I am glad therefore on your behalf; but I would have you wise unto that which is good, and simple concerning evil. Rom 16.19 (Santamaria)

Paul’s sentence in Romans 16:19 is like a bright, hard star after the storm-cloud warning of verse 18. He has just described the smooth-talking deceivers—χρηστολογία and εὐλογία, honeyed words used to ἐξαπατᾶν, to thoroughly mislead the unsuspecting (ἀκάκους). Then he turns, almost with relief, toward the believers themselves: “I’m glad for you.”

In Greek, it’s tender and emphatic: ἐφ’ ὑμῖν οὖν χαίρω—“Therefore I rejoice over you.” Not “I tolerate you.” Not “I’m cautiously optimistic.” χαίρω: joy. And not joy because they are clever, but because God has been at work in them so that their obedience has become known: ἡ γὰρ ὑμῶν ὑπακοὴ εἰς πάντας ἀφίκετο. Their obedience has “arrived” everywhere—like news carried on the wind.

And then comes Paul’s desire, his pastoral ambition for them—an ambition that feels almost paradoxical in our anxious age:

θέλω δὲ ὑμᾶς σοφοὺς εἶναι εἰς τὸ ἀγαθόν, ἀκεραίους δὲ εἰς τὸ κακόν.
“I want you to be wise unto the good, but pure/innocent concerning evil.”

This is not a motivational poster. This is spiritual warfare strategy. This is Paul teaching the church how to survive in a world where Satan can dress like light and where deception often arrives with polite words.

Start with the verb: θέλω—“I want,” “I desire.” It’s personal. It’s not mere instruction, it’s a father’s heart. Paul is not handing them a syllabus; he’s pleading for their safety. And what he wants is not that they become experts in evil, but that they become experts in good.

He says: σοφοὺς εἶναι εἰς τὸ ἀγαθόν—to be σοφοί (sophoi), wise, skilled, discerning, practiced, trained—with respect to (εἰς) the good. He wants them competent in holiness. Fluent in what is true. Experienced in the ways of God. Not merely able to define “good” like a dictionary, but able to recognize it the way a musician recognizes a key. Good becomes familiar. Good becomes home. Good becomes the instinct.

That’s already a rebuke to a certain kind of religious personality: the man who can detect every error online, but is thin and irritable and prayerless; the man who knows every conspiracy, every scandal, every rumor—yet cannot rejoice, cannot forgive, cannot worship without cynicism. Paul’s vision is the opposite. He wants a church whose brains are trained by goodness itself. Not a church naive about danger, but a church nourished by light.

Then comes the second half: ἀκεραίους δὲ εἰς τὸ κακόν—“but akeraious with respect to evil.”

ἀκέραιος (akeraios) is one of those Greek words that has a moral shine. It means unmixed, unadulterated, pure—like a metal without alloy. It can carry the sense of “innocent” or “guileless” in the best sense: not streetwise in sin, not stained by fascination with corruption, not initiated into darkness as if darkness were “knowledge.” In Philippians Paul uses the same word when he says he wants them “blameless and innocent” in a crooked world (Phil. 2:15). It’s the opposite of the serpent’s sales pitch in Eden: “taste this, and you will know.” Paul is saying: there is a knowledge you can gain that will not ennoble you; it will contaminate you. Don’t drink poison in order to become an expert in poison.

Our age pretends the opposite. Our age worships exposure. It thinks the surest path to maturity is to immerse yourself in filth with a serious face and call it “research.” We have built entire industries on it. People marinate their minds in the most twisted content imaginable and call it “staying informed.” They study evil like connoisseurs. They can tell you the names of every demon—real or imagined—yet cannot quote the beatitudes without embarrassment. They know darkness intimately, but goodness feels foreign. They are “wise” in the wrong direction.

Paul flips the compass.

He does not say, “Be ignorant.” He’s not advocating the stupidity of denial. He has already warned them about deceivers; he’s not asking them to be blind. But he is saying: do not give evil the honor of your curiosity. Do not treat corruption as a graduate seminar. Do not let your mind become a museum of horrors. The heart is not a dumpster you can fill with rot and then rinse clean. What you ingest shapes what you love. The “belly” in Romans 16:18 worships appetite; Paul is now telling the church to discipline appetite—to refuse the appetite for darkness disguised as sophistication.

There is something profoundly Christlike in this. Jesus says to His disciples, “Be wise as serpents, and harmless as doves” (Matt. 10:16). Paul’s phrasing echoes the same tension: wisdom, yes—σοφοί—but innocence too—ἀκέραιοι. Not gullibility, not paranoia. Not cynicism, not childishness. A serpent’s discernment without a serpent’s venom. A dove’s purity without a dove’s helplessness.

And here is where this becomes emotionally explosive, because Paul is not talking about abstract ethics. He is talking about what kind of souls these believers will become. There is a way to fight evil that makes you resemble evil. There is a way to “discern” deception that turns you into a suspicious, sour, joyless man—someone who cannot trust, cannot rest, cannot sing. There is a way to stare into the abyss so long that the abyss starts writing its name on your face.

Paul refuses that.

He wants them to win without becoming ugly. He wants them to be sharp without becoming bitter. He wants them to be discerning without becoming obsessed. He wants them to have clean hands and a clean heart—not because they are fragile, but because purity is power.

This is the real warfare: not merely identifying lies, but staying beautiful.

Because the devil does not only tempt you toward sin; he tempts you toward deformation. He wants to distort your loves. He wants to make you feel that evil is fascinating and good is boring. He wants to train you to crave outrage. He wants you to become addicted to suspicion. He wants you to confuse vigilance with paranoia. He wants you to feel “awake” while you are actually enslaved to anxiety.

So Paul says: be σοφοί in the good. Let goodness be what you study. Let goodness be what you practice. Become skilled in patience. Become skilled in mercy. Become skilled in prayer that doesn’t perform. Become skilled in Scripture that doesn’t merely win arguments but heals the soul. Become skilled in worship that makes Christ large and the self small. Become skilled in obedience—ὑπακοή—the kind of obedience that becomes known “to all” not because it is flashy, but because it is steady.

And be ἀκέραιοι regarding evil. Keep evil at arm’s length. Learn enough to recognize it, then refuse to caress it with your mind. Don’t dabble. Don’t flirt. Don’t let yourself “sample” poison as if maturity requires a taste. There are people who can describe in exquisite detail what is rotten in the world and yet have never become proficient at what is good. Paul would call that not maturity but imbalance—wisdom misdirected.

This verse is also a quiet rebuke to a certain modern myth: that to be “serious” you must be drenched in darkness. Paul says: no. To be serious, you must be drenched in goodness.

And that is not soft. That is not sentimental. That is war.

Because what is “good” in Paul’s mind is not generic niceness. The “good” is the gospel good—the crucified and risen Christ, the truth that humbles pride and kills the belly’s rule. The “good” is the kind of goodness that resists smooth talk because it has learned the sound of the Shepherd’s voice. The “good” is the kind of goodness that does not need constant novelty because it has already encountered the deepest reality.

And notice the pastoral warmth surrounding the command. Paul begins with joy: χαίρω. He is not whipping them into nervous vigilance. He is rejoicing in God’s work and then aiming that work toward maturity. That matters. Fear makes people stupid; joy makes people steady. Paul’s strategy is not to terrify them into discernment, but to ground them in a glad obedience that makes discernment possible.

So take Romans 16:19 as a blueprint for spiritual health in a world of “fair speeches”:

Let your mind be trained, not by endless autopsies of evil, but by long practice in good. Let your discernment be rooted, not in suspicion, but in familiarity with Christ. Let your innocence be not childish ignorance, but a deliberate refusal to be contaminated—to be “unmixed,” ἀκέραιος. Let your wisdom be not cleverness in darkness, but competence in light.

The devil would love nothing more than to turn you into a believer who is “well-informed” and spiritually starving—stuffed with headlines and rumors and outrage, empty of prayer, empty of joy, empty of love, empty of worship. That is belly religion dressed as discernment. Paul offers you a better life: a mind sharp enough to recognize deception, and a heart pure enough not to be seduced by it.

And the end of that path is not paranoia. It is peace.

Not peace because evil isn’t real, but peace because Christ is realer.

So yes—be watchful. But don’t become fascinated with darkness. Become fluent in goodness. Become wise toward what is holy. Become σοφοί εἰς τὸ ἀγαθόν. And keep yourself clean—unmixed, uninitiated, unromanced by corruption—ἀκεραίους εἰς τὸ κακόν.

That is how you remain a Christian in an age that profits from fear: you don’t let evil set the curriculum. You let Christ set it.