Sermon Tone Analysis

!!! Romans 15

!!!! Romans 15

*Tape #8134*

*Pastor Chuck Smith*

 

Let’s pray.

Father, with hearts filled with excitement and anticipation, we gather, as we look to You.

The work that You’re desiring to do in our lives tonight as You teach us more and more of Your wonderful grace and Your mercy and Your love and Your goodness unto us, Your children.

Father, we pray that our hearts might be in tune with Your heart, tonight, that You, Lord, will speak to us and allow the word of God just to minister to us and to our needs.

We just commit now Lord, this time, that You might use it for the edification of the church.

Building us up in the things of the Lord, giving us the strength that we need to cope with the world in which we live.

To be an example to them of what true Christianity is.

Lord, help us.

We fall short.

We realize that.

But not by desire, it’s just by weakness.

So make us strong.

Strengthen us tonight, Lord, in the things of the Spirit.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

Let’s turn now in our Bibles to the fifteen chapter of Romans as we continue our journey through the word of God.

In the fourteenth chapter you will remember that Paul is dealing with Christian unity that is created by Christian love, accepting each other though we may differ in some of our ideas and interpretations of the Scripture.

Basically the early church had a split over the Jewish aspects of the church and the Gentile aspects of the church.

Many of the Jews were still following the Kosher laws.

They were very concerned about the diet, that it be Kosher.

Many of the Gentile believers had never really heard of the Kosher laws and were not really worried about keeping Kosher.

So it developed this kind of division between the Jewish believers and the Gentile believers.

Many of the Jewish believers were insisting that you could not really be a Christian without keeping the Jewish laws, even the ritual of circumcision.

So Paul, an apostle to the Gentiles, though he was one of the strictest Jews at one time, he had been called of God to be an apostle to the Gentiles.

God took one of the most strict of all of the Jews and made him an apostle to the Gentiles.

In so doing, Paul came to a recognition and a realization that Jesus Christ has really set us free from the traditional observances of dietary laws and things of that nature.

So going to the Gentiles, he had this liberty and this freedom.

So yet the rule of Paul was to walk in love and try not to be an offense unto people.

So he said he had learned to be all things to all men that he might gain the more.

To the Jews, I became as a Jew.

He could go and enjoy fellowship with the Jews, keep Kosher and all.

Or he could go into a Gentile home and have ham, just give God thanks and eat it.

He had this liberty.

He said all things are lawful for me.

There is nothing unclean of itself unless a person esteems it to be unclean.

Then to him it is unclean.

Now Paul sort of put it in the category of “weak in the faith” and “strong in the faith.”

If you have a tender conscience, weak in the faith, then you are better off not to do those things for which you feel guilty.

In the same token, a person who had no qualms or conscience about it, should not openly flaunt his liberty in Christ to the extent of stumbling another brother for whom Christ died.

If you have liberty, Paul said, have it to yourself, in your own homes, enjoy it.

But don’t just flaunt that liberty so as to stumble or hurt someone else.

But basically the real law is love!

Walk in love.

Be considerate.

Now Paul is showing that in the church, we are one, both the Jewish believers and the Gentile believers.

Throughout the Book of Romans he has been showing that we are all of us sinners.

We have all come short of the glory of God.

We were all in need of redemption.

God has provided that redemption through Jesus Christ through whom we must all come in order to be redeemed.

So in that same flow as we enter into the fifteenth chapter here, Paul is continuing the same thought in the first few verses, as he says, /We then who are strong ought to bear with the scruples of the weak, and not to please ourselves.

/If you are strong in the faith, if you feel a liberty of doing certain things, then you need to bear the infirmities of the weak.

Understand them and don’t live to please yourself.

Again the key is love, not living for myself, not living to please myself, but walking in consideration and in love for another person’s feelings, not being an offense unto them or using my liberty in such a way as they are offended.

/2//Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, leading to edification.

/Let’s just seek to do those things that will please that we might build them up.

The whole idea as a church is that we should be interested in building one another up in the things of the Spirit.

We should be encouraging one another in the things of the Lord.

We should be praying one for another.

We should be concerned about the weakest member of the church.

And if you are strong, then help bear the infirmities of that weak.

Seek to build them up.

Seek to encourage them, to strengthen them, to do those things that will edify or build them up.

Then he uses Christ as our example, /3For even Christ did not please Himself;  /Jesus said I didn’t come to do my own will but the will of Him who sent Me.

And He submitted Himself unto the Father’s will, even unto death, the death on the cross.

We remember in the Garden as Jesus was praying, “Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me, nevertheless not what I will but Thy will be done.”

He didn’t come to please Himself, but to please the Father.

/but as it is written, "The reproaches of those who reproached You fell on Me."  /That is out of Psalm sixty-nine, the prophecy of the Messiah, who bore the reproach of the people against God.

Now, the early apostles bore the reproach of Jesus Christ.

Jesus said unto them, don’t be surprised because the world hates you.

It hates me.

So that often times, we when we are reproached by the world, are bearing the reproaches of Christ.

It isn’t a personal thing.

It isn’t that they just don’t like you.

What they don’t like is Christ in you.

Your walk and your faith and your trust in Jesus Christ, that troubles them.

We used to sing the chorus, I have the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart.

Then there was, I have the peace that passes understanding down in my heart.

I have the wonderful love of my Blessed Redeemer way down in the depths of my heart.

There were so many verses that they added to that, but then there was that one, I have the happy hope that heckles heathens, down in my heart.

And when you have that happy hope in Jesus, often times the heathen are heckled by it.

And they reproach you, but it isn’t to be taken personally, it is bearing the reproach of Christ, so that when the disciples were beaten, they went away rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer for Jesus' sake.

When we are reproached for Christ’s sake, we ought to have that same attitude, realizing that I am bearing the reproach of my Lord.

Now He bore the reproach of God, the people who were rebelling inwardly against the law of God, people who were rebelling against the truth of God.

Jesus said to them one day when they were ready to stone Him, I’ve done a lot of good works.

For which of the works are you stoning Me?

They were sort of baffled.

They realized they really didn’t have a reason to stone Him, but He said it’s because I’ve told you the truth, because He told them the truth about God.

He exposed their hypocrisy.

That angered them.

So the reproach against God that was deep down in their heart against God.

He bore that reproach, willing to give Himself to bear the reproach that they had in their hearts against God.

So Christ is our example.

He didn’t live to please Himself, willing to bear the reproach that the people had in their hearts against the Father.

Not coming to win popularity contests.

Not coming to pat everybody on the back and tell them how wonderful they are, but coming to reveal the truth to them that they are all hopeless sinners and we are desperately in need of the grace and the mercy of God.

Now Paul goes on to say after quoting Psalm 69,  /4For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.