Paul’S Vocation And Credentials
PAUL’S VOCATION AND CREDENTIALS
ROMANS 1:1-4
As we begin this letter, we start to understand who wrote it.
Paul was no waster of words. Every ancient letter began with a note of the one who sent it, and a clear statement of the person or persons to whom it was addressed. The discovery in the twentieth century of the thousands of papyrus letters, which the arid sands of Egypt have preserved, has revealed that the New Testament letters conform to the pattern of those of their time. The deep matters of the faith required nothing more than the common forms of communication and the simplicities of daily communication in which to express themselves. They need no more today. Christ can find demonstration in our conversation, in the normal conduct of our lives and our activities. The common bush can be “aflame with God.”
Paul passes promptly to his credentials. He is a servant of Jesus Christ, not his own, but “bought with a price,” and bound in wondrous servitude to the King of kings. It was an ancient and honorable title. Moses had carried it (Joshua 1:1f.), and so had the prophets (Jeremiah 7:25). It implied a dedication to the doing of a master’s will. The beautiful story of Abraham’s servant on his mission to Haran is a perfect illustration (Genesis 24:1-66). And like Abraham’s servant Paul was a special messenger, an “apostle,” one sent to fulfill a particular task. The purpose and the vocation are emphasized in the closing words of the first verse. It was Paul’s conviction that he was “set apart” for the gospel of God, not merely by the formal commissioning of his fellow Christians (Acts 13:2), but in the long-laid plan of God himself (Galatians 1:15). In both contexts the same Greek verb is used.
Then, in swift economy of words, Paul proceeds to state the essential facts of the good news of God. He is apparently addressing in the Roman church a group of Jews and their converts. He can rely on an Old Testament background. Hence the emphasis in two verses on the Lord’s earthly royalty, his power and divine Sonship, confirmed by the Holy Spirit, and sealed by the resurrection. The incarnation without the resurrection is meaningless. The two basic doctrines of the faith move together. Paul never wavered from this position. And without God revealed in Christ (John 1:18), a Christ risen from the dead, there is no Christianity.
Meditation 1 Corinthians 15:12-19.