1208PODCAST

In ancient times, religion and state were the same thing. Therefore, you can imagine how difficult it was for the Jews to understand their theology when (A) some started to believe that Jesus was the Messiah, (B) the Messiah wanted non-Jewish people to join their religion/state, and (C) those non-Jewish people didn't practice any of the boundary markers that the Jews had always practiced (ie. obedience to the law, circumcision, etc).

In the Book of Romans, Paul strives to help his Jewish brothers and sisters understand the theological impact Jesus has had on their religion/state so that they can welcome their non-Jewish neighbors in. And that's what we hit on in the first half of Romans 3.

In ancient times, religion and state were the same thing. Therefore, you can imagine how difficult it was for the Jews to understand their theology when (A) some started to believe that Jesus was the Messiah, (B) the Messiah wanted non-Jewish people to join their religion/state, and (C) those non-Jewish people didn't practice any of the boundary markers that the Jews had always practiced (ie. obedience to the law, circumcision, etc).

In the Book of Romans, Paul strives to help his Jewish brothers and sisters understand the theological impact Jesus has had on their religion/state so that they can welcome their non-Jewish neighbors in. And that's what we hit on in the first half of Romans 3

In Romans 2, Paul calls attention to how God-followers have always said one thing and done another, and for that reason the world has made fun of God. How have we been bad witnesses to the character of God today? How did we witness to Jesus throughout the pandemic? In a lot of negative ways to be sure, giving people reason to make fun of God and doubt the church as an organization. It nearly seems like most people have given up on the church at this point.

And it's perhaps from organizations like Nintendo that we can learn something about the church, discipleship, and witness.

Romans has been used over the years to diminish evangelism to nothing more than "thinking" a certain way to be on the right side of judgment. But Jesus required good works of his followers if they were to be on the right side of judgment. In this message, Jamin looks to harmonize both sides of the Bible, recognizing that even the book of Romans expects good works if we are to be on the right side of judgment. If this true, then what is really needed is a better definition of what "salvation by faith" means, which we will get more into in the coming weeks.

After hours of working on his message, Jamin still wasn’t ready to preach it. Not only can the theology of Romans be a bit confusing, but it’s also deeply personal to Jamin’s own story. So in this short speech, Jamin asks for more time so that he can preach this message more effectively and reminds us that church is not all about preaching.

In the Silmarillion, Tolkien pictures God singing a song and Satan trying to improve on it until he's ultimately offering a different song. Paul sees something similar in the song of order being sung in Eden and the song that humanity has sang instead via Sin. We talk more about that in today's episode as we continue through Romans.

Paul uses the Greek word "Dikaiosyne" which Bible translations often translate as "Righteousness." But N.T. Wright suggests the phrase "covenant justice" may make more sense given Paul's context. Jamin explains why he agrees when it comes to Paul's gospel of which he is not ashamed.

There's a lot to be said in Paul's opening words in his letter to the Romans. In this episode, we just read the first few verses and take questions.

The letter of Romans is just that: A letter. And so to understand it correctly we must read it as we would a letter. And so, in our first service preaching on Romans, we come together and read straight through Paul's work so that we might hear it all within context. In this particular reading, we use N.T. Wright's "Kingdom" translation.

The Holy Spirit made life, continues to make life, and will make life again—and that's part of the celebration of Pentecost Sunday.