“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? 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. He will render to each one according to his works.”
Romans 2:4-6
Paul wrote these two verses of Scripture to a group of people who were, from generation to generation, taught that they were of more excellent value to God than the rest of the world. The one glaring problem was that because of this way of thinking, it didn’t matter how they lived or treated others. They based their self-worth on a false premise. The Bible says we are not to think of ourselves more highly than we should. (Romans 12:3)
The hard and impenitent heart cannot view God for all He is. Paul states they only saw God’s kindness, forbearance, and patience. They did not see nor understand God’s righteousness, wrath, and judgment for those who lived this way. When we approach this idea of self-worth with critical thinking, we realize our prideful heart hasn’t changed.
Without a proper understanding, we cannot grasp the truth about the righteous judgment of our lives. Even though our salvation is available through God’s grace, He still judges us according to our works, or, to put it another way, we answer to Him concerning how we live our lives. But this idea becomes more profound because the Bible also speaks concerning the intentions or motives of our hearts.
Motive is the underlying reason for any action. Proverbs 16:2 says, “All a person’s ways seem pure to them, but the LORD weighs motives.” Because the human heart is deceitful, we can easily fool ourselves about our motives. (Jeremiah 17:9) Even if we pretend we are doing certain things for God or the benefit of others, in reality, we can have selfish reasons. God is “a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12).
So, where does this leave us? It brings us to an understanding of how to remedy our hard and unrepentant hearts. God promises, “I will give you a new heart and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.” (Ezekiel 36:26-27)
Step one. “Repent, therefore, of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord that, if possible, the intent of your heart may be forgiven you.” (Acts 8:22)