Romans 1:1-17 - May 7, 2023

From time to time, people say to me, “I don’t know how you do it” - referring to writing a sermon each and every week, week in and week out. I don’t know if they mean the “writing” part of it or the “preaching” aspect of it, but my response is generally, “Sometimes it’s easy, and sometimes it’s hard.”

As you can imagine, it’s been a difficult couple of weeks. This is one of those times when writing a sermon is hard. 

In the midst of so many things, a confusing array of emotions: shock, surprise, disbelief. Anger, hurt, disappointment. Some were hit with a ton of bricks and maybe some anticipated it. 

Change and transitions, especially sudden ones, are not easy, regardless of who is moving on. 

It was hard to focus this week because of the emotions and anxiety that I, too, am experiencing - a pit in my stomach. I care about this place, I care about the ministry that we do, I care about you who come here and give of who you are and what you have to help praise God, serve neighbor, and live in community. It is hard to focus and keep my mind on any one task. 

And yet, even in the midst of all that has happened, life goes on, ministry goes on, worship goes on. Stuff still needs to get done. 

As one of my seminary professors used to say, “Sundays come around with vicious regularity.” Sermons still need to be written, even when focus is difficult to come by. Even when there are dramatic changes. Even when it is hard. 

To make things even more challenging, our lectionary assigned the opening of Paul's letters to the Romans. At the end of our lesson, Paul gives his thesis statement for the letter: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it, the righteousness of God is revealed through faith for faith…”

Nothing cures anxiety like highly convoluted religious speak, am I right? 

These couple of verses are packed with meaning, and these are the verses that Paul is going to spend the next 15 chapters unpacking. Here, he boils the whole letter down into one tiny, little paragraph. But (like in our lives sometimes) though it is hard to see, the Good News is there. 

Paul starts off by saying he is not ashamed of the Gospel. And why not? Because the Gospel is God’s power to save everyone who has faith. Why everyone? Because this type of salvation is what shows God’s righteousness. 

Now, the key to all of this - the key to these verses and to Romans in general - lies in the next four words, “through faith, for faith.” God’s power (salvation) is God’s righteousness and is revealed “through faith, for faith.”

Here’s the thing about “faith.” We often think of faith as believing the right stuff. You know, having it all straight between the ears, or right in our hearts, or something like that. But really, Paul’s understanding of faith is more akin to “faithfulness” than “belief.” 

And I make that distinction because here, Paul’s not only talking about himself or them or us or me. He’s expanding this idea of “faith” beyond what is in our heads or our hearts. 

And this is seen because the first “faithfulness” we come across in Romans is God’s faithfulness. It is through God’s faithfulness (through faith) that God’s righteousness is revealed. It is through God’s faithfulness that salvation is given. 

If we look up from verses 16 and 17 to verses 1 and 2, Jesus is God’s promise kept. The Gospel is God’s promise kept. God keeps promises. God upholds the covenant. Nothing says “faithfulness” to someone like keeping a promise. And Jesus is proof of God’s faithfulness to us. God is faithful in keeping relationship with us. 

Jesus is proof of God’s faithfulness. Despite everything - and I do mean everything - God is faithful to us. 

God’s power, God’s salvation, God’s righteousness, God’s Gospel - it is all revealed through God’s faithfulness. And because of God’s faithfulness, therefore, we have faith. Through God’s faithfulness, for our faithfulness. Through faith, for faith. 

Our faith and faithfulness are founded on the rock-solid acts of God.
Our faith doesn’t make God powerful; our faith doesn’t reveal God’s righteousness; our faith doesn’t make salvation happen. Our faithfulness to God simply flows out of God’s faithfulness to us. It is how we respond to a God who has quite literally given us everything. 

Salvation and life and grace and all this goodness and promise of God… they aren’t up to us. It’s not up to our heads or our hearts. It is all up to God - through what God has done, how God has responded throughout human history. 

When it looked like God was absent, God raised Jesus from the dead.
When it looked like God forgot about the covenant, God made a new, better covenant.
When it looked like God was not faithful, God gave us everlasting relationship.

Which means, even when we are sad, God is faithful.
Even when we are empty, God is faithful.
When our head just isn’t in it, God is still faithful.
Even when our hearts hurt, God is still ever faithful.
When a sermon needs to be written, God is still faithful, still speaks, still shows up. God’s faithfulness and love come with vicious regularity, and there’s nothing we can do to stop it. 

That’s where my faith, my trust, lies - in a God who is faithful to me, faithful to you, faithful to our community, faithful even when we’re uncertain, unsure, unfaithful. 

This is God’s promise, and this is God’s faithfulness: that even in the midst of crosses and tombs, of grief and uncertainty, life will come, life will rise, and life will go onward. That is what God promises, and that is what our faith is founded on. 

Through God’s faith, for our faith, new life happens. Always. Thanks be to God.