Sharon Reformed Presbyterian Church · Sermon study sheet

How to Escape God's Judgment

Bryan Schneider · April 4, 2026

Romans 2:1-16

sharonrpc.org/sermons/how-to-escape-god-s-judgment

Summary

Paul turns from the sins of the Gentile world in Romans 1 to confront the person who judges others while practicing the same kinds of sin.
Comparing ourselves favorably with other people cannot shield us from God's judgment, because His judgment is truthful and impartial.
God's patience is not approval of sin; His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering are meant to lead sinners to repentance.
Possessing or hearing God's law does not make a person righteous: both the written law and the conscience testify to human guilt.
Religious credentials, baptism, church membership, and past emotional experiences cannot substitute for living faith in Christ.
Our only hope is to confess our guilt and cling to Jesus, whose blood satisfies God's justice and whose righteousness is received by faith.
Christ's resurrection confirms that the believer's righteousness is not found in self but in the living, risen Savior.

Where am I quick to condemn another person's sin while excusing a similar sin in my own heart or conduct?
Have I mistaken God's patience with me for approval instead of receiving it as a call to repentance?
Am I trusting in baptism, church membership, family background, or a past experience instead of resting in Christ?
What do my conscience and God's commandments reveal about the thoughts, loves, and motives of my heart?
Why can neither ignorance of the written law nor knowledge of it provide an escape from God's impartial judgment?
How do Christ's propitiatory death and imputed righteousness answer the guilt exposed in Romans 1–2?
What would it look like this week to stop pointing at others and run to Jesus in confession and faith?

Impartial judgment: God judges according to truth and does not excuse sin because of ancestry, religious background, baptism, or church membership.
Repentance: Turning from sin to God in response to His goodness, with honest confession rather than self-justification.
Conscience: The inward witness that accuses or excuses and shows that God's moral requirements are known even apart from possessing the written law.
Propitiation: Christ's blood-bearing sacrifice that satisfies God's righteous wrath against sin.
Justification: God's gracious declaration that a sinner is righteous through faith in Jesus Christ rather than through personal merit.
Imputed righteousness: The perfect righteousness of Christ credited to believers, so they stand before God clothed in Christ rather than in their own works.