THE RESPONSE OF GOD TO HUMAN REBELLION

ROMANS 1:28-32

          And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful; and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval of those who practice them (NASB).

          A Father had a rather strong-willed son. On the way to the store he kept telling the child, “Sit down and buckle the seat belt.” But the little kid just kept standing in the seat. Again he said, “Sit down and buckle the seat belt.” And after a time or two more the boy was convinced that he had better sit down or disaster would strike. So he slipped down onto the seat, snapped the seat belt closed, and said, “Daddy, I’m sitting down on the outside, but I’m still standing up on the inside.” Human rebellion is not a learned art but a condition of the heart that has not been transformed by the Spirit of God. We are born with a heart bent on rebellion because we are sinners by nature, choice, and practice.

          As I conclude the series on “The Steps to Human Degradation and Destruction,” I would like to share with you on the topic: “The Response of God to Human Rebellion.”

I.                  GOD’S ANSWER TO HUMAN PRIDE

     AND SELF-SUFFICIENCY V. 28

          The downward spiral of human rebellion, which began with the rejection of God’s self-disclosure through natural revelation or general revelation led to idolatry. Idolatry then, led to homosexuality, which resulted in self-inflicted diseases. For one last time, lest there should remain any doubt, Apostle Paul emphasizes the direct link between humankind’s rejection of God and its disordered state. It all stems from the basic refusal to recognize God. The character of this refusal is the deliberate act of human pride and self-sufficiency. Humans began to think whether they should give God a place in their life and thoughts, but they concluded that God does not deserve a place in both their lives and thoughts. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, some Western thinkers concluded that God does not exist. They explained that humans made God to fit into their ways of life. In other words, people made their own projections of God to fit their belief systems.

          The Apostle Paul says that due to this rejection of God, though there are ample evidences of His manifest presence in creation and history, God handed them over to “a depraved mind.” The phrase “depraved mind” can be translated “unapproved mind” or “disqualified mind.” The truth of the matter is that sin affects not only your affections (idolatry) and your senses (immorality) but also your thinking (mind). The judgment the unbelieving world passed against God has actually condemned them. In claiming the ability to evaluate God, they simply proved the unfitness of their own rational powers. Therefore, God handed them over to the maturity they claimed. The irony is that the human sense of maturity that rejects the self-disclosure of God through His creation is immaturity, because only the immature would be bold enough to make such a claim in the first place. Only the immature person would dismiss the existence of God.

          The root of all evil is man’s choice to be independent of God (Gen. 3). The simple fact is that humans as created beings cannot escape their own nature and the nature of the world as God made it. Rather, it is God who has handed unbelievers over to their desires and the endless pursuit of their satisfaction. Your freedom to go your own way still leaves you within the limits set by God. Therefore, Christians should not be depressed at the disorder of the society and the evidence of human degradation, because it really constitutes evidence of God’s overall control. Man is still the creature whom God made no matter what he thinks or says. The truth is that even when you refuse to recognize God, your essential creaturely instincts bear witness to the Creator your conscious mind denies. This makes it clear that God’s wrath is indeed the converse (opposite) of His righteousness, since both express and bring into effect the world as God intends it to be. Righteousness through faithful dependence on the Creator leads to salvation; wrath through self-deceitful pride and self-indulgent desire leads to self-destruction.

          Turning away from true knowledge of God, means cutting yourself off from any ultimate and accurate understanding of this world and your place within it. That is why many people do not understand the moral stand that Christians take on the basis of God’s truth. This is why you run into a problem with your boss, who is not a Christian when you take a moral stance on an issue. In the Parable of the Prodigal son, the father could not force the younger son to reconsider his decision and stay home. The father allowed him to go to the foreign world. When unbelievers dismiss the existence of God and write Him off in their affairs, God gives them over to depraved mind to do those things, which are not proper.

II.               THE OUTCOME AND EXPRESSION OF PRIDE

           AND SELF-SUFFICIENCY VV. 29-31

          When you reject God, you end up doing what you should not do. In order not to let those who have rejected God but do not practice idolatry and engage in homosexuality off the hook, the word of God provides a catalog of sinful conduct. It is not only idol worshipers and homosexuals or sexually immoral persons, who are living in rebellion against God, but also those who practice the works of the flesh. The climax of Paul’s analysis of the fall of humanity and its consequences is a picture of the general disorder of human society. This is what the word of God is saying: if you are an envious person, deceitful, whispering behind backs, gossiper, malicious, slanderer, arrogant, boastful and so on, you are manifesting human corruption, which is as serious as those who are idolaters and homosexuals. In other words, God is saying that if you practice the list of vices that are listed in verses 29-31, you are not different from a person who is a homosexual. Your pride and self-sufficiency that gave you the audacity to reject God and the knowledge of His truth is what is producing these works of the flesh in your life. Since you have written God off, you do not have an inherent power to produce any righteousness or godliness in your life (Gal 5:19-21). The catalog of vices in these verses contains a certain logical order. The first part of the list contains general terms for sin; the second focuses on basic sins affecting human relationships; and the third list is, more a potpourri (mixed collection) of sinful conduct. Similar lists of sins usually called vices appear elsewhere in the New Testament (Matt. 15:19; Gal. 5:19-21; Col. 3:5; 1 Tim. 1:9-10; 1 Peter 2:1; 4:3). People have the tendency to minimize or ignore their own sins, while they are pointing accusing fingers at the sins of others. In order not to overlook the sin of anyone who has rejected God and His revealed truth, the Apostle Paul provides a list of sins. For example, you may not be worshiping a statue of an animal but do you gossip? You may not be a homosexual or a lesbian but do you slander others? While gossip and slander may not be as serious to you as idolatry and homosexuality, they are nevertheless just as much an indication of God’s wrath against sin.

          Therefore, if you engage in everyday vices, which poison human relationships, you have rejected God and His revealed truth as any person that practices sexual perversion. How can you say you love God when you are envious of your brother or sister that you see? How can you say you know God when you slander people who are made in the image of God? How can you say you are walking in the light when you are inventors of evil? How can the terrorists say that they are fighting God’s battle, when they are inventing evil ways of destroying human lives? The Apostle John says that if we say we are in the light and walk in the darkness, we are liars. Those who are the children of God and love Him are the ones, who bear the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22-23). Unless the Holy Spirit lives in you, you cannot produce the fruit of the Spirit. Because unbelievers have rejected God and God in turn has given them up, the natural outcome of their lives is evil deeds.

III. THE PRACTICE AND APPROVAL OF

SINFUL CONDUCT V. 32

          In this verse, the apostle Paul under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit refuses to accept that people generally are not aware of the negative character and ultimately destructive effect of such conduct. For instance, in the creation narrative, God gave a warning to Adam concerning the tree of the knowledge of good and evil saying, “In the day you eat of it you shall die” (Gen. 2:16), and yet Adam went ahead and ate. Every human being, created in the image of God, has a basic moral nature and a conscience. This truth is understood beyond religious circles. Psychologists say that the rare person who has no conscience has a serious personality disorder that is extremely difficult to treat. Most people instinctively know when they do wrong, but they may not care. Some people will even risk an early death for the freedom to indulge in their desires now. Take Timothy McVey for instance, he knew that what he did in Oklahoma City would result in the loss of human lives, and ultimately his own life, but he did not care. Sometimes when people want to justify their sinful conduct they say something like: "I know it is wrong, but I really want it, or I know it is dangerous but it is worth the risk." For such people, part of the fun is going against the law of God, the community’s moral standards, common sense, or their own sense of right and wrong. However, deep down inside they know that sin deserves the punishment of death (Romans 6:23). Even if you go to any primitive society, where the people do not have access to the Bible, I can assure you that they have moral principles that guide them to distinguish right from wrong. It is like a parent who knows that his/her child has done something wrong. Instead of dealing with the child’s sinful conduct, he/she goes out of the way to support the child and malign the person or persons the child has offended. When you do that you are setting your child up for a future catastrophe.

          In this verse, the apostle Paul is saying that humans are in a position to understand God’s truth. Earlier Paul focused on what might be called “ontological” knowledge of God, that in creation, people come to understand something of God’s existence and nature (v. 20). In verse 32, the apostle Paul turns to the “moral” knowledge that all people possess. What the word of God is saying is that all humans have a sense of right and wrong and understand that wrong actions deserve punishment.

          The next key theme that Paul expresses one last time is the fact of divine punishment for sin. Sinners deserve death. Choices have consequences. The death that is mentioned here is spiritual death; the condemnation or wrath of God under which all who have not embraced His Son Jesus Christ stand because of sin. When you are defiant of God and continue to violate God’s moral laws, and give hearty approval to others who do the same, you become just like the devil. The devil rebelled against God because he wanted to usurp the throne of God. In view of this, God booted or expelled him out of heaven. He was not content to be the adversary of God. He went out of his way and enticed Adam and Eve to rebel against God, and they did. Sin is contagious; and those who are living in sin continue to spread their sinful lifestyle. They give hearty approval and a hand of fellowship to those who practice evil. God says that the sentence for sinful rebellion against Him is death. God gave the same warning to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. God extended the same warning to the Israelites in captivity in Babylon when He said, “The soul that sin shall surely die” (Ezek. 18:4). Death in this context is not physical death, but spiritual and eternal death. When Adam and Eve believed the lies of the serpent and sinned against God, they died spiritually. There are many people who are alive physically but dead spiritually, because of their rebellion against God. What is more dangerous is that unless they repent and turn to God for forgiveness, they will die in their sins. When they die in their sins, they are separated eternally from God; that is eternal death. When a person is living in sin, he thinks he has much time to live.

          George Whitefield mentioned in his journal that during his first voyage to Georgia, the ship’s cook had a bad drinking problem. When the cook was reproved for it and other sins, he boasted that he would be wicked until the last two years of his life, and then he would reform. Whitefield added that within six hours of the time the cook made his boastful statement, he died of an illness related to his drinking.

          Perhaps you are asking, "Is there no hope for those who have rejected God?" When there is life, there is hope. All that such people need to do is to act the same way as the “Prodigal Son” did. The heavenly Father is still waiting for His rebellious sons and daughters to return home. First, the sinner must come to the end of his rope. You need to acknowledge your sin. You need to have a heart of contrition and broken spirit. In other words, you should repent and return to God the Father. He will receive you warmly, save you, and forgive you of all your sins. He will wipe the slate clean—He will delete your sinful document from His hard drive. The Apostle Paul gives an example of what I am saying in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, "Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God. Such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of God" (NASB).

INVITATION

1.     I extend the invitation to you that have not received Christ to come to Him to experience His transforming power in your life.

2.     Maybe you are a Christian but you are living in disobedience to God, repent of your rebellion and ask God for forgiveness and He will forgive you.

3.     Maybe some of your friends, coworkers, family members, and neighbors are living this life of rebellion, please pray for them and share this message with them.