Throughout the first chapter Paul deals with law (1:1-11, 18-20) and grace (1:12-17).
One by one, the Australian states have adopted extreme euthanasia laws, to go alongside their extreme abortion laws and their celebration of LGBTQI lifestyles. Now, New South Wales is being pressed as the last domino to fall, as it were. We are all supposed to be progressive these days, and …
Verses 16-17 are set side-by-side as contrasts, yet they belong together in Paul’s mind.
‘Flee idolatry’ was Paul’s message back in verse 14, 20-21. But what about outside the pagan temple?
It is not misleading to say that the West celebrates what it calls diversity (it is actually conformity), whereas the Bible is concerned with truth. It is very serious to worship the wrong god – Romans 1:21-23.
Thomas Bilney: ‘O most sweet and comfortable sentence to my soul’. Bilney felt what he described as ‘a marvellous comfort and quietness, insomuch as my bruised bones leaped for joy.’ About 1524 he conveyed its message to Hugh Latimer.
Enticing to sin is a part of Satan’s very nature – Matt.4:3. Calvin defines temptation as ‘everything that allures us.’ Verse 12 is a warning, and verse 13 reads more like a promise.
John Bunyan’s second most famous book, after The Pilgrim’s Progress, is his autobiographical Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners. He received the inspiration for the title from verses 14-15.
This is clearly written to those inside the church, not those outside.
