02 Why Can’t You Just Try Harder to Be Good?

by Krisan Marotta | Feb 11, 2026 | 01 Podcasts, Start Strong

Romans 1:18-32 reveals a three-part pattern: rebellion against God, the consequence of death, and God’s wrath as He gives people over to their sin. Understanding this pattern is essential for grasping why trying harder to be good doesn’t work. You’re guilty before God and guilt requires more than an apology. It requires the gospel.

Why You Still Feel Guilty After You Say Sorry

Guilt is one of the most common, and one of the most misunderstood, experiences in the Christian life.

In Chapter 2 of Start Strong, I unpack how God responds to our guilt, not just our sin. That matters because confusion about guilt runs deep.

According to the 2025 State of Theology survey, only 23% of evangelicals agree that “Even the smallest sin deserves eternal damnation,” while 74% still believe everyone is born innocent.

You can debate whether wording influenced the numbers, but the trend is clear: we underestimate sin, which means we underestimate our guilt, which means we misunderstand the mercy of God.

In the last podcast and Chapter 1, we saw why it’s vital to grasp the seriousness of sin. Today we will look at God’s surprising response to sin.

Romans: The Setup

Romans: Justification by Faith

We’re going to look at another passage from Romans. Since this is the anchor passage for Chapter 2 of my book, it’s helpful to go over it in detail. It’s one of the clearest passages on God’s response to sin.

Paul wrote this letter to the church in Rome. Unlike his other letters, he had not visited Rome before writing. So this is not a response to a specific crisis. It is an introduction to Paul and his gospel.

Paul starts by explaining the gospel. He spends the first four chapters arguing that we are justified by faith in Jesus Christ, not by keeping the law.

The passage we’re studying launches the argument that runs through Chapter 4.

In many ways Romans 1:16-17 is the thesis statement for the whole book. He makes a claim in these two verses, and the rest of the book expands on it.

Rom 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”

“I Am Not Ashamed of the Gospel”

Paul is not ashamed because the gospel is true, valuable, and comes from an authoritative spokesman. Both the message and the messenger are reliable.

Paul is an authoritative spokesman for Jesus Christ. God testified to Paul’s authority by the miracles he performed and the changed lives that followed his preaching.

The content of the message about Jesus and what he did for us is also reliable. Jesus’ identity was validated by his resurrection from the dead.

“The Power of God for Salvation”

What does that mean and why is it important? The promise of the gospel is the power to change, the kind of change we actually need.

Christianity says, “You’re a wretch. In fact, you’re worse off than you think. Dig deep down inside yourself and you’re still a wretch. Left to yourself, there’s nothing you can do about it. The harder you try, the worse it gets.”

The gospel starts by saying, “You need help. It doesn’t matter who you are, you’re not good enough.” Once we admit we have a problem, we see our need to change. And the gospel alone supplies the power of God to change.

“To the Jew First and Also to the Greek”

Salvation begins with the Jews. Not every religion is equal to every other. God made himself known in history through a particular people, the children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God gave His laws to this people and promised a Savior would come who would bless the whole world.

But because the gospel came first to a particular people does not mean they are less in need of saving or more exalted.

No one has any basis for pride. We all have the same disease and require the same cure. On that basis we have hope that the barriers which divide others need not divide us.

“The Righteous Shall Live by Faith”

Habakkuk 2:4 is the Old Testament verse most often quoted in the New Testament.

Paul’s point is that the gospel is a gift from God. It cannot be earned or deserved. It has nothing to do with your qualifications, appearance, age, wealth, name, history, origin, or accomplishments.

The gospel calls you to believe what God has done. That is the key to everything. Whatever the outside looks like does not matter; God begins his work on the inside. That is what Paul means when he quotes Habakkuk 2:4: “The righteous shall live by faith.”

The power of the gospel, the power to change, is freely given to those who have faith. The verse he quotes is a promise, not a command. He will spend the next four chapters arguing that this is true.

Why God’s Wrath is Not Like Human Anger

Rom 1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.

Paul just said the righteousness of God is revealed to faith. God justifies those who have faith because they have faith. Now he says the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness. That is present tense. Not was or will be, but is.

We tend to think of wrath as something future, reserved for Judgment Day. But Paul says it is being revealed now, every day in human experience.

Skeptics imagine God is far away and disengaged. He wound up the universe and walked away. Paul says otherwise.

God is not distant. His wrath is being revealed now. Nothing escapes his notice. Nothing is outside his control. He sees, he cares, and he acts.

God’s wrath is personal. It is not karma, fate, or bad luck. It is personal judgment from a personal God.

Three times Paul says, “God gave them over.” God gave them over, not nature, not chance. This is not passive cause and effect. This is a holy God responding to rebellion. He upholds His holy order and brings judgment when that order is defied.

God’s wrath is principled and controlled. When we hear wrath, we think of human anger, emotional, unpredictable, vengeful. That is not what Paul describes.

God’s wrath is not an outburst. It is not petty or impulsive. It is reasoned, principled, and controlled. It is the holy response of a just God to real evil. He is slow to anger and patient, but he will not overlook sin forever.

Why Ignorance is No Excuse

Rom 1:19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.
Rom 1:20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

God’s wrath is not aimed at people who do not know any better. It is not because they are unaware of the truth. It is because they suppress the truth.

What can be known about God is plain, because God made it plain. He has revealed himself through creation. You do not need a theology degree to recognize that someone made the world. Look around.

Nature testifies. The skies declare the work of his hands. The beauty, order, and complexity of the universe point to a Creator.

Let me give you a quick example. My dad is an atheist, and we have had many conversations about faith. One time I said, “Dad, imagine you’re walking down the street and come across a million pennies, all heads up. Would you think they landed that way by accident?”

He said, “Of course not. Someone had to place them that way.”

Exactly. The odds of that happening by chance are astronomical. I said, “Dad, look around. The world is all heads up. You’re looking at design.”

He was unimpressed, but the logic stands. Paul’s point is the same: creation is evidence. It is shouting the truth about God.

Instead of responding with worship, we suppress that truth. We ignore it, deny it, or explain it away. We trade it for lesser things.

What Does God’s Wrath Mean?

God’s wrath is his just and reasoned decision to give humanity over to what it insists on having. God lets people go.

He lets them follow their desires, even when those desires lead to ruin.

This is not indifference. It is judgment. God gives people what they want. In doing so, he shows what happens when we reject him.

Paul is setting the stage. He is explaining why we need a Savior. Before he tells us the good news, he shows us the reality we all face: left to ourselves, we are without excuse.

Why Paul Repeats ‘God Gave Them Over’ Three Times

From verse 21 to the end of the chapter, Paul gives a structure to understand the human story.

Rebellion: We turn from God
Death: We experience spiritual decay
Wrath: God gives us over to our chosen path

Listen for the pattern as I read Romans 1:21-32.

Rom 1:21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. 24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. 26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature, 27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. 28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.
Rom 1:29 They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, 31 foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32 Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.

Rebellion: “Although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks” (vs 21)
Death: “They became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened” (vs 21)
Rebellion: “Claiming to be wise, they became fools” (vs 22); “They exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images” (vs 23)
Consequence: “Therefore God gave them up” (vs 24)
Death: “in the lusts of their heart to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves” (vs 24)
Rebellion: “because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator” (vs 25)
Consequence: “For this reason God gave them up” (vs 26)
Death: “receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error” (vs 27)
Rebellion: “And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God” (vs 28)
Consequence: “God gave them up” (vs 28)
Death: “to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done” (vs 28)

Paul’s list in verses 29-31 describes the consequences of sin: envy, murder, strife, deceit, gossip, arrogance, disobedience, lack of love, lack of mercy.

This is not just how far we have fallen. It is the outcome of rebellion. When we cut ourselves off from God, who is the source of life and holiness, this is what is left.

These are not merely unfortunate flaws. They are the visible consequences of a larger spiritual problem.

Paul is not only saying, “You rebelled, and you became terrible people.” He is saying, “You rebelled, and God gave you over to your idols. You are prisoners of them.”

This is judgment. Death is the natural consequence of sin, but God’s wrath goes further. He gives people over to experience that death. We are enslaved to it.

We do not just sin and feel the fallout. We have been handed over, locked into a pattern we cannot escape. No strength of will or human effort can break these chains.

How Idolatry Moves from Eyes to Heart to Body

Paul uses the verb “exchange” to describe idolatry. At its core, sin is an exchange.

We do not merely stumble or misbehave. We trade what is right for what is wrong. We trade the truth for a lie. We trade the Creator for the creation. We put ourselves in God’s place.

Instead of saying, “God is my Creator, and I will trust him,” we say, “I will be in charge. I will call the shots.”

We give up glory for garbage. Life for death. Truth for deception.

Notice the progression. It starts with the eyes, moves to the heart, then is expressed in the body.

Rom 1:23 “They exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images.” Idolatry begins with sight. We see something God made and it captivates us. We elevate it. That is where idolatry starts: with what we behold.
Rom 1:25 “They exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature.” What we fix our eyes on captures our hearts. We serve it. We build our lives around it. We trade worship for idolatry.
Rom 1:26 “For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions.” Idolatry does not stay abstract. It shows up in how we live. It shapes our values, choices, desires, words, and actions.

Some idols are easy to spot. Others are not. Paul’s list includes gossip, pride, and disobedience to parents. Those feel normal, so we excuse them. But Paul says all of it is evidence of the exchange. Whether respectable or scandalous, the root is the same. We have put creation in God’s place and trusted a lie. The result is death.

Paul is not showing a progression of sins as if one is the worst. He is not saying this one sin is more perverse than the others. Everything on his list is evidence of rebellion. All sin is a distortion. All of it deserves judgment. All of it stems from rejecting the truth about God.

So why single out same-sex behavior? In his day it served as a visible example of abandoning the created order. It is not that this kind of rebellion to God is worse. It is that the departure from God’s created design ought to be obvious.

We excuse pride, arrogance, or impatience. They feel normal. But Paul chooses an example where the violation of design is visible. You do not need a theology degree to see that male and female bodies were created to function together. That design is built into nature itself.

We live in a culture that works hard to deny that. Paul’s point is that this denial is not new. It is another expression of the same rebellion. Professing to be wise, we become fools.

Again, Paul is not elevating one sin above the others. He is illustrating his larger point: when we reject God, we reject design, and consequences follow.

Where Paul Is Taking Us

Paul is building a case that carries through the end of Chapter 5. He’s answering the question: How can anyone be justified? How do sinful people become right with a holy God?

His first point is sobering: you are a prisoner of sin and death. You did not just mess up; you are guilty before a holy God. You are not merely struggling in your sin; you are stuck in it.

God’s wrath is not only future judgment. It is the present reality that he has given you over to what you have chosen. Left to yourself, you cannot escape.

How We Should Respond

It is easy to read this and think, “This describes our culture today.” It does.

But if we stop there, we miss the point. Paul did not write this to make us self-righteous. He wrote it to make us humble.

If we are honest, we see the same patterns in our own hearts. We may not bow to statues, but we practice idolatry. We trade the glory of God for lesser things.

Maybe it is good works. Maybe it is appearances. Maybe it is being right or being better than everyone else.

We all dig broken cisterns and try to drink from them instead of going to the source of living water.

So our response to Romans 1 should be humility. We are prone to wander, prone to leave the God we love.

Paul is not handing us a stick to beat the culture with. He is holding up a mirror. This is where we all stand apart from grace.

Messengers of Grace

Paul does not write so we will despair. Yes, God’s wrath is being revealed. Yes, people experience death every day.

But we know the cure: the gospel. God made a way of escape. Jesus stepped in to take the penalty we deserved. There is real hope for people in real bondage.

That means we are not messengers of wrath. That is already built into the world. People are living it.

We are messengers of grace. We carry good news.

We should not be surprised or despairing when culture spirals downward under the weight of its rebellion. Expect it. Paul told us this would happen.

This is our chance to say, “I know the way out. Let me tell you about the gospel of Jesus Christ.”