There’s a saying that all roads lead to Rome, meaning that regardless the pathway, the same destination awaits. This should be true about God if you open your eyes to your surroundings, or take a moment to contemplate your existence. Here Paul states that man should know that a greater being must have been and is to this day at work. This power is witnessed in the glory of his handiwork, the lightning dancing across the sky, the brilliant sunrises and sunsets, and the miracle of birth, for starters.
All have the intelligence to see this irrefutable evidence of God all around them, and “are without excuse.” (1:20) They should also follow the logic that a being who could create such wonder can certainly hold sway over what he has created.
But man, in the face of all this, suppresses what he knows in unbelief. But this can’t really be unbelief if effort must be constantly exerted to keep the truth at bay. It does get easier when God, seeing this foolishness, allows the exchange of incorruptibility for the corrupt. (1:23)
In time, man degrades and devolves into to everything at odds with the righteousness of God. Taking this course, that is, by choosing to deny the truth of God, man must explain his every act with his own congitations, and satisfy every God-given drive with what seems right in his own eyes, or feels good, no matter how depraved.
All this makes God very angry, as you might expect. He put out all the road signs that would lead man right to him, but they were willfully ignored. Consequently, God’s wrath awaits at the end of this futile detour.
But he’s left behind a lifeline in Jesus Christ, for man is only saved from this road to perdition by accepting directions from him.
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