Sunday Night Live 4 th January 2015 Paul s Letter to the Romans- An Introduction. (Romans 1: 1-17) Intro: Potentially, the next 9 weeks could be the most important in your entire life. I don t say that lightly and it s not a sale s pitch just to get you to come to church. I say it because during those 9 weeks we are going to read a letter that has transformed the lives of millions of people throughout human history. It s a letter that changed Augustine from a blubbering wreck into a man that discovered a new power to overcome his struggles with temptation. It s a letter that helped a devout Catholic monk to appreciate that God was a God of love and motivated him to start a worldwide religious revolution. It s a letter that warmed the heart of a young Methodist man and inspired him to launch a spiritual revival. It s a letter that has changed my life and made me want to spend my days telling others about Jesus. That letter is St. Paul s letter to the Christians in Rome. It should come with a warning- You may never be the same again! It s certainly my hope and prayer that as we study this letter together that God will do something special in each of our lives Ancient letters were written on Papyrus which will last forever providing it is kept dry. As a result letters which are over 2000 years old can still be read today. When we read these letters it soon becomes clear that they follow an identical pattern. They begin with a greeting, then there is a prayer for the person the letter is for and thanksgiving to the god the person worships. This is followed by some special contents and it always ends with salutations and personal greetings. When we read Paul s letters to different Christian churches in our New Testament we discover something very interesting. He uses exactly the same format that the rest of society used 2000 years ago when they were writing letters. That in itself teaches us a very important lesson as we come to read and try to understand Paul s letters. We must never forget that they are letters! They are not books of systematic theology. They are personal correspondence from a Christian minister to groups of Christians, many 1
of whom he knew intimately. They were often written as a response to letters he had received from members of these churches. They were often written to answer specific questions or to give advice about a particular concern or threat. When Paul was writing them he wasn t thinking that 2,000 years later we would be reading them, much less trying to work out our Christian beliefs and practices from them. Yet that s what we do and it s important for us to do so because Paul was an apostle which means that his teaching comes with the authority of Jesus. But it also means that as we try to draw lessons from his letters we must never forget that reading them is like listening to one side of a telephone conversation. If we aren t careful it can be easy for us to get what he is saying completely out of context or completely wrong. That s not the only reason Paul s letters are never easy to fully understand. It s clear from the contents of his letters that as was the custom of the day, Paul did not always write the letters himself. Rather, it seems that he often dictated them and then added his own signature to authenticate them. That s why his secretary Tertius slips in his own greeting at the end of Romans and why at the end of his letter to the Corinthians Paul says, This is my signature so that you know this letter is from me. The truth is that in all probability, when he wrote most of his letters, Paul wasn t sitting at his desk crafting every sentence. It is more likely that he was striding up and down a room or prison cell dictating. This may explain why in his letters Paul seems to stop suddenly and then restart by going off on a bit of a tangent. With the people in his mind, he poured out his heart in words that often trip over each other in his eagerness to answer their questions and to give them his pastoral help. At times he is so overcome with emotion that he simply bursts into spontaneous praise. All of this is faithfully recorded by his secretary. If we understand these things about the background to Paul s letters, then it will help us to gain a better handle on the lessons we can learn as we read them. Another interesting twist that we discover is that Paul s letter to the Christians in Rome is very different to the other letters he wrote. That s because Paul had never been to Rome. The church in Rome was probably started by some of the people who became Christians on the day of Pentecost and who then went back to Rome bringing the 2
message of the gospel with them. Although he d never been to Rome, Paul still knew some of the Christians there. He had previously met Priscilla and Aquila on one of his missionary trips. So he was aware through the grapevine of the types of people who were in the church in Rome and what some of the issues were that they were facing. This is reflected in the middle sections of his letter where Paul gives advice about how the Christians from a Jewish background and the Christians from a non-jewish background can solve the conflicts that were arising because they understood their Christian faith slightly differently. So if he didn t start the church in Rome and if he was only acquainted with a few of them, why did Paul write to them if his missionary principle was not to go anywhere where someone else had already been? Well it seems that he wrote to them for two main reasons. The first reason is that he needed their support. Paul s great dream was to visit Spain which was rapidly becoming a centre of greatness in the Roman Empire. He so much wanted to spread the good news about Jesus in Spain and further West but to do that he needed a base. Rome would be that perfect base. Paul needed the Christians in Rome to be his partners practically and prayerfully if he was going to effectively bring the message of Jesus to Spain and the West. So he writes to them to introduce himself to them and to gain their trust. He begins by sharing his credentials. In v1 he tells them that he is a slave of Christ- someone who has given themselves so completely to Jesus that they are obliged to do whatever He commands. He explains that God has called him to be an apostle- someone who not only met the risen Jesus but who has Christ s authority to teach God s message. He tells them that God has set him apart to explain the good news of God. Once he has assured them of his character, Paul moves on to explaining the content of his message. In v2 he appeals especially to the Jewish Christians among them by reassuring them that the gospel he preaches isn t some new-fangled message. It is the authentic gospel that God promised through the OT prophets for hundreds of years. He continues to gain their confidence in v3 and 4 by explaining to them that it is the gospel about the person and the work of Jesus Christ- the Son of God, a descendant of King David, fully human and familiar with every weakness we experience. Yet at the same time, completely God, as evidenced by 3
His resurrection from the dead and His exaltation to His rightful place of rule over all the earth. In v5 he appeals particularly to the non-jewish or Gentile Christians by telling them that through Jesus name and for His sake, God had given him grace and the apostolic authority to call non- Jewish people to a life of true faith, a faith that leads to glad obedience to God. In v6 and 7 he cleverly brings Christians from both traditions together by encouraging them that all of them have been called by God to belong to Christ, they are all loved by God and they are all saintspeople who have been set apart to bring glory to God. Having captured their heads, Paul now reaches for their hearts. He expresses his wish that they might receive the blessing of God s grace and peace. In v8 He praises them for the fact that their faith in Jesus has been reported far and wide. And in case there are those who are suspicious of such flattery, Paul tells them in v9 and 10 that he has been praying for them a lot and asking God to make it possible for him to visit them. In v11 and 12 he tells them that he can t wait to meet them so that he can use his gift of teaching to strengthen them in their faith but also so that he may receive encouragement and help from them. He rebuffs any rumours they might have heard in v13 by assuring them that the only reason he hasn t yet visited them is because his busy missionary schedule has made it impossible. That brings us nicely to the second reason that I think Paul wrote to the Christians in Rome. Not only did he want to gain their trust so that ultimately he could use Rome as his base for further missionary trips into Spain, he also wanted to ensure that he left them with a detailed written explanation of what the true gospel message was. That would be important for two reasons. Firstly, Paul was on his way to Jerusalem from Greece. He was taking the collection gathered by the church in Corinth to provide for the Christians in the mother church who were experiencing extreme poverty because of persecution. For many reasons that journey would be fraught with danger. Paul had many enemies in Jerusalem. If the authorities arrested him, there was no telling how it might end. Paul was aware that he might never make it to Rome, in fact his days on earth may even be numbered. So it was that he felt it essential to put down on papyrus a detailed description of what the message of the gospel really is. But why did he do that specifically 4
in his letter to the Romans? Well, apart from the immediate threat of his Jerusalem trip, Paul knew that Rome was a centre of great power and influence throughout the Roman world. If Rome could be won for Christ then there was no telling what implications that would have for the spreading of the gospel throughout the world. That is why although it is a letter, Pauls correspondence to the Christians in Rome reads more like a book of Systematic Theology, particularly in its first eight chapters. It is these eight chapters that we will be exploring together over the next 2 months. Let me encourage you to prepare for our study of these chapters together by reading them at home during the week before you come to church on Sunday mornings. Let me encourage you to read the sermons which will be uploaded onto our church website. Let me encourage you to invite your friends who may not yet be Christians to hear this message. It is my sincere hope and prayer that through Paul s letter, you too will discover the wonder of the gospel- Something which so transformed Paul that he felt compelled by God to share its message with all the people on earth. For in this gospel Paul discovered a power from God to set people free from themselves and to make them right with God forever. I hope that the message of the gospel will transform your life over these next 8 weeks and give you a passion to share that good news with all the people with whom you rub shoulders with each week. Amen and Amen. 5