Paul is the author of Romans. His name is pretty much the first word of the book of Romans, so there's no question there.
Paul describes himself in v. 1 as a slave (or servant or bondservant) of Jesus Christ. This is pretty common throughout the New Testament: Peter did it, James did it, Jude did it. But why would they say that? I don't generally think of "slave" as something I'd like to call myself. I mean, I do serve my husband and family in a lot of ways, but I'd never call someone up and say "Hey, it's Eric's slave. How's it going?" "Slave" is not a terribly desirable title to hold. But after a bit more research and thought, it does make sense that the apostles referred to themselves in this way. While, even in Paul's day, being a slave wasn't something that was desirable, there was a certain je ne sais quoi applied to the title of slave. It wasn't about the slaves' rights, of course - they didn't have any - but about their duties. They were indebted to their master and were, in an ideal situation, honored to be good stewards of their master's property. It's more like being an indentured servant than a slave, I think, but the word slave has a lot more power behind it, so I'm going with that translation. And I can see, in that light, why the apostles would call themselves Jesus' slaves, and why we should desire to be Jesus' slaves too. We are all deeply indebted to him. It's a debt we can never pay off, no matter how hard we work. But because of that debt, we should willingly, humbly, gratefully do everything we can - even to the death - to take care of our Master's property: His flock and His creation. We should be honored, as Paul and the other apostles were, to hold that title.
Paul also has a rather hairy background, considering that his former hobby was killing Christians. But Jesus came to Paul (or Saul... same guy) while he was on his way to lock up some Christians in Damascus. Jesus blinded him, preached at him, and essentially converted him to Christianity. From that moment forward, Paul had a new hobby. Paul became an apostle, which is basically just a fancy way of saying he was sent forth to preach the gospel. Specifically, Paul preached to the Gentiles and made Christians out of them; that's the special job he was given when Jesus confronted him on the road to Damascus.The story of Paul/Saul's conversion really makes verse 1 much clearer. Jesus literally came to Paul and broke his heart. He learned in those precious moments with Jesus how much he had done wrong, and that Jesus died a brutal death to pay for it. He would have felt extremely honored to be a "slave" to this wonderful God, who would still offer him - an undeserving sinner - the chance to be a saint. Paul had to suffer greatly for the name of Jesus, but he was glad to be called to that. Jesus had great plans for Paul, and although he really messed it up in the beginning, what with all the killing of Christians and such, he was still "set apart for the Gospel of God". I can only imagine how indebted and honored he felt. Paul elaborates on those feelings in verse 5 when he mentions that he has received "grace and apostleship". He is so glad to have received those things from God that he can't help proclaiming it. He, murderer of Christians, was pardoned by a holy and awesome God, and then sent out into the world to tell people about it!
In verses 2-4, Paul gives a brief explanation of the "gospel of God" mentioned in verse 1. It's almost like a checklist of points that ends in the exclamation: Jesus Christ our Lord! He rocks! (Okay, I might have embellished a bit, but that's how I read it, okay?) The gospel of God was, first of all, "promised beforehand". God wasn't born as a human baby by chance. It was all part of God's plan for us; he knew we were cursed, and he knew that if we were ever to be reconciled to him, he'd have to save us. And he wanted to save us. So he promised all through the Old Testament ("Holy Scriptures" in verse 2) that he would send a Messiah to do just that. He made these promises "through his prophets". There are actually quite a lot of these prophecies, and the fact that they were fulfilled by one man is miraculous! Of course, God has always been in the miracle business.
Paul does mention one of those prophecies specifically, in saying that Jesus was, in "his earthly life, a descendant of David". The biggest question that I have about that particular prophesy is this: how could Jesus be a descendant of David when the genealogy given is of his earthly father, Joseph, instead of his biological father, God. (Okay, yeah, that sounds weird too, but you get what I mean.) So, apparently the genealogy given here is through Mary, who was obviously Jesus' mother, but it doesn't actually say that from what I'm seeing. And Matthew, which was a book written to Jewish people who would have known the prophecies far better than a Gentile like me, gives only Joseph's lineage (which also goes back to David), so that's what would have been important to them. From what I can gather, the reason for that is that Joseph was accepted as Jesus' earthly and legal father, which would have been more important in their society. Furthermore, a genealogy given of a woman, namely Mary, wouldn't have had the same impact, so it was more important in a Jewish sense that his adoptive father be of David's line than his birth mother. Also, I think that it is an issue that holds a bit of mystery, as Jesus himself continues to confound me regarding it. I'll leave it at that.
Paul also says in verses 2-4 that Jesus was appointed Son of God through the Spirit of Holiness. That literally happened in front of a lot of witnesses at Jesus' baptism. All three parts of the Trinity are present there, acknowledging one another in front of men. I think that is, in my opinion, the absolute coolest thing recorded in scripture. Imagine the Son of God coming up out of the water, the Spirit of God falling on him, and the Voice of God recognizing him. Absolutely amazing! How could someone have doubt after seeing that?! Paul also mentions in those verses that Jesus' power was shown by his resurrection from the dead. Okay, if there were doubters among those who say all three parts of the Trinity at Jesus' baptism, I suppose there were still doubters who saw the man they killed three days ago walking around. However, I cannot possibly imagine how you could doubt such an awesome God. And that's why Paul brings these things up. He wants to represent, to the Romans (and to us), how awesome God is and how there's no denying that Jesus is the Messiah the Jews have been looking for.
Another point of interest that I'll just mention briefly is that in verse 3, Paul uses the word "son" in talking about Jesus the man ("as to his earthly nature") while in verse 4 he uses the word "son" again in referring to Jesus as God. Jesus was the God-Man, and that's just a really cool reference to His deity and His humanity as one.
I'm just going to mention something to wrap this up here. I honestly planned on going through v. 17 in this blog, but I found that I needed more... something. Time? Space? Mental Energy? All of the above. I have this much finished currently (and it took a good week), and thought I may as well post it and take the next week to work on as much as I can of the rest of this passage. I ended up getting into the doctrine of predestination and all sorts of things, so it got kind of hairy, as you can imagine. You have that to look forward to, though. Unfortunately, because of that delay, I have no good way to wrap this up. So I guess I'll just kick it Apostle Paul style: Jesus Christ our Lord! He rocks!
I am so used to Facebook that I was looking for a "like" button. So, yeah.. I like it. Good work. Keep it up!! <3
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