Romans 16:1-6

Gospel Living (continued)

by Pastor Jim Lincoln on July 8, 2007

  Paul's tribute to the believers in Rome reminds me of a story I once heard about two wicked brothers of the Midwest. After a life of debauchery, deception, and greed the older brother died. His brother went to the local minister and told him that if he would officiate at his brother's funeral he would make a million dollar contribution to the small church's building fund. There was one condition. The brother's condition went like this, "You must say that my brother's a saint." Without hesitation the minister agreed. During the eulogy piece of the sermon the minister started describing all the wicked and evil things the deceased brother had done. His brother thought, "This minister is blowing a million dollars!" Then at the conclusion of his eulogy the minister said, "All that I have said about this man is true. However, compared to his brother...HE'S A SAINT." Smart man.¹

Roll the Credits

Now In the first half of chapter sixteen, Paul mentions about thirty people and most of them by name. Some people read this the way they read the credits at the end of a movie. Most walk out. It's a temptation, but Paul has some specific reasons for mentioning these people and they all reveal the power of the gospel to bring about great changes in the lives of those who follow Jesus. As we said some weeks ago, Paul not only taught the gospel, he also lived it and so did the people he mentions here. So, this morning I want to look at what Paul says about these friends of his and see if we can discover how the gospel was at work in his and their lives as well. Overall there are three ways the gospel was alive and at work in the lives of these people. First, it created a love for one another that would have never naturally developed. Second, it created some great character qualities that made their love grow even greater for each other. And third, it created an ability to overcome barriers that normally keep people from loving and trusting each other. O.K., how is the gospel revealed in this list?

First, it does so by showing us that in the gospel God can transform a person's hate into tender love and affection for people we would have otherwise ignored or hated.

Let's remember whose writing this. Just a few years before, Paul was hunting Christians down, throwing them in prison, and cheering at their execution. Of course he did all of this in the name of religious zeal. People are asking today, "How can you change a religious zealot who uses his religion to murder people?" With Paul you have an example. The love of God in Christ can create that change. I don't know of any argument that will make that change. But I do know that if your heart is full of hate that the love of God for you in Christ can change that. I hated my step father. Through the grace of God, I came to love him. There was no human explanation outside of the gospel. The knowledge and power of God's love for me simply changed my heart for him. The same people Paul would have persecuted and killed a few years earlier, he now loves from the depths of his heart. You can feel this in the way he describes these people.

Is This Really Paul? Over the years many have made sport of portraying Paul as a harsh and insensitive person. The problem with that characterization is that there is little evidence to justify it. I think many just don't agree with Paul on a number of issues. So, they try to write him off as harsh or insensitive. Look at the words he uses here to describe these people that he once despised. He doesn't just record their names; he speaks of loving them as one loves his own sister, brother, or a mother in the case of the mother of Rufus. Who do you know so well that you would call her your mother? He's not merely interested in getting his theology in their heads. He says, "Greet, Prisca, Aquila, Mary, Andronicus, and Junia and twenty-or so more! Let them know that I am thinking about them and that I honor, cherish, and love them." With five people he uses the word, "beloved." Do strong men say the phrase, "I love you?" Paul did. These are warmhearted words, words of love and tender affection. They aren't the words of a harsh, insensitive bull in a china shop. He spoke the same way to the believers at Thessalonica

"But we were gentle among you, like a mother caring for her little children. 8 We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God, but our lives as well, because you had become so dear to us." 1 Thess. 2:7-8 NIV

And how does he instruct them in verse sixteen? Greet one another with a handshake? Greet one another with, "Later dude?" No! He says to greet one another with a holy kiss. If I'm not mistaken it is the most often repeated commandment of the New Testament and every time it is from the apostle Paul. Now, it's a holy kiss; so it's restrained. There is not a hint of sexual or sensuality in it. But at the same time it is a form of communicating tender affection. I'm not sure the hand shake does the job.

If becoming a Christian doesn't make you love people that you would not have naturally loved it's simply not alive in your heart. It gives you a love for people that you would have otherwise had no interest in. Jesus said it's easy to love those who love you. But when you love your enemy or someone out of your friendship network or class or race well, then you have the love of God in you.

Making a Difference: On Friday night's edition of NBC nightly news it was reported that a woman who worked on Wall Street with a six figure annual income gave it all up to teach prisoners in Texas. In the interview she said, "As a professing Christian who was quick to talk about God's grace, I still had totally written off this entire population." So, she quit her job and moved to Texas. She now teaches prisoners how to establish and run a start up business. The national rate of inmates returning to prison is between 60% and 70%. The rate for her students is less than 5%.

Your story may not be as dramatic. But where is God calling you to love someone you would not naturally love who may need to experience the love of Christ? This is what we see in Paul's life and as we shall see later what we see in their lives as well.

Paul Honors Women: His love extends in an extraordinary way to women. His Jewish background would not have honored women the way Paul does here. The first person he mentions is Phoebe, a woman. She was a member of the church near Corinth. Cenchrea was a port city, an eastern suburb of Corinth. When the church was established in Corinth many fled to Cenchrea to start their fellowship because of the persecution in Corinth. Phoebe was from that church.

Now, Paul calls her a deacon. He uses the masculine word here. We know that he knew that a deacon was an official office of the church. He could be using it informally but it's possible that she was a deacon of the church there. The word deaconess wasn't used until the third or fourth century. Here, Paul gives her that honored title. Most likely, Phoebe was a business woman like Lydia of Philippi, of independent means, who made routine trips to Rome. The fact that Paul would trust her to deliver this critical letter to Rome speaks volumes about the respect he had for her. Also, notice the respect he demands the church to give her in verse 2:

"receive her in the Lord in a manner worthy of the saints and that you help her in whatever matter she may have need of you; for she herself has also been a helper of many, and of myself as well."

The fact that he is so at ease trusting her, sending her and recommending her shows how at ease he was with women in all kinds of ministry. The fact that he chose a woman to take his letter to them instead of a man is very symbolic.

Notice that he also mentions nine other women in his list of people to be greeted. Prisca (3), Mary (6), Junia (7), Tryphaena and Tryphosis (translated mean: delicate and dainty). It has been suggested that these were twin sisters. Then there was Rufus' mother in verse 13, and Persis (12) Julia (v. 15) and the sister of Nereus (15).

The number of women Paul mentions here is far greater than what was typical in the literature of his day especially among Jewish writers. As a rule, religious writers virtually ignored women. Paul was no misogynist. Instead, in his love for women he elevated women to positions of honor and ministry that would have been absolutely unheard of in his Jewish circles. He puts them on equal footing with the men in terms of honor, dignity, and respect. Again this was revolutionary in the first century.

How do you explain Paul putting Pricilla (Prisca) ahead of Aquila in the list other than to honor and acknowledge her faith? In Ephesus, there was a very gifted evangelist named Apollo who began to speak boldly in his synagogue. But his zeal outpaced his knowledge so Pricilla and Aquila took him aside and caught him up on his theology. Luke says that it was Pricilla and Aquila who taught him. And like Paul, Luke mentions Pricilla first and then he explicitly says that "they" explained to him the way of God more accurately to Appolos. Paul honors Pricilla and Aquila for their work of discipleship and education. He specifically honors Priscilla by naming her first. He intentionally honored women of the faith along side of the men in the church at Rome. He was living out the truth of the gospel that in Christ there is neither male nor female, Jew nor Gentile, or slave nor freeman.

So the gospel transformed Paul's heart from one of animosity and prejudice to one of love and honor for Jew, Gentile, slave, free, men, and women in the faith. These represented enormous changes in Paul's heart. How about yours and mine? Are the same changes taking place in your heart?

The second thing I notice here are the changes the gospel made in their lives that fueled and fanned into flame Paul's love for them.

Look at what the gospel did in their lives. Pricilla and Aquilla became fellow workers who put their own lives at risk to spread the gospel. They were expelled from Rome by Claudius when he kicked the Jews out of Rome. And yet they hunt down the apostle Paul and ask how they can help him. When they return to Rome, what do they do? They open up their home as one of the house churches that met in the city.

Look at the others: Mary is said to "work hard" in the faith (9). Andronicus and Junia (7), Paul's fellow Jewish believers, were thrown in jail with Paul for their faith. They were outstanding among the apostles. He probably means a second tier of apostles who had been converted before him and witnessed the resurrection. Urbanas (9): a fellow worker. Apelles (10): approved in Christ. That may mean that he overcame some character issue in his life and proved himself worthy of the name Christian. Tryphaena and Tryphosis (12) were called workers in the Lord. Persis (12): who worked hard in the Lord.

Four others opened their homes for the church meetings. All of this means that their love for each other wasn't automatic. It came as a result of the decisions and sacrifices made to make the well being and joy of others more important to them than their own. If Rufus is the same as the Rufus in Mark 15 he is the man who carried the cross of Jesus on his way to being crucified.

What strikes Paul about these people is not how much they know about the faith (though that is important). What strikes him is the sacrifice, love, and hard work they offer up to God and for each other. What legacy were they leaving? They were leaving a legacy of love, hard work, being in prison, risking their very lives for the well being of others, helping, hospitality, and opening up their homes to welcome other believers in for care and support and worship. So, let me ask you, "What legacy will you leave of your faith in the Lord?" The gospel made them workers, prisoners, helpers, hospitality givers, sisters, brothers, and brothers to people they would have never given a moments notice to before. What is it making of you?

One last thing I notice about how the gospel affected these people.

The gospel removed the barriers that normally keep people apart and divide people and nations.

In this respect he is simply shining the light on the power of this gospel: the theme of his gospel. This list of names is remarkable in its diversity. People listed here are from every different kind of racial, economic, gender, and social strata. Paul's list here includes names that were associated with slaves, Roman officials (Narcisus) as well as honored citizens. There are names of women and men. Some names are clearly Jewish (Pricsa and Aquila) and there are Gentile names in the list.

So, that tells us that the gospel spread both laterally and vertically.² It jumped over the homogeneous units of race, class, and economic status of that world. It spread vertically through all the layers of society. It touched slaves like Onesimus and perhaps many in this list. It touched those of ordinary birth and the wealthy like Phoebe and John Mark's mother whose large house in Jerusalem was the first meeting place of Christians. It entered Caesar's own household. In other words, this list reveals that the gospel traversed all socio-economic, ethnic, linguistic, and class barriers to draw God's people not into subsets of the like minded who could be comfortable with each other, but into the richly diversified people of God. It showed the world that it is possible to love each other in spite of enormous differences.

Peter wasn't ready for this at least not at first. Perhaps that's why his name is missing from the list. My guess is that he had yet come to Rome.

In Galatians 2:14, the reason Paul corrects Peter for not eating with the Gentiles was not that he was being unkind, though it was clearly that. It wasn't that he was being bigoted, although he was being that as well. Paul corrected Peter because he was not being, "straightforward about the truth of the gospel." What is at stake when we fellowship along the fault line of class, race, education, social or economic or even matters of taste, is the gospel. Beloved, the church is not only called to declare the gospel of reconciliation, but also to model that truth and if it doesn't, it will undermine what it declares to be true.

And the gospel declares that there is no natural, merit, no national merit, no human standing, no breed or pedigree or achievement which advances a person toward God or makes a person more acceptable to God more than another. All of the ways in life in which people seek importance and seek preeminence over one another are irrelevant to their standing before God. This is true of ethnicity, wealth, class, nationality, power, privileged birth, connections, profession, and generation. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave or free, male or female: for you are all one in Christ Jesus, (Ga. 3:28). Therefore, beloved, although it works in the market place and although it will work to make the church more marketable, in the gospel...there is neither Builder, Buster, Boomer, Generation X'er, child of the Millennium, Blue collar or White collar, city dweller or suburbanite, American, Hispanic, Asian, Westerner or Third worlder. In the gospel we are all one in Christ. Exploiting these distinctions for success is an offense to the gospel. We may not find the love of Christ to do it. It is hard. But we must try.

The diverse names in the list represent the enormous challenge it is for people of different backgrounds and value systems to come together and love each other. It's much easier to divide up in the camps that normally keep us apart. In the list I see at least five house churches. The temptation was to stop welcoming one another and worshipping together and instead, split off into five different churches who simply couldn't get along, and therefore, nullify the reconciling power of the gospel.

Beloved, what makes us one with God and gives us peace with God in Christ is what gives us peace with each other. And that is the grace of God in Jesus Christ, not your education, not your talent, not the privileges of your birth, not your political party, not your denomination, not that you are hip or unhip. It is that we are all sinners saved by the grace of Jesus Christ and by that grace we are now one of His cherished children as is every other person in the world who trusts Jesus. Finding peace on that basis will be the hardest thing the church will do. Outside of the visitation of the Spirit's grace in our day, it will be impossible.

We have said it often that becoming a Christian isn't an initial spasm followed by chronic inertia. It is really becoming a new creation in Christ. Has He changed your heart and caused you to love those you would have never loved? Has he made your love credible by the hard work and sacrifices you make for the well being of others? Is God breaking down the barriers that divide you from people or are you becoming more gracious, forbearing, and merciful to people who aren't like you and have different struggles and challenges than you have? May His grace make the gospel transform us as it did to those in Rome.