Telling the Truth

Guest (Female): Today on Telling the Truth, Stuart Briscoe brings a message on what is unquestionably the best news you will ever hear. He'll begin in just a moment, but first, if you've been feeling overwhelmed lately, like your mind just won't slow down, you're not alone. A lot of people today are carrying anxiety, uncertainty, and questions they don't know where to take.

That's why Telling the Truth is sharing biblical teaching in digital spaces so people can encounter God's truth right in those moments, right where they are. As we approach the end of the financial year, your support is critical to keep this ministry going. Right now, your gifts will be doubled through an $82,000 matching grant, helping reach more people searching for peace and direction.

And as our thanks, we'll send you Stuart Briscoe's book, *A Piece of My Mind*, a resource designed to help you experience God's steady pace when life feels unsettled. Call 262-788-4648 to have your gift doubled by the match, or give online at tellingthetruth.org. Now, here's Stuart with the message "Let Me Tell You the Good News" on today's Telling the Truth.

Stuart Briscoe: There are three main types of preaching, I would suggest to you, all of which I do at different times. One way of doing it is what we call narrative preaching. That is basically to tell the story. Narrative preaching is very popular, increasingly popular, because it is the easiest kind of preaching to listen to. Topical preaching is another way of doing it. What that means is that you choose a topic that you believe is relevant, but you address it then on the basis of what God's Word says about that particular topic.

This has become perhaps a predominant style of preaching, where the idea has been, find out what the people are interested in and talk about those things. The third style of preaching is systematic exposition of scripture, and that is the hardest one to listen to, and that's what we're going to do in this series in Romans. So you've been warned. That's enough by way of introduction.

Paul writes his letter to the people in Rome who are followers of Jesus. He has never been to Rome. He has not planted this church in Rome, unlike the other churches that he writes his letters to. We don't know how much he knew about the church, or more accurately, the many house churches that had sprung up in Rome, but we do know that he is very anxious to go there.

If you look towards the end of this Roman epistle, Paul explains the situation. The situation is that he has concluded his ministry in the Eastern Mediterranean. He has planted churches in many of the major centers. They are thriving, and he says, "I basically have finished with my work there." Now he wants to do what I like to do, which is simply to preach where others haven't preached and not to build on somebody else's foundation.

In other words, he is the quintessential church planter. He is the quintessential pioneer missionary. Now he says, "I want to turn my attention to Western Mediterranean regions, particularly Spain." In order to do that, he says, "I want to establish a base of operation, not in Jerusalem, and not in Antioch, not even in Corinth. I want to establish a base of operation in Rome, and so I want to introduce myself to you. I want to explain to you what I've been doing. I want to explain to you what my message is and what my plans are."

The benefit of this, of course, as far as you and I are concerned, is that in this letter that he writes to the Romans introducing himself, he also is at great pains to introduce his ministry and his message. And so we have a particular treasure in this epistle to the Romans because it is without doubt Paul's finest statement of the Christian Gospel. I firmly believe every Christian needs a working knowledge of Paul's letter to the Romans.

All right, Romans chapter 1. Three sections here: verses 1 through 7, Paul introduces himself; verses 8 through 13, Paul outlines his plans; verses 14 through 17, Paul reveals his motivation. Notice how he introduces himself in the traditional way that people wrote letters in those days. He does that, but he invests the traditional way of doing it with spiritual content.

"Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God—the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures regarding his son, who as to his human nature was a descendant of David, and who through the spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the son of God by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord. Through him and for his name's sake, we received grace and apostleship to call people from among the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith. And you also are among those who are called to belong to Jesus Christ. To all in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints: grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ."

Now, I promise you, there is a lot of content in that formal greeting, that formal introduction to the letter. Let me just pick out a few things for you. You can think about them at your leisure. Notice Paul's self-description. He calls himself a servant of Christ Jesus. The word is stronger than servant; it is *doulos*, which means literally a slave. He regards it as a singular honor to be the slave of Jesus. He also recognizes that because he is a slave of Jesus, he has abandoned his rights and simply says, "Now I belong to Jesus."

Sometimes we derive a great sense of worth by being asked to work with a certain person, or being invited to be associated with somebody or a particular task or a particular business. Sometimes we talk to our friends about our children and we tell them how well they're doing because they are working for so-and-so. There's a sense of honor about it. Paul is honored to be a slave of Christ Jesus, even though it means abandoning his rights and simply saying, "I am not my own; I have been bought with a price." *Doulos*.

Not only that, he calls himself an apostle. That means he has been uniquely called to a specific task, and that specific task is to be sent on a mission. The particular mission in his case is to take the gospel to the Gentiles, who as yet are living in abject ignorance of this gospel. The third thing he says about himself is, "I was set apart for the gospel of God." The gospel of God, of course.

Gospel means good news. When it says the gospel of God, it can mean either the gospel that comes from God or the gospel that is about God. Quite often, Paul will use an expression like this with both things in mind. And what we can say with certainty is this: the gospel of which Paul has been commissioned to take to people who've never heard it comes from God. He didn't make it up himself, and it is all about God. It is not about his theories; it is what God has to say about himself.

The word gospel, from the Greek word *euangelion*, means literally good news. I have some good news from God. I have some good news from God about God. You should prick your ears up when you hear that. Just to think that God wants to communicate to you information concerning himself which is good news at core. Just the very idea of God having something to say to human beings and us having the ability to assimilate what he has to say should set our pulses going at a higher rate.

This is going to be great. That is Paul's feeling about this gospel. Now put all that together. He is a servant of Christ Jesus, honored to belong to him. He is an apostle who knows what he's called to do and has been sent on a mission of profound significance. And he recognizes that he has been set apart to communicate what God has to say about himself, and it's good, good news.

Now he goes into more detail about this gospel of God. He says, first of all, this gospel was promised beforehand through the prophets in the holy scriptures. What he's saying here is this: this gospel that I am going to preach is an extension of, a continuation of all that God revealed to his people, the children of Israel, through the holy scriptures. He is referring, of course, to the Old Testament.

He is rooting this gospel of God in what God has already revealed of himself, both in what he said to the children of Israel and what he did with the children of Israel. That is where the bedrock of the gospel lies. That is the pre-gospel. That is the introduction to the gospel. Paul is adamant about this, and there's a very good reason for it.

You see, there was an awful lot of conflict in the early church between people who were ethnic Jews and those who were Gentiles who were coming to faith. This probably was a particular issue in the churches in Rome, because there's no doubt about it, the churches in Rome came into being initially through Jews who went back to the synagogues having grasped the gospel of God and shared it with their friends there.

Which caused all kinds of turmoil among the Jewish people in Rome, who numbered at that time probably up to 50,000 people. The turmoil was so bad over somebody called Chrestus—they got the name wrong—that Claudius the emperor expelled the Jews from Rome. The people who had subsequently come to know the gospel were Gentiles.

Eventually the Jews were allowed to dribble back into Rome. They go back to their synagogues and what do they find? They find that the Gentiles who were God-fearers—that is, were interested in Judaism—have embraced the gospel. They have started up things that the Jewish people are not prepared to go into. People from Jerusalem, the old-timers in Jerusalem, the old true-blue Jewish believers, they don't like what's happening in the Gentile churches either.

There's the possibility of a huge rift between the Gentile believers and the Jewish believers, and Paul is busy building bridges here. He is saying, "Hey, I am the apostle to the Gentiles, but the gospel that I'm taking was revealed in the Old Testament. It was spoken about by the prophets. It's all about the promises that God made to his people, the children of Israel. There's no big argument here; we can come together on this." That's what he means by saying the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures.

Second thing he says about this gospel is, "It is regarding his son." It's all about God and what God has to say about his son. Son was a term that was used in the Old Testament, which is our reference point—Paul's already told us that—to understanding the gospel. Son was often used to describe people who were called God's son or the son of God, referring either to a king who'd been placed on the throne of David or to the promised Messiah.

And so when Paul talks about Jesus being God's son, he certainly is thinking about him being king. He's certainly thinking about him being Messiah. But we also know that when Jesus, in his teaching and in his praying, revealed something about the relationship he had with the Father—remember, Father was the term he loved to use speaking to the Father—then he was demonstrating that the idea of Jesus being the son of God was a whole lot more than him being a king and a whole lot more than him even being Messiah.

It had to do with the intimacy, the unique intimacy, that Jesus enjoyed with the Father. We can only adequately understand what Jesus understood by being the son of God by studying what he himself said about it. And that is what Paul is going to talk about in his gospel: what Jesus understood himself about his relationship with the Father, which was utterly unique.

Two things that Paul then highlights. He says regarding his son—this is in verse 3—"who as to his human nature was a descendant of David." That qualified him in a physical sense to be a rightful occupant of the throne of David. That was the physical side of it. But also, Jesus the son, who through the spirit of holiness was designated to be son of God with power by his resurrection from the dead. This is a tricky statement that he makes here.

The word probably is better translated designated son of God with power than declared. The Greek word is the word from which we get horizon, and it really had the idea of marking out a boundary. When we talk about horizon, we're talking about as far as we can see; there is a limit, marking out a boundary, marking out a limit. Jesus is marked out through the resurrection in a unique way.

And what is he marked out? When he is raised from the dead, Jesus is designated by the Father to be the son of God with power. This doesn't mean he wasn't the son of God before. It doesn't mean he didn't have an intimate relationship. It doesn't mean that he was not pre-existent with the Father before time was. What it means is that this eternal son of God, when he is raised from the dead, is now designated to be the Lord in power.

And this power is going to be the power of the gospel to transform lives, and it is envisioned for us in the resurrection from the dead. He has talked about him being the seed of David from a physical point of view. Now he's talking about a spiritual dimension.

Guest (Female): You've been listening to Stuart Briscoe, part of the teaching team that makes up Telling the Truth. Today he's been talking about the good news, and he'll be right back to answer a few questions about this thought-provoking message. What if your generosity today helped place biblical truth in front of someone at the exact moment they needed it most? That's what's happening every day through Telling the Truth.

Through social media, our Telling the Truth website, and other digital platforms, people are encountering God's word, many for the very first time, right where they are. And more people than ever are searching for the kind of peace that can only be found through life in Christ. That's why as we approach the end of the financial year, it's so important that we finish strong because your support can help us reach even more people with biblical truth in the coming year.

The great news is that a group of generous friends has offered an $82,000 matching grant, doubling your gift to expand the outreach even further. Now is a powerful time for you to step in and help keep God's word going out to the people who need it most. And as our thanks, we'll send you Stuart Briscoe's book, *A Piece of My Mind*, to help you experience the peace of God in whatever you're facing today. Just call 262-788-4648, or you can give online when you visit tellingthetruth.org.

Stuart joins us now to answer a few questions about God's power in the gospel message. Stuart, you said today that Jesus had the spiritual power to transform. Well, how does he transform people?

Stuart Briscoe: The quick answer to the question about Jesus' spiritual power to transform is that he does this through the indwelling Holy Spirit. Remember that when we receive Christ, we receive the living Christ in the person of the Holy Spirit, and he comes to live within our spirit or within our heart. He brings with him the transforming power of his love and his grace.

Now, that is the underlying principle. It's rather like electricity. When you've got electricity coming into a house, there in that cable you have enormous potential, enormous power. However, it is necessary, if you want a particular appliance to work, to switch on that thing, to as it were lodge into the power available. And that takes place when we do acts of obedience, when we take steps of faith. It is as we live in obedience and take steps of faith that the Holy Spirit is released within us and he transforms us.

Guest (Female): Stuart, tell us how God has equipped you to answer a calling.

Stuart Briscoe: Well, there is a golden rule as far as spiritual life and spiritual calling, spiritual ministry are concerned. And this is the golden rule: God never calls without equipping. You'll remember the story of the children of Israel when they were in Egypt, and they were slaves and they were desperately abused by their taskmasters. One of the great complaints that those slaves had in Egypt was that they were told to make bricks, but they were not given the straw that was necessary to make the bricks.

Hence the expression "making bricks without straw." If God called us, not to make bricks, but if he called us to do things but did not give us the grace, did not give us the power, did not give us the divine ability to do those things, he would be—well, first of all, he'd be like an Egyptian taskmaster and secondly, he'd be making fools of us. And so we have to believe one thing, and it is this: if God has called me, he has equipped me, and now it's up to me to live in trust and obedience.

Guest (Female): Before we go, here's something important to remember. Your support this month can help Telling the Truth reach even more people in the coming year. Right now, your gift will be doubled through an $82,000 matching grant, helping extend biblical teaching to people around the world through digital platforms.

And as our thanks, we'd love to send you Stuart Briscoe's book, *A Piece of My Mind*, to encourage you with the promise of God's peace. So please request your copy when you call 262-788-4648, or you can give online when you visit tellingthetruth.org. Thanks for listening to today's teaching. Come back next time for more biblical truth here on Telling the Truth.