Order, Words, & Voices
05.07.23, Mutually Encouraged, Romans 1:1-17
Order
Pre Worship Music
Opening Song Billy/Linda
Father of Love
Faithful One
Call to Worship Response/Lord’s Prayer Rick
Reading Romans 1:1-17 Cricklins
Songs Billy/Linda
Be the Center
Jesus Lover of my soul
Message Mutually Encouraged Rick
Music Jesus, Lover of My Soul Billy/Linda
Community/Peace Rick
Benediction Rick
Post Worship Music
Slides Note: There is a blank title slide between each Section – except for message/sermon slides.
Music (slides)
Jesus Lover Of My Soul
Verse
Jesus lover of my soul
Jesus I will never let You go
You’ve taken me from the miry clay
You’ve set my feet upon the rock
And now I know
Chorus
I love You I need You
Though my world may fall
I’ll never let You go
My Savior my closest Friend
I will worship You until the very end
Faithful One
Verse
Faithful One so unchanging
Ageless One You’re my Rock of peace
Lord of all I depend on You
I call out to You again and again
I call out to You again and again
Chorus
You are my Rock in times of trouble
You lift me up when I fall down
All through the storm
Your love is the anchor
My hope is in You alone
Ending
My hope is in You
My hope is in You
Our hope is in You alone
Call to Worship (Slides)
Leader: The gospel is about God
Response: The gospel is about what God did in sending the Son
Leader: The gospel is proven in the resurrection of the crucified Son
Response: What God did in enthroning Jesus at His right hand
Leader: The gospel is mirrored in the human sphere
Response: May what is in heaven be also on earth
Leader: The gospel is the story of God’s faithfulness
Response: God was faithful to the faithful Christ
Leader: The gospel is the call to us to be faithful to the resurrected Messiah
Response: God was first faithful to us
Leader: May we be a reflection of God’s faithfulness
Response: May we be a reflection of Jesus’ faithfulness
Lord’s Prayer (Slides) ‘Join me in the prayer of Jesus’
Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, On Earth as it is in Heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our trespasses, while we forgive those who trespass against us. And, lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen.
Reading (Slides)
A letter from Paul to the believers in Rome – ‘I am a slave of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for God’s good news. God promised this good news about his Son ahead of time through his prophets in the holy scriptures.
Jesus was a descendant from David. He was publicly identified as God’s Son with power through his resurrection. God’s Son is Jesus Christ our Lord.
Jesus’ descent from David roots him in history; his unique identity as Son of God was shown by the Spirit when Jesus was raised from the dead, which identified him as the Messiah.
Through him we received both the generous gift of his life and the urgent task of passing it on to you, the gentiles, who receive it by entering into obedient trust in Jesus. You are who you are through this gift and call of Jesus Christ!
First of all, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you,everywhere I go people keep telling me about your lives of faith, and every time I hear them, I thank God.
And every time I think of you in my prayers, which is practically all the time, I ask God to clear the way for me to come and see you.
Please don’t misinterpret my failure to visit you, you have no idea how many times I’ve made plans for Rome but something always prevents my trip.
I am determined to get some personal enjoyment out of God’s work among you. I want to be with you so we can mutually encourage each other. We can be encouraged by the faithfulness we find in each other, both your faithfulness and mine.
That’s why I’m ready to preach the gospel to everyone. I’m not ashamed of the gospel: it is God’s own power for salvation to all who have faith in God, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
God’s righteousness is being revealed in the gospel, from faithfulness for faith, as it is written, The righteous person will live by faith.
Romans 1:1-17 (CEB & The Message)
Music (Slides)
Be The Center
Verse 1
Jesus be the center
Be my source be my light
Jesus
Verse 2
Jesus be the center
Be my hope be my song
Jesus
Chorus
Be the fire in my heart
Be the wind in these sails
Be the reason that I live
Jesus Jesus
Verse 3
Jesus be my vision
Be my path be my guide
Jesus
Jesus Lover Of My Soul
Verse
Jesus lover of my soul
Jesus I will never let You go
You’ve taken me from the miry clay
You’ve set my feet upon the rock
And now I know
Chorus
I love You I need You
Though my world may fall
I’ll never let You go
My Savior my closest Friend
I will worship You until the very end
Message – Seeing Good (Slides)
About 2-3 years after the resurrection of Jesus, the Pharisee named Saul, met the risen Jesus on the road to Damascus. Saul was headed to Damascus as a passionate official of the Jewish institution on a mission to stop the rise of Jesus’ believers. As Saul met Jesus, Jesus redirected Saul’s passion and purpose from defeating a movement to being a leader of that very Jesus’ movement.
After this conversion, Saul became better known by his Roman name, Paul. Soon, he was a preacher of the resurrection, and of the life he himself had found in Jesus. For a decade Paul traveled to Jewish communities teaching of the resurrection, leading people to the hope and peace of Jesus Christ. In most of the places, as a group of Jesus followers coalesced, Paul would stay long enough to teach them the basics and prepping leadership for what would soon be known as churches. Then, Paul would leave to the next community, often writing letters to those followers in the places he had left – letters encouraging them and sometimes confronting them based on the news that had come to him.
As we saw last week, after that first decade, Paul and Barnabas were ‘set aside’ to begin preaching to the gentiles, mostly in gentile cities. This was quite a shift for this former passionate anti-Jesus Jewish official.
As Paul began his third decade he began hearing of a group of followers in the city of Rome. A group of Jesus believers that included Jewish believers and Gentile believers. Paul desperately wanted to go to Rome and meet this church for the first time. Especially after hearing about their growing gentile membership – Paul wanted to meet this church and these believers.
While Paul had heard of the successes of the church in Rome, he also had heard of their troubles. Years before, the Jews had been kicked out of Rome, this included the Jewish Jesus followers. During their five years in exile the church in Rome had continued to grow but now primarily with gentile believers and leaders. So, when the Jewish members were allowed back in Rome, the Roman church had lost its Jewishness and the practices the Jews expected. Naturally, there were tensions – the gentile believers had become the church leadership as well as the majority of membership.
It is important to also know that, while Paul had not met them, they too, had not met Paul. The church at Rome did not really know Paul or about Paul. This is Paul’s purpose in the first 17 verses of Romans as he seeks to introduce himself to these people. It is also key for us to understand the basics of Paul’s heart in approaching them.
The church at Rome was a surprising success yet also now a fragile mess, Paul wanted to be a part of strengthening these followers while at the same time growing from time spent with them.
As Paul begins with an introduction of himself, and then proceeding to the shared belief he has with the believers in Rome, he is faced with a quandary. First, which Saul/Paul do these people know? Did they know the fervent and passionate Jewish official set on protecting the sanctity and holiness of the Jewish institution no matter the cost – including the persecution of the Jews believers. Or, did they know of the Saul/Paul, still fervent and passionate protector of the sanctity and holiness of the God whose promise had now reached beyond the Jews to now include the gentiles?
(Slide – screen share through ‘end screen share’ note)Then, Paul closes out this opening introductory section of his letter with his famous line, “I am not ashamed of the gospel.” This is probably an intentional address to the different perspectives the believers had of Paul. Is he speaking to the changes in his own perspective where he was first trying to stop the Jesus’ movement but now he is advancing the Jesus’ narrative? Was he addressing his own Romaness, Hebrewness, and now his own Jesusness? Whatever their perspective of Paul was, he just wanted to get to Rome.
(Slide) ‘One of the first things we discover in Romans 1 is that the gospel Paul proclaims is part of a larger story. It is an act of God that God had previously promised in scripture. Before the gospel is about our faith toward God, it is about God first keeping faith with us.
(Slide) The inclusion of the Gentiles is a crucial component of Paul’s message. Human obedience to God must be as broad as Jesus’ lordship is to the world.
(Slide) It is not enough for God to save Israel, as fulfillment of God’s promise in scripture; instead, both Gentiles and Jews must live into the new reality that has begun with Jesus’ resurrection-enthronement.’ (J.R. Daniel Kirk)
(Slide) Paul says, ‘I’m always asking that somehow, by God’s will, I might succeed in visiting you at last. I really want to see you, to pass along some spiritual gift to you, so that you can be strengthened. What I mean is that WE can mutually encourage each other while I am with you. We can be encouraged by the faithfulness we find in each other, both your faithfulness and mine.’
(Romans 1:11-12)
(Slide) Listen again as Paul’s emotions almost fumble through his attempt to convey how much and why he wants to be with the believers in Rome, ‘Here is what I mean to say…I want to be with you so that we, you and I, can be mutually encouraged by each other. We can all be encouraged by the faithfulness we find in each other, me through your faithfulness and you through my faithfulness.’
(End Screen Share)
Although Paul places such an emphasis on his desire to be with them, he then writes them the letter we call the book of Romans. Romans is Paul’s presentation of the Good News, the gospel – written as evidence of the shared common ground of Paul with the church at Rome. It is also a reminder to this church experiencing division of their common ground, the core sameness, that these gentiles and Jews share with each other.
What is the Good News, the Gospel? Traditionally in the life of protestant evangelicals, the idea of sharing, spreading, the gospel has meant converting people to institutional Christianity centered on the concept of heaven – ‘Will you go to heaven when you die?’ The dynamic result of that has been a form of discipleship based on control, controlling behaviors of those converts while here on earth, oddly, through a focus on the OT law, primarily those areas of behaviors, morals, focus on the current things considered most evil. Then this control is the underlying foundation of all the human discipling efforts that take place.
This would not have been the definition of The Gospel expressed by Paul, nor would it have been the core of the life and teachings of Jesus.
The first question would not have been about death, but about life – primarily about life lived now as well as eternally.
For Paul, Good news is…
- (Slide) Revelation of God’s Righteousness in Jesus/Proven in the Resurrection – through life. Testified in our lives.
- (Slide) Creation of New Humanity out of Diversity – discipleship for all
- (Slide) Fulfillment of God’s Promise to Israel (Paul’s personal pain)
- (Slide) Unified Jesus believing Church
But, none of this is our primary emphasis for these first 17 verses in Paul’s letter to the church at Rome. The message of this introductory section is a message of connection. It was not so that he could build his ‘convert’ statistics – Paul wanted this true human connection. He had heard about their faith and wanted to experience their faith. Paul had heard of their increasing numbers of gentile believers and he wanted to learn from the testimonies the believers had established in their community. A testimony 95% accomplished through their lives and not with their voices. He wanted the Roman Jesus believer experience.
Paul understood that he was not an island. If you read his travel journals you will quickly notice that he is almost always accompanied by another apostle or church leader. Paul is a lifelong learner. Just because he has been commissioned by the Church, he is still in pursuit of more knowledge and in the journeys of other believers. He doesn’t go into a town to fix them but to know them, to learn from them, to help and assist them. He goes, as he defines in his introduction to the Romans, he goes to be encouraged by them and to be an encouragement to them – Mutually Encouraged.
Our human nature conditions us to aspire for an ultimate moment of no longer needing to learn, to a state of being – when we know it all and we only need others in order to teach and correct them while bossing them around. This is largely how religious institutions operate, ‘We Know, Stick With Us and Learn Everything From Us’ philosophy. We have seen this as churches get a new pastor or leader, the one who knows exactly how to fix everything. Policies and practices are altered and people are dismissed. Businesses and politicians do the same thing – I would say that they have learned from the church. Never listening to the people that are already there, or those who have done the work before, just coming in, building a bubble, and doing everything their way.
If there is anything to learn about Paul, anything that is a epiphany to those who have studied any of Paul’s writing, anything new in Paul’s opening is that we all need others.
(Slide – leave up until ‘exit screen share note’) Percival Lowell was an astronomer and mathematician in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. It was his work that theorized the existence of a ninth planet Pluto discovered after his passing. Lowell spent most of his career focused on Mars though. He moved to Flagstaff Arizona and built one of the premier observatories where he spent the next 25 years mapping the surface of Mars. Even with the best telescope, it was not an easy task so he developed techniques and a special lens that let him narrow the aperture of the telescope far more narrowly than previously possible allowing him to see the surface of Mars. His maps were accepted by some and not accepted by others, his analysis that martians did exist was the basis for many scifi books and movies including the classic ‘War of the Worlds’. When the Mariner orbiter was able to get close enough to Mars in 1964 it proved Lowell’s mapping and theories to be false. Researchers, later while trying to figure out why Lowell was so mistaken, discovered that when you narrow your lens as much as he did, to such an extreme, then the image actually reverses, meaning that Lowell spent 25 years mapping the inside surface of his own eyeball.
When our perspective is too narrow, our religion is too narrow, our worldview is too narrow, our experiences are too limited, then we don’t see the world as it is. We see the world as we are. We map our own self onto the world. We think we’re looking at Mars, but we’re really mapping our own eyeballs unknowingly. We think we’re looking at society, but society is really just reflecting back to us what is already within us.
(Exit Screen Share)
The Gospel is about opening us up wider, to see more of the world as it is and not as we wish it were, and not as we already are. The Gospel teaches us how to live in reality, and it reminds us that our perspective with which we see is good but limited, and because it is so limited, there is reason to exercise grace and mercy gratuitously in life both with ourselves and others.
Music (Slides)
Jesus Lover Of My Soul
Verse
Jesus lover of my soul
Jesus I will never let You go
You’ve taken me from the miry clay
You’ve set my feet upon the rock
And now I know
Chorus
I love You I need You
Though my world may fall
I’ll never let You go
My Savior my closest Friend
I will worship You until the very end
Community (Slides)
- Next Sunday, May 14, Guest Speaker – Kyle Tubbs, Matthew 9:27-31
- Book Study Interest, Armageddon, Speak, email, or text Rick if interested.
Benediction (Blank Slide)
May we walk securely in the confidence of the defeat of death on the cross. May we release our burdens at the wonder of the empty grave. May we continue forward in our hope proven through the resurrection. May we meet our world understanding the blessedness and struggle of humanity. May we live in our reality with the challenge to be salt and light. May we show Jesus through our lives. May we see others with God’s eyes. May we glorify God in our lives.
Closing Peace
Leader: May the Peace and Hope of the Lord go with you.
Response: And also with you.
Leader: Go in the Peace and Hope of the Lord.
Order, Words, & Voices 