Romans 1:21 Commentary and Bible Study

‘They glorified him not as God.’ You knew he existed; you knew he was there, and yet you didn't give him his glory and honour him, and worship him. You glorified him not. You deliberately withheld honour and praise. ‘Neither were thankful.’ What do you say about yourself, to yourself? ‘I've got a marvellous memory’ – perhaps you are able to say that; ‘I'm very pretty’ – perhaps that is true of you; ‘I'm very strong. I have this ability and that gift. I am the God of my life. I am the director of my destiny and my future. It's all down to me’, and you have never thanked him. ‘O Lord, this conscious life that I have that nobody can explain: it is thy creation. These gifts and abilities – certainly they are smothered with so much pride and sin – they are given me by God.’ The apostle is describing us before conversion. ‘But became vain’, futile. Not vain in the sense of proud – we have become that too – but the Greek is vain in the sense of futile, empty. ‘Vain in their imaginations’ and their thoughts. The Greek word translated ‘imaginations’ means their to-ing and fro-ing. They are arguing with themselves in their internal debates. ‘I have a policy of life. The purpose of life is such and such. The destiny of life, everything is here. I can explain human nature’, so we think. But it is rubbish. All our thoughts are vain. You don't recognize God. You banish him from the equation. You cannot make sense of life, and all your efforts to do so are feeble, but you insist on trying. That's what the Bible says. It doesn't matter how brilliant they are in material things. ‘They glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imagination and their foolish heart was darkened. You know what it's like if at night you get up and there's been a power failure and you stumble around the house trying to find your way around in pitch darkness. You can't go at your normal speed. You pick your way around so slowly because you're in darkness. That's the Bible's view of humanity without God, picking itself along its way along through life. ‘Foolish hearts.’ The heart here stands for the mind and the affections and the will, the hub of all my thoughts, and all my words, and all my deeds. The hub from which they flow, is tied up entirely with earth now. The reason for this is explained: ‘Their foolish heart was darkened’, and we have become as it were fools. I have earthly gods, idols perhaps or earthly entirely treasures. Money, pleasure, human thought, political skill, these are the things. I have no living God, no relationship with him, no God of power. I simply have substitutes on earth – horizontal thinking – things which I can control, things which do not bind me to any moral standards. But I have no salvation from God, no help from him, no eternity in my life.