No Human Can be Righteous - Part 3. Romans 3:14-20
Romans is talking about the
righteousness of God. The phrase is first used in Romans 1:17—verses 16 and 17 should
be read together NASB “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it
is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first
and also to the Greek.
The first thing Paul says is that God’s
condemnation of the human race is based on the rejection of Him by the human
race and this leaves God in His justice to delivering the human race/mankind to
His own desires. We suffer the consequences of our rejection. The second
direction humans move toward is emphasizing their own morality. In one sense
they go towards licentiousness or antinomianism and then in the first five
verses of chapter two, which is the second point, there are others who move in
the direction of morality, thinking that somehow they can be good enough. They
recognize that morality is necessary to have a productive, stable society. The
third point that Paul makes is that the universality of human failure will be
demonstrated when God judges everyone on the basis of works. All will fail; our
works aren’t good enough. Fourth, God also condemns the Jew because of his
trust in religious externals. The Jews thought that because they were given the
Law, that they had the covenant with Abraham signified by circumcision, that
this meant that they had an automatic get-out-of jail free card. But it didn’t
do that, it just gave them a place of privilege but it didn’t get them saved.
Therefore Paul concludes in 3:9-18 that all are under sin, Jew and Gentile
alike. He gives a conclusion: the application of the Law is that all the world is guilty before God and that the Law is not
the source for justification but is the means of the full knowledge of sin. The
next section is the fact of justification—
For those who think that
somehow we can get righteousness, or for the Jew who thinks that somehow they
can get righteousness through the Law, we have statements from the Torah. In
Ecclesiastes
Paul builds on this and in verse 20 as he
concluded that section stated NASB “because by the works of the Law
no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law {comes} the knowledge
of sin.” This doesn’t refer to simply the externals of Jewish ritual. The term
refers to obedience to all of the Law and an emphasis on morality. The Law
wasn’t given as a means to get righteousness but it is to show that we can’t do
it on our own. Man is helpless, hopeless and it is impossible for us to do
anything whatsoever to save ourselves.
There are those who have been influenced
by the theology that is called “the new perspectives on Paul.” We have to
understand a little about the spasms are of the day so that as we are out there
in the world and talking and interacting with people we can understand some of
the things that are going on. One of the elements in this new
perspectives of Paul idea is that Paul really wasn’t talking about
condemning all morality here, he is just condemning by the works of the Law,
the idea of ritual of the Law only. But that is not true. The phrase refers to
all human efforts, and that is clear from many passages that we have seen.
Psalm 143:2 NASB “And do not
enter into judgment with Your servant, For in Your
sight no man living is righteous.” This is a blanket condemnation from the
Torah that everyone is guilty of sin. Then in Job 9:2 NASB “In truth
I know that this is so; But how can a man be in the
right before God?” In the context of Job 9 Job has lost everything. His three
friends come to encourage him. They look at him. And the knee-jerk reaction of
most people is if you are going through this kind of suffering you must have
done something to deserve it. There is this thought in the mind that somehow if
a person goes through intense adversity then God must be punishing them for
something that they have done. Of course, the flip side would be that someone
who isn’t apparently going through any adversity must be richly blessed by God.
And that, too, is a wrong and superficial judgment.
So Job and his three friends start
talking. There is this dialogue that goes back and forth between each of them
and there is about three series or sets of dialogue where one will take his
position, then the other will give his view, and then the other. They are all
manifestations of the view that that if God is taking you through this, if He
is letting this happen you must have done something to deserve it; you are
basically at fault. In a previous dialogue in Job chapter four when Eliphaz, one of his friends, says, “Can mankind be just
before God?” He is basically saying no one can be just before God so you
deserve this. Job is questioning that, and in Job 9:2 NASB “In truth
I know that this is so; But how can a man be in the
right before God?” That is really the 64,000 question. How are we righteous
before God? And that is what Paul answers in Romans and tells us how we get
this gift of righteousness.
Job and his three friends wrestle with the
question of why these horrible things have happened to Job. Job questions how
he can sit down and reason with God face to face about why this is happening.
And he is saying you can’t. Finally, when we get toward the end of Job God
begins to speak to Job and answers Job’s question—sort of. He answers him by
giving him about a hundred questions and never really explains why it is that
Job went through what he went through. The conclusion is that God is omniscient
and understands all the billions of elements that go into any event, and we
can’t comprehend five of them at the same time. And this is what God is
pointing out to Job: where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Where were you when I created the sun, the moon? It is all to point out that
God’s magnificence, His omnipotence, His wisdom and knowledge of everything and
how puny, limited and finite and restricted our knowledge is that we can’t
understand what He is doing; all we are left with is trusting Him. Job says:
“Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” That is
not an empty faith, not a leap of faith; it is a faith that is based on the
content and the object of the person of God and His character.
These passages emphasize, though, that no
one is righteous before God. This is the continuous testimony throughout the
Hebrew Scriptures.
Romans 3:21 NASB “But now apart
from the Law {the} righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by
the Law and the Prophets.” The opening phrase “the righteousness of God” is the
same phrase we have in
Quotations: The man who wrote this first
one was a colleague of Dr. Chafer’s, for many years the librarian at Dallas
Seminary. What he wrote in the Bible Knowledge Commentary on Romans 1:17
is a little confusing:
This righteousness is
not God’s personal attribute. However since it comes from God [from the source
of God] it is consistent with His nature and standard.
A.T. Roberson:
A
God kind of righteousness. In response to faith
this righteousness is imputed by God in justification and imparted
progressively in regeneration and sanctification, culminating in glorification
when standing and state become identical.
He
has drawn a distinction between the righteousness that is imputed and the righteousness
of God’s character. What is wrong with that? The righteousness that we are
given according to Scripture is the righteousness of God. These writers aren’t
clear on that. The righteousness that is imputed is not something that is
quantitatively given to us. And this is one of those areas that is really confusing.
In
Roman Catholic theology they believe (under the doctrine of imputation and
justification) that the righteousness that we have as a Christian at salvation
is a moral infusion of God’s righteousness. What that means is that you are
changed morally. According to Roman Catholic doctrine there is a moral shift
that occurs because you are actually given quantitatively the righteousness of
God. They would translate, you are made righteous.
When
Martin Luther came to a saving understanding of the Scriptures he did so by
reading Romans and he came to understand that this Roman Catholic view of
infused righteousness was wrong—that we are not made righteous. The idea that
Paul is talking about is that we are declared righteous; we are not
actually given anything quantitatively. We are credited with Christ’s
righteousness so that the Supreme Court of Heaven declares us to be righteous.
The point to be made here is that we can’t distinguish between God’s attribute
of righteousness and what is imputed to us. It is legally imputed to us but it
doesn’t make us righteous.
“the
righteousness of God is revealed…” There is a second element here that is
important for understanding that this isn’t talking about the ongoing
imputation of righteousness. That is the verb there that is translated
“revealed,” the same word that we have in Romans 3:21. The verb that is
translated “is revealed” is a perfect tense verb in the Greek. The perfect
tense means that the action of the verb is completed action, completed and over
and done with at some point in the past. The writer uses it to either emphasize
the present ongoing results of that completed past action or he is talking
about the completion of the action—emphasizing the fact that is was
completed—in a former time. E.g. My mortgage is paid.
Present tense “is” but that would reflect of a Greek perfect tense—that it was
paid off in the past with the ongoing results so that today I can relax, I
don’t have a mortgage to pay off. It seems that the verb here, “is revealed,”
is a perfect passive indicative, indicating that the revelation of this
righteousness is something that was completed and over and done with in past
time so that we are experiencing present on going results. It is a fixed, final
past tense idea. That can only apply to the character of God, not to imputation
unless people are no longer receiving that righteousness. It is completed.
The context also indicates this because there is a contrast between verse 17 and verse 18. Verse 17 talks about the righteousness of God and verse 18 talks about the wrath of God. The wrath of God is a figure of speech that is describing the application of God’s justice. So again it is talking about an attribute of God just as righteousness of God must be talking about an attribute of God.