Romans 2:4-5

Romans 2:4-5 Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? (5) But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.

Paul has made it clear that all men are sinful and practice the evil deeds listed in Chapter one. Now in Chapter two, he is asserting that even those who make a distinction between righteousness and unrighteousness by judging others are also guilty of the same evil deeds. The religious Jews of Paul’s day had the Law of Moses and believed that they had established their own righteousness through the law. This led to them judging others who in their eyes did not measure up to the law. However, Paul pointed out that they are also guilty and, through a rhetorical question, asserts they are presuming on God’s kindness and patience. They have missed the point that God’s forbearance was meant to lead them to repentance rather than thinking they had become righteous through the law.

As surely as farmers store hay and grain in barns, those who depend on the Law of Moses for their righteousness are storing up wrath for the day of wrath when God’s judgment will be revealed. Each ungodly and unrighteous sin that human beings commit is stored in their own personal sin barn. Although a person may also have good works they think will cancel out their sins, Scripture reveals that even our best works are like filthy rags and are of no value in removing our sins. Therefore, human beings have no way in and of themselves in which they can appease the wrath of God. The situation appears to be hopeless since all human beings come to the Day of Judgment with a barn full of sins. Praise God that He provides a way that Paul explains later in The Book of Romans.