Paul is speaking about the refusal of some to repent and turn to God. He warns anyone who lives like this that they are storing up wrath for themselves. The beginning of the book of Romans is quite stern and it takes a harsh line against a lot of worldly things, but we have to keep in mind that Paul is not speaking to Jews who know the one true God and who have the law and the commandments. He is speaking to Gentiles who have made their own gods and their own rules. Up til now they have been serving false gods who require little of them and they have been living by rules made by man and not by God; in other words, rules that benefit man's carnal nature rather than rules that help the creature be more like his Creator. As we get deeper into the letter to the Romans we will find some of the most familiar and most beautiful verses of the New Testament, but here at the beginning the Apostle Paul intends to strike fear in the hearts of Gentiles who have so recently been serving nonexistent gods or who are still caught up in false religions.
He says to the ones who have been unwilling to receive the truth, "But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God's wrath, when His righteous judgment will be revealed." (Romans 2:5) Some modern-day preachers and teachers have strayed from the truth, telling their listeners that a loving God will not judge sin, assuring them they don't have to worry about a day of wrath. But that is not Biblical. Both the Old Testament and the New Testament warn us of the judgment to come. Jesus Christ spoke of the judgment to come. It's true that God loves every human being who has ever existed or ever will exist, but it's also true that He is holy and must judge sin. On the radio the other morning I heard Dr. Adrian Rogers sum it up like this, (and I'm paraphrasing because I don't recall his exact words): "Some say a loving God can't judge sin. But a God who doesn't judge sin isn't a loving God."
Shouldn't God judge unrepentant murderers, thieves, swindlers, child molesters, rapists, and those who perpetrate other acts of cruelty and neglect and prejudice against their fellow man? Could we really say a God who shrugs His shoulders and ignores such things actually loves us? No, I don't believe we could. So we find that God's wrath against sin is a demonstration of His love, and we find that He has made a way for us to escape His wrath if we will have faith in His Son who made the only acceptable offering for our sin debt.
"God 'will repay each person according to what they have done'. To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, He will give eternal life. But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger. There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile; but glory, honor and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For God does not show favoritism." (Romans 2:6-11) Everything to do with God is "first for the Jew, then for the Gentile". Israel is the nation God chose to be His special people. Israel is the nation to whom He sent the law and the prophets. Israel is the nation to whom God made the promise of a Messiah and King. So naturally it is to the Jew first that the gospel was preached, and then to the Gentiles. But being a Jew does not exempt a person from wrath if he has rejected the Lord. God isn't concerned with a person's nationality or his status in this world: He's concerned with the state of a person's soul. Sin will be judged without partiality.
"All who sin apart from the law will also perish apart from the law, and all who sin under the law will be judged by the law." (Romans 2:12) God is not going to judge anyone by what he does not know, but by what he does know. Those who know the law will be judged by whether they have kept the law. Now no one is perfect, and no one has ever kept every single point of the law except Jesus Christ, but a person can live in the spirit of keeping the law. A person can live with a constant awareness of God and His holiness, seeking to honor Him in all things and being willing to repent whenever he messes up. Those who do not know the law will be judged by the knowledge about God that has been made available to them. Remember in Chapter One when Paul said no one has an excuse for not believing in the existence of God, because the very creation testifies to the existence of a powerful and holy Creator? On that very basis alone the Gentiles are judged for not worshiping the Creator and for bowing down to images that look like created things. And now, as Paul is writing his letter, the gospel message is beginning to spread throughout the Gentile world, so that no one who hears it is without excuse for not believing it. An island native in some remote corner of the world who has never heard the name of the God of Israel, and who has never heard of Jesus Christ, and who has never heard of the Holy Spirit, will not be judged by what he does not know. But he will be judged for not recognizing and acknowledging that a God created everything, and that this God is much greater than everything He created, and that He alone is to be worshiped.
"For it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God's sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous. (Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them.) This will take place on the day when God judges people's secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel declares." (Romans 2:13-16) Hearing the law doesn't make a person righteous. Obeying the law does. Hearing the gospel doesn't make a person righteous. Believing the gospel does. I grew up in the church and I can't remember a time when I didn't know the gospel, but this didn't make me righteous. It was the giving of my heart and life to Jesus Christ at the age of twenty-two that is going to make me able to stand before a holy God someday and be told that my sins are forgiven.
Paul is telling his readers that some who know the law have failed to honor the law, but that some who don't know the law have succeeded in honoring it. This is why God's judgment is going to be fair. He is not going to judge you or me by whether or not we are of Jewish or Gentile heritage. He's going to judge us by our hearts. Do we love Him or not? Do we seek to honor Him or not? Does our conscience bother us when we sin or are we able to live however we please without a care in the world? Do we want to be made right with our Creator or are we satisfied by living at a much lower level than we were created to live?
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