Amen. You may grab your Bible and remain standing, please. Just going to read one verse. It won't be long. Romans Chapter 1. Romans Chapter 1. I think Romans Chapter 1 is going to be like Revelation Chapter 21 and 22. I don't know. We'll see. Romans Chapter 1 in your Bible. Verse number 18, Romans 1 18 says, For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in unrighteousness. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you, Father, for the opportunity to open it today. Lord, we just pray that you'd meet with us and you'd have your way. Look forward to all that you're going to do in Jesus name. Amen. All right. You may be seated. All right, Revelation, Romans chapter one. Romans chapter one and verse number 18. Continuing here, there are multiple fours in this chapter, and I don't mean the number four. At the beginning of this verse, it says for the wrath of God. Well, this is right after another for, and that is, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed, and so on. And that is right after another for, which is, for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ. And so, this continuing the thought here, We begin with Paul introducing himself and speaking about his audience there, the Romans, and we go into the next several verses and he begins to talk about how God has given the gospel not only for the Jew, but also for the Gentile, not only for the Jew, but also for the Greek, not only for the the. Yeah. the Greek, but also the barbarian, not only to the wise, but also the unwise. The gospel is is made available to all. And he says, so as much as in me is I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also for this is the first four here in this group of force. There are there are three force. I know there's probably more than that, but there are three verses that start with four here says for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ. Well, here's another four for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth to the Jew first and also to the Greek for therein is. The righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith as it is written, the just shall live by faith for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in unrighteousness. This verse begins the rest of the chapter. I know that's cliche, right? It's like saying today is the first day of the rest of your life. Yeah. Yeah. So this verse, but it does begin the thought for the rest of the chapter. We're not gonna finish out the rest of the chapter today, sorry. We don't have enough time. And I like that clock. I like that clock a lot better than the other one. It's okay, you can look at it, I like it. I like it, it's nice. But that was the last time you look at it, don't look at it again, ever. No, I'm kidding. So, I've got three main points today. Was it just two last week, wasn't it? Yeah, man, the messages are growing on me. So they all start with, they all start with the. Oh, how'd you get three last week? Did I have three last week? I did, it was to the week before. It was to the week before. So see, they they didn't make it and they still took notes. They got their notes. They're ready to go. Amen. All right. So I'll give you the three points since my wife isn't in here. I'm just kidding. You know, she's like, why you give us all the points up front? That's right. The revelation of wrath is the first point. The second point is the recipients of wrath. And the third point is the reason for wrath. All right. So it just makes it easy and simple there. It's a whole bunch of right. Revelation of wrath, recipients of wrath, and reason for wrath. Alright, so looking at the revelation of wrath, this is the verse here now. The verse after this is going to talk about other things that are revealed, but in this verse we're looking at the wrath of God being revealed. As the verse starts with, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven. I tried to keep all of these poetically done. Here we have the reality of God's wrath. The reality of God's wrath. Wrath is not just an Old Testament concept. It continues in the New Testament. It continues today. Wrath. I know I'm trying to be positive in my tone as we talk about something that's negative, right? What is wrath? Isaac, what's wrath? Sir, what's wrath? Wrath. But God's wrath. Judgment, destruction, what'd you say? A way of venting? Well, yeah, when it's from a human perspective, yeah. God doesn't vent. That's right. The reality of God's wrath. It is a reality no matter the time. God's wrath. The fact is, well, I don't want to go too far yet. I'll talk about some of those things in a little bit. but in in in john chapter 3 oftentimes people go to john chapter 3 to talk about uh the you know john 3 16 right that god so loved the world that he they talk about the love of god right but verse number 36 says he that believeth on the sun hath everlasting life and he that believeth not the son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him." Yeah. So, all of my notes are negative. This morning I was contemplating after having completed the notes and everything yesterday. And I typically try to have it done Saturday so that I'm not, you know, like last week, for some reason, I was having to play catch up a little bit on Sunday morning. But I like it to be fresh. I know some preachers that are like, in fact, Spurgeon it was. He talked about the lazy Saturday study time for the preacher. It's like if you wait until Saturday to study for your message. That affected me for a while. I used to make sure that all of my messages were ready on Monday for the following week. But then you live life. and you forget the passion and the excitement of what God gave you in the study. And so I've now moved it to Saturday at the soonest, usually, to where I'll be thinking about it throughout the week, and then Saturday is when I sit down and compile it and everything. But then, this morning, I was thinking, man, it's all negative, I've got to get into the positive. Maybe I'll do that. Or maybe I'll just leave you with all the negative, because that's what the verse is about. It's about the wrath of God. In Hebrews 10.31, what's it say? It is a fearful thing. to fall into the hands of the living God." The verse, yeah, your bulletin is wrong, I'm sorry. There were a few things. My wife and I were just resting, in bed resting, and I handed her the laptop and said, here you go, do the bulletins. And so that's why there are a few minor errors on the bulletins. Ignore them. They are there. Look at your Bible for the correct text there. So, we'll try to do better next time. That's true. Letter B here. So we talked about the reality of God's wrath. Letter B, the righteousness of God's wrath. The righteousness of God's wrath. It's not just response to sin in that sense. It's not God just jerking His knee in a reaction. It's God's righteousness in Nahum chapter 1. There's a book in the Bible called Nahum, if you haven't noticed. It's in the Old Testament. Toward the end, it's one of the minor prophets. Chapter 1, verses 2 and 3 says, God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth. The Lord revengeth and is furious. The Lord will take vengeance on His adversaries, and He reserveth wrath for His enemies. He doesn't just react, it's righteous. Nahum 1, 2, and 3, but I haven't read verse 3 yet. The Lord is slow to anger. So He doesn't just react, He's slow and calculated and great in power. and will not at all acquit the wicked. The Lord hath His way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of His feet." See, when God pours out His wrath, it is righteous wrath. That is not possible for man. I know man tries to say, well, I have righteous indignation. If you are honest with yourself, your righteous indignation goes beyond righteousness and more into the indignation part. That's right. In Revelation 16, verse number 7, it says, And I heard another Out of the altar say, even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are thy judgments." God is not unrighteous to pour out wrath. He is true, He is righteous, He is holy, He is perfect. And when His wrath is kindled, it is not done so flippantly or in just a simple reaction. It is the righteousness of God. His wrath is righteous. Let her see the revelation of wrath in the present. The revelation of wrath in the present. Today! In the present. 2025. God's wrath is revealed today, not just in the future judgment, right? We don't only have His wrath to look forward to in judgment, in the day of judgment, the great white throne judgment. We're not just looking at it happening at that point. going to see the wrath of God later when this life is over, but we will experience the wrath of God today. Well, if you're still in Romans chapter 1, I didn't turn anywhere else because I have everything typed out, at least the verses that I've said so far. In Romans 1 and verse 24, it says, "...Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lust of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves." Let's just read a few verses here. Verse 26. For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections, for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature. Look at verse number 28. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind to do those things which are not convenient. I'm not focusing on the particular sin that's being mentioned here until we get to it later, but What I'm focusing on here is that God's judgment today sometimes is just giving you up to your sin. God's judgment today. I'm not talking about hell. That's going to be God's judgment at some point as well. But God's judgment today is often simply this. You like that? Fine. Take it. Take it. And you know what comes with it? The consequences. Because there are consequences in this life that God has set up in creation that we get to enjoy when we choose to sin. I say we get to enjoy, right? But we get to enjoy God's judgment in the sense that we wanted something, we get all of what it gives, right? If people say be careful what you ask for, what you wish for, what you pray for, be careful because you might get it, right? You ask God for something, good or bad, in the sense of whether, you know, sometimes people pray for sinful things. That's not good. But the things that you strive for and you want in your life, be careful because you might get those things and all that comes with them. Man, you could you could start talking about all kinds of things, all the blessings that come with certain things, right? Young folks, oftentimes they'll they'll go after, you know, a relationship and they just strive for this relationship, strive for this relationship. They really would like they like this other person. They want to be involved with this other person. And the next thing you know, a blessing. Now they look at it as inconvenient or a problem and it is out of order. But that blessing is a expectation of another human life into this world. Well, there is another human life at that point already. But be careful, because you get what you wanted, the outcome of things. isn't always what you thought you wanted, right? No, we praise God for blessings, right? The blessing of life and things like that. But that's something that children, even older children, are ready for, right? I heard a guy tell me one time, a preacher, he was talking about how this guy at his work, Really, really wanted. He wanted a boat. Like, really wanted a boat. And he's done all this stuff to try to get this boat. He finally gets the boat. And with the boat, lots of headaches. Anybody ever owned a boat before? All right. See? It wasn't Brother Travis. It was before Brother Travis existed. Well, I'm sure he existed. We just didn't know him yet. But this guy really wanted a boat. With that boat came a lot of things. You know, when you buy toys like that, they take your time, don't they? You want to have excuses to use it, then you have to buy fuel. You have to have a trailer, you have to have a vehicle that can pull a trailer, you have to have, what's that? You have to have tags, maybe insurance, I don't know how that goes. You get out there on the water, and you open it wide open, you get going, and you're just having a good old time, and then the engine goes, and then black stuff comes out, right, what's that? And then you broke down. And then you gotta have somebody pull you back. Right. Now, you know, not that it's not always what happens. Right. But you got to have a place to store it. And then it becomes sometimes a contention and relationships and things like that. Right. Sometimes you want these things. Right. People say, well, you know, I want money. Right. People say they want money. They want they want a larger income, larger bank account. They want equity in their properties. They want all this stuff. And, you know, understand that Having money comes with consequences, doesn't it? It comes with consequences. When you have more, there's more to be concerned about. What do you do with that? What's that? Dodge the IRS, no. You have taxes that you have to deal with when you make more money. My goodness, our society is set up so backward in that area, you know? It's like, oh, good job, you did good, let me punish you. Right? But there's various things, right, that you have to deal with when you have resources, when you have things. When you get something nice, something new, what now do you have with that? Kids that break it. You have maintenance, kids that break it, liability. You have responsibility for something new, right? Mm-hmm. That's right. That's right. That's why the richest, most popular, most famous people in the world are depressed. Why? Because they have everything that they thought they wanted, but it didn't fulfill them. But with our choices, now I'm giving you things that may or may not be sinful. But with our choices, when we choose to sin, with that sin comes consequence. God's wrath. And by the way, God's wrath can be both passive and active. Right? Let me explain it to you. The passive wrath of God is He set everything up with laws. I don't mean the first five books of the Bible. I don't mean the law of God of the Bible. I mean He set up creation with laws, right? Consequence, right? If I climbed up on here and I jumped out like this, what happens? I fall on the ground, right? Why? Because God set up I would understand the gravity of the situation at that moment. But God set up creation with rules. I didn't have a lot of inspections this week. I was studying physics and quantum theory. string theory and these various things. Yeah, why I fall down? I was studying these things. I went outside and I dropped an apple. No, I'm kidding. I stayed inside. But there are consequences, right? God made the universe. He made His creation with consequences. By the way, there are consequences in terms of just living life and doing things and interacting with other people. There are consequences. the passive wrath of God. Some people call that karma. That's wrong. The Bible says you reap what you sow. Right? That's right. You reap what you sow. You know? That's the way that works, right? I mean, praise God that we reap what we sow. I would hate to put some avocado Seeds, I guess they're seeds, right? Yeah, I'd hate to put avocado seeds in the ground and I mean I'd be okay with bananas, but that's not what's supposed to come out, right? Wouldn't it be crazy if you go if you if you're in your backyard and you're tilling it up and you're planting like All different things. Tomatoes, potatoes, you're planting cucumbers, green beans, some squash, some watermelon, some spinach, some lettuce. Well, I wasn't going to go that far. And you walk out one day, and your crops have grown. I mean, it's this tall. but it's all corn. What? What's that? I'm not trying to go that far. Brother Travis back here, he's like, it's all poison ivy and venus fly traps and things that'll kill you. Praise God, though, that when we plant corn, we get corn. When we plant beets, we get beets. Squash, we get squash. When we plant zucchini, we get zucchini. When we plant pumpkins, we get pumpkins. When we plant watermelon, you like watermelon, right? We get that. No, you don't get eggplants when you plant your eggs. Different thing. You get chickens. There are some things you can't plant and then get, okay. So I know some people in their backyard, they've planted boxes of money because they're looking for a money tree somewhere to come up. No, I'm kidding. But praise God, we do in the sense of plants, we reap what we sow. And in that same analogy, we reap what we sow in this life. And that, That is both passive and active, right? If you choose to get angry and fly off the handle, there is a passive wrath of God. People withdraw themselves from you. God is acting in a passive way. The wrath of God is coming about passively. You're experiencing it based on how God created everything. You're experiencing kind of the wrath of man, but you're experiencing the consequence from just a passive perspective. but that goes further in the sense of the active wrath of God. In our passage here in Romans 1, all of these are passive. God's not actively pouring out His wrath on them. He's passively pouring it out. He says, okay, you want that? Take it. You want that? Take it. You want an idol? You can have an idol. God says, you don't want Me to be in control of your life and you don't want Me to give you all the blessings that come with that? Then fine, you can be in control, your idol can be in control, and you can have the blessings that come with that instead of the blessings that come from Me. If you want that, you can have it. if you want your sin, if you want your idolatry, Things that you know, in this particular case, you know, we're we're looking at they're being given up to uncleanness and it's gone beyond, you know, they've they've they've worshipped. They start worshipping idols and then they start with all this perverted mess and things that are happening after that. But it's all because God says, OK, fine, if that's what you want, take it. And take the consequence with it. The passive wrath of God, but it is present. Another example of that is Proverbs 1. Turn over there. Proverbs 1. There's the active wrath of God. I didn't put this in my notes, but you can find the active wrath of God also in Proverbs, but you can also find it in Hebrews where it talks about the chastisement. I'm sorry, I'm turning to Proverbs 15 and stuff. Proverbs 1. This comes as a result of rejecting the wisdom of God. In v. 24, it says, "...because I have called, and ye refused, I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded, but ye have set at naught all my counsel, and would none of my reproof. I also will laugh at your calamity." This is wisdom speaking, but who is wisdom? God. Jesus is wisdom, right? But he says what? I will laugh at your calamity. Now, God doesn't just laugh at calamity just in general like something bad happens. God's not laughing anytime something bad happens. In fact, He says that he that is glad at calamity, it's not a good thing. But He says here, because you have rejected Me, because you wouldn't listen to Me, because you wouldn't hear what I had to tell you and you rejected My reproofs, He says, I will laugh at your calamity. I will mock when your fear cometh. My goodness, that's pretty strong. That's pretty strong. You know, when you reject the wisdom of God, you reject God's Word and His wisdom. When the things come on to you, when all the crazy stuff starts happening, and the things that you fear are coming upon you, rather than God comforting you, rather than God protecting you, rather than God carrying you through that, He'll stand off and He will laugh and mock you because of what you've done, rejecting Him. That's wrath. He set things up to passively bring consequence when you choose to reject Him. And then when those consequences come, He says, I will laugh and mock. Verse 27, he says, "...when your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind, when distress and anguish cometh upon you, then shall they call upon Me, but I will not answer." You think about all the crazy things. Whenever destruction comes and all of these things, whenever we make decisions as a country, It brings about consequences. And then later, we have these things happening and people are crying out and saying, you know, God bless America. God save America. Help us, Lord. And they become religious all of a sudden. He says, I will not answer. He says, they shall seek Me early. You see, they get up early in the morning and they seek God, but they're seeking Him early in the morning too late. I don't mean too late in the day. I mean they're seeking Him too late. They should have sought Him when He was seeking them. Instead, they reject and they refuse and they deny and they ignore, and then when they're in trouble, when they need, they seek Him early. Or maybe I shouldn't say they, we. Any of us. And all of us. It says, they shall seek Me early, but they shall not find Me. For that they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord. I'm telling you, there are so many things that we, we as believers even, sometimes in our own lives, there are things that we know that we know are harmful. That God has revealed through the truth of His Word, that God has revealed, and even in some things there are things that we just know because of understanding the way God created things. But yet hated knowledge. And we do not choose the fear of the Lord. He says, "...they would none of my counsel. They despised all my reproof. Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices." That's what's happening in Romans chapter 1. Giving them up to it. You want it? Take it! It's yours. Think about the illustration. Israel. With Moses, right? Moses, we're hungry. And Moses says, manna. Our soul loatheth this light bread. Give us meat. And they complain and they whine and they fuss because they want something other than what God's given them. They say, give us meat! We need meat! And off in the distance, they hear the fluttering of wings. These quails, a nice wind has blown them over the side of that body of water. And once they got out over that body of water, they couldn't get back. They had to keep flying. And so their flying is an interesting scientific aspect to the answer that God gave them while they were in the wilderness. These quails, they couldn't stop flying because they would have fallen into the water. but they get to where they could finally get somewhere and they're out of gas, so to speak. And they just start falling out of the sky. By the way, that's why we don't have flying vehicles. Y'all know that's why we don't have flying vehicles? It's because all you guys drive around on empty and you'd be falling out of the sky. I'm just kidding. What's that? Yeah, maybe. So these birds, they just, they, and they all just start falling from the sky. Amazing. And here, the Israelites, they've got so much meat, so much flesh. Oh man, they started getting what they wanted. It was chicken, winter, winter chicken dinner. Well, quail dinner, but you know what I mean? It tastes like chicken. Anybody ever ate quail? Yeah, and it tastes like chicken, right? Pretty much. It's just a little bit leaner. What's that? They're related. Yeah. Same family there. Yeah. Yeah. You know, you plant their eggs in the ground, you get eggplant, right? No. But no, so these quail, they come in and... And Israel just starts feasting on quail like there's no tomorrow. It said that they ate until it came out of their nostrils. And they were sick from eating meat that they wanted. It reminds me of when I was a child. I liked candy. And and I would eat a lot of candy. Y'all remember being a child eating a lot of candy and then like you're out playing and all of a sudden you're like, oh. Oh, no, no, no, no, I'm not talking about, I'm not talking, okay. Not like this, it's like this. Oh, where is it? Is it on the left side or the right side? I can't remember. It's like your pancreas like screaming. And it feels like somebody's stabbing you in the side. Nobody remembers that as a child. You ate so much sweet junk. And then like, what would happen with me is I'd be with my dad and we'd go to the dinner bell over here. on Shelby Street, and I would get, I'd get a bunch of candy and stuff, and he'd get his stuff, and then we would leave, and we would walk home, and we'd get about halfway, we lived over here on Cruft Street, and we would get about halfway from the Dinner Bell to Cruft Street, and I'm like, dad, my side, my side, and he's like, you ate too much sweet, you ate too much sugar. And I'm like, what does that mean? What's the? You know, sometimes you get what you want, and then you get what you want, right? They got their meat, and it started coming out of their nose, their nose holes, right? Their nose straws, and it just starts coming out, and they're, I mean, they're eating their meat, and they're vomiting it, and it's, it's a... Wherefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices. For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them. Y'all ever see the people that win the lottery, you know, the stories about the people, what's that? Oh yeah, oftentimes they're in a worse condition than they were when they were poor. You want it? Take it. It's yours. The prosperity of fools. That's right. That's how you find out your long lost cousins and things like that. The prosperity of fools shall destroy them. You see, there is a present nature to the wrath of God. The wrath of God is revealed in the present. Now, there's also chastisement for the believer. But from the perspective of the unbeliever, it's simply reaping what you've sown in this life. We're not even getting to the eternal wrath yet, but reaping what you sow in this life. Point two. Sorry. Point two. Man, I'm glad there's not a second hand on that clock. Or an hour hand. Or a minute hand. What? I'm just kidding. Yeah, I just put the face on the wall. I took the hands off. Number two, the recipients of wrath. The second part of the verse says, "...against..." So, first part of the verse, "...for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness and ungodliness of men." Three sub points. Go figure. Wrath against ungodliness. Wouldn't you know? Anybody want to guess what the second one is? Wrath against Unrighteousness. Yeah. And then the third one just lumps them all together. Wrath against all sin. All right. So wrath against ungodliness. This is sin against God, in a sense, right? It's it is the sin of being ungodly. This refers to rebellion and rejection of God himself. In Psalm 14, verse number one, it says the fool has said in his heart, there is no God. They are corrupt. They have done abominable works. There is none that doeth good." 2 Timothy 3, verses 1-5. I know I'm moving quick here because we've spent a lot of time on the first point. 2 Timothy 3, verses 1-5, "...This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come, for men shall be lovers of their own selves, Covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof from such turn away." The wrath of God is revealed against ungodliness. These are those who choose to reject God. And by the way, with that rejection of God comes all of these things that affect other people, right? They're lovers of their own selves. And then it carries into having sins against other people. This is the wrath of God against unrighteousness. Let her be there. Wrath against unrighteousness. Sin against others. Unrighteousness refers to immoral, lawless behavior. In 1 Corinthians 6, you can jump over there real quick. 1 Corinthians 6. 1 Corinthians 6. And verse number 9, No you not, 1 Corinthians 6, 9, No you not, that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Be not deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. This would be a great place to plug the gospel in there. Think about it. Think about it where you were. sinful, in those cases there, unrighteous, deserving of the wrath of God. And the wrath of God is poured out. You're going to have to just chase me around with that camera. The wrath of God is poured out. The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in unrighteousness. But the wrath of God was also poured out on His Son. in our place. That wrath, because of our sins, because of our unrighteousness, the righteous took our place. That we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. He that knew no sin became sin. and then we get to carry His righteousness. But in order for that to happen, the wrath of God had to be revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men onto the person of Jesus Christ. And because of that, we have the opportunity for salvation if we simply trust in His work at Calvary, His death, burial, and resurrection. unrighteousness. You could also look at Genesis 6 verses 5 through 7 there where man was unrighteous and violence had filled the earth and the thoughts of every man's heart was only evil continually and God poured out His wrath in the form of a flood. And His wrath was revealed against unrighteousness in that day. It's also revealed against all sin in general. God's wrath is not selective like, well, I'm just going to pour out my wrath on this sin. That's all sin. In Ecclesiastes chapter number 12, remember in verse number 13, he says, Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. But verse 14, the last verse of the book, For God shall bring every work into judgment, and every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil, Revelation 20, verse 11. We were just there on Sunday night. I saw a great white throne and Him that sat on it, from whose face the heaven and the earth led away. There was found no place for them. I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God. And the books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them. And they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. Whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. The wages of sin is death. It always has been. It always will be. And the second death is where we go. if the death of Jesus Christ doesn't take the place of our second death. The reason for wrath. Number three, the reason for wrath. He ends the verse with, who hold the truth in unrighteousness? Three sub-points here. Suppressing the truth, spurning the truth, and spiraling into sin. suppressing the truth. This word, hold, they hold the truth in unrighteousness. It means to restrain or repress or suppress rather. It's not ignorance, but willful rejection. The truth has been proclaimed. The truth has been revealed. In fact, he's going to talk about the truth in the next verse. Next week we'll talk about that. How man has had access to the truth. How God made the creation pointing to the truth of His existence. In fact, we'll just real quick here look at verse 19. He says, verse number 18, "...who hold the truth in unrighteousness, because that which may be known of God is manifest in them. For God hath showed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power in Godhead, so that they are without excuse." He goes on to say, "...because that when they knew God." You see, every man, there's no such thing as an atheist. God doesn't believe in atheists. There's no such thing as an atheist. Every man, at some point or another in their life, recognize that there is a God. Atheism is a condition that is learned. It's something that when they know God, they glorify Him not as God. In fact, most of the time when people say, I'm atheist, I don't believe there's a God, because if there was a God then... and they give reasoning based upon their feelings about what God should do if He existed. I've also heard people say, well, if there was a God, why does He allow such and such? I think you're probably just establishing that there's a God. You just don't like what He does. Just because you don't like him doesn't mean he doesn't exist. I mean, I don't like you, and I don't think you don't exist. No, I'm kidding. I was just looking at William when I said that. I didn't mean that to you, Brother William. I like you, and I know you exist. Sometimes I don't, though. Sometimes I don't know that you exist. I try to call you, I text you, and no answer. I'm like, did he cease to exist? Man, I'm just kidding. In John 3, verse 19 says, And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world. And men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. And that's why people claim to be atheists. Because they don't like God, because He's too bright for them. They don't like the light. 2 Thessalonians. 2 Thessalonians. I think I need to get a new clock, that one's broke. It just keeps moving. 2 Thessalonians chapter two. Verse number 10. with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish, because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved." You think about that. They received not the love of the truth. The truth is there. They chose not to love it. Right? As Proverbs 1, you know, as we talked about before, Earlier in that chapter it says, wisdom crieth in the streets. Right? What is it wisdom said in the streets? I don't remember exactly, but I think it had something to the effect of, come to me. Maybe. earlier in the chapter. Wisdom crieth without, she uttereth her voice in the streets. She crieth in the chief places of concourse. In the openings of the gates in the city, she uttereth her words, saying, how long, ye simple ones, we love your simplicity, and scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge. Turn to you at my reproof. Behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you. I will make known my words unto you, because I have called." And then it goes into all of that. But wisdom crying in the streets. There's another passage that talks about wisdom crying in the streets. And then Jesus, you know, come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden. The truth cries out to us. And we choose to ignore. We suppress the truth. We spurn the truth. We know it, we've heard it, but it's rejected. As I mentioned in Romans 1 there, it continues that theme of God revealing Himself, but then He's rejected. In Psalm 19, verses 1-3, it says, The heavens declare the glory of God. Think about that. We're going to spend more time. I don't want to spend too much time on this, but we'll spend more time on it next week. The heavens declare the glory of God. I mean, they're shouting out, God's glory! Just look at God's glory! Now, you might say, well, that doesn't say they're sounding out. Well, let's read on. It says, the firmament showeth his handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech. And night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard. The creation of God itself cries out and bears witness to the truth of God's existence and our responsibility to Him. But we spurn the truth as mankind. In Acts 17 verses 24-27, Paul says, God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that He is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands, Neither is worshipped with men's hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he giveth all life, and breath, and all things, and hath made of one blood," in case you were wondering, all nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed and the bounds of their habitation, that they should seek the Lord, if happily they might feel after Him and find Him, though He be not far from every one of us." But when man chooses to suppress the truth and spurn the truth, he will spiral into sin. As we saw in Romans chapter one. Verse number 21 it says because that when they knew God they glorified him not as God neither were thankful but became vain in their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened professing themselves to be wise they became fools and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like made like to corruptible man and to birds and four-footed beasts and creeping things wherefore God also gave them and then we go into all of that again But man chooses to do that and they continue to spiral and spiral and spiral into sin and spinning down into that sin. They're given up to uncleanness and they're given up to the lust of their flesh and they're given up to the and they continue to worship or change the truth of God into a lie of worship and serve the creature more than the creator and they're given up to vile affections and they have this sinful perverted relationships going on and they they do not like to retain God in their knowledge and God gives them over to reprobate mind they do things which are not convenient they're filled with unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, debate, deceit. I mean, it just keeps spinning and spinning and spinning. They're getting dizzy. Proverbs 29.1 says, He that being often reproved, hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy. So we talked about the wrath. of God being revealed. God's wrath is real. It's being revealed now and will be fully revealed in the future. God's wrath is righteous. It is against ungodliness and unrighteousness. God's wrath is for a reason. It's not random. It's because men suppress suppress and spurn the truth. They spiral into sin and they refuse to repent. Question? Are you living under God's wrath or under His grace? The whole message about the wrath of God, you know there's a flip side to that. You don't have to. You can live under the grace of God and His blessings and His mercy. For the believer, this should stir us to fear God and preach the Gospel. And for the lost, only Christ can deliver you from the wrath to come.