Romans chapter 2, if you'd open your Bible please to Romans chapter 2. Ever since chapter 1 verse 18, Paul has been talking about the wrath of God. Romans 1 18 says, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. And since that verse, Paul has addressed the secular person who rejects God and rejects God's truth. He's also addressed the moralizer who thinks he's good enough to gain God's approval, to escape God's wrath. And in our passage this evening, Paul is gonna kinda step back a bit and take in the big picture for us. So chapter two, and beginning in verse five, But because of your hard and impenitent heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath, when God's righteous judgment will be revealed. He will render to each one according to his works. To those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor in immortality, He will give eternal life. But for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek. But glory, honor, and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek, for God shows no partiality. Let's pray together. Our Father, as we come back into this deeply theological book of Romans, I do pray that you'll help us to have keenness of mind and clear thoughts, putting aside all distractions, that we may focus on the theology that is contained in these verses. And I pray, Lord, that you will help us to gain understanding and that we might properly apply these things in our lives. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. Many of those who are outside of the Christian faith and yet do believe in God do not base their understanding of God on God's revelation, that is to say, the Bible. Instead, they prefer to see God as that nice old man upstairs. An irreverent way of viewing God. The nice old man upstairs who never gets angry. Because after all, they reason from their own fallen thinking. They reason that God is love, and He is. And therefore, from their fallen perspective, God will overlook all of their unrighteousness, all of their evil deeds, and just pretend like they never happened. And of course, He will not do that. The Bible reveals just how wrong this sort of thinking is. And especially the passage we're looking at this evening addresses this head on. God reveals himself in the Bible as a God of love who is also a God of justice and his justice demands that he show forth his wrath when he encounters sin. In fact, God is provoked to wrath and anger by sin. There is a theme that we can trace through the Bible, all the way back in Ezra, chapter eight and verse 22. Ezra says this to King Artaxerxes, the hand of our God is for good on all who seek him, and the power of his wrath is against all who forsake him. You see, the first part is true, but the second part is also true. And to have an accurate view of God, you must take in both parts of that verse. Nahum chapter one, verse two says, the Lord is a jealous and avenging God. The Lord is avenging and wrathful. The Lord takes vengeance on his adversaries and keeps wrath for his enemies. That's in the Bible. And we encounter it not only in the Old Testament, but also in the New Testament. And we're seeing that throughout this series of messages in Romans 1 and 2. This evening's passage is completely in line with those other passages that I just read. And the specific message of our passage this evening is this. God's wrath is righteous judgment. on evildoers. Now, as I read those verses, I don't know if you picked up on this, but this passage is in a chiastic or X kind of pattern. You may have heard that term before, this idea that, you know, kind of the first verse gets paired up with the last verse and so on toward the middle of the passage. And so, verse 6 pairs with verse 11. Verse 7 pairs with verse 10. Verses 8 and 9 form a pair in the middle. And so this is going to be the way we approach the passage tonight, kind of from the outside in, working our way toward the middle of the passage. And so let's start with that outermost pair of verses, verses 6 and 11. In these verses, we see the equitable nature of God's judgment. God is just. His judgment is just and right and fair. And we see in verse six that his judgment is fair because his judgment is according to one's works. We could use the word deeds or actions there, what one does. And so as you look at verse six, it says, God will render to each one according to his works. Now the Greek word for render literally means to give back, to repay, to recompense. Sometimes it's translated that way. We could even use the word reward in the sense of being rewarded in accordance to what one deserves, whether positive or negative. So it could be a positive reward, it could be a negative reward. This principle of divine rendering is found throughout the Bible. Paul, in fact, may be quoting here from Psalm 62, 12. It says, and that to you, O Lord, belongs steadfast love, for you will render to a man according to his work. Jeremiah 17, 10 says, I, the Lord, search the heart and test the mind to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds. The writer of Hebrews writes in Hebrews 11.6, and without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. So there it's reward in a positive sense. Now, maybe you're thinking deeply and theologically at this point, and you're saying, how do we reconcile what is said here in verse six with the truth that salvation is by grace alone and not by works? Well, the answer to that question is to realize that the statement here in verse six pertains to judgment. not to a means of salvation. And so it's important to separate the two. Justification in salvation is entirely by grace and not by works. But judgment will be on the basis of one's works. And we can see that very plainly if you'll just hold your place here and turn back to Revelation chapter 20. As we look at the great white throne judgment of this passage, the final judgment that all those who have rejected God, who have not accepted Christ as Savior will face this judgment, Revelation 20 and verse 11. Then I saw a great white throne and Him who was seated on it. From his presence, earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne. And books were opened, and another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books according to what they had done. And the sea gave up the dead who were in it. Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done. So it is a judgment according to works. And in this case, it's going to be a judgment for unbelievers, and their works are not going to measure up to God's standard, and they are going to be condemned to an eternity in the lake of fire. So kind of to summarize here, how do faith and works relate? Well, John Stott wrote this, the presence or absence of saving faith in our hearts will be disclosed by the presence or absence of good works of love in our lives. And so when we talk about those kind of works, we're talking about the works that result from salvation. They're not the basis of it or the cause of our justification. They're the works that result from salvation. And you know this, you know Ephesians 2, 8 through 10. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not of your own doing, it is the gift of God, not of works, so that no one may boast, for we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for what? Good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. So these are the works, not that lead up to and cause our salvation, but they're the works that result from our salvation. And our salvation is entirely by grace through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. So we can reconcile all of these doctrines if we just understand, as we go back to Romans chapter two, that this passage is really talking about the works of judgment in judgment. So verse six describes the equitable nature of God's judgment in terms of God rewarding each one according to their works. Now the verse that's paired with this is verse 11. And this verse informs us that God's judgment is without partiality. It simply says, for God shows no partiality. This is a statement of fact. pertaining to the very nature and character of God himself. He is the impartial judge of all the earth. He shows no favoritism. He holds no prejudice, not even between Jew and Gentile. As the King James puts it, he is no respecter of persons, completely impartial. David Abernathy writes this, the primary point is that God's impartiality demands that he judges all people on the same basis, end quote. And as we have just learned, that basis is in fact their works. Ephesians 6, 9 is addressed to masters. It says, masters, do the same to them and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their master and yours is in heaven and that there is no partiality with him. No partiality with God. Colossians 3.23 says, whatever you do, work hardly as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. For the wrongdoer will be paid back for the wrong he has done. And then the rest of that verse says, and there is no partiality. No favoritism. Nobody's gonna be able to come up to God's bench of justice and hand him a bribe. And he's gonna just look the other way and pretend like that crime or that sin never happened. Not so with God. He is impartial. So God's wrath is righteous judgment on evildoers. And we've seen here the equitable nature of God's judgment in this outermost pair of verses. It will be judgment according to each one's works. It will be judgment that is completely impartial. Now we go to the next pair of verses, going toward the middle of the passage, and this would be verses seven and 10. Verse seven says, to those who by patience and well-doing seek for glory, honor, and immortality, He will give eternal life. And the verse that's paired with that, verse 10, glory, honor, and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first, and also the Greek. What I'd like to do in evaluating these two verses is I'd like us to look at them in terms of this group that's being described here and understand what are their goals, what are their works, and what are their rewards. So in terms of goals, those in this group seek for glory, honor, and immortality. That's how their goals are described. If we take each of these one at a time, glory, I think Charles Hodge is correct when he says, glory refers to the excellence of the saint's future condition, a condition that is, in fact, worthy of honor. And so glory is related to honor. These two words are often together in different verses of the Bible. So glory, think of our future glorification, if you will. And then honor speaks of God's approval. And so this is honor really coming from God. And immortality relates to the hope of the resurrection that all believers share. And that hope is fulfilled with an eternal life that is in the presence of God. And so the goals here are described as glory, honor, and immortality. And together they represent the eschatological hope of this group. That is to say, what's going to happen in the end times? As they look, as we look to the future, this is in fact our hope, glory, honor, and immortality. So these are things that we're hoping for. These are the blessings after which the people in this group are seeking. And these are the overarching goals that motivate their works. And so that brings us from goals to works. Now, verse seven mentions patience in well-doing. The New American Standard renders these words perseverance in doing good. A very literal rendering of the Greek would be perseverance in good works. So we're talking about works here. And perseverance would imply that we're talking about really the span of one's life. This is a life pattern of doing good works. And the word good here speaks of moral goodness, but it also speaks of that which is wholesome and beneficial. And so in verse seven speaks of patience and well-doing. Verse 10 describes the works of this group as doing good. Everyone who does good, it says. And really this verse is saying the same thing about the same people, but with an emphasis on the action. So they actively and deliberately do good. And so in summary, by God's own criteria and evaluation, their works are judged to be good. So what rewards might they receive as a result? Well, verse seven says their reward is eternal life. This is what God renders to those in this group. Their reward, their blessing, is eternal life. Now, eternal life is mentioned very often in John's gospel that we've been studying on Sunday mornings, more than any other book of the New Testament. And directly relevant to the passage we're looking at would be John 3, 36, that says, whosoever believeth in the Son hath eternal life. And whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. So we see the theme of eternal life here, we see the response of obedience, and we also see the wrath of God in view in that verse. And then John 5, 24, Jesus says, truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me hath eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life. And so we see Paul here in Romans 2 talking about these two different groups. We see John writing about these two groups. We see Jesus talking about these two groups as well. And so verse 7 says the reward is eternal life. Verse 10 mentions some of the blessings that come with this eternal life. So we have glory and honor. These are the very things that people in this group are seeking after. We've already talked about those. And then peace is mentioned, peace. This is a comprehensive peace, probably on the order of the Hebrew idea of shalom peace. The idea of shalom is wellness of the whole person, well-being of the whole person. It would include peace with God and inner peace, rest for the soul. So these are the rewards given to this group, a group that seeks glorification, God's approval, and immortality, a group that does good works as a result of their justification by faith. They will obtain eternal life and with it glory, honor, and peace. So we see that God's equitable judgment is poured out upon those who do good. They receive good rewards. Now we come to the innermost pair of verses in this passage. Verses 8 and 9 speak of God's equitable judgment for those who do evil. Let's reread those verses. But for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury, there will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek. Now, no doubt you've noticed how God's equitable judgment is reinforced time and time again through this passage, and we have this phrase at the end, the Jew first and also the Greek. You know, God is impartial. God is entirely fair. He includes everyone in his judgment. But we have a group that's described here, and we want to look at their goals, their works, and their rewards. starting with their goals. How are the goals of this group described? Well, this group is described as self-seeking. The Greek word originally referred to someone who would be serving for hire, a hired servant. like that of a day laborer. In other words, it's somebody who's working and they're getting something back for that. Something, their very own pay that they can put in their pocket. The word over time came to mean self-interest of selfish ambition. So you can kind of see the connection there. And it can even mean in some contexts, contention. Especially when someone in this group is pursuing their own self-interest and that conflicts with the interests of somebody else. There could be contention. And so the attitude of this group is, what's in it for me? What benefit or pleasure will I get out of this? And that's the way they approach all of life. It's what's in it for them. The Greek philosopher Aristotle used this Greek term to describe those who were self-seeking in their pursuit of political office by unfair, self-promoting means. All about self. It's all about me. That's the attitude of this group. And so all of their life goals are kind of wrapped into this idea of what's in it for me. Well, what does that lead to? What kind of works do we see in their lives? Well, their works are described here using a couple different words, a few different words. The first word, they say they do not obey the truth. We'll use the word disobedience. They're disobedient. Truth in this context refers to divine revelation, beginning with God's own self-revelation, even in His creation. We studied about that back in Romans 1. And so they're disobedient to the truth. Back in Romans 1.18 it says, For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. And so this is a group that does not obey God's truth and beyond just kind of passively being unresponsive to it, they actively suppress the truth by means of their own unrighteousness. So they're disobedient to the truth. Another term that we would encounter here is unrighteousness. People in this group naturally and consciously do those things that transgress God's standards, His righteous standards of morality, of spirituality, and of justice. So their works can be described as unrighteous. And then verse nine describes their works as evil. And in this passage, this word is put in contrast to the word good that we talked about in the other group. And so there's a sharp contrast here. This word evil broadly includes that which is morally wicked, but also that which would be harmful to others. And verse nine goes on to stress the individual accountability before God. You may have picked up on this. It says, there will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil. Each and every one, that's the emphasis here. Every human soul will be taken to account before God. They'll receive exactly what they deserve in judgment. So that's how the works of this group are described. Disobedience to the truth, unrighteousness, and evil. They're evildoers. So what rewards might this group expect to receive from God? Well, it's going to be negative, negative rewards, rewards in a negative sense. And verses eight and nine describe their rewards using two word pairs. And so let's take each of these. First we have in verse eight, wrath and fury. These two words often occur together in the scriptures. They're sort of like two sides of the same coin, if you will. In this case, both have to do with God's anger. his righteous indignation towards sinners. And commentators debate on whether this is just two words that are kind of synonyms that are emphasizing the severity of this, or whether these two words have maybe a nuance of meaning that would separate the two a little bit. And I tend to go into that latter group of thinking to quote from Richard Trench, an older work, Synonyms of the New Testament. He says the word wrath, which is the Greek orge, is the abiding and settled habit of the mind. And the word fury, which in the King James, the translation's different to wrath, okay, that can cause some confusion. But the word fury in our text is the Greek word thumos. And Trench says, this describes more of the turbulent commotion, the boiling agitation of the feelings. And so, yes, they're both having to do with God's anger. They're both describing God's anger, but maybe in slightly different ways. We could think of Orge as the posture of anger, and we could think of Thumas as the expression of God's anger. And so, again, we have this word pair, wrath and fury, and the King James indignation and wrath, and these are both describing God's anger. And then also the other word pair that we have in verse 9, tribulation and distress. Now if you trace back the Greek words and you look at their etymology, the former word literally has the idea of pressure. And the latter word literally speaks of being in a tight or narrow place. Isn't that interesting? So it's kind of using this imagery, it's using these terms more in a metaphorical sense of the pressure of affliction and the squeeze of distress. You can think of it that way. And so the word tribulation kind of focuses on the inner anguish whereas the latter term focuses on the external circumstances, tribulation and distress, the pressure of affliction and the squeeze of distressing circumstances. Now, as you think about these rewards, certainly they are very negative rewards that are described here, for those who do evil, We might think that God is doing this, He's rewarding these people in this lifetime. And indeed, that is the case, is it not? That very often, evildoers will suffer God's judgment in some form during this lifetime. But in this context, these negative rewards are primarily eschatological, having to do with final judgment. just as the positive rewards for those who do good were eschatological. And we go back now to verse five and it confirms this understanding. Here is Paul writing to those who do not believe in Jesus. They have rejected God's truth. It says, because of your heart, an impenitent heart, you are storing up wrath for yourselves on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed. So when you look at those rewards in the context of verse five, it's very clear that these rewards come ultimately at the final judgment. And indeed, we understand what sinners who have not come to saving faith are condemned to, an eternity in the lake of fire. And all of these things will be true. And so in verses 8 and 9, we see God's equitable judgment for those who do evil. Just to review their goals, they seek to please themselves instead of seeking to please God. Their works are disobedience, unrighteousness, and evil. And their rewards are wrath and fury from God, tribulation, and distress. God's wrath is righteous judgment on evildoers. So as we think our way through this section of Romans, and we think about how Paul just keeps talking about the wrath of God, and he's addressing all of these different groups, he's going to very soon focus in on the Jewish people in particular. And what he's saying time and time again is you need to listen up. No matter which group you're in, God's wrath is coming. God's wrath will be poured out on evildoers. And so what have we seen in this passage? What have we learned? Well, one important takeaway from this is we need to keep in view that God's judgment is equitable. He is fair. We can never ever question God's judgment. It is entirely fair. For God judges each one on the basis of their own works. And so no one who's standing before God on judgment day can say, well, the devil made me do it. Can't use that excuse. Well, my parents are the problem. Can't use that excuse. Well, I got associated with the wrong friends and they made me do it. No, that excuse is not gonna work either. We cannot shift the blame. Like Adam and Eve tried to do, right? Adam said it was the woman that you gave to me, God. He's shifting the blame to the woman and to God. The woman said it was the serpent who made me do it. So this habit of trying to shift the blame has been around all the way since the Garden of Eden. And people are still thinking that they're gonna stand before God and they're going to get a bye, they're going to escape God's wrath because they can shift the blame to somebody or something else. It's the devil, it's my home that I grew up in, it was the people I ran with, it was the environment I was in. No, no, we cannot shift the blame. God's judgment is impartial and equitable and He will judge each one on the basis of their own works. And those who do good as a result of being justified by grace through faith and then have works, good works, as a result of salvation will receive their just rewards. And those who do evil will receive their just rewards as well. Everyone will be judged fairly and equitably by the judge of all the earth. The Bible is full of warnings for those who just think that they're going to escape the wrath of God by somehow convincing God that he ought to let them into heaven. Hebrews 10 verse 26 says, for if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sin, but a fearful expectation of judgment and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. And later in that same chapter, verse 30, it says, for we know him who said, vengeance is mine, I will repay. And again, the Lord will judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. I want to close with this quote from John MacArthur. He writes this, God does not judge on the basis of religious profession, religious relationships, or religious heritage. But among other standards, he judges on the basis of the products of a person's life. An issue on the day of judgment will not be whether a person is a Jew or a Gentile, whether he is a heathen or orthodox, whether he is religious or irreligious, or whether he attends church or does not. An issue will be whether or not his life has manifested obedience to God. On that day, each one of us shall give account of himself to God. Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you that you are the righteous judge of all the earth. You always do right. Your justice is fair. Your judgment is equitable, and we know, Lord, that you do show your wrath and anger upon those who sin. We know that there are times when your judgment is temporal during this life, and you do reward those in this life who do evil according to their ways. But, Lord, we know that ultimately there is a final judgment. And we know that everyone will have to stand before you and give an account of what they have done. And Lord, for those who do not know Christ, there is that fear of judgment of the last day at the great white throne, when you will declare them to be condemned and you will send them to an eternity in the lake of fire. And for the believer, we know that we will face the judgment seat of Christ, the behemoth seat of Christ, and we will be judged according to what we have done, and we will receive rewards for the good that we have done. We thank you, Lord, that your judgment is equitable and fair and good. In Jesus' name, amen.