The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness.For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hinder the truth in unrighteousness;
14 sermons cite this verse
… Just as it is written, the righteous will live by faith. The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth of God by their wickedness. And so we know about God as plain to them because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities, his eternal power, divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood from what is made so that men are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him. But their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. Therefore, God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts, the sexual impurity, for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie and they worshiped and served created things rather than the creator who is forever praised. …
… unreached it means you have knowledge of god okay you have knowledge of god this is exactly where Paul starts in Romans 1 18 right after what we read he says verse 18 the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth for listen to verse 19 what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them for his invisible attributes namely his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world and the things that have This is Paul saying, everybody, everywhere has knowledge of God. He's made it plain to them. In creation around them, God has shown himself, his glory. In such a way that verse 21, right after this, in case we didn't get it in verse 18, 19, 20, it says, for although they knew God, you have knowledge of God. So wherever you're unreached, you're an unreached person, you have knowledge of God. …
… in the heart of every man. Romans 1 confirms this Ecclesiastes truth verses 18 and 19. It says for For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness because they suppress it. Because what may be known of God is manifest, clearly revealed. Why? Because God has shown it to them. The idea of suppressing is to hold down physically. That God has revealed himself. The Bible makes the case between Ecclesiastes 3 verse 11 and Romans 1, 18 and 19. It makes the case that there is no such thing as an ultimate atheist. It is someone who might make the claim. But that person has to fight against something that has been put within them by God. he has to suppress the knowledge that has clearly been revealed in him there is no ultimate atheist c.s lewis said it this way if we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy the most probable explanation is that we are made for another world and truly he's put eternity in our hearts, but that does not mean that we have the answers to everything. Notice how verse 11 ends, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end. …
… And God is calling our young people and the old people and all people in between to stand up and resist these evils. In Romans chapter 1, verse 18, the Bible says, For the wrath of God is revealed. By the way, the Greek word in the original Bible says this. For the wrath of God is being revealed. It's happening now. From heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. Make fun of the truth. Mock the truth. Romans chapter 1, verse 28. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, I don't want to think about God. Don't talk to me about God. I don't want to hear it. God gave them over to a debased mind or reprobate mind. How do we know? To do those things which are not fitting or not correct, not proper. Being filled with all unrighteousness and what? Sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness. Yikes. I want to take a shower after you read this verse. …
… I find that fascinating. in Romans chapter 1 verse 18 the Bible says for the wrath of God this is kind of terrifying everybody listen up so you can be scared I'll exaggerate it by giving you the Greek interpretation or translation watch this for the wrath of God it's pure it's perfect it's holy it's just is being revealed it's already it's in the process of being revealed. It's happening now, and it's going to increase. It's revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. Think about that. Do you see people doing very horrible things in the world today? Did you know that God's wrath? We can't see this. Have you ever had that feeling, why doesn't somebody do something? We all have that feeling more and more now. you don't need to panic. What you cannot see in the invisible world is a blade, as it were, right behind that guy's neck that's the wrath of Almighty God. Their day's coming. It might come five minutes after. …
… nothing against God. Maybe, maybe not. God has something against everyone. I'm letting that sink in because this is often misunderstood. Romans chapter 1 verse 18, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness and ungodliness. That's the position of humanity under the wrath of God. You come to Christ and experience God's riches of Christ's expense, grace, there's a cessation of hostility. Now you have peace. You've raised the white flag of surrender. You've made peace with God. He has nothing against you because everything he had against you, the wrath poised against you, was put on his son, Jesus Christ. God made him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in him. God treated Jesus like you deserve to be treated, so he might treat us like Jesus deserves to be treated. That's peace with God. Once you experience, and I know I'm going slow, but it's worth it. Once you experience peace with God, you can also experience the peace of God. …
… you should know that God loves you. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness. The Greek is in the present continuous sense. The wrath of God is now falling upon, from heaven, upon people who are against all, against heaven, with ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. It's happening now. Who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. The word suppress, that word means to like sit on the lid of a boiling pot. Can you imagine a pot boiling and you stand on top of the lid to try to hold it down? That's what the ungodly are doing. At every turn, they try to stop biblical truth from getting out. Like somebody standing on a lid that is boiling, like a pot. Remarkable. Suppress the truth in unrighteousness. How come? Why? Because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world is invisible, attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made. …
… That's likely the banner category. Remember back in verse 18, we saw the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness. So unrighteousness is the big category. We've already seen that. The wrath of God against unrighteousness. We've seen the example of idolatry and sexual immorality. Now, gives this category again, unrighteousness, and what follows are 20 different sins. So, if you add unrighteousness, it's 21. If that's the headline, then there's 20 more. You can look at them roughly in three groups. There are four nouns qualified with the word all, so they were filled with all. And then after that, there are five nouns. They are full of. We have five nouns there. And then 12 characteristics, beginning before verse 30, they are. We have 12 items there. The last four begin with the negation. In Greek, when you want to say negate something, you put in alpha at the beginning of it. So, an atheist is someone who doesn't believe in God. Agnosticism, gnosis is knowledge. …
You look at verse 22, claiming to be wise, they became fools. Paul from Romans 1.18 through chapter 3 verse 20 is pouring upon his readers this argument about the universality of sin. And here particular in chapter 1, it's about sins in the Gentile world. Now, not the Gentile world alone. There's a reason that the Mosaic Covenant had rules about homosexuality because it was known even in that part of the world. But chiefly about the Gentile world, that they have known God, that they have this divinely implanted awareness communicated through general revelation. They know something about God and they suppress that. And so some of the smartest people, most learned people, most philosophically sophisticated people claiming to be wise, they become fools. And then following that in verse 22, there are three sets of exchanges. Verse 23, they exchange the glory of the immortal God for images. and then in verse 25 they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and then the third exchange in verse 26 for their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature. …
… We ask in Jesus' name, amen. We come this morning to Romans chapter 1, verses 18 through 20. Romans chapter 1, 18 through 20. So we continue with this series of Romans, having heard in verses 16 and 17 really the great theme of this greatest letter ever written about the gospel and the revelation of the righteousness of God, we now, on the heels of that theme, introduce a new but related subject, which will be our companion, I expect, for many weeks. Verse 18, For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them. For His invisible attributes, namely His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world and the things that have been made, so they are without excuse. This is one of those passages in Romans, and there will be many more like it, where you need to ask yourself this question. …
… He's thinking about salvation and deliverance from the wrath to come. Verse 18, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. Or chapter 2, verse 5. But because of your hard and penitent heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath. Romans 5 verse 9, Since therefore we have now been justified by His blood, much more shall we be saved from the wrath of God. So most prominently and most simply in this book, salvation is right there. It is deliverance from the coming wrath of God. The implication is that this message, this gospel, which we've already seen in the first opening verses, and we'll see in the remainder of this book, this gospel of the Son of God, descendant of David, raised up, coming again, this Savior on the cross for our sins, this message by itself is sufficient to save you. We believe in the sacraments. Celebrate the Lord's Supper this morning. Christ gave to His church two ordinances. We call them sacraments. Baptism and the Lord's Supper. …
… but all of a sudden he puts the proverbial brakes on. and he gives us Romans chapter one, verse 18, through Romans chapter one, verse 25. He's gonna talk about, I'm just warning you, some negative stuff. You heard it. He's gonna talk about some stuff that we don't like to talk about, that I don't like to talk about, but I've gotta talk about it because it's in the word of God. He talks about, you ready for this? the wrath of God. Some of us have a hard time with that. We have a hard time thinking about using God and wrath in the same sentence. Others of us, when we hear and see the word wrath, we think about our family of origin. Because maybe you had a mom or a dad who raged on you. Or you're thinking about the person you've seen who's just gone absolutely crazy with anger over a situation. Paul talks about the wrath of God. Well, I've got news for you. …
… So this is Romans 1, 18 through 21. The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth of God by their wickedness. Since what may be known about God, listen to this, is plain to them because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made so that men are without excuse. And it says in verse 21, for although they knew God, plain and simple, the Bible is saying here that all people everywhere, all over this map, have knowledge of God, no matter where they live. God has made himself known clearly in creation, in our hearts, so that all are without excuse. No one can say, you didn't show yourself. He has shown himself to all. Of course, not all people say they believe in God. That leads to the second truth. …
Go back to Romans 1 for the indictment that our Lord gives regarding that. Romans 1.18, the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them. God planted the understanding of His existence in the heart of every human being. And we can see that there has to be a Creator by looking at the creation, verse 20, since Since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen. Anybody with half a brain can look and understand the God who created the entire universe. You have to have a cause for this massive universe, and He has to be powerful and supernatural. This is so evident, he says, that they are without excuse to reject the knowledge of God. But they do nonetheless. Even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations. …