The Guilt of All Men, Part 2
Romans 3:12-20
Look with me in your Bible at the third chapter of Romans again and may I read for your hearing verses 9 through 20 as a setting for our message. Paul writes: "What then, are we better? No, in no way for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles that they are all under sin. As it is written, There is none righteous, no not one. There is none that understandeth, there is one that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way. They are together become unprofitable. There is none that doeth good, no not one. Their throat is an open sepulcher, with their tongues they have used deceit. The poison of asps is under their lips, whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood, destruction and miser are in their ways and the way of peace have they not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. Now we know that whatever things the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law in order that every mouth may be stopped and the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight for by the law is the knowledge of sin."
Paul here is talking about sin and guilt and holding every human being in the world responsible before God as guilty. We've entitled this passage, "The guilt of all men."
Just by way of introduction, in Greek mythology there was a king of the Estruscans by the name of Mizentius(?). Mizentius was known by his contemporaries as a detestable cruel fearful man. It is said by the ancients that no torture which entered into his cruel mind was too horrible to gratify his vengeance. He would do anything.
One of his methods of punishment was hard to imagine. He would tie a living person to a dead person, hand to hand, face to face, lip to lip and leave the person alive in that wretched condition until finally he died in that terrible embrace.
Virgil gives us an interesting account of this practice in the Aeneid so we can somewhat substantiate it historically. And some people even believe it is to that very cruel practice to which the Apostle Paul refers in Romans 7 when he says, "O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death," seeing himself as a new living creature in Christ and yet face‑to‑face with that old sinful part of him.
Now whether or not in Romans 7 Paul actually had in mind this incredible practice, we don't really know. But we do know that when he cried out, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death, he was crying for deliverance from sin. He was crying for deliverance from the unholy and impure passions and appetites which had ruled his body for so long and would still had a residual power in some cases over him. Paul saw sin as a foul polluting reality, offensive to be something that you deeply desired to get rid of.
Now if sin is such a fearful and horrifying thing to the Apostle Paul, imagine what it is to God Himself who is utterly and totally holy. If you'd like to know what God feels about sin, and how He reacts to it and how He describes it, all you need do is look at Romans chapter 3 and the passage we just read. For in this passage more than any other single passage in the Scripture, we have the bringing together of the statements of God regarding the sin of man. It is a composite divine definition and description of the sinfulness of man and his utter inability to do anything about it.
Now remember what I told you last week that as we approach the section that closes Paul's message on sin in Romans, we find ourselves in a courtroom setting and all men were brought, as it were, before the judgment bar of God. God is seated behind the bench as the divine judge who is going to render a verdict in the case of every man. This is Paul's final effort to show the reader the utter sinfulness of men and his climactic argument in showing the sinfulness of man is to use the very Word of God. And so, this is filled with Old Testament scriptures. And so as we said last time, Paul has already showed us how creation points to the sinfulness of man, how reason points to the sinfulness of man, how history points to the sinfulness of man, how conscience points to the sinfulness of man. He's even talked about how the law points to the sinfulness of man. And now he will show us how Scripture verifies the fact that all the world is guilty before God. And this is where the gospel begins, as we've been saying. Before you can come to know God, you must realize you're a sinner and then you can hear the message of a Savior.
Now remember last time we began with this trial. And the first thing in a trial is the arraignment, verse 9. "What then," Paul says, "are we better?" And we told you the "we" here has reference most likely to Paul and the Romans who were Christians. He has already condemned the Jews, he's already condemned the Gentiles as sinners and now he says, in effect, that even those who are Christians are not Christians because they're not sinners, they're not really in themselves any better than anybody else, we are all sinners. We've already proven, he says in verse 9, that the Jews and the Gentiles are sinners and we must be included in that as well so that all are under sin. Believers by their human nature are no better than the rest. We're not anything different, we are just like the rest. We are all under sin.
The whole human race, you see, has inherited the legacy of Adam and Eve. When Adam and Eve fell in sin, they produced a line of sinners that was only broken in the birth of Jesus Christ who in a very real sense bypassed the curse by being born of a virgin conceived by the Holy Spirit.
I read kind of an interesting thing this week. I don't usually read articles on rats, but this was somewhat interesting. And it was telling about rats and how rats multiply. And this was staggering to me. Two rats can reproduce if none of them in the process die 359 million rats in three years. So, check your ivy, folks, you never know what's going on in there. You may have an army march out of there some day. There's very little question as far as animals are concerned that rats are probably the most disease carrying animal. But imagine two rats in three years producing 359 million descendants, all of them disease bearing. And you might have a little idea of what Adam and Eve did. They produced millions and millions, yes billions and billions of offspring who carry the disease of sin. And none of us escapes, that is the arraignment in verse 9.
We moved then in our last study to the indictment in verses 10 to 17, the indictment is in verses 10 to 17 and I told you here you have the specific indictment. God specifically naming the manifestation of sin characteristic of men. It is a collection of Old Testament quotes. This is a rather common rabbinic style of teaching. The rabbis called it a "carax(?)" which literally means to string pearls. And they would string together the pearls, as it were, of wisdom or the truth of God. And that is in very rabbinic fashion that Paul does this, stringing together the pearls of God's statements relative to sin. There are 13 counts in the indictment against men. And you'll know it in verse 10, it begins with the statement, "And as it is written..." In other words, that is a familiar way to introduce quotes from the Old Testament.
Now the 13 indictment counts are divided into three categories. First is character, then is conversation, then is conduct. If this were a medical doctor rather than a theologian and an apostle, we might say that when man is taken in for his exam it begins with Xrays. And the Xray reveals what's inside. And that's where Paul begins the analysis of the sinfulness of man with an Xray to show us his character. Then there is an inspection of his mouth and throat and finally a full physical examination. The result of which is that man is diseased in every part.
Now Paul begins with the character of man in verses 10 to 12, starting from inside. And there are six negatives to describe man, six elements of the 13 indictments appear here. First of all, there is none righteous, no not one. And that is from Psalm 14 as we noted last time. And that simply says man is evil, there's none righteous, no not one. In character, he is evil. He is not good, he is bad...at the very core he is bad.
Secondly, he says there is none that understands. He is not only evil, he's ignorant. He is not only bad but he doesn't understand good. He cannot perceive it. And that again is from Psalm 14.
Then in verse 11 is the third element of the indictment, there is none that seeketh after God. And again that appears in Psalm 14. And that means man is not only bad and ignorant but he's rebellious. It would be better if he was just bad and ignorant and willing, but he's bad and ignorant and unwilling and does not seek God.
And then it says in verse 12, they are all gone out of the way. Not only is he rebellious, he is deviated, he is perverted. And the perversion runs from his self‑will. We might even say he is proud and chooses his own course rather than the way of God. So man is evil, and ignorant and rebellious and deviated.
Fifthly, and this is where we stopped last time, he is useless. They are together literally all together become useless. Unprofitable, says the Authorized. And it really carries two ideas. It is the basic thought of useless but it is useless due to its corruption. It is useless because it's not useful anymore, it has so deteriorated, it is so been corrupted, it's lost its significant use. The Hebrew equivalent, by the way, of the word "unprofitable" is used of milk that has gone sour. And milk that has gone sour is useless. The human race is rancid. The human race has gone sour. It has been corrupted and consequently it is useless. It is, if you will, like branches without fruit, John 15. It is like salt without savor, Matthew chapter 7. Man is useless, he is worthless. He serves no divine purpose. So if you will with Paul to the Xray and you read what he takes of the character of man, you find that man is evil, ignorant, rebellious, deviated and useless to the purposes of God. The Greek term basically means he is good for nothing. In fact, the very same word is used, interestingly enough, in Homer's Odyssey, ancient writing, and he uses it for the senseless laughter of a moron. That's about the value of man. He's about as useless as the senseless laughter of a moron.
I might add also that this statement in Psalm 14:3 adds that man is stinking...or filthy, putrid and thus helps us to understand why he is so useless. He is like milk gone sour. He is like food gone bad that is rancid and putrid and filthy and stinking and he has no value other than to be thrown away. And that is why the Bible tells us that such a man is like a branch who bears no fruit and is thrown in the fire because there's no other thing to do with him than to burn him. And the same occurs to the salt without its savor, it is utterly useless and thrown away. So in a very real sense, hell and eternal punishment reflects the discarding of useless human beings, useless to the purposes of God.
The sixth element of the indictment appears also in this same verse and it is a bracket that brackets these first elements of the indictment because it is almost identical to the first one. In verse 10 it says there is none righteous, no not one. And now in verse 12 it says there is none that doeth good, no not one. And that's basically saying the same thing. Taking it a step further, there is not anyone who is good so there is no one who does good. The idea of good here, chrestotes has to do with moral goodness. There is no real goodness. There is no eternal goodness. There's no God‑glorifying goodness. There's no genuine holiness. As we've been trying to point out to you, we're not saying that man does not do some human good, that there's not some relative good done on a human scale, but ultimately it is not the goodness of God. It does not advance the Kingdom.
So, the sum of man's character is just very clear as you look at it, man is bad, he is ignorant, he is rebellious, he is deviated, he is useless, and he cannot do anything but what is evil.
On one Saturday afternoon in Rukon(?) Glen which is outside of Glasgow, Scotland, it was a lovely summer day and there was a faithful Christian man walking through the park and he tucked in his pocket a Bible. Some young people were cavorting and frolicking around the park and having a great time. And they wanted their picture taken. And so they stopped this stranger to them and they said, "Sir, would you take our portrait, our photograph?" And they were all gathered around to await his answer and he said, "Oh, I already have it." And they looked at him somewhat quizzically and said, "What do you mean you have it? When did you take it?" He said, "Oh, it's right here in my pocket." And he took out his New Testament and he read this to them, "There's none righteous, no not one, there's none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God, they are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable, there is none that doeth good, no not one." And he said, "That is your photograph."
Startling, but true...and then proceeded to present to them the gospel of Jesus Christ. We should be so clever. That is the photograph of man. Now his character will inevitably manifest itself in his conversation. Verse 13, and this is the first place that he goes to show the demonstration of character. You remember what our Lord taught us in our chapter in Matthew 12, "Out of the abundance of the heart...what happens?...the mouth speaks." Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. A good man, Matthew 12:35, out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things. And an evil man, out of the evil treasure brings forth evil things. And I say unto you, every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account of it in the day of judgment, for by thy words thou shalt be justified and by thy words thou shalt be condemned."
And you remember at the time we studied that I pointed out to you Matthew 15 verse 18, "But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart and defile the man for out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, theft, false witness, blasphemies." So the mouth is the first indicator of what is in the heart. And that is exactly where Paul moves in verses 13 and 14 and he quotes, by the way, from Psalm 5:9 and Psalm 140 verse 3 and Psalm 10 verse 7.
The revealer he says of the corrupt character is the mouth. And I think James really supports this. In James chapter 3, you're familiar with this, James talks about putting a bit in the horse's mouth to make the horse obey. He talks about how a ship can be guided by a very small helm that turns the ship one way or another. And he says, "Like a small bit that guides a large horse and a small rudder, or helm, that guides a large ship, so a small thing like a tongue can have a great effect." And he talks about a tongue is like a fire, it is a world of iniquity. A tongue among our members defiles the whole body. It sets on fire the course of nature and is set on fire of hell. He says the tongue can no man tame, it is an unruly evil full of deadly poison. The tongue manifests what's in the heart.
Proverbs 10:32 says, "The mouth of the wicked speaks perverseness." Proverbs 15:2 says, "The mouth of fools poureth forth foolishness." And verse 28 of Proverbs 15 it says, "The mouth of the wicked poureth out evil things."
So, Paul moves then to the conversation of man and nothing is so revealing of his character as his mouth. Like a master surgeon diagnosing the mouth and the throat, he begins down in the throat and proceeds out. Look at verse 13, this is a most interesting thing. "The throat is an open tomb, the throat is an open grave." Now that's from Psalm 5:9, but that is a most fascinating statement. What is he saying? He is saying that the throat is to the heart as an open grave is to the corpse that is in it. When a body is laid in the ground, it only makes sense to cover it. To leave the casket open and the grave open would only expose to all who came by the filth and the rot of decay to say nothing of the stench. Paul says mankind is like a corpse rotting and it is through his throat that the stench comes to recognition by those around him.
John Trapp(?) years ago said, "It is easy to observe that Paul here making the anatomy of a natural man stands more on the organs of speaking than all other members and shows how his tongue is tipped with fraud, his lips are tainted with venom, his mouth is full of bitterness, his throat is a gaping grave, his tongue is a sword to run men through and his throat as a sepulcher to bury them." No matter whether you see the throat as a tomb for burial or whether you see it as I see it as the place where the stench rises, the picture of Paul's words is vivid. Nothing can be more abominable than an open grave with a rotten body putting out its staggering and unbearable smell.
By the way, the word here for open is a perfect participle, indicating that it stays open. It just stays open. The sum of what he's saying, very simply, is man's soul is dead as Paul said in Ephesians 2, dead in trespasses and sin, and the putrid stinking decaying corpse emits a foul and filthy odor that comes through the throat in the form of words. All you have to do is listen to what people say to know whether man is depraved.
Then there's another, an eighth element in the indictment that occurs here. It says moving from the throat, "With their tongues," verse 13, now we come to the throat to the tongue, "they have used deceit." The tense again here indicates a life habit, dolioo is a word that has as a root idea a fishhook and that's deceit. You think you're going to bite on a healthy meal and you're caught and you die becoming someone else's meal.
And that's what Paul says about mankind. And see if it isn't so. You take a man at his word, you trust a man at his word, you take him at face value and you are hooked for the kill because men don't tell the truth. Have you found that to be true in your business? Have you found that to be true in your relationships with unbelievers? It is true.
I'll never forget picking up the L.A. TIMES when I was a seminary student and I read of a terrible crime that was committed in East Los Angeles. There was a sidewalk hooker who was doing her, applying her trade on the sidewalk and a fellow from an affluent part of Los Angeles was over there looking for some evening's entertainment. And he saw this girl and so he pulled to the curb and picked her up.
They drove a little while and he decided to stop and make advances to her, which he proceeded to do. And he took her into his arms and kissed her and little did he know that she had between her teeth a razor blade with which she proceeded to slice off his lips. An unimagineable event. I doubt whether you'd have to convince him that his sins had found him out.
But I've often thought about how that is a very graphic description of what Paul really says here. If you trust the mouth of man you will find yourself hooked for the kill, sliced, if you will. You see, in Psalm 54..or, 57 verse 4 it says, "Their teeth are spears and arrows," their teeth are razor blades, if you will. Psalm 36:3, "The words of his mouth are iniquity and deceit." And then it says it in Psalm 52:2, "Like a sharp razor working deceitfully." You think you're going to get a kiss, but you don't.
Isaiah chapter 59, I think, among other passages speaks to this same issue. "Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save, neither His ear heavy that it cannot hear, but your iniquities have separated between you and your God and your sins have hidden His face from you that He will not hear, for your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers with iniquity, your lips have spoken lies, your tongue has muttered perverseness."
I think Jeremiah saw the same manifestation of the sinfulness of man through his mouth. Chapter 9 verse 3 he said, "And they bend their tongues like bows for lies, they are not valiant for the truth upon the earth, they proceed from evil to evil. They know not me, saith the Lord, take heed everyone of his neighbor, trust not in any brother." Don't trust them because you can't believe what they say. "For every brother will utterly subplant and every neighbor will walk with slanders and they will deceive everyone his neighbor and will not speak the truth. They have taught their tongue to speak lies." That's true. People don't tell you the truth. They say whatever is expedient to gain their end, and that is a revelation of the filthy rotten corpse inside. Man is evil.
And so, from the throat to the tongue and then to the under part of the lips, verse 13. "The poison of asps is under their lips." They seek to draw you near to lure you near and then to destroy you by releasing their concealed poison. One writer describing this phenomena of asps said, "The fangs of such a deadly snake ordinarily lie folded back in the upper jaw, but when the snake throws his head to strike, these hollow fangs drop down and when the snake bites the fangs press a sac of deadly poison hidden under the lips injecting venom into the victim." Their words may appear flattering and subtle, but then they strike.
About two weeks ago a friend of mine told me that his neighbor had found a little baby rattler and he decided to keep it as a pet. No one has to my knowledge, or to his, been successful in having a pet rattle snake...but this fellow thought he would try it. And he played with it and kept it around the house until it grew and then all of a sudden, even though it was still somewhat small, it disappeared in the house and he couldn't find it. And it stayed in seclusion, perhaps hibernating for months and months. And by the time it was ready to reappear it had grown substantially. And one day he reached behind a table to get something that he dropped and when he shockingly tore his hand out, attached to it was a rattler...sinking his fangs into him.
You can't tame man, either. In the end he will revert to his nature and he will dig his fangs and pump his poison to gain his own ends. Man is poisonous.
I think about David in this regard, 2 Samuel chapter 11. And I think about the incredible evening that Uriah spent when David wined and dined him, you remember that? David was up on his roof and he saw Bathsheba taking a sunbath. Man, he got really excited about this lady and figured since he was the king he could have any lady he wanted. And she was the one he wanted. He had a real problem with that area, by the way. And so he developed a strategy and you know the story. But the really amazing part is here was David, God's king, and he brings Uriah her husband in and he wines him and dines him and leads him to believe he's his friend and leads him out to be slaughtered.
Do you remember the woman with the flattering lips in Proverbs? Who leads men down to Sheol to death. And the worse kiss of venom in all of history was the kiss of Judas. It interests me, too, to remind you that Jesus called the Pharisees