Paul’s Letter to the Romans

Jesus Christ: The Power of God to Save Us

We have encountered the life, conversion, and missionary work of the apostle named Paul in the second half of Luke’s two volume work, “The Acts of the Apostles”. As we examine the life of Paul, we realize that he understands and feels at home in the culture of Greek civilization. He is a Roman citizen as well. But the Paul we meet in Romans is a son of Israel too. He claims his personal ancestry to the tribe of David and is a member of the Pharisee party. In the middle of his life, Paul met and believed in Jesus. It is now this new Paul, the messenger of Jesus Christ, who writes to the church at Rome. He has not yet been to Rome, and he wants to encourage the church and remind them of the things they believe.

Romans is the Apostle Paul’s “big book”. It is written in a more treatise-like fashion that any of his other 12 letters which we have in the New Testament (save possibly Ephesians). Paul is carefully laying out his argument from beginning to end.

The Main Point: All of humanity has exchanged what was true about God and true worship with idolatry. Jesus Christ come into the world to satisfy God’s justice and reconcile us to the God with whom we were estranged. Through Jesus, the gift of the Holy Spirit transforms us from sinners into the very children of God. God the Father, who is glorified in Jesus’ sacrifice, initiates the Holy Spirit in our lives, and brings about the salvation of Jews and Gentiles, is now calling us to live out that faith by making Jesus known.

Key Verse: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile. For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed – a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written, ‘The righteous will live by faith'” (Romans 1:16-17)

The Structure of the Epistle:

1) Paul’s Greeting and Purpose (Romans 1:1-17)

2) The Gospel (Romans 1:18-11:36)

2a) How we have exchanged the truth for a lie and become estranged from God (Romans 1:18-3:20)

2b) How Jesus reconciled us to God (Romans 3:21-5:21)

2c) How the Spirit changes us from sinners into the children of God (Romans 6-8)

2d) How God is glorified in salvation (Romans 9-11)

3) How then shall we live? (Romans 12-15)

4) Personal greetings (Romans 16)

There is the constant presence of Jesus under and within everything that Paul writes. When Paul thinks about God’s love for humankind, he is always thinking of the demonstration of that love in the person and work of Jesus Christ. We must never be led away from that historical center of our faith. It is in Jesus that we understand God’s love and forgiveness and find true life. Our constant awareness of the life, and now the reign, of Jesus Christ our Lord, puts in check the intellectual desire to translate this book into a systematic theology, with complicated atonement theories, or simplistic tracts reducing all God has done for us into four simple steps. Jesus didn’t come just to save us and guarantee us a place in heaven. He came to transform our lives and give us the power to shine and share this new life with others. It is Jesus and that new life that will carry us from this life to the next.