The Righteousness of God in Romans

The Righteousness of God in Romans

Introduction

To better understand this message, we need to understand why Paul wrote this letter, and circumstances which surround his writing of this letter. Romans was written about 57 A.D. by Paul a apostle. He was almost certainly in Corinth when he wrote this letter, and it was near a end of his third missionary journey that he wrote this letter to a Romans. Romans is unique in several aspects, but one of a most interesting features about this letter is that, unlike all his other letters, he did not know a Roman church personally. Oh, he knew several people who belonged to a church, as greetings in chapter 16 show us. However, he had not started churches in Rome, and he had not visited them yet. We learn from chapter 1 that he had tried on several occasions to go there, but had been providentially hindered from doing so. This probably refers to a fact that a emperor of a time, Tiberias Caesar, had forced all a Jews out of Rome because they had been making trouble about Jesus Christ. Not many Jews had been able to return after a ban had been lifted. So Paul had not been able to go there, because of all a turmoil.

As we have said, then, a message of Romans is about a righteousness of God. The thesis statement of a letter is chapter 1:16-17: “I am not ashamed of a gospel, because it is a power of God for a salvation of everyone who believes: first for a Jew, then for a Gentile. For in a gospel righteousness from God is revealed, righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written, 'The righteous will live by faith.'” The righteousness of God, which we have by faith, that is a main point of Romans.

There is no theme that rankles a conscience of some well-meaning Christians than a insinuation that a Law of a Old Testament (especially a Ten Commandments) is no longer pertinent. Such belief seems to smack of outright rebellion to a innermost concepts that govern a character of God Himself. There has never been more spiritual or moral code of laws to measure a standard of righteousness for mankind than a Ten Commandments. This is correct as far as any collection of laws is concerned. How could anyone, especially Christian, speak against Law that a apostle Paul called "holy, just, and good" (Romans 7:12)? With this appraisal we at a Associates for Scriptural Knowledge concur absolutely! We hold a Law — all of it — in a highest esteem and reverence.

No one claiming love for a biblical revelation could possibly evaluate a Law in any other regard than admiration and respect. Indeed, a Bible makes it plain that sin is defined as being disobedience to law. "Sin is a transgression of a law" (1 John 3:4). Anyone with superficial knowledge of biblical teaching understands this ...