It is with a fair amount of trepidation that I begin this four week sermon series on the Letter to the Romans.
The superlatives that are used to talk about Romans make it daunting to think about preaching on it!
“It is Paul’s finest work – a masterpiece!”
“It is the greatest letter ever written!”
Some have even compared it to other great works like Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony to give some sense of its magnitude and excellence.
Probably more volumes have been written about Romans that any other letter in history.
It has changed more lives, and changed the world more than any other letter in history.
It led to the conversion of Augustine in 386 A.D., and later influenced his thinking and writing, which has had a huge impact on the church ever since.
Martin Luther’s reading of Romans shaped his theology, and was a significant part of the Protestant Reformation.
It was after hearing about Paul’s letter to the Romans that John Wesley had his heart warming Aldersgate experience, and from that point on, the Methodist Movement began to explode.
Yet, as Eugene Peterson says in his intro to Romans, “When this letter arrived in Rome, hardly anyone read it, certainly no one of influence. There was much to read in Rome – imperial decrees, exquisite poetry, finely crafted moral philosophy – and much of it was world class. And yet in no time, as such things go, this letter left all those other writings in the dust.
The letter to the Romans is a piece of exuberant and passionate thinking. Paul takes the well-witnessed and devoutly believed fact of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth and thinks through its implications. Paul writes to tell us how the death and resurrection of Jesus has changed the direction of world history, and at the same time the life of every man, woman, and child on the planet.”
Over these Sundays in July, we’re going to work our way through Paul’s letter to the Romans. It is a letter that is meant to be read in its entirety.
Although there are many, many well-known verses that are instantly recognizable throughout Romans, individually they do not do justice to the whole letter. For the letter in its entirety is more like a masterful symphony, whose sum is much greater than its parts. Just listening to a few measures played by one violin doesn’t allow one to appreciate the whole.
Paul’s letter to the Romans is probably one of the last letters he wrote. It was most likely written from Corinth around A.D. 55.
Paul didn’t start the church in Rome, like he had started so many churches throughout the Eastern provinces of the Roman Empire. He wanted to continue his evangelism in the Western provinces, and take the gospel all the way to Spain. He needed the help of the church in Rome if he was going to be able to do this.
By the time Paul wrote Romans, the church in Rome was divided. When the gospel was first preached in Rome, probably by Peter, there were many Jews living there. Like elsewhere, many of them believed the gospel Peter shared, and became believers that Jesus was the Messiah. They came to be known as Jewish Christians, because they retained their Jewish customs even though they were Christian.
But many Gentiles in Rome also heard Peter preach, and became Christians. They had no Jewish background, and didn’t pick up any of the Jewish customs. They came to be known as Gentile Christians.
Sometime in the 40s, before Paul wrote this letter, the Emperor Claudius had expelled all the Jews from Rome, including the Jewish Christians.
During their expulsion, the Church in Rome continued under the Gentile Christians. And several years later when the Jews and Jewish Christians were allowed to return to Rome, the Jewish Christians would naturally have rejoined the church they had left.
And this created tension between the two groups. The Jewish Christians were trying to understand their faith in Christ through their Jewish practices and understandings. And the Gentile Christians were trying to understand the gospel of Jesus through their pagan background and their Roman roots.
This background helps us understand some of the topics that Paul takes on in Romans.
We’re going to be focusing on the first four chapters of Romans this morning. Next Sunday, we’ll look at chapters 5-8. On July 24, we’ll get to chapters 9 – 11 and then we’ll conclude on July 31st with the remaining chapters, 12 – 16.
Paul begins the letter to the Romans by introducing himself to them. Remember, he has never been to Rome, and he didn’t plant the Church in Rome. He uses an interesting juxtaposition of adjectives to describe himself. On one hand he is an apostle, who has been set apart for the gospel of God. And on the other hand, he refers to himself as a slave of Jesus Christ.
From that introduction, Paul gives thanks for the Christians in the Church in Rome. He regularly prays for them. And he tells them that he was wanted to come and meet them for a long time, but has never been able to yet. He wants to proclaim the gospel among them. He wants to strengthen them with spiritual gifts. He wants to encourage them, and be encouraged by them.
Paul had longed to take the gospel beyond Rome and all the way to Spain. In order to do this, he would need some help both with other people to join him, and with finances for the journey. This is how he had worked previously in starting new churches throughout the Eastern provinces, and undoubtedly he was planning to use the same method to reach the Western provinces.
Paul then begins to lay the groundwork for the message that he will unpack throughout the rest of the letter. That is, the Good News of Jesus Christ revealed by God is for everyone in the world. Paul believed that everyone in the world is in need of the good news of Jesus Christ.
Since the beginning of time and in all of God’s creation, God has shown his eternal power and divine nature in the things he has made. No one has an excuse not to worship God, but people have still turned away from God, and separated themselves from him. Every human being is guilty of sin. But, the Good News of Jesus Christ is for everyone by faith.
When I was in seminary, I had a New Testament professor, who pointed out the list of sins that Paul mentions toward the end of chapter 1, and he said how we’re all in that list somewhere. Paul’s point is that we all miss the mark of what it means to be the people we were created to be.
In chapter 2, Paul teaches us about the foolishness of judging others. No one has the right to judge another, for no one is without guilt. Judge not, lest ye be judged!
The story is told of a rich man who was sailing for Europe on one of those great transatlantic ocean liners. When he went on board, he found that another passenger was to share the cabin with him. After going to see the accommodations, he came up to the purser's desk and inquired if he could leave his gold watch and other valuables in the ship's safe. He explained that ordinarily he never availed himself of that privilege, but he had been to his cabin and had met the man who was to occupy the other berth. Judging from his appearance, he was afraid that he might not be a very trustworthy person. The purser accepted the responsibility for the valuables and remarked, 'It's all right, sir, I'll be very glad to take care of your valuables for you. Your cabin mate has been up here and left his for the same reason!”
God is the only one in a position to judge. Only God knows every fact about us in order to judge righteously. Paul writes that everyone will be repaid according to their deeds. God will not show any partiality. Gentiles and Jews will be judged by God; Gentiles will be judged apart from the Jewish Law, and Jews will be judged under the Law. Paul rightly teaches that a person’s actions reveal a person’s true inner character.
In chapter 3, Paul continues to show that no one is righteous—not the Jew, and not the Gentile. Everyone is under the power of sin.
In verses 3:10-18 Paul uses 9 different Old Testament verses to prove the depraved state of human beings.
“There is no one who is righteous, not even one.”
“All have turned aside, together they have become worthless; there is no one who shows kindness, there is not even one.”
“Their throats are opened grave; they use their tongues to deceive.”
“The venom of vipers is under their lips.”
“Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”
An illustration of how an Eskimo kills a wolf is a good example of how we are slaves to sin:
"First, the Eskimo coats his knife blade with animal blood and allows it to freeze. Then he adds another layer of blood, and another, until the blade is completely concealed by frozen blood.
"Next, the hunter fixes his knife in the ground with the blade up. When a wolf follows his sensitive nose to the source of the scent and discovers the bait, he licks it, tasting the fresh frozen blood. He begins to lick faster, more and more vigorously, lapping the blade until the keen edge is bare.
Feverishly now, harder and harder the wolf licks the blade in the arctic night. So great becomes his craving for blood that the wolf does not notice the razor-sharp sting of the naked blade on his own tongue, nor does he recognize the instant at which his insatiable thirst is being satisfied by his OWN warm blood. His carnivorous appetite just craves more--until the dawn finds him dead in the snow!"
It is a fearful thing that people can be "consumed by their own sinful pursuits." Only God's grace keeps us from the wolf's fate.
Yet, as bound by sin as people are, God is all the way at the other end of the scale—completely righteous!
In well-known verses from Romans 3:23 Paul writes, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”
But he goes on to say, “They are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood, effective through faith.”
Those who are justified by faith have received, not achieved, favor with God and therefore have nothing to boast about.
It is all the righteousness of God revealed in Jesus Christ that God offers as a free gift to those who have faith which justifies us in God’s eyes. It is Jesus’ righteousness, not ours which sets things straight.
Once there was a man in England who put his Rolls-Royce on a boat and went across to the continent to go on vacation.
While he was driving around Europe, something happened to the motor of his car. He cabled the Rolls-Royce people back in England and asked, "I'm having trouble with my car; what do you suggest I do?"
Well, the Rolls-Royce people flew a mechanic over! The mechanic repaired the car and flew back to England and left the man to continue his vacation. As you can imagine, the fellow was wondering, "How much is this going to cost me?"
So when he got back to England, he wrote the people a letter and asked how much he owed them. He received a letter from the office that read: "Dear Sir: There is no record anywhere in our files that anything ever went wrong with a Rolls-Royce."
That’s justification! That’s what Paul is writing about in this letter, that even though we have all missed the mark and have sinned, the good news is that through God’s grace in Jesus Christ, we can be made right.
In chapter 4, Paul begins to show how faith has always been the way in which God justifies humans as being righteous. He uses the example of Abraham from the Old Testament
God promised Abraham that he would be the father of a great nation. And even though Abraham was old, and his wife Sarah was barren, Abraham still believed God would keep his promise. Romans 4:3 says, “Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.”
Abraham believed God even before he had been circumcised as the sign of God’s promise. Therefore, Paul writes, Abraham is the father of both Jew and Gentile alike. Abraham was fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised he would do.
Paul says that the story of Abraham’s faith recorded in the book of Genesis, where the bible says his faith was reckoned to him as righteousness was not just written for Abraham’s sake. It was written for us as well!
“For it will be reckoned to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was handed over to death for our trespasses and was raised for our justification.”
John Wesley agreed with the early Protestant Reformers that justification is making our relationship with God right through Jesus Christ. But he went a little farther in his understanding, and taught that God’s mercy and grace shown in the suffering and death of Jesus on our behalf, pardons our sins and restores our capacity for love of God and neighbor.
It results in a renewal of the image of God in us that had been damaged by sin, so that we might begin lifelong growth in Christ-likeness as the Holy Spirit enables us to love God and neighbor. The theological word for this process is the word, “sanctification.”
Our justification in Christ begins our lifelong process of sanctification through Christ.
These opening four chapters of Romans invite us to think about some very important and fundamental issues that every person needs to wrestle with whether they have a religious faith or not.
What does it mean to be human? Why do I often struggle in being the person I know I’m supposed to be? And most importantly, what or who can help me to be the person I was created to be?
Paul helps us to think about these important questions in the opening of his letter but he also lets us know early on this good news when he writes in Romans 1:16, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith.”
Just think, today, in this very moment, this good news can be true for each and every one of us here today. Through faith in Jesus Christ, God is more than able to save us from our sins so that we can be the people we were created to be. All you need is to have faith that this is true for your life.
Now, if you think that is really, really good news, just wait until we get to chapters 5 through 8 for next Sunday. Like a great symphony, this composition is about to reach a glorious crescendo.
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