Chapter 1

In the first verses of the letter Paul spells out the foundation of his preaching identifying the gospel (the good news) concerning Jesus Christ. Paul has, by the time that he’s writing this letter, developed a clear theology concerning Jesus Christ. He identifies Jesus’ humanity being descended from David “according to the flesh.” Jesus is declared God’s Son as well by the power of the Holy Spirit and put forward as the messiah through the resurrection from the dead. This is a fully developed theology of the full nature of Jesus being both fully human and fully divine in his origins.

In this short introduction Paul also spells out his theology of unity, being open to both Jew and Gentile. Paul’s theology of salvation in Jesus Christ is universally open to all “who believe” in Jesus.

This Gospel is also fully the source of both grace (acceptance and forgiveness from God) through Jesus as well as the source of our “apostleship”. Note that he isn’t just talking about his apostleship, but the call of God to all who believe to be “sent out” in Jesus name to make his name known. That is the very definition of apostleship, being sent out. Paul addresses his letter to “all God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints.”

To the Gentiles

The fact that Paul’s focus lies in the area of the gentiles is of great significance. The gentile a community is specifically Paul’s calling. There is a high degree of irony in this calling, and I’ve said often that it reflects the fact that God has a sense of humor. Biologically, Paul’s father was a Roman Citizen, making Paul a Roman citizen also. In this religious life, he was a member of the Pharisee party, among the most conservative of the Jewish sects, dedicated to the fullness of the Torah and strict obedience to its laws. We know that Paul’s teacher and mentor was Gameliel, a rabbi of great renounce in and out of his time. Paul was well versed in the law. He knew it deeply and profoundly. I add just a brief note here: We are going to see many instances of Paul’s knowledge and upbringing in the law expressed throughout this book as it is throughout the body of his writing. At times it is possible to hear the dialogue between the legal teaching and the newly found freedom of the gospel that Paul expounds. I have often wandered in working through the writings of Paul whether much of his writing is reflective of his own struggle make sense out his religious background and his newfound faith. Socially, for a Pharisee, the gentile community would be considered off limits. For a ritually kosher Jew, relationship with the gentiles would make them unclean. Paul’s (then Saul’s) religious zeal was such that he dedicated his life to killing Christians in the belief that he was actually doing God a service.

Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus headed to another region to eliminate some more of those Christians; Paul encountered the risen Christ who called him to service on behalf of the gentiles. That moment of insight changed his life, as Paul began to see that kosher didn’t reside in the laws of the covenant, but in the encounter with Christ and his cross.

It is this gospel, the righteousness of God made available to all who are justified through their faith in Christ. It is this Gospel that Paul identifies as the “power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith (in Christ) to the Jew first (first because theirs was the original covenant with God) and then to the Greek (often a code word for the gentile world).” Paul’s theology of justification and righteousness are also well developed by the time he writes this letter. He says, “the righteousness of God (being totally right with God, congruent with God, on the same page with God) is revealed through faith for faith; as it is written, ‘The one who is righteous will live by faith.” (Habbikuk2:4) A brief note for us Lutherans, this combination of Habakkuk and Paul provided the moment of enlightenment for Martin Luther. This theology of “justification by grace through faith” was the hinge pin upon which the entire Lutheran reformation turned.

The Wrath of God

Equally important to Paul along side of his theology of justification is his theology of sanctification, another of the twenty-five dollar words that appear in his writing. Simply put, justification is the “being made right with God,” while sanctification “is the process of the Holy Spirit in transforming the lives of sinners into saints.” As important for the writings of Paul as is the truth that works do not make us right with God, Paul espouses that being made right with God is questionable if our works do not follow closely behind.

Paul turns to the works in the world that reflect “ungodliness and wickedness “of those who by their wickedness suppress the truth.” Among the signs of this suppression are:

· Though God has made himself and his power apparent in the world through what he has made, “they didn’t honor God.” They made idols out of the things that God made, and in the forms of the creatures that God created. They worshiped the creation instead of the creator. God’s judgment on this is that God let them have their way in futile thinking and darkness.

· They gave up “wise thinking” for “foolish thinking.”

· Once again, God let them have their way “and gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, the degrading of their bodies.

· Paul attributes what we have come to call “homosexual behavior” as a result of this abandonment of worship of God for worship of the creation. I say, “what we have come to call” because the ancient world had not concept of sexual activity with same sex or opposite as anything strange or different. In fact, in ancient Rome and Greece, such sexual behavior was common. The only boundary around same sex behavior was that same sex activity was not allowed among “men” of the same social class. Activity with those of a lower class and as such a younger age was acceptable. Paul is speaking to a culture in which such behavior was not socially questioned. Paul questions the behavior based upon his understanding of the legal system of the Torah. This one of those moments when Paul’s Pharisaic teaching comes to the foreground. Paul’s learning of the law reflects the code of Leviticus in which the law of Leviticus refers to such activity as an “abomination.” The Levitical code reflects on this and all behavior that would differentiate Israel from all the “nations” around them in the new land. The word “nations” is Hebrew is goyim, translated also as “gentiles”. By the time of the writing of these codes, Israel had been totally separated from “the nations”. They were not to marry, or to mingle. Gentiles were to be avoided as the unclean, the very concept that Saul operated upon in his zeal to rid the world of such infidels.

I raise this bullet to our attention at this point because it has raised deeply troubling emotions in people of every persuasion, both straight and gay who find themselves in the arena of being Christians who are trying to follow Christ. In our time we have come to learn that being oriented toward the same sex is not a choice. They live with the reality of being attracted to a person of the same gender is not as so simple as “having to change a behavior.” This attraction is not something that someone can stop. The only choice to be made is being a gay individual and then having to face the dilemma of whether to be in a relationship or not. Not all are able to be celibate for their entire lives. Unfortunately that leaves no option in a religious environment that considers them an “abomination” that they must either live in conflict with the taught faith of the Church or walk away from the church all together. I raise this question so as to say that there is no easy answer to this confrontation of human life situation with the Biblical record and the teachings of most mainstream churches. My hopes and my prayers are that all who confront these words of Paul take on the challenge of facing down and finding the workings of the Holy Spirit in meeting the real life challenges of the church in this issue seeking God’s gracious acceptance of all people (as the gospel promises) as they come before the Lord Jesus beneath his cross.

· This list of human conditions that place humanity outside of “honoring God” grows as we look at the conditions that identify us that Paul identifies as “deserving to die”

o Filled with every kind of wickedness, evil

o Covetousness

o Malice

o Envy

o Murder

o Strife

o Deceit

o Craftiness

o Gossip

o Slanders

o God-haters

o Insolent

o Haughty

o Boastful

o Inventors of evil

o Rebellious toward parents

o Foolish

o Faithless

o Heartless

o Ruthless

I am personally always taken by the list because these others often appear so common place that they aren’t always recognized as even problematic. As we look at the list of “offenses” we’ve become numb to the “small” things, the “white” lies that everyone does because they don’t rank as poorly as the “big” offenses. We often work on the level of degrees of sin, a very Roman Catholic view of “venial sins” as opposed to “mortal sins.” Paul doesn’t operate with these categories or levels of sinfulness as we will see developed in the chapters ahead. In Paul’s thinking, envy is every bit as condemning as sexual misconduct of any variety.

Friday, November 14, 2008