Sermons, Articles, and Other Things

Paul is reaching the close of this section in Romans in which he has explained the contents of his gospel. We have travelled with him as he plumbed to the depths of human sin, have soared with him as he explained the doctrines of justification and adoption, have borrowed his telescope as he detailed some events still to come, and listened to him as he brought several questions to our minds. We will consider the last of his questions in this sermon. Life in the early church As we read the list of troubles Paul mentions in verse 35 we have a description of what life was like in the early church. What did those early believers face on a daily basis? They faced tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, and the sword. Who were among the ‘they’? There were men, women and children; there were old and young; there were rich and poor; there were Jews and Gentiles; there were the educated and the uneducated. The author of this sad list knew about the various details f

The first human to whom the risen Jesus appeared was Mary Magdalene. She had originally come to the tomb with other ladies to anoint the body of Jesus. Matthew says that Mary was accompanied by another lady called Mary; Mark’s account says that she was accompanied by Salome and Mary the mother of James; Luke adds that Joanna and other women were also present as well as Mary the mother of James; she is not alone in John’s account because she says ‘we’ (20:2). Mary Magdalene is the only woman to appear in each of the Gospels’ accounts of the resurrection.  When they arrived at the tomb they saw that the stone had been rolled away. An angel told them that Christ was risen from the dead and that they should go and tell his disciples that they were to go to Galilee to meet him (Matt. 28:5-7; Luke 24:5-7). It seems that the women split up in order to go and tell the disciples, with Mary Magdalene going to tell Peter and John. They then run to the tomb upon hearing her words. After they ha

The words of this verse – ‘He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world’ – are frequently used in the theological discussion of the question, ‘For whom did Christ die?’, with regard to the extent of the atonement. I would suggest that this question was not in the mind of John when he penned the words, but we will have to consider it as we think about the verse. The verse is a cause of conflict in liberal Christianity as well because those who are so described regard the idea of a God requiring propitiation as a remnant from a barbaric past. The necessity of understanding theological terms Often the gospel is presented as being simple in nature. Such a description needs to be clarified because the word ‘simple’ has more than one meaning. When we use it in connection with the gospel of Christ, do we mean that it is simple as opposed to complicated or simple as opposed to profound? It is true that the gospel is not complicated