God's Actions, Not Ours

By Matt

I read: Romans 1-3

When people list themes of the book of Romans, they almost always note something about how it's God acting on our behalf, paying our debt. You see a lot of that in chapter 3: "God does not respond to what we do; we respond to what God does." Or: "But by shifting our focus from what we do to what God does . . . "

The interesting thing about all this is that it really renders moot any of our attempts to judge anyone else. God's emphasis is on his movement, not ours. And furthermore, when we try to set ourselves up as better than others, we need to remember it's God's actions, not ours, that got us to where we are. Better yet, there's the truth that "we've compiled this long and sorry record as sinners (buth us and them) and proved that we are utterly incapable of living the glorious lives God wills for us. God did it for us."

I am an extremely critical, judgemental person. Sometimes that's good, like for my website, but judging other folks really isn't my domain at all and I love to hear the correction in these verses that let me know that, again, God's in charge and I need to be about recognizing his actions in my life and others' lives.