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– 1 Timothy 3:15

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19. PAUL, THE MINISTER

Paul is ever the consummate and devoted minister of God. In his writings to the divided Roman Christians, he provides theological, ecclesiastical, and practical reasonings for them to leave aside their quarrelsome ways and to live in harmony with one another as ‘brethren’ in the community of the people of God. Not satisfied, he pronounces two benedictions upon the Romans to that end:
     May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity
     among yourselves as you follow Christ Jesus, so that with one heart and mouth
     you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. May the God of hope
     fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope
     by the power of the Holy Spirit. - Romans 15:5, 13 (emphasis, mine)

Having done what he has intended, Paul now begins to wind up the epistle with some personal rumination about his work as an evangelist (principally, to the Gentiles) and his plans for the immediate future (15:14-33); and in the final chapter, his personal greetings to a good company of people in the Roman church.

He prefaces his rumination with his expressed conviction that the Romans ‘are full of goodness, complete in knowledge and competent to instruct one another’ (15:14). Then, in the next breath, he confesses: ‘I have written you quite boldly on some points, as if to remind you of them again’ (v. 15). This, I believe, is the apostle’s backhanded way of telling the Romans that they should be matured enough to heed his words and do the needful to engender Christian unity.

His rumination on his ministry can be summed up in four points: (1) he regards his ministry as a priestly duty (v. 16-17); (2) he always aims to preach the gospel in virgin territory (vv. 18-22); (3) he plans to push on to Spain and on the way, drop by in Rome (vv. 23-29); and (4) he asks the Romans to pray for him (vv. 30-33).

Ministry as a priestly duty Paul’s description of his ministry to the Gentiles in sacerdotal terms is reflective of his personal mindset - that his life is given as a ‘living sacrifice’ to the ‘service of God’. In a very brief span of space, the apostle uses five words, which, directly or indirectly, have priestly associations: ‘minister’ (leitourgos, in biblical literature, used of religious and ritual services), ‘priestly duty’ (as in temple services), ‘an offering’, ‘acceptable’ and ‘sanctified’. This attests to the Pauline principle of ‘all life is worship’, which the apostle actually hoists on the Roman Christians in 12:1-2. Personally, the apostle recognises that the life he lives is no longer his, but Christ’s; and therefore he can only live it ‘for God’ (see Gal. 2:17-21) or in ‘service to God’ (Rom. 15:17). He finds this particularly true in his service as ‘a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles’ (v. 16). They, in contradistinction to the Jews, were once outside the ambit of the favour of God; but with the advent of the gospel, it becomes possible for them to ‘become an offering acceptable to God, sanctified by the Holy Spirit’ (v. 16). It behooves, therefore, on Paul, as the chosen vessel of God to the Gentiles, to bring as many of them as possible to acceptance before God through their obedient faith in the gospel.

Preaching the gospel in virgin territory Paul’s preaching of the gospel is ‘through the power of the Spirit’. But Paul desires only to preach the gospel where it has not been preached before. This is not out of personal vanity, but for the expediency of reaching to as many as possible to save all that may be saved.

To Spain via Rome For this reason, Paul looks westward to as far as Spain for new territories to preach the gospel. Whether he accomplishes this goal we are not too certain. The closest intimation to this, is a statement we have from Clement of Rome of the late first century: ‘To the whole world he (Paul) taught righteousness, and reaching the limits of the West he bore his witness before rulers’. But we do know that he reached Rome; however, not in the manner he had intended - as a free person - for when he came to Rome he was a Roman prisoner who had exercised his legal right of appeal to Caesar (see Acts 21-28). It is quite possible, however, that upon his release from this first Roman imprisonment, he made his way to Spain before he was imprisoned a second time in Rome and subsequently beheaded by the mad emperor Nero.

He requests prayers As he completes his rumination about his travel plans, Paul urges the Romans to pray on his behalf in three specific aspects: (1) that he may be rescued from the Judean unbelievers, (2) that the Jerusalem church will accept the contribution he has brought from Macedonia and Achaia for the relief of the poor in Jerusalem, and (3) that he will come to Rome ‘with joy’. But he knows that all these must be in accordance with God’s will. From what we know of his subsequent happenings, we learn that God did not meet all of Paul’s requests to a T. In this respect, we need to learn, like Paul, to live with the will of God and not to insist on our own will.

Archive
The Romans Series
1. Being the Community of God’s People
2. Ethno-Religious Tensions
3. The Power and the Wrath of God
4. Justification by Faith
5. Justification Brings Blessings
6. While We Were Still Sinners
7. Died to Sin
8. Slaves to Righteousness
9. The Difference of the Spirit
10. The Israel Problem
11. The Gentile Problem
12. Community Living
13. Community Unity
14. Community Ethics
15. Loving the Enemy Ethic
16. Extra-Community Ethics
17. The Weak and the Strong
18. Community Formation
19. Paul, the Minister
20. Gems in Greetings

Articles on The Da Vinci Code, Gnosticism and
the Gospel of Judas
1. The Da Vinci Code: A Christian Response
2. The Nag Hammadi Documents and Gnosticism
3. The Gospel of Judas
4. The Gospel of Judas - A Retake
5. Teachings in the Gospel of Judas Compared (Part 1)
6. Teachings in the Gospel of Judas Compared (Part 2)
7. Teachings in the Gospel of Judas Compared (Part 3)
8. Canonicity and the Gospel of Judas

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