Romans Commentary Project, chapter 7

1 Or do you not know, brothers, I speak to those knowing Torah, since the Torah lords over a man upon what time he might live

Chapter 7 begins continuing the theological theme of chapter 6 (deliverance from Torah) with a new analogy. (Release from matrimony instead of exodus from slavery.) Both analogies are explanations of 5:12-21. Those in the Messiah are no longer bound to Adam and the Adamic problems, but are now free to be bound to the Messiah. Paul will explain in v.7 how the entrance of Torah into the Adamic problem (sin and death) creates a complex bifurcation, but these first verses serve to restate in different language the bond/freedom idea of the previous chapter. The marriage language starts in this chapter. When Paul speaks to those knowing (ginoskousin) Torah he uses the same term for a man’s “knowing” a woman. In other words, he speaks to those bound by covenant to Torah. “Speaking to” is the best way to render the cases, but it doesn’t mean that Paul is addressing Jews and everyone else doesn’t need to listen…rather Paul is speaking about or with reference to those “knowing” Torah. “Lords over” is kurieuei, from the same stem as kurios. Simplest way to translate the end of the verse is probably “as long as he’s alive.”

2 For a married woman is given by law to a living husband. But if the man might die, she is released from the law concerning the man

By law could also be according to or in the law. (I’m translating nomos as law instead of Torah a few times here for clarity’s sake, although it’s really continuing to evoke the specifically Jewish law as well.) Released is the same word (katargeo) as nullify earlier, but it changes meanings in the passive with the preposition apo. Nomos and andros are both in the genitive, nomos because of the preposition. Could also be translated with some liberties: the bond to the man is nullified/emptied of power. (Basic idea: Death ends the power of Torah.)

3 Therefore she is called adulterer if she come to another man with her husband yet living. But if the man might die she is free from the law

The Torah has power as long as the old bonds are intact (i.e., there has been no redemptive death) and that power is quite real, enough to make one an adulterer. This passage is about the Torah’s authority, not about practical advice for church discipline.

4 So that, my brothers, you also have died with reference to Torah through the body of the Messiah, unto your becoming to another, to him raised from the dead, that we might bear fruit to God

By participating in the Messiah’s death the bond to the old man (still referencing Adam here) is broken. In that sense we really have “died.” We are now bound (become, as in v.3) to another man, in order that we might bear fruit to God. The bearing fruit idea completes the marriage analogy, because offspring are a necessary part of a successful and blessed marriage in the ancient world, not just an extra bit of trivia on the “happily ever after” page. Our marriage to the Messiah is a blessed and fertile one.

5 For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sins which were enroused through the Torah were in your members, unto your bearing fruit unto death

The only hope we had of offspring (and hope of/for offspring is another major O.T. theme) in our bond to the old man was unto death. We have here the beginning of the bifurcation language that gets sorted out in vv. 7-25. Though the Torah was the covenant marker and blessing from God, somehow it was Torah that enroused (energeito) the passions of sins, leading ultimately to a legacy of death.

6 But now we are released from Torah dying to what we were held down by, so us to serve in the newness of the spirit and not the oldness of the letter

Released is katergethemen again. In the Messiah we have died to what bound us. Not quite sure how to translate the end. There is no subject, “us” appears to govern the verb, and there is no object. Some have read new life and old life, but zoe doesn’t appear anywhere. I think I’ve seen “new” and “old” modifying spirit and letter respectively, but that doesn’t seem right either. I welcome an explanation.

7 What then will we say? That the Torah is sin? May it not be! But I did not know sin except for Torah. For I did not know coveting except the Torah said You shall not covet

One of the more controversial points I’ll argue here (argued much more convincingly elsewhere by Wright, to whom I owe pretty much everything I’ll say about the next chapter and half) is that the following passage is not Paul speaking autobiographically. Rather, the I (ego) is a continuation of the discussion started in 7:1 (I speak now concerning those knowing/bound to Torah) and the larger narrative of the Israel story redone by the Messiah, which began in ch.5 in Eden, went to Egypt and the Red Sea in ch.6, and now is at Mt. Sinai. We should not, then, read the following chapters as a revelation of Paul’s personal interior sin. (As some would have it, his discovery of sexual desire around the time he started reading the Pentateuch for his Bar-Mitzvah.) If you presume a personal reading the argument is full of starts and stops, and makes no sense. Context demands that, as elsewhere, Paul writes the “I” as Israel. (He writes vv. 7-12, by the way, the aorist tense—as history, and vv. 13-24 in the present tense as the “current problem.”) There’s a lot more to say about why Paul did this, but I’ll leave the argument hanging for now.

We need to, for the whole section, keep Paul’s question of whether or not the Torah is sin(ful), at hand. It is certainly not (see v. 12) but Sin used Torah, which was holy and good, to accomplish what it couldn’t otherwise. (The image here of the arrival of Torah on top of the mountain is most certainly linked to the arrival of the golden calf below)

8 And Sin receiving the opportunity through the command accomplished in me all coveting. For without Torah sin was dead.

Accomplished (ergazomenoi) could also be worked or wrought. When Israel was bade to have no other gods or idols, they immediately were filled with the lust/desire (epithumia, though Paul is evoking the 10^th commandment specifically from the LXX translation) to have them. As the child who is told to do anything but go in the one closet (which, unbeknownst to him, holds the poisonous spider), the command itself serves to implant the burning desire to disobey it.

9 But I lived formerly without Torah, and receiving the command Sin came to life.

Even though the giving of Torah was supposed to be the initial seal to the life giving covenant, it roused sin to life within Israel and led to all the painful history of Israel’s failure to live up to its covenant vocation. Though the Torah-bound people were supposed to be a light and life to the world, their own failure to keep Torah amplified Sin’s effect. (Still keep the question in v. 7 in mind)

10 And I died and the commandment found to be life unto me, the same was unto death.

So Israel wanders in wilderness and eventually overrun by pagan oppressors, because of their failure to stay faithful to the good law given them…but the same law that convicts them of their failure

11 For sin receiving the opportunity through the command deceived me and through it killed me

Deceived, or led astray, once again using golden-calf language and evoking the failure at the foot of Sinai where, at the giving of Torah, Israel failed

12 So that the Torah is holy and the command holy and just and good.

Here is the answer to the question in 7, although now the question of why Torah must be addressed in the context of God’s faithfulness to the promises for Israel. For the next verses, we’ll see that we’re looking a psychological treatment not of the pre or post conversion Christian, but of the Israel of Paul’s day.

13 Therefore did that good become death in me? May it not be! But rather sin, through the good accomplished death in me, that it might be shown sin, that sin might become overaboundingly sinful through the command.

The concept of this verse is vitally important to all that follows in chapters 8&9, and also serves to explain what Paul mentioned earlier when he said that the Torah came (5:20) that sin might “abound.” What he begins to explain here is that sin, in being made “aboundingly sinful” is collected in one place, or drawn up to its full stature. As we shall see later, the Messiah conquered sin and death by taking this “heaped-up” sin, which was concentrated on Israel, as Israel’s king and representative, upon himself. This is, perhaps of all the verses that follow, the most clearly non-autobiographical verse as well. (Though of course, the sections that follow do find an authentic parallel in the way that most of us deal with the problem of interior temptation and virtue.) Note the question again that Paul seeks to address: Did the Torah become (or effect) death in Israel? (Answer, no)

14 For we know that the Torah is spiritual, but I am sold fleshly by sin

It is an implicit reference, but the “sold by sin” is a continuation of the slave language from the previous chapter. Vv. 15-19 serve as the explanation for this imbalance. Fleshly is sarkinos, spiritual pneumatikos.

15 For what I work I do not know. For this I will I do not do, but this I do which I hate.

In plainer English (I’ve tried to play the Greek as it lies in the translations throughout) I don’t understand my own actions. I don’t do what I want, but I do the thing I hate. It is very easy to read this, as was said earlier, in context of a private morality struggle, but I think Paul is actually referring to the failure of the covenant people to keep the very laws that sealed their covenant. Though Israel would be the light of the world, they instead are idolatrous, unfaithful, and exiled. The very things they ought to hate, they do.

16 But if I do this which I will not, I agree with the law that it is good.

If I do what I don’t want, I agree that the law is good.

However, Torah itself is exonerated from the charge of evil, for by my “not willing” to do these things I uphold its goodness.

17 But now no longer do I accomplish this but sin dwelling in me

But it’s no longer me that does it, but sin dwelling in me.

So then, Torah is not responsible for “my” death, but the sin revealed by Torah. Torah is not to blame for the (apparently) catastrophic failure of God’s chosen people Israel in the world, but the sin in that people that their covenant law reveals.

18 For I know that good lives not in me, that is in my flesh. For that present to me to will, and this good to accomplish not.

For I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I can’t do it.

Though Israel would do what is right, she is unable, because of the indwelling sin exposed by Torah. In her “practical” living out of the covenant, Israel admits failure. Good does not live in her.

19 For not this good I will do I do, but this ill which I do not will I do.

For I don’t do the good I want, but the evil I don’t want is what I do.

Good and evil/ill throughout are kalon/agathon and kakon.

20 But if I do this which I do not will, no longer do I accomplish it but sin living in me.

Now if I do what I don’t want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells in me.

It’s important to note here that at the end of this analysis Torah and “I” are both exonerated. In other words, God himself is exonerated and can be considered still faithful, for the promise always was that the solution would come through Israel. Since Israel, corrupted though she is by indwelling sin, must be the solution, she must provide a way despite the indwelling sin for God to deal decisively with that sin.

21 Therefore I find this concerning Torah, to do good by my own willing, that evil is present to me.

This verse should NOT read “Therefore I find a law.” The sense in readable English is “So I find concerning Torah that when I want to do good voluntarily, evil is close at hand.” Close at hand/present is parakeitai, which is literally “laid-next to.” I wonder (though I’ve never read it anywhere else) whether this might be evoking the marriage analogies from the beginning of the chapter. Though I am willing and eager to do good, I’m bound, conjugally, to sin and death.

22 For I delight in God’s Torah according to the inner man

Inner man is eso anthropon. Full analysis next verse.

23 But I see another law in those members of mine warring with the law in my mind and making me captive to the law of sin being in my members

But yet I am a bifurcated man. Torah seems good and holy to one part of me, but to another part it is the instrument by which I am sold to the slavery of sin/death. (v. 14 again.) Here is the answer to the question of v. 13. Torah has become to me both a holy thing and a dreadful thing, just as I am become both a holy thing and a dreadful thing. I am split in half.

24 I am a wretched man. Who will save me from this deathly body?

Since I am at war and taken captive/made a slave, who is it that will deliver me? Who will save wretched Israel, will solve this muddle of what was supposed to be God’s faithful promise to fallen humanity, will end the war, and redeem the one sold into slavery?

25 But thanks to God through the Messiah Jesus our Lord. Therefore then I myself in the mind on the one hand serve God’s Torah and in the flesh the Torah of sin

This will be done through the Messiah’s victory. (Explained fully in chapter 8.) The contrast between spirit and flesh serve to underscore the state of bifurcated Israel apart from the Messiah’s dramatic rescue. I’ll add as a final note to this chapter that those who insist on reading this passage only in terms of private obedience have been justifiably confused by this “conclusion,” and would be tempted to understand that Paul is advocating them to live as exactly as he has said NOT to in the previous chapters and throughout the rest of his writing: as dualist Gnostics who can do whatever they want in the flesh because their “salvation” is from the head/spirit.

International Date Night: American

Convalescence

I've recently recovered from a rather severe bout of Mahleria with the BPO. (The 3rd symphony, playing assistant.) Mahleria, of course, is a pretty severe ailment. Once you've contracted a strain it takes over your life quickly, and is known for being so protracted and lingering that sometimes there isn't even time for an intermission.





 

Most music students have an episode of it sometime or another. It's quite contagious, and mostly spread by tiny, annoying, high pitched insects with vindictive swarming personalities making a horrible whiny sound. I mean violins, of course.

 

So anyway, a week of Mahleria takes over your life. You feel listless, and then really excited, and then triumphant, and then despairing again, pretty much in random sequence every couple of minutes. I was going to take some medication, but when I got it out I found all the instructions were in German.

 

Okay, that's enough with the Mahler jokes. It was a great week with BPO, and the gig ended with my favorite words: "Hey, what are you doing next week?" Fortunately, this week being a program of absurdly difficult contemporary music, I don't really need to practice, and can devote a little bit of time to reading, writing, and playing with my bouncing baby boy.

James is very bouncy recently. He starts kicking his feet as soon as he wakes up in the morning, then kick-kick-kicks the wipes at the end of his changing table, and leans for the mirror on his dresser when he has a new diaper. Once he gets in front of the mirror he bounces with his reflection for a few minutes, and then goes downstairs. (Bouncing, preferably.) From there he bounds/trots from one end of the house to another with a set of hands under his armpits, from kitchen to living room to kitchen again, then up the stairs, down the stairs, and another circuit. Eventually he tires both parents out, and we put him in his bouncer, where he will happily kick himself up and down, up and down, until he needs a nap. I'm reminded, taking care of him, that the most wonderful thing about Jameses is he's the only one.

Currently reading C.S. Lewis' big 16th century literature book, which I may have to abandon. The first section I kept up with, with some help from the internet looking up names of poets and poems, but the second section is so full of Middle English that I'm missing most of what he's saying. I'm also still working through the Confessiones, Aeschylus' Prometheus, the Iliad, and the Zondervan Hebrew grammar. J and I listened to an N.T. Wright lecture last night on his new book, How God Became King...very good talk and much to talk about afterwards, but we were so tired by the end of it (see Mahleria and the bouncing baby boy) that we went straight to bed!

Romans Commentary Project, chapter 6

VI

1 Therefore what shall we say? Should we remain in sin, that grace might abound?

Another question as at the beginning of chapter 4.

2 May it not be! Those which have died with reference to sin, how might we yet live in the same?

The baptism language of this chapter actually beings here with “having died,” which is, throughout equivalent to the process of Christian baptism. As we’ll see, it is analogous for Paul with the deliverance from Egypt. A passage through water from slavery on one side to freedom on the other. Likewise, the Christian in baptism passes through death with Jesus from the slavery from sin into freedom from it. All of these “died to sin” bits are datives of reference, not a personal dative—don’t think of it with a capital S, but in terms of reference.

3 Or do ye not know that, such which were baptized into the Messiah Jesus, into his death were baptized?

Baptism here is unto (eis) and not in (en). This is not only the Messiah Jesus the person, but the incorporatative Messiahship of Jesus, in which, as Israel’s representative, the covenant has been reinaugurated. We who are baptized in Jesus’ name are actually baptized into his Messiahship, which is how we can share in his death and come alongside his passage through it.

4 Therefore we were buried with him through baptism into death, that just has the Messiah was raised from the dead through the glory of the father, thus even we in new life might walk

Paul’s statement of new life for the Christian believer—a separate process from justification, which is belief in the Lordship of Jesus. The new life is participation in the burial and resurrection of Jesus. This burial is the baptism required of every believer, which is not symbolic, but a true passage from the old life (though death) unto the new.

5 For if we are become sharers in the likeness of his death, rather even we will be of his resurrection

And expansion of the outos clause at the end of verse 4. Sharers is sumphotoi. The process of dying with reference to sin by participating in baptism is not a mere convenient analogy. It serves instead (analogous to the Red Sea passage for the ancient Israelites) as the physical representation of their deliverance from slavery and entrance to the promise, and now confirms the final hope of life through the resurrection.

6 Knowing this that the old man of us has been co-crucified, that the sinful body might be condemned, of that our no longer to serve with reference to sin.

A complicated passage. The old man (ho palaios anthropos) is a continuation of the ideas presented in chapter 5. The net result of the old man’s death in the Messiah is a solidarity with us for him as the new man—the man who is the new solidarity as Israel’s representative and king.

7 For he dying is justified from sin

That is to say, his service is ended. He has paid the “wage.”

8 But if we died with the Messiah, we believe that we will live again with him

This baptism language is no mere symbolism. By entering into the baptismal waters we truly do participate in the Messiah’s passage through death. In the second half of the verse, there is explicit resurrection language. This hope of living again is not for a disembodied heaven, but is thoroughly rooted in the hope of physically rising in the mode of Jesus.

9 Knowing that the Messiah being raised from the dead dies no longer, for Death no longer lords him

Death no longer kurieuei him. Again, note that the whole chapter is about the escape from slavery.

10 For what he died, he died once for all to sin. But what he lives, he lives with reference to God

The “he” is the same, I just left both pronouns in to preserve the Greek syntax. Dative of reference again to sin. Once for all is the ephapax, something unrepeatable. The life is also dative of reference. Paul doesn’t include the second half of the sentence for balance or contrast—he is speaking of transferred fealty, of a new sort of service, apart from the slavery to sin/death.

11 And thus reckon ye yourselves [to be] dead with reference to sin but living with reference to God in the Messiah Jesus

And as the Messiah has recapitulated this Exodus and deliverance, so we who participate in him now consider ourselves, through our dying and rising with him, to be a liberated people serving God. This (and v. 12) are the answer to the question in v.1

12 Therefore let not Sin hold dominion in your mortal body unto obeying its desires

If you begin to read the discussion of sin in 6 as an unknown question regarding personal behavior, you might miss the narrative structure Paul achieves in vv. 1-11. In v. 12 he does get to the question of personal sin with regard to v.1, but in a way that makes more sense as an auxiliary conclusion. Mortal body is thneto somati, not sarki.

13 Nor present ye your members implements of unrighteousness to sin (or w/ref) but present yourselves to God has from the dead living and your members implements of righteousness to God

You have to see the whole Exodus backdrop to understand the possible resonance of v. 13, but if you accept it so far then you can see the understated point Paul makes in 12-14: since you’ve been liberated, don’t go back to your old slavery. In other words, don’t repeat the grave mistake of old Israel and ask to go back to Egypt. Hopla can mean either weapons or smithy’s tools. (Implements sort of suits both.)

14 For sin now longer lords over you, for ye are not under Torah but under grace

A transitional verse, changing of the key of discussion from deliverance from Sin to deliverance from Torah. This simultaneously sets the stage for chapter 7 (What do we make of Torah’s goodness?) and recalls the Torah discussions of ch. 3, which of course is to Paul’s main point: How would the righteous God keep faithful his promises?

15 Therefore what? Might we sin, since we are not under Torah but under grace? May it not be!

Paul restates the problem of v.1 with regard to freedom from the ethical commands of the Torah.

16 Do ye not know that (w) ye present yourselves servants unto obedience, ye are servants to what ye obey, whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto righteousness?

In other words, to yield is to be slaves, but you are no longer slaves of sin, death, or Torah. You are no longer as the old man. Don’t yield to that old slavery, because slavery is death.

17 But thanks to God that ye were slaves of sin but ye are obedient from heart unto the type of teaching which was entrusted

Which is as much as to say a faithful life characterized by baptism (the new exodus) and communion feasts. (the new Passover)

18 But being free from sin ye are enslaved to righteousness

In yielding to these you have transferred your fealty

19 I speak anthropomorphically because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as ye presented your members servants to uncleanliness and to lawlessness unto lawlessness, thus now present ye your members servants to righteousness unto holiness.

Anthropinon, or in human terms. Lawlessness in anomion, uncleanliness akatharsia.

20 For when ye were servants of sin, ye were free to righteousness

I don’t think Paul’s getting at any incapacity of the non-believer to understand justice; he’s just saying that their ownership was elsewhere.

21 Therefore what fruit had ye then, upon which now ye are ashamed? For the end of these is death

Fruit can also mean reward or wage. Vv. 21 and 22 are an expanded version of 23. Again, this may also pertain to private behavior, but it is primarily a retelling of the deliverance from slavery.

22 But now being freed from sin and serving to God have ye your fruit unto holiness, and the end eternal life

The holiness which could not be accomplished through Torah by the old Israel (more on that in ch. 7) is available in service to God, along with the true inheritance promised in the new covenant.

23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God eternal life in the Messiah Jesus our Lord

Ascension at LCS Devotions

I gave this talk this morning at LCS. As I recently told Calvus, "It's much better to be an amateur theologian, because the pay isn't any worse, and you don't have to cite your sources." In the interest of due credit, however, I owe much (most) of this to N.T. Wright and J.I. Packer. Thanks to J, Mom, Calvus, and Dad Davis for contributing edits.

The last time I presented a devotional here I spoke about Paul’s exposition of the Resurrection in I Corinthians 15, and especially about how that text ought to inform the way we think of heaven and the afterlife against the dualistic popular notion that heaven is the place where we go after we die to live in an eternal state of disembodied bliss. Having just completed the Easter season and celebrated the bodily resurrection of our Lord, with all the rich and joyful implications of that event, I thought I might talk a little this morning about the great event that followed shortly thereafter: his Ascension. The Ascension is approached in all four of the gospels, but given its fullest treatment in Acts. From Chapter 1, Verse 1, Luke writes:

In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, ² until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. ³  He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. ⁴ And while staying^[a] with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me; ⁵ for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized in^[b] the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” ⁶ So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time reestablish the kingdom to Israel?” ⁷ He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. ⁸ But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” ⁹ And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. ¹⁰ And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, ¹¹ and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

I have a suspicion that this passage is misunderstood in modern popular theology, not because anyone disbelieves the core points, but because they have slightly forgotten what the core points are and gone on believing other things in their absence—as has happened with the resurrection. We are just now at that time of year when everyone has been reminded of the importance of the bodily resurrection, and it all seems clear again, but after a month or two we might revert back to some muddled compromises. The central truth of the Ascension, as far as I can see, is the entrance of Jesus into heaven as King and Ruler, rather than as a departure away from earth. In short, the Ascension doesn’t mean absence, it means sovereignty. I’ll briefly talk about what this sovereignty means, how this event was anticipated in the Old Testament and by Jesus himself, and what it means for us in the present.

No Christian would dispute the claim (just as no one would dispute the claim that Jesus is raised from the dead) that Jesus is Lord. But what does that really mean? The Evangelical movement in which most of us have served has taken great care to emphasize how Jesus is Lord of our personal and individual lives. We’ve been deeply concerned, and rightly so, with bringing people to confession of personal faith that Jesus is Lord. Thanks be to God, however, that he is not merely the Lord of our private interior lives, but is also the world’s one true Lord in the cosmic and political sense. To put it another way, he is not only a religious Lord, but the Lord of all lords, and all things are subjected to and summed up in him—one need not look further than Ephesians 1 for a great summary of this high Lordship. It is sovereignty in this sense that the New Testament writers meant when they announced the gospel to the 1^st century Mediterranean world. To call someone kurios kai huios theou—the Lord and Son of God—was not to use religious language, but political, and political language that threatened the other man who laid claim to such titles: the Caesar of Rome. When the New Testament writers call Jesus Lord, they do not mean only that we owe him private obedience, but that he is in fact the world’s true king, and Caesar, or whoever else might be claiming power against him, is not. What’s this to do with the ascension? Keep in mind that the ascension was not merely an entrance into heaven, but an entrance into heaven to be seated at the right hand of God the father. If your controlling metaphor for heaven is someplace a long way off where eventually we might go to strum ethereal harps in disembodied bliss, you might mistake the ascension as a departure story—E.T. getting back into his spaceship and returning home, only with the second person of the Trinity. If however, you draw from all the biblical language portraying heaven as the control room of earth—which is as much as to say, God’s domain—then Jesus’ enthronement at the Father’s right hand is about becoming the world’s true sovereign. When he said in Matthew, all authority in heaven and on earth is given to me, he meant it! We are even given a glimpse of Jesus in his glorified state in Revelation 1—where he is described as the ruler of the kings of the earth.

Thus was the language the New Testament writers used to describe the ascension event—an event prophesied in the Old Testament and looked for by expectant 1^st century Israel. The ascension was not an afterthought to Jesus’ Messianic career, nor was it a tidy wrap-up to the gospel accounts. Rather, it was the final task of the Messiah as foretold in Daniel 7: And behold, there came with the clouds of heaven one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed. Though there were many varieties of Messianic expectation in second temple Judaism, all camps were roughly agreed that God’s Messiah would be the one to put an end to exile, drive out the pagan oppressors, restore the true temple worship of YHWH in Jerusalem, and lastly to share YHWH’s throne ruling as the king of Israel and the world. Jesus was keenly aware of all of these Messianic vocations, which he fulfilled in unexpected ways. His ascension represented the completion of this final task, having, as was foretold in Daniel, defeated Israel’s monstrous enemies, he went upon the clouds to share God’s throne, with all authority given to him for the everlasting kingdom he proclaimed. This would not only have been looked for by the Jews of his day, but was clearly anticipated by Jesus himself. Being tried by Caiaphas, he was asked directly whether he was the Messiah, the son of God. He answered thus: You have said so, and I tell you from now on you will see the son of man seated at the right hand of power and going on the clouds of heaven. When asked directly whether he was the Messiah, Jesus replied to the Jewish leaders that indeed he was the son of man foretold in Daniel, the one who would defeat Israel’s enemy—by his death on the cross—and would be exalted to share the throne of the Ancient of Days, being given the everlasting power and kingdom, that Kingdom not from this world, but the Kingdom from heaven, which Jesus at the ascension received as coronation.

This brings me to my third and most important point—that Jesus’ omnipotent rule and kingdom are a present as well as a future reality. As I said earlier, the meaning of Jesus’ ascension is not absence, but sovereignty. I believe, and am willing to discuss with any interested party, that the last 150 years of popular eschatology has misunderstood this badly, though it’s not my task to address eschatological questions here. As the people of God on earth we are not called to bemoan the degradation of a world ruled by evil—we are to remind the world that it already has a King. Some here might quickly object that the world does not look as though anyone were in charge, let alone the supposed son of God. But keep in mind, it was no ordinary king who ascended to the right hand of the Father—it was the man whose kingdom looked like peasant fishermen, and whose crown was made from thorns. The Jesus of the gospels rarely ruled as the kings we know, those kings who are but a parody of his power. Rather, his kingship is through service and suffering; ultimately, through sacrifice. It is in this present reality of his Lordship that the church is to act for the world, in religious and public life. We do not fill the vacuum of his absence. Rather, we pray, work, play, and act as the subjects of the already-crowned king. We should be constantly asking ourselves, “What would it look like if God were in charge here?” For in and through Jesus, he is. Ask yourself today, “What would it look like if God ran the show at Lima Christian School? Not, keep in mind, the God of watery Deism who looks down from way up high and pulls the puppet-strings, but the God who in and through Jesus forgives prodigally and feasts and creates. Or what would it look like if our Lord ran the city of Rochester? We remind those in power who is the true Lord of the world. We take care of the poor and widowed, we reflect the creator God, and we tell stories of his exalted Messiah—the Messiah whom God raised to heaven to share his throne. His ascension does not mean absence, but sovereignty.

Let us pray. Almighty God, we thank you this morning that you have raised your son Jesus to the right hand of your throne, and him we do confess to be our Lord, he to whom all authority and power is forever given. We pray that we might be faithful stewards of his kingdom on earth, and that through our efforts and the working of the Holy Spirit that kingdom might be realized on earth as it is in heaven. Give us, O Lord, the courage and wisdom to bring Jesus’ kingdom to the world’s believing and unbelieving, and especially to our students. To you be all glory and praise forever more, our gracious God. All these we ask in the name of your son, our Lord, Jesus Christ.

Romans Commentary Project, chapter 5

Chapter V

1 Therefore being made righteous by faith we have shalom to God through our Lord Jesus the Messiah.

v. 1-2 are an early statement of what will be fully said in 8:31-39, what would be, in musical terms, the development of Paul’s argument so far. Having established that God is faithful to his promises through the Messiah Jesus, Paul now begins to explain how the privileges which ought to have been enjoyed by Israel are now given to the people of the Messiah, through the Messiah’s re-making of the Israel story around himself. First off is the peace with God, standing against the wrath of God which is to be poured out against the ungodly earlier.

2 Through whom we also have the coming-near [in faith] unto this grace in which we stand and we boast upon the hope of God’s glory

Just as the Messiah people now have the shalom to God that should have been the privilege of God’s elect, so also they have the entrance before—prosagogen—that would have been associated with the approach to God’s dwelling in the holy temple on Mount Zion, and a portion of the hope of his glory, which was, as God’s elect, to have been the privilege of ethnic Israel. Remember that the entrance before God was not a spiritual abstraction. In temple language, God really did dwell on Mt. Zion. (At least he did in the old temple) To enter higher and further within the temple really was to approach God. That privilege, through the Messiah, is now given to the Messiah’s family—Gentiles are allowed within, regardless of their status to purification, circumcision, or Torah.

3 And not only this, but we also boast in troubles, knowing that trouble produces endurance

Paradoxically, the situation of the persecuted early Christian is to glory in his distresses, for this is how the Messiah accomplished his great victory. It was not by raising arms and striking his enemies, but by submitting to their strikes. Boast is kauchometha again.

4 And endurance character and character hope

Dokime can mean character, worth, proof, or evidence.

5 And the hope is not disgraceful, since God’s love is poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit given to us.

Kataischunei is often translate “disappoint,” but I think that Paul writes about the Christian dokime in contrast with that of pre-Messianic Judaism, which was disgraced because it had, through its disobedience, allowed itself and its God to be shamed by the pagans who had taken it and subjected it to troubles. In contrast, the people of the Messiah, looking to him as their model, expect and glory in the troubles they are given. Again, Paul is not writing in abstract spiritualisms when he talks about God’s love in the Holy Spirit—it is as concrete as the glory which once filled the temple, but now is indwelt within the Christian heart.

6 For the Messiah with our yet being weak at the right time for the sake of the ungodly died

Ungodly (asebon) might also be irreverent? If vv. 1-5 are a preview of ch. 5-8, vv. 6-11 are a sort of recap of the letter so far. Paul restates the propitiatory death of the Messiah for the ungodly.

7 For scarcely will anyone die for the sake of the just. For concerning a good man someone might dare even to die

I’ve always wondered (and I can’t find any footnotes to see if anyone else has followed this up) if Paul is quoting from another source here. He breaks the line of his argument, and the sentence just doesn’t quite sound Pauline. But I have no real evidence for this. It just doesn’t sound quite right. Dik language again.

8 But God demonstrated his love unto us, that with our yet being sinners the Messiah died for our sake.

Though we (the Messiah people) were not worth saving, the Messiah made God’s rescue by sacrificing himself to suffering and death. Keep the verse within the context of the argument before and after. (Although, of course, it is one of the key verses of whatever atonement theology ought to be drawn out of the New Testament.)

9 Therefore much more being justified now in his blood we are saved through him from wrath

Justified is again dikaiothentes, which ought to be read as a shorthand way of saying “given covenant membership.” The problem of God’s just wrath in ch. 1 is addressed by the sacrifice—which is somehow a temple sacrifice—of Jesus.

10 For if being enemies we are reconciled to God through the death of his son, how much more being reconciled will we be saved in his life?

Reconciliation here and throughout is katellagemen, which could also be read as “being put into friendship” but comes from a term from the reconcilement of an estranged man and wife. Here is powerful resurrection language—as the cross has accomplished covenant membership through sacrifice, so also will Jesus’ victory over death be translated into our final salvation. (Note, this is a future salvation)

11 And not only this, but also boasting in God through our Lord Jesus the Messiah through whom now we receive reconciliation.

Parallels v. 3, concluding the expository section.

12 On account of this just as through one man sin entered unto the world and through sin Death, even thus unto all men Death spread over, upon which all sinned.

Paul now begins to retell the whole Israel story, starting with Adam and the problem of sin. Adam is the type of the Messiah, but everywhere he has failed Jesus has conquered. Spread over is dielthen, which also could mean passed through.

13 For before Torah sin was in the world, but sin was not charged with the Torah not being

A complex sentence grammatically. Basically it means that there was Sin before there was the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai, and though the penalty was paid for Sin (Death), sin could not be charged in the same way. (I’ll get a little ahead of Paul’s argument and say that the giving of Torah served as a warning against sin but also as a stumbling block by which Israel and the world would be convicted.)

14 But Death ruled from Adam until Moses and upon those not sinning upon the likeness of the overstepping of Adam who is the type of the intended one

Without sin, Death held dominion. (ebasileusen, was king.) Overstepping is again parabasis. Adam is the typos—model, figure, example--of the intended one, who is the Messiah.

15 But not as sin, thus even the gift. For if by one all die in sin, how much more the grace of God and the gift in grace of the one man the Messiah Jesus unto all abounds

The original word order makes less sense. The meaning is, “but the gift of the Messiah is not as the sin of Adam.” The Messiah not only counteracts, but does more than Adam, for the gift abounds. (or overflows)

16 And not as through one sinning the gift. For indeed the judgment from one sin unto condemnation, but the grace from many sins unto justification

The first part of the verse (all the references to one, one, one are comparing to Adam to the Messiah) says that the gift is not as the sin of the one sinning. Though it was but by one sin from the one first sinner that death/condemnation came, the gift can and does cover many sins. Dik language implying covenant again.

17 For if by one in sin Death ruled through the one, how much more those the abundance of grace and of the gift of justification receiving in life will rule through the one Jesus the Messiah.

Death did rule the world through the one sin of Adam, but we will rule the world in Death’s place through the gift and justification of the Messiah.

18 Therefore then as through one sin unto all men unto condemnation, thus even through one righteousness unto all men unto justification and life.

Righteousness and justification, here as always, cognate through dik.

19 For just as through the disobedience of one man many were made sinners, thus even through the obedience of one many will be made justified

Many are entered into the covenant by the obedience (which elsewhere, Paul calls faith) of the one man, in contrast to the disobedience of Adam. Will be made might also be translated “proved” in a legal sense, continuing Paul’s courtroom metaphors.

20 And the Torah arrived, that Sin might abound. But where Sin abounded, Grace overabounded.

Paul doesn’t leave us hanging with this mysterious statement that Torah came and Sin abounded—this will be the task of ch. 7-9 to explain. But please do read as “Torah came, with the result that Sin abounded.” Abounded (epleonasen) becomes overabounded (upereperisseuesen)

21 That just as Sin ruled in death, thus even Grace might rule through justification unto eternal life through the Messiah Jesus our Lord.

Where Sin had dominion (ebasileuisen) now Grace has dominion unto the covenant justification, and ultimately eternal life (the victory over death) through the Messiah.

For Men Only, by Shaunti and Jeff Feldhahn

I suppose the best preliminary question is not whether this particular book is any good, but whether it's even possible to write a good book--at least one that isn't mealy sentiment and common nonsense--about one gender to another. Whatever might be generally true of enough women that someone might dare to write it down, is astonishingly false about some other woman somewhere. Writing about the genders is like writing about America. Whatever you say is true, the opposite is true somewhere else. Confusing this further, there are several truisms about women espoused in For Men Only that might be vaguely correct about American women between the ages of 26 and 49, but are certainly not at all descriptive of African women, or Victorian women.

With all that said, For Men Only doesn't come off quite as poorly as you'd expect. It's biggest flaw actually turns out to be the underlying assumption that a happy marriage is one in which the husband and wife keep up the constant sensation of "being in love" for as long and as powerfully as possible. Being in love, of course, and enjoying that love in romantic and sexual fulfillment, is quite pleasant. It is not, however, helpful for very long in building a successful marriage, or in understanding, so far as such a thing can be done, what a woman is.