Romans 1 (Pt 5)

Romans 1:24-25 (ESV)

[24] Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, [25] because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

Often our morality determines our theology rather than the other way around. Verse 18 says that they suppress the truth “by their unrighteousness.”

Romans 1:28-29 says,

[28] And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. [29] They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips,

And the list goes on. We tend to view sexual sins as the height of wickedness, but sexual deviance was the second step toward depravity, not the end. There are sins listed in the final step of depravity that we would expect to be part of step one, not the final step. Envy, deceit, gossip . . . these are listed in this final step of depravity. One would expect them, if listed at all, to be in the first step, not the last step. Perhaps these sins are more deadly that we realize.

But the final step doesn’t just include a list of sins. The final step in depravity is not only living in unholiness. The final step in that of approving of those who live in unholiness.

[32] Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. (Romans 1:32; ESV)

The final act of depravity is not sexual deviance. It is approving of those who practice unholiness. It is approving of those who use and excuse dishonesty, unrighteousness, strife, and gossip. That sounds pretty innocuous, but God calls it serious.

So let’s be honest. Over the past year, no matter where you stand politically, no matter where you stand concerning Covid precautions, left or right, conservative or liberal, we have all excused, and sometimes even approved of dishonesty, strife, and gossip. They became a means to an end. Perhaps we are farther down the slide toward depravity than we care to admit.