The Idolatry of God's Word

Therefore, you have no excuse, everyone of you who passes judgement, for in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things.

-Romans 2:1

The next section of Romans is one where Paul will turn his attention on the Jews. He has already concluded that the Gentiles are without excuse for the depravity of their thinking and therefore cannot stand before a true and just God (see below). He will now show that Jews will be unable to stand before this God because of their depravity. Ironically, the law that was sent to set them apart from all humankind, set them apart from God. There are many lessons we, as Christians, can take from the response of the Jews toward their God.

So much of Jewish identity is their tradition and their ancestry. The key person that they connect themselves with is Abraham. They also connect themselves with the law (esp. the Pentateuch, or the first five books of the Bible) that was given to Moses. In Paul's view, the law was given as a guide or a tutor to show the lack of humanness in them and their need for God to make them fully human (see Galatians 3:15-29). The law and the God who gave it were never supposed to be equal and they were never supposed to be separated.

Unfortunately, this is not what the Jewish people did with the law. Instead, they made the law the only pathway to God and even made the law constrain what God could (or would) or could not do. They were unable to see God do something new. The law became their identity. They began to place their entire trust in the law. They began to praise and lift up the men that committed their lives to interpreting (or at least giving their opinion on) what the law said and what it meant for them. The law became an idol. It became a false or physical representation of God. It is not! The Holy Spirit gave God's Word, the Holy Spirit communicates through God's Word, but God's Word is not your God!

The Jews used God's Word to abuse people. They became a testimony against God.  They placed the burden of following its requirements on all others while they themselves broke the very laws they were judging others by (see above and the rest of Romans 2). They believed that because they had the law that they were upholding the law. In other words, the possession and provisions of God's Word made them righteous. The idolatry of God's Word was the precipice of their idolatry (see the Prophets esp. Jeremiah), this was not their first offense. Paul says, they are without excuse (Rom. 2:1). God will judge them according to the law that they have made into an idol. 

Ironically, by that law no one can stand before God. 

No one.