<p>16:19 <i>For your obedience is known to all</i>- Obedience is a major theme in Romans; Paul liked to see the believers in Rome as a parade example of Gentile obedience to the Gospel (1:5; 6:16; 15:18; 16:26). He therefore feared that they would be led away by the Jewish false teachers, and this would negatively impact all those who had looked to them as an example of obedience. As noted in our study of Galatians, Titus and 1 Timothy, the legalism of Judaism was strangely attractive to the Gentile converts. To believe in salvation by pure grace is actually very demanding- for the wonder of it requires our all. The flesh finds it attractive to retain our acceptance that God and Jesus exist, but to slip back into a half-hearted attempt to keep a few laws in the hope that maybe we might be thereby accepted at the last day.</p><p><i>But I would have you to be wise regarding that which is good and simple concerning evil</i>- A reference to the tree of knowledge of good and evil and the need to not listen to the voice of the serpent. The true wisdom was in Christ, not in the serpent. See on :20.</p>