Last week we looked at Paul’s argument for God concluding all men under sin that he might include them all in grace. There is the law of the Gentiles written on their hearts and the Law of the Jews given by Moses. Both Jew and Gentile are accountable to their own laws but while there can be moral uprightness by obedience to each neither one can bring righteousness. Righteousness and a reconciled relationship with God comes from God alone – apart from both laws – and it comes only through faith. So, as he says in other places, there is no difference now between Gentile and Jew because all have…

1.  This is the defining event in the history of Israel. Through no fault of their own and not due to their sin they are enslaved for 430 years. A new king has no regard for Joseph and the contribution of the Hebrews to Egypt. He is afraid of them and their lack of loyalty to the State religion. It is also the experience that – along with the Babylonian exile – formed their character as a people. In the Exodus we also find some of the literary elements that are present even today. The first several chapters of the book are lasting examples of Jewish humor. It’s not vaudeville…

For most of us, we sketch out what we want to say, edit it, scratch out things, rearrange and reorder and only then do we come up with the final form. Others, like some claim for Shakespeare, write without edits or drafts and so quickly they can produce enormous amounts of material in their lifetime. I would like to know what it was for Paul. Did he draft and edit before sending? Did he practice what he wanted to say before reducing it to writing? Were these sermons and teachings he had given many, many times and it was only when he wrote these epistles that we see them almost…

Last week we left Paul as he described the chilling process of wrath that leads to death. It is not merely a laundry list of sins with each becoming worse than the last. It is a path with gateways that leads in a direction toward a particular destination. Just as there is a journey of sanctification there is a journey of destruction. And what is at the end of the passage that sums up the degree of their sin? What is the thing that completes the cycle? “They not only continue to do those very things but also approve of those who practice them.” What is detestable becomes normal. What…

When we left Paul last week he was in Corinth and had just finished telling the Roman church that he was looking forward to seeing them. He opens with his calling as an apostle even though much of the leadership of the early church thought of him as an outsider and someone pushing his way in. And then he reiterates his special calling to the Gentiles and we looked at all the years he had spent unsuccessfully preaching to the Jews. But, we also said it is often the case that those very things we might consider failure and wasted effort might well be God’s way of keeping us occupied…