*Gospel-driven Disciples: Setting the Stage

SERMON GM15-042

SERIES: Renewal Through Romans: The Gospel Defined, Explained & Applied

SETTING: North Kelso Baptist Church

SERVICE: Sunday AM (Jan 4, 2015)

SUBTITLE: Setting the Stage

SCRIPTURE: Romans; Selected Scriptures

SUBJECT: setting the stage

SUMMARY: The book of Romans is a carefully constructed master piece of Christian theology for the spiritual wellbeing of genuine believers.

SCHEME: that the Christian grasps the theological truth for which this book is known

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Our theme is: setting the stage

This is a good reminder for us all that we need to understand the argument of Romans in order to be able think through the epistle and to see the absolute importance of this letter for the complete spiritual wellbeing of the genuine believer.

Proposition: The book of Romans is a carefully constructed master piece of Christian theology for the spiritual wellbeing of genuine believers.

Interrogatory Sentence: What will this introduction and overview reveal?

Transitional Sentence: The introduction and overview reveals three features that help us set the stage:

1. The Arrangement

2. The Accolades

3. The Advantages

INTRODUCTION TO ROMANS

Romans 1:1-17

Setting the Stage

Selected Scriptures

INTRODUCTION

The bible is not an ordinary book. It is God’s book. The bible is a book about God and about man’s relationship to God. As we enter this study of Romans always keep in mind that this not just some intellectual study. This letter was written by the Apostle Paul to a church body with very specific and practical objectives.

Paul wanted to help the believers in the Roman church:

· Paul wanted to build up these Roman believers in their faith

· Paul wanted to establish them, to confirm them in their faith

· Paul wanted to help them grow in the grace & knowledge of Jesus Christ

Our theme is: setting the stage

Proposition: The book of Romans is a carefully constructed master piece of Christian theology for the spiritual wellbeing of genuine believers.

Interrogatory Sentence: What will this introduction and overview reveal?

Transitional Sentence: The introduction and overview reveals seven features that help

So, how are we going to study this magnificent letter by Paul to the Roman believers?

Well, we have to start with an introduction and an overview of this great letter. We need to take our time and “set the stage” for our in depth study of this letter. The first thing I want us to take in is…

1A THE ARRANGEMENT

The first thing that we notice is that Romans is the very first book after the four (4) gospels and the book of Acts. It is the first letter in front of all the other letters that had been written,

Why was Romans placed first?

First of all, it wasn’t placed first because it was the first letter written. It wasn’t. There is a debate on what letter was the first one written. There are some who say the first letter to the Thessalonians was the first NT letter written. There are some who say the letter to the Galatians was the first NT letter written. I personally think Galatians was the first letter written and 1^st Thessalonians came after it.

Secondly, it wasn’t placed first because of the fact that it is the longest letter written.

It seems that it was placed first because of its utmost importance to the church and to believers. This letter has been recognized as the NT document that brings us face to face with seminal and foundational truths of the bible.

So, with the book of Acts we are able to see how the NT church was formed, how it was established, and how it developed. Now we have the document that gives us the basic foundational truths upon which we stand.

The book or letter to Romans deals with the fundamentals of our faith. This book has played a greater and more important role in the history of the church than any other letter.

Yes, we are to read all of Scripture and Paul said;

“All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” (2 Timothy 3:16-17, NKJV)

But it seems from a close look at church history this particular book or letter seems to have been used in an exceptional manner in a number of lives and ways more so than other books in the bible.

[For example, let’s look at…]

2A THE ACCOLADES

I want to share with you several examples of how this particular letter impacted both men and church history. I trust that you won’t find this section irrelevant or uninteresting. I truly want you to see just how influential the book of Romans. Think, if you can where Christianity, or the Church, or even yourselves would be if it weren’t for the great impact of this letter.

[So, let’s been with one of the most important early church fathers there was…]

AUGUSTINE - was an early Christian theologian and philosopher whose writings influenced the development of Western Christianity and Western philosophy. He was the Pastor of the church at Hippo Regius, which was located in Numidia (Roman province of Africa). He is viewed as one of the most important Church Fathers in the Western Development of Christianity for his writings in the early church formation. Among his most important works are the City of God and Confessions.

God used the book of Romans in his conversion. Prior to being converted Augustine was a very immoral man living a very sinful lifestyle.

One day he was sitting in a garden of his friend Alypius in Milan, Italy and he was crying and in great agony over his life and lifestyle. At some point he heard the voice of a small child saying, “Tolle, lege, Tolle, lege.” This is Latin for “Take up and Read, take up and read.” So Augustine got up, went to his room, opened his bible, opened it to Romans 13 and this is what he read:

“Let us walk properly, as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lust, not in strife and envy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provisions for the flesh to fulfill its lusts.” (Romans 13:13-14, NKJV)

After reading that the HS regenerated him, giving him the ability to understand that passage and to repent of his sins which were crushing him and he was converted.

Later he wrote of that experience, “No further would I read nor did I read; for instantly as the sentence ended, by a light, as it were or security infused my heart – all the gloom of doubt vanished away.”

He became a vital part of church history. Especially when a man named Pelagius came along. The early church went through a period of fighting and major strife due to a major heresy taught by a man Pelagius.

What did Pelagius teach that was so dangerous to the church?

Pelagius taught:

· …that people had the ability to fulfill the commands of God by exercising the freedom of human will apart from, or without the grace of God.

In other words, Pelagius taught that a person's free will is totally capable of choosing God and is able to choose to do good or bad without the aid of Divine intervention. He taught that man can be good and do works of righteousness that please God without any help from God.

· …that that man's nature is basically good.

He denied original sin, or the doctrine that we have inherited a sinful nature from Adam. Pelagius said that Adam only hurt himself when he fell in the Garden of Eden, and he also taught that all of Adam’s descendants were not affected by Adam's sin. In other words, they were not born with a sin nature.

· …that a person is born with the same purity and moral abilities as Adam was when he was first made by God. He meant that we are born perfect and without sin or sin nature.

· …that a person could if he so desired chose not to sin at all

He taught that people can choose God by the exercise of their free will and rational thought. God's grace, then, is merely an aid to help individuals come to Him. He taught God’s grace was not necessarily necessary.

Pelagius was condemned by many, many councils and many doctrinal confessions throughout church history including the following:

Councils of Carthage (412, 416 and 418)

Council of Ephesus (431)

The Council of Orange (529)

Council of Trent (1546) Roman Catholic

2nd Helvetic Council (1561/66) 8-9. (Swiss-German Reformed)

Several doctrinal confessions condemned Pelagius and his teachings, such as:

Augsburg Confession (1530) Art. 9, 18 (Lutheran)

Gallican Confession (1559) Art. 10 (French Reformed)

Belgic Confession (1561) Art. 15 (Lowlands, French/Dutch/German Reformed)

The Anglican Articles (1571), 9. (English)

Canons of Dort (1618-9), 3/4.2 (Dutch/German/French Reformed).

These all condemned Pelagius and his teachings as a heretic. He faded off the scene, actually disappeared and we don’t have any information about the specific time or details of his death. God just sort of erased him from the scene.

The reason he developed his teaching was because he got angry at a prayer that Augustine had prayed:

… - "Command what thy will; and give what thy command." In other words, God command us to do whatever you want and give us the ability to do what you command us to do. Pelagius hated the thought that God would command us as Christians to do something we couldn’t do without God’s help.

Pelagius hated that idea and was why he developed his heresies. It was to refute this prayer by Augustine.

Augustine's Doctrines of Grace

Augustine taught, this is in a nutshell, if you will:

…that Salvation comes by God's grace, which is wholly undeserved, and is wholly free as a gift of a sovereign God. God gave salvation as a gift

…that Adam's sin and subsequent fall affected all of Adam's posterity (Doctrine of Original Sin). In other words, everyone from until has been born with a sin nature.

…that grace comes to those to whom God chooses to send grace to (we see this clearly in Romans 9 and Ephesians 1-2, in 1Peter, and quite frankly throughout the bible). God predestinates whom He will "to punishment and salvation."

…that Grace is irresistible and man cannot reject God's call. Grace after conversion frees the enslaved will to choose that which is pleasing to God, "not only in order that they may know, by the manifestation of that grace, what should be done, but moreover in order that, by its enabling, they may do with love what they know."

In other words, God’s grace now allows us to do more than just know what God wants, God’s grace has freed our will to do what is pleasing to God and not only do it, but to love doing the things that please God. And so a genuine Christian loves pleasing God.

…that through us, God does good works (cf. Eph. 2:8-10), which He rewards as if they were men's own works and to which He ascribes merit.

…that The Sacraments, or ordinances (baptism & the communion) are signs of spiritual realities, rather than the realities themselves.

The ordinances are essential; but the truths to which they witness are, whenever received, the work of divine grace.

If the church had accepted Pelagius’s heresy it would have ruined the church. The church was saved from certain destruction by Augustine who refuted it by simply teaching the book of Romans. The Divine Truth in the book of Romans is the bedrock and foundation on which the faith of the church is established and is able to continue

For the record, even though Pelagianism was declared a heresy, unfortunately the church is still plagued by it to this day with a revived heresy called semi-Pelagianism.

· Semi-Pelagianism says that the sinner has the ability to initiate belief in God. By that it means that God can’t won’t save you until you make the first move.

· Semi-Pelagianism says God's grace is a response to man's initial effort.

· Semi-Pelagianism denies predestination or the doctrine of election

· Semi-Pelagianism was condemned at the Council of Orange in 529.

I really hope you don’t mind that I spent quite a bit of time here. Augustine’s conversion due to the book of Romans is huge. God used him to preserve the doctrine and plan of salvation by teaching the truths and principles of the book of Romans.

[Another example…]

MARTIN LUTHER

God used Martin Luther to begin the Protestant Reformation.

In 1515 Martin Luther was giving a lecture to his students from Romans. While he was studying the book in preparation for his lectures he wrote these words,

“I greatly longed to understand Paul’s epistle to the Romans, and nothing stood in my way but that one expression, ‘the righteousness of God,’ because I took it to mean that righteousness whereby God is righteous and deals righteously in punishing the unrighteous…

Night and day I pondered until…I grasped the truth that the righteousness of God is that righteousness whereby through grace and sheer mercy, he justifies us by faith. Thereupon I felt myself to be reborn and to have gone through open doors into paradise. The whole of Scripture took on a new meaning and whereas before ‘the righteous of God’ had filled me with hate, now it, became to me inexpressibly sweet in greater love. This passage of Paul became to me a gateway to heaven.”

What happened was that the truth of justification by faith and faith alone opened his heart and mind to the truth of the gospel. This awakening was his conversion and it led him to challenge the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church showing how they were in error.

Martin Luther called Romans “The Chief book, the masterpiece of the New Testament and is truly the purest gospel.” He said, “It is worthy not only that every Christian should know it for word, by heart but also that he should occupy himself with it every day, and the daily bread of the soul.”

Martin Luther was huge in the Reformation. The unfortunate truth is that he didn’t go far enough and tried to rehabilitate or reform Roman Catholicism until he was kicked out. Even then in Lutheranism he maintained much of Rome’s teachings and practices.