As you study Romans, here are some questions either you or someone else might have.  To ask your own question, click here.

Did Paul consider homosexuality to be a sin?

Why doesn’t sin seem like such a big deal in our culture?

How could God love Jacob and hate Esau?

When Paul says in Romans 11:26 that all Israel will be saved, what does he mean?

Did Paul consider homosexuality to be a sin?

A better question is this: Does God consider homosexuality to be a sin? When you read Romans 1:18-32, there doesn’t seem to be any room for doubt on this question.  This passage starts by saying that God is angry with “sinful, wicked people who push the truth away from themselves” (1:18).  Because of this defiant attitude, “God let them go ahead and do whatever shameful things their hearts desired” (1:24). And just what are these shameful things? Paul explains very clearly in 1:26-27: 

• Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. And the men, instead of having normal sexual relationships with women, burned with lust for each other.  Men did shameful things with other men and, as a result, suffered within themselves the penalty they so richly deserve.

It’s important to keep in mind that Paul doesn’t stop with homosexuality.  In 1:28-30, he lists several other shameful things: greed, hate, envy, murder, fighting, deception, malicious behavior, gossip, backstabbing, insolence, and boasting. Those who do these things as a pattern of living are those who refuse to acknowledge God (1:28). Furthermore, “they are fully aware of God’s death penalty for those who do these things” (1:32).

Talk about risky behavior! What people fail to accept is that God has set a standard for living, and it’s a standard none of us can keep on our own.  “For all have sinned; all fall short of God’s glorious standard” (3:23).  And the consequence of sin is death, “but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord” (6:23).

Why doesn’t sin seem like such a big deal in our culture?

The reason is that we live in a culture where sin isn’t a popular notion.  Notice when people who do wrong are asked to explain their actions. No one say, “I was wrong,” or “It was my fault.” These days people—even people who are caught red-handed—do their best to deflect the blame.  They will say, “Mistakes were made,” or “It was an error in judgment,” or “I had no control over my circumstances.”

As for God actually being angry with people who sin, people today just can’t accept that.  You will hear people question how a loving God could judge people. Or they will make a statement such as, “I can’t believe that a God of love would send people to hell.”  The truth is that God doesn’t have to condemn anyone or send anybody to hell. As sinful people, we are already condemned. Jesus said, “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn it, but to save it” (John 3:17).

People who don’t think they are sinners cannot appreciate exactly what it means for Jesus to save them.  Only those who think about sin the way the apostle Paul and other biblical writers thought about it know they need a Savior.  Those who ignore or ignore the problem of human sin—that it offends a holy God—need to consider how bad sin really is.

Those “experts” in who think guilt is a bad thing are completely wrong.  The problem in our culture is not that people think to little of themselves; it’s that they think too much of themselves and too little of God.

How could God love Jacob and hate Esau?

This difficult verse from Romans 9:13 is actually a quotation from Malachi 1:2-3.  When you read the verse in context in Malachi, it’s easy to see that Malachi is not talking about the individuals Jacob and Esau.  As Douglas Moo explains, the prophet is using these names “to refer to the nations founded by these individuals: Israel and Edom, respectively. Dr. Moo goes on to write:

• With this Old Testament background in view, many scholars think Paul is speaking throughout this chapter about God’s calling of nations and their place in his plan of salvation. He is not—as so many interpreters have thought—teaching anything about the salvation of individuals.

In this context, the verbs “love” and “hate” in Romans 9 are “covenantal” terms. They do not express God’s emotions about Israel and Edom, but his actions with respect to them. Paul could have just has easily said, “Jacob I have chosen, but Esau I have rejected.”

When Paul says in Romans 11:26 that all Israel will be saved, what does he mean?

Again, you have to look at the context.  Paul has been careful to distinguish between Gentiles and Jews, so he is probably referring to the “national” Israel when he writes about Israel.  In other words, he is referring to Israel in a collective sense, meaning that a significant or representative number of the Israel nation will be saved, not every single Israelite.  This is a future event (11:15) that will occur in the end times.

Douglas Moo summarizes it this way:  “Romans 11:26 does not promise salvation for every Jew alive at the time of Christ’s return.  What it promises is that a significant number, representative of the nation as a whole, will find salvation in Jesus their Messiah.”