Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things. 2 We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. 3 Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? 4 Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? 5 But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.
6 He will render to each one according to his works: 7 to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; 8 but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. 9 There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, 10 but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek. 11 For God shows no partiality.
12 For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. 13 For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. 14 For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them 16 on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.
-Romans 2:1-16
As Paul speaks to the followers in Rome, he reminds everyone that we are all sinful and broken. As human beings, we were all born with sin because of the nature of this world. Paul speaks in the book of Romans how we need to change our minds and perspectives of the law from what we believed in the past in order to be saved as a Christian. But that comes after recognizing first that we are all broken people.
You know when a friend calls you out for having a certain "bad" habit or the way you acted a certain way in a situation? We usually don't know what wrongs we did until someone has to point it out. Then, we move on to accepting the fact and starting to change and better ourselves. This is what Paul is here to do. He is helping us understand our sins and our evil doings even when we don't realize we are doing something bad. He is here to criticize us and tell us how to be more righteous.
Paul starts this chapter by calling us hypocrites and that we need to stop judging other people when we do the same. Aren't there people everywhere who act hypocritical? Well, only God is allowed to judge us because He can. Because He has done nothing wrong and is the most righteous in this world. Everyone else, even if they don't do obviously bad things, still has some sort of sin in them that prevents them from the right of judgment. What we want as Christians is the ability to know what is right and only do good/right things. We need to learn the way to righteousness.
Do you think you know what is right and wrong in the eyes of God? Do you think you meet God's standard? Do you understand your sins and want to be a righteous person? I would take this time to ask God to help you make changes in your life to be a better child of God and pursue righteousness.
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