Romans 1:1–7 (ESV)✞: Greeting
Passage
There’s a formula followed by letters in the New Testament; the Catholic Resources website gives an overview1 which is as good as any I’ve seen:
- Letter Beginning
- Sender(s): From whom
- Recipient(s): To whom
- Formulaic Greeting
- Thanksgiving (or Blessing)
- Letter Body
- Initial Exhortation
- Thesis Statement
- Theological Discussions
- Ethical Admonitions
- Letter Conclusion
- Practical Matters
- Individual Greetings
- Personal Postscript
- Doxology (or Prayer)
Romans follows this template as well, and these first seven verses are the “letter beginning” part of the formula. But Paul is starting to pack his letter to the Romans with some deep theology right from the very beginning, in his introduction! It’s clear from the first few verses that Romans is going to be a book we want to read slowly, with a highlighter in hand and some paper for taking notes2.
Let’s look at the whole passage:
1 Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, 2 which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, 3 concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh 4 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, 5 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, 6 including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ,
7 To all those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints:
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Who is writing? Paul. Who is he writing to? Christians in Rome.
Ah, but… who is Paul? This is one of the few letters Paul wrote to people he didn’t know personally—I think Romans is the only letter in the New Testament that Paul wrote to people he didn’t know, but I might get to another letter later on in the New Testament and correct myself—and he’s going to be writing about some deep theological issues, so he wants the Romans to know who he actually is, so they will know how seriously to take his letter.
Let’s get into it…
Paul,
In a sense, this could have been enough of an introduction! I think Paul was well known enough by this point that the Christians in Rome would have known who he was and would have paid close attention to the letter just by virtue of the fact that it was being sent by him.
So there’s a very real sense in which the introduction to Romans could have simply been:
Paul,
To the saints in Rome:
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
But he didn’t want his name to stand alone, he wanted the saints in Rome to have assurance that he really knew what he was talking about; hence the rest of these seven verses.
a servant of Christ Jesus,
Paul viewed himself as an Apostle, alongside the other Apostles, but more importantly he viewed himself as a servant of Jesus.
I think many of us would get this backwards; in Paul’s shoes we might admit “I’m a servant of Christ,” but then we’d be quick to interject, “but I’m also an Apostle, so you should listen to me!!!” We’d figure that would be the more important point. Paul is the other way around; he’ll admit that he’s an Apostle, but he’s also quick to interject, “but I’m also a servant, so you should listen to me!!!” (Not that Paul is saying, “you should listen to me,” I’m just making my point.) He doesn’t ever want us to forget the part about being Jesus’ servant. In this case, where he has time to lay things out, he gives his servanthood the priority over his Apostleship.
The being said, he then immediately goes on to say:
called to be an apostle,
Despite what he considers to be the main point (he is a servant), he is also an Apostle. Paul wants the real authority of his words to come from their truth, not their source, but that doesn’t mean that he doesn’t also have authority in and of himself as an Apostle.
set apart for the gospel of God,
Why is Paul Jesus’ servant? Why did God make him an Apostle? To spread the Gospel – that is, the Good News of Christ (which we’ll get to in a sec). God gave Paul a special task to deliver that Gospel far and wide.
which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures,
This is an important point; in fact, it gets into one of the key reasons Paul wrote this letter to the Romans in the first place – though it’s just as important for modern-day Christians!
We should remember that Christianity is not a “new religion” that “replaces” the “religion” of “Judaism.” There is no sense in which God decided, “That’s it, Judaism didn’t work, I’ll throw it out and start fresh with Christianity.”
Jesus’ work on the cross had always been the plan; expanding the set of God’s people beyond Jews to include Gentiles had always been the plan; erasing His children’s sin to have a relationship with them—something we couldn’t do on our own!—had always been the plan. The early Christians didn’t see “the Way” (which is what they were calling Christianity at the time) as a new thing, they saw it as a direct continuation of the work God had been doing all along.
But… when I say the early Christians viewed Christianity that way I’m oversimplifying. The New Testament letters present things that way, Paul thought that way, but the early Christians… well, different people thought different things. Some Christians were Jewish and thought that Jesus’ work would only extend to Jews because the Jews were God’s people and always had been. Some Christians were Jewish and were happy to hear that Jesus’ work extended beyond ethnic Jews to include Gentiles because He’d always promised that would happen. Some Christians were Gentiles, and there were probably some who were learning about Judaism and some who were looking down on the Jews – perhaps in the same way some modern-day Christians in the West look down on Jews, thinking that they’d failed God so He had to come up with an alternate plan.
Given all of this it shouldn’t surprise us that the local churches in Rome were split on ethnic lines: there were Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians, but they didn’t tend to intermingle. We’ll see this theme again in Romans, as Paul tries to get these two groups to come together – so much so that he even gets into it here in the introduction!
- To the Jews: This has always been God’s plan, He has been telling His people through His prophets for centuries, and it’s wonderful!
- To the Gentiles: The work Jesus did for us didn’t come from nowhere, there’s a long history of God working with His people, and your new faith comes out of that.
Modern-day Christians shouldn’t look down on Jews any more than 1st Century Gentile Christians should have. My faith in God is a direct extension of the work that He was doing with His people through the ages; it culminated in Jesus’ work, it wasn’t replaced by Jesus’ work.
concerning his Son,
The message—the Gospel—Paul is so eager to spread is the message of Jesus. Who He is, what He has done, and how that impacts us as believers. This “gospel of God,” which (as just mentioned) has been coming from the prophets for centuries, is Jesus.
It’s worth reminding ourselves how different Christianity is from any other religion or belief system. Jesus didn’t come into this world to tell us how to get to God; Jesus is the way to God. Jesus didn’t come to tell us how to live; we can’t live properly, so He did it for us. Above, I didn’t say the Gospel is about Jesus, I said it is Jesus. Yes, there’s a sense in which Jesus does tell us how to get to God (through Himself), and how to live, but focusing on that is missing the point.
who was descended from David according to the flesh
For those looking for the fulfilment of the promises in Scripture, especially promises that God would set up an eternal ruler from the line of David, it’s important to know that, from a worldly perspective, Jesus is a descendent of David. But He is also the Son of God:
and was declared to be the Son of God
Jesus himself pointed out that there are some parts of the Old Testament Scriptures that don’t seem, on the surface, to make sense; for example, why would King David be calling his descendent, the Messiah, “lord,” when he’s a descendent? It doesn’t make sense! Unless, of course, that Messiah will be a descendent of David and also the Son of God – which he is! I don’t know if that’s why Paul is calling this out here, but it’s the first thing that comes to mind when I see “descendent of David” and “Son of God” right after each other like this.
in power according to the Spirit of holiness
The larger portion of this phrase is, “[who] was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead.” (which is a mouthful – that’s why I’m breaking it down!) So Jesus “was declared to be the Son of God.” How? “In power.” How was that power demonstrated? “By his resurrection from the dead.”
In the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John), where we read about Jesus’ life, he never performed miracles for the sake of performing miracles. He performed miracles as a sign that he was who he was claiming to be. We know that Jesus was the Son of God, at least in part, because of the power he displayed. Paul himself also displayed a lot of power, and so did the other Apostles in Acts, but they were very clear where that power came from: they didn’t perform miracles on their own, they did so in the name of Jesus.
And a big part of that power was the fact that Jesus is currently alive:
by his resurrection from the dead,
Not even death could contain Him! There were others who were raised from the dead before Jesus, and more after, but all of those people eventually died again. At this moment, they’re dead – but He’s not! When the Bible talks about Jesus being the first to rise from the dead they’re talking in that sense: one day I will be resurrected, never to die again, just like Jesus raised Himself.
Paul has already named Jesus, but here he specifies the Son of God by name again:
Jesus Christ our Lord,
… followed by what Jesus’ power has led to:
through whom we have received grace and apostleship
I think the “we” in this snippet needs to be handled carefully; all Christians have received Grace, but only a select few were ever called “Apostles.”
to bring about the obedience of faith
… this is why Jesus appointed those Apostles: to lead the way in bringing about our “obedience of faith.”
“But wait,” some might be thinking, “isn’t it ‘either/or’? Shouldn’t it be obedience or faith – how is it both? What does Paul mean by ‘the obedience of faith’?” Actually, he means that quite literally!
One lesson we should have taken away from the Old Testament is that it is impossible to please God through obedience. We’re simply not capable of it – we’re too sinful! Even if we have pretty good days, where we’re mostly doing the right thing (for the right reason), we fall far, far short of what is required of us. To speak nothing of the fact that it’s too late by that point anyway, because all of the days that weren’t pretty good – all of that sin, in other words, that we’ve already committed, for which we’re already guilty.
And yet, Jesus said that if we love Him we’ll keep His commandments (John 14:15✞). So which is it? It’s both, because it’s not the conundrum we try to make it out to be. Jesus didn’t say, “if you obey me I’ll love you,” or “if you obey me I’ll let you love me.” He didn’t even say, “if you love me you’ll prove it by obeying my commandments” (though there is a sense in which that’s true). He simply said, “if you love me you’ll obey my commandments.” There is a cause and effect, but it’s backwards from what we might expect: love Jesus, accept His Grace, and you will want to obey him. As I say, there’s a sense in which this is a “proof” that you love him, but it’s a “proof” in the sense that it’s a witness to others, not that you’re “proving it to God.”
The Old Testament Scriptures showed us that we can’t please God through our obedience, it’s simply not something we can accomplish, which makes the Law a burden to us – until we get to the Gospel presented in the New Testament, under which Jesus did what we couldn’t, freeing us to obey Him in a way that we otherwise couldn’t. I mean that in two ways:
- The Holy Spirit enables us to be more obedient than we otherwise would have, and
- Since my obedience is now done out of love, as opposed to something I have to do in order to avoid Hell, it’s also less burdensome! There’s a lot of pressure taken off me by Jesus. So even if I fail—which I do—often—I don’t have to fear for my immortal soul. I just have to pick myself up, ask for His forgiveness, and start obeying Him again.
I believe this is what Paul means by, “the obedience of faith.” It’s the kind of obedience that I can achieve through faith in Jesus. Jesus called Paul to be an Apostle, and used his preaching (including this letter to the Romans) as a means of bringing about “the obedience of faith” of myself and countless other Christians throughout the millennia.
for the sake of his name
We shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that all of this—my obedience of faith, Paul’s many good works, all of it—should be pointing back to Jesus himself. If I hear Paul’s words and live a good life and people think, “Wow, what a good man he is!” then I’ve failed. But if I hear Paul’s words and live a good life and people think, “I want to know more about this ‘Jesus,’ that he claims is the only way he’s able to live a good life,” then I’m doing it right.
among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ,
And now we get back into the “conflict” that Paul was hearing about the churches in Rome: the division between the Jewish and non-Jewish Christians. He wants to emphasize here that Jesus’ powerful work has extended beyond the Jews, to all nations. Including, of course, the very audience to whom he is writing.
And that finally brings us to the end of Paul’s description of himself, so he now indicates who the letter is addressed to and gives his greeting:
To all those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints:
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
It’s worth reminding Western Christians that Paul is calling the Christians in Rome “saints,” because, in the Bible, all Christians are “saints.” There aren’t some “regular” Christians and some “super” Christians who are “saints,” the word “saint,” in the New Testament letters, is simply another way of saying believer, or Christian.
And finally, the grace Paul is wishing to be extended to these saints comes from the Father and from Jesus Christ, whom Paul calls “Lord.” I have a feeling there’s a point to be made here about Paul’s “Trinitarian language” (that is, he’s reaffirming the doctrine of the Trinity), though I don’t get the sense that he’s saying it to make a point, I think Jesus is just such a central part of Paul’s theology that he naturally talks that way.
Thoughts
Phew! This is one of my longer posts in quite a while and it only got through the introduction to this letter!
New Testament Letters
While Romans is definitely a deep theological book we should remember that it is also a letter, which Paul wrote to Christians who were living in Rome—both Jewish and Gentile Christians—and that he had some specific purposes for writing it.
One of the biggest reasons that’s been called out to me is that there were divisions in the Church (or rather, churches) in Rome, and the Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians didn’t seem to be intermingling. Jewish Christians created local churches for Jewish Christians, and Gentile Christians did the same. So one reason Paul wrote this letter was to show both “kinds” of Christian how the Christian faith actually works, to show them that they both had the same Gospel, both worshipped the same God, both had the same history of Jewish teachings (even if the Gentile Christians were new to all of it), that they were much more alike in Christ than they were different, and that whatever differences existed could be overcome in the spirit of brotherhood.
It’s true that Romans has a very cohesive structure. It’s a very well put together letter; Paul had obviously given these things a lot of thought before he wrote this. Of all the New Testament letters, Romans is probably the one that’s the most “book-like” – but it’s also still a letter.
I’m not advocating that we have to stop calling it (and other New Testament letters) a “book,” but I am saying that we should remember it’s a letter and read it as such, at least from time to time.
Jesus the Christ
Another quick point: Paul says in verse 1✞ that he’s a servant of “Christ Jesus.” That’s not a typo; Paul didn’t write “Jesus Christ” and the ESV translators accidentally got it backwards. “Christ” wasn’t Jesus’ last name, it was His title. Jesus was “the Christ” – that is, the Messiah, or Saviour, or Anointed One.
We could compare it to the name King David, where David is his name and King is his title; we could say “David the King,” we could say “King David,” or, if we’re being really old fashioned, we could say “David King” (I think I’ve seen the names of kings written this way, perhaps in medieval contexts?) – but if we do, we’d know that “King” is still David’s title, not his last name. Similarly, when we see Jesus’ name written as “Jesus Christ” (as we do in verses 4, 6, and 7 of this passage), it’s still not referring to “first name Jesus last name Christ,” it’s referring to the man named Jesus who is the Christ.
When I was new to the Bible and first learned that “Christ” wasn’t Jesus’ last name, it helped for me to mentally substitute that word for another (such as “Saviour” or “Messiah”) when I was reading the text, until I started getting used to the idea that “Christ” is Jesus’ title.
I’ve probably written about this before – and I’ll probably do so again!
Capitalisation
This is a very, very minor point, but I’m used to certain words being capitalised in Christian writings whereas they may not actually be capitalised in the actual Bible. If I quickly peruse these seven verses I see the following terms that, normally, I’d be capitalising though they aren’t all being capitalised in the text: “apostle … gospel … Scriptures … his Son … Son of God … Spirit of holiness … Jesus Christ our Lord … grace and apostleship … his name … saints.”
I won’t feel so bad when I continue to be inconsistent with how I capitalise things…
Footnotes
- The page doesn’t just give the formula, it maps out each New Testament letter to that formula. ↩
- I’m speaking metaphorically. I realize less and less people are using physical paper for notes and highlighters on physical paper Bibles; not even myself… ↩
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