Show Notes
Romans 1:1-4
Pastor Christopher Chelpka
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Let's pray and ask God to bless the reading and preaching of his word.
[00:00:05] Our Heavenly Father, you have announced your word into the world. You have preached your word into the world in such a way that we might hear it and know it and be forever changed by it.
[00:00:18] We thank you for the word that was prophesied and promised long before the angels came to the shepherds.
[00:00:27] We thank you for the word that they proclaim and sang of that word, good news, of great joy, that the Lord Jesus, the Son of God, had been born entering into the world for the salvation of man.
[00:00:43] Lord, we ask that you would help us to hear that word afresh today, that you would apply it to our hearts and our lives in all the particular details.
[00:00:53] Each of us come here with particular limitations and particular gifts, a particular set of circumstances and schedules and things that are on our minds.
[00:01:04] You know them all as omniscient. You know them all as omnipresent. You are everywhere we go.
[00:01:14] And so we look to you, the God, creator of the heavens and the earth, our God, the shepherd of your sheep, our Father who is in heaven, and ask that you would bless us today, allowing us to hear your word, to meditate on it and to follow you. Help your sheep to hear the voice of the shepherd. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
[00:01:43] Let's remain standing and turn our attention now to Romans, chapter one, verses one through four.
[00:02:09] Let's hear the word of God, one through six. I'm sorry, one through six.
[00:02:17] Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the Gospel of God, which he proclaimed beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the spirit of holiness, by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ.
[00:02:59] Amen. Please be seated.
[00:03:18] Well, we have been on a side quest preaching wise to hear about how the Incarnation connects with the Davidic covenant.
[00:03:33] I've been preaching for some time through First Samuel and then Second Samuel, and right before we came to December, we ended with 2 Samuel 7, this great chapter in the Bible, this pivotal chapter in the Bible in which God makes this promise to David.
[00:03:53] Now, I suspect that most of you know who David is or have heard of David. Certainly you have heard of David's. They're all around us. And for Good reason. Because in that promise, in that promise in 2nd Samuel 7, God says that he will make David like one of the great ones, that his name would not just pass from history, would become. He would become one of the great ones in the history of the world.
[00:04:21] And indeed he has.
[00:04:24] And we have. We name our sons David.
[00:04:28] We think about this epic king and his kingdom.
[00:04:34] And yet God, in his promise to David there wasn't just about making him a great name or making him well known.
[00:04:42] He was going to do something bigger.
[00:04:44] He was going to establish through David a house, a kingdom, a family, a people that would be his people forever, and that God would rule over through a king descended from David in this eternal kingdom.
[00:05:04] So this is the promise God makes to David in 2 Samuel 7. And then that promise, like a flower, then opens up through history and we get to see more and more and more of what that is, what that's about, and who that future king will be, this one descended from David.
[00:05:23] We hear about how he will be a king of righteousness, a king of justice, a king of strength, a king of protection, a king of provision and support, a king of compassion and love, a king who is able to squash great kings and lift up the poor to make them sit with princes.
[00:05:48] We also hear how in God's marvelous and mysterious ways, this king is going to be one who will also be a suffering servant.
[00:05:58] Somehow this king who is going to be born, will come into the world. And he won't just come with angelic choirs singing his name and praising glory to God in the highest, but he will also come in humility.
[00:06:15] He will come in a lowly form. He will be rejected and despised, and he will suffer, but not to the detriment of the kingdom, not to the loss of the kingdom.
[00:06:29] This king will come, and he, through the suffering, will be victorious, through death, will be victorious, and will loose the bonds of the curse, will justify people who were condemned, will provide forgiveness for. For all who turn to him.
[00:06:52] And so throughout December, we've been thinking about how the scriptures in various places point to Jesus as this king.
[00:07:03] And we thought about how Jesus was, of course, prophesied, as Paul speaks about here. We looked at a passage from Jeremiah. We thought about the king conceived, the king born.
[00:07:15] And now today we will come to consider, in Romans 1:1:6, the king proclaimed, the king proclaimed. We hear about how Jesus Christ, our Lord, as Paul calls him here, and as we call him too, how Jesus Christ was the son of David, the Promised One, the fulfillment of all of these things and Also the Son of God, and how that identity and his mission and his message is now proclaimed throughout the world, which is also our privilege today.
[00:07:50] In other words, it wasn't enough for Jesus simply to come, but His Word and his identity and his message must also be preached and proclaimed throughout the world. It's part of the promise of God.
[00:08:06] And so I want to walk through with you through 1 through 6 today and consider some things around this subject, around the identity of Jesus and what Paul's saying and all that God is working in this moment and think about how that applies to us today.
[00:08:24] So Paul begins first by introducing himself, right? That's pretty obvious. He says, Paul. And he calls himself a servant of Christ Jesus.
[00:08:33] He introduces himself as one who is obedient. He is a servant, a slave. He belongs to the king.
[00:08:42] Being called an apostle means that he is one who is sent out by the king. He is a messenger. Much like the angels who came to the shepherds. They also were messengers from God to proclaim the gospel. Paul is an angelic man, if I could put it that way without being weird. He is not an angel, but he is an angel in the sense that he is a messenger. He's sent from God. He's an apostle.
[00:09:11] This is worth thinking about just a little bit and thinking about the fact that David as a king, right, had many servants.
[00:09:20] There are various kinds, people to do all kinds of things as kings do. Jesus is the same, only greater. Jesus has servants all throughout the world. And I, for one, am proud to name myself as one. And I hope you are too.
[00:09:38] To be a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ is not to be low or despised or unappreciated.
[00:09:48] To be a servant of the Lord is the highest calling anyone could have.
[00:09:53] To know and to follow him, to hear his words, to be close to him, is what we were made for, to glorify God and enjoy him forever.
[00:10:05] He didn't make us to be our own kings. He made us to be his servants. And when we fulfill that calling, we're like trees.
[00:10:15] I almost said parked. Rooted by a stream.
[00:10:19] Rooted by a stream, their roots feeding deeply, leaves growing fruit, producing shade. All these kinds of things. It's good to be a servant.
[00:10:31] And as his servant, as the apostle of the Lord Jesus. This means that Paul is not allowed to proclaim anything except what has been given to him.
[00:10:42] Sometimes people will say very strange things like who do you follow, Paul or Jesus?
[00:10:49] Paul or Jesus? If you have this idea that there's sort of a choice to be made, you're not thinking about this rightly.
[00:10:57] First of all, they're not equal.
[00:10:59] They're not equal options. The answer is always follow Jesus. That's who we follow. There's no way to salvation, there's no way to God, except through him.
[00:11:09] But of course, to follow Paul doesn't mean you're not following Jesus.
[00:11:14] Why?
[00:11:15] Because Paul is a servant of Jesus.
[00:11:18] If the ambassador of a country comes to your country and declares to you the word of the ones who have sent him and you listen to it, you're not choosing to follow the ambassador over following the country.
[00:11:32] You are listening and heeding the words of the one who has been sent to you.
[00:11:38] Jesus is the king.
[00:11:40] Paul is his faithful servant. He speaks for the king.
[00:11:44] And as his servant, this is his job. And he has been set apart for a very particular job. We all have different jobs, different gifts. Paul's job, Paul's calling, was to be an apostle.
[00:11:58] He was set apart for the gospel.
[00:12:01] Well, if that's the man, what is his message? His message is the gospel.
[00:12:07] What does gospel mean? Gospel means good news.
[00:12:12] And that gets into the meat of what we're talking about today.
[00:12:17] The good news, he says, first of all, was that which was promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures.
[00:12:27] In other words, it's that same news that the angels proclaimed when they called it good news of great joy.
[00:12:34] It's that news that I spoke about where it was promised to David and before David, to Abraham and before Abraham, even to Adam and to Eve.
[00:12:44] It's remarkable, and I've mentioned this before, but it's always remarkable to me that after the fall, Adam calls Eve, Eve, the mother of the living, after a curse has been pronounced, after death has been pronounced. Why does he do that?
[00:13:01] Because in addition to the curse, God promised that a son would be born who would crush the head of the serpent.
[00:13:09] God promised that life would continue through her.
[00:13:13] God promised that one would be born. And indeed he has.
[00:13:18] This is the gospel. This is the good news. Hear all about it. Hear all about it. This is the word, the good news of great joy.
[00:13:28] And it begins, Paul says, by being promised through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures.
[00:13:35] The second thing he mentions is in verse three, he says, this gospel, this good news, the topic is his Son.
[00:13:45] The topic of the gospel, the good news of the gospel, or the good news that is proclaimed, is about his Son, the Son of God.
[00:13:56] So what is Paul about? What is the message that he has proclaims? It is the message of Jesus, and he defines who this Son is. Or he identifies this son in the next phrase when he says, who descended from David according to the flesh.
[00:14:14] And that's where we get our connection with 2nd Samuel 7.
[00:14:18] This is not some random connection. It's also not some kind of interesting tidbit that you search really long in the scriptures and then you find this little connection that's kind of cool. This is a major, major thing. Right in all the ways that Paul could have introduced the Gospel. Right in all the ways Paul could have said, here's what the Gospel is about. This is one of the things that he decides to say at the. At the beginning of this epic letter, the letter to the Romans.
[00:14:49] He identifies Jesus as the one who is descended from David according to the flesh.
[00:14:57] This should tip you off that this is a big deal, which is why we're spending time on this. The Davidic covenant, strangely, is often ignored, even though it's present all the time, especially in our Christmas hymns. We see all the time this language of the rod of Jesse and from David and in David's city and David, David, David, David. But do we really understand why this is so important?
[00:15:26] Well, I hope you're seeing it here. It's important because God had made this promise to David that this everlasting kingdom would be established through his offspring. And it's happening right now.
[00:15:40] It happened when Jesus was born. And now that message is being proclaimed. Can you imagine what a tragedy it would have been if in the fullness of time, God sent forth his son born of a woman, born of a. Under the law, born in this manger declared by angels, and then no one ever heard about would be the total undoing of, of everything that God had promised.
[00:16:06] It would be the unfulfillment of the salvation of the world. Jesus has promised.
[00:16:12] Jesus has promised not just to be born.
[00:16:17] He's promised to be a savior and a king of a kingdom that will last forever.
[00:16:25] These are not just inspiring stories about faith in God at important moments in desperate circumstances.
[00:16:32] This is about God entering into history and changing the course of humanity forever.
[00:16:39] Bringing us out from the curse as we sang in joy of the world and into this estate of salvation and blessing forever.
[00:16:51] Good news, of great joy.
[00:16:55] And he is descended from David according to the flesh.
[00:17:00] But he's not merely man, and he doesn't merely belong to David or only belong to David, as many others were.
[00:17:09] He is unique in this way.
[00:17:11] He was the Son of God.
[00:17:14] And Paul gives proof of that. There's so many proofs of this, but one that Paul gives in verse four that he was declared to be the Son of God, we could say, preached to be the Son of God, proclaimed to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of God, the holiness, very Trinitarian, all here in Romans 1, according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead.
[00:17:43] When Jesus Christ rose from the dead, all of these things that had been promised, all of the things that had been prophesied, all the things which had been hinted at and foreshadowed were vindicated, were proven beyond the shadow of a doubt.
[00:18:05] Other people had worked miracles, right? Not like Jesus, we could say, but other people. In the course of history, God had used to work miracles. Great prophets, right? But Jesus did things that no prophet ever did, no Moses ever did, no Elijah ever did.
[00:18:27] Jesus didn't just cure the blind, feed the hungry out of a few loaves and a few fish.
[00:18:35] Jesus didn't just walk on water. Jesus didn't just calm storms. Jesus didn't cast out demons.
[00:18:43] Jesus didn't just heal the sick and raise the dead, but he himself rose from the dead after being killed, after being crucified, and most importantly, after coming under the wrath of God for our sins.
[00:19:03] Who can overcome the wrath of God except God?
[00:19:11] So God overcomes His own wrath by his own perfect righteousness.
[00:19:17] And he imputes that righteousness to us so that we can be saved, so that we can be forgiven.
[00:19:24] And so he was declared in his resurrection from the dead to be of the Son of God. And that's why Paul says later, or rather in a different letter, if this hadn't happened, we would have no hope. But of course we do, because it did.
[00:19:42] More. More news.
[00:19:44] More good news. More good news of great joy. And this, of course, all leads to this conclusion, that this Son of God is of course Jesus Christ, that the Promised One of David is Jesus Christ. And we're not waiting anymore, we're not hoping anymore for the Messiah to come, for the descendant of David to come. He has come. He has risen. He is coming again. And most importantly now, among all these other important things, he is our Lord, our King.
[00:20:20] That's what Lord means. Master, ruler, King.
[00:20:26] At the beginning of our service, we read Psalm 145, where it calls us to declare the glories of God's kingdom, like Paul did here, like the angels did to the shepherds, like God did throughout all of history through his messengers.
[00:20:46] And like you're hearing today, and hopefully every Sunday, as you attend church and hear of the good news of the glorious kingdom of God in Jesus Christ.
[00:20:58] That is received through his grace.
[00:21:02] And that brings us to verse 5.
[00:21:06] This glorious kingdom we have received through grace.
[00:21:12] Now Paul talks about his apostleship as well. That's something we don't have as a specific office, right? Paul's writing this letter, not us. But we do have this in common with him, that we have received this message, these words, this kingdom through. Through his grace.
[00:21:31] Now think about that for a moment and how important that is, and also how unlikely that is.
[00:21:39] Glorious things come generally to people who earn them, right? Imagine how frustrated you'd be if you went to a Christmas office party and then somebody who'd been a slacker all year, didn't show up on time, didn't meet the goals, etc. Etc.
[00:22:01] Gets like a thousand dollar bonus and a big prize and a nice plaque on the. On his desk.
[00:22:10] You'd be like, why that guy?
[00:22:13] There are so many other people here who worked so much harder and did so much better, right? It wouldn't feel fair even, maybe it'd even make you mad that somebody who didn't deserve the honors that he's receiving now was getting them.
[00:22:28] Glorious things tend to come to people who deserve them, right?
[00:22:35] Great armies that capture great empires. Right? Glory in battle, People that meet athletic goals at the Olympics and get medals of gold placed around their necks. Right? Glory. Honor because of achievement.
[00:22:53] Paul is saying here that he has received his apostleship, his servanthood, this kingdom, because of grace.
[00:23:05] He's saying, as he said in Titus, that we heard that this comes to us not because of works done by us in righteousness, but how?
[00:23:14] By the righteousness of God.
[00:23:19] In other words, God has given to you and to me and all who turn to Him.
[00:23:27] Not a medal, not a plaque on the desk, not a thousand dollars, but an eternal kingdom.
[00:23:37] And we did nothing to deserve it.
[00:23:40] In fact, we did things to not deserve it.
[00:23:43] We are anti earners or we are sinners.
[00:23:51] How would God do this?
[00:23:54] Why would God do this?
[00:23:56] Well, as Titus tells us, or as Paul tells us in his letter to Titus, as Jesus proclaims throughout his words and his life, it was because of his goodness and loving kindness, because of his steadfast faithfulness in fulfilling his promises to David, because of his goodness and his grace to us, when Paul says in Titus, but when the goodness and loving kindness of God appeared, He saved us, you want to think Jesus, not just goodness and loving kindness like words on a T shirt, not goodness and loving kindness like nice vibes.
[00:24:39] You want to think Jesus, when the goodness and loving kindness of God appeared, was Manifested was made known.
[00:24:50] That's Jesus.
[00:24:52] And that's why we are here.
[00:24:56] That's why we worship God. That's why we are citizens of this kingdom, because we belong to God through His grace.
[00:25:05] That's why we humble ourselves in repentance. And we fall on our knees when we hear his invitation. When he says, come unto me all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. And we say, here I am, Lord, save me, help me. And he says, every time I will.
[00:25:28] Like a promise in marriage, he says, I will.
[00:25:36] And so he's our Lord.
[00:25:39] And so we follow him because of his grace.
[00:25:45] This is the message that Paul proclaims. And that brings us finally to his mission.
[00:25:51] Paul is being like a good journalist here. He's reporting the facts.
[00:25:56] He's putting them in context of history and God's promises. He's teaching us that these are the things that we need to know. And he's telling us the reason why these things happened. And that comes to us at the end of verse 5.
[00:26:12] God has done these things.
[00:26:14] God has sent Jesus. And God now sends his servants, Paul and other servants into the world so that to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations.
[00:26:33] So preaching the proclamation of the Gospel, both that which comes from the pulpit like this, or Paul's ministry as he moved around the Mediterranean world, or you as you invite your neighbor over to your dining room table and say, hey, would you like to read through the Gospel of John with me?
[00:26:54] All of these moments, right? In all of these moments, the Lord is doing his work of doing this, of bringing about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations.
[00:27:08] The proclamation of the Gospel, the discipleship of people and disciple making that happens is not a bonus on God's plan.
[00:27:19] It's not a side project. It is the next natural step.
[00:27:24] It's the work of God in fulfilling his promise of love to David.
[00:27:29] It is this work of God in fulfilling these things that are made complete in Christ.
[00:27:36] It was necessary for the fulfillment of the promise to be proclaimed in all the world.
[00:27:43] So what does this mean?
[00:27:45] One thing this means is that Jesus is not a king in exile or a king without a people.
[00:27:53] He is a king who has a people.
[00:27:56] He is a king who has ascended to the throne in order that we might join him as his loyal, obedient subjects.
[00:28:04] And unlike the despotic kings and tyrants and wealth mongers of the world, he is a king who rules in righteousness and justice and Those are glories of his kingdom that will never be taken away.
[00:28:19] If you go back to 2 Samuel 7, verse 16 says this. And your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me. Your throne will be established forever.
[00:28:31] This throne and house and kingdom come.
[00:28:38] As the Gospel is proclaimed out into the world, as the Holy Spirit changes our hearts and our lives and causes us to follow the Lord Jesus, and that happens throughout the world.
[00:28:53] It's part of the message. It's part of why we continue doing what we're doing. Because God is continuing his work in the world and through us.
[00:29:07] The kingdom of God would be established forever because of the power of the king and the preaching of the king.
[00:29:14] Just as God promised to David, who believed those promises and enjoyed the fulfillment of those promises, he continues to make that promise to us.
[00:29:25] So on with this. This is why Paul in Romans 1:16 says this.
[00:29:31] For I am not ashamed of the Gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.
[00:29:39] To the Jew first, as it was proclaimed, first to the Jews, and also to the Greek.
[00:29:46] As God's work of salvation continues in the world, the preaching of that gospel, the preaching of King Jesus, he is fulfilling the promises to David, the promises made through the prophets, the promises made to Abraham. He is continuing that giant, cataclysmic, cosmic, world changing work that he began way back in the beginning, right after the fall.
[00:30:12] And each of you are part of it.
[00:30:15] No one can ignore it. At least you can ignore it.
[00:30:21] Not to your detriment.
[00:30:23] Which means we have choices to make.
[00:30:26] We have things to think about.
[00:30:29] As God has come into this world, has proclaimed his message throughout the world, you have to ask yourself, will I remain in my sin and continue to cling to the dust, to the things of this world that moth and rust destroy?
[00:30:46] Will I cling to false hopes and empty promises of kings and men who are not God?
[00:30:52] Or will I put my faith in the great King, the Son of David and the Son of God?
[00:31:02] My encouragement to you, my calling to you, my plea to you is that now is the time to believe.
[00:31:11] Now is the time to follow Jesus, to profess your faith. Now is the time to live and to follow him with all of your heart, with all of your life.
[00:31:21] As we look into 2026, none of us know what this year will bring.
[00:31:29] Did we know what 2025 would bring?
[00:31:32] No. Or 2024?
[00:31:35] Or 2023.
[00:31:37] We don't know what's coming.
[00:31:39] We don't know what heartaches or tragedies or temptations or trials or joys or excitements or changes.
[00:31:50] We don't know if the Lord will return or not to judge the world in its sin. Maybe 2023 will have 12 months. Maybe it'll have one 2026.
[00:32:04] We don't know. Obviously, I don't know.
[00:32:08] So what will we do?
[00:32:11] Will we continue on our own, in our own pride, thinking that we know history and all that will happen, and we know the future and how safe we are in our own works and our own glories and our own strength?
[00:32:25] Or will we put our faith in King Jesus, our Lord, the One who has descended from David, the Promised One, who has come and has been vindicated to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead and the One who is coming again not only to judge the world, but to save and to rescue and to establish permanently and forever his glorious kingdom which we now speak of and declare to the world.
[00:32:54] Let's pray.
[00:32:56] Our Heavenly Father, grant us each the grace that we need through the power of your word and spirit to follow you.
[00:33:05] Give us the grace that we need to hear your word and to turn our hearts in repentance, to turn away from our sins, to turn away from our pride, to turn away from the passions and pleasures which enslave us and turn to you, knowing that in you and in your power, you can break the power of sin.
[00:33:27] You can open up to us hearts that are full of joy. You can give to us peace in our consciences and the glory of no longer being identified only with our sin, but being those who are justified, those who are redeemed, those who are adopted, those who can proudly proclaim that we are children of God.
[00:33:57] Lord, wrap us in your arms.
[00:34:01] Help us to follow in your ways. Shine a light on our paths that we might forever worship the great King Jesus Christ, this one who was descended from David according to the flesh and declared to be the Son of God, in power according to the Spirit of holiness, by his resurrection from the dead. Come quickly, Lord Jesus.
[00:34:25] Amen.
