Romans 1:22-25 22 Professing to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.
24 Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. 25 For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.
Message: Man continues to go down his own path, away from God, looking inward, basically worshiping himself.
Time: Written sometime in AD 57-58, probably from Corinth, at the end of Paul's third missionary journey.
What the Lord is Saying:
Where did we leave off in the previous verses? We left off with the reminder that the knowledge of God is written into every man. And just for being alive, man is witnessing all that God has made, and His power. And in spite of what man can see, man goes inward, rather than upward, to define life and its meaning. All of this begins with a simple act of not giving thanks to their creator for all that He has done.
[This reminds me again of the importance of giving thanks. Do I begin with an attitude of thanksgiving or do I instead beginning with wants and needs? How quickly do I acknowledge that the Lord is always on my side? David continually in the Psalms saw the nature of man, but also saw the Lord being on His side always. I even think about my own prayer time, that I have been better about doing, and yet that prayer time is about petition first rather than thanksgiving. In remembering the ACTS acronym of prayer I learned as a kid -- A is for Adoration, C is for Confession, T is for Thanksgiving, S is for Supplication. I too quickly run to S forgetting the great God, my Sin, and Giving Him thanks for what He has done thus far. Lord, help me return to the lessons of my youth and go to You first with a thankful heart.]
In verse 22, on the heels of darkened heart, man now proclaims his wisdom. I think of the atheist. After pushing away God, the atheist states that they have all the answers. Despite the evidence of creation, the evidence of God's power through weather and events of nature, man does not look upward but thinks answers are found in man. Psalms 14:1 states that "the fool says in his heart there is no God." And verse 22 here repeats this stating that man replacing God with his own thoughts has become a fool.
Again, the God of the universe has made himself known to man. His glory is seen. And in verse 23, man exchanges the gift of God for an idol. [This makes the conversations between followers of God and non-followers painful and a chore because in Romans 1 there is clear progression and clear statement of the workings of man pushing away God and exchanging God for something, that to the follower, is something God created. The Atheist is really his own god. The Atheist wants to be the one that defines life through his own self-discovery. The Atheist has set himself up as god to make the decision of life and death.]
Verse 23 mentions man, birds, four-footed animals, crawling creatures, such as a snake. I think the main point is that God has been exchanged for many different types of gods in many different forms, all springing up from what God has previously made. It all stems from what our eyes can clearly see.
The next verse is a stunning verse. I could see it being a verse that people may get upset over. Verse 24 states that because of man's desire to leave his creator, forsake the creation, define life on his own terms, that God allows--progression of their turning away--to further multiply, to the natural out-working of all that they have done. I wonder if it is like when raising a child or managing an employee. You can step in and correct the problem before the end, or you can let the matter run its course, with the hope that the person would see the error of their ways.
And the reason God gives them over is because in verse 25 man has exchanged that which is true for that which is false, though they think the falsehood is true. That's the funny thing about deception and lies, the hearer thinks it is true.
So, that is my assessment of the verses right there, without looking at any commentaries. Rich verses.
TableTalk mentions that, in verse 25, the act of exchanging the truth of God for a lie is true for religions such as Islam, Mormonism, Jehovah Witnesses, Unitarian, and even parts of Catholicism. This happens when God (or Allah) is defined by what man wants the God to be like. God becomes a creation of vain imagination no less than the other gods of the day that are worshiped.
TableTalk also mentions that this passage is primarily to the Gentiles because they still had idolatry in their lives where the Jews had given up idols.
A sermon I found my Ray Pritchard states that in verse 22, people truly believe that by rejected God they have found truth. There is a clear progression in these verses. Neglect (not giving thanks) leads to speculation (exchanging God) while leads to moral blindness (hearts of impurity) which now climaxes with a total loss of God (worship creation). When a person turns away from God, they always turn to something else. One issue that the atheist just can't see is the atheist is worshiping and is setting up a god, but it is defined in non-faith or non-god terms so they view it instead as a fact of life rather than a belief. Faith can't be duplicated, but they believe science can.
Promise: From TableTalk, when human beings impenitently refuse to love the one true God, God will confirm them in their sin. The Lord gives people what they want.
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