11
THE DAY IS AT HAND And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof (Romans 13:11-14).
The theocentric focus here is God's salvation. This is a time text, and its goal is to motivate God's people to righteous living. The means of achieving this is to put on Christ, meaning to submit to His law through His grace. Paul is writing to converts, not the unregenerate. He is not talking about conversion. He is talking about progressive sanctification.
The Meaning of Salvation This passage is a time text. The meaning is clear: there is not much time remaining. Time remaining for what? "Our salvation." What is this salvation? The commentators disagree. John Murray believes that it refers to the second coming of Christ in final judgment.(1) So does William Hendriksen.(2) Others see Paul as referring to the individual's death. This eschatology is therefore personal.(3) Finally, some view it as referring to the end of the Old Covenant order and the delivery of the kingdom of God exclusively to the church (Matt. 21:43).(4)
Salvation Delayed
Murray and Hendriksen know the problem that their interpretation raises: after nineteen centuries, there is still no deliverance for a world in sin, no fulfillment of the promise. If this interpretation is correct, then Paul was trying to motivate people to act ethically, using the hope of Christ's second coming as the motivation. Liberal theologians use this passage and other "imminent deliverance" passages to argue that New Testament authors were incorrect. The authors supposedly believed that Jesus was coming in final judgment in the immediate future. The early church fathers then had to re-think their plans for the church because this prophecy did not come true. In other words, there are major prophetic errors in the New Testament.
Murray and Hendriksen cite II Peter 3:8 as justification for their interpretation. "But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day."(5) This converts a time text to a non-time text. This passage in Second Peter does not solve their problem, namely, the language of Paul's text. "The night is far spent, the day is at hand." Was Paul justifying his command to live chastely on the basis of an event that still has not come to pass? What kind of deceptive motivational tactic was this?
Liberal expositors argue that this strategy backfired on the church within a generation, that the early believers' focus on Christ's imminent return as their motivation for living righteously could not be sustained. The early church's leaders then had to find new motivations. They also had to explain away the obvious inconsistency. Murray and Hendriksen are still trying to explain it away. They do so by converting a time text -- "soon" -- to a timeless text. Murray writes: "It is the nearness of prophetic perspective and not that of our chronological calculations."(6) Hendriksen writes: "The error is committed not by Paul but by us when we apply earth's chronology to heaven's mode of life."(7) This does not solve their problem. A liberal can easily respond: "It is not our interpretational error alone, but also the error of the recipients of Paul's epistle. They were supposed to conclude from his language that they should live righteously, for Christ was coming back in final judgment soon. They were thinking temporally, in terms of their own life spans, which was exactly how Paul was telling them to think, in order to motivate them to live righteously in the present. The following argument would not have been highly motivational: 'Live righteously because Jesus is coming back in final judgment soon, by which I mean up to twenty centuries from now, and possibly a lot more.' By deceiving them regarding Christ's imminent return, Paul was either a charlatan or a false prophet." Of course, a theological liberal would not accuse Paul in this way, for he might lose his teaching or preaching job. He would say, "Paul's intensity regarding the need for holy living in the church led him to place a short timetable on Christ's judgment." Murray and Hendriksen refuse even to consider this obvious response by liberals. Why? I think it is because they cannot reply effectively to it in terms of their denial of the time element in this text. They also do not respond exegetically to either the "judgment at one's death" argument or the "judgment on Old Covenant Israel" argument.
Individual Judgment at Death
The argument that Paul was referring to a person's death has defenders. It acknowledges the obvious meaning of Paul's language: soon. The night is far gone, Paul says. Jesus used language in a similar way: "I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work" (John 9:4). But there is a problem: Jesus said that the day was almost gone. Paul says that the night is almost gone. Jesus said that He was working hard before darkness fell, presumably referring to His death. Every person faces this night, He said. A man can work only while he is still alive. But Paul is saying that the day is coming. "The night is far spent, the day is at hand." He calls on members of the Roman church to change their evil ways before daybreak arrives.
What does "night" mean in this context? In what way was the night far spent? Not every member of the church at Rome was old when Paul's letter arrived. In fact, the majority were not old, unless the Roman church was a statistical anomaly. Some members would have been youngsters. In what way were their nights far spent? Their lives lay ahead of them. If Paul's reference was to each individual's death, then night and day had to apply differently to different members.
Paul's use of "day" does not refer to the day of the Lord in final judgment of all humanity. The time element was too specific: soon. It has been too long since Paul wrote. But "day" also cannot apply to individual's judgment at death, for Paul was calling them out of a prevailing darkness. The contrast between night, which was far spent, and daybreak, which was close at hand, could not have applied to all of the recipients of his letter. In matters of personal lifespan, a few people are at the end of the night -- sin-filled living -- while the majority have their lives to lead. Paul was not referring to the statistical possibility that all of them could die the next day, for that probability was low. In any case, his language was not probabilistic; it was emphatic: the night was far spent.
The End of the Old Covenant Order Jesus had made it clear that the next great eschatological event would be the fall of Jerusalem. He told His listeners specifically:
And when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh. Then let them which are in Judaea flee to the mountains; and let them which are in the midst of it depart out; and let not them that are in the countries enter thereinto. For these be the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled. But woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck, in those days! for there shall be great distress in the land, and wrath upon this people. And they shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations: and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled. And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken. And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh (Luke 21:20-28).
In the parallel Matthew passage, the reference to "coming in the clouds" appears in verse 30. "And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. Now learn a parable of the fig tree; When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh: So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors. Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled" (Matt. 24:30-34). Verse 34 says that the generation that was listening to Him would not pass before all of this would be fulfilled. This specifically includes His coming in the clouds. This phrase has to apply to the fall of Jerusalem. It does not refer to the end of history and the final judgment.
Liberal theologians accuse Jesus of making an error. He supposedly thought that He would return in final judgment within one generation, but He did not return in this way. Paul was merely being faithful to Jesus' time perspective regarding final judgment when he passed along this misinterpretation to the church at Rome. They both believed that night was ending for this sin-filled world. They were both wrong.
When the fall of Jerusalem takes place, Jesus had said, "look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh" (Luke 21:28). What redemption? Not final judgment. This has yet to take place. Not personal judgment at death. Jesus was warning His followers to flee Jerusalem when they saw these signs. He wanted them to avoid being killed. The church survived the fall of Jerusalem. Then what happened? Liberation. His words can mean only one thing: redemption from the bondage of the Old Covenant order. This is also the meaning of Paul's use of salvation in Romans 13:11: "And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed." The Greek word for salvation (soter) is used repeatedly in the New Testament to mean "deliverance." "That we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us" (Luke 1:71). "What then? notwithstanding, every way, whether in pretence, or in truth, Christ is preached; and I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice. For I know that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer, and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ" (Phil. 1:18-19). "By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith" (Heb. 11:7).
Gary DeMar lists three pages of New Testament prophetic time texts. Romans 13:11 is one of them. These texts are specific. They say that certain events will take place soon, or before the listeners die, or are near at hand.(8) Commentators who attempt to place the fulfillment of these prophecies in the distant future are fair game for liberals who reply that New Testament authors obviously did not know what they were talking about when they used the language of imminence.
The Jewish Revolt
Prior to A.D. 66, the church was under continual persecution by the Jews. This included the gentile churches. The Jews still had influence with local Roman administrations. In Thessolonica: "But the Jews which believed not, moved with envy, took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort, and gathered a company, and set all the city on an uproar, and assaulted the house of Jason, and sought to bring them out to the people. And when they found them not, they drew Jason and certain brethren unto the rulers of the city, crying, These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also; Whom Jason hath received: and these all do contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, one Jesus. And they troubled the people and the rulers of the city, when they heard these things" (Acts 17:5-8). They were not always successful in their efforts to get the government to suppress the gospel, but they tried. "And when Gallio(9) was the deputy of Achaia, the Jews made insurrection with one accord against Paul, and brought him to the judgment seat, Saying, This fellow persuadeth men to worship God contrary to the law. And when Paul was now about to open his mouth, Gallio said unto the Jews, If it were a matter of wrong or wicked lewdness, O ye Jews, reason would that I should bear with you: But if it be a question of words and names, and of your law, look ye to it; for I will be no judge of such matters. And he drave them from the judgment seat" (Acts 18:12-16).
When the Jews revolted against Rome, beginning in A.D. 66, their influence with Rome disappeared. For the next four years, Roman legions battled Jewish military forces in Palestine. Then, in A.D. 70, Jerusalem fell to the Roman siege. The temple was burned. This put an end to the Old Covenant order. Jesus' prophecy, recorded in Matthew 24 and Luke 21, was fulfilled. Some members of the generation that had heard His words were still alive when the siege of Jerusalem began. Far fewer were alive when it ended.
The end of the Old Covenant order was the context of Paul's remarks at the end of the epistle: "And the God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen" (Rom. 16:20).
The Transfer of the Kingdom Paul here tells the church at Rome that their deliverance is drawing nigh. He assures them that they will not live under Jewish persecution forever. This did not mean that an era of peace with Rome was imminent, but this conflict would be between Christ and Caesar, not Christ and Caiphas. The church's confrontation with Rome led in the late fourth century to the replacement of Roman paganism with Christianity as the religion of the empire.
Paul tells the church to adopt holy living. The long night of the Old Covenant order is drawing to a close, Paul tells them. A far better covenant -- Christ's -- is about to replace the Old Covenant. The church will soon see God transfer His kingdom to the church, just as Christ had told the Jews. "Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof" (Matt. 21:43). The fruits of righteousness are basic for identifying the recipient of this kingdom inheritance: the church. Jesus had said this; Paul repeats it here. Because of the imminent demise of the Old Covenant order, members of the church were therefore required to live differently from those around them. "The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying" (v. 13).
Paul offers a specific motivation for righteous living: the imminent dawning of the day. This cannot refer to the post-resurrection world of sin-free living, which has not yet arrived in our day. Whether it comes tomorrow or at a man's death is irrelevant for the call to righteous living. Righteous living is a moral obligation at all times. Then why does Paul emphasize the time factor here? What has the dawning of the day have to do with righteous living?
It has to do with the inheritance of the kingdom of God. In Romans 11, Paul spoke of the jealousy of the Jews against the gentiles (v. 11). Someday, this jealousy will lead to the conversion of the Jews, he told them. The original olive tree's branches, which were in the process of being cut off for the sake of the grafting in of the branches of the wild olive tree, will someday be grafted in again. This grafting in, Paul says in Romans 11, will mark the fulness of the gentiles.(10) But the original branches had not yet been completely cut off in history in his day. They were fighting the replacement process. They were attacking the church: the replacement branches. God's transfer of the kingdom of God was still in transition. It had not yet been completed. When would this transition period end? Paul makes this clear in Romans 13: soon. The transfer took place in A.D. 70, but the actual date was not known to the apostles. They knew only that it was close at hand.
The kingdom would be transferred to that nation whose citizens showed the fruits of righteousness, Jesus had said. The church was required by Christ to demonstrate publicly its commitment to living righteously. Paul tells them here, "But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof" (v. 14). To replace the Old Covenant order, the church must live in a way ethically superior to the Jews. Jesus had said as much: "Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 5:17-20). Gentile Christians during the transition period had a responsibility: to live ethically, so that the transfer could take place.
Does this mean that the transfer was conditional? Yes, in the same way that the promise to Abraham was ritually conditional: circumcision. It was a promise, but it was also conditional. This does not mean that the outcome of the promise was in doubt. The church's ethical performance would be acceptable. This had been foreordained. "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them" (Eph. 2:10).
Future-Orientation In chapter 11, Paul told them that there will be a future conversion of the Jews. This re-grafting will bring in an era of extreme blessings for the church. Paul did not say when this will happen, only that it will happen. His readers were not being told to shorten their time horizons. They were not being told that the era of the gentiles will be short. They were being told that the dawn was at hand; the long night was coming to an end. Dawn is not evening. This was not a call to short-term thinking. The day would last a long time, just as the night had. This was not an apocalyptic message. On the contrary, it was a call to patience. Do not expect the end of the world, Paul was telling them. Before there is an end to this world, two things must take place: the conversion of the Jews and an era of kingdom blessing that will follow this conversion.
When Paul told them in this section that their salvation was drawing nigh, he meant that the era of church's exclusive kingdom would soon begin. The kingdom of God was being shared in Paul's day, which is why he continued to honor the high priest (Acts 23:5). Paul had already told them that not until the fulness of the gentile era is complete will the Jews be converted. "Now if the fall of them be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fulness?" (Rom. 11:12). This diminishing process was still going on. The era of gentile exclusivity had not yet begun. Until it did begin, and then continue for an unspecified period, there could be no completion of the gentile era. "For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in" (Rom. 11:25).
Paul's epistle to the Romans in no way can be classified as apocalyptic, as if the end of the world were near. On the contrary, the epistle told the readers that the end of the world was not near. The end of the Old Covenant order was near.
Economic Growth
Time perspective is important for a theory of economic growth. The shorter that men's future-orientation is, the higher their rate of interest is. They want to attain their near-term goals at the price of not fulfilling long-term goals. They discount the present value of both future income and future costs. The importance of the future recedes rapidly at higher rates of interest.
The child does not think of his old age. He does not plan for it. He does not defer enjoyments in the present for the sake of greater wealth in his old age. Because of this, individuals who place a low value on the future do not save and invest as much money as individuals do who place a high value on the future. The same is true of societies. Men get what they pay for. Those who want instant gratification at the expense of future gratification achieve their goal by spending on consumer goods and services rather than saving. Emotional maturity involves a recognition of the uncertainty of the future and also the present cost of attaining income in the future. Extreme present-orientation is a mark of an immature person or an immature society.
Had Paul been teaching a doctrine of the imminent return of Christ in final judgment, he would have created extreme present-orientation in the minds of his followers. This was not his intention. It was not Christ's intention, either. Paul taught, as Christ had taught, that the transfer of the kingdom of God to the church was taking place, and that it would be completed soon. Then the exclusive era of the gentiles would begin.
Cooperation With Future Generations Edmund Burke, in his Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), made an observation that has become one of the pillars of conservative political thought. In his chapter on "The Church of France," he wrote:
Society is indeed a contract. Subordinate contracts for objects of mere occasional interest may be dissolved at pleasure -- but the state ought not to be considered as nothing better than a partnership agreement in a trade of pepper and coffee, calico or tobacco, or some other such low concern, to be taken up for a little temporary interest, and to be dissolved by the fancy of the parties. It is to be looked on with other reverence; because it is not a partnership in things subservient only to the gross animal existence of a temporary and perishable nature. It is a partnership in all science; a partnership in all art; a partnership in every virtue, and in all perfection. As the ends of such a partnership cannot be obtained in many generations, it becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are living, those who are to be born.(11)
Burke used economic terms -- contract, partnership -- to describe what we would call a covenant. He viewed the social contract as a covenant: sealed by an oath. "Each contract of each particular state is but a clause in the great primaeval contract of eternal society, linking the lower with the higher natures, connecting the visible and invisible world, according to a fixed compact sanctioned by the inviolable oath which holds all physical and all moral natures, each in their appointed place."(12)
Paul was calling the Roman church to take a similar view of their church membership. They belonged to an institution that will survive into eternity (Rev. 21; 22). The day was at hand, he said, not the night. They were part of a covenant made with them by the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Their good works will bear fruit into eternity, he was telling them.
In this sense, they were in a partnership, just as Burke described it. This partnership extended backward to Abraham and forward to our day. It was, and remains, cross-generational. This means that they were cooperating with generations yet to come. So Are we. We are called by God to extend the work of the patriarchs, and in doing so, we extend this ancient legacy into the future. We are supposed to add value to this legacy. The late-twentieth-century's marketing term, value-added, is a good one. It accurately describes what entrepreneurs are supposed to do with scarce economic resources. This is the underlying meaning of the phrase, "buy low, sell high."
Conclusion This passage is often incorrectly interpreted as a prophecy of the imminent bodily return of Christ in final judgment. What it taught was that a long night was coming to a close, and the day would soon dawn. This also did not refer to their imminent deaths as individuals, which would take place at different times in the congregation. Some would die soon; others would die decades later. There would be no simultaneous dawning of the day, if "day" is interpreted as physical death.
What Paul taught in Romans 11-13 was the establishment of the New Covenant church on the ruins of the Old Covenant order. This is an important concept. It is inherently future-oriented. It should move covenant-keeping men's thinking from the expectation of the imminent end of this world to a vision of an unprecedented expansion of God's kingdom in history: the fulness of the gentiles and beyond. This establishes future-orientation. When believed, it redirects men's goals to a distant earthly future: a kingdom legacy that their spiritual heirs will inherit, more surely than their biological heirs will inherit their earthly wealth. This temporal vision identifies the kingdom of God in the broadest sense as the one institution capable of achieving compound growth until the end of time.
Christians are members of a cooperative venture with future generations. They are supposed to build today on the assumption that future generations will inherit. Each generation is supposed to add value to this legacy. This is also what the meaning of compound economic growth is: adding value, generation after generation, to the original capital base.
Footnotes:
1. John Murray, The Epistle to the Romans, 2 vols. (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1959, 1965), II, pp. 165-70.
2. William Hendriksen, New Testament Commentary: Exposition of Paul's Epistle to the Romans (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1982), pp. 441-47.
3. Hendriksen cites W. Sandy and A. C. Headlam, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans (International Critical Commentary (1911), p. 378, and S. Greijdanus, De Brief van den Apostel Paulus aan de Genente te Rome, 2 vols. (Amsterdam, 1933), II, p. 578. Hendriksen, Romans, p. 445n.
4. Roderick Campbell, Israel and the New Covenant (Tyler, Texas: Geneva Divinity School Press, [1954] 1981), p. 107.
5. Murray, Romans, II, p. 168; Hendriksen, Romans, p. 446.
6. Murray, Romans, II, p. 168.
7. Hendriksen, Romans, p. 446.
8. Gary DeMar, Last Days Madness: Obsession of the Modern Church (Atlanta, Georgia: American Vision, 1999), pp. 38-40.
9. L. Junius Gallio Annaenus, the brother of the philosopher Seneca. He was proconsul in Corinth under the emperor Claudius in the early 50's. See Dennis McCallum, "A Chronological Study of Paul's Ministry." http://www.xenos.org/classes/chronop.htm
10. Chapter 6.
11. Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), I:3:3.
12. Idem.
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