The Road to Salvation – We study Paul's letter to the Romans

Background

The road to Rome is your road from unbelief to salvation. We will be discussing this particular book for the next 13 weeks. We are going to do this on the basis of different preachers' messages. For the first chapter we use the following video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKyWrpiHhEs (First, the Bad News, by Gary Hamrick, 43 minutes).

In his writing to the congregation in Rome, Paul looks at the gospel from the point of view of the finished work of Jesus Christ, and we see in Philippians 3 how this is realized in his life. First, let's make sure we understand what Philippians 3 teaches us. Paul explains his background, and it reads like that of a very privileged person, with the necessary qualities to achieve anything in his life:

1. He is circumcised, and this is the beginning of his life as a devoted Jew.
2. He is from the right nation, Israel, who is God's chosen nation.
3. He is of the right tribe, Benjamin.
4. He is a Hebrew.
5. He is religiously on the right side of two groups, a Pharisee, an advocate of the Torah.
6. He politically does the right thing for his time and is a fanatical persecutor of the Church.
7. He acts righteously as far as the law is concerned, blameless, and keeps the Jewish law to the letter.

All these things counted in his favour, but living out the will of Christ was now more important, and now he sees the seven points above as harm. For him, circumcision is no longer important; he no longer belongs exclusively to one people, but to the Church; his lineage is irrelevant; his own people, the Hebrews, are against him; he is now in conflict with the very group of which he was a part; he now fights for the Church whom he persecuted; and the law is useless to him now. He considers it dregs (Also "dung", Philippians 3:8) to get Christ as gain. All these things prepare him to write the letter to the congregation in Rome.

Rome consisted of about one million people of various backgrounds. The society was characterized by immorality and decay. The religious view was polytheistic. They followed Greek mythology and worshiped the emperor. By the nature of the matter, it clashed with the monotheistic view of the Jews and Christians and led to the death of thousands of Christians.

The church in Rome was started by converted Jews who were in Jerusalem during the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in Acts 2. In AD 49 they were exiled by Claudius (Acts 18:2) but returned five years later. However, the church had changed a lot in the meantime, and there was a lot of conflict. Emperor Nero ruled for 14 years, from 54 to 68 AD, and the letter was written in about 57-58 AD while Paul was in Corinth (Acts 18). Paul had never been to Rome at this point. The reason for the letter was to address the conflict between the Jewish and Gentile Christians, and to indicate both the Church and Israel's future as part of God's plan for both. He also wanted to make Rome the base for future trips to Spain. See Romans 15:24.

There are a few key words that appear more in this letter than in the other letters. Gospel (εὐαγγέλιον – “good news”) in verse 1 occurs 12 times in the letter. The good news is that it doesn't matter what you've done in your life. All sin is forgiven if you place your faith in Jesus Christ. The word grace (χάρις, “charis”) appears 26 times in the letter and faith (πίστις, “pistis”) appears 39 times.

The gospel means good news, and that is Paul's focus, but there is both good news and bad news in the letter to the Romans.

• The good news is that it is faith in Jesus Christ and what He has done for us that leads to our salvation, through the grace of God.
• The bad news, and we must first understand it in order to appreciate the good news later, is what we are saved from, the wrath of God. The word wrath (ὀργή, “orge”) is used 13 times in Romans. We find it the first time in verse 18.

Main moments in chapter 1

1. Paul first of all introduces himself as a servant. The Greek is δοῦλος (doulos; slave). However, the word has a greater meaning. A doulos was a slave who was free, but who chose to stay with his master. See Luke 9:23. Here we see how Jesus mentions that if you want to follow Him, you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. You are free but connected to Him. It's your choice.
2. Secondly, he calls himself an apostle. He would also be the last apostle to whom Jesus would appear but was not part of the original 12 apostles (1 Cor 15:8). The word "apostle" was not initially used in a biblical context. The word meant to be a representative and to be sent, carry out the orders of the emperor, and change your world so that it becomes like Rome. So, you were a predecessor who wanted to bring change. As an apostle of Jesus Christ, Paul had the authority to change things for the better. He is now Jesus Christ's predecessor and representative for the Gentiles.
3. Thirdly, he is set apart to the gospel. It became his only focus, and it is his new identity in Jesus Christ. Everything he had or was, was now useless to him.
4. The gospel was already mentioned in the Old Testament, and the way to Christ ran through David.
5. The gospel gave us the grace to be saved. We are called to be saved.
6. Paul states that he knows that other people are talking about the congregation in Rome, and they are known everywhere, and he is looking for a reason to come and visit them so that he can encourage them, but he has been prevented so far.
7. He wants to preach the gospel to them because he is not ashamed of it, and because the gospel leads to the salvation of both the Jews and the Greeks (Gentiles). Verses 16-17 are the core of the gospel. We live by nothing, but faith and we are not ashamed of it.
8. Paul explains the state of the nature of the person who is without faith (18-25; Matt 24:12) and who deliberately excludes God from their lives. There are three bad categories into which mankind is classified, which Paul points out in the first two chapters:
   1. The unjust experience God through nature (Rom 1:18-25). They
      1. deny the truth of the existence of God (verse 18);
      2. can know Him through nature (verses 19-20);
      3. became foolish and did not glorify Him (verse 21);
      4. however, keep themselves smart (verse 22);
      5. make for themselves idols (verse 23); and
      6. swap the truth for the lie and change the order. Even today, we pay more attention to the problems of the world than we do to God (verse 25). We moved Him from first to third - nature, man, God. Look at how the "tree huggers" and the "Just Stop Oil" movement are going to stop on the streets.
   2. The self-righteous experience God through their conscience (Rom 2:1-16); and
   3. The excessively righteous are the Jews (Rom 2:17-29; 3:9-24).
   4. All three groups
      1. are wicked and unjust;
      2. suppress the truth (John 14:6; 2 Thess 2:10) and hang on to the lie;
      3. deny that which is revealed about God in them;
      4. do not glorify and thank Him as God;
      5. their pretensions (thought) are foolish;
      6. their hearts are darkened;
      7. do not recognise the Divine character of God, and instead make images of Him that are similar to men and animals.

9. Now go watch the second video in the series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoX7pnTjOnc.
10. The world's standards consider that man is inherently good. This is contrary to what God says about people, that people are inherently evil (verse 23). We live today in an evil society that excludes God. Laws and words are changed to hide their real meaning.
11. Because they did these things, God gave them over to do what they wanted, and get the reward for it (2 Thess 2:11-12). They exchanged the truth for the lie.
12. The result is that they are given over to sexual misconduct (26-27).
13. They are also given over to sin and a bad attitude (Eng. "debased", "reprobate", Gr. ἀδόκιμος, adokimos; [a in Greek indicates a negative] not allowed, not acceptable, worthless, rejected) (28).
14. Because they did not bother to determine why they were wrong, God gave them over to a bad attitude (29-31).
15. Not only do they do these things, but they hate God (verse 30). Just look at the left's performances on American university campuses; the BLM movement (an atheistic, demonic movement that actually cares nothing for the lives of blacks); and other leftist resistance groups - all the "woke" supporters, wherever they may be.
16. Even worse, although they knew that they deserved death, they not only continued to do it, but also approved of similar acts of others. Because they do not believe in God, they also do not believe in God's judgment.
17. If these things happened so long ago, how much worse are they in our time?

Discussion

1. Was Romans written for the people of Paul's time, or for our time as well? Motivate.
2. If you had to take only one text verse to give to someone as representative of Romans 1, what would the text be? Motivate.
3. Read Romans 2 in preparation for the next reading.

Chapters

• Romans Chapter 1
• Romans Chapter 2
• Romans Chapter 3
• Romans Chapter 4
• Romans Chapter 5
• Romans Chapter 6
• Romans Chapter 7
• Romans Chapter 8
• Romans Chapter 9
• Romans Chapter 10
• Romans Chapter 11
• Romans Chapter 12
• Romans Chapter 13
• Romans Chapter 14
• Romans Chapter 15
• Romans Chapter 16

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