WWUTT 236 Spiritually and Materially Beneficial?

The Apostle Paul did not fund his missionary journeys on his own, he was aided by other churches and those churches even helped one another because they had received blessings from God spiritually and so they were a blessing to one another materially when we understand the text.

Many of the Bible stories and verses we think we know, we don't. When we understand the text as an online ministry committed to teaching sound doctrine and exposing the faulty, visit our website at www .utt

.com. Now here's our host, Pastor Gabe Hughes. Thank you, Becky. We are going to finish up Romans chapter 15 this week.

If you'll open up your Bibles and join with me there, we'll be looking at Romans 15 verses 22 through 33 today.

Starting in verse 22 here, this is the reason why I have so often been hindered from coming to you.

But now since I no longer have any room for work in these regions and since I have longed for many years to come to you,

I hope to see you in passing as I go to Spain and to be helped on my journey there by you once I have enjoyed your company for a while.

At present, however, I am going to Jerusalem, bringing aid to the saints. For Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem, for they were pleased to do it and indeed they owe it to them.

For if the Gentiles have come to share in the spiritual blessings, they ought also to be of service to them in material blessings.

When therefore I have completed this and have delivered to them what has been collected, I will leave for Spain by way of you.

I know that when I come to you, I will come in the fullness of the blessing of Christ. I appeal to you, brothers, by our

Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, to strive together with me in your prayers to God on my behalf, that I may be delivered from the unbelievers in Judea and that my service for Jerusalem may be acceptable to the saints so that by God's will,

I may come to you with joy and be refreshed in your company. May the God of peace be with you all.

Amen. Sounds like the conclusion to the letter, but we have personal greetings coming up in chapter 16, which are actually pretty neat and we'll be looking at that next week.

So, let's come back to verse 22 here. Paul says, this is the reason why I have so often been hindered from coming to you.

What is that reason? Because he has been planting churches in places where churches have yet to exist.

As we go back to verses 20 and 21, thus I make it my ambition to preach the gospel not where Christ has already been named, lest I build on someone else's foundation.

But as it is written, those who have never been told of him will see and those who have never heard will understand.

So one of the reasons why Paul has not yet made it to Rome is because he is fulfilling his calling as has been given by God to preach the gospel to those who have been unreached.

And so as he has completed that work, he is now ready to head to Rome.

He's on his way to Spain and will stop in Rome on his way there. We'll kind of explain that a little bit more as we get there.

But also in this statement that he makes in verse 20, I make it my ambition to preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named, but rather to preach the gospel in places where Christ has yet to be heard of.

Yet we have read in Romans chapter one that he desires to come and preach to the

Roman Christians there also. I'll flip back to that here, Romans chapter one. It's in verse 14 and 15 where he says,

I am under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish.

So I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome. So there are those who are unreached that he is under obligation to preach to.

But he also wants to preach to these Christians that are there in Rome so that they might be mutually encouraged by one another, as he said earlier in the chapter.

So when he's talking to them in chapter 15, we talked about this last week when he's talking to them about wanting to come and share the gospel with them and preach certain things to them by way of reminder.

He also means to say to them, I'm not doing this to convert you, to bring you to the faith, because you are in the faith.

You have heard the gospel proclaimed to you. You have accepted it. You are growing in it. And in fact, these

Roman Christians were being persecuted in it as well. They were being put to death for their faith.

But the testimony of these Christians who remain steadfast despite persecution, that testimony was going out to churches all over the

Roman Empire. And so there were many churches and many Christians who were being strengthened by hearing what was happening by those

Roman Christians. Paul gave them those assurances in chapter one. So as he says that he wants to come to them and share the gospel with them, this statement that he makes in verse 20, where he says,

I make it my ambition to preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named. He's also saying to them in sort of a way,

I'm coming to preach to you so that we might be mutually encouraged by one another, not because I need to convert you to the faith.

I am sure as brothers in Christ that you are in that faith and you are growing.

He said previously in verse 14, I myself am satisfied about you, my brothers, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge and able to instruct one another.

But on some points I have written to you very boldly by way of reminder because of the grace given to me by God to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the

Gentiles in the priestly service of the gospel of God. So this this desire to preach the gospel to the world is one of the reasons why

Paul is yet to make it to Rome. But he's on his way there to stop, be among them as he desires to go to Spain and preach there.

And there actually is some historical evidence that Paul did make it to Spain.

Now, there's no concrete proof of this. We don't have any writings from Paul or writings from any other of the apostles during that time that indicate that Paul actually was there.

But there are some later writings that seem to indicate that Paul had made it to Spain. Chrysostom is one of those.

And of course, he's writing in the fourth century, but it is one of the earlier works that we know of mentioning

Paul having made it to Spain. And there are also other references of Paul going to Spain. They're talking about Paul's journey to Spain or that he made it to Rome on his journey to Spain.

So it could be that it's just that journey in which he made it to Rome is referred to his journey to Spain because he talks about it here in Romans chapter 15, but doesn't necessarily conclusively prove that Paul did actually make it all the way to Spain.

But anyway, so he says in verse 23, since I no longer have any room for work in these regions and since I have longed for many years to come to you,

I hope to see you in passing as I go to Spain and to be helped on my journey there by you once I have enjoyed your company for a little while.

So the continuation of his journey from Rome to Spain was going to be helped by these

Roman Christians, that they would have an opportunity to serve an apostle in the ministry work. At present, however,

Paul says, I am going to Jerusalem, bringing aid to the saints for Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem.

Now, this is talked about in the scriptures, this collection of money that Paul has taken that he means to deliver to Jerusalem.

We read about it in first Corinthians chapter 16, where Paul says now concerning the collection for the saints, as I directed the churches of Galatia.

So you also are to do on the first day of every week. Each of you is to put something aside and store it up as he may prosper so that there will be no collecting when

I come. And when I arrive, I will send those whom you credit by letter to carry your gift to Jerusalem.

If it seems advisable that I should go also, they will accompany me.

So Paul had given instructions to the Corinthians as to the money that they were to collect that was going to go to Jerusalem.

We know that the Thessalonians were involved in this collection in some way. And first Thessalonians chapter one, verses six and seven,

Paul says you became imitators of us and of the Lord for you receive the word in much affliction with the joy of the

Holy Spirit. So that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia.

And we see this mention also in later on in chapter four, where Paul says concerning brotherly love, you have no need for anyone to write to you for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another for that indeed is what you are doing to all the brothers throughout

Macedonia. But we urge you brothers to do this more and more and to aspire to live quietly and to mind your own affairs and to work with your hands as we instructed you so that you may walk properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one.

So there was kind of this, this mutual encouragement that was going on among the churches. And now those churches had an opportunity to help those who were in Jerusalem with their financial needs.

And as Paul goes on here in chapter 15 to talk about, it is good to help them to benefit them because we are recipients of the spiritual blessings that were given to the

Jews. And so it is good for us that we would share with them in our material blessings as well.

So starting in verse 26 for Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem, for they were pleased to do it.

And indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have come to share in the spiritual blessings, they ought also to be of service to them in material blessings.

We read the following in first John chapter three, verse 16. By this we know love that he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.

But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need yet closes his heart against him, how does

God's love abide in him? Little children let us not love in word or talk, but in deed and in truth.

And so if we have received the spiritual blessings from God, the mercy and grace and love that he has shown us through Jesus Christ our

Lord, so we should be blessing the brothers and sisters of Christ in material ways as well.

It is the physical outpouring of the spiritual blessing that we have been given.

So it is that that sign, that indication, that showing of the transformation that has happened in our lives, of the love of God that we have been shown when we show that love and grace and mercy toward one another in material ways as well.

And here Paul is talking about a way that a Gentile group of people is able to show love toward a

Jewish group of people. Both Jews and Gentiles here are Christians. They're one body in Christ Jesus, but they are

Jews by ethnicity and Gentiles by ethnicity. This was during a period of time when you would have been very clearly able to distinguish between the two, who was a

Jew and who was a Gentile. And yet they're all one in Christ Jesus. And so those who are Gentiles are able to receive the blessings of God, the blessings that had been given to the

Jewish people because they were the recipients of the oracles of God, as we read earlier in Romans chapter three.

And so because they share in this inheritance with the saints, then they should be of blessing to one another.

They've received the spiritual gifts that were promised to the Jewish people. And now we are one Israel in Christ Jesus.

And so they should be willing to want to bless them materially as well. So may we, as members of the body of Christ, be willing to benefit one another in such a way.

We show outwardly that we have been changed inwardly by Christ in the ways that we demonstrate love for one another in his body.

Our wonderful God, we thank you for the mercy that you have shown us. And I pray that by the lesson from what we have read here today, the sacrifice that Paul has made for the sharing of the gospel and the sacrifice that these

Romans, Roman Christians have made and other churches have made to be able to benefit the least of these.

I pray that we would, by their testimony, understand the charge that has been given to each and every one of us to show the love of Christ to the body of Christ.

So help us to be sacrificial and even going out of our way to benefit a brother or sister in Christ.

And we pray and ask these things in the name of Jesus. Amen. You've been listening to When We Understand the

Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. We hope you are a part of the church family committed to gospel teaching, and we thank you for including us in your

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