God is faithful. Always. We are not faithful. This is true. Our faithlessness does not make God unfaithful. He is God. He has welcomed us into His world, His way. He is good. We can trust this. We can’t be justified by our works, for they are not good. Further, we shouldn’t do evil so that good may come. That doesn’t make any sense.

This is a remarkable truth and something for us to consider. In some ways, this is what it means: Even though followers of Jesus have let us down and have fallen short, we still stand account before our God for our decisions and life before Him. You are not comparing your faithfulness to John P Elder or Mike B Pastor (I have no one in mind here). You are compared to God plain and simple. You can’t be good enough to match Him. He is God. He is faithful even if His followers are not. I am afraid there are many who will stand in His presence one day with excuses based on the church and/or His followers missing the mark and He will simply remind them “I am enough.” “I am faithful.”

There is no one righteous – not even one! Sin has separated us from what we were meant to be in Him (v23), but Jesus set us free. By faith, we now follow Him as the guide and way for us to follow. Are you in?

God’s wrath will surely come, we see that in chapter 2. What now feels like freedom will one day be shown to be wrath as the judgment of sin falls. We often judge but are guilty of the same sin ourselves.

While the next set of verses suggest that those who do good will have eternal life and those who do evil will be judged, one must wait for who defines good and evil! While you may feel you are good enough, remember that you, as a judge, are ill equipped to determine right from wrong. You are wandering and your conscience is seared. Paul then makes the case that Greeks die without the law but know they need something. This condemns them. Jews have the law and their conscience is unsettled for they know they’ve fallen short.

The end of the chapter is a masterful showing that an outward appearance is of little good, circumcision, if the heart is not right. Our conscience condemns us so we need help!! We aren’t good and can’t be good in the sense we need to be. Watch this argument unfold!

Paul starts by declaring who he is in Christ. A servant, devoted to following Jesus’ way. An apostle, called to be sent and sharing the message of Jesus. He is set apart for the gospel, which fulfills the prophetic word God had been giving from early on. From this individual, the church in Rome receives this letter to help them understand their faith.

One of the most famous line in Romans is verse 16 – “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” Paul is clearly neither afraid nor ashamed to share the message. Even if it leads to pain and embarrassment.

Paul then shows God’s wrath in a unique way. I think we expect wrath to look like fire and brimstone, but Paul shows it to be the releasing of man to have his own way. In Romans 1, the wrath God shows us is allowing us to do our thing. We want something other than what He wants, and His response is to let us. This should be sobering to us. We feel His wrath by walking away. We experience His love by doing what He wants. Keep that in mind.

Paul states that God’s wrath is being revealed (v18). Even though God is obvious when you look around (v19-20, and how could all we see and experience just happen by chance?!?!), we move God out of the place of power and serve images of Him rather than Him (v21-23). So He gives us up to get what we want. And we choose impurity and pain instead of life (v24-25).

We sacrifice truth for lie and this leads to our further wandering to get what we want when we want it (v26-27). We then are so “messed up” that we have a mind that thinks nothing like God would want. We are selfish, arrogant, etc (v28-31). We don’t stop there. We don’t just invent evil, we honor those that promote and live out evil in all areas of life (v32). This feels like today. In politics, family structures, schools, businesses, churches, etc we are far from what God wants. This is human nature. This is our way. This is our way without God. So what does God do about this? You’ll have to wait for the rest of the argument.

For all the letters (epistles), I am going to try to give some basic commentary information first. This post will cover Romans and attempt to give some thoughts to set the book up properly for us.

Having just finished Acts, we can remember the point when Paul left Ephesus and then was heading to Jerusalem while hoping to be in Rome soon. Romans 15:22ff gives us information that shows Acts 19-22 and Romans to line up. We aren’t sure when in this time frame, but at some point between his long stay in Ephesus and the journey to Jerusalem, Paul writes this letter.

Romans is an amazing piece of literature, a theological masterpiece. It had a great effect on Augustine and then on Luther and in our modern time, John Piper. Often when people start to dig into it and learn from the Spirit’s leading, they are changed and blown away by the amazing argument made in this letter.

It teaches justification, sanctification and glorification along with key verses that build the truth of the Gospel of Jesus for us. Many call this string of verses the Romans Road – 3:23 (3:10, 5:12), 6:23, 5:8, 10:9-10, 10:13 and 10:17. Romans 12:1-2 shows us how to live better now in an act of worship.

I’m excited to work through this book with you!

Paul uses the shipwreck to serve Jesus. He really is an inspiration. No matter what trouble befalls him, he is steadfast and useful in his faith. Does that describe you?

He is bit by a poisonous snake and doesn’t die. They think he’s a god, but he corrects their thinking and points them to Jesus. There are many who are diseased, but Paul heals them in Jesus’ name. After three months of this, Paul and the crew set off and finally reach Rome. The book ends with Paul under house arrest in Rome waiting to speak to the emperor.

We believe he did speak to the emperor and even goes on a fourth journey. However, we have no written record of this in the Scriptures, just bits and pieces. We will cover those as the time comes. Hope you liked Acts!

The journey does not go as expected (that is an understatement!). Clearly Luke is on this journey (note the “we” usage). The winds slow the boat down and leave everyone in a dangerous predicament for the time of year. They should have stopped, as Paul prophesies, but they all want to get going with the journey, so they set out. Note how different this is from Jonah’s story – Paul wants to go but cautions vs Jonah’s attempt to run putting them all at risk.

Like Jonah’s story, a storm arises and the ship is wrecked. After the storm starts, they ditch their cargo. After 14 days of the storm, they are without food and Paul prays over a little bread that is left and God provides them some food. There were 276 people on board and all ate enough! They finally run ashore and are stranded on the island of Malta.

Agrippa hears Paul’s whole testimony and considers what he has heard. He believes Paul has done no wrong and could be set free if he hadn’t appealed to Caesar. Finally Paul will go to Rome!

After Felix dies, Porcius Festus takes over. He tries to keep Paul in prison like Felix had, but Paul appeals to Caesar. Now Festus has no choice but to send him to caesar.

Then Agrippa and Bernice get involved, but will make little change for Paul or for Festus. This Agrippa is king (Herod’s family) and surely has knowledge of all that has happened since Jesus died and rose from the grave (which has now been over 25 years time).

This new route is to try to convince the governor that Paul will cause him too much trouble by holding him. To this, Paul has an answer:

He was not stirring up trouble in Jerusalem, but worshipping. For days this was fine, until a group showed up to cause trouble. He appeals to being a follower of Jesus, something Felix understands. Yet Felix tries to freeze out Paul and get Paul to give him money – so for two years he keeps him in prison! Imagine being Paul – Jesus said He would send him to Rome. This is a roundabout way for sure! Would you lose faith?

As he speaks to the council, he tries to show that he should be considered righteous in their eyes. The high priest disagrees and wants Paul to be struck in the mouth for saying “lies.” Paul responds harshly and then repents in their midst once he realizes it is the high priest. He then uses the disagreement between the Pharisees and Sadducees against them (concerning the resurrection from the dead). As the argument arose, the tribune again saves Paul. That night, the Lord confirms that Paul will be okay and will testify in Rome. He uses Paul’s sister’s son to save Paul’s life (again) and the tribune calls two centurions to deliver Paul to Felix the governor (not Pontius Pilate anymore). The governor protects him and the Jews begin to plot a new route.