Follow us on Social Media:

Should “THERE IS NO ONE WHO SEEKS GOD” Be Taken Literally?

Paul was quoting two psalm texts in that particular verse, Psalm 14:1-3 and 53:1-3. Let’s read the whole passage from Romans:

 10As it is written:

 “There is no one righteous, not even one;

      11there is no one who understands;

        there is no one who seeks God.

12All have turned away,

      they have together become worthless;

there is no one who does good,

      not even one.”

Romans 3:10-12

This was originally written in the time of David, almost a thousand years before Christ died for our sins and was resurrected for our justification (Romans 4:25). As such, the perfect righteousness offered to people through faith in Christ was not yet available (Romans 3:22). However, the Scriptures clearly distinguish between righteous people and unrighteous people in the pre-Christ era. Here’s an example:

7and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the depraved conduct of the lawless 8(for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)— 9if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to hold the unrighteous for punishment on the day of judgment.

2 Peter 2:7-9

Lot is referred to here as a “righteous man” and “godly” despite the fact that he dubiously offered his daughters to a wicked mob for sexual purposes (Genesis 19:7-8) and, later, got so drunk that he wasn’t aware his daughters had sex with him (Genesis 19:30-38).  Yet it’s clear that he hated evil in a general sense and was therefore genuinely distressed by the great transgressions of the Sodomites. Keep in mind that Abraham believed in God and it was counted to him as righteousness (Genesis 15:6; Romans 4:3), so we can assume the same for Lot. In short, one’s righteousness is linked to faith in God.

So, the statement “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God” must be taken as hyperbole, which is exaggeration for effect. There are further reasons to conclude this in light of the fact that there are numerous accounts of spiritually unregenerated people seeking God & truth throughout history, including:

(What I mean by “spiritually unregenerated” is that they hadn’t experienced spiritual rebirth since they lived before regeneration was available to humanity, as detailed in passages like Titus 3:5).

For instance, consider David’s words here:

4One thing I ask from the Lord,

     this only do I seek:

that I may dwell in the house of the Lord

     all the days of my life,

to gaze on the beauty of the Lord

     and to seek him in his temple…

8My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”

     Your face, Lord, I will seek.

Psalm 27:4,8

Additionally, there are myriad directives in the Old Testament to unregenerated people about seeking the LORD, e.g. Deuteronomy 4:29 and Isaiah 45:22, including when YHWH commissioned Jonah to preach to the Gentile Ninevites; and they genuinely repented (Jonah 3).

Then there’s the fact that Abraham expected to find at least ten righteous people in Sodom almost 800 years before the Mosaic law (Genesis 18:16-33). Not to mention, the LORD agreed to not destroy this infamous city if there were that many noble souls living in it. This of course means that there had to be righteous people in other cities that did not suffer the judgment of Sodom.

Related Topics:

How to Walk FREE OF THE FLESH by being Spirit-Controlled

Why the BREASTPLATE of Righteousness Is So Vital

Is It Wrong to REPRESS Negative Desires?

The Basics of Christianity


comments powered by Disqus