For almost a year now, we've been walking through the book of Acts together on Sunday mornings. We watched a handful of frightened disciples in an upper room become a movement that couldn't be stopped; not by threats, not by prison, not by shipwreck. We watched the gospel move from Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria and finally, in the last chapter, all the way to Rome. Acts ends with Paul under house arrest in the capital of the empire, still preaching, still unable to be silenced.
Here's something I find remarkable. Paul had never been to Rome when he wrote to the Romans. He wrote this letter years before Acts tells us he finally walked into the city in chains. This letter to the Romans isn't Paul working out his theology as he goes. It's Paul, already settled in what he believes, writing the fullest and most careful explanation of the gospel he ever put to paper, to a church he'd never met.
This coming Sunday we'll be starting our new sermon series, working our way through the letter of Romans.
Here’s why. Like Rome, Hope is a mixed room. We've got people who grew up in church and people who wandered in mostly on accident. We've got people who vote differently, who read the news differently, who disagree on more than a few things that feel important. I look out on Sundays and wonder how we're all even in the same building. But that's not a problem to solve. That's just what a real church looks like, and it's exactly the kind of room Paul was writing to.
Paul says it plainly right at the start of the letter, For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes (Romans 1:16). That's the whole book in one sentence. Romans goes on to tell us how people with nothing to offer God get made right with Him anyway. It tells us what it looks like when the Holy Spirit moves into a life and starts rearranging things. It doesn't pretend suffering isn't real, and it doesn't rush past it either. And near the end, it tells us how followers of Jesus who disagree on real things are supposed to keep loving each other instead of tearing
the room apart.
If our whole aim here at Hope is bringing people closer to Jesus, Romans does that work in seekers and lifelong believers in the same breath. It isn't written for one kind of person in the room. It's for all of us.
So we start Romans this Sunday. Bring a friend who's never opened a Bible. Bring the parts of your life that still feel unresolved. Romans has room for both.
peace,
Nick
Here's something I find remarkable. Paul had never been to Rome when he wrote to the Romans. He wrote this letter years before Acts tells us he finally walked into the city in chains. This letter to the Romans isn't Paul working out his theology as he goes. It's Paul, already settled in what he believes, writing the fullest and most careful explanation of the gospel he ever put to paper, to a church he'd never met.
This coming Sunday we'll be starting our new sermon series, working our way through the letter of Romans.
Here’s why. Like Rome, Hope is a mixed room. We've got people who grew up in church and people who wandered in mostly on accident. We've got people who vote differently, who read the news differently, who disagree on more than a few things that feel important. I look out on Sundays and wonder how we're all even in the same building. But that's not a problem to solve. That's just what a real church looks like, and it's exactly the kind of room Paul was writing to.
Paul says it plainly right at the start of the letter, For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes (Romans 1:16). That's the whole book in one sentence. Romans goes on to tell us how people with nothing to offer God get made right with Him anyway. It tells us what it looks like when the Holy Spirit moves into a life and starts rearranging things. It doesn't pretend suffering isn't real, and it doesn't rush past it either. And near the end, it tells us how followers of Jesus who disagree on real things are supposed to keep loving each other instead of tearing
the room apart.
If our whole aim here at Hope is bringing people closer to Jesus, Romans does that work in seekers and lifelong believers in the same breath. It isn't written for one kind of person in the room. It's for all of us.
So we start Romans this Sunday. Bring a friend who's never opened a Bible. Bring the parts of your life that still feel unresolved. Romans has room for both.
peace,
Nick