Principles of God’s Judgment: Guilt (Pt. 1)

Romans 2:4

⁴ Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? ⁵ But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God,

We have seen that God judges according to definite and identifiable principles.  Thus far, we have identified and explored two of those principles: Knowledge and Truth.  Verses 4 and 5 bring us another of those principles: God judges according to guilt.

(Verse 4-5) - Here the Holy Spirit, through Paul, affirms that God judges on the basis of a person’s true guilt, guilt that is common to every human being, including those, such as ancient Jews, who considered themselves exempt because of their high moral standing, their religious affiliation, or any other external reason.

The apostle first warns his readers not to think lightly of the riches of God’s kindness and forbearance and patience. The famous commentator Matthew Henry wrote, “There is in every willful sin a contempt for the goodness of God.” Every intentional sin takes lightly and presumes upon God’s kindness and forbearance and patience.

Think lightly of translates kataphroneoô, which literally means “to think down on” something or someone and to underestimate the true value. It therefore often had the connotation of disregarding or even despising. This word properly means to contemn, or to treat with neglect. It does not mean here that they professedly treated God’s goodness with neglect or contempt; but that they perverted and abused it; they did not make a proper use of it; they did not regard it as suited to lead them to repentance; but they derived a practical impression, that because God had not come forth in judgment and cut them off, but had continued to follow them with blessings, that therefore he did not regard them as sinners, or they inferred that they were innocent and safe. This argument the Jews were accustomed to use (compare Luke 13:1-5; John 9:2); and thus sinners still continue to abuse the goodness and mercy of God.

Through the prophet Hosea, God proclaimed His great love for His people, saying, “When Israel was a youth I loved him, and out of Egypt I called My son.… I who taught Ephraim to walk, I took them in My arms;… I led them with cords of a man, with bonds of love, and I became to them as one who lifts the yoke from their jaws; and I bent down and fed them” (Hos. 11:1, 3-4). But “My people are bent on turning from Me,” the Lord lamented. “Though they call them to the One on high, none at all exalts Him” (v. 7). It seemed that the more gracious God was to Israel, the more she presumed upon or spurned His grace.

Without exception, every person who has ever lived has experienced the kindness and forbearance and patience of God. Every breath a person takes and every bite of food he eats is by the kind provision of God. God is the only source of goodness, and therefore everything good and worthwhile a person has is from the gracious hand of God.

The riches of his goodness - This is a Hebrew mode of speaking, for “his rich goodness,” that is, for his abundant or great goodness. Riches denote superfluity, or what abounds, or which exceeds a man’s present desires; and hence, the word in the New Testament is used to denote abundance; or what is very great and valuable; (see the note at Rom. 9:23; compare Rom. 11:12, 33; 2 Cor. 8:2; Eph. 1:7, 18; 3:8, 16; Col. 1:27; Eph. 2:4). The word is used here to qualify each of the words which follow it, his rich goodness, and forbearance, and long-suffering. Goodness is kindness or benignity. God’s own kindness is reflected in His children and is one among the fruit of the Spirit that believers are to manifest (Gal. 5:22).

Forbearance - Literally, his holding-in or restraining his indignation; or forbearing to manifest his displeasure against sin. Forbearance comes from a Greek word which means “to hold back,” as of judgment. It was sometimes used to designate a truce, which involves cessation of hostilities between warring parties. God’s forbearance with mankind is a kind of temporary divine truce He has graciously proclaimed. Patience translates a Greek word which was sometimes used of a powerful ruler who voluntarily withheld vengeance on an enemy or punishment of a criminal. This word denotes his slowness to anger, or more properly, slowness to demonstrate or express that anger; or his suffering them to commit sins long without punishing them. It does not differ essentially from forbearance, though it does emphasize a different aspect of that idea. This is shown by his not coming forth, at the moment that sin is committed, to punish it. He might do it justly, but he spares people from day to day, and year to year, to give them opportunity to repent, and be saved.

This is not to say that God is unjust.  This is the way in which people despise or abuse the goodness of God, that is to infer that He does not intend to punish sin; that they may do it safely; and instead of turning from it, to go on in committing it more constantly, as if they were safe. “Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil,” Eccl. 8:11. The same thing was true in the time of Peter; (2 Pet. 3:3-4). And the same thing is true of wicked people in every age; nor is there a more decisive proof of the wickedness of the human heart, than this disposition to abuse the goodness of God, and because he shows kindness and forbearance, to take occasion to plunge deeper into sin, to forget his mercy, and to provoke him to anger.

Until the inevitable moment of judgment, God’s kindness and forbearance and patience are extended to all mankind, because He does not wish “for any to perish but for all to come to repentance” (2 Pet. 3:9). Kindness refers to the benefits God gives, forbearance refers to the judgment He withholds, and patience to the duration of both. For long periods of time the Lord is kind and forbearing. That is God’s common grace or providence that He bestows on all of fallen mankind.

The psalmists rejoiced that “the earth is full of the lovingkindness of the Lord” (Ps. 33:5), that “the lovingkindness of God endures all day long” (52:1), that He gives “His wonders to the sons of men” (107:8), that the Lord is “good and doest good” (119:68), and that “the Lord is good to all, and His mercies are over all His works” (145:9).

Strangely most people do not perceive of God as being totally good. Instead of recognizing His gracious provision, patience, and His mercy, they accuse Him of being insensitive and unloving for letting certain things happen. “How could God allow that little child to die?” they ask, or, “Why does God allow that good person to suffer pain and poor health and permit a scoundrel to enjoy health and wealth?” Such people judge God from an incomplete and distorted human perspective, failing to acknowledge that, if it were not for God’s gracious goodness and patience, no human being would be alive. It is only His grace that allows any person to take another breath (Job 12:10). “Not considering”. The word used here means not merely to be ignorant of, but it denotes such a degree of inattention as to result in ignorance. (Compare Hos. 2:8). In this sense it denotes a voluntary, and therefore a criminal ignorance. This was, of course, developed in our discussion of the first chapter and need not be more than commented on here.  Men are deliberately ignorant of the person and nature of God.  They do not even so much as want His true character displayed before them as it, by the very reminder of it, condemns them and convicts them of their sin.

God is extremely patient with men.  Before God destroyed the world in the Flood, He waited 120 years for men to repent while Noah was building the ark and calling them to repentance through his preaching of righteousness (2 Pet. 2:5). Despite His many warnings and Israel’s continued rebellion, the Lord waited some 800 years before sending His people into captivity.

Rather than asking why God allows bad things to happen to seemingly good people, we should ask why He allows seemingly good things to happen to obviously bad people. We could ask why He does not strike down many other people for their sins, including Christians, as He did with Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1-10). We should wonder why does God not cause the earth to swallow up apostate Christendom as He did with the rebellious Korah and his followers (Num. 16:25-32)? The reason is that God “endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction,… in order that He might make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory” (Rom. 9:22-23).

Leadeth thee … - Or the tendency, the design of the goodness of God is to induce people to repent of their sins, and not to lead them to deeper and more aggravated iniquity. The same sentiment is expressed in 2 Pet. 3:9, “The Lord is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” See also Isa. 30:18, “And therefore will the Lord wait, that he may be gracious unto you;” (Hos. 5:15; Ezek. 18:23, 32).

The purpose of the kindness of God is not to excuse men of their sin but to convict them of it and lead them to repentance.  The word for “repentance” has the basic meaning of changing one’s mind about something. In the moral and spiritual realm it refers to changing one’s mind about sin, from loving it to renouncing it and turning to God for forgiveness (1 Thess. 1:9). Repentance is thus a change of mind, and purpose, and life. The word here evidently means not merely sorrow, but a forsaking of sin, and turning from it. The tendency of God’s goodness and forbearance to lead people to repentance is manifest in the following ways.

(1) it shows the evil of transgression when it is seen to be committed against so kind and merciful a Being.  This is truly one of the “lost” ideas about sin.  We really have little concept of just how truly terrible sin is.  Actually, there is no clear way for us to see the sinfulness of sin except when we compare it to the forbearance and the patience of God!

(2) it is suited to melt and soften the heart. Judgments often harden the sinner’s heart, and make him obstinate. But if while he does evil God is as constantly doing him good; if the patience of God is seen from year to year, while the man is rebellious, it is adapted to melt and subdue the heart.  In fact, it is the only thing that can so melt and soften man’s heart (and is really, the only we actually ought to want to do the melting!).

(3) the great mercy of God in this often appears to people to be overwhelming; and so it would to all, if they saw it as it is. God bears with people from childhood to youth; from youth to manhood; from manhood to old age; often while they violate every law, contemn his mercy, profane his name, and disgrace their species; and still, notwithstanding all this, his anger is turned away, and the sinner lives, and “riots in the beneficence of God.” If there is anything that can affect the heart of man, it is this; and when he is brought to see it, and contemplate it, it rushes over the soul and overwhelms it with bitter sorrow.

(4) the mercy and forbearance of God are constant. The manifestations of his goodness come in every form; in the sun, and light, and air; in the rain, the stream, the dew-drop; in food, and raiment, and home; in friends, and liberty, and protection; in health, and peace; and in the gospel of Christ, and the offers of life; and in all these ways God is appealing to his creatures each moment and setting before them the evils of ingratitude, and beseeching them to turn and live.

The person who, because of stubbornness and an unrepentant heart, presumes on God’s kindness, forbearance, and patience, is simply storing up wrath for himself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.