Not Ashamed of the Gospel

Not Ashamed of the Gospel

Romans 1:1-17

Paul

In verses 1-5 of Chapter 1, Paul introduces himself as an apostle and servant of Christ Jesus and says that he is set apart for the gospel of God. The term “apostle” means “one who is sent” and its use in Christendom originated with the twelve that Jesus selected and sent out. Paul resolutely claimed the title for himself after his conversion experience. We know of this Damascus road experience from Acts, where it is told three times: once by the narrator of Acts (9:1-19) and twice by Paul himself (22:3-16, 26:4-18). Paul does not recount this experience in any of the letters which now exist. Instead, he says only that he saw the Lord (1 Corinthians 9:1, for example).

We do know something about the life of Paul (or “Saul”) before his conversion, as he himself tells us he was “circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews” (Philippians 3:5) and Acts reports that how zealously he pursued the Christian church. We do not know, however, what eventually became of him.

The story in Acts makes it sound as though he was released from one imprisonment in Rome and went on another missionary journey before ending up, at the end of Acts, in a rather comfortable house arrest. This second imprisonment is not supported by the letters, however, and from the letters, 2 Timothy in particular, we have that heart-wrenching call to “come before winter” (2 Timothy 4:21) from a Paul who is deserted by his friends (only Luke is with him) has fought the good fight, and is ready to leave this world.

Romans

In verses 8-15, Paul addresses his audience: the church at Rome. This is a very unusual letter for Paul for, as he says in this greeting, he had never met the church. Because Paul had never met his audience, the nature of the letter is somewhat different. First, the letter is less personal. This is true not only in the sense that there are fewer personal greetings, but in the sense that Paul is not writing in regard to problems within the church about which he has personal knowledge. Instead, the letter is a more general summary of Paul’s theology than we find in any of his other letters.

It is not known who founded the church at Rome. Later content of the letter seems to assume that the congregation has some familiarity with Jewish law, yet in this section Paul says that he wants to minister to the church at Rome just as he has among the “other gentiles”. Perhaps, if there were Jews at the church, there were both Jews and gentiles.

As an aside, this passage contains two examples of complete ethnocentrism. There is the Jew/gentile divide and the Greek/barbarian divide. For a Jew, you were either a Jew (one of God’s chosen) or you were not – you were gentile, and therefore completely without value. From the Jew’s prospective, God chose the Jews and did not value a gentile. We know that is completely wrong, of course, but it surprising how easy it is to put a label on a group of people, for whatever reason, and come to that conclusion again today. The Greeks as a nation had been overrun by the Romans, but the Greek culture flourished under Roman rule. For a Greek, you were either Greek, or you were not – you were barbarian. This word meant to have no culture, and it meant, literally, to say “bar bar”, because the Greeks could not understand the language of the people around them, and assumed it was nonsense.

Paul came into to this divide between Jew and gentile and between Greek and barbarian with the Gospel of God which is for everyone.

The Just Shall Live by Faith

These next two verses, 16 & 17, are jam-packed. Paul is definitely through with preliminaries at this point, and getting down to business.

Here, Paul speaks of the gospel as being the power of God. The word “gospel” comes (somehow) from the Greek evangelion, which means “good news”. It became a Christian word after Jesus announced his ministry in the temple in Nazareth by reading from Isaiah (Luke 4:16-21). So, it was associated both with the good news that Jesus preached, and the good news of Jesus Christ himself.

Paul says this power is a power for salvation for all who believe. Our Lord called this power “love” when he said “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.” (John 3: 16) Paul, too, says this gospel gives life. “The just shall life by faith,” he says, quoting Habakkuk 2:4.

Most of us (and when I use a phrase like that I am almost always admitting my guilt and hoping that there is someone else out there like me) well remember that brief passage of scripture “The just shall live by faith.” Though, we certainly remember it from Paul, and not from Habakkuk. And, while we remember John 3:16, we tend not to remember 3:17, which says: “For God sent not his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.” But, those two verses in John say just what these two verses Romans say, using somewhat different words.

Jesus says that God sent his son. That is certainly the gospel, or “good news”. It was God acting out of love: the power of God. Paul (as he is translated) uses both “believe” and “faith”, but these are the same word: to believe is to have faith. Jesus says we are not condemned but are saved, Paul says we are made righteous. Jesus says we will have everlasting life, Paul says we will live.

Not Ashamed of the Gospel

Paul said he was not ashamed of the gospel, and why should he be? It sounds like wonderful, powerful, life-giving stuff. But it is not the power of this world. The power of this world lets me draw a dividing line between me and mine and all the rest of you. If I am very powerful, I can draw that line pretty much where I want. The power of this world divides between the “haves” and the “have-nots”. It divides between Jew and gentile, and between Greek and barbarian. We have the power to make those divisions and we want the power to make the division between the just and the unjust. Sometimes I find myself like Jonah (Jonah 4:1-3) not proud of the gospel, but angry at the God who wants to share it with the whole world.

Why are we like that? Why are we so intent on condemning others, rather than sharing the gospel? Is it because we know we do not deserve the gospel ourselves. That when Paul (or Habakkuk) says “The just shall live by faith” it secretly makes us worry, and to hide our secret, we lash out against others?

The Good News is that God wants to save us, not condemn us, not because we deserve us, but because it is in his power – his loving nature – to do so, and not just us, but the whole world, too. And our world needs saving.