Romans 2:6

The law enunciated in the Psalm, that God will render to every one according to his works, is valid within the sphere of redemption as well as independent of it. Paul the Christian recognises its validity as unreservedly as Saul the Pharisee would have done. The application of it may lead to very different results in the two cases, but the universal moral conscience, be it in bondage to evil, or emancipated by Christ, accepts it without demur. Paul had no feeling that it contradicted his doctrine of justification by faith, and therefore we are safe to assert that it did not contradict it. It seems a mistake to argue with Weiss that Paul is here speaking of the Urnorm of the Divine righteousness, i.e., of the way in which the destiny of men would be determined if there were no Gospel. The Gospel does not mean that God denies Himself; He acts in it according to His eternal nature; and though Paul is speaking to men as under the law, the truth which he is insisting upon is one which is equally true whether men are under the law or under grace. It is not a little piece of the leaven of a Jewish or Pharisaic conception of God, not yet purged out, that is found here; but an eternal law of God's relation to man.