The Gospel is news about Jesus Christ, Son of both David and God, proven powerfully by his resurrection. Anyone who believes this gospel is saved. This gospel is where the power of God is now seen to save sinners.
You and I also love power. We love capability and mastery and prowess and power. ‘Look mum, no hands!’ Or my kids at Aqua Golf, ‘Look at me, dad, watch my shot… Ok, that wasn’t so good, but watch this next one… just one more. … Did you see that, did you see my shot’. Watch me do this kick. Come see my tidy room. Have you read my report! I did it!’
‘Look at this tidy kitchen I’ve restored to usefulness and beauty. Look at my neat piles of clean clothes I’ve ordered. Come see the back yard I’ve tamed, and the grass I’ve beaten back. Or these unruly children I’ve organized into social acceptability. I came, I saw, I whipped it into shape. I’ve conquered vast tracts of formless and empty void, restored order over it, and mastered it for a little while, until the relentless process of entropy works disorder and chaos once again.'
Humans want to see power to bring about real change. It’s the before and after of Weightwatchers. 'I was a 150 kg slob, but now check out my guns and six pack.' It’s the power of the religious healer. 'Leave the wheelchairs at the door, you will be walking out.' It’s what successful ministers communicate with their impressive buildings and massive congregations and spine tingling worship music. It’s the Islamist terrorist yelling ‘God is great, Allah Akbar’ before detonating his bomb. 'See, we have power. Allah is better than your god because now you’re dead.'
Where is the power of God really seen? Where does God show himself restoring order in his broken world?
The power of God is seen in a simple message about Jesus. God’s power is seen when people are saved from death and hell by believing in Jesus, King of the universe, who died for them, and rose again from the dead. That simple message is the power of God.
Welcome to the letter to the Romans. We are going to spend the next two terms looking at it. When Paul writes the letter to the Romans, he has never been to Rome. Paul didn’t establish the church in Rome. In fact, no apostle founded the church in Rome. The church in Rome was founded in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost. So Apostles formed it, but not in Rome. Jewish pilgrims heard Peter and the other disciples preaching in their own languages. And they took the gospel back with them on their return to Rome.
Paul hasn’t been to Rome yet, but he knows a lot about the Roman church. Just look at chapter 16 and all the people Paul knows. Rome was the Imperial capital. So many of Paul’s relatives and friends ended up there. The church in Rome consists of both Jews and Gentiles. And Paul knew the difficulties in uniting Jews and Gentiles as one body.
When Paul writes Romans, he has a mission in mind. Paul is heading west. He is currently in Corinth, Greece. He wants to go to Spain. He is going to Spain to preach the gospel. And he wants the Roman Christians to help him get there.
But Paul uses the opportunity to set out his gospel. Romans Chapters 1 to 3 show us why we need to the gospel. Romans Chapters 3 to 8 tell us what the gospel is. Romans Chapters 9 to 11 show how Jewish disobedience fits into the gospel. And Romans Chapters 12 to 15 tell us how we should live now we’ve received the gospel. So you might like to spend some time reading Romans at home. It is Paul’s longest and most detailed explanation of his gospel.
It’s a dreadful mistake to think that Romans is all about Paul. It is not. It is about the Gospel. But it is good to know who Paul thinks he is. Verse 1, Paul is a servant set apart for God’s gospel.
Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God (NIV)
Paul sets out his job description again in verse 5:
Through him and for his name's sake, we received grace and apostleship to call people from among all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith. (NIV)
The word ‘Apostle’ means one who is sent, literally a ‘sent one’. Paul has been sent by Jesus to the nations to preach the gospel. And so in verse 9, Paul now serves God with his whole heart in preaching the gospel of his Son.
Neither is Romans about the Roman Christians. It is about the Gospel. But we learn a little about them in these verses. Paul prays for the Roman Christians, because their faith is famous. Paul has heard the reports about their trust in Jesus Christ. After hearing these reports for over 20 years, he wants to finally meet them. He wants to preach the gospel in Rome, as well as everywhere else.
And Paul says that he is a gift for the Roman Christians. And they have a gift for him. It is a remarkable gift, but it’s very ordinary. It’s a spiritual gift, but a gift every Christian has power to give. Verses 11 and 12:
I long to see you so that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to make you strong - that is, that you and I may be mutually encouraged by each other's faith. (NIV)
The spiritual gift here is your faith in Jesus Christ, and mine too. Your faith encourages me. My faith encourages you. By coming to church, and showing your faith, you encourage me. By coming to you, and showing I still trust Jesus, I encourage you. Church and bible study groups and meetings one-on-one to read the bible and pray are a mutual encouragement society for the Christian. And even the mighty apostle Paul, who had seen the risen Lord Jesus, and heard the voice of his mouth, was not beyond being encouraged by other Christians.
Did you know that you encourage me to keep trusting Jesus? When you turn up, when you show that you are trusting Jesus, I get encouraged. You are giving me a spiritual gift to make me strong. Thank you. And, by the grace of God, I get to do the same to you.
But it would be a mistake to only talk about Paul, and the Roman Christians, and their faith. It wouldn’t honour Paul to talk about Paul. Because Paul is only a servant – a slave – of the gospel. To properly understand this letter, we need to spend most of our time talking about the gospel. Romans chapter 1 verses 1 and 2, again:
Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God - the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures (NIV) ...
The word gospel simply means ‘news’. It is about what God the ruler of the world has done. It is bad news about us, because we are sinful. But is good news for us, because God has acted to save his people.
What does Paul say about his gospel, his news, here?
He says that this gospel, this news, was promised and prophesied. We open the Old Testament, and we find the gospel, the news. This is old news, if you only have eyes to see it.
Where do we find the gospel in the Old Testament? The first hint of the gospel is Genesis 3:15. God promises that the seed of the woman, a son of Eve, will strike the serpent’s head, but the serpent will strike his heel. And so the Old Testament is one long search for the serpent crusher. And as we search for the serpent crusher, God promises that all nations will be blessed through Abraham (Genesis 12:3). And Abraham’s grandson, Jacob, prophesies the ruler’s staff will not depart from Judah’s feet until he comes to whom it belongs (Genesis 49). And then Moses comes along and tells us to watch out for a prophet like him. And through Moses, God sets up a sacrificial system that will point to Jesus Christ, the lamb of God. Then David comes along, and God promises David a dynasty that will endure forever. David’s descendant will be God’s son, King and Priest forever (2 Samuel 7, Psalm 2, 110). Later still, Isaiah tells us about a son of David who will reign on David’s throne forever, as mighty God (Isaiah 9:1-7; compare 7:14). And Isaiah writes of a servant, on whom is the Spirit of the LORD, (Isaiah 42), who will be a light for the nations and extend salvation to the ends of the earth (Isaiah 49:6), who suffers for our sins and is crushed for our iniquities and the punishment of our peace was upon him, and who will then be cut off from the land of the living, and then after the suffering of his soul he will see light, and justify many (Isaiah 53). Daniel tells us about the coming of the Messiah, who will be cut off, but not for himself, and about a Son of Man, who will receive all power and authority, and whom all nations will worship (Daniel 7, 9).
This gospel, the news, is prophesied and promised in the Old Testament. The ‘news’ comes fresh and new with Paul, but the news is not all that new, after all. Verse 3 tells us that Paul’s gospel is about God’s Son. Verse 3:
… regarding his Son, who as to his human nature was a descendant of David … (NIV)
We’ve just finished 1 and 2 Samuel. And we saw in 2 Samuel 7, that God promised David that a Son from his own body would reign over his house forever. This Son of David would also be Son of God. He would be King of Kings and Lord of Lords, to whom every King and Lord will bow. That is why Matthew and Luke provide genealogies of Jesus. They were showing from his human nature that Jesus was a descendant of David[1]. And thus Jesus is the fulfillment of the promises God made to David (2 Samuel 7). But there is another attestation to Jesus being God’s Son. God did something else to Jesus, Son of David to show him the Son of God. Verse 4:
… and who through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God, by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord. (NIV)
Jesus continually claimed to be the Son of God. He said God was his Father. He accepted the titles ‘Christ’, ‘King of Israel’, ‘Son of Man’. But the rulers and kings of the time all rejected this claim. The religious leaders considered him a deceiver. And Herod and Pilate considered him a threat. So they condemned him to death.
But their courts were not the highest ones. For there is always a higher court than human rulers. The final Court of Appeal is God. And God declared Jesus Christ to be who he said who was. God did this by raising Jesus Christ from the dead on the third day. So God overturned the findings of sinful human courts. God himself declared Jesus was the Christ, the Son of God by raising him from the dead. Death could not hold him down… he is risen.
Verses 1 to 4 is Paul’s potted gospel. Here’s the news. The risen Jesus, who died for our sins, is Lord and Christ. And this is not just normal, feel-good news. ‘Oh my, what an interesting story, but it doesn’t effect me. I’ll go back to my old way of life because nothing has changed.’ This news changes lives. It brings sinners from death to life, and gets them from hell to heaven. Verse 16:
I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. (NIV)
This news is powerful news. For everyone who believes, this news is great news. Because this news is strong enough to save everyone who believes.
Most news, whether it’s good or bad, doesn’t save you or change you. It just tells you the way things are. You are pregnant. That’s good news. You’ve got cancer. Not so good. But it’s still just news. You are just finding out something that you need to know.
But this news, the gospel, is powerful news. This news is powerful to change us and save us. It is powerful news because it speaks of God and his Son, Jesus Christ. God through the news of his Son has shown us something about himself. The first half of verse 17:
For in the gospel a righteousness from God [literally, ‘a righteousness of God’] is revealed …
The gospel reveals the ‘righteousness of God’. What is this ‘righteousness of God’ that the gospel reveals?
The word ‘righteousness’ usually means that someone has kept to a standard. They have acted with ‘uprightness’ and ‘justice’. We know that God is just and upright, and without sin[2]. And that would explain why God’s wrath is revealed from heaven against human wickedness in verse 18. God is righteously indignant at human sin.
But frequently in the Old Testament, righteousness is used in parallel to salvation. You see it in Psalm 98 verses 2 to 3:
The Lord has made his salvation known and revealed his righteousness to the nations. He has remembered his love and his faithfulness to Israel; all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God. (NIV)
So the word ‘righteousness’ then seems to ‘hunt’ with the word ‘salvation’. That doesn’t mean they mean the same thing. It probably means that God saves in a righteous way, and God is just and righteous in a saving way. So some versions translate it as ‘saving righteousness’ or ‘saving justice’. And that’s true, too.
But there is a third way to understand this phrase ‘righteousness of God’. That is, the righteousness of God is really a righteousness from God, hence the NIV translation. The righteousness of God speaks of the origin of righteousness that people receive. It tells us where their righteousness comes from. It comes from God. And that fits with Paul’s statement in Philippians 3:9, where Paul longs to be found in Christ Jesus, not having a righteousness of his own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. It fits with Romans 10:3, where Paul says that the Jews did not know ‘the righteousness of God’ and so ‘sought to establish their own’ righteousness, because ‘they did not submit to God’s righteousness’. But now, Paul is announcing that there is righteousness by faith for everyone who believes (Romans 10:4). Moreover, Paul in Romans 5:17 says that righteousness is a gift, which suggests it comes from God and is given to people as a status.
For myself, I think all three things are true. First, God is just and fair. So God is righteous. Second, God’s righteousness brings salvation. God has acted mightily in Christ to save his people. God is just in a saving way, and saving in a just way. But third, God gives a righteous status to sinners who trust in his son. They are righteous, not because they have kept God’s standard, but because God gives them that righteousness as a gift. I think Paul used the phrase ‘righteousness of God’ because it was flexible enough and rich enough to convey all three ideas at different times in Paul’s letter.
So the Gospel reveals that God is just. God is angry with our sin. But the Gospel reveals that God has not abandoned us but has acted to save us. God has shown saving righteousness in sending Jesus Christ, to die and rise again for us. And the Gospel reveals that there is a gift of righteousness, a status of righteousness, that everyone who trusts in Jesus Christ receives, though they have not earned or deserved this status. It has been earned and deserved. But not by us. It has been earned and deserved by God the Son, Jesus Christ, in our place.
And the last part of verse 17 tells us how this righteousness comes to a person. It is a righteousness that is by faith from first to last [more literally, ‘from faith for faith’], just as it is written: "The righteous will live by faith." (NIV)
I think the NIV has got the phrase ‘from faith for faith’ right. The righteousness Paul is talking about is a faith righteousness, not a law righteousness or a works righteousness. It is a faith righteousness, and faith alone. It is a righteousness that starts by faith (so that it originates from faith). It finishes by faith (so that it is heading toward faith). And in all the middle bit, it is by faith. The righteous person always and can only live by faith. This is righteousness by faith, only by faith, and by nothing but faith.
You can only ever be counted righteous with God only by faith in Christ. You start the Christian life by trusting Jesus Christ. You continue the Christian life by trusting Jesus. At the end of the Christian life, you stand only by trusting Jesus. You’ve got nothing else but faith in Jesus and faith alone. The way of life of the person who receives God’s righteousness is by faith. We are the people who trust in the God we cannot see, who does things in the past we have not seen, and who promises us things in the future which we do not now see. But that is always the way the righteous people have lived. By trusting God, his provision for us, and his promises for us.
Friends, we have the power of God at our fingertips. It is the power of God to pluck sinners from the pit of hell and the mire of sin and death and raise them to the heights of heaven and seat them with the risen Lord Jesus Christ. The power of God is revealed in a simple message. That Jesus is both Lord and Christ. That he was betrayed into death for our sins. That he was raised to life, by which God declared him powerfully as the Son of God. And now Jesus Christ, seated in heaven, is our righteousness. And he gives to everyone who has faith in him the gift of righteousness. A righteousness that they don’t have from themselves, that comes from obeying the law. But a righteousness that comes from Christ’s obedience, vindicated by resurrection (Romans 5:18-19).
You might think that is not very powerful. Other things look so much more powerful. Impressive healings, miracles or works of power. Thousands of bums on seats in a magnificent building. Or a suicide bomber chanting ‘God is great’ before he detonates.
None of these things are the power of God for salvation. The Power of God for salvation is the simple news of Lord Jesus Christ, who died and rose again. The gospel, and the gospel alone, takes people from the pit of hell to the heights of heaven. So don’t settle for cheap imitations.
Let’s pray.
[1] Jesus took his human nature from his mother, so Mary must have been a descendant of David. More than likely, Mary also had Levitical blood, given her relative Elizabeth’s husband Zechariah was a priest. Calvin argues it was quite acceptable for Judahites to marry into Levi and vis versa, as the Levites, by having no landed inheritance, could not imperil the inheritance of other tribes. Calvin indeed cites 2 Chronicles 22:11. Some take the Luke 3 genealogy as running through Mary (eg Gleeson Archer), though not Calvin, who distinguishes between legal (Matthew) and natural descent (Luke), on the supposition that Solomon’s natural line was probably broken after the death of Ahaziah, so the Kingship reverted to Nathan’s line through Joash (who was not the actual son of Ahaziah but the nearest relative). See also Eusebius’ citation of Africanus, in Paul L Maier, Eusebius: The Church History, 35-38
[2] Compare Psalm 98 verse 9: Let them sing before the Lord, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples with equity. (NIV) This seems to carry the nuance of fairness, justice and uprightness.