Rom 2:17-29
One of the tricky things about being a pastor is the pressure to have all the answers. It may shock some of you to know I don’t actually have all the answers. There are still things in scripture that I am trying to wrap my head around. There are things I don’t always understand. There are things I certainly don’t know.
Many times, people have sat in my office, sharing their difficulties and hardships, and all I can offer is an ear to listen and some encouragement because I don’t have that fantastic word of advice that will turn everything around and change their circumstances.
Most of you can relate to this. Maybe, as a parent, your kid comes to you with some tough dilemma, and all you can offer is comfort and understanding because you can’t fix it. You may run into a problem you can’t solve yourself at work, and you need to turn to someone else for help.
Admitting that you don’t always have all of the answers is healthy. Admitting you need help instead of pretending you can do it on your own is good. All of these things are indicators of a humble heart.
In the second part of Romans 2, Paul reminds the Jewish Christians of their need for humble and contrite hearts. The Jewish Christians thought they had all the answers. They thought Judaism, or maybe more specifically, their interpretation of Judaism, was the only righteous way to live. If you were going to follow Jesus, you needed to follow their lead.
Paul will poke holes in their thinking and remind them that Religion Is No Solution. The religious practice of Judaism is not the solution to man’s problem of sin. There is only one solution, and that is the gospel message and the gospel message only makes a difference when it changes our hearts.
Rom 2:17-20 (CSB)—Now if you call yourself a Jew, and rely on the law, and boast in God, and know his will, and approve the things that are superior, being instructed from the law, and if you are convinced that you are a guide for the blind, a light to those in darkness, an instructor of the ignorant, a teacher of the immature, having the embodiment of knowledge and truth in the law—
God chose the Jews to be His people. He made a covenant with Abraham that He would bless them and that, through that blessing, they would bless every nation. The covenant is found in Genesis 12.
Gen 12:2-3 (CSB)—I will make you into a great nation,I will bless you,I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, I will curse anyone who treats you with contempt, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.
God makes this promise to the Jews, beginning with Abraham. It is a covenant, which is an unconditional promise. How could you not be a Jew and not have a sense of pride that God had chosen your group, your nationality, to be great and bless the rest of the earth.
Then, God gave the Jews the law. You can read about God giving the law in Exodus 20. This law, given by God to Israel through Moses, governed life for the Jews. It defined everything from how they were to worship to what they could eat and even how they conducted some of the most menial daily tasks.
For example, the law tells you what to do if your ox injures your neighbor’s ox.
Ex 21:35-36 (CSB)—When a man’s ox injures his neighbor’s ox and it dies, they must sell the live ox and divide its proceeds; they must also divide the dead animal. If, however, it is known that the ox was in the habit of goring, yet its owner has not restrained it, he must compensate fully, ox for ox; the dead animal will become his.
But Paul says to these Jews who valued their heritage, who valued obedience to the law, “Look, just because you know the information doesn’t mean that qualifies you to be a guide for others.”
Rom 2:21-24 (CSB)—you then, who teach another, don’t you teach yourself? You who preach, “You must not steal”—do you steal? You who say, “You must not commit adultery”—do you commit adultery? You who detest idols, do you rob temples? You who boast in the law, do you dishonor God by breaking the law? For, as it is written: The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.
Paul says, in your heart, you are doing the same things you are accusing the Gentiles of doing.
Jesus says something similar In Matthew 15. He chastises the Pharisees and scribes when they question him about why the disciples don’t always follow the law when they don’t wash their hands before they eat. The Pharisees are very concerned with what they see the disciples doing.
Jesus comes back with a question for them. Why don’t you follow the law? God said, in the law, Honor your father and your mother, and Whoever speaks evil of father or mother must be put to death. But you Pharisees tell the people if you give your money to the temple, you don’t have to honor your father and mother in their old age and care for them. Jesus says this man-made tradition violates what God has told you. You may be following the letter of the law, but you are violating the heart of the law.
Matt 15:7-8 (CSB)—Hypocrites! Isaiah prophesied correctly about you when he said: This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. They worship me in vain, teaching as doctrines human commands.”
Paul is saying to the Jewish Christians in Rome, you are guilty of this. You are more concerned with the letter of the law and man-made traditions than you are about the heart of the man. Because you have not attended to your hearts, you fail to do the very things you accuse the Gentiles of failing to do.
And look, you’re not fooling anyone; everyone sees it.
Look again at
Rom 2:23-24 (CSB)—You who boast in the law, do you dishonor God by breaking the law? For, as it is written: The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.
It is not the being seen of men that is wrong, but doing these things for the purpose of being seen of men. The problem with the hypocrite is his motivation. He does not want to be holy; he only wants to seem to be holy. He is more concerned with his reputation for righteousness than about actually becoming righteous. The approbation of men matters more to him than the approval of God.
—Augustine
Paul then switches from obedience to the law to another issue dividing the church in Rome: circumcision.
Rom 2:25-27 (CSB)—Circumcision benefits you if you observe the law, but if you are a lawbreaker, your circumcision has become uncircumcision. So if an uncircumcised man keeps the law’s requirements, will not his uncircumcision be counted as circumcision? A man who is physically uncircumcised, but who keeps the law, will judge you who are a lawbreaker in spite of having the letter of the law and circumcision.
The Jewish Christians were insisting that the male Gentile Christians should be circumcised.
In Gen 17, God tells Abraham that as a sign of our covenant, every one of your males must be circumcised. But the Jews missed the why of circumcision. They understood the command and had been faithful in carrying it out for generations, but they lost the why.
Why did God give them the command to be circumcised?
Circumcision was:
1) An identification of God’s people, an outward sign of what was to be an inward reality.
2) An illustration of God’s dealing with the flesh.
In Ezekiel 44, God chastises the Israelites because even though He had forbidden them to, they were allowing people who were uncircumcised in heart and flesh into the temple. The only people allowed in the temple were people who were participants in God’s covenant.
Not only were the people the Jews allowed into the temple not physically circumcised, but their hearts were not circumcised; their hearts did not identify with God.
This is precisely what Paul is saying to the Romans. He is saying you are so hung up on the physical expression of circumcision that you are missing the real purpose. God desires a circumcised heart, a heart that demonstrates on the outside what God has done on the inside.
Here is the point Paul is making and the point I want you to see:
Outward expression means nothing if not accompanied by inward experience.
Paul says, “Religion is no solution. You will not experience inward change through religion.
Why?
Religion says:
- I can do it on my own.
- I can be good enough and reach high enough to earn God’s affection. Pastor and author Josh White calls this ladder theology. When we practice ladder theology, we climb a ladder to get to God.
- I have all the answers.
- I am driven by fear because if I don’t do the right things, God will punish me.
When you have an inward experience, and your heart is changed:
- You recognize you can’t and don’t need to try and do it on your own because Jesus has already done it for you.
- You realize you can’t be good enough and don’t have to reach high enough to earn God’s affection because He has reached down to you and has loved you with an everlasting love.
- You look to God’s Word to inform you and the Holy Spirit to guide you.
- Instead of being driven by fear, His perfect love has driven away your fear because Jesus has taken the punishment I deserve.
And when God has our hearts, our obedience and good works will flow out of that relationship. What we do will become the outward expression of an inward experience. Our motivation for living holy lives is no longer the approval of the people around us but because we love our Heavenly Father.
Here is one way to illustrate this: What if a friend invited you to coffee to hang out? Maybe this is a good friend you haven’t seen in a while, and they just want to connect. So you sit down for coffee, and as soon as your friend starts talking, you pick up your phone, check your email, and scroll through your social media. Physically, you are present, but your heart is not. Your body is there, but you are not there.
In many ways, the attitude of obedience is much more vital than the act, because if the attitude is right, the act will naturally follow. But the right action with the wrong attitude is nothing but hypocrisy.
—John MacArthur
Look at how Paul wraps up this thought:
Rom 2:28-29 (CSB)—For a person is not a Jew who is one outwardly, and true circumcision is not something visible in the flesh. On the contrary, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is of the heart—by the Spirit, not the letter. That person’s praise is not from people but from God.
Paul says to the Jews in Rome, let me tell you what it means to be one of God’s people; let me tell you what it means to be a son or a daughter of God. It means you are someone whose heart has been changed by God, you have a new motivative, and that motive is to be led by the Holy Spirit, not the letter of the law. That is the child God is pleased with.
That experience only comes through the gospel; that is the solution.
How is your heart this morning?
We all come to this room with our hearts in various conditions.
Some of you are still living with voices of condemnation in your head. Maybe it was a parent maybe a friend or a church leader that made you feel like you never measured up. That is the beautiful thing about the gospel. It reminds us that we are called to live holy lives but it doesn’t leave us grasping upward for God but it reminds us that Jesus has reached down and made us holy through his body broken and blood shed on the cross.
May this morning be a reminder that above all, God wants you.
Chris Hankel 
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