Hillcrest Evangelical Free Church

Pastor Curt's Sermons

Sunday, June 8, 2008

The Gospel Part 1-- Romans 1:1-17

This week, I am in an unusual situation for me. I am starting a new studies in each of the 4 groups I am teaching. I am starting studies in Ephesians, Colossians, Genesis (early chapters) and here in Romans. By far, preaching through Romans is the most ambitious undertaking. My biggest challenge is to take the text slowly enough to do it justice, and yet quickly enough that you do not lose interest.

But as I am doing in each of these four new studies, I want to take the time to give an overview of the book. Think of it as a center out approach. Once we find the center, then we can see how the whole is put together and how each piece fits into the whole. Then we are ready to go through from beginning to end.

The book of Romans is a masterpiece. Indeed, listen to what Martin Luther says about this book as he begins his commentary on it. "This Epistle is really the chief part of the New Testament and the very purest Gospel, and is worthy not only that every Christian should know it word for word, by heart, but occupy himself with it every day, as the daily bread of the soul. It can never be read or pondered too much, and the more it is dealt with the more precious it becomes, and the better it tastes." That is lofty praise.

I equate the book of Romans to a college thesis paper. It is exquisitely laid out, meticulously detailed, flowing from thought to thought. In it, Paul lays out his thesis, breaks it down into individual points, backs each up citing sources, even dealing with hypothetical objections to his points. Unlike other Pauline epistles, this one does not focus on problems faced by the church, but rather is a careful exposition of a positive statement. This is what a basic book about the gospel ought to look like.

To find the center of the book, we would really need to read the whole thing in one sitting. But since we do not have the time to do that in this setting, I want to give you what I believe is the center, the main theme of the book. In short as Luther suggests, the gospel is the center of the book. This is a book about the gospel of Jesus Christ: what it is, why we need it, what it does, who its for, how we receive it, how good it is, what its benefits are, how it impacts our daily lives. So, the center of the book is the gospel.

To that end, I see the thesis statement of the book in the passage we have before us this morning, specifically verses 16-17. If you are willing to memorize only two verses from the book of Romans, these are the two that I suggest: Romans 1:16-17, "I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: ‘The righteous will live by faith.’ " This is the main point of the book of Romans. This is what Paul wants us to know first and foremost. The gospel is key, we ought not be ashamed of it or apologetic for it.

Now, there is much in these two verses which we will unpack in due time. But for now, I want you to see what is at the core of the book of Romans, the thesis statement that we are not to be ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God to save the believer, both Jew and Gentile. The gospel provides for us what we cannot provide for ourselves: righteousness which is accessible only by faith. Remember, the righteous will live by faith.

As many of you know, this thought was a turning point for Martin Luther, this last statement that the righteous will live by faith. This is the cornerstone of the Protestant movement, that the righteousness necessary for acceptance before God is only through faith. This is at the core of who we are, what we believe, how we orient our lives, why we do what we do. We live by faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And so, it is worthy of our time to consider this statement, this exposition, this whole great book to better understand what it means to live by faith. Thus we embark on a study of the book of Romans. It will not be quick, it will cause us to think and ponder, it will stretch our understanding, but it will be worthy of our time. Will you join me in this great journey through one of the greatest books of the greatest book ever written?

I. We are all "set apart" for the gospel. Vv. 1-7

Paul introduces himself as one who is set apart for the gospel. But then, when he addresses these Roman Christians, he says they are "called to be saints," which sounds to me like much the same thing. In other words, the gospel sets us apart from everyone else.

Bear with me as we slowly work through these first verses. I know they seem generic and formulaic, I assure you there is much here. Indeed, it is Paul’s habit to introduce his themes in these opening "generic" niceties of his letters. We clearly see that here.

V.1- "Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus"-- the very first thing he wants us to know about him is that he is a servant of Jesus. By this, I do not think he is trying to emphasize that it was forced upon him. But rather, the emphasis is that because of the gospel, Jesus Christ now has a claim on his life, he is totally devoted to Christ. Know this first and foremost about me: Jesus Christ has first claim upon my life. That is the impact.

"Called to be an apostle"-- Apostle carries with it the weight of authority, the responsibility to establish this new movement wherever he goes, carrying with him the mark of approval to hold such a position. Notice that he tells us he was called to such a position. In other words, he is not saying, "I am important. Listen to me." Instead, he is saying, "I am really nothing but a servant. But God has called me to establish and lead His church, as so I do so. I am writing to you with the authority of God Himself." Can you see how he emphasizes both his authority and his humility, even in these first two phrases? Then he adds a third.

"Set apart for the gospel of God"-- Paul sees himself as set apart or called out for a special purpose: the gospel. It is more than simply historical fact or special calling, it is the "for the gospel of God" that he is set apart. The historical truth, the divine initiative have a purpose: the gospel. Are you catching the big picture?

Now, we could view this as a special calling. And in some ways I am sure that it is. We read in the book of Acts that Paul was set apart to preach the good news. Of those set apart, Paul was set apart to preach to the Gentiles. In some ways then, Paul is acknowledging that the gospel is his special purpose in life.

And yet, there is another sense in which his being set apart for the gospel is generic to all those who believe. Paul will state this forcefully later in chapter 8, that God foreknows, God predestines, God justifies, God sanctifies, God glorifies, and He does this for all who are His. That is what it means to be a Christian. So, Paul is simply applying that to himself. In other words, he did not choose to be set apart. He is simply the servant, chosen by God for this purpose. He is writing with the authority of God Himself, but it is not a matter of self promotion, it all has taken place by God’s hand, all for the sake of the gospel.

V.2- "the gospel He promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures"-- Immediately, he launches into another of his major themes, the continuity of the message of Scripture. The gospel he preaches and writes about is the same gospel that has been promised by all the prophets, by indeed all of Scripture.

Since we have just finished our study of the life of Abraham, what word sticks out in this sentence? Of course, the word "promise." By this time, we all ought be quite familiar to the use of promise in Scripture and its ties to Abraham. More on that in chapter 4. But for now, notice it is not just that it was foretold by the prophets, it was promised. Can you see the difference? One has the sense of announced ahead of time. The other has attached to it the sense of goodness and the assurance that God has staked His name and reputation to seeing it fulfilled. The gospel has been promised by God since the very beginning.

V. 3- "Regarding His Son, who as to His human nature was a descendant of David."-- At the center of the gospel, at the core of all that prophecy from so many over such a long period of time is God’s own Son. The promise centers around the Son of God.

And yet, there is the human side that cannot be ignored or downplayed. These apostles, these early Christians physically saw, heard, touched and smelled the Son of God. He was human. Paul grants that here, again tying it to the prophesies of Scripture. This Son of God was also the promised Son of David. He was divine and human, He connected the OT to current events, He joined together both Jew and Gentile. He is at the center of it all.

Pause for a second. I am sure that some of you are just about to tune me out. This is not new stuff. In fact, you could probably preach this yourself. Why should we take the time to linger over things you already know? Well, perhaps there are several reasons. First of all, because it is at the very core. Who Jesus is, what the gospel is, these are at the core. If we don’t get to all the other stuff but we know this stuff really well, we will have done our job. In other words, we could spend all our time talking about the intricacies of the Jewish law in Leviticus, or trying to decipher all the images in Revelation, or even being hip and doing a 7 part series about living green. We could be like some and weigh in on the current political events unfolding before us. I hear that is the way to get your sermons sent out over the internet. We could do any or all of those things, but if we do that at the expense of knowing and lingering over the gospel, we will have wasted our time. This is at the core of who we are.

But a second reason why we out to linger over this stuff we know is that perhaps we do not know it as well as we think we do. As I have said to our students more than once, the thing I do not like about this upcoming generation is their lack of concern about or knowledge of doctrine. As Christians, we ought to be able to explain the difference between justification and sanctification. We ought to be able to define righteousness and tell why it is crucial to our standing before God. We ought to be able to distinguish truth from falsehood. When the Jehovah’s Witnesses come to your door and want to talk about whether Jesus is God or the Son of God, are you up to the challenge? Yes, these things matter. They keep us centered, they keep us from wandering off into heresy or inch deep theology.

But a third and perhaps most important reason why we linger over these familiar thoughts is that they are the key to life. We see that in our theme verse, "It is the power of God for salvation... The righteous will live by faith." Without the gospel, we have no life. To take Paul slightly out of context, paraphrasing, "I am not ashamed to linger over the details of the gospel." OK, let’s move on.

V.4- "and who through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God by His resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord."-- This verse is both complex and important. It lays out a foundation about the person of Jesus Christ, upon whom the gospel is centered. While there are a bunch of ways to understand this verse, here is my best sense.

Clearly there is a connection between "according to the flesh" in v.3 and "according to the Spirit" here in v.4. He has a connection with the Jews of old and yet He has a connection with eternal God. And just as clearly, at the center of this statement is the resurrection. Something changed at the resurrection. I agree with those who see the change as the role of giving eternal life, He is now the Son of God with power. He has always been the Son, indeed the One who called all things into existence. But on the basis of His resurrection from the dead accomplished by God Himself, He now is able to raise from the dead all who follow after Him. He is the son of David, He has always been the Son of God. But now He is the Son of God with power, the power to grant eternal life. Only after the resurrection was that possible. Only then was a righteousness from God revealed. Because of that one event, He is now to be hailed as Jesus Christ our Lord.

By proclamation of the Holy Spirit, by direct action from the hand of God the Father in raising Him from the dead, this human Son of David is to be regarded by all for all time as Jesus, the Christ, our Lord. That’s what I see here. The interesting part for me is that this ends the emphasis on this particular doctrine. In Colossians, there is great emphasis on the person of Christ, but here it is assumed after this point. The emphasis here is on the gospel, with the person of Christ understood from this short section of the text.

V.5- "Through Him and for His name’s sake, we received grace and apostleship to call people from among all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith."-- Because of who He is and what He has done, the called and sent ones have a new purpose in life, to call people whoever they are to a new way of life, the obedient life of faith. Can you see how Paul has already shifted from the person of Christ to the implications of the gospel? No matter where you are in the book, you are never far from the gospel. Here it is the fact that non-Jews like us are being called to a new way of life, obedient faith, faith that leads to obedience. "I believe in the person and work of Jesus to such an extent that I am willing to change the way I live to conform to His desires for me." In this context, that is what it means to be a Christian.

V.6- "And you also are among those who are called to belong to Jesus Christ."-- What has been extended to me has been extended to you. The desire God has for me is the same as that which He has for you.

V.7- "To all in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints."-- Wait just a second! This seems out of place. Did you catch where we are in the form of the letter? Verse 7 gives the identity of the intended readers of the letter, something we would have expected in v.2. this means that verses 1-6 are all Paul’s self-description. He adds this lengthy articulation of the person of Christ and His gospel to his name. "I, the one who has been set apart by God to preach the good news of Christ Jesus, whom God raised from the dead with great power to offer you eternal life, write you this letter."

In one sense, this is so like Paul. When he in the normal course of writing mentions Jesus, he just can’t stop himself. But more than that, he has a purpose in his mind in writing this letter, and that purpose shows up in the text from the very beginning, even in how he introduces himself to his readers.

But notice how he addresses his audience, "to all who are loved by God and called to be saints." He doesn’t just say, the church in Rome. No, he teaches as he addresses them. They are not just a church in Rome, they are all people loved by God and designated by God to be saints, to be holy, to be set apart for the gospel of Christ. In other words, he could have included the same paragraph of the first 6 verses for them as well. What was true of him was true of them, except of course his claim of apostleship. But they too are called, they too have received grace from God, just as he described himself before. In other words, this is what it means to be a Christian. This is what it means to be a beneficiary of the gospel. It means that though we are Gentiles far from God, we have been called to be saints, we are being shown the love of God.

Now, I know there are some who have a special designation for sainthood, as if that was a higher designation reserved for a few, the best. But the way Paul, and indeed the rest of Scripture’s writers, uses the term, it is simply another way of saying, "Christian." If your faith is in Christ Jesus, you are a saint. If your faith has led you to obedience, you are a saint. If you have received the message of good news found only in Jesus Christ, you are completely acceptable before God. As Paul will put it later in chapter 8, "Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." You are a saint.

"Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ."-- Or as we might say it, "Hello!"

This "grace and peace" is how the early Christians greeted each other. But even in saying hello, Paul is teaching and introducing his themes. Grace has special meaning to the Greek perspective while peace or shalom gives honor to the Jewish perspective. The gospel brings together and gives special honor to both sides. It also teaches that both things come from God, that He gives them to us as gifts. All we can do is pronounce them from Him, "grace and peace to you from God." Again this will be a point for Paul in chapter 4, where he uses Abraham as an example that Abraham did nothing to earn God’s grace. That would be a wage.

"From Paul, to the church at Rome. Hello!" So far, that is what we have covered in our first look at the Epistle to the Romans.

So if we believe this passage is the Word of God, what should be different about our lives?

1) We will remember that we are both pretty low and pretty exalted. Like Paul, we are simply servants. But also like Paul, we are saints. We must not forget either side. There is not one Christian who is not both servant and saint, nothing special and set apart as holy. We have all been given a special, divine purpose in life. We are recipients and proclaimers of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Everyone who has been a recipient of the gospel of Jesus Christ has been set apart to be a proclaimer of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

2) We will remember that the gospel is nothing without Jesus Christ. The gospel is nothing without who He is and what He has done for us. The gospel is about saving people from the consequences of simply being human, a feat accomplished only because of who Jesus is and what He has done. As common as it sounds, there is no more profound truth than that.

3) I hope we will hide the theme verse of the book in our hearts. It is my hope that every single one of us will come away from our study of Romans saying, "I am not ashamed of the gospel!"