Divine wrath upon disobedience.
It was necessary for the apostle to mark the true nature and real end of impurity in all its manifestations. "Let no man deceive you with vain words."
I. IT IS NO UNUSUAL EXPERIENCE FOR WICKED MEN NOT TO SEE THE WICKEDNESS OF THEIR ACTS. The heathen regarded moral purity as a thing indifferent, and many of their moral guides palliated some of the worst features of pagan sensuality. They argued, as some have argued in modern times with a wicked levity of purpose, that tins of impurity have their origin and their justification in the very constitution of our nature, that they are not inconsistent with many social virtues, and that they are not injurious to others. It is one of the blinding effects of sin that men do not see their sin "through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart" (Ephesians 4:18).
II. IT IS A MISTAKE TO SUPPOSE THAT THE WRATH OF GOD IS LIMITED TO THE PRESENT LIFE, and is merely entailed through the connection established by the Divine government between sin and suffering. There is such a connection written in the physical constitution of man. Sinners often in this life receive in themselves "that recompense of their error which is meet" (Romans 1:27). The drunkard is punished here in broken health, in loss of substance, reputation, and happiness. But we are not to suppose that the laws of Providence which ensure these results exhaust the fullness of Divine wrath against sin. Scripture tells us plainly that sins of impurity entail exclusion "from the kingdom of Christ and of God" (Ephesians 5:5); that he will judge whoremongers and adulterers (Hebrews 13:5), and that "the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone" (Revelation 21:8).—T.C.