Thursday, November 27, 2014

Romans 2:19

Copyright Ó 2014 J. Neely
Romans 2:19

19 And [te] art confident [peitho] that thou thyself [seautou] art [einai] a guide [hodegos] of the blind [tuphlos], a light [phos] of them which are in [en] darkness [skotos],KJV-Interlinear

19  and if you are sure that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness,   ESV

The worst type of fool, is one who believes sincerely that he is wise and not the fool.  And so Paul continues the reprimand of the local Jews, who were proud, wicked and hypocritical, never for a moment believing that they were these things.

There are three types of fool.

The first is simply not interested in the Bible and therefore by rejecting truth, is subscribed by default to the lies of the world and therefore becomes a fool for believing and depending on the nonsense of the world.

The second type of fool, is one who makes a front or a pretense of the Bible or God or such things, but never learns the inaccuracy of their beliefs, and never pursues a learning process in order to learn the truths of life.

The third type of fool, is one who studies diligently, but incorrectly, but misapplies what they learn thus arriving at the wrong conclusions.  This is where the Jews were.  They studied the Law diligently but they missed the whole point of its purpose, believing that its works were a means of salvation, instead of the proof of ones inability to work for salvation and therefore needing a Savior to do all of the work for them.  They missed the principles of salvation, the principles of confession, the principles of the spiritual life and so forth.

Today, most Christians are in the those second and third categories of fools. They know all of the words and stories, but miss the whole point of spiritual growth and development.

Most Christians today, as with the Jews of Pauls day, believe they are right, believe that they are sincere enough, and believe that, that is quite enough for them to be acceptable to God.  And they are wrong.

Unfortunately, most will not discover the error of their ways, because they simply do not look for the errors within themselves. They do not abide by Gods mandate to learn by being taught through study daily, they do not confess regularly and thus remain perpetually out of fellowship.  They do not promote doctrine because they do not know it.  They do not support Bible study, because they are subtly selfish.

Yet they will see themselves as wise in their own eyes, and whatever it is that they do, is quite sufficient as far as they are concerned.

And in the next couple of verses, we will see that they teach or promote their wrong beliefs, never pausing for a moment to check themselves or the accuracy of their own beliefs.

You cannot know if what you believe or know is right or wrong, unless you constantly compare or test it against a standard.

And the spiritual life, being constantly hammered by the world throughout your entire life, demands that you be constantly on guard and alert.  And that comes by means of a daily study.