Paul’s Letter to the Romans

Part 11

This evening we move on into the first eight verses of chapter 3:

Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the benefit of circumcision? Great in every respect. First of all, that they were entrusted with the oracles of God. What then? If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it? May it never be! Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written, "That You may be justified in Your words, And prevail when You are judged." But if our unrighteousness demonstrates the righteousness of God, what shall we say? The God who inflicts wrath is not unrighteous, is He? (I am speaking in human terms.) May it never be! For otherwise, how will God judge the world? But if through my lie the truth of God abounded to His glory, why am I also still being judged as a sinner? And why not say (as we are slanderously reported and as some claim that we say), "Let us do evil that good may come"? Their condemnation is just.

In this passage we see the continuation of a characteristic feature of Paul’s teaching style in this letter. Not only does he directly address an imagined objector, he anticipates responses and answers them, thus ensuring that his own major conclusions are not misunderstood. In Paul's other letters, he only uses this style occasionally, probably because many of the recipients already knew him personally and he was often responding to their questions. 

But in Romans, Paul calls on this style and hammers his theological and practical points home with relentless rhetoric, building his argument carefully and leaving his recipients clear on where he stands.  And although I'm sure it was clear to Paul's Roman recipients, after it's been translated into English and with the passage of nearly 2000 years, it's not all that easy to understand today.

William Barclay uses a dialogue format in his commentary on this passage and I found it helpful in my study.  Since I couldn't find a better idea, I'll share Barclay's with you:  

The objector: The result of all that you have been saying is that there is no difference between Gentile and Jew and that they are in exactly the same position. Do you really mean that?

Paul: By no means.

The objector: What, then, is the difference?

Paul: For one thing, the Jew possesses what the Gentile never so directly possessed—the commandments of God.

The objector: Granted! But what if some of the Jews disobeyed these commandments and were unfaithful to God and came under his condemnation? You have just said that God gave the Jews a special position and a special promise. Now you go on to say that at least some of them are under the condemnation of God. Does that mean that God has broken his promise and shown himself to be unjust and unreliable?

Paul: Far from it! What it does show is that there is no favoritism with God and that he punishes sin wherever he sees it. The very fact that he condemns the unfaithful Jews is the best possible proof of his absolute justice. He might have been expected to overlook the sins of this special people of his but he does not. 

The objector: Very well then! All you have done is to succeed in showing that my disobedience has given God an opportunity to demonstrate his righteousness. My infidelity has given God a marvelous opportunity to demonstrate his fidelity. My sin is, therefore, an excellent thing! It has given God a chance to show how good he is! I may have done evil, but good has come of it! You can’t surely condemn a man for giving God a chance to show his justice!

Paul: An argument like that is beneath contempt! You have only to state it to see how intolerable it is!

I don’t want to wear this portion of Scripture out, but I think it’s worth reading it again from Eugene Peterson’s Message…I think it will spark some clearer understanding:

So what difference does it make who’s a Jew and who isn’t, who has been trained in God’s ways and who hasn’t? As it turns out, it makes a lot of difference—but not the difference so many have assumed. First, there’s the matter of being put in charge of writing down and caring for God’s revelation, these Holy Scriptures. So, what if, in the course of doing that, some of those Jews abandoned their post? God didn’t abandon them. Do you think their faithlessness cancels out his faithfulness? Not on your life! Depend on it: God keeps his word even when the whole world is lying through its teeth. Scripture says the same: Your words stand fast and true; Rejection doesn’t faze you. But if our wrongdoing only underlines and confirms God’s right doing, shouldn’t we be commended for helping out? Since our bad words don’t even make a dent in his good words, isn’t it wrong of God to back us to the wall and hold us to our word? These questions come up. The answer to such questions is no, a most emphatic No! How else would things ever get straightened out if God didn’t do the straightening? It’s simply perverse to say, "If my lies serve to show off God’s truth all the more gloriously, why blame me? I’m doing God a favor." Some people are actually trying to put such words in our mouths, claiming that we go around saying, "The more evil we do, the more good God does, so let’s just do it!" That’s pure slander, as I’m sure you’ll agree.

In Paul's mind, what made the Jews "special"?  What gave them "privileged" status?

Through out his life, Paul believed the Jews to be in a special position in regard to God.  That, in fact, is what they believed themselves.  However, there was a significant difference between their views of why they were special.  The Jews thought that their special position was one of privilege while Paul focused on the responsibility of that privilege.

Paul saw God saying to Israel, "You are a special people; therefore you must live a special life." He did not say, "You are a special people; therefore you can do what you like." He did say, "You are a special people; therefore you must do what I like."

In Paul's view, it was their possession of the "oracles of God" that set them apart.

What are the "oracles of God"?

The Greek is logion (log·ee·on) and means the utterances or words of God.  The NASB95 shows an interesting cross reference to Acts 7:38 where Steven, in his speech that resulted in his stoning, describes the "living oracles" as being given at Mount Sinai...a reference to the Ten Commandments.

Some commentators think the "oracles of God" refer to the Old Testament, while others think they are the Pentateuch and still others feel Paul is specifically referring to the Ten Commandments.  I tend to think Paul had in mind the Hebrew Bible, or what we call our Old Testament.

All through his writings there are three basic facts in Paul's mind about the Jews.  They are briefly mentioned here, but are in fact the three thoughts that it takes this whole letter to explain. To his question, "What if some of them were unfaithful and did not believe?" he makes these three points:

  1. Paul was quite sure God was justified in condemning the Jews.  They had their special place and their special promises; and that very fact made their condemnation all the greater.  The more opportunity a person has to do right, the greater his condemnation if he does wrong.
  2. Paul recognized that not all Jews were unfaithful.  He never forgot the faithful remnant and was quite sure that this group, however small the number, was the true Jewish race.  The others had lost their privileges and were under condemnation, in fact, they were no longer Jews at all...the remnant was the real nation.
  3. Paul was always sure that God's rejection of Israel was not final!  Because of this rejection, a door was opened to the Gentiles (Romans 11:25-29) and in the end, the Gentiles would bring the Jews back within the fold where Jew and Gentile would be one in Christ.

In Romans 11:25-29, Paul reminds the Gentiles that in the end, God will save all Israel. What does that mean?

Here Paul has faced a bewildering, and, for a Jew, a heartbreaking situation. Somehow he has had to find an explanation for the fact that God’s people rejected his Son when he came into the world. Paul never shut his eyes to that tragic fact, but he found a way in which the whole tragic situation could be fitted into the plan of God. It is true that the Jews rejected Christ; but, as Paul saw it, that rejection happened in order that Christ might be offered to the Gentiles. To maintain the sovereignty of God’s purpose, Paul went so far as to say that it was He Himself (God) who hardened the hearts of the Jews in order to open a way to the Gentiles; but, even then, however contradictory it might sound, he still insisted on the personal responsibility of the Jews for their failure to accept God’s offer. Paul held fast at one and the same time to divine sovereignty and human responsibility.

Then Paul has a strange thought. "God," he says, "shut up all men to disobedience that he may have mercy upon all." (Romans 11:32) The one thing Paul cannot conceive of is that any man of any nation could merit his own salvation. Now, if the Jews had observed complete obedience to God’s will, they might well have reckoned that they had earned the salvation of God as a right. So Paul is saying that God involved the Jews in disobedience in order that when his salvation did come to them it might be unmistakably an act of his mercy and due in no way to their merit. Neither Jew nor Gentile could ever be saved apart from the mercy of God.

In many ways Paul’s argument may seem strange to us and the "proof" he brings forward unconvincing. Our minds and hearts may even shudder at some of the things he says. But to Paul, God was in control. Nothing moved with aimless feet. Not even the most heartbreaking event was outside the purpose of God. Events could never run amok. The purposes of God could never be frustrated.

In Romans 3:1-8, we find two great universal human truths:

  1. The root of all sin is disobedience.  When pride sets up the will of man against the will of God, there is sin.
  2. Once a man has sinned, he displays an amazing ingenuity for justifying his sin.

In the last four verses of this evening’s text, we come across an argument that reappears again and again in religious thought, the argument that sin gives God a chance to show at once His justice and His mercy and is therefore a good thing.  But it is a twisted argument.  One might as well argue that it is good to break a person's heart because it gives us a chance to show how much we love that person.

It's probably just me, but these verses seem to parallel the frequent response from Christians when the concept of ultimate reconciliation is presented. The opening questions found in this evening’s text: "Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the benefit of circumcision?" are not that different from: "Then why be a Christian? What is the benefit of trying to do the right thing?"  And Paul's response to these twisted arguments seems equally appropriate: "And why not say (as we are slanderously reported and as some claim that we say), 'Let us do evil that good may come'? Their condemnation is just."

If there were no heaven or hell, would you still choose to live the Christian life? Why or why not?

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