Sin — the universal need
Romans 1–3
Romans — five movements
Five movements, one gospel — argued in order from the universal verdict to the renewed life of the redeemed body of Christ.
Paul's gospel does not begin with grace. It begins with the verdict. Before the righteousness of God can be revealed (1:17), the wrath of God must be revealed (1:18) — against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. The first three chapters are the indictment, and the indictment is universal.
Chapter 1 prosecutes the Gentile world: knowing God they did not glorify him; their imagination was darkened; God gave them up. Chapter 2 turns the same prosecutor on the Jew: the one who teaches another, dost thou not teach thyself? Chapter 3 closes the case: there is none righteous, no, not one — every mouth stopped, all the world brought in guilty before God. The conclusion is not pessimism; it is precondition. Justification by faith is unintelligible until the universal verdict is heard.
Key movements
1:18–32 — Wrath against the Gentile world
The exchange of God's glory for an image; the descent into idolatry, sexual disorder, and a reprobate mind. Three times: God gave them up. Calvin: 'There is no remedy for this disease but the gospel.'
2:1–29 — Wrath against the moral and religious
The same charges turned inward. Hypocrisy in the moralist, formalism in the circumcised. The thunder of 'thou art the man' from Nathan's parable, lifted into doctrine: he is not a Jew which is one outwardly.
3:9–20 — The universal verdict
Six OT citations stacked (Psa 14, Psa 5, Psa 140, Psa 10, Isa 59, Psa 36) — the catena of total depravity. The law speaks that every mouth may be stopped. Paul's case-closed sentence: 'all the world… guilty before God' (3:19).
Key verses
- Romans 1:16–17
The thesis. Power of God unto salvation; the just shall live by faith. Hodge: the proposition the rest of the book proves.
- Romans 3:23
All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
- Romans 3:19–20
Every mouth stopped. The law's first office: not to save but to silence.
Christ in this section
Christ is the silent contrast in this section. Every charge laid against humanity is a charge from which Christ alone is exempt — and his exemption is not a private privilege but the basis of the substitution that follows.