Romans 3:7

But if the truth of God through my lie abounded unto his glory, why am I still judged as a sinner? And why not (as we are slanderously reported, and as some affirm that we say), Let us do evil that good may come? whose condemnation is just.

Why am I still judged as a sinner ... shows that the addressees are Jewish, for the Christians did not so judge Paul. Lenski's view that "from verse I onward, Paul addresses the Roman Christians"[14] cannot be true, for there is no way to put the charge of falsehood against Paul in the mouths of any kind of Christians, much less those whom Paul had never met, as a body, and who are addressed in this epistle. The misunderstanding of some in reference to these verses lies in their failure to consider the subject matter. Paul, in this place, is absolutely not discussing the abuse of the doctrine of salvation by grace, which subject he had not even presented at this point in the epistle; but he is still defending the intrinsic righteousness of God. As Murray put it:

What then is Paul's answer to the distortion he is dealing with in Romans 3:5-8? We might expect a lengthy argument after the pattern of Paul's rebuttal of the antinomian bias in Romans 6. This we do not find. We must bear in mind that the distortions in view in the respective passages are not identical, though they are similar. In Romans 6, Paul is dealing with the abuse applied to the doctrine of grace, whereas in Romans 3:5-8 he is dealing with an assault upon the justice or rectitude of God. "The righteousness of God" (Romans 3:5) is the attribute of righteousness. ... It is the inherent equity of God and is to be coordinated with the truth or faithfulness of God (Romans 3:5-7). The abuse with which Romans 3:5-8 deal is therefore of a different cast, and it is significant that Paul has no lengthy refutation. The consideration that he pits against the distortion is simply, "God forbid; in that event, how will God judge the world?"[15]

These verses are an "argumentum ad hominem" (an argument from what people do) ably explained by Lard as follows:

You Jews cannot deny that you have been unjust; but this injustice, you say, has displayed the justice of God. You therefore cannot see how he can be just and punish you. Now, I will prove that your reasoning is false. In order to do this, I take my own case and show you how you view me. I am held by you to be false to the religion of my fathers. I am consequently condemned by you as a sinner. But in all this I am wronged, according to your own reasoning. For if the truthfulness of God has abounded the more to his honor by my being false, why do you still condemn me as a sinner? If, according to your reasoning, you should not be punished, neither should I.[16]

Let us do evil that good may come ... Paul here reduced the arguments of Jewish objectors to an absurdity, as it might be paraphrased, "If your method of judging is correct, then why not do evil to procure the good that would come of it?"

Whose condemnation is just ... was Paul's way of saying that any such notion was absolutely incorrect and sinful, and justly condemned by God.

My lie ... means, "the lie that I am now dealing with," or "our lie," thus identifying himself with the objector for the sake of a more effective rebuttal. Since the passage is directed against Jewish objectors, the thought is, "My lie, that is, my lie according to your view of things!" Whatever the exact construction put on this expression, it positively forbids the conclusion that Paul addressed these words to the Christians in Rome.

"As we are slanderously reported, and as some affirm that we say ... is a parenthetical statement; and we are in darkness as far as knowing who made any such slanderous reports against Paul, or upon what grounds they were fabricated. Certainly, it is going beyond the word of God to make the supposed grounds of those slanders the basis for concluding what kind of gospel Paul preached. That gospel is abundantly clear and concise in the light of a major portion of the New Testament which Paul wrote; and no reliance whatever should be placed upon the deductions which some have dared to make, basing their deductions, so they say, upon the grounds slanderers had for attacking Paul. Reference is made to the extensive deductions of Griffith Thomas who wrote:

Evidently his teaching had been charged with giving an excuse for sinning. Salvation by grace was said to have an immoral tendency, as we shall see again in Romans 6:1. This (by the way) shows quite evidently the meaning of the Pauline doctrine of righteousness without works, for against no other teaching could such a charge be made.[17]

The fallacy in Thomas' deduction stems from the consideration that Paul was not discussing salvation by grace in this passage, and from the further consideration that it is illogical and dangerous to base a deduction upon the alleged basis of a slander, especially where there is total ignorance of what that basis, if any, was. Slander needs no basis, and more frequently than not, has no basis other than the wickedness of the slanderers. The doctrine of salvation by "faith only" is certainly hard up for support, when its advocates appeal to alleged grounds of slander in order to try to sustain it. Moreover, Thomas' assertion that "salvation by grace is said to have an immoral tendency" is without foundation. Who said that it has such a tendency? Paul declared that it does not have such a tendency and named as slanderers any persons who might allege that it does. There are doctrines that tend to immorality, one of them being the theory of salvation by "faith only;" but salvation by grace, as taught by Paul, is of an utterly different category.

In the next dozen verses (Romans 3:9-20), the scriptural proof that all people are sinners in the eyes of God is set forth in the form of a number of Old Testament quotations; but it is likely that even more was intended than the mere conclusion of universal sinfulness. The apostle here pronounced a verdict, not only against sin, but also against mankind as now constituted, against all people and their systems, even against the Jew with his God-given system, and against the Gentiles and their pagan religions, and, in all this, showing how utterly helpless is man, apart from God, in his pitiful efforts to achieve any such thing as justification. What was so desperately needed was the revelation of God's way really to save people, to make them actually righteous, and to reveal the system of true reconciliation with God. Brunner thus expressed it:

And now Paul has reached the stage where he can strike the decisive blow against every kind of human presumption, so that he can crush it before going on to speak of what the whole letter points to: God's gracious act of reconciliation in Jesus Christ.[18]

[14] R. C. H. Lenski, The Interpretation of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Augsburg Publishing House, 1963), p. 219.

[15] John Murray, op. cit., p. 98.

[16] Moses E. Lard, op. cit., p. 105.

[17] W. H. Griffith Thomas, St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1970), p. 96.

[18] Emil Brunner, op. cit., p. 25.