The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

And actually I was asked to read this passage in worship service a few weeks ago as well. I knew, of course, that many have difficulties reconciling limited atonement with this seemingly apparent expression of God’s wish that “all should reach repentance.”  But then in reading it, I thought, wow . . . this verse doesn’t have to be so hard.

In Dr. Thomas’s lecture he quotes Calvin and John Murray on the passage, one employing the hidden vs. revealed will of God and the other observing that God in Scripture expresses “wishes” that he has not ordained should come to pass.

I wonder if delving into the hidden/revealed will of God distinction in this instance is really necessary.  It might be simpler if we just look at what Peter seems to be telling his readers. His audience is eagerly waiting for the Day of the Lord and final redemption, and wondering why God delays. This is a similar situation to the church in Thessolonica to whom Paul writes, where the believers are likewise growing restless for the return of Christ.

In this context Peter tells them that the Lord is “patient toward you.” Some manuscripts read “patient on your account.”  Shouldn’t the rest of the verse be read in this light? If it is, then the reading thereafter says to us that God is “not wishing that any [of you, i.e. God's elect] should perish, but that all [of you] should reach repentance.”  There is a definite object of God’s patience stated here, and the object of God’s wish for repentance is implied to be the same.  God’s patience is “toward you.”  The following statement is not to be taken as a general well-wishing for every individual in the world, but an expression of the decretal will with a personal purpose.

If we read it this way then we would see that Peter is not making a broad sweeping statement about God’s will for universal salvation, but rather he is telling us that God is withholding that Day of the Lord specifically for the sake of his elect, so that all the fulness of those he has chosen might certainly reach repentance and not perish.  So the Lord has not yet returned because he is faithful to those he has chosen.  All whom he has willed to save will be saved.

To summarize, there are essentially two different but both “Calvinistic” ways of reading 2 Peter 3:9:

Reading the verse through the lens of the hidden/revealed will of God distinction reconciles the passage with limited atonement by saying that Peter’s statement, while being of unlimited scope, is merely expressing God’s revealed wish that every individual in the world should come to repentance and should not perish, and yet this is not part of God’s hidden will, as He has not decreed that this should be.

However, if we say that God’s patience specifically “toward you” or “on your account” necessarily narrows the field of who Peter means by “any” or “all” immediately afterward, we reconcile the passage with limited atonement by showing that Peter’s statement is itself one of limited scope referring to the elect in history, and so does not present any contradiction with an atonement that is likewise limited.

I believe that this second reading is the most natural of the two.

My reading of Romans 7 in particular and of Romans in general is indebted to some key observations of A. Andrew Das, author of Solving the Romans Debate.  His book is less about Romans 7 specifically, though one chapter includes a fairly lengthy exegesis of that section. The thesis of the book in general is that Romans was written primarily to a pretty homogeneous Gentile church in Rome. I think Das’s arguments are very compelling, if not totally conclusive. While this thesis colors his reading of Romans 7, I don’t think the reading he presents relies entirely on it.

I will be seeking to demonstrate here that Paul’s use of the first person is prosopopoeia (speech in character) from the perspective of an preregenerate person, and specifically a Gentile god-fearer, though the application of the passage is certainly broader.

We start with how Paul uses language in Romans in general when differentiating Jews and Gentiles, particularly in their relation to the Law. He generally speaks of Jews as being “under the law” and Gentiles as being “apart from the law.” Think Romans 2:12-14 when he is arguing that both Jew and Gentile stand equally condemned before God:

For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law . . . For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law.

This is, in fact, the first time Paul refers to the “law” in the book. Again, in Romans 3:21-22,

“But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it—the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction [between Jew or Gentile see Romans 3:29-30].”

So just as there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile as to who are guilty before God, there is also no distinction as to how they are saved (i.e. through faith in Jesus Christ).  With these passages as basis we should move forward with the understanding that “apart from the law”=Gentile and “under the law”=Jew.  Keep this in mind because it’s important.

In Romans 4 Paul shows that Abraham received the promise before the law (i.e. apart from the law), and so was like a righteous Gentile before his coming under the law through circumcision, so that it is clear that justification is apart from the law.

Romans 5 speaks of the period from Adam to Moses as “before the law was given,” again very much like a Gentile state, not being “under the law,” but still in sin and standing condemned. I also think Paul in Romans 5 is using the word “imputation” in a very different way from how we usually think of it (not that this invalidates the doctrine of imputation).  With this general context in mind, then we come to Romans 7:7-10.

For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me.

Now we would look at two particular issues in the section: the classical rhetorical device of prosopopoeia and Paul’s use of “Spirit” and “flesh.”

First prosopopoeia: “Speech in Character.” Das and Stanley Stowers observe that the “Oh wretched man” section in particular bears a striking resemblance to the classical device of “speech in character.” In fact, Paul is using strikingly similar language to Greek (Gentile) tragedies. Compare these passages:

Eurepides’ Medea:

“Ah, me! a wretched suffering woman I! O would that I could die!”

“Oh, oh! Would that Heaven’s levin bolt would cleave this head in twain! What gain is life to me? Woe, woe is me! O, to die and win release, quitting this loathed existence!”

“This one brief day forget thy children dear, and after that lament; for though thou wilt slay them yet they were thy darlings still, and I am a lady of sorrows.”

Seneca’s Medea:

“Why, soul, dost hesitate? Why are my cheeks wet with tears? Why do anger and love now hither, now thither draw my changeful heart? A double tide tosses me, uncertain of my course; as when rushing winds wage mad warfare, and from both sides conflicting floods lash the seas and the fluctuating waters boil, even so is my heart tossed. Anger puts love to flight, and love, anger. O wrath, yield thee to love.”

“Why dost thou delay now, O soul? Why hesitate, though thou canst do it? Now has my wrath died within me. I am sorry for my act, ashamed.”

“What, wretched woman, have I done? wretched, say I? Though I repent, yet have I done it!”

Romans 7

“For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate . . . So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.”

“For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.”

“Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?”

“Wretched man that I am!” is a despairing cry of a distinctly Gentile tone, as is the language Paul uses for the dual wills dilemma.  A resident of the city of Rome (or any other Greco-Roman city) would have immediately connected Paul’s words with similar passages from their contemporary arts. This is the language of theater, their pop culture. The allusion would be as apparent to them as it would be to us if someone wrote the words “there is no spoon.”

Prosopopoeia was one of the standard and widely used rhetorical devices of Paul’s day, in which the speaker would “take on” the character of a third person using first person language.  The effect would be one of a Roman prosecutor speaking in the first person (using “I”) but from the perspective of a murdered victim. Together with the kind of language Paul uses in Romans 7 (close in character to the Greek tragedy), I think this is good indication that he is in fact employing this commonplace rhetorical device.

The actual content and message of text strongly suggests this as well with the language used to describe “I”: “I am of the flesh, sold under sin,” “captive to the law of sin,” etc. In short, there is no Spirit-empowering work described in the life of “I” in Romans 7:8-24. It’s all flesh. Only the law is described as “spiritual.”

This lends itself strongly to the reading of Paul speaking from the point of view of an unregenerate person. By itself the prosopopoeia theory might be interesting, but we need to be careful of how we use extra-biblical sources to interpret. The Scripture trumps all tertiary sources. So for me, the real clincher is how Paul speaks of the “Spirit” in contrast to the “flesh” in chapters 7 and 8.

7:5 “For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.”
7:6 “But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.”

7:14 (prosopopoeia?) “For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin.”
7:18 “For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh.”
7:24 “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?”

8:2 “For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.”
8:3-4 “For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”
8:6 “For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.”
8:7 “For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot.”
8:8-9 “Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you.”

The state of the “I” in Romans 7 is very different from that of the believer described in Romans 8. I think it is a deliberate contrast by Paul. In Romans 7 “I” is still a slave to sin (sold under sin), and “of the flesh.” It is the law that is “spiritual,” but “I” cannot perform it.

In Romans 8, Paul tells his readers that they are no longer of the flesh, but of the Spirit, and as they walk by the Spirit the righteous requirement of the law is fulfilled in them (i.e. in us).

That is all very well and interesting, but what indication do Paul’s readers have that we are supposed to understand this section as prosopopoeia?  Isn’t the autobiographical sense the most natural reading of the pronoun “I”?  And if we do grant the rhetorical device, why should we think Paul is speaking from the point of view of a Gentile?  Why not a Jew?

For this, we go back to that phrase, “apart from the law.”  Romans 7:8-9 is the key to understanding this section as “speech in character” from the perspective of a Gentile proselyte who is trying to come “under” the Law of Moses. As we noted earlier, Paul always speaks of Gentiles as being “apart from the law” in their pagan existence and of Jews as being “under the law.” In v.8 and 9 Paul says that “apart from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law.” I believe that when we read this, we must remember how Paul has used this phrase previously in the epistle and understand that he is speaking from the perspective of a Gentile. If we take “apart from the law” to mean the same thing as he’s meant by it previously and even in other epistles (e.g. 1 Corinthians 9:20-21), Paul might just as well have said, “I was once alive as an ignorant  pagan Gentile.”

If we do not take it this way, then we have to explain what Paul means by saying that he was once “apart from the law.” When is a Jew (such as Paul) ever apart from the law? He is born under it and made a participant of it through his circumcision.¹  This is a point that Paul has made repeatedly in Romans—that Jews being under the law are condemned by it. We must also then explain how his use of being “apart from the law” in a personal sense in Romans 7 relates at all to how he has used the phrase previously to distinguish Gentiles from Jews.  And finally, we must wonder how a Gentile readership used to seeing prosopopoeia in everyday use would have been expected to understand that what Paul was saying was not to be taken as speech in character! ²

So, I believe this all strongly favors the reading of Romans 7:7-24 as Paul’s impersonation of one who was ignorant of the law (as in the case of a total pagan Gentile), who comes to the law and realizes that it is good and right and just . . . but then discovers to his horror that he has no power to keep it. This might be before, perhaps, he has even heard of Jesus Christ or whether there even is a Holy Spirit (as in the case John’s disciples in Acts 19:2). They might not even understand why they are so powerless to do good.

In other words, this would describe an aspect of total depravity (that of total inability apart from the work of the Spirit), but it would describe someone that God is already working in to bring them to a realization of their need for Christ. This is someone who is struggling under the reigning power of sin. It would not describe those who are conscious enemies of God.

We see this kind of thing today. There are those who are the self-conscious enemies of God, who hate him and all he commands (think the New Atheists). And then there are those who want to do what is right, perhaps even believe there is a God, but have suddenly come to the realization that no matter how they try, they constantly sin (e.g. someone relying on his own works to merit himself salvation, and suddenly realizes his works fall far short of God’s righteous standard).

In this context Paul is using “flesh” exclusively to refer to someone before conversion, since he tells us that “Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” Flesh and Spirit are diametrically opposed conditions under which a person might be. In Romans 8:9 Paul makes a sweeping statement that refers to all believers:

You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

No one who belongs to Christ is without the Spirit, and all who have the Spirit are free. And I think that Romans 7 has to be understood in light of that reality.

In light of the above, it is very difficult to fathom Paul speaking of a redeemed existence as being “sold under sin.” This is language of slavery, and if we read Romans 8, then we should understand those in Christ to be freed from the bondage of sin.

I am certainly not a “perfectionist” in the sense that I think that once you’re saved you can no longer sin. Christians are no longer under the reign of sin and the flesh because we have a new Lord, Jesus Christ, and a Spirit that has set us free. But the temptation to sin and the “desires of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16) are still present in us.

So there certainly is a war between Spirit and flesh in the believer. But it isn’t characterized by a despairing “Oh wretched man I am!” but rather by the victorious “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.”

Paul repeatedly reminds us that we are “in Christ” and that we “live by the Spirit” in order to exhort us to continue to walk by the Spirit. The reminder of the “deeds of the flesh” in Galatians is so that we will remember what we are saved from and not do the deeds that characterize one who still lives under that reign. So there is a certain distinction between being “in” the flesh and the “works” of the flesh. Paul’s repeated line of exhortation appears to be that because we are no longer “in” the flesh, therefore we ought not to do the “works” of the flesh.

Colossians 3:7 makes similar statements: “In these you too once walked, when you were living in them.” Paul presumes that those who are in Christ are no longer living in the flesh, and therefore they ought not to walk in the flesh.

Galatians 5:16 likewise shows that Spirit and flesh are diametrically opposed. “For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.” And again, “I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” That is, those who persist in such works are not saved.

Romans 7, I believe, is the voice of one who has realized this, but sees no way out, so to speak.  So, Paul shows that one the way to freedom in Romans 8.

So in what way did the fruit of the Tree convey death to Adam and to the human race after him? Was the fruit toxic? Did it carry in it a hereditary disease? Not at all. The fruit itself was good for eating, for God created all things good. It was covenant commandment that was attached to the fruit that conveyed with it consequences. Adam brought death to himself and to his race by eating the fruit, but it was not the fruit that killed him. It was the covenant sanctions attached to disobedience that brought death.

Today, the Church also has a covenant food. A meal with blessings and curses attached to it. It has become common among even Reformed Christians to say that in the Lord’s Supper, nothing actually happens. The bread and wine do not physically become the body and blood of Jesus Christ, and therefore it would be superstitious to think that the bread and wine are anything special or that eating them might actually do anything to or for you, right? After all they are only useful as means to help us to remember Christ’s sacrifice.

But that is not how covenant food works. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians that those who eat and drink unworthily eat and drink judgment to themselves. The reciprocal is also true. When we eat and drink rightly, we have true fellowship with Jesus Christ. Is it anything inherent in the bread and wine that brings this about? Not at all. But that does not diminish the use of bread and wine, for they are covenant symbols (there is nothing “mere” about a symbol) of what they represent, namely the body and blood of Jesus Christ. To dishonor the elements or to use them lightly is to dishonor Christ himself. Not because the elements have been mystically changed, but because they represent him as their covenant function.

A good analog might be the Reformed doctrine of imputation. When God justifies and declares us righteous, he does so on account of Jesus’ righteousness, in commendation of a righteousness we do not have in ourselves.  Even so, the covenant food is imputed or reckoned to be to us Christ’s body and blood.  It is the God the Holy Spirit who applies the reality of the sign so that it is as if you had eaten his flesh and drank his blood, as he says we must do in John 6.

Just as it is the Spirit that applies the reality of the sign, it is the Spirit that judges the use of the sign.  When Adam misused covenant food it was not the food that judged him, but God himself.  So also if we misuse our covenant food it is God who judges, not the food. There is no active causality in the food, but there is direct correlation.

But the Table of the Lord is intended for life. God has given us an easy enough guideline to follow for worthy partaking that even a child can do it. One who eats of the Church’s covenant food need not be sinless or especially knowledgeable. They must simply eat in faith and in fellowship, waiting for and upon one another in love. This is no forbidden fruit to bring us death. The covenant food is intended to bring life to those who eat it in covenant.  It must be taken in faith, yes, but also God strengthens faith through it.  Surely even faith so small as a mustard seed.

When Hagar is driven away from the mother of the covenant child Isaac, God has mercy on her and promises her that her child will become a great nation. That child is Ishmael, who is the father of the Arab Muslims today. When God determines to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah because of their wickedness, Abraham intercedes for any righteous who may dwell in the city. Because of this, God has mercy on Lot, and allows him to escape the judgement with his daughters. By incestuous union, those daughters bear both Moab and Ammon.

Ishmael, Moab, and Ammon later become Israel’s greatest enemies and stumbling blocks to the people of God.  But God not only allows them to prosper when they are evil, but he ensures that they will come into being by acts of special preservation.

Of course, we also remember that God uses this to his ends.  Later from Moab comes Ruth, who will be one of the great women in the line of Jesus Christ.  And as long as we are talking about those who were the enemies of God, we must remember ourselves.  Christ prayed for those who were crucifying him.

For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.
Romans 5:10

With that assumption, I believe there is a good reason that chapter 2 names God as YHWH.  The name of God is a covenant name.  When we read things from a broader viewpoint in chapter 1, there is a distance apparent from the reader to this God.  But when the writer of Genesis takes a closer look at the creation of man, he gets personal.  YHWH is supremely personal.  It is a name, and it not only tells us what God is, but who he is.  The creation of man in chapter 2 is extremely personal.  God breathes life into him.  He gives them a place to live and food to eat.  In short, he creates man in covenant and gives a commandment together with sanctions and blessings.

In chapter 3 we have an interesting development.  The serpent is deliberate in its way of addressing God, not as YHWH, but merely as Elohim.  The serpent’s words are the only part of the section that address God in general, rather than personally.  In so doing, he seeks to draw Eve away from the personal nature of God and portrays him merely as a despot.

It is as if the serpent told Eve, “God is not near.  He is a domineering power who seeks to keep good things from you, and so there is no covenant with him worth keeping.”

This is saying something quite different from how it is rendered in some translations. The NLT, for instance, says “Then you will live a long, full life in the land the Lord your God is giving you.”  While it may be true as a general principle that those who honor their parents and heed the wisdom of the past generation are more likely to healthy, prosperous, and long-lived, I don’t think that is what the promise is getting at.

God is addressing His people as an assembly in Exodus 20.  The third commandment is followed up with an expression of God’s wrath and blessings upon generations.  We see immediately that God is very concerned about covenant faithfulness over generations.  And now, when we come to the commandment that is addressing the relationship between two generations, are we to presume that the blessings are primarily individual in nature?

I would argue that the blessings promised are also generational, to fit the commandment and the concern that God shows repeatedly in urging faithfulness.  That is, in this commandment God promises not so much that you’ll have long life if you honor your parents as an individual (which nevertheless may be true), but He is promising that a nation or assembly (or church) that is characterized by covenant faithfulness and honor from one generation to the next will likewise be blessed over generations.  If Israel were to be faithful in honoring past faithful generations, God would extend their days in the land.  That your days may be long in the land.

Today, this applies to the Church just as much.  If we as a Christian culture disregard the wisdom of our parents and are characterized as rebels, thinking we know better and have nothing to learn from those who have gone before, then we may forfeit blessings.  God’s kingdom will march on, but we or our children may be left out.  A generation of rebels will beget a generation of monsters.

But if we honor past faithful generations and teach our children to do likewise, then God’s promise is that He will bless in a broad generational way through His covenant with us.  Our days will be long and He will prosper us.  God’s blessings are not for individuals only.  They are from one generation to the next.