Life Project Blog

What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, discovered in this matter? If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about—but not before God. What does Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”

Romans 4:1-3

Having stated his thesis in the last section, Paul moves on now to prove it; what better place to begin than the story of Abraham? After all, all Jewish history begins with Father Abraham. Abraham found favor in God’s sight, but that favor wasn’t the result of his works, it was found because of his faith. He was no more perfect than you or me, in fact he made some bizarre mistakes, and still he was righteous in God’s sight because of one thing and one thing only: He believed God. God offered Abraham a promise, and Abraham decided that he would believe God, and God decided that Abraham was righteous when the only thing he had done was to make a decision to believe God.

Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation. However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness

Romans 4:4-5

Paul illustrates this idea with an example. A man who works has earned his wage as an obligation on the employer’s part. The employer pays the worker nothing until the payment has been earned through work, and when the obligation is paid, the employer has no obligation whatsoever to pay anything else. A gift is different, for it is given freely− if it isn’t given freely, then it isn’t a gift. In the same way, grace is not earned by working because if it was it wouldn’t be grace; it would be a payment for services.

David says the same thing when he speaks of the blessedness of the one to whom God credits righteousness apart from works:

“Blessed are those
whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the one
whose sin the Lord will never count against them.

Romans 4:6-8

David had a sense of what was to come when he wrote this, for there is no specific provision in the Law for what he referred to here. David, like Abraham, believed God and was a man after God’s own heart even though he was far from perfect. Believing God, he perceived  a time that was coming when God would provide for outright forgiveness for those who would place their faith in Him and so he decided to do his best, as had Abraham long before, to live as though God’s promise was already fulfilled: We call that faith.

Oh yes, and God, through Jesus Christ, took care of the rest!

Romans 3:21-31

In the first main section of Romans, Paul demonstrates that Mankind is in a perilous situation, for none can be saved through the working of law− unless of course one is perfect.

But we are not perfect.

Paul’s purpose in writing the second main section of Romans is to let us know that there is another way, apart from the workings of law; the way of grace. This concept however, is as complex as it is simple, an apparent dichotomy that gives trouble to many in understanding it. Comprehending that none of us is perfect really isn’t difficult; we see it in others, we see it in ourselves, human imperfection is ubiquitous. Comprehending that God’s standards are way too high for mere mortals isn’t that complicated either, after all He’s God. Yet if God’s standards are so high and we are so imperfect, how can God maintain His standards while letting us off the hook? Ah yes dear reader, that is the tricky part, isn’t it? Paul answers that question in 3:21 – 5:21, the second major section of the letter.

 But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify (3:21). God has introduced a new system, a system that is apart from the Law; entirely new. Yet in doing so, God has maintained the high standard of the Law without compromising His integrity that the Law has demonstrated. It is a system that has been promised in the past, and now it has finally been revealed. In verses 22-24 Paul explains that this new system is based upon our placing our faith in Jesus Christ as a sacrifice for our sins. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith (25a). Here is where Paul tells us how God has done this amazing thing. Then Paul reveals the tricky part:

to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished—he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.

Romans 3:25b-26

When an Old Testament Jew died, he died in his sins, for the sacrifices of the Law did not take sins away, they postponed punishment for a year at a time. Under that system, God agreed to hold off dealing with the sin question, but He didn’t agree to forget about it entirely; a permanent solution would come later which is how Jesus became the fulfillment of the Law. Now Jesus has come and completed His work, and if we would like to receive God’s grace we may, but in order to receive it, we must place our faith in Jesus Christ. This is true for both Jew and Gentile, from Paul’s day until now.

Suppose I wrote out a check to you for $100,000. as a gift. Before I sent it to you, I shoot you an email asking you if you would be interested in accepting my nice gift, for I wouldn’t want to clutter up your mailbox if you didn’t want it; all I’m asking is that you send a quick reply and let me know that you will accept it, and the gift is yours. I’d almost be willing to bet that most of you would hurt my feelings by not placing enough faith in me to accept this gift that I’ve worked so hard to be able to offer you! Why I would imagine that if I just mailed the check to you, most would be afraid to cash it, some might even call the police.

I’m hurt, dear reader, I’m hurt…

In any event, this is the case that Paul is setting out to demonstrate in this section as he moves on to verses 27-31, where he points out that the result of this grace is that there is no longer any distinction in God’s sight between Jew or Gentile, and that the redemption we have received in Christ has nothing to do with any righteousness we might have apart from God’s grace: This is the fulfillment of both the Law and the prophets.

Yet, this is not to say that there is nothing we do to receive grace, however. Does that surprise you? To be quite honest, there are three things we must do to receive grace, but you can relax, for none of them involve our earning of grace in any way− but we must accept it. To accept grace, we must decide to believe God when He offers it. Second, if we decide to believe God’s offer, we must then decide to place our faith in Jesus Christ, and then we must decide that our first two decisions are irrevocable.

Look, you already lost out on $100,000. of free money because you didn’t make those decisions, how much more important is forgiveness of your sins and eternal life? Come on people; let’s make up our minds here!

Hopefully Paul can make this point with more eloquence than I have. We’ll see as we continue our study…

What shall we conclude then? Do we have any advantage? Not at all! For we have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under the power of sin.

Romans 3:9

We have arrived at Paul’s conclusion of what he has been discussing in this, the first main section of Romans. Without any doubt, his conclusion is one of those “good news – bad news” kind of things. The good news is that neither Jew nor Gentile has anything over the other: They have amazing equality. The bad news is that they both have serious problems with God.

Verse 9 leads us right into the fray: The Jewish Christians have no advantage over the Gentile Christians, because the very thing that makes them Jewish is the Law, and the Law condemns them for their disobedience to it.

In verses 10-18, Paul cites Old Testament passages to bear this out; I’ll let you read them on your own…

Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. Therefore no one will be declared righteous in God’s sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin.

Romans 3:19-20

Does anybody really want to go back to the Law?

This is precisely why God promised deliverance through Jesus Christ, for the Law could never make a person righteous in His sight, and it is also precisely why God has no intention of ever going back to the Law in the future. The Law has served its purpose by making the people aware of their sin and their need of salvation. If you look at the world around you, you might notice that apart from God, people have a nasty habit of not noticing that their ways aren’t exactly all that wonderful. Of course, we know that the Law also had a second purpose, that of binding God’s people together into a Kingdom, a Nation, and in the Old Testament, it did so in form by providing an illustration of what would come in Christ.

And then Jesus came and fulfilled the Law entirely, bringing about, by His sacrifice on the cross, a wholly new kind of Nation, a Nation that is not of this world, but rather a Kingdom of Heaven, a Kingdom that is within us even now.

When we next get together, Paul begins a new section in Romans, one that explains the redemptive work of our Lord; see you then.

Romans 3:1-8

I really enjoy these passages in which Paul uses a style called “modified diatribe” or as I would say, a rant. In these verses, Paul gets into an argument with himself. To be sure, he is not confused about these issues, he instead is trying to anticipate common objections to the revolutionary statements he has made at the end of chapter 2, and in all likelihood these reflect arguments that he has had with prominent Jews in the past.

The first of these questions and answers is found in verses 1 and 2 where Paul asks the question: What advantage, then, is there in being a Jew, or what value is there in circumcision? (v. 1) and then provides the answer:  Much in every way! First of all, the Jews have been entrusted with the very words of God. (v. 2)

Since Abraham’s day, the Jews have had a special relationship with God, and it was to them that God provided His Word, and to them that He trusted that His Word would be protected and obeyed, which of course takes us back to the problem of their unfaithfulness. They had the relationship and the Word and the Law… and they didn’t keep it.

The next Q & A is in verses 3-4:

Q: What if some were unfaithful? Will their unfaithfulness nullify God’s faithfulness? (v. 3)

A: Not at all! Let God be true, and every human being a liar. As it is written:

“So that you may be proved right when you speak
and prevail when you judge. (v. 4)

The question relates to the proposition that if God would punish His people for their disobedience, then God would be acting in a way that was unfaithful to His covenant promises in the Law, namely that He would be their God and they would be His people. Paul flatly rejects this premise in verse 4 (“Not at all!”) but that exposes a fundamental error in the understanding of many people, both then and now, who miss the fact that God made two kinds of promises in the Old Covenant, for as you read through the Law, you will find that it is full of “blessings and curses”.  There are promises of blessing for those who keep the Law, and curses, which are also promises, for those who break the Law. To put it another way, if a person kept the Law, they would be entitled to claim the promise of a blessing, but if they broke it, God promised to curse them, thus for God to provide the blessing and forget the curse would mean that He wasn’t faithful to the whole Law.

This is the point that Paul makes in verses 5-8:

But if our unrighteousness brings out God’s righteousness more clearly, what shall we say? That God is unjust in bringing his wrath on us? (I am using a human argument.) Certainly not! If that were so, how could God judge the world? Someone might argue, “If my falsehood enhances God’s truthfulness and so increases his glory, why am I still condemned as a sinner?” Why not say—as some slanderously claim that we say—“Let us do evil that good may result”? Their condemnation is just!

Paul mentions in verse 5 that this is a human argument. As we read it, we might even think it is a frivolous argument, which it is. These are just the kinds of arguments that often trip us up; silly ones, based on human thinking that cannot begin to see things from any perspective other than a personal one; they are the kinds of arguments that children make.

Many commentators have asserted that since the end of the Second World War, New York City has been the world center of finance and culture, and while this can be argued, it is surely the media capital of much of the world; its influence is great indeed. Imagine if this cultural center used its media influence to promote the Gospel; just imagine the impact that could have…

In Paul’s day, Rome was the capital of the greatest Empire the world had yet seen; it was the very center of power, economics, culture and religion, and yes, all roads led there. Since Paul was the main guy called to take the Good News to the Gentiles, it is easy to see his thinking when it came to evangelizing Rome. With this in mind, is it any wonder that he wrote his great “doctrinal essay” to the Roman church?

Even more interesting is the unique nature of the Roman church itself that appears to have started organically without an Apostle’s visit or deliberate missionaries being present. Yes, I am aware of the tradition that Peter had gone to Rome to start the church there, but there isn’t any historical evidence to support the assertion, and it seems unlikely at best. You might even notice Paul’s remark in Romans 15:20 that he prefers “to preach the gospel where Christ was not known, so that I would not be building on someone else’s foundation” which is followed by his long held wish to visit Rome as an indication that no one had previously made a “missionary” visit there.  This of course leaves us with the question of how the church started…

The short answer is that nobody knows for sure.

The long answer is that we have quite a few clues giving us a number of dots we can connect, and the amazing part of this is that it will give us insight into God’s workings in this world.

According to Acts 2:10, there were visitors in Jerusalem who were present when the Gospel was first proclaimed at Pentecost. Since 3,000 came to believe and were baptized, it stands to reason that some of the visitors from Rome would have been included in that number, most likely Jews and other interested Gentiles who would have taken their new faith home with them. Another possibility is that people from Rome were reached by Paul (and others) when he preached in other Gentile locations and returned home after conversion from paganism. Remember, Rome was the center of things, and people were constantly travelling to and from Rome to destinations all over the known world. An additional bit of evince to this is the fact that in Romans 16 Paul greeted by name no fewer than 25 people in Rome that he had met on his travels; mostly Gentiles.  In the process, he makes reference to at least 2 home churches in Rome, and various others whose names he doesn’t state specifically.

If we consider these clues, it would appear that there is a mixture of Jewish and Gentile believers in Rome who have probably taken the Gospel throughout the city, a city of around a million people, including 16 synagogues that history has recorded. At this juncture, we have another question: If we know so much about the presence of Jewish synagogues, why don’t we have better information about churches in the city?

On that question, we do have solid information. In about  49 AD, the Emperor Claudius issued a decree exiling all Jews from Rome (Acts 18:2). According to the Roman historian Suetonius this was done because “the Jews at Rome caused continuous disturbances at the instigation of Christus (sic).” So, you ask ‘how it is that Christ instigated disturbances among the Jews of the city?’ If the church in Rome began when Romans on their travels observed others, such as Paul, preaching the gospel in various places, it stands to reason that they would have taken the Gospel first to the Jewish synagogues, and then to the Gentiles with similar results: Some Jews accept the Gospel and others riot. Roman leaders don’t like riots!

We know from other accounts in the New Testament that the Roman authorities seldom made distinctions between believing and unbelieving Jews, so all were sent away from the city. By 54 AD, Claudius had died and the decree was no longer enforced and the people were free to return to the city, but were hesitant to resume public assemblies. Some scholars say that such assemblies were prohibited, and maybe this is so, but I haven’t been able to verify this, yet we do know that the Christians kept a lower profile than before and met in homes during this period. In any case, when those Jewish Christians returned to Rome, they found a church that was now dominated by Gentiles, since they had not been kicked out of the city.

By the time of Paul’s writing, we can be certain that the church in Rome was comprised of both Jews and Gentiles, a fact that Romans confirms. Some parts are specifically written to Jews, others to Gentiles, but the message is clear: They are to act as One. Clearly, this caused Paul to write a universal message that is relevant to all Christians of whatever background or ethnicity in any period of time.

Romans 2:1-16

In the last part, I mentioned that we entered the first main section of Romans (1:18 – 3:20) and that this section is divided into 3 subsections, the first of which deals with the condition of the Gentiles. Here we begin the second subsection that deals with God’s wrath and the Jews. For the sake of clarity, I’ve decided to split this into two parts, this being the first.

You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge another, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things. Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth. So when you, a mere human being, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God’s judgment? Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?

Romans 2:1-4

Paul originally wrote this for Jewish Christians to consider, and while that was the situation in the first century, in the 21^st century I think all Christians would be well advised to take this section to heart and do some soul searching.

This need not be a very long post, for once again, Paul’s text is elegant in its simplicity, and one needs to be proud indeed to miss his point, which is that none of us is qualified to pass judgment on anyone else, for this is the sole purview of God Himself.

Is this to say that we turn a blind eye to unrighteousness?

Of course not!

If our brother or sister stumbles, the loving thing to do is to offer them a hand so they can get up again, but there is a huge difference between a helping hand and a kick in the butt while they’re down! We have received God’s mercy and kindness; all of us. Why must so many repay God’s mercy and kindness by thinking they can push God aside and take His place as the Judge over others?

I hope that each of us will reflect on these things today, and as we each ask God for His forgiveness, may we also ask Him for His guidance as we move forward in our journey with Him.

Programming Note: Be looking for the first Romans “Bonus Post” later today that will provide some background on Rome and its significance in both the first century and on Paul’s strategy for spreading the Good News worldwide.