Romans 1:16–17 (ESV)✞: The Righteous Shall Live by Faith
Passage
I’ve already written two fairly lengthy posts on Romans and I’m not even out of Chapter 1 yet! Luckily I’m not in a hurry to get through Romans because in this post I’m only covering two verses, so I’m not getting any quicker!
In the last passage Paul wrote of his desire to visit the Christians in Rome to preach the Gospel to them. Not because they hadn’t heard it—Paul was very encouraged by their faith—but because he considered the preaching of the Gospel to be an ongoing thing. He now continues on:
16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel,
Our first inclination might be to ask why any Christian would be “ashamed” of the Gospel, but it doesn’t take much further reflection to see that, by the wisdom of the world, there are a lot of reasons to be ashamed of it! We are seen as not only stupid, but weak. Everything in our society tells us that Christian teaching is wrong: Christianity teaches us to be humble but my society values being proud; Christianity teaches us to be meek but my society values boasting; Christianity teaches us to worship as a body of believers—the Church—and to put others’ needs ahead of our own but my society values an “every person for themselves” attitude.
To be clear, I’m not claiming that Christians are the “underdogs” in North America. Quite the opposite! Much of the wailing we see from Christian leaders about society backsliding comes from the fact that Christianity has been “in charge” for hundreds and hundreds of years, and so a lot of us are freaking out about losing just a bit of that power.
I am claiming, however, that, on an individual level, humans don’t want to hear the message of the Gospel. People don’t want to hear about a religion where we’re helpless before a Holy God and the only way to be saved is through His Grace – which means that He can demand anything He wants of us! On top of that, in my particular society people don’t want to hear about a religion where we’re encouraged to be humble and meek and to put others’ needs ahead of our own. (If I give my money away to help others then I won’t have it anymore!) Other societies will have different values, so there will be different parts of the Bible that are offensive to them, though I’m thinking that the root of the problem—we’re so sinful we can only be saved by Grace, so what might God ask of us if that happens—might be pretty universal.
When we’re promoting a path to God that we know many don’t want to hear, it’s tempting to be ashamed of the Gospel.
for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes,
And this is why we shouldn’t be ashamed of the Gospel: it’s true. If the Gospel was just one more belief system, or even just one more way to God, and it had all of the drawbacks mentioned above—that is, having to be meek and humble and help others and having to believe I’m too sinful to help myself and putting myself at God’s mercy—then why would I be a Christian? It kind of would be shameful to put myself through all of that if it wasn’t necessary!
But the Gospel isn’t just some idea Paul had, it’s the power of God. Everything that Paul is about to teach in Romans, and that he’s been preaching for years, is all true: I really am too sinful to save myself, I really do deserve the wrath of God, but believing in Jesus is salvation to me – and to anyone else who believes, too!
to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
Wait… what? To the 21st Century Western Christian, this seems to come out of left field! Why is Paul suddenly talking about Jews and Greeks?
The second part of that question is the easy part: all Paul is really saying is “to the Jew first and also to the non-Jew.” He could just as easily have said “Gentile” instead of “Greek” and gotten the same idea across.
But that leaves the first, and more difficult, part of this phrase: why to the Jew “first?”
We should remember that Romans is a letter Paul is writing to Christians in Rome, and one of the big topics he wants to raise—one of the reasons for writing this letter in the first place—is the way Christian churches in Rome are splitting along ethnic lines: there are churches for Jewish Christians and churches for Gentile Christians, but the two groups aren’t intermixing. To Paul, this is a huge problem! A key topic that comes out in many of Paul’s letters is that of unity of Christians; from what I see in Paul’s letters, the unity of Christians seems to be one of the main ways he envisions us spreading the Gospel to non-Christians. So what are Romans going to think when they see that Christians are split across ethnic lines?
So Paul wants the Christians in Rome to to hear one of two messages:
- To the Jewish Christians: God is finally bringing to fruition something He’d always been promising: that His people would eventually extend beyond just the Jewish people to include people from all nations.
- In retrospect, to the 21st Century Western Christian, this seems obvious, but at the time it was anything but. God might have made some promises to His people along these lines but He had clearly also made the Jews His people, so… how was that supposed to fit together?
- To the Gentile Christians: this new faith didn’t come from nowhere and it’s not based on nothing. Jesus’ work on the cross was the fulfilment of thousands of years of history and promises from God to His people. Understanding the history of God’s involvement with His people will help us to understand Him, and better appreciate the work Jesus did on the cross.
- To both sets of Christians: since we’re all under the same faith, we should act like it.
Which is all well and good but what does Paul mean when he says that the Jews are “first?” Does it mean the Jews are more important? Does it mean that, for example, when God raises the dead He’ll raise the Jewish believers first, and then the non-Jewish believers? Neither of these feels right to me – but none of the commentaries I found at hand were more precise.
Both the ESV Study Bible and the Global Study Bible say that this phrase means the Jews have “priority in salvation history,” because they’re God’s chosen people; Matthew Henry’s Commentary is (as usual) longer, but I’m not sure in this case if it’s more helpful:
To the Jew first. The lost sheep of the house of Israel had the first offer made them, both by Christ and his apostles. You first (Acts 3:26), but upon their refusal the apostles turned to the Gentiles, Acts 13:46. Jews and Gentiles now stand upon the same level, both equally miserable without a Saviour, and both equally welcome to the Saviour, Col. 3:11. Such doctrine as this was surprising to the Jews, who had hitherto been the peculiar people, and had looked with scorn upon the Gentile world; but the long-expected Messiah proves a light to enlighten the Gentiles, as well as the glory of his people Israel.
Matthew Henry’s Commentary
But honestly… “first” meaning “God offered it to them first but now He’s offering it more widely” also feels… off. Historically it’s true; Jesus ministered almost exclusively to the Jews and much of the early work of the Apostles in Acts was directed toward the Jews, but it just doesn’t feel to me like that’s the point Paul would be making in this letter.
Perhaps I’m just overcomplicating it! Perhaps the Jewish Christians were claiming to have primacy in God’s favour, and all Paul is saying to the Gentile Christians is, “Yes, sure, they were first, but God’s favour rests upon you all!”
Or maybe I’m still overcomplicating it by putting too much emphasis on the word “first.” For example, in the NIV it’s worded a bit differently than it is in the ESV:
16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
Romans 1:16 (ESV)✞, emphasis added
16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile.
Romans 1:16 (NIV)✞, emphasis added
The wording seems a bit softer in the NIV translation; instead of focusing so much on the word “first,” perhaps Paul is just saying that the Gospel is the power of God, “to these folks and also to those folks,” as opposed to strongly saying, “the power goes to these folks first, and then to the others!”
17 For in [the Gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed
It’s often counterproductive to get too fine-grained in our reading of the Scripture; going word-by-word often makes us lose the forest for the trees. But sometimes a sentence is so densely packed with theology that we really do have to go that deep.
First of all, whose righteousness is revealed by the Gospel? God’s. It’s Him who is righteous. That exact point is what makes Christianity stand out from any other religion or belief system; it’s not a set of rules whereby we please God. Christianity states that we can’t please God, because we have no righteousness. So He had to be righteous on our behalf. So even when I do the good works He has prepared for me, it’s still His righteousness, not mine.
But then let’s reverse it: how is that righteousness revealed? In the Gospel. God doesn’t reveal His righteousness by setting out rules we’re to follow (though that does exist in the Old Testament), nor by living an exemplary life we can follow (though Jesus did do that), and luckily for us He doesn’t reveal it by smiting us in His wrath. God reveals His righteousness by sending His Son to die on the cross, and take the punishment we deserve. He “earns” our way into His presence through His own efforts.
And, in the process, He also sends us His Holy Spirit, so that some of His righteousness is now flowing out from us – that is, the good works we do in HIs power also reveal His righteousness!
from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”
This phrase “from faith for faith” is a very Paul-like way of speaking! (Pretty sure the adjective is “Pauline,” instead of “Paul-like,” but I’m going for clarity not beauty.) It’s correct (obviously), but I have to sit and think about it for a minute before it sinks in.
When I finally get my head around it, however, I realize that Paul is simply saying exactly what he means to say: the righteousness of God is revealed from faith, because I need to have faith in Jesus to understand any of this, but it is also revealed for faith – once I have that initial faith, that leads to belief, the result will be continuing faith in God.
Because that’s how the righteous live – they live by faith. (I should say “we live by faith,” but I have trouble thinking of myself as being “righteous,” even if it’s theologically correct.)
There’s no “pull yourself up by your own bootstraps” in the Gospel. There’s no “God helps those who help themselves” in the Gospel. There’s no “God will get you started and then you’re on your own” in the Gospel. The Gospel is that we have faith in the work of Jesus and that faith is rewarded by more faith so that we can live our entire lives by faith. Anytime I rely on my own strength I’m doomed to fail; anytime I rely on the strength of God I’m looking in the right direction.
We can see why Paul is eager to preach the Gospel to the Christians in Rome even though they’re already Christians; if the Gospel was, “God get you started and then it’s up to you,” Paul would have no need to preach to people who already believed. Instead he’d be handing out rules and best practices as to how we’re supposed to do it!
But if the Gospel is, “have faith in me and continue having faith in me to the point that you’re living by faith,” then that’s something even the most experienced of Christian believers needs to be reminded of daily.
Thoughts
It’s going to take me forever to get through Paul’s letter to the Romans1, but that’s not a complaint. When I was blogging through the Gospel of John I remember being struck with how much theology John packed into every verse—into every word!—and as I get into Romans it seems that Paul has packed theology into every letter.
Too bad I can’t read ancient Greek…
Footnotes
- I guess I’m being a bit pedantic to always write out “Paul’s letter to the Romans” instead of just “the book of Romans,” and in today’s world it is a book of the Bible so calling it a book wouldn’t be wrong, but I honestly do feel it’s important for us to read each part of the Bible as it was written; Romans is a letter, the Psalms are poems, Revelation is apocryphal literature, the Gospels are historical books, etc. ↩
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