The Crisis of Grace: The Priestly Service of the Gospel

This is perhaps an epilogue to my previous sermon series on grace, which focused on what God's grace inspires, transforms, and equips us to do in, to, and for other people. One of the main problems people have with seeking to be used by God in the lives of other is the potential for undesirable consequences.

However, consider a personal example. My 2-year old has just had her toe nails painted for the first time. In enjoying her pure rapture, my heart was saddened by so many teen girls who are nothing more than salivation trips for locker room guys. And ... many of these girls have no problem with this. In fact many girls are far more sexually-aggressive today.

So ... question ... Am I to withdraw support, influence, and personal involvement in her life ... simply because of the potential for undesirable consequences. Most sane people would in no wise hesitate a hearty "No." And yet, this is what we see with God, church, and ministry.

You see Grace brings crisis. Forget the contemporary understanding for crisis (Help! My life is falling apart!). Rather for a moment consider a different understanding of crisis ... which is a fork in the road of life yield the possibility for both opportunity and danger.

Many would do well to remind me that not being involved in my daughter's life in any meaningful way is the only sure fire way to ensure undesirable consequences in her life. Not only is there the possibility for undesirable consequences, there is also the potential for godly-wise success. Let us never forget that. The same holds true for the God/church/ministry stuff.

The basic point of this sermonette is that God's grace is especially designed for his people to take God-risks for his ministry. Yes, there is the potential for undesirable consequences ... but there is just as much (if not more) potential for God-sized rewards and dividends. After all who is the One who is building his church ... but our great Sovereign King. What have we to fear? My desire for my two churches is that we would learn to embrace dreaming God's dreams for ministry.

At any rate let us consider the first part of our text, Romans 15:25-33:

At present, however, I am going to Jerusalem bringing aid to the saints. For Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem. For they were pleased to do it, and indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have come to share in their spiritual blessings, they ought also to be of service to them in material blessings. When therefore I have completed this and have delivered to them what has been collected, I will leave for Spain by way of you. I know that when I come to you I will come in the fullness of the blessing of Christ. (25-29; ESV)

Understand that at this point Paul is writing to the Roman church and is expecting to see them (and minister to and with them, see chapter 1). Yes, the future indeed held a visit from him to them ... but little did he realize his visit would be in chains. Let's continue picking up in verse 30.

I appeal to you, brothers, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, to strive together with me in your prayers to God on my behalf, that I may be delivered from the unbelievers in Judea, and that my service for Jerusalem my be acceptable to the saints, so that by God's will I may come to you with joy and be refreshed in your company. May the God of peace be with you all. Amen. (30-33; ESV)

Notice here that Paul is dreaming of the possibility of a future visit to this Roman congregation in fullest sense of the word "encouragement." Yet, little did he realize that though he would certainly be making a visit to them, it would be in chains. Though he certainly expected to see some measure of trouble, little did he realize the violent uproar that awaited him. Paul would see this God of peace, who he invokes, is in the midst of this uproar and will be with him during his many future shipwrecks, beatings, tortures, imprisonments, etc. Even in these future messy circumstances Paul is still dreaming God's dreams for ministry. Wow!

And yet, when at first we consider Paul and his life, we shipwreck him on the South Pacific island of great and important peoples, while me, myself, and I live in the real world of the mundane and boring. If there was ever a concept that was destined to shipwreck any church's ministry it is this one: the stuff in the Bible, real ministry, Christian excitement, all that is for paid professionals on staff somewhere in some mega church. Christianity for me is signing my name on Heaven's dotted line, getting my eternal fire insurance, and then waiting on Heaven. What a crock!

Let us simply consider how Paul opens his letter to the Romans in 1:1-17. Keep this question in the back of your mind as you read: What does it mean to preach the Gospel?

Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ, to all those in Rome who are loved by god and called to be saints; grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (1-7; ESV)

We need to understand that this whole passage (1:1-17) serves as an introduction to the whole of his letter. And verses 1 - 7 serve to give us a rather unique pattern. Allow me, if you will, to highlight it.

• Paul as servant of Jesus Christ ... Paul as apostle
• Jesus as descendant of David ... Jesus as Son of God
• Paul's missionary band receiving grace ... his band receiving apostleship
• The Roman Church being loved by God ... the Roman Church called to be saints

What we have here is a comparative group of passives and actives. Paul cannot choose to be a Christian. And to be a servant of Christ, he first must respond God's initiating call. This is passive. Paul is called to be an apostle. This is the active outflowing, his Christian production, if you will. His apostleship is what he produces with his Christianity. It is his ministry.

So we have the passive call (passive to man, active to God) and we have the active ministerial production. Yes, God the Son chose to come to earth, but the image is that of a baby boy. A human baby hardly has an active choice concerning which family he is born to. So Jesus is the descendant of David. And his active ministry is as the Son of God ... reconciling the world to God. Paul's missionary band received grace. They could not earn it. All they could do was passively receive it. Yet, they were given to the Christian ministerial production of apostleship.

Here is where it gets interesting. The pattern, again, is passively receiving from God and actively producing by God and for God. Consider the last example. The Roman church passively received love from God. They could do nothing to earn it. They received his love. Yet they are called to be saints.

Our contemporary understanding of Saint is either some mystical superhero in the Roman Catholic Church or some super pious old lady that lives in the church building.

However, if we follow our pattern, this understanding of saint does not hold holy water! Rather saint is a calling for ministry ... for the general Christian population in the church. The Roman church was loved by God ... called to be saints (ministry).

As we pick back up in 1:8, let us ask continue to ask ourselves what Paul's concept (at least in this passage) of preaching and ministry is.

First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world. For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I mention you always in my prayers, asking that somehow by God's will I may now at last succeed in coming to you. For I long to see you, that I may impart some spiritual gift to strengthen you-- (8-11; ESV).

Question?: What is a spiritual gift? If we follow Paul's thinking ... and he remains consistent in all his writings ... Let us consider 1 Corinthians 12:4-7:

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. (ESV)

A spiritual gift is nothing more than a Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered work, event, and activity for the "common good."

What Paul is saying is that he is hoping to visit them to produce in them from his apostleship ministry a special Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered work, event, and activity for the "common good." He wants to empower them for ministry among one another ("to strengthen you.").

Let's continue his thought by picking back up in verse 11 and continuing through:

For I long to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you--that is, that we may be mutually encouraged by each other's faith, both yours and mine. I want you to know, brothers that I have often intended to come to you (but have thus far been prevented), in order that I may reap some harvest among you as well as among the rest of the Gentiles. I am under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise adn to the foolish. So I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome (11-15; ESV).

Question?: How much "mutual" encouragement can 1 person participate in? None. It takes two to tango. So he's coming to them to impart to them some further ability to be used by the Spirit to minister ... and he hope to be ministered to by them being empowered by the Spirit. He's looking to build up and participate in this community of Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered ministers. He's not coming to laud his Apostleship over them. He's coming to mold them into people who can then mold one another and others.

Notice he's hoping to come reap a harvest among them. But they are already Christians. Here are two possibilities.

1. He's considering their being further trained for Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered ministry as his harvest "among" them.
2. He's hoping to work with them in reaping further harvest of Roman pagans.

Either way this harvest "among you" business is not the crusade-style ministry of Billy Graham. Rather its his being deeply and personally and tangibly involved in their being molded for Holy Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered ministry to one another and others outside the Kingdom.

Against this backdrop is his desire to "preach the gospel to you." Again, these people are already Christians, so this must not be so much evangelistic as it must be more of cultivating more and further Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered ministry among them to one another and others outside the kingdom.

Thus Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered ministry is not simply hiring some dude in a suit to run his mouth and tell you that you're going to hell (though this might certainly be a part of it, it's not the whole). Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered ministry involves deep, personal, and tangible ministry in the lives of others.

Let us consider verses 16-17:

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for (or to) faith, as it is written, "The righteous shall live by faith"(ESV).

Quite the common interpretation of verse 16 is the Gospel is the power of God for the initial conversion experience to everyone who will call upon the name of Jesus at the altar at the behest of some fire-breathing evangelist. However, this interpretation, while true in its own right is quite anemic when read against the backdrop of the whole of the preceding passage. And Paul was talking about reaping a harvest among believers. The preceding passage is about ordinary Christians being transformed by the Spirit for Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered ministry to one another and to those outside the kingdom.

Therefore this verse must be speaking to something deeper than the initial conversion experience. Rather it must be speaking to the salvation experience that is the life-long experience of Sanctification.

This is the power of God to everyone who believes. Well, duh. It only makes sense when read in this light. As a believer, I have been converted, and as a believer, I am being transformed.

"For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith." In it ... in the ministry of the Gospel the righteousness of God is revealed. And this happens "from faith to faith." Again what we have here is deep, personal, and tangible involvement that is Spirit-decided, -willed, and -empowered ministry in the lives of and to one another and to those outside the kingdom. Sanctification happens in the relationships of ordinary believers inside the Church to and with another another. The righteousness of God is revealed from my faith to the establishing and building up of your faith and vice versa.

And the passage reads as if Paul were expecting them to continue the pattern long after he had left. (Consider chapters 12-14.)

With this understanding of Paul's heart, let us pick back up in Romans 15:14-16:

I myself am satisfied about you, my brothers, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge and able to instruct one another. But on some points I have written to you very boldly by way of reminder, because of the grace given to me by God to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles in the priestly service of the gospel of God (ESV).

Paul knew there were potential problems awaiting him in Judea, yet he continued to dream God's dreams of a super-Spirit-sized Roman church ... and of no doubt the same established in Spain. May we ... in spite of potential problems dare to dream God's dreams for us in ministry. Seeing God do exciting things is not merely reserved from some dudes in the Bible or on TV, rather God expects these things of us. Rather than a few dudes in suits or in the Bible being called to the priesthood, we are called to be priest in the "priestly service of the gospel of God."