Romans 12-16: Application Process

So now that we’ve gotten all of that out of the way…

             

            -faith ALONE in Christ ALONE = Justification
            -how to deal with the zombie sin nature
            -what’s going on with Israel, and who is God in light of that

…we can begin the best part of the whole book – application. How, then, are we supposed to live in light of what we’ve learned from the rest of the book?

Paul actually makes it surprisingly simple, by giving us specific lists of things to do and things to avoid.

(the following outline has been borrowed and tweaked a bit)[1]

(1) At Church (chapter 12)

Recognize your position within the body of Christ. You have a position. You know how I know that? If you’ve accepted Jesus, you’ve been given the Holy Spirit as a gift- and along with that certain spiritual gifts for you to use to build the church up (cf. 1 Corinthians 12) It really only works, though, if we all work together. And we do that through love, through patience, through calling out evil in our midst, through forgiveness. Through doing life together and seeking to honor God in the process.

(2) The government (chapter 13)

The general tendency of the day? Hate the government. The general tendency of people today? ….Hate the government. Not much has changed in 2000 years. So many wars have been fought over this concept of how to govern a group of people. What the Bible says: Pray for our government, because they have been put in their position by God.

(3) Loving On Each Other (chapter 13-15).

Seems kind of simple, really. “All you need is love, ba badada da” (The Beatles). But honestly, it fleshes out in different functions.

Love means: Don’t bicker about small things. It destroys relationships, and really, what are we fighting for? Don’t confuse matters of opinion with issues of sin. They’re different. [2]

Love means: Be good to those around you whose conscience is bothered in different ways than yours. As in, don’t do things around a person if there’s even the chance it will cause them harm in their spiritual walk.

Love means: No racism. Period. The end.

Love means: Bear these things in mind and live like they’re important – they wouldn’t be in the Bible if they weren’t. 

Love means: Follow the example Christ set for us.

So now you know. We can both stop working - stop trying so hard - to earn grace that was a gift in the first place. We can recognize that, while in theory we ought to be able to stop sinning, our sin-nature is going to cause us to mess it up every now and again...and guess what? Before God created the world, He knew this about us. It doesn't shock Him when we sin. We can recognize that God promises to hang onto us forever, despite our sin and faithlessness - and through that promise we can see a lot about God's character. 

And in light of that knowledge we can choose to live in a way that reflects who God is. Not because it will save us. But because we want to, out of joyful expression of who God is to us. 

---

[1] I am indebted to Professor John Correia and his stunningly awesome power-point for the outline format used in this blog.

[2] Concept retrieved from when Pastor John taught out of Romans at West Greenway Bible Church