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Taking the statements of Rom. 1: we find them worked out in the other epistles :
1. "As God." The creature more
"The man of sin....as God" (2 Thess. ii 3, 4)
than the Creator."
2. "The lie." "The truth."
"The received not the love of the truth...they believe the lie" (2Thess.ii.10, 11)
3. "Given up to an undiscerning mind"
"God shall send them strong delusion" (2 Thess. 2: 11).
4. "Pleasure in them that do them."
"Had pleasure in unrighteousness" (2 Thess. 2: 12)
A comparison of the list of sins in Rom. 1: with that of 2 Tim. 3: 1-7 will show how completely
the para recorded. The reader must supply further parallels by studying the intervening epistles.
The lie.
We must draw attention before closing to the fact that the A.V. is not strong enough in its translation
of Rom. 1:25. It is "the lie." Of this lie Satan is the father (John 8: 44), and the Babylonian delusion
at the time of the man of sin is the climax (2 Thess. 2: 10, II; Rev. 14: 5 (cp. Companion Bible)21:
27, 22: 15). This lie could not dominate the mind of man without something having entered into that
mind at the same time. We have seen that as man robbed God of His glory, he robbed himself of his
highest and best. As he degraded God to the level of a creature, so he degraded himself. The explanation
is given in verse 28. In this verse there is a play upon the words dikimazo (" to try or prove"), and
adokimos (" disapproved ") :
"And as they did not approve to be holding God in acknowledgment, God gave them up unto a disapproved mind, to do that which is not
becoming."
Vaughan, with a certain amount of liberty with the English, expresses it thus: "As they refused. . . .
God gave them to a refuse mind." The glory of God is the last item of importance in the ethics and
culture of material philosophy. It is the sheet anchor of all the teaching of Scripture. God knows why
He placed the ten commandments in the order in which we have them in the Word. They are in the true
sequence. Idolatry is "the lie" in essence, murder and adultery are but" the lie" in practice. The fear of
the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. "There is no fear of God before their eyes" (Psa. 36: I) is the
climax of the dreadful list of Rom. 3: 10-18.
Thus far we have traced the failure of the Gentiles. The apostle's object is to demonstrate the
universal need of the righteousness revealed in the gospel. Consequently he has to show the parallel
condition of Israel with the Gentiles before he can proceed with the opening up of the truth. This we
must study together in another paper. Meanwhile, it would be good for us all to heed Eph. 2: II-13.