Paul and Rome | Episode 28

This week, we jumped into Romans in our YTTB Podcast.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Obedience really matters to Jesus. We cannot earn God's grace and mercy and and uh salvation when you put something in a vending machine and you push a button like it's it is owed to you now, right? Like I can force the vending machine's hand by formulaically doing the right things, and now the Kit Kat comes out. And if it doesn't come out, somebody owes me something, right? Like this is this is not that. But obedience is like this active ingredient that we have agency over. We do have agency over our own and be obedient, and Jesus is very clear about that. All right, welcome back, everybody, to the Year Through the Bible podcast. My name is Rodney Adams. I'm the executive pastor at Asbury Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and you are?

SPEAKER_01 0:49

Kevin Watson, and I'm the senior director of Christian Formation here at Asbury.

SPEAKER_00 0:53

Kevin, it's good to have you back. Um, our pastor, the senior pastor of our church is still on vacation, but um it's fun when you and I get to spend time together in this way. So I enjoy um having you here. Uh, a couple of things before we get started. Uh as always, you can go to yearthhebible.com and you can find a bunch of stuff on our Bible reading plan for the year. You can ask questions. Um, we may get to some of the questions on this podcast, but uh you'll definitely most likely get something from a pastor, at least acknowledging that you asked a question. You might even get a longer answer depending on what your question is, or whether we've already answered that question. But if you have it, don't try to decide whether we've already answered it or not. Just launch it and we will get to it if we can. Uh a little bit of housekeeping. The next two weeks, so um, not of course, we're releasing this episode, you know, uh on normal schedule, but then the next two weeks, um, we're gonna kind of depart from our normal Bible reading plan. We actually have a special guest that that I did an interview with, and we're gonna cut that into two pieces and we're gonna um um release that over the next couple of weeks. So today we've got a little bit of ground to make up because um we just finished the book of Acts in the New Testament of our Bible reading plan, and we started Romans uh a day or two ago. And by the time those two episodes that have the special guest are done, we will be pretty deep into Romans. And so we may actually look at a little bit more of Romans today, but we're kind of talking about Paul. Yep, right? So I want to read this out loud. I think this will set the tone for some things that you've been observing that you think are interesting. Um, I want to start with Romans chapter one. And verse one through seven is kind of that typical Pauline um intro, greeting, extending grace and peace to the the folks who are his primary audience. Um and let me read from verse eight. In my Bible, the ESV that I'm reading from right now, there's a there's like a paragraph heading or a section headings that says longing to go to Rome. Verse eight. First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world. For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit and the gospel of his son, that without ceasing I mention you always in my prayers, asking that somehow by God's will I may now at last succeed in coming to you. For I long to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you, that is, that we may be mutually encouraged by each other's faith, both yours and mine. I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that I have often intended to come to you, but thus far have been prevented, in order that I may reap some harvest among you as well as among the rest of the Gentiles. I am under obligation both to the Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish, so I'm eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome.

SPEAKER_01 4:11

Such a great setup. Like there's, you know, at the beginning of this kind of legendary theological treatise from Paul that just has so many gold nuggets of of truth about the significance of Jesus. And um, right out of the gate, it's like this like setup that's like been building. Like I've been trying to get there, it hasn't worked out. Like, and so he's sending this letter kind of ahead of himself. Um, I also, as you said in the beginning, um, I hope Andrew talks about this more when he is back, but as we move into all these epistles, all these letters, for me, there's often times where I'm tempted to just skip through the greeting, kind of just read it really fast. But it's a reminder that these are actually letters that were written to specific communities. And so the context and the details that are in there actually really do matter. They're sometimes the names seem random to us, but the names are like they sort of give more weight to the historicity. These are actually people in these communities that it would have been obvious if you wrote a letter to Romans and the names, especially at the end, don't make sense to anybody. Like it's it's kind of like obviously bankrupt historically. So I think that's a helpful thing to remember.

SPEAKER_00 5:12

Well, and we'll talk about that um as we get through the epistles, a lot of these letters, because a lot of times there are clues, there are clues about their about the ministry um in the names, right? Like, like the names themselves tell you something about who is receiving the letter, who has um who has carried the letter, from where did they carry it, and to whom do they give it to. There's a lot of there are clues in the names. So on one hand, the letters are really sweet, like you said, because they're like, um, I don't know if you had any family members who used to write these like Christmas letters. Andrew's talked about that before, where we used to get them all the time. I get them less now, but they kind of give an update, you know, you know, Ben is off to college and and Sally is over here, whatever. Though these letters to me read like that. There's a sweetness to them where it's like, hey, give my regards to to Jim and um, you know, tell Sally that I miss seeing her and and stuff. So these are there's a sweetness to Paul's ministry because these are people that he actually loves and is also relying on to advance the gospel. Um, and also they give us some clues as to who is actually receiving it, and and um I can't wait to talk about that. That's a fun part of the epistle. So, anyway, back to Romans. Um, this is written to real people. Paul has not yet been to Rome. He's telling them, he's telling them, I long to go to Rome. Yep. So what is what is so he's writing this to them, but what is happening? Where is he?

SPEAKER_01 6:41

Yeah, so if if you go to Acts 20, uh, as you said, we just recently finished Acts, so you should have already read this passage. And it's pretty subtle, it doesn't say anything explicitly about Rome, but this is where um scholars think this is the context in kind of the chronology where Paul actually wrote the letter to the Romans. So Acts 20, verse 1, after the uproar had ceased, Paul sent for the disciples, and after encouraging them, he said farewell and departed for Macedonia. When he'd gone through these regions and had given them much encouragement, he came to Greece. Then he spent three months, and when a plot was made against him by the Jews as he was about to set sail for Syria, he decided to return through Macedonia. So he's in Greece, and he kind of has this period of where the rhythm kind of slows down. He's in one pace for a season. And um, this is the place where most scholars think that uh he had the time and and wrote this letter. So it's uh in the his what's known as his third missionary journey. Um, but the trip to Rome isn't actually a part of that journey, but it's the letter is written in the midst of that journey. So I think that's kind of an interesting thing to see where this fits into the details that are going on in Romans. And then if you go to Acts 27 and 28, the end of the letter, um, this is where he's been um arrested and he has this kind of prolonged journey uh where it starts in Jerusalem, um, and then in 27 he actually sails for Rome. I think this is a fascinating account because so he's already written the letter, but he's actually now going there. Um, and there's some things that go wrong that we could talk about, um, some miraculous intervention that happens to that kind of establishes his authority uh and and the place where they have this shipwreck uh and then are on the island. Um, I don't know if there are particular parts that I think I want to, is it okay if I read the beginning of 27? Go for it. Um so it says, and and when it was decided, Acts 27, verse 1, that we should sail for Italy, they delivered Paul and some other prisoners to a centurion of the Augustan cohort named Julius. And embarking in a ship of Adramedium, which was about to sail to the ports along the coast of Asia, we put to sea accompanied by Aristarchus, a Macedonian from Thessalonica. The next day we put in at Sidon, and Julius treated Paul kindly and gave him leave to go to his friends and be cared for. And putting out to sea from there we sailed under the Lee of Cyprus because the winds were against us. And when he had sailed across the open sea along the coast of Cilicia and Pamphylia, we came to Myra and Lycia. There the centurion found a ship of Alexandria sailing for Italy and put us on board. We sailed slowly for a number of days and arrived with difficulty off Snidus, and as the wind did not allow us to go farther, we sailed under the lee of Crete off Salmone. I want to I want to keep going, but I just want to pause. Like there's there's a lot of like detail that can be overwhelming and confusing. But I actually the part of the reason I want to read it is I want I want us to see like there's it's a pretty chaotic situation, and it would be if like you and I were just going on a trip somewhere and a lot of like the flag gets canceled, there's a weather delay, and so forth. But Paul's like a prisoner this whole time, so he's also like not really in control of his own situation. And I want us to see like the way in which he's so grounded and like he just has this massive authority even in that space.

SPEAKER_00 9:56

Um, so they're they're basically doing planes, trains, and automobiles.

SPEAKER_02 10:00

That's right, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:01

But like as a prisoner, and what's what's really interesting is when we think of the ancient world, but really any um the picture that that I have if someone is being is imprisoned and being sailed around and moved around, is that conditions are not very good. Yeah, but Paul's a Roman citizen, yeah. And by the power of the Holy Spirit, he also seems to have, as you said, some authority and influence. So the situation, even though he is in captivity, it's probably very different than than what what what you would immediately think of of being in captivity in the ancient world. Yeah, like he's he's being permitted to go see people to receive care. Like he's he has some freedoms and he's kind of he seems to be in relationship with his captors, it seems like, right? Yep. Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

So then verse 10, um, Paul says, Sirs, I perceive that the voyage will be with injury and much loss, not only of the cargo and the ship, but also of our lives. So he's like, This is not gonna go well. And then verse 11, but the centurion paid more attention to the pilot and to the owner of the ship than to what Paul said. So they don't do what he says, they don't listen to him. And then in starting in verse 13, it's basically exactly what Paul says is what happens. And he's remarkably, it's kind of like when Jesus is on the boat and there's the storm that comes. Like Paul's just pretty relaxed and kind of like, yeah, this is what I told you was gonna happen. Um, and then uh basically there's a point where he he has a vision. Uh, let's see, it's in verse 21. Since they'd been without food for a long time, Paul stood up among them and said, Men, you should have listened to me and not have set sail from Crete and incurred this injury and loss. Yet now I urge you to take heart, for there will be no loss of life among you, but only of the ship. For this very night there stood before me an angel of God to whom I belong and whom I worship. And he said, Do not be afraid, Paul. You must stand before Caesar, and behold, God has granted you all those who sail with you. So take heart, men, for I have faith in God that it will be exactly as I have been told. But we must run aground on some island. So there's this remarkable detour, but also uh just another example of not just Paul's faith, but also his authority, that something about kind of his contending and his presence in this boat, even though he's sort of the one that is in bondage, uh that the lives of all these people are sort of like carried by him or entrusted to him, protected for him, uh, because they're with him on this journey.

SPEAKER_00 12:36

What's what's interesting is is um he seems to have been graced with vision from God Himself about what is about to happen and what what God is not what God didn't tell him, what the angel didn't tell him is don't worry, God's got you, nothing bad is going to happen. He's in fact, he says, um, listen, everything's gonna be the way I said it was because God tell has told me this stuff, but we've got to let this ship run aground. Like this is it's gonna get worse before it gets better, but but the God of all things is sovereign over all of this, and I and he has given me vision for how this is gonna play out. I just think that is so interesting. It's like in our modern prayer lives, we almost always, always, always pray for God to make things easier on us. Always. It's like God, um now that the Lord has come into my life, or now that I feel more filled with the Holy Spirit today than I did yesterday, or if any manifestation of God's presence in my life right now must equate to a circumstance getting easier. And that's just not what's in the scriptures. Yep, it's just not there. We even saw this with Paul uh earlier, maybe in the episode or two ago, where we talked about how um, or maybe it was you that was talking to our staff about this, how there were people that felt like the Spirit of God was telling Paul not to go to Jerusalem because bad things were gonna happen to him, and Paul went to Jerusalem anyway, um, and both of those things can be true. That's right, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:23

It's not bad things did happen to him.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

The Holy Spirit didn't give one bad information and one good information, they're they both can be true. Um, and it seems to be characteristic of Paul's life that while he has this just unbelievable amount of insight into the Lord's plan and the mystery of of what God is doing, and we saw that we'll see that in Rome or uh the book of Romans, we'll talk about that in a minute. He doesn't get to avoid um difficulty. Yeah, he just doesn't get to avoid it.

SPEAKER_01 15:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:01

So interesting to me.

SPEAKER_01 15:02

Well, and you talked before about how uh in in Paul's own story when he saw, he's actually the one sort of inflicting difficulty. Like his agency is being used to create hardship and persecution for others. He's there when Stephen is stoned, the first martyr in Acts. Um, and then you had a really interesting comment. I don't know if you want to unpack it now about uh the way in which that sort of mirrors Paul's own story in a sense. There's kind of bookends.

SPEAKER_00 15:27

Yeah, yeah. I guess it's kind of like what I was just saying. Maybe this gets into a much larger discussion about um grace and mercy and then just outcomes in life. But I wonder, so I've just been wondering how like Paul continued, as the word says, breathing um breathing threats and murder or something against the against the early believers. Yeah, right. Um even he will say in some of his his letters, I was the about the most I was as Pharisaical as you could possibly be. And not meaning like in the hypocritical way that we would think now, but just in like the zealous way. Like he was a Pharisee among Pharisees, a like he was as Jewish as you could possibly get. He was as uh as much of a religious leader as you could possibly get. I mean, you get the sense that Paul is an unbelievably intense guy, yeah. And he meted out punishment and persecution against the early church because of this. And then Jesus confronts him, he's struck blind, the scales fall from his eyes, and now he's he has to spend some time learning from Barnabas, but ultimately he becomes like basically with the same level of intensity and influence, but now um for the kingdom. Yeah, he's now but what he doesn't get to do is avoid persecution, yeah, right? And I'm I want to be very, very clear. I don't feel comfortable saying that because Paul was so hard on the Christians then and he had to like it wasn't like a one-for-one formulaic, like he he received persecution in the measure that he gave it out. It seems like that's the case, but I'm not comfortable saying that in all times and all places God works on this eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth. In fact, Jesus kind of um says something very different than that in his ministry. But what is true is just because Jesus comes into your life, and in Paul's life, Jesus like slams into his life, you don't just then enjoy easy street the rest of your life. And so while grace and mercy are present, they are of eternal significance, not necessarily um getting you out of temporal consequences to the way that you've the way that you've behaved or something like that. I see this all the time um in my work as executive pastor in the church, because I just I have authority to do a lot of things in the church, whether it be from a staff perspective or or have conversations with people in our congregation, whatever it may be. And oftentimes, if um some measure of accountability needs to be imposed or something like that, someone might say, Well, we're a church, so we ought to have grace. Yes, totally, and I hear you. Um but if you like separate, if you separate for a moment from that situation and you just think about God's design for accountability, for consequence, for limits and boundaries. I talked about this with our young adults and our students the last couple weeks. Um think about the parent-child relationship. Yeah. If if if if it if there were never any limits or boundaries or consequences in a child for in a child's life imposed by the parents who've been instructed to train them up in the way that they should go, follow the Lord. And they only ever were getting like if the only form of grace they ever experienced was getting out from under consequence all the time, like would that produce fruit when that kid becomes an adult? Everybody would say no. Everybody would say no. Nobody on earth actually thinks and would say out loud that kids ought to live consequence-free lives. Now, sometimes that's how we behave or how we act because we lose nerve in the moment or for a bunch of different reasons. But my point is saying this um in God's sovereignty, what he knows is that um slipping out from under the consequences of of our sin might actually not be the thing that that that is that will bear the most fruit. Yeah. The grace and the mercy that he um allows in our lives has more to do with living a life eternal in him than avoiding eternal or avoiding temporal circ uh avoiding temporal consequences for our for our sin or something like that. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_01 20:18

Yeah, and I think a lot of times those responses, and then I I I think maybe we should look at that passage in Romans 8 that we were talking about to get us back to the text, but like there's often a like hyper-individual like thinking about sin that just assumes like I got forgiven because I sinned and it only affected me. But a lot of times, like people just pat you on the head and say it's okay, but it's not okay. Like what you did actually wrecked someone else's life. Like it's not okay, it can't be fixed. Uh, and so the the consequences, you you know, people will often say you're in control of your decisions, but you're not in control of the consequences of those those decisions. And so sometimes there's a trivialization of of actually real justice, like in terms of this actually a price has to be paid somewhere, and you can be forgiven, like in terms of eternity, you can be reconciled to the Lord. Sometimes you can even experience reconciliation with those you've sinned against, and Christians should always pursue that. But sometimes the things that have happened because of your sin really can't. They there's not like a neat like this, everything's okay, it's gotten fixed and cleaned up. Um, yeah, so I'm really like as as you think about this. So we're still talking about Paul. Paul wrote Romans, and you've actually preached on this passage. Um, one of my favorite passages, probably in the whole Bible, uh, and is in the heart of this masterful book, Romans chapter eight. I liked it. I just want to set the table up for our listeners. Kind of in the Westlean tradition, this is a Romans 8 16 is like a famous passage where the Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we're children of God. And it's this idea that you can know that you know that you know that you're a child of God, you can know that you have the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit tells you himself that you're God's. Child. So if you don't know, you can ask the Holy Spirit. He tells you. It's like this internal confirmation. And we believe that every Christian can have that. Like you can actually know. And if you don't have that, you should ask the Lord to give it to you. And if you still don't receive it, you should ask a pastor at your church to pray for you. And it's it's a deep confidence and peace that we believe God's children have. But then Romans 17 immediately follows Romans 16, 8, 16. We're in chapter 8. And it's, I mean, this is this is such a rich, like pulling out, but it has just so much nuance. And I don't know, every time I read it, it's almost like my brain just breaks because there's so much there. So the the two verses together, the Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we're children of God. And if children, then heirs. Heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, which is, I mean, that promise is staggering and astounding. But then look at how Paul then concludes the thought, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. So how do you like how does this tie into what we were talking about and kind of how you've been thinking about these two verses?

SPEAKER_00 23:04

Yeah, so first of all, just to set this up, um, as I mentioned at the beginning of this episode, we we're acknowledging that we're kind of gonna be speeding through a lot of this. Yeah. The next two weeks on the podcast, we're we're have a special guest, so we're not gonna be talking about Romans at all. By the time we get back into Romans on this podcast, we'll be middle the way through, if not more.

SPEAKER_02 23:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

Romans is an is probably the deepest theological, it is the deepest theological and the most um dense theological piece of the scriptures we have.

SPEAKER_02 23:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:42

And so because of the pace at which we're reading through this one-year Bible, we are just not going to be able to um go into deep waters in every parts of Romans. Yeah, we're just not going to be able to. So um go to if you go to YouTube, go to Asbury Church's YouTube page, and if you go to the fall of 2024, if you kind of scroll through there and you look for this, you could probably just type in Romans and and some stuff will come up. I believe it's the fall of 2024. We read through Romans as a church for several months. Pastor Andrew preached through Romans every single week. I preached one of those weeks on this passage that we're about to talk about. And then there are a couple of two or three all-church Bible studies that we did on Romans. So if if if you start having deep Romans questions, you really need to just go hunt this stuff down and it'll be worth your time because we're just not gonna be able to get to it.

SPEAKER_01 24:46

Okay, this is a gold mine. It's worth this is actually a place where it would be worth kind of slowing down if you can and going into some of this content because it's just so rich.

SPEAKER_00 24:54

Yeah, it's deep. Okay, so I th so for me, what got me, what really piqued my interest and got me looking at this in the fall of 2024 is some of the language, it's like it it um it's almost like when you say it out loud, there's like a check in your spirit because it just seems so outrageous and maybe even arrogant to claim some of the things that the scriptures are claiming about our our relationship to the the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. Yeah. Um the Spirit Himself bears witness with our Spirit that we are children of God. And if children, then heirs, okay, so we have an inheritance. Yeah. An heir only matters if there's an inheritance or if there's a furthering of the line or something like that. Yep. Right? And so heirs of God, okay, so now um God doesn't owe us anything. We we can't obligate God to something because that would negate his his godness, it would uh it would negate his sovereignty, but his covenant that he's made with us, like we we're heirs. And now this is the this is a crazy part, and then fellow heirs with Christ. Yeah. Okay. Seems important, and we'll get to this comma here in just a minute. But like, just right now, and this is what caught my this is what piqued my interest in 2024. It was like, wait, but but in all of our creeds, in in John 3.16, and we talk about Jesus as being the Father's one and only Son. Okay. Well, how are we fellow heirs with God or with uh Jesus? Well, how are we fellow heirs if we are his, if if Jesus is the one and only son? And the only way that that actually makes sense is if you are somehow, this is like I'm you're you're you're witnessing real time the check in my spirit. If you are somehow in Christ, yeah. And we know that in uh John uh 16, let's go back to John 16 real quick. It could be okay, here we go. Now let's go to John 14. John 14, chapter 15. So, so Paul is saying that that um that the spirit dwells in us, and that that spirit, the Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are heirs, fellow heirs with Christ of the Father. We have an inheritance. Well, then you start wanting to say, ask the question well, well, what did Jesus say? Yeah. Our supposed brother, or our supposed fellow heir. And in John uh 14, this is when Jesus promises um that the Holy Spirit is going to come. John chapter 14, verse 15. If you love me, you will keep my commandments, and I will ask the Father, and he will give you another helper, helper with a capital H, to be with you forever, even the spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. Okay, so we've been reading through the Bible at a rapid pace. We've been running through the Old Testament. What has God always been trying to do, but to dwell with his people? The dwelling place of God is with man, going all the way back to the garden. He walks with Adam and Eve in the cool of the day, going to the tabernacle in Exodus, going to um the the the temples and in kings, like God wants to be with his people. Yeah. Verse 18, I will not leave you as orphans. Okay, what's an orphan? Fatherless. Yeah. I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you. Yet a little while, and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. In that day you will know that I am in my father, and you in me, and I in you. This is crazy. Yeah. Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me, and he who loves me will be loved by my father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him. We're gonna go all the way to verse 24. Judas, parentheses, not a scariot, so another Judas, said to him, Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us and not to the world? Jesus said, If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. Okay, so now just in this passage, we've had a few examples of GD Jesus. Obedience really matters to Jesus. So we cannot earn, we cannot earn, um, we cannot earn God's grace and mercy and and uh salvation. And the way that you earn something when you put something in a vending machine and you push a button, like it's it is owed to you now, right? Like I can force the vending machine's hand by formulaically doing the right things, and now the Kit Kat comes out. And if it doesn't come out, somebody owes me something, right? Like this is this is not that. But obedience, somehow obedience is like this active ingredient for that we have agency over. We do have agency over our own and be obedience, and Jesus is very clear about that. If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my father will love him, and he will come to him and make our home with him. There it is again. The dwelling place of God is with man. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words, and the word that you hear is not mine, but the father's who sent me. So even here, you have you have so much going on. Yeah, you have obedience with us, you have you have the obedience of Jesus. Notice how Jesus' obedience to the Father doesn't negate his like godness, like it doesn't um, it doesn't um reduce Jesus' dignity to be to be subordinate to the Father when he is with us, like in bodily form. I mean, it's just oh my gosh, there's so much here.

SPEAKER_01 31:48

Yeah. And I part of what's powerful about I know we've kind of gone in a several different places, um, but it's it's one story. Like it's talking about the person Jesus and what difference he makes for our lives today. And so it's I think that's I mean, one of the things I think I struggle most with as a teacher and preacher is these kind of passages where you're just trying to get people to see like the the plain sense of the text, which is overwhelming and amazing. Like everything is offered to us. Um, as you were talking, I was thinking about, and I I've gone back and forth because I'm afraid it'll be too trivial. But people, this this isn't me, but people I know and love um are can get obsessed with like the British monarchy, like just thinking about the royals, anytime there's a royal event, um and just like as a hobby or or or yeah, just the the kind of cultural interest. Yeah, the cultural interest and and the sort of pomp and circumstance and and the excellence that goes into planning like a royal wedding or coronation, those kind of things. Um, but also I think there's this interest that people have because they're in this lineage, like these are important people, they're heirs to this, like, and so there's also always been an interest like in the children and and those kind of things.

SPEAKER_00 32:59

Um and well, for our yeah, it's a modern novelty almost. Like it doesn't happen. Yeah, I mean, it's if you're a conservative, and I don't mean a political conservative, but like a small c conservative, a preservationist type, like you would root for the monarchy to continue, even though we don't have to live under it, only because it's so interesting. Yep.

unknown 33:19

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 33:19

There's nothing really like that anymore.

SPEAKER_01 33:21

Anyway, go ahead. And so the but the thing that's interesting to me is that in scripture, like the the invitation is through faith in Jesus, we all actually can be royals, but of the one who created the heavens and the earth, like of the Lord Himself. Like it's it's crazy. It's not crazy, it's not a particular temporal thing that will pass away at some point and there will be some new lineage or some new form of government. It's actually like heirs of God. That's the Christian like claim. It's radical and audacious, and it's true. Um, and a lot of I think one of the the challenging things that that I face, kind of as on on this side of the table, in a sense, trying to figure out is like, how do we activate the people of God to live as if they're heirs of the Father Himself, the one who created everything that is? And with that kind of authority, that you see Paul's a great example. Like, he doesn't just get all anxious and start wringing his hands. I don't know what I'm gonna do, I've been arrested, I guess it's over. Like he knows that he's an heir of God the Father, and so he keeps his eyes fixed on Jesus and he's filled with the Holy Spirit and he keeps moving forward. And so even at the end of Acts, like he's in Rome, like he's made it, he's testifying to the gospel before not just the Jewish authorities now, but the most important authorities of his day and time in the entire world. Like he's before the powers and principalities testifying to the gospel. So he just keeps his eye fixed on on kind of the goal that he's moving towards constantly.

SPEAKER_00 34:45

You said how do we activate the people of God almost like how do you how do you um continue to help people wake up to the reality, the spiritual reality that they live in? Um I think Paul in chapter eight has a lot to say about that. Like Paul is Paul is working out some of these words of Jesus. I mean, I don't want to read the entire eighth chapter on this podcast just for time's sake, but I mean, look at look at what he says. Let's just go. Well, okay, I'll read it. Chapter 8, 1 through 9. I'm gonna probably end up reading the whole thing, but whatever. There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. Okay, so we we've we've been reading through the Old Testament, the law of sin and death. Listen, look at Judges, look at the kings, look at these periods where where these people cannot, they cannot stop sinning. Like they can't do it. They they're um they're continuing to give themselves over to foreign gods. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. For those who live according to the flesh, set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the spirit set their minds on the things of the spirit. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law. Indeed it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. Here we go. You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit. If in fact the spirit of God dwells in you, anyone who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the sp although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness. If the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. Then he goes on to talk about our sonship and being heirs. So the question, how do you awaken? And you're you're our cre you're the the senior director of Christian formation here. Um you've spent a lot of time on formation in your academic life.

SPEAKER_02 37:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:20

Jesus says, so let's just make this really simple. Jesus says that those who are those who obey his commands are in the Father and in him. So we just talked about this. There's an obedience factor here. Um and Paul says, if you're in the spirit, then then you set your mind on the things of the spirit. So, in a lot of ways, living into the reality that we are somehow participating in this Trinitarian life kind of requires just doing it. Yeah. Like you just go for it. Like you, you go, you go with boldness and confidence that that the scriptures are true and that Jesus' words are true, and you stop speaking this slavery to sin and death over yourself and making excuses that, like, well, that's just how I am. That just comes with the dinner. This little sin pattern, it just is what it is. Like, I I I guess some people are like this, but I'm like that, and I guess it's gonna be my lot in life. No, it's not.

SPEAKER_02 38:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:25

Like, like, if you set your mind on the things of the spirit, and the spirit dwells in you, like like you can that pattern can be broken. Yeah, you do not have to live with that sin pattern. Yeah, and you are an heir along with Jesus. It's just crazy. Yeah, it's awesome. Anyway, it's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 38:47

And I I mean, I love the way it builds. This is why it's so masterful. Like Paul's saying, the law, it's not bad, it just didn't work. It's like it's showing you what's good and true, but it's also sort of like breaking people, like, and they're then they're just they're lost. And so the the solution is Jesus coming. And then verse nine, uh, which you read, like it it raises this concern that, like, okay, so how do I know if the spirit is in me? Because that's the solution. Like, if the spirit dwells in you, um, and so then Romans 16 and 17 is telling you how you can know that the spirit is in you. Like, it's not God doesn't play hide and go seek, it's not like some kind of cruel guessing game where you can't figure it out. Like, the spirit himself bears witness with our spirits that we're children of God. Like the Holy Spirit tells us, like, he wants us to know, he wants us to have that peace because he wants us to win. He doesn't want us to just keep falling down and and you know making a mess of our faith over and over and over again. So we can actually live victorious lives now through faith in Christ and the empowerment of the Holy Spirit.

SPEAKER_00 39:44

Today, let's go. Yeah, this fires me up. So I think, I mean, gosh, there's just so much there. We could go for four hours, but we're not going to. Um, I think we should stop there. My encouragement to the folks who are listening um to this particular episode is you really like either just get just get through the text. Paul's gonna say things that are deep and confusing, and and um if you desire to go deeper, then go back to the fall of 2024 on our YouTube page. So much there. Andrew did some great teaching, some great Bible studies, some great preaching on this stuff. You really, really, really should go back and and supplement your reading. Or just know that um Paul working out, Paul, Paul's working out the theological working out of of um what happened in Christ and moving from basically the law to the spirit, like that's a that is a central, that's a central part of our belief system as as Christians. Yeah. And and there's a lot of debate within the within Christ Church over what each little line means, but the bottom line is that's what Paul is doing here in this in in this chunk of the letter.

SPEAKER_01 41:06

Yeah, and I just encourage people, if you haven't ever read Romans all the way through before, uh, you don't have to understand everything. You you can't, you won't the first reading through. If it's your first time, it shouldn't be your last. So just get you know, get familiar with it. Uh, there will be some things that stand out. Let the spirit speak to you and just kind of stay with the things that stick out. If there's places where you get confused the whole year through the Bible point in some senses, you just got to keep going. And there's plenty of time to come back to it later.

SPEAKER_00 41:33

Amen. Okay, that was fun. That's it. Um, that's it for today. We did it. Um this is deep, deep water, but it's fun. It's fun, deep. It's fun, deep water. Yeah, it's uh it's it's good stuff. We'll see you. Uh we'll be back in the reading plan. Like I said, in a few weeks. Um, you should listen in the next couple of weeks because um I had the opportunity to do a really fun interview about um the modern church with someone who I think is just doing incredible work. And so that's going to be the next two episodes. Um, but for now, we're done. This has been the Year Through the Bible podcast. I'm Rodney. I'm Kevin. See you next time.