I Thank My God
Notes
Transcript
Over the last two weeks, we have looked at Paul’s salutation to the church at Rome. Now, he begins to move into the meat of his letter. Already, he has praised God for the Gospel, Salvation, and his calling into the ministry. It is the same calling that the church at Rome received.
Today, we are going to look a little further into this first chapter of Romans. Turn in your Bibles to Romans 1. We are going to read the next section of text, though we will not cover all of it today.
8 First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world. 9 For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers; 10 Making request, if by any means now at length I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come unto you. 11 For I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift, to the end you may be established; 12 That is, that I may be comforted together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me. 13 Now I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that oftentimes I purposed to come unto you, (but was let hitherto,) that I might have some fruit among you also, even as among other Gentiles. 14 I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians; both to the wise, and to the unwise. 15 So, as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also. 16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. 17 For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.
PRAY
Paul says in Romans 1:8
8 First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world.
The first point he wants to make, the first thing he wants to tell the church at Rome, “I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all”.
Paul, not careless with his word use, reveals the first thing he wants the church at Rome to know, that is, that he thanks For for them and he does this through Jesus Christ.
Don’t miss this. That word through is vital. This word through was used to speak of passage from one side of a gate to the other; to pass through the gate. Paul’s prayer of thanksgiving pass from him to God, through Jesus. Jesus is the mediator of the prayer.
How said that the church at Rome forgot this point! Jesus is our intercessor, our mediator. We pray through him and him alone. No where in the New Testament are we taught to pray through Mary, a priest, pastor, or anyone else. We may pray for someone, but we do not pray through anyone but Jesus. It is Christ alone who sits on the right hand of the Father (Hebrews 8:1), and ever lives to make intercession for us (Hebrews 7:25). Because of Jesus’s work as our High Priest, our intercessor, the writer of Hebrews said that we should come boldly unto the throne of grace (Hebrews 4:16).
Paul was praying a prayer of thanksgiving for the church at Rome. “I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all”! This church that he had never met was a source of thanksgiving for Paul.
We should absolutely thank God for our own church, but do we thank God for other churches? Do we lift the ministries of others up to God in prayer?
I can remember growing up, I say pastors who were jealous of preachers whose church grew faster than theirs. This jealousy festered until it turned into gossip and slander. To use Luke’s words from Acts 15:39, “And the contention was so sharp between them, that they departed asunder one from the other”. Men that I respected departed from fellowship because they believed that a growing church must be doing something wrong and thus looked for the spec in their brother’s eye while ignoring the beam in their own eye. It is a wound that has not healed 18 years later.
I also remember youth workers being jealous because one youth group performed a song better than their youth group. There was no mal intent, there was no desire to one-up the other choirs. There were actually three youth groups that sang the same song that night because none of them communicated with the others what they were going to sing. However, rather than laugh about it, rather than thanking God for the participation of so many youth, jealousy sprung up. With that, there was also a heated argument among adults that left kids in tears.
Paul was not in a competition with this church. He had the same heart as James who recorded “Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be” (James 3:10). We should not praise God for his blessings and then curse another church because God is blessing them. We should not sing praise to God and then condemn a different youth group, or other ministry because they do something better than us. Who is to say how God views the efforts of others.
Remember when Samuel was sent to anoint a new king of Israel. He went to Jesse and said “show me your sons because God has selected them to be the next King of Israel.” Jesse showed him the oldest and God said no.
7 But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.
We judge based on what we can see, but we do not see what God sees. I can tell you this, if our heart is ugly then God sees ugly. If we allow our efforts to be overshadowed by jealousy or pride, that is what God will see. We are not in competition with each other. We are in combat with Satan and his forces. Lets not lose sight of that and make other Christians and other churches our enemies.
What was it about them that Paul was grateful for? He says, “that your faith is spoken of throughout the world.” This church was known for their faith.
This faith that they were known for was a saving faith. That is the only way into the church. Ye must be born again. These believers at Rome had believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and they were saved.
Their faith was an enduring faith. Peter nor Paul started the Church in Rome. At this point, neither had been to Rome. This church was likely started by Jewish converts, possibly from the Day of Pentecost. In A.D. 49, Emperor Claudius expelled all Jews from Rome. This would include Christian Jews. The Gentile believers were left on their own.
Think about that! The Jews were the ones who knew the scriptures. It is possible that these Romans had a copy of the Septuagint, which is the Old Testament translated into Greek. We honestly do not know this to be true or not. However, the Old Testament was the History of the Jews. They and their ancestors had lived it. However, these Romans had faith to endure and continue on for the Lord.
9 For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers; 10 Making request, if by any means now at length I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come unto you.
Paul wants the Romans to know that he is not just trying to sound spiritual. He says that God is his witness that he does not cease to make mention of them always in his prayers. Paul prayed for this church that he had never been to.
His care and concern for their prosperity in the Gospel work drove him to his knees. It drove him to the throne of God. He thanked Go for them but also, he prayed to be able to visit them. We will get into why he wanted to visit this church next week. However, let us think about this point for a little while. Paul loved a church that he had never been to, he prayed continuously for this church, and he earnestly desired to visit this church. This was no small task. Paul would travel from Jerusalem to Rome. That is roughly 1400 miles as the crow flies. Let me give you some perspective on that.
1400 miles is about the distance from Glennville to Denver, Colorado
or from Glennville to Bismark, North Dakota
or from Glennville to Mexico City
or Managua, Nicaragua
1400 miles takes you almost past the island of Puerto Rico.
To give us a clearer picture, most scholars believe that Paul wrote Romans from Corinth. If that is true, he was 2/3 of the way from Jerusalem to Rome but traveled back to Jerusalem. Imagine being in Kansas City and driving back to Glennville, only to turn around and drive back to Denver.
Conclusion
Are we jealous when we hear of the success and faithfulness of others? If so, we should repent of this. Envy or jealousy is a sin. It sets our hearts and minds against others. Instead, we should be like Paul and be thankful for those who labor in the Gospel with us. The job of evangelism is too big for any one person or church. It takes all of the saints of God. Pray for someone else this week. Pray for another church this week. Continue to pray for our church an each other, but also lift up another church; that God would bless their faithfulness.