a beautiful breakdown of Rom 5.1-5

Here.

ROMANS iNTRO [1.1-7]

From Paul

• [a slave of Christ Jesus]
• [called as an apostle]
• [set apart for the gospel]

For the Gospel

• [which God promised beforehand]
• [which God promised through His the prophets in the Scriptures]
• [which concerns His Son]

The Gospel about God's Son, Jesus

• [who descended from David]
• [who was declared the Son of God in power, through the Spirit, by His resurrection]
• [who is our Lord]
• [through whom we have grace and apostleship for the obedience of faith among the nations]

To all those in Rome

• [called to belong to Jesus]
• [who are loved by God]
• [called to be saints]
• [grace and peace to you all from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ]

ROMANS [in a sentence]

It is very clear that Tom Wright knows the Apostle Paul. This is evidenced in that he writes obscenely long sentences that are tough to follow, just like Paul. Here is a prime example [from pg 180 in "Justification"]:

Romans is a book about God, and the primary thing it is saying about God is that he is the God of faithful, just, covenant love, that this has been unveiled in the gospel message about Jesus, the crucified and risen Messiah, and that through this gospel message, and the radical unveiling of God's covenant justice and faithfulness, God's saving power is going out into the world, and will not rest until creation itself is set free from its slavery to corruption and decay and shares the liberty of the glory of God's children. 

GRACE iS DANGEROUS

Paul knew it in Romans 6. "Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? May it never be!" What's interesting, though, is that Moses understood this in Deuteronomy 6 as well.

Then it shall come about when the Lord your God brings you into the land which He swore to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to give you, great and splendid cities which you did not build, and houses full of all good things which you did not fill, and hewn cisterns which you did not dig, vineyards and olive trees which you did not plant, and you eat and are satisfied, then watch yourself, that you do not forget the Lord who brought you from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

Deuteronomy is a series of three "sermons" by Moses on the plains of Moab before the people enter the land. In each sermon, Moses is reminding the people of what God has done and wants them to do. You can sense that the people are not getting it like they should. Still, Moses is relentless in depicting God's gracious dealings with them.

Later, in Dt 30, Moses says that he has set before them life or death and blessing or curse. He pleads with them to choose life/blessing. In Dt 31, God pulls Moses aside and essentially tells him that the people are going to choose death/curse over life/blessing. They are going to forget and neglect the grace of God. They will not remember the extent of His promises to their fathers. They will will not cherish that He brought them up out of bondage and freed them. 

What is even more bothersome is the fact that in the land, they persist in this. Then, under their judges, they become even more selfish [Jdgs 21.25]. Under their kings, the nation is divided! When the prophets preach, they don't listen. And when their Messiah comes, many reject Him. 

Of course, we are never like this?

But there is something different about this New Covenant grace in which we stand. We don't necessarily get it all the time [see Apostle Peter], but we have been given the Spirit in a way that they had not. God's covenant people are no longer physically, ethnically, and/or geographically defined. So now, by the Spirit and because of the work of the Messiah, we, as his people, can now see and experience further grace when we don't fully understand grace. There is something humbling, odd, sweet, and dangerous about that. This kind of grace must birth faith, hope, and love. This kind of grace does not yield apathy, passivity, and pride.

May it be so with us.

ROMANS 11.33-36

The breakdown in Romans is chapters 1-4, 5-8, 9-11, and 12-16. All are distinct sections. All are thick and thorough. As you know, 9-11 is likely the toughest. However, thick thinking for Paul doesn't lead to theological restlessness or apathy or anything of the sort. In Paul's heart and from Paul's pen, deep thinking about God's plan leads to elaborate praise. For Paul theology leads to doxology. It must be the same for us.

Let's look at how he closes ch 11. Rom 11.33-36 gets more intense the more I muse over it. Here's a fun way to remember it: 2, 2, 3, 3

Paul lauds the great depth of WISDOM OF GOD and the KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. That's your first 2.

He then asks, "how UNSEARCHABLE ARE HIS JUDGMENTS and how UNFATHOMABLE ARE HIS WAYS?" There's your second 2. 

Both of Paul's sets of three begin with the word "for" [NASB]. In Greek, this simply means that he is explaining something or continuing his train of thought. So, in 11.34-35 Paul asks three "who" questions. 

• WHO has known the mind of the Lord
  
• WHO has become His counselor
  
• WHO has first given to Him...

This is your first 3.

Lastly, Paul chooses three prepositional phrases to depict why glory will eternally and rightfully be to God. 11.36 reads, "For FROM Him and THROUGH Him and TO Him are all things. To Him be glory forever! Amen." This is your second 3.

So, in Rom 11.33-36 we have two exclamatory couplets that lead to two explanatory triplets, but that are all under one consuming goal - the fame of God.

Just this structure is enough to make me delight in God's wisdom and beauty. Now go read Rom 9-11 and see His mercy and it the will be greater grounds for glorying in and rejoicing in His goodness.

this might not make any sense. it just came out of the keyboard. it's not my fault.

In a sense, works justify justification. They are also inseperably linked to it, follow it, and flow forth from it.

Also, since when did good works get a bad rap?

Probably since we deduced from the Protestant Reformation that Judaism and Catholicism are both merely morality-based expressions and attempts at a relationship with the God of the Bible.

Or, probably since we have set the post-Enlightenment human psyche as the goal and end of all thinking. When this happens, human motives behind works take a seat on the throne.

But all of this - works, motives, justification, sanctification, salvation, etc - all of this takes its proper order and place when our focus is correct. Our focus is God Himself [2 Cor 3.17-18]. This means we must "hear with faith" [Gal 3] and walk by the Spirit [Gal 5, Rom 5-8] as we have our eyes perpetually fixed on what God has done in Jesus.

THE BiBLE and WORLD POLiTiCS

Pharaoh.

King Cyrus.

Caesar.

Nebuchadnezzar. 

If you've read your Bible at all, you'll know that these are big-time political leaders found in the Old and New Testaments. These are just a couple. There are dozens more. What's unique about these fellas and their political counterparts is that they were pawns in God's huge, providential hand. God was always working through and against world politics to bring about His purposes for His covenant people.

The use of the two prepositions in the above sentence is massively intentional. Politics is never an end or a goal. It is a means. I know that we will always wrestle until "the kingdom of this world becomes the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ" [Rev 11.15], but why do Christians live like one tiny slice of the political pie is the end all. Further, if you don't see eye to eye with them, you are often deemed a lesser believer in their mind.

Let me repeat those prepositions again. God works THROUGH and AGAINST world politics. That is the biblical paradigm. I don't feel as if many believers live like it is. Yes, render to Caesar what is Caesar's [Mk 12]. Yes, submit to authority [Rom 13]. But please, don't rush to the polls as if you are doing God a favor. We must be upstanding citizens, but we are strangers and aliens here [1 Pe 1 and 2] and our true citizenship is in heaven [Phil 3]. We have to live like that is true.

summer camp.

I got to speak for a youth group last Thursday night. It was their last night of camp. You know how interesting those are. Actually, it was pretty sweet.

One reason I loved it is that it was a really small group. There were only 20 kids. Here's the best part... Four black kids. Four metal-heads. A few good ol boys and girls. A few Christian school kids. And everybody else was in between.

I gave them a quick running commentary on Rom 3.19-26. We talked about the pervasiveness of human guilt in the courtroom of God [3.19-20], the wrath that belongs to each of us ["propitiation" in 3.25], and how God is the Just and the Justifier [3.26] for everyone who is trusting Jesus. Then I explained how all of these collide in the cross of Jesus. Luther said that 3.21-26 is the center of the whole Bible. It sure feels like it sometimes.

After this, I talked about right and wrong ways to live the Christian life. We normally think that we have to have God in the story of our lives to make it better, to make us feel more spiritual, or to be psychologically satiated. We tend to think we need more of Him in our lives as well. Some of those thoughts might be close to right, but the reality is that God has called us into His story. We are now a part of what He is doing to redeem humanity and creation.

Lastly, I told them that the key that unlocks both becoming His and living as His is the same. The cross.

At the cross, Jesus became our substitute, our example, our wrath-bearer, our victory, our healing, and much more.

I genuinely felt the Holy Spirit there. He was working, moving, and making Jesus look good. God is faithful, ya know.

BUNYAN ON SiN

There are many attempts to define what sin is. Rom 3.23, Rom 14.23, I Jn 3.4, and other texts help to biblically define what sin is. There are philosophical arguments within theology that say that sin is more the absence of something than the presence of something. This is a good line of reasoning to think about. However, the following is the most convicting and soul-penerating thing I've ever read in regards to defining sin. It is from John Bunyan.

Sin is the dare of God's justice, the rape of His mercy, the jeer of His patience, the slight of His power, and the contempt of His love.

predestination ponderings

• If you're a Christian and believe the Bible, you believe in predestination. Actually, you get to believe it. It's in the Bible. God has revealed it. However, what you believe about it is another story altogether.
• As far as how the NT readers and writers understood it, it was never an issue of contention or debate.
• In the NT, the doctrine of predestination is grounds for praise. Ephesians 1.3-14 is one huge sentence in Greek that praises/blesses God for his electing love and grace.
• In the NT, the doctrine of predestination was a comfort for Christians. When Paul gets to the height of his discourse in Romans 5-8, he explains that present suffering and tribulation bow in comparison to future glory. He then says that this future glory is based on God's predestinating love. Cherishing this brought peace to Christians, not ignorant anger or arrogant apathy.
• Obviously it leaves us now with tons of unanswered and unaswerable questions [the two are different you know]. We seem to collapse because we can't have every conclusion served on a simple, silver, intellectual platter. This is partially due to the fact that you are a product of Western post-Enlightenment thought. Why can't we just accept that the parts of this we don't understand that are intended by God to grant us great humility. This is of course easier said than done.
• Lastly, the doctrine of predestination is not fair. Not a single one of us who are His deserve to be His. Our pride is so thick, our lusts are so strong, our minds are so bent, our passions are so misplaced. We all deserve terrible judgment, which He would be just and holy to give. Why He chooses to love anyone is not fair. We are pretty rotten, but He is rich in mercy.

Redemption from the New Perspective? Towards a Multi-Layered Pauline Theology of the Cross

Here.

"for My own sake"

"You have not heard. You have not known. Even from long ago your ear has not been open because I knew that you would deal very treacherously and you have been called a rebel from birth. For the sake of My name, I delay My wrath. And for My praise, I restrain it from you in order not to cut you off. Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver. I have tested you in the furnace of affliction. For My own sake, for My own sake, I will act. For how can My name be profaned? And My glory I will not give to another" [Is 48.8-11].

But God cannot ignore sin. It spits in the face of His goodness and makes His character as mud caked in shoe tracks. Our pride and rebellion fly in the face of His beauty and holiness. Just as He chose to restrain His wrath under the Old Covenant, He chooses to do so now as well. The reason for His restraint, however, is the same. It is the cross. For everyone who is believing, Jesus bore the wrath of God that belonged to them.

"This [the atonement] was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed for the demonstration of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus" [Rom 3.25-26].

And lest we think that we're worth dying for, we must remember - He did this for the sake of His name. How humbling?

You know, if you're a Jew, you don't have exclamation points, bold, caps-lock, or italics. So, when you want to emphasize something, you say it twice. Like "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?" in Acts 4.4. Or like Jesus' words from the cross, "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?" in Mt 27.46. Thus, in Isaiah 48, when YHWH repeats Himself concerning His intentionality in restraining His wrath, it is most assuredly and undeniably for His great name and fame.

ALL THAT iS iN THE WORLD

John says that "all that is in the world is the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life." I don’t want to use this as a key to unlock other passages to make them say what they don't mean, but I have found this text as a helpful key in grasping what sin is.

The first sin and temptation was is in the garden. I see this paradigm applied there. The next sinless human on the scene, the Second Adam - our Lord Himself, was lured by the tempter in the same three ways. Finally, God's wrath comes upon mankind in three ways and for three reasons in Romans 1. I see John's "all that is in the world" in this tri-degradation as well.

So, here is all of the above charted out.



"We don't have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore, let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need" [Heb 4.15-16].

ROMANS 12.1-2

Rom 12.1-2 might be two of the most pregnant verses in the Bible. They hinge on the previous eleven chapters of grueling and articulate theology. Paul’s plea with those in Rome is to do the impossible – to offer their bodies as living sacrifices. This is, of course, ridiculous. Sacrifices don’t live. Paul knows that. But apparently, doing this is the height of service and worship to God.

In 12.2, we finally have a direct command, two imperative verbs actually. What is strange though is that both of them are passive imperatives [“don’t be conformed” but “be transformed”]. I don’t want to over-theologize a verb tense, but how should we take these? Is their passive nature simply because of the essence of the command? Or is it due to their relation to God’s mercy in 12.1? Is it that these are heart and mind commands and they can only be accomplished by the Holy Spirit? However these are taken, their end is to know God’s good and pleasing will. This is the goal of Paul’s exhortation.

I kind of like the NIV’s “in view of God’s mercy” in 12.1. But what “mercy” does Paul have in mind here? I think he is generally referring to all of chapters 1-11, more narrowly referring to chapters 9-11, and most specifically to the mentions of “mercy” in 9.15-16, 9.23, and 11.30-32.

There can be no thought of moving forward in sacrificial and unconforming transformation unless one’s grip is tightly on the mercy of God in Jesus.

ROMANS 11

Romans 11 is just as tough as Romans 9 or any other text in Paul. Along with slowly trudging through Romans, I’ve also been reading a little Cambridge Greek commentary on Romans from 1912. It’s so refreshing because much of it is removed from modern debate and discussion. It offers some excellent summary statements. On 11.23,

As the Gentiles came to share in the hope of Israel, so fallen Israel may share the hope of the redeemed Gentile.

On 11.25-32,

The argument is summed up in a picture of the wide and patient purpose of God… to bring both Jew and Gentile under His mercy.

Another helpful thing to remember while reading Romans 11 is that chapters 9-11 are a single unit. Many say that these chapters must be read with the covenant in view. I tend to agree with this. The word “covenant” is only used twice in Romans – 9.4 and 11.27, as bookends for the whole section [and only 9x in Paul total].

The phrase “according to election” is repeated in 9.5, 11.5, and 11.28 so as to give further pointers to his purpose.

Lastly, when reading 11, it is important to note which uses of “Israel” are referring to physical, ethnic Israel and which ones are referring to spiritual Israel.

9.14-23 is a tough pill to swallow; 10.8-17 shows the simplicity of the response to mercy; and 11 is unique about God’s plans for Jew, Gentile, and “Israel.” But Paul’s theological explanation [all of 9-11] and his emotional angst [9.1-5, 10.1-2] are not two issues, but one. Their union leads to the birth of great praise and gratitude for God’s wisdom for all mercy and redemption in history [11.33-36]. Impenetrable is the depth of God’s wisdom and knowledge for His sake.

ROMANS 1.16 and 10.4 [present active substantival participles carry a durative nuance.... "are believing!"]

there’s no in justice with God [Rom 9.14]

9.15 [says to Moses]
9.16 [so then....]
9.17 [says to Pharaoh]
9.18 [so then....]

"the spirit of holiness" [romans 1.4]

This is a phrase unique to only this text in all of the NT. Michael Haykin gives good musings on it.

ROMANS 9.30-33

The Gentiles [nations] have attained righteousness.

• They didn’t pursue it.
• They attained it by faith.

Israel pursued a law of righteousness.

• They didn’t arrive there.
• They didn’t pursue it by faith, but by works.
• They stumbled over the rock of offense – Jesus.

COVENANT and ROMANS 9

Any time the Bible talks about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob together, it is really talking about God's covenant. Covenant, in the biblical sense, is an intimate and intentional word for relationship. It is just as much about the "who" of the covenant as it is about the covenant itself. God loves people. He loves people more than He loves the words that describe His love and relationships with people [like "covenant"]. Take Ex 32.13 and Deut 9.27 as examples.

In these texts, Moses longs for God to remember His covenant promises. But He doesn't say that exactly. He says, "Remember Abe, Isaac, and Jake." He says it like this because God is into relationships. He is into knowing people [Rom 8.29, 1 Cor 8.3, Jer 1.5, Gal 4.9, Mt 7.23] and people knowing Him [Gal 4.9, Jn 17.3]. He is not into random promises. The reason that the Bible uses such pregnant language like “covenant” is because God had to show people the gravity of their sin and need and the “breadth, length, height, and depth” of His love [Eph 3.18].

With all of this in mind, now you can read Romans 9. If you randomly pick out the hard verses, of course you won’t get it. Look at 9.6. “The word God has not failed.” This means His covenant promises stand in spite of ethnic Israel’s rebellion. Paul then mentions Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in 9.7-13. With this, the jump to theoretical fatalism or deterministic nonsense is almost impossible. Why? Because everything it says is about God’s covenant promises. This is about relationship. If it was about God damning and delivering with His eyes closed, why are there so many people’s names in chapter 9?

Here’s the deal. God loves people. And to those who are recipients of His covenant promises and His mercy, He will exert great energies [mercy in 9.15, 16, 23; compassion in 9.15; power in 9.17, 22; wrath in 9.22] in sustaining those relationships. This is His Church. This is His Body. And He does so for glory, His glory [9.23; 8.29-30].