When we come the book of Revelation and gaze into heaven, we see continual expressions of praise to our God. As the four living creatures and twenty-four elders thought of God as Creator they sang: “Worthy are You, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and because of Your will they existed, and were created” (Rev 4:11). When they thought of Jesus Christ as Redeemer, joined by a countless multitude, they sang together: “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing” (Rev 5:12). In other words, as they pondered the worthiness of the Lord Jesus they offered similar praise as they had offered to the Father. The multitude took up yet another song of praise: “To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever” (Rev 5:13). Later, as the redeemed from every tribe, tongue, people and nation gathered around the throne, they cried out with a loud voice, “Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.” Then the angels, twenty-four elders, and living creatures raised their voices, “Amen, blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might, be to our God forever and ever. Amen” (Rev 7:10, 12). Another scene in heaven takes place in chapter 15, as the victorious redeemed sing unto the Lord: “Great and marvelous are Your works, O Lord God, the Almighty; righteous and true are Your ways, King of the nations! Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify Your name? For You alone are holy; for all the nations will come and worship before You for Your righteous acts have been revealed” (Rev 15:1-4).
Now, what is the picture shown to us in Revelation? When beings—human and angelic—are unencumbered by sin, unhindered in sight, and unimpeded in understanding gaze upon the living God worship follows. Did you notice the common threads that ran through these doxological passages in Revelation? The worshipers acknowledge the glory, honor, wisdom, and power of the Father and Son. While worshiping God as Creator happens in chapter 4, the rest of the doxologies contain a gospel context.
My excursus in Revelation is to simply demonstrate that Paul was in concert with the habits of eternity through his Roman’s doxology! Just like what transpires in heaven, Paul calls us to glory in our God by glorying in the gospel. As we considered last week, our God is glorified in and through the gospel of Jesus Christ. We saw previously that God is glorified for His power that preserves His people (“Now to Him who is powerful to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ”) and that God is glorified for His gospel through Jesus Christ (as the “revelation of the mystery which has been kept secret for long ages past, but now is manifested, and by the Scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the eternal God”). In what other ways does the gospel redound to the glory of God? Let’s notice two considerations.
As we considered particularly in chapter 15, the gospel, and the church purchased and shaped by the gospel, is for the nations. While Israel, for the most part, had an “only us” mentality, the OT prophets foresaw the day when the good news would be proclaimed to all peoples. That’s Paul’s implication by the phrase, “but now is manifested, and by the Scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the eternal God, has been made known to all the nations.” Though the good news had been hidden to past generations, Jews and Gentiles alike, now it is made known. Yet, it had already been declared in the OT prophets but it had not been recognized. We read in the Psalms (e.g. Ps 2:11 where the nations are called to worship the Lord with reverence) and in Isaiah (e.g. Isa 49:6 in which the Messiah would be a light of the nations so that the Lord’s salvation may reach the end of the earth) the many passages that speak of the extension of the good news to all people and have no difficulty seeing it, but not so in former times. Is it that they just were not as bright as us or didn’t have as many good resources? That is not it at all but rather, the gospel can only be understood when God is pleased to make Himself known.
Everyone knows a little something about God. It may be very little due to hardness of heart and rebellion but man knows something. God has made Himself known through the conscience yet mankind refuses to consider the moral bearing placed in him as evidence of the living God (Rom 1:19). He has revealed Himself through the creation of the world, even making some of His invisible attributes known through creation yet mankind rejects this revelation, choosing instead to worship the creation rather than the Creator (Rom 1:20-23). This kind of revelation is called general revelation because it is common to all humanity. The sophisticates on Wall Street to the animists in the Amazon jungle stand on common ground in this regard. God has made Himself known through conscience and creation. Even so, the sophisticates and animates both stand together in rejecting this common revelation of God. They may acknowledge some kind of celestial being or power but they live by their superstitions and reason apart from the revelation of God.
The gospel remains to them a secret. Yet God has been pleased to make the gospel known! “But now is manifested,” throws the emphasis on the present-tense revelation of the good news. How did this happen? It came “by the Scriptures of the prophets”—which is another way of saying the entire Old Testament Scriptures, “according to the commandment of the eternal God.” In other words, the reason the revelation of the gospel was formerly not known but now is know to the nations is because God was pleased to make Himself known through the gospel.
Ironically, Paul calls this revelation of Jesus Christ in the gospel “the power of God and the wisdom of God,” while the world considers it foolishness (1 Cor 1:24, 30). Yes, the gospel is odd to the world. Talk of one God creating the world and sustaining it, all humanity corrupted by sin and under divine judgment, God the Son becoming a human being, the God-man dying as a substitute before God’s wrath at the cross, dead for three days, rising from the dead, and ascending into heaven to be seated at God’s right hand, seems preposterous! Why talk of such as that ought to land you in the insane asylum! Or, so much of the world thinks so.
Yet what seems so demeaning and unspeakable—God the Son crucified in a bloody, horrific act of substitution at the cross—gives all the glory to God. That’s why Paul glories in “the only wise God, through Jesus Christ.”
How would mankind devise a means of salvation if it believed that God truly exists and man truly needs forgiveness? First, man would not think of himself to be in such need, considering himself to be basically good and deserving of every favor by the Creator. Second, if forgiveness and salvation were to be necessary, then certainly, just weigh out the good deeds done to compensate for the very few bad ones. That should be enough merit! Or so the world believes. Third, just let man do a little religious activity to procure salvation. He can get baptized, if he dares to be so bold. Of course, he could have his parents do that for him in infancy and it would be just as good. He can show up for religious services on occasion and perhaps leave a generous offering of a ten-dollar bill for the collection plate once in a while. That would be enough for the Creator to open the gates of heaven—wouldn’t it? Or, if so inclined, he could do good deeds for the needy. Yes, since Jesus did so much for needy people then if we do the same surely God will accept that as compensation for forgiveness! Won’t He?
What is wrong with each of those proposals? In every one, man can claim glory. Anything that snatches the glory that belongs to God alone fails. But not the cross of Christ! Not the gospel of grace through Christ alone! It is the only way for sinful man to be made acceptable before the holy God so that God alone gets all glory. What boasting can you make for your salvation? Like Paul we must say, “But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world” (Gal 6:14).
We’ve already considered in detail, as we studied Romans 3-4, the instrument of faith that receives the righteousness of Christ on our behalf. The gospel is by faith so that it might accord with grace, and therefore God alone receives all the glory for our salvation (Rom 4:16). But notice that the commandment of God made known to the nations leads “to obedience of faith.” The gospel of Christ is believed unto obedience to Christ. The Christian faith is a life of obedience. Jesus did not die to make heaven a gift while we live self-centered, idolatrous lives. That’s why Paul rejoiced in the salvation granted to the Romans that led to heart-obedience: “But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness” (Rom 6:17-18). The gospel calls us to be followers of Jesus Christ. How can you follow Him without obedience?
Do you ever find one instance in the four Gospels when Jesus called someone to Himself without expecting whole-hearted yieldedness and obedience? He told the rich young ruler to sell everything that he had, give his treasure to the poor, and to come follow Him. He told the woman taken in adultery, “I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on sin no more” (John 8:11). He told the crowds, “If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. . . . So then, none of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions” (Luke 14:26-27, 33). Jesus Christ becomes our treasure when we trust Him, and as our treasure, our whole hearts are invested in Him.
We miss something by translating eis panta ta ethne as “to all the nations.” While that is not inaccurate, the term “nations” obscures what Paul is saying. We think of nations as geo-political units: Ghana, India, Spain, Brazil, and Kenya, rather than the thousands of different people groups (people united by ethno-linguistic distinctions) that make up those nations. We can look at a geographical unit without thinking of Kurds, Turks, Gypsy, Bosnian, Dayak, Balinese, Malay, Batak, and other people. What Paul has shown in Romans and throughout his epistles (especially in Rom 15 and Eph 2) is that the gospel breaks down the prejudice and bigotry that one people group has toward another. Paul is glorying in the gospel that God has made known that brings the multiplied thousands of people groups unto an obedient faith in Christ! The Holy Spirit unites us into one body in Christ (1 Cor 12:13; Eph 2:11-16). The gospel is for all peoples!
So what does that mean practically? It means that the person of another race or language background or social upbringing or educational tier or political affiliation or any other social or personality distinction is someone that needs the gospel. And we might be just the person that can demonstrate and communicate the gospel to him/her. It is very easy for us to look for people who are just like us to engage with the gospel. But the Lord God has “made known to all the nations” the gospel of Jesus Christ, “leading to obedience of faith.”
One of the issues that Paul addresses in Romans is that of law-works righteousness instead of relying on the gospel of grace through Christ. Now, it seems, that if one would be delivered from sin by God, that he must do things to earn it—at least it seems that way. Yet we saw that, especially in chapters 2-4, Paul showed the Jews that their righteousness did not profit them before God anymore than that of the Gentiles. Even the great father of Judaism, Abraham, believed God so that his faith was counted as righteousness, not his deeds. Paul makes similar point while looking at sanctification in chapters 6-7. Even the work of sanctification, while calling for us to take action to not let sin reign in our mortal bodies, relies ultimately on the grace of God: “Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Rom 7:24-25) The aim in all this is to give God, through the gospel of grace, all the glory: “to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, be the glory forever. Amen.”
The gospel leads us to the glory of God alone. It strips all boasting from us. “Where then is boasting? It is excluded.” It is excluded because man has no works of the law for which to boast before God. “By what kind of law? Of works? No, but by a law of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the Law” (Rom 3:27-28). And so God alone gets the glory. After the apostle had considered the wonders of God’s grace in election and redemption, he stopped to worship. “Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! . . . For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen” (Rom 11:33, 36). From whichever angle you trace it—from the origin to the means to the destination—God alone gets the glory!There is no other god who gets all “the glory forever.” The Philistines boasted for a couple of days in their god Dagon after their defeat of Israel during the time of Eli and his ungodly sons, Hophni and Phineas. But you recall what happened. They took the Ark of the Covenant as a trophy in battle, placing it in the temple of Dagon as a tribute to their god in an effort to give him glory. The next day, Dagon was on his face before the Ark of God! Thinking it was merely coincidence, they put Dagon back on his stand with the Ark before him. But the next morning, Dagon was dismembered before the Ark of God! While the Philistines attempted to attribute glory to their god, he was shown to have no glory before the glory of the living God. Fools that they were for worshiping a false god, they had enough sense to send the Ark back where it belonged!
No other god is “the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God” to whom belongs “honor and glory forever and ever!” (1 Tim 1:17) There is no other god who has done all things “to the praise of the glory of His grace” (Eph 1:6). There is no other god who “works all things after the counsel of His will, to the end that we who were the first to hope in Christ would be to the praise of His glory” (Eph 1:12). There is no other god that seals believers with the Holy Spirit of promise “who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory” (Eph 1:13-14). There is no other god “who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord,” that equips “you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever” (Heb 13:20-21). There is no other god “who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy,” . . . “the only God our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever” (Jude 24-25).
Many object to the revelation of the details in the gospel. They use the word “gospel” but strip from it the sovereign pleasure of God, the bloody price of redemption, and the certainty of God’s wrath upon sinners. But Paul’s doxology is “to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, be the glory forever.” Think of the great themes that we’ve studied in Romans. The first three chapters have shown us the plight of humanity under the wrath of God. The third chapter has shown us that we are justified or declared righteous before God only through Jesus Christ and His God-satisfying, wrath-absorbing, and sin-atoning death. The four chapter declares to us that our works do not contribute one drop to our salvation. The fifth chapter explains that the only peace we have with God is the peace wrought in justification and now experienced in union with Christ. The sixth and seventh chapters show the struggle of sanctification but assure us that our ultimate triumph is in Christ. The eighth chapter echoes that truth, offering the great crescendo of confidence in Christ alone for our assurance. Chapters 9-11 explain the electing grace of God, and that we are chosen by Him as a display of His grace and wisdom. Chapters 12-14 show how the gospel works out in our relationships while reminding us that we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. The 15th chapter spurs us forward with the gospel, while the 16th chapter shows us the significance of relationships through the church. We do not learn any of this by the world’s wisdom. All of it rings of the wisdom of God! “To the only wise God!”
What better place to end our study of Romans than with the glory of God through Jesus Christ! The Greek text displays an ambiguity: (lit. “To the only wise God through Jesus Christ, to whom is the glory unto the ages, Amen”) Is Paul glorying in the only wise God or is he glorying in the Son? The ambiguity is intentional—for we dare not try to choose between glorying in the all-wise God or in His Son! The gospel does both, for the gospel glorifies the Father for His promise of salvation in sending the Son; the gospel glorifies the Son for the Incarnation, death, resurrection, and the work of redemption; the gospel glorifies the Spirit as He applies the promised redemption through the Son, sanctifying us to the glory of God.
While the gospel glorifies our great God, do your life and lips also glorify Him? If you do not live to the glory of God by believing unto obedience to the Lord Jesus then you’re no better off than the worshipers of Dagon. God has been pleased to make the gospel known to you. Give Him glory by your trust and obedience in Jesus Christ alone!
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