Romans 1:7 To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.

We live in strange days in America.

Our First Amendment rights are slowly being removed – and it seems that no one cares. It happens in subtle ways. During the Covid-19 Pandemic (and its still there) some made the remark that this was the Wuhan or Chinese Virus, only to be shouted down as being politically incorrect. The reason we call it the Wuhan Virus is because Wuhan is the place that recorded the first major COVID-19 outbreak. The virus was traced to that area. When people speak of the Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever it is not racism that gives it that title. It is called the “Rocky Mountain” Spotted Fever because it was first identified in the Rocky Mountains. Likewise the sickness called MERS or the Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) is so named because it was first identified in the Middle East.

The 1996 “Defense of Marriage” Act was passed by the 104^th U.S. Congress and signed into law by Bill Clinton. This Act banned federal recognition of same sex marriage by limiting the definition of marriage to the union of one man and one woman. Just recently the U.S. Senate passed the 2022 “Respect for Marriage” Act. One of the sponsors of the Act Susan Collins (R-Maine) said “The Respect for Marriage Act would ensure that all married couples—including same-sex and interracial couples—are entitled to the rights and responsibilities of marriage, regardless of the state in which they live.” Though it must pass in the U.S. House, all indications are the it will be signed into law soon.

At last count I heard there are from 147 to 68 genders in America. God is not the Author of confusion (1 Corinthians 14:33), but Satan and the world are.

A lady recently sued Kraft for 5 Million Dollars because the “time it takes to make its microwaveable cup of Velveeta macaroni and cheese is longer than what the claims on the label indicate”. The label says “ready in 3 ½ minutes”, but doesn’t include the amount of time it takes to open the packaging and add the water and stir it. No, I’m not making this up.

America has lost its mind, but the Church that Jesus loved
and died for must NOT lose it’s mind.

How do we deal with the madness going on all around us? We keep our eyes on God’s Word, and speak His truth in love (Ephesians 4:15) regardless as to what others may do. As the Apostle Paul addressed the Church in Rome – a Church surrounded by the same madness that we see in America today – he wants Christ’s Church to not lose hope.

To ALL That Be In Rome, Beloved Of God

God speaks to ALL of His Church in Rome. Though madness has gripped the land, God is STILL in control. How can we say this? Well, look at the first two verses of our text:

Romans 1:1-2 Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God, 2 (Which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures,)

Let’s consider first the Messenger

When we read the Scripture, we are reading text written by – as Peter said – by

2 Peter 1:21 … Men who spoke from God as they were moved by the Holy Spirit

So Paul must have walked with Jesus while our Lord walked this earth. Did he? Absolutely not! God has a great sense of humor. He could have chosen anyone to go and spread His Gospel to the Gentiles. But who did God choose? Jesus chose someone who described himself as:

Acts 23:6 (ESV) … a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees …

Paul was at one time Saul, “an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin” (Romans 11:1). As all Pharisees did, when Paul was Saul he hated the Gentiles. Paul was “circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the Law of Moses, a Pharisee” (Philippians 3:5). Saul hated Gentiles, but the thing he hated most was the Church of God.

Starting at the execution of the Deacon and Evangelist Stephen, Saul “breathed out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord. He went to the High Priest and asked for warrants for Damascus, so if he found any following Jesus, he could bring them bound to Jerusalem” (Acts 9:1-2). It was on the Damascus Road that this racist and hateful man found Jesus – or rather, Jesus found him. And – miracle of miracles – Jesus chose Saul to be Paul the Apostle. His calling was absolutely undeserved. Paul would later write the Churches and say:

1 Corinthians 15:9-10 (ESV) I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain.

And in another place:

Galatians 1:11-16 I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man’s gospel. 12 For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. 13 For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it. 14 And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers. 15 But when he who had set me apart before I was born, and who called me by his grace, 16 was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles

It was only after Saul met Jesus on the Damascus Road that he realized Christ is indeed the Gospel. As a Pharisee Saul went forward to promote Judaism, thinking that he was doing the work of God. But then God knocked him down on Damascus, and by Grace called him to preach the Gospel. Paul described his call by saying:

Galatians 1:15 he who had set me apart before I was born, and who called me by his grace

When Saul traveled through the streets of Judea, capturing and killing Christians, he followed the pathway of darkness. God allowed him to do so for a little time. But then God called the messenger. He not only called, but he converted, then equipped Saul to be Paul. And though Paul often looked back on his time as a Pharisee, he nonetheless praised God daily. Paul said:

1 Corinthians 15:10 His grace toward me was not in vain

No matter how dark the days may seem, God is still in control. As America goes through the degradation of sin and the darkness, God can still change whatever God can change.

If God can change a Saul into a Paul, God can change any lost person into a son or daughter of God. Our God is able.

Saved by Grace, the Messenger Paul was 100% committed to sharing the Gospel outside of his comfort zone. Though Paul loved to go to the Temple and Synagogues, speaking the the lost Jews, he nonetheless kept his eyes on what Jesus called him to do. Paul wrote:

Romans 1:14-15 I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians; both to the wise, and to the unwise. 15 So, as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also.

One of the biggest barriers to salvation is the hardened heart – yet Christ was able to break through the heart of this “Pharisee of Pharisees”. Paul was saved on purpose for a purpose.

Word Study: Paul said that he was a “debtor” not to the Jews (though he shared the Gospel with the Jews) but to the “Greeks” and “Barbarians”. The word “debtor” is the Greek opheiletēs (pronounced of-i-let’-ace), which means “to be indebted to, to owe another, to be under obligation to or bound by duty to”. Paul knew that God entrusted the Gospel to him not to hide it, but to share it with the Gentiles. Notice that Paul breaks the Gentiles down into two different categories:

“Greeks” and
“Barbarians”

Why does he do this? Geoffrey Stone, the Edward H. Levi Distinguished Service Professor of Law at the University of Chicago wrote in his book “Sex And The Constitution”:

“From the sixth to the fourth century B.C. … The Greeks of this era generally {deliberately avoided using} the legal enforcement of moral or religious notions of “right sexual conduct.” Classical Greek morality and law focused not on sexual sin, but on whether an individual’s conduct was harmful to others.

The Greek gods indulged freely in sexual pleasure. In Greek mythology, Zeus variously became a bull, a swan and even rain with the goal of seducing mortals. Aphrodite was the goddess of love and of sexual rapture. Sex was “ta aphrodísiæ” — “the things of Aphrodite.” It is said that during the festival of Aphrodite her priestesses had sexual intercourse with strangers as a form of worship.

A distinctive feature of classical Greek sexual life was the practice of pæderasty. Adult men, both married and single, often had sexual relationships with adolescent boys. (These relationships did not involve children, but post-pubescent adolescents, usually between the ages of 15 and 19. Sex with prepubescent boys was punished, sometimes quite harshly.)

Greek boys were not taught to see themselves as either heterosexual or homosexual, a distinction that did not exist for another 2,000 years. Instead, Greek culture acknowledged that same-sex and opposite-sex sexual desires could naturally coexist in varying degrees in the same individual, just as we today might think of the different desires individuals might have to engage in some sexual acts more than others. To the Greeks, same-sex sex was simply a sexual act. It did not define a type of person.”

I believe the reason Paul spoke of being under obligation to both “Greeks” and
“Barbarians” was to distinguish between the sexually confused Gentiles of his day, and the other Gentiles who were not so afflicted. Rather than run away from sexual sinners, the Apostle shared the Gospel with them. The sexual immorality we see in America today is – as King Solomon said in Ecclesiastes 1:9

“What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun”

Because it is strange or seemingly insurmountable to us, do not believe that God cannot fix it through Christ. Paul was not discouraged. He said:

I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also

Paul did not rely on his own power,
nor the power of politics,
nor the power of peer pressure,
but only on the power of God by sharing the Gospel.

Let’s next consider the Message

Romans 1:1 Paul … separated unto the gospel of God,

What is “the gospel of God”? First of all, the GOSPEL is the ONLY WAY anyone can be saved. The Gospel is God’s Grand plan of Salvation.

Romans 1:2 (Which {Gospel} He had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures,)

The GOSPEL is not a last minute, “Hail Mary” pass from God to help defeat the devil. The Gospel was promised by God BY HIS PROPHETS in the Holy Scriptures. Paul is speaking of the Old Testament. As he writes these words, the New Testament has not yet been written. The Church will be

Ephesians 2:20 … BUILT on the foundation of the APOSTLES (Jesus’ hand picked representatives following His incarnation to humanity) and PROPHETS (Jesus’ hand picked representatives under the Old Covenant or Old Testament), with Christ Jesus Himself as the Chief Cornerstone …

God foretold the Gospel all throughout the Old Testament. Starting in Genesis 3:15 God foretold the “Seed of the Woman” would crush Satan’s head. Our Jesus took upon Himself flesh and blood,

Hebrews 2:14 … (ESV) that through death He might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil

Jesus did not come to make peace with sin nor the devil, but He came to “destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8). In Abraham God promised

Genesis 12:3 … in you {Abraham} shall all the families of the earth be blessed

The Apostle Paul tied into this promise in …

Galatians 3:8 (ESV) And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “In you shall all the nations be blessed.”

The Gospel is God’s Grand Design, foretold from the beginning of creation. When Abraham paid tithes to an ancient Priest named Melchizedek (Genesis 14:18), he was paying tithes to a pre-incarnate Jesus Christ (Hebrews 6:20). When Melchizedek brought out bread and wine (Genesis 14:18) this was a foreshadowing of the Last Supper (Matthew 26:26-29), where Jesus took bread and said, “Take, eat, this is My body, broken for you. Take, drink, this is My blood of the New Covenant, poured out for the forgiveness of sins”.

It was in Isaac, the son of Abraham that God said:

Genesis 17:19 (ESV) … Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his offspring after him.

Jesus Christ – God become Man – is the everlasting offspring of Isaac. When Jacob slept and saw a staircase to Heaven (Genesis 28:12), Jesus was that staircase. He said, “I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man” (John 1:51).

Our Lord Jesus is the Shiloh (Genesis 49:10), the Eternal Life from God (John 17:3).

Our Lord Jesus is the Lamb without spot or blemish (Exodus 12:5), sacrificed for the sins of the people.

Hebrews 9:13-14 For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, 14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

It is His Blood that saves once and for all. It is His precious Blood, like that of a Lamb without spot or blemish that makes us right before God (1 Peter 1:19). The power is in the Gospel of Christ!

When Moses stood before the Rock at Horeb (Exodus 17:6), and struck that Rock, Moses was showing the Gospel. We read:

1 Corinthians 10:4 (ESV) {Israel} drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.

Jesus is the Gospel. Jesus is all throughout the Old Testament. Oh, how I wish I could preach! When the sacrifice was killed outside the camp (Leviticus 16:27), this is a picture of Jesus Christ coming to Golgotha (Matthew 27:33), the Place of the Skull. Though we rightfully call it “Calvary”, the original term is that ugly word “Golgotha”. A place of horror, a place of suffering. It was outside the city of Jerusalem, a place where only lepers and trash was gathered. There Jesus died that lonely death – nailed to a tree between two thieves – for you and for me. We who believe in Jesus cry out with Job:

Job 19:25-27 … (ESV) I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. 26 And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, 27 whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me!

This Message – this Gospel – has been preached by Jehovah through His Prophets and Apostles from the beginning of time. This is why Saul become Paul preaches:

Romans 1:16-17 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. 17 For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.

The Gospel has the power to save anyone – even the sexual sinner. Therefore:

We Must Not Turn Away From The Message Of The Gospel

Many churches today have compromised with the darkness. They have either become abusive toward the sexual sinner, or untruthful toward the sexual sinner. Beloved, God’s standard and God’s design is not subject to debate or vote. What God has said stands true forever.

After discussing the Gospel, the Apostle turns to this:

Romans 1:18-20 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness; 19 Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. 20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:

God will judge all “ungodliness and unrighteousness of men”. Those who reject Christ “hold the truth in unrighteousness”. The word translated “hold” is the Greek katéchō, {pronounced kat-ekh’-o}, which means “to hold back, detain, or restrain”. Those who HOLD BACK the truth are supporting unrighteousness and darkness, not light. God has left Himself a witness that is outside of the Bible, and this is the Creation all about us. As we are told in verse 20, “the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen”. People know that this current creation did not just spontaneously evolve into what it is. All creation shows an order. All creation shows the hand of a Creator. And all people know this.

When people turn against God, they invoke His “wrath”. God does not wink at sin. He does not look the other way. God punishes sin. And yet, though God has left us the witness of Creation and the witness of our Consciences, some choose to turn away.

They move into idolatry.

Romans 1:21-23 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. 22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, 23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.

If a person rejects the Creator God, then they will turn to empty idols to worship. We were designed by God to worship. An empty faith in a false god will make you worship yourself, the creation of your own gods.

This is where sexual deviancy comes from.

Romans 1:24-28 Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves: 25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshiped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen. 26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: 27 And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meet. 28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;

Sexual sin, whether heterosexual or homosexual, sexual confusion that leads to 147 genders, these things are where the idolatrous Greeks went once upon a time. This is where America is today. And yet, God is able … if we cling to and continue to present the Gospel.

But we must not compromise.

We cannot show acts of hatred toward the sexual sinner, nor should we justify their sins. We must stand firm on sharing the Gospel to them as lost ones whom God wants to save. We must not compromise. We must remember that – though we are in Rome …

Romans 1:7 To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.

We are “beloved of God, called to be saints”. Jesus can fix anyone. He fixed Saul, and turned him to Paul. We are not able, but Jesus is able. Let us stand firm on His Gospel, for His glory. In Christ name I pray. Amen and Amen.