Romans 1:23-26 diagnoses human depravity not as a "fall into nothingness," but as a "misplaced substitution." The tragedy Paul exposes is not that people lose God and remain suspended in emptiness, but that they inevitably fill the vacancy with something else. This is precisely where the central emphasis-repeated again and again as Pastor David Jang (founder of Olivet University) expounds this passage-touches down: human beings are not creatures who do not worship; they are creatures who change the object of worship. Ungodliness, then, gives birth to idolatry, and idolatry inevitably exerts its force in the direction of collapsing ethics and sensibilities, relationships and communities. The sharpness of Pastor David Jang's preaching lies in how he refuses to let idols remain embalmed as ancient statues or temple relics; he uncovers the way they reappear with more polished faces in ordinary modern life. People often say, "I don't serve any religion," but not worshiping God does not mean worshiping nothing. In Paul's language, when "the glory of the incorruptible God" departs, a person will set up in its place "the likeness of corruptible man and birds and animals and creeping things"-anything at all. This is not merely a problem of superstition; it is an ontological loss of direction. When the central axis of life is replaced, the gravitational pull of values that once held life together is replaced as well.
Pastor David Jang seems to insist that when we read Romans 1, we must first hold onto the verb "exchange." Paul does not depict humanity as having merely slipped and fallen by accident; he indicts an intentional and repeated "swapping out." They exchange God's glory for something else, exchange God's truth for a lie, and invert the hierarchy of life by worshiping the creature rather than the Creator. The terror of idolatry is not that it is simply a bad hobby, but that it overturns the direction of worship and trains the human soul into self-deception. Worship forms a person. What one treats as ultimate determines what kind of person one becomes. Modern civilization rarely carves gods from stone or wood; instead it refines desire into products, burns emotion as fuel for algorithms, and lays the self upon the altar of adoration. Success, approval, money, power, pleasure, nation, ideology-even the conviction "I am right"-can all be deified. The idols Pastor David Jang speaks of typically take root deeper than visible objects: they lodge in the highest value-system of the heart. Idolatry is not a fringe religious issue; it is the central issue of human existence.
After Paul names idolatry, he immediately continues: "Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity." The phrase "gave them over" feels chilling. It sounds less like neglect and more like judgment-God's judicial and ethical ratification of the direction human beings chose. Yet the emotional register that Pastor David Jang's preaching draws out is not merely a cold pronouncement; it is closer to grief. It is not abandonment born of loveless indifference, but the painful distancing that love itself can entail-an unsettling paradox. If human beings refuse to keep God in their hearts and finally reject Him, what does God do? To forcibly seize and subdue would not be love but control, and control destroys relationship. Here Pastor David Jang brings forward the nature of freedom and love: love does not turn the other into a tool, and God is not a tyrant who manipulates humans like machines, but One who calls them into personal communion. Thus "giving them over" is at once the consequence of human rebellion and the expression of love's suffering. As God watches the human being who has left Him travel farther down a darker road, God remains patient. That patience is not indifference but delay for salvation-not the suspension of judgment as an administrative tactic, but time granted as grace, leaving room for repentance.
Even so, Paul does not romanticize reality. The passage soberly shows what grows as fruit in a person who has lost God. The phrase "their bodies were dishonored among them" points to a condition in which desire is no longer governed within order but instead governs the person. When Pastor David Jang speaks of ethical collapse, his aim is not mere moralism. He reads depravity as "the loss of humanity." The moment a person leaves God, that person begins to leave behind true humanness. When the center is lost within, desire occupies the throne, relationships become transactions, and both body and mind become possessions. Here "impurity" is not a question of hygiene; it is the muddiness that results from a twisted direction of being. Paul also indicates that this confusion concentrates in particular arenas. As he continues, he alludes to the sexual ethics and relational breakdown of Roman society, and many traditional Christian interpretations have read these as signs of sexual license and disorder. Yet for today's reader, this text must never be weaponized to despise or hate a particular group. The edge of Pastor David Jang's preaching is aimed first not at "others," but at "my heart" that tilts toward idols. Scripture exposes sin, but it also calls people into salvation; the gospel treats anyone as a dignified human being. The passage's question is not "Who is worse?" but "What have I swapped into God's place?"
At this point Pastor David Jang draws upon the sensibility of the Reformed church tradition. The radicality of the Reformed movement was not merely institutional reform, but the act of returning worship to the "God of the Word" at the center. God cannot be objectified; He cannot be carved, held, or captured by human hands, nor can He be fully contained by human imagination. The Ten Commandments say, "Do not make an idol," not because they exist to forbid art, but because the moment we replace God with something "I can control," that "god" is no longer God. When Pastor David Jang warns that "what is visible easily becomes an idol," he is not demonizing sight itself; he is cautioning the human impulse to see, seize, and possess. To say faith is closer to "hearing" than "seeing" means this: rather than standing as the subject who evaluates God, I descend into the place where I become the one shaped before God's Word. Jesus' call to Zacchaeus-"Come down"-is not merely logistical guidance for a short tax collector; it is a spiritual map declaring that salvation begins not with human "ascent," but with humble "descent." Following that map, Pastor David Jang emphasizes that restoration begins where the hands that fabricate idols stop moving, and the ears that hear God's Word are opened.
To understand this passage more deeply, we must hold together two axes: "truth" and "worship." As Pastor David Jang would say, not knowing truth is a problem of ignorance, but knowing truth and still refusing to worship God is a rupture of relationship. It is not a lack of information but the collapse of love; not a deficiency of data but an overthrow of adoration. That is why Paul says, "they exchanged the truth of God for a lie." Truth is not merely the precision of doctrinal sentences; it is an order that places God and the world in their proper positions. When the placement collapses-Creator as Creator, creature as creature-everything rushes toward extremes: either the creature becomes absolute and deified, or meaning disintegrates into relativism. As a result, people lose the criteria of right and wrong; desire becomes the law of the moment, and tomorrow's guilt cannot restrain today's pleasure. This is why Pastor David Jang might resort to the image of "a car with failed brakes." Sin does not evaporate naturally; it accumulates, becomes habit, and finally turns into numbness. More terrifying still is this: at first, the one who sins feels anxiety, but as time passes, that anxiety disappears. When the alarm of conscience shuts off, a person accelerates without knowing where they are going.
Yet in the middle of Romans 1, an unexpected doxology breaks in: "who is blessed forever. Amen." This sudden outcry sounds like the final line of faith Paul clings to so as not to lose God while speaking of humanity's darkness. Pastor David Jang's preaching does not miss this praise. The reason to speak of wrath is not to delight in destruction, but ultimately to speak of restoration. God's wrath is not caprice; it is another name for holiness. The jealousy of God-His zeal as One who loves-stands opposite to apathy. The word "jealousy" may sound unfamiliar or uncomfortable, but if there is no pain when a loving relationship is violated, then that relationship is already dead. God does not "leave idolatry alone" because He sees human beings being ruined by idols. That ruin is not merely a violation of religious rules; it is the breaking of human dignity itself.
Here the gospel-shaped conclusion of Pastor David Jang's preaching becomes clear. Human beings cannot climb to God by their own strength, nor can they discover God by their fallen vision. Darkness is not dispelled by "more knowledge" alone. Darkness retreats when light comes. For that reason, the center of Christian faith is "God coming down." The confession that God so loved the world that He gave His only Son is not a ladder humans built toward God; it is a bridge God laid down toward humanity. Pastor David Jang speaks of the darkness of Romans 1 without ending in despair because the gospel, as much as it faces the darkness, proclaims God's light that pierces it. Christ, as the substance of God's revelation, opens the way to know God for those who have become unable to know Him. Worship becomes possible again. Truth breathes again. Relationships are rearranged in the direction of reconciliation. The event that tears down the wall between human and God-and between human and human-happens at the cross. Therefore, even when reading a passage about "giving them over," the church must not become an institution that recites a cold verdict, but a community of reconciliation that announces: the road home is still open.
Sometimes, a single painting becomes a surprising commentator on a biblical text. Nicolas Poussin's The Adoration of the Golden Calf, depicting the scene from Exodus, testifies visually that idolatry is not merely a theological concept. It shows how idolatry erupts through human psychology, the heat of crowds, sensual intoxication, and the collusion of power. In the painting, people cannot endure the patience required to wait for the unseen mystery; they manufacture something visible and then dance before it in frenzy. Idols often glitter like "gold," and the cheering of the crowd tastes sweet. But that cheering makes people forget covenant, flips the center of the heart, and finally throws the community into confusion. What Poussin's canvas displays is not only a past spectacle; it is the everlasting pattern of "exchange" Paul names in Romans. Human beings crave visible certainty. They want a god they can hold. And the moment that craving replaces God, the inner order collapses. The danger Pastor David Jang warns against arises from this subtle psychology: idols rarely approach with the face of evil. They come with the face of safety, success, pleasure, approval-sometimes even with the face of religious zeal-demanding "more than God." In that moment, instead of praising the Creator, we bow to the glory of the creature.
So what should a believer do today while standing before Romans 1:23-26? If we follow the tone of Pastor David Jang's preaching, we must first refuse to push idolatry away as "someone else's story." Idols are not only outside the sanctuary; they are erected inside the heart. What I cling to out of fear, what I lean on because of wounds, what I exaggerate due to the hunger for recognition, what I overconsume to forget emptiness, what I show off to hide failure-any of these can trespass into God's place. And repentance is not emotional regret; it is a change of direction. It is slowing down, turning around, and reestablishing order. Above all, the restoration of worship is not merely a Sunday habit; it is the event in which the entire center of life is reordered toward God. Word-centered faith, as Pastor David Jang emphasizes, is the path by which a person refuses to "shrink God into something explainable," and instead chooses to be reshaped before God's Word. A hearing faith is a faith that steps down from the throne of the self. When that stepping-down happens, desire becomes not the master but the servant; relationships become not possession but gift; community becomes not competition but a space for reconciliation.
If we reread this passage with the name Pastor David Jang as a central keyword, it gathers into one sentence: the human being who has lost God will inevitably serve something as though it were God, and that service will ultimately deform the person-yet God does not watch that deformation with indifference; through the gospel He opens a way back. Pastor David Jang's preaching moves from "wrath" toward "gospel" because the deeper human darkness is, the more clearly God's salvation shines. Therefore this passage is not a sword for condemning others, but a mirror that awakens me; not a poison that makes the church proud, but a prescription that makes the church humble. Before mocking idols, we must look at our own hands that produce them. Before speaking of depravity, we must examine our own hearts that have misplaced grace. And in that place we must once again put Paul's praise on our lips: "He is blessed forever." Praise is not escapism. It is a spiritual act that resets the center of life. When we honor the Creator as Creator, the creature becomes beautiful again in its proper place, the human being is restored in the proper place of being human, and the community begins to breathe again in its proper place of being a community. What Pastor David Jang's Romans preaching calls for is not greater information but truer worship; not sharper criticism but deeper repentance; not stronger hatred but a more whole power of the gospel.
