3:18
There can be a misconception that everyone is basically nice and will try and do their best, then when we encounter true evil, which can be found in people, it comes as a shock. Paul was under no such illusions, knowing that there were many who lived as enemies of Christ. The default position these days seems to be that we should enter into dialogue with people of different views. Sometimes this is ok, but we also need to recognise that there are those who are living as enemies of Christ. People who deny the divinity of Christ, or deny the resurrection, those who advocate unbiblical sexual behaviour, those who use the gospel as a money making machine. In Paul's context there is debate over whether the specific people he was thinking of here were Judaizers or Gentile false teachers. Arguments can be made for both.
3:19
Paul is very clear about their destiny, destruction! The list of things here in v19 can be made to apply to Judaisers, but it seems to me that it fits more with licentious "Christians", ie those who took Christ's forgiveness as licence to live as they liked. Gluttony is one of the sins mentioned here. In fact, we should bear in mind that it is mentioned quite often in the Bible and is a serious sin. "There glory being in their shame" could be an allusion to sexual immorality, but could be referring to gluttony. The key point is that there mind, their focus, was on earthly things, and in the next verse Paul will contrast this with the attitude that we should have. When Paul attacks false teachers or other opponents of the gospel he often has a twofold aim, one is to make us aware of the error of their ways, the other is to point us to the truth.
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