Mood:
caffeinatedTopic: MyWords::RE::God'sWords
I didn't post last week's message notes, so--if you weren't at church--you missed it when it comes to Romans 1:1-17. The following are my musings on Romans 1:16-32.
"Renovating your soul" will, I think, be the imagery that ties together the next three messages. Chris Louvier--one of our more colorful church members and a fellow believer whom I love deeply--gave me this idea when I was describing the renovations that are proceeding at church. "If only it were that easy to renovate this building," he said, patting his chest. Yes, if only my soul could be restored to its purpose in a series of sure-fire steps that can be sketched out in blue and white and accomplished in a specific number of weeks.
When renovating a building, sometimes it's possible to slap on some paint, fix a few doors, add some carpet, and go on. But, sometimes, the structure simply can't be adapted, and it must be demolished and rebuilt. There's a sense in which the old Preschool and Children's area was dead--dead to the very purpose for which it was built. So, for the sake of new life, it had to be destroyed.
Humanity is like that.
The difficulties in our souls run too deep to be solved by slapping on some paint--stopping one or two specific behaviors, going to church for a few weeks, reading a certain book, completing a certain class. We try this not only in spiritual lives but in the rest of our lives. Magazines tell us a certain number of steps we follow to solve our difficulties--but it doesn't work. You know this: You've tried to stop this or that habit or solve your life's problems in quick and easy steps--and you've ended up right back where you started.
Our souls are dead to God, dead to the purpose for which he created us (Ephesians 2:1-3). What we need is not simply a new layer of paint or carpet; what we need is life. The problem is, new life doesn't come easily. The process of moving from death to life is difficult.
Working as a hospital chaplain and witnessing chest compressions for the first time ... this movement from death to life is difficult, traumatic, even violent.
It's that way with your soul.
We'd like to believe that, somehow, the new life of God magically happens through a few easy steps--and that might be the case, if all that we needed was a layer of paint or some new carpet. But our difficulties run deeper than that. By nature, though our bodies may be alive, we are dead to the things of God.
We don't need one more program in our present lives--we need new life ... and not just in one moment when we trust in Jesus Christ. We need renewal of life every moment, to draw life from the Source of Life in every instant of every day (see Deuteronomy 30:19).
That's why Paul says, "It is the dynamis [life-giving power] of God. ... The righteous--people who are right with God--live by faith" (Romans 1:16-17). Faith is not something that happened in the past, when you first trusted in Jesus. If you are a believer, your faith is a process of drawing new life from God in every moment of every day, allowing him to tear down the old, dead stuff left over from your old self and restoring it with new life. If this doesn't happen, the old--the dead--creeps back in. That's what's happening in the Roman church: Gentiles and Jews aren't getting along, both of them are allowing the old, dead ways to slip in, and it's ripping them apart.
So, what Paul does in Romans 1-2 is to tell us, "Here's what your old, dead self looks like! This is the opposite of new life--the real life, life in God."
So, let's look at these words--and, in the process, look for God's life.
Romans 1:18-32
God is filled with wrath against the death that he sees in the human soul. Why? Because of his love. God sees how sin tears people apart in their relationships and in themselves; God also sees the life that he has planned for us, and it fills God with wrath.
Every human being knows instinctively that there is some life greater than what they're experiencing. That longing within us--the longing, the emptiness in us, when we look at a sunset, at the sea, at the stars--is evidence that there is someone greater than ourselves.
There is a problem, though (1:21): All the problems of sin and death begin with one simple wrong ... a failure to be thankful. This is where every sin begins. Eve and Adam were not thankful for what God had given; they wanted something more. The Israelites headed to the Promised Land weren't thankful for manna; they wanted something different, something more. Once they got into the Promised Land, they weren't thankful for the one God that they had; they wanted more gods. In every case, sin begins with a failure to be thankful. This is the evidence of the death within us--a failure to be thankful. We live in a world that constantly whispers to us, calling us to refuse to be thankful for what God has given to us.
Unthankfulness is the basis of sexual sin. Paul describes homosexual practice here in very explicit terms. Why does so much tie into our sexuality? Why is that such a big deal to God? When God created us, he created us "male and female, in his image." The beauty of that relationship between a husband and wife is supposed to reflect the faithful love that God has for humanity. When someone chooses a homosexual relationship, it begins with a failure to be thankful for the fact that God created us male and female.At this point, the readers were probably feeling pretty good about how they were doing in the life of faith. "We don't do this! No death in our lives."
But, then, Paul begins to describe the end result of death creeping into our lives, the result of unthankfulness.
"Greed and envy": TV producers parade perfect bodies across the screen, and we become unthankful for the spouse that God has given us. Magazines show us perfect houses, and we become unthankful for the home we have. Billboards show perfect cars, and we become unthankful for the vehicles we have. An entire industry--credit cards--has capitalized on making us sufficiently unthankful that we will spend money we don't have on things we don't need to impress people we don't even like. (Average balance moved from $3,000 in 1990 to nearly $8,000 today, with 2005 being the first year in which Americans as a whole actually spent more than they earned.) I'm not saying it's wrong to use a credit card or buy a new car or look at a larger house. I am saying that, much of the time, our motive isn't because we need this or that but because we are unthankful for what we have.
Child in store ... "Why do you need this?" ... "Because I don't have it."
"Murder, fighting, malice, gossip, backstabbing, deception, ... disobedient to parents": We may not murder someone in the body, but we are more than willing to do it with words. Again, it is a failure to be thankful. When someone talks down another church member, you are not thankful for that person. (You don't have to be thankful for what they do.) When your words tear down someone in your family--your spouse or children--you are not thankful for them. (There are put-downs and negative comments we'll make to family members that we wouldn't dream of speaking to someone else. When was the last time you told your spouse or children or parents ... "I am thankful"?)
"They refuse to understand, break promises, heartless, unforgiving": What Paul places as the lowest, darkest point of unthankfulness is to be unforgiving. Why? If you are a believer--living in the life God, experiencing his forgiveness--your thankfulness for God's forgiveness is shown outwardly by how you forgive others.
By this point, those in Rome who thought they were pretty righteous, thankful, full of God's life ... well, what Paul wanted was for them to look within themselves and to see those dark places where death was still present. Paul wanted to challenge them to live in faith--this begins with thankfulness, the capacity to be thankful for Jesus Christ, thankful for the life he's given us, thankful for the people around us. The life of faith begins with, "Thank you."
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