Paul: The Message Carrier

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(Romans 1:16, 17) 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 faith, as it is written, "The righteous shall live by faith."

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Who was this messenger? Paul, a seemingly powerless, vagabond Jew, a supposed criminal on death row chasing his final court appeal, wrote these sentences (which summarize his entire epistle). Ironically, he addressed these Latins in Greek to explain the life of Jesus of Nazareth, who had taught primarily in Aramaic--in this circuitous path of languages is an easily lost hint about the universality of this message. So, knowing the power of his message, Paul arranged his travel plans so he could take his presentation to Rome's imperial, terrifying throne of judgment. He knew he carried the indestructible idea that, in time, would pulverize all earthly kingdoms and establish an unshakable kingdom of true eternal glory. David's slingshot against Goliath and Luke Skywalker's longshot against the Imperial Starfleet are child stories in comparison.

How apparently arrogant this Jewish prisoner was to make this claim. Yet history has so far proved him right. Paul's life culminated in a Roman execution, but where would history have flowed without his lifework? While the Roman Empire collapsed under the barbarian sweeps of Franks, Goths, Visigoths, and Vandals, Europe--the West--would have risen only as high as the Vikings and Mongols had it not been for the power of Paul's message. There would not have been Bach or Beethoven, no Newton or Pascal, no Washington or Lincoln. The East would be equally unrecognizable because without Mohammad marrying a Christian as one of his wives, his "pro-Jesus, anti-Christ" cult could not have formed. Paul was right: the Gospel he proclaimed turned out to be more powerful, more influential, more enduring, more beautiful than either the idea or the institution of Rome (or any subsequent kingdoms, institutions, or religions).

Who were the Romans? It's not likely that we, today, can comprehend what Rome meant to people living in that chapter of history. Paul knew their power, and rather than allow it to intimidate or appall him, it quickened his step and desire to go to Rome. He anticipated the shame that Rome would level against him in defense of itself. Alexander Maclaren wrote: "What proud contempt would have curled their lips if they had been told that the travel-stained prisoner, trudging wearily up the Appian Way, had the mightiest thing in the world entrusted to his care. Romans did not believe much in ideas. Their notion of power was sharp swords and the iron yokes on the necks of subject peoples. But the history of Christianity, whatever else it has been, has been the history of the supremacy and the revolutionary force of ideas. Thought is mightier than all visible forces. Thought dissolves and reconstructs. Empires and institutions melt before it ... and the hillock of Calvary is higher than the Palatine with its regal homes and the Capitoline with its temples: 'I am not ashamed of the Gospel for it is the power of God for salvation.' "

What was this message, this good-news Gospel? It was not that Jesus died, was buried, and was then raised from the dead. Even with the shock of Jesus' resurrection, that message would have perished in foolishness, vanity, weakness, deception, and shame. The Gospel that Paul outlined to the Romans he also summarized in his first letter to the Corinthians (chapter 15). Jesus did not merely die; He died in accordance with the Scriptures. He was not merely buried and resurrected, but he rose from death in accordance with Scriptures. In the context of God's revealed plan from the beginning of His creation, we see an entirely different reality behind Jesus' death, burial, and resurrection.

Borrowing again from Maclaren's summary, we see how Paul explained the Gospel to the Romans: it included (1) the universality of sin; (2) the awful burden of guilt; (3) the tremendous outlook of penalty; (4) the impossibility of people rescuing themselves or of (5) living righteously; (6) the incarnation, life, and death of Jesus Christ as the sacrifice for the sins of the world; (7) the hand of faith grasping the offered blessing; (8) the indwelling in the believing souls of the Divine Spirit; (9) the consequent admission of believers into a life of adoption, power, peace, victory, and glory; and (10) the child-like place in the love of the Father from which nothing can separate. Negatively, salvation is the removal and sweeping away of all evil, both physical and moral. Positively, it's the inclusion of all good for every part of our composite nature--every good that we can receive and that God can bestow. And that is the task the Gospel sets for itself. For that to be accomplished, something more than man's power is essential. Only God can "trammel up" the consequences of my sins and prevent them from scourging me. Only God can bestow upon my death a new life that shall grow up into a complete righteousness and beauty that is related to His own. This Gospel is so much more than we realize!

A (Personal)

The direction that the current on which the Gospel river flowed is curious. It traveled to the Jew first, then it seemed to have forked to the Greeks and to the Romans. Using a different metaphor, the Jews would be the parents and the Greeks and Romans the offspring of this Jewish message. This is not unlike Jesus' parable of the Faithful Father, the Prodigal Son, and the Heartless, Perfectionist Elder Brother (Luke 15).

The elder brother created a false sense of safety by worshiping perfect order and uncompromising duty. Like Rome's, his was the worship of human power that sustained itself, that proved and justified itself by punishing the weak and the guilty. This path led to destructive power and rage, and unfortunately I've traveled that path before. To the Roman as with the elder brother, the Good News was the refreshing honesty of acknowledging that, "even though I'll never be good enough, God's grace is still available."

The prodigal brother created a false sense of satisfaction by chasing fantasies of sensual and selfish pleasures. Like the Greeks, he worshiped the endless chase of ideas, beauty, and perfected dreams. Toss rules aside! Abandon even the pretense of doing right. Perfectionism is too hard of work! Instead, explore the possibilities of absolute freedom. This path led to destructive destitution and despair, and I've traveled that path, too. The Good News to the Greeks as well as to prodigals is that Christ has a baptism for us that surpasses our private ambitions.

The Faithful Father was Jesus' description of His Heavenly Father. This "family of origin" was what both sons were fleeing from. Historically, the Greeks and Romans viewed the Hebrews as embarrassing vagabonds, weak and irrelevant. Scripturally, this family--those who have been adopted through Christ into God's family--would be the only branch of the human family tree that would survive God's judgment. The Father gave both sons freedom to choose their destinies, and interestingly, if the brothers in this parable were to reconcile--one with his love for righteousness and the other with his passion for freedom and untethered beauty--then both would have discovered the joys of living within God's kingdom.

How often I forget that my best dreams and ambitions can find their fulfillment only in seeking first God's kingdom and His righteousness? My pursuit of my own destiny--my own path apart from my Heavenly Father's will for me--leads only to the futilities found in God's "I told you so's."

A (Psychological)

Paul challenged Rome's intimidations and power plays by refusing to be shamed by them. I believe shame is universal, and psychologists have been studying shame, analyzing it, hoping to find its psychological and sociological cure. Shaw, Medes, and others have wisely distinguished shame from guilt and embarrassment: with embarrassment being essentially a social blunder that gets publicly exposed; guilt being a more technical distinction of having done a wrong or failed to do a right deed, one is either guilty or not guilty of that; and shame being an internal dislike, repulsion, or even rejection of self, more for what one is rather than for what one might have done or not done. Shame is more toxic and destructive, and seems to get most clinical attention.

Shame and guilt, too, seem to be the roots of addiction. Similar to sufferers of covert depression, addicts try to outrun their shame by chasing cures that promise to separate them from their unwanted and seemingly intolerable thoughts, feelings, and memories.

As helpful as these insights about shame have proven to be, I suggest that this might be a mistaken focus after all. Beneath shame, like a steaming volcanic spring that perpetually defies frosts and winter snows, shame is perpetually fueled by an inner realization of a deeper, darker reality--guilt. I can't be good enough. I can't atone for my wrong-doings. I can't make right all the wrongs that I have done. I can't keep myself from slipping back into wrong or destructive behaviors. I don't have what it takes, so I must run faster to hide from that shame and fear of guilt.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ severs the root of guilt. The Gospel alone is ultimately sufficient for eradicating the paralyzing shame of guilt. The Gospel doesn't sever guilt by cognitive restructuring or creative reframes. It doesn't provide insight about different goals or motives--although each of these might be part of the healing process. The Gospel, instead, provides a tangible, kinetic intervention from God: He personally atoned for each of our wrongs by dying on the cross, and His resurrection invites us into a vibrant new life that is constructed on a fault-free foundation.

Without helping people to be free of justified guilt, we can't really address shame. In relational and civic schemes, we can help people resolve minor infractions of guilt, but apart from Christ, we cannot help people with the merged guilt and shame for our dark, human propensities. Only the blood of the cross can eradicate the effectiveness of our sin nature (Hebrews 9, 10) and answer our deepest longings.

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Lord, thank You for revealing Your righteousness. It is my power for salvation and my freedom from being ashamed. By faith I see it, I receive it, and I live by it. I revel in the relief of Your love. Thank You!