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Pathways Through Paul
Daily Devotional
January 15
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Today's Pathway:
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We now come to the third instance in Romans 1 where God gives those who reject Him "over" to something. In verse 24 God gave them over to uncleanness. In verse 26 He gave them over to vile affections, specifically homosexuality. Now in verse 28 he gives them over to a "reprobate mind". He has discussed their Moral Perversion. Now he deals with their Mental Perversion.
He starts off by saying that these unbelievers "did not like to retain God in their knowledge". The phrase "did not like" carries with it a stronger meaning than we might think. The Greek word for "like" means "to put to the test", "to approve", or "to pass the examination". In other words, these rebels looked at the world around them, looked at what they knew of God, and found Him to be "unapproved." Bruce Hurt put it this way, "This verse means that ungodly men presumptuously put God to the test for the purpose of approving Him. In so doing they determined that He did not meet the specifications which they laid out for a god who would be to their liking. They refused to approve Him as God Who should be worshipped." Does this not sound like the view of many in our world today? They don't like what the Bible says, they don't like what God does, and because He doesn't do things the way they want Him to, they reject Him. As we saw in verses 21-23, they decide that Creator God isn't suitable, so they create their own gods.
Because they didn't find God acceptable, they chose not to think about Him. To think about the Creator to Whom they were accountable would be too convicting, so they pushed Him out of their minds. They already knew about Him (verse 21), but they determined not to learn anything more about Him, and to forget what they did know. How prevalent this is today. The unbeliever doesn't want anyone to talk about the Scriptures. Those who preach the Truth are told to be silent by the rebellious. Creation can not be taught in the public schools. Public reading of the Bible and prayers to God in the name of Jesus are forbidden. Why? Because people who don't like God's doctrine don't want to even acknowledge His existence, for to give credence to His existence demands that you obey His Word, and that is unacceptable to them.
So what does God do? He gives them over to a "reprobate mind". Reprobate means to be "unapproved", or to fail the test and to be determined to be worthless. There is a play on words in the Greek language which isn't as evident in English. Basically, the idea is this: since in their thinking they found God to be worthless (because He didn't measure up to their liking), God gave their thinking over to worthlessness. One man put it this way: "the rejecting mind becomes a rejected mind, and thereby becomes spiritually depraved, worthless and useless!" The end result of having this unapproved mind is that these rebels "do those things which are not convenient". We will see what these things are tomorrow.
Pastor Mark J Montgomery
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