entrusted with the oracles of God” (Romans 3:2 -translation). Stephen, who Paul before his conversion experience had seen martyred, gave a brief historical account of the people of Israel. In his account, he reminded the Jews to whom he spoke that Moses had received from God the living oracles to give to the Jewish people (Acts 7:38). Stephen quoted the historical account and made application of it. The oracles were living to Moses, but they were not living to the Jews to whom Stephen spoke. The whole Levitical system, consisting of the tabernacle, priesthood, and offerings, given to Moses to give to the children of Israel typifies what Jesus Christ would accomplish and what He would be to His people when He came. The whole system was living, because it typified Jesus Christ the living Savior. To Moses, who had the Spirit of God and with whom God spoke face to face (Exodus 33:11), the oracles of God were living. Living oracles were given to a living man-Moses; and Moses was to give those words to the people to whom he ministered. The Lord Jesus had spoken to the same hypocritical religionists within the same nation about Divine election and efficacious grace; but they rejected His words as being offensive to them, murmured among themselves, and turned and followed Him no more (John 6:57-66). Circumstances have not changed in the presence of the proclamation of the written word. The living Father sent the living Savior who spoke these living words to spiritually dead people. Anyone offended by God’s word is spiritually dead. Every person outside of Jesus Christ is ignorant about the most important things in life. Paul’s desire was that the brethren not be ignorant of the exemplary things recorded of Israel. “For I do not desire you to be ignorant, brethren, that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized to Moses in the sphere of the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; for they were drinking of the same spiritual Rock following, and the Rock was Christ. But with the majority of them God was not well-pleased; for they were killed in the desert. Now these things were made examples, so that we should not be cravers for evil things, as those also lusted. Neither be idolaters, as some of them; as it has been written: The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. Neither may we be committing fornication, as some of them committed and fell in one day 23,000. Neither may we be trying the Lord, as some of them also tried Him and were destroyed by the serpents. Neither be complaining, as some of them complained, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now these things were happening to them by way of example, and they were written for our admonition, to whom the ends of the ages have come” (1 Corinthians 10:1-11 -translation). The Israelites represented a local assembly made up of saved and lost, and Paul was writing to the local assembly at Corinth, made up of saved and lost, using the Israelites as an example. The Spirit is the One making alive; the body profits nothing (John 6:63). The words that Christ spoke are spiritual and living oracles. The only ones who understand Christ’s words in a spiritual sense, whether they are those who listened to Him in Person or those who listen to the proclamation of the word by others, will find them living in operation. The hearing ear, seeing eye, and receptive heart are possible because God has already made that one alive, thus giving him by grace the ability to hear, see, and receive the word. Nothing in the Christian life is greater than God’s word speaking to our hearts and then their becoming operative as a result of God’s having given us the ability to understand them. The gospel comes to a quickened person not in word only but also in power: “for our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power [operative] and in the Holy Spirit and in much assurance, as you have known what kind of men we were among you for your sake. And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, having welcomed the word in much affliction with joy of the Holy Spirit” (1 Thessalonians 1:5-6 -translation). Paul thanked the Lord that this was true of the Thessalonian Christians: “And because of this we give thanks to God unceasingly, because having received the word of God which you heard from us you welcomed it not as a word from men but as it is in truth the word from God, which continually operates also in the ones believing” (1 Thessalonians 2:13 -translation). Hence, the word of God becomes the instrument not only of a person’s initial conversion experience, but it also becomes operative in his life in progressive sanctification. We learn these things from the word of God. Therefore, there is a realm of reality of truth beyond the comprehension of natural powers.

Jeremiah described the word of God as being like wheat, fire, and a hammer: “The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream; and he that hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat? saith the LORD. Is not my word like as a fire? saith the LORD; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces” (Jeremiah 23:28-29). The purpose of wheat is to feed. Fire is felt. A living person cannot read and study the living word without feeling it. The result of feasting on the word is that the affectional nature is affected. An illustration of the word of God being like fire is the words of Jesus Christ burning in the hearts of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus: “And their eyes were opened, and they recognized Him; and He vanished out of their sight. And they said to each other: Was not our heart burning in us while He talked with us in the way, and while He opened to us the Scriptures?” (Luke 24:31-32 -translation). The word is also like a hammer that breaks. The woman of Samaria went to Jacob’s well for literal water, but Christ told her that when she drank of that water she would thirst again. But if she drank of the living water, the water He would give her, she would never thirst again (John 4:13-14). Blessings will flow to others through the one who has been made by the grace of God to drink of the living water (John 7:38). The living word operates in living people. Living persons are in union with the living God the Father by means of the living Son’s redemption accomplished at Calvary. That redemption is applied by the living Holy Spirit in regeneration. Then as living stones, we experience the living word in operation by presenting our bodies as living sacrifices. This is our reasonable service as we are motivated by the living hope of the coming of the living King who shall reign forever.