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“The Root of Jesse Will Come” (Romans 15:4-13)On Palm Sunday the crowds welcomed Jesus as he entered Jerusalem, hailing him as their king: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” Great excitement! Great joy! Cloaks and palm branches spread in front of him, a welcome fit for a king! Here was the one they had been waiting for. “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold your king is coming to you.’” This was the Son of David they were welcoming, the long-promised Messiah, who would deliver...

“Present Yourselves to God” (Romans 6:12-23)“Under New Ownership.” Have you ever seen that sign on a storefront? It means that the business has been bought out by a new owner, that the old owner is no longer in charge. And the new owner may have a different way that he wants to run the business. Things will be different now, perhaps vastly different. “Under New Ownership.” Hey, that sign could be placed on you! For you have come under new ownership. Ever since your baptism, you have belonged to a new owner--to God, who purchased and won you with the...

“The Spirit Is Life” (Romans 8:1-11)When you became a Christian, what happened? That is to say, when you were joined to Jesus in Holy Baptism and given the gift of saving faith, what changed for you? Well, we can say that God the Father took you as his own dear child. We can say that all your sins were washed away on account of Christ. But something else happened as well. You were given the gift of the Holy Spirit, to dwell in you. And that’s something special. That’s something to rejoice in. Because, as our text today tells us,...

“The Promise to Abraham and His Offspring” (Romans 4:13-25)There is a monster on the loose. Tonight I want to warn you about this monster. It is dangerous. It could kill you. No, it is not big and hairy. It does not have sharp claws and teeth. But it is a monster nonetheless, a deadly one. And it especially likes to attack Christians. The monster I’m talking about is the monster of uncertainty. That’s a term that Luther came up with, “the monster of uncertainty,” for he himself had been subject to its attacks for many years. But our text tonight,...

“The Righteousness of God Is Revealed” (Romans 1:8-17)When I decided to do a whole series of sermons based on St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, for all of our services this Lent and on through Easter Day, I thought about what to use as a title for this series--something short, catchy, concise, something that could serve as an overarching theme connecting all the sermons. And the theme I came up with was “Readings in Romans: Righteousness Revealed.” But lest you think this took a lot of ingenuity or originality to arrive at such a title--no, it wasn’t like that. I...

“We Rejoice in Hope” (Romans 5:1-8)How has your life changed, now that you have been justified? What is different about your life, now that you have been declared righteous? What are the effects, the results, the new situation in your life, because of justification? This is what St. Paul addresses in our text for today, the opening verses of Romans chapter 5. “We Rejoice in Hope,” Paul says. That’s one of the blessed effects of justification, but there’s a whole lot more here as well. “One Thing Leads to Another,” you might call this passage, for in it Paul moves...

“The Gospel of God . . . Concerning His Son” (Romans 1:1-7)During this Lent, and on through Easter Day, we’re doing a series of sermons based on texts from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans. “Readings in Romans: Righteousness Revealed” is our theme, and tonight we come to the fifth of sixteen messages in this series. So far we’ve had texts from Romans 6, Romans 5, Romans 10, and Romans 4, but tonight we finally get around to going where the epistle begins, in Romans 1. This is St. Paul’s formal introduction to his letter, and it follows the familiar...

“His Faith Is Counted as Righteousness” (Romans 4:1-8, 13-17)Do you know how much you have in your bank account? It’s good to have at least a general idea, to know that you are on the positive side of the ledger and not about to overdraw your account. Because if you write a check and you don’t have enough money in your account to cover it, your bank will then hit you with an overdraft charge. There is a penalty for falling into a negative balance. So you want to know how much is in your account and to make sure...

“The Word Is Near You” (Romans 10:5-13)Imagine you are young and healthy--well, wait, right off the bat, that may hard for some of us to imagine, being young and healthy again! But for now, try to imagine that you are young and healthy, with all your life ahead of you. You’re married, you’ve got a couple of little children who need you--you’ve got a lot to live for. However, your doctor has just informed you that you have an extremely rare and deadly disease. It isn’t affecting you just yet, and it won’t for some months still, but within two...

“Reign in Life through the One Man Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:12-19)During this season of Lent, going on through Holy Week, and even on to Easter Day, we’re doing a series of sermons based on “Readings in Romans”: fifteen straight services in which our sermon texts are all from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, under the overall theme, “Righteousness Revealed.” Our text today comes from Romans 5, and I think we can get at the point of the passage as a whole by way of verse 17: “For if, because of one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man,...

My Christmas week reflections are inspired by a brilliant 25-year-old book by historian Robert L. Wilken. I picked up The Christians as the Romans Saw Them in hopes of finding resources for my research on the sanctity of life. I thought that Wilken might reveal the extent to which the Romans noticed the unique early Christian commitment to protecting human life. Instead, the book focuses on five pagan observers who offered a barrage of criticisms of the young religion. The five critics in chronological order were Pliny, Galen, Celsus, Porphyry and Julian, and each critic was more sophisticated and devastating...

And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.(Romans 8:28)Though we are Sons of God and heirs of a new heaven and a new earth, our time has not yet come.We await the time when our inheritance will be realized, when our true Son ship will be manifested. We are groaning with creation, for a new creation and for the final release from sin and corruption. But the present is not merely an interim time of waiting, nor is it a painful but meaningless...

The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.(Romans 8:14-17)Christians are Sons of God. Not naturally, but by adoption, God has brought us into his own family,and given us the status of sons. Also by virtue of a new birth, having been born from above, we share in the Divine nature,and are Sons of God. John 1:12-13 brings out this twofold truth powerfully when he proclaims , *adoption,“As...

Dave Crisp found treasure on a soggy ridge outside the Somerset town of Frome last April, and helped rewrite history. On a bitter winter afternoon, as he walks the frosty field again, he recalls one of the most heart-stoppingly exciting moments of his life. The 63-year-old ex-army man had discovered a scattering of Roman silver coins in the field. He came back a few days later with his detector, bought secondhand on eBay, to round up any remaining broken pieces. The signals were faint and confusing.

For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: (Romans 8:14-16)Romans 8 is all about the assurance of salvation. The apostle asserts in the first verse that “there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus…”, and the rest of the chapter teaches why this is so. There is no...

But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. (Romans 8:11-13) What is the current state of the Christian? How can it be that there is no condemnation for us, when we know...

But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. (Romans 8:9-11) One of the...

For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.(Romans 8:5-6)Why is it that “there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus”? One of the reasons is that those in Christ Jesus are indwelt by the Holy Spirit and live their lives by the Spirit of God. In the last article we looked at Paul’s expression, “They that are after the flesh“, that is those who...

For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.(Romans 8:5-8)Romans 8 is the great teaching of God about the assurance of salvation. There is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus…Why not? That is...

For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.(Romans 8:5-8)Romans 8 is the great teaching of God about the assurance of salvation. There is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus…Why not? That is...