People KNOW there is a God. It is revealed all around them. They simply suppress the truth about God because they do not wish to glorify Him.
AMEN! Alamo-Girl always reminds us God is revealed in the creation, and here Paul is clearly telling us that very fact.
All men were created in the image of God, and all men carry this imprint on them as if it were an implanted I.D. chip saying "This, too, belongs to God."
Paul then continues to tell us that some of these men are left in their natural disobedience to God and thus they will be vessels to display His wrath.
And some men will have their sins paid for by Christ, and their minds quickened by the Holy Spirit, and a new heart will be given to them in place of their stone heart, and thus they will repent and obey and believe, by Christ within them. And these men will be vessels to display God's mercy.
"Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?" -- Romans 9:20
Each man is responsible, and none is without excuse. But some men are left in condemnation, and some men are called and thus, acquitted by Christ, according to God's holy purpose.
O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants' sake, the tribes of thine inheritance. The people of thy holiness have possessed it but a little while: our adversaries have trodden down thy sanctuary. We are thine: thou never barest rule over them; they were not called by thy name." -- Isaiah 63:16-19 "...thou, O LORD, art our father, our redeemer; thy name is from everlasting.
"We are thine...they were not called by thy name."
The fact that the only thing separating the redeemed from the condemned is that God has named us as His family should make us all even more sober and humble -- nothing distinguishes us from the lost except the love God has for His Son, mercifully given to us as a free, unmerited, transformative gift of pure grace.
Like the last line from Frost's poem, "The Road Not Taken" -- "And that has made all the difference."
Truly, man has no excuse for not noticing God.
The fool hath said in his heart, [There is] no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, [there is] none that doeth good. - Psalms 14:1
And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him: for they know his voice.
And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him: for they know not the voice of strangers. - John 10:3-5
Amen.
Thx for the pings.