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Good News Romans 1:1-4 |
January 18, 2004 Pastor Tom Marcum |
About 18 months ago I got a letter from my mortgage company inviting me to refinance my existing mortgage. The letter came in the midst of our national refinancing bonanza and I realized immediately that they were simply trying to keep me from refinancing with someone else. As I read the letter explaining their offer it quickly began to sound too good to be true. It said with interest rates having dropped so dramatically in recent days, they were rewarding a select number of their valued customers with a quick, easy and absolutely free opportunity to reduce their mortgage interest rates and it asked me to call them within a week to let them explain how the process worked. So, I called.
The representative told me that I had been pre-approved for a fast-track loan reduction. With my approval, they would send me some documents to fill out, I was to complete the forms, get them notarized and then return them within a week. And they would drop my interest rate.
I listened with my usual degree of skepticism, waiting for the catch. Waiting for the hook that would make this seemingly too good to be true offer, too good to be true. But it never came.
So, I said, "So, let me get this straight. All I have to do is fill out these documents and return them to you and you're just going to lower my interest rate, lock in my new loan at this new, lower rate and it's not going to cost me anything." He said, "That's right." I said, "Let's go for it."
And two weeks later the deal was done and I had a new set of loan documents fixing my interest rate at a level that lowered my house payment a couple of hundred bucks a month.
So, I tracked down the representative that had originally sold me on the idea and I asked him if he had a hard time talking people into his offer. He said, "You know, most people start off kind of skeptical, but once they realize the offer's legit…once they realize that all the news is good news…they can't wait to get in on it."
And I thought to myself, what a great job. All day long this guy gets to call people with nothing but good news.
Last week we started an open-ended journey into what I described as the deep waters of the book of Romans. And our journey began with a look at Paul, the author of this amazing book. And, in verse 1, by way of introduction, Paul told us 3 things about himself. Verse one says, "Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God…"
--Paul says, "If you want to know me you must understand this: first and foremost, I am a servant of Jesus Christ. I seek no one's approval but His."
--Secondly, Paul says. "You also should know that the reason I'm an apostle, is because God called me to be an apostle. I didn't just decide to be a spokesman for Jesus, this task was assigned to me by God, Himself."
--And finally Paul says, "In fact, God did more than simply assign this work to me, rather, He actually created me in such a way that my gifts are perfectly suited for the work He's given me to do. He set me apart for this. I was God's very first choice for this assignment."
And what exactly was Paul's assignment? Well, the essence of Paul's assignment is captured in the phrase, "the gospel of God," and that's what we want to examine, this morning. When we talk about "the gospel," what exactly are we talking about?
Now, the word, itself, is easy to define. The Greek word translated as, "gospel," simply means, "good news." God called Paul to be a bearer of good news, the kind of news that anyone would want to hear once they realize that it's true…that it's legit. Like the representative at my mortgage company that got to call people every day and simply tell them the good news about what their mortgage company had done to make their lives better, Paul got to spend his days telling people the Good News about what God had done to make their lives better. And in verses 2-4 Paul identifies 4 key elements that we must understand to fully comprehend the essence of this gospel, this good news.
So, let's look at those verses.
Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God -- the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures regarding his son, who as to his human nature was a descendant of David, and who through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord Romans 1:1-4
Paul says, the first thing that we need to understand about the Gospel is that THIS GOOD NEWS COMES TO US FROM GOD. Paul is sharing good news, but he's not the author of this good news. The good news that Paul is sharing traces its origin to God. And Paul makes that abundantly clear in verses 1-2 when he writes, "…the gospel of God -- (that) he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures…" Now, I want to you look very closely at the process that made it possible for us to find out about this good news.
--It started as an idea in the mind of God.
--Then, God's idea became God's promise.
--Then, God's promise was revealed to prophets who told us the good news.
--Then, God's promises were written down in Scriptures, so that we can now read about the good news.
--And, finally, these Scriptures were called, "Holy." And they are "holy" because they are "set apart," altogether distinct from every other form of writing we will ever run across. And what makes these Scriptures distinct? These are the words of God. When we read the scriptures, God Himself is speaking to us.
People everywhere are looking everywhere for some way to have an encounter with God. But the truth of the matter is, God is not aloof. God is not in hiding. God is no further away than these Scriptures. Every time we open these pages and read these words, God speaks to us. And that, my friends, is Good News.
The second thing that Paul says we must understand about the gospel is that it's FOCUS IS JESUS. In verse 3 Paul says that this is the gospel of God, …"regarding his Son…" Folks, let's be really, really clear about this: The focus of the gospel is Jesus. If you take Jesus out of the gospel and put anything else in His place, it ceases to be the gospel. I don't know what it is, exactly, but I know that it ceases to be good news. Because the essence of the good news of what God has done to make our lives better can only be discovered in Jesus.
--The good news is NOT that everything's going to be OK if you'll just go to church.
--The good news is NOT that everything's going to be OK if we'll just elect the right people to office.
--The good news is NOT that everything's going to be OK if the good things we do outnumber the bad things we do.
--Folks, the Good News is that God loves us so much that He sent His own Son, Jesus, into the world to do for us what we could never do for ourselves. The Good News is that Jesus has made it possible for each and every one of us to get right with God. The Good News is that everything that had to be done to secure our eternal salvation has already been done by Jesus. All that's left for us to do is believe it and accept it as true.
And that, my friends, is Good News.
And that brings us to the third thing that Paul says we must understand about the Gospel and that is that God's Son, Jesus, who is the focus of the gospel, was FULLY HUMAN. And Paul emphasizes his point by offering us two significant details about Jesus in verse 3 where he writes, "…as to his human nature was a descendant of David…"
--The first of those significant details is that Jesus took on our "human nature." In other words, when God sent Jesus to be born among us, Jesus didn't just act like one of us, he became one of us. He wasn't pretending to be a man, he became a man. And that means that Jesus has first-hand experience with all aspects of our human nature, our strengths and our weaknesses. And that's Good News, because it assures us that Jesus can fully identify with our condition, because he's walked in our shoes.
--And the second significant detail that Paul offers us here is that Jesus, "was a descendant of David…"
Now, remember that in verse 2 we learned that long before God sent Jesus into the world, He promised that He would do so. In fact, the Old Testament is filled with prophecies describing specific aspects about God's plan to send Jesus to us. And one of the things prophesied about Jesus is that he would be born in the line of Israel's beloved King David. Jeremiah 23:5, for instance, says, "'The days are coming,' declares the Lord, 'when I will raise up from David a righteous Branch, a King who will reign wisely and do what is just and right in the land.'"
So, now we come to verse 3 and Paul says that, in fact, Jesus was a descendant of David. So, what does that mean? It means that, centuries after God first gave the promise, the promise was fulfilled. Is that significant? You bet, it is, because it assures us that when God makes a promise, He keeps a promise. And as we think about all that God has promised us…as we identify all of the things that God has promised us…that is very Good News, indeed.
And that brings us to the fourth thing that Paul says we must understand about the Gospel and that is that Jesus was not only fully human, he was also FULLY DIVINE. Writing in verse 4 Paul says that, "…through the Spirit of holiness (Jesus) was declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord." In other words, there were 2 distinct events that we can look to as clearly establishing the divinity of Jesus.
--First, the divinity of Jesus is seen in the unique way in which we see the Holy Spirit at work in Jesus' life. Though he was fully human…just like us…the Spirit of God enabled Jesus to live a life that was absolutely unique in that His life was utterly free of sin and that He was completely obedient to the Father, up to and including the voluntary sacrifice of His life on the cross.
--And, secondly, the divinity of Jesus was established in power when God raised Him from the dead. The point here is not that Jesus was not divine prior to the resurrection. The point is that, through the resurrection, Jesus moved from being the humble Son of God to the triumphant Christ who will reign in power for all eternity. And it is this triumphant, powerful Christ that Paul is writing about in Philippians 2:9-11 when he says, "Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."
And that, my friends, is the end towards which the gospel of God is leading.
And for those of us who believe…those of us who know Him as Lord and Savior…that is very Good News, indeed.
And all of God's people said, "Amen."
© Copyright 2004 Pastor Tom Marcum