Romans 1-4
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Today we begin the journey into Paul’s letters to different
churches, starting with a letter to the believers in Rome. The book of Romans has been called the
most important book of the Bible. Since
we are reading through the whole Bible in a year we will only be in Romans for
a short time, but if you ever want to pick a book to really spend some time in,
this would be the one. It is
filled with the greatest teachings on the salvation we have by faith in the
grace of God through Jesus.
Paul first helps us to understand that there is no one who is
righteous on their own. We can
never earn righteousness no matter how much good we do; it has to be credited
to us by God. “This righteousness
from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have
sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his
grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” (Romans 3:22-24)
Salvation is a gift from God that we do not earn on our own. He gives it freely to those who believe
in Jesus as His Son who died and rose from the dead. I love this explanation Paul gives in Romans 4. Here it is from The Message translation:
“If you’re a hard worker and do a good job, you deserve your pay;
we don’t call your wages a gift.
But if you see that the job is too big for you, that it’s something only
God can do, and you trust him to do
it—you could never do it for yourself no matter how hard and long you worked—well,
that trusting-him-to-do-it is what gets you set right with God, by God. Sheer gift.” (Romans 4:4-5)
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