Unshakable Love! Romans Week 29, March 19, 2023
Introduction
God’s Unwavering Support
A Rhetorical Question
Since salvation turns on the will of God, not the will of man, opposition to God from the human realm is not really an issue
A Parent’s Sacrificial Love
Precedent
God’s Unquestionable Justification
The declaration of righteousness
The intercession of Christ
God’s Unbreakable Bond
God’s Unwavering Love.
Our Triumph in Christ
We are more than conquerors!
God’s Unconditional Love
Our Certainty
Our Ultimate Assurance
Conclusion
At its greatest extent, the Roman Empire reached as far north as the British Isles, into Europe as far as modern Germany, eastward throughout Asia Minor, and around the eastern Mediterranean rim south throughout North Africa. The Romans were conquerors and builders in the tradition of the world’s greatest empires. In fact, they were the greatest empire yet to cast a shadow across the plain of human history. And yet Paul, in his letter to the Roman believers in A.D. 57, said that Christians were “more than conquerors.” Little did the Christians in the world’s mightiest city, in the heart of the Roman Empire, know how they were about to be called upon to be “more than conquerors.”
As the Romans, over time, embraced the worship of many gods inherited from surrounding peoples—Isis, Dionysus, Mithras, Cybele, and others—they also offered official recognition to long-standing religions such as Judaism. Since the days of Julius Caesar, Judaism had been allowed to exist in the Roman Empire as a minority sect which seemed not to cause harm—witness the coexistence of Roman rule and Jewish rule in Jerusalem as evidenced in the Gospels and Acts. But when Christian missionaries fanned out from Jerusalem with the gospel in the A.D. 30s they headed straight for the Jewish quarters in Roman cities—especially Rome—and began making converts. As evidenced from Paul’s closing in Romans 16, there were many believers in Rome with whom he was on a first-name basis.
For nearly thirty years Roman officials looked upon Christianity as a variant sect of Judaism, and paid it little heed. But as Christians became more numerous, and tension between Jews and Christians increased (witness the Roman historian Tacitus’s record of a conflict among the Jews in Rome regarding one “Chrestus,” probably a reference to Christ), officials began to recognize that Christianity was different from Judaism, and that it was gaining in influence. Public and official opinion began to turn against Christianity, and in A.D. 64—seven years after the writing of Romans—it took an ugly turn.
On July 19, a fire swept through Rome, raging for seven days, destroying ten of the fourteen wards in the city. Many felt that Emperor Nero was responsible, using it as a form of urban renewal, since he grabbed prime real estate after the fire on which to build his own new palace. To turn the tide of negative opinion from himself, Nero blamed the Christians in Rome. For the next four years, until Nero’s death in A.D. 68, Christians were persecuted, impaled on poles and used as torches, thrown to ravenous dogs in the arenas, and made to spill their blood over Rome and much of the empire. Even Paul and Peter were killed during this period of persecution.
But who conquered whom in that tragic period of persecution? We need only to look around the world today and see a worldwide church—and no Roman Empire—to answer the question. Apparently, the words that Paul wrote in Romans 8 had taken root during the seven years between his letter and the start of Nero’s persecution. The “persecution,” “danger,” and “sword” (Rom. 8:35) of Nero were not enough to conquer the church of Jesus Christ. The church turned out to be more than (their) conquerors!
What did the Roman believers think of Paul’s words when they first heard them read in a meeting of the church? Did they think Paul was warning them about a coming persecution? What do we think about his words when we read them today? Could a time come today when the church of Jesus Christ will undergo persecution such as Nero’s? The modern church needs to learn from the church at Rome how to conquer the conquerors. Paul did not write Romans 8 as an exercise in theology, but as instructions for how to live free from the fear of being separated from the love of God—regardless of what test may come. If we are not ready to light up the modern skies with the flame of our faith, then we have not yet internalized Paul’s message.