Day 341 (Romans 1-3) - Year 6
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Hey, Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble, and I'm your host for The Bible Recap.

We first heard about the church in Rome back in Acts 18. That's when we met Aquila and Priscilla, the married couple who were Paul's tent-making missionary companions. The whole reason Paul met them in Corinth is because they were kicked out of Italy for being Jewish. Then, about five years after the governor kicked them out, they were allowed to return. But when everyone comes back to Rome, the church looks dramatically different than it did half a decade earlier. There are so many new Gentiles in the ranks, and the Jewish culture has really been diluted. It's

It's causing a lot of division and frustration. We've seen this theme from country to country and church to church. So Paul picks up his pen again to address this persistent problem with a new group of people. And as always, the gospel is his solution. He writes this letter to help the church zoom out on what the gospel is and what the gospel means and what the gospel does.

He addresses his letter to all in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints, every Christ follower from every culture and ethnicity. Through Christ, they have all received grace and apostleship, which lead to the obedience of faith. Our obedience is a gift of grace from him to us. It's something he gives us that we offer back to him. But also, hold up, he gives us apostleship? Paul, an apostle, calls the believers in Rome apostles—

What does that mean? We've talked about this briefly in the past. Many scholars believe there's room for all believers to be called apostles today. Others believe it still exists today, but it's a spiritual gift granted to few, and still others believe it ended in the first century after the church was established. If you want to read more, check out the three articles we've linked to in the show notes. Also, for what it's worth, we're still in the introduction. I told you Paul's intros are dense.

Paul really wants to come visit the Romans. I know he's probably starting to sound like that friend who says, we should catch up sometime, text me and we'll put on the calendar. Except he totally means it. He's willing to endure beatings and imprisonment to visit his friends and encourage them in the faith. He knows this visit would be mutually encouraging. Also, gelato.

But in the meantime, he has a call to preach the gospel to a whole variety of people. He'll preach it to anyone who will hear, and he trusts it will save everyone who believes it. And the fact is, everyone needs to hear it. Everyone was born into a fallen world, and some have even resigned themselves to that fallenness. God has made the truth obvious to them that there is a creator who is in charge of all this. Like Psalm 19 says, "...the heavens declare the glory of God, and the skies above proclaim His handiwork."

But people ignore the truth and continue to live life on their own terms, suppressing the truth. Jesus said this same thing in John 3, 19. He said,

They knew God but didn't honor or thank Him. And their lack of humility and gratitude toward God served to harden their hearts all the more, catapulting them further down the trajectory of disbelief and disobedience. Their idolatry continues on, ever increasing. Instead of worshiping the Creator, they worship the things He made, humans and animals, as they distort worship and sexuality and creation.

The way God responds to them is with inaction. He doesn't grant them repentance. They feel no guilt over their actions. In fact, they celebrate them. This is what God's passive wrath looks like. It lets people continue on in their sin, unchecked. He gives them over to their sins. It's terrifying and heartbreaking.

While believers in Christ will never experience any version of God's wrath, passive or active, it's important to remember two things. First, if we're honest, we all find ourselves somewhere on this list of evil things in verses 29-30, and not just in the past but maybe even in the present. Here it is.

Unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, maliciousness, envy, murder, strife, deceit, gossip, slander, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, and ruthless. Did any of that ring a bell? Second, because we're all on that list somewhere, death and separation from God is what we all deserve. But God grants us grace instead.

And third, the recognition that we deserve what they got keeps us humble. We can't grow prideful toward them as if we did anything to earn grace. We're not Judaizers. That's legalism and moralism and not at all square one. In fact, Paul points all this out in chapter 2. He says,

He says,

This message was probably directed primarily toward his Jewish readers who might have been relying on the law and the old covenant to keep them in good standing with God. It was probably easy for them to look at the Gentiles and think, "'Ew, sinners.'"

So Paul is saying, takes one to know one, you guys. And whether you're a Jew or a Gentile, you're living out what you believe. It's being revealed day by day. And there will be a day when it all culminates in God's righteous judgment in response to that, regardless of your ethnicity. Paul talks a lot about obeying the law. So let's clarify a few things. He's probably referring to all 613 Old Testament laws, which Jesus summed up as the vertical laws and the horizontal laws. Love God and love people.

To love someone is to honor them, and these people aren't really doing either of those things. He points out that the Gentiles, who don't even have those 613 laws, are proving by their actions that they do love and honor God. And that kind of love only comes from a transformed heart. At this point, he assumes that his Jewish listeners might be wondering, what's the point of even having the law if you don't have to have the law to know and love God? Paul says,

Seriously? The law revealed God to us. That's a huge blessing. The law made us carriers of the promise and the covenant. That's incredible. And the law revealed our great need for God's great rescue because we can't live up to what the law requires. And we need to know this about ourselves. The law shows us so much about God and about ourselves.

Then Paul responds to another hypothetical question. This time he imagines his readers asking, is there even any advantage to being an ethnic Jew instead of a Gentile? And Paul says, no, there isn't. Being Jewish doesn't protect you against the righteous judgment of God. Both Jews and Gentiles are under the curse of sin. Both Jews and Gentiles need God's rescue. And there's only one Savior for all ethnicities, Christ Jesus.

So we Jews have no reason to boast in our Jewishness or our attempts at law-keeping because we're only saved by faith in Jesus anyway. But that great gift of faith and salvation is adjacent to a changed heart that makes us want to obey and honor God and His law. In other words, we don't obey the law because we want to get God's love. Rather, we want to obey the law because we've been given God's love. The cause and effect is a crucial distinction.

My God shot was in 3.23-24. It's talking about faith in Jesus and it says, All of these things are gifts. The grace, the faith, the justification, the redemption. He gives the best gifts. Everything I need and everything I didn't know I need, He gives it all.

He's where the joy is. Tomorrow, we're starting the second half of Romans. So check out the short video overview we've linked to in the show notes. It's nine minutes long and it will really set you up for success.

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