No Excuses

Romans 1:19

We looked at the wrath of God in our previous article on Romans 1:18. We looked at how God has wrath towards those who are ungodly and unrighteous. We also saw how the ungodly that Paul refers to are the unsaved and that He is angry at them because they suppress the truth.

In the next verse, Paul writes, “because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them.” This verse helps us understand in more depth why God is angry with the unrighteous. It will also show why no one has an excuse.

Simply put, what Paul is saying here is that the unsaved are aware of God. It is manifested in them. The Cambridge dictionary defines manifest as “to show something clearly, through signs or actions.” Therefore, the unsaved know what they need to know of God.

The way they know of God is also shown in this verse. The second half of the verse says that it is God who has shown them what they need to know. God opens the eyes of the unsaved so that they can clearly see Him. He shows them what they need to know.

This was a groundbreaking thought for me when I understood this verse (and verse twenty) a few years ago. No one has an excuse (as we will see more in our next article). No man can say that they did not have the opportunity to be saved or to know God. This verse makes it abundantly clear that everyone has what they need to get saved. God is not hiding Himself from the unsaved. Despite the fact that they are unrighteous He makes sure that they have an opportunity to know Him and be saved.

It is interesting when we consider verse eighteen as well. This is still the same sentence, and we saw at the end of verse eighteen that God is wrathful because the unsaved suppress the truth. Verse nineteen continues this thought by starting with “because.” This shows us that God is angry that the unsaved suppress the truth because He shows them the truth and they choose to suppress it. The unrighteous are unrighteous because they choose it over God and this makes God angry.

As mentioned last time, when the unrighteous suppress the truth they are suppressing God. They are attempting to distract from and belittle Him. God is perfection, and He cannot be diminished, so the devil does what he can to make people look in a different direction. Or perhaps more accurately, he keeps people under a rock. He aims to cloud their judgment. But God is greater then the devil; He still breaks through and the unrighteous are still manifested the truth.

Though the unsaved may have seen the truth, we should still remember that we are called to share the gospel with them. We just read about the importance of sharing the gospel in Romans 1:16-17. We still need to stick to our task and be a light so that the unrighteous see the light more and more.

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