What the Gospel Reveals: A Study of Paul's Epistle to the Romans

By Robby Charters

Paul begins, "I am not ashamed of the Gospel, since it is power of God ... in it is revealed --" ... well, what is revealed in the Gospel? A study guide for Paul's Epistle to the Romans from a Judeo Christian Perspective

• Language: English
• Publisher: Robby's eBook Formtting
• Release date: Feb 6, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311203595

Robby Charters

I live with my wife and my son, sometimes in Thailand where I was born and my wife is from, sometimes in Ireland where my dad is from. In Thailand, I taught English as a second language. Here in Ireland, I work from home, turning people's manuscripts into e-books. Wherever I am, I write.

Book preview

Chapter 1 – What the Gospel Reveals – Paul launches his message with verses 16,17 – For I am not ashamed of the Good News, since it is God’s powerful means of bringing salvation to everyone who keeps on trusting, to the Jew especially, but equally to the Gentile. For in it is revealed how God makes people righteous in his sight; and from beginning to end it is through trust — as the Tanakh puts it, But the person who is righteous will live his life by trust. (CJB)

Key phrase: For in it isrevealedhow God makes people righteous in his sight... If we take the key word revealed as a clue, we can divide the first part of Romans into sections: What's revealed is 1. God's wrath (1:18 – 3:20), and 2. God's means of making people righteous (3:21 ff).

vs. 18: What is revealedis God’s anger from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people who in their wickedness keep suppressing the truth …(CJB)

The rest of chapter 1 can be divided into two parts: the root problem, and the symptoms.

The Root Problem:verses 18-23 describe humanity's refusal to acknowledge God,

The root of it all is humanity's suppression of the knowledge of God. By not thanking and glorifying God, humanity has lost the focus, and become futile, undiscerning and lost in the dark.

Proverbs 1:7 – The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Vs 18-23 describes the inverse of Prov 1:7.

The Symptom, or the result of suppressing the knowledge of God:

vs 23-32 describes the outward results. By rejecting the beginning of wisdom they let themselves in for every form of sin (Prov 8:13 – The fear of God is hatred ofevil.)

Emphases is on the rejection of the knowledge of God in vs 18-22. The situation described in vs 24-32 is secondary. Much of the failure of religion is due to not distinguishing the symptoms (vs 18-22) from the root problem (vs 23-32).

Chapter 2:1-3:20 – How we, as humans, tend to deal with the root problem and the symptoms. It's easy to notice the symptoms (1:23-32), but understanding the root cause (1:18-23) takes more perception. However, the clues are there for those who will look for them.

Verses 1-16 describes those who fail to regard thesymptomsas secondary, and instead, judge their fellow humans by their failures. Though some interpret this as referring to the Jews, the wording of this verse,...whoever you are...,makes it clear that Paul is addressing humanity in general.

According to Jesus and James, judging puts us in the position to be judged according to the criteria by which we judge. It only serves to highlight the fact that we have no excuse when we do the same things. Whether we actually do it to a greater or lesser degree than those whom we've judged, doesn't matter. What does matter is that we've set up those standards as a criteria by which we will be judged.

...without excuse... Adam and eve, before gaining the knowledge of good and evil from the forbidden fruit, did have an excuse. They were incapable of judging. However, their natural appetites and instincts hadn't become corrupted by the knowledge of good and evil so that they weren't driven by the evil urge¹, and they maintained the full knowledge of God, which made it unlikely that they would commit any of the other sins. By judging, we show that we are driven by the knowledge of good and evil, and are therefore under the same judgement whereby we judge.

Vs 4: By judging, we despise His kindness. He is still patient with us even with our judgemental attitude. When we stop judging, we put ourselves in position to receive His kindness in leading us towards repentance.

Vs 6-8: ...who will render to each one according to his deedseternal life to those who by patient continuance in doing good seek for glory, honour, andimmortality (NKJV)... As this is written about humanity in general, it reveals a ray of hope for those who have never heard of the Torah or the Gospel, and a clue to the question what about those who have never heard?

vs 9-16: This makes even clearer the principal that everyone is judged according to their knowledge, whether they actually have the written Torah, or simply have an intuition of what's the right thing to do. The phrase, To the Jew first, then to the Gentile is repeated several times.

In verses 13-16, Paul applies it to the Gentiles in a positive way. For whenever Gentiles, who have no Torah, do naturally what the Torah requires, then these, even though they don’t have Torah, for themselves are Torah! (vs 14 CJB) If we compare this statement with the following quotes from the Talmud and other Rabbinical sources, we see that Paul is speaking out of his upbringing as Pharisee:

Which man shall carry out and by which he shall live. (Leviticus 18:5) Rabbi Yirmiyah would say: We see from here that even a gentile who fulfils his laws is like (equal in rank to) a [Jewish] high priest.(Midrash Sifra, Acharei Mot 9:13)

Rabbi Jeremiah said: Whence can you know that the gentile that practices the law is equal to the high priest? Because it said, which, if a man do, he shall live through them (Lev. 18:5)... (Sifra 68b; b. Baba Kamma 38a)

And yet if a Gentile study the Law for the purpose of observing the moral laws of Noah, R. Meïr says he is as good as a high priest, and quotes: Ye shall therefore keep my statutes, and my judgments, which if a man do, he shall live in them (Lev. xviii. 5). The text does not specify an Israelite or a