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Sermon - Second Sunday after Pentecost (A) - 25th May 2008
St Alban's Epping Evening Song 6pm
Readings: Genesis 15:1-1; Romans 4: 4-13
With no reading from the gospels tonight, there is no doubt that the passage from Romans is the pivotal one. I felt glad as I read much of that epistle in one sitting the other day, that no-one has ever written me a letter like that! It interested me that one commentator argued strongly that it really is a letter and not a treatise. Unless it comes perilously close to the latter, why would you say so?! It contains the longest, most sustained argument of any of Paul’s letters, has probably become the most influential of them and comes closest of any of them to being a summary of Paul’s faith.
I find it helpful to put the letter into some sort of context to understand these very dense verses and the drift of Paul’s argument. Paul had not founded this Christian community, hadn’t ever been to Rome and is not thought to have been personally acquainted with the members he was writing to. There are numerous verses in the New Testament that make reference to Paul’s intention and longing to go to Rome to preach there. He realised in the ancient world the advantage of going to its very heart, the city of Rome. This letter is partly to let that congregation know that he needs to go to the church at Jerusalem which we understand was quite poor, to take to them the proceeds of the collection he has made for their welfare among some of the younger new churches. It would be a dodgy visit, where the acceptance of the money, if it was accepted, would imply some sort of authority vested in Paul and a commitment to the oneness of the Gentile and Jewish converts there who had not had an easy time working out how to be Christian community. Paul was a strategist who also had his mind set on going on to Spain to preach the gospel and thought he could call into Rome to make this visit en route.
His letter, probably because he had not had personal contact with the Roman Christians, seems less personal than most of his letters and it seems to be less responding to an immediate practical situation of concern than most of them do. It is very close to the systematic enunciation of a theological position independent of immediate circumstances.
He must have had some concerns about writing to the Romans. The church was predominantly made up of Gentiles as, seven years earlier, the Jews had been forced to leave Rome. Some had returned when the trouble seemed to be over, but there was still both a theological and practical issue of how the church should function in unity. Probably Paul saw the recipients of this letter as needing instruction on the role of Jews and Gentiles in God’s plan. Would they take kindly to receiving an authoritative letter from Paul about this? He no doubt knew that all sorts of rumours about him would have reached them and he needed to overcome any unease and suspicions they had about him. He sets forth his gospel to allay any doubts they harboured about him and to establish his Christian leadership credentials.
He wrote this letter in about the year 56 CE with a sense of having responsibility for these Roman Christians, as he was really the apostle to the Gentiles. He wants them to endorse his inclusive vision for the church and to work towards overcoming disunity between Jewish and Gentile Christians in the community.
When he wrote this epistle, given the time and the setting, he could not have helped but have at least four different churches on his mind.
- Obviously he has the Church in Rome on his mind as they are his target audience, although it is thought that letters such as this did the rounds of the young churches.
- As well he has the Corinthian Church in mind too; it’s where he is writing from. There have been stormy debates in that church on the legitimacy of Paul’s apostleship and the importance of charismatic gifts in the life of the congregation and issues such as the consumption of meat sacrificed to idols and Christians’ participation in pagan social life.
- Also in his mind must be the recent debate with the Galatian church where Jewish Christian teachers seem to have slipped into the teaching, that new, Gentile converts needed to be circumcised and to keep the Law to be authentic children of Abraham and to belong to the people of God.
- And then too he must have had on his mind the church in Jerusalem, the mother church if you like, for which he was about to set out and for whom he had done the rounds collecting donations. They were suspicious of Paul’s apparent law-free mission to Gentiles and he wanted to explain and clarify his gospel that embraces both Jewish and Gentile believers in the one Church of God and the place of the law in the new covenant.
Perhaps this background explains the structure of the letter to the Romans:
Chs 1-8 where our reading comes from, deals with the question of righteousness.
Chs 9- 11 with the question of the Jews, God’s chosen people
Chs 12-15 with practical questions of life and living and
Ch 16 is a letter of introduction and personal greetings.
So our reading tonight is part of the way Paul addresses the question of righteousness. His understanding of that concept is a right relationship with God with the implication that there is then lived out a life that reveals and reflects that right relationship. Trying to be right with God by our own efforts or attempts at goodness, can only lead to a continual consciousness of being in God’s debt and under God’s judgment. In brief, Paul says that the only way to this right relationship is to take God at his word and to rely on his mercy and love rather than what we are capable of ourselves; it is the way of faith; God himself declares us to be righteous before him.
Paul uses the example of Abraham, the hero of the Jewish, faith to illustrate exemplary faith in God and the way God attributed righteousness to Abraham because of his faith rather than his works. He steadfastly and unswervingly hoped in God even when hope would not have been a realistic position to take in most people’s eyes; he did not succumb to futile striving to do things that might win God’s approval.
During the dispute with the Galatian false teachers that I referred to earlier, reference had been made to Abraham as a key example of a man of faith. Paul must have reread the Abraham story through his converted Christian eyes and discovered in the chapter of Genesis that we read tonight, that Abraham had already been declared righteous by God on the basis of his faith and not on the basis of his achievement. Paul declares that they are blessed indeed who God declares righteous apart from their works. Psalm 32 reiterates this idea: “Blessed are those whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed are those whose sin the Lord will never count against them.”
In the psalms, David is already teaching justification by faith. It is interesting to note that Martin Luther came to the great insight the led to his pronouncing the doctrine of justification by faith, while he was lecturing on the psalms and not, as one might guess, on the epistle to the Romans.
Some streams of first century Jewish tradition interpreted Abraham’s faith and righteousness in a manner similar to Paul’s interpretation. It is this stream that Paul develops now in the light of God’s saving act in the cross of Jesus. It needs to be remembered that not all Jewish thinkers advocated a righteousness obtained through works.
If Paul did indeed write this letter partly to set down the tenets of the faith to prevent later squabbles and distortion of doctrine, it is understandable that he starts off with the hero of the faith, Abraham as his example of a man who was seen as a very good man in God’s eyes. And yet, he was accounted righteous by his faith, rather than his works. After using this familiar example, Paul then moves on to discuss those who had no good works to speak of, or even only had evil works to bring before God. It is not just that a person of good works who doesn’t quite make it can be accounted righteous in God’s eyes if he or she has faith to compliment the inadequacy of the good works. Paul really ups the anti with his readers even further, in saying in verse 5 “To anyone who does not work, but trusts God who justifies the wicked, their faith is credited as righteousness.”. It’s an emphatic, even exaggerated way of writing that goes ahead with its shocking claim getting more and more radical and leaving the reader in no doubt. It is thought from the word “not” that was inserted in this section of some ancient versions of the text, that this notion was so radical, the scribe writing it felt it had to be wrong in meaning. So, he in all responsibility, changed it to what made better sense to him, more “just and fair sense”, to say that people were rewarded for their works. But that is not God’s way. God’s immense generosity means that even a wicked person can, by putting faith in God, be accounted righteous. The Jews found it hard to break their mindset and wanted new Christian converts to follow the laws and traditions of the Jewish religion, some arguing for circumcision to fulfil the law. Paul argues that a person is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly, by circumcision. To truly belong to the people of God, a person must be changed in heart, not necessarily in the flesh. If people want to be counted among the people of God, they need faith, the kind of faith that Abraham already had before he was circumcised. Even that is a response to God, something that we bring not of our own selves as a good work, but in response to a loving, generous God.
And what is the nature of that faith? God’s promise was that Abraham would become the father of a great nation, too numerous to count. And yet, when that promise was made to him by God, he knew that his body was, in the words of Genesis, “as good as dead” because he was so very old. He knew too, as a friend of mine puts it so nicely, that his wife Sarah, was well past her use-by date in that department. This is the sort of faith that looks the apparent reality in the eye and still trusts in the promise of God. God raises the dead, creates out of nothing, justifies the ungodly. This is the God who, when humanly there is no reason to hope, is still trusted by Abraham and Sarah, who, fully aware of the human facts, go forward to live as if God’s promises will be fulfilled in His own time and His own way. It’s knowing that God is faithful and therefore we can have faith while still looking realistically at the seemingly impossible situation as it now presents to us.
It is a relief that we do not need to be burdened by the sense of guilt and failure, of unworthiness towards God, because God has so strongly said that he makes righteous even those who bring nothing by way of good works. But what of good works? Are we expected or do we want to bring nothing? In Ephesians 2:10 Paul said to that Christian congregation: “For we are God’s masterpiece, created in the Messiah Jesus to do good works that God prepared long ago to be our way of life.”. The way of faith is to take God at his word, accept the righteousness he offers and in thankfulness to actively seek his direction so that we give ourselves to the good works that he has graciously ordained for us to do. Thanks be to God for his immense generosity.
The collect for today: O God, before whose face we are not made righteous even by being right: free us from the need to justify ourselves by our own striving, that we may be abandoned to faith in you alone; through Jesus Christ. Amen