Book of Romans Intro

I had mentioned several, I think a few weeks ago anyway, that I wanted to begin to go through the Book of Romans. And I'm tending to begin this today. I know in looking at the Book of Romans that it will take several, it will probably be at least four, maybe five, counting this one, areas that we should cover. But I'd like for us to think about, in a sense, the way that God has composed the Bible, particularly the New Testament. We're all familiar with the first four books. Talk about the life of Jesus, talk about what he went through, what he did, how he interacted with others, ultimately how he died, and how he was resurrected. And we're familiar with the Book of Acts, which is, in essence, a history of the New Testament church. It covers a lot of the early things that went on with Peter and John and James, and then more so Paul toward the end of the Book of Acts, or actually two-thirds of the Book of Acts covers the life of Paul and things that he did, where he went, his different journeys. And we went over those last year, the year before, we went over much of that material, and I hope that that would lay, in a sense, a groundwork for what we want to go through in studying some of these writings of Paul. Now, I'm starting with Romans, not because it's the next book after Acts, but simply because, in many ways, it is unique. Now, how would you say that the Book of Romans is unique? What stands out to us? We should be, you know, we're not unfamiliar with the Bible. We're not unfamiliar with the different books that we would say that Paul was the author of, which is 14, I believe, as far as when you read through all of the letters that he wrote.

And yet, I will tell you that most of the letters that he wrote were directed to a specific location, like we could say Corinthians, or Galatians, or Ephesians, or Philippians, or Colossians, or Thessalonians. What are those? Well, those are all congregations. Those are all cities where, for the most part, Paul had been, and in many ways, he was used to raise up those congregations, many of them. He wasn't perhaps the only one, but he was certainly directly involved in most of those letters, and often he was writing to them, knowing who the people were, knowing what some of the problems were, because that's what he often did in those letters. And you later find Paul then writing to people, to ministers, to Timothy, to Titus, to Philemon. You see these letters, and of course you see a book, again, that is pretty unique, which is the book of Hebrews, that it would appear Paul had to be directly involved in that, as far as the writing of that.

But see, what's unique about the book of Romans? Well, as we'll study this, you know, Paul would eventually get to Rome. But see, he wrote this book a number of years before he would ever be in Rome, and before he would ever live out the several years that he would live in Rome, mostly in prison. And so, what I'm saying about this book is that Paul is writing this book to members of a congregation of the Church of God who were in Rome, and yet he had never been there. He had not been there at that time. He was going to go there later, but he was writing this beforehand. He was writing this to a congregation of people who were made up of some who were Israelites, some who were Jews, and some who were not. Some, maybe many, who were Gentiles. And yet he was writing about a very important topic.

Now, whenever you read through the book of Romans, I think you can find, or you will, if you look through the pages, you can see it has 16 chapters. It's longer than any of the other books that Paul wrote. At least it has more pages. That has about the same number of chapters as some of the others, but it has more pages. It's a longer letter. But the significance is that he was writing this to Christians in Rome to teach a given topic. And I want to focus on that topic today. I'm not going to say what that is yet, and you can think about, well, what is the topic of the book of Romans? Actually, in some ways you might find, I guess I could say, and I wrote down these verses, that, well, perhaps I could just read through some of them. I wrote down many of the verses that probably most of us are very familiar with. See, there are some verses in Romans that we quote over and over and over again in services. There's some that you would think would be kind of memory verses. What would any of you say as far as a memory verse in Romans?

This would be an audience participation sermon. 623. Okay, I think most of us would identify with the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Now, that's clearly an outstanding verse. What else would we say?

828. Okay, 828 is another one. All things work together for good to those who are the called. Those, you know, that verse is one we often would use. What else?

Okay. Well, let's see.

I'm, I would have to, I'm convinced that either death or life and or angels or rulers or things to come or powers or height nor depth or anything in all creations able to separate us from the love of God and Jesus Christ, our Lord. That, you know, that clearly is a, you know, a well-known verse or one that we would often use because it points out a very good, a very good understanding. See, I would think we also would quote chapter 2 verse 29 where it talks about what it is to be a spiritual Jew, to have circumcision of the heart. That's, that's very important. I think we could go to chapter 3 verse 23 where it says, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. We often go to Romans 5 verse 10 where it says, while we were yet sinners, we, you know, the sacrifice of Christ was given for us and we are justified by that, but we are saved through his life living in us. Certainly chapter 8 is one that we ought to be very familiar with. We had chapter 8 mentioned a couple of times. Chapter 8 verse 6 and 7 talks about what it is to have a carnal mind, how it is that a carnal mind is enmity against God and against God's law. See, these are, again, very familiar verses. Chapter 8 verse 14 says, the children of God are those who are led by the Spirit of God. And if we dropped on down toward the end, chapter 12 verse 1 talks about our lives needing to be a living sacrifice. And in chapter 14 verse 17 it says, the kingdom of God is not food and drink, but it is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Those are all ones that, you know, that I, as I look through it, at least I had marked in some way, and yet most of those are verses that we're familiar with.

And yet what was Paul's thinking whenever God was using him to write what in many ways was a letter to people that he didn't know. He wasn't familiar with this group. He knew some of them, I think you could say, but he didn't know most of them because he hadn't been there. You also find, you know, that, well, let's go to how it is that Paul says. Here in chapter 1, starting in verse 8, I may jump around a little bit today, but I hope that this, in a sense, just lays a framework for what we will cover in the next several sermons about the book of Romans. Because in many ways, the book of Romans is one of the most important, it's one of the most needful to understand books that you see Paul writing. I guess you can't say it's more important because, obviously, all of the books that Paul wrote and that God inspired to be a part of the Bible are important, and they give us directive as far as our way of life. But see, there's some specific important information we need to have as an overview. Here in chapter 1, verse 8, Paul says, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you because your faith is proclaimed throughout the world. So even though he hadn't been there, even though he was yet to go there, even though he really wanted to go there, he wanted... Now, why would he want to go there? Well, it was because Rome was the capital of the world at that time. It was the capital of the Roman Empire that was going to rule, as we even see from the book of Daniel, there were going to be a number of Gentile kingdoms that would rise, and the fourth one of those was the kingdom, the Empire in Rome. And it was actually going to rule the world for 500 years. It was, in a sense, even kind of young.

As the world-ruling empire, the Roman Empire, it was young at the time when Jesus was alive, and at the time when Paul would begin to interact with people who would make up, you know, this congregation that would meet him wrong. But here he says, your faith is proclaimed throughout the world. Everybody knows about the faith of the Christians in Rome. For God, verse 9, whom I serve with my spirit by announcing the gospel of his Son is my witness, and without ceasing I remember you in my prayers.

So he prayed for the other congregations of people that he was close to and knew, but he prayed for people he didn't even know. He prayed for this congregation that met him wrong. He says in verse 11, I'm longing to see you. So obviously he hadn't been there yet. Or you know, he is he's going to explain that I've wanted to come. I'm longing to see you so that I may share with you some spiritual gift to strengthen you, or rather so that we may be mutually encouraged by each other's faith, yours and mine.

And he goes on to say, I want you to know, brethren, verse 13, that I have often intended to come to you. But thus far, I've been hindered. So far, I've been prevented from coming to you in order that I may reach some harvest among you as I have among the rest of the Gentiles. So he had been directed by God to be the apostle to the Gentiles.

He had been not only in Jerusalem, where he started out, or in Antioch, where his headquarters kind of were for a while, and he would come back to Antioch whenever he would go into Turkey, where he would go into Greece. That's where the churches are, that he knew and that he was very familiar with.

Galatian, Colossae, Ephesus, Corinth, or Philippi, or Thessalonica. Those were all cities that he was close to because he had traveled there, and he had raised up those churches. But he says here in the beginning of this book to Rome that I have wanted to come. I intend to come. I see the need to be there, but I've not been able.

And actually, you find that this congregation in Rome is, in a sense, needing to fully understand, to fully understand a topic which was a clear understanding of salvation. How it is that we receive salvation from God. I'll go over that a little more, but that's what we're going to find Paul talking to the Jews and to the Gentiles who made up this church in Rome. Let's go back to Acts chapter 2. See, how was it that since Paul didn't start this church, and we don't find Peter mentioned here at all, and it doesn't appear that Peter had been there during this period of time?

See, we're talking about the lifespan of Paul about 30 years after Jesus' death and 30 years after he was then converted. And he had about a 30-year span before he would ultimately die in about, I believe, 67 AD is the date that is thought to be when Paul would die. And he died in Rome. He was beheaded. He was a martyr for the church at that time. But from about 33 or 31 to whenever he came into his conversion, a couple of years after the death of Jesus. So maybe 30-35, if we push it a little bit, years.

But here in the book of Acts, we're familiar with chapter 2. We know it talks about the day of Pentecost being in that year when Jesus died. And so in Pentecost, 31 AD, it says in verse 1, the day of Pentecost had come. They were all together in one place. Suddenly, the sound came like a rush of a mighty wind or a violent wind. It filled the entire house where they were sitting, divided tongues and tongues resting on each of them.

All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit began to speak in other languages as the Spirit gave them utterance. And in verse 5, now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. So who were the people who had gathered there, who were there, and who were celebrating the, in this case, the Feast of Pentecost? Well, it says there were those who were from all over. And at this sound, the crowd gathered and was bewildered because each one heard them speaking in the native language of which they were.

And they were amazed and astonished. All of these who were speaking out are, they ask, verse 7, are not all of these who were speaking Galileans. And how is it that we hear each of us in our own language? And so here you see starting a listing of different nations that are represented, Parthia and Mede and Elam, Mesopotamian, Judea and Cappadocia and Pontus and Asia and Figurian, Pamphylia and Egypt and parts of Libya.

Verse 10, belonging to Cyrene and Visters from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, those who had, those who would genealogically be Jewish or Israelite-ish, and then those who would more or less be Gentile and who would have agreed or come to have a connection to a Jewish celebration like the Day of Pentecost clearly was for many of them. They were observing this day. But here you see where the origin, origin, I guess, would be.

It goes ahead to talk about the amazing miracle that had happened, but, you know, where did the people come from who would make up or begin the Church of God in Rome? Well, it appears it would go back to the Day of Pentecost, 31 AD, and then after that, you know, there would be people who did travel and who certainly traveled to Rome, traveled to the center of the Roman Empire and the Roman capital, and they would then make up this congregation, again mixing Jews and Gentiles together. Now, to follow through some of the sequencing here in Acts chapter 18, we see, and this is talking about the life of Paul and is talking about his travels, and of course, as we covered earlier, there were three different missions that Paul entered into, you know, where he started churches in most of those places that we already mentioned, but it says in verse one of chapter 18, after this, Paul left Athens and he went to Corinth, and so, you know, Athens was in Macedonia, as was Corinth. They were not too far apart. They were both a part of, if you look on your map, you see that they were a part of Greece. They were, again, not too far away, but Paul left Athens. He went to Corinth, and there he found a Jew named Aquila, a native Apontas who had recently come from Italy. He had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, and here it describes why it was that Aquila and Priscilla, you know, we're going to find that these individuals travel with Paul a good amount. He's very familiar with them. He works with them. They, actually, when we see in the book of Romans that there was a church in their home in Rome, and it seems that they are a prominent couple, and they are actually used by God to teach a polis. But here it says he found them, Aquila and Priscilla, because they had come from Italy because Claudius had ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. You know, this appears to be at about 49 AD, whenever that would have happened, when he would have sent an edict around Rome and sent all the Jews away, and so here they're arriving and meeting Paul. Paul went to see them because he was of the same trade. He stayed with them. They worked together by trade. They were tent makers, and so that was the business that they were in. That's what Paul also did. It says in verse 4, every Sabbath they would argue in the synagogue, and they would try to convince Jews and Greeks. And so that's just a little sidelight of how it was that there were people who were a part of the church who were in Rome, probably coming from the time of the day of Pentecost when the church began.

And then you see Paul interacting with Aquila and Priscilla here, in this case. And then in chapter 19, again, we're not going over this in detail, but in chapter 19, verse 21, it says, after these things had been accomplished, Paul resolved in the spirit to go through Macedonia and through Achaia, and then he was going to go to Jerusalem, and he said, after I go to Jerusalem, I have got to go see Rome. So here he's discussing, wanting to see Rome. He knew that he had several things that had to be done before he had actually, and when he wrote this book to the people in Rome, he had not yet gone there, and yet he wanted to go there. And I want us to sequence this with chapter 20. This was an uproar that was in Ephesus. Paul sent for the disciples, and after encouraging them and saying farewell, he left for Macedonia, and when he had gone through the regions and had given the believers much encouragement, he came to Greece, and so in this case he came to where Corinth would be, and there he stayed for three months, and he was about to set sail for Syria when a plot was made against him by the Jews. So it goes on with the narrative, but I point this out in that it this appears to be when Paul did send this, he wrote this book, and sent this book to Rome. When he was in Greece or when he was in Corinth and where he was staying there for several months, you see some of this in kind of an internal information and different of the books, but this is what Paul is saying, where he is writing this. This would have been in the latter, later 50s, 55 or 57. You see several different similar dating in different commentaries, but it would appear to be later in the 50s whenever Paul actually is in this part of his ministry, and he is sending this book to Rome. Now, I want us to go back to the book of Romans again, because you have some again some reference information here in Romans chapter 15. Romans chapter 15 starting in verse 22. Now, obviously this is toward the end of the book. You know, what we read earlier was right in the very beginning. He said, I wanted to come see you. I've not been able to. I've been prevented from doing so, but he says in verse 22, this is the reason that I have so often been hindered from coming to you, but now with no further place for me in these regions, I desire, as I have for many years, to come to you when I go to Spain. And so Paul is actually saying this as he's writing this letter to the people in Rome. I said, I'm wanting to come. I'm here in Corinth now. I actually, down in chapter 16, he mentions Phoebe, who is a deaconess in the Church of Cincria. That is actually just outside. It's almost a suburb of Corinth, and she's the one who would actually deliver this letter, it appears, to the people in Rome. He's telling them in chapter 16, verse 1, or verse 2, that you may welcome her in the Lord, as is fitting for the saints, and help her in whatever she may require from you, for she has been a benefactor of many, and certainly of myself as well. And so that's how he eventually would get this letter to the people in Rome. But I want us to back up in verse 23.

He says, you know, I've pretty well finished what I need to do here in Greece, here in the Corinth area, where he was.

I have for many years wanted to come to you, and I want to do that, and I'm going to do that when I go to Spain.

For I do hope to see you on my journey, and to be sent on by you once I have enjoyed your company for a little while. So he said, I want to come, and I'm hoping to head towards Spain. Now, I don't know whether Paul actually ever got there or not. I think there are different reports that would verify or not verify that, depending on who you might be reading. But certainly Paul's intention was to go to Rome, and then from there be sent on from there to go into other regions that needed the gospel preached. For I do hope to see you on my journey, and to be sent on by you once I have enjoyed your company for a little while. That's in verse 24, and at present. However, I'm going to Jerusalem in a ministry for the saints. For Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to share their resources with the poor among the saints at Jerusalem. And they were pleased to do this, and indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have come to share in the spiritual blessings, they also ought to be of service to them in material things. And so here he was actually saying, I'm writing this book to the Roman church where I've never visited. I'm writing this book from Corinth. I'm writing it knowing that I'm yet to go back to Jerusalem. Now, you actually find a good number of the chapters in the latter part of the book of Acts deal with him getting ready and taking this offering, these physical things that he was needing to take back to Jerusalem, getting them ready and then taking them to Jerusalem. And of course, you know, that's where he runs into a lot of trouble. He gets accused of all kinds of things. He ultimately then begins to be imprisoned. And ultimately, it's through being imprisoned that he will eventually get to Rome. But this is what he's saying here in the latter part of Romans 15.

He says that I need to go to Jerusalem and then in verse 28, so when I have completed that task and I have delivered to them what's been collected, I'm going to set out by way of you, by way of you, Romans, I'm going to come to Rome and then I'm going to go on to Spain and I know that when I come to you I will come in the fullness of the blessing of Christ. And so that is, in a sense, kind of background information that we need to have in being able to study this book of Romans.

Paul had not been there, but he wanted to go there. He looked forward to seeing them. He understood that there were Jews and Gentiles in the congregation.

But see, whenever you read the book of Romans, you find him focusing on what would be helpful to the Jews and what would be helpful for the Gentiles.

And so ultimately, what he would be teaching them and what we find is the focus of the book of Romans is actually something that many people stumble over today.

Many people read Romans and don't understand what it's talking about. They read Romans and come away thinking, well, the law doesn't exist, or that the law doesn't need to be observed, that all we need to do is have faith in God. And yet that, of course, is not what Paul teaches in the book of Romans. What he teaches is about the righteousness of God.

It's about the gospel of salvation.

How we receive salvation. How the Jews receive salvation and how the Gentiles receive salvation. That's what we're going to find focused on. It's wrapped up in the righteousness of God, yes. And yet, too many people stumble over many, many things here in the book that Paul has written that is called Romans.

Now, one of the reasons why they stumble over this is because he uses a lot of words that people misunderstand. Certainly, he uses righteousness. He uses grace. He uses reconciliation. He uses justification. He talks about law. He talks about by works. He talks about by grace.

He talks clearly about faith.

And so why was it that people would get confused about that? Well, I want to point out one verse here in 2 Peter because this is actually what Peter had to say about Paul. Because Paul, of course, was highly schooled. He was intelligent. He was able to write a number of languages if he needed to. He could converse in a number of languages. He'd been given many gifts from God. But here in 2 Peter chapter 3, you see at the very end of what Peter would write that he says, our brother Paul is often misunderstood. He's hard to understand.

He wasn't saying he couldn't be understood. He was just saying many people twist what Paul has to say and particularly you find much of that in the book of Romans. So here in chapter 3 verse 14, the very end of 2 Peter chapter 3 verse 14, therefore beloved, while you are waiting for these things, strive to be found by him in peace without spot or blemish and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation. And so also our beloved brother Paul wrote to you according to the wisdom given to him. And so again, it wasn't just Paul's writing. It was wisdom from God, wisdom from above that God had given to Paul, speaking in verse 16 of this as he does in all of his letters.

And he says, there are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and the unstable twist to their own destruction as they actually do other scriptures. But he says, you therefore beloved, since you are forewarned, beware that you be not carried away with the error of the lawless and lose your own stability. Peter is actually saying, you know, well, you understand that there is a correct way to view the law, a correct way to view faith, a correct way to view grace. And he says, if people want to scramble those terms, then they can do it. They can twist them. But he says, you shouldn't do that, but you are to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be glory both now and forever. And so, Peter actually points out to yell, some of what Paul had written at times was not clearly understood. What are some of these verses? Well, let me just read through a few of them with you here in Romans chapter 3, verse 21. See, again, if you take any of these verses out of context, you can come to a wrong conclusion.

Chapter 3, verse 21, it says, now, apart from law, the righteousness of God has been disclosed, and it is attested by the law and the prophets, the righteousness through God, or of God, through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. See, many times people read that and say, oh, well, I don't have to observe the law. You know, they conclude wrongly what Paul is actually talking about. We might drop down to chapter 4. What then are we to say? In verse 1 was gained by Abraham, our ancestor. Verse 2, if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. What does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. And so, again, you know, if people only read that and they don't understand what the book is about, they don't understand what Paul was addressing with the Jews and with the Gentiles and how any of us will receive salvation, you know, they might misunderstand and think that, well, you know, all that is needed is faith, or in this verse here, all that is needed is to believe. Well, faith and belief clearly are needed, but, you know, that still doesn't do away with the law.

Chapter 5, verse 1. Therefore, since we are justified by faith, again, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Again, if people want to pick that out and say, well, I'm just I'm justified by my faith, they're not getting the big picture of what Paul is talking about. Chapter 6, verse 15. What then should we when should we sin? Because we are not under law, but under grace. Again, that's even maybe more problematic if we don't understand what Paul is speaking about. Chapter 7, verse 4. In the same way, my friends, you have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead in order that you may bear fruit for God.

Again, taken out of context, people will misunderstand. And even chapter 8, verse 1. Now, there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Jesus Christ. Again, all of those verses could easily be, if they were taken out of context and not understood in what Paul is actually saying, they could lead to wrong conclusions. They could be, as Peter said, they could be twisted. They could be, and he says, even those who are going to do that are ignorant and the lawless. You know, there's a description there that he uses, I think, for a reason. You know, those who would resist anything to do with the law of God. So I found it fascinating in just looking through those, because, you know, many of those could be taken out of context. But as we study this, I think all of us will conclude, though that's certainly, you know, not what Paul was talking about. He was wanting the Jews and the Gentiles to understand how they would receive salvation. And, like I said, you know, in writing about the righteousness of God, or even as he calls it, a gospel of salvation, you even see, you know, we believe in what we call the true gospel. The gospel that is correct, the gospel that is the kingdom of God, and yet you see the gospel referred to in a number of ways. The gospel of God, the gospel of Christ, the gospel of salvation, the gospel of peace. There are many different descriptions, but they're all teaching an understanding of the good news of the coming kingdom and of the king of that kingdom, Jesus Christ. That's what Paul is going to be passing on to these Christians who are in Rome. Let's look at the very first part, chapter 1. Romans chapter 1, verse 1, Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ who was called to be an apostle, who was set apart for the gospel of God. Again, that's, you know, one of the first things you run into. He starts describing, you know, what it is that he's going to be describing and talking to this group that he has never met, but a group that he knows are Christian, a group that he knows made up of Jew and Gentile, but to have certain need for understanding from him. He says, I've been set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand for the prophets and the holy scriptures of gospel concerning his son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ, our Lord. See, actually, one of the other things you find with many of Paul's writings that sometimes people might misunderstand is that he can use many words to make up a sentence. He makes up long, long sentences, and even, you know, we read part of one here. I guess it starts, I don't know, we hadn't really looked up that, but what Paul is wanting them, what he's wanting the Romans to fully understand is just how it is that God is going to give them salvation, how he's going to give them to the Jews, and how he's going to give that to the Gentiles.

And that's what we want to keep in mind as we read through these chapters in Romans.

Now, I'll tell you that we will be covering in the next several weeks the first section is actually chapter one through three. Chapter one through three covers it covers a chapter that deals with describing the Gentiles and their disobedience of God. Chapter two actually describes the Jews and their disobedience to God.

And chapter three is where you find chapter three verse 23 where it says, all, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. You can see what he was doing in trying to help the church in essence be united, trying to help them all understand that, well, yeah, the Jews do have some benefit. They're familiar with the law. They've been given responsibility from God to maintain the law, to maintain that and to pass it on. You know, they're familiar with the Old Testament and they're familiar with the calendar. See, where do we get much of that information today? Well, it's through maintaining that through the people of Israel. But then he also talks about the Gentiles in a very positive way as well. And so you could say the first section that we'll cover probably next week in chapter one through three could be highlighted or titled, All Have Sinned. And, you know, that is a beginning premise to understand fully what Paul's going to write about through the rest of the book. Now, the second section is chapter four through eight. Now, several of the verses that we quoted earlier and that I quoted that people misunderstand are in that midsection there from chapter four through eight. And certainly chapter eight is an incredibly remarkable chapter because we call it the Holy Spirit chapter. It talks about how it is that without the Holy Spirit we are without God. We are without Christ. And it is those who are led by the Spirit of God who are going to be called the children of God. And it actually tells us that it's through the Spirit of God that we put to death or perhaps that's back in six, we put to death the deeds of our body. And so, you know, there's a lot of really great information in chapter four through eight, but what Paul is going to describe, and it's important for us to keep this in mind when we'll cover this, chapter four through eight is explaining how righteousness is imputed. How righteousness is imputed both to the Jew and to the Gentile. And so again it's important for us to keep that in mind. That first section, one through three, goes through a topic about how that everyone is a sinner, all of sin, and then chapters four through eight about how righteousness is imputed.

And that's a very important topic. And then you see a section from chapter nine through eleven. Chapter nine through eleven, in many ways you could look at and you could think, what is Paul talking about? What is he describing? Well, what he's describing, he's talking about the Jew and the Gentile, and about an olive tree, and about some being grafted in, and some being hardened, and then some added later. What's he describing? Well, he's actually describing in chapter nine through eleven the plan of God regarding Israel. It's very clear when you look back in the Old Testament, you see ultimately the descendants of Israel, the descendants of Jacob, are the people through which God would work. That's what the book is written about. The Old Testament is a history of the people of Israel, the descendants not only from Israel, but from Isaac and then Abraham before them. And yet, in chapter nine through eleven, there's a description of God's plan regarding Israel, how he is going to bring many sons and many daughters, some Jewish and some not, into his divine family. We have family mentioned earlier in our sermonette, and that's certainly important, but the most important family is the family of God. The family that God is growing, the family that he is wanting all of us to be thoroughly versed in his word, not to be twisted or not to be taken off track, but actually to be growing in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. But chapter nine through eleven, when you read through that, you can see the plan of God regarding Israel and how he is the one who revealed information to Israel. He was the one who made that information available to the Gentiles, and he's the one who can bring the Israelites to understand it as well. It actually is talking in many ways a far more lengthy period of time than we might just think, well, it deals with the people there at home. Well, no, it deals with the entire population on earth, and it deals with how God is working out a plan. And then finally, the last section we could say is chapter 12 through the end, chapter 16. You see what you could describe as many Christian living principles in chapter 12 and 13 and 14, even 15. So you could say Christian living would be the final section that we would cover. What I want us to go as we conclude here today, as we try to have the background that's necessary in order to study the book of Romans. And I would certainly recommend that you read it, at least read it in the sections that we'll be going over, because there's a lot of wonderful information for us to understand. But here in chapter 16, you see Paul in essence concluding this book.

And as I mentioned in verse 1, he says, I want to commend to you our sister Phoebe, who's the deaconess of the church of St. Croes, so that you may welcome her in the Lord as is fitting for the saints. See, he was sending this letter with her. She was the one who was going to deliver it to Rome. He says he actually makes... And actually, this is kind of a unique section from verse 3 on down to verse 16, because he mentions many of the people there in Rome. Now, he had to have some awareness of them. He had to know of them, at least. He says, greet Priscilla and Aquila, who work with me in Jesus Christ and who risked their necks for my life, to whom not only I give thanks, but also all the churches of the Gentiles. See, here he's actually greeting people that he knew were there. Now, as we saw there in the book of Acts, there was a time when Priscilla and Aquila had to be moved out of Italy. They had to move out of Rome, but it appears that they were then back when he was writing this letter. But you see a number of other people, and you can have fun reading through that section to try to pronounce or mispronounce whatever those names are of the many different people that he was in a sense. You don't really see Paul even writing to congregations that he was very familiar with, a big long list of people that he was wanting to make a personal connection with.

But that's what he was doing. And he said in verse 17, I urge you, brethren, keep an eye on those who caused division and offenses in opposition to the teaching that you have learned and avoid them. So he was obviously being a little bit corrective here at the end. He says, such people don't serve our Lord Jesus Christ but their own appetite, and by smooth talk and flattery deceive the hearts of the simple-minded. For while your obedience is known to all so that I rejoice over you, I want you to be wise in what is good and then guileless in what is evil.

Because the God of peace will shortly crush Satan under his feet.

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.

Now, you know, that's a, in a sense, it's an amazing conclusion. Of course, he mentioned several others who were going to be assisting in delivering this book. He mentions Tertius, apparently, who was writing it down for him as his secretary. And he mentions Timothy. Of course, we're familiar with him and Gaius. But it's amazing that he starts off in the very beginning is that your faith, your faith is known all over the world. And here in verse 19, he says, while your obedience is known to everybody so that I rejoice over you, I want you to be wise in what is good. I want you to be guileless in what is evil. So he, he in a sense was concluding this book in a very positive way. He clearly wanted them to understand how it is that righteousness is imputed to both the Jew and the Gentile who made up this congregation. And that's what he's talked about throughout the book. But in verse 20, he says that God of peace will shortly crush Satan under his foot.

See, that's actually referring back to something we read in Genesis, Genesis chapter 3, where Adam told, or God told Adam and Eve, he told Eve directly, you know, that her descendant, ultimately talking about, he was given a prophecy there in Genesis 3, that Satan would try to crush the seed of Eve being Jesus. And then, ultimately, you know, Jesus will truly crush Satan. Now, perhaps we can go through that more next time, but anyway, that's perhaps as much as we can cover here today as far as an introduction. But I hope that we will find, in reading this book of Romans, that there is so much there that needs to be properly understood, and that we can grow in how it is that we seek the righteousness of God. That's clearly what he tells us to do. He tells us to seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness. And so he was explaining to the Christians in Rome how it is that God would offer, how he would impute righteousness to us, to all of us, who recognize that we are sinners.

So we will begin the first section there, 1 through 3, next time.