December of 2005, Lisa and I went on a cruise with some friends. While on the cruise I started a study of the book of Romans. When I got back from the trip I intended to start posting my notes from that study. Here we are almost 2 years later and I haven't done that. I'm not even sure where those notes went. So, I will start fresh today. But first, a few reminders about this blog: It's a journal of my thoughts on something I'm reading, it's a random spilling out of those thoughts that my not always make sense or flow nicely, there are probably spelling and grammar errors because I don't re-proof my work, it's my attempts at understanding what I read better so add your comments.
Romans 1:1-7 starts in a similar why to all of Paul's letters. Paul starts by acknowledging his understanding that he is a servant or bondservant meaning slave to Christ Jesus, as he was called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God. He realized that he was nothing without that calling to salvation through Jesus, which God promised us through His prophets in the Old Testament. And he believed the accuracy of the OT and that Jesus was in fact God because He did come through the line of David as was prophesized, and He did rise from the dead by the power of God. Paul goes on to explain that through Jesus comes the grace and apostleship or membership in His family to go out and spread the news of His grace. All this was done for God's glory. He called us to Himself to belong to Him.
How awesome to be so confident in God's grace. Paul closes the greeting to the church at Rome with his standard, "Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."
So far, Ephesians and now Romans seem to talk about grace in a huge way. I fear that I don't realize the extent of God's grace for me and allow myself to get discouraged in my faith. Instead of feeling unsatisfied with my life due to sin, I need to work harder to realize God's grace is there because I can't earn salvation. I can't earn His favor, but he gives it to me because He loves me.
Praise God for His Grace.
Glad to have you back! I enjoy reading these every morning. God certainly is graceful to us.
ReplyDeleteWhen I took a class on Romans in college my professor always liked to remind us that Romans is a fund raising letter. "I write you a sermon, you send me cash." I never thought it was that important, but he seemed to think it was. I argued with him that I thought it was Paul thanking the Romans for supporting his ministry more than asking for more money. You can decide for yourself... :-)
I'll watch for that. At this point, I think that goes against Paul's heart. I think his desire was genuine. I believe God gave Paul a true love for people and a desire to lead them to Christ. Sure he needed money for his ministry, but his faith in God was strong enough that he wasn't concerned about finances.
ReplyDeleteLiberal college. They probably voted for B.O. too. Haha, just kidding. I went to a non-christian JC so I can't talk.