Romans 16:5 - The Glory of Conversion (05/21/2023)

you guys have any money oh good let's pass the plate around let's see if we can get some money now we'll do an offering we'll have brother brother

John you mind getting you know and helping us with that and we just need one we need to to just do one today okay oh yeah

I'm not sure where the plates are oh you see I'm okay I was gonna make brother on do it but we just talked about how tired it is

I think by the time we get all that money in the plates can be more than a pound so oh he's gonna help anyway yeah brother

John do you pray for us please good morning once again that was lively music today thank you very very good let's see

I was gonna say something nice to Pam but she walked out for a second but I appreciate what she said about this being church family and it is that and that's how we all feel and it's gonna say something else but I wanted her to hear it so I will wait on that all right are we ready all right well we're back in Romans 16 verses 1 through 4 we've covered and today we're gonna pick up on verse 5 and we might finish the book of Romans today we'll see but I mentioned to you we got like 35 people that it talks about that are commended for their service to the

Lord and it's kind of hard to take something like that and make it very interesting but then

I asked myself well when the Bible is just this thick which isn't very thick and everything

God wanted us to know about himself and ourselves is in that book and how concise it is and he would take time to mention these names maybe they're important maybe we should take a look at them and so I prayed about it for a good while as far as how to do it but I think the

Lord showed me a way we can do it and get through it today make it somewhat interesting because what I'm going to do is

I'm gonna quote one of the old -time great old -time preachers his name is

John Gill some of you have heard of John Gill he was an English Baptist pastor

I'm gonna read to you some of the things that he mentioned about these people and it's it'll be fascinating I think it's as good as you can make it

I mean it's it's not super exciting material but the thing it's supposed to teach us is that these people serve the

Lord who knows if anyone noticed them or not when they were serving the

Lord but the Lord noticed them and the Lord himself put their names in God's Word now think about that and Paul certainly certainly noticed them as well and so we'll talk about that a little bit see if we can get through it today

Romans 16 and verse 1 mentioned a town at the end of the verse

Sincrea which is where a Phoebe was a servant from that particular church and I just want you to know sort of where that is in case you don't know it's a seaport of Corinth in the mainland of what we call

Greece today and so a lot of what this a lot of Paul's mission work was happening around that area at this time in his life and so this is sort of the town that the context of where we were it was at this place in Acts chapter 18 18 where Paul had his hair cut short he was in this town when he did it he was about to sail to Ephesus and he had made a vow to God now this is

Jewish you know Paul was a Jew a Jewish believer so there's some Jewishness going on and one thing that's very instructive is to understand that the early church was almost a hundred percent

Jewish for a very short time period even time even by the time you get less than halfway through the book of Acts all of a sudden you've got thousands of Gentiles as well being saved and probably before you get to the end of book of Acts it was predominantly

Gentile by the time Paul started going around this area and the

Lord began to bless his ministry in a huge way you had more Gentiles being saved than Jews and so as the church age progressed it's become predominantly a

Gentile Church in the world today and the Apostle Paul talked about that he said that the

Jews had been blinded in part so that the gospel could come to the Gentiles and then the

Bible indicates that when the last Gentile is saved the rapture will occur isn't that interesting so apparently there's still a few

Gentiles out there we need to witness to brother Dave so that's a fact so that's this is kind of where we were here near Corinth about nine miles east of Corinth in what's now called

Greece and so obviously the

Apostle Paul had established a brand new local church here and Phoebe was entrusted with the letter of Paul to the

Romans some people some scholars believe we don't know that as a fact but some scholars believe that she actually brought the letter that we now call the book of Romans she brought that letter with her and so forth she was highly commended obviously by the

Apostle Paul so when we get verses 1 through 4 kind of talked about all that so now look at verse 5 with me

Romans 16 5 likewise greet the church that is in their house now that's talking about Aquila and Priscilla everywhere they went they would start a church in their home and then when it got bigger

I'm sure they would move into a bigger building but they were church planters and salute my well -beloved

Eponetus and who is the firstfruits of Achaia unto

Jesus Christ so here's the next person that's commended and it mentions that this person obviously has a

Greek name right so this is a Gentile believer most likely although some of the Jews would take a

Greek name because back then it was kind of like nowadays if you travel anywhere in the world English is also the second language that they speak because English is the language of commerce today in the whole world well back then

Greek was so a lot of the Jews as they would disperse out into the Gentile nations they would take on sometimes their first name would be a

Greek name kind of like happens nowadays with American names and so forth so Eponetus was probably a

Gentile could have been a Jewish person who had gotten saved but had a Greek name but he was the first convert in this area called

Achaia and we'll talk about where that is in just in just a little bit so you get an idea of where on the map of the

Middle East that is but it's in the same general area and he was the first convert unto Christ under Paul's ministry in this area so isn't it interesting that he would mention the first person that got saved under his preaching and here he is listed he it says that he is well beloved and is the firstfruits of it's not really pronounced

Achaia it's Achaia if you want to know how to really pronounce it but so this this person you know to the

Lord every time a single individual is saved the Bible says that the angels in heaven rejoice over it it's a big event now when you really understand the gospel like we do in this church and I say

I don't think we're the only ones that understand it this way there are well if you go back a hundred years almost everyone believed it this way hundred and fifty years to be safe I keep forgetting

I'm 68 years old and I when I was 20 I said if you go back a hundred years so now now it's like a hundred and sixty years or a hundred and fifty years you'll find that the pastors taught the scripture like the scripture reads more that more so than today so more people understood these things but when you understand how salvation actually really works according the

Bible and it starts out where Dave was today where he was in Psalm 14

I think where Paul quoted that in the New Testament the book of Romans as a matter of fact where he said there's none righteous no not one there is none that seeketh after God among the children of men it says

God was looking down from heaven and observed this that's what we call the doctrine of the depravity of man and it means that when we're born into this world we are born with eyes that are blind to spiritual things we cannot see spiritual things we have ears that cannot hear and understand the

Word of God at all and our spirit the only part of us we have a body soul and spirit the spirit is the only part of us that can commune with God and it's dead so you have to ask yourself if the gospel works like most churches say it does today where you make the decision whether to accept

Jesus or not and based on that you determine your eternal destiny if you're dead and blind and deaf how will you ever make the right decision that is a great question to ask the modern church because the answer is it's impossible you cannot and you remember the story of the rich man and Jesus said he walked away sad because he didn't want to give up his riches in order to follow

Jesus remember that story and the Apostles told Jesus well how can that be Lord how can anyone be saved in that case then and Jesus said well with men it's impossible but what did he say next but with God all things are possible which tells us salvation comes from God not from man but the modern church wants it to be mannish the modern church wants it to be us that make that decision the church that tells you what little prayer to pray and you got to do it our way and be at our altar or be in our magistrate water or whatever so churches have so many different things to tell you how to get saved it's all about how man would do it and Jesus said it's impossible man can't save himself only

God can save us now when you really understand that that you that God already knew and it doesn't mean he was aware of us it means he knew it you know your grandbabies like you know your children he knew us like that with love before the foundation of the world before the world was created before anything existed he already knew us as his children that's the sheep the goats he said they will come to me in the last day and say

Lord I've done many wonderful things at church served you and he'll say depart from me I never what knew you so the goats he does not know now does that mean he doesn't know that they're there of course not he knows everything right

God knows all things it means he doesn't know him like his kids because they're not his kids and never have been his kids and never will be his kids that's why

Jesus looked at the Pharisees and says you're of your father the devil of my father and where I go you cannot come and you will lie and kill like your father the devil because that's your father so the world listen the world does not understand salvation this way very few

Christians and there's a lot of churches that preach it right but they're not the largest churches so there are very few

Christians when you when you count everyone that claims to be a Christian there are very few Christians that understand this from the scripture but it is true now so with that in mind think about this when one person gets saved it is a much bigger event than the modern church would ever think that it is because the modern church just thinks well it's how it's supposed to work we advertise we tell people we're here we have great music now you think about this salvation does not work via marketing the music 20 -minute devotion that's anything that the modern mega church is doing to grow is not what makes it happen it's not a it's not that you as a human determine your eternal destiny by making a choice to give your life to Jesus that's the modern gospel that's not how it works the

Bible teaches that you must be called by the Holy Spirit and by the

Word of God you got to have the water in the Spirit Jesus said or you'll never be saved he told Nicodemus who was one of the best religious leaders of his day that it does not work like you think it works

Nicodemus you must be born from above and Nicodemus did could not understand it nor did he like it because the church couldn't save a person if that's true it's

God that determines it you must be born from above Jesus said sometimes it's translated born again but Nicodemus couldn't understand it because he thought you got this list of works and if you just do those you can save yourself and where that we the church can teach of course when the church is the

Jewish religion will teach you these things and it makes us even higher than you because we know what they are and we do them better than you do and if you'll do them to God may save you too and that's how they thought people got saved well that's how the

American Church today thinks it works it's all about the church it's churchiness well do you really think that the angels in heaven would rejoice very much over that type of religion but when the angels see a person who they know that God knew before he made the angels that that was a child of God at that point and that Christ was crucified before the foundation of the world so that that child of God could be brought back to God because he strayed from God he was living in a way that he never looked after God he never sought

God he went his own way he thought he was God and yet he was a little sheep off in the wrong part of town and here comes

Jesus via the Holy Spirit and takes that sheep and puts him around his neck and brings him all the way back miles and miles to the flock and puts him down said here's where you belong and that's the day you knew you were saved now that's when the angels rejoice they see the whole thing they see that all of it is of God a hundred percent of the salvation of one single human soul is of God not of that human soul and all the things that that human did were effects of the salvation that God brought to him the repentance the belief the good works the water baptism all of that happened because he's already regenerated now tell me where that's taught here in this town right here probably got one brother out there by the lake right maybe and brother

Raj right and that's it everyone else it's very mannish it's very human the human makes all the choices the human decides if he's saved or not the human side if he stays saved or not and God gets no glory for any of it so there's no rejoicing in heaven when that type of salvation happens because it's not real it's religion so you think about why is this man listed who is the first fruits of Achaia which is a big part of the

Gentile world it's the center of it because it was a miracle that he got saved because when any human gets saved it's a miracle from heaven something that God calls something that God did a hundred percent of the work to make happen and to make possible through the death of his own son

Jesus a hundred percent of the work was accomplished on the cross when he said it is finished the work had been done and that was 2 ,000 years ago and you didn't do one bit of it neither did

I and neither did anybody and so when somebody gets regenerated born from above the all of heaven rejoices because it shouldn't ever happen from a human viewpoint it's impossible for humans to save themselves it is impossible for a dead blind deaf lost person to ever even seek

God whom he doesn't care one whit about because he sees himself as God it's impossible he will never seek

God and so when that person turns around in two seconds later he saved heaven takes notice the angels take notice and man hates that kind of salvation man will fight that to the bone and if the law would allow it they would kill you for believing it and preaching it and all you got to do is study history and you'll see they've done it many times the first person who ever printed this

Bible in English was burned at the stake for doing it Wycliffe right the many of the

Christians throughout the time when the Catholics were in charge which we call now the Dark Ages because they wouldn't let people be around the scriptures that's why it was dark when they found someone reading what we now call the received text which was the

Greek that this book follows which the New American Standard and the

NIV and all of these don't follow it's a whole different line which comes from what

I one of the main manuscripts is called the Vaticanus where does that sound like it was found anybody ever heard of the

Vatican it's a Roman Catholic literature every modern version other than the

King James in English comes from the Vatican literature but if they found you reading a different Bible than the

Vatican Bible back then they would burn you at the stake and burn the book you were reading do you know that history because I do so anyway they rejoice in heaven over this one man whose name is very difficult for me to pronounce

Epiphanetus that's the way it takes a Texan would pronounce it anyway he is the first fruits of Achaia now

I'll tell you a little bit about a K and then we're out of time for today so it's gonna take another Sunday to finish

Romans at least but Achaia was known as what they would call now a senatorial province kind of like the northern part of Greece where the wealthy and political individuals live the politicians who had made themselves wealthy live there so then this is a place where you know when

Paul goes in there to preach you've got all the wealthy powerful people and you you know he had to he had to pray about that because they could do him harm if they chose to and this is where this man the first fruits was saved he was in this part of the world of Greece and so they didn't have a lot of military men running around there it was one of the most prestigious places in that part of the world and it's where the senators and the governor's lived the smallest part of that country around there they call it the

Corinthian Gulf so it's kind of in the larger area where the Church of Corinth was as well but this is kind of the area in the world this is talking about where this happened you don't want to know all the stuff

I wrote about it just kind of interesting stuff but that gives you an idea of where it is it is kind of interesting that in history if you go back to about 250 250 years before Jesus was born there was a man called

Aratus of Sisyon who was chosen to be the commander -in -chief of the

Greek army at that time and what's kind of fascinating about that of note has nothing to do with Scripture but it's interesting he increased the power of this government in this part of the world and he gave it an excellent

Constitution which our founding fathers of the

United States of America Hamilton and Madison consulted this document from in putting together our

Constitution isn't that cool I bet brother Larry knew about that because he studies he studies this stuff anyway in 146

BC Corinth was destroyed and this league was broken up and the whole of Greece including

Achaia came under the Roman power at that time and of course a little over a hundred years later

Jesus was born into the world so that kind of gives you some history of where this is talking about where this happens and this man we talked about today was the first convert in that part of the world which is a very powerful part of the world at that time almost like New York City or Washington DC would be nowadays and we're out of time but and I'm not you know

I just kind of wanted to introduce it with that we'll go through these other names very quickly I'm gonna let

John Gill tell you what he observed about these because he was very studious he would he would bring out anything history knew about these people which is very little by the way but what he does know

I'll share with you next time so let's stand and have prayer together John Gill is another preacher who never went to seminary he was self -taught kind of like the great

Charles Spurgeon but he was highly noted in his day and time for the scholarly work he did in his preaching

Lord thank you so much for your word we ask you to bless it once again as you always do

Lord we pray for those who have gone out from among us and ask you to lead them to the place where you want them to be if it would be well to bring them back here we would receive them under certain circumstances and Lord we just pray that you would bless each family here with a greater understanding of your word each week that we live together and Lord that we would be watchful in our time that we live in in these last days would be very watchful for things going on in the news and in the world around us and not be asleep as others sleep would be watchful and Lord thank you for the family that we have our church family here the fellowship that we have and the unity that we have and we ask that your