Archive for the 'Romans' Category

Today (D.V.), I will preach on Paul’s Trinitarian theology in the first seven verses of Romans 1:1-7.

Notice the emphasis I have added for the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

1 Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God,2 which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures,
3 concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh
4 and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord,
5 through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, 6 including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ,
7 To all those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Trevin Wax recently wrote an excellent post, The Trinitarian Gospel: Why We Need All Three Parts.

. . ..There is also a Trinitarian layer to the gospel that needs to be recognized.

• • God the Father justifies sinners by satisfying his own wrath through the death of Christ and by applying Christ’s righteousness to sinners who respond to him in faith.
  • God the Son inaugurates the kingdom of God on earth through his life, death, and resurrection.
  • God the Spirit breathes new life into sinners, giving us eternal life (”the life of the age to come”), uniting us to the community of faith, and empowering us to live in the world as a foretaste of the new creation.

Each of these aspects of the gospel should remain Christ-focused. Each points back to his life, death, and resurrection.

When these get out of balance, we run into problems.

Read the whole thing here.

We continue the Romans Project today and here it is appropriate to thank God for one of his greatest gifts to his Bride: the Apostle Paul.

One cannot study Romans without being in awe of the apostolic ministry of Paul.  Other than the Lord Himself, Paul was arguably the greatest theologian that ever lived  (See Romans!).  He was certainly the greatest missionary.  Such a miracle was Paul, that F.F. Bruce argued that by himself Paul is sufficient to prove Christianity.

“No single event, apart from the Christ-event itself, has proved so determinant for the course of Christian history as the conversion and commissioning of Paul. For anyone who accepts Paul’s own explanation of his Damascus-road experience, it would be difficult to disagree with the observation of an eighteenth-century writer that ‘the conversion and apostleship of St. Paul alone, duly considered, was of itself a demonstration sufficient to prove Christianity to be a divine revelation.’” F.F. Bruce, Paul: Apostle of the Heart Set Free, page 74.

As a result of Paul’s theology and missionary leadership, local churches quickly belted the Roman Empire from Jerusalem to Spain.  The Gospel burned like a flame spreading across a map (picture the opening of the old Western Bonanza) north into Europe and south into Africa, so that by circa 200 Tertullian would insist in a letter to Roman leaders.

We are but of yesterday, but we have filled every place among you cities, islands, fortresses, towns, market places, the very camp, tribes, companies, palace, senate, forum we have left nothing to you but the temples of your gods.

If you would like to read a reliable biography of the Apostle Paul, then I highly recommend F.F. Bruce’s, Paul: Apostle of the Heart Set Free.  Dr. Hoch (for whom I am so thankful) required us to read it in seminary and I still consult it.

The study of the book of Romans is the greatest conversation that has ever taken place and Dr. Doug Moo has a seat at the table.

Imagine a great banquet hall in an ancient castle with a vast round table in the center. Huge torches light the room, which has stadium seating surrounding it. Placed in the center of the table is Paul’s letter to the church in Rome, written from Corinth in 57 AD, inspired by the Holy Spirit: God’s Word. 

The Greatest Conversation began in the first century when the historical church began to consider Romans.  Indeed, the observing crowd is the historical church.  Men and women from all ages look down at the table and listen intently to this great conversation.

Gathered around the table, one by one, men and women, first listen and then stand and speak about Romans. Their thoughts are careful and measured, and when they speak wisely the audience murmurs in appreciation—knowing that the statements made by one voice may be considered for the next thousand years and even eternity.

We can review only a few high points from this great conversation:

In the late fourth century, John Chrysostom, one of the greatest preachers of the early church—known as the golden mouthed—says Romans is so remarkable he has it read to him twice very week.^[1]

Around that same time, Augustine of Hippo speaks. He shares his personal story of how he was living an immoral, sinful life, yet one day, wrestling with profound agony in the depths of his soul while seated in his garden he heard the voice of a child saying, “Take up and read,” and so he began reading Romans and “there the truth of God in Christ flashed upon him, and he was converted and saved, and became a guiding light in the Christian church.”^[2]

When Pelagius stood and attempted to introduce error, Augustine countered him through careful teaching from Romans and the Pelagian heresy was silenced.

Over one thousand years later, on October 31, 1517, dressed in a monk’s habit, Martin Luther nails his theses to the table with a hammer. He then shares how in lecturing on Romans he understood the doctrine of justification: that we are saved by faith alone. Even as Luther speaks a great noise builds until there is deafening tumult as the meaning of Romans becomes clearer, and the current and direction of all of history changes.

On May 24, 1738, John Wesley is “strangely warmed” when he hears Luther’s voice in his preface to Romans. Wesley begins to preach in the open air, and the Great Awakening resounds in England and echoes all across North America.

In 1919 Karl Barth jolts sleepy modern theologians awake by listening to Paul in Romans.^[3]

The Scotsman John Murray loses an eye in World War I but gives a lifetime to study which includes a major commentary on Romans.  The Welsh medical doctor turned London preacher, Dr. David Martyn-Lloyd Jones preachs 14 volumes worth of Romans in London.

In our current day, E.P. Sanders, James D.G. Dunn, Tom Wright, and others have sought a New Perspective on what Paul was saying in Romans even as John Piper has replied.  In the last ten years, the New Perspective on Paul has an elevated sense of the Greatest Conversation ever to a new level of urgency as theologians sharpen one another’s thinking about what Paul meant.

There is no question that as the Great Conversation on Romans continues, Doug Moo is one of the central voices being heard.  He is, arguably, the most evenly appreciated Romans scholar in the world today.  If you take the New Perspective debate I referenced earlier – - N.T. Wright and James D.G. Dunn are on one side of the table.  John Piper and Tom Schreiner are on the other side.  Both sides would recommend Doug Moo’s commentary.

Dr. Moo is the Blanchard professor of New Testament at Wheaton.  He was on the faculty at Trinity for over 20 years.  Dr. Moo and his wife have 5 grown children. 

Prayerfully keep this picture in mind. It is now our turn to look at Romans, which is positioned in the center of the table. We also have the opportunity to listen to the theological dialogue that has taken place as Romans has been studied throughout church history.

This morning, our modest little church has been invited to come down to the front row of the greatest conversation that has ever taken place and listen to someone who has been called by God to have a seat at the table.

What is meant by the “glory of God”?  Can you write down a definition?

“Glory” is a hard word to define.  Yet, it is foundational for the Christian.  Our chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever according to the Westminster Shorter Catechism.  Whether we eat or drink or whatever we do, it is to be for God’s glory (1 Corinthians 10:31).

We need to meditate on the word “glory.”

I recently listened to a sermon (see here) by John Piper in which he helped me better define God’s glory.  Piper said, God’s glory is the manifest beauty of his perfections. 

So, Isaiah wrote, “Holy, holy, holy  is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory (Isaiah 6:3).”  Do you see the connection?  Because God is holy, the earth is full of his glory.  God’s glory is the visibility of his holiness.  God’s glory is the manifest beauty of his manifold perfections. 

**********************

Where the Romans series is concerned, we must get a handle on what glory is.  Romans is about how the Gospel glorifies God.  We will only understand Romans to the extent that we understand glory.

Schreiner (page 23):

Paul ultimately wrote Romans as a servant of God to honor his Lord.  I have endeavored to show inductively in my exegesis of the letter that God’s glory is indeed ultimate. . .”

*********************

Piper:

First, an attempt at the impossible—a definition of the glory of God. The reason I say it is impossible is that glory is more like the word beauty than it is like the word basketball. You can define a basketball by saying its round, inflated, about nine or ten inches in diameter; it’s used in a game to bounce and put through a hoop. But you can’t do the same with the word beauty. We all know it exists, but the reason we can talk about it is because we have seen it, not because we can say it.

What might help get at a definition of the glory of God is to contrast it with the holiness of God. God is holy means that God is in a class of perfection and greatness and value by himself. He is incomparable. His holiness is his utterly unique and perfect divine essence. It determines all that he is and does and is determined by nothing and no one outside himself. His holiness is what he is as God which no one else is, or ever will be, and it signifies his intrinsic, infinite worth.

Then we hear the angels in Isaiah 6:3 say, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory.” The glory of God is the manifestation of his holiness. God’s holiness is the incomparable perfection and greatness of his divine nature; his glory is the display of that holiness. His glory is the open revelation of the secret of his holiness. In Leviticus 10:3, God says, “I will be shown to be holy among those who are near me, and before all the people I will be glorified.” When God shows himself to be holy, what we see is his glory—the beauty of holiness. The holiness of God is his concealed glory. The glory of God is his revealed holiness.

So here’s my effort at a definition: The glory of God is the infinite beauty and greatness of his manifold perfections.

Read Piper’s whole sermon here.