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Paul famously says in Roman 1:20 that people everywhere are without excuse in their denial of God and suppression of the truth because God’s invisible attributes and His eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen and are understood through the creation. This is one of the most often quoted verses in the first couple of Chapters of Roman.

I have often quoted Romans 1:20 as a defense of the faith to unbelievers, but Romans 2:1 catches my eye today. It begins with same phrase, “Therefore, you are without excuse….” Except this verse is clearly directed to an audience of Roman believers.

I wonder how I have missed the parallel nature of this statement to believers. Just as nonbelievers are without excuse in their unbelief, Paul says believers are without excuse in a different sense:

“Therefore you are without excuse, whoever you are, when you judge someone else. For on whatever grounds you judge another, you condemn yourself, because you who judge practice the same things.”

Romans 2:1

I have to admit my own tendency to focus on Romans 1 and Paul’s statements that the world is without excuse, because God made himself known, and people in their depraved minds chose not to honor God, embracing sin instead. I tend to focus on the list of sins, including men and women trading natural relations for unnatural ones.

It seems that the world focuses on those things as well. Christians and non Christians alike, and this list of sins has become become a dividing line in the ongoing battle of a “culture war” that wages in the United States.

While Romans 1:20 and the list of sins that follow it seems to have captured our attention, I wonder today why we seem to glossed over what Paul says in Romans 2:1?

The parallel nature of the two verses demands some attention. We dare not focus on one half of the equation to the exclusion of the other half of the equation.

Paul says in Romans 1:14 that he is a debtor to Greeks and barbarians and to the wise and the foolish because the Gospel has the power for salvation. (Rom. 1:16) The righteousness of God is revealed in the Gospel from faith to faith. (Rom. 1:17)

Then, Paul says that the wrath of God is revealed against the ungodliness and unrighteousness of people who suppress the truth (Rom. 1:19) because God has made it plain to them…. Therefore, they are without excuse.

Paul doesn’t stop there, however, and neither should we. In Romans 2, Paul starts out saying that people who judge others are also without excuse! On whatever grounds we judge others, we condemn ourselves because we practice the same things.

This is a sobering statement, and one which we ignore to our detriment and the detriment of the preaching of the gospel.

Again, it’s important to note that Paul is talking to the believers in Rome. He is not talking to heathens and barbarians and people who are given over to their carnal desires.

Five chapters later Paul talks personally about believers’ struggles with sin (Romans 7:15-20), doing the things we don’t want to do and not doing the things we know we should do. Paul is brutally honest about the fact that sin is still a problem for the believer. If anyone ways he is without sin, he makes God out to be a liar! (1 John 1:10)

Of course, believers should resist sin and learn to overcome it. This is a lifelong process, and we only overcome by the work of the Holy Spirit in us as we yield to His direction in our lives.

Yet, the holiest of people – Paul – admits to failing from time to time and giving into or returning to some form of sin. It doesn’t what what the sin is. The sin that causes us to stumble may be different for each one of us. That fact is that we sin, even though we don’t want to sin anymore.

The import of this for the believer, Paul is saying, is that we, should not adopt a judgmental attitude toward anyone. Not even to those who God has given over to their carnal desires. In judging others, we condemn ourselves, says Saint Paul. Paul also days,

“What business of mine is it to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside?”

1` Corinthians 5:122

The timing of this fresh revelation from my daily scripture reading is interesting. My social media feed has been full of judgmental tirades over the opening ceremonies at the Paris Olympics. I did not watch them, but I have certainly become aware of how everyone feels about those ceremonies, particularly Christians.

I know I am late to the discussion, but I have resisted the temptation to jump into the fray. It seems there is much to be offended about, yet the parallelism of Romans 1:20 and Romans 2:1 gives me pause. The judgmentalism of offended Christians screams for a response.

I want to be offended also! But, I am caught up short by Paul’s admonition not to judge the world that God has given over to their carnal desires. I am reminded of Paul’s reminder to the Corinthians – that such were some of you! Before you were washed clean of your sin (1 Cor. 6:11)

I wonder what does our offense accomplish? I am afraid the answer, in the most positive sense, is not much. More likely, our offense serves only to raise the wall higher between the Church and the world Jesus came to save.

Are we surprised that people who do not believe in Jesus, who have not honored God as God, and who God has given over to a depraved mind would mock God and the Church? We shouldn’t be!

Does God need defending? No! Jesus will judge everyone at the end of the age.

In the meantime, Jesus came and died for the very people who mocked him and crucified him!

I understand the outrage and the offense. In expressing our outrage, however are we not simply trying to justify ourselves? Are we not sitting in judgment?

Paul pretty clearly says we should not do that in Romans 2:1, which follows directly after Romans 1:20. Just as nonbelievers are without excuse to deny God, believers are without excuse to judge non believers. Such were each of us before we believed!

But for the grace of God, they are us!

Shouldn’t our response be more compassionate than that? Shouldn’t we acknowledge how we still struggle with our own sins? In that acknowledgment, hot can we judge them? We have less excuse than they do! We know and have committed ourselves to the truth – yet we sin.

As for apologetics and our message to the world, Peter makes it clear that we should be prepared to give defense of our hope when people ask. (1 Peter 3:15) He doesn’t say we should be defend God. He says we should be prepared to give a defense of our hope.

That presumes, also, that people are asking about our hope. If we pit ourselves against the people who might ask about our hope, they aren’t going to ask. If we are judging them, we are pushing them away when God desires that we be attracting them!

Jesus, when he was mocked, didn’t seek to defend himself. He allowed himself to be lifted up to the mocking and the worst that the world could possibly do. In being lifted up, however, his life stood as a testament to the love and the grace of God toward all people.

In the humiliating death endured at the hands of a mocking world, Jesus gave his life for the salvation of all who would believe. He calls us, in the same vein, to offer our lives as a living sacrifice – to pick up our own crosses and follow him as he demonstrated how to live our lives in honor of the God who saves.

As much as I want to be offended, I am convinced that we make a mockery of God’s grace when we are offended. We dare not judge those who mock us, because we (also) are without excuse. We are under obligation to follow Jesus as he lived and died and to spread the Gospel from that position.