Rome was a complex and progressive society – and the church there faced many of the same temptations and challenges offered us by society today. Learn insights from Paul’s letter to the Romans about how we can live in our world today – and keep our focus where it belongs.

<p>Rome was a complex and progressive society – and the church there faced many of the same temptations and challenges offered us by society today. Learn insights from Paul’s letter to the Romans about how we can live in our world today – and keep our focus where it belongs.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Dalton SDA Church

The Book of Romans

Chester Clark

Romans 1 – Not Ashamed

It's 1 of my favorite parts of the New Testament.

In fact, the book of Romans is probably, of all of Paul's epistles, my all-time favorite.

Not because it's brief like some of the others, you know, you can read them in just a few minutes and have a blessing from them.

Romans is a little more complex and complicated, but it's 1 of my favorites because Romans shows Paul's attempt to give a complete picture of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And Romans is a gospel in itself, an epistle in itself for which all Christians can be grateful.

This morning we're going to look at the first part of the first chapter of the book of Romans.

We're going to be thinking about the Rome in which Paul was thinking of, of which Paul was thinking of, the Rome to which he was writing.

And we begin here in the first few verses, Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated under the gospel of God, which he had promised to for by his prophets in the Holy Scriptures, concerning...

Concerning his son, Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to flesh and declared to be the son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness and by the resurrection from the dead.

In these 2 verses, Paul basically summarizes the Christian faith, doesn't he?

He says Jesus, His Son, God's Son, was made flesh like us.

He came in the likeness of flesh and then He was declared to be the Son of God with power.

He was obviously Christ, the Son of God, throughout His life, and even more obviously when He came forth from the tomb, resurrected by the power of God.

By whom we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations, for His name, among whom are you also the called of Jesus Christ." Now, here Paul is thinking about the Romans, and he's imagining what it must be in that city of Rome, that cosmopolitan capital of the world at the time.

He's thinking that he knows that there are people that are believers in Jesus Christ in the city of Rome.

In fact, he knew that there were probably some people who were in lower castes of society who were believers in Jesus Christ.

He had also heard that there were some even in the household of Caesar who were believers in Jesus Christ.

And as he's thinking about them, he wants to write them a letter.

He wants to tell them of his love for them and his love for Jesus and Jesus' love for them.

And as he begins writing, I think it's obvious that he is thinking of them and his great concern for them.

In the next few verses, he says, to all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints, grace to you and peace from God our Father and Lord Jesus Christ." And he begins to say, look, I've wanted to visit you in Rome but I haven't been able to yet.

And let's just take a minute to think about what Rome would have been like in the imperial days.

I know none of us have had the opportunity to actually be there then, but there's a lot of historical evidence, there's a lot of history that we can look at and try to remind ourselves what Rome was like.

We know that because as the empires of Daniel chapter 2, Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome, it would be the last of those empires, but it would last longer than a couple of them put together.

Over 600 years Rome would bear sway over that part of the earth, a powerful, powerful empire, and also an empire that was filled with luxury, an empire that was filled with art and culture, a very high society, you might say.

In fact, it is said that in imperial Rome, about the time that Paul was writing, it is said that in the city of Rome, there were as many or more statues than there were inhabitants.

That's how opulent and lush it was with artwork and with what we would consider and what they considered the trappings of society.

I don't know, is there anyone here who also likes history?

Because I love history and I probably bore some of you who didn't raise your hand sometime in my sermons because I talk quite a bit about history but as I think back about Rome, what it would have been, I know that it was a grand city, an awesome city.

In fact, still today when we see the ruins of Rome, we see it as a grand and awesome city.

I've had the privilege many times of taking groups, mostly student groups, on church history tours, and often we would stop in Rome and see the remnants of what Rome is, or used to be, still today.

Still many, many items that are beautiful, that are fascinating, that show the artwork and the culture.

The Trevi Fountain just being 1 of them, it's not only a beautiful fountain, but it shows us some of the culture of Rome with the myths that they believed in and the different things that these statues represent to their culture and to their myths and mythology.

This is just 1 of the areas where we can point to their engineering feat and this would have been the case in Paul's day.

This was not post-apostolic times that Rome built these engineering feats.

Here we see a picture of 1 of the many, many aqueducts that were built to supply Rome with water.

Not just Rome, but other cities around the Roman Empire were served by aqueducts in order to carry water across valleys from their sources up in pristine springs to the cities, which would be on the opposite side of a valley.

Now, they're impressive architecture, not just because they're still standing today, 2, 000 years later, not just because of their size and proportions, but they're impressive because with the perfect form and perfect balance, we can see today, they also had perfect drop, so that the water flowed across.

I mean, if you engineered it wrong, you understand, you would get to the top and the water would be flowing the wrong direction.

But the water flowed through these aqueducts as masterfully designed channels of water to their perspective destinations.

I just have a few pictures of Roman aqueducts that still are existing today and inspire us with their beauty and with their impressive formation, with their engineering.

And so, these are things as Paul's thinking of Rome, he's realizing they're living in this environment.

He's realizing Christians are living in a very sophisticated, very advanced society.

They're living in a place where nothing is impossible, where we can do it, we can build it, we can conceive it and achieve it.

And this is the culture that he is writing to.

Here is another instance of Roman engineering and this is the Roman roads.

Many of you know that the Roman roads covered 50, 000 miles by this time in the empire.

50, 000 miles of roads networking, spider webbing across Rome.

You've heard the expression that all roads lead to Rome?

It's because they were built by the Romans for the purpose of sending messengers out and sending soldiers out and sending the commerce of the empire out, and indeed they were leading to Rome.

50000 miles of road, This particular picture is none other than the road that Paul would himself walk down.

These stones make up what we know as the Appian Way, or the Appian, Via Appia Antica, as it would say in the Italian street signs along this street.

The old Appian Way, there's a new Appian Way that looks quite different.

But this is the old Appian Way, this is the road that Paul would have journeyed down.

The roads, 50, 000 miles of Roman roads were carefully leveled.

Valleys were filled in, mountains were cut down, And then many feet of foundation materials would be put in before the final surface of stones would be laid.

And that's why in many cases they're still today intact and the stones are still there and in some way usable.

Notice with me what he says in Romans chapter 1 and verse 13.

Now I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that oftentimes I purposed to come unto you, but was let, or prevented, until now, that I might have some fruit among you also, even as among other Gentiles." Paul's telling the church in Rome, look, I have been wanting to come and visit you.

I've been wanting to come and spend some time in the city of Rome.

I've been wanting to make my journey over to visit you because I want to preach here also.

You see, Paul, the great evangelist, had spent time in different parts of the Roman Empire.

In Asia Minor, he had worked among the Greeks, he had worked among the Celtics, in Galatia and others, So he'd worked among several major language groups that the church had become well established in, but he had not yet had much opportunity to travel in the part of the world we would today call Italy, in the Latin world where the Latin language was primarily spoken.

He had not yet had much opportunity to go there and he wanted to.

He wanted to have some time to visit Rome and to establish further the church that was there.

And he's thinking about them, he's writing them because they are on his mind.

Now, if we look at a summary of the life of Paul, and boy that's way too small, isn't it?

But we see here a timeline of the life of Paul And we come down here to Paul's conversion was in AD 33.

His first missionary journey would have been right here, right here, about 46 and 47.

His third missionary journey was the longest, 52 to 57, about 5 years.

Somewhere around the end of that third missionary journey, he's probably, we believe, in Corinth, and I'll get to that in just a minute, he's riding from Corinth to the church in Rome while he's still on a missionary journey.

He was going to finish up his missionary journey, his third trip, and get back to Jerusalem for 1 of the feasts.

As people from all over the world be gathered in Jerusalem, he wanted to go there and have an opportunity to share Christ before them.

After Jerusalem, he intended to go to Rome and to visit the Roman Christians.

In fact, this would happen if we look at a map of Paul's last missionary journey, as well as his trip to Rome.

We see the red here is where he was traveling on his missionary journey.

He started in Antioch, he makes his way across Asia Minor, he comes over here through Greece and Macedonia, and here he comes to Athens and and to Corinth, and he's riding here from Corinth.

He's about to head back, and this was his path as he comes back, back to Jerusalem.

What he didn't realize was that once he got back to Jerusalem, he would actually be captured as a, well he would be caught up in a, what you might say, a religious dispute between the Jews who hated him and the Roman Empire who was obligated to try him.

And when they went to try him, they realized it was a matter of Jewish prejudice against Paul and they would have let him loose, but Paul was afraid that if he went to trial there, he was going to not get a fair trial, so he appealed to Caesar, and this complicated his life greatly.

Appealing to Caesar for trial meant that he had to be carried all the way from Jerusalem, where he'd been captured, and carried all the way to Rome, where he would stand trial before Nero.

And so, in the end, Paul did end up going to Rome, but not in any way in the manner that he expected to be going.

He went not as an apostle to preach the gospel, he went as a prisoner in chains.

Although he was able, we find in the book of Acts, he was able to do a great work even as a prisoner.

And so, Paul is here in Corinth, he's on his third and last missionary journey, and he's riding to the church all the way over here in Rome, where he's never been, saying that he wants to be there.

Now, there's several indications that we can look at to see that the epistle was written from Corinth.

He references Gaius, who we find is in Corinth, and Erastus, who we also find Timothy, who was in Corinth, was, in his letter to Timothy, he talks about Erastus.

And he also commends Phoebe, whom he elsewhere describes as rendering special service to the church at Cincre, which is an eastern seaport of Corinth.

And so we believe that Paul was writing from Corinth as he is writing the believers in Rome.

Romans 2 – Love that Hates

You know, usually after you spend your lifetime focused on something, studying something, becoming good at something, you might have some affinity toward that which you've done, right?

I think of General and then President Dwight D.

Successful, hard worker, had spent time studying and mastered, you might say, the science of war.

But this is 1 statement that he made that probably stands out in my mind as much as any other.

Only 1 who has seen its brutality, its stupidity.

Today we're going to be talking about love that hates.

Now that may seem like a peculiar juxtaposition of words, love that hates.

Surely someone can't use those 2 words in the same sentence as if love could hate, but indeed I believe it's true.

And today we're going to look at 3 main principles.

We're going to flesh them out from our study of the book of Romans.

We're going to be looking at the chapters in Romans.

We started a couple of weeks ago looking at Romans chapter 1.

We're going to be looking at the latter part of Romans chapter 1, and also at Romans chapter 2.

And we're going to find 3 profound and distinct truths, I believe, in our study today.

First of all, we're gonna find that God is a God of love and God loves who, friends?

In fact, Jeremiah's message to a wayward Israel from God was this, I have loved you with an everlasting love, and with loving kindness have I drawn thee.

I have loved you with an everlasting love, therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you, 1 translation reads.

God's love for us has no beginning and no ending.

Even if those, God forbid, should be separated from Him eternity by their refusal to accept His love, He will keep on loving them.

Because there's a place in His heart, especially just for them.

We are familiar with the best known text in all the Bible.

John 3.16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

And of course, we know John, overwhelmed by this, towards the end of his life, writing the epistle of 1 John, he says, simply, God is love.

But there's another truth that we must recognize, and that truth is that sin separates us from God.

In fact, if you have your Bibles, and I hope you have them this morning, we're going to be spending some time, not just in the book of Romans, but in other places in the sacred word.

Isaiah chapter 59 and verse 2, the prophet expresses in a very succinct and clear way the consequences of sin.

It says in Isaiah 59, verses 1 and 2, are you there?

Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save, nor is it ear-heavy that it cannot hear, but your iniquities have what?

Separated you from your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you." You see, God made man in the beginning, and friends, we've gone over that story.

Man chose to disobey God's word, to disobey God's instructions, he sinned.

And it wasn't just the act of eating a piece of fruit, arbitrarily, it was an act of the heart where Adam and Eve chose to rebel.

They chose to do what they knew was the wrong thing to do.

You see, sin ultimately has to do with our hearts, doesn't it?

It has to do with the decisions that we make, but it's the attitude and the perspective of our hearts.

And Adam and Eve sinned, and because of that sin, they were driven out of the garden, they were separated from God, and we tend to, as human beings, we tend to read this story from a very, very human-centered perspective.

Oh, isn't it terrible that Adam and Eve had to leave the garden.

Isn't it terrible that Adam and Eve's first son was the murder of their second son?

Isn't it terrible that they suffered thorns and thistles and pain in childbirth and all of these things, but we rarely spend much time thinking about what sin cost God?

And if we could somehow just peel away the blinders off our eyes and see what sin cost God, sin broke the heart of a loving God who lovingly created our first parents and then had to be separated from them.

Sin separates, and sin is painful to the heart of God.

And you know, when we read later in the book of Romans, Romans chapter 6 and verse 23, the wages of sin is death, there are some Christians who, or even critics of Christianity, who see this as a judgment call, a subjective decision by an angry God who is not liking people who have rebelled to say that the wages of sin is death, that's what He's going to punish them with.

But I believe this is the statement of fact of a God who is broken by the truth that separated from Him, His loved ones have no source of life.

His loved ones are separated from Him, and apart from salvation by His blood, will be separated from Him forever.

Because sin separates Him from His loved ones.

And the whole plan of redemption, friends, the whole plan of redemption is simply calculated to restore man with God.

That's the point of Jesus coming and living and dying.

That's the point of His ministry now on our behalf.

That's the point of Him coming again to take us to where He is.

Sin separates us from God, but praise God, there's a plan to be reunited.

So first, God is love and God loves sinners.

And third, we must recognize that God hates sin as only 1 who experienced it can hate it.

You and I can say, you and I, and there may be some veterans here, but you and I who've not been in the trenches, we can say we hate war, but only, as Dwight Eisenhower said, He hated it as only 1 who has experienced it could hate it.

And I want to tell you this morning, my friends, Jesus hates sin as only 1 who has experienced it can hate it.

You see, while we think that we are doing fine in this life, in this world, while we think that everything is going fine and we're abandoning our wounds and we're living a life in denial, Jesus has tasted the full measure of the wrath of God against sin.

He has tasted what true eternal separation feels like.

And he hates sin as only 1 who experienced it can.

I want us to make something very clear here as we look again at Romans.

God hates sin because it separates His beloved from Him.

Let's turn in our Bibles now to Romans chapter 1.

And we're going to remember that a few weeks ago, we were talking about the power of God that is unto salvation to the Jew first and also to the Greek.

Paul was not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, amen?

He wasn't ashamed to be counted the follower of 1 who died upon the tree.

He wasn't ashamed to have that stigma attached to him.

In fact, when he came to Corinth, we saw, he determined to lay aside the sophistries and the smooth sayings and the great preaching and oratory.

He decided to know nothing among them except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

Because in Christ crucified, there is power.

In the blood of Jesus there is cleansing for our sins.

In the blood of Jesus there is peace that passes all understanding.

In the blood of Jesus there is power to make the sinner whole, and not just to legally justify us, but also to change our hearts and to give us victory over those things that have enslaved us.

And so when he comes to the middle part of Romans 1, he's just given this introduction.

He's talked about how he wants to preach the Gospel in Rome also, but he says in verse 18, for the wrath of God, that's the hatred of God, the anger of God, is revealed from heaven against all what?

We tend to superimpose that idea upon God.

But the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all, what does it say, friends?

It's not the people that God is angry at, it's not the people that God hates, they're His beloved, they're His creation.

But the unrighteousness that separates us from Him, He hates.

Bad News, Good News

I'm sure each 1 of you have had the experience of someone coming to you and saying, I've got good news and I've got bad news.

Maybe that very phrase conjures up some memory of such an occasion.

And usually the choice is between hearing the good news or the bad news first, right?

And I remember the story I read 1 time of a doctor who told his patient, I have good news and bad news.

The good news is that you only have 1 week to live.

In shock, the patient asked, well, if that's the good news, what's the bad news?

The bad news is I was supposed to tell you last week, but I forgot.

Often it seems as though the good news, bad news is simply relative, isn't it?

In this world, different variations of bad news.

And this week we're going to continue our study of the book of Romans.

We're looking at Romans chapter 3, and thus far Paul has addressed the believers, actually, in Rome with an amazing, first of all, an amazing description in chapter 1 of the wickedness of the world, and just as they were about to say, Well, yes, we agree, amen, preach it, brother.

He said, wait a minute, sin is sin, and there is sin in the church as well.

In fact, he sort of summarizes this concept in Romans 3, 9.

He refers to this experience that he's just taken them through in chapters 1 and 2 when he says, What then?

Not at all, for we have previously charged or argued both Jews and Greeks that they are all under sin.

Now if you can be lost in the world and you can be lost in the church, What's the point of being in the church?

Do you think people ask that question sometimes?

And that's the question that he begins this chapter with.

In Romans chapter 3 and verse 1 he says, What advantage then has the Jew?

And today we might ask the question, is there any advantage to being a church member?

If you can be lost in the church, you can be lost outside the church.

Maybe you might even be saved outside of the church or lost in the church, right?

So then why go through the process if salvation is an inward experience that is a personal experience, not a community experience, If it's something between me and Jesus directly, not administered by a pastor, not administered by a priest, not administered by the authority of a church.

Why be a member outwardly of the body of Christ?

I think he's gonna come back to that later on in the book of Romans.

But he says there's many advantages, much he says in every way, and he gives 1, just 1.

Chiefly because to them were committed the oracles of God.

To them were committed the oracles of God.

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Series

The Book of Romans

Romans 1 – Not Ashamed

Transcript

Description

Parent Series

Sponsor

Recorded

Parts

Romans 1 – Not Ashamed

49m

Romans 2 – Love that Hates

39m

Bad News, Good News

42m

Righteousness by Faith

55m

Wanted: Dead & Alive

46m

Romans 7 - Freedom from the Law

52m

Romans 8 - Living by the Spirit

53m

Romans 9-The Calling

1h

Unexplainable Ways

36m

Reasonable Service

47m

The Bible and Politics

39m

Sound Doctrine