Romans 14: Weak and the Strong

“As surely as I live,” says the Lord, “every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.”

Paul closes his letter to the Romans by emphatically stating in chapter 13 that believers should fulfill the law by expressing love for others. Expressing love to others and living righteously are especially important since we are approaching Christ’s return. Believers should accept one another in love even when they disagree over issues of conscience, even as they follow their own consciences.

In 14, Paul warns his readers that they should be careful not to allow their behavior to disturb other believers who hold different convictions. For example, they should be especially careful not to encourage other believers to do something they do not believe is right. It is wrong, Paul claims, to eat, drink, or do anything that disturbs one’s conscience.

Jewish and Gentile believers, the weak and the strong, should live in unity and try to build up on another. They should learn to glorify God with one heart and one voice. Jesus Himself came into the world as a servant to the Jews, fulfilling the promises to the Jews, and yet including Gentiles in God’s plan so that they might glorify God like the OT foretold.

Reflection:

With Rome being the center of the world in every way- law, culture, learning, etc… a letter to these folks- needless to say- had to be impressive. Paul brilliantly set down the whole scope of Christian doctrine, which, at that time, was still being passed along orally from town to town. Paul wanted to convince the Roman readers that Christ held the answers to all of life’s important questions., leading to the famous battle cry of the Reformation- “by faith alone.”

Romans 12: Hating Evil, Clinging to Good

Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts, according to the grace given us.

Too often, people view theology as stuff for hermits or marooned shipwreck victims. When there's nothing else to do, then is the time to ask abstract questions about God. Such a notion would have exasperated the apostle Paul.

To him, theology always leads to action. He characteristically concludes the most concise theological book in the Bible with a down-to-earth discussion of everyday problems: politics, revenge, pride and the ups and downs of interpersonal relationships.

Pauls' life offers a good example of how to make theology practical. No intellectual recluse, he applies his theology to life, practicing what he preaches. In fact, he is writing the lofty book of Romans while traveling to raise funds for victims of a famine. Here in Romans 12, Paul describes what love in action should look like. "Offer your bodies as living sacrifices," he urges his readers. The Romans of his day, both Jews and Gentiles, associated the word sacrifice with the lambs and other animals they bring to the temple for priests to kill on an altar.

Reflection

But Paul makes clear that God wants living human beings, bot dead animals, as sacrifices. A person committed to God's will is the kind of offering most pleasing to God. Yet, as Paul warns us...let us be careful not to think of us more highly than we should; it's so easy to get "showy" with our sacrifices and forget about the humility that Christ tried to instill in us during his time on earth.

Romans: 10: A Crushing Blow to Paul

Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved.

Does anything bring more pain to a new Christian than family rejection? A teenager converts to Christianity. Her parents overreact, assuming their daughter has fallen for some weird cult. They slap away all her attempts to present the appealing facts of the gospel. What is good news for her is seen as bad news by the family.

Some new Christians can melt down the walls of suspicion and hostility. But others are treated like diseased persons by other family members and forced to live in a state of emotional quarantine. Anyone who has lived through such an experience can understand the agonizing dilemma Paul faced. Members of his own race, the Jews, were rejecting the gospel he had committed his life to.

Rejection by the Jews was a crushing blow to Paul, and he interrupted his letter to the Romans to consider the dilemma. These three chapters (9-11) contain some of his strongest words ever, including an offer to forfeit his own relationship with Christ for the sake of his race (9:3).

The issues discussed here apply to non-Jews as well, for they raise basic questions about God. Had he given up on the Jewish people, ignoring the promises he had made to them in Old Testament times? If so, couldn’t he also break promises made to us today?

For Paul, a Jew who called himself an apostle to the Gentiles, no other issue was so important to resolve. He couldn’t rest until he had linked the brilliant theology set forth in Romans to God’s past, present and future activity among the Jews.

Reflection:

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I don’t think that I’ll ever fully comprehend the dynamics of the Judeo-Christian theologies. In chapters 9 and 10, Paul painfully admits that, on the whole, the Jews did not believe in Christ. Despite all the advantages of Old Testament history, they stumbled over the ‘stumbling stone’ (9:32). Later in chapter 11, Paul goes back over that history and asks whether it was futile. Will the Jews come to believe in Christ some day? Did their tragic experience produce any advantage for the rest of the world? Chapter 11 concludes with Paul proclaiming God’s mysterious ways of working on Earth.

Romans 8: Spirit Life

If God is for us, who can be against?

The Holy Spirit is the theme of chapter 8, and in it Paul gives a panoramic survey of how the Spirit can make a difference in a person's life. In the first place, Paul sets to rest the nagging problem of sin he has just raised so forcefully. "There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus," he announces. Through his life and death, Jesus Christ has taken care of the sin problem for all time. (In chapter 4, Paul borrows a word from banking to explain the process. God "credits" Jesus' own perfection to our accounts, so that we are judged not by our behavior, but by his.)

Once again, Paul reminds us of the best news of all: Jesus Christ did not stay dead. Paul marvels that the very same power that raised Christ from the dead can also enliven us. A life-giver, the Spirit can break the gloomy, deathlike pattern described in Romans 7.

To be sure, the Spirit does not remove all problems. The very titles the Bible applies to the Spirit- Intercessor, Helper, Counselor, Comforter- imply that there will be problems. But "the God within" can do for us what we cannot do for ourselves. Paul never minimizes suffering: after all, his own life has included beatings, imprisonment, shipwrecks, assassination attempts and chronic illness.

The way Paul tells it, what happens in believers is the central drama of history: "The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed." Somehow spiritual victories within us will help bring about the liberation and healing of a fallen creation. The apostle can hardly contain himself as he ponders these truths. Romans 8 ends with a ringing declaration that nothing- absolutely, positively nothing- can ever separate us from God's love. For Paul, this truth is a fact worth shouting about.

Reflection:

Paul insists with absolute conviction that future rewards will outweigh all present sufferings. Just as Olympic athletes endure years of practice, discipline and pain to achieve the goal of winning a gold medal, so, too, the Christian's life on Earth may involve many difficulties (verses 22-23). But the glorious end result will make all the difficulties seem worthwhile.

Romans 7: Limits of the Law

For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.

One issue surfaces in virtually every one of Paul's letters: What good is the law? To most of Paul's audience, the word law stands for the huge collection of rules and rituals detailed in the Old Testament. Whenever he starts talking about "the new covenant" or "freedom in Christ," his Jewish listeners want to know what he thinks about Moses' law. Does God still require obedience?

Thanks to his years as a Pharisee, Paul knows Moses' law well. This chapter, the most personal and autobiographical in Romans, discloses exactly what Paul thinks about this issue.

When the Law is Helpful. Paul never recommends discarding the law. He sees that it reveals a basic code of morality, an expression of behavior that pleases God. The law is good for one thing: exposing sin. "Indeed I would not have known what sin was except through the law." To Paul, rules such as the Ten Commandments are helpful, healthful and good.

When the Law is Helpless. The law has one major problem: After proving how bad you are, it doesn't make you any better. As a carryover from his days of legalism, Paul has a very sensitive conscience. Yet, as he poignantly recounts, it mainly makes him feel guilty. The law that bares his weaknesses cannot provide the power needed to overcome them. The law, or any set of rules, leads ultimately to a dead end.

Reflection

A person like Paul probably had little trouble keeping most of the Ten Commandments. Outward actions such as swearing, murder, adultery, stealing and lying can be measured and controlled. But an internal, invisible sin, such as coveting, proves far more bedeviling. As Jesus made clear in the Sermon on the Mount, invisible sins like coveting, lust, and anger can have the same toxic effects as the more outward manifestations of stealing, adultery and murder.

Romans 3: the Remedy

This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.

Throughout his arduous and adventurous life, the apostle Paul has kept one career goal constantly before him: a visit to Rome. In Paul’s day, Rome stands alone, the capital of the powerful Roman Empire, which rules over the entire Mediterranean region. A tiny new church in Rome has caused great excitement among other Christians who know that in some ways the future of the church rests on what happens in Rome. If they expect to make an impact on the world, they will have to penetrate this great city.

Paul prays for the Roman church constantly and has made plans several times to visit there. Since none of those plans has yet materialized, Paul writes this letter, a concise summary of the Christian faith and the notion that Christ holds the answers to all of life’s important questions.

The remedy for human problems, Paul proclaims, is god’s amazing grace- a complete cure available to all. Yet people will not seek a cure until they know they are ill. If a doctor were to suddenly appear on a television news program announcing a cure for, say, the Paraguayan flu, who would care? For his discovery to impress us so deeply that we would seek vaccination, he must first prove the terrible danger posed by this unknown virus.

Thus Romans begins with one of the darkest summaries in the Bible. “There is no one righteous, not even one,” Paul concludes. The entire world is doomed to spiritual death unless a cure can be found. Out of the mournful sounds, however, comes a clear, bright note of wonderful news (verses 21-31), a compact expression of the core message of the gospel.

Reflection
It truly is hard for me to fathom how racial tensions continue to exist after the time of Christ. Paul makes it so incredibly clear that non-Jewish Christians should be considered first-class citizens of the kingdom of God. Faith in Jesus is all that God requires, regardless of age, color, or ethnicity.

Acts 28: To the Capital…in Chains

From morning till evening he explained and declared to them the kingdom of God and tried to convince them about Jesus.

The future of the Gentile church depends in large measure on what happens to Paul, God’s chosen Apostle to the Gentiles. The last few chapters of Acts portray a spiritual tug-of-war in which God turns apparent tragedy into good. Paul gets arrested; he’s sent at last to Rome. The ship wrecks; they all survive. A poisonous snake bites Paul; he shakes it off and starts a healing ministry. The voyage ends at last in Rome.

Paul knows that if Christianity is to gain a foothold anywhere, it has to be in Rome. “All roads lead to Rome” is more than a figure of speech. Like a center of gravity, the city attracts all the roads of commerce, all the leaders and thinkers and fortune seekers of the empire. Political and military powers fan out from Rome. It is the indisputable capital of the world.

Ironically, the greatest spokesman for the Christian faith arrives at his ultimate destination as a prisoner. Paul is exhausted, having just survived a harrowing shipwreck. No doubt the reputation he has gained on the voyage helps convince authorities to treat him leniently. He lives by himself under a kind of house arrest. A soldier is always present, possibly chained to the apostle.

Despite the circumstances, Paul keeps busy. During his very first week in Rome, he calls in Jewish leaders and explains to them the Christian “sect” everyone is talking about. Over the next months and years Paul gets hours of quiet solitude to works on fond letters to the churches he has left behind.

Yet, Paul can no longer choose his audience; they have to seek him. But boldly, in the heart of mighty Rome, he proclaims a new kingdom and a new king. Before long, some of Caesar’s own household staff converts to the new faith. Christianity has made the journey and the transition from Jerusalem to Rome.

Reflection
Another great lesson that we can all learn from Paul’s story is to strive to make the best of bad situations. So often, when things go awry, I tend to make rash decisions and turn away from God, using him almost as a scapegoat. Instead- like Paul- I need to take what life gives me and run with it…keeping in mind all along that Christ is right beside me.